British Hang Gliding & Paragliding Association

The British Hang Gliding and Paragliding Association (BHPA) is a not for profit company limited by guarantee, and is the recognised governing body for hang gliding and paragliding in the UK. The Association is managed by an elected Executive Council.

Exec members serve for a maximum of three years before they must either retire or put themselves forward for re-election at an Annual General Meeting (AGM). Once approved BHPA AGM Minutes and BHPA Exec Minutes are published on this website.

Current Executive Council Members

Marc Asquith - Admin Director & Company Secretary (marc-asquith@bhpa.co.uk)

Marc Asquith is one of the founding members of the BHPA. As a member of the BHGA Council, he was one of the six BHGA nominees to serve on the original BHPA Exec. Together with the BAPC Treasurer and Company Secretary, Dick Long, they wrote the BHPA Constitution. Marc is credited with inventing the title "British Hang Gliding and Paragliding Association".

By profession he is now a barrister specialising in aviation law, having had a mid-life crisis and a career change from retail management on the high street in the mid-1990s. He has served variously as BHPA PR Officer, Safety Officer, Insurance Officer, External Representation Officer, Treasurer and for many years, Chairman. He is currently BHPA Company Secretary and Admin Director.

As BHPA External Representation Officer Marc sat on the Royal Aero Club Council as the BHPA delegate and served as RAeC Chairman for 3 years in the mid 1990s. He is currently a Vice-President of the RAeC. He has also served as a Trustee of the RAeC Trust and Flyability.

In his spare time he also served as a County Councillor in Cheshire and as a Councillor on Cheshire East Council.

As an Air Cadet, having completed a solo gliding course in 1975 and his PPL through a flying scholarship 1976, he first started flying hang gliders in November 1977 at Swansea University.

He qualified as a microlight instructor in the early 1980s working for Gerry Breen at Enstone Airfield teaching people to fly the American Aerolights Eagle.

He competed in the Hang Gliding League throughout the 1980s and managed on one occasion to be selected as a member of the British Hang Gliding Team.

In 1986 he started flying paragliders. In 1991, having been elected Chairman of the BHPA, he also started flying in parascending competitions, achieving a Team Bronze in the 1994 Nationals at Middle Wallop. He started flying powered hang gliders when they became legal and now most regularly flies his Doodlebug in Snowdonia. He also flies his hang glider or paraglider whenever weather and time allow.

In more recent years Marc has held significant posts on the European Hang Gliding Union, Dissatisfied with the EHPU's representation at Europe Air Sports (EAS) and its general lack of a direction of travel, he re-drafted the EHPU Statutes, creating a Management Committee which meets online every 2 months. The statutes also created the post of EAS Delegate, which had previously been a post for the President and General Secretary. At the first elections to the Management Committee, Marc was elected to the post of EAS Delegate.

In 2021 Marc was elected as the EHPU President and served until February 2023. He continues as the EHPU EAS Delegate.

Martin Baxter - Sites Officer (martin-baxter@bhpa.co.uk)

In 2010 Martin dared to criticise the BHPA Executive. The wily Chairman challenged him to do better, and he was co-opted into the role of Sites Officer. He was formally elected the following year. Martin is a former Army helicopter pilot with a background in Flight Safety. He has been Chairman of the Dales Hang gliding and Paragliding Club for a number of years, serving as club sites Officer before that.

Martin brought the BHPA Sites Database into the 21st Century and now manages its content. It isn't published as some sort of UK Sites Guide (that's club business) but is used to deconflict between clubs/schools and to identify a single point of contact for each site. He is also a Trustee of the BHPA Sites Trust Fund, co-ordinating all applications for grants towards site purchase.

Over recent years Martin has been attempting to improve the Civil Aircraft Notification Procedure (CANP). Military bureaucracy has thus far got the better of him and he continues to bang his head against that particular brick wall.

If you have any concerns, ideas or questions he'd be delighted to hear from you.

Bill Bell - Competitions Officer (bill-bell@bhpa.co.uk)

Bill has been flying for 25 years and is currently flying Hang gliders on the good days and light aircraft on non-XC days with his flying partner Sue. Currently a lapsed paraglider pilot because of lack of any obvious ability and because there are not enough good days to do both. He is a club coach and one-time Airwave dealer which gives him great respect for those earning a living in free flying.

Bills background is in broadcast TV operations and he has worked for a number of years as a self-employed Technical Director.

Jenny Buck - Chair (jennifer-buck@bhpa.co.uk)

Jenny Buck joined the BHGA aged 15 in 1989 and has been a member of BHGA and BHPA ever since. Having first flown tandem with her late father in 1981, she achieved her EP in HG on her 16th birthday. She is Advanced Pilot Rated in Hang Gliding and Pilot rated (Hill and Tow) in Paragliding. She has also previously flown light aircraft and sailplanes. Having previously been an active competition pilot for the last 6 years she has served as Meet Director for the British Open HG Series, UK Nationals and GB HG Team Manager.

Professionally she has served in the Military Medical Services for the last 16 years, has an MSc in Trauma Management and is now working in London as a Commander in the Royal Navy. During this time, she served as Treasurer in the Army HPA and latterly 2 years as Chair of the RNHPA.

A strong believer in coherence, team work, effective leadership and risk management, Jenny's experience on military duty and operational deployments lends itself well to the world of free flight.

Flying opportunities limited by work and single parenting, Jenny is simply content to get off the ground by HG or PG whenever the planets align. Happiest flying at Perranporth, Bradwell Edge or the Alps and always with a smile.

Ed Cunliffe - SPHG Representative (edward-cunliffe@bhpa.co.uk)

Ed was co-opted onto BHPA Executive council as 'Paramotor liaison' representative in 2011 and elected onto Exec in 2012. He has been flying for 13 years off and on, starting on flexwing microlights in 1996 then switching to paramotors in 1999 and more recently paragliders too.

Ed is a founder member of the BHPA registered Yorkshire Owls Paramotor Club in which he holds the Finance Officer post, and has recently been appointed as a club coach. He is also a new member of the Sir George Cayley Sailwing Club and is busy learning the intricacies of unpowered flight. An occasional competition pilot, Ed is also on the PPG Comps advisory panel.

In his non flying life Ed has a background in IT though he managed to escape the office, and hankering for the high life, switched to tower crane driving for three years. With little crane work around he has recently switched careers again and is rapidly becoming an amateur accountant as he starts to take over the financial side of the family business.

Paul Dancey - Publications & Web Site (paul-dancey@bhpa.co.uk)

Paul first joined the BHPA Executive Council in 1998 and took over the role of Skywings Director, previously undertaken by Mark Woodhams. He is currently responsible for the day to day management of Skywings and the BHPA web site, and combines both roles each month by transforming the printed version of Skywings into the page turning on-line version that can be downloaded from the BHPA website.

Paul took up hang gliding in 1989 and joined the SE Wales club. Five years later he was elected to the club committee and took over as magazine editor. Before retiring from the club committee in 2016, he served in a variety of capacities including membership secretary, club secretary, and finally club chairman.

Paul was also a member of the Welsh Sports Association Board for many years, and chaired the Committee responsible for distributing grants for overseas expeditions on behalf of Sport Wales. The contacts he made in that role proved helpful when, as a leading member of the team behind the purchase of the Blorenge, he was able to secure Sports Lottery Funding to assist in the purchase of that site.

He no longer flies, but remains keenly interested in site and access issues. Paul also spent 5 happy years working with Paul Farley at the Welsh Hang Gliding Centre in the 1990's.

Martin Heywood - Vice Chairman & Insurance Officer (martin-heywood@bhpa.co.uk)

Martin is the Vice Chairman of the Executive council. He also looks after the BHPA's aviation insurance contract, which provides indemnity cover to each and every member of the Association. This is a significant responsibility given that over half of the Association's expenditure goes on this important area.

Martin regards himself as a "newbie" to the sport having only seriously taken it up in 1999. He has served on Exec for the past sixteen years, but has now retired from active flying due to a knee problem.

Outside BHPA business, Martin is a full-time solicitor based in Peterborough working in the healthcare sector with particular interest in litigation and inquest handling.

Brett Janaway (brett-janaway@bhpa.co.uk)

Brett has been a BHPA member since the mid 90's and has been an active pilot throughout that time. He previously spent three terms on Exec, and after several years away, has re-joined to help shape the future of competitions within the sport.

Brett flys paragliders, hang gliders & paramotors, holds instructor and tandem licences for paragliding, with hill & tow qualifications, and is the CIVL rep for the UK.

His professional life is predominantly that of a competition organiser for paragliding events.

Angus Langford - Treasurer & Company Secretary (angus-langford@bhpa.co.uk)

Angus is a recently retired chartered accountant and has held a number of finance director roles in the past. He's been interested in flying all his life and took up paragliding 18 years ago. He took early retirement to spend more time flying both in the UK and abroad.

He has been treasurer of the BHPA for the past 11 years, during which time he's worked to keep costs and subscriptions as low as they can be consistent with maintaining the operational integrity and financial stability of the association.

Angus Pinkerton - FSC Chairman (angus-pinkerton@bhpa.co.uk)

Angus is an elected member of the BHPA Executive Council and is the Chairman of the Flying and Safety Committee. He has held these posts for what sometimes seems like forever, and before amalgamation with the BAPC he was Chairman of the BHPA Training Committee.

He has a degree in Aeronautical Engineering and worked for a while with a small Scottish hang glider manufacturer, as well as being a part-time Instructor. In 1979 he made his first hang glider flight, and has been a member of the Lanarkshire and Lothian Soaring Club since then. He has flown throughout the UK and Europe and in many competitions at home and abroad, including the World Championships at Fiesch, Switzerland, in 1989.

Angus was founder Chairman of the International Hang Glider Standards Organisation, and for the last ten years has been the Co-ordinator of the CEN Paraglider Standards Working Group, steering the creation of the CEN paraglider Flight Test and Load Test standards.

Fitting all this around his paid employment as a computer information security consultant has finally got too much, and he will be retiring (early!) from work in 2007. He lives in Paisley with his exceptionally tolerant wife Norma and their two sons, who are both now studying at Glasgow University. Angus was awarded the FAI Tissandier Diploma in 1994.

Steve Young (steve-young@bhpa.co.uk)

Steve is an active hang glider pilot, and enjoys flying in the UK and around the Alps. He is a senior coach (hill), an Aerotow coach and a first aider. He is also Chairman of the Malvern Aerotow Club, the Mercian HGC, and a trustee of the Long Mynd site.

Steve spent his career designing engines and powertrains for Land Rover, New Mini and Aston Martin. He has now retired and has the time and enthusiasm to try to put his experience and organisational skills to good use on Exec.

He is a keen cross country pilot and wants to help in any way to preserve our freedoms to fly cross oountry in the UK and protect all of our sites around the country.

Stuart Blackburn (stuart-blackburn@bhpa.co.uk)

Stuart came to paragliding late in life at the age of 46, training with the Joint Services School in Crickhowel over the summer of 2015 and achieving Pilot status in 2017. Within a year of qualifying, whilst serving in the Royal Navy, he became the Chairman of the Royal Navy Hang Gliding and Paragliding Association. In that role he concentrated on the development of Grass Roots training, especially for those within the ranks, and also enabling the early stages of the journey of one of the Association's pilots to represent in the PWC arena.

Stuart completed 33 years in the Submarine Service, an area that allowed him to hone his leadership skills, teamwork, and team management in addition to understanding and managing the implications of risk, especially its tolerance or removal.

Since retiring from active service, he has joined the Civil Service and in his spare time has become the Chair of the South East Wales Hang Gliding and Paragliding Club. Since day one his pledge has been to prioritise the safety of the club's membership and security of it's sites. Without either the club would not exist. Stuart is passionate about pilot safety and development, and sees pilot development as a key enabler.