Chris Hall

Occupation: Legal Adviser

Co-operative businesses traded with in the last 12 months: Food and Bank

Skills and experience

As a solicitor and lifelong co-operator I’m willing to speak up for members on the National Members’ Council. I will propose greater openness by the NMC to keep members more informed. I’ll ensure better communication via Facebook, emails (chrishall@phonecoop.coop), twitter (@chrishall6412) and face to face, so members can participate in more Society events. I’ll assist our Member Pioneers, with activities to connect our shops with members and customers for maximum community impact across Wales.

Additional Information

We need to lift the cloak of confidentiality that hangs over the National Members’ Council so that Society members know a lot more about what is being done in their name and the Board can be called to account. Why is our Society so secretive? Business sensitive information should remain confidential, but thereafter the presumption should be in favour of openness and disclosure. Only with this basic information about the society's performance and social or community activities, can we decide if the Board are doing a good job or if the executive team need to be challenged? Our 5 million members shouldn't be kept in the dark.

We need to re-engage our active members, rebuilding the broad base of membership across Wales and England, so as to create a more dynamic society that really listens and responds to the member’s voice. We should seek to increase member participation and activities in the regions so as to enthuse and involve more people in co-operation, thereby increasing trade with our society. This in turn will create future generations of co-operators who will keep our society vibrant and relevant in 2018 and beyond.

I drafted the member’s motion on pay ratios and gathered the requisite 100+ member signatures so that it was put on the AGM agenda, voted upon and ultimately carried overwhelmingly by 97% of those who voted at the 2017 AGM. As a result the Board and Executive Managers will now be held to account at the 2018 AGM for the excessive levels of executive pay at the top of our Society in comparison to that of shop floor workers.

The management need to reach out beyond Manchester, to get us all excited about co-operation as a better and fairer way of doing business that is ethical and sustainable and therefore good for everyone. But where our business is successful, the profit (or surplus) should be shared more evenly amongst all 70,000 colleagues who contributed to that success.

As well as holding the Board to account, the 5 Wales representatives on the NMC must become more accessible to fellow members, colleagues and customers so as to identify what works in Wales and share good practices. I belong to or have links with many organisations which could work more closely with the Co-operative Group for their mutual benefit. These include: Wales Co-operative Centre, Co-ops & Mutuals Wales, Gwerin Y Coed (Woodcraft Folk), Shared Interest, Lendwithcare, Cambrian Credit Union, Moelyci, Revolver (Coffee) Co-op and the Woodland Trust. I am a qualified solicitor working in the magistrates courts and have lived in North Wales for 23 years. I am a member of the Phone Coop; a life member of C.A.T, Machynlleth and the National Trust, for whom I also volunteer. I have been an active trade unionist for many years and I believe that I possess the skills, energy, ideas and enthusiasm to make a great success as part of the Wales team of representatives on the NMC. Twitter: @chrishall6412; Email: chrishall@phonecoop.coop.