Friday, May 16, 2008

Life's A Beach

I see the Dickensians over in Boredstares are getting uppity over the amount of litter that was left on their beach after last week's sweltering weekend. According to the front page of today's Gazunder more than 100 bottles, empty drink cans and dirty nappies (eeurgh!) were left strewn across the sands in Viking Bay.

However, here in the Millionaires' Playground we get a better class of visitor. Here's what I found on a recent stroll along the strand:

1. Fortnum's picnic hamper
2. Copy of Country Life
3. Seven bottles of Dom Perignon
4. Five bottles of Krug
5. Apple iPhone
6. Two jars of Gentleman's Relish
7. Pair of Prada sunglasses
8. Chemical toilet from Sunseeker Portofino 35
9. Porsche Cayenne (minus wheels)
10. Bentley Continental (burnt out)

As you can see, you don't just get any old rubbish in Ramsgate!

23 comments:

Anonymous said...

We in Margate (I live in Westgate but the sign says Margate) have had the following recently found on or near the beach:

1 x dead tramp
1 x buried artist (he was in the news)
1 x box of wet matches (some missing)
1 x sea mine (Navy lost it for a while, later found under the scenic railway)
Just shows we can stand proud with Broadsrairs and Ramsgate.

Peter C said...

Another thing found near Margate beach recently was 60s legend P.J. Proby: after his gig at the Winter Gardens on sunday he stayed in the car park & didn't leave until wednesday!

Anonymous said...

I saw a lot of willies in Bottany Bay once does that count?

Anonymous said...

Anon 2-30.....As long as they were over 8"

'MR X'

Anonymous said...

Well we all know who left the five bottles of Krug, don't we?

Anonymous said...

Whilst spending time enjoying the sun on the beach, the Tdc employees spent their time sitting down doing nothing, when a small bin was emptied it took one to take the lift off and one to take the contents out productivity?. There was one TDC employee doing a good job of walking around the beach picking up single items. Again shows how out of touch TDC with what goes on, and then complain How can they exoect the rubbish to disappear with the high number of people on the beach, when their employees are sitting around doing nothing!

Anonymous said...

That's nuffink, guv.
Over 'ere in Mahrgate, I went for, like, one of them walk fings on the beech da over day an bought back all this guff...

1 tin of Spam
2 marketing people (muttering something about the Turner Contemporary)
1 scotch egg
2 hypodermic needles (used)
and a whole bunch of shattered hopes and dreams.

Anonymous said...

Joking apart, the Gazette report is interesting in that Cllr. Wells claims to have seen the police dealing with the problem while the police report says there were no youths when the police arrived. Slight contradiction there. Someone I know was so disgusted by the foul language, drunken, yobbish behaviour that they packed up and went home. Mind you, judging by the amount the yobs were drinking in the sun, they'd have had hellish hangovers.

I e-mailed various councillors to say I thought it was an offence to drink in public places in Thanet (local bye-law) but the ones who replied weren't sure if the bye-law applied to the beach. I was told the yobs left broken bottles on the sands and that's no joke if you or your child steps on glass. It would appear the yobs have moved from causing trouble in the evenings to be obnoxious during the day. Ask those who live near Pierremont Park or in Albion Street what it's like there on a weekend evening.

Anonymous said...

Surely someone from the local authority could go on the beach and proclaim his/her predilection for ultra -violence and say "put your face in mine"...or even call them w******s. That would sort them and very possibly him/her out, once and for all?

Ken Gregory said...

The law relating to public drinking does not ban drinking in public, it just gives the power to the people in blue to deal with people who drink to excess and make a pain of themselves to other folk.

In addition, I have not been made aware of a litter squad, who go out on behalf of TDC spreading litter. Its the public behaving badly that make a mess of our isle.

Anonymous said...

Ken

I suppose the question here is 'who' is behaving badly (a) The Public or (b) The Cllr's your face or mine incident (yup that old chestnut).

I personally have nothing but admiration for the real workers of TDC "the road sweepers" who have to deal with the litter every day.

chris wells said...

The ability of the Police to take alcohol away from people does extend to the police.

I said I had seen police action in Broadstairs, which I did. The claim was that the police had been called and did nothing, which was why I ventured I had seen them in action in the town.

As ever, we are quick to condemn, but not to act!

Anonymous said...

There is absolutly no excuse for Tdc employees from sitting around on the beach and doing very little, ok it was hot, but they are paid to do a job and this was not clearly being done!

Anonymous said...

TDC employ causual summer labour as cleaners for the beaches. Unlike the street cleaners have little or no experiince, so our beaches will suffer from litter.

Anonymous said...

The street cleaning round here leaves much to be desired as streets get left for weeks without a broom being seen. There doesn't seem any regular pattern to where and when. Mind you, during Broadstairs Folk Week -now that's a different story, at least as far as the town is concerned. Central Broadstairs gleams but the other 51 weeks, now that's a different story altogether.

Anonymous said...

Our local street sweeper has been spotted skooting around on roller skates with a wheelbarrow, lying flat on his back on the lower prom with arms spread wide and also spending quite sometime picking daisies and scrutinising them. Still at least he takes an interest in the local flora.

chris wells said...

Broadstairs street and beach cleaners work damn hard against the tide of thoughtlessness and vandalism that is the hallmark of our current society.

Anonymous said...

I presume you are implying Cllr Wells that it's all the Labour government's fault? Really! It was famously your leader in the 80s who said there was no such thing as society. That's where the rot began to set in.

Anonymous said...

You'll here little more from Wellsy now he's under attack. He only likes praise. Pity that little is due to him.

Anonymous said...

Cllr. Wells, perhaps you could employ a few more cleaners to stem the tide of rubbish in our streets. To my knowledge there are only two who cover Broadstairs and they can't possibly cope with the rubbish, much of which in the Westwood Road area can be clearly traced back to the consumption of KFC and ASDA products. Take a walk up Westwood Road sometime and see for yourself. The rubbish lies for weeks spoiling the pavement and blowing into the fields. Emptying litter bins is fine but how about asking the workers to sweep a broom around the bin area to pick up what didn't make it into the bin or is that not in their job description?

chris wells said...

Actually it was a totally apolitical comment, merely an observation of how society's manners have changed, since for example my childhood.

I could make a case for it being the fault of many things, but on this occasion it was the results I was highlighting nothing else.

I am happy to debate any of these points - intermissions in my contributions are rather usually down to time pressures.

Anonymous said...

It's all very convenient blaming it on society - are we saying there was never any litter or yobs back in the 60s and 70s? I think the trouble is that most people are just lazy - treble the number of bins on and around the beaches and make the collections more frequent and you'll get less of it left on the sands. Ah, but that would cost money - blaming it on society is free!!

Anonymous said...

Attitudes can be changed with time (how many people cleared up dog's mess in the 70s?).