Boats are moored next to the towpath to the right, whilst another boat drives away from the camera up the canal

Boater Report 2025

Each year, the National Boating Team pulls together key updates, insights, and information we believe matter most to you as a boating customer.

Welcome from the National Boating Team.

For 2025, we’re excited to bring you this year’s Annual Boater Report in a new, more accessible format on our dedicated webpage. Instead of a traditional PDF or printed version, this online format allows us to share content in a more dynamic and engaging way, including videos, interactive media, and up-to-date information.

To introduce this new approach, Alex Hennessey, our National Boating Manager, has recorded a short video which you can watch below. Alex, and National Boating Officers, Dan and Ellie, make up our small but committed team working to represent the needs of boaters across the network.

We hope you find this new approach helpful and informative, and we welcome your feedback to help us shape the future of the report.

Read the video transcript
Hi, I'm Alex Hennessey, national boating manager for Canal & River Trust and welcome to the 2025 annual Boaters Report.
Each year, the National Boating Team compile this report inclusive of key information, updates, highlights, and insights we think most relevant to you as our valued boating customers. This year has been a year of significant change across the organisation, not least with the announcement of our new chief executive. And of course, we've seen unprecedented environmental challenges from relentless winter storm damage, breaches on and off our network, changes in water abstraction licensing on the Monmouthshire & Brecon Canal, and of course, as I record this, unprecedented drought conditions, which are having a knock-on effect to navigation across our entire network.
Despite these challenges, as an organisation, we are more committed and focused on improving customer service and experience than ever before. In 2024, we announced our Better Boating Plan, which is made up of four key themes: keeping our canals open for navigation, getting the basics right, focusing on boater facilities, and improving communication and customer service, and it's an organisational-wide commitment to improving boater satisfaction.
This year, we've decided to base our Annual Boater Report on these key themes, and we hope you find this new web-based format accessible, engaging, and intuitive. But of course, as ever, your valued feedback is welcome to help shape and improve the information you receive as valued customers. Thank you.

2024-25 Overview

2025 has been a year of significant change, marked by the departure of our Chief Executive Officer, Richard Parry, unprecedented environmental challenges, an increased focus on customer experience, and continued efforts to maintain navigation and invest in our vital infrastructure.

Across our remarkable network of over 10,000 structures, including locks, bridges, aqueducts, and reservoirs, many dating back over 250 years, our teams have worked tirelessly to keep the waterways open and safe in the midst of historically low water levels.

In November 2024, we introduced our Plan for Better Boating, a Trust-wide action plan built around four core themes that reflect what boaters have told us matters most. Overseen by a newly established Boating Board, made up of three Trustees and chaired by our Chair of Trustees, David Orr, the plan is already shaping decision-making across the organisation.

We’ve organised this Boaters’ Report under the four core themes of our Plan for Better Boating. Click the links below to hear from some of our colleagues from around the Trust who are leading on the delivery of this committed plan.