And now the RYA wash their hands of it ...

[Tranona]

You're assuming that Poole will only have a single refuelling point (or all refuelling points will only offer 1 fuel type) - I would hazzard a guess that Poole, along with the Solent has sufficient quantity of both leisure and commercial to support both fuel sources.
It is the smaller and more isolated harbours that would find it hard to justify the provision of both red and white.

We are in danger of losing our most convenient fuel supplier in the harbour because the Fuel barge is up for sale - any takers? Nice stable business, benign regulatory regime, lots of rich customers (well there used to be!)

 

[Bobobolinsky]

I can't be bothered to read through umpteen pages.

1. Start a boycott all Belgian products thread. (Though I'm still thinking about what they are)

2. Don't go there.

3. You tight lugger, clean your tank fill with white and get a £75 trailer and £30 IBC off ebay

Just shows the mentality 1.5 years to clear the tank of cherry. Thats about £50 extra in diesel over 1.5 years and that on a £40K yacht. I liveaboard and have a seperate heating tank, If a bit of diesel goes in the river, they will have to live with it, but with the right gear, it's not rocket science not to spill any

 

[AntarcticPilot]

If a bit of diesel goes in the river, they will have to live with it, but with the right gear, it's not rocket science not to spill any

It's not a question for many of us about being careful or not. I daresay I could equally manage not to spill any if I filled from cans, though I'd hate to guarantee never to spill even a teaspoonful. But where I berth, it is strictly verboten to fill from cans because although you and I are supremely capable people who will never spill a drop, there is always Ham-fisted Harry who will inevitably spill half a jerrycan every time. And we aren't even allowed to pump bilges in the dock because of the risk of oil pollution; that's how careful they are. It's not the marina's rules, either - it is the Port Authority, as the marina is in a dock.

And, though less rigorously enforced, similar rules are in place for most places that boats moor, especially in rivers.

 

[grumpy_o_g]

There's no question of commercial users being denied red diesel - there's an EU directive that says they must be permitted it.

Not quite - it says they can and should use red diesel I believe - it doesn't say that a supplier has to provide and that's the crux - will fuel suppliers still provide it if they have a few hundred or more leisure boats and only a couple of dozen commercial?

 

[maby]

Not quite - it says they can and should use red diesel I believe - it doesn't say that a supplier has to provide and that's the crux - will fuel suppliers still provide it if they have a few hundred or more leisure boats and only a couple of dozen commercial?

True - in the sense that no legislation can force anyone to sell anything - only ban the sale of certain things. I was responding to a post that seemed to be considering the possibility of banning red diesel to all marine users, both private and commercial.

If the vast majority of users in a given location are pleasure sailors and there is a clear wish to switch to white, then it's hard luck for the commercial users in that area - in much the same way that half a dozen leisure sailors in Dover cannot expect to force a switch to white.

 

[Elemental]

HMRC suggested it's that was a fair level of split and i agree with them.

As for being community minded, why would i choose to pay additional taxes that i don't have to pay ?

If you call that "gonads" then I'm afraid it demonstrates that you have failed to understand the situation.

...

The "60:40" rate (40p/litre) was and is a pragmatic compromise. The tax on "60:40" fuel is way way way above the EU minimum for pleasure craft (0.33 Euros/litre), but it is close enough to the rates charged by our EU neighbours (eg 0.43 Euros/litre in France) that the really big users (big mobos) are less likely to be tempted to refuel abroad, keep their boats abroad, or give up boating altogether.

It is not "evasion" to pay the tax required: no one is under any obligation to pay more tax than is legitimately demanded of them.

According to the RYA there is no specified split - you have to make a 'true' declaration. I quote Gus Lewis directly

I’m afraid I don’t agree, however, that the 60/40 split is a “tax dodge” – we make it clear in our advice that if boaters know that they use more than 60% of their fuel for propulsion then they are expected to make a declaration to that effect and pay the additional duty.

 

[fireball]

There are enough ppl with difficulty operating their boats - let alone knowing what %age fuel split they use ...

if HMRC are happy with a generic 60/40 split then that's good enough for me.

Please let me know just HOW hmrc are going to prove that it isn't 60/40 ...

HMRC really couldn't give two hoots about the leisure fuel duty - it's such an insignificant sum it's not even a blip on the budget...

Once again the forum bickers about keeping red diesel and %age splits - yet nobody really gives a stuff what colour our fuel is - so long as we're not running a risk of getting fined for using it or having it in our tanks.

 

[yesod]

According to the RYA there is no specified split - you have to make a 'true' declaration. I quote Gus Lewis directly

maby doesn't - why should anyone else?

 

[maby]

maby doesn't - why should anyone else?

What do you mean? I always make a declaration based on anticipated use - usually tending towards a larger proportion for propulsion than is the probable case.

 

[thalassa]

I can't be bothered to read through umpteen pages.

1. Start a boycott all Belgian products thread. (Though I'm still thinking about what they are)

2. Don't go there.

Oh ...I'll help out with a list:

Many Belgian-made products are mostly exported and often repacked and sold under other labels in the EU, so it is likely you're using or consuming them.
Many products are food products, but also intermediate products, tools, machinery like spinning and weaving machines, ESA satellites, steel, aluminium, chemical products for paint systems, mattresses, PVC, Acrylic glass, etc.
The pharmaceutical sector is of global importance, and it is highly unlikely you haven't got some in your cupboard.
World's largest exporter of diamonds and carpets.
Of course there is foods: high-fibre meals, eggs, vegetable oils, margarine.
Strawberries, witlof, non-alcoholic beverages, soja products, cookies, cakes.
Please do not mention chocolate and beer... And nooo, Poirot was a FICTIONAL Agatha Christie character, I can't count the British and Americans I met thinking otherwise.

Ladies high-couture, flowers (azaleas), luxury products in leather like handbags.
Car assembly. Until two years ago, your Vauxhall Astra was likely assembled in Belgium, and the seats made also. Ford cars (Mondeo), Volvo's, and even a supercar that Jeremy Cl*rks*n would hate. City busses and tourist busses. Bus stops.
Internet content management systems (Drupal), used internationally in many governement sites. If you go to the cinema, it is also highly likely it uses a beamer of Belgian manufacture. If you get a traditional X-ray, the film used is very probably to be Belgian-made.
High-definition TV recording systems.
On the darker side, the muck in world estuaries is dredged by Belgian companies.
Belgian contractors build the Burj Khalifa, the highest building in the world (in 2010).

I hope this helps avoiding Belgian products.
And I'm currently looking up the postal rate for sending back the remnants of my heavily used Red Ensign to the RYA. Like most Dutch and French yachts, I will not be spending my usual four weeks on the East and South Coast, thanks to the British Insular Policies. Good news for you, more visitors berths available!

 

[Koeketiene]

Oh ...I'll help out with a list:

Many Belgian-made products are mostly exported and often repacked and sold under other labels in the EU, so it is likely you're using or consuming them.
Many products are food products, but also intermediate products, tools, machinery like spinning and weaving machines, ESA satellites, steel, aluminium, chemical products for paint systems, mattresses, PVC, Acrylic glass, etc.
The pharmaceutical sector is of global importance, and it is highly unlikely you haven't got some in your cupboard.
World's largest exporter of diamonds and carpets.
Of course there foods: high-fibre meals, eggs, vegetable oils, margarine.
Strawberries, witlof, non-alcoholic beverages, soja products, cookies, cakes.
Please do not mention chocolate and beer... And nooo, Poirot was a FICTIONAL Agatha Christie character, I can't count the British and Americans I met thinking otherwise.

Ladies high-couture, flowers (azaleas), luxury products in leather like handbags.
Car assembly. Until two years ago, your Vauxhall Astra was likely assembled in Belgium, and the seats made also. Ford cars (Mondeo), Volvo's, and even a supercar that Jeremy Cl*rks*n would hate. City busses and tourist busses. Bus stops.
Internet content management systems (Drupal), used internationally in many governement sites. If you go to the cinema, it is also highly likely it uses a beamer of Belgian manufacture. If you get a traditional X-ray, the film used is likily to be Belgian-made.
High-definition TV recording systems.
On the darker side, the muck in estuaries is dredged by a Belgian company.
Belgian contractors build the Burj Khalifa, the highest building in the world (in 2010).

I hope this helps avoiding Belgian products.
And I'm currently looking up the postal rate for sending back the remnants of my heavily used Red Ensign to the RYA. Like most Dutch and French yachts, I will not be spending my usual four weeks on the East and South Coast, thanks to the British Insular Policies. Good news for you, more visitors berths available!

 

[westhinder]

Oh ...I'll help out with a list:

Many Belgian-made products are mostly exported and often repacked and sold under other labels in the EU, so it is likely you're using or consuming them.
Many products are food products, but also intermediate products, tools, machinery like spinning and weaving machines, ESA satellites, steel, aluminium, chemical products for paint systems, mattresses, PVC, Acrylic glass, etc.
The pharmaceutical sector is of global importance, and it is highly unlikely you haven't got some in your cupboard.
World's largest exporter of diamonds and carpets.
Of course there is foods: high-fibre meals, eggs, vegetable oils, margarine.
Strawberries, witlof, non-alcoholic beverages, soja products, cookies, cakes.
Please do not mention chocolate and beer... And nooo, Poirot was a FICTIONAL Agatha Christie character, I can't count the British and Americans I met thinking otherwise.

Ladies high-couture, flowers (azaleas), luxury products in leather like handbags.
Car assembly. Until two years ago, your Vauxhall Astra was likely assembled in Belgium, and the seats made also. Ford cars (Mondeo), Volvo's, and even a supercar that Jeremy Cl*rks*n would hate. City busses and tourist busses. Bus stops.
Internet content management systems (Drupal), used internationally in many governement sites. If you go to the cinema, it is also highly likely it uses a beamer of Belgian manufacture. If you get a traditional X-ray, the film used is very probably to be Belgian-made.
High-definition TV recording systems.
On the darker side, the muck in world estuaries is dredged by Belgian companies.
Belgian contractors build the Burj Khalifa, the highest building in the world (in 2010).

I hope this helps avoiding Belgian products.
And I'm currently looking up the postal rate for sending back the remnants of my heavily used Red Ensign to the RYA. Like most Dutch and French yachts, I will not be spending my usual four weeks on the East and South Coast, thanks to the British Insular Policies. Good news for you, more visitors berths available!

+1

 

[sailorman]

+1

I have done my very best since 1978 to bring as much bier as is possible form the General Stores via the North Sea to Suffolk . this has stopped since hmg decided we should not

 

[chewi]

Just out of idle curiosity: I noticed that your fine craft doesn't seem to have a diesel heater fitted.
Do you claim 60/40 or do you pay 100% tax?
Just wondering.

Just because the introduction of 100% taxed white wouldn't suit you, can't deny those of us for whom it would make life considerably easier the right to argue our corner.

My 10hp diesel is at best 40% efficient, 60% is heating & power, so I have a heater!


That said I am prepared to pay th whole white rate, but others are in different circumstances and they have valid points of view.

The ones that haven't are the shortsighted politicians that let it get this far.

 

[chewi]

another idea..
suppose we all individually write for clearance to arrive with red diesel, but then not turn up...
That ought to pxxs them off a bit!

 

[LONG_KEELER]

Oh ...I'll help out with a list:

Many Belgian-made products are mostly exported and often repacked and sold under other labels in the EU, so it is likely you're using or consuming them.
Many products are food products, but also intermediate products, tools, machinery like spinning and weaving machines, ESA satellites, steel, aluminium, chemical products for paint systems, mattresses, PVC, Acrylic glass, etc.
The pharmaceutical sector is of global importance, and it is highly unlikely you haven't got some in your cupboard.
World's largest exporter of diamonds and carpets.
Of course there is foods: high-fibre meals, eggs, vegetable oils, margarine.
Strawberries, witlof, non-alcoholic beverages, soja products, cookies, cakes.
Please do not mention chocolate and beer... And nooo, Poirot was a FICTIONAL Agatha Christie character, I can't count the British and Americans I met thinking otherwise.

Ladies high-couture, flowers (azaleas), luxury products in leather like handbags.
Car assembly. Until two years ago, your Vauxhall Astra was likely assembled in Belgium, and the seats made also. Ford cars (Mondeo), Volvo's, and even a supercar that Jeremy Cl*rks*n would hate. City busses and tourist busses. Bus stops.
Internet content management systems (Drupal), used internationally in many governement sites. If you go to the cinema, it is also highly likely it uses a beamer of Belgian manufacture. If you get a traditional X-ray, the film used is very probably to be Belgian-made.
High-definition TV recording systems.
On the darker side, the muck in world estuaries is dredged by Belgian companies.
Belgian contractors build the Burj Khalifa, the highest building in the world (in 2010).

I hope this helps avoiding Belgian products.
And I'm currently looking up the postal rate for sending back the remnants of my heavily used Red Ensign to the RYA. Like most Dutch and French yachts, I will not be spending my usual four weeks on the East and South Coast, thanks to the British Insular Policies. Good news for you, more visitors berths available!

True or false ?

" 80% of billiard players use Belgian-made balls "

 

[thalassa]

True or false ?

" 80% of billiard players use Belgian-made balls "

I don't know if this is entirely or partially true, but a few facts: Belgium started making billiard balls from the ivory imported from its colony the Congo. My father was, like many Belgians, a fanatic adept. I was told that they started making synthetic billiard balls because the inner structure of real ivory is not consistent, making the weight of an otherwise perfect ball uneven. Ivory was at the start of last century already an expensive product, and even then there were not enough elephants to satisfy demand... (....let's not go there...). To solve this, Leo Baekeland invented the first synthetic, bakelite. A zillion articles, many in electric appliances were made in the stuff, until modern synthetics came along.
I suppose the vast majority now comes (as everything else) from the PRC, but the top players use Belgian-made balls. So, in short, we do have balls...

This is typical of manufacture in small countries ( think Switzerland), in general terms it is specialized articles and not volume they go for. (Oh, that last bit reminds me, we've got a few successful bra manufacturers). To bore you even more with useless info, a friend of mine works in a firm making bicycle spokes. But they make them of special alloys, so the set of spokes of ONE wheel costs as much as a complete, but modest bike.

On another note, I have great sympathy for the view of many Britons that the 'Brussels' EU institutions are bloated money guzzling entities, but they have little to do with Belgium as such. Many MP's live around the more attractive suburbs of Brussels, driving house prices up till they are out of reach of the 'natives'. It took my daughter two years to find somewhere affordable.

Cheers!
Will

 

[thalassa]

I have done my very best since 1978 to bring as much bier as is possible form the General Stores via the North Sea to Suffolk . this has stopped since hmg decided we should not

Good man... But I like an Adnam's Broadside as well!

 

[LONG_KEELER]

I don't know if this is entirely or partially true, but a few facts: Belgium started making billiard balls from the ivory imported from its colony the Congo. My father was, like many Belgians, a fanatic adept. I was told that they started making synthetic billiard balls because the inner structure of real ivory is not consistent, making the weight of an otherwise perfect ball uneven. Ivory was at the start of last century already an expensive product, and even then there were not enough elephants to satisfy demand... (....let's not go there...). To solve this, Leo Baekeland invented the first synthetic, bakelite. A zillion articles, many in electric appliances were made in the stuff, until modern synthetics came along.
I suppose the vast majority now comes (as everything else) from the PRC, but the top players use Belgian-made balls. So, in short, we do have balls...

This is typical of manufacture in small countries ( think Switzerland), in general terms it is specialized articles and not volume they go for. (Oh, that last bit reminds me, we've got a few successful bra manufacturers). To bore you even more with useless info, a friend of mine works in a firm making bicycle spokes. But they make them of special alloys, so the set of spokes of ONE wheel costs as much as a complete, but modest bike.

On another note, I have great sympathy for the view of many Britons that the 'Brussels' EU institutions are bloated money guzzling entities, but they have little to do with Belgium as such. Many MP's live around the more attractive suburbs of Brussels, driving house prices up till they are out of reach of the 'natives'. It took my daughter two years to find somewhere affordable.

Cheers!
Will

Thanks Will. Enjoyed that.

I am love Bakelite and Tufnol. Thanks Belgiuim !

This http://cheeseweb.eu/2009/08/25-belgium/ adds a bit to the fun but there are some serious 'Firsts' coming from Belgium.