London lifeboats boost rescues The Lifeboats had another busy year in 2002, with crews rescuing 7,365 people. In their first full year of operations. Beach Rescue lifeguards were involved in 867 major incidents and saved 22 lives.

The four stations on the River Thames responded to over 800 calls and rescued 269 people. Tower Pier station alone was called to launch on 400 occasions.

This is a remarkable first-year record and proves beyond doubt the immense value of the Lifeboats rescue service on London's river. The busiest coastal station was Poole, with 162 launches.Family Association The RNLI Family Association was formally launched at the 2003 ACM. The Association will provide a network for those former and retired lifeboat station volunteers and staff who want to maintain a connection with the organisation. It will also be a point of contact for those who might be in need of help.

Membership will be by invitation of the RNLI and, in this initial phase, will include: • operational volunteers (ie appointed station branch officials, lifeboat crew and registered shore helpers) at lifeboat stations and members of RNLI staff who have retired on full service to retirement age or on medical grounds, operational volunteers at lifeboat stations (ie appointed station branch officials, lifeboat crew and registered shore helpers) and members of RNLI staff who left service before retirement age but who have a minimum of 5 years' service.

If you have past service with the RNLI in one or other of these categories, we would like to hear from you. Membership is also open to the surviving wives, husbands or partners of those who, during their lives, fulfilled one of these criteria.

For more details please write to The Family Association Secretary, RNLI, West Quay Road, Poole, Dorset BH15 1HZ; or telephone 01202662222.Callous thieves put lives at risk A D class relief lifeboat was stolen in early June while en route to Sunderland The lifeboat was parked on its trailer in the car park of a Hartlepool hotel, while the driver, from Poole headquarters, took a rest break. The inshore lifeboat, worth around £20,000, was due to replace Sundertand's station lifeboat to allow routine maintenance to take place.

Operations Director Michael Vlasto says: 'It's outrageous that someone would steal a lifeboat: it's like someone stealing an ambulance or a fire engine. This equipment is used to save lives and it is vital that it is returned as soon as possible. Unlike other emergency services, the RNLI is a charity and all our equipment is available because of the public's generosity and support for our fundraising efforts. The people of Sunderland will be appalled, along with all our other supporters, that someone could do such a heartless thing.' Sunderland lifeboat station's D class lifeboat, Landlubber, started service at the station back in 1974. It was funded by the generosity of the Thirsk and District Landlubbers. It needs regular maintenance to ensure it is operating at its best and this is why the relief lifeboat was on its way. The theft means that the RNLI needs to provide an alternative relief lifeboat and could have caused life-threatening delays.

As the Lifeboat went to press, police had had no success in tracing the thieves.Gifts gone missing! For those of you who are wondering where your Watermark gift catalogue is ... we haven't forgotten to enclose it.

During previous seasons we received numerous telephone calls and letters notifying us that your catalogues were missing. Therefore, to ensure that you receive your copy of the Lifeboats Gift Catalogue this year, we have decided to mail it independently from your magazine. You will be pleased to know that your own copy will be with you very shortly.

We are pleased to say that this won't cost us any extra - the postage costs are offset by savings on insertion costs and postage for the Lifeboat magazine.

We do hope you enjoy browsing through the pages and discover a wonderful range of great value and unique gifts for family and friends. The Lifeboats Gift Catalogue is solely operated by the Lifeboats to help save lives at sea and really does have something for everyone.

* free gift on all orders over £50 • free postage and packing on orders over £35 received by the end of September.

This is an exclusive member-only benefit.

We do hope that you will like what you see and decide to place an order. By purchasing gifts from us you contribute enormously, because every penny of profit from the items you buy goes directly towards the funds needed to run the Lifeboats. Did you know that last year the Lifeboats Gift Catalogue raised over £1M? We are proud to say that, with your help, we are able to continue to help our brave lifeboat crews save lives at sea.

Happy shopping!Work on the Lifeboat College is proceeding well (see the Lifeboat, Spring 2003, p.3).

Clearance of the burial ground, on the site of the proposed Lifeboat Support Centre, has now been completed. Tenders for construction of the Lifeboat Support Centre were received in March and Mowlem Building has been selected. The building is due for completion in mid-2004.News.

Collectors take to the city streets RNLI volunteers, staff and supporters took to the streets of London to collect for the Lifeboats from 3-10 March. London lifeboat week saw a series of door-to-door collections, finishing up with London lifeboat day on 11 March - the Lifeboats' largest annual collection. This year's collection had extra relevance for those who live and work around the Thames, as it marked the first anniversary of lifeboats on the river. Lifeboats at Cravesend, Tower Pier, Chiswick and Teddington have responded to over 800 incidents and have saved many lives since going on station in 2002. lifeboats are now playing a part in everyday life in London' says Sue Clifton, regional manager for Greater London. 'This makes the Lifeboats so much more relevant to all of us here in the capital.' London lifeboat day itself saw teams of staff, crew members, lifeguards and volunteers gathering at main train stations during the rush hours to collect money and raise awareness. Teams, consisting of two or four members, a captain and a London lifeboat crew member, were assigned to man each of the 11 main train stations, Canary Wharf and the South Mimms motorway services. All team members had an early start, as they needed to be at their posts from 6.30am until 10.00am. They all returned to their stations for another shift from 3.45pm until 7.00pm. Volunteers from the London area covered the rest of the day.

The week-long appeal is a huge undertaking for the London staff and volunteers, and represents almost a quarter of the region's annual income. The organisation of the appeal continues throughout the entire year, starting with the application for the licence and finishing with the submission of audited accounts to New Scotland Yard in mid June. As the Lifeboat goes to press, all the generous donations received are still being counted; but organisers hope to have raised in excess of £225,000.

Branch shake up Station branch committees stem from the Lifeboats earliest days when communications with headquarters were rare and difficult, many crew were illiterate fishermen and there was a need for local stations to run almost autonomously; a task undertaken by the Branch Committee.

The requirements have changed over the years, as have communications, but the branch structure hasn't. This has been reviewed by a group of Lifeboats staff and branch officials who devised a new structure to meet the needs of stations and the Lifeboats in the 21st century.

This new structure has been successfully piloted in 24 lifeboat communities.

A change many will notice is that the Station Honorary Secretary becomes the Lifeboat Operations Manager, as a majority felt that the old title was misunderstood. A common quote summed it up: 'I don't want to talk to the secretary, I want to talk to the man in charge'. Each locality with a lifeboat station will have a Lifeboat Management Croup responsible for coordinating all Lifeboats activity within their area. The group will comprise: Chairman; Lifeboat Operations Manager; Lifeboat Treasurer; Lifeboat Press Officer; Lifeboat Administration Officer (if required); Chairman of the Fundraising Team; Head Lifeguard (if applicable); and Sales Team Representative (if required).

There will then be an operations team responsible for the day-to-day running of the lifeboat station comprising: Lifeboat Operations Manager; Deputy Launching Authorities (two or more, as now); Coxswain at all-weather lifeboat stations; Mechanic at all-weather lifeboat stations; Nominated Helmsman at inshore lifeboat stations; Lifeboat Treasurer; Lifeboat Medical Adviser; Lifeboat Training Coordinator; Lifeboat Press Officer; Lifeboat Administration Officer (if required); Lifeboat Boathouse Manager (if appointed - inshore lifeboat stations only); and Lifeboat Chaplain (if appointed).

The new structure has roots in what already happens at many stations and reflects the way that modern lifeboat stations are run.In the public eye Over the last 12 years, the Lifeboats has measured public awareness of the charity and the willingness of the public to give support if asked. These measurements are a useful barometer of the fundraising climate. Now, just as the Institution needs to increase fundraising, the figures are at an all-time low. For people to support any charity they first must be aware of the need and feel motivated to respond - so publicity is the oxygen of fundraising. The challenge is to make the public aware that lifeboat crews, lifeguards and water safety teams do a worthwhile job and to appreciate that the cost of providing these vital services comes from voluntary contributions and legacies.

Over the past few years, legacy income has been high. This reduced the need for voluntary income from other sources. Therefore, the RNLI cut the number of fundraising requests sent out, in the form of press inserts, door drops and direct mail letters. It also virtually stopped all national, regional and local appeals. If you don't ask, you don't get and in the increasingly competitive charity market,you are quickly forgotten in favour of the causes that are seen to be shouting the loudest.

Now, legacy income is declining, partly because of falling numbers of legacies and partly because the downturn in the value of stocks and shares affects the value of estates. This means increasing fundraising from other sources, which will help create more awareness. But this is not enough.

The Lifeboats competes with other news stories for media share, especially television. The fundraising and communications team are investigating various ways of keeping the lifeboat service in the public eye and hope to have awareness levels climbing back to their late-1990s levels and above.Full Metal Challenge A team of three lifeboat engineers have taken part in the new Channel 4 programme Full Metal Challenge. They competed against 26 teams, from five continents, in a fearsome battle for automotive supremacy. The teams, from Britain, North America, China, Russia, India, Germany, Chile, Australia, New Zealand, Iceland and South Africa, were given a budget of £2,000 and one month to build their ultimate dream machine.

A set of guidelines formed a basts for their vehicle design; over and above this, their creativity was limitless. These monstrous machines had to be capable of feats of endurance and speed to out-smart and outmanoeuvre the competition. The event took place at a disused power station in Kent, which was completely transformed to house a series of hair-raising circuits, designed to push man (or woman) and machine to the limit.

Games included Ten Pin, where the contestant had to knock down as many skittles as possible in an oversized bowling alley with 4m skittles; Hall of Mirrors, where teams navigated their vehicles through a constantly changing maze of fairground style mirrors; Roller Coaster, in which teams drove their vehicles along raised tracks negotiating terrifying obstacles up to 15m high in a race against time; and many others.

The Lifeboats team, dubbed the Aquaholics, consisted of Design Engineer Adam Kyte, who was captain; Marine Engineer Martyn Pitman and Senior Design Engineer Tony Stankus, who was the main driver. To find out how the team got on: visit the Lifeboats website at www.lifeboats.org.uk or the show's website at www.fullmetalchallenge.comCharity law needs reform The Lifeboats is part of a new coalition of top UK charities and NGOs campaigning for the reform of English charity law. The Charities Bill Coalition wants the introduction of a public benefit test for all charities. The aim is not to remove charitable status from any one particular type of organisation, but to simplify the legal definition of a charity, making it much clearer on what basis charitable status is awarded. This will help to keep public trust and confidence in the voluntary sector.

Research commissioned by the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) suggests many people do not understand what is the definition of charity.

80% of respondents to an ICM poll did not know that the Royal Opera House has charitable status and over half of the younger respondents (18-24 years) mistakenly identified the Child Support Agency as a charity. The ICM poll also suggests that public knowledge of the Charity Commission is very poor, with one third of respondents not knowing that there is a charity sector regulator.

Another ICM poll, commissioned by NCVO last year, revealed that nine out of ten members of the public agree that an organisation wishing to be a charity should be able to demonstrate that its activities provide a benefit to society. Presently, no universal test of a charity's public benefit is demanded by English charity law, which dates back to 1601. Instead, this quality is generally presumed to exist in religious organisations and in organisations that promote education or the relief of poverty.

NVCO is the umbrella body for the voluntary sector in England, with sister councils in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and has over 3,000 members. Its policy document Why do we need a charities bill? is available on request from the NCVO press office on 020 7520 2468.

The Charities Bill Coalition are: The Royal National Lifeboat Institution; The National Council for Voluntary Organisations; Amnesty International UK; Cancer Research UK; The British Red Cross; National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children; British Heart Foundation; Community Matters; World Wide Fund for Nature; Royal National Institute for the Blind; Guide Dogs for the Blind; British Trust for Conservation Volunteers; Help the Aged; National Children's Homes; Women's Royal Voluntary Service; The Royal British Legion; The Association of Chief Executives of Voluntary Organisations; Citizens Advice; Turning Point; National Autistic Society; Association of Charity Officers; Catalyst Works; and Charities Aid Foundation.Liverpool remembers convoy heroesby Nicholas Leach Over the May Day bank holiday, a series of events were held in Liverpool to mark the 60th anniversary of the Battle of the Atlantic, the longest running campaign of World War II, which saw the Allied convoys overcoming the German threat to strangle vital trade routes between America and Europe. A number of warships were in attendance at Liverpool's historic Canning Dock and across the river at Birkenhead. Representatives of those involved in the conflict from both the Merchant and Armed Forces were also present. Pride of place went to HMS Invincible lying at moorings in the Mersey and used as the backdrop for a series of helicopter and aircraft displays.

The commemoration service held on Sunday, 4 May was followed by a march past, which included crews of the visiting vessels and veterans of the conflict and was headed by the band of the Royal Marines. This was followed by a banquet for veterans at St George's Hall and the unveiling of a commemorative plaque remembering those who gave their lives during the War.

An air-sea rescue demonstration, which involved a Royal Navy rescue helicopter working with the Hoylake Mersey class lifeboat LadyofHitbre, took place in front of the thousands of people who lined the historic Mersey waterfront at Albert Dock.

The aircraft carrier provided an impressive backdrop for the operation, with the Lytham St Annes relief Mersey class lifeboat Lifetime Care and New Brighton's Atlantic 75 Rock Light also on hand to fly the flag for the Lifeboats.

The presence of the Lifeboats was a notable reminder of the role the crews and boats played during World War II, when many of the most famous rescues in the annals of the Institution took place. Lifeboats performed numerous services to ships in the Atlantic convoys; some of these rescues stretching the skills and courage of lifeboatmen to the limit..