Gangs target grit supplies
Tuesday 12th January 2010, 11:22AM GMT.
Council staff refill gritting lorries at the depot in Donnington, Telford.
Gangs of thieves are believed to be stealing salt from grit bins in parts of Shropshire to sell on in other parts of the county.
And council chiefs in Telford have revealed they are diluting salt supplies with grit to preserve stocks as forecasters predict more snow tomorrow. Shropshire Council and police said looking into the theft of grit in the Oswestry area.
It has been reported that gangs are taking the grit to sell on to householders in other parts of the county.
Shropshire Council says the thefts have not impacted on its gritting service and that it has 2,400 tonnes of salt remaining, enough to keep priority routes gritted for six days.
Steve Oakley, for the council, said: “We are aware of instances of people stealing salt out of the grit bins in the north west Shropshire area.
“These grit bins are placed along minor roads in rural and urban areas and are for local people to use to keep minor roads and footpaths passable with care. Stealing salt from grit bins is an offence.”
Police spokesman Richard Ewels said the public should decline the services of people who call offering grit for sale.
Although most schools and businesses were operating as normal today, health chiefs said Shropshire casualty units had been dealing with a big rise in weather related injuries, many due to sledging.
The Royal Shrewsbury Hospital treated more than 50 people on Sunday for fractures or suspected fractures, compared to about 10 patients it would normally see suffering from such injuries.
Adrian Osborne, spokesman for the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital Trust, said: “We have seen a really high number of ice-related injuries that have involved sledging, people hitting fence posts, or being hit by other sledges. We have also seen a lot of people who have suffered slips and falls on icy pavements.”
Forecasters say the wintry weather looks set to continue for the next few days before a slight thaw sets. Billy Payne, for MeteoGroup, said milder air pushing in from the Atlantic would cause more snow tomorrow as it bumps into colder air.
By Iain St John
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Nothing surprises me anymore.
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I bet you would be surprised if you saw a dog talking spanish, while holing paws with cat that was eating sushi with its feet?
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“Gangs”? Interesting – it sounds like the Star knows quite a lot about these alledged thefts.
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If it’s true, then they must be selling it a huge price to cover their overheads.
Each box contains probably 100 kg grit at most, so they need to come from those “other parts of the country”, drive around in the snow to find the boxes that actually have some grit inside, (rather than sweet wrappers and drinks cans), dig it out, load it into a truck, bag it, drive it back and sell it, all the time, risking being stranded or caught by the police.
Salt grit wholesale is about £25 a tonne, (or 10 boxes-full, probably more than they actually have in Oswestry), so I’m not sure where the economics are in this project.
More likely is the fact that there are people getting fed up with seeing no local gritting who have decided to take things into their own hands and take it to spread it locally where it’s needed.
Wasn’t there actually a letter-writer to this very column not many days ago who said that he would do exactly that to help old people near to him who were stuck in their houses?
More poignant comment would be: “why have the bins got grit or salt in them in the first place?”. It should be on the streets and paths, not in pretty yellow boxes.
And how does the law stand on this? Obviously the grit boxes are not put there to brighten the place up, so surely the grit is being freely offered to the public to address local ice problems. So can I go and take some from the box up the road without Elderly William screaming to the scene and arresting me for theft?
Come on councillors, especially that one in Ironbridge who got a mention in Graham Hickman’s letter yesterday, (titled “Unable to get hold of local councillors”), please tell us the answer.
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I saw someone filling a bag with grit from the box at Haughmond Hill just a few days ago, and thought at the time how sad some people are, to steal a bag of grit.
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If the grit is there “for local people to use” then how is it stealing to take some from the bin? And how do they know the salt being “offered for sale” to householders is that which has come out of the bin, have the people watched these ‘gangs’ shovel it into a bag and then walk down to their house with it? Doesn’t sound right to me! Does this mean I’m not allowed to take a bag full of grit from the bin around the corner (if by some miracle it actually has any in it) and sprinkle it on the pavement outside my house, for fear of being reported to the police?!
On the other hand, if this is right, it’s pretty low for these ‘gangs’ to stoop.
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Well done Shropshire Star for exposing these anti-social scum. We saw one of these gangs (well, it was one bloke but “gangs” sounds more dramatic) in action last weekend.
He was shovelling grit out of the bin near Stirchley garden centre into a bag in the back of his car – in broad daylight!!!! Later on he had the barefaced cheek to scatter the grit he had just stolen along Stirchley Road, which obviously doesn’t need gritting because the council never touch it (it’s so busy the traffic will wear the ice away with their spinning tyres).
What makes this worse is that this swine is actually one of my local parish councillors – just wait ’til he comes round asking for my vote next time – he’ll get it!!
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Good point – why are the grit boxes there, unlocked if you’re not allowed to take (reasonably) from them?
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