Extraordinary General Meeting, Monday 5th June, 3pm - to wind up or not?
Cath M in Bentley (A Commune in the North/Radical Routes/Platform6)
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The current directors do not have capacity to keep Platform 6 Development Co-op functioning.
Extraordinary General Meeting open to all, Monday 5th June, 3pm
Meeting link: https://de.meet.coop/b/gra-cpf-owy-a9s
We have around 30 members, including member organisations, but this meeting is open to everyone in the Platform 6 community.
Decisions/Proposals for the EGM, which need input from you lot in advance:
a) To dissolve Platform 6 Development Co-op, to pass the cash assets and the funds/brands of Ways Forward and of Breadfunds/Mutual First Aid on to (??)____ and to pass the fiscal hosting of our 30-odd Open Collectives to (??)_____ [Note - Graham is checking whether innovate.coop could take this on] - or to wind up once Open Collectives have found their own alternative fiscal hosting.
or...
b) to transfer assets and fiscal hosting as above, and to turn the company dormant with new named directors [Mx Y, Ms Z and Mr X - people would need to take this on before we could vote for it].
Why?!
P6 has been struggling for years now to create a culture of participation. The people putting in the graft have themselves been stretched over many projects and have not been able to put in the work of promotion, induction, outreach and organising which is necessary for an organisation of unpaid enthusiasts. When we surveyed to find more interested people, we didn't then have capacity to follow-up on the interest that was shown.
The fiscal hosting of Open Collectives has increased the administrative workload significantly, with constant issues over payment platforms and a vast amount more bookkeeping.
We really never got to the exciting position of having many members contributing to a fund for co-operative development, which was the original nub of the project, and would have created an engine driving inspiration and participation (in relative terms, at least).
We note that Development Co-op and the Young Co-operators Network have similarly struggled to survive/thrive and wonder what the similarities, differences and contexts are, what can we learn from this?
What we want from you now
respond below with any alternative suggestions for how we should proceed, or any questions
If you want to join Platform 6 in order to vote at the EGM or step into a directorship role, follow the link from https://platform6.coop/.
Suggest appropriate homes for the 'Ways Forward for the Co-op Movement' brand and seed fund for future events
Suggest appropriate homes for the Breadfunds/Mutual First Aid remaining moneys
Suggest appropriate homes for the Platform 6 Development Co-op fund
if you are considering taking on the responsibility for Platform 6, do express interest here or let us know. Happy to have conversations about what we think running Platform 6 entails/how it could be different.
RSVP
The work of re-homing Open Collectives will begin after the EGM - feel free to put questions here, but there may not be answers for a while.
We are very sad to have ended up in this position - all the challenges and opportunities that prompted the founding of Platform 6 still exist, it is no less necessary than it ever was, but we have run out of steam.
Cath, Graham & Austen
Graham Fri 28 Jul 2023 10:12AM
In advance of Monday's call I'd like to share some positive news, that may encourage more people to join the call on Monday, and to bring useful input and questions to that discussion:
Since early June when we met we've been exploring possible options for the future of Platform 6. As we have discussed, the organisation has created a number of useful resources and assets, and done valuable work in respect of it's fiscal hosting service that has proved valuable to groups like social.coop and meet.coop among others (please join both of these groups if you've not yet done so), and the Cooperative Ways Forward conference, etc.
We have been successful in identifying a partner who is enthusiastic to work with us on this. innovation.coop has agreed, subject to due diligence, to take over the key fiscal hosting service. More than this, and in order to effect a seamless transition, the agreement is that innovation.coop essentially takes control of Platform 6, thereby enabling it to continue to operate. Longer term, they may choose to wind it up (one option that proposed was to convert it to a society and then undertake a transfer of engagements), but all of that is for future deliberation. In the meantime all of the stuff that Platform 6 has built up can continue to be useful.
A bit about innovation.coop: it's a relatively new organisation, and a project that I've been involved with since about 2008, when I did a piece of work for Midcounties with Shaun Fensom to develop some strategic thinking about who to make the dotcoop domain name service more successful. The ideas and thinking that we developed have spent some years in the dark, but in the last couple of years we've revisited, updated and attracted some serious attention. innovation is about to start trading, and it has the support of a retail society. The overarching strategy is to develop a cooperative ecosystem (a protective "biome" within which business ideas can be innovated, incubated and developed all within a 'cooperation-by-default' context, with multiple organisations working collaboratively for mutual benefit using cooperative governance rather than contract law to govern the relationships between them).
For me, in many ways innovation.coop is an evolution of what I had in my head when Platform 6 was dreamed up, so this move feels like a very natural transition.
I hope that others share the positive view of this move that I know @Cath M in Bentley (A Commune in the North/Radical Routes/Platform6) and I both have, and I'm looking forward to working with colleagues in innovation.coop to take this forward and build on the good things that platform 6 has been able to achieve.
See you Monday at 3 here: https://de.meet.coop/b/gra-cpf-owy-a9s
Cath M in Bentley (A Commune in the North/Radical Routes/Platform6) Tue 1 Aug 2023 3:01AM
Hi all - minutes from today's members' meeting to review the EGM actions from 5th June and consider Graham's proposal above. TLDR: support the proposal, details to be worked out slowly, consider the possibility of remaining a membership organisation, @Chris Funnell to look into legalities of whether we can proceed without changing much in the short term/having another members' meeting.
Graham Tue 1 Aug 2023 8:27AM
Thanks Cath - I really don't know how you do it. You effectively chaired the meeting AND wrote minutes! Outstanding.
Andrew Escobar (Andres) · social.coop Finance Working Group Mon 21 Aug 2023 5:13PM
Within our social.coop Loomio forum, with respect to P6 transitioning to Innovation.coop, @Graham mentioned that “the details of the transition, while agreed in principle in July, only became clear [recently].” I also understand that a brief was being drafted by @Chris Funnell on this transition from a legal perspective.
Are there any updates or next steps that you can share?
Graham Mon 21 Aug 2023 5:24PM
As I understand it Chris is looking at the optimal approach in terms of innovation.coop - as a registered society can best take control of Platform 6 Development Cooperative Ltd (which is a company limited by guarantee). Both of these legal forms are specific to UK jursidiction. An important question being, given that Platform 6 is a cooperative, can it have just one member, or do we need to take a different approach?
Gareth Nash · Mon 24 Jul 2023 1:42PM
Likewise
Gareth
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Co-operative and Mutual Solutions Ltd
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