Tuesday 18 February: Britain’s aid budget should help people flooded out of their homes

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its comments facility (now reinstated, but not as good as ours),
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 blacklisted.

Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2020/02/18/lettersbritains-aid-budget-should-help-people-flooded-homes/

781 thoughts on “Tuesday 18 February: Britain’s aid budget should help people flooded out of their homes”

  2. ‘Morning All

    Have you ever read such utter bollocks

    “Homeowners should no longer automatically expect to be protected from major floods, ministers will announce in the coming weeks.

    Under a radical policy shift drawn up by the Environment Agency, flooding will be seen as inevitable due to the predicted effects of climate change.

    Instead of spending millions on “limitlessly high walls” and

    barriers, the government will help people to rebuild their water-damaged

    homes or to move away from flood-risk areas.”

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/02/17/climate-change-means-homeowners-should-no-longer-expect-protection/
    Nothing to do with endless planning permission and development on flood plains and piss poor river management then??

    1. Morning, Rik.

      Nothing to do with endless planning permission and development on flood plains and piss poor river management then??

      It’s everything to do with the above but governments/Quangos cannot be heard to admit that their complete failure to do what they’re paid to do is at the root of the problem.

      1. I don’t believe it’s failure. It’s blatant disinterest.

        Which raises the question of what are these people doing, if not their jobs? Sack them!

    2. Yup. Much of the rain excess water can be absorbed for slow release, by diverting it to water meadows in the upper reaches of rivers. Extensive planting of trees and other greenery will take up a lot of water. Also much better for the planet, local wildlife than concrete walls.
      PS Does concrete manufacture not give off the dreaded CO2?

          2. We have plants growing the garden, North of the Border.
            However, throughout spring and summer plants intercept water that would drop into aquifers and stuff. This reduces the water content of the land, allowing it to take up water when the heavy rain hits. Water meadows act as reservoirs for surface water which drain slowly. This was the field behind our house last week. No this puddle has gone.
            The flood problems have been caused by sudden rushes not overall annual volume.

            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4fe0491f6adf56a6d4f480913101276881013c277960ff2947286bd89828ebae.jpg

          3. I know about transpiration, thanks. It is, as you say, a spring and summer phenomenon but ground water levels fall in summer also because of evaporation i.e. evapotranspiration. The idea that more trees will mitigate winter flooding is false.

            We can quibble over the term water meadow. It is used interchangeably for low-lying land that floods normally or which is subject to managed flooding.

          4. A water meadow is a managed area of land where flooding is controlled by the use of irrigation channels and sluices.
            Land that floods naturally are flood plains.

          5. I know the distinction. Many don’t. Managed water meadows are low-lying and would still flood naturally.

          7. The distinction is one of management. I wouldn’t be too critical of anyone who fails to make that distinction. It’s still the same land, the flat valley floor.

          8. I follow what you say about transpiration and evaporation.
            Do trees not store water as part of their make-up? So if they suck it out of the soil in the summer, the soil is drier than it would otherwise be. Therefore the soil can absorb more water in winter before overflow and flooding commence?

          9. The amount held is modest when compared with the volume of rain that falls and, of course, in winter there is no growth and no drawing of water.

            We can have wet and dry winters and summers and ground water level can fluctuate considerably.

          10. Sure. All that I am saying is that there are ways to work with nature and not against it. No to concrete.

    3. “Homeowners should no longer automatically expect to be protected from major floods…”

      Nor should they expect to be safe on the roads, to be looked after when ill, nor should they expect to be safe from invasion by foreign powers or jurisdiction.

      In other words, Ministers will not have to do their jobs in an effective and competent manner – so suck it up.

    4. It’s the ‘Climate change is ‘inevitable’ – yes, it’s called weather. We’ve always had it. The problem isn’t an invention, it’s entirely manageable. What you’re saying is that you now can’t be bothered to do anything about the effects it has on people rather than managing it’s effects – skewing the fault away from you and on to others.

      As for helping people rebuild their homes, again, that’s back to front. As it means the government can ignore some people. It’s all off loading their responsibility.

    2. They also don’t see the irony that they wander around with their body cams switched on.

      One hopes that that video was sent to the Police Commissioner and the Home Secretary

  7. ‘Morning again.

    This comment on Biased BBC will surely ring true with many Nottlers:

    “Somebody a few days ago posted a picture used by the BBC showing soldiers helping residents near me . Needless to say the picture was of a BME soldier moving a sand bag.
    I would just like to point out that the BBC have adressed the issue and published another picture of another soldier moving a sand bag, this time it’s a white soldier., albeit a women. So nearly there. If the floods hold out till Wednesday we should see a picture of a white male soldier, who do seem to make up the vast majority of those helping, but sadly again underepresented on the BBC and MSM as a whole.”

  8. Morning all

    SIR – I am simply one of the millions who have watched from afar as adults and children have had their lives devastated by the two recent storms, with carpets, clothes and possessions ruined by the downpours.

    There have rightly been calls for flood defences to be strengthened, but there is also a compelling need to help the people affected to get their lives back on track without further ado.

    Britain spends billions in foreign aid. There is a case for spending much of that money at home.

    Brian Atkins

    St Albans, Hertfordshire

    1. SIR – Time to ignore EU diktats. Time to dredge our rivers.

      Jan McKechnie

      Swansea

      SIR – For George Eustice, the Environment Secretary, to say that the flood assets have worked in the face of Storm Dennis is simply not true. To people deluged for the fourth time in eight years, it is a real slap in the face. I do vote Conservative but this attitude appals me.

      It is the job of the Government to defend this country and that should include flood defences.

      Wendy Munday

      Oswestry, Shropshire

      1. The EU prevented dredging and we are allowing building on flood plains because councillors get more cash for more residents. And Tesco style hard paving is fashionable…

      2. The only politician who understood the disaster caused by EU rules was Owen Paterson who was the minister of the environment at the time of the floods in the Somerset Levels which resulted because the age old practice of dredging had been abandoned to comply with EU rules.

        Of course that totally inadequate imbecile, Cameron, felt so threatened by having a member of government with both competence and common sense that he sacked him and appointed Adultera Truss in his place.

        It is rather worrying that Johnson is also afraid of competent people. Why else has he not offered Owen Paterson a place in the cabinet?

        Of course Shakespeare understood this very well. In Antony and Cleopatra one of Antony’s generals realised that it would not serve him well if he did too well:

        Who does i’ th’ wars more than his captain can
        Becomes his captain’s captain; and ambition,
        The soldier’s virtue, rather makes choice of loss
        Than gain which darkens him.
        I could do more to do Antonius good,
        But ’twould offend him, and in his offense
        Should my performance perish.

        1. The awful irony is that so-called ‘Green’ policies actually cause huge environmental damage. From our wholly-preventable floods to the Australian wildfires, there is huge loss of life (human and animal) and damage to habitats.

          I am a city-dweller to my pampered fingertips, but I know that the best people to manage the land are those who have lived on it for generations, not trendy virtue-signallers who care little for the suffering caused to ordinary people as long as it serves the great God ‘climate change.’

      3. The EU prevented dredging and we are allowing building on flood plains because councillors get more cash for more residents. And Tesco style hard paving is fashionable…

    2. Poor fellow, he does not understand that “foreign aid” is a euphemism for the bribes we dole out to nasty foreigners in the vain hope that we will gain some commercial or political favour.

  9. SIR – Forty years ago I was employed as geologist by an aggregate company to develop gravel pits around the United Kingdom.

    Under no circumstances would planning permission be granted for any permanent structure on a river’s flood plain, where sand and gravel are generally deposited. Any structure that might restrict the flow of water across the flood plain was prohibited; not even a Portakabin would be tolerated.

    Nowadays entire housing estates are built on flood plains.

    And people wonder why they are regularly flooded out of house and home.

    Jeremy Spencer-Cooper

    Easebourne, West Sussex

  10. Morning again

    SIR – Christine Armstrong (Features, February 11) says the effect of going to boarding school is that you end up “emotionally stunted”.

    I went to boarding school aged eight and left at 16. I am glad to have been emotionally stunted by the experience: it makes one less of a nuisance. It also makes one a lot less miserable when bad stuff happens, and bad stuff will surely happen at some point, even to the cosseted members of our coming generation.

    Dr Alex Abercrombie

    Fishguard, Pembrokeshire

    1. I find it hard to agree with Christine Armstrong.

      I went to boarding school at the age of eight and did not leave school until the age of 18. Added to which I spent many years of my life living in accommodation in boarding schools as a schoolmaster.

      I wonder why I am so happy, cheerful and fulfilled in my life and especially in my emotional life with my lovely wife?

      1. One learns how to manage one’s emotions when things don’t go well. I’d not call it being stunted, maybe a stiff upper lip?
        Anyhow, Rastus, the reason for your fulfilment is likely described by your last three words!

  11. Russia’s ‘Big Brother’ facial recognition system goes on trial. Aljazeera. 16 hours ago.

    Activists in Russia, who are concerned at government plans for one of the world’s largest facial recognition systems, are taking legal action.

    They fear the surveillance system is being used to target critics of President Vladimir Putin.

    Police say law-abiding Russians have nothing to fear.

    Morning everyone. A bit slack that for the Russians! Ours is already up and running. Strangely enough the cops here say exactly the same thing! There’s nothing to worry about!

    https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/02/russias-big-brother-facial-recognition-system-trial-200217150907189.html

    1. Women are inferior to men and that can never be changed other than by means that destroy the premise on which Islam is based.

        1. Morning Rik,
          316445+up✔s,
          There you go again, flying in the face of
          submission,PCism,Appeasement practised by the lab/lib/con coalition & followers.

    2. If they had simply confined themselves weaving carpets, they would not have got into trouble.

  13. SIR – Professor John Ashton rightly criticises the dearth of useful information about coronavirus (report, February 15).

    Many people worldwide have now had the illness and recovered, yet the media still refers to it as the “killer virus”, and sufferers are immediately sent to hospital. This spreads fear.

    It has been suggested that, in most cases, the illness is somewhere between a heavy cold and flu. If we can establish that this is the case, GPs can then handle it in the usual way, by giving advice for relieving symptoms and keeping an eye on more susceptible patients.

    Dr Robert Walker

    Workington, Cumbria

    1. “… the illness is somewhere a between a heavy cold and flu. If we can establish that this is the case, GPs can then handle it in the usual way,” by telling people not to come to the surgery but stay at home and have hot drinks and ibuprofen.

      1. HP,
        316445+up✔s,
        May one suggest spend the time reading up on what the lab/lib/con coalition politico’s & party has done for these Isles regarding the eu years of rule.
        Recovery & enlightenment could be a winning double.

  14. Here’s Freddy……..

    SIR – Michael Deacon is talking poppycock when he avers that “patriotism is loud, it’s boastful, it’s showy – and… a tiny bit vulgar”. That is chauvinism. There is nothing ignoble in quiet, dignified love of country – that is patriotism.

    The acid test is when the country, through a recognised authority, asks a citizen to go into harm’s way for it. No need to wave a flag or prepare an invoice. Just say yes and get on with it.

    Frederick Forsyth

    Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire

    1. Morning E,
      316445+up✔s,
      Currently past patriotism can now find one being Tommy Robinsoned & receiving a porridge diet.

  16. HSBC to cut 35,000 jobs and shed assets in major overhaul

    Banking giant HSBC will cut 35,000 jobs over the next three years and shed assets in a major overhaul.
    Some $100bn (£77bn) in assets will be cast off and the bank’s investment branch slashed as it seeks to become leaner and more competitive.

    Interim chief executive Noel Quinn said: “The totality of this program is that our headcount is likely to go from 235,000 to closer to 200,000 over the next three years.”
    HSBC reported its 2019 profit before tax was $13.35bn (£10.2bn), down from $19.89bn (£15.3bn) the previous year. Brokerage estimates had been for around $20bn (£15.4bn).
    The bank blamed $7.3bn (£5.6bn) in write-offs linked to its global banking and markets and commercial banking business units in Europe.

  17. Large employers fail to spend apprenticeship money

    Employers are failing to use hundreds of millions of pounds that was intended for training apprentices, according to figures obtained by the BBC.
    At least 55 of the largest employers in England have each released more than £1m back to the government which was meant to be spent on apprentices.
    In total around 5,000 English employers relinquished more than £400m of funding raised by the apprenticeship levy in the first eight-month period when sums could expire.
    That’s about a quarter of the money made available for apprentice training and covers about one in three of those employers who then had to pay the levy.
    This suggests that some large companies seem happier to treat the levy simply like an extra tax and say goodbye to the money involved, rather than take advantage of it to improve the skills of younger workers.

  18. Review into failed £500m Job Support Wales scheme

    A review has been launched into how a £500m job support scheme failed to get off the ground for a second time.
    Job Support Wales (JSW) was intended to help people into employment by giving them individually-tailored support and was meant to begin in April.
    It would have replaced previous schemes including ReAct and Jobs Growth Wales.
    The Welsh Conservatives said it was “totally unacceptable” but economy minister Ken Skates said existing support would remain available.
    The idea behind the scheme – previously known as Working Wales – was to help people with things such as access to childcare, mental health support and skills training.

    1. I think he needs reminding that he has no right to any input at all – disgusting little creep!

      1. It is treasonous. As were the repeated visits to Brussels by pro-EU MPs and the SNP during the so-called negotiations. These people should have been taken into custody for the duration. The bad-minded, ill mannered dogs in the EU encouraged them as it made things more difficult for our legitimate representatives.

        1. Morning HP,
          316445+up✔s,
          Instead they still found succour via the polling booth.
          With the polling results of the last couple of decades it is reminiscent of the peoples practising alchemy via the polling booth, turning political sh!te into a decent patriotic government.
          Same results as crap into GOLD.

      1. Morning A
        316445+up✔s,
        Positions of power nationwide,
        join the dots.
        Submission,PCism,
        Appeasement is helping the nation build a NEW governing
        force.

    4. Does the bloody fool not understand that the town he’s looking after is still part of the UK, despite appearances?

      1. There are two and a half million Muslims in the UK. One million of these are in Greater London alone and the inhabitants of Westminster are terrified of them!

        1. Alas that 2.5 million figure was from the 2011 census and the numbers are higher now. One recent government estimate from 2018 reports the figure to be: 3,372,966 (2017 estimation – made 2 August 2018 – via http://www.ons.gov.uk.)

          Those numbers of course only include the ones that they know about, and do not record the numbers arriving here under the radar for the past 20 years. The real figure will be higher. Add to that:

          “Between 2001 and 2009, the Muslim population increased almost 10 times faster than the non-Muslim population. Islam is the second largest religion in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. According to recent projections the Muslim population in the UK in the year 2050 is likely to number around 13 million.”

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_the_United_Kingdom

          It will not take another 30 years for that number to be reached though. That will not matter anyway, as we have seen in other countries that those “very serious followers of islam” may only be 25% of the total, but they openly attack a country and start a civil war to drag it down when their population level reaches 10%-13%. Which is around 7 million in the United Kingdom. We are seeing them flexing their muscles already and demanding that we change our society to bow down to them.

          From the Guardian itself (11/02/2015) “One in three Muslims in the United Kingdom is under 15.” You can imagine the impact that it will have when those “dormant children” become active adults in the community in the next 10 years. Such a massive fundamental change in population cannot be thought of as an accident. It is deliberate and is happening across Europe, and anywhere that the globalists can lower border controls. The good thing, and the thing that will save us, is that people have started to notice this happening.

  21. SIR – Henrietta Smith (Letters, February 15) dislikes shaking hands or kissing to celebrate the Peace.

    I recommend the practice of our churchwarden who, when the Peace is announced, drops to his knees. He is then left in total peace.

    Christopher Martin
    Royston, Hertfordshire

    The Churchwarden should be thankful there are no muslims attending the service. While he is on his knees, they might be tempted to show their version of ‘Peace’ by whipping out a sword and beheading him.

  22. Extinction Rebellion activists slammed for digging up lawn around apple tree linked to Sir Isaac Newton

    Another case of the police standing ideally by whilst they committed criminal damage

    LOCALS have blasted activists for digging up a college lawn linked to Sir Isaac Newton.
    Extinction Rebellion (XR) protesters also chained themselves to an apple tree at Trinity, Cambridge, yesterday.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/29da30309f40e3666da8ebf13f8bee54d1632d887ead1e43114f2d8e72494b3e.jpg

    1. All of them supported financially by the bank of Daddy and Mummy .. I wonder whether they approve of Granny’s central heating set on high , or the munch burger and coffee they will consume after expending so much energy digging and destroying ..

      What is wrong with the police , are they scared of middle class kids?

      2. Morning, Belle.
        I would imagine Mummy and Daddy have already finagled their finances to ensure their sprogs are a burden on the taxpayer.
        You have to be comfortably off and middle class to understand how to seriously work the system.

      1. The Criminal Justice Public Order Act of 1994 brought trespass under the auspices of criminal, rather than civil law, with the introduction of a new offence: aggravated trespass.

        The law can be applied to public or common land, and has implications for activities including: picketing a workplace demonstrating in the precincts of a public facility – eg, a school, hospital, library, university, town hall leafleting outside a shop to protest, for example, about sales of non-dolphin friendly tuna disrupting motorway building The right to roam and the “right to party” are also affected by this piece of legislation.

        police officers have the power to order people to leave private land if damage has occurred. The Edinburgh Freedom Network’s website reports that courts have already ruled that walking across a field constitutes “damage to land”.
        In the case of outdoor parties or raves, police have the power to prevent events where amplified music is played, even if the landowner has given permission for the party to take place. permission for the party to take place.

        Common Law Breach of the Peace can also be used by police officers to arrest and move on protesters.

        breach of the peace was often used to arrest hunt saboteurs, and has been used to arrest members of picket lines.
        He said that although you couldn’t really be charged under common law for breach of the peace, you can be charged with obstructing a police officer.

      1. Some stupid fools vandalising a lawn is significant.

        The groundskeepers not being able to get rid of them is one issue.

        Cambridge University Corporation not booting them off another.

        The college porters not acting a third.

        But what’s really egregious is the police closing roads. The green nutters have no right to block the road. It is illegal. The police not clearing them off and worse, supporting their activity is the final nail in the coffin of legality.

    4. I’m sure that a few beefy proctors from other colleges could see them off – after they’ve all had their faces ground into the earth they’ve revealed.

      2. Well I would assume this is private land so the owners could take out a civial action against them for damages and if they did not pay get a CCJ against them

    6. Have the police arrested them and re-opened the roads or are they still aiding and abetting a crime?

  23. 200,000 homes ditch BBC TV licences

    HUNDREDS of thousands of homes ditched the BBC TV licence in just one year as No10 plans to force the broadcaster to adopt a Netflix-style subscription.
    New figures show the plummeting number of households paying for the Beeb TV licence amid Downing Street’s plans to scrap it and move to a subscription model.

    Research revealed that there had been a 200,000 drop of “in force” TV licences in only one year,In November 2018 there were 25,805,141 licences, but only a year later, the number had dropped to 25,606,957 – a staggering drop of 198,184 households without licence fees.

    1. Presumably somewhere on the Continent.
      You can understand how they’ve become a major problem.

  26. From the BBC.Andrew Sabisky: No 10 adviser resigns over alleged race comments.
    Strangely the furore that’s resulted in his resignation comes from remarks that may be true. Some suggestions were perhaps more humorous than serious.
    Does anyone really think that the average black person is as intelligent as the average whitey? If so, where is the evidence?

    2. I was under the impression that there has been plenty of research into IQ which showed variations between different races with Ashkenazi Jews at the top of the ladder. Not having read any of the research I wouldn’t want to vouch for it, and I’m not sure that the variety of foreign girls at my school was a statistically valid sample, though there were some very obvious differences in attainment.

        1. Looking at the link posted by Datz I thought it would be interesting know if differences still occur in countries like the US between the different racial groups, where there is a greater chance of having recieved the same education, as opposed to comparing rich and poor countries.

          1. Morning C. This is a minefield for Academics. Obviously if someone is at the top of the IQ tree someone must be at the bottom. The problem is that it contravenes the Cultural Marxist tenet that all are equal. I myself have no difficulties as a Caucasian in accepting that Ashkenazi Jews and The Chinese are on average smarter than us. Blacks and their supporters cannot say this! It is racist!

      2. My understanding is that research showed that girls matured intellectually much earlier by the age of 11 than boys who a few years later caught them up. And that, based on this research, in the days when all children took the 11-plus exams fewer girls were given a “pass” than boys to ensure that after a few years the numbers reflected the correct state of intellect at that later age. This may or may not be true, but I would be interested to hear from other NoTTLers with greater knowledge – Rastus for example?

    3. The Nazis notoriously engaged in negative eugenics by genocide in World War II.

      Eugenics is a very delicate raw subject .. best to leave well alone , no matter what one thinks privately.

        1. Nutrition.
          Many of those picturesque starving babies were irreversibly brain damaged before any decent food was pumped into them.

      2. Their IQ is high enough to extract foreign aid from gullible countries like ours for no apparent benefit except to the ‘officials’

  27. A week’s worth of short stories:

    MONDAY
    The mother of a 17-year-old girl was concerned that her daughter was having sex.

    Worried the girl might become pregnant and adversely impact the family’s status, she consulted the family doctor.

    The doctor told her that teenagers today were very wilful and any attempt to stop the girl would probably result in rebellion. He then told her to arrange for her daughter to be put on birth control and until then, talk to her and give her a box of condoms.

    Later that evening, as her daughter was preparing for a date, the mother told her about the situation and handed her a box of condoms.
    The girl burst out laughing and reached over to hug her mother, saying,

    ‘Oh Mum! You don’t have to worry about that! I’m dating Susan!’

    TUESDAY
    A man went to church one day and afterwards he stopped to shake the preacher’s hand.
    He said, ‘Preacher, I’ll tell you, that was a damned fine sermon. Damned good!’
    The preacher said,
    ‘Thank you, sir, but I’d rather you didn’t use profanity.’
    The man said, ‘I was so damned impressed with that sermon I put five thousand dollars in the offering plate!’
    The preacher said, ‘No shit?’

    WEDNESDAY
    Brenda and Steve took their six-year-old son to the doctor.
    With some hesitation, they explained that although their little angel appeared to be in good health, they were concerned about his rather small penis.
    After examining the child, the doctor confidently declared, ‘Just feed him pancakes. That should solve the problem.’
    The next morning when the boy arrived at breakfast, there was a large stack of warm pancakes in the middle of the table.
    ‘Gee, Mom,’ he exclaimed. ‘For me?’
    ‘Just take two,’ Brenda replied. ‘The rest are for your father.’

    THURSDAY
    One night, an 87-year-old woman came home from
    Bingo to find her 92-year-old husband in bed with another woman.
    She became violent and ended up pushing him off the balcony of their 20th floor apartment, killing him instantly.
    Brought before the court, on the charge of murder, she was asked if she had anything to say in her defence.
    ‘Your Honour,’ she began coolly, ‘I figured that at 92, if he was such a Superman that he could still screw, I thought he could fly too.’

    FRIDAY
    A Doctor was addressing a large audience in Tampa.
    ‘The material we put into our stomachs is enough to have killed most of us sitting here, years ago. Red meat is awful. Soft drinks corrode your stomach lining. Chinese food is loaded with MSG. High fat diets can be disastrous, and none of us realises the long-term harm caused by the germs in our drinking water. However, there is one thing that is the most dangerous of all and we all have eaten, or will eat it. Can anyone here tell me what food it is that causes the most grief and suffering for years after eating it?’
    After several seconds of quiet, a 75-year-old
    man in the front row raised his hand, and softly said,
    ‘Wedding Cake.’

    SATURDAY
    Bob, a 70-year-old, extremely wealthy widower, shows up at the Country Club with a breathtakingly beautiful and very sexy 25-year-old blonde-haired woman who knocks everyone’s socks off with her youthful sex appeal and charm and who hangs over Bob’s arm and listens intently to his every word.
    His buddies at the club are all aghast.
    At the very first chance, they corner him and ask, ‘Bob, how’d you get the trophy girlfriend?’
    Bob replies, ‘Girlfriend? She’s my wife!’
    They are knocked over, but continue to ask. ‘So, how’d you persuade her to marry you?’
    ‘I lied about my age’, Bob replies.
    ‘What, did you tell her you were only 50?’
    Bob smiles and says, ‘No, I told her I was 90.’

    SUNDAY
    Groups of Americans were travelling by tour bus through Holland.
    As they stopped at a cheese farm, a young guide led them through the process of cheese making, explaining that goat’s milk was used.
    She showed the group a lovely hillside where many goats were grazing.
    ‘These’ she explained, ‘Are the older goats put out to pasture when they no longer produce.’
    She then asked, ‘What do you do in America with your old goats?’
    A spry old gentleman answered, ‘They send us on bus tours!

    2. Great stuff it reminds me of the TV programme old Jews telling old jokes………often hilarious but sadly no longer available.

  29. Good morning all.

    Scones with passionfruit curd for breakfast together with a litre of goat’s milk.

    1. Good morning, Peddy (and all NoTTLers). Just orange juice, tea and toast with marmalade (the usual) for me this morning.

      And now for something completely different:

      OLD IS WHEN…

      … your sweetie says “Let’s go upstairs and make love”, and you answer “Pick one, I can’t do both!”

      … your friends compliment you on your new alligator shoes and you’re barefoot.

      … a sexy babe catches your eye and your pacemaker opens the garage door.

      … going bra-less pulls all the wrinkles out of your face.

      … you don’t mind where your spouse goes – just as long as you don’t have to go along.

      … you are cautioned to slow down by the doctor instead of the police.

      … “getting a little action” means “I don’t need to take any fibre today”.

      … “getting lucky” means finding your car in the parking lot.

      1. Morning Elsie

        Oh dear, not good to go into ‘Old mindset ‘

        Husband ate a superb Manx kipper for breakfast yesterday , it stayed with him all day via burps etc!

      2. Morning Elsie

        Oh dear, not good to go into ‘Old mindset ‘

        Husband ate a superb Manx kipper for breakfast yesterday , it stayed with him all day via burps etc!

        3. I’ve been trying to buy breakfast kippers in w/rose for 2 weeks, but they seem to be constantly sold out.

    1. Banks have been substantially cutting saving rates as well. They though now have no where to go with rates at almost zero in many cases. It just further discourges savings which are already at far to low a level.. Most people only have enough saved to last them a week or two and that will be more than outweighed by the level of debt they are carrying(Excluding mortgages)

      1. Bankers’ bonuses should be banned until the savings rate rises to a sensible rate. They are ignoring the Savers in their banks and treating them with contempt.

        1. Between 1955 and 1962 the savings rate was under 5%. Between 63 and 76 the rate averaged about 7.5%. From 76 to 95 it averaged about 11.5%. Since 95 it’s averaged about 7% and is currently 6%. For the high savings period interest rates went as high as 17% and averaged over 10%. They are currently 0.75%.

          2. Then don’t save which was always a pretty stupid idea once you have enough for emergencies saved up, and even these days overdrafts or a credit card does the job there.
            Money should be spent or invested.

      2. Correct.

        Saved money sitting in bank accounts is dead. At least pension savings get invested but largely into gilts.

        No loans means no money creation. No money creation and the wheels fall off.

      1. Well, you know the prevailing fashionable economic philosophy, savings are dead money and not to be encouraged. Get out there and spend, spend, spend to keep the consumer boom going.

    4. We did alright with the bonds last year, 2.15% return (1.12% in 2018).

      The only good thing you can say about them is that they are a damned sight better than the normal savings accounts, but only if you have a lot of them.

      This latest move is a continuation of the rot that set in in 2009, when they reduced the value of the minimum prize from £50 to £25.

        1. A £500 prize towards the end of the year boosted the return. Other than that it was all 25s and 50s.

          1. We’ve never had anything over the £25 consolation prize, but we often get two or three at a time.
            Best one was five consolation prizes a year past November.

      2. They must do away with the two £1 million prizes and spread the money to increase the chances of winning.

        1. 2 million spread across the number of bonds issued wouldn’t make any noticeable effect on the number of prizes, while removing that important ‘pot of gold’ selling point.

  31. Boy Scouts of America files for bankruptcy

    Boy Scouts of America (BSA) has filed for bankruptcy protection as it faces new legal battles over thousands of cases of alleged sexual abuse.
    Scores of lawyers are seeking settlements on behalf of several thousand men who say they were molested as scouts by scoutmasters or other leaders decades ago.

    The alleged victims are only now eligible to sue because of recent changes in statute-of-limitations laws.

  32. Boy Scouts of America files for bankruptcy

    Boy Scouts of America (BSA) has filed for bankruptcy protection as it faces new legal battles over thousands of cases of alleged sexual abuse.
    Scores of lawyers are seeking settlements on behalf of several thousand men who say they were molested as scouts by scoutmasters or other leaders decades ago.

    The alleged victims are only now eligible to sue because of recent changes in statute-of-limitations laws.

  33. Morning all.
    I read that the couple aboard the quarantined cruise ship have now also been confirmed positive as catching the Corona virus. Mr Able is the chap who has been making live reports from his cabin on the ship. He and his wife are being separated and moved ashore. He has stated in no uncertain terms that in some way it’s been a set up.
    I sincerly wish them all the best.
    Speaking of which, does any one else wonder why political figures and those who are deemed the most important in our lives do not catch such nasty viruses or diseases ?
    Co Mafia boss Mr effing Barnier is becoming more and more akward by the minute. Perhaps he needs a holiday, a cruise might be suitable.

    1. I am still no wiser about this business. What I suspect is that a truly massive lie is being propagated here though for what reason I do not know!

      1. I know I have mentioned this previously……but the bbc have been making reference to the treatment of Chinese muslims for no apparent reason. It just came out of the blue.
        But the book “I am Pilgrim”. After selective practice in an out of the way area.
        Is all about the attempt by a clever alternative faith scientists/doctor, to spread a virus in the US…..
        Just adding it to the conversation.

          1. I read it, didn’t think too much of it to be honest.

            I recommend the Orphan X series by Greg Hurwitz, and the Carter Blake series by Mason Cross.

        2. I have read it Eddy though this would appear to be more shooting yourself in the foot if true!!

      2. Morning AS,
        316445+up✔s,
        My belief is all the scare material is covering for the already done “deal”negotiations farce coming up.

      3. A cover, for what is really happening? After all, some of those of different ethnicity should be seen to get it, or be pronounced ‘superspreaders?’ They could easily inject those who are said to have the virus with a common cold as part of the treatment for a touch of reality…! How would the poor old patient know? Oh dear, my imagination is running away with me at full pelt.

        Edit: ‘those of’ inserted.

      4. A cover, for what is really happening? After all, some of those of different ethnicity should be seen to get it, or be pronounced ‘superspreaders?’ They could easily inject those who are said to have the virus with a common cold as part of the treatment for a touch of reality…! How would the poor old patient know? Oh dear, my imagination is running away with me at full pelt.

        Edit: ‘those of’ inserted.

        3. Every panic allows governments to exert greater control over their populations.
          It’s a ratchet effect; once that grip is gained, it is never released.

          2. If th IRA had not existed the UK Government would have had to create it. That way, anti-terrorism laws, detention without trial, nonsensical ‘security” at airports could all be introduced, and accepted by the proles.

          3. Increased police powers are what suddenly sprang to mind a few days ago as I wondering why this was being blown up out of all proportion for so long. As one Doctor said in a rare comment that slipped through the net: “Normal Flu is more deadly than this.”

            Then it was announced in a news program that the Police were going to be allowed to forcibly detain/isolate those suspected to have the virus. That is a useful little new trick to have in your back pocket for the future, which bypasses the normal rights you have when you are arrested. You don’t need to charged with an offence or released if you are being “detained” for the public good for health reasons.

            They can always then say, when you are found not to have it at all: “Well… We thought that they had it.”

    2. What really doesn’t “gel” over this is that I believe that the authorities are/were proposing to let people go once the 14 day quarantine period was over, which is fairly soon. Surely they should only be released 14 days after the last case is confirmed.

      Countries are flying their own citizens home now, even before the initial 14 day quarantine is over.

      It is almost as if they have been trying to get as many people infectious as possible before releasing them back into the general population.

      It just doesn’t make sense, unless you start from the conspiracy theory.

        1. Most vaccines contain particles of an attenuated virus. That provides sufficient exposure to get the immune system going.

          1. Or we just let a few super-spreaders go 🙂

            Does the same job with a few casualties and saves millions in vaccine development and dispersal.

          5. No – just that some parts of my education are obviously lacking. I was not aware of Typhoid Mary as part of my education.

            That’s the trouble of having foreign (abeit adoptive) parents. They know little of the stuff that home-grown people do. I knew no end of stuff that my parents grew up with. I knew what wild flowers were called in Danish, but not their ordinary English names…

        2. Indeed so, but if the disease is as contagious and deadly as suggested; and judging by the efforts being made by the Chinese to contain it it might be, then exposure is not the way forward.
          Vaccines will come out of the laboratory.
          Any herd immunity on this one, without a laboratory soluton, looks as though a lot of the herd will die first.

        2. Especially the useless old and ill. Certain races appear to be less susceptible, though.

          I am surprised that with the amount of Chinese involvement in Africa, there seems to be no outbreak in Africa.

        3. If the climate people are correct what better way.

          Kill off the elderly, the infirm and the poorest who won’t have access to hospitals and care.

        4. If the fatality rate is only 2%, then it’s a pretty poor way to go about it. The third world will be breeding faster than that.

          1. Thing is, it used to be balanced. First world societies had the technology, education and infrastructure to support themselves.

            Thus the birthrate and death rate were rational.

            Then Labour got in and wanted a voting bloc, and imported millions of unnecessary, unwanted individuals who out bred the locals.

            In the third world, first world technology (medicine, food) created a boom and survival rates that were not then matched with education and infrastructure. We’ve kept them alive when they should have died, creating even more demand for our technology but we’re not giving them the other tools to check their birth rate.

            I don’t want to see kids dying. Equally the famines are caused by having too many mouths to feed with the tech and infrastructure they have. It’s a balancing act. Perhaps an unfair one, but it exists to stop these disasters in the first place.

        5. In 20 years the population has increased by 20 million. 50m to 70

          The native birthrate was falling. Therefore, it’s all down to unwanted immigration. The population should have increased by about 10 percent. Instead it’s well over 45.

          Thanks Labour.

      3. I don’t exactly understand how if this couple have been isolated for 14 days they have contracted the virus. Just after a flight of people had left to returned to the states.
        Conspiracy theories are in reality just words Sos, actions are far more theatrical.

        1. They have not really been isolated in the true sense here.

          The passengers have been allowed to wander around the ship, they are fed and watered and presumably share the same air conditioning laundry, utensils etc. There is some reasonable doubt that the masks being used are effective. If one wanted to do a study on transmission speeds and infection opportunites a large crusie ship, apart from age distributions, would almost reflect a small town.

          Some of the actions being taken suggest it is a global threat, yet at the same time people are still permitted, if not facilitated to travel back to their countries of origin.

          Words and figures differ here.

          1. If that is the case, what was the point of keeping them all on board.
            It was ‘an accident waiting to happen’.
            One might suspect that some others must have also been infected possibly including some of the Americans flown home.

          2. Indeed, the whole exercise seemed pointless as constructed; as if they were doing an experiment.

            I am sure several of the Americans will turn out to be carriers.

  34. Morning all.
    I read that the couple aboard the quarantined cruise ship have now also been confirmed positive as catching the Corona virus. Mr Able is the chap who has been making live reports from his cabin on the ship. He and his wife are being separated and moved ashore. He has stated in no uncertain terms that in some way it’s been a set up.
    I sincerly wish them all the best.
    Speaking of which, does any one else wonder why political figures and those who are deemed the most important in our lives do not catch such nasty viruses or diseases ?
    Co Mafia boss Mr effing Barnier is becoming more and more akward by the minute. Perhaps he needs a holiday, a cruise might be suitable.

      1. Remarkable cinema.

        The ‘beaver’ was never shown on the screen, but every man in the audience could see it in full glorious technicolour.

      1. Firstborns farm has beavers. They really do gnaw the trees as drawn, just like a pencil sharpener.

  36. If you think the Labour Leadership elections are long and drawn out that’s nothing to that of the Lib-Dems. They are in such chaos they have postponed any leadership election until after the May local elections

    So far though most of them have hinted they will stand for election all 12 of them

    1. Very wise not to rush it.

      Like all parties, they need to sort out their Blairite pragmatists and their radical purists. Much will depend on how Boris’ Government performs, who the Labour Party elects and how they perform under this new leader, and also how Brexit pans out. Issues. such as climate change and the threat brought on by Islamist migrancy and mllitant radicalisation, may also become pressing if they aren’t already.

      Under Jo Swinson, the plan was to ditch the Celtic fringe radicals and concentrate on winning over the metropolitan Remainer Blairites, who had been effectively kicked out of the Conservative and Labour parties. Outside London and Scotland, this was not a popular policy, and lost the Lib Dems a lot of their grassroot supporters out in the shires. In fact the Lib Dems have been moving towards metropolitan authoritarianism with its attendant clampdowns on free speech and unapproved views on gender and other things, but a totally relaxed approach to fiscal crime on a global scale since adopting the Orange Book after the fall of the last of the true liberals and social democrats under Paddy Ashdown and Charles Kennedy, who are both now dead.

      Thankfully, the Brexit debate has shifted since 31st January in that it is no longer possible to remain in the club, only to reapply or to join onto a member state, such as Ireland. I imagine the Scots and the Nationalist Northern Irish will be making informal approaches to the Taoiseach with that in mind. A bit far-fetched imagining London doing so.

      Otherwise, if the Labour Party elect a faceless metropolitan Blairite, who can only speak in platitudes (and he is currently frontrunner), then there is little point in the Lib Dems copying them with the Swinson approach. They need someone more thoughtful who can pick up the Tories’ borrowed ex-Labour vote in the North, come up with some arrangement with the Scots, and rely on Boris’s post-Brexit plans falling apart (having £100 billion taken out them for Vanity Line doesn’t help the Tory Party balance the books) to win them back their old stamping ground in the Liberal West Country, and make serious inroads into the Home Counties.

        1. I heard him last night, and I couldn’t make out anything of substance he was saying. It was all platitudes, said with an emphatic tone to make it seem it was carrying any weight.

          The most sensible of the three was Lisa Nandy, but like Ed Miliband, suffers from lapses of judgement that really need to be covered.

          When she does slip up (as she did over monarchy abolition last night, and did before when she went all woke over trans rights, and also has not through asset taxation as opposed to income taxation), the best thing for her to do is to say it’s not a priority and kick it into the long grass.

  37. No 10 must look at hiring process after Andrew Sabinsky ‘racism’ row, says minister. 18 February 2020.

    Government’s hiring process has to be “looked at” in order to prevent “racists” from working in Number 10, Kwasi Kwarteng has said.

    The energy minister said comments made about eugenics by Andrew Sabisky, a Downing Street adviser, were “reprehensible” and “racist”.

    “The comments were completely reprehensible. They were racist, offensive remarks and he’s now left very quickly and that’s the end of the matter,” Mr Kwarteng said.

    BELOW THE LINE.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e4d4fe86d1c8b55fe8229cb77662ad1de80b7640aeafd9b6b3cac713d4c38e59.png

    Obviously there was some disagreement with Mr Kwarteng’s analysis. Lol!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/02/18/boris-johnson-brexit-latest-news-andrew-sabisky-bbc/

  38. Wages back above pre-economic crisis levels

    How strange was not our economy supposed to sink if we left the EU. Instead it is starting to outpace the EU

    Average weekly wages in the UK have returned to pre-economic crisis levels for the first time since March 2008.
    Weekly pay reached £511 in the three months to December – the last time they were this high, after adjusting for inflation, was before the downturn.
    Excluding bonuses, earnings grew at an annual rate of 3.2% in the three-month period, official figures show.
    Employment rose by 336,000 to another record high of 32.93 million, while unemployment stayed at 1.29 million.

    1. I’m earning less than minimum wage. I get £7 an hour and that’s been the rate for this job for at least 2 years.

      My wife hasn’t had a rise in five years and only 2 rises in the previous ten years.

      I don’t know anybody doing well.

        1. I’m officially self-employed. I don’t qualify for minimum wage, holiday, sick pay, in fact any benefits at all.
          Mistakes are deducted 100% from my wages. If I take a card payment and the card turns out to be fraudulent and they often are then the driver still gets paid, but not by the customer, by me!
          My normal week is 48 hours ( 4 x 12 hr night shifts). Assuming no deductions for ‘mistakes’ my pay is £336 per week, paid in cash on my last night of the chain.
          Of course I have no right to subcontract my job, or send a substitute, it’s pure disguised employment in the gig economy.
          Minimum wage laws are not properly upheld. Usually backdated pay or named and shamed is the result. This is what the modern economy really looks like!

          1. AS you are describing the job I would say you are not Self Employed but are classed as a Worker

          2. I worked for a company a decade or so ago that converted all its staff, not sourced from an agency, from employees to self-employed in order to get round the regs. Laffer in action!

          4. …and of course you are paying income tax and NI contributions based on your £17,472 annual income.

          5. You’ve already won one Employment Tribunal case. You are probably owed a lot of money fro your current employer (presumably this is not the same one that you took action against?).

  39. New budget will be on March 11

    A government source has confirmed to the BBC that the budget will go ahead on March 11. And..

    1. Well Cummings has already written it. The new chancellor’s job isn’t to design the budget, it’s to read it out.

  40. Morning Each,
    316445+up ✔s
    “Don’t expect to be protected from flooding” environment
    agency warns, (DT)
    Is the warning against man made flooding or nature doing ?
    Man made is through mass in many respects uncontrolled immigration & the need in many cases to build on flood plains to accommodate our “guest’s”.
    Natures hand in it can be accommodated via dredging
    and waterway maintenance but the UK politico eu rubber stampers were under brussels rulings, hence we flood in both categories .

  41. Flooding

    Whilst we have had a wet spell in most of the UK the rainfull has been well within normal limits. Most areas that have flooded are areas prone to flooding and I suspect it have been made worse by new developments and building on flood plains and mismanagement of waterways. Rivers are not dredged and brooks and streams are not maintained by councils and even drains are not cleared on a regular basis now

    1. Dredging is not the answer, in fact it has the potential to make things worse while doing ecological damage that can take 30 years to clear up by which time the dredgers come out again.

      Flood plains are necessary features, not prime building land.

      Land is terribly managed in the UK.

      2. Some management of waterways has to be carried out. If you do not they become overgrown and silted up

      1. I just love your sarcasm, Ndovu. (Hence my upvote – not because of your Climate Emergency claim.)

        :-))

      1. We have a local beaver a few hundred yards away. I haven’t seen it (maybe more than one) yet, but I’ve seen the trees it’s gnawed.

      3. They only use mud and sticks for the tourists. Under the water they’ve got concrete and are waiting for you to nip off to get on with the proper stuff.

    1. The Labour Party have totally lost the plot. It is really now the Islington Labour Party. The direction they are going in is not going to win them back the voters they have lost

    1. Apparently the Human Rights of the ‘peaceful’ protesters to ‘protest’ take precedence over our rights to go about our daily business unimpeded by scruffy louts forcing road closures, causing damage to private property and obliging is to walk through dirt when we enter Barclays Bank.

      The Police have clearly lost their way. Wholesale reform and a return to law enforcement must be high on this government’s agenda. Surely?

      1. They may have a right to peacefully protest, but they don’t have a right to block Her Majesty’s Highway, nor to cause criminal damage, nor to engage in activities likely to cause a breach of the peace. That’s three arrestable offences they’ve committed right there.

  45. Just how crazy is a criminal justice system?

    Secretary who stole nearly £1.2m from her property tycoon bosses and used it to splash out on a fleet of luxury cars said ‘thank you so much’ as a judge spared her jail

    A secretary who stole nearly £1.2million from her property tycoon bosses and used it to splash out on a fleet of luxury cars said ‘thank you so much’ as a judge spared her jail.
    Mother-of-one Samina Khan, 48, of Wykeham Green, Dagenham, Essex, bought Aston Martins, BMWs, Porsches, and Audis while fiddling the books and forging signatures at Landmark and Duram Properties over a period of 13 years.
    She left property tycoon brothers David and Richard Murad ‘utterly betrayed’ after stealing £1,185,955 from their family-run companies and destroying cheque books that would trace the theft back to her.
    Khan claimed she had been trying to provide for her six-year-old son when she was first confronted about the theft however the offending predated her child’s birth.

      1. Spared jail. but what other punishment? None? Not even a mention of paying it back? Bet they daren’t even fire her in case she screams discrimination or a hate crime.

        1. THe article said a lot of it could be recovered but thats no punishment a lot of it will never be recovered and she has had the benefit from it

    2. Clucking bell. Were all those cars for a sprog wot is too young to drive? (Well, too young to drive in unenriched areas of the country.)

  46. Lisa Nandy said she would like to see “Queen Meghan” when quizzed about the Royals in a Labour leadership debate.
    When asked if they would vote to abolish the monarchy, all three candidates said that it was not a pressing issue.

    Lisa Nandy was the only one of the hopefuls to say that she would vote to get rid of the monarchy as she is a “democrat”.

    Later on she said: “I’d quite like to see Queen Meghan.”

    1. Quite what is a “European Citizen” , does this not imply membership of a State or Country?. The “project” continues apace .

      Definition:- an inhabitant of a city or town especially : one entitled to the rights and privileges of a freeman. 2a : a member of a state. b : a native or naturalised person who owes allegiance to a government and is entitled to protection from it.

    3. No, those who shouldn’t be here should be deported.

      Is Khan making a distinction betwen Londers and Britons? Does he understand that there are no Britons in London because it’s a toilet of his own spattering?

  48. London horror: Woman ‘ran over in street before man threw body into car’ in Croydon

    What has happened to London? Once one of the safest cities in the world

    A WOMAN was ran over in the street before being forced into the driver’s car last night, London’s Metropolitan Police have revealed.

    Police said the woman was badly injured following an “altercation” with a man, believed to be known to her, at around 9p, in Beddington Lane last night. Witnesses said the woman was struck by the car following a “domestic” incident, before a man forced the woman into the vehicle. The witness told the Sutton Guardian: “There was a girl standing outside, and I don’t know exactly but it seemed like a domestic situation

    “Officers were later notified by the London Ambulance Service that a woman, believed to be the same individual, had been taken to hospital from a nearby address.
    “She currently remains in hospital in a potentially life changing condition. “It is believed the individuals were known to each other..

    1. What has happened to London? Once one of the safest cities in the world.

      See Dick Khant he knows everything, but just can’t get it right.

    1. Is the escort to stop him escaping, protect him from the public, or prevent him carrying out any further assaults?

    1. This is obviously true. However, building many more prisons and putting prisoners in them, instead of failing to prosecute, handing out community service, probation and admonishments, is something no political part will contemplate for various reasons. None of the reasons make sense to the man on the Clapham omnibus…

  51. “Trans patients are having to wait up to three years for their operations and some are getting so desperate that they are taking matter into their own hands …. ” (SWITCH OFF)

    Q: what TV programme had I accidentally tuned into this morning?

    A: Victoria Derbyshire (BBC)

        1. Afternoon M,
          316445+up✔s,
          Waiting list’s = delays
          and what do delays
          give us ?
          Nearly 4 years of political treacherous tripe.

    5. Afternoon LD,
      316445+up✔s
      Self dickchopperoffer, kit offer is, I believe on amizon in a limited number only, this eye watering deal is a one off, so don’t miss it.

    6. Fine. I don’t see a problem with their paying for their own operations. If they want to mutilate themselves, it’s their business.

      Frankly, the wait should be 100 years, as it is not the business of the state to indulge mental illness.

  52. Brexit defeat: EU claims first trade victory as Boris Johnson backs down

    A pretty minor thing and not worth wasting time arguing over

    BRUSSELS will host the first round of trade negotiations with Britain as eurocrats secured an early victory over Boris Johnson

    Michel Barnier demanded both sides’ opening salvos be presented in the Belgian capitals when formal talks begin on the first week of March. It is understood the Government was happy to concede to the bloc but has insisted London will host later rounds. Boris Johnson has demanded negotiations are shared between Whitehall and the European Commission’s Berlaymont headquarters.

    1. No, no, no! Later rounds should be held in Sunderland, Rotherham, Wigan, Blackburn, Mansfield, Tipton, Blaenau Gwent, Grimsby, and Dover (some queueing may be necessary).

  53. I repeat from very late last night:

    Q: Can you think of a major difference between a wide range of BBC output and Sky Live Football?

    A: Yes, on Sky Live Football they apologise to viewers if they (over)hear some “Industrial Language”

  54. A decent article but no mention of the enemy within…

    How can the governing classes be so naive about the threats we face?

    NICK TIMOTHY

    Once famed as perfidious Albion, today our leaders’ approach to the world is making us look ridiculous

    Britain once pursued its national interest with such cynical single-mindedness that European diplomats came to call us “perfidious Albion”. Yet these days, on the international stage, we are hopelessly naive. This weekend we learned that Huawei – the Chinese telecommunications company that will help to build our 5G network – secretly funded a Cambridge University study into the global governance of communications and technology. Cambridge denied that Huawei had the right to veto its findings, but the Chinese had no need to do so: predictably, the authors praised their paymasters.

    “Elite capture”, as intelligence agencies call it, is part of China’s strategy to undermine its rivals, kill questions about its actions, and use the openness of liberal democracies against them. And universities are an important part of the game. Chinese students now provide one fifth of university tuition fee income, and take one in 10 places at Russell Group universities. Dependence on Chinese revenues is such that vice chancellors worry that the coronavirus could bring about a funding crisis.

    It is doubtful this is all they worry about, given their reliance on Chinese cash. Universities are supposed to be seats of free thinking and independent research. But the Chinese state is open about its willingness to use its financial muscle to shut down criticism and dissent. As the House of Commons foreign affairs committee has recorded, China seeks to influence research and block academic discussion in Britain of subjects from its treatment of the Uighur Muslims to the status of Tibet.

    As the committee noted, it is not only the scale of Chinese student migration that provides Beijing with leverage over British universities. Direct research funding – of the kind Huawei provided to Cambridge – is commonplace. Imperial College London receives millions in research funding from China, and publishes more than 600 research papers with Chinese institutions every year. The London School of Economics has accepted funding from Huawei to study the company’s role in the development of 5G technology. Unusually, Oxford was brave enough to ban research grants and donations from Huawei.

    This elite capture – of institutions as well as individuals – is perhaps part of the explanation for Huawei’s successful attempts to play a part in building Britain’s 5G network. Huawei’s UK board is like a Who’s Who of the British establishment; it employs top lobbying companies, and has even sponsored the Civil Service’s own awards ceremony.

    It can sometimes feel baffling that Britain can be so wide-eyed when it deals with companies like Huawei. We are, after all, talking about a company under the control of a hostile state that routinely attacks British interests, conducts industrial espionage, and uses big data and artificial intelligence to spy on foreign nationals as well as its own citizens.

    Why is it that we are so quick to treat firms like Huawei as though they were benign companies from conventional market economies? Why do we treat China like it is a normal country, with a normal government that respects the rules of international trade and diplomacy?

    It might simply be down to defeatism: the belief that we are living through “the Asian century”, that China will become the world’s most powerful nation and we should do whatever it takes to stay in its good books. It might also be down to the fact that China – having relied not on a domestic free market but the strength of its state – is able to provide cutting-edge technologies at prices the West cannot match. But these explanations only take us so far. We might have seen China’s rise and decided to meet it with strength and self-respect, by deepening the Western alliance. We might have seen China’s competitive advantage in aspects of telecommunications and sought to build Western alternatives.

    Just as important an explanation for British – and Western – complacency are the liberal ideology and assumptions held by our governing classes. Since its earliest thinkers, liberalism has misunderstood us as humans. We are all motivated by the desire to be free and autonomous, they believe. We are rational and selfish individuals, or in modern terms “economic maximisers”. And we are the same the world over: in our pursuit of our own freedom, we will throw off customs, institutions and traditions as unwelcome and irrational hindrances.

    This universalism is what gets us into trouble on the world stage, time and again. We had no reason to worry when China was permitted into the international trading system, we were told, because Beijing would observe international norms and laws. As China traded more with the West, it would import the greatest of Western products: the desire for personal and political freedom. And as China’s economy became more market-based, so its state would accede to the demands of its people for freedom.

    Our leaders seemed convinced of these things, yet they turned out to be horrifically naive. China has abused the international trading system by over-producing goods and dumping them on other markets. It has engaged in mass industrial espionage. It has set debt traps for other countries to win leverage over them. Its state has not become more liberal or democratic, but even more oppressive.

    We invaded Iraq and Afghanistan because our leaders believed Iraqis and Afghans wanted to become more like us, and would inevitably do so with time and exposure to our products and culture. We expected privatisation and elections to turn Russia into Sweden. We invited China to finance or build swathes of our critical national infrastructure. We cut a deal with Iran that would allow the ayatollahs to develop a nuclear capability.

    And the reason for our naivety is the mistaken and arrogant assumption that our enemies and rivals cannot hurt us because they are destined to become the same as us. More ridiculous Albion than perfidious Albion. If we do not learn soon, our independence and prosperity will be destroyed by our complacency and hubris.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/02/16/can-governing-classes-naive-threats-face/

    2. ” …
      We are, after all, talking about a company under the control of a
      hostile state that routinely attacks British interests, conducts
      industrial espionage, and uses big data and artificial intelligence to
      spy on foreign nationals as well as its own citizens…”

      I’d think we’re in more danger from our own government, which does the same but also arrests us when we disagree with it.

  55. Malcolm Stamp: Ex-hospital boss ‘faces extradition’ over Australia warrant

    A former NHS hospital boss is facing extradition to Australia on corruption charges, according to reports.
    Malcolm Stamp was chief executive of Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge, and ran others across England before moving to Brisbane in 2013.
    He faces allegations his daughter was given a job in return for a contract while he ran the Metro North Hospital.
    He said he was unaware of the arrest warrant, adding: “I have never been interviewed about any of the claims.”
    Two other men were charged after the Queensland Crime and Corruption Commission (QCCC) opened its investigation at Metro North Hospital.
    One, a former subordinate of Mr Stamp’s at Metro North, has been handed a suspended sentence.

      1. I used to have a 78 on the Parlaphone Rhythm series of a totally different song with the same title.
        As yet I can’t find it on Youtube.

  57. I’ve just had a phone call telling me I have won second prize of £197000 in an Australian lottery and have 15 days to claim it. I put the phone down as I don’t like coming second..

    1. Not to worry, I came first. I have just e-mailed them my bank account details and will split the prize with you when it arrives.

  58. MRD award for this letter.

    SIR – While every system could be improved, and protecting rights and freedoms for all is a balancing act, our Human Rights Act is a proportionate and well-drafted protection for the fundamental liberties and responsibilities of everyone in Britain.

    The Act guarantees the rights to free speech and expression, to life, to liberty, to security, to privacy, to assembly, and to freedom of religion or belief. It prohibits torture and guarantees fair trials and the rule of law.

    Judicial review (Comment, February 17) is an indispensable mechanism for individuals to assert those rights and freedoms against the power of the state. Any government that cares about freedom and justice should celebrate and protect these vital institutions and never demean or threaten them.

    Andrew Copson
    Chief Executive, Humanists UK

    Daniel Gorman
    Director, English PEN

    Martha Spurrier
    Director, Liberty

    Jodie Ginsberg
    Chief Executive, Index on Censorship

    Aderonke Apata
    African Rainbow Family and Manchester Migrant Solidarity

    Jules Carey
    Partner, Bindmans LLP

    Louise King
    Director, Children’s Rights Alliance for England

    Adam Wagner
    Barrister, Doughty Street Chambers

    Peter Kumar
    Chair, Discrimation Law Association

    Dr Wanda Wyporska
    Executive Director, The Equality Trust

    Sarah Mann
    Director, Friends, Families, Travellers

    Bernard Reed
    Trustee, Gender Identity Research and Education Society

    Andrew Neilson
    Director of Campaigns, Howard League for Penal Reform

    Enver Solomon
    CEO, Just for Kids Law

    Julie Bishop
    Director, Law Centres Network

    Karen Smith
    Coordinator, Lesbian Immigration Support Group

    Anthony Hudson QC, Zrinka Bralo
    CEO, Migrants Organise

    Lukasz Konieczka
    Executive Director, Mosaic LGBT Youth Centre

    Deborah Gold
    Chief Executive, National Aids Trust

    Jim Killock
    Executive Director, Open Rights Group

    Jabeer Butt
    Chief Executive, Race Equality Foundation

    Andy Gregg
    Chief Executive, Race on the Agenda

    Rebecca Vincent
    UK Bureau Director, Reporters without Borders

    Leila Zadeh
    Executive Director, UK Lesbian & Gay Immigration Group

    Sarah Clarke
    Senior Policy and Communications Officer, Unlock Democracy

    Dr Greg Ussher
    CEO, METRO Charity

    Mary-Ann Stephenson
    Director, Women’s Budget Group

        1. No. Some of these organisations exist. These are the people who want to have the de jure right to determine what can be said as “free speech”. They are already working hard on their de facto ability to close us down.

  59. Woman, 55, who became fifth victim of Storm Dennis after being swept away by floods when her car became stranded

    Very sad but it should be a warning to people not to try to drive through flood water particularly when it is flowing. It does not take much water to sweep a car away

    In some parts motorist have even been removing cones and road closed signs to drive through flood water

  60. Murdered Megan’s last moments: Chilling CCTV shows teenager, 18, inviting killer, 19, into her flat where he strangled her, stabbed her NINE times and fled with blood on his hands

    He appear to be white British

    Chilling CCTV captured the final moments of Megan Newton’s life as she let her killer into her flat just hours before she was brutally raped and murdered.
    Video shows the 18-year-old football coach giggling with Joseph Trevor, now 19, before inviting him into her bedsit on Fletcher Road in Stoke-on-Trent.
    She offered to let Trevor, the son of a former police officer, sleep at her flat after he told her he was too drunk and high on drugs to go home to his parents.
    This harrowing footage shows Trevor follow her into her home at 3.45am last April 20, before he raped and strangled Ms Newton and stabbed her nine times.

    1. How many perpetrators of murder and physical assault are acting under the influence of drugs?
      If, as I suspect, it is a fairly high percentage, can someone tell me how legalising the drugs will reduce this horrific toll?

      1. Bearing in mind the link between alcohol and violence, I would guess the answer is “most”, either under the influence or trying to get more.

  61. Britain’s flooding crisis ‘made worse by the EU’: Green Brussels
    bureaucrats have ‘banned’ river dredging that allows water to drain
    faster, say farmers.

    Daily Mail

    1. The farmers must realise that the Green politicians would rather the farmers’ fields were flooded than peoples’ houses. They don’t worry that flooded fields are costly to return to fertility. The politicians were reported recently as discussing finding more fields to flood in the future.

    2. One of the worst aspects of EU influence is that silt dredged up from such works must be treated as “hazardous waste” and disposed of as such.
      This has pushed up the costs of dredging to crippling levels.

      1. They were dredging the Welland just outside Spalding last week and just dumping the muddy goop beside the waterway.

        1. AFAIK, EC/EU dredging rules allow material to be dumped on the banks where the river is a drain i.e. it has artificially raised banks, as is common in the Fens, Humberside and the Somerset Levels. Had the Steeping River New Cut been properly maintained in this way, Wainfleet might not have been flooded last summer (ditto Bardney and Fishlake).

        2. That is still permitted, but has the problem of preventing the flood plains from fulfilling their natural function.
          the other way of using/disposing of the silts, spreading back onto the fields, has been banned.

    3. As folk here have corrected, this isn’t strictly true.

      What has happened is the environment agency, seeking an opportunity to do nothing has adopted a directive encouraging the growth of wildlife and natural river passage – i.e, not dredging, clearing and so on.

      This would be a great idea in a more overgrown, less industrialised settings where rivers run through wildlife.

      Of course, the UK is not like that and as I found yesterday cutting through the park near the Rivert Test what’s happened is the half mud river beds have flooded into the park. It’s statist laziness writ large.

    2. A point made by the great majority of respondents, the main exception being the absurd Yves Binoche.

    3. Afternoon DM,
      316445+up✔s,
      IMO well done,
      This has been a ( real) UKIP mantra for donkeys years only to be derided by the lab/lib/con,submission, PCism, Appeasement coalition party.
      A great many people know this but…….

      1. Afternoon, Phil! You need multi-IDs to gain access to the DT Letters on a daily basis, without subscription, so ….. from “The Goon Show”
        1) Major Dennis Bloodnok
        2) Hercules Grytpype-Thynne
        3) Count Jim Moriarty
        4) Henry Crun
        5) Minnie Bannister

        and others:
        1) Hertz van Rentaal
        2) Rupert de Beer
        3) Blind Pew
        4) Paul McCock
        5) Genghiz McCann
        6) Dragan Sonovabic
        7) Roger de Lodger
        8) Galahad Threepwood
        9) Aaron Aardvark

        … and of course my own nick-name “Donnach a’ Ghlinne”.

  64. – So all the great and the good people that have been going on about how nasty hate attacks on the MSM were responsible for the death of Flack are now doing the same thing to the young government advisor for some reason.

    2. I think the doctors at our local surgery have been in isolation for the past 5 or 6 years, the time it takes to get an appointment.

    2. I watched it late the other night.

      One annoyance was the narrator’s insistence on pronouncing it as Ordinance Survey.

          2. …and, who tell the world, Jack, that the trouble with France is that they have no word for entrepreneur.

        1. Just so. It’s only the most important word in the entire show, so they chose an actress who can’t say it.

    3. Electric cars, you just can’t make it up… How many people lost their electric power, how many have no other alternatives to stay warm .

      There is just no joined up thinking is there .. Sorry to say this but we are being dictated to by idiots .

      We will soon find out that whether we were in the EU or out , political mindsets are not capable of thinking things through.

      1. In previous actual emergencies, i.e. World War 1 and World War 2, there were many local power stations. So the country, and our factories had electrical power. Our railways were operated by independently powered locomotives, so provided the rails were intact the railways continued in operation. The same applied to motor vehicle, lorries and essential cars.
        This meant the damage caused by the enemy was localised. We are moving towards a situation where that would not be the case.

        1. Not to worry, an enemy won’t need to bomb us, they’ll just let their hackers loose, to close everything down.

      2. Afternoon TB,
        316445+up✔s,
        “Governing political mindsets are not capable of thinking things
        through”
        IMO unless treachery is inclusive.

  68. Hear,Bloody Hear

    “Defeatist officials need to stop hiding behind climate change and take action on floods”

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/02/18/defeatist-officials-need-stop-hiding-behind-climate-change-take/

    Interesting btl comment

    “The Environment Agency has taken over the functions of countless local
    drainage and river authorities across the country. It then decided on
    policy based on environmentalist priorities. Where I live, the
    watercourses have become choked with Norfolk Reed. Not surprisingly they
    don’t flow well in heavy rain. The EA won’t allow them to be cleared or
    the bed dredged. Local people creep out at night to spray weed killer
    from small boats”.

    1. That was the Somerset levels problem – wild life habitat placed above human habitation by the EA, citing EU regulations as the source of such rulings.

    2. What exactly then does the EA do? Perhaps people should get together and sue them for causing their homes to be left unprotected by sensible dredging operations.

    3. Rik
      316445+up✔s,
      May one ask who, in the main who these peoples vote for ? if it is lab/lib/con then the problem will never be solved as this is not a new problem but been with us some time.
      Surely to continue voting for a party that are working against the peoples wishes is a pointless exercise.

  69. The wonders of government.

    Ontario has a new car licence plate introduced with great fanfare by our premier (on a par with Trudeau, how can we elect such losers).

    A minor problem has now been noticed by the police. The plate number is unreadable at night.

    4. Presumably the criminal fraternity are at the head of the line for the new plates….

      1. Thanks.

        The series is a bit marmite for some people but i have enjoyed it.

        One comment in the Graun said to take a hanky because they laughed from beginning to end.

        2. What Guardian readers find funny and what normal people find funny are 2 different things. The Guardian is so grey and humourless that a well-aimed custard pie is seen as hilarious.

          1. I read all the reviews i could find, Max.

            They all raved about the show.

            I used the Guardian link because it was the most glowing.

            A lot of the BTL comments were negative. And also from people who hadn’t seen it on the stage.

            I paid £300 for two tickets in the dress circle and i think it was money well spent.

          3. I have watched David Mitchell and Gemma Whelan in the TV series and by all accounts it has made the transition to the Stage perfectly. I know i will enjoy it.

        3. I recall seeing part of the first episode of the BBC series. Didn’t manage to get through it to the end… It’s no Blackadder in my view…

          1. I was the same, I gave up half way through the first episode but oddly when the series was repeated and SWMBO took up with it I persevered and have found it quite entertaining, but as you say no Blackadder, although that could be all part of a cunning plan

          2. In the episode ‘Go on and i will follow’ Wills son Hamnet dies. The acting was absolutely solid and it conveyed the emotional distress of the family with such heartfelt pathos it brought a tear to my eye.

            Most of it is much more lightweight.

      1. You only live once.

        I’m combining it with a restaurant i always wanted to go to. Never had the time when i lived there…:o(

        The drinks in the theatre are horrendously expensive so i’m going to take a page from Upstart Crow. The bloody futtocking bollingbroke cod dangles !

  71. “Boris Johnson reaches financial settlement with estranged wife”
    He isn’t on the marina any more?

  72. Syrian government on brink of recapturing strategic province of Aleppo from rebels in ‘record time’. 18 February 2020 • 7:50am.

    Syrian authorities announced on Monday that Aleppo airport will be reopened to civilian flights for the first time in eight years, after regime forces captured huge swathes of northwestern Syria from the rebels.

    Operations will restart on Wednesday with a flight from the capital Damascus to Aleppo, while another flight from Cairo to the northern Syrian city will take off a few days later.

    Troops retook over 30 villages and hamlets in the western countryside in a single day, securing the provincial capital and Syria’s second city that had for years remained within range of opposition fire.

    It’s beginning to look as if the Jihadists have finally cracked and are bugging out completely. In practice this will probably mean that they will join ISIS in Iraq which will cause further problems there.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/02/18/syrian-government-brink-recapturing-strategic-province-aleppo/

    1. “Troops re-took over 30 villages and hamlets… in a single day.” Any chance of them taking over the construction of HS2?

      :-))

    2. This is why it was so important for Erdogan to open up a corridor through Northern Syria, clearing it of Kurds, to give the Jihadists free movement to Iraq, rather than crossing the border into Turkey either direct, or through Afrin, which Erdogan has been clearing of Kurds for quite a while.

      They could also consider asking Israel for safe passage to North Africa, especially Libya with its sea passage to Italy, as well dumping them onto Lesbos for the EU to distribute around the continent.

    3. “Troops re-took over 30 villages and hamlets… in a single day.” Any chance of them taking over the construction of HS2?

      :-))

    1. In previous days, the mayor would have been shot for conniving with the enemy. Pity we do not apply the same standards to traitors today.

    2. And when the EU does its damnedest to destroy the “city” what will you say then Mayor Khan?

      Those nasty Lawyers, Bankers, Insurance people, Accountants etc etc etc are the lifeblood of London. They support your restaurants, hotels, coffee bars, pubs and culture.

      Without them your diverse city will see unemployment skyrocket and rates plummet.

      Still, it will allow you to house more wastrels, criminals and jihadists, I suppose.

      1. He looks just like one of those children one sees marching out with the players before a rugby match.

        Very pleased to be alongside a “hero”, basking in reflected glory.

    4. What the heck is Khan doing talking to Barnier about Brexit? London had a relationship with the rest of the world (including Europe) before Khan was born. What is the little idiot playing at – he is simply making a fool himself (as usual).

      1. Khan and many like him have not yet accepted that the new game in town is called ” Standing Up for Britain ” not ” Licking EU Back Sides “.

    5. So where does this idiot think the U.K. is going?
      We are leaving the bloody EU not Europe.

    6. Repeat after me you miserable midget turd :-

      EU ≠ Europe
      EU ≠ Europe
      EU ≠ Europe
      EU ≠ Europe
      EU ≠ Europe
      EU ≠ Europe

      and continue until you understand that.

      edit:- comment pointed at the Pimple on the top of The Great Wen not TB

      1. On the plus side, if they did make this idea a reality, then these people will have joint United Kingdom / European nationality. When the EU finally declares itself a nation and not just a trading partnership, then we can revoke their British Citizenship without leaving them “stateless.” We can then put them onto a ferry and release them into the wilds of France.

        They will then be the EU’s problem, and we will have only lost those who do not know what it means to be British in the first place.

      2. And as any British people would become dual nationality we could rescind their British side.
        Fully untied country kin otherwise formerly family.

      3. The EU is not a country – yet.

        Watch out you 27 remainers, you are shortly to become just states in a United States of Europe.

        Remove your blindfolds and blinkers.

  74. Morning, Campers.
    I do wonder (though it doesn’t dominate my thinking) if Lady Nugee realises, deep down, that she is an object of justifiable mockery and will always be an outsider of any group she joins. A BTL commentator describes her as the Florence Foster Jenkins of politics.
    A link to TCW:

    https://conservativewoman.co.uk/see-emily-bray/?utm_source=TCW+Daily+Email&utm_campaign=4c2a36060d-Mailchimp+Daily+Email&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_a63cca1cc5-4c2a36060d-559682581

    1. Morning, Anne.

      IMO, Lady N’s thought does go down that deep. Her skin and her arrogance are so thick that they meet in the middle.

      1. I’ve wondered about that.
        Is it possible to have that level of arrogance and lack of insight in one body?

      1. Is that a rule? I’m not aware of it. Thinking Listen With Mother, though a little late..
        Oh, just noticed the typo…

        1. Not a rule. I tend to leave the entertaining bits for the afternoon so people can make all the serious points they wish to and before the evening shift arrive.

  77. Copy of letter sent to my MP (Andrew Rosindell):

    Firstly, belated congratulations for your stunning election win. Think majority has never been higher!

    Other reason for writing is to do with Extinction Rebellion (XR) antics in Cambridgeshire. Was astonished that local police force appear to be aiding, rather than stopping, them. It is beyond my understanding that roads XR are occupying have been closed by police, thus completing their work for them. Why are these people simply not arrested and roads re-opened?

    Does it therefore follow than any citizen with a grievance can force a road closure? If not, why not, if the precedent has been set?

    Notice also XR have been allowed to vandalise Trinity College Lawn, again without the police seeming to want to intervene. During XR’s London demonstration we saw police dancing and cavorting with them, rather than throwing them off the streets and letting Londoners go about their lawful business.

    Who is behind deciding police policy and how is it that he or she has seemingly not been held to account?

    Please kindly let me have your responses.

    1. Adapted and sent to two local MPs.
      Plus I have passed it onto family and friends to use as they think fit.

    2. I have slightly adapted this letter and sent to my MP and asked him to raise this with the Home Secretary. I dare say it will have no effect but if everyone wrote to their MP about this maybe something might just get done.

      This is the most appalling guff from a police superintendent and needless to say the local residents don’t take the same view – https://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/extinction-rebellion-cambridge-police-protest-17766704

      1. ‘Afternoon, Jay, I could only take 3 minutes of the Police video as it is unmitigated bollocks.

        I too have sent Very Old Man’s letter to my MP, Dr Dan Poulter.

    3. “It’s a peaceful protest, there’s no disorder down there at all.” No disorder? Other than traffic being prevented from using the highway and any pedestrians feeling intimidated. The whole tone of the police farce’s response is of mealy-mouthed cowardice in avoiding confronting these layabouts, giving them permission to continue disrupting the lives of residents, businesses and visitors to these streets. Destroying the lawns at Trinity must surely be criminal damage. I presume these ‘ER’ creatures are self -funded rather than being on benefits – after all, they are neither actively seeking work nor making themselves available for work.

  78. No 10 must look at hiring process after Andrew Sabinsky ‘racism’ row, says minister. 18 February 2020.

    Government’s hiring process has to be “looked at” in order to prevent “racists” from working in Number 10, Kwasi Kwarteng has said.

    The energy minister said comments made about eugenics by Andrew Sabisky, a Downing Street adviser, were “reprehensible” and “racist”.

    “The comments were completely reprehensible. They were racist, offensive remarks and he’s now left very quickly and that’s the end of the matter,” Mr Kwarteng said.

    BELOW THE LINE.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e4d4fe86d1c8b55fe8229cb77662ad1de80b7640aeafd9b6b3cac713d4c38e59.png

    Obviously there was some disagreement with Mr Kwarteng’s analysis. Lol!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/02/18/boris-johnson-brexit-latest-news-andrew-sabisky-bbc/

    1. The witchhunt for his scalp can be summed up as:

      “This man is actually an independent thinker and not an easily controllable mindless drone. Get rid of him at once. We don’t want someone with ideas of their own.”

    2. A cold but sunny & pleasant morning with light showers has given way to a downpour up here in the Derbyshire Dales.

  81. The Unflu is still with me. A quick trip to the shops shows how bad I am, so skiing hol the rest of this week cancelled.
    :-((
    First time in 25 years no skiing in February. Mega-bummer, I’m right pissed.

  82. Yup. I’m shallow; and catty with it.
    Richard Lttlejohn …

    “Be-bop-a-flu-la

    Just as we are getting to grips with the coronavirus, along comes another health scare.

    Elton John had to be helped off stage in New Zealand suffering from something called Walking Pneumonia.

    That’s a new one on me. I wonder if it only afflicts musicians, like the Rockin’ Pneumonia And The Boogie Woogie Flu, the 1957 R&B classic written by Huey ‘Piano’ Smith.

    Symptoms include a sore throat and cough. But, apparently, you can get a syrup for it.

    Which is good news for Elton. He’s got a syrup for every occasion.”

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-8014311/RICHARD-LITTLEJOHN-memo-Michel-Barnier-No-retreat-baby-no-surrender.html

    1. Symptoms include a sore throat and cough. But, apparently, you can get a syrup for it.
      Which is good news for Elton. He’s got a syrup for every occasion.”
      It’s not just a little bit funny…….. it’s Hilarious.
      A long time ago when Reggie had not long been a solo act due to his writer Bernie Taupin.
      My best mate and I drove from London N20 to Brighton to see Him at the big apple club.
      He failed to turn up, due to a sudden illness ??? We had to watch Status Quo instead. I guess they were the support band. Its wasn’t Fun Fun Fun or what we wanted, so we left and went for a steak and a few pints.

    2. Walking Pneumonia is a recognised condition where a lung infection that would otherwise cause full blown pneumonia fails to develop and remains a persistent low level “irritant” causing coughing, chest irritation and breathlessness for up to several months before either fading or suddenly developing into the full blown disease.

  83. Just back from taking Oscar to the vet for his annual booster vaccination and nose-job. Came out £80+ lighter, but we were seen by a very nice young lady, whose natural kindness and gentle approach assuaged the instinctive fear sometimes generated by a visit to the vet’s surgery.

    The dog didn’t seem bothered either.

        2. I took photos of Mongo splashing in the puddles (6″ deep puddles) and I can’t get them on to the computer!

    4. instinctive fear sometimes generated by a visit to the vet’s surgery

      Worried you might get fixed?

  84. The sky is going black. It has suddenly started coming down in buckets. The wind is crashing through through the bushes, the tree on the neighbour’s side of the fence at the back looks ready to crash over. This is not weather. It is not climate change. We are being attacked by Martians arriving in batches from outer space in their electric cars.

    1. From the article:

      “Medieval hospitals were religious institutions that provided a variety of services to the needy, including assisting pilgrims, providing alms to the poor and helping the sick and dying,”

      And then they were closed down, in a fit of pique, by England’s King, that fat Welsh twat, Henry VIII, just because the Church didn’t concur with his avant-garde approach to marriage.

        2. Agreed. We visited Beaune about 10 years ago – lovely spot, and the Hospices is fascinating.

    2. What’s funny is those hard Left green fanatics constantly complain about green yet when something comes along to rebalance the equation they throw everything at stopping it.

  86. COVID-19

    It would start to appear that the “experts” could do worse than read Nottle.
    You probably read these observations here first:
    Killing off the elderly and infirm
    The ship was a Petri dish
    It was an accident waiting to happen.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-8015951/Most-coronavirus-infections-mild-says-Chinese-study.html
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8015215/British-tourists-David-Sally-Abel-test-positive-coronavirus.html
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8016077/First-coronavirus-patient-NO-connection-Wuhan-seafood-market.html

    1. Funny Old World
      NoTTL appears to be frequently ahead of the MSM curve,a bunch of busy bees flitting over the internet and bringing pearls of information honey back to our home hive
      Very efficiently too

          1. Anxious and helpless.

            It might appear heartless, but I still think that transporting carriers around the world was a bad idea, particularly when it turns out that we knew so little about it.

            It’s too late now, we may as well bring them all back.

    3. “The first coronavirus patient was a bed-bound man in his 70s, BBC reported”
      Well, if you get up to things like that, you do stand a chance of catching something nasty.

      1. Best you go back to school.

        EDIT This reply was to a completely different comment asking me to quantify what 15% meant.

        1. Oh, I see. That was the reference to ” up to “. Sometimes things change while you look at them, like politicians’ promises.

      1. The BBC still obsessed with floods as if we had never had them in the past. Every year the Severn burst its banks beneath my school and sank Worcester County Cricket ground.

    3. Just get a razor and shave it all off yourself. Then you won’t have to worry about which hairdresser to go to.

    5. This young man (I’m assuming) is reeking of self-importance and at just how unfair life is that the world does not fit in with him and what he wants.

      You can see 1,000’s of years of ancestors looking down from above and shaking their heads that modern society has produced people like him.

      “Spare the Rod, spoil the child” as they say.

    6. “I’m more of that other, it’s it’s even an option”.

      It isn’t. Grow up. You’re born male or female. In your case you’re a bloke, just a bit limp wristed.

    7. Reminds me of someone we used to know back in the mists of time who would not go to a Unisex salon as it was “full of poofs”. I always went to a traditional barber – a lot cheaper, and no attempt to sell a “poncy” cut of any sort.

      p.s. the one downstairs at Liverpool Street station was good.

      1. Most hairdressers that I have been to in the past twenty years have quite happily cut the hair of anyone sitting in their chair. They just charge more for a ladies cut than they charge the men.

        A nice basin cut can be done by a friend. Assuming that this wimpering fool has friends

        1. The only women I have ever see in “my” local barbershop are the owner, and her staff of young women barbers. And it’s cheap.

          The ladies tend to go to the salon across the road.

      2. In the backwater known as Chipping Norton, almost two decades before it became known to the outside world because of the Cameron/Clarkson connection, the barber’s shop became ‘unisex’ because it was the only one in town. Men and women cut the hair of men and women. The proprietors were man and wife. Nobody was in the slightest bit bothered in that conservative Conservative town.

    1. Are British sausages still sold under the special arrangement whereby they are allowed to have non meat fillers, whereas the “rules” say sausages should be all meat?

      If so, no surprise as that accommodation will presumably end with withdrawal.

      1. Whose rules? Surely if we have left the EU the it can’t be theirs. Or is it our EUphilic Civil Service throwing a wobbly?

        1. I thought we were still stuck with EU rules during the transition period. Which is why the latter IMO is such a criminal waste of time.

    3. Greetings, Rik.

      Ultimately the EU is a consumer bloc that seeks to get its member states the best “deal” on goods worldwide. The principal beneficiary of EU protectionism/alignment are large industrial nations like China and India, who no longer have to navigate 27 different laws in 27 different countries.

      The simple fact of the matter is that there’s always a market for high-quality goods and/or foodstuffs. British sausages will grace many tables after 31 December 2020, both at home and abroad.

    5. ” The emulsified high fat offal tube ”

      Clucking bell. What a bunch of wasters. Say no to everything, refuse a trade deal, slap 20% on German cars.

      Watch the EU cave.

  89. Extracted from the Spekkie about an event that took place yesterday evening.
    The Prime Minister’s Europe Advisor and Chief Negotiator David Frost gave a lecture to students and academics at the Université Libre de Bruxelles high-lighting Britain’s point of view.

    ‘We bring to the negotiations not some clever tactical positioning but the fundamentals of what it means to be an independent country. It is central to our vision that we must have the ability to set laws that suit us – to claim the right that every other non-EU country in the world has.

    So to think that we might accept EU supervision on so called level playing field issues simply fails to see the point of what we are doing. It isn’t a simple negotiating position which might move under pressure – it is the point of the whole project. That’s also why we will not extend the transition beyond the end of this year. At that point we recover our political and economic independence in full – why would we want to postpone it?

    In short, we only want what other independent countries have.’

    Later in the speech, he emphasised that fact;

    ‘If those doubts persist, we are ready to trade on Australia-style terms if we can’t agree a Canada type FTA. We understand the trade-offs involved – people sometimes say we don’t but we do – and we will be setting out in written form next week actually how we see the shape of the future relationship in more detail.’

    1. It seems pointless having a transition period if that really is the case during which time the EU rules Britain to an extent it has never done before, as well as agree to hand over £39,000,000,000 without a murmur of complaint.

      1. On what basis are we going to hand over that money, I wonder? Because May said so? There is no deal yet, and as the EU representative himself said “nothing is agreed until everything is agreed”…

        Or have I missed something?

        1. I think the rules change as the EU wishes. “Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed” hasn’t been mentioned for an awful long time.

    2. 316445+up✔s,
      Evening Anne, has this frosty chap earned any trust from the real pro UK side / peoples?
      All we seem to be getting is plenty of rhetoric on an issue that should not be an issue to start with.

    2. As you say, Peddy, it’s a start but the question that needs answered is, “Why didn’t plod move in to arrest these cretins the instant they started destroying the lawn at Trinity College?”

      The police had no excuse for standing-by and passively watching while a criminal act was in progress.

      3. It seems that the college itself was not going to do anything. Had the police intervened, and the college been unwilling, the police may yet again have had a prosecution fall through.

        The police are being told what [not] to do, by some authority. Which authority?

        1. I think the problem is that some people, at the very highest level in the police and elsewhere, are trying to “lead beyond authority”.

          1. The CP individuals are being told to lead beyond authority – that doesn’t mean that some higher authority is not telling them what to do…

          3. No they won’t. We only pay their inflated salaries and perks. Their futures, more salaries and even more perks come as the gift of others. Plus brown envelopes.

            We are only technically their employers insofar as we pay. We have no other employer rights.

            Edit: stinks, doesn’t it?

      6. I always thought a major part of their job description was ‘Crime Prevention’.

        When did closing roads to permit illegal activities and watching crimes being committed unhindered become part of the JD?

      7. Look at who the new Master of Trinity College is, and I think your question might answer itself

      8. Nor for shutting down the road.

        That’s frankly disgusting. The police exist to serve the public. Not those breaking the law.

      9. They were quick enough to force TR/SY-L out of that pub before the match they were watching ended.

    3. Yet I expect that was for obstructing a police officer – not for the real crime of vandalism.

      Also, why didn’t the police act faster?

  91. 316445+up✔s,
    This aid budget is helping peoples who are flood stricken in all probabilities just not the indigenous of these Isles, india for example, they are so delighted they are firing of rockets in delight.

          1. Yes, fairly regularly, he doesn’t miss Nottle ( }:-(( ).
            He’s OK and returns to Laure in March.
            He’s reading more and says he is using Nottling time more productively.

          6. Thanks J – just thinking of the last minute vital things we’ve forgotten to pack – then we’re off about midday.

  93. Greetings Nottlers:

    February 17, 2020 — “Spain: European Court Approves Summary Deportations of Illegal Migrants”
    https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15615/spain-migrants-deportations

    “In a landmark decision that will have potentially seismic implications for immigration policy in Europe, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled that Spain acted lawfully when it summarily deported two migrants who illegally tried to enter Spanish territory.”

    The Spanish case dates back to August 2014. For five-and-a-half years illegal migrants have been under the misconception that they might win in court–that member countries of the European Union have no say in enforcing their own immigration laws.

    Over five years later–how many millions of illegal migrants are now in Europe–unwilling to leave?

  94. 316445+up✔s,
    These political rear exits go into a perpetual motion mode I swear, they first create the problem then rhetorically set about solving it.( no action taken)
    Chap on radio 4 just now went into a khan stance regarding nationwide flooding saying it is getting more regular & we must learn to live with it along the lines of
    more regular knifings & learning to accept it, NOT a word about how many cubic yards of concrete had been laid, NOT one word about lack of waterway drain off maintenance.

  99. Khan, Lammy, Abbott and Butler, with their TV and social media pontifications are making me wonder about eugenics and IQs etc.

  100. The whole world’s gone batshit crazy,three lead and two opinion pieces about the suicide of a violent c list sleb grace the DT

    “The suicide of Caroline Flack should be a warning against such hubris.
    More often than we sometimes like to acknowledge, it may actually make
    matters worse. Lawyers as well as doctors should perhaps be taught the
    principle primum non nocere (“first do no harm”).”
    Fine,fine,the next time someone upsets me and I smash a heavy blunt object into their head whilst they sleep I am certain the wankeratti will leap to my defence
    Oh wait,I’m male and not a sleb
    I’m doomed aren’t I
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/02/17/caroline-flacks-death-cps-should-reconsider-handles-domestic/

    1. We had never heard of her, but when we heard she could have murdered her lover whilst he was a sleep, one wonders whether Domestic Violence arrests are taken seriously .. That woman obviously had a public face and a private face.. and the celeb culture are only selective when necessary .

      1. Agreed Belle,had never heard of her and had barely heard off never mind watched “Love Island”
        Thanks to the furore I now note “Love Island” has been responsible for 3 suicides,making it currently more deadly than the Coronavirus in the UK
        Just saying………………

        1. Love Island epitomises the rudderless, air-headed generation that has come into being. No surprises that the individuals attached to the program have difficulties adjusting to the real world outside their bubble. I believe they refer to their problems as a mental illness, I suggest they have not grown up into viable adults and are unable to cope with the real world.

          1. If I could add, I would suggest that the inability to cope with the real world is all part of the Common Purpose plan, and coming along just splendidly. When all hell breaks loose, as it will before not too long, they will have no backbone to fight back.

          2. Sadly, scores of teenagers have no better ambition than to ‘become famous’, be ‘an influencer’, or other similar vacuous notions.

  101. There was one of the extinction rebellion guys on LBC this afternoon, full of self entitlement, pretty much insane with his views, he reminded me of Swampy from back in the day. I expect he has never had a proper job or cares about how people are going to survive with his crackpot dystopian plans
    It all seems very sinister how the media give these self nominated people a platform and such an easy ride when they stuck the knife into Dom’s advisor whose ideas sounded quite sane in comparison.

  103. The whole world’s gone batshit crazy 2

    Spiked

    “Science has been a particular Achilles heel for the shadow minister. Not

    only does Butler believe that human babies are born with no sex, she

    also has some strange views on animals.

    ‘Ninety per cent of giraffes are gay’, she told a Pink News awards event. ‘Let’s just accept people for who they are and live as our true, authentic selves’, she added.

    Senior Labour figures reportedly embroiled in row over whether giraffes are gay

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/02/18/labour-the-political-wing-of-the-flat-earth-society/

  105. Long, but amusing, from Taki of course. And I agree!

    “The Great Shoe Wars
    David Cole February 18, 2020

    This is not going to be another coronavirus column. Yes, the disease we’ve been saddled with thanks to the Dagwood Bumsteads of China will make an appearance later on. But let’s start by rolling the clock back—way back—to a time long past, a disease long forgotten, and a lesson about footwear.

    If you get your information about American history from MSNBC, you know that when the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620, they swarmed off the Mayflower doling out smallpox blankets and using muzzle-loaded automatic weapons to violently mow down the innocent natives, all of whom were honor students and some of whom were gentle giants.

    However, if you get your information about American history from American history, you know that by the time the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth, nearly nine out of ten coastal Indians were already dead, having perished in a devastating epidemic that lasted from 1616 to 1619. The Pilgrims found abandoned land and weakened tribes.

    So what killed the Injuns? Again, if you watch MSNBC, you know that there’s no such thing as “unsettled science.” So don’t mention this to Elizabeth Warren, but in fact the jury’s still out on what killed “her people.” Suspects have included yellow fever, smallpox, plague, chicken pox, and even trichinosis (oy, I told you, no pawk!). But over the past decade, a new consensus has begun to form among historians and epidemiologists. Meet leptospirosis. Like coronavirus and SARS, leptospirosis is zoonotic, meaning it jumps from animal hosts to humans. And it’s a nasty little bugger. Pain, cramping, jaundice, and violent death by severe hemorrhaging.

    Leptospirosis is carried by rats and passed to humans through contact with rat feces. And quite a few brainy science types are signing on to the theory that it was leptospirosis wot dun in the Red Men. Writing in the CDC’s Emerging Infectious Diseases journal, epidemiologists John Marr and John Cathey speculate that leptospirosis got its mitts on North America via invasive rats that’d stowed away on the vessels of early European explorers. The two Johns speculate something else—that the Indians caught the disease because of their love of bare feet. Infected rat droppings littered the ground and sullied the streams and standing pools. Indians would traipse through said droppings, making bare-skin contact with the contagion. Even sandals and easily waterlogged moccasins provided little protection when walking through infected water.

    “Western charities dole out shoes by the millions, but millions of Africans refuse to wear them.”
    Funny enough, unlike the other diseases that thinned the Indian herd following contact with whites, leptospirosis does not generally confer immunity upon those who’ve grown up around it. “Prior exposure [to leptospirosis] does not necessarily result in immunity because there are a number of different infectious strains,” wrote neuroscientist Madeleine Johnson in Slate. The Pilgrims (and subsequent European settlers) didn’t avoid New World leptospirosis because they possessed a natural immunity; they avoided it because they wore thick-soled shoes. Quite literally, their advanced footwear saved their lives.

    Instead of stretching their hands skyward to implore the mercy of celestial divinities, American Indians preferred to walk barefoot on the Earth.
    —Frédéric Gros

    You dumbasses.
    —David Cole

    Don’t expect to find any discussion of the leptospirosis plague in American schools or pop culture, because inherent in the hypothesis is the idea that the death toll was the result of native primitivism, not European barbarity.

    Of course, that was the 1600s. Everyone was primitive to some extent. But did you know that the Great Shoe Wars continue today? Yep, Africans are dropping like flies because they don’t wear shoes, and white-knighting whites just can’t seem to save the poor souls from their poor soles. The Public Library of Science’s Neglected Tropical Diseases journal (which I only read for the hilarious fold-ins) details a litany of infectious tropical diseases that thrive in Africa due to the native aversion to shoes. Yes, aversion to, not “lack of.” Western charities dole out shoes by the millions, but millions of Africans refuse to wear them.

    A 2016 study published in the British Medical Journal examined efforts in Ethiopia to combat podoconiosis, a disfiguring disease specifically caused by walking through filthy soil. Shoes prevent it 100%. But the Ethiopians won’t wear ’em. Why? Because the locals believe that the deformities caused by podoconiosis occur not from disease but from “bad fortune, evil spirits or stepping on goat’s blood.” Others blame curses. In 2015 the science journal Nautilus profiled an Ethiopian woman with podoconiosis who explained the origins of her disease thusly: “I mistakenly stepped over a magic herb. It was placed in my way by somebody who was jealous of my beautiful and slim feet.”

    The BMJ piece further detailed how native “doctors” and tribal ooogabooga-men spread the belief that wearing shoes “weakens the feet” and renders the wearer crippled. Farmers refuse footwear because working the fields with covered feet is seen as “disrespectful to the crops.” Yes, they actually think the crops feel dissed if the farmer’s barefoot. Those Africans who do wear shoes often face ridicule from their peers, who assume that the footwear hides accursed hooves.

    Even such champions of nonwhite superiority as Time and The Washington Post were recently forced to admit that walking barefoot is a major factor in the spread of Ebola. A spokeschucker for the West African Kissi tribe explained in the Post that his people just don’t like shoes.

    Which would be fine if Ebola didn’t occasionally get “walked” to other continents.

    Which circles us back to China, where the government knew quite well following the 2003 SARS outbreak that the native fetish for eating disease-ridden beasts (and storing them in wet markets that become walk-in petri dishes) could, conceivably, end us all. And like the barefoot Africans, the Chinese preferred to cling to their beloved customs and superstitions, regardless of the risks to themselves and the world. And now they’re paying the price…a price we may soon pay too.

    But as I said, this isn’t a coronavirus column.

    Rather, it’s a column about the frauds and liars who claim that the West is being “enhanced” by all the diversity brought by barefoot disease carriers, feces-stompers, and bat-eaters. If “multiculturalists” truly believed in the mutual benefits of “diverse mixing,” they’d be the first to talk about how great it was that the European settlers taught the natives a lesson or two in proper footwear. They’d celebrate the advances the Europeans brought to the Americas. But they don’t, because copping to the superiority of Pilgrim footwear would mean having to say a few good things about whites. And leftists just can’t do that.

    It’s ironic; they could probably sell whites on the mass-immigration hooey a bit more easily if they’d occasionally tell a “diversity” tale in which whites aren’t the villains. But they can’t. Because in the end, open-border immigration isn’t about “both sides benefiting”; it’s zero sum—the newcomers gain, the hosts lose.

    That’s why multiculturalists aren’t mocking the Africans for their shoeperstitions the same way whites are mocked for their McNuggets. Again, if they really wanted to make this whole “invite the world” thing seem more attractive, they’d stroke a little white ego now and then by pointing out that one of the reasons we have a society that’s so attractive to outsiders is because we’re not afraid of our fucking shoes.

    But no, even if it might help their agenda, multicultists cannot deviate from the “whites ignorant and harmful/nonwhites brilliant and benevolent” script.

    Look at how leftists are spinning coronavirus. They’re attacking whites for being racist for daring to place blame for the disease on the Chinese foolishness that created it. Think of other ways leftists could be spinning things. They could be using coronavirus to praise Western regulations regarding food safety and preparation and the treatment of livestock. They could be using the virus to promote more government red tape by claiming that regulatory oversight is what ensures that we don’t have zoonotic ground zeros here in the West. They could literally go full Upton Sinclair and use the outbreak to declare that E.U.-style conformity of food and livestock standards is necessary to save the world.

    But they won’t, because such arguments would imply that we in the West know better than shithole-country nonwhites. So the left ignores the very food safety regulations it pushed for. The opportunity (deserved or not) to take a nanny-state victory lap is secondary to the need to demoralize whites and disparage all they’ve created.

    Not that all of Bernie Sanders’ socialist shock troops are on the same page about this. Last week, self-described “Catholic American socialist” and full-time Bernie Bro Ian Samuel explained to Tucker Carlson that Bern “rejects narrow identitarian appeals that are used to turn the working class against each other”:

    You know, you’ve got to pick out individual identity characteristics and set them against each other. You can see this with race, you can see it with sex, all sorts of things. And Bernie, to his credit, he has always believed in a kind of coalitional politics, that first we all get together based on our common class interests, and then we can solve all of the problems that vex us individually. But we’re workers first, and that is very powerful.

    Wotta schmuck…he really believes that class warfare can take precedence over race warfare among today’s leftists. In fact, the AOC types are only socialists and communists to the extent that pursuing those ideologies harms the traditional West. They’d turn capitalist in a minute if they felt doing so would accomplish the same goals. They’re race warriors first, doctrinaire economic theorists second. They despise blue-collar whites just as they do wealthy ones; they’d happily align with brown-skinned billionaires and oligarchs at the expense of poor whites.

    To quote one of the greatest social satires in movie history, many of Bernie’s supporters “wouldn’t know Karl Marx from a toffee apple.” They just know that they hate whites. In this way, they’re similar to Jews in early-20th-century Russia, many of whom were attracted to communism not so much for the dense dialectics as for the havoc the revolution would wreak on traditionalist Christian Russia.

    If Bernie wins the nomination, his campaign will be rocked by “identitarian” bickering. That’s just a given.

    The left could be harnessing all of that coronavirus fear to sing the praises of increased regulation of the private sector, but they’d rather use the outbreak to scream condemnation of whites. Sanders thinks he can persuade those same people to put class first and race and gender second this November.

    That poor, deluded old putz.

    In part, because inner-city Americans are not actually starving (AOC hyperbole aside), the socialism thing just won’t catch fire like the race thing. Poor nonwhite Americans are well-off enough to put their hatreds before their hunger.

    Because they live well, compared with poor people in nations that were not forged by men who understood the value of good strong shoes. Men who built a nation that the barefoots now want to claim for themselves.”

    2. I do like a good rant.

      We have at least two on here who think dear old Bernie Sanders is a good egg. May God forgive them.

      Hi Lottie…..

    2. Your eyes scan over the Jack of Clubs each time you look at and away from the subtitles. It’s screaming ‘pick me’. The rest are just peripherals.

      1. It’s also partially covered by the ‘Start’ arrow before you start so you have to spend a fraction longer on identifying the card, it all adds up.

        1. Nope, it’s because they wrote “your” instead of “you’re”

          (see above for the true expanation)

    3. OK folks you’ve had your chance to work it out.

      Here’s the real answer:

      First up:
      King Clubs, Jack Spades, Jack Clubs, King Diamonds, Queen Diamonds, Queen Hearts
      Last up:
      Queen Clubs, King Spades, Jack Hearts, King Hearts, Queen Spades and a blank.

      In other words, they’ve all gone. You’ve been fooled by the picture cards to see that the one you chose is missing, you’ve failed to see that they are all missing

        1. Similar concept.
          Paul Daniels did a good exposé of these things.
          I recall it was “The Bunko Booth” or something similar.

        2. Similar concept.
          Paul Daniels did a good exposé of these things.
          I recall it was “The Bunko Booth” or something similar.

    4. OK folks you’ve had your chance to work it out.

      Here’s the real answer:

      First up:
      King Clubs, Jack Spades, Jack Clubs, King Diamonds, Queen Diamonds, Queen Hearts
      Last up:
      Queen Clubs, King Spades, Jack Hearts, King Hearts, Queen Spades and a blank.

      In other words, they’ve all gone. You’ve been fooled by the picture cards to see that the one you chose is missing, you’ve failed to see that they are all missing

      4. Sorry Aeneas – your comment didn’t appear at all (or bassetedge’s etc.) when I wrote, or i wouldn’t have written. How strange – I did scroll down…

        Anyway apols for repetition.

        Does a post show the time of an edit rather than the original time of posting, perhaps?

        1. Bassetedge’s saying about the jack of clubs was the first that appeared after the cards.

          What’s Disqus up to?

        2. My post probably would not show unless you press refresh. As to edits – I don’t know if the original time or the edited time shows e.g. “4 minutes ago”.

    8. All the new cards shown are different from the original six, that’s why.

      Edit: so whichever card you were concentrating on isn’t there any more – ‘cos none of them is.

    9. “Your”???????? For heavens’ sake – surely it’s “You’re”? (As I suspected, I wasn’t the first to mention this !)

    1. And for me that is even worse, if that’s possible, than the organisers getting prosecuted.

      The “users” must be passing this on by word of mouth, so a large section of that “community” must have known/know what is going on and nobody tries/tried to stop it.

      May Allah and Mohammed curse their bones and drag them all down to Hell to dwell with them.

      2. I guess their wives are grateful. No unwanted attention or sprog this time. What’s not to like for them?

          1. So they are hardly going to spill the beans on their disgusting spouses, are they…

            And the disgusting spouses are not going to turn themselves in.

            So exactly how many muslims apart from those, are keeping quiet (apart from family members, which must cover the rest).

            Are there any left to tell the police?

          2. One can only hope that all the bastards pick up any STD’s going from each other and then pass them around their entire families.

          6. Now, you may have hit on the answer.

            I suspect the RSPCA might be more effective than the police have been.

          8. Some of their belief (I can’t say “them”) are mayors – and other politicians. We’rte dooomed!

      3. Huddlesfield has a population of 150,000
        10% Moslem 15000
        50% Children 7500
        50 % female 3750
        At least 300 punter rapists call it 10%
        I think we can safely say it was common knowledge what was going on in most Mosques
        Utter Silence from the community,after all it’s only a few filthy Kuffar
        I despise them all

        1. On balance you’re probably not far off, but I wonder what the “catchment” area is, and how many of the scum overlap several towns.

          1. Where were the Imams??
            Protection of the scum in their Mosques clearly took priority over protecting children

        3. And the females knew darn well this was happening.
          Somehow, this makes it even worse.
          “Not tonight, Adbul, I’ve got a headache….”

        1. Possibly, but equally likely they are about to be on trial for other offences.
          These bastards pop up in all sorts of criminal enterprises.

  108. Half you say……………………………………..

    “Desperate Irish protesters whose families have

    been waiting up to 15 years for social housing have blocked the

    construction of new homes for “non-national families”, demanding “local

    houses for local people”.

    “We watch these houses being built, and none of our children on the

    list are getting them,” one middle-aged woman, who asked to remain

    anonymous, told The Irish Times.

    “They can be 10, 12 years on the list, and they’re going nowhere. There’s no explanation as to why,” she complained.

    The ‘House the Irish First’ protest movement, most of whose members

    are women, has been blocking the housebuilding project at Ladyswell Road

    in the predominantly working-class Dublin suburb of Mulhuddart since

    January.

    The protesters, who believe too much social housing is going

    to “non-national families who are not from the area”, are demanding at

    half of the new homes are set aside for local people on the housing list

    for the local authority, Fingal County Council.”

    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/02/17/house-irish-first-protesters-block-housebuilding-non-national-families/

    2. Cornish communities by majority votes voted that all new builds should be offered to locals first. Although they benefit greatly from tourism the communities are dying because of second home owners who only spend two weeks a year there.

      1. Good afternoon Phizzee
        And who sold their homes to the absent owners? Oh yes, the locals.
        What goes around comes around or am I being unkind?

        1. Good evening Alf.

          You are not wrong. Though some of them would have been on the open market because of other reasons than cashing in on the booming property market.

          St Mawes is famous for its local fresh fish but if the fishermen have been priced out then there will be no fish. Certainly not fresh and not local after if it has travelled to Spain and back.

          A balance is required at a more local level and not dictated by Brussels..

          Many crew now have come from Eastern Europe and the Captains are happy to have them.

          Processing the fish is also staffed by women from Lithuania.

          If this local industry is to survive all these people need somewhere to live.

  109. Has anyone noticed that we never had all this extreme weather before we built all these wind farms and closed down all the coal mines.

        1. Heaven forbid, the idiots who put them up would merely replace most of them, no doubt at great cost to the taxpayers.

  110. ”

    Britain faces having to return the Elgin Marbles as part of a free trade deal with the European Union after Greece demanded a clause was inserted in the agreement.

    A draft negotiating mandate circulated among European governments in
    Brussels today hardened EU demands in key traditional trade areas,
    particularly fishing, but also included the unexpected “return and
    restitution” line.“The parties should address issues relating to the return or restitution of
    unlawfully removed cultural objects to their country of origin,” said
    newly drafted text that will be signed off by EU governments”

    Okay, what do you all think of this ?

    2. Can’t say I care much either way about the Elgin Marbles, but since it’s the EU we should just tell them to do one and keep the marbles in the basement anyway.

        1. I met them many, many times when they performed in Liverpool, Annie, and even invited them to parties at my flat by Sefton Park. We were on first name terms but lost contact for many, many years. Then just a month or so ago I Googled them and was dismayed to discover that they had all passed away some years ago. The clip you posted above has saddened me once again. But even when people have gone, the happy memories we have shared live on.

    4. Comical, really.

      It’s a trade deal. If the EU wants a trade arrangement, it’s going to have to give a lot more than it wants to.

    5. But if they get Elgins marbles, what is to stop them going after Holst, Britten or even Elton John.

    8. It’s not a problem, Tony. ogga1 assures us that the UK/EU negotiations will continue until Thursday (“the day after tomorrow”) and I doubt that the document can be sent in turn to 27 EU nations within the next couple of days, by which time we will be fully and completely out of the EU.

    9. I think that this is the 6th time we have now had this same scenario laid out before us, the long suffering people of the United Kingdom. You just lose track after a while. It always starts out with our politicians talking tough and laying out exactly what we want to hear, and always ends in complete capitulation to the European Union, who have also been talking tough. I think it was twice with David Cameron and three times with Theresa May.

      David Cameron (1) – The EU said that we had earned more money than expected in one sector and we had to pay them billions to make up for it. Cameron huffed and puffed saying there was no way we would be dictated to. He stood strong before paying them what they told him to. Cameron(2) He went around the EU countries to get changes for the United Kingdom to make us better off staying in. He came back with almost nothing and declared it a victory.

      Theresa May(1) She stated very strongly that No Deal was better than a Bad Deal and had lots of red lines. She didn’t mean a word of that and tried to sell us into EU slavery with an unending Withdrawal Agreement. Theresa May (2) – oh this is too depressing and life is too short to keep thinking how we have been betrayed by so many. One final one:

      Boris Johnson (1) He said that Theresa Mays’s Withdrawal Agreement was a “tu*d” and that the deal was dead and finished. It was gone. He followed this with the claim that he had a great new deal for the United Kingdom, which it turned out was exactly the same as Theresa May’s deal apart from minor changes around Northern Ireland’s border. It did have the pointless “backstop” removed, but that was just a distraction from how bad the rest of the deal was anyway, and the EU did not miss it. The EU even said themselves that the rest of the deal had not changed since Theresa May signed off on it.

      So this is now the 6th time that our politicians are telling us what we want to hear about our future relationship with the EU. Only by their future actions will we know if what they say now has the same weight as it has the last 5 times.

      I am obviously hoping for a No-Deal Brexit. 🙂

      On that cheery note, the heavens have just opened here with thunder rolling around, so I’m logging off now to go and stand in the garden to enjoy the lightshow. 🙂

      1. “The EU said that we had earned more money than expected in one sector and we had to pay them billions to make up for it. Cameron huffed and puffed saying there was no way we would be dictated to. He stood strong before paying them what they told him to.”
        That would be the putative tax revenues from drug dealers, pimps and their wh0res. The EU living off immoral earnings. Quelle surprise.

          1. ‘‘Twas ever so”. Presumably there are no prostitutes in France and Germany unless they offer their services for free. This might well apply to the European Commission executives since every other expense they incur is evidently paid for by us.

            I suppose we could always ask for the EU’s books? Nah, thought not!

      2. How did Boris Johnson manage to go to the general election without spelling out exactly what was ‘brilliant’ about his WA?

        Andrew Neil might have asked him some searching questions about this but Boris Johnson refused to be interviewed by hom and, to our great dismay, Nigel Farage capitulated too soon – he should only have agreed for the BP to stand down in seats where Conservative sitting members were proven leavers. He should have forced a proper electoral pact but as things stand the devious Mr Johnson can sell us out just as Mrs May did.

    10. If the Elgin Marbles were ever returned to Greece you may be assured that they will wind up as an exhibit in the New Museums complex in Berlin, possibly in the Pergamon which already contains many historic artefacts pilfered by the Germans.

      At least Lord Elgin paid the Greeks for the marbles. Hitherto the Parthenon had been used as an ammunition store (by Turks) which exploded, hence their present condition and that of their host building.

    1. What’s to sentence? Castration, flaying, flogging and buried alive.

      If we don’t punish these people then what’s the point of the law?

      1. W,
        Tell me who in their right minds would support / vote for parties that are known to be mass uncontrolled immigration, Submissive,PCism, Appeasement parties, purveyors of sh!te as has been witnessed time & again?

          1. Evening EB,
            316445+up✔s,
            No apparently about it, but weight of numbers was definitely on
            the party before Country side.

    2. O2O,
      This is not a late tweet from Gerard Batten as he has been warning of the dangers of islamic ideology rhetorically & in book form since 2005.
      Castigated as judged to be a far right racist, castigated further by standing
      by another, as many of real members
      are called, far right racist, one
      Tommy Robinson.

          1. Didn’t spot the Lyme Regis connection until you posted that, Peddy. And now to you and all NoTTLers, good night, have a good rest, and see you all tomorrow. (D. V.)

    2. Those shoes are similar to the Start Rite / Clarks school sandals many of us wore in the summer term of the year dot ..

      Celebs are such twerps .. and very untidy … Psst is he wearing knee socks as well?

      1. ‘Evening, Mags, Great Good God, the cad is wearing white socks with a suit – what a faux pas.

    1. I see their usual plea for more money to keep publishing has become rather self-defeating, by declaring they will not accept money from companies that are involved in fossil fuel extraction.

    2. I’m building an ark but am having trouble sourcing the gopher wood. It hasn’t gone well because the first ark I tried to build was made of wood from the shittah tree (not easy to find and people kept laughing), and then discovered that was what the Ark of the Covenant was made from. So confusing.

      1. I don’t recall any stating explicitly that racist and sexist behaviour – real or perceived – is unacceptable.

    2. In my experience (11 yrs NHS) staff reflect what they’re faced with. Some pts can be bl**day rude, others aggressive, even violent. Part of my job is dealing with complaints. In nine out of ten times, a pet’s complaint is unfounded because after investigation and speaking to them, it is clear that they have misunderstood, or ha e had unreasonable expectations.
      Front line staff need to have the patience of saints, it’s not surprising if the occasionally snap.

    2. I reckon the DJ at the start of this clip was a bit dim. Didn’t he realise that the caller was requesting a smash hit of the day? (Easier than peeling spuds and boiling them for twenty minutes, then bashing them with a fork and a spoon.)

    1. I fail to see what earthly good a non-engineering politician can do by rushing with his entourage from one flood-plain to the next while people on the ground are trying to get on with sorting it out unbothered by the distractions of VIPs.

      Nothing but useless political point-scoring.

      Why doesn’t Dawn Butler get her wellies on and head down there with a mop?

      2. Why?

        If she wasn’t an MP she would be doing that as her day job.

        Assuming she’s qualified even for that.
        Which I doubt.

    2. The it should reduce other programs – ones relating to climate change perhaps – and reinstate the flood spending.

      Also, it was 15% of the money set aside for flood defences. What was the total amount? £100m? That’s barely 15m. If you can’t balance a budget then you shouldn’t be in the post you are. Floods have become bigger and bigger news due to over population and over building. The EA should be better prepared. After all, it’s a massive organisation with 83 senior officers likely on 6 figure salaries.

    3. Presumably the rivers have been cleared of silt to stop flooding, or have they been allowed to clog up? Research shows that Britain had massive floods in 1947 when many bridges were washed away which hasn’t happened this time.

      1. The photos of the church in Tewkesbury show the flood water a good bit higher in 2007 than it is this week.

      2. 316445+up✔s,
        Evening Jo,
        The Louth flood of 1920 or Louth “cloud-burst” was a severe flash flooding in the Lincolnshire market town of Louth which occurred 29 May 1920, resulting in 23 fatalities in 20 minutes. It has been described as one of the most significant flood disasters in Britain and Ireland during the 20th century.

    2. Greta van Fleet?
      Shurley a long lost cousin of the erstwhile frontman, Captain Beefheart, to his Magic Band

  124. Nick Timothy neatly exposes the ”elite capture” and false premises of the Conservative Party in the final paragraph of his superb February 16 Daily Telegraph article of the month….

    ”And the reason for our naivety is the mistaken and arrogant assumption that our enemies and rivals cannot hurt us because they are destined to become the same as us. More ridiculous Albion than perfidious Albion. If we do not learn soon, our independence and prosperity will be destroyed by our complacency and hubris.”

    It is, of course, already too late. Nature is destined to take her course on non defended British civilization.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/02/16/can-governing-classes-naive-threats-face/

  125. A qualified welcome for this.

    Businesses’ use of cheap, low-skilled migrant workers to be ended

    An end to low-skilled migration will be announced today by Priti Patel, the Home Secretary, with the creation of a points-based system

    Businesses will be forced to end their reliance on cheap low-skilled migrants and recruit more British workers under a new points-based immigration system, the Government will announce on Wednesday.

    Boris Johnson will introduce new laws next month aimed at limiting migration to skilled workers from the EU and rest of the world who have a job offer, speak English and command a salary of £25,600 a year or more.

    Ministers claim it will lead to a “significant reduction” in migration with advisors saying up to 70 per cent of EU workers allowed into the UK since 2004 would not have qualified under the points system.

    “Businesses can no longer rely on cheap migrant labour to do low-skill work as has been the case for the last 20 to 30 years,” said a Government source. “They need to invest in British workers. They need to be able to attract people.

    “They are going to have to invest in automation and improve the conditions for their workforce. They have to adjust to this new system.”

    Businesses have 10 months to prepare for the points system before it starts on January 1 2021. But the Home Office says they can plug any gaps by using the “safety valve” of the 3.2 million EU citizens seeking to settle here and the 170,000 non-EU low skilled workers on work visas in the UK.

    Under the scheme, all EU and non-EU applicants will have to have a job offer from an approved sponsor firm, to be educated up to A-level or equivalent and pass a English language test.

    The A-level grade jobs, classed as skilled by the Government’s Migration Advisory Committee (MAC), range from plasterers, plumbers and carpenters to doctors and nurses but not waiters or waitresses.

    There will be no cap on skilled worker numbers. Applicants who fulfil the job and language requirements score 50 points and can then reach the necessary 70 points for entry if their job pays £25,600 a year or more.

    They can still come if they earn a lower salary to a minimum of £20,480 a year but are in shortage occupations such as nursing, or have a PHd in a science subject relevant to their job. These can earn the extra 20 points needed for entry.

    It means a nurse on £22,000 a year could still enter the UK as a “shortage” occupation, as could a university researcher on £22,000 with a PHD in science, technology, engineering or maths.

    Many migrant workers in the care, construction and other low-paid sectors are, however, unlikely to meet the salary threshold or skill level, forcing businesses to recruit and train more British workers for the jobs.

    Carolyn Fairbairn, CBI Director-General, warned some sectors would struggle: “With already low unemployment, firms in care, construction, hospitality, food and drink could be most affected.”

    Higher earners such as pilots or engineers will have higher salary thresholds and will be expected to earn up to £60,000 to ensure they do not undercut the wages of those already working in the UK.

    So-called “new entrants” to jobs – generally aged under 26 – will be able to claim a “discounted” salary threshold up to 30 per cent below the £25,600.

    Highly-skilled workers – such as scientists and academics rated as “global talent” and musicians and artists – will be the only groups entitled to enter the UK without a job offer if they have the required points and are sponsored by a relevant professional body. Their numbers will be capped.

    Foreign students will be free to continue to take up places at universities and will be granted two years’ grace after graduation to stay in the UK and bring their skills to the British economy. EU citizens will be able to visit the UK on six-month visitor visas.

    Home Secretary Priti Patel said it was a historic moment: “We’re ending free movement, taking back control of our borders and delivering on the people’s priorities by introducing a UK points-based immigration system, which will bring overall migration numbers down.”

    She said it was also “right” that people should speak English before moving to work in the UK.

    The UK Homecare Association described the lack of provision for low-paid workers in the proposals as “irresponsible”.

    A spokesman said: “We are dismayed by the decision Government has made.

    “Cutting off the supply of prospective careworkers under a new migration system, will pave the way for more people waiting unnecessarily in hospital or going without care.

    “Telling employers to adjust, in a grossly underfunded care system, is simply irresponsible.”

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/02/18/businesses-use-cheap-low-skilled-migrant-workers-ended/

  126. Dear old auntie at her best. BBC 4 King Alfred and the Anglo Saxons. Superb.
    First broadcast 2013.

        1. She likes dressing up for sure. As with many high profile historians she used the curatorship of Historic Royal Palaces Agency to promote her image as did the more intelligent Simon Thurley before her.

          I was the architect to the Restoration of the Privy Garden and amongst other projects designed the scheme for resurfacing The Base Court at Hampton Court Palace. At the time my design and tender documents were deferred in order to devote funds to the overspend on the representation of the Crown Jewels at the Tower of London.

          You might imagine my annoyance when a decade or more later I switched on the TV to see a couple of impostors claiming an award for implementing my design.

          I believe Lucy Worsley was Curator at that time and since then I have no regard whatever for her as an historian.

    2. That’s my father they are talking about:))
      * hugs daddy * 🙂

      They sometimes get it right the BBC, sounds as if this was an example

  127. AP perhaps not at her best, with references to ‘tackling climate change’ and ‘precious green lung’, but the overall message is sound enough.

    Criminal damage in Cambridge has unearthed how the police really see Extinction Rebellion

    ALLISON PEARSON

    No one is allowed to walk on the grass outside Trinity College Cambridge. I suppose an exception might be made if you were a 365-year-old don who once lolled under the famous apple tree with Sir Isaac Newton (probably a couple of those old fellows still holed up in the port cellar).

    Otherwise, set one foot on that sacred turf and you will soon find yourself experiencing the full force of Newtonian gravity; rugby-tackled to the ground by a puce-faced porter in a bowler hat.

    So there was general astonishment on Monday when a scrofulous mob of Extinction Rebellion (XR) protesters were allowed to dig up the lawn. After hideously defacing the emerald sward, they carried the earth in wheelbarrows to Barclays Bank, where they deposited it in the foyer.

    Where were the porters? Where were the police? Why did no one intervene to stop this appalling act of vandalism?

    Fear and collusion, that’s why. Increasingly, we see authorities of all kinds running scared of over-mighty minority groups. Tread softly for you tread on their screams. Universities cower before (or even agree with) strident students. Hounded by trans groups, domestic-violence refuges admit “women” with a penis. The vast majority of the country thinks this is insane but too many institutions have been captured by the woke zealots or are afraid.

    The demands of XR Cambridge are particularly outrageous. Having occupied the council chamber last week and delayed the crucial city budget, they insisted that the council give its democratic powers over to an unelected Citizens’ Assembly. Behaviour which seems even crazier when you consider that Cambridge Council has one of the most advanced strategies for tackling climate change in the UK. In our road, recycling is next to Godliness.

    The huge shock for residents like me is that those bodies we thought would protect our interests – the council and the police – have behaved as though they are on the side of those disrupting our way of life.

    Crossing Cambridge by car can be a frustrating business, but a whole new level of nose-to-tail fuming was introduced at the weekend when Extinction Rebellion occupied one of the city’s busiest junctions. No problem, we thought. It was surely the work of minutes for police to remove the straggly gaggle of protesters who were getting a well-deserved pelting from Storm Dennis. Except, as soon became apparent, the police had no intention of reclaiming the public highway for the public.

    An extraordinary tweet from Cambridge Police said: “We are using emergency police powers to close two city centre roads. An organisation known as Extinction Rebellion Cambridge have begun a week long protest…” The statement went on to say that the police, “working in partnership with Cambridge City Council and Cambridge County Council to mitigate disruption”, had closed the Fen Causeway intersection.

    That’s a bit like the Mayor of London announcing that, to avoid causing chaos to Southern commuters, Waterloo station would be shut for seven days while a scheduled climate-change protest took place, but people were most welcome to use a replacement bus service.

    Of course, the disruption in Cambridge could quite easily have been “mitigated”. All you had to do was arrest protesters who were breaching Section 137 of the Highways Act 1980.

    I approached one councillor to ask what on earth was going on. “The ridiculous police and council strategy,” he said “seems to be that, by closing the roads and diverting traffic themselves, the actions of XR are no longer illegal, so they don’t have to do anything. Heaven forbid some dons’ children get arrested. If kids from the Arbury [Cambridge’s big council estate] tried this they would be straight in the slammer. What a joke!”

    The helpful councillor shared a photograph to clarify matters. It shows an “XR Youth” banner and a female protester flanked by Daniel Zeichner, Cambridge’s Labour MP, and Lewis Herbert, the leader of the city council. Do you think that pair would have been smiling so benignly if it was Right-of-centre protesters who had blocked two key thoroughfares?

    Silly question. They’d have Brexit supporters expelled faster than you can say climate-change emergency. It’s dismaying, if not entirely surprising, that a Left-wing MP and councillors should be cosying up to an extremist group aligned with their own agenda. It is quite another to find out that the police have been enlisted to support those political purposes.

    I emailed Superintendent James Sutherland, who is in charge of (not) policing the XR protest. Had Priti Patel and the Home Office been made aware of Cambridge Police’s extraordinary decision to use emergency powers to inconvenience residents?

    “There is no requirement under statute or College of Policing APP to provide such notification,” the superintendent replied.

    I asked him in what way could closing two roads in the centre of Cambridge be said to “mitigate disruption”. “The closure […] has allowed for proper diversion routes to be in place prepared as a contingency by the County Council. […] Diversionary routes are working effectively with minimal impact. Cambridge City Council and the County Council have been working in partnership with us and all other emergency services.”

    Let me translate that from the Copperese for you, shall I? There was never any intention of trying to stop the XR protest. Instead, councillors and the police collaborated to accommodate the activists.

    They knew full well that there would be disruption so they introduced diversions which would hopefully ease it. Then they tried to present the whole thing to residents as a remarkable success, even though it was police and councillors who had agreed to permit the inconvenience in the first place.

    Ironically, both of the diversions are immensely environmentally unfriendly. One takes you through the narrow streets of the historic centre, rattling the bones of fragile 17th-century buildings. A frantic ambulance, siren whooping, was stuck there for 10 minutes on Monday behind a lorry. But who cares if a heart-attack victim dies so long as our imperious eco-overlords get their way?

    Superintendent Sutherland told me that the police “are under a positive obligation under the Human Rights Act 1998 to facilitate peaceful protest”. The law, he says, sets a high bar for police action that “impedes or frustrates lawful protest. The College of Policing guidelines state that the obstruction of the highway does not make a protest unlawful. The test that the police apply is the seriousness of the impact on the life of the community… whilst undoubtedly frustrating and inconvenient, the road diversions have meant that this threshold has not yet been met.”

    Do you see what Superintendent Sutherland did there? By using emergency police powers to close two roads while opening another to create diversions, Cambridge Police effectively enabled Extinction Rebellion to wriggle under the high bar for action against them.

    What world are we living in where police and council workers actively set up a roadblock for protesters? With good reasons, five thousand Cambridge residents have signed a petition calling for the roadblocks to be taken down and accusing the police of allowing “mob rule”.

    I reckon there is a strong case for saying that the actions – or rather inactions – of the police emboldened the XR protesters to dig up the Trinity College lawn. It was so clearly an act of criminal damage. At least to anyone who hasn’t swallowed the pernicious nonsense that the human rights of protesters outweigh the community’s right to expect respectful behaviour.

    Even people who have been sympathetic to Extinction Rebellion’s cause recoiled to see them tearing up the very green stuff they claim to want to protect. That beautiful lawn was one of Cambridge’s precious lungs.

    At least you expect anarchists to behave badly. I confess it has been deeply shocking to see police officers in my own town stand by while a council meeting is disrupted, while ambulances are delayed, while college property is destroyed and traffic deliberately held up. (The fact that yesterday Cambridgeshire police belatedly arrested a 19-year-old woman in connection with an “incident” outside Trinity College suggests that public anger may be cutting through.)

    The Home Secretary must intervene. The spectacle of a police force acting with a Left-wing council to interpret the law in favour of extremist protesters, and against the interests of decent citizens, is enough to shake your confidence in the justice system. Far too many of our intimidated institutions agree with their attackers.

    Priti Patel needs to get her tanks on their lawn – and fast.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/criminal-damage-cambridge-has-unearthed-police-really-see-extinction/

    1. Those fools protesting outside Trinity College should take a brief moment and enter the ante chapel of the Trinity Chapel. There they will see the engraved brass plaques celebrating the lives and achievements of Trinity fellows and masters.

      The plaques themselves cover several hundred years of achievement celebrating masters from Lord Butler (Rab Butler) of Saffron Walden to the eminent scientist Paul Kapitsa. The plaques also represent the finest calligraphy over decades. Kapitsa’s plaque was designed by David Kindersley, a pupil of Eric Gill, and executed by John Salt.

      The idiots might even find interest in the marble Roubilliac sculpture of Sir Isaac Newton at its centre.

      Instead these privileged upper middle class dolts wish to impose their rotten immature views on the rest of us, those with life experience and knowledge that these cretins are unlikely ever to attain given their primitive and wasted antics.

  128. I’ll take CM to task on one point – Mark Sedwill. He’s a pipsqueak and worse. This is the man who stuck his oar in on Brexit, defending Gus O’Donnell against criticism of his anti-Brexit stance in that notorious Radio 4 interview, and who predicted that ‘no deal’ would see a 10% rise in food prices.

    CHARLES MOORE

    The BBC must be saved from its imperial folly

    Storms are coming for the BBC

    Some Conservative MPs, as well as Labour ones, are getting worried that the Government is picking a fight with the BBC. Writing for the Telegraph yesterday, Huw Merriman, who chairs the all-party parliamentary group on the BBC, warned of “an unedifying vendetta against this much-loved organisation” by “senior government aides”.

    Mr Merriman and co are right about tone, I suspect, but wrong in the content of their argument. They are right that the Government should not trash the BBC. They are wrong to conclude that the corporation can carry on as before.

    It is essential to understand that technological and generational change has already destroyed the BBC’s century-old “wider still and wider” doctrine. It is simply not possible for it to dominate all fields any longer. The BBC must start to decolonise. It needs government help to do this in a dignified manner – more like British imperial decline than like the fall of the Soviet Union.

    Any declining organisation needs to develop its strengths and jettison its weaknesses. Here are some of the strengths: global reputation; a service to all regions and nations within the kingdom; Radio 3; Radio 4; depth of research. Here are some weaknesses: entertainment channels, including Radio 1 and Radio 2, which could be better done commercially; a website which crushes competition; a massive, talent-destroying bureaucracy; and, yes, bias.

    This bias is not chiefly party political (though it is certainly anti-Tory). It is politico/cultural – woke, pro-Remain, credulously green, anti-market, obsessed with issues connected with “diversity”, yet itself not truly diverse at all.

    This means that the BBC excludes a vast range of people, views and activities which are important in the life of this country. If you had watched only the BBC in 2016, it would have come as an almost total shock to you when 17.4 million people voted Leave. The bias led to blindness. This means that it is not a good public service. I have studied the way this bias operates for a long time, and I am convinced that it will never reduce until the BBC’s monopoly disappears.

    The greatest single wrong on which the BBC rests is the licence fee. It is an offence to freedom and a poll tax for anyone with a television (and, nowadays, a computer or mobile phone). Non-payers, almost always poor, clog the magistrates’ courts. They are pursued by TV Licensing, a ruthless organisation which implies untruthfully that it can enter their homes. Technology nowadays means that evasion can easily succeed, so the courts catch only the weak. Means of payment involving choice have to be found. In the short term, a much lower licence fee would help.

    Petroc Trelawny, the Radio 3 presenter, complains that Boris Johnson has “no more right than any licence-fee payer” to dictate the future of the BBC. His remark exposes BBC arrogance. The corporation exists under a charter provided by government, and is allowed to earn nearly £4 billion a year from the licence fee because of this. Any prime minister has not only a right, but a duty to make sure that this immense privilege is not abused.

    Inside the BBC’s enormous out-workings of imperial flummery lies some basic good – people who are interested in accuracy, moderation, balance, high culture, free speech, British traditions. “Out there” sit many viewers and listeners who care about these qualities too and want to rescue them. The politico-cultural task of this Government in the years before the charter runs out in 2027 is to see what can be salvaged from the wreckage caused by the BBC’s own imperial folly.

    Sedwill’s shirtsleeves are far too informal

    In the recent photographs of Boris Johnson’s new Cabinet, only one man (so far as one could see) was in shirtsleeves. This was the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Mark Sedwill. All the rest were fully suited.

    I wonder why Sir Mark affects this style. It has become old-fashioned – dating, I think, from the Tony Blair era, when shirtsleeves were seen as a rejection of Tory stuffiness. On one laughably staged occasion, Mr Blair even appeared thus dressed outside in Downing Street, clutching a mug of tea with pictures of his family on it. In those days, young Mark Sedwill was, among other things, private secretary to the foreign secretary. As an ambitious young official, he may have thought that dressing down would raise him up. Perhaps it did.

    In fact, informality is usually inappropriate for the public face of government. Cabinet ministers have serious business to transact on behalf of us all. They should dress as if they know that. Dressing down is supposed to convey accessibility, but actually – like men putting their feet on the desk (a fault I must myself confess to) – it looks as if you think you own the place.

    In 2017, when he was our new national security adviser, Sir Mark shared a platform in Washington DC with his US opposite number Lt-Gen HR McMaster. This was the first time such a joint public appearance between two NSC advisers had ever happened. Americans in the audience afterwards remarked unfavourably on the contrast between the formally attired general and the shirt-sleeved Brit. The former looked up to the task, the latter like a pipsqueak.

    Sir Mark is no pipsqueak, but he needs to look right. Even the notoriously scruffy Boris Johnson, who is next to Sir Mark in the Cabinet picture, has managed to get his suit on.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/02/18/bbc-must-saved-imperial-folly

    1. Excellent piece by Charles Moore but I would correct the following: “It is an offence to freedom and a poll tax for anyone with a television (and, nowadays, a computer or mobile phone).”

      He suggests that owning any of these devices requires a TV Licence. It does not. A licence is needed to “Record or receive live TV broadcasts or access BBC iPlayer”, not to own equipment.

    2. One of my nieces was in the same class as Sedwill and said he was a bit of a nerd then and she thinks he hasn’t changed. My niece is now 55.

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