Saturday 15 May: Seeing a GP? There’s a two-week wait for a phone appointment, if the receptionist allows

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its comments facility (now reinstated, but not as good as ours),
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Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2021/05/14/lettersseeing-gp-two-week-wait-phone-appointment-receptionist/

629 thoughts on “Saturday 15 May: Seeing a GP? There’s a two-week wait for a phone appointment, if the receptionist allows”

  1. Good morning, all. Yet another grey, dreary looking day. When will Spring spring?

    1. Good morning Bill

      Gentle drizzle here this morning, growing weather , and I believe the farmers have had their prayers answered , we need rain.
      We had patches of blue yesterday and there was some heat in the sun when it appeared.

      Today feels mild and rather muggy , everywhere is nice and green , except for a few dead ash trees.

    2. The weather’s running a month late this year, Bill. (Good morning, btw.) The rain in May is just the normal April showers. So glad I did so much gardening yesterday before this weekend’s rain.

  2. Yo All

    Oxford University decolonising inch by inch, with imperial measurements the next target

    Mile, inch, yard, pound and ounce are ‘tied deeply to idea of the Empire’ and their presence in the
    curriculum could change, say scholars

    AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHH

    Soon, all we will have left is our English Language

    Hang on……………… have I given the Barstewards ideas

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/14/oxford-university-decolonising-inch-inch-imperial-measurements/

    1. Soon to be renamed “Common Language.”

      Oxford has fallen – there is no way they can let in so many people based on anything other than academic merit and still maintain the academic standards that they had in the eighties. The amount of work we got through on my course is something that is outside the experience of today’s state school kids. Sure they’re bright, but they have not been trained to handle three essays a week or its scientific equivalent. They will be coming out with Oxford degrees just as useless as the degrees from other left wing cult institutions.
      The danger is that they will go straight into the great institutions of Britain, to perpetuate the marxist takeover.

    2. 332746+ ticks,
      Morning OlT,
      If we had a General Election tomorrow
      the voting pattern dictates the immediate future, going on getting worse.
      People power used via the polling booth in an abusive manner ie continuing to support & vote for a party
      be it con / lab that is no longer in existence having been supplanted by political treachery groups.
      The current electorate in the main are reminiscent of a dog chasing its tail.

    1. Note that Harry made his latest appearance alone.
      Having been married to the male version of Meghan (a narcissist), I am aware that such people are already looking to move on the moment the chase is over and they’ve got you tied down.
      Cynical me says that two babies are the security that the desperately insecure Meghan needs, and Harry will get his marching orders far quicker than he suspects. I cannot help wondering whether the excuse will be that Harry was out of control, he couldn’t stop obsessing about his family and she couldn’t handle it any more, and it was bad for their children to grow up with such negativity. Pure speculation. But this public playing out of their marriage is giving me flashbacks.

          1. “…how would a therapist decode what he’s really saying?”

            Easy. I want to eat my cake and have it

          5. Reminds me of a psychologist trying to explain the behaviour of a patient on the locked ward to the student nurses. She was spouting all the right jargon; eventually the ward sister lost patience and explained the patient’s problems to the assembled staff: “It’s because she’s bloody mad.”

      2. Because many of my anecdotes involve real living people with families, I try to be circumspect.
        I too know someone who married a lady from the Americas whose behaviour was not totally dissimilar to that of MM; the marriage ended badly. His best friends had warned the groom well before the wedding.

      3. On the other hand many people said at the time that the Beckhams’ marriage would not last and it has now endured for over 20 years in spite of the odd affair.

        I wonder how Hairy would behave if Migraine had a well-publicised affair and how Migraine would behave if Hairy had one?

        1. all the King’s horses and all the King’s men couldn’t put “arry back together again – he’s gone, he’s never forgiven what the system did to his Mum and he’s chosen to break the “Royal Omerta”. the other oik, if the BBC still exists down the road in whatever format will no doubt make a series built around the woke mistreatment of Wallis Simpson Jnr

  4. Exclusive: HMRC uses ‘Big Brother’ powers to seize pensions and dock wages

    Investigation reveals how tax office recovered £54m via computer codes as tax debts soared in crisis

    A Telegraph Money investigation into HM Revenue &Customs’ most extreme enforcement methods has uncovered a series of
    unpublished government figures. The figures have shown how:

    HMRC has bankrupted almost 15,000 taxpayers and businesses since 2016 over unpaid bills

    It has threatened to take possessions from the homes of more than a quarter of a million people and sell them to cover debts at a cost to
    the taxpayer of almost £1m in auction fees over the past five years

    Official debt collectors have confronted almost two million people on their own doorsteps in pursuit of arrears

    The tax authority has seized hundreds of thousands of pounds from taxpayers by taking cash straight out of their bank accounts

    But will it chase TV presenters, Coffee Shop chains, Big Business with the same fervour

    Vhttps://www.telegraph.co.uk/tax/income-tax/exclusive-hmrc-uses-big-brother-powers-seize-pensions-dock-wages/

    1. And will HMRC chase GP doctors who claim to be self employed, but who refuse to work for anyone other than the NHS?

    3. I’ve never understood why I can go to the polling station and say I am whoever I like. I could vote twice by going in the morning and give a friend’s name then go again in the evening and give my name.

      If I were to do that, what would happen when the friend turns up later to cast her vote?

  7. ‘Morning All

    Last night at BiL’s I had the misfortune to catch the beginning of the “News” Full on Fear Porn about the “Deadly Indian Variant” the rest of the MSM continues with this today with Sage peddling the usual Doom-Mongering about megadeaths

    Obviously the government must move swiftly to protect us once more by sealing the borders

    Oh Wait

    https://www.heathrow.com/arrivals/terminal-2/flight-details/UK017/15-05-2021?search=arrivals

    https://www.heathrow.com/arrivals/terminal-5/flight-details/BA138/15-05-2021?search=arrivals
    Today’s arrivals from Mumbai and Dehli what an utter farce,these people think we are blind idjits,the problem is too many people are exactly that!!

    3. If the Govt didn’t make announcements about it, it would be accused of covering up.

    1. All members of the armed forces should quit, right now.
      They could be next.

      1. Quitting won’t save them. Subjecting Politicians to a military tribunal for binning the covenant might.

  9. #CovidClownWorld

    https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/074/005/093/original/a5f4b6b25eaeac0a.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9cc6a3bb7461f6c6bfccec663efc3c0a2f22c22b7190c049f648229b5156f096.png

    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9c7c023d16dcd5b707e725f7f115677e8681679cb8e3df44ae78d8afc4af07c9.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8eb33882281518f44b3eeff5ffa33967f700fb12b9eba1b0567e1cd84c84f11f.jpg

    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b1b4d564bfa36bc2084cf9d394dd343a2abd36887178d01815dd3dac64a302a9.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e7f886fd2076dc406a5f3f3d1aa8d3a875848da8fddadd17b2bf8b81d5d4f0da.jpg

    1. It’s going to be domestic terrorism to spread this kind of thing* soon, Rik. Oh wait a minute…didn’t H G say something about that too?

      *Or upvote it of course!

    2. It’s going to be domestic terrorism to spread this kind of thing* soon, Rik. Oh wait a minute…didn’t H G say something about that too?

      *Or upvote it of course!

    4. These conspiracy theory opinions weren’t seen so much when the number of cases was running at 000s per day though.

      1. The first one is still true though. People die every year from heart attacks, failed ops, cancer etc – I haven’t seen hordes dying this year. Hospitals that were cleared for covid patients remained empty – my daughter was working in one. Many of their elderly patients caught the lurgy before they were closed, but not one died, including a woman in her 90s.
        Yes, it’s nasty, but nowhere near as nasty as the TV wants us to believe.

        1. I would venture to disagree; it’s a very nasty virus, but it does seem to affect some people much worse than others, almost as if had been adapted for a purpose.

          1. It was particularly bad in a small number of regions (eg Wuhan and northern Italy). Nobody has really explained this, though Professor Cahill did hypothesise that a bad reaction to a coronavirus could imply a previous flu vaccine that had been contaminated with a coronavirus.

        2. I would venture to disagree; it’s a very nasty virus, but it does seem to affect some people much worse than others, almost as if had been adapted for a purpose.

        3. A not-that-elderly acquaintance died from it shortly after I met her at our annual music festival. She was fit and healthy when I saw her but within a month she was dead. That sounds nasty enough for me to take notice.

          Then, despite all the precautions that were being taken, many cases of Covid developed in a care home a few yards from my house. One of the residents had been into hospital for an unrelated problem and a few days after she was brought back to the home, having had a negative Covid test on her release, she tested positive in the routine testing. Within days more than fifty percent of the staff and residents tested positive, and several of the residents died as a result of it. The care home had to put out an appeal for helpers to supplement the staff as so many of the regular staff had to isolate.

          It was indeed very nasty if you were one of the unlucky ones not to be resistant to it. Even then, many of those who didn’t die from the infection face a significantly changed life. A friend’s daughter-in-law is a teacher and contracted Covid at her school from one of the children. She now has virtually no sense of taste or smell, which might sound trivial but it affects her daily life in a big way.

          It’s down to luck whether you have sufficient natural immunity to survive it or not, so I am improving my chances by being vaccinated. I also have no intention of mixing with the thoughtless idiots who flock to the coast when restrictions are lifted and ignore all the advice to maintain distance and wear a mask, because they bring infection in with them. It happened last year and I fully expect it will happen again.

          4. We had two very mild flu years preceding the first corona year, so it’s hardly surprising that many people who might have died of flu had an extra year or two.

            A man I know died during 2020 very suddenly – he was in his fifties. Heart attack. People I know die every year nowadays! There has not been an avalanche of deaths since the covid appeared.

          5. Hi Gavin,
            Good to see you posting stuff again. I have scrolled down to look at your comments.
            Ten days ago there was a BTL comment on Telegraph about the subsidies paid to one particular wind turbine in Northern Ireland. The owner appeared to be an off the shelf UK limited company, but there was a further paper trail. The ultimate beneficial owner appears to be the NatWest employee pension fund; as I understand it, I am currently paying a levy on my electricity bill in part to an enterprise that is/was 49% owned by the Government which had authorised the levy.

          6. That’s very interesting, but unfortunately not surprising

      1. Why do you think British governments have spent so much time and effort disarming the population?
        It has progressed since people noticed that Britain’s involvement in the Common Market/EEC/EU was based on the government lying its socks off.

    2. Their expression of regret is interesting at this time. Last Monday Reiner Fuellmich’s charge of crimes against humanity against the WHO were submitted to the SC in Canada which was accepted, so I read (so at least not thrown out in a manner of Trump’s admission). The process has been a year in the gathering of information from around the world. Fuellmich successfully brought charges of fraud against VW (emissions) and Deutschbank. Is this where it starts to unravel, where various groups come out and say oh, we’re so sorry, it was a bit of a cock-up, we might have got things wrong…. are they starting to feel the heat blowing over the horizon, damage limitation exercises now in progress?

  11. Right, here’s the Woke Supplement for the weekend. Penny Keens dispatching non advice on how to lose friends and un-influence people being one:

    SIR – I have no idea how our GP surgery will manage to do face-to-face appointments (report, May 14).

    Not only is there at least a fortnight’s wait for a telephone appointment, you can’t even get that unless you are prepared to tell the receptionist what is wrong with you and exactly why you want it.

    Sarah Ibbetson
    Windermere, Cumbria

    SIR – The near-impossibility of getting a face-to-face appointment with a GP is a scandal. How can triage be carried out by receptionists who are not medically qualified? How do they have the right to decide who can or cannot see the doctor?

    Pamela Kitt
    Wallington, Surrey

    SIR – My reading of your report is that there is some confusion between the imperative and the aspirational in the latest NHS directive on patient consultations. I would feel more confident of actually meeting my GP had he been instructed to see me in person on request, rather than saying that he “should” do so.

    Michael Allisstone
    Chichester, West Sussex

    SIR – I fell on ice and was unable to see a doctor, even when my ankle was hugely swollen. Diagnoses on the phone are not the same.

    Two days ago I had a blood test and have heard that the result is abnormal and that I must speak to a doctor. The first appointment I can get is on June 2.

    I will be 80 next month and have been a widow for six years. Imagine what I feel like.

    Sarah Kenyon
    Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

    SIR – My husband was requested to see his GP at 3.15pm. He duly presented himself at the surgery. At 3.10pm I received a phone call for him from his GP. I explained he was at the surgery.

    After my husband had waited nearly half an hour, the GP appeared, came over and explained that it was a phone call appointment. My husband then said: “Well, as I’m here, let’s talk about whatever you want to see me about. There is no one else here in the waiting room. You can sit two metres away.”

    The GP replied: “I can’t do that. Go home and I will phone you.”

    If that isn’t the world gone mad, what is?

    Janet Bates
    Stock Green, Worcestershire

    SIR – Not many years ago, for a GP to decline to see a patient would have been a breach of the terms of service, resulting in hearings, fines or worse.

    My GP wife and I, in practice, stuck to the adage: “A stitch in time saves nine.” Often, the earlier a sound diagnosis is made, the better the outcome. Many patients find it difficult to explain their problem, especially on the phone.

    Triaging, algorithms and online contact are barriers to GP access. People want to see GPs promptly, face to face and, if necessary, have a physical examination. As many of your readers’ letters suggest, hospital doctors, dentists and many other health workers have continued to provide their service. Why not GPs?

    Dr Martyn T Lucking
    Lytham St Annes, Lancashire

    SIR – Since Christmas I have twice contacted the Glebelands practice, South Woodford, with no delay, spoken to a doctor on the telephone and been given an appointment.

    This is obviously a very well-run surgery. It can be done.

    Sheila Creswell
    Loughton, Essex

    SIR – After lockdown, a few of us retired doctors met for a pub lunch. We made a list of those diseases that you can diagnose by smell.

    We were taught that you needed all your senses to practise medicine.

    Andrew Harding
    Haywards Heath, West Sussex

    SIR – Dr Hilary Aitken (Letters, May13) suggests that possession of a medical degree is a sure help in obtaining a doctor’s appointment. Sadly, for this retired GP, this has just not been the case. I can only conclude that, as with snow and leaves, I have the “wrong kind” of medical degree.

    Dr Adam Kowalczyk
    Cirencester, Gloucestershire

    SIR – I was interested to learn from Dr Aitken that physicians in the 18th century were not expected to examine the patient, using history alone to reach a diagnosis.

    A veterinarian from my old practice would in the 18th century be driven in a pony cart by his groom, who would examine horses for soundness. If the vet had to get out of the cart to pass an opinion he charged extra.

    Are GPs going in this direction?

    Rod Murdoch
    Lincoln

    Inventor of television

    SIR – I was amazed to read (Business, May 11) about the new 50 pence coin celebrating John Logie Baird and the birth of television. Baird put forward the basic idea of scanning a picture broken into horizontal lines (in his case 30 lines caused by viewing holes cut in a spiral on his “Nipkow Disc”, rotating relatively slowly).

    But television as we know it, winning the competition for a viable system, was invented by A D Blumlein of EMI. His method used the cathode ray tube, scanning 405 lines at 25 frames per second to produce a viewable picture.

    To add insult to injury, the coin shows a representation of the Alexandra Palace transmitting mast. The mast prototype was built at EMI’s factory at Blyth Road, Hayes. I worked in the research building beneath the prototype mast in the 1950s.

    James E Sugden
    Hibaldstow, Lincolnshire

    One bridge at a time

    SIR – If Sadiq Khan is so keen to “build bridges” (report, May 9), as he said in his mayoral acceptance speech, perhaps he would get on with reopening the one at Hammersmith.

    Lynne Proctor
    Farnham, Surrey

    The horse’s mouth

    SIR – Writing of poshness (Features, May 14), William Sitwell refers to a riding ménage behind his mansion – which conjures up an image of frolics in the hayloft. An enclosed equestrian training arena is called a manège.

    Michael Orpen-Palmer
    Hove, East Sussex

    Trouble with Harry

    SIR – The Duke of Sussex stated in an interview on an American podcast that he realised in his 20s that he did not want the royal “job” or even to be part of the “operation” (report, May 14).

    If so, why has he not relinquished his titles of Prince and Duke of Sussex, and he and the Duchess of Sussex not become Mr and Mrs Windsor?

    Is it the case that the royal titles open doors for the Sussexes’ private ventures which would not be so otherwise?

    Rod Taylor
    Harlow, Essex

    SIR – I suggest the source of the Duke of Sussex’s recently exposed pain can be found in his newly adopted home and with the person who encouraged him to live there.

    Bill Todd
    Twickenham, Middlesex

    SIR – Is it a good and happy example to one’s children to have fallen out with both their grandfathers?

    Penny Keens
    Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire

    SIR – I never realised that therapy for emotional pain automatically allowed you to throw the kitchen sink at people you know, and in the process inflict emotional pain on them.

    Previously I had always regarded that as revenge.

    Ann Walker
    Rotherham, South Yorkshire

    SIR – Can somebody please tell Prince Harry to stop all this disloyal moaning and ridiculous self pity?

    Diana Humble
    Beenham, Berkshire

    SIR – Who is this lily-livered “victim” Duke of Sussex, and what has he done with the real Prince Harry?

    Tim Nixon
    Braunton, Devon

    Resisting destruction of church monuments

    SIR – The Church of England talks of removing monuments deemed offensive to its current woke preoccupations (Letters, May 14). It needs to remember that there exists, with Ecclesiastical Exemption, a system of faculty jurisdiction that must adjudicate on any such proposals. This has evolved over a century as a substitute for requiring the Church’s historic buildings to be subject to normal listed building consent.

    Many historians and conservationists have been unhappy that this allows the Church to be its own judge and jury in potentially highly contentious cases. Any new move to purge churches under the cover of the Exemption is likely to revive calls for it to be scrapped and listed building consent substituted.

    Roger White
    Sherborne, Dorset

    SIR – Our historical markers belong not just to us but also to future generations, who have a right to make their own judgments, according to the thinking of their times.

    If monuments are removed, our grandchildren will have been robbed of the chance to re-evaluate history. Future historians won’t look kindly on those who remove historical resources.

    Isobel Greenshields
    Billericay, Essex

    A self-walking cocker spaniel’s seaside holiday

    SIR – In the 1940s we went on holiday as a family to Orcombe Point, Devon.

    We had a golden cocker spaniel named Betty, who every morning without fail went off by herself (Letters, May 13) down the cliff path across a road and swam in the sea, returning by the same route.

    At the end of the holiday the sea water had turned her into a blonde cocker spaniel.

    Richard Davies
    Mortimer, Shropshire

    SIR – My childhood pet, a spaniel collie cross called Bambi, regularly took herself to the door of the local primary school’s canteen, where she was given a plate of school dinner leftovers.

    June Green
    Bagshot, Surrey

    SIR – When I was a boy growing up in London, I lived near a park. Every morning on my way to school I saw a large labrador sitting at a pedestrian crossing opposite the park gates waiting for the traffic to stop for it.

    When it did the dog sauntered across the road into the park. I believe it would wait at the crossing even if there was no traffic until something came along that stopped for it.

    Stephen Woodbridge-Smith
    Tavistock, Devon

    SIR – I, too, had a self-walking dog during the Second World War.

    Toby, a Punch and Judy clone from Battersea Dogs’ Home, would be let out of our second-floor flat, walk half a mile up Gloucester Road, cross Kensington High Street and enjoy Kensington Gardens. He would return safely unless some well-meaning person had taken him to the police station. It cost five shillings to bail him out. At 91, I still miss him.

    Michael Hancock
    Little Gaddesden, Hertfordshire

    1. Janet Bates’s husband should refer his “GP” to the General Medical Council for unprofessional conduct.

    2. More letters blaming the receptionist. I’d like to see a letter blaming the receptionists’ instructions instead.

      1. Hi Stormy.
        A local area health centre was amazingly efficient with the vaccinations of older people back in December January. Turned out that there was a new practice manager, with a non-NHS background. He/she defied the NHS guidelynes and insisted on the second jabs being administered, rather than switching to a cohort of younger OAPs for part 1 jabs.

    3. I wonder if someone could put up that graphic concerning 1, 2 & 3 masks, all futile because the Covid bug is so small it passes through, plus a link to it’s origin. I have to convince someone.

  16. I don’t believe in the “Indian Variant”. They NEVER intended us to be liberated. They promised – knowing that they’d find a way to kill the optimism

          1. Nah – she’s fine today, thank you. My comment was a general one (he adds quickly).

  17. Morning All

    Following from Ian Duncan-Smith’s piece reported by William Stanier in yesterday’s NOTTL:

    Why is it being deemed necessary to force high-rise buildings in among ‘normal’ housing? As a recreational light aircraft pilot over Southeast England I was always on the lookout for places to land in case of engine failure – that’s just good piloting practice.

    But it showed me how very little of the land below you is covered with housing. The UK National Ecosystem Assessment (NEA), for example, estimates that less than 1% of the country is “built on”, about 2% of England.

    Why shoe-horn high-rises (which few people seem to want to live in) into such a relatively low-density country (compared with, say, ultra high-rise Hong Kong?). Aha! I spy what’s coming! They’ll need to feel at home.

  18. Morning All

    Following from Ian Duncan-Smith’s piece reported by William Stanier in yesterday’s NOTTL:

    Why is it being deemed necessary to force high-rise buildings in among ‘normal’ housing? As a recreational light aircraft pilot over Southeast England I was always on the lookout for places to land in case of engine failure – that’s just good piloting practice.

    But it showed me how very little of the land below you is covered with housing. The UK National Ecosystem Assessment (NEA), for example, estimates that less than 1% of the country is “built on”, about 2% of England.

    Why shoe-horn high-rises (which few people seem to want to live in) into such a relatively low-density country (compared with, say, ultra high-rise Hong Kong?). Aha! I spy what’s coming! They’ll need to feel at home.

  19. Good morning from an overcast and slightly damp Derbyshire. 5°C, but at least the rain has stopped for now, though I see more is forecast.

    The latest madness from Oxford:-

    Oxford University decolonising inch by inch, with imperial measurements the next target
    Mile, inch, yard, pound and ounce are ‘tied deeply to idea of the Empire’ and their presence in the curriculum could change, say scholars

    By
    Ewan Somerville
    14 May 2021 • 9:00pm

    Oxford University has suggested imperial measurements should be “decolonised” over links to the British Empire.

    The mile, inch, yard, pound and ounce are “tied deeply to the idea of the Empire” and their presence in the curriculum could change, decolonising plans by Oxford’s maths, physics and life sciences faculty suggest.

    Undergraduates have been recruited (on living wage) to conduct extensive research this summer, alongside scholars, into how Oxford’s science curricula can be made less “Eurocentric”.

    They will draw up proposals for lecturers to implement any recommendations in syllabuses, in a drive to “diversify” maths and science courses.

    The plans, seen by The Telegraph, advocate a “cultural shift” in teaching so that Oxford students’ learning is broadened so they understand the “global historical and social context to scientific research”, and assess “historical work revising older narratives of scientific progress”.

    It acts on a pledge by Oxford’s vice-chancellor to embed teaching on colonialism into courses following last summer’s Black Lives Matter protests, and is among a raft of decolonising overhauls currently underway on campuses across Britain.

    It comes despite Michelle Donelan, the universities minister, in February warning the “so-called decolonisation of the curriculum” mirrored the Soviet Union and was “censoring history”.

    The Government also announced in this week’s Queen’s Speech that universities will face fines for silencing students and academics, under new free speech legislation to combat “rising intolerance” on campus.

    One new curriculum addition to be considered in Oxford’s eight-week decolonising project, is “history of modern measurement, which is tied deeply to the idea of the ‘Empire’ and Imperial standardisation”.

    Another, for maths courses, is “ancient Chinese number theory – particularly the Chinese Remainder Theorem”.

    In biology, “economic plant collecting in colonial Brazil (1500-1800)” could be investigated for addition to the curriculum this autumn.

    Imperial units of length, weight and volume could be given historical context in Oxford’s physics curriculum, which currently includes modules on classical mechanics, condensed matter and fluids.

    The system of units were officially introduced in the 1824 British Weights and Measures Act, and by 1826 were widely adopted across the British Empire and Commonwealth.

    However, Imperial units have a longer history, born out of the so-called English Units, a combination of Anglo-Saxon and Roman systems of measurement which included variations of feet, inches and yards.

    Since the colonial period many countries shifted to metric units of measurement, such as metres and kilograms, but some African and South Asian nations still use limited forms of imperial units, including gallons for volume.

    Following pressure from students angered by George Floyd’s death in the US last summer, Oxford’s vice-chancellor, Prof Louise Richardson, committed to a “diversity fund” for teaching resources to shake up curriculums, saying it was “an area that is frequently overlooked”.

    Protests saw Oriel College launch an inquiry into a statue of the Victorian imperialist Cecil Rhodes on its facade, and Prof Richardson vowed to ramp up decolonising efforts. “Many departments in social sciences have begun work on making their curriculum more inclusive and adding diverse voices to it,” she said.

    “This includes steps such as integrating race and gender questions into topics, embedding teaching on colonialism and empire into courses, changing reading lists to ensure substantial representation of a diverse range of voices, and ensuring better coverage of issues concerning the global South in syllabuses.”

    The campus “decolonising” drive, often focused on the humanities, is increasingly sweeping the sciences.

    Two faculties at Sheffield University have named Sir Isaac Newton, the founder of modern physics, and Charles Darwin as figures who may need historical context when their theories are taught because of apparent ties to the Empire.

    An Oxford spokesman said: “The university supports the diversifying STEM curriculum project, which is looking at how curricula might change to acknowledge questions of diversity and colonialism.

    “We value the input of students into this work; all recommendations arising from the project will be referred to departments to consider next steps.”

      1. We’re quite a way along the colon now, but still a little way to the rectum, Bob³.

    3. Why don’t they just “cut to the chase” with this programme? Just announce that English, is “tied deeply, into Empire” and just stop using English. In one simple move, the problem is solved. People, can communicate in a language that they believe is not tainted by the past and all will be sweetness and light. Better still, communicate in grunts and add emphasis by wielding a hefty club to emphasise your point. We are clearly, on our way back to the lives of cavemen.

      1. Yes I get that totally , so black and slightly black students must not use our language , nor must they dress like us .

        Our culture is our culture , end of.

        1. “The Breitbart Doctrine is the idea that “politics is downstream from culture” and that to change politics one must first change culture.”

          We can see our culture is now under a permanent assault and as the above quote seems to be pertinent, we can see how our politics is changing, accordingly. We now have a “woke” Conservative government.

          3. I suspect your quotation marks are around the wrong word; they are a woke “Conservative” government.

        2. Exacto. If I were to style my hair in an Afro and wear a long colourful mu-mu I’d be accused of cultural appropriation (dreadful phrase) yet western dress seems to be allowed for those of African descent.

      2. Hey Dean. You need to get with it, Dude; grunting’s been back in vogue since that Kipling rolled over, Hombre.

        English is passé: no Oxford commas (or even ‘periods’) in textspeak, Compadre.

        1. no prpr wds, capitalisation or punctuation at all, Grizz. txtspk z gibberish to me… :-((
          Morning!

        2. no prpr wds, capitalisation or punctuation at all, Grizz. txtspk z gibberish to me… :-((
          Morning!

        3. Good morning, Grizzly. I checked my weight this morning and found I have lost another pound one divided by 2.2 kilograms in weight. :-))

          1. Good morning, Auntie Elsie.

            I lost the same pound. I wonder which of us will find it first? :•)

    4. Why don’t they just “cut to the chase” with this programme? Just announce that English, is “tied deeply, into Empire” and just stop using English. In one simple move, the problem is solved. People, can communicate in a language that they believe is not tainted by the past and all will be sweetness and light. Better still, communicate in grunts and add emphasis by wielding a hefty club to emphasise your point. We are clearly, on our way back to the lives of cavemen.

    6. History of everything began with the Victorians. Moreover GK Chesterton had a clear understanding of history and historians, “It is quite easy to see why a legend is treated, and ought to be treated, more respectfully than a book of history. The legend is generally made by the majority of people in the village, who are sane. The book is generally written by the one man in the village who is mad”.

  20. Aftenposten has a column for younger readers to make a contribution (under-18s, I think), called “Si :D”. Earlier this morning, I read in that column an article by a nice young lass of Arabic descent (judging from her face and her name) whimpering that she’s ashamed of being Norwegian, and that Norway should “do something” about the situation in Gaza – what, is not explained. The BTL comments explained what Norway has done, how the situation came about, the errors in her history knowledge, and the selective reporting of casualties – you can maybe guess which was she leans. One or two commenters were well informed and surgical in their dissection of her misleading bla bla. They also accuse Aftenposten of not fact-checking, error-by-error. Their “likes” were increasing as you watched, to numbers I haven’t seen before in Aftenposten.
    The article has gone, as if it never existed. Oh, noes, it doesn’t fit the “Bash the Jews” theme.

    1. Good Grief: the British disease has travelled north.
      Morning, Herr Oberst.

      1. The comments are mostly what I would call “sane” and say that both sides need to give some, but nothing will happen until Gaza stops shooting at Israel. That it’s more complex to solve. And these comments get the high scores. Thew few who blame Israel exclusively get close to zero likes.
        Bearing in mind the left-wing press loves a poor Palestinian and hates Jews, this perhaps explains why the article has gone underground – and fills my heart with joy, that ordinary folk can write sense, see both sides of the argument, and won’t be told what to think (well, some of them, anyway), and by and large are supportinve of Israel.

      2. Morning, Anne.
        Looks like the good weather has gone. Worked outside all day Thursday (Ascension Day holiday) and got tired as F and sunburned, repeat at 1/2 power Friday, now ready to sit in sun & enjoy a cold 6-pack… and it’s raining! Bugger!

        1. Same here. This spring has been so late – practically non-existent. The lime tree outside our house has only just leafed up.

          1. Still snow outside Firstborn’s barn. A pile about 18″ high, cunningly located in the shade.

          2. Who knew that snow had a survival instinct? We see it here on the North-facing slopes of the Cheviots.

        3. The heating at work was turned off a couple of weeks ago. I have been siting in my office all week wearing my coat, as have most of my colleagues. 🙁

          1. I remember that one on the wards. Regardless of weather, heating was on or off because of the date.
            Patients sitting around were absolutely frozen.

          2. It was the same at school; come 1st May, the heating was off,even if it was snowing. Then we remained heat-free until 1st October.

      1. The comments do not auto-translate but using Google translate for the first one, I get this sensible comment:-

        Ulf Larsen
        a day ago
        First, Norway is not among the five permanent members of the UN Security Council. We can shout as loud as we want, but that does not matter. Secondly, Palestine and Israel are countries far from Norway, and significantly larger powers than Norway, such as the United States, Russia, Iran and Saudi Arabia, are the ones that decide.

        Add that Israel, a democracy, does not care about anything other than what the United States says, and that Palestine, a corrupt dictatorship, is an attempt at a state formation both in conflict with Israel, and itself, so most people understand that Norway CANNOT or SHOULD do anything, other than follow Norwegian and international laws and regulations, something we have broken with regard to. both parts.

  21. ‘A special day’: how a Glasgow community halted immigration raid. 15 April 2021.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9b2c690e46e4786f5d9ef8f5ee1187217dd19a8c03e726e8d7efedef1a6e7be3.jpg

    It was just after 9am on Thursday and he was finishing breakfast when the callout came. Kenmure Street’s “Van Man” – the activist who spent nearly eight hours squeezed underneath an immigration enforcement van to prevent the detention of two men on Glasgow’s southside – was on his bike in minutes.

    “It’s not often you can catch raids in the act like this, but the southside has a lot of folks pulling together,” he said. “The only way that day could have ended was with our neighbours’ release; there were simply too many local people standing in the street for the police to have taken the van away. The strategy does work – and we want the world to understand that it was the people on the streets who won that victory, not the politicians.”

    Morning everyone. Special indeed! Two Sikhs! A good thing too! I’ve lost count of the White Schoolgirls they’ve raped, the people they’ve stabbed and the places they’ve blown up. How fortunate that this man was on hand to stop this heinous crime against them; perhaps he should buy a lottery ticket! The van with its unmistakable logo’s would have no difficulties carrying out its task, though a siren and flashing lights would have been better. The placards at the back are heartening; no doubt kept handy in a cupboard for such occasions, these are de rigeur now I understand. I’m thinking of getting a couple myself!

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/may/14/a-special-day-how-glasgow-community-halted-immigration-raid

        1. What? You are saying that Mrs Murrell and MSPs did not incite mob violence?

          Why on earth don’t right-minded Scots people vote these bastards out?

    5. Minty, the Sikhs are sworn enemies of Islam. Most, but not all, are law abiding citizens. However, I would agree that they have been known to take advantage of turbans and Mrs May’s inadequate ID procedures to enable unlawful immigration to the UK.

      1. They did get terribly uppity when (20 years ago??) a play was performed which took the michael out of Sikhism. The play was “cancelled”.

        I thought that that was the thin end of the wedge then…..

    6. I covered this yesterday with the incitements of Paul Sweeney, MSP, and pictures of a couple of the useful idiots supporting the criminal actions of the mob.

    7. Then he should be charged with obstruction of justice and arrested. During that, sent a bill for the full costs of housing, legal fees, police salaries for his actions. If he wants to keep them, he will pay for them.

  22. 332767+ up ticks,
    Morning Each,

    Saturday 15 May: Seeing a GP? There’s a two-week wait for a phone appointment, if the receptionist allows.

    This issue and likes have been in the making, in the open, plain to see, for at least three decades encouraged
    to thrive via the polling booth.

    The governance parties lab/lib/con coalition have set up & triggered this infrastructure of fear within society and are running a successful campaign with the aid IMO of people power.

    To kiss X a lab/lib/con candidate in the polling booth is to give consent & carte blanche for the parties actions, to be a consenter is to be an active part of the ongoing problems we are facing.

    Until these facts are faced NOTHING will change for the better.

    1. I’d vote for the NOTHING party but there’s nothing on the voting paper to ✖️.

      1. 332767+ up ticks,
        Morning AOE,
        Makes one wonder who would design a voting paper that way.
        A mass NOTA printed neatly in feltip, no abuse, would, although no notice would be taken,surely get the message across as to many of the indigenous peoples true feelings.

    1. Volume Two:

      LESSONS HAVE BEEN LEARNED.
      (inside, acknowledgements to Charlie Marks, Joey Steel, Mo and others.

      2. As in, “We’ll say that as it always works. The dummies accept that under the delusion that we will learn something, act on that knowledge, make things better and prevent a recurrence of the problem. Thank God that no one ever seems to ask why we didn’t get it right the first time and demand our resignation, if not prosecution and imprisonment..”

  24. Liz Cheney – soon to be an ex-congresswoman? May 14, 2021 by Pat Lang.

    Watch the video in the linked interview. Cheney is every bit as obnoxious as her dear ol’ dad. When she was an uber-flunky in the State Department during the run-up to Desert Storm I went to Foggy Bottom to visit her, just to see what she was like. I got the full treatment. She lectured me about the need to invade Iraq, the ABSOLUTE NECESSITY of invading Iraq. She had never been to Iraq. As I have recounted in my memoir, “Tattoo” I was effectively a participant in the Iran-Iraq War. I tried repeatedly to explain to her that the people who attacked us on 9/11 had nothing to do with the Government of Iraq. She would have none of it and implied that there was something seriously wrong with me and that this was made clear by my non-acceptance of the neocon position.

    My genealogist wife tells me that my Puritan ancestors and the Cheneys were close associates in the founding of the Massachusetts Bay colony. My God what an awful thought!

    People of Wyoming! Get her out of office! Pat Lang.

    The view from the States. Colonel Lang is always interesting to read. During his Military and Intelligence career he met many of these people personally, including Biden. It is uncanny how his views coincide with those of Nottlers!

    https://turcopolier.com/liz-cheney-soon-to-be-an-ex-congresswoman/

  25. Children

    A husband and wife have four sons.
    The oldest three are tall with red hair and light skin while the youngest son is short with black hair and dark eyes.
    The father was on his deathbed when he turned to his wife and said,
    “Darling, before I die, please be totally honest with me: Is our youngest son my child?”
    The wife replied, “I swear on everything that’s holy that he is your son.”
    With that, the husband passed away.
    The wife muttered, “Thank God he didn’t ask about the other three.”

  26. SIR – I have no idea how our GP surgery will manage to do face-to-face appointments (report, May 14).
    Not only is there at least a fortnight’s wait for a telephone appointment, you can’t even get that unless
    you are prepared to tell the receptionist what is wrong with you and exactly why you want it.

    Sarah Ibbetson Windermere, Cumbria

    Perhaps the conversation should proceed along the lines of.:

    “Good morning, I need to my GP, face to face and Time is of the essence.
    I have the symptoms of (insert problem ie Bowel Cancer)
    I am recording this phone call, to be used in any litigation problems, caused by my early death
    from an undiagnosed/untreated condition.

    I know that your job is to screen calls, but I am very concerned about my health and
    would not like you to have my early death on your conscience
    Thank you

    1. That would be regarded as a threat – you would be struck off the GP’s list and prolly visited by the plod.

        1. Hence the threatening signs in GP waiting rooms telling you not to be rude to their poor, over-worked staff….

      1. I will certainly not have the dentist doing MY teeth, via the backdoor

      2. Not likely there’s a lot of dosh to be made as my wife and middle son have recently discovered from recent visits to local dental practices.

    3. I type a letters detailing the problems and post it at the surgery letter box or drop it in at the reception desk. They always get back to me and i have have even had two appointments booked next Monday Tuesday at local hospitals for MRI scans and ECG monitoring.
      I gave up trying to phone the reception and listening to all their pre conversation covid BS time and time again. But the receptionist is pretty defiant in her attitude as well.

      2. I had a concern,:after 90= mins spoke to someone

        A GP phoned me back within 20 mins and organised a facei-to-face
        appointment within the hour

        Blood test on to be done on Tuesday, with the nurse who knows that I am allergic to ladies with big needles

  27. I see that the Babbling Poltroon may be investigated by the Serious Fraud Office. Good.

    It did make me wonder, however, whether there is a Trivial Fraud Office….

    2. Good morning everyone.
      Nay me old hearty, you be thinking of the Hilarious Fraud Office.
      I’ll get my hoody.

    3. I’ll bet no-one cracks any jokes at the Serious Fraud Office Christmas party.

    1. If there had been any sign of a brain, I would say that she had been brain-washed.

    3. Yesterday i was requested to clean or three year old oven.
      I read the instructions on the can and after contracting single pneumonia (one sided) a few years ago cleaning the disgustingly filthy oven our eldest son and his wife inherited in their new home in St Albans (yes you filthy swines, now in NZ, you know who you are). I elected to wear a once used NHS type face mask, we have a few ‘floating about’ the house. After only a few moments i started to cough from the fumes. I had to go out in the garden with the wire racks to spray them in the open. But what became obvious was that although I was wearing the mask it was fairly clear to me that it didn’t have the desired effect of protection, as in keeping the fumes or even possibly certain germs away from my mouth. However i’m still here and we have a sparklingly clean oven.

      1. I have a chap come round once a year to clean my oven. I would sooner buy a new one than clean it myself. £50 well spent IMO.

        2. I press a button and it glows red hot, then all the rubbish collects in a tray and the rest is wiped down with fairy.

      2. Thing is those masks are not designed to protect you from incoming fumes but to stop your breathing on other people.

        However, when using oven cleaning products – the nuclear sort – you want a full blown NCBH mask.

  29. Pissing with rain here – looks like it is set for most of the day… Grrr.

  31. From https://www.thetimes.co.uk/
    “Women must be allowed to speak on trans identity, says new equalities chief”
    I agree, everybody should. But what happens that is especially bad for women who express their mind, compared to men, that needs highlighted? Or is it that the Equalities chief only gets heard when she talks about gender inequality?

    1. Can you copy and paste, Obers?
      It’s asking for a subscription on the link.

      1. Women must have the right to question transgender identity without being abused, stigmatised or risking losing their job, the new head of Britain’s equalities watchdog has warned.

        In her first interview since taking office, the incoming chairwoman of the Equalities and Human Rights Commission said it was “entirely reasonable” for people to challenge the biological status of women who were born as men.

        Baroness Falkner of Margravine added it was a “freedom of belief” the commission was determined to protect.

        “Someone can believe that people who self identify as a different sex are not the different sex that they self identify,” she said. “A lot of people would find this an entirely reasonable belief.”

        Falkner was speaking after the commission, that has statutory responsibility to police the UK’s equalities laws, controversially intervened in the case of a woman who lost her job after colleagues criticised her attitude to transgender rights.

        Maya Forstater took the Center for Global Development think tank to an employment tribunal claiming she’d been discriminated against on the basis of her “gender critical” views.

        A judge ruled that her views were “not worthy of respect in a democratic society” and threw out her claim.

        However the commission has now backed Forstater’s appeal, arguing that the judge incorrectly interpreted the law that should have protected her right to freedom of belief and speech.

        “The principles are absolutely clear, which is why we took a position to intervene in the case,” Falkner said. “The principles are that freedom of belief is protected.

        “So there wasn’t any doubt in my mind whatsoever, that this was something that we should do.”

        Falkner’s intervention, in one of the most divisive equalities issues, will be welcomed by feminist campaigners such as the author JK Rowling who say they have been “slurred as bigots” for having raised concerns on issues such as single-sex spaces.

        Rowling backed Forstater after she lost the first round of her employment tribunal, saying she had been forced out of her job for saying “sex is real”.

        Falkner said she was concerned that current levels of abuse were making it difficult for people to exercise their fundamental rights — protected by the EHRC — such as freedom of speech and belief.

        “There is too much self censorship going on — certainly in terms of gender critical theory,” she said. “And what happens to women who raise that does seem to be an effect on them of abuse and stigmatisation.

        “We ought to be able to have a debate about it, even when we disagree with them, without them feeling so isolated.”

        Falkner said she was particularly concerned about anonymous abuse online and announced the EHRC would be pushing the government to take further action in the area.

        She said the commission would be conducting an investigation into what more social media firms needed to do, suggesting that they should be compelled to verify the real identities of all their users to prevent perpetrators hiding behind the “cloak of anonymity”.

        She added that this information should be made available to the police “to take the necessary action”.

        “These companies cannot get by under the wing of free speech,” she said. “It’s not a free speech defense to be anonymous. We really want to change that at the commission.”

        On racial equalities Falkner said she was determined to make further progress including proposals for companies to publish information about ethnic pay gaps and career progression.

        But she attacked those who criticised the recent government commissioned report on race and ethnic disparities that some claimed was an attempt to “re-write history”. She said: “I’d urge people to get beyond the narrative and look at the proposals, because these [the report’s authors] are good people who put themselves forward to do a serious job.

        “And the way that they have been attacked for doing a serious job is unconscionable. Nobody should be attacking anyone else in those terms however profound your disagreement might be.”

        Falkner, who was born in Pakistan, added that more broadly she was concerned that the “discourse” around race in the UK had become “so bad” that different ethnic minorities had become “juxtaposed” against one another.

        “We’re not linked together any longer,” she said. “My experience is more relevant than yours, you’re not equipped to speak about what I feel.

        “None of us can replicate our personal experiences and they will all be true. But ultimately, the resolution of whatever is going wrong in your life as a young black woman, can be the same resolution of whatever’s going wrong for the Indian consultant in the NHS. This idea that somehow there are levels of gravity, levels of pain, that only the individual person can express diminishes our common cause.”

        Falkner said those concerned about equality in the UK needed to see both the progress that had been made over the past decades and how much better Britain was to comparable countries.

        “I’ve lived and worked in France, I’ve lived and worked in the US. I see Europe, very close up,” she said. “And . . . compared to all of these countries we are in a pretty good place. I came back because [Britain] is a good place. It’s a good place to be.”

        2. IMHO

          “discourse” around race in the UK had become “so bad” that different ethnic minorities had become “juxtaposed” against one another.
          With very little research its possible to discover that there are ongoing conflicts that cause many deaths within certain dominant religions in arab states and parts of south asia.

          She must know that ‘one’ will only be able to claim equality and respect if it’s worked for.
          Sticking body parts on or chopping bits off, wearing wigs removing facial hair etc. will never equate to equality., which ever way ‘one’ looks at it.
          And I would suggest as a Baroness she has and will never have to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. Most other members of the human race have to suffer from time to time.
          All she appears to be taking part in is ‘earning a living’ by fanning the flames of a current popular and woke misconception.
          As nature intended there are only two sexes in the species on the planet none of us would be here today if it were different.

          2. Pathetic Aren’t they and she knows the easy ride bandwagon will support her pile of BS.

        3. And we laugh at mediaeval people for discussing how many angels could dance on a pinhead.

        4. The first thing that need to end is men pretending to be women competing in women’s sport.

          Then any law – ANY – giving them special treatment, forbidding calling them men must be revoked.

          There must be absolutely no public money given to a man who wants to become a woman. They’re mentally ill. Not a woman.

        5. I agree whole-heartedly that men who claim to be women (and vice versa) are only fooling themselves – the DNA tells the truth, but…

          …and this may not be popular…

          …I see the ECHR quoted as the final arbiter. The ECHR is constantly mis-used, and allows itself to be mis-used without reference to Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights, giving the thousands (maybe millions) of illegal immigrants and their shyster lawyers the ability to obtain for them, unreasonable leave to remain.

          That may only be stopped by the UK formally leaving the ECHR, repealing the Human Rights Act, dissolving the Supreme Court and re-instating the Law Lords and the Monarch, as the ultimate appeal, thus allowing the deportation of the undesirables without the mis-used, right of appeal. “You are here illegally – get out.”

          This will remove many who are behind this so-called trans-gender idiocy, take up the shyster lawyers’ time for so long that cases overwhelm them and allowing the hitherto denied ‘Freedom of Speech‘ to be once more, extant.

          Since Freedom of Speech cuts both ways across the trans-gender debate, the Judiciary will be forced to take account of the DNA when making judgement on the competency of cases.

          That makes sense to me and, I’m not even a lawyer.

    2. Can you copy and paste, Obers?
      It’s asking for a subscription on the link.

    2. Wonder how the black one manages to exist – no job, no qualifications and all that…. (sarc)

    3. Not being a subscriber, I’m guessing that young Mr Sharif or a very close relative already has married into the Kennaway family

      1. Kennaway’s son has a baby by one of Sharif’s sisters…

        And the “article” is simply promoting a book.

  33. An Obit, which will be hard to beat:

    Asfaw Yemiru, former street urchin who founded a school for disadvantaged children in Addis Ababa – obituary

    He started teaching street children under an oak tree aged 14 and persuaded Emperor Haile Selassie to grant him land to build a school

    The lifestory of a True Hero

    A BTL comment

    What a wonderful human being! I’d write more but there’s something in my eye.(I felt the same)

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/obituaries/2021/05/14/asfaw-yemiru-former-street-urchin-founded-school-disadvantaged/

  35. Morning all.
    ‘Indian’ Variant ???
    BBC are so keen to show the British public their concern for the work being carried out on the ‘Indian’ variant, filmed live in Bolton this morning, in a car park our side a marquee where vaccinations are taking place. Given the established fact that there are around 28 mosques in the Bolton area alone, suggests that quite a high number of the local population are of the persuasion who would use the kneeling facilities. But what a surprise for the BBC, especially as they do absolutely love to target people in islamic dress as often (never miss an opportunity) as they can possibly manage. But this morning they were out of luck as the queues of people attending the vaccinations, were to coin a phrase ‘hideously white’. Even the doctor interviewed was struggling to avoid the obvious.
    I don’t think there is a known India community in Bolton so may i suggest ASAP the BBC and others use the appropriate terminology to describe the variant. And stop maligning British Indian people.

    1. Indeed. My Indian-heritage bridge partner and her family despair at how Pakistani & Bangladeshi people and issues are called Indian. Her father, a retired pharmacist, tells me there are no issues with his Indian-heritage friends and relations complying with the Covid rules and vaccinations. Given the antipathy between Muslims and Hindus/Sikhs, I doubt there are many Indians in Bolton.

      Apart from the colour of their skins and her mother’s penchant for wearing saris at home you wouldn’t know they weren’t born and bred English. I came across a coach load of Sikhs at a motorway station dressed in traditional finery, clearly en route to a festival or wedding; they all spoke English to each other, were respectful and polite, in great contrast to the Muslim groups I’ve seen.

      1. We also have an Indian connection in our family, in discussion around the meal table or in the local it’s pretty obvious they have no time for the islamic culture.

      2. I have worked with many Indians, Pakistanis and Sikhs. With the exception of the loud-mouth, self-seeking, Pakistanis, the others were respectful, well mannered and knew how to get on with their jobs.

  38. Morning peeps. Good to see you are all still putting the world to rights in here! I’m nursing an injured back right now so might drop in now and then if I can get my new computer to use the right password.

    1. Good grief, Gavin. Long time no see. I was thinking about the other day while admiring my solar panels!!

      Don’t go away again.

    3. Hello stranger. Back trouble takes ages to get over. It’s a right pain in the arse.

      1. To paraphrase the Moody Blues – “face trials of piles with smiles” ha ha.

      1. Haha! Had a bit of deconstruction to do. A pigeon fell down the chimney and got stuck behind my sister’s gas fire, which is fixed into the wall behind a huge stone fire surround – not something that can be moved. After a day with us believing (trying to convince ourselves) that the shock would have killed the poor thing, it decided to tap-dance on the top of the fire enclosure and sing a happy song to itself (if a pigeon cooing can be described as a happy song). Not wishing to let the poor creature starve to death, I decided to tunnel into the fireplace from the back. The pigeon was duly released, a little dusty from the destruction of the wall, but still able to fly out through the window after a few laps. In appreciation for its release it didn’t decorate any of the soft furnishings before departing.
        It would perhaps be nice to end the story by saying that the exertions in saving the bird’s life were responsible for my back injury, but I can’t really claim that. I think I twisted awkwardly while sitting in a comfy chair watching television, and this tweaked an old back injury that I sustained while at university. My back has had this weakness ever since. Happily things are a bit easier today than they were yesterday, when I was virtually immobilised. Getting old is no fun.

        1. Good day, TCS! Long time no see!
          Getting old is no fun. But it sure beats the alternative!

        3. Hmm, “Getting old is no fun.”

          Tell us about it.

          Happy to see your return, Gavin.

      1. Good one!

        My brain is becoming like Swiss cheese so I have to store all my passwords on the computer. When I bought this new laptop it dutifully informed me that many of my stored passwords had been seen in leaked data, so it advised me to change them. It also has a simple system for logging in based on a fingerprint detector – you just put your finger on the button and it logs in for you, so I duly changed all the passwords to the secure new ones that the computer suggested (which are essentially unmemorable gobbledeygook) including using a much stronger password to log in to the computer account itself.
        Then I cut my finger doing some DIY and the damned thing wouldn’t recognise me, so it wouldn’t let me log in. All the new passwords I had saved were stored inside the computer, so I couldn’t get at them to be able to use them on my old computer. It took a monumental effort on my part to remember the strong new password I had chosen to log in to the computer manually.

        There are times when I curse this technology!

        1. I can only imagine. Anything that seeks fingerprint / retina scan for computers I avoid like the plague. Anyway, you managed to get on here, so don’t let me interrupt your enjoyment of Elf’s live broadcast of the Jean Michel Jarre lightshow in Tel Aviv

        2. Cursing the cut finger could be a good idea and then change the fingerprint to the little finger on the left hand.

  39. Good Morning & Happy Saturday all Nottlers. Its been quiet in Tel Aviv for the 3rd night in a row but Ham-Arse have been firing rockets non stop at our cities down south since last Monday with no let up. Over night they fired more than 200 rockets, the Iron Dome shot down 100, 30 fell short & exploded in the Gaza Strip killing some of their own civilians, 70 fell in open areas but one hit a high rise in Beer Sheva causing damage but no casualties & another hit the border town of Sderot causing some damage to a house but no casualties. Well that’s enough bad news , now for some good music : Amado Mio – Avalon Jazz Band
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQ1R–8MYx0

    1. How do the rickets get into Gaza? Prolly a daft question- but I am puzzled, what with the IDF Navy close by to monitor sea traffic.

      Shalom, anyway, Hatman.

        1. I just hope our daft and rather pathetic political classes are thoroughly checking containers arriving from the middle east.

      3. Bill lots are smuggled in via Egypt & lots of the smaller ones are made in Gaza thanks to the generosity of the UN, EU, UK & US tax payers who poor billions of aid money into Gaza plus cement , steel & fertilizers which end up being used by Hamas to make tunnels & bunkers , rockets out of the steel & explosive warheads & suicide bombs out of the nitrate fertilizers . All this aid enters the Gaza Strip legally under UN supervision from the Egyptian side.

        1. Good article in Aftenposten explaining where the rockets come from – funded by kind-hearted (?) donations of money, fertiliser, steel, sugar… You’d thought that Aftenposten has had a change of polotics, so I, being a suspicious barsteward, wonder what they are playing at – they have been left-wing, pro-Palestine, truth-manglers since before the war, when they were nasty sympathisers, too.
          https://www.aftenposten.no/verden/i/56x5ze/hvor-fikk-hamas-2000-raketter-fra-det-er-paa-reodor-felgen-nivaa

      4. They use the funds the U.N and the E.U give them for housing to build tunnels instead.

  40. Just signing off till the arvo. The MR has an international zoom meeting which will take two hours and has , rightly, decided to do it in my office….

    A bientôt

  41. Tribalism Comes to the West – decent piece https://unherd.com/2021/05/tribalism-has-come-to-the-west/?tl_inbound=1&tl_groups%5B0%5D=18743&tl_period_type=3&mc_cid=af29e08bb9&mc_eid=f8bf59e7dc “In Somalia, where I was born, my mother was blindly loyal to our clan. So much so that, apparently, she claimed she could detect the malicious intentions of an individual from a different clan just by the structure of his forehead. She would, for example, often warn my father that someone was trying to take advantage of him, purely by the way he frowned” – I spot similar tenets in Halfcock, Whitless Whitty, “Jean Claude Van-Tam” every time they infiltrate the screen as their foreheads and frowns are frequently displayed

    1. Morning PT.
      With some mates we used to frequent a blues club called Klooks Kleek upstairs at the Railway Inn/Tavern West Hampstead.
      A couple of times we saw a band called Peter B’s Looner’s. Peter Bardens on Hammond Peter Green on Guitar and vocals, Mick Fleetwood on Drums. The beginning of Fleetwood Mac. Another guy I know who lives in Germany, was a lead guitarist in a North London band, Cliff Adams and the Twilights, Cliff Adams being the singer. He later became the manager of Fleet Wood Mac.

      1. Thanks … brings back happy memories.
        Peter Barden played keyboard with founding member of the British progressive rock group Camel. One of my fave rock bands…

        I was there………………..how lucky we were

        Did you go to Eel Pie island?

        1. They toured as Pete Barden’s Camel, as I think there was a slight dispute with Andy Latimer! They were/are a fantastic band and were the background to my old man and I getting together! As you say, how lucky we were!

        2. I did once, clip clop over the rickety rackety bridge and it was rammed and the Stones were on, very loud of course. I loved those great nights.
          There was a pub in Richmond we use to go to as well i think it was the castle.
          Where did you live than PT ?
          There was another small blues club near Chalk Farm underground. Easy to get to from Mill Hill East.
          My mate Dave was a drummer in a band, we went to see John Mayles Blues breakers.
          They were on a stage about two foot high, pints in hands we stood in front of the guitarist watching him closely. Dave said, blimey he’s good who is he ? I said, I don’t know. …….It was Eric Clapton just after he’d left the Yardbirds.

          1. Hi Eddy
            I lived near Bath, often went to London re concerts/festivals and work. I loved it…at the time I was record buyer for a co. in the West country and often visited the music scene in Cornwall which was really hot….lots of great bands which were eventually signed up
            by the record companies.

          2. Bath, lovely place we spent a weekend there, loved it.

            What i liked about those times was the pubs were heaving with people listening to bands and North London was no exception we were so lucky to be able to see them, often many working their way up the ranks. Britain had talent in those days in droves, such as Reggie Dwight he played the piano for Jong John Baldry’s band I believe it was called Steam Packet. If i remember correctly Rod Stewart sang with them as well, we had no real idea who the band members were in the those days. Maggie Bell was one of the raucous singers, put those two together an i think you’d have a popular song. One of the sax players name was Elton Dean, so plus Long John Baldry and you have another famous person. I had a really good book about the 60s music scene i lent it to someone i cant remember who but it had had most of the cross wires from different bands forming new bands etc.

        3. Coming from North London it was fairly easy to get tom places like the Harrow area. I remember going to see The High Numbers at the Trades Hall Watford, opposite the bus garage. They latterly change their name to The Who.
          The refectory at Golders green was a another great place to go. The animals Paul Butterfield Chicago Blues band. Georgie Fame, Zoot Money Big Roll band, so many great bands of the era.

      1. Another very loud boom nearby & dozens of terrified birds flying around ( we have lots of migrating birds nesting in the trees near us ) & the neighbours dogs are all barking away – quite a cacophony of barks from terrified dogs !

          1. A rocket fell in Ramat Gan, the town adjacent to where I live in North East Tel Aviv ( I used to live in Ramat Gan for many years ) . Apartment’s above a shop damaged & a car in the street destroyed & 2 women lightly wounded. In Tel Aviv the Police have ordered the beaches closed, they were full today & the TV showed people running from the beach to take shelter in the hotels along the Tel Aviv Promenade . At least 30 rockets were in the first wave & most were intercepted. Large numbers of rockets fired in 3 waves covering the whole of the Tel Aviv metropolitan district & beyond well up the coast & inland, all this while rockets are being fired non-stop at our cities & communities around the Gaza Strip & as far inland as the city of Beersheba

        1. he’s from Sarf London Obs, no chance. He’ll have his bottle opener and his crate nearby, blade in his pocket somewhere to hand and reliving the Brixton riots, keeping one eye for those who avoid walking on the cracks in the pavements

          1. Guess that if there’s a rocket show for “free”, might as well enjoy the spectacle!
            With suitable refreshment, of course…

          3. I have adopted a lighthearted tone, but I worked with a guy a few years ago from Chechnya. Top bloke, lightly Muslim, I have enormous respect for his abilities – good mate, too.
            He was a refugee from the war in Chechnya. He doesn’t talk about it much. Thank God, I don’t want to hear.
            One of his stories was that he and his mates had been hanging out in the street when there was yet another rocket attack. They took shelter until it was past, then broke up to go home. 2 minutes later, a huge bang! from the neighbouring street… they went over to see if anybody needed help, and there was his best mate, in pieces.
            That’s the reality of random rocketting into civilian areas. Family or mates in bloody pieces.
            And that’s why I cannot feel a tiny bit of sympathy for those that do that kind of thing – blow apart non-combatants, women, children, grandparents, whoever, deserves all Hell’s damnation, and for that to start soonest.

          4. Hamas don’t care. Why would they when their hatred so massively outweighs their care for their children? No doubt their demented religion considers those deaths as heroes in a better world.

            Their fanatics.

          5. I always have my SAK ( Swiss Army Knife ) with me but I rarely drink beer, last time I had one must be 2 or 3 years ago whilst having lunch with friends at a Cafe near the beach in Tel Aviv & I seldom drink wine, last time I had a glass was at Passover back in March.

  44. Wild boars corner woman in Rome supermarket car park and steal her groceries. 15 May 2021.

    A group of boars were caught on camera cornering a woman in a supermarket car park before stealing her shopping in the latest example of the animals wreaking havoc in Italy.

    The clip recorded in the village of Le Rughe, around 30km from Rome, shows the woman backing away from the boars as she tries to shake them off.

    What next? Badgers mug cyclist! Squirrels hijack car? There will be no end to it!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/14/wild-boar-corner-woman-rome-supermarket-car-park-steal-food/

    1. What were they doing – going through her shopping and saying things like “You don’t want to buy that – too much sugar” or “You should really go vegan and save the planet”.

      Oh – boars. I thought it said bores.

  45. I’m now receiving emails offering packs of face masks at greatly reduced prices. Have suppliers been tipped the wink that their nice little earner is for the chop?

      1. You’ve probably guessed correctly.
        They will say something like, Cloth masks don’t work against the new, deadly (insert name of country with right wing leader) variant! and everyone will have to wear industrial FFP2 ones.

    3. How about one of these for your next dinner party?

      Sanitiser Sentinel Unit Sentinel Proximity Unit

      £48.95

      Sentinel Proximity Unit
      – automated spoken reminder system. It provides a safer environment by
      highlighting any item to ensure sanitiser stations, washroom dispensers
      important posters and any other safety communication is highlighted and
      adhered to.

  46. At last, news the BBC has been waiting for: Children killed in Israeli strike on refugee camp

    At least 10 people have been killed, including eight children, in an Israeli air strike on a refugee camp in Gaza, officials say
    A five-month-old baby found trapped in the rubble is said to be the only survivor from a family

    Even more misery:

    Saturday is the day when Palestinians commemorate what they call al-Nakba, or the catastrophe, when Israel came into being in 1948.

    A few minutes ago on Radio 4, Jeremy Bowen weeping because the television companies are not showing images of bodies torn limb from limb, piles of dead and blood soaked streets. The Jews are killing indiscriminately and our the Palestinian bombs are not killing as many of them. It’s not fair!

    1. That the BBC look to celebrate such events is sad. Their bias and lack of balance is almost comical, if people were not being slaughtered.

      They make no mention that Hamas started firing the missiles. They don’t seem able to point and say ‘They started it’.

    2. That the BBC look to celebrate such events is sad. Their bias and lack of balance is almost comical, if people were not being slaughtered.

      They make no mention that Hamas started firing the missiles. They don’t seem able to point and say ‘They started it’.

    3. I listened to coverage of the Isreal Palestine issue a Canadian talk show last night.

      They interviewed an expert from an unbiased English university to talk about the root causes of the problem. He must have been recommended by the BBC, his rants made a wailing Palestinians woeful tale sound conciliatory.

    4. As Mahatma Aka Elf & Safety, our man in the thick of it, explained earlier many Hamas rockets are landing on their own territory.
      Perhaps someone should explain this to the BBC they might not be bursting into tears so redily.

    5. It’s just normal end of ramadan celebrations isn’t it? Fire a few rockets into Israel, that sort of thing.

      1. Yes, its a long standing tradition which is being imported into the UK and the rest of the civilised world. Who are we to object to the oppressed billions slaughtering the evil unbelievers when it is in their ancestral blood and DNA?

        1. Which why they take it out on sheep; snatch them from their meadows and cut their throats.

          1. It’s a means of keeping their hand in until the call comes from the muezzin in the local mosque.

  47. 332767+ up ticks,
    Seems like the pakistani paedophilia plague only attacks
    in the main, underage,unsullied, white children.

    Plenty of scope there for this being Mental awareness week.

    Live Coronavirus latest news: Indian variant only severely affects the unvaccinated, says Government advisor

    Both issues seem to have a great deal of governance party action & rhetorical input.

    Mass uncontrolled immigration, ongoing / paedophile umbrella cover up, ( ie Jay report )

    1. These men will appearat Bradford Magistrates Court on July 7 and 9.
      The Eight suspects who were arrested over the course of the investigation have been released without
      charge.
      Those charged with sexual assault are:
      Asad Ali, 37, o fBrighouse, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Ajmal Aziz, 39 of Halifax, is charged with three counts of rape and attempted rape.
      Mohammed Jangier,44, of Halifax, is charged with rape.
      Mohammed Asif, 36,of Halifax, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Harris Ahmed Butt,37, of Halifax, is charged with two counts of rape and two counts of indecent
      assault.
      Taukeer Butt, 36,of Halifax, is charged with three counts of rape.
      Muitasim Khan, 40,of Halifax, is charged with rape.
      Mohammed Hamza, 47,of Halifax, is charged with rape.
      Mohsin Mir, 40, of Halifax, is charged with three counts of rape.
      Javid Mir, 38, of Halifax, is charged with rape.
      Haroon Saddique, 37, of Bradford, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Zahir Iqbal, 41, of Halifax, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Sarfraz Rabnawaz, 35, of Bradford, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Wajid Addalat, 43, of Halifax, is charged with rape.
      Sajid Addalat, 45, of Halifax, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Nazim Hussain, 43, of Bradford, is charged with conspiracy to rape.
      Nadeem Saddiqque, 43, of Sheffield, is charged with rape.
      Saquab Hussain, 43, of Halifax, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Sadakat Ali, 48, of Bradford, is charged with rape.
      Ziarab Mohammed, 48, of Halifax, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Imran Raja Yasin,41, of Halifax, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Zulfiqar Ali, 40, of Bradford, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Malik Abid Qadeer, 64, of Halifax, is charged with five counts of rape.
      Kamran Amin, 45, of Halifax, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Mohammed Akhtar, 51, of Halifax, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Ali Zulfiqar, 38, of Halifax, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Shafiq Ali Rafiq, 40, of Dewsbury, is charged with two counts of rape.
      Amir Shaban, 45, of Halifax, is charged with rape.
      Sakeb Nazir, 36, ofHalifax, is charged with two counts of rape.se

      1. Do you know, there does seem to be a common thread running through this affair, but I’m blowed if I can see what it is.
        They’re not all from Halifax, so what else could they have in common?

      2. 332767+ up ticks,
        Afternoon S,
        Let us use caution otherwise we could be upsetting a good many folk who insist that we need these peoples, this is clearly portrayed by the support for the lab/lib/con mass uncontrolled immigration, ongoing, coalition.

        There will be hell to pay among the electorate when it is realised that only one segment of our guests seem to be monopolising the paedophilia market when it should be a multicultural issue shared among the three mass uncontrolled immigration, ongoing, parties.

      1. Neither. A message needs to be sent to Muslims – who are disproportionately represented in our jails against their percentage population.

        Flogging. They think they can behave how they want to, so we need to show that Muslims will fit in and vanish, or be flogged. Chain them to a post, shave their stupid beards off and flog them.

    2. No longer available that was probably too sensible and close to the truth.

        1. Oh he’ll be out in 18 months, without question.

          Reformed, all perfectly normal, regrets his actions… and will leap out and rape another woman.

      2. 332767+ up ticks,
        Afternoon W,
        I believe we are lucky he got that. when sentenced to two years he told the judge he could do that standing on his head,
        so the judge added two more to get him back on his feet.

  49. Vladimir Putin and the Myth that Just Won’t Die. 15 May 2021.

    First, even in cases when Putin is the central decision-maker, he does not work in a vacuum.

    Other actors — including in the bureaucracy — influence the information he receives and the range of options presented to him. The “one-man show” model is completely silent on the significant agenda-setting power held by others beyond the Russian president.

    Second, even if Putin is involved in all important decisions, he does not necessarily impose his own settled preferences (assuming he has them across all areas). A plethora of accounts portray Putin as an arbiter, acting as a judge between competing interest groups, rather than as somebody who simply dictates policy.

    In fact, this “arbiter” model can help explain frequent policy U-turns in some policy domains. These changes do not reflect Putin’s own vacillations, but, rather, the shifting balances of power between these competing groups. A focus on Putin alone would miss this.

    Hmmm? A little late for this. The Myth is a creation of the West. For the last five years at least it has been Putin this and Putin that! There have been times when I wondered if anyone else actually lived in Russia! Putin orders Skripal’s poisoned in Salisbury. Putin pushes unknown doctors out of windows. Putin’s secret daughter throws fit. Putin’s dog sh*ts in Red Square! Anything to do with Russia belongs to Putin!

    My guess here is that after the Ukraine screw up which has seen the United States sack all of its MSM shills and abandon Navalny to his fate that a new propaganda program is being launched. This will avoid the vilification of Putin (mostly because it has made him extremely popular) and concentrate on Geopolitics.

    https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2021/05/14/vladimir-putin-and-the-myth-that-just-wont-die-a73891

      1. Pictures of a Ukrainian Dream. 11 May 2021

        Blinken demanded a massive push against every Ukrainian oligarch, so that huge chunks of Ukrainian economy are transferred to – who else – foreigners. Same for land privatization.

        Somewhat hilariously, Blinken warned that Russian troops might invade Ukraine. In this case, Zelensky can count only on huge political assistance, not military. So Zelensky in fact was ordered to stop asking to join NATO and cease provoking Russia, as President Putin, who already drew red lines, could make a “drastic decision”.

        Blinken demanded that American assets should be untouchable by Ukrainian law, and named honored figures of civil society. Maidan cookie distributor Victoria “F**k the EU” Nuland, also in the room, drew up a list of The Untouchables, and Blinken met with them separately.

        Finally, the giant ghost hanging over the whole trip to Kiev had to make itself known. In practice, Zelensky was invited to turn in everyone in Ukraine who helped bring information about Hunter Biden to the media via Rudolph Giuliani.

        Try this!

        http://thesaker.is/pictures-of-a-ukrainian-dream/

        1. the village idiots in the nursery continue to follow a path they can’t follow or stay on. Face saving in the extreme

  50. Just in from Oz

    Weather Forecaster

    The Aboriginals in a remote part of Northern Australia asked their new elder if the coming winter was going to be cold or mild.

    Since he was an elder in a modern community he had never been taught the old secrets. When he looked at the sky he couldn’t tell what the winter was going to be like.

    Nevertheless, to be on the safe side, he told his tribe that the winter was indeed going to be cold and that the members of the tribe should collect firewood to be prepared.

    But being a practical leader, after several days he got an idea.

    He walked out to the telephone booth on the highway, called the Bureau of Meteorology and asked, ‘Is the coming winter in this area going to be cold?’

    The meteorologist responded, ‘It looks like this winter is going to be quite cold..’

    So, the elder went back to his tribe and told them to collect even more wood in order to be prepared.

    A week later he called the Bureau of Meteorology again. ‘Does it still look like it is going to be a very cold winter?’

    The meteorologist again replied, ‘Yep, it’s going to be a very cold winter.’

    The elder went back to his tribe and ordered them to collect every scrap of firewood they could find.

    Two weeks later the elder called the Bureau again. Hey, ‘Are you absolutely sure that the winter is going to be very cold?.

    ‘Absolutely,’ the guy replied. ‘It’s looking more and more like it is going to be one of the coldest winters ever.’

    ‘How can you be so sure?’ the elder asked.

    The weatherman replied, ‘Our satellites have reported that the Aboriginals in the north are collecting firewood like crazy, and that’s always a sure sign.’

  51. Good afternoon all

    Off soon to plays bowls but this is amusing

    From our Indian doctor neighbours

    Guys, please start taking this Indian Covid Variant seriously!! My neighbour caught it and has been in a korma for a week and he’s only just buried his naan.

    2. It’s a poorly-illuminated robin Erithacus rubecula.

      I don’t understand what you mean by a “50mm zoom”? A fixed focal length of 50mm is not a zoom, it is a standard lens. To be a zoom it must have a range of focal lengths, e.g. 18mm–40mm or 80mm–200mm, etc.

      1. It is a variable 16mm-50mm zoom lens used at 50mm maximum zoom.

        It’s the naffest shot I could take to test the camera limits at default VGA recording setting.

        The test was mainly to hear the sound recording from the camera and the level enhancements available from the InShot editing app.

  54. Female student, 29, who said ‘women have vaginas’ and are ‘not as strong as men’ faces disciplinary action by university after fellow classmates complained about the ‘offensive and discriminatory’ comments Dreary Fail

    A student who said women were born with female genitals and claimed the difference in physical strength between men and women ‘was a fact’ is facing disciplinary action by her university.

    Lisa Keogh, 29, who studies law at Abertay University in Dundee was reported to university chiefs by her classmates after she said that women were not as physically strong as men. The mature student, who is in her final year, is now facing a formal investigation by the university for the ‘offensive’ and ‘discriminatory’ comments.

    Abertay University launched the world’s first computer games degree in 1997 and in 2017 held a programme of events celebrating 20 Years of Games.
    Abertay was also the first to offer a degree in Ethical Hacking, starting in 2006. Currently it is offering degrees in Utter Stupidity and In-depth Wokism.

    Please tell me that this is a joke… or that it is run by the BBC. That would explain a lot.

    1. This sort of stuff is not new. I went to US in 1971 as a Kids Camp Counsellor (I’ve just realised the double entendre in that description so no funnies!) and an American guy was there teaching frisbee, he had a degree in frisbee from an American university. That was my introduction, as a very naive Brit, to the way the world was developing.

    2. Take the university to court. Make them prove she is wrong. This is biological fact. That the Left might not like it is irrelevant. They need to be slapped down.

    3. In the current series of hopefuls on the SAS Who Dares Wins prog there is Holly – a person with a large Adam’s apple, who claimed to be female, but “stil have male genitals”. At the start of the prog Holly was shown as having “boobs” under the jumper, which had disappeared in later shots. The staff all referred to Holly as “She”.

    4. The trans lobby will go all the way with this one, because the idea that men take on the characteristics of women, including comparable strength, after a few years on oestrogen, is the basis of their argument that trans women should be allowed to compete in women’s sports.

    1. Do you have to plant your own magic money tree and wait, or do they give you a fully grown one?

    2. They’ve tried it in the USA, and lo and behold people would rather be on paid holiday than at work.
      https://www.takimag.com/article/are-the-halcyon-days-over-for-joe-biden/

      Where economists had predicted employment gains of a million new jobs in April, the jolting figure came in at about a fourth of that number.
      One explanation: The $300-a-week in bonus unemployment checks the Biden recovery plan provides may have been a sufficient inducement for workers to stay home until their benefits ran out.
      Workers might reasonably ask: Why go back to work when we can take the summer off, with full unemployment, plus $300 a week?

      After the crushing jobs report came the inflation figure from April. 4.2% the highest in 12 years; stagflation here they come. Well done Joe Biden

      1. Many restaurants are bitterly complaining that they cannot get staff even when they offer better wages and benefits than before. People are opting to stay at home rather than taking jobs in the service industry.

        I our little area, staffing is so bad that restaurants are talking of only opening part time in summer (that is if big brother allows them to open).

        1. When one looks at it from the point of view of being say $40 a week better off working a 40 hour week why bother?

          1. I doubt that it is even that, the canadian benefit pays $500 a week, minimum wage in Ontario is under $15 an hour. Take into account the expense of getting to work and you are better off staying at home.

            Add to that the increased cost of housing round here. Thanks to the escapees from the big city, house prices have gone up 78% in the past year. Our tourist industry depends on summer students for many positions but no one can find rental accommodation.

    1. Dear Hope not hate.
      I hope your possessions are stolen and your properties are used as fly-tips by local, so-called, Travellers and that you hate the experience.

      1. Why are we so scared of these people “taking offence”? They are tiny minority groups who get huge amounts of publicity and money, then bleat about being offended or harrassed. They are taking the p*ss and it’s time we stopped pandering to the not-so-silent whinging minority!

        1. They tend rather quickly towards violence and tend also to be in physical good shape, so your average citizen is at a disadvantage. Unless tooled up, and that’s not something your average citizen is likely to be, either.

          1. I was rather thinking of our Police farce…you know the ones who are supposed to uphold the law, without fear or favour…remember them?

          2. Uphold the law, without fear or favour
            HA! HA! HA!
            uphold the law, without fear or favour…
            Sorry, Sue, it must be the way you tell them!

    4. Can’t these jorno’s find something else to do ?
      Number one…..how is it racism and if so what race are these people ?
      And obliviously people who even like them have never been subjected to their life style of nick-it and run and dump everything else in the shrubbery or a layby.
      Ask the owners of Brocket Hall Hertfordshire what they think of them, around 3 years ago they moved into a layby and had dumped tons of their shite, before they moved on, probably literally, shite, in the woods now the area is so contaminated nobody will go near it, even to discover what they dumped there. I used to enjoy walking our dog through the woods and along the river Lea.
      That’s what is wrong with these bloody people. They could be likened to politicians, in that everything they come into contact with they ruin and or leave a mess that someone else has to clear up. Or both.

      1. Or ask the widow of that young policeman who was dragged by his ankle along the road.

        1. Exactly. That was appalling.
          When I was working I had several run-ins with them. One was moaning about the state of things, so i said do you vote ? he said nahh can’t be bovvered mate . Well I replied are you a tax payer ? Nahh Then you can’t complain can you ? He didn’t like that.

    5. I don’t like that concept of giving them dedicated sites, couldn’t they be told to pay for access to the sites?

  57. Steve Coogan admitted he used BBC Partridge show to make Brexiteers look like ‘fools’ D Expresso

    On being asked by presenter Cathy Newman about what Partridge would make of the election, Coogan replied: “Alan Partridge is ill-informed and ignorant, therefore he is a Conservative and a Brexiteer.”

    There! That’s you lot put in your place… and me!

    1. A desperately unfunny and unpleasant man still trying to be relevant.

      1. It has always been a complete mystery to me how he kept on being offered work by the BBC. Does he know where the bodies are buried or something, because he is completely unfunny.

        1. You may well ask! Looking back to when he slithered out in public about 1989, I can’t remember one moment I found him remotely amusing.

      3. At least (apparently) there is some sort of satisfactory application for hemorrhoids.

          2. The only cure for piles is a scalpel. But first you need the camera inserted so the Doctor can see where to cut and stitch.

            Problem is….the camera crew keep getting in the way. :@(

    4. Odd, I’d bet Steve Coogan knows nothing about the EU. He’s just another nasty little Lefty.

      The Top Gear guys did a big thing about rubbishing Brexit as well. It was petty and pathetic.

      Maybe one day when the EU has become the Soviet union with the leaders in their private cars and everyone else starving, living in concrete apartments, when it’s finally about to collapse and does what every communist, fascist abomination always does and starts a war all the whinging remoaners will realise they were, and always will be wrong.

      Hah, who am I kidding. They’ll say it was because we left, won’t they?

      3. You’d only get Sturgeon whinging and the home office would give them more money against the public will.

        Big state is specifically against the people. If it were not, the sodding border farce wouldn’t bring ever more wasters here. At 120 odd illegal gimmigrants here every day that’s very nearly ten percent of our bloody birthrate.

        We don’t want them.

        We shouldn’t have to put up with them.
        They have no right to be here.
        Don’t bring them here.
        Tow them back, destroy the boat.

    3. Yes – *legal* migrants. *Legal* refugees. If he wants to support them, send him the bill. See how he likes that.

      Ah, I see he is a Lefty. Thus is probably in the pay of the state or, more likely, unemployed.

      Such people disgust me.

      Why are the police not arresting him for obstruction? They’re happy to leap one anyone else. Hell, they smash down doors to get to people who have committed no crime apart from civil disobedience.

  59. Free society is finished if we fail to resist this new Dark Age of unreason. 15 may 2021.

    So we are arguing about how many angels can stand on the head of a pin. What is worse is that once you have devalued argument and evidence, you have no defence against superstition and hysteria: the lunatic conspiracy theorists and the social control fanatics have as much legitimacy as anyone.

    This new Dark Age, with its odd combination of narcissism and self-loathing, is a threat nobody saw coming. If the institutions that should resist – universities, the arts, and democratic governments – fall before it, the free society is finished, defeated more resoundingly than it would ever have been by the old enemy.

    It’s already here Janet. While you were arguing for Equality and Feminism it walked right in and took over.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/15/free-society-finished-fail-resist-new-dark-age-unreason/

    1. It would be helpful – and polite – to preface Janet Daley’s article with her by-line …

  60. LNER, which runs trains between London and Scotland, is reviewing the language used in its announcements after a complaint by a passenger. An announcer had addressed the public using the phrase “ladies and gentlemen”. The passenger believed that this was insensitive, because it excluded anyone who identified as “non-binary”. D Torigraf

    According to a sex education teacher who appeared on a BBC Teach film in 2019, there are “over 100, if not more” gender identities (And that’s just those at the BBC and the Guardian).

    The answer is just to say Public (Púfters, benders, loonies and incestuous cretins). That covers most of them.

    1. There are two genders to match 2 biological sexes. Any other consideration is moronic pandering to the mentally ill.

  61. Thousands join London march in solidarity with Palestine. 15 may 2021.

    Organisers of Hyde Park event say UK government needs to act immediately after at least 126 people killed in Gaza.

    Protesters gathered at Speakers’ Corner, Hyde Park, and will march to the Israeli embassy at Palace Green, Kensington. The MPs Jeremy Corbyn, Zarah Sultana and Diane Abbott are among the scheduled speakers.

    The demonstration has been organised by Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Friends of Al-Aqsa, Palestinian Forum in Britain, Stop the War Coalition, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and the Muslim Association of Britain.

    The usual suspects! Some might think it odd that Hate Not Hope and Antifa are absent but these of course are quasi-government organisations!

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/15/thousands-join-london-march-in-solidarity-with-palestine

    1. Why don’t the authorities help these people achieve their aim? Give them all a first aid kit, some sandwiches and a few tins of condensed milk and ship them out to the Middle East so they can render much needed aid to their fellow countrymen/women/thingys? Then remove their passports and NI numbers and sail back for more?

      2. Probably get some Scots complaining it was unfair. Could we kill two birds with one stone and ship them *all* out to Palestine?

      1. I’ve just got home from the Freedom March. Massive and joyous. We walked from St James’s Park to Regents Park, via Whitehall, Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square, Piccadilly, Regent Street and Portland Place. All age groups and yes, about 85% white and the rest more black than Asian but that makes us representative, shirley?

        1. Good for you,Sue! Glad it went well, if a little under-reported by al-Beeb!

        2. You’re a right anarchist, Sue! More power to your elbow (other parts of the anatomy are available!)

          1. This won’t be reported by the MSM. If anything, they’ll simply say that a few dozen far-right agitators tried to disrupt central London….

            (I always imagine Our Susan as a far-right agitator…and subversive!!)

          2. I don’t think this government is any more corrupt than ones before it back to Lady T’s term.

            I think people very, very quickly forget the far worse fraud of previous administrations.

            Everyone has an opinion on how we should have handled the covid outbreak. My own is to carry on regardless, as only by infection can we recover. If the NHS had been overwhelmed, then the NHS is not fit for purpose. It coud have prepared. It could have organised. It was too busy navel gazing, complaining it needed more money rather than asking why it did and resolving those problems.

            However, whichever way he jumped would have been wrong. As long as he keeps to his intent now to unlock – and stay unlocked as very clearly, lock ups have been proven not to work.

      1. I don’t think he is. He is just ardently, fervently pro Islam. Why? Because they’re troublemakers. Maybe Corbyn sees them as the underdog? Who knows?

    5. Someone rather needs to point out that when Hamas were not firing rockets, Israeli didn’t have to shoot them down.

      Perhaps.. just perhaps… the problem is Palestine? It’s free to do what it wants. It chooses to try to kill Israelis. Maybe… just maybe.. you know, postulating this… if Hamas didn’t fire those rockets….. again, just perhaps…. there wouldn’t be a problem?

  62. Alex Scott ‘excited and honoured’ after it is announced the former England star will become the first female presenter of Football Focus.

    Were Seema Jaswal or Eilidh Barbour not female, or black enough?

    There may be others but, as I have never heard of it, never mind watched it, I can’t be rrsed to do further research.

      1. Another programme, Eddy, that I’ve never watched, nor had any inclination, so to do.

    2. She occasionally appears on MOTD2 (possibly also MOTD when the regulars are away). She’s a bit ‘gor blimey, entcha’. I have to say that when she’s on I FF – but then I do that with Crisp Bagger as well.

          3. Open goal. Irresistible. Sorreee.

            Looked in the hall mirror whilst on the way to the kitchen?

    2. I bet that goat or maybe even Ewe, is sheeting its self as well.
      I heard about a dyslexic pimp who once bought a warehouse.

  66. If the Indian variant doesn’t get named Vindaflu I’m giving up on humanity.

      1. “You are in a queue. You are number 75 in the queue. Your call is not important to us.”

  69. I’m away to make dinner using Reblachon, lardons and sliced potato. Otherwise known as Tartiflette.

    1. The thing is Dan you and everyone in the MSM know who the the refuseniks are, are but are scared stiff to mention the M word.

    2. Refuse to give treatment under the NHS if anyone refuses the vaccine and becomes infected. That might focus a few minds.

      1. How about refusing cancer treatments or cardiac treatments to people who haven’t lived vegan or vegetarian lifestyles?

          1. I fear so.
            And having “rushed” this series through the normal testing and review the PTB will allow a similar approach to the next threat.

            And then there will be a vaccine/drug that makes people less aggressive/friendlier/racially blind to their fellow man which will be encouraged until eventually a Soma is compulsory.

      2. Sorry, Gavin (and welcome back), but compulsory “vaccines” are problematic. I’ve had both AZ jabs, but only because the writing is on the wall for vaccine passports, and I want to live some sort of life. If I was younger, I would be more resistant.

    3. For info: (my emphasis)
      The ten points of the Nuremberg Code )https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Code)
      The ten points of the code were given in the section of the judges’ verdict entitled “Permissible Medical Experiments”:[6]

      1. The voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential.
      2. The experiment should be such as to yield fruitful results for the good of society, unprocurable by other methods or means of study, and not random and unnecessary in nature.
      3. The experiment should be so designed and based on the results of animal experimentation and a knowledge of the natural history of the disease or other problem under study that the anticipated results will justify the performance of the experiment.
      4. The experiment should be so conducted as to avoid all unnecessary physical and mental suffering and injury.
      5. No experiment should be conducted where there is an a priori reason to believe that death or disabling injury will occur; except, perhaps, in those experiments where the experimental physicians also serve as subjects.
      6. The degree of risk to be taken should never exceed that determined by the humanitarian importance of the problem to be solved by the experiment.
      7. Proper preparations should be made and adequate facilities provided to protect the experimental subject against even remote possibilities of injury, disability, or death.
      8. The experiment should be conducted only by scientifically qualified persons. The highest degree of skill and care should be required through all stages of the experiment of those who conduct or engage in the experiment.
      9. During the course of the experiment the human subject should be at liberty to bring the experiment to an end if he has reached the physical or mental state where continuation of the experiment seems to him to be impossible.
      10. During the course of the experiment the scientist in charge must be prepared to terminate the experiment at any stage, if he has probable cause to believe, in the exercise of the good faith, superior skill and careful judgment required of him that a continuation of the experiment is likely to result in injury, disability, or death to the experimental subject.

      1. To add to their woes, the vaccinated will have most likely invalidated their life insurance policies by submitting to an experimental treatment. They will have no comeback on the Pharma industry and will have to rely on prosecuting the folk administering the jabs.

        For the unvaccinated it is probably a good idea to cancel the assumed agreement with the NHS to allow medical histories to be shared. The NHS will have a log of those vaccinated and those unvaccinated.

      2. Yo Ol

        More like

        During the course of the experiment the scientist in charge must be
        prepared to terminate the experimented on subject at any stage, if he has probable
        cause to believe, in the exercise of the good faith, superior skill and
        careful judgment required of him that a continuation of the experiment
        is likely to result in injury, disability, or death to the experimental
        subject.         his failure to get the attention of the Big Pharma

      3. Yo Ol

        More like

        During the course of the experiment the scientist in charge must be
        prepared to terminate the experimented on subject at any stage, if he has probable
        cause to believe, in the exercise of the good faith, superior skill and
        careful judgment required of him that a continuation of the experiment
        is likely to result in injury, disability, or death to the experimental
        subject.         his failure to get the attention of the Big Pharma

    4. Some people believe that Dan Hodges has matured and gone from being a vile piece of excrement to a political commentator worth reading. I am not among them.

      There’s a latent Stalin or Mao inside every socialist just screaming to get out.

      1. There are no less than 500,000 so called Palestinians living in the UK & many are active members of Hamas, the PLO, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the PFLP & numerous other terror groups, many of them are also using charity group fronts to raise money for terror groups & many have British citizenship thanks to Tony Blair & especially his wife Cherrie who is a lifelong friend of Suha Arafat & I believe that Cherrie is the patron of several of these fake Palestinian charity groups operating in the UK. It goes without saying they are also Labour party voters & members, as they are of the SNP & the Liberal-Dems, in fact they have a Palestinian Lib-Dem MP Layla Michelle Moran

        2. Islamic Brotherhood are based in London, IIRC.
          Well-known terror sponsors.
          Why are they allowed to remain in the UK?

      2. 332767+ up ticks,
        Evening TB,
        ALL parties as showing should be shipped to the war zone
        stand either side of the border and rhetorically take it up from there .

        Foreign issues disputes in many respects financed by, in many cases UK welfare.

        Courtesy of the lab/lib/con alternating governance over the last three decades we have enough crap to shovel out before our home stables are anywhere near clean.

      3. Why are so many of the people in London from Palestine? Surely they should be living there, not here?

  74. Seems to me as if very few white English lads play in the Premier league these days .

    Moh is watching the Cup Final , funny old world isn’t it .

        1. Good show! How are you feeling? Any lingering headaches or blood pressure? I’m due my 2nd AZ shortly!

          1. Horrendous headache long gone , my b/p is being monitored by the surgery .

            You will be fine Sue, I am just awkward , even tomato sauce sets me off !😉

        1. I like Fulham and I’m impressed with Scott Parker. Of course, he used to play for us Magpies, back in the day!

          2. At least he seems to be motivated and optimistic. Sorry they got relegated!

          1. Hello Geoff. I’ve supported/followed Fulham since 1957 when I was 11.
            Looking forward to 1 June.

          3. It was never quite that full when i used to go. Used the schoolboy entrance for 1/3d. Less expensive than watching Arsenal, my local club.

  76. Complimenting foreign student’s English a ‘microaggression’, says Imperial College
    Saying ‘you’re so articulate’ also carries an assumption that white people are more intelligent, according to diversity training manuals
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/15/complimenting-foreign-students-english-microaggression-says/

    Giving someone a compliment is now forbidden.
    One of the other gems from this ‘training manual’ is this:-
    Staff should not say “I believe the most qualified person should get the job. We need excellence!” because this perpetuates the “myth of meritocracy” that BAME people are not disadvantaged.

    1. It was bound to happen when b liar said he wanted 50% of school leavers to go to university. The dumbest are now the ‘masters’.

          1. 332767+ up ticks,
            Evening GG,
            It was taken out via treachery nEc / farage.
            Unless it’s like is reinstated these Isles via the lab/lib/con are in, and staying in, deep doom laden sh!te until it will be a relief, when the imams have the shout.

          2. UKIP couldn’t be allowed to threaten the ‘two-party’ (one-party really) status quo. So it was infiltrated by the forces of darkness. I still believe Nigel meant well, but he was nobbled.

          3. 332767+ up ticks,
            I to believed him right up until he wanted his life back, then he condemned himself on LBC and mass knifed the membership that gave him a platform, me inclusive.
            ALL on record.

          4. #MeToo, Geoff. I was a paid-up member until 2017 when all the in-fighting started.

            Haven’t the fools identified (and sorry for the simile) that they’ve shot themselves in foot and are no longer contenders.

  78. Interesting btl comment on the Israel/Palestine events:

    Here is the reason – not reported in the British press -(Pakistan Dawn News) why the ‘pause’ in the apparent Israeli plan to invade the Hamas terrorist Gaza strip :

    Fake news that Israeli troops were ‘on the ground ‘ invading … “sent Hamas fighters rushing into defensive positions in an underground network of tunnels known as the Metro, according to Heller and other Israeli reports.

    Israel called in 160 warplanes and bombarded the tunnels for 40 minutes, the military said. Heller said it was his understanding that scores of fighters had been killed, though he said it was impossible to say….”

    Underneath in the Comment section, a Pakistani reader observed succinctly ; ”

    the Israelis are smart ” !

    A good way of avoiding civilian casualties, and wiping out scores of terrorists in one hit…

  79. That’s me for this damp day. No sun at all. Just constant drizzle- not wet enough to wear an anorak – but wet enough to make you, er, wet… More follows for the rest of time, apparently.

    Still, I have planted the greenhouse tomatoes – four varieties, having first put up a substantial frame. Then potted on 80 bedding plants. It is maddening still having to bring plants – which should be hardening off – back into the greenhouse at night. Grrr.

    So, shall reward myself with some medicine and look forward to doing the crossword.

    A demain.

    1. It’s been miserable and damp here all day, but the Sun has put in a belated appearance. The April frosts have played havoc with my modest garden.

          3. In all seriousness, Bill, I (thankfully) don’t suffer phantom pain, but I do have ‘phantom sensation’. My brain ‘thinks’ the toes are still there, but if it tells them to wiggle, they don’t oblige.

            While I was still at Roehampton, I ordered a pair of trainers from Amazon. They were duly delivered, and I handed them to my prosthetist. She fitted them, returned my legs, and I stood up, thinking “these are really comfortable trainers. Oh, wait…”

            Phantom Sensation is a Good Thing, since the brain ‘knows’ where the feet are, despite them having no feeling. But that was the case with diabetic neuropathy anyway. I’ve learned to avoid appliances with long trailing leads, since they’re very good at wrapping themselves around one’s ankles, unnoticed. Cordless Dysons, and 18V Bosch garden tools are very much the order of the day…

          4. The akle wrap problem is the same when I had a stroke, Geoff. Every Goddam thing attaches itself to my feet, and being slightly unstable anyway, gets me agitated.
            The bramble runners this morning (whilst fencing) did an excellent job of that, twice undoing my bootlaces! :-((

          5. Quite, Paul. It’s a bugger… :-)) Few brambles here, thankfully, but there’s a paved area, laid by a well-meaning neighbour for the last tenant, which is uneven, to say the least. Having rigid ‘ankles’ makes uneven ground somewhat uncomfortable. Guildford has pavements from hell. So a priority this year is to lift the slabs, level the ground and relay (plus some extra slabs). May as well get it right, since this is a ‘forever home’. In other words, I’ll leave here in a box…

          7. There was/is much humour in the whole foot thing, OLT. I have no regrets.

            I do have a redundant pair of toenail clippers, though…

          2. Quite. And it is sufficient for me. 25 m² of which is lawn, and Mowhammed the robotic mower takes care of that. Except that the clay soil here tends to protrude from the.. er.. grass, and does a very good impression of brick. Actually, there used to be a brickworks a few hundred yards from here, so I shouldn’t be surprised.

          3. I’m not interested in the modeeeest I want the pleasure gardens of the imodebeast.

          4. Fairy nuff. I don’t have your wide open spaces, but I’m quite satisfied with what I have. Wildlife is limited to a neighbour’s cat. The bastard. There are the remains of a greenhouse (foundations only, though I unearthed several panes of glass when weeding a distant corner of the plot). Don’t think I’ll replace it. Two thirds of the garden are vaguely green. I hesitate to call it ‘lawn’. Yet.

            I’ve considered decking, but I’m going to pave the final third. It’s interesting, seeing what grows here in the first year. Three hydrangeas have succumbed to the April frosts. Daffs, tulips, have been and gone. Bluebells are following. There are several roses, although the strong wind a few days ago ripped one large climber off the back fence. It’s back in place, and I suppose my scalp will heal eventually.

            I have a bag of agricultural gypsum which I’m going to introduce to the lawn. It’s supposed to break down clay soil, but I won’t hold my breath.

            At the front, there’s a large quadrant of grassed area which is tended by contractors. Thankfully.

            They say a man needs a hobby…

      2. Fenced this morning, driven indoors after lunch by monsoon. Still, ache like a barsteward, especially around the shoulders, but we got something done.

  81. For all those Woke Folk, who want to ditch our measurements, known as Imperial, and resort to the Metric System, brought in By Mr Napoleon,
    it should be compulsory for thosee Wokists to abide by the Napoleonic Code, as regard to their posessions when they die:

    Succession law in France is based on the Napoleonic Code, which was introduced in the 1800s. The law
    has traditionally considered that the estate of the deceased belongs to the whole family, rather than any single member,
    such as the surviving spouse.

      1. Only up to a point, and an assurance vie is a good idea, but as most Nottlers are over 70 it’s too late now!

  82. 332767+ up ticks,
    Under the Gerard Batten leadership the real UKIP called for controlled immigration,Batten and the real UKIP were treacherously taken down via the party nEc and leggit farage, it is all on record.

    He is a top flight condemmer he done johnson proud with his 80 seat win, at the expense of many decent people.

    Farage Predicts 20,000 Illegal Boat Migrants Will Arrive in 2021, Condemns Media for ‘Conspiracy of Silence’

    2. I once admired what they had achieved, but the treatment of Ranieri relegated them to being just another Billionaire’s toy.

    1. You can just see the gazelle’s remains swinging above the leopard, but most must be inside causing its weight increase.

    2. Lennon was a spoilt jerk; wrong woman, and destructive.
      Jus like Harry, sweetie x

  88. 332767+ up ticks,
    If this be fact then the odious neglect of the Nations mental health can now be considered to be irretrievable.

    Boris Johnson would secure 122-seat majority if he called snap general election, mass poll finds
    The Prime Minister would win 23 more Red Wall seats in the Midlands and the North

  89. The Church of England’s purging of school hymns is reckless cultural destruction

    New guidance instructing faith schools to abandon overtly religious songs is yet another lunatic assault by the C of E on its own heritage

    SIMON HEFFER

    It’s a long-standing joke that the Church of England exists largely to remove any idea of religion from our national life. The more the Church has sought to make its services more “inclusive” and “relevant”, the more Christians have converted to other denominations where they think things are done properly (notably Roman Catholicism), and the more those curious about Christianity have avoided the C of E.

    Confirmation of this absurd situation arrived yesterday in new guidance for faith schools from the Church, preposterously named a statement of “entitlement and expectation”. No, this does not refer to David Cameron’s catastrophic attempts to build a post-Downing Street business career, but what hymns should be chosen for singing in assemblies. The diktat has it that strongly “confessional” hymns are to be avoided because they may make children and teachers alike feel uncomfortable. They are said not be sufficiently “invitational”, which seems to equate Anglican worship with a cheese and wine party.

    Those of us (and I speak as an atheist) who thought one of the purposes of religion was to make people feel guilty about having done things frowned upon by the Bible, and to expect God to be both unhappy about our behaviour but to forgive us our trespasses, will wonder what is wrong with a little discomfort. Apparently, the halfwits who run the Church of England (and are running it into the ground) feel it is dangerous because “there should be no assumption of Christian faith in those present.”

    It is all, of course, about diversity: and the increasingly toxic idea that causing someone the mildest offence (such as assuming that someone in a Christian school might actually subscribe to Christianity) is equivalent in gravity to gratuitously amputating one of their limbs without permission or anaesthetic.

    In a Church of England school, it is surely a reasonable assumption that the children are there because their parents subscribe to the basic tenets of the Church of England and the Christian faith; and that the teachers are grown up enough to know what to expect when they sign up for such a job. The children, like generations before them, can like it or lump it until they reach the age where the law says they are masters of their own destiny. The teachers, having reached that age, if they feel the institution insufficiently diverse, should go and work somewhere else.

    Millions of us who found the Christian story somewhat far-fetched nonetheless went through our educational careers being culturally enhanced by the magnificent tunes that many of our hymns featured. The doctrine, except for the precociously devout, were neither here nor there. One obvious casualty of this bonkers pronouncement will be one of the most ravishing hymn tunes ever written, Repton – recognisable immediately from its opening lines:

    Dear Lord and Father of mankind
    Forgive our foolish ways!

    One can almost hear the squeals of anguish from the Church’s imbeciles-in-chief. Can we really be expected to tolerate being told that some of our ways might be foolish? And even if they were, why would it be God’s place to forgive them?

    That magnificent tune comes from Sir Hubert Parry’s oratorio Judith. In these culturally benighted times, when the nearest most children come to being inculcated with an idea of beauty is being force-fed pop music and the inanities of CBeebies, when otherwise would they have a chance not just to hear, but to participate in, the music of a composer so great as Parry? One must also doubt that they are encouraged to sing another of his majestic tunes, Jerusalem – which although not a hymn appears in most hymn books – given the entirely erroneous associations made for it with English nationalism and, therefore, colonialism, fascism, imperialism, white supremacy and all the rest of the largely imaginary components of our growing litany of cultural self-hatred.

    It is suggested, instead, that other favourites such as Kumbaya and Lord of the Dance – neither of which one could pretend has the slightest association with a high aesthetic or cultural enrichment – are perfectly safe, because they do not entail undue grovelling to the Almighty for real or imagined wickedness. It does not seem to occur to the those advocating this censorship that few take any notice of the words anyway, and that in life we all have to put up with things – including aspects of the Church of England – that we find tedious or that we disagree with; but that in putting up with them we are provoked to think, mature, and eventually form our own conclusions.

    The Church of England has done its best to desecrate – and I choose that verb carefully – its cultural heritage. Worshippers have been driven away by having to endure the Princess Margaret Bible and the Rocky Horror Prayer Book. Organs have been replaced by guitars and tambourines. It is as well the listing of buildings protects most of our churches, because one only has to see the vandalism done inside some of them by what modernising fanatics euphemistically call “re-ordering” to realise the scope such people have to destroy this vital part of our heritage if let loose on it. Think how offensive to parts of the “diverse” community the average church must be – all those crosses, angels, saints in stained glass and the very association of the Gothic style with Christianity.

    Taking an important aspect of the Christian religion out of hymns is not only theologically questionable, but it is certainly culturally destructive. Most of our greatest composers, from Tallis and Bach onwards, wrote the hymn tunes that children sing in school assemblies, and most children love singing them. Many tunes sung in the Church of England were pillaged by Vaughan Williams from old secular folk melodies, and recycled for the English Hymnal when he edited it in 1906: they are a vital part of our heritage, brilliantly preserved this way. Will O Little town of Bethlehem, originally a Sussex folk tune, survive the purge? Some extremist on the Church’s provisional wing can no doubt find an anti-diverse reason to hate it and have it banned.

    For years it has seemed that the culture of the Church of England as embodied in its buildings, liturgy and music is of far too great national and international significance to be left to the church to superintend. This nonsense about hymn singing finally proves the point.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/music/what-to-listen-to/church-englands-purging-school-hymns-reckless-cultural-destruction/

    2. Dear Lord and Father of mankind, is indeed sexist – what abart muvvers and womankind?

    3. My wife snd I were married in a Unitarian Chapel in Victoria Street Cambridge where we lived in 1987. It was but a short 50 yard walk for me to arrive at the venue.

      The preacher was great and the hymns unfamiliar to some of the attendees. We asked the organist to play an Elgar March in preference to the Mendelssohn. The other music I chose included parts from Boellmann’s Suite Gothique opus 25.

      Thankfully the organ in the Chapel was a good instrument and the organist an accomplished musician.

      I suspect the attendees had no idea about the music we chose or why we chose it.

      Edit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOyHci0j518

      1. Any schoolchildren who were forced to sit through BBC TV’s ‘Songs of Praise’ on a sepulchral Sunday evening in the 60s and 70s would have been familiar with many of the fine old Anglican hymns and tunes, even if they hadn’t sung them at school. It was my misfortune to attend an RC school where the music teacher appeared to know only two songs (not hymns!), the despised ‘Lord of the Dance’ and ‘Go Tell Everyone’. If a 10-year old were to write music for 5-year-olds to sing, it would sound like that. At the age of 13 we lampooned it mercilessly and continuously, despite the detentions.

    4. Two BTL Comments:-

      Joseph Wyse
      16 May 2021 6:43AM
      I am an English Jew who, in the early 1960’s attended a Church of England school (founded in 1701) adjacent to a wonderful ancient yet still functioning Church (mentioned in the Domesday survey).The archaic majesty and poetry of the Anglican hymns that were sung, and the readings of the Collect, still bring tears to my eyes when I recall them, read them or hear them. I never felt any sense of compulsion from the school to embrace Christianity, and felt comforted by the decent and fundamental gloriousness of the English language, the beauty of the English Faith, and it’s interweaving with the long reach of English history. With this experience and upbringing in mind, I rather fancy that in the British isles, minorities of faith are safe to practice without censure, disapproval or compulsion, their own religions, non -conformisms, agnosticisms or atheisms under the canopy of the ancient Institutions of these islands and their ancient ways. I shudder to think how these same minorities would fare under any of the modern, baleful, ungenerous and fanatic guardians and ayatollahs of wokism and their ilk. Do not change anything, preserve the religion of England, the C of E, by law established !

      Flag12UnlikeReply

      Terry Dacktill
      16 May 2021 7:09AM
      @Joseph Wyse
      The CofE would not exist if Israel had not existed. The entire Christian faith is built on the Jewish foundation and Jesus did not change anything but rather upgraded the law of Moses to make it an internal rather than an external requirement. The Christian faith has been under attack since the day Jesus was crucified no less than my those who call themselves Christians but who do not follow Christ.

      And another thing, the “Jews” did not crucify Jesus. The human race did that as all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

  90. Knickers and Spit. Found that the colours on needlepoint chart were so way off that i used a wrong colour.
    Have spent a jolly evening unpicking and redoing a chunk of the work.
    Eyeballs feel like gravel. Am knackered but feeling v. virtuous.

      1. Thanks, Sirens went at 24:10 & at 24:12 4 booms so far but not as loud as the booms this afternoon of the 2 rockets that hit Ramat Gan ( a town bordering on where I live in North East Tel Aviv ) which killed a man & wounded 2 women & destroyed a block of flats above some shops. Cant see any intercepts locally but TV is showing some over the Tel Aviv skyline.

    2. Mahatma, I just love your taste in these swinging jazzy groups. I could listen to them all day long. Thanks for your nightly posts. (And here’s hoping you sleep well tonight and awaken safely tomorrow – my thoughts are with you.)

    3. That is nice, it starts so calmly before becoming the energetic mambo Italiano that I know.

      Stay safe, your reports are very helpful to our understanding what is going on.

    1. Good evening, Conway. I hope you have had a good day. It has been cloudy, wet and oppressive over here in the east of England. I’m off to bed now. More of the same, I think, tomorrow. Night-night.

      1. Sleep well. The rain here has been torrential, but at least I was riding indoors. I did get soaked when I was in town, though.

        1. Hello Conway!

          Speaking of riding indoors, did you see the letter pointing out that one did so in a manège rather than a manage, as some hapless columnist had suggested? Made me laugh.

          1. I didn’t see it but it’s a common mistake. They all think we make use of a ménage à trois 🙂 I even had to point it out to my parish clerk (and her children ride).

        2. I have been trying Bach Rescue Night Remedy and so far I am pleased with it, three good nights’ sleep.

          1. Good. I tend to find that a couple of max strength co-codamol before bedtime send me off. If I’m giving the drugs a break, half a bottle of red is pretty good, too 🙂

          2. Hmmm, yes, I found Solpadeine Max would send me off to sleep and mostly I would wake feeling rested. I have given it a break for a while but I am getting very anxious about what is going on even though we don’t watch tv; I feel it is not going to be sorted by simply marches and protests. And I am concerned for our sons in their thirties, there is only so far I can get involved in informing them of what is going on. There are other influences in their lives now; wives and their in-laws.

      1. Alas, no. I filled in yet another form for a rehoming centre last night – at least, I tried to. The computer locked up, the Internet refused to co-operate and I left it on all night trying to send. It was still in the same state this morning when I came back to it. I did manage to get it to send this afternoon when I came back in from gardening (at least the weather has been pleasant until it rained hard again about 6pm). It’s nearly four weeks and I am really struggling to cope with the silence, the lack of doggy walks and the missing waggly tail and cold nose to distract me from the sheer drudgery of caring for MOH.

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