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Our Aim is to promote walking as a means of enjoyment, exercise and social contact. We are also active in ensuring that our legacy of
footpaths remains open for all walkers.
We have a New President Dave Hitchman has been a tireless worker for the Ramblers over many years. Apart from producing much of the planning for the Essex Hundred series of walks he has quietly researched and advised the national organisation on Coastal Access – many of his recommendations are now part of the Marine Bill. He has also made a massive contribution to the work on lost ways and historic paths. The AGM re-elected many of the long-serving post holders, we are particularly happy to welcome Kevin Clark as the Assistant Secretary. Selected Area Council Officers contact details are given on the Committee page.
Helpful Advice from Lea Valley Friends:The European Health Insurance Card (EHIC) (previously E111). The quickest way to receive or renew your EHIC, free of charge, is to apply on this website: www.dh.gov.uk/travellers, clicking on the 'Apply Now' or apply by phone on 0845 606 2030. But be aware: if you search for EHIC in Google etc, there are several apparently helpful sites that tell you that you can apply for this card through them, but they charge over £9; the official site is free! Reg. & Margaret Act Now! If you fancy spending a day at the RA’s Central Office. Contact Len Banister on (talkingwalking@aol.com or 0208527 8158) for a place, expenses paid and refreshments will be supplied. The date for the event is 10 June 2009 between 11am – 5pm. There are only 15 places available nationally so book soon. Matters of National Importance The AGM also nominated Len Banister as a candidate for election to the Board of Trustees. This is his election address: I have been a member of the RA for about 13 years; have held the positions of Publicity Officer and Outreach Officer for my Group (West Essex); I joined the Executive of Essex Area as Publicity and Media Officer and have been Area Secretary for four years. For the last year I have been Chair of the Ramblers’ Greater London Forum – a body set up to coordinate the interests of the London Boroughs and the Counties abutting – representing about 25000 members. I have contributed to many of our charitable objectives: path clearance and furniture installation; writing articles for newspapers and supplying radio and television interviews; leading walks and group holidays; setting up walking groups for ethnic minorities. I write walking books and contribute regularly to Country Walking magazine. Since 2006 I have been part of the BBC’s Twenty Twelve Lives project, which involves features the interests of walkers during the build up, and the aftermath of the Olympics. I am a life member of the National Trust and the Art Fund; I also belong to the Woodland Trust. Prior to my retirement I was a secondary school teacher; a head teacher for twenty years. I am no great believer in democracies but I do think that the RA needs to sort out its decision-making procedures – it seems to me that, at the moment, the Trustees pay lip service to democratic procedures yet actually act unilaterally on quite important issues: the handbook; dropping support for legal issues; shortening the General Council etc. I am keen to support:
BudgetsElsewhere we have talked about the various changes which are taking place in the Ramblers; budgeting may seem like a new demand but in fact it has been anticipated for a number of years and Essex Area was slightly defiant in not introducing it as the funding method for Groups in the current year. Up until now each Group have been funded by their Area on a numbers basis plus some additional monies to assist some of the smaller groups. From now on Groups will be funded solely on their successful budgeting bids to Area. Although some committees have viewed the changes with trepidation, the use of budgets can be a liberating experience. It does, after all, give Groups the opportunity to plan their future expenditure with rather more security and will encourage re-thinking of priorities. Those Groups, which are basically satisfied with the status quo need do hardly more than look at their expenditure for the previous year and add an element (if any) for inflation. I will be trying to persuade the Executive Committee to set up a sub-committee to receive the bids from Groups and will recommend some appeal mechanism to handle disagreements. The Area Budget will be largely a composite of the Group bids therefore, if my proposals are agreed, the procedure will take rather longer than before although it should be no more onerous for Group Treasurers. It is therefore likely that we will be asking for the budgets at an earlier date. Whilst we hope that Groups will continue to be as self-financing as possible and follow the Area’s lead by running down their reserves we also hope that they will take advantage of the system to put in bids associated with new technology, re-branding and for those especially in London Boroughs, contracting to receive South East Walker. As long as the Area agrees that bids for money meet our charitable objectives they are likely to be successful; the appeal system will most likely be used to resolve issues surrounding interpretation. LAB
THE SOCIAL SIDE OF THINGS Have you felt misled about the relationship between Ramblers' charitable objectives and social activities. Hopefully the following will set out the differences. Walks which groups run are a social activity just like a barn dance; a whist drive; or a coach outing. The only exception would be some walks specifically designed to engage people in walking who were otherwise unlikely to join groups walks - examples might include walks for the sight impaired; family walks; walks for schoolchildren etc. Social activities should not make a loss. In other words charity money should not be used to subsidise social activities. It is recognised that activities will need a 'float' and that some social activities, whilst mounted to make a profit, can sometimes result in a loss. A social fund or separate account is a means used by some Groups to draw a paper distinction between the charitable and social activities. In the end, all monies existing in Group funds belong to the RA. Anyone reading the very upbeat nature of the Groups' entries in the Essex Area Annual Report will know that the social walking side of our activities is going from strength to strength. However, we must keep remembering that the bulk of our membership never go on Group walks. It is this bulk of our members that we must convince to renew their membership each year. We must, as the new CEO has pointed out, continue to remind them of the work we do in keeping paths open; of lobbying for coastal access; of persuading Authorities to spend more money on our hobby. We must continue to publicise our successes so that we retain the membership of those who provide the bulk of our finance.
Ann McLaren remembers Fred MatthewsI was delighted to read some of the memories of Fred published recently in EAU it has brought flooding back, both of my early walking with the R.A. and with outings with Fred and his many memorable sayings. I am sure some of you would be interested in joining me to remember another side of Fred. I first had the honour of going on a led walk with Fred in the early 1970s. We turned up at the start. Five Green Horns. Our group consisted of myself a nervous recently abandoned one parent Mum, Kath & Stan my worried parents, and my two rather reluctant young daughters. Fred soon put us at our ease. Dad said to his granddaughters ‘Don’t worry it wont be a long walk Fred is wearing Wellingtons!’ How wrong can you be? It was getting late well past 5.00pm when Fred said if the girls are getting tired we could catch a bus back from the next stop as there was another 3 miles to walk back to our car. We jumped on board and soon regained our car, and food, drink and a loo. Because of the beauty of what we had seen and the friendly way Fred had been we soon recovered our spirits and we joined the R.A. in August 1975. In those heady pre-computer days you could be a member of more than one group. I walked weekends with the Brentwood Group and West Essex alternate Wednesdays and Thursdays for a number of years. During these mid week walks I enjoyed both the company of Len Alcott and Fred. Fred specialised for a number of years on leading along bridleways. This lead to his famous chant ‘Lovely walk, shame about the mud’ and did we find some! In 1976 I was again lucky in meeting Norman Skinner on a ramble at Thaxted. We later married but still continued to walk with the R.A [now computerised] so we had to make the hard choice. We became Brentwood Group members but still walked with West Essex as ‘members of another R.A Group’. We continued to see Fred on many a happy ramble. He had never in his tremendous enthusiasm for walking lost his ability to put in extra bits and his walks frequently over ran. The West Essex committee gave him a ‘talking to’ and one day he produced a timetable. Half jokingly he told us he had to finish his walks by 4pm. He sat down at home and in Freddie stile timed everything. We had got to the final church early so he told us his story and read out his note ‘Loose 5 minutes here if necessary’. 10 minutes later exactly on time, we walked off for the final mile back to the cars. This continued for a number of years and everyone was happy. I was privileged to be at the Suffolk boarder with Fred when he, Dennis Nesbit, Norman Skinner and myself met Reg. Cheek and his Suffolk walkers to hand over the Jubilee Walk into Fred’s capable hands. He, single handed had got everything sorted and despite one day at Stock when the rain would have put anyone off walking, we all had a marvellous time. It was from this Margo and I persuaded him to take a cross Essex walk for the next year and the 100 was born. Fred had the wisdom to see this was the best Footpath tool and aid to campaigning to come his way. The first one covered some 138 miles walking over at times very unkempt countryside paths so it was refined for future years. When I took on the job of Group Formation Officer for the Area and later came up with the idea of Friends Groups it was natural to go to old friends for support and help. Once Bill Dove had given me the big push and encouraged me to go for it. I must say help came in equal measure from a large number of people as well as Fred including Gordon Ayres, Kevin Ascott, Michael Cullem, Norman Turner and Peggy Clark to name a few that are currently well known and respected within Essex Area. However it is Fred who stood out with the sheer number of walks he made available jointly between Friends and West Essex so both groups were able to jointly gain from his wealth of experience. Three walks in 1994, 8 in 1995, 8 again 1996 and 3 in 1997. In 1998 when walking had become a painful experience for him, Norman invited him to join Friends as our guest fittingly enough at Lambourne Church and to lead the walk downhill back to our cars at Abridge. I can remember Fred sometime later having a good giggle about HERD [Happy Essex Rambling Day] an advertising slogan Norman had dreamed up. Fred would have it that 1st timers would become ‘Herded into Ramblers.’ The other aspect of Fred that seems to have been forgotten is his Budgie. He always had a way with computers ever since when writing one of his Walking Guides he gave the instruction to remove ‘e’ and it did from his whole book. Fred laughed and laughed about this as he did later when another computer turned his Budget into a Budgie. Needless to say he adopted the poor little bird and even sent pictures of it large time to his friends! It was Fred who put Norman in touch with Countryside Books in 1992 when they were looking for an author who knew about pubs, saying famously ‘I know about walking but not about pubs but I know a man that does’. Fred was also very supportive of me when in 2002 Norman died and the next year I met Eric on a ramble. He welcomed Eric as my husband and spoke with him warmly when we met. Fred was a great campaigner, a man of many words but he was also a good friend, a supportive person and a very funny man. I shall miss him.
ASK NOT WHAT YOUR AREA CAN DO FOR YOU BUT WHAT YOU CAN DO FOR THE AREA If you have any comments on the above or any other pages within this site please contact the editor at
ear@essexarearamblers.co.uk The Ramblers' Association is a company limited by guarantee, registered
in England and Wales. Company registration number: 4458492. Registered
Charity in England and Wales number: 1093577. Registered office: 2nd
floor, Camelford House, 87-90 Albert Embankment, London SE1 7TW." |
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If only Essex looked like this. Although our landscape is a little flatter, one of the prime functions of Area is to maintain contact between Central Office and the
various Groups that have been formed across the County. Close contact is maintained with Members of the National Executive by sending delegates along to National
Council meeting and from time to time promoting motions to be considered at
national level. We also ensure appropriate distribution of capitation and supplementary funds that are necessary for the efficient running of the Groups. We also have an undertaking to help set up and support formation of new Groups to meet the needs of developing communities across Essex and an involvement in how London is providing for walkers.