Government CRT funding statement

[IanD]

2 minutes ago, Tonka said:

No I am not. I am saying every little saving helps and someone needs to look at new ideas to see if they can find something that has not been thought of.

Your idea is just get the government to give more money which comes from where. 

How many local councils have gone bust. The water industry needs more money. The utility industry needs more money. The government have not got a bottomless pocket. 

But I suppose it saves you thinking about other ideas.

Every little saving -- go on, like what? -- doesn't help when your real problem is a funding gap of something like £100M per year. Wishful thinking and magic beans will not fix this.

 

The only conceivable way of filling this gap is the government, investing in not just part of the national infrastructure but one that confers benefits to non-boaters which far exceed the costs -- according to their own analysis.

 

I have spent a lot of time thinking about this -- unlike you, it seems -- and that's my view, and it's backed up by the numbers. If you disagree then that's your view, but not one that's supported by the facts.

[Tonka]

2 minutes ago, IanD said:

Every little saving -- go on, like what? -- doesn't help when your real problem is a funding gap of something like £100M per year. Wishful thinking and magic beans will not fix this.

 

The only conceivable way of filling this gap is the government, investing in not just part of the national infrastructure but one that confers benefits to non-boaters which far exceed the costs -- according to their own analysis.

 

I have spent a lot of time thinking about this -- unlike you, it seems -- and that's my view, and it's backed up by the numbers. If you disagree then that's your view, but not one that's supported by the facts.

As per usual you have to be right. 

[IanD]

4 minutes ago, Tonka said:

As per usual you have to be right. 

So if I'm wrong about the funding gap, how else can the canals be fixed?

 

Please don't say "with new ideas" yet again, you might as well say "the canal fairies will do it"... 😉

Edited July 11, 2023 by IanD

[Tonka]

5 minutes ago, IanD said:

So if I'm wrong about the funding gap, how else can the canals be fixed?

 

Please don't say "with new ideas" yet again, you might as well say "the canal fairies will do it"... 😉

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/travel/canal-seine-nord-europe-5-5-billion-western-front-spc-intl/index.html

How about building new canals like they are doing in France. 

They had high-speed railway and we are copying that

So maybe we could copy the canal idea.

 

Let us see what Professor Pat Pending replies to that

[MtB]

4 minutes ago, Tonka said:

How about building new canals like they are doing in France. 

 

I don't see how that will fix the £100m funding gap. 

 

Could you explain please?

 

Thanks

[IanD]

9 minutes ago, Tonka said:

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/travel/canal-seine-nord-europe-5-5-billion-western-front-spc-intl/index.html

How about building new canals like they are doing in France. 

They had high-speed railway and we are copying that

So maybe we could copy the canal idea.

 

Let us see what Professor Pat Pending replies to that

But do you have any sensible ideas for fixing *our* canals, not the French ones?

 

Which it should be noted will swallow up 100x the annual investment our government makes in the canals -- so maybe the real problem is not canals but the UK government?

 

BTW thanks for the compliment at the end... 🙂

 

https://www.ortomarine.co.uk/professor-pat-pending/

Edited July 11, 2023 by IanD

[magnetman]

Means tested boat licences? 

 

The more assets you have the more you pay. 

 

People with nothing get it paid for by the state.

4 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

I don't see how that will fix the £100m funding gap. 

 

Could you explain please?

 

Thanks

Presumably income from freight use of the waterway. 

Edited July 11, 2023 by magnetman
formatting

[Midnight]

8 minutes ago, Tonka said:

No I am not. I am saying every little saving helps and someone needs to look at new ideas to see if they can find something that has not been thought of.

Your idea is just get the government to give more money which comes from where. 

How many local councils have gone bust. The water industry needs more money. The utility industry needs more money. The government have not got a bottomless pocket. 

But I suppose it saves you thinking about other ideas.

 

You're banging your head against the wall. The so far boatless fountain of all knowledge seldom sees anyone else's point of view. Wait until he tries to get his new shiny boat across the Pennines. He agrees that bonuses should not have been paid. I wonder if he agrees that Todbrook should have been better inspected and maintened - that would have saved a whole lot of £millions. What about the use of contractors when the ground staff say they could fix simple things like paddles & cills - they used to! What about the ground staff telling they get sent on a job and if the materials don't turn up they are not allowed to go on another job so sit there all day. What about the level of marketing? There's a whole community of boaters posting good news, YouTube vids and Facebook stories so why do we need very expensive 'sponsored' adverts? How essential are all those admin bods 'full stack developers, solicitors, etc. I don't see the EA navigations spaffing money up the wall on such things

 

"I can confirm that, subject to certain conditions being met, government will offer a new long term funding package of over £400 million to the Trust."

Will C&RT have a better chance of meeting those conditions under a new leadership with fresh thinking? So far Parry's C&RT have been a disaster for navigation. Someone famous once said "The buck stops here". I agree that these things won't save a huge amount in the scale of things but may just fix a few locks and give use Yorkshire based boaters a chance to get back to base. And as you said "...every little saving helps"

[magnetman]

1% of personal assets to be the licence fee. 

 

Got a million pound house? £10 grand a year then. Not got a pot to piss in? £1000 a year to be sourced via benefits system. 

 

 

 

 

"Certain conditions being met". 

 

Do we get to find out what these are? All a bit mysterious or is this just a KPI reference. 

 

 

[beerbeerbeerbeerbeer]

8 minutes ago, Midnight said:

What about the level of marketing?

anyone remember the CRT advert on TV?

…probably not. 

It died a quiet death 
 

Alone it may not have cost much compared to the CRT budget but all these little bits of wasted money add up. 
And add to a loss of confidence.  
 

 

[doratheexplorer]

 

 

[IanD]

47 minutes ago, magnetman said:

1% of personal assets to be the licence fee. 

 

Got a million pound house? £10 grand a year then. Not got a pot to piss in? £1000 a year to be sourced via benefits system. 

 

"Certain conditions being met". 

 

Do we get to find out what these are? All a bit mysterious or is this just a KPI reference. 

 

 

Ooh, great idea -- let's see if the numbers add up, shall we?

 

An extra £100M a year is about £3000 per boater extra on average, meaning the average licence fee going up to about £4000 a year.

 

Average UK household net worth is about £300k, so if the average boater is paying £4000 a year one with £1M net worth would be paying £13k a year. All sounds good for "soak-the-rich", not so good for your average boater though?

 

Of course this ignores the fact that quite a lot of boaters don't have nice houses on land, so their net worth will be a lot lower -- probably well under £100k on average. Which means those with houses will have to pay more to make up this difference. There are a few rich boaters but that won't come close to making up for the much larger number of poor ones.

 

Probably means up we end up with license fees something like this:

 

"poor" boater (no house) : £2000

"average" boater (with a house) : £6000

"rich boater" (bloated plutocrat) : £20000

 

Great, no funding gap, canals are restored and the rich get hammered 🙂

 

Hang on, where have all the boaters gone? 😞

 

Dammit, half of them have buggered off, we'll have to double the license fee again to £4000/£12000/£40000 to get the revenue back.

 

Crap, now half the remaining ones have left, better double them again...

 

Oh well, might as well close all the canals now, there aren't any boaters left to use them... 😞 

 

30 minutes ago, Goliath said:

anyone remember the CRT advert on TV?

…probably not. 

It died a quiet death 
 

Alone it may not have cost much compared to the CRT budget but all these little bits of wasted money add up. 
And add to a loss of confidence.  
 

...to a small number compared to the CART budget and the funding gap... 😞 (like executive bonuses and blue signs...)

 

It's like the government telling the NHS (or wherever...) that they need to reorganise and save money by "better efficiency" and "operational cost savings", which is like moving the deckchairs around on the Titanic -- the savings inevitably turn out to be small, the cost of reorganisation wipes them out, the staff get p*ssed off, and then the ship sinks anyway.

 

The problems of the NHS and the canals are similar in many ways, increasing demand/running costs fighting against a government that doesn't want to admit this and so blames the organisation/staff -- because it wants to distract attention from the simple fact that it doesn't want to pay, it would rather spend the money on important things that benefit its members and supporters... 😞

 

Roll on the GE, that's all I can say...

Edited July 11, 2023 by IanD

[mrsmelly]

23 hours ago, doratheexplorer said:

I would think it more likely that CRT will bury their heads in the sand and just allow all their waterways to deteriorate.  Closing a specific canal would be a tricky thing to justify to all the canal-dependent businesses along its length.  I'd predict a major uproar if a canal was to simply close, but maybe that's what's needed.

 

 

Imagine the localised housing crisis if the K and A closed again and drained of water 

[Tonka]

4 minutes ago, mrsmelly said:

Imagine the localised housing crisis if the K and A closed again and drained of water 

The boats would just sit on the bottom where they were. Most of the people wouldn't care as long as they could carry on living there

[IanD]

12 minutes ago, Tonka said:

The boats would just sit on the bottom where they were. Most of the people wouldn't care as long as they could carry on living there

They might even be happier, plenty of new canalbed garden space...

[mrsmelly]

21 minutes ago, Tonka said:

The boats would just sit on the bottom where they were. Most of the people wouldn't care as long as they could carry on living there

True, I spose it would stop some of them sinking 

[beerbeerbeerbeerbeer]

1 hour ago, IanD said:

...to a small number compared to the CART budget and the funding gap... 😞 (like executive bonuses and blue signs...

 

How much of a grant is worth spending to self promote to secure a grant?

Would it be fair to say their advertising and promotion hasn’t achieved the funding from government they hoped for?

And shouldn’t they now just get on with the job of fixing things so we can go boating ?

 

23 minutes ago, Tonka said:

The boats would just sit on the bottom where they were. Most of the people wouldn't care as long as they could carry on living there

Yes, I’d put a picket fence around. 
With a big sign ‘get off my land’. 
 

[Tim Lewis]

2 hours ago, Jon57 said:

How much revenue doe's Crt get from it's very large property portfolio under it's srewardship. Must be many hundreds of millions. Are they not allowed to spend the money on the actual maintenance of the canals. Or does it go elsewhere.

The £50m PA odd pounds raised from

their property portfolio goes into the general pot for the running of CRT

[Jon57]

1 minute ago, Tim Lewis said:

The £50m PA odd pounds raised from

their property portfolio goes into the general pot for the running of CRT

What is the value of the property that income comes from please.

[Grassman]

I've never understood how the government expected CRT to be self financing like the National Trust, when 95% of people who use our canals don't pay a jot for it, whereas most NT places are able to charge for entry, use, car parking etc. Even allowing for CRT's inefficiencies and wastefulness it's still unfair.

 

Another point - HS2 probably spends every week the amount of money CRT want for a whole year and our canals and rivers benefit far more people that HS2 ever will, and probably benefits the country's economy more than HS2 as well.

[Barneyp]

3 hours ago, Goliath said:

 

How much of a grant is worth spending to self promote to secure a grant?

Would it be fair to say their advertising and promotion hasn’t achieved the funding from government they hoped for?

And shouldn’t they now just get on with the job of fixing things so we can go boating ?

Obviously they would of hoped for more, but given a lot of peoples expectations before this announcement, and the governments stated intention when CRT was created in 2012 that it would be self funding, it could be argued that the advertising and self promotion has paid off - the funding that has been announced is far more than has been spent on advertising and self promotion, so financially it makes sense.

 

The only way to know whether the money spent promoting CRT was well spent would be if you could magically find out how much the grant would have been if CRT had not done any self promotion.

 

Personally I think CRT made a mistake by using a similar logo to BW when they were set up and then had to change it to raise awareness, now they've done the rebranding the promotion/advertising budget can be less and they should do more to explain to those who are most invested in and the waterways (i.e. boat owners, businesses etc) that they are underfunded and need more money to maintain the waterways - they can only put up licenses by so much before it becomes counter productive and revenues start to fall and/or they really do make the canals only accessible to the rich which won't help with government funding.

 

To all those that say that given the state of the economy and the demands of the NHS etc it is unrealistic to ask the government to fund the waterways, this announcement clearly shows that the government are prepared and willing to to fund them, so pressure applied in the right way and to the right people could increase the funding.

[robtheplod]

The Government could divert the money to CRT from this.....  

 

Hotels given millions of pounds to reserve beds for migrants (thetimes.co.uk)

 

They obviously dont envisage solving this issue for a while!

[Barneyp]

5 hours ago, Midnight said:

.................

There's a whole community of boaters posting good news, YouTube vids and Facebook stories so why do we need very expensive 'sponsored' adverts? How essential are all those admin bods 'full stack developers, solicitors, etc. I don't see the EA navigations spaffing money up the wall on such things

.........

The You Tube videos, Facebook posts etc do a great job of saying how wonderful the waterways are, they generally don't explain that they cost a fortune to maintain and that the government are trying to stop funding them. The vast majority of the population don't stop to think how things are funded or even if they need funding. They might think the surrounding landowners have to maintain canals, or the income from boat licenses covers all the costs, or they might think "ooh that looks pretty, I'm going to walk/cycle along there" - without even registering that someone has to maintain it.

 

EA don't spend some of their money asking for more money because as a government entity they are not allowed to, my guess is they do have "admin bods 'full stack developers, solicitors, etc." although the cost of these may not appear in the published accounts as being directly allocated to the navigations.

[Allan(nb Albert)]

3 hours ago, Tim Lewis said:

The £50m PA odd pounds raised from

their property portfolio goes into the general pot for the running of CRT

 

3 hours ago, Jon57 said:

What is the value of the property that income comes from please.

Firstly, it is no longer just a property portfolio because CRT also has acquired significant non-property assets. The latest figures are from the 2021/22 Annual Report and are as follows -

The value of CRT's investment assets (property and non-property) was £1.14 billion.
These produced a gross return of £51.4 million.

However, it is wrong to say that £51.4 million goes into the general pot for running CRT. That is because of the expenditure needed to raise that sum - £17.7 million.

 

The actual contribution made to the "general pot" was £33.7 million (for comparison that was just under 50% of CRT's employment costs of £70.3 million).

Put another way in 2021/22, CRT's £1.14 billion of property and non-property assets produced a net return of just under 3%.

By a peculiar coincidence, some of those assets were purchased with a £150 million long term loan with CRT paying interest of just under 3%.

 

[Arthur Marshall]

3 minutes ago, Allan(nb Albert) said:

Put another way in 2021/22, CRT's £1.14 billion of property and non-property assets produced a net return of just under 3%.

By a peculiar coincidence, some of those assets were purchased with a £150 million long term loan with CRT paying interest of just under 3%.

 

Thats like every other worthwhile asset in the country - load it up with debt and wonder why the hell you can't maintain the asset, while using the borrowed money to pay bonuses and director's loan. Got to pay the Board, you know, to get the calibre of management you need. Honest, guv, it works...