Thursday 1 September 2016 was the date for our Humorous Speech Contest when a fun time was had by all.
The meeting was ably led by our Contest Chair, Susan Rayner, who warmed us all up by asking us to say what we liked about summer.
This led us into the Humorous speeches. We had six contestants Ian Brett, Sue Shaw, Richard Murray, Alex Clark, David Henson and Neil Pettigrew.
They entertained us with their humorous stories, which included a visit to the theatre, getting a Parking Ticket, a Voucher for a tattoo, playtime, the lyrics of a well-known song and a fairy tale.
The speeches were followed by Table Topics. The topic was a very interesting one,
“Do you believe that effort is its own reward?”
This led to some entertaining speeches and some diverse opinions about the topic from our contestants Sue Shaw, Alex Clark, Richard Murray, Paul Lynch, David Wilson, Neil Pettigrew, and Ian Brett.
In between the two events Susan led a very lively debate about whether it was right that Apple Computers should pay so little tax. On one side of the debate we had Apple Executives and on the other we had Members of Parliament. This led to some interesting and heated speeches on the topic.
This was a great idea as it meant that everyone could get involved with giving a speech – not just the contestants.
The evening was finished off by giving a Certificate of Participation to all the contestants followed by giving Winning Certificates to the top three in each event.
The winners were:
Table Topics: 1. Neil Pettrigrew, 2. Richard Murray 3. Sue Shaw.
Humorous Speeches: 1. Richard Murray 2. David Henson 3. Sue Shaw.
The winners Neil and Richard were also presented with awards by our Contest Chair, Susan.
Neil and Richard will be going through to the Area Finals on Wednesday 5th October – please come along and support them. The Area Finals will be held from 7pm at the Mind Building, 10 Altyre Road, East Croydon.
Finally, thanks to all the contestants, judges, contest chair and everyone else who took part and who helped to make this a fun, fantastic evening.