Firstly.
Thanks to all of the people that have supported us in the past year, making BMAD a huge success within the motorcycling community.
I thought that I would try to give you an insight into what we do as a committee.
As you may or may not be aware, we all give our time to BMAD on a voluntary basis. At no time is anyone paid for their time within the organisation and only occasional expenses are claimed. I myself have only claimed £35.53 in the past 4 years which was for extra stationary. Most of the committee have full time careers and have families that need to be taken care of. It is not an easy task to juggle your time to be able to complete all your work, family and committee commitments, but we somehow manage to do this on a weekly basis.
The committee, along with the Marshalls work throughout the year to provide Paignton with an event that brings people in from all over Europe thus bringing in a huge boost to the local economy. Working hard alongside the local council, police and local traders, we are building bridges with the general public to alleviate misconceptions about ‘Bikers’. Many people now approach us with a very positive image of what we are doing and praise the efforts of all involved. Raising awareness and raising money for the local sick and disabled children of the bay, has been and will continue to be the main objective of our organisation. As a rough estimate I would assume that all the committee give more than 10 hours of their time per week, and this greatly increases during our festival in May.
We are made up of Nurses, a Police Officer, Lorry Drivers, Teacher, Town Councillor, Company Reps, Motorcycle instructor, Store worker, College Lecturer and retired workers etc. Each of these people brings their own quality and ideas for the running of BMAD.
Whilst we do our best to ensure we put on a good show, we are aware that we cannot always please everybody and we welcome any feedback. We also welcome people who would like become involved with either the marshalling or the committee. Without new recruits we will one day cease to be able to continue, and this would be a great shame for so many people who rely on our help.
BMAD has become a great social network for many motorcyclists who have renewed old friendships and forged new ones. It has been said that we provide a much needed break from the stress and strains of daily life by the way of a mid week meet up on the sea front. This has been commented not only from motorcyclists, but also from the general public .We also have our monthly ride-outs which are growing in numbers. On the ride-outs we ride to the slowest rider, we do not race and there is always someone that is on hand should you have a problem. No one is ever left in the event of a breakdown, and riding tips are given if required.
With a little time taken and working on the lower end of the scale I have tried to break down the input from all of those concerned within BMAD.
This is based on basic figures and will be higher than the estimate:
Hours.
Bike night hours x 5hours x 20 people = 100 x18weeks = 1800hours x 6 years = 10800hours
Committee Meetings hours . 3 hours x12 per year = 36 x 15 =people = 540 x 6 years = 3240 hours
Festival hours. 96 hours x 10 committee members = 960 x 5 years = 4800
27 hours x 20 people = 540 x 5 years = 2700
Lowest amount of hours given in the last 6 years Total = 21,540
If these hours were paid hours at today’s minimum wage for over 22’s @£5.80(which the majority of our volunteers are) the total would come to £124,932 for labour.
Add this to the approx £180,000 we have donated to charity over the past 6 years, you have an estimated £274,932 towards the benefit of the bay.
With huge thanks and with something for you all to be proud of.
Wayne
Budda |
