Nanny's chums, in her "beloved" local councils, are forever looking for ways to save money.Nothing wrong with that, except that:
1 Our council tax bills just keep rising, irrespective of "savings"
2 One major cost, defined benefit pensions for all council staff, is never touched
Anyhoo, Nanny's local councils have come up with a jolly wheeze to save some money; they are going to start turning off street lamps.
Needless to say, Nanny is also keen to emphasise the "green" "benefits" of this "initiative".
How funny that "green" is the new mantra of our lords and masters in the councils. Do not fall for that, it is merely a good excuse for them to brow beat us and impose more rules, regulations and taxes.
Councils in certain parts of the country are experimenting with turning off some street lights, the trials are ad hoc - each is doing it differently.
- Buckinghamshire has selected sites that are "low-risk" and has added solar road studs, extra signs and road markings.
- Gloucestershire County Council will be turning off 36% of its lighting part-time, but not on main traffic routes or areas of high crime.
- Essex is carrying out "part-night lighting" trials in Maldon District and in Uttlesford.
When the blackouts were in place (1914/18 and 1939/45) the level of crime (robberies, rapes, assaults etc) and accidents skyrocketed.
Would Nanny and her chums in the councils care to tell us why, in 2008, things are going to be different if we are put back to blackout conditions?
The Police Superintendents' Association thinks that the idea is bollocks, and says that good street lighting deters crime and reduces accidents.
To paraphrase Sir Edward Gray, on the eve of the First World War:
"The lights are going out all over Britain, they may not be lit again in my lifetime."
Look what happened to the country as a result of that disaster!
Ken,
ReplyDeleteHmmm, Nanny is undoubtedly out to save money here, (will saving be passed on in council tax reduction hah ha ha) but I have often thought that the streets (in a very leafy little town) where I live are overlit at night. When the lights go out for some problem or other the place assumes a more natural look at night.
Granted, I don't live in an area where muggers hang out on the street corner (but Nanny is working on importing some from overseas and 'disadvantaged areas of London' to help me in that respect)so the lights out idea would not work well in say one of Ken Livingscum's urban paradises like Hackney.
You don't need to be a criminologist (which I am), a genius or even someone with a modicum of intelligence to know that where there is inadequate lighting there is usually an associated rise in crime. I can prove that from personal experience. When a street lamp failed in the road I live in it led to a stretch of said road being very poorly lit indeed, despite it being reported to the local council they failed to fix it for three months. In that time seven cars were broken into, both myself and a neighbour were subjected to attempted burglaries with the perpetrators using the lack of lighting to cover their activities and it was noted that a doorway in a nearby building, no longer illuminated witnessed a rise in the number of obviously incontinent young men needing to use it to relieve their bladders. Oh and this is in what is considered to be a good area to live. Heaven knows what the crime rate would rocket to in the 'bad' areas.
ReplyDeleteOf course a cynical person might point out that this is exactly what our glorious Nu-Stalinist government actually want to happen so that they can wheel out ever more draconian laws in order to clear up the mess of their own making. Naturally if these laws can then be used to ensure that many more of us end up on their databases then that is just an additional benefit.
There has been a trial of turning street lights off at night just outside Southampton. The usually nice village is being plagued with crimes such as vandalism and other petty offences. Local Nanny admits there is a problem but wants to see the six month trial out....another five months still to go.
ReplyDeleteWhy is it that only Nanny can't see the enevitable consequenses of her action?
Of course the New State Religion of Climate Change is the justification for these and other experiments, but we know that it is a false religion.
Perhaps Nanny thinks we should all be home in bed by midnight so that we can get up for work the next day just like the good brainless worker drones we are all becoming.
There will be no reduction in council tax(Ripp Off Tax) for the savings made but, I suspect a nice new glossy brochure will be produced by local Nanny to tell us how well Nanny is spending our newly saved money.
I think Captain Von may well be right....The subsequent rise in crime will be used as justification to put into place even more draconian measures....All with fines attached I don't doubt....Kerching...There goes that till again.
To those whom are too young to remember, here is a list of what Great Britain was known for:-
Honesty, Fair play, Freedom of the person, freedom of speech, Good Manners, common decency, Justice, integrity, a green and pleasant land, charity, a stiff upper lip and a zinc kneecap....Oh how I long for a return to British values so that again I could be proud to be British and being British actually meant something.
Interesting comments.
ReplyDeleteI read a letter in a newspaper that claimed installing and using street lights in the respondents quiet and crime free area led to an INCREASE in crime since the perpetrators could ee what they were doing without having to resort to using rather visible torches.
I heard the same sort of thing about car crime many years ago, before unique fit music units were commonplace and stereos were portable and good currency in the pub. Park under or near a street light and the the scrotes can see if it is worth there effort to break in for theft from a vehicle.
Theft OF a vehicle might work the other way of course.
The problem of crime displacement that is reported in the trials will, undoubtedly, be reversed once all areas are without lights.
Mugging, rape and murder may well increase - I predict a huge increase in infrared CCTV to 'fight' that - and more than likely road accidents (as during WW2 but perhaps not as bad because at least the cars will be allowed to use their light properly. Well, I assume they will, unless the Optimum Population Trust has a say in it) though of course anything BUT lighting or lack of it will be blamed. Expect blanket after dark 20mph limits, more reflective everything to turn the country yellow and the entire country monitored by SPECS cameras in addition to CCTV.
Moving to Kabul looks more attractive by the day.
Once you recognise that anti-humanity humanitarians run government, it follows that we are the scum, the inconvenient truth that they will seek to bury just as bloodily as their mentalities permit.
ReplyDeleteOf course, the quieter and more antiseptic the holocaust is, the more they will be able to deny inflicting it at all.