Poppy Ban in West Midlands

[Spotting Bad Guys]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/west_midlands/3953729.stm


Somehow they can cope in the Royal Albert Hall.....'health and safety' rules again:yuk:


SBG:*

[Big Cat Handler]

So the problem isn't the poppies, it the workers up in the rafters dropping them? Theatres have been dropping things from the flyers for years - surely designing something to release the poppies without having anyone up there can't be that difficult!

[Richae]

You're not taking this seriously enough. You can get a nasty paper cut from a poppy. Sharp little buggers those poppies. And what about safety glasses for the audience in case one of them catches them in the eye on the way down! :8

[althenick]

Quote from article ...

The issue arose after fire inspectors said they were unhappy with the way in which the poppies were distributed from the roof space of the town hall.

Fire inspectors???? - I think they're just having a poke at the armed services for doing thier jobs while they were on strike ;)

[Snakecharmer]

In HMFC it would have been so easy... get the Security inspectors in - you could always rely on them to come up with the opposite recommendation to the firemen! As I recall, the Fire Jobsworths would come round annually, telling us how all these entrances etc needed to be easily openable and not lockable; the following week, the Security Jobsworths would come round telling us that everything had to be as locked as a locked thing in locked land... how I loved that trivia!

[Bo Nalls]

Just heard on the news that the poppies can be dropped...

...as long as there is a fire tender sat in the carpark!!!

Hmmm, why not get the fire crews more involved - as they say it's too dangerous to be in the rafters - why not let them go up and drop the poppies :O

[handysnaks]

Just to dampen all this a wee bit. The reason the fire inspectors were concerned (according to reports on the local tv) is, that to release the poppies the 'releasers' have to crawl into a small roof space between the exterior and interior wall/roof/ceiling. The fire inspectors feel that in the unlikely event of a fire there would be very little chance of escape for those individuals.

However, when did the dropping of poppies in the Royal Albert Hall manner become a necessity rather than just a nice touch?

[Scud-U-Like]

Quite. It is a bit of a non-story. If the thread title had been, "Council Workers Die in Poppy Drop Inferno", I suspect most of the posts on here (after the predictable, "Very sad, but what has this got to do with military aviation?") would have gone something like,"Why the hell were they allowed to go up there in the first place? Has H&S bypassed the Brummies?" .

[Stupid Boy]

Allow me to get of the fence here, but isn't the West Midlands an area which has a high population of non-British, non ex military personnel? What if we asked for one of their festivals or acts of rememberance to be cancelled because of the same concerns? Political correctness disguised as safety concerns I think. Surprised the Albert Hall had not gone up in flames yet.........:mad:

[handysnaks]

Stupid boy, I take it that the fence you are getting off is erected on some far flung planet. The Service of Remembrance is not being cancelled, in fact I believe the poppy drop is not being cancelled, it is just being carried out in a different manner. This is nothing to do with political correctness, thus your point, like your post, is irrelevant!:rolleyes:

[Eagle 270]

Handy, I think SB had a sort of relevant point actually. As much as we hate to agree that sometimes our history is being eroded due to a new 'openness' of multi cultural ideas. I.e. not being racist!! (That word, I know).
A catchall to incriminate anyone who doesn’t agree to allow their own values and background to be flushed down the drain at the expense of a vote winning ideal.

When will Britain stop being embarrassed or ashamed of its rich history? A history, BTW that has encouraged half the planet to drag its bottom out of the dark ages and allow it too, to have a voice.

I’m off to raise the Union Flag outside Eagle towers and by God, be proud of it!!

[BlueWolf]

Health and Safety has been hijacked (worldwide, not just in Britain) as the new vehicle by which anal-retentive control freaks impose their twisted obsessions on the rest of us. Time was, they resided mostly within various religious organisations, local Government, political parties of a certain persuasion, and a number of pressure groups wanting peace, veganism, and cetacean rights. Now they have a mania expression forum with statutory authority!

Why not just hang the poppies in a net, if it's too dangerous to go up in the roof space?:confused:

[Scud-U-Like]

Health and safety has been hijacked by curmudgeons, trying to make mischief out of best practice. (Introducing racial arguments into a subject where they are completely irrelevant is even more telling.) If you care to read the thread properly, it appears the drop is going ahead.

I for one am glad we're a bit more aversed to taking unecessary risks with people's lives and health than we once were . Perhaps those who scoff at H&S would rather we returned to 'the good old days' of widespread industrial diseases and accidents.

[WE Branch Fanatic]

The trouble is the crying wolf syndrome - health and safety gets trivialised by all the over zealous nonsense, then when there are real safety issues they get ignored.........

[Stupid Boy]

Handysnaks, I did not say that our festival or our poppy drop had been cancelled. Thank you for the patronising reply anyway :ok:

[volrider]

Why is it assumed that the Day of Rememberance is for British people Stupid Boy? Surely it is to remember all who have fell in conflict? Did this country in WW2 not have support from non-white and non- british combatants?? or are they excluded ? Does a persons religion make their efforts and lives worth any less??
I fail to see where your coming from:hmm:

[Cambridge Crash]

Last year my 5 year old lad went off to school wearing a poppy. It was removed by a teacher 'on safety grounds' because of sharp pin (it was a small safety pin!). I spoke with the teacher and I conceded that the safety pin could have been a dangerous weapon in my son's hands. However, it transpired that the teacher had a hazy idea about the origins and purpose of the symbol, and express disquiet about 'rasing money for old men to sit in smoky clubs drinking cheap beer', and although the teacher accepted that these 'old men' were returned serviceman, that was the limit of understanding. I passed the teacher some material from Combat Stress, which outlines more contemporary cases. The teacher was appreciative of this and had 'forgotten' that UK plc had sent large numbers of troops to the Balkans in the 1990s, which inter alia had generated a need for support for troops and their families.

I suppose that the purpose of my ravings is to highlight the lack of understanding of the place of the armed services in the community. There is a lacuna of understanding and some deep prejudices about those who serve; the mawkish behaviour of those surrounding Ken Bigley's family is declamatory of this - what about the 60-odd British troops who have died in Iraq in service of the Crown, rather than an ad eundum statum gentleman of questionable virtue in pursuit of money?

[handysnaks]

Stupid boy
Allow me to get of the fence here, but isn't the West Midlands an area which has a high population of non-British, non ex military personnel?

That is correct, you did not say that Remembrance Day had been cancelled. However you did write

What if we asked for one of their festivals or acts of rememberance to be cancelled because of the same concerns?

So I think it was fair to point out that the Service had not been cancelled (only changed). I am assuming that you would intend a like for like approach to cancelling /changing festivals of various cultural groups throughout the Isles.

And thanks, I was in a particularly pompous mood and tried to be as patronising as possible, glad you picked up on it;) That was because you suggested the issue was about race ('their festivals') when it was nothing to do with it. By all means have a go at health and safety legislation but don't stir up a race issue where none exists
(Eagle 270, same for you, how have you managed to read a race or cultural issue in all this?)

My original point still remains though. Why is it at all an issue if we drop poppies or not? Surely the main aim is to get as many people as possible to think about the sacrifices made, not to ensure that there is a great stage show:confused:


Handy:p

[Stupid Boy]

Handy, having read the BBC article without the benefit of Stella running through my veins I can see that my post was, how shall I put it, less than objective! I'll get me coat.......:uhoh:

[handysnaks]

SB, No Probs. I like to play the pompous to$$er every now and then
:D

[volrider]

No Probs. I like to play the pompous to$$er every now and then
Hmm not the handysnacks I know then;)

[DC10RealMan]

Just out of interest. I shall be in Ypres on the 11th November which is the anniversary of the end of the Great War, it is a public holiday in Belgium and thousands of people mainly Belgian men, women, and children will come to Flanders Fields to commemerate Men of the British Empire who died decades before most of the visitors were born, in defence of Belgian independence, the Rule of Law and respect for the individual against German militarism. I once asked my French mother-in-law who was in Paris during the occupation by the Nazis in World War 2 about her wearing of a poppy and the sometimes ambiguous attitude of some British people towards rememberance and she simply replied that the reason was that Britain had not been invaded and subjugated by force. Enough said!

[Spotting Bad Guys]

Having spent quite some time in the US, it's interesting to see the real difference in the attitude to those of us in uniform of Joe Public on each side of the pond. It was a little embarassing the first time it happened, but each time I stop off at Wal-mart (or wherever) on my way home from work, still wearing the growbag, it's quite common for random people to come up and want to shake my hand and thank me for "defending them". And when they hear my accent....

Can't quite see the same thing happening in the UK!

Cheers

SBG

[WE Branch Fanatic]

Perhaps its something to do with the stereotypes used to portray service personel in the media? Always idiots, thugs, bullies etc.........

[Zoom]

DC10
Be good enough to point out to your French mother-in-law that Britain has had her fair share of invasion and subjugation by force over the last 2000 years or so, including some notable activity emanating from her homeland in 1066.