Red diesel - reply from the Belgian Embassy

[Burnham Bob]

Rather than post at the end of what must be one of the longest threads ever, I have received the following cryptic reply to my letter and e-mail.

Dear Mr Calver,
I’m contacting you following your writing to the Belgian embassy. Unfortunately the email you sent via the embassy website was not passed on to me and I apologise for that.

The Belgian authorities are currently awaiting the result of an investigation launched by the EU Commission following a UK complaint pertaining to the fining of yachts using red marine diesel in Belgian waters. Let me reassure you that my authorities will implement the COM’s recommendations, whatever those might be, once they have received them. Meanwhile, they will continue to implement strictly the EU legislation as they understand it should be.

I have now written back as follows:-

Dear Mr Dikschen,

Thank you for your e-mail. Please would you clarify what you mean by "they will continue to implement strictly the EU legislation as they understand it should be". Is their understanding that no vessel should have red diesel in its main fuel tank, although that red diesel was duty paid in the UK to the satisfaction of Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs?

If that is the case, then no pleasure vessel can in practice sail from England to a Belgian port without facing severe financial penalties from Belgian Customs. We cannot fill our main tanks at UK marinas with any diesel other than red diesel.

Please could you therefore clarify the point as to the current understanding of the Belgian authorities. Will red diesel automatically mean a fine when we visit Belgium?

so watch this space for the reply.............this one could run and run!

 

[Reverend Ludd]

Nice one

So much for freedom to travel.

 

[baggypipes]

belgian

hi bob.
many thanks for the update looking forward to further reading.
Does anyone have input from RYA? Will they actually do anything to represent us, or will they as usual, as i see it, do nothing.

 

[sailorman]

hi bob.
many thanks for the update looking forward to further reading.
Does anyone have input from RYA? Will they actually do anything to represent us, or will they as usual, as i see it, do nothing.

if they do nothing i will reconsider my 40 yr continuous membership

 

[Appledore]

Thanks for this, Bob.

A very contentious issue for all boat owners visiting Belgium and The Netherlands too.

I wonder what there stance is on boats departing from the Channel Islands, which are not in the UK, nor the European Union? My own boat is registered (Part 1 Registration) in St Peter Port, but kept in Cornwall!

Also, and my main thoughts on this topic is about those Dutch and Belgian boats visiting the UK, and having to replenish their own tanks with red diesel. I guess they would be in the same boat, literally!

As has already been said (other posting) it is such a pity that hundreds, perhaps thousands of UK boat owners will not be visiting those shores until the matter is cleared up one way or the other.

Geoff

 

[Bosun Higgs]

if they do nothing i will reconsider my 40 yr continuous membership

Who do you think started this off but the RYA " an investigation launched by the EU Commission following a UK complaint pertaining to the fining of yachts using red marine diesel in Belgian waters"

 

[maxi77]

Who do you think started this off but the RYA " an investigation launched by the EU Commission following a UK complaint pertaining to the fining of yachts using red marine diesel in Belgian waters"

Please do not respond an attack on the RYA with facts.

 

[jtwebb]

There is also the point that Belgian and Dutch boats will not be coming to the UK as they can not do anything but top up with red diesel. We are all banned from going to a garage to buy white diesel and then filling from cans in the marina, even if we were able to carry it back. They will therefore be returning via or to Belgium with red diesel.

 

[exfinnsailor]

There is also the point that Belgian and Dutch boats will not be coming to the UK as they can not do anything but top up with red diesel. We are all banned from going to a garage to buy white diesel and then filling from cans in the marina, even if we were able to carry it back. They will therefore be returning via or to Belgium with red diesel.

We fill our tanks with white diesel using cans. No one has complained at :-

Southwold
Ramsholt
Ipswich Haven
Burnham
Greenwich
Ramsgate

 

[Rivers & creeks]

Good grief - The Kipper's tanks take 800 litres of diesel, there's no way we'll risk a fine. A real blow as we love our annual trip to Belgium. Looks like it will be the West Country after all this year.

 

[Tranona]

hi bob.
many thanks for the update looking forward to further reading.
Does anyone have input from RYA? Will they actually do anything to represent us, or will they as usual, as i see it, do nothing.

Just look on the RYA site for an update. The action taken by both RYA and HMG in response to the EU complaint is well documented and widely reported in the press - although inevitably not yet resolved one way or the other.

 

[alan_d]

We are all banned from going to a garage to buy white diesel and then filling from cans in the marina.

Who are we all and who is doing the banning?

 

[prv]

Who are we all and who is doing the banning?

Not me. I filled up with cans before the Cherbourg trip as I couldn't get out at a time the fuel barge would be open.

Pete

 

[Burnham Bob]

My Trapper 500 only has a small fuel tank, but lugging a series of gallon (or 5 litre of you've gone metric) cans from a nearby garage to the marina and filling up with white diesel just isn't a practical proposition.

The idea of a mobo doing it is absurd. Even though I could top up with white diesel in the marina (although there are usually rules if you read the small print about unauthorised fuelling) it's a very difficlt process, although I can imagine it will be about the only way I can call in at Ostend on a coastal hop from Dunkerque to Vlissingen and will involve lots of trips to garages here in Burnham and at Ramsgate where we itend to sail from.

Marina bought red diesel is duty paid - it should say so on the receipt - so the Belgains are actually fining us for having dye in the diesel - not for avoiding duty.

Only the EU could create this state of affairs with the opportunities it offers idiot jobsworth bureaucrats to interpret complicated rules. And no - I'm not anti EEC - just the idiots who pore over the rules.

 

[PCUK]

EEC? I don't think so. That's what we voted for! You must mean EU that no-one voted for and which is now happily crumbling, brought down by one tiny country. Hooray!

 

[Sinc]

Marina bought red diesel is duty paid - it should say so on the receipt - so the Belgains are actually fining us for having dye in the diesel - not for avoiding duty.

When we buy red diesel in the UK the receipt usually has a VAT No. on it but nothing to say duty has been paid. Asking for a 'proper' VAT receipt usually gets a blank look.

Does anyone know what constitutes acceptable proof (outside the UK) of duty paid?

 

[Bosun Higgs]

The idea of a mobo doing it is absurd. .

Dont know about that. You should see the trailers wiith 50 gall drums of red diesel coming for our motorboats. Amazing what people will do to save money.

 

[ithet]

Groundhog Day

When we buy red diesel in the UK the receipt usually has a VAT No. on it but nothing to say duty has been paid. Asking for a 'proper' VAT receipt usually gets a blank look.

Does anyone know what constitutes acceptable proof (outside the UK) of duty paid?

And that completes the circle, back to the beggining of the prvious thread!
http://www.ybw.com/forums/showthread.php?t=291897

 

[maby]

EEC? I don't think so. That's what we voted for! You must mean EU that no-one voted for and which is now happily crumbling, brought down by one tiny country. Hooray!

We can but hope...

 

[Csail]

Ignore the law, by red but also carry an empty bottle of redx. Nothing illegal about that..
Also write all the vat docs in Welsh....yhey give up. When u do get pulled don't speak english just express i don't understand.