CaRT's response to Coroner

IT TOOK less than three hours for Canal & River Trust (CaRT) to respond to a narrowboatworld article (CaRT ignores Coroner's Harecastle concerns), writes Allan Richards.

The article criticised the Trust for failing to give a comprehensive account of its response to the Coroner so that boaters could see how the Trust intended to deal with all four issues he raised.

Poor reply

Starting its reply to the request for a copy of CaRT's response to the Coroner with 'We have considered your request and we do not consider the information you have requested to be subject to the limited application of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to Canal & River Trust' does little for the Trust's already tarnished reputation in this matter.

One is somewhat reminded of CaRT's predecessor, British Waterways, who actively attempted to make a Coroner withdraw a similar report and subsequently took no action on it.

In public domain

Having said that, both the Coroner's report and CaRT's response are now in the public domain so boaters can see how the Trust says it intends to deal with the four issues raised.

However, 'saying' is one thing 'doing' is another.

The Coroners report is available on the Judiciary website:

http://www.judiciary.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Holgate-2014-0357.pdf

CaRT's response is on whatdotheyknow.com:

https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/240626/response/591237/attach