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Billion pound kick-start for Canal & River Trust

Richard Benyon said: “Our £1 billion investment will get this new charity off to the strongest start possible, and let local communities and volunteers shape the future of our world-famous waterways.”

Tony Hales, Canal & River Trust chairman, said the agreement meant they could now start planning for the future.

 He commented: "The agreement significantly increases the public commitment to invest in the waterways and provides greater funding certainty for the historic network than ever before.

 “This is a major step for us and for the waterways, and creates a viable foundation for the new Trust to build the future growth and prosperity of our wonderful canals, rivers, docks and reservoirs."

 The funding deal has the following components:

• Core grant of £39 million per year (index linked to inflation from 2015/16 onwards)
• From 2015/16, an additional grant of 10 million per year (reduced gradually over the last five years of the grant agreement, tied to three performance measures):
  - satisfactory condition of principal assets
  - satisfactory condition of towpaths
  - satisfactory flood risk management measures 
• A £25 million one-off grant  to be spread across the next few months, and a capped ‘last resort’ Government guarantee in relation to the historic public sector pension liability; 
• The government has already announced that the £460 million commercial property endowment used by British Waterways to fund the infrastructure network will be transferred to the CRT for the same purposes.