Mother fined for dropping 'a bit of sausage roll' (subsequently eaten by birds)

Mother fined for dropping 'a bit of sausage roll' (subsequently eaten by birds)

www.telegraph.co.uk

A single mother has been fined £75 for "littering" after her daughter dropped a piece of sausage roll on the pavement.

Sarah Davies, 20, was feeding Chloe, four, when the roll slipped from her grasp inches from her daughter's mouth and fell to the floor.

The incident happened in Hull city centre on Monday and a fixed penalty fine arrived in the post just three days later.

Miss Davies said that pigeons swooped down to eat the remains just moments later.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Eh.....I should probably mention that it was the bit of sausage roll eaten by birds, not the mother. What gives? This is just one more example in a very long list of irrational fines and taxation I've seen in the UK. As if the gov over there has been having contests to see who could enact the most audacious schemes to fleece more money from the people.

What in hell is going on over there? In the last year or so I've read dozens of news items exposing new fines, new taxes and the often ridiculous circumstances in which they are levied. I can understand certain fines but some of these are just way over the top.

Toddler fined £89 for dropping two crisps
www.dailymail.co.uk...

McDonald's drive-through customers face £125 fine for taking too long to eat
www.dailymail.co.uk...

£50 fine for boy who fed seagull
www.dailymail.co.uk...

Man fined £75 for dumping his rubbish - in a litter bin
www.dailymail.co.uk...

Newsagent fined £50 over stray scrap of paper found 120 yards from his shop
www.dailymail.co.uk...

Girl 'fined' £50 over a cardboard box
www.dailymail.co.uk...

Pensioner fined £75 for dropping cigarette ash
www.dailymail.co.uk...

Recycling police threaten pensioner with £1,000 fine
www.dailymail.co.uk...

Now the bin police get the power to take your car away
www.dailymail.co.uk...

£50 fines for putting your feet on train seats
www.dailymail.co.uk...

Parents fined over term-time holidays
www.dailymail.co.uk...

Pipped: Woman driver fined for eating apple
www.dailymail.co.uk...

Motorists face national pay-as-you-drive scheme
www.dailymail.co.uk...

UK Driver Flips Off Speed Camera And Is Fined
www.rense.com...

Are these items really indicative of reality over there of am Is this news source more of a "tabloid"? (not really familliar with the Daily Mail...)

www.telegraph.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

Haha very comprehensive list there mate, nice work.

It even shocked me that I wasnt surprised by this fine. I distrust this current political climate and government who are so inclined to ban and fine everything they find unsavoury.

Actually that list is precisely what I talk about when i mean that our freedoms are being eroded slowly but surely.

reply to post by SystemiK


you brits across the pond might want to watch the movie "V IS FOR VENDETTA" if you haven't already. looks like your government is trying to "outbush" us, here in the states. i'll come visit you in your future gulags.
cheerio!! mates!!

[edit on 25-4-2008 by jimmyx]

I am sure that there are a lot of weird and unjustified fines. However i am not sure that this one falls in that category. Where i live there are no fines for such littering and when people celebrate something or have barbecues, parks and nature resorts look like a litter storm blew through. The knowledge that there are fines and they are enforced will really help. Plus, pigeons eating sausages??? Evolution theory at work?

The real culprit here is a bloated bureaucracy that must justify its existence by handing out these fines.

In many European cities, there are trash inspectors that go through the streets and find stray waste--a letter with your address on it, for example--and who then call or write you to accuse you of public littering, even though a vagrant had overturned your trash bin before collection, or the trash collectors were sloppy in their work.

Feed and grow these petty bureaucrats and they eventually have to do something to justify their existence. I'm sure the UK is groaning with them; there's your culprit.

reply to post by SystemiK


WOW,AND YOU ALL SAY THE US IS [messed] UP


Did the "ring of steel"capture the now infamous"sausage drop"?

[edit on 4/25/2008 by jkrog08]



Replaced censor circumvention

Please read ABOUT ATS: Vulgarity and The Automatic ATS Censors

www.abovetopsecret.com...

and...

The Use of ALL CAPs

www.abovetopsecret.com...

[edit on 25/4/08 by masqua]

Where's the happy medium, eh? That fine was most absurd and intrusive in MHO; however, we seem to have the totally opposite problem over on this side of the pond.
I see people willfully throwing stuff out their car windows, and tossing things into the street with out so much as a second thought. The city does nothing. A complaint to the bureaucrats here takes months for any action.
Not sure which problem I'd rather have tho. At least I can pick up litter myself when I see it, but a heavy handed bureaucracy, that seems like a problem with the potential for something much more serious down the road.

Once UK went all "big brother" this type of insanity seemed to follow naturally. They were ahead of the curve with all the surveilance cameras and before long, the US was following suit. I completely expect to be seeing these kind of frivilous laws in the US as well.

I've always looked at the UK / Europe as a kind of barometer of what to expect soon in the US. It seems they are a few years ahead of the US in their plan to completely dominate and oppress their people. What we see there is always soon to be here in the US.

Just a matter of time...

This may as well read: Sausage Roll Fined For Dropping 'a bit of Mother' (subsequently eaten by birds). Because that's how much sense it makes.

Since when has Hull County Council employed tracksuit bottomed Pirates to monitor pedestrians and accost them for money? The Police usually wear a uniform.

I was actually really lucky the other day.

Whilst walking through town I scratched my nose - later that evening as I counted my skin cells I became aware that I was short by at least 50

But I was okay as the enforcement officers had there attention else where... They were analysing pigeon droppings for DNA.

Puts a lump in my throat and a tear in my eye when I think just how much I love this country.

reply to post by Now_Then


I've been pretty lucky where I am in this country, I guess. I can get blind drunk and stoned and start pissing in the streets whilst shouting absolutely bizarre obscenities toward the sky, without any financial or criminal repercussions whatsoever.

I wonder if Hull County Council is just berserk? The madness doesn't seem to be restricted to that location, though, does it? If the links provided further up by SystemiK show anything, they show that. No doubt this isn't the last article like this people will see.

I'll probably get fined on Monday for having the audacity to actually put rubbish inside a bin. Sod's ghastly law.

(Que moderation)

Originally posted by Sir Francis Bacon
I wonder if Hull County Council is just berserk? The madness doesn't seem to be restricted to that location, though, does it?
(Que moderation)

No it's not just limited to that location (Hull) by a long shot! - I believe, but I may be wrong, that it has to do with whether the enforcement is contracted out or not, if this kind of thing is in private hands then it stands to reason they will ticket as many people as possible.

Down my way we seem to have it right - not a great deal of litter in most place, and I haven't heard of any of the totally ridiculous fines like this one, wonder how long that would last.

Although I have personally been fined for, how should we say - relieving ones bladder after a healthy drinking session - £80, that was one expensive penny, and I took measures to make sure I was hidden away - thing is the cops has just woken me up as I had fallen asleep on a very comfortable patch of grass, I was told to be on my way, but they watched me stagger into the bushes, by the time I was finished I had a copper behind each shoulder shaking their heads.

I'm at a loss for words... thesaurus to teh reskew!

stupid (vs. smart)
anserine, dopy, dopey, foolish, goosey, goosy, gooselike, jerkyblockheaded, boneheaded, duncical, duncish, fatheaded, loggerheaded, thick, thickheaded, thick-skulled, wooden-headedcloddish, doltishdense, dim, dull, dumb, obtuse, slowgaumless, gormlesslumpish, lumpen, unthinkingnitwitted, senseless, soft-witted, witlessweakyokel-like

Yeah... that about sums it up.

Originally posted by apc
witlessweakyokel-like

Shocking... Which dictionary did you use APC?! It butchers the language so!

If the goal is to reduce crime, then fining people for their violations means that there is little to no incentive for the rich to stop committing them.


If you're a millionaire and you've got to pay $75 for littering, big deal.

If you're late on your electric bill, have $12.00 in your pocket, zero in the bank, and are hungry... $75 feels like a kick to the groin.


In a more extreme example...

If you're Bill Gates, and the company under your direction is found in violation of intellectual property copyrights, a fine of $500 million won't stop you.

If punishment for criminal acts amounts to paying fines, then the rich simply decide whether or not the risk outweighs the reward, and act accordingly in the interest of profit.


Sick sick system. If you've "wronged" someone or damaged some thing, I think you owe the human time and effort required to fix it... NO MORE.

Originally posted by ianr5741
If you're a millionaire and you've got to pay $75 for littering, big deal.

If you're late on your electric bill, have $12.00 in your pocket, zero in the bank, and are hungry... $75 feels like a kick to the groin.

Your forgetting / overlooking one thing!

The fine was £75!!

The UK/US exchange rate is 1.9833

75 * 1.9833 = $148.75 of your finest and well earned American dollars

reply to post by Now_Then


Excellent point, we here in the US are not yet used to so many foreign currencies overvaluing our own. It will take some time for this to sink in to the American psyche....

Originally posted by SystemiK

What in hell is going on over there? In the last year or so I've read dozens of news items exposing new fines, new taxes and the often ridiculous circumstances in which they are levied. I can understand certain fines but some of these are just way over the top.

£50 fine for boy who fed seagull
www.dailymail.co.uk...

while it seems harmless it encourages and teaches them and especially offspring to rely on humans for food and therefore be less afraid of us.

heck, once when i was younger our family were having a lovely outing, got some lunch and decided to eat at a local picnic table in a lovely reserve.
we were feeding the very friendly seagulls some of our hot chips by hand, next thing one flew BETWEEN US, its wing hit my brother on the head as it snatched a pastie right from my mums hands as she was about to have a bite.
we laughed hysterically at the time, but the point is there in black and white. it encourages bad behaviour.

if i was at yellowstone park and decided to throw some meat scraps to bears hiding around the trees near your camp, would you be angry with me when the bears come out the woods and trash your camp looking for more because they are now not afraid of humans? of course, and its a similar thing.

Originally posted by SystemiK
Man fined £75 for dumping his rubbish - in a litter bin
www.dailymail.co.uk...

he didnt just put his little bit of hand held trash in the bin, he took stinky trash from his home and dumped it in a public bin for all to smell.
how about we all use public bins to dispose of our most smelly or disgusting trash so we dont stink out our own homes?

if you allow one, you allow everyone. and when you allow everyone there becomes no point in having bins because they are filled with peoples personal crap which stink up every public sidewalk you go down.

one rule for all people.

Originally posted by SystemiKGirl 'fined' £50 over a cardboard box
www.dailymail.co.uk...

HER MOTHER drove her to a recycle plant which was full/closed whatever.
so she allowed her daughter to dump it out their gate for them to clean up.

ok, the kid was fined because some identifiables were left in the box but it was the mothers decision to drive there and dump it there, yet the news paper plays it as "some poor kid got fined for trying to recycle"

ive seen this at our local refuge centre. people unload piles of trash at the gate so the workers have to clean the # up before they can allow everyone access through the gates.

a cardboard box full of crap today, a garbage bag tomorrow by your neighbour, the dude around the corner dumps a trailer load.. where does it end?

its either YES for all, or NO for all.. there is no grey area that says "oh its ok to dump your crap there, your just a kid being driven around by your mum"

it even occurs at a local scrap metal place where people dump a stripped car body with no wheels outside the premises and leave it for the company to clean up the street (after all, it was dumped in the street ya know just like the cardboard box kid)

Originally posted by SystemiKRecycling police threaten pensioner with £1,000 fine
www.dailymail.co.uk...

yes, this one is a real lame fine..... but did you notice the way the article tries to draw sympathy from you instantly by mentioning a few times hes a MS sufferer?
tell me, what does having MS or any other disability have to do with incorrect recycling?
again, yes its a real lame and pedantic fine but my point is the way that particular newspaper likes to spin things to add a bit of sympathy, just like the "ooh my kid got fined coz i allowed her to dump # on the curb in a box" article.

Originally posted by SystemiK£50 fines for putting your feet on train seats
www.dailymail.co.uk...

feet on public seats is a self centred thing to do. everyone else has to sit there in their clean clothes (possible on the way to work) after you move your dirty shoe's off that seat
its a public place sure, but would you allow me to put my smelly work boots up on your kitchen table? i think not.

its a common courtesy that all commuters should know and respect.

Originally posted by SystemiK Pipped: Woman driver fined for eating apple
www.dailymail.co.uk...

she's either driving, or she's eating an apple.. dunno about the UK but in Aus your legally obliged to have BOTH hands on the wheel.
what happens in an emergency when she cant react properly because she's got an apple in her hand she has to dispose of first?

you dont get advanced notice that "your about to be in a car smash so put down your apple and brace for impact", she should be prepared for anything because accidents happen when you least expect them and with very limited reaction time.

is she that rushed for time she couldnt stop for 2mins to eat? if so then maybe she has poor time management skills

good drivers just drive

Originally posted by SystemiKAre these items really indicative of reality over there of am Is this news source more of a "tabloid"? (not really familliar with the Daily Mail...)

www.telegraph.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

no, those articles are indicative of the sources you quoted these from.

some of those articles were legit fines spun into fear mongering anti govt articles with sympathy draw cards thrown in to really grab your attention (oh poor man, he suffers MS and got a fine, or poor kiddy getting fined coz her mum allowed her to break the law, etc)

but some of them were a bit of overzealous fine happy councils or govt workers.

you need to remember, its the person who hands out the fine and not so much the councils fault.

if your 1minute over your parking permits time sure your able to be fined, but the guy fining you can either be an asshole and fine you anyway or he could be a nice dude and let you slide since your moving your car.

some people are powermongers, even those who hand out parking fines and the like. you cant always blame the entire govt or council over one parking officer whos got an attitude and is having a bad day.


[edit on 25/4/08 by Obliv_au]

[edit on 25/4/08 by Obliv_au]

[edit on 25/4/08 by Obliv_au]

reply to post by Obliv_au


Your "custom title" and avatar speak volumes toward your opinion. Considering those two facets of your identity I would expect nothing less from you.