These Minutes have been approved (as amended) by the EBLIDA Council, May 2006.
 

Minutes EBLIDA Council Meeting,
Cork, Ireland, 13-14 May 2006

Friday 13 May 2005

1.    Opening and announcements

The President of EBLIDA, Jan Ewout van der Putten, opened the meeting and made the corresponding presentation of the invited speaker, Tom McCarthy.

2.    Apologies for absence

The Secretariat received apologies of absence from the following members:

3.  Approval of agenda

The agenda was approved with the following amendments:

Finn Vester requested to discuss Item 14. Draft Budget 2006 together with Item 12. EBLIDA Finances: Financial Statement 2004 & Draft Budget 2005.

Jan Ewout van der Putten suggested discussing Items 15 & 16 right after Item 12, before the Elections.

The Agenda was approved.

5, 6 and 7.    Discussion Groups: general introduction, discussions and conclusions

Jan Ewout van der Putten introduced the organisation of the Discussion Groups. He related the topics of the discussion groups in Council with the work of the EBLIDA Working Groups. He said that the EBLIDA working group on WTO (World Trade Organization) matters came up in Madrid in 2001 spontaneously and that EBLIDA working groups appear naturally as a response to an urgent need in time, like for instance the EBLIDA copyright Expert Group (CEG). During the discussions for a new EBLIDA Strategy in 2003 – 2004, the EBLIDA PEG (Professional Education working group), came along and all members were invited to nominate a representative. 

Jan Ewout van der Putten continued saying that at present the creation of a working group on Culture has to be decided, but EBLIDA has no rules to regulate its working groups and there is a need to regulate their role.

Jan Ewout van der Putten said that the Executive Committee decided on their meeting the previous day in Cork that the EBLIDA working groups’ functioning needs to be regulated in order to make sure that their members give expertise and share knowledge and not join just to learn or benefit from the work of the Director.

The Spokespersons of each Council’s Discussion Group presented the groups’ topics and gave a summary of the EBLIDA recent actions on these fields.

The Spokespersons of the Discussion Groups were:

o            Winnie Vitzansky, EBLIDA Institutional and Membership matters

o            Toby Bainton, Copyright and related rights

o            Sue Brown, Professional Education matters

o            Frode Bakken, World Trade Organization (WTO) and EU related legislation

o            Britt Marie Häggström, EU Culture matters.

Participants were assigned to the discussion group of their choice and met after lunch in their corresponding meeting rooms. The Spokespersons of the Discussion Groups appointed participants in each group who would report to the Council plenary on the conclusions of each group and who submitted the following conclusions:

        EBLIDA Institutional and Membership matters

Participants: Nana Berg, Klaus-Peter Böttger, María Pía González Pereira, Pedro Hípola, Jens Lethan, Jonna Vestergaard, Winnie Vitzansky.

Rapporteur: Nana Berg, Denmark.

Following the presentation made by Winnie Vitzansky and her paper on this matter, the conclusions of this group were as follows:

Role of EBLIDA

The discussion group tackled the question about the role of EBLIDA and agreed that it is to lobby and bring issues to a political level.

New EU countries

Also the issue about the new EU countries was raised and how EBLIDA can make these countries’ library Associations become members.

It was agreed that there is a need to make these Associations aware that it is important for them to contact their Governments and corresponding Ministries in order to support their EBLIDA membership. This would also apply to candidate countries to the EU. Means to raise this awareness can be to organise workshops in the new EU countries, where the work that EBLIDA performs can be explained. Also, when Executive Committee meetings are held, local library associations should be invited to attend them as observers.

Non EU Associations: Full members?

The answer to this question was unanimously negative as this would blur the EBLIDA focus.

EBLIDA Associate members: voting rights?

There was a long and interesting discussion about this delicate question, as there are both pros and cons in this matter. It was also suggested that voting should be pondered according to the membership fee paid by each member. However, the conclusion was that the current system of membership in EBLIDA should be supported.

        Copyright and related rights

Participants: Toby Bainton, Ilona Fonyó, Karin Linder, María José Moura, Jorge Manuel Resende, Grether Rostboll, Olga Saíz, Juan Carlos Sánchez Olivares, Bas Savenije, Thórdís Thórarinsdóttir.

Rapporteur: Bas Savenije, the Netherlands.

No conclusions are available.           

        Professional Education matters

Participants: Michèle Battisti, Sue Brown, Pernille Drost, Ghyslaine Duong-Vinh, Berndt Fredriksson, Aleksandra Horvat, Helena Patricio, Silja Rekomaa, Tuula Ruhanen, Andris Vilks.

Rapporteur: Pernille Drost (Denmark)

No conclusions are available.   

        World Trade Organization (WTO) and EU related legislation

Participants: Henrik Aslund, Frode Bakken, Marian Koren, Jan Ewout van der Putten, Disa Svenskberg.

Rapporteur: Marian Koren (Netherlands)

No conclusions are available.

        EU Culture

Participants: Giles Eboli, Britt-Marie Häggström, Gerald Leitner, Carmen Morlón, Christa Müller, Liam Ronayne, Monika Schlenger, Maria Carla Sotgiu, Finn Vester. 

Rapporteur: Liam Ronayne (Ireland)

A group of 9, convened by Britt Marie Häggström, met on 13^th May to discuss what EBLIDA should do in the field of culture.  The group felt that it was too early to form a working group; rather the immediate need was to prepare a position paper for consideration by the first European Culture Council under the UK Presidency, to be held in autumn 2005.  The following decisions were made:

o        Establish a distribution/discussion list to exchange ideas and help formulate a position paper.

o        Prepare position paper by end June, tailored to possible European Culture Council agenda.

o        Carmen Morlon to send relevant documents to distribution list: proposed Culture and Citizens’ Programme; recent agendas from European Parliament, Commission and Council relating to cultural questions.

o        Carmen Morlon to draft an outline of a position paper dealing with: role of libraries in European culture; libraries as national cultural repositories; digitization; libraries as agents of integration of newcomers; and services to the public.

The essential purpose for the position paper would be to argue why libraries are vital cultural resources in Europe. The draft will be forwarded to the incoming President and Executive of EBLIDA so that it may be ready for submission to the European Culture Council.

8 and 9.    Plenary discussion and recommendations to Council

Further to the presentation of conclusions by the Rapporteurs of each discussion group, the Council commented on a few points.

Sue Brown said that the EBLIDA PEG (Working Group on Professional Education) would present a report to the Executive Committee for some clear action on this matter.

Berndt Fredriksson commented that when it comes to archives, certification issues are different from those applicable to libraries. Archivists are still trying to define their own profession. If there would be an EBLIDA Position on this matter, it must include a section on professional education for archivists.

About the voting rights system in EBLIDA, the Council agreed that no changes should be made to the Constitution at present concerning the EBLIDA membership and voting rights.

The Council agreed on this way of organizing the meeting and with discussing EBLIDA lobby issues within the discussion groups.

Pernille Drost (Denmark), Disa Svenskberg (Finland) and Saara Ihamaki (Finland) commented very positively on the Cork’s Council organisation.

These Minutes have been approved (as amended) by the EBLIDA Council, May 2006.
 

Minutes EBLIDA Council Meeting,
Cork, Ireland, 13-14 May 2006

Before the beginning of the Council meeting on Saturday morning, Thórdís Thórarinsdóttir (Iceland) handed out to María Pía González Pereira a book entitled "History of Icelandic Library Associations" Annual Report of Upplýsing (Icelandic Library and Information Science Association) as a present for the Secretariat. 

María Pía González Pereira thanked Upplýsing and notified Jan Ewout van der Putten, who also thanked Iceland for the gesture and said that although grateful for the invitation to celebrate the next EBLIDA annual Council meeting in Iceland, this would have to be postponed until 2007, as it is intended to celebrate the Council 2006 in one of the new EU members.

10 and 11.    EBLIDA Annual Report 2004 – 2005 and Annual Work Programme 2004 - 2005

María Pía González Pereira presented briefly both documents.

As regards EBLIDA Cooperation with other Organizations, Berndt Fredriksson (Sweden) had been appointed member of the ICA Steering Committee on Professional Associations which is concerned with the professional education for archivists. This appointment is to be considered as a part of the efforts to build up relations between EBLIDA and the International Council on Archives.

After discussion, both documents were approved by the Council.

12 and 14.    EBLIDA Finances: Financial Statement 2004, Draft Budget 2005 and Preliminary Draft Budget 2006

        Financial Statement 2004

Klaus-Peter Böttger presented the EBLIDA financial matters. He thanked María Pía González Pereira for making the information accessible to him and always having the right answers.

Klaus-Peter Böttger said that in the Annual Report 2004 – 2005 (pages 19 - 21), María Pía González Pereira explained very well the current financial situation of EBLIDA. Only small deviations are observed regarding the estimations, but the balance of 2004 shows a very positive result of 5.493, 84 Euros.

The Council approved the EBLIDA Financial Statement 2004.

        Draft Budget 2005

The Council approved the Draft Budget 2005.

        Preliminary Draft Budget 2006

The Draft Budget 2006 was approved by Council, although corrections will have to be made later on according to development of administration.

13.    Elections 2005 – 2007: EBLIDA President and Executive Committee

Klaus-Peter Böttger coordinated the elections procedure. He explained that, in accordance with the EBLIDA Constitution, the Director called for nominations in January 2005 and the nominations had been registered and uploaded on the EBLIDA website as received in the Secretariat.

The elections for Executive Committee members were celebrated on the first place. The candidates for the Executive Committee 2005 – 2007 presented themselves to the Council and gave a brief introduction on their background.

The candidates were: Gerald Leitner (Austria), Finn Vester (Denmark), Disa Svenskberg (Finland), Barbara Lison (Germany) –absent and represented by Klaus-Peter Böttger-, Carla Sotgiú (Italy), Bas Savenije (Netherlands), Helena Patrício (Portugal), Olga Saíz (Spain), Karin Åström (Sweden) –absent and represented by Karin Linder-, Kjell Nilsson (Sweden) –absent and represented by Henrik Aslund-, Sue Brown (UK), and Toby Bainton (UK).

After the presentations, the election procedure took place. There were 33 ballot papers and the candidates received the following votes:

The election procedure for EBLIDA President took place afterwards. The 2 candidates, Pedro Hípola (Spain) and Jan Ewout van der Putten (Netherlands), presented themselves and their views on the direction of EBLIDA in the next term 2005 – 2007. There were 33 ballot papers, 2 were in blank and 31 were valid, and the results were as follows:

According to the results, the EBLIDA Executive Committee and President for the term 2005 – 2007 will be as follows:

NOTE: After the closure of the Council meeting the new executive Committee met and Sue Brown was elected Vice-President.

15.    Approval of Draft Minutes Council meeting Estoril, Portugal, 14 and 15 May 2004

The Minutes were approved.

16.   Items arising from Minutes Executive Committee meetings

There were no comments.

• Executive Committee meeting in Estoril, Portugal, 13 May 2004
• Executive Committee meeting in Prague, Czech Republic, 5-6 November 2004
• Executive Committee meeting in Helsinki, Finland, 12 March 2005

The Minutes were approved.