The panel will help us create our upcoming consultation, part of our response to the independent Commission on Boat Licensing. The consultation is to create a clearer, fairer licensing system for people who go boating, and will cover a range of topics, including boat safety, support for boaters, greater certainty around navigation requirements, fair sharing of the space, and managing the canal network responsibly.
Join our panel
“Boaters are at the heart of our waterways, so it’s important that they are at the heart of the conversation about their future” says Matthew Symonds, our head of boating and customer service.
“We’re inviting boaters to join a volunteer Citizens’ Boater Panel and help us design a better consultation. Whether someone lives aboard full-time, cruises for leisure, runs a business from their boat or uses the waterways in another way, we want to hear from them.
“By bringing together a representative group of around 40 boaters and giving them a genuine role in shaping the consultation, we can build a stronger understanding of the different experiences that exist across the network and develop a consultation informed by real life on the waterways.”
Application information
Applications for the Citizens’ Boater Panel are open for six weeks from 5 August to everyone who goes boating.
All our boat licence holders have received a unique application link via email or text. Boaters who have not given their details, who have opted out of our communications, or who do not currently hold a Trust licence but wish to apply can request an application link via our customer service team on 0303 040 4040 or the website form: Contact us form | Canal & River Trust
Our welfare and licence support teams will talk to boaters they meet about the panel to ensure boaters who may not be online or receive communications from us are invited to take part.
Panel members will take part in a series of workshops and discussions between September and November, working alongside other stakeholders including national boating organisations, boater representatives and local boating groups. During the workshops, participants will explore how licensing arrangements and navigation requirements affect day-to-day life on the waterways and draft consultation questions, ensuring they are fair, balanced and easy to understand.
The panel will then reconvene after the consultation to work with us to review the outcomes to build policy that truly works for those on the water. We're committing to a ‘comply or explain’ approach. This means that boaters’ feedback will be accepted and built into the policy. If that is not possible, for example for legal, financial, operational, or other reasons, we will provide a comprehensive and transparent explanation.
To ensure the panel reflects the boating community as fairly as possible, boaters will be asked to provide demographic details, as well as details about their boating lifestyle, as part of the application process. Applications will be anonymised and participants selected through a third party ‘random selection tool’ which is designed to create representative Citizen Panels. This approach will ensure that no single viewpoint dominates and that a broad range of boating voices can contribute to shaping the consultation.
The random selection tool is provided by the newDemocracy Foundation: Stratified Random Selection Tool
