On Wed, 29 Jun 2011 22:21:29 +0100 "Nigel A. Gunn" <[email protected]> wrote:
> Britain has more CCTV cameras per head of population than anywhere else > in the world. That was actually a bit of nonsense written by one of the far-right tabloids (possibly the Daily Mail). Essentially what some greasy journo did was count up the number of CCTV cameras in about half a mile of the main street of an unpleasant part of London - that includes the privately-run ones on all the bookies, off-licences, pubs, brothels etc - and multiplied by the total length of roads in the UK. By that logic, every surfaced road would have a camera every 25 feet - the farm track to my house would have four! This is plainly not the case. > Britains airports and military establishments are crawling with armed > police and military security staff. As long as the copper on the street I would expect military establishments to have military security staff. I've only very rarely seen armed police at any of the airports here. You saw what happened to the last person who (allegedly) tried to attack an airport in Scotland... Although why anyone would attempt to attack the one building in the surrounding hundred-mile radius with extensive CCTV coverage, an advanced fire-suppression system and some armed police nearby is beyond me - did they not think this through? > here keeps his weapon in it's holster then it's no threat. > I can't think of anywhere in my city that had security staff or metal > detectors. > > Britain already isn't far behidg the US. Well, you don't get stopped by seven police cars because someone's computer has a typo in your registration number, that's for sure. I have had problems with the police thinking my car is an illegal taxi. It's a big silver Citroën, the fact that it's a classic doesn't seem to register with them. They just see a silver Citroën, Skoda or Lexus and think "it's a taxi!", especially if it's got a VHF whip on top. That hasn't happened for a couple of years, so presumably they've learned to tell the difference now. I *did* have a problem with the vehicle licensing - and this relates back to Clint's problem - with them trying to send me parking tickets and congestion charge tickets for my "black BMW X5", down in London. Odd that, they had the registration right but CGA 78X is a white Citroën CX Break and parked outside my house, not a black BMW X5. I guess someone's decided to make a copy of my plates. The fun bit came when they insisted on sending me a tax disc for a black BMW X5 and despite actually showing up at their offices with the damn car refusing to believe that I didn't own a BMW. Ah, bureaucrats. Can't live with 'em, too much paperwork if you shoot 'em... Gordon MM0YEQ _______________________________________________ Sent via [email protected]. Opinions expressed are those of the author. Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb
