No sleuths needed
IN RELATION To Canal & River Trust (CaRT) making payments to celebrities to promote volunteer lock keepers, John Howard asks ‘Maybe one of your narrowboatworld sleuths might be able to find out', writes Allan Richards.
The short answer is that they do make payments to celebrities.
Licence fees
John Howard remarked:
'I really hope that CaRT aren't spending our well earned licence fees (or perhaps the recent flood appeal donations!) on paying celebrities for their endorsement of the CaRT policy of making lock keepers redundant and replacing them with volunteers? Maybe one of your narrowboatworld sleuths might be able to find out'.
It is true that lock keepers such as Atherstone's Tony Wright, MBE were made redundant despite opposition from local residents, and have been replaced by volunteers. Perhaps just as important is that in the two years from April 1st 2010, British Waterways reduced bankside staff by 11%.
UNITE press statement
A press release in 2011 by the Union UNITE stated:
'We also oppose clearly stated plans to substitute experienced staff with volunteers. Despite assurances from British Waterways Chief Executive, Robin Evans, to the contrary, this is already happening around the network and is totally unacceptable'.
Totally unacceptable it may have been but it is now a fact of life!
Pru and Tim
Turning to the payment of celebrities to promote use of volunteer lock keepers, or even volunteers generally, I am rather surprised that John Howard asks the question.
Those such as Prunella Scales and Timothy West have long been supporters of various waterways causes and give up their time freely to support those causes. It is very sad to learn in the More4 documentary 'Grand Canal Journeys, that one of these stalwarts, Prunella, is suffering from a 'sort of mild Alzheimer's' according to her husband.
Brian and Penny
Brian Blessed and Penny Smith are not waterways supporters but are simply hired to provide a couple of photos and a few sound bites. Think of it as actors being paid to appear in an advert.
That is not to say that Brian Blessed and Penny Smith do not support charities unless money changes hands. Brian Blessed, for example, is big supporter of animal related charities such as 'Born Free' and 'Dogs for the Disabled' and gives his time freely to those (for an example see Raft race raised thousands).
£5.7 millions
It is not known how much the hiring of Brian Blessed and Penny Smith cost. It is not even known how much CaRT spends on volunteering. However, the Annual Report stated that in the first nine months of the Trust, it spent £5.7 millions on training, safety and volunteer management.
[When I met Brian Blessed in June last year he could hardly remember endorsing CaRT until I mentioned ‘life jacket'. He told me that he had at first thought it was a red bra and added that it fitted better than his trademark sports jacket!]