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get involved: access, environment, BMC / Re: BMC Resolutions shout out 📣

« Last post by Offwidth on Today at 04:08:48 pm »

Perceived response in the face of the Board,  Senior Management team and Council all saying proper detail will be provided for 2023 and 2024 as soon as the audit is signed off. I ask again why  on earth would we all do that if it wasn't true? It would be terminal for the Board.

Three Council memberships  (and the President)  sit on the Board and two sit on the Finace and Audit Committee. These five include some of those who raised concerns about Board behaviour last March. They are highly credible and they say there are real practical reasons providing similar information for 2022 would be difficulty (if not impossible).  The arguments Paul D left us with was less than £200k extra core costs for GB Climbing including all office admin, on top of costs reported in the 2022 accounts (alongside grant income in the accounts)

I agree Comp climbers are still facing serious issues (especially on quotas) but if we care about them (and I do) parking them in a subsidiary and removing BMC core  funding that's been there for decades is hardly going to help (as their reps point out on BMC Watch. We simply can't move forward with such major stakeholder concerns: as such we need some more work on this.

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get involved: access, environment, BMC / Re: BMC Resolutions shout out 📣

« Last post by Duma on Today at 03:54:25 pm »

I think that's mischaracterising why people might be leaving now. If you were simply appalled at the financial management you'd have gone a while ago. If you're leaving now it's because of the response.

Exactly this. I'm godsmacked you need it spelling out.

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get involved: access, environment, BMC / Re: BMC Resolutions shout out 📣

« Last post by Wil on Today at 03:44:54 pm »

I think that's mischaracterising why people might be leaving now. If you were simply appalled at the financial management you'd have gone a while ago. If you're leaving now it's because of the response.

I'm disappointed that the MC is willing to take the board's word that telling members the proper breakdown for 2022 isn't worth the effort. Paul Ratcliffe seems to have made a good start though, and has the confidence of staff I've spoken to. Communication with members when this started was shocking and dismissive, it showed to me that PD didn't understand the organisation he was running.

The comps and funding issue isn't likely to go away anytime soon, it's been rumbling on for 50 years! The BMC need to get better at selling that aspect to current members. It still feels like there's a lot of reactive rather than proactive work in this regard. It's not going to be an easy shift with tight budgets.

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music, art and culture / Re: RIP

« Last post by Nails on Today at 03:28:32 pm »

Really sorry to hear this. Adam was a big character and a lot of fun. RIP

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news / Re: The inevitable E grade thread

« Last post by jwi on Today at 03:26:57 pm »

Whereas Uk climbers abroad inevitably return convinced of it's superiority (I'm not talking about E7+ here), but also when the hardest routes are done outside the Uk, a uk trad grade is often offered. But as illustrated by this thread, I think there are issues getting to grips with it, particularly if you are an experienced climber who already understands other grades. ...

But this is only natural, non? Despite climbing routes with French grades on 95% of the time, when I do a traditionally protected multipitch route on the continent together with someone from Sweden/Norway I will inevitably talk about the pitches in terms of Scandi grades. Like "you really think that pitch was 8-? That seems a bit generous, no?" "Yeah, I found it more like 7+" etc... even if there is no limestone in Scandinavia. And if someone from scandinavia ask me about the routes I would tell them what I think the Scandi grade is, if it is trad.

British grades seems perfectly reasonable for the pitches I've been told the grades for. I have a pretty good idea what kind of grades I can get up with little effort vs huge effort vs not at all.

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news / Re: The inevitable E grade thread

« Last post by Johnny Brown on Today at 03:21:13 pm »

Thinking about this a bit more, I think my chief attachment to Uk grades vs other systems is that they reflect messy reality - trad climbs vary widely in many aspects and will resist being pigeonholed into any sensible order of difficulty.

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music, art and culture / Re: RIP

« Last post by GraemeA on Today at 03:07:35 pm »

Just been told that Adam Pepper has passed away. I don't know any details but someone has posted something on Adam's FB page (https://www.facebook.com/adam.pepper.94).

Condolences to his family especially Ben and Joe 

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conditions reports (isitgreasy on twitter) / Re: Forest rock

« Last post by Bradders on Today at 02:58:55 pm »

What's the situation with Lucid Interval following the hold breakage?

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news / Re: The inevitable E grade thread

« Last post by Johnny Brown on Today at 02:33:59 pm »

I can't speak for Jase but was never really steeped in British climbing culture. I am very attached to the British landscape, but not so much the population or culture. When I moved to Sheffield I found the scene pretty uninspiring tbh, was never a Ben and Jerry fanboi either.

What I am very attached to is the idea that trad climbing is, at it's core, about self-reliance and freedom. By this I mean the rock is left for others to choose their own adventure on, not 'made' into climbs. I'm not sure this is even an accepted British thing, it seemed to be implicit when I was a youth, but not so much any more. I took my son up the east face of Tryfan for the first time this weekend and, despite its long history of being climbed on, we didn't see a single piece of fixed gear of any kind. Almost anywhere else I've been climbing in the world that wouldn't have been the case. I hosted lots of foreign climbers on International meets in the noughties and despite being accomplished climbers, they were often surprised that many routes had no fixed gear at all. They were always impressed by this, and on more than one occasion remarked that 'every ascent is like a first ascent'. I think this is worth preserving on its own merits, not special because its British. Even in Britain it now seems to be a constant battle against a majority view that trad climbs are where you don't put all the bolts in so that punter tradsters can indulge themselves in placing cams.

E grades, honestly, are a more head than heart thing for me. I think they work fine and it annoys me when people say they don't. But mainly that's because, like the YDS example above, I've always measured trad grades to trad routes, whereas I've done next to no easy sport climbing so have no reference.

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get involved: access, environment, BMC / Re: BMC Resolutions shout out 📣

« Last post by Offwidth on Today at 02:14:08 pm »

I can assure you it doesn't feel that way from the view of many key volunteers and especially not so for staff. If people are serious about  leaving just as the finances and GB climbing are being sorted out, it's certainly going to impact those BMC stalwarts even more (and as for those who were involved with mismanagement but have now left the BMC: it will have no impact at all).

BMC leadership are custodians for what's important: the BMC work outside of governance.

It's not all been bad: there are more access staff FTEs now than pre covid.