Anyone who has tried to secure an affordable safe mooring for their boat will know how scarce they are. And if you are unable to fund the increasingly high cost of an ‘off-line’ marina mooring or they simply aren’t to your taste, your problems multiply.

The limited supply of canalside ‘on-line’ moorings is about to get even more limited and costly courtesy of two BW moves.

Firstly, a Policy Briefing paper posted on the BW website on 5 April 2007 will set alarm bells ringing for many who prefer not to keep their boat in a marina. This document makes quite clear the policy to remove 1000 ‘less popular’ BW moorings from use and establish 10,000 new off-line berths by 2015.

BW cites a survey that suggests that boaters want to see no more than 15 boats moored per site with at least 6 miles between sites and marries this with a different survey about mooring location preferences to produce a conclusion that there is unsatisfied demand for off-line and lay-by moorings – and inaccurately imply that boats moored at on-line moorings are somehow less acceptable.

BW’s waiting list for its own on-line moorings is in many areas very lengthy which might, of course, suggest that they ought to be providing more of them – or managing their waiting lists more efficiently. However, BW has come up with an astonishing new plan to manipulate the moorings market to the detriment of boaters.

Boaters in receipt of the e-mail newsletter ‘Waterscape’, recently received notification of a 12-month trial on tendering for moorings. This appears to be effectively a Dutch auction with moorings going to the highest bidder, presumably at rates in excess of the current fixed rate.

BW waiting lists are to be suspended so if you have been on one for a couple of years (and many have) your chance of securing an on-line mooring is effectively now no better than any number of boaters with more disposable income than you. BW’s rationale that this scheme ‘opens up access for many more people to have an opportunity to secure a mooring, beyond those on the waiting lists’ is highly questionable logic. The current waiting lists are open to all and are at least a fair way to gauge demand and manage supply.

And the cost? Bear in mind that BW online moorings often have fewer facilities than marinas (often none at all) and have traditionally therefore been cheaper. This scheme raises the prospect of tenders inflating on-line BW mooring rates without a ceiling and possibly reaching the inflated level of marina moorings. Conveniently, the uncertainties of this system may drive more people into (BW) marinas and away from those messy on-line moorings. It goes without saying that as on-line mooring rates rise, so too will the off-line rates.

The RBOA has registered its own very valid questions about the fairness of this proposal. Indeed, it is so ill thought through – or poorly explained – that licence fee paying boat owners and lobbying groups across the country should be asking serious questions of their own and make them known to the Waterways Ombudsman.

For example, what happens to those who have patiently waited on the waiting list should the trial be discontinued after 12 months? What if you don’t want to commit to a 3-year contract, i.e. the same mooring for that period? Why should boaters without internet access be charged a £10-£15 premium?

And perhaps most importantly of all, is a tender scheme even legal for an organisation like British Waterways to undertake? Perhaps those in the profession should take a very close look in the context of BW’s remit.

But most of all, both moves to change the nature of moorings bear all the hallmarks of schemes cooked up by BW accountants which will do little for the future use of the waterways by hard-pressed boaters.

Boater beware.