Bryson Group held their 112th Annual General Meeting
On the 15th October Bryson Charitable Group held their 112th Annual General Meeting in the Board Room of Bryson House.
Since 1906, the Bryson Charitable Group has been committed to tackling social inequalities, working with people and communities building better futures.
Hugh Crossey, Chairman’s Remarks
In this, my sixth year as Chair at the Bryson Charitable Group, we ended a three-year strategic planning cycle. Our planning model over the last three years has had to successfully accommodate a range of political, economic and social policy shifts, whilst maintaining profitability and service growth. During this time, we have had to deal with the uncertainty created around the Brexit vote, the timeframe for its introduction and the significance of it for the NI Peace Process.
Who would have predicted that in 2018 we would have more than 18 months of no Executive or local Assembly operational; a freeze on policy decisions and budget setting resulting in a social-economic policy vacuum?
Despite this turbulence, we have weathered the storm and have shown some significant improvement in the Group’s financial performance over the last year through increasing operational turnover by 17% to £29.8 million, securing net fund movement of £682k and growing our workforce to over 860 employees.
Key highlights during this 3-year plan include:
- Continued development and growth of our innovative kerbside recycling model by bringing new vehicles and containers onto the marketplace. As a result, there are now 250,000 wheelie boxes and 400 Kerbsort vehicles in use across the UK. Our model is helping to change the face of recycling and will help local council partners to achieve recycling rates of around 60%.
- Successfully winning contracts to deliver the Social Investment Fund in 3 of the 4 Belfast City regions, resulting in 25% of clients to date moving onto employment.
- Co-ordinating support for over 900 vulnerable Syrian refugees to resettle and start a new life in Northern Ireland, through the work of the consortium.
- Building a social partnership with the Northern Ireland Housing Executive (NIHE) to develop, province wide, 27 home heating oil buying clubs with 4,900 members. We have ordered just over 7.7 million litres at a value of £2.8 million, facilitating an overall saving of 7.2% to members and helping to tackle fuel poverty.
- Expansion of our domiciliary care services within the Western Trust, now employing over 350 people and delivering over 300,000 hours of care per year to 1,130 clients across Strabane, Limavady, Derry, Dungiven and Belfast.
- Increasing customer numbers and range of activities offered at Bryson LaganSports to over 10,000 users per year.
Other strong headline figures include:
- 82% of income was derived from service contracts held by the Group.
- 94 pence in every pound was spent on the delivery of our social objectives.
Going forward, we remain committed to innovation, service excellence and cost effectiveness, providing value for money and making a real difference. I would like to acknowledge the voluntary commitment and hard work of all my fellow Non-Executive Directors on our Group and Company Boards, who contribute so much to our ongoing success, and to all our hard-working volunteers and staff.
With this in mind, I want to acknowledge the important role that John McMullan has played in the success of Bryson over the last 33 years. John is retiring as CEO during 2018 and I want to thank him for his contribution to Bryson and the wider social economy and wish him well in his retirement.
Our annual review provides an opportunity to highlight our work and impact in building better futures for all.