Quote Originally Posted by Witton Park View Post
Clubs (and race organisers) don't keep the unattached levy - that's a misconception.

As an UKA affiliated club we have to pay £25 for a permit for every road race that we organise. We then have to pay an amount to UKA based on the number of runners that ran in the race and not on the number of unattached runners.

So if we have a race with a few hundred runners, we already have incurred a significant cost.

This system hugely favours the mass races and undoubtedly was cooked up by the London Marathon / Great Run lot - self interest most definitely.

If that applied to each and every Park Run, you would have a fixed overhead for your permit and insurance through UKA of between £50 and £300 per race.

So no - Parkrun isn't treated as an affiliated club in the way that you outline - and your "free" permit and insurance is in effect public funding as the cover comes from UKA.
Yes that is a fair point WP. And partly why I said no direct funding. But then again you have to look at all the public money that goes on promoting exercise - leisure centres, council gyms, RunBritain gimmicks, Fit4Life posters and adverts, personal trainers for obese teenagers. parkrun is good value in comparison and utilises parks for a community event.

We're also providing 5ks for slower runners who might take 30mins+ to get round. It is questionable whether you want too many people running say 1.20 in a club 10k and certainly not a fell race if you're marshalling on a cold hill.