Hi all!

I know there are some intelligent posters on here so wanted to see what you thought of this.

On Saturday morning I was working and was on the way to another job when I called in at McDonalds for a coffee to accompany my paper and cigarette before I left, I finished my cigarette outside of my vehicle and stumped it out onto the floor and got back into my vehicle.

Next minute some 18 stone bouncer lookalike stands next to my van and says.

"Do you know why I have come over to you?"

I said "Haven't the foggiest".

He said "He was working for the local council and under section 87 of the Envirnmental Protection Act 1990 you have committed an offence and I'm issuing you will a fixed penalty notice of £75".

I said "Pull the other one, where's your I.D" (He had plain clothes on)

He produced a piece of paper that looked like it was wrapped in cling film.

I said "That's fake, you have no uniform and your telling lies, go away" (A lot harsher words were said at the time)

He said "We can trace you from your registration number on the DVLA database and take you to court". Then wrote down my registration number. It is a company vehicle and I didn't want them getting wind of me being in bother otherwise I would have driven off.

I said "Where is the cig butt?"

He looked around and couldn't find it, I got out of the vehicle and found one so picked it up and put in the vehicle.

I said "There you go, it must have fallen out of my pocket by mistake"

Then I rang my mate who is in the CID for that area and he instructed me that I didn't have to give my name as it is a civil matter and not a criminal matter, I only have to give my details to the Police when asked.

The bouncer/warden then rang the Police who then showed up, as soon as they did I thought I may have him as a fake due to his lack of uniform and amateur I.D.

The Police came and instantly took his side and asked me who I was, what I was doing there, where I'm from and did a search on my name to see if I wanted for anything (never done anything to get into trouble and have no criminal record or had any dealing with the Police).

Then the Police made me give him my details and was issued a fixed penalty notice for £75, reduced to £50 if I pay within 10 days. Even though he got his way I made sure I took up as much of his time and made it as awkward as possible for him.

All in all what do you think I should do? What are your thoughts?

I think it's a case of 'secret police' preying on the average Joe to make money?

What did they say/do to MAKE you give him your details ?

What did he identify himself as and is their a company/address on the fixed penalty notice ?

Was this in the car park of McDonalds or is it a public car park ?



From experience of having clampers camped outside my office on private land for five years or more I can definitely state that whenever the police were called they did not take any sides and simply informed both party's that they were there to observe and make sure a breach of the peace or similar wasn't committed.

1 - The bouncer/clamper/warden told Police I wasn't giving my details, the Police Officer said the guy was legit, the bouncer/warden asked me for my details when the Police officer was there, I said I don't want to give them to him but I'll give them to you (Police). He asked again and the Officer nodded and ushered me to give them.

To be honest I didn't want work finding out a few weeks down the line that its gone past the due date and have them in court and end up in bother due to them finding me via my vehicle registration number as its a rental vehicle out of many rental vehicles in the company so would have taken a while to find me. At the end of the day I had been awkward and maybe a little antagonistic/rude to the bouncer/warden and didn't want some average thug having my name and address after what I had said to him before the police arrived, mainly due to retribution from these kind of people, they probably aren't vetted, trained or audited and shouldn't be dealing with peoples data.

Would this be a breach of the data protection act?

2 - He identified himself as working on behalf of the council.

3 - I'm not sure who owns the car park, it wasn't McDonalds though.

So you littered the pavement and got fined.

What advice are you actually looking for?

The way they dealt with it and the fact they had plain clothes people preying on the public to fund the councils coffers.

Sure, if my dog fouls and I leave it I would expect a fine, f I was driving down the road and threw a coffee cup out of the window I would expect noting less than a fine, however where the bloody hell do you put cig stumps? In a bin and risk setting it on fire? Which I have seen done quite a few times. What then, I get done for arson?

What I would have liked to see was signs up stating that there were officers in the region on the look out for people throwing litter (like you do with wheel clampers) and either designated smoking areas on the car park or ash trays on top of bins in the area.

Do you smoke?

If you do that in Enfield or Waltham Cross you get a fixed penalty, they wear gear that makes them look like security and they carry a small fitted cctv camera.
There's no getting away from it, you litter and you pay the price.

I wish the Enfield consul would enforce it a lot more. I've just been to Enfield and the litter everywhere made it look like a town of landfill

As a dog owner I'm well conditioned now to not leaving the house without a pocket full of plastic bags, I even found one in my suit pocket when at a clients the other day, but there are two habits that I wish would be clamped down on more especially in city centres - spitting and throwing used chewing gum on the floor.

I once was hanging around one of the precincts in Leeds waiting for the females to do whatever the hell it is they do all that time in shops when for no reason at all I started to notice just how many little black circles of trod-in chewing gum there was on the pavements - basically the whole of Leeds city centre is paved with chewing gum and they needn't have bothered with paving slabs because according to the council its takes a special very expensive jet wash with incredible water pressure to shift the stuff once its been trodden in.

Filthy habit - £50 fine straight away and no sympathy.

TBH you are way too precious about your company getting to know you are a litter bug. If it was me I'd have laughed at him and told him to do one when he couldn't point out the butt that you dropped. I think you were daft to search for one and then BS him that it must have fallen from your pocket. The fact that he couldn't point out your fag end meant he had no evidence that you'd left anything. But your clever remark proved you had littered.

Just pay the fine and stop crying.

in the ashtray in your vehicle. its normally located in the main console in front of the gear stick failing that stub it out and throw it in the bin, of which there are normally many in McDonalds car parks. as someone else pointed out, you littered, got caught, pay up

If you were on public property you are bang to rights, if you were on private land then they can go and do one.

Why do arrogant self-centred people like you just assume (as you clearly have, since you didn't spot the problem yourself) that society should deal with your filthy habit and clean up after your polluting arrse has left the building?


Yes, all boxes correctly ticked. Maybe all that is needed is for the penny to drop as to your obnoxious anti-social behaviour.

I'm going to to be as harsh as FA, but I ing (most) hate smokers.

What is wrong with these people, if they're not littering they're standing out side door ways blowing smoke in your face when you leave.

Think you'll find smoking in a company vehicle is illegal now too.

Just to set one point straight, your employer should have no issue with you and this incident, you weren't smoking in the vehicle and the vehicle is just being used as a means of identifying you so unless there is a clause in your contract of employment for non-littering in public places or one that completely bans you from smoking anywhere then they have no complaint and probably wouldn't even have discussed it with you.

What would have happened had you not identified yourself is that eventually your employer would have received a letter informing them that a user of their vehicle was witnessed committing an offence, details of which would have been described, and your employer would be asked to identify the employee on that date.

Exactly the same thing happened to me some years ago when one of my employees was spotted flicking a cigarette out of one of my vans when driving, I dobbed him in of course.