At CRT’s Annual Meeting, the  Head of boating and customer services Matthew Symonds spoke about plans to improve boater satisfaction with actions developed through a series of workshops with the boater representatives on the Trust’s Council and in its navigation advisory group.

The Trust’s commitment to boating was reinforced by plans to recruit a further volunteer trustee to sit on its Board who will bring extensive boating experience and insight. Together with a sub-Committee of the charity’s Board, they will measure the charity’s performance against specific key performance indicators that reflect the feedback of the boater workshops. These will be published in early 2025.

The priority will be to improve navigation and target issues that predominantly affect boaters. These include: a ‘paddle pledge’ with a target to fix newly reported broken paddles as soon as possible and no longer than four weeks, and clear all outstanding issues by 2026; more greasing and clearing vegetation from locks and moving bridges, with more work scheduled earlier in the year; increased grass cutting over the next three years and ensuring grass is cut at locks and mooring sites; quicker response to broken boater facilities and a review of busiest refuse sites to improve provision and reduce issues; and better recycling provision, with segregated collections introduced in 2025.

The Trust will engage with boaters with more face-to-face forums for boaters and will publish a 12-month calendar of the meeting dates. It will also explore ways to make it easier to access up-to-date navigational information and to report issues via a requested Boater App.

Richard Parry, chief executive at Canal & River Trust, said: “Keeping our canals open for boating is paramount: without navigation the canals as we know them today would not exist, and neither would the tremendous benefits that navigable canals bring to communities both on and off the water.

“However, many boaters have told us that they’re not satisfied with the service they receive and want to see our efforts focused on the things that matter most to them. We need to change this and make sure that we demonstrate to boaters that their needs are at the heart of what we do. This means regular and improved engagement with boaters, and actions that prioritise navigation and reinforce our commitment to the boating community: looking at how we can address some of the problems that boaters tell us about.

“We’ll be publishing a new set of performance indicators around navigation, and we hope boaters will be able to see how we’re making progress on the things that matter to them, and in caring for the network.”

The Trust has published the Better Boating Plan: Our plan for better boating | Canal & River Trust