Harassment, arrogance, threats and unacceptable behaviour in Illey Lane

Sunday morning, 19 April 2020

Thuggish behaviour, lawlessness and harassment in quiet, so respectable, heavenly Hunnington and Illey - that makes this all the more surprising!

Guerrilla gardener is threatened with being beaten up by an Alsatian dog handler.

After Worcestershire County Council declined to cut a very basic path to keep walkers off a busy country lane, I decided to do something about it myself to help us stay safe.  I was at the very end of re-clearing a path through the roadside one-third of an old double rowed hedge at Illey Lane, Hunnington, near Halesowen where I live.  A very large bramble bush covered the bank between the road and hedge and it was that that forced walkers onto the tarmac.

On the other side of the hedge and fence, on Sunday morning 19 April there were dog handlers in training.  One of them saw me and angrily told me to clear off, which I did, almost immediately.  The man thought that his dogs would escape through the fence and hedge, said I was destroying birds' nests and that I had no insurance.  I had cut back one third for a narrow path.  Unfortunately, as I walked back along the cleared path, with him on the other side of the hedge and fence, the realisation dawned on him that I had cleared even more than he had first thought.  He became even angrier, with a host of expletives, the most shocking language of obscenities and threats to beat me up.  I think he said that he would kill me.  I got back to the bike, with the front wheel against the fence under the hedge.  He then stuck his body and arms through the hedge and grabbed the handlebars.  There was then a tussle between me and him as I tried to get the bike off him to hurriedly cycle away.  Thankfully, the sharp spikes of the hawthorn made him release the bike and I speedily raced off to avoid the physical confrontation that he was threatening.  I got clean away, shaken but without any injuries.

BACKGROUND

Do visit Illey Lane, and use the more civilised way of walking it by a pleasant enough secret passage through woodland, over a carpet of ivy and high above and away from the traffic, to Illey Mill.  The new path is on either side of the disused Halesowen Railway on Illey Lane. I have also re-cleared a second path that, this time, is alongside the railway and is a public right of way for walking from Hunnington cricket ground.  Both new paths are part of a circular, Covid-19 permitted daily exercise walk.

ROADSIDE NATURE RESERVE

I would like to ask that, from now on please, tractors do not use the roadside verge except when the ground is dry and their tracks cannot sink into the ground.  At the moment, there are bluebells in flower between the tractor tracks.  The tractor was probably used to clear the brambles from making it impossible for the public to walk the roadside verge.  Hence, the need for my path - please that only goes through stinging nettles and cow parsley at this time of year.  And I do know that last year, I had asked for the roadside verge to be cut to enable us all to walk on it instead of on the road. 

Wednesday afternoon 22 April 2020  

The first officer on a motorbike visited (see details of the phone message left in the morning, below).  When I asked his name he said "James from Bromsgrove District Council".  When I asked for his surname, he said that was it.  He broke my spade when I had just locked it up to the base of a hawthorn.  He was so angry, he grabbed the metal blade that came away in his hand and the handle was left locked to the tree.  He behaved suspiciously like the man who threatened to beat me up on Sunday morning, if not to kill me, for my public-spirited action in re-clearing the path to keep walkers safe.  So I did comply with his threats to stop and fled the scene to escape his ​possible ​assault.  In my hurry to get away from him, I left behind my long-handled pruners. When I came back shortly afterwards, the pruners had gone and he had ripped up and walked off with the string and poles I was using to cut the path straight.  This officer of yours must have taken them because there was no-one else around all afternoon.  No cyclist or motorist would have bothered to stop or even have seen the tools from the road.

I reported the matter to the police.  Is he your officer from Bromsgrove District Council?

Friday 24 April 2020

I had a second visit from one of your officers on a motorbike, as I was creating a safe route for walkers away from the busy, 60 mph Illey Lane at its Hunnington/Halesowen end.  At present, walkers walk on the road for 438 metres (Google maps) from Illey Mill and the public right of way that ends there to where there is the fork in Illey Lane and the right-hand branch is now a footway.

I also stopped all work when this morning's officer told me.  This man rather impatiently and brusquely showed me his ID, as if I had no right to ask for it.  I was not near enough to be able to read it.  His attitude, like the first, also left much to be desired.  A little arrogant and uncalled for, I thought.  He was most insistent that the boundary between your WCC land and that of Philip Bibbey’s was the hedge and not the post and rail fence.  He said that the hedge came first and was put on the boundary.  How on earth could he have known that?  But where I cut was still Highways owned land, was it not?

Unfortunately, we both had to raise our voices because of social distancing rules, the noisy road, the motorbike idling and, the officer kept his helmet on that also included ear muffs to receive phone calls.  I explained I was a guerrilla gardener that, in Britain has a proud tradition in beautifying otherwise neglected places, like Illey Lane Nature Reserve.  I said I was a public-spirited guy who is saving public money in all my volunteering work.

I did try but was interrupted when I would have gone on to explain that the parish paths' warden and I had cleared and reopened the cul de sac right of way from near Hunnington railway station, south to the next field, in January and February of last year.  Since then, we had both been maintaining it and keeping it open.  In fact, I have now straightened twelve of the old 19th century concrete railway posts on either side of the ancient farm cart track.  And, I am continuing to root up the bramble root balls between all the posts on the west, field side of the public footpath.

I think, two years ago, in 2018, and certainly in 2019, I had asked for the bramble bush to be cut through so that we could continue to walk off the tarmac when walking from Halesowen to Illey Mill on the roadside verge.  I cut through the wide bramble bush in 2018 but it is quite impossible for me to persevere with that particular job, with brambles being so invasive and rampant.  And, so quickly impossible to walk through.  However, the county council declined my request.  Hence, I continued my much more attractive path above the brambles, on top of the bank and by the hedge.

27 April 2020

Yet more harassment, arrogance, threats and unacceptable behaviour by Mr James of Bromsgrove District Council in Illey Lane.

This afternoon, I was about to leave on my bike from the Illey Mill end of the newly re-cleared footpath when Mr James of Bromsgrove drew up on his motorbike.  Once more, he behaved like a thuggish Scottish laird or lord of the manor. He ranted and raved at me for being on the path, again for having no liability insurance and for my having sent e-mails via NextDoor, the social media site talking about a path with a carpet of ivy over which you walked.  He told me he would be blocking the path and putting notices up warning people off from going on it.  When I asked him to step back to obey the two metre distancing rule he came even closer.  Your other officer on the 24 April did step back when I mentioned about the social distancing. The fact that your officer spoke about my lack of insurance does reinforce the thought that he must be the same man who laid into me on the 19 April who also condemned me for no insurance and also ordered me to stop and keep away from the path, then.

Your Mr James, on the 27 April, shouted at me for destroying bats in the woodland but, this time, did not mention nesting birds as was the case on the 19 April and phone message on the 22 April.  But he said that he was not that man.  There is another man who does dog training and it's not him.  He said he was not Paul Howard whose face I recognised on Facebook.  He told me I was a maniac for doing what I was doing and I was never to return.  I said little in order not to provoke an assault and because there was no point.  He could not be reasoned with. When I eventually asked if I could go, he finally let me pass him on the narrow path with my bike.

Two phone calls from the same man

On the 15 June 2019, according to my phone's record, he rang me. This was about a stolen lawnmower from one of the sheds next to the railway line on the farmer's field that the dog trainers use. I know this man as Paul Howard from the fish and chip shop in Dudley Road, Halesowen called 'Our Plaice'. He wanted me to pay £750 in compensation for reintroducing access to the top of the bank alongside his dog training field. Or, to get the money from my third party public liability insurers. I did neither.

The second phone call was on Wednesday 22 April at 1014 hrs from Bromsgrove Council. I picked up the phone quickly but the caller put the phone down and left a message instead of speaking to me. The message was that I was "to stop cutting grass and stuff in Illey Lane, to stop cutting trees when birds were nesting and one of my staff from the Bromsgrove office of the County Council would be up there shortly and I would be fined". I checked the number on the message and it was the same as the one that the man I know as Paul Howard gave me in 2017, on the very first occasion I met him after the farmer had given me permission to go into the field.

Do you know whom I am referring to?

Will you please investigate these incidents and tell me what you have done about these matters.  Both officers need to be spoken to about their unfortunate, unreasonable and belligerent approach to a member of the public. And, for stealing my long-handled pruners, string and poles. The pruners have 'HWG' stamped on them, for Halesowen Wildlife Group. Thank you.

ADDITION to my complaint, dated 28.4.2020

I have just remembered these events.  Verbal assaults and fearing physical.

On the 22 April, two cyclists were so alarmed by the angry behaviour of Bromsgrove DC's Mr James that they stopped and asked, "Do you want any help?  Are you all right?"  I foolishly said, "I'm OK" and they went on their way.  I should have asked them to ring for the Police and then I might still have my loppers.

Everyone, including NextDoor, have expressed appreciation for my efforts on both footpaths, except for your Mr James and one driver who pulled up and asked what I was doing.  I explained and said, "I hope you like it" and he replied, "Not really".

Six walkers, yesterday 27 April, were all delightful in their reaction when I told them about the secret path to avoid them using the road.  Then there came along, on his motorbike, Mr Over the Top Blazing Angry James who ranted and raved once more, as I described and, was most intimidating.  And, I was unable to get away because I had the pushbike and he blocked me from going down my only escape route.  I had to wait for him to get over his self-righteous outburst.  Thankfully, I had my cycle helmet on to protect me from any assault.  I was waiting for the attack as I pushed the bike past him.

This is the man, your member of staff, whom you are backing up to the hilt.  You are reinforcing his anti-social and intolerant, dangerous behaviour.

Tim Weller