Michael,
I can answer some but not all of your questions.
1) Honorary means free paper subscription. Hard copies of the Journal and Handbook posted to the Honorary member.
2) This year we have added a page to the website about donations and legacies. We decided to keep it simple as we did not want to offer legal advice.
https://britastro.org/donations
We have also added some wording to encourage legacies to the renewal emails. Trying to be very delicate in how we approach this. The legacies do make a major contribution to the Association, basically meaning the subscription rate can be about half of what it takes to run the Association. We would either need to do a lot less, or otherwise have much higher subscriptions, without these generous donations.
I don’t have any hard figures as to the actual legacies received, though I think there is a small number each year, with a large legacy every few years.
I agree a debate like this is an excellent sign of a healthy Association. As indicated by David these are proposals. They have been through lots of internal discussions and by no means just the Trustees. They are not decisions until voted in, out or changed at the SGM. So Honorary membership at 50 years may continue indefinitely, or maybe leave it open for another 5 or 10 years, rather than a year and a half form now.
Best wishes,
Andy
British Astronomical Association
Supporting amateur astronomers since 1890