St Cuthbert & First Martyrs of Rome Pastoral Parish Council

Chairperson           Yvonne Coppin (email)

Vice Chairperson     David Somerville (email)

The aim of the PPC is to promote parish life and its activities.

The Committee meets approximately once a quarter in the church halls of either St Cuthbert’s or First Martyrs. Minutes of the previous meeting are available in either church and on the website.

Agenda items are welcomed from the committee or Parish members and can be added to the proposed agenda which is again available prior to any meeting in either church or on the website.

The next committee meeting of the PPC is on Wednesday 9th April 2008 in the church hall of First Martyrs.

Background to the formation of the Pastoral Parish Council.

The Pastoral Parish Council was formed following recommendations made by the Steering Group and two open meetings of the Parish. To achieve the aim of the PPC i.e. to promote Parish life and its activities, it was recommended that the ideal committee should be a balanced mixture of 8 to 10 people representing the three main constituent groups of the parish i.e. Fabric, Liturgy/Evangelical and Pastoral/Social and also possible nominations from Parish members. The Parish Priest would be the President and there would be two ex officio members in the posts of Secretary and Finance.

Because of the diverse interests and involvements of the Parish it was recognised that on occasions, additional members may be co-opted onto Council for a short period of time and/or sub committees could be formed to cover a particular project. It was also thought that the first committee may have slightly increased numbers to help its establishment.

It was recommended that the PPC would meet three times a year (one per School Term) with a fourth open meeting being the AGM. It was recognised initially that it may be beneficial to have more frequent meetings until the Council was up and running.

The way forward:

Following and based on these recommendations the first meeting of the PPC took place on the 4th July 2007 in the Church Hall of First Martyrs with the committee as listed below.

Further meetings were held on the 3rd October 2007 and the 22nd January 2008 with full member attendance at meetings. The focus to date has been on the Welcome, involvement of the Youth and some basic changes to the safety and structure of the Parish.