Bede Mullen, member of  the Rotary Club of Hebden Bridge has been honoured with the prestigious Champion of Change 2023 award.  Along with fellow Club member Stuart Bradshaw, Bede founded the charity Slow the Flow CIO (Charity no.1191174) and, as Chair, has steered it though its remarkable achievements and transformations. 

Bede mobilised our local community to take strong, proactive measures to alleviate or prevent a recurrence of the devastating floods that have hit our town and the surrounding valley three times in recent years. In doing so, Slow the Flow has created a new sense of empowerment and community spirit, inspiring the participation of a large workforce of volunteers, whose ongoing Natural Flood Management initiatives such as “leaky dams” have already changed the local landscape.

Alongside the practical work goes an equally important educational programme which aims to impart deeper knowledge of climate and sustainability issues. Although Slow the Flow is a local organisation, its influence is much wider. Leading by example, its local achievements have already been recognised by a world-wide audience and resulted in a change in government policy towards flood prevention. Bede and his colleagues have showcased the effectiveness of action by a local community, in the face of an apparent catastrophe.

The valley is still not safe, despite the multi-million pound work done so far by the Environment Agency, but the many thousands of hours of work by Slow the Flow volunteers has already shown its worth.  Bede believes that the effects in the valley of this month’s Storm Babet and previous heavy rainfall could have been so much worse without the work of Slow the Flow. 

The search for this year’s winners was carried out across Rotary’s network of over 1,500 Rotary clubs, with Rotarians and members of the public having their extraordinary work recognised, across a wide range of projects and causes.

For more information about Slow the Flow, or to become a volunteer; see Slow the Flow- Slow The Flow