Taking the Pi$$ !!!
Discussion
Got a call from a friend of mine last night, here's how it went.
Driving back from London to Plymouth on the A303, his 4 year old needed a jimmy riddle, having just passed the services he decided to pull into the next available pit stop, a parking strip.
Out the mum gets with 4 year old Johnny (To protect their names) standing by the car, but aiming at the grass verge, johnny drops his trouser and pants, mum holding him, he proceeds to have a wee.
Within seconds a Cop car pulls into the bay, copper gets out and walks up to them and starts lecturing mum and son on urinating on the highway.
My mate gets out of the car, the copper informs him that under the local laws they are open to prosecution, thinking the copper is joking he plays along for a while (minutes) the copper then takes a more serious line, and insists that my mate should be a better parent.
My mate explodes at this point and demands an apology, who is the copper to judge whether or not my mate is good parent.
Well the upshot is my mate packs the family up and drives off without any recourse.
My mate told me last night he is going to get in touch with media, to show the bloody minded nature of some of our Police officers, my mate who is a law abiding citizen with no convictions, good parent has now lost his faith in the Police.
Is this cuontry going MAD!!!!!!!
Driving back from London to Plymouth on the A303, his 4 year old needed a jimmy riddle, having just passed the services he decided to pull into the next available pit stop, a parking strip.
Out the mum gets with 4 year old Johnny (To protect their names) standing by the car, but aiming at the grass verge, johnny drops his trouser and pants, mum holding him, he proceeds to have a wee.
Within seconds a Cop car pulls into the bay, copper gets out and walks up to them and starts lecturing mum and son on urinating on the highway.
My mate gets out of the car, the copper informs him that under the local laws they are open to prosecution, thinking the copper is joking he plays along for a while (minutes) the copper then takes a more serious line, and insists that my mate should be a better parent.
My mate explodes at this point and demands an apology, who is the copper to judge whether or not my mate is good parent.
Well the upshot is my mate packs the family up and drives off without any recourse.
My mate told me last night he is going to get in touch with media, to show the bloody minded nature of some of our Police officers, my mate who is a law abiding citizen with no convictions, good parent has now lost his faith in the Police.
Is this cuontry going MAD!!!!!!!
Just be grateful that I wasn't driving by.
See here www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=12024&f=23&h=0&hw=a12
Seriously compared to France the UK is piss poor when it comes to public toilets adjacent to highways. Think however, if the lad had been peeing up against the rear nearside wheel he would have been ok - some ancient bylaw dating back to horse drawn coaches still in existance. (Madcop - please correct me if I am wrong)
Last time I got caught short I ended up parking my @rse in a bed of stinging nettles - too busy looking to see if anyone could see. It is not so easy for us girls - never mastered the art of peeing standing up.
See here www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=12024&f=23&h=0&hw=a12
Seriously compared to France the UK is piss poor when it comes to public toilets adjacent to highways. Think however, if the lad had been peeing up against the rear nearside wheel he would have been ok - some ancient bylaw dating back to horse drawn coaches still in existance. (Madcop - please correct me if I am wrong)
Last time I got caught short I ended up parking my @rse in a bed of stinging nettles - too busy looking to see if anyone could see. It is not so easy for us girls - never mastered the art of peeing standing up.
I know it was only a child, I know he was taken short, I am not excusing the behaviour of the police officer concerned if he was officious.
BUT
If the Police could see him, then so could others.
Why did she (the mother) not take him out of view for his own dignity and that of others who may have been offended.
Will this sort of behaviour continue through his adolesent years because mum taught him to pee next to the car in full view of the public?
Will he then urinate in shop doorways when he is a yoof coming out of a nightclub so it stinks of p1ss for the shoppers the next day?
We do not live in France where this is acceptable behaviour. The officer may well have been offended himself and was in a position to do something about it!
If something as trivial as this affects the judgement of your friend about the whole of the Police service, he is a little niave to say the least.
I went out for a meal last Saturday and ended up with food poisoning from a restaurant. The cause was calves liver which I had from the menu main course. I was badly affected for 48 hours. It has not made me feel any different about restaurants or in fact liver. Even though I had a bad experience with that particular one, I will still eat liver and still go to restaurants! Your friend needs to think a little more about his anger and put it into perspective
>> Edited by madcop on Thursday 26th June 12:41
BUT
If the Police could see him, then so could others.
Why did she (the mother) not take him out of view for his own dignity and that of others who may have been offended.
Will this sort of behaviour continue through his adolesent years because mum taught him to pee next to the car in full view of the public?
Will he then urinate in shop doorways when he is a yoof coming out of a nightclub so it stinks of p1ss for the shoppers the next day?
We do not live in France where this is acceptable behaviour. The officer may well have been offended himself and was in a position to do something about it!
If something as trivial as this affects the judgement of your friend about the whole of the Police service, he is a little niave to say the least.
I went out for a meal last Saturday and ended up with food poisoning from a restaurant. The cause was calves liver which I had from the menu main course. I was badly affected for 48 hours. It has not made me feel any different about restaurants or in fact liver. Even though I had a bad experience with that particular one, I will still eat liver and still go to restaurants! Your friend needs to think a little more about his anger and put it into perspective
>> Edited by madcop on Thursday 26th June 12:41
mechsympathy said:
Think however, if the lad had been peeing up against the rear nearside wheel he would have been ok - some ancient bylaw dating back to horse drawn coaches still in existance. (Madcop - please correct me if I am wrong)
I think that's only for London cabbies!
Can't say for certain. I believe that there is some sort of statute covering it but it is very old and I do not have record of it here.
Well the real danger, is stopping 'unnecessarily' on the hard shoulder, where you run the risk of being wiped out by an artic or something.
Most of us have had to stop on the hard shoulder for some reason, and maybe on a few times it could have been avoided ie I once ran out of fuel because of a faulty gauge, but knew the gauge was a bit rubbish and could have kept it topped up at all times.
The point is, being killed on the hard shoulder would probably be more easily accepted as an argument against stopping by a motorist than public indeceny offenses involving weak-bladdered kiddies.
Not that I know the full facts, but you see what I'm saying.
PS I hope you complained to the restaurant Steve
Or sent the boys from trading standards around if they didn't give you a free meal and a box of after eights. 
Most of us have had to stop on the hard shoulder for some reason, and maybe on a few times it could have been avoided ie I once ran out of fuel because of a faulty gauge, but knew the gauge was a bit rubbish and could have kept it topped up at all times.
The point is, being killed on the hard shoulder would probably be more easily accepted as an argument against stopping by a motorist than public indeceny offenses involving weak-bladdered kiddies.
Not that I know the full facts, but you see what I'm saying.
PS I hope you complained to the restaurant Steve
Or sent the boys from trading standards around if they didn't give you a free meal and a box of after eights. domster said:
Well the real danger, is stopping 'unnecessarily' on the hard shoulder, where you run the risk of being wiped out by an artic or something.
Most of us have had to stop on the hard shoulder for some reason, and maybe on a few times it could have been avoided ie I once ran out of fuel because of a faulty gauge, but knew the gauge was a bit rubbish and could have kept it topped up at all times.
The point is, being killed on the hard shoulder would probably be more easily accepted as an argument against stopping by a motorist than public indeceny offenses involving weak-bladdered kiddies.
Not that I know the full facts, but you see what I'm saying.
PS I hope you complained to the restaurant Steve
Dom
I purposefully didn't mention hard shoulder as it was not mentioned in the original thread as being on a Motorway. It was the A303.
If the father stopped in a layby as is insinuated, then it was understandable for him to do so at that point.
If this happened on a motorway, they are lucky
1) that the officer did not award that spot of bladder relief with £30 FPT for the offence of stopping on the hard shoulder
2) Arrest the father when he started to become upset about being told why under Section 5 Public order Act 1986 (disorderly conduct)
3) that they were not injured or killed whilst they were stationary on the hard shoulder,
4) that they were not injured or killed as they left the hard shoulder to re-gain the carriageway.
As it is unbelievable that the number of people that stop on hard shoulders have no concept of how to do so correctly or profficiently
Even when you explain it to them in graphic detail before they attempt to do so with the Police car right behind them!!!! 
Stopping for a p1ss on a motorway hard shoulder has been tested in court and is not considered by courts as an emergency reason for stopping, even if it was a small child that needed to do so.
>> Edited by madcop on Thursday 26th June 13:05
domster said:
PS I hope you complained to the restaurant Steve
It was a local one to you in Marlow. I have informed environmental health. I'm not interested in compensation, just want to have them avoid poisoning anyone else with their liver!
madcop said:
PS I hope you complained to the restaurant Steve
It was a local one to you in Marlow. I have informed environmental health. I'm not interested in compensation, just want to have them avoid poisoning anyone else with their liver!
[Hijackthreadmode]
Now if everyone in the UK had this attitude then we could get rid of Claims Direct and all be happy Good to see there are some people left in the human race who think like this.
[endHijackthreadmode]
All,
I agree MadCop he souldn't be so niave (Spelling) about 1 incident, but it just wound him up, I think he will take it in his stride.
For all others he did park in a layby, not on a hard shoulder, yes the boy should have been placed in a position where he could not be seen while having a jimmy but wasn't.
I think the most upsetting thing for my friend, was the lecture about parenthood.
I agree MadCop he souldn't be so niave (Spelling) about 1 incident, but it just wound him up, I think he will take it in his stride.
For all others he did park in a layby, not on a hard shoulder, yes the boy should have been placed in a position where he could not be seen while having a jimmy but wasn't.
I think the most upsetting thing for my friend, was the lecture about parenthood.
martin hunt said:
I think the most upsetting thing for my friend, was the lecture about parenthood.
Quite right - and while you are on the subject of dignity of the little boy, whats worse, him standing at the side of the road, with his mother to protect him, and showing his bits to no-one in particular (all of whom that may have saw, would have undoubtedly seen such things before) - OR
Making the boy pee himself at the age of four all because daddy didn't stop intime. He would have had to spend the rest of the journey in wet trousers through no particular fault of his own. One assumes at the age of four, he has enough self pride not to do that any more.....
At the end of the day, if the incident was in a lay-by or parking recess at the side of the road, the policeman was being a cock. The bad parent thing was out of line too - FFS there are kids elsewhere in the country running amok whose parents blatantly don't care about them...
Doesn't necessarily warrant the father calling the media, but i don't think the policeman did himself any fabours in this instance....
JMO - and its not often i take offence at a policemans attitude.....
My Dad, bless 'im, wont stop at the services to let my mum pee when he is driving. So she has to pee in a tupperware box while he is driving. Guess what I get presented with when they come to visit - a tupperware box filled with yellow liquid.
Mind you my Mum is a pain in the @rse when it comes to needing a pee - she must have a bladder the size of a peanut or something. Needs to go every half hour or so. Guess that is what getting old does to you.
while he is driving. Guess what I get presented with when they come to visit - a tupperware box filled with yellow liquid. Mind you my Mum is a pain in the @rse when it comes to needing a pee - she must have a bladder the size of a peanut or something. Needs to go every half hour or so. Guess that is what getting old does to you.
Ah - that old "urban myth" about being legal to pee up the rear of a london cab....
The Cabman's Shelter
Old london hackney drivers risked a stiff fine or loss of his license by leaving his horse and vehicle unattended. Cab laws usually required drivers to stay close enough to their cabs to keep control of their horses and there was no provision for meal breaks or calls of nature. Because of this a tradition sprang up in London that, in moments of need, cab drivers were legally entitled to urinate against a cab wheel while parked on a stand. So many taxi drivers acted on this supposed right in recent years that the Metropolitan Police circulated a letter warning them to desist. There is a copy (somehwere) of this letter on TAXI-L.ORG.
To combat this back then, the cabman's shelter was an institution designed to provide drivers with a place to get in out of the cold and have a cheap meal without straying from the cab stand. The first shelter was erected in London in 1875 at the instigation of Sir George Armstrong, a newspaper publisher who sent his servant out one blustery January day to fetch a cab from a nearby stand. The servant was a long time returning because the drivers had all abandoned their cabs and retired to the warmth and conviviality of a local pub.
It occurred to Sir George that if the cabbies had been provided with a heated shelter on the cab stand, his servant could have found a cab a lot sooner. Sir George immediately started a building fund and got some of his friends to contribute. Not coincidentally the first shelter was located on the closest cab stand to Sir George's house.
The idea caught on and more shelters were built by the Cabmans Shelter Fund, which equipped them with kitchens and employed retired cabbies to operate them. The shelters themselves were usually small green sheds capable of seating about a dozen customers. At their peak there were over 60 of them in London. In 1986, when John Bainbridge wrote about them for Gourmet Magazine, thirteen still survived as going concerns, each with its regular clientele of cab drivers.
The cabman's shelter idea spread to other countries, including Ireland. A lengthy scene in Ulysses takes place in the shelter adjacent to the cab stand at Butt Bridge, to which Leopold Bloom brings a very drunk young man named Stephen Dedalus at one in the morning. Bloom hopes to sober Dedalus up with some food and coffee.
The shelter's proprietor is named Skin-the-Goat Fitzharris. Fitzharris's former career as driver presumably qualified him for the post; when two government officials were stabbed to death in Phoenix Park in 1881, he was rumoured to have driven the jaunting car that enabled the assassins to escape.
Upshot is that it isn't law - it was just a "tradition" that was ignored in the mid 1800's. AFAIK it's urban myth that it's still legal as it never was....
J
>> Edited by joust on Thursday 26th June 20:31
The Cabman's Shelter
Old london hackney drivers risked a stiff fine or loss of his license by leaving his horse and vehicle unattended. Cab laws usually required drivers to stay close enough to their cabs to keep control of their horses and there was no provision for meal breaks or calls of nature. Because of this a tradition sprang up in London that, in moments of need, cab drivers were legally entitled to urinate against a cab wheel while parked on a stand. So many taxi drivers acted on this supposed right in recent years that the Metropolitan Police circulated a letter warning them to desist. There is a copy (somehwere) of this letter on TAXI-L.ORG.
To combat this back then, the cabman's shelter was an institution designed to provide drivers with a place to get in out of the cold and have a cheap meal without straying from the cab stand. The first shelter was erected in London in 1875 at the instigation of Sir George Armstrong, a newspaper publisher who sent his servant out one blustery January day to fetch a cab from a nearby stand. The servant was a long time returning because the drivers had all abandoned their cabs and retired to the warmth and conviviality of a local pub.
It occurred to Sir George that if the cabbies had been provided with a heated shelter on the cab stand, his servant could have found a cab a lot sooner. Sir George immediately started a building fund and got some of his friends to contribute. Not coincidentally the first shelter was located on the closest cab stand to Sir George's house.
The idea caught on and more shelters were built by the Cabmans Shelter Fund, which equipped them with kitchens and employed retired cabbies to operate them. The shelters themselves were usually small green sheds capable of seating about a dozen customers. At their peak there were over 60 of them in London. In 1986, when John Bainbridge wrote about them for Gourmet Magazine, thirteen still survived as going concerns, each with its regular clientele of cab drivers.
The cabman's shelter idea spread to other countries, including Ireland. A lengthy scene in Ulysses takes place in the shelter adjacent to the cab stand at Butt Bridge, to which Leopold Bloom brings a very drunk young man named Stephen Dedalus at one in the morning. Bloom hopes to sober Dedalus up with some food and coffee.
The shelter's proprietor is named Skin-the-Goat Fitzharris. Fitzharris's former career as driver presumably qualified him for the post; when two government officials were stabbed to death in Phoenix Park in 1881, he was rumoured to have driven the jaunting car that enabled the assassins to escape.
Upshot is that it isn't law - it was just a "tradition" that was ignored in the mid 1800's. AFAIK it's urban myth that it's still legal as it never was....
J
>> Edited by joust on Thursday 26th June 20:31
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