The K&A Floating Fayre is back! On Saturday 18th and Sunday 19th May 2024, the visitor moorings by the George Inn, Bathampton will be full of boats selling unique art, crafts, jewellery, traditional canal art and craftwork and other handmade wares; bike repairs, gifts of all kinds, clothes, food, drink and much more. Support our roving canal traders!
Please sign the petition to keep The Bike Boat trading on the Kennet & Avon Canal – see https://www.change.org/p/get-the-canal-river-trust-to-let-the-bike-boat-to-continue-trading-on-the-kennet-avon
Liveaboard boaters in Wiltshire who missed out on the Government’s Energy Bills Support Scheme are being offered £400 by Wiltshire Council. If you did not get any winter fuel and food payments from Julian House, you can apply. The funding covers boaters on residential, leisure and other non-residential moorings. Anyone in Wiltshire who has previously missed out on funding needs to upload a PDF of their CRT licence, and the first 500 households will receive £400. Neither CRT nor any mooring companies or marinas etc will be involved in the application process. The deadline to apply is 31st March 2024. You can apply by phone, contact 0300 003 4576.
We have been alerted to the fact that CRT may be considering restricted opening hours all year round on a permanent basis for the Caen Hill flight in Devizes, should no objections be raised. The winter opening hours for Caen Hill (Locks 29-44) are 10am – 1pm every day, with last entry into the flight by 1pm.
CRT’s policy statement and report on its 2022 consultation on a minimum standard for boaters’ facilities, published on 30th May and 5th July 2023, states that CRT will increase its minimum cruising distance between facilities from 4 hours to 1 day, even though 25% to 35% of respondents (depending on the specific facility) thought a gap of 5 hours was too great. Since then we have had multiple reports of CRT closing facilities all around the waterways.
WE HAVE CHANGED THE PLAN FOR SATURDAY 27TH JANUARY, AS CRT HAS CANCELLED THE OPEN DAY…….
WE WILL MEET AT DUN MILL LOCK AT 10.30AM AND WALK UP THE TOWPATH TO HUNGERFORD TOWN CENTRE. WE WILL LEAFLET THE PUBLIC ON THE PEDESTRIAN BRIDGE OVER THE CANAL AND UNDER THE BRIDGE.
THEN WE WILL GO TO THE PUB AND DISCUSS MORE ACTIONS AGAINST CRT’S UNJUST SURCHARGE!!
Protest and engagement against the surcharge, 27th January, meet at Dun Mill Lock at 10.30am. Join us to protest against the surcharge on boats without a home mooring and engage with the public to get their support!
Around 12 liveaboard boaters attended the meeting of Wilcot Parish Council on 9th January 2024. There was discussion of a letter from a boater to Wiltshire Councillor Paul Oatway objecting that the rubble and earth banks in the lane by the canal were constructed without planning consent and were an unauthorised waste disposition. Two boaters spoke in the public question time.
There will be a Kennet & Avon Canal User Forum on Wednesday 24th January 2024 from 10:30 to 12:30. The in-person forum will be held at the St James Centre, Estcourt Crescent, Devizes, Wiltshire, SN10 1LR. CRT’s Sarah Cook says “Please join us for some short presentations, have your questions answered and an opportunity to talk to us directly.”
Voting opened on 13th December in the CRT Council elections. We recommend voting for Rosie Strickland and Nick Corrigan in the Private Boating constituency. Both are members of the NBTA and intend to promote the interests of liveaboard boaters without a home mooring if they are elected. Please vote for both of them as your first and second choices. Below are their manifestos from the CRT web site – see
https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/about-us/how-we-are-run/the-council/council-elections-2023-24/private-boating-candidates You may also be interested in voting for Penelope Barber and Fiona Burt in your third and lower choices.