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It seams to be about continuous cruisers that don't want to move as they have children in schools in the area and are using this as an excuse not to move and abide by the regulations. If they can't abide by the continuous cruising regulations then maybe it's time they stopped living the false dream and get a house, get off the canals and stop spoiling it for genuine continuous cruisers. It will be interesting to listen to and see if this is the case. Just listened to the start, they obviously can't go too far as her kids are at school and husband works in Bath. So they are not going to continuous cruise too far, so maybe they should just get off the canals, get a house and stop living the false dream.

Indeed I do - its come along way since I coded version 1.0 back in the early 1980s Don't forget that if data is missing then you can add it. There's long term plans to introduce "Pinch Points" but like enhanced POI (which I'm currently working on) its something that will need good data to make it work

Sounds like the same story that was running on the BBC website last week Clearly got their act together in terms of a media offensive, but doesn't change the fact that when push comes to shove they can't have what doesn't exist. They can no more have a right to moor exactly where they want to moor when there are no moorings that are in their price range than a right to buy a house at the price they want in the same place.

Not a lot, it was a woman asking CaRT to explain how far she has to move if a continuous cruiser as she found it hard to move as she had 2 kids at school and a husband that drove to Bath each day to work and anything over 10 miles would be too difficult to get the kids to school, they could not get a mooring as there are none on the K&A and non that would take kids, than again she was only looking on the CaRT site and obviously not a private residential mooring. Maybe she needs to have a rethink and get a house

Where do yo you think C&RT have got it wrong legally? To me C&RT is no more a Landlord, than a farmer who has "travellers" pitch up on his field and refuse to move. The argument about C&RT's approach is quite simple, as a boater, when you first took to the water, by doing so, you agreed to be bound by certain Statute Laws, Waterways Bylaws, and Terms and conditions. Now if you didn't do your homework first, to find out what these entail, you have 2 choices, conform, or move to a place where you are comfortable.(on or off water) If you think laws are being broken or not applied correctly you can ask the Courts to make a judgement. Which in this case would be a very good idea, but would if done, have a great effect, far and wide over the system. Bod

I find all this a little tiring. If you NEED to be in the vicinity of any town or city due to work or schooling can you really in all honesty be a Continual Cruiser? I think not. Full Stop.

The repeated pushing of the '' it's my home '' angle is starting to grate with me. This has no bearing whatsoever on anyone's failure to '' satisfy the board '' and is not a problem to lay at CaRT's door. If you have chosen to live on a boat ( like we have ), then that's your choice. If you choose to have children, fine. If you choose to also continuously cruise, that's fine too, provided that you actually want to cruise. It won't be easy, bearing in mind getting to work and getting the children to school from distant locations but it is possible,it just depends on how eager you are to cruise and how much you want children. If that sounds too much like hard work, then it's not for you. I don't want a definitive answer to '' how far is far enough '' thank you, so please stop asking the stupid question. Keith

We all agree there's a problem but everyone just goes round and round pointing the finger at CRT or those who don't abide by the rules. Nobody ever seems to find a reasonable solution acceptable to all. CRT as a navigation authority think the problem can be solved by enforcement. It probably can but is going to be messy and painful. They can't say what distance is required to stay within the term bona fide navigation because the act doesn't allow for that. They can and have said what distance in a year would satisfy them and it's not very much. Boaters who cannot meet that target are IMO asking for trouble. To be honest I don't see a bright future in campaigning for something which is not going to happen. On the other hand if all that effort was put into lobbying for local authority provision (and planning consent) I believe there would be the possibility of a better outcome for all. Having said that I'm still unsure how acceptable such an outcome would be to those in conflict with CRT.

I think I kind of agree but... CRT are not a housing association nor a welfare rights organisation. They are a navigation authority trying to administer the system albeit handicapped by some weak and ambiguous legislation so perhaps making up a few rules themselves. When the acts were passed a continuous cruising license was just that, intended for those who wished to continuously cruise the system 'bona fide'. Move on a few years and the cost and availability of housing complicates things. Boaters who wish to stay in a particular area because of work and school commitments are not intending to continuously cruise in the spirit of the act. They are not really boaters as such but rather 'boat dwellers' and are not really continuously cruising bona fide, merely moving as little as possible hoping to stay out of enforcement. The same boaters in the same area with a residential mooring would not come into enforcement at all. So it's the lack of acceptable residential (home) mooring that is the real issue. Maybe it's the local authorities who need to address 'boat dwellers' needs. Similar to the way the needs of travellers are managed. Should the council be obliged to make suitable provision by creating more moorings or marinas especially to address this obvious need. Would those 'boat dwellers' who currently seem to be on a collision course with CRT find that acceptable or do they simply wish pay as little as possible and continuously whinge about CRT doing what they are supposed to do?

I am out of the country and had a reminder from CART to renew boat licence. Phoned the number given and sat for well over 20 minutes waiting for somebody to answer, running up a costly overseas phone call. I tried again, but still waited and waited, finally giving up! Went on line and could not licence after filling all the info required as wanted my bank branch sort number. Don't know this as no bank paper work with me. Then had to phone the bank. Tried again on line to pay licence and this time it said my debit card number was wrong. I use it every day and it definitely is not wrong! Yes I understand that CART need boat licenses paid, but they should make it easy to pay that licence, especially by answering that phone quickly. They are efficient and quick in telling me that my licence is overdue both by email and phone, also with the threat of a £150 fine for late payment. So now have yet again gone on line and again filled in all the details, they are now quibbling about something else, but you can't speak to anybody, so don't know if the boat is licensed or not. If anybody from CART reads this. The boat name is Kyle and my email address is (... Available by pm ...) They gave me a code number of DC26C4. The money is there, all I ask is for them is to take the money and licence the bloody thing. Roger

In years gone by I would have liked to have lived in places that I couldn't afford. So I didn't. If people living on boats want to live in the Bath area or London or any other area for that matter and can't find a residential mooring because there aren't any, or they can't afford a residential mooring, then the truth is that maybe a reassessment of their life style needs to be carried out. There are already moorings throughout the system where boats can be accommodated, why spend an enormous amount of money on widening canals to satisfy the few people who can't get their heads around what continual cruising really means. Martyn. Continual Leisure Cruiser. Do you need a permanant mooring in,say, Reading, Newbury, Banbury? You are not tied to any place in particular. Martyn

Its always been the same, living on your boat is a grey area, we did it for years and just kept our heads down and moved a bit or had a towpath mooring and quietly lived on. Thing is that that was 35 years ago and the world was a lot different, having a boat meant that you felt an affinity to the world of the industrial/boaty thing. Nowadays there is an undeniable housing crisis, earning £20k is a very good wage for many and it won't buy conventional housing. Anybody with half a brain can see that a boat is a good home and there are lots of affordable ones. There is no way I will condemn anybody for making a home for themselves with what money they've got. Perhaps CRT could widen bits of canals where they own both banks for moorings and instead of the undefinable CC licence return to the old cruising licence and an 11 month / semi residential mooring on the wide bits. The 'problem' isn't going away so maybe CRT should grow up and find ways to accomodate boat dwellers. More revenue, rules that it is possible to comply with, how could anybody possibly complain?

Agreed... 1) If you need to be near where you work and where your kids go to school, you almost certainly cannot be a continuous cruiser. The lady in question said that 10 miles would be too far to cycle, but she could use the car on the occasions they were moored near Bath because that's where her other half works. 10 miles wont be a large enough radius to be a continuous cruiser. 2) If you need a definition of how far you need to cruise to be a continuous cruiser, you almost certainly cant be a continuous cruiser.

Only if they were moaning and groaning all the time and going onto national radio pleading that CRT were making life difficult for them.

no but some folk do so they know they are doing it correct, how do you know how far you have to move? you may not be going by the laws as loads of other CC`ers, nothing wrong with wanting to know how to stick to rules, CRT should give a an area as Dyertribe says or a distance, Easy things in life are such a ball ache at times, why make it so hard.

I don't think anyone's protesting the existence of the rules, but it's the variable interpretation and the changing requirements which people are upset about. In the film (and online elsewhere), people were pointing out that what was fine last year and the n years previous to that, is now not fine and for some it's retrospectively not fine. You hear of people who hear nothing from EOs and suddenly they're given six weeks' notice to quit the canal. That's not ok. The term continuous cruiser was recently coined by CRT and in the legislation I understand it doesn't occur- what's used is boat without a home mooring. That's quite different. It's also problematic that CRT are only authorised to issue guidance, not to enforce it in the way they are doing, nor to sanction people by confiscating their home and only asset, yet they are using powers originally designed for the removal of sunken boats, to remove boats which are lived aboard. That's not ok either. Lastly, as I said above, I really don't understand what they are hoping to achieve by these actions. What's the long-term goal? Because to the cynical eye, it looks remarkably like an attempt to gentrify the canal, to make it accessible only to those with the spare cash to run a boat without living on it.

Most boaters ringing in had little sympathy to be honest, I am in the same camp, I have mooring because I need one, because of commitments in the area, when those commitments are gone so will I be gone

Sorry. I'll report myself to the mods...

No need to be sensible about this!

When you choose to live to your life a certain way, you have to accept the problems that come with it if you choose not to play the game. Not got much sympathy for them, really.

I've had media friends contact me about doing something on this. I told them straight that this is a very specific issue confined to one or two specific places. They soon realised that this wasn't the story it's made out to be.

Well, the enforcement team care because that's what they are paid to do. So yes, it does matter to them, because if they just shrug they'll all be out of a job. Only people bothered are, as you say, other boaters, mostly the ones trying to behave in a social manner. But, in fact, all of them, including the ones who are overstaying because they may want to go and overstay somewhere else but they can't because of all the overstaying boats already overstaying there. As someone has already pointed out, there are already lots, in fact miles, of 14 day moorings on the canal - it's called the towpath. And these are already free. Hoorah - problem solved!

Impeller shower drain pumps need a very good filter before them. My very own invention, the green Scotch scouring pad stuck over the plug hole will halt the passage of pubic hair and everything.

Well for my point of view, & please consider this is based on my limited experience of cruising and mooring through London last year going through in early May and then again in mid June in our WB. We didn't struggle at all finding places to moor, didn't encounter a wait at all in May for the water point and had to wait about 20 minutes for the water point to be free in June. It wasn't at all what I had expected after reading all the negative comments on here and FB about how congested London was. I was expecting to see miles on end of moored boats; all of them double & triple moored. Don't get me wrong there were quite a few double moored, but only a couple of spots where they were triple moored. I was quite surprized by the size of the crowds gathered at Camden Market/Locks watching us go through. Maybe we were just very lucky, but we found it much harder to find decent moorings on the K&A in certain areas than going through London...again that's based on my limited experience

I don't envisage ever taking our boat to London, but this looks like good news for those who do want to.

Force 7, beer froth blows off.

There is a shed load of history here, maybe you should investigate some of it. As part of trying to"solve" the K&A Western End issue CaRT did even investigate building a marina, but most of the boaters rejected that because they wanted to continue to moor on line for free. A roving mooring permit also came very close to happening, but some of the boaters (NBTA?) pointed out that it was probably illegal for CaRT to offer something to a group of "deserving" boaters without offering it to everybody, and also why pay for something that you hope to continue getting for free? I am not biassed here, I love the Western End people and unique lifestyle, but there is no easy solution and blaming CaRT only makes things worse. CaRT are ultimately a navigation authority and a large number of leisure boaters are avid Daily Mail readers who don't want their licence money spent supporting "hippy liveaboards". CaRT has to please them too, they are probably the majority In light of the current enforcement, and with hindsight, maybe working with CaRT to find a constructive way forward might have been the best approach (though not easy) but things are now so polarised that moment might have passed .................Dave

Does the enforcement team really care? Does it really matter to them if you overstay your time limit. The only people bothered are incoming boaters looking for a place to moor - and maybe the local suppliers who might lose business because passing boats have nowhere to stop. The problem won't be solved until CRT provide more places for temporary moorings with an additional mooring permit that CC's buy in advance for the 'free' use of long stay temporary moorings provided by CRT throughout the network - a season ticket you could say. This can't happen without CRT revising the whole pricing structure. .

It isn't a sideline, you claim that councils are responsible and yet they do nothing whatsoever to carry out these responsibilities as it is all done by the voluntary sector. CRT does not have anything like the same responsibilities (again if I'm mistaken, help me out with the relevant legislation) so why would you expect them to take on responsibilities that aren't their's? They may be a charity but then so is Eton School and I don't see them housing the homeless either .

I agree with most of what you've said- as for this, we can't know because nobody seems to be even trying to find out. I think the housing issue is crucial- it's affecting me- and however much CRT might wish to ignore it, it affects them too. However, I'm not sure I agree that CRT are only "doing what they are supposed to do", I think they're taking it on themselves to go beyond that and it's not hard to see how it might be argued that what they're doing is a form of social cleansing or forced gentrification. Thing is, all these issues are connected and none are beside the point. In my own case, there's space in a marina near enough to work and my daughter's school that we can commute. However, it's not residential. So I'll be up and down the canal too, and visiting friends and family, and fortunately for me my parents will take my post and they also live nearby. I work, I am a single mum, and if I took a flat in the area I'd spend more than I earn each month on rent, even before a single bill is paid. Yes, tax credits help, but (a) I can't trust them to be there next year, and (b ) if your entire income is spoken for on rent and bills, you're asking for trouble. The moment you get a puncture or the car fails its MOT, you're in debt. IF you can get a loan. I'm a graduate, a professional, but the reality of the situation is that I cannot earn enough, and also meet my daughter's needs, to keep us in a house without going catastrophically into debt- or cutting back to the bone, feeding my daughter and not myself sort of style. We already clothe ourselves from charity shops and sales, we don't live extravagantly. So I do sympathise with those people who don't have the option of a permanent mooring. I do think there need to be more available moorings. Boat dwelling is less impactful on the environment, it's a person or family not on a waiting list for a council property and not paying housing benefit into the pockets of a private landlord. It's a socially responsible solution, rather than living on credit and handouts, and I think where people have made their own solutions to the problems they've faced they should be applauded rather than condemned and their worldly goods taken away (and then sent a bill for the privilege). I have yet to see an argument to persuade me to the approach CRT have adopted- I was swaying towards the boaters before I watched the film, just from reading on here, and now I have watched it and heard the CRT guy saying his piece, I totally think they've got it wrong, both legally and morally.

Well, I was a landlord, briefly, and I think I was a decent one. For me it's a moral issue. And saying that everyone else is immoral or doing the wrong thing doesn't lead automatically to saying that it's ok to do that and should be encouraged. That's just not an argument. The Highways Agency doesn't have many rough sleepers because they're responsible for major routes like motorways. Local councils who are responsible for local streets and areas where people sleep rough are responsible for those people, which is why council-run homeless shelters (and anti-homeless spikes) exist. I don't see what CRT's actual goal is. People who are staying in an area because they are working there are not a burden on society, are members of a community, are putting money into the economy. Why can't there be some sort of compromise, like someone suggested earlier to have (eg) people who are in one area for school doing their year's worth of cruising in the holidays? Or semi-permanent moorings which are accessible to ordinary people- the same person I think suggested 12 years' mooring (school career) which ended when the child left school.

So you sit on a prime mooring and its the same as being in the middle of nowhere? Don't be daft. This is a much edited post as the original seven drafts would have been moderated out of existence...

Sorry if it's been mentioned but have CRT noticed that Tadworth is a historic vessel? I have not been in the back cabin and I know she doesn't have the original engine but she is substantially intact which is rare. "Keeping people history and nature connected" Would it be better if this boat was scrapped? Surely not.

I don't accept that CRT are a landlord any more than the Highways Authority are a landlord for rough sleepers and people who live in their cars. You do however seem to be living in a former era . Can you direct me to any bricks and mortar landlords who have any moral responsibility at all for their tenants? You want to complain about a broken boiler/damp/leaking roof/mould? You'll soon be looking for somewhere else to live. These days you get a 6 month tenancy and if, after that time the landlord can find someone who will pay more for your place with less hassle you are pretty much out on your ear. This is what the population seem to want (otherwise there would be riots and revolution) so that is what they have got, why do you think CRT should be all pink and fluffy when the rest of Society isn't?

1. Buy a bargepole. 2. Don't touch this boat with it.

There is a school of thought that says 'If you want a particular supermarket to take a greater interest in what happens to their shopping trollies then next time you recover a trolly from the canal then you should return it to the customer service desk inside the supermarket' It's amazing how the presence of a stinking mud encased trolly inside their store excites both the store management and the environmental health executive.

Other than Ma Pardoes what places do you recommend for grub and overnight on the BCN? Given that Team Cat who are our bunk for the night have not yet decided their route, we get to influence them as we plan our walk. They will chug all day, we will walk all day, and we aim to meet somewhere for the night which is under 5 hours walk from the finish line. We do NOT plan to walk for 24 hours, I want to stress. We are being Catlike. But will aim to walk for about 10-12 hours total, and include some former canals wot are no longer on the official route. But to do this we need pub grub at strategic points!

It has been proven (in the past) that whilst lock keepers (at least on the Trent) 'take down' your boat name, registration number and date of expiry of your licence, no use is made of this information and their note-books are not linked in any way to the enforcement / monitoring system. There was a thread sometime ago about a boater (who started the thread) who was 'under enforcement' for non-movement, having travelled 'hundreds' of miles up the Trent and Witham and then back down the Trent. There was no record of his movements. One of the Lockies who was a forum member said he would provide him with evidence / support his case to prove that he had in fact passed his lock on a number of occasions during the period in question. I would have no idea where to find an EO - I have not (knowingly) ever seen one, the only C&RT representatives I have had any dealings with in 100s of miles per year that I cruise have been volunteer lockies and bankside volunteers trying to make me be a 'friend'. I am sure if I went into the Red-Bull offices (for example) and asked them to come out whilst I photographed them next to my boat, or asked them to write me a letter saying they had witnessed me (and the boat) outside their offices I would get short-shrift.

Seems to be two main problems: People mooring in the same spot or small area for the entire year, clearly not CCing. People frequently returning to the same popular VMs thereby denying others the chance to use them. IF CRT can just enforce both of these I think most would find that acceptable. (OK unlicenced boats and overstaying at the same VM is clearly outside of the rules)

Bak in the 70's or was it early 80's a bunch of "me, me,me" types instead of living under the radar in their vehicles decided to go on a random rampage, taking any objection as further excuse to up the stakes. At the heart were a bunch known as the convoy crazies, they had numbered tatoos on there bums. There were maybe 20 of them, the rest were well meaning human shields. Thanks to them living in a vehicle got a lot more difficult. I knew a few of the crazies personally, fighting "authority'for it's own sake was the name of the game, a disappointing lack of cunning. I lived a more outrageous life without making a fuss about it. I think mtb has a good point. Why do people have to push when it's not needed, it's pure selfishness.

Thank you. I certainly wish the NBTA would STFU and all the CMers would toe the line and move around acceptably. That way, people will be able to continue living on boats under the radar virtually indefinitely. But sadly the "I know my rights" brigade in that film are going the feck it up for everyone, I fear.

I have met some proper idiots on the Llangollen. The majority of them were on hireboats. Therefore most hireboaters are idiots. Except of course they aren't. The majority of boats moving on the Llangollen in Summer are hire boats, therefore the boats you are going to meet are hirers. A proportion of these are first timers and most of them meet their first lock at New Marton. So at New Marton you have a stressful busy section of canal, with a number of inexperienced boaters. The idiot count therefore seems quite high, but in reality it's just busy and sometimes a bit slower than it might be. The real idiots are a very small proportion - all the cliches - the drunks, the speeders, the arrogant tosspots, and because of the sample at New Marton being mostly hirers, it would appear that the population of hireboaters has a high proportion of buffoons. So lets look at a different set of locks - Hurleston has a number of hire boats, but because of the big marina at the top, and the logistics of a weeks holiday, the sample of boats here is usually much more diverse. The proportion of idiots is probably the same, but the number of hiring idiots is smaller. tl;dr There are idiots on boats. How many of them are hirers is a matter of perception, based on location, time of the year, day of the week, time of day even. Oh, and personal prejudice.