{"id":1664,"date":"2020-11-01T00:03:46","date_gmt":"2020-11-01T00:03:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/?p=1664"},"modified":"2020-11-17T18:04:42","modified_gmt":"2020-11-17T18:04:42","slug":"difficult-times-difficult-decisions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/2020\/11\/01\/difficult-times-difficult-decisions\/","title":{"rendered":"Difficult times, difficult decisions"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The autumn is when the Harbour’s infrastructure gets maintained and the moorings lifted and inspected. It is also when the Harbour Board looks at how the finances <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>have <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>turned out and set<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>s<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> a <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>fresh<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> budget, fees and charges for next year. It is, of course, pretty problematic to <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>fore<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>see what may happen next year and e<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>qually<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> difficult to work out whether to freeze everything, or to plan ahead as usual. In the end, the Board opted for business as usual, so there will be modest increases, <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>enabling the<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> now <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>customary<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> passing of quite <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>large<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> sums into reserves. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>But a new feature will be some provision to assist <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>those <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>local marine businesses which are suffering hardship.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Van Oorde dredger<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>Harbour\u2019s<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> reserves <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>are not <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>a piggy-bank \u201cjust in case\u201d. The<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>y<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> are built up systematically because it is known with some certainty when the pontoons will need replacement, the Harbour will require dredging, or the boat lift or <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>h<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>arbour barge will need replacement \u2013 each of <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>which<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> cos<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>t<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>s<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> a <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>five or six-figure sum \u2013 <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>b<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>ut then the nature of running harbours is that all the infrastructure is subject to highly corrosive salt water. I should add that, Covid restrictions permitting, it is <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>plann<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>ed that dredging, which now takes place routinely every 4-5 years, will happen in the early part of 2021.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Crime or anti-social behaviour has been a pain this year, prompted by two things. Schools being shut during a heatwave seemed to <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>be associated with<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> small boats and kayaks at New Bridge being <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>requisitioned<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> as transport to nearby moored boats, which were then used as diving <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>platform<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>s. In a low crime area as few as half a dozen miscreants can generate what looks like a crime wave. The second cause was, strangely, the closing of the Millbrook Inn<\/a> in the early part of the summer. This appears to have led to a significant increase in evening speeding back and forth to Kingsbridge.\u00a0 I suppose the up-side was that Southpool creek w<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>ill<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> have been a great deal quieter. I might add that the trend for open-water swimming seems to have spread to Batson creek, <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>where it <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>can get in the way of boats<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>: <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>new <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>signage will be used to discourage this.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I wrote last month about the part being played by fishing in the Brexit negotiations. Nearer home, it is good to be able to report that the <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>Salcombe<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> fishing fleet has managed to keep going throughout the summer. The prices have not been great, indeed they are low relative to the summer before last, but <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>at least <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>the crab<\/a> processing and export<\/a> ha<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>ve<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> been able to carry<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span> on as <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>norma<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>l. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The autumn is when the Harbour’s infrastructure gets maintained and the moorings lifted and inspected. It is also when the Harbour Board looks at how the finances have turned out and sets a fresh budget, fees and charges for next year. It is, of course, pretty problematic to foresee what may happen next year and equally difficult to work out whether to freeze everything, or to plan ahead as usual. In the end, the Board opted for business as usual,…<\/p>\n

read moreDifficult times, difficult decisions<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1664"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1679,"href":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1664\/revisions\/1679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marriages.me.uk\/hugh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}