BEAR ESSENTIALS The Newsletter of : -
IWA Warwickshire Branch Issue No. 51 – April 2018.
Welcome, and Welcome Back: At our AGM last month, we not only welcomed the attendance of both our National Chairman - Ivor Caplan, and our Regional Chairman - Helen Whitehouse, but we also welcomed four newly elected committee members:- Ian Lauder, Neil Skerry, Peter Claisse and Philip Spencer.
L to R: (Back Row) Jeff Biddle, Ivor Caplan, Neil Skerry, Ian Lauder, Peter Claisse and Nick Nicholson.(Front Row) Helen Whitehouse, Greta Russell, Sheila Bell and Carole Nicholson
Also at this meeting Muriel Richardson stepped down – after more than 11 years of sterling service as Minutes Secretary, and Carole Nicholson relinquished her role . Chairman. However, Carole will stay on as the committee as our Meetings / Speaker Organiser. Sheila Bell, Greta Russell, and Nick Nicholson continue in their respective roles as Treasurer, Secretary, and Planning Officer. Finally Jeff Biddle and ‘yours truly’ retain roles as ‘corresponding members’- responsible respectively for coordinating our walks programme, and editing our newsletter. All this should help to blend continuity with evolution in our future activities. Our new committee, now comprises 8 members - a strength not seen in the Branch for many years. This can only be a reflection of the enthusiasm with which members have embraced the activities that recent committees have organised, and for which we must thank them. After this meeting Ian Lauder was confirmed as our new Chairman – we offer him our congratulations, and wish him well. We must all now encourage our new committee to continue to provide a programme of varied activities – not just on behalf of branch members, but for all who enjoy Warwickshire’s waterways. Editor: Ian Fletcher.
From the 1930’s onwards our local canal, between Napton and Birmingham, became a single ‘unified’ waterway – part of the Grand Union. In 2009, at the time of BW’s last reorganisation, this unity was severed. Based on a mixture of false premises and bovine excrement, and against the advice of Warwickshire Branch and the wishes of BW-West Midlands, the management of BW-South East persuaded the then BW Chief Executive to move the SE/WM boundary from Napton to Radford Semele. The folly of this move soon became apparent, and as readers may recall, by 2012/13, travelling between the two sections (SE and WM) was akin to travelling between two different worlds. – We used this photo, here on the left, to illustrate the problem in our Dec 2013 edition of BE, and we know that it found its way onto the desk of the then BW-SE manager - but all to no avail. – – Today, the balance-beams on the Stockton flight, are not as bad as that. As this photo shows, they are now in fact four years worse! The problem has mainly been caused by BW/CRT-SE’s inability to find, manage and motivate volunteers at this, the periphery of their region – Milton Keynes is many miles from the midlands. However, our relationship with CRT-WM is in stark contrast, and it yields significant results – as can be seen here at Knowle.
The best waterways news that we’ve received so far this year is that - as part of the current CRT reorganisation, (for those interested in mathematics ten into six will go) - CRT-WM’s good work is being rewarded with an enlarged operational area. Now, not only will the north Oxford be added to its brief, but also the two halves of the northern GU will be re-united, and the whole of the Warwickshire Ring will then come under one jurisdiction. For us the most pleasing facet of all this is that the Napton to Radford Semele section of the northern GU returns to its true home here in the west midlands – welcome back.