The club has carried out its annual review of membership fees.

In general the benefits of club membership are the ability to use club equipment, free of charge, during club sessions. A discount on the fee to paddle the whitewater course in public sessions. Access to the course when we hire it privately (whitewater Fridays). Public liability insurance when paddling with the club. boats licensed to use most of Britain‘s river navigations and canals. Access to club coaching courses. A group of people to paddle with. Boat storage.

A significant change this year is in the way that Canoe England handle canoe licenses.

(The governing body for Great Britain is the British Canoe Union (BCU) who also used to be the governing body for England. More recently Canoe England was set up as the English governing body. However we may occasionally refer to BCU, meaning Canoe England.)

Every individual member of Canoe England gets a boat license as part of the membership deal. That license covers the British Waterways network (canals), The Thames, and the Environment Agency controlled rivers (the Nene, Welland and a number of others) plus a number of other river systems. See the Canoe England website for more details.

The same type of license is now available to cover club boats, so that they are licensed when used by non-Canoe England members. You will see these stickers on most (but not all) of the club boats next season.
The cost of them, paid by the club, is £10 per boat.

The club is affiliated to Canoe England, which is why we are able to get these discounted licenses. It also provides public liability insurance. We have to pay an additional fee for every club member who is not a Canoe England member in order to cover them as well.

In summary: if you are a Canoe England member, you are licensed for whichever boat you are paddling. If you are not a member of Canoe England but paddle your own boat, you need to buy licenses for the rivers or canals you paddle, including the river Nene by the club. If you are paddling a licensed club boat, you are licensed.

It is therefore in our interests for club members also to join Canoe England. It saves the club money for our annual affiliation. The members get the benefit of insurance beyond the club cover (i.e. when paddling away from the club) and licenses for their own boats. It should be noted that the river authorities now have the power to seize and crush unlicensed boats. With this in mind adult individual members and family memberships who are also Canoe England members will receive a £5 discount on their membership fee.

At the AGM there was discussion about ways to encourage those who have been members for some time to continue as members. We are aware that as they join Canoe England and buy their own equipment the advantages of club membership diminish, so we are adopting a sliding scale of discounts based on the number of years of membership. These years do not have to be continuous, so people who have dropped out can rejoin and take advantage of the discounts. The discount is 10% off the current fee at renewal time, for every complete two years‘ of prior membership. This means that from the 21st year, membership is free! We reckon by then they will be contributing enough to justify this.

This is in addition to the existing scheme of a year‘s free membership for those who have served on the committee for a year, and for those who have done significant amounts of coaching for the club.

The Region is getting its act together on first aid courses and plans to offer courses at the end of January and June. These will offer both the one day and two day courses that coaches need to stay current and which should also of interest to all paddlers. More details to follow on the Regional web site.

Best Beginner - Sarah and Rebecca Davies
Most Improved - Will Davis
Slalom - Nathaniel Hickey
Marathon - Caledonian Six (Jim
McCarthy, Ian Smith, Bob & Dace Fisher,
Ted Moss, Julia Tinker)
Supporters - Jenny Bingham
Gary Baker - Mike Smith
Rob Yorke - Steven Battams