Peter's Waterways Blog How Well Are We Being? This was first published in IWA West Riding's Milepost in September 2018, commenting on the recent rebranding of the Canal and River Trust.

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Canal & River Trust is now a wellbeing charity, with a new branding and logo, and it aims for greater public recognition and engagement in the period of the supportive government funding contract until 2027. On the logo, I assumed that the C&RT lockkeeping team an Hanbury locks were being ironic with their painted car-tyre in the new colours, mounted on their fence. On the new “wellbeing” idea, I find myself in agreement with Steve Haywood in CanalBoat p25 October 2018 who is sceptical at these "attempts to butter up the Government into extending its grant by trying to pass itself off as some sort of arm of the NHS, dedicated to the health of the nation." and he advocates ways that C&RT could more successfully sell the canals as a national resource, which he thinks they are missing a trick by not doing. As I understand it, wellbeing is a local authority funded responsibility so no easy money there for longer term canal maintenance and development.

New Logo Launch Event in Leeds

We all need to attract support from communities, their Local Authorities, MPs, Town Councils, ... It's all better than going for fitness, which can happen around the duckponds just as well as the navigable canals. Our Unique Selling Point is the vibrancy, the colour and the movement of the navigation across the countrywide connected network, by powered boats, by paddled boats and anything else that floats.

On the bankside, one of our members reports being told by a C&RT person that the £3m spent on rebranding would be better used on the canals. That was probably a rhetorical flourish, as even a couple of thousand new teeshirts, replacement signs all over a dozen high profile locations, and a few launch events, together with the £60k on the rebrand itself – and I'm still a nought away from £3m. It is still worth reading the C&RT Annual Report, which doesn't have any better rebranding accounts, but does show how their money is spent, as in the pie chart alongside. Restructuring costs for the new six regions, (on p84) were £2.2m. There is another report on how wellbeing is measured by C&RT. See here and here Peter Scott

From C&RT Annual Report