Sorry, I need to vent. Second home owners!

[Querlouse]

I live in a small village in a quiet farming area. One of the old cottages was bought by a family from London about 18 months ago, they spent a long time getting planning permission but have now started works.

They are coming down and meeting mates there every weekend. Yesterday I walked past (footpath runs alongside house) and there were two massive flashy Landrovers not really relevant cars outside and three blokes, at least two women and four kids all hanging out in the big garden. The house is currently uninhabitable so they aren't staying there permanently.

Dh says just forget about it but its really annoying me! Our village is generally really old and we've had no cases of cv so far.

It's not OK to drive 3 hours from London to a village then meet mates is it??

"Shame for 70 year old neighbour next door who hasn't been out in 7 weeks though. Which actually has always been the point."

Omg...pop yourself over to the shopping thread, everyone is criticising an op for saying 70 year olds shouldn't be out...because the majority of them are out!!!

Tabby have you actually been to snowdon? Even on the more remote climbing routes you are never alone

They run a shuttle bus from bigger car parks lower down the valley because the nearest car parks overflow?

One place to stay away from then! Was this village the Londoners dared visit at the foot of Snowdon?

The op doesn’t like Londoners who travel in big cars and have second homes!

No, Mumsnet doesn't like POSTERS who come across as not liking Londoners who travel in big cars and have second homes.

And have tied themselves up in knots to justify a bunch of entitled wankers repeatedly driving into the country and ignoring lockdown.

In addition, the nuances in her post smack of envy.
They would rather hone in on the 'nuances' of her post than the plain fact of twats ignoring lockdown. Peak bloody Mumsnet.

So crack on. It's fine. @ BubblesBuddy why do you bother observing the lockdown even?

Omg...pop yourself over to the shopping thread, everyone is criticising an op for saying 70 year olds shouldn't be out...because the majority of them are out!!!

I'm referring to the 70 year old in this actual thread

And I don't think you should confuse what you read on MN with err actual fact. Excuse me while I bat the swarming herds of pensioners from my door.

Was this village the Londoners dared visit at the foot of Snowdon?

Give over @BubblesBuddy . Dared to visit . Boring.

"No, Mumsnet doesn't like POSTERS who come across as not liking Londoners who travel in big cars and have second homes."

Mumsnet is not a person. Thousands of people post on mumsnet, all with different opinions.
Noone is trying themselves up in knots at all. All just taking part in a thread and putting different opinions across.

"And I don't think you should confuse what you read on MN with err actual fact. Excuse me while I bat the swarming herds of pensioners from my door."

Neither should you. We all take on board what we read on here. But where you have a thread with 90 percent of the posters saying they've all been popping out to the shops very regularly to buy one or two items, you can likely believe most of them.

Read the thread Tabbs.

Apply the critical thinking.

Some of my best friends are London-based owners of Land Rovers and second homes, but what the OP says is happening here is not right. I can understand the concern about travel to a rural population with elderly residents by people from distant cities with high cases of the virus. A one off visit, I would probably ignore, more than that I would report and let the local police have a quiet word. As Prof Ferguson has just discovered, the law and government guidance applies to us all, even to those who think it doesn't and even to hypocrites.

I do observe it because I’m well behaved! The fact that half of those around me are not has greatly surprised me. At the moment, compliance is ok but that doesn’t mean I cannot question it. You seem to think questioning something is the same as disobeying it. It’s not. Healthy debate about the state, laws and how we are expected to live is just fine. It’s not necessary to agree with each other. I have my own footpaths, woods, fields and amazing views! I totally get that I’m lucky. Urban people don’t have this. I can understand them wanting to escape.

sleepingpup

"Read the thread Tabbs.

Apply the critical thinking."

Sleeping pup...you too. I've just reread the thread to find this 70 year old that you say lives next door....cant find a mention of it but I did find a very interesting paragraph where the op admits the family who have bought the house has said they are moving there permanently and it's not going to be a second home.!!

DD2 has been upset by it all.

Poor dear. Actually everyone has been upset by it, bar perhaps your DD1. It was awful. We went out for a ten minute walk and saw no fewer than three ambulances parked up in the main rod attending people in the local flats.

But hey. All the more reason to argue that people with second homes, and presumably even London gardens should be able to restrictions. After all it is mainly affecting people like bus drivers, not PLU.

Sorry. Round our way people have been taking lock down very seriously. Because it is so clearly very serious. And the levels of infection that have been floating round in London mean that people who then ignore Government restrictions have a higher probability of passing the infection to parts of the country that are less equipped to cope with it or to people who are more vulnerable.

Out of, genuine, interest. Are your DDs sticking to lock down, or at least the one who was bothered by the constant sirens. Or don't rules apply to them.

I ask because as far as I can see, DD and her student aged friends are even stricter than their parents. Plus, and I think one of your DDs is a medic as well, they are hearing some pretty dreadful stories from friends working in hospitals.

I would say that I want lockdown eased and modified. There are clearly some areas, estate agents showing empty properties where safe working methods can be developed. And it looking as if infection in open space is not as bad as had been feared. I would love to be able to go out for more than an hour a day. But I want it based on the science, I want to ensure that we don't get back into a place where it is spreading in an uncontrolled manner. I want vulnerable people safe, and key workers protected.

Not what some entitled, but ignorant, second homer prats think is OK.

And sleepingpup....we just disagree, there is no need to get nasty. I will not change my mind, and I doubt you will change yours. We all live in different areas and all have a different experience of lockdown. I'm just at the point where I'm questioning what is considered to be absolutely terrible by others. As are many others.

If what these people are doing is OK.. I presume mnetters have no problem with me going off to spend the day with my friends walking on the beach and stopping for a bbq.. Cus we will stay a 2m distance from anyone else and the liklihood of us needing any assistance from nhs or fire brigade is low... Thats OK then isn't it?

I wouldn’t give a shit

Love your response kingjarvis ha ha.

At the moment, compliance is ok but that doesn’t mean I cannot question it.

Question away. It's totally healthy.

But please don't imply that any disagreement is because
"Londoners" are disliked in some sort of ignorant parochial, just because way.

Or that any one who questions you is some sort of Curtain twitching, panicked, iron curtain zealot.

it's a shame you've tagged your questioning of lockdown compliance, to the bunch of entitled plonkers who've been descending on OPs village though.

The OP doesn't like Londoners who travel in big cars and second homes
So the OP doesn't dislike the majority of Londoners. Many of whom have no car nor first home.

Does the OP equally dislike people from elsewhere who have big cars and second homes?

How about rural people who have big cars and second homes in London?

Perhaps they included amongst their number the many rural folk who continued commuting into London after returning from ski trips to infected countries.

It's Londoners and others in large cities who are dying in large numbers (because of the clearly not equipped to cope facilities). Largely as a result of people who did that.

The SUPPOSITION by SOME posters is that OP doesn't like Londoners. She has never said that.
And it is based on 'nuances'. So I wouldn't get worked up about it.

Regardless of what the OP thinks it might help if other posters stopped perpetuating the myths. There's an awful lot of strange (and ignorant) focus on Londoners in this thread.

a) Londoners all have big cars and second homes. Nearly all the people I know with big cars live in the countryside. Many Londoners don't have any car.

b) Only Londoners have second homes. Like I say the housing crisis is most acute in London

c) London is well equipped to cope. The facts speak for themselves

d) It's Londoners. All of it. Everything. They travel everywhere and infect everyone else. Except that it was people from elsewhere who travelled into London infecting Londoners. Who, unlike the countryside, weren't afforded the protection of roadblocks Keeping The Infected Out.

Oh and let's not forget the majority of those who left London to go to the countryside were locals returning home to their families. More of that than a few second home owners.

d) It's Londoners. All of it. Everything. They travel everywhere and infect everyone else. Except that it was people from elsewhere who travelled into London infecting Londoners. Who, unlike the countryside, weren't afforded the protection of roadblocks Keeping The Infected Out

You what? You've lost me. Do you live in London? .

Ha, as far as I can see, Londoners are being blamed for everything.

Problem is most are probably not ‘Londoners’ but people living comfortably in the home countries g&t belt with their large gardens, or in bits of London with Surrey or Herts or Essex post codes.

Lockdown is pretty grim living in a flat or without a garden, but from the recent wave of ambulance sirens it was needed. Yet caravan parks, and indeed some urban parks have been shut.

And on MN, no empathy. Just smugness.

And toffee is right. Where I live 70% of households don’t have cars, and 95% don’t have gardens. Playgrounds are shut.

There are relatively few people out and in the main people are obeying the rules. They are trying to protect their neighbours and the NHS.

The London/car aspect is completely irrelevant, other than to demonstrate that they are not local and have driven a long way to the OP's village to visit the new house and meet friends, possibly numerous times, all in breach of the emergency guidelines we are all meant to abide by during this pandemic. They deserve to be reported, much as it pains me to say it as someone who, under normal circumstances, believes strongly in live and let live. But we are not in normal times and they ABU.

Meanwhile, many less selfish people around the UK and the globe, often living without a garden or even a balcony, and with limited access to shared outside spaces, are still struggling on, all these weeks in, to join our shared effort to save lives and protect the NHS. They are the ones who can hold their heads up high, while the people the OP describes should be ashamed - but they are behaving like 'the entitled' and are possibly incapable of self-critical thought.