Questions people ask

No. Tickets and membership are completely separate. Plenty of people come every year and never become members, and that's totally fine.

No. Membership is free, with no dues. The only money ever attached to it is the £1 guarantee, and that only bites in the unlikely event the company is wound up owing money.

We'll send you a friendly nudge when it's time, and renewing is one click. If you'd rather step back, you can leave any time. No hard feelings.

Of course. You can resign whenever you like from your account. The £1 guarantee tails off a year after you leave, and then you're fully out.

We want to encourage people to have their say & get involved in running Nest in the future. Board members also want to be able to retire from the board at some point & know that there’s a pathway for others to take up the mantle & keep Nest going. A key thing for us is to make it possible for new people with new ideas to be able to join the Board, not just people who we happen to know. This seems to be the best, most open way we can achieve that.

It’s a risk, but we trust you as members to participate & get involved. If you care about the future of Nest you’ll turn up to the AGM & vote according to your conscience & best judgement to shape the future of Nest. If you don’t then Nest probably won’t continue, or it’ll go a direction none of us is comfortable with. That’ll be your fault for not participating and leaving others to set the direction.

No. You can contribute in any way you like at Nest, volunteer for build, strike, Ranger, Site lead, bring a theme camp, do a welfare shift, bring art, act as a link organising any area you like, etc. Nothing has changed. The only role you can’t do without being a member is become a Trustee. As becoming a Trustee carries with it its own legal responsibilities (far more onerous than that of a member) we don’t think that’s a big issue.

We don’t want to impose legal rights and responsibilities on people if they only want to buy a ticket to an event. We think people will be more involved if they make an active and informed choice to become a member of Burning Nest Ltd. This means that we have to pay Corporation Tax if we go above the required threshold of profits, but as a conscious community we are happy to do our part in funding [public services which we rely upon as an event and a community. We also recognise the fact that as an organisation we are effectively non profit making - any profit we make in ticket sales is used to fund Nest, whether in that year or the next.

Nest & Decom (all burns really) are very different events with different history & ways of working. At Nest we realise that there are many people deeply involved in and committed to Nest who, for whatever reason, don’t take a lead role: those who bring a theme camp each year, are involved in welfare, who bring art or volunteer heavily in different ways. We wanted to include these people. We also wanted to ensure that every member has an equal say & equal rights to feed into decisions about Nest’s future, not just those who take on a lead role.

No, legally & for the purposes of having a say in the governance of Nest you’re not. We value you greatly & love that you keep coming to Nest though.

Legally, tickets (we called them memberships for a while) are tickets and not recognised in law as a membership. Initially ‘membership’ was used in comms to foster a concept of community in Nestlings. We hadn’t considered the legal meaning. Now as a more established event we are looking at promoting democratic involvement of our community. Membership has a legal status under the Companies Act 2006 under which Burning Nest Ltd is governed. Nest is a private company limited by guarantee, it is guaranteed by its members. Until recently the members were the original 3 guarantors who set up Nest in 2013. The board weren’t even members. Up till now we haven’t opened up the opportunity for people to become official, legally recognised members. This is what we are trying to change to allow for more community input in the running of Nest. To be a member we need to jump through some legal hoops, collect certain information for a register & make you aware of the legal rights and responsibilities. We have not done that previously, we’re doing it now.

No, you won’t need to register again, but you’ll need to renew your membership - if you want to - by clicking an email link we send you. You can cancel your membership on this platform, through settings.

No window, join whenever you like. That said, for technical issues, and to prevent entryism, if you join less than 2 months before the AGM you won’t be able to vote in that AGM, but you’ll be a full member and able to vote in all subsequent AGMs.

We set out the details of this in the constitution. If you’ve never attended Nest (a requirement of membership) your membership may be revoked. Similarly if you’re banned from attending Nest, or evicted from site, your membership may be revoked. Revocation of membership for any other reason would require a vote of members at a General Meeting. This is pretty standard practice for membership organisations.

Members of Burning Nest Ltd will be able to hold the Board to account over decisions, raising questions at the AGM & getting answers from the Board or others in the event team. They can stand to become a Board member, vote for the Board, and raise resolutions to be voted on at the AGM.

No, a ticket to Nest costs the same for everyone and no one has preferential access to buy tickets. There are no perks or benefits to membership other than having a voice in the future of Nest.

No, the Trustees might, but you as a member won’t be in any trouble. Unless you started it of course.

Talking mainly, I expect. It’ll be the first legal & official one we’ve had so who knows. We have in the past held AGMs, or Townhall meetings, and these have been useful and informative. Got a question for us, want to raise any important issues, what to know why that thing happened last year? The AGM is a good chance to ask.

Possibly, but we trust people in this community. We’ve set certain criteria around who can stand as a Trustee to try to avoid entryism by those with no involvement or commitment to Nest. We also believe our new constitution protects us from that sort of thing by setting out the various roles and responsibilities of those who volunteer in different ways to make Nest happen. By setting out clear areas of responsibility for volunteers, theme camps and circle links and limiting the extent to which anyone can impose things on them. We also rely on you, as a member, to be involved and alert to potential issues which might lead to disaster. We feel we’ve got a strong enough community which cares enough about Nest & its future to make this work. If we don’t, and Nest fails, then it’ll be because we trusted the community too much. We’re quietly optimistic though.

No, our hands are tied a bit here by company law in the UK, which specifies how companies are run and how they respond to their members. That said we are a burn and a do-ocracy. Everyone involved in Nest is an unpaid volunteer, and those who step up to lead a certain area or ensure something happens (e.g. power, LBT, art, etc) do so with autonomy and under their own direction. We don’t want to try to tell them what to do. If you have better ideas then stand up and volunteer to take over that area and implement your own ideas. We don’t tell other people how they should work. There is a bit of a conflict between these two concepts, so to unite them in a workable way we’ve tailored the Constitution (which spells out how Burning Nest Ltd is governed) to reflect our established ways of working and principles as a burn.

There are some legal requirements around this. Basically you need to provide us with the resolution you want to propose, in writing, at least 28 days before the date of the AGM. You also need to get signatures (electronic ones are ok) from 5 people as ‘proposers’ of the resolution & 35 other members who support it.

The Board, and Burning Nest Ltd, isn’t a hierarchical organisation, we don’t have any control over how any of the circles or areas of Nest do their thing (beyond requiring basic legal & financial competence). We don’t tell anyone what to do or how to run the things they’ve volunteered to handle. So resolutions, which can be acted upon. You can raise resolutions to remove a trustee from office or require Nest to take some particular action. That said no resolutions can be accepted if they would be ineffective if passed - that includes resolutions containing offensive language, resolutions incompatible with the constitution, law, regulations, licensing conditions or contracts between Nest & third parties.

Trustees are ultimately responsible for ensuring that Burning Nest Ltd operates legally & safely. While legally we’re responsible in practice we don’t have any real power, we rely on everyone from individual volunteers to circle links to make Nest happen. We don’t try to tell them what to do. We try to give them the tools to make their jobs easier & we try to handle the legal, financial & licensing issues. Trustees also carry all the legal responsibility in the event of anything serious goes wrong, and act as the lightning rod for people who want to complain about Nest & how it’s run.

First, become a member by 29th September. Then there will be further comms and more info on the process with a deadline for Trustee nominations of 29th October.

Anyone who has signed up to be a member by 29th September latest, and also meets the criteria in the constitution for standing to be a Trustee. Which are: "3.7 Election of Trustees A) Any Member wishing to nominate themselves for election as Trustee must meet all criteria in Part One, and one of the criteria in Part Two below: Part One: i) Have attended at least one of the last 2 Burning Nests. ii) Be committed to the ongoing continuation of Burning Nest. iii) Have never been excluded from Burning Nest for breach of the code of conduct. iv) Have never been asked to leave a theme camp they’ve camped with at Burning Nest. v) Provide a completed board application form and CV within the advertised timescale. vi) Be over the age of 18. vii) Not be legally disqualified from serving as a Director or Trustee of a UK company; viii) Be a Member of The Organisation. Part Two: ● Have previously held a Circle Link, or Circle Co-Link role, at Burning Nest; or ● Have previously been a site lead; or ● Have previously led a Theme Camp at Burning Nest (including Welfare); or 6 ● Have previously brought large scale art to Burning Nest (including Temple or Effigy); or ● Have previously been a Trustee of Burning Nest Ltd." We want to encourage anyone who cares about Burning Nest, meets the criteria and has time and enthusiasm to give to stand for elections. We also want to encourage more folk from marginalised communities, and in terms of the current representation in the board we would particularly encourage those from diverse backgrounds to stand. Two of the current board members are standing down, which means we are looking for up to 4 new Trustees

Probably a spreadsheet, but yes. We’re legally required to keep a register of members & certain information about them. This won’t be shared unless we’re legally required to. We also have a new privacy and data protection policy which sets out how we handle your data.

Back in 2013 when Nest was first started the original organisers wanted a legal structure for the organisation and event which limited personal liability and wasn’t owned by or reliant on any individual. They set up Nest as a private company limited by guarantee, which meant Nest is owned by its members. Frankly as a membership owned company we’re probably the least corporate we can be while still having the benefits of being a separate legal entity. We considered things like a CIC (Community Interest Company), but it doesn’t provide much practical benefit for us, while having some more onerous requirements.