Profile of a Practical Working Party
City of Birmingham Group
For at least thirty years our RA Group (and its previous incarnation the
“Midland Area”) has been involved in footpath work through our “task
force”.
Why do we do it?
Here’s ten reasons to start with:
- We enjoy it!
- It builds team spirit
- We meet new people
- We develop new skills
- It enhances the reputation of the RA at all levels
- It’s rewarding and satisfying to see real path improvements
- It helps us to keep fit and develops muscles we didn’t know we had
- We put something back into the footpath network that we take so much from
- It develops good relationships with the County Council and local communities
- It’s good fun!
Getting started
Our current task force was set up in 2003, and is essentially a resurrection of a previous working party that wound down due to various reasons. We have been going out on a monthly basis since May 2004. Under the guidance of Keith Sinfield, Community Paths Officer in the Warwickshire County Council Countryside Access Team, we have improved stiles, erected waymark posts, installed kissing gates and built bridges, the most challenging of which is 8 metres long (26 feet in real money). Our new Group committee, elected in 2003, decided to try to revive footpath work and maintain the tradition set by previous organisers. I took on the co-ordinating role of the task force.
Generating interest
The first step to setting up the task force was to rally support from Group members. A head start was provided by previous co-ordinators, who provided names of potential volunteers. There was no shortage of interest.
Contacting the Council
The next step was to offer our services to the council and get working. Surprisingly this turned out to be more difficult than we anticipated. Many authorities were reluctant to accept an offer of footpath work. Of those we contacted, the only response was from Warwickshire County Council Countryside Recreation Department and we were eventually put in touch with Keith Sinfield, who is one of a small team with responsibility for maintaining the definitive map, negotiating with landowners, identifying and planning footpath improvement and maintenance tasks, and co-ordinating the P3 scheme (Parish Paths Partnership) whereby grants are available for volunteer groups within a parish, and regular “Volunteer Workshops” are offered.
Getting Area approval
We then formally contacted our Area Secretary for approval to go ahead, which was particularly necessary as it transpired that we would be working on another RA Group’s “patch”. Having RA approval nodded through, we then had to face the inevitable tangle of red tape. A “Voluntary Working Group Agreement” was prepared in a face-to-face meeting between Keith and myself and signed off by both of us.
The agreement defines the responsibilities of the Highway Authority (i.e. the Council), who:
- Provide tools, gloves, safety boots, and all materials
- Arrange training as required
- Provide specifications for work to be done and site access details
- Make appropriate arrangements with landowners
And the Group, who:
- Arrange insurance cover
- Provide names of volunteers
- Comply with Highway Authority health and safety guidelines and work standards
- Will not work at the roadside or with power tools
- Work at intervals of approximately once a month, weather permitting
- Notify the Community Paths Officer of timing of workdays
- Complete and return a Volunteer Worker Report Form for each session
- Take due care of the tools, and return them when the agreement terminates
The final step was to check out the insurance situation. We are covered by Zurich Municipal Insurance through the BTCV scheme costing the Area £112.50 for the current year.
Getting going
With all the groundwork done, we were actually able to set a date and
get going. It suits everybody to work mid-week, so a date and time was
set, making sure we didn’t clash with any other Group activities. At the
first meeting we collected the tools, signed for them, made our way to the
first worksite and received basic training “on the job” by Keith, covering
risk assessments, safe use of tools, and how the job was to be done.
Since then we have met monthly, and been engaged in a variety of
challenges and new tasks, usually in the company of Keith, not because we
are not safe to be left alone, but because he enjoys the activity as much
as we do!
Each month the next date is fixed by us, and in due course Keith provides
the location and details of what’s to be done. There’s never a shortage of
eager beavers ready for the next session, sometimes embarrassingly too
many for the allocated tasks. But in such cases, there’s always
photographs to take, coffee to serve, or a greater level of job sharing to
occupy the team. It’s just important to be there!
Roger Gibbs
City of Birmingham Group