12^th December 2015

Dear Colleagues,

Kidderminster PGMC Trustees Report for 2014/15

Accounts for the year ending 4^th April 2015 confirmed a balance of £154,555 down from £157,580 in 20012/13. However, I am pleased to report that the Trust’s income, from our new COIF Fixed Interest Investment, had improved to £5,998 with a capital appreciation of £3,531. As a result of this improved investment income, despite the expenditure of another £12,085 on four bursary awards, the excess of expenditure over income was down from £6,694 in 2013/14 to £3,025.

We have continued to use the Society’s funds to offer two £3,000 bursaries each year and, for 2014/15, the one allocated to Birmingham University Medical School was awarded to Claire Wallace, a young lady from Edgebaston. Her end of year report and expressions of thanks to the Society for granting her some financial security in the first year of her graduate-entry course, has been posted on the website.  

The second £3,000 bursary for 2014/15 was advertised on the Society’s website and by poster in the Education Centre. I was also in contact with all the other 30 medical schools in the UK which offer four or five year graduate-entry medicine courses and last year these various approaches attracted four applicants, three of whom had strong local connections. These included Laura Cowell, who although living out at Bridgnorth, had undertaken some work experience at Church Street and whose mother was a nurse practitioner in that practice. The other two local candidates were Sam Owen-Smith, a Kidderminster resident for 15 years, and Lucy Studd, whose father worked as an anaesthetist in Kidderminster from 2002 until his retirement in 2012. As was the position last year, each of these applications was supported by excellent references and we found it very difficult to choose between them. We, therefore, decided to take the fairer option of awarding bursaries to all three and you can again find each of their end of year reports on the website.

For the current academic year, Birmingham Medical School have put forward as the choice for their bursary allocation, a young lady from Handsworthwood, and our trustees met earlier this month to consider applications for the second bursary. Contact had again been made with all 30 medical schools in the UK and of the resulting six applicants we had to consider, two had strong links to Wyre Forest. As with last year, both of these candidates were supported by excellent references and we have again decided that it would be invidious to choose between them. Fortunately, we still have more than £10,000 in the HSBC current account and can therefore make £3,000 awards to each of them without dipping into the COIF Investment Fund. We hope that you will approve of this decision.

                                        Best wishes,

                                        Martin Lewis, Chairman of the Trustees.

Dec 13 2014

Kidderminster PGMC Trustees Report for 2013/14

In the past 12 months your trustees have noted the sad passing of Geoff Campion who contributed so much to the Society during his many years as a trustee and then as chairman of our group. On a brighter note, we have been very pleased to welcome Jan Cox to our proceedings in place of John Murray.

We have met twice since the last Medical Society AGM and at the first of these meetings we decided to transfer the bulk of the Society’s funds, some £140,000, into Income Units of the COIF Charities Fixed Interest Fund. COIF handles the investments for about 45,000 charities, including the Church of England, and also a number of local authorities. COIF funds have generally returned earnings of more than 4% per annum. However, it must be appreciated that this is a stock market investment fund, the value of which could fluctuate. Thus, it should be considered a long term investment and will have the advantage that investment in a new bond will no longer need to be considered every 2 or 3 years.

Accounts for the year ending 4^th April 2014 confirm a balance of £157,584 down from £164,274 in 20012/13. You will note from the accounts that the Trust’s income was down to £5,591 during that period because of the relatively poor rate of return on the Britannia Bond. As a result of this modest investment income, while increasing our expenditure to £12,085 on four bursary awards, we have to record an excess of expenditure over income of just under £6,700. However, since April the interim financial statement for 1^st December reveals that the new COIF investment has produced an improved return of £3,000 for the half year with the £140,000 capital sum appreciating at the same time by more than £3,500.

We have continued to use the Society’s funds to offer two £3,000 bursaries each year and, for 2013/14, the one allocated to Birmingham University Medical School was awarded to Alice Jones, a young lady based in Selly Park. Her end of year report and expressions of thanks to the Society for granting her some financial security in the first year of her graduate-entry course, have been posted on our website.  

The second £3,000 bursary for 2013/14 was advertised on the Society’s website and by poster in the Education Centre. I was also again in contact with all the other 14 universities in the UK which offer a graduate-entry medicine course and last year these various approaches attracted ten applications. These included Stephanie Bareford, a Cookley resident, with Lawrence Hopkins from Bewdley  and Shannon Lennock , whose home address was in Hagley. Each of these applications was supported by excellent references and we found it very difficult to choose between them. We were, therefore, prompted to take the fairer option of awarding bursaries to all three and you can again find each of their end of year reports on the website.

For the current academic year, Birmingham Medical School have put forward as the choice for their bursary allocation, a young lady from Edgbaston with an excellent CV, and our trustees met earlier this month to consider four more applications for the second bursary. Unlike previous years, we have decided to widen the bursary eligibility to also include graduates on the full five year medical school programme. This is because we were informed that graduate-entry students on a 4 year course can get a tuition loan for the first year and are subsequently supported by NHS bursaries. On the other hand, graduates on a five year programme have to support themselves entirely in the first 4 years of their course and cannot get a loan from Student Finance at all. Contact was therefore made with all 31 medical schools in the UK and of the resulting four applicants we had to consider, three had strong links to Wyre Forest. As with last year, each of these three was supported by excellent references and we have again decided that it would be invidious to choose between them. Fortunately, we still have more than £17,000 in the HSBC current account and can therefore make £3,000 awards to each of them without dipping into the COIF investment. We hope that you will approve of this decision.

                                        Best wishes,

                                        Martin Lewis, Chairman of the Trustees.

18^th June 2014.

                      Re: KMS Postgraduate Bursary Awards for 2014/15.

 Dear Colleagues,

Your Trustees are once again in the process of seeking applications for the bursary awards for the next academic year and have drafted a further advertisement to be posted on this website and in the Education Centre.

As usual, one £3,000 bursary is allocated to Birmingham Medical School and in the last few years this has generally been awarded to a student undertaking the graduate-entry accelerated course in medicine. However, you may note that this year we have decided to modify the offer slightly to include graduate students on full five year courses and we will be sending the same flier with regard to our second £3,000 bursary to all the other 30 medical schools in the UK. This is because it has been brought to our notice that this latter group of students generally suffer greater financial hardship than graduates on four year courses. Details of all the applications received will be given at the Society’s AGM in the autumn.

December 2013             

                  Kidderminster PGMC Trustees Report for 2012/13

Dear Colleagues,

Can I start by recording the resignation of John Murray as a Medical Society Trustee. You may be aware that John has now moved to Norfolk and I am sure that we would all wish to record our thanks to John for his great contribution as a trustee over many years. As for a replacement, I am delighted to report that Jan Meggy has agreed to fill the vacancy.  Wendy Kingston, John Tudor and I are very grateful that she is willing to take on this role and we trust that this choice will be acceptable to the other members of the Society.

Accounts for the year ending 4^th April 2013 confirmed a balance of £164,274, down from £165,582 in 20011/12. The Trust’s income was down to £4,891 during that period because of the relatively poor rate of return on the Britannia Bond. In fact, it is striking to note that over the last two years our investment income from  the Britannia has fallen from £6,761 and, for obvious reasons, is likely to be lower again next year. As a result of this lower investment income, while maintaining our expenditure of £6,000 on two bursary awards, we have to record an excess of expenditure over income of just over £1,300.

The Britannia 2 year bond paying 3.5% per annum matured earlier this month and my initial enquires had suggested that if we had rolled over this investment into another two year bond the interest we would have received was likely to have fallen again to around 2.1%. Perhaps I should also remind you that enquiries around the town a couple of years ago confirmed that no banks were able to accept money from trustee accounts and that no other building societies were offering a more favourable rate than the Britannia. Under these circumstances your trustees decided not to purchase another Britannia bond but to consider placing the Society’s funds in the COIF Charities Investment Fund as an alternative. This Fund is operated by CCLA Investment Management Limited and is owned entirely by its customers in the faith, charity and local authority sectors

We have continued to use the Society’s funds to offer two £3,000 bursaries each year and, for 2012/13, the one allocated to Birmingham University Medical School was awarded to Heather Bailie, a young lady from a low income family living in Whythall, Worcestershire. Her comprehensive and colorfully illustrated end of year report and heartfelt expressions of thanks to the Society have been posted on our website.  

The second £3,000 bursary for 2012/13 was advertised on the Society’s website and by poster in the Education Centre. I was also in contact with all the other 14 universities in the UK which offer a graduate-entry medicine course and last year these various approaches attracted twelve applications. These included Carly Lewis, a Kidderminster resident, and Samera Dean, who was not resident in our area but had been working as a domiciliary optometrist around the Wyre Forest district. As I explained in my report last year we had, in fact, an extra £3,000 available because the Brmingham School had failed to use their allocation a year or two ago. As a result, we were able to award bursaries to both of these applicants. Carly’s end of year report has also been posted on our website and Samera has promised hers in the very near future.  

For the current academic year, Birmingham Medical School has chosen Alice Jones, a Birmingham resident with a First Class Degree in Biological Sciences. She was apparently the needier of two possible candidates selected for consideration and your trustees met again recently   to consider ten more applicants for the second bursary. Three of these ten were from the Wyre Forest area and included Stephanie Bareford from Cookley, Laurence Hopkins from Bewdley and Shannon Lennock from Hagley. All three had excellent references, and we found it very difficult to choose between them. In fact, in the six years that this second bursary award has been available, we have generally had either one or no local applicants and, therefore, we decided to offer bursaries to all three candidates on this occasion. We hope that members will approve of this decision even though it will dip into the capital of the trust fund to a modest degree.

In closing, may I remind you that most of our bursary recipients to date  have been on graduate-entry four year medicine courses but it has recently been brought to our attention that graduates on five year programmes tend to be much worse off financially. This fact will certainly need to be taken into consideration in future years.

Best wishes,

December 2012

Kidderminster PGMC Trustees Report for 2011/12

Dear Colleagues,

Accounts for the year ending 4^th April 2012 confirmed a balance of £165,582.90, up from £164,789 in 20010/11 and it appeared from the figures that the Trust’s income had apparently improved from £13,761 in 2011 to £23,079. However, this total included £6,000 transferred from the HSBC deposit account and another £1,273 transferred from the Education Centre accounts. This meant that the net income from our investment in the Britannia Building Society had actually fallen from £6,761 in 2011 to £5,805 and that we were left with an excess of income over expenditure of only £793.

The previous Britannia 2 year bond paying 4% per annum matured last December and at that time we were offered a reinvestment bond at 3.5% gross interest. Investigations around the town confirmed that no banks were able to accept money from trustee accounts and that no other building societies were offering a more favourable rate than the Britannia. We therefore decided to remain with the Britannia and to increase our bond holding by an additional £10,000. This new money was largely made up of funds previously transferred from the Education Centre Private Account and also ensured that our deposit account with HSBC, earning almost no interest, was reduced to an acceptable minimum.

We have continued to use the Society’s funds to offer two £3,000 bursaries each year and, for 2011/12, the one allocated to Birmingham University Medical School was awarded to Lara Reilly, a graduate-entry student who was educated in Worcester. Her end of year report and expressions of thanks to the Society were received in July and subsequently posted on our website.  

The second £3,000 bursary for 2011/12 was advertised on the Society’s website and by poster in the Education Centre. I was also in contact with all the other 14 universities in the UK which offer a graduate-entry medicine course and last year these various approaches only attracted two new formal applications. Robyn Hill, the 2010/11 bursary recipient who lives in Bewdley, had also submitted another application with details of her financial commitments over the following 12 months. Neither of the new applicants had any strong local connections and, therefore, it was agreed by your trustees to award the bursary to Robyn Hill for a second and final year. Robyn has now completed her second year of study and details of her successful academic progress and of some of her extra-curricular activities, nicely illustrated, have again been posted on our website with her expressions of grateful thanks for all our support.

For the current academic year, Birmingham Medical School have chosen Heather Bailie, a young lady from a low income family from Wythall in Worcestershire, currently needing to work at weekends to pay for her living costs, as their bursary candidate, and our trustees met again recently to consider applications from twelve more graduates for the second bursary. One of these was a young lady, Carly Lewis (no relation!), born and educated in Kidderminster, who had excellent references, and who met with our approval. Perhaps I could also remind you that, due to an administrative oversight, Birmingham failed to award their bursary a couple of years ago. As a result we had an extra £3,000 available on deposit at HSBC and therefore decided to make a second award this year. Our choice for this second award was Samera Dean, who first applied last year and just missed out. She was a domiciliary optometrist to Kidderminster and surrounding areas and was invited to apply again this year. She, too, had excellent references and the trustees were very happy to support her bursary application as well.

Further information can be obtained from:

Dr M L Lewis
Chairman of Trustees
Kidderminster Medical Society
117 St John’s Avenue Kidderminster
Worcestershire DY11 6AX

Email: martinlewis283@gmail.com

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