28th
Thames 21 Waterway Champions
Imagine Geneva, faces turned towards the camera, smiling, with the famous water spout behind. Its not people with extraordinary superpowers aka Stuart Damon, Alexandra Bastedo and William Gaunt in ITV’s ‘The Champions.’ Its Thames 21’s ‘Champions’ or to be more exact their Waterway Champions.
Thames 21 has £266,000 from youth volunteering charity v to spend over the next few years to convert (hopefully) 2,500 youngsters into ‘WC’s’ with a sense of love and duty for the London Canal system.
Will it work? Its said by ‘v’ that “Instead of seeing them as a problem to be fixed, we are giving them the chance to become a positive force for change.” Have youngsters ever been a problem? Isnt it often the adults with their type of community, social and political agenda that causes youngsters to be disillusioned? Take Thames 21 for example, their trustees dont even have waterways backgrounds, except for one who just isnt the best trustee possible because he forms the ageis of another organisation that is well noted for its non-transparency. What sort of example is that then?
What will Thames 21 do when one or two of these aspiring youngsters want a job? It’ll probably say ‘you aint got enough experience.’ Its just like many other charities, looking good on the cover but inside full of contradictions because inevitably (as one disgruntled ex charity director recently said to me) all charities exist for themselves! Its time for V to take over! Lets hear it for the real Champions!
