Arthur Marshall

It's not a complaint, just a statement of fact. Means testing is expensive and rarely justified economically - same as the pensioners winter heating payments. In the light of this perfectly legal scam, there's no reason really why all boaters registered as continuous cruisers shouldn't have got the grant. Yes, genuine liveaboards are outnumbered by dumpers, and the latter will get it twice, but the logic is no different from that of second home owners getting the payment, and the numbers are probably considerably less. Maybe the NBTA ought to team up with CRT to provide the details.

No, because your lucky household with two houses gets an extra grant. Or three. The made up twaddle is trying desperately to pretend extra grants aren't going to those who don't need it. I believe "thought" is not an action you have employed, sadly.

The grants were supposed to be one per household. They wound up as being one per house, presumably because it was easier to waste money on rich people rather than making sure people who really needed it got it. I'm sure their policy will be popular in certain circles.

Doesn't each house connected to the electricity system get the payment? That was certainly the impression given in the news. So owners with a holiday home get the grant for both, even though they only use one house at a time. You don't have to apply, it's given automatically by the power companies. "The government’s Energy Bills Support Scheme will see every household in the UK receive at least £400 to help them pay their bills, regardless of wealth or income, meaning second home owners will receive the grant for every property they own." Fancy you not knowing that.

You're probably right, in that the govt aren't going to bother much about such a small number of people, most of whom, if they are able to vote at all, aren't going to vote for them. Factor in the almost infinite capacity for fraud in any system they come up with, plus the ignorance of any boffins working on it of the itinerant lifestyle, and they just won't try. I'm surprised the gypsy council, or whatever it's called now, hasn't got stuck in though. Without the fuss the NBTA have made, though, they wouldn't even have pretended to look for a solution.

Yes, I know the link says one claim only. But how can you police that? Two or more people living on a boat each claim. Why not? There's no workable ID. They can't check against people who have already had it, because they don't know who has as it was paid via a reduction in bills, not to individuals. Anyone with a boat could claim. Or who says they've got one. Presumably the government wonks have been working on this for months and obviously haven't yet found a solution that limits it to one liveaboard per boat. Bearing in mind they'll know nothing about the difference between boaters I'll be surprised if they invent anything rational. They've struggled to find a solution for static parks and aren't even sure that will work. It's an open gate for fraud and while the government appears to have no problem with that at cabinet level, it doesn't like it lower down the food chain! The idea that you claim, get rejected and then claim for the councils emergency fund is, I suspect, a nonstarter. The council, if it has any money left in the fund, which even the NBTA admit is unlikely, will want to give it to their residents, not noncontributing itinerants, or as has been pointed out, technically illegal leisure mooring or marina dwellers who they will regard as CT dodgers. Most councils can't even afford to fulfill their legal obligations, let alone hand out money to those for whom they have no responsibility.

Which are the ones that are going to give the council a headache, as someone has to decide which council pays the money out, and how to stop someone claiming a dollop of cash from every council they pass through. Anyone who stays in a marina on a leisure mooring should at least have a c\o address to quote. The marina will deny that the boater is resident but is in fact itinerant so that should knock council tax on the head. Alternatively, everything's going to get terribly bureaucratic.

Normal. Takes me a few days on the boat before the world wobbles when I step on dry land, and that fades after a day ir so. Doesn't seem to happen as much as it used to so maybe my brain is getting used to the contrast. And the boat is always moving a little, and sometimes your brain thinks it's going along rather than just rocking a bit. It adjusts after a bit.

On the 17th of January, in response to a Shropshire MP "Mr Shapps said: “A lot of members will have park homes in their constituency, including my own, and the issue there has been more complex to get the money to them. She'll be pleased to hear that the pilot schemes actually launched yesterday to get that money out to them. It will be a process through the local authority and we're making sure it's expedited as much as possible". So something's been launched, somewhere, for someone but no details appear to be available anywhere. Still doesn't look like anything for boaters.

It's not just the usual inflation that makes it a cost of living crisis for some. Inflation as measured is about 10% and falling, but food inflation is about 17% and constant, rents have rocketed and power bills have tripled, though they are falling and may just end up double. It's no crisis at all if you've got a good salary or pension or own your house. If you're stuck on minimum wage and renting, it's a crisis. It rather depends on one's point of view, and whether you consider other people to be worth bothering about.

It's all a bit "Yes Minister". The bloke at the top says something will be done and ultimately after a month or three it rolls down to a lowly civil servant somewhere to work out how to do it. Then everyone picks holes in their method for another month or two and then it works its way back up the chain. By this time the bloke at the top has got more important things to think about (like the local elections and millions of people not being allowed to vote and concurrent bad publicity), the councils are screaming they can't afford to do it and the weather's warmer anyway, the price of gas has come down, they're still alive, aren't they, and there aren't enough of them to make much of a fuss so he shoves it to the bottom of the agenda, decides it can't be done and that itinerants have made their choice of lifestyle so tough. I wouldn't hold your breath.

Good grief. I hope no-one tells my farmer, he hasn't put the price up in living memory. There again, there are no facilities and we can't live on.

I have long suspected that most restoration schemes are a bit like monetary value - only existing for as long as someone believes in it. People get lottery or goverment funding for doing studies, planners get paid, money gets shelled out for bits of work round it, someone's doing a PhD, community service gets involved, in the old days the EU provided regeneration grants - lots of people make some money and get a bit of work out of projects which have no real prospect of happening. As soon as someone somewhere realises the money would be better spent elsewhere, usually for the latest popular fad where they'd get a bit of better publicity, the tap gets turned off. Especially, as you say, these days, when if these did ever happen the rest of the system would be in no fit state for there to be any point.

Ah, but it's what people want, so while they have their engine or genny running all day and until they turn both their TVs at 11pm, they can enjoy the peace and quiet of boat life, surrounded by all the others who are doing the same... I distinctly remember hearing a bird sing once, when I was moored up.

As mine now has four sides and three bottoms, I'm not sure how many boats it is. Used to have a dinghy and an inflatable thing.