Wednesday 24 September: The families set to suffer should Reform ever enact its immigration plan

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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430 thoughts on “Wednesday 24 September: The families set to suffer should Reform ever enact its immigration plan”

  2. Enjoying a lovely relaxing bath with a cup of tea in a rather shabby (but clean) hotel in Rosslare. Back to Blighty shortly. Hope to see my son in Cardiff as we pass by on our way to Ilchester; we have an appointment at the Fleet Air Arm archives tomorrow

    1. Yo L I R,

      The FAA Museum is a fantastic place.

      If you look for the 'Supermarine Walrus' in there, I helped 'renovate' it, as an Artificer Apprentice, as part of my training, at RNAS Arbroath in the early 1960's

      I helped 'sew' the wing fabric on.

  3. Good morning, chums. And thanks, Geoff, for today's new NoTTLe site. A Par for Wordle today. Alas I was not first today; I'll need to be sharper to get in first.

    Wordle 1,558 4/6

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

  7. BTL Comment:-

    "It never ceases to amaze me that people think by simply voting for Reform all will be well in Britain again. Nothing could be further from the truth" writes C M Watkins of Brentwood.

    No, Mr. Watkins, we do not believe "all will be well in Britain again" with a Reform Government, but we DO believe that a Reform Government will at least begin to arrest the decline of our Nation that began with Mr Blair and continued with Mr. Cameron and every other Tory (In Name Only) PM until the current disaster moved into No.10.

          1. Makes it easy to find! Thanks, Belle. Was on the move from Cardiff via Mother’s care home to i-laws, so not much nottl access.

  9. Last nights hand grenade in Oslo was followed by another that didn't detonate. No injuries, just broken windows. Police have arrested a 12-year-old boy.

        1. Who would have guessed that giving out free benefits to all comers would lead to child gangsters throwing grenades on the streets of Oslo, eh?

          About fifteen years ago, Norway was one of the hottest destinations for asylum seekers. I knew of someone who drove a relative from Austria to Norway so that he could claim asylum there (doubt he will be in a gang, they were the hard-working type not the gang type)

  11. My grandfather always said we were descended from survivors of the Battle of Vinegar Hill in 1798; whilst being aware that this took place in Ireland. Turns out it’s very close to where we are now; but we only learnt this yesterday evening. Too late to pay homage.

  12. Good Moaning.
    Hoorah. A lovely DT article on Eric Railious, one of my favourite artists.
    There is a depth to his work that is not immediately apparent; a melancholy element that goes beyond illustration.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/art/artists/eric-ravilious-woodblocks/

    Exclusive: Eric Ravilious’s daughter on her quest to recover his long-lost work

    The artist’s woodblocks were once thought stolen or burnt – then they appeared on eBay
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/48493acfa48368fbc28a09ba420386a638fd389d22d2022d551ea907c368260e.png

  13. Right! I'm just about to turn the Rayburn on and start getting the 7 packs of yellow flashed strawberries I picked up from Iceland yesterday converted into Strawberry Jam.

      2. Iran executes at least 1,000 people in ‘mass killing campaign’

        Number of hangings carried out between January and September is most in more than three decades, activists say

        https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2025/09/23/iran-executes-at-least-1000-people-mass-killing-campaign

        https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/world-news/2025/09/23/TELEMMGLPICT000440913988_17586432855920_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqA7N2CxnJWnYI3tCbVBgu9T0aesusvN1TE7a0ddd_esI.jpeg?imwidth=1280

  19. Morning All – fine morning again. I slept till 8 o'clock after my exertions yesterday. Just a few left to plant in an easier patch.

  21. https://youtu.be/qxnLKFNgy_E
    WATCH: Macron Blocked in New York by Trump Motorcade
    An awkward moment as New York police stop Macron’s car for Trump’s motorcade to go past. Macron called Trump and asked him to “clear the road.” Didn’t work…

    1. The last line of this excellent sketch sums up the Trans nonsense accurately and succinctly:

      " Symbolic of his struggle against reality."

  23. There you have it, Palestine is a Muslim cause, not a humanitarian cause..

    Mariem Meftah activist aboard Greta floatilla took to social media to voice her opposition to LGBTQ+ activists 'taking advantage' of the pro-Palestine cause, one that is 'sacred to us as Muslims'. But being a “queer” activist means touching on society’s values ​​and taking a path that risks placing my children and loved ones in a situation we reject,'

    risks to children? The audacity of Muslims.

    1. I may be quoting from your source.

      It's not often that I agree with/believe anything said by Muslims, but this is one of them where I agree.
      It's a longish article but shows how stupid the Queers et al for Palestine are.

      Woke-on-woke fury brings chaos to Greta Thunberg's Gaza flotilla: Pro-Palestine activists quit convoy after learning LGBTQ campaigners are on board… and Swedish eco-protester also leaves her role

      https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15126153/Woke-woke-fury-brings-chaos-Greta-Thunbergs-Gaza-flotilla-Pro-Palestine-activists-quit-convoy-learning-LGBTQ-campaigners-board-Swedish-eco-protester-leaves-role.html

      In two video streams posted on social media, he is understood to have complained about the addition of members of the Tunisian LGBTQ+ community to the convoy – activists who joined the flotilla when it stopped at the northern port of Bizerte.

      'We were lied to about the identity of some participants in the vanguard of the flotilla, I accuse the organisers of having hidden this aspect from us,' he said, according to a translation by Le Courrier de l’Atlas.

      The cause of his frustration was allegedly the participation of activist Saif Ayadi on the flotilla, a 'communist queer militant' who boarded the convoy when it stopped off in Tunisia.

      Another prominent activist from the flotilla, Mariem Meftah, took to social media to voice her opposition to LGBTQ+ activists 'taking advantage' of the pro-Palestine cause, one that is 'sacred to us as Muslims'.

      'Everyone’s sexual orientation is a private matter… But being a “queer” activist means touching on society’s values ​​and taking a path that risks placing my children and loved ones in a situation we reject,' she wrote, according to a translation.

      'I refuse to have my son offered a sex change at school… I call on everyone to save the situation and repair the mistake made against the people who gave their blood so that this flotilla can see the light of day.'

      On the same day, presenter Samir Elwafi expressed a similar sentiment.

  24. BBC banging on about "asylum seekers" – anyone would think they're all families with women and children.

  25. Just quickly while i read the Terriblegraph. Here is the text of the speech by Trump about “hating his opponents”:

    “That's where I disagreed with Charlie. I hate my opponent, and I don't want the best for them. I'm sorry. I am sorry, Erika. But now Erika can talk to me and the whole group, and maybe they can convince me that that's not right, but I can't stand my opponent.

    (24:59)
    Charlie's angry. Looking down, he's angry at me now. He wasn't interested in demonizing anyone. He was interested in persuading everyone to the ideas and principles he believed were good, right and true. Before each appearance, he prayed these words. "God use me for your will." Always said the same thing. "Use me for your will."”

    https://www.rev.com/transcripts/trump-speaks-at-kirk-memorial

      1. What kind of opponent does Trump hate? All of them, including those who merely disagree with him and have a different point of view? That would be all-consuming, embracing many millions of people, allowing little time for enjoying life's pleasures.

        1. I personally think he was using rhetoric to make a point. But maybe that’s just me.

  26. SIR – I found your headline “Reeves told to launch tax raid on pensioners” (September 23) concerning. Having already had my winter fuel allowance taken away and my personal allowance frozen, I am watching the pennies more closely these days. Now it appears I shall have to make further economies in my day-to-day living.

    However, I am comforted by the thought that my sacrifices are going to excellent causes such as funding all the immigrants who arrive here illegally; funding those who don’t like to go to work; and bankrolling the ever expanding public sector with its bumper pay increases. If it were not so, I would be feeling quite angry.

    Tony Manning
    Barton on Sea, Hampshire

  27. DAN HODGES: This is damning proof Starmer's most senior adviser tried to pull the wool over the eyes of electoral officials. The net is closing

    You know it's turning badly for Labour when Dan Hodges writes a very critical article about them at all.
    When it isn't behind the paywall it suggests even the staunchest supporters are getting sickened by the stench.
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-15126391/DAN-HODGES-damning-proof-Starmers-senior-adviser-tried-pull-wool-eyes-electoral-officials-net-closing.html

    1. Something else in the news regarding more cover ups at Downing Street.
      Proof that as most of the public are already aware of, our political classes are out and out LIARS. No doubt at all about it.
      Drowning Street there will be no flood of sympathy.

    2. I thought that Glenda's lad was acquiring some common sense until last week when he reverted to producing his usual nonsenses.

      Maybe that was a blip and he is now back on the right course?

  28. There are various indicators which mark the changing of the seasons. One of them begins today. The final matches of cricket's County Championship get underway this morning. Their completion on Saturday will bring the domestic season to an end for 2025. Nottinghamshire are well placed to become champions this week. Only defeat for them and victory for Surrey come Saturday in their respective fixtures will reverse the current standings in the table. Largely fine weather is in the offing for the first three days, but rain might spoil proceedings come the last. Fingers crossed that it doesn't.

    1. Our good friend Grizzly usually has something to say on this subject. I cannot recall seeing much discussion here on Monday though someone did post a part of Keats's ode.

      Autumnal Equinox
      Mon, Sep 22, 2025, 8:19 PM
      Northern Hemisphere · Central European Time

      1. Grizz has a scientific correctness to back his assertions, but I don't think astronomers ought to have a monopoly of the subject.

  29. Yo and Good Moaning all from a cold, but dry, C d S.

    A ponder for you

    Are you allowed to be a Liebour MP if you are an ethnic Brit by birth and lineage?

  31. Is Reform fit to govern?
    Bruce Newsome: https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/is-reform-fit-to-govern/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=2025-09-24&utm_campaign=TCW+Daily+Email

    "On August 25, party leader Nigel Farage and Zia Yusuf, his policy chief, announced a plan to detain and deport all illegal immigrants, even asylum claimants (given that they should have claimed asylum in the first safe country). Farage and Yusuf offered constitutional and judicial reforms too, hence the branding of the mini-manifesto as Operation Restore Justice."

    BTL

    Nigel Farage is now proposing the same plans as those proposed by Rupert Lowe and for which he and Zia Yusuf sacked him

    The question that nobody is prepared to answer honestly is:

    Can Islam and Christianity ever live peacefully side by side or are they simply incompatible with each other?

    1. Pity people do not read their history. There will never be a happy outcome with all this. There can only be one winner.

          1. There is a big take-up of Christianity among Gen Z. In time, they will work their way through to being churchwardens, parish councillors, vicars and parents.

          2. See my argument on that, yesterday. We are Christian but don’t realize it because familiarity breeds contempt. Or more correctly, blindness.

    3. When farage can list all those entities who would oppose his plan I will take him seriously. The entire system is a tangled web of back handers and supporting groups. One side says no, so you defund it to shut it down. Another says 'You can't do that' and launches a legal challenge. In support of their favoured group, the supposedly on side legal team then says 'yeah, you can't get rid of them' or simply goes on strike, wasting months of time, each time and the first opposing group is still there, still fighting your will.

      While that's going on another group of hate no hope wokers are spinning up with foreign (EU) money to fight you on a different point of law and they are then backed by other organisations and all of them attack at once. Meanwhile a hostile press is spinning endless leaks from an angry, bitter civil service, a minister is facing an invented bullying charge, another bunch have gone on strike because they can and absolutely nothing – nothing is getting done.

      That's the first six months. The halo is tarnished, the public are still seeing the invaders pour in and their appointments/trains/GP appointment has been cancelled. Then the CS strikes again with a piece of malignant EU policy that we have to implement or else and that slaps another tax on people or else Farage fights that on yet another front.

      That's five already in the first few months. This will go on his entire term in office. The state will ensure absolutely nothing gets done. The public will see him not achieving anything and the Left wing press will spin relentlessly against him. He will be demonised, derided, insulted, mocked and worse he will achieve absolutely nothing. The public will turn against him as a disappointment, Reform will lose their single term and then the Leftists will say 'told you so. Far Right thugs/evil/hate mongers/fascists' when it's entirely their own actions that have caused the problems.

      It is as predictable as hair growing or it raining when you put the washing out.

  32. Reform's immigration plan is the most consequential policy of my lifetime

    For decades, outsiders have cashed in on benefits paid for by British families. At last, someone has dared to end the racket

    Allison Pearson
    23rd September 2025, 7:00pm BST

    The backlash to Reform's pledge to scrap indefinite leave to remain (ILR), while deporting hundreds of thousands of migrants who are a burden on the taxpayer, was swift, squeamish and sneering.

    There were heart attacks in Hampstead, conniptions in Camden and several thousand people in the Richmond area had to postpone their pilates lesson, so great was their distress at the news that some ghastly far-Right oiks want to put the British people first for a change.

    Critics complained that Reform's maths didn't add up. Nigel, they said, had clearly scribbled his appalling policy on the back of a fag packet. "Farage plan to save £234bn from migrants' benefit cuts 'falling apart'," gloated one headline.

    In all fairness, the sums of Farage's opponents weren't looking that clever either. On LBC, former Liberal Democrat leader, Tim Farron, was almost in tears when he said: "This would be a revolutionary change, but not for the better. It would leave Britain much poorer – it would be a massive reduction in people paying taxes."

    How did tiny Tim arrive at the conclusion that removing benefit-dependent foreign nationals, who use huge amounts of public services, would be bad for the country's bank balance? (Almost Diane Abbott levels of numerical dexterity!)

    Perhaps Tim would prefer the UK to import 500,000 unskilled migrants every year, plus dependents, and borrow £150bn to keep the whole mad Ponzi scheme going – until, that is, our welfare system collapses under the intolerable weight of numbers, and we can no longer protect our own citizens from hardship.

    That is not a dog whistle, as some hand-wringing liberals have rushed to claim. A report last year from the not exactly far-Right Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) concluded that immigration is extremely costly – only a tiny number of incomers to our country contribute more than they consume.

    So Farage was right to highlight the looming catastrophe of the so-called "Boriswave", and vow to reverse it. An unprecedented 3.8 million people were granted UK visas between 2021 and 2024, and the vast majority are passengers on the increasingly clapped-out Clapham omnibus as it wheezes up Inflation Hill.

    Half of the Boriswave do not work, and they never will. Yes, you read that right. Only 5.4 per cent were skilled; seven per cent were here on health and care visas; and a staggering 83 per cent entered our country as dependents, students or for humanitarian reasons.

    No one quibbles about the 150,000 Hong Kong Chinese who were granted a British National Overseas visa, quietly fitted in, and are more than paying their way. Glad to have you aboard.

    Legions of dodgy "students" from the subcontinent, and their ninth cousins twice removed, are another matter. At a recent trial for sexual assault, the foreign defendant requested a translator. I noticed the varmint had a recent degree in English literature from a British university. Perhaps they've removed the requirement to be able to read a book or, you know, speak English since my day? Honestly, folks, if your country acts like a mug, prepare to be mugged.

    Legal immigration has spiralled out of control, and it is damaging the quality of life for British people. We can all feel it, as can our ally on the other side of the Atlantic. In a speech on Tuesday to the United Nations General Assembly, Donald Trump warned European leaders about the threat of unchecked immigration.

    "Your countries are going to hell," he said in strong language, even by his standards, "In America, we've take bold action to swiftly shut down uncontrolled migration. It's time to end the failed experiment of open borders."

    I am told it is now the settled view of the Trump administration that Europe is basically a basket case which can no longer be relied upon to defend Western values due to nervous pandering to a growing Islamist minority. The situation in the UK causes particular anxiety to President Trump, and co-operation on security among other things may soon be under threat.

    They may not be the perfect vessel for all our hopes, but at least Reform shows they gets it. Other political parties preferred not to discuss the matter until Farage came along to embarrass them into action. The last Conservative government promised us a picky, points-based system that would admit the best and brightest, or address skills shortages. Instead, we got influxes the size of cities and a ballooning welfare bill.

    Now, a timebomb is ticking. A large number of the Boriswave are approaching the date when they can apply for indefinite leave to remain. Foreign nationals who have been in the UK for five years can acquire a status that gives them the right to live, work and study here for as long as they like, often a gateway to citizenship.

    The Tories announced a plan to extend the waiting period for ILR to 10 years. Labour should match it, and fast. The British economy is already in the cemetery. We do not need to give ILR to 800,000 freeloaders to help dig our own grave.

    What Reform did this week was simply to say, "No more". We can't go on like this if we wish to survive, let alone thrive, as a nation. It was the most consequential policy announcement of my lifetime, I think, and it is urgently needed. Tim Farron called it "revolutionary". It's not a revolution, rather, it's a restoration that takes us back to where we always should have been. Other countries do not give benefits to millions of foreign nationals – why do we?

    So perverse is our establishment, so trained in habits of national self-loathing, so accustomed to thinking that open borders are a good thing and anyone who dares disagree is a hateful racist, that any suggestion to the contrary is seen as dangerously outlandish. You saw that lazy groupthink in action at the press conference where Farage and Reform's head of government efficiency, Zia Yusuf, outlined their plan with commendable vigour. One reporter asked whether it didn't violate the "British idea of fair play".

    Can these people even hear themselves above the self-satisfied hum of their own virtue? To weaponise the British idea of fair play against the British themselves is what the political class has got away with for decades. The Left supported mass immigration because they love multiculturalism (and despise Britishness). The libertarian Right supported it because they wanted cheap labour for their rich mates, and it made GDP look better so they could borrow more money.

    Normal families, with two parents working hard, yet struggling to stand still, have been expected to passively accept that there is no housing for their children, no doctor's appointments and no medical places at university (sorry, we're importing our doctors and nurses – cheaper, you know). They have a mortgage on their semi-detached house, while an Afghan family on benefits has just been gifted a spacious detached property with four bedrooms for their many children by the council – which the British family subsidises through their taxes.

    Yes, that actually happened in my own town, and everyone who knows about it is horrified. Sorry, that does not strike me as being a good example of British "fair play", which is about reciprocity and generosity of spirit. It does not mean paying into a system your whole life, and then looking on in jealous astonishment as recent arrivals take out from that system to which they have made no contribution.

    Evidence of unfairness has a corrosive effect on our society. A Telegraph reader comments that student nurses qualifying this year are only being offered 50 per cent contracts, as the Tory government brought in too many foreign workers and flooded the NHS before the 2024 nurses graduated. Once you take your nursing qualification, you are not allowed to look for work below your grade, so there is no chance of supplementing your income within the care sector.

    "Many have been working in bars and shops to make ends meet," the reader says. "This year, they are trying to get those nurses work by sharing the roles with 2025 graduates."

    Shameful, isn't it? All those keen young people will have large student debt, and be committed to a career caring for others, yet their country has discriminated against them in favour of immigrants, many of who speak poor English.

    "Not one more economic migrant until there is zero unemployment in Britain." So said Margaret Thatcher. It was patriotic common sense then, and it is patriotic common sense now. The Iron Lady would have been appalled that her beloved country had become a soft touch.

    It is likely that the plan to scrap indefinite leave to remain will save billions over the long term, while acting as a deterrent to economic migrants. But what matters more to millions of us, I suspect, is that Reform wants to stop the rot.

    "The establishment are all screaming about it, so it must be right," says Nigel Farage. "In future, our country intends to look after its own."

    Our own. How strange that even needs to be said. How nice that it is being said at last.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/09/23/reform-immigration-plan-consequential-policy

    1. "…their country has discriminated against them in favour of immigrants, many of who speak poor English." Allison – "many of whom…." not who. Copywriter's blunder or Allison's?

  33. Morning all 🙂😊🤗
    Bright high broken cloud 10c rain later.
    Nigel is going to have a problem if he ever gets into number 10. The far left barriers of lies are being erected.
    I am not long out of my few days in hospital and my wife and I are both suffering from the effects of some sort of viral infection I have picked up. I noticed that when I first arrived only one or two of the staff wore masks after 4 days in nearly all of them were wearing them.
    I have A Fib again and it may have ruined our planned holiday and cruise around the Greek Islands next month.
    Also the seemingly forgotten results of my examinations nearly two months ago have suddenly turned up. And it's confirmed something I have been afraid of for years. An asbestos related lung infection. Not the worst ones but there all the same.
    Oh well Something else to cope with in old age.

    2. Oh noo…. more bad news. I hope the infection soon clears up. I think you'll both need that holiday and I hope you're able to go.

    3. Sorry you are both feeling rough.

      Grandchildren are most likely to have infected you both .

      If your immune systems are suspect , children do pass on ll sorts of bugs they pick up from school .

      Teachers will tell you the same .

      I hope you both feel better soon .. COPD is not pleasant .

      I was prescribed Carbocisteine, when I had Covid cough issues for 6 months years ago

      Carbocysteine, is a mucolytic that reduces the viscosity of sputum and so can be used to help relieve the symptoms of chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder and bronchiectasis by allowing the sufferer to bring up sputum more easily.

      1. Not the grandchildren this time TB the three nights and four days in hospital.
        I noticed how more of the staff wore masks as time went by. But strangely not the doctors.

      2. I have been taking Carbocisteine since being diagnosed with late onset asthma several years ago.

        I still have a rough cough which I believe is the result of the seeding of the atmosphere by small plains spraying some form of aluminium oxide to prevent sunlight. The shit farmers spray on those fields not yet blighted by solar “farms” is a contributory factor.

    5. Oh, no. I am sorry you have had such awful news. Here's hoping that while these issues will stay, you will soon feel improved. Take it easy.
      if you have to cancel the holiday, will your travel insurance cover you?

  34. Another fine mess Nigel Farage is planning to get us into
    He gaily led the UK into leaving the EU, but with no real plan it took years to implement, but never mind blame someone else.
    He split the vote with his new party bringing in incompetent leftwing authoritarianism, but don't worry,. someone else's fault.
    He now plans to implement a badly thought out reign of terror on foreign residents who thought they had fulfilled all legal requisites.
    If he wins it'll be horrible but he'll find someone to blame.

    1. "…but with no real plan it took years to implement…"

      It would be hard to find a greater misrepresentation of events than this. It took years to leave because Parliament and the establishment beyond spent years trying to prevent it happening. I don't think those who voted to get out expected the campaigners to write the entire agenda and script for the negotiations but they soon realised that 90% of that establishment ("We will honour the result") were rank liars.

      "…a badly thought out reign of terror on foreign residents who thought they had fulfilled all legal requisites…"

      Many of them certainly did fulfil the requisites: work for long enough to qualify for benefits then sit back and take them – after inviting the extended family to join them.

      1. Yeah all someone else’s fault. The consequences of his actions should have been thought out. Just voting to leave was never going to be enough.
        As to this pathetic tableau you’ve painted of foreign residents in the UK, I’m sure you don’t even believe that.
        The results of Farage’s Draconian measures will be to put power in the hands of bureaucrats employed to fill cuotas, harrassing the usual easy targets of respectable people.
        But Farage will simply find someone else to blame for his mess as always.

        1. You must have been out of the country between 2016 and 2020 when Parliament engaged in its war of attrition against the country.

          Recent figures showed that 1.2 million adult migrants are on Universal credit, 700,000 of them Europeans (and those numbers might be undercounted). Eight million people have come here since 1997. Please don't insult our intelligence by telling us that they're all making a contibution.

          And consider this: that those recent migrants who are worthy of their place might well be as angry as the resident British about the huge number living off the backs of others.

          Read Allison Pearson's piece above.

          2. Yes you can talk about me all you like but you don't answer my points. Why didn't Farage manage Brexit. Because he didn't count on the millions who were against it. Why did Labour win the election? Because he didn't count on the millions who wouldn't vote for reform ñ. Why won't his anti foreigner plan work? Because he doesn't count on the millions against it.
            He doesn't think things through.
            you can't vote for populists. They're incompetent.

          3. Farage really wasn't involved. How could he count on those who were against it? What's he to do with that?

            Why did Labour win? Because the Tories offered nothing to vote for and had set about some truly awful policies. They had done nothing in 14 years except enforced decline.

            No, he doesn't think things through, but there is a limit to what you can pin on him as if he were responsible. There re 5 Reform MPs. They're having a bigger impact now on policy than the entire Tory party is.

            Hang on – there's that phrase that Lefties use when they mean democracy. Populism, as if to demonise being popular.

            If reform are 'incompetent' and are not making policy then you've nothing to judge them against. True incompetence is what Labour are doing.

          4. But those people will never be targeted. Have you never experienced British bureaucracy? Incompetent functionaries will harass respectable people, leaving to one side the escoria you might want to eject.
            Don’t insult our intelligence. Farage has made a dog’s breakfast if this country with his meddling and intends to continue.

          5. Could you name six ways Farage has caused a problem – with sources, outcomes and what not?

            For example, Reeves' tax hikes sent unemployment soaring to 8% (any news paper/blog).

          7. Do you have evidence of this though? Could it not be that the Tories offered absolutely nothing to vote for?

          9. Sadly the massive welfare bill is because over 72% of gimmigrants are welfare dependent.

            If we change that, we get rid of them.

            However – to change that means leaving the ECHR and repealing the HRA, the communities act and a dhost of other tangled knots that Blair created specifically to ensure his favoured groups could not be affected.

            This is why to get his way Farage needs to undo a host of legislation BUT ALSO to fight the forces who exist because of it: the judiciary, Leftist companies, universities, fake charities, the quangocracy.

            I honestly don't believe he has the energy or team to foresee all the ways those groups will fight him.

        2. You must have been out of the country between 2016 and 2020 when Parliament engaged in its war of attrition against the country.

          Recent figures showed that 1.2 million adult migrants are on Universal credit, 700,000 of them Europeans (and that might be undercounted). Eight million have come here since 1997. Please don't insult our intelligence by telling us that they're all making a contibution.

          And consider this: that those recent migrants who are worthy of their place might well be as angry as the resident British about the huge number living off the backs of others.

          Read Allison Pearson's piece above.

        3. Gawd rob, robert, bobsie .. you do know people can read your back posts?

          Farage is planning a reign of terror on foreign residents in the UK. LOL

          Millions is not a lot in a country like the UK. Millions are also alarmed by Farage's rhetoric. LOL

          Indeed.. Millions is not a lot. However, millions of hairy arsed fighting aged Mohammads along with their deformed cousins already in every enclave in every single city who are already imposing on the locals their wonderful ways..
          are a million too many.

          Do you grasp that concept?

          1. Yes I of course people read my posts.If you had read them more closely you might have got a different impression.
            Farage’s plans, as always, are half baked. The people you intend to target will continue to enjoy British hospitality. But the British functionaries will enjoy a field day harassing respectable hardworking people as they wallow in their incompetence enjoying new power.
            That’s how it will work.

          2. I can easily believe that officialdom would target the least deserving for deportation, if only to emphasise how unjust the policy is that Farage and his gang have forced them to carry out.

          3. I had a conspiracy theory moment over May's 'Windrush' debacle. She had, of course, talked of 'a hostile environment for immigrants'. That would have upset Home Office types. While there was undoubtedly an administrative cock-up going back to the days of paper records, I wondered whether the HO made the most of it in the hope that it would demonstrate how difficult it was to to deport people: "Let's not bother – much better to let them stay."

        4. You are aware that in every major city and in many towns, the English are now in the minority and that by most demographic studies we will be a minority in our own country by 2060 and that this will be a Muslim country. Or is it you don't care?

        5. I am confused as to why you are blaming Farage. Admittedly he hasn't done things when he should have and has when he shouldn't, but compared to the clown show of Tory, labour and Eurocratic infighting he does quite well.

          Do you mean quotas?

          1. Yes I probably do. I’m bilingual and sometimes confuse languages. With that and the word corrector I tend to have many typos. The corrector keeps on putting Garage instead of Farage.

      2. Two key questions:

        i) "Let's Get Brexit Done!" was Boris Johnson's election promise in 2019. Why did he not deselect each and every single Remainer MP before going to the polls?

        ii) Why did Farage's Brexit Party not field a candidate against every sitting Conservative remainer MP – this would have forced Johnson into making some sort of pact with Farage. In a word: Farage blinked first.

        And then why did David Frost, the chief negotiator – who until the very last moment held to the position that the UK would not give way on either British Fishing and Northern Ireland – suddenly cave in showing how completely futile and weak Boris Johnson was on leaving the EU properly?

        Brexit needed to be built on sound foundations and the failure of our politicians of all parties has been a complete catastrophe.

        1. For 1, he couldn't. He needed their support as he was double dealing to make sure they go their slice of the pie when they elected him. It's important to remember that MPs band together around a figurehead, and where the figurehead goes, so do the votes.

          2. This is Farage's big mistake but also the right thing to do. He wasn't ready. He didn't have the funding, organisation or discipline in place to do things properly and the Left would have fought him to nothing today.

          The Eu refused, point blank to allow us to leave the HRA. The political fall out would have been more than Boris could handle – mainly because he wasn't interested in politics once he got the job.

          It's all down to the border with Northern Ireland. The EU said 'it's at Dover' making the entire UK part of the single market – which we wanted access to without being chained to the EU. The EU knew this and simply refused.

          We said no, it's at Northern Ireland. The EU said no, unacceptable. As some people would have had to fill in EU paperwork to get milk out of their fridge. The EU would have enforced that as well, and made it clear they would out of spite. We wanted a loose border with no real checks because that's common sense. Some simple digital system where a few packages were checked every week or so. The EU demanded every single package be opened and that we pay for it all. They weren't prepared to give an inch so to get 'something' for the papers, Boris gave up.

          Sunak moved the border to our shore, gave the EU exactly what they wanted, made us pay for the whole thing all to look good – mostly because the remoaner establishment was, by then extremely happy with having made a complete pigs breakfast of Brexit and was busying itself with giving away Northern Ireland, tax harmonisation, border checks for we and not for thee, ensuring we never left the CFP and CAP, continuing with May's appalling 'net zero' abomination that was her 'legacy' yet is EU socialist policy.

          By then Boris was looking after his 96th baby, had a difficult wife (remember plod visiting after the neighbour's complained of the shouting) and was basically heading for bankruptcy as PM doesn't pay as well as high profile journalist.

        2. Just imagine going into that election with the Conservative Party in a state of civil war. Not a recipe for success, I'd wager, possibly allowing the Corbyn-led Labour Party to become the governing one.

    2. We never left. We voted to leave and the ruling class ignored us. It did some frilly bits around the edges hoping it would fool us. But we are still in the EU. We follow its rules, its people fish in our seas and Northern Ireland is still in the EU thanks to the traitorous people in Westminster who are supposed to be our servants, there to carry out our will. But, in fact, ignore us and carry on in their corrupt ways. It is because of all that and more, that the country is in crisis. Don't give us guff about Farage. Turn your discontent where it belongs, on the Conservatives, the socialist Labour Party and the Lib Dems, the party of the useless. The coalition of the practically traitorous that these parties represent as they line their own pockets. You really are talking rubbish.

      And as for your attitude to the illegal hoard that have invaded us. Frankly, I think your point of view amounts to genocide against the native people of this country. You and people like you have no right to expect us to relinquish our land to uncontrolled hoards of people, many of them outrightly hostile to us, who espouse a cult that would destroy our way of life and destroy everything our ancestors built and fought for.

      1. Ahem! Jonathan! Horde, my dear fellow!

        I understand the original posters frustration and your own, but reality is endlessly more complicated and is a series of malicious, bitter, egotistical but fundamentally stupid people all wanting their own way.

        The way some groups acted during the campaign should have been punished though. Miller especially should have been laughed at. The 'Change UK' (by keeping it the same) group should have forced by elections but, ultimately they were all incompetent, nasty, selfish effluent on all sides.

        1. I don't know Wibbling. To me it boils down to traitorous MPs who when they got the result they weren't expecting set about deliberately complicating matters that were quite simple. We all knew what Brexit meant. But they pretended it didn't mean to leave the EU but this that or the other and waffle, waffle, waffle. Pick at the rope until it unravelled into endless strings that they could create knots in for the sake of their own gravy train.

      2. I understand the frustrations of those who see the prolonging of fishing rights in UK waters to EU vessels and the semi-detachment of Northern Ireland from the rest of the United Kingdom as unforgiveable acts of betrayal, but a more balanced view might at least acknowledge that not budging on these matters might have had adverse consequences and that an explanation might be warranted about how the benefits would still outweigh the costs. For example, would consequences have included a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic, with length queues at border crossings? Would the Common Travel Area have come under threat? Might it have sparked a return to the Troubles and a renewed outbreak of IRA terrorism and Loyalist reprisals? Would tougher trade barriers between the UK and the rest of the EU have been erected? Would greater restrictions have been placed on UK nationals wanting to visit EU member states whether on business, for leisure, for study or for visiting friends and family. As it stands, all I see is how standing firm on fishing rights and Northern Ireland's status in the UK would have been easy stances to maintain and were only abandoned because of the pusillanimity of UK negotiators combined with a lack of enthusiasm for the task in hand.

        1. Thing is, Stig, those negatives you suggest were imposed anyway, despite the legalese not to. The Eu did not act in good faith. It never does. Our negotiators knew this, they understood the wording was all one sided. It was sold as such.

          1. Wasn't the British government being lobbied by business interests leaning on it not to take a too rigid stance in the negotiations for fear that it would lose ready access to long-established EU markets?

        2. There was never going to be reasonable negotiations because the EU's primary objective was to punish Britain for leaving, "pour encourager les autres".

        3. Much of what you say is about 'what if's' and at this point, who knows. I favored a hard Brexit and then to go from there. As it is what we have had is a mess from start to finish and along with it the destabilization of Britain. So franky, a hard Brexit could have not been any worse. I actually benefited from being in the EU but I'm a loyal Englishman and was quite willing to give up a lot to get out of what seemed to me a dictatorship to assert our sovereignty and make our way in the world. As it is we have ended up with nothing of any benefit. I certainly have ended up with no benefit but loss from leaving. And that is an outrageous result from something that was supposed to assert our independence and create again, our ancient ability to make our own way in the world and be quite successful at it. Something we did for at least 500 years.

    3. Not really, to be honest. In truth, the 'father' of the referendum and it's driving to actually get one was Daniel Hannan. When the competition opened to see who would get to represent each side, neither of the two big ones – Vote Leave and Leave.EU – wanted to work with Farage. Then we have other actors such as Aaron Banks pushing their own agenda.

      It was a bitter, pathetic spat between petulant toddlers scrabbling for cushy jobs at the expense of the country.

      Farage wasn't in any position to promote a plan to leave the EU. That was down to the May government. May ignored all the advice to work out what she wanted from the EU and then take that to the table. Instead, because she wanted some quick wins and was utterly ignorant of the machinnaion and arrogance of the Eurocrats, let alone the frenzied hatred of the civil service for leaving the EU, simply triggered article 50 without a plan for the optics.

      May was then encouraged to call an election again, without a plan, an awareness of the public mood or even with her advisors knowing what was going on. Downing Street just assumed it would win because Brexit.

      Then May presented some truly catastrophic policies and proved poor at being the figurehead. So much so that she was swiftly removed from that role, leaving the Tory campaign leaderless when the whole point was to promote the leader to the public.

      May then appointed a series of technocrats who were real Europhiles over the advice of the in place bureaucrat who wasn't telling her what she wanted to hear. May, and the Tory government generally were riven by division, aimlessness, confusion, infighting and pettiness while the Eurocracy stood united with one finger extended skyward. We were humiliated repeatedly as May fought a political battle at home while the Eurocrats humbled her over there.

      The sad saving grace of May was the Eurocracy knowing if it destroyed May – as they nearly did many times through votes of no confidence – they'd face either Corbyn, who really hated them or another, stronger Tory who would actually confront them. It was a tedious effort to humble May but keep her on life support for their own benefit.

      At every turn, officials double dealt, accepting Eu deals against Tory request, did back room agreements, ignored the politicians, slid in specific and careful wording to get their own way and strung out the farce for as long as possible.

      Their hatred and shame at the cash cow of the UK leaving the communist bloc drove them into a frenzy they haven't recovered from. France still hates us because we're no longer paying their lazy farmers – except, of course, we are.

      The comedy of errors, foul ups, back handers, double dealing and sheer, utter arrogance, spite and stupidity of all parties involved is monumental. Farage, for all his bluster, character and demagoguery was really little more than a walk on show in a marathon decade long farce.

      1. Lots of excuses but he left the UK in a limbo for years. Then he started Reform and gave the country this awful government and now for his next act a reign of terror on foreign residents and their families.
        And when it goes wrong it’s someone else’s fault.

        1. Not excuses, facts.

          I don't understand why you think 'Farage' gave us this awful government. The Tories lost the election because Tory voters had no Conservative party to vote for.

          I think your hatred of Farage is blinding you to the truth. In fact, you sound like you work for Labour!

  35. Six years ago today.

    A tyranny of judges

    Today's Supreme Court ruling is a vile assault on the democratic order.

    Brendan O'Neill
    24th September 2019

    Today's Supreme Court ruling is a vile assault on the democratic order. In finding that Boris Johnson's proroguing of parliament was unlawful, and that parliament is not prorogued, the 11 justices have made an explicitly political decision in favour of the Remainer elite. They have taken sides. Ignore the utterly unconvincing pleas of the Remainer fanatics who brought this case, all of whom robotically insist that this is not a political decision, just a legal, constitutional one. No one is buying that. This was a decisively political act by 11 unelected judges who have taken sides against the government of the day, and this opens up a new, dark era in British political life.

    What we have seen emerge via this judgement is a borderline tyrannical layer in British politics. A layer that stands above everyone and everything, including the government itself. A layer of unrepresentative, unaccountable individuals who have now presumed the authority to strike down actual government decisions. This instantly weakens any future government's claim to moral and political authority and their basic ability to relate to parliament, to negotiate treaties, and to act on the will of the people. The precedent set today is that any of that might potentially be subject to the higher, apparently wiser judgement of politicised courts. It is an outrage.

    It is staggering just how political, how uninhibited, the judgement was. Even Remainer fanatics are shocked by the extent to which the court took their side against the government (and ultimately against the people, whose vote to leave the EU these fanatics are seeking to overthrow). The justices said the prorogation is unlawful and no longer exists and suggested therefore that parliamentarians may reconvene as and when they please. It was an implicit invitation to the Remainer Parliament to continue its frustration of Boris Johnson's Brexit plans and of Brexit more broadly. The Speaker of the House, the hardcore Remainer John Bercow, wasted no time in responding. Parliamentarians 'must reconvene without delay', he said. Bercow, loather of Brexit and usurper of parliamentary custom, has now effectively been put in charge of politics in this country. Good news for the Remainer elite; terrible news for anybody who truly believes in democracy.

    Democracy – incredibly, some of the Remainer elitists who supported the Supreme Court case claim this is what they are fighting for. Gina Miller, the wealthy woman who brought the case, and others outside the court – Caroline Lucas, Anna Soubry, Jo Maugham – all insisted that this was a simple, non-political defence of parliamentary sovereignty against an overreaching executive. Do they really think we're that stupid?

    These people despise Brexit. They have devoted themselves to stopping it. They are against enacting the democratic will. In expecting us to believe their legal case wasn't political, they expose what a low opinion they have of the people of this country. Millions will see this case, and the judgement, and know instantly that it will not do anything whatsoever to defend democracy, parliamentary or otherwise, but rather will enable the Remainer Parliament to continue thwarting democracy and silencing the people's voice. At least voters now know what they are up against: virtually every institution in the land, including the law itself, all of which are lending their considerable power to the Remainer elite's anti-democratic, anti-people project.

    This judgement is a disaster for law and for politics. It's bad for law because it will convince many more people that the law has become a political instrument, wielded by the wealthy to achieve openly political ends that they failed to achieve in the public, democratic sphere. And it is bad for politics because it points to the formation of a new politicised but untouchable elite which has power over the entire nation and everyone in it. That should terrify anyone who believes in real democracy. When the Daily Mail accused judges of behaving like enemies of the people, the Remainer elites went into meltdown. Our message to them today is clear: if you don't want to be called an enemy of the people, stop behaving like one.

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2019/09/24/a-tyranny-of-judges

    1. Blah blah blah Brendan O'Neill..
      Yet still he couldn't work out what Blair had done.
      Johnson was clueless too.
      Somehow the Globalist Trot had inserted the lawyer above parliament, above the monarchy and above the Will of The People.
      Something Cromwell knew all too well.. keep any lawyer away from power.

      Starmer, Clintons both of them, Blair, Obama.. all lawyers. Nuff said.

      2. Just because O'Neill doesn't mention Blair's assault on the constitution (much discussed on here) doesn't invalidate his piece (some shooting of the messenger there by you). We'd already had a warning with the Article 50 case. This was the moment that the judges' takeover was confirmed.

      3. Just because O'Neill doesn't mention Blair's assault on the constitution (much discussed on here) doesn't invalidate his piece (some shooting of the messenger there by you). We'd already had a warning with the Article 50 case. This was the moment that the judges' takeover was confirmed.

      4. Just because O'Neill doesn't mention Blair's assault on the constitution (much discussed on here) doesn't invalidate his piece (some shooting of the messenger there by you). We'd already had a warning with the Article 50 case. This was the moment that the judges' takeover was confirmed.

      5. This is something Farage isn't thinking of either. As it is, the highest authority in the land is the taxpayer. Beneath them – far, far beneath them – is the political class, where our foot rests on their neck. They act with our permission, not as they wish to.

        Below that sits the judiciary enacting law the public want. The feedback route is also back through the politicos, to the public.

        Beside these – NOT under them – sit the police, who enforce these laws, acting as the servants of society to protect and serve it's best interests.

        Unrelated to the state machine sit education, healthcare and to a degree defence, as there has to be a check on the political class having access to the military.

        Beneath it all, as the irrelevance it is, sits the administration which should be small, efficient, over-worked and losing staff due to burn out from the 12 hour days, 7 day weeks the public demand of it.

        The problem we have at the moment is that pyramid is utterly inverted. That's why nothing works. It's why the political class are corrupt. It's why the entire machine is broken.

      6. This is something Farage isn't thinking of either. As it is, the highest authority in the land is the taxpayer. Beneath them – far, far beneath them – is the political class, where our foot rests on their neck. They act with our permission, not as they wish to.

        Below that sits the judiciary enacting law the public want. The feedback route is also back through the politicos, to the public.

        Beside these – NOT under them – sit the police, who enforce these laws, acting as the servants of society to protect and serve it's best interests.

        Unrelated to the state machine sit education, healthcare and to a degree defence, as there has to be a check on the political class having access to the military.

        Beneath it all, as the irrelevance it is, sits the administration which should be small, efficient, over-worked and losing staff due to burn out from the 12 hour days, 7 day weeks the public demand of it.

        The problem we have at the moment is that pyramid is utterly inverted. That's why nothing works. It's why the political class are corrupt. It's why the entire machine is broken.

      1. Fun fact – we can re-use rubber for pot holes. It's lighter, flexible and in shredded/pellet form makes a good hole filler.

    2. OHMYGOD! Don't mention the water cycle! Don't mention the basic fundamentals of environmental science! The Leftists can't cope with it!

      Confronted with science, facts and reality their heads explode.

      Won't someone think of the lying Leftist greeniac desperately denying reality!

      1. They will have some absurdly complicated and unlikely reason why these cycles don't apply in this case.
        They will trot it out and think you are a fool for not believing it.
        People should listen to themselves when they are making excuses for believing in unlikely tales.

    1. A busload of German Sh1tLibs and moronic hipster activists getting a huge reality check.
      Will they learn? Nah.
      Will they change their ways? Nah.

      1. We can, wibbling…we're not able to because of politicians, civil servants, lawyers..add others as you please…..

    4. Is this for real? Why on earth would they believe that the country that won't take in palestinian refugees would welcome pro-palestinian activism?

  38. Plumber's been……..new cylinder thermostat was overheating and causing it to overflow. He's had trouble getting onto our drive so I've just been hacking away the overgrown buddleia foliage and stems – another three bags for the next trip to the tip. At least people can see the drive now. Time for a coffee and a sit down before I tackle the planned jobs for today.

  40. Morning all, Sunny but cool. Nice day actually but summer is most definitely over unless we get an Indian summer (Wacist, wacist! ) in October. Trust all are well?

    1. Good one 'mum…there's liars, damned liars and then some others (apologies to whoever coined the original)…

    2. Whenever one of my late aunties received a marketing call, she would tell them her hearing was poor, then to hang on while she got her policeman son to help. Funnily enough, the caller immediately hung up.
      Donkeys years ago, when double glazing cold callers were forever ringing, I would tell them I would get my husband as the house was in his name (a lie), then I would go back into another room, leaving them for a few minutes. On one occasion, I was distracted by our baby needing his nappy changing, and I genuinely forgot the call. When I eventually remembered, almost an hour later, the idiot was still there, and was fuming that I had wasted his time and cost for the long call; my response was to tell him that he had wasted my time by cold calling in the first place. Other times, we would tell them we were bankrupt. Fun times. 🙂

  44. 413487+up ticks,

    These political overseers are all in "Best we forget" mode and NOT "Lest we forget" issues such as the remnants of the BEF for nine days in 1940 crossing the channel in small boats in regards to protecting these Isles from foreign invaders.
    After nigh on forty years proven treachery by political overseers as in the lab/lib/con pro eu coalition party there surely must be more than enough indigenous "patriots" to make vote splitting of no consequence.
    Reform to challenge the toxic trio YES party torso GOOD in the main, party leadership needs heavy coat of looking at.
    On safety grounds a second patriotic party must surely be on standby in case of………..

    IMHO The Farmers Food and Freedom Party would fill ALL requirements, especially in the "watch your back department"
    https://x.com/PeteJacksonGMP/status/1970765980084158840

      2. The chap steering that boat is also a front-row forward in rugby.

        He is the only cox-hooker in Cambridge.

  48. Labour lawyer 'advised' Starmer's chief of staff to label £740k donations as 'admin error'.

    Leaked emails have put Keir Starmer's chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, in hot water as a senior Labour legal adviser reportedly directed him to dismiss £740,000 in undisclosed donations as merely an "admin error," according to the Daily Mail.

    It comes to something when the friend and closest personal advisor to the UK Prime Minister is a hard-left Grandson of an IRA man who fought against the British in the guerrilla war fought in Ireland from 1919 to 1921 and was given a medal for his services. Born in Macroom, County Cork, married to a Scotch Labour MP and keen for the UK to remain in the EU.

    He is also unelected and the highest paid government special adviser with £155,000 and unlimited expenses. Not a friend of the flag waving Brits.

  49. Labour lawyer 'advised' Starmer's chief of staff to label £740k donations as 'admin error'.

    Leaked emails have put Keir Starmer's chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, in hot water as a senior Labour legal adviser reportedly directed him to dismiss £740,000 in undisclosed donations as merely an "admin error," according to the Daily Mail.

    It comes to something when the friend and closest personal advisor to the UK Prime Minister is a hard-left Grandson of an IRA man who fought against the British in the guerrilla war fought in Ireland from 1919 to 1921 and was given a medal for his services. Born in Macroom, County Cork, married to a Scotch Labour MP and keen for the UK to remain in the EU.

    He is also unelected and the highest paid government special adviser with £155,000 and unlimited expenses. Not a friend of the flag waving Brits.

  51. The Katie Hopkins arrest debacle escalates.
    Soooooooooo..

    Fa fa fa far right nasty who had part of her brain removed from previous surgery in 2016 uses an apt 'slang' word about herself.
    Threatened with arrest for using a slang word unless she makes an appearance at local nick by a police force that doesn't police crime.

  52. Indefinite leave to remain cannot go on

    We push out wealthy people who contribute billions while allowing in millions who will be net welfare beneficiaries

    Telegraph View
    22nd September 2025, 6:19pm BST

    The concept of indefinite leave to remain (ILR) has its origins in the Immigration Act 1971, the legislation introduced amid public concern over the status of incomers from the old colonies, stirred in part by Enoch Powell. It regulated the entry, stay, and departure of those without the right of abode with the aim of controlling immigration. For decades net migration was never more than around 50,000 a year. On some occasions it was lower still, or even negative.

    The arrival of New Labour in government saw the numbers shoot up, partly as a result of the expansion of the EU, and they have continued to rise ever since. Since Brexit, which was supposed to let the country control its borders and suppress immigration, it has exploded.

    Net migration has added 2.6 million people in the four years since the Government led by Boris Johnson launched an "Australian-style" points-based migration system. This has been dubbed the "Boriswave", a term used often by Nigel Farage at his news conference to announce Reform UK's latest policy on immigration. He is proposing to scrap ILR as a means to staying in Britain so that migrants would no longer be able to qualify for permanent settlement after five years in the UK.

    Moreover, only British citizens would be able to access welfare benefits, pensions and other entitlements. In its place Reform would re-establish work visas as a temporary right to come to Britain for employment. All migrants with permanent residency will have to reapply for visas under stricter criteria, including higher language and salary requirements.

    Both Labour and the Tories have proposed doubling the residency requirement for ILR to 10 years but their credibility on this issue has been shot to pieces, whereas Mr Farage can make promises without having to defend past or current failures. His difficulty will be delivery and he is aware that voters are weary of being sold a pup.

    From a base of just five MPs, he would need to win a huge majority in the Commons and stack the Lords with Reform peers to get his plans through parliament and change the law to obviate the legal challenges that would inevitably follow.

    As a country we push out wealthy people who contribute billions to the Exchequer while allowing in millions who will end up as net beneficiaries of a welfare system we can no longer afford. This cannot go on.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/09/22/indefinite-leave-to-remain-migration-farage

    1. That it has expanded since we voted to leave (we haven’t had Brexit in truth), is punishment for the audacity to believe we should be sovereign.

  53. Why hasn’t the BBC cancelled The History Boys?
    The 2006 film has not aged well. Few would now countenance that a teacher who gropes his charges can also be an inspirational figure
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/09/23/why-hasnt-bbc-cancelled-history-boys/

    Many years ago the head girl of a mixed sex public school in the South West of England fell in love with one of her teachers. She went to Oxford to study for a B.A. degree and her teacher lover resigned from his teaching job and went himself to Oxford to do a Ph.D.

    Three years later they returned – as a married couple – to the school where they had met each other, were both employed as teachers and, as far as I know, lived happily ever after.

    1. I've never watched it. I refuse to allow anything to be shown in my house that has the cretinous James Corden in it.

  54. That's 8 x jars of Strawberry Jam done.
    Or at least I hope it's jam and not a Strawberry Syrup!

    1. Fingers crossd.
      The grape jelly I made this year was a disaster.
      I can only use the results as a dollop to flavour other dishes.

  55. Russia is feared to have hit a Spanish Air Force plane with a GPS attack, after a flight carrying Spain's defence minister suffered an electronic 'disturbance'.

    The attack is believed to have happened this morning after the Spanish Airbus A330 carrying top minister Margarita Robles flew over the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad on its way to Lithuania.

    Robles was due to meet with her Lithuanian counterpart Dovile Sakaliene at the Siauliai airbase in the north of the country on Wednesday morning, according to the Spanish government's agenda.

    My bold
    So it's OK for a NATO plane to fly over Russian airspace, but not OK for Russian planes to fly over NATO countries.

    WW3 edges closer.

    1. Given the present tensions between NATO and Russia, it ought to have been self-evidently prudent to take a minor diversion around Kaliningrad in order to reach Lithuania. It wouldn't have added much mileage and time to the flight.

      1. Back in the '90's I flew Delhi to London a few times. I used both United and BA. Both flew very different flight paths due to avoiding countries where they were at risk.

    2. Lots of planes fly commercial routes over Russian territory. The Russians close their airspace to countries they don't like, but this sounds more like someone just demonstrating "we could if we wanted to". At least unlike Malaysian flight 17, they did not shoot it down. Or Korean Air 007,

  56. Brendan O'Neill
    The idea that facts are sacred to The Guardian is a sick joke

    Are you a rich, smug liberal? There’s a new garment on the market that lets you wear your moral sanctimony across your chest

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/2f59a12f5a020519

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

    Emma Dixon
    2 hrs ago
    Ouch! Accurately excoriating, Brendan. They’ll hate you over at the Graun. Well done!

    Antony Foster
    1 hr ago
    I prefer the Daily Mash tee-shirt which has the logo:

    The Guardian. Wrong about everything. All the time.

    Yours for £20

    Scottish Resident
    1 hr ago
    The greatest sin of the Guardian is that of omission. They routinely fail to report news which doesn't fit their narrative. A recent example would be the BBC reporter referring to Charlie Kirk as 'far right'. Not a breath about this on their site….

    Ian Howlett
    2 min ago
    Knowing the Grauniad, you’ll probably buy it and get one that says “Facts are scared”.

    1. Al Beeb does the same though. The Left always ignore the bit that doesn't suit the narrative.

      Case in point: two headlines:

      IDF kills children by blowing up school.

      muslim hamas terrorists occupy school and use children as human shields.

      Al Beeb with always, always go with the former because it frames the narrative as they want it to be. They lie by omission.

    2. BTL Comment:-

      We need to get a line of apparel with slogans on the lines of:-
      "Facts Are Sacred
      Unless you are a Guardian Reader"

  58. For Molamola:

    "Poets talk about “spots of time,” but it is really fishermen who experience eternity compressed into a moment. No one can tell what a spot of time is until suddenly the whole world is a fish and the fish is gone.”

    From "A River Runs Through It" by Norman Maclean.

    2. I once went fishing. After two hours I looked at my watch and discovered that only five minutes had passed. Needless to say, I didn't go fishing again.

  59. It's time to end the Ukraine war

    Seeking a decisive Russian defeat is a virtually impossible goal that presents serious and unwarranted risks

    David Rundell
    23rd September 2025, 6:59pm BST

    The war in Ukraine needs to end. It has been out of control for three years, costing hundreds of billions of pounds and hundreds of thousands of lives. Further escalation risks confrontation with a nuclear power.

    Opinions differ on how we got here. Some claim Vladimir Putin is intent on recreating a Russian empire. Others believe that no Russian leader would survive if they allowed NATO to expand to within 300 miles of Moscow. What matters is what we do now, starting from where we are with the available options.

    Harsh economic sanctions have not ended the war because, unlike most nations, Russia is largely self-sufficient in food, energy and armaments. The Russian economy continues to grow and the rouble is worth now roughly the same as what it did when the war started.

    China and India have replaced Europe as Russia's leading trading partners. Efforts to punish China and India with sanctions would likely ignite a global trade war. Donald Trump has made it clear that the United States will not tighten sanctions further until Europe completely cuts off Russian energy imports. Meanwhile Iran, Turkey, China, North Korea and Kyrgyzstan all send microchips, drones, cars and much else to Moscow.

    It has always been extremely unlikely that Ukraine, with a 2021 GDP of $200bn and a population of 44 million, could defeat Russia, with a GDP of $1.8tn and a population of 145 million. This would seem particularly true since only Russia possesses a sizeable air force, significant defence industries and nuclear weapons.

    NATO support for Ukraine has escalated from short-range missiles, to medium-range missiles to heavy weapons such as Abrams tanks and advanced fighter aircraft. Yet Moscow continues its slow, relentless advance with an army made up largely of volunteers while spending an estimated 7 per cent of its GDP on its military. Kyiv, on the other hand, is spending roughly 34 per cent of GDP on defence and is reduced to kidnapping men off the street just to stay in the fight.

    A just war requires a reasonable possibility of victory. While a generation of Ukrainian men are dying, the reality is that without NATO intervening directly, Ukraine has about as much chance of winning a war against Russia as Belgium would have against Germany.

    Direct NATO engagement is not an option. This is an existential conflict for Putin and for Russia. Politically, and perhaps even physically, he could not survive an obvious defeat.

    If need be, he will escalate. Since the end of the Cold War, Russia has invested heavily in nuclear armaments. Today, it possesses roughly 10 per cent more warheads than the United States. Some of these can be mounted on hypersonic missiles against which there is no effective defence. The massive Russian Sarmat missile carries the equivalent of hundreds of Hiroshima bombs. Regardless of how unlikely even a limited nuclear exchange may be, there is no British, or even Ukrainian, interest in taking such an enormous risk. After the Cuban missile crisis, John F Kennedy warned that we should "never again force Russia to choose between national humiliation and nuclear war". We should heed his advice.

    Compromise is never popular. Lord Lansdowne (1845-1927) was one of Britain's most accomplished diplomats. He served successfully as governor general of Canada, viceroy of India, minister of defence and foreign secretary. In the midst of the First World War, Lansdowne wrote a letter in this newspaper proposing to end the war through negotiations. He argued that Britain could reach a compromise and should "not desire the annihilation of Germany as a great power". Lansdowne was harshly criticised and ignored by a government committed to total victory. The First World War dragged on, the death toll mounted, Russia became the Soviet Union and total victory lasted barely 20 years. Perhaps we can do better this time.

    Ending this war will require negotiations on two fundamental issues; Ukraine's neutrality and Ukraine's borders. It is not obvious why a purely defensive alliance like NATO needs to expand its membership or how adding weak and vulnerable new members adds to the security of current NATO members. Moreover, Russia has now made it very clear that it will fight a prolonged war to prevent Ukraine from joining the alliance. Soviet troops withdrew from Austria when it committed itself to neutrality. Austria has joined the EU, but has honoured its 1955 treaty commitment and not joined NATO. Could Ukraine do likewise?

    The Donbas and Crimea are not historically part of Ukraine. They are Russian-speaking regions that were annexed to Ukraine during the Soviet era for political purposes. They probably should have reverted to the Russian Federation when the Soviet Union collapsed. At the very least their people are now entitled to a UN-sponsored referendum to determine if they wish to remain Ukrainian. Are they any less deserving of self-determination than the people of Scotland or Quebec?

    Russia could be offered international political rehabilitation and the end of economic sanctions for accepting such a plebiscite. Ukraine could be offered significant reconstruction aid for doing likewise.

    Nations seldom gain back at the negotiating table what they have lost on the battlefield. The longer this war goes on, the more territory Ukraine is likely to lose. Economic sanctions, no matter how harsh, will not change the policy of a leader like Putin whose parents lived through the siege of Leningrad in which over a million Russians died, many of them starved to death. The maths in this war of attrition does not favour Ukraine. Seeking a decisive Russian defeat is both a virtually impossible goal and presents serious and unwarranted risks. A path to peace, however, could come through Ukrainian neutrality and acknowledging the right of self-determination for the Russian speaking parts of Ukraine.

    David Rundell served as an American diplomat for 30 years. He is a former Chief of Mission at the American Embassy in Saudi Arabia

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/09/23/its-time-to-end-the-ukraine-war

    1. Your bolded text sums up the problem. These areas are not ethnically Russian.

      However, would we feel the same if, say Norway decided to annex Scotland? (and yes, we might say 'take the whinging porridge eaters!)

        1. I have long been of the opinion that Geography and History are one and the same subject.

          Every historical event has occurred somewhere on the globe; and every location has existed through time.

          The two are inextricably linked so should be taught as one subject. Geohistory sounds about right.

          2. On your 1330 map, Skåne, southern Sweden (where I live) was indeed part of Denmark. It passed back and forth until the 17th century, since when it has remained part of Sweden.

            I regularly tell the locals that they are all really Danes, especially since their dialect is impenetrable to other Swedes. Even the local (regional) flag is a yellow Nordic cross on a red background.
            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/51d917f959d2b45379726565faecb7887092ea818b63220e681fa2ed4bc54afc.png

    2. Your bolded text sums up the problem. These areas are not ethnically Russian.

      However, would we feel the same if, say Norway decided to annex Scotland? (and yes, we might say 'take the whinging porridge eaters!)

  60. Rachel Reeves' hike in alcohol duty 'backfires' as tax revenues are set to FALL by nearly a billion pounds this year
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15129019/Rachel-Reeves-hike-alcohol-duty-backfires-tax-revenues-set-FALL-nearly-billion-pounds-year.html

    She's not going to be laffing now!

    The Laffer Curve showcases the intricate relationship between tax rates and government revenue, a concept popularized by economist Arthur Laffer in 1974. This theory posits that both excessively high and low tax rates result in reduced tax revenues, suggesting that tax cuts can potentially enhance revenue collection.
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0d88974d20e14a52b7331c7ed39565d404c096fdccfa3926c10aff0b42e5226f.png

    1. If the Treasury understood basic economics it would advocate tax cuts. It expressly rules them out, so never presents the one thing that would achieve the best outcome.

      Taxation is one of those spun nonsense: 'We have raised £x billion this year'

      When really that number is down, it's headlined and manipulated to make it look as if high taxes are a good thing. It ignores the jobs lost at every point in the supply chain, the increased welfare demand.

      Only the state beneficial lie is told.

          3. He had bought a large map representing the C,
            Without the least vestige of land:
            And the crew were much pleased when they found it to be
            A map they could all understand.

            “What’s the good of Mercator’s North Poles and Equators,
            Tropics, Zones, and Meridian Lines?”
            So the Bellend would cry: and the crew would reply
            “They are merely conventional signs!

            (With apols to Lewis Carroll)

        3. The point at which tax revenues no longer increase with tax rates. It's different for every economic scenario.

          Reeves has gone past it to the point where revnues are falling, hence the panic. Apparently having an Oxford PPE and an MA in Economics from the LSE, does not imbue any actual knowledge of economics.

          1. The moment she became chancellor she increased the minimum wage and increased the amount employers had to spend on employing people.

            Most of us – even those of us without Oxbridge and LSE degrees in Economics – saw immediately that this would drive up unemployment, raise inflation, weaken the pound and stop economic growth stone dead.

            I can only conclude that studying economics is the surest way of losing all your common sense as far as money matters are concerned. Far better to employ someone with a GCSE in woodwork who might at least produce something.

          2. I agree completely with your last point. Everyone I know who has studied economics seems unable to see beyond Keynesian economics. They recite it as though it's fact!

          3. Many years ago, I remember an interview with Milton Friedman when he expounded on the point that people and companies don't cause inflation, governments do. This was back in the Wilson era and said broadcast was far from popular as anyone and everything except the government was being blamed for inflation.

            Tahat Chicago School approach is just nowhere near left wing "group think" enough for it to be taught in British universities..

          4. In the old days, if someone went up to Oxford or Cambridge and made a complete hash of their studies, they left with a pass degree in Economics. And everyone knew just what that meant.

          5. One of my Scottish cousins, brought up by card-carrying commie parents, somehow lectured in economics at St. Andrews. Needless to say, he was – and still is – very socialist, as is his wife.
            I saw him and his siblings every year when I was growing up. Around 12 years ago, we reconnected at the funeral of one of our many uncles. Once he discovered that I was not a rabid (or any degree of) socialist, he promptly unfriended me on social media. His wife has no problems with me. Silly man.

          6. You have defined the sweet spot of the Laffer curve but, like everybody else, declined to say where it is. I suspect that it might be a little further to the right on the graph than many would care to believe.

          7. It beggars belief that she even passed A levels, never mind being given places at such institutions. Maybe a place at a plastic 'uni' that was created from a former local F.E. college if she was lucky, and the 'uni' was desperate to fill places.

        4. The hypothetical maximum revenue point of the Laffer curve for any given market cannot be observed directly and can only be estimated—such estimates are often controversial.

    3. Lower taxes just make sense.
      Slightly different, but with a similar effect, back in the 1970s/early 1980s when I was a student and then working in Sheffield, the buses were heavily subsidised, frequent, reliable, and they were always very well used. The policy of cheap farers was to discourage car use, and it worked. I rarely used my car when travelling within the city.
      When our children were at secondary school, we always drove them when they wanted to visit friends at weekends or in school holidays; it was multiple times cheaper than the bus fares. They were at school in the nearby (5-6 miles) market town. Their friends' parents did likewise. (They had bus passes for school)
      Pricey bus fares, what a way to discourage people from using local buses.

  61. Everyone is chasing Charlie Kirk and Palestine squirrels and I haven't seen it said anywhere else, but Mario Inecco picked up that in Trump's speech he said that the Ukrainians should get back all the territory taken by Russia and then go further.

    There must be some reason for Trump's constant 180 degree changes which I guess will be somewhere between the TDS line that "he is stupid" and the ever-Trumper line that "he has a cunning plan which is too complicated for us mere mortals to understand."
    If I had to guess, I'd say the constant changes are just another psyop to keep everyone stirred up and angry and not following what the latest line is – just like they did during covid, when they changed the rules so much that nobody know what the rules were any more.

    Mario Inecco's video is here. He sees 'Trump's words as a signal to greenlight a war. If that is the case, I fear that the script is already written, and Europe will be on the losing side. Germany will be blamed for starting it. Did I miss anything? Oh yes, the bankers and industrialists will make their usual fortunes out of it, war bonds bought by ordinary people will be worthless and our sons and grandsons will be sacrificed. May all warmongers rot in hell forever.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0AbllL3Ogw

  62. DWP Department of 'work' and Pensions are apparently set to visit homes of people who are now living on as many as 19 different state benefits. How long has it taken the authorities to realise that fraudulent means and lies have meant that millions of these people can live by cheating the taxpayers.
    How throughly ignorant are these government workers ? I think there's going to be an absolute revelation if the findings are ever revealed or made public. There must be so much cheating happening.

    2. Strictly Muslim only DWP DEI teams can visit Muslim households.. it is the law.
      Starmer's Law.. International Law.. Home Office Law & the law of the land Sharia Law.
      No evidence found of benefit fraud..

        1. Reminds me of my French neighbours. One son lost his job (builder) and was on benefits. He also worked for a local building firm as "casual" labour. I said is Eric wrking? thught he was unemployed. "Of course he is working – he can't manage on the benefits". Logical!

      1. Thanks for sending a tip – unfortunately mine is not a combi boiler , it’s an unpressurised system boiler.

    2. “How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live.

      A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property – either as a child, a wife, or a concubine – must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the faith: all know how to die but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it.

      No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilisation of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilisation of ancient Rome.”

      Winston Churchill, The River War, 1899.

  65. Sadiq Khan calls Trump ‘racist, sexist and Islamophobic’
    Mayor of London hits back after US president made false claim that he wanted to impose sharia law on capital
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/09/24/sadiq-khan-calls-donald-trump-racist-sexist-islamophobic/

    When Samuel Johnson made his famous pronouncement “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel,” he was not criticising those who love their country he was criticising those who, when backed into a corner, falsely claim to be patriotic.

    The fist attack of miserable little lefty worms like Sadiq Khan is to accuse anyone who opposes them of being racist and Islamophobic. The sexist slur is pretty absurd given the way that those of Khan's religious belief treat their women.

    BTL

    Most of us are entirely on the side of Trump.

    Khan has always poured scorn on Trump – even going to the extent of putting an insulting, tethered, yellow balloon effigy of him up into the sky when he visited England the last time he was president.

    Like Corporal Jones' Sudanese this repulsive, venom-spitting little squirt doesn't like it up 'im.

    1. What an insult to worms, most of which are not only harmless, but essential to the soil and everything that grows.
      Khan't is hostile, dangerous, malignant little apology of a man.

  66. Any Mods out there who may help?

    My account keeps getting a notification: "Not the Telegraph Letters requires you to verify your email address before posting. The email address for your account xxxxxxxxx.xxxxxxxx@xxxxxxx.xx still needs to be verified." Resend confirmation email »

    That email address no longer exists so I cannot receive any notifications sent to it. Yet Disqus's arcane site is ridiculously complicated and it will not permit me to change my email address: it simply freezes when I attempt to do so. There is simply no online advice available to get me out of this conundrum.

    How the hell may I change my email address in order to log in on to this accursed site?

    [By the way: this is Grizzly and for some reason known only to itself, my decades-old avatar of Olaf Bloodaxe (inspiration for 'Elsie') has been reawakened by Disqus!]

          1. How do I do that? The last time I tried it told me I couldn’t have Grizzly since “that name was already in use”.

    2. Not that one, but I regularly get a notification that my account has been "suspended due to inactivity" and so I have to get a new password. Had one yesterday as an example. Who knows what happens inside Disqus, but it does not exactly seem to be a rigorously run operation.

    3. Not that one, but I regularly get a notification that my account has been "suspended due to inactivity" and so I have to get a new password. Had one yesterday as an example. Who knows what happens inside Disqus, but it does not exactly seem to be a rigorously run operation.

    5. It's been playing up a fair bit in recent days. I've been logged out more than once. On another occasion, I submitted a message only to be told I'd already sent it (I hadn't), pressed 'Comment' again and it appeared twice (probably the same fault that someone else had when a message appeared five or six times).

      1. I've not been logged out as such: I was simply prevented from logging in until I acknowledged a message from Disqus sent to a long-defunct email address.

        Their idiotic system will not permit me to change an email address on my username.

    6. I might have the same nag here. Basically means Disqus keeps logging me out every other minute when using an Android device. Got to log back in and spot the motorcycle, again and again.

        1. Young Olaf and I are related, opopanax, he is my nephew. We are not an item, as you put it. Lol.

    1. Well, we're still buying it. We need it. We buy it from China, though, pretending it's not Russian.

      We could drill our own, create jobs here but no. Milioaf insists on destroying the country.

    2. The German economy was built on manufacturing and powered by Russian gas. Without relatively cheap Russian gas the Germans have to buy it from the US.

      The German economy is already in recession and many thousands of Germans have become unemployed. This has come about quickly because the EU directed the compliant German government to switch off pipeline gas from Russia. The destruction of the Nordstream pipelines in the Baltic Sea made matters far worse.

      The EU and German infatuation with windmills and solar, the closure of coal plants and decommissioning of their relatively modern nuclear power stations and the rest of the Green Party agenda has seriously damaged German and thus European prosperity.

      Much the same is occurring in the UK for similar reasons and an energy policy driven by the mad Marxist Miliband. The twit ordered the permanent capping of all fracking sites and has prohibited extraction of oil from the North Sea by withdrawing licenses.

      2. The problem could be solved by drilling and capping Red Ned Miliband. Then disposing of the debris by incineration.

        1. Wouldn't it be wonderful if some these twats in Wastemonster started to suddenly disappear.
          And were never seen again.
          How long would it take before all the guilty started to run off of their own accord.

  69. 413587+ up ticks,

    Question is, will it be tax free,will losing benefits be also inclusive,if ID returning next day what will their reward amount to, is it a good idea to have a foreigner
    in such a power seat as she has told us quite clearly the allah chap comes first and foremost, and allah by all accounts via his instruction manual, doesn't like us indigenous English.

    Dt,
    Foreign criminals paid up to £2k for agreeing to be deported
    Shabana Mahmood admits payment to nearly 50 offenders on deportation flights ‘doesn’t look good’

    2. There's an irony that they want to tax wealthy earners for leaving the country but are prepared to pay criminal vermin to do so.

      1. There are so many ironies in all this , wibbles, as I am sure you are aware, Sometimes I want to scream

  70. Any chance of such whacky humour returning to British politics?

    When she set sail on her latest maritime aid mission to Gaza, Greta Thunberg might well have been expecting – perhaps even hoping – to encounter some resistance. Though perhaps not in the form of Abba songs being blasted down the radio.

    The Swedish protester’s Global Sumud Flotilla (GSF) claimed on Tuesday that Israeli “military drones” had jammed its communications and were playing Lay All Your Love On Me through the ships’ speakers.

    “It seems designed to intimidate and keep us awake,” one activist told The Telegraph.

    To complete the scene of mild ridiculousness on the high seas, the Italian navy then turned up to offer its assistance (presumably exclaiming “Mamma Mia!” at the situation).

    Thunberg’s flotilla, made up of 51 vessels, set sail from Barcelona in late August to “break the illegal siege of Gaza”. By Tuesday night it was off the coast of Greece.

  72. By the way. I learnt last night, it was Dr David Starkey, that at the Unite the Kingdom rally that of the arrests that were made. 18 were the left wing demonstrators and just 8 were from the rally itself. A useful piece of information for those who accuse us of violence.

    1. Dr John Campbell made a short video of the Unite the Kingdom rally. He was there and said it was entirely sedate and peaceful and that there was camaraderie among the millions who attended.

      1. We may not have known, but we probably suspected. there needs to be a total ban on these perverts being allowed to claim they are women.

        1. Probably unenforceable in law, unless a crime committed. A good handbagging, on the other hand, or a well aimed kick….

  75. SOS! Greta’s Gaza flotilla under attack … from Abba

    Italy sends in warship after suspected Israeli drones blast pop music at Thunberg’s aid mission

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/1af2e303e28080e8

    Mr Cuberdon
    5 hrs ago
    I will always remember Greta walking off a plane with her hands behind her back, pretending she had handcuffs on while she didn’t. I don’t believe a word of what she says. She is a professional victim.

    1. I didn't think I would have any sympathy with Greta, but having Abba inflicted on you is a form of torture.

      1. When my brother and his family turned up from Australia (Christmas 2018) they insisted on visiting the Abba museum in Stockholm.

        It was my biggest nightmare. There was a repeating soundtrack of their 'music', played ad nauseam. They remained in there for over three hours. I walked out after one!

        I asked a young chap, on my way out, where I may find museums for The Hives and Yngwie Malmsteen. His gormless look told me that my ironic query went right over his head!

      2. I used to be dismissive of Abba, but exposure from my autistic son's (he has perfect pitch and literally cannot bear off-key singing) absolute obsession with their music has changed my mind and I now find their harmonies glorious. Too good for Greta. Send her some Grime, Drill or Garridge musak.

      3. I used to be dismissive of Abba, but exposure from my autistic son's (he has perfect pitch and literally cannot bear off-key singing) absolute obsession with their music has changed my mind and I now find their harmonies glorious. Too good for Greta. Send her some Grime, Drill or Garridge musak.

    2. Trump called her out by ignoring her…her expression was a treat…she is apparently dyslexic (or similar), her parents happy she found something to focus on. Her day is more or less done, I think.

        1. That is a feature of some females, there was a case years ago of a chap who called the GP because his wife had suddenly been struck dumb (wasn’t me, guv, I didn’t do it…)

  76. Wordle No. 1,558 3/6

    🟨⬜⬜🟩⬜
    ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟩
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    Wordle 14 Sep 2025

    Coarse for Birdie Three?

        1. I’d be bored but for the fact that simple tasks require much more effort and care than normal and take longer. Shopping, for instance, means buying only as much as I can comfortably carry so I’ll do a little each day. I’ve reduced the daytime paracetamol intake but will continue to take two at bedtime. Could do with sleeping better. Did John sleep on his back after the heart surgery? Did he find that OK?

          1. You should – perhaps – consider home delivery; I am 'housebound' and use Tesco.

            I reckon that one paracetamol every three hours is optimal, Sue.

    3. Late on parade today – I was promenading in Grange-over-Sands in the beautiful evening sun!!

      Rather disappointing par given everyone else's results…..

      Wordle 1,558 4/6

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

    4. Late here, too. Well done and I join the 3s.

      Wordle 1,558 3/6

      ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
      ⬜⬜🟩🟨⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  77. Another Wordle fluke for me today.
    Wordle 1,558 3/6

    ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨
    ⬜⬜🟩🟨⬜
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  79. Evening all. Discurse lost my post so this is the shortened version. Went for acupuncture so I’m slightly more mobile. Gave in and turned the heating on to supplement the fire.
    There are plenty of families who have lived, worked and paid taxes for generations who will suffer if we don’t sort the problem.

        1. Sharp intake of breff. What CAN you mean???

          "
          In Islamic finance, charging or receiving interest, known as Riba, is forbidden. Instead of earning interest on savings or paying interest on loans, Islamic banking offers alternatives like profit-sharing or partnerships for investments and home financing, where banks invest deposits in Sharia-compliant ventures and share the generated profits with customers, or buy and sell assets with profit. "

          Larf a minit, them slammers.

  81. Just passing through (on the way to another bottle of wine). Sister-in-law told me amusing story. A farrrr-LEFT acquaintance of hers – who "welcomes all the poor illegal economic migrants" – discovered that her son, who is married to a bint from Colombia, has arranged for his mother-in-law – suffering from Parkinson's – to come to the UK for treatment "because it is so bad in Colombia". Said woman given unlimited leave to remain…..

    Acquaintance (remember "lovely incomers") is up on arms because HER mother has been waiting three years for a hip replacement.

    So there IS a God, after all!!!

          2. No that was the loose head – bizarrely I could never play on that side, you only ‘packed’ on one shoulder – it always felt unbalanced! Plus all the best props were tight-heads…….

  83. Saw my son briefly in Cardiff on the way through from Pembroke to Ilchester. He is despondent, applying for jobs for next year when he graduates.

    He said last year there were 180,000 graduate jobs. This year – 55,000.

    Thanks, Thieves.

    1. This is where networking comes in. What's his degree and what sort of career does he wish to follow? I'm sure this Tribe of Nottlers may have one or two contacts….

      1. He is doing Bisiness Economics, would like to get into “Finance”. I think Insurance (my old trade – but have no contacts. He’s astute, works hard but otherwise “normal” – in my view – but what is “normal”? Oí just know me and his dad work hard and he knows how to work hard.

        He had a 5 month internship over the summer with an Amazon company but unfortunately the boss “worked from home” for practically the whole period and my son really felt a bit undermined. But an interesting discussion point if he ever gets an interview – learning in a work-from-home environment).

        1. I have a Son in Law who works for a very large Multi National Insurance Co. His specialist area is Marine Installations (Harbours & Kit) Insurance. Happy to put your son in contact. Geoff Graham has my contact details.

          PS The last graduate son of a former work colleague I helped was interested in renewable energy. He was introduced and employed by a chap who has a company that services on-shore & off shore wind turbines…

          PPS I'm going off line for the next 2 weeks so if you try to get in touch I will get back to you shortly thereafter.

    2. AI has swallowed some of the jobs too. My son knows people who have done a degree in animation and racked up debt accordingly, only to graduate just at the moment when AI swallows 4 / 5 animation jobs.

    3. Tell him not to despair – if he has a decent degree from a decent University he will prevail (might need a bit of legwork though!).

      There are a lot of Mickey Mouse degrees out there from Mickey Mouse Universities – I feel sorry for the youngsters involved , it's really not their fault but they have been fed a totally unrealistic expectation. Decent degrees still count!

      1. ITMA..Blair…mine did totally useless degrees, had a lot of fun, jobs they were offered no better than mine – left school shy of 16 with a handful of O levels.

      1. Yes, we discussed it; I said Ireland or Dubai, he wonders USA. I wouldn’t object but think he would need green card?

    5. My elder son was left £1,000 by my father. He used it to do an HGV course and got a licence. Worked wonders when he had a management job with a truck company and was the ONLY chap in a suit who could drive a huge artic.

      Not a bad skill to have under your belt. Eddie Stobart had to start somewhere…

  84. In our country the government uses the trusted opinions of so called experts on the mainstream media as a way to back them up and convince us all that their dystopian freedom reducing plans and agendas they impose on us are all in our unquestionable best interests.
    To doubt them or raise concerns in public usually leads to intolerant personal abuse or career destroying cancellation.
    The problem for the layman is how do we know that these experts speak the truth, are they just the product of our groupthink cancel culture, who holds them to account if they are proven to be wrong in some future date, do we even know who these experts are?
    They would have no doubt faded into obscurity by such a time that our country has descended into the living hell as has been predicted by Trump if we carry on regardless.
    Government no longer seeks to gain public support by winning the argument through public debate, they create an environment whereby people are afraid to challenge the settled science or ideology.

  85. What's a Greek Earn…?

    Greek farmers claimed to be growing bananas on the slopes of snow-covered mountains as part of a massive fraud costing the European Union tens of millions of euros.
    The scandal, in which false claims secured huge farming subsidies, is rocking the conservative government of prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
    The most creative scams included claiming subsidies for phantom flocks of sheep and goats, as well as for non-existent banana plantations on 9,570ft-high Mount Olympus, which is covered in snow for much of the year.
    The country’s highest peak was revered as the home of the gods in ancient Greek mythology, but is now associated with the national scandal that has revealed shocking levels of corruption.

    Landowners claimed subsidies for olive groves in a high-security military airport and for pastureland that extended into the sea.
    Farmers misappropriated EU subsidies worth at least €22m (£19m) between 2019 and 2024 by faking land ownership, a government minister said this month.

    Government officials were allegedly complicit in the massive fraud, which has claimed the scalps of four ministers.

    1. About 30 drachmas an hour……..

      Fraudulent claims to the EU? Shocked I am, I tell you, Shocked!!

    2. Absolute chicken feed compared with what is being scammed from British taxpayers by various gimmegrants and charriddees..

    3. They’ve been doing that for years! When the EU funded the new National road from Athens to Thessaloniki as a sweetener pre-euro, they had to buy out a lot of olive groves and cotton fields etc along the route! I personally know of 3 farmers who were able to nip out and buy million drachmae tractors by inflating the number of f’fields’ they lost!

    4. Many years ago I heard of a Greek hospital that employed 40 gardeners. Particularly excessive … as they had no gardens!

  86. Featured briefly on here yesterday.

    St George's flag campaigners are 'nonces', says Labour council leader

    Official told to resign after claiming organisers of Operation Raise the Colours committed 'sex offences'

    Gabriella Swerling, Social and Religious Affairs Editor
    23rd September 2025 2:29pm BST

    A Labour council leader is under fire after claiming St George flag campaigners were "nonces".

    Jeremy Newmark, the Labour leader of Hertsmere borough council, Hertfordshire, described Operation Raise the Colours as "an attempt by a bunch of criminals, extremists [and] nonces to hijack our national flag". He made the comments, which triggered gasps from his fellow councillors, at a meeting on Sept 17 in Borehamwood, Hertfordshire.

    He is now facing calls to resign, with Conservative colleagues accusing him of "forfeiting his integrity" and "pushing people apart".

    Operation Raise the Colours is a political campaign that involves displaying the Union Flag and St George's Cross in public places. Critics of the campaign have associated it with far-Right activism, with many local authorities removing flags whenever they appear, but the movement has been defended as a display of patriotism.

    Mr Newmark made the remarks in response to Conservative councillor Brett Rosehill's question as to whether he supported the Liberal Democrat-run Hertfordshire County Council's decision to remove the flags in the coming weeks.

    Mr Rosehill said: "You've spoken about extremists, do you accept that by constantly linking our national flag to extremism […] as well as many Labour MPs at the moment, that you run the risk of letting extremists define it instead of reclaiming it for the mainstream?"

    In response, Mr Newmark said: "I'm sorry but I'm not playing. I won't be taking lectures on our national flag and extremism from a councillor that has the audacity to speak in almost glowing terms in his question to this council about Operation Raise the Colours.

    "Operation Raise the Colours – an organised and orchestrated attempt by a bunch of criminals, extremists, nonces to hijack our national flag. Yes, Cllr Rosehill, this is the organisation that you cited in glowing terms in your question – look at the individuals behind that organisation, look at the individuals behind Tommy Robinson's event this weekend.

    "Look at their string of criminal convictions, sex offences, and such like, if those are the people that councillors in the group opposite see fit to quote in this chamber, see fit to laud in this chamber and to see fit to use as part of normative political discourse – something is very wrong."

    Earlier this month, Sir Keir Starmer told BBC Radio 5 Live: "I'm very encouraging of flags. I think they're patriotic and I think they're a great symbol of our nation."

    He also said: "I don't think they should be devalued and belittled. I think sometimes when they're used purely for divisive purposes, actually it devalues the flag. I don't want to see that. I'm proud of our flag."

    Yvette Cooper, the Foreign Secretary, also said she owned Union Jack and St George's flag bunting and tablecloths.

    After Mr Newmark's comments, Hertsmere borough council's Conservative Group has called on him to resign immediately as leader of the council and leader of the Labour Group.

    The Conservative Group has since written directly to Mr Newmark, whose Lab-Lib coalition has governed Hertsmere since 2023. The letter demands his immediate suspension or resignation pending a full Labour Party investigation.

    They said: "Our borough deserves leadership that unites, respects, and upholds the highest standards – not one that fuels division and disrespect. His words have had real consequence over the weekend, stirring hostility and undermining community cohesion."

    Lynette Sullivan, the leader of the Conservative Group, said: "The words I said in Full Council that night still ring true. It is up to us, as local leaders and Conservatives, to step forward with calm, clarity, and compassion to bring people together, not push them apart. Cllr Newmark's words have had far-reaching consequences. He modelled behaviour that was not in the best interests of residents and must be held accountable."

    Harvey Cohen, the deputy leader of the Conservative Group, added: "Any leader who insults residents and undermines trust has forfeited integrity. Hertsmere deserves better – he must resign."

    Alex Clarkson, the deputy chairman of Hertsmere Conservative Association, said that Labour "bang on about diversity and inclusion, but only when it is on their terms. As long as you agree with them you're fine. If not, you're cancelled. Well, Conservatives won't be cancelled. He needs to go".

    Hope not Hate, an advocacy group which campaigns against racism and neo-fascism, said in a report published in August: "While there is nothing wrong with flying the nation's flags, Hope not Hate can reveal that the key organisers behind much of this activism are hardened and extreme far-Right activists."

    Mr Newmark was contacted for comment.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/09/23/labour-councillor-claims-st-george-flag-campaigners-nonces

    1. Labour's dichotomy – whether to jump on the bandwagon and claim the Union Flag as theirs or to claim that everyone who flies it is a racist. Pick a side, Starmer. Oh, I forgot – you change your mind depending on which way the wind is blowing (apologies for the wind/flag reference).

  87. https://hs-146483074.f.hubspotemail-eu1.net/hub/146483074/hubfs/G1nDIA_XwAAmnbz.jpeg?width=1120&upscale=true&name=G1nDIA_XwAAmnbz.jpeg
    EXC: Judge Who Spared Quran Knife Slasher From Jail Imprisoned Man for Sending Nasty Emails

    The same judge who spared jail for a man who attacked someone burning a Quran with a knife gave a man a prison sentence for sending nasty email to John Bercow. Rule of lawyers in action…

    Judge Adam Hiddleston gave Moussa Kadri a 20-week prison sentence, suspended for 18 months. In Knightsbridge in February Kadri had seen a man setting alight the Quran and shouted “I’m going to kill you” before “slashing at him with a knife.”

    Hiddleston said in his remarks that Kadri is of “previously exemplary character” and “much respected” in doing charity work. He said he accepted Kadri’s “remorse” and “there is an almost non-existent chance of repetition of this behaviour” and the effect of his incarceration on others “would be wholly disproportionate.“According to the sentencing remarks Kadri tried to mislead investigators into thinking he attacked Coskun with a palette knife…

    Free Speech Union director Toby Young said after the sentencing that it “sends a green light to any Muslim who wants to enforce an Islamic blasphemy code by taking the law into their own hands. The court is effectively saying that if you attack a blasphemer with a knife, he will be convicted of causing you harassment, alarm or distress and you won’t have to spend a day behind bars.” Judge Hiddleston has taken a different point of view in the past…

    In 2021 Hiddleston jailed a 35-year-old businessman for one year for sending rude and at times threatening emails to Bercow, Ed Davey, Ian Blackford, Corbyn, and Amber Rudd among others. He said: “I have no doubt that you did harbour a deep-seated animosity to those who held opposing views to your own and that appeared to have been your motivation. The contents of those emails were vile.” More vile than a knife attack?

    September 24 2025 @ 13:01

    7 hours ago
    So basically Moussa Kadri used a variant of the Ricky Jones defence. Which was I am a Muslim, therefore I cannot be guilty. Tier one.

    This defence is not available to white Christian indigenous folk, who are advised to plead guilty under tier two.

    6 hours ago
    About 10 years ago I was plod and a CPS gatekeeper who'd make charging decisions. I had a good few chats with CPS for more serious charges and race etc always came into it with them. I made charging decisions around summary offences and not once did I consider race, religion etc. The whole CJS needs scrapping and overhauling.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b62fa9a379181133ded493de5b8170265bd63e2a06ef92c4df3bb0a20e7b0866.png

      1. lol. It was the same in hockey so any decent woman (over the age of 50) worth her salt should know it

      2. lol. It was the same in hockey so any decent woman (over the age of 50) worth her salt should know it

    1. !…but I leave a disturbing warning."

      Thanks a bunch, BoB. Just getting ready to go and snuggle in my basket, hoping for the best, then…

  91. Boiler intaller firm's technician turned up today to diagnose heating system problem (GIF copied to Nottlers earlier).

    Tech said is was the CH two port actuator causing the problem.
    Actuator and valve replaced as he was carrying a spare.

    Unfortunately he had to drain the boiler down to replace the valve and now both CH and HW circuits are suffering from air lock.

    Will try to sort the bleeding radiators tomorrow to discover what's left working.

    Time for bed – night all.

  92. Goodnight, all. Have taken some prescription painkillers. so am falling asleep. Early start in the morning.

    1. Good Night, Conners – and Kadi and Winston. Before you nod off I hope you can read my post about Grizzly and perhaps (if you know how) can move my post "to the top" so another person can help him. Thanks!

      1. Hello Elsie. Ask for your post to be pinned. It will then remain at the top. I managed to make the appointment despite the traffic and the pain, but it was for my knee and we decided it wasn’t bad enough to be replaced. I called at the surgery on the way back and managed to get an appointment for next Wednesday to see about my SIJ.

        1. Well, Conners, you may now realise that Grizzly did in the end get back on this site with his new avatar of Olaf Bloodaxe. And this happened before my own post of his message. Good luck for next Wednesday.

  94. URGENT MESSAGE: I have just received an urgent message from my friend Grizzly in which he flags up a serious problem he has experienced today. He sent me this message early this morning, but I have only just read it (9.15 pm on Wednesday th 24th of September). Here is his message:

    "Sorry to trouble you but I cannot log in to the Disqus channel to access Not the Telegraph Letters.
    A decade-and-a-half ago when I first joined the old Daily Telegraph Letters forum I made an account – grizzly – using an old (and now long defunct) email address.
    This morning Disqus will not permit me to log into Disqus until I have 'verified' this now non-existent address. When I go to my 'Settings' page and attempt to enter a new email address it just freezes up and will not permit me to do so.
    I then attempted to post a cry for help on today's NoTTLe page but it will not permit me to do so!
    I'm just wondering if you [i.e Elsie Bloodaxe] if you would be so kind as to pass the information – below – on to one of the Mods and ask them if they can help me acmes Disqus's contact page so that I may change my email address and carry on as before?
    Many thanks.
    Grizzly
    Any Mods who may help?
    My account keeps getting a notification: "Not the Telegraph Letters requires you to verify your email address before posting. The email address for your account xxxxxxxxx.xxxxxxxx@xxxxxxx.xx still needs to be verified. Resend confirmation exam >>
    That email address no longer exists so I cannot receive any notifications sent to it. Yet Disqus's arcane site is ridiculously complicated and it will not permit me to change my email address; it simply freezes when I attempt to do so. There is simply no online advice available to get me out of this conundrum.
    How the hell may I change my email address in order to log in to this accursed site?"

    And the above is the message I received from Grizzly which I have posted here. I personally am not computer savvy enough to help Grizzly, so I am hoping that someone who is able to can move this post to the top of the page so that lots of you can read it. And hopefully someone will see it who is able to help our friend. Many thanks to you all.

    1. Blimey, Elsie! Poor Grizz. No chance of any informed insight from me (useless on tech), but from experience i do think it might resolve itself.

      1. It may just do that, opo – one day several days ago I couldn't access Disqus…I'm so lazy I just sloped off until it resolved itself. No idea what Grizzly can do other than message Disqus itself? (Is that possible?) And when I worked with computers and any problem arose, phoned 'Support'…first advice was 'have you tried turning it off and back on again' (that never seemed to work).

          1. Poor Grizz may need to go to one of those computer problem places, think Curry’s had a service at one time…

          2. I think he should swerve Curry's, personally. i had a wonderful nerd (from the local pages) who came and set up my present laptop which, so far, does what I want it to do and nothing more (he removed all the bloatware and showed me how to avoid importing any more)

          3. They’re not great I admit and prob try to sell him summat. Maybe someone local press advertises service…computer nerd type. Suspect deleting all Disqus app/msgs plus others…even operating system. Wish him all the best with it 🤞

      1. I did suggest earlier on that you can use the Olaf account but change the name and avatar to Grizzly if you want to. Other than that I've no idea as I never need to log in or out.

        1. My Grizzly account is attached to an old and now defunct email address. Disqus wanted to send me a 'confirmation' to that non-existant account which, of course, is impossible. When I tried to change the email address it simply would not permit me to do so.

          Trying to contact Disqus to ask why is an impossibility.

    4. Take the easy way and make a new account with a new email address. Loads of people have had the same problem and I don't know anyone who managed to change the email address, probably because the email address is the unique identifier for the account.

  95. Europe's pygmies don't realise how irrelevant they've become

    Putin is a pound-shop Stalin who could easily be defeated if only the West had the will. But our leaders lack all self-belief

    Allister Heath
    24th September, 2025 6:20pm BST

    Europe, the continent that gave the world democracy, Pax Romana, the Renaissance, the Great Explorers, the libertarian ideals of the Scottish enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution and the emancipation of slavery, is now the world's laughing stock.

    Our leaders are non-player characters in the story of our spiral into oblivion, standing by as we rush towards civilisational seppuku. Sir Keir Starmer, Emmanuel Macron, Ursula von der Leyen: all are political pygmies, interchangeable in their incompetence, cowardice and lack of vision. Even Italy's Giorgia Meloni, the only semi-decent major Western European leader, hasn't reversed her country's own hara-kiri. Friedrich Merz, hardly Germany's Thatcher, won't save his country.

    Their once great nations are sliding ever faster into irrelevance and impotence, and failing on every count: economic, military, moral, demographic, technological and geopolitical. They have lost the world's respect, except as a shopping destination, theme park or finishing school.

    Western Europe's pathologies are many, and they are metastasising uncontrollably. We are unable to grow our economies meaningfully, partly because we choose to regulate and tax all that moves. Our obsession with net zero has pushed up prices, bankrupted industry and impoverished families.

    We can no longer compete against US or Chinese firms, or foster world-class entrepreneurship. Our jobs are about to be wiped out by AI, overwhelming semi-insolvent welfare states. We sometimes pay pensioners more than workers, while infantilising young adults by forcing them into brainwashing camps we call universities and robbing them of their economic independence through a broken housing market and monetary manipulation. Our birth rate has collapsed. Our health systems are unsustainable. We teach the public to prioritise security and comfort over risk, and then wonder why they vote against cuts.

    We have embraced a naive anti-militarism, refusing to acknowledge that Europe's holiday from history is over. Despite a combined GDP that is 10 times larger and a population 3.7 times greater than, we cannot help Kyiv defeat the Kremlin. We keep having to beg America for assistance in undignified fashion, having learnt the wrong lessons from the Cold War. We couldn't wait to surrender to the grotesque, Western-hating anti-Semitic butchers and rapists of Hamas, demonstrating to every rogue actor the hypocrisy of our human rights discourse.

    We have perverted the beautiful cosmopolitan ideal that is the oneness of the human soul, weaponising it to condemn borders as racist and to globalise the welfare state. Combined with socialist economic and educational policies, mass immigration has led to catastrophic failures of integration, fuelling sectarianism, Islamism, excessive crime and a crisis of democratic legitimacy.

    Our brains, addled by Marxist and post-modern ideologies, our hearts darkened by envy and atavistic hatred, our souls eaten away by post-Christian self-doubt, we wish to be neither Athens nor Sparta, neither Jerusalem nor Rome, neither liberal nor conservative.

    We have embraced a warped ideology that puts equality above merit, bureaucracy above democracy, extreme environmentalism above growth, emotion above reason and the universal above the national.

    Never one to leave weakness unpunished, Donald Trump mocked Britain and Europe mercilessly at the United Nations, our representatives forced to listen in sheepish silence. Many of Trump's barbs hit their targets.

    Western Europe's failure to reinvent and retool itself – its economy, military, society – after Putin's invasion epitomises our decadence. Last week, Russian MiG-31s violated Estonia's airspace; previously, drones were shot down over Poland. Moscow is intensifying its cyber-warfare.

    How will we react if Putin flies more planes into Nato airspace, or worse? Trump wants us to shoot them down, but how could we? We are hardly ready for an escalation; it's easier to distract the world with meaningless gestures, such as rewarding terrorists.

    We are no longer able to change gear, let alone work at warp speed. Our institutions are sclerotic, our politics dysfunctional. Yes, Germany is going to spend more, and military industrial capacity is improving, but it is too little, too late. Russia launched its despicable invasion in February 2022, and neither Britain nor any Western European power has yet to build an Iron Dome style-missile defence system (foolishly, we have betrayed the pioneering Israelis) or to expand their military properly. The UK still apparently employs more parking attendants than full-time soldiers.

    It has been estimated that Europe will import €4-5bn of Russian oil this year. The value of imports of Liquefied Natural Gas from Russia jumped 27 per cent year on year in the first half of 2025, hitting €4.4bn, mostly arriving via Belgium's Zeebrugge.

    Europe still cannot rise to the occasion, even though Putin's unhinged plan is unravelling, which helps to explain why Trump – again, pouncing on fragility – finally turned on him.

    Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa, his invasion of the Soviet Union, on June 22 1941; four years later, on May 2 1945, the Soviets hoisted the Hammer and Sickle on Berlin's Reichstag.

    The clock is ticking for Putin, a pound-shop Stalin, to avoid humiliation in his deranged quest to rebuild Moscow's sphere of influence. He has grabbed Mariupol and a few other smaller Ukrainian cities, but that doesn't amount to much in over three and half years of war crimes and destruction. He stands no hope of defeating Ukraine by January 2026, the equivalent time in which it took Stalin to seize Hitler's Reichshauptstadt.

    Trump was right to dismiss him as a paper tiger at the UN. He is a loser, backed by Iran and Belarus, reliant on trade with India and Turkey, his imperial pretensions a farce, his country little more than a Chinese protectorate.

    So why haven't we swooped? By now, Europe, its economy strengthened, should be ready to provide Ukraine with a final, decisive boost. Instead, we have barely started to remilitarise, Britain and France are teetering on the brink of a fiscal crisis, and stand powerless as Moscow becomes increasingly provocative. This is how great civilisations finally die.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/09/24/europes-pygmies-dont-realise-how-irrelevant-they-are

    1. The chap makes several points but misses the real point. Ukraine is and always promised to be a dead duck and so it has transpired.

      Anyone suggesting a continuance of the disastrous support the west has given to the Ukrainians in a war against Russia is in need of mental health treatment. The very idea that Ukraine might conquer Russia is delusional and in my view a sign of madness.

  96. Well, chums, my bedtime has arrived. So I wish you all a Good Night. Sleep well, and I look forward to seeing you all tomorrow morning.

Comments are closed.