The role of IWA Trustees is to drive the direction of the charity, monitor its effectiveness in achieving its goals, and ensure the organisation meets its charitable objectives. As a member of the Board, an individual Trustee’s role is to use skills and judgement to work collaboratively with the other Trustees to:
- Ensure the charity is carrying out its purposes for the public benefit
- Comply with the charity’s governing document and the law
- Act in the charity’s best interests
- Manage the charity’s resources responsibly
- Act with care and skill
- Ensure the charity is accountable and well managed
We are looking to complement our existing Trustees and have identified the following skillsets that we think need
strengthening:
- Experience of engaging and enabling participation of younger people with the charity
- Health and safety management
- Funding/fundraising
- Environment and sustainability
- experience of restoration projects (not just waterways)
- Marketing, membership and recruitment
We would also welcome applications from individuals to apply if they think they have experience that would be valuable to the Association beyond those mentioned above. For example, we would like younger people (18 and over) to apply who may have very relevant skills and experience for growing IWA today.
Candidates must be passionate about our campaigning: for sufficient funding for Britain’s waterways; the sustainable operation of navigations; restoration of closed waterways; and our work to make the waterways great places to live, work, travel, play, and for wildlife, nature recovery and mitigating climate change.
Most Trustee meetings are held online. However, we feel it is important to meet in person and to visit sites and events from time to time. Reasonableexpenses are covered. We are committed to improving the diversity of our Board. We encourage applications from individuals from underrepresented groups, including those of varying ages, genders and minority ethnic backgrounds. Selection will be made on merit and the ability to best serve the Association’s charitable objectives, taking into account the current skills and experience of the Board. Candidates should have sufficient time available to be able to spend at least one to two days per month on IWA business
The Application Pack contains information about the roles and responsibilities of Trustees and contact details in case you wish to discuss potentially applying. Applications will close at 5pm on 11th June 2026. Applicants will be asked to submit their CV, complete a skillset questionnaire, and submit a covering email rather than completing an application form.
