Stormtroopers raid Teddy Bears' picnic

If you go down to the woods today, forget about disguise - you'd better wear a hard hat and a hi-viz jacket.

Dingly Dell has fallen to the health and safety nazis.

For the past 12 years, retired builder Mike Kamp has been collecting firewood from the forest near his home at Betws-y-Coed, North Wales.

It's a right enshrined in the Magna Carta of 1215, the template for democracies around the world. Free men down the centuries have been granted the liberty to gather dead wood from common land to fuel their stoves, repair their homes and make charcoal.


That was before the Forestry Commission came along and started demanding that anyone wanting to collect wood would need a licence to forage.

Now it has imposed an outright ban, stating: 'This is an area where we are subject to increasing constraints in terms of health and safety. We have a duty of care to people in our wood.'


Note the use of the possessive our wood. It isn't their wood. It's common land and it belongs to everyone.

As Mr Kamp said: 'They are claiming there are health and safety issues. But people have walked through the woods collecting firewood for hundreds of years without too many safety problems.'

Precisely. I doubt there is one recorded incident of a firewood-related fatality in North Wales.

This, as usual, is about bureaucrats justifying their own sad existence and protecting their backs in the event of someone turning their ankle in a rabbit hole, ringing Blame Direct, and suing for compensation.

It's the same warped thinking which led to plans for an open-air ice rink in Bath this Christmas being abandoned because council officials feared it could be a magnet for paedophiles.

How sick do you have to be to reach that conclusion?

And a school in Colchester has banned children from bringing in broomsticks for Halloween in case they get hurt. In fairness, they were only following official advice on the NHS website:

'Be careful with witches' brooms made from sticks. If the sticks get dislodged, they are a choking hazard. These brooms should be labelled For Adult Use Only.'

You couldn't make it up. Where is it all going to end? We take you over now to a briefing at the multi-million pound headquarters of the government's Firewood Prevention, Health and Safety and Child Protection Joint Task Force.......




'Listen up, team. We've had a tip-off that a number of teddy bears are going down to the woods today and we want to maintain the element of surprise. So you'd better go in disguise.'

'For every bear that ever there was will gather there for certain because today's the day the teddy bears have their picnic.

'Every teddy bear who's been good is sure of a treat today. There's lots of marvellous things to eat and wonderful games to play.

'But they don't have a catering licence or a safety certificate. If anything goes wrong we could have carnage on our hands. Food poisoning, sprained ankles, it doesn't bear thinking about, if you'll pardon the pun.'

'I want the tactical support unit beneath the trees where nobody sees. They'll hide and seek as long as they please, 'cause that's the way the teddy bears have their picnic.

'And I don't want any heroics, either. If you go down to the woods today, you better not go alone. It's lovely down in the woods today, but safer to stay at home.'

'What do you want us to do, guv?' 'Watch them, catch them unawares.
See them gaily gad about, they love to play and shout, they never have any care.

'At six o'clock their mummies and daddies will take them home to bed, because they're tired little teddy bears. That's when we move in.'

'Why wait until six o'clock, guv?'

'We suspect a major paedophile ring is operating in the area.
After all, we've only got their word for it that they are mummies and daddies. Remember little Maddie?
'I want names and addresses and don't forget to read them their rights. They won't be getting off on a technicality.

'Social services are providing armed back-up, the helicopter is on standby and I'm bringing in the firewood squad. We believe that some of the contraband wood is being used to make offensive weapons - ie: witches' brooms.

'So let's do it to them, before they do it to themselves. And, hey, hey, hey. Let's be careful out there.'