1. Financial year ended 31.03.2026

These are the current figures from Sage – to be reviewed before submission to Charity Commission.

Trading from 01.04.2025 to 31.03.2026

Summary: major improvement over last (and previous) years’ figures – loss of nearly £2k converted to profit of nearly £13k.

Sales up from £27k to £39k, but expenditure reduced from £29k to £26k.

But note that one rental makes up £9.5k, so important to ensure that they renew in August.

Profit and Loss Report

Total sales   £39,416

Total direct expenses   £15,625

Overheads   £10.840

Net profit (loss)   £12,951

The largest income generators are:

Room rentals             £23,505

Events – gross profit £2.297

Talks and workshops – gross profit  £2,604

Other income (mainly memberships and donations)  £1,810

Café (pre-creation of limited company) £1,141

Christmas Market – gross profit £1,081

The largest costs are:

Labour           £10,801

Cleaning £3,262

General Rates £1,677

Internet charges £1,794

2. Cash balances as at 09.04.2026

Bank account   £1,223

Savings account £18,118

Cash in hand         £107

Total £19,448

The above figures exclude £1,230 loaned to the café to cover start-up and subsequent costs.  The café repaid £270 of the £1,500 total loans last month.

Debtors as at 09.04.2026

Of the old invoices shown below:

Kids’ Club has promised payment when funding is received from the council.

Meal UK is expected to be cleared after checking payments received from the café.

Southlands Photography Club has just paid £100 on account and promised to pay the balance owed today.

4. Rental income

The main renters are:

HRSG £790 pcm (paid annually)

Opal Lily £350 pcm (should be more now the leak in the roof has been fixed)

Uxbridge Piano School £300 pcm

5. Café

Since 01.11.2025, the café has been operated by Southlands Community Café Ltd, a company 100% owned by Yiewsley and West Drayton Arts Council. It is hoped that the café will generate a useful income for the charity once the weather improves and a manager is appointed.

Michael Cook

Treasurer

The post Yiewsley and West Drayton Arts Council – Treasurer’s Report 9 April 2026 appeared first on Southlands Arts Centre.

Registered Charity: 1173801

Southlands Arts Centre 

75 The Green 

West Drayton

UB7 7AW 

AGM: 26^th March 2026 7 pm 

Trustees: 

Chris Wright (Chair) 

Lisa Tompkins (Dep. Chair) – Apologies

Jason Merry 

Olivia Smith (Resigned) 

Alan Boyd 

Dr. Ben Parker 

Vanessa Bonner 

Attendees: Paula O’Shea, Dr Ben Parker, Jason Merry, Vanessa Bonner, Chris Wright, Mike Cook, Clare Alford (member), Cllr Jan Sweeting, Cllr Scott Farley, Gwen (member), Ray Wasti, Wendy, Janet Quinn (member)

Apologies:, Sylvia Taylor, Tony Sandell, Mohammed Islam, Jayne Towndrow, Natashia Gravett, Jayne Towndrow, Alison Quinn, Luke Bryant, Lisa Tompkins, Sue Williams. 

Agenda

*Chairman’s Statement 

*Treasurers report 

*Re-election of annual Auditors 

* Retirement of Existing Chairman 

*Stand down of one existing Trustee 

*Re-election of existing Trustee by Proxy forms 

*New Potential Trustees to be proposed (subject to later approval by board of Trustees 

*Election of new Chair to be subject to later selection by board of Trustees 

*Award of Exceptional Support to Charity 

*Questions from the floor 

*A.O.B. 

Minutes

Chairman’s Statement

During the last year we’ve advanced from a loss-making position, and we’ve turned the situation around. Many, many, events have been run in the past year. Exhibitions, lessons, craft fayres, speaking functions, 

Classic music, we’ve brought the place to life. A large part of this is the café, which was considered impossible until recent years. It is essential for bringing people into the house. The gardening group have had a spectacular year which has attracted prizes and funding, it is an excellent example of what has been going on at Southlands. 

CW is disappointed that the lease has still not been finalised during his tenure, but he is hopeful that the changing staff and the contacts we now have will move this forward. We will be fundraising on the basis of a rolling lease. 

Pleased to say that from a fairly dismal position, the finances have improved substantially. Mike Cook has been extremely valuable in this. 

Treasurer’s report given by Mike Cook (See additional page)

24/25 accounts have been submitted and are available to view on the

Charities Commission website.

Not making a huge fortune, and in fact, in 24/25 we lost £1,814.

Context being that, in the previous year, we lost nearly £17k, and lost

£9k in the year before.

Turnover is shown in the increased activities, which are providing more

of the income. Steady growth in these areas.

Expenditure is not increasing in the same way.

YTD unaudited figures show £38k turnover and expenditure of £25k,

which should mean an overall profit in 25/26.

This is a major turnaround.

This is due to volunteers/staff/Trustees etc.

Cash in bank reserves is back up to £21k.

Managed to reduce the aged debtors also, with just a few currently on

the list. This was high due to a changeover in treasurer and Barclays

cutting off access to the bank. This means some of the old invoices have

been closed off, as they should have been marked as paid

previously, but this will not continue; it is an anomaly.

V6.1.26 AGM Agenda

Membership scheme – please sign up. Link on front page of website.

This helps the charity as it means more money coming in, but it also

means that we have numbers for funding, other organisations, and it

allows us to contact you easily to update you.

20% discount on Chess, Carrom and Scrabble club.

Café is currently open Saturday/Sunday –  please do come along. 

Easy fundraising – please sign up. Link on the website. It costs nothing to join but allows a small percentage of the money spent to be given to the charity 

https://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/southlands-arts-centre/qr

Re-election of annual Auditors – Lee Mathers

No objections. 

Retirement of Existing Chairman – Chris Wright. 

Stand down of one existing Trustee – Olivia Smith (letter on file)

Re-election of existing Trustee by Proxy forms 

Vanessa Bonner – to stand down and hope to be re-elected this year.  Happy for personal statement to be sent out. 

New Potential Trustees to be proposed:

Clare Alford – personal statement can be sent out.

With regards to the trustees, 

3^rd of the trustees must step down at the AGM. Chris Wright and Olivia Smith are resigning. Vanessa Bonner was co-opted and so needs to be re-elected during the time.
Anyone else is able to stand. It is the members who will vote on the trustees. 

Election of trustees

Any member can make suggestions. 

For trustee elections, we will be putting a ballot to the members, this will be emailed to all members, and a vote will be carried out. This is a blind vote. 

Trustee application forms are to be filled in and can be sent out with the permission of the applicants. 

Personal statements for new Trustees to be sent out to the members, with a ballot. 

14 clear days for voting to be carried out. 

Election of new Chair to be subject to later selection by the Board of Trustees 

This will occur once we have finalised the trustees. To be decided at the May Trustee meeting. 

Award of Exceptional Support to Charity 

Sylvia Taylor (not in attendance) is to be recognised for her long service to the centre. She has been an attendee, a volunteer and a trustee over her (25 yr) tenure at the centre. 

This will be deferred to a later meeting.

Questions from the floor 

Clare – What is the situation on the roof?

Jason – The roof has been sealed and fixed and is water-tight, and we are now in the process of sorting out the ceiling in the room. As this was preventable, and the council were informed 18 months before the leak caused the issue, there is a debate on who is responsible. Our insurance will cover the interiors of the house. 

Café

CW is very happy to have been involved in the birth of the café, along with Paula, and wants to encourage the trustees to back this going forward as it is a vital part of the centre. 

Over the course of the year, the café was being run by Mark as an independent enterprise. He left in October. We tried various things over the winter. Paula has been managing for first quarter. Consultation was held with interested parties, mostly sensible suggestions were given. Opening hours were agreed as weekends and possibly Friday/Monday. Most thought relaxing the USP to be vegetarian would be more amenable. Some people thought too expensive, some too cheap. 

Meeting before this:

Café is highly seasonal – breaking even in winter is hard

We’ve decided to advertise for a manager for the next six months. 

Big Thanks to Janet, Jason (in attendance) and Dawn, Kieran (not in attendance), who have been a huge help in the café. 

Paula has other responsibilities within the charity, so she cannot continue to manage.

The idea is to open over the summer with paid staff and volunteers. 

We are mostly breaking even. 

Cream teas will be making a recurrence during the summer. 

Ray – Are we able to cook on site?

Paula – This will be dependent on the lease, as it involves a change of use for the kitchen and then an application for the license. 

Ben – When we did have a full range, it wasn’t as popular as expected, wastage was high, and people had many ideas about what they wanted. 

Janet – Has anyone spoken with Kay’s Kitchen? Could be a win/win with them.

Ben – There is a lot of opportunity to discuss local suppliers. This has not yet been done. Pre-made sandwiches are on our list to discuss with them. 

Paula – Kays and Sharon are both preferred suppliers for private functions. We’ve worked with them both on prior events. 

Clare – We did that for our event, and it would be good to publicise that outside caterers are allowed on site and how to go ahead with that. 

Paula – We are working on getting the “preferred list” of caterers on the website with the new room hire rates and private hire aspects. 

Chris – Worth mentioning that even with Craft Markets, if someone makes food items, they need their own insurance. 

Ben – just to highlight, this is why the café is an independent business, which is registered on Companies House to protect the charity.

Ray – Are there any plans for lights in the car park?

Paula – We were on the list for the council for 2025. As you can see, that hasn’t occurred. I have a budget for temporary lights in the car park, and I’ve had the bushes cut for more light on the stairs. This should be addressed in the coming months. 

Jan – I brought it up with the council recently. Please do bring it up to me again via email, and I will chase it with them. 

*A.O.B. 

Huge Thank You to Chris Wright for his work.

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