I have just brought my boat down the 'terrible six' or whatever those broad locks on the Trent & Mersey are called, and like many others have struggled with hard to move gates and very stiff paddles.
Yet there was not a volunteer lock keeper in sight at any of them, even though it was in the middle of the day, but come to the automatic locks at Sawley and there are three volunteer lock keepers, just to turn a key! And they told me they are there every day now.
How ridiculous. Those locks must be the easiest to work on the whole system yet three volunteers, but none where they are needed.
Paul Gould