Man the lifeboats! It’s the obscene crockery squad
TWO Yorkshire lifeboatmen have been sacked for ‘production of inappropriate material of a sexual nature’.
Ben Laws and Joe Winspear, from Whitby, were told by the RNLI that their behaviour posed a ‘ safeguarding risk’ to schoolchildren.
their ‘crime’ was to give each other coffee mugs featuring images of semi- naked women — one of them with Winspear’s head superimposed upon it.
A ‘senior female member of staff’ saw the mugs on a shelf at headquarters and decided they were a clear and present danger to any children who may be visiting the premises.
Laws, with 15 years’ service under his lifebelt, and Winspear, who joined in 2014, were told over the phone that they were being ‘stood down’ immediately.
several of their colleagues have since walked out in solidarity, or been sacked, too. No one seems quite sure. their dismissal has sparked a North sea-style storm of protest on social media and in the seaside town, where a petition is being raised demanding their reinstatement.
But the RNLI is unrepentant. A spokesman said: ‘ the lifeboat station should be an environment where people can expect to be treated with dignity and respect.
‘ We cannot allow bullying, harassment or discrimination in what should be a safe and inclusive environment and there will be serious consequences for anybody who demonstrates this behaviour within the RNLI.’
HANGon, we’re talking about a couple of jokey coffee mugs here, exchanged by colleagues as secret santa gifts.
this unbelievably pious, and menacing, RNLI statement makes these two public-spirited individuals sound like serial sex pests.
Where’s the alleged ‘ bullying, harassment and discrimination’ of which they have been found guilty? If anyone is on the wrong end of bullying and harassment — not to mention character assassination — it’s Ben Laws and Joe Winspear.
As it happens, guys ’n’ gals, these two blameless lifeboatmen are merely the latest victims of the Jimmy savile hysteria.
Ever since it was revealed that the old monster had been at liberty to molest his evil way through hospitals, care homes and the BBC, public bodies and charities have been frantically slamming the stable door. In their desperation to
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be seen to be ‘ doing something’, an entire ‘ safeguarding’ industry has sprung up.
It took me only seconds on the internet yesterday to discover a current recruitment advert from the RNLI for a full-time safeguarding Officer, on a salary of up to £41,926 a year. Nice work if you can get it. Of course, in this febrile climate, it’s no wonder that a ‘senior female member of staff’ decided that possession of ‘ inappropriate’ crockery was the greatest threat to child safety since savile and that other novelty Northern nonce, Cyril smith.
Each time I hear the word ‘inappropriate’ I want to retch. Who gets to decide what’s appropriate and what isn’t? Finding offence where none exists is our new national pastime. Lives and careers are wrecked daily by these deranged witch-hunts.
Let’s just pause, however, to examine the evidence in this latest case. there’s some muttering about WhatsApp messages, but nothing has been produced.
From the available photographs, the images on the mugs aren’t remotely obscene. You’ll find more explicit material in national newspapers and on tV.
As I’m writing this, at lunchtime, an advert has just popped up on sky News for a range of ladies’ swimwear. the models are flaunting just as much — if not more — flesh than is exposed on the offending coffee cups. In the photo with Joe Winspear’s head plonked on top, the model is wearing what looks like a pair of passion-killing Bridget Jones big knickers.
And here’s a thought. surely by putting a man’s head on a woman’s body, they could have claimed they were making a stand against transphobia.
Heck, Winspear could even have said he was now identifying as a woman and demanded that the RNLI provide him with his own toilet and changing facilities.
that would have sent them into complete Corporal Jones mode. It’s a gender fluid lifeboat-person, Mr Mainwaring! Don’t panic! OK, so I jest, up to a point. But this isn’t in the least bit funny. It’s simply another example of how our public institutions have been hijacked by professional Guardianistas to promote and impose their own warped brand of political bigotry and intolerance.
One Mail Online reader, commenting on the story, wondered how much of the £50 he’d just donated to the lifeboat service was going towards the wages of the ‘senior female member of staff’ involved.
WELL,since the RNLI is prepared to pay the best part of £42,000 a year for a safeguarding Officer, I’d have thought quite a chunk.
How many of these essential members of staff does the organisation employ?
Compare and contrast that attractive salary with the volunteers who actually man the lifeboats for nothing.
Check out the website of the Whitby lifeboat crew. Along with Ben Laws, who is a chef, and Joe Winspear, a banker, you’ll find, among others, a mechanic, a joiner, a teaching assistant, a heating engineer, a publican — even a potash miner. How many of us would devote our spare time from working down a potash mine to volunteering for lifeboat duty?
they are the Best of British, ready to risk their lives in all weathers to rescue those in distress. In 2016, the most recently available figures, RNLI crews saved 431 people from drowning.
the Whitby lifeboat station was established in 1802, pre-dating the RNLI by more than 20 years. For more than 200 years, selfless crews have been on standby around the clock, all day, every day, prepared to subject themselves to the mercy of the most treacherous seas imaginable in order to aid others.
they know all about genuine risk, not the confected ‘safeguarding’ variety. And ‘confected’ really is the operative word.
someone with local knowledge pointed out that there was no need for any child to be exposed to these ‘ inappropriate’ mugs at headquarters.
the lifeboat museum, which is open to families and school parties, is in a different building, on the other side of the River Esk.
Ben Laws and Joe Winspear should be reinstated immediately, with a grovelling apology.
their courage and self-sacrifice deserve better than to be repaid by having their reputations trashed and their lifeboat service terminated because a couple of harmless novelty coffee cups are deemed insanely to pose a ‘safeguarding risk’ to children.