Merry Christmas from Geoff and all at IRRV!

East Midlands Association

Marianne and I were delighted to attend the Association Dinner Dance hosted by President Alan Lemmon at the East Midlands Airport Hilton Hotel.

A champagne reception was followed by a splendid dinner, speeches and raffle and then a disco till late.

It was good to see several Council Members support the occasion.

Thank you Alan and Committee for a warm welcome and great evening. Well done East Midlands!

Above : Geoff and Marianne

Above : Geoff, Alan Lemmon and David Magor

Above : Presidents with Chains!

For more photos see East Midlands Association website - http://tinyurl.com/irrveastmids.

Visit to Scottish Association

30th November: It's St. Andrew's Day so it was great to visit Dumfries and be welcomed by the Scottish Association last week.

The Forum Day was an interactive session on Revenues Benefits and Fraud plus a bit on Reval 2010 where the large increases on LA properties valued on Contractors Method were noted.

Organised by Fraser Macpherson and led by Scottish President Brian Jeffrey, Forum delegates came from all over Scotland, and discussed manly issues including the Future of Local Taxation in Scotland.

A presentation was made to Alistair McNair who recently retired from Aberdeenshire Council but remains an active member of the IRRV Scottish Association Executive.

You may recall that Dumfries and Galloway Council won the Excellence in Social Inclusion Performance Award this year and was highly commended for the Revenues Team of the Year Award. Glasgow City Council won Most Improved Team of the Year Performance Award. I hope to see plenty of Scottish entries for next year's Performance Awards in Harrogate.

The day was rounded off by the traditional Scottish Chinese Karaoke where I was able to lead the singing of "Maybe its because I'm a Londoner" and Lambeth Walk before departing for the Sleeper train back to London for the Rating Diploma's lunch and the London Association Quiz the following day ... more on that later ...

This coming week is the IRRV Scottish Benefits and Benefits Fraud Conference in Crieff to be opened by Senior Vice President Kerry Macdermott as I have the Valuers' Faculty Board Meeting in London.

But I will be up in Edinburgh next week for the Scottish Association President's Christmas Reception on the 9th December at the Royal Scots Club.

For more about the Scottish Association have a look at their excellent web site http://www.irrvscotland.org.uk

Above : Geoff at the wine reception after the Forum meeting
Above : Geoff (left) and Scottish Association President Brian Jeffrey (right) made retiral presentation to Alistair McNair
Above : Geoff addresses the Forum and Association joint meeting
Above : Geoff with Liz and David Magor at the Chinese Karaoke!