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The 2003 Waterway Recovery Group Canal Camps booklet
arrived through my letterbox today (or it would have done, if they hadn't
changed the shape of it so it no longer fits my letterbox!) and it set me
thinking about WRG, and how it was in the old days, and what's changed since
then... and I thought I might give the WRG volunteers the benefit of a few
suggestions of my own concerning where the organisation might be heading in the
future...
As I leafed through the glossy booklet I couldn't help
thinking how far WRG has come since the early days. I remember the days before
the Canal Camps booklet existed as anything more than a badly-photocopied
one-page insert in 'Navvies', WRG's magazine, and 'Navvies'
itself was 12 pages hand-printed on a John Bull printing set in Graham Palmer's
garage. And the talk was of whether WRG could justify the cost of a new letter
'M' to replace the one that had been lost, or whether it was better to simply
avoid working at Marple, the Montgomery and the Mon & Brec in future...
These days the talk is of the benefits of glossy paper,
full-colour illustrations (or more likely red-and-brown - red for the vans and
T-shirts, and brown for the canal mud - the other colours are pretty much
superfluous) and increasingly use of the Internet to replace the printed word
altogether.
But I feel that if they really want to sell the product,
there are a few further improvements that could help. For example, even colour
printing can't quite bring out the full unpleasantness of the mud on some of
WRG's work sites. So how about including a small sample of genuine canal mud
alongside each of the entries in the 'diary' pages, so that volunteers can make
an informed choice of which camp to attend.
And while on the subject of 'Navvies', how about
making an English translation available? Of course 'Navvies' and the
Canal Camps booklet aren't the only WRG publications: WRG also produces
informative publications such as 'How to be a navvy' and 'The
Practical Restoration Handbook'. But I feel that there is scope for further
additions to the WRG range...
For example, for all the importance quite rightly attached
these days to doing the job properly, we all know how much more fun it is for
the 'armchair navvy' (by which I mean the WRG supporter who sits in an armchair
reading 'Navvies', not the sort of navvy who pulls armchairs out of the
BCN.) to read about all the amusing mishaps and disasters that befall the
volunteers on work-parties where not everything goes quite right. So how about
publishing 'The Impractical Restoration Handbook', with chapters on
installing lock-gates that won't open because the balance beam hits a bollard,
how to knock down a new brick wall so you can get your dumper out again, and
the effects of running petrol-powered machinery on diesel and vice versa.
Or what about something to keep the younger enthusiast
involved: "I-spy on a Canal Camp" in which points are scored for seeing
different shapes of shovel, pick and mattock, and bonus points are awarded for
unusual sightings. (such as a wheelbarrow with a non-flat tyre or a pump that
starts first time)
This could then be followed with something for the
slightly-older reader, along the lines of the Ian Allen train-spotting books
that are seen clutched in the palms of spotty youths at the ends of railway
station platforms everywhere. WRG-spotters would tick off individual Transit
vans, dumpers, diggers and tools as they 'spot' them, and compare notes (over a
flask of cocoa on a lockside) of unusual sightings...
"Have you spotted the new Kit 'D' trailer yet?"
"Yes, and I 'copped' the old WRG NorthWest minibus in a
scrapyard in Stockport last week."
"That's nothing - I 'cabbed' it on the
Ribble Link last year. And I've 'cleared' the entire WRG board except for the
chairman."
"Ha, beat you! I saw him yesterday at Braunston."
"That doesn't count - he wasn't working at the time."
"Doesn't count? How's anyone ever going to spot him,
then? Anyway, it's ticked off in my book now."
"I've spotted every item in Bricklaying Kit 'C' except
the 4-inch bolster and the plasterer's floats."
"Better hurry up then - I've heard they're replacing the
old metal floats with plastic ones next month."
"They're not!"
"Afraid they are. I read it in this week's 'Tool Trailer
Enthusiast' magazine. They've only got a few camps left to go. All the spotters
I know are heading for the Grantham camp - it's probably your last chance to
see the old tools in service before they're withdrawn."
"It won't be the same, will it? All this modern plastic
rubbish they're bringing in, nobody's going to be interested in WRG-spotting in
a year or two..."
Another thing I've noticed about WRG these days is the sheer
luxury of the places they stay in, compared to the early days. Their magazine
keeps going on about how there are showers on-site in the accommodation, how
good the kitchens are and so on. And there are even suggestions of holding a
'luxury camp' somewhere with beds instead of sleeping bags on the floor.
Where will it lead to next? The WRG Suite at the Droitwich Hilton? Canal Camp
joining instructions that tell you where to catch your limousine from?
This is all very well - maybe there are potential volunteers
who are put off by the idea of roughing-it in a church hall. But listen to any
group of long-serving WRG volunteers in the pub talking about Canal Camp
accommodation, and ten-to-one they're trying to outdo each other with tales of
how basic it used to be in the good old days...
"I remember we used to get kept awake by the sound of
mice running around all night"
"We never had any mice - they would have drowned in the
pools of water from the rain coming in through the holes in the roof..."
"Roof? You had a roof on your hall?"
"Yes - but we didn't have any walls..."
After a few minutes of this (and before it degenerates into
a recital of the 'Four Yorkshiremen' sketch from 'Monty Python') it becomes
clear that what the average navvy really wants isn't 5-star luxury but a 'Back
to basics' approach. Far from a luxury camp, 'Navvies' should be
advertising a 'Basics' camp to keep these people from deserting the
organisation. The WRG Sites group could be sent to look for potential venues
with the right level of rodent-infestation, standard of draughtiness,
insanitary kitchens and toilets, holes in the roof and so on. Little symbols in
the diary (pictures of rats, people with clothes pegs on their noses, umbrellas
etc) could indicate which particular lack-of-luxury features were available at
each dig. And if the available accommodation isn't up to (or rather, down to)
the requisite standard, perhaps a team from the local canal society could turn
up a couple of days before the camp armed with sledgehammers,
wallpaper-stripper and a supply of small rodents from the local pet shop...
Another area that I feel needs looking at is site safety.
It's all very well co-operating with BW, the Waterways Trust, the Health &
Safety Executive or whoever to run training in safe working practices - and I
know canal volunteers need to keep up with all the latest safety legislation.
But let's face it: it doesn't really fit with the 'Mad, bad and dangerous to
know' image that WRGies revel in.
You only have to listen to the same bunch of WRG volunteers
in the pub for a few more minutes, and they'll be reminiscing about that time
in 1974 when they used too much dynamite to knock down a lock-side and
inadvertently demolished the lock-cottage too, or the time the local organiser
arrived in the pub on a dumper - through the wall!
Of course none of them actually want to go back to having
accidents in unsafe vehicles - but maybe they'd like just a little bit to go
back to appearing to be the sort of people who might have conceivably get
involved in the odd scrape or two. But it's hard to be a hell-raiser in a
hi-vis vest and safety helmet, sitting strapped-in on a dumper with a roll-cage
fitted, with a CITB training certificate in your pocket.
So I have a few suggestions that - while keeping working
practices safe - will help to keep the 'rebel without a hard-hat' image going.
Starting with a 'hard-wig': what looks like a typical 1970s-relic long-haired
navvy is actually wearing full head protection underneath his shaggy mane. And
fitting all vehicles with red seat-belts that don't show up against a WRG
T-shirt.
And speaking of vehicles: the next subject that the crowd of
WRG old hands in the pub inevitably get onto is how much more fun it was in the
old days driving around in beat-up old wrecks that broke down all the time.
Which rather puzzles you, because you've just shelled out a tenner for their
appeal to buy some brand-new minibuses. But it's another part of the 'image'
that some WRGies seem keen to maintain.
So when the next batch of new WRG Transits are bought, why
not get the showroom to spray one of them in rust-colour paint, and install a
small tape recorder under the bonnet that plays recordings of a variety of
rattles, creaks and engine-knocking noises?
And on the subject of buying new WRG Transits... I'll have
to leave you now, as a bunch of red-shirted volunteers are forming a human
pyramid outside my window, and appear to be reciting in unison the latest
version of the government Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations
concerning safe operation of site machinery. I think it's some kind of modern
safety-conscious sponsored event to raise money for new vans...
PS you'll be glad to know that the 'Navvies' printing team
did eventually manage to persuade their treasurer to shell out for a new letter
'M', after a slight misunderstanding involving a WRG Plant article about "pups
and dupers", and some concerns about appointing a chairman called Ike Paler....
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