The cost of enforcement
In referring to the cost of enforcement (Checking unlicenced boats—5/9/12) Mr Earley makes an analogy with the police that I have heard before, writes John Wilkinson.
Whilst I am open to persuasion that, in these straitened economic times, the present numbers of police officers can possibly be justified in what may be termed the real world, I can see absolutely no case for employing 22 'Enforcement Officers' in a supposedly charitable 'trust' that is run by a hugely overpaid Board, is completely top heavy with staff and is effectively broke.
Taxpayers' cash
For heaven's sake, this organisation, devoted essentially to providing what are simply leisure activities for a relatively small number of people, would not exist without large amounts of taxpayers' cash propping it up every year, and it's really time people woke up to that fact. These are hard times, and my question, as yet unacknowledged by Mr. Griffin, was reflecting that.
Believe the propaganda if you will, and many do, but this is overkill of the worst sort—by 'management'. It's something that Canal & River Trust's predecessor excelled at, and it now looks as if a New Improved Version has begun!
Slip through the net
Whatever the organisation, a certain number of people will always slip through the net. Accept it. It's been happening on the waterways and people have been complaining about it ever since I first entered this narrow world, in 1965. It will not be eradicated by 22 'Enforcement Officers'.
What I 'would have CART do', Mr Earley, is require it to be fully accountable to the people who pay for its miserable existence, and for it to be staffed by people who are open and honest about the way it is run (rather than inhabit a system in which, inter alia, Freedom of Information requests can be ignored and obscene amounts of money can disappear without trace wasted on ludicrous retail developments), and where director's salaries and pensions are paid at a level commensurate with their abilities.
Current economic situation
I want people who can take into account the current economic state of the world (no more balloons, bunting or poems on locks), and can acknowledge that they are very small fry in a very big pond. Is that unreasonable?
But of course, if the paying customers continue to swallow the party line, accepting without question the ridiculous and ever-increasing charges imposed upon them whilst continuing to give support to the money wasting ideas dreamt up by these people, that's not going to happen, is it?