City Swimmers
To turn in at the gate from Hampstead Heath and walk through the dark wood is to walk away from daily tribulations and shrug off individuality until by the time you have reached the pond you as all the others before and after have become only what you need to be: a lady swimmer.
On the tube to work I want to shout “I saw the kingfisher today!” to the unsuspecting travellers.
Kenwood Ladies Pond3 miles from Oxford Street4 miles from the City
December 12th. A really dark morning, in fact it is not morning but night-time when I leave the house. There is hardly any light on the surfaces of the ponds to reveal themselves.
The pond, for all of us a sourceOf comfort, friendship, solace, peaceExquisite and sometimes glorious.Like climbing into a painting and for a few moments of the dayBeing part of something beautifulAnd then holding that loveliness inside, till next time’
Did we take the pond for granted? I don’t think so. It’s too remarkable and for London - and also for England - unusual: free swimming in natural surroundings! But why is it unusual? There should be places like it in every town and every London Borough.
I started swimming in the ponds at a point of great stress in my life, as is often the case as I’ve found from interviewing people. That they discover the pond and the pond gives back a sort of emotional energy.
Mary Cane historian of Kenwood Ladies’ Pond
OkI’ll just put a little bit on the side it gives people a better grip when they come out.
It’s dropping to 5 - 5 degrees Celsius, 42 Fahrenheit. It’ll probably get colder. This time last year it was 2 wasn’t it?
The best time to see it is really in summer because that’s when it’s most beautiful. its like being in a fairy tale.
There’s a nest up at the top.
Mm?
There a nest up there.
Yes I know. Right at the top.
Do you know what’s nesting in it?
Coot
I was one of those people who would turn up on a wonderful and lie in the meadow and go anddip in the pond itself. And it wasn’t until about 8 or 9 years ago when I stopped working and I was able then to carry on swimming and I decided to swim in the early morning and about four years ago, five years ago I was swimming though until the end of October and one year I decided to come back and swim in November and I just decided then that it was what I had to do every day of the winter.
Jane Shallice chair of Kenwood Ladies Pond Association
Frankie, there’s the odd stick about.
Yes I know, yes I can see it .
People sometimes suggest that a swimming place for women only is archaic and pointless in the 21st century. If that’s so, why has it survived so long? Clearly, thousands of women like it. But perhaps the key to its survival is that there are alternatives . It’s one of four open air swimming places on Hampstead Heath, all packed on hot summer days. There’s a pond for mixed swimming, and also men only. There’s also a purpose built lido which, as older swimmers remember, was narrowly saved from closure in the seventies.
It’s blue and very cold.
Its well know around London probably and a lot of people come over from other areas and swim here.
It’s really cold but really clean.
He loves the water he gets in the water he loves the swimming.
It’s a nice place to meet up with your friends.
Also jumping off the spring board when it used to be there.
The mixed pond, a favourite with couples and families no longer stays open throughout the winter.
This is the most accessible of the ponds. It’s only a few hundred metres from Hampstead Heath railway station so people become familiar with this pond first and it’s usually the one they swim in first. Today doesn’t really give you measure of what a fabulous place it is. I describe it as heaven on earth.
It’s quite big and a bit dirty but its still really fun.
The best view is always from the middle. Unfortunately I couldn’t paint it from the middle so I did numerous paintings from the bridge.
It’s one of the few places where some sort of sanity in a big metropolitan city can be preserved. It just enriches us and nourishes us so we can go outside into the real world and deal with those things more effectively if we’ve got the pond to swim in.
The men’s and women’s ponds are quite different in character, they’re much larger, the men’s particularly is much larger.
There you are two of us, two swimmers all at once!
Ah is this a porn movie because it so be prepared for it.See you Later.Cheerio, Roy.
I must be off, must start my disagreeable journey on the tube. Bye.
I only know the seven o’clock people. I don’t know later on in the day.. There’s a certain segment of population that we get to know and we know each other’s jokes and careers.
It’s very unfortunate. I very much dislike what I’m hearing from the ANC – that’s the African National Congress Youth League. I mean they came up with something about Robert Mugabe the other day.
I started when I was 70 I remember. I found out about it and started coming. It was in the summer I started and then I just carried on.
In the old days the mixed pond was open all the year and that was the pond that I started in and stayed in until it closed in the winter. And then I found this place that I’d always kept away from as I thought it was rather macho and brutal but it actually doesn’t turn out to be quite like that.
See you Richard You have yes.. Bye
Bye William.
We told her the rabbit went under a cupboard and came out so covered in dust.
That’s a good idea, tie a mop to it and let it run around.
Bye. Bye
Bye
There are days - It’s not too cold, it’s days when it’s pissing down and you think ‘I’m not sure what’s the point really, I’ll be so wet by the time I get there. But on the whole I don’t shirk it because it I do I feel a, with drawl symptoms and b, guilt
It’s quite addictive?
It is addictive and that’s the danger you get obsessive and boring about it as I’m in danger of being now and just go on and on and on about why everybody should do itBut there’s some truth in that
Hampstead Heath and its ponds are managed by the Corporation of London – not the new Greater London Authority whose first mayor is Ken Livingstone.
The Corporation has roots in the middle ages. It governs the square mile of the City and is elected by an exclusive group of voters mostly representing city businesses.
We had a very good relationship with the managers of the Heath until about three or fours years ago when suddenly the atmosphere towards swimmers changed
But the main thing came about three years ago when it became clear that they were going to alter the timing of swimming during the winter
It meant the pond opened so late that you couldn’t swim before work and it is that swimming before work that is so very precious.
Consequently, we started negotiations to establish a winter swimmers club to enable those of us who wanted to swim before work to continue to do so but without lifeguards. The debate over whether this would be legal or not has wrangled on and on and in the end after nine months of negotiations the city suddenly produced a legal opinion to say it would never be legal and they couldn’t possibly allow it.
At this stage swimmers asked for a judicial revue. That meant a court of law would rule on whether the Corporation’s lawyer was right. This process was begun before there was a threat to stop swimming completely at a time when management was imposing various other restrictions in the name of health and safety.
Because we were pressing them all the time they instituted an assessment of swimming facilities on the Heath, drafted in some absolutely wonderful consultants and produced a most dire report.
There was a report about cold water swimming being dangerous and then we had a period when breaking the ice was forbidden when we couldn’t swim in the icy pond and one of the joys of winter swimming is swimming in the icy pond and we had the rather farcical situation of notices in the changing room saying that cold water is dangerous and of course we who do it regularly know that it’s not dangerous it extremely good for us
My first winter I don’t think I was more excited than on the days that I knew there was going to be ice on the pond because you’d get into the water and be surrounded by this tinkling sound and it was almost like singing
All right?
October 2004. The Corporation of London threatens closure.
I was elected chair of the Kenwood Ladies Pond Association in March 2004 and it was on October, so it was less than 6 months after that I received a letter from the Corporation of London to inform us that there was going to be a management committee meeting which was going to discuss budget issues and the budget was going to be a question of a cuts budget and the key thing for us there was a proposal they were going to close the mixed pond and it was going to be a permanent closure and within the document it was also clear that there was a possibility of other ponds being affected or charges being imposed. And of course from the beginning of December onwards it was very clear that the was going to be a response from the swimmers.
December 6th meeting of Kenwood Ladies Pond Association
Save our swimming at yahoo dot co dot uk.
The Heath is a heath. It’s common land. It’s not a park. And that’s what the Corporation are trying to do. They’re trying to turn it into a business park.
The point I want to make is , to do with money again if you charge people entrance the next step and you’ve probably said this - is a little kiosk selling ice cream and then another little kiosk selling cappuccinos.
They’ve betrayed us. They’ve betrayed a trust they were given this and they’ve betrayed us in a most disgusting way in the most bureaucratic way.
We do need to have a sort of some kind of dialogue where positions don’t get hardened
I disagree with the previous speaker. I think no point in being passive and quiet. We should be as noisy and loud as possible
The fact that they’re so secretive about their concerns about future budgets without ever expressing it publicly and without talking to people about the implications it seems to me that’s their problem.
The Heath does not belong to the Corporation as lots of people have said and I think as Jane is saying we should stick with that as this stage and then have some fallbacks
December 20th meeting of the United Swimmers Association of Hampstead Heath
The notion that somehow the ponds, an integral and defining part of Hampstead Heath need conform to some consultant’s suggestion of some kind of monitory value or return is wholly inappropriate. If commercial economics were the criterion there would be no Hampstead Heath and never would have been. Moreover the true economic value of Hampstead ponds in terms of what economists call opportunity costs is enormous including social and in inverted commas spiritual value.
I don’t think it’s the job of the USA or any of the other swimming associations to sit round a table with Mr. Lee or Mrs. McGuiness - Ms. McGuiness - to discuss details of management that’s not our job. Our job is to get transparency of account. The Audit Commission doesn’t audit the sums of money that are involved and that is absolutely scandalous because it’s public money. It may come from obscure city funds in part but nevertheless it is money that is in the public domain. I think we should know exactly where it is going.
The most sensitive point that we have to attack on is to get access to information so that we can make this argument and show what they have done
I think it’s terribly important that we don’t let the corporation divide the users of the Heath.
I’m Joy Walter. I have been raising a petition. Most of you have signed it and those that haven’t I invite you to do so tonight. So stand for open and free. Do not think of letting them charge. That’s what’s I say.
The United Swimmers Association was a sort of umbrella organisation It was though United Swimmers Association that really the campaign has been welded together. It was the run up to Christmas it is the darkest time of year, it’s the bleakest time of year it’s a time of year when people don’t want to go to meetings don’t necessarily want to go out.
Mummy, do you know what I want? I want some chewing gum - one of the pinky ones.
I don’t have any of the pinky ones.
Joe does.
It was always a struggle about getting people out and getting them to do things but I think the level of response just typifies what in fact people think about this pond.
And its not going to be something that is easily put away whatever the decision is going to be in terms of the Corporation.
Just a heap of rubble is all that was left after this huge explosion. Iraqi police have stormed into the building….
I suppose that for many people when we’ve just been through a period of time of seeing what is happening in Irak to look at things like the Tsunami to know that for many people in the world just pure existence is incredibly difficult it may seem a real luxury to be arguing about whether we should have one two three or indeed any swimming ponds but I think that the thing we’ve got to keep holding on is the idea that concerned as we are - and for many of us do spend time and money thinking about and finding ways of supporting people outside Britain - it’s hugely important as well to keep saying that what we have here has to also be fought for we shouldn’t be going to the minimum we should be demanding the maximum.
I’ve been absolutely amazed and delighted by the response we’ve had to the campaign and if I reflect on it I think it must be due to a number of things. One of these things is that everybody is now alert to the drip, drip destruction of our access too all sorts of things and the notion of charging for swimming we all know that it’s a complete red herring. It’ll be charges for swimming today and charges to go on the Heath tomorrow.
We had to fight to have the Heath in the first place and every little bit that’s been added since has had to be fought for, collected for and has been meeting a need of the public and if we lose any little bit of it now it will be lost for ever.
For me the Heath has been the most important part of being in London. I can’t think of any city that’s got an area of land that is as varied and as variable as the Heath. And quite exceptional in terms of its differences and its wildness. And its still a heathland.
When I first came to London the Heath was managed by the Greater London Council. Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s decided that the Greater London Council was a complete pain for her she required the political power of the Greater London Council to be finished and she decided to abolish it. There was a major discussion going on about what ought to happen to the Heath. It was very, very worrying for a lot of people because we knew that in fact none of the boroughs surrounding the Heath were going to have sufficient money to be able to maintain it. And what happened was the Corporation of London in an incredibly magnanimous gesture, it appeared, decided that they would offer to take over the Heath as they did with some of the other open spaces. Now I say’ magnanimous’ but when the Greater London Council had been operating the City of London had been giving money to the GLC in order to redistribute to some of the poorer boroughs so when the GLC was abolished the Corporation of London, the City of London was one of those places which gained hugely. It no longer had to pay our money to help poorer areas.
The decision to hand the Heath over to such an unrepresentative, undemocratic body was intensely controversial at the time. The conflict over the ponds has reminded us all about that.
Some of the support that’s come from further a field than London has come from people involved in their own campaigns to obtain access to open water swimming.
It’s a real pity that there’s been a need for campaigns. It used to be taken for granted after all that you could bathe in any swimmable water near by and it would be freeAnd swimming in natural water is such a pleasure
So faced with landowners and local authorities trying to ban swimming swimmers have had to get organised. Some of us from the ponds have been involved in a national campaign and visited other campaigns round the country.
Hatchmere, Cheshire, closed for swimming in 2000
We’ve been to Hatchmere, a lake near Liverpool where swimmers successfully overturned a ban but it’s a complicated story involving Cheshire Wildlife Trust , the Lottery and a fishing club
In 1997 Cheshire wildlife bought it from the previous owner with Lottery money and decided that the best thing to do to have least work and better control of the lake was to give it to a fishing club . So, that’s what they did. And at the same time they closed the bay that we just swam through. They put a fence across it. We went to MPs and we went to the Lottery. We found a contract, the standard conditions of grants and that says that the place must be kept open to the public and would you believe it then Lottery at first backed them up. They couldn’t do any thing wrong. And so we realised that we have a fight with the Lottery. It took altogether 3 years. What really turned the tide was that we wrote a report. It was based on years of collecting information and what we did we sent it to them ‘for their comments’ before it goes on a special web site which we set up. We sent it to them, we took out the name Lottery Scandals dot co dot uk. and we put a picture of Hatchmere, just a lovely picture of an afternoon in Hatchmere, on the web page - I think I told you that - it was the only thing that was on the web page, web site, We sent them that report and we started monitoring what happened to the website and I tell you from the moment it arrived in the post every hour someone from the Lottery was looking at that picture. So we knew we were on a winner. After that they cooperated.
Nearer London we’ve been to support swimmers trying to overturn a ban at Black Park in Buckinghamshire.
Black Park near Slough closed for swimming since 2002
As a child we used to come over here, ride our bikes over here and swim. It should be kept open definitely.Well we’re trying to have these Sunday regular Sunday meetings at Black ~Par where everyone gets together where we get together, chill out, go in the water. We want to keep it open definitely.
One of our pond regulars is driving a campaign to restore swimming in a series of lakes near Rickmansworth where she swam as a child
Bury lake, Rickmansworth
We used to cycle there from Harrow Wield ten miles.Really?And swim
A man in that speedboat, orange speedboat, told me it was illegal.
We’ll sort that out.
Well I want to go to court then.
That can be arranged.
He said you can’t swim here? Did he say you can’t swim here?
He told me it was illegal, it’s illegal to swim here.
What did you say? you can?
Well I said I want to go to court in that case.
I see.He said that can be arranged.Well he can’t tell me off.
Terribly deep dangerous water, terribly dangerous!
It’s really, really nice swimming here but apparently it’s illegal. But I don’t understand how it can be illegal…
The sailing club used to be up to there and all the rest was for swimming.
It’s all about money. This place, when they objected they said we’re building a 3 million pound club house in other words we’re paying for this facility, you’re not.
And to me it just reeks of what is happening increasingly in virtually every single town this is happening.
There was a very interesting letter written by someone in support of the ponds. It was a woman from Kentish Town.‘Now the Hampstead Heath ponds may not be the Bamiyan Buddhas but the threat of their closure evokes the same feeling of despair about the short sightedness of leadership’.
It’s in today’s C. and J. as I’m sure you already know. It’s up here.
Yes I saw it saw it earlier.
More irritation, more anger!
This story will run and run.
Lovely piece in the Guardian and so it goes on really. I collect anything of interest relating to the ponds and I got a box full rather quickly.
The ponds action group was helped by a very good press. The local papers were particularly supportive, covering every stage of the six month long campaign.
New Year’s Day 2005 Kenwood Ladies’ Pond
Happy New Year! Nice to see you walking better.
(inaudible chat)
Oh Liz you’ve got Holly too.I think your is a wonderful colour.Happy new year!
Oh hurry up Ann I’m dying.
All the nurses used to come here when I was 18. And I’ve just had my 70 birthday so I intend to go on swimming here for a long time.And anyway who’d want to swim in a swimming pool when you can swim here. Why would you want to?
There’s Wynn. You know she’s over 90There’s a lovely smile!
Why are there so many taking my photo?
You’re becoming a celebrity these days Wynn.
Excuse me. Can I just say a word or two please. I’m Jane Shallice and I’m the chair of the Hampstead Ladies’ Pond …Thank you all for coming. It’s hugely important as all of us know to make as big a representation as possible of our support for this absolutely beautiful place. And I’ve just said, there’s a very small girl standing round here and I’ve just said that our campaign has got to be that we maintain this pond for her to use in the way that we’ve used it in that it’s open all the year and it’s free. This is the facility for women in London. It’s not just for people in Hampstead. It’s for people who can come from all over London and know that they can be here to either swim or just be in an environment where there is no question of being hassled or interfered with in any way.
Everybody is also opposed to charging ….
January 2005 Public Meeting arranged by the Corporation of London
Challenged by the strength of public opposition to its plans, the Corporation arranged a public meeting.
I suspect this is the first budgetary crisis that the Corporation has experienced in the 15, 16 years or so since it’s taken over the running of the Heath and I would suggest that it points to a loss of direction on the part of the Corporation and its losing sight of its role in running the Heath and this is summed up by a phrase which often comes up when you hear representatives of the Corporation interviewed, particularly recently, They talk about how they provide the swimming facilities. They do not provide the swimming facilities, the Heath provides the swimming facilities.
Catherine McGuinness Chair of the Heath Management Committee
These problems have been developing over a number of years but have now hit home with a significant overspend developing in the second year in a row. And therefore we’ve looked at a number of saving across our budget in order to find a total saving of £330,000 a year. We are, of course, trying to find savings which will have the minimum possible impact on the way we maintain the Heath and range of facilities which we offer.
If this great international city made by such things as free museums and free pond swimming – And today I hear we have a Moscow support group forming - how come a bid for the Olympics is supported by the Corporation of London at a time when the Corporation can’t even keep free muddy, slimy, green ponds open and free?
If we don’t look at our level of spending on our ponds we are going to have to make even more savings in other areas and that would be unfair. But can I make clear that we have no intention of closing all the ponds altogether we’ve always made clear, we’ve always made clear - if I may continue - we’ve always made clear that swimming in the ponds is a very cherished tradition which we would like to see continue in a sustainable form.
What an incredible well of knowledge and passion and believe about the essence that lies on the Heath and is that area of green space and if you don’t take away that passion and apply it to your accounts and your processes you have mishear the meeting tonight.
A thing called City’s Cash which is a huge fund had been spending capital as income and that this had been discovered. And that, of course, isn’t an accountancy error, it’s something else.
In view of the strength of feeling that’s been expressed on the question of the ponds we are willing to explore all options to try and reduce the cost of the ponds without closing them without closing any of them
We’d like to have a chance to work with you not against you so I think you’ve put us on the spot I often feel that you’re saying ‘ you’ve got to come up with solutions by February 21st or we’re going to act. ‘ We haven’t had any time to act there’s been no year to sit on panels and develop a trust or develop a fund raising mechanism. And every time we make a suggestion you say we’ve already thought of that and it won’t work. So what we’d like is time, time, time to work with you.
So those who are voting have no confidence in the current management of the Heath and can I see those who retain confidence in the current management of the Heath?
February 2005 London’s Guildhall
The final decision on the ponds rests with a formal meeting of the Corporation’s Heath Management Committee. The public can observe but not participate. Cameras must remain outside.
I have here 6884 signatures to be presented to the management committee at the beginning of the meeting.
I’m hoping that we might bring the Corporation of London to their senses. It’s insane that to pay for their mismanagement of their budget that they want to close or make people pay for something that is free and one of the most wonderful experiences in the world.
Profit belongs to our times disastrously. Why shouldn’t we have some things in life which are free and pleasurable and which don’t make a profit?
The meeting was longer than usual with a wider discussion but at the end they decided that they would not close any pond. They were going to institute charging which they called ‘self policing’ and they decided that next year they would look again at the whole question of the funding of the ponds.
At the end of the meeting we were meant to interview Catherine McGuinness who is the chair of the committee to have a brief interview on what had then happened.
Yes unfortunately Catherine McGuinness has had to go and have a meeting with Jennifer Adams and Simon Lee to discuss the ramifications of the meeting and how to communicate it to the staff and the public. So, I’m sorry she has sent me in her stead to answer any questions you may have.
Jon Logie Press officer, corporation of London
Thanks for coming to see us but most of the questions I have are specifically for Catherine. But one of the major issues is quite clearly the way the Committee was using the term ‘voluntary’ and at no point was any clarification made about what the term means. Is it a voluntary contribution?
The system is a self policing charging system that has been recommended and now approved by the committee. It’s not a voluntary charge.
We succeeded the following week to have an interview with Catherine McGuinness were she was able to put forward her views about what she thought had now happened.
We’ve tried to listen very hard to what people have said about not wanting closure even if the closure of one pond or reducing the hours meant that we could afford free swimming. We’ve listened to what people have said about not wanting obtrusive or divisive barriers and that’s why we’ve gone for this light touch - we’ve called it self policing, I know it’s an unhappy term – this light touch charging where we will really be levying a charge but relying on people’s honesty.
We won’t have barriers which prevent people getting in.
Historically the Heath budget were over or under spent but by relatively little and appeared in equilibrium but since 2001 there have been substantial overspends
There have been increasing overspends in the last couple of years which is why we’ve had to take decisions to keep the Heath within budget
Do you know which precise areas of the Heath budget were responsible for the overspend
That’s very difficult because of the way our budget had worked in the past. We haven’t broken it down by area. We’ve done a lot of analysis in the last year leading up to the last decisions and we’ve now got quite a grasp on what we’re spending where? I think that is all part of much more financial realism coming from the Corporation which yes, is a wealthy organisation but has finite income, resourcesI would be very sorry to see swimming stopped and I’ve always said.., I genuinely mean it that swimming I know it’s a very cherished activity on the Heath it’s very much part of what makes the Heath what it is. It would take a very long time before we would stop ..I can’t imagine us ever stopping swimming in the ponds but we won’t be able too afford it and all the other activities and care of the Heath if we have to carry on paying at this level
If people didn’t pay are they breaking a bylaw, are they trespassing?
I’m not sure, I’m not sure of the answer to that (inaudible prompt off screen) I mean we don’t prosecute people you know for not paying when they go onto the tennis courts so I’m not sure of the exact legal status of that.
May 2005 The mixed ponds opens with a party
It’s a celebration of having got the season at all because as you know they nearly closed it for good and its also an occasion to get people because they tried to close it during the winter to sign up to the mixed pond action group so that this Autumn when they will undoubtedly try to close it again we’ve got thousands of people ready to say its our pond we love it.
I can’t even imagine why someone could even think about closing it. It’s lovely. We live half an hour from the Caribbean sea so we’re used to rivers and ponds and stay by the sea its part of our culture and that’ probably the reason we find this so lovely.
I feel that as an alternative to this charging which I totally disagree with we should have ‘pay with a poem’. That would be a wonderful resource to gather a sort of community poem about why all sorts of different people love these places.
By the time the mixed pond opened for the summer season the judicial review about a winter swimming club had given its verdict – another reason for some of the swimmers to celebrate.
On 26 April 2005 in the High Court, Mr Justice Stanley Burnton, in the case of The Queen v The Corporation of London on the application of Hampstead Heath Winter Swimming Club, ruled that the Corporation could not be prosecuted under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 for allowing adult swimmers to swim without lifeguards in the Hampstead Ponds, and that the Corporation’s decision to prohibit such swimming for fear of prosecution, being based on a mistaken view of the law, was invalid. The Club now swims without lifeguards at the Mixed Pond throughout the winter.
The judicial review was an opportunity for a judge to say there are limits to the scope of the nanny state. He really said, look the truth is, people have not got to be oppressed by undue restrictions. And he came out fighting on that one.
I think the judge made a very sensible decision and he was fairly well informed about the issues the health and safety risks and passionate that people should be able to take risks to a much greater degree than the current is running at the moment.
He said it would be a sad and cheerless and grey Britain if every risk were removed and he opened his judgment with ‘the Hampstead Heath ponds are a gift from God or from nature..’
He said ‘the open spaces of London are the glory of London and the most beautiful of them all is Hampstead Heath’
Kenwood Ladies Pond. A June morning 2005….And we hope, far into the future
It’s important to realise that we’ve had two victories one was the judicial review which applied to a small number of people on the Heath but will have wide national implications but the second victory was the victory to maintain three swimming facilities on the Heath and those are the things that in fact all of us have got to be very proud of and that we’ve got to make sure that we maintain in the future. We’re hoping that that we’ve been successful. We know that there will be threats and we therefore just have to be aware of them but hopefully they’re going to be smaller than the ones we’ve faced in the past and maybe we’ll be lucky and the Corporation will now decide that they have started to work with us and that they want to give us what we want rather than fight against us.
You’re not expecting to have another winter of non stop campaigning?
No. Certainly not.
For information about natural water swimming throughout UK contact: River and Lake Swimming
Associationwww.river-swimming.co.ukThe Right to swimwww.righttoswim.co.uk/
To support better opportunities for swimming (indoors and outdoors) in London contact London Pools Campaign www.londonpoolscampaign.com
Because it’s had a national profile, this campaign, I think it’s sent a message to others as well that if they are prepared to fight, they can get back the things that they’ve lost.
Hopefully this is going to be something that is a much, much wider campaign both through London but also nationally.
To turn in at the gate from Hampstead Heath and walk through the dark wood is to walk away from daily tribulations and shrug off individuality until by the time you have reached the pond you as all the others before and after have become only what you need to be: a lady swimmer.
On the tube to work I want to shout “I saw the kingfisher today!” to the unsuspecting travellers.
Kenwood Ladies Pond3 miles from Oxford Street4 miles from the City
December 12th. A really dark morning, in fact it is not morning but night-time when I leave the house. There is hardly any light on the surfaces of the ponds to reveal themselves.
The pond, for all of us a sourceOf comfort, friendship, solace, peaceExquisite and sometimes glorious.Like climbing into a painting and for a few moments of the dayBeing part of something beautifulAnd then holding that loveliness inside, till next time’
Did we take the pond for granted? I don’t think so. It’s too remarkable and for London - and also for England - unusual: free swimming in natural surroundings! But why is it unusual? There should be places like it in every town and every London Borough.
I started swimming in the ponds at a point of great stress in my life, as is often the case as I’ve found from interviewing people. That they discover the pond and the pond gives back a sort of emotional energy.
Mary Cane historian of Kenwood Ladies’ Pond
OkI’ll just put a little bit on the side it gives people a better grip when they come out.
It’s dropping to 5 - 5 degrees Celsius, 42 Fahrenheit. It’ll probably get colder. This time last year it was 2 wasn’t it?
The best time to see it is really in summer because that’s when it’s most beautiful. its like being in a fairy tale.
There’s a nest up at the top.
Mm?
There a nest up there.
Yes I know. Right at the top.
Do you know what’s nesting in it?
Coot
I was one of those people who would turn up on a wonderful and lie in the meadow and go anddip in the pond itself. And it wasn’t until about 8 or 9 years ago when I stopped working and I was able then to carry on swimming and I decided to swim in the early morning and about four years ago, five years ago I was swimming though until the end of October and one year I decided to come back and swim in November and I just decided then that it was what I had to do every day of the winter.
Jane Shallice chair of Kenwood Ladies Pond Association
Frankie, there’s the odd stick about.
Yes I know, yes I can see it .
People sometimes suggest that a swimming place for women only is archaic and pointless in the 21st century. If that’s so, why has it survived so long? Clearly, thousands of women like it. But perhaps the key to its survival is that there are alternatives . It’s one of four open air swimming places on Hampstead Heath, all packed on hot summer days. There’s a pond for mixed swimming, and also men only. There’s also a purpose built lido which, as older swimmers remember, was narrowly saved from closure in the seventies.
It’s blue and very cold.
Its well know around London probably and a lot of people come over from other areas and swim here.
It’s really cold but really clean.
He loves the water he gets in the water he loves the swimming.
It’s a nice place to meet up with your friends.
Also jumping off the spring board when it used to be there.
The mixed pond, a favourite with couples and families no longer stays open throughout the winter.
This is the most accessible of the ponds. It’s only a few hundred metres from Hampstead Heath railway station so people become familiar with this pond first and it’s usually the one they swim in first. Today doesn’t really give you measure of what a fabulous place it is. I describe it as heaven on earth.
It’s quite big and a bit dirty but its still really fun.
The best view is always from the middle. Unfortunately I couldn’t paint it from the middle so I did numerous paintings from the bridge.
It’s one of the few places where some sort of sanity in a big metropolitan city can be preserved. It just enriches us and nourishes us so we can go outside into the real world and deal with those things more effectively if we’ve got the pond to swim in.
The men’s and women’s ponds are quite different in character, they’re much larger, the men’s particularly is much larger.
There you are two of us, two swimmers all at once!
Ah is this a porn movie because it so be prepared for it.See you Later.Cheerio, Roy.
I must be off, must start my disagreeable journey on the tube. Bye.
I only know the seven o’clock people. I don’t know later on in the day.. There’s a certain segment of population that we get to know and we know each other’s jokes and careers.
It’s very unfortunate. I very much dislike what I’m hearing from the ANC – that’s the African National Congress Youth League. I mean they came up with something about Robert Mugabe the other day.
I started when I was 70 I remember. I found out about it and started coming. It was in the summer I started and then I just carried on.
In the old days the mixed pond was open all the year and that was the pond that I started in and stayed in until it closed in the winter. And then I found this place that I’d always kept away from as I thought it was rather macho and brutal but it actually doesn’t turn out to be quite like that.
See you Richard You have yes.. Bye
Bye William.
We told her the rabbit went under a cupboard and came out so covered in dust.
That’s a good idea, tie a mop to it and let it run around.
Bye. Bye
Bye
There are days - It’s not too cold, it’s days when it’s pissing down and you think ‘I’m not sure what’s the point really, I’ll be so wet by the time I get there. But on the whole I don’t shirk it because it I do I feel a, with drawl symptoms and b, guilt
It’s quite addictive?
It is addictive and that’s the danger you get obsessive and boring about it as I’m in danger of being now and just go on and on and on about why everybody should do itBut there’s some truth in that
Hampstead Heath and its ponds are managed by the Corporation of London – not the new Greater London Authority whose first mayor is Ken Livingstone.
The Corporation has roots in the middle ages. It governs the square mile of the City and is elected by an exclusive group of voters mostly representing city businesses.
We had a very good relationship with the managers of the Heath until about three or fours years ago when suddenly the atmosphere towards swimmers changed
But the main thing came about three years ago when it became clear that they were going to alter the timing of swimming during the winter
It meant the pond opened so late that you couldn’t swim before work and it is that swimming before work that is so very precious.
Consequently, we started negotiations to establish a winter swimmers club to enable those of us who wanted to swim before work to continue to do so but without lifeguards. The debate over whether this would be legal or not has wrangled on and on and in the end after nine months of negotiations the city suddenly produced a legal opinion to say it would never be legal and they couldn’t possibly allow it.
At this stage swimmers asked for a judicial revue. That meant a court of law would rule on whether the Corporation’s lawyer was right. This process was begun before there was a threat to stop swimming completely at a time when management was imposing various other restrictions in the name of health and safety.
Because we were pressing them all the time they instituted an assessment of swimming facilities on the Heath, drafted in some absolutely wonderful consultants and produced a most dire report.
There was a report about cold water swimming being dangerous and then we had a period when breaking the ice was forbidden when we couldn’t swim in the icy pond and one of the joys of winter swimming is swimming in the icy pond and we had the rather farcical situation of notices in the changing room saying that cold water is dangerous and of course we who do it regularly know that it’s not dangerous it extremely good for us
My first winter I don’t think I was more excited than on the days that I knew there was going to be ice on the pond because you’d get into the water and be surrounded by this tinkling sound and it was almost like singing
All right?
October 2004. The Corporation of London threatens closure.
I was elected chair of the Kenwood Ladies Pond Association in March 2004 and it was on October, so it was less than 6 months after that I received a letter from the Corporation of London to inform us that there was going to be a management committee meeting which was going to discuss budget issues and the budget was going to be a question of a cuts budget and the key thing for us there was a proposal they were going to close the mixed pond and it was going to be a permanent closure and within the document it was also clear that there was a possibility of other ponds being affected or charges being imposed. And of course from the beginning of December onwards it was very clear that the was going to be a response from the swimmers.
December 6th meeting of Kenwood Ladies Pond Association
Save our swimming at yahoo dot co dot uk.
The Heath is a heath. It’s common land. It’s not a park. And that’s what the Corporation are trying to do. They’re trying to turn it into a business park.
The point I want to make is , to do with money again if you charge people entrance the next step and you’ve probably said this - is a little kiosk selling ice cream and then another little kiosk selling cappuccinos.
They’ve betrayed us. They’ve betrayed a trust they were given this and they’ve betrayed us in a most disgusting way in the most bureaucratic way.
We do need to have a sort of some kind of dialogue where positions don’t get hardened
I disagree with the previous speaker. I think no point in being passive and quiet. We should be as noisy and loud as possible
The fact that they’re so secretive about their concerns about future budgets without ever expressing it publicly and without talking to people about the implications it seems to me that’s their problem.
The Heath does not belong to the Corporation as lots of people have said and I think as Jane is saying we should stick with that as this stage and then have some fallbacks
December 20th meeting of the United Swimmers Association of Hampstead Heath
The notion that somehow the ponds, an integral and defining part of Hampstead Heath need conform to some consultant’s suggestion of some kind of monitory value or return is wholly inappropriate. If commercial economics were the criterion there would be no Hampstead Heath and never would have been. Moreover the true economic value of Hampstead ponds in terms of what economists call opportunity costs is enormous including social and in inverted commas spiritual value.
I don’t think it’s the job of the USA or any of the other swimming associations to sit round a table with Mr. Lee or Mrs. McGuiness - Ms. McGuiness - to discuss details of management that’s not our job. Our job is to get transparency of account. The Audit Commission doesn’t audit the sums of money that are involved and that is absolutely scandalous because it’s public money. It may come from obscure city funds in part but nevertheless it is money that is in the public domain. I think we should know exactly where it is going.
The most sensitive point that we have to attack on is to get access to information so that we can make this argument and show what they have done
I think it’s terribly important that we don’t let the corporation divide the users of the Heath.
I’m Joy Walter. I have been raising a petition. Most of you have signed it and those that haven’t I invite you to do so tonight. So stand for open and free. Do not think of letting them charge. That’s what’s I say.
The United Swimmers Association was a sort of umbrella organisation It was though United Swimmers Association that really the campaign has been welded together. It was the run up to Christmas it is the darkest time of year, it’s the bleakest time of year it’s a time of year when people don’t want to go to meetings don’t necessarily want to go out.
Mummy, do you know what I want? I want some chewing gum - one of the pinky ones.
I don’t have any of the pinky ones.
Joe does.
It was always a struggle about getting people out and getting them to do things but I think the level of response just typifies what in fact people think about this pond.
And its not going to be something that is easily put away whatever the decision is going to be in terms of the Corporation.
Just a heap of rubble is all that was left after this huge explosion. Iraqi police have stormed into the building….
I suppose that for many people when we’ve just been through a period of time of seeing what is happening in Irak to look at things like the Tsunami to know that for many people in the world just pure existence is incredibly difficult it may seem a real luxury to be arguing about whether we should have one two three or indeed any swimming ponds but I think that the thing we’ve got to keep holding on is the idea that concerned as we are - and for many of us do spend time and money thinking about and finding ways of supporting people outside Britain - it’s hugely important as well to keep saying that what we have here has to also be fought for we shouldn’t be going to the minimum we should be demanding the maximum.
I’ve been absolutely amazed and delighted by the response we’ve had to the campaign and if I reflect on it I think it must be due to a number of things. One of these things is that everybody is now alert to the drip, drip destruction of our access too all sorts of things and the notion of charging for swimming we all know that it’s a complete red herring. It’ll be charges for swimming today and charges to go on the Heath tomorrow.
We had to fight to have the Heath in the first place and every little bit that’s been added since has had to be fought for, collected for and has been meeting a need of the public and if we lose any little bit of it now it will be lost for ever.
For me the Heath has been the most important part of being in London. I can’t think of any city that’s got an area of land that is as varied and as variable as the Heath. And quite exceptional in terms of its differences and its wildness. And its still a heathland.
When I first came to London the Heath was managed by the Greater London Council. Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s decided that the Greater London Council was a complete pain for her she required the political power of the Greater London Council to be finished and she decided to abolish it. There was a major discussion going on about what ought to happen to the Heath. It was very, very worrying for a lot of people because we knew that in fact none of the boroughs surrounding the Heath were going to have sufficient money to be able to maintain it. And what happened was the Corporation of London in an incredibly magnanimous gesture, it appeared, decided that they would offer to take over the Heath as they did with some of the other open spaces. Now I say’ magnanimous’ but when the Greater London Council had been operating the City of London had been giving money to the GLC in order to redistribute to some of the poorer boroughs so when the GLC was abolished the Corporation of London, the City of London was one of those places which gained hugely. It no longer had to pay our money to help poorer areas.
The decision to hand the Heath over to such an unrepresentative, undemocratic body was intensely controversial at the time. The conflict over the ponds has reminded us all about that.
Some of the support that’s come from further a field than London has come from people involved in their own campaigns to obtain access to open water swimming.
It’s a real pity that there’s been a need for campaigns. It used to be taken for granted after all that you could bathe in any swimmable water near by and it would be freeAnd swimming in natural water is such a pleasure
So faced with landowners and local authorities trying to ban swimming swimmers have had to get organised. Some of us from the ponds have been involved in a national campaign and visited other campaigns round the country.
Hatchmere, Cheshire, closed for swimming in 2000
We’ve been to Hatchmere, a lake near Liverpool where swimmers successfully overturned a ban but it’s a complicated story involving Cheshire Wildlife Trust , the Lottery and a fishing club
In 1997 Cheshire wildlife bought it from the previous owner with Lottery money and decided that the best thing to do to have least work and better control of the lake was to give it to a fishing club . So, that’s what they did. And at the same time they closed the bay that we just swam through. They put a fence across it. We went to MPs and we went to the Lottery. We found a contract, the standard conditions of grants and that says that the place must be kept open to the public and would you believe it then Lottery at first backed them up. They couldn’t do any thing wrong. And so we realised that we have a fight with the Lottery. It took altogether 3 years. What really turned the tide was that we wrote a report. It was based on years of collecting information and what we did we sent it to them ‘for their comments’ before it goes on a special web site which we set up. We sent it to them, we took out the name Lottery Scandals dot co dot uk. and we put a picture of Hatchmere, just a lovely picture of an afternoon in Hatchmere, on the web page - I think I told you that - it was the only thing that was on the web page, web site, We sent them that report and we started monitoring what happened to the website and I tell you from the moment it arrived in the post every hour someone from the Lottery was looking at that picture. So we knew we were on a winner. After that they cooperated.
Nearer London we’ve been to support swimmers trying to overturn a ban at Black Park in Buckinghamshire.
Black Park near Slough closed for swimming since 2002
As a child we used to come over here, ride our bikes over here and swim. It should be kept open definitely.Well we’re trying to have these Sunday regular Sunday meetings at Black ~Par where everyone gets together where we get together, chill out, go in the water. We want to keep it open definitely.
One of our pond regulars is driving a campaign to restore swimming in a series of lakes near Rickmansworth where she swam as a child
Bury lake, Rickmansworth
We used to cycle there from Harrow Wield ten miles.Really?And swim
A man in that speedboat, orange speedboat, told me it was illegal.
We’ll sort that out.
Well I want to go to court then.
That can be arranged.
He said you can’t swim here? Did he say you can’t swim here?
He told me it was illegal, it’s illegal to swim here.
What did you say? you can?
Well I said I want to go to court in that case.
I see.He said that can be arranged.Well he can’t tell me off.
Terribly deep dangerous water, terribly dangerous!
It’s really, really nice swimming here but apparently it’s illegal. But I don’t understand how it can be illegal…
The sailing club used to be up to there and all the rest was for swimming.
It’s all about money. This place, when they objected they said we’re building a 3 million pound club house in other words we’re paying for this facility, you’re not.
And to me it just reeks of what is happening increasingly in virtually every single town this is happening.
There was a very interesting letter written by someone in support of the ponds. It was a woman from Kentish Town.‘Now the Hampstead Heath ponds may not be the Bamiyan Buddhas but the threat of their closure evokes the same feeling of despair about the short sightedness of leadership’.
It’s in today’s C. and J. as I’m sure you already know. It’s up here.
Yes I saw it saw it earlier.
More irritation, more anger!
This story will run and run.
Lovely piece in the Guardian and so it goes on really. I collect anything of interest relating to the ponds and I got a box full rather quickly.
The ponds action group was helped by a very good press. The local papers were particularly supportive, covering every stage of the six month long campaign.
New Year’s Day 2005 Kenwood Ladies’ Pond
Happy New Year! Nice to see you walking better.
(inaudible chat)
Oh Liz you’ve got Holly too.I think your is a wonderful colour.Happy new year!
Oh hurry up Ann I’m dying.
All the nurses used to come here when I was 18. And I’ve just had my 70 birthday so I intend to go on swimming here for a long time.And anyway who’d want to swim in a swimming pool when you can swim here. Why would you want to?
There’s Wynn. You know she’s over 90There’s a lovely smile!
Why are there so many taking my photo?
You’re becoming a celebrity these days Wynn.
Excuse me. Can I just say a word or two please. I’m Jane Shallice and I’m the chair of the Hampstead Ladies’ Pond …Thank you all for coming. It’s hugely important as all of us know to make as big a representation as possible of our support for this absolutely beautiful place. And I’ve just said, there’s a very small girl standing round here and I’ve just said that our campaign has got to be that we maintain this pond for her to use in the way that we’ve used it in that it’s open all the year and it’s free. This is the facility for women in London. It’s not just for people in Hampstead. It’s for people who can come from all over London and know that they can be here to either swim or just be in an environment where there is no question of being hassled or interfered with in any way.
Everybody is also opposed to charging ….
January 2005 Public Meeting arranged by the Corporation of London
Challenged by the strength of public opposition to its plans, the Corporation arranged a public meeting.
I suspect this is the first budgetary crisis that the Corporation has experienced in the 15, 16 years or so since it’s taken over the running of the Heath and I would suggest that it points to a loss of direction on the part of the Corporation and its losing sight of its role in running the Heath and this is summed up by a phrase which often comes up when you hear representatives of the Corporation interviewed, particularly recently, They talk about how they provide the swimming facilities. They do not provide the swimming facilities, the Heath provides the swimming facilities.
Catherine McGuinness Chair of the Heath Management Committee
These problems have been developing over a number of years but have now hit home with a significant overspend developing in the second year in a row. And therefore we’ve looked at a number of saving across our budget in order to find a total saving of £330,000 a year. We are, of course, trying to find savings which will have the minimum possible impact on the way we maintain the Heath and range of facilities which we offer.
If this great international city made by such things as free museums and free pond swimming – And today I hear we have a Moscow support group forming - how come a bid for the Olympics is supported by the Corporation of London at a time when the Corporation can’t even keep free muddy, slimy, green ponds open and free?
If we don’t look at our level of spending on our ponds we are going to have to make even more savings in other areas and that would be unfair. But can I make clear that we have no intention of closing all the ponds altogether we’ve always made clear, we’ve always made clear - if I may continue - we’ve always made clear that swimming in the ponds is a very cherished tradition which we would like to see continue in a sustainable form.
What an incredible well of knowledge and passion and believe about the essence that lies on the Heath and is that area of green space and if you don’t take away that passion and apply it to your accounts and your processes you have mishear the meeting tonight.
A thing called City’s Cash which is a huge fund had been spending capital as income and that this had been discovered. And that, of course, isn’t an accountancy error, it’s something else.
In view of the strength of feeling that’s been expressed on the question of the ponds we are willing to explore all options to try and reduce the cost of the ponds without closing them without closing any of them
We’d like to have a chance to work with you not against you so I think you’ve put us on the spot I often feel that you’re saying ‘ you’ve got to come up with solutions by February 21st or we’re going to act. ‘ We haven’t had any time to act there’s been no year to sit on panels and develop a trust or develop a fund raising mechanism. And every time we make a suggestion you say we’ve already thought of that and it won’t work. So what we’d like is time, time, time to work with you.
So those who are voting have no confidence in the current management of the Heath and can I see those who retain confidence in the current management of the Heath?
February 2005 London’s Guildhall
The final decision on the ponds rests with a formal meeting of the Corporation’s Heath Management Committee. The public can observe but not participate. Cameras must remain outside.
I have here 6884 signatures to be presented to the management committee at the beginning of the meeting.
I’m hoping that we might bring the Corporation of London to their senses. It’s insane that to pay for their mismanagement of their budget that they want to close or make people pay for something that is free and one of the most wonderful experiences in the world.
Profit belongs to our times disastrously. Why shouldn’t we have some things in life which are free and pleasurable and which don’t make a profit?
The meeting was longer than usual with a wider discussion but at the end they decided that they would not close any pond. They were going to institute charging which they called ‘self policing’ and they decided that next year they would look again at the whole question of the funding of the ponds.
At the end of the meeting we were meant to interview Catherine McGuinness who is the chair of the committee to have a brief interview on what had then happened.
Yes unfortunately Catherine McGuinness has had to go and have a meeting with Jennifer Adams and Simon Lee to discuss the ramifications of the meeting and how to communicate it to the staff and the public. So, I’m sorry she has sent me in her stead to answer any questions you may have.
Jon Logie Press officer, corporation of London
Thanks for coming to see us but most of the questions I have are specifically for Catherine. But one of the major issues is quite clearly the way the Committee was using the term ‘voluntary’ and at no point was any clarification made about what the term means. Is it a voluntary contribution?
The system is a self policing charging system that has been recommended and now approved by the committee. It’s not a voluntary charge.
We succeeded the following week to have an interview with Catherine McGuinness were she was able to put forward her views about what she thought had now happened.
We’ve tried to listen very hard to what people have said about not wanting closure even if the closure of one pond or reducing the hours meant that we could afford free swimming. We’ve listened to what people have said about not wanting obtrusive or divisive barriers and that’s why we’ve gone for this light touch - we’ve called it self policing, I know it’s an unhappy term – this light touch charging where we will really be levying a charge but relying on people’s honesty.
We won’t have barriers which prevent people getting in.
Historically the Heath budget were over or under spent but by relatively little and appeared in equilibrium but since 2001 there have been substantial overspends
There have been increasing overspends in the last couple of years which is why we’ve had to take decisions to keep the Heath within budget
Do you know which precise areas of the Heath budget were responsible for the overspend
That’s very difficult because of the way our budget had worked in the past. We haven’t broken it down by area. We’ve done a lot of analysis in the last year leading up to the last decisions and we’ve now got quite a grasp on what we’re spending where? I think that is all part of much more financial realism coming from the Corporation which yes, is a wealthy organisation but has finite income, resourcesI would be very sorry to see swimming stopped and I’ve always said.., I genuinely mean it that swimming I know it’s a very cherished activity on the Heath it’s very much part of what makes the Heath what it is. It would take a very long time before we would stop ..I can’t imagine us ever stopping swimming in the ponds but we won’t be able too afford it and all the other activities and care of the Heath if we have to carry on paying at this level
If people didn’t pay are they breaking a bylaw, are they trespassing?
I’m not sure, I’m not sure of the answer to that (inaudible prompt off screen) I mean we don’t prosecute people you know for not paying when they go onto the tennis courts so I’m not sure of the exact legal status of that.
May 2005 The mixed ponds opens with a party
It’s a celebration of having got the season at all because as you know they nearly closed it for good and its also an occasion to get people because they tried to close it during the winter to sign up to the mixed pond action group so that this Autumn when they will undoubtedly try to close it again we’ve got thousands of people ready to say its our pond we love it.
I can’t even imagine why someone could even think about closing it. It’s lovely. We live half an hour from the Caribbean sea so we’re used to rivers and ponds and stay by the sea its part of our culture and that’ probably the reason we find this so lovely.
I feel that as an alternative to this charging which I totally disagree with we should have ‘pay with a poem’. That would be a wonderful resource to gather a sort of community poem about why all sorts of different people love these places.
By the time the mixed pond opened for the summer season the judicial review about a winter swimming club had given its verdict – another reason for some of the swimmers to celebrate.
On 26 April 2005 in the High Court, Mr Justice Stanley Burnton, in the case of The Queen v The Corporation of London on the application of Hampstead Heath Winter Swimming Club, ruled that the Corporation could not be prosecuted under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 for allowing adult swimmers to swim without lifeguards in the Hampstead Ponds, and that the Corporation’s decision to prohibit such swimming for fear of prosecution, being based on a mistaken view of the law, was invalid. The Club now swims without lifeguards at the Mixed Pond throughout the winter.
The judicial review was an opportunity for a judge to say there are limits to the scope of the nanny state. He really said, look the truth is, people have not got to be oppressed by undue restrictions. And he came out fighting on that one.
I think the judge made a very sensible decision and he was fairly well informed about the issues the health and safety risks and passionate that people should be able to take risks to a much greater degree than the current is running at the moment.
He said it would be a sad and cheerless and grey Britain if every risk were removed and he opened his judgment with ‘the Hampstead Heath ponds are a gift from God or from nature..’
He said ‘the open spaces of London are the glory of London and the most beautiful of them all is Hampstead Heath’
Kenwood Ladies Pond. A June morning 2005….And we hope, far into the future
It’s important to realise that we’ve had two victories one was the judicial review which applied to a small number of people on the Heath but will have wide national implications but the second victory was the victory to maintain three swimming facilities on the Heath and those are the things that in fact all of us have got to be very proud of and that we’ve got to make sure that we maintain in the future. We’re hoping that that we’ve been successful. We know that there will be threats and we therefore just have to be aware of them but hopefully they’re going to be smaller than the ones we’ve faced in the past and maybe we’ll be lucky and the Corporation will now decide that they have started to work with us and that they want to give us what we want rather than fight against us.
You’re not expecting to have another winter of non stop campaigning?
No. Certainly not.
For information about natural water swimming throughout UK contact: River and Lake Swimming
Associationwww.river-swimming.co.ukThe Right to swimwww.righttoswim.co.uk/
To support better opportunities for swimming (indoors and outdoors) in London contact London Pools Campaign www.londonpoolscampaign.com
Because it’s had a national profile, this campaign, I think it’s sent a message to others as well that if they are prepared to fight, they can get back the things that they’ve lost.
Hopefully this is going to be something that is a much, much wider campaign both through London but also nationally.