I know I've mentioned this before, but this time it's even more personal.
First it was at my people's house in Shropshire where a 'Traveller' threatened to do serious damage to me, after I'd discovered him moving onto a small field at the bottom of our garden. It was a very unpleasant experience; he was a BIG man, and he wasn't kidding.
Then after this recent long Bank Holiday weekend, I see that some of them have moved onto a field in our lovely old Sussex village (above).
West Chiltington is a very pleasant, quiet (and expensive), village. It is filled with very beautiful old houses, and pristine gardens. The residents are mostly good honest middle-class professional folk, who care deeply about their surroundings. It is regarded as one of the most desirable villages in Sussex. This very pleasant house (below) is typical of the houses in West Chiltington (it was ours).
Then along comes this bunch of law-breaking, so-called, 'Travellers', who put two fingers up at authority, and dump tarmac over a large area, put up fences, and illegally invite their pals to buy a 'plot'.
This MUST NOT BE ALLOWED.
Sadly, no-one is prepared to go in and boot them out, and force them to return the field to its original condition.
Just imagine if YOU owned that lovely old farmhouse in the top right of the top photo. One minute you have all the peace and quiet you desire (and have paid through the nose for), the next you have a bunch of criminals moving their caravans up against your back garden. That is an expensive house too!!!
I AM aware that it makes no difference whether or not the location is 'desirable' or not, but somehow because I lived there, and knew many of the residents, it does seem particularly outrageous.
If the Police can't deal with these people, then bring in The Army. They have all the heavy moving kit they need, and could tow away any vehicles within minutes. And I'm sure there's a local 'Crusher' not too far away.
In another part of Sussex, in Clayton (above), the little darlings have even invaded the local Cricket Pitch. Is there no end to their disgusting behaviour !!!
If the authorities simply do nothing, these scumbags will see it as a sign of weakness, and move on to yet another field or Cricket pitch; and do the same again. Someone needs to act AT ONCE.
14 comments:
We had them here about half a mile away. Luckily they were only here for a couple of weeks and the council assisted by the police moved them on.
They had chicken coops, lots of dogs and washing lines everywhere!
The mess they left behind was atrocious.
Dog walkers reported human excrement in several.places. Dirty beggars.
They seem to think that they can do whatever they want, wherever they want, and whenever they want. And sadly they can. You were very lucky to get rid of yours after just two weeks!
I despair, how the hell are these people allowed to get away with it? And yet if you or I put a foot wrong we'd be banged up in no time at all, it's just not fair. I fear that the world is coming to an end in that biblical sense, war, pestilence, overpopulation, climate - we're all like rats in a bag, glad I only have a few years left if I'm lucky.
Sadly we have them locally every summer, one year they took over the local football fields, all clubs stopped for the entire summer, the fields had bolted gates, they just cut through them. We are already watching their movements via reports on facebook. They totally vandalized the football club, breaking into buildings and stealing, the one building they could not get into the set alight and blocked the fire engine. No wonder people dislike them so much. On the plus side a gofundme page raised enough to replace everything with a bit spare, the football club donated the excess to the local food bank.
It cost a local village £ 40,000 to clear up the mess left on their playing field and another village have dug unsightly trenches all around their village green.
I feel much the same. It'll be for others to clear-up all the mess; if they can be bothered. Europe has become far too liberal, and we now allow anyone to do anything; without incrimination.
It's a bit like the people who pitch their tents in our churchyard. The least they could do is collect their own rubbish. But they can't even be bothered to do that. It's no wonder they're hated and mistrusted so much.
We have a well trained Army, who often do very little. Just give them the address and tell them to 'get on with it'. They could treat it as a Military Exercise.
We have recently had such an invasion in Scunthorpe. They set up camp right next to a school. An order for them to disperse was taken out, and they decided to move on. They left behind a disgusting pile of garbage. Where do they come from I do not know.
It's all very well organised. These people are no fools. It's just a shame that the authorities aren't as well organised.
There are two different scenarios here. The cricket pitch invasions and the playing field invasions described are those where the authorities move them off for trespassing and they disappear once the paperwork has been finalised, or before if you're lucky. The other scenario you describe in the first example of the tarmac field next to the pleasant house is where the travellers, I assume, bought the land and then moved in and do what they want. We have a lot of that here and if they get planning permission they skew it a bit to suit what they want to do and then appeal and end up doing exactly what they want. I blame John Prescott if you look back into Labour archives.
Yes, it's a problem. They buy the land, offer plots for sale, tarmac over everything, put up fencing, and walk away; leaving a complicated legal mess.
Come to Norfolk and see it all over the place. The "complicated legal mess" ends up not particularly complicated when the local authorities give in to the travellers and let them have whatever they want.
I can understand your anger because I would not want such a pop up traveller settlement in my back yard. Fortunately, around Sheffield, there have been very few problems with invading travellers. On the edge of the moors up near Redmires reservoirs there's a small licensed traveller site with hard-standing and access to water, electricity and waste disposal. As far as I know, they have not caused any significant problems.
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