Stupid Councils and Police

[Gavster]

Did you know that if you get a vehicle, park it on the street, remove the number plates, then start living in the vehicle, the police and the council can't do anything?

My "Irish" neighbours have proven this by parking two fucking massive motorhomes outside my house, ripping the plates off and moving their spawn into them. The council and Police have both been down to visit and shrugged that they can't do anything to a vehicle when there's someone living inside it. This is on top of the Land Rover, Transit flatbed, Merc A-class, Ford Galaxy and 2 x trailers parked outside with no reg plates.

So it turns out that tax, insurance, registration etc are all completely optional

Sigh. I need to get the hell out of this neighbourhood. It's cursed.

[Matty]

That can't be right, surely? I thought it was law that any motorised vehicle must tick all the boxes, regardless.

Is this just because of who they are and they don't want to get involved?

[Gavster]

It definitely seems to be a combination of several factors, one of which being their "Irish" heritage. I only call them Irish because the first time I ever spoke to them, they told me they're Irish

The council have said "they have to meet certain criteria for the council to deem them abandoned and for us to be able to remove them." and urged me to contact the police about the vehicles. However, I've spoken to the police about one vehicle (the Land Rover, which was 'accidentally' was registered to my address), they visited the street to check it out and sod all happened.

[Gavster]

I've done a full denial claim with DVLA so the Land Rover is no longer registered here, however because he was driving it all over the place with no tax, insurance, ULEZ etc, I'm still getting this amount of mail on a weekly basis which are fines and PCNs etc from various authorities. Need to go through and inform each one individually that they're barking up the wrong tree. Luckily the DVLA have provided me with a letter confirming this is the wrong address which I can use as evidence.

[Gavster]

And the worst thing about this is that they're violent people, the entire family smack the shit out of each other in the street. Kids, husband, wife, they all throw swingers at each other - it's horrendous to see Police have been here probably 20+ times in the last couple of years. When it gets especially heated, she goes out with a metal bar and starts battering the windows on the cars, most of them have smashed windscreens etc

[V8Granite]

Ahhh but it's a lovely culture, not harming anyone.

Hope they get moved on, fired at the moon, kill themselves off as necessary.

We had awful neighbours a few years ago and it stressed the wife out but we got them moved.

Dave!

[dinny_g]

Christ Gav you're cursed... any chance the folks downstairs have invited them to stay as a final "F U"

We have a halting side near here and at least 4 or 5 days a week, they burn large amounts of house clearance crap, including Tyres sending thick flumes of black smoke over the town - AND the M1 (and we know what happened with smoke on the M4 a few years back). they also were doing this during the recent hot weather, dried conditions etc

People are encouraged to report them to the council who are "establishing a file" - but they've been establishing a file for the past 10 to 15 years with ZERO action.

They don't want to be accused of any sort of discrimination based on heritage so they just do nothing.

A brand new estate of £500k to £1m houses is being built right up to their fence so let's see what happens then

[Rich B]

And the worst thing about this is that they're violent people, the entire family smack the shit out of each other in the street. Kids, husband, wife, they all throw swingers at each other - it's horrendous to see Police have been here probably 20+ times in the last couple of years. When it gets especially heated, she goes out with a metal bar and starts battering the windows on the cars, most of them have smashed windscreens etc

Have you considered moving somewhere nice?

[Gavster]

Yes, as recently as 11 minutes ago

As soon as I legally pack up and sell/rent everything and get out of here, it’s probably going to happen very quickly.

[Gavster]

Christ Gav you're cursed... any chance the folks downstairs have invited them to stay as a final "F U"

We have a halting side near here and at least 4 or 5 days a week, they burn large amounts of house clearance crap, including Tyres sending thick flumes of black smoke over the town - AND the M1 (and we know what happened with smoke on the M4 a few years back). they also were doing this during the recent hot weather, dried conditions etc

People are encouraged to report them to the council who are "establishing a file" - but they've been establishing a file for the past 10 to 15 years with ZERO action.

They don't want to be accused of any sort of discrimination based on heritage so they just do nothing.

A brand new estate of £500k to £1m houses is being built right up to their fence so let's see what happens then

That's mad that they can just do that for so long without any repurcussions hopefully the new housing estate will create some additional pressure on the council to act

[GG.]

Yes I find it intensely irritating that so little is done about these situations.

The vehicles should be confiscated and crushed and if they refuse to vacate them then they should be taken into custody.

It probably is the case that the law needs to be amended to be more categorical about what the police can do in these situations rather than leaving it to a mishmash of effectively vehicle registration/taxation related offences and then obstructing the police.

[dinny_g]

My guess is they'll ask to be paid to move - along the lines of £10k per adult.

At which point 200 Adults will arrive from all over the country and want' paying. The developer will pay and they'll up sticks and move... to the other end of the housing estate and then want £15k to move...

Which will be paid whereupon they'll move to the road outside the home of the managing director of the development company and want £20k to move.

* - this rather depressing view is borne out of that exact scenario occurring at an office near where I grew up when I was a kid. Blocked Entrance #1. got paid to move. Moved to Entrance #2. Got paid to move. Moved to outside the MD's home...

[240PP]

We’ve had travellers take over our head office carpark a few times. I’ve heard rumours they demanded ~£25k to move on. It only takes a few of them to completely shut down a 2000 space carpark resulting in a lot of people having to be advised to not come in on Monday morning.

[tim]

Christ, that sounds like a living hell. Move to Suffolk, Gav!

[Mito Man]

Woodland neighbours are cut from the same cloth. The father figure came in, subdivided the woods into 4 plots for each of his kids. Put in 4 tarmac drives, streetlights, water, electricity, septic system and static caravans.

I always minded my own business, I only went to the woods to cut the odd tree and gather firewood, so ended up getting on with them because we’d just chat about chainsaws and cars. Or rather chainsaws and Hiluxes and Transits. Then one day the council got wind of their activities and sent officers round. They had put a tall electric fence round their woods except the part that ran alongside ours so the enforcement officers cut through our woods to get to theirs.

Next day the eldest son calls me up to lend a hand. He had a trailer full of fence posts and fitted his digger with a post knocker. So that weekend we fenced everything off which damn near killed me but I think we ended up with some special bond because he gave me the padlock code to his toilet.

They get up to some seriously dodgy shit, but the weird thing is they also work for the council so they know lots of people inside. They knew the name and address of every person who reported them to the council and seem to magically resolve problems. They got mains water and electricity hook up sorted in like 10 days and that’s all third party stuff.

[V8Granite]

A few funny "cheeky scamp" incidents over the years.

In Peterborough many years ago a load of Iraq immigrants were housed on a long street. One of the Iraqis stabbed a Gypsy, so the next morning the entire street had a row of caravans on and all their front doors were removed, the Iraqis were moved on
Number one rule of Gypsy fighting, fists only, when they are down, leave them be. You can work pretty well with Gypsys, they are forceful but not arseholes imo.

Pikeys are a different sort.

Local farmer has a cow stolen and butchered, he turned up with many farmer friends and was chaining up the vans to his tractor and said he gets paid for the cow or he leaves with the vans, cow was purchased, Pikeys left next morning.

The Ideal World shopping channel building was built, some Pikeys said they will provide security for x amount a month, the company declined, next night its on fire.

Horse racing down Frank Perkins Parkway, horse slips and breaks something, guy gets picked up by following hoardes in pick-up trucks, suffering horse had to be put down at the side of the road.

Market Deeping had about 10 vans on a field just outside of town, most people wanted them moving but a load of "they are just living their own lives" folk said leave them be. Then a few teenage boys were chasing girls around at the local primary school and harrassing and touching them, a couple of teachers slung them out. They got moved on very quickly then.

We get a lot of actual Gypsys in Peterborough and in east anglia in general and they are pretty good folk, clean up after themselves, ask for nothing but get mixed in with the nefarious scum criminals of the Pikeys.

Gav, I suggest you start playing Celine Dion as loud as possible from the flat above and blame some crazy old neighbours, they may move on then

Dave!