Does this mean they'll be taking down the likes of the racist Tory election posters next time they appear on billboards around the place. That'll save us a job.

Or will it only apply to messages and art that people who can't afford to buy public space put out there? I fear so...

Is this suppost to be a good thing? Because from the looks of things, it seems like a way for companies to protect their oh-so-important property from the messages of the resistance.

Thanks for the info. Graffiti is an urban blight that does much to lesson the quality of life for working class people all over the country. Although there are still a few Middle Class tossers who try to claim is as art that's only because they don't have it in their stairwell.

Here in Manchester there has been a brilliant scheme where the council, once alerted send out a team to paint over any grafitti straight away, sometimes within hours of it going up, this has proved very effective. Later on a council team arrives and restores the wall or fence to its original state. This has been combined with an initiative in schools to encourage real artistic work.

Would these "messages of the resistance" be such pieces of important social importance as,

"Chelsea are great", "FATBOY", "YO !" and a three foot snake in lime green with the words, "Suck this bitch" comng out of its mouth because that's what I can see from my window.

99% of grafitti is just crap, it has no message of the resistance or politcial comment it's just damage.

Even the crap, the unimaginative insults and the dull tags, is a message of resistance. It's about people making a mark on their communities - taking control over them if only in a symbolic way. Graffiti is a statement of community versus private property.

These council plans are a direct attempt to re-impose state control, literally erasing anything not sanctioned by capitalism and it's functionaries. And the resources that are used propping up capitalism are resources that can't be used for real, human needs and desires.

Solidarity with graffiti 'artists', solidarity with graffiti 'vandals'. They're on our side, whether they know it or not.

OK, so everyone should be forced to accept unsightly tags, insults sprayed on walls, etc just because it's an "act of resistance", and it's reclaiming the space from the State. If they don't like it, they are obviously brainwashed drones, yeah?

Well if people in a area don't want all their walls covered with graffiti, they shouldn't have it forced down their throats IMO, it's THEIR space too, so what right has some individual have to go around defacing it with a spray can if that is not what the people want?

Egads, the world has gone completely mad....

To say that tagging is a form of art and some deep and meaningful statement against 'the man' is at best short sighted. Its basically just a different way of pissing on a corner to mark out your territory, and when these urine stains contain messages of hate and anti community - it becomes even more pathetic. these acts of mindless selfishness make it so that people will no longer see any forms of messages people are trying to give out.

i also think that trying to get rid of messages of hate and making it so that people can try to live without a small few people making theirs worse is a human need/desire.

Fuck the National Front
It says, loud under the arches
Pray, it advises, in pink letters on the bridge
Brad was there, and Supersledge
Their names are sprayed on subway walls
Multi-coloured jewels of names in swooping lines and curving falls
(Practiced hard for ages on the back of cornflakes packets
Til they got to 3 dimensions, then they knew that they could hack it)
But Sledge got caught, a shiny sort
Sitting on a polished chair
Smoothing back his tidy hair
Gave him five years deep inside
His creative spark just died
Brad moved on meanwhile, you would
Found a woman, said for good
Spends his time now gurgling
At his new kid, his cans forgotten
While Sledge has started burgling
A prison trade, and something rotten
Smells inside his Ford Capri
Deodorant, sprayed on him
By our shiny clean society.

With people living on the streets, how dare the council waste its money on quick response graffiti response teams. Where are its fucking priorities?

I'm against the alienation of the modern city.

I'm against the destruction of our communities in the name of profit and greed.

I'm against the soulless boxes they call architecture.

I'm against adverts everywhere telling me to buy buy buy things that I can't afford, don't need and that wouldn't make me happy even if I could.

I can think of a million better responses to all these problems than writing a nickname on every wall, bollard and bus shelter in my neighbourhood.

Taggers: get a life. You have nothing to say and infinite repetition with a few stylistic flourishes doesn't make your "message" any more profound. If tagging is meant to be an artistic or a political statement, it's a totally brainless and ineffective one. No amount of academic theorising is going to make a tag on a bus stop into anything other than it is: infantile self-gratification. You are illiterate and incontinent and your message is shit. (Yes, especially those of you that are plenty old enough to know better and have higher degrees in semiotics.)

Congratulations to Wandsworth Council for trying to get a grip on the situation. We can all think of good ways to spend the money elsewhere, but a neighbourhood that was a total graffiti free-for-all would be even less worth living in than what we have at the moment.