licence-review | National Bargee Travellers Association

The other week CRT’s Licence Review Commission published the results of their ‘engagement survey of Canal and River Trust waterway users’, carried out between March and April of this year by independent consultants Campbell Tickell. The survey – which many respondents have reported as being ill-conceived and biased – has nevertheless returned results that will make difficult reading for CRT.

Results showed that more than 8 in 10 are frustrated with the day-to-day management of CRT waterways in the UK. Over 60% of respondents were frustrated about maintenance – including of towpaths and banks, management of water supply and a lack of investment in infrastructure – making this the biggest issue raised in the report. Despite CRT scapegoating the rise in itinerant boat dwellers, only 1 in 20 surveyed saw overcrowding on the waterways as an issue. 9 in 10 did not support legislative change, despite CRT’s recent emphasis on this possibility.

Scapegoating itinerant boaters

The survey forms part of CRT’s ongoing ‘Future of Boat Licensing Commission’ which caused outrage earlier this year when it described the itinerant boating community as an ‘operational, financial and reputational challenge’ and lamented how legislation like the Human Rights Act 1998 and Equality Act 2010 were limiting the charity’s ability to take enforcement action against boaters, which includes forcing people into homelessness via eviction proceedings.

The total amount of itinerant boats is only around 7000 across CRT waterways. Yet CRT continues to target this small community with a controversial fee surcharge, a decline in services, punitive enforcement including of families, pensioners and disabled boaters, and multiple attempts to remove historic mooring spaces altogether.

Questions about the survey data

The National Bargee Travellers Association, requested the raw data of the survey in a meeting with CRT, but to date has received nothing, shedding doubt on the Commission’s promises of “clarity” and “fairness”.

A Freedom of Information Act request has now been lodged, but CRT continues to deny the boating community its own data.

Failing on the basics

Despite CRT’s continued scapegoating of boaters, the numbers show a convincing rejection of legislative changes that could have decimated England’s boating community.

More worryingly for CRT, they also indicate a range of stakeholders’ overwhelming level of frustration with its day-to-day management of the waterways, including financial mismanagement, a decline in facilities and anger over the inflating wages of CRT executives

Seemingly out of the blue, late last December, the Canal and River Trust (CRT) announced a commission to review licensing. Attached to the press release was a ‘Terms of Reference” to the commission that clearly outlines their intentions to remove itinerant boat dwellers from inland waterways. It explicitly states that CRT views the community of boat dwellers without home moorings as a problem, advocating for changes to the law to address this ‘problem’. The document claims that the community has “created challenges for the Trust both from an operational, financial, and reputational perspective” and that in dealing with these so-called ‘challenges,’ CRT is seeking changes to the law, pointing to its issues with the Human Rights Act 1998, the Equality Act 2010, and the British Waterways Act 1995 —the very legislations that enshrine our community’s legal protection to exist.

In this document, CRT announced it has appointed an ‘independently led’ commission to review a future legislative framework for how boats on its waterways are licensed. Currently, the rights of itinerant boaters to live on the waterways are underpinned by Section 17(3)(c)(ii) of the 1995 British Waterways Act, which provides that a vessel may be licensed without a permanent mooring as long as it is “used bona fide for navigation throughout the period for which the consent is valid without remaining continuously in any one place for more than 14 days or such longer period as is reasonable in the circumstances.”

It is not just what the document does say that’s alarming, it’s what it doesn’t say too. There is no mention of the many positive aspects of itinerant boating: we ensure the network remains ‘operational’ with itinerant boaters flagging and fixing issues with locks, towpaths, facilities, and the cut itself; we keep each other and non-boaters safe in places that were once seen as no-go areas; and we act as unpaid but willing tour guides/tourist attractions/security guards for the many visitors to the UK’s canal network each year. Numerous things can be said about itinerant boaters’ positive impact, but the document is truly desolate on that front. The document also does not mention any other class of boater (apart from liveaboard) or waterways user……it is us they’re after!

Despite the NBTA sending the commission a response laying out facts which show the invalidity of the Terms of Reference, Commission has already ratified CRT’s document. This is worrying. It may be a sign that a conclusion has already been reached. The Commission has had multiple meetings and has put out a survey, making it clear what is seen as the problem. The commission is expected to run until at least September 2025, when its recommendations will be considered by CRT’s board of trustees.

In the meantime, the NBTA will keep a close eye on the commission and engage whenever possible, relaying information when useful and raising questions on your behalf. After the commission, CRT may well go to Parliament to try to get a new damaging law. We are currently lobbying MPs and Peers to generate support in Parliament to remove the threat. All MPs and Peers engaged so far are very
supportive. It may also help to put together a portfolio of positive boater action. If you want to add to the ‘Better with Boats’ portfolio, please email us at nbtalondon@gmail.com.

If you want to be involved in lobbying MPs or generally in this campaign, please email nbtalondon@gmail.com

You can read the CRT ‘Terms of Reference’ and NBTA’s response to it: https://bargee-traveller.org.uk/nbta-response-to-crt-commission-terms-of-reference-to-review-law-and-policy-on-boat-licensing/#:~:text=The%20Canal%20%26%20River%20Trust%20%28CRT%29%20announced%20that,National%20Bargee%20Travellers%20Association%20%28NBTA%29%20to%20the%20ToR.

Boaters’ Big Bash

National boater event on Saturday 14 June. Come to the Boaters’ Big Bash; it will have food, stalls, children’s activities, speeches, live music, and acts from the boaters, oh and bunting…

Saturday 14th June starting 12 noon, W2 5TF near Westbourne Park, a little west of Paddington on the Paddington Arm, Grand Union Canal, London

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National Bargee Travellers Association – London Branch

Tag Archives: licence-review

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A volunteer organisation formed in 2009 campaigning and providing advice for itinerant boat dwellers on Britain’s inland and coastal waterways