PEBBLE Minutes - 6 April 2006

The Public Bodies Liaison Committee for British Paganism

PEBBLE Minutes - 6 April 2006

Date: Thursday 6 April 2006
Location: Oxford
Time: 7.30 pm

Present:

Rhiannon Biddulph (PA)
Angela Grant (TDN and Web Editor)
Clement Jewitt (PA)
Emma Restall-Orr (TDN)
Steve Wilson (chair)
Belinda Winder (PF)

Further Abbreviations Used Throughout:

CoBDO : Council of British Druid Orders
HFP : Heathens for Progress
PA : Pagan Association
PF : Pagan Federation
PN : Pagan Network
TDN : The Druid Network

MINUTES

Apologies for Absence
Apologies were received from Liz Murray (CoBDO), Marcus Adams (PN) and Casp (PN). HFP were absent, with no apologies received.
Minutes of the Last Meeting
To be distributed (by BW), checked and approved by email.
PEBBLE partnerships
A vote was taken to accept the Druid Network as a member of PEBBLE. It was noted that this should have been done at the last meeting but was not carried out simply through an oversight. The vote was unanimously in favour.
Membership Criteria
It was recognised that membership criteria for PEBBLE were still not adequately transparent, further needing to be more definitive and inclusive. It was agreed that an organization needed to fulfil the following eight criteria :
1. promoting Paganism as a religion;
2. have been established for longer than a year;
3. not be solely internet-based;
4. have a minimum of 50 members;
5. have accounts made available to members, with transparent financial procedures
6. be British-based (since PEBBLE was set up to liaise with the UK government);
7. should not bring Paganism into disrepute;
8. send a representative to the biannual PEBBLE meetings (covering their own travel expenses).
It was agreed that the term 'member' invoked notions of exclusivity, and that the preferred term would be 'partners'. In addition, it was agreed that the PEBBLE website should contain a Partnership page, outlining how interested organisations apply.
Charitable Status
BW stated that she was expecting to hear from the Charities Commission in the near future regarding the Pagania Greenfield Trust application, having made a final submission to the CC some months ago.
ERO gave an update, saying that TDN's application had been initially rejected by the CC on the grounds that some of the work may benefit only a minority of members. This misapprehension has been refuted in a 7 page document, sent to the CC at the beginning of April 06.
SACREs
SW is the PEBBLE representative for Newham and, in this capacity, has been asked to attend the NASACRE AGM in early May. Two Pagans have applied to join the Cornwall SACRE and SW has submitted a letter in support of both.
It was agreed that Pagans need to know more about how to join SACRES. PEBBLE needs to know how many Pagans sit on SACREs, and, with that in mind, SW is to send Kestrel information about how to join one's local SACRE and links to SACREs for the PEBBLE website.
ACAS Training
Following on from the Employment Regulations December 2003, on three days over the end of February. beginning of March, SORB training sessions were held for representatives from each ACAS at three regional offices - London, Nottingham and Newcastle. Sarah Rooke and SW (CoBDO) gave a presentation to the London office, ERO (TDN) in Nottingham and Wayne of the Circle of Pagans in Newcastle. PF information packs were distributed.
It was agreed that this a very positive step - practically every ACAS office will have material on the major Pagan faiths written by Pagans themselves, and over 60 officers will have a better understanding of issues of Pagan concern.
CENS (Community Empowerment Network)
SW mentioned that CENS are looking for faith representation; although he could not actually find out much about who CENS are and what they do. It was agreed that PEBBLE may well be interested in getting involved and that a request would be placed on the website by AG to this effect.
EDF (Equality and Diversity Forum)
SW has applied for membership to this on behalf of PEBBLE.
PEBBLE WEBSITE
It was agreed that AG had done a fantastic job getting the website up and running. AG asked for a number of pieces of information to facilitate this, notably some information on Witchcraft and Heathenry from BW and some on Druidry from ERO. In addition, some discussion took place about the formatting and categorising of the website (for example, providing an information page with links to the Census data) and about the email links to individuals.
Pagan Oaths
BW has been in touch with Andrew Drury, Policy Advisor/Faith Forum Co-ordinator of the Equality and Diversity Unit, Department for Constitutional Affairs in London, regarding a Pagan oath. During discussions, RB suggested the following format for a Pagan oath 'by all that I hold sacred' and this was agreed as the most appropriate form of words for a Pagan oath. BW agreed to contact Andrew Drury to follow up progress on this front and to communicate the new wording to him.
Scouts
BW reported that she has recently been asked to act on behalf of two Scout leaders who have been told that 'Paganism does not count as a religion'. BW agreed to report any progress on this front.
Inter-Faith Network
Applications for the Inter-Faith Network were discussed and BW agreed to find out more information from Carol Nowlam, the PF's Inter-Faith Manager on this subject. It was agreed that PEBBLE should try to identify all and any Pagans involved with their local IFNs, and that the PEBBLE website should give people information about how to get involved at a local level, whilst we also looked into resubmitting an application at the National level.
Bridgwater Group
Kate Overton, who is part of a Pagan discussion group in Bridgwater, contacted BW to ask for a PEBBLE representative to attend one of their meetings. SW volunteered to do so and BW said she would pass on Kate's contact details to SW.
Volunteers
BW was contacted by Tony who volunteered to help out, perhaps on something in the PR line. After a discussion of what we might usefully ask Tony to do, two related suggestions were to be put back to him by BW (i) to ask Tony to assess PEBBLE's public image, and what could be done to improve it and (ii) to put him in touch with Carol Nowlam, the PF's Inter-Faith Manager, to facilitate an application to the Inter-Faith Network by PEBBLE.
Date of Next Meeting
It was decided that PEBBLE should hold biannual meetings in April and October every year, and that the next meeting would be on Saturday 30 September 2006 in Oxford.