Feeding the birds, blackberry foraging and picking up stones are among daily activities prohibited by town halls accused of ‘abusing’ sweeping powers.
A report has found that Public Spaces Protection Orders (PSPOs) – initially designed to tackle serious anti-social behaviour – are being used to ‘criminalise’ a broad spectrum of daily activities.
They also include ‘intentionally shouting or screaming’, ‘catcalling, staring or leering’, standing around in groups and busking.
Among the weirder ‘Orwellian’ restrictions was one against feeding birds.
Thirteen councils said they had PSPOs in force curbing this everyday activity – a restriction that led to a woman being arrested and fined £100 under a PSPO for feeding pigeons in Harrow, north London, in January.
In Bury, 17-year-old Charlie Wilson – a Britain’s Got Talent contestant – was handcuffed by police last year for busking while using amplified equipment under a PSPO, despite members of the public gathering to watch and enjoy his performance.
Eight people were punished under a PSPO in Leicester, including a socialist political activist in her seventies who was demonstrating against council cuts. The fine was eventually revoked by Leicester City Council.
According to the report, picking up stones is banned in an area of Torbay, Devon, while picking up stones, soil or turf is prohibited in areas of Richmond Upon Thames and Rugby.
Foraging for blackberries would be an ‘offence’ in areas of Harrow, Richmond upon Thames and Rugby.
Meanwhile, sleeping in public is prohibited by PSPOs across the entire Rother district, East Sussex, with four other councils found to have effectively banned sleeping or rough sleeping.
A curfew for under-16s at 11 pm – and under-14s at 9 pm – has been introduced by Burnley, while wild swimming is prohibited across the whole of North Lincolnshire under a PSPO, according to the report.
Enfield London Borough Council prohibits ‘catcalling (e.g., whistling, making sexual comments), staring or leering’ while Guildford Borough Council has banned ‘intentionally shouting or screaming’.
Gosport Borough Council has prohibited sitting or loitering ‘in a manner causing or likely to cause harassment, alarm, distress, nuisance or annoyance to any person’, while Lancaster City Council bans groups of two or more from allowing ‘their actions to cause annoyance’ to anyone nearby.
The study by the Campaign for Freedom in Everyday Life, which campaigns against draconian regulations, found that the use of PSPOs has ballooned.
Soon, relaxing in a park will leave people stressed out, just in case they do something that they shouldn’t.
They say that pigeons are germ-riddled and that they harbour diseases. This is somewhat true, but excessive. Wild pigeons can carry pathogens such as Salmonella or fungi such as Histoplasma; however, transmission to humans is rare and usually linked to intimate contact with large amounts of droppings, not everyday presence in parks – you’re probably more likely to get something nasty from bird droppings from pigeons that have pooped on your car.
Indeed, pigeons aren’t the cleanest of our feathered companions, but it would be exaggerated to say that they pose a serious hazard to human health.
THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO 