Davie's french attraction.

[CitroJim]

The way forward is decriminalization. People have taken drugs of one kind or another since the beginning of time, and will always do so. Make them clean, make them cheap, put in place proper programmes to help people get clean from class-A addictive substances and cut out the criminal middle men. It's the only way. Everything else has been tried. This approach is working slowly in Portugal.

Totally agree wholeheartedly... Been my view for a long time now... It would, at a stroke, get rid of the biggest evils of the trade.

People must be free to choose themselves if they wish to indulge in drugs or anything else... Banning is the wrong way... How they've made fags totally socially unacceptable is not a bad model to follow... Works better than any bans or heavy-handed tactics...

Also, if drugs were legal the government could cream off some tax revenue as they do with fags and booze; everybody is then a winner... Treatment for Class A addictions then gets at least partially funded...

The correct response from plod to Davie's lad's doughnut should have been "Oi. Mckay. P1ss off and don't let us catch you being such a tw@t again or we will throw the book at you. <throw in suggestion of where doing a donut might not be so annoying to locals>"...

Absolutely, worked well for us when we were his age...

[Stickyfinger]

The "Car Park thing" has escalated massively in the last few years, the result is what has happened, eg a "shot gun" response from the Police issuing ASBO's to anybody.

[MikeT]

Sounds like the aspiring Ken Block needs to be pointed to where he can exercise his wild driving ambitions in a legal, safe(er) and controlled manner - send him to a track event or something? That way he can learn from experts, get it out of his system, probably be a more responsible car-owner/road-user as well, knowing there's a time place for everything?

I despair at all this unnecessary demonising of youngsters (and other demographics), their whole life can be completely ruined by one single over-zealous use of authority as it can make a life-long criminal out of a non-criminal mind. Anbody would think that's what they™ want!

[daviemck2006]

The correct response from plod to Davie's lad's doughnut should have been "Oi. Mckay. P1ss off and don't let us catch you being such a tw@t again or we will throw the book at you. <throw in suggestion of where doing a donut might not be so annoying to locals>"...

He maybe has been told that a few times already that I don’t know about and that is why he has been done this time.

[daviemck2006]

Took Shaun to retrieve his car. Had to go to plod station with the v5, and id. Copper on duty, older guy about 50 ish I would say, said what did you do. Shaun said a donut in a deserted carpark. Older copper says I would have given you a bolloking and told you to bugger off home. He had to take a day off work, pay £150 as well as the fixed penalty and points he will get. Expensive donut! Anyway it turns out the young copper, one year older than Shaun is at 23 didnt even fill out the correct form and the old copper even said he is a dickhead! My daughter is besties with the coppers sister. The sister is a nice girl but the copper is and always was an asshole with a huge chip on his shoulder, as is his mother who I know. All the local young lads hate this copper and there is a few of them going to get him when he is off duty and going to have a word. I just hope that Shaun is not one of them. Arsehole or not, a few lads having a word with a copper in a dark alley is never going to end well.

[Stickyfinger]

Oh dear......even if he is a ****head, BIB do not like it when one of their own get grief, it is why most BiB do not live locally to where they work these days

[Zelandeth]

It might just be me being cynical, but I do have to wonder if there has potentially been a "slap on the wrist" verbal warning already given and we just don't know about it...I don't know the person in question, but given the stories we've heard about his apparent disregard for common sense and responsibility with regards to motoring, I tend to think that having been told off beforehand is something that he might "forget" to mention to you Davie...

The mucking about in a public carpark thing is something I can see both sides of.

I spent a few years being responsible for the upkeep and management of two large carparks (650 and roughly 1200 spaces respectively) in a major city that were only used during the day. One was in the middle of an industrial area, the other was on the outskirts of a residential area, but a few hundred yards at least and totally invisible from the nearest house. These were basically dropped on me one day when the department who had previously been managing them suddenly decided they weren't any more!

We had quite an issue at one of them with youths gathering there and re-enacting scenes from the Fast & the Furious. They generally didn't actually cause any *actual* problems though, and my approach was always "I'd rather they do that there in an empty, well lit car park out of the way than on the main road."

Then one day one local resident started to complain about the noise. At that point things went rapidly downhill - not least because the company who provided our public liability insurance somehow got involved, and basically told us "stop this from happening or we'll shut you down." As such we had to then get the police involved.

The coppers did the right thing though initially. They turned up there one Saturday night when things were in full swing, and told the folks there to keep it down, that there had been complaints etc and that if they kept it up that they would have to take actual legal action. Things did quiet down for several months - then someone nicked a car locally, and drove up the access road into our carpark so fast that they got air over one of the speedbumps and collided with a streetlight a good six feet off the deck. They then tried (and failed...dismally...) to set fire to the car, and claim they had nothing to do with it. The dozen or so (good!) CCTV cameras they were caught on around the site said otherwise. Sadly that was the point at which I was instructed that a zero tolerance policy was necessary, and the police also agreed that their warning was up, and that they were thereafter going to fully follow any further complaints up to the maximum extent possible of the law. I was still of the opinion that this was going to be more likely to just hack everyone off rather than solve anything (and waste a lot of both my time and that of the police), but it was out of my hands - I'd been given an instruction in how the matter had to be handled, and that was that.

Classic case of a select few spoiling everything for everyone else. Also meant that anyone after that one incident who was just messing around (especially in winter when it used to get crazy slippery overnight before the gritters went through in the mornings) in all innocence was going to get the book thrown at them because of the earlier trouble we'd had.

I do have to wonder if there's been trouble at the site in question here at some point which had lead to whoever manages the site having to get the police involved, and it therefore being part of a regular patrol route rather than being one of those areas to which a blind eye is turned.

The Colpy Straight (A920, just east of the Drum of Wartle) was one such bit of road. Good couple of miles of absolutely straight road, next to no properties on it, and good visibility. The traffic police deliberately used to turn a blind eye to speeding there, because they knew people were going to do it, and that they'd rather it happened there than on far busier and less suitable roads (the A947 between Fyvie and Oldmeldrum being one that was often quoted - it had a horrible safety record). If you were being truly daft, yes they'd still pull you, but if just "nipping on a bit" they'd generally ignore it. That information came from a retired officer who had held a position pretty high up the tree in the traffic section, so I tend to trust the source. These days though it's all zero tolerance, and if they clock you doing 70 down there they'll throw the book at you.

It makes me sad to be honest. Through work I had to do quite a lot of stuff in co-operation with the police (that happens when you maintain a couple of thousand bits of street furniture and have a finger in the pie of several major events), and the vast majority of them are great folks who honestly want to make the world a better place. The general opinion among them with regards these days towards everything being done "by the book" and zero tolerance being the only sort of tolerance allowed was usually a resigned sigh and a shake of the head...They generally don't seem to think that "the system" is any more sensible than the rest of us do.

Tell you one thing I do *not* miss from that job...being the key holder for those aforementioned car parks. Getting the phone call from ADT at three AM on a Saturday morning to be told the alarm had been triggered got *really* old after the fourth or fifth time...

[daviemck2006]

Im surprised that this 23 year old copper is working in the area he was born and brought up in, and picking on the guys he went through school with, where he was not liked by many. He was a bully at school by all accounts and still a bully yet. Coppers should really be trying to engage with the young drivers, giving bollockings when needed but trying to be friendly and gaining the trust of them. Shaun says there is one who will stop, get off his arse and walk amongst the young talking about their cars and mods etc, and will give a rollocking when required but will rarely give tickets for petty things. The young lot are quite happy engaging with him and taking advice from him. Thats how it should be. However Shaun does need to behave a bit better, and fix his petty things like blown bulbs and broken lights as they happen.

[daviemck2006]

Zel I do think there is every possibility that he has been warned on previous occasions and ignoed these warnings, and thats why I have little sympathy for him. But there is a known problem here, as I fell foul to it, of the young coppers not actually knowing the law, and saying you will do as I say cos Im a copper and you arent. That was my debacle with blue badge parking where the copper admitted he had never ever seen the rules about it.

[Hell Razor5543]

Sounds like that 23 year old PC has managed to get 'authority' to continue imposing his will on those who are not in a position to prevent this happening. A proper police office (if they are allowed to use their brains, and are not micromanaged) engages with the public, listens to their needs and complaints, slaps the wrists of those deserving of such treatment, and will only take further action when it is warranted. A proper police officer has earned the respect of those they seek to protect, while an officious prat has earned their contempt. A proper police office can ask for help (and will get it), while the prat will demand help and be told where to go, how to get there, and how long it will take there! A police officer wants to help people, a prat wants to order people around.

[Zelandeth]

Yep, there's nothing that instills confidence in the police for me than seeing a gathering of that sort of age group with their cars, than a police car parked in the middle of it, and the officers actually *engaging* with the folks there... generally the folks who cause trouble aren't liked any better by the folks there any more than the police, and if everyone actually talked to everyone else, including the police, it's funny how problems tend to resolve themselves before they actually become problems.

Have only seen a couple of examples over here, but quite a few places in the US have really doing a good job of it. Can't remember exactly where it is, but there's one area where they regularly hold track events for free, where folks can compete with the force who have a couple of vehicles they've modified themselves for the purpose. Surely that can only be a good way of encouraging engagement with that sort of agegroup/demographic.

I think it's a cracking idea...Santa Pod is on our doorstep here, wouldn't be hard to set something up... encourage them down there rather than racing down the H5 here...

Sadly it only takes a single idiot - in either group - to make life a misery for everyone and to undo years of good work.

[Hell Razor5543]

Top Gear (in the Clarkson era) went across USA in three high powered cars, and at one point were at a 'Beat the Heat' meeting, where members of the public to try and out drag the Police in their vehicles. It turns out the Police have cars that are somewhat faster than expected!

[Zelandeth]

Davie, I know the type. I've had trouble with them before (tried to nick me while I was doing survey work near a school...the work I was doing was *for* the school!) simply because I was in a private car rather than a yellow van with a flashy light on top. Big yellow signs front and back saying "HIGHWAY MAINTENANCE - SURVEYING" and all the prerequisite ID badge and paperwork...

...they don't like it when you know the Road Traffic Act better than they do...

[daviemck2006]

After 3 evenings at work on the trot, and in snow and icy conditions I have to say Gabby is one of the best winter cars I have had. Shes very surefooted in the slippy conditions, lots of other cars sticking and slipping and sliding about and seen a couple of minor bumps, Gabby never a seconds worry, no locked wheels even without ABS, no skids, and only once had wheelspin, trying to start off uphill on near sheet ice. She did get going though! And a cracking good heater.she just keeps getting better.

[CitroJim]

Davie, I'm so pleased Gabby is proving so good And doing you sterling service too... Far better than languishing unused here

Same applies to my Activa; I'm so delighted to see her in regular use and being enjoyed...

And that both my last Xantias are well loved...

A perfect situation as far as I'm concerned...