Thursday 28 July 2011

Just Pay Them The Money…

…and then deduct it out of your business rates.

I don’t see how they can possibly object:
A penny-pinching council left a shopkeeper stunned when it refused to hand over CCTV crime footage... because it would cost too much.
What?!?
Amanda Wright, who runs Wright's Family Bakers in Walton on the Naze, Essex asked for the images after mindless vandals smashed the shop's front window.

But the baker was left gobsmacked when Tendring District Council bosses refused the request, saying it would be too expensive to retrieve footage.
Just why was she doing this herself anyway?

Surely if a complaint of criminal damage has been made, it should be the responsibility of the police to liaise with the council?

And would the council tell them ‘Sorry, no can do’..?
She said: 'What is the point of having CCTV if no-one can view it?’
Good point!
Lynda McWilliams, the councillor responsible for customer services, said: 'The footage is contained on a hard drive within the camera equipment itself.

'Therefore the council need to call in its contractor with a cherry picker to get at the footage and obtain a copy.'
Hey, Lynda, maybe you should have thought of that before you soaked the ratepayers for the money to put the useless bloody thing up in the first place?

19 comments:

SBC said...

"'The footage is contained on a hard drive within the camera equipment itself."

Which dipshit came up with that purchasing order?!

So, in other words, the hard drive got full months ago and the CCTV isn't actually recording anything and so is sitting there as a deterrent...

*digs his old 'tools' out of the cupboard*

Now excuse me please, I have just thought of a way to pay this winter's fuel bill... Where have the bloody kids put my crowbar..?

A K Haart said...

"Lynda McWilliams, the councillor responsible for customer services"

Give her a break - after all she only fails on "responsible", "customer" and "services".

SBC said...

[OFF TOPIC BUT LOLz] Our local bank back home in a small German got robbed yesterday....

By a man armed with a note!

Just a note.

I kid you not.

He handed over a note saying 'I have a gun, give me the money'...and the teller did!


Tis a kinder, gentler way of life over there...

[ For the 'foreign' speakers among us: http://www.op-online.de/nachrichten/rodgau/bankraeuber-zettel-ueberfaellt-sparkasse-1338514.html]

SBC (who still isn't literate) said...

*edit "in a small German town"

Captain Haddock said...

The victim ought to consult a Lawyer, with a view to taking the Council to Court, in order to obtain a Court Order for the production of said CCTV footage ..

By witholding that CCTV footage, the Council are effectively aiding & abetting the offender(s) ..

Of course, if the local Police were doing their job properly, they would already have demanded the CCTV footage, as is their legal duty ..

Zoom shot said...

So how many more CCTV cameras are unreachable, full of jerky footage of rainy Thursday afternoons with nothing happening in slumville and therefore of no use at all?

One begins to suspect millions of the things, which we can assume may only exist to make councils feel powerful and CCTV manufacturers wealthy.

Hey, here's an idea: the cherry-picker could go up there and it could be taken down and sold on ebay. If Slumville doesn't want it then Chavtown might.

Anonymous said...

Given that most local authority CCTV footage appears to be of the same grainy quality as Logie Baird'early experiments , WTF use is it anyway?

Gallovidian said...

Tell the council someone was wearing a racist t-shirt at exactly that time, in view of that camera. They will hire a fecking helicopter to retrieve the hard disc.

ivan said...

In other words there isn't any recording and the camera is only for show.

SBC said...

"Tell the council someone was wearing a racist t-shirt at exactly that time, in view of that camera."

Just tell the council that someone was smoking in public NEAR CHILDREN.

Paul said...

It actually sounds like they're lying here. I would have thought that any and all footage immediately gets sent wirelessly to another location, like the police station, where it gets saved there to a big computer drive for safekeeping. They could easily edit a copy for DVD or memory card release.

I'd say they're lying.

Paul said...

Oh, and this is Tendring District Council? The very council that Douglas Carswell has been lauding on his blog?

SBC said...

"like the POLICE STATION, where it gets saved there to a big computer drive for SAFEKEEPING."

SNORKO-LOL!

See story at top of page....

Paul said...

Yes, I know. My point was is that they're lying.

microdave said...

Even cheap domestic CCTV equipment can record to SD cards, and once they are full will progressively overwrite the oldest files. So there would always be a continuous record going back over (typically) several days.

As for needing a cherry picker - Oh FFS! if you can't manage to network the damn things, then at least have a long USB lead reaching down to a easily accessible locked cover...

Better still, don't bother to lock it, then any Tom, Dick or HRH Harry can avail themselves of the footage. Let's face it, we've all paid for bloody things!

Captain Haddock said...

"I would have thought that any and all footage immediately gets sent wirelessly to another location, like the police station, where it gets saved there to a big computer drive for safekeeping. They could easily edit a copy for DVD or memory card release" ...

In the town where I live, all CCTV footage is transmitted back to the council CCTV control room (which is manned 24/7 365 days a year) where it is stored ..

The Police have no immediate access to the stored data or to the cameras themselves, though they do have a direct phone line to the CCTV control room so that they can ask the CCTV operators to move certain cameras, if they need to see what's going on in "real time" ..

If the Police require a copy of CCTV footage, they have to complete a Form, officially requesting it from the council ..

I happen to know this as a former neighbour worked in the CCTV control room and at one time considered applying for a job there .. but decided I didn't fancy doing "watch-keeping" again..

JuliaM said...

"Give her a break - after all she only fails on "responsible", "customer" and "services"."

*chuckle*

"He handed over a note saying 'I have a gun, give me the money'...and the teller did!"

LOL! The pen really is mightier than the sword, then?

"By witholding that CCTV footage, the Council are effectively aiding & abetting the offender(s) ..

Of course, if the local Police were doing their job properly, they would already have demanded the CCTV footage, as is their legal duty .."


Well, precisely! It must be more satisfying than assisting the RSPCA in bullying heartbroken pensioners, surely?

"So how many more CCTV cameras are unreachable, full of jerky footage of rainy Thursday afternoons with nothing happening in slumville and therefore of no use at all?"

Horrible thought, isn't it?

JuliaM said...

"It actually sounds like they're lying here."

Well, this IS Essex, and our councillors ARE particularly dim..

"As for needing a cherry picker - Oh FFS!"

'elf n' safety, you know...

microdave said...

"'elf n' safety, you know..."

Yes I saw that story in the Mail. I'm rather surprised at the comments in your link - clearly "playing with toys" is more important than common sense.

But other comments pointed out that the vehicle was parked on double yellow lines, and the bucket was at head height over the (obstructed) pavement. So any HSE bullshit was completely negated in that example.

We are Sooooooo f***ed.....