Private Eye on CRT

[Stilllearning]

Some people really don’t help themselves when trying to make a point, do they.

[MtB]

Speed cameras on the canal system. Any person, vehicle, bike or boat doing more than 5mph gets a £100 fine. That should fix the CRT funding shortfall a treat. 

[Rob-M]

1 hour ago, magnetman said:

Not looked into it but do the CRT ever apply for lottery funding ?

 

I know its a bent system and Eton received funding for their rowing equipment (I now own one of the original Eton rowing coaching launches which were decommissioned and replaced with lottery funding) so presumably if they are a Good Cause the CRT are in with a chance. 

 

 

 

 

Or does one need to have the right cuntacts for this perhaps. 

There has been many CRT projects funded through lottery funding, national lottery and postcode lottery.

[Stroudwater1]

2 hours ago, magnetman said:

Not looked into it but do the CRT ever apply for lottery funding ?

 

I know its a bent system and Eton received funding for their rowing equipment (I now own one of the original Eton rowing coaching launches which were decommissioned and replaced with lottery funding) so presumably if they are a Good Cause the CRT are in with a chance. 

 

 

 

 

Or does one need to have the right cuntacts for this perhaps. 

Given that the Stroudwater restoration have received two significant Heritage lottery grants that seems a tad unfair. 
The Anderton boat lift I believe have had two grants now, one just received of over £500,000. The other in BW days of £330,000
The application is pretty strict but would seem to be egalitarian in its delivery . Can you actually evidence anything bent in the process? 

[magnetman]

13 minutes ago, Stroudwater1 said:

Given that the Stroudwater restoration have received two significant Heritage lottery grants that seems a tad unfair. 
The Anderton boat lift I believe have had two grants now, one just received of over £500,000. The other in BW days of £330,000
The application is pretty strict but would seem to be egalitarian in its delivery . Can you actually evidence anything bent in the process? 

No I can't provide evidence. I'm afraid I may just be prejudiced as I am entirely against the principle of a national lottery in the first place. Nothing good can ever come of such a system. 

 

 

 

 

 

[ditchcrawler]

5 minutes ago, magnetman said:

No I can't provide evidence. I'm afraid I may just be prejudiced as I am entirely against the principle of a national lottery in the first place. Nothing good can ever come of such a system. 

 

 

 

 

 

A gambling tax used to support things that should be supported anyway

[magnetman]

3 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

A gambling tax used to support things that should be supported anyway

Exactly. 

[Arthur Marshall]

1 hour ago, ditchcrawler said:

A gambling tax used to support things that should be supported anyway

Except it's all smoke and mirrors, because it doesn't actually support anything. It provides for capital purchases, and has paid for museums and galleries and heritage sites to be set up, but then leaves them to fail without any further funding as it won't provide continuing support. It is, like the lottery itself, just another con that's made a few people rich (including, possibly especially, those who run it).

[Stroudwater1]

2 hours ago, Arthur Marshall said:

Except it's all smoke and mirrors, because it doesn't actually support anything. It provides for capital purchases, and has paid for museums and galleries and heritage sites to be set up, but then leaves them to fail without any further funding as it won't provide continuing support. It is, like the lottery itself, just another con that's made a few people rich (including, possibly especially, those who run it).

Agree to a point but wasn’t it always set up as additional funding that wouldn’t otherwise be done? The Anderton boat lift would certainly not be likely to have been operable without the 1999 funding. There’s many other projects that just wouldn’t have happened under any political party. 

I suspect it probably achieves better value for money than most government funded capital projects tbf. 

 

[MtB]

6 hours ago, Stroudwater1 said:

The application is pretty strict but would seem to be egalitarian in its delivery . Can you actually evidence anything bent in the process? 

 

Prima face, a lottery-funded grant to Eton College seems bent whichever way you look at it. 

[Stilllearning]

9 hours ago, MtB said:

 

Prima face, a lottery-funded grant to Eton College seems bent whichever way you look at it. 

When I was a member of a national grant giving panel, we always were careful to give grants to organisations that needed help. An application from Eton would have been laughed at, and probably not even really considered. We did try to be even handed but I expect a few favourite projects did slip through the collective net.

[Rambling Boater]

3 hours ago, Stilllearning said:

When I was a member of a national grant giving panel, we always were careful to give grants to organisations that needed help. An application from Eton would have been laughed at, and probably not even really considered. We did try to be even handed but I expect a few favourite projects did slip through the collective net.

Eton college charity No 1139086.

[Stilllearning]

7 minutes ago, Rambling Boater said:

Eton college charity No 1139086.

Yes. All ‘public schools’ are ‘Charities’, but that is a meaningless tax dodge that the committee I was a member of was wise to.

[David Mack]

20 hours ago, Stroudwater1 said:

Given that the Stroudwater restoration have received two significant Heritage lottery grants that seems a tad unfair. 
The Anderton boat lift I believe have had two grants now, one just received of over £500,000. The other in BW days of £330,000

The Huddersfield Narrow and Rochdale Canal restorations would not have been completed without Millennium Lottery funding.

On 02/03/2023 at 11:34, robtheplod said:

Introduce/increase fishing licences?  (no idea if they pay currently....)  there is lots of them...... pay per mile cycle lanes!

Anglers are required to have an EA rod licence wherever they fish. And they have to pay land/waterspace owners separately to fish particular stretches of water. On most of CRT's canals the fishing rights are let out to angling clubs, some of which restrict fishing to members only, others offer day tickets. The angling clubs are responsible for policing their waters, and may check anyone fishing has paid. Others probably don't think the additional revenue is worth the hassle of collecting it.

 

Some years ago Waterways World published a review of the latest BWB Report and Accounts which listed the Board's various sources of income. This prompted a letter in the following issue from a reader who noted that the income from angling was about 1/10 of that raised from boat licences and moorings. The letter writer suggested he would be willing to pay 10% more for his licence to be rid of the fishermen!

[Bob Chamberlain]

On 01/03/2023 at 21:39, Jim Wortelhock said:

This is what happens when you put academics in charge. Ineptitude and ideology. 

If CaRT put as much effort into maintenance as they put into wellbeing and inclusion they'd be fine.

Having worked in the university sector the majority of my life I can assure you that academics are often educated beyond their intelligence!  My esteemed professor of surgery told me that in the mid nineteen eighties and he's dead right!

[Jen-in-Wellies]

On 03/03/2023 at 13:21, David Mack said:

Anglers are required to have an EA rod licence wherever they fish. And they have to pay land/waterspace owners separately to fish particular stretches of water. On most of CRT's canals the fishing rights are let out to angling clubs, some of which restrict fishing to members only, others offer day tickets.

What about the fish? No license, no index number tattooed on their scales, no checking. Some of them continuously cruise, but most of them are swimming up and down the same short stretch of canal, with no intention of making steady progression round the system. They'll make an excuse about "we've got fry in this area", or "we need to stay here to spawn", or "I've got an ecological niche here", but they are exploiting the lack of enforcement by CaRT.

Don't get me started about ducks. Worse than cyclists. CaRT pay for duck lanes on the tow path, which they don't use. At least the cycle path upgrades are usually funded from external grants. Bunch of freeloaders, after your hard earned bread.

 

Edited March 5, 2023 by Jen-in-Wellies

[magnetman]

The herons are bad because they are stealing the fish. They should be locked up. 

[MtB]

And what about the water?

 

Every canal is half full of the stuff and does it pay to be there? I very much doubt it. 

 

 

[magnetman]

Water liberty!

[TheBiscuits]

7 minutes ago, MtB said:

And what about the water?

 

Every canal is half full of the stuff and does it pay to be there?

 

It pays more than boaters apparently, or at least the people who extract and discharge it do.

[Jen-in-Wellies]

17 minutes ago, magnetman said:

The herons are bad because they are stealing the fish. They should be locked up. 

Employ them as CaRT enforcers. A fish has been on the same pound for more than two weeks? Jab, Gulp.

[system 4-50]

When my government comes to power we shall be very popular as we shall supply free mobile phones to every member of the population.  In year 2 we will make it compulsory to carry the phone whever you go.  In year 3 we shall charge walkers & cyclists for using towpaths, and enforce CC rules, by analysing phone tracking records.  In year 4 we shall build on that success by charging for road usage with a combination of phone tracking and ANPR.  Phone implants will also be investigated. (We shall also institute a research program to see if phone motion monitoring can enable taxation on sex.)  

Edited March 5, 2023 by system 4-50

[TheBiscuits]

11 minutes ago, system 4-50 said:

(We shall also institute a research program to see if phone motion monitoring can enable taxation on sex.)

 

If your partner doesn't put their phone down during, you're doing it wrong ...

[system 4-50]

.

4 hours ago, system 4-50 said:

(We shall also institute a research program to see if phone motion monitoring can enable taxation on sex.)  

Sorry, that should be watches not phones.

Edited March 5, 2023 by system 4-50

[Willonaboat]

6 hours ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:

What about the fish? No license, no index number tattooed on their scales, no checking. Some of them continuously cruise, but most of them are swimming up and down the same short stretch of canal, with no intention of making steady progression round the system. They'll make an excuse about "we've got fry in this area", or "we need to stay here to spawn", or "I've got an ecological niche here", but they are exploiting the lack of enforcement by CaRT.

Don't get me started about ducks. Worse than cyclists. CaRT pay for duck lanes on the tow path, which they don't use. At least the cycle path upgrades are usually funded from external grants. Bunch of freeloaders, after your hard earned bread.

 

 

I've seen two dead sheep in the Grand Union. The C&RT should fine them for non-payment of licence fees and then charge them for burial at sea. They could then do pop-up barbecues on the towpath, charging passing walkers £5 a pop and cyclists £10 (no reason, but you know, cyclists...)

 

6 hours ago, system 4-50 said:

When my government comes to power we shall be very popular as we shall supply free mobile phones to every member of the population.  In year 2 we will make it compulsory to carry the phone whever you go.  In year 3 we shall charge walkers & cyclists for using towpaths, and enforce CC rules, by analysing phone tracking records.  In year 4 we shall build on that success by charging for road usage with a combination of phone tracking and ANPR.  Phone implants will also be investigated. (We shall also institute a research program to see if phone motion monitoring can enable taxation on sex.)  

 

I'm sorry to tell you that the current government have stolen your idea and plan to roll out Digital IDs for all, possibly starting as early as December of this year. It will of course be for your benefit and convenience (at first).