How do you get treated by model shops.

His union are officially in favour of child-safety policies and so are the press. And the council are legally obligated to protect themselves from risks of litigation. So what do you think the press are going to do? I suppose they could run a story that plays up the chap as a potential molester and shows the council taking firm action. No harm in that.

No, the incident will be logged in the poor fellow's file, and if he ever does anything like it again, then he'll be heading straight for List 99.

Cheers, Steve

In message , John Turner writes

The lunatics really are running the asylum. The problem is of course that 'we' let them. It is indeed a great pity and we are all to blame for the stupidity from which large numbers of us suffer at the hands of all sorts of crazies their 'committee' decisions and half baked legal advisors.

We are involved in running a preserved line with which is associated a large model railway that is open to the public every weekend and during the holiday periods. We have junior members who hold a junior membership and who actually act as our operators working [once trained] in exactly the same way as the adults. We also have a junior policy that enables us to ensure that our young people work safely and are trained to keep them safe around the large lumps of hot metal that thunder in and out of the platforms with monotonous regularity. We are of course inundated daily by lots of adults of both sexes who lurk everywhere with cameras. We - and our young people, often co-operate with the happy snappers and will happily pose for set pieces involving operator and layout. Compare this with the actions of the mentally challenged petty dictators who ban photographs of the kids taking part in school plays or while on school trips.

Who I wonder is sicker. Those rare people who prey on kids or the hordes of petty dictators who seek to control and oppress.

Cheers.

One would hope that they would highlight the idocy of a lifegaurd being disciplined for saving a child's life.

Absolute bollocks; if it helps may I point out that I work for these people ...

The message from Richard contains these words:

I suspect that if he'd done nothing and the child had drowned, there would have been far worse consequences than an official reprimand. You can almost see the headlines in the Sun: Lifeguard watches child drown!"

IMHO denying the existence of an act just because the words in the title were placed in the wrong order is pedantic.

For the rest I generally agree with you, and the act itself appeared to be one result of the hysteria. Keith

Make friends in the hobby. Visit Garratt photos for the big steam lovers.

But Chris, when you use expressions like "saving a child's life" you are exactly representing the outlook that prompted all the child-safety concerns.

I mean, why not just say "saving a life"?

Just a thought...

Cheers, Steve

...

In this case simply to highlight the idiocy of he entire situation.

I see where you're coming from but I assure you that any pedantry was intended simply to downplay the "Won't somebody think of the children!!!" aspect of the post rather than have a dig at the poster.

"Great minds think alike" or "Fools never differ" ;-)

Well I'm over twice your age but I wouldn't hold that against you. Bet you haven't got a big enough beer gut....or perhaps you like diesels.

Ken.

Don't drink beer (perhaps my big failing!), and like Diesels, Electrics though prefer Steam.

One of the model shops that you mentioned seems to have moved to Pickering on the NYMR, along with the extremely unhelpful staff who seem more content in building scratchbuilt coaches on the counter (must be where he makes his money!!!)

Alan

When visiting several preserved lines in the UK, I have been gratified at the number of members obviously under age 18 who are taking an active part in the full-scale operations. This is to be encouraged, subject of course to health and safety concerns.

With good reason since so many of them are thieving little bastards.

(kim)

No it won't. There will be more people turning 50 next year than last year and more the year after that and they will have more money to spend than any previous generation.

(kim)

"kim" lifted head from the sand and hollered outrageously,

And it's that stuck-in-the-mud attitude that actually causes so many of the problems in today's society. I've taken young kids to one side and explained things to them, then allowed them (supervised, obviously) to partake in the task at hand (everything from model railways to car maintenance), and you'd be amazed at the change in their attitude when you do so. A lot of these kids are from a society where the parent(s) don't take the same degree of care in the child's upbringing as a lot of us were lucky enough to receive ourselves, they have no money to buy the expensive "toys" that WE have forced the prices of ever-upwards in our quest for greater realism, so they see simply taking it as an alternative to purchasing. This is true in almost every area of consumerism, not just toys/models, and a lot of it is a direct result of falling values in society. WE as a country have allowed standards to fall, and simply referring to these kids in that manner won't in itself solve anything - in fact it will probably serve to create an even greater invisible barrier and sense of them-and-us, making the situation worse. We need greater powers of discipline, yes, but it must start in the home and we must take the time to explain to the child why he or she is being disciplined in the first place, today's kids have an even greater capacity for knowledge and the need-to-know than most of us ever had, we just accepted things and "got on with it", now they say "why?".

Badger.

On the subject of kids and how model shops relate to them, there was an article in our weekend newspaper on behavioural changes with kids of today. I'd suggest that most enthusiasts now aged in their fifties that are the big consumers of model railway products (buying the stuff they couldn't afford as kids in the 1950's and '60's) were brought up in the traditional two-parent family where Dad went out to work and Mum stayed home - AND was home when the kids came home from school.

Its different now, - many kids of today are from second generation situations where both parents work, so the concept of having been brought up with some form of external child care until a parent finishes work is now considered the norm, rather than the exception. In addition, the percentage of children brought up in a single parent situation is far higher than it was forty or fifty years ago. The newspaper article highlighted that today's kids have different values and ideals, as there is rarely the two-parent traditional family atmosphere, where the parents, rather than child care workers provide most of the role modelling.

I do agree with Badger that most kids do respond when treated properly and are given the opportunity to learn and participate.

Back to the hobby shop thread, my problem with our four local model railway retailers is this:-

Shop 1 removes every loco from its packaging and places them inside its display shelves, so you are getting an ex shop soiled display model, not a brand new item.

Shop 2 is located some distance away and whenever I visit, it is temporarily closed with a sign "back in ten minutes" stuck to the door. What does that mean - has the guy been away for 8 or 9 and is due back any tick or the clock, or have I missed him by 30 seconds and have to wait 9 and a half minutes. Go and have a coffee (the shop is in a shopping centre) and come back in 20. The place is still closed with sticker on the door.

Shop 3 has price tags saying xxxx Nett. What does Nett mean? Is the Government's tax to be added, - is it what he will sell it to me for? Does it mean they won't give a discount to members of the local model railway club like their competitors do?

Shop 4 has very poor lighting and display cases that go from floor to eye level height. I'm damned if I am going to grovel on my hands and knees with a torch to check the number on a loco to see if it is one I could be tempted to buy.

Far easier to fire off an Email to someone like Hattons or Rails of Sheffield and wait a couple of days for it to arrive in the mail, even though I'm not a UK resident.

Price rises have nothing to do with it. Model railways went out of fashion with kids in the 1960's when there was massive overproduction and price cutting all around. They simply weren't interested.

(kim)

I've never been treated by a model shop, I've always had to pay. :-(

-- Cheers Roger T.

Home of the Great Eastern Railway

Yes, but some of the ones that might well like to become interested can't, due to the prices! Badger.