Rather than going for long term rental contracts people with property to spare are opting for renting their houses out for wild parties on a nightly basis.

They have found they can make much more money by letting partygoers take over their property for a wild night often including noisy karaoke and pool well into the morning.

Some people have been forced to leave their own homes and sleep elsewhere.

While yet more others who want to sell up and move away are unable to do so as buyers get wind of the problem, often in classy residential estates.

There are also claims that the parties feature more than booze – one Australian man spoke of one house being used for illegal drugs.

Requests for action to the police and local council have achieved nothing and now residents at their wits end have turned to Thaivisa to publicize the issue before things potentially turn violent.

One man affected is British retiree Paul Fearnley, 57 who moved to Thailand with his wife Stella, 66, three and a half years ago. They previously lived in Lincolnshire.

He was expecting a quiet idyllic lifestyle in Thailand but instead it has turned into a daily nightmare of noise and ever increasing problems and frustrations.

He said that there are two houses in the “Sunshine Mountain 1” housing estate that are being rented out as party houses after the owners realized they could make a killing.

One is owned by a Thai couple and the other Australian/Thai.

“Both properties have moved in karaoke machines,” he said, “and one even has a pool table. That has made the screaming from that place even worse for some reason”.

He said that the problem has been going on for a long time but has been even worse recently with the Songkran holidays meaning parties every night – and no sleep for any of the neighbors.

“We have friends who just go and stay elsewhere during the parties – they can’t sleep.

“And it is not just in our housing estate,” he claimed. “This is happening all over Hua Hin. Just down the road from us in another new estate they have it even worse than we do”.

Police have been called on numerous occasions but while that means the noise goes down temporarily it is soon cranked up again when officers leave.

There have even been reports of partygoers’ waste such as bottles and cans being dumped in neighbors’ bins because the ones at the party houses were overflowing.

The partygoers are all Thais he said.

“A friend of ours is trying to sell up and move away,” said Paul, “but when prospective buyers find out about the party houses they are no longer interested in moving in”.

The council has been called in by Thai people living in Paul’s estate – that currently has just 19 properties – but while promises are made to take action nothing concrete has taken place.

“Our peace has been shattered”, said Paul, “And the problem is now all over Hua Hin and the authorities must take action”.

While he told Thaivisa that there have been no threats to people at this stage he admitted that it could turn nasty if something is not done.

Meanwhile, the situation for an Australian couple in Soi Green Shop off Pala U Road is probably even worse.

Electronic engineer Peter Merz and his wife Paula, both 72, have a party house right next door to their two story property as well as another one just 40 meters away.

“It is impossible to describe how unbearable this situation is,” Peter told Thaivisa on Tuesday. “Next door there has been a party almost every night since the beginning of March”.

Peter, who had lived in Bangkok for ten years and has been in Hua Hin for seven said that only being able to go to friends’ houses has kept the couple sane.

They have only slept in their own home twice since the beginning of April, he said.

His neighbor is a Thai man who refuses to discuss the matter instead referring the couple to an agent.

Speaking about the noise from the pool area as well as a pool table set up in the home he said that sleeping was impossible and that 5 to 6am endings for the parties were par for the course.

In addition the houses were not built for large numbers often up to 20 persons – consequently he said that the septic tank had overflowed sending the smell of awful waste over to his side of the fence.

This prompted the agent to make alterations but the noxious smells continued unabated.

“The more whisky and beer they drink the louder it gets,” said Peter.

“And I have also observed the use of illegal drugs on more than one occasion”, he claimed.

Labour Minister General Sirichai Distakul said after the Cabinet meeting that a royal decree on the Social Security Office (SSO) insurance qualifications and a royal decree on the SSO contribution criteria and rates, and criteria and conditions for benefits, as well as a ministerial regulation on the rate of government contributions were approved.

Voluntarily insured persons under the Social Security Act’s Article 40 will enjoy increased benefits, including:

Bt300 per day of hospitalisation due to accident or sickness to compensate for a lack of income (up to 90 days per year).

An additional Bt3,000 on top of the Bt40,000 death/funeral-assisting compensation if the voluntarily insured person has paid contributions to the SSO fund for more than six months.

Bt200 per head per month in child support (for up to two children).

Bt10,000 one-time old-age pension if the voluntarily insured person has paid contributions to the SSO fund for more than 180 months.

Being a voluntarily insured person under the Social Security Act’s Article 40 does not require a health check and can be used along with the universal healthcare scheme.

The country’s 21 million informal-sector workers can benefit from the changes. The Labour Ministry planned to cover 3 million such workers this year and the changes will require a Bt400-million budget if implemented.

In the long term, a Bt3-billion budget is meant to cover the entire informal-sector workforce in line with the 20-year national strategy’s framework.

Meanwhile, major media organisations planned to move against the bill on Media Freedom Day on May 3, saying the bill was aimed at controlling the media rather than protecting journalists.

The committee, under the National Reform Steering Council (NRSA), plans to deliberate the proposal next month, Kanit said, adding that the latest proposal was to ease concerns of the press about state interference in the media.

The draft bill on media regulation will be tabled in the NRSA whips’ meeting tomorrow. Kanit said members were expected to discuss the regulation on May 9.

He said the bill had 100 articles and, despite the controversy surrounding the legislation, the committee had maintained most of the key points. Among them was the setting up of a 15-member media professional council, which would include permanent secretaries of the Prime Minister’s Office and Culture Ministry as well as presidents of media organisations and experts from diverse fields.

Kanit said that after the two permanent secretaries had completed their terms of office, the council could recruit other suitable candidates to fill the vacancies. The council should be set up within two years of the law taking effect, he said.

The committee also maintained the proposed licensing system for members of media in the bill, Kanit said. Existing professionals would be granted a licence while new entrants would be required to undergo training.

The law also prescribed rules and regulations for professionals to abide by. If they fail to do so, they would face consequences with revocation of their licence being the most severe, Kanit said.

Meanwhile, major media organisations led by the Thai Journalists Association launched a campaign against media repression under the slogan “Stop Media Registration, Stop Controlling the People”.

On May 3, the organisations plan to read a statement opposing the bill and hold a series of activities in protest against the legislation.

THE MILITARY government yesterday confirmed its decision to buy a submarine from China because of its cheapness and the fact that many neighbours have the vessels – but observers said the warship was of little strategic value and questioned its price and quality.

The Cabinet quietly approved the Navy’s proposal to spend Bt 13.5 billion on one Yuan-class submarine and instructed the Navy’s commander, Admiral Na Arreenich, to finalise the purchasing contract with the designated Chinese manufacturer soon.

“The reason we chose Chinese-built submarines is because they are the cheapest when compared to other countries,” Deputy Prime Minister Prawit Wongsuwan told reporters yesterday. The submarines were needed to “protect our natural resources in the Andaman Sea”, he added, while stressing that neighbouring countries “all have submarines”.

The Navy planned to obtain three S26T Yuan-class submarines for Bt 36 billion. The first one approved by Cabinet last week would be delivered within the next six years. Two more are expected to be purchased over the next decade.

In Southeast Asia, Singapore and Vietnam have already commissioned six submarines each to their fleets while Indonesia and Malaysia have two each. All are buying more amid looming threats to their maritime security due to territorial conflicts over the South China Sea.

The China Shipbuilding Industry Corp will be the likely main contractor for the Thailand-bound submarine. If the contract is secured, Thailand will become the company’s second foreign customer after Pakistan.

A security expert said yesterday that, while it is not unusual for the military-installed government to favour purchases of weapons and vehicles for the military, it is necessary to render civil benefits of such to the public.

“Reasoning to gain large-scale vehicles to maintain military balance during war-free time is rather conservative,” said Rangsit University’s Wanwichit Boonprong. “What the public becomes intrigued about with this issue is the military hardware’s worthiness to people as mere civilians.”

Regarding the submarine, the authorities should make clear what actions the warship may take to serve its purpose on deep-sea resources, such as by surveying for potential energy in maritime economic zones, he said.

On regional security, he said, the authorities could provide some tangible reasons, apart from a mere strategic maritime balance. For instance, they could make use of military joint practices as an opportunity for technology exchanges and regional cooperation to protect international waters.

While analysts saw the need for a submarine, Surachart Bamrungsuk, security expert at Chulalongkorn University, was quoted by local media as saying the factors of timing, the number of submarines, price, quality as well as the suitability to the strategic areas and missions for their operations must be clarified by the Navy.

This clarity is required because the purchase will require a lot of budget and the procurement will create debt to the country for over 10 years which all Thais must shoulder, he was quoted as saying by Krungthep Turakit, The Nation’s sister newspaper last week.

Defence spending has tripled in Thailand over the last decade, a period during which the military has seized power twice.

“As the military has the final say on budgeting, there should be no surprise that we should see the junta seeking more ‘toys for the boys’,” said Paul Chambers, a expert on the Thai military, said

‘Potential maritime threats’

“This is a contributing factor to Thailand’s current economic morass,” he told AFP, adding that the junta tried to keep the deal quiet because of its unpopularity.

Royal Thai Navy spokesman Admiral Jumpol Lumpikanon, meanwhile, told The Nation yesterday that the submarine would contribute greatly in protecting Thailand’s Bt24 trillion worth of maritime resources as well as preparing for potential maritime threats.

“There is not a threat signal yet, but one day we could face some threats such as underwater mines. And our maritime forces have been decommissioned since 1951,” the spokesperson said.

He was referring to the year Thailand discharged the four submarines it bought from Japan in 1937.

“We have to be ready to cope with increasingly advanced technology. We can’t be reckless,” he added.

“This is an appalling incident and our hearts go out to the family of the victim. There is absolutely no place for content of this kind on Facebook and it has now been removed,” Facebook spokesperson said in an official statement yesterday.

Earlier in the day, the Public Health Ministry had urged the online giant to remove the video from the Internet.

The father committed suicide after the killing, but that act was not included in the Facebook Live broadcast.

Heartbroken family members were in tears yesterday as they retrieved the bodies of the man and his baby daughter for funeral ceremonies.

The clip, which lasted more than four minutes, shocked the public and left the family distraught.

Ministry spokesman Dr Taweesin Visanuyothin, who also heads the Somdet Chaopraya Institute of Psychiatry, said earlier in the day that Facebook had to remove the clip immediately as it could cause depression and could prompt copycat suicides.

“If his family members have no access to his Facebook account, Facebook must take action. It’s Facebook’s responsibility,” he said.

He said he expected that the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission would raise the issue with Facebook and encourage it to introduce features that would help to prevent a repeat of such incidents.

“In the United States there are monitoring programmes to link suicidal people to help hotlines,” he said. “We should have such features in Thailand too.”

The Phuket tragedy involved a 21-year-old man who was apparently angry over his wife leaving him.

The father, whose name was withheld in accordance with the law, broadcast the tragic incident at about 5.45pm on Monday. The video remained online for approximately 24 hours.

The Facebook Live clip went viral and was drawn to the attention of the mother who rushed to seek help from police.

In the clip, the man was seen sitting with the baby girl on the rooftop of the multi-storey deserted building. He was seen looping plastic ties together and placing a noose around the neck of the infant, who is wearing only a diaper. He then dropped her down from the edge of the rooftop holding onto the plastic ties.

The baby is heard crying briefly before her father pulled her up and untied the knot. She is then heard crying briefly.

The mother said she had quarrelled with her husband because he suspected she had a relationship with another man. The woman said she left their house after he checked her phone and threatened to kill her at about 3am on Monday.

“I accompanied my younger sister when she collected her things from his home and tried to settle the issue with him. But he said he needed to run some errands and took his daughter with him,” said a male relative.

The relative said he had no idea what was going on until he saw the clip on Facebook.

The 21-year-old mother went to Thalang Police Station at about 6.30pm after learning about the clip.

Police searched the area for the deserted building that was shown on the video and eventually found it near a five-star hotel at Naithon Beach in tambon Choeng Thalay of Thalang district.

They found the father had hanged himself from a beam inside the building and the body of the baby girl was lying on the rooftop.

Phuket Governor Norapat Plodthong said social workers would provide counselling to the baby’s mother.

Facebook has previously admitted that broadcasts of murders and suicides have been an issue that it has taken steps to prevent.

In reference to a previous video clip of a murder in Cleveland that was uploaded to Facebook, co-founder Mark Zuckerberg said: “We have a lot of work, and we will keep doing all we can to prevent tragedies like this from happening.”

On April 16, a Cleveland man uploaded the video clip of him shooting and killing Robert Godwin Sr, a 74-year-old grandfather who was on his way home from an Easter meal with his family.

The News Broadcasting Council of Thailand yesterday released a statement to condemn media outlets that broadcast the baby killing and urged TV stations to uphold ethics in their coverage.

A TV station was strongly criticised on Facebook for replaying the clip of the baby’s murder. A popular Facebook page, “DramaAddict”, said although the station blurred the faces, the baby was heard crying.