Do cavers come first in the British Caving Association? NO!

[John S]

We have had quite a bit of discussion now and a couple of things have come to light.

While remembering the BCA statement :-

4.6. That the owners and tenants of property containing caves have the right to grant or withhold access.
Where caving bodies have control of access delegated to them by the owners, such access should be obtained and granted as freely as possible for all responsible cavers, within the terms of those agreements. When obliged to make new agreements, the appropriate body should endeavour to ensure that this freedom is maintained or improved.

The first line may now be a wish rather than fact, when applied to CRoW land. Thus some rewording to reflect this should be proposed and sent to BCA.
To be tidied up but something like "That the owners and tenants of property containing caves have the right to grant or withhold access, but on CRoW land the situation may differ." This could go even further but it would probably be better to have a working document on it. (like D Judson's but with more detail, maybe examples etc.)

The second point is that some access agreements have not stuck to "such access should be obtained and granted as freely as possible for all responsible cavers" and "endeavour to ensure that this freedom is maintained or improved". Access arrangements by various bodies and groups should have some form of review to see if they are breaking this clause. Either regional or national level.

 

[graham]

John

If you want to waste your time and money challenging in court whether David's comments on CroW and cave access are correct or not then do so. Until then his wording stands.

However, be prepared for the vast majority of the UK's caving population wishing to dump ordure on your head when you screw over caver/landowner relations across the country.

As for your second point, well the qualifier "as possible" is there for a reason, you know.

 

[Ian Adams]

4.6. That the owners and tenants of property containing caves have the right to grant or withhold access.

I think this is a perfectly reasonable policy for the BCA to adopt.

In the case of non-CROW land, landowners have the right to grant/deny access in any event.

With CROW land, the very best one could argue (and it has been argued) is that there is no legal case precedent. In the interests of harbouring good relations with landowners and being seen to be a credible organisation (and certainly in the absence of a legal precedent), I would consider that the BCA has a perfectly proper policy in this regard.

"such access should be obtained and granted as freely as possible for all responsible cavers" and "endeavour to ensure that this freedom is maintained or improved".

Yes I agree.

However, the statement is obviously open to interpretation (certainly in respect of degree) and we (cavers) are largely in the hands of the access agents opinions in respect of each cave/mine/hole we would like to venture down. I would think that if an access body were unreasonably denying access (under the terms of their BCA membership/insurance) then a complaint to the regional caving body (or the BCA) might be the right course of action ?

So far, I, personally, have not been denied access anywhere  .... I have to wonder how many other people have been denied (I expect it will be very few....)

Ian

 

[Stu]

There seems to me to be two distinctions which need to be made here - CRoW land and "private" non-CRoW land (yes I know CRoW can be private).

CRoW allows walkers, climbers and many other recreational groups the "right" to have fair recreational use. This situation has been a statute for circa 10 years. Being an active outdoor type, mingling with owners, users, tenants, professionals of the land, there has been (anecdotally) no major grievances. It would seem land owners have nothing to worry about from the hoi polloi wandering around as they might have first thought. Would somewhere like say the Allotment (closed March to October - to cavers at least) really be affected by if this closed season was lifted? The walkers can still walk up there but not me as a caver. Hmm. And it doesn't help that if I'm not in a CNCC affiliated club it could affect my application. Isn't part of the BCA's Youth and Development Campaign about making it easier to get into caving (what with numbers being at an all time low - though Descent reported figures being slightly higher than last year)?

Ok conservation of the caves are rightfully an issue but then "control" in the loose sense of the word could be given to CNCC to monitor.

Issues of increased liability to the land owners are, I think, a smokescreen...

http://www.naturalengland.org.uk/Images/Liability_tcm6-9802.pdf

It seems liability is reduced with CRoW (ironically permitting or inviting people on to your land might increase it - if my reading of this is right).

So what about people digging on land? - which seems to concern some people in as much as they presume landowners will decide not to allow such activity in what I think people are inferring, as a fit of pique for our audacity at asking for a bit more of the pie. If people want to dig they'll do what they've always done surely... ask the relevant people!

As for anything not CRoW. Keep it as it is. We're not greedy. We're not at the vanguard of an anti-landowner revolution.   

 

[Bob Mehew]

It seems liability is reduced with CRoW (ironically permitting or inviting people on to your land might increase it - if my reading of this is right).

Please recall the "dispute" of whether CROW applies to "inside" the cave means that if CROW does not apply inside the cave, then neither does the easing of liability given by CROW.  And your reading is correct, if a land owner does permit someone a person onto their land, then their potential liability is some what greater than if the person goes on the land without permission.  Also no one has mentioned another problem relating to a land owner using the land as a place of work.  That brings a new set of legal requirements on the land owner which frankly I don't have the inclination to explain.  See Radon Underground for more details.  (I will admit to using the term land owner loosely.)

 

[oli]

Rumour has it student clubs are rather low down the MLCMAC agenda and that the CCCltd are a shadowy group who enjoy making acess difficult.

We dont seem to be doing a particually good job of ensureing easy acess and conservation of caves where responcibility for this has been delagated to us. prahaps we should sort our own house before clarafing the position of caves under CRoW legeslation.

 

[Les W]

Rumour has it student clubs are rather low down the MLCMAC agenda and that the CCCltd are a shadowy group who enjoy making acess difficult.

I cannot speak for MLCMAC but if you want to visit the Charterhouse controlled caves (CCC Ltd) then just turn up at the Wessex and ask for keys and permits.
No problems and no "shadowy groups".
Even if you are students.

 

[oli]

Rumour has it student clubs are rather low down the MLCMAC agenda and that the CCCltd are a shadowy group who enjoy making acess difficult.

I cannot speak for MLCMAC but if you want to visit the Charterhouse controlled caves (CCC Ltd) then just turn up at the Wessex and ask for keys and permits.
No problems and no "shadowy groups".
Even if you are students.

I'm fine with the CCC ltd, and I was quite happy with the Dreanan padlock, but enough cavers seem to enjoy arguing about caver controlled acess procedures to make me think that getting control of acess ourselves is prahaps anouther argument.

 

[AndyF]

I cannot speak for MLCMAC but if you want to visit the Charterhouse controlled caves (CCC Ltd) then just turn up at the Wessex and ask for keys and permits.
No problems and no "shadowy groups".
Even if you are students.

Maybe Im just unlucky..... but I've done that three times and was successful in getting keys and permits once. One of the times the person who could issue permits had a "massive hangover" and would/could not get out of bed, the other we were given the wrong key and assured it would work as it was "the same". The person who knew had gone out for breakfast.

Unimpressive when you have driven for three hours and your caving trip is fecked up by paperwork/uninformed/drunkards.

Not bothered caving in the Mendips since.

 

[graham]

I cannot speak for MLCMAC but if you want to visit the Charterhouse controlled caves (CCC Ltd) then just turn up at the Wessex and ask for keys and permits.
No problems and no "shadowy groups".
Even if you are students.

Maybe Im just unlucky..... but I've done that three times and was successful in getting keys and permits once. One of the times the person who could issue permits had a "massive hangover" and would/could not get out of bed, the other we were given the wrong key and assured it would work as it was "the same". The person who knew had gone out for breakfast.

Unimpressive when you have driven for three hours and your caving trip is fecked up by paperwork/uninformed/drunkards.

Not bothered caving in the Mendips since.

Maybe you'd have had better luck with the BEC, or the Shepton, or the MNRC or the ...

 

[ChrisJC]

Maybe you'd have had better luck with the BEC, or the Shepton, or the MNRC or the ...

By which time it would be time to go home..... 

Chris.

 

[graham]

Maybe you'd have had better luck with the BEC, or the Shepton, or the MNRC or the ...

By which time it would be time to go home..... 

Chris.

Really? The belfry is, what, five minutes from Upper Pitts?

 

[Elaine]

This 'turn up - there'll be someone there who can help you' approach is too vague for my liking and bound to backfire occasionslly and cause much hassle to the person requesting the key.

 

[cap n chris]

I'm fine with the CCC ltd, and I was quite happy with the Dreanan padlock, but enough cavers seem to enjoy arguing about caver controlled acess procedures to make me think that getting control of acess ourselves is prahaps anouther argument.

There's probably a brilliant thread there!

I'm guessing you're mebbe suggesting that cavers purchase caves, thus ensuring they have unfettered access?

I think you may be stumbling into sacrosanct territory though since IIRC cavers generally want to have someone else's paid-for cake and eat it. Also there's some neat "problems" with this approach (examples from the USA spring to mind) and the nature of clubs/RCCs and ownership issues.

A recently mentioned scenario was Lamb Leer and the landowner's request for the regional caving council to stump up (a mere) ?4k for 3 years' access. Clearly this would NEVER (why, is beyond me) have been acceptable to the beardy wasp-suckers, even though it would probably have worked out less per head than pretty much all the other goodwill access sites locally.

 

[langcliffe]

I'm guessing you're mebbe suggesting that cavers purchase caves, thus ensuring they have unfettered access?

BSA, under the leadership of Ely Simpson, leased Lancaster Hole and the surrounding moor with interesting consequences.

 

[graham]

A recently mentioned scenario was Lamb Leer and the landowner's request for the regional caving council to stump up (a mere) ?4k for 3 years' access. Clearly this would NEVER (why, is beyond me) have been acceptable to the beardy wasp-suckers, even though it would probably have worked out less per head than pretty much all the other goodwill access sites locally.

Speaking as a beardy wasp-sucker, I believe that, at the time that this deal was proposed, the ?4k was significantly more than was being taken at certain other well-known nearby caves. But that's only half of it. The problem was the requirement to raise ?4k up front, that was a precedent we could not afford to set. Just imagine if other Mendip landowners had gone down the same route (and who could blame them if they needed to raise a bit of ready cash at some point). The Mendip caving community would have needed to raise significant sums of money on a regular basis in order to maintain access to caves and in order to pay the admin costs of setting up such agreements the sums would have been somewhat higher than the headline price as well. We don't have the ability to raise such sums nor can we guarantee that the ensuing debts would be serviced. After all, cavers are notoriously mean at paying for, well, anything really.

So we declined, no other landowner on Mendip has considered a similar scheme and so money trickles out at a rate that the individual caver can manage without really noticing too much.

Mind, it occurs to me that in certain parts of "other UK regions" they get access at no cost at all for many years and still they complain, so maybe we're lucky after all.

 

[Hughie]

I'm guessing you're mebbe suggesting that cavers purchase caves, thus ensuring they have unfettered access?

I can just imagine.....

I thought of suggesting this in the Draenan thread, but couldn't 'cos of the uncontrollable laughter! 

 

[khakipuce]

I'm guessing you're mebbe suggesting that cavers purchase caves, thus ensuring they have unfettered access?

BSA, under the leadership of Ely Simpson, leased Lancaster Hole and the surrounding moor with interesting consequences.

The world needs to know what the consequences were?

 

[oli]

I'm fine with the CCC ltd, and I was quite happy with the Dreanan padlock, but enough cavers seem to enjoy arguing about caver controlled acess procedures to make me think that getting control of acess ourselves is prahaps anouther argument.

There's probably a brilliant thread there!

I'm guessing you're mebbe suggesting that cavers purchase caves, thus ensuring they have unfettered access?

I'm sugessting that cavers dont f*** with access agreements.

if CRoW is challanged and its decided caveing is covered what happens next? presumably some caves get turn up and go acess, but various diggers, conservationists and bat people decide spesific caves still need restricted access (praps Notts 2 as an example). at this point I hypothisise that all hell breaks loose

 

[ChrisJC]

.... at this point I hypothisise that all hell breaks loose

Like 42 identical threads being started on UKC each being full of the finest dung? Surely not.

Chris.