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Society for Genomics Policy and Population Health
First Annual General Meeting 31 October 2006 Institute of Child Health, London

AGENDA

• Name of Society
• Purpose (results of questionnaire)
• Constitution
• Election of officers

Chairman: Dr Ron Zimmern

Minutes

The Chairman noted the intention to transfer the running of the Society from the PHGU once the President and Officers of the Council had been elected, hopefully before Christmas.

1. Name of Society

The Chairman invited suggestions on the current name of the Society noting that the changes could be made more easily before the bank account for the Society is opened. There was discussion about altering some of the words of the name but it was decided to keep the current name of the Society omitting the comma after the word Genomics.

Questions were raised about the British Society for Human Genetics (BSHG) plan to accept the Society as a special interest group and whether its membership would easily understand the core aims of the Society from its current name. It was noted that, using the current name, the Society has already attracted over 80 members and so is meaningful to those people but that the ‘trading name’ and the ‘name in use’ do not necessarily have to be identical, if future financial and legal issues are of concern.

The Chairman clarified the procedure on joining the BSHG and membership of its subgroups. The membership of BSHG, once the Society is accepted as the special interest group, works as follows: each member will have to pay the current BSHG membership fee (£45 at present), which allows membership of one special interest group and would include the £15 fee for the SGPPH. However, if an individual is already a member of the BSHG and one of the other special interest groups, then SGPPH members will need to pay the £15 Society membership fee in addition.

2. Purpose

The Chairman noted the results of the questionnaire and that activities described in questions 1, 4 and 2 were rated as being slightly more important for the Society than activities relating to questions 3 and 5.

A few further questionnaires were received after the meeting however the results overall remained the same.

Overall, it appeared that members value getting together for discussion with the aim to develop a national collective voice for the population aspects of genomics.

It was suggested that an additional aim of the Society should be to strengthen the interdisciplinary research needed for this enterprise and this could be achieved through holding scientific meetings to facilitate debate and interdisciplinary research.

The Chairman proposed that the aims of the Society are to:
a) develop and strengthen a national collective voice for the population aspects of genomics
b) provide education to members
c) develop networks of people with similar and complementary interests
d) facilitate debate
e) promote interdisciplinary research

The Chairman outlined a possible future timetable for meetings with two meetings per year: an all-day one, similar to this, around Feb-March and the second meeting attached to the BSHG annual conference in York in September – in the way of the other constituent groups.

3. Constitution

The Chairman explained that the current (draft) constitution was modelled on the constitution of the BSHG and the constituent societies but there is no reason why it cannot be changed.

Since the Society was not very large, there was no necessity to make things too formal, so the decision was made, subject to the agreement from the members, that the membership will elect the Council members and the President. It will then be up to the President and the Council to decide which Council members will take up the different posts.

The Chairman invited comments on the Constitution and the following amendments were made:

Point 8: “reaching the age 65 years” to be removed and word ‘shall’ be replaced with ‘may’.

Point 9: the words ‘on clinical genetics’ to be replaced with ‘in fields relevant to the aims of the Society’.

Point 20: to be reworded to read: ‘President and Council members will be directly elected to their posts by the members of the Society’.

4. Election of officers

The Chairman described the composition of the Council as laid out in the Constitution. The Council shall consist of President and between 5 and 8 general Council members. Therefore the minimum number on the Council is to be 6 and a maximum 9.

The following individuals had been nominated and could be agreed as Council members:

• Mair Crouch
• Mark Kroese
• Alison Hall
• Alastair Kent
• Imran Rafi
• Layla Jader *
• Christine Patch *
  *Also nominated for President

Given the number of nominees it was noted there was no need to hold an election for Council members but there was a need to hold an election for President. The ballot for President will be open until Friday 24 November.

Both candidates, Dr Layla Jader and Dr Christine Patch, were invited to give a brief talk in support of their candidacy for the position of president.

An enquiry was made about the post of vice-president, and the Chairman pointed out that the Society is probably too small to have a vice-president but that the current Constitution allows for the retiring President to remain on the Council for a further year to support the newly elected President. The Chairman also felt it should be left to the newly elected President and Council to decide on this matter.

Once a President has been elected, the Council will be convened in the New Year to set up mechanisms for running the Society. The Chairman suggested that the Council then opens a separate bank account on behalf of the Society and the PHGU will then transfer the funds from the membership and registration fees. The hire of the room and costs of this meeting will be met by the PHGU to enable the Society to start its independent existence with full funds.

A question was asked about the continuing PHGU involvement on the Council after the election of the President. The Chairman indicated that two of the potential Council members are from the PHGU, Alison Hall and Mark Kroese. The Chairman also pointed out that the intention of PHGU has always been to assist in the formation of the Society but to disengage from active involvement once the Council has been established.

There was a request for further information on the rest of the candidates for the Council and those present said a few words about themselves. The Chairman outlined the backgrounds of the nominated Council members who were unable to attend the meeting. A lack of social science representation on the Council was noted and Michael Hopkins from the University of Sussex volunteered to join the Council as a social scientist. His nomination was approved. It was further decided that there needs to be a facility for the Council to co-opt up to 2 members in addition to the maximum of 9.

It was agreed that an item should be written for the BSHG newsletter once the Council has convened.

Finally, Chairman noted thanks to the BSHG for their support in setting up the Society and closed the AGM.