A welcome return home for the Olympic Torch
- Today's leader
Is town really a ‘chav magnet’?
Wednesday 16th April 2008, 2:30PM BST.
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Video reporter James Shaw has taken matters into his owns hands after the Uncyclopedia website alleged that Telford is a magnet for chavs.
Also see: Group fights back after chav slur
The Telford-based journalist, who has lived in the town for 32 years, went out onto the streets this week to gather opinions from local people.
Also on hand was Telford & Wrekin Mayor Miles Hosken, who challenged the website authors to let him “change their minds”.
Find out what James discovered with our exclusive video.
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Telford is just a conurbation of the West Midlands. What a pity your reporter didn’t speak to the people originally from Madeley, Dawley and Wellington to ask them how Telford New Town measures against the promises that they were made regarding regeneration of these towns? It was a disaster for those areas from the time the very first brick was laid….
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Er yes….and it’s a shame that it impacts on all the lovely little villages around…such as Ironbridge.
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WELL SAID MILLY!!!!!
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I live in a posh estate where theres no chav people. I work hard for a living and have a nice house. The people who usually moan are the people who live in poor council houses that did rubbish at school and are now working in a factory or supermarket. I was bullied at school for taking my schooling seriously, im only glad i stuck with it and made something of myself.
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I agree with Milly, I was born in Wellington where I still live before Dawley New Town was thought of. I always give my address as Wellington Shropshire, only the post code TF1 gives it away.
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Fairy king, wrong there, I’m afraid, you will probably find that most of the “moaners” are well educated, sensible people who have everything that you have but actually remember the place as it used to be.
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Such a shame fairyking that during your outstanding academic career that you failed to learn about English grammar. Such sweeping generalisations reveal a shallow individual living a sheltered existence.
Personally, I don’t believe that Telford is any better or worse than other towns of a similar size. It has pleasant parts and not such pleasant parts.
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Fairyking that is abit strong. I used to live in a council house growing and we were poor and i did moan about the way we were treated by upper class people thinking we were scum.
I however still to school and then college and then uni and I am now a qualified solicitor not bad for someone from a council background.
Stereotyping people is such a horrible thing to do
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It would appear that most of the local people that live in or around Telford disagree with the Mayor’s opinion that it is a nice place to live, even blogger jemjabella (google it) has commented on it (I agree wholeheartedly with her comments too)
Shame really, this could be such a nice place to live if only some of the residents made a bit more of an effort.
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Interesting that the Star has as its headline story tonight about ‘Four held in town brawl’. And the town in question? Shrewsbury!
It would be nice to be able to add a comment to that story, but the Star has decided that we won’t have the opportunity to say anything negative about their beloved County Town!
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This is hilarious – Chavs indeed.
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i was born and bred in dawley. well said milly
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Take a walk round the the telford centre any day of the week for the answer. Can’r move for people tracksuits, baseball caps and cheap jewellery usually pushing a pushchair as well. Chav central!
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Fairyking – sorry, but you’re ignorant of the facts. To me, “Chavs” are the sinister youths who espouse the law of the urban jungle. They wear hoodies, gloves, spray graffiti and in this respect, make only the same statements as “Teddy Boys” of the 60s, Skinheads of the 70s and Punks” of the 80s. The big difference now, is the part which drugs (primarily Cannabis) and cheap alcohol play in their behaviour. It induces a “no boundaries” perspective which is vicious and brutal. On your “posh” estate, it’s probably like a ghost town. I doubt there’s any sense of community and expect that few people know their neighbours, preferring to remain distant and aloof. The children of such families are only human though and some will eventually congregate with “Chav” elements and get sucked into that lifestyle, defying their despairing parents behind closed doors. “Chavs” have moved on from their council estate roots and you only need peruse the Shropshire Star to identify the fact that Telford is plagued by them.
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Bob – your post is excellent and absolutely spot on.
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A response to Paul i am not shallow just realistic. Many people want to bury their heads in the sand. You are a bully sir and from my experience probably work in a warehouse or building site or medical services.
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Lighten up… it’s a joke… they also say about Shrewsbury…
“Shrewsbury is a town only famous for being the birthplace of Charles Darwin, who wrote the Origin of Species, whilst studying the town’s residents. Most shoppers on the town’s infamous Pride Hill have experienced his survival of the fittest theory whilst trying to barge past other shoppers in order to enter into one of the identikit high street shops. This of course, was not the case in Charles Darwin’s time, when the town’s residents were all monkeys. They have evolved since then,however, into sheep”
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Reading through the comments it seems a shame that all peaple can do is criticise. Telford could be a nicer town if some of teh residents had some community spirit and gave it a chance. After forty years (the anniversary celebrations take place this summer) it might be time to accept that Telford is an important part of the community and rather than looking back to a perceived “Golden Age”, start doing something about creating a better town for everyone now. Stop whining and start doing.
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To Dobbin,
You could apply that to ANY town centre in the UK, Shopping Centres attract people (along with serious shoppers) with nothing else worthwhile to do, maybe you should travel a bit if you think what you describe is unique to Telford, I suggest starting locally, in perhaps Shrewsbury, the demographics in the Pride Hill or Darwin are idenctical.
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Fairyking, just wait until a housing association starts to secretly buy up private houses on your nice estate to let to ‘problem’ families. Or neighbours who want to move can’t sell, so they rent out to ‘problem’ families.
Wave goodbye to your “posh” estate.
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Bob, what ultimate ‘old fogy’ are you? while I agree with the latter part of your post, your
dateline was a little off the punks were 70s and then the club/rave scene was 80s and conceivably the very last youth statements were the Goths.
Now, youth statements seem to have been diffused into the internet. I think your way off likening Chavs to youth statments, they’re young people who have ended up in their lifestyle thanks to the Thatcher years of respect-destruction (starting with the teacher union for her own political means) rather than actually taking Britain back to a point where people respected each other.
These are part of a huge population of people who, in the past, would have had work in industry, the global economy saw to that (NO not the EU, without that we’ve be a desert!). They’ve no hope of work and year-on-year begin to care-less. Nobody is trying to sort it out – the govts eyes are else where. So exists the Chav.
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As a non-resident of Telford I can safely say that it isn’t any different to other parts of the UK in terms of chavs and the like – whether comparing it with big cities or even small towns in the countryside that can have similar problems as there’s even less for young people to do in those places! At least Telford has some good plans for its residents in the future.
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Jesus its simple if you think Telford is full of chav’s and don’t like it MOVE and let the people who like Telford enjoy it
I mean come on have you people never been anywhere else in the UK you could say every city is full of chav’s and as Telford is a small town citys will have a hell of a lot more
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Personally I wonder as to what Telford would be like had the new town never happened. I doubt it would have had billions spent on local infrastructure, I doubt there would be as many jobs as there are at present. I would love to see the car happy people of this town trying to get around amidst the spoil heaps and terrible roads they had here previously. Would no new town see Dawley as attractive as Bridgnorth or Madeley as vibrant as Ludlow? I doubt it. I’m not saying its perfect far from it I see many faults in the town but it is also not the worst place ever like some of you lot seem to think.
That shopping centre should be wiped from the face of the Earth though.
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““Teddy Boys” of the 60s, Skinheads of the 70s and Punks” of the 80s. The big difference now, is the part which drugs (primarily Cannabis) and cheap alcohol play in their behaviour. It induces a “no boundaries” perspective.”
Bob, did you live in any of those eras??? How can you say that drugs and alcohol are playing a different role now? 60s: booze, cannabis, LSD; 70s: booze, heroin; 80s: all of the above. If anything drugs and booze are more difficult to get hold of now, and the chavs you accuse of having no boundaries much more concious of getting caught.
IMO the main difference between the punks of the 70s and the chavs of today is that the chavs do not know what they’re rebelling against. They need to get political then they might be able to make an effective statement against society.
Oh, and Bob – punks: 70s (alongside the skinheads (who never really went away)). It was already New Wave by the 80s.
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BTW that’s particuarly brave film making from the Shropshire Star. 1 clip of a man walking past wearing a hood taken from about 50 yards away in the middle of the car park!!!
Where are the interviews with the ‘chavs’? Where are the monstrous images of gangs hanging around drinking and smoking da ganja and terrorising the neighbourhood? Probably not in Wellington Town centre or in the nicer parts of Ironbridge anyway…
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Well….I don’t know about anyone else but a concerned wife wants to know what her husband did for the first time under that bridge!
Some questions need answering when you get home James!
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Grey, you are a fool, I could cycle places in less time in the sixties than I can get there now in the car. All the straight roads have been changed for ones that meander endlessly. They close roads because people actually have the audacity to use them, calling them “rat runs”.
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Unfortunately its the same wherever you go – society at the moment seems to be breeding a chav like culture and the scary thing is that it is these individuals who seem to be the only ones reproducing – you only have to watch Jeremy Kyle – not sure I have seen a female go on that talk show yet who hasn’t been donning a burberry checked maternity tracksuit.
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Devilschair, an excellent and intuitive post if I may say so.
We have always to some extent had an underclass, who wouldn’t work, as opposed to the unskilled part of the working class which had always managed to get by.
The opening up of everything to ‘Market Forces’ in the ’80s disturbed the equilibrium to such an extent that we have seen constant increases since at both the extremes – more super-wealthy who earn their money simply by possessing more and more of it, and a huge increase in an underclass with no work ethic whatsoever.
Telford has its fair share of chavs (and I think the defining characteristic of a chav is the expectation that they have a right to everything but no responsibilities) – so does Shrewsbury, Oswestry et al, but to suggest, as Bob does, that Telford is plagued by them is a gross exaggeration, although hardly surprising since by his own admission he gets his view of Telford from the pages of the less than impartial Shropshire Star.
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“Is town really a ‘chav magnet’?”
Yes, and those who say otherwise are in denial.
Love how once again the journalist, like a good Telfordian, banged on about how the place is the birthplace of the industrial revolution, etc. This is the industrial revolution which occurred some 150 years before Telford even existed. Duh.
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Graham – quite right, doh! How I could,’ve forgotten the summer of 76, I don’t know, but in my defence, Punks were still a common sight in the Kings Road, Chelsea in 1986.
You’re wrong about drugs though. I’m not being flippant when I tell you it’s easier for a 14 year old to buy drugs than cigarettes. I’ve spent years fighting to save a son from drugs, but it’s the same pattern everywhere these days. Are they more concious of getting caught? Yes, their “gangsta” mentality is a nervous balance of aggression and fear. Policing is ineffective long term however, because it just moves them elsewhere and being arrested is something to be laughed about with their mates afterwards. The courts are no deterrent at all. Drug abuse also breeds petty car crime, muggings and burglary. The heart of the problem is having nothing challenging to do and too little guidance from the old fogeys (cheers for that, Devil’s Chair)who used to organize works social clubs or youth clubs. These kids aren’t all bad, they just haven’t got a chance once they start immersing themselves in the gang culture. National service is no answer, a government scheme which opened up facilities staffed by military personnel that offered something for the disgruntled youths who don’t want a regular education and prefer to stay up and out with their mates all night, would. Let them earn financial credits for playing on high tech military training aids, but sprinkle it with practical skills as simple as changing a tap washer or treating a bleeding wound. By such means, youth crime might be reduced and a type of “civil defence” qualification acquired.
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No need to get personal Brian. Did I say the meandering roads were a good thing? I don’t think so. In fact I seem to remember commenting recently about the lack of direct routes anywhere.
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bored now, can we move on
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shrewsbury, town of flowers.
more like shropshire capital of gun crime.
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Grey you seem to contradict yourself , saying one minute how brilliant the roads are since the birth of telford and now saying they are not direct and a bad thing, make your mind up! The problem is , you don’t know what this area was like pre telford so you have no idea how much better/ worse it is now. You are merely spouting the Telford Development/Telford and wrekin council propaganda. How do you know the roads were so terible before? Do you even know what a spoil heap looks like?
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The infrastructure in place is of a relatively high standard, I personally don’t like roads but I’m aware of the need for them. When I talk about needing direct routes who says I am talking about roads?
No I don’t have frst hand experience of what Telford was like before the new town but I do have a strong interest in local history and am descended from some very proud Dawley folk. As for believing TDC and T&W propaganda I think i’m experienced enough to know that you shouldn’t take the evidence of one source as gospel. My opinions are formed from reading pretty widely on the subject and a bit of study too. Anything else?
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I actually agree with the description of Telford, as someone who took my studies seriously and didnt like getting off my face on which ever narcotic was lying around I was considered ‘different’.
I eventually had to move to get away from the bullying, vandalism and general Chavdom that thrives in Telford.
I personally feel comfortable walking around Shrewsbury, when I venture to Telford I actually count it as a bonus if I am not the victim of an attempted mugging.
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the reality is that there are serious social issues of eduction, employment, housing and dress code that t&w need to address.
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You people do know that Uncyclopedia think this is hilarious, and are just satirising it more… right?
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Grey , you keep harping on about the infrastructure of being of a high standard, can you put it in laymans terms and tell me exactly what you believe is of a high standard round here?
And pray tell me where you have read something that gives rise to the following?
“I would love to see the car happy people of this town trying to get around amidst the spoil heaps and terrible roads they had here previously.”
To me it sounds like every road was a cart track which wound their way in between huge mounds of “spoil” threatening to cascade down on us at any time like Aberfan.
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So Grey theest a Dawley mon bist? Thee hat me fooled theer fu a minat, no doubt thee nowst what a trowin on thee wum is then? or bin thee jus sayin that?
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I read the Shropshire Star which had this article in it and they said that the writers for Uncyclopedia were unavaliable for comment, which to any person who knows nothing about the site, would think this meant that the authors were cowardly and being embarrased about the comments made on the site. Well here’s some news for you, Uncyclopedia is an online Wiki, which means that anyone can add information. There are no set down authors of the site and you’d have to go around knocking on peoples doors at random to find the author of the article. It could be anyone in the world remember, so this could be someone in Australia who has visited the area who has written the article. I think the article on Uncyclopedia has a fair point as every time I go into Telford I see a large group of Chavs congregating somewhere. I even witnessed the large group of teens who sit around the court house area reporting to the PCSO’s that they had just been attacked by a group of Chavs not too long ago so it’s not all teens who are Chavs. You can’t bundle them into the same group and I hated it when I was younger when the people in shops would stare at me like I was going to nick things.
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What can we say about Telford?
The best thing to come out of Telford is the Road to anyware else in the UK…..
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what was wrong with wellington town. the wellington journal and wellington town football club both have a ring to their names, why not go back to the name wellington
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It would appear that GREY has disappeared when faced with giving hard facts about what this area was like Pre Telford. So for anyone interested and wants a honest run down from someone who actually lived here then and is sick of the Telford Propaganda machine telling everyone that it was a really run down tip Pre Telford, let me put a few facts down.
The “spoil tips” they keep refering to, although they were waste tips when the mining finished all those years ago were actually covered in heather, grass and in some cases trees in the sixties and we as children used to love to walk and play over them, we called them the mounds. We had small pools that you could fish and swim in which are now festering buckets of puss. Many of the roads went straight from A to B not the winding, potholed jokes that we have now with traffics lights and humps everywhere to make every journey a nightmare. We had bus services from Wellington, Madeley, Dawley, Oakengates to vitually everywhere which used to run til 10.30 at night and that included places like bridgnorth. Try catching a bus now that doesn’t take you straight to the town centre, where you probably have to get offf and change.
So no, Grey, this area wasn’t as run down in the sixties as it is now and if you don’t believe me ask any person who is over fifty and lived here all their life.
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‘Robert Smith’
“I personally feel comfortable walking around Shrewsbury, when I venture to Telford I actually count it as a bonus if I am not the victim of an attempted mugging.”
What a silly comment!! Don’t bother coming into Telford then if it bothers you that much.
What about the shootings in Shrewsbury?? They not bother you then?
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I have lived in Telford since 1976, I have a good education and live in a council estate due to my relationship ending. my kids are at uni and secondary school where they are doing just fine. I don’t know what the problem is with kids in hoodies and tracksuit bottoms. its the fashion of today same as patch pocket trousers and tank tops were when we were kids. some wore jeans and denim jackets. we were told we were trouble makers for wearing denim, but i assure you we were far from it. its just how people perceive them that’s all. leave the kids alone to express themselves how they want, their not harming anyone. as for Telford being full of chavs have you seen the choice of clothing these kids have got in the shops, its chav or tarty. i know one thing i prefer chav than seeing young girls walking round looking cheap.
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Oh some of the comments here are hilarious!
Fairywings you need to get out more – I think maybe your psh estate is starting to warp your sense of reality! There are ‘chavs’ all over the country! Its only a matter of time before the focus is on somewhere else so until then, surely it would be better to dust off your wings and get out a bit more?
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Martin,not as much as the regular murders on Telford
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dear blue , not nearly as hilarious as the web page created to counter the chav slur eh?
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I am one of the original authors of the article, and I would like to take this opportunity to remind you that you are all in fact gay
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Check the Uncyclopedia article, it has been updated with a response to The Mayor and the Star’s comments
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Anyone who takes *anything* they read on Uncyclopedia seriously needs to take a long hard look in the mirror.
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Instead of making silly comments,it seems everybody care about TELFORD do something to change the area so people may have a positive opinion.
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What is a Chav?
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I believe that uncyclopedia has got it quite right, you could not walk down to sutton hill centre without coming across a chav, for the life of you.
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anyone know where the origin of CHAV comes from?
It’s a police term standing for “Council House Always Violent”……….
Draw your own conclusions…..
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Its not a police term! There are plenty of things CHAV is said to stand for,eg. Council Housed Avid Vermin, futhermore the police would never be able to use such words to describe people,as it suggests that anyone that lives in a council house is always violent-there would be a public uproar!
I don’t believe that Telford is any worse than any other town. Every town has chavs,and generally they will all be found in abundunce in the town centres especially at the weekend. There are alot of people in Telford that do fit the description of a “chav” but you will find that everywhere,and of course there are better and worse towns for chav infestation
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Chavs are in every Town and City in the UK there are just as many in Wolverhampton and Shrewsbury.
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