Tractor pushes parked cars out of the way

[anonymous-user]

TooMany2cvs said:

Andy20vt said:

What PROOF do you have that the farmer has deliberately done this?

I'm absolutely sure he did do it deliberately.

He carefully and deliberately drove through the gap, causing damage to vehicles. He didn't have any other choice, and he minimised the damage he caused, but he definitely drove through that gap deliberately. I'm sure he deliberated on whether it was the only realistic option, beforehand.

And I'm equally sure that he was absolutely right. It was his only option. He seems to have minimised the damage very well, too.

Is that proof though rather than your assumption about what happened? Were you there? Did you observe that?

The farmer would probably claim otherwise (e.g. perhaps a roll of baler twine stored behind the window was jolted by a bump in the road and lodged itself under the clutch pedal causing the tractor to keep going rather then stop). How would you dis-prove the farmer and make a court see your opinion, particularly as (I'm guessing here) - you were not present at the time?

[anonymous-user]

Seesure said:

And what PROOF do you have he hasn't ???

Come on then ... put up or shut up...

On the balance of probability you and the rest of the world knows he has...

Or can't you comprehend that?

Nope I'm sorry I don't know what happened - I wasn't there was I? Were you?

[anonymous-user]

ferrisbueller said:

Seesure said:

Lots

You appear to believe the farmer has gone postal. He hasn't. In fact, he's done well to cause as little damage as he has. If he'd really wanted to fk things up, every car on the road would need to be craned away.

"Done well"

[anonymous-user]

TooMany2cvs said:

Like I said - I think he did a good job of keeping the damage to the bare minimum.

OMG another one

"Well he didn't crash as badly as he could have done, so I think hes done well..."

What a pair you two are.

[anonymous-user]

heebeegeetee said:

FiF said:

johnwilliams77 said:

Seesure said:

In all honesty it's pointless having a debate with folk like you... at what point did I say anything about agreeing that there was no alternative? Clearly you are very severely intellectually challenged when in comes to reading and comprehending what is written in front of you.

Don't bother answering as your response will either be insulting or having no relevance to anything I wrote as you've proven already.

Clearly what has emerged is a small group of rurally focused Phers who think "city type folk" deserve what they get at any cost whereas others on here are able to see the situation for what it was and that deliberate damage is not acceptable regardless of who creates it.

So I CBA to engage further on the rights or wrongs of an idiot farmer so this is my last post on this topic.

Edited by anonymous-user on Friday 17th November 02:28

Good

Seconded, TFFT!

Thirded. I haven't had chance to respond to his earlier comments, but seesure, you've been posting nonsense from the off, imo.

Ooooh Seesure's flounced - get you!!!!!

Fourthed, seems Seesure was simply trolling and despite his 'issue' with the farmers actions (perhaps farmers in general), seemed to not want to engage with the discussion seeking a credible alternative for the farmer to resolve this situation without causing damage. Perhaps because there wasn't one.

[anonymous-user]

sunbeam alpine said:

We're not running these large, slow (and very expensive!) machines along the roads for fun, or to ps off other motorists, but because it's our job!

To all those who suggest that the farmer should just park up and wait, leaving aside livestock welfare questions, how would you react at your work, if you have to achieve a particular target, and other people are hindering you? When your manager gives you grief (or if you miss out on a financial bonus) because you've failed, when you know it's not your fault, but other people who have let you down?

I think the point you are missing is that we all have jobs , and at some point we will all get hindered by other people , but at no point does that give us the right to smash up other peoples property (or punch them in the face or whatever we'd really like to do at the time), with the occasional exception of life and death situations such fire engines and ambulances trying to reach an incident.

This guy is just a farmer - hard job? Boo hoo, lots of people have hard jobs. I'm sure the bin collection guys job is hard too and they get blocked by bad parking etc.. all the time , but look at the reactions on here where a bin truck (allegedly) put a small scratch in somebody's P&J - it's not an overwhelming "good, you deserve it". I expect A&E staff have a much more unpleasant job than the average farmer.

The people applauding the farmer are just doing so out of spite, whereas the more sensible would prefer to see the law applied equally to all parties and the farmer prosecuted, and possibly the car drivers too if they parked illegally, of which there is still no evidence - so far the only clearly illegal action is damaging vehicles.


Now this one on the other hand:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3336162/No...

I do find amusing and well-deserved. The farmer made things very awkward for some inconsiderate people without actually going too far, and in that case I reckon he got the balance about right.

Edited by anonymous-user on Friday 17th November 09:14

[anonymous-user]

JimSuperSix said:

I think the point you are missing is that we all have jobs , and at some point we will all get hindered by other people , but at no point does that give us the right to smash up other peoples property (or punch them in the face or whatever we'd really like to do at the time), with the occasional exception of life and death situations such fire engines and ambulances trying to reach an incident.

I'm sorry but the problem here was caused 100% by the parked cars and not the farmer who was simply trying to go about his rightful daily business. What do you propose the farmer should have done? Abandon his days activities and go to the pub to await the ramblers return in the evening? Then the same obstructive parking thing happens the next day, and the next? Should he go to the pub on these days too? Perhaps in the pub he can at least use the pub's phone to again phone the police/council who will again do nothing anyway?

I'm not sure you really understand the demands of upland hill farmers do you? It's not a 9-5 job, it's a 365 day a year operation, and with very long hard days at that. Way harder than nursing or any of the other examples you choose to give (most of whom at least get a couple of days off every week), often with very little financial reward to show for it at the end of the day. Yet without these hill farmers, the hills (and access to them) that the walkers demand would be a very different proposition. Yet the said walkers decide it's perfectly okay to block complete access between the farmer and his land because they're just nipping up the hill for the day? Go figure.

And I'm arguing this as a city dweller who happens to be a walker too. If I'd parked my car as badly as that then I'd be expecting some sort of damage to it on my return. There would be no one to blame but myself.

[anonymous-user]

Andy20vt said:

JimSuperSix said:

I think the point you are missing is that we all have jobs , and at some point we will all get hindered by other people , but at no point does that give us the right to smash up other peoples property (or punch them in the face or whatever we'd really like to do at the time), with the occasional exception of life and death situations such fire engines and ambulances trying to reach an incident.

I'm sorry but the problem here was caused 100% by the parked cars and not the farmer who was simply trying to go about his rightful daily business. What do you propose the farmer should have done? Abandon his days activities and go to the pub to await the ramblers return in the evening? Then the same obstructive parking thing happens the next day, and the next? Should he go to the pub on these days too? Perhaps in the pub he can at least use the pub's phone to again phone the police/council who will again do nothing anyway?

I'm not sure you really understand the demands of upland hill farmers do you? It's not a 9-5 job, it's a 365 day a year operation, and with very long hard days at that. Way harder than nursing or any of the other examples you choose to give (most of whom at least get a couple of days off every week), often with very little financial reward to show for it at the end of the day. Yet without these hill farmers, the hills (and access to them) that the walkers demand would be a very different proposition. Yet the said walkers decide it's perfectly okay to block complete access between the farmer and his land because they're just nipping up the hill for the day? Go figure.

And I'm arguing this as a city dweller who happens to be a walker too. If I'd parked my car as badly as that then I'd be expecting some sort of damage to it on my return. There would be no one to blame but myself.

What the farmer should have done is not damage vehicles. You make it sound like , because its his job, that he's entitled to just smash through with no regard to property or the law.

He's not.

Whether his job is affected is irrelevant. He should not damage property. If it means he has to sit there until the car drivers return, or he has to wait for police attendance , or whatever , thats what he should do as that is the law of the land. Once you allow people to take action like this with no repercusions you might as well abandon any attempt to have a lawful society.

Also, as far as I've seen so far nobody (who matters) has decided the cars were parked illegally, so from that point of view the farmer is the only one to have broken the law and he should be punished.

[anonymous-user]

akirk said:

JimSuperSix said:

Also, as far as I've seen so far nobody (who matters) has decided the cars were parked illegally, so from that point of view the farmer is the only one to have broken the law and he should be punished.

Have you read the rest of the thread

leaving a car on a road where it gets in the way of another road user is obstruction...
obstructing the road is illegal

in the UK we have laws drivers have to observe, most of them are based on common sense - it doesn't need yellow lines / warning signs for the law to be broken...

let us work it out...

As I said , "people who matter".

Show me where the police have decided the cars are illegally parked? So far the only people to say they were illegally parked are a few posters on here. I've also not seen any picture evidence of the road being blocked for normal vehicle access.

Some people here claim farm equipment is no wider than a normal car , and yet it would appear that normal cars were able to drive along quite happily to park all along that road.

So which is it?

And unless the law has changed in the past few days, I don't believe the farmer is legally entitled to smash up even illegally parked vehicles?

Edited by anonymous-user on Friday 17th November 10:33

[anonymous-user]

JimSuperSix said:

As I said , "people who matter".

Show me where the police have decided the cars are illegally parked? So far the only people to say they were illegally parked are a few posters on here. I've also not seen any picture evidence of the road being blocked for normal vehicle access.

Highways Act 1980 Section 148 (c) is what you are looking for:

If, without lawful authority or excuse—

(a)a person deposits on a made-up carriageway any dung, compost or other material for dressing land, or any rubbish, or

(b)a person deposits on any highway that consists of or comprises a made-up carriageway any dung, compost or other material for dressing land, or any rubbish, within 15 feet from the centre of that carriageway, or

(c)a person deposits any thing whatsoever on a highway to the interruption of any user of the highway, or

(d)a hawker or other itinerant trader pitches a booth, stall or stand, or encamps, on a highway.

he is guilty of an offence and liable to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale.

[anonymous-user]

TooMany2cvs said:

JimSuperSix said:

What the farmer should have done is not damage vehicles.

OK, so what should he have done?

Nobody else seems able or willing to come up with a credible alternative. Perhaps you'd like to give it a try?

JimSuperSix said:

Also, as far as I've seen so far nobody (who matters) has decided the cars were parked illegally, so from that point of view the farmer is the only one to have broken the law and he should be punished.

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1980/66/secti...

The law said:

137 Penalty for wilful obstruction.

(1)If a person, without lawful authority or excuse, in any way wilfully obstructs the free passage along a highway he is guilty of an offence and liable to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale.

Nope, don't see anything there about how it's only legal if somebody official says it is - just that it definitely isn't if free passage is obstructed. Which was undoubtedly the situation. We could possibly debate "wilfully", but IMHO that'll only wash if they really didn't intend to leave their cars there - say, they broke down and were awaiting recovery. Perhaps either the Skoda or the BMW could argue it was the other person's fault, not theirs, but that's kinda academic.

Good grief man, i posted above what he should have done - waited , called police , not damage property. It's not that hard to understand, whether his job was affected or not is legally irrelevant.

I've said it before but I'll say it again - If the drivers were illegally parked then they should be prosecuted also. So far I see no official police response about that.

None of that makes any difference to the farmer's actions legally - he can't legally smash up property , he did, he should be prosecuted.

[anonymous-user]

TooMany2cvs said:

JimSuperSix said:

Good grief man, i posted above what he should have done - waited , called police , not damage property.

And it's been repeatedly explained to you why that simply isn't practicable.

Legally, IT DOESNT MATTER. How hard to understand is that?

Something being "not practicable" doesn't give a person carte-blanche to smash up property. Like it or not, he should have acted within the law, no matter how inconvenient that is. If that means he has to sit there for 8 hours waiting on the Police , so be it, that's how the law works.

Edited by anonymous-user on Friday 17th November 10:55

[anonymous-user]

Mr2Mike said:

JimSuperSix said:

Good grief man, i posted above what he should have done - waited , called police , not damage property. It's not that hard to understand, whether his job was affected or not is legally irrelevant.

Clearly you have little or no knowledge of farming, otherwise you'd realise how ridiculous your "solution" is.

That is irrelevant - my solution is one legally acceptable solution. His was not. He should be prosecuted. There is no lee-way there in the law for what he did.

[anonymous-user]

Efbe said:

JimSuperSix said:

TooMany2cvs said:

JimSuperSix said:

Good grief man, i posted above what he should have done - waited , called police , not damage property.

And it's been repeatedly explained to you why that simply isn't practicable.

Legally, IT DOESNT MATTER. How hard to understand is that?

Jim, we (as in most of the posters here) understand he may well get in some trouble for this, even if just with his insurance company.

The point it though that he didn't have much option and this was a situation caused by crap parking by walkers.
You have not taken into account lack of mobile reception, and not knowing if he did contact the police or not. Someone early on in this thread mentioned the local police were aware of this situation. They may well have turned a blind eye and just left it for the insurance company to deal with. There was another example a few pages back of the police doing this elsewhere.

He had the legal option (wait , reverse , walk home, float away on a balloon, whatever) or the illegal one - smash up cars. He chose the illegal one. Hence he should be prosecuted.

[anonymous-user]

TooMany2cvs said:

JimSuperSix said:

TooMany2cvs said:

JimSuperSix said:

Good grief man, i posted above what he should have done - waited , called police , not damage property.

And it's been repeatedly explained to you why that simply isn't practicable.

Legally, IT DOESNT MATTER. How hard to understand is that?

Actually, you're wrong. (How very unsurprising)

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1971/48/secti...

The law said:

1 Destroying or damaging property.

(1)A person who without lawful excuse destroys or damages any property belonging to another intending to destroy or damage any such property or being reckless as to whether any such property would be destroyed or damaged shall be guilty of an offence.

(2)A person who without lawful excuse destroys or damages any property, whether belonging to himself or another—

(a)intending to destroy or damage any property or being reckless as to whether any property would be destroyed or damaged; and

(b)intending by the destruction or damage to endanger the life of another or being reckless as to whether the life of another would be thereby endangered;

shall be guilty of an offence.

There's a defence of having a lawful excuse. Now, only a court can rule for sure whether he acted with legal excuse or not, but there's a very strong argument that he did, purely through having absolutely zero other option practicably available to him.

It's already been posted that police have - albeit not in the UK - accepted a very similar action and given the go-ahead, not that it's required beforehand. It's already been posted that a typical farm insurance policy will definitely cover the damage, and any legal costs arising, from a similar situation - which it would not if the actions were inherently illegal.

If moving sheep is a lawful excuse I will eat my own shoes.

Also as said he didn't have "zero" option, no matter how many times you keep on trotting out that same line.

[anonymous-user]

TooMany2cvs said:

JimSuperSix said:

If moving sheep is a lawful excuse I will eat my own shoes.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume that you haven't actually bothered to read anything that's been written here, unless it agrees with your preconceptions.

LOL coming from you that is quite the statement. I've read everything here, so far all you can state is that you think he had "zero" option but to drive forward and smash up cars.

Are you saying it was physically impossible for him to stop and turn off the engine? Sit there for 8 hours? Call the police? Reverse? All of those are physically impossible? Of course not, in which case he DID have options, no matter how much they interfere with his job.

[anonymous-user]

FiF said:

TooMany2cvs said:

JimSuperSix said:

Good grief man, i posted above what he should have done - waited , called police , not damage property.

And it's been repeatedly explained to you why that simply isn't practicable.

Quite. Yes, as explained previously, it may have been possible to extricate everyone from the situation, eventually but it would have required a degree of cooperation and everyone working together that possibly may or may not have been achievable. Certainly it would have taken the rest of daylight hours and possibly beyond.

Alternative 2 was to try and get vehicle through without damage, and then deal with the consequences afterwards if that were not achieved.

Alternative 3, dunno, knock down a stretch of drystone wall and drive through fields? Looking at the way the cars were parked that probably wasn't possible either.

Which one you take is down to where the personal line sits. Mine? As earlier stated, I would have switched off, wandered off to phone police and ask for help and/or advice.

Finally a sensible post. I would have done the same , and if I followed the farmers chosen route I would expect to be prosecuted for it.

[anonymous-user]

JimSuperSix said:

None of that makes any difference to the farmer's actions legally - he can't legally smash up property , he did, he should be prosecuted.

Unless he could show lawful excuse - which is something that is a little vague and that's open to interpretation by judge and jury. They would have to weigh up the options here and consider whether it was reasonable for a farmer to wait for an indefinite amount of time with a trailer full of sheep (with risk to the amimal's welfare), or whether it wasn't.

No doubt the farmer could demonstrate perfectly reasonably to the said judge and jury that having (by no fault of his own), been put into a difficult situation on a particularly tight stretch of road, that reversing backwards, with poor visibility (and with the likely hood of walkers around), would be considerably more risky, with potential for more damage than by continuing forward to extricate himself from the situation. Staying put indefinitely and risking the welfare of his animals would also potentially have not been an option for him. By leaving the vehicle there to return home to phone the council/police whatever he could be potentially blocking the public highway himself, itself an offense.

Therefore with the above taken into account, any reasonable jury would no doubt agree that finding himself in a particularly tricky situation, that he'd taken a reasonable course of action, and a course of action that minimized the potential for even greater damage and potential animal suffering/welfare issues.

[anonymous-user]

pavarotti1980 said:

This is the without lawful excuse (s.5 Criminal Damage Act) to see if it fits to this situation

5“Without lawful excuse.”

(1)This section applies to any offence under section 1(1) above and any offence under section 2 or 3 above other than one involving a threat by the person charged to destroy or damage property in a way which he knows is likely to endanger the life of another or involving an intent by the person charged to use or cause or permit the use of something in his custody or under his control so to destroy or damage property.

(2)A person charged with an offence to which this section applies, shall, whether or not he would be treated for the purposes of this Act as having a lawful excuse apart from this subsection, be treated for those purposes as having a lawful excuse—

(a)if at the time of the act or acts alleged to constitute the offence he believed that the person or persons whom he believed to be entitled to consent to the destruction of or damage to the property in question had so consented, or would have so consented to it if he or they had known of the destruction or damage and its circumstances; or

(b)if he destroyed or damaged or threatened to destroy or damage the property in question or, in the case of a charge of an offence under section 3 above, intended to use or cause or permit the use of something to destroy or damage it, in order to protect property belonging to himself or another or a right or interest in property which was or which he believed to be vested in himself or another, and at the time of the act or acts alleged to constitute the offence he believed—

(i)that the property, right or interest was in immediate need of protection; and

(ii)that the means of protection adopted or proposed to be adopted were or would be reasonable having regard to all the circumstances.

(3)For the purposes of this section it is immaterial whether a belief is justified or not if it is honestly held.

(4)For the purposes of subsection (2) above a right or interest in property includes any right or privilege in or over land, whether created by grant, licence or otherwise.

(5)This section shall not be construed as casting doubt on any defence recognised by law as a defence to criminal charges.


ps i am not making judgement, merely allowing the relevant section to be posted

Thanks Pavarotti, I believe that Section 2 (b)(i)(ii) and Section 3/4 could be perfectly reasonably taken into account to vindicate the actions of the farmer in this situation.

[anonymous-user]

pavarotti1980 said:

However if it got as far as crown court since damage will be over £5k then its very much a jury lottery

Which judging, if by the weight of opinion on here goes, he'd win.