Lawful Excuses

The latest bout of hysteria about knife crime has brought on the usual predictable reponses from our politicians.
Gordon the Moron's Assistants in Idiocy are proposing an arduous penalty of community service for anyone caught carrying a knife; whilst Dave 'the people's toff' Cameron and his lot are proposing a mandatory jail sentence (disregarding the fact that there aren't enough prison cells to go around, but that's never stopped politicians making empty promises...).
There are some categories of people who have a lawful excuse to carry a knife, and us little band of allotment holders are one such.
The last thing we want is to be made to do community service or to share time with convicted felons in an overcrowded jail cell.
'I find it endlessly fascinating' Nosher began 'that politicians ignore the obvious when they indulge in sound-bite policy-making.'
We were sitting, as usual, in our deckchairs on the little patch of grass outside Nosher's allotment shed one lunchtime, enjoying a glass of his excellent parsnip wine.
'I guess somewhere in the small print they'll list the categories of people who they consider have a lawful excuse for carrying a knife' I replied.
Nosher raised his eyebrows in disbelief.
'No, I think that's expecting too much of the people who draft the laws' he said 'they might have the obvious ones such as fishermen who need a gutting knife, but do you think their capacious brains will manage to think as far as the humble allotment holder who needs a knife for a wide variety of tasks during the day?'
'You may have a point there' I told him 'so let's draw up our own list in case we get stopped by the Police.'
Nosher thought for a moment.
'Well, there's cutting the twine we use to tie up our plants with' he said 'also cutting the string we make the strings of onions with; then there's tying our little wigwams of bean canes together for the runner beans; and whittling a new dibber from time to time. There's a host of others, but that should be enough to convince even the most slow-witted of police officers that we have a lawful excuse for carrying a small pocket knife.'
'I hope you are right' I said ' because at the rate things are going in this country at present, anything less than wholesale butchery is not going to be enough!'
More from www.overthegardenfence.blogspot.com soon.
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