Thick as thieves

Living within 20 miles of a container port we have hideous problems with metal theft. They even steal small bits of flashing from houses :roll:

As it's almost free to ship a container back to China from here, I'm pretty sure that a fair bit never even touches the hands of scrap dealers here any more.

We had a spate of lowlifes knicking the manhole and drain covers round here. One of the primary schools was broken into and the copper stolen flooded the school and it was out of operation for a good while.

Walking down the hill into Keighley ("Keefla") yesterday I noticed some abandoned council houses where some of the "windows" hadn't been boarded up, namely these innovative skylight features that were edged around the chimneys- yes somebody had nicked the lead flashing.
When I mentioned it to my mum she said that her friend had stayed at home from work a few days before and found somebody on the roof of her house, whom she scared away.
Every month now I get delayed either going to or coming from work because somebody has nicked the copper wiring from the railway line. It's probably quite easy to do because the last train is at halfpast eleven and even if they take the 25,000V line they won't get zapped providing they just take the earth/ return cable which I notice is at ground level and already cut into handy 2 yd lengths. It's worse in May-June which co-insides with a certain horse fair nearby.
I've got a zero tolerance attitude for law and order so when I hear of thieves been electrocuted or blown up when they steal a gas pipe I feel a bit relieved.
Sorry to rant on about this a bit but last week I was reading about it in the paper in the pub with some bright-eyed-bushy tailed naive friends who didn't get what the problem was. They thought it was a victimless crime- even though one of them is an electrical engineer- and it had never occurred to them that these vermin are endangering the public when they steal gas pipes or wiring.

yagamuffin":18rfcjnh said:

Rob Atkin":18rfcjnh said:

Bullpup":18rfcjnh said:

highlandsflyer":18rfcjnh said:

A couple of places I take my dogs have been littered with pieces of electric motors, etc. I have seen the guys working out of the back of a transit full of rusty old bits and pieces. These disregarded pieces are often sharp and will take decades to break down.

No idea what the answer is, but I suppose it is going to involve a lot more tax payer pounds to solve.

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No not really just regulate the Scrap business. In fact it must be the only business that isn't.

Put a positive obligation on keeping records. All transactions must be accompanied by a copy of a drivers licence and a valid utilities receipt.

Ist offence £5k fine, 2nd £10k, 3rd £50k plus jail time. In fact fines are probably 2 low - who ever heard of a poor scrappy?

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It is regulated, I know this. ;-)

Soon there will be the need to assess whether an operator has been convicted of handling stolen scrap when determining whether they should get a permit/keep their permit.

The problem is the burden of proof. It's practically impossible to prove that someone has got stolen property they are trying to weigh in as nothing has distinguishing marks etc. Stolen cars are quite easy to trace, obviously, as is some industrial cabling but everything else is nigh impossible.

Extra regulation won't help at all, but extra resources for the Police to work in this area will.

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Surely just forcing scrap dealers to check for and record the identity of anyone who sells to them would go along way.

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They already have to do this, regulation is already there.

A few weeks ago when I was riding home from work, I was passed by plod vans and cars all with blues and twos on. Nothing much happens in Malvern so this was a bit unusual.

Turns out they'd nabbed a gang of eastern europeans who'd been nicking and processing dodgy scrap, and I'd witnessed the mop up operation after the raid.

.

Bullpup":1ocxqagx said:

highlandsflyer":1ocxqagx said:

A couple of places I take my dogs have been littered with pieces of electric motors, etc. I have seen the guys working out of the back of a transit full of rusty old bits and pieces. These disregarded pieces are often sharp and will take decades to break down.

No idea what the answer is, but I suppose it is going to involve a lot more tax payer pounds to solve.

Click to expand...

No not really just regulate the Scrap business. In fact it must be the only business that isn't.

Put a positive obligation on keeping records. All transactions must be accompanied by a copy of a drivers licence and a valid utilities receipt.

Ist offence £5k fine, 2nd £10k, 3rd £50k plus jail time. In fact fines are probably 2 low - who ever heard of a poor scrappy?

Click to expand...

Having worked recovering BT exhange cables we often got stopped by pikeys trying to blagg it off us. The tools are already in place to stop scrappies most have been warned if they are caught with stolen metal then they will run the risk of having their SEPA or equlivlent licence removed.

My company has also had street cabinets targeted badly up here for battery theft in certain areas so a couple of weeks ago someone along with the police and other intereested parties went round scrappies looking for them. As they got there Transit van getting unloaded with the same type of batteries that being robbed. not only that the stupid junkies were made turn out their pockets which were full of ID lables proving they belonged to my company.