PRESENT : Alan Mc Connochie, Tom Bettley, Georgia O’Neill, John Cable, Derek Crook, Sandy Brunton, James Hilder.

APOLOGIES : Olive Brown, Michael Ackerley.

MINUTES : Minutes of the meeting on 7th July 2003 proposed by John and seconded by Georgia.

Sandy thanked Michael for acting as Chair at the previous meeting at such short notice.

MATTERS ARISING : ROAD UPGRADE - <JAMES> will speak to the STRAG reps.

TRAVEL FAIR - Next meeting.

ZYNET - Sandy ran through his response to Alan Parker and Alan’s reply.

CONSTITUTION - <JAMES> will look into improvements required, but in his opinion it needed only minor additions.

PRESIDENT : The Scottish Executive would like to make a presentation on power efficiency and waste minimisation.<SANDY> will contact. <MICHAEL> will comment on the Area Transport Guide for winter at the next meeting.<GEORGIA> will put the Learn Direct details on the website.

WEBSITE - Georgia reported an increase in visitors to our site. She is still looking for content for the Zynet site. <GEORGIA> will look into the digital picture competition suggested by John.

M.I.C.T. - James updated the Chamber on the activities of the MICT. These included a new map showing car parks, the MESS recycling scheme, the Bunessan swap shop, Food Festival, Drimnin ferry, comm. butcher shop. Island Voices involves a survey of the issues affecting Mull & Iona.

James displayed a plan for a MICT office and Comm. business centre in Craignure.<JAMES> will send the Chamber a letter requesting support.

TREASURER - Tom reported a balance of £3916.21.

SECRETARY - Alan reported on correspondence received in the month. Alan also advised that he had signed up for a First Aid course organised by the Glasgow Chamber and received a 25% discount as a Chamber member.

AOCB - Alan Parker’s application to re-join the Chamber was accepted and <SANDY> will advise him of the Board’s decision.

<SANDY> will prepare a press release in the event he is contacted for the Chambers view on the Cal. Mac. strike/settlement at John’s suggestion.

John suggested organising a meeting for tourism based members. <JOHN> will make enquiries re venue and when arranged <GEORGIA> will send a circular e-mail to members and former members.

Derek advised that there are to be 11 Waste Area Strategy Groups set up in Scotland. The group for our area will hold their next meeting on Mull.

SEPA have picked up on the Chamber’s successful waste meeting last year and are suggesting that other organisations on Mull join in the strategy on minimisation.