As a reader of this blog you are probably aware of the British Mountaineering Council, and a lot of the work that it carries out on the behalf of mountaineers in the UK. As the national representative of climbers, hillwalkers and mountaineers* one pertinent question that very few of us choose to ask is who actually runs it?
The obvious answer is Dave Turnbull the CEO of the organisation, however underneath this public face of the BMC lays the true answer. As a council the policy decisions are made by believe it or not a national council of representatives from across the various geographical areas of the UK, as well as honorary presidents. Each of these areas has two voting members on the council who attempt to represent the views of the people who turn up to area committee meetings to discuss proposed policy decisions and local points of interest.
So theoretically you, the near 60000 members of the BMC steer the ship in the direction you choose and poor old Mr Turnbull has to command the staff in the mother ship (BMC office and other volunteers) towards those policies and decisions. In reality around 300 members make it to the 9 different area meeting, meaning that less than 0.004% of the members of the BMC are actively involved in what can be very important decisions.
None more so than some issues that are on the agenda at present, in particular through some very good budgeting from the finance team, and a profit sharing scheme set up with insurance company that provides BMC travel insurance means that the BMC has £200000 to spend at present, for which there are several suggestion as how spend this cash.
* Including ski mountaineering