If I take a day off to go shopping or run errands, I don’t need to avoid school run time and if I don’t take a day off, my morning and evening commute isn’t blighted by the antics of the animals in green and blue school uniforms that catch the c2c service to and from Southend.
Truly, it’s bliss.
On the other hand, if you’re a bus driver, it must be a time fraught with danger:
One of the attacks shattered three windows on First number two service while several frightened passengers were on board as it drove along Redbridge Hill in Millbrook. It was one of a string of attacks on number two services.Yes, it’s not unknown, is it? It seems to happen with monotonous regularity.
In March last year, Blue Star suspended services in the area after youths pelted a single-decker with bricks and stones, shattering a window and terrifying the passengers on board. It resulted in an emergency meeting between councillors, police and bus companies to stamp out the vandalism, to ensure services kept running through the area.Oooh, a meeting! Clearly, it didn't work. Do they ever?
Millbrook ward councillor Georgie Laming said: “I know we have had issues with other bus services being cancelled in the past because of this and I completely understand why First would do that, because the welfare of the drivers.
“We have worked together to resolve these problems before. This is the kind of thing that gets brought up in police and community together meetings and people need to keep reporting it to the police so they can deal with it. ”But they don’t ‘deal with it’, because it keeps happening..!
Putting offenders in the stocks for a day would teach them rather more than they are probably learning at school.
ReplyDeleteWow Julia,crime happens,children misbehave! Who would have thought it?
ReplyDeleteNo crime-no blog?
Jaded.
XX reporting it to the police so they can deal with it. ” But they don’t ‘deal with it’, because it keeps happening..! XX
ReplyDeleteUnless they have a full police escort, Northern Ireland style, with armed and arounred landrovers, (pigs), and carriers full of mechanised infantry, what do you EXPECT the police to do?
I presume you would also be against having your taxes raised to PAY for this?
ADD to that, WHEN, after chasing a gang of twenty or so, through one of these rabbit warren estates, and having captured one or two, what happens at court?
FUCK ALL!
Do NOR blame the police for the restrictions placed upon them by your politicians and legal system.
Aye! The Police COULD deal with it.
We have see them "deal with" the bastards in Kiew.
Don't get me wrong, give me HALF the chance I would LOVE to deal with it in that way.
Give us the staff, give us the legal means, we will do it willingly. A good kicking down the alley at the back of Woolies does a hundred times more good than a slapped wrist in court.
I mean, come ON(!) your shower* are shit scared of WATERcanon!!*
*(no pun intended)
XX
ReplyDeleteAnonymous said...
Putting offenders in the stocks for a day XX
Yesss. Beef stock, Fish stock, veg stock (Save on pork, use a bastard.... HEY THAT could be a catch phrase for a new "stew in a can!")
ar but if we delt wiv it u woodent need us then julier innit
ReplyDeleteI am trying to remember the title of a SF story set in a time after the collapse of society in which they had buses and road trains travelling between cities. Those buses and road trains had machine guns mounted in turrets at the front, sides and rear as well as a roof mounted cannon used to break up any road blocks - once they started the trip they didn't stop for anything until they reached their destination, they just blasted their way through.
ReplyDeleteI'm not saying anything, just throwing out ideas.
It might be Agenda21 by the UN.
DeleteIvan, could you be thinking of Damnation Alley by Roger Zelazny?
ReplyDeleteIvan- you are thinking of that famous film "Escape from Southend" with Snake Pliskin.Well not so much a film as a documentary.
ReplyDeleteXX ivan said...
ReplyDeleteI am trying to remember the title of a SF story set in a time after the collapse of society in which they had buses a.......XX
FUCK!!!!
YES!
I read two, middle in a series, I believe, and could not get hold of any more.
Ask Leg Iron????
@ Jaded
ReplyDeleteAttacks from bridges are an interesting class of crime.
As FT says, a terrible message was sent out in the case of Hancock and Shankland. Not only was the conviction down-rated to manslaughter, as if chucking concrete off a road bridge through a windscreen could be anything other than an intention to kill, but after lobbying by Tony Benn (expletive deleted) and others, their sentence was reduced to 8 years, then they were let out after five.
If ever there was a signal that we do not care about the lives of the innocent and that really, it is alright to kill someone if you do not like what they do for a living, then that was it.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/may/16/newsid_2512000/2512469.stm
The first thing to recognize is that attempting to kill people is not 'children misbehaving'. It is children dangerously out of control such that it threatens everyone, including their own prospects for a pleasant life.
For their own sakes they need to be brought back under civilized care. I would entertain the idea that the parents should be made responsible for their failure to supervise their children, but I would also give them the authority to do so - which has systematically been removed from parents since the early 1980s.
Hey hey, Melv is back in his fave cross dressing uniform fetish persona. Way to go MTG! As dull and as predictable as ever saddo!
ReplyDelete"but I would also give them the authority to do so - which has systematically been removed from parents since the early 1980s."-WOAR
ReplyDeleteTHIS by God!
Eldest and Youngest and their mates were on a foot/cycle bridge that crossed the autobahn...yes a GERMAN autobahn with no speed limit (this was some years ago, mind). They were throwing stones and bigger stones at the passing cars.
They even threw stones at the Polizei sent to arrest them. Then they legged it before the coppers could get on to the bridge.
Naturally a little while later the Polizei turned up at my door- to arrest the miscreants right (my kids being well known in the village)?
No. My kids were under the age of 14 (Age Of Criminal Responsibility) and it wasn't worth the copper's time etc . The polizei had come round to see me to inform me of my kid's misdeeds and to WARN ME NOT TO RESPOND WITH PARENTAL VIOLENCE! ie not to take my belt to them nor knock them into the middle of next week. If I did I would be arrested and charged.
This from the copper who had been driving when the stone went through his windscreen.
FT will no doubt tell us that things have changed in Germany since the early 90's and he would now have at least arrested my kid etc but things really were that way back then.
XX FT will no doubt tell us that things have changed in Germany since the early 90's XX
ReplyDeleteNot this time.
Between 14 and 18 they come under Jugendgesetz.
If they are under 18, but will be under 21 on realease, they serve the entire time in Youth custody. 21 and it is off to the big boys nick.
"No crime-no blog?"
ReplyDeleteWell, that'd never happen!
"Aye! The Police COULD deal with it.
We have see them "deal with" the bastards in Kiew."
Bring it on!
"I am trying to remember the title of a SF story ..."
Woodsy42 has provided a good suggestion - they made it into a film, with (I think, and can't be arsed to Google) Jan Michael Vincent.
I've only recently discovered your wonderful blog, through comments posted at Tim's. I am intrigued by the reference to Southend. I could have been one of those green clad animals, except it was 50 years ago and I went to school by bus...
ReplyDelete50 years ago, I'd have written to your headmaster with a complaint about your behaviour and you'd all have been called in to a special assembly and read the Riot Act. And that behaviour needc have been nothing more than occupying a seat while an adult stood.
ReplyDeleteBecause that's what happened at my mother's uniformed grammar school.
Now? They behave like zoo animals - worse! And no one cares.