This is what England’s class system looks like in real life.
This is a private patio where people like to sit in the summer and enjoy a barbecue. Yes, literally.
But these are ordinary people without any clout. Lower class.
(This includes people like me too, yes, in England.)
Unable to get any support with this from Portsmouth City Council – including Gerald Vernon-Jackson, the Lib Dem city council leader – I eventually demolished the mattresses myself. Mattresses out in the open not only are an eyesore, they can get really moldy and smelly.
As it had become sheer impossible for me to do much high-end work, tackling the rubbish hands-on gave me something to do, too.
In case you still wonder, yes, Gerald Vernon-Jackson was fully aware of this.
I provided him with copies of photos and with copies of letters sent to Grant Murphy by recorded postal mail or special delivery.
I enquired here and there how much it would cost to get the fridges removed, but I couldn’t afford it, certainly not right away. (A hilarious fairly standard response to “I don’t have the money” is “no problem”. 😂)
Next, I ordered a bunch of signs and stickers in an attempt to put a stop to the rubbish dumping. (It’s helped.) I also put a webcam in my office window. Below are screenshots of some of my order confirmations.
The rubbish dumping was actually started by Grant Murphy’s people after the police interfered when there was illegal drugs activity in one of the front three dwellings.
Once you dump rubbish, it encourages others to do the same. Everybody knows that.
I had been trying to address this for many years. I repeatedly had offered to help Grant Murphy’s people with this, too. To no avail.
See also
and
https://angelinasouren.com/2023/04/30/my-battle-with-the-establishment-in-portsmouth/
This latter post has more photos of dumped rubbish as well as a screenshot of a communication with Hampshire Fire & Rescue.
[…] Possibly, rubbish dumping might occasionally be started deliberately too and even encouraged? I first addressed the illegal rubbish dumps issue in 2015 or 2016, got rid of some of the mess and then raised the issue with Ms Esther Smith at the real estate developer’s offices. In 2018, Hampshire Fire & Rescue interfered, and cooperated with the owner of adjacent properties to address the problem. In 2020, Hampshire Fire & Rescue asked for landlord details and then contacted the Health and Environmental dept at Portsmouth City Council. PCC did not follow up, however, and once again, I started tackling the issue myself. I purchased signs, got rid of part of the rubbish, and the PCC bin men who weren’t happy with the mess either apparently had some dumped furniture removed from the adjacent patio. There are three to five illegal dump sites, three of which are on tenants’ patio areas. By far the biggest is the responsibility of this particular real estate developer. It was started after the police apparently interfered in drugs-related activities that were taking place in the front building. Copies of photos and emails were also forwarded to the real estate developer as well as to the City Council leader, including hand-delivered to his home address to avoid possible interference at the Civic Offices, with certainly no response from the city council leader whatsoever. This concerned a lot more material than what you see in the images below. See also this post. […]