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Showing content with the highest reputation on 01/09/13 in all areas

  1. Yesterday while doing a bit of work to the outside of my boat while moored in the centre of Skipton a boat came within inches of our boat while avoiding a floating weed bank. The offending item got washed to the front of our boat. I proceeded to pull it into the side with my boat hook. After a few aggressive stabs I managed to break it into 3 manageable pieces as it was about 3' by 2' and get it hurled onto the path. I placed it away from the said path onto a small grass verge. Its visible from the path but NOT causing a hazard. Whats wrong with that!? A bloke who sells frozen diary products in his floating shop asked me what I was gonna do with it? I told him nowt. He said why have I pulled it out and not left it as it would eventually rot away. I told him that it causes problems for boaters either for prop issues or for dodging it in the cut. He still insisted I shift it. I said I was going to leave it. He then started to get shirty and say that it would be left there for ever. I replied in a rather abrupt reply. Well its gonna get left then. Have I done wrong? I later praised myself for not loosing my rag with this man who wears genitalia on his forehead.
    3 points
  2. I am very tempted to suggest that we should use CaRTs apparent methods of calculating visitors and multiply the number of members by the number of times they visit the site per year (I know that is not possible because some of them will remain logged on as I do). I think I would then account for 365 x 3 visits (often more) = over 1000 visits. We should end up with millions
    2 points
  3. "Exploit" is a word whose meaning can be determined by the reader according to their preconceptions. Eg the first definition on t'internet is: Verb Make full use of and derive benefit from (a resource): "500 companies sprang up to exploit this new technology". With this meaning, there is no concept of malpractice or stretching the rules beyond that intended. Other definitions are available for those wishing for them!
    2 points
  4. Sue and I would prefer just to sleep together as usual if that's OK with the rest of you
    1 point
  5. I suppose the most appropriate answer would have been "I ain't got a problem with it. If you have you move it".
    1 point
  6. Sorry, I didn't realize that there was a superstition behind changing the name of about in that way. I am aware that some people uphold a superstition in relation to changing of a boat name generally but you seem to be saying that there is a further superstition regarding the boat being in or out of the water. I actually like your boat name. It's original.
    1 point
  7. I think you find this video interesting about the telephone No.112 to contact the emergency services:-
    1 point
  8. This post cannot be displayed because it is in a forum which requires at least 10 posts to view.
  9. After being a marina moorer since 1995 and then for 15 years living in a marina in order to be on site whilst operating a business, my wife and I have long anticipated the time when we could "up anchor" as it were and begin at last to enjoy all that our wonderful inland waterways has to offer, I find myself now having to reconsider and re-evaluate where we go from here. For the first time we have had a taste of realising our long held dream. We have cruised continuously from mid May to the present time, never staying more than a few days in any one location. We have sampled the delights of the Macclesfield, Trent & Mersey, Staffs & Worcs, the rivers Severn and Avon, the Gloucester & Sharpness, the Stratford, Grand Union, Regents and the Thames (including the Tideway), the Oxford and Coventry Canals and we are now heading for the Shroppie. Earlier, in March we took a boat from Macclesfield down to Newbury on the K & A. All of the above demonstrated to us that we are still fit enough to achieve our dream. It has been an absolute delight and confirmed our belief that a few years continuous cruising would further enhance our experience. But now, I wonder. Am I to be "exploiting" loopholes in legislation that specifically provides for bona-fide continuous cruising? Am I to be regarded as someone who is "bucking the system" and pushing the boundaries? During all my time connected with the Inland Waterways, I have always played by the rules, paid my way and despite the many shortcomings of BW in the past and CaRT at present, I have always been appreciative of the good work that has been done. Now I feel betrayed and marginalised and seriously wonder if it is worth the hassle.
    1 point
  10. Is it really? There are a minority who actively exploit the clause. Now John isn't in that minority so to my mind that quote isn't aimed at ccers like John but at the few whom make no effort to stick within the guidelines thus exploiting the cc clause.
    1 point
  11. This post cannot be displayed because it is in a forum which requires at least 10 posts to view.
  12. It's cute how you have so much faith in the Justice system. The same justice system that refuses to prosecute crooked bankers and sends people to jail for making rude jokes on twitter. It must be nice to live in a world where you don't have to think for yourself, where everything told to you by the authorities or newspapers is correct and shouldn't be questioned. How do I get in to this fantasy land of yours where no innocent people ever get found guilty and all court judgments are fair?
    1 point
  13. Seems to me there's two completely separate issues that are getting mixed up in this. 1: Enforcement. Licencing, Boat Safety Certificate, terms & conditions of a licence (perhaps particularly, in this case, a continuous cruising licence). 2: Individual circumstances. Disablement, financial circumstances, lifestyle (someone spoke of lifestyle choice but I wonder how much choice Mr Ward really has), social policy with regard to support for homeless people, disabled people, the economic state of the country - add further factors according to choice & political/social belief. CRT have, so far, treated this as an enforcement matter. So have NBTA, I suspect - Brown has a well-publicised case currently in progress and it would assist his efforts considerably if another boater succeeded in showing that some part of the legislation CRT relies on were in any way defective. One might almost go so far as to say that Brown is using Mr Ward in the interests of his own case; although I'm sure there is a considerable degree of fellow-feeling, Brown's insistence on pursuing the case when Ward felt himself unable to continue is instructive. At the level of a purely enforcement issue, CRT's action in seeking costs makes a lot of sense. They can choose to not enforce it, in which case the debt remains and they can use that at any time in the future to exclude Mr Ward from keeping a boat on their water. (Someone with better knowledge than I would have to comment whether limitation would apply to the period the debt stands and whether this could be overcome by any means, such as occasional reminders of the outstanding debt in the form of a letter of claim and threat of action.) Measured as the cost of excluding one person of no means from the waterways, £76k is ridiculous. Measured as the cost of establishing a principle that can then be enforced against a much greater number of people at minimal cost, the economics are rather better. Measured as the cost of establishng the principle, enabling future enforcement and deterring numerous others who might otherwise require enforcement action in the more distant future it begins to look quite reasonable. That is the purely enforcement issue, the technical legal matter that a court has to decide. Individual circumstances are another matter altogether. I'm rather uncomfortable with some of the dismissive comments on Mr Ward's disablement and his receipt of benefits. Correction: in some cases I'm simply appalled! There is no sign there of human compassion and I think people who make those comments say more about themselves than ever they say about the subject of their disdain. Few, if any of us know Mr Ward or his circumstances; any who do have chosen not to comment. Rightly so; would you like the intimate details of your life spread across a forum like this to be picked over, insulted and dismissed by some of the less empathic commentators - or indeed to elicit a rather unempathic 'poor man' sympathy from the more empathic? I know I wouldn't. But individual circumstances may reflect social and political issues. Thirty years ago, homelessness was rife in this country and the centre for homeless people in the crypt of my church fed and cared for over 300 people a night. Which meant we heard some of their stories. Truly, 'there but for the grace of God...' Don't think it couldn't happen to you - it could, and if it does it could happen so quickly you don't have time to recognise it and make any effective response. I thank my God that, starting in the later 1990s, serious money was put in to helping homeless people off the street (even if some had been so affected by the experience that living in a house had become impossible for them). More recently, recession and austerity have led to homelessness becoming a feature once more. (It'll be a long time before I forget the cardboard shelter in the doorway of a closed shop in my local high street that was somebody's Christmas 'home'; truly no room at the inn!) The lack of official compassion has been very notable (the nadir was probably the police action in Ilford a few months ago, an example of official heartlessness that will take a lot of beating). Disablement remains a hot topic. Only last night the TV news reported that, a year after the Paralympics, attitudes to disabled people remain somewhere between bad and appalling. That is exacerbated no end by the narratives - largely in certain sections of the press - that equated disabled people living on benefits with 'scroungers' and cast them as an improper burden on society. Just remember that many of our triumphant Paralympians are among those people who need benefits in order to survive, let alone achieve those potentials! Official attitudes are scarcely better; the controversies around disability tests to qualify for benefits have been well reported and the problem has not gone away just because it has ceased to be flavour of the month. Lifestyle might seem a different matter. But I wonder. Officialdom is slowly limiting possibilities for people, creating a society of bland uniformity in which only wealth creation by identikit docile workers is regarded as a truly acceptable occupation. A good number of the refuseniks congregate here, one of the things that makes this forum worthwhile (IMHO anyway). But many alternative lifestyles can be lived rather more cheaply than more conventional ones. Someone mentioned the cost of Mr Ward's choice of lifestyle. In my neighbourhood a house costs in excess of £1000 per calendar month to rent, a room in a shared house something like £500pcm. Is 'the cost of Mr Ward's chosen lifestyle' really greater than the cost of living on the land? Or is he, rather, saving the taxpayer money by choosing to live on the water - and preserving a degree of individuality in the process? It seems to me that there does need to be room for official compassion in individual cases. It would be to CRT's advantage, in my view, if they now adopted a policy of engaging with people who are currently living on the waterways in a non-compliant way, but making it clear that 'new entrants' will not be tolerated. The judgement against Mr Ward could be a useful tool in that, provided it is not enforced willy-nilly or heavy-handedly and provided they now seek to negotiate a reasonable solution. It also seems worth mentioning that Mr Ward, being disabled, not working and in receipt of benefits, is in a rather different position to that of the person (was it Mr Brown?) who sought to move his boat up and down 10 miles of the K&A so he could remain in the locality without having to pay the cost of a mooring even though he was working. I wonder if that might have influenced Mr Brown's willingness to be a McKenzie to Mr Ward - perhaps hoping that a compassionate judge would make a chink in CRT's legal armour?
    1 point
  14. There are some appallingly ignorant people on this site who should go back to their football phone ins. Some show some signs of awakening to what's going on which has been staring them in the face for years. However the brief awakening of a week ago was soon quelled by the appearance of Sally Ash and you were falling over yourselves to return to grovelling as usual. None of you, the 'regulars' have got a clue yet you set yourselves up as the 'voice of the waterways'. You have allowed these usurpers to destroy the waterways and the idea of a 'way of life' on the waterways and you are now getting what you deserve.
    1 point
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