Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
On my own doorstep
About 2 minutes ago someone rang my doorbell. There they were. Two beggars and a baby on my doorstep, with the man saying “This is my wife, this is my baby, we have nothing..”.
I decided to shut the door on them and not engage as I was on my own and did not appreciate being approached by beggars in my own home and was certainly not interested in being scammed or robbed by these people.
Am I being insensitive? Perhanps, but I value my own personal safety!
Another thought is that we have recently returned from holiday. Were they actually checking if we were still away?
Surely this thing is illegal? Anyone else had this bunch come knocking? Anyone know how they are?
This also reflects on how many beggars there now are on our bit of Green Lanes. It’s sometimes a little scary, as some are quite aggressive.
What can be / is being done about this?
Whoops, turned in to two discussions in one I think.
I decided to shut the door on them and not engage as I was on my own and did not appreciate being approached by beggars in my own home and was certainly not interested in being scammed or robbed by these people.
Am I being insensitive? Perhanps, but I value my own personal safety!
Another thought is that we have recently returned from holiday. Were they actually checking if we were still away?
Surely this thing is illegal? Anyone else had this bunch come knocking? Anyone know how they are?
This also reflects on how many beggars there now are on our bit of Green Lanes. It’s sometimes a little scary, as some are quite aggressive.
What can be / is being done about this?
Whoops, turned in to two discussions in one I think.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on
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OAE: As a part-time NZer myself I can vouch for the fact NZ is a rugby nation and soccer is generally regarded as inferior if not irrelevant.
(the dubbing of the team the "All Whites" is a cheeky reference to the mighty All Blacks. The latter contains some Pakehas and the former contains some dusky types).
The level of domestic following for the footy amateurs is the exact opposite of the level of domestic following for the England team. Is there a lesson there?
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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We're making light of what is about to be an avalanche of people in Tottenham who are no longer able to support themselves or their families. Whether this is their fault or not is beside the point, we're geographically their first port of call and they will on the whole take our charity as a last resort before taking by force.
We should all be writing to Claire Kober asking her to raise our council taxes to supplement what the government are about to take away.
I notice that this post is tagged "beggars doorstep scary", can we make sure all our begging posts have "begging" in them and we'll have a nice social record.
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Permalink Reply by Old-Age-Emporium(OAE) on
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John, in fact your suggestion is much closer to my own line of thought. You made it before in another thread (Was it in Hugh's 'Big Savings Needed in Haringey'?)
I'm perturbed by the tone and expressions of jumping to conclusions about scams, robbery, threat to our persons or property just because a couple with a young baby knock on our door or approach us on the street. It just might be genuine. Why should London or the UK be immune to what's a common phenomenon in cities and countries around the world?
On a Council-wide front, the realistic thing to have done back in the Spring might have been to hike up our Council Tax by 5 or 10% (rather than freezing it for whatever putative purposes) - on condition that the extra £5 - 10 million could be ring-fenced (?hypothecated) either for the relief of genuine hardship which is definitely on its way; or even as a contribution towards rectifying the gap between the hardest hit of Haringey's schools and their counterparts in other boroughs. A sort of DIY Area Cost Adjustment - for I'll be mightily amazed if the much promised 2011 ACA review, or the LD 'pupil premium' wheeze, makes even a dent in that shortfall - pace Tony Brockman's great campaign and Lynne F.'s strong position before they enmeshed her into Theresa May's equality web.
Yes, that last paragraph has partly fallen off Anette's doorstep. I know none of us want to be innocents abroad when confronted by sturdy beggars. Still, in the times that are upon us (after the Budget later today) we shouldn't be too firmly lodged up our own fundaments.
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OAE: a small digression if I may on hypothecation or ring-fencing. I'm not sure if these terms are as robust as they appear. For example, all CPZ revenue is ring-fenced to go into roading/transport. If the budget for transport is already larger than CPZ revenue and along comes a big chunk of CPZ revenue, all to go into transport, what is to prevent the transport budget being reduced by the amount of the CPZ revenue, allowing those monies to be redeployed where ever the council likes? Is this not smoke and mirrors? Substance vs. Form?
Amongst my favourite council-speak phrases: when they don't want to spend money on something "there is no money in the budget for that", but they will always find money to spend on things they do want. At least £800,000 was spent on lawyers in the botched attempt to sell Ally Pally (every last penny wasted). Monies are shuffled from budget to budget to suit changing circumstances, as with the diamond-encrusted TV aerials for Council Leaseholders.
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I think painting all squatters with the same brush is a bad thing to do. If houses are left empty then why the hell shouldn't someone be allowed to live there for free? It's shameful that there are so many vacant properties while people are living homeless on the street. Landlords who leave their properties empty are usually doing so for personal gain and should have their houses seized by the council, who can then offer them to people waiting to be housed.
I don't really agree with straight up begging; luckily in this country we have a welfare system that means people shouldn't have to stoop to this... however some slip through the net, and with the spending cuts outlined in the recent budget I'm sure we will see a surge in this kind of thing, as well as an increase in theft and such like.
I have been homeless - I was too young to claim any benefits and was on a housing waiting list (not in London) for over a year - and I have begged off strangers, though usually I busked. Sometimes I spent this money on alcohol, which is good for taking your mind off the cold and aids sleep. Although I'm sure some people think this luxury shouldn't be allowed to people who don't have their own home to live in.
Luckily for me I found some people who were squatting - having an address meant it was much easier to find work, in fact it was necessary to get a bank account which is a requirement of pretty much all jobs these days.
Anyway, that's my rant over. Sorry to get off topic!
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Permalink Reply by Liz on
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If you give money to the chaps that hang around the bottom of my street, you are almost certainly contributing to the coffers of Mssrs Ladbrokes, Hill and Metrobet. Yesterday, I watched one 'regular' manage to extract a pound out of a kind hearted family and then watched as he walked purposefully into the William Hill next to the bus stop and, no doubt, straight up to the fixed odds betting terminals. On another occasion, to prove to me that giving these blokes money wasn't keeping the in tea and sandwiches, my husband gave a pound to another regular who didn't even attempt to hide what he was going to do with it as he crossed the road and headed into the Ladbrokes on the corner.
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Permalink Reply by Tammy Palmer on
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Ah I hadn't thought about that - was waiting for a bus at Wood Green outside one of the betting shops last week and a fairly unfriendly chap was harrasing anyone that walked past for money I hadn't really thought that might be the reason!
Anyway just another thought regarding beggers knocking at peoples homes - perhaps the police ought to drop leaflets through peoples doors alerting them to the fact that this is happening in their area, I read a shocking news report this weekend about a 94 year old who was conned out £176,000 by various rogue traders
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Give or don't give without prejudice please.
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