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Roger Booth

Bell restoration funds are raising income faster that they are spending it, the amount spent in grants is relatively static, and going down significantly in real terms, whilst the real problem in ringing now is not a lack of bells, but a shortage of ringers.

The Central Council used to undertake a triennial survey of BRF’s and, following Charity Commission guidance, encouraged societies to spend money, rather than accumulate large reserves. In the last CCCBR survey in 1996 there was 5.3 years’ worth of grant expenditure held in reserve.

Nowadays the annual income and expenditure figures for each BRF are published on the Charity Commission website. Since the Ringing Foundation, I have been tracking these figures. There are 29 societies where just the BRF is a charity and 14 more where the whole society is registered as a charity. Of the 29, the amount spent over the last 15 years averages £237k, whereas the income averages £306k. I suspect that a similar trend applies to the 14.

Looking at the figures it is clear that some societies are receiving substantial bequests (Devon in 2014; Guildford, Lancashire and Yorkshire in 2015, and the Salisbury DG received £115k in 2022).
Not included in the graph are a £681k bequest managed by the Diocese of Coventry which is professionally invested for capital growth and also produces an income of over £20k per annum for the Coventry DG. The Essex Association (one of the 14) also received bequests totalling £373k in 2021.
Even excluding these bequests, income to the 29 has averaged £255k per annum over the past 15 years. Given inflation, both income and expenditure should have increased significantly, but have remained relatively stable.

What is of particular concern is that in 2023 income was £316k, whereas grant expenditure was £196k, the income figure having been boosted by investment income from the bequests. It is clear that societies could give significantly larger grants, and many are, however given financial pressures it is likely that going forward many churches will be less willing to embark on large bell restoration projects.

We also have an ageing ringing population and are experiencing a slow but steady reduction in the number of active ringers. Between 2011 and 2023 the membership of the 29 societies decreased from 22,834 to 20,614 a decrease of 9.7%.

Apart from bell restoration, much of ringing is run on a shoestring, but more could be invested in growing the number of ringers. The typical grant for one large bell restoration project would go a long way, and benefit far more bands.

John de Overa

I completely agree that training and not bells is the biggest need, but as most BRFs are charities with a specific purpose of funding bell repairs, wouldn't reallocating funds to training require a change to a BRF's governance?

As for the cash mountain, I get the impression that some BRFs have fairly low limits on what proportion of a project they'll fund, perhaps they could be encouraged to be more generous?

Lucy Chandhial

Some Associations are actively raising money / requesting donations for training as a separate thing to BRF fundraising and I think this makes good sense.

Changing BRF use of existing money would not be easy but starting to collect money for different purposes can be done alongside and gradually transition the habit of donations to the BRF into donations towards recruitment or training.

However, I think people find it harder to pin point what the donation is for or what the charity aspect is when it’s about publicity, recruitment and training.
Some people have tested charging for handling lessons but most people are still giving their time for free as part of recruitment, teaching and training so the parts which are paid for (some of the admin organisation, perhaps the lead organisers time, advertising in local media, tower donations) are varied from place to place and tend to be ongoing costs. I think this makes it harder for people to see it as a charity donation and it is more seen as part of running costs for the organisation.

BRF’s can sit on a fair amount of money as each tower only needs work every 50 - 100 years but then needs a lot of money so it is long term planning but it is likely there could be fewer projects as some churches close or towers fall silent.

I don’t think the challenge is about re-allocating existing funds but more about starting to raise money for other purposes, which requires some thought and definition around what those purposes are. How do we want to recruit and teach bellringing in order to reach more people more quickly?
This is part of the Ringing 2030 challenge and has a variety of possible solutions which people are trying in different places to see what works.
They don’t necessarily need more money although funding for centralised admin support has proved useful in ART and funding to manage an active teaching tower has proved useful in some teaching hubs.

Roger Booth

↪John de Overa

The duties of a charity trustee include keeping the objects of the charity under review, so changing them should be something that is considered from time to time. In addition the proportion of subs transferred into the BRF can be changed very easily. Also there is case for considering registering the whole society as a charity, where there is then more flexibility.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66290919b0ace32985a7e6c3/CC3_feb24.pdf

Roger Booth

each tower only needs work every 50 - 100 years but then needs a lot of money so it is long term planning — Lucy Chandhial

When I learnt to ring xx years ago, a lot of towers had timber bellframes, with bells hung on timber headstocks and plain bearings. Over the last 50 years, thanks to societies setting up BRF's, a substantial proportion of these have been replaced. Modern engineering is such that in 50 - 100 years only a minor overhaul will be needed, which will be far less expensive. Long term planning needs to focus on the needs of the future, not what we have been used to doing for the last five decades.

John de Overa

The duties of a charity trustee include keeping the objects of the charity under review, so changing them should be something that is considered from time to time. — Roger Booth

That would require the agreement of both the association membership and The Charity Commission:

You must ask for Commission authority if your amendment will:
* change your charity’s purposes

That it will likely be difficult and time consuming. I think @Lucy Chandhial's suggestion of diverting funding from the BRF into a training fund would be easier.

Modern engineering is such that in 50 - 100 years only a minor overhaul will be needed, which will be far less expensive. — Roger Booth

Our installation is 100 years old and it cost ~£60K for the rehang - the wheels needed rebuilding, the steel and wooden frames need strengthening, a new ceiling/floor etc etc etc - refurbishment is always going to be an expensive business.

How do we want to recruit and teach bellringing in order to reach more people more quickly? — Lucy Chandhial

Recruitment gets most of the attention but it's pretty pointless without a solid, countrywide pipeline for people to progress along, and that's sorely lacking in many areas. That training needs to go well beyond PH/PB, which is about the outer limits of most people who start via ART. Relatively speaking, "fixing" recruitment is easy - indeed my tower has stopped at the moment because we don't have sufficient capacity to deliver decent training to new starters. Adequate training at the Surprise / 8 bell level is rare at best - once-a-year courses don't cut the mustard and I'm just about to stop going to the nearest fortnightly (!) Surprise Major practices which are almost entirely focused on extending the repertoire of long-term already-advanced-level ringers, I can't justify 90 mins of travelling for two half courses of Cambridge, which is all I'm "allowed" to ring by the person running the practice. Fair enough if he wants to ring Spliced DooDah with his friends, but it isn't an adequate learning environment for anyone trying to get to that level.

John Harrison

the proportion of subs transferred into the BRF can be changed very easily. Also there is case for considering registering the whole society as a charity, where there is then — Roger Booth

The ODG AGM normally votes to make a substantial grant to thee bell fund but this year the trustees said it didn't need any more money,over and aabove its other sources of income, so no donation was made.

John Harrison

That would require the agreement of both the association membership and The Charity Commission ... That it will likely be difficult and time consuming. — John de Overa

That doesn't follow. The Charity Comission is primarily concerned with whether a charity spends it's money to achieve charitable purposes. If a charity is not spending its money effectively, and modifying its objects would enable it to do so more effectively (on charitable purposes) then the Commission would be likely to support the change of objects.

John de Overa

That doesn't follow. — John Harrison

You'd first have to persuade the majority of the members of the association that it was a good idea, get them to formally approve it, deal with the thorny issues of donations and bequests that were given specifically for bell restoration, rewrite the governing document of the BRF, get that approved by the membership, then after that you'd have to approach the Charity Commission to ask them to approve the change.

As I said, "That it will likely be difficult and time consuming".

John Harrison

↪John de Overa

I admit I was replying to the point about the Charity Commission, which is a legal point, and I didn't spot the reference to persuading members. Yes, members would need to agree to changes, but in the current climate that is something to work through rather than a reason not to try. The CC has modernised itself. Several societies have also done so, and my own Guild has just embarked on the process. If those changes are possible, so are changes to how we prioritise the use of money.

John de Overa

in the current climate that is something to work through rather than a reason not to try. — John Harrison

Absolutely so. But I think it needs to be supported by a fully thought-out plan for how the reallocated money is going to be put to best use. @Roger Booth pointed on FB to what The Essex Association are doing in this area, it's an interesting read.

Roger Booth

Charity Commission approval shouldn't be a problem. Their guidance is that Charity Trustees have a duty to keep the objects of the charity under review and to spend resources on charitable purposes, and not to accumulate large reserves. Charity Trustees should also seek professional advice where appropriate as the ODG does (and not let reserves lose value in real terms by being kept in short term deposit accounts).

Roger Booth

Possible actions could also include giving larger grants, or widening the scope of work that the BRF will fund, such as refurbishing all those dingy ringing chambers or paying for professional bell hangers to visit and train local steeple-keepers. The Trustees could also consider the merits of registering the whole Guild/Association as a Charity.

Members shouldn't be a problem either. When consulted, rank and file members of the Essex Association came up with some excellent ideas of how their large bequest could be used. However, perhaps someone from Essex could comment on what has happened since. My understanding is that the status quo has prevailed.

John de Overa

Possible actions could also include giving larger grants, or widening the scope of work that the BRF will fund — Roger Booth

Yes to everything on your list. Sound Control funding seems to be uncontentious, but I don't know how simulators and CCTV for the bells are viewed by BRFs. We have both (installed during the rehang) and they are used regularly. We also have three roller displays about the church, the bells and ringing in general. We also hired a mobile belfry for the local carnival during the rehang. The funding for all those "add ons" came from the HLF rather than the Association, it seems ironic that it's easier to get funding for that sort of thing from external funding bodies than it is from our own sources.

John Harrison

came from the HLF rather than the Association, it seems ironic that it's easier to get funding for that sort of thing from external funding bodies than it is from our own sources. — John de Overa

Indeed. But it merely reflects that the HLF was set up for broad support of cultural activities whereas BRFs were set up with a narrow focus on hardware. Why they were so set up, and the culture behind it is another matter.

Roger Booth

Many of these BRF's were set up in the 1960's and 1970's. In 1972 the Central Council conducted a survey of ringing and there were 4,962 towers with five or more bells in the British Isles. Of those that completed the survey, over 8% were classed as unringable or unsafe. Today, according to Dove only 4.4% of towers with 5 or more bells are classed as unringable and the number of towers with five or more bells in the British Isles has increased from 4,962 to 5,738. All thanks to the work of BRF's and projects such as Ring in the Millennium.

Over the next few decades many of these churches with bells are likely to have a handful of services each year, or even close for worship. The challenge is going to be to retain access so that future generations of ringers can ring them, and even to have a future generation of ringers. The challenge is also going to be to change the deeply embedded culture and move away from narrowly focussed BRF's to one where Guilds and Associations are charities with a much wider remit to safeguard ringing.

1972 survey unringables.png

Barbara Le Gallez

↪Roger Booth

wrote "where Guilds and Associations are charities with a much wider remit to safeguard ringing".
This is relevant to our band at All Saints' Landbeach, Cambridgeshire, because that is the direction I am trying to steer us in, unilaterally. So any advice would be welcome.
I feel that our church is headed for being a Festival Church and so I am trying to set up our band such that it is secure and can continue to, as Roger says, "safeguard ringing", even if we lose the support of an active church.
Any suggestions as to the best way to go about this would be welcome.

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