One Saturday afternoon not so long ago, I parked my car on a double yellow line outside a Chinese takeaway near where I live. I had done this numerous times before, as have many others. Virtually anytime I pass the takeaway during business hours, there are three or four cars parked outside or nearby.
In fact the first occasion I pulled up there, I asked a passing garda if it was all right to do so. He said it was OK if I was only going in for some food. Over several years, I have noticed squad cars passing up and down by the cars parked outside this takeaway and taking plenty of no notice. In truth, there is nowhere else to park nearby, so that, were it not for this blind-eye strategy, the takeaway would go out of business.
On this occasion, however, I had my little daughter, Roisin, with me, so instead of waiting as usual inside the shop, I simply stuck my head around the door to order food and was back at the car in less than a minute. The food was for Roisin, as she is partial to the occasional portion of egg fried rice.
She was sitting in her baby seat in the back of the car. I sat in beside her so we could talk and have a view of the food counter. Food can take up to 15 minutes to prepare, and I had arranged with the assistant to give me the nod when it was ready. After a couple of minutes, however, a squad car happened along and had to stop to let a couple of cars pass from the other direction. This happens all the time, as there is room for just one line of traffic to pass at a time, and this would probably be true even if no cars were parked there at all. Seeing me in the back seat of my car, the driver of the squad car started to wave at me furiously. I got out and he shouted: "Where's the driver?". I indicated that I was the driver. "Get that so 'n' so car out of there", he replied.
I started to explain that I would be just a couple of minutes while my order was being prepared, but he insisted in even more belligerent terms that I should get the hell out of there before he gave me a ticket. Feeling that I had no choice in the matter, I drove off. Eventually I found a parking place some distance away. I then unstrapped my daughter and carried her back to the takeaway.
When I arrived, there were no fewer than three cars outside, including one in the space recently vacated by me. There was no sign of the squad car. I went into the takeaway, collected my food and walked back to my car. On the way, however, I suffered a slight brainstorm and found myself heading for the local Garda station.
I went in, knocked on a small window and explained to the garda behind the desk what had just occurred. It all seemed very black-and-white to him. Had I or had I not been parked on a double yellow line? Yes, I acknowledged, I had. Well, then, what was I going on about?
What I was going on about, I explained, was the arbitrary nature of the manner in which the law appeared to operate. What I was going on about was the fact that the reason I and others parked on the double yellow line was that there was manifestly no place else to park, and that this had been acknowledged by the gardai in their implicit policy of turning a blind eye to the illegal parking most of the time. Yes, he said, but it was still illegal.
I know that, I replied, but if it is illegal, why is the law not enforced at all times? Why, for example, were other drivers not moved along? Why were the three drivers illegally parked outside the takeaway at that very moment not being told to move along? Why was one of them entitled to occupy the position which I had been ordered to vacate? Because, he replied, the drivers were probably not sitting in their cars. Had I been sitting in my car? Yes, I agreed, I had. There you are then, he said. So, I said, the offence is the fact that I was sitting in my car rather than the fact that I had parked on a double yellow line? No, he replied patiently, the offence was illegal parking, but I had been moved along because I happened to be sitting in my car at the time.
So, if I had been inside the takeaway, instead of talking to my daughter in my car, I would not have been asked to move on? Yes, he agreed, that was probably the case. Did he not find that a strange approach to law enforcement? No, he said, since everyone parked illegally outside the takeaway, gardai would need to be there all the time in order to enforce the parking prohibition. This was not possible, but this did not mean that parking there was legal.
I then told him that, on at least one previous occasion, it had been indicated to me that it was OK to park there if I was going in to buy food. He did not dispute that this might have occurred, but seemed puzzled as to its relevance. I suggested that if the law was rigorously enforced the takeaway would have to close. That was probably the case, he agreed, but it was not a matter for the Garda. The force had its duty to do. Yes, I remarked, but only when they felt like it. It wasn't a question of feeling like it, he replied. "The law is the law". Yes, I replied, except sometimes it's not. "You're just mad because you got caught", he said.
"No," I replied, as evenly as I could. "I don't give a damn about being caught. But I am mad because the others have not been caught as well. I am mad because I had to walk half the length of the village, carrying my baby daughter, to find that someone else has been able to take up, with impunity, the space I have been forced to vacate.
"I am mad because the gardai are supposed to be public servants, working for me, but instead I am their subject, at the mercy of their whims. I am mad because I was forced to move on simply because I was `there'. I am mad because I have been reminded by this trivial incident of my observations and experience of the abuse of power, for as long as I can remember, by gardai who would give you a kick in the arse as quick as a pat on the back.
"I am mad that a perfectly reasonable unofficial arrangement which allows a trader to carry out his business is misused in a manner as to confer arbitrary powers on what should be public servants. I am mad because such arrangements enable gardai to be as capricious and overbearing as they please. I am mad because such inconsistency in the implementation of a law causes not just this law, but all laws, to fall into a degree of disrepute.
"I am mad because there is one law for the goose and another for the Cantonese fried duck. I am mad because there is a difference between justice and the law, and this does not appear to be understood. I am mad, in short, because of the metaphysical affront which I have just suffered." Well, that's what I should have said. What I did say was: "Thanks anyway, I just wanted to make the point".
I'm sure anyone in this State who pays PAYE, or a TV licence, or water charges, or whatever, and wonders why it is that only the easy targets are pursued, will have a sense of what I wanted to say. Something tells me that the garda behind the desk had no such insight, and I can only imagine that they all had a great laugh when the boys in the squad car came in for their tea.