BA/4/03
Meeting held at 1.30 pm on 14th March 2003, at RNIB Judd Street, London WC1H 9NE.
1. Rollcall: Iain Millard, Harry Beevers, Steve McCall, Lisa Bhogal, Stephen Phippen, Richard West, David Boden, Fred Jakeman, David McKerral, Jim McCafferty, Irene Grayson, Sarah Home, Barbara Leighton, Bill Poole, Hans Cohn, Peter Wilkins, Gail Chester.
Apologies: Allan Young, David Moodie, Winnie Morrell, Isobel Yule, Michael Townsend, Claire Gailans, Gareth Davies.
Bill Poole reported that St Dunstan's had requested that their number of representatives on BAUK be increased back to two from their current single member (their previous reduction having been caused by a lack of available people). This was agreed; their new member, Harry Beevers, was welcomed to the meeting, and would have voting rights.
2. The minutes of the last meeting (17th December 2002) were agreed.
3. Matters arising from the minutes. Lisa Bhogal was concerned that the meeting on 15th July 2002 was actually inquorate; however, Bill Poole responded that since the meeting had not actually been declared inquorate at the time, it was too late to do anything about it now. The informal notes of the October meeting would not require approval since that meeting was also inquorate.
4. Officers' reports.
(a) Chair.
Bill Poole reported that Darleen Bogart had sent him a message saying that the next ICEB General Assembly will be held on 29th March to 2nd April 2004 in Toronto. ICEB will not be paying for travel or accommodation, so people may need to raise funds to attend.
Bill Poole said he had given a report on the future of the UEBC project at the December BAUK meeting, and the details were given in the minutes of that meeting. That meeting had made two recommendations to be put forward for the approval of the current meeting: (1) that BAUK members involved in the project should continue, with the aim of making the code as good as possible; (2) that steps should be taken to precipitate a decision by ICEB on the future of the project before its General Assembly. On the latter point the view of the UEBC Project Committee was that the project should continue until the 2004 Assembly, and to see then how the Assembly viewed it.
Fred Jakeman asked what was the position of Australia and New Zealand on UEBC. Bill Poole replied that New Zealand was in favour of UEBC, while Australia was equivocal. Canada, South Africa and New Zealand are likely to ratify UEBC on any grounds; Nigeria would ratify if it were a unifying force; while Australia is unsure. Fred Jakeman then asked if the support from South Africa, Canada and New Zealand is based on research, to which Bill Poole replied that there had been some earlier evaluations, but more research is starting now. Fred Jakeman then asked how the views expressed by NFBUS and ACB in the US affected BANA's position. Bill Poole replied that BANA was smaller than BAUK in terms of its representation, but he thought it would have to take account of users' views as expressed by NFBUS and ACB since they are the two main organisations of the VI in the US, though they only have one vote each on BANA. Fred Jakeman added that our problem was that we had been dealing mainly with pro-UEBC people in the US, and hadn't realised the strength of the opposition.
Richard West asked whether the acceptance of UEBC was "all or nothing"? Bill Poole replied that he had previously openly said that any country would be able to adopt or reject any parts of UEBC it wished (i.e. nothing could stop it). In point of fact, a recent suggestion to make sequencing optional within UEBC had been rejected by the Project Committee, since it was recognised that individual countries could take their own line on the issue in any case, making the option redundant.
Hans Cohn said that he could not see Committee 5 completing its work before the 2004 Assembly, and that it had been spending time going back over previous decisions. Bill Poole added that some UEBC committees seemed unsure about the direction they should be taking, but it had been agreed by the Executive meeting in New Zealand that Committee 5 was one that did not really need to complete its work before the Assembly. Fred Jakeman asked what part Joe Sullivan was currently taking in the project, to which Bill Poole replied that he was still the Chair of Committee 2, and was the "brains" behind the design of UEBC. As Chair of Committee 2 he was very fair, and strong on the analysis of issues. Although Committee 2 has done the bulk of its work, it is still active, and has a long list of items on its "clear-up" list.
In conclusion it was agreed to accept the two recommendations concerning the project put forward by the December meeting.
(b) Secretary.
(1) Stephen Phippen said that the BAUK membership and structure list was overdue for updating, but that he was concerned about the lack of replies to his notice about the current meeting, which everyone should have responded to. This may indicate that some of the names or addresses on the list are not correct, or that there are a number of people who do not wish to participate. Richard West suggested that we could approach the parent organisations to see if those members were still interested, and to remind them that substitute representatives can be sent to meetings, if necessary.
(2) Stephen Phippen reported on the current status of efforts to set up a BAUK web site. It had been discovered that someone had already taken the web address bauk.org.uk, and was using it as an "alternative" BAUK site, critical of BAUK for not having set up a web site itself. However, we had approached the owners of this site, and it had been agreed that BAUK could take over the address when we were ready to do so. Stephen Phippen outlined his ideas of how we could initially structure the site, i.e. keeping it fairly plain, but using it as a useful source of information for the public (e.g. containing BAUK papers, minutes, information on current projects and links to other sites). He said that he had most of the information in a form from which he could generate the required HTML automatically, so it should be fairly easy to load documents once we had the site set up.
Steve McCall asked whether moon would be included. Stephen Phippen replied that the Moon Committee secretary had already designed some web pages for moon, and had previously said that he would be happy for them to be hosted by the main BAUK site.
David McKerral asked whether the site should list the names of BAUK members and the BAUK constitution. Richard West said that he thought the constitution would be all right to include, and possibly the member organisations, but probably not names of individuals.
Bill Poole asked how long it would be before the site was set up. Richard West replied that it would likely be a matter of weeks, and hopefully before Easter. Once it is set up it would be easy to maintain. Iain Millard asked what the expected financial outlay would be, to which Richard West replied that it would not be free, but should not be more than half the £1000 we had agreed as a maximum. The cost of hosting might be about £50 per year; maintenance would be free if we did it ourselves (otherwise there would be a fee for an outside maintainer); paying for the web site name may be £50-£100.
Bill Poole asked the meeting for confirmation that we should go ahead with setting up the site, and this was given. Richard West, Stephen Phippen and Christopher Edwards would follow this through. (Richard West explained that Christopher Edwards was a member of BCAB who had done this sort of thing before, and had offered to help with our site.)
(c) Treasurer. Iain Millard said that he had nothing to report, but in reply to a question said that BAUK had about £7000 in reserves. Richard West commented that costs for setting up the web site would have to be covered in the next financial year.
(d) Public Relations Officer. Lisa Bhogal said that she did not have much to report, except that she had also been liaising with Richard West about the web site, and that the main issue coming up would be the ratification of the new edition of British Braille.
5. Report on the joint meeting of BAUK and UKABP held on 4th March 2003 to discuss the implementation of the new edition of British Braille.
Bill Poole reported that the meeting had agreed that braille software manufacturers should be contacted and informed of the proposed braille changes. Stephen Phippen said that he had already contacted Duxbury who make the DBT and MegaDots software. Duxbury estimated that the changes could be implemented in their software within 6 to 12 months after they had been agreed. The changes would be easier to implement in DBT than in MegaDots because of the way the programs were designed. For DBT the changes would be treated as a normal upgrade for customers; but for MegaDots some extra funding for programming resources might be necessary to make the changes financially viable to implement, both because of the additional technical difficulties, and because MegaDots has a smaller user base. Since Gail Chester is on the Literary Code Committee, and works with Pia who deal with the Braille Maker software, that company should also already be well informed of the proposals. The three main braille translation programs should therefore already have been covered.
As soon as the changes have been agreed, Stephen Phippen will write up a detailed list which can be used by software manufacturers and transcription agencies.
Richard West said that the meeting had also considered the timing of implementation, and the need to link it with the academic year. In view of this, an implementation date of July 2004 had been proposed. Steve McCall emphasised that there was a need to get the list of changes to schools as well as to software manufacturers, and added that teaching courses will also need to be updated. Gail Chester said that it would be a good idea to make a clear announcement of the start date on the new BAUK web site.
Peter Wilkins asked whether users should also be asked about an implementation date, and said that users had not yet been consulted about the proposed changes. Stephen Phippen pointed out that the British Braille draft had been circulated many months ago, asking for feedback from organisations. Had they not already had enough time or opportunity to make consultations? However, Lisa Bhogal and David McKerral replied that they had not thought that this was meant as a time when they could open the discussion within their organisations, or to the public outside.
Bill Poole said that in that case our decision at this meeting should not be one of ratifying British Braille, but only to agree to open up the discussion within organisations and to the public. However, Hans Cohn replied that he would not be happy with such a line, as it would only delay matters, despite the fact that most of the changes will have little impact on ordinary users. Richard West said that he agreed in principle to postponing ratification to allow further feedback, but would be concerned about having to contend with the sort of views which come from some quarters that any change to braille is bad; we also do not want to inadvertently reopen the capitalisation debate. Bill Poole responded that he regarded the capitals issue as having now been resolved, but that there were changes, such as those to the oblique stroke and italics, which people may not have had a chance to express a view on. BAUK couldn't afford not to extend consultation, and we would get a better reception for doing it.
Hans Cohn asked what the process would be; Bill Poole replied that organisations would need to go back and consult their members. Hans Cohn then asked how this consultation would be assessed. Bill Poole replied that at this stage we must simply be prepared to accept feedback. He suggested that the list of changes which Stephen Phippen had prepared could be used for circulation, and that we could set a deadline of 1st October for feedback. It would be up to individual organisations to decide how they dealt with their own feedback. Gail Chester agreed that we would not be asking for a vote, but rather for feedback on any difficulties envisaged. Lisa Bhogal suggested that a workshop could be held at the NFB conference.
Hans Cohn said that he was concerned that although the Literary Code Committee had worked on the new edition of British Braille for over a year, and had argued over the points closely, we could be faced with decisions being overturned by a vote of ordinary readers who were following a personal, rather than a communal objective. Bill Poole replied that the position would be that we should first try to obtain feedback, and then we would have to decide if we were persuaded to change our decisions; and if not, to explain why such decisions should not be changed. Uninformed opinion is also of value; we need to engage with any findings.
Sarah Home said that it was important for the reasons for the changes to be given during such consultation, so people can pick up on the LCC's thinking. It was agreed that Stephen Phippen should prepare an amended version of the document listing the changes, adding extra comments where necessary to explain such points.
It was agreed that the feedback would be assessed at a full BAUK meeting to be held in November, rather than at a separate LCC meeting. It would be up to organisations to arrange their own consultation processes, but BAUK would also accept feedback from individuals. UKABP will need to be informed of this change of policy from what was decided at the joint BAUK/UKABP meeting.
6. Changes to the BAUK constitution.
Bill Poole read out his motion (seconded by Lisa Bhogal) to change the definition of the quorum for BAUK meetings in the BAUK constitution: In clause 10 (b), delete the words "one-half" and substitute "one-third". This will have the effect of reducing the quorum from one-half to one-third of the total membership, including coopted members. He explained that he viewed the proposal as a short-term expedient to avoid inquorate meetings, blocking important decisions. There were several possible reasons for the recent difficulties in attendance, e.g. the change to the RNIB meeting cycle, and the RNIB move to Judd Street, etc.
Richard West suggested that it might be possible to change the quorum from half the number of individual members, to half the number of affiliated organisations being represented; but it was agreed that this could result in some undesirable anomalies, and other related suggestions were recognised as being too complicated to enact.
Fred Jakeman thought that the proposal led to a risk of a small group dominating meetings, but Bill Poole suggested that this would then be motivation for more people attending. Fred Jakeman then suggested adding a phrase such as "to be reviewed in 12 months"; Bill Poole replied that he would be prepared to give a guarantee to have such a review, but that it would be hard to put such an additional clause into the constitution.
David Boden said that he was not happy with the proposal because it would reduce BAUK's accountability to the public. He suggested that we could instead contact the secretaries of member organisations in cases where they had not sent a representative for two consecutive meetings. Bill Poole replied that he thought this process would be too slow for what was needed now.
Fred Jakeman then suggested as a compromise to change the quorum level in the amendment from one third to 40%. A vote was taken on this modified amendment to the constitution, and was passed by 11 votes to 5.
7. Braille Promotion Committee. It was briefly reported that the Braille Promotion Committee had met, at which it had discussed the new BAUK web site, and had considered an idea of writing an article about braille.
8. Arrangements for future meetings. It was agreed that we should try to book the next BAUK meetings for: 9th July 2003, 12th November 2003, 17th March 2004, 7th July 2004.
The meeting closed.