Victor: An Open Meeting

ONE thing that must be stated about our new boss man, Richard Parry, he is certainly mixing amongst the boaters, and is listening, but I must say he is a past master at evasion—there were not many 'yes','no' answers to the questions at his Open Meeting yesterday at Nottingham.

We even had the rabble interrupting his answers, but he quickly silenced them with the threat of eviction!

Dredging

He told us there was to be eight millions spent on dredging—but it had to last 10 years.  And that there would only be licence increases at the rate of inflation, but this time not for 10 years but three.  Then we learned the Trust had 5,500 'Friends'—about half that had been expected. And there were even more partnerships in the offing, with he told us the 'single purpose of looking after the waterways'.  That is something I just cannot accept, as surely partnerships are more interested in their own thing, whatever it is.

But he spoilt it with his '10,000,000 visitors to the waterways a year'.  Even though it is on record that his predecessor told Parliament in was 3.7 millions or something like.  But of course he counts those taking short cuts and dashing to and from work on their bikes as visitors I expect.

No curb on cyclists

And that certainly arose a few hackles—with many complaining at being physically struck by speeding cyclists and pets sent into the water, with one suggesting a licence that had to include insurance. 'No way' told Richard, they are all visitors to our waterways  [I told you so!] that we must encourage.  No barriers either, as they will stop people in wheelchairs.  That, dear Richard, will not wash, as the organisation Radar provides keys for barriers for the disabled.

One thing I just could not understand about towpath users is his reasoning that 'we need their input'. What input?

Boaters on council

He came under the hammer for the dismal number of boaters on the council, but fobbed it off with a future 'consultation' excuse, telling us the council 'must be broad', but hardly explaining why.

Someone dared to mention the old lengthsmen, but they will not be coming back, it is all up to volunteers his audience was told.  Mind you, as volunteers must have access to a toilet within striking distance, how that will work was not said.

And continuous moorers who were hoping a cheap 'Roving Licence' to save having to pay mooring fees—forget it, it is not going to happen, he was very clear about that.

Enforcement officers

One subject raising a great deal of comment was the way boaters were being treated by enforcement officers, with one in particular, a Stuart Garner, coming in for a lot of complaints about his attitude to boaters and the way he was treating them.  All we received however was that the enforcement officers do their work in a professional considerate way, doing their utmost to find solutions.

This was received with derision by quite a few in the audience who had obviously had dealing with the fella, and were most certainly not impressed.

50,000 high priority defects

Richard did have the decency to tell about the 50,000 high priority defects on the system, but can only attend to 20,000 of them each year.  Have a think about that.  More and more defects every year, and less and less attended to—what will be the result?

Victor Swift