Last weekends NKC talkfest, including a  list of late agenda items, is estimated to cost   karters around $7K – what benefits are there of these meetings to karters ??  

Every couple of months or less there are meetings that do not seem to achieve anything other than expend karters funds , the organisation seems hell bent on calling meetings and then not effectively achieve anything worthwhile at them.  Wonder why, well it's complicated but 2 answers leap out at you, the late agenda items being one and the lack of a strategic plan being the other.  

To understand why late agenda items are left field, we need to recap on how the AKA is supposed to work. The NKC is just a council or committee who's voters are the representatives of the members, the states. The states instruct their council rep on what they wish to say on business that has been notified which means the states need to be notified well in advance of the business to be conducted so a state council meeting can discuss the matters and instruct the rep. Simple really, but late agenda items don't fit the bill because the states haven't considered them and instructed their rep. There's a strong argument that the NKC can't validly resolve that type of business. For example, the JMax case (and closer to home, the un-notified motion to remove RV from his position as Nat Tech Coordinator)  

Leaving aside the unconstitutional nature of this, this business is put to just 7 mostly well intentioned individuals who mostly have no idea what the background is, and who don't have the benefit of their State's discussion and direction and instead of saying sorry, we can't deal with this, they make decisions off their own bat. An inglorious example of the mess that leads to is the CIK engines. The IKC said the series isn't viable, don't go ahead. The NKC did it anyway and the AKA owns 40 CIK engines that are now just 4 months short of being redundant.

 Since July 2003, there has been a push towards Governance via a Board of Directors under a  sports best management practice structure. 

Preparations for moving the association into a new area was completed some 3 years ago  and an HR expert arranged to vet over 40 expressions of interest from very qualified applicants in banking and finance, technical, competition and marketing and promotion but  that died because someone thought it could be done for half the price but never took it further.   Having skilled expertise as the required criteria for  members of a board  is just common sense to take the sport forward but it seems a number of current office holders  don't see themselves as being put in the reserves despite the fact that since 2003, no strategy has been produced and they still can't run the Association according to the simple rules that you notify the members of the business in time for them to instruct their reps.

Not to mention the conflicts of interest, vested and pecuniary interests and the like.

In November 2008 , Governance came back to the table in a highly modified form to the model approved by the members. This time, we punters were advised that migration to a Company Limited by Guarantee need not take place , the clubs were no longer to be the members, the directors no longer had to be skilled in the area they applied for and the current exec who are part of the NKC and so share in the blame for the years of mismanagement, appear as your interim board of directors. 

At this weekends indoctrination, CLG is back on the agenda (good) but then this masterpiece   from the mob who have no instructions from their states:

"The NKC voted to accept the move towards the new structure with a final vote to be taken at the June conference following the receipt of the final draft of the new constitution. It has been said for a number of years that the Governance structure  will take our sport into a new era and it is pleasing to see that the NKC has voted, to accept the final draft of the constitution, which will be presented in June."

NKC delegates, please listen. You cannot change the constitution, it is the members who must vote on any constitutional change and if that means our existing constitution, then by a special resolution of 75% in favour. 6 of 7 members must agree.

The NKC's 'agreement in principle' is ridiculous as it has no standing  and is just the opinion of the 7 individuals who made it, not the opinion of the states who don't know how to instruct them because that business hasn't been notified.

That is not entirely their fault, their states need to act more responsibly and tell them not to deal with any business that hasn't been notified.  Maybe then, the rot would stop or, at least abate