The UK's Finest Independent Forum for Shooters and Gun Owners. Est 2010.

There are lots of other forums where this is being debated and it's unlikely that all the candidates know of them either. Anyone should be welcome to join here so I'm all in favour of them coming over.

ChrisB wrote:John,
Should there be any difference in the voting rights and membership privileges between shooters who are members of affiliated clubs and those that are direct members of the NRA?

Sorry to ask, but it is a big gripe of mine...

Yes I agree that affiliated clubs should get a vote, or even several votes proportionate to the number of members they have. After all they pay quite a bit in subscriptions each year, which has risen steadily over a number of recent years now. That way you will engage them more with the NRA as they will become stakeholders and not just see the NRA as a necessary evil that is remote in many ways not just geographically.

I'll be blunt and say that in my opinion many clubs at present have absolutely no interest in the NRA or it's future, and if for instance BASC was recognised by the Home Office in the same way for the purposes of H.O. approval then many clubs would desert the NRA in the blink of an eye. Personally I would hate to see such a thing happen but unless things change I can see that as the way things will eventually go. In fact it wouldn't surprise me if contingency plans are already in place should the NRA suddenly go belly up. Don't forget that there are very many target shooters who are also members of BASC, the NGO or BDS and who regularly shoot on ranges.

I would agree that an affiliated club should get at least one vote for the affiliation fee of £75.00 they pay, as I understand it clubs are also required to pay a fee for each Non-NRA Individual Member in the club which I currently believe is £8.00 per person. An allocation of ballot papers based on the number on Non-NRA members fees paid in my opinion would also be appropriate, say one per 10 non-members for example.

Something that could be proposed in the future if it is not already the case.

Question then is how does the club demorcratically agree on who the non-members vote for, not a problem for the Individual NRA Members as they get their own ballot paper.

DavidRees wrote:

Dark Skies wrote:I'll vote for anyone that will make moves to remove the NRA portal from a private self-interested company back to an NRA controlled portal. If I wanted to give my private details and firearms ownership to strangers of dubious nature I'd just scribble them out on a piece of paper and leave it on a bus.

I agree. One of the more stupid decisions I've seen over the nearly 20 years I've been a member of the NRA. I'm boycotting the new system, because as an IT specialist, I consider the new system has been designed and implemented with insufficient thought to security. It is clear the NRA has no clue about such IT matters, and despite making repeated attempts to speak to the responsible partiers within the NRA, they have not been courteous enough to return my calls, so they are not interested in rectifying their error, unfortunately.

Luckily I have other clubs where I am a member, so can establish good reason to possess elsewhere. Not all are so fortunate.

It seems very few people share our concerns, David, certainly not the NRA. There are very few posts that question the wisdom of storing such sensitive information with a private for profit organization. I believe the one thread that considered the matter took to more pressing matters regarding the state of a bathroom shower.

Recently Ebay was massively hacked - and you can be sure their security measures were far superior. It took them three months to acknowledge the fact and notify potential victims to change passwords. And that's a well known, hugely respected, global organization. I've never even heard of Azolve - although their name immediately translates to 'Absolve' in my head - possibly due to the wording of their following disclaimer which basically says 'we accept no responsibility for keeping secure the whereabouts of a vast nationwide cache of firearms'. Perhaps when they are eventually hacked we'll be treated to 'lessons have been learned.'

"15. Disclaimers

15.1 Azolve Limited makes no warranty or representation that the Website will meet your requirements, that it will be of satisfactory quality, that it will be fit for a particular purpose, that it will not infringe the rights of third parties, that it will be compatible with all systems, that it will be secure and that all information provided will be accurate. We make no guarantee of any specific results from the use of our Service or Services."

Can see a lot of problems with clubs getting votes especially when they can't agree on who should actually get the votes :roll:

It would also need an amendment to the Second Schedule (the Second Schedule needs several minor amendments which some of us on General Council have been discussing for years but nothing has happened).

If you haven't read the Second Schedule it is downloadable here

http://www.nra.org.uk/common/asp/genera ... category=9

My personal view is that if I pay £72 to be an individual member shouldn't I get more for that money than someone who has paid £8 to be a non-NRA-member of an affiliated club?

However what I really want is everyone to be a full NRA member at a much reduced rate!

Love

Karen

karen wrote:
My personal view is that if I pay £72 to be an individual member shouldn't I get more for that money than someone who has paid £8 to be a non-NRA-member of an affiliated club?

Totally agree which is why if it were at all possible it should be proportionate accepting the difficulty they may have in deciding who to vote for. I'd like to see more individual NRA members as well.

However, as it stands at the moment in accordance with the Rules of the Association, only Individual NRA members are allowed to vote.

Dark Skies wrote:

DavidRees wrote:

Dark Skies wrote:I'll vote for anyone that will make moves to remove the NRA portal from a private self-interested company back to an NRA controlled portal. If I wanted to give my private details and firearms ownership to strangers of dubious nature I'd just scribble them out on a piece of paper and leave it on a bus.

I agree. One of the more stupid decisions I've seen over the nearly 20 years I've been a member of the NRA. I'm boycotting the new system, because as an IT specialist, I consider the new system has been designed and implemented with insufficient thought to security. It is clear the NRA has no clue about such IT matters, and despite making repeated attempts to speak to the responsible partiers within the NRA, they have not been courteous enough to return my calls, so they are not interested in rectifying their error, unfortunately.

Luckily I have other clubs where I am a member, so can establish good reason to possess elsewhere. Not all are so fortunate.

It seems very few people share our concerns, David, certainly not the NRA. There are very few posts that question the wisdom of storing such sensitive information with a private for profit organization. I believe the one thread that considered the matter took to more pressing matters regarding the state of a bathroom shower.

Recently Ebay was massively hacked - and you can be sure their security measures were far superior. It took them three months to acknowledge the fact and notify potential victims to change passwords. And that's a well known, hugely respected, global organization. I've never even heard of Azolve - although their name immediately translates to 'Absolve' in my head - possibly due to the wording of their following disclaimer which basically says 'we accept no responsibility for keeping secure the whereabouts of a vast nationwide cache of firearms'. Perhaps when they are eventually hacked we'll be treated to 'lessons have been learned.'

"15. Disclaimers

15.1 Azolve Limited makes no warranty or representation that the Website will meet your requirements, that it will be of satisfactory quality, that it will be fit for a particular purpose, that it will not infringe the rights of third parties, that it will be compatible with all systems, that it will be secure and that all information provided will be accurate. We make no guarantee of any specific results from the use of our Service or Services."

Which person at the NRA signed a contract to outsource IL3 data with a caveat like that (my bold) on the provider's website?

Some - any - description of the technical measures protecting the hugely sensitive data on that site is needed. I've never heard of Azolve - they seem to be management consultants rather than data warehousing experts - and their website states they have an office in Bangladesh. I'm hoping the NRA member database is hosted in the UK, and subject to UK data protection law...

"My personal view is that if I pay £72 to be an individual member shouldn't I get more for that money than someone who has paid £8 to be a non-NRA-member of an affiliated club?"

No but if the club pays over £700 a year to the NRA shouldn't it get a vote?

Chapuis wrote:"My personal view is that if I pay £72 to be an individual member shouldn't I get more for that money than someone who has paid £8 to be a non-NRA-member of an affiliated club?"

If the club pays over £700 a year to the NRA shouldn't it get a vote?

I'm not suggesting for one moment that each member of an affiliated club gets a vote the same as an individual member only that the club gets a certain number of votes depending on membership.

Chapuis wrote:

Chapuis wrote:"My personal view is that if I pay £72 to be an individual member shouldn't I get more for that money than someone who has paid £8 to be a non-NRA-member of an affiliated club?"

If the club pays over £700 a year to the NRA shouldn't it get a vote?

I'm not suggesting for one moment that each member of an affiliated club gets a vote the same as an individual member only that the club gets a certain number of votes depending on membership.

+1

btw, liking this thread. Some interesting and intelligent points (except mine)..