Pontins told to stop screening Irish names

[Douglas Quaid]

I heard Jeremy vine talking about this and he said he thought it might be something to do with the IRA but that didn’t make much sense to him. He had no clue about travellers, or at least pretended not to know. I think the people that have never had contact with this group of people see them differently to people that have.

[stitched]

anonymoususer said:

catweasle said:

I assume you know the difference but posted this for the "comedy" value?

Forgot to include the pointed noses
Yep They are well known both locally and in another town where they are watched like hawks by store detectives because they are always trying to rob stuff out of the shops.
Usually very amateurishly

The last thing a decent security guard is watching is the amateur stuffing corn flakes up her top while the rest of the family clear out the razor blades.

[Randy Winkman]

Hang On said:

TwigtheWonderkid said:

It's a free but regulated market. Their business, their model, their decision, so long as it's within the law.

Would you be happy with a firm refusing to do business with black people, Asians, Jews, Gays?

It's not an essential service as other options are available, just like your bank. Would you be happy for your bank to close your accounts, based on bad debts incurred by others with an Irish surname.

Well I certainly wouldn’t be happy with a firm refusing business for reasons of ethnicity or sexual preference (though I do think refusing that cake was ok so it isn’t black and white). But such a refusal would be immoral and illegal. Refusing business based on some statistical analysis of surname is imbecilic but likely not immoral (depends on motive) and I’m not sure about legality. Postcode discrimination isn’t illegal for example and doesn’t seem different to me.

The free market argument trumps it for me (absent any demonstrable illegality) because I don’t expect as a consumer to have an absolute right to buy what I want when I want it and from whom. Protections are necessary for essential services (such as bank accounts eg) but not for staying at filthy holiday resorts at which to contract food poisoning; the latter being an optional service.

I'm not sure your two paragraphs are consistent. Does the free market principle trump ethnicity/sexual preference discrimination?

[XCP]

I am not at all sure that surname is an indication of race to be honest. I work with 3 people who share the same surname.
One is Northern Irish, one is English, and one is Black of Caribbean heritage.

[anonymous-user]

Couldn’t pontins do the following ?

1. No trade or commercial vehicles.
2. Passport AND driving licence for proof of id and address.
3. Deposit on every member of family ?


You would have to do this for everyone obviously.

[vaud]

Iwantafusca said:

Couldn’t pontins do the following ?

1. No trade or commercial vehicles.
2. Passport AND driving licence for proof of id and address.
3. Deposit on every member of family ?


You would have to do this for everyone obviously.

What would that achieve if they were still seeking to discriminate?

[Eric Mc]

Hang On said:

The free market argument trumps it for me (absent any demonstrable illegality)

And that is the point. It was an illegal decision - so the "free market" principle falls flat when its application results in breaking the law.

[SpeckledJim]

TwigtheWonderkid said:

SpeckledJim said:

If these 20 families are no trouble, then why would pontins break the law to try to filter them out?

Oh, I didn't realise it was actually 20 families, because that's fine. They can ban individual families no problem. I thought it was 40 common Irish surnames (not exclusively traveller, just Irish). But now you say it's families, that makes sense. Obviously Pat Cash, the Aussie tennis player is the brother of Bill Cash, Tory MP, and the late Johnny Cash, American signer. And Paddy McGuiness turned out ok, considering he grew up under the shadow of his dad, IRA bigwig Martin.

But it leaves me with one question. Were Bruce Lee and Spike Lee twins, or just brothers?

The policy encompasses surnames, and as such is an extremely blunt (and likely illegal) instrument, but the core of the problem might well be 20 families.

Even factoring the Saintly Susan in the credit column, Pontins reckons the mean average Boyle is so bad a customer that they don't want any of them. Without a way to tell which is which, they're left with the blunt instrument.

Naturally, 95% of the Boyles (including Susan no doubt) are no bother at all, and would be pleasant and profitable guests, so just imagine how terrible the 5% must be in order for this embarrassing and illegal policy to be a rational management decision.

It remains an enormous fluke that the 20 surnames are all associated with travellers, who don't cause any aggro when they are on holiday, and are warmly welcomed by experienced hoteliers all over the world.

[slow_poke]

The full list of surnames:
Boylan
Boyle
Carney
Carr
Cash
Connors
Corcoran
Delaney
Doherty
Dorran
Gallagher
Horan
Keefe
Kell
Leahy
Lee
Maclaughlin
Mcalwick
McCully
McDonagh
McGinley
McGinn
McGuiness
McHarg
McLaughan
McMahon
Millighan
ans
Murphy
Nolan
O'Brien
O'Connell
O'Donnell
O'Donoghue
O'Mahoney
O'Reilly
Sheriadan
Stokes
Walch
Ward

But as well as those names, and commercial vehicles being banned, they also refused bookings from anyone with an Irish accent.
So if you're one of the many Irish immigrants to GB - or even if you're a UK citizen from NI - you're banned.

Looks like the days of "No blacks, no dogs, no Irish" aren't so far away after all.

[XCP]

Eric Mc said:

And that is the point. It was an illegal decision - so the "free market" principle falls flat when its application results in breaking the law.

The fine might be less costly than the damage caused. It might well be reassuring for normal holidaymakers too.

[TwigtheWonderkid]

Iwantafusca said:

Couldn’t pontins do the following ?

1. No trade or commercial vehicles.
2. Passport AND driving licence for proof of id and address.
3. Deposit on every member of family ?


You would have to do this for everyone obviously.

Yes, they could.

[TwigtheWonderkid]

Hang On said:

Postcode discrimination isn’t illegal for example and doesn’t seem different to me.

It's different in so much as it isn't illegal. Although I suppose it may be deemed so if it's intention was to exclude people based on a protected characteristic. If you were found to be excluding people with, for example, a Southall or Stamford Hill postcode, you could be skating on thin ice.

[Eric Mc]

XCP said:

Eric Mc said:

And that is the point. It was an illegal decision - so the "free market" principle falls flat when its application results in breaking the law.

The fine might be less costly than the damage caused. It might well be reassuring for normal holidaymakers too.

To be honest, does Pontins have much of a reputation anyway?

[slow_poke]

Eric Mc said:

XCP said:

Eric Mc said:

And that is the point. It was an illegal decision - so the "free market" principle falls flat when its application results in breaking the law.

The fine might be less costly than the damage caused. It might well be reassuring for normal holidaymakers too.

To be honest, does Pontins have much of a reputation anyway?

Not among the Irish nowadays, I'd imagine.

[SpeckledJim]

XCP said:

Eric Mc said:

And that is the point. It was an illegal decision - so the "free market" principle falls flat when its application results in breaking the law.

The fine might be less costly than the damage caused. It might well be reassuring for normal holidaymakers too.

I doubt they will (because they're in enough trouble already), but it would be interesting if Pontins were to publish their figures on

Cabarets cancelled due to brawling
Turds in swimming pools
Kitchenettes ripped off walls

In order to illustrate why this policy ever existed in the first place. Is a fact racist if it's also a fact?

I'm keen to see where the Patels and Fujikawas and Fortescue-Smythes rank on the 'Police Attended' League Table. I bet old Mr Patel from Acacia Avenue is a bloody madman once he's had half a dozen snakey-b's. Every year he and Mr Fujikawa take up that old feud from the 60's and do battle over the Crazy Golf.

And you ain't never seen Golf as Crazy as when Justin Fortescue-Smythe catches someone giving Jemima the sneaky side-eye. Wrong kind of windmill, son. Big mistake.

[anonymous-user]

That's a mighty list of knacker names.

[Type R Tom]

What I find the hardest part to swallow is that when in a hotel I'm scared to drink a coffee in bed in case I spill it and get fine for cleaning. Yet we have an element here that can behave so badly and without repercussions that it has led to what Pontins have done.

These types of threads on social media always go the same way, half saying "they aren't all like it" and "I know some great ones" vs "they are all terrible". What I wish they would do is the good guys have a word with the others, as they are giving them a bad name!

[eldar]

Electro1980 said:

eldar said:

Electro1980 said:

Insurance cannot price based on gender, or race.

And because of that, the lower risk categories pay more to subsidise the higher risk people.

Which is always the case no matter how insurance is calculated, and is the point in insurance. Rightly it is not longer assumed that being male makes you automatically higher risk. Why should I, who has had one accident in 22 years, with a total cost of £1500, be penalised for other men and my neighbour, who had about one minor accident a year, be subsidised by other women purely because of our gender?

Young men crash more frequently and expensively than young women. The law prevents that risk being reflected in premiums. Thus young women subsidise young men. That s equality.

[anonymous-user]

anonymoususer said:

catweasle said:

I assume you know the difference but posted this for the "comedy" value?

Forgot to include the pointed noses
Yep They are well known both locally and in another town where they are watched like hawks by store detectives because they are always trying to rob stuff out of the shops.
Usually very amateurishly

Roma? you sure about that?

[Eric Mc]

slow_poke said:

Not among the Irish nowadays, I'd imagine.

They are a perceptive race, to be sure.