GB - simple solution.
Find someone to put in a proposal to the committee and who would be willing to take on the responsibility that Martin has taken on.
True, and I'm seriously considering offering my services to do this.
I can see the point of view that some people have regarding DIYs and Perms, however I tend to use them as a last resort. If there's a calendar ride that is relatively easy to get to then I'll plan on doing it. If there's only one weekend I'm free in a certain month, and the only calendar rides that weekend are 400 miles away in Scotland then I'll be riding a DIY or a Perm.
If some people are riding just DIYs and Perms then the reasons why need to be uncovered, rather than just assuming that DIYs are detrimental to calendar rides. Maybe, like one person I know of, only rides DIYs because they work weekends. If DIYs or Perms didn't exist then there'd be little point for him being an Audax UK member.
I'm sure there are people who prefer riding DIYs to calendar events, AUK isn't exactly filled with the most sociable and extroverted bunch of people, but getting rid (I know you're not suggesting that) of DIY rides isn't the way to solve this problem as it just punishes people who do use them "responsibly".
I'll can quite happily go through all of the DIY rides I've done and explain why I did them. This year I've done 4 DIYs, three covered by mid-week 3 day ride up to Edinburgh to recce the LEL route for my piece of mind (doing this didn't stop me riding The Dean less than two weeks later that month as I'd originally planned). The other one was a 100km Calendar event wrapped up into a DIY 200. I've got one planned for a couple of weeks time to cover making the Dun Run into a DIY 400 by riding to Dunwich and back, I'm still planning on riding LEL 3 weeks after that and possibly even doing a Grimpeur 100 in between those too/two.
Last season I did 7 DIYs. One was a DIY 600 including a Calendar 300 to get an SR (as I'd packed on a calendar 600 the month before). The 300 was London to Thorne to look at the LEL route (and I'd planned on doing the top half this year but ended up being able to do the whole thing). One 100 was to get home from Oxford the day after riding The Dean. One 200 was the same February 100km Calendar ride extended to a DIY 200. This leaves a one way 100km ride up to Cambridge to go watch CUFC beat Wycombe in the FA Cup Third Round. Another one way 100 up to Cambridge to visit family. Finally, the November 200 was a DIY 200 as there wasn't a single calendar event that weekend (the online results list has nothing for 17th or 18th November 2007).