Following very careful consideration of the risks and benefits, on 5 December the Ramblers submitted a tender to Natural England and the Department of Health (DH) to take over the assets and host the "national centre" of Walking for Health (WfH) in England. The tender included a bid for a possible £1.89million of funding over three years which is being offered by Macmillan Cancer Support. The submission was approved by the Board of Trustees after detailed consideration and discussion.
Many Ramblers volunteers in England will be familiar with WfH, which is currently largely funded by DH. Nearly 70,000 regular walkers take part in over 600 health walk schemes across England, led by 12,000 active volunteers – some of whom also lead Ramblers walks. There are separate schemes in Scotland and Wales.
Ramblers' bid is for the national centre, which doesn't deliver walks itself but instead provides resources to assist local delivery -- including training, accreditation, branding and materials, quality control, a national website and monitoring and evaluation. The walks themselves are organised by a multitude of local scheme coordinators, many of them based at local authorities or NHS bodies.
Macmillan Cancer Support is offering to fund much of the WfH programme for at least three years, Though Macmillan is keen to improve walking opportunities for people living with and through cancer, it wants to keep health walks open to all.
Although the Ramblers would contribute resources too, we will proceed only if satisfied that the benefits to our other activities, such as development of a training model that can in due course be adapted for our traditional led walks along with enhanced reputation and influence, are sufficient to justify the investment. We believe that a partnership with Macmillan, another highly respected charity doing immensely valuable work, will bring benefits to both parties.
Although WfH will utilise the skills we have built up running Get Walking Keep Walking, it attracts a substantially different type of walker and in the long run we see WfH both complementing our existing walking programmes and nurturing new walkers.
Over time, we believe there will be benefits for the Ramblers as a whole, including for example:
- Making it easier for people new to walking to find the group that’s right for them, whether that’s through WfH or a Ramblers Group
- Greatly increasing our campaigning influence, by representing a broader range of walkers. We would be able to say we speak “for ¼ million walkers, in over 1000 groups, putting on more than 100,000 led walks a year” and use this to support our role as guardians of the footpath networks, the right to roam and the countryside
- Providing greater co-ordination for volunteer walk leader training, expanding the model which is already well established by WfH
- Encouraging those taking part in WfH to get give something back as volunteers, hopefully, to cancer support and walking.
Many Ramblers Groups report that there are local walking groups, separate from the Ramblers, springing up all the time. As Britain’s premier walking charity, we believe it is far better for the Ramblers to take on the running of WfH and in so doing to provide better co-ordination of volunteering, promotion and progression for all walkers.
We expect there to be several other bidders, possibly with alternative sources of funding, as part of the confidential competitive tendering process. The team managing the process are currently analysing the tenders and in January 2011 will invite shortlisted bidders to give a presentation on their bids.
Should the Ramblers be accepted as preferred bidder, negotiations will begin on the funding conditions. They should be completed by March 2012 and the Board would then make the final decision, with WfH handed over by late March or early April.
We will continue to update volunteers with news. However please note that the content and timing of future communications may be subject to agreement with Natural England, DH and Macmillan.
Previous updates to Ramblers volunteers, including background on the divestment process, were published on 16 November, 12 October and 29 March.
Updates on the divestment process and information about interim arrangements for health walk support are published on the Walking for Health website at www.wfh.naturalengland.org.uk.
Please send comments or questions to des.demoor@ramblers.org.uk.
