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Ruthless Eviction of Liveaboards from Fens Marina


Roger Gunkel

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What would happen if everyone refused to move?

 

I suspect that we would see a water-borne version of Dale Farm. It would be interesting to see what pratical measures the police would use to remove the boats though, I suspect it would prove a lot harder than shift a few caravans and the like.

 

As to the OP - it is pretty reprehensible behaviour on the part of the owners and I would hope the boating community would stick together and 'boycott' the place when it re-opens, though that may be practically very difficult for some if they really do need to be in the area.

Edited by The Dog House
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This is sad. The Popes Corner marina was where I moored when I lived aboard some 20 years ago. Even then there was despute between the owners and the multi- billion pound business that is Shropshires/Greens. The problem then was that the mile long road that led to the marina belonged to the farm and was not open to the public. It was used by the marina and the then Pub traffic only by some loophole in some old bylaw.

 

To be honest, a company like this will have every legality covered and they would not hesitate to close the marina as the loss of revenue would be no more than small change. If people decide to stay put, they will cut off road acess and force people out.

 

I feel for those living there. As someone else pointed out, alot of the boats would be unable to move as they are engineless and have not moved for years.

 

From a very selfish point of view, this will put alot of pressure on alternative moorings which is bad news for us who are hoping to live aboard in this area in the next year or two.

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I've been in touch with them and Ivor Caplan, when I get replies from NABO, I will post it all.

Will you ask both their permissions to do so.......

 

And have you fully digested and understood all the answers about copyright of such material!.....

 

(:tongue_in_cheek: - in case that wasn't clear!).

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Could the RBOA help here? They are, after all, a 'boat dwellers organisation', if more of us joined, there would be more impetus behind them.

Based on more than one thing I have seen recently, the RBOA seem rather content to just say things like "we are the only assosciation o have been fighting for residential boaters rights for many decades", but, without knocking past efforts, I do wonder if like the IWA they rest more on past laurels than on putting up a strong fight now.

 

It seems Jenlyn is trying hard to get multiple associations to be more up front about their current stance on many issues, and I will applaud him if he gets to a point where he can publish information obtained.

 

Although not live-aboard myself, I know and talk to many people who are, and can understand their concerns for the future. (Not that us non live-aboard boaters don't also have major concerns for the future, too, of course!).

 

Some will inevitably get into the debate of "do I join an existing organisation, even if flawed in some areas, and then try and influence it from within?" versus "do we think about starting another one?". I think this is a terribly different call - all the existing organisations were no doubt formed with good intentions - some precisely as break-away groups from others where people had lost the faith. Clearly creating another one will be felt by many to be causing further divisions, but I have yet to find an association or organisation that I personally have that close agreement with.

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Will you ask both their permissions to do so.......

 

And have you fully digested and understood all the answers about copyright of such material!.....

 

(:tongue_in_cheek: - in case that wasn't clear!).

Lol, I think you we're right taking the decision you did, for various reasons other than copyright.

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Do liveaboard boaters have no rights at all

 

Well hopefully not, and hopefully it will stay that way because otherwise the liveboard issue will become polarised, and unintended consequences will follow.

 

Give boaters sufficient formally approved, official residential moorings with planning permission etc, and I predict the authorities will then move to stamp out all residential use of leisure moorings, citing the existence of the residential moorings for people wishing to live aboard. And who here wants that?

 

Anyone?

 

(Eidted to add a word to make a sentence make sense.)

Edited by Mike the Boilerman
  • Greenie 1
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It's evident that Roger is extremely upset by the story which he has heard, and other forum colleagues have understandably been in agreement with him.

What we have not yet heard is the marina owner's side of the story. It would make interesting reading.

 

 

 

I would agree we need to see the other side and understand why the existing boaters did not pay the extra £50 a month to maintain their live abroad status which we assume was not recognised legally through planning permission, council tax etc. I imagine the boaters must have got together and refused to pay this hence the conflict . It looks like the marina has exercised the right of termination correctly through the notice period. If they are charging more than the going rate they will have great difficulty in filling the marina again so I suspect there is much more to this story .

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I find it difficult to understand why a £550 a year surcharge for living aboard is so unreasonable. Liveaboards use the marina facilities more heavily than the leisure moorers for sure, and in the broadest sense, soak up more management time for the marina office.

 

For example, if I were to stay in my current marina, I would be complaining shortly to the marina office about cats shitting on my boat. The place has dozens of them, all owned by the liveaboards. A tricky problem that would probably take up quite a bit of management time. as it is, I'm leaving. one could say this was a contributing factor so T&K are now losing money from me due to the 'enlarged footprint' of the liveaboards there. So from a commercial POV liveaboards SHOULD be charged a little more.

 

Mike

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I find it difficult to understand why a £550 a year surcharge for living aboard is so unreasonable. Liveaboards use the marina facilities more heavily than the leisure moorers for sure, and in the broadest sense, soak up more management time for the marina office.

 

Surely it's because the marina is 'officially' saying 'there are no residential moorings here', but by the back door accepting (by way of taking additional monies) that actually yes there is...

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To give a bit more detail, Davina has worked within the Shropshire organisation for some years and is the daughter of John Shropshire. She has been moved about within their main business 'Gs', and from those I know that have also worked there, she was known as being not very well organised and was shipped out to Spain to help run that end of the organisation. That didn't last long and when she married in 2011, Popes Corner Marina, which sits on a few thousand acres of their land, was given to her as a wedding present. Her new husband is a property developer!

 

G's is a multi million pound business, with thousands of acres of farming land both in the UK and abroad, in addition to fresh food processing and packaging plants. It likes to promote an image of being environmentally friendly, and a family run supportive company. However at Popes Corner, long established wild habitats have been dug up for new parking etc. and trees cut down. As part of their enviromentally friendly improvements, a new bio degradable sewage disposal point for boaters has been installed, with the bacterially cleaned fluids intending to be pumped into the river. Lack of knowledge however, failed to predict that chemical from chemical toilets would destroy the bacteria content and the system would not work.

 

The majority of residents have been there for a number of years and I understand has been a healthy and thriving community. There was also a pub restaurant on the site for many years, The Fish & Duck, which was also demolished by the Shropshires about 5 years ago. There have been various rumours of a new pub being built to replace it.

 

One of the problems for liveaboard boaters seems to be that they have not organised themselves into a publicly recognised independent group, unlike travellers who have raised a high public profile and established a perceived way of life requirement. Liveaboard boaters however, are basically a typical cross section of normal society, who have chosen to adopt a waterborn lifestyle. This means that most just get on with everyday life, working, paying their taxes and not intruding on others. Unfortunately boat dwellers are often viewed by general society as itinerant spongers, or water gypsies whereas the truth is exactly the opposite in most cases.

 

The fact that most liveaboards are just looking for a quiet life means that they are not militant,or geared to protecting any traditional role aggresively in the way that true gypsys and travellers are. It would take a hard core of people prepared to stand and fight to prevent boat dwellers from being treated as second rate inconsequential nobodys. An intense campaign would be neccessary in the public eye, to show that we are ordinary people going about our business, who live alternatively, freeing up housing, minimising use of utilities and living in a green and enviromentally friendly manner.

 

Perhaps local authorities would be more supportive if they were forcibly shown how many people are able to live comfortably in areas where conventional housing would not be practical and with a minimal supporting infrastructure. They would be less than happy to be suddenly expected to provide housing for people who really don't want it.

 

Roger

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I find it difficult to understand why a £550 a year surcharge for living aboard is so unreasonable. Liveaboards use the marina facilities more heavily than the leisure moorers for sure, and in the broadest sense, soak up more management time for the marina office.

So do I

I pay £660 surcharge a year on top of the moorings, I dont consider it unreasonable, I also had to pay a 20% surcharge when I had the barge as it was over 7ft wide.

Personally I think that the moorers might have been slightly shortsighted in refusing to pay as many of them will not find a mooring elsewhere for a variety of reasons.

And I do know popes corner, I also have a boat on the Ouse I hope that this wont lead to the clogging up of all the GOBA and EA moorings in that area.

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In order to achieve this, the council would have to grant planning permission for the residential use. The local land-dwellers are often incredibly hostile to such applications; near my mooring, for example, a village campaign was stirred up against "hordes of rampaging waterborne gypsies" (their words not mine) when the application was for just two residential berths. Imagine what they would have said about a whole marina.

 

 

Popes is pretty much in the middle of nowhere. Even finding the road entrance is a bit tricky. Can't see any local objections what goes on there form neighbouring residents.

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Surely it's because the marina is 'officially' saying 'there are no residential moorings here', but by the back door accepting (by way of taking additional monies) that actually yes there is...

 

I think you are just being argumentative for the sake of it.

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I think you are just being argumentative for the sake of it.

 

Really?

 

fairy nuff, I wasn't actually, I do think it is anomalous and thought it worth some debate but as you don't I'll comment no further.

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It appears that many marinas charge a daily user rate / surcharge for heavy users.

 

Pillings Lock marina is an extra £383

BWML (Kings)grade I mooring is £30 per metre extra over a grade 2 mooring

 

For BWML this gives 'unlimited usage' a mailbox and a storage shed.

Grade 2 is a leisure mooring with limited extended stays (holidays etc)

Residential is charged by berth - irrespective of length at £35I2.00

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One of the problems for liveaboard boaters seems to be that they have not organised themselves into a publicly recognised independent group, unlike travellers who have raised a high public profile and established a perceived way of life requirement. Liveaboard boaters however, are basically a typical cross section of normal society, who have chosen to adopt a waterborn lifestyle. This means that most just get on with everyday life, working, paying their taxes and not intruding on others. Unfortunately boat dwellers are often viewed by general society as itinerant spongers, or water gypsies whereas the truth is exactly the opposite in most cases.

 

The fact that most liveaboards are just looking for a quiet life means that they are not militant,or geared to protecting any traditional role aggresively in the way that true gypsys and travellers are. It would take a hard core of people prepared to stand and fight to prevent boat dwellers from being treated as second rate inconsequential nobodys. An intense campaign would be neccessary in the public eye, to show that we are ordinary people going about our business, who live alternatively, freeing up housing, minimising use of utilities and living in a green and enviromentally friendly manner.

 

Perhaps local authorities would be more supportive if they were forcibly shown how many people are able to live comfortably in areas where conventional housing would not be practical and with a minimal supporting infrastructure. They would be less than happy to be suddenly expected to provide housing for people who really don't want it.

 

Roger

That isn't true. Live aboard boaters formed the RBOA , a well respected organisation, but how many liveaboards have bothered to join or help campaign for better conditions. Are any of the affected boaters going to join? Are you offering to join and help?

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That isn't true. Live aboard boaters formed the RBOA , a well respected organisation, but how many liveaboards have bothered to join or help campaign for better conditions. Are any of the affected boaters going to join? Are you offering to join and help?

I put in my membership application this morning :cheers:

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One of the main problems is that, around here, there are simply no alternatives. The next closest marina, Upware, is pretty full. There might be a little space in Ely marina or in St Ives, but not for 60 boats. There's nothing available in Cambridge without waiting 2-5 years on a waiting list, or with a widebeam, 20+ years.

 

There are also a limited number of moorings locally. There's about 10 boats that hop from mooring to mooring around the Ely area, and already that means that, at peak times, it's very hard to get a mooring.

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