Why the Roving Permit

[mayalld]

I understood your position to be that people who didn’t pay, even when they didn’t need to, were freeloaders?

 

Indeed, it went further than that; you claimed that even people who paid voluntarily despite not being required to, were freeloaders if they asserted anything like this present post of yours.

 

A courageous confession under the circumstances.

 

But we DID pay.

 

In each case, the owner of the mooring paid the fee to BW, and we paid the fe to the mooring owner.

[NigelMoore]

 

But we DID pay.

 

Understood; see my post #240. So did we pay in the circumstances of the dispute over which you passed said comments, the difference between us being that you had no choice. I took the opportunity to make a point from the superficial meaning of your post and it is perfectly true that you made the characterisations I described, despite your then being in full possession of the facts to the contrary [unless your reading of the relevant judgment was uncharacteristically defective].

 

Those were accusations typical of so many of your otherwise informative posts where you have been unable to resist using your usually superior grasp of relevant facts as an occasion to be simply and unnecessarily unpleasant. In my case, as maybe with others, the accusations were also utterly false.

 

You demean yourself when you so demean others, and dilute the value of your contributions. The worst of it is, I am in danger of here becoming infected with the same disease! And going seriously off-topic.

[NigelMoore]

As I understand it, PP is only required for a residential mooring in a precisely defined position. A Roving Mooring Permit valid for even a tightly defined fww hundred metres or so negates the need for PP, and removes liability for CT. I cite the Cambridge city centre residential moorings site as the precident, discussed in the thread about a month ago.

 

Was this the topic “Cambridge Moorings Consultations”? I couldn’t find anything there relating to roving residential use vis-à-vis Council Tax. From other Council minutes, however, and from relevant case law, I can see that you would be correct to state what you have.

 

In making my suggestions for getting raw facilities in place as a start, I have presumed that there would be the eventual goal of having residential moorings instead of the RMP. Were you suggesting that for so long as leisure moorings were available for the use of those with RMP’s on a rotational changing basis, their residential use of the boat itself would not make their use of the leisure moorings a “material change of use” in planning terms?

 

That’s rather clever; it would be something akin to the marinas who insist on inserting into Terms & Conditions the proviso that the agreement does not give the moorer the right to any particular berth.

 

Nonetheless, the whole Council Tax thing relating to boats is in an ever-tightening state of flux, so I doubt think the RMP seekers will find comfort in such suggestions. The driving principle of the whole engagement appears to be based on the Caesar’s wife principle - it is not good enough that they are doing no wrong; they must also be seen to be above suspicion.

 

Can’t fault them for that.

[MtB]

Was this the topic “Cambridge Moorings Consultations”? I couldn’t find anything there relating to roving residential use vis-à-vis Council Tax. From other Council minutes, however, and from relevant case law, I can see that you would be correct to state what you have.

 

No not that thread, this thread: http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=56371&hl=cambridge

 

Post 10 in particular by Black Ibis, explaining the reason they don't/can't pay CT.

 

Not the first time I've heard this said by someone I'd expect to know.

 

 

MtB

[NigelMoore]

No not that thread, this thread: http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=56371&hl=cambridge

 

Post 10 in particular by Black Ibis, explaining the reason they don't/can't pay CT.

 

Not the first time I've heard this said by someone I'd expect to know.

 

Thanks MtB, as you said there – a fascinating inversion of the usual situation!

 

The basis on which Cambridge would not have been levying Council Tax in their situation would presumably have been that the boats, by nature of the non-exclusivity of any particular mooring space, could not pass the relevant test of being in “actual and exclusive occupation of the heriditament”.

 

That would put them in a different category from the Reeves v Northrup situation. I'm not sure the the rationale was exactly the same as with the boaters in my former yard, none of whom were allowed to pay Council Tax, even though some tried hard. In that situation of course, I was the one paying the Council Tax as business rates for the whole property.

 

Actually - there was one exception now I think of it. A chap who rented one of the boats successfully applied for housing benefit, as a result which, all unbeknownst to me, that boat became listed as formal residential premises within my commercial premises, despite this being contrary to both my own rules and the Council's! It took a year of calls and correspondence to get it taken off again.

[NigelMoore]

Following on from MtB’s references to Cambridge I looked at the Cambridge Council’s website on moorings, which includes an excellent Report [Tales from the Riverbank] by Phil Beck Associates, that has to be the very best of its type I have ever read. Published in 2009, many of you might have read it ages ago.

 

Cambridge authorities have been taking an exceptional approach over the years, it would appear; an enviable situation I think. The Report includes an interesting comment on BW’s approach -

 

“In spite of a somewhat tentative approach to its pricing policy, BW has managed over the period of its reflection on this issue to create significant alienation with its main customer base. The debate that BW has been through in establishing its new policy is not especially helpful to this report, except to note that both its ideas and its approach seem to have created unnecessary and unhelpful uncertainty among its customers in particular. There has been a strong perception that BW is favouring the more well-heeled boater, and promoting a policy of maximising income against the interests of lower-income moorers.” [my emphasis]

 

Obviously an approach now eschewed by their successors of course.

 

That aside, the Report looked at all the other major players and situations, and provided worthwhile advice. I’d recommend a read for anyone interested enough to be following this topic–

 

https://www.cambridge.gov.uk/sites/www.cambridge.gov.uk/files/docs/Tales%20from%20the%20Riverbank%20-%20Review%20of%20Moorings.pdf

 

Certainly worth directing Hillingdon Borough’s attention to, if not done already.

 

 

[cotswoldsman]

Cambridge authorities have been taking an exceptional approach over the years, it would appear; an enviable situation I think. The Report includes an interesting comment on BW’s approach -

 

“In spite of a somewhat tentative approach to its pricing policy, BW has managed over the period of its reflection on this issue to create significant alienation with its main customer base. The debate that BW has been through in establishing its new policy is not especially helpful to this report, except to note that both its ideas and its approach seem to have created unnecessary and unhelpful uncertainty among its customers in particular. There has been a strong perception that BW is favouring the more well-heeled boater, and promoting a policy of maximising income against the interests of lower-income moorers.” [my emphasis]

 

Obviously an approach now eschewed by their successors of course.

 

 

At our meeting in Milton Keynes on Monday we spent a lot of time discussing the way CRT still seem unable to communicate in a non confrontational manner. I think it will take some time to change this. If anyone spends time looking at the people in for example The Waterways Partnerships, The Council etc it is not hard to workout who it is that CRT listen to and I hate to say this the majority fall into the group mentioned above.(In RED) that is why in my opinion we need as many boaters as possible to be part of the engagement we are facilitating with the Trust

Edited May 22, 2013 by cotswoldsman

[Berengaria]

How do I know if I'm in this group? Is it down to how reflective my paintwork is?

[magnetman]

yes

 

they have gps based reflectometers for data collection

[cotswoldsman]

How do I know if I'm in this group? Is it down to how reflective my paintwork is?

I think if you had met some of the boaters I have spoken to who struggle to pay for diesel and food, or the Marina Owner I spoke to last week who says over 15% of his customers are behind on paying mooring fees and have asked to make special arrangements. Or even the 67 year old woman who emailed me last week because she has been give notice to quite her marina. (hence the conversation with Marina Owner) you would soon know what group you are in

[Berengaria]

I think I'm closer to that lot than a shiny boater