Allan(nb Albert)

The IWA position is very similar to NBTA.

This has been the case for many years. More recently, ministerial powers to remove or replace CRT or transfer assets, in specific circumstances have been removed to counter the ONS classification as a public body.

Not true. CRT has KPI's it sets itself (which sometimes change when it fails to meet them). It also has KPI's agreed with Defra, failure to meet which might result in grant reduction or other penalties. These KPI's are known as publication data and some relate to navigation. One of the reasons that CRT failed to convince government that it needed more grant is that since 2012 it has, year on year, been improving on Navigation KPI's. https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/about-us/annual-report-and-accounts/publication-data-required-under-the-defra-grant-agreement

As I understand it, ICO can caution as an alternative to prosecuting.

Sorry for the delay in responding to this. My FOIA request made on 19 February reads (my bold) - I refer to your DJS Research report at - https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/media/doc... The report reads - This final report is based on the 8,479 responses to the survey, received between 15th February and 6th April 2023. Please provide a copy of all previous reports, The same sentence appears in both the files and can be found on slide 2. 2. You are getting confused between the the published and withheld reports. If you count the slides in the 'withheld' report you will find 41. The count for the published report is 37 - four less. Section 77 is about withholding/hiding/altering information rather than the contents of that information.

Short term memory loss?

The links are both in the article and the FOI request and, I think, here. To save searching - DJS Research 'independent' report provided to CaRT's Board of Trustees (but claimed not to exist) - https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/board_meeting_minute_23043_boat/response/2530822/attach/3/8696 Boat Licence Consultation Summary Report 16.05.23 v1.0.pdf DJS Research report made public (after removal of slides 23,24,25, and 34) - https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/media/document/x1UqKBGCWaVdDXeTeh-bFg/dhZ8yzogvUfdFuPf6WKjKJryfQS0JSa3HzUMZdrSYv4/aHR0cHM6Ly9jcnRwcm9kY21zdWtzMDEuYmxvYi5jb3JlLndpbmRvd3MubmV0L2RvY3VtZW50Lw/018aac5f-0e03-73bd-b848-b6b78234139e.pdf You will have difficulty using pdf comparison programs. I compared by converting both files to text (one requires stuffing through an OCR program). Then I wrote some code to get the text in the correct order, identify start of each slide and remove slide numbers. ***** Edited to add - Just realised that you might have meant that you intend to compare manually rather than via software ...

You may be confusing the Freedom of Information Act with Environmental Information Regulations. CRT was made subject to FOIA by The British Waterways Board (Transfer of Functions) Order 2012 Section 15. With EIR, CRT volunteered to be bound by the regulations until such time as it was established in law if they were subject or not. The Information Commissioner quickly found that CRT performed the actions of a public body so was subject to EIR.

Whilst it might be fun to bait other forum members it might be more instructive to read what CRT tried to hide in the DJS consultatation report.

I suggest you read the information request at https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/surcharge_consultation and then apologise to Alan de Enfield. Yes, I asked CRT for previous versions of the pubished DJS Research report. They twice claimed that they held no previous versions. About a month later I found by chance that this was untrue and the published version differed from the version provided to the board of trustees in July 2023. Under Section 77 of the Freedom of Information Act it is an criminal offence to conceal information with the intention of preventing disclosure and, after giving CRT an opportunity to explain, the matter has been refered to the Information Commissioner. The link to the information request is above.

Not sure he is looking for a holiday on something that is brown and comes out of Cowes backwards ...

Sad but true.

The "bargain" regarding inflation was written into the grant agreement rather than the MOU. It is legally enforceable by both parties. It should also be understood that government have actually exceeded its legal obligations in respect of grant payments. That said, the grant agreement has worked out well for government (i.e. the taxpayer) who will be saving about £60m on the estimated £800m estimated spend over 15 years.

Correct. I say informal because the mou was not legally binding. It is interesting to note that, having served its purpose, government now wishes to "retire" the MOU.

The fact is that government has stuck to this informal agreement. CRT has had the opportunity to hand back responsibility to government but has failed to to do so.

Part of justification for BW becoming a charity was the efficiences it could acheive by change of legal status ... There is a basic difference between CRT and councils in that reduction and elimination of funding was agreed between the parties informally at the outset.

Cost estimates for Toddbrook have risen from an initial £10m to £37.6m. However, that figure is a year old so may have gone up again. It should also be remembered that Toddbrook raised questions regarding safety of other reservoirs and, indeed, other structures. Following the incident, CRT bypassed Defra and made a £200m + bid direct to the Treasury for extra money over a five year period. In effect this would have almost doubled government grant. The 2020 bid (actually a bid and a revised bid) was quietly rejected. Has CaRT’s government bid for £220m extra funding failed? As far as I can recall, CRT is footing the bill for almost everything related to Toddbrook and its wider implications. BTW, the costs for Harthill (mentioned in the article) have risen from £5m to £10m.

You should have owned up to the Max Bygraves LP ...

That was me some years ago. I don't know if more up to date information is available. On a more general note, the problem seems to be that CRT is below target on volunteer man hours this year.

I guess it costs a lot less than the TV advertising campaign of a few years ago. Mind you that was suddenly pulled when the Toddbrook incident gave them free press coverage.

It is not true that CRT trustees can not be fired by Council. A provision (24.9) in the Articles of Association mirrors a provision in the Companies Act 2006 (168 and 169) which allows shareholders (i.e. members of council) to remove trustees from office by resolution at a General Meeting.

The number of people bothering to look at this topic says it all ..

I guess that those that are aware wonder why they should bother. Can Council hold the Board of Trustees to account when its chair is also chair of Trustees?

I note that you did not take up the challenge of publishing your own calculations... ... and what you call three multi choice questions were, in fact, binary choice ...

IanD may wish to apply "a standard statistical method" to the results given to the board and tell us what he finds. I get a "most preferred" of - Option A - 46.15% Option B - 25.65% Option C - 12.82% Option D - 15.38% Not really surprising, bearing in mind the lack of support for options B,C and D. I have already taken the matter up with the reports authors and also queried why the results given to CRT's board of Trustees are not to be found. Fairly obviously I will not get a reply until the new year. I may not receive a reply.