Helping communities make

good space for sport and play

Oxfordshire Playing Fields Association (Registered charity: 304398)

Colin Sanders Business Innovation Centre, Mewburn Road, Banbury, OX16 9PA

Phone: 01295 817662 E-mail: oxfordshirepfa@gmail.com Web: www.opfa.org.uk

TRUSTEES’ ANNUAL REPORT 2015-16 Governing Document Constitution (adopted in 1985 and amended in 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2008 and 2013) Area of benefit: Priority given to Oxfordshire but our objects are not specific to this county. Unincorporated association. President Malcolm Cochrane, former Vice Lord Lieutenant of Oxfordshire Vice-Presidents Mrs. P Narroway Mr A Walker Mrs. JR Williams Charity Trustees The members of our Executive Committee, who as charity trustees were legally responsible for the control and management of the charity during this period, following election at the AGM, were as follows: Chairman: RT Johnston Vice Chairman: Mrs E Bickley Hon. Treasurer: D Monk (to Oct. 15); J Cooper (from Oct 15) Hon. Manager Ms M Smith Other members: R Beattie, Ms R Smith, Sir Charles Ponsonby (from Oct 15) Method of appointing Trustees According to the constitution, Trustees are appointed annually at the Annual General Meeting consisting of the following:

Chairman, Vice-Chairman, Hon. Treasurer and such other Hon. Officers as the Association may from time to time decide.

Members elected at the Annual General Meeting, the number to be determined from time to time by the Association.

Bankers National Westminster Bank plc, 32 Cornmarket Street, Oxford OX1 3HQ Independent Examiner M Watkinson MBE Staff members Nicole O’Donnell Community Development Officer (part-time – 18 hours per week)

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.Association Membership 2015-16 Hon Officers

Representatives of Statutory Authorities

Oxfordshire County Council: Ms R Smith, RT Johnston, M Lygo

West Oxfordshire District Council: Mrs EHN Fenton, Mr AS Coles

South Oxfordshire District Council: David Turner, Jeannette Matelot

Representatives of the following National, County and other organisations:

Oxfordshire Association of Local Councils

Community First Oxfordshire

Fields in Trust (National Playing Fields Association)

Oxfordshire Play Association

Others (by invitation)

Mr R Beattie, Mrs E Bickley, Mr M Cochrane, Mrs P Narroway, Sir Charles Ponsonby, Mrs

J Poska, Mr A Walker, Mrs JR Williams

Subscribing members

Parish and Town Councils

Adderbury Deddington Leafield Stoke Row

Alvescot Dorchester Little Milton Stonesfield

Appleford Drayton (Abingdon) Long Wittenham Stratton Audley

Aston Rowant Duns Tew Longcot Sutton Courtenay

Baldons East Challow Mapledurham Swalcliffe Bampton East Hagbourne Marcham Sydenham

Beckley & Stowood East Hanney Middleton Stoney Tackley

Begbroke East Hendred Milcombe Tetsworth

Benson Epwell Milton (Abingdon) Towersey

Berinsfield Ewelme Milton-u-Wychwood Uffington

Binfield Heath Eynsham Moulsford Wallingford

Bladon Faringdon Nettlebed Wardington

Blewbury Filkins w Br’ton Poggs North Hinksey Wendlebury

Bloxham Finmere North Moreton Wheatley

Bourtons Freeland Nuffield Wigginton

Brightwell-c-Sotwell Goring Piddington Witney

Brize Norton Gosford /Water Eaton Radley Woodcote

Cassington Great Haseley Risinghurst&Sandhills Woodstock

Chalgrove Grove Rotherfield Peppard Wootton (Abingdon)

Charlton on Otmoor Hailey Sandford on Thames Wootton (Woodstock)

Checkendon Hanborough Shiplake Yarnton

Chesterton Harwell Shrivenham Voluntary groups

Charlbury Henley Shutford Ardley & Fewcott P F Cttee

Chinnor Hethe Sibford Ferris Bloxham Rec Ground

Chipping Norton Hook Norton Sonning Common Bodicote Welfare Fund

Combe Horspath South Newington Charney Bassett Hall/PF Trust

Cropredy Islip St Helen Without Great Milton Rec Ground

Crowmarsh Kennington Standlake Kennington PFA

Culham Kidlington Stanford in the Vale Nuneham C’tnay Sports&PFA

Cumnor Kidmore End Stanton St John South Stoke VH and Rec Gnd

Curbridge & Lew Kingston Bagpuize Steeple Aston Wheatley PF Trust

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The Charity’s objects and statement of public benefit Our charity’s main aims, as set out in the Objects clause in our constitution, are as follows: 1. To advise on and assist in the provision of adequate playing fields and playgrounds for

the purpose of outdoor games, sports and pastimes including facilities for the recreation of people with disabilities.

2. To encourage and develop the playing of all games, sports and pastimes as aforesaid with a view to promoting the physical and moral welfare and the safety of the population and to extend the benefits of playing fields, playgrounds and open spaces to all members of the community.

3. To ensure that the fullest use is made of all playing fields. 4. To encourage and develop all types of children’s play facilities and play leadership. 5. To co-operate in saving threatened recreational facilities. 6. To co-operate with local authorities and all statutory and other bodies for the furtherance

of these objects. We review our aims, objectives and work programme each year. The review:

looks at what we achieved and the outcomes of our work in the previous 12 months,

identifies the benefits that our work has brought to the population in the county’s communities which our charity was set up to help; and

develops a work programme for the coming year which will enable us to fulfil our main aims.

The review is carried out with reference to the guidance available from the Charity Commission on public benefit.

Our work fulfils the two key principles of public benefit in the following ways:

There is clear recognition by both policy makers and public of the benefit to the physical and mental health and well-being of children, young people and adults of involvement in formal or informal sport, play and outdoor recreational activity. This depends on the availability of adequate and locally accessible playing fields and playgrounds. All our aims and activities are focussed on achieving these benefits and we cannot identify any potential detriment or harm that needs to be balanced against those benefits.

Our activities are aimed at achieving these benefits for all the population in as many communities as possible. The recreational facilities we promote and support communities to provide are not restricted to use by any particular section or sections of these communities. On the contrary, we promote the provision of facilities that are as accessible as possible to people of all ages and abilities. The facilities are also generally available free of charge.

The main activities undertaken in order to fulfil these charitable purposes are to:

Provide an on-going information, advice and support service for community recreation space managers or project groups, such as parish and town councils, playing field committees and play area action groups

Provide opportunities for recreation space managers to share ideas and information

Assist other agencies in the administration of their grants funds available to support community recreation space improvements and liaise with other grant funders within the county

Raise awareness of the importance of good quality outdoor recreation space and of community recreation space managers’ needs and issues by liaising and working in partnership with other interested agencies at national, regional and local level responding to policy and consultation documents using publicity media

Be alert to evidence of threats to existing community recreation spaces from development or other pressures and make representations and/ or support representation by others in order to remove them.

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Summary of work and achievements during the year

In relation to our main activities

Provide an on-going information, advice and support service for community recreation space managers or project groups Our Community Development Officer has continued to provide a comprehensive information, advice and support service for local community organisations, including the following: Site visits

21 visits to advise on local improvement projects Newsletter and information sheets

4 quarterly editions of our electronic quarterly OPFA Newsletter – well-received by readers

Regularly up-dated information sheets on: o Sources of funding o Outdoor fitness equipment

Answers to individual queries by letter, phone or e-mail – 48 local parish organisations have been helped. Ongoing support given to Bloxham Parish Council and the Bloxham (Jubilee Park) Recreation Ground Committee on respective play area improvements and on obtaining Fields in Trust protection for the Recreation Ground. Regular input into Nuneham Courtenay Playing Fields Association’s plans to bring a play area back into the village by reinstating equipment on the playing field. Ongoing support for a proposed parkour facility in Kingston Bagpuize, which when achieved will be a first of its kind in the county. Continued to work regularly with Witney Town Council on its ongoing programme of improvements to recreation areas in the town. Advice to Drayton (Abingdon) Parish Council on organising a local consultation on new recreation facilities needed in association with forthcoming new housing development in the parish. This will eventually include analysis of the consultation results on a consultancy basis. Invited by Cherwell District Council to participate in design consultations for a proposed Country Park for the Banbury area. Assist other agencies in the administration of their grants funds available to support community recreation space improvements Our CDO is now the Vice-Chair of the WREN local grants assessment panel, which deals with applications for grants under the terms and conditions of the Landfill Communities Fund.

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Raise awareness of the importance of good quality outdoor recreation space and of community recreation space managers’ needs and issues In order to promote our aims and objectives and our work we have attended meetings and other opportunities for contact with representatives of other interested agencies: The Manager attended meetings of the following:

County Sports Partnership

Oxfordshire Play Association Trustees

Oxfordshire Stronger Communities Alliance The CDO attended meetings of the following:

South and Vale Area Activities Group

Cherwell Young People, Play and Wellbeing Partnership

Cherwell District Council Parish Liaison Meeting

South and Vale Voluntary and Community Forum

OALC village green training

Cherwell District Council Voluntary Organisations Forum The Manager and CDO both attended the National CPFA Conference in Kenilworth in June 2015. Be alert to evidence of threats to existing community recreation spaces from development or other pressures We maintained a watching brief in case of any evidence of threats in the local media and through contact with agencies and communities within the county. We provided advice to Mapledurham residents concerned about proposals to build a free school on a local playing field held in trust and liaised closely with Fields in Trust, who were also monitoring the situation.

In relation to the management and funding of the charity and its work: 1. Business Development National “The Playing Field” website development project Since August 2013 the OPFA has been contracted by the National CPFA Support Committee to carry out work on a national website development project funded by a grant of £12,000 p.a. over 2 years from the Playing Fields Legacy Fund (PFLF). The website, The Playing Field (www.theplayingfield.org.uk), provides news updates and technical information on the provision, management and good usage of playing fields. The PFLF funding was sufficient to support 9 hours of our CDO’s time each week spent on delivering the national project up until 31 March 2016. From 1 April 2016 with the agreement of the PFLF a remaining funding underspend will support continued work for 2 hours per week. The project work fits neatly alongside our CDO’s local advice and support service and the two areas of activity are mutually supportive. During the year our CDO’s time as site editor has been concentrated on keeping the site populated with new material and on efforts to recruit more visitors and subscribers to a 6-weekly e-news bulletin linked to the site.

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Madley Park, Witney At the invitation of West Oxfordshire District Council the OPFA successfully bid on a consultancy basis to act as the Council’s Project Manager to support a local steering group in the development and implementation of phase two of the Madley Park Teen Zone, which has been established with the help of S106 monies received in connection with this new housing development in north Witney. This is a welcome opportunity for our Community Development Officer to work with WODC, the Witney Town Council and the Madley Park Residents’ Association and will provide another useful source of income to OPFA. It also demonstrates that the organisation’s experience and expertise built up from promoting and supporting the provision of many local outdoor sport, play and recreation facilities is well-recognised within the county. Taking OPFA work across the border into Northamptonshire The Hon Manager and CDO have been talking to Northamptonshire ACRE (the Rural Community Council) about the possibility of making OPFA expertise available to local organisations in that county. NACRE was interested in exploring opportunities for introducing a CPFA-type service (as there is none currently in place) in partnership with OPFA and undertook to survey potential local interest in such a service and to explore sources of funding. Eventually the results of the NACRE survey of need for a playing fields advisory service in the county indicated that the majority of respondents (mostly parish councils with some other local community groups) said they did not need a port of call for help in addition to the sources they already used, although an area where it was felt that additional help might be needed was in relation to funding advice. In response to these results NACRE felt that they should look at an ad hoc collaborative arrangement with OPFA and felt that there could be scope for offering tailored training events to local people running both village halls and open spaces. This idea has been picked up and a playground inspection training event has been planned for the Autumn 2016. The OPFA is still minded in the future to advertise OPFA services to local outdoor playing space managers in Northamptonshire, in case individual local organisations are interested in becoming OPFA members and benefiting from our information and advice services. The amendments to the OPFA constitution agreed in consultation with the Charity Commission in 2013 allow us to carry out work outside Oxfordshire as part of our primary charitable purposes. 2. Other fund-raising

The Trustees recognise that the organisation needs to pursue an ongoing fund-raising campaign to address the budget deficits that now seem to be faced on a regular basis at the beginning of each financial year. They reviewed their fund-raising plan at the end of the financial year and set up a funding working group to plan future appeals to charitable trusts.

3. Change in OPFA office accommodation arrangements At the beginning of the year we learned that the Oxfordshire Rural Community Council (now Community First Oxfordshire), with whom we had had a Partnership Agreement over very many years which provided us with an opportunity to share staff and office accommodation in return for an annual fee, was facing office accommodation changes that were unlikely to

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be convenient for our CDO. While in principle not wishing to break the strong working links with ORCC/CFO, the Trustees agreed in April to give notice to them that they would be planning to move to homeworking by the CDO by the Autumn of 2015. In the following months the Trustees explored the best options for achieving appropriate and cost-effective homeworking arrangements in line with statutory and best practice requirements as well as providing appropriate office support infrastructure which could accommodate any future change in personnel and also a professional appearance and credibility for the organisation in the eyes of the outside world. This led to a decision to purchase a virtual office service from the Colin Sanders Business Innovation Centre in Banbury (the CDO lives in the area), which provides the OPFA with a landline phone number and phone answering service and a recognised business postal address. By the end of the financial year which is the subject of this report our new office arrangements have been in operation for six months and have proved, from our point of view, to be effective, convenient and value for money. We hope that this experience is shared by our service users and have no evidence so far to the contrary.

Thanks As always our thanks are due to the following for their interest and support during the year: The local authority Officers and Members with whom we work in partnership;

All the Parish and Town Councils, local playing field and play area committees and various other locally based sports clubs, societies and individuals working hard to provide and maintain local outdoor playing spaces for their communities;

Fields in Trust (National Playing Fields Association) Oxfordshire Association of Local Councils Oxfordshire Play Association Institute of Groundsmanship (IOG) Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) Sports and Play Construction Association (SAPCA); Our President, Malcolm Cochrane, and our Hon Officers and members of the Executive Committee (the Trustees), acknowledging the extra work taken on by Meryl Smith as Hon. Manager; Tony Nock for being our Independent Examiner of accounts over a number of years. We send condolences to him on the death of June, his wife, in February 2016;

Mike Watkinson MBE for stepping forward as our Independent Examiner of accounts for 2015-16;

Our funders (mentioned in the Notes to the Accounts) including the companies/suppliers which support OPFA’s work by taking Newsletter advertising space and sponsoring events; ORCC/Community First Oxfordshire for providing an opportunity to share staff and office services up until October 2015 and for ongoing sharing of information and expertise, which we hope will continue into the future; Our CDO for inspired and dedicated work.

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Notes on the accounts INCOME

Having lost regular grant aid from Oxfordshire County Council, Vale of White Horse District

Council, South Oxfordshire District Council and West Oxfordshire District Council due to

funding pressures and changing priorities, we are extremely grateful to Cherwell District

Council for continuing its invaluable revenue support and are pleased to offer a more

concentrated service to communities in the District in return. The income from CDC did not

in fact reduce compared to the previous year, as the 2014-15 accounts show two annual

grant payments, one of which in respect of the 2015-16 year was paid on 31 March 2015.

We continue to appreciate the regular support through subscriptions of our member parish

and town councils and other local organisations, who clearly value the service we provide.

Income from membership fees during the period was down on the previous year, as we had

taken the decision to move from a rolling programme of membership renewals during each

year to one renewal date of 1 April with effect from 2016. This change meant that some

memberships were not renewed on the anniversary of the last payment but delayed to the

beginning of the following financial year.

Restricted Fund

As is reported on page 5 of this Report, we are in receipt of income to carry out work on a

national project being funded by the Playing Fields Legacy Fund (PFLF). The PFLF money

is treated as a Restricted Fund and income and expenditure during the year is shown as

such in the accounts. A separate more detailed statement of income and expenditure on the

national project during the year is available from the OPFA office.

Contrary to the impression given by the accounts, expenditure on the national project was

matched 100% by income from the PFLF, as the grant payments made during the year were

supplemented by past income held in reserve and carried over from 2014-15.

EXPENDITURE

Helpfully, the OPFA no longer has to pay an employer National Insurance contribution to

HMRC, following the introduction of a Government Employment Allowance which provides

relief from Class 1 NICs up to the value of £2,000.

The reduction in agency fees and office costs reflects our move from an annual partnership

agreement with Community First Oxfordshire to homeworking supported by a virtual office

service provided by the Colin Sanders Business Innovation Centre.

The entry for Pension Debt Payments reflects the fact that we are required to pay an annual

sum to the Pensions Trust as part of a 10 year programme to eliminate the debt in the

pension fund to which we contribute.

PENSION LIABILITY

Due to changes in pension legislation, the Pensions Trust multi-employer pension scheme in

which we participate to provide for our CDO now requires any participating employer to pay

a contribution towards remedying scheme under-funding, if they were to withdraw from the

scheme. Withdrawal would occur if the OPFA should ever be in the position of not having

any employee contributing to the pension scheme. Our Executive Committee considers

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that the maintenance of a designated reserve is the most effective and appropriate way of

mitigating this particular financial risk, as well as ensuring as far as possible that we can

continue to carry out our charitable objectives through the employment of a CDO, which is of

course our prime concern. We have set aside a sum of £30,000 in a higher interest Bond to

cover any Employer Debt which might crystallise in the future. This is shown as a

Contingent Liabilities Fund as part of our Reserves.

RESERVES POLICY (see statement of designated reserves on page 11)

We are reserving sufficient funds (General Reserve) in order to cover total operating costs

for at least 6 months, in the event of any substantial loss of/reduction in income. We have

also reserved a sum to fund any redundancy payments involved.

Our designated Community Development Fund consists of monies received through past

and recent income- generating initiatives, which have been set aside to support the

employment of a Community Development Officer, which our Trustees consider is crucial for

maintaining a consistent and high quality professional service.

Our small designated Business Development Fund is set aside to fund any costs incurred in

putting the organisation in a favourable position to develop new sources of income.

The Trustees declare that they have approved this Trustees’ Report.

Signed on behalf of the Charity’s Trustees:

Signature

Full name

ROBIN TIMOTHY JOHNSTON ELISABETH SARAH BICKLEY

Position

Chair Vice-Chair

Date

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OXFORDSHIRE PLAYING FIELDS ASSOCIATION

ANNUAL ACCOUNTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 MARCH 2016

Statement of Assets and Liabilities as at 31 March 2016

Cash Funds

Unrestricted Funds £

Restricted Funds

£

Total 2016

£

Total 2015

£

NatWest Current Account

5,552.56 0.00 5,552.56 5,861.43

COIF Charity Deposit Account

36,133.22 3,309.05 39,442.27 45,246.16

Shawbrook Bank Deposit Account 30,606.69

0.00 30,606.69 30,184.11

TOTAL ASSETS: 72,292.47

3,309.05 75,601.52 81,291.70

Liabilities

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

NET ASSETS:

72,292.47

3,309.05

75,601.52

81,291.70

DESIGNATED RESERVES

£

Current Account 5,552.56

Redundancy Reserve 2,000.00

Community Development Fund 20,690.00

Business Development Fund 2,500.00

General Reserve 10,943.22

Restricted Fund 3,309.05

Contingent Liabilities Fund 30,606.69

TOTAL: 75,601.52

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