And now for some serious (UN-style!) Negotiation

As the conference has progressed, everyone has started to get down to the serious business of considering the motions which we will be asked to vote on tomorrow. This requires considerable concentration, with every break in proceedings rapidly being seized as an opportunity for discussion and negotiation between delegations on the finer points of detail.

A key focus of discussion at this - the 35th - World conference has been the changes which the World Board are proposing to make to the WAGGGS constitution. Just as we, in the UK, have been reviewing our governance arrangements, to ensure that they remain effective in the 21st century, so the World Board have been looking at how WAGGGS needs to respond to the changing environment they operate in. So - if I had hoped to escape from governance duties (I am currently chairing the steering group which is reviewing Girlguiding's governance arrangements) by coming to Hong Kong, it was time to think again!

The WAGGGS offices are in London, at Pax Lodge and this means that they are required to operate under UK law - bringing with it all the complexities of negotiating constitutional changes with the UK Charity Commission. With our knowledge of the UK context, we quickly recognised the value of the World Board's proposal that WAGGGS should become an incorporated charity and have made it clear from early in the conference that we will support this proposal when we are asked to vote on it tomorrow.

For many other member organisations, most of whom operate in a very different legal context, the decision has been a more challenging one and a number of concerns have been expressed about the process which has been adopted to try to navigate the Charity Commission's complex requirements as well as about some of the implementation detail, which has yet to be worked out. The UK delegation has therefore had a role to play in helping others to work their way through the various issues. 

This has translated into much time spent in discussion with a number of other delegations, pulling together a joint statement, which was read to the Conference by the Swedish delegation during this afternoon's governance debate. In it, we - together with Denmark; Norway; Sweden; Finland and Iceland have made clear our recognition of the proposed changes to the WAGGGS constitution but called on the conference to support us in asking the World Board to take note of a number of important principles as they move forward with the development of the accomanying processes and procedures.

The debate over, we now await with interest the outcome of tomorrow's vote on the subject.