The Membership Flame – an NFU Scotland award that recognises outstanding efforts in recruitment and retention of members – has gone to the hard-working Dumfries team of Sally Heggie and Louise Graham.
Looking after the interests of more than 300 members of the Dumfriesshire and Langholm branches, the Dumfries office is one of the busiest in the Union.
This year saw the team recruit 19 new members, retain 98 percent of existing members and bring in almost £90,000 in subscriptions.
They were at the heart of very successful Dumfries Show in August 2017, that saw the NFUS stand provide lunch and refreshments to more than 500 visitors. At the same event, the Union hosted many of the region’s politicians and launched the new regional health and welfare campaign.
Presenting the award at the Union’s annual conference and AGM in Glasgow, Chief Executive Scott Walker said: “It gives me great delight to congratulate the team at Dumfries on receiving this award. Providing a first-class service to the farming community is the key to both recruiting new members and keeping our existing ones and Sally and Louise have gone above and beyond with their performance this year.
“With the retirement of long-serving secretary Jim Milby in 2016, after 33 years, it is great to see the Dumfries and Langholm branches doing so well and I know that in the year ahead driving branch activity is high on their agenda.”
The Union’s unique local secretary network – which works on behalf of both NFU Scotland and NFU Mutual – continues to provide an excellent service to members around Scotland. It also generates great loyalty.
In the past year, the Union has said good bye to Mary Fisher, who retired after 32 years in the Bearsden office and Robin Gawn, of Perth, who retired after 26 years as a secretary.
In 2018, two NFUS secretaries – Elaine Robertson in Keith and Vicky Carmichael in Duns – will have been in post for 25 years while Kenny Slater in Orkney and Susan Lamont in Tiree have been NFUS secretaries for 20 years.
And a new crop of secretaries has joined the fold in the past 12 months – Chris Husthwaite (Campbeltown); Garry MacLean (Isle of Islay); Angela Smith (Bearsden); Margaret Hebbourn (Perth); Duncan Macintyre (Stornoway); Richard Murphy (Kilmarnock) and Katy Neill (Perth).
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