Nanny's Threat Levels II

It seems that Nanny reads this site.

Following on from yesterday's article about The Bar Steward running the country, Bliary Poppins has decided to postpone her holiday until the Middle East is sorted out.

That may take more than a day or two I suspect!

Nanny's Threat Levels

In keeping with the "joining the dots" approach postulated by Blairy Poppins, in her war against the so called crescent of evil threatening the West, Nanny has redesigned her threat level warning system and decided to make it public. Thus ensuring as many people as possible are scared shitless.

With regard Nanny's current foreign policy "intiatives", some wiser heads amongst us might suggest that "democratising" people down the barrel of a gun is not necessarily the best way to win friends and influence people. However, we are fortunate to be ruled by Blairy and W who are clearly far wiser than others when it comes to joined up foreign policy initiatives.

It is certainly clear that the current foreign policy being exercised in the Middle East is having a unifying effect, and as such can be considered to be "joining the dots".

It is also reassuring to know that when W and Blairy leave office, the consequences of their actions/inactions now will have to be borne by the rest of us for decades to come.

By the way, the current threat level is severe.

The other good news is that The Bar Steward is now "in charge".

It's going to be a long summer!

Prats of The Week

This week's prestigious Prat of The Week Award goes to the good people of Camden Council, or rather their parking control department (or whatever they choose to call it).

I am sure that the hapless driver of a Meyers of Stratford lorry will agree with this award, as he encountered a jobsworth prat from the council in Belsize Park the other week.

The driver was travelling along a road, weakened by water from a burst main below. Then the front wheel of his truck had got stuck, axle deep, in a hole after the road collapsed beneath the vehicle.

Needless to say, the responsibility for maintaining the roads lies with the council...so you might suggest that it was their fault.

Anyhoo, the driver the tried to shift his trapped truck. At this point a jobsworth traffic warden turned up. The good lady from the legion of wardens did what she does best, instead of helping, she provided the hapless driver with a ticket.

Rather like an old Laurel and Hardy film, a small crowd of astonished onlookers gathered to watch the "comedy" show. The driver tried in vain to explain his predicament. However, the jobsworth warden just shrugged and told him he could appeal against the fine.

Sue Melkman, a resident, said:

"It's crazy.

There was water everywhere.

It was obvious what had happened but she still wrote the ticket.

She wouldn't engage in conversation.

All she would say was, 'You can appeal'.

It's the daftest decision.

How can you give a ticket to someone who's stuck in a hole?

The woman must live in a parallel universe.

It's so ridiculous.

Everyone was laughing at her

and a few were taking pictures on their phones.

I told her she'd be a laughing stock

and it would be in the local paper but she didn't reply.

She just wrote the ticket and off she went.

The poor driver tried to reason with her,

but what can you do?

If they're going to write a ticket they just do it.

He took it very philosophically."

The incident was sparked by decision from the ever respected and useful Thames Water (who leak a gazillion gallons of water every day). Dear old Thames Water had decided not to put cones around the bulging, cracked patch of road after inspecting it the previous day.

By the way, the German owners of Thames Water have decided to sell it; any takers?

One resident of the street said:

"It was really the water board's fault.

A water main burst outside my house at about 7.30pm on Thursday evening,

and at about 10 o'clock Thames Water came along to see what was happening.

I saw them with some cones in their hands,

but then they put them back in their van.

The road was bulging and cracks were appearing.

There's a fire station nearby

and I was worried the road might collapse if a fire engine went over it

but the engineers said it was fine

and they would be back to fix it the next day.

Then at 7.30 next morning a lorry came to collect a skip from my neighbour

and he just sank down into the road to his axle.

They came to fix the water main in the middle of it all

but couldn't because the lorry was on top of it."

Sounds like Thames Water also deserve the Prat of The Week award.

Meyers of Stratford said:

"Camden Council said we can appeal

but what a waste of everyone's time.

Now we've got to write the letters and send off the forms.

It was absolutely obvious why the truck was there

but she still fined us.

It makes you sick."

Nanny makes us all sick.

Her rules, red tape and indifference are designed to beat us into submission.

Anyhoo, congratulations to Camden Council for winning this prestigious award.

Feel free to email them via this link Camden Council, to tell them that they have won.

Nanny Bans Standing

My thanks to the multitudes of you (well two actually), who wrote to me this morning telling me about this particularly daft scheme of Nanny and her acolytes in the police.

As we all know, Nanny has something of a problem with regard to drinking; on the one hand she is happy for 24 hour drinking, but on the other hand she believes that this should only be for those of us who indulge in a small glass of Chianti.

Drinking amongst the working classes is absolutely frowned upon; as we all the working classes can't handle their drink.

Anyhoo, as part of Nanny's ongoing scheme to turn us into middle class Chianti drinkers her chums in Preston police have decided that it is illegal to stand at the bar drinking.

Nanny wants us all to sit down at the table, and sip our drinks in a leisurely fashion.

Now a couple of points here...the British pub is specifically designed for drinking at the bar; the barmaids are selected for their cleavages (to encourage men to gather round the bar), the bar is long enough to allow many to stand there and only the "continentals" sit at tables drinking wine.

As such the scheme is utter BOLLOCKS!

Notwithstanding that, Nanny's police in Preston have renamed standing at the bar "Vertical Drinking".

Prats!

They argue that drinking while standing in a like-minded group is a contributor to booze-fuelled violence.

Nanny's NHS primary care trust also got in on the act, and the police want a "no standing" drinking rule imposed on the city by the autumn; they want customers to be served only if they have a seat.

Police in Preston already have an alcohol harm reduction and prevention team. Sergeant Andy Hobson, the team's alcohol project manager, said:

"If people are sat down there is less potential for flashpoints than with vertical drinking.

This is not designed so much to affect the amount they drink;

it is the proximity of other people when you are stood up, which is where the problems can start.

People go into these places and crowd round the bars,

then the next you know somebody gets a push,

the pint goes over and that's it."

We pay them for this shite?

-How do you get served if you are sitting down?

-How do you enforce a no standing rule in a pub?

Publicans have dismissed the scheme as bollocks.

Ryan Wood, manager of Yates's pub, said:

"They have completely missed the point.

If anything it is going to cause more friction because people are not going to like being told to sit down every five minutes.

It's almost impossible to enforce."

I would also remind Nanny that many years ago, I was sitting at a table in a bar and had imbibed quite a few. When I stood up, I fell over. Now, if I had been standing that would never have happened!

The Dangers of Trees! II

Oh my word!

Yesterday's article on Nanny arresting three 12 year olds, for climbing and damaging a tree, seems to have caused quite a stir.

Many have, quite rightly, pointed out that I do not know the specific circumstances. I have not met the kids or seen the actual incident. It has, again quite rightly, been pointed out that the three kids may in fact be absolute hooligans who were intent on destroying the tree; in other words, they needed to be given a short sharp shock.

I fully agree, a short sharp shock may well have been needed. In pre Nanny days, this would have been a sound thump around the ear by the policeman and being taken to see the parents in full view of the street.

Unfortunately Nanny has banned that more common sense, and effective, approach to policework. Instead the police are either powerless to intervene, or do so with disproportionate heavy handedness.

I take note of your concerns about "siding with the forces of evil". However, I still feel that the police action was excessive; why precisely do they need to take DNA swabs of 12 year olds?

I would also suggest that maybe the police force in the West Midlands has its priorities a tad muddled. Another story has been brought to my attention about them banning Hopscotch in the street.

Two of Nanny's pseudo police in the West Midlands, ie Community Support officers, noticed four or five chalked grids on a pavement.

They then went to work and traced the culprits; Kayleigh Mangan, 14, and Georgina Smallwood, also 14. They told them they had drawn too many chalk marks, and made them fetch a bucket of water and scrub all but one off.

Kayleigh Mangan said:

"They said it made the street a mess and told us to clean it up.

They said they didn't mind one but four or five was too many."

Nanny has already issued a warning letter to parents in the area about not playing ball games in the street. The letter did say that old-fashioned games such as spinning tops, jacks and hopscotch were permissible.

West Midlands police said they responded to a complaint

"By targeting what may seem relatively low-level crime we aim to prevent it developing into more serious matters."

Read the above very carefully, and think about what they are saying.

Hopscotch and ball games are not criminal activities.

PERIOD!

I repeat my question that I raised yesterday; are the levels of gun crime, knife crime, assaults and drug related offences all so much lower in the West Midlands than anywhere else?

If not, should not the police be concentrating on these issues instead?

Am I so out of touch, or just plain wrong, that I am mistakenly siding with the forces of evil (tree climbers, and hopscotch players)?

The Dangers of Trees!

It may be advisable to warn your children that Naughty Nanny is on the prowl again. This time she is looking for those children who have the cheek to build tree houses.

Tree houses, you see ladies and gentlemen, are the work of the devil and are banned!

Sam Cannon, Amy Higgins and Katy Smith (12-year-old friends planning to build themselves a den in a cherry tree) from Halesowen, West Midlands, found this out to their cost recently.

The kids climbed the 20ft tree, then found themselves frogmarched to a police station and locked in cells for up to two hours.

Nanny's ever vigilant police then removed the childrens' shoes, took mugshots, DNA samples and mouth swabs.

Funny that gangs of yobs, criminals, drug dealers and other assorted scumbags are not treated in the same way isn't it?

Nanny's police told the children they had been seen damaging the tree, which is in a wooded area of public land near their homes.

The police interrogated the children, who admitted that they had broken some loose branches because they had wanted to build a tree house.

Hardly worth a DNA swab is it?

Nanny felt otherwise, and seriously considered charging the children with criminal damage. However, very graciously for Nanny, she eventually decided that a reprimand (the equivalent of a caution for juveniles) was sufficient.

The hapless children will now have their details will be kept on file for up to five years.

Is this a police state or what?

Sam's father, Nicholas, said:

"The children did not deserve to be treated in the way they were.

A simple ticking-off by officers would have been sufficient.

The children didn't realise they were doing anything wrong,

they didn't deliberately set out to damage the tree.

Sam's eyes were swollen and red when they let him out of the cell

as he had been crying.

He is a placid child and has never been in trouble before.

When I got the phone call from the police to say Sam was in custody

I thought he'd done something-like steal something from a shop.

I couldn't believe it when he said all he had done was break some loose branches off a tree.

To detain them,

DNA them and treat them that way was simply cruel and an over-reaction by the police.

Generations of children have played in that tree

and my son and his friends won't be the first to have thought of building a tree den."

Superintendent Stuart Johnson, operations manager at Halesowen police station, said:

"I support the actions of my officers who responded to complaints from the public about kids destroying an ornamental cherry tree by stripping every branch from it,

in an area where there have been reports of anti-social behaviour.

A boy and two girls were arrested

and received a police reprimand for their behaviour.

West Midlands Police deals robustly with anti-social behaviour.

By targeting what may seem relatively low-level crime

we aim to prevent it developing into more serious matters."

You will note that he happily ignored commenting on why the police needed DNA samples.

I assume then that the crime statistics for drug offences, assaults, robbery, knife crime etc in the West Midlands area are at an all time low?

Please can residents of the West Midlands comment on this.

Rod Morgan, chairman of the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales, said:

"It's my opinion that too many children are being criminalised for behaviour that could be dealt with informally

by ticking them off and speaking to their parents."

Doubtless the police will log this as a success in their records, which Nanny uses to judge the efficiency of the police.

After all, it is easy to arrest a 12 year old; seemingly not that easy to break up a gang of yobs, terrifying a council estate, or crack down on scumbag drug users/pushers.

It's not the quality of crime prevention that counts in Britain, it's the quantity!