PhilAtterley

If CRT's figures of around 35,000 boats on their waters are correct, then one must conclude from your figures that throughout the whole country there are a mere 35 or so boatowners who are concerned that the Trust is contemptuous of Parliament and the laws it has made on our behalf. Do you think that is in the slightest bit credible ?

I have never understood the need for these so-called 'riser wires', especially in a lock of the size that Kegworth Deep is. As a young boy I remember many passages through the original old Loughborough Navigation built lock at Kegworth with my father's 1920's converted lifeboat. Although there was around a foot less fall in those days it was nonetheless a comparatively deep lock but was equipped only with the usual wooden strapping stumps - one either side at the top end and two either side by the bottom gates. I cannot remember any difficulties ever arising due to the lack of any 'riser wires' at this lock, and nor were there ever any problems when passing through the 4 x boat Trent locks, none of which back then were equipped with these vertical wires either. Standard practice in those days, for both commercials (tug + 2 x boat tows - all the older 81' 6'' Trent size tugs had been lengthened to around 110' by then, and the new ones were built at up to around 120') and pleasure craft was either a hook-rope on a ladder rung or a stop-rope up onto a bollard on top of the lockside.

Having just done a laptop repair and swap with TD, I am in Nottingham with him at the moment and have passed on your query to him. He says that the application, and payment, for AW's PBC was all done over the phone, so there were no boxes to tick and no signature either. The conclusion I would draw from this is that CRT themselves recognize that ticking a box agreeing to abide by their T&C's and adding a signature to a form which exists only as a computer record and is in any event very definitely NOT a contract, carries no weight whatsover, and it is therefore utterly pointless to insist that it is done as a pre-requisite to issuing something that they are legally obliged to issue provided always that there is compliance with the three conditions in S.17 of the 1995 Act. I see your point to a certain extent, however, the PBC falls within the scope of the term 'relevant consent' which in CRT speak translates into 'Licence' and therefore, according to CRT, falls under the umbrella of S.43 of the 1962 Act. Furthermore, it is vitally important to note that CRT have not in fact issued a PBC to Andy Wingfield, but instead something which they print as a 'Standard River only Licence', which, according to the Invoice that accompanied it, is a 12 Month Licence to which they have applied a 40% 'River only' Discount. A genuine PBC is limited in statute to costing no more than 60% of the Licence fee, it follows therefore that they are, in reality, issuing a product of their own warped imagination, something which the law does not recognize or require, and which, therefore, they have no power or authority to issue. It is simply a rather pathetic and transparent attempt to conjure a Registration Certificate, which they are compelled under statute to issue, into what appears to be a mandatory Licence which boaters will accept at face value as something authorizing or permitting them to use the scheduled River Waterways, upon which, of course the PRN confers the unassailable right to navigate and use, irrespective and independent of any mythical powers that CRT would like boaters, and Courts/Judges, to believe they have.

Not a 'case' as such, and hence no Judgment, at least nothing post the Court Order exiling the boater from CRT's waters. The boater concerned was Andy Wingfield, who has now returned to Nottingham after spending a year on the Nene, and his PBC was applied for and obtained on his behalf by Tony Dunkley.

If, after spending some time in Newark you felt like reverting, at least partially, to your original plan, then you do have the option of a few days pottering about between, say, Cromwell and Gainsborough and so getting to know the river and it's tides. Contrary to what seems to be the commonly held belief that boating on the tidal Trent is only to be regarded as necessary evil just to get you from the non-tidal rivers and canals of the Midlands to the broad Northern canals, but is otherwise to be avoided at all costs, the Trent between Cromwell and Knaith does not have the high flood banks that hem you in further downriver, and passes through some quite pleasant countryside. If you do like the idea of spending some time on and exploring the stretch between Cromwell and Gainsborough, then the tides are getting smaller through next week with the smallest Neap expected in the early hours of next Friday (5 May) morning, so you could not have better conditions in which to do so. There are floating pontoons for pleasure craft at Dunham, Torksey and Gainsborough where you can spend the night moored safely, and these days, sadly, no commercial traffic for you to worry about.

There is no need to challenge CRT about issuing a 'relevant consent' absent acceptance of their bogus contract and agreeing to non-statutory, add-on T&C's unilaterally imposed by CRT themselves. If the applicant for a Licence or Pleasure Boat Certificate demonstrates that they are sufficiently resolute in their refusal to accept any of CRT's nonsense, then they they will cave-in and issue your Licence/PBC. In fact, they have just recently issued a PBC to a boater who not only did not agree to the T&C's, but also against whom they had obtained one of their Section 8 Injunctions excluding him from their waterways. The single most important factor in successfully resisting and opposing CRT's threats and bluster is never to lose sight of the fact that they themselves know full well that they are exceeding their powers and are simply 'trying it on' to see just what they can get away with. The last thing they actually want to do is to risk exposing their feeble arguments to too much open scrutiny.

But it does NOT have to be, even for a first-timer. The now generally accepted method of timing the downriver arrival at Keadby to be well after half (local) Ebb with the tide running swiftly down past the lock and barely sufficient water left in the river to float even a shallow draughted pleasure boat over the 5' - 6' high mudbank that permanently adorns the lock tail these days, makes no sense whatsoever. There is a much better alternative available to everyone - see my previous post !

There is an old thread on this Forum titled, I think, something like - " The tidal Trent - why not do it the easy way ?". It was started by a lifelong friend and acquaintance of mine, Tony Dunkley, who has well over half a Century of boating on the Trent to his name, mostly on commercial vessels from tugs and hoppers to barges of up to around 500 ton cargo capacity, but with a goodly helping of pleasure/holiday boating thrown in too. There were several attempts to sabotage the thread by one or two members, but if you ignore all the nonsense they posted you will find some very good advice on how to plan a downriver passage to Keadby, arriving there at around local High Water with negligible or no tide running and very little difference in water levels between the canal and the river. I visit Tony D quite frequently, and I am down in Nottingham now, taking him his laptop back after repair. If you have any questions you would like to ask him, there are several options open to you. You could post them on here, and I will relay the answers, you can contact Tony on the 'Thunderboat' Forum, you can e-mail him at, > tony@canalrivertransport.com <, or you can phone him on 07553 294325. He will be glad to help you in any way he can.

Your estimate of 5 minutes saved by turning the lock round without penning a boat could be a little on the conservative side - 10 minutes might be nearer the mark in 'the real world', but the issue is not the actual time lost at Keadby, it is the time lost as a proportion of the already short period during which the Flood runs up - as opposed to merely causing a rise in water levels - especially on tides closest to the smallest Neaps, such as would have been occurring at the time. However many minutes of Flood are lost at Keadby can translate into boats coming under Ebb many times more than that number of minutes sooner than they would have done, after having traveled a number of miles upriver, but still far short of their destination. I cannot agree with your view that today's so-called narrowboats cope well when having to overcome any sort of river current or tide, but in any case, any boat underway at the sort of speeds we are talking about here will have its speed (over the ground) reduced when stemming the Ebb to around something like between a half and a third of what it was making when being pushed along by the Flood. Neither can I agree that - "Getting a boat off the river, especially at Keadby should always take priority" - especially in the conditions which there would have been on the day in question, namely negligible current/tide, and no shipping on the move. The lock keeper's explanation of his actions was unarguably a poor one, but he might have felt that a better and more comprehensive explanation, such as above, delivered by way of shouting it down to you over the bottom gates was neither practical nor achievable. Given sufficient time, a willing listener, and of course assuming that he knew himself, he might even have gone to the trouble of explaining how boats traveling upriver to Torksey or Cromwell and coming under Ebb when still well short of Torksey face the hazard of grounding early on what could be a 9 to 10 ebb at places such Marton Rack where a boat grounding on the hard steep-to edges of the very narrow deep channel not only has, at best, a very long wait for the next tide to float them off, but could also be at risk of either rolling over as the tide falls or flooding as the next tide floats them off. As you rightly say, boating knowledge is a 'must' for lock keepers - perhaps even more so than for those aboard the boats who use their locks!

I am in complete agreement with your assessment of the part time, Summer only, apologies for lock keepers who are left in charge on the Trent locks nowadays, but in defence of whoever it was on duty at Keadby on the day you mention I would ask you to consider if he might have had good reason to believe that getting the upriver bound boats on their way with the absolute minimum of delay, even down to a matter the saving of just a few minutes by turning the lock round on you, took priority over penning you up, which would inevitably add some time to the process. If flood at Keadby was at around 0900hrs then Hull HW would be around sometime shortly after 1100 hrs, and therefore the tides would be only a day or two away from the smallest Neaps. The lock keeper may have been anxious to get the upriver bound boats away as soon as possible on what might have been a poorish Flood in order that they would be as far on upriver as possible before they ran out of 'push' from that tide, and came under Ebb a long way from their destinations.

An old and much respected friend, at least, respected by those with the good sense to recognize and value the worth of a lifetimes experience which includes well over half a century of boating on the Trent both commercially and for pleasure, says that the best time for any boat to leave Cromwell bound for Torksey is immediately after the bottom gates of Cromwell lock are opened for it. In other words, whenever you like and whenever it suits you, simply because the small tidal range that far upriver and the floating pontoons that have been put in Torksey Cut mean that this 16 mile jaunt is a doddle with a guaranteed safe mooring at the destination where you can stay afloat at any state of the tide. He does add the proviso, however, that anyone who does not know the river sufficiently well to be sure of not grounding en route should aim to leave Cromwell at a time which they estimate will see them at Torksey at or about the time of predicted Low Water (ie. Flood) at Torksey. That will prevent any possibility of too long a wait for the next tide if they do happen to ground at any of the most likely spots on the way, ie. Fledborough (Scotchman's) Shoal, Dunham Rack, and Laneham Pinfold or Maltkilns.

Claiming that CRT are not empowered to set conditions on the USAGE of the waterways for which they are the Navigation Authority is unquestionably wrong, but I am not aware of any such claims by those to whom I believe you are referring. What CRT do not have powers to condition is the ISSUING of boat Licences, Pleasure Boat Certificates and Houseboat Certificates over and above the three specific conditions laid down in Section 17 of the 1995 Act, which, when met, preclude either refusal or revocation of a 'relevant consent'. The inclusion of, and the reference to, 'contracts' in the context of this matter is an irrelevancy. Contracts are undoubtedly 'enforceable', always provided of course that they pass the fairness tests, but any form of 'relevant consent' that an Authority is statutorily obliged to issue is NOT, and can never be, a 'contract'.

In fact, the words 'continuous' and 'constant' are NOT used with reference to navigation, 'bona fide' or any other sort for that matter, anywhere in the wording of the 1995 BW Act - so the 'inventors' on this Forum may well outnumber the CRT personnel who are paid to 'invent' all the untruths and nonsense about all the powers that, in reality, CRT do not have.

It should be noted that CRT have been in denial with regard to the contents and ramifications of this Judgment since it was handed down by HHJ Halbert on 22 November 2013, and have consistently refused to either publish it or acknowledge it's existence.

The way in which BW and CRT's totally illogical claims for the all encompassing powers derived from Section 43 of the 1962 Act are so constantly perpetuated, and believed, is another excellent example of what can be achieved via the simple expedient of the constant, sustained repetition of a lie. To put an end to this argument, one needs only to consider the answer to the question - if S.43 of the 1962 Transport Act did/does in fact have the broad ranging and virtually limitless effect that BW/CRT claim for it, then why was any of the subsequent waterways legislation necessary if the powers conferred under later Acts, for example 1971, 1983 and 1995, were already at their disposal?

Here is an excellent example of how CRT utilize this fact on their website - to be found in the "Cruising whilst away from a home mooring" link on the "How we monitor boat movement" page, but not one word of it to be found anywhere in the 1995 British Waterways Act : Cruising while away from your home mooring In accordance with Condition 3.1 and 3.2 of the 2015 revised terms and conditions, if you have a home mooring, you must cruise on the waterway whilst you are away from your home mooring, stopping only for short periods (defined as 14 days or less if a local restriction applies). This requirement to cruise is the same as it's always been - it is not an amendment to the terms and conditions. What it means to “cruise” on the waterway depends upon the period of time your boat is away from its home mooring. The longer it spends away from its home mooring, the greater the range of movement expected. As an extreme, if you never returned to your home mooring for the entire period of your licence, we would expect you to cruise continuously and therefore your pattern of movement should be the same as that of a boat without a home mooring. In contrast, however, if your boat spends the majority of the time on its home mooring and only leaves to cruise for short periods of time, then the range of movement expected for each cruise will be much more limited. To explain further, every time you return to your home mooring (provided that this is not merely for a nominal period in an attempt to circumvent the rules), your cruise ends and “the clock” is effectively re-set. The next time you leave, you start on a new cruise, the extent of which will depend upon the time spent away from the home mooring. If you are away for just a weekend, that cruise will be quite short in terms of distance. On the other hand, if you are away from your home mooring for several months, we would expect to see a much greater range of movement. By way of example, it would be perfectly acceptable to leave your home mooring for weekend, cruise a short distance and moor for 48 hours (at a legitimate mooring site) and then return to your home mooring, and this pattern of movement could be repeated on several weekends throughout the year. However, shuffling between two locations close together, neither of which is your home mooring, for an extended period is not permitted as that shuffling is not "cruising

I would think that they have thought about how this will diminish the numbers able to attend -- and then concluded how very desirable that would be!

I cannot begin to understand the thinking behind these remarks, which appear to be nothing less than a defence of illegality. There is no argument that whilst "legal stuff" is of no help whatsoever to those wanting to act illegally, it can be of immeasurable assistance to anyone being taken to task despite complying with the law. As for branding the drawing of attention to legal wrongdoing as "find(ing) legal loopholes" - words fail me!

Does your gearbox have a reduction box fitted to it ? If so, a badly worn chain and sprockets could be the source of the noises. I think that some Wortham Blake (although it might have been 'Watermota' - it was a long time ago!) reverse gears were supplied with duplex or triplex chain reduction boxes instead of the more usual pinion and reduction wheel set-up. It is easy enough to establish whether it is a chain or a gear equipped box - just check the rotation of the reduction box output shaft/half coupling - if it is rotating in the same hand as the engine crankshaft in ahead gear, then you have got a chain equipped reduction gear.

I fail to see the relevance of someone's attitude, and for that matter, why CRT have any business in challenging it, especially if the person concerned has not contravened anything in either Byelaws or statute law to warrant any such sort of attention. If CRT have, as you say, been obliged to re-license his boat then that very fact suggests that he is at the very least currently fully compliant with the requirements of the licensing legislation, and calls into question the wisdom of spending vast amounts of money in trying to evict him from the waterways in the first place.

The difficulties likely to arise for anyone choosing to do as you quite rightly suggest is that since mid to late 2013 CRT have sought to foist Continuous Cruising rules on boaters with moorings. They began this campaign to unofficially amend the 1995 BW Act and bring into effect the resulting self-conferred additional powers in early 2014 when they revoked Nottingham based boater Tony Dunkley's (Rivers only) Licence, served Section 8 papers on him, and then took him to Court. After having failed miserably in this attempt they then, in late 2015, turned their attention to another Nottingham based boater, Andy Wingfield, who was doing virtually the same thing as TD had been doing, but in this instance succeeding in getting a Court Order and having AW banned from their waters. As far as I am aware, CRT are continuing with this policy of attempting to force boaters with moorings to comply with Continuous Cruising rules when away from their moorings.

A "genuine purpose for navigating" a pleasure boat could be derived from the purpose for which the boat was designed, built and purchased, could it not ? I think anyone seeking to minutely define the motives which drive any individual to own and use, or 'navigate', a pleasure boat could quite reasonably be accused of straining at a gnat. Surely, the word 'pleasure' in the description of both the boat and it's Licence is the key to this question and defines the purpose for owning and using it.

Although not binding on any other Court, the words of one of the few Judges, HHJ Halbert in CRT-v-Mayers, to see through CRT's disingenuous utterances on this subject are probably the most authoritative available to you. Canal and River Trust v Geoffrey Douglas Mayers Chester County Court 22 November 2013 In paras 7.21 to 7.22.4 of his Judgment, HHJ Halbert stated:- 7.21. It seems to me that the expression ‘navigation’ clearly means the process of undertaking any purposeful journey from one specific point to another by water. The addition of the words ‘bona fide’ import an entirely subjective element and merely mean that the journey must be undertaken for genuine purposes and not for the purpose of circumventing the legislation, when in reality the intention of the boat owner is to stay as nearly as possible in the same place. 7.22.1. It is, as I have already said several times, unnecessary for me to comment on whether the guidelines match the legislation. I do so in only two respects and with the express proviso that this does not form part of the decision. 7.22.2. I think the guideline’s interpretation of ‘in the same place’ is correct. It cannot be taken to mean ‘in exactly the same position’ because to do so would drive, perhaps not a coach and four but at least a horse drawn narrow boat through the purpose of the legislation. The requirement not to stay in the same place for more than 14 days is imposed on boats with either form of licence so if it could be satisfied by moving 50 yards the legislation would be wholly ineffective. I agree that it only makes sense if it is interpreted in a much more general sense. If a boat were moved 500 metres within the Parish of Anderton it would in my view be in the same place. If it were moved to Northwich, over 2 miles away, it would not. 7.22.3. I consider the requirement imposed by CRT that a substantial part of the network is used cannot be justified by relying solely on section 17 (3). That section requires ‘bona fide navigation throughout the period of the licence’ not ‘bona fide navigation throughout the canal network’. The requirement is temporal not geographical. In my view it does NOT follow from:- ‘Such journey or cruise must take place throughout the period of the licence’. that it ‘therefore requires progression round the network or at least a significant part of it.’ 7.22.4. If a person who lived permanently on his or her boat had specific reason for making repeated journeys over the same stretch of canal between two points sufficiently far apart to be regarded as different places, it would in my view be purposeful movement by water from one place to another and hence ‘bona fide navigation’. In the course of argument I used the example of someone who lived on his boat and was also using the vessel commercially to move coal from a mine to an iron foundry only a few miles away and then returning empty for another load.

0 Tony Dunkley Tony Dunkley Members 487 3,298 posts Gender:Male Location:United Kingdom Boat Name:Black Swan - Selby Michael - Arthur-a-Bland - Halcyon Daze Posted June 13, 2016 · Report post You should be able get down Thorne with a narrow beam x 68' boat without having to go stern first, . . I've been [downgate] through that lock with a 67' x 14' 6" BW Trent bucket dredger, on the way back to the Trent from Doncaster. There's a lot of depth over the top cill of that lock, and if the pound from Thorne to Keadby is on weir or close to, it's still got a foot or so over it with the lock drained right down. With your draught you can drain the lock down enough to be able to let the fore-end run under the walkways [on the bottom gates] and into the corner by one of the heel posts before there's any chance of the stern end catching the cill. When the lock has drained right down, open the other side bottom gate and shove the fore-end across.

An air-cooled Ruston made at around that time will be from the YBA, YDA or YWA series. The YB's were produced only as single or twin cylinder units and were rated at 6.25 bhp/cylinder at 1800 rpm. The YDA's were available as 2,3,4 or 6 cylinder units producing approximately 20bhp/cylinder at 2200 rpm at industrial ratings - slightly less at marine ratings, and at 2000 rpm - and limited to approximately 16 bhp/cylinder when governed to 1500 rpm for electrical power generation. The YDA series all used belt driven cooling fans mounted at the gear (timing case) end and were very noisy engines, with the howling from the cooling fan competing quite successfully with fairly loud and harsh combustion noise (diesel 'knock'). This model also had an unendearing reputation for the geardriven lubricating oil pump mounting lugs occasionally failing through metal fatigue, resulting in the pump ceasing to work and dropping into the sump whilst the engine was running. The YWA series was available in single, twin or 3 cylinder models only, utilized a flywheel fan for circulating cooling air, produced a maximum of 14.5 bhp/cylinder when rated at 2200 rpm, and were slightly less noisy than the YDA's. All three models required the cooling air to be ducted outside when installed in a confined and closed, or partially closed space. If you would like to talk to someone with 'hands-on' experience of maintaining and overhauling the YDA and YWA series engines I recommend you contact Tony Dunkley on 07553 294325 or at > tony@canalrivertransport.com <.