Monday 17 April: Why was the Government so slow to see smart motorways’ stupidity?

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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508 thoughts on “Monday 17 April: Why was the Government so slow to see smart motorways’ stupidity?”

  1. Good morrow, Gentlefolks, today’s story

    Who’s To Blame

    A man is flying around in a hot air balloon, and realises that he is lost. He reduces altitude and spots a man down below.

    He lowers the balloon near the man and shouts, “Excuse me, but can you tell me where I am?

    The man down below says, “Yes! You’re in a hot air balloon, hovering 30 feet above this field.”

    “You must be a consultant,” says the balloonist.

    “As a matter of fact, I am!” replies the man, “how did you know?”

    “Well,” says the balloonist, “everything you’ve told me is technically correct, but it’s of no use whatsoever.”

    The man below says, “Well then! You must be in upper management!”

    “I am,” replies the balloonist, “but how did you know that?”

    “Because you don’t know where you are or where you’re going, and you expect me to be able to help!

    Plus, you’re just as lost as you were before we met, but now you think it’s all my fault!”

  2. Good day all,

    Up and about early at the McPhee abode. Dull start with some rain, a light zephyr from the East, 9℃ brighter this afternoon and evening. Having new front and back doors fitted today That should be fun.

    Here are two ladies who have started something we could all get involved in.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJXTPcW_XXE

    The website is here:

    https://www.ukcitizen.org/community-connections/

    We could all do our bit instead of sitting grumbling about it all on t’internet.

  3. Good Morning Folks,

    Damp grey start here, what happened to the promised heatwave, I wonder.

  5. Why was the Government so slow to see smart motorways’ stupidity?

    Does one really have to ask that question?

    1. I’ve been calling them ‘dumb’ motorways for years. Leaving aside the inherent danger when it’s busy, before I stopped working I used to be on the motorways late at night and there would often be miles and miles of speed restriction for no obvious reason. In the case of night-time road works the speed limits would be on many miles before the the stretch being worked on and remain on once it had been passed. There would be messages on the overhead signs: “Pedestrians in the Carriageway”, “Animals in the Road”, “Stranded Vehicled” all with speed restrictions attached which had to be obeyed because – cameras. The worst of all is speed restrictions to “cut pollution” which was the case for a long tome in the new stretch of dumbness on the M27 around Southampton. It’s permanent on the M4 at Port Talbot.

      You’d continue on your way but pedestrians, animals or stranded vehicles were there none. Someone had just gone to sleep in the control room or couldn’t be arsed to switch off the warning and restriction.

      By using the ‘10% plus 2’ technique – e.g. limit 50 so set 57 on cruise control or 60 so set 68 – I was never slowed down too much unless there were people in front who insisted on sticking below the variable limit. I was never ‘flashed’.

      2. The M4 speed limit at Port Talbot has been 50mph, since at at least the early 1980’s, when I moved there.

        The road is basically a viaduct, over houses: that may be the reason ie vibration, crashed vehicles falling on houses.

        It is has now been Drakefordised, along with many other sections of M4

        1. I can see that houses are close but you don’t get the impression that there are any close to being under the carriageway. The ‘pollution’ message is usually up on the overhead signs when I drive it. The worst bit is the section around Newport from the `Celtic Resort’ to past the tunnels. There have been horrendous queues there on my most recent journeys to Pembrokeshire.

          1. Believe me, they are under the road.

            SWMBO said the speed has been 50mph (on the raised bit) since the road opened, which was before it was joined onto M4

          3. More to the point, why do you build a road Over Houses.

            Those who have no alternative

          4. A major point. I would have though the houses underneath would have been vacated/demolished a long time ago and the occupants rehoused. It seems we can find houses for migrant invaders, though.

          5. More to the point, why do you build a road Over Houses.

            Those who have no alternative

          6. Believe me, they are under the road.

            SWMBO said the speed has been 50mph (on the raised bit) since the road opened, which was before it was joined onto M4

          8. Proposals for a Newport M4 relief road were first put forward in the 1980s. Drakeford pulled the plug in 2019, citing the cost and “the global climate crisis and local ‘environmental impacts’ to the Gwent Levels”.

    2. I’ve been calling them ‘dumb’ motorways for years. Leaving aside the inherent danger when it’s busy, before I stopped working I used to be on the motorways late at night and there would often be miles and miles of speed restriction for no obvious reason. In the case of night-time road works the speed limits would be on many miles before the the stretch being worked on and remain on once it had been passed. There would be messages on the overhead signs: “Pedestrians in the Carriageway”, “Animals in the Road”, “Stranded Vehicled” all with speed restrictions attached which had to be obeyed because – cameras. The worst of all is speed restrictions to “cut pollution” which was the case for a long tome in the new stretch of dumbness on the M27 around Southampton. It’s permanent on the M4 at Port Talbot.

      You’d continue on your way but pedestrians, animals or stranded vehicles were there none. Someone had just gone to sleep in the control room or couldn’t be arsed to switch off the warning and restriction.

      By using the ‘10% plus 2’ technique – e.g. limit 50 so set 57 on cruise control or 60 so set 68 – I was never slowed down too much unless there were people in front who insisted on sticking below the variable limit. I was never ‘flashed’.

    3. I’ve been calling them ‘dumb’ motorways for years. Leaving aside the inherent danger when it’s busy, before I stopped working I used to be on the motorways late at night and there would often be miles and miles of speed restriction for no obvious reason. In the case of night-time road works the speed limits would be on many miles before the the stretch being worked on and remain on once it had been passed. There would be messages on the overhead signs: “Pedestrians in the Carriageway”, “Animals in the Road”, “Stranded Vehicled” all with speed restrictions attached which had to be obeyed because – cameras. The worst of all is speed restrictions to “cut pollution” which was the case for a long tome in the new stretch of dumbness on the M27 around Southampton. It’s permanent on the M4 at Port Talbot.

      You’d continue on your way but pedestrians, animals or stranded vehicles were there none. Someone had just gone to sleep in the control room or couldn’t be arsed to switch off the warning and restriction.

      By using the ‘10% plus 2’ technique – e.g. limit 50 so set 57 on cruise control or 60 so set 68 – I was never slowed down too much unless there were people in front who insisted on sticking below the variable limit. I was never ‘flashed’.

  7. It takes THREE DT reporters to capture the true import of this breaking news idiocy…

    Brecon Beacons to be renamed over links to climate change

    National Park says the symbol of a ‘carbon burning beacon’ is incompatible with its ‘push to net zero’

    By Emma Gatten, ENVIRONMENT EDITOR ; Craig Simpson and Daniel Martin
    17 April 2023 • 12:01am

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/news/2023/04/16/TELEMMGLPICT000332276598_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqpVlberWd9EgFPZtcLiMQf0Rf_Wk3V23H2268P_XkPxc.jpeg?imwidth=680

    The Brecon Beacons are to be renamed over concerns that the word “beacon” is out of step with the fight against climate change.

    The national park will now be officially referred to as the “Bannau Brycheiniog” National Park, granting the landscape a Welsh name, and steering clear of any associations with historical signal fires.

    Officials said the symbol of a flaming beacon emitting carbon “does not fit with the ethos” of the national park as an eco-friendly organisation.
    *
    *
    **********************************

    David Williams
    5 HRS AGO
    What a good idea and such intelligent insight. Can we please have the dragon taken from the flag as well, fire breathing animals should not be promoted in the spirit of net zero.

    1. I’m sorry to have to say that in my long acquaintance with the Brecon Beacons it has never once crossed my mind that the name might have anything to do with Signal Fires nor is there anything in their history that suggests that they have ever been used for such a purpose. The name was concocted in 1794 so it certainly has nothing to do with the Armada. Their original name seems to have been Black Mountain but let’s not go there. And let us also ignore this half- witted plan by an underemployed and overpaid executive with nothing better to do with their time. One of the great joys of history is to learn that the fantasies of the Elites fade in retrospect and that St Petersburg and Volgograd regained their names once normality was resumed.

        1. Not being fluent in Welsh, can’t we just compromise and call them The Woke Heights? Lol.

    2. Haven’t they also renamed Snowdon to something equally unpronounceable? Is it really a good idea to be less welcoming to visitors who don’t speak Welsh?

        1. Do Nottlers call that African country KEEN YA or do they call it KEN YA ?

          (I still use the former pronunciation.)

        2. It’s a nuisance driving in Wales and having to try to take in road signs in Welsh and English.

          1. It’s something you get accustomed to. When people ask me if I speak Welsh, my answer is “only roadsign Welsh”!

          2. Trouble is, I have only infrequently driven in Wales, so when I come across a road sign, it takes me more time to get to the English part, so the warning I get is delayed.

          3. It’s something I’m not particularly happy with, but in Wales language is a political issue (as it is in Quebec). There were complaints about English coming first, would you believe? It’s bad enough having to decypher it without having to seek out the important info that everybody can acess.

      2. Yr Wyddfa. Snowdonia is Eryri. There are signs warning you about lack of parking in Eryri – unfortunately, they’re all in Welsh! Dim parcio, dim stopio, boyo!

    5. The Chinese have already sorted out the issue of Welsh fire-breathing dragons, as any visit to Welsh souvenir shops will demonstrate. In China, dragons are friendly and benevolent and dispense good fortune. The cuddly Welsh dragons they make for the souvenir shops look like cows.

    6. I always had the idea that stoopid was a self attained infliction. But seemingly these days it’s spreading like wildfire.

    7. I live not far from Beacon Hill, the next bump in the Hampshire Downs beyond Watership Down. That will have to go too, I suppose.

  8. Are they struggling to teach basic mathematics these days because of a change in teaching methods or because of a change in the school children?

    3. The truth is that children are probably no more or no less intelligent than they used to be. However the educational system is designed to ensure that by the time they leave school they are less intelligent and have no critical facility whatsoever.

      Critical and logical thinking should be taught in schools but the more one reads about teachers the more one realises that none of them would be capable of teaching the subject.

      1. It’s important to note that the curriculum leaves no room for such thinking. It is rote learning to pass the enforced tests. Actually learning the subject is not relevant. That comes from a government determined to enforce results for the purposes of statistics, not education.

        Pupils are a side issue for schools. Their real customer is the state, not the child.

    4. Probably a combination of both; different teaching methods (a one size fits all that probably fits nobody) and a lack of discipline (largely due to the Children Act putting all the power in the hands of the child).

  10. Starmer must account for his tenure as Director of Public Prosecutions

    He has deprived himself of all defences against future scrutiny of CPS actions under his leadership

    NICK TIMOTHY 16 April 2023 • 9:28pm
    *
    *
    *
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/04/16/starmer-must-account-for-his-tenure-as-director-of-public-p/
    **********************************************

    Hugo McEwen
    8 HRS AGO
    We all know that Labour, indeed the entire left -MPs, councillors, media – all the ‘right-thinking’ ones, turned a blind eye to the grooming gangs, as did Starmer when he was DPP. You’re right, Nick, he’s opened himself to the attack that has up until now been a bein pensant taboo. Let’s talk about why the grooming gang scandal was swept under the carpet by Starmer, while brave individuals who spoke out like Sarah Champion were sidelined, ridiculed, traduced and maligned.
    You reap what you sow.

    John McGowan
    1 HR AGO
    Reply to Hugo McEwen – view message
    A great comment, Hugo.
    I would further add that Starmer enabled these gangs and gave them ‘untouchable’ status.
    Thousands of young girls’ lives have been ruined and the message from Starmer and the CPS was that they were liars (sacrificial lambs on the altar of wokeness and and political correctness).
    If anyone has any doubt that this behaviour is still ongoing within the Labour Party, just look at the ongoing hatred within the Labour Party against Rosie Duffield.
    Her crime? To state biological FACT.
    If any of the readership are thinking of voting tactically for Labour, I would suggest that there is no amount of disinfectant in this world to make oneself feel clean after a vote for Starmer and Labour.

      1. Sometimes in politics, an attack reveals more about the attacker than the target. So it has proved with Labour’s recent and now notorious claim that Rishi Sunak does not believe adults convicted of sexually assaulting children should go to prison.

        For starters, Sunak clearly does believe child abusers should be punished with custodial sentences. Indeed, the overwhelming majority of those convicted are sent to prison. While the statistics Labour cited referred to a minority of cases, their claim was written to imply Sunak believes child sex offenders should in general avoid custodial sentences.

        So the question prompted by Labour’s claim is whether all those found guilty of sex offences against children should receive mandatory custodial sentences. Allowing judges flexibility to take into account the circumstances of a crime has been a longstanding principle of sentencing policy, and on this question we do not know yet what Rishi Sunak thinks. But we do know Keir Starmer’s own position.

        As the former Director of Public Prosecutions, Starmer led the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) between 2008 and 2013. In that capacity he sat on the Sentencing Council, the organisation that tells judges the parameters of punishments they can issue to convicted criminals. Between 2011 and 2013 Starmer attended 21 meetings of the Sentencing Council, which in that period approved a consultation, released in December 2012, and guidelines for sentencing sexual offences that came into effect in April 2014.

        For rape of a child under 13, the consultation says “there is a necessity for flexibility within the sentencing regime” and that in some cases, “a sentencer may decide that a non-custodial sentence is more appropriate”. The final guidelines say “there may be exceptional cases where a lengthy community order … may be the best way” of dealing with an offender.

        The same approach is taken to a variety of other sex offences against children. “The Council,” it says, is “consulting on whether in some sexual offences [against children] it may be appropriate to give the offender some credit for recognising and trying to address their behaviour.” The guidelines state “where there is a sufficient prospect of rehabilitation, a community order with a sex offender treatment programme requirement … can be a proper alternative” to a short or moderate custodial sentence.

        And so the logic runs through the guidelines. Rape of a child under 13, sexual assault of a child under 13, causing a child to watch a sexual act, possession of indecent photographs of children, inciting a child to engage in sexual activity, payment for the sexual services of a 16-year-old child: all are offences that, in some circumstances, might be punished with a non-custodial community order. All under the guidelines signed off by the Sentencing Council.

        Last May, several guidelines had to be revised at the request of the Court of Appeal, which pointed out that they had led the courts to judge harm to be low in cases where an offender had arranged or facilitated sex offences against children but where no sexual activity took place – as often happens in police “sting” operations. It seems that the original guidelines made it more likely that serious offenders would escape custodial sentences.

        It is of course legitimate to argue that Parliament should be more directive to the courts, and make sure that more, or all, child sex offenders are sent to prison. It is legitimate to question whether ministers really ought to contract-out decision-making to less accountable bodies like the Sentencing Council, and to figures like Keir Starmer, who has political views that do not match the values of the elected government he served.

        But it is quite clearly not legitimate for Starmer to claim Sunak believes something he does not, and to claim Sunak is responsible for decisions he never took – particularly when Starmer himself did have such responsibility. When Starmer sat on the Sentencing Council, Sunak was not yet a Member of Parliament, let alone a minister with executive power.

        And this is not all that is wrong with Starmer’s hypocrisy over his time at the CPS. The Labour leader routinely boasts that “as Director of Public Prosecutions, I prosecuted serious terrorists”, “I prosecuted people smugglers”, and “I prosecuted grooming gangs”. But if critics point out errors and failures in the organisation he led for five years, his allies insist that Starmer cannot be accountable for decisions made by thousands of CPS lawyers. Yet this is the standard to which Starmer seeks to hold ministers running government departments every week.

        So Starmer claims responsibility for the successes of the CPS, and denies responsibility for the crises. Embarrassingly for him, his own shadow attorney general, Emily Thornberry, attacked the performance of the CPS while Starmer was Director of Public Prosecutions for its policies and performance in prosecuting rape cases, and for its failure to prosecute Jimmy Savile. In interviews since the publication of Labour’s claims about Sunak, Thornberry has been unable to say whether Labour would send all child sex offenders to prison. For the reality is, they would not.

        Voters already find Starmer shifty. Focus group reports say people find him smart after event, always complaining and never leading. After watching him perform endless U-turns – on Shamima Begum, on his “friend” Jeremy Corbyn, on Brexit, free movement and the single market and customs union, on nationalising utility companies, ending outsourcing, scrapping Universal Credit and abolishing tuition fees – there is good reason to believe he is not a man to be trusted.

        Now, with this shameless and hypocritical attack on Sunak, Starmer is not only compounding his reputation for being evasive. He has invited maximum scrutiny of his record as Director of Public Prosecutions, and his attitudes to law and order. He has deprived himself of all defences against attacks based on his own decisions and record in office.

        That record will present a different picture to the one Starmer seeks to paint. In trying to get tough, the Labour leader has exposed himself to the charge that he is no such thing. A liberal-Lefty human rights lawyer, on crime he is ineffective and weak.

  11. Vladimir Putin’s war has exploded into Sudan. Richard Kemp.7 April 2023.

    Thus, Vladimir Putin, either by accident or design, has helped to unleash a wave of violence that could have disastrous consequences not just for Sudan and North Africa, but the world. His failed invasion of Ukraine has empowered the Wagner Group, which uses that clout to plunder African nations and stir up trouble. His desperation for money since the West implemented severe sanctions has made Russian state support for such illicit actions a necessity. All this will come at a heavy price.

    Indeed, Sudan may be just the first African nation to implode under Russian influence. In the Central African Republic, Mozambique, Libya and Mali, Russian mercenaries have worked to reinforce existing conflicts, prop up despotic regimes, suppress efforts towards democracy, loot natural resources, secure strategic advantage for Moscow and drive out Western influence. The forces unleashed by their efforts will not be easily contained.

    We must hope that Kemp; an elected official of the Crown, is being paid vast sums by the CIA to post this drivel since the alternative is that he’s completely lost his marbles and turned into a paranoid Conspiracy Theorist that would make Joe McCarthy look well balanced!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/04/16/putins-war-has-exploded-into-sudan/

    2. I think I mentioned yesterday someone will get the blame for this.
      The world msm is stirring it up again.
      The Plastic POTUS will be involved in this.

    1. A friend of mine whose spouse insisted he accompany her on a voyage to commemorate the exact spot where the Titanic sank, joined a group of similarly press-ganged spouses and called their respective opposite halves “The Titaniacs”.

      1. They probably pull them over.
        I saw a lovely clip of two baby elephants playing with a minder he was sitting on the ground. And they were all over him.

  15. Some Ukrainians who fled Russia’s war ended up in Siberia. 17 April 2023.

    A year ago, Natalia’s life was upended by war. With her family, she fled the fighting in Ukraine’s southeastern city of Mariupol and crossed into Russia.

    From there, she and many other Ukrainians were encouraged by Russian authorities to take a 4,000-mile train journey east to the very edge of Siberia, to a coastal town called Nakhodka on the Sea of Japan, a stone’s throw from North Korea. It’s closer to Alaska than to the front lines.

    In the absence of a reliable evacuation corridor to Ukrainian-held territory, going to Russia was the only option for many people in Mariupol at that time. Ukraine describes these refugees as forcibly deported, though Natalia says no one forced her to leave. “It was our decision,” she told CNN by phone from Russia’s far east, where she has resettled since arriving last spring.

    A pretty good rebuttal of the Ukie Propaganda Story about the evacuees being kidnapped!

    https://edition.cnn.com/2023/04/17/europe/ukrainians-russia-far-east-intl-cmd/index.html

  16. Good Moaning.
    The Murrell saga is up there with the Profumo affair.
    Riveting stuff that just rolls out before you in all its gruesome details.
    However, we have moved on in the past 60 years.
    Instead of two sexes being involved, it’s now roughly 57 – and counting.

      1. MRD was smart and sassy. You could understand why men fancied her.
        Christine Keeler … apart from loose knicker elastic, had little to offer other than being young and reasonably pretty. As the years showed, that is no basis for a happy life.

  17. Good morning all. Back out of bed after my earlier start. It’s 5°C and a dull but currently dry overcast start today.

      1. Forecast cloudy here up to this evening when we are supposed to get some sunshine.

          1. We get something like that. Mist/low cloud right down the valley sides, but usually the road is quite clear!

    1. I Can’t make out what that is about.

      But My word she’s so annoying. I can’t stand her on the TV programme my wife loves to watch. Kirsty and Phillip. “Love it or list it”.
      She knows everything even before anyone has mentioned anything and claims she has designed everything, how do you design a freaking byfold door ? And even makes claim she has carried out all the building alterations.
      Her continual Gobby stances are really annoying.

      3. She believes men can become women simply by saying “I am a woman” and are thus eligible for admission to women’s wards in hospital.
        She also appears to have totally missed the drive to eradicate mixed sex wards in recent years!

    2. In 30 months there were 1019 reported assaults. Now, what determines what sexual assault is? Who committed them? Other patients? Heck the twice I’ve been hospitalised I’ve been in no state to stand, let alone assault someone.

  19. Good morning, all. Bright start to the day. Dry.

    This is what we’re up against, ignorance from the people pushing an agenda. If the same question was put to the members of the HoC how many would know the answer and how many would understand why commercial growers using greenhouses increase the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere in the greenhouses?
    More importantly, how many would know that reducing the level of carbon dioxide in the World’s atmosphere would have a detrimental effect on plant growth and hence on mankind and all animals? The all-knowing zealots are meddling with things that they cannot possibly understand but claim that they have all the answers.
    The claim that the science is settled is probably the most arrogant and ignorant statement ever made.

    https://twitter.com/nbreavington/status/1647656580362403842

    1. I don’t know what the blokes answering are so can’t tell if their not knowing is relevant. Let’s assuming they should know and don’t, thus exposing their ignorance. Why then, does the green scam continue? Who really gains? Oh look. It’s MPs. Troughing away on the offensive subsidy that unreliables require.

      They’re greedy, and they’ve got to be stopped before this country’s progress is permanently retarded by morons.

    2. 6CO2 + 6H2O = C6H12O6 + 6O2 (given off). It’s the formula for photosynthesis. The current lot have not done science as it was taught in my day. All they have is “environmental science” which is indoctrination.

  20. Morning all 🙂😉
    Grey but looking brighter after rain.
    Why were the government so slow to see the stupidity of ‘smart’ motorways ?
    Because politicans and Whitehall always like to stick to the script. It’s written in stone. They Eff up everything they come into contact with.

      1. I kept getting emails from my local mp telling me how hard he’s recently been working. He didn’t even bother to go in and vote on the invasion issue. I’ve unsubscribe from his specialist BS.
        I hope he’s noticed.

        1. It will be a minion working on his behalf who sends the emails, so I doubt it. I had more self publicity from our LD MP delivered in the post this morning. It went straight in the grate. The local rag is regularly full of her photo – if there’s an award ceremony she’s there front and centre whether she’s had any input to the winning of it – but ambulance times (which she made a big thing of improving when she was campaigning) are as bad, if not worse, than ever and I cannot see one single improvement she has delivered.

          1. It’s so obvious what they are all up to.
            I have a local friend who’s daughter in law was working in Westminster for a tory mp. He wouldn’t say who, but his DiL use to write all of his public speeches.
            She has children of her own now.

    2. If you/we believe ‘smart motorways’ are a disaster, wait until the ‘smart cities’ arrive. The ‘idea’ is being floated as the 15/20 minute neighbourhood with all the good intentions that County/City/Borough councillors can dream up or have been coached to claim. Imagine these useless entities trying to run their current fiefdoms, and failing badly. These metropolises will be the disaster of all disasters should the globalists’ scheme ever come to fruition.

  21. 373520+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Monday 17 April: Why was the Government so slow to see smart motorways’ stupidity?

    Lets ask instead why are the peoples so slow to see these are NOT governments, they are political persuaders leading the herd successfully down the repress,replace,RESET road.

    They are quite openly running a national spirit destruct campaign, nothing is slow or done in a lackadaisical manner, nobody but nobody with their level of education combined is that inept.

    They are successfully working to a well planned, thought out, strategy, seemingly engaged in the most civil of home turf wars, so civil that the killing & maiming goes unnoticed when the polling booth appears, and the party before Country brigade are triggered.

    Bear in mind the next time you enter a polling booth the political
    reptiles minions WILL eventually come for YOU.

    1. There are district and parish elections this year where I live. The candidates are mostly public spirited independents prepared to sacrifice their time and energy for the good of the community and put their heads over the parapet as Aunt Sallies to be the whipping wotsits for the sins of others. Apart from clearing the bins once a fortnight and commenting on planning applications, they have precious little power or money.

      The lion’s share of the Council Tax goes to County, which is overwhelmingly dominated by one Establishment Party, and elections there are a fait accompli.Even county councillors have no control over the decisions of their officers, founded on Rules handed from above safe from democratic scrutiny, and of course from Central Government, also whose elections in all but a handful of constituencies are a fait accompli, and decided by Party List governed from above safe from democratic scrutiny.

      Therefore, what is the point of my vote, for which my antecedents gave their lives?

      1. 373520+up ticks,

        Morning JM,
        I work on the theory that nationwide what has been put in place via a, in the main, mindless electorate majority time & again can be replaced once realisation
        dawns, on the odious political creature THEY have created.

        The true plague virus befalling these Isles
        currently is the lab/lib/con coalition virus
        and its self harm followers.

      2. I’ve banged this drum so often folk are tired of it, but the fundamental problem in this country is a complete lack of democracy. Oh, we get a vote, but then the elected bunch do whatever they want, blaming each other in the go around while wasting public money on pet projects.

        Local government is unaccountable, national government is happy to follow globalist agenda (mostly because they keep signing s up to rules they don’t care about) and the civil service is desperate to take all the power while farming it out to quangos and charities who are then utterly unaccountable and unelected – but they get the result the civil service wants. It’s a roundabout of incompetence, laziness, arrogance and back stabbing – fuelled by trillions of pounds of debt and waste.

      3. We don’t have local government elections, but the situation with councillors’ lack of power is as you describe. Many a time we (parish council) object to a development, only to have County give it the green light.

    2. Why so slow? Because they didn’t want to find out. The state deliberately pretended there were no problems. It’s studies found they were safe because that’s what the studies were commanded to find. When the state doesn’t want to know the truth, it just doesn’t bother asking for it. Then, when the obvious becomes a problem they say ‘none of our research said there would be a problem, blame them.’.

      Smart motorways allowed the department for transport to say it was adding more roads, it saved them money and they were all very happy. The truth didn’t come into it. Common sense wasn’t even in the room.

      Sadly, this is how a lot of government operates.

      1. 373520+ up ticks,

        Morning W,

        Makes one wonder how they find support, or is it the case of an electorate voting for the party name no matter the content or evil consequences.

        1. Come on Ogga. Time you started the Ogga Party and gave the miserable voters an alternative to the foul Lib, Labs, Cons. SNiPs and Greens!

        2. Because most people are stupid, Ogga. It’s not a pleasant thing to say but for every person here (self excluded!) there are a hundred thickos. Why? Because intelligence is an average. A chap made a good joke in the chemists just now. He said ‘I like rain. It’s the only thing in this country coming down!’ and at least three people just didn’t get it at all.

          Those three people are allowed the same say in this country as you and I and, bluntly, they shouldn’t be. Why should someone who doesn’t understand inflation be allowed to vote? Why should someone who calls supermarkets and energy companies ‘profiteering’ from high prices, ignorant of the damaging effects of taxation be allowed the same say?

          Most people are told what to think. They like this. It makes their lives easier. It’s why – as Rastus has commented earlier – education is failing the country.

          1. That education is failing is deliberate policy and has been since at least 1997. Pupils are penalised for original thought and Heaven forfend they should apply critical thinking!

      1. Thank you CV2, I’ve just listened to her and it made me think, “We’ve not had an orator like that for many a long year; Maggie was one and Winston t’other. Apart from those two, nobody else springs to mind. The current crop is useless and hopeless.”

    2. Anne Widdecombe makes many of the points that we Nottlers make.

      One point she does make particularly clearly is that Northern Ireland has been thrown to the wolves and is still under the rule of the ECJ rather than under British law. Reading the BTL comments under the DT articles on the matter it seems that the vast majority of people in Northern Ireland and in the UK are all in favour of Sunak’s sell out and don’t give a damn about sovereignty.

      To me this means that the only solution must come from a referendum on Northern Ireland’s continued membership of the UK. If the people of Northern Ireland vote to leave the UK then they must accept that they will get no more moral, financial or legal support from the UK; if they vote to stay in the UK then the EU and its ECJ must get out of Northern Ireland completely. This half-in, half-out state of affairs must not be allowed to continue.

      (However Ms Widdecombe does not make clear the Reform Party’s position on the Covid jabs. Richard Tice gave the impression that this was no different from the Conservatives’ position and I am not convinced that Tice has what it takes – do any Nottlers think he does?)

      1. 373520+ up ticks,

        Morning R,

        Rerun the 2019 General Election treachery, brexit party = the farage hill climbing brigade = pro johnson very pro tory (ino) party.

        reform = brexit party still with farage input still very pro tory (ino_ party, name change to protect the guilty.

      2. No. He won’t set the world on fire. Lacks rhetorical skills. Besides he sticks firmly within the Overton Window when we need people who will step outside. Well outside.

        Apart from that, I have come to believe that political parties are themselves the problem. They are by nature top-down and corruptible. If Reform gains any real traction among the electorate it will be subjected to entryism, attract corporate donors and be corrupted.

    3. She’s right, but when you have a moronic statist saying ‘low taxes are a race to the bottom’ you realise something is horribly wrong with the country. Low taxes are a good thing. Forcing tax competition is a GOOD THING. If every nation is forced into a small state, low tax economy you get a far, far better government that cannot do the damage this bloated one does.

    1. A leading London hospital has been signed up by NHS England to provide ‘masculinising surgical treatment’ to transgender patients born as women, some still teenagers, who believe they are living ‘in the wrong body’.

      Morning Bob. Why is the NHS funding such a project?

    3. I haven’t time to read the safety sheet, I have sausage rolls and cheese straws to bake, but is the gist along the lines of, Safe & Effective?

      1. In fact it’s thickening! ©George Crump, circa 1970, Civilian instructor, Army Apprentices College Chepstow.

      2. 373520+ up ticks,

        Morning SE,

        Just shows even the threat of a people power boycott.
        On par with carpet bombing a target.

    1. I live not far from Beacon Hill, the next bump in the Hampshire Downs beyond Watership Down. That will have to go too, I suppose.

    2. I like one particular comment made in response to this, the dragon on the flag will have to go. Can’t have a fire breathing dragon with all that CO2

    3. The following 4 towns should watch out:

      Beaconsfield
      Blackburn
      Burnley
      Coalville

      And committees will have to decide the fates of:

      Ashfield
      Ashington
      Burnopfield
      Stoke

    4. There used to be a racehorse called Brecon Beacon (he was by Spectrum). No doubt he’ll have to be renamed if he’s still around (he retired some time ago).

  29. ‘Morning All

    Why the Medleys you ask??

    Because I can no longer bear the MSM on a daily basis the constant lies and idiocies give rise to such feelings of hate and loathing that are not good for my mental health

    Best avoided I can rely on you lot to cover important news

    Now,Medley Time

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ab06600d882f5ed6cd4355400b50f7cc01480abe01b61cd6e9b486ddee35256f.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/773a89d165cfb44f5e4e3d6e80d2ad85829232dae0109f78c872b88f1442f82f.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ead9caaa25da785129b756b393fcb1290a24f6de623950d865eea16b4cbc78ae.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7e7133c33f19523b170cdff3c2e6430259a0f07824190c4e7f4a83564c3a3256.jpg?w=800&h=258

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/6f3dac7b9324bf94c6f5a915112e6ccd6f1f9c07e51b15eae3eb562db4349d0f.jpg?w=800&h=476

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/31fcb06ba42583d2d9fee5f1c498444e049f10a130fb7a29199ff2e85434cd47.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/20a90290c23f5b9ed96f7813ef532a8f3b2b4a67502e79743ffcbca86aba82f2.jpg

  30. Good morning, chums. Clearly going bed at around 8 pm last night was a mistake. I woke awakened at around midnight and was up for around four hours finishing the film I had been watching and nodding off to at around 8 pm. Ah well, tomorrow is another day, as Scarlett O’Hara said. (I hear you all replying “Frankly my dear…”).

    2. Apocryphal probably. Nevertheless, should anything like it happen it’s what the response should be, politely delivered. “You don’t have to ride in my cab, good-bye”.

    3. Apocryphal probably. Nevertheless, should anything like it happen it’s what the response should be, politely delivered. “You don’t have to ride in my cab, good-bye”.

    4. I was told that, in a collision between a car and a camel, the car driver is always in the wrong, because cars are not mentioned in the Koran.

    5. Good story but there was plenty of music before the 7th century when the Islamic faith got started.

  33. 373520+ up ticks,

    Post
    Gerard Batten
    @gjb2021
    ·
    19h
    These girls are just taking the piss. That is what kids do given the opportunity.

    In our age of insanity taking the piss is the pass time of choice for the mentally troubled.

    Female teacher at £20k-a-year girls’ school ‘humiliated’ after being forced to apologise for saying ‘afternoon, girls’ – LBC,

    A female teacher has claimed she was left “humiliated” after being forced to apologise to a group of 11-year-olds at a private girls’ school for calling them girls.

    We didn’t get a good morning,we got a nicotine check and if fingers found brown, a clout, resulting in a great many Noel Cowards behind the bike shed.

    apple.news

    10. 14278
      Told me I’d already signed it – don’t remember but it must have been ages ago

    11. 14278
      Told me I’d already signed it – don’t remember but it must have been ages ago

    13. I’ve signed it, but I don’t hold out much hope even if they debate it. They won’t be doing anything to stop whatever is harmful to this country.

  35. 373520+ up ticks,

    Finland Starts Construction of Border Fence With Russia After Joining NATO

    Any chance the United Kingdom following suit with a security fence ringing the palace of westminster and the anti Brit reptiles within.

        1. True, but I was thinking about all the small stumps you presumably have further up the plot.

          1. The jack is potentially useful, but not the weed puller. I already have a smaller version and it’s not a lot of use.

        2. I have got rid of trunks of this size by digging a trench around them and lighting a fire and and feeding the fire with logs for a few days until the stump has burnt away to nothing.

      2. We’ve got one, or should I say my missus, the gadget queen, has got one. Used once, with my help, in 9 years.

        2. Gadgets, bought for a specific task, have a tendency to gather dust. Hiring, unless expensive, is usually a better option.

      1. In that case she had my sympathy, but the tone of her initial post is one of entitlement and I’m afraid it rather got up my nose.

        1. Yes – I thought that too, but not every single parent is single by choice.

          I was a single parent for a few years when my sons were in their teens, but I was working so didn’t claim anything except the single parent addition to child benefit. My ex paid £100 per month while the younger one was still at school, but that didn’t go far even then. I carried on paying the mortgage until we settled and I bought out his share. I also carried on paying his life assurance but got no thanks for that.
          I didn’t mean to jump down your throat but you touched a raw nerve there!

  38. Nice little story in Andrew Pierce’s column in the DM this morning:

    Spectator editor Fraser Nelson, in an article criticising the lacklustre Keir Starmer, reminds his readers the magazine once published a verbatim copy of one of the Opposition leader’s speeches.

    ‘Midway through, we buried an offer of free champagne to anyone who read that far,’ he wrote. ‘No one claimed it.’

  39. Sir Cursed Harmer certainly knows his onions.
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11979311/Keir-Starmer-accused-spectacular-goal-latest-attack-ad.html

    Keir Starmer is accused of a ‘spectacular own goal’ after his latest attack ad highlights a 15 per cent council tax increase caused by a Labour authority going bust
    The latest Labour ad said Tories were ‘raising council tax by up to 15 per cent’
    But Croydon is the only authority raising tax by this level after Labour regime
    Council went bankrupt in 2020 following speculation on commercial property

    I wonder if Croydon’s growing criminality has made commercial property investment a fool’s errand?

  40. Good morning, all. Just. Very late on parade. Gut rot started at 4 am. Won’t elaborate. Just got up and will take things very easy today.

    Have I missed any news? Thought not.

    1. Oh dear…….I hope you are beginning to feel better. What could have brought that on?

      1. There is a plague of flies from the chicken concentration camp at the end of the garden.. The MR thinks that could be the source.

    2. Install fly screens so they can’t get in the house.
      Can you still get Kaolin & Morphine where you are?

      2. He’s correct, I’m sure one policeman with a taser would have dampened his enthusiasm.

    2. I hope that the police did a health and safety analysis before stepping into that fountain.

    3. For goodness sake. He – like far too many of them – are animals. Just shoot him.

          1. Anyone remember a company called ‘Phonotas’? When I was working in offices back in the 70’s, uniformed people used to come around the offices once a week and clean all the phones. Are they still going? In this day and age when everyone seems to be so scared of germs its a wonder there are’nt armies of them marching through offices cleaning phones (they could do mobiles as well).

          2. We used to have people coming round to clean the phones when I was at work, too. Don’t know what company they were from. This was in the 90s and noughties.

    2. It has cargo capacity for 330lbs so it could probably only take one wokie at a time.

    1. “…a more sovereign food system without animals in it…that would actually feed everyone in our country…”

      A tiny proportion of the world’s population might be able to exist on a vegetarian diet, an even smaller one on vegan. That’s it.

      He seems unaware that in a cool temperate climate it’s hard to grow the crops (pulses and nuts) that this change would require.

      1. Tillable land is in short supply here. Animals can be let out onto the grass and mountains to eat what they can find, and then be eaten. If we just ate what we planted, we’d all starve.

    1. This green nonsense has got to end. This Sunak nonsense has got to end. If he had just forgotten that he owed a huge share in a child care set up then he has no ability whatsoever to understand what the average man needs and wants.

      1. Personally, I think he’s so far insulated from reality that, regardless of his forgetfulness, he has NO ability (including to understand what the average person – see what I did there? – needs and wants).

    2. Wot, another PM to be installed in No10. Is anybody surprised at their lack of integrity.

      Let’s see them make the same amount of fuss as Johnson had over birthday cake.

  45. Suspected IS fighters kill 26 desert truffle hunters in Syria. 17 April 2023.

    The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said “civilians and at least 10 pro-regime fighters” were among “the 26 people killed in an attack by Islamic State fighters while they were collecting truffles in the desert east of Hama”.

    Suspected IS jihadists also killed four shepherds in the eastern Syrian region of Deir ez-Zor, said the observatory, which relies on a wide network of sources on the ground. The militants, who carried automatic rifles and rode motorbikes, also stole the sheep before fleeing.

    They stole the sheep before fleeing? This is only slightly more comprehensible than they stole them after fleeing. What did they do? Put them in the saddlebags?

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/16/syria-suspected-islamic-state-fighters-kill-desert-truffle-hunters

    1. Does make you wonder how they hoofed the sheep on to the bikes.

      Clearly we utterly failed in Afghanistan.

      1. I’ve seen a bloke on a moped with a sheep in front, forelegs over the handlebars. Near Sfax in Tunisia.

      1. Occasionally I like to confirm my vital signs – just to confirm that I’m dead right! 🤔

      1. I was trying to make a comment with this image but got hung up with disqus.

        My latest pulse oximeter has some amazing measurements all from the blood flow at the fingertio.

        As well as the basic blood oxgen % and pulse rate it shows the plethysmogzaph waveform at the bootom along with the derived calculatiin of PI, P eripheral Infusion and RR Respiration Rate.

        My cardiologist doesn’t like me showing him the display or believing the results. 🤔

          1. Peripheral Infusion measures the efficiency of your peripheral circulation – if it’s zero your fingers are about to drop off. Respiration Rate shows how fast you are breathing – if it’s too low you are not breathing properly and too high means you’re having a panic attack. The plethysmogragh waveform shows the regularity of your hearbeat and if you are getting early or delayed heartbeats – will show a flat line when you are flatlining.

            In my case I was able to deduce that I had Supraventricular Tachycardia from my Oximeter before I referred myself to A&E where a triage doctor confirmed it with an SVT diagnonsis and I was admitted as an emergency.

          2. That’s good then. We have one at the moment – lent by the cardiac rehab nurse who won’t let OH join the course yet as his A-fib and rapid heart rate are not yet under control. He takes his blood pressure and heart reading each morning and although the BP is normal or on the low side, his heart rate is still around 120. He found the small finger-tip monitor won’t work on him – perhaps his fingers were too cold? It works for me and my heart rate is around the 60 mark and Ox about 99 mostly.
            He’s been bumped up the scale for Bisopralol and is now on10mg but it seems to make no difference.

          3. I have had problems with medical professiinals who say I have A -fib and high blood pressure.

            First of all A-fib is not clearly defined or measurable and secondly blood pressure is likewise not well defined with ad hoc measurements being taken at the brachial artery undee varying conditions.

            There is a general medical consensus that follows the WHO terget that everybody should have a BP of 120/80 BP at all times with a regular. ECG trace showing no irregularities over a 10 second time strip.

            The cardiac team treating me in hospital for a consistently high heart rate over 160 bpm (I was a bit over 70 at tye time) drugged me up until they got me down to 120/80 mmHg BP They were pleased I had reached this target because they admitted that they rhemselves couldn’t achirve it. That night the nurse on duty rushed in to see me as my cardiac monitor was going off – it woke me up. She told me that it would be better if we didn’t tell anybody that it had happened. Actually it had happened after a couple of nights I had difficulty breathing after my oxygen had been turned diwn.

            My approaching to monitoring vital sign measurements is to monitor the range of readings I get under different stress conditions and ensure I can come to a reason why any should be out of range.

            If anything about my ECG is unusual it is the interval called QT of my heart waveform which is highly individual and can result in many different adverse heart rhythm irregularities. Abnormally long values of QT can result in life threatening heart rhythms. I know I’m vurnerable to excessive elongation of this interval. I have measured my own QT intervals with my own ECG waveform printout but my cardiac consultant has declined to discuss my own findings.

            I have found that my own dosage of bisoprolol is quit crital in keeping my vital sign within ranges that I am comfortable with.

            As far as A-fib is concerned my consultant prepared me for a cardioversion for which I established that he had no documentary evidence of A -fib or that I actually needed a cardioversion.

            It’s starting to become apparent that we are all built very differently and that attempts to medically get us to conform to measurable target standards is unhelpful – it may in fact be harmful for some individuals.

          4. The BP target of 120/80 for all is quite unrealistic for older people. Your heart rate of 160 bpm is very high! I asked my OH to find out the readings for the ECG he had prior to hernia surgery in 2021 and apparently it was under 90 bpm. It’s now quite steadily over 120 in spite of the Bisopralol now at 10mg. This seems to be only since his recent heart surgery.
            Mine is around 60 resting heart rate but I think my bp is higher than his.

  47. Diesel 146.9 or 148.9 a litre in local garages

    Unleaded 10 pence a litre more expensive

    3. In our local one yesterday diesel was 159.9 and petrol was 146.9. Diesel seems to have gone down a bit lately – I paid 164.9 a week or so ago.

    4. Regular unleaded $1.55; a litre here, I am glad that Canada sits on top of almost endless gas and oil reserves!

      A friend in New Brunswick reported $1.75 a litre in his town but if he took the five minute drive across to Maine, it was $1.25 a litre. He hasn’t filled his car in Canada since the borders were reopened.

    5. I passed a petrol station selling diesel at 140.9ppl! Pity I no longer have a diesel car.

    1. I think she was stuck in this morning’s humungous traffic jam at North Station.
      There was certainly a mo-ho in the queue just like the one on Mrs. Murrell senior’s driveway.
      Should I alert the police?

    1. Small town high streets clogged with fuel-inefficient cars and lorries in the days before by-passes were built?

      Reminds me of the drive from the midlands to the West Country for family holidays in a Mk 1 Cortina!

      1. Gosh, yes – the nightmare of the A38 right through the middle of Birmingham – en route from Harrogate to Devon….

          3. Funny you should say that. Last year I stood outside the building in which I was born (the old National Provincial Bank at the top of he high street – my mother’s brother-in-law was manager). The place i now some did=tsy shop. I told a woman that it used to be a bank – and she said that was nonsense! She had lived in Totnes all her life and it had never been a bank! I then said that I was born on the top floor – and, again, she said that was impossible because it was a shop and not living quarters!!!

            I had a good old larf…

          5. AA route planner, Harrogate to Totnes avoiding M-ways, via Derby, Brum and Brizzle: 330 miles, 9½ hours today. Overnight stop back then?

        1. I reckon it’s a TD, I’ve had a TC and they had wire wheels and it’s not sleek enough for a TF

    1. Are they yours?…erm…i don’t mean did you impregnate the ewes personally………..ahem.

      1. The Lamb
        BY WILLIAM BLAKE

        Little Lamb who made thee
        Dost thou know who made thee
        Gave thee life & bid thee feed.
        By the stream & o’er the mead;
        Gave thee clothing of delight,
        Softest clothing wooly bright;
        Gave thee such a tender voice,
        Making all the vales rejoice!
        Little Lamb who made thee
        Dost thou know who made thee

        Little Lamb I’ll tell thee,
        Little Lamb I’ll tell thee!
        He is called by thy name,
        For he calls himself a Lamb:
        He is meek & he is mild,
        He became a little child:
        I a child & thou a lamb,
        We are called by his name.
        Little Lamb God bless thee.
        Little Lamb God bless thee.

        [The symbol of Innocence in contrast with The Tyger who symbolises Experience]

        1. Songs of Innocence and Experience – one of those books I’ve treasured for many years.

        2. The Tyger is one of those poems I can recite verbatim.

          [He wishes for the Cloths of Heaven, by William Butler Yeats, being another]

  53. Afternoon, all – don’t faint! I don’t have anything organised for today, for a change! The government wouldn’t recognise stupidity even if it bit them on the nose. If they did, the country wouldn’t be in the state it is today. I see from my local rag that it is “too disruptive” to reinstate the hard shoulder on “smart” motorways. If I had my way I’d make it too disruptive NOT to do it!

  56. I am signing off. Must get fit for tomorrow. It is the MR’s birthday and we have long planned a trip to Lincoln cathedral – and the weather looks to be perfect.

    Cross your fingers for us.

    TTFN

  57. An effin’ Bogey Five today.

    Wordle 667 5/6
    ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
    ⬜🟨⬜⬜⬜
    ⬜⬜⬜🟨⬜
    🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. Glad I have company!

      Wordle 667 5/6

      ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜
      ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜
      ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜
      ⬜🟩🟩⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      1. A bogie party in fact, I had a few chances too.
        Wordle 667 5/6

        ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜
        🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜
        🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜
        🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  58. Well, we did it! Up to Asda because it’s closest and my husband managed quite well. As usual, our wonderful cabbies were kindness itself.
    He made it round OK, mainly doing his own thing and then we came home. He’s very tired right now and will likely be a bit stiff tomorrow but we are making progress.
    I feel like raising a flag or something because he’s come on so well. Still a ways to go but one day at a time. The best thing he did was to discharge himself from that dreadful ward in the hospital.
    A nice crispy salad with cheeses and crusty bread tonight.

    1. Yo Lottie. That’s good news.

      O/T Knowing that you are a secret penguin and a loyal fan of Spike Milligan….

      Celebrity king penguin reaches final of world’s most popular flightless bird competition

      Spike, who boasts 15,000 social media followers, is down to the last two and hopes to ‘ruffle a few feathers’ to win the global crown

      By Telegraph Reporters
      17 April 2023 • 3:53pm

      https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/news/2023/04/17/TELEMMGLPICT000332148938_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BquOb2vcF6KBf7hC3cFejvt2SV_hJnOjRo8G6tjJJfVCo.jpeg?imwidth=680
      Spike, 15, who lives at the Birdland Park and Gardens in the Cotswolds, has seen off competitors from as far afield as Australia, America and Canada
      *
      *
      In addition to his television work, Spike has appeared in numerous calendars, on greetings cards and he even has a double-page spread in a natural history book.

      Penguins International is a non-profit organisation committed to preserving and protecting penguins throughout the world.

      Voting for the winner opened online on Sunday, April 16, and runs until Tuesday, April 18, with the result being announced on Thursday.

      To vote, visit Penguins International’s website, Facebook and Instagram.

      You can also follow Spike on Facebook (SpikeKingPenguin), Twitter (SpikeKingPeng), and Instagram (spike_the_king_penguin).

    3. Go on ,go ahead and raise a flag. If you make it an English flag , you might be lucky and manage to annoy some woke person in search of upset

      1. I would if I had one but sadly not. We will celebrate in our own inimitable way;-))

  59. We’ll keep a welcome in the hillside…

    Brecon Beacons has become a frontier for cultural Marxism

    Will the authority calculate and publish the carbon cost of the re-branding exercise?

    JAMIE BLACKETT 17 April 2023 • 5:08pm

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/news/2023/04/17/TELEMMGLPICT000332392207_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqA7N2CxnJWnYI3tCbVBgu9f4Xpit_DMGvdp2n7FDd82k.jpeg?imwidth=680
    The Brecon Beacons national park, Wales

    George Orwell was right: “Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped.”

    The latest manifestation of the cultural Marxism foreseen by the author is in the Brecon Beacons National Park, shortly to be known as Bannau Brycheiniog National Park.

    This name change will no doubt be cheered on by some divisive Welsh nationalists. It pushes Anglopohobic buttons by following in the tradition of spurious celticisation of signage – always leaving the original English as well so that the 82 per cent of the Welsh population who don’t speak Welsh don’t get lost. It stirs atavistic yearnings for nationhood by renaming it after the 5th century Celtic King Brychan Brycheiniog (Bryan from Brecon), ironically an Irishman by birth, who demonstrated outward looking tendencies by marrying a Saxon princess then a Scottish one, and whose descendants are mostly thought to live in Cornwall.

    Most of all, in this coronation year it severs the link with the British practice of celebrating royal and national occasions with hilltop bonfires from Land’s End to John O’ Groats, after which the Brecon Beacons are named. With unintended Orwellian humour the chief executive, Catherine Mealing-Jones, said that it won’t be compulsory for local residents to refer to the park by its new name.

    Classical Marxist theory calls for the use of specious argument to break down the status quo. Climate change all too often provides the ammunition. Apparently the old name was associated with the burning of carbon and therefore “not a good look”. Will the park authority now discourage landowners from lighting celebratory bonfires in May, and perhaps burn more carbon themselves to power electric illuminations on landmarks? It will be interesting to see whether the authority calculates and publishes the carbon cost of the re-branding exercise, particularly the new signs that will be required, as well as the burden on the taxpayer.

    There is disturbing pattern here. National Parks all too often become vehicles for bureaucrats to reject the cultural heritage and customs of the rural population and impose politically correct dogma. Local landowners and farmers are often too busy maintaining the fabric of the landscape to attend meetings and disproportionate influence is gained by retired incomers, who can be all too keen to exploit the control over planning given to park authorities. This latest insanity in Brecon follows moves by the Lake District National Park to ban trail hunting in the land of John Peel. Sheep farming, so central to the creation of our upland landscapes for centuries, is also under threat from authoritarianism. Rural people are increasingly asking whether park status is a boon or a burden.

    Jamie Blackett farms in Dumfriesshire and is the author of ‘Red Rag to a Bull’ and ‘Land of Milk and Honey’ (Quiller)

    1. “by following in the tradition of spurious celticisation of signage – always leaving the original English as well so that the 82 per cent of the Welsh population who don’t speak Welsh don’t get lost”.

      I’m a bit disappointed at Jamie Blackett with that one. Very many places did have Brythonic names before the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons and long after, in what is now England too. The Beacons would certainly have been one of them.

      1. As for “Celticisation” I give you parcio, stopio and ysmygu (parking, stopping and smoking) as well as y cricet.

          3. Dim ysmygu. On our first trip across the Severn Bridge with the kids we stopped at the first service area. Son asked the waitress what the sign on the table meant. She said she didn’t know but would go and ask.

          6. Quite right too!
            But, when one thinks about many of our gimmegrants, I wonder how many refuse to allow English to tb spoken in their houses?
            Asking for a friend…

          7. Judging by the many jabbering in foreign (and I don’t mean Welsh) even round here, quite a few. What is particularly annoying is those with children in tow who aren’t speaking English.

        2. That’s fair enough. Those things did not exist in dark age/medieval Prydein/Cymru.

          There’s also Welsh for a microwave oven: Popty-ping

          1. Given that dark age/medieval Prydein/Cymru still exists today, I’m not sure you’re correct!

    2. More letters in the Welsh version = Bigger signs. They’re murdering the environnent with their wastefulness, and we shall all die in the flames.

  60. ‘Evening all,

    I’ve been having a delightfully amusing exchange with some people in YouTube comments. It all started when I made this comment below a Richard Vobes video on conspiracy theories, the first one of which was ‘The Earth Is Not Round, It Is Flat:

    Me: 1. The Earth is unquestionably round. We pilots who have been to over 40,000 ft have seen the curvature.

    Flat Earth 1: You cannot see the curvature from 40 thousand feet.

    Me to Flat Earth 1: Oh, is that right? So I just saw an optical illusion the hundreds of times I flew fighter aircraft above 40,000ft? Is that what you’re saying? Not to mention the thousands of times I flew airliners between 35,000 and 41,000 feet. Not to mention the opinions of former pilot colleagues who have flown at altitudes above 60,000ft.

    Flat Earth 2: We’ve also got amateur weather balloons at 120000 ft showing it level! Plane windows are curved and during the 2nd world war it became apparent that windows/canopies in aircraft gave distorted views.

    “Pilots never see the outside world through a canopy. They see an image of it.”

    “Every manufactured canopy optically distorts the view of the outside world in a unique way,” added Jones, who has been influential through the years in devising instruments to quantify these distortion differences for the F-16 and F-22. He is the inventor of the advanced canopy mapping system used for the F-35 canopy.

    The words of Mike Jones, a Lockheed Martin Technical Fellow in optics, electro-optics, and directed energy.

    Me to Flat Earth 2: Then it’s funny isn’t it how they all distort the horizon in exactly the same way – showing a curvature. Sorry, I’ll stick with the evidence of my own eyes gleaned over 18,000 flying hours. You might like to consider too the principle of Great Circle tracks and how they could possibly be the shortest route between two points if the world was anything other than round.

    Flat Earth 3: Fiscal, you lied. Weather balloon footage taken by straight lens cameras (not fisheye lenses) shows nothing but Flat line Horizon…at ALL altitudes (Weather balloon footage taken from 130,000 ft+ on YouTube alone. Furthermore, every attempt trying to prove apparent curvature or rotation has failed.

    Me to Flat Earth 3: If that footage is not with a horizon to horizon lens it is unreliable.

    Flat Earth 2: and how often do you have to keep dipping the nose to maintain a level 30000ft altitude? Or are you going to miraculously claim the plane automatically adjusts to the Earths curvature, so basically flies in an arc.

    Neil de grasse Tyson also claimed, Felix Baumgartner wasn’t high enough to see the Earths curvature at 127000ft. So I’ve got an expert telling me you see a distorted view and a scientist telling me you don’t fly high enough to see curvature either. No offence, but your words mean absolutely nothing.

    Me to Flat Earth 2: aircraft fly level at constant pressure altitude so they do follow the curvature. Since attitude is with reference to the horizon no ‘dipping’ as you put it is perceptible. Finally, They are both wrong. I’ll stick with my 44 years professional flying experiences.

    Flat Earth 2: you’re more than welcome to stick to your point of view and I’ll stick with mine.

    Having googled your “aircraft fly level at constant pressure altitude”, I was unable to find a single mention anywhere to corroborate your claim.

    I did download the principles of flight from the federal aviation administration which explains that all aircraft instruments are calibrated to the standard model, which just by coincidence happens to be a flat, non rotating Earth, the same model used by NASA. It explains that ‘pressure altitude’ is a instrument calibrated to a standard atmosphere and that the Earth has a non standard atmosphere. It informs that pressure altitude is merely a computation with the temperature and humidity to actually derive density altitude. It also explains that density altitude informs the pilot of the planes performance at that altitude.

    Me to Flat earth 2: Thank you, you are very generous but you are confused. I’ll explain.

    Standard atmosphere is at a sea level pressure of 1013.2 hectopascals or 29.92 inches of mercury and 15℃. At lower pressures and higher temperature the air would be less dense so aircraft performance will be adversely affected. Higher pressure and lower temperature will have the opposite effect, improving performance. None of this matters with respect to altimetry.

    Above certain altitudes all aircraft fly on standard pressure setting 1013/29.92. They are then flying at ‘flight levels’, not altitude above mean sea level. This is done to separate aircraft vertically. An aircraft at 35,000ft on its altimeter set to ‘standard’ is at Flight Level 350. If the ACTUAL atmospheric pressure at its position is below 1013/29.92 it will be lower than 35,000ft. If the pressure is above 1013/29.92 it will be higher than 35,000.

    Look up Great Circle navigation and ask yourself why is the shortest route between two points on the surface of the Earth an arc and not a straight line. Then consider why an airliner leaving say, London, UK and flying to Tokyo, Japan will route over the polar regions.

    Flat Earth 2: for the record, i’m not confused, it really isn’t rocket science and quite self explanatory even for non pilots. More importantly, I was relaying the information within an official aviation manual, maybe they got confused.

    I noticed you claimed that flight routes go over the North pole but not the South Pole between Africa, Australia and Southern America, I wonder why it’s fine in the North but not the South.

    Concerning the Great Circle, this is indeed the shortest route possible upon a globe, no disputing the fact. However, there are ample examples of planes being forced to make emergency landings which make a complete mockery of the Great Circle route. There’s been flights between two Southern Hemisphere locations where the Great Circle route doesn’t even cross the Equator. Yet amazingly when the flight was forced to land, it landed within the Nothern Hemisphere, being 1000’s of miles from the supposed flight path. Adding the flight path to a globe proves how proposterous the very idea is and yet when plotting the flight on a flat Earth map, it makes absolute sense.

    There’s video’s on YouTube of Commercial and Air Force pilots all admitting the Earth is flat. There’s even a SR71 co pilot clearly detailing seeing the pacific West of America from 81000 feet, the only problem being, it was impossible to see from that vantage point.

    So respectfully, I hear your argument but draw upon the ample evidences contrary to your claim.

    (To be continued for your amusement and delectation)

      1. I deliberately haven’t asked this because he’s probably one of the ‘moon landings were faked’ fraternity.

          1. Don’t be silly, everyone knows that there are mountains at the edges…

            I am a bit surprised though – I thought the Flat Earth society was a joke.

          2. Oh no, we met a few of them at the pub we used to frequent before injuries etc. They’re out there.

      2. Not at all, but have you ever seen a picture from deep outer space where the Earth isn’t a disc?

        }:-O

    4. The exciting part of this exchange is that Fiscal and the Flat Earthers could now be AI bots.

      1. I hadn’t thought of that. Perhaps the bots will keep on arguing and I can just watch.

    1. One day he’s going to get the Norman Tebbit mantle and be awarded the best PM we never had for his generation of MPs.

    2. This power-grab by the WHO, aka Bill Gates, along with the 15 minute neighbourhoods project has awoken constitutional experts. There must be legal challenges when Sunak attempts to give sovereignty away and councils try to restrict free movement.
      Why should a temporary, unelected by the people to be PM, incumbent of No10 be allowed to wipe away our enshrined rights with the flourish of a pen? As a supporter of globalist plans he does not have any skin in the very dangerous game he is playing.

    1. Perhaps it’s the BBC reporter who got canned by Musk posting a false flag to show Twitter hate?

    2. I don’t use Twitter, but I would be interested to know what a white Brit arriving in Nigeria might expect from their Government and taxpayers.
      SFA to a jam tart, I suspect.

    1. Invest? That implies a return. Just throwing money at a problem isn’t an investment (unless, of course, you are Gordon Brown).

          2. Ah, that was Saturday, so I was a bit confused. Most people who are in racing have little sympathy for the virtue signallers who know sod all about it. I have known several horses that have managed to break a leg or otherwise fatally injure themselves in a field. Are they going to stop horses being turned out? If they did, the horses would still manage to fatally injure themselves getting cast in their boxes (personal experience). There were three fatalities in three days (out of how many participants?); hardly carnage. One of those was a horse that was jumping loose. It seems to me that what they dislike most is that people ENJOY the racing and watching the horses.

          5. It was, but mainly playing Bob of Bonsall.

            Numerous piles of wood, from twigs to proper logs, being converted into kindling and wood burner size.
            I’m pleased to say that I’ve now gone from chainsaw to bow saws (various) to loppers and hand axe, and am now down to about 40 logs for bow sawing. I prefer to bow saw anything under about six inch logs ,the chainsaw scares me, on the plus side it’s excellent exercise!

            Next up, my favourite wood cutting: the felling axe and sledge hammer and wedges for the bigger diameter logs. Each one fills a large wheelbarrow and lasts two full 24 hr burns and normally we don’t get too many days when that’s needed, usually only 6-8 hours a day. I get enormous pleasure from swinging the axe and watching how 1/2 the mass times the velocity squared really is true.
            It is very satisfying work and I should now have the better part of two years worth of wood.

          6. Respect! I have to admit the chainsaw scares me, too. Particularly now arthritis has affected my hands.

  65. OK, this is a sponsored site but it does show the difference between here and the UK.

    Yer French know that it’s cheaper in the long term to catch and cure than to wait until the costs go through the roof and the patient’s chances are minimal.
    https://www.healthcare-in-france.fr/blog

  68. Face-mask evangelism has undermined trust in science

    It was a scandalous failure of science and government that mask mandates were imposed with so little evidence to support their use

    ROBERT DINGWALL • 16th April 2023

    The great Covid mask debate is limping towards closure. While there is no single conclusive piece of evidence, it is reasonable to argue that their effectiveness has been oversold. Indeed, a recent rapid-review report published by the UK Health Security Agency found that there is not enough evidence to suggest that even medical-grade face masks protect vulnerable people from the virus.

    The lack of good-quality evidence on the use of masks is a major policy failure. From the early summer of 2020, some of us were noting that previous research did not support the mass use of masks to reduce transmission. Senior health- department officials seemed to agree. Both Jonathan Van-Tam and Jenny Harries expressed early reservations in public, and Matt Hancock’s WhatsApp messages show that Chris Whitty was ambivalent about the usefulness of masks in some school settings. These uncertainties did not, however, translate into research contracts.

    This failure matters for three main reasons. First, for those who genuinely do not benefit much from vaccination. This is a very small group, including people with some blood cancers. Most of those originally thought to be vulnerable get adequate protection through vaccination. But the suggestion that masks are a substitute form of protection is a cruel deception practised in the name of care. This group has always had a heightened risk from infections and been advised to manage their lives accordingly. Endemic Covid does not demand different behaviour from, say, influenza or RSV.

    Second, for trust in science. The Covid lockdowns revealed a nasty streak of authoritarianism in some medical circles. Many commitments made by leading medics and scientists in the past 30 years to public dialogue, engagement and partnership were binned in favour of a false certainty and a simplistic read-off from science to policy. Public-health leaders used to see their role as educators, acknowledging uncertainties. “Do as I say” is not a good way to build trust, let alone being nudged by subliminal pressures to comply rather than question.

    Third, for democracy itself. It is a fundamental principle that democratic states use their power with restraint and with clear justification. Democracies create the largest possible space for citizens to do their own thing, provided they do not harm others. Where imbalances of knowledge and power unbalance that space, states may intervene to prevent harms. But the burden is always on states to show that those interventions are effective. Much Covid public policy conspicuously failed to do this because social interventions were not subjected to the same rigorous tests as medical ones.

    Sociologists and anthropologists knew that mask wearing in South-east Asia was a complex and context-specific practice. It was not universal within the region, let alone a model for the rest of humanity. Lawyers knew mask mandates were unlikely to have the intended effect because laws are not simple commands that compel obedience. Psychologists knew masks were likely to have an adverse impact on child development, on people with sensory disorders or neurodiversity.

    The lack of rigorous research on masks stands for the wider policy failures of a state that has excessively privileged expertise from the medical and natural sciences without recognising that its impact always depends on its translation into actions by ordinary citizens.

    Robert Dingwall is a consulting sociologist and emeritus professor at Nottingham Trent University

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/04/16/facemask-evangelism-has-undermined-trust-in-science/

    1. Not a failure. It was a triumph of government getting people to bow to it’s will and behave stupidly – to order. Much more of that, and behaviour as ordered will be automatic.

    2. I thought right at the beginning of this scam WHO said they masks offer no protection but may be useful for political purposes.

  69. Cretins attacking the snooker.

    If the law can’t deal with this then let the public.

          2. You are right. I decline to disagree with you!

            Scim, scam, scum, scimis, scimi, scime.

        1. Shove one up his backside and stab it through his belly. Leave him there until his screams turn to whimpers.

          These brats need to be taught a lesson.

    2. What’s the matter with snooker? Apart from the white ball hitting the black ball, of course.

    3. How did those idiots get in? No security or maybe they didn’t think it would be necessary for snooker.
      Absolute bloody fools.

      2. Bravo, Spikey. I had my headphones on and the top-notch stereo separation you’ve got going there was quite surreal. 👍🏻

      3. Excellent.
        I’ll play that to Erin she’s been learning to play the piano for at least 5 years. Not good sofar.

          1. Nor does Jules Holland and he is almost as good at the keyboards as you are!

  72. I am having problems with my internet dropping out again, so I’ll say goodnight while I still can.

  73. Just slip sliding away myself.
    I managed to help and win the battle against the council and our street lighting is now back on.
    Long story, but they were completely wrong.
    So it’s good night from me.
    Victor.

    2. Good one, Eddy!
      Now the NHS crisis? After a reviving cup of tea and a Jaffa cake, of course!

  74. Thrilled to hear that doctors and nurses may all strike at the same time. Oh boy. There goes my appointment in late May I guess. Why oh why can’t this useless govt do something about the important things like immigration, the strikes and etc. But no, Fishy Rishi waffles on about maths and all sorts of other trivia. God help us all.
    My husband’s next appointment with his consultant for his other issues is a phone call on July 4. So doctors don’t need to examine patients anymore- they can assess progress or lack thereof over the phone?
    I am at the point where I am scared to go to bed because of pain. My husband went to bed really early as his outing today knocked him out. I thought it would but at least he did it! We’ll get there.
    Thank you for putting up with my moaning and I do know and appreciate that we are not the only ones going through all this crap.
    I hope y’all sleep well.

    1. We should sack the lot of them. If they wish to continue in NHS employment they should be re-engaged under a new contract forbidding them to strike.

      The NHS is a black hole funding wise. The management structure is absurd with novel new offices created by the management to merely bolster their numbers and increase leverage. Diversity this and inclusion that bollocks.

      I would privatise the lot of the present NHS and force it to compete with the massively subsidised existing private hospitals. These entities are
      subsidised by making use of taxpayer funded and trained ‘junior doctors’ and their money grubbing seniors at our expense. We paid for their training but there is evidently no loyalty and they sail on with their badge of superiority over normal folk.

      As for ‘do no harm’, what a joke. These idiots have happily taken the money and jabbed millions with poisonous substances. They went along with the distancing and mask rubbish and swallowed the hypocrisy of the WHO and our own Pharma-boughten medicos hook line and sinker.

      The only thing these strikers deserve is our contempt. They are not Angels but the Devil incarnate. Their Unions are the Anti-Christ. It ever was.

    2. We should sack the lot of them. If they wish to continue in NHS employment they should be re-engaged under a new contract forbidding them to strike.

      The NHS is a black hole funding wise. The management structure is absurd with novel new offices created by the management to merely bolster their numbers and increase leverage. Diversity this and inclusion that bollocks.

      I would privatise the lot of the NHS and compete with the massively subsidised existing private hospitals. These entities hate sunsidised by making use of taxpayer funded and trained ‘junior doctors’ and their seniors at our expense. We paid for their training but there is evidently no loyalty.

      As for ‘do no harm’, what a joke. These idiots have happily taken the money and jabbed millions with poisonous substances. They went along with the distancing and mask rubbish and swallowed the hypocrisy of the WHO and our own Pharma-boughten medicos hook line and sinker.

      The only thing these strikers deserve is our contempt. They are not Angels but the Devil incarnate. Their Unions are the Anti-Christ. It ever was.

  75. The public will reject the Brecon Beacons name change, Downing Street said on Monday after the rebrand prompted a far-reaching backlash.

    Officials responsible for the South Wales park  announced on Monday that it would be renamed the “Bannau Brycheiniog” National Park because the symbol of a carbon-emitting beacon goes against its efforts to fight climate change.

    But ‘bannau’ means beacons anyay so what’s the point?

      1. I recall after crossing the Severn Bridge Mk II into Wales my utter bewilderment at the ‘Brown’ signs written in effing Welsh and making it nigh impossible to navigate to Cardiff Bay FFS.

        1. When I was a teenager and crossed the old Severn Bridge on the back of a motor bike for the first time, we were joking about needing passports.

      2. I recall after crossing the Severn Bridge Mk II into Wales my utter bewilderment at the ‘Brown’ signs written in effing Welsh and making it nigh impossible to navigate to Cardiff Bay FFS.

      3. I dont object to the name change per se, just the new name and the reason. I’m quite in supportvof the move to e.g. Abertawe, Caerdydd etc

    2. I’d quite like to see a beacon of light ascending the blue touch papers on rocket sstuffed up the back passages of those who came up with this idea.

  78. Justin Rowlatt turbo -gesticulating on the Beeb propaganda channel tonight on the demos against 15 minute cities and traffic restrictions. 😳 People are fighting back. 🙄

    1. The more people find themselves called “far right extremists” by the BBC, the more that label will lose its sting.

  79. Quiche Le Reign! Cooked up in the Palace kitchen, it’s the official taste of the celebration… So will it prove a match for Coronation Chicken from 1953?
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11983059/Quiche-Le-Reign-Cooked-Palace-kitchen-official-taste-celebration.html

    Is King Charles a Real Man?

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8935eee1e98f13a377952daf961e8e1883a12b5006decdbe8441dead7bd8e335.jpg

    He only went half the hog by excluding the ham but this quiche is still made with cream, eggs and cheese – good for Vegetarians but Vegans don’t eat cheese, cream or eggs – won’t they feel excluded?

    1. A poor choice in my view, Richard. I shall follow the late Queen’s choice of Coronation Chicken by celebrating Charles’ Coronation with Coronation Turkey. Not the entire Turkey, you understand, just the Crown! Lol.

      1. Au contraire, Auntie Elsie. A favourite home-made quiche of mine has long been spinach and broccoli. This version replaces the broccoli with my most-loved vegetable, broad beans. I can’t wait to try it.

    2. Interesting fact: Quiche is considered a classic French dish but its name hails from the German “kuchen”, meaning cake. It is said to have originated in the middle ages in the mediaeval kingdom of Lothringen, which the French occupied and renamed Lorraine. It was originally an egg custard pie baked in a brioche pastry.

  80. Well, chums, I decided today at the last minute to cancel all my “busy, busy, busy” plans and have a lazy day instead. Now off to bed. Sleep well.

    1. It’s kind of comforting to know that we can trigger the lefties merely by singing London’s Burning.

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