Friday 18 February: How water from roofs can be prevented from overwhelming sewerage

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here.

685 thoughts on “Friday 18 February: How water from roofs can be prevented from overwhelming sewerage”

    3. Forgive me if i have this arse about face back to front but…………….

      Did you post you liked the new Dune film?

      I have enjoyed all the iterations except the cartoon versions.

      The mini series aren’t bad.

      If you do like space opera then read Alistair Reynolds. Peter F Hamilton and Iain Banks.

      Excession is my go to.

  2. Pay-per-mile road charging ‘threatens electric car sales’
    Plus: How electric cars could blow an £8bn hole in Britain’s finances

    The chairman of the influential Transport Select Committee has admitted that his own proposals to charge drivers per mile on the road threaten to slow the switch to electric vehicles.
    Huw Merriman is promoting radical plans to move to road pricing to help replace the £35bn drivers pay in vehicle excise and fuel every year.

    Another prime example of a lack of forward planning and no joined-up thinking. What else would we expect?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2022/02/17/pay-per-mile-road-charging-threatens-electric-car-sales/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr

    1. Why does government after government carry on with these green innovations when it is patently obvious even to the most stupid of us that they will not and cannot possibly work without destroying what is left of our economy?

    2. Here’s a thought: Why does there have to be a charge for using the roads? Is there not enough tax taken already?

    3. Googy, goody Road Tax will be abolished

      All cars will be fitted with transmitters (if they do not have them already), give location, mileage done, parking, usage etc

      Road charges could be adjustable for the type of vehicle, including electric ones

      However:

      Vehicles will be monitored for driver:

      Compliance of of speed limits,

      Application of Parking charges,

      Parking on single double Yellers

      Crossing Double White Lines

      Time spent in Pub Carparks, to give Perlice (Drink Driving)

      Possible illegal Taxi services

      Criminal Investigations

      etc

      Big Brother, Big Sister, Big Step Parents, Uncles, Aunts, ex’s Jealous ones etc WILL BE WATCHING YOU

  5. Convoy!!

    Getting nasty now……

    https://twitter.com/OzraeliAvi/status/1494407476707741696?s=20&t=kpWbsM9ykM7w2fexaw6e7g

    https://twitter.com/Yanky_Pollak/status/1494450461025665028?cxt=HHwWiIDU_dexrb0pAAAA

    https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fcf0e5118-9fb9-4f47-b35a-2521dbb9502b_1080x696.jpeg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d5d7100de3c76143102ad683c888369608df2ed88b9ad863686f69ed34f23180.jpg

    Oi laffed

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/213a08ba8069b532ec23b0c0d38242d0ac51506a9d4232318fe5d1783a416b81.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/de07781f317ff01d020975b5f5df83755df3f6f2528a51faec89cbd639846109.png

    1. If you have a Ledger hardware c r y p t o wallet, it generates a new address every time you want to do a transaction.
      I haven’t tested this theory, but I think the RCMP can ban away as much as they want.
      Part of the problem with c r y p t o s is that so few people really understand them and the interfaces are not very user friendly.

  6. Doh , golf course closed due to red weather warning, even though it is only amber in the South East.
    The good news is that I wasn’t planning to go anyway.

    1. The London area including parts of the South East are now under a Red Warning issued about 4:30 this morning.
      Good morning BTW

          1. Yes, the met office map now shows that most of the SE is included, from Portsmouth to Essex, and just skirting Oxford.

            ‘Morning Oldie.

            Edit – I think Suffolk is now included.

  7. Spiked

    We’ve known for some time that the left is morally lost, intellectually

    spent and in bed with the very elites it claims to rail against. But the

    truckers’ revolt could well be the final nail in the coffin – for any

    claim contemporary leftists might once have had to be on the side of

    workers. The left as we knew it is gone, and it isn’t coming back.

    Rest Here

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2022/02/17/the-truckers-revolt-has-exposed-the-lefts-class-hatred/

      1. Left and Right don’t have the meanings they did before; there are pro-globalists and anti-globalists these days.

  8. UK ramps up information war with Russia as Vladimir Putin accused of creating excuses to invade Ukraine. 18 February 2022.

    The UK has ramped up the information war with Russia, accusing the Kremlin of creating excuses to invade its neighbour and building a military machine which allows it to attack at any time.

    In a series of public interventions, the British Government said Vladimir Putin was “willing to sustain thousands of casualties to get what he wants”, and called on Western allies to accept “short-term pain for long-term gain”.

    There’s no doubt who wants this war. All the rhetoric is being brewed up in Washington and Westminster. The plans, the threats, the accusations, come from one source; the West’s MSM. Whatever the final result it will initially strengthen Johnson and Biden and distract attention from their own borders and the vast domestic problems that are accumulating; all this with the added benefit of being able to blame Putin and Russia for them.

    UK ramps up information war with Russia as Vladimir Putin accused of creating excuses to invade Ukraine (msn.com)

    1. Morning all.
      After I saw a bbc interview with Lord Dannatt on Wednesday morning I posted that he said that while there is a border dispute no nation will be allowed to join Nato. This is written in stone.
      Since he made that statement there has been no further mention of it.
      What we see now in the rocket attack and damage to a school, is reminiscent of the way Hammas behave when they are trying to achieve and stir up support, when they are losing the advantage.
      I doubt very much if Russia is responsible for this. The msm are not being honest which is not unusual.

  9. Good morning, everyone. I am looking forward to today, as the weather changes. First of all I shall switch off the central heating and switch on my electric fan to keep the house cool. Then I shall sit out in the garden with a nice, cool drink and soak up the sun. Of course I shall rub sunscreen all over my exposed parts. Isn’t this global warming great!?!?! (Sarc.)

    3. You’ll be blown away by it all……
      Forecast not quite living up to all the scaremongering, only marginal puffs of wind out there. Some times they do get their proverbial underwear in a twist.
      By the same reckoning snow was also forecast surely not from South westerly.

      1. Morning RE, here in Norf Zummerzet my old gran used to say “snow coming, the wind is blowing from the abbey “ during really cold snaps.
        It took me a while to realise she lived due West of the abbey and it would have been an Easterly wind.

          1. …and here, in E Anglia, it’s referred to as a lazy wind; it doesn’t go round you but cuts straight through.

  11. Good morning all from a damp and breezy Derbyshire with 4°C in the yard.
    Undecided on what to do today. Was planning to check on Stepson’s flat but his mental state has regressed again and he’s been placed under Section 3 again, so is not likely to be discharged any time soon.

      1. I’m relieved actually.
        When I did a cancerstick run for him on Monday it was obvious that he’d regressed with his delusions and paranoia returning with full force.
        I’m wondering if the decline could be associated with the depo type injection he’s been put on for one of his medications?

          1. Not quite sure, but his sectioning in the first instance was due to his inability to handle his meds.

    2. That must be very worrying; I’m sorry. I think you should treat yourself to something enjoyable today – you seem to spend a lot of time helping others.

    3. Oh, man. Poor lad.
      That’s no fun for anybody. Might be worth just checking for water & gas turned off, heating on low and any post?

    4. Oh dear, it’s a never ending saga.
      Was he still in hospital so at least you didn’t have to deal directly with the problem?

      1. On the verge of being discharged.
        In fact had SAHA net been planning the bathroom refurb, he’d have been discharged a couple of weeks back.

      1. One of the reasons I don’t plan going in this weekend.
        Besides, if the weather improves I might be able to do a bit of wall building!

      1. Low down in the ground effect. Wind not so strong due to friction with the earth surface.
        Even in a really strong wind, if you lie down, all you feel is a pleasant breeze.

  14. First letter:

    SIR – I recall, as a retired chartered surveyor, that in my early career it was common practice to pipe roof rainwater into soakaways within the curtilage of a new property.

    Then it became the policy on new estates for all rainwater to be piped to an existing watercourse, often a substantial distance away. This, to my mind, created or exacerbated flooding problems downstream.

    It is no wonder that we are now reaping such problems virtually every time there is substantial rain.

    Much better, surely, to dispose of rainwater on site rather than create a flush into rivers, necessitating the dumping of raw sewage by water companies because of a self-inflicted inability to cope with the storm deluge.

    John Marsh
    Sheringham, Norfolk

    That, and population growth – oops, hush my mouth, the problem we mustn’t refer to!

    1. SIR – The pollution of rivers and the sea by sewage is most unpleasant, but the alternative – the backing up of sewage into houses because the systems can’t cope – is even worse.

      The problem has been caused by enormous population growth in recent years and a lack of effective town-planning control of new development.

      You can tinker at the edges of the problem and try to blame it on profiteering by water companies, but the only really effective solution would involve the regulator, Ofwat, approving huge increases in water bills to fund the investment needed to multiply the capacity of the sewerage system along with an – admittedly most unlikely – temporary moratorium on new housing development.

      Antony Ward
      Folkestone, Kent

      Anthony Ward, you are a brave man! I await the denials over the next few days…

    2. I doubt the acres and acres of terraced houses flung up in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries ever had soakaways when they had piped water installed. Their water must always have gone into the mains system.
      The problem is simply too many houses that have been run up by property developers without a corresponding requirement to install sewage facilities.
      All over the south east of England there are people who are rolling and strutting around as though they have won the lottery because they sold a few fields for housing or have been involved in property development.
      Many people have made an enormous profit because the true cost of building new houses hasn’t been addressed.
      Too many brown envelopes in planning departments!

      And now they will want to get the public to pay via increased water bills! As usual, the crooks reap the benefits, and the stupid mug taxpayer pays.

  15. Not quite sure what the headline today refers to, but when people build extension to their homes it’s usually mandatory in the planning applications to dig a soakaway on the property and to drain the surface water into that. This takes the pressure off the present drainage systems.

    1. ‘Morning, Eddy. Yes, that is certainly the case here, although I think this ‘innovation’ is relatively recent.

      1. We live in a private cul-de-sac….it only sounds posh…. completed late 50s, all our road drains are all soakaways. The problem we have is they should be cleaned every two years. This removes the silt and stops the drain from flooding. But since a gave up the job of chair of the committee no one seems to bother. We have had several new commers in recent years and one of the first things they do is build an extension. Which after the builders have finished the adjacent soakaway floods.
        I’ve given up trying to tell people the younger generation already know everything. Until it’s to late to make ammendments which everyone has to chip in and pay for. We are thinking of moving.

  17. SIR – On my water bill, the charge for sewage disposal is higher than the amount for metered fresh water. It’s a large amount for a service it appears some may not be getting. A rebate would be handy to help towards all the other crippling utility bills.

    David Coster
    Grantham, Lincolnshire

    If I had built my own house it would have included a large underground tank for rainwater storage, to be used for WC flushing, washing machine and so on. It is quite insane that water of drinking standard is used to flush the bog! This activity is reckoned to account for 25-30% of domestic water consumption. It’s madness, particularly in a country like ours with plentiful rainfall.

  18. How to embolden crooks, without even trying:

    SIR – I too disturbed an intruder (Letters, February 14), in this case in my garden, clearly in the process of mobilising a large item to remove it.

    I detained him for some time (safely) until the police arrived and took him away. They later declined to charge him as they said there was “no evidence” of an offence, despite the fact that the incident was fully recorded on my doorbell video device, including an audio recording of threats against me and my family. For all I know these still stand.

    Professor Emeritus Irving Benjamin
    Deal, Kent

    1. A professor? Says it all really. Eyes fixed on the stars; fell into a ditch! The Law now exists to oppress the Law abiding.

      1. Which of those involved had in a protected social category and therefore immune from prosecution, but those harrassing such people by recording the crimes done by “protected” villains may not themselves be in a protected social category and therefore can be collared at will.

    2. Alas, the police all too often get blamed for the faults of others. The decision not to prosecute may be due to the CPS not the police. Furthermore, there is already a large backlog of cases far more serious, the court system seemingly unable to comprehend that shutting for Covid would lead to such a backlog and therefore they should be using the wasted time to prepare to deal with it.

    1. ‘Morning Bill. You should be fine as the ‘red zone’ stops south of you. Perhaps you will just have to make do with mere amber…

  20. SIR – More than 700 sub-postmasters were convicted of theft, fraud or false accounting between 2000 and 2014 (Letters, February 17).

    Did it never occur to those running the Post Office to compare these figures with previous years, and ask why there had been a sudden outbreak of criminality among those they once trusted, in some cases for more than 20 years? Was it simply a coincidence that this happened after the installation of a new computer programme?

    Those responsible should answer in court, as their innocent employees had to.

    Peter Sandall
    Ludlow, Shropshire

    Good point, Mr Sandall. Which is why I suggested a few days ago that prosecutions for conspiracy ought to be pursued.

    1. I said something similar in that you would have thought someone would have noticed that there was an unusual problem occurring.
      I suspect the civil service bosses will shove it under the carpet.

      1. Someone did notice. Not only did they cover it up and continue prosecuting their employees they also lied to the Court.

        1. In a recent TV interview of one of “the Guilty” she said that she was charged with fraud which would be a custodial sentence, but

          if she agreed not to mention Horizon in evidence, the Post Office would reduce the charge to false accounting which would have

          a non custodial sentence.

          ….so even then the management of the Post Office KNEW that Horizon was faulty.

          I’m surprised that Paula Vennels was given a CBE.

          Very surprised.

          Very, very surprised.

    2. Evidence for me of the general institutional breakdown that has infested my nation.

      No doubt those self-servers who ruined hundreds of good innocents in order to pad out their bonus pots will be getting knighthoods, peerages and lucrative speaking tours in America out of it. It’s called the Free Market.

      The Free Market stinks.

      1. Paula Vennels who oversaw this shambles was awarded a CBE for services to the post office and charity.

  21. BTL Comment and one of several responses:-

    Logical Paradox
    57 MIN AGO
    It turns out that the Finance minister in Canada( implementing a ‘ we can steal your money’ policy, against truckers)… is also a trustee of the WEF.
    So, is this the Great Reset in action?

    Robert Spowart
    1 MIN AGO
    Reply to Logical Paradox – view message
    Message Actions
    I think Canada, to match it’s new Totalitarian Ideology, needs a new National Anthem to reflect it’s status.
    What would readers suggest would be most suitable? The Internationale or The Horst Wesel Lied?

    REPLY 0

    1. ‘Morning, Grizz. It’s just possible that I’m not the only resident of leafy* Surrey who hails from North of Watford.

      *Given the red warning for wind currently in force here, there may be fewer things for leaves to grow on, after today.

      1. Good morning, Geoff. It’s been quite blowy here for the past four days. We seem to get the remnants of Atlantic storms: sometimes with full force, sometimes lesser so.

    2. From a disgraceful song written in the 1960s called Nouveau Riche

      I wish I could succeed and be a social winner
      I wish my friends arrived at one when I asked them out to dinner
      I know I’ve got the brass, but I haven’t got the class
      And the whole situation is getting up … I mean’s become a farce.

  23. SIR – I was interested in your report (February 16) on new research that suggests domestic wood-burning causes only half as much fine-particle pollution as was previously thought, but that it is still a significant factor in harmful fine particulate matter emissions.

    I have just been cutting back an overgrown hornbeam hedge that grows close to our house, 50 feet away from a chimney above an open fireplace, in which we light a fire on most winter evenings. Some of our village neighbours also burn wood.

    I found rich lichen growth on the older hornbeam branches, despite the fact that lichens are extremely sensitive to air pollution. So while there may be a problem with burning wood in cities, is this really such an issue in more rural areas?

    Ursula Buchan
    Glapthorn, Northamptonshire

  24. Whitehall is certain Putin is about to invade Ukraine and conflict will be ‘horrendous’ – after MoD reveals Moscow’s ‘battle plan’ and US warns of ‘moment of peril’

    Russia insists their troops are retreating, but the MoD has published a report explaining Putin’s plan of attack hours after the White House warned of a false flag chemical weapons attack. This in turn saw President Biden told to withdraw all troops from Central and Eastern Europe.

    They have Russia’s Battle Plan! The mind boggles. These are the people who had to run for Kabul Airport to escape the Taliban only three months ago!

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10525105/How-Putin-Ukraine-MoD-reveal-Russias-battle-plan.html

    1. The battle plan and other details of the false flag operational prelude were given to us by Biden. He has all the info.

  25. Oh for even a fraction of this chap’s courage and leadership qualities today!

    Colonel Tony Aylmer, Irish Guardsman who served in Germany, Palestine and Aden after helping to shelter British pilots in Co Kildare – obituary

    He commanded a platoon at 19 and was later assistant to Lord Mountbatten, Chief of the Defence Staff

    By
    Telegraph Obituaries
    17 February 2022 • 7:33pm

    Colonel Tony Aylmer, who has died aged 96, served with the Irish Guards for 37 years and saw active service in the Second World War, Palestine and Aden.

    In September 1943 Aylmer, aged 17, enlisted in the Irish Guards, and after attending Mons OCTU he was commissioned the following year. In February 1945 he was sent to Germany as part of an emergency draft to reinforce the 3rd Battalion Irish Guards (3 IG) which had taken heavy casualties at Hommersum in the German Reichwald.

    Having flown by Dakota from Northolt to Belgium, where he was met by battalion transport, he took over command of a platoon whose former commander had been wounded.

    After a long convoy advance by lorry in snow and rain, his platoon was detached from the company and detailed to be defence platoon for battalion HQ. Aylmer had not seen the position in daylight and they dug in in darkness. During the night there was desultory shelling and it was an anxious experience for a young officer on his first night on operations.

    At battle school, he had learned the importance of keeping his men informed of what was going on and, a few days later, he gathered the guardsmen together in a barn for a quick update. The barn took a direct hit from a mortar and he was knocked out and thrown to the ground by a shell fragment.

    When he came to, he heard his sergeant saying, “These young gentlemen don’t last very long.” He struggled to his feet, continued his briefing and sent the platoon back to their positions. The medical officer patched up the wound in his back and asked him if he wanted to be evacuated. “Certainly not,” he replied and returned to his platoon.

    John Anthony Aylmer was born in Dublin on October 7 1925. His father, Major John (Jack) Wyndham Aylmer, served in the First World War with the 4th Royal Irish Dragoon Guards and was awarded an MC.

    Young Tony was brought up at Courtown House, Co Kildare. The house, about 20 miles west of Dublin with distant views to the Wicklow Mountains, had only two bathrooms and no electricity or mains water supply.

    He and his brother and sister lived in the isolated nursery wing. Their governess was issued with a revolver so that she could defend them if there were unwelcome intruders. None of the workmen who worked in the garden had watches, and the time was given by a large bell outside the stable yard.

    During the wartime shortage of petrol, one of the family cars was powered by a charcoal burner, the other by a gas bag on the roof rack. There was enough paraffin for just one lamp. Candles, made from mutton fat, with string for a wick, supplied the rest of the lighting in the house. In the winter months the family had dinner in their overcoats.

    RAF pilots who had to bale out over the neutral country in an emergency or were forced to land there, were held at an internment camp at The Curragh, about 35 miles south-west of Dublin, and were strictly guarded. For an escaped pilot trying to cross the border into Ulster in the north, Courtown was a useful “safe house” where he could lie low until pursuit had died down.

    Aged 16, Aylmer, armed with a shotgun, used to accompany his father on night patrols with the Local Defence Volunteers. One night he was in bed when he was awakened by the sound of pebbles rattling against his bedroom window. An RAF pilot officer had escaped from the camp and was on the run.

    The airman was concealed under the vast roof space at Courtown. His bicycle was hidden under a pile of rugs in the summer-house and great care was taken to ensure that the staff did not find out.

    The Gardai arrived the next day. They questioned the family and the maids and, after a cursory look around, they went away.

    The Gardai set up road blocks and made regular patrols so the fugitive was forced to stay hidden. After five days, the hue and cry died down and, at midnight, he was led across the fields by Tony Aylmer, carrying the bicycle, and sent on his way. A few days later, a message was received from Belfast to say that “the package has arrived safely.”

    The risks of helping escapees were not inconsiderable. Some participants had been caught and had served several uncomfortable months in Mountjoy Prison. After the war, Jack Aylmer received a letter of thanks from the Director of British Military Intelligence.

    Tony Aylmer was educated at Wellington, where one of his best friends was Prince John Makonnen, the son of Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia. In 1940, during the summer holidays, working on a farm in Sussex, he watched the dogfights overhead during the Battle of Britain.

    The following year, sleeping in a shelter, he was awakened by the sound of falling bombs. The Master’s Lodge received a direct hit and the headmaster was killed.

    In March 1945, serving with 3 IG, he took part in the crossing of the Rhine. Thereafter the battalion sustained steady casualties. The most severe occurred on April 25 when a heavy German attack overwhelmed one of the platoon positions in the battle of Wistedt. As a result of a gallant action, Guardsman Edward Charlton was awarded the last VC of the campaign in North West Europe.

    After the German surrender in May, Aylmer helped to disarm the German sailors at Cuxhaven. A move to a camp north of Cologne was followed by a period of spring drill parades. The local population who gathered around the village square greatly enjoyed seeing the young officers being chased around by fierce-sounding drill sergeants.

    After a posting to HQ 32 Guards Brigade as a staff officer to Brigadier Joe Vandeleur, followed by a stint at Pirbright as an instructor, Aylmer joined the 1st Battalion in Palestine as second in command of a company.

    In 1950 he was appointed ADC to Lieutenant General (later Field Marshal) Sir Gerald Templer. On the death of King George VI two years later, he was chosen to undertake a vigil at the Lying-in-State and then to be the marshal of the gun carriage for the procession to Paddington Station. He became adjutant of the 1st Battalion in BAOR but returned to London as part of the Guard of Honour for the Coronation.

    In 1960, he accompanied the 1st Battalion Irish Guards Pipes and Drums to Brazil for the Rio Festival. Announced as the Band of the Queen of England, they marched through the city led by the drum-major making liberal use of his mace to clear a path through the masses. A vast crowd, accompanied by a comely drum-majorette in star-spangled pants, followed them doing the samba.

    The band did their spin wheel in front of the saluting base and their General Salute was rapturously received. A distinguished Brazilian admiral, struggling through the crowd to present the band with a trophy, was laid out by an over-excited policeman wielding a truncheon.

    In 1963, Aylmer became Military Assistant to the Chief of the Defence Staff, Admiral of the Fleet, Lord Mountbatten of Burma. The tour included attendance at Nehru’s funeral in 1964 and a six-week farewell visit to 16 countries, covering 36,000 miles.

    In 1966, he assumed command of the 1st Battalion and saw active service in Aden. He commanded the regiment as Regimental Lieutenant Colonel from 1969 to 1972, served at SHAPE from 1974 to 1975 and retired from the Army in 1980.

    After his Army service, he worked in Conservative Central Office in London for about 10 years and was closely involved in ex-service charities. He was a champion of the Boy Scout movement and an active supporter of the Prince of Wales’s Trust.

    He was Deputy Lieutenant for the Isle of Wight from 1990 to 2000. Calm, courteous, good-looking, and with great charm and considerable presence, he was a first-rate organiser and the best of company.

    Colonel Tony Aylmer married, in 1961, Shaunagh Guinness. She predeceased him and he is survived by their son and two daughters.

    Tony Aylmer, born October 7 1925, died January 25 2022

  26. What is the temperature like today in the UK? Here in Skåne it is just Sheila, Fayette and Valerie this morning.

  28. Morning all, I have chanced upon an appropriate web site for today’s forecast. Interesting how there are variations depending what you select along the bottom of the page, ECMWF or GFS etc when you have put in your location.

    http://www.windy.com

    1. It’s very calm here in Wellingborough right now (9:15) but was a bit blowy an hour or so ago when the cold front went through with a bit of a splash. The gales are still out over the southern Irish Sea.

      1. Typical, nothing ever runs to time these days, even named storms are tardy in their timekeeping.
        According to last night’s local forecast it was really going to ramp up by now but as you say nothing to speak off yet….

          1. It arrived as promised albeit late. Many houses in the area missing roof tiles, sheds wrecked, fence panels now firewood, debris on all roads.
            I will have to repair a fence panel, build 2 new ones and look at 3 posts which are rocking and rolling, 1 certainly will need to be replaced, I suspect all 3 will be done.
            A couple of years ago I employed a local roofer to check over my tiles as I could see mortar missing on the ridge. He done a good job but will not be doing much work for anybody at the moment, I just went past his house, a tree landed on his roof and on his van. The council are trying to saw it up to clear the road. The van is a write off, his ladders fixed on the roof crumpled and unusable.

  29. Good morning all.

    Blowy during the night ,

    We were up at 7.30 am to let the dogs into the garden , Westerly wind , no rain , mild. Dogs did their business… Moh put the kettle on , but can you believe the wind has built up strength in the past half hour … blue sky, but there is some strong stuff out there .

  30. Good morning, my friends,


    Boris is about to make Nick Clegg one of the most powerful men in Britain
    The Government’s Online Harms Bill gives Big Tech too much power to censor opinions it does not like
    Fraser Nelson : https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/02/17/boris-make-nick-clegg-one-powerful-men-britain/

    BTL from a chap called Owen Sanders

    The Big Gov/Big Tech/MSM alliance is the biggest threat to liberal democracy. All three are the biggest purveyors of misinformation.
    As we’re starting to see in Canada and the US, dissent or disagreement is being redefined as terrorism. Truly dangerous times.

  32. Received this* from my MP. Replied as; “Nato is the aggressor. Since the Cold War ended NATO has roped in 10 Warsaw Pact and 4 former Yugoslavia countries. US led NATO has pushed against the borders of Russia, despite saying that they would not. Has Truss learned the difference between the Baltic and Black Sea yet?”

    Link to Truss’ insanely dangerous speech; https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/foreign-secretary-gives-keynote-speech-in-ukraine-17-february-2022

    *https://twitter.com/John2Win/status/1494414131285446659?cn=ZmxleGlibGVfcmVjcw%3D%3D&refsrc=email

    4. Could you start by allowing some democracy here at home? You know, power held by the people?

      Such as: no tax hikes. No green agenda. No forcing scrapping of boilers, no forcing electrical cars, an end to the unwanted illegal gimmigrants…?

      Ah. I see. We’re not a democracy either, are we.

  33. Typically the bbc have reporters standing by the raging sea in the howling gales telling us it raining and windy.

    1. I still chuckle when the bBC sent some metrocentric soyboy up to Shetland a few years ago to ‘report’ on a cargo ship that had been blown aground. He breathlessly told of winds gusting up to 120mph, i.e. normal for Shetland in January.

      1. One of my nephews lives in the North Pennines. If the towns lower down have 3 inches of snow they have 12 inches.
        I remember a reporter standing in one of the towns telling the world it was snowing. But hadn’t made any efforts to get up to where it was really snowing.

  34. A rather disturbing article from James Delingpole just landed in my inbox.

    “Putin Is the Least of our Problems
    Have you seen the photos of the Canberra protesters with hideous burns on their cheeks, lips, arms, their faces red, their skin puffy and raw?

    The claim is that they are the victims of directed energy weapon (DEWs), used by the Australian federal police in the nation’s capital to crush a peaceful demonstration against that unfortunate country’s draconian Covid regulations. Effectively Prime Minister Scott Morrison has been microwaving his own people.

    This Twitter thread by Cathy Fox has the details:

    https://twitter.com/CathyCathyFox/status/1494321340110704642

    This Substack short by Jessica Rose provides solid corroborating evidence.

    https://jessicar.substack.com/p/directed-energy-weapons

    I doubt you’ll hear a peep about this from the mainstream media. But you definitely would if, instead of happening in Australia, this barbaric crowd-control method had been used by President Putin in Russia.
    (the rest of the article is about Russia, and people being distracted from the death of democracy)

      2. As an Air Radar Mechanic during the early 60s, you knew well enough not to stand in front of the Air Interception radar whilst it was operating. The scare put about was that it would sterilise you but I’d seen its effect when an electrician was climbing a ladder, 20 feet away, with a fluorescent tube in his hand; someone mischievously pointed the AI17 scanner at him and the tube lit up in his hands, before he dropped it.

        Dangerous stuff uwave transmissions.

        I said it yesterday and I’ll repeat it today – a class action for massive compensation from both the police and the government for using a life-threatening weapon against a peaceful demonstration.

      3. As an Air Radar Mechanic during the early 60s, you knew well enough not to stand in front of the Air Interception radar whilst it was operating. The scare put about was that it would sterilise you but I’d seen its effect when an electrician was climbing a ladder, 20 feet away, with a fluorescent tube in his hand; someone mischievously pointed the AI17 scanner at him and the tube lit up in his hands, before he dropped it.

        Dangerous stuff uwave transmissions.

        I said it yesterday and I’ll repeat it today – a class action for massive compensation from both the police and the government for using a life-threatening weapon against a peaceful demonstration.

  35. Good news. Professor Legover Ferguson has just announced that at least 100,000 people will die today from wind.

    1. Morning! In her own words, Klever Kaff! Petroc Trelawny played it on the Radio 3 breakfast show this morning in one of his themed compilations, stitched together with some Bryn Terfel. I have a vinyl record somewhere.

      1. Morning Sue ,

        Sorry I missed that .

        Such a beautiful song .

        Moh was watching the Olympics .

        We have had many gales similar to this recently , must be a bit rough further on the coast .. too many trees around here , not worth the risk venturing out .

      1. Well worth catching if it pops up near you. Performances all disrupted due to you-know-what so I don’t have her touring schedule to hand.

        1. And apologies for the multiple posts, but this site has gone really screwy on my phone (reply keeps popping up in huge letters and it’s hard to negotiate the pointer); almost impossible to post links. If anyone knows why (Samsung phone) and how to fix it, I’d be most grateful. Doesn’t happen on other Disqus sites.

          2. Anything I do just whacks up the box to full zoom. Interestingly, this isn’t happening here in the disqus comments section.

          4. Yep. Pops back to zoomed view as soon as I try to edit it or add a link. Most frustrating!

          6. Thank you so much for your perseverance! That doesn’t work either; it’s just the reply boxes in the main part of Nottl that does this. Weird. Maybe it’s a conspiracy to stop me putting in my two-penn’orth? 🤣🤣

  41. One for Grizzly

    Southerners are urged not to travel unless absolutely necessary.

    Northerners you’ll need your big coat.

  42. Can anybody please republish the blooper GIF of the two, presumably American, reporters battling against a supposed hurricane with the nonchalant couple strolling by drinking coffee in the background?

      1. Many thanks Bleau, not the one I was thinking of, nevertheless it’s perfect for my purpose.

      4. The twerp is even moving the wrong way in relation to the wind blowing through the grass. What a plonker!

  45. Two hours ago the sun was shining here. The sky was blue. There had been some snow in the night and there was a thin layer of snow in the back garden. On the other side of the fence the fields were green*, free of snow, stretching to the horizon. Now dark grey clouds are gathering.

    *Well, of course, the grass is always greener…

    2. Off topic..
      Plum posted a day ago in response to Covid.

      Hi Rastus,Did you lose your taste or smell?
      Presumably you tested for Covid….

      1. Yes we both tested positive for Covid. Caroline lost her sense of taste and smell for a couple of days and I lost mine after having had the negative test. Stiff joints and wanting to sleep were my symptoms at the time. Having had Covid we are now allowed to go out to restaurants again and so we went out for a splurge yesterday and our taste buds were in fine fettle.

        I am convinced that Vitamin D, Vitamin C and Zinc enabled us to get through so lightly. After all, according to the authorities a 75 year old man who is overweight, unvaccinated and has ‘comorbidities’ has no right to still be alive after getting Covid.

        1. Rastus, are you using a particular brand? I was doing a multi vitamin but it smelt so foul I gave up on it. Any recommendations gratefully received.

          1. Vitamin C (1000 mg per tablet, 1 a day) and zinc are both from Healthspan.
            Vitamin D3 from D.Plantes Laboratoire; 2000UI per drop and we have two drops a day – it is a pretty tasteless oil.

          3. We also take turmeric pills every morning – with the two Vit tabs.

            Shake us – we rattle.

        2. Thanks Rastus,
          I feel fine apart from the winter blues but my taste buds are playing tricks …….the sherry tastes better!
          Zinc, vit C and D etc plus a healthy diet
          help.
          Looking forward to the Spring and hopefully more tennis!

    3. Any suggestions for the other two events to add to ironing in the Traditional British Ladies’ Triathlon?

  47. Morning to all.

    “How water from roofs can be prevented from overwhelming sewerage.”

    Or a letter on how to bore people until comatose.

    Anyway, very windy here and very worried about my three greenhouses. Hope to god they aren’t destroyed! Had to call someone already to deal with one of them. Window broken and one panel blown out. Not much we can do about it at the moment.

    So, weather in West Sussex, Clear sky, very sunny, but extremely windy, but quite warm.

  49. We essayed a walk on Kit Hill earlier. Walked the NE side which gave some respite from the gale. Oscar found some fox poo which the swine enjoyed rolling in.
    Closer to the summit where conditions underfoot were poor and slippery I was actually propelled a few yards as if I was ice skating. A fair bit of rain didn’t help. Always a little exciting to experience rougher weather conditions.

        1. G and P remarkably unkeen on going out. They went out at 5 am – but were only too willing to dash back in at 7.30!

        2. Dotty has been out but not far – she hates wind, as do many animals ‘cos it’s something they can feel but not see.

          She is currently in her daybed looking out of the window and occasionally barking at the wind.

        3. Poppie has been lying on the bed all morning with me. She knows what it’s like out there. She has scarcely moved, but her eyebrows twitch occasionally. She hasn’t even asked to go out for a tiddle. She once went 27 hours (her choice) in France without tiddling. She would check the weather from 6 ft in, head extended, and say ‘no thanks, I don’t think so’ when offered.

        4. Mongo is sat out in it. I’m going to give him a brush later on. Clear all the fluff off from his winter coat.

          1. My Oscar reluctantly skirted the flood and then consented to follow me as we were blown round the block. Neither of us felt like going very far!

  50. A real good blow on the East Sussex coast. But nothing to write home about. So far the forecast wind speed from the Met Office has not happened.

      1. They forecast 80 to 100 Mph ( met Office). the highest recorded at local weather station 51.5 MPH.

    2. Just saw an empty crisp packet fly past the window. Shame I didn’t have my video camera switched on as it might have made the lunchtime news.

  53. The truckers have changed Canada forever. Spiked 18 February 2022.

    I walked through the protests on the first day, as truckers and other protesters were arriving, and realised immediately that the reality on the ground was nothing like the received narrative. The protesters spanned the demographic diversity of Canada, including young and old people, people of colour and new immigrants. The signs and messages they held up were largely about love, unity, peace and inclusiveness – not the hate and divisiveness I had been told to expect. The many stories I heard shattered the stereotypes that the protesters and truckers were all anti-science, anti-vaxxers, racists, misogynists and would-be insurrectionists.

    I am only surprised that he should ever have thought otherwise. That the MSM is simply a Globalist Mouthpiece is apparent to everyone who can think. It is spinning a similar Farrago of Lies at the moment about Russia and Ukraine. This time there will almost certainly be Real World consequences! We should watch out here in the UK for a similar announcement of a State of Emergency which will enable the shutting down of all dissident opinion!

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2022/02/18/the-truckers-have-changed-canada-forever/

  54. Pay-per-mile road charging ‘threatens electric car sales’
    Plus: How electric cars could blow an £8bn hole in Britain’s finances

    Googdy, goody Road Tax will be abolished

    All cars will be fitted with transmitters (if they do not have them already), to give location, mileage done, parking, usage etc

    Road charges could be adjustable for the type of vehicle, including electric ones

    However:

    Vehicles will be monitored for driver

    Compliance with speed limits,

    Automatic application of Parking charges,

    Parking on single double Yellers

    Crossing Double White Lines

    Time spent in Pub Carparks, to give Perlice (Drink Driving) info

    Possible illegal Taxi services

    Criminal Investigations

    etc

    Big Brother, Big Sister, Big Step Parents, Uncles, Aunts, ex’s Jealous ones etc WILL BE WATCHING YOU

    2. How else can taxes on vehicles be replaced? Direct taxation of vehicles, ie excluding eg VAT on vehicles and services, currently brings in over £50Bn of which some £10 Bn goes back on road spending, leaving £40Bn for general spending (per vehicle, some £1,500, £300 and £1,200 respectively).

      Don’t say ‘cut spending’. No politician would do that in our current democratic system. Even the best efforts of Margaret Thatcher failed.

    4. Great news if you do not break the law you have nothing to worry about as it was in 1930s Germany.

  55. Fence blown over and a couple of pots. Getting windier here on the South Coast.

    Still, it’s a better clarse of wind than that up North.

    1. I can’t hear the wind from inside Television Centre but my phone tells me it’s blowing at 25 mph outside. I can tell from the movement of the trees in Wood Lane that it comes in intermittent gusts.

    1. Whilst not wanting to spoil a good story with the truth, no self-respecting BA captain would be having a coffee at that point and neither would he refer to trousers as pants.

  59. The Spiked! article referenced here earlier (‘trucker’s revolt’) includes this paragraph:

    Britain’s Paul Mason has penned a typically mental article for the New Statesman. ‘There is no mystery as to what kind of movement this is: it is 21st-century fascism’, he writes. Mason naturally calls for the full force of the state to be used to crush the protesters and cut off their funding. He dubs it ‘self-defensive democracy’, all to the end of bringing the fash to heel.

    Here is that piece:
    https://www.newstatesman.com/comment/2022/02/the-canadian-protests-are-a-test-of-whether-democracy-can-arm-itself-against-the-far-right

    He’s reworked parts of his rant a year ago against Covid protestors. Here’s some of that:

    There is, in short, a small but dangerous plebeian movement against the lockdown and its scientific basis. If its adherents were randomly selected it would still be dangerous, but it is not. It is composed of many of the people who believe in QAnon, and of people who believe that – as TalkRadio’s Mark Dolan claimed in September – “wearing a mask is the new woke. It’s state-sponsored virtue signalling on a grand scale.”

    The anti-vaxx, anti-mask and “Plandemic” movements are drawn from the same stratum in society that massed to “defend Winston Churchill” during the panic over Black Lives Matter and that flocked to Brexit Party rallies the year before. They are not fascists, but they are a group prone to what the French call “Poujadism” – small-town xenophobia based on carefully contrived ignorance.

    I want to see politicians and public figures proactively and strongly refute Covid denialism. As with full-blown fascism, ignoring it does not make it go away.

    https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2021/01/covid-deniers-have-been-humiliated-they-are-still-dangerous

    1. Mason is one of those typical leftists who have no idea that fascism is totalitarian socialist collectivism (fasci meaning to bundle), is a fascist through and through and accuses all opponents of being fascists.

      1. Typical behaviour of the bully and Lefties. Accuse others of what you yourself are guilty of.

        I wonder if they realise how telling that attitude is.

      2. Exactly.
        Devised as an alternative form of socialism to the ideas of Marx, replacing his “Class Conflict” with National Unity.

    2. “Paul Mason is a British commentator; he was Culture and Digital Editor of Channel 4
      News, becoming the programme’s Economics Editor on 1 June 2014, a post
      he formerly held on BBC Two’s Newsnight programme      ” I think that explains everything?

    3. I have always taken it for granted that Paul Mason is a typical left wing Fascist. Articles by him are an indictment of magazines that carry his articles. Makes quite clear who they are for and it is certainly not the people.

  61. Off topic
    This morning our car passed its “contrôle technique”, the French equivalent of the MoT test, first time.
    Two more years of motoring, hooray.

    1. We were about to buy a new minibus but then Covid came along so we had some welding done on the chassis of our 20 year old Fiat Scudo and that gave us 2 more years.

      We are still nowhere near where we should be to make a comfortable living from our courses so a €35,000 expenditure on a new bus may no longer be on the cards.

      1. The advisories mention corrosion, suspension and possibly new front break pads but nothing serious. We get it fully serviced annually by a main dealer, expensive but so far it’s paid off. Being an oldish diesel Land Rover with ~170k miles on the clock; I always worry more about exhaust emissions than most other aspects. It’s the eighth time it’s been tested in France and has passed first time each time it’s been in.
        We hope it will give us a few more years as we certainly can’t afford a new car, let alone the equivalent of this one.

        1. We have never failed an MoT test in France but we were warned that we would fail next time if we didn’t have the welding done – so we had the welding done.

        2. It’s that €50 note you leave in the carte grise when you hand it over!!

          I know the feeling. I was 95% sure the dear old Kangoo would fail the last CT in 2017 on emissions. Sailed through.

        1. The oil light stays on for a few minutes after the engine is running. It’s probably a sensor problem, but I’ve asked them to check it out. I don’t want an oil pump failure if I do manage to get away this year.

          1. Mine usually stays on for a few seconds after it starts and then the computer sounds a small ding and the light goes off. Initially I found it disconcerting because dings usually mean there’s a problem.
            It does it when the temperature gets to 4 degrees C and even though I quickly realise why it did it, it still startles me.

          2. Mine doesn’t ding and it stays on longer than a few seconds. We are looking at more than a minute. I’ve booked it in for a service and told them to look at it.

          3. Good luck.
            Being a mechanical illiterate, I hate things like that.
            We’ve been out today, and the car, (not tempting Providence) is humming along like a sewing machine, smooth, even and relatively silent. All the oils were changed and the systems were flushed yesterday.

            Long may it continue.

  64. The Gospel reading in the Lectionary for this Sunday is Luke 8:22-25 – Jesus calms the storm.

    1. Years back, on a Sunday, we had a very noisy gale during Matins. When preaching, the dear old Canon could barely be heard – then there was a sudden lull. “Now is the time for my still small voice,” he said..!

  65. Prince Andrew will not be interviewed by the FBI over Epstein connection
    Two years ago, the Duke came under immense public pressure to speak to US prosecutors about his friendship with the convicted sex offender
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2022/02/17/prince-andrew-will-not-interviewed-fbi-epstein-connection/

    BTL

    How can anyone believe that Prince Andrew is any more guilty than Bill Clinton and Bill Gates and several other prominent Americans who made several trips on the Lolita Express?
    The whole thing stinks but what stinks to me is that people in Britain have lost their sense of fairness and the belief that one is innocent until proven guilty. In my opinion Bill Gates and Bill Clinton should club together to pay Prince Andrew’s settlement bill in full. Why should the Queen have to stomp up for it?

    1. I agree with you on the point “that people in Britain have lost their sense of fairness and the belief that one is innocent until proven guilty.” We do not know, in all honesty, what Andrew did or did not do. And I am not defending him as an individual. On that score he seems to be a rather unpleasant person.

      What really bewilders me and perhaps someone can elucidate. These shenanigans supposedly took place in the UK where she was above the age of consent. So how has this incident/s become a matter for legal action at all and why in New York? Where neither principle lives. In fact the “victim” doesn’t even live in the USA as far as I understand.

      I note also that they are now after Prince Charles and doing their best to vilify him.

        1. The RF aren’t helping themselves. One blunder after another! Vaxxes, WEF participation, wokedom, Andrew, Harry…the mishaps just keep piling up.

          1. I agree but the MSM are revelling in it.
            If only they’d pay that much attention to the destruction of our country by government policies and illegal immigration. But then the RF can’t answer back especially HMQ.

        2. I have said that before Alf. I am convinced that there is a systematic effort on the left to bring down the Royal Family because if they manage that then their victory and destruction of the UK will be complete. Because the Royal Family is a symbol of what it is to be British. It is what we are loyal to in the end, not a flag.

    2. I agree with you on the point “that people in Britain have lost their sense of fairness and the belief that one is innocent until proven guilty.” We do not know, in all honesty, what Andrew did or did not do. And I am not defending him as an individual. On that score he seems to be a rather unpleasant individual.

      What really bewilders me and perhaps someone can elucidate. These shenanigans supposedly took place in the UK where she was above the age of consent. So how has this incident/s become a matter for legal action at all and why in New York? Where neither principle lives. In fact the “victim” doesn’t even live in the USA as far as I understand.

      I note also that they are now after Prince Charles and doing their best to vilify him.

    3. I agree with you on the point “that people in Britain have lost their sense of fairness and the belief that one is innocent until proven guilty.” We do not know, in all honesty, what Andrew did or did not do. And I am not defending him as an individual. On that score he seems to be a rather unpleasant individual.

      What really bewilders me and perhaps someone can elucidate. These shenanigans supposedly took place in the UK where she was above the age of consent. So how has this incident/s become a matter for legal action at all and why in New York? Where neither principle lives. In fact the “victim” doesn’t even live in the USA as far as I understand.

      I note also that they are now after Prince Charles and doing their best to vilify him.

    5. I think people may feel he is more guilty than the others simply because there’s been so much more publicity about him. The whole thing does stink but PA is a Brit, son of the monarch to boot, and the monarchy is in the firing line generally. Clinton got away with saying “I did not have sexual relations with that woman” (Monica Lewinsky) I’m spite of the stained dress and that seemed to be the end of it. Haven’t heard much about Gates but he and his wife have split. I’m looking forward to the dirt being thrown by her but so far ….

      1. I am disillusioned that Bill is (apparently) so keen on vaccination, but he wouldn’t be the first wealthy middle aged man to look for a bit of nooky.
        As for Melinda, she used to serve on a committee with someone I have heard of, and who happens to be as straight as they come.

  66. Welcome to the Free Speech Union’s weekly newsletter, our round-up of the free speech news of the week. As with all our work, this newsletter depends on the support of our members and donors, so if you’re not already a paying member please sign up today or encourage a friend to join and help us turn the tide against cancel culture.

    Government pushes back against woke school indoctrination with new guidance for teachers

    Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi has released new guidance on political impartiality in schools. It’s part of a welcome bid to tackle political indoctrination in schools and ensure contentious issues are approached in a balanced way, with teachers instructed to avoid pushing biased views. The Education Secretary wrote for the Sun about the proposals earlier in the week. The guidance can be read here. Our Secretary General Toby Young wrote an article about the new guidance for Mail+ and welcomed the proposals in an FSU press release:

    The Free Speech Union welcomes this guidance. Schools should not be teaching contested political views as fact. Teachers have a legal obligation to be balanced and impartial when discussing political issues in the classroom, but too many have been ignoring that duty and promoting a left-wing, woke agenda. The result is that schoolchildren with mainstream views often feel demonised and isolated. I hope this new guidance will mean teachers encourage schoolchildren to make up their own minds about controversial issues, tolerate views they disagree with and recognise the importance of free speech.

    Gareth Sturdy said politicisation in schools is rife. One anonymous teacher wrote about his experiences for Conservative Woman.

    Parents who withdrew their young sons from a school that told them their children would be deemed “transphobic” for expressing confusion about another pupil’s sex change are mounting a legal challenge against the Department for Education. A letter from the school’s headteacher and chair of governors said that an “inability to believe a transgender person is actually a ‘real’ female or male” was transphobic. The Department for Education is defending the claim, the Times reported.

    Jo Bartosch wrote in Spiked:

    The message that sex matters, and that it cannot be identified out of, has yet to trickle down to schools. Well-intentioned teachers and human resources departments are still embedding policies that frame acknowledging biology as bigotry. And teachers, parents and pupils are still scared to speak out against this.

    Meanwhile, teachers have been told to stop children saying “Sir” and “Miss” at a training session funded by the National Education Union in a bid to cleanse classrooms of gendered language. Toby was quoted in the Mail Online, saying that “teaching unions should confine themselves to fighting for better pay and conditions and stop promoting woke gobbledegook. Asking their members to tell children not to call them ‘Sir’ or ‘Miss’ is inappropriate and will make teachers’ lives harder, not easier.” The Government said banning gendered language was “inappropriate and unnecessary”.

    Avalanche of critical race theory training in Civil Service and quangos

    A whistleblower at an NHS quango was quoted in the Mail on Sunday about the incessant woke training sessions staff are asked to attend. Andrew Scarborough, who is mixed-race, was branded “racist” for objecting to training on “unconscious bias” and “white fragility”. The Civil Service has continued to run mandatory unconscious bias training sessions, despite the Government recommending against the courses a year ago. The Mail Online revealed that the UK’s top-paid diversity commissar is Network Rail’s Director of Diversity and Inclusion, who is paid £164,999 a year – a salary higher than that of Boris Johnson.

    Rakib Ehsan wrote that universities are promoting a culture of racial grievance by putting forward “pseudo-academic race theories”. Asra Nomani called for the doctrine of “anti-racism” to be resisted, as schools are now more segregated than they were when she was growing up in the 1970s. Conversations about race must acknowledge different perspectives, wrote Sita Nataraj Slavov.

    Volunteer blocked as fosterer for dissenting from trans ideology

    Mandy Neeson, a Samaritans volunteer, was blocked from becoming a fosterer by her local authority after expressing gender-critical views to the Aberlour Child Care Trust. A doctor was sacked for refusing to refer to a six-foot bearded man as “Madam”, a decision upheld at an employment tribunal which he is now appealing. Bristol University was in court this week, being sued by PhD student Raquel Rosario-Sanchez for its failure to help defend her against a campaign by militant trans activists. She said the University was too scared of the trans lobby to defend gender-critical feminists. Julie Bindel wrote about Raquel’s struggle against the “two-year hate campaign” targeting the researcher. “We cannot let our universities become seminaries for the priests of preselected social justice causes,” wrote Myles McKnight in National Review.

    We wrote to the Vice-Chancellor of Durham University, objecting to a requirement that those applying for the role of Assistant Professor in Durham’s International Relations department provide a statement affirming their commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion. We are concerned that requiring applicants to profess their fealty to a particular belief system could be a breach of the Equality Act 2010, as well as Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

    Tony Blair told the Times that voters “don’t want a situation where women can’t talk about being women”. Keir Starmer can’t hide from the trans wars forever, said Janice Turner.

    Now trans activists are trying to cancel Equality and Human Rights Commission

    Trevor Phillips condemned the attempt by trans activists to have the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s status revoked at the UN. He said the modern LGBT+ movement was “preoccupied by the intricacies of a language despotism which has emerged from the faculty lounges of minor North American universities”.

    “Is life now so brittle that to ask questions is now, of itself, deemed to be controversial?” asked Baroness Falkner, Chair of the EHRC.

    Joanna Williams explained the dominance of Stonewall’s ideology across our institutions:

    When our own views reign supreme, we convince ourselves that we exist in the realm of common sense, not politics. When we mix only with the like-minded, we believe not only that we are right but that there is no debate to be had. It’s only the awkward people who disagree who insist on “politicising” issues. In this way, decisions to fly the Pride flag on public buildings, change the text on a historical plaque or leave the word “woman” off an advert for cervical cancer screening are nodded through countless committees before ever confronting opposition. When disagreement comes it feels like an affront. How dare people politicise the bureaucratic march of progress?

    Comedy wars

    The BBC has refused to apologise for a joke Graham Norton made about the Ukraine crisis, the Times reported. Viewers complained that it was offensive, but the corporation said “no subject is off limits” for comedy.

    There was a protest against Jimmy Carr’s appearance in Cambridge, and, in response, we stood outside and handed out leaflets defending free speech. Carr said in advance that he would cut Holocaust material from the gig. Jeremy Clarkson lambasted the campaign to cancel Carr.

    CNN continues to pursue an “unhinged war on Joe Rogan,” wrote Simon Evans in Spiked.

    Gavin Haynes described a “regular pruning of the Overton window by the media–tech complex” in an article for UnHerd:

    As with Roman politics, there is a kind of elite double act going on here. The journalists are pleading to YouTube, the enlightened despot who, wringing hands, clutching pearls, dabbing hanky, regretfully accedes to the crowd’s demands. And the cycle will continue on and on until there is very little to discuss at all.

    Legal updates

    It’s worth reading this Guido Fawkes article on the Online Safety Bill in full. The site warns of the disastrous consequences of the legislation on free speech:

    During the pandemic, Big Tech has run riot stifling legitimate debate on the grounds of public health concerns. If this continues and spreads into general censorship it will be disastrous. The problem is that politicians generally are so fed up with the abuse they get on social media they are angry enough to overturn the widely accepted free speech norms of the free world for a more authoritarian approach.

    Professor James Chalmers wrote about the recent conviction of Joseph Kelly for an offensive tweet about Captain Sir Tom Moore:

    However insulting his tweet might have been – and by the low standards of Twitter it does not seem exceptional – the role of the criminal law is to forestall and punish harm to others, not to enforce politeness. If a remedy is required for tweets like his, it should be through Twitter enforcing its terms of use, not by the state dragging keyboard warriors through the courts.

    A black HR manager has lost an employment tribunal case after claiming a reference to the Chimp Paradox was racist.

    A woman has been jailed for 11 months for posting antisemitic posts blaming Jews for Grenfell Tower on social media. She was convicted of stirring up hatred.

    Culture war chaos emboldens the West’s enemies

    Oliver Dowden has given a speech to the Heritage Foundation on woke ideology emboldening the West’s enemies. He said this “pernicious” ideology saw “free speech [as] not a fundamental right necessary to the pursuit of truth”, but as a weapon.

    The woke left is destroying the Anglosphere, argued Douglas Carswell in the Telegraph. Andrew Roberts likewise said the West couldn’t afford the “dangerous decadence” of the woke movement.

    Paul Kingsnorth said the post-liberal west is becoming unquestioningly more censorious. Ed West compared our current cultural debates to the fate of the last pagan generation in ancient Rome. Eric Kaufmann of our Advisory Council and Brian Anderson spoke about the future of the culture war.

    Art and culture

    Small publishers are standing up to groupthink, the Telegraph reported. The author Kate Clanchy penned an exposé of sensitivity readers for UnHerd.

    The Globe has branded Hamlet racist. The Tate’s restaurant is to close after an ethics committee decided its 1926 mural, which features two black slaves, is racist. Heather Mac Donald said the Metropolitan Museum of Art has redefined its purpose as “overcoming the racism of Western civilization”.

    Fashion retailed Boohoo was forced to drop “sexually suggestive” images which the advertising watchdog found were both “irresponsible” and likely to “cause serious offence”. Jennifer Sey wrote about leaving her senior position at Levi’s for the freedom to speak her mind openly.

    Popular puzzle game Wordle, now owned by the New York Times, has removed “insensitive” words such as “wench” from the game, the Telegraph reported.

    World news

    A mob killed a man accused of blasphemy in Pakistan this week. He was said to have burned pages of the Quran. 80 people have been arrested.

    Chinese novelist Yan Geling has had her work removed from China’s internet by Communist Party censors after she called President Xi a “human trafficker”. The Times reported that her name had vanished from social media platform Weibo and search engine Baidu.

    Justin Trudeau has been criticised for using emergency powers to freeze the bank accounts of protesters. The Economist said his draconian approach to stopping the protest is likely to make things worse. Professor Eric Kaufmann wrote of the situation in Canada:

    Cultural liberalism upholds freedom of speech, due process, equal treatment for all and the scientific method. Cultural socialism, which Trudeau promotes, believes that the speech and heritage of historically dominant groups must be restricted so as not to offend minorities.

    Book now! Free speech from Socrates to social media

    Join us in London for a live public lecture, discussion and book launch on Thursday, March 17, as Jacob Mchangama introduces his new book, Free Speech: A History from Socrates to Social Media. Jacob is an author and lawyer, and founder and director of Justitia, a Copenhagen-based think tank focusing on human rights, freedom of speech and the rule of law.

    Following a short lecture, Jacob will be joined in conversation by Dr Joanna Williams, a writer and the director of the think tank Cieo, as well as Toby Young, general secretary of the FSU. The discussion will be chaired by Claire Fox, director of the Academy of Ideas. There will then be a wine reception, hosted by Basic Books.

    Tickets are £10/£5, with special rates for FSU members who use this link or enter the promo code FSUmember. We recommend booking early—we anticipate selling out! Founder Members should email events@freespeechunion.org if they would like a complimentary ticket.

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    As with all our work, this newsletter depends on the support of our members and donors, so if you’re not already a paying member please sign up today or encourage a friend to join, and help us turn the tide against cancel culture.

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    Best wishes,

    2. Why is being antisemitic against the law? If so, what is the definition of “antisemitic”. By contrast why is being anti-Christian, amusing, traditional, untrammelled, and admired?

      1. To me, “antisemitic” means being opposed to, or against (for whatever reason) Semites, which are the sub-tribe of Caucasian that includes Arabs, Jews and others from the middle east who share similar skin and facial characteristics.

        1. If it includes Arabs (yes, I’ve long known that they are also Semites) then class me ant-Semitic as well as Islamophobic.

      2. Something to do with the Crusades, which the Christians lost. Also the Inquisition, which according to the far left, killed 92 million people – the entire population of Europe and them some, at that time. Intersectionality has fantastical foundations.

        1. For some reason our politicians and do-gooders do not seem to understand the lesson of the Crusades. A Western Christian Middle East was taken over by force by invading muslims.

        1. So being rude to certain people/groups of people is deemed to be “stirring up hatred”. How can motivation or intention be determined for certain?

  69. The maximum gust recorded at our local weather station was 54.1 mph at 1.20 pm, much less than forecast. Wind is still strong but easing.

    5. Shame about the Church. Couldn’t care less about the O2. As long as no one was injured of course.

  72. A fierce 3 hour gale seems to have gone through ..NO RAIN, still a strong wind , but not the howling maniacal gale we had earlier .

    No 1 son arrived home before 11 am , the site he was working in told everyone to get out of the way , scaffolding was collapsing and kit blown around , too dangerous , trees down . He said he had a very dodgy drive home from the Weymouth area .

    Trees and branches down in this area , no trains , and the wind …. what a shreiking sound , hell opening up.

    Sun is shining brightly now.

    Phoned son no 2 who lives in Worthing … in a sea front flat . the windows of his flat were vibrating , the lampshades on the ceiling lights were shaking , and the water in the toilet was bubbling away. It was his day off thank gooodness. He showed me people walking along the prom , staggering along …

    Video calls are fine and dandy , but the weather has proved to be an unleashed monster … a strong seasonal storm .

    Our windows here were cleaned last week , it looks as if some one has sprayed them with flour, they are filthy , is it dust / sand / salt or what , but they are unbelievable . Dry outside , no sign of heavy rain, sun is shining , and the wind sound is less than earlier .

    Dogs are reluctant to go outside in the garden … I expect they will shortly.

    All I want to do is have a walk , and see some sea , unwise thought , fallen trees being the main issue .

    1. Our windows were cleaned by the early rain they are now fully salt sprayed as if we had net curtains.

  73. Papers showing snaps of wazzocks walking along the shore – inches away from 30 ft waves. Bloody mad – just making unnecessary work for rescuers.

      1. Been a nice calm day all day up here and I was out gardening in my shirt sleeves (nothing else – just the sleeves!) :o)

  75. The police heavy squad are out in Ottawa today, starting to bash heads.
    As a new low, there are threats that truckers pet dogs found at the protest will be euthanized.
    Todays debate on the emergency measures act has been canceled because of the emergency outside parliament!

    Over in BC, left wing protesters destroyed equipment and threatened workers at an oil pipeline camp. This event is receiving no coverage from the lefty media.

    1. The wording is unbelievable:

      Attention animal owners at demonstration If you are unable to care for your animal as a result of enforcement actions, your animal will placed into protective care for 8 days, at your cost. After 8 days, if arrangements are not made, your animal will be considered relinquished.

      Does that really mean killed?
      Trudeau should be relinquished.

      1. The Ottawa humane(?) Society said that they would euthanize siezed animals that are not considered fit for adoption.

    2. Have Ladbrokes opened a book on the odds for and against Trudeau being lynched and having his throat slit?

    1. Nutters they may be, but are you suggesting that those waves are any bigger than you’ve swum in?
      Unless it’s a trick of the perspective, I have enjoyed swimming in waves several times as large.
      I presume the swimmers have experience of whatever currents there are there.

      1. As the Fool remarked to King Lear when he was ranting, raging and raving in the storm:

        “‘Tis a naughty night to swim in!”

  78. Please excuse my language … but what about the idea that Britain should become all electric … and what does that Tw#t Johnson and his green squeeze and all the others , left right and Liberals think about the current disruption to power cables , power shortages , trees down , floods , and destruction of property … by a seasonal storm .

    Don’t any of them engage their brains .. we need a variety of power sources .

    1. If Cressida is a d*ck and Boris is a tw#t then what would a trans person have to say about it?

      1. Thank you Jill.
        I was originally told, 4th Feb, that it should be within a month.
        Fingers crossed.

          1. 2 weeks ago. I accepted a cancellation for that appointment and the one on Monday was also a cancellation but now cancelled. The consultant said this might happen as people are still scared to go to hospital.

          2. “…still scared to go to hospital.” Maybe because they are liable to catch something that will be misdiagnosed as Covid in order to swell the lies figures.

    4. It will change your life for the better when it happens, Alf. It did for me, five years ago now. 👍🏻

      1. Thanks.
        The cataract in the right eye had deteriorated, the consultant used the word ripened, rapidly since I had the detached retina in June.

      1. Yes Conners. Text on Tuesday offering the op and a text today cancelling it. I was looking forward to seeing properly again. It will happen and I am disappointed but also looking forward to a phone call soon.

  80. Besides the fence going over and the pots too. My neighbour came round with the remains of one of my ridge tiles. Narrowly missed his car ! I said to him ‘that is what insurance is for’. He’s cool.

    1. A section of my neighbour’s fence has blown down and damaged one of my wife’s treasured garden statuettes. I fitted it for him and it survived strong winds imperiously. However, his builders removed it when replacing his conservatory, I thought they’d not resecured the post to the wall properly and I offered to anchor it, only to see him turn my offer down.

      The fence came down because the post was secured by 2 screws, one at the top and the other at the bottom, each only scratching the mortar, allowing the post to come loose and the wind broke the fence panel at the other end. If he’d said ‘that is what insurance is for’ to the statuette damage (replacement cost £200+ but I can repair it) I’d have thumped him. A good job your neighbour knew you were joking . . .

      Edited for typos.

      1. We are old friends. Nothing bothers us.

        Your neighbour should at least offer to repair the damage. It’s what good neighbours do.

        1. My wife’s been friends with them for over 40 years but they can be a bit strange. The time that area of fencing blew over onto our side, fortunately not damaging everything, I left it on our patio for weeks without them saying anything. I did their fence at material cost, nothing for my time, and provided receipts that they reimbursed to the penny – nothing on top for a coffee – and they never gave me anything such as a bottle of wine to say thank you. I was happy to do it, not only to be neighbourly but also because it made our view of it pretty, but I did find their behaviour strange.

    2. We’ve also lost a fence panel and the wreckage of another is only held upright by the ivy that has affixed itself along the top and half-way don the side. It’s flapping like an open door.

  83. I was just about to say that the weather seems to have calmed down a bit but it’s raining now and blowing hard again. However, I have made a pot of veg soup that is simmering so that’s supper sorted. Good alliteration eh?
    Sunset is about 5.30 but we’ve had the lights on for a couple of hours, bloody weather.

      2. It would be interesting to know how many wind turbines were knocked out of action and for how long, particularly those broken beyond economic repair.

        1. They would all have been switched off, of course – because the wind might make them go too fast…

      2. Plus thirteen dogs, electrocuted by fallen power line. I’d be sadder about the dogs than if a politician had been ****kerd.

        1. That’s sad. I remember the racehorse The Grey Bomber being electrocuted by a fallen power line in County Durham a while ago.

    2. We don’t know what really happened but he of all people should know to speak politely, quietly, clearly and in an assertive way.

      I get the feeling he didn’t do all that.

      BA cabin crew can be a bit snobbish but they won’t take any shit.

  88. Does this ring any bells with any of you?

    What is A.A.A.D.D. ?
    It is Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder.
    This is how it manifests itself:
    I decide to water my garden. As I turn on the hose in the driveway, I look over at my car and decide it needs washing.
    As I start toward the garage, I notice mail on the porch table that I brought up from the mail box earlier.
    I decide to go through the mail before I wash the car.
    I lay my car keys on the table, put the junk mail in the garbage-can under the table, and notice that the can is full.
    So, I decide to put the bills back on the table and take out the garbage first.
    But then I think, since I’m going to be near the mailbox when I take out the garbage anyway, I may as well pay the bills first.
    I take my cheque book off the table,
    and see that there is only one cheque left.
    My extra cheques are in my desk in the study, so I go inside the house to my desk where I find the can of Coke I’d been drinking.
    I’m going to look for my cheques, but first I need to push the Coke aside
    so that I don’t accidentally knock it over.
    The Coke is getting warm, and I decide to put it in the refrigerator to keep it cold.
    As I head toward the kitchen with the Coke, a vase of flowers on the counter
    catches my eye — they need water.
    I put the Coke on the counter and
    discover my reading glasses that
    I’ve been searching for all morning.
    I decide I better put them back on my desk, but first I’m going to water the flowers.
    I set the glasses back down on the counter, fill a container with water and suddenly spot the TV remote.
    Someone left it on the kitchen table.
    I realize that tonight when we go to watch TV, I’ll be looking for the remote,
    but I won’t remember that it’s on the kitchen table, so I decide to put it back in the den where it belongs, but first I’ll water the flowers.
    I pour some water in the flowers, but quite a bit of it spills on the floor.
    So, I set the remote back on the table,
    get some towels and wipe up the spill.
    Then, I head down the hall trying to
    remember what I was planning to do.
    At the end of the day:
    the car isn’t washed
    the bills aren’t paid
    there is a warm can of Coke sitting on the counter
    the flowers don’t have enough water,
    there is still only 1 cheque in my cheque book,
    I can’t find the remote,
    I can’t find my glasses,
    and I don’t remember what I did with the car keys.
    Then, when I try to figure out why nothing got done today, I’m really baffled because I know I was busy all day, and I’m really tired.
    I realize this is a serious problem, and I’ll try to get some help for it, but first I’ll check my email….

        2. Sparty must be glad of that, Annie. If you had been trawling through the interwebby he wouldn’t have got his daily walk. Or, considering the gales, he might have wished that you had spent the day trawling. Lol.

          1. He didn’t get a walk at all.
            He has shot out into the garden a few times, not even stopping to have a row with the next door dog.

        3. Sparty must be glad of that, Annie. If you had been trawling through the interwebby he wouldn’t have got his daily walk. Or, considering the gales, he might have wished that you had spent the day trawling. Lol.

      1. That great Barry Cryer joke…..My stair lift is so fast I can actually remember why I went upstairs.

    1. Shirley one could argue that all bar the injuns are immigrants and the injuns are now an ethnic minority. Not that I expect logic or consistency from liberals.

      1. Our son did not take Canadian citizenship. After 40 years, does he still count as an immigrant?

        One of the reasons given for this abuse of power was that the protest had become an insurgency by foreign interests. What better way to stop this than to make asylum seekers and immigrants exempt? /sarc

        1. My son is now 41- he’s lived in the US since he was 10 months old. He has legal permanent resident status and is married to an American girl. He has never wanted to take out US citizenship and his wife is fine with it.

    4. Does that mean you’re allowed to protest against vaccine mandates if you’re black, but not if you’re white? Seriously?

  91. HAPPY HOUR NoTTlers – Why do we miss the 80’s?

    Because they were the last blast of freedom before our age of wokedom,
    says JULIE BIRCHILL
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/37512fa7694fbf62a96285bcf01fb8032bca1f2e4818fb7ed3a563a62e42f7e0.jpg
    People used to say of the 1960s: ‘If you can remember them, you weren’t there.’ I’d say of the 1980s: ‘If you can remember them, you felt like a lottery winner — until you blew all our winnings, blacked out and came to in the rainy grey morning of eternal wokedom.’
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10521043/Why-miss-80s-blast-freedom-writes-JULIE-BURCHILL.html

    I preferred the 60’s …..I WAS there and I CAN remember them. They were great!

    Peace and Love Brother….

          3. Thankyou.
            I’m so pleased, you’ve just proved my point perfectly, you are an absolute Flobbagob

          4. I must confess, George, I would have expected better of you. Consider the terms of service on this site, “…rudeness or personal attacks on other posters will not be tolerated.”

            I say no more except to expect you to withdraw that before the MODS get violent.

          8. Certainly not.
            My “name” is exactly what he describes.
            However, he rather misses the point. It is a reflection on modern society. I believe we as a whole actually are acting like a BOC accepting what the SOS are telling/running us. Everywhere one looks the people in charge are treating their subservients as exactly that, a BOC.

            I also believe that people should be free to post what they wish and let others decide what they think about what is posted.

          9. I must confess, Tom, that I did not start the exchange. I was the one who was (yet again) insulted first by the same serial attacker. Am I to take constant vitriol, from the same troll, without recourse to reply? You are criticising the wrong chap.
            Moreover, all I have added (in my response) is the correct, word perfect, acronym chosen by said person. If you don’t believe that’s what it stands for just ask him.

        1. I started working on computers in the late sixties, but computer problems were strictly mother in law territory since she ran the computer department at thermos.

          2. For some time, talking about work was the only possible conversation with mil.

            I actually worked with a computer that used vacuum tubes, that’s a long time ago.

          7. By “vacuum tubes” I assume you mean valves? Needed time to warm up and became a potential problem if glowing cherry red? 🙂

          8. I certainly started by training by working on ‘Valve’ driven Radar and Wireless.

            If I remember correctly the heater line was driven by 6.3 volts.

          9. b7g and b9g base were mostly 6.3v but a lot of octal based (metal valves for example) could be 12.6 volts.

        2. Any phone in the sixties was a problem, wasn’t the phone service nationalized with at least a six month wait for a new phone.

          3. Bloody awful things, they were. With a dial, they were so light they skidded all over the place as you dialled.

        3. I’d miss the internet. The information, shared ideas – learning a programming language used to be done from a book, now I can use a range of editors and compilers, almost immediately getting anwers to my simplest questions.

          1. And email. I have friends and family all over the place, mainly in the US; the US and UK postal services seem totally ballsed up these days so being able to email people is a lifesaver.

    3. I miss the late 80s.

      The Berlin Wall came down; Communism came to an abrupt halt – and, for the first time in my life – peace and prosperity seemed to lie ahead….

    4. 70’s.
      The music wasn’t as good as the 60’s but for me university, marriage, children, first house, first proper job, (I had different jobs pre university and every vacation) lots and lots of sport and social, what was not to like?

    5. 60s to the 90s, I found them all great. It was in Blair’s era that the destruction started.

      1. The ‘Seventies: Crisis; What Crisis?

        [Britain in the Seventies – Our Unfinest Hour?
        Les années 1970- le pire moment de l’histoire britannique?
        Kenneth O. Morgan]

        The negative aspects of Britain in the seventies, on which commentators focussed, were essentially four. These were conflict and class war in industry, a sharp downturn in the economy, a flight to extremism in political life, and a rise in public and domestic violence. Without doubt, each of these revealed a new pattern of internal vulnerability not experienced previously, and a marked contrast with the stable social democracy that the United Kingdom had appeared to be since the second world war, both under Labour’s welfare democracy under Attlee after 1945 and Wilson after 1964, and the thirteen years of emollient ‘one-nation Toryism’ in between. Now there were new challenges to which a post-imperial, once-great power seemed unable to respond.

        The social conflict in industry, certainly, was on a scale and of a character not experienced since the days of the Triple Alliance, Black Friday and the General Strike between 1919 and 1926. It is true that warning signs of future conflict had been evident in the later sixties. The Donovan report of 1968 illustrated how the internal structures of leadership in the unions had been changing in the sixties with power increasingly passing to shop stewards like ‘Red Robbo’ (Derek Robinson) in Longbridge and Alan ‘the Mole’ Thornett in the Cowley car plant in Oxford during unofficial strikes. National collective bargaining was becoming localised which gave militants on the shop floor more power. Barbara Castle, backed by the prime minister, Harold Wilson, had tried to deal with this by legislation but her 1969 Industrial Relations Bill was strongly opposed by the unions. It met with its nemesis in Cabinet, the main opponent being no less than the Home Secretary, Jim Callaghan. But the turmoil provoked by Heath’s 1971 Industrial Relations Act was of a quite different order. It was a dangerous attempt to apply legal sanctions to industrial relations which had been governed by voluntary collective bargaining since the 1906 Trades Disputes Act, a policy which the Donovan report had previously supported. The irony was that the unions had carefully observed the terms of the Act – and yet the strikes went on. Furthermore, the trade unions were now primed for battle as never before. Their membership had been rising fast, reaching a record 13,498,000 in 1979, growing spectacularly amongst white- collar workers, with unions like NUPE and NALGO recruiting strongly amongst local government workers and amongst groups such as health service workers and schoolteachers. The unions now had immensely powerful national officials like Jack Jones, secretary of the mighty Transport and General Union, with well over a million members. Frightened journalists wrote of ‘The Emperor Jones’ and of the ‘terrible twins’, Jones and his associate Hugh Scanlon of the Engineers. Heath’s Industrial Relation Act of 1971 led to the largest trade union protests for two generations, while a hitherto unknown public official called the Official Solicitor was called in to release some trade officials, the so-called ‘Pentonville Five’, from gaol. Worse still followed with two national coal miners’ strikes in 1972 and the beginning of 1974, the first such since 1926. They were solidly backed by the TUC’s general secretary, Vic Feather. The first led to a total surrender to the wage and bonus demands of the miners (a surrender duly noted by the government’s Minister for Education, Margaret Thatcher). The second in January 1974 led to a national state of emergency, the three-day week and a general election called by Heath on the theme ‘Who Governs Britain?’ The answer appeared to be the unions since Heath was defeated and had to resign.

        2 See Kenneth O. Morgan, Michael Foot: a Life (Oxford University Press) chapter 8.

        The union troubles, however, continued to mount up alarmingly under Labour. Wilson and Callaghan had concluded a so-called ‘social contract’ with the TUC under which the unions would supposedly observe wage restraint while legislation sympathetic to their wishes went through. The minister responsible for industrial relations was now Michael Foot, an old left-winger determined to give way to the unions on virtually everything, including the closed shop: he did, however, restore a measure of order to relations with the unions more on the lines intended by the Act of 1906, the so-called Magna Carta of Labour.2 But strikes continued, many of them unofficial, and wage claims mounted, driving the level of price inflation up to almost 30 per cent. All manner of workers were now engaged including key groups not previously considered as a threat such as the water workers. Some employers made matters far worse by an intransigent anti-union attitude such as in the Grunwick photo-processing works in North London where the far-right owner sacked a number of Asian women workers who were members of unions. This led to daily violent confrontations between police and up to 20,000 workers outside the Grunwick plant, and a new sense of class war between the unions en masse and right-wing journalists and commentators. There was talk of private anti-union groups being prepared for a coup armed by an eccentric extremist called Colonel Stirling, and General Walker’s ‘non-party militia’. A sense of potential civil war loomed in England’s green but no longer pleasant land.

        3 Tony Benn, Conflicts of Interest: Diaries 1977 – 80 Hutchinson, 1990), p. 448 – 9 (30 January 1979)
        6The worst of the class war came, ironically, under the premiership of James Callaghan, the old trade union official who had led the opposition to Barbara Castle’s bill of 1969 in Cabinet. Fanned by a background of lagging pay increases and reviving price inflation, there erupted a massive series of industrial disputes that lasted from late October 1978 to the spring of 1979. These were random, often quite unco-ordinated affairs. While many workers could be classed as low-paid, many of the strikers, such as oil-tanker drivers and power workers, were not and their actions added to the inflationary pressures on their poorer comrades. There were large unions on strike like the Transport and General Workers (led now, not by Jack Jones who had retired, but by a weak former shop steward called Moss Evans). But there was also a wide array of almost nihilistic local strikes which impacted directly on the public. Striking dustmen meant that putrid rubbish bins were not collected and emptied, children were kept out of school by striking school care-takers, hospital wards were closed by striking health workers and patients died. In one especially notorious episode, Liverpool grave-diggers went out on strike. A Cabinet minister, Harold Lever, gloomily observed, ‘Let the dead bury their dead’.3 .The government seemed paralysed by the extent of the strikes and stoppages. In January and February 1979, almost 30 million working days were lost, more than three times the whole of the previous year. On the worst day, 22 January 1979, 1.5 m. public sector workers did not turn up for work. Callaghan, slumped in anomie, could offer little other than an almost meaningless ‘St. Valentine’s Day agreement in February. The government failed to call a state of emergency which ministers like David Owen wanted. The strikes went on, at a diminished pace, until the minority Callaghan government fell from power at the general election in May.

        4 Robert Taylor, The Trade Union Question in British Politics (Blackwell, Oxford, 1993), appendix 5, (…)
        5 Mrs. Thatcher, Speech to Conservative Party conference, 1985.
        7Of course, many commentators gave exaggerated, politically prejudiced, verdicts on the Winter of Discontent. Not all workers were on strike all the time. Many of them were very brief and unco-ordinated. Some of the wage claims, including by the miners, had much justification at an inflationary period even if high wage settlements made that inflation worse. Many were provoked by insensitive and right-wing employers with poor management skills. But it would be absurd to deny that something very unusual and alarming was taking place’ A total of 29,474,000 working days were lost in 1979, easily the worst since 1943 (the next worse were also in the seventies, the second highest in 1972 with 23,909,000 and the third 1975 with 14,750,000). In all, 4,583,000 workers were involved in 1979 and there was a massive loss of production.4 The psyche of the country was deeply shaken. Later, the unions, especially after their defeat in the 1984 – 5 miners’ strike, were to suffer a steep decline: their membership slumped from 13 million to just over 5 million; their power has been gravely undermined by legislation; their allies in the Labour Party were to be out of power for eighteen years. The unions had refused to move away from their traditional, adversarial, ‘them and us’ class attitudes. Proposals for industrial co-determination contained in the 1976 Bullock report had failed because the union leaders had no wish to become bosses under the capitalist economic order. The resultant folk memories of ‘he enemy within’ were kept warm by Mrs. Thatcher. At the Conservative conference she recalled the bad old days when the unions reflected the left-wing dogma of a socialist government. ‘Do you remember the Labour Britain of 1979? It was a Britain in which leaders held their members and our country to ransom.’5 The unions’ behaviour had destroyed their role in a corporate Britain going back to Ernest Bevin during the war. The ancien regime was over.

        8Closely intertwined with the industrial conflicts of the seventies, of course, was the decline of the economy. Despite repeated balance of payments problems and the forced devaluation of the pound in 1967, the Labour government of the sixties kept things reasonably stable. Employment was high; inflation under control. Economic historians wrote of a ‘golden age’ of the economy which lasted from 1945 to 1973. However, the Labour years had been one of frequent crisis, with frequent recourse to bailouts from the US Treasury. The plan for four per cent a year economic growth had manifestly failed, and the growth rate in 1964 – 70 had, if anything, been below that of the previous six years under the Tories. The new department supposed to promote growth, the Department of Economic Affairs under George Brown had been humiliatingly abolished. From the early seventies, the dark clouds rolled in.

        6 Andy Beckett, When the Lights went out: Britain in the Seventies (Faber and Faber, London, 2009), p (…)
        9The old nostrums, those of Keynes and Beveridge, which had governed social and economic policy since the war under both major parties, now seemed no longer valid. Increasingly, economic writers suggested that Keynesianism, with its expansionary pump-priming economics and positive use of the deficit in finance, was proving out of date. It paid insufficient attention to the global economy and to inflation (in fact, an inaccurate account of Keynes’s own views). For many decades, following Keynes, governments had regarded a return of pre-war unemployment as the main danger to be avoided. Now economists, especially in the United States, urged that inflation not unemployment was the major evil to be identified, and this should be checked through strict controls of the money supply. This was the burden of a growing number within the Conservative Party, attracted by the monetarist doctrines of the Chicago economist, Milton Friedman. Particular evangelists for this viewpoint were the maverick right-winger, Enoch Powell, and a more recent guru, Sir Keith Joseph, and it was also voiced by a think tank like Ralph Harris and Arthur Seldon’s Institute of Economic Affairs, deeply committed to the neoliberal doctrines of the venerable Austrian guru, Friedrich von Hayek.6 Nor was the critique of Keynesianism confined to Conservative ranks. Peter Jay, son-in-law of the prime minister Jim Callaghan and son of a famous socialist theorist, Douglas Jay, hammered out the same message as financial columnist of The Times. With the theoretical basis for analysing weaknesses of the British economy discredited, politicians found themselves in the unknown without a map and without a compass.

        7 See Edmund Dell, A Hard Pounding. Politics and Economic Crisis,1974 – 76 (Oxford University Press, (…)
        10Throughout the seventies the endemic structural problems of Britain’s economic performance plagued every government and provided painful experiences for working citizens. The Heath government which took office in June 1970 had won the election on a starkly anti-state manifesto, designed to curb central planning and to stimulate the private sector with tax cuts and other measures. Long before it fell from power, it was clear that its economic policies were a total failure. In addition to failing to secure a prices and incomes agreement with the trade unions, its Chancellor, Anthony Barber proved to be highly incompetent and his supposed ‘dash for growth’ was having precisely the reverse effect and leading to a property boom and huge inflation. In addition, the government had the misfortune to be in power at a time when the outcome of the Arab-Israeli war of 1973 led to a massive oil price inflation with the nation’s balance of payments suffering badly. Heath, who had totally reversed the Selsdon Park programme in office, was now replaced in 1975 as Tory leader, by Margaret Thatcher, a far more committed supporter of monetarism with a particularly close relationship with Sir Keith Joseph. But it was now Labour which had to bear the burden of economic decline. Denis Healey, Labour’s powerful Chancellor from March 1974 had to grapple with a new phenomenon that of ‘stagflation’ with inflation and unemployment both rising at the same time.7 Inflationary cost-push pressures at home from aggressive unions made his dilemma all the worse. In 1975, with inflation approaching 30 per cent, his policies seemed about to collapse in ruins but he was rescued by Jack Jones who committed the unions to a flat-rate wage increase of £6 a week – a proposal which, of course, was also strongly egalitarian.

        8 Personal information from the late Lord Callaghan, Lord Healey and Peter Jay.
        9 Douglas Jay, Sterling (London, Sidgwick and Jackson, 1985), pp. 162 – 3.
        11But by the autumn of 1976 the British economy seemed at a critical point. Notable was the fact that the Labour government was giving sops to monetarism itself. Healey began the policy of privatizing public assets starting with Burmah Oil, and of applying cash limits and other monetary targets to public spending. More startling still, Callaghan shook the 1976 party conference by telling them that ‘you can no longer spend your way out a recession’ in a passage of his speech written by his son-in-law, Peter Jay.8 But the inexorable financial problems of the British state continued. There were runs on sterling and talk of a further devaluation. Tense discussions were now conducted with the International Monetary Fund about the kind of monetary package that would be socially acceptable. Callaghan, who well recalled from his earlier career the downfall of Ramsay MacDonald, another Labour prime minister who was forced to talk to international bankers in 1931, kept his Cabinet in continuous session on a collective basis. In the end, he managed to get his way, just, against both Keynesian expansionists like Crosland on the right, and left-wing anti-capitalists like Tony Benn on the left. In the end, the IMF granted the government $3.9 billion credit as against a $2.5 billion cut in domestic expenditure. For the next eighteen months, the government did much better. Douglas Jay wrote that it was a rare administration that sharply reduced inflation and cut unemployment at one and the same time, a rare double achievement.9 But in the end the pressures of the ‘winter of discontent’ were overturning the government’s policies once again, and when Callaghan left office in May 1979 the economic warning signs were all too visible. Britain’s standing as the sick man of Europe seemed all too clearly confirmed.

        12There can scarcely be any argument that Britain’s economic standing was severely weakened through the seventies, by global issues of inflation, and by industrial disorder at home. The country suffered and governments were hapless victims. The partial recovery in 1977 – 8 suggests that there was still resilience. One fortuitous salvation was floating the pound, that is, the ending of fixed exchange rates, surviving from the 1944 Bretton Woods agreement, in 1972. While this ate into the exchange value of the pound, it means that it was no longer a reserve currency and the reserves less buffeted about by global pressures. More practical and visible was the fact that in later seventies, oil from the North Sea was starting to come through after 1975 to the immense benefit of both the balance of payments and inflationary pressures. Europe’s sick man seemed likely to become as oil rich as countries in the Middle East, perhaps even to enter OPEC. But this would only really assist the economy if the gains were devoted to investment and modernization, and British internal economic relations were to become less disorderly. As Margaret Thatcher entered 10 Downing Street in May 1979, somewhat vacuously citing blessings from St. Francis of Assisi, this all seemed a long way off.

        10 Coined in The Economist, 13 February1954.
        13Another alarming feature of British experience in the seventies was the polarization of its politics. Since the second world war, despite the harshness of party disputes, there was relatively consensual aspects to political life. At times, there was talk of a possible coalition government under someone like Callaghan. In the fifties, the journals invented a composite figure, ‘Mr. Butskell’, part Mr. Butler, a one-nation Tory, part Mr. Gaitskell, a Labour centrist.10 Even in the sixties, Harold Wilson and Edward Heath did not seem that far apart. The mixed economy, the welfare state, full employment, decolonization in the old empire, collaboration with the US in overseas affairs but steadfast resistance to involvement in war, as in Vietnam, were common to all the major parties. Europe was a divisive issue, but the Conservatives got the country into the Common Market in 1973 and Labour confirmed it through the new device of a referendum in 1975. The tiny Communist party faded away while British fascism had little substance in the first place.

        14In the seventies, it all changed and turned very sour. In both the Labour and the Conservative parties there were sharp moves to the extremes. Worryingly for both parties, two-party politics in which the big parties aggregated up to 90 of the vote for themselves, was giving way to a more fluid system in which the Liberal Party showed a brisk revival under Jeremy Thorpe, challenges threatened the Labour ascendancy in both Scotland and Wales from the nationalist parties, and individual revolts against their party’s leaders were more numerous, as with Dick Taverne in the Labour Party in Lincoln and Enoch Powell in the Conservatives who migrated to North Down in Ulster. British politics seemed pluralist, almost unrecognisable.

          4. Worst since 1772, all your fault becase I have my Encyclopædia Britannica open, looking for names and dates because of books I’m reading.

          5. When I lived in Cheshire we used to go for the occasional picnic at a reservoir which I think was called Derwentwater. It’s the place where some of the footage for the Dambusters movie was filmed. In that summer, the tower from the church in the submerged village became visible as the water receded.

          6. It’s where the actual Dambusters practised (along with dams in Wales). There’s a little museum in one of the towers.

          10. I thought so, my late father in law took me there – navigator 600 squadron Beaufighter.

          12. My Fil didn’t speak much about the war, but when he did it was fascinating. He was in a night fighter sqd and then moved to North Africa.

          13. I was teaching EFL in Worthing at the time. The school was in a stately home and I spent my free time sunbathing on the roof!

        2. Don’t forget the oil crisis and Wilson’s 3 day week. Cost me a job – but I soon found another by working on ‘contract’.

        3. I was in my 20s and just trying to enjoy myself in the 70s. I cared, and knew, little of politics.

    6. I have very mixed feelings about the 80s- it wasn’t all sunshine and light for me. Much of it was very hard to bear but I shan’t go on…

      1. My schooling, Connors was in the 50s and I had a paper round that required me to be up at 06:00. Fortunately the newsagent was immediately opposite but I do remember (at 14) delivering the news that the Big Bopper, Richie Valens and Buddy Holly had all died in an air crash.

        1. I went to grammar school in 1960 and then to university in 1967, having spent a year in the Scholarship Sixth.

        2. I ‘built’ my own crystal set radio in the ‘Fifties to listen to Radio Luxembourg in my bedroom; my parents had no idea …

          1. Me and my transistor radio under the covers listening to Radio Caroline….Johnie Walker and the Frinton Flashers.

  93. That’s me for this moderately windy day. Still quite strong but it will slow down as the night proceeds. I didn’t go out and barrow logs – it was just too unpleasant.

    Hope you all remain safe and sound and damage free.

    A demain (if the leccy is on).

        1. This was only a shrub. I’d done part of it and thought I’d finish it, but my hands turned red and lost all feeling so I gave up.

    1. Lefty fascists never change. He could have met with the protestors. He could have talked to them as equals. Instead, the pathetic coward is doing what all Lefty fanatics do and using state thugs with guns to get what he wants.

  96. Evening, all. A bit blowy here, but nothing like what was predicted. There’ve been more problems with floods (and not water running off roofs) than there has been with trees down. I suspect all those that were rotten and about to fall have already been brought down.

  97. Society can’t afford the dangerous decadence of the woke movement

    The Tory party chairman’s hard-hitting truths about the threat we face must be translated into action

    ANDREW ROBERTS • 16 February 2022 • 9:30pm

    The Margaret Thatcher Centre for Freedom in Washington DC is where British Tories go to let their hair down ideologically. It occupies an entire floor of the Heritage Foundation, America’s largest conservative think tank, and its director, Nile Gardiner, was one of Lady Thatcher’s favourite public intellectuals. It is a place where British conservatives can speak directly to like-minded people, both in the US and around the world.

    It was instructive, therefore, that Oliver Dowden, the Tory party chairman, chose the opportunity of a speech to the centre to make some important and hard-hitting points about the dangers that woke ideology poses. For it is an argument that matters as much to America and the wider world as it does to the United Kingdom. The virulent response to the speech from the political Left has been almost equally as instructive.

    “The enemies of the West are finding fresh confidence in their eternal battle against liberty,” said Dowden. “So, conservatives themselves must find the confidence to mount a vigorous defence of the values of a free society.” Regarding the new cold war with Vladimir Putin’s Russia, he said: “At the precise point when our resolve ought to be strongest, a pernicious new ideology is sweeping our societies. An ideology that, if not confronted, threatens to rob us of the self-confidence we need to uphold those very values. In Britain, its adherents sometimes describe themselves as ‘social justice warriors’. They claim to be ‘woke’.”

    (The mention of social justice reminds us of one of Robert Conquest’s famous Laws of Politics, that adding the adjective “social” to almost any noun automatically both demeans it and politicises it in a Left-wing way. There is justice, which we all understand and revere, and then there is “social justice”, a Left-wing bastardisation which often leads to the exact opposite of true justice. Similarly, you find a far more honest, stronger and less Left-wing noun if you excise the word “social” from social market, social enterprise, social policy, social care, social housing, and so on.)

    Dowden went on to describe “that tendency among cultural and educational elites to serve their own interests rather than serve the public at large” as nothing less than “a dangerous form of decadence”. He identified the woke as “engaged in a form of Maoism, determined to expunge large parts of our past in its entirety”. He rightly denounced the disgraceful vandalisation of Winston Churchill’s statue during a BLM march in May 2020.

    It was refreshing to hear such uncompromising language, although The Guardian predictably interpreted the speech as trying “to mock the concerns of campaigners for trans rights and those pushing to confront the legacy of colonialism”, while itself mocking Dowden as “secretary of state for the culture wars”. The Huffington Post similarly denounced the speech as “bizarre” without bothering to explain why they thought it so.

    James O’Brien of LBC, who now undertakes much of the role of Leader of the Opposition in this country during Sir Keir Starmer’s charisma vacuum, said of Dowden’s speech: “All I’ve got is that he doesn’t want us to be talking, acknowledging or reporting on facts.” In fact, that was very clearly the exact opposite of what Dowden was saying; Dowden obviously does want responsible talking and reporting, rather than what he called the “painful woke psychodrama” that is being played out daily in “our universities, but also in our schools. In government bodies, but also in corporations. In social science faculties, but also in the hard sciences.”

    In social media – another good example for Conquest’s law of nouns – Corbynites denounced Dowden’s speech in characteristically unmeasured terms, thereby illustrating the truth of something else Dowden had said, that “for all their fury at so called imperialism, these [woke] activists have absolutely nothing to say about that Vladimir Putin’s modern-day empire building”.

    What Dowden politely did not mention was that in the country in which he was speaking, the battle is being comprehensively lost among the young. Of Generation-Z Americans, (those born after 1996), more than half believe that “gender binary is outdated”, that America is “inextricably linked to white supremacy”, and support reparations for slavery. Some 60 per cent believe that “systemic racism is widespread in general society’ and 64 per cent support the idea that therefore “rioting and looting is justified to some degree”. Equally worryingly, 41 per cent support censorship of “hate speech” and as many as 23 per cent approve the use of violence to silence it. As the American thinker N S Lyons put it recently: “Culture wars are generational wars, and the young are woke as hell.”

    Of course, one hopes that they will grow wiser as they grow older. Institutions such as the Heritage Foundation have an important role to play in that educational process. So do conservative politicians, which is why Oliver Dowden’s speech is so uplifting.

    For how much must Vladimir Putin, President Xi, the Iranian mullahs, and our other global antagonists be laughing at us, that while they are threatening Ukraine and Taiwan, and speeding up the centrifuges in Iran’s military nuclear facilities, we in the West are, in Dowden’s words, “obsessing over pronouns or, indeed, seeking to decolonise mathematics”.

    The Conservatives have been in power for 12 years now, and today enjoy an 80-seat majority in the House of Commons. None the less, this has been the period when woke absurdities have reached their present hiatus, when careers are being destroyed and “cancelled”, when the police are intervening in “thought crimes”, when authors are too scared to describe how women look in their novels, when comedians are silenced, academics self-censor facts they know to be true, and scientific biological realities are deemed unsayable.

    Oliver Dowden made a fine speech in America. Now is the time for the Government to turn his eloquent and hard-hitting truths into practical form back home.

    Andrew Roberts is the author of ‘Churchill: Walking with Destiny’

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/02/16/society-cant-afford-dangerous-decadence-woke-movement/

  98. Society can’t afford the dangerous decadence of the woke movement

    The Tory party chairman’s hard-hitting truths about the threat we face must be translated into action

    ANDREW ROBERTS • 16 February 2022 • 9:30pm

    The Margaret Thatcher Centre for Freedom in Washington DC is where British Tories go to let their hair down ideologically. It occupies an entire floor of the Heritage Foundation, America’s largest conservative think tank, and its director, Nile Gardiner, was one of Lady Thatcher’s favourite public intellectuals. It is a place where British conservatives can speak directly to like-minded people, both in the US and around the world.

    It was instructive, therefore, that Oliver Dowden, the Tory party chairman, chose the opportunity of a speech to the centre to make some important and hard-hitting points about the dangers that woke ideology poses. For it is an argument that matters as much to America and the wider world as it does to the United Kingdom. The virulent response to the speech from the political Left has been almost equally as instructive.

    “The enemies of the West are finding fresh confidence in their eternal battle against liberty,” said Dowden. “So, conservatives themselves must find the confidence to mount a vigorous defence of the values of a free society.” Regarding the new cold war with Vladimir Putin’s Russia, he said: “At the precise point when our resolve ought to be strongest, a pernicious new ideology is sweeping our societies. An ideology that, if not confronted, threatens to rob us of the self-confidence we need to uphold those very values. In Britain, its adherents sometimes describe themselves as ‘social justice warriors’. They claim to be ‘woke’.”

    (The mention of social justice reminds us of one of Robert Conquest’s famous Laws of Politics, that adding the adjective “social” to almost any noun automatically both demeans it and politicises it in a Left-wing way. There is justice, which we all understand and revere, and then there is “social justice”, a Left-wing bastardisation which often leads to the exact opposite of true justice. Similarly, you find a far more honest, stronger and less Left-wing noun if you excise the word “social” from social market, social enterprise, social policy, social care, social housing, and so on.)

    Dowden went on to describe “that tendency among cultural and educational elites to serve their own interests rather than serve the public at large” as nothing less than “a dangerous form of decadence”. He identified the woke as “engaged in a form of Maoism, determined to expunge large parts of our past in its entirety”. He rightly denounced the disgraceful vandalisation of Winston Churchill’s statue during a BLM march in May 2020.

    It was refreshing to hear such uncompromising language, although The Guardian predictably interpreted the speech as trying “to mock the concerns of campaigners for trans rights and those pushing to confront the legacy of colonialism”, while itself mocking Dowden as “secretary of state for the culture wars”. The Huffington Post similarly denounced the speech as “bizarre” without bothering to explain why they thought it so.

    James O’Brien of LBC, who now undertakes much of the role of Leader of the Opposition in this country during Sir Keir Starmer’s charisma vacuum, said of Dowden’s speech: “All I’ve got is that he doesn’t want us to be talking, acknowledging or reporting on facts.” In fact, that was very clearly the exact opposite of what Dowden was saying; Dowden obviously does want responsible talking and reporting, rather than what he called the “painful woke psychodrama” that is being played out daily in “our universities, but also in our schools. In government bodies, but also in corporations. In social science faculties, but also in the hard sciences.”

    In social media – another good example for Conquest’s law of nouns – Corbynites denounced Dowden’s speech in characteristically unmeasured terms, thereby illustrating the truth of something else Dowden had said, that “for all their fury at so called imperialism, these [woke] activists have absolutely nothing to say about that Vladimir Putin’s modern-day empire building”.

    What Dowden politely did not mention was that in the country in which he was speaking, the battle is being comprehensively lost among the young. Of Generation-Z Americans, (those born after 1996), more than half believe that “gender binary is outdated”, that America is “inextricably linked to white supremacy”, and support reparations for slavery. Some 60 per cent believe that “systemic racism is widespread in general society’ and 64 per cent support the idea that therefore “rioting and looting is justified to some degree”. Equally worryingly, 41 per cent support censorship of “hate speech” and as many as 23 per cent approve the use of violence to silence it. As the American thinker N S Lyons put it recently: “Culture wars are generational wars, and the young are woke as hell.”

    Of course, one hopes that they will grow wiser as they grow older. Institutions such as the Heritage Foundation have an important role to play in that educational process. So do conservative politicians, which is why Oliver Dowden’s speech is so uplifting.

    For how much must Vladimir Putin, President Xi, the Iranian mullahs, and our other global antagonists be laughing at us, that while they are threatening Ukraine and Taiwan, and speeding up the centrifuges in Iran’s military nuclear facilities, we in the West are, in Dowden’s words, “obsessing over pronouns or, indeed, seeking to decolonise mathematics”.

    The Conservatives have been in power for 12 years now, and today enjoy an 80-seat majority in the House of Commons. None the less, this has been the period when woke absurdities have reached their present hiatus, when careers are being destroyed and “cancelled”, when the police are intervening in “thought crimes”, when authors are too scared to describe how women look in their novels, when comedians are silenced, academics self-censor facts they know to be true, and scientific biological realities are deemed unsayable.

    Oliver Dowden made a fine speech in America. Now is the time for the Government to turn his eloquent and hard-hitting truths into practical form back home.

    Andrew Roberts is the author of ‘Churchill: Walking with Destiny’

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/02/16/society-cant-afford-dangerous-decadence-woke-movement/

  99. Trudeau is world leader in woke illiberalism

    The Canadian PM’s double standards have exposed the woke ideology’s desire to crush any dissent

    ERIC KAUFMANN • 15 February 2022 • 9:30pm

    Justin Trudeau, the prime minister of my country, Canada, has emerged as a figurehead for the illiberal progressive ideology. This is clear in his attempt to smear those who oppose vaccine mandates as racist and misogynist and, now, in his invocation of the Emergency Measures Act, a wide-ranging piece of legislation that allows the government to freeze people’s bank accounts in order to prevent them from assembling, among a range of other draconian measures.

    The Act is an updated version of the War Measures Act, last triggered by Trudeau’s father Pierre in the 1970s, who used it to send in the military in response to a wave of terrorist activity by Quebecois separatists. This time, the context is weeks of protests by truckers opposed to vaccine mandates. I hold no brief for them: they made their point and should not dictate policy. However, Trudeau’s behaviour is riven with double standards and misinformation.

    Contrast his combative posture towards the truckers with his gentle approach to protesters who would seem to share his philosophy. When Left-wing arsonists burned some 30 Catholic churches over a false claim that mass graves had been discovered near a former residential school for indigenous Canadians, Trudeau called the violence “understandable”. When indigenous protesters and their allies blocked rail lines and pipelines over a longer period than the trucker convoy, Trudeau patiently called for “dialogue and mutual respect”.

    These double standards are rooted in ideology. Cultural liberalism upholds freedom of speech, due process, equal treatment for all and the scientific method. Cultural socialism, which Trudeau promotes, believes that the speech and heritage of historically dominant groups must be restricted so as not to offend minorities.

    Wokeness is Trudeau’s moral compass, and that of an important section of the 60 per cent of English Canadians who vote for Left-wing parties like Trudeau’s Liberals or Jagmeet Singh’s New Democratic Party (NDP). Trudeau has leaned into it both because he is a true believer, and because he knows it can win him votes.

    The Liberals and the NDP have a vision of Canada as an urbane moral power. This metropolitan, multicultural, university-educated self-vision has no space for its despised Other, the white rural working-class male. Thus the convoy that entered Ottawa was not seen as a contribution to the debate over when to lift vaccine mandates, but as a symbolic intrusion of the regressive, fallen Canadian past into the progressive present.

    The fact that the protesters had the audacity to wrap themselves in the flag and present this image to the world was viewed as an act of symbolic violence. It elicited a hysterical overreaction from many on the Left – who falsely tried to portray anti-vaccine mandate voices, some of them from minority groups, as bigoted, racist extremists.

    Sadly, this misinformation has been effective: 57 per cent of Canadians agree that the convoy was not about vaccine mandates but “an opportunity for Right-wing supremacist groups to rally and voice their frustrations about society”. Half say that they find the convoy “scary” because it reminds them of the January 6 capitol riot in Washington.

    The Canadian population has been weaned on politically correct taboos for two generations. When the British loyalist cause which had supported Canadian identity for nearly two centuries waned in the 1960s, a vacuum was created which the cultural Left was able to fill. Their invention of Canada as a culturally Left-wing country succeeded, and was institutionalised by Pierre Trudeau in the 1971 Multiculturalism Act.

    While too many Canadians are willing to swallow the alarmist and dehumanising myths propounded by cultural socialists, they can see that their country is polarising under Justin Trudeau. Though just 22 per cent want the trucker protests to continue, 44 per cent say that his “condescending attitude” has had a negative effect and 65 per cent say his statements and actions have worsened the situation.

    Canada’s deepening divisions will not go away so long as wokeness remains the country’s official ideology. And that won’t happen so long as its current prime minister remains in power.

    Eric Kaufmann is professor of politics at Birkbeck College, University of London, and a senior fellow at Policy Exchange

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2022/02/15/trudeau-world-leader-woke-illiberalism/

    1. Sadly, this misinformation has been effective: 57 per cent of Canadians agree that the convoy was not about vaccine mandates but “an opportunity for Right-wing supremacist groups to rally and voice their frustrations about society”. Half say that they find the convoy “scary” because it reminds them of the January 6 capitol riot in Washington.

      I would be very interested to understand how that voting cohort was selected .

    2. “Trudeau is world leader in woke illiberalism”
      The Canadian PM’s double standards have exposed the woke ideology’s desire to crush any dissent …

      Canada must get rid of Trudeau – or continue to bear well-deserved world-wide ridicule …

  101. Right, I’m off to socialise with Best Beloved who has just returned from the PCC (Parish Church Council) meeting bearing my resignation as Lay Chairman. Good night, goodfellows and God Bless.

    1. I hope your resignation is as a result of your deciding it’s time to pass the baton rather than a problem.
      Enjoy your evening and enjoy your “retirement”.

  102. UK conservatives have surrendered to the woke Left

    Americans fight over every piece of ideological ground. Brits content themselves with minor changes to schools guidance

    DOUGLAS MURRAY • 18 February 2022 • 7:00pm

    The Conservative Party’s co-chairman, Oliver Dowden, was in Washington this week, giving a speech at the Heritage Foundation. In it he focused on what he called the “painful woke psychodrama” playing out across our societies. In particular, he addressed the effects of cancel culture, the obsession with pronouns and efforts to “decolonise” the curriculum and, indeed, our whole history.

    It was one of the first times that such a senior Conservative has actually lasered in on these matters, although Dowden’s colleague Kemi Badenoch has toiled in these vineyards for some years. The Prime Minister himself is reported to be wildly scared of being seen to be engaging in “culture wars”. And the reaction to Dowden’s speech by what remains of the Left-wing press might have been a reminder of why that is.

    For the Left-wing media immediately denounced Dowden in the usual ways. He was accused of both starting and stoking a culture war. This is how the Left operates on these matters. It wages a vicious culture war throughout every aspect of society, from women’s sports and education to a refutation of our entire history, and then when a conservative raises even the mildest objection, they accuse said conservative of “fuelling” or “starting” a culture war.

    If you doubt that such a culture war is occurring on the Left, then just look almost anywhere.

    Consider the 10-year old schoolchildren in Nottingham being encouraged by their teachers to write letters calling on the Prime Minister to resign.

    As ever, students in America take things one step further. Earlier this week, high school students in Pennsylvania made a video of themselves taking matters into their own hands. Specifically, they filmed themselves going through the stacks of their school library and forcibly “decolonising” it.

    In the video, they proudly gather up scores of books they can never have read, including a work on Rousseau and a book by the distinguished feminist writer Christina Hoff Sommers, and throw them into bins and then a giant dumpster. “Just doing the Lord’s work,” was one of the labels they put on their video. I’m sure certain people in the inter-war years in Germany felt the same way.

    In the past year there have been some claims that conservatives are finally fighting back against such Left-wing excesses. In the United States, the election of Glenn Youngkin as governor of Virginia was in part achieved because he lasered in on the issue of so-called “critical race theory” being taught in American schools.

    The Left is slightly confused about how to answer these allegations. At present, they argue that this divisive, race-baiting ideology at one and the same time doesn’t exist, is an invention of the Right, ought to exist, is excellent and should be taught everywhere. In fact, CRT certainly is being taught in US schools, and the evidence proves this in spite of the weird smokescreen put up by the American Left. In America, Youngkin’s election is seen as an important piercing of this dangerous nonsense.

    In the UK, we too can point to occasional victories. Some have pointed to the guidance issued to schools this week by the Department of Education recommending that contentious historical periods are taught in a “balanced” manner. Specifically, schools have been warned not to teach Black Lives Matter-style propaganda about “white privilege” and the like.

    Conservatives point to such guidance as victories. But the truth is that conservatives can win the odd election, and even issue the occasional piece of guidance to schools, and still woefully lose any and all cultural wars.

    As I have often pointed out, this problem even extends to the departments over which government ministers preside. The Civil Service in our country is infused with woke ideology, regularly participating in Diversity, Inclusion and Equity struggle sessions and the like. When it comes to public appointments, time and again the Civil Service try to ensure that only those with centre-Left or Left-wing opinions are deemed appointable to all public bodies.

    When you ask ministers about this, you tend to hear that these are initiatives that the Civil Service starts without the awareness of the politicians running the departments. It is a wholly inadequate excuse. If schools, universities or other public bodies were found to be doing things that their heads did not approve of, those heads would not be excused simply because they professed ignorance.

    Furthermore, it is exceptionally hard for ministers to lecture other public bodies to get a grip of the wildest extremes of woke in their own sector if ministers cannot get their own departments in order.

    The conservatives who tinker with, and make occasional interventions into these matters fail to recognise that the culture war in Britain is all but won.

    In America, the fight is very much still on, because American conservatives fight for every inch of ideological terrain. Often bitterly, occasionally histrionically, but dedicatedly and sincerely all the same.

    In Britain, by contrast, much of the Right appears to have given up a long time ago. Not in the media, or in all of our public spaces, but certainly among our public bodies and national institutions. Go, for instance, to Tate Britain in London and read the appalling denunciations in that gallery, by that gallery, of works that the gallery is exceptionally lucky to own. Just this week it issued a fresh condemnation of the beautiful and whimsical mural by Rex Whistler in its basement. A mural which the Tate has deemed, completely incorrectly, to be “racist”.

    Or read the description alongside one of the great masterpieces of the collection, The Resurrection, Cookham, by Stanley Spencer. A display caption placed by the gallery alongside this transportingly moving work also accuses Spencer of racism, because of what it claims are “generalising” depictions of non-white people in the painting.

    Spencer is guilty of reinforcing “racist stereotypes and divisions” according to the Tate – thereby turning a deeply moving depiction of the Resurrection of all of humanity on the Day of Judgment into yet another banal lecture in dodgy racial politicking.

    Will the Tate suffer any withdrawal of funds – private or public – over these outrageous interventions of ideology into art? It should. But the moment any minister suggested such a thing, the Left would claim that the Government was engaging in a culture war.

    Whereas, of course, it is the Tate and its crepuscular, ignorant and cowardly trustees who are the ones polluting one of our great national collections with their juvenile radical ideology.

    There is a struggle going on at present over everything to do not just with our present, but with everything that ever happened in our past. Though even to say that this is a struggle is to present it as more fought-over than it is. In reality, it is a great stampede in one direction, occasionally responded to in speech, occasionally responded to in some school guidance. But it is a stampede which conservatives in Britain have vastly underestimated. To everybody’s peril.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/02/18/uk-conservatives-have-surrendered-woke-left/

  105. Ah, “trans rights” etc. On the Scottish News this evening we were told that around 900 children under 18 are on a waiting list for “gender reassignment”.
    This is Scotland today, a country where parents can be jailed for giving a child a thick ear, but are being encouraged to help them to be mutilated.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-60395731

  107. Good evening all, if anyone’s still awake. Lost power / internet / mobile signal around 10.30 am; finally restored at 11.15 pm. No serious damage to report – just a couple of fence panels and a flimsy cheap plastic tool store thingy. Anyway, in case the power goes off again, Saturday’s new page is here.

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