Tuesday 10 September: The Government’s ‘difficult decision’ on the winter fuel allowance is really just cowardice

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its commenting facility (now reinstated, but we prefer ours),
Intelligent, polite, good-humoured debate is welcome, whether on or off topic. Differing opinions are encouraged, but rudeness or personal attacks on other posters will not be tolerated. Posts which – in the opinion of the moderators – make this a less than cordial environment, are likely to be removed, without prior warning.  Persistent offenders will be banned.

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

363 thoughts on “Tuesday 10 September: The Government’s ‘difficult decision’ on the winter fuel allowance is really just cowardice”

    3. 392815+ up ticks,

      Morning JN,

      Let us face the unthinkable, it is yet another form of culling, in my book a strictly monitored
      system for the indigenous should be as with the bus pass, able to ride the therms free over winter months.

      No need to worry on account of the foreign invaders, THEY ALREADY DO.

    4. Only 4,000? Well, it's a start.

      As each of these OAPs dying of cold or malnutrition – as eat or heat inevitably kicks in – takes their last gasp they can rest assured that they have done their bit for the UK and have saved the government from wasting £400,000 of taxpayers' money.

      You know it makes sense!

  3. Good morning, chums. And thanks, Geoff, for today's NoTTLe site.

    Wordle 1,179 5/6

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    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    2. "This does not mean that the PM in your pocket has been devalued! No it will still buy the same load of codswallop…."

  9. Greetings all.
    A dull, overcast start with 9°C and a VERY light drizzle felt as I took the milk bottle out 10 minutes ago.

    A run to Bradford to pick up an auction purchase this morning. One of those annoying ones where I missed the main item I wanted, but still bought a couple of minor lots.

  12. 392815+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Early morning Question,

    My honest belief is we need ALL the Tommy's we can lay our hands on, Atkins and Robinsons alike.

    They have been needed as patriotic defenders of the faith for decades along with the tools of their trade very much so in the near future.

    What gets me is the dangerous gall of those melining Tommy Robinson for his historic attachment to the EDL whilst themselves continuing to support & vote for the lab/lib/con
    mass uncontrolled / politically controlled, morally illegal foreign invasion, paedophile umbrella coalition party.

    As for their tactical voting strategy, that has most assuredly set the political RATS among the innocents, in the very cold, freezing,
    light of a winters morning day TACTICAL VOTING CAN & WILL KILL.

    https://x.com/benonwine/status/1833221926447100266

    1. It's weird on facebook, I never really come across anything about TR except on Lefty groups, for some reason.
      They cannot stop talking about him.
      They give him all the publicity he needs.
      It's a bit like the Guardian and BBC with Trump.

    2. Another Early Morning Question,

      Why has the BBC gone so quiet about the brave Ukrainians recently?

      So very, very quiet.

      This quote from an American publication might give the answer:

      "While the air force might have successfully fended off the latest wave of Russian drones, Ukraine’s military as a whole isn’t faring well in the face of Russia’s drawn-out offensive. According to interviews with six Ukrainian commanders and officers, desertion and insubordination are becoming a massive problem among the company’s soldiers. “Not all mobilized soldiers are leaving their positions, but the majority are. When new guys come here, they see how difficult it is,” said one commander".

      Now you know how sensible Starmer's gift of £2.5billion to Ukraine was.

      Now you know why the deafening silence from the MSM.

  13. The Government’s ‘difficult decision’ on the winter fuel allowance is really just cowardice

    It's all quite a clever move really, Labour are very good at dividing and ruling.
    Now they have managed to make old people the problem, instead of all their immigrants.

    2. And today Starmer is releasing thousands of prisoners, many whom have served less than half of their sentences.
      His father was a tool maker I believe.

  14. Of course, the “left leaning think tank” would never think to urge for reform of unsustainable gold-plated risk-free public sector defined benefit pensions. This “reform” does not appear to bother the public sector as the public (i.e. taxpayer) will have to cough up the additional NI, the public sector not being revenue-generating in and of itself:

    “RACHEL REEVES has been urged to launch a £9bn tax raid on pensions in the Budget to help cover ballooning government spending.
    Left-leaning think tank the Resolution Foundation said the Chancellor should make companies pay National Insurance (NI) on money contributed to staff pension schemes.
    The Resolution Foundation said the current “unnecessary” and “arbitrary” tax relief on such contributions should be scrapped, raising billions for the Treasury in the process.
    However, experts warned that such a change would discourage employers from helping staff save for retirement.
    Steve Webb, a former pensions minister now at consultancy LCP, said: “We want employers to be generous and pay generously into people’s pensions. The more we tax them for doing that, the less they will do.”
    Such a change would also leave Labour open to charges that the party had broken its election pledge not to raise taxes on working people.
    Under auto-enrolment rules, employees must contribute a minimum of 5pc of their salary into a workplace pension while employers pay the equivalent of 3pc of pay. Company contributions are on top of salary. Employees pay NI on contributions, but companies do not.
    Most workers receive more than the 3pc minimum from their employer. Many companies offer “matching” schemes where they encourage staff to sacrifice salary into retirement pots by promising to mirror any contributions above the 3pc minimum. Some 13.9m workers are getting more than 4pc from their employer.
    The Resolution Foundation said in a report yesterday that company contributions should be charged at the same rate as the NI “jobs tax” on businesses – 13.8pc. At the same time, the think tank wants to make staff contributions tax free. Taken together, the changes would raise Ms Reeves an estimated £9bn.
    The Resolution Foundation, which was until recently led by Torsten Bell, now an influential Labour MP, said in a report: “Pensions are exempt from employer NI at every stage. With an estimated cost [to the Treasury] of £18bn in 2029-30, this is a significant – and unnecessary – tax relief that is of varying, arbitrary advantage to different workers. Some will have arrangements to allow salary sacrifice whereby all pension contributions can benefit from the relief, but others will not. One particularly perverse outcome is that the default auto-enrolment system, affecting millions of employees, is not tax efficient.”
    The Resolution Foundation also said Ms Reeves should increase inheritance tax and capital gains tax, helping to raise an additional £20bn for the Treasury and avoiding deep cuts to public services.
    The think tank conceded in its report: “Employees would be likely to pay over the long-term through lower wages or pension contributions.”
    Mr Webb said: “The worry is that you are raising taxes on people doing what you want them to do.”
    The Resolution Foundation’s recommendation came as an influential architect of Labour pensions reform separately urged Rachel Reeves to restrict tax relief on contributions for up to six million middle-class workers.
    Pension contributions are currently tax deductible, with basic rate payers receiving relief equal to 20pc of their payments to cancel out the income tax that would otherwise be due.
    Higher rate payers – those earning more than £50,270 – get relief of 40pc, and most additional rate payers earning more than £125,140 get 45pc.
    Baroness Drake, who served on the Turner Pensions Commission in the early 2000s, said she favoured a “flat rate approach”. Such a policy would mean high earners would be forced to pay tax on their retirement contributions for the first time.
    In its report of Budget submissions, The Resolution Foundation also said Ms Reeves should increase inheritance tax and capital gains tax.
    A Treasury spokesman said: “Following the spending audit, the Chancellor has been clear that difficult decisions lie ahead on spending.””

    HOW ABOUT SPENDING LESS?

    2. They have to be removed from office.
      They are more than wrecking our country and our lives. They are absolutely useless and insane.

    2. Shameless 'reporting' by Editor Danielle Sheridan. Tragic passing of fearless reporter & journalist from cardiac arrest aged 32.
      “His dedication to reporting the truth.."

        1. Katie Hopkins ranted yesterday about the targeted attack on Elle Macpherson by MSN (#BeKind) editorial teams.. for the temerity of her rejecting Big Pharma six years ago in her successful battle with cancer.

        2. Katie Hopkins ranted yesterday about the targeted attack on Elle Macpherson by MSN (#BeKind) editorial teams.. for the temerity of her rejecting Big Pharma six years ago in her successful battle with cancer.

  16. I never get into any political stuff on Fb except anti animal cruelty. I used to go on protest marches against trophy hunting, ivory etc. That all stopped with the lockdowns.

  18. A couple of BTL Comments:-

    Trevor Anderson
    56 min ago
    The BBC can be likened to being a self-ingratiating. introverted political party, serving only itself. We can all think of another of those.
    A complaint to their ECU regarding the shocking grammar of their female football presenter, Alex Scott, brought a response that "Some people are uncomfortable with formal language." The signature on the letter from an Alison Wilson was, I promise you, one inch high. I responded that these unfortunates must turn off the news when confronted with Sophie rayworth and her like.
    A further complaint about not calling Hamas terrorists was met by a response which in part, stated: "The principle around the word ‘terrorist’ has been the same for many years but the editorial guidelines are periodically reviewed and the latest edition, from 2019, makes clear that the word shouldn’t be used without attribution."
    On that basis, presumably, a man who installs one's new kitchen sink would not qualify for the attribution of "Plumber."
    Delicense asap. edited

    R. Spowart
    10 min ago
    Reply to Trevor Anderson – view message
    Message Actions
    Am I the only one who read "Sophie ragwort" there?
    Very appropriate!

  19. Letter & BTL Comment:-

    SIR – Withdrawing the winter fuel allowance from the better-off is not unreasonable, as services must be funded somehow – but effectively handing the savings to train drivers (who were not badly paid before) is.

    Denise Backhouse
    Alton, Hampshire

    Oh dear Denise Backhouse. You just don't get it do you?
    Instead of cutting payments to pensioners, how about the Government just spending less?
    Especially the recently announced billions going to help 3rd World countries cope with "Climate Change"?

    On which point, I wonder how many have ever given a thought as to whose coffers those aforesaid billions will end up?

    3. Saying the five times daily prayers to the moon? Artemis, Goddess of the Moon, is of course sitting on Mount Olympus saying WTF?

  21. 392815 + up ticks,

    More like WEF / NWO davos orchestrated, kneeler activated facet of culling, truth be told.

    Tuesday 10 September: The Government’s ‘difficult decision’ on the winter fuel allowance is really just cowardice

      1. And handing out billions in overseas aid. And feeding clothing accommodating hundreds of thousands of illegal invaders that's causing a black hole in the economy.
        One complaint from one of them feeling chilly and this government will be filled with action keeping them all warm.

  22. Morning all 🙂😊
    Weather nasty, wind rain grey skies, chilly.
    Oh dear what happened to all that dreadful glowball warming ?
    That was such a popular saying not long ago.
    But then it hasn't or never really happened, they came out with climate change. A very political statement similar to how they blame everyone else when they eff up everything, now seemingly on a daily basis.

  23. Good morning, all. Overcast. Possibility of some rain late afternoon.

    Californian legislators have apparently lost the plot when it comes to housing illegal immigrants or whatever else they call them in the USA.

    Budget? What Budget?

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/762cec46b34c1c506d6e0fb2849f9772730f52b946ce27041d98c137b0359793.png
    Being an election year it's doubtful whether the Governor will sign off on the bill. However, this move does indicate the way forward for the supporters of what is known as progressive politics.

    Rayner's 1.5. million new homes for 'those in need?' has a similar look.

    The full video, about 12 minutes duration, is worth watching.

    https://x.com/TheRedactedInc/status/1833300606062113094

  24. Good morning, all. Overcast. Possibility of some rain late afternoon.

    Californian legislators have apparently lost the plot when it comes to housing illegal immigrants or whatever else they call them in the USA.

    Budget? What Budget?

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/762cec46b34c1c506d6e0fb2849f9772730f52b946ce27041d98c137b0359793.png
    Being an election year it's doubtful whether the Governor will sign off on the bill. However, this move does indicate the way forward for the supporters of what is known as progressive politics.

    Rayner's 1.5. million new homes for 'those in need?' has a similar look.

    The full video, about 12 minutes duration, is worth watching.

    https://x.com/TheRedactedInc/status/1833300606062113094

  26. Good morning all

    15c here , was a very chilly night , strong breeze now , overcast and a bit drizzly.

    We haven't had any thunderstorms, nor have we had strong sunshine over the past few days .

    Draught rushing down the chimney.

    1. Jessie spent the night on the bed with us last night – she knows how to keep warm!
      Sun's peeping through the grey here now.
      I have things to do in the garden – so I'd better get on with them!

  27. SIR – With regard to Labour’s cut to the winter fuel payment (Letters, September 9), our “hard man” Prime Minister and his “iron Chancellor” are really just cowards.

    They know that pensioners can’t strike to defend their allowance – and so they ignore them.

    Winston Lewis
    Llanelli, Carmarthenshire

    SIR – I can’t help wondering whether the TUC’s calls for all pensioners to retain their winter fuel allowance are really part of a deal between the Government and the unions to reduce public criticism of the pay rises awarded to train drivers and others, while letting the Government show that it is not in the unions’ pocket.

    Lionel Steele
    Coventry, Warwickshire

    SIR – As a pensioner, I can think of objections to a lot of the Government’s plans, but the removal of a non-means-tested winter fuel payment is not among them.

    Many pensioners are financially comfortable and can well afford to heat their houses. I would also observe that many grew up without centrally heated and double-glazed homes, and their parents and grandparents survived winters that were often colder than what we are used to now.

    Dr Martin Shutkever
    Pontefract, West Yorkshire

    DTl Comments

    Claire Sharp
    1 min ago
    I would point out to Dr Martin Shutkever that in the 60s and 70s hospital admissions with hypothermia in the elderly were commonplace – I never saw a child with hypothermia in 42 years of nursing    .

    1. Silly bint Reeves doesn't understand that many elderly people are too scared to put their heating on .

      Does that Lego headed woman nor understand the older people suffer from the cold more , and even putting on more clothes, many are also worried about using electricity for heating , cooking , cleaning and even using an electric blanket .. Utility bills including council tax and car insurance , food bills and even the cost of a postage stamp whittle away available money .

      Savings are being eroded , and we all worry, don't we .

      We have left it too late to dumb down .. and heavens knows what we are going to do in the future .

  28. 'Morning Peeps,

    'Long time no see' although I do dip in occasionaly.

    I'm hoping that the author of this moving letter isn't 'our' Patrick Tracey??

    SIR – In December last year, out of the blue, I was given 24-48 hours to live. The next morning the NHS saved my life with major cancer surgery.

    Sadly, six weeks ago a CT scan revealed that I now have secondary cancer, and I have been given a terminal diagnosis. I am very grateful for the attendance allowance available to those in my position. However, having worked for more than 40 years and paid all my taxes, I am shocked by the Government’s decision to axe the winter fuel allowance for many.

    My condition causes severe attacks of chills, and up here in the North we have already had to put the heating on several times over the past few weeks.

    A week ago I wrote to my new Labour MP about the Government’s plan. I have yet to receive a reply, but hope that she will not kowtow to the party whips in today’s vote.

    Patrick Tracey
    Carlisle, Cumbria

    1. Our Mr Tracey is in the north, but northern France; apparently as fit as a flea.

      Good to see you, I hope all is well with you and yours.

      2. A rather overweight flea but I am trying to keep active in the garden and helping my wife with her French courses.

        1. Ah yes! Quite sobering isn’t it? Things you think happened quite recently turn out to have been 30 years ago! 🤦🏻‍♀️

      1. Thanks, 'Belle. Please see my reply to Sue.

        Unfortunately I was persuaded to have the clotshot this time last year, due to the problems I have with a respiratory complaint going back to my mid-20s (partial removal of a lung). I was advised that Covid, being a potentially serious respiratory infection for the older and vulnerable types, might well see me off (in not so many words) So much against my better judgement I agreed. Some 18 hrs later I awoke feeling very hot (oh no, I thought, I've got a cold or 'flu developing) and with raging tinnitus. I have never suffered previously from this condition and I cannot recommend it to anyone. I eventually saw a consultant who accepted that my diagnosis was almost certainly correct, and although the brain (what is left of mine) will slowly learn to ignore it, the condition does in some cases go away. No sign of this so far, and I am resigned to learning to live with it for the forseeable. IA recent purchase of ear buds has helped (distraction, masking) and fortunately the noise isn't at full throttle for all of the time. Still, worse things happen at sea and plenty of other folk have far greater crosses to bear.

        1. So the clotshot caused your tinnitus? Hopefully no other longterm effects.

          I have had tinnitus and poor hearing for many years so I can't blame the clotshots for that. I had them (two AZ) purely for travel reasons and dodged the bullet – no ill effects at all. But I'm not having any more.

          I think my tinnitus stems from a journey home from London in 1966 in an almost empty train – one with corridors, as there used to be. I left the window open and paid for that when we went through the tunnels between Swindon and Gloucester – the shockwave hit my right ear and damaged the eardrum. It was painful for several weeks but healed and left me slightly deaf and with permanent tinnitus. It's there all the time but I can zone it out.

        2. Oh, Lord. That's not fun. I really hope it's not permanent for you..
          I've had tinnitus since, as a 19-year-old, I was in close proximity to gunfire and wasn't wearing protection. Much of the time, I can forget it, but when reminded, this loud screech in both ears starts up and continues at a high volume until I can forget again.

    4. Good morning, Hugh

      We wished you a happy 73rd birthday here on 19th August.

      I hope all goes well with Patrick Tracey (who is no immediate relation as far as I know). His letters do appear in the DT from time to time.

      I hope his MP has the integrity to stand up for his/her/its voters rather than for his/her/its tyrannical party leader.

    5. Good morning, Hugh

      We wished you a happy 73rd birthday here on 19th August.

      I hope all goes well with Patrick Tracey (who is no immediate relation as far as I know). His letters do appear in the DT from time to time.

      I hope his MP has the integrity to stand up for his/her/its voters rather than for his/her/its tyrannical party leader.

  29. The EU calls for €800bn a year fund & urgent reform to prevent falling behind China and the United States and avoid "a slow agony".

    Too late. The EU is already left behind in the AI race let alone the next leap forward due to kick off next year. US tech companies have already secured $billions of investment by the mere mentioning of AI wordies such as; context window prospective agent text action thingys.

    Meanwhile, Peter Kyle UKs Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology frets about AI taking jobs away from triple-locked-pension train drivers.. rather than how to raise the eye-watering capital required to build the data centres.. or the mind blowing amounts of energy resources required to power the data centres.

    Then there's Ed Miliband.. promising to fill 'vacuum' left by Rishi Sunak's U-turn on net zero.

  30. Any day now, I fear that Putin/Russia is going to take the gloves off.
    He will see all the military aid pouring into Ukraine and how it is being used and he will start to strike the suppliers' infrastructure.
    The whole damned thing is getting totally out of hand.

    Ukraine hits MOSCOW in huge drone attack, sparking apartment building blaze, wrecking dozens of homes and killing at least one woman in shock blow to Putin

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13832829/Ukraine-hits-MOSCOW-huge-drone-attack-sparking-apartment-building-blaze-wrecking-dozens-homes-killing-one-woman-shock-blow-Putin.html

    2. I don't understand why he has been so restrained. It hasn't gained him anything. The West is financing and arming this struggle.

      1. Initially I genuinely thought the whole thing was about the adverse treatment of Russian ethnic Ukrainians and had BoJo & Co not stepped in a reasonably acceptable solution would have been negotiated.
        NATO/the USA want all of Ukraine, I don't believe Putin does..

        1. We have been as misled about Ukraine as we have been misled about global warming, net zero and Covid gene therapy.

          Which will have the direst consequences?

          2. World war in the short term, medium term: global warming/climate/net zero could be economically disastrous but I’m beginning to think that apart from the UK the wheels are starting to seize up, long term the mRNA could be a disaster for human health/immune systems

      2. I can only guess that he refuses to be manipulated by the West. Perhaps he's keeping his powder dry until after the US election, depending on whether they can foil the stealers or not. At the moment he is allowing the West to display their venality.

      3. He has been restrained because contrary to Western propaganda he has no desire to widen the war. The little Nazi in Kiev has because he has nothing but desperate measures to further his aims. I think pretty soon he will be removed by the Ukrainians themselves. I hope they assassinate him, he does not deserve to live the life of Riley in luxury, in exile, for what he has done to Ukraine.

    3. Yet if Russia were to take an eye for an eye by bombing Kiev it would be "an unprovoked attack". As for "who started this", should anyone be tempted, the USA did. We can only hope that the Dems underestimate the number of fake postal votes needed, as the Cons did here in 2016.

      1. I wish that Trump had kept quiet and not pointed out the obvious. His timing in pointing out the Emperor had no clothes was stupid in the extreme. He should have waited until it was to late for the Democrats to bolster Harris with false propaganda. Now there is a real possibility that Trump will lose and that would be disaster not just for the USA but for all of us. A victory for Harris could well be a literal death knell for the world.

        1. It beats me how otherwise sensible people can be taken in by lefties. Kamala is not a bad-looking woman but she can barely string two coherent words together. What has she done to be worthy of the position she has, let alone be the actual President? do any of these people look any further?

          My good friend and neighbour calls Trump a 'criminal' – not thinking that it's only the senseless lawsuits he's been targetted with that make him so.

          1. They do it by building up a false narrative about Harris and by keeping her well away from any opportunity where she has to speak for her self. Fox keeps a calendar of her avoidance of Press conferences , interviews, on its web site. So far she has been silent for 51 days 1 2hours and 11 minutes. You can see the clock on the right of this page.
            https://www.foxnews.com/

      2. Tonight's "debate" might give them a better idea of how many to organise.
        There is a view that the wheels may be starting to come off her campaign bus.

        Is Kamala Harris fit to lead the free world? US Presidential Democratic nominee's biographer CHARLIE SPIERING says she is terrifyingly ill-equipped for power and an incompetent lightweight

        https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13831837/Is-Kamala-Harris-fit-lead-free-world-Presidential-Democratic-nominees-biographer-CHARLIE-SPIERING-says-terrifyingly-ill-equipped-power-incompetent-lightweight.html

  31. Good Morning to all. Very gloomy day here in West Sussex, cold too.

    Thought people would like to read this. At the bottom is Rafe Heydel Mankoo defending Sir Winston

    The extraordinary attempt to paint Churchill as the real villain of the Second World War
    A movement of Right-wing American populism is attempting to brand the PM as a ‘warmonger’ – but why the reevaluation now?

    Iain Hollingshead

    Saviour of Western democracy or racist imperialist? Greatest Briton of all time or villain of the Bengal famine, the Tonypandy Riots and independence movements from India to Iraq to Ireland? While enthusiasm for dissecting Winston Churchill’s legacy remains a popular litmus test in the left-right cultural war, we have grown used to the flak for the wartime Prime Minister coming exclusively from the Left. No one breaks away from a pro-capitalist march in Parliament Square to climb Churchill’s statue with a pot of blue paint and write: “The price of Churchill’s wartime alliance was the much-lamented end of the British Empire and the beginning of Attlee’s disastrous experiment in state-sponsored socialism.”

    Cue outraged surprise, therefore, when a Right-wing American historian, Darryl Cooper, sat down last week with Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News presenter and prominent Donald Trump cheerleader, for an interview and called Churchill the “chief villain of the Second World War”. Among other ludicrous claims – including the egregious thesis that the murder of millions in concentration camps owed more to weak logistics than methodical genocide – Churchill was lambasted as a “warmonger” and a “terrorist” for allowing the war to spread beyond Poland in 1939, refusing to negotiate with Hitler in 1940 and bombing German cities from 1942.

    Needless to say, this wasn’t what Churchill meant when he wrote: “In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies.”

    “Darryl Cooper, I am afraid, is a know-nothing about Churchill or World War II,” says Sir Max Hastings, one of Churchill’s biographers. “He and podcasters like him are sensation-seekers, no more and no less, and the best response to them is to ignore them.”

    If only that were the case. By the weekend, a White House spokesman had condemned the interview as “a disgusting and sadistic insult to all Americans”, Elon Musk had posted – and subsequently deleted – a post calling it “very interesting, worth watching” and a show normally watched by around 800,000 people had racked up over 33 million views on X.

    Meanwhile, two of Churchill’s garlanded biographers took the opposite approach to Hastings and decided to remind readers that Hitler, not Churchill, is still widely viewed as the “chief villain” of the Second World War. “This is not revisionist history,” wrote Sir Niall Ferguson in The Free Press on Thursday. “It is a pack of lies.” In The Washington Free Beacon the next day, Andrew Roberts argued that the Prime Minister spent half a century combatting the triple threats of Wilhelminism, Nazism and Communism, thereby saving freedom of speech “that has been so squalidly abused” by this “intellectually vacant” interview.

    Victor Davis Hanson in The Free Press, a distinguished military historian, wrote: “Britain was the only one of the six major belligerents in World War II that went to war on the principle of a third-party nation’s territorial integrity.” What’s more, any peace terms would have been at best a “David Lloyd George Pétain-like collaborationist government”; at worst a “Nazi-imposed Oswald Mosley Quisling dictatorship”.

    “In sum,” Hanson argued, “Germany and its fascist allies started World War II, initiated the mass warring on civilians, and institutionalised genocide. And they felt empowered to do so not because of Allied aggression or terrorism, but because of initial Western European appeasement, American isolationism, and Russian collaboration.”

    So, although Darryl Cooper should consider his hot take on history thoroughly rebutted (unsurprisingly, his unabashed X feed describes his many critics as “shameless”, “mendacious” and a “loud minority of hyenas”), this row still tells us something fascinating about Churchill’s legacy – as well as the contemporary American political landscape.

    One of the less-examined claims among Cooper’s ramblings is that the war fatally weakened the West. A variant of this right-wing criticism of Churchill was expressed in respectable academic form in the 1990s by Prof John Charmley, a British historian. If the prime minister had negotiated with Hitler, Charmley argues in Churchill: the End of Glory, he might have been able to avoid defeat in the battles he really cared about. For example, preserving the Empire, preventing socialism in Britain and stopping the Soviet Union from dominating the European continent.

    “This school of thought struggled to find an audience in Britain because it proceeds from the twin premises that socialism was uniquely terrible and the British Empire uniquely good,” explains Dominic Sandbrook, author of a series of acclaimed histories on post-war Britain and co-host of the popular The Rest is History podcast.

    But although Charmley’s view has been largely drowned out by a combination of louder, Left-wing critics, staunch Right-wing supporters and “maybe 75 per cent of people who sit in neither camp and simply view Churchill as a national hero”, criticising Churchill from the Right is a “peculiarly American” phenomenon that stretches back to the 1930s.

    “There has always been an element of American populism obsessed with European cosmopolitan conspiracies,” says Sandbrook. “Many felt they were tricked into joining the war in 1917 and this fuelled some of the arguments for isolationism in the 1920s.

    “Churchill, with his cigars, bowties and Blenheim pedigree, was the perfect hate figure for these populists. And although this suspicion was largely suspended in 1941, it never went away entirely. Pat Buchanan, who worked for Nixon and challenged George H W Bush for the White House in 1992, anticipated a lot of what Cooper has been saying recently in books such as Churchill, Hitler and The Unnecessary War.”

    So why is this unpleasant sub-culture enjoying a right-wing renaissance in America now?

    “If Hitler is no longer widely understood as the negation of our deepest values, America will be softened up for Donald Trump’s most authoritarian plans,” writes Michelle Goldberg in The New York Times.

    “It is calculated Kremlin-inspired disinformation on a vast scale designed to confuse and misrepresent history in the interest of elevating a view that Western democracy is at fault in the long twilight struggle against authoritarianism,” writes Marc Johnson in Idaho’s Lewiston Tribune, on the notion that the West didn’t need to fight Hitler.

    Frank Luntz, a veteran American pollster and political consultant, discounts such apocalyptic theories. “I don’t think this is a meaningful, measurable trend,” he says. “Cooper is simply wrong.”

    But while the story of a podcaster who riled the White House and half the academic establishment might not represent a conspiracy of widespread authoritarian acceptance, many point to a looser, if no less damaging, ecosystem of Trumpism, contrarianism and egotism.

    Sohrab Ahmari, a conservative columnist, has written compellingly about what he calls “the Barbarian Right”, a group of “pseudo-scholars” eager to “overthrow egalitarian – and essentially feminine – structures”, while attempting to revive some of the “darkest tendencies in the history of thought, including the idolatry of strength (as cartoonishly personified by the likes of Andrew Tate); the notion of supposedly ‘natural’ hierarchies; IQ-based eugenics; overt racism and anti-Semitism”.

    Their denizens have, he argues, “got what they wished for” out of Cooper’s interview, praising it widely online and adding their own racist and anti-Semitic tropes.

    Carlson, a Trump confidant and notorious cable news host who has entertained conspiracy theories, was finally sacked by Fox last April. Undeterred by losing his $20 million salary, he has taken his contentious views and some of his audience to YouTube and X, where his nearly 14 million followers were treated to his soft-soap interview with Cooper last week.

    Their cosy, two-hour chat rounded off a busy – and, presumably, lucrative – period for Carlson. Not only did he famously interview Vladimir Putin in February (the Russian President lectured him, almost uninterrupted, on his unique version of Ukrainian history), but he is widely viewed to be responsible for Trump choosing JD Vance as his running mate, having repeatedly interviewed the would-be vice president at Fox and afterwards.

    After a prime slot addressing the Republican National Convention in July, Carlson launched a 15-stop live tour last week by interviewing a barefooted Russell Brand in Arizona. The controversial British comedian, who once supported Jeremy Corbyn, endorsed Trump’s MAGA movement, dropped to his knees on stage and led the crowd in prayer.

    Brand’s cameo in this strange nexus of podcasters, presidents, pundits and pseudo-scholars leads us to the conclusion that this story primarily illuminates – and inflates – the egos of a new tribe of internet iconoclasts more interested in being provocative than accurate. Gnomically claiming rare and privileged enlightenment in the face of universally accepted truths, the likes of Cooper have discovered that the Second World War provides fertile ground for tilting at contemporary shibboleths.

    “The true villains of [Cooper’s] story are not, in the end, Hitler or Churchill,” writes Megan Garber in The Atlantic, where she accuses Cooper of creating “straw men”.“Instead, they are the culture warriors of the present: the woke, the mobs, the ruling class – the people who will be offended by claims such as ‘Winston Churchill Ruined Europe’.”

    Ferguson added his own villain to this list last week, blaming podcasts for “drowning history in a tidal wave of blather, at best sloppy, at worst mendacious”.

    Sandbrook, unsurprisingly, disagrees.

    “There are a lot of history podcasts out there – some are very good, whereas some have a tendency to be obsessed with soldiers, samurais and themselves,” he says. “A test of a good historian is that they’re honest about what they don’t know, while acknowledging that other historians think differently. Unfortunately, the last 20 years have given a platform to nerdy bores and ranting monomaniacs with a bee in their bonnet.”

    The last seven days have certainly given these two monomaniacs their 15 minutes’ worth. Darryl Cooper’s podcast, “The Martyr Made”, was third on Apple’s charts over the weekend, just behind “The Tucker Carlson Show” which had introduced him as “the best and most honest popular historian in the United States”.

    As they – like many others – probably think Churchill said (he didn’t): “Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.”

    Discussion on Churchill starts at 25:13 minutes

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6IN_h4-12c&list=TLPQMTAwOTIwMjTsWUwl3iiENg&index=1

    1. To be honest I prefer Patrick Christys, Dan Wootton's, replacement at GBNews but I do think that Wootton was shabbily treated by GBNews as were Calvin Robinson and Mark Steyn.

      I was particularly shocked by the odious Mark Dolan who did not stand up for his friends.

      1. Agree with you Rastus. Don't particularly like Wootton either. I actually lost my enthusiasm for GBNews after Steyn was sacked. But, unfortunately, there isn't much else that isn't left wing propaganda. It this point I only watch the computer so I do not have to listen to the misanthropy of the left.

    2. Churchill defeated Hitler and the Nazi fascism. When the Left changed their weapons from goose stepping and machine guns to economics and dropped the national from national socialism, but kept socialism they found a new enemy – Lady Thatcher. That's why they hate her. It's why they hate Trump as well.

  32. ‘Tommy Robinson cannot exist in the current UK environment. Why? Because he exposes what our establishment do not wish to have revealed to the masses. He also brutally exposes the pseudo media, alongside those organisations supposedly “protecting” the public and in particular young adolescent girls. It’s that simple.’

    Kathy Gyngell : The Conservative Woman: https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/tommy-robinson-in-his-own-words-part-one/

    BTL

    Tommy Robinson should be rewarded for telling the truth by being sent to the House of Lords. He could adopt the title of Lord Yaxley of Lennon! That would confuse his detractors.

      1. Probably a lot more killed by the Liverpool Pathway and the "end of life care" they received in 'carehomes' during the lockdowns.

  35. Good morrow, Gentlefolk. Today’s (recycled) story

    I Think I Like Getting Old – on balance

    I used to be able to do cartwheels. Now I tip over putting on my underwear.

    I hate it when I see an old person and then realise we went to school together.

    I told my wife she should embrace her mistakes… so she hugged me.

    My wife says I only have 2 faults. I don't listen and something else….

    I thought growing old would take longer.

    I came, I saw, I forgot what I was doing. Retraced my steps, got lost on the way back, now I have no idea what's going on.

    The officer said, "You drinking?" I said, "You buying?" We just laughed and laughed…. I need bail money.

    I think the reason we are born with two hands is so we can pet two dogs at once.

    Scientists say the universe is made up of protons, neutrons and electrons.

    They forgot to mention morons.

    1. Good morning Tom

      From your post: "Retraced my steps, got lost on the way back, now I have no idea what's going on." Reminds me of the excellent song. "Age" by Jim Croce:

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acgaH-Qxvdw
      "I've turned inside out and around about and back and then
      Found myself right back where I started again."

  36. Utterly Off Topic

    NHS envy of world they say.

    Here in France:

    My GP prescribed a scan. I went to the specialist health centre yesterday morning to arrange an appointment.
    I was offered 08.45 this morning.
    Arrived today at 08.35
    All administrative details recorded and I was called in for the scan at 08.45.
    Scans and CD rom supplied by 09.15
    Written report in my email just after 11.00.
    All clear thankfully.

    I have to pay the medical centre and the doctors up front but most of, if not all, the fees will be reimbursed. Because of my heart attack I'm treated as long-term sick and for GP and prescriptions for that aspect I don't get charged.

    In my experience this service is not exceptional, although for certain heavily used aspects one can wait a few weeks, unless it is regarded as urgent, in which case one gets fast tracked. The French are very, very proactive.
    Perhaps I'm very lucky living in a well served part of France.
    One wonders why the NHS can't do similarly

    1. Ah… but.. but.. perhaps,
      were you fast-tracked by the trans-purple-haired-lumpa on reception because of the Pally flag you waved?

      1. I have some flags from my Promming days. The Yorkshire Rose, the Star of David and the Skull & Crossbones. This way to the Shower Block, Madam…

    2. Here is my experience of going for a scan. I decided to have it done privately. My doctor said using the nhs be a case of waiting for an appt at the musculo-skeletal clinic, then being referred for a course of physiotherapy, at the end of which I would be referred back to the musculo-skeletal clinic with a recommendation that I attend for an MRI scan. There would be a lot of queuing and attending involved in the process (and travelling and car-parking). Then, presumably, a waiting list for the nhs scan. I made an appt with a clinic in Milton Keynes, which happens to be the nearest, 45 miles away. It is impressed upon us that we must arrive 15 minutes before the appt, and if more than 10 minutes late the fee will be forfeit. It is a stressful journey there, single lane traffic, across country, several small towns and villages – on the first (!!) journey we encountered a pony and trap behind which a long queue of traffic had built up. Finally finding the place in a modern block (satnav decided it had done its job after saying cheerio at the top of the road) I encountered reception only to be told that the machine had broken down, didn't you get our phonecall and email? Well, no we didn't because we had already left home by the time it was sent.

      So I made another appt, for the same day (Sunday) – but two weeks later – same time (midday) only to be told we're sorry, but the machine has broken down again. I really couldn't believe it….. To cut the story short, I now have an appt for tomorrow, 1.40 pm and we have had our travelling expenses refunded. I'll phone just before we leave to make sure the infernal scanner hasn't broken down again, which is what I should have done this last Sunday, but I didn't think, I couldn't imagine, that lightening would strike same place twice and so quickly. I suppose it is still quicker than going via the nhs would have been. I have a torn knee cartilage which occurred last September, I have managed so far with the aid of a knee support, but it is becoming more painful.

      1. Third time lucky then – at least you know the way now……. but allow extra time for a weekday journey.
        I do hope you get your scan and then whatever treatment will be needed to get the knee right again.

        1. Thank you Ndovu. Knowing the way and the journey – it is very dreary, just a slog – and Sunday conditions (busy in the towns and villages) was why I chose the same day and time for my second appearance at the centre – I just couldn’t face a repeat journey a week later, which is why I chose the Sunday two weeks later. Nevertheless I am determined now so tomorrow here we come! Yes, I will allow extra time. It is so stressful when you feel the minutes slipping through your fingers, I can well do without that.

      3. If this was a private appointment you should have charge them the fee and travelling expenses.
        My eldest brother went to the dentist about 30 years ago only to be told the dentist was off sick but nobody called my brother. He said that's OK and that will be £30. The receptionist asked why and he told her he was applying their rules which said if you don't turn up for an appointment you will be charged £30. She took advice from the boss and lo and behold another dentist magically appeared. It was a NHS dentist.

    3. Morning SOS, is the difference that there is an element of competition in the Frenchg health care system?

          1. Within reason yes, there is a facility called doctolib where one can make appointments directly with a specialist, BUT often one has to have been introduced by your GP. Hearing, eyesight, physio chiro etc can be direct or by referral.

            Distances between bigger towns and cities are greater here, so you may not wish to travel.

            For qualifying treatments you get transport.
            Eg for my 4 week daily cardio-rehab I had a roughly 80 mile round trip; hospital transport was provided, (essentially an ambulance taxi), by the health service and I didn't have to pay anything.

            Dentists are harder to find, but not as bad as the NHS.

    4. Your experience reflects my own dealings with the French health system. Comprehensively first class.

    5. SecSavers referred me to the hospital eye clinic because my post cataract surgery lens was grubby and needed laser cleaning. I received a reasonably timely appointment for the eye clinic where they carried out identical assessments to SpecSavers but using less modern equipment. The waiting list for laser cleaning was 6 months.
      My wife asked if I could be referred privately and a nurse told us to get our GP to refer me to an outfit called SpaMedica in Poole. They are a private company who specialise in only cataract surgery and associated problems for the NHS.
      On referral I received an appointment two weeks later in mid August for assessment. Shortly after that I received a date of Sept 10th for the cleaning.
      Had it done this morning. Very efficient. Confirm personal details, sign consent form and take a seat for 5 minutes. Then called in by nurse to have drops to dilate the pupil. About five minutes later called in for the cleaning which took less than 3 minutes. In the time we were there the waitng room was cleared of about 20 patients. Their waiting list is about three weeks so why is the NHS six months?

      1. I have always suspected that a major part of the NHS problem is that insufficient proactive preventative tests are carried out.
        Here we get sent for bloods, urine, colo-rectal, prostate, mammary etc regularly and the system is set up to remind us to go and offering an appointment in the reminder.
        It seems to catch many problems before they major issues and can be dealt with quickly. It’s a different approach.

  37. Do you want to live for ever? I know, I know, but at least it would give us more time to rid ourselves of the rotten, corrupt globalist Establishment. Anyhow, whether everlasting life is attractive to you or not, Rob Mason's new article in Free Speech will help you stay healthy and, if he's right, possibly live long enough for the scientists to develop pills to make us live 'indefinitely'.

    If optimism is not your style, our resident Grumpy Old Man, will put up his list of irritants in modern life shortly.

    freespeechbacklash.com

    1. My favourite grumpy old man was Geoffrey Palmer who sadly died three or four years ago.

      Who could forget him as the doctor wanting sausages for breakfast when one of the hotel guests at Fawlty Towers had died before having touched his plate of kippers?

  38. Michael Deacon on top form today. He is one of the few DT journalists I actually enjoy reading:

    "Straight talking

    Dan Levy – the Emmy-winning star and creator of the globally acclaimed TV series Schitt’s Creek – is very proud of his show’s success. This, he explains, is because he’s gay – and in the entertainment industry, gay people “don’t get the same opportunities as other people… The opportunities that do come are very rare.”

    I’m sure we can all see exactly what he means. Because, if there’s one thing everyone knows about the world of showbiz, it’s that it’s screamingly heterosexual.

    From pop music to reality TV, and from pantomime to musical theatre, it’s hard to think of a more rigidly old-fashioned bastion of heteronormativity than the performing arts. As a result, opportunities for gay actors, singers, presenters, writers and dancers are few and far between. Which is why the entertainment industry is dominated by flaming heterosexuals like Sir Elton John, Stephen Fry, Graham Norton, Craig Revel-Horwood, Alan Carr, Bruno Tonioli, Russell T Davies, Sir Ian McKellen, Alan Bennett, Sue Perkins, Matt Lucas, Boy George, Sam Smith, RuPaul, Sandi Toksvig, Andrew Scott, Sir Derek Jacobi, Kristen Stewart, Rupert Everett, Miriam Margolyes, Cynthia Nixon, Julian Clary and Christopher Biggins.

    Thankfully, though, it seems that there is at last hope of a breakthrough. This month sees the launch of Queer Theatre, a London-based LGBTQ+ theatre and production company that, its founders say, is “dedicated to nurturing queer talent”.

    I wish all involved the best of luck. Indeed, the news has inspired me to take action, too. Because, in the same spirit, I’ve decided to set up a support group for heterosexual builders.

    Just as gay men are notoriously thin on the ground in the world of showbiz, heterosexual men have always found it desperately difficult to break into the construction industry. Since time immemorial, building sites have been the almost exclusive domain of flamboyantly camp gay men, endlessly blasting out their favourite show tunes, leering over photos of topless hunks in the latest issue of Attitude, and shouting rude comments at female passersby (“Where DID you get those simply FRIGHTFUL shoes, darling? They’re SO last season”).

    Sadly, the near total lack of straight representation in the construction industry discourages heterosexual men from entering. With enough support and encouragement, however, I firmly believe that my plucky little group of heterosexual builders can finally break the glass ceiling. And then fix it again, for a reasonable price."

    1. BTL:

      David McLellan
      3 hrs ago
      How about setting up a support group for black and mixed race actors unable to find work in TV adverts?

  41. EXCLUSIVE'I'm a lifelong Labour voter now!': Drug dealer, 20, hails Keir Starmer, freed convicts are sprayed with bubbly and one insists 'I'm a good boy now' – as 1,700 inmates are released early

    There is a party atmosphere outside Britain's prisons this morning as criminals set free under Labour's controversial inmate release scheme praised Sir Keir Starmer for giving them their freedom.

    Those walking out from behind bars whooped and punched the air in delight before hugging loved ones, with some crowing they would be finally be spending time with their girlfriends – but not before going to McDonald's.

    Some were greeted by a cacophony on their release, with friends blasting out music and giving them new clothes, and some even spraying the former prisoners with sparkling wine to celebrate their newfound freedom.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13832853/First-prisoners-released-released-today-reoffend.html

    2. Well spare a thought for the grannies, gays and people who shouted at police dogs, who have taken their place.

      You know it makes sense

      1. A bit like tax evasion. There is no victim (as taxation is plain theft) but because it is a rejection of statist orthodoxy it is treated more harshly solely because it annoys the machine.

  43. Electric car battery maker to slash jobs and scale back operations
    9 September 2024 • 6:18pm
    Northvolt's gigafactory in Skellefteå in Sweden

    Northvolt, the Swedish company which raised £10bn to challenge China’s dominance of batteries, today pledged to refocus efforts on improving its struggling factory in Skellefteå and cutting costs.

    This will involve “a re-scope of operations and appropriate resizing of our workforce”, an announcement said.

    The company, which counts German car giants BMW and Volkswagen among its backers, also said it would sell or seek investment from outside partners in its energy storage business.

    It is the latest business to scale back its investment plans as a slowdown in EV sales spooks the automotive industry.

    Last week, Volkswagen warned that it could be forced to close a factory in Germany for the first time and make large cost savings as it manages the transition away from petrol cars.

    2. This the same VW that made a car in China to save costs and wanted to sell it for a premium in Europe only to find the protectionist EU considered it (as it is) a Chinese import?

      Now, I am a free market libertarian to my core. I don't believe in protectionism. Globalised industry is a good thing. However, the bigger story avoids discussion of the fundamentals: why is it so much cheaper to make a vehicle in China and ship it around the world?

    3. Reminds me of the story:

      A young couple were having a meal in a restaurant with their 18 month old baby when the baby swallowed a 50 p coin. The baby started to choke and went purple in the face.

      Luckily a woman at an adjacent table – who looked remarkably like Rachel Reeves – saw what had happened and instead of slapping the child on the back – as most untrained people would do – she grabbed him by the testicles and squeezed. The 50 p immediately came flying out of the infant's mouth and the woman put it in her purse.

      The parents were overwhelmed with gratitude and asked the woman:

      "Are you a doctor – you acted so decisively and efficiently?"

      "Oh no, " she replied, "I work for HMRC."

  45. https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/a9f231fa615556460cc5bf6222887aa09d60cf3b/0_0_1179_1657/master/1179.jpg?width=700&quality=45&auto=format&fit=max&dpr=2&s=24b86a4bf457845ca4ab1c0b299f2d91 A robin lands on top of a garden robin ornament in Macclesfield, England

    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/eb09fee0ac748a5d237eb2650d54e109cb1f761e/0_0_5118_3414/master/5118.jpg?width=700&quality=45&auto=format&fit=max&dpr=2&s=fe922ac87a674f45988a8e58f98958f4 Two bear cubs climb a tree in Martinselkonen, Finland

    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/f2b368df193bb6238c2c840869762ddbb671561e/0_0_5472_3648/master/5472.jpg?width=700&quality=45&auto=format&fit=max&dpr=2&s=602333c4f587cd632fe86643e7836f9b A white-tailed doe and her fawn in Le Roy, Illinois, US

    1. What do you still get when you gold-plate a turd?

      Dress Starmer however you like and what do you still get?

      1. I don't care what colour his hair is. When you look up pointless technocrat in the dictionary you see a picture of Starmer.

  48. The Spectator has been bought by the owner of …….
    …
    …..
    …
    GB NEWS!!!!!!!

    A really bad day for big-ego Brillo (Andrew Neil) I see. Must be (or have been) a chaotic few days of clearing cupboards and computers at The Spectator.

  49. A really bad day for big-ego Brillo (Andrew Neil) I see. Must be (or have been) a chaotic few days of clearing cupboards and computers at The Spectator.

  50. Will the stopping of the Winter Fuel Allowance affect pensioners in Care/Nursing homes who are paying £1400 per week as they will be deemed rich enough to do without it.
    After the scamdemic it looks as though being in a care home is now quite dangerous.

  52. I know now why Labour have gone so extreme with their policies.
    The Conservatives had already implemented all their soft polices in the last 14 years

    3. They are Posh, They have a step to sit on (too sharpen knives)

      Mum had a mangle and a Gas Boiler to boil the washing in

          1. Waiting for council house, in our case. My mother thought that was a palace by comparison, especially indoor WC and separate bathroom.

          2. Until I joined the RN, in 1961, I did not realise there was such a thing as an inside loo.
            Where did you hang the galvanised steel bath.
            In my teens, I knocked out the ‘thrall’ (brick cold spot) in our pantry, so we could have a bath put in.
            That gave us Hot Water,without the need for the kettle or ‘boiler’

          3. The 'pantry' was a stone shelf at the top of the cellar steps, galvanised bath hung on the back of pantry door. Remember one time my father was down in the cellar being attacked by a wasp, started trying to kill it with rolled up newspaper, broke the only lightbulb….chaos ensued. My mother laughed her socks off 😀 I had every childhood illness going before we moved, absent from school a long time, one illness after another – I reckon RfKJr is correct re vaccines.

    4. They are priveleged to have a flying buttress.
      That kind of support is no longer available from our current Government.

  54. Germany shuts down borders.. starting 16th September land border checks within EU.
    Bit late now, since it was Angela Merkel that kicked off this "ever-so slightly irregular" migrant invasion.

  55. Iranian ballistic missiles will be used in Ukraine within ‘weeks’, says Blinken. 10 September 2024.

    Anthony Blinken confirmed on Tuesday that Russia had received a supply of close-range ballistic missiles from Iran for use in Ukraine.

    Speaking alongside David Lammy in a joint press conference, the US secretary of state said the delivery constitutes a “dramatic escalation”.

    “We’ve warned Tehran publicly, we’ve warned Tehran privately, that taking this step would constitute a dramatic escalation…Russia has now received shipments of these ballistic missiles,” Mr Blinken said.

    Hypocrisy writ large. Not only because the US supplies such to the Ukies but the contrast between the approach to the Israel-Hamas war, where pretty much everything is on the table, and Ukraine -Russia where there is literally nothing.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/09/10/israel-hamas-war-latest-news-airstrikes-mawasi-gaza/

  56. Iranian ballistic missiles will be used in Ukraine within ‘weeks’, says Blinken. 10 September 2024.

    Anthony Blinken confirmed on Tuesday that Russia had received a supply of close-range ballistic missiles from Iran for use in Ukraine.

    Speaking alongside David Lammy in a joint press conference, the US secretary of state said the delivery constitutes a “dramatic escalation”.

    “We’ve warned Tehran publicly, we’ve warned Tehran privately, that taking this step would constitute a dramatic escalation…Russia has now received shipments of these ballistic missiles,” Mr Blinken said.

    Hypocrisy writ large. Not only because the US supplies such to the Ukies but the contrast between the approach to the Israel-Hamas war, where pretty much everything is on the table, and Ukraine -Russia where there is literally nothing.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/09/10/israel-hamas-war-latest-news-airstrikes-mawasi-gaza/

  57. Afternoon All
    Brutal Medley
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2934ed8145383c014bb85c3b805e28bc1b4bec3261ef7d7ccc0da76605162481.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/cf5d1d3ff44072fc5280073e9bc3b470716a6a5ee5d94d07ba9021ad249aa28e.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5991e9ad851eb5b44f5f73b2ca31353f121c832c58769649adefc63a33fa98ab.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/50c77fdd0aa6228535370be0866ba6e7e23e803b6c619a7c7c849004648dd5a7.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f5c5765cf3057d89bf59e927ca3c7e26a8041b48b1dad7f335e36519d9eb62f9.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/313dc4e779b62f46918a56f6da1f8e045c7764027996e5063f45547ff48e4562.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a3d631daa5c60ea2525e5bf9c26f3523ae62201569972c235e79ef8a6459cb8b.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9b03123c18332eb5e0f414fdb852d62285d3de4c9161e7851add6057ff9d1055.png
    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7de74950a849e870313087dd842f553eb454dd0c2623b002cc3011b7abb59766.jpg

    1. No no, what folk don't realise is that when the lights go out, that's it. There will be no candles as those require energy to make and distribute let alone get the raw materials to the factory.

      It's simple. We need cheap, reliable, uninterrupted masses of energy. The Left seem to think there are no consequences to their mania.

    1. What did he expect? Plod are now just the enforcement arm of the Hard Left state. Justice, law are mutable under socialism because the entire system is dedicated against the citizen and for the alien.

  59. German opposition leader wants ‘comprehensive’ rejection of illegal migrants at borders
    Friedrich Merz, the head of the Christian Democratic Union, will meet government for more talks on toughening policies
     https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/09/10/german-opposition-leader-rejection-illegal-migrants-borders/
    Scholz’s rejection of Merkel’s open borders legacy won’t save him
    Imposing temporary controls at all Germany’s borders has only strengthened opposition leader Friedrich Merz of the CDU
     https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/09/10/olaf-scholz-rejection-angela-merkel-open-borders-elections/

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ac662e50099bad0e52a0fcb8d93543c5c2db8245a5cf043f512e7f133613e565.png

    1. And to whom does Starmer choose to cosy up?

      Sholz who wants to use the Rwanda deal The British set up
      Sholz who is clearly on the way out politically.

      Watch Starmer rejoin the EU, pay an enormous rejoining fee and then, the following week, having to pay into the EU disbanding fund as the whole thing has collapsed.

      1. The EU is bankrupt. The countless billions given to Ukraine both in military materiel, loan guarantees, direct payments from the European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund will never be repaid.

        Nobody but a fool would continue granting monies to the corrupt Ukrainians but then Starmer is just that: a prize fool.

        1. From Coffee House, the Spectator

          The EU’s Apple tax ruling is a bleak day for Ireland
          Comments Share 10 September 2024, 2:47pm
          For those of us who grew up singing songs about Irish nationhood, today is a depressing day. As youths we crooned about how Ireland, ‘long a province’, will one day be ‘a nation once again’. We stood in stiff attention to the Irish national anthem with its promise that Ireland will never again ‘shelter the despot or the slave’. And now we switch on the news and what do we see? A foreign court bossing Ireland around.

          Ireland must now go after Apple and demand billions of euros from it
          Today, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruled that Ireland granted Apple ‘unlawful aid’ and must now badger Apple for £11bn in ‘unpaid taxes’. The case was brought by the European Commission (EC). It accused Ireland of giving Apple unfair tax advantages between 1991 and 2014. Ireland did indeed enforce low tax rates on Apple because it was keen to show that Ireland is an ‘attractive home for large companies’. That is, it judged that tax losses were worth it if it meant more tech giants would come to the republic. Unacceptable, decreed the EC, and today the EC won.

          Ireland must now go after Apple and demand billions of euros from it. But here’s the thing, the crucial thing, the chilling thing: Ireland doesn’t want to do this. As the BBC sums it up, this is an outcome the elected rulers of Ireland ‘spent years of legal wrangling trying to avoid’. That a small country that’s far from rich doesn’t want to tick off vast corporations makes sense. And yet now Ireland has been instructed to do precisely that, by a foreign court hundreds of miles away.

          What do you call a nation that can be forced by foreign judges to do something it doesn’t want to do? I know what you don’t call it: a sovereign nation, a free nation. The EC’s strongarming of Ireland to put aside its own petty democratic desires and go after Apple for ‘unpaid taxes’ represents an intolerable intrusion into Ireland’s internal affairs. The right to set taxes, for both corporations and citizens, is central to a nation’s sovereignty. It is one of the most important rights of free states. It’s a right Ireland has now effectively been robbed of by the EU.

          This case exposes how imperious the EU’s rules on ‘state aid’ can be. Everyone – ostensibly, at least – accepts that taxes should be set nationally, by elected governments. Yet the EU’s awesome power to regulate state aid across the bloc means that in this case it could decree that Ireland’s low tax rates for Apple added up to an ‘unfair subsidy’. And thus Ireland was branded a state-aid deviant, an errant nation, and now it must atone for its sins of sovereign decision-making by aligning its tax rules with the EU’s state-aid rules.

          It is a very foolish leftist who is laughing at Apple today, who is cheering the ECJ for sticking it to the big tech bosses. For the EU’s state-aid rules are as likely to be wielded against leftish governments that want to pump money into certain industries as they are against governments that give big corporations an easy tax ride. Under the guise of policing state aid, the EU gives itself the border-busting, sovereignty-smashing power to tell governments of all persuasions what they may do with their own resources. No one should support this – not the free-market right nor the state-leaning left.

          As for Ireland – I thought we’d agreed to never again ‘shelter the despot’? Yet a foreign court has overruled Ireland’s sovereign wishes and compelled it to pursue a policy it does not want to pursue: I’d call that despotic. James Connolly, hero of the 1916 Easter Rising, said: ‘A free nation must have complete control over its own harbours, to open them or close them at will, or shut out any commodity, or allow it to enter… entirely free of the interference of any other nation.’ Short of these powers, he said, ‘no nation possesses the first essentials of freedom’. We might also add the power to set taxes. A nation that cannot set its own taxes is not a free nation. It just isn’t.

          Few in Ireland seem to have the stomach for an honest discussion about the unaccountable power of Brussels. On the contrary, politicians, the media and all the cultural movers and shakers seem content to take the knee to the EC. Indeed, the government has said it will ‘respect’ today’s ruling. Big mistake. There is nothing to respect in the bully-boy tactics of a foreign institution that clearly has no regard whatsoever for the right of the Irish nation to determine its own affairs. How sad that a country that fought so hard for its independence should now sell it off so cheaply to a distant commission.

      2. I saw a picture of him earlier with his right arm in the air. Perhaps only one knee didn't convince his mixed group of friends.

      1. Just had a cuppa. Whoops misread that in my dilemma over which specs I should wear. One lens or two.

          1. If you had any idea of the problems I have after my cataract operation kow bhoy 😏🤔😕🥴
            It’s been an absolute nightmare for nearly three months. Drops three times a day for all of this time. Two old pairs of specs with one lense removed. And still no contact from the surgeon. Too busy coining it for winter warmth.

    3. So this shows that it is not just Starmer, Reeves and Cooper who are sadistic monsters but the majority of Labour MPs are too.

      2. And they, all of them earning multiple times the value of most pensions (as well as eye-watering expenses and subsidised bars/restaurants), will still get their much larger fuel subsidies for their second homes.

          2. As for the troughers in the HoL claiming £300 a DAY for merely showing their face for 5 minutes ……..

  61. Re earlier post.
    And so it builds.

    US unveils new sanctions on Iran for sending missiles to Putin and reveals David Lammy and Anthony Blinken will make first joint UK-US visit to Ukraine to discuss use of British weapons to hit targets in Russia

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13834077/David-Lammy-Anthony-Blinken-sanctions-Iran-missiles-Putin-Ukraine-Russia.html

    If you're not fried, a stock of Potassium- Iodine may be helpful.
    https://www.who.int/news-room/questions-and-answers/item/use-of-potassium-iodine-for-thyroid-protection-during-nuclear-or-radiological-emergencies#:~:text=The%20thyroid%20gland%20can%20be,of%20exposure%20to%20radioactive%20iodine.

    1. I believe that Blinken was instrumental in BoJo's intervention to halt earlier peace talks.

      Doubtless he'll be well supported by his new dark buffoon replacing the blond buffoon.

    2. Very funny 'mum :-D…my daughter had a hamster (going back 40+ years), always escaping. One time, I left bread cooling, next thing hamster had bulging cheeks, half a loaf disappeared, possibly under floorboards – hamster also disappeared later only to reappear following day, still no sign of bread. They are very cute, and handle easily, a good pet for a child.

  64. For every early release violent prisoner who goes on to commit another such offence before their "real time" was due to end, perhaps a Labour MP, or a member of their family should be selected at random to suffer the same harm as the violent offender's victim?
    If more than one new victim then choose more than one MP.

  65. "Blinken and the British Foreign Secretary are traveling to Kyiv to announce permission for long-range strikes against Russia, a Congressional correspondent for the American publication Axios said"
    C'mon Putin you'll never have a jucier target do the world a favour

  66. A penniless Par Four?

    Wordle 1,179 4/6
    ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨
    🟨🟨⬜🟩🟨
    🟩🟩⬜🟩🟩
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. Double bogey today.

      Wordle 1,179 6/6

      ⬜⬜⬜🟩⬜
      ⬜⬜🟨🟩⬜
      🟨🟩⬜🟩🟨
      🟩🟩⬜🟩🟩
      🟩🟩⬜🟩🟩
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    3. I'm on a bit of a roll for amazing guesses – get in!

      Wordle 1,179 4/6

      ⬜⬜⬜🟩🟨
      ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
      🟨⬜⬜⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  67. The List of Shame.

    https://x.com/SamanthaTaghoy/status/1833518512834547736 Mike Tapp (Labour)
    David Taylor (Labour)
    Rachel Taylor (Labour)
    Nick Thomas-Symonds (Labour)
    Fred Thomas (Labour)
    Adam Thompson (Labour)
    Marie Tidball (Labour)
    Jessica Toale (Labour)
    Dan Tomlinson (Labour)
    Jon Trickett (Labour)
    Henry Tufnell (Labour)
    Anna Turley (Labour)
    Matt Turmaine (Labour)
    Karl Turner (Labour)
    Laurence Turner (Labour)
    Derek Twigg (Labour)
    Liz Twist (Labour)
    Harpreet Uppal (Labour)
    Valerie Vaz (Labour)
    Chris Vince (Labour)
    Christian Wakeford (Labour)
    Imogen Walker (Labour)
    Melanie Ward (Labour)
    Paul Waugh (Labour)
    Chris Webb (Labour)
    Michelle Welsh (Labour)
    Catherine West (Labour)
    Andrew Western (Labour)
    Michael Wheeler (Labour)
    John Whitby (Labour)
    Jo White (Labour)
    Katie White (Labour)
    Nadia Whittome (Labour)
    Steve Witherden (Labour)
    Sean Woodcock (Labour)
    Rosie Wrighting (Labour)
    Yuan Yang (Labour)
    Mohammad Yasin (Labour)
    Steve Yemm (Labour)
    Daniel Zeichner (Labour)

      1. Can only see from surnames beginning with 'T' onwards. Is there a problem with my setup or maybe the post itself?

        1. I think the original poster on X has deleted the post, to which my repost of that information was linked.

      1. The ones who voted. I did a copy and paste of the last section which is why the names are still standing because it repeated a middle section twice when I provided links (there were three sections with links to all three).

  68. Christmas is coming

    Good King Wenceslas looked out
    On the feast of Stephen
    When the snow lay round about
    Deep and crisp and even
    Brightly shone the moon that night
    Though the frost was cruel
    When a poor man came in sight
    Starmer stole his winter fuel

  69. 'Night All
    DT

    '“The CSJ calculates that a single unemployed parent with two children can increase their income from around £20k a year to over £33k if both they and their children are diagnosed with ADHD.”

    Don’t need to look much further than that statement to find the bigger part of the reason for the “epidemic”.'
    A No Shite Sherlock moment

  71. Labour MPs explain why they didn't vote today

    17:34 BST
    We're starting to hear now from some of the 53 Labour MPs who did not vote on today's motion.

    Tooting MP Rosena Allin-Khan posted on social media, saying: "Unfortunately, I am currently unwell and awaiting surgery, so will be away from Parliament, slipped this week and unable to cast a vote today."

    Allin-Khan did not say how she would have voted if she had been present for today's vote.

    Bell Ribeiro-Addy, Labour MP for Clapham and Brixton Hill, says she was unable to vote as she is "still out of the country following my Dad's funeral in Ghana".

    But she adds: "If I was able to attend in-person, I would be voting against these cuts." [Oh, yeh?!]

    The result showed 52 MPs had no vote recorded, including some ministers. It is not yet known how many of those were abstaining, as some MPs may have been absent for another reason
    ____________________________________________________________________________________

    Labour MP Anna Dixon said her party was not to blame for the need to make a cut, pointing the finger at a Tory "scorched earth policy"

    Earlier, Keir Starmer told the TUC conference "we won't be reckless" with people's money and again said Labour had inherited a "£22bn black hole"

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c5y3n56eg9rt

    Please, please spare us the 'black hole' bollocks. Surely even some Labour voters aren't taken in by it.

        1. I think that Asian millionaire chappy that bought him the glasses, suits and hair dye will probably have also paid for such a procedure. Just in case.

    2. The cowardice of these people is absolutely sickening.
      They are part and parcel of a rotten Marxist government who send people to prison for standing up and saying what they believe because they believed in the free speech that the parents and grandparents had bequeathed them. Starmer, the reason we don't like marxism is the fact it leads to poverty and violence against the normal population which is the 80% that didn't fall for your lies.

      1. PS. Not to mention the thousands of violent criminals about to be released upon society. Every robbery, every assault, every rape and every murder committed by these people are down to you Starmer. Civil rights lawyer, Gawd help us.

      2. PS. Not to mention the thousands of violent criminals about to be released upon society. Every robbery, every assault, every rape and every murder committed by these people are down to you Starmer. Civil rights lawyer, Gawd help us.

          1. Surely you meant: Does one get out of the city through the Blackball Tunnel or over Black-Fryers Bridge?

  72. Labour MPs explain why they didn't vote today

    17:34 BST
    We're starting to hear now from some of the 53 Labour MPs who did not vote on today's motion.

    Tooting MP Rosena Allin-Khan posted on social media, saying: "Unfortunately, I am currently unwell and awaiting surgery, so will be away from Parliament, slipped this week and unable to cast a vote today."

    Allin-Khan did not say how she would have voted if she had been present for today's vote.

    Bell Ribeiro-Addy, Labour MP for Clapham and Brixton Hill, says she was unable to vote as she is "still out of the country following my Dad's funeral in Ghana".

    But she adds: "If I was able to attend in-person, I would be voting against these cuts." [Oh, yeh?!]

    The result showed 52 MPs had no vote recorded, including some ministers. It is not yet known how many of those were abstaining, as some MPs may have been absent for another reason
    ____________________________________________________________________________________

    Labour MP Anna Dixon said her party was not to blame for the need to make a cut, pointing the finger at a Tory "scorched earth policy"

    Earlier, Keir Starmer told the TUC conference "we won't be reckless" with people's money and again said Labour had inherited a "£22bn black hole"

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c5y3n56eg9rt

    Please, please spare us the 'black hole' bollocks. Surely even some Labour voters aren't taken in by it.

  73. Mary Dejevsky
    This could be far worse than axing the winter fuel payment
    9 September 2024, 9:23am

    You won’t find me mounting the barricades in defence of the winter fuel payment, though I’ll miss the pleasant surprise when it landed in my bank account sometime before Christmas. I do, though, have a bit of a bone to pick with those well-heeled and often still lucratively-employed pensioners who dusted off their metaphorical loud-hailers (in the form of letters to newspapers and social media posts) every autumn to protest that they didn’t need it, that it was a waste of taxpayers’ money, and that they a) gave it to charity, b) spent it on Christmas presents or c) ordered another case of good wine.

    These individuals may be more responsible than they know for the Labour government’s decision to abolish the payment. This won’t just affect the more than comfortably-off like themselves, but the vast majority of the ten million or so who used to receive it, including those just above the threshold for other help. Their interventions reinforced the cliche that your average pensioner is a feather-bedded ‘boomer’ sponging off ‘hard-pressed’ working-age families.

    To be sure, there were many who, strictly speaking, didn’t need the winter fuel payment. But universality reduced administrative costs and meant that no one had to plead for it, claim special need, or otherwise put themselves forward, which is why – along with the obligatory form-filling – so many miss out on pension credit. That is why I regret that, barring an unlikely rethink, the universal winter fuel payment is dead and gone – along, in time perhaps, with some elderly people of a proud and self-reliant disposition who decide not to risk using their heating.

    But, as I say, I won’t be on the barricades for the winter fuel payment. There is one change being floated, however, which could see me deploying not just all the metaphorical loud-hailers at my disposal, but asking to borrow someone else’s real megaphone for some serious business in Parliament Square. This is the suggestion, not denied by Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, that the government could bow to pressure from impecunious local councils and allow them to discontinue the single occupier discount for council tax. In objecting, I would be motivated at least as much by a basic sense of fairness as by parsimony (though paying less council tax is always welcome, too).

    The sole occupier discount reduces council tax by 25 per cent for households with just one adult. This still means that single occupiers are paying way over the odds. Given that full council tax is payable by two adults living in one house or flat, and in many properties several more, 25 per cent is at the mean end of the spectrum – 50 per cent would be more like it. But there is no point in jeopardising the principle by demanding too much, so let’s stick with the 25 per cent.

    Abolish that, though, and Labour – along with its insolvent proxies in local government – could find itself with a full-scale revolt on its hands. A revolt, what is more, that won’t be halted by clapping us all in jail, as per the ‘tiny minority of far-right thugs’ who are currently being fast-tracked through the courts. We won’t be rioting (probably), but we could use our vote to evict local councils, or maybe take them to court on grounds of elementary justice. After all, if the women of Next can win an equal pay claim on the basis of equivalent work, then we who live expensively alone could surely mount a successful challenge on grounds of proportionality.

    A single existence is considerably more expensive, as I soon noted as a widow after happy decades of coupledom. The old adage that two live as cheaply as one is wrong, but shared expenses make it a lot cheaper than living alone. From travel of all kinds to supermarket food, where bigger equals cheaper – to the detriment of the nation’s health – there is a singles penalty, and it is very hard to escape. You can maybe zone the heating in your home to reduce usage, but you can do that as a family, too. And you can’t keep the place cooler or the water less hot just because you are the sole user. A water meter might cut your bills, but that isn’t available to everyone.

    Ending the single occupier discount could cause more problems for the government than means-testing the winter fuel payment. This is because the council tax discount as it currently works applies not just to older people, but to all those who occupy a home alone. And so it should, given our inevitably lower demand on council services. We produce far less rubbish for collection than families. Most of us don’t have children who use the schools or other children’s services. There is just one of us to use the libraries and other council services, compared with two or more in many other homes. Let me say it again, a 25 per cent discount is still ripping us off.

    Along with peaceful protests and court challenges, however, there is another response that abolition of the council tax discount could provoke. It is one that most Labour councils, if not all Labour voters would find deeply uncomfortable. It could spur support for revisiting Margaret Thatcher’s doomed community charge, otherwise known as the poll tax.

    The principle was that council tax should be levied according to the number of people in a household, much like state income tax does in the United States. Its critics saw the switch from a property-based tax as the distillation of free-market Thatcherism. But the principle surely has merit: that the amount you pay to the local council for its services should be in proportion to the services you use. It is not an income tax, which is redistributive. It is a contribution to local services.

    A change of government tends to revive calls for a reform of the outdated council tax system, which is based on the rentable value of the property way back when, and the same is true this time around. But any mooted abolition of the single occupier discount could make a new poll tax the least bad option for many, especially as the number of single occupier households has been rising. Opposition would also be broader than with the winter fuel payment, as those affected would include younger people and single parents, as well as lone pensioners.

    The aborted introduction of the poll tax is now widely seen as a symptom and a cause of Thatcher’s political demise. It prompted protests on the streets and a mass refusal to pay. Could an end to the discount for sole occupiers do the same for this Labour government?

    ************************************************

    Sossidge
    a day ago
    The poll tax should have been enforced. My wife and I are paying more than £2,000 a year in council tax for what, exactly?
    The bins being emptied?
    Our children are grown and flown and paying council tax of their own.
    If the abolition of the 25% single reduction comes in there are at least two widows down this street who are going to be left struggling.
    How is this the Labour party?
    The Labour party of my youth didn't stand by as working men were thrown out of jobs, as they are in Port Talbot.
    They didn't wage war on pensioners and in particular widows – they had compassion.
    Now they are led by a grim, humourless, joyless bully who could have stepped straight out of the politburo.

    Mark
    a day ago
    Some 30% of households are single person. The scam that Angela thinks she can get away with is simple.
    Overall council tax rates can increase by 3-4%……but by removing the single person discount the council INCOME will increase by 14%.
    The smoke and mirrors will continue when Central government grant to Local authorities is reduced. Central taxes will remain the same.
    Just over half of single occupancy is of people over 65. More women live alone than men.
    Thus, old people lose their fuel allowance, more old people will have to pay significantly more council tax.
    If a tax becomes unfair then people will protest. Just as with the Poll tax I suggest a campaign of non-payment at the higher rate……Let these communists take people to court. Let's imprison non-payers. Let's see Angela's smoke and mirrors turn to dust.
    It is inequitable that one adult may have to pay as much as three. It is wrong.
    The issue with dramatic changes to tax for the old is this……working age people can react to higher costs in a number of ways…they are still earning. An old person gets what they are given.
    Comrade Starmer should tax working age people more. Leave the old alone. They've done their bit and now worry about what the future holds for them. There comes a time when an old person no longer thinks how much to save, but thinks instead of the date when the money runs out; the pensioner prays they are dead by then.

  75. I imagine Ed Miliband is over the moon, the less money the pensioners have for heating the more likely he is to hit his 2030 net zero target and the less likely we will need power cuts.
    Although the crematoriums use a lot of power, I bet he never thought of that.

  76. 392815+ up ticks,

    Sums it up nicely, first death in the winter months make these political capos, supporters / voters guilty of aiding & abetting.

    In a decent society bumping off fully paid up via a lifetime of toil members , as in mum/ dad / granny / granddad is deeply frowned upon but,as it goes currently in England, finds favour via the elected political capos.

    https://x.com/BGatesIsaPyscho/status/1833514876360065429

  77. The timeline that reveals Labour’s winter fuel raid hypocrisy

    Speculation grows that Rachel Reeves’s decision to axe the benefit was years in the making

    Noah Eastwood, Money Reporter
    10 September 2024 • 3:00pm

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/money/2024/09/10/TELEMMGLPICT000393302128_17259668194130_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqqVzuuqpFlyLIwiB6NTmJwfSVWeZ_vEN7c6bHu2jJnT8.jpeg?imwidth=680

    Labour fought against a winter fuel raid for decades before withdrawing the payments from 10 million pensioners last month.

    All of the party’s manifestos going back as far as 2001 pledged to protect the benefit. But the most recent Labour manifesto failed to mention it once.

    The omission fuelled speculation Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s recent decision to axe the benefit for most retirees was planned all along.

    It has called into question claims her hand was forced by a £22bn “black hole” in the public finances discovered by Treasury officials after the election.
    *
    *
    *
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/timeline-hypocrisy-labour-warning-tory-winter-fuel-raid/

    ******************************

    BTL comments flooding in

    https://twitter.com/RachelReevesMP/status/1561304441898385408?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1561304441898385408%7Ctwgr%5E8d07c34df2707e5e2da5aecb2dd60749e2ec9b41%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.telegraph.co.uk%2Fmoney%2Ftimeline-hypocrisy-labour-warning-tory-winter-fuel-raid%2F

  78. This new government should be called the Monopoly Party
    What with their go directly to jail do not pass go.
    Their get out of jail free cards
    Their community chest pay rises for donors
    And their lose all your heat allowance Chance cards.
    While building houses and hotels for newcomers.

          1. I'm hoping he'll bring Starmer down!

            Other outside bets for PR disaster (or worse): the Stockport Slapper; Jess Phillips; Clive Lewis.

          2. The long term emphasis on the phrase, 'political idiots' is now being reinvented. Or at least reinforced.

      2. He will be delighted. He wants the worst govt possible so that we will welcome a WEF/NWO One World Government with open arms.

    2. He probably thinks New Clear is a kind of weed remover. Or spectacles. Or constipation tablet. Or toilet cleaner.

  80. I've had enough for today.
    I'm sick of our vile political divots.
    it's been proven many times over that they are all absolute are souls. But like to be recognised as the social elite.
    I'm watching Michael Portilo in Minneapolis on his railway journeys. Now he's long left behind his political career. I wonder what he thinks of these AHs we have wrecking our lives now.

    1. They just belong to another political party. So not much difference at all, really. The Cons led the way to Starmageddon. .

    2. I've just emailed Danish D-i-L to ask about lutfisk.
      It sounds both lethal and disgusting. Even turkey is better at Christmas.

      1. No. Lutfist wont be on my menu any time soon. I admired Portillo's brave face having to eat it though.

      2. We take Jacques's Justice's advice at Christmas – we prefer to line our fair round bellies with good capon at Christmas!

    1. Pay for much cheaper fuel?

      I rather suspect that the fuel allowance was a smokescreen for one of Gordon Brown's many stealth taxes on Pension savings.

      1. "Introduced in 1997 by the then-chancellor, Gordon Brown, the winter fuel payment was intended to help older people with their heating costs during the colder months. Paid annually in autumn, it is £200 or £300, depending on age, and had always been universal – paid to everyone, irrespective of income or wealth", soc – according to Google.

          1. 1. Destroyed one of the best pension systems in Europe;
            2. Sold Westinghouse – most of our Nuclear expertise;
            3. Sold our gold at the bottom of the Market;
            4. Built two enormous ill-conceived Carriers (jobs for Scottish shipbuilders).
            They don't work.

    2. Re my earlier reply, I also suspect that the removal of the winter fuel allowance is a smokescreen to divert attention from forthcoming tax rises in other areas.

      1. "…divert attention from forthcoming tax rises in other areas."

        Or, divert attention from insane investments in 'Net Zero'.

    6. "The Chancellor and other Labour MPs spent more than £400,000 of taxpayer money heating their own homes over the past five years, with some claiming thousands a year more than a typical household spends. It comes as Sir Keir Starmer and Ms Reeves fought off a backbench rebellion over the decision to axe winter fuel payments for millions of pensioners. See the timeline that reveals Labour’s winter fuel raid hypocrisy."

      What a bunch of hypocritical, duplicitous, treacherous, uncaring, self-centred wankers.

    8. That's not really the point though, is it? It's a bit like saying what did the more vulnerable elements of society do before the Welfare State?

  82. I've just had an upvote from steve-the-beard.
    Very long time no see.
    Pleased to observe you're still around, it would be good to see you joining in again.
    I trust all is well with you.

    1. I have just commented that i hope the next editor is less wet and woke than the current one

  85. Gawd; the Dower House is crabapple central.
    I hadn't realised just how much Sis-in-Law had brought me.
    Tried to give some to a jam/jelly/chutney producing enthusiast, but – in a manner of speaking – she'd gone off the boil.
    On the plus side, the house smells rather nice.

  86. And that's me to bed.
    A VERY changeable day, weather wise, but a decent run up to Bradford and picked up my purchase, over £150 worth of Italian soft drinks for under £15!
    I wish I'd had them at the start of last month when the Y-Not Festival ended. I could have had my little fridge outside and been selling cold drinks at £1 a go!

    Stepson is out of hospital, but I'm stepping back and leaving to mental health and social services to take the strain for now.

    Goodnight all.

  87. I can now stop watching.
    Harry Kane has scored on his 100th appearance for England.
    Well done Mr Trophyless.

  90. The UN's purging of 'unwoke' language is Orwellian nonsense

    It's tempting to keep on laughing at this kind of idiocy, but it's dogmatism of the most dangerous kind and we must treat it as such

    CELIA WALDEN • 9 September 2024 • 7:00pm

    What I would have paid to sit in on the 'Guidelines on Inclusive Language' meetings held by the World Intellectual Property Organisation prior to their crackdown on "gendered language". According to the Geneva-based United Nations agency – which protects trademarks and patents globally – using "masculine-specific" terms risks giving the impression that "women are not represented in certain groups". So, whilst the "terms to be vetoed" section might have been titillating, it would also have been pretty predictable.

    "Englishman" was always going to have to go, as well as "brotherhood of man" – and "forefathers"? Be serious. But the part I would have relished the most is where everyone around that conference table started offering up ideas for replacements.

    I would have wanted to see with my own eyes the (non-gendered) person who, after thoughtful discussion, decided that "cavemen" should be replaced with "cave dwellers". I would have wanted to marvel at the imbecilic back and forth over concerns that this new term might be deemed derogatory by Stone Age people (most of whom did not, in fact, live in caves, but tents and wooden huts). Stone Age people are dead, the WIPO word warriors will have agreed, overruling objections, "so we're probably safe there". Time for a vegan brownie break!

    I'd have liked to watch these people fête the bright spark who swapped "man's best friend" for "a faithful dog" and listened to them all confront the challenge of "midwife" head-on. I mean, obviously "wife" has to go. But it's no easy task reducing to something sufficiently anodyne the crucial support those health professionals give pregnant people (of no particular gender). That is until someone suggests "birth attendant", and it's a eureka moment. Give that woke genius a big "plus-size" raise. Never mind that "birth attendant" calls up imagery of heavily made-up women in scrubs performing safety demonstrations before 'preparing for arrival and cross check'.

    Lastly, I'd like to know what kind of a human cyborg opted to ditch "lumberjack" for "wood chopper" – and had them walk me through every step of their sophomoric logic. It's "Jack", isn't it? He's the problem. He's the reason that not a single country in the world has yet achieved gender equality; that the global gender pay gap still stands at 68.5 per cent; that women are still shouldering billions of hours of unpaid childcare. Anyway, might I suggest "lumberjane"? Why shouldn't Jane be able to lumber with the best of them?

    It's tempting to keep on laughing and sneering – at the World Intellectual Property Organisation; at the Red Cross (who back in August circulated a 12 page handbook with similar content to help staff recognise that some "language can be harmful, triggering or emotive") and; at Lloyds Bank, who became the object of mass derision when their guidance, earlier this year, went so far as to caution against the use of the words "guinea pig" and "headless chicken" in the office (both trauma-inducing for vegans).

    One should be able to laugh off these idiocies. Only, as with the NHS's "chest milk" and male sanitary towels, the ideology behind them isn't funny. This is totalitarianism in action; it's political extremism; it's dogmatism of the most dangerous kind. It is as Toby Young, founder of the Free Speech Union, said on Sunday, "precisely what George Orwell warned us about".

    It's also, by the way, a depressing reminder of how pedestrian-minded we've become. Words are like ancient buildings: they were built that way for historical reasons and have developed over centuries of use. Imagine the plodding little brain that fails to understand the value of all that? Imagine the kind of person who looks at "man in the street", tuts, draws a line through the phrase and corrects it with: "ordinary citizen".

    Above and beyond all this, however, is the penny-wise and pound-foolish aspect: the rearranging of the deck chairs on the Titanic. Because whilst this United Nations agency (hard to get over that one fact) is wasting time, energy, money and headspace over the intrinsic unjustness of "lumberjacks", nearly 4.4 million girls are at risk of female genital mutilation this year (that's more than 12,000 girls each day).

    Additionally, one woman or girl is killed by someone in her own family every 11 minutes; 122 million girls remain out of school worldwide; only one in three managers or supervisors are women; and it's estimated that we'll need approximately 286 years to remove all the discriminatory laws that currently exist for women and girls. Crazy thought, but maybe we focus on these issues before addressing the "problematic patriarchal connotations" of the word "sportsmanlike"?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/09/united-nations-woke-purge-of-language-george-orwell

    Test Match Special has also fallen. 'Batters' and 'Men's Ashes' have been heard recently.

  91. The three best bets in the Conservative paddock

    So far, nothing decisive has emerged in the campaign. But it is clear who deserves to make the next cut

    CHARLES MOORE • 9 September 2024 • 2:45pm

    Those, including this column, who called for the Conservative leadership contest to be taken in stages did so for a reason. The one luxury total defeat has bought the Tories is time.

    This was not available in the last great Conservative rethink, which began with Margaret Thatcher's candidacy for the leadership in February 1975. She won at a point when the Labour government, though still young, held only a tiny majority. All through the ensuing four years, she had to be ready for a snap general election if Labour lost that majority through by-elections or defections.

    As a result, her big, long-term philosophical and policy rebuilding of the party was always vulnerable to the sudden necessity of a campaign. Indeed, if Jim Callaghan, the Labour prime minister, had chosen October 1978 as his election date, he might well have won. After the Winter of Discontent of the following January and February, nothing could save him.

    Now that the Tories find themselves "We few, we unhappy few", with almost no chance for the next five years, they do not yet need to obsess about opinion polls. The "How can we win again?" question is vital, but not immediate. They must answer the prior question, "What is wrong with Britain?" The right person to lead them is the one whom they can trust to answer that question with the best remedies.

    Today's second stage in the long process is for MPs only. Their job is to boil the candidates down to the four who can best be presented to the party membership for its inspection – quite a different thought-process from making their final choice. They can do so fairly freely because no candidate is truly well known to the public and or has unmistakable momentum.

    So far, nothing decisive has emerged in the campaign. No one has soared like a rocket. No one has crashed and burned.

    My own, slightly tentative impressions are that both Mel Stride and James Cleverly have shown they are liked by colleagues, but that is about it. I defy anyone to discern "the vision thing" in either.

    This is not so surprising in the competent Mr Stride, because he is the most obscure, but it does seem a bit worrying that Mr Cleverly, who has held two of the great offices of state (the Foreign Office and the Home Office) is such a blank page. Can anyone say, for example, what he really thought about immigration when he oversaw it? If I were a member of a golf club, I would always be pleased to find him at the bar, but voters might want a bit more than that.

    The three candidates who surely deserve to go before the members – and whose disagreements in that forum will be instructive – are Kemi Badenoch, Robert Jenrick and Tom Tugendhat.

    Here are a few thoughts, favourable and critical, about their showings so far.

    Mrs Badenoch leaves the strongest mark. She is vivid and brave. She makes Tories feel that at last someone is ready to take on socialism once more. Most of them enjoy the sensation of this being done by a black African woman: she knows exactly how to make the other side squirm about how to fight back.

    The reverse of the same coin is that it is not only political opponents she likes to assail. She is such a pugilist that even Conservatives can feel bruised by her. There are stories of important donors being treated high-handedly, of her arriving late, of occasionally being under-briefed or tetchy or, as a minister, being less interested in her departments' work than her culture-war skirmishes.

    After the years of Boris and the weeks of Liz Truss, some want a leader who is steadier, calmer and more strategic.

    Mr Jenrick is the one who has made up the most ground in the campaign so far. Since his resignation as immigration minister last year, he has transformed himself from a seemingly rather identikit middle-ranking minister into a thoughtful and tough-minded campaigner who speaks up for those bits of England (he sits for a Nottinghamshire seat) most neglected by the modern ruling classes. He is probably the closest to the party's grass-roots.

    That might make him too narrow for the task, though. He might well steady Reform defectors, but at a high price for the "One Nation" ideal – not in its debased meaning of pink Tories who love high spending and taxes, but in its real vision of national unity across the classes. Despite determinedly slimming, he has not fully escaped the "Tory boy" caricature.

    Mr Tugendhat is the one with the most unblemished record. In his admittedly brief ministerial career, he well articulated his security portfolio, setting it in its global context. He understands how our Western economy and way of life are threatened more than at any time since the 1940s. This can be said of very few current politicians. Our freedom is at risk. I think he was the only candidate to emphasise the word "freedom" in his campaign launch speech. He is also the strongest on the Union, the others tending to think England equals Britain.

    Against that, is the feeling among some that he has not built up a strong enough parliamentary base and is a bit to the Left at a time when momentum is with the Right.

    It is too early to weigh up any of these questions finally, but I do think it is clear who deserve to make the next cut.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/09/the-tory-leadership-contest-is-a-three-horse-race

    Charles Moore has had his boots stuck in the mud of the Tory wetlands for some considerable time, so his preference for Tugentwat is unsurprising. However, I can't see any of these three winning the next election. Of course, that is assuming Max's Mad Marxists last the term. With the majority they have, only a political calamity can bring them down before time. Perhaps the Tories only hope is an unlikely rebirth where, in the spirit of the best political fiction, a giant appears out of nowhere to win a by-election and sweeps all before him (or her, of course).

    1. Not a particularly inspiring article but I don’t thing any of the main political parties have any idea of They must answer the prior question, "What is wrong with Britain?" and the answer to that is it’s the politicians themselves. Anyone with their eyes open and outside Westmonster knows that but they spend all their time gazing at their navels.

  96. I fell asleep this evening and have just woken up. So, Good Night chums, and I shall see you all later this morning.

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