Mark Garnier was a guest speaker at the IWA’s annual general meeting last week, held in Wyre Forest’s Cookley sports club. Mark is an active member of the APPG for Inland Waterways and takes a keen interest in the progress of the transfer of English Waterways into the New Waterways Charity.
Speaking after the event, Mark said: “It was a great pleasure to welcome the members of the IWA to Wyre Forest. We have a significant number of rivers and canals here and so the views of the IWA are important to us here. I am well aware of the concerns the IWA has over the transfer to the New Waterways Charity and I would certainly want to help progress this through as smoothly as possible.”
Subsequently to the meeting, Mark met with Tony Hales, chairman of English Waterways and responsible for progressing the changes. “I was certainly reassured by Tony’s comments. DeFRA has offered £39 million per annum to fund the new charity and he has assured me that taking into account the internal income generated through normal business activities, there is only a 10% shortfall of funding. That, he feels, can be raised by donations. He has also proposed what sounds like a sensible solution to the pension deficit. The final issue seems to be the membership and voting process, and I am keen to follow this debate to see where the consensus takes us.”