Why? Why oh why are people still coming here on holiday?

[Jux]

Devon. We have seen caravans and motorhomes and people obviously on holiday (canoe and suitcases etc on car roof, all that stuff; it's bloody obvious), bikes loaded with camping stuff....

We live 20 miles from the beach and none of us have seen a wave for weeks. DH spends half the day complaining because he can't go to the beach in this lovely weather as he normally does.

Thank goodness the market is not on, or we'd be over-run. Really worried as both dd and I are vulnerable (not extremely vulnerable) and dh freaks out every time he has to go out as our Designated Shopper that he'll bring it home to us.

Why are people such arseholes?

We're going to need road blocks!

but local vigilantes are getting together aiming to let tyres down/slash tyres in nearby roads.

that's absolutely disgusting. I hope these cars have cameras and these idiots will be prosecuted.

Reporting is absolutely fine, but vigilantes are not.

Second home owners overestimate the contribution they make to the local economy. They might occasionally eat in local restaurants and buy the odd coffee but often they arrive with everything they need for their stay.

I don't endorse poor treatment of second home owners by locals but I think the lack or respect cuts both ways.

It defies logic really @SchadenfreudePersonified doesn't it? How has it spread so wildly in an area where all the people are spaced out?? Even in our only city there aren't really high rise tower blocks of flats or anything, we're not exactly all on top of each other

I hadn't realised that your overflow victims had had to be moved to Newcastle (my area) but it doesn't surprise me.

My Dad is one of them

This is probably going to be very outing. I live in the Peak District and at the start of the lockdown we had an influx of tourists, you could hardly move for them, on about the second or third day of this a local farmer went out to feed his sheep and saw some walkers he kindly said there are too many people please go home and they physically attacked him! They were on his land, he had every right to tell them to go home, but they beat him up instead.
The local police have been trying very hard to stop tourists coming into the area but we are still getting loads of them, we are also getting people coming to our local shops because we have stock in and all the other shops they have tried haven't.
This thread really doesn't surprise me at all, the government have even said that our police are being selfish sending people away, but they are serving their community.
There was another case of a woman who drove out here to go for a walk and fell and broke her ankle, this is what we mean when we say stop putting a strain on the NHS, not just how many you may infect with COVID-19 but if you get hurt. Why can't people understand this?

that's absolutely disgusting. I hope these cars have cameras and these idiots will be prosecuted.

Reporting is absolutely fine, but vigilantes are not.

Yes just causing more trouble and work and I don't suppose any visitors know about it until after the damage is done but locals, like us, are unable to take the risk. We live about a 3 minute drive away but can't walk it as DH can't walk far and definitely couldn't manage the hill. We won't risk it as we don't want the car damaged, obviously, but we wouldn't be able to change 4 tyres, we don't have 4 spares, and we wouldn't want to call out recovery people.

I'm in favour of paintballing, preferably with indelible paint! Ihope you make sure you know who you are paintballing. People like you just cause trouble that the police end up dealing with.

I hope you get arrested if you do something so stupid.

Second home owners overestimate the contribution they make to the local economy they absolutely do.

I hope you get arrested if you do something so stupid

Might get arrested but would be a local hero I suspect!

Has everyone forgotten #bekind

Not necessarily @Tonyaster. DM told me that a friend of hers who has lived in the same village in Pembrokeshire for 35 years got shouted at to go back where she came from the other day- she'd just dyed her hair a completely different colour.

Has everyone forgotten #bekind

Personally I hate that passive aggressive hashtag, but the second home owners were not #beingkind when they decided to come here and refuse to stay in London.

DM told me that a friend of hers who has lived in the same village in Pembrokeshire for 35 years got shouted at to go back where she came from the other day- she'd just dyed her hair a completely different colour

Course she did!

Has everyone forgotten #bekind

#bekind seems to primarily be used by people trying to justify generally unacceptable behahaviour

MIL told DH yesterday that Swanage (where she lives) and whole of Purbeck is closed off and Police watching all roads. They're stopping people at the ferry and turning them away if they're not residents.

She is relieved that there won't be any holidaymakers flocking to the beach and stripping the shops of all the food.

I still stand by my previous comment to consider that some people towing caravans may be travellers who need somewhere safe to stay and may have been turned away from many campsites and are afraid. Think first before you condemn all caravan owners as holidaymakers & be kind.

I have to say we seem to have been quite lucky on the south coast. All our holiday parks and hotels are shut, police are patrolling beaches, and all of the touristy places are closed. I haven't noticed any obvious holiday making idiots driving past to the beach. We are three miles from the beach and wouldn't even consider going.

@FrangipaniBlue hope he’s ok.

The police in Cornwall are asking people not to confront people they suspect as holiday makers and only to contact them about it on a specified email address. They have also pointed out that very few of the people who have been reported are on holiday and tang they have been called out to holiday lets that are actually occupied by NHS workers at present (i.e - stop calling bloody 111 and taking up precious time and resources!)

I live in a very touristy area in Cornwall and have honestly not witnessed any of the hoards that I am hearing about on social media!

We went for our hour walk across the beaches yesterday. The tide was out and the beaches are huge. But, if you had taken a photo from the right angle, in a few places, and then cropped it... it could easily have been used as one of the “people flocking to the beach” photos you see in the media lately.

The reality is that people were really spaced out, in family groups, walking not sunbathing.

I was talking to my DM earlier about the vigilante style behaviour. Her theory is that people need to feel in control and that, as they are not at present, they focus on controlling other people so they feel as though they are doing something.

I live in a Lincolnshire seaside town and the locals have seen an influx of unfamiliar faces these past few days too

It amazes me how you all think you know everyone who lives locally. I live in a town where you have to be careful what you say about people because everyone knows everyone else, but I can walk around for weeks and not see a familiar face. It amazes me people are so arrogant that they assume that because they've not seen someone before, they must be a visitor. Unless you live in a hamlet with just a few houses there is zero chance of you knowing every single resident of the settlement you live in.

Might get arrested but would be a local hero I suspect! Like the people who slashed the tyres of a nurse in a holiday let to isolate her from her family? Yes everybody is calling them heroes.

Holiday makers shouldn't be coming but to pick out individuals you don't know is ridiculous. How do you know that woman isn't in that holiday let as she has fled from her violent husband and the women's refuge is full but someone offered her the property? How do you know it isn't an NHS worker who is on the front line but doesn't want to go home to protect their child with cancer or their partner or their parent. You don't do you.

Apart from that do you think tying up police time to sort it out is a good idea?

Chienloup, Why can you not go to a beach near your own home for a walk?

I live in a very touristy area in Cornwall and have honestly not witnessed any of the hoards that I am hearing about on social media

of course you haven't because they are a figment of people's locked down imaginations.

Yes there will be a few idiots, but with no accommodation open and police watching out for caravans and campervans (and I assume, family groups with bikes on the backs of their cars for example) they're not going to get there even if they think they can.

The only people getting there might be those stupidly visiting family in the area.

Which bit don't you believe @Tonyaster?

The Lincolnshire seaside town sounds exactly like my part of London. Resources unable to cope. Six weeks wait for GP, urgent care place (which is not 24 hours as I'm sure some of here think) is around an hour on public transport. Less people drive in London. The nearest hospital does it's best but it's under pressure, partly because of the knife and gang crime injuries they have to deal with.

This is clearly a London bashing thread for some who repeatedly refuse to accept reality. I don't believe they don't ever watch or read the news. They must be aware of the widely reported acute housing crisis in London. The place with the most rough sleepers in the country, where young (and older) people can't afford to rent a home let alone buy. Many many threads over the years from Londoners struggling to afford a home (to rent, forget buying) and almost always they're told to move out of they can't afford it. Yet according to some here they have it good? The double standards and ignorant prejudiced resentment of some here is shocking.

Absolutely I understand you wanting to stay much safer than the cities. But please just be grateful that you were protected, unlike the cities, which is why extra hospitals haven't been built where you are. You don't need them. In the highly unlikely event you did, you'd get some. As for all the money spent on London? That doesn't go to the majority. You can see on the news the amount of deprivation in parts of the city. It has some of the highest levels of deprivation in the whole country. Not arguing for or against no movement between areas in the UK but there can't be double standards. If it's not ok for people to come to Cornwall or Norfolk or Cumbria putting pressure on local housing, nor is it ok for people from these areas to come to cities putting pressure on housing already in acute shortage. There's less people crammed into HMOs and tiny flats in rural areas. If it is ok for people to come to cities than it needs to work both ways.

If it's not ok for people to come to Cornwall or Norfolk or Cumbria putting pressure on local housing, nor is it ok for people from these areas to come to cities putting pressure on housing already in acute shortage

Are there many people who have flats in deprived areas of London as second homes then?

Because they’re selfish.