ALL SAINTS'
CENTRE NORWICH
Annual Report for the year 2011
ALL SAINTS CENTRE
ALL SAINTS CHURCH,
WESTLEGATE
NR1 3LG
Registered Charity No. 1069474
PATRON
The Lord Bishop of
The Right Revd Graham James
TRUSTEES
Chairman Mr Peter Threadkell
Vice Chairman Mrs Angela Quinn
Treasurer Mr David Leathart
Chaplain Revd Janet Wyer
Trustees: Mrs Katherine Gray, Mrs Diane Harber,
Mr Michael Hope, Canon John Minns, Mrs Sue
Rolfe
Secretary to the Trustees Margaret Hill
AIMS AND OBJECTIVES
All Saints Centre, housed in a redundant historic Church in the heart
of
All Saints is a home from home for
everyone
Tel: 01603 633726
E-mail: admin@allsaintsnorwich.org.uk Website: www.allsaintsnorwich.org.uk
OUR
All Saints Centre was founded in March 1979 as a daytime
Christian drop-in centre, housed in a redundant mediaeval church building in the
heart of the city of
As a totally independent one-off charity we are able to offer the
only focal point in the city of
The Centre has an open-door policy and is not only widely used by
those in specific need but also by passing shoppers, tourists, local shop and
office workers, and many others from all walks of life. We have thus become well known in
The invaluable work of the Centre was recognised in 2000 by the award
of a Community Fund grant to provide better access and improved toilet
facilities for the disabled.
Further awards from local charitable trusts have recently enabled the
Centre to install new central heating, replace worn out flooring and expand its
catering and caf facilities in order to meet growing demands for its services
and to comply with more stringent health and safety
regulations.
2011 was another busy demanding year at the Centre. I am grateful to my fellow Trustees, the staff, so ably led by Karen Maidstone and to all the many volunteers for making the Centre such a warm welcoming place. During the year Alison Woodrow left us to pursue other interests. We are grateful for the commitment she showed to the Centre and its work. Subsequently it was felt that the Manager needed an assistant so we advertised for the post of Managers Assistant. A shortlist was drawn up from twenty six applicants. We appointed John Dunning (previously a volunteer) to the post. We are proud to be open six days a week, open to all members of the community where they can rest, talk to people and be still a sanctuary in the heart of the city. Next years accounts will show how much we have spent on upgrading the Centre in 2012 for the benefit of the people visiting. Our lease expires in 2015. We are subject to annual rent increases, something which will be of concern to the Trustees in the future; our hope is that we can balance the needs of the many visitors we have with the need to have a viable organization.
Peter
Threadkell
Chairman of the
Trustees
THE MANAGER'S REPORT
Over the last 12 months, finding volunteers is still an
ongoing challenge, even more so as we are no longer involved with the Probation
Service. I am pleased to have John
Dunning as my assistant after the departure of Mrs Alison Woodrow.
We were pleased to be of help and a base for Foodbank
during the year. The Dinner held in March with music by Reprise was an
excellent success.
Again we had good weather for the Fete in September
which was held the same day as the Churches Bicycle Ride and Heritage
weekend. The Centre was abuzz with
so many people.
In December, the Norfolk Keyboard Orchestra entertained
visitors with a varied programme of music and players aged between 9 16
years. This was another busy
day.
Last but not least I must thank my staff and volunteers
for all their help and hard work in the daily running of the Centre.
Karen Maidstone, Centre
Manager
2001 was a difficult year for grant funding, but we were extremely grateful to receive an unexpected and very generous legacy from the Will of Pamela Clabburn, amounting to a total of 24,000. This has made a big difference to our incoming funds for the immediate future. However it should be noted that, without this generous gift, our income from normal sources of selling food and drink, Food For Thought vouchers and other goods was over 10,000 down on the previous year. This makes us all the more dependant on grants and legacies.
We also received a number of smaller donations from St Augustine's PCC, The Fitzmaurice Trust, Anne French, J. Langley, J.A. Hill and the Basil Cook Funeral collection, all of which we are extremely grateful for. One of the problems of occupying an attractive but very old church, such as All Saints', is that a good deal of internal maintenance work continuously needs to be done.
During the year, we identified at least 5,000 of work such as a new kitchen floor, redecoration of the toilets and various electrical work as well, that needed to be done. Once again, the Geoffrey Watling Charity, that has supported us so well for many years, kindly gave us a grant of 3,000 towards this work, which will be undertaken in the first quarter of 2012. The cheque arrived in January so it does not show in the 2011 accounts. All your Trustees are very grateful for this support.
It should not be forgotten either that our rent is continuously going up, year on year, and by 2014 it will have risen from 5,800 a year in 2008 to over 14,000. So your continuing support from grants and donations, however great or small, is much appreciated.
Michael Hope
.
The
budget for the year was approved though, at that time, we were not
aware of the downturn in the economy and how we might be affected. April was a most fruitful month,
with several very welcome donations from various organisations and individuals,
particularly a Bequest of 12,000, (this Bequest eventually totalled a staggering
24,000, for which we are eternally grateful.); thank you to them all, they saved
us having to use savings.
By the time we
finished the year, income was under budget in many categories. Applications for
further grants were unsuccessful, and donations from corporate bodies were
down.
The income from food and
drink was 12.71% below budget, which no doubt was probably helped by Government
cuts causing a downturn in the economy.
If I assume 50 customers a day, then they were spending about 57p per
customer per day less. This sadly
all adds up. On the whole, the
income from food and drink did not fluctuate as wildly as it had in
2010.
The increase in salaries
has been due to changes in personnel, and the addition of two part time
paid cooks as staff members. This has led to an increase of 1.22% in
salaries. As everyone else is
finding, there are increases in expenditure including food and drink,
insurance, and heating as well as managing the running costs of an old
building.
One extra expense needs to
be pointed out. We have been
grateful to Sainsburys for their donations of food, particularly of
vegetables. Unfortunately, due to
an unnecessary EU ruling, they are no longer allowed to give us food. This ridiculous piece of EU nonsense has
hit many charities very hard and our food bill has gone up 3.66% and no doubt in
2012 will rise even more.
Maintenance remains a major
problem with an increase of 361.56% over 2010 and 2012 promises to be another
big expenditure in this area.
Whilst we have received some grants towards costs this has been a small
amount.
Despite our protests, our
landlords had to raise our rent in 2010 and this will continue to increase over
the next few years and this will greatly add to the burden of keeping All Saints
running smoothly.
We reached the end of the
year with a surplus of just 8,074 a decrease of 851 over 2010. We look to 2012
to endeavour to arrive at this total at the end of this year through extra fund
raising. Fund raising in 2011
increased by 14.65%; this was largely due to Sue Rolfe's extra curricular
activities in the air, notably wing walking, a feat I would not be too sure that
I would willingly undertake!
Thanks go to David Farrow and team, of Voluntary Norfolk, who took over our book-keeping in September 2010 and have continued to manage the day to day running of the accounts in a most professional manner. This ensures that Trustees know on a daily basis exactly the position of the finances.
The 2001 accounts will be published in due course
David Leathart