Election Rules

At the Board meeting on the 25 November, it was agreed that we would start to draft some Election Rules to cover the election of the Directors at the AGM. Items under discussion are surrounded by [ ]. Please suggest and changes here and on the talk page as appropriate

These Election Rules will be opted under Article 28 and nothing in these rules can contradict anything that is written in the Articles of Association themselves.

The relevant clauses in the Articles of Association include:

14.1 A Director must be a natural person aged 16 years or older except that a person aged under 18 may not be appointed a Director if after their appointment a majority of Directors would be aged under 18.

14.3 The number of Directors shall be not less than three but (unless otherwise determined by ordinary resolution) shall not be subject to any maximum.

16.1 Providing that one or more valid nominations for Directors are received, all Directors shall retire from office at each Annual General Meeting

17.2 No person may be appointed a Director at any general meeting unless (a) he or she is retiring as a Director; or (b) not less than fourteen nor more than thirty-five clear days before the date of the meeting, the charity is given notice

17.4 Where a vacancy has arisen due to the resignation, death or ineligibility of a Director, the remaining Directors may by a unanimous decision at a meeting of the Directors appoint a person who is willing to act to fill the vacancy.

Election Committee

The Board shall appoint an election committee who will administer the election in accordance with these rules. Candidates for election shall not be eligible to serve on the election committee. Where there is any uncertainly arising from the application of these rules, the election committee will decide the most appropriate course of action and their decision shall be final and binding on all parties.

Number of Directors

When the Articles were being drafted, the Board agreed they would put an Ordinary Resolution to the first AGM establishing a maximum number. The interim Board has five directors on the grounds that "A smaller Board is beneficial in the early stages as it helps with certain approvals especially Bank Account opening."

A review of other chapters shows they have:

• Germany: Seven
• Austria: Eight
• France: Nine, and
• Australia: Seven

We have decided that the maximum number of directors will be [insert number]

Voting system

The interim Board was elected using the "" system. When the Board was discussing these Articles the general feeling was that approval voting should be used again, but this would be left to the Election Rules to specify.

We have decided to [adopt the approval voting system again].

Under the approval voting system, the candidates who receive the greatest number of positive votes are elected. For the interim Board, a proviso was added that candidates would only be elected if they received a majority of votes. This means that if fewer than the maximum number of directors got 50% approval, only those that did get more woudl be elected.

We have decided to [adopt this criteria again].

However, when discussing the articles, it was agreed that there should be an exception to this so that the candidate who receives the most votes will always be elected - even if they dont get more than 50%. The purpose of this proviso is to prevent a situtation occuring where all the directors resign at the AGM and no-one is elected in their place, leacing the organisation in legal limbo.

Under Article 20.8, the only thing that director could do is call another General Meeting to elect a new Board.

Therefore, we have decided to [adopt this proviso].

Election system

[Add any other changes to the way the election should be run]