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Post by wildman on Mar 2, 2013 10:40:06 GMT
I notice a number of rallies listed, does that mean the forum has sorted a rally exemption certificate with natural England, if not the the only legal site you can rally is a motorhome show whre they hold the camping licence. For everywhere else if more than 3 vans attend the forum needs its own Exemption certificate. Assuming you have one Don't forget I have a 10 acre rally field with water, black and grey dump and a WC but currently no leccy though gennies are no problem. So anyone fancy organising a rally in North Devon if so Victorian week might be popular. www.ilfracombevictoriancelebration.org.uk/diary/eventdiary.shtml
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Post by Firefox on Mar 3, 2013 9:56:28 GMT
Some of those meets are organised totally by other forums but some involve us. For example this weekend I am at Oxford at what may loosely be described as a WC4MH/FMUK meet and wvw is at Helwith bridge where they are some members of MH-W and FMUK. Neither meet has a an exemption certificate. I know technically one may be required, but in practice we just do it. We are usually in on Friday night and gone for the most part by Sunday afternoon. We always patronise the local hostelry where possible, and are always good little boys and girls and clear up before we leave. My personal view of exemption certificates is they are a lot of troublesome paperwork which I as an individual do not want to get involved in doing. Furthermore, when you are on site, to abide by the terms of the certificate one is supposed to have rally marshalls in fluo jackets to direct members etc non of which red tape the wild camping members really have any interest in. Most venues we find, don't demand one, or are ignorant of the technical need for one. However, if someone else on the forum wants to go through the motions and get a certificate organised for us without any financial cost to the forum, feel free, just send me a PM
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Post by wildman on Mar 3, 2013 10:36:16 GMT
Thats a shame, because if I hold a rally without a rally exemption certificate in place then my CL licence is likely to be withdrawn and never reissued. Whilst you as a forum can come and go without fear of retribution the land owner is put at financial risk. There is no cost involved in actually getting a certificate it is just a matter of paperwork, the reluctance of a number of forums to get a certificate is beyond me MH-W is the same all it means is rallies are a lot of the time illegal gatherings for want of a bit of paperwork. As a site owner I am only covered to hold rallies for the granting body (club or forum) who licences the site and any other organisation who hold an exemption certificate. Sites that are licenced by the local authority as a full unrestricted campsite don't have this problem. Whilst individuals can and do flout planning law organisations if to be seen as responsible bodies cannot afford to do so. There are not many good sites in the southwest and none that I know of that hold rallies at £5 per van per night. I am in the process of installing a WC on site, cost over £500, the septic tank has to be emptied after a rally cost £80, other ongoing costs mean I cannot offer the facility for free, I wish I could but it is at least a darn sight cheaper than any other local site. If you have a rally organiser maybe he/she could do the paperwork as part of their job. nothing in the rules state the member who organises the rally should wear a flourescent jacket, as to parking well its common sense to park with health and safety in mind, I as member and land owner usually take on the task of siting vans, after all I know where everything it and generally I collect the money as well so everyone attending has nowt to do but enjoy (other than giving a hand briefly to get the marquee up if required). My land is the only income I have outside af a basic pension, I love it, the visitors love it and every year since we have opened people come back again and again
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Post by Firefox on Mar 4, 2013 6:26:57 GMT
I'm not suggesting you take any risks that you aren't comfortable with. And of course people should expect to pay a reasonable price for a CL which has been developed with facilities. At the meet I attended this weekend, it was in a scout group car park. We did pay £3.50 a night towards the scouts funds. I only stayed a night but gave the scouts £10 as they needed the funds to finish their new clubhouse project. No certificate just a quick in and out visit.
This is an extract from the application details.
We don't have any minutes of meetings or any previous experience except as individuals, so there would be a considerable paper chase involved.
I'm not against the idea of a certificate, just I have too much else to do, and we have no funds to cover minor expenses involved in obtaining such a certificate, and no funds to cover any insurance that may be required or recommended. But if any other member wants to undertake obtaining it at no cost to the forum then please feel free, just send me a PM.
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Post by wildman on Mar 4, 2013 9:49:07 GMT
zoe managed it without a problem for both club nomad and Motor roamers, neither were long established at the time.
d)You have the constitution and club officiers
e) they just want to know a rally can be held responsibly and within h&S rules, every member of the club has been around long enough to claim that experience.
f) you already have held rallies for this and other organisations. I ran rallies for motorhome fun at both the Carmarthen Shows and the Shepton Mallet shows with attendances up to 50 vans for 3 years in a row, so the experience is within the club.
g) needs to be thought about as they need to be two legally held rallies, at a motorhome show would be ideal. (Though it does say where possible), the scouts have a blanket exemption so thats one, just find another or a second scout site) There is nothing to wangle you can do it all legally and above board. If that were not so I would not discuss it on open forum.
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Post by Firefox on Mar 4, 2013 12:14:24 GMT
As member here yourself, Roger, the invitation extends to you or any other member to do the paperwork and get us an exemption certificate. Any member including yourself who wants to go for it, will be given the title of exemption certificate officer on the board to give them the official status to back up the task The Exemption Certificate Officer may be given a place on the forum committee subject to the other committee members agreeing. We couldn't really make that change unless everyone agreed though, as per the constitution.
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Post by landydriver on Mar 4, 2013 21:04:38 GMT
Just out of curiosity is the exemption thingy an official law type thing?
It all seems rather over the top to me. Who would know if a meet was an organised meet or just a few camper vans who happen to be in the same place at the same time.
Wildman... Just say a few of us decide to meet at your place ( using old fashioned means...like talking) How would you know....how would anyone know?
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Post by Firefox on Mar 4, 2013 21:49:41 GMT
Well, he's only got a licence for 5 vans as a CL, and if some NIMBY saw he had more than 5 vans on site and made a complaint to the local council planning, and it turned out the rally didn't have a certificate, then technically he could be at risk of losing his site licence, so he has a point. If we had 5 vans or less there, then nobody would be any the wiser. We usually meet at places where it's kind of public land, highways land, or at pubs where they just don't care or maybe they have a certificate for a larger site anyway. So we generally get away without a certificate just fine, at all kinds of venues. But, it wouldn't harm getting one, we'd have a few more meeting places available to us, so if anyone wants to get us one, feel free as I said
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Post by robmac on Mar 4, 2013 22:08:43 GMT
I'll look into it if you like vernon?
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Post by robmac on Mar 4, 2013 22:17:47 GMT
I've downloaded the application form, but I will look into it a bit more before sending.
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Post by robmac on Mar 4, 2013 22:46:57 GMT
Couple of points; Do we go for paragraph 4 or paragraph 6? www.naturalengland.gov.uk/ourwork/regulation/campingandcaravan/caravanexemption.aspxWe need a code of conduct in place - suggestions welcome so I don't miss anything. We can get a certificate within 15 days if we can give 2 legal rallies we have held. One would be the Oxford meet as it was a scouting site, do we have a second? Otherwise we can apply as a new organisation which will take up to 6 weeks. This would cover MH and caravans only - no camping - we would have to stick to this. Not that this has been a problem before at the meets I have attended. I presume we would want to cover England Scotland and Wales.
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Post by Firefox on Mar 4, 2013 22:48:07 GMT
That would be really cool Rob.
There are a few pitfalls as I see it. Constitution and minutes - well we have a constitution but no minutes. We may need to have a committee meeting in the chatbox and adopt the constitution and minute it. The constitution may need to be added to to cover whatever Natural England want eg AGMs quorums etc. Membership - is always going to be free but we may need a token membership fee, maybe 5p or something I'm not sure. Experience - we have loads but meetings at Charlie's handfasting, Oxford, Crufts etc could be shoehorned in as examples. Previous sites, could use Brandon, Greywell, Brownlow as examples.
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Post by robmac on Mar 4, 2013 22:49:36 GMT
They need to be legal sites Vernon eg. The Oxford meet (see my previous post)
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Post by Firefox on Mar 4, 2013 23:05:04 GMT
I think paragraph 6 is simpler - that's all we need and what WC4MH/Exceeder went for. Not sure Oxford counts, as the Scouts have an exemption for their rallies, not necessarily other people's held on their premises - we can try it - would have to check the small print or hope Natural England don't pick up on the point.
They give a model code of conduct on the site. I hope we can just adopt that. There are a few ridiculous provisions such as 6m between units !
(Brandon/Brownlow was legal as campsite is established - Greywell, not sure. Handfasting was with permission of premises. Shustoke is probably not strictly legal)
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Post by wildman on Mar 5, 2013 10:39:24 GMT
Just out of curiosity is the exemption thingy an official law type thing? It all seems rather over the top to me. Who would know if a meet was an organised meet or just a few camper vans who happen to be in the same place at the same time. Wildman... Just say a few of us decide to meet at your place ( using old fashioned means...like talking) How would you know....how would anyone know? Yes it is law unless the site in question holds a caravan site licence from the local council. In my case I have a Site licenced issued under paragraph 5, i.e a 5 van site. with regards to the type of licence Paragraph 4 allows camping up to 28 days ( things like Victorian week run for 10 days so it would be useful) Paragraph 5 exemption would allow you to licence your own CL's. Paragraph 6 only allows 5 days at a time. most clubs go for 4 & 6 It would also appear that a seperate licence is required for tents, whenever we have rallies here there are a number of tents so it would be wise to include a camping cert as well seeing as it costs nowt and would cover all bases. whilst there are currently no recorded minutes, when the forum/club was formed discussions took place, those discussions can be minuted in retrospect with the agreement of all present. As far as me holding the certificate I don't feel able to do so as the land owner of a prospective site it would I'm sure be deemed improper. It could also raise problems with other forums/clubs of which I am a member and I have no wish to create waves.
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Post by Firefox on Mar 5, 2013 11:47:07 GMT
You wouldn't need to hold it, we could do the holding, just need to do the paperwork to obtain it in our name, but that problem has gone away since Rob kindly volunteered to do that side and I'll give him a hand It's still somewhat of a paper exercise as the rules state 6m between units, and many rallies I have seen and been on have nowhere near 6m between units. There isn't this space on a lot of sites. So strictly all of these rallies are illegal, certificate or not! I don't think we need any more than 5 days. All of our meets are long weekends etc. Probably go for the easiest and then when we build up a track record and if we feel the need, we can increase it.
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Post by wildman on Mar 5, 2013 16:23:24 GMT
with 10 acres at our disposal 6mtr spacing to meet fire regs is not a problem, As we are just outside of the coastal preservation area the local authority are on the ball re checks and every site is checked a couple of times a year to ensure they are complying with regulations, hence my need to be legal at all times. The North Devon area is immensely popular with campers and caravanners, there is just so much to see and do, plus the weather in this part of the UK is generally warmer than elsewhere. I hope to see some of you there this year.
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Post by landydriver on Mar 5, 2013 20:28:31 GMT
Ok its a legal thing. Right I was on a site in France where the van were jammed in where you could hardly walk between the mirrors. Ive also camped (tent) in France where all the tent ropes overlapped. So how do they gat away with it? Or is that ok as long as you dont know anyone else on the site...therfor its not a meet
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Post by Firefox on Mar 5, 2013 21:01:46 GMT
It's OK until there is a complaint and the council officer or HSE or police come round, meet or not. In practice, we are long gone before that ever happens.
If you have authority for a meet you may get asked to space your units out. If you haven't, you may get asked to leave. Police usually take no notice on private land. If it's highway land they should not be interested unless causing an obstruction. Sometimes they have nothing better to do and take more interest than they should. If you have a gathering of more than 5 on private land, and there are aggravating circumstances eg Noise, abuse, damage, litter, you may get moved on by the police. It all depends where and when and how many and how long and how.
France is similar no doubt although I believe there, the mayor has a lot of clout, and if he says it's OK, it's OK.
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Post by robmac on Mar 5, 2013 21:45:16 GMT
One consideration though Vernon, if say the vans are not 6m apart and we are holding a rally under our exemption certificate and one van catches fire and then damages a couple more, who is liable? Because there are H & S issues, the insurance companies of the damaged vehicles (or worse) could ty and tilt responsibility on the organisation who have broken the H & S rules laid down under the certificate.
Or am I looking too deep?
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Post by Firefox on Mar 5, 2013 22:08:35 GMT
No that's exactly right.
It's one of the reasons I wasn't too interested in getting a certificate originally, and one of the reasons WC4MH gave up on hosting rallies using their certificate(IMO). Phil took out insurance to cover the above (I think) which proved expensive, and therefore he was not interested in continuing the use thereof, stating that members could organise the meets on their own initiative, even though the certificate is still in place, it's not being used as far as I know.
So if the certificate was used it would have to be on a bona fide site with adequate space and safety equipment.
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Post by Daz on Mar 5, 2013 23:57:49 GMT
I had to take out insurance for a car club I ran, it turned out so expensive we only actually took it out for one year, plenty of friends met up afterwards without insurance & without the club arranging anything
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Post by donkeytoo on Mar 6, 2013 10:35:46 GMT
Ok its a legal thing. Right I was on a site in France where the van were jammed in where you could hardly walk between the mirrors. Ive also camped (tent) in France where all the tent ropes overlapped. So how do they gat away with it? Or is that ok as long as you dont know anyone else on the site...therfor its not a meet They get away with it because the French say "Rules are for the British,not us"
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Post by donkeytoo on Mar 6, 2013 10:38:53 GMT
Do pikeys have exemption certs?
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Post by wildman on Mar 6, 2013 10:42:54 GMT
There is no legal obligation to take out insurance, spacing vans 6 mtrs apart means any risk lies with the owner of the respective vans, its a simple rule and with sufficient space easy to conform to. Any number of vans over 3 constitutes an illegal gathering unless there is a certificate in place to cover it. Such is the legacy of the hippy convoys in the 60-70's. We all suffer because of that. Turning up without a certificate is irresponsible and will eventually kill wild camping for everyone as more and more legislation is brought into place. The overall system makes it easy and free to comply so I don't see the problem. Responsible motorhoming must be encouraged if it is to continue no matter how much of a rebel we wish to be. Ignoring the law only does the hobby a disservice and ranks those people alongside gypsies and travellers who do what they like and to hell with the law. France has different rules altogether and those that they do have are often ignored. But it is a great place to motorhome.
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Post by Firefox on Mar 6, 2013 11:09:25 GMT
First point is that many gypsies and travelers are very responsible people. Not fair to bash all of them generally. I don't think it makes us like those travellers who are irresponsible if we camp without a certificate, as long as we are in and out within a few days and we clear up after ourselves.
There's numerous times we have been at Stonehenge with a campfire on the verge and the Police have rolled by. They are not interested in moving us on. They just want to make sure there's no disturbance. As far as they or we are concerned it's not a gathering. Just a few people parking on the verge of the highway. One wouldn't harass a group of mums who all knew each other, and 8 of them had gone down town to go shopping together, and parked their cars in a line, and were standing on the pavement talking to each other. I mean what is a "gathering" and what is "parking"? And if one falls asleep in a parked car then so what, there's no law against it.
It's all a very grey area, and the bottom line is to be respectful and not create a disturbance. The police and everyone else are generally happy with this. Technically there may be some law which is open to interpretation, but then we're breaking the law every time we don't practice archery every day of the week.
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Post by Daz on Mar 6, 2013 11:24:43 GMT
The police and everyone else are generally happy with this. Technically there may be some law which is open to interpretation, but then we're breaking the law every time we don't practice archery every day of the week. You don't practice archery everyday? Damn you to hell, you are the reason this country is in the mess it's in etc etc
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Post by Firefox on Mar 6, 2013 11:47:30 GMT
I know... and I've played a sport other than archery on a Sunday... off with my head
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Post by Daz on Mar 6, 2013 12:24:47 GMT
but have you killed a welshman on a Saturday in York lately?
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Post by Firefox on Mar 6, 2013 16:57:45 GMT
No but I killed one in Chester with a bow and arrow. I hope it wasn't Morgan the Moon. If that's the case... who is going to do our next BBQ!?
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