Licences

[sueb]

10 hours ago, ditchcrawler said:

Wasn't it Sir Adrian Scott Stott who suggest a premium licence to go to the head of the queue at locks etc. 

An interesting man. It was his eloquent arguments that stopped BW then CRT charging extra for widebeams. I never noticed odd eyes.

[Ronaldo47]

2 hours ago, MtB said:

 

Its not lawyers* that scrutinise daft laws, its committees of MPs in The Commons, then committees of lords in The Lords. AIUI. 

 

 

 

*Unless any committee members happen to be lawyers too.

 

 

P.S. Ooops, I'll leave that typo in, lol! 

 

It has been going on for ages. The Parliamentary draftsmen who actually draw up draft legislation are also responsible for some of the issues with unclear legislation. I was working in the UK Patent Office in the 1970's and '80's, a time when several new Acts of Parliament affecting Intellectual Property were passed.  The Transitional provisions of the 1977 Patents Act dealing with potential conflicts between 1977-act applications and those filed under the previous 1949 Act, turned out to be particularly obscure, meaning that both an old-act and a new-act patent would take precedence over each other. A judge described them as "a paradigm of unclarity and anfractuosity". A colleague who was seconded to the policy department while a subsequent Act was about to go through parliament, said that part of the trouble was that departments prepared drafts of legislation that were then passed to the parliamentary draftsmen, who re-wrote them in their own style.  However, there was no step of referring the draft bill back to the originating department for a reality check, it just went straight to Parliament as a draft bill.  

 

In a later Act, some time limits which could just have been set out in a table in the Act or its rules, had to be determined by a sort of ping-pong, by referring to clauses in the Act, the Rules, the Act, and the rules again, utter unnecessary madness. 

Edited September 30, 2023 by Ronaldo47
typos

[magnetman]

anfractuosity. / (ˌænfræktʃʊˈɒsɪtɪ) / noun. the condition or quality of being anfractuous. a winding, circuitous, or intricate passage, surface, process, etc.

 

 

 

 

Thanks for that. Always like a new word for the vocabulary

[Momac]

I wonder what other countries do regarding payment for use of navigable waterways.

I belive in The Netherlands you pay a small fee , a couple of euros , per lock. Moorings in a town pay be charged or free with no facilities. 

In France a 14m + boat pays a license fee of about £500 per year.

So generally cheaper than the UK.

 

 

 

[Ronaldo47]

47 minutes ago, magnetman said:

anfractuosity. / (ˌænfræktʃʊˈɒsɪtɪ) / noun. the condition or quality of being anfractuous. a winding, circuitous, or intricate passage, surface, process, etc.

 

 

 

 

Thanks for that. Always like a new word for the vocabulary

I guess it's just the right word for describing the Southern Oxford's meanderings around Wormleighton!

 

 

 

 

[matty40s]

9 minutes ago, MartynG said:

I wonder what other countries do regarding payment for use of navigable waterways.

I belive in The Netherlands you pay a small fee , a couple of euros , per lock. Moorings in a town pay be charged or free with no facilities. 

In France a 14m + boat pays a license fee of about £500 per year.

So generally cheaper than the UK.

 

 

 

I know you are not allowed to say it, but Europe is generally cheaper than the UK for almost everything nowadays.

[Momac]

26 minutes ago, matty40s said:

I know you are not allowed to say it, but Europe is generally cheaper than the UK for almost everything nowadays.

Why aren't we allowed ?

Not sure that's true anyway.

 

[MtB]

Coat of living charts are irrelevant. They relates cost of stuff locally to the salaries people earn locally, surely?

 

The perceived cost of stuff abroad to a UK citizen relates mainly to the Sterling exchange rate to the local currency.

 

 

 

 

[Momac]

5 minutes ago, MtB said:

Coat of living charts are irrelevant. They relates cost of stuff locally to the salaries people earn locally, surely?

 

The perceived cost of stuff abroad to a UK citizen relates mainly to the Sterling exchange rate to the local currency.

 

I still don't get your point 

The exchange rate is not particularly favourable recently.

 

 

 

 

[Bee]

10 hours ago, MartynG said:

I wonder what other countries do regarding payment for use of navigable waterways.

I belive in The Netherlands you pay a small fee , a couple of euros , per lock. Moorings in a town pay be charged or free with no facilities. 

In France a 14m + boat pays a license fee of about £500 per year.

So generally cheaper than the UK.

 

 

 

Our licence for 10m x 3.4 in France is three or four hundred a year - can't remember the exact figure - and the marina mooring, gated and fenced, with showers and washing / drying machines on a pontoon with water and electric is about £600 so if you round that up it comes to approx £1000 pa. We could do it for less (or more!) but that is for a mooring within easy reach of Calais. We are unusual in that we are presently paying for a 12 month mooring, many people just pay for the winter and cruise in the summer or part of it then find another mooring, we sometimes do this if we are going to Belgium, Southern France or Holland.   As you say town moorings can vary from nothing with coin operated electric to awfully expensive (Paris) but mostly a few euros. Belgium is cheap. Netherlands is or was free of licence but you do pay for moorings and other incidental costs. The smaller French canals though struggle with costs and are 'at risk' just like the UK.

[ditchcrawler]

11 hours ago, matty40s said:

I know you are not allowed to say it, but Europe is generally cheaper than the UK for almost everything nowadays.

Petrol was 2 euro a ltr when I was in Italy a couple of weeks ago

[peterboat]

11 hours ago, matty40s said:

I know you are not allowed to say it, but Europe is generally cheaper than the UK for almost everything nowadays.

Trevor has just come back from Italy, he says everything was a fortune 9 pounds for a beer seems like daylight robbery. Worse it wasn't even Rome where you expect to pay

[MtB]

8 minutes ago, peterboat said:

Trevor has just come back from Italy, he says everything was a fortune 9 pounds for a beer seems like daylight robbery. Worse it wasn't even Rome where you expect to pay

 

I thought stuff in Italy was priced in Euros.

 

 

[peterboat]

3 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

I thought stuff in Italy was priced in Euros.

 

 

He converted the price he was shocked how much prices have gone up

[MtB]

8 minutes ago, peterboat said:

He converted the price he was shocked how much prices have gone up

 

No they haven't.

 

Italy annual inflation

5.44%

YoY ending in Aug 2023

 

https://www.inflationtool.com/rates/italy

 

 

[matty40s]

55 minutes ago, peterboat said:

Trevor has just come back from Italy, he says everything was a fortune 9 pounds for a beer seems like daylight robbery. Worse it wasn't even Rome where you expect to pay

We have not long ago returned from Bologna, and it was cheaper to eat out, and supermarket shop than here. Even a major concert venue with a Worldwide Band tour was far better value and choice than our rip off stadiums in this country.

(..and was $6 for a beer)

Edited October 1, 2023 by matty40s

[Momac]

 

1 hour ago, Bee said:

Our licence for 10m x 3.4 in France is three or four hundred a year - can't remember the exact figure - and the marina mooring, gated and fenced, with showers and washing / drying machines on a pontoon with water and electric is about £600 so if you round that up it comes to approx £1000 pa. We could do it for less (or more!) but that is for a mooring within easy reach of Calais. We are unusual in that we are presently paying for a 12 month mooring, many people just pay for the winter and cruise in the summer or part of it then find another mooring, we sometimes do this if we are going to Belgium, Southern France or Holland.   As you say town moorings can vary from nothing with coin operated electric to awfully expensive (Paris) but mostly a few euros. Belgium is cheap. Netherlands is or was free of licence but you do pay for moorings and other incidental costs. The smaller French canals though struggle with costs and are 'at risk' just like the UK.

Thank you for the detailed input.

It seems like boating in our neighbouring countries could well be cost effective (even if the price of beer may not be).

 

 

 

 

[BoatinglifeupNorth]

10 minutes ago, MartynG said:

 

Thank you for the detailed input.

It seems like boating in our neighbouring countries could well be cost effective (even if the price of beer may not be).

 How things change🍷🍺 maybe now the French are doing Booze and Bacci runs to Dover to get their cheap beer and fags? 😂🍺🍷🚬🚬

[Mike Todd]

17 hours ago, Arthur Marshall said:

When was the last government that invited scrutiny?

If legislation was well drafted, there would be no need for lawyers.

Not entirely so as some legislation intentionally uses non-specific criteria (like reasonableness) to be assessed by a court in each individual situation. Which is why, as Nigel Moore oft cited, courts will not answer hypothetical questions and such legislation can only developed by specific case law.

17 hours ago, alias said:

 

Not sure if it is still there but the owner of Itchington Bottom Lock cottage told me that he had managed to negotiate a towpath side end of garden mooring by the lock a few years ago.

 

 

But is it really EOG? Not by the common meaning of the words!

[Allan(nb Albert)]

15 hours ago, Ronaldo47 said:

It has been going on for ages. The Parliamentary draftsmen who actually draw up draft legislation are also responsible for some of the issues with unclear legislation. I was working in the UK Patent Office in the 1970's and '80's, a time when several new Acts of Parliament affecting Intellectual Property were passed.  The Transitional provisions of the 1977 Patents Act dealing with potential conflicts between 1977-act applications and those filed under the previous 1949 Act, turned out to be particularly obscure, meaning that both an old-act and a new-act patent would take precedence over each other. A judge described them as "a paradigm of unclarity and anfractuosity". A colleague who was seconded to the policy department while a subsequent Act was about to go through parliament, said that part of the trouble was that departments prepared drafts of legislation that were then passed to the parliamentary draftsmen, who re-wrote them in their own style.  However, there was no step of referring the draft bill back to the originating department for a reality check, it just went straight to Parliament as a draft bill.  

 

In a later Act, some time limits which could just have been set out in a table in the Act or its rules, had to be determined by a sort of ping-pong, by referring to clauses in the Act, the Rules, the Act, and the rules again, utter unnecessary madness. 

My understanding (from Nigel Moore) is that the various British Waterways Acts were private Acts  promoted by British Waterways. As such the Bills would have been drafted and amended by BW.

 

My further understanding (again from Nigel) is that CRT does not have the power to introduce new Bills but does have the ability to change or add byelaws subject to ministerial approval.

[peterboat]

3 hours ago, MtB said:

 

No they haven't.

 

Italy annual inflation

5.44%

YoY ending in Aug 2023

 

https://www.inflationtool.com/rates/italy

 

 

Wrong I did say drink and as a tourist its food so try this real inflation for those items

[Paul C]

55 minutes ago, Allan(nb Albert) said:

My understanding (from Nigel Moore) is that the various British Waterways Acts were private Acts  promoted by British Waterways. As such the Bills would have been drafted and amended by BW.

 

My further understanding (again from Nigel) is that CRT does not have the power to introduce new Bills but does have the ability to change or add byelaws subject to ministerial approval.

That might be factually true, but if you follow the thread properly, the area of discussion was actually to do with dogs fouling the pavement and the legislation surrounding that, not the waterways act(s).

 

The 1995 Waterways Act was worded very carefully, and is deliberately 'vague' to allow for a broad ethos of different type of canal use within its meaning. Not simply poorly worded.

[Allan(nb Albert)]

40 minutes ago, Paul C said:

That might be factually true, but if you follow the thread properly, the area of discussion was actually to do with dogs fouling the pavement and the legislation surrounding that, not the waterways act(s).

 

The 1995 Waterways Act was worded very carefully, and is deliberately 'vague' to allow for a broad ethos of different type of canal use within its meaning. Not simply poorly worded.

My response was to Ronaldo47's post in the context of the original post.

 

I was not suggesting that the 95 Act was poorly worded but rather that British Waterways were responsible for the wording.

 

The reason why it is vague is because BW were unable to satisfy parliament that all boats required a home "mooring mooring". Also they failed to convince that an operational need existed to restrict mooring with draconian fines for contravention of displayed notices.

[Rambling Boater]

16 hours ago, Allan(nb Albert) said:

My response was to Ronaldo47's post in the context of the original post.

 

I was not suggesting that the 95 Act was poorly worded but rather that British Waterways were responsible for the wording.

 

The reason why it is vague is because BW were unable to satisfy parliament that all boats required a home "mooring mooring". Also they failed to convince that an operational need existed to restrict mooring with draconian fines for contravention of displayed notices.

Allan, do you know why BW tried to make having a home mooring a legal requirement? Was it all about them collecting revenue?

 

I always thought that the CC'ing thing came about due to a number of boaters arguing that it wasn't fair to be forced to have (pay for) a home mooring if you choose to travel around the country.

 

Sorry if I've asked you before, but maybe the answer never really sunk in!

 

 

 

 

[Arthur Marshall]

40 minutes ago, Rambling Boater said:

Allan, do you know why BW tried to make having a home mooring a legal requirement? Was it all about them collecting revenue?

 

I always thought that the CC'ing thing came about due to a number of boaters arguing that it wasn't fair to be forced to have (pay for) a home mooring if you choose to travel around the country.

 

Sorry if I've asked you before, but maybe the answer never really sunk in!

 

 

 

 

Can't hsve been to make money as they didn't charge a mooring fee lke the current one.