In
1895,The Institution of Surveyors, Victoria was
created by a Memorandum of Association as a company
limited by guarantee, incorporated pursuant to the
provisions of the Companies Act 1890. The memorandum
notes that the Institution was established for the "advancement
and elevation of Surveying and Civil Engineering as
professions in Victoria".
In
1975, the current version of the Articles of
Association (otherwise known as the "Pink
Book", based on the colour of the cover) were
adopted at an Extraordinary General Meeting. The
Articles of Association use language which is very
gender specific, the document refers to Acts of
Parliament which have been or soon will be superceded,
and does not include any reference to the Graduate
grade of membership of the Institution.
In 2000
it is appropriate that these two documents are
modernised. The primary motivation, as identified by
Committee, is that the Annual General Meeting must be
held in December, and this does not allow the
Institution to submit mandatory annual reports to
government authorities in a timely manner. The
Institution has been fined a small amount annually in
recent years for late submissions to ASIC. Further,
the Institution financial year is stated as October 1
to September 30 and this should be amended to be
aligned with the universally adopted July 1 to June 30
financial year.
The
Memorandum of Association is now an historic document
that should stand intact, however a preamble or note
to alter some of the (now) misleading statements is
advisable.
As per
section 77 of the Articles of Association, a Special
General Meeting must be called and a three-fourths
majority of those present and entitled to vote must
approve for there to be a change in the Memorandum
and/or Articles of Association. The Special General
Meeting will be held immediately prior to the
Quarterly Meeting of The Institution of Surveyors,
Victoria on 26 May 2000, at the Regional Survey
Conference in Marysville.
The
current and revised versions of the documents are
available as PDF (or Acrobat) files for download or
viewing
