Wednesday 1 April: Britain needs a pragmatic decision on how long this lockdown can last

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2020/03/31/lettersbritain-needs-pragmatic-decision-long-lockdown-can-last/

605 thoughts on “Wednesday 1 April: Britain needs a pragmatic decision on how long this lockdown can last”

    1. A first class cartoon from Blower, but surely the rozzers would never want to prevent access to Easter Eggs….oh wait. (And their spacing is not at a minimum of two metres, either…)

      Thanks for posting, Citroen.

    1. Morning, R-R.

      I read Peston’s tweets last night and some of the replies. There’s a lot of doubt about how candid Gove is being re the testing issue. If the Government is found to be playing politics with this issue, i.e. saying one thing but doing something else, and putting people’s lives at risk unnecessarily, then I do not see how the Government will survive the fall-out.

      https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5864636e8dd1d782a5a95d15a8891bf0dc4b1c4b4a590fbaa7b3f6a61a7b08d6.png https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b8f5bb935f62dceeb3ccffd2b91d29c0485bf477b917e684233a89547424bbe6.png

      1. Morning KtK, now I am worried, I am nodding my head in broad agreement with Dr Optimistic. Never thought I would see the day when any #FBPE authored comment would not be dismissed out of hand.

      2. Ayone who still uses that treacherous BPFE nonsense should be rounded up and shot.

        They have been beaten. Their continual miserable arrogance cannot be permitted ever again. Such repellant, spiteful people must never be allowed to damage this country.

    2. Hi Rik, I am no fan of Gove – a slimy, back stabbing, barstool.
      However, he has normally appeared well organised and on top of his brief/department. Is he getting the correct information from his civil servants – it wouldn’t be the first time.

    3. Gove studied PPE, spent most of his time in the Union, became a journalist after graduating and then moved seamlessly into Parliament.
      I see no point along that journey at which he might have become scientifically literate or acquired experience in making things.
      If you want further proof, remember that photo of him listening to St Greta’s words of wisdom, with a serious look on his face.

      It is a great weakness that our country is run by PPE graduates, and for this Oxford University and the Oxford Union are largely responsible!
      Although scientists and engineers do run in the Union and get its unparalleled intensive training in greasy-pole climbing and weaselling, mostly they don’t have time, due to the academic demands of their courses (equivalent 3 essays a week in my day). PPE undergraduates on the other hand, with their one essay a week in the first year have plenty of time.
      Does it make sense to have the Cabinet dominated by Oxbridge graduates? Hell yes, they are a subset of the cleverest people in the country (or were, before the dead hand of political correctness started influencing admissions).
      PPE graduates? Not so much.

      1. Such as the Cambridge spies for example. That kind of person. Sounds a great idea.

        1. You think there are fewer traitors and marxists among the non-Oxbridge elite today?

          1. Probably. But the problem really lies elsewhere

            Having to be elected creates people who aren’t normal.

            That’s why the former House of Lords was so sensible and responsible.

          2. I agree completely with that!
            Removing the hereditaries from the House of Lords was one of the most destabilising things that Blair did, and like his other destruction, it passed largely unnoticed.

            – “supreme court”
            – House of Lords “reform”
            – postal voting

            These were three disasters that ensured our country would remain fettered by gravy train passengers and globalists long after Blair was removed!

          3. …and his decommissioning of Britannia guaranteed that the peerage that he and his awful missus so craved never happened. Well done, Brenda!

          4. Cherie Blair being photographed yawning widely whilst being entertained by the Queen at the Highland Games didn’t help that cause either, I would imagine. Dreadful pair!

            Blair and Brown have really given away their anti-democratic, globalist agenda with their recent calls for world government. But the Cons don’t have the spine to reverse the damage that pair of wreckers did!

          5. blackbox2: When Boris took over from May he inherited in effect a minority government, pushed about by other parties with the connivance of the then-Speaker. Since his much increased majority government he has been swamped with the Corona virus pandemic. So don’t accuse him by saying “Cons don’t have the spine to reverse [Blair’s] damage.” First things first!

          6. Boris has retained Dominic Cummings, and Priti Patel among others, who I’m sure both have the right instincts, and this is a good omen.
            However, the Cons have let us down consistently over the last quarter century or so. The only one with any spine to try and reverse the globalist and socialist tide, was IDS.
            So I am reserving judgement about whether Boris will actually deliver the deep changes that are needed, or whether it will just be another fake Conservative government that makes the right noises (they know what we WANT!), but does the exact opposite.
            Have they got the will and the courage to tackle the Blob? I’ll believe that when I see it.
            The rescue package and continued adherence to the dogma of Keynesian economics is not a good economic start. They don’t exactly have a lot more interest rates to cut!

            I’m willing to believe that Boris is better than Cammay, but that’s not saying much! The Cons have not yet earned my vote back.

          7. “I am reserving judgement”? Why write “Cons don’t have the spine” then? It seems to me that you are not reserving judgement but have instead already made up your mind.

          8. I would dearly love to return to the days when I believed in the Conservative Party. I would be very happy if they discovered a Thatcherite zeal to reverse the appalling destruction of the Blair years to Britain’s constitution, and I would be 100% behind any attempts to do so.
            However, what I won’t do is line up behind Blue Labour. Cameron was a disgrace, and so was May. Appalling cowards who squandered their time in office conserving globalism and socialism.
            There are too many MPs who are tainted by having served under these two. Plus, I know too many MPs personally from my university days, and the Cameron/Gove “A List” of candidates in my opinion, selected some of worst, while freezing out anyone with inconvenient principles.
            Trying to exclude the Tory right from getting into Parliament was a huge mistake. They thought they were being clever, but all they’ve done is created a group of disgruntled voters like me, who will never support a Conservative party that consists of the Tory left.

            I believe that situation is now changing, however, the pressure needs to be kept up to avoid the government relapsing into even more socialism and kowtowing to the Blob than they do at present.

          9. In which case I will change my post from “Why write Cons don’t have the spine? then” to “Why write I am reserving judgement then?”

          10. Because I am! I have hopes of Cummings, and there are a few Cabinet Ministers who would back him up. Unfortunately there are a few more (like Therese Coffey, for example), who are just waiting for the opportunity to stick their oar in and pull the Tories back to centrist politics, and kowtowing to the post-Blair status quo. I hope Boris’s right wing instincts prevail over his fear of being unpopular, and that he will pull off a Thatcherite scale of reform. Heaven knows, we need it.

          11. Such is the arrogance of the man and such is his sense of entitlement, I have always suspected that Blair turned down a mere life peerage, because he wanted a similar arrangement to Thacher, where he could pass on a Baronetcy, or better still an hereditary peerage to his family.

          12. 317612+ up ticks,
            Morning BB2,
            Add the lab/lib/con coalition without their continuing guidance we could never, as a country, sunk to half the depth in the mire that we have.

          13. Who really didn’t want the hereditary peerage messing things up ?

            I suspect it was Soros. He controlled Blair and micromanaged him. Soros doubtlessly could see what you have specified.

            The Lords were an obstacle to globalism that had to be removed. So my theory is that he instructed Tony accordingly who was happy to oblige.

          14. Wherever Blair got it from, these three measures were the worst he could do to destabilise Britain. I’m sure he would have abolished the monarchy too if he had thought he could get away with it!

          16. Interesting. I haven’t lived in one of the devolved countries since the changes – do you mean that it has weakend the UK by stoking regional resentment against the government in London?

          18. It’s stoked up chippy nationalism (except for England, of course, where any expression of national pride is howled down with shouts of “racist”).

      2. I’ve worked with Cambridge engineering graduates, and they were a very mixed bunch. A few were brilliant, even if they didn’t know how to read an engineering drawing, many were very personable, but I’m not sure I’d let them drive a car. Problem-solvers and multidiscipline, they were not. The metallurgy graduate had done 2 years “general engineering” and one semester metallurgy – knew fuck-all about the subject.

        1. They will have studied mostly theory. I have never, not once in my entire career applied anything that I learned at Oxford – it was way too theoretical to be useful in the real world, and in the entire 3 years, there was one exercise in problem-solving.
          Later on, I did a really excellent HNC in software engineering designed by a guy with a Phd in mathematics, and some City and Guilds certificates in C Programming. Also an OU course in communication protocols. I still use most of the stuff I learned on the HNC every day, and the OU course was very good as well.

        2. As a Cambridge Engineering graduate (1966-69), I would largely agree with your assessment, Oberst. In those days, if one sacrificed the first summer vacation, one could complete Part1 of the Tripos in two years. It was all very mathematical and theoretical. I didn’t bother attending most of the lectures as it was easier to pick up what one needed from the textbooks rather than having to bicycle out to the Engineering labs. I was hopeless at creating an engineering drawing but could read them (and can drive a car). For Part2 of the Tripos I did PIMS which has now evolved into the basis for the Judd School of Management. It was a complete goof-off. Soon after graduating, I was lured away to the City and Wall Street and such problem solving skills as I have were invaluable, especially when uncovering accounting fraud and inventing things such as commodity indexed swaps.

          Since my era, the Cantab Engineering degree has been transformed. It is now four years of very hard work and far more practical….it actually has something to do with engineering!

          1. I lament the loss of the Graduate Training Scheme, where one could learn actually how to be an Engineer, not just the sums. After quite a few years of carrying out interviews and hiring people, I concluded that a Bachelors degree was useful in that you learned some of the words, the relevant measurement units, and could typically do simple maths. It was when you actually got into the field that you learned engineering, supported by a grumpy old git saying “You’re making a right bugger of that”! [(c) Fred Dibnah]
            So, as Unit Manager, I devised a training scheme where we would send the newbies on jobs where they could learn something about the work, (ideally doing something useful, not as a tourist) and gain experience. You’d be amazed how many clients were OK with that, many offered to pay our fees for the newbie, too. Best one was placing a tiny Irish lass newly hired into my department in Norway in the team at South Hook LNG, much to the fury of colleagues from Aberdeen. But I’d asked the Client, and they hadn’t.

            Sorry about the rudeness about Cambridge graduates…

          2. In my brief time as a civil engineer, I got so bored sitting in the office doing botched drawings and couldn’t wait to get out on site and be taught how to pour concrete. I can assure you that it is not only the (old) engineers that are useless Cambridge graduates…we have infiltrated everywhere.

          3. A son entered an graduate engineering scheme 22 years ago. The job interview happened 12 months before graduation – it was some 10 weeks summer job. Free shared house & £50/day for expenses. All bright but most southern students lacked drive.

          4. Deary me. After all that massive and endless success you tell us about, you ended up wrecked in the corner of a field. Life can be tough sometimes !

          5. My best man, Joe Ruston, was at Queen’s College, Cambridge from 1966 – 69 and he read electrical engineering. He was in the navy and the last job the poor chap was given before leaving was to teach the Argentinians how to use Exocet.

      3. Well, one would not want Cambridge graduates as their speciality is treason. It may be the least bad case to have people from Oxford run the country. In the absence of real people now that the political ladder has become a closed shop.

  14. Morning all

    SIR – There is a reason why scientists do not run the country, illustrated by the deputy chief medical officer’s recent suggestion that the lockdown in Britain could last six months.

    Whereas scientists seek perfection in their field, politicians must consider the whole picture. In the current circumstances, this involves weighing up the cost to the economy and jobs compared with the benefits of slightly reducing the spread of the virus.

    As long as people are kept two metres apart, as they are in supermarkets, surely there is no reason why garden centres, shops, warehouses and factories should not reopen and trade normally.

    David Kilpatrick

    St Albans, Hertfordshire

    SIR – Marcus Aurelius, the Roman emperor, is credited with saying: “Remember that sometimes to change your mind is just as astute as to be able to discern the right course without advice.” The Government should change its mind and follow Sweden’s example. The elderly and vulnerable should be protected by isolation, if they wish, with supplies delivered to them, while the rest of the population – which would have little need for the NHS’s services – gets back to work.

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    This would also reduce the length of time that the virus is present in the majority of the population, posing less of a danger to the elderly and vulnerable in the long run – and saving the economy too.

    Tim Martyn

    London N3

    SIR – We are in a crisis – the biggest since the Second World War, through which I lived as a child.

    But there is a big difference between now and then. Today we know we will win, even if it takes months. During both world wars, there were periods, sometimes lasting years, during which it was probable that we would not win and would end up being ruled by a foreign power. The worries that coronavirus presents to parents of this generation regarding their children and grandchildren are not the same as those faced by the parents of my generation.

    Antony Johnson

    Mapperton, Dorset

    SIR – Could ministers, their excellent advisers and the media think a bit more carefully about the impact of what they are saying?

    A couple of weeks ago, Matt Hancock, the Health Secretary, suggested that we could be in lockdown for three months. As an elderly citizen, I am following advice, but the next morning I woke up feeling depressed by his statement.

    Recently there has been further speculation about how long the lockdown will last, but much of it has been based on modelling which may or may not be accurate, and so has resulted in more uncertainty.

    Can we therefore just be told what we need to know? It would help to keep morale up.

    Hilda Gaddum

    Macclesfield, Cheshire

    1. No one pointing out that despite winning the war our freedoms were given away to a foreign dictatorship which, despite our voting to leave tens of thousands of people fought desperately, using foreign funding to overturn? Heck some of our own damned servants deliberately went behind the backs of the elected officials to undermine that process of freedom.

      What would be decent is for those officials and all the BPEF idiots to now, happily be jailed, together under these ’emergency powers’ for spreading the most virulent disease going: ‘treachery’.

  15. SIR – I am sure there are many former Public Health Laboratory Service (PHLS) staff who share Michael Cole’s view (Letters, March 28) that until 2003 we had a laboratory network across England and Wales that was the envy of colleagues in many other countries. It not only serviced the NHS but could be mobilised rapidly in the event of an outbreak or epidemic to conduct coordinated investigations using standardised and validated methods.

    During the 56 years since its creation, the PHLS had a key role in the investigation and control of a wide range of infectious diseases, from tuberculosis and salmonella food poisoning to measles, mumps and rubella, major ’flu epidemics, meningitis, hepatitis, legionnaires’ disease and many others. As Medical Director of the PHLS through the Nineties and the last director of the Service, I was saddened and concerned by the loss of this national coverage. Public Health England (PHE) runs the remaining laboratories, but it does not have the same capacity.

    I applaud the work the staff of PHE and NHS laboratories are doing in these very difficult times, but hope that, in the aftermath of coronavirus, there may be a rethink on the need for a more coordinated and responsive public health microbiology service.

    Professor Brian I Duerden

    Chepstow, Monmouthshire

  16. SIR – Jennifer Reynolds’s delight at the letter from her granddaughter (Letters, March 30) reminded me of basic training in the Royal Air Force, when the highlight of the day was the arrival of the mail orderly and the expectation of a letter from home.

    It reminded me, too, of the disappointment when one’s name and number were not called. On such occasions, our friends read their letters aloud for us to share their news.

    Pat Cooper

    Stoke Bruerne, Northamptonshire

  17. Morning again

    SIR – It seems a good time to remind members of the public and my former colleagues in the police that the primary word in the English criminal vocabulary is “reasonable”: reasonable grounds for an officer to suspect and arrest; acting without reasonable excuse; use of reasonable force. Policing by consent depends on being reasonable, and this applies to both the authorities and the general public.

    It is often the case that, when one side becomes unreasonable, a fracas or strong disagreement follows. Everyone living in lockdown should remember this too. When relationships become strained, the thought of being reasonable may come to mind and help bring matters back into a better perspective.

    Chris Broadley

    Walmer, Kent

    SIR – As a retired police officer, I read with incredulity and no little annoyance the spurious comments of Lord Sumption, Neil Basu and others (report, March 31) regarding the use of coronavirus enforcement powers by my former colleagues.

    This situation is new to them and they deserve our utmost support. We did not hesitate to give them powers when they were running towards terrorist incidents to try to save lives, yet we so easily criticise them now, when they are in fact trying to do exactly the same thing.

    George Osborne

    Newton Aycliffe, Co Durham

    1. Not all of them were “were running towards terrorist incidents to try to save lives”, George.

      1. There was that top copper who locked himself in his car during the stabbing of one of his colleagues outside the Palace of Westminster.

        2. Dick of the Yard’s Deputy Commissioner, Sir Craig Mackey (apparently related to brave Sir Robin of Monty Python fame), remained in his locked police car with his driver whilst, only yards away, one of his junior colleagues, PC Keith Palmer, was stabbed to death by yet another lone wolf Islamic nutter. No wonder he retired so rapidly after this show of abject cowardice.

    2. Well Chris, I suppose we should all just do as we are told even if it is unreasonable and not sanctioned by an actual law?
      Well George, I am sure that some policemen have acted very bravely. Some were obviously having hysterics however and shouting and waving guns at the innocent. Are all our policemen actually concentrating on their guard duties or are they distracted by posing for photos with chatty tourists?
      Just saying.

  18. SIR – My wife, who was originally Romanian, lived under the regime of Nicolae Ceaușescu.

    One of the key elements of the communist state was the use of informers to denounce their neighbours. Not only did this allow the authorities to arrest potential troublemakers, it also divided the populace and maintained an atmosphere of suspicion and hostility.

    Is it not of grave concern that, within five days of the Prime Minister introducing draconian restrictions, a number of police forces have appealed to neighbours to report people violating the rules, and even provided a hotline for them to do so?

    Gregor Gruner

    Wisbech, Cambridgeshire

    SIR – Would someone please tell the arrogant joggers to keep a safe distance when they go past huffing and puffing their germs everywhere?

    Richard Bell

    Tunbridge Wells, Kent

    3. Too late, Gregor, she’s already told us where you have hoarded the bog roll.

    4. If you walk down the street behind someone smoking a cigarette, you realise how much of other people’s recently exhaled air you actually are breathing in. The smell lingers for about 15 yards behind them. Fortunately, they are never very fast walkers, so you can overtake them relatively easily and breathe clean air again.

          1. Thank you for that little nugget, Peddy, e-cigarettes have saved my life since turning to them after my third heart attack in 2017 and ditching the cigarettes after 60 years.

            The only side effect remaining after those 60 years is COPD, so I consider myself punished enough thank you.

      2. I remember driving through small town and smelling cigar smoke. As it carried on for some distance I relived it was not coming from a house, but from air in front. I eventually got sight of the driver in front. He was indeed smoking a cigar with the window open.

      3. I always cough on smokers.

        For some reason, they hate this, yet they never think that actually their poison is truly disgusting. One bloke got shirty and it was a rare time I suggested he shut up or I feed him his cigarette. Maybe i was in a good mood or something.

    5. It is the norm in Switzerland to rat on anyone who breaks the rules.
      There is a polizei for almost every facet of life in the country.

    7. As I was obliged to go into town twice today, I was really irritated by the dozy so-and-soes who didn’t seem to be able to work out how far six feet (or two metres) was. I was constantly having to move aside as they came barrelling along the pavements with their dog or child. It will not be long before I am had up for lack-of-social-distancing rage! It’s as though they are totally unaware of anybody else in the vicinity. I hope the coppers in the panier à salade which passed me as I avoided the couple with a child who were heading for me were impressed.

  19. Absurd that garden centres are being ruined.

    SIR – The coronavirus will kill all the traditional British plant nurseries.

    Supermarkets are open and selling plants, many of them grown overseas. But nurseries are now left, at the busiest time of the year, with plants blooming unseen and unsold.

    Pat Perry

    Whitby, North Yorkshire

    SIR – Yesterday a gardening company arrived at a neighbour’s house to trim the hedges, so clearly they are still allowed to work. Would it be possible for nurseries to deliver to customers, who could order online or by phone?

    Matty Thacker

    Tanworth-in-Arden, Warwickshire

    1. Nurseries should take telephone orders and deliver. One of my local ones has put together some selections of best selling plants in boxes that they will deliver for a fixed price.

      1. Some businesses are adapting, some not.
        Our local curry house is doing a roaring trade in carryout or delivered, as are Pepes Pizza; just up the road, a restaurant has closed down as there are no guests, but they didn’t do anything about it, as the other two have. My Mother’s local grocery store noew does delivery, and when I called they said they had never been so busy.

        1. Very true. I have seen restaurants that don’t normally offer takeaway offering it at the moment as well. They should be thankful that they can do that – the poor hairdressers can’t!

          1. Yes, I feel for them. Dentists are having a thin time, as are opticians. Only emergency work, no routine. Hotels & pubs are in the poo, too.

    2. Blooming disgrace. Our closest nursery has hundreds, if not thousands, of plant seedlings that will need constant potting on, but to what end.

    3. The local garden centre in this town has a lot of bushes etc outside which could be viewed under supervision and taken to the checkout by a member of staff. The problem with the centre is that it has only 2 checkouts close together. The restaurant is closed so there is room to pack on-line , phone and orders by post. The car park is large and customers could be given a time slot to come and collect their orders from the car park. Delivery orders could be kept to a minimum. The payment points would need to be made safer and outside under temporary cover. If the government amended the order to close such centres the Local authority could be allowed to inspect the arrangements and permit them to resume business if appropriate.

  20. I wish we could make ourselves into an experimental village. Close us off to the outside world, after letting in several ‘super spreaders’. Open the pubs and the few shops, might need some stocks coming in (especially the pub). Get together again and just see what happens. A few ventilators up at the surgery. Some good data should come out of it.

    1. The Diamond Princess cruise ship was as good an experiment into the infectiousness and mortality rate of the virus. Not very, in either case, apparently.

  21. A short while ago a flight of four Mallards flew over my house, at the same time I noticed four wring-neck (sic) parakeets stripping the cherry blossom off a nearby street tree. Should I be on the lookout for the imminent arrival of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse?

      1. Didn’t catch sight of the plumage of the first one but the last three were certainly drakes. But thinking about it the distressed quaking from the first one seemed to say:” It’s A MISTAKE, I’m a DRAKE!”

  22. In light of the PPE and now the testing kit problems Nick Ferrari read out a listener’s comment that has an uncanny ring about how this Country is run, and has been run, for quite some time.
    Paraphrasing: “In a war situation and the frontline do not have the required kit. Bosnia, Iraq etc. sound familiar?”

    Ferrari giving Robert Jenrick MP a hard time and he, Ferrari, stating that the public are starting to doubt the Government’s candour on the PPE etc. issues. Jenrick producing lots of waffle, if that was useful in this crisis we’d be well placed, but wasn’t entirely convincing.
    Is it me or does it appear to be that every crisis in this Country takes a long time to be addressed and then not always addressed fully e.g. flooding, stabbings and now CV-19? It’s as if there is a dead hand being applied that gets in the way of quick and sensible solutions. Is it merely incompetence or something more sinister?

      1. I was hoping that someone would confirm my suspicions that the CS has become a drag on this Country’s future progress. Until that organisation is completely overhauled this Country will continue to stagnate.

        1. Yup. Just notified by Lloyd’s that I have paid Braintree District Council £265.42 for sod all services bar rubbish collection. Still it ensures their dodgy investments and inflated wages and pensions are safe.

          1. And that is precisely what that money will go on.
            The rest – 75% of their income – comes from central government aka you ‘n’ me – again.

        1. ‘Morning, Peddy, agreed, we need to know, particularly about HMOs similar to the one opposite Warrington Cop-shop.

      3. …and the apportionment of contingency funds, approved contractor lists, tendering procedures, audit trail…Hello is it week 5 already?

        This is where we need a local expert like BJ….

        1. ‘Morning, Stephen, is there some sort of irony in that Bill Jackson’s initials are the same as those sported by our Prime Minister?

    2. I was a summer student in the MoD way back (very way back, now) in the day, and was swiftly told off for actually doing stuff. It showed up all the others. I even made the horrific mistake of banging on an office door and bursting in before being invited, to find the occupant waking up from sleeping at his desk!
      I suspect that so many get paid for just turning up that the concept of actually doing a job is beyond the pale, and that is why nothing actually gets done. Institutionalised torpor.

      1. MB worked for the MinDef as a civilian for several years.
        He had finished his allotted work by 10.00 am; the next 7 hours, spent trying to look busy were exhausting.

    3. On the plus side ….. we do know that 20,000 police are already on the streets.
      BTW, a BTL poster in the Tellygraff has triggered a new line of thought.
      If I buy Easter Eggs for the family, I’ll be arrested.
      However, if I steal them, I’ll be safe because the value will be under £200.

    4. 317612+ up ticks,
      Morning KtK,
      The “dead hand” after year upon year of unfulfilled manifesto’s, decade after decade, belongs to the tribal
      electorate corpse.

    6. A military coup is starting to look attractive. At least some organisation would be evident. The new hospital Nightingale is such an example.

      1. In Scotland there is brand new zillion pound hospital standing empty. It is the new Sick Kids in Edinburgh. Unfortunately it has been so badly constructed that it was condemned as unfit for purpose before it could open. The Exhibition Centre in Glasgow is being turned into one of the makeshift “dormitories of dust”.

    1. 317612+ up ticks,
      Morning Ptv,
      Man? even a rodent would rightfully feel insulted if he were called a rat.

    2. How come people are just able to walk into a hospital on lockdown?
      and
      I bet they wouldn’t have made that video public if he was from an ethnic minority.

  24. BRITISH MILITARY ANNUAL STAFF APPRAISALS
    1. His men would follow him anywhere but only out of curiosity.
    2. I would not breed from this Officer.
    3. This man is depriving a village somewhere of its idiot.
    4. This Officer can be likened to a small puppy – he runs around excitedly, leaving little messes for other people to clean up.
    5. This Officer is really not so much of a has-been, more of a definitely won’t-be.
    6. When she opens her mouth, it seems only to change whichever foot was previously in there.
    7. Couldn’t organise 50% leave in a 2-man submarine.
    8. He has carried out each and every one of his duties to his entire satisfaction.
    9. He would be out of his depth in a car park puddle.
    10. Technically sound but socially impossible.
    11. The occasional flashes of adequacy are marred by an attitude of apathy and indifference.
    12 When he joined my ship this Officer was something of a granny; since then he has aged considerably.
    13. This Medical Officer has used my ship to carry his genitals from port to port, and my officers to carry him from bar to bar.
    14. This Officer reminds me very much of a gyroscope, always spinning around at a frantic pace but not really going anywhere.
    15. Since my last report he has reached rock bottom and has started to dig.
    16. She sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them.
    17. He has the wisdom of youth and the energy of old age.
    18. This Officer should go far and the sooner he starts, the better.
    19. In my opinion this pilot should not be authorised to fly below 250 feet.
    20. The only ship I would recommend for this man is citizenship.
    21. Couldn’t organise a woodpecker’s picnic in Sherwood Forest.
    22. Works well when under constant supervision and cornered like a rat in a trap
    23. Not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
    24. Gates are down, the lights are flashing but the train isn’t coming.
    25. Has two brains; one is lost and the other is out looking for it.
    26. If he were any more stupid, he’d have to be watered twice a week.
    27. Got into the gene pool while the lifeguard wasn’t watching.
    28. If you stand close enough to him you can hear the ocean.
    29. It’s hard to believe that he beat 1,000,000 other sperm.
    30. A room temperature IQ.
    31. Got a full 6-pack but lacks the plastic thingy to hold it all together.
    32. A gross ignoramus,143 times worse than an ordinary ignoramus
    33. He has a photographic memory but has the lens cover glued on.
    34. He has been working with glue too long.
    35. When his IQ reaches 50, he should sell.
    36. This man hasn’t got enough grey matter to sole the flip-flop of a one-legged budgie.
    37. If two people are talking and one looks bored, he’s the other one.
    38. One-celled organisms would out score him in an IQ test.
    39. He donated his body to science before he was done using it.
    40. Fell out of the stupid tree and hit every branch on the way down.
    41. He’s so dense light bends around him.
    42. If brains were taxed, he’d get a rebate.
    43. Some drink from the fountain of knowledge; he only gargled.
    44. Takes him 1½ hours to watch 60 minutes.
    45. Wheel is turning but the hamster is long dead.

    A lot of these, although intended to apply to the British Military, could well be applied to our current Police Farce.

    2. Could apply to the dolt in my bank who set up a standing order due to go out on the TENTH (ie after I’ve been paid) like all my other SOs, but put it down for the first. Hence it was paid 8 days early and has meant my budget is up the shoot. I went in today (second visit because I hadn’t picked up on it when I went to pay a bill) and it’s been amended from next month, but the end date is still the first. Yet another trip into town tomorrow to get it sorted third time lucky. I only need somebody to snitch on me for breaking curfew (one trip to walk the dog and two trips into town) and my day will be complete 🙁 I would have sorted it over the phone, but I spent nearly a quarter of an hour waiting to be connected and gave up. I have, of course, been charged for that unresolved call. If there were a choice, I wouldn’t bank with them, but the alternative is even worse (I moved from them because they couldn’t even set up a twelve month standing order!).

  26. An added ‘Birthday Present’, more pages from the Ladybird Book of Covid-19:
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5b0f152ed2a4db887f0c5df541ced8ed0da7a03f4261dcc28574034dfe049d5f.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2f29678dba3bdc0729f81512c9b0c0451ed4b5f7e70bbca1000fffe032b95640.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1763315092c56809f5490640c19ca6e8ccaa0e19e626c2b8ccd65e8b5af784a0.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/68fac878face98c597864da617aba43ab06aa2a9fed58ed4d89a26b5bbcf079a.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/17cdd0c6c42fa1d289b01cfb25a0fbacdc0e7d6c14f025a37f61806c77d2f339.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/485938d31e754f71ec0485bb900de8baf1f3287eb2c6212b282b077c3aaf6162.jpg

    1. That boy is improperly dressed! In the 1950s all young boys while outdoors would wear either a school cap or a wolf cub cap.

      1. Oh, I don’t know, Aeneas, I started school in 1949 and not until 1955, when I started at Bungay Grammar school, did I have a school cap to wear and, since I wasn’t in the Cubs, I had no Wolf Cub cap either.

        I must have spent 6 years being improperly dressed.

        1. ‘Morning, J, DT Letters and BTL comments.

          Mags can take comfort in the number of ‘likes’ she accumulated, as did those who supported her.

          Yves Binoche, the troll who was harassing her, got all of 2 likes.

          1. I strangely enjoy the contrariness of Yves Binoche, a man whose conscience has taken him from his/her natural safe haven at the Grauniad all the way to the Princess of Meghan Fanzine.

          4. I haven’t seen that exchange yet but I did find this BTL comment and a few more like it…

            I don’t think George Osborne (the retired police officer, not the retired chancellor) realises the low esteem that the police are now held in. Having gradually added to the list of things that we can’t expect them to have the time or resources to do, we suddenly find that lots of them have appeared from nowhere and suddenly do have time to crack down on dog walkers, cyclists and chocoholics. and anyone filming traffic wardens, apparently!

      2. Well done Maggie and Anne! It’s also good to see our old friends TP and Damask Rose are still there.

    2. That last is not my dog; he very clearly knows who’s a good boy – and asks for his reward 🙂

    1. Notice the hand on tazer. Is that necessary?

      That’s typical. They’ve become bully boys and state thugs!

      1. There have been bullies (boys and girls) for decades. The women were sometimes more thugs than the men.

    2. Filming and photographing people in public has become a plague.
      I particularly detest people who film someone getting angry or doing something slightly unsafe, and then run to social media to upload it so that they can unleash a hail of public contempt upon their victim.

      I don’t see that filming a traffic warden is any worse than that though. What was the filmer supposed to be charged with?

      1. A public order offence. Probably a Section 5 as follows ……….. within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress thereby.” Can’t see any other possibly but very unlikely to proceed to court. Perhaps he should counter charge them with the same offence. That would be interesting.

    3. It seems the police are now the criminals and they wonder why trust n them has sunk to below zero.

    5. And yet the police hierarchy say they aren’t being heavy handed!? Five of them, yet not even a phone call for the £8K stolen!!

  31. Russian plane takes off for U.S. with coronavirus help onboard: state TV. MARCH 31, 2020.

    A Russian military transport plane took off from an airfield outside Moscow early on Wednesday and headed for the United States with a load of medical equipment and masks to help Washington fight coronavirus, Russian state TV reported.

    Hmmm. I don’t think Vlad will be sending us any aid in the near future. We might do a swap though. Half a million face masks for the Skripal’s bodies!

    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-russia-usa/putin-sending-medical-supplies-to-help-us-fight-coronavirus-ifx-idUSKBN21I37W

      2. “I’m a ding dong daddy from Dumas
        You ought to see me do my stuff
        I’m a ping pong papa from Pitch Fork Prairie
        You ought to see me strut…”

  34. CHARLES MOORE

    For the BBC, the virus truce has already ended

    At first, the BBC tried to be responsible under the shadow of Covid-19. After its long-running Brexit disgrace, it briefly returned to the straight and narrow, giving useful information calmly, as it always should, particularly in a crisis. As a result, the Government was forced to let ministers appear once more on the Today programme. Anything else would have looked petty. The BBC sensed the licence fee might be saved if it behaved.

    Now, however, the corporation is reverting to type. Its default position is a narrative in which the Government is failing to provide whatever it is that organised groups of public-sector individuals – especially the NHS – demand. That is fair enough, but leaves out so much: the needs of other workers, the vital interconnection between public and private sectors, the urgent need to investigate conflicting scientific models.

    The BBC won’t touch wider questions, such as China’s responsibility for the catastrophe, although it attacks Donald Trump without scruple. Quickly it becomes coercively moralistic, just as it does about climate change.

    Yesterday morning on the Today programme, Nick Robinson was back doing what he loves best, trying to beat up a government minister. He succeeded, of course, against the decent but inexperienced Helen Whately. It was so sterile. Why didn’t the BBC look into how best to get tests to people faster, instead of scalping Ms Whately?

    A few minutes earlier, the news bulletin had announced that Boris Johnson, in a message to the nation, had said that “Margaret Thatcher was wrong that there is no such thing as society”. Yet all he actually said – just as David Cameron did a few years back – was: “There is such a thing as society”. Clearly Boris was making a deliberate reference to her famous sentence in order to present himself as a caring Prime Minister, a point that Chris Mason analysed fairly. But the news, as a matter of simple fact, was wrong, and wrong in the way the BBC usually is.

    In her famous interview, by the way, Mrs Thatcher was making almost exactly the opposite point to what we are told to think. She was trying to show that “society” is not an abstract, but made up by the obligations of each to all. She spoke of “a living tapestry of men and women” – not a bad description of our interconnectedness, which matters so much just now.

    Some may be dying, but others are trying to live

    There are certain virus phrases of which one can have too much. One is “People are dying…”, as in “People are dying, so how dare you visit your mother/drive to go on a country walk/sell an Easter egg”, and so on.

    Yes, people are dying, but you will not do much to stop them dying by self-righteous policing (by citizens or by the authorities) of the most marginal infringements of the rules. People are living, too. The more they are trusted to behave sensibly without snooping and lecturing, the likelier they are to maintain psychological balance and public-spiritedness when panic is a much more prevalent risk than death.

    Besides, people are not, so far, dying in unusual numbers. Roughly 50,000 people die in Britain each month. Roughly 1,500 have died with Covid-19 (not necessarily of it) this month. Since many of these deaths are of people who were already very ill for other reasons, the normal monthly statistical total has hardly altered. It is probable that the situation will get much worse, but the prevailing view is that the bad trend will not last very long.

    I spoke to a respected local undertaker recently. He told me that there has as yet been no rise in the number of funerals, but there is a shortage of coffins. In other words, there is what, in other contexts, people call “panic-buying”. Without coffins, body bags may have to be permitted. Unless properly informed, the public will assume the coffin shortage is because “people are dying” in unprecedented quantities. So far, it is not.

    Hurrah for the Queen and her telephone

    It has been cheering, in the time of plague, to see pictures of the Queen granting Boris Johnson an audience down the telephone, and of the Duchess of Cambridge launching an initiative to assist mental health during the crisis, also on the phone.

    Both calls were made from home, of course, so one could see the pleasant backgrounds. The Queen had beside her or on the mantelpiece two statuettes of horses, two of corgis and one of a serviceman. The Duchess was seated at a desk furnished with an elegant uniform edition of hardback books (I couldn’t see the titles) and that nostalgic object, a blotter.

    Both women spoke into telephones attached to wires, a rarity in the age of the mobile and the portable: no chance of either of them pacing up and down as they spoke. The Duchess’s instrument, admittedly, looked as if it might have been born in the 21st century. The Queen, however, was wielding one of those off-white numbers from the Seventies where the mouthpiece looks like a small vase for violets or forget-me-nots and the wire is always getting twisted up. The face of the phone was not visible in the picture, but I like to think it had a circular dial which you revolve, rather than buttons which you stab.

    Both scenes felt stable and cosy – effects which, in people’s idea of a successful monarchy, are even more important than pomp and circumstance.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/03/31/bbc-virus-truce-has-already-ended/

    1. Assuming it has been reported correctly, I’m disappointed that Boris didn’t read what his predecessor actually said about ‘society’ in her Womens Own interview. Sounds like he’s fallen into the usual selectively quote device of the Left.

      2. The only good news is that – while he is isolated and his mistress is heavily pregnant – the Bonking Buffoon won’t have much chance of doing any bonking. This might clear his mind of its normal carnal garbage.

        1. I doubt it, but now you understand why Britain’s yoof were so keen to stock up on toilet paper.

        2. Oh. I don’t know, Richard, it’s a well-known young wives tale that where there’s a way, there’s a willy!

      3. for anyone who has never read it, the relevant paragraph:-

        But it went too far. If children have a problem, it is society that is at fault. There is no such thing as society. [end p30] There is living tapestry of men and women and people and the beauty of that tapestry and the quality of our lives will depend upon how much each of us is prepared to take responsibility for ourselves and each of us prepared to turn round and help by our own efforts those who are unfortunate. And the worst things we have in life, in my view, are where children who are a great privilege and a trust—they are the fundamental great trust, but they do not ask to come into the world, we bring them into the world, they are a miracle, there is nothing like the miracle of life—we have these little innocents and the worst crime in life is when those children, who would naturally have the right to look to their parents for help, for comfort, not only just for the food and shelter but for the time, for the understanding, turn round and not only is that help not forthcoming, but they get either neglect or worse than that, cruelty.

        https://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/106689

  37. Deaths registered weekly in England and Wales, provisional …www.ons.gov.uk › birthsdeathsandmarriages › deaths › datasets ›

    The provisional number of deaths registered in England and Wales in the week ending 20 March 2020 (week 12) was 10,645; this represents a decrease of 374.

    1. With everybody locked in, they’re not going out doing dangerous things like walking in the countryside.

  39. I have heard that there is now a sharp drop in temperature, wind speed and direction reports being received from overflying aircraft. An unexpected consequence of the virus.

    The warmists are just going to have to guesstimate the figures.

  40. ‘Morning, all. Came across this little gem, from the Daily Express

    Troops compare coronavirus fight to ‘Battle of the Somme’ as NHS ExCeL hospital completed

    TROOPS converting London’s ExCeL convention centre into a 4,000-bed hospital yesterday compared the fight against coronavirus to the Battle of the Somme.
    By Michael Knowles, Security Correspondent

    https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1263090/coronavirus-uk-army-troops-nhs-nightingale-hospital-excel-centre-london-latest-update

    My eye was caught by a quote from the OC Ops, one Colonel Ashleigh Boreham, who is surely a contender for the Pulitzer Prize for Hyperbole 2020.

    “I’ve come from a family that served in the past. My grandfather was at the Somme, this is no different. I’m just at a different battle.”

    I think not. My grandad served in the Seaforths at the Battle of the Somme, a battle that lasted over almost five months and cost the lives of almost 420,000 British soldiers. I’m confident that were he alive to hear this ludicrous – and somewhat distasteful – comparison, he would describe Col. Boreham as a total dickhead. I suspect that Col. Boreham’s own grandfather would agree with this description.

    2. #MeToo, Duncan, my father joined up in 1914 with the Queen’s Westminster Rifles, marched to and from Mons, fought twice at that place and wouldn’t talk about it. It was only after he was long dead, that I found out that he was wounded but went on be commissioned in the field in August 1915, when all the other officers were dead.

      That BF of a Colonel hasn’t a clue what a real battle is. Watching his men do some construction work hardly qualifies.

  42. Coronavirus testing will be at 25,000 per day in UK by mid-April, Government hopes

    Unless the tests are to prove whether people who have died did or did not have the virus and the other tests are on those who are showing signs, I wonder just what they hope to achieve with this.

    Only 7 years to test everyone once. The fact one is clear today does not mean you will be clear next week. One cannot even be certain that if one has had it and recovered that one cannot have a relapse or recurrence.

    We must be seen to be doing something…

    1. I’ve just arrived here for the first time today. At the front of my brain was the figure 7.2 years. Of course, as well as the valid points you make, there is the question of whether the tests actually work. So, fifteen years to test everyone 3 times…
      Apart from that there no longer seems to be a link to the figures of the numbers in different areas. These were so vague as to be of no help. The 50 infected in the Borders could be all in one street in Langholm, so we can easily avoid Langholm. But we do not have that information, so we don’t know if we are heading into a hot-spot.
      Why? It is almost as if they want to crank up the fear and at the same time make sure everyone gets infected. (If there is an oil spillage the street is cordoned off. If people get fatal communicable disease, everyone can go there too.)

      1. ‘Morning, Horace, possibly the thinking is that if we ALL get infected we ALL build up immunity. Joined up herd thinking.

      2. At the very least, it might make more sense to use significant numbers of tests on a randomly selected sample of the general population to try to establish what the likely number of carriers might be. Given a well chosen and representative sample the figures produced should be reasonably accurate.

        In statistical terms it should be relatively straightforward and probably more accurate than the current modelling.

          2. I think some of the experts are just sniffing the glue!!
            ‘Morning Alf,I am sure you know Boz are doing deliveries as are Princes for meat/cheese etc
            About two day wait

          3. Good afternoon Rik
            We weren’t aware of that but it makes sense as all the pubs and restaurants they normally serve are closed. We’re quite happy to pop out and do a bit of shopping to break the monotony. Boz are particularly well organised especially when here is a queue.
            Hope your sister is well. Do you live close by or far far away?

        2. Excellent idea. How come the professionals we are paying to manage all this don’t seem to have thought of it? Or have, but won’t do it?
          If they had done it, it could hardly be kept secret?

      3. 317612+ up ticks,
        We ain’t never going to run out of odious maladies all the while the invasion craft are hitting the beaches and the aircraft the landing fields, unchecked.
        Plus the politico toxic trio are finding support / votes.

    2. It just reminds of the MOT test. Just because your car passes doesn’t mean it won’t break down on the drive back home.

      1. I’ve actually had that happen to me. Full annual service and test passed.

        Extremely irritating, on the plus side the garage fixed it free.

        1. Not on the same scale, but 3 years ago I put my car into a main dealer for its first MOT and a service. I told them that in addition to the service it needed a badly worn driver’s side windscreen wiper replacing. Serviced and MOT passed, I went back to pick up the car and drove it off. Within a mile I ran into a thunderstorm. Torrential rain. I switched on the wipers and couldn’t see a yard in front of me. I pulled into a handy layby and waited out the storm.

          The dozy sods had changed the wrong wiper blade.

          But then passed it on the MOT.

          Good job it rained or I might not have noticed for weeks.

  43. UK charity failed to safeguard aid worker killed in Syria – report. Wed 1 Apr 2020 11.39 BST.

    Henning, 47, was beheaded by the Islamic State militant known as Jihadi John after being held captive for nine months in Syria along with other western hostages in 2014.

    The taxi driver, from Eccles in Greater Manchester, was among a group of volunteers who raised money to purchase medical equipment for a hospital in Idlib, north-west Syria.

    He was volunteering for the Worcester-based charity Al-Fatiha Global when he was kidnapped soon after crossing the Turkish border into Syria in December 2013, according to an inquiry by the Charity Commission.

    Its report, published this week after a seven-year inquiry, said it had seen no evidence that the charity raised the alarm with UK authorities after Henning’s abduction.

    Out of all the murders in the Syrian debacle I’ve always remembered this guy and what happened to him. I think this is because he was so obviously an ordinary good guy (can I say Englishman) who thought people in trouble deserved help. I could berate him for his foolishness in believing the stories about the Syrian opposition as freedom fighters but he was not the only one who fell for it. He was one of what is a dying breed. May he rest in peace.

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/apr/01/uk-charity-failed-to-safeguard-aid-worker-killed-in-syria-report-alan-henning

  45. Good Morning Folks

    A bright frosty start here

    Nice lie in and toasted hot cross buns, not watching the MSM.

  46. Today is your last chance to protect the BBC from attack. Use it. Wed 1 Apr 2020.

    What a difference a couple of months makes. The virus has turned our national broadcaster into the great unifier, the most trusted for news, with a cornucopia of programmes for the locked-down nation unmatched anywhere in the world – and that’s fact, not hyperbole. Netflix, with its plentiful entertainments from nowhere and no time, can never fill the role. The BBC has proved itself through soaring viewing figures, including among those often hard to reach 16- to 34-year-olds. The BBC says shortly to be published figures show that more than 30 million citizens a day browse the BBC News online website; a third of the population are watching the news at 6pm. The local radio network’s phone-ins connect isolated people, volunteers and services, as 1.28 million home-schooling children use the BBC Bitesize education site. New drama and old classics join great spectacles promised to replace Eurovision and Glastonbury. A country bereft of live theatre, music, comedy, book festivals, museums and galleries can turn to the BBC’s Arts in Quarantine: look at the dazzling array.

    Can I point out to Polly Pinko that the entire population is imprisoned in their homes and there is not much else to do! Though I have to confess that I’m only watching about five minutes once a day, partly on principle, but also because I suspect a month’s regular diet of CV news and death will come as a welcome relief!

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/01/last-chance-protect-bbc-boris-johnson

    1. There was an all staff live phone-in at Midday with Tony Hall telling us gleefully that lock-down is going to last for three months. The enjoyment was palpable so after less than twenty minutes I switched off. I’m busy in fits and starts and at least when there are quiet times I can come on here without anyone looking over my shoulder so I guess it’s not all bad. The fluid retention in my legs and feet has also gone down considerably since I’ve been working at home with the laptop perched on a beanbag tray.

        1. Yay! I knew I’d had the odd on-screen credit here and there but only one of the titles they list makes sense to me, though I may well have had some involvement in all of them!

          2. The Internet Movie Database. Created by a British couple and the worldwide resource centre now for all things related. Bought by Amazon some years ago.

          5. It’s a very useful site. Also Rotten Tomatoes.

            If i’m wondering whether to watch a particular film or not i look at the ratings. Any film that scores in the high 80’s is normally worth a watch. Regardless of genre.

          6. Ah, but do you look at the critics’ score or the audience score? They can vary by a huge margin.

      3. Sorry to hear about the fluid retention.

        Be careful with the laptop on the bean bag because they need air circulation. They can get hot and combust.

    2. “the great unifier, the most trusted for news, with a cornucopia of programmes for the locked-down nation unmatched anywhere in the world”

      Bwahahaha!
      What is she smoking?
      Or perhaps she meant to say
      “the great supporter of the Guardian, with a cornucopia of subscriptions for the newspaper that nobody actually wants to fork out their own money for, in order to keep my over-inflated salary flowing so that I can peddle even more pernicious garbage”

      End the compulsory licence fee now!

    4. .”..the most trusted for news” – I know it’s April Fools’ Day, but really Polly that’s pushing it! And as for the quality of the programming – the fact that we are watching repeats of the Hairy Bikers on some high number channel tells you all you need to know about the BBC’s current offerings!

        1. I’m unconvinced.
          How many people could tell with certainty what type of bat they were buying?

    2. Fox news us about as reliable as CNN, they are both totally biased just opposite ends of the spectrum.

    3. The fact that the bats tied to the virus were not native to the area was well reported in the MSM some time back, both in the UK and the US, when the outbreak was first becoming a disaster within China. Complete with write ups about the lab and the fact that it was (at the time) China’s only Level 4 lab.

      Probably went unnoticed at Fox News as they seem to get most of their “news” from alt right conspiracy theory sites, like the one that published the story yesterday about a health workers union supposedly “hiding” face masks.

      1. Can you point me to any of the right wing conspiracy sites? Would that include the South China University of Technology?

    4. Pangolins aren’t exactly abundant in China either, but plenty at the market. There are prenty of Chinese bleeders of exotic non-native fauna, even endangered ones.

  48. I’ve just had a WhatsApp message saying the UK lockdown will end at 8:30 pm tomorrow …. Just saying

    3. That’s not exactly a good April Fool’s joke, giving, even for a second or two, a bit of hope. Don’t want to be a downer but…

    4. It is April Fools day but pm is rather late for jokes.
      Sorry, just seen your other post.

    1. How many people die from ‘flu and how many die with it? Asking on behalf of a statistician friend.

  50. Does anyone know why Sheffield is a covid 19 hotspot? Presumably nothing to do with demographics.

    1. I think it can be as little as one large gathering where a few people are infected, and then everyone’s got it.

      1. Carpe diem! I think a scheme for the rolling-out of soup kitchens in the muslim occupied enclaves should be a matter of priority.

        Bat-soup should be on the menu, halal of course.

    2. Lots of Chinese students back from New Year celebrations. They brought everyone a present.

    1. Same general family, but those are wild boar, and they cause an enormous amount of damage.

      Wild pigs are not quite as dangerous.

    2. Hmm, don’t know about Italy and wild boar but, Llandudno, it’s no more than you deserve, just for being Welsh!

      1. Hoi! My father was Welsh and from that part of the country. Most of his family were ardent chapel botherers and not the most cheerful of souls. They also stole the grandfather clock that was mine by right and just about everything else that was worth lifting before my father got there after his father’s death.
        Maybe you have a point, NtN.😎

    3. Only the beginning: as most of us succumb, the wild Welsh mountain lions will come down from their refuges and start attacking survivors as far away as Cowdenbeath and West Sussex…

  52. I was just talking to a friend in Europe about the situation in European countries, and their opinion was “We had better issue those coronabonds because if we don’t, China will step in to “help” Italy and Spain.”

    It beggars belief that the Italian politicians would accept more investment from the country that brought them directly a coronavirus peak for which they were unprepared – but we all know that they will.

      1. Probably better than the Chinese in the long run, but not by much. Not sure that I will be driving over any concrete viaducts in Italy ever again!

    2. 317612+ up ticks,
      Afternoon BB2
      Them old Ities would have to catch a fast train to beat
      GB politico’s when it comes to dealing with the charlie chans.
      That ain’t no secret.

    3. Rest assured, BB2, it all presages the total demise of the EU and its wicked ways.

      It cannot come soon enough and, if it’s blamed on the economic shutdown caused by corona-Virus, who am I to care?

      1. Yes and no. The Brussels dictatorship can’t disappear soon enough.
        But the Chinese don’t care about Europe’s ridiculous human rights laws and all the rest. It is in their interests that Europe stays shackled to this particular ball and chain.
        However, they will happily cooperate with dismantling anything that keeps European countries strong and economically independent from them.
        Unfortunately, in the EU, the good and bad are bound together.
        We risk losing the economic strength of the EU, while keeping the dictatorship over individual citizens – and that is very dangerous.

        1. Economic strength of the EU?

          Its total lack of economic strength as an entity is about to be horribly exposed

          1. The free market is an economic strength. It’s a pity it was infiltrated by megalomaniac bureaucrats from day 1.

          2. Agreed re bureaucrats.

            The EU single market (and its customs union) is anything but a free market.

            If it was truly a free market a significant part of the Brexit negotiations would be unnecessary.

          5. Those are reasonable quality controls surely? As a consumer I don’t mind, because I buy
            – Italian hard cheese for half the price of Parmesan,
            – Cremant d’Alsace for half the price of Champagne and
            – Airdried Italian ham without additives for half the price of Parma ham.

            Don’t you remember how snotty the French used to be in the old days, with lots of stupid little rules designed to discourage imports? Giving them ANY say whatsoever in the EU was always going to end in disaster! Especially combined with the Germans’ insatiable desire for rules to cover every eventuality.

          6. I have no objection to them per se, I think they can be a good guide, but they certainly prevent direct competition and individual countries, France in particular, do set restrictions to hamper a truly free market.

          7. At a very high annual price, both in contributions and in submission by all of the member states (except Germany and France).

          8. I think we’ve got to change our relationship with the EU now that we’re close to being out of it.
            Instead of asking “What benefits do we get out of being a member?” which were clearly “not enough”, we now have to ask ourselves “What benefits do we get out of having the EU as one of our closest neighbours?”
            In this case, are our interests better served by having the EU as our neighbour, or by having China picking off individual EU nations and hollowing them out, for example, the former Italian leather industry?
            A Zimbabwean friend has a very low opinion of how China has hollowed out her country; the supposed benefits for which minerals have been sold, bring nothing to Zimbabweans, and flooding the country with Chinese manufactured goods has killed the local manufacturing economy that survived the hyperinflation in the Mugabe years. Europe will be the next to be colonised if we don’t watch out – so which is more in Britain’s interests as a neighbour, the EU or Chinese colonies?

    4. Don’t forget, it was some of those (left-wing) Italian politicians who were decrying the possible racism triggered by the Wuhan virus outbreak, and urging people to hug a Chinese person.

      That didn’t work out well.

      The sooner the left-wing government (everywhere, including the UK) gets kicked out, the better for its citizens.

  53. Iran Spreading Coronavirus in Syria, Assad Killing Patients to Cover It Up. Breitbart. 31 Mar 2020.

    The opposition claims Assad officials, including members of the health ministry and doctors, have been instructed not to discuss coronavirus cases in public. The Syrian state security apparatus was instructed to treat unauthorized public statements about the epidemic as a threat to national security that would “spread chaos and panic at a time when we are at war.” At least one prominent doctor has allegedly been murdered by the regime to silence him.

    Most disturbingly, the opposition says regime forces are trying to prevent the epidemic from spreading by putting suspected coronavirus patients to death using overdoses of anesthesia.

    My God this makes the Chemical Attacks look credible. It’s propaganda written by idiots. The “opposition” are of course the jihadists with charming names like al Qaeda and ISIS so we should all believe everything they say. I don’t think!

    https://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2020/03/31/opposition-iran-spreading-coronavirus-in-syria-assad-killing-patients-to-cover-it-up/

  54. It’s funny how the mainstream media BS threshold has visibly gone from its usual sky high to ground level over the last few weeks.

    An example: early on, the Telegraph ran an article about all the poor freelancers who were suffering from the shutdown, talking to various people with completely unnecessary jobs – freelance travel journalist, drama coach etc. Aka middle class women, usually married to a wage earner.
    Today, they are talking to another freelancer who is going through hard times – she cleans elderly people’s houses, but they are all having to isolate, so her business is hit. Perhaps they realised that the high falutin stuff won’t get people to dip into their pockets for Turn2Us.

    Even the Guardian has switched from their initial articles about the plight of people with OCD when faced with the need to wash their hands, to the story yesterday about the Indian workers who are having to walk for several days back to their villages.

    It would be a good thing if a side-effect of this situation were that millennials get a more realistic outlook on life and what is really important.

  56. I am feeling rather contemplative today – so be warned and skip this post if you want wit and levity!

    A headline in a DT story today reminded me of a memorable few lines from Julius Caesar which my father often quoted during a long illness which led to his death in 1984 at the age of nearly 86:

    Cowards die many times before their deaths.
    The valiant never taste of death but once.
    Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,
    It seems to me most strange that men should fear,
    Seeing that death, a necessary end,
    Will come when it will come.

    But my father never lost his mental agility and he loved discussing the follies of the world. As he approached the ‘necessary end‘ in his last few weeks he argued his points most coherently and expressed himself articulately, with great humour and with the same twinkle in his eye that he had always had. How I loved talking with him.

    At his funeral I gave a short address in which I quoted from William Cory’s Heraclitus:

    I wept as I remembered how often you and I
    Had tired the sun with talking and sent him down the sky.
    ……………
    Still are thy pleasant voices – thy nightingales – awake
    For death he taketh all away – but them he cannot take.

    2. When my Aussie friend committed suicide, I put a quote from Ode to a Nightingale on her condolences page:

      Now more than ever seems it meet to die,
      To cease upon the midnight with no pain.

      It would have been midnight my time when she did the deed. Still hurts even now.

    1. Wow. Just. Wow.
      Incidentally, there’s a plaque on the console: ‘This organ was presented to the Corporation by
      Alderman Sir Samuel Turner JP and was formally declared open by the donor on
      the occasion of the visit of their Majesties King George V and Queen Mary to
      the town on 9th July 1913’

          2. There were indeed four, Jules. My point is that – at times – he was playing three simultaneously, using just his thumb to play the melody. And, all the while, the pedals.

          5. I have occasionally come across music where it’s necessary to play a few notes with the thumb, whilst doing something else with the fingers on the manual above. But here, there were whole passages where the thumb was playing the melody, and the fingers (and the other hand) playing a hell of a lot of notes at a stonking pace.

            I attended a recital in Winchester a few years ago, when the organist played a few notes with his nose, but that’s another story…

    4. I couldn’t watch all the recent stream of Tannhausen from the NYMet – Venus was not exactly Venus de Milo shaped, rather a Venus de Lardo – very off putting…

  58. Afternoon all.

    Quarantined

    Jim was off work in quarantine because he had contracted the coronavirus.
    Finally recovered and back at work, he ran into a friend of his who asked, “Jim, how are you feeling?”
    “I’m better, thanks. You know, it was a wonderful experience,” Jim replied.
    “Wonderful? How can the flu be wonderful?”

    “Well, I learned that my wife really loves me. You know, whenever the mailman came by or a delivery man headed towards the door, my wife ran out to
    meet them. I could hear her excitedly saying, ‘My husband is home! My husband is home!’”

    1. We have over 20.000 + ave. deaths from flu every year and these are never reported. Why is that I wonder.

      1. Sadly, I must say No to Nanny, I am not BJ. I wish they would break down these figures to inform us of the location, sex, age and ethnicity of these unfortunate victims. The initial symptoms are now being re-examined and it now appears fever is not a regular symptom and probably loss of taste and smell could be more significant. The deaths are now starting to climb to the peak of confirmed cases with at least one “expert” suggesting there could be another peak in the approach to Winter. I won’t be surprised if this is the case.

        1. The 13 yr old boy who died “with no underlying conditions” had a cardiac arrest and was called Ismail. Make of that what you will.

        2. OK, Clyde, I recognise now and at the time, that mine was a throwaway remark but I was just ‘feeling’ for those that miss Bill Jackson – I don’t.

        3. No disrespect but what would you do with the breakdown, how would it help and would you stop worrying? You have at least a 95% chance of not getting it but if you do there’s nothing you can do about.

          1. No, we all pretty much have a 100% chance of getting it. They will let us out sometime, and then…

          2. We know that 100% we will all die, however, we won’t all die at the same time as the death rate in the U.K. is about 0.9%. Although we could all die at the same time statistically it won’t happen anymore than we’ll all get Covid-19 or seasonal flu.
            We are also told that a) there is so little known about this virus and b) it’s more virulent than seasonal flu. Do those statements together make sense.

          3. None of it makes much sense. However, oldies such as myself are not being saved. We are being saved for later. The general idea is to stop the NHS being swamped. People who get sick because they are exposed by being out there doing the jobs of delivering, warehousing, serving, arresting and so on will get priority.
            They have said as much. That is what “flattening the peak” means.
            Whether it works or not we have yet to see.

        4. It would be good to know where the cases occurred, in detail. Our area is 100 miles across. Are all the cases spread out or in one place? Is there some reason that the authorities abandoned any idea of tracing the sources of infection? Would it not have made sense to cordon off the infection hot-spots and carry on as normal elsewhere?

  60. 317612+ up ticks,
    May one ask, would it not be in the peoples interest to put together a
    ” for good intentions ” slush fund paying substantial sums to
    whistle – blowers against loss of employment threats.
    Truth in many respects would be revealed from the shop floor as against
    the political, supposedly, elite.

  62. A plane has five passengers on board – Donald Trump, Boris Johnson, the Pope, The Queen and a ten year old boy.
    The plane is about to crash and there are only 4 parachutes on board.
    Trump says “I need one, I’m the smartest man in the USA”, takes one and jumps out of the plane.
    The Pope says “I need one, I have to sort out the Catholic church” takes another one and leaves the plane.
    Boris says “I need to sort out England” , grabs another and jumps.
    The Queen turns to the schoolboy and says ”You have the last parachute. I’ve lived my life and you still have yours ahead of you”.
    The ten year old replies “Don’t worry, there are two parachutes left. The smartest man in America took my schoolbag….”

      2. What Alf says, is probably correct – but, since I was sent it on a phone, I just went to YouTube and searched for ‘Fuck All’

    2. Wonderful. If only I were still in my teens, when staying in bed doing sweet Fanny Adams came naturally.

  66. Just seen a story suggesting that iboprofen isn’t the devil they claimed it was only last week. They’re in a flat spin and they haven’t got a clue. They don’t even have a sensible datum against which to measure deaths, infections or anything else you care to mention.

    Every day more nonsense, much of it baseless, just to fill the papers and keep the panic going to boost circulation when they’ve got nothing else to report on. You even see two contradictory stories in adjacent articles, so you can pick the one that frightens you most.

    1. Daily mail archive of cancer scare stories. They have a complete A to Z of them. Pretty much everything gives you cancer. Mostly utter nonsense.

      They like to scare people. They are sadists.

      1. Only if you take them seriously. I gave up the DM for Lent. Only 12 more days until I can wallow in stories about cancer and Meghan again! Can’t wait!

  67. When did we become a country so happy to surrender its liberties? 31 MARCH 2020 • 9:30PM

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/fa29aecf39d22d92d5c44f1d63ec7452e69ef271a54bf2043c8e80879917b062.jpg

    It was about the same time as the MSM decided to become a mouthpiece for propaganda and the politicians decided they could do as they liked while the police morphed into the Stasi!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/03/31/did-become-country-happy-surrender-liberties/

      2. Taken on a phone, as most photos are these days. Unfortunately phones aren’t cameras, despite what the manufacturers would have you believe and they all have an incredibly wide angle lens so that they can include all the drunken mates of the photographer in night-clubs at close range, which is what they are often used for and also to distort the faces of close-range pouting young women so that they are displayed in a form that their own mothers wouldn’t recognise.

        The result of this is that when they are used in an outdoor setting the incredibly wide angle lens makes everything look further away and distorts perspective, so you get converging parallels, like those shadows.

        1. So the photo was taken on this planet, and not a planet with two suns in the sky? Phew! I was wondering how strange things could become.

    3. Indeed. The clue lies with the dog, I imagine. It’s hardly a beauty spot that she’s driven miles to get to, is it.

        1. That’s it well done – you may need to supplement your rations in the not too distant future….

          1. Can’t agree, Stephen, foxes have just become urban vermin and the old and near-death ones are still roaming the countryside and feasting on any unguarded hens, duck and geese.

            Despite all the luvvies’ protests, hunting used to reduce the rural population such that those left were able to fend for themselves in the countryside without raiding urban dustbins and any odd cat that was outside. Townees, who know no better, only encourage the problem by feeding the urban vermin. You might as well feed your local rats.

          2. With regard to Urban foxes as they are wild creatures it should be an offence to feed the bloody things (I have stupid neighbours who put food out for them)…

  69. Just heard that a mystery benefactor has paid the Fox Inn in Denchworth to provide a fish & chips supper every Friday for the entire village over the next 3 months. For Free.

      1. I only normally eat them in the summer. The beach is 2 mins from the chippy.

        Haven’t you got any fish in your freezer. Fish finger sandwich is my go to when the urge becomes too great.

        1. Only smoked haddock I’m afraid. Anyway I like them with mushy peas which has unfortunate consequences!

        1. I have a beer machine at home, Paul and get 2 litre refills from Beerwulf. In fact, I’m going for a refill, right now. Best Beloved has Dinner just about ready, so there’s an added attraction – or two. Back later – maybe.

        2. Indeed. I am constantly reminded that during the war your life might be suddenly snuffed out (by bombing or strafing), but at least you could go down the pub for a pint!

    3. Population of 171 according to 2011 census but by Friday will be 293,721. 😂😂

  70. Wimbledon 2020 cancelled in response to coronavirus pandemic. 1 April 2020.

    This summer’s Wimbledon has been cancelled, the All England Lawn Tennis Club announced on Wednesday in a move that had become increasingly inevitable amid the spread of coronavirus.

    Mark my words this is the Apocalypse. Not because of this minor ailment but because the response to it will destroy the foundations of the modern world.

    https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2020/apr/01/wimbledon-2020-cancelled-response-coronavirus-pandemic-tennis

          2. Fingers crossed, our local asparagus farm will start selling this coming weekend.
            Apparently the wet, cold weather has delayed the start of the season.
            No sign of the usual migrant workers, but then, most sales will be to direct customers rather than catering establishments, so the farm may be able t keep things jogging along.

    2. “Mark my words this is the Apocalypse. Not because of this minor ailment but because the response to it will destroy the foundations of the modern world.”

      I agree Minty, It should be a case of, “Don’t Panic, Mr Mainwaring!”

      As I said yesterday, now is the time to take advantage of the Globalists’ panic, for Boris to recall Parliament, repeal the Coronavirus Bill and put Britain back to work, while treating this, as if it were a major ‘flu epidemic but start to supply the rest of the World’s needs and accumulate a fat profit for the UK.

      Makes Sense to me and I’m one of the most vulnerable but I’m also Old School British.

      1. Afternoon Nan. Yes. I think it’s nothing in itself but it’s going to set in motion forces that cannot be controlled!

        1. The Chinese epidemic is well past its peak – and their social distancing policies were much more draconian than anywhere else in the world – which of course is why they now recovering before anyone else. UK has not hit peak. Nor has the US, but April is expected to be the peak for some areas here, with other areas hitting peak throughout the summer.

          Don’t expect a return to normal any time this year.

      3. Well said, Tom. I have an appointment at the Eye Clinic tomorrow. Twice they’ve phoned me and said I don’t need to return for three / several months. I’m supposedly vulnerable, being diabetic. On each occasion, my reply was that the good eye had deteriorated in the last week, and I’m fairly sure I need another injection. Frankly, if I had to choose between losing my sight and being snuffed out by Covid-19, I’d choose the latter. Anyway – I’m still attending tomorrow, and it may be the quickest visit ever.

        2. Safe trip, Geoff and let’s hope they do the biz and you get an improvement.

    4. The players could still play the matches, but without the crowds or prize money (as long as they don’t get too close to the net at the same time:) )
      The list of participants would show who is interested in the title and who is interested in the dosh.

    5. The players could still play the matches, but without the crowds or prize money (as long as they don’t get too close to the net at the same time:) )
      The list of participants would show who is interested in the title and who is interested in the dosh.

    2. The brilliant medics at Holby City NHS don’t seem to have been hit with COVID virus yet but then most of them are either sick or filling up their own wards – no wonder there’s a bed crisis.

      1. Sounds like Sun Hill, where half of the area’s criminals worked in the police station.

    3. I wonder if there are a lot more actors and actresses who think like him, but keep their traps shut for fear of some kind of reprisals.

        1. Of course, but he’s one of the few luvvies who speaks his mind about PC/LGBT.

          3. The character played by Lawrence Fox in Lewis. D S Hathaway, former candidature for the priesthood in Oxford.

          5. I liked the Morse series, but found the Lewis one good, too. The pair worked well together.

    4. Bravo, Sue and Laurence Fox. Is Laurence Fox’s father (or Grandfather) Robin Fox?

      1. Laurence’s father is the actor, James Fox, the latter is the son of Robin Fox. I knew the James Fox connection but as Google is my friend I learnt something new today. Bit of an acting dynasty.

      2. Laurence Fox’s father is James Fox; his uncle is Edward Fox and his cousin is Emilia Fox. Laurence’s older brother, Tom, came on one of our French courses over 25 years ago before our own sons were even born.

  72. Hurrah! My next Kerry Wilkinson thriller has just clattered through the letterbox from Amazon a month earlier than predicted. The driver was wearing surgical gloves.

  73. Right I’m off to read Necklace and Calabash by Robert van Gulik. I’m reprising all my old Judge Dee stories!

    2. I have great sympathy for my wife.

      I was never handsome, but then turned into an uglyphant.

    3. Of course you are as well dressed as when we got married. It’s the same dress!

      Andy Capp I believe from many years ago.

  79. The authorities are STILL giving “Protect the NHS” as the reason why everyone should stay at home.
    Surely it will occur to even the stupidest voter at some point that the NHS should be there to protect them?

    1. I think more correctly, it’s to protect the politicians for failing to ensure that the NHS can, in fact, protect us. Largely because they have fiddled with its structure without making it more efficient, have allowed lots of people not entitled to the service use it, impoverished it with PFI and gone far away from its original remit which did not include changing who you were born to be.

      1. It was a dead duck from the day it was born, because of the stupid nationalised funding structure. Just survived a long time on its quasi-religious status.

      2. 317612+ up ticks,
        Evening C,
        What has not helped since the mid 70s is the continuing support / votes for mass uncontrolled immigration parties & the party policies.
        You can’t run with the fox & also the hounds, it just don’t work.

      3. Perhaps it’s to cover their failure to act on warnings three years ago that the NHS could not cope with a pandemic:

        https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/03/28/exclusive-ministers-warned-nhs-could-not-cope-pandemic-three/

        We are essentially being locked in our homes to give the politicians the time to do the things they should have done years ago. A global pandemic was entirely predictable, stockpiling ventilators and facemasks would have cost a whole lot less than the coming global depression.

        1. They always ignore the old but still valid advice: “fix the roof while the sun is shining“

  80. David Hockney on BBC News at Six


    Birth is the cause of death

    “Hello world”
    “Goodbye cruel world”

    Well that didn’t last long did it?😟

      1. But only after two years swimming around in the river after hatching from the egg.

      1. 317612+ up ticks,
        Evening GG,
        They got special political dispensation as some politico’s do, on account of it being a short stage.

  85. I caught the excellent Freddie Francis film ‘So long at the fair’, with Dirk Bogarde and Jean Simmons a couple of nights ago, on Talking Pictures. And immediately was transported back to my early childhood because of this lovely tune, that was frequently requested on the radio then:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUEzU8G-FCU&app=desktop

    Carriage and Pair,1950, by Benjamin Frankel.

          3. Ah! Penny drops. I used to do a spot of sheep worrying in the Lakes. Wound the window down when passing them, and shouted “Mint Sauce”…

    3. We need to eat far more meat.. We had lamb leg steaks today. Fillet steak tomorrow. Doing our bit.

        1. The shepherds I knew as a laddie were too old, tough & stringy to make a decent pie.

          1. T’was only a cook-chill Waitrose single portion variety. Prefer the real thing, but these are difficult times.

            I’m going to risk a visit to Waitrose tomorrow, en route to the horse spittle. Might grab some lamb mice, and do it properly.

      2. Years ago in France we were famished having driven for miles and on a quiet day happened upon a presumably mediaeval bridge with a tower house at its entrance. There was an illuminated flashing sign ‘Le Grille’ and nothing elsewhere but a bridge to the other side of a wide river.

        My wife speaks French and we were admitted to the restaurant, initially bowled over by the atmosphere and strong odours of cooking. The place was seeming with French folk enjoying their conversation and drinking decent wine in complete contrast to the quietude outside. The lady in charge was watching TV in her semi-basement retreat and the punters were having to turn their steaks on the enormous grille over a coal or more likely charcoal fire.

        We ordered steaks in a creme and cognac sauce. The lady proprietor came up from her lair grasping hefty slabs of steak, dripping with blood and cast them onto the iron grille beneath the wide stone hearth. Some wag remarked in French that the steaks were ‘still galloping’.

        The lady then came back and emptied a half bottle of Cognac into the sauce skillet whilst adding the cream and other ingredients. There was the inevitable but comforting flaming.

        The steaks, whether horse or beef were exceptional.

        Whilst we were sat there surrounded by Frenchmen, a party of posh poser English knocked on the door and attempted to gain entry. They were told to sod off by the lady proprietor.

        After we had eaten a most welcome meal the lady proprietor sat with us and had brought out her photograph albums which showed the privations she and her family had experienced during the war. She was a wonderful lady and a allowed me and my wife a certain pride in our parents and forefathers which was totally unexpected.

        We love the French but admit to hating Macron.

        1. We too have only found kindness from the French people.Its their leaders that are the problem.

    4. They can’t guarantee that the lamb wasn’t halal slaughtered, so I’m no longer one of their customers, sorry.

  88. I think a lot of people had already guessed it was something like this, I just picked up on Going Postal that the woman who murdered Emily Jones in Bolton was a Somali immigrant who also tried to decapitate her.

    2. I wish you’d left that last bit off, Bob. It was bad enough without that.
      :-((

    1. We’ll see. These things have side affects but don’t all drugs? I remember taking anti-malarial drugs in the 80s and 90s and 2000s and having a few problems with vision etc. My company actually gave us a choice of continuing taking them because our work/break schedules did not coincide with the amount of time prior to and post exposure you had to take them for.

  92. Is it just me being callous? A ‘healthy’ 13 year old boy dies of Coronavirus-19 in the UK, and I’ve just seen “Six-week old baby dies in Connecticut” in the US headlines. Aren’t these numbers of young deaths something to be thankful for. As horrible as their deaths are, it shows how safe youngsters are during this ‘pandemic’.

    1. I’m just referring to the numbers.The Chinese ‘statistics’ show no deaths of children under 10 years of age for the first 72,000 cases reported.

  93. ‘Night All

    No cats or dogs tonight but a few laffs

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2076758b7586f5ec2f1ffdfed6b98221fd2be46463728c6b8459900fd5bcb979.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1061d79fcb1f851579f477b7cc93b6eadc33dd80335257385d228f87a320ee29.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/60bd2731e53f6882e18c1e4408f0a84ee1e5932346cfb55c3dc0a086cbb4f56b.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/99a82746bd9e90de85d64627921bc2fd58cf75f3d5c4e5e7d21fbc1fb8251c16.jpg

    https://i0.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2020/03/Screen-Shot-2020-03-27-at-9.45.13-PM.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c3b294680ddf61a0c82b68e1a1132ce0cfa659b562053f6e670549de51d56d34.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8c2a400d6e5b5edd6fb4eabcde8154f940703380b70aa3a499248161d9860fb6.jpg

    1. The ironic thing about fish is that fish counters in supermarkets are bare in Ipswich yet just up the A12 in Lowestoft a fish wholesaler can’t get rid of his fresh fish because most of his customers are hotels and restaurants which are now all shut.

  96. It was a good day today.
    MOH went to Waitrose for the Elderly and Vulnerable hour starting at 07:30 hrs.
    Spent £200 on a trolley load without buying more than two items but still got away with buying a bunch of bananas.

    🍌🍌🍌🍌🍌🍌🍌🍌🍌🍌🍌

    ‘night all.

    1. It’s amazing how much one can spend in the way of ordinary items and not see very much for it. I arrived at Waitrose today at 8.00am, it was very quiet and no queue. The staff were lovely; cheerful and smiling. I was allowed six bottles of wine and they told me there was no restriction on wine. The shelf stackers were busy and moved out of the way with good grace and a smile. I noted the pasta and rice shelves were starting to be filled up as were the toilet rolls, tissues and kitchen rolls. No bleach, no canned beans of any description. Eggs thin on the ground, loads of Easter eggs. It seems like the panic is over, the nation’s pantries and freezers must be stuffed to bursting. Full marks to Waitrose for a lovely attitude, it must be worrying and stressful for the staff too.

      1. MOH brought back a Waitrose Essential toilet cleaner.
        Smells !ovely – we might use it in future instead of othrr brands.
        PTB in some places have banned Easter Eggs for purchae as non-essential items but there of course Waitrose has an advantage.

        1. I didn’t realise that they had actually been banned in some places…… when will they ban bacon – via mission creep – from the shelves, I wonder? I am assuming you mean those councils with a high proportion of those from a certain ethnic community.

          1. Supermarkets are having to make up rules that they believe is the interpretation of Government policy.

            Of course there are major injustices like when my daughter as an NHS worker shared a car with her husband’s daughter (with visiting rights from a previous marriage) and had two trollies – one for my daughter’s family and one for the step daughter who was shopping for her 12 week stay-at-home grand parents.

            The supermarket insisted that they used only one trolley which meant mixing up all the shopping and making it extremely difficult carrying and sorting it out.

            Grandad had few choice words with the supermarket but did get an apology.

            My daughter is facing enough pressure having joined the district nursing teanm as a nurse practitioner facing end of life decisions in the community without the help of GPs who are required under the rules to administer certain terminal care treatments.

  97. ‘Evening, All!

    Apols if this has been posted, and if it is rather harsh, but I think the Chinese government and people (if you read the narrative) need to be put in their place, and not make a profit out of Coronavirus, as they look like they are trying to do. I for one am furious with our Government for kow-towing to this country. Enough is enough. Extracts from Taki:

    Speak the Truth, Shame the Chinese
    David Cole March 31, 2020

    Well, I’ll be damned; the Chinese are now encouraging “cultural appropriation”! After telling whites that they can’t cook “Asian” food or open “Asian” restaurants or wear “Asian” clothes, because everything that comes from Asia belongs to Asians only, the Chinese are now willingly surrendering credit for the COVID-19 virus, even though it came from China as the by-product of specifically Chinese customs.

    Sorry, pallies. You want ownership of the pot sticker, you get ownership of COVID.

    There are times to avoid pointing fingers, and there are times to point them so vigorously that you put someone’s eye out. So let’s do some pointin’.

    COVID-19 is zoonotic, meaning it jumped from animals (in this case, bats) to humans. You’re going to hear a lot of media propagandists claim that “we don’t know the origin of the virus.” That’s pure obfuscation. True, we don’t know how bats originally acquired the virus in the wild. But that’s not the issue; the issue is how the virus jumped to humans (a “zoonotic spillover”). And regarding that “jump,” we know exactly where it happened: at a Wuhan “wet market” where exotic animals are sold for food in the most appallingly unclean conditions. That’s where the “jump” occurred.

    Officially, COVID-19 is called SARS-CoV-2. As the name implies, COVID-19 is a relative of another coronavirus, SARS. Remember SARS? It was all the rage in 2003. SARS also did the zoonotic jump to people through the Chinese wet markets. And back in the early 2000s, the media was willing to say so. “SARS was not an isolated outbreak,” reported CNN in 2005. “South China has long been the epicenter of pandemic flus, giving birth to three or four global outbreaks a century.”

    And why?

    South China offers the most exotic fare from all over the globe—by some accounts at least 60 species can be found in any one market—thrusting together microorganisms, animals and humans who normally would never meet. This thriving trade gives the manufacturing hub that straddles the Pearl River Delta the unenviable title of being the “petri dish” of the world.
    ………..

    In an attempt to control the SARS outbreak, the Chinese government tried to stem the trade and consumption of exotic animals. But again and again, the people of China said no. This bears repeating: The Chinese government acknowledged that the SARS “jump” happened because of the wet markets, and those markets were closed…until the Chinese people brought them back.

    “COVID-19 is the most predictable calamity in modern history.”
    As Jacques deLisle, director of the Center for the Study of Contemporary China at UPenn, wrote in 2004.

    As world health officials were trying to curb SARS, the locals were inviting it. “Chinese Diners Shrug Off SARS: Bring On the Civet Cat.” That’s a New York Times headline from December 2003:

    It was lunch hour at The First Village of Wild Food, and if anyone in the restaurant was worried that SARS might again be spreading in this city, they were not showing it. Huang Sheng was more worried about which of the small animals in black metal cages would become his midday meal. Asked if he worried about eating wild game in light of SARS, Mr. Huang said he saw no risk. “It’s no big deal. It’s not a problem.” He said Guangdong Province residents had a reputation for eating exotic foods, a taste not even SARS could deter.
    …..

    As the Chinese people fought for their right to spread zoonotic diseases, Chinese activists fought to keep the West from noticing. Victor Wong of the Vancouver Association of Chinese Canadians gave a talk in May 2003 in which he downplayed the need to take SARS seriously: “I contrast SARS with the fact that thousands die from influenza every year in Canada. Around the world, millions die from tuberculosis, malaria and AIDS.” He urged an end to “wall-to-wall coverage of Asians wearing masks, patients being wheeled away on stretchers, health officials in moon-suits” because such stories “only serve to fuel more public panic.” He demanded that the media stop running stories with a “negative message” about how “the Chinese eat exotic wild animals.” Finally, he stressed the need to study not the disease but the “trauma” the coverage inflicts upon the Chinese……

    In January 2004, SARS reappeared in China. The wildlife market ban was repealed in August 2003, and five months later, the Chinese had ushered in a new round of the disease. As NBC reported in January ’04, even as the ban was reimposed, wild animals were nevertheless “back on the menu” in Chinese eateries. Many in the Western press treated the return of the wildlife markets as a joke. A January 2004 Slate piece by Wired’s Brendan Koerner stated, “Considered a culinary treat in southern China, the animals are believed to carry the virus that causes SARS. What’s a civet cat, what’s the best way to cook one, and what do they taste like?” Yes, Koerner provided recipes for the disease-carrying animal. I’m sure that seemed hilarious at the time.
    …..

    By 2007, with the WHO no longer “passing judgment” and with the wet-market ban long gone, Reuters reported that “exotic wildlife and squalor have returned to the Qingping market, making health officials worried that another killer virus could emerge. Traditional wet markets still account for the bulk of fresh food sales in China, where diners hope exotic meats will bring good fortune.” Taiwanese health official Li Jib-heng direly predicted that “a new disease could emerge from close contact with sick wild animals.”

    The Chinese knew a ban would work, but they allowed the markets to thrive.

    In 2013, Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post disclosed that a new Chinese zoonotic pandemic was likely: “Scientists warn of more serious disease threats than SARS.”

    The Chinese people were living in stubborn, arrogant denial, and the WHO had fallen silent because only racists “pass judgment” on Chinese zoonotic practices.

    And now we have COVID-19, which has disrupted the entire world. One-third of the earth’s population is under some sort of lockdown. Livelihoods are ruined, economies destroyed, hundreds of thousands are ill and tens of thousands are dead. And the Chinese government, the Chinese diaspora, the political left, and the media want you to forget how COVID grew from the willful failure of China to learn the lessons of SARS.

    So let’s not forget.

    Remember that COVID-19, like SARS, began because of specifically Chinese customs, practices, and fetishes.

    Remember that during and after the SARS outbreak, the Chinese knew that the wet markets were a danger, yet they were allowed to prosper.

    Remember that experts predicted that a bigger, badder SARS would eventually be born from the wet markets. COVID-19 is the most predictable calamity in modern history.

    And remember that a ban on Chinese wet markets would have prevented COVID-19. This was the most preventable calamity in modern history.

    If we allow anything—fear of “racism,” hatred of Trump, lucrative Chinese business dealings—to get in the way of halting those wet markets for good this time, it’s a certainty that eventually we’ll see an even worse pandemic. There can be no soft feelings here, no sensitivity, no diplomacy. The Chinese must be cajoled, shamed, ridiculed, banned, and threatened until they stop risking the lives of every human on earth because they love eating things that shouldn’t be eaten.

    The Chinese don’t deserve hugs; they’re lucky that most of us are civilized enough to not take violent revenge for what they’ve wrought. They should count their blessings that they can still walk among us unmolested. But they shouldn’t mistake our civility for forgiveness.

    They have the power to shut the sky…and to strike the earth with every kind of plague as often as they wish. I’m not a religious man, but that line from Revelation seems appropriate. The Chinese have shut the world with their latest plague.

    We need to make sure it’s their last.

    https://www.takimag.com/article/speak-the-truth-shame-the-chinese/

    P.S. The Chinese are selling us (i.e. the world, including us) apparatus with which to fight the coronavirus. Apart from the fact thethe Spansih received a shipment which didn’t even work, apparently we are being shipped something which we have paid for, out of China. We should blooming well not pay for a pandemic that they, and only they, created! Grrrrrr.

    1. Hi Lass, apologies if you have already seen this piece in today’DT or if anyone has already posted it. It’s worth a read…….

      When the Government says that there needs to be a “reckoning” with China once the coronavirus emergency is over, its focus must be much broader than simply examining Beijing’s culpability in creating the pandemic.
      The deliberate lack of transparency and cooperation that has characterised the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) response to the outbreak since the virus was first identified in Wuhan constitutes nothing less than a fundamental breach of trust between China and the rest of the world.
      Despite Beijing’s attempts to cover up the true scale of the outbreak in China, British scientists are now warning Downing Street that the CCP has probably downplayed the number of cases by a factor of 15 to 40.
      To make matters worse, Beijing has compounded its reprehensible behaviour by launching a disinformation campaign that seeks to portray China as the victim, rather than being the instigator of a global health crisis that has so far claimed almost 40,000 lives worldwide, and caused the greatest slump in global economic activity since the Second World War.
      China’s attempts to blame the initial outbreak on an American military delegation that visited Wuhan last October have received short shrift in Washington, while British ministers have privately expressed their disgust at Beijing’s attempts to exploit the pandemic for economic gain with what they call “predatory” offers of help for affected countries.

      Nor, as Beijing declares “victory” in its own campaign against the virus, is there any evidence that China has learnt its lesson. The reopening of live animal markets, where bats and scorpions are offered as traditional medicine, suggests China’s rulers have no intention of fulfilling their pledge to close the markets, which is where the virus is believed to have originated.

      At every level, the CCP’s response to the coronavirus challenge has been contemptible, to the extent that, once the present crisis is over, there needs to be a radical rethink in Britain and other Western countries about our future dealings with Beijing.
      Certainly, the idea that it will be business as normal so far as our trade ties with Beijing are concerned will be totally unacceptable to the vast majority of the British public.
      There is a deepening resentment among ordinary citizens that China is ultimately to blame for the disruption the pandemic has inflicted on their daily lives, for causing the greatest assault on their personal freedoms in peacetime, for millions of workers losing their jobs or taking pay cuts, and for victims of the coronavirus ending their days alone and isolated from their loved ones.
      China’s appalling conduct from the outset has led ministers to warn that the country risks becoming a “pariah state”, and this assessment must be at the heart of how Britain shapes its future relationship with the CCP.

      The first, and most obvious, casualty of Britain adopting a more robust approach to Beijing should be Boris Johnson’s questionable decision to allow the Chinese telecoms giant Huawei access to Britain’s new 5G telecoms network. Even if Mr Johnson persists with the flawed assessment that Huawei can maintain its involvement without jeopardising national security, the Prime Minister will face renewed Cabinet pressure to terminate the arrangement.

      Serious consideration must also be given to Britain’s broader trade links with China, which are currently worth around $25 billion a year. For too long British politicians and business leaders have kow-towed to Beijing and ignored the CCP’s repressive rule in the hope of landing lucrative contracts. This has resulted in important sectors of the British economy being out-sourced to the Chinese, from the manufacture of car components to vital pharmaceuticals.
      Champions of these profitable trade ties, such as former chancellor George Osborne, who once enthused about a “golden era” in Sino-British relations, worked on the assumption that Beijing did not pose a threat to British interests.
      The naivety of this approach has been exposed through China’s response to the coronavirus, with the CCP at one point threatening to withhold the export of key medicinal supplies. If China can no longer be trusted to honour existing trading arrangements in our hour of need, then industry leaders must give serious consideration to relocating key manufacturing back to Britain.
      The Government’s forthcoming integrated defence and security review is another area where we need to take heed of the threat China poses to our well-being. The last defence review, in 2015, worked on the assumption that Russia was the state that posed the biggest threat to our security.

      This assessment will need to be reviewed in the light of the immense damage Beijing has inflicted on the nation’s economy and health. In future, we will need to focus our attention as much on the inner workings of the CCP’s Central Politburo as we do the Kremlin.
      The era when gullible politicians in the West could give China’s motives the benefit of the doubt is well and truly over.
      ◦

    2. Canada donated a lot of medical equipment to China in February. Canada is now buying medical equipment from China.

    3. Maybe if we started referring to it as the Colona Vilus, they might realise what we’re talking about.

  98. The UK must learn to become self-sufficient just as we did in the last war.
    At the moment it has all has all the right resources but not necessariy iin the right places.
    The big difference is of course thar the battle is now on the home front

    https://youtu.be/_YMVPXmaKds

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