DAVID Bendall recently resigned from the ICHCA Australia board.
He is a long-serving board member of both IAL and ICHCA International and was chairman of the board at IIL for several years and was instrumental in making major changes during challenging times.
He joined the board of IAL in 1983 as treasurer and shortly after became the Australian (and NZ for a few years) representative on the IIL board. In the 1980s there were about a dozen countries represented on the international board.
David Bendall organised and delivered two Sydney conferences at the Hilton Hotel, one in 1993 for IAL and one in 1998 for IIL.
He remembers the 1998 conference as one of the most financially successful ever as, due to a flooding event, the conference floor was covered with an inch of water, which led to a lot of reorganising of venues and the Hilton Group cancelling all charges for accommodation, catering, and the conference venue.
IAL chairman John Warda praised David Bendall for his work.
“On behalf of the board of ICHCA Australia, I would like to express our extreme gratitude for the contribution you have made to IAL over many years,” Mr Bendall said.
“Furthermore, your role as chairman of IIL during some trying times and the leadership shown by you to resurrect IIL at that time has not been forgotten and you leave the organisation in a better place today, albeit in ongoing challenging times for NGOs.”
