SCoJeC Chair Alan Kay opened our well-attended 2021 AGM by thanking Council, staff, and volunteers “for the extraordinary amount of work that they have put in during an extraordinary year”. He said that the Community as a whole, and SCoJeC in particular, had risen to the challenges of a pandemic that has had huge impact on people’s lives and caused huge heartache and distress. More recently there has been an enormous flare-up of violence in Middle-East and a significant rise in antisemitism that have intensified communal worry and stress, adding that the bile and vitriol have been the worst that he could remember, and antisemitism is becoming normalised within British society.
On a more positive note, SCoJeC responded quickly to the pandemic by moving our many events online, and he suggested that in some ways this has moved us forward ten years. We have also approved a Memorandum of Understanding with the Board of Deputies, which has enabled us to make progress towards appointing a salaried Chief Executive Officer.
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Treasurer Philip Mendelsohn then presented our formal Annual Report and Accounts, which show a successful year in which we had been able to increase our level of activity thanks to a grant from the People’s Postcode Trust, and we had generated a small surplus overall. However, he expressed concern that the new Scottish Government equality fund excludes faith-related activities, and the terms of future funding for these have not yet been announced, so it is impossible to predict our position when the present funding ends in September. He also expressed concern about entering into financial commitments to employ a CEO when the funding for this is not secure.
After discussion, there was a contested election for the Chair, which was won by Nicola Livingston. The new Hon Officers are:
Chair:
Vice Chair:
Hon Treasurer:
Hon Secretary: |
Nicola Livingston
Gillian Raab
Philip Mendelsohn
Fiona Brodie |
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"I am honoured to have been nominated and elected as SCoJeC's new chair. In my professional and voluntary careers, I have always worked on the basis of maximum involvement from the widest range of people, in order to create an ethos of inclusion, where people know that differing views differing views should be discussed with respect.
My goal is to focus on unity, and I look forward to working with SCoJeC's Executive and Council to build on the excellent work that's been done over recent years, in particular with regard to plans to appoint a paid CEO. I also look forward to working together with the Glasgow Jewish Representative Council, the Board of Deputies, and the Jewish Leadership Council to develop and protect the interests of Scottish Jewry.
During the Covid crisis our community came together like never before. I look forward to building on this collaborative approach. We have a duty to think about future generations of leadership, and I intend to engage with a diverse range of voices, cross communally, to ensure that we are representing the Scottish Jewish community as a whole." |
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