23/01/2017 Inside Out East

The scams costing our elderly billions every year.

Pensioners are being targeted by devious scams and

Criminals refer to these people as suckers,

people they can go to and target to take money off.

After the threat of a massive storm surge, what is the

way forward for our coastal communities?

And Milton Keynes was a vision for the future,

Revealing the stories that matter closer to home,

Just over a week ago, the coast here was being

First, our elderly are being conned out of

their money and we discovered the problem is getting worse.

What I'm working on at the moment is a scams

We are visiting consumers in their homes to give them advice

It is prevalent as we have so many older consumers in Suffolk.

Leslie has come to see 67 your old John Pearce.

He has spent thousands of pounds responding to scam mail.

These plastic bags contain just a few weeks' worth.

Catalogues, letters, an important reminder.

If they tell you you have won a lot of money...

This is a sort of thing we're talking about.

It is designed to make you excited about receiving the letter.

The only thing you have to do is order a significant amount of

product from our little catalogue that you can't live without.

Then you will get entered into the prize

So what are the chances of winning big money

Well, according to Leslie pretty much non-existent.

Trading Standards say they are struggling to cope

Research shows the typical victim is aged around 74,

lives alone and is losing an average of four and a half thousand pounds

Scam victims like John often end up buying products they don t need just

so they can be entered into the prize draw.

John has bought loads of medicinal creams and supplements that

Lesley is worried they may even be unsafe.

You have a stash of these in the garage?

If you do not know what is in it, especially with your health

Do you even know if you can take it with your medical condition?

The fear is that scams are now reaching epidemic proportions

and the cost is estimated at a staggering ?3.5 billion a year.

This conference in Ipswich is trying to raise awareness of scamming

and to see what can be done to stop it.

If you have lists of people's names, you can sell those and if you have

lists of vulnerable people, that is worth more.

People trade on the dark Internet what we call suckers list.

It is how criminals refer to these people.

They are referred to as suckers, people they

I get the impression that it is something that is almost

a crime that is going on behind closed

We do not know just how widespread it is.

For all sorts of reasons, people are the targets of

So embarrassed that they were conned that we do not tell anybody.

I think we would begin to realise that there

is a whole other group of people out there who are very lonely elderly

people who are so isolated from the community that some of us

To try to combat the problem of scams a national scam

Using information from the sucker list they tell local trading

standards teams who s at risk of being conned.

But Inside Out has discovered that while the names of more than 80

thousand people have been passed on, only a fraction of that number

have received visits from trading standards officers.

Suffolk Trading Standards have been working with

Suffolk Trading Standards have had 1,507 scam victims referred to them

but just 132 of those have been visited by a trading

It might not be very impressive, but the work

We contacted every single person in writing.

We followed up with phone calls where there was a phone number

The 132 visits where were we made definite contact and the individual

wanted or gave permission for us to visit.

We also did nearly 200 telephone referrals where we spoke

Unfortunately, a lot of people had died,

a lot of people had moved away

and a large proportion had moved into care.

We could do far more if we had resourcing.

Our department is very effective at what it does.

I see us as being very small but very impactful.

But with every else these days budgets rule the roost.

Our research has revealed Suffolk is not alone is having

Do you have any post? J McKenzie had been the victim of scam may several

years. ?15,500 ready and waiting. It years. ?15,500 ready and waiting. It

is not. What is your take on it? They told me it was waiting and

never heard another word. Does it never heard another word. Does it

occur to you that there is a serious organised crime who are gangs

setting up? It would worry me very much. I am a fairly trusting person

and I always thought when people see, we are offering you this, and

it comes, I think it is genuine. I thought this was another company

trying to make its money. Then you came along and told me it is a lot

of rubbish and since then, I have been telling them up. Well Jill has

stopped responding to scam mail, stopped responding to scam mail,

Leslie is hoping that John Pearce Leslie is hoping that John Pearce

will also stop wasting his money. As far as consumers are concerned, we

are saying do not be silly. You have been taken in by conmen who write

material is intended to make you material is intended to make you

part with your are in a full stop it happens to all people, rich people

good cash for that. Because you have good cash for that. Because you have

definitely one? What is that. John's home is full of boxes of things he

paid for hoping to win a prize. Most of these boxes have never been

opened. Do you need all this? You don't, do you? Leslie will be

sure he does not lose any more of sure he does not lose any more of

his money. I'm angry on his behalf. He has been taken in by companies

selling overpriced, potentially unsafe products to somebody who

thinks they are in with a chance of winning a significant prize. I

believe you cannot have people in business who say you are going to

win but you're not likely to win because there is no draw or nothing.

It is just one big con. I wish they would tell me that because it could

have saved me a lot of money. If there is something you think

we should be looking in to on the You're watching

Inside Out for the east We look back at

the history of Milton In my view, the city has been

an outstanding success. So many of my friends

take the mickey out of I have great parks,

great everything. It was a huge relief just over a one

week ago when the storm surge on Friday the 13th was not as bad

as some Powerful waves crashed

onto the coast. While east escaped

serious damage this time, we are asking

for how much longer? I really wish I could convey

to you just how powerful this swell is appearing here at the beach

at Hemsby, with these waves crash onto the beach with the winds

blowing down the north sea. Now you might find this hard

to believe but where I m standing, three years ago,

there was a house here. It was the home of Jackie

and Steve Connolly and on the night of the storm surge, December 2013,

their house along with a number of others houses in Hemsby

were lost to the sea. It was one of the most dramatic

incidents seen along the east coast coast in recent years -

six homes were washed into the sea, Now, three years on from that

fateful night there s a real concern it could happen all over again

and not too far from here down on the Marrams the remaining houses

are being evacuated. But not everyone here is taking

the advice to leave their homes. I'm spending the day with local

resident Paul Ray who's decided to stay put,

despite his home being just Are you worried living here? A

little but not a lot. I am not going to leave my home. I will stay here.

The wife will stay here too. I want to make sure everything is OK and if

everything is OK, I will stay here. If things are dodgy and it starts

ticking the sand and dunes away, I have somewhere to go to. Are you

ensured? Yes, I am insured. I do not want to lose the place. Obviously

what happened three years ago with people who lost their homes here,

that must be firmly in your mind when you get storms like this. I

will never forget it. I was part of the crew who made some materials

from one of the bungalows down here. It will stick with me all the time.

We're it is a one off and a piece of land is taken away, I will just keep

my fingers crossed and keep my eye on it. You cannot believe how cold

it is right now but if you live in a place like this, the three things

you are going to worry about are things like this. You have a spring

tide, so lots of the water coming down the north sea and if you have a

high tide that converges with strong winds, you are really going to worry

because the wind behind all this water coming down the north sea

creates a surge and then crashes into where people live. Hemsby was

not alone for feeling the worse. Along the east coast, people were

anxiously awaiting the tidal surge. At the ferry they were doing what

they could to prepare for flooding. Along the coast at J Wicken Essex,

people were being advised to leave their homes and get shelter. In

Great Yarmouth, the council were providing sandbags and emergency

services warned 5000 homes and it to be evacuated. 17th severe flood

warnings were in place. The highest alert, meaning danger to life.

Cromer was one of the first places to feel the full brunt of the surge?

on shore winds worsened the effect of the high tide.

Twenty five miles away at Hemsby residents were anxiously

waiting their turn to be hit by the tidal surge.

I'm back with Paul to check on the state

The winds not inshore here, things might be OK.

That is a long way up there now. You can see the concrete box that they

put into thousand and 13. which is helping tonight,

but is not efficient really, but if we didn t have those

what happen, it would take another Did you think you would be spending

evenings like this checking the sea? No, never. Why did you miss here in

It is a lovely place to live and I It is a lovely place to live and I

like it. Like many places up and down our coast today, it has been

dramatic at times. A lot of fear and apprehension with what could happen

with this storm surge. Thankfully, looks like it is coming to an end.

Hemsby has dodged a bullet this time.

The tidal surge might not have been as bad as people feared, but even

Cromer in Norfolk took a real hammering.

The pier and dozens of beach huts were damaged.

The cost of repairs is estimated at hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Two days later a man was killed in Thorpeness in Suffolk,

when a cliff collapsed on top of him.

A tragic reminder of just how dangerous erosion can be.

In Hemsby, this time around, no homes were lost,

but some sea defences were dislodged and had to be replaced.

But what does the future hold for places like Hemsby,

is there long term solution to protect our coastal communities?

The coast is very low lying. A lot of it is below sea level. As you can

see here, it is a very soft coast line and it erodes very fast when

the waves hit on it. The fastest the waves hit on it. The fastest

eroding coastline in Europe, Norfolk and Suffolk. How quickly is the

landscape changing? Very fast. 6000 landscape changing? Very fast. 6000

years ago we could have walked over to Holland here. The north sea was

not here. The coast has been eroding back and back to where we are today.

I think the challenge for the future is with the volatility with the

weather we are seeing an increased surge is coming down the coast, that

erosion will accelerate. What can be done to protect this coastline? We

are already spending hundreds of millions of pounds on this coastline

to maintain it and build new defences. We will continue to do

that in the future. We cannot protect everyone everywhere all the

time from these big surges. That is why it is so important that we do

our warning and informing people when we think there is a big surge

appropriate measures to protect appropriate measures to

themselves. Every time there is a themselves. Every time there is a

storm surges have to evacuate homes and get the emergency services

involved, is it more cost-effective to build sea defences as Maggie

would have to build a concrete wall which would build millions of

pounds. It would be very ugly and not the sort of thing people with

life. We have makeshift sea defences here. We have managed to sink some

concrete here. This is the kind of thing you could help them with?

Could you add my sea defences here as the Environment Agency? This is

something the committee has done as something the committee has done as

a pilot and the local authority is monitoring this and see whether it

will work and last into the future. If you think it will put a proposal

for funding and we will look at that for funding and we will look at that

positively and work with them and the queue minuted to see what we can

do to help. -- the community. Look at this today. A contrast to what it

was like during the storm surge. It was not as bad as people thought it

could have been but lots of sand has lost from the sand dunes, which

means the houses are more at risk than ever. When a storm surge is

forecast, you are always going to fear the worst.

On this very day in 1967, the new town of Milton Keynes

It was designed to relieve the pressure

on housing in London and to

give Buckinghamshire a commercial centre.

Sean Peel has been to meet some of the people involved in the

Milton Keynes, famous for its concrete cows

That is just headline fodder, there is much more to Milton Keynes.

I have come here to meet the people who shaped

the place, the people who

Also the people who think the original plans

At the moment, most of it is still farmland.

The last harvest before a new town was sown.

This 1973 film shows the lie of the land

It is home to a quarter of a million people,

with plans to add another 100,000 in the next ten years.

The plan here shows a gridiron of roads.

Master planner Fred Roach designed the town

Wide roads and borders, pathways and cycle

routes, car friendly, people friendly.

American Lee Shostak was one of the original

On Milton Keynes in 1971 and ended up

working for the development corporation.

What more can a planner ask them to be involved in building a

In my view, the city has been an outstanding success.

There were a few things we could have done better.

Some of the housing could have been built to

We still do not have a good public transport system.

Something that defines Milton Keynes is the number

of trees, intended to give it a feeling of being

Fred Roach told his team, we cannot afford to build Venice,

40% is green space, perfect for this walking club who have plenty to say

about what works and what does not. Like the buses. It is very hard on a

grid to run the bus system that is efficient. I think in London they

buses on. I do not think anybody can buses on. I do not think anybody can

afford to do that here. I like the openness of the grid squares, that

is one of the defining features. There is a nice walk you can do from

is near your front door is. We met is near your front door is. We met

the planners in 79 and it was winter and quite stark. We said, I want to

be here in 20 years' time and we're here 35 years later and it is

looking gorgeous. What about the people who live here? Former world

Badminton champion Gail arrived in Milton Keynes 15 years ago because

the National badminton headquarters is based here. When she stopped

playing to start a family, she stayed. Milton Keynes is one of the

best places for families. I am spoilt for choice and so many of my

friends take the Mickey out of me for being in Milton Keynes.

Actually, I have this. Fantastic schools around the corner from my

house, great parks, great everything. It really is so family

centred now. Why would I want to leave? My kids are going to grow up

and Milton Keynes and be proud to be from Milton Keynes. It is about what

they need and what they would like. Fred Roach, the father of Milton

about buildings or design, it would about buildings or design, it would

be about the people and the people who live here by and large really

love it. There are some who feel the plans have been ruined. Where we are

standing now is the site for the new Central area. The sinner that people

forget we existed, we are only an agency, the sinner it will mean the

people who live in Milton Keynes have adopted their own city. We have

been forgotten to soon according to feel. He is a fierce defender of the

original plans. He feels it might become like any other city. The

principles of the original masterplan were brilliant. However,

sadly, the people of Milton Keynes have been betrayed. The people who

are now in charge and have been in charge for the last 20 years or so,

bit by bit, death by 1000 cuts, destroyed the very thing that made

Milton Keynes extremely special and a very user friendly city. He at the

hub, really narrowed the Boulevard from 75 to 40 metres, filled in

underpasses sort that pedestrians are forced to cross the road at risk

and hold up all the traffic, you lot of the time now there are traffic

jams. It is much harder. There has been a lot of pretending. We are

doing the same thing. No, you are doing the same thing. No, you are

not. We are not fooled. Unlike Gail, a newcomer, Simon moved

here in 1978 when he was just four years old. Simon loved growing up

here and now links with his wife Hannah and two children, close to

where he used to play. Milton Keynes was great as a kid because it was

all open. I remember most summer all open. I remember most summer

holidays we would be outside and my dad to me fishing for the first

time. That was it, really, I spent most of my summer 's fishing. There

is more sea front here than in Brighton with all the different

lakes and canals. Yes, it was fantastic. I think there are a lot

of things we've had to wait for. The snow dome is only 12 years old. That

was a new development. We did not get a decent sized cinema until the

1980s. The football stadium was only ten years old. No professional

sport, apart from the ice hockey. We wait but when things come, they tend

than they would have been somewhere than they would have been somewhere

else. Is there to early for there to be a Milton Keynes type? A

character. I think people in their character. I think people in their

30s and 40s and people we grew up with, they would say yes, I am from

Milton Keynes. We are adaptable. Everything changes. We could drive

out to the edge of the city one weekend and it is not a road

junction there and then there is a roundabout. OK, that is new. That is

made Milton Keynes part of the made Milton Keynes part of the

landscape. A garden city in all but name. Compared to the lack of

Colchester, Cambridge built on centuries old foundations. It is a

mere toddler. A 50-year-old toddler, just finding their feet. My children

are going to say, I am from Milton Keynes and I am really proud. Have a

real voice of what they want. I feel a bit wanted when I read development

plans and expansion plans, the huge. I think it is in danger of growing a

bit too quickly. 200 years from now when you come back to Milton Keynes,

what will you find? You will find the landscaping, the city 's trees

and parks will be even better, more luxurious. Our city's landscaping is

the gift that keeps on giving. I love that. I never knew people from

Milton Keynes were called milk and beans. Next week, the incredible

story of the work of art found behind another. It is like something

out of a movie. You can get in touch with me... That is it from

Lowestoft. I will see you next week. Goodbye. Also next week, the women

who face abuse because they were Islamic dress. It should not give

people the chance to define new like you are worthless. What it is like

when you take over the care of relatives and loved ones.

Hello, I'm Riz Lateef with your 90 second update.