'Young people should stop scrolling and start volunteering'

Eve volunteers on the Brighouse section of the Calder and Hebble Navigation in West Yorkshire

When Eve Ingle, 24, was made redundant she had too much time on her hands and began looking for volunteering opportunities, but she didn't expect it would lead to winning an award.

Eve, from Brighouse, was walking alongside the Calder and Hebble Navigation waterway when she decided to help out.

"In October 2024 I was made redundant from a restaurant manager job. I was like, 'right, I need something to do with my time'.

"I've always been a community person and I wanted something else to fill my time.

"I bumped into one of the Canal and River Trust people. I started talking to her and she said there is a group around Brighouse that volunteer.

"So I went online and got into it. Next thing you know, I'm looking for a job that will work around my volunteering," she says.

Now she works as a house sitter, fitting work around her volunteering priorities.

Eve Ingle was awarded for her volunteering work

Earlier this month she was named Young Volunteer of the Year by the Canal and Rivers Trust for her work.

In her award recommendation, the charity described Eve as "an inspiration to other young people and adults".

She does everything from pulling logs out of the canal to planting bulbs, painting and general maintenance, but says her favourite task is litter-picking.

"They don't really feel like jobs because when you're walking and having a natter with whoever you're walking with, you really don't really notice," she explains.

"Like with the painting and maintenance for lock gates. There's a lot of sanding and painting but it goes by really fast. You'll end up covered in paint. It doesn't feel like work."

The Brighouse volunteer group of about 10 meet every Thursday for four hours.

Eve says it allows her to meet a variety of people and pick up valuable life lessons from the older volunteers.

"A lot of volunteers are of a certain age and retired," she says.

"So I find it very interesting to see the different perspectives that a lot of the other volunteers have from their life experiences."

She adds: "Talking to people of different age groups you get different perspectives."

Eve's volunteering tasks include everything from litter-picking to general maintenance

According to the Department for Media, Culture and Sport, 28% of adults in England, about 12.9 million people, took part in formal volunteering at least once in the year 2023-24.

But these rates are much lower among those in their twenties. Just 11% of 25-34-year-olds volunteered once a year compared to 23% of adults aged 65 to 74.

Eve says she feels the respect for nature has been lost among younger people.

"You don't get a lot of people my age respecting the area they live in, so I thought I'll do my bit," she says.

"It just sort of drew me, I felt like I had to give that time because not many people do and it's such a beautiful area. We do need our canals."

She encourages other young people to put down their phones and take up volunteering roles.

"A lot of young people are steering away from traditional nine-to-five work and going more online like myself. I'm self-employed and with that you find you've got so much time.

"A lot of people sit and they scroll on TikTok, then after they've sat there for 20 minutes, half an hour, oh what have I done with my day, nothing. Going out doesn't take up too much time, it's only four hours and it flies by so fast and but then you've got the entire day.

"It's really good both physically and mentally and that's the thing that a lot of people nowadays struggle with."

She adds: "I definitely think that it is something everyone should try. You get a sense of pride with it. I'll be walking down the canal with my boyfriend and I'll be like, 'oh, you see that wall that's been fixed? That's me'."

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