He wasn't in a Wange Wover

[hemo]

The mask/buff/ balaclava or what ever it is not the issue, it is the nature of the masks detail. Seems that it is scaring the children (so say's HM) probably one with graphic's like a skull/jaw bone type. In the background is a kid with buff/balaclava and no one is asking him to remove it, so bloke must have one that is perceived offensive or scary.

According to the pinned comment under the video, the kid has also been told he is not allowed to wear it in future, so I don't think the above reasoning holds.

At one point the masked cyclist calls out to parents across the road and ask's if his mask scares them, to which they reply no.
So can only assume there is something more to in then just a plain covering.

[Patrickpioneer]

I'm from a different era but I get the impression there's a growing number of people hoping to gain their few moments of fame with footage from their mobile or camera.

That's a good point, we have all seen vids like this about many things but how many would behave this way without a camera?
Pat

[Oldjohnw]

The policeman was not at the school on this matter specifically.

I suspect the head saw the character, who had very likely (based on his attitude, easy provocation and inability to let anyone else get a word in) already given her trouble, and thought "I've got the police here; let's deal with this jerk once and for all!"

[cyclemad]

geez who'd want to be a copper! "you've said something I don't like so i'm going to whip my phone out and waste your time"

fantastic!

why can't people just wind their neck in a be a little more polite?

don't get me wrong, i'd be peeved by having a policeman tell me i've been reported by a headmistress for being rude! i'd consider that a waste of time too - but then i'd give her no reason to say it. Bit of an odd thing for one adult to report another adult for..

just take the damned thing off - pretty simple. I mean you wouldn't rock up in your mankini would you?

yes there are other people breaking rules like the car driver sitting there but hey, how do you suppose they'd react if asked to turn their engine off? spout some rubbish about their rights to be there blah blah blah or just say sorry and turn it off? It's escalating for the sake of escalating.

agree with you ...but speaking to a local cop friend...he stated that many of the calls he receives now are from people making complaints that someone o a forum or social media has been rude to them ....Crime report submitted for harassment or malicious communications ........irrespective of whether or not it is investigated etc a crime MUST be submitted .. Thankyou Home Sec as was T.May....( ps I think her brother is ace on top gear )

[bigjim]

i see it as the headmistress wasting police time to support her own personal agenda. The guy and his son was apparently well known to all and her. Maybe she is a cyclist hating motorist in her spare time, who knows? Nobody was frightened. Good luck with frightening older kids these days by a cyclist with a mask over his nose. Plus all the other kids probably know the dad and his son.
We all know cameras are useful tools these days and I don't blame the dad for recording the dispute. I wouldn't post it on social media though.
Yes, maybe the guy got a bit bolshie. He is a bit over the top though. Would have done better if he was calmer and the the PC ramble on. Though I would have been a bit annoyed as well over the Headmistress calling the police over such trivial nonsense. What sort of person encourages a police officer to question or threaten a father in front of his child. Didn't have much concern for his child's welfare did she?

[AMMoffat]

The guy was being rather rude, though not aggressively so, and it would seem with some justification. We don't see what happened previously but it does appear that he, and his son, are known by the school staff, so what's the problem? It also seems that his son has been instructed not to wear his "mask" either on school grounds (or even travelling to school!!!). If it was his son in the video, he was wearing a neck warmer, which is basically a scarf without the annoying ends that keep getting unwrapped or catching on things. I wear one, and it is of one of my most indispensable items of cycling wear in the winter. I wonder if similar demands are made of pupils, or parents, who choose to wear scarves wrapped around their faces as many people do. The guy's warmer was different, but if that's what he likes to keep his face warm then why not - remember it's not that he was an unknown masked stranger.

This does smack of the sort of unreasonable "request" more often made by people using health and safety as the reason (when it is nothing of the sort). The sort of thing where an unreasonable demand has been made for whatever reason, and when refused one party (in this case the headteacher) has chosen to escalate because she's the authority figure and couldn't possibly be wrong. People often tend to be rude when they feel they are not being listened to or respected, which is also rude. A policeman asked to approach a guy, known by the school staff, fundamentally because he wouldn't carry out an unreasonable request - really? I would be furious too in that situation.

On a related matter, I wouldn't be happy to have film of my own child, let alone the other children shown on the video, plastered all over the internet, but maybe I'm just old fashioned in relation to the ways of social media.

[The utility cyclist]

the cyclist is being an a*r*s*e....no excuse for his actions. He was requested to remove his mask by teaching staff AND the police officer as his actions were causing concern to staff and pupils.

There is no power to request removal on this occasion but his actions were causing a breach of the peace and so could have been arrested.

What were these actions? The Daily Heil is blocked here. Was it simply wearing a balaclava, buff or similar to keep the cold out? Has the school drive become so near-universal that merely wearing outdoor clothes to take children to/from school by bike is regarded as cause for concern?

What was the mask, for that matter? I wear a firey skull buff in spring/autumn, hoping it might unsettle some drivers and make them think twice about confronting me, but I'd probably switch to another design for visiting schools!

By wearing such a design of mask / balaclava which caused the school staff and pupils to be disturbed and his failure to remove himself from the area in front of the school and failure to remove it even when this had been brought to his attention by the teacher and then police officer he still failed to remove it. His conduct was then causing a breach of the peace .
All he had to do was to remove the facemask...which would have been so easy to do but he chose not to.
The police have several options: to try to resolve the situation without using one of their common law powers. The officer ( and the teacher ) asked several times for the male to remove his facemask as his presence and the wearing of the mask near to the entrance of the school was causing alarm and distress.

The police can arrest and detain anyone who is committing, or they have reasonable cause to believe is about to commit, a breach of the peace.
The correct definition for breach of the peace is that which was given in the case R v. Howell (1981), ie, that the behaviour of the person involved caused the police officer (or private citizen) to believe that:

a breach of the peace had or would occur; and that
it related to harm which was actually done or likely to be done to a person or, in his/her presence, their property.

In this era of terrorist activity, safeguarding of young persons you need to ask yourselves. If a male who was not known to me to and was not initially known to the school turned up at the gates of my child schools wearing a balaclava mask / face mask which caused my child and their friends distress would I be ok with not challenging that person ?

So rightly the school and police will act in the same manner for those wearing a Niqab or Burka, if not why not? Many people have fear of people wearing these garments and worry about the fact they might be terrorists, so on that basis we need to ensure the police and school act in the same manner, otherwise we have a different set of rules for one than another. Or are you going to say that people only feel threat of a terrorist act or fear/upset only for some people wearing a face covering and not others???

[PDQ Mobile]

i see it as the headmistress wasting police time to support her own personal agenda. The guy and his son was apparently well known to all and her. Maybe she is a cyclist hating motorist in her spare time, who knows? Nobody was frightened. Good luck with frightening older kids these days by a cyclist with a mask over his nose. Plus all the other kids probably know the dad and his son.

We don't really know anything about the cause of the "grief".
But to speculate the headmistress is a "cyclist hating motorist" is simply not worth stating.
She probably rides a Norton 750.

What we do know is that he's being a real pain.
Not listening, not giving anyone a chance to say anything.

A man with a problem I would say.

I judge it on the evidence.
What else can one do?

[bigjim]

But to speculate the headmistress is a "cyclist hating motorist" is simply not worth stating.

Did you not notice the,'who knows'?

A man with a problem I would say.

Right back at you!

[PDQ Mobile]

But to speculate the headmistress is a "cyclist hating motorist" is simply not worth stating.

Did you not notice the,'who knows'?

A man with a problem I would say.

Right back at you!

I did notice. But thought it excessively speculative, as I said.

A little politeness goes such a long way.
We simply do not know what preceeded.

But yes, I think he has an attitude problem.
That he posts it up online lends some credence to that.

[reohn2]

....... I think he has an attitude problem.
That he posts it up online lends some credence to that.

I'd agree,it seems some people go out of their way to wind others up.
This chap is a classic example of that.

[bigjim]

But to speculate the headmistress is a "cyclist hating motorist" is simply not worth stating.

Did you not notice the,'who knows'?

A man with a problem I would say.

Right back at you!

I did notice. But thought it excessively speculative, as I said.

A little politeness goes such a long way.
We simply do not know what preceeded.

But yes, I think he has an attitude problem.
That he posts it up online lends some credence to that.

Maybe you should be a little more polite then? You are speculating about his state of mind. Yes he was IMO wrong to post it, but it has since been taken down.

[PDQ Mobile]

Terribly sorry about that old chap.

Though I refute the point that I was speculating (in contrast to your good self).
I saw and heard what I did.
And thought it unnecessarily boorish.

[Airsporter1st]

Reminds me of the time when I was around 8 years old and my father and I made our weekly visit to a market in North London on Saturday morning. We parked, as always, in a residential street (not that many cars around in those days) and went off for a couple of hours browsing.

When we returned, a PC was patrolling up and down the street and, as soon as he saw us heading for the car, he homed in, telling my father that the street was a no-parking zone. My father, quite rightly, enquired where the signs were, to which the PC replied "its only just become a no-parking zone - the signs haven't been put up yet". Needless to say, my father argued the toss, to the point that he was then cautioned. When the PC got to the point of "anything you say...." my father exploded and gave him a few well-chosen words to put in his notebook. Subsequently, my father wrote to the Chief Constable and received an apology.

I can't help thinking that, had the incident been filmed, my father would similarly have been pilloried for his 'attitude', but the fact is he was 100% in the right and expressed his indignation the best way he could.

I must confess, as an impressionable 8 year-old, my respect for the law took quite a nose dive that day, but the point of my story is that, whilst he may not have expressed himself very well, I can fully sympathise with the cyclist's reaction to being unfairly accused. And I do believe, on the evidence provided by the film, that the cyclist was unfairly accused. As has been said already, no one would be taking issue with a woman(?) in a burka under the same circumstances.

If there were a blanket law that everyone's faces should be fully exposed when within, say, 100m of a school and that law was rigorously and impartially enforced, then it would be a different matter.

[PDQ Mobile]

I did not think the PC was overzealous in the clip.
He had been asked to "have a word" or that is my impression.
I thought him professional and polite.

I only watched it once- that was enough!
There may well be other issues which had preceeded the "grief" but it could all have defused much better and everybody could have gone on their happy ways. IMHO.