CaRT don't have the money

Published: Wednesday, 14 June 2017

I KNOW it is the thing at the moment to complain about the state of the waterways, but the complainers seem  to miss one thing, and that is that Canal & River Trust just do not have the money.

Nowadays maintenance is much more expensive than it used to be, and I believe your Victor Swift once mentioned that all the health and safety requirements make work a much longer job than it used to be when a simple bit of orange plastic fencing was all that was needed.

b newlay lockLock open day

I visited one of those open days at a lock and was surprised at the layers of fencing and steps now having to be put into place to protect workers, and though a good thing, certainly takes time and money to implement and then dismantle.

I will admit that contractors cannot possibly know as much as former workers who have spent years working on locks and things, so this means that the work also takes longer, all adding up the cost, and the Trust simply does not have the money available to put everything in order as we boaters would like.

Take up caravanning instead

So the lock gates are difficult to work, but so what, boating is labour intensive, and anyone taking up boating should first have a good read about it and realise it is not for the weak and elderly, who should perhaps take up caravanning or such instead.  (I mention this as I noticed the other day that Sawley Marina now have a big caravan display, so they are perhaps trying to tell us something!)

Paul Gratton