British Waterways Volunteer Award
The meeting at the Pump House at Titford between members of the Birmingham Canal Navigations Society and senior representatives of British Waterways on Wednesday 16th September was more than usually cheerful and friendly. The BCNS had been selected as one of only ten recipients nationally of British Waterways Volunteer Awards, forv which there is a great deal of competition.
Tony Harvey, General Manager of British Waterways West Midlands, was unstinting in his praise of the Society, and said that the decision to award the certificate to the BCNS had been unanimous.
He went on to stress the importance that British Waterways places on safety, seeing it as the most important aspect of volunteer work, and said that the BCNS has never found this to be a hindrance. The BCN Society had recently achieved self supervising workparty staus. There had been no issues, and the BCNS had met all the requirements 'with flying colours'.
He then presented Graham Whorton, the Chairman of the BCNS, with an attractive framed certificate, which incorporated a photograph of three members of the society working on a canal.
In response, Mr Whorton thanked Mr Harvey and British Waterways, and said
" I am very pleased to accept this award on behalf of all the hard working volunters of the BCN Society and I thank Tony and his tean at British Waterways forv recognising our efforts. Volunteering is not just about removing shopping trolleys and rubbish from canals but covers all aspects of running the Society - organising events and rallies, membership, publication of Boundary Post and all other things that have to be done to ensure that we carry out our work in a safe and efficient manner."
" I would like to take this opportunity to thank all our volunteers for their hard work. I am very pleased that we have been able to form a very good working partnership with British Waterways and I thank all their staff involved for their help."
"I hope that the Society will continue to develop our partnership and we look forward to working with British Waterways during the coming years."
After the presentation there was a buffet.
