Broads Stakeholders

[vanessan]

Oooh, I think I noticed four stinkies on the move in that video. Along with 5,389 yachts and 4,617 SUPs.  (Do you think someone is trying to make a point? I rather think if anyone came to the Broads expecting the rivers and lakes (!!) to be exactly like that might be a tad disappointed. I know it’s not meant to be a tourist promotion video but it may well attract some folk who want something different.

 

[Bytheriver]

53 minutes ago, Poppy said:

JM, your post came in as I was typing in a similar vein to the Academy in which I referenced the various legislations pertaining to the Broads and information on The Sandford Principle ( a report from the Broads Society. )

Here is an update from the Campaign for National Parks (The charity which encompasses all of the English & Welsh National Park Friends Groups)  https://www.cnp.org.uk/blog/ensuring-national-parks-benefit-planning-reforms

[JennyMorgan]

15 minutes ago, Bytheriver said:

Here is an update from the Campaign for National Parks (The charity which encompasses all of the English & Welsh National Park Friends Groups)  https://www.cnp.org.uk/blog/ensuring-national-parks-benefit-planning-reforms

Obviously us mere minions need to maintain a cautious eye on proceedings.

Interesting point emerging though, and I quote:

". . . . .  and enhancing landscape and scenic beauty in National Parks, the Broads and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty . . . . . . "

The Broads is mentioned, as are AONBs, alongside but separate to the 'real' national parks. Perhaps the message is finally sinking in, hopefully.

[FairTmiddlin]

Loved the fact that over the lakes title they showed. Possibly the track to the Locks inn and the flooded fields.

[Vaughan]

1 hour ago, Vaughan said:

All right then, I'll do it after lunch . . .  

So, I have watched it.  It was either that or Songs of Praise and even that nowadays, is more concerned with its agenda message, than actual "songs of praise".

It is only a couple of minutes so I have watched it several times.  I have noticed a few things, not necessarily in order of appearance :

When we get the title on screen "Welcome to the Broads National park", it appears over an aerial view of the Whitlingham gravel pits.  That should tell us something, for a start!

Gillingham Dam in Beccles, when flooded in mid winter, is neither a lake, nor a Broad.  Just a flooded marsh road.

Nice shots of the Yare Navigation Race but that only happens on one day a year, so hardly "typical".  Same applies to regatta sailing on Black Horse Broad.

Fallow deer stags, galloping over a stubble field, in open country?  When did you last see that from your holiday cruiser?

Five white horses, rolling in the mud on heathland?  Breckland, maybe, but not Broadland.  So not typical!

Distance swimming on the Waveney is hardly typical either!

I thought burning off reed stubble was no longer allowed, on the Broads?

I did see that the paddle boarders were in lifejackets and appeared to be supervised.  They were also filmed in quiet waters around Coltishall, which are suitable for that activity.

I am left wondering what this is supposed to represent?  If it is someone's vision of the Broads, then it is not mine!

So is it a mis-representation?  Perhaps that is the question.

 

[OldBerkshireBoy]

Doesn`t exactly "Do what it say`s on the tin" does it but then adverts rarely do.

[Poppy]

1 hour ago, Vaughan said:

So, I have watched it.  It was either that or Songs of Praise and even that nowadays, is more concerned with its agenda message, than actual "songs of praise".

It is only a couple of minutes so I have watched it several times.  I have noticed a few things, not necessarily in order of appearance :

When we get the title on screen "Welcome to the Broads National park", it appears over an aerial view of the Whitlingham gravel pits.  That should tell us something, for a start!

Gillingham Dam in Beccles, when flooded in mid winter, is neither a lake, nor a Broad.  Just a flooded marsh road.

Nice shots of the Yare Navigation Race but that only happens on one day a year, so hardly "typical".  Same applies to regatta sailing on Black Horse Broad.

Fallow deer stags, galloping over a stubble field, in open country?  When did you last see that from your holiday cruiser?

Five white horses, rolling in the mud on heathland?  Breckland, maybe, but not Broadland.  So not typical!

Distance swimming on the Waveney is hardly typical either!

I thought burning off reed stubble was no longer allowed, on the Broads?

I did see that the paddle boarders were in lifejackets and appeared to be supervised.  They were also filmed in quiet waters around Coltishall, which are suitable for that activity.

I am left wondering what this is supposed to represent?  If it is someone's vision of the Broads, then it is not mine!

So is it a mis-representation?  Perhaps that is the question.

 

Straw and stubble burning has been illeagal for some years AFAIK, but I regulary see burning (of reed straw ?) beside Barton and lower down the Ant towards How Hkll.

[HEM]

4 hours ago, Poppy said:

What's with the obsession with SUPs ???

I honestly do not believe that I could stand up on one of those boards let alone paddle at the same time.
I was most impressed to see a bikini-clad not-so-young lady succesfully paddling her SUP - albeit slowly - across the bay at Cala Fornells (Mallorca) back in 2017.

I'll stick to my glider / Sailplane.

[HEM]

44 minutes ago, Poppy said:

Straw and stubble burning has been illeagal for some years AFAIK...

Many, many years ago (probably before I got involved in the sport of gliding) there used to be gliding competitions organised in the UK in Autumn using the lift from stubble fires.  I believe that these were known as "Kipper Competitions".

[floydraser]

5 hours ago, JennyMorgan said:

Another Academy offering:

 

I saw this and the other offerings by the academy although I haven't watched it all the way through. Again, comments turned off. 

The description introduces it as being aimed at students of the academy. So assuming that to be true, the good news is that it won't be being peddled all around the place to potential tourists. The bad news is that the academy has made a massive mistake in two parts, or even two massive mistakes: 1 The information is wrong/inbalanced 2. They've made the videos public. 

If I wanted to secrectly brainwash a bunch of students into becoming my own Master Race, I would keep quiet about it and make the videos private. The fact that they haven't shows they've failed to do their homework on the workings of Youtube, or have they? It would be very interesting to see the search tags entered for these videos. 

My own Master Race are not ready yet; they're still in my secret lair below BGM....

[vanessan]

8 minutes ago, floydraser said:

The description introduces it as being aimed at students of the academy. So assuming that to be true, the good news is that it won't be being peddled all around the place to potential tourists.

Surely students are potential tourists too? They do go on holidays as far as I am aware. They also have friends and family and word of mouth very often has an effect. 

[floydraser]

22 minutes ago, vanessan said:

Surely students are potential tourists too? They do go on holidays as far as I am aware. They also have friends and family and word of mouth very often has an effect. 

True. I meant tourists in the broader sense.

[JennyMorgan]

13 minutes ago, vanessan said:

Surely students are potential tourists too? They do go on holidays as far as I am aware. They also have friends and family and word of mouth very often has an effect. 

Very true, Venessa, but education should be based on fact, not personal ambition and whimsey.  The Courts agreed that the BNP branding / lie could be used for marketing, no mention in their judgement that it could also be used in education. 

Unsurprisingly the BA has involved itself in education, catch 'em young!.

[vanessan]

1 hour ago, JennyMorgan said:

Very true, Venessa, but education should be based on fact, not personal ambition and whimsey.  The Courts agreed that the BNP branding / lie could be used for marketing, no mention in their judgement that it could also be used in education. 

Unsurprisingly the BA has involved itself in education, catch 'em young!.

I think that’s the point I was trying to make. The students involved will most probably accept what they are told and then pass the information on to all and sundry whether or not that information is correct. 

[Cheesey69]

The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world. 
Since returning to The Broads, I’ve had the feeling anything with a motor in it is being marginalised with the environmental hammer used to beat us down. 
Even down to the argument how natural is The Broads. The greatest danger is complacency. 
Rights can always be changed or lost, mission statements changed with enough public backing 

[JennyMorgan]

2 hours ago, Cheesey69 said:

Even down to the argument how natural is The Broads.

JP sought to prove that the Broads is not a natural waterway in order to gain further control. The Broads is largely a tidal water, a branch of the open sea, thus there remains a public right to navigate. He then sought NP status in order to gain Stanford which would have given him the ability to exclude boats and anglers from designated 'sensitive' waters, he would then have been able to over rule our common law rights and traditions of access and navigation.   

[Vaughan]

7 hours ago, JennyMorgan said:

he would then have been able to over rule our common law rights and traditions of access and navigation.   

When reading your posts, Peter, I think we should all remember that as an ex member yourself, you have far more actual experience of the inner workings of the BA than we do.  A couple of years ago, I counted 5 other ex members who I know personally and have spoken to about this.  They all expressed the same opinion as yourself.  Funny, that!

It is certain that promoted activities such as canoe-ing, paddle-boarding and pram pushing are pretty well maintenance free : you don't need any dredging of a navigation, or overnight moorings for a paddle board!  You don't even have to keep that navigation "open".  All you would need is national park style "public right of access".  In other words, yet more car parks and public toilets.

I am often left wondering what would actually happen if the Broads really was closed to pleasure boat navigation, both power and sail?  Sail means dredging, remember.  What would happen to it, with not enough income to maintain it?  Would it, as I fear, become just a glorified wildlife reserve, from which the public would be kept off?  That is certainly the published vision of the RSPB!  I was going to say "bird" reserve but I think that, left to his own heavily protected devices, the otter would soon put paid to the birds!

I am certainly very aware of the potential threat to the future of the Broads and Floydraser clearly sees these videos as a threat as well.  Society is changing and the public way of life is changing.  The "paddle boarder" may well be someone with a lot of political clout, in years to come.

So is this "for marketing purposes"?

Or is it insidious and grossly biased political education of youth?

It certainly wouldn't sell me a Broads holiday but I somehow don't think that was the point of it!

[TheQ]

I object to that second video, not just because it's titled with those words, but because its got a full front of me.... my face that is...

[Vaughan]

24 minutes ago, TheQ said:

I object to that second video, not just because it's titled with those words, but because its got a full front of me.... my face that is...

I wasn't going to mention that !

[JennyMorgan]

32 minutes ago, TheQ said:

I object to that second video, not just because it's titled with those words, but because its got a full front of me.... my face that is...

Wouldn't want to be seen as a supporter of the unmentionable!

[Vaughan]

15 minutes ago, JennyMorgan said:

Wouldn't want to be seen as a supporter of the unmentionable!

I think it was Oscar Wilde, who called fox hunting the pursuit of the uneatable by the unspeakable.

[JennyMorgan]

The sad thing is that had the 'right' man come along with an acceptable, fair agenda, with agreed protection for access and navigation, then he might have carried Broads folk along with him. I'm afraid that raising people's hackles from day one is a real non winner, especially when hard earned, established trust is destroyed on the way. As a well known commentator on Broads matters once remarked, words to the effect of: "If you want to lead Broads folk then find out where they are going and then walk behind them." For JP it is his career, for us it is our lives. I see only one way forward, a fresh start.

[Vaughan]

11 minutes ago, JennyMorgan said:

The sad thing is that had the 'right' man come along with an acceptable, fair agenda, with agreed protection for access and navigation, then he might have carried Broads folk along with him. I'm afraid that raising people's hackles from day one is a real non winner, especially when hard earned, established trust is destroyed on the way.

I don't know the Good Doctor and have never met him but I did meet Aitken Clark now and again.  He may have been a bit of a cold fish at times but he seemed to know what was needed of him.  The demise of the River Commissioners and the rise of the new BA was not widely appreciated at the time, by those of my father's generation who had worked hard, from all viewpoints, to make the Broads into what we now know today, since the last War.  Everyone worked together for a common aim, including naturalists such as Ted Ellis, who clearly understood that the Broads are not "natural" and have to be commercial, in order to be maintained.  He was not short in saying so, either.  In Blakes in those days, we laughingly used to think of it as more of a League of Gentlemen than a multi-million pound business.  Which it was, even then.

Public grant money for national parks and the like is going to be in very short supply in the years to come, post COVID.  We are heading for what will probably be a crippling recession.  River tolls from navigation will suddenly become of vital importance.

Those with wonderful and political visions for the Broads, should perhaps be careful what they wish for, in these times.

[floydraser]

3 hours ago, Vaughan said:

I am certainly very aware of the potential threat to the future of the Broads and Floydraser clearly sees these videos as a threat as well.  

A respectful point of order Vaughan: As far as the BA is concerned I remain on the fence. I don't see the videos as a threat in themselves. What I will always highlight though is what my mind interprets as dishonesty bordering on corruption of a body who, I presume are funded partly by the taxpayer, putting out propaganda in favour of (presumably) one or more of it's supplementary funding sources. If I get more time on my hands I may investigate the funding of this academy. Either way, if they want to make a video promoting paddleboarding then I don't have a problem with that, just call it "Paddleboarding for all" or something and state if you're getting any funding/advantages (advertising/discounts) for it.

What may be a better project for the young students of the academy is this: Do your research into the history of the Broads Authority and then research the history of the Broads National Park status. Now produce a video which busts a gut to unite all parties to make an agreeable future for the Broads and it's prospects. Get everyone on board and working for a common cause. An excellent opportunity to learn how to communicate effectively and with purpose. You will also have achieved something which will push your academy to the top of the ratings making it an extremely valuable asset to your CV as well as easing future funding.

Carry on as you are and it'll be nothing to be proud of.

I also have no problem at all with anyone helping with the education of our young people, but "help" shouldn't be used as an oportunity to brainwash.

 

[Vaughan]

15 minutes ago, floydraser said:

As far as the BA is concerned I remain on the fence. I don't see the videos as a threat in themselves.

Neutrality, down the years, has always been a most difficult position to maintain.  Especially if you are perched up on a fence!  I am sorry if I misunderstood your posts but they gave me the impression that you see the videos as a threat. Indeed, I still have that impression, and I agree with what you have just said about education.