LONG LONELY WAIT

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 72, Issue 232, 30 September 1929, Page 5

LONG LONELY WAIT

A SECRETARY’S VIGIL Every year on the August Bank Holiday tho secretary of the Ancient Cutler’s Company, in Hallamshire, Yorkshire, keeps a lonely vigil at Cutler’s Hall, where he arranges a meeting for members of the company who he knows will never come and never have come on this particular date. An old Act of Parliament, passed as part of a charter of the Cutler’s Company, says that a meeting of the company shall be held on the first Monday in August every year, between the hour of 1 p.m. and 3 p.m., to elect 24 assistants to the company. In these days no meeting is held, but to comply with the statutory requirements provision has to be made for a gathering at Cutlers’ Hall. The presence of at least 40 members would be necessary if a meeting took place, for this number is needed to form a quorum. If the Act of Parliament were to be altered to avoid the necessity of the secretary attending, it would cost about £BOO in legal fees and other charges, and so from 1 o’clock to 3 o’clock the secretary sits and waits the errant members, who are probably enjoying their holidays.