Pete Tattam

Just noticed that a lot of the post I was replying to has been moderated so apologies for long winded post which will baffle peoplewho have not seen the moderated post.

Fellas please don't assume that because a police car doesn't turn up within 5 minutes with a prisoner kicking & screaming in the back seat that nothing is being done. Police resources are at their lowest for decades and all calls must be prioritised. Unfortunately a suspicious vehicle doesn't rate as highly as an incident where an actual offence is being committed. If an uncommited unit is in the area they may well be searching the surrounding area for the sus truck but you won't be aware of it (although in an ideal world someone should call you back & tell you what has been done!). If the truck is found it will be stopped and the occupants spoken to. However if no evidence is found of an offence they must, by law, be allowed to go as soon as practicable. Modern policing is mostly "intelligence led" and the information gathered will be entered onto a database. If sufficient information is obtained search warrants can be executed at suspects addresses in order to obtain evidence and arrest/prosecute offenders. I know thats not much good with our friends without actual addresses but "rules is rules" and the police (regrettably) have to stick to them. So please don't slag off the old bill untill you fully understand the restraints within which they have to work. They really do want to catch the bad guy, it's just a very difficult thing to do, unless they catch 'em in the act, which in itself is very hard.

Those were the days when tobacco was used to aid clotting and Rizzlas substituted expensive dressings. Money was tight back then!!!

On sale every year at Bentley Wood Fair in East Sussex.

I worked shifts for over 30 years which included weekends (1 weekend in 4 off). I thought nothing of it at the time, "it's my job". Now I'm retired from that role, working with my boy. I realise how much of the kids growing up I missed and how much my wife did with them, they have mutual memories that I don't figure in. You don't realise how much that sucks untill its to late. My advice is don't use money or workload as a reason to work all hours. You'll never get that time back, there's more to life than money and if you've got to big a workload delegate it. You've only got one life.

You couldn't pay me enough to work on a Sunday!

I used to spend a lot of the time like this...........but I steer clear of Brighton these days!!!!!!!!!!

when I saw the title of this thread I was expecting a link to Utube showing a couple of lizards going at it with swords! I was so disappointed.

Of course! True, Truer, Truest like Blue, Bluer, pornographic!!!

Are the councils that are tendering all large municipal authorities? My local District Councils (as far as I'm aware) all use sub contractors for this sort of work. Yes they have parks depts/ street wardens and the like but they only seem to do very minor tidying etc. There is no slack for them to start tendering for outside work. In my town the volunteer tree wardens do all the small tree work (stuff that can be done with a Silky). Anything bigger the town council get in a contractor. I would have thought its only the big city/town councils that have the logistics to do this sort of thing.

I think its the same as the burger vans in lay bys etc the council license it (and raise revenue). Mind you I know of at least one person who sells from roadside unlicensed and has never had a problem. If you do it that way make sure you've done a good risk assesment! Some councils are more pedantic than others.

Just been offered semi-permanent loan of MS260 so happy as a pig in muck at the moment. thanks for advice

Thanks Spudulike but you may as well have been writing in Chinese 'cos I didn't understand a word of it! Obviously you need a modicum of engineering knowledge to do this and I very definitely don't. I thought it may have been a process that even a dozy idiot like me could undertake. Wrong again!

Your local authority obviously use the old system......common sense! Or is it just my councils who are really anal?

Usually same form for both though