Beadle asked for more. Oliver Twist says no

Enough! to the injustices of the housing industry

We probably know that scene from Dicken’s novel where the titular pauper orphan boy holds up his gruel bowl before his benefactor and asks for a second helping. We are used to being in Oliver Twist’s shoes – the dependant far smaller than those in authority over us, ‘fortunate’ to be in the care of an institution. We are used to being told that their benevolent provision has saved us from the streets and the gutter but we must now submit to their regimes, their fees, their rules. If we do not pay directly but live from charity we especially must accept the menu and portions given to us. We do not return to the front of the room, to the powerful one’s area, and in public ask for more. Oliver asked politely and suppliantly, holding his bowl out, but at the level of the man in front of him.

A beadle is but one example of one of our many kinds of administrators claiming authority – often more than they really have.

I hereon concentratate on those relating to housing: local authorities, legal figures, and most of all, landlords.

Did you know that judges are in fact just senior administrators?

Administrators tend not to be chosen by the people. Landlords are those who aren’t even called to office; there is no calling or bar for them in any sense.

Like the likes of beadle, landlords claim that they too are providing something – shelter – which you would suffer without. How magnanimous of them. So it’s quite reasonable for them to have to charge you – they do have to make a living, of course. And what’s wrong with making money? Investing is shrewd. Buying and selling, gaining lucrative planning permissions, making good returns, are all skills. It is a legitimate and necessary business.

I wish to stop there and get us to roll over this stone.

And then I wish us to think about the injustice of evictions, and I’ll share some of my recent experience on that, including the legal system, the council, and charities meant to assist those facing homelessness.

My story began last summer, when on the day that covid rules ended (but so did the moratorium on eviction and rent raises), my landlord asked for more. He knew of my long term financial difficulties and that thanks to the government shutting down businesses and expecting us to stay at home for many months that I was unlikely – like so many of you – to have improved my situation during the pandemic period.

A day is coming, and is now here, where it is Oliver who has the right of refusal. It is those who hitherto charged us who raise up their bowl to us. May we? Nope. Landlords, along with others we pay our bills to, have already had so much from us. They’ve hoarded gruel and the bowls it goes in for too long. They have made us beg them for something to eat. They have made a roof over our heads and the supplies that go with it something that is conditional on us placating them. They have made it their gift, not our right. They have made this placation an endless abasement, a debt that we are never released from.

I recently pointed out that that is slavery.

I want us to think about landlordism – yes, that’s the term for it – as hoarding resources and selling them back to us, as I have already written of regarding utilities (gas, electricity, water). It is known as rentier capitalism – that of hiring out resources permanently, which the users never own, even though most housing (unlike a wedding dress or a holiday vehicle or hotel) is a long term need. The landlords set the prices, not us the dweller/consumers. We can choose to some extent where we live and with whom we contract, but unless we own outright (and are not in a managed property), third parties claim rights to repossess that home and to have control over what goes on in it – who lives with us, whatcauses we promote outside of it, expecting us to submit to inspections and repairs, and often paying their bedfellow – the insurers.

In the last couple of years, the disparity of power and the poor behaviour of many landlords (including the failures of the legal system) have been exposed to the point that a sea change is occurring, internationally.

This is the water that is surrounding King Cnut:

In Britain, the hated legislation that contains the clause which gives the landlords the right to move you on without reason or automatic recompense is the housing act of 1988 (no capitals, any more than I give for the established church). Although its section 21 is infamous – that’s the bit that allows the judiciary power to arbitarily order your forcable ejection and create you homeless – the whole act is objectionable. It was created in a little chain of acts under our then conservative government (deliberately lower case). I may surprise by saying that in one sense, I support ex-prime minister Margaret Thatcher’s moves to sell off council housing because I want people to own their homes and I do not not think that councils are good landlords. There is much intrusion into tenants’ homes and lives, and if you’ve ever tried to get on a housing list – even and especially in a crisis – you’ll know how rubbish they are. I will talk more about that later. I do not support getting everyone on a mortgage, for it is a swindle and gives your power to banks, and makes you another kind of slave. At least this slow filling bucket with a hole does lead to eventually stopping casting money in a bucket, and the bucket becomes yours to do with as you wish – except for tax. Renters’ buckets never fill and they never get the bucket at the end.

But the late and controversial Maggie’s push to get us owning, not renting, affected landlords. I’ve seen figures that under 10% were renting around the time of this act. Landlords felt that they had less legal rights than tenants now (good, that is the right way round) and that their market was too small. Rent capping – making limits on how much could be charged – was spoiling their favourite doctrine: the free market.

So my understanding is that this act of 1988 was created to encourage a wider rental housing market with the freedom for landlords to charge what they want.

The infamous section 21 of that act gives the landlord the right to move tenants on at their whim, mostly to create more wealth for themselves. That’s right: the power of arbitrary homelessness is purely so that landlords are able to make more money. They can move on people who simply aren’t paying the rent that they’d like – or who stand up to them (eg over not doing repairs, dealing with anti social behaviour, or for turning up at tenants’ without sufficient warning – all of which are illegal).

Please sit with that a moment.

The clause about non payment of rent (section 8) which is internationally considered a common and reasonable reason to to evict is also about making wealth for the landlord, and is also unfair. We should and do have the right to withhold payment – for shoddy service (interpersonally), for lack or faulty goods (a home not fit for habitation, and breaking the intrinsic right to quietly enjoy), and if we have overpaid. To undermine this right is to create serious inequality and is a human rights issue. It is a form of slavery to say your home is at risk if you don’t keep paying for something which costs the owner little, which the landlords generally didn’t even build, and which never ends, and that rights are one-sided.

Why should landlords keep getting for doing little to nothing? Especially when it keeps us in work we maybe don’t like, giving a high proportion of our income away to them, whether we’re rich or poor.

Those who attack the notions that rent is theft and that most landlords are bad are landlords themselves, or attached to them. They’re feudal enough to consider that they offer a service that we would be without, if it weren’t for them. There’s still a lick of that old school “I own you”, “respect me, I’m your landlord.” They expect to act like that beadle and for us to be Oliver Twists, up to that point of the double helping.

I found this piece ‘The Myth of the Good Landlord’ by Tom Lavin very interesting, although I reject his solution: government ownership, at any level, is not public ownership and certainly not the people’s. Let us not confuse them; for the government is not benign – you just give it greater power and create it as a huge landlord.

I also have written several pieces of my own, often in emails to policy makers. I was not happy with the stance and [utter lack of] assistance of Shelter – Britain’s most famous housing charity – nor the Citizen’s Advice Bureau (there’s something legally dubious about the word ‘citizen’ – it means owing allegiance to your nation in return for protection.)

There are those who might protest that they are good and busy landlords, kept busy by the government’s growing demands. I have found that this list is less about real tenants’ safety and rights, and more about landlord compliance to checks which are lucrative to those that undertake them (such as gas engineers), and as one writer argued, is about keeping your chattels (ie us rent payers) still valuable (ie able to pay and not dead or suing due to gas leaks).

I was shocked at how much of a countersuit against eviction depends on not only on checking our electric and gas – even during the years we’re meant to have limited who came into our homes! – but on having a valid Energy Performance Certificates (whose real value I query).

Council workers asked me this first: they actually confessed (I recorded Mr PT at Norwich City say it) that their concern at the homelessness prevention team is to establish if they have any legal requirement to help; they and will dump you if not, not caring if you die in the gutter. This council spied on me after the notice period expired (still when covid was meant to be rife and restrictions in place), hoping that if I seemed to have moved on (rather than face the violence of bailiffs) that they could wash their hands of me, which they think they did.

They are wrong – read the below.

If you move before you’re pushed, the council can claim that you made yourself voluntarily homeless and thus you are not assisted; if you sit tight in a home you’re not welcome in with a legal case over you, you wonder if you’ll actually receive the papers inviting you to court to defend yourself and whether you’ll receive a fair hearing, and warning – or could the bailiffs just turn up? (You should have several warnings and opportunities to defend but I found that legal post doesn’t always arrive). Living with that fear is very stressful, as I heard other local families state on news last Christmas.

I say this not to scare, but to illustrate the injustice of the system which we must fight against.

I’ve wondered how much of my own experience to share. I’m aware of attempted repercussions, but I remind that it’s only slander/libel if it’s untrue; and that speaking out is whistleblowing, which is protected, and it is about protecting others from particular companies and individuals, and calling them to account to to make reparations. I write nothing to be vindictive or vexatious, although I believe I have been on the receiving end of both of those from those to whom I allude; my home and income was lost through the bloody-minded actions of others – especially particular individuals at the supposed Housing Options department and revenues and benefits at Norwich City Council, HMCTS (the court service), and my former landlord – a man who’s been investing in multiple properties since the 1970s, and had over 30 tenants when I moved in, on top of a presumed public pension and other business.

I had lived long term in a tiny one room home, not fit for purpose and with no commercial value, unable to move on. “A bolt hole, suboptimal at best,” said one visitor – “not a serious home”. “It’s the second worst home I’ve seen in Norwich” said another. “I wouldn’t swap with you.” Yet my landlord had received tens of thousands for my just being there.

Those concerned have been individually and personally put on permanent notice, and know who they are. At this time, I will just name my landlord, Clem Vogler of Norfolk. He is on the net for several reasons – his Dec 2018 Telegraph article on helping landlords avoid the new tax rules (he saved over £50,000) in which he confirms the size of his £4m property portfolio, and his work for infamous Golden Eye International, which is verified on his own website.

As for his interactions with me, his own words and actions convict him. Both are utterly provable and undeniable.

There will be repercussions for any repercussions.

I will here point out that

-the court, with its huge backlog, processed his forms (at Christmas) in under a week but failed to serve my countersuit over some months, despite his form missing sections

-the council wanted instrusive forms and compliance from me (as did HMCTS) to do anything

-there is strong circumstantial evidence of collusion

-the unfairness that Rent Repayment Orders (designed to punish rogue landlords) do not benefit council tenants or benefit recipients nor those with live-in landlords, and are again about those checks

-few lawyers seem really interested in championing tenants, especially if you need support to pay their fees (that legal dress down piece is coming). A real champion I found was a Californian firm – do look at what tenants were awarded. I like reading their site for empowerment.

Don’t feel that if this isn’t where you live that no-one can help.

I hope this inspires any genuine lawyers and paralegals to assist in this battle, and any true judges.

We need a new legal system, and many are looking to People’s Courts and Grand Juries.

I think it’s time that homes simply were: perhaps we could pay to buy, repair or build one but not to live in it, certainly not to the tune of what we’re used to paying. Homes need to be given to the those who live in them. As for landlord being compensated – they have been, all along. It’s called rent.

All those who have been part of the injustice should be ashamed

Every bully landlord – and bank – and those who support them (such as bailiffs) needs to make reparations, now.

We need to end this slavery and the system that makes it not only possible, but pretends that it’s normative.

My fomer landlords wrote in to the Telegraph nearly 30 years ago with his views on tyrants. The irony is clear: it is not just political dictators at a national level who are tyrants, it is anyone who ill uses (often self-given) power.

I was put at risk by Clem’s actions, and those of those courts and council, like so many others. Those doing so in these last couple of years especially are reprehensible and are guilty of crimes and liable for all the distress they caused, your losses, inconvenience, detriment to your income, relationships, health…… there are many in an eviction.

There are consequences for evicting people and all injustice – certainly in the next world, but I’d like them in this, now.

And I wish to see the end of landlordism and bully banks. The new world is here. Beadle’s bowl is empty.

If I go silent…

As already warned, if this stops (and I’m currently planning a weekly Lent piece and have advertised services each month til Sept on betweenthestools.webs.com) something will have happened to me. It is possible that it might.

On top of the below, my home is also in jeopardy

I am being harrangued for a debt I don’t owe whilst in hardship by EDF, who was given this household’s supply by OFGEM when it closed down several small companies in 2019.

Unbelievably, this is happening during cold months and a full strict lockdown!

I consider that this is a crime on several counts:

1) fraud by nondisclosure, as per 2006 act: that free energy exists and that patents have been suppressed, thus giving the illusion that energy can only be supplied by for profit companies (the same is true of water), when it is a naturally occurring, God-given free resource which has been harnessed and sold back to us, and it’s hard to avoid or find alternatives

2) the energy industry is a form of modern slavery as per 2015 act, holding us in lifelong custom: something we need, can’t easily find an alternative from or not use. This supplier took over without consent or knowledge or warning and will not relinquish without paying them; but the amount grows as they continue our abusive relationship

3) as utility acts such as the 1989 and 1990 clash with inalienable natural Common Law and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 and various other laws, some to be listed anon, that the so-called powers given to energy companies to gain money and bully are not lawful

4) removal of energy takes our rights (as in the UDHR) to eat, wash, be warm, work, communicate, and have leisure and enjoyment. Particularly, it can cut those off who rely on the internet and mains charging operated phones, thus making them vulnerable, and causing a snowball effect

5) cutting off, or the fear and bullying around doing so and ‘recovering debts’, causes mental and physical suffering, as well as great inconvenience and loss.

a) These are recoupable in monetary terms of the claimant (ie customer’s) choosing

b) this amounts to constructive demise or manslaughter  – including attempt and conspiracy to commit this serious crime (attempt and conspiracy apply for all the others below)

6) asking for money in a way which is upsetting, intimidating or distressing is another criminal offence under the Prevention From Harassment act of 1997 – and most debt demands fulfil this, and are not incidental, but designed to cause fear in the way they are worded, in the design of the ‘red, urgent’ envelopes, in the vagueness of who and where the collector is, offering a generic phone number; bluffing about their powers and a warrant; coming to the door with hand delivered envelopes to embarass in front of household members and neighbours; and the way they appear at your door to actually collect or tamper with supply

7) There is Aggravated Trespass under the Criminal Justice and Public Order act of 1994, where if you have given written notice that implied access to your property (I include remotely, in the case of smart meters), to enter the premises (including outside areas) without written permission and especially with ill-intent, is a further summary, ie imprisionable offence

8) this is also exhortion and blackmail

9) it is an aggressive sales technique, no different from drugs barons and loan sharks

10) a prepayment meter is just another way of forcing debt repayment; and as the customer doesn’t set the amount, if they do not have resources, they are still left without power and heat

11) this is closely related to the data and surveillance and weaponised energy of 5G via smart meters, and so this is

a) espionage

b) mass experimentation under the Nuremburg code of 1948

c) biowarfare

12) it is also breaking and entering, if they force or pick locks

13) any physical abuse has other crimes – such as battery, grevious bodily harm, assault

14) lying or tricking to gain entry is also a crime

15) their involving your neighbours breaks confidentiality – such as asking about you, getting them to let them in. This is against their industry code

16) during lockdowns and other restrictions related to covid, they break the coronavirus act 2020. Utility workers are only classed as keyworkers when they are keeping a supply running and safe. They are not permitted to work or travel to harass and cut off – this is especially reprehensible during an extended pandemic when so many are anxious have weakened immunity, and financial difficulties. When most of us are not meant to see loved ones, especially indoors – how can they justify coming to us?!

17) if the operatives are masked – this includes a locksmith or any enforcement with them – this heightens the offence as, despite covid guidance, it is done with criminal intent and knowingly

a) makes them look sinister, thus adding to fear of the customer

b) hides their identity and obfuscates justice

18) any persons involved, including administrators and the judge who created any warrant

19) to exaggerate one’s legal powers is also an offence

Furthermore, utility companies send out – and sell out – debts and debt collectors who have no knowledge of the communications between the company and the customer; such as whether they are misbilled, or even the right person. I also believe that poor service, such as being ignored or bullied, means a rebate on the ‘bill’.

The ombudsman have consistently exacerbated and failed to put right, and OFGEM’s policies have added to this too.

We need to take the power back into our hands; to choose our energy source and provider; to harness free, safe energy.

I am putting EDF staff on notice for all these.

Has anyone else had any similar trouble for this, especially in the last year? I would like to know the extent of the problem

I am considering class action. An expression of interest in no way commits you, especially financially.

You may be interested in my piece at https://elspethr.wordpress.com/2020/08/22/expulsion-from-the-garden-its-time-we-took-our-energy-back

And if you want to know who to contact: execteam-exeter@edfenergy.com

and ask for Operations Manager

Customer Intervention Team

Why the AO and HMRC need calling to account

I’ve written before about the failings of ombudsmen and adjudicators, the latter being Trash Heaps (think Fraggle Rock). In fact, they both could be, as are the organisations we bring to them.

The Nottingham based Adjudicator’s Office is a hive running round the Queen – and yes, it’s been a woman for six years: currently Helen McGarry.

Like her predecessor, she’s no Wincey Willis (think 1980s gameshow Treasure Hunt).

There’s a hunt with obscure words and a deadline, but the treasure is all the treasury’s. For the AO deals with complaints about Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs and The Valuation Office.

I’ve long had issues with HMRC – the tax office – and it’s not hard to find others who feel the same. They especially like to pick on self employed people and small businesses. Their compliance checks can mean hours, as well as pounds – photocopying and scanning, buying cloud software to upload… and then HMRC ungraciously deciding that they won’t accept your offering. All of course at your own expense. Often their drawn out investigations are because of their own misinformation.

May of us are deemed to have not paid enough tax or paid it too late, or that we have received too many tax credits and they will not only cease, but be demanded back.

I’ve been bullied for some years – I won’t give personal details, but I’ve had to spend much energy on fighting HMRC and learning what hard hearted bullies they are, and how the system is designed for you not to be able to easily recover from it, in any sense. I have strong evidence of collusion but also misuse of law. I think they want compliance or cessation. In any sense.

My case returned to the AO for the 3rd time – a different part, they won’t reinvestigate old ones. They also don’t award for their own failings. And they know that the next tier – the PHSO – is useless. I obtained figures of the tiny percentage of cases which are ever upheld, let alone given compensation. They elongate and annoy, and you need your MP to apply to them. Mine, Clive Lewis, messed up by not sending the supporting documents and he refused to resend the case, even when the PHSO asked me to. Hence Helen McGarry thinks she sits safe, knowing she’ll rarely be called to account by the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman.

The recent investigation seemed to be no such thing. Even the bit about frustration and sympathy was a cut and paste job. It was condescending and had little or no back up. I’d reapplied for tax credits a year ago, but they claim that my area’s roll out for Universal Credit had begun just after, so it was too late. If I’d had a quicker response from HMRC, I would have gotten the award, worth a few thousand. I note the statements which make me look unreasonable: “if [I’d] chosen to…” – utterly inappropriate; the ones that make them sound fair… it’s a school of writing that I see throughout bureaucracy and sometimes in personal emails. McGarry claims the law is on her side; nothing can be changed now. But I’m well aware of law being bent or ignored or even created to suit governments.

I am tired of these organisations not being accountable, of not righting wrongs and even acknowledging them. I am tired of Trash Heaps whose rather ill-judged pronouncements become binding, and who do not expect comeback. I am tired of governments who bully, not work for their people.

If you are too, then let’s stand together against it. We need an AO who’s fit for purpose and a tax office that’s fair – it’s supposed to be collecting for the benefit of the people. We need reform. We need leaders who listen and laws that benefit and protect us, not the few. We need different values that aren’t about greed and control, but respect and fairness. And yes, love, even in politics. And that means love of justice, a fierce love that stands up for ourselves and others and doesn’t take no for an answer.

 

 

Why TV licences need to end

I note that many countries still have these – but that many have ceased them. In Britain, our license is decades behind what is on offer and how people view.

My issue is firstly that a compulsory legally backed fee was ever levied from the public. Although the British Broadcasting Corporation was created as independent, the fact that its licence was equated in law to tax – and thus has the same punishments of fees and ultimately imprisonment for non payment – shows that it is not independent from the establishment, and thus neither is the BBC. This shows how law and crimes are often relative and privately self serving, not public safe keeping.

That the decision for change has to come from parliament is also telling.

It is often commented on that the BBC is biased. Its news is very negative and feels created to gain a particular response. During the credit crunch and since Brexit, it repeats doomful ideas. Watching it alongside other news – and in the early evening, you can chain watch about 4 different channels – you see the particular tone of the BBC. In a couple of weeks, everyone appearing on BBC TV will wear a red poppy, which has connotations for beliefs about war. The BBC skips over other matters – such as the unpopularity of its licence and the widespread historic abuse in it uncovered around children’s presenter Jimmy Saville.

Although some proponents claim that the BBC is standard bearer in both television and radio, it is not to everyone’s tastes. Its programming is repetitive (thus across more channels we do not gain more content than before BBC 3 and 4 were created), and that its drama is outweighed by the reality and non narrative programmes. Peeking at the BBC’s website, I see that programmes about food, dancing, antiques and nature are high profile. We should not be paying for that website – one I don’t even really rate or find user friendly.

I personally now don’t see BBC as appealing or good quality, in any of its media.

There’s also a certain kind of Britishness associated with the BBC. The BBC creates and maintains a status quo. Many of the BBC’s popular programmes are older ones. I’ve not yet seen it be ahead of the curve, and truly radical.

It’s also pointed out that BBC does have many adverts – for itself – and thus isn’t really better than a commercial channel.

The BBC hasn’t been the nation’s only provider of television or radio for some decades. By the early 1980s, there were four TV channels and three providers; the other two – Independent television (ITV) and Channel 4 – having to fund themselves via advertising, thus introducing the commercial break that is so familiar in other countries. There were other radio stations, locally and nationally, and further, if you could find the frequency. At that time, home video had arrived, and we covered the cost of what we watched in the purchase or hire fee.

And many videos – now in a different format – are of films, and I wonder if there’s a trend that non TV owners are regular cinema goers. Or perhaps they prefer theatre, or music, or sport, or lectures, or they’re involved in churches or politics.

So my point is that yes there are still people who don’t have a television and aren’t interested, and find other ways to find out about the world and have culture in their lives.

But these non viewers can be disbelieved and harassed. No, we’re not all glued to the box.

But it’s not easy to prove that we’ve no such box and that other devices which can pick up pictures are not being used for the purposes that require licensing.

I have seen some websites put out incorrect facts regarding when you need a licence: owning a DVD/video player and TV do not require one, it’s watching new programmes, live or recorded, on any device. It has been the case for some time that viewing prerecorded media only does not require a licence – and rightly so.

And if we’re watching DVDs of cinema films, then why should the BBC expect to gain a share by enforcing a licence that almost solely benefits itself? Or what of television shows that don’t come to Britain, or aren’t British made, or are made by another channel? The BBC doesn’t have to prove its share or gain an audience to elicit its fees, unlike anyone else.

This is the point that many people have made, and it’s been valid since the introduction of the 3^rd channel, but especially from the 1980s, which is now over 30 years ago. By 2000, satellite and cable had arrived for many, as had the net. Now of course we have much greater choice and diverse habits and the BBC is an ever smaller offering of our media diet.

The BBC makes most of us pay them a tax (or be prepared to prove why we are exempt) but it itself does not pay corporation tax, as it’s non-profit making. This is huge: that it takes tax but doesn’t expect to have to run like other companies. It has also been accused of avoiding other kinds of tax on a large scale, by using a not long closed loophole.

And then, the most pertinent point: the TV license funds bullying.

I read huge numbers of prosecutions, many of which are thrown out of court. I’ve heard above 180,000 a year, and that 1 in 10 UK prosecutions are to do with TV licensing.

The licensing company has a whole collections arm, which are thus paid for publicly. They employ bully boy tactics, including their fear inducing adverts, with vans cruising about watching for signals from unpaid watchers, and then swooping on whoever answers the door, often exaggerating their powers (which is an offense of both kinds). They say that non payment is unfair on those who do pay, and call non payers “evaders”, which is an emotive and negative word.

But fee abolition website SpiderBomb shows that the BBC’s revenue from licensing creates a huge budget and it’s much more than it needs. Large salaries are pointed out – why should we have to pay for those? SpiderBomb suggests a much more modest fee is viable.

Yes I’ve heard the Beeb themselves argue that the radio part of the licence is pence, that it’s like a pint of beer each week, but what if we don’t drink Beeb beer? The price of beer argument’s a weak one, for some people still struggle with the £147 annual license and certainly the £1000 fine. There’s been much about the economic imbalance that the fee is a flat tax, unrelated to income (or usage), and that the poor are disproportionately harassed and even end up in prison because of this matter.

This sounds so familiar in inequitable governing around the world and history. I believe that the BBC and its overseas branches often argued for are part of empire retention, and that the real issue is about the use of public broadcasting.

And what if we resent funding a salaried collections company who are paid bonuses and given quotas, such as Capita are?

Many of us would be keen to not fund organisations of abuse and oppression, but we’re being forced to do so directly, via British law and our own so called Aunt.

Auntie Beeb is not seen as our caring trustworthy source of news and stories, but a not so subtle controlling matriarch who seems exempt from critique and change.

The BBC is one of a large family now, and a relation we may not ever spend time with, especially due to her brutish behaviour – that she requires gifts for visiting not only herself but other aunts, and sends in her henchmen for those who don’t. Is this someone you want to have a relationship with, and feel should go unchecked?

Today, a debate is happening in Westminster about the TV tax. Let us ensure our views are listened to and that it’s not replaced (which it needs to be) with more draconian rules.

– We need a new system which doesn’t involve further watching the public, as I fear subscription and online based scenarios lend themselves to, and we know that digital television sets assist with

– Fines and especially prison and door to door bullying is an abuse and needs to stop

– TV licensing needs to come off people’s criminal records; it makes a mockery of what law and crime really is

– Look to New Zealand as an example of a country who stopped the licence through peaceful people power

– Find a solution which reflects people’s habits and what there is now

We’ve put off this conversation too many times: we need to listen to the public to create a decision, and make something for them, not against them.

Parking Pains

I took what was supposed to be a nice walk today, to think about my next novel.

I got plenty of thinking done – but not the sort I’d planned. And it wasn’t the pleasant, relaxing invigorating joy that a walk should be. Because every few steps I saw another of those bloody signs.

The private car park ones, from people such as Parking Eye and National Parking Enforcement and similar names, all with something aggressive in their title.

So why have these notices popped up so much in the last 10 or even 5 years?

Companies who employ these firms claim that their parking is being abused; that people are overstaying or that non customers (or residents or workers) are using their facilities. So they contract private parking enforcement firms to ‘manage’ the parking spaces, sometimes on wasteland, to threaten motorists into not using their space, or staying too long, or parking outside of the sometimes too small and vague markings.

Even if there are issues with visitors being unable to park, this is not the right way to deal with them. By all means, get in touch and ask people to move on, but I cannot see how these henchman are needed.

Having the intrusion of being photographed each time you come in and leave which is then used to harass you for a disproportionate charge for going 1 minute over an arbitary limit is a far truer example of abuse.

The truth is that these firms hope of course that drivers will commit what they consider a misdemeanour and garner them some revenue, to top up the fees from the landowner.

I don’t see that these companies run a legitimate business, for they exist from someone’s else’s faults. There is often no real harm done by the drivers and the companies create some with threats of bullying.

Much of the time they are guarding free parking where other custom is being given.

I think there needs to be a debate about paid parking and how motorists are over charged on many matters. Many of us can’t park even at our homes, even when we’ve paid permits, and parking charges are high. Many parking rules, private or otherwise, are more arbitrary than for safety – which is the only fair reason to penalise on parking.

We want to cut down on cars, but we also want drivers so we can make money from them. I especially note this contradictory call from councils.

These parking firms don’t give us much choice – for as we hove into the only parking place available for us to visit our friend, pop to the shop, have a drink, attend a business meeting, collect someone off the train, even go to church, we are greeted by a notice. Yes, usually not at the car park entrance – where the salient point will be that it’s free, or otherwise – but at the place we park. And we’ve already gone through a barrier, and can’t easily get out.

Perhaps we don’t see those horrid signs. Now I’ve noticed them I see the signs everywhere, but I didn’t for a long time. If it’s a free carpark and one that is for visitors, why would I imagine that I can be charged?

Their notices are ugly. ‘Private property’ is one of the first and most common things they say – so this is definitely capitalist. Not – ‘visitors only please’, or even, ruder, ‘private carpark’. I disdain anyone who puts up private property signs, it doesn’t speak well of them.

Then the signs say – if you don’t do this arbitrary thing, you ‘agree’ to being clamped – but clamping in Wales and England has been illegal on private ground for 5 years – and charged £60 to £250. But for what? And that removing these signs is a criminal offence.

I see a criminal offence here. I certainly see a moral one.

The removal of the signs being illegal is questionable; it would mean that the fees – note, it’s not a real fine – can’t be pursued. Those signs are vital to their having any credibility and success. They masquerade as real fines, which can only come from councils and the police. They use county courts to enforce these, but that is an abuse too. Parking Eye – Britain’s worst and most aggressive – is making a loss in legal fees to recover their invoices. That says a lot about them, and also the legal system.

They pay solicitors to send out letters which threaten credit rating harm – which is only possible, and much further down the line. (The credit system is something I want to question too.) This practice speaks ill of the solicitors.

There is, I understand, no legal basis for these fees. (It’s supposed to be under contract law but this is contentious).

I also challenge the legality of de facto one sided contracts.

These companies are buying driver’s data from the DVLA (Britain’s vehicle licensing authority), but this is effectively bribery and abuse of government information.

I query the underlying basis of the companies, rather than whether you were unaware or unfairly caught out.

I encourage businesses and land owners not to use them and for anyone who receives a notice from them to fight it. Let your favourite cafe and shop know how you feel about their use of these companies. Avoid custom.

Find another way to manage your parking – differently worded signs and without threats and privacy invasion.

There are many sites about how to fight these parking people and also petitions for greater regulation, and for the banning of these companies.

https://www.change.org/p/campaign-against-illegal-practices-by-private-car-park-companies-and-debt-collectors This site has many good points and a sound legal basis.

I’ll encourage others to do their own research. These firms are often acting unlawfully, and are living from harassment dressed as a service to landowners.

Instead, I refer you to a Suffolk village who says “no claims, no fines” and asks us to donate when we park towards the village upkeep. It works, and we lingered rather than moved on without spending like we did the Parking Eye run retail park.

A film that shows what the people can do

Today, I again saw a film that makes me inspired and alive. It is Belle, which shows us what can happen when people of conviction speak out for justice. It was an issue that felt so entrenched and widespread, with opposition so numerous and powerful, that a hope of quashing it must’ve felt extremely daring.

But this is the real story of how a major step was taken towards justice and the end of something that had caused so much suffering and been a disgraceful aberration of human rights.

It made me think about the essence of all injustice, and how it relates to continuing despicable problems.

A powerful group defines themselves as other to another and sees that other either as a threat or something less valuable than themselves. Therefore, that other is there for their profit, to be silenced and destroyed.

Once we start to care and give features to those we have commodified, once they cease to be expendable or wicked, we cannot continue treating them as we have. This is true of all earth life. It is true of those we call enemies, those and that which we would use for our own gain.

Not saying: it’s always been that way, it’s too big; it’s too costly to change or end, but: this is enough!

The more I read history, the more I see the themes of control by fear occurring, from armies to bailiffs – people carrying out the instructions of another without question. Rebels will be punished. Conformity is rewarded.

But I also read stories of people who did push for change, of balls of moss that gather in size and momentum.

Stories, actual and imagined, can give us the impetus to put faces on those we refuse to see, give voices to those who hadn’t been heard, and to empower us to take on that which pretended to be invincible.

I post this as the Tory party conference takes place in Manchester this weekend.

Police commissioner – why I’m not voting

There has been some talk that voting should be compulsory. Yes people died to allow all to vote – but it is an opportunity – it should not become a requirement, with further policing to force us.

 

As I’ve said before I suspect the lack of turnout is the belief that voting doesn’t work: that first past the post system does not mean our choice will even count; or that all the candidates are much the same – and none of them are who we would like or who will make a positive difference.

 

Many people in Britain feel that voting for their local police commissioner is not something they want to bother going to the poll booths for. Candidates mostly stand for a political party and the ones I have read of do not impress.

 

What I fear this move is about is creating pleasing seeming statistics, and more “tough on crime” talk. It could make life hard for both the police and the public.

 

What policing should be about:

‘Police’ is an unfortunate phase, a verb that means to nose and control. What we need is a body who helps keep us safe through laws only needed for protection – and not the powerful few. Laws should not be excuses to collect revenue for governments through fines. They should not be nannying, controlling punitive rules. We should not fear or distrust our police, who should not be curtailing freedom of expression.

 

The Green Party, who did not want this to come to vote, put questions to the candidates, including public accountability and the right to peaceful protest.

 

Nationally, we read regularly of police brutalities to protesters; and in the last week, there has been news that questions the behaviour of undercover police.

 

My local force has recently blasted front pages with their sprees of raids, and threaten more; their ‘message to criminals’ is, when finally deciphered, is aimed at minor crimes and a show of strength. Raids should be about emergency  rescue, not minor drug dealers. It also publicly sent messages to potential kerb crawlers, displaying their car number plates.

 

Meanwhile, it made reporting crime (which was largely down to their lack of doing their duty) more trouble than it was worth and failed to follow up a complaint for inappropriate behaviour.

 

I think many of us have mixed stories of the police, and as we pay for them through council tax, they especially need to be accountable to us and doing something worthwhile.

 

As there is no space on the voting form for ‘none of these’ or ‘I don’t want this’, I am saying it here, and making clear what kind of police force we expect and need, and making a stand against the force we often actually get.

 

I hope the prediction of under 15% turnout is true – do not we have a law that there needs to be a minimum proportion for a vote to count? Most of us don’t want this imposed on us – isn’t that a voice in itself?