See you on Screen

A WEEKEND OF Zoom

You can’t ignore Zoom, and it’s now being used to keep BMF members in touch with each other and the management team – HeLen HanCoCk reports

Above: Say hello, Management Team Below: Regional Zoom meets were well attended

It was the first ‘proper’ weekend of January when Sheonagh Ravensdale, BMF’s Communications Director, hosted a weekend of Zoom meetings in an effort to open up connections between all members in all regions in this new era of online video calls.

The weekend was split into five meetings which loosely grouped areas together. The invites were sent and we waited in hope for attendees to enter the waiting rooms at the allotted times...and they did! All the meetings were very well supported and after the initial introductions of all the management team a great Q&A session was undertaken. Each region had its own issues but not surprisingly some issues were relevant to the whole of the UK.

We had a few interested parties respond to our call for ‘local antenna’ to help us respond to local issues, and we will be following up on these.

Full minutes for all the meetings can be read on our website at www.bmf.co.uk/news/show/proceedings-of-bmfregional-meetings-in-january-2021. We will continue these Zoom meetings on a fairly regular basis and hope to see you on screen until we can meet up in person.

As always, it is vital that we have current email addresses for all our members, and at the moment we are falling short of this goal – please contact Helen on admin@bmf.co.uk to update your membership profile.

What Came Up...

A few examples of questions of what was asked on the Zoom meetings – and the answers

Q Will the new National Motorcyclists Council be the first point of contact with Government?

A The current group COMO is morphing into a more permanent coalition that is NMC – this will be the first point of contact for Government. Instead of just reacting we want to become more proactive. NMC will go to Government and say this is what we want. Nothing to stop the individual organisations doing their own lobbying but it is felt a more targeted approach would assist the overall programme.

Q What involvement does BMF have at local council level?

A Local councils are best approached by local people. What we need is more people to establish a relationship with their council and bring matters up with them for us – ie be a local rep. We can support but there’s only one Anna so unfortunately, she can’t be everywhere! Local people really do make the difference.

Q Many of our affiliated clubs have magazines. Rarely do we see any bmf press releases, articles or anything in them. We need to reconnect with clubs and their magazine editors to ensure this is done.

A We do send out press releases directly to our club contacts, those email addresses that we have been given. This is something that Sheonagh will be working on to try to make sure these are getting through to the correct contact. We are also hoping to get all clubs to send us a copy of their club magazines. If you are reading this as a club magazine editor, please contact us!