I reported the same thing back in February 2007
"Well, I thought I had seen it all until yesterday.
I passed a relatively new unlettered Berlingo Van outside our local library. What caught my attention was the long aluminium water fed pole leaning up against the 2nd story windows. I turned my van around and headed back to this youngster purely with the intention of finding out what aluminium pole he was using and how he managed with it as it was a big ’un.
He was just packing up as I got to him after finding a place to park. In the back of his van was a blue plastic drum mounted horizontally on a metal frame. There was a small round hole crudely cut in the top of the drum. There was a battery and pump lying around along with 4 plastic 20 litre drums and a massive DI vessel – nothing secured – all loose in the back. The young operative informed me that he fills the blue drum through this hole with ordinary tap water from his supply of plastic containers. He said that there was a hose coming out of the bottom of the drum to the pump, then to the DI Vessel (he didn’t know what it was called but knew there were beads in it) and then onto his pole. If he ran out of water he could fill his ‘jerry cans’ from his customer’s tap.
The brush this youngster was using was an old Vikan 16” which was battered and had lots of bristles missing.
I had to pinch myself to make sure that what I saw was actually real. I come from Africa and have seen some improvisations, but this took the cake.
For a moment I wondered why I was going to all the future trouble of kitting an 800kg Peugeot Partner HDI van for my son to use when our local council are employing the services of out of area contractors who supposedly meet all the Council’s safety criteria but blatantly ignore the health and safety of their own personnel.
I drove past the library today and from the road could see the terrible mess of all of the windows he had washed. I didn’t think it was possible to see so many white spots and streaks."
Funny, but 2 days later it poured with rain and the driven rain washed the windows clean. They were great. Sadly some yobbo (s) threw something on them a couple of days later which has left fatty runs all down them.
Its July and the windows haven't been cleaned since.
Don't want to enquire either.
Spruce