West Yorkshire

[glatt]

I love your pictures, Sundae.

And your camera was just fooled with the red brick near those blue houses. When you dampen the red highlights, the blue comes out more.

[limey]

Somebody here may need this http://www.buzzfeed.com/danieldalton/now-then.


Sent by thought transference

[Big Sarge]

I'm enthralled with your photos. The stain glass in the church is wonderful. Plus, I loved the twisted tree in the cemetery.

[xoxoxoBruce]

I see in Masham, Health & Safety strikes again.

HEALTH and safety bosses have ordered knitted bunting in a town on the Tour de France route to be taken down – as it was causing lampposts to lean. The bunting, featuring yellow, green, white and polka dot jumpers to represent the winners’ jerseys in the race, had been hung in Masham, near Ripon, by Harrogate Borough Council following an appeal by the authority to decorate the district.

Over six months, hundreds of schoolchildren, women’s institutes, craft groups and knitters from as far afield as Australia and the Arctic Circle created 23,453 jumpers for the display. A month after the bunting was hung in the town’s Market Place, and less than three weeks before 20,000 visitors are expected to visit Masham to see the race, residents and traders were stunned to see hundreds of the knitted jumpers being taken down by tree surgeons.

North Yorkshire County Council, which owns the lampposts, said it had asked the borough council to remove the bunting on safety grounds. It is believed the weight of the bunting increased after rain, causing lampposts to lean.

I suspect when one becomes a member of the Health & Safety SWAT Team, everything becomes a health and safety issue, and the biggest orgasms come from trumping another authority. But that's just a guess.

[Clodfobble]

Maybe. But I also maybe buy it. Ever pulled a wet comforter out of the washing machine to put in the dryer? And that's been spun free of as much liquid as possible. Depending on how thickly the fabric was layered on the lampposts, I could see it maybe actually being a significant amount of weight added, when rained on. Knitting can also be very thin, though, so who knows. I bet it had a ton of bugs living in it though, after a month...

[DanaC]

We did have a brief (hahahaah) period of very, very heavy rain just recently

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

Maybe. But I also maybe buy it. Ever pulled a wet comforter out of the washing machine to put in the dryer? And that's been spun free of as much liquid as possible. Depending on how thickly the fabric was layered on the lampposts, I could see it maybe actually being a significant amount of weight added, when rained on. Knitting can also be very thin, though, so who knows. I bet it had a ton of bugs living in it though, after a month...

I don't doubt the string of knitting gets considerably heavier when wet, it just amazes me that their light posts are so wimpy. Also, I suspect the posts are a lot stronger than they think, although they should know best.
The posts bend under load? Ever see a light standard in a heavy wind, they'll whip like a willow.

My viewing Health & Safety with a jaundiced eye comes from reading an almost steady barrage of ridiculous stories, in the Brit press, with maybe 70% stemming from what I would call questionable rulings/enforcement from that agency. They could be a Monty Python division.

[glatt]

This yarn bombing thing has jumped the shark.

[Clodfobble]

Oh, that's way less yarn than I was imagining. I take it back; they're full of shit.

[DanaC]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

I don't doubt the string of knitting gets considerably heavier when wet, it just amazes me that their light posts are so wimpy. Also, I suspect the posts are a lot stronger than they think, although they should know best.
The posts bend under load? Ever see a light standard in a heavy wind, they'll whip like a willow.

My viewing Health & Safety with a jaundiced eye comes from reading an almost steady barrage of ridiculous stories, in the Brit press, with maybe 70% stemming from what I would call questionable rulings/enforcement from that agency. They could be a Monty Python division.

I'd say about 70% is actually made up by the media.


Health and safety, along with 'political correctness gone mad' are staples of the press. Most of it is bullshit - like the war on Christmas ('can't even put a Christmas tree in Bradford any more!' yes you can)

[Sundae]

Some stories also come from misunderstandings of Health & Safety legislation, or establishments blaming it because they do not want to carry out a Risk Assessment/ get adequate insurance/ actually be bothered with the event in the first place.

There was a report issued recently regarding stories which had come up through the local press which had nothing to do with Health & Safety.
For example Local Child's Party Cancelled; Health & Safety Concerns because it's in a pub garden and a glass might have been left on a table from the night before. So family calls up the local fishwrapper, who go to the pub in question, who say blahblah health & safety. Picked up by a national because the Mum is fit and the child is a curly haired moppet with big eyes. Big headlines, then buried in the last line of the article is a quote from the Council saying they had not been approached regarding this issue.

When properly investigated it turns out that the pub in question just thought it might be a bit dangerous and you know what Health & Safety is like these days you're not allowed to do anything, and they were going to be short-staffed anyway...
So it's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The report I read locally re the bunting was that there was one lampost which was affected. So rather than pay for repairs to ensure it was safe, far better to remove the efforts of volunteers

It's the same thinking that cuts funding for successful patient treatment clincs (asthma, diabetes, obesity etc) where patients are helped to manage their own conditions by a pharmacist and a nurse prescriber. Save money in the short term. Increased medication costs and hospital admissions will happen in another fiscal year and from a different budget after all.

[Carruthers]

I was going to post earlier, but went off to paint the fence instead (Oh joy!)

In the meantime, Sundae has neatly covered the subject so I'll just add this from the Daily Telegraph.

Health and safety has become synonymous with nanny statism, interfering jobsworths, ludicrous litigation and risk aversion. And yet the Health and Safety at Work Act, which is 40 years old this summer, has arguably saved more lives than any other piece of legislation, including the ban on drink driving or the compulsory wearing of seat belts in cars. It may well have reduced deaths by 5,000 or more.

So how did an Act that was by any measure a milestone in social reform turn into one of the most disparaged statutes of recent times? Partly it has to do with the way the law is interpreted – and often wrongly blamed for absurd restrictions imposed on perfectly innocuous practices. But it also reflects an absolutist view that it is possible to avoid accidental injury or death, rather than simply to reduce the circumstances in which they might occur.

Let’s fly the flag for the life-saving health and safety law

Given the Telegraphs's general outlook on life, it's surprising to see the article published there. However, some of the more forthright comments do tend to redress the balance.

Incidentally, I suspect that the term 'jobsworth' might not survive a trans-Atlantic exchange of electrons so allow me to assist.

"Jobsworth" is a British colloquial word derived from the phrase "I can't do that, it's more than my job's worth", meaning it might lose the person their job: taking the initiative and performing an action, and perhaps in the process breaking a rule, is beyond what the person feels their job description allows. Wikipedia.

[Sundae]

Today I went up The Chevin. Or at least that's how they say it here.
I haven't worked out whether it's the range of hills, or the forest, or just one part of the one hill, so I say it the way they do. Pronounced SHEV-inn.

On the way I passed passed the launderette, so I know where to go when I want my heavy duvet washed - the light one fits in my machine but the one I use as a mattress cover is much thicker. I wouldn't have anywhere sensible to dry it even if my machine did cope with the wash.

I also went past this decorated street. No knitted flags, but bicycles on top of bay windows.

[Sundae]

Next a car boot sale setting up on the Cattle Market - pleased I know where it is now. Also I didn't go into the car boot sale as they charged a nominal entry fee and I wanted to save my worldly wealth for later in the day. I don't even know if 30p would have got me admittance.

The road up to the forest is very steep. I expected that, from the way the hills seem to stand like a wall from close to the end up the High Street.
I just hadn't expected to climb so high for so long. Perhaps it was because the view forward was uninspiring. You had to turn and look behind for the view. Which I did.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by DanaC

I'd say about 70% is actually made up by the media.

Originally Posted by Sundae

Some stories also come from misunderstandings of Health & Safety legislation, or establishments blaming it because they do not want to carry out a Risk Assessment/ get adequate insurance/ actually be bothered with the event in the first place.

Originally Posted by Carruthers

Incidentally, I suspect that the term 'jobsworth' might not survive a trans-Atlantic exchange of electrons so allow me to assist.

Cool, thank you, and thanks for the jobsworth explanation. I'd posted the story here because of the proximity to Sundae's new stomping grounds and references to the bike race decorations. But since it's a bigger issue on both sides of the pond, let's stop littering Sundae's thread, thank her for being a lovely hostess, and take it over here... or over there.