Ringing Forums

and funding slightly easier. I think any effect on recruitment would be indirect. — John de Overa

and associated physical infrastructure. — Tristan Lockheart

It would be useful to hear if there is a strategy in place by the CC to pursue this. — Peta Steadman Bee

In the 1990's I was a member of the CC's Ringing Centres Committee an we received a large grant from the Founders Livery Company to set up new ringing centres, with the objective of being a focus for the promotion of ringing and the training of new ringers. Whilst to start with this resulted in a number of new ringing centres being set up, this became increasingly difficult, and we had to work very hard to spend all the money. There was a focus on physical infrastructure, and some of the proposals were used to justify ambitious augmentation schemes, whereas there were other towers that would make ideal teaching centres with far less investment. We also learnt that successful ringing centres were about people. Once a key leader ceased ringing there, they became no different to any ordinary tower.

In the 2010's I was also involved in the CCCBR establishing the Ringing Foundation. This had the objective of levering in external finance to support ringing. We quickly realised that we could not make the case to external funders to plough in large sums of money, unless we had an effective training scheme in place. Hence, why we established what is now ART.

We also talked to a fund-raising consultant about approaching external bodies such as the Heritage Lottery Fund. Following an initial enquiry to HLF we were advised that we would need to demonstrate a successful regional pilot first, before rolling out nationally. Also, we would need to put in some of our own money first, before they would consider matching it. The problem was that the CC and RF had limited funds, whereas it was the Guilds and Associations that held large reserves. We identified over £3m held in BRF's, but any suggestion to increase CCCBR affiliation fees, or for Guilds and Associations to change the amount allocated to their BRF, and allocate a proportion of their subs towards PR, recruitment and training projects, was highly controversial.

The RF did lever in significant donations from private individuals, and was able to allocate some grants. You can support a lot of very worthwhile PR, recruitment and training projects with the amount spent on just one typical restoration or augmentation project, but the other problem was that the ringing community generally is not yet in right mindset to do this on the scale that is needed, especially now.

It was very interesting that the Essex Association received two very large bequests totalling £373,000 in 2021, and many good ideas were put forward by its members, but I am not sure what progress there has been since https://eacr.org.uk/about/bequests.html

I think sometimes we need to be more open about our needs within a Committee of Officers and ask for volunteers who can update the website, or visit less visited towers with news of the activities available and not worry that people who might volunteer to do this are not the most experienced ringers. — Lucy Chandhial

I think a lot of our problems in ringing in the moment are down to a lack of ladership at all levels. Old Fred who has been a tower captain, District/Branch or Guild/Association officer for 20, 30 or 40 years is applauded. They are not challenged, and they prove a very difficult act for anyone to follow. Everything becomes stuck in a rut, becuse we always do things that way, and people with fresh ideas are discouraged and put off.

What we need are more maximum terms of service and contested elections. There are plenty of people who could take over. They might make mistakes to start with, but the old Fred's should be there in the background supporting them.

It's quite a major culture change from where we are at the moment in many of our ringing organisations, and I'm pretty sure that a few simple introductory guidlines on a CCCBR website are not going to have the necessary impact. Reaching down to the grass roots, such as the RfK learners, and bypassing the 'gatekeepers' who are resistant to change is what we need to do.

...given that it is claimed that younger generations may no longer be interested in engaging with email. — Jon Warbrick

I don't know where this comes from, but is seems untrue. You cant do much on-line these days without an e-mail address, and the younger generation do most things on-line. However, it is true that they are not particularly keen on Facebook, preferring instead to use other forms of social media, whilst many of the older generation still prefer Facebook.

Guilds such as my own already have effective email distribution and communication mechanisms in place, at Guild and Branch level (in our case based on MailMan). — John Harrison

So, I think, and I’m not yet an expert, that we couldn’t easily use this as a newsletter route (which is okay for Middlesex as we have a Google group for easy distribution of information to interested ringers (members or not). — Lucy Chandhial

One of the attractive features of integrated mailing lists (as provided by systems like LoveAdmin, MemberMojo, etc) is that it is possible to have more specialised lists, with members opting in or out themselves. — John Harrison

It seems that we have up to around 50 territorial ringing societies, all experimenting with different systems, but there is limited sharing of information between societies. There used to be a computer Coordination Committee. Is there now a Central Council Workgroup that could take this sharing role on? I am sure that societies would benefit from sharing the experience of other societies in setting up and using these systems.

My original suggestion was just that a simple CCCBR newsletter be prepared centrally and circualted electonically by societies to their members a coulple times a year, just to inform grass roots ringers of some of things going on which may interest them (e.g. the new logo and branding, the new mobile belfry, residential courses, teaching hubs, young ringers and the YRCA, putting ringing on a more sustainble footing etc).

Below this top level communication, there are various applications which societies can use to engage with their members such as Mailman, Mailchimp, Google Groups, Facebook groups, 'X' etc. Locally WhatsApp has become popular with a number of towers, and one of our new ringers who brings a lot of expertise in this field is helping us to move to Spond, which seems very well suited to our needs, both for our own local band and the District training sessions that we run.

Different things inerest different people. Therefore, beyond the top level communication to everyone, which needs to be limited to just a few times a year and kept relevant in order to avoitd it becoming ignored (how many call-change ringers are interested in surprise practices?), there needs to be the flexibility to establish different groups for different interests, and these may also extend across traditional Guild/Association/District/Branch boundaries.

However where can I access exprtise and find case studies of things that have worked, and which are the best systems to use. Also, just as important, what has failed, and why?

The grass roots ringers that you mention though include, I fear, many who only ring at their own tower and who see no point in joining the association. Your quarter peal courses sound fantastic, but are irrelevant to someone who rings plain hunt by the bell numbers and regards methods as beyond them. — J Martin Rushton

I'm afraid that you're still missing my point. Whereas there are some grass roots ringers who only ring in their own tower, and not interested in doing more, there are many others who are keen to progress, but unable to do so. In my experience there have been a lot of people taking up ringing since Covid, especially last year, and they are very keen, but frustrated because they are held back in their own towers.

If you still don't believe me, have a look at my wife's latest podcast on www.funwithbells.com where she interviews three of the ringers who learnt in our local ART Hub last year. Andy Pearce was one of those who previously rang in a call-change tower as a teenager, where the local band was not interested in ringing elsewhere, however he has really enjoyed ringing with us and is doing fantastically well progressing into method ringing. The band at his previous call change tower has died out, and it has been a silent tower for quite a few years now. He is far from unique, as we are often turning up lapsed ringers who are quite impressed how much rapid progress they can make in method ringing with the Learning the Ropes scheme.

Another example is that in our Guild most of the Districts take turns in holding a practice at Winchester Cathedral in August. Last year each of these practices attracted between 50 and 70 ringers, mostly rounds and call change ringers, to gain the first experience of ringing rounds on 10, 12 and 14 bells. These pracctices were far better attended than the traditional fayre of Guild/Association/District/Branch practices and events.

The point I am making is that in this day and age, if we could only communicate better with this group of new ringers, and make them aware of what is possible outside their own tower, we could have a far more vibrant ringing community. However I fear that if we sit back and do not adapt because of the tired old cliche that these people are not interested, these keen people are either likely to give up and do something else, or be ground down by the system and just be another ringer that only, at best, rings shalky plain hunt by numbers in their own tower. In doing so, we will be losing a lot of the more able recruits and potentially good method ringers.

You can't tell these people what they want, and expect them to come to you, fit in with your existing offering, and join your Guild or Association. You need to listen to them, find out what they really want, and adapt to provide it. Then they will see the point and enthusiastically join and take part.

“Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning." - Bill Gates

“If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.” — Tony Robbins

I think you are missing my point. It's not about numbers for the sake of numbers, but there are a lot of grass roots ringers out there who are not engaged, and many Guilds and Associations, Districts and Branches are stuck in a rut, doing the same as they were doing a long time ago. Many are also struggling to find volunteers to fill vacancies. Contested elections are a thing of the past.

However I've come across many grass roots ringers who are on the verge of giving up because the support that they receive is so backward. Only about 50% of ringers have ever got as far as ringing a quarter peal. Only about 12,000 ringers rang one or more quarter peals last year (Coronation year) out of an estimated 30,000 ringers.

As a District Ringing Master I have been focussing on getting the newer ringers in my District up to the stage of tringing heir first quarter peal, and have 18 who have signed up for our regular fortnighltly Saturday morning ringing school to help them reach this stage. Demand is so high that we have increased the number of groups to three and now have a waiting list. These inexperienced ringers bring with them a lot of enthusiasm, and useful skills from their day jobs.

As a member of ART I also regulalry receive requests from ringers from elsewhere who would like extra tuition as they are frustrated with progress in their local tower. They are willing and often expect to pay. Some have even paid quite a lot to attend residential ringing courses, and want more. It is perhaps no coincidence that last years NorthWest ringing course was three times over-subscribed for the elementry group, whilst the more advanced groups had almost as many applicants as places available.

Therefore the evidence that I have seen is that rather than run things on a shoestring, the same as we have always done, there is a vast un-tapped group of people out there who could become more engaged and revitalise many of our towers, Guilds, Associations, Districts and Branches, by bringing with them their enthusiasm, fresh ideas and the resources needed to do things better.

Whilst MemberMojo moves us away from the old fashioned way of collecting subscriptions via the tower correspondent at each tower, and into the 21st century, I wonder if there is not another major benefit here? We've talked in the past about the fragmented communications in the exercise, and the difficulty of engaging with grass roots ringers. Hence the proposal for a Direct Membership Ognaisation, which seems to be stuck.

However, with so many Guilds and Associations now using MemberMojo, could the Central Council consider producing a quarterly newsletter to be districuted electronically, by Guilds and Asociations with items of interest for grass roots ringers? With project 2030 on the horizon, I am sure that there is plenty of material that would interest the grass roots ringer, rather than talking about methods and peals which they will never ring etc. There is also potential to collaborate on this with the Rining World and ART's Tower Talk.

All many grass roots ringers usually see for their membrship is a certificate and their name printed in an annual report. However I know that many would like to see more, and this would be a start.

I don’t know how many of you have followed the link and completed the survey, but as ringers we are often too focussed on our own perspective. At this stage it is a consultation about what categories of intangible rather than tangible heritage should be included.The Convention text groups Intangible Cultural Heritage into 5 categories or “domains”:

• oral traditions and expressions, including language as a vehicle of the intangible cultural heritage;
• performing arts;
• social practices, rituals and festive events;
• knowledge and practices concerning nature and the universe;
• traditional craftsmanship

The following additional categories are also being consulted about.

• traditional games and sports; and
• culinary traditions / knowledge.

To be listed, itangible cultural heritage needs to be something that is currently practiced and recognised by the wider community. Therefore, things such as the ringing of bells to mark the new year would seem to qualify quite easily.

A while ago I attended a Heritage Lottery Fund seminar for applicants, and one of the other applicants there was a group promoting Caribbean Cookery. As a bellringer this might seem a little odd, and not heritage in the same that restoring a set of bells is. However, by participating in the seminar I came to realise that those who came across on the Empire Windrush had brought their culture with them, and several generations later it is now established as one of the UK’s diverse cultural traditions.

Therefore, it is important that we as ringers do not stay out of sight in our church towers, in our own little world, but engage with the wider community in every way that we can. Otherwise, we will lose out.

I was a member of the CCCBR’s Ringing Centres Committee for quite a long time. I saw quite a few proposals to establish new ringing centres, but these were often focussed on doing something with a particular ring of bells, rather than a well thought out plan to recruit and train new ringers. There are many towers out there which with just a little investment would make ideal teaching towers, rather than undertake an ambitious project elsewhere.

We also have a problem in the exercise that many Guilds and Associations have been focussed on hardware projects for the last five or six decades, but so many rings of bells have been restored, and with modern fittings they now need less maintenance going forward. The need for new rings of bells and augmentations is also not top of most PCC’s list of priorities. Therefore, we need to review our priorities.

With much bell restoration fund money invested in short term deposit accounts, and losing value through inflation, we could invest that money far more effectively in people projects. A typical grant of £10k spent on one major bell restoration project at one tower, would go a long way to helping to regenerate local bands at sevral towers.

If members see a large balance in the BRF they have less incentive to raise funds for it. With property prices where they are, in recent years several Guilds and Associations have also received large windfall bequests, far more than they know what to do with.

The CofE has a dilemma. It needs to attract younger people, but it cannot afford to upset the older members of its congregations. It also has a large number of buildings which are inflexible, not situated in ideal locations and expensive to insure, heat and maintain.

In our local Deanery we have a ring of three in a small village. Five years ago, they were augmented to six, but there is only one service a month. The benefice has two other village churches with ring of bells, but since Covid there are just two ringers left in the benefice, and they don’t have the time or energy to train a new band.

A neighbouring benefice has four churches, two with bells. One of these is a ring of five which were installed fifteen years ago in an empty tower. This is now a ‘festival’ church with a handful of services each year. The Christmas service is at 8am, and the church has no churchwardens.

Another benefice also has two towers with bells and they too both have difficulties filling churchwarden and PCC vacancies. One of these churches is also now also a ‘festival’ church.

Evensong is now almost non-existent at any church in our Deanery, having been replaced at the larger churches with family orientated teatime gatherings.

One thing is certain, we cannot expect ringing to continue the way it has continued over recent decades. We cannot restore every ring bells and add more. We need to recognise the realities adapt. We have significant resources at our disposal and as ‘Ring for the King’ has shown, an activity which many members of the public are willing to participate in, and these new people are needed to help address our own demographic challenges and preserve the exercise.

PS Talking to Annie Hall, Secretary of the Coventry Diocesan Guild earlier about another matter, I learnt that investment of a large bequest that they had received a few years ago is managed by the Diocese and held in long term investments. As a result of the income that this generates, the Guild BRF is now offering grants of up to 50% to major projects.

The open day in aid of Ropley was an excellent well managed event, and showed just how generous the ringing community can be, not just financially but also in terms of their time and energy taken to organise it. However, it was in aid of a specific project.

Much has changed over the last 50 years since many of our Society BRF’s were established. Thanks to many decades of fundraising and much volunteer labour, there are now far fewer unringable towers, and many rings now hang in modern frames, with modern fittings, which are far less expensive to maintain.
We often hear calls to raise more money for Society BRF’s, but in recent decades money has generally been coming in faster than it is spent. The surplus is often invested short term deposit accounts such as the CofE CBF Deposit Fund. In 1995-7 a CCCBR survey showed that there were about 5.3 years’ worth of reserves held in Society BRF’s. Nowadays this has doubled to about 10.6 years’ worth of reserves.
Taking figures from CBF’s factsheet, If a BRF constantly had £50k invested in that fund over the last ten years it would have grown to £54,160. However, to match the CPI measure of inflation over the same period, it would need to grow to £66,600, so there would have been a loss of £12,440 in purchasing power.

I know that some will argue about which is the most relevant measure of inflation, and investment in short term deposit accounts may have been appropriate when there was a faster turnaround. However, the point is that when members see their money held in the BRF for a long period of time before is spent, and it depreciates as it is held in short term deposit accounts, will they contribute more? In real terms, members are donating less than they did a few decades ago. Martin Lewis would not be impressed!

CCLA, which manages the CBF Deposit Fund on behalf of the CofE, offers actively managed longer term investment funds for the CofE and other charities. It is recommended that these are held for a minimum term of five years, and they have a target of beating CPI inflation. The COIF Charities Investment Fund has reported an annualised return (increased on average each year) of 9.44% over the last ten years. Over this period, it has beaten its target of matching CPI + 4% to produce an annualised return of CPI + 6.68%, significantly enhancing the purchasing power of the money invested.

The Oxford Diocesan Guild Bell Fund has been investing money not needed for the next three years in a basket of longer-term investments, based on advice from their Diocesan financial adviser, for many years. Consequently, it has accumulated a large investment fund, the income from which now helps the fund to offer grants of 20% of the cost of eligible works. If only more societies did the same, they could generate far more money to spend on their bell restoration projects. Alternatively, they could invest more money on more welcoming ringing environments and towers where ringing can thrive, as Robin Shipp and Simon Linford argue in the Ringing 2030 thread. Or they could do a mix of both.

https://www.ccla.co.uk/investments/investor/charities-and-churches

I don’t know whether London is unusual but there are very few towers here which focus heavily on called changes, most are looking to get people to cover and then plain hunt and then treble and then ring methods inside and this is definitely harder if there are less steady support ringers than progressing ringers at a practice night but I can’t think of a practice night which spends more time on called changes than methods. — Lucy Chandhial

There are plenty of opportunities in Central London and many in the inner suburbs too, but again you have to travel. I think, as Lucy suggested further up the thread, that older learners (as with younger learners) need to be encouraged to engage with other bands in their local areas from an early stage. — Tristan Lockheart

Looking to the future, a culture of travel will need to be normalised if ringing is to remain sustainable; — Tristan Lockheart

Let me add a different perspective here. I learnt in rural Gloucestershire as a teenager, then spent 40 years in London and the past five years retired in rural Hampshire.

Throughout the 1970’s between 20% and 25% of the local G&B branch membership were junior members. We could easily have entered a branch team in the NWRC if it existed then, as could many other branches/districts. There were plenty of opportunities to progress as the difference between the top end and the bottom end of ringing was far less. Through contact made at branch meetings and practices, conductors (who were not much older than us) would invite us into peal and quarter peal attempts. These were often in plain methods. Three of my first peals were of plain bob minor, the fourth was of grandsire doubles. I had to ring three more before ringing one of Surprise Major.

In the 1980’s the MCA&LDG had four active Districts. The London County Association was also very active. The MCA&LDG now has just two larger districts and the LCA needed to be wound up in the 1990’s. It attracted the many young ready-made ringers moving to London, but that supply slowed to a trickle. We now have a situation where there are fewer local bands, and as public transport in London is so easy, people gravitate to where the best ringing is.

There are a substantial number of towers where there are no regular local practices, with the bells kept ringing by a band based at another tower. Whilst there may be enough support ringers now in order to fast track a limited number of learners on to methods quickly, that is not sustainable in the long term.

The one factor that determines whether a local band is an active one is the presence of a couple of people who between them have the skills needed to run a successful band They can take over an otherwise silent tower and soon build up an active band. Conversely, I have seen quite a few local surprise bands collapse completely when a few key individuals move away.

The weekday evening ‘after work’ peal bands are far less active, their members now being retired meet up on weekdays in the countryside instead. Generally, they are also now far more risk averse, so don’t provide the opportunities to bring on large numbers of new ringers in the way that they used to.

Locally, in the Hampshire countryside we have recruited and taught quite a few new ringers since Covid. Many are early retired or working from home, and although many are mature learners, I’m pretty sure that many of them will be ringing Grandsire Triples and Bob Major inside in a couple of years’ time. The limiting factor is the availability of helpers to fill in, as many of the more experienced ringers are older than me and are less enthusiastic than they used to be. Infirmity is also creeping up on them..

However, once we have got our new ringers to ringing Grandsire and Plain Bob, and having put all the hard work in, we wouldn’t want to see the more able ones travel and join another band in order to learn to ring even more advanced methods. That can’t be sustainable, especially if those bands haven’t put the hard work in. It will just reinforce a two-tier system or downward spiral which towers cannot escape from. I don’t mind the new ringers taking opportunities to progress, by ringing with others in the District or Guild, but they also need to remain members of the local band in order to help the others on the lower rungs of the ladder. That way the band as a whole will progress further.

Nor does my local band wish to see our practices over-run by learners from other towers, especially when we may have to invest time in re-teaching some of them to handle, or some of the other basic skills needed to ring simple methods successfully. We support the neighbouring practices where the bands are at the call-changes/kaleidoscope stage, as they have an important role to play in teaching the foundation skills well.

So what would I do differently at a national level?

There needs to be far more emphasis on developing bands, and less on individual advancement. Far more leadership training will help.

The Hereford Ringing course model has been around for about 50 years, but is it the right one in today’s circumstances? The new learners are willing to pay, and that is part of the solution, but the elementary levels on the recent North-West Ringing course were three times over-subscribed. The more advanced groups had roughly the same number of applications as places available. Finding sufficient helpers of the right quality has also always been a problem.

The Essex course model, where the opportunity is now being taken to train new teachers and spread good teaching practice, has the potential to have a far more lasting impact, rather than just trying to teach other people’s learners for them. Smaller local courses are far easier to organise, so long as they are held frequently, rather than the typical annual training day.

We also need to be realistic about the scale of action needed, and ensure that sufficient resources are mobilised. Over the last ten years the Birmingham School of ringing has taught 250 new ringers. If we are to teach 15,000 new ringers between now and 2030 we will need far more schools like this, not just 30 or 40 ringing centres or teaching hubs and a couple of extra residential courses. To end up with 15,000 new ringers in 2030 you will need to recruit and start teaching around 30,000 people. That’s over 4,000 per annum.

There were difficulties in many areas coping with Ring for the King enquiries, but we will need to do more than that every year between now and 2030. We’re going to need something like 200 hubs/centres of a similar scale to Birmingham, with a sufficiently large pool of teachers and helpers. That’s almost one per District/Branch, more if they are on a smaller scale in the rural areas, and those areas where the supply of the necessary helpers is the weakest.

I agree that some "just one student at a time" is needed, but it really does cut down on each student's ringing time. It also results in what some residential courses complain about - the same students coming back and doing the same thing year after year (as they can ring whatever it is ONLY when surrounded by good ringers — David Smith

It was also my experience as a group leader on the Surrey Association training days in the 1990's and 2000's. These were held twice a year, and the same strudents came back time after time. They didn't get the support in their local towers, and reverted to their bad habits. We did hold tower captain's training days, but few tower captains attended.

At Alresford we have ten new 'Ring to the King' ringers at the moment, who are all very keen, and just starting to pain hunt. This requires a far geater degree of bell control, and other skills, than are needed to ring call-changes. If we had tried the traditional approach of 'one in at a time' to plain hunt, it would be very slow, the new ringers would only have got a couple of goes each evening, and our experienced ringers would have become very bored too!

Therefore we have used all the exercises in the Learning the Ropes foundation skills toolbox (whole pull and stand, set after a variable number of strokes, kaleidoscope places and dodges, mexican wave, switch-a-roo, moving anticlockwise round the circle to ring all the bells in the tower, ring facing out the circle etc.) We don't need very many helpers to do this and the students get a lot of rope time, so they are making rapid progress. They also enjoy doing all these exercises.

If only we could spread the word and get more towers, Guild and Association trainiing days (and residential couses) to do the same!

Going back to the original question, have you ever played in an orchestra or a brass band, or sung in a choir.? If so, you will realise that what you are able to play or sing is dependent on the least able members of the group. Joining another orchestra, band or choir to play or sing more advanced music may work for you, but unless you stay to help the others, you will be letting them down. Despite having invested a lot of their time in teaching you, they will be stuck or go backwards.

The same is true in ringing. It’s a team activity, not an individual one, and we need to teach smarter.

Rather than the old way, we need to focus on teaching core skills such as advanced bell control and the three speeds of ringing, listening skills and understanding the concept of place in a row, right from the outset. Otherwise, it takes far longer to acquire these skills if people become accustomed to not needing them, or once bad habits become ingrained.

We too have a lot of new ringers, and we have found the techniques in the ART Module 2F syllabus invaluable. Rather than ring endless call-changes and plain hunt by numbers, we have used exercises such as whole pull and stand, setting after a number of strokes (decided by throwing a large furry dice) kaleidoscope places and dodges, Mexican wave, ringing twinkle twinkle little star, switching from rounds to backward rounds and back again, moving people round the circle to ring different bells, ringing facing out of the circle and teaching people how to call call-call changes. We have found these exercises invaluable.

We use a previously silent neighbouring tower for our Monday evening beginners practices, which are very popular. Everyone enjoys themselves and there is a good team spirit. We’ve even needed to discourage some of our experienced ringers from coming along to help, as you don’t need very many experienced ringers to run these sessions. This gives the new ringers far more rope time, which is what they need, and it retains their interest.

This also has the benefit of relieving the experienced ringers of the tedium of endless call changes and plain hunt. Having mastered the key skills at the beginners practices, the new ringers are also now able to join in the Friday night practices and make far more rapid progress than they would if they had followed the few minutes of call-changes and plain hunt by numbers each week pathway.

We are able to recruit elsewhere in the District without a problem, and we have not wasted time trying to save the bands that are reluctant to engage with us. It's just a shame that these villages are just the same as the others where we have plenty of recruits. We've noticed that RFK enquiries passed on to these bands are either not followed up, or there is a very high drop out rate compared with elsewhere. When these bands cease to exist, hopefully some of our enthusiastic ringers can step in a recruit and train up a new band.

I would also argue that before embarking on another national PR and recruitment campaign, we first need to carry out an internal PR campaign to make sure that any influx of new recruits can be handled properly. It's interesting that ART has received around 2,000 RFK enquiries in recent months, and although the number of fresh enquiries has slowed right down, there are now a significant number coming back to ART asking if there is somewhere else where they can be taught to ring. They are keen to learn but only making very slow progress at the tower where they are learning.

To quote Donald Rumsfeld there are”… known unknowns an unknown unknowns”. Any contractual arrangement involves allocating risks between the client and contractor, and in my 40+ years of experience the term ‘fixed price contract’ is a misnomer.

For example, a bell project that I am currently involved with involves a ring where the church was gutted by fire. Two of the bells were cracked, but the other four are OK, although they need to be annealed (heated up and cooled back down) so that there are no stresses left in the metal induced by the fire. Some of the bellhangers had quoted for re-tuning the bells after annealing, others had not. We therefore included a ‘Provisional Sum’ for this known unknown in our analysis and budget, so that we could compare all the quotes on a like for like basis.

It was quite interesting when we compared all the quotes on a like for like basis. All the companies had similar cost structures, so there was not much difference in the final bottom line. Had we simply accepted the lowest quote we might have been approached for an extra once the bells had been annealed, but we now have this risk mitigated.

On previous projects that I have been involved with there have been various unknown unknows that have surfaced, although beforehand we have tried to eliminate them by spending a little money up-front to carry out some investigations and tests. One tower suffered tower sway and rather than just risk proceeding with the cheapest, we employed a well-known ringing Structural Engineer to advise on the best technical solution. Many other towers have metal frames, but the older ones were often painted with lead-based paint. Therefore, I would recommend that paint samples be taken and analysed, rather than going ahead and finding out later. Similarly, foundation beams embedded in tower walls can suffer hidden corrosion or rot, which to the un-trained eye might otherwise only become apparent once work commenced. If the church electrical installation is being used for the hoists, has it been inspected and tested recently? is it adequate for the load and safe to use? Are sockets nearby? Is lighting adequate?

Also, do look carefully at the exclusions in any quote and make sure that they are properly costed in, especially where there are demarcation lines. Does the clock specialist just connect up the hammers, or is he expected to modify the hammers as well?

Contingencies are there to cover the unforeseeable, but being thorough and taking a view on what is covered by provisional sums, and the risk of them being required, you can allow a reasonable level of contingency. Typically, this might range from 5% from a very straightforward project to 10% or even 15% for a very complex one.

If you have got some magical way to attract demand, then please share. — J Martin Rushton

In my experience it's not too difficult to find new ringers. There's some very useful recruitment advice on the Association of Ringing Teachers website: https://ringingteachers.org/resources/recruitment-and-retention

The Central Council's Volunteer and Leadership Workgroup have also developed a very good ten-point plan and there is a video about this here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-egnSnol7k&t=220s

Of course, asking for £100 may put some off, but there are ways round this and a different charging structure could be adopted. However ringing is generally well out of date in its attitude to money and what people would be willing to pay. If only we charged a little more we would be able to do far more.

I've just done a quick google search to see what it would cost to take up one of the alternatives to bellringing.

Swimming lessons
Start Mon 9th Jan 2023
£55 per month

After school soccer club - School Year: 2
Tuesday's - 15.30-16:30
From January 3, 2023 to March 28, 2023
Price: £49.50

Music Lessons
From £13.93 for a 20 minute lesson to £27.76 for a 40 minute lesson. £9.25 for a single group lesson.

Girlguiding
The annual subscription amount is set by HQ. This goes towards running Girlguiding nationally. In 2023 this will be £28 per member. In addition amounts, known as levies, are set by the district, division, county and country or region. This helps with local running costs. As it’s set locally, this amount will be different for different units and levels. Each member pays a total of these two amounts as their annual subs. There are extra charges for uniform, special activities, camps and events.

Scouts
Subscription costs are £135 of which £36.00 per annum is the HQ fee. There are additional costs for activities and uniform.

Insofar as it relates to ringing, we have to be prepared for a considerable reduction in the number of towers. What are the implications of considerably fewer towers for recruitment and retention? Where are the opportunities for relocated rings of bells, or will many be lost? — Tristan Lockheart

The problem is that we have significantly more bells than ringers, and there is a mismatch between where the towers are and where the ringers are. I’m not so sure that we will see a considerable reduction in the number of towers, instead we are likely to see the bells and towers retained, albeit that service frequency will be reduced to one or two a month, or even half a dozen a year.

Consequently, many bands in the smaller villages will peter out, as the current generation of elderly ringers reach the end of their ringing careers. They haven’t been recruiting many new ringers, especially young ones, for decades, so it isn’t going to make a lot of difference.

The larger villages may see groups of local people come together to get their silent bells ringing again, and if they are fortunate to be able to tap into a few experienced teachers, they will be able to establish a new band. Sometimes a benefice band will be established to help facilitate this, or perhaps ringers from a nearby market town will help.

Drawing on my previous experience as a member of both the CCCBR’s Redundant Bells Committee and the CCCBR Ringing Centres Committee, I suspect that only the ‘best’ rings of bells will be saved, but there is then a problem of where to put them. Many parishes are struggling financially, so will be reluctant to take on a major financial commitment, unless there is a direct benefit to them. Also, it will be pointless putting these surplus rings into small village towers, where there will be limited prospect of them being rung. I can, however, see existing ‘poor’ rings of bells swapped for a ‘nice’ second-hand one – e.g. what has happened with the ten from Hanley.

Also, I can’t see the justification for redundant bells to be used to create new ringing centres in an empty tower. The former CCCBR committee was approached to help establish several of these, but they were driven by the desire to re-home a set of bells, at significant expense. However, whilst an attractive idea, there was limited thought given to how these ringing centres were going to be staffed and operate, and there was often an existing suitable tower just up the road which could be used, for a fraction of the cost. It is the people side, rather than the hardware that is important in establishing a new ringing centre. That is why a number of us from the former committee were involved in setting up the Ringing Foundation and subsequently ART to address the fundamental problem of too many bells and not enough ringers..

What I was suggesting (if somewhat clumsily) was that if the church buildings were reordered in some cases a modern church hall could be made redundant and the older church used as a combined space. — J Martin Rushton

Having rung at several churches which have been reordered to enable seven days a week community use, there may be an unexpected problem for the ringers. In order to justify the investment, and pay for future upkeep the parish will be looking to hire out the building to various users, who will be paying a commercial fee for the use of the building. These uses may clash with the bells being rung in the tower. We've had to change a regular practice night when a community choir wished to practice in the church on those evenings instead. We've also had to avoid visiting bands on Monday evenings as Alcoholics Anonymous were using the meeting room for their meetings! To take priority over these other uses, ringers will need to pay a realistic fee for the use of the building.

Also, it seems that many of these reordering's are when evangelical groups take over a dwindling church to turn it round by attracting a new younger congregation. Ringers who just ring the bells and who do not stay on to play a further part in the worship, are not seen as a priority.

I am sure that all sorts of things are happening elsewhere, and what is worrying is that the ringing community has not really woken up to this. A couple of miles from where I live is a church with a ring of five that were installed in 2009. There is no local band and we had not rung there since before Covid and when we sough permission about six weeks ago we were told that pigeons had got in and there was no power.

With a tiny congregation there was no churchwarden, but we finally managed to get permission to inspect the bells about 10 days ago. Fortunately the pigeon had died and its carcass had been cleared away and it tuned out that the electric heating system in the whole church had been turned off to save money. As a result condensation was occurring and thick black mould was forming on the walls and ceiling of the nave.

The church is one of four in the benefice, all close together and is now a 'festival' church with six services a year, most of which are 8am communions. There are at least two other festival churches in our district of 33 towers, and others with small congregations are having difficulty finding someone to take on the churchwarden role, so it is not just about clergy being stretched.

Even quite a few of those that are not festival churches have less than one service a week, sometimes just one a fortnight or even once a month. So it is not just closures that we need to worry about.