Has the liveaboard community been wrongly penalised for freedom ?

[grumpygit]

Has the liveaboard community been wrongly penalised for freedom ?............. I think so !

Sorry for hijacking the thread Torrevieja and ISDMT Tax but I think this may warrant a fresh thread.

I believe most liveaboards will think as we do.

Here we are, giving up our home, jobs and closeness of family to follow the yearning for travelling off in our bath tubs (of varying sizes) hoping to satisfy our dreams.

We go out into the wild blue yonder looking peace and tranquility away from troubles and woe, then what do we have to worry about; 183 days here, 90 days there, taxes, charges and extortion in whichever corner we turn......
Correct me if I'm wrong but aren't these the things we are trying to get away from (but not especially trying to avoid).

Most of you I would think pay taxes to their home state/country by way of interest earned from investments (not much at the moment), pensions etc, or if they have retained their property and are paying council tax etc.
Where the main rub is with me is that the "powers that be" deem to think aaah yacht! loads of money! let's exploit them.

Now. I had to work bloody hard to get what I have now and no, I am not loaded, far from it, but it's the dream that drives me to take the plunge into economic uncertainty and make sacrifices so far unknown to us as land based wage/salary earners.

We own our vessels for pleasure, not as a financial asset to be valued in how much tax the host country can extract from us.

What do we give to the hosts? Maybe not a lot except we spend what we need in their community. If you are in a marina in high season ( some in low ) you can easily get a hotel for the same money.

We can be treated or looked upon as vagrants or gypsies, people of no social standing apart from our own liveaboard community, the list can go on and on and on.

I really don't want to go any further into a full blown rant (more than I have done anyway), but I would like to open it up for discussion and observation with the rest of you. However, IMO, we really do not have the freedom we may have expected, not by any stretch of the imagination.



/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

 

[Gerry]

Over the 4 years that we have been cruising the Caribbean I have seen a steady tightening of all rules to do with cruisers. Sadly I have to believe that many of these are tightened because of the flagrant abuse of immigration laws by a significant percentage of cruisers. Not checking in immediately in order to extend time in any given country. Illegal renewal of visas and a strange belief that somehow the rules just don't apply to them.

When we first visited Panama it was possible to stay up to a year with only one visit outside the country. as more cruisers have abused the rules, ie arriving in the country but cruising for up to 2 months before adhering to immigration legislation this has been tightened to a three month period ( if you are lucky).

So once again the majority will pay for the abuse by the minority. C'est la vie....

www.gerryantics.blogspot.com

 

[Sandyman]

I would put it down to a number of things. Firstly is they don't understand us. Secondly, as you suggest, they see us as rich fat cats. And thirdly, the ever creeping Big Brother State & Control freak Government find it difficult to keep tabs on us.

 

[Conachair]

[ QUOTE ]
IMO, we really do not have the freedom we may have expected, not by any stretch of the imagination

[/ QUOTE ]
Easy way out may be to accept that your expectations of the future may be nothing like when the future becomes the now. Dreams come true but when they do you still have to wash the dishes, unblock the heads and sh*t still happens. I haven't seen any "taxes, charges and extortion in whichever corner we turn......" but if you start to make up your mind that that's the way it is then maybe you will find it. Or you could hope to find beauty, the intense stressful pleasure of being self sufficient, the warmth and generosity of strangers and so much more. Reality is perception. You really can choose.

 

[charles_reed]

Not my experience during the last 8 years in Europe.

However I've only stayed for more than 6 months in France and the problems to which you allude are local autonomous community taxes (I believe) in Baleares (ask George Sand how welcoming they are), and Valencia.

If you look on it as an attempt by the local government to claim their local rates, it's quite reasonable, when most of the people who are being targetted are those who keep their boat permanaently in Spain as a holiday home.

It is also the law in France that if you're living on your boat in one place for a year, the boat has to be re-registered as French, and you and the boat have to conform to local requirements in equipment, Taxes and certificates.

You are probably a trifle naive to expect to enjoy the benefits of any locality without contributing something towards the upkeep.

There is an easy answer - MOVE ON.

 

[BurnitBlue]

A country must protect her borders. You need permission to enter another country and always have done. The Q-flag requests permission. In the EU the borders are still there but allowance is made for members of the EU "superstate".

A country has every right to pass and enable any law they choose and they can choose to apply that law to anybody they like. And get away with it.

Dear Grumpy, if you think your freedom for unlimited and unrestrained travel is being abused, then take a moment to reflect on the situation in the past and for some unfortunites the present.

I thank my lucky stars that I won the lottery of life and was born British. Imagine being a Palestinian boat owner or pre aparthied SA or a soviet just a handlfull of years ago.

Look on the bright side (of life) tra la whostle whistle.

 

[Alyssa]

I was once given the following advice by my boss when I was in a difficult situation with my parent company headquarter's colleagues......
Ask yourself the following two questions...

1) Realistically are you going to change their minds? and
2) Do you feel so strongly about it that you are prepared to resign over it ?
If the answer is NO to both questions, then let it drop and MOVE ON.

I found this to be sound advice...which I passed on to others during my working career.
Applying it to your concerns.... 1) are you going to change government policies? and 2) are you prepared to give up the liveaboard life?

I would suggest the answer to 1) is NO and the answer to 2) is up to you!

 

[saltwater_gypsy]

Lets face it---IT'S THE END OF AN ERA.
Ten or twenty years ago we would read about idyllic cruising (The Hiscocks and all that) and gradually , over the interveningyears, we patched together the set of circumstances which have allowed us to liveaboard in the Med. today.
We still have great time, but the sheer number of yachts, the costs in marinas, the bureaucracy etc makes it different from the "old days".
What can you do about it? Well you anchor where possible to avoid marinas; you are patient with officials and you avoid the flotillas.
Ten years from now, someone will raise the same point and reckon that WE were very priveleged NOT to have for example:
(1)an annual license to skipper a boat (cost £350),
(2)an annual fee for owning a boat (£1550),
(3)a special wealth tax when buying a boat(20% of value)
(4)the necessity of lodging a passage plan with the MCA for even the shortest of outings (£25 per application)
(5) annual safety inspections (£1500)
etc etc (suggestions welcome)

 

[Sandyman]

As for being wrongly penalised for wanting freedom, I would suggest that is down to how the individual interprets it. What I do object to more than anything else is b****y land lubbers interfering with my chosen way of life. They may not understand it, but then I dont ask them to. So why must they interfere becasue I choose not to conform to what they see as a normal way of life.

 

[groper]

The one thing about being a liveaboard is the freedom to move if you don't like your neighbours. That includes governments as well as rowdy ravers next door. If I lived in a house, which was mortgaged for a great sum of money and not a boat I'd bought outright, I would be stuck with that mortgage, those neighbours and that government for quite a time. Instead, as others have said, I can move to a place that suits me. Time and time again.

Be thankful you are not stuck in one spot but in a home that can change its view (be that location, government or neighbours) and in an international community of boaties who are far more friendly than landlubbers AND look out for each other!

 

[BrianH]

[ QUOTE ]
Lets face it---IT'S THE END OF AN ERA.

What can you do about it? Well you anchor where possible to avoid marinas; you are patient with officials and you avoid the flotillas.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is almost impossible in my favourite cruising area - the Adriatic in general and Croatia in particular.

The area has become so crowded - charterers contribute enormously to that, not just flotillas - and the Croatian authorities are moving to make anchoring overnight illegal on the pretext of "protecting the environment" thus driving everyone into costly marinas and onto charged buoys, that it is indeed "the end of an era".

 

[Ariadne]

Just keep sailing, just keep sailing, just keep sailing, just keep sailing.

Enjoy our freedom while we still have it. It might not be as good as in the 'good old days' but its all we have got, so you have to make the most of it. We have all elected to opt out of 'normal' society and to be honest it scares the [--word removed--] out of them. Our respective governments can't effectively track us, watch us and tell us what to do and when to do it. So they have to try and penalise us (for our own safety as HMG states).

Look on the bright side, at least we are not stuck in a cold UK with a spinless government trying to control our every move.

 

[BobnLesley]

Freedom's just a state of mind; if you're not happy and can't ignore the local downers, then at least with a boat you've the means to move on.

As an example, Adriatic anchoring restrictions got a mention: Why not just up anchor and move to another Cruising Ground? If a sufficient proportion of boats were to eventually do the same, then the economic imperatives would force the relevant authorities to reconsider. Alternatively, if you feel the benefits/joys of staying there outweigh this one downer, then stay there and enjoy it; but don't stay/pay and then moan as that'll achieve nothing beyond spoiling your own day.

 

[BobnLesley]

[ QUOTE ]
a spinless government

[/ QUOTE ]

/forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif, whilst there's a long list of things that history will record about the current government, that certainly won't be one of them.

 

[Ariadne]

OK, OK, I meant SPINELESS!!!

We all know that SPIN is the way ahead for current and future UK governments, and I'm sure you knew what I meant.

My family and I are very much enjoying our cruising, live-aboard life style, and the further away from the UK we get the better it seems. I'm not being penalised for my lifestyle where we are, but I'm sure they'll find some way to penalise us if we ever decide to return to the UK!

 

[Sandyman]

[ QUOTE ]
We all know that SPIN is the way ahead for current and future UK governments, and I'm sure you knew what I meant.

[/ QUOTE ]

The way I saw it was that I had two choices. Stay in UK and fight the b******s which would mean becoming a two faced lying Pollio. Or go to sea. Not a difficult choice to make was it /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
Now making preps to sail for the Med and beyond, in the spring.
And, we have no intentions of ever returning.

 

[grumpygit]

Thank you for your mostly positive replies, they are for once mainly reassuring instead of the general negativity that comes from some quarters on this forum.
It would be a breath of fresh air if there were to be more good news than bad. I make no apologies for making my thread up from snippets of information taken from posts from the dark side.

Is there not enough gloom and doom about already without turning the forum into platform for tabloid-like sensationalism? It's a new year and there has got to be some good news and tales to be told out there.

As for us, we have not yet set off (planned for April 09) and it is going to be all new for us. We do not have a yard stick to be liveaboards except for the useful threads that are posted, even though we have owned and cruised yachts on the NE coast of England, Southern Spain and have cruised Croatia for the last couple of years for holidays. We will be setting off with an open mind and will take what is thrown at us in our stride regardless of the scare mongers.

Come on some of you, get off your high horses and bar stools ( careful with that one, drink can make you giddy ) and lighten up for 09.

Onwards and upwards ! /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

 

[Sandyman]

I detest anyone telling me what & what I cannot do. I detest the UK Police State & the UK dictatorial Government. Idid not want to be part of it and now i'm not. I live at sea. I dont have a vote. But then what idiot would i vote for anyway?

 

[binch]

Distilling all those posts and then filtering out the bees from bonnets, there is a common thread. One has to draw the distinction between the semi-stationary houseboat who has really become a resident in whatever country, and the cruising yacht on the move.
Life is still good for the latter and an important thing is to be a good neighbour wherever you go. And don't go back if you feel unwelcome.
My own never-again places:
Cartagena and......er......and.......er, so that's the only bad reception we've ever had.

 

[binch]

My wife has just reminded me that on the day after the Heysel stadium disaster we were asked to leave Trapani, not because the Port Captain was unreasonable, but because he thought there might be trouble from the yobs.