Unita Fortior Fans Group

Quoted from Dancingbear on Monday, 23 May 2025

Quoted from Mullen103 on Friday, 20 May 2025

I suppose you just had to read MMs leaving statement to know the feelings towards some sections of the trusts membership/supporters that I dare say wasn’t just shared by him, but a few in the trust.

I think it’s dancingbear on here that’s said the trust should give up and give their shares up - to be honest, it’s a ridiculous suggestion, but doesn’t look so bad at the moment.

Hopefully some new people will stand, and there’ll have my support. We need a functioning trust fit for 2022, unfortunately the current trust board, not entirely their fault aren’t up to it.

The suggestion of non fundraising, for a trust, beggars belief really but I don’t think with the current personel they know how to raise significant cash, but can anyone else?

Mainly though, to begin with members just want truth and to feel involved something which imo has failed miserably.

Strangely Mullen despite now being a member I still firmly believe they should give the shares back and completely disband. It’s been a complete failure from day 1.

I’m leaning towards that thought.

We need a trust and fan involvement but the problem is, the way the trust is set up, is there’s really only the retired or unemployed are able to do anything.

It shouldn’t be taken the hours it does but you still need someone to be available to write a quick statement, attend a board meeting at short notice etc, if voted on the board.

For those positions it can be a full time position, especially if you have a 7 hour board meeting.

I was doing some research and I looked at the Mutuals Public Register. This is a mine of information. CUOSC members are fobbed off with a much abbreviated financial report but the full works are available on the link. Just as Laffy moans about the Club's accounts being out of date by the time they are published, this information is historic but interesting none the less. In the year to 31st January 2021, CUOSC had 430 members but the total subscriptions were just £2352, an average of £5.47 per member. That's a lot of concessions bringing the average down. I've commented before on the repayments of Norman Steel's loan which seem to be £5016 per annum. That is over twice the amount of money coming in through subscriptions. It's easy to see why CUOSC as it stands is not viewed as a viable fund-raising entity.

However this needn't be the case. CUOSC say they are looking at tiered memberships but if they are to be introduced then perhaps a cap on Norman's loan repayments should be introduced as well.

Good find Carwash, good to read the meat on the bones!

Quoted from Mullen103 on Monday, 23 May 2025

Quoted from Dancingbear on Monday, 23 May 2025

Quoted from Mullen103 on Friday, 20 May 2025

I suppose you just had to read MMs leaving statement to know the feelings towards some sections of the trusts membership/supporters that I dare say wasn’t just shared by him, but a few in the trust.

I think it’s dancingbear on here that’s said the trust should give up and give their shares up - to be honest, it’s a ridiculous suggestion, but doesn’t look so bad at the moment.

Hopefully some new people will stand, and there’ll have my support. We need a functioning trust fit for 2022, unfortunately the current trust board, not entirely their fault aren’t up to it.

The suggestion of non fundraising, for a trust, beggars belief really but I don’t think with the current personel they know how to raise significant cash, but can anyone else?

Mainly though, to begin with members just want truth and to feel involved something which imo has failed miserably.

Strangely Mullen despite now being a member I still firmly believe they should give the shares back and completely disband. It’s been a complete failure from day 1.

I’m leaning towards that thought.

We need a trust and fan involvement but the problem is, the way the trust is set up, is there’s really only the retired or unemployed are able to do anything.

It shouldn’t be taken the hours it does but you still need someone to be available to write a quick statement, attend a board meeting at short notice etc, if voted on the board.

For those positions it can be a full time position, especially if you have a 7 hour board meeting.

Ask yourself this Mullen. If we’d never had a trust at all would the club be any worse off ?. They’d maybe have to get the ticket office staff to sort the season tickets out which they prob should be doing anyway but doubt much else would be different. 7 hour board meetings indeed. What a waste of time.

Quoted from Dancingbear on Tuesday, 24 May 2025

Quoted from Mullen103 on Monday, 23 May 2025

Quoted from Dancingbear on Monday, 23 May 2025

Quoted from Mullen103 on Friday, 20 May 2025

I suppose you just had to read MMs leaving statement to know the feelings towards some sections of the trusts membership/supporters that I dare say wasn’t just shared by him, but a few in the trust.

I think it’s dancingbear on here that’s said the trust should give up and give their shares up - to be honest, it’s a ridiculous suggestion, but doesn’t look so bad at the moment.

Hopefully some new people will stand, and there’ll have my support. We need a functioning trust fit for 2022, unfortunately the current trust board, not entirely their fault aren’t up to it.

The suggestion of non fundraising, for a trust, beggars belief really but I don’t think with the current personel they know how to raise significant cash, but can anyone else?

Mainly though, to begin with members just want truth and to feel involved something which imo has failed miserably.

Strangely Mullen despite now being a member I still firmly believe they should give the shares back and completely disband. It’s been a complete failure from day 1.

I’m leaning towards that thought.

We need a trust and fan involvement but the problem is, the way the trust is set up, is there’s really only the retired or unemployed are able to do anything.

It shouldn’t be taken the hours it does but you still need someone to be available to write a quick statement, attend a board meeting at short notice etc, if voted on the board.

For those positions it can be a full time position, especially if you have a 7 hour board meeting.

Ask yourself this Mullen. If we’d never had a trust at all would the club be any worse off ?. They’d maybe have to get the ticket office staff to sort the season tickets out which they prob should be doing anyway but doubt much else would be different. 7 hour board meetings indeed. What a waste of time.

The trust had a purpose when it was set up - get rid of Knighton and that happened - whether they had any influence in that - maybe.

The last 14 years - I don’t think they’ve had any influence in anything really. They’ve had a vote on the holdings board but would be interesting if any vote has swing anything - I’d guess at no

Yeah the first part was prob more due to Courtenays lot but like you say we’ll never know. They did take Story to court I suppose so that and sorting the season tickets out are their main successes.

Don’t forget the telly they bought for the Sunset Suite. A fine achievement.

Following the appeal in this week’s CUOSC briefing for a volunteer to be co-opted onto the Board for the period up to the AGM in late July, I have replied offering my services.

I believe our Trust can offer so much more and hope to be able to help them do so!

Up The Blues!

Quoted from ccu on Sunday, 05 June 2025

Following the appeal in this week’s CUOSC briefing for a volunteer to be co-opted onto the Board for the period up to the AGM in late July, I have replied offering my services.

I believe our Trust can offer so much more and hope to be able to help them do so!

Up The Blues!

I think you'd be the ideal candidate, it's also a good opportunity for you to understand what's involved and for the Trust to see where your skills lay after they requested people apply to stand ahead of the AGM.

The trust needs someone that gets things done, that supporters want!

And it needs a fox in the coup which Dan will do.

This will be interesting. Dans came out and made it public so they should co opt immediately.

Good luck

I’ve gone public as the appeal has been made openly in their Briefing this week.

As such, I feel it’s only right to be open about approaching them regarding the role.

There may be several interested, who knows, but I’m happy to put my hat into the ring, and make it transparent that I have done so.

Our Trust has so much potential, let’s get it delivering…

The co-option to the Board, announced today in their Briefing, was of a former Board Member, Don Beacock.

I never expected to get in, but know of at least one candidate who approached them and would’ve been excellent. Instead, an old hand returns.

Ah well, we continue…

How does the co-opting process work? Who makes the decision?

[censored] the trust now..time to go alone and do one seperate from the clique...

Nobody will be allowed in to ruffle the feathers and try to change..they want it just how it was.

“Someone” mentioned what the trust were like a few years ago and “someone” suggested a vote of no confidence but no one was really bothered and here we are.

You can get new people in yet you’ll always have some members of the old guard for at least 3 years.

I’ve worked with the trust and some are ok, but there’s problems of communication and some members wanting/needing to stay on for their own reasons and yeah reluctance to change were evident.

I think there’s two routes now, vote of no confidence or say sod it and use UF as a supporters club that show them up, because standing some members at the agm and possibly voting one of (won’t happen) won’t work.

Quoted from STH on Sunday, 19 June 2025

How does the co-opting process work? Who makes the decision?

The current CUOSC Board…

Quoted from ccu on Sunday, 19 June 2025

Quoted from STH on Sunday, 19 June 2025

How does the co-opting process work? Who makes the decision?

The current CUOSC Board…

Suspected as much. Hard lines to you, CCU, and well done for putting yourself forward. Did any part of you think it would be different?

Absolutely not!

But, there’s an AGM in six weeks time, could certainly be more interesting than the previous few!

Quoted from ccu on Sunday, 19 June 2025

But, there’s an AGM in six weeks time

I guess now's when we'll see if the fans are happy to stick with the Trust we've got or truly want change.

It's easy to sit on the messageboard and twine.

Let's see who's prepared to stick their hand up and be nominated to stand. Let's see who's prepared to vote for new blood. Let's see who's prepared to spend a tenner and join in order to force meaningful change.

Looking back, I think people were hoodwinked into believing the Trust would be a positive force, and only had CUFC's prosperity as it's No1 ambition.

As it is, we have a massive lump of dead-wood that is toxic, and has had the opposite influence to what we all hoped.

Nothing but a bunch of layman, who bit off more than they could chew.

UNITA FORTIOR – Tuesday 21st June 2022

To all Blues supporters:

When we launched Unita Fortior in January this year, our aim was to push for a Supporter’s Trust that was more representative of our fanbase, drive an increase in membership numbers and help CUOSC become a more modernised entity.

Our launch statement was well received by fellow fans, and approximately 150 of you have joined CUOSC since – an increase in membership of approximately 37.5%. Such a jump in numbers had only occurred once before when membership was included free with season tickets in the 2015/16 season.

Shortly after we went live with our ideas, the working group received an invitation from the CUOSC Board to meet up to ‘try to establish a relationship and discuss more ways we can move forward.’ After discussion in our group, we turned down the invite – our feeling was that a private meeting was unnecessary as we were merely members of CUOSC and would prefer to attend a standard member meeting where ALL fans could come. Although we felt this was a reasonable and sensible approach, turning down a private meeting was deemed ‘disappointing’ by the CUOSC Board in their weekly News & Star column, a comment we felt was unnecessary and unhelpful at best.

Despite this, we did encourage them to attend an open meeting we had organised for the end of January prior to the Sutton match, which Billy Atkinson and Malcolm Nugent attended on behalf of the CUOSC board. There were a lot of good discussions and to their credit, both Billy and Malcolm answered all questions they were asked and were open and frank throughout. This was also the first time we showed the flyers that we had produced, encouraging fans to join CUOSC, and these were seen as a good idea by all present.

CUOSC then tried to organise a private meeting with ourselves again in early February. This was again turned down, and we reaffirmed that our preference was to attend a standard members’ meeting. We did say though that some of our group would pop into the regular CUOSC pre-Match supporter’s surgery prior to an upcoming game.

In the meantime, two further disappointing incidents occurred. Firstly, the CUOSC board began to complain about our flyers – their main issue being the size of the CUOSC logo being used (placed in the middle of a specially designed QR code linked to the CUOSC website joining page). We were surprised at such a petty take on something that was designed to help increase members (something they themselves hadn’t managed for a number of years), but thankfully common sense won the day and with the club’s permission, we were allowed to distribute them at upcoming matches.

Secondly, a claim was made by CUOSC in their News & Star column that we apparently ‘refuse to engage and talk with us’ – something of a surprise given two members of the Board had already attended our open meeting!

Despite this absurd claim, a group of us did attend the CUOSC surgery prior to the Swindon game in mid-February. Again, a good discussion was had by those present, and we looked forward to the members’ meeting which had now been arranged for the following week. Although numbers attending the meeting were low, there were several of the UF group in the room and on Zoom, and we feel we made some excellent points and offered several ideas for the future, alongside some other good thoughts from non-UF attendees.

In the weeks following the members’ meeting, we contacted CUOSC directly over some of the issues raised at the meeting. A particular focus was on the memberships, payments and entire joining process, as this is something fans who had joined during our initial push had raised many times, particularly when you compared them to Trust’s from similar-sized clubs. We were told that these would be looked into.

One of our group, Ross, also offered to help CUOSC with the running of the first CUOSC Cup, showing that we are more than happy to help.

A second members’ meeting was then arranged for mid-May. Again, several of UF attended. Once again, a good positive discussion was had in the room, although again the numbers attending were disappointingly low. A big disappointment was the lack of follow-up regarding the issues previously highlighted regarding the whole membership process. This we felt was a key component of the whole Trust set-up, so to hear that nothing had been even looked at was incredibly disheartening and showed a lack of urgency.

Following this second members’ meeting, it emerged in the weekly briefing that one of the gentlemen introduced on the night as ‘helping with IT’ had in fact been co-opted onto the CUOSC Board the evening prior to the members meeting at the monthly CUOSC Board meeting!

Discussion amongst fans on Twitter showed bewilderment that such an important move hadn’t been relayed to members both at the meeting and via various social media channels. Indeed, it turns out in the aftermath that he had been co-opted without his agreement, and one member of the CUOSC Board resigned due to his role in the communications surrounding this. An astonishing sequence of events, where despite being so slow to actually communicate the news, they still managed to mess it up.

Following this news and the loss of a board member, CUOSC made an appeal for a member to be co-opted onto the Board until the AGM as the number on had fallen below that required to make a quorum. Two of the UF group both applied, one publicly and one privately, to see if we’d be considered.

The replies both received were near-identical. Neither was approached for a proper chat or interview to sell their case or get a bit more background on their skillsets and knowledge. The confirmation that the co-opted place had gone to a member who had served on the board previously spoke volumes to us about the lengths that those on the board currently appear to be going to maintain the status quo.

With that co-opting decision in mind, we at UF spoke at length and made the decision that the only way change is realistically going to happen within CUOSC is to put forward candidates at the AGM ourselves. As we stated previously, this was never an original aim, but as the weeks and months have passed it’s clear to ourselves, and hopefully you the fans, that if this project is to succeed then we’re going to have to put our heads above the parapet and stand.

Therefore, in the next couple of weeks, some of UF will announce their intention to stand for election at the upcoming CUOSC AGM on Sunday 31st July.

We also hope that this will encourage other members who are not part of the UF group to stand. This whole process isn’t just about us, it’s about the entire fanbase. If our push to improve the Trust and make it more representative of our fanbase over the last few months encourages someone to step forward and offer their skills, we’d be delighted. If you feel you could offer something, then stand – the wider range of new people standing, the better.

When it comes to the AGM vote, if you the fans want change, then we would encourage you to vote for the new faces with fresh ideas, enthusiasm, and skillsets.

With the greatest respect to the current CUOSC Board, they’ve been in situ for many years as the organisation has gone stale. Change can only be made if you vote accordingly. The opportunity for a new CUOSC is NOW!

Oh, and if you haven’t joined yet, then please do so ASAP to make your vote count – you can’t complain if you don’t try to do something about it!

You can join CUOSC here: http://cuosc.org.uk/apply-for-membership/

Email: UnitaFortiorCUFC@outlook.com

Facebook Group: Unita Fortior
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1314815592271006

Twitter: @UnitaFortiorCU
https://twitter.com/unitafortiorcu

Someone mentioned what the trust were like years ago

Some of the stuff that’s happened this year has been comical. It’s a good statement and highlights the main thing that the current board want to keep the status quo no matter what.

I’ve no intention to stand but I’ll support the new candidates because it needs change. Again as mentioned in the statement the trust has gone stale.

My worry is, as mentioned before, you’ll still have the crux of the current board in place.

I’m not suggesting anything untoward at all, but I’d really be pushing for someone independent to do the counting of the votes and make sure it’s legitimate.

Quoted from Mullen103 on Tuesday, 21 June 2025

My worry is, as mentioned before, you’ll still have the crux of the current board in place.

Nonsense Mullen, three members are up for renewal plus Mark Middlings replacement.

Out of the current board of 8, 4 could potentially be replaced.

That’s more than enough to effect real change *if* people are prepared to join and vote for the change the Trust desperately needs

Great stuff. You've got my vote/s. I will be away on holiday. Will I definitely still be able to vote.

Quoted from whytakemypostcode on Tuesday, 21 June 2025

Great stuff. You've got my vote/s. I will be away on holiday. Will I definitely still be able to vote.

Yes, there’s no in person voting - postal or email/online only and thank you WTMP