Friday 25 October: The PM is right to reject demands over slavery and focus on the future

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.

705 thoughts on “Friday 25 October: The PM is right to reject demands over slavery and focus on the future”

  2. Good morning, chums. And thanks, Geoff, for today's NoTTLe site. After four Wordle attempts, I realised that the penultimate (yellow) would be letters number two. So I reached attempt number five with the wrong first letter. There were then only two letters to complete the solution. Alas, the one I chose was the wrong one.

    Wordle 1,224 X/6

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

  3. Good morning Nottlers, especially Geoff
    Today's Tale
    The bishop moved out into the Prison Remand Yard and came across three Irish inmates leaning against the wall.
    “What are you in for?” he asked the first.
    “Murder,” he replied.
    “And what did you get for that?”
    “Life.”
    The bishop asked the next man what he was in for.
    “Fraud,” he replied. “I got 15 years."
    The bishop asked the third man what was his crime.
    “Pouring petrol over Protestants and setting them alight.”
    “And what did you get for that?” asked the bishop.
    “About fifteen to the gallon,” replied the prisoner.

    1. 395296+ up ticks,

      O2O,
      This is the thanks you get when you save their multi coloured arses, then many come to the United Kingdom and act that thanks in crimilarty.

    3. Don’t forget the people of the south west of England captured by Barbary pirates and sold into slavery.
      But we know why no one mentions them, don’t we…

      1. The Barbary pirates went even further – west coast, Ireland and even Iceland! But they have a get out of jail free card as far as history is concerned!

  6. I thought this BTL comment was a peach:

    Sharon Wheeler
    4 hrs ago
    Only a demographic of a certain age will recall Isla St Clair, the Scottish singer back in the 70s.
    Married to Barry White, they later divorced after she fell for Brian Ferry and subsequently married him.
    She now answers to Isla White-Ferry.

    Taxi!

  7. This BTL comment hurts:

    Blodwyn Pig 1 hr ago

    I was recently speaking to someone (a taxi driver whom I use when needed). He painted a truly painful picture of reality. A simple example of one..

    He was in the magnificent city council offices to pay his council tax. In cash. (he is unable to get a bank card). As he counted out the cash, there were 17 individuals who have taken up residence in the city, (there are hundreds more) being handed their weekly cash handout.

    The naked practicality as he saw it was quite literally him handing in cash and at the same time seeing it recycled.

    These same people take council funded taxis to the shopping centre. Evidently they like Primark. A lot. He ignores council requested fares. He can’t bring himself to do it anymore.

    Apparently they don’t like the 122 (electric) bicycles which were provided when they took up residency at a local (and very decent) hotel. They remain in the council installed cycle berths.

    The council have no money.

    2. Once the sedation wore off i would set fire to the hospital if they tried to force me into something against my will.

      Only joking.

      I would set fire to the Doctors.

  10. Good morning all.
    Not raining with an almost warm 8°C on the Yard Thermometer and still dark.

    So, Starmer appears to acknowledge that we do owe "reparations" but are unable to afford them.
    Tw@!!!

  11. Armed Forces not ready to fight a war, admits Defence Secretary. 25 October 2024.

    John Healey said the military had been “hollowed out” and “underfunded” under the last government to such an extent that it would not be able to deter the enemy if war broke out today.

    He said: “The UK, in keeping with many other nations, has essentially become very skilled and ready to conduct military operations. What we’ve not been ready to do is to fight. Unless we are ready to fight, we are not in shape to deter.

    It is a good thing that Russia is not a threat to the UK. Were it next door and hostile we would be in real trouble. This of course is the unspoken excuse for the rundown of our military. There is no real danger.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/10/24/armed-forces-not-ready-fight-war-admits-defence-secretary/

    1. After all, Russia not only has oil, gas, coal and millions of acres of arable land … it also uses them.

    3. The real reason the military has been hollowed out and underfunded was to align us with the EU for Euro Force.

      Same reason the new aircraft carriers that have neither support ships nor aircraft.

      Both Labour and the Tories have been gaslighting us for decades.

      Good morning.

      1. The carriers were built solely to buy Brown votes in Scotland. Hell, what's a few billion of tax payers money when Labour want an MP, eh?

    4. An idea would be to get marines into the channel to open fire on any dinghy that won't return to france. I'm past caring. I don't want the scum in this country. When they set off, turn them back. if the criminal vermin won't, shoot them.

      (Yes, I am not giving it a capital deliberately. )

  12. 'Morning All
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0fd6204a729ab11e7b3b1be947cda81b83709bfa571a6e9807ef76e2fedabdba.jpg
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  13. Good Moaning.
    The excellent Madeline Grant in the DT.

    "Meet the Parliament of Illusion; they’re active but nothing of substance is happening
    This current lot of MPs are perfecting a form of hitherto unparalleled gibberish and stream of waffle

    Asked a simple question, Georgia Gould gave a masterclass of the genre of speaking but not saying anything

    "Throughout parliamentary history, certain callings together of the two Houses have been so dreadful at doing the job for which they were assembled that they earned nicknames: the Mad Parliament of 1258, the Bad Parliament of 1376, the Parliament of Dunces of 1404, the Useless Parliament of 1625.

    Watching the House of Commons today, though many of those epithets came to mind, it occurred to me that it might be time to give this gathering a name.

    This current set of MPs are finding their feet, yet already a clear trope is emerging.

    This is the Parliament of Anti-scrutiny. A Parliament so far up its own bottom that none of its words mean anything any more.

    It is the Say-Nothing Parliament, the Jargon Parliament, the Parliament of Toads. There is the illusion of activity, while nothing of substance happens.

    Today saw a parliamentary debate about that great pressing international crisis: regulating ticket resales.

    Playground scrap
    Practical solutions are generally thin on the ground, but there’s nothing that can’t be solved with a strategic review, a new regional hub, or better yet, a “mission-board”.

    This is government overreach repackaged for the age of the corporate ice-breaker: LinkedIn Stalinism.

    Meanwhile, the standard of debate increasingly sounds as if a management consultancy had arranged a playground scrap: “My dad’s bigger than your dad, by McKinsey.”

    Often this wholesale slaughter of good sense takes the form of a non-answer; eg “I will take no lectures from the Tories because of [insert horror here]”.

    Of course, the Tories were often just as guilty of blaming “the last Labour government” for their self-inflicted woes.

    But alongside this predictable line, MPs are perfecting a form of hitherto unparalleled gibberish in the Commons.

    Sarak Dyke probably did not expect the answer she wanted about business support Credit: John Rose/Alamy
    Today came a masterclass of the genre, courtesy of Georgia Gould who, though only recently elected, has already been catapulted into the ministerial ranks – to the chagrin of some more weather-beaten colleagues.

    But Gould, the daughter of Tony Blair’s pollster, is what passes for royalty in Labour. Thank goodness these brave fighters against privilege have booted out all the Dukes and Earls, eh readers?

    Lib Dem Sarah Dyke asked a really very simple question about supporting businesses in the South West.

    Eschewing specifics, Gould launched a tidal wave of word vomit.

    Growth, she said, was one of “driving missions of this government” and that “work was going on across government to support economic growth and investment”.

    The Government, she added, would soon be “consulting on a new national procurement statement to set out their expectations around mission delivery and social value”.

    Well glad we’ve cleared that one up. She might as well have given her speech in Icelandic. Or Wingdings.

    Party chairman Ellie Reeves (whose sister, husband, father-in-law and mother-in-law were all MPs before her) bemoaned cronyism in politics.

    An MP who struggled to read off her prompt-card complained that the House of Lords wasn’t reflective enough of regions.

    Cabinet minister Nick Thomas-Symonds agreed that hereditary privilege had no place in public life, while Gould Junior and Reeves Minor nodded along beside him and the Blob Dauphin Liam Conlon, son of Sue Gray and recipient of a five-figure Lord Alli donation, geared up to make his maiden speech.

    Perhaps that might be this gathering’s ultimate epithet: “The Parliament Where Irony Died.”

    At Business Questions, Munira Wilson wondered why only five hours of parliamentary time had been allocated for such a serious moral debate as the assisted dying Bill.

    In lieu of an answer came a stream of waffle, courtesy of Commons Leader and long term sense-vacuum, Lucy Powell. Wilson was reduced to mouthing “five hours!” in despair.

    Faced with this lot running the country for the length of this Pygmy Parliament, we might well have to join her and mouth “five years” as its members set fire to everything in sight."

    2. Consulating on a procurement statement.

      For [expletive] sake. They are asking people how to write a thing about buying things.

      Yet in other areas they are wasting money hand over fist – our money. It really is time this farce was ended. The Commons emptied, the lot of them kicked out, whipped and shredded and real democracy imposed.

      They achieve nothing because they don't want to. Because activity is more important than achievement. The whole farce needs burning to the ground, every 'civil servant' sacked and every quango smashed, every council burned to the ground. I doubt anyone – anywhere would miss them.

  14. 395296+ up ticks,

    And so it came to pass ,the political second coming
    is gaining traction.

    Dt,
    Three Tory councillors defect to Reform UK after Farage urges them to join party
    Two are in Scotland, making them the party’s first elected politicians north of the Border

      1. Yes, its amazing how many European place names there are in North America. I wonder if there's a connection?

        1. As if… we started it all?

          I do wonder what would have become of the world if we hadn't. For all it's faults, America is an astonishing engine of invention brought about by rampant capitalism.

      2. There’s also a suburb of Los Angeles called Ontario. It has an airport and many years ago, flying to LA on Laker SkyTrain, the main airport (LAX) was fogbound and an announcement was made that we were being diverted to Ontario and being bussed to LAX! I had imagined we were somewhere in Canada until all was explained.

    2. Irony Alert.
      Labour Scotland complain about political interference in a foreign country.

    1. By name and nature?

      Didn't A.A. Gill, the man who used to be married to Amber Rudd, get into trouble when he described an omnipresent BBC television presenter as the dike on a bike?

    4. Must be the next door constituency to Tessa Munt who is my sister’s MP (previously elected after expensegate then lost the seat but has now regained it). My sister tells me that posters for Ms Munt always just refer to her as ‘Tessa’. Can’t think why.

    5. Must be the next door constituency to Tessa Munt who is my sister’s MP (previously elected after expensegate then lost the seat but has now regained it). My sister tells me that posters for Ms Munt always just refer to her as ‘Tessa’. Can’t think why.

  16. British deputy ambassador clashes with Russian ‘journalists’ in Moscow. 25 October 2024.

    Britain has condemned Russia’s “shameful behaviour” after its diplomats were targeted in an apparent Kremlin stunt at a Moscow airport.

    Tom Dodd, the deputy ambassador to Russia, was swarmed by a crowd of people claiming to be protesters and journalists when he landed with his colleagues late on Tuesday.

    Footage taken at Vnukovo airport shows a visibly frustrated Mr Dodd grabbing a press pass from one alleged reporter and ripping up a protester’s placard.

    The only “stunt” here was British. This is another fake Mi6 story. We have a Deputy Ambassador no less, parading around a Russian airport with no personal security. He even looks hammy. He has avoided the VIP lounge and headed straight for the journalists. They even know who he is.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/10/24/britain-deputy-ambassador-russia-journalists-spying/

    2. I notice the route keeps well away from France then closer to Europe with Spain and Portugal. How very apt.

    3. The green con is just that. A hoax. It's the latest 'war' the state has started to force people to support and endorse it's stupid ideas.

      22bn could build countless nuclear, coal and gas power stations. This is simple waste. It is virtue signalling writ large. What do we do when those panels are smashed? Hell, what do we do when the sun goes in?

  19. 395296+ up ticks,

    With the Dover invasion still operating successfully
    in taking down a nation via the RNLI, surely begs the serious question " have we got a FULL time patriotic English defence minister in this healey chap, or is he doubling up with doing a milk round" ?

    Dt,
    Armed Forces not ready to fight a war, admits Defence Secretary
    John Healey says military has been ‘hollowed out’ and ‘underfunded’ under last government

    1. Not related to the late Denis Healey by any chance?
      One of the last Labour politicians worthy of respect?

      1. Denis Healey, respect?

        A gunner and Beachmaster – the latter a very precarious position in the landing zone – at Anzio in Italy.

        Military Career

        Whilst some of Healey's decisions were to prove controversial during his time in the post, his service in the Second World War certainly wasn't.

        After being awarded a double first from Oxford in his early twenties, he joined the Royal Artillery as a gunner, but quickly rose through the ranks.

        He was swiftly promoted to second lieutenant and then major, later serving with the Royal Engineers and seeing action in North Africa, the Allied invasion of Sicily and the bloody Italian campaign, making him a true 'D-Day Dodger'.

        The term was used, with a fair amount of ironic bitterness, by the British soldiers who didn't take part in the Normandy landings of 1944 – instead serving in Italy.

        Speaking at a House of Lords discussion on his career last year, former Labour MP and House of Commons speaker Betty Boothroyd remembered how "intellectual thug" Healey's wartime service left him with a unique position of authority as Defence Secretary.

        She recalled how on one occasion he was being "talked down to" by an Admiral who'd never seen wartime service – at which point he warned:

        "Look here – if you go on talking to me in those terms, I'll crawl under this table and I'll chew your balls off!"

        forcesnews.com – Denis Healey

        1. ROFLMAO at that last bit!
          Surprised there weren't a couple of expletives in that comment too.

        2. That reminds me of a song, set to the tune of Lili Marlene, about the D-Day Dodgers which summed up the ironic bitterness in the repeating last line 'We are the D-Day Dodgers in sunny Italy'.

          1. Yes, composed in response to Lady Astor's crass comment about them just having dodged D Day.

          2. Correct – there is no such thing as a D-Day dodger, it was a well kept secret. There certainly were Draft dodgers though, but nothing to do with those who served in Italy.

          3. One of my uncles served in the Commandos on D-Day and survived. He was later posted to Italy where he was injured in action – but survived. I knew nothing of this before he died, he never mentioned it.

          4. One of my grandfathers was in the Navy in the Italian campaign and killed in action. IIRC he is buried in Port of Rome military cemetary. He was Lt. Commander of a minesweeper.

      2. Beach master at Anzio for the British assault brigade. I remember watching a very good interview by George Galloway with Steven Norris on RT a few years back. The sort of interview you don't get on the BBC or Sky. Two competent politicians (even if you don't like their politics) having a respectful discussion. They were commenting on the poor quality of modern MPs and Galloway said that when he first entered the Commons he sat next to Healey and mentioned him having been a beach master. People who had done something outside of politics.

        1. Yes, an ex-gunner who, when commissioned, changed cap badge to the Sappers and finished as a Major.

          3. Ooooh, you're not allowed to downvote on Nottl. Them's the rules, apparently.

            Just a bit of inter-corps banter Bob. Particularly as both Beachley Boys. 😉

          4. Well, you are, I just don't see the point. Better to engage and discuss your point of view to help folk understand a different perspective. Otherwise all you're doing (downvoting) is uttering a petulant whinge.

          5. No, a downvote just says you don't agree with the post /premise just as an upvote say that you do agree. I've never understood why folk on here are so touchy about down voting. It's just an opinion!

          8. Once a Gunner – always a Gunner: Ubique! Healy was an honorary Yorkshireman too, he was brought up in Keighley from childhood (probably knew my uncles and aunts too) and served 35 years as MP for East Leeds.

    3. Quelle sur feckin-prise, Left wing Labourite whinges about defence spending while intentionally making the country less safe.

      Of course the military has no money. The MoD consumes most of it, same as the dept for education eats more than half the cash meant for schools. Same for every sodding department. Worse? They spaff the money they are given away on quangos and fake charities to do their jobs for them.

    4. Which war is Healey referring to? Is the military so weakened that it would be incapable of defending our homeland? There's an invasion continuing that the previous was, and now the current government is loth to stop.

      Think on that!

    1. Arabs and Muslims don't like the Poppy. It is why fuckface Starmer removed his when he had a meeting with the Muslim Council.

      This is a way to destroy it.

      1. And the memory of all those who died to give us the choice.

        A choice destroyed by the EU.
        A choice denied by our system of government which fought and squabbled trying to undo Brexit
        A government that actively sets out to find invented 'thoughtcrime' on the internet over real crime (just as the fascist Left did before during WW2).
        A government that passes ever more destructive and expensive, wasteful budgets to promote the mentally ill.
        A government that will force blackouts, that oversess crumbling roads whih it blocks off to contain us and removes our freedoms.
        A government that wants to control what we can say, do, think, eat, buy, sell, enjoy.

        When you see an MP wearing a poppy you have to realise they don't mean it. They don't care. It's something they do, valueless, denigrated, unwanted. It is a reminder of decency they lack. Of duty they despise. Of heroism they cannot understand and for a cause they are furiously trying to overturn.

        I hate them.

        1. I didn't watch the ceremony at the Cenotaph last year. I just cannot bear looking at Blair, Cameron, Major, May etc lined up in front of it.

    4. That is utterly depressing.
      Can't get RBL poppies here, so I'll wear my old one, bought when the RBL were for supporting servicemen, not fantasy causes. And spreading money where it's not donated for.

  22. Good morning all.. muggy, wet, dark heavy clouds and 15c.. Feels tropical almost . Just a little bit of clearance , not much though.

    Did anyone hear noisy aircraft flying overhead at roughly 0400hrs.. We both heard them , and wondered whether something was happening elsewhere where the RAF was required ?

    1. No, but I suspect we're in different parts of the country. I did feel my knees aching all night though, and I certainly remember thinking I'd rather not get up at 4am at the insistence of my kidney stone.

    2. He deserves pity. He doesn't know who he is so hid in a pretence. Now the pretence failed him he sought to hide in muslim.

      His is a broken, useless psyche, too frightened to face reality.

      1. He is, wibbling – how our health system deals with it is to put them on medication which they sometimes stop taking, sometimes leading to knifing incidents.

    2. Notable that the ruins of Babylon stand witness to the perpetual failure of violent Lefties.

    3. It's the Mukaab. A new self contained city that the Saudi Crown Prince is building. It's ambitious but it will be spectacular once it is up. I like it, but then I like futuristic architecture for its visionary quality, it is optimistic about what human beings can acheive and, I think, we focus far to much on the negatives of the future, the destructive 'what ifs', what if global warming, what if over population etc etc etc. The sort of thinking that is already having negative and destructive effects on the young. In short, the nihilism of our advanced societies which is destroying the soul of our children.

      There is also another factor at work, if rumors are true, and that is it is a reply to the other cube in Mecca, a deliberate "blasphemy that the clergy dare not challenge because of who commissioned and ordered it to be built.The princes cube is far grander and secular. There are rumors that MBS, to use his initials, is an atheist or a secret Christian who wishes to dispose of the power of the clergy in Arabia for the obvious reason that they hold the country back with their reactionary views. So it is a direct challenge to the archaic powers that be for the obvious reason that it will be superior in every way to the cube in Mecca.
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84Sm_9OAUTQ

    4. It's the Mukaab. A new self contained city that the Saudi Crown Prince is building. It's ambitious but it will be spectacular once it is up. I like it, but then I like futuristic architecture for its visionary quality, it is optimistic about what human beings can acheive and, I think, we focus far to much on the negatives of the future, the destructive 'what ifs', what if global warming, what if over population etc etc etc. The sort of thinking that is already having negative and destructive effects on the young. In short, the nihilism of our advanced societies which is destroying the soul of our children.

      There is also another factor at work, if rumors are true, and that is it is a reply to the other cube in Mecca, a deliberate "blasphemy that the clergy dare not challenge because of who commissioned and ordered it to be built.The princes cube is far grander and secular. There are rumors that MBS, to use his initials, is an atheist or a secret Christian who wishes to dispose of the power of the clergy in Arabia for the obvious reason that they hold the country back with their reactionary views. So it is a direct challenge to the archaic powers that be. For the obvious reason that it will be superior in every way to the cube in Mecca.
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84Sm_9OAUTQ

  25. Morning all 🙂😊
    Back to normal weather wise.
    The pm has his own indigenous slavery system being set up.
    And making impossible demands on British taxpayers and pensioners, who are being ripped off for working hard all their lives.

  26. SIR — Speaking of pairs in cricket (Letters, October 24), if you were to play against Cresswell of the Bassetlaw league in the late 1960s and early 1970s, you could be faced with a bowling duo of Swindell and Fiddler.

    Paul Marshall
    Ambergate, Derbyshire

    I doubt that very much, Paulie, there is no such place as 'Cresswell'. You may well have played against Creswell (home of Creswell Crags), a mining village with a team in the Bassetlaw League, situated just inside Derbyshire near the Nottinghamshire border.

  27. Friday 25th October, 2024

    Sue Edison

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/95069cfb3259e28be7fbcd7c7941f5fb53726e0507a54f73a2b8349848c9cca6.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f15108925be65a9a2608d8e25edca14c950fe7218c958fddb1d38927a117d0b9.png

    I think we chose this song for your last year – but that's no reason not to play it again!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPulEz0gVj8

    With fond birthday wishes,

    Caroline and Rastus

    And here's another song:

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

      3. Wandering around the Left Bank in Paris, one sultry Saturday evening in 1977, I came upon two young American students (at the Sorbonne) who were entertaining a street crowd by playing their guitars and singing (in English) Everly Brothers songs. As they burst into "Bye Bye Love", I positioned myself between them and joined them singing as a three-part harmony. They joyfully slapped me on the back afterwards and thanked me. I was fairly sober at the time.😊

  28. Happy Birthday to Sue Edison, have a lovely day today and I hope you enjoy everything you do 🥰🤩🤗🥂🍾 cheers to you

      1. Have a wonderful day,
        One of the few birthdays that you can stand on your head and be the same!

          5. It must be all those bingo adverts on the telly. There's more of them than funeral ads.

          9. Another of the few.

            I didn’t try to list and count them all, and it depends how one writes the numbers, but there aren’t very many,
            I try to make a comment regarding the age, and I thought a Phizzee -type observation inappropriate.

        1. Thank you! Don’t worry about breakfast for me but I will try and make it to St Pancras tomorrow morning. Is the Wetherspoons inside the station?

          1. Apparently yes.
            Just posted my mobile no. on one of your posts from yesterday.
            Let me know when you've got it and I'll delete it.

      5. Happy Birthday, Sue – have a good one, and one on me 🙂 Tenterhooks for tomorrow, apparently expecting arrest prior to march…

        1. Thank you! Unfortunately if I’m to be out tomorrow, the laundry needs doing today but might go out for lunch.

          1. Heh, do have a lovely day Sue. I remember what I was doing for my birthday to celebrate and I said 'tumbling the washing rather than hanging it out.

      8. Yo Sue, Happy Birthday for today and of course Happy 364 Unbithdays 'til your next one

        1. Thanks! My dad always used to add the next number in January but no, he didn’t think I was a horse!

    1. Anyone who shows the slightest sign of upset over the incident will be given lodgings in one of the freed up prison cells.

  31. Grattis på födelsedagen to Wellin'ton. 🥤🍦🎂🍖

    Hope Ol' Boot got you a decent present.

        1. Would you please tell us something about it? Love Joan Collins. I think she is incredible. She was great as Alexis Colby in Dynasty.

          1. It was her and husband Percy Gibson seated on wingback chairs centre stage, with a screen behind and above them onto which clips from various events in her past were projected. He acted as MC and did it very well. Various amusing anecdotes came out as well as some opinions and gags. The second half was mostly a Q&A session with a roving microphone for individual audience members to ask her questions. She fielded these very well, even the awkward questions were handled with good grace. It was an entertaining evening which was clearly appreciated by the entire audience.

      1. Wishing you a very Happy Birthday, Sue! Hope you have a wonderful day! 🍷🎂🎉🥂and it was lovely to see you smiling face at the Nottle get together in Rules! 💕

    1. I guessed as much when I read that she pays someone to do her personal tax return, allegedly charging it to the public purse! She’s not the only cabinet member to embellish their past.

      1. She's a liar and a crook who has no concept of probity or self control. She, like all MPs has no care for right or wrong, she just slaps everything she can on the public purse because why not? There are no consequences to her for immorality.

        1. Now that Jacqui Smith, who claimed her husband's pornographic videos on her parliamentary expenses when she was home secretary, has been elevated to the House of Lords she should be given the job of setting up a special video library.

    2. We've had imposters wasting our money for decades. A group that refuses to acknowledge basic economics and rigidly adheres to failed dogma rather than rational economics. It's called the Treasury.

      Osborne created a giant quango to legitimise his idiotic dogwaffle.

  35. Good morning all. Cloudy but bright with a light breeze. Washing on the line and making a start on washing the windows and frames that I should have done in the Spring.

    After the revelations re Tommy Robinson and his documentary film, here is another anti-establishment patriot suffering the inadequacies of the justice system.

    In the words of the woke this incident would be called a mostly peaceful attack with a brick and a samurai sword.
    https://x.com/GoldingBF/status/1849511736946143430

    1. What did he expect? He should have said he misgendered you. Violent black crime is the norm and almost expected, certainly not considered criminal by the statist Left.

    2. Specifically, White lives don’t matter.

      Edit. I wonder how many of the jury were born here.

    3. Specifically, White lives don’t matter.

      Edit. I wonder how many of the jury were born here.

    1. LSO thinks that it is suicide.

      We think that the Elite wish to produce a type of feudal system where the Elite live in complete luxury,

      and the remaining 98% of low status work hard in poverty for their wealth and pleasure.

        1. ThThey would prefer that you call it the good old days, slavery has hints of reparations which they don't want.

    2. Matt Goodwin has written recently on a similar theme, about politics being less about Left vs Right but more about Controllers vs Liberators.
      A couple of quotes:

      "What this is really about is a crucial new dividing line in liberal democracies; a line that separates, on one side, people who we might call Liberators, who are fighting to preserve a public square in which citizens can speak freely without fear of negative consequences or having political bias imposed on them from above and, on the other side, the Controllers, people who are now working overtime to try and dominate and control the public square, including the supply, flow, and interpretation of information and, ultimately, truth."

      Concluding:
      "Which is why Controllers are now gunning after Elon Musk’s platform, as well as platforms like GB News, which they seek to discredit by expanding terms like “hate” and “misinformation” while simultaneously using politically-motivated ‘Centres for Disinformation’ and ‘fact-checkers’ to reinforce the narrative and project an air of authority and legitimacy, when in reality, as we see with this Centre for Countering Digital Hate, many of these entities are packed with Controllers and party allies.

      They simply cannot stand the fact that others have influence and hence power in the public square, or are creating a level playing field in which the views of Liberators are represented and respected just as much as the views of Controllers.

      And this is why, like Michael Gurri, many previously apathetic and still moderate citizens are now swinging behind politicians, parties and platforms that seek to defend Liberators over Controllers, who openly acknowledge the obvious flaws in figures like Donald Trump and Europe’s populists but who increasingly feel, on balance, that they’d much rather be led by imperfect politicians who don’t want to control everything than progressive authoritarians who want to control and dominate anything that stands in their way."
      Source: https://www.mattgoodwin.org/p/what-labour-and-the-lefts-plan-to (not sure whether paywalled or free, sorry)

    3. Can’t disagree with any of that.

      In the words of Romald Teagan: Don’t just do something, stand there.

      I want the Government out of my life. It has no place regulating the price of Oasis concert tickets.

    1. We stick the pollution in hotels. We're far worse at pandering to the vermin.

      They should be collared and chained to a post in the open, fed twice a week and forgotten about.

    2. We must not forget that using national stereotypes in jokes is not very nice and may even be considered racist.

      In Irish jokes the Irish are always portrayed as rather stupid but the way they have allowed so many immigrants into their country shows how inaccurate this stereotype is.

    3. We should build something like this for at least 50,000 in the middle of Dartmoor and surrounded with razor wire. All illegals end up there until they ask to be repatriated.

  38. 395296+ up ticks,

    May one ask,
    Why would we want a second set of Neanderthals when we have had these same types in great numbers supporting & voting lab/lib/con coalition party for at least four decades, and the voters choice appearing in every governing cabinet over that time span.

    Dt,

    What Neanderthals really looked like – and the twins bringing them back to life
    Alfons and Adrie Kennis have devoted their lives to creating models of our ancient relatives – sometimes with controversial results

  39. Hallo all. It's a gloomy day here in glorious West Sussex. Lights on. Not raining yet but I'm sure it will pretty soon. On the slavery thing which is nothing more than an attempt at theft by people incapable of running a decent society, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Zimbabwe, formally a prosperous country called Rhodesia, as proof. I watched this morning a short video on the topic by Darren Grimes that featured the delusional Perpetual Moaner in Chief, James O'Brian and Dawn Butler another black racist. But, at least, she isn't as bad as the insufferable Her Royal Highness, Dr Adeshola Mos-Shogbamimu another race grifter from an incredibly privileged background pretending to be down trodden. So, here we are, the video. Enjoy!
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2FenZNQrZM

  40. Hallo all. It's a gloomy day here in glorious West Sussex. Lights on. Not raining yet but I'm sure it will pretty soon. On the slavery thing which is nothing more than an attempt at theft by people incapable of running a decent society, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Zimbabwe, formally a prosperous country called Rhodesia, as proof. I watched this morning a short video on the topic by Darren Grimes that featured the delusional Perpetual Moaner in Chief, James O'Brian and Dawn Butler another black racist. But, at least, she isn't as bad as the insufferable Her Royal Highness, Dr Adeshola Mos-Shogbamimu another race grifter from an incredibly privileged background pretending to be down trodden. So, here we are, the video. Enjoy!
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2FenZNQrZM

  42. Madeleine Grant’s Parliamentary sketch:

    “Throughout parliamentary history, certain callings together of the two Houses have been so dreadful at doing the job for which they were assembled that they earned nicknames: the Mad Parliament of 1258, the Bad Parliament of 1376, the Parliament of Dunces of 1404, the Useless Parliament of 1625.

    Watching the House of Commons today, many of those epithets came to mind, but it might be time to give this latest gathering its one name.

    This current set of MPS are finding their feet, yet already a clear trope is emerging. This is the Parliament of Anti-scrutiny. A Parliament so far up its own bottom that none of its words mean anything any more.
    It is the Say-nothing Parliament, the Jargon Parliament, the Parliament of Toads. There is the illusion of activity, while nothing of substance happens.

    Today saw a parliamentary debate about that great pressing international crisis: regulating ticket resales.
    Practical solutions are generally thin on the ground, but there’s nothing that can’t be solved with a strategic review, a new regional hub, or better yet, a “mission-board”. And the standard of debate increasingly sounds as if a management consultancy had arranged a playground scrap: “My dad’s bigger than your dad.”

    Today came a masterclass of the genre, courtesy of Georgia Gould who, though only recently elected, has already been catapulted into the ministerial ranks – to the chagrin of some more weather-beaten colleagues.
    But Gould, the daughter of Tony Blair’s pollster, is what passes for royalty in Labour. Thank goodness these brave fighters against privilege have booted out all the Dukes and Earls, eh readers?

    Lib Dem Sarah Dyke asked a very simple question about supporting businesses. Eschewing specifics, Gould launched a tidal wave of word vomit. Growth, she said, was one of “driving missions of this government, which, she added, would soon be “consulting on a new national procurement statement to set out their expectations around mission delivery and social value”.

    Well glad we’ve cleared that one up. She might as well have given her speech in Icelandic. Or Wingdings.
    At Business Questions, Munira Wilson wondered why only five hours of parliamentary time had been allocated for such a serious moral debate as the assisted dying Bill.

    In lieu of an answer came a stream of waffle, courtesy of Commons Leader and long term sense-vacuum, Lucy Powell. Wilson was reduced to mouthing “five hours” in despair.

    Faced with this lot running the country for the length of this Pygmy Parliament, we might well have to join her and mouth “five years” as its members set fire to everything in sight.”

    1. They don't call it Question Period for nothing, calling it Answer Period would be a lie – and we know that politicians never tell porkies.

  43. Rejoice, the nation is saved
    We can even pay out reparations to the commonwealth

    Latest Breaking News.

    Some months ago researchers at the Treasury were going through some dusty old archived files from the Dennis Healy’ era and they made a remarkable discovery.
    In a file labelled EMERGENCY, they found a packet of seeds.
    Well it just so happened that the new Chancellor of the Exchequer is a very keen gardener and planted some in her greenhouse.
    Miraculously one germinated and has now grown into a strong sapling, botanists have since examined the rare plant and have a theory that it could be an Acer Pecunia Magicus, thought to have gone extinct in the 1970s, also known as a fast growing magic money tree.
    What luck for the country

  44. Evidence, if any more is needed, that politicians, and especially the dolts infesting the Labour party, do not have the faintest idea of what they are dealing with. This shower is attempting to partition the people into groups and deal with each group as it sees fit, and not equally.

    Labour should clearly declare where its loyalty lies and then take things from there.

    They will not do that as a) telling the truth is beyond their wit and b) the truth would be the final wake-up call to the real British people, including those settled and fully integrated former immigrants.

    https://x.com/LeeAndersonMP_/status/1849714180896457064

    1. Sorry to repeat.. but Starkey nailed it before the election. He warned that Starmer revealed in an interview that he viewed "working people" as those "without any savings". So Starkey deduced that Starmer would wage war on those with savings and view those savers as enemy of the "working people".

      1. So working people is really 'poor people' or, how about my developer chum who earns £70K a year yet lives on take aways and has everything on credit, including a big landrover and has no savings?

        He works all hours and spends it all. Is this the Keynesian 'worker' who spends all his money? Or perhaps the rig worker in Aberdeen on £3000 a week with a £2000 drug habit? I think what Starmer means is 'anyone who's vote we can buy because they're a profligate, financially inept berk with no concept of deferring gratification.'

        1. Here you go.. you work out what's going on in the brain of PM Trot Sir Stu Grant.

          Good people: ..
          "when things get a bit tough, they can't simply get a cheque book out and sort of write their way out of the problems that they're facing.

          But [it’s] the sort of people that have the anxiety I suppose in the bottom of their stomach that should something happen to them or their family, they know they can't simply write a cheque to get themselves out of any future difficulty. They're the people I have most in mind when I make the decisions I make.”

          Bad people: the opposite?

        2. He also means anybody who has a lifetime job with a very good pension and who spends all his/her income because he/she sees no need to save.
          When I was a child this was a cause of some simmering resentment in my extended family. My uncle worked for one of the big High Street banks and never had any money so my widowed grandmother was always helping him out and there were whingeing comparisons with my parents who lived in a better house, had a better car etc etc. But my uncle retired at 60 on 2/3 his final salary as a non-contributory pension and he had had an interest free mortgage for all his working life. My father earned more money than him but had a very poor pension provision after the company he had been the backbone of was sold out to venture capitalist backed sharks, so my parents were heavily dependent on income from shares and savings.
          As someone with a moderate public sector pension, but whose son works free-lance and has no pension because putting a roof over his head has been his first priority, I am painfully conscious of the ‘two nations’.

      2. As Starmer has accumulated his own wealth through lies, theft and corruption, saving is probably not a concept he understands. (Just heard the latest news bulletin on GBN. Starmer is backtracking. Surprise, not!)

  45. Vine discussing slavery again stirring it up as usual. Never a mention of course about the 'barbary pirates' who during the Muslim domination in Spain. Sailed around the coasts of the British Isles and Ireland stealing children, kept in caves for the use of at Alhambra. Pet lion fodder when the Palace residents had finished with them.
    Hello all you moaning 'do-gooders' !!!!

    1. .– …. .- – / .- .-. . / -.– — ..- / – .- .-.. -.- .. -. –. / .- -… — ..- – ..–..

        1. Being silly.
          I had a problem with my phone had to shut down and restart as comments can't be left blank I put three dots while I fixed the problem.

      2. -.-. — — .–. . -. … .- – .. — -. / ..-. — .-. / .– …. .. – . / … .-.. .- …- . …

    2. Jeremy Whine coming on any radio or TV channel is a signal to change to something else, even if it isn't transmitting at the time!!

  46. Just passing through to wish Our Susan a very happy birthday. She is no age, of course; nobbut a lass!

  47. It’s odd how life goes on! Our grandson was 4 yesterday, and his 96 year old great-Gran died in the night.

    1. So sorry , but I expect great-Gran lived a good life and as you say, life goes on , except we are the next generation on the waiting list , sadly .

      At least it feels like it here because the village is full of baby boomers like us.

      1. Agree Belle. I want to live long enough to see the next general election, I hope I do. And I hope I live a decade beyond that. We must make way for new, but life is so interesting I really would prefer to stick around.

        1. From the Telegraph

          It’s time for the young and ambitious to leave Britain
          Rachel Reeves’s Budget will herald a new era of unprecedented state command and control

          Sam Ashworth-Hayes24 October 2024 7:00am BST
          Fly into Britain through Heathrow, and one of the first things you’ll see on getting off the plane is a helpful sign pointing the way to baggage reclaim. Looking ahead to the Budget, it might be worth adding a second, larger sign: “Abandon all hope, ye who pay tax here”.

          Ahead of the Budget, the only element that appears to be in doubt is just how much Chancellor Rachel Reeves intends to raise taxes by. The Institute for Fiscal Studies thinks we’re in for £25bn in tax rises; the Bank of America, £35bn.

          That taxes will rise, however, is taken as read by everyone. And it’s this part, rather than anything in particular that the Government is doing, that worries me.

          The most frightening chart in British politics can be found on page 4 of the drily named “Fiscal Risks and Sustainability” report published by the Office for Budget Responsibility.

          Over the next 50 years, government policy is expected to maintain revenue at around 40pc of GDP. Spending, meanwhile, is poised to cross the 60pc threshold last reached in 1944-1945, when German foreign policy led to unusually strong spending pressures.

          It’s worth thinking about what this looks like in practice. In 2020-2021 – when the economy was shut down, the NHS was running at maximum capacity, money was pouring into test-and-trace and a quarter of the country’s employees went on furlough at one point or another – government spending reached 53pc of GDP.

          So even the pandemic state at its most interventionist looks relatively slim compared to the relatively near future. What the report is projecting is a level of state command and control essentially unprecedented outside of three years at the height of the Second World War, funded by borrowing equal to a fifth of national income, every single year.

          This is absurd, and unsustainable, and the OBR says as much. The problem for the beleaguered youth of Britain is that the way out isn’t particularly palatable either: one way or another, we appear to be due for a dramatic change in the structure of the state.

          It looks suspiciously as if the change in spending will come after the rise in taxes, when today’s workers are closer to the end of their careers than their start. After all, the real fiscal bite isn’t when we’re paying in, but when it comes to our turn to take out.

          Recommended

          Until that point, there’s a good stretch of high but not impossible spending to get through, which we’ll be expected to fund. And thanks to our population structure, it doesn’t really matter which party is in office: with the over-55s quite possibly already accounting for a majority of votes cast, the weight of demography is on the side of draining the taxpayer further.

          The NHS, the state pension system, and state-funded elderly care are all but untouchable – turkeys don’t vote for Christmas – and those nearing retirement don’t vote to reduce their own entitlements when there’s any other option available. Unfortunately, spending on these three items also accounts for an additional 10.5pc of GDP by the mid 2070s. Add on the interest on our expanding debts, and that’s effectively all fiscal wriggle room erased.

          Taxes and borrowing will rise until they can rise no further, and somebody will be left standing when the music stops.

          Back in the present day, Reeves isn’t going to stand at the despatch box, lay all this out to the public, and then seek a mandate to reshape the state entirely to avert a crisis in the future. Then again, neither was Jeremy Hunt. Last time I looked, the Conservative offering for young people was corvee labour in care homes and the delight of funding a quadruple lock.

          On this issue, the parties are united: kick the can down the road, and hope like hell the job of sorting it out lands with someone else.

          It was partly these pressures that led the Conservative Party to turn to mass migration on an unprecedented scale, bringing in everyone from doctors and nurses to teachers and care workers in an attempt to hold down the cost of government services, and flooding the economy with cheap labour in an attempt to stimulate activity.

          The long run effect of this sugar rush, however, may well be to make Britain even less attractive to home-grown talent. The OBR believes each low-wage worker will cost Britain £151,000 by state pension age, £500,000 by 80 and £1m by 100. In other words, the “migration” strategy simply shunts the costs of today’s retirees into the future – and into the period where state spending is already unsustainable.

          Better still, in the present day, it puts further pressure on a housing market where home-ownership is out of reach for many young people in what used to be considered good jobs, and unpleasantly expensive for those who can afford it.

          As economists are fond of pointing out, migration responds to both pull factors and push factors. The UK’s abysmal growth record – which has left us with per capita incomes closer to Poland than the United States – gives rise to the pull. Housing, and rising taxes, the push.

          This is particularly true for high earners, given that the Labour Party appears to have settled on combining a laissez-faire approach to mass migration with a special antipathy towards the successful, attempting to load as much of the rising cost of public services as possible on to those with the “broadest shoulders”.

          Recommended

          With 1pc of the population already paying 29pc of the income tax, however, this strategy is starting to run into diminishing returns. This is particularly true when we consider the behaviour the state incentivises: parents who cross the £100k threshold will be left worse off thanks to the withdrawal of childcare support. As absurd as it sounds, they’re better off earning £99,000 than £134,000.

          Add to their tax bill further by raising employer National Insurance contributions – a tax that is charged to companies, but is effectively paid by workers – or by targeting their investments, and an increasing number with aspirations to be in this group may just give up on the whole enterprise.

          The UK is already expected to experience the largest outflow of millionaires of any country other than communist China this year. As the Government continues in its effort to create a hostile environment for the young and ambitious, the lure of friendlier jurisdictions will become harder to resist for those with less wealth, but equally marketable talents.

          Rather than worrying about American businesses asset-stripping British companies, we should be more concerned that they’ll cotton on to Samo Burja’s idea that Britain is an underdeveloped English-speaking country where you can get talent dirt cheap, and start poaching our high earners.

          Increasingly, those who can leave may find it better to do so.

          1. The first thing I notice at Heathrow are signs telling passengers not to harass staff (or some such). In the US there is a picture of Sleepy and signs saying Welcome to the USA. Just a completely different mindset there.

          2. The young should stay and fight. You can keep retreating but eventually, because you keep relinquishing ground, the devil will be at your door or at your children’s door and then he will be to powerful to resist.

    4. A sad lesson for the lad that death is the natural conclusion of someone's life.
      A fact we try to run away from all too often.

      My condolences.

      1. Nobody should be allowed in, unless they have at least two direct-line grand-parents in their family tree and can prove it.

    2. A long time ago I did a project in Luanda, the people there wouldn't venture above them. Just a few miles north is the ultimate hellhole of Africa where even the most savage of savages that roam Africa wouldn't dare go. Even the resource hungry Chinese CCP have given up. Just ask Charles Marlow.. avoid Congo & Congolese at all cost.

      No no no.. scream the progressives.. "Once they land here they instantly become aware of 1000 years of British history and embrace common law & decency. In no time they will be watching reruns of Dad's Army."

      1. Hello K.

        When I was a youngster , and my parents were in Nigeria , father was working for a UK based company , I was attending boarding school in the UK, but flying out to them for holidays ..

        One Christmas 1960, after spending Christmas with my parents in Lagos , the aircraft was a BOAC Christmas special , a Britannia .. the aircraft landed in Kano , stop over , many white adults , nuns and priests and their little dogs boarded , and we were wondering why many of the adults were in bandages , heads bandaged , arms in slings etc.

        The captain of the aircraft asked that we all keep quiet , and told us that the grown ups needed to sleep before they reached Rome .

        These people were Belgian missionaries who had been attacked in the Congo , many had been massacred , and us English expat children were scared and worried .. for our own parents safety.. because Nigeria was celebrating independence at that time , and there had been riots.

    3. A long time ago I did a project in Luanda, the people there wouldn't venture above them. Just a few miles north is the ultimate hellhole of Africa where even the most savage of savages that roam Africa wouldn't dare go. Even the resource hungry Chinese CCP have given up. Just ask Charles Marlow.. avoid Congo & Congolese at all cost.

      No no no.. scream the progressives.. "Once they land here they instantly become aware of 1000 years of British history and embrace common law & decency. In no time they will be watching reruns of Dad's Army."

  49. Late on Parade as Mr.T would say.

    So belated Birthday Wishes to Sue E on reaching 69 (A remarkable and somewhat unpunny number!)

    Happy Birthday Sue!

      2. When was your birthday Sue, did I catch it? If not, a sincere Happy Birthday, belated, to you. Love Johnathan.

          2. If you let Rastus know, he’ll give us a heads up well in advance and you’ll be showered with good wishes 🙂

      5. Happy Birthday, Sue!! Singing loudly between sneezes brought on by winds madly blowing tree debris around Buenos Aires 😎 x

    1. A lifetime of otherness. Oh bug off you racist wretch. You're just a nasty little Lefty.

      Clear off.

  52. Good Morning!

    Free Speech has two short articles new today, one by Duke Maskell on how, under the woke incompetents runing – and ruining – society, judgements of the plausibility of scientific theory have become not just mistaken but hopelessly confused by having politics beaten into them, forming a mixture that allows science to go on only as ‘the science’ or ‘settled science’ and something to be obeyed. The other is another Gripe – on alchohol sold in supermarkets – by Graham Bedford.

      1. Peach of a volley?

        Who can forget Dan Maskell's commentaries on matches at Wimbledon?

          1. I’m not good at the parenthetical wink type jokes Bill. Still come and comment anyhow.

  53. Four fateful days in the life of Tommy Robinson
    https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/four-fateful-days-in-the-life-of-tommy-robinson/

    BTL

    Now is the time for Nigel Farage to acknowledge that many of Tommy Robinson's sincere beliefs are very much the same as the views espoused by The Reform Party.

    If Farage cannot do this and if he persists in treating Robinson as an uncouth, mindless yob he will very much damage his own credibility.

    People are beginning to wonder if Robinson has more sincerity and is more genuine than Farage. To paraphrase Martin Luther King: 'A person should be judged by the quality of his character and not whether he went to Dulwich, Eton or the Luton Sink Sec Mod.

      2. I don't think it is a good look for Farage to continue to present himself as a snob!

        Even if he does not like the way in which Robinson looks, dresses and his way of speaking Farage should admit that basically the two of them have many basic political views in common.

        Whatever Farage's personal antipathy towards Robinson he should be prepared to proclaim just how monstrously Robinson has been treated. If Reform does not pledge itself to fair treatment of those with whom it disagrees or disapproves then what is its purpose?

      3. Yes, I think Farage is playing it smart. If Reform are to really replace the Tories then they need to be media and public savvy, which Farage is.

    2. Very tricky for any politician to express support for a person who has a conviction for an offence involving violence.

  55. And it's not just men, Tommy Boy.
    I feel as if I've been sent to the head master's study.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-13998771/TOM-UTLEY-Pious-pep-talks-queues-Timbuktu-feel-nuisance-no-wonder-men-age-swerve-sclerotic-NHS.html

    TOM UTLEY: Pious pep talks, queues to Timbuktu, and being made to feel a nuisance – no wonder men of my age swerve the sclerotic NHS

    All week I've been afflicted by a pernicious bug, which our one remaining resident son brought home at the start of half term from the school where he teaches Spanish.

    I won't describe the symptoms of my condition, because they are far too disgusting. Enough to say that after one near-disastrous venture into town, I'm playing it safe today by writing this from home, within easy dashing distance of the plumbing.

    Though our health-fanatic son was over his bout of illness after only a couple of days, I seem at last to have reached the age (I'll be 71 next month) at which these things are much harder to shake off. It could be that my half-century of enthusiastic smoking and drinking may be starting to catch up with me.

    Indeed, after six days of this misery, I'm beginning to fear that if it drags on for much longer, I'll have to bite the bullet and face the ghastly ordeal of seeking help from the sclerotic NHS (or 'RNHS', as politicians of every hue insist on calling it).

    We can all guess what that will mean: endless queues, referrals to join other endless queues, pious pep talks about my bad habits and generally being made to feel like a massive inconvenience, rather than the paying customer every taxpayer is.

    As for the chances of seeing a doctor I've met before – well, I won't hold my breath.

    Young people may not believe me, but there was once a time when contacting the family doctor wasn't a prospect to fill anyone with dread.

    In my childhood and youth, patients could telephone in the morning and make an appointment at the surgery for that very same day, with a GP we actually knew. If we were bed-bound, he or she would make the effort to come round to our homes, at any hour of the day or night.

    But for most of us, this is a just fantasy today. In this age of NHS 111 and online consultations, surgeries shut up shop outside office hours, many GPs retire in their 50s and, shockingly, only one in five works full-time – down from an already pretty unimpressive one in three in 2017.

    Meanwhile, more than seven million patients languish on waiting lists for hospital treatment, and queues in A&E stretch from here to Timbuktu.

    Before I go any further, I must acknowledge that there are a great many shining exceptions to all my gripes about the service. There are still a few hospitals that work efficiently, while many dedicated medics still uphold the finest traditions in every branch of their profession.

    I know that readers will have their own NHS heroes but, at the risk of embarrassing him, I'd like to single out Dr Richard Hull, the specialist who took charge of my kidneys at King's College Hospital, London (I believe he has since moved on).

    He was the man my GP sent me to see when I last went to the doctor six or seven years ago, at my wife's insistence, about a strange rash on my leg.

    When I told Dr Hull that his regular Thursday afternoon surgeries clashed with my duties at work, he volunteered to come in early on Thursday mornings, specially to see me. I call that a kindness far beyond the call of duty.

    I should also offer an accolade to Dr Carley Hennah, a GP at my local surgery, who correctly identified my strange, kidney-related rash as something called HSP: a rare disorder in adults but one which is, humiliatingly, far more common in children. No self-respecting grown-up wants to be told he has a kiddies' disease!

    The downside was that, inevitably, tests for my kidney trouble brought other problems to light, and I am now made to undergo annual blood tests as a condition of continuing to receive medication.

    This year I escaped lightly, having had to give up only two precious afternoons to visit the testing centre (the first sample showed some abnormality and so they asked for another, which was, thankfully, OK).

    But the previous year, as I recounted in this space, I was instructed to report immediately to A&E – my first visit since I broke my leg when I was five. Apparently, my blood test revealed a life-threatening level of potassium.

    The upshot was that I had to spend seven wretched hours in three separate waiting rooms at King's, queuing for one test after another – feeling like a complete fraud since, as far as I could tell, nothing whatsoever was wrong with me – before I was finally allowed home with a clean bill of health.

    Perhaps you'll understand, then, why so many men of my generation – and, yes, we tend to be the worst offenders – try to avoid any dealings with the NHS for as long as we possibly can.

    Ignoring all invitations to optional routine tests, we just hope that time and a couple of aspirin will work their ancient magic on whatever may happen to be wrong with us. Either that or we wait until our womenfolk can bear our moans of self-pity no longer, marching us to the surgery at the point of a rolling-pin.

    As for the answer to how to make the NHS more efficient and less forbidding, you might think that after 14 years to mull over the question in opposition, Labour would have devised some sort of coherent strategy.

    Indeed, I had high hopes for our new Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, who before the election spelt out some uncomfortable truths to the unions about the need for radical reform, unhampered by old-fashioned dogma.

    But what has he come up with since he took office? Apart from a couple of gimmicks – such as dishing out free weight-loss jabs and Fitbit-style smart watches – nothing but a ruddy 'conversation'!

    That's if we don't count surrendering to striking doctors' pay demands, for zilch in return, or indulging in tiresome nanny-statery through various plans to make us give up our every last little vice. All for the questionable pleasure of living into extreme old age in puritanical self-denial.

    Oh, how much longer can we go on like this, allowing the NHS to keep bankrupting our economy, while politicians cling to the myth that there's something sacred about funding British healthcare entirely through general taxation?

    Doctors are forever telling us that unless more public money is shovelled into the NHS, more and more of them will emigrate to Australia – where medicine is less stressful and more rewarding, since the pay and the health outcomes are both so much better than here in Britain.

    Here's an idea for them: instead of exporting our doctors to Australia, how about campaigning to import something like Australia's mixed-funding model to Britain?

    But I must stop now, before I get on to a few other wizard ideas for making the NHS experience less grim – I happen to have an urgent appointment with the plumbing."

    1. I too have been v unwell for the last 4 weeks. Now awaiting a medical practitioner. It seems to take hours.

  56. Rastus, was this you on DT yesterday?

    Richard Tracey
    16 HRS AGO
    PENSION APARTHEID IS THEFT.

    (All people should have access to the same pension schemes. If that is not possible then those working in the private sector should be paid substantially more than those working in the public sector to compensate for the fact that their pensions are so much worse)

  57. Rastus, was this you on DT yesterday?

    Richard Tracey
    16 HRS AGO
    PENSION APARTHEID IS THEFT.

    (All people should have access to the same pension schemes. If that is not possible then those working in the private sector should be paid substantially more than those working in the public sector to compensate for the fact that their pensions are so much worse)

  59. Only just! Put wrong letter in twice.
    Wordle 1,224 6/6

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

    1. I scraped in today too.

      Wordle 1,224 6/6

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

    2. Same wrong letter for me as well.
      .
      Wordle 1,224 5/6

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

    3. Tough today.

      Wordle 1,224 5/6

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

    2. The Radio Times recently did a plug for a programme with Miriam Margolyes [The Last Leg, 25 Oct at 2200] but the programme details listed her as Gargoyles!

      2. Can't load the image at the moment but Miriam Gargoyles pic was alongside a gargoyle that looked similar to her in Private Eye.

  62. One of the recent cases of medically assisted suicide in Ontario was a man suffering from a Post Covid vaccination illness.

    At the same time we are assured that the covid shots are perfectly safe and we should toddle on down to the pharmacy and get the latest jab – that is now good for the cefunct covid variant doing the rounds back in May!

    Right on baby!

    1. …cefunct (sic) covid variant doing the rounds back in May!

      A case of "Same shit, different day".

      Take that any way you feel inclined to.

  63. The anniversary of Agincourt today. No two finger salute among the emojis on my phone. Wonder why?

    1. I only found one but it wasn't downloadable.

      The Italians like to hand gesture quite a lot. Rather rude some times especially when done with an expletive.

      The curled finger one with a very rude saying won't be repeated here !

      Nope. Not gonna. Go look for yourself !

  65. Canada’s woke nightmare: a warning to the West. 25 October 2024.

    This prognostication has come true with a vengeance, as the vulnerable young women it confused have been lining up in droves of thousands – many of them minors – for the utterly brutal double mastectomies that have now become far more common as a form of “gender expression”. I believe that professional participation in all of this – particularly the surgeries, which in the case of the boys affected means castration – is tantamount to the crimes against humanity that (particularly) everyone on the left absolutely forswore, in principle, following the fascist atrocities of the National Socialist State.

    This is sobering reading. I know Richardl_ keeps us up to date on Canada’s travails but not to this extent. A must read.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/10/25/canadas-woke-nightmare-a-warning-to-the-west/

    1. That whole article is a depressing summary of how bad Canada has become.

      The Canadian Paediatric Association announced that the findings of the Cass Review were not applicable in Canada and they would continue to encourage gender sex changes for youth.

      Peterson is not in Trudeaus good books, he was accused of being paid by Russia to spread false information.

    3. Enslaved males from East Africa were (no source so hearsay) traditionally castrated, but not so with the Atlantic trade.

      1. No. The Southern Democrats wanted them to be able to produce more slaves from what comes naturally.

  66. More on the collapsing justice system.

    Tommy Robinson is due in court on Tuesday re his breach of a court injunction relating to playing the video, Silenced. However, it appears that the injunction was not served correctly i.e. personally but via e-mail. However, in light of this breach of the legal requirement for serving injunctions the PTB are requesting that the Court "dispense retrospectively with the requirement for service".

    What a shambles. Incompetence is looking more and more as an essential qualification for working in government bodies.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/015d93d1877350b7a5b049f97228900e1db748944bcaa0f1c3e1e22ab0d3a10b.png

    https://x.com/brianoflondon/status/1849428112708169878

  67. Sometimes the BTL comments are irresistible, although they could apply to many people in Britain.

    "I would not give him a job stacking shelves, he would go on sick leave day one, never pitch up, get fired and then sue us for wrongful dismissal. "

    1. I can think of many people who might fit that description, but wonder who is the subject in this case?

    2. Anyone in the Labour cabinet?

      Any politician, in fact.

      I think our little company as been tremendously lucky. We've avoided hiring any diversity and the two women are one 75 year old and a 0 something who is better than me at my job. I can honestly say I don't think anyone has treated them differently because of their gender. With two of the 7 being slightly and very autistic I don't think our solicitor man has even noticed they started.

      1. Good guess, but I try to avoid ad hominem, because it means one is losing the argument.
        But I enjoyed the above insult, whether fair or unfair.
        Was being vague because I was criticised by another Nottler for being prejudiced by daring to re-post an anti-Kemi BTL comment.
        Mrs Badenoch has achieved a lot, but she and the Cons party simply do not understand the illegal immigration crisis.

  68. 395296+ up ticks,

    I honestly see this" force"more as a voluntary hand over putting tory (ino) back in the saddle, riding once more the range of treachery & deceit.

    Dt,
    Live, I’ll force Farage into retirement, says Jenrick

    1. Labour's definition seems to flip flop depending on the weather. I think it's far simpler: they define working person as layabout socialist who's never done a days work in their life, the low skilled, low earner and the public sector.

      Of course, their policies will do nothing to address any of the issues that group has because that's not the point. Doing something is not important. Making the noises is what matters.

      1. I’ve just written similar on a GBN Twitter thread. Starmer’s definition of working class is the socialist client class who vote for their benefit cheques and as you say, don’t work.

    2. Stephen Christopher Yaxley-Lennon (né Yaxley; born 27 November 1982), better known as Tommy Robinson, is a British anti-Islam campaigner and one of the UK's most prominent far-right activists.[4]

      Robinson has been active in far-right politics for many years. He was a member of the British National Party (BNP), a British fascist political party, from 2004 to 2005. For a short time in 2012, he was joint vice-chairman of the British Freedom Party (BFP). He co-founded the English Defence League (EDL) in 2009 and led it until October 2013. In 2015, he became involved with the development of Pegida UK, a now-defunct British chapter of the German Pegida. From 2017 to 2018, he wrote and appeared in videos on the Canadian website Rebel News. In 2018, he also served as a political advisor to former UK Independence Party (UKIP) leader Gerard Batten.

      Robinson served four prison terms between 2005 and 2019. In 2013, he illegally entered the United States using a friend's passport. In 2018, he violated a court order by publishing a Facebook Live video of defendants entering court. Prior to sentencing, he appeared on the American far-right website InfoWars to appeal for political asylum in the US. In 2021, he was found to have libelled a 15-year-old refugee at a school in Huddersfield and was ordered to pay £100,000 plus legal costs. In 2021, he was subjected to a five-year stalking prevention order for harassing journalist Lizzie Dearden and her partner.

      Early and personal life
      Robinson was born in Luton on 27 November 1982.[5] According to Robinson in 2013, he was born Stephen Yaxley in London, and later adopted by his stepfather, Thomas Lennon.[6][7]

      Robinson had an Irish mother and an English father. His mother, who worked at a local bakery, also worked at the Vauxhall car plant in Luton.[8] He applied to study aircraft engineering at Luton Airport after leaving school: "I got an apprenticeship 600 people applied for, and they took four people on". He qualified in 2003 after five years of study, but lost his job when he was convicted of assaulting an off-duty police officer in a drunken argument[8] for which he served a 12-month prison sentence.[9]

      The real Tommy Robinson, from whom Yaxley took his name, was a prominent member of the Luton Town MIGs, a football hooligan crew which follows Luton Town FC.[10] The pseudonym successfully hid his identity and criminal history until the connection was uncovered in July 2010 by Searchlight magazine.[11][12] He has also used the names Andrew McMaster, Paul Harris,[13] Wayne King,[14][15] and Stephen Lennon.[13]

      Robinson married Jenna Vowles in 2011 and is the father of three children.[16] The couple divorced in February 2021.[17] In 2010, he owned a tanning salon in Luton.[18][19]
      [Wiki]

  71. Anyone else experiencing a very dark day? I assumed that rain was coming at 9 this morning, it is now almost 1 pm and it is still as dark as it was then and no rain.

  72. A Ugandan court has sentenced a former commander in the notorious Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) to 40 years in prison following a landmark war crimes trial. Thomas Kwoyelo was found guilty of 44 charges, including murder, rape, kidnapping and pillaging.
    If he had been charged in the UK he would have been awarded damages and those who arrested him whipped and put in solitary confinement for years. Two tier Britain.

  74. Teflon Rayner will outlast dull Starmerites
    Her charisma and force of personality place her miles ahead of fellow Labour politicians vying to be PM
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/10/24/teflon-angela-rayner-outlast-dull-starmerites-labour-pm/

    Isabel Oakeshott thinks that they are beginning to circle around Starmer and that Rayner will soon be in the top job. It is surely to the credit of Britain that neither lack of competence nor lack of good judgement stand in the way of progress in our marvellous meritocratic political system so the foreign secretary and the deputy prime minister are not at a disadvantage.

    BTL

    Lammy and Rayner will be able to demonstrate to the whole world just how magnificent the educational system in the UK is.

  75. I was reading some dreary nonsense about UFO's buzzing a US military base. Turns out they were flares.

    When the article wandered on to the subject of superior mirages. Where a ship at sea looks as if it is floating above the water.

    This curious event is to do with air temperatures and refraction.

    I found this a bit more interesting than the bollocks about UFO's so i investigated further.

    There is a name for these mirages. Fata Morgana.

    I then googled that name and up popped a swingers club in Amsterdam.

    I think google algorithm needs tweaking. As opposed to my nipples.

  78. Asylum seeker hotel worker ‘stabbed to death by migrant’. 25 October 2024.

    A teenager believed to have arrived in the UK on a small boat has been charged with the murder of a woman working at an asylum seeker hotel.

    Rhiannon Skye Whyte, 27, died after she was stabbed in the neck with a screwdriver at Bescot Stadium railway station on Sunday night.

    Deng Chol Majek, 18, from Walsall, was initially arrested and charged with attempted murder.

    They like us really. The Government tells us so.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/10/25/asylum-hotel-worker-rhiannon-skye-whyte-stabbed-to-death/

      1. ALLEGEDLY! as in allegedly murdering…. Everyone is entitled to a fair trial.
        As for Lucy Connelly-Connolly, she will be feeling physically sick again.
        No idea why the young man was allegedly carrying a screwdriver late at night, perhaps he wanted to train as a toolmaker and needed it for studying?
        BTW there is a photo online, but the name doesn't quite match.

        1. It said he was a migrant. That makes him wog coloured. The ones that aren't a problem tend to work and have an IQ over 50. They're fine and welcome.

          1. An IQ of 90 can struggle with basic comprehension.

            Thing is, a thousand more of these scum pour in every day. How many more must die before the barbaric criminal savage is removed? When will the 750,000 be thrown out?

  79. Today is St Crispin's Day, the feast of twin saints Crispin and Crispinian, cruelly murdered by Rictius Varus, Deputy to Emperor Maximian

    The government, with the agreement of the BBC, has ordered necessary alterations to the famous speech:

    Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
    From this day to the ending of the world,
    But we/thems/us in it shall be remembered;
    We few, them happy few, us band of brothers/sisters/thems and thoses.

    Those who quote using hurty words will be severely dealt with.

  81. Were all the vacuous twats who voted for a Labour government really craving a nanny-state, where the government takes full control over every minute aspect of their lives?

    This would be tantamount to the hard-of-thinking voting for an equally hard-of-thinking administration.

    Or, "I'm a complete, retarded fucking moron, ergo I need some likewise complete, retarded fucking morons to run my life for me."

      1. 20% of the electorate directly voted for them. 20% of an electorate of around 50,000,000 = 10,000,000 wankers. Add to those all the supporters of nonentity minor parties — who directly opened the door to Labour being successful — then you have a larger contingent of the hard-of-thinking.

          1. Not all. My brother and his wife, both life-long Conservative voters (they met at the local Conservative club where her father was secretary) voted Labour this time.

            Their two sons were both 'radicalised' when they attended Manchester University to study for Mickey-Mouse degrees. My brother and his wife thought those two Lefty muppets spoke more sense than her father (who will be squirming in his grave) ever did!

            You cannot educate pork!

          2. My hairdresser tells me that one of her sisters looks down on her because she doesn’t have a degree. (She went to Selfridges as an apprentice instead.) Her sister did Media Studies.

          4. I don't have a degree. I'm just a thick steerage-class scumbag with a grade-5 CSE in art.

            I wonder what your hairdresser's sisters would think of me?

      2. Yep. I was very surprised that Andrew Bridgen was turfed out but then I suppose ima conspiracy theorist and his constituents were sheeple.

    2. Hard of thinking, perhaps.

      But a group remains who would pin a red rosette on a donkey, like their ancestors.

      They're not particularly bright, and certainly don't engage with the sort of debate you'll find here.

      1. 'They're not particularly bright, and certainly don't engage with the sort of debate you'll find here.'

        Er…you're forgetting i'm here. :@(

        1. I'm here too Phizzee! I think we provide comic relief to the serious high brow topics the others discuss.

          We are… jesters… to the nobility.

          1. The man who founded St Barts Hospital was a jester. Honestly. Rahere was court jester to King Henry I. After a pilgrimage to Rome, he decided to build a hospital for the poor of the City of London. And he wasn’t joking.

          2. This is one of the reasons i like your company. Though i think Citroen wins the prize on naughty/funny stories… :@)

      2. I'll never forget two northerners, sat in a pub being interviewed by al Beeb.

        BBC: Can i ask how you'll be voting?
        Northerners: Laybuh. Pardy o' t' werkin' maaaan.
        BBC: Are you working now?
        Northerner: NAhh, No jobs t'up 'ere.
        BBC: When did you last find work?
        Northerner: Nunteen eighty fere.

        During Lady T's era. Under a Conservative and conservative government.

      3. You've just described that Scottish woman who Gordon Brown called a bigot. She was affronted, but still voted Labour.

        I have a lot of such types in my own family: you can't reason with them because they are too stupid to want to listen.

      4. Absolutely Geoff. Remembering that the number of Labour voters in July was some 3 million less than in 2019. The diehards who vote for the rosette come what may were enough because the Tory vote collapsed.

    1. Thank you Ash. Started reading it and will finish it later. Started without realizing that it is quite long. I go for the second story. How about you?

    2. Thank you for that Ash. I am reassured that I am not in the wrong when I write on these blogs.

  83. Free Speech magazine now has three articles new today, another in our series of patriotic posts, celebrating the 609th anniversary of the Battle of Agincourt , a seminal event in the development of the English identity, one by Duke Maskell on how, under the woke incompetents runing – and ruining – society, judgements of the plausibility of scientific theory have become not just mistaken but hopelessly confused by having politics beaten into them, forming a mixture that allows science to go on only as ‘the science’ or ‘settled science’ and something to be obeyed. The other is another Gripe – on alchohol sold in supermarkets – by Graham Bedford.

    Please find the time to read and comment.

    https://www.freespeechbacklash.com/

  84. Free Speech magazine now has three articles new today, another in our series of patriotic posts, celebrating the 609th anniversary of the Battle of Agincourt , a seminal event in the development of the English identity, one by Duke Maskell on how, under the woke incompetents runing – and ruining – society, judgements of the plausibility of scientific theory have become not just mistaken but hopelessly confused by having politics beaten into them, forming a mixture that allows science to go on only as ‘the science’ or ‘settled science’ and something to be obeyed. The other is another Gripe – on alchohol sold in supermarkets – by Graham Bedford.

    Please find the time to read and comment.

    https://www.freespeechbacklash.com/

  86. Gridwatch shows that wind is producing 2.00 gigawatts at the moment (16.08) from a maximum installed capacity of 28.5 gigawatts. The turbines must be working from home. Gas is generating 51.23% of the demand for electricity, wind 5.95%.

    1. On the windiest days the windmills never get above 60% capacity. It's a complete con – they're paid the full whack when they never reach it.

    2. Meanwhile Crudwatch (aka NOTTL) is keeping us up to date with the antics of politicians. Not surprisingly they aren't very bright…..

  87. After reading all the poop that is the news, there's something immensely satisfying at loosing off dozens of arrows at a target. Especially on St. Crispin's day!

      2. Kenneth Branagh certainly out Oliviered Laurence with his magnificent performance as Harry.

        1. Much could be be said about Olivier's acting. IMO on stage he over projected. I did like his films.

        2. There's an older black and white – not sure if that's the Olivier – but in that Henry is static, emotionless, dispassionate.

          Brannagh got it spot on.

    2. The immensity of satisfaction must surely depend on your choice of target – and the motive, Stephen?

    2. I washed two cups today!

      Then I got a bollocking for putting a plastic food bag into the waste paper bin!🙄

      2. I washed nine windows and their frames; two doors and their frames; a pair of patio doors and their frames; put out and brought in two lines of washing but decided that washing the porch was a step too far. Lazy barsteward.

        Now, I'm having a rest and writing this before cooking my tea: cauliflower cheese with smoked streaky bacon followed by the last slice of a carrot, walnut and raisin cake I made earlier this week. In truth, no rest for the wicked.😎

        1. I walked into town to do all the things I didn't have time to do yesterday while I was waiting to have the oil delivered (it came too late for me to get in before the shops shut). I was shattered when I got back.

  89. Mongo and I went off to the Children's hospice today and there were more empty beds. Mongo did a wonderful job of pretending to be cheerful and fluffy and, I imagine he was, but I think he notices. Maybe I'm putting emotions and attitudes on him he doesn't have. I don't know.

    He seemed subdued on the way back. No head stuck out the window, no complaining about the seat belt even laying on the floor rather than in the seat where he usually goes (and tries to steer, change gear…).

    Stopped off at the shop and we ate a couple of Babybels togther.

    1. Kadi likes to lie on the floor and get under my feet when we're travelling in the motorhome. He is restrained, but somehow he still manages it. I have to keep moving him over until he gets the message.

      1. No it won't. I don't believe for one moment that the party's fate depends upon how Farage or the party responds to this. It seems to be a highly inflated view of Robinson's importance.

        1. If Farage's party doesn't stand up for the individual victimised and maltreated by the state it doesn't stand for anything and doesn't deserve to survive.

          Do you not find it significant that both Douglas Murray and Jordan Peterson are very much on Tommy's side?

        2. I agree. Whilst I admire TR for his bravery in standing up and challenging the anti-British woke establishment, real, lasting change will only come from a political movement. What people should really see are two branches of the same movement; one with more direct action on the streets and the other political (think IRA/Sinn Fein but with slightly different objectives!)

        1. Given that Robinson has been arrested for contempt of court, it would be best if Farage kept his counsel until proceedings have finished.

          1. Farage could speak out against due process not being followed regarding the issuing of the injunction. But he won't.

          3. Good question. I don’t know.
            The MSM tells me there are so many UFO’s in the sky they are blocking out the sun.

          5. I thought he had been arrested for repeatedly breaching a court order not to repeat claims made about a Syrian found in court to have been libellous. He has been remanded in custody and will appear in court Monday on that charge.

            Tommy Robinson has been remanded in custody after handing himself in at a police station in Folkestone, Kent.

            Robinson, 41, was charged with one count of failing to provide the PIN to his mobile phone under Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000.

            He will appear at Westminster Magistrates' Court on 13 November over the charge but has been remanded in custody ahead of a separate contempt of court case on Monday.

            Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, was due to lead a rally in London on Saturday.

            Earlier today he spoke to supporters outside the police station, where he told them: "I'll see what happens mate, I don't expect to come back out there."

            A man in a grey jumpsuit went with him to the station carrying a blue holdall.

            A High Court judge issued a warrant for the former English Defence League (EDL) leader's arrest after he failed to appear for a contempt of court hearing at the end of July.

            He left the country the day after leading a protest in central London and hours after being released on unconditional bail by Kent Police, who arrested him at the Channel Tunnel at Folkestone under Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000.

            The law allows police to stop anyone passing through a UK port "to determine whether they may be involved or concerned in the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism".

            Robinson, who flew back to the UK last weekend, is facing a possible jail sentence over the contempt of court claims at a two-day hearing at Woolwich Crown Court.

            https://news.sky.com/story/tommy-robinson-remanded-after-handing-himself-in-at-police-station-in-kent-ahead-of-london-rally-13240838

            So, just to clarify, he has been arrested, charged and bailed to appear on November 13th at Westminster Magistrates' Court for breaching the Terrorism Act but has been remanded in custody for a hearing on Monday over separate contempt of court claims. When was he arrested for that and why has he been remanded in custody for the latter but not the former? Is he considered to be a flight risk? If so, why one and not the other? Or is it just to prevent him from attending tomorrow's rally and is that a legitimate reason to hold him in custody. To be honest, I'm finding it somewhat confusing.

    2. Great respect to Sue who protested today. I can't march but i do have a bit of money to send.

      If Tommy goes down and is killed i am leaving this shithole of a country.

    3. Silenced!

      What's it going to be?
      Starmer doubles-down and has him beaten to pulp?
      An own goal by the progressive liberal psychopaths, as Silenced goes viral?
      Media blackout?

      1. The state will ensure no one knosw about it. Any trial will be a complete blackout, including location. Robinson will simply be erased, unpersoned. He threatens the state.

        If Starmer wanted to show strength he would stop the bitter, spiteful Left wing lawfare and sit down with Robinson to discuss what is being done, but Starmer hates people like Robinson. He hates their very being, their core ideology. It is utterly anathema to Starmer.

    4. Tommy Robinson charged with terror offence
      Move follows far-Right activist’s arrest at port in July
      https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/10/25/tommy-robinson-charged-with-terror-offence/

      "The far-Right activist, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, hugged supporters waiting outside Folkestone police station on Friday afternoon, who then cheered him as he entered the building."

      [Written by DT senior reporter, Piece O'Shyte, whose real name is possibly Connor Stringer]


      Doesn't the DT realised that banging on about Tommy Robinson's name before he changed it to protect his family makes the paper look childishly absurd?

      I wonder what Reggie Dwight (whose unreal name is Elton John), Harry Webb (whose unreal name is Cliff Richard) and , Maurice Micklewhite (whose unreal name is Michael Caine) make of it?

      1. For example, Red Ed the Energy Commissar, whose real name is Edward.
        Or the late great Prince Philip, whose paternal surname was Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg.

    1. What can he say? If he says something outside of the Commons he'll be clobbered for it. If he speaks inside the Commons no bugger has to do anything.

    1. Just call these countries' bluff. Tell them the UK is leaving the Commonwealth. They need us far more than we need them (which is not at all).

    2. Send them a back dated bill for infrastructure, language use, governmental configuration and international support through the Commonwealth fund.

      Scrub off reparations debt and I imagine we could pay off our 28 trillion national debt thrice over.

  94. A disapproving Par Four!

    Wordle 1,224 4/6
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    1. Crappy six.

      Wordle 1,224 6/6

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      1. Happy birthday, Sue!
        Same here..
        Wordle 1,224 6/6

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      4. 🎉Happy Birthday🎉🎈🪅🎁🥂🍾🎂🍧 Sue! I hope you have had a great day! Keep out of trubble tomorrow!

      1. Well done.
        Wordle 1,224 5/6

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    3. Big Phew! from me – another multiple choice horror show…. finally got one right (eventually)….

      Wordle 1,224 6/6

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

  95. Garden items.

    I grew this from the seed of a pepper I bought in the supermarket. The plant didn't grow very tall and only produced two fruits, both of which grew to a decent size and turned red. Also, I had two other plants from the original pepper, both grew to the same size as the plant that produced good sized fruit but both have produced small green fruits, few in number. On one plant all of the fruit rotted when they grew to the size of a tennis ball and this fruiting and rotting lasted over the summer; the other plant has small green fruit that do not seem to grow larger than a tennis ball and no sign of turning red. All three plants are adjacent to one other in the greenhouse and in similar size pots and growing medium.

    My thought is that the original pepper was a hybrid, probably F1, and their seeds are known to not come true to type. Thoughts?

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/de710a181b136952db2a67a8f5c79148b52653ad3174ba655f9f9f81e5e1c1cc.jpg

    Latecomers:

    I think the clematis opened late yesterday and is on a stem that I missed when it had fallen on the ground. Variety unknown.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/818fdbd9db07b553a20789cd680ed96922c4c4ef0d576cb1ba9276f46f17d515.jpg

    The passion fruit is Snow Queen, one of a number of plants I have in memory of my late dear wife.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/153b4d597006fb8d24743f4216d548b97c51af4fad4a19be12bea2dfaad95069.jpg

    1. Well done, old green fingers! That passiflora is the same as mine! Just beautiful! The clematis is Nelly Moser, I think!

        2. It does look like a Nelly Moser, but there are so many look-alikes. I must have two dozen varieties (and none of them is a Nelly Moser!).

    2. I think you are probably right about the pepper plant being F1 hybrid. You got one good plant but the others were rubbish, though the green fruits may eventually turn red.
      I suppose this is really to protect the professional growers, as they probably have to buy new seed each year and it is a cost to them.

    4. I have 30 or more ripe passion fruit on one plant alone. Unfortunately they are small and the fruit inside quite sparse. I don't eat them normally but I have just sampled three and they were fully ripe and tasty but not very sweet. If I don't post tomorrow I'll be in hospital or the morgue.

    5. The F1 hybrid theory was the first thing that came to mind. Nice clematis. Mine are still in flower, too. Don't recognise it. My passion fruit has dozens of flowers on it, but no fruit as yet.

  96. 395296+ up ticks,

    There have been MORE potential foreign troops through Dover
    the governmental invasion port this year, than the total sum last year, The political overseers are feeling their oats and things are, I believe, fast coming to a head.

    Gerard Batten
    @
    If you can possibly get there be at Tommy Robinson’s Rally in Westminster tomorrow.

    Tommy is about to go to prison for the ‘crimes’ of telling the truth, making a film proving his innocence in a libel case, & defending British underage girls being raped on an industrial scale.

    Tommy needs all the support he can get. Let’s be there for him now.

  97. I didn't know they were. I'd have to find out their reasoning before determining whether I think it important. Although they are familiar figures on forums such as this, the vast bulk of the population wouldn't have a clue who they are.

    1. The great thing that Jordan Peterson and Douglas Murray have in common is that each of them has a very good, fully-functioning brain!

      https://podcasts.apple.com/fr/podcast/462-why-the-establishment-hates-this-man-tommy-robinson/id1184022695?i=1000661584520

      https://www.google.com/search?q=Douglas+MAurray+Tommy+Robinson&oq=Douglas+MAurray+Tommy+Robinson&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOTIJCAEQABgNGIAEMggIAhAAGBYYHjIKCAMQABiABBiiBDIKCAQQABiABBiiBDIKCAUQABiABBiiBNIBCTE0NDM2ajBqN6gCCLACAQ&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:e8c9e0a1,vid:EzeUTZNsjFk,st:0

    1. Tommy Robinson. Martyr. Our State and its henchmen are out of control. And they have the cheek to try to imply he is a fascist! They should try looking in a mirror!

  99. Most strange. There was a video on Youtube "Keir Starmer To Make CATASTROPHIC ‘Slavery Reparations’ Move Days After VOWING Not To" – quite recent I believe. It started and then suddenly became "video unavailable". I wonder why? If it was rubbish, then lots of rubbish is put on Youtube and not necessarily taken down. If it was true, then what has Starmer got to hide?

  100. Most strange. There was a video on Youtube "Keir Starmer To Make CATASTROPHIC ‘Slavery Reparations’ Move Days After VOWING Not To" – quite recent I believe. It started and then suddenly became "video unavailable". I wonder why? If it was rubbish, then lots of rubbish is put on Youtube and not necessarily taken down. If it was true, then what has Starmer got to hide?

  101. Sir Keir Starmer is preparing to give ground on slavery reparations amid demands from Commonwealth nations for payments of up to £18 trillion.

    The Prime Minister has rejected calls for financial reparations, but is reportedly considering non-cash options, such as providing debt relief. Other possible options could include a formal apology, supporting public health institutions and educational programmes for students from Commonwealth nations.

    Sir Keir ruled out giving an immediate apology, telling the BBC on Thursday: "An apology has already been made in relation to the slave trade, and that's not surprising. Our generation can say the slave trade and the practice was abhorrent and we should talk about our history. We can't change our history, but we should certainly talk about our history."

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/10/25/keir-starmer-prepares-give-ground-commonwealth-reparations

    2. Will that history include the story of the West Africa Squadron and the later anti-slavery efforts off the East Coast of Africa in the Indian Ocean?

    3. Perhaps he could start a concurrent claim against Rome snd Copenhagen for Britons' enslavement under the Romans and the Vikings.

  102. Sir Keir Starmer is preparing to give ground on slavery reparations amid demands from Commonwealth nations for payments of up to £18 trillion.

    The Prime Minister has rejected calls for financial reparations, but is reportedly considering non-cash options, such as providing debt relief. Other possible options could include a formal apology, supporting public health institutions and educational programmes for students from Commonwealth nations.

    Sir Keir ruled out giving an immediate apology, telling the BBC on Thursday: "An apology has already been made in relation to the slave trade, and that's not surprising. Our generation can say the slave trade and the practice was abhorrent and we should talk about our history. We can't change our history, but we should certainly talk about our history."

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/10/25/keir-starmer-prepares-give-ground-commonwealth-reparations

  103. Sir Keir Starmer is preparing to give ground on slavery reparations amid demands from Commonwealth nations for payments of up to £18 trillion.

    The Prime Minister has rejected calls for financial reparations, but is reportedly considering non-cash options, such as providing debt relief. Other possible options could include a formal apology, supporting public health institutions and educational programmes for students from Commonwealth nations.

    Sir Keir ruled out giving an immediate apology, telling the BBC on Thursday: "An apology has already been made in relation to the slave trade, and that's not surprising. Our generation can say the slave trade and the practice was abhorrent and we should talk about our history. We can't change our history, but we should certainly talk about our history."

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/10/25/keir-starmer-prepares-give-ground-commonwealth-reparations

          5. Speaking of which.
            I just ordered a selection of Robots from Amazon. Not really paying much attention.

            At the very least some of them will make novelty Christmas gifts.

          1. Seems so, Obviously Khan being a little shit cunt bastard probably has a micro penis and fucks goats.

          3. If i were to share a cell with Tommy i would be honoured.
            What would likely to happen would be we had had fatal food poisoning.

  106. Charged under Terrorism Act, bailed and remanded in gulag.. execution on Monday by circular firing squad.

    1. Meanwhile.. .. Manchester Airport victims Fahir Amaaz and his brother Muhammad Amaad seen skipping down the street without a care in the world.
      Oh btw job interview with GM police went well.

  107. Dr. Jay Bhattacharya received the American Academy of Sciences and Letters’ top intellectual freedom award on Wednesday for resisting attempts to politically control his scientific work during the COVID-19 pandemic.

    The academy presents its annual Robert J. Zimmer Medal for Intellectual Freedom to a scholar “who displays extraordinary courage in the exercise of intellectual freedom,” according to its website.

    Bhattacharya, a professor of medicine at Stanford University, received the honor during the academy’s annual investiture ceremony at the Library of Congress in Washington D.C. Afterward, he joined Princeton University Professor Stephen Macedo for an interview on stage.
    Macedo began by asking about the first time Bhattacharya pushed back against the government’s handling of the pandemic.
    “I wasn’t prepared for it,” Bhattacharya said.
    “I had never published an op-ed. I had never been on TV. I was a quiet scholar, and I had this idea regarding the pandemic that the disease was more widespread than people realized,” he said.
    Then, after he wrote an op-ed about it, he “got death threats.” Bhattacharya said attacks came from Stanford as well.
    “The university, which I loved, … investigated me for false allegations … that they knew were false,” he said.
    “I got sent a very clear signal that I needed to stay quiet.”
    “I lost sleep, I couldn’t eat,” he said. “But I decided that I didn’t care about my career anymore and I needed to say what I saw."

    1. Including the Great Barrington Declaration with the other two authors Sunetra Gupta and Martin Kulldorff. Vilified at the time, as I remember.

  108. 395296+ up ticks,

    These political overlords really are now taking the piss,

    I would say they have the backing of their police lapdogs and no doubt every morally illegal foreign immigrant in the country, also a great many, shame to say, lab/lib/con supporter / voters within these Isles.

    Dt,

    Tommy Robinson has been charged with a terror offence after refusing to give police access to his mobile phone…

    Firstly they come for the leading patriots, then they come for you.

    1. When the Nazis came for the communists,
      I remained silent;
      I was not a communist.

      When they locked up the social democrats,
      I remained silent;
      I was not a social democrat.

      When they came for the trade unionists,
      I did not speak out;
      I was not a trade unionist.

      When they came for the Jews,
      I remained silent;
      I was not a Jew.

      When they came for me,
      there was no one left to speak out.

      Friedrich Gustav Emil Martin Niemöller
      (14 January 1892 – 6 March 1984) was a Protestant pastor and social activist.

  109. Starmer angry.. really angry.. and I mean really angry about the freed serious offenders giving thx luv hearts & thumbs up to Sir Keir as they head off in the motorcade of luxury cars.

  111. Oh Tommy TOMMY
    Bailed on the joke terrorism charge and then remanded without bail ahead of his court appearance on Monday which has been moved to Woolwich instead of the High Court.
    There is a conveient tunnel from Woolwich Crown Court direct to Belmarsh High Security jail which is infested with the very worst Moslem offenders.
    So no Tommy at the demo tomorrow,I am personally deeply ashamed that mobility problems prevent me from attending,if as I suspect they organise his murder in jail I'll bloody well crawl to the next one!!
    Well done Bob and Sue!!

      1. Listening to campanologists today Geoff for first time in a long time, made me think of you (ok bit of a stretch from bells to organ playing) good to see you here, hope you're doing ok :-)) x

        1. Hi, Kate. Since moving out of the Parish in 2020, I no longer have a dog in this fight. t haven't been replaced. No-one else in the parish knows anything about clocks. It was much easier when Iived rent-free across the road from the church. But I play every fortnight at Seale.

          So Seale tower clock is currently around three minutes slow.

          I'm at the wrong end of the Parish on Sunday, to deal with the clock. This is immensely frustrating. But, given that a former churchwarden has changed the lock to the Vestry,so I can't access the Tower key, what are my options?

          1. ‘Evening, Geoff x. Things change, and often (usually seems more apt, of late) not for the better. Where I live is on the opposite side of the valley to the church…in very hot and dry Spring/Summer I can still see the worn path to the other side I think possibly from long ago Sunday church attendance. Why would the lock be changed, did the warden lose his key, or possibly something to do with insurance which seems to worsen annually. Whatever, look after yourself:-)

          2. In our case. the wrecktorette had the lock changed to stop the bell captain accessing the tower to ring the bells! You couldn't make it up! Unfortunately, you didn't have to.

          3. Why would that happen….I’ve read (some years ago, admittedly) about people who moved to live near a church and then complained about bells ringing Sunday am…what the heck, Conway..friend of mine worked rescue centre for dogs…couple at a village quarter of a mile away complained about barking..dog rescue was there first…as PetaJ would say ‘some people are really stupid’…seems the only explanation 🙂

          4. The wrecktorette is a law unto herself. She's alienated just about everybody who used to come to church and most of the village as well. She took against the bell captain (perhaps he put her right about something), sacked him and locked him and his band out of the tower.

          5. oohhh Conway….if only there was a non milquetoast archbish you could turn to for support, but in the absence of that I’d be planning…..

        2. I once went out with a campanologist, her name was Isabel Ringing – I'll get me carillon…….

          2. No KJ, I borrow then from the bloke next door, Harry Modo, he got them off his brother Quasi, who had a bad back……

    2. The man has been arrested and held in a high security prison for refusing to disclose his PIN when demanded with menaces.

      So much for any pretence that the law has anything to do with justice or even protecting people! This must be said tomorrow.

        1. That seems logical. Anyone threatening to go on a protest march that is “inappropriate” to Government policy would be interned until the threat of protest has been removed.

          Fine though to comment on compliant topics, such as who is on Strictly and what they are up to.

    1. Including his wife..
      Rumours are.. she has left him.
      Not been seen since 24th September.

      and he's gay.

      2. Yes. The real reason he was in Lord Whatsit’s flat is that he was having an affair and his wife threw him out. But was the affair with Lord Whatsit?

        2. Dunno about you, Sue – he doesn't do it for me, and I don't think he's capable of doing it for anyone else either 😀

    2. Including his wife..
      Rumours are.. she has left him.
      Not been seen since 24th September.

      and he's gay.

    3. An acolyte of one T. Bliar is an arsehole?
      Well, I never saw that coming.

    4. Most politicians speak in soundbites. He's the norm. The likeable ones are the rarities. It's my contention that succeeding in politics is either more difficult for likeable people or that likeable people are less likely to be drawn to politics.

    5. I agree with him, are they keeping schtum because of shame they voted Labour? Where did the votes come from, 20-30 year naive females or 60-70 year socialists or River to the Sea marchers all of whom think Starmer is one of them?

  113. White supremacist stabbed asylum seeker in hotel

    Callum Ulysses Parslow, 32, stabbed Eritrean Nahom Hagos in the chest and hand at the Pear Tree Inn at Smite near Worcester, Leicester Crown Court heard.

    Parslow, who has a tattoo of Adolf Hitler's signature on his left forearm, tried to send a post to X before his arrest which claimed he "just did my duty to England" by trying to "exterminate" his victim, the trial heard.

    Parslow railed against what he termed the "evil enemies of nature and of England" who he identified as "the Jews, the Marxists and the globalists" that he said were responsible for demonising Christianity, white people and European culture. [Two out of three, anyway.]

    Nazi memorabillia [sic] was seized at Parslow's bedsit in Worcester.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cjdl5y3y3mvo

    This is so typically BBC – one sad liitle man in his bedsit represents all opposition to immigration.

    1. Even given the nazi angle (assuming it's true, which is not a given these days), it is a stretch to portray someone who tries to resist their country being invaded as a "white supremacist".
      Where were all these "white supremacists" in the 90s, when people didn't feel threatened by mass migration of young men? It's not "white supremacism" that motivated this, it's the desire to have a home land where he looks like his neighbours.

  114. A pensioner is by definition not a "working person" and therefore has been singled out for punishment on Wednesday. "Hardworking" is one of these cliche buzz words along with "Change".

    Contributions welcome if anyone can think of some more, and how many can be worked into a punitive manifesto.

    1. This is getting most confusing. I read that he had been bailed to appear at Westminster Magistrates Court in November over breaching the Terrorism Act but is being held on remand to appear at Woolwich Crown Court on Monday over separate contempt of court claims.

    2. 395295+ up ticks,

      O2O,

      If I remember right the police prior to the JAY report, really, along with rotherham council members, had little interest if any, in what their friendly neighbourhood muslims were up to.

    3. Thank you for this. I have just donated £50. I am not allowed to make political donations, but i would argue this is not political, rather existential. TR is obviously an “enemy of the state” and needs our support.

  116. TTFN. May look in tomorrow – if t'computer lasts. The good, nay brilliant, news is that the MR's fantastically skilled IT wizard nephew has located a very good reconditioned desktop – has bought it, has had it delivered to HIS home where he will do all the loading, deleting, cleaning etc – THEN will drive 100 miles to bring it here and transfer what stuff I need from my existing PC – and make sure it works with the printer and scanner – and then take old PC away and destroy its hard disk.

    He's a good lad….

    Have a jolly evening – we are watching the film "Patton" in stages. The opening really is impressive!!

    A demain, possibly.

  120. Mr Nelson engages in a high-wire balancing act and just about stays upright.

    We're witnessing American democracy in all its glory – not the rise of fascism

    The US political system is facing challenges, but it is robust enough to overcome them – as it has often before power

    Fraser Nelson, 24th October 2024, 7:56pm BST

    If there is method to Donald Trump's madness, then John Kelly would be the man to explain it. A former general in the US Marines, he was seen as a force of sanity when he went into the White House as Chief of Staff and started kicking out the likes of Anthony Scaramucci and Steve Bannon.

    But what he saw, he now says, was a president who "certainly falls into the general definition of fascist". In any other time, such a verdict, from such a well-respected source, could be devastating.

    But this language has been used so often as to have lost its force. Kamala Harris has been calling Trump a fascist too, following an absurd line of attack that the Democrats have been running for months. "Is democracy still America's sacred cause?" Joe Biden asked at a speech in January. "It's what the 2024 election is all about." This is what The Washington Post thought the 2016 election was about. When Trump won, it adopted a new motto: "Democracy dies in darkness."

    But democracy, as it turns out, didn't die. For all of Trump's antics, the US economy prospered, employment hit a record high and poverty among African-Americans hit an all-time low. A wider world, unsure how the mercurial Trump would react, was on good behaviour. This is why it's harder to say that a Trump victory would lead to calamity: it didn't last time. And, yes, he attempted to bend the democratic rules. But that ended not just in failure but in the strengthening – even a rebirth – of the system he tried to subvert.

    It's hard to cut through the hyperbole of the democracy-in-crisis narrative but James Gibson, a professor at Washington University in St Louis, has sought to do so in Democracy's Destruction? published last month. He looks at Trump's attempt to cling on to power, with the president claiming "absolute proof" that the 2020 election had been rigged. This, it's fair to say, was a serious challenge to the democratic system.

    Trump accused the Supreme Court of being "weak" for ignoring his claim, but it was hardly alone. Some 86 judges, many appointed by Republicans and some by Trump himself – also did so. Mike Pence, his unflinchingly loyal vice president, point-blank refused to send the results back to the states after studying the Electoral Count Act of 1887. Trump howled, "hang Mike Pence" chants began, protesters came looking for him in the Senate chamber. But democracy and its institutions prevailed.

    Prof Gibson then looks at surveys testing genuinely anti-democratic propositions in the aftermath of all this. Should the Senate be done away with? How many say that, no matter what, Biden would "never be my president"? Or refuse to recognise laws he passed? No more than 12 per cent went along with any of these statements; about the same as still believe that Nasa faked the moon landings. It's not much of a basis to have serious concerns about the impending death of American democracy.

    If anything, demand for democracy has been growing. The Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe vs Wade put abortion law back into democratic control by allowing each elected state legislature to decide their own rules. Even this decision did not lead to a majority wishing to constrain the Supreme Court's independence, let alone abolish it. Americans may curse the result of their elections or the judgments of the Justices but they have faith in the system.

    They fear for its future, to be sure. America has never been short of people drawing analogies to mayhem in Washington and the end of the Roman Empire. A poll at the end of last year found 72 per cent of Democrats saying that democracy is at risk in the presidential election – but so did 52 per cent of Republicans. Some see, in Trump, a would-be Caesar. Others see, in Harris, a vacuous puppet serving as a proxy candidate for a faceless machine. And one that also tried to defame and imprison Trump, to stop him running.

    Even the lawfare backfired. After 34 convictions and charges ranging from fraud to election subversion, as well as being found liable for sexual assault, Trump is now running ahead in national swing-state polls (which is more than he managed last time). The only way to defeat a presidential candidate, it seems, is to have an election and field a more popular alternative. The basic democratic rules have proved unsubvertible.

    What we are seeing is a rise in the number who confuse losing an election with a crisis in democracy. Britain had a fair share of this after Brexit, described by no less an authority as the Archbishop of Canterbury as standing in the "nationalist, populist or even fascist tradition of politics". But the bigger trend is an attempt to shut down debate by calling the other side fascists; and, when this fails, claiming that fascism is winning. The rise of populism in Europe is, of course, all democratic. And a necessary, painful reminder to other parties not to keep important topics – like demographic change – off the agenda.

    The balance between freedom and authoritarianism is certainly moving the wrong way, but this is generally due to democratic pressure. Those of us who opposed lockdown, the smoking ban and other incursions on liberty need to concede that they were depressingly popular – so we can't very well say it's undemocratic. It just means that the case for liberty needs to be made a bit better.

    Whether you see Trump as a political antichrist or a necessary corrective to a broken system, it's hard to find evidence that he is, in any meaningful sense, a fascist. The Harris campaign know this. They'll also know voters have, by now, made their minds about Trump. At this stage, all that matters is how well each side persuades its supporters to get out and vote – which usually means saying that this is a contest between light and dark, good and evil. Between dictatorship and democracy.

    Americans do all this very well. That's why so many Labour activists are out there campaigning: they want to experience political campaigns fought with more passion, intensity and professionalism than they'd find anywhere else. But it doesn't show a system in crisis. It shows that America, in spite of everything, can still lay on the greatest democratic show on earth.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/10/24/american-democracy-in-all-its-glory-not-fascism-rise-trump

    1. "The greatest democratic show on earth." Quite so. It's theatre. It's pantomime. "Oh, yes he is!". "Oh, no he isn't!".

      1. "I don't like Trump but he's not Adolf."
        (Well, I won't say it out loud).

        "Respect the vote!"
        (Can I go and be sick now, please?)

  122. 11 days to save the World?

    "Perhaps as expected, some hawks in Washington are reacting loudly and angrily to continuing reports which say North Korean troops are in Russia preparing for greater involvement in Ukraine. South Korean intelligence and the Zelensky government say that some are already in the fight, invading Ukrainian soil.

    Republican Representative Mike Turner of Ohio, the chair of the House Intelligence Committee, has already taken warnings against Pyongyang to the next level. He has urged the United States to consider "direct military action" if it's confirmed that North Korean troops are sent to fight in Ukraine.

    "If North Korean troops were to invade Ukraine’s sovereign territory, the United States needs to seriously consider taking direct military action against the North Korean troops," Rep. Turner wrote on X."

    1. Interesting BTL Comment:

      "Zelensky's term in office ended 20 May 2024. He is no longer the president of Ukraine."

      1. It's true his term has expired. They just used lawfare tactics to not have another election.

    2. I expect they're using Chinese equipment, just about the only country supporting NK for most of its existence. Xi seems to be losing some support, possibly this action could make or break his future.

  123. Just watched a cool video on YouTube – Former President Trump frying at McDonalds, he is so decent with the young man training him…everyone loves his company!

    1. …..except around 120+ million Americans…!

      I do so hope he is elected – it will be priceless watching the Beeb and fellow travellers squirm…..!

      1. Ach…Musk’ll send ’em to Mars, 120+m sounds about right…Beeb et al will get a lot of footage out of their dislike….everybody happy 🙂

    2. …..except around 120+ million Americans…!

      I do so hope he is elected – it will be priceless watching the Beeb and fellow travellers squirm…..!

      1. Thanks Johnny…great atmosphere, a party! Hope his security guys alert and canny x Did you see him speaking at the Dan L Smith ’24 dinner, very good.

  124. Well, a bit of work done up the garden and some leaves, brambles and brash burnt with a few more mushroom trays filled with sticks.
    Clothes etc. ready for tomorrow and I've just had a bath.
    Will need to be out of the house by 07:30 to catch the 08:45 off Cromford so the alarm will be on for 06:30.

    So now off to bed and leaving a jolly little piece for you all to enjoy:-
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=beXW5s3ZCB4

    3. You never cease to amaze me with your combination of musical interests, BoB. Folk type singing in pubs as well as more classical music appreciation. Well done!.

  125. Tommy Robinson arrested for not providing PIN to mobile phone. What next? Will they arrest him for breathing?

  126. Good evening all,
    I think a few Nottlers are planning on attending the rally in London tomorrow, so I would like to wish them good luck, and stay safe.
    Early night here.

    2. Carry flowers. Don't let yourself be photographed with your mouth open ("shouted far right abuse at a police dog"). Keep arms clamped by your sides (was photographed giving a narsti salute!!). If running from police, don't run into any private property for safety (they will find some charge against you)

  127. Evening, all. Just back from yet another meeting (and I've another tomorrow afternoon as well). Clearly I have a finger in too many pies!

    1. Good evening, Conners. I too suffer from "a finger in too many pies" syndrome. It's a hard one to deal with.

        1. Swamped by the amount of work I have committed myself to, Conners. I usually spend all day "catching up", then realise that I have still lots more to do the next day and it's often jobs I had hoped to complete today, meaning that my "catch up" jobs have increased for the next day.

          1. At least mostly for me it's just attending meetings. There are only a few where I'm in office as opposed to PBI.

  128. I've just caught the end of the women's footie. Ian Wright (pundit – never off the screen – must either be broke or think himself very important) is wearing a poppy.
    It's OCTOBER.

    It's bad enough that Halloween has turned into a 'season'.

    1. I went to a civic service in church last Sunday and one of the councillors was wearing a poppy – admittedly it was a knitted one, but still …

      1. Some years ago I actually made some enquiries from the British Legion authorities, Conners, and apparently they can be worn all the year round.

        1. Yes, I was told that, but the convention is you don't start wearing one until 1st November (in time for the Opening Meet).

          1. I would agree with you. We are told to always tell the truth but sometimes, e.g. after a person's death, it is more appropriate to be discrete. And with wearing poppies I reckon it's best to wait until November the 1st at the earliest.

    2. Do you know anywhere we can buy those paint guns? Preferably with ball bearings,

      Asking for someone pissed and pissed off.

  129. Well, chums, I wish you all a Good Night. Sleep well and I hope to see you all tomorrow morning.

  131. Woke fury: Royal British Legion accused of 'using donations to fund large corporate payroll instead of aiding veterans'

    Hundreds of ex-servicemen and women are turning their backs on 'bloated, corporate organisations', GBN has been told by an ex-serviceman

    There has been widespread anger in the veterans' community over the Royal British Legion's 'Head of Diversity and Inclusion' earning roughly £65,000 a year while many ex-servicemen and women struggle for support.

    An anonymous ex-serviceman who now helps veterans claim compensation told GB News: "Why on earth are they spending this money on DEI hires. When you see what the veterans who come to us are going through and who can't get support, it's terrible. Although the big charities like the RBL, SSAFA, Help for Heroes do great work, we're finding more and more veterans turning away from them. They can't get through the bureaucracy.

    "What they're finding is bloated corporate organisations (a large proportion who aren't even veterans) using donations to fund their large payrolls whilst they sit on hundreds of millions in investment portfolios, instead of being used to help veterans directly."

    Although not controlled by charities like the RBL, some veterans' war pensions pay just £65 a week.

    According to the Charity Commission, the RBL recorded an income of £147 million in 2023. They spent £180 million, with £133 million going to 'charitable activities' and £46 million used for 'raising funds and other expenditure'.

    This latter figure includes paying 1,649 employees, of which seven receive over £100,000 per year.

    RBL's use of funds for Diversity and Inclusion has seen them come under fire from their own supporters. David Gagen, a managing director from Swindon, commented: "I have supported the RBL for almost 40 years in uniform and out. I have raised lots for the charity. This is just more woke nonsense. I will be cancelling my membership and will not include RBL as a charity to support until it returns to its roots and spends its funds on supporting veterans not this rubbish."

    Businessman David Mann commented: "My wife has been a poppy seller for many years and is now being confronted with people who don't want to donate for poppies. How can we make sure all the money collected goes to those that need it?"

    Geoff Hewitt said: "I am not particularly wealthy but make regular donations to the RBL to honour the memory of my late father who served in WW2. I did not realise that my small donation was going, not to current ex-servicemen having a hard time, but to a Head of Diversity & Inclusion. I fear that the RBL has lost contact with its roots, and from now on I will find an alternative military charity with more relevant ambitions."

    Reform MP Richard Tice posted: "What on earth are Royal British Legion doing wasting huge poppy donations on woke diversity nonsense? Millions of us will donate to other veterans' charities if they carry on like this. Get a grip."

    The RBL's head of Head of Diversity and Inclusion wrote on LinkedIn: "My role is to drive change to become a more diverse and inclusive organisation. You would come to me if you want to chat or get advice on how to reach out to different and diverse audiences or make your services more accessible or generally find out more about equality issues.

    "Some of my big projects are helping to support our wonderful Diversity & Inclusion Staff Networks, making sure our D&I data is as accurate as possible so we can track our progress better and legislation changes in the next year around flexible working and carers' leave."

    The Royal British Legion's Poppy Campaign launches today with the aim of highlighting mental scars soldiers can endure during conflict. Poppy appeal collectors and veterans met the Prime Minister in 10 Downing Street this week as he made his donation to the Royal British Legion ahead of the official launch.

    The Royal British Legion has been contacted for comment.

    https://www.gbnews.com/membership/diversity-inclusion-veterans-affairs-woke

    _________________________________________________________________________________

    Diversity and Inclusion Statement

    Our ambition
    The Royal British Legion has always been made up of many parts and we are almost unique in our ability to bring together nations, communities, and individuals in support of our Armed Forces community. Bringing people together is core to Remembrance and our mission.

    As the Armed Forces community and society continue to evolve, we need to evolve too. We are the largest UK Armed Forces charity with thousands of passionate staff, volunteers, and members, and we have a responsibility to take the lead and lead by example.

    Our commitments
    • We will ensure our leaders play a visible role in fostering a positive and inclusive culture
    • We will provide opportunities for everyone, no matter their role at RBL, their background, or personal characteristics
    • We will support our members in building diverse and inclusive communities
    • We will enable everyone to reach their potential and receive the service or recognition they deserve
    • We will showcase diverse role models and celebrate our differences, working with key stakeholders and partners to share best practice

    Driving change and continuing progress
    We believe that the compassion, understanding, and service we show each and every individual should be reflected in the way we all support, respect, and include every individual who works with us. We want everyone involved in our work or receiving our services, to feel proud to contribute to or be part of a diverse and inclusive organisation.

    We recognise that we still have a long way to go to ensure that we make the RBL a truly great and inclusive organisation to work for and be part of so we have set out our commitments to provide a clear path to deliver this ambition. We will keep listening, learning, and sharing our progress and impact.

    Charles Byrne
    Director General

    https://www.britishlegion.org.uk/quick-links/diversity-and-inclusion-statement

    1. What an utter load of cojones. Not a mention of the service man and women who risk their lives in protecting our country.
      There is no place for this crap in an organisation that is there to look after service personnel.

      1. They don't.

        My Will was witnessed/countersigned this evening by my neighbour who at 18 years of age his first tour was to the Falklands.

        There were quite a few pages to sign including power of attorney.

        At no time did he question what he was signing. He didn't read any of it.

        He now works for BAE and though i haven't asked has likely been subjected to those unconcious bias courses.

        I despair.

        The new Will drops the RNLI in favour of the Victory Services Club who do look after ex-military.

        My friend and neighbour was oblivious to both.

          1. Breakfast is great. Though last time i was there the huge tub of scrambled eggs contained all the burnt bits from the bottom of the pan.

            And…and…and…AND… i had to make my own TOAST !!!

            Just changed my Will. VSC get everything…..Well ….what is left after.

        2. Well done you.
          Quite right that he didn’t read it as he was only witnessing your signature.

          1. He didn't have any idea what he was signing. Not that he's dumb… but trusting.

            To make all those changes cost just over £1000.

            I think i might go out and do some poppy tin rattlin'.

          2. I have been asked to be a witness on numerous occasions. Some start to tell me what it’s about but I stop them and say that I’m only witnessing their signature on nothing else.

    2. What an utter load of cojones. Not a mention of the service man and women who risk their lives in protecting our country.
      There is no place for this crap in an organisation that is there to look after service personnel.

    4. So insensitive, excluding and divisive. When the British Legion's gone, there really is nothing left. The fight back has to start from the bottom upwards.

    1. Is it okay to laugh yet or do i have to stick a pillow over my head ?

      Asking for me Jew mate….

  135. Just been looking at my posts and responses from earlier this evening.

    I must apologise for the vulgarity of my language.

    That said…Starmer and Khan are still both cunts.

  136. Up at 4:58 and heard the washer. I thought… need to tumble the clothes that're out to put the newly washed on the hangers so did that. Cleaned the kitchen and shovelled stuff in the wishdosher and stuck that on. Was followed about by the ever watchful Lucy.

    As the immersion is still going, did the baking trays and put those away as well. Hung new washing out and put it outside – it's 12'c but any wind will help and having damp clothes indoors isn't wonderful. Let Lucy out so she could potter as well.

    Tumbled clothes now being put away. As I went into the room I found a dozing Oscar in the back bedroom. The door was open so he could pootle about, but it was a bit odd to see him on his own. Usually he lays on the Warqueen's side so made a fuss of him and had a natter about how awful the Labour party were.

    Just let Lucy back in and Oscar out.

    1. Yes, so that it can be checked if necessary but he’s only witnessing your signature.

  139. Yes, but he could have been signing anything !

    My normal response would be …'can you leave it with me'…If no…then no.

    1. I think the wording for witnessing only says ‘signed in the presence of’ and as long as they see you sign then he can sign that he saw you do it. The contents of the document are of no concern to the witness.

      1. True. He still could have been signing anything. No wonder scammers have such an easy time.

  140. What would you have said if he read the document and said I don’t think you should be doing that?

    1. Good question. Though my response to him would be, in these circumstances, would be…just sign the bloody thing !

        1. You okay this morning?
          I only ask because you are wasting your time talking to me. :@)
          OT. Did you see my post about the Lanesborough and afternoon tea some time in the new year?

          1. 1. It’s never a waste of time talking to you.
            2. No I didn’t see that can you send it to me please.

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