Ringing Forums

is needed for the "Employed Admin Assistant. Weekly hours of 16 to deal with enquires generated by recruitment hub" who will cost us £15,000 in 2030, which will be 41% of the total Council expenditure of £36,450.

It is, concurrently, both dominating and peripheral, and needs more justification and expanded detail before we commit to doubling our subscriptions for such a modest addition to available resources. — PeterScott

Ringing 2030 needs to overcome this inertia in order to move forward, and do this in sufficient time so that fewer bands fall below critical mass. — Roger Booth

These two quotes highlight the 'dammed if you do, dammed if you don’t' dilemma the CC has. Overcoming inertia requires brave leadership and decision making plus increased resource. More volunteers, doing more and being better directed is necessary but not sufficient. Funds need to be spent, albeit as wisely as possible. To be sustainable that means increased income.

To make best use of scarce volunteer resource, more routine tasks need to be taken away from them. Also, the CC role is rarely the only volunteer role that volunteers are doing. To avoid volunteer burnout, volunteers need to be nurtured and feel valued. Just because they are volunteers does not mean that standard HR hygiene factors can be ignored. And that means by all of us.

In my experience the effect of introducing people in assistant roles is that it initially slows progress. The effort of the existing knowledgeable people is diverted to defining work processes for the assistants and then training them up. Once assistants are trained, experience has to be gained in the level of supervision they need for different tasks. If assistant effort is to be shared then an understanding needs to evolve of how much support an individual volunteer can receive. Admin or any other type of Assistants are not short-term silver bullets, they are medium to long-term support infrastructure provision initiatives. So don’t expect quick payback and do expect mistakes to be made along the way. More detailed expenditure plans with supporting cost-benefit analysis are indeed needed. That in itself takes effort. Unless we are to wait till the limited volunteer Suitably Skilled and Qualified Personnel (SQEP) can do it, SQEP costing somewhat more than £100 per hour will be needed; never mind £15K a year. ‘Courage mes braves.’

There are no guarantees that any one specific measure will work; continuing to do the same things that sees ringing in increasingly more towers either endangered or extinct is guaranteed not to. “There is nothing that is more certain sign of insanity than to do the same thing over and over and expect the results to be different” ― Albert Einstein.

Paul Wotton, CCCBR Ringing 2030 Recruitment and Development Workgroup Lead (And yes, I too need to better direct my team. Always more to do!)

Yes, there is a danger that following one bell for too long, as in CC's, is detrimental to the skill required for looking around for other ropes. — Phillip George

I like most was taught call changes before I was taught to plain hunt. They can be a useful step to method ringing as btw can be the various kaleidoscope exercises in the ART Level 2 module. What is important is that an emphasis is put on striking, as it should have been when learning to ringing rounds. Clean shifts of position that give accurate CCs at the 1st handstoke after the call; not some gradual drift to the new change over a number of rows. Ringers placing their bell in the right place not just 'following' a bell. Good bell control and awareness of place using listening, sight, rhythm and feel are key skills needed for all decent ringing. This of course will involve a significant culture change in many towers. Changing culture is a hard and slow process. Something that makes the Ringing 2030 timescales look ambitious not lagardly.

I think use of '2030' infers no need to act until 2030 — Ken Webb

To me the 2030 tag recognises that the future of ringing as we know it is under threat and that addressing that is a medium-term project, if not a continous one.

A 'Do nothing' approach that keeps on doing the same old stuff will lead to a further decline in ringing. I don't think that many ringers would disagree with that statement, particularly if we are talking about the bulk of grass roots ringing. There are no quick fixes. The 2030 date is a good head mark. What it says to me that we need to do stuff now to start moving to a better place. The CCCBR Ringing 2030 Product Roadmap shows the planned current workstreams and is much more detailed in the near term than the long. I don't think anyone is suggesting that progress should not be made as soon as possible, but the target cannot be fully achieved overnight and there is no point suggesting otherwise. As other current discussions show limited volunteer effort can only be expected to achieve speed limited progress. Pushing for more speed risks volunteer burn-out.

What is needed to progress Ringing 2030 on a volunteer basis are volunteers with the capability, creativity, commitment and capacity to deliver it. Ringers with even three of these characteristics are rare, those with all four vanishingly so. Of these rare people, those of working age are in demand in the workplace, may have the great responsibility of raising children and are struggling to keep up their continuous professional development. They may even be trying to do some ringing. Those that that are retired can struggle with capacity, I know I do. We need to nurture our volunteers, too many of whom are doing too many volunteer roles in ringing to do all of them as well as they would like. Sorry is not a word that volunteers need to say. They are the ones doing something, general as well and as fast as they can.

(For more on CCCBR plans see my earlier post in the ART related discussion.)

It is unclear whether the CCCBR has considered ... — Ken Webb

Correct, not that it is not being considered; it is not well publicized.

Evidence that it is being consider can be found in the CCCBR Ringing 2030 Recruitment and Development workplan (See the Reports section at https://cccbr.org.uk/about/workgroups/volunteer-and-leadership/) which contains a number of tasks that relate to liaison/working with ART. That it can be 'found' is not good enough. The CCBR cannot expect ringers to spend time studying its web-site, find out what is there, and then either use or comment as they wish.

Action on myself as Workgroup leader for Recruitment and Development to 'push' this information; not expect it to be 'pulled' by a host of ringers eagerly awaiting its publication.

Thanks for these comments. They are not a million miles away from my thinking and I what I am trying to address. My impression is that ringer 'activists' engaged with tower, district/branch, society/association or CCCBR organisation are trying to achieve similar aims. As ever with human endeavours tensions are as often caused as much by poor communication as divergent views.

The Yellow Yo-Yo report has many good points. It is produced by a business that write many such reports and may have certain presumptions about what ringing needs. Having been involved in writing a number of commercial reports I detect much 'boiler plate' content that has is then tailored as appropriate. The emphasis on youth is pretty standard. Ringing has, if not a Unique Selling Point, with its appeal to older recruits a relatively rare one. The future of many towers may depend on a steady thoughput of mature recruits who are not destined to master advanced methods or ring lots of QPs or peals. If they can ring what they ring fairly well, they will be valuable assets to their towers for a decade or more.

The Recruitment and Development (formerly Volunteering and Leadership) Work Group have mapped their relevant Ringing 2030 3 Pillers on to a high-level plan. This plan is published on the Ringing 2030 Recruitment and Development web page in the reports section. See https://cccbr.org.uk/about/workgroups/volunteer-and-leadership/ , The plan also contains a more detailed rolling 3-year plan aimed at delivering those aspects of Ringing 2030 in the Work group remit.

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Today the Touring Tower is at Hurst Show in Berkshire and the Charmborough Ring is at Billingshurst Show in Sussex. All three mobile belfries will be used at about 30 events this year, and seen by hundreds, thousands and even tens of thousands of people at each event. We can show that when followed up effectively, they are not only an excellent PR tool, but also a good way of recruiting new ringers. — Roger Booth

Great. That's just the sort of evidence I think the CCCBR needs to justify having more financial muscle. I also take on board the various contributions pointing to Guilds and Associations making better use of the funds entrusted to them. As a 'church' associated organisation, perhaps the parable of the three servants is applicable (Mathew 25: 14 to 30).

The CCCBR strategy seems to be "Let's not bother with the existing 20/30k ringing duffers, let's just start over with teenagers" — John de Overa

As the CCCBR Ringing 2030 Recruitment and Development Work Group lead that is most certainly not my view. The Development part of the WG title is equally, if not more important, than the Recruitment part. Inspection of the Ringing 2030 Recruitment and Development CCCBR webpage will show that I use the term 'Recruit, Retain, Regain' as an expansion of the 'Recruitment' brief. Towers I know don't find initial recruitment that hard, particular of mature learners. Retaining ringers and regaining lapsed ringers is key and not simply. To do so we need development that delivers for all capabilities of ringers and of all ages. I don't claim to have the answers, but I am totally committed to the CCCBR providing support all those that ring to achieve whatever their ringing aims may be. I am also committed to encouraging all ringers to stive to produce as good a level of, what are overwhelmingly public, performances as they can. It matters less what is rung than how well it is rung. From a base of good core ringing skills individuals need to be supported to develop as they see fit and their abilities and available time allow.

Please see my comments under cashflow-forecast-spend-for-2025-24000-overstated. What the CCCBR is currently for is agreed by its members, its affiliated societies. Those societies democratically representing individual member ringers. That's the governance model we have. If ringers don't like it then they need to take action within the societies they are members of. The CCCBR seems to be being criticized for trying to do what its members have mandated it to do. That it could be done better is not in dispute. That's what Ringing 2030 and associated funding consultations are all about.

It's a chicken and egg issue. If you don't provide the CCCBR with the resources it needs to do its job, then it you risk it not being fit for purpose. If it's not fit for purpose, then why provide resources. There can be no guaranteed success, only guaranteed failure if resources are not provided.

Returning to the original question of 'What new outputs will result from the proposed increase in affiliation fees? The aim would be to achieve the Ringing 2030 aims. To that I would add to better deliver the CCCBR objects as set out in Section 3.2 of the rules of the CCCBR. As discussed above it is hard now to show that extra expenditure would achieve this. The proposed 'proof of concept' approach using CCCBR reserves means that the increased affiliation fees are not significant to start with. By the time they might be there should be evidence one way or the other of the effectiveness of additional expenditure. No doubt not all funding decisions will prove fruitful but the safeguarding the future of ringing does not present a 'do nothing' option. Scrutiny of fully costed, cost-benefit analysed, future plans and budget should be the focus of the CCCBR AGMs. Preparing such plans may well require initial expenditure on business advisor support,

Peter Sotheran's comment that "Out here at the grass roots of ringing I reckon only one-in-ten local ringers (if that) is even aware of the CCCBR.", is almost certainly true. In conversation on the topic of CCCBR funding after a 12-bell practice in Bristol with a regular peal ringer and member of one of the leading societies, it became evident that he did not know that the CCCBR is a registered charity. A charity with purposes democratically agreed by its affiliated society/association members (See CCCBR rules on the CCCBR Website). The funding provided by its members is barely enough, perhaps not enough, to fund its AGM and basic administrative functions. By voluntary effort it tries to achieve some of its stated purposes. Only one-in-ten local ringers being aware of the CCCBR shows that it is failing to achieve those purposes satisfactorily. To be effective as a charity it needs funding in line with its purposes. A measure of success perhaps being that 9 out of 10 ringers are then aware of the CCCBR and value what it does. The alternative is a radical review of what the CCCBR purposes are. The CCCBR Trustees might at that point recommend that the CCCBR ceases to be a charity.

The CCCBR is either a charitable organisation set up and properly funded by its members to achieve its purposes or it is not. If not, its members should decide what, presumably smaller, role they want it to preform and fund that, assuming they do want it to do something.

Paul Wotton
CCCBR Ringing 2030 Recruitment and Development Workgroup Lead

Yet we rely on older ringers. This morning, Sunday 17th March, Wells Cathedral (10 - Tenor 56 cwt), call changes on 10 as part of service ringing, the average age of the ringers of back four bells was seventy-one.

See my comments of 3 months ago in the Ringing 2030 topic which speaks to how, and perhaps why, Church of England churches are felt to 'belong' the communities they are located in. Making these churches into living community assets seems to many the way to go. Doing so would need a serious national debate. As the Establish church CofE incumbents have the care of all souls in the parishes; not just those who attend church. The right to be baptised, married, worship and have a funeral extends to all (Albeit being married in church is subject to restrictions some think wrong). Not all taxpayers will see that this justifies public support for churches and not all shades of churchmanship will be happy for 'their' churches to be used for secular purposes. The way forward is thus not easy.

Regarding selling unused bells.

Whilst there is no doubt that the legal ownership of CoE churches and bells lie with the Church of England, there persist a sense within communities of them being their churches and their bells. Cultural memory is long, as many conflicts in the world bear witness to. Generations pass down a sense of what is right and of ownership. It is my understanding that Church of England churches and their bells were largely paid for out of the tithes of the parishioners and the gifts of the gentry, for whom the parishioners often worked. Bells were and still are donated by individuals or from funds partly raised by the community, as are church and bell restorations. This feeling that church infrastructure somehow belongs to the successors of people who funded it is explainable.

As the Church Commissioners Report on the future of churches showed there is a problem of squaring the circle between the fact that communities want ‘their’ churches to remain open and who pays. The Church selling off the family bronze and then presumably the silver is not a long-term solution. Sadly, once the Church Commissioners get the taste for selling bells to raise cash, I don’t see them holding to any intention of not also selling off those where there is the capability of supporting ringing, still less investing the proceeds of such sales in ringing. The only financial constraint of them not selling bells and fittings will be that the cost of removal may exceed the scrap value of the metal.

Leadership as part of good tower governance has been a recognised issue since I joined the Volunteer and Leadership workgroup during lockdown. Tim Hine, the then workgroup leader, asked me to take on a Leadership Development role. Tim had also indicated that his 6 years as Workgroup Leader was up and he was looking for a replacement. That ended up being me. I retained the Leadership Development hat. I have found out that the Work Group Leader role is more reactive than I imagined. Leadership Development has remained on my ‘To do’ list but is continually pushed down that list by more immediate emerging tasks.

I now wish to recruit a Leadership Development Lead into the Volunteer and Leadership Work Group to develop a Ringing Leadership course that can be delivered as a one off event or as evening sessions on the various weekend ringing courses. I have started producing a course outline which a new Leadership Development Lead may, or may not, wish to build on. If you are interested in the role please contact me at vlleadatcccbrdotorgdotuk.

I also went to the W&P open day and agree with Alison that it was an excellent event. For me a key to its success was the advertised and delivered support of local ringers to ensure that there was always a band for visiting ringers to ring with. The result of this was that ringers could travel with confidence that they would get to ring on and hear the complete rings at towers they visited. As a result ringers came from far and wide and there were queues to ring at many towers I visited. The helpers you stood by to ensure that the rings could be rung may have sometimes felt redundant; they were not, without them being there the queues would not have been there.

I can only echo Alison's praise and thanks to all the W&P members who made the event work so well. It's an example of good practice that we can all learn from.

I think that the saying: "There is no such thing as bad publicity." applies. We need to raise awareness of what Bellringing is. The public need to appreciate it as skilled physical and mental activity, one that when done well is a positive contribution to the soundscape and that is more a communitarian church activity than a 'churchy' church one. When I tell people that I am a bellringer there quite a few that are surprised that bells are not rung automatically, disabusing people of that is important. Add in that it is a relatively low cost voluntary activity and you start to arose interest.

Improved awareness of ringing is a good thing in its own right, arousing interest will naturally lead to improved recruiting.

Do we need more pictures like the one of the band in this performance?

https://bb.ringingworld.co.uk/view.php?id=1541656

Recently when asked to call some call changes for the specific benefit of one learner, as well as calling up, which for reasons rehearsed above I prefer, I also told the learner which place they were in. This seems to aid their striking, as one would expect. I also reinforced that they were still in the same place when I stretched them by swapping the bells immediately below them with out initially telling them which bell they were following. Saying something like "Keep ringing at rounds pace you are still in 4th place.

This emphasises the fact that we are changing the position of bells. From memory one of the ART Stage 2 techniques is to get a band at a practice night to ringing call changes by calling which place bells are to cross. Once again stressing the relationship between knowing what place you are in, listening and striking. All this helps learners understand the change of pace required to ring well, be it method or call changes. It also makes call changes a more valuable stepping stone to method ringing, the theme of subject of a previous forum topic.

Regarding what the CCCBR should be doing, absolutely. See the task description of the CC Volunteer & Leadership Workgroup in the 2023 Diary. It starts with the words “Facilitating and encouraging …”. The challenge is doing that in way that matches what ringer want. One purpose of a new survey should be to get a good idea of what that is.

You should not need to be worried about attending towers that are populated by black-zoners. They were all learners once. e-mail the tower captain and possibly have a talk over the phone. Explain that you want to progress to 8 bell ringing and eventually Surprise Major and that you may be nervous ringing with much better ringers than yourself. Make it clear that you don't expect to get that many rings in a practice.

If you get a positive reception from the tower captain, expect to make mistakes and get constructive criticism about your striking. Talk to the tower captain about what your next step should be. It might start with Plain Bob of Grandsire and that is fine. It about finding you comfort level and then being stretched. Learn the methods they ring regularly and try to follow what a ringer in front of you is doing rather than just sitting there being bored. Don't worry if you can follow for more than a few rows to start with. it will come. This 'observing' will develop your method knowledge, 8 bell ropesight and listening skills. In fact, the ropesight will be harder as the ringer of the bell you are watching will often obscure your view. So that's a bit of 'overtraining' as eventually it will be easier to see when you are one of the band.

It is to be hoped that you are made welcome and that you can then slowly progress to become a black-zoner yourself. Sadly, if you are not made welcome you may need to look elsewhere if that is possible in your area.

Personally, I am using this approach to develop to my next level and it is slowly but surely showing results.