CANAL & RIVER TRUST issued a press release on the 31st July detailing the outcome of its 'National Boat Count 2025'.
In previous years, the trust has released this information two months earlier.
Scapegoating certain sections
The unexplained delay has fuelled speculation in some quarters that figures were being altered to support CRT's scapegoating of certain sections of the boating community.
Allan Richards has examined CRT's figures and they do not add up ...
Evasion
CRT and British Waterways before it has a long history of attempting to tackle what it calls evasion. BW director, Simon Salem had bonus earning targets set to reduce unlicensed boats from over 10% to 3%. CRT picked up the 3% target that Salem had almost achieved but failed to deliver on it. Rather that admit defeat, CRT decided on keeping it below 5% as a replacement target.
However, year on year the number of unlicensed boats has risen.
One of the veiled messages in the National Boat Count figures is that one in ten boats are now unlicensed with the blame being put upon boats without a home mooring. This is double CRT's target of 5% and treble its 3% target
What CRT never explains is why, with a claimed 3,000 unlicensed boats on it system, it only manages to remove about 100 per year.
They also fail to explain what proportion of evasion is due to CRT refusing licences that have been applied for.
Not adding up
CRT's 2023 National Boat Count shows that compliance (boats with licences ) was 93% and evasion (boats without licences) was 7% (this adds up to 100%).
The same figures for 2024 are 91.8% and 8.2% (again adding up to 100%).
However, the figures for 2025 do not add up. CRT gives compliance as 90.9% and evasion as 9.9%. That does not add up to 100%. It adds up to 100.8%...
FOI request
It would be inappropriate, at this point in time, to speculate or accuse CRT of manipulating the outcome of the 2025 Boat Count. That said, it is difficult to understand how and why CRT has provided contradictory information and why it was two months late in publication.
A Freedom of Information request has been made to give CRT the opportunity to correct its press release.