…and the damage to fencing is apparent from my photograph, taken this morning. The tenants tell me that the  6 vandals were all of school age, approximately 15years old, hooded as usual to hide their identity and repeatedly kicked the fence until it was broken.

The Police were on the scene within 15 minutes of the resident’s 999 call, but were unfortunately unable to find the culprits.

This morning the grass verges of Litton Road were littered with empty beer bottles and cans. I picked up and brought home the bottles, to avoid the possiblity of the added problem of broken glass; smashing bottles - another mindless activity enjoyed by the vandals.

…. in their indiscriminate spoiling of our heritage. Bath Mill was destroyed by vandals, but now the government is to introduce new rules which will undermine the protection of local conservation areas.

Tens of thousands of listed buildings and large swathes of countryside could be destroyed after two key planks of the planning system were disbanded. The Government is to downgrade protection on old buildings and those in conservation areas in order to “benefit developers” and “reduce the number of applications for planning permission rejected on heritage grounds”.

Yet another example of a desperate government.

…I tend to think that ‘drink is the root of all evil’.

In the early hours of this  morning an awful lot of wanton damage was done on Peafields Estate. There was a parked van fired and burned out, the window of the Community Centre was smashed, a wheeled bin was fired, guttering and downpipes smashed on Senior Citizen bungalows, fences kicked down and flowering shrubs stripped of branches.

According to information I have received, this all took place at around 0100 and this kind of vandalism occurs generally when folks who have no control after a drink, sink into the mindset exhibited by the hordes of marauding Vandals of ancient times.

…have fallen victim to some numbskulls who have kicked and pulled off the heads. The young children from Peafield Infant School who spent such a lot of time planting the bulbs will be very upset to see the damage caused by a mindless group of vandals who have no appreciation for beauty. Those lovely flowers heralded spring and now they are merely empty stalks.

We know that teenagers always say there is nothing for them to do outside of school hours and one of the priorities for the Area Partnership is provision of activities for these disenfranchised kids. I hope that we can help put a stop to the vandalism before the youngsters become a lost cause.

We have had wheeled bins burned out in Whinney Hill Woodland, fencing in the wood ripped up and burned, copper piping stolen from properties and graffiti written on houses. Our Neighbourhood Wardens and Beat Manager are struggling to keep on top of all this mini-crime and there is a lack of reporting of crimes by residents for fear of reprisals. Up to now there have been 26 wheeled bins burned out in the woods and the resultant cost of replacement and clearing of the detritus runs into hundreds of pounds.