CANAL & RIVER TRUST

Registered charity 1146792 · accounts filings on the Charity Commission register · also known as CRT; CANAL AND RIVER TRUST; GLANDWR CYMRU

Canal & River Trust is the charitable operator and guardian of 2,000 miles of historic waterways across England and Wales. In addition to caring for the waterways so that they are available for the public to enjoy, the Trust maintains the nations' third largest collection of listed heritage structures, as well as museums, archives, and hundreds of important wildlife sites.

Causes: Education/training · Arts/culture/heritage/science · Environment/conservation/heritage · Economic/community Development/employment · Recreation · Other Charitable Purposes · website · Get email alerts

Financial health, per its FY2025 accounts

The accounts state that total income decreased to £232.6m from £237.3m in the prior year, while charitable expenditure was £184.8m. The Trust reports a net movement in funds of £22.7m, driven by significant gains on investments, resulting in total unrestricted reserves of £852.6m.

Automated summary of the FY2025 accounts; the evidenced findings below carry the verbatim passages.

What the accounts disclose

Accounts audited by BDO LLP. Discloses 3 of 6 completeness components.

Year-over-year changes

• Reserves position vs the charity's own policy moved from "above" (FY2024) to "within" (FY2025).

Comparing this charity’s FY2024 and FY2025 accounts as analysed by this site.

In the news

Recent coverage mentioning this charity by name (automated match; headlines belong to their publishers).

• Canal & River Trust: Gloucester Docks dredging budget doubled dredgingtoday.com · 26/09/2026
• Canal & River Trust doubles funding to tackle silt in Gloucester Docks | News - Greatest Hits Radio (Gloucestershire) hellorayo.co.uk · 26/09/2026
• Canal & River Trust launches citizens’ panel to shape future of boat licensing marineindustrynews.co.uk · 11/08/2026
• Canal & River Trust suspends 14-day movement rule in England and Wales as drought worsens marineindustrynews.co.uk · 07/08/2026
• Canal & River Trust asks boaters to help shape future of UK waterways licensing marineindustrynews.co.uk · 27/07/2026
• Canal & River Trust survey shows boater satisfaction falling after drought disruption marineindustrynews.co.uk · 10/07/2026
• Long-serving directors to leave Canal & River Trust as it reduces top team thirdsector.co.uk · 06/07/2026
• Canal & River Trust restructures executive team amid ‘demanding’ environment marineindustrynews.co.uk · 02/07/2026

Public fundraising profile: JustGiving — Canal & River Trust (matched by registered charity number).

Funders the charity credits

Named as funders/supporters on the charity’s own website (the charity’s claim, distinct from accounts-verified grants).

• Postcode Lottery — “Since our partnership began in 2012, players of Postcode Lottery have supported a variety of important waterway and wellbeing projects” (source page)

UK research funding (UKRI Gateway to Research)

• GRAM - Gravity for Rivers Agriculture and Mines —
• GroundsWell: Community-engaged and Data-informed Systems Transformation of Urban Green and Blue Space for Population Health —
• The Proactive Infrastructure Monitoring and Evaluation (PRIME) System: Technology Demonstrator for Remote Monitoring of Transportation Earthworks —
• The Proactive Infrastructure Monitoring and Evaluation System (PRIME): Enabling Intelligent Earthworks Management —
• Infrastructure KE Fellowship (Enhancing the resilience of infrastructure to climate change & extreme weather using automated monitoring technologies) —
• GRAM - Gravity for Rivers, Agriculture and Mines —
• EUWATHER —
• Capability for Human Bioarchaeology and Digital Collections —
• Understanding the Value of Outdoor Culture and Heritage Capital for Decision Makers —
• Yorkshire iCASP - Yorkshire Integrated Catchment Solutions Programme —

Property (HM Land Registry)

7,226 registered titles in England and Wales held by the charity’s company or corporate body (7043 freehold); recorded price paid £157.7m. All charity-held property. Contains HM Land Registry data © Crown copyright, OGL v3.0.

Trustpilot: Canal & River Trust scores 1.7/5 from 96 reviews (source) — reviews usually concern the charity’s shops or services, not its charitable performance.

Public profiles (found on the charity’s own website): facebook (894,078 likes) · instagram (75K followers)

Advertised salaries (public job ads)

Roles this charity has advertised on CharityJob, matched on the exact employer name. A different source from the statutory pay bands above: these are asking salaries for vacancies, not what anyone was paid.

• Works Inspector (Clerk of Works) · Ellesmere Port
• Marketing Automation Executive (Fundraising Operations) · Remote
• Construction - Operative · Burnley
• Apprentice Civil Engineering Technician · Milton Keynes
• Principal Environment Lawyer · Remote
• Senior Hydrologist · Gloucester
• Senior Civil Engineer (Concept Design) · Burnley
• Waterway Operative · Northwich CW9 5JJ

Structured financials (annual return, FY ending 31/03/2025)

Reported reserves equal ~43.8 months of spending — in the top quarter for charities its size (median 2.7 months; benchmarks).

Per its annual return, largest income source: Other trading activities (43% of income) — components as reported reconcile to the return’s total income; not from the accounts narrative.

Per its annual return, cost of raising funds: 20.6% of total income — above the median for charities its size (2.9%) (benchmarks).

Register events

• Received assets from another charity (08/01/2025) — per the register’s event history; asset transfers typically record mergers or reorganisations.
• Received assets from another charity (13/09/2021) — per the register’s event history; asset transfers typically record mergers or reorganisations.
• Received assets from another charity (15/02/2016) — per the register’s event history; asset transfers typically record mergers or reorganisations.

Trustees · trustee networks

• David Orr CBEchair
• Bronagh Kennedy
• Clair Jennifer Price CBE
• IAN PETERS
• SIR CHRISTOPHER KELLY KCB

Trustee list from the Charity Commission register (current, not historical).

Operates in: Throughout England And Wales

Income and spending

Common questions

Known funders

Grants to this charity found in funders’ own accounts filings.

Government & lottery funding

Grants to this charity published as open data by government and lottery funders (360Giving).

Funders of similar charities

Funders whose accounts show grants to charities similar to this one (and no recorded grant to this charity) — a starting list for fundraisers.

Charities like this

Semantically similar by activities and financial character, from our analysed corpus. Compare with THE CHESTERFIELD CANAL TRUST LIMITED.

• THE CHESTERFIELD CANAL TRUST LIMITED income £1.0m
• THE WEY AND ARUN CANAL TRUST LIMITED income £816k
• HEREFORDSHIRE AND GLOUCESTERSHIRE CANAL TRUST LIMITED income £195k
• THE INLAND WATERWAYS ASSOCIATION income £1.5m
• MERSEY RIVERS TRUST income £1.2m
• THE CALDER AND COLNE RIVERS TRUST income £629k

Side by side with its peers

Each row is that charity’s latest analysed filing; every value is quote-backed on its own page.