Police guidelines for officers on what is a reasonable excuse - worth reading

[chomalungma]

www.college.police.uk/What-we-do/COVID-19/Documents/What-constitutes-a-reasonable-excuse.pdf

Interesting reading. Especially with regards to driving for exercise, what exercise is, going shopping and the allottments.

Thanks for posting these - they clarify a great number of misunderstandings. Clearly most people don't want them clarified.

Very interesting. Shame people can’t stick to it.

I’ve just been sat in the garden listening to our neighbour couple (older) singing happy birthday to their grown up daughter who is visiting along with her grown up son. They have visited several times since lockdown began.

Dropping food off -essential.
Sitting in the garden sharing out birthday cake -not essential.

Really helpful thanks op

England only but still, likely to be reasonable includes:

"Buying a small amount of a staple item or necessity (eg, a newspaper, pet food, a loaf of bread or pint of milk)."

"Driving to countryside and walking (where far more time is spent walking than driving). "

"Stopping to rest or to eat lunch while on a long walk. "

"Moving to a friend’s address for several days to allow a ‘cooling-off’ following arguments at home."

Not going to keep a lot of people on MN happy though, as they won't be happy until there's a policeman on every street corner quizzing passers by, or they have their own hotline to snitch on their neighbours who they perceive to be "breaking the law" even though they're not.

Those rules are England only
Not uk wide
There will be other specific guidance in the other home nations

However, a very short period of ‘exercise’ to excuse a long period of inactivity may mean that the person is not engaged in ‘exercise’ but in fact something else.

So no going to the park, sunbathing and then doing 5 minutes of yoga

Why don't they make this public?

Thanks OP, that's very helpful.

I don't understand part of it - can you exercise outside twice a day? Eg. Could I take my toddler on two long daily walks?

Interesting there's nothing about how long you can exercise for.

Clearly far more leeway for a degree of reasonable common sense in the interpretation and implementation of these restrictions than many of the loudest voices on MN have ever deemed possible.

It’s all common sense really isn’t it, unfortunately very few of us still have that!

You’ve only got to look at some of the threads on here to see people can’t think for themselves at this time and want to shame others for buying a milk & bread when they could of eaten dust

Yanbu in the slightest, but good luck getting large swathes on MN to read them, much less understand.

Well this is clear and sensible. They should’ve plastered social media with this from the get go.

@AintOverUntilTheCatLadySings the way I interpret it is if you’re bobbing out on 3 bike rides a day then there’s a chance you’ll be pulled up on it. If you take your kid out for a meander in the park in the morning and go running alone later in the day then it’s a-ok.

There's a chap down our street, we'll call him Pete, and he keeps an itinerary of the people's movements in the houses around him, shaming them publicly if he possibly can.

My Dad is almost 80 and currently has pneumonia so is shielding. I went out last week to take his prescriptions and groceries to him (he lives 30 minutes away - two miles away from his nearest neighbour, my siblings both live abroad - I'm truly the only person able to run around after him), called by with a bag of shopping for a friend who is shielding and then dropped some letters at our postbox from the DC for friends/family. Pete down the road was waiting for me when I arrived him, telling me I'd been gone for more than two hours in total and he was reporting me to the authorities. Our local Facebook community page has a PCSO who pops on every so often - Pete duly reported me to him. I messaged to explain that my travelling about prevented my elderly Dad from having to travel miles by bus for a prescription and a vulnerable single parent from having to take her also-vulnerable DC out for shopping. The PCSO handled it beautifully and put Pete in his place, but how utterly ridiculous that neighbours are being encouraged to tattle on one another like this. I am almost 40 years old and bright enough to know that my going out protects those more vulnerable. I don't do unnecessary trips, I don't have parties or friends visit, I don't do anything that puts anyone at risk. It is madness the way people are behaving and I honestly think it's going to get worse the longer we're in lockdown.

YANBU at all and I agree it’s all common sense. Unfortunately, that seems to be in short supply at the moment in some quarters.

But some MNers will not be happy unless we’re all taking joyless walks along the pavement within 200m of our homes for exercise and eating pencil shavings and dust.

Driving to countryside and walking (where far more time is spent walking than driving)

I’m pleased to see this one clarified. Every couple of days I’ve been driving a short distance, about a mile and a half, to take my dog for a walk to give her some variety from trudging the local pavements. My nearest park is very small and likely to be busy, the place where I’m walking the dog is huge and not at all busy. However comments on here about “unnecessary” car journeys have had me second guessing myself.

^I don't understand part of it - can you exercise outside twice a day? Eg. Could I take my toddler on two long daily walks?

Interesting there's nothing about how long you can exercise for^

Because there are no limits, on time or frequency. You have to decide for yourself what's reasonable.

If you're in an area where you can be in public outside space like woodland, fields, quiet parks (not the play equipment obviously) you can go out more than once and stay out as long as you want to. If you live on the high street and you're dodging people every time you exit your front door, sadly not.

It’s all common sense really isn’t it

Unfortunately common sense isn't that common.

I am also very glad to see these clarifications. The 'reasonable' column covers pretty much most of the mn debates I've been in lately, in which I (and others) have tried to explain that someone taking an energetic dog out for a second secluded walk =/= killing the NHS.

Just because you hear folk in the garden doesn’t mean they are a) less than 2m apart or b) eating cake.

Some folk are just bitter, joyless noseyparkers. I’m so sick of this shit.

So relieved we can drive somewhere to walk - we have done every single possible route round our area, at least twice.

This was posted a couple of days ago on MN but went largely unnoticed and not commented on as this is absolutely not the common sense that a large proportion of the mumsnetter police are willing to acknowledge.
Let's see how many positive comments are posted this time. Not as many as those against the pregnant lady who had the temerity to stop to eat during her exercise I suspect!!
I can now take the dog out twice a day with a clear conscience. Yaay.

Finally we have some common sense coming through about to socially distance ourselves and slow the spread in a way that is sustainable and compatible with the law.

I suspect some on mn will be frsutrated that this doesn't match their own interpretation of 'never leave the house'.

I can now take the dog out twice a day with a clear conscience. Yaay.

Me too. He WILL be happy - he was really struggling on once a day

These are the kind of clear guidelines the government should have issued to the public, imo.

It would have cut down on the noise from those who thought this all gave them the right to judge someone's shopping.

Or worse, the flack given to a poor lady whose homelife was very tough and who was going out for two walks a day, once with her children and once to clear her own head.