Tuesday, March 22, 2011

One man's rubbish...

It is common in Western Australia for anyone with something they want to get rid of that someone might find useful – an old bike, a bed-frame or whatever – to put that item on the road verge for collection by anyone who might want it. It emerges that picking up any such unwanted discarded items might be stealing.
The arrest of a Melbourne man, who says he took a vacuum cleaner from a hard rubbish collection, has raised questions about the legality of scavenging abandoned goods.
Surely police have better things to do with their time.

5 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Becky,

You've buried the lede!

Sure, it's a waste of the police's time.

But the bigger issue in the linked article is that there's a Monash Uni academic who studies council hard rubbish collections.

WHAT THE???!!!

Our taxes are probably funding her research.

7:20 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Here in WA, people who have taken items from kerbside collections have been charged with "stealing by finding". If memory serves, it's in the criminal code, not council bylaws. Similar uproar ensued.

Apparently this charge applies in cases where someone genuinely finds a wallet, purse or some other valuable and keeps it - but then (somehow) gets caught. Alternatively, if it's handed in to the police and remains unclaimed, after three months, it's yours - legally.

Regards
Sandi

9:55 PM  
Anonymous Dan Lewis said...

Yes. Police should be spending their time cracking down on illegal Karaoke operations.

5:15 AM  
Anonymous spot said...

Maybe the act of wandering around poking through peoples' stuff after midnight aroused a resident's suspicions, and they called the police?

I can't imagine otherwise why the police would have even gotten involved in the first place.

11:12 AM  
Anonymous Dan Lewis said...

Twenty years ago, councils used to place skip bins at key intersections for resident use. Then they changed to the model where people leave stuff on their lawn.

I always thought the councils changed to those collections as half the waste is collected by other people before the council ever get to it, presumably meaning less to landfill.

Around my way, you see the scavengers turning up with empty utes within minutes of the first piles appearing out the front of buildings.

Who knew?

6:25 PM  

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