Neil Arlidge wrote: > YEAH!...get rid of the spinless **** and get someone like Sir Frank Price in > control!
I don't think anyone would accuse BW of being "spinless", even now Eugene has left. ;) > Bruce Napier wrote: > > The idea (raised I think in another place) of announcing that some of > > the recently regenerated lengths will have to be reclassified as > > remainder waterway as BW doesn't have the funds to maintain it to > > cruiseway standard would galvanise the LAs concerned to do there bit, > > perhaps. The idea of taxing waterside properties in view of their > > increased amenity value is new, I think (and down to Sheila, let me > > say) > > I went on about that in my little read submission to EFRA. ...and I did in a letter to the Indy the other year (on the morning of the BW AGM: http://comment.independent.co.uk/letters/article1838337.ece), and a chap from the Shrewsbury/N Wales IWA was suggesting it the other week. So it's being talked about. A precedent has partly been set. Crossrail, the east-west London railway, is to be funded partly by a supplement on London business rates - because London businesses will benefit from it. It's not 100% comparable but it's a first step. For a while it looked like the "planning gain supplement", first proposed by Government in 2004, would be exactly what we were looking for. This now isn't going to happen, but instead, there'll be a "planning charge" on new developments. This is to be introduced in next year's Planning Reform Bill. At present the charge proposals are focused around local councils - there is no provision (AFAIK) for a national body such as BW to benefit. BW needs to _urgently_ make sure that it gets something out of this. (This would have been easier if it had been pressing for a move to DCLG, which will be introducing the charge, but no matter.) Some links: http://www.communities.gov.uk/statements/corporate/planningreform http://www.building.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=555&storycode=3099618&c=2 http://tinyurl.com/yvr6dn (CBI website) Richard
