It’s worse than I thought. Look what else Alice Springs Town Council members voted for last night:
Proposed Alice Springs by-laws would allow rangers to take homeless people’s blankets away from them, an Alice Springs alderman says.
Somebody buy these people a heart, stat.
That email address, again – Aldermen@astc.nt.gov.au. (It’s important to title your email as an official response to the proposed Public Places By-Laws and request a receipt from Council.)
Seriously, that’s going from sadly believable bureaucratic bastardry to cartoonish super-villainy. I dread to think what else they passed. Perhaps council officers will also be required to kick the poor in the face before they leave? Oh, hell, I’ve just given them another idea.
Moved On 
I think one should live there before one comments on what laws are appropriate. I have and its not a very nice place due to the itinerant population….drinking…humgugging…..fights……
Not saying that this stuff doesn’t happen anywhere else but…..just live there for 6 months and you will know what I am talking about. It’s hard to articulate the reality.
yeah..lets articulate the reality…altogether now “‘stralia is the lucky country…”..how’s about that cemil? will that do? or maybe..”mutual obligation”..better? like that one?…jeez…2009…”something should be done”.
They are heartless bastards. How is takeing a persons blanket going to solve anything.
cemil, I’m not denying that there may well be a problem.
Further punishing the victims of it is unlikely to solve anything, however.
What planet are these tossers on? Fining someone for begging? Oh yeah, that’ll work a treat.
J honey are you making this up?
well they’ve rung my mobile (from my email signature) and they are emaling me back and they are pleading that they are only trying to help. they are truely pathetic, and there is no justification for what they are doing.
none whatsoever.
Ah – Eric! You’re the person they think I’m in cahoots with because your email was very similar to mine.
Miss P – I wish!
yes of course, and we are in cahoots on this one for sure. i did edit you a bit, i think mine was a little harder..shall we say. however they remain d..ckheads of the highest order. the one that rang me really didn’t like my line about trying to explain it to his grandchildren.
Maybe I should’ve given them my phone number.
well i don’t mind..they are elected officials, i’m a citizen (not a consumer) … they should be used to people ranting at ’em..but they are clearly not used to it at all….the green emailed to say thanks.
they are saying they are “helping the most vulnerable in society”..and that “the elders want us to do it….” you know…the usual bollocks.
i have simply said that there is no justification, none whatsoever.
This govenment is elected by its people, it is its people. It needs to give its people hope no matter how hard or inconvient that proves to be. The too hard basket is no longer an option, the benefits of getting the best out of your people beats the easy road they are choosing to take.
Show some faith for the long term and stop these short term unsustainable measures proposed. Kicking the can down the road and not dealing with it is not the answer. You must now deal in a sustainable matter by investing in your people (jobs, training, education, healthcare and hope) for the long term and see it through. Your towns future depends on you.
Have courage to give hope and dont give in to hopelessness, if your worth your salt.
So when they get in touch and say they’re only trying to help, did you ask them specifically how these measures are helping?
I guess this measure would ‘help’ in that after failing to pay a fine or three that person may be imprisoned. Problem fixed?
from one of them..Liz Martin: “They have more choices in this town than they would have in any other of equivelant size in Australia should they choose to better their lives”…so yup…penalising them and taking away their blankets is a sure fire way to get ’em “bettering” their lives.
Yes, she cut and paste that one to me, too.
One of the others suggested it was about protecting the vulnerable from “humbugging”. How? The humbugging isn’t beggars sitting on street corners with a sign; it takes place in people’s homes. And it’s already a crime.
Ah, the old ‘choice’ argument. Tres choice Neo-con freemarketeers are always pulling this one and London to a brick folks, Alice Springs Town Council is verily stacked with neo-con freemarketeers.
The argument goes something along the lines of everybody having a ‘choice’ not to beg, not to be unemployed, not to be poor, hell, they could’a even chosen not to be born Aboriginal or to live in Alice Springs. We are simply ‘choosing’ to take their only source of comfort and warmth away. Ain’t choice grand!
(Can we not just shoot the fuckers? It would save so much time.)
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Thanks Erik….seeing as you are the savious of Alice I ook forward to your plans…
But you may have to live there first….I can recommend a good real estate agency.
well they are still emailing me…now apparently it is my responsibility to offer them solutions..i would argue that as elected officials it is actually their responsibility to do their own research…
and the “you have to live there” argument is simply pathetic….pathetic cemil. i do not have to live anywhere particular to know the difference between right and wrong. And as i have said to you before..i know alice well..not that that has anything to do with anything.
elected officials in an Australian government behaving like Nazis should be attacked from far and wide, they bring the entire country into disrepute and they need to be told.
Fuck me I leave town for two weeks and the useless bunch of monkey’s at the council go from being generally ineffectual to being downright inhumane.
Long term resident of Alice here (30 years), work with the mentally ill. There is an extreme lack of housing for my clients so they sleep rough, in near freezing conditions. I fear should this toilet paper pass into law that they will be greatly effected.
Bylaw 58 also has me worried – I gather it refers to the public display of pornography (hardly a problem) but has me concerned should one or our local religious wackaloons ever become a ranger and confiscate my copy of The God Delusion 🙂