The Fourth Annual General Meeting of the Institute of Rail Welding - 16 April 2008

The AGM was attended by members of the current Management Committee who are representatives of Corporate Member companies. The proceedings were as follows:

Pending minor changes, the IoRW Constitution was reapproved. It will be updated and re-circulated in due course.

The Annual Report of activities was presented and approved. Serco Docklands joined as a Corporate Member in 2007.

GPX Engineering, Scotweld Employment Services Ltd and Goldschmidt-Thermit left the IoRW in 2007. Letters of resignation were received in 2007 from Amey Rail and Railtech (UK) Ltd to come into effect in 2008.

Two Technical Seminars were held in 2007, the first in May at the Riverside Centre, Derby on Rail Welding Management - Safety and Solutions, the second in November at TWI on Recent Developments in Rail Welding. Although Technical Seminars are no longer free to members, these events continued to attract a high number of participants, particularly the one at TWI which was attended by 90 or so delegates.

IoRW members continued to benefit from Business Briefing events. These are designed to provide a forum for discussion with relevant experts on business matters such as Directives and legislation that affect the industry. Three such successful events were organised for members of the Management Committee with presentations on forthcoming changes to Network Rail Standards: NR/SP/TRK/032 and 132, the Innotrack project and Construction Design Management.

Three issues of Welding Lines were published in 2007 which included a wide range of relevant technical articles, company profiles and interviews with Corporate Members. Information on the IoRW website continued to be regularly updated and it received over 60,000 visits during the year. A further survey of members' needs was carried out with the aim of ensuring that the IoRW continued to be responsive and to add value to the membership network. This resulted in the development of two draft guidelines: Diploma in Rail Welding Engineering and Rail Welding Instructor. It is expected to begin their implementation in 2009.

A financial statement was tabled and approved. It is intended to keep the fee structure under review.