First world problems don’t get much more pressingly “first world” than the scourge of leaf blowers in leafy northwest London.
However, Tom Conti remained unrepentant yesterday after being ridiculed for complaining that the machines were ruining the peace and tranquility of life in Hampstead, one of London’s best addresses.
The actor, who lives in a £15 million home complete with a “small ballroom”, a home cinema and a roof terrace commanding views across London, had blamed newcomers for ignoring Hampstead etiquette by hiring gardeners who used noisy leaf-blowers.
Last year he put the house up for sale and had previously complained about local planning decisions. He also opposed a Tesco store in Belsize Park.
His comments, in an interview for the Channel 4 programme, Posh Neighbours at War, attracted little in the way of sympathy. Responses on social media included accusations of “champagne socialism — live a real life Tom, try living in the real world” and the advice: “Tom Conti . . . how do you want them to get rid of them leaves? Just go to the back of your enormous house and you won’t hear it!”
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Another Twitter user posted: “Here he is. King of the complainers. Tom Conti. Complaining about leaf blowers. What an a***.”
The actor was standing firm, however. He told The Times: “It is not a case of it being a rich person’s problem and poor people aren’t affected. Anybody with ears is affected. There are judges and lawyers who live around here and many people who work from home. I write.
“It’s a terrible noise and as soon as it begins the rage starts, which is not very helpful for the creative juices. It’s like having a motorcycle in the room. It’s all very well idiots on Twitter, pointing out that half the world is starving. But the question wasn’t about half the world starving. It was about leaf-blowers.”
He added: “They really ought to be outlawed. It’s only in the last 10 years it has become a problem. It’s the newcomers. The ones who hire those people in white vans who call themselves gardeners. When you buy a house here there are certain rules, and one of the rules is you mustn’t make noise.” As for leaves on the ground, he said: “There’s a perfectly good solution — use a bloody broom. You’ll find it works awfully well.”
The 74-year-old actor and theatre director, originally from Paisley, Renfrewshire, had lamented the changes in the neighbourhood since he and his wife moved to Hampstead in 1985. In Monday’s programme, he said: “It’s very, very loud and unnecessary. If these people can’t stand the sight of a leaf then it’s not a leaf blower they need, it’s a psychiatrist.”
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The din of the petrol-powered machines has already divided the wealthy residents of the area, with the local residents association risking the wrath of neighbours by posting football-style yellow and red cards through the letterbox of offending leaf-blower users to make their feelings known.
Gary Shaw, a retired stockbroker and secretary of Hampstead Garden Suburb Residents Association, said that the organisation was receiving half a dozen requests for cards every week, since the campaign was launched last year.
He added: “It’s a terribly trivial problem, of course, in the context of the world’s problems. But if you’ve got a pile of leaves and there’s a cheap and noisy way of solving it [a leaf-blower] and a quiet but more expensive way of solving it [hiring a gardener], then you are saying to your neighbour, ‘You are going to bear the cost of my gardening.’ We are approaching the time of year again when you cannot use your garden on a summer’s day because as soon as one [blower] stops on one side, another starts on the other. Something must be out of balance when the party causing the disturbance seems to have more rights than the party being disturbed.”
Celebrity spats
• The former Arsenal and France striker Thierry Henry and Tom Conti fell out over the footballer’s plan to build a home with a 40ft fish tank.
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• The singer Robbie Williams and Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page were at loggerheads over Williams’s plans for building works.
• George Clooney upset his Oxfordshire neighbours with plans to install an 18-camera CCTV system, some of which were on 4m poles.
• Justin Bieber was reported to have paid $80,000 (£55,000) to his neighbours after causing damage to their home by throwing eggs at it.