In 2006 I contacted Yoga Alliance USA to ask if they were interested in setting up a Yoga Alliance in the UK. I was told that their organisation had been set up in the States, under United States law and specifically for the USA, and they were not considering establishing a British counterpart. However, in the spirit of yoga, they were very helpful and encouraged me to set up a UK version of Yoga Alliance, and offered to give advice and help if needed. And so Yoga Alliance UK was born. The next year was spent researching the British yoga scene, and based on our findings, we decided on a plan of action which we felt was long overdue.

Some people have been saying that the name Yoga Alliance UK was chosen to mislead as it is so similar to the USA version. As explained above, it really came about for historical reasons and if anything it has been a hindrance rather than a help. This is especially true because I have set the criteria for becoming a training school far higher than the USA counterpart, and our overall terms of acceptance are more stringent. We have done a huge amount of work on our website to make it user friendly and encourage networking and promotion of teachers and schools. Interestingly, Yoga Alliance USA totally revamped their website after ours had been operating for a couple of years and I suspect that was more than coincidence.

My reasons for setting up Yoga Alliance UK

There was a lot of dissatisfaction among many yoga teachers that the British Wheel of Yoga was falsely placing itself as the ‘National Governing Body for Yoga’. Although some of their advertising followed this statement with ‘as recognised by the English Sports Council’ , the overall impression given to the public was that they were a governing body and authority on yoga, and that teacher training courses had to be endorsed by them. Part of Yoga Alliance UK’s remit was to address this and set the record straight. It is worth repeating this here:

You do not have to register with the British Wheel to teach yoga; the British Wheel does not regulate yoga in the UK, nor is it the UK authority on yoga teaching and practice. The British Wheel does not monitor and co-ordinate yoga activities in the UK and does not represent the interests of the UK yoga community.

Last year, the Advertising Standards Authority ruled that the statement that ‘the British Wheel of Yoga is the National Governing Body for Yoga’ was misleading and should be amended. The British Wheel have finally agreed and changed it to:

‘The British Wheel of Yoga is recognised by Sport England as the National Governing Body for Yoga’

Needless to say, many yoga practitioners are not happy to see yoga considered as a sport and wonder what Sport England has to do with the regulation of yoga.

The second area that Yoga Alliance UK wanted to address concerns standards in yoga teaching and particularly in yoga teacher training courses. There has been a proliferation of training courses in the last few years and it begs the question ‘where did they all come from and how good are they?’ I personally practiced yoga for over 20 years before even considering becoming a yoga teacher, and then taught intensively for another 10 years before thinking of running teacher training courses. Now I find that students with a couple of years yoga practice become teachers and then start their own training courses a few years later and in some cases only one year after qualifying as a teacher at the basic level.

My vision for Yoga Alliance UK