dmr

I have lived in many houses and now lived on a boat for over ten years as a continuous cruiser, this thing appears to successfully combine the disadvantages of both options. ................Dave

Its all very difficult, I quite liked the piano boat and a bit of novelty on the cut is good, but the New Islington shed was just an ugly box. I believe there is a rule, rarely if ever enforced, that boats should be appropriate to their waterway, but who would be the arbiter of this? ..................Dave

Have you totally eliminated the obvious, badly clogged air filter or something round the prop? ...............Dave

So, reading between the lines, they had a boat (a boat) moored on a leisure mooring and lived on it, the sort of thing that lots of people do and get away with by maintaining a low profile, though maybe a bit risky in a highly controlled place like Bristol. At some stage they got rid of the boat and decided to replace it with a large house like structure without getting planning permission or formal approval from the harbourmaster. Now they feel that by emphasising that they have a young child it will all be ok???? If this is ok then the ultimate conclusion would be to fill in the harbour and build a housing estate. Many years ago that's what Bristol council wanted to do (though to build a road rather than houses) but luckily that did not happen. ...............Dave

I think the knob controls the gas flow rather than air, not sure if its direct or via a thermostat. I am not aware of any adjustment so maybe its gone wrong. We have had two of these fridges as we had "his and hers" camper vans before we got together and got a boat, nasty temperamental things. A good clean usually helps things. .................Dave

Its one of our all time best canal journeys so do try to do it yourself if you can. Nene is lovely but not a place to be if its flowing, especially in a 70 footer. Getting out of Salters Lode is much much easier than getting in but do take advice about approaching Denver and possible sandbanks. I believe there is a traveler camp giving trouble on the Northampton Arm at present, maybe gone now. Could you delay this trip till next spring and really enjoy it???? ..................Dave

I think one of the smaller 12 volt fridge companies already does this, you take them your chosen 240v fridge and they convert it to 12 volts. The 12v compressor is an expensive and well made unit, and the conversion needs a bit of equipment and expertise, so if you set up a company doing the conversion your prices will likely turn out just the same. .................Dave

A charity is simply a company that does not have shareholders and does not pay a dividend to those shareholders, any "profit" must go back into itself, it does not have to do "charitable work" or give anything away to the needy. Most Universities are now very big and ruthless businesses but they are also charities. ...............Dave

I was likely going to be made redundant but managed to negotiate early retirement instead, so they employed a new (slightly younger) replacement for me, I expect nowadays they would have found a volunteer 😀 .................Dave

You are correct, its the job itself, not the person doing it, that becomes redundant, but the unions (if they even exist here) are a lot less powerful than they used to be so CRT can just break the law or find a loophole, or maybe the government changed the law when we were not paying attention??? .................Dave

Yes, but how does the employee know if he is working for for the NHS (or CRT) or the agency? I thought I knew who I was working for (a University) but its only when things started to go a bit wrong that I read my letter of appointment in great detail, plus all the other letters documenting changes to the terms of my employment (plus a couple of dead dodgy ones that I refused to sign). ................Dave

Yes, I believe that's exactly how its done, CRT recruit the staff, tell them they are CRT staff but that the actual payroll is handled by an agency, the staff believe they are employed by CRT and everything supports this, but when CRT want to get rid of them they "find" they are agency staff, they have been seriously misled, maybe somebody who knows more might be along a little later. ..................Dave

I think CRT have maybe already accepted this and said that the "friends" scheme was more about getting people involved than raising money, not itself a bad idea, though likely just a way of putting a good spin on a bad result. ................Dave

I used to do a bit of racing in the Solent and once or twice we did forget to get the fenders in. Within minutes some retired old navy bloke in a lovely wooden motor cruiser would hammer up towards us and dish out a huge telling off. The memory has stayed with me and whenever I forget to lift the fenders on the cut I feel incredible guilty and wait for the shouting....and on the cut getting the fenders in is important, on the sea its just tradition and etiquette. 😀 ..................Dave

And they have also got rid of most of their towpath fund raisers, no redundancy money as although these staff believed they were CRT employers CRT now claims they were agency staff. What is going on? I wonder if CRT suspect the sought after government grant is not going to materialise so all this cycling investment and rebranding as a welbeing trust etc was wasted money and somebody has to pay the price, and its not going to be the new "engagement officers" and other office staff. ..................Dave.