The full text of the letter is:
"For the past 20 years, my boyfriend, Brian Bruno, has worked as a street performer in Leicester Square, London, singing and playing guitar to the thousands of holidaymakers, members of the public and tourists from abroad.
He's made many friends from chatting to them and getting song requests and generally helping people who get a little bit lost around the area. We receive many postcards from around the world.
Brian is extremely talented, and it's his choice to entertain in this fashion. So imagine our surprise when, last week, the council confiscated his hard-worked-for equipment without any warning or discussion. It is quite extraordinary that in a country where millions are unemployed -- and many seem to want to stay that way -- and where businessmen and government officials are making thousands from fraud and deceit, one man trying to make a living from his talent should be treated this way.
Brian has never claimed state benefits, nor indeed sought any help of that kind, until now, having been stripped of the only way he knows how to earn a living. With no equipment he cannot perform, indoors or outdoors, and Leicester Square is being deprived of a loveable, helpful character.
He has never caused any trouble or harmed anyone, and friends and I believe he does not deserve this treatment. Brian wants to work in a job and area he loves, but now he is being forced by law to seek an alternative way of living, namely joining the millions on the dole.
Without performance money, we will definitely have to move, and I cannot bear the thought of living on the dole or on the street.
Miss Antje Jakob, London N1."
I have written to the Daily Mail (they don't publish an email address for letters to the editor, so it's had to go via snail-mail), asking that a reporter follow up on the story, to find out the council's version and whether or not Brian gets his equipment back. If anyone else wants to write, the address is:
Paul Dacre, Editor, Daily Mail, Northcliffe House, 2 Derry Street, London W8 5TT.
Joanline breaks added by mudelf ;-)