An article which appears in the most recent edition of
CAMRA’s “What’s Brewing” newspaper raises concerns about the growing gulf
between an increasingly aged, active membership and the new, young, “hipsters”
of the craft beer movement.
Written by a long-standing CAMRA activist, the author uses
examples from his own branch to illustrate the problem. It appears that despite
membership numbers being at a record level, the number of active members within
the branch is declining year on year, making it increasingly difficult to fill
committee posts and leading to problems with the day to day functioning of the
branch.
West Kent CAMRA members 30 years ago |
This situation is reflected in my own, West Kent
branch, where none of the principle officers are younger than their mid 50’s.
The same applies to the handful of active members we now see. Committee posts
are increasingly hard to fill; so much so that one poor chap is covering the
positions of both Membership and Social Secretary.
These sorts of situations are untenable; not only in the
medium term, but increasingly in the short term as well, but no-one seems to
have an answer. The correspondent in “What’s Brewing” makes the point that
CAMRA is in danger of becoming a two-tier organisation; one which has sway with
government, and able to influence policy on beer and pubs, but at the same time
is far less capable of making an impact locally.
I’m sure there are branches which can demonstrate this is
not the case, but for branches like mine, what is the way forward? When I first
joined the Campaign for Real Ale, as a young student, over 40 years ago, it was
by and large a young person’s organisation. This may not have been apparent at
the time, but looking back at photos of those early days, in particular those
of marches held to protest against various brewery closures, shows this to be
the case.
West Kent CAMRA members 3 years ago |
Today, CAMRA’s membership is predominantly, but not
exclusively, late middle-aged and male, and the fact that the old guard,
including myself, is not getting any younger is proved by the obituaries which appear
on a regular basis in the pages of
“What’s Brewing”.
The article in “What’s Brewing” makes a plea for the
campaign to engage far more with the predominantly young people involved in the
flourishing craft beer scene. This is a sentiment I wholly agree with, and I
know many of my West Kent colleagues feel the same.
However, there are also many within CAMRA for whom craft beer, and especially
“Craft Keg” is a total anathema. This is a view shared by those in charge of
the organisation; at least publicly. Privately they might well admit there are
hundreds, if not thousands of excellent “non-real” beers produced both at home
and abroad, but because CAMRA has boxed itself into a corner by its narrow
definition of “Real Ale”, they are unable to come out in support of these
beers.
The new generation of young beer enthusiasts have no such
restrictions, and base their judgement of a beer on what it tastes like in the
glass, rather than on an out-dated and increasingly irrelevant definition based
on post-brewing processing and dispense. This unfortunately means CAMRA will be
seen as increasingly irrelevant by younger drinkers, to whom no such
constraints apply.
So will it be a case of never the twain shall meet? I
sincerely hope not, but unless CAMRA is prepared to undergo a seismic shift in
policy; a “Road to Damascus” experience, then I’m afraid that as the old guard depart
their watch, and with no new blood coming along to replace them, the campaign
will literally whither on the vine; or should that be hop-bine?