Just to say from me if anyone of my friends on this site are involved in any of the riots in London, or
indeed any of the other cities.

It is disgusting and my thoughts are with you.

Stay strong us Brits will come through this.



ROSE x

Yes Rose, I agree, seeing all this on the television is absolutely terrible you just wonder what the world is coming to these days, one thing after another.

Julia x

PS Sorry to hear Rose that you are having trouble getting hold of your rheumy nurse, you really don t need all the anxiety when you are in this position. When I was pulling my hair out as I couldn t get hold of anyone and GP wasn t getting very far either will any response from the hospital , I paid to see my consultant privately and got things moving with the first anti-tnf its not right but when you re desperate .....

I had a scary journey home from Southampton last night.

As our train left Leamington the guard (as that's what they are, not whatever they're calling them this week!) announced there were problems in Brum, I'd been keeping tabs on twitter since I left Reading on the problems. and our own Helly helped me find out beforehand about the lockdown at New Street. A young man who was across the aisle from me, who had got on at Oxford with a bit of an aggressive attitude turned to me ashen faced and asked what was happening. The poor chap literally turned into a boy before my eyes "what am I going to do" he asked. I let him use my mobile so he could phone his parents to meet him at one of the suburban stations instead of New Street.

All exits from New St Station locked down except the glass doors. no taxi's being allowed into the city, no buses either. Station unusually deserted for time of day apart from the noticeably visible police presence. Eventually I caught train to Kings Norton, and I couldn't get a taxi home from there either, streets eerily quiet. had to wait for a bus then a long walk from the nearest stop back home, streets here too were eerily quiet, and I headed home as quick as I could.


it's terrible what is going on, but I'd hate to think that all young people get tarred with the same brush as this tiny minority causing this devastation.


my thoughts are with everyone, no matter where they are, that they stay safe!!

Jo. xx

Thinking of all of you who may be in the affected areas.

I live in Telford in Shropshire and we have heard that there is a pre-planned English Defence League protest happening on Saturday just up the road from where I live. Our local council tried to get it banned but the Police said they would allow it. Even before this happened we were wondering if this might cause trouble and now we are wondering if the Police may now be regretting their decision. Now we are all scared stiff that something might erupt. We have heard rumours that 600 people from another area hundreds of miles away are planning to turn up. I just hope it is rumours.

Jackie
xx

Jackie

Your demonstration may get postponed as I here there are more demos tonight - ugh

Anne

You reference to the NHS / RA etc. I quite agree

sad times, my sons girlfriend works in a shop in town and they had a gang trying it on when they were closing the shop last night, she was scared out of her wits,i live in lowestoft and its not the kind of place to expect this but as said its getting a grip thankfully she got home at speed i imagine,take care all.

I find it hard to comment on the "Disorder", not least because as a Special Constable for the Metropolitan Police we are told throughout our training at Hendon that we should not tell people what we do in our spare time - as it just results in lots of awkward questions about dodgy divorces and neighbours who insist on parking across your driveway etc - but I think today is as good a day as any to lift off my mask so to speak (topical?)

I left work here at NRAS last night and went straight to my Borough where I found that I could not get in to the locker room for bodies, there were 25 Special Constables out of a total of 70 that are currently operational on our Borough at any one time. We worked a night shift with the operational team on duty offering high visibility patrols all over the Borough, concentrating on each and every high street and shopping arcade on and near to us. At times there seemed to be more officers on the streets than pedestrians - however, the continuation of this operational plan for the rest of the week should, you would hope, change the atmosphere somewhat. The extra measures that are now in place across London to give police additional powers make a huge difference on the ground. I stopped one young lad on a bike and searched him at about 11.30pm only to be told I was the 9th officer to do so – to which I replied “why don’t you go home then before you get around the corner and meet the 10th?”

Anyway, I’m waffling, but I just wanted to speak up for the wider policing community and let you know that we are all working to the very best of our abilities, in whatever small way that we can, to help resolve this situation. I’m leaving here at 5.30 and reporting for duty at 7pm again tonight for starters......

I think everyone here will commend you on what must be a very difficult and frustrating role , and also a very rewarding one .. knowing that your presence has averted more of this outrageous criminal behaviour.( because that's what it is !).

Even here in Gravesend , we saw shops and offices close at 3.30pm in the town centre and a huge Police presence , which is the reason why there were only 5 arrests apparently .

Again Thanks for being part of this .:)

Rich

I fully appreciate what the police are having to do.
I sometimes wonder if we were still in the dark ages, without television, internet, Facebook etc, would there have been so many copycat riotings and lootings? I think not.
Did you see the father of one of the young men killed in the hit and run incident? He was marvellous, and he told a crowd to stop it right now and grow up.

It must be so scary to be where it's happening, may you all have a ring of safety round you.