Sunday 5 April: Britain needs reassurance that curbs on liberty won’t last indefinitely

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/2020/04/04/lettersbritain-needs-reassurance-curbs-liberty-wont-last-indefinitely/

1,025 thoughts on “Sunday 5 April: Britain needs reassurance that curbs on liberty won’t last indefinitely”

  1. Two killed and several injured in French knife attack. at 4 Apr 2020

    Police told French media the arrested man was a 33-year-old asylum seeker from Sudan. Anti-terrorism investigators have been advised and were said to be evaluating the situation before getting involved.

    Morning everyone. There’s an oddity. Have the French adopted a different policy to concealment? The Germans have still not released any information about the driver who ran over those children a month ago and the Brits simply sectioned the woman who killed the child in Bolton which conveniently avoids apportioning motive.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/04/two-killed-and-several-injured-in-french-knife-attack

    1. Morning Minty.

      “Socialist image makers like the detestable Alastair Campbell and murderous Islamic Jihadists were the quickest to catch on to persuasion through undetectable falsehood. Today everyone’s at it, so nobody knows who to believe: reality has left the theatre. What’s more, nobody cares…..reality is at home alone – friendless and isolating itself from a relatively benign virus.”

      An interesting essay from John Ward: “How the camera became a pathological liar” https://hat4uk.wordpress.com/2020/04/04/the-weekend-essay-how-the-camera-became-a-pathological-liar/

    1. Morning Michael – maybe its just the subject matter, but I find neither the cartoons or the subject remotely funny

    2. Keir Starmer will just be the beard behind which the islamic movement can increase its power in the UK.

        1. So was Ed Milliband, but the Islamisation continued unabated!
          That’s why I say Starmer is the beard – he presents an acceptable, non-islamic front to the sheep.

    1. Corbyn’s finest achievement was to make Labour unelectable. At least he did something worthwhile.

      ‘Morning, HK.

      1. ‘Morning Hugh. A good point. And they still haven’t come to terms with their own unelectability

        1. Come on, now, give him a chance. He’s only been in charge less than 24 hours.

  5. This is quite the most worthwhile thing I have seen in The Guardian in decades

    ‘Gruffalo stayed in the cave’: Axel Scheffler and Julia Donaldson’s coronavirus cartoons
    Axel Scheffler and Julia Donaldson 2020

    The creators of the Gruffalo have produced a series of cartoons to encourage people to stay at home during the coronavirus crisis

    Sat 4 Apr 2020 14.37 BST

    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/8f447f18120b723ddb69ffc1b0b10641a46ccbdb/0_0_6142_4961/master/6142..jpg?width=1010&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=36f4d2cd799305d8fcafd80247d19168
    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/803bc469e4906cbc039867d36026f079e26e72a7/0_637_6142_3688/master/6142..jpg?width=1010&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=cd956a49834be22c385d7e289de99322
    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/0d70e13794843bfcdb195cdf9ddc5de30d477210/0_0_6142_4961/master/6142..jpg?width=1010&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=438163cafa30c81cd647c22c6e869778
    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/bd97de9159404c3df5503e58d60a29f8175dfc71/0_0_6142_4961/master/6142..jpg?width=1010&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=ca1658ab54edfc1c45f4fb5c103f7ddc
    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/0ed77aaf1313ae09d3f970af95b2a127b498c82d/0_0_6142_4961/master/6142..jpg?width=1010&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=b0c7afb1a3211b31f86ef793a42183d2
    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/490bdd90a9459601912653bbf95441f993fadab8/0_0_6142_4961/master/6142..jpg?width=1010&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=9e9a8a6e48d0e9c2fda18fb3eebf8903
    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/3f15dfce934b4a61fa71e91b2884d988805ae69c/0_0_6142_4961/master/6142..jpg?width=1010&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=1f93e741b3e9552e180ecaa70c1bbf6a
    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/bf5a0d0dd79a2bf807e5564d77dd4e37c443e182/0_0_6142_4961/master/6142..jpg?width=1010&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=b428e1784d0824239f6033b866cba495

    https://www.theguardian.com/books/gallery/2020/apr/04/gruffalo-axel-scheffler-and-julia-donaldsons-coronavirus-cartoons

    2. Some of those revoltingly smug little characters are not keeping the correct social distance!

  6. ‘Morning All

    “It could never happen here”

    Well that’s gone well hasn’t it,it turns out we are a nation of snitches and narks who crave authoritarianism at any price and common sense be damned

    If you sit down for half an hour in the middle of your “permitted” exercise and take your shirt of to catch some vitD it seems the virus streaks 30 yards across the grass to infect you…………..

    Who Knew……..

    https://twitter.com/g__ferris/status/1246475565072371712

    1. “No Sunbathing – Exercise Only”
      Another phrase, like “Diversity Is Strength” that Orwell would have kicked himself for not thinking of when he was writing 1984.

    3. Today I will live dangerously.
      I will take Spartie for a walk this morning.
      Then, in the evening, I will venture out again to the post box (are you listening CCHQ?); in that 100 yards, I will spray around as much C19 as I can manage.

      1. Best Beloved takes Dotty at least twice a day. Sees no-one and walks on rural paths by fields and woods.

        1. Ah, but is BB adhering to the country code? No frightening the horses, wipe your hands before and after using stiles (that’s a new one), etc.

          1. Of course she is, Conway, and she collects all the poop, way out there in the Rural Rides, where animal dung is such a great fertiliser. She’s a wonderful gal and the little bitch goes along with her. (Hoi, Yanks, a bitch is a female dog in case you didn’t know).

          2. It’s a measure of the invasion of the townies that people have not been following the country code. Unsurprising as most of them have no idea that it exists, let alone what it is.

  7. Do not be fooled, Keir Starmer is no centrist
    ROBBIE GIBB – 4 APRIL 2020 • 5:00PM

    Aside from Jeremy Corbyn, there can be no other Labour politician who bears more responsibility for the party’s crushing defeat at the last election than Sir Keir Starmer. While Corbyn spouted the politics of the student union and opened the door to toxic extremism, Starmer was waging his own ideological battle – to stop Brexit.

    As shadow Brexit secretary, he offered sincere assurances that Labour would respect the referendum result. But, as director of communications at No 10, I saw first-hand how Labour’s new leader sought to block our departure from the EU. I sat in on many of the cross-party Brexit talks and witnessed how he would frustrate any progress with endless objections. This reached farcical levels on one occasion when he branded the language of one government document as totally unacceptable, only to be told the text had been cut and pasted from a Labour paper.

    Ultimately the public was not fooled, either by the “lawyer’s Brexit” that Starmer offered up or by public assurances that Labour would respect the referendum. He now has a mountain to climb when it comes to reconnecting with voters. How he approaches the terrible Covid-19 pandemic will be a major test of whether he can win back their trust.

    If ever there was a time to transcend the boundaries of political tribalism, it is now. The Prime Minister yesterday wrote to party leaders urging them to “work together” with the Government. But will Starmer be able to resist playing politics with this pandemic? My guess is not. In his acceptance speech, he insisted he would work with the Government but would “challenge” and “call out” ministers if necessary. He went on to lay out a key battle line that will emerge when Britain breaks free from the pandemic – public sector pay.

    It seems, as with Brexit, that Starmer will insist he is putting politics to one side, while in reality indulging in the same old point-scoring. This political profiteering will only serve to divide when we should all unite. We are all on the same side in this war and Starmer would be wise to avoid going down this route. Daily press conferences mean the public have access to Government information as never before.

    They can judge for themselves whether ministers are doing everything possible. These ministers will rightly be held to account over the roll-out of testing – as they have been over protective equipment, intensive care beds and ventilators – but only those blinded by ideology would doubt their determination to beat this virus.

    I fear Starmer may be no more capable of breaking free from his own form of political tribalism than Corbyn was. He is not from the hard Left of the party like his predecessor – but he’s no centrist either. He is a true believer in the ideology of woke. As a human rights lawyer, he has dedicated his career to pursuing radical change in society through the courts, and being well paid for it. He represented poll tax rioters and striking print workers at Wapping. He helped eco-warriors in their bid to physically block road-widening schemes and often worked against the police.

    He is fully signed up to the articles of faith of the London metropolitan elite: supportive of open-door immigration, fiercely anti-Brexit, suspicious of patriotism and desperate to blame society rather than criminals for crime. The reason Labour lost dozens of seats in the North and Midlands was that traditional Labour voters realised the party was distant from their concerns and beliefs. Worse, it had contempt for them.

    So yes, Starmer will bring order to the grotesque chaos of today’s Labour Party, he will make his arguments in a reasonable tone and he will get a hearing. But in the end he is too immersed in the gospel of the progressive elite to be able to reach out to the communities abandoned by Labour. Above all, he won’t do the crucial thing that all successful leaders of the opposition do: he won’t challenge his party activists to look at themselves in the mirror and ask why the public rejected them.

    The Labour leadership election lasted for months, but not once did its eventual victor challenge the prejudices of Labour members. Political parties win elections by moving out of their ideological comfort zones and standing firmly in the mainstream, where the general public is. That’s why Keir Starmer is not the answer to Labour’s problems.

    Sir Robbie Gibb is a senior adviser at Kekst CNC and a former director of communications at 10 Downing Street
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/04/do-not-fooled-keir-starmer-no-centrist/

    2. He was also one of the worst Directors of Public Prosecutions in my professional lifetime.

      1. Welcome back, Bill!

        Yes, he was a complete prat, lacking in sound judgement and always far too keen on self-promotion. Living proof that politics is for the otherwise unemployable?

        1. Hullo, Hugh.

          And able to command huge “consultancy” fees – references to which appear to have been deleted from Google…can’t think why…

      2. Morning, Bill. How nice to hear from you. I hope you and the MR are fit and well.

      3. Bill, welcome back! I hope this is not just a brief “pop in and pop out” and that you stay on here for a considerable length of time. Yesterday, someone suggesting a full English breakfast might just include baked beans brought Grizzly back to refute that suggestion. It’s as if we are back to the good old days (despite us all having to stay at home for the foreseeable future). Regards to the Most Recent.

        1. He’s been forced onto Cynics R Us because MR has had enough of his moderate and considered views.

        2. He’s been forced onto Cynics R Us because MR has had enough of his moderate and considered views.

      2. Morning Minty
        Starmer is as unctious as that ex washing machine scandal MP chap who has a sitting sister .. Cannot remember his name . Keith some one or other .

        In fact some of those Labour men and women are similar to the the spider rhyme , come into my web said the spider to the fly!

    2. She’s worked out how to open the lid of the crayon box but is barred from using the sharpener.

    4. Hang on! Max Headroom was my hero! (And immeasurably superior to that other bloke Keir Garten?)

  10. Working from home proves offices are out of date — we’re more productive in our jim‑jams
    Rod Liddle — Sunday April 05 2020, 12.00am, The Sunday Times

    “Nobody knows anything, so shut up” is the rather mordant thought that occurs to me whenever I listen to the various pundits, experts, journos and — especially — government ministers telling us on the radio what’s going to happen with this wretched virus. Not least our health secretary. Expecting Matt Hancock to lead us to a disease-free sunlit upland is rather like expecting a blind man to find a discarded matchstick in the Kalahari desert.

    I don’t entirely blame Hancock. I just wish he’d stop pretending he had a clue what he’s talking about, when he patently doesn’t. And the optimistic encomiums about getting this thing “beat” in the next couple of months sound a little hollow when some local health bosses have just effectively said of all over-75-year-olds in care homes: do not resuscitate; let ’em die.

    Meanwhile, commentators from both sides of the divide have been predicting that the current strictures on our lives will, once this is over, behove us all to change our behaviour patterns for good — always in a manner commensurate with their respective political mindsets.

    So, for antediluvian social conservatives like me, it means we will once again value the benefits of a nation state with strong borders, never go to London and upon meeting people say a cheery “Good day to you, sir!” from a respectable distance rather than slobbering over them. For the liberals, it means we will eschew the nation state in favour of worldwide collaboration, and we’ll all be a lot nicer to each other.

    All of this is probably balderdash. I genuinely hope that in future we will travel less, by plane or car, shop more locally and be a little more communitarian in our outlook. But I suspect that as soon as this mysterious parasitical creature has been vanquished, there will once again be a river of good old British urine on the streets of Ibiza and Ayia Napa and we will be every bit as rapaciously selfish as we were before.

    However, there is one good that might come of all this. My suspicion — or hope — is that right now our companies, large and small, will be examining their vast and deserted offices, and the enormous bills for their maintenance, heating and upkeep, and wondering: what on earth is the point of the office any more?

    They had a use once, these desolate areas of parched pot plants and plywood cubicles, patrolled by willy-waving middle managers forever calling fatuous meetings, often involving PowerPoint presentations, in order to ameliorate their own crushing insecurities — but, surely, no longer.

    If, instead of the elderly, we could pin the notice “do not resuscitate” on the door of almost every office in the land, we would be an immediately better, happier and more profitable place for big business, employees and society in general. There is almost no downside. Abolish the office, everybody gains.

    Let’s run through the facts. Home-working (or co-working) employees are considerably more productive than those who work in the office, to the tune of three additional weeks of work per year. Those fatuous, time-consuming meetings are much shorter when conducted remotely (plus the company doesn’t have to provide stewed coffee and cheap biscuits).

    An American workplace survey showed that the more workers were out of the office, the more innovative and successful the company. Another US survey suggested national productivity would rise by $334bn (£273bn) if workers did their jobs from home, or a “third site” (such as a co-working space or, in my case, Madame Svetlana’s Correctional Dungeon and Cocktail Bar).

    Imagine the cost savings to our companies. And then imagine what we might do with those buildings, given that we have a housing crisis. Just as we transformed and humanised our docklands and inner cities by converting the old warehouses into apartments, around which sprung up a plethora of shops and restaurants, we could do exactly the same with the thousands of newly redundant offices.

    Commuting? Dead time. We could spend those precious hours doing something more fulfilling with our lives than wondering if we have passed Hither Green, or growing ever more enraged in a queue at the Swanley interchange as we spew carbon emissions into the air. And we’d avoid the personal costs of the commute: a Swedish study suggested that people who commute more than 45 minutes a day each way were 40% more likely to divorce.

    Homeworking has already seen a rise of 173% from 2005 to 2015 (again, American figures; they’re ahead of us on this). The trend began two decades ago. Here, in coronavirus lockdown, we’re experiencing a bit of what it might be like if that Victorian concept, the office, were suddenly abolished. A quieter, happier, more efficient way of working.

    Nature takes over

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/imageserver/image/%2Fmethode%2Fsundaytimes%2Fprod%2Fweb%2Fbin%2F8b896f2a-7676-11ea-bb38-48b9ff09ecb0.jpg?crop=1500%2C1000%2C0%2C0&resize=1180

    Going Caracas
    Some things are still happening, out there, beyond our eyesight. Did you know, for example, that Venezuela seems about to go to war with everybody, especially Portugal?

    I exaggerate, but only a little. The demented Venezuelan government is angry with Portugal’s national airline, TAP, accusing it of allowing what it calls the opposition (read: “legitimate government”) to bring explosives into the country. Meanwhile, a Venezuelan navy vessel rammed a German cruise liner. The warship sank, the cruiser merrily sailed on, crew sniggering in a very smug German manner.

    I’m mildly appalled that we haven’t got ourselves involved yet. But, then, Venezuela v Portugal does sound more like a World Cup quarter-final, rather than the start of the Third World War.

    Harrowing times in the garden
    Apparently, gardening is the best way to lift the gloom of lockdown, as it gives one an enormous sense of self-esteem. This is according to a typically useful study from Anglia Ruskin University.

    The problem is, I already have an enormous sense of self-esteem, however grotesquely misplaced — and every attempt at gardening has lowered it considerably. My last vegetable patch finally yielded some scant produce, which, in terms of man hours and equipment, worked out at about £450 per courgette. Worse, my family wouldn’t eat them because they didn’t look “clean”.

    Rabbits ate the lettuces, slugs finished off the cabbages. Wood pigeons ate everything else, despite my purchase of a large plastic sparrowhawk called “Mr Roberts”, which I placed on top of a beanpole. (When I looked out one morning, a wood pigeon was sitting on his head, eating my vegetables).

    Mr Roberts, humiliated, is now sectioned in the garage. The vegetable patch is full of wholesome nettles. And my self-esteem is back to being as obnoxiously vast as it was prior to this failed bourgeois experiment.

    An inspired gift was what I wanted
    It is always pleasant to receive birthday greetings via social media, but the ones I got last week for my 60th had a different tone from those of previous years. Summed up, it was: “Sixty years old? No ventilator for you, sunshine. HB.”

    True enough, I suppose. I had actually requested a ventilator for my family present, but my wife proved as dilatory as Hancock. I got a jigsaw puzzle instead.

    1. I have been in a perpetual state of missing my home for the last six and a half years. Weekends don’t count, because I’ve only just relaxed when it’s time to spring into action for Monday again. In any case, I’ve been working at the weekend for quite a lot of the time, to make more days when I can go to see my elderly parent.
      So my guilty secret is how much I’m enjoying working from home.
      Nobody can make me go out.
      I cleaned the printer the other day, a job which has been reproaching me for at least four years.
      I am finally starting to relax and feel at home in my house.

      1. ‘Morning, BB2, I trust the printer still works and doesn’t now need an extensive (and expensive) repair.

    3. “Expecting Matt Hancock to lead us to a disease-free sunlit upland is rather like expecting a blind man to find a discarded matchstick in the Kalahari desert.”

      That matchstick presumably would be a Blackened Swan Vesta…..

    1. I hope those planes are well guarded, also those of other fleets which are grounded.

      Otherwise who knows what may be planted in them.

      1. I noticed UK Slipform, down the road at Dunsley Mill, has had one of the railings of it’s palisade fence ripped off. I’ve e-mailed the company to warn them so I hope they are monitoring their e-mail account.

      2. morning Peddy – I don’t think Richard Branson would dare do anything silly.

        1. You mean he would snip a few cables if he doesn’t get £squillions from the British taxpayer?

    2. ‘Morning, Mags, all those pilots are working from home trying to learn how their Flight Simulator software has been converted for them to take off and fly their planes, remotely.

      Oh, that isn’t what fly-by-wire means?

      1. Nearly. All small boys used to build model aeroplanes. Whether they had a motor or were gliders a key element in preparation for flight was test gliding. The planes were launched by hand at shoulder height. The objective was to obtain a long flat straight glide to earth. Balance weights would be adjusted front to back to ensure the correct balance. Once the model flew in a long gentle stable glide, A real flight could be tried. A glider would be launched by tow-line. A small diesel motor might be fitted. A glider would be trimmed to fly in a wide circle and would gradually descend to earth. A motorised plane would fly much faster and would climb. Some might even have radio control. If the engine stopped the plane would descend quite quickly but in a stable and safe descent, just as in the hand launched testing.
        Real planes were made the same way. All were made to be stable, to glide back to earth if the engines failed. Because they were inherently stable they “wanted”to fly in a straight line in a shallow glide. This meant that they had to be forced hard to do anything else whether it was dog-fighting for fighter jets, or sharp turns for small private planes for fun, or airliners coming in sharply to land at small city runways.
        This required energy, manual or power-assisted. The plane resisted being forced out of the gentle flat flightpath. It made sudden moves more difficult but was inherently safer. Pilots could set the controls and doze off, even before the days of auto-pilots.
        When micro technology and small powerful computers came on the scene, all the small adjustments could by made by the computer sensing the forces at work. The computer sent orders to motors and solenoids at the rudder, flaps, ailerons and motor speed regulators, fuel flow and so on.
        To make this efficient the plane was built to be inherently unstable in every possible direction and position. It meant that the plane should easily be turned, dived and generally manoeuvred in any direction speedily and without any inertia or resistance to overcome. Planes would happily loop the loop or dive down vertically from the merest touch of the controls by the pilot, power-assisted.
        It resulted in planes that could literally fly themselves, making their own adjustments for wind conditions, more sensitively than human pilots, while the human pilots drank coffee with the flight attendants and First Class passengers.
        However, when the control systems fail the planes are inherently unsafe and usually cannot be successfully flown manually, except to any extent that fail-safe positioning and replication of controls (redundancy) has been built in.
        I have no special knowledge or expertise, it is a schoolboy explanation.
        Hope it helps.

        1. Many pilots lack experience of “seats of the pants” flying, so when they are required to do so things rapidly go wrong. The Air France accident was a case in point.

          2. By the time they called the Captain, things had deteriorated so much they were pretty well fooked. Over reliance on faulty instruments finally did for them.

          3. That’s jogged my memory. Were the external information collectors not at fault? Pitot tube kind of things?

          4. Yes. I seem to recall there was discrepancy so it sent the sensors into a loop or something like that. They were giving false readings so all the time the captain was hauling back on the stick when he should have been diving. Unsurprisingly, it stalled and fell out of the sky.

  12. Good morning, all. Just dipping my toe in. After many weeks away, I thought I let you know my views on the Plague.

    I believe it to be a very clever bit of biological warfare by yer Chinese. They have convinced the West to panic and go bust. Then the’ll step in and buy everything up for pennies. You read it here first.

    One bit of advice – don’t try to move house when the country is at a standstill.

    1. They have already bought lots of stuff for pennies. They just bribed the politicos.

      Morning, Bill

      1. Good morning. I was thinking rather that they would take over the whole of western Eurp.

    3. Many a true word…my daughter’s house purchase is in limbo, she has a buyer and another house lined up, but without a remover nothing can happen.

        1. Quite well, thanks for asking. A few years younger than you, but suffering with the old BP, I await the virus relieving the comooni’y of the unproductive burden that I am. But I’m sure you’ll cheer us all up.

        2. I see you still have the carp keyboard and happily call Joseph by his anagram.

      1. HMS Amethyst if I recall correctly. Today we need America to send an aircraft carrier – a gunboat won’t do.

    6. ‘Morning, Bill, Good to know that you haven’t succumbed to the dreaded lurgy. Was it the boredom of being busy that decided upon your return to the fold? Or is there just nothing left to do? I doubt that last bit since you’ve left yer France.

      Welcome back vieux haricot.

      1. Morning, Tom – it was partly being in quarantine – which expires tomorrow; and mainly because the MR told me to STFU with my cynical views – which I so wanted to share.

        2. Ah, yes, Best Beloved also gets tired of my rants and I’m now only allowed to rant at the TV – always provided that she can still hear the lies and drivel being spewed.

          Nothing for it but to retire, hurt, to the office and find something to rant about on here.

          1. Rant? Shome mishtake, shurely. Measured and thoughtful comment on the events of the day!

    7. Morning M.Thomas – I’ve tried to move home twice in the past 10 days and my last attempt a few days ago was thwarted by the buyers’ Solicitor who advised them not to complete (even though my removal firm had stated categorically that they would arrive at 8:00 am on the day of the move so I could vacate the premises.)

      Now I learn that the empty property that I was planning to move into has been made available to a senior physiotherapist to enable her to isolate herself from her partner (who suffers from asthma) – she is still working (as the only permanent member of NHS Staff in a community hospital – the other permanent staff having been seconded to the DHG and being replaced by agency staff and some retired NHS staff who have returned to work).

      C’est la Vie!

    8. Good morning, Bill.

      How nice to read your comments.

      You cynical?…..Perish the thought.

    9. I think a cleaner at the Wuhan Research Lab. found a dead bat in a waste bin and flogged it off to Cousin Hoo Flung Dung for his stall at the local market.

  14. Morning all and a special good morning to Bill.

    SIR – We live in challenging times, but this crisis will pass. The predilection for more state control, however, may not.

    Police officers are being asked to define “essential” activities, and people are being asked to inform on their neighbours. The implications are disturbing.

    Once the virus has been overcome, we must ensure that our way of life is not threatened by a bigger state. Our public services rely on a vibrant private sector.

    Charles Foster

    Chalfont St Peter, Buckinghamshire

    SIR – Let us make some reasonable assumptions to illustrate the awful coronavirus dilemma facing the Government.

    Continuing the lockdown is likely to devastate the lives of at least 25 million citizens and bankrupt the Government. Lifting it to allow the resumption of economic, social and cultural activities may result in 250,000 fatalities. Which of these should the Prime Minister choose? For the moment he prefers to “save lives” and “protect the NHS”. But surely more lives will be lost with the probable upsurge of the virus in the autumn – and the only way to preserve the NHS is to promote a thriving economy.

    The Government must do an about-turn and order people to return to work as soon as possible, mitigating some of the Chancellor’s measures. All the Government needs to do after that is to protect the vulnerable as far as possible, through voluntary lockdown among those over 70, those afflicted by respiratory or other serious medical problems – and, of course, those who have come into contact with the virus.

    I am 83, with several background medical afflictions, so might be among the fatalities. But we need to adopt a strategy of mitigation rather than one of repression.

    Pascal Ricketts

    London SW1

    SIR – The experts have run their computer models to predict the spread of coronavirus and come up with wildly differing results. They can’t all be right – but they could all be wrong. Yet the Government has based its response on these speculative figures, rather than adopting the methods used to combat the spread in countries such as South Korea, which have proved effective. Why?

    John Godfrey

    Hitchin, Hertfordshire

    SIR – On police advice, our seafront car parks have been closed. This denies access to open spaces for those within walking distance, particularly the elderly and flat-bound.

    Much of our vitamin D comes from short daily periods of sun exposure between April and September. Police action in preventing access to safe open spaces risks another public health crisis of increased fractures, notwithstanding the effects on immunity and mental health.

    Dr David Ward

    Gosport, Hampshire

  15. Morning again

    SIR – Concern has been expressed that the lack of immigrant farm-workers caused by the coronavirus pandemic will lead to a dearth of fruit and vegetables in shops.

    Is it now time to set up a land army to help harvest such crops? With colleges and universities closed, there are thousands of young people at home. Many will live in, or close to, farming areas, and would be ideal to fill these roles. The very nature of the work would mean they would not be in close proximity to each other, and they would gain both an income and valuable experience.

    Ted Shorter

    Tonbridge, Kent

    SIR – Self-isolation has created a sustained period of “gardening leave” for very many people. The therapeutic benefits of gardening are well-known, and there is much interest in “growing your own”.

    Given that April and May are crucial planting months, why are garden centres closed? By all means have entry restrictions and keep cafes closed, but items such as seeds, plants, composts and fertilisers should be readily available.

    Mike Hames

    Cradley, Herefordshire

    SIR – I have recently had the opportunity to spend a lot of time in my gym at the bottom of the garden. While rowing, cycling and using an elliptical trainer, the highest heart rate I have achieved is 150 beats per minute. Yesterday, however, my tracker recorded 170 bpm. I had been forking over a couple of flowerbeds.

    Geoff Brown

    Haywards Heath, West Sussex

        1. Hullo, K. Indeed – we are recovering. The MR is slaving marking exam papers – I relax in the greenhouse – pondering why the trombetti seeds are not germinating….

          1. I have two remaining from last year and I do believe, via a quick scrape and look, that at least one is germinating. If I am successful I will build a much larger frame to accommodate the monster.

          5. Our grand-daughter is currently at a loss; she had geared herself up for her GCSEs (‘O’ levels to you’n’me). Now she has to hope she didn’t pee off her teachers too much.

          6. All the students who were on our Skype French course were very grateful because it gave them something interesting and instructive to do.

            We were very impressed with how very hard they worked and the quality of the research work Caroline set them to do. Next course starts this afternoon with an introductory session.

      2. Heyup Bill!
        Hope you’re keeping well and that your house sale gone through without problems!

        1. Good day, Robert. The actual sale was fine – the money came through to the MR’s bank two days later. The problems were the logistics.

          2. ‘Morning, Anne, Best Beloved and I are having our Great Escape by taking advantage of our click and collect at Waitrose, Ipswich.

            Since we both qualify as sick and feeble old fogies, we wouldn’t be able to enter the store to collect, so BB’s grandson is coming over from Colchester to actually collect and shove it in the back of the RAV4 – which BB is taking advantage of quieter roads to have her first drive in it to see if she likes it.

            Grandson will be rewarded by a large Lemon Drizzle Cake and a dozen large eggs, fresh from the local farm. He’s a good boy and loves his Nan.

          3. If the eggs are coming from where I suspect, good choice.
            Keep my rellies solvent.
            We always carry shopping bags in the car.
            A ward sister I worked with was married to a Romanian. When they went back to visit the old folks at home, they used to prominently display packs of ciggies on the dashboard. That little gift wafted them through many a border post.
            My shopping bags are the same principle. The Iron Curtain has merely migrated to Blighty.

          4. Yes, Gordon and Wilma – both on the PCC as well and Gordon raves about his RAV4 as well.

    2. We have already pointed out to 16 year old grand-daughter – kicking her heels since her fate now depends on teachers’ attitude – there are plenty of local businesses that could do with pickers and packers.

  16. Smee again and I’ve unearthed a joke book I put together in 2000. Some have grey whiskers on them while others have become quite smutty from lying in the dark for so long. However;

    Her husband has been slipping in and out of a coma for several months yet she stayed by his bedside every single day.

    When he came to, he motioned her to come nearer.

    As she sat by him, he said, “You know what? You have been with me all through the bad times.

    When I was fired, you were there to support me.

    When my business fell, you were there.

    When I was shot, you were by my side.

    When we lost the house, you gave me support.

    When my health started failing, you were still by my side.

    When I think about it now, I think you bring me bad luck!”

    2. As I have said before; we didn’t have all these panic measures before we went metric.
      2 metres distance – pah!!!

  17. We’ve had income tax since 1799 – as an emergency measure to defeat Napoleon. Now unless someone knows different, Napoleon was finally seen off in 1815. Yet here we are 205 years later. . .

    1. Until 1799, taxes were grossly regressive and unfair and often led to riots. The secessation of what became the United States of America started off as a rebellion against an unfair tax.

      Since then, there have been a number of unfair taxes, such as the Window Tax and the Community Charge, as well as numerous stealth taxes and charges that put up overheads. This is particularly onerous today when the survival of businesses depend on keeping overheads at rock bottom during times of national emergency.

      Income Tax is progressive, fair and comparatively easy to collect, since it is levied on liquid earnings before they are spent.

    2. Ah yes, but like waiting for a convenient second wave of corona virus, you can never be too careful.
      No government ever willingly gives up on repressive measures.

    3. The man is a zombie. Look into his eyes and you see little that is alive. Listen to his words and you hear platitudes delivered with the capability of a corpse.

        3. Bonjour, mon vieux, content de te revoir!

          It’s a real pleasure to see you’ve rejoined us. Trust all’s well with you and yours?
          :¬)

      2. He deserves full credit for steering Labour into a 180-degree U-turn on their 2017 Manifesto re. Brexit and thus helped dozens of seats transfer to the Conservatives in 2019 – a bigger plonker than Johnson …

    4. Given that the Labour Party is possibly the biggest cess-pit in modern Britain, it is inconceivable that anyone they could elect as a leader would be untainted.

      1. Harrumph, Phil, he’s another, almost in the mould of the poisonous shit called Bercow, who doesn’t recognise that his wish to remain in the EU was over-ridden by 17.4 million people and he did his damnedest to stop it but remaining mealy-mouthed about it. There is no place in any form of government for odious scum like these two.

  19. Call for social media platforms to act on 5G mast conspiracy theory. Sun 5 Apr 2020 08.11 BST.

    The government is to hold talks with social media platforms after mobile phone masts in Birmingham, Merseyside and Belfast were set on fire amid a widely shared conspiracy theory linking 5G networks to the coronavirus pandemic.

    Broadband engineers have also faced physical and verbal threats by people who believe that radiation from 5G masts causes health risks and lowers people’s immune systems.

    Conspiracy theories can work two ways of course. There’s considerable Foreign and Domestic opposition to Huawei being given this task so a little unfavourable coverage would not go amiss and what ordinary person would know where the masts are, let alone traipse round half of the UK to set them on fire?

    https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/apr/05/call-for-social-media-platforms-to-act-on-5g-mast-conspiracy-theory

  20. Hancock says sunbathing is against the rules. 5 April. 2020.

    Health secretary Matt Hancock is first up on Sophy Ridge on Sky News this morning, emphasising that people should not flout the coronavirus lockdown rules despite the warm weather.

    “Sunbathing is against the rules that have been set out for important public health reasons,” he said, adding that it was “unbelievable frankly to see some people are not following that advice”.

    “I say this to the very small minority of people who are choosing to flout the guidance you are putting other’s lives at risk and you are putting yourself in harm’s way.”

    So says the Party Health Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Republic of Britain!

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2020/apr/05/uk-coronavirus-covid-19-live-news-hancock-starmer?page=with:block-5e8988e48f08c9eaf0daeb3f#block-5e8988e48f08c9eaf0daeb3f

    1. If the Health Secretary is getting close enough to see some people sunbathing on their balconies and in their gardens, is he not flouting regulations on social distancing?

      1. I trust no country, government or political party that had ‘Democrat’ in its name. The one thing you may be sure of is that they are anything but Democratic.

    3. It would be more helpful to be told WHY sunbathing is against the rules, & not just because Hancock says so.

      2. That reminds me of working with Chinese nurses.
        However illogical the treatment we were carrying out, the answer was always “Sister said….” No doubt if Sister said “cut off his head” they would have unquestioningly done so.
        And these were Chinese from Hong Kong and Malaysia.
        You can see why China is such a basket case of illiberality.

    4. I get the feeling that the isolation bandits do not just want people to sit indoors there has to be a element of pain and torture involved as well for them to feel satisfied.

      1. Like Covenanter children being beaten for looking out through the windows on a Sunday.

        1. Traditionally play park swings were locked up on a Sunday in Scotland. (Well within living memory.)

    6. Never forget that before the coronavirus thing started, Matt Hancock said “Nobody should have the right to choose their doctor.”
      I find this statement, from someone who masquerades as a Conservative, utterly shocking.

        1. In response to someone apparently having tried to avoid a doctor from an ethnic minority. A very telling piece of virtue-signalling.

      2. Morning BB. There aren’t really any Conservatives in the Tory Party or in Westminster for that matter. They are all in various shades Neoliberal!

  21. Getting fed up with all this fuss about essential workers, okay for a week or two it went by without much thought, but people must be waking up to the fact that all workers and jobs are essential, if only to the the wages of the essential workers.

        1. I see the lockdown has not dulled your rapier-sharp wit. Plum – if I interpreted you answer right, which I think I did!

          1. Hi lass, hope you and David are both OK….

            It’s pretty shite here but thankfully I have Maud!
            Struggling with laptop..aarrgghh….

  23. SIR — I am 83, with several background medical afflictions, so might be among the fatalities. But we need to adopt a strategy of mitigation rather than one of repression.

    Pascal Ricketts
    London SW1

    May I suggest lots of sunshine and cod liver oil capsules as ways to supplement your intake of vital Vitamin D?

    [Counting …]

        1. ‘Afternoon, Tom.

          Sorry for being late in replying but I’ve been out all afternoon enjoying a birthday party at a restaurant. Strange situation this: the restaurant normally serves a typical Swedish Sunday smörgåsbord buffet which is well-attended; however, due to the current situation, they are still open, but serving pre-ordered courses which are brought out, ready-plated, from the kitchen to the tables.

          We were all seated a metre apart on the long tables and had plenty of elbow room. The food was the usual delicious fare but it all seemed so very strange.

          [BTW. I knew you would suss out the Vit D/Rickets connection. :•)]

    1. and we didn’t (or rather we daren’t) speak with our mouths full and we knew how to use a knife and fork.
      Morning Maggie

      2. My father had a strict rule of no speaking at the meal table except to ask to leave the table when you had finished eating.

    2. That’s so good!
      I was a 70s child and I remember not knowing what pizza or yoghurt were, and the first time I saw cooking oil.
      I’d add another one: nobody we knew had a freezer.

      Remember Jilly Cooper calling muesli “rat’s droppings in sawdust” in one of her early novels?

      1. I qualified in Dec. ’71 in Bristol.
        Some months later I went back for some reason &, now fully entitled, I took a seat in the SCR. The sole topic of conversation was one-upmanship over freezers.

    3. “Seaweed was not a recognised food.”
      Unless you were Welsh.
      (Do I hear the thunder of feet scrambling over Offa’s dyke and blood curdling yells approaching from a westerly direction?)

        1. Google indicates 1958 which chimes with my recollection. Perhaps it was rolled out in phases?

          1. The Egyptians had it long before UK – Pharaoh Liquid – it was kind to mummy’s hands

      2. My grandmother had a plastic thing that you put all the old pieces of Fairy soap bars in and squidged it around in the bowl of hot water. The resultant soapy solution was all they had.

        1. Gosh – that takes me back. My mother had one – and the slimy mess in the water was – too horrible to describe.

          1. Nice to see you back Bill, trust you are well. A friend of mine wouldn’t use washing up liquid (can’t remember why), she used soap powder – I tried it, it was horrible, slimy stuff

        1. An empty Sqezy bottle then filled with soapy water was the windscreen washer in my 1936 Wolseley 12. Had to wind down the window first. No heater either.

    5. Priceless Belle – well do I remember it! Having to beg a ration coupon from my Mum for my two penn’orth of sweets weekly!
      OB
      x

  26. 317849+ up ticks,
    ALERT,
    All I am hearing is echo’s of police sirens, must be the expected break
    out from the old peoples home up the road.
    Many now , led by old Gert ( 95) streaming past the window heading for the uckit inn to join the lockin, many are clutching ciggies, pipes & crib boards darts etc,etc.
    The stand off will last as longs as the old firkins hold out.

  27. And another thing.

    The Sunday Grimes splashes on its front page what the Queen will be saying.

    Wouldn’t be nice if they did NOT do that, but reported tomorrow, what she had said?

    1. They are all at the same game, it’s appalling but then the media have been revealed in their true colours over the past few years. Only Clicks count…

    3. Remember the days of embargoes? ‘Not to be released until 20.30 Sunday’?

      Whatever happened to them?

      Now we get ‘The Queen will say..’ instead of ‘The Queen said..’

    8. Welcome back Mr Beagle, nice to see you, to see you nice.

      Have you sold your property in France and are you back in the UK. (Apologies if you’ve been through this already).

    9. Remember the days of embargoes? ‘Not to be released until 20.30 Sunday’?

      Whatever happened to them?

      Now we get ‘The Queen will say..’ instead of ‘The Queen said..’

        1. Her Maj reportedly does have a good sense of humour. But she is not one to set the cat among the pigeons, unfortunately.

    1. It is Sunday you know, Stephen and everyone has been practicing all week to perfect their Sunday Morning lie-in and now they’re checking if it works.

      ‘Morning.

      1. I don’t normally have a Sunday morning lie-in; I’m usually off to church. I have to get accustomed to having nowhere to go and nothing to do. It is making me lazy (and depressed).

      1. Ah the Penguin School of Management Theory: One Penguin is selected by his fellows and pushed off the ice into the sea. The others look on intently. If Penguin in the water bobs up to the surface and isn’t promptly eaten by a Leopard Seal – the others dive in saying in Penguinese: ‘Come on in the water’s lovely”

    3. I’ve been busy writing a letter to the Queen:

      Your Majesty

      Please don’t bother giving your speech to the Nation and the Commonwealth tonight at 8 pm, Ma’am; we’ve all read it in the press this morning.

      Your humble servant (curtsies)

      Elsie Bloodaxe (Mrs)

      PS – Could you please have a word with your Prime Minister and ask him to get a move on; I still haven’t received a copy of the £5 million letter he promised to send to each and every one of us.

  29. We need Churchill’s can-do spirit to get our bureaucratic health system moving
    DANIEL HANNAN – APRIL 2020 • 7:00PM

    So much for the idea that reforming the quango state was a side issue or distraction. In a crisis, the inertia of our executive agencies can become lethal. Consider Public Health England (PHE). In theory, that vast bureaucracy exists for precisely such an emergency as the present one. It has more than 200 executives on six-figure salaries, some of them earning more than the Prime Minister. For years, its busybody officials have hectored us about pizza and fizzy drinks. Yet the moment a real public health threat comes along, they prove useless.

    A paper by Matthew Lesh of the Adam Smith Institute sets out to explain why the UK has conducted fewer tests for Covid-19 than comparable countries. It finds that the most successful nations, such as Germany, South Korea and the United States, were quick to push testing out to private laboratories. In Britain, by contrast, there was an early determination to concentrate the samples at PHE’s own facilities. “The UK’s Covid-19 testing has been dangerously slow, excessively bureaucratic and hostile to outsiders and innovation,” Lesh concludes. “PHE has actively discouraged use of private sector testing.”

    Naturally, in politics, ministers get blamed for the shortcomings of public bodies. In an inversion of Baldwin’s quip about press barons, ministers have responsibility without power. Voters insist, for example, that they want an NHS free from political interference; yet they blame politicians, rather than the NHS, when things go wrong.

    Hence the determination with which Matt Hancock, the Health Secretary, has taken control of the situation. He knows that he will be judged by the Government’s success in containing the disease. No voter wants to be told, at a time like this, that large bureaucracies are unresponsive. No voter wants to be reminded that, as late as February, PHE was fretting about inequality, while the World Health Organisation was telling us that racism was more dangerous than the coronavirus. People want action from their elected leaders.

    And, by heaven, they are getting it. Hancock’s return from his seven days of self-isolation was like the teacher coming back to the classroom. After a week of lethargic daily briefings, it felt as if someone was in charge. There are to be more swab tests, more ventilators, more hospital beds, greater tracking and surveillance, and support for a British diagnostic capacity. “And I say to this man, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh.”

    The Prime Minister, perhaps even more than his Health Secretary, knows how Winston Churchill used to cut through bureaucracy by taking personal charge. “Action this day”, he would scrawl across memos. As Boris hauls himself from the pupa of his self-isolation, something similar is happening across Whitehall.

    British commentators went weak at the knees when the Chinese managed to build a new hospital in Wuhan, but consider what has happened here: a mammoth new facility in east London completed in nine days, with regional hubs following in Glasgow, Harrogate, Manchester, Birmingham and Bristol. At the same time, clinical trials – an area where Britain can fairly be said to lead the world – are being stepped up.

    True, we don’t yet have a reliable way to identify people who have previously recovered. But it is surely only a matter of time before one of the many tests currently in development is shown to have a high degree of accuracy. That will be our way out of this wretched situation. At the very least, antibody tests will allow immune people to get back to work. But they could do much more. If they suggest that infections were more widespread than was realised at the time, that there were many mild or asymptomatic cases, they might allow us to lift most of the current restrictions.

    It is hard to see how else we can avoid years of poverty and unemployment. Politicians know that they are being judged solely by the number of coronavirus fatalities, which creates a perverse incentive to maintain the shutdown for longer than the hard science might suggest.

    Suppose, for example, that growing evidence were to support the Swedish approach – that is, promoting social distancing and banning mass meetings, but otherwise leaving things open. Suppose (this is necessarily a conjecture, but not an unrealistic one) that we could be reasonably confident that infections had peaked by Easter. There would, I suspect, be overwhelming pressure to err on the side of caution, to keep the restrictions in place until we could be certain.

    Look, after all, at the opinion polls. Fifty-four per cent back the Conservatives. Seventy-two per cent approve of the way the Government is handling the crisis. Ninety per cent support the ban on commercial activity (I refuse to call it a “lockdown”, a ghastly term borrowed from prisons). In the circumstances, all the pressure is for ministers to do things that are probably unnecessary, rather than run the slightest risk of being accused of not doing enough.

    The cost of the restrictions is hard to measure, but no less painful for that. One of my university contemporaries , who has a history of mental health problems, has struggled terribly with confinement. A neighbour is facing the grimmest of hat-tricks: her business ruined, her house-move frozen and her cancer operation postponed. The village osteopath, who went from 300 patients a week to zero when the bans came in, has been forced into insolvency. Nationally, a million more people have been pushed on to benefits.

    I am astonished by how many commentators duck these consequences by airily asserting that “lives matter more than the economy”. What do they imagine the economy is, if not the means by which people secure their welfare? The economy is not some numinous entity that exists outside human activity; it is the name we give to transactions among people aimed at maximising their wealth, health and happiness.

    If shops and businesses (excluding only those which are judged disproportionately likely to accelerate infections, such as nightclubs) are able to open next week, we might yet escape the worst. Many firms teetering on the brink of bankruptcy could recover. But if the prohibitions remain in force into May, businesses will topple like dominos, and a decade of depression will ensue.

    Anyone can follow public opinion. The measure of leadership is to anticipate it.
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/04/need-churchills-can-do-spirit-get-bureaucratic-health-system/

  30. Bugger the Government and all who sail in her. I go where I want, when I want. I’m putting my dog in the car and driving to Loch Meiklie for a long walk.

    I was born a free man and if anybody wants to take away those freedoms ….. μολὼν λαβέ

  31. BBC:

    ‘Coronavirus: Exercise out of the home ‘could be banned’ if people flout rules’

    Handcock. Backed by der Starmer.

    They’re just bloody loving getting the whip hand back over the little people, aren’t
    they? The peons have been getting uppity over the last few years.
    Can’t be having that………………
    Tossers

    2. Maybe this is why the snivel serpents persuaded Boris to go with Neil Ferguson’s Scenario – to pay us back for voting for Brexit time and again.

    3. 317849 + up ticks,
      Morning Rik,
      The little people AKA, the herd, will continue with the rebellious talk right up until they kiss the usual candidate
      X in the polling booth.
      Hold your nose / best of the worst.
      Comes under the heading re-cycling…………….. sh!te.

    4. Hancock really has lost the plot, if he ever had it in the first place!! This lunacy needs to stop and be replaced by a healthy dose of common sense, especially in the police force!

    5. Yet Norway is contemplating reducing lockdown- such as schools open again after Easter.

    6. Let’s penalise the vast majority because of the actions of a few. Mainly mozzies?

  32. Oh, and one other thing. If the people in charge of the meeja had been around in 1940, they’d have told you the war was lost, we should welcome our Cherman liberators, hand over our homes and businesses to them and yer Plod would been demanding that you get your yellow star on sharpish.

    There – I feel better already.

    Enjoy Palm Sunday.

        1. Rain, unfortunately :-((
          But the roads were swept of their winter gravel, so rain will wash a lot of the remaining dust away, and the ground needs wetted.
          You in yer Blighty nest now?

          1. Indeed. I could tell you the whole ghastly saga of our last two weeks in yer France – being obliged to stay indoors, carry our bit of paper, the charities and the dump closed, whether the removal men would make it (they did, bless them)…and the bizarre drive back (hotels closed) – 600 miles and seeing 50 cars in all – and a lorry every ten miles. But I won’t!

          3. That smacks of my definition of a Gentleman – one who can play the bagpipes – but doesn’t.

    3. Oh! Is it Sunday? I can usually tell – the church services were a clue – but Welby has locked the churches and thrown away the keys. Against government guidelines. “Leading beyond authority”, one might say…

      Good to see you, Bill.

      1. Our church is livestreaming the Palm Sunday service. They’ve sent out the Order of Service by email.

        1. So is ours. I offered to add a musical dimension, but under no circumstances am I allowed to nip across the road and attempt to play the organ in a deserted church. I’d b charged with attempted hymnody.

          1. How very odd! I noticed that our first service was in a deserted church, but the second one was done from the Vicarage. I wonder if the Palm Sunday service will be in the church again – and whether they will have someone playing the organ.
            I think they are planning some kind of music, because they have sent out a hymn sheet.

          2. Official C of E guidelines are that services may only be streamed from the people’s homes*. Depending on how this morning’s effort goes, I may rig up a virtual pipe organ setup on the laptop for Easter. If it has sufficient memory. Otherwise it gets complicated…

            *Of course, if you’re ABofC, your home contains a handy chapel…

          5. The service was from the Vicarage per Welby’s order, and the music was recorded. It included a very modern recording of an old favourite hymn “My song is Love Unknown”. It jazzed up beautifully!

            I managed to find an unlocked Catholic church on our walk though, and sneaked in for a quick prayer!

          6. I understand our church is open for private prayer (while practising social distancing, of course) “at your own risk”. Unfortunately, I’d have to drive there and plod would be setting up a road block at the one and only bridge on the main road.

          7. The Danes – as ever – are using churches on Easter Sunday.
            Obviously not enough Jarlsvikings settled in Blighty.

        2. The Bishop of St Brieuc has organised an on-line service which Caroline, a good Roman Catholic, is now attending in spirit on her computer

          1. Someone’s got to pay for our building and slice of the Vicar!
            They represent good value for money 🙂

          3. ‘Morning, Geoff, as Lay Chair of our PCC, I’m aware of the Parish Share – we are thinking of asking for a rebate!

      2. Good day, Geoff. The Sunday Next Before Easter (as one was wont to call it…)

          4. Why “Palm”, Geoff? Same word used in Norwegian, not “håndflate” (p. of the hand).

          5. ‘Morning, Paul, ‘cos dem Middle Eastern Natives scattered Palm Leaves in front of Jesus on a Donkey as he entered Jerusalem as The Messiah.

          6. The vicarette used to organise a genuine donkey (called Noah) to circumnavigate the church on Palm Sunday. Fortunately, he didn’t seem to produce a Flood 🙂

      5. My rector has sent us uplifting words for Palm Sunday via email. The organist put together a medley of Lenten hymns and uploaded them to YouTube. I don’t think they are great fans of Welby, to be honest.

  33. Carrie Symonds.

    “I’ve spent the past week in bed with the main symptoms of Coronavirus. I haven’t needed to be tested and, after seven days of rest, I feel stronger and I’m on the mend.”

    1. Does just feeling peed off and worrying about the Orwellian world my grandchildren will inherit count as symptoms of coronavirus?
      If so, I’ve got them in spades. (A reference to a suite of playing cards, constable. Please put the door back on its hinges after you dragged me off to the hoosegow. MB feels the cold.)

        2. As in Eric?
          Strange how the greatest prophet of our snitch culture and its greatest enabler shared the same surname.

  34. One thing that puzzles me about NoTTL these days- all the new names of people who are clearly old hands. Did something happen to make a new moniker compulsory? Just asking.

    1. Yes – more or less. The autobot eliminated many people’s upvote balances meaning that they couldn’t access other disqus fora. With a new identity the task of accumulating a positive balance could begin again. Although I’ve changed name, I’m too dumb to have figured out how to do it.

    3. Morning Uncle Bill and a very big welcome back!

      I set up a new account too but only changed my avatar and email address. Partly to evade the auto vote gobbler – the new account is not subject to its appetites – and also because the old account was attached to the BBC email address and I decided it was better that Disqus not replicate my comments there.

    4. Some of us opened new accounts with the same name (I did) and some changed their names and avatars. Just to see if we still got upvotes – we do. But the old ones are all zeros. Nobody bothers about it now. It seems to have been just a Disqus blip.

  35. The denial of antimalarials is a denial of the obligation of doctors to do their best for the sick without the intervention of politicians and cranks. Not to use these drugs is now negligent in my opinion.

    SIR – The chief medical officer, Professor Chris Whitty, has banned doctors from treating Covid-19 with anything other than paracetamol and, in severe cases, oxygen.

    Colleagues have rightly condemned this response, which ignores the experience of doctors overseas. Professor Whitty’s position is that British doctors may not use therapies that have not undergone double blind controlled trials here. This could condemn many thousands to avoidable death through a failure to recognise that different rules should apply when patients are dying at such a rate.

    The drug, hydroxychloroquine, is well-known, with a well-understood side-effect profile. It is safe. It also has a recognised mode of action in preventing replication of the virus. Comparison of the death rates in South Korea and Italy strongly suggests that it works to dramatically reduce the death rate. Evidence from India is similarly encouraging.

    What sort of society do we live in when professors of rheumatology and consultants in respiratory medicine can only object anonymously? It is distressing that colleagues are too scared for their professional positions that they cannot advocate for their patients. Right or wrong, we have a duty to profess that which we believe to be true. To do otherwise brings into question our role in society. Are we doctors or are we civil servants?

    Dr Steven R Hopkins

    Scunthorpe, Lincolnshire

    1. 317849+ up ticks,
      Morning E,
      Doc Steve,from sunny Scunny,clearly showing a yellow belly & commonsense combined, we need more of his calibre in all walks.

    2. Chloroquine is an antimalarial, taken by millions when they did not have malaria, with few side effects.
      The worst case is that it is useless against covid – but at least you won’t get malaria!

  36. I mentioned the other day that I am reading the biography of Field Marshal Slim and there are some extracts that I find amazing. Here’s one that would have our modern diversity outreach coordinators drooling.

    …There were men from every caste and race – Sikhs, Dogras, Pathans, Madrassi, Mahrattas, Rajputs, Assamese, Kumaonis, Punjabis, Garhwalis, Naga headhunters – and from Nepal, the Ghurkas in all the tribes and sub tribes…

    …there were vegetarians, meat-eaters and fish eaters, and men who only ate rice, and men who only ate wheat; and men who had four wives, men who shared one wife with four brothers, and men who openly practised sodomy.

    At one time Slim had 750,000 men under command in 14th Army. Little wonder he has such a great reputation.

    Russel Miller. The authorised biography of Field Marshal Viscount Slim.

    1. The forgotten army.
      I always think of the inscription at Kohima:

      “For Your Tomorrow, We Gave Our Today”

      It always brings tears to my eyes.

    2. Slim was very probably Britains most able general of WWII though this is no encomium.

    4. My avatar reflects my time with 2nd Infantry Division. We used to commemorate Kohima Day every year. I only found out much later that Slim and I both attended the same grammar school.

  37. Larking about with the lads, future MI5 chief who even then was known as 007: How hockey-playing Glaswegian grew up to be the new director general of Britain’s domestic security agency. 4 April 2020.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5780f0231a72d75ea156cf6b2af6debe0690a6bc487a74665d4e11c802ad46ea.jpg

    When his promotion was announced last week, the agency released only limited information about his life for security reasons. Even his age is a secret, with MI5 saying only that he is in his ‘mid-40s’.

    He began as an intelligence officer in Northern Ireland in 1995, where he remained for ten years, and his rise through the ranks continued on his return to London, where he led security operations for the 2012 Olympics.

    In April 2017, a month after the Westminster Bridge terror attack in which five people were killed, he was appointed MI5’s deputy director general and oversaw the investigation into the poisoning of Sergei Skripal, now 68, and his daughter Yulia, 35, in Salisbury, which led to the identification of the suspected Russian agents behind the attack.

    The news of this appointment was released last week but a dearth of stories has led to the Mail recycling it. It contains all the original affectations so we hear again about the concealment of his age (he’s 45) his appointment to his first post in Northern Ireland in 1995 ( the IRA ceasefire was in 1994) and of course the Skripal Affair where he suppressed the investigation so as not to reveal the truth. This latter is particularly interesting since when one thinks of the liaison links between the Security Services then it is not unreasonable to suppose that Mr McCallum not only knows personally the people responsible for the Novichok Debacle but also those who subsequently murdered both Father and Daughter. They probably all tell themselves over cocktails that they are protecting Democracy.

    The publicity picture of him is as carefully composed as the textual image. It shows a confident steely eyed intellectual not unlike Collin Firth’s Harry Hart in Kingsman. The lip line, as an earlier picture reveals, is not hereditary but habitual from the teeth biting the lower lip and with a now permanent wry twist to the left side of the mouth. One would like to think this latter was caused by an appreciation of the hypocrisy of his calling but duplicity is the more probable cause!

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8188075/Larking-lads-future-MI5-chief-known-007.html

    1. You really must stop bin diving. It can’t be healthy for you! I only heard this expression used during a Lovejoy episode. But it explains the row of teddy bears on the front of some bin lorries.

  39. Call for social media platforms to act on 5G mast conspiracy theory. Sun 5 Apr 2020 08.11 BST.

    The government is to hold talks with social media platforms after mobile phone masts in Birmingham, Merseyside and Belfast were set on fire amid a widely shared conspiracy theory linking 5G networks to the coronavirus pandemic.

    Broadband engineers have also faced physical and verbal threats by people who believe that radiation from 5G masts causes health risks and lowers people’s immune systems.

    Conspiracy theories can work two ways of course. There’s considerable Foreign and Domestic opposition to Huawei being given this task so a little unfavourable coverage would not go amiss and what ordinary person would know where the masts are, let alone traipse round half of the UK to set them on fire?

    https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/apr/05/call-for-social-media-platforms-to-act-on-5g-mast-conspiracy-theory

    1. How do you set one on fire?
      The phone masts I’ve seen are not the old telephone masts made of wood soaked in tar for two years.
      I remember the local hoohah over a mast being sited alongside a school route (kiddiewinks’ brain cancer etc). It was pointed out that those same kiddiewinks were welded to their phones which were not 20 or 30 feet away from their heads.

      2. Morning Anne. Whatever it would require a committed individual or a conspiracy. Something our new Mi5 boss could invesigate! Don’t hold your breath waiting for a result!

    2. ‘Morning, Minty, I don’t suppose, for one minute, that the destruction is an attempt by the PTB to track and trace each of us by our mobile phones?

      1. I leave my phone at home.
        I only ever carry it when embarking on a long journey in case the Noddy car plays up.
        So that fear is currently in abeyance.

  41. The owners of the ExCeL centre in east London are charging the NHS millions
    of pounds in rent to use it as a temporary hospital for coronavirus
    patients.
    The ExCeL, owned by the Abu Dhabi National Exhibitions
    Company (Adnec), is charging the health service £2m-£3m a month,
    according to industry sources.

    The ExCeL’s decision to charge rent
    is in contrast to the NEC in Birmingham, owned by the American private
    equity giant Blackstone, which is providing the venue for free and said
    it would put “the entire NEC facility at the disposal of the NHS for as
    long as it needs it”.
    Thanks a bunch,we wont forget our “friends”

    1. Well, we won’t, but will Government who quite frankly don’t seem to care.

    2. Indeed. I have blasted American venture capitalists in the past, like carrion crows picking off titbits cheap hived off when British institutions are forced to sell off assets. The NEC was acquired when Birmingham City Council was bankrupted by an Equal Opportunities lawsuit taken by dinnerladies who demanded parity over pay (but not over conditions) with dustmen. After lengthy proceedings, the lawyers made a fortune, the dinnerladies won, the Council had to find a billion pounds to pay the bill, and the dustmen went on strike.

      However, America’s business, crass and money-grabbing it may be, has a streak of philanthropy that is admirable, and we need to consider this each time we wince at another assault on our shared language and their assumptions made about social values.

      1. “The man who dies thus rich dies disgraced.” Andrew Carnegie. He endowed some 6500 libraries.

      2. I remember that lawsuit, but I didn’t realise that was one of the results.
        Once again, the things I learn on NOTTL.

    2. Something similar happened last week at a shop in town, much to the amusement of the checkout staff.

      It took them two days to realise they were pinching all the diving equipment.

  44. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d2eebaaadd6e87876bf37e91831f6b20d7e3f2ead9c95fedf667bc7e932b5f6e.jpg To all the NoTTLers who gave me a kind greeting yesterday (Sue Edison, HardcastleCraggs, BugSpatteredKnees, Alf_the_Great, Ndovu, Stephenroi, rastusctastey, Bob3, anneallan, lacoste and Philip) and nice upvoters (True_Belle, Citroen1, David Wainwright, richardl, clydesider, corimmobile, ashesthandust, Sue Macfarlane and Geoff Graham), I am well, thank you, but maniacally busy.

    I have a large number of commissions for portraits in oils. That is keeping my fully occupied now that the weather is warmer and the natural light is more conducive to painting.

    We are not yet in ‘lockdown’ here in Sweden and life, in the main, goes on as normal. Whether or not this approach by the government here proves to be beneficial or deleterious in the long run still has to be proven. Time will tell. As it stands, many schools are still open — as are shops — and all the government has advised is that people should not gather in crowds of more than 50. Just how they came to that arbitrary figure is anyone’s guess! In any case I only venture out to the shops once a week and the only shelves I’ve noticed that are depleted are those holding dried pasta.

    Sue: it goes well, thank you. How goes it with you?

    HC: The white rose of Yorkshire hangs opposite the green cross and yellow rose (on blue background) of Derbyshire. This is because I am a mongrel of both counties.

    Nursey: I only tidy up prior to having a photo taken. The everyday normality is much different.

    Alf: The studio is all my own work, though most of it was made from scrap timber and second-hand furniture.

    Rastus: My beard came off because it was unbelievably itchy and I feel much cleaner without it.

    Philip: The bog-roll is next to the commode because I cannot afford a ‘groom of the king’s stool’! 🤣

    Bob3: No my side is to the drawing board; my back is to my wall-mounted easel. [The photo, which was taken back in 2013, i.e. before I had made my studio and when I was a tad more portly, shows me at my real drawing board: an A0+ draughting machine that I bought for a fiver when Raleigh bikes closed down their drawing office.]

    I hope and trust that you are all well, sane and happy and that you will come through this period of ‘lockdown’ with your spirits high and health in good order.

    [Anyone wishing to take a gander at some of my output (mainly wooden signs, artwork and food) can do so on my Instagram page under my real name (Alan George Barstow).]

      1. Cripes. Waits for mushroom shaped cloud to erupt in north westerly direction from Allan Towers.

        1. Nah! No clouds of any shape.

          Just got back from a restaurant. The food was delicious but I had to give my spuds away and refuse the pudding.

    2. Go’eftermiddag, min ven,

      En lidt forsinket velkommen tilbage!

      I have seen your art before, and your food when you have kindly sent pictures. Pity food doesn’t travel, as your photos and descriptions always make my mouth water. Namnam, as they say in Daneland.

      Hope all continues to be well in your hytte!

      Har du stadigvaek samme email?

    3. Another nice hat and good to see you smiling, any chance that you can knock out some portraits of us on here if we post some pictures.

      1. Thanks, Bob. I can certainly do that, but I do charge for the service (even though I’m not that expensive).

    4. Morning Grizz!

      I’m well, thanks. Don’t like this working from home stuff but I really have comparatively little to complain about. Depression over this government power grab has given way to anger now. Much healthier.

      1. Hi Sue.

        Biting one’s lip when reading of governmental mismanagement tends to become the norm. I’ve actually isolated myself from all forms of news media (it is all ad infinitum, ad nauseam in any case) and keep to my workshop/studio with some good music (blues, rock, Bach, Pachelbel, and soul) to keep me sane.

        Keep safe.

          1. How could I forget exquisite Spikey music?

            Good belated afternoon, Spikey (just back from dinner out).

    6. Hey Grizzly,
      Life goes on in Canada as well. Not really a lockdown yet but schools are closed and many shops are also closed or only doing curbside pickup.
      Our Ontario premier was much vilified by the left but has really stepped up to the plate (sorry, American ) and is doing as good a job as any politician.

      Your svelte new you is most impressive.

      1. Hi, Richard.

        I’m getting svelter to the tune of 1½ lbs (on average) each week. I’m now just under 2 stones lighter than I was on Jan 1.

        1. Soldiering on, thankee, Grizz. If it weren’t for my dog and the ability to escape with an Ausweiss for the regulation bout of exercise, I suspect I would be even more of a basket case by now 🙂

    8. Morning, Grizz.
      Time for the DT to publish one of your letters.
      (Mainly so I can feel smug and think “I know him”)

  45. Gosh – here’s something I don’t often say.

    A really interesting programme on BBC Radio 3 – Private Passions with Jools Holland. Fascinating.

    And he didn’t allow himself to be overawed by the smug git of a presenter.

    1. Hi Bill,

      I have been to two Jools Holland concerts. Everyone ends up on their feet dancing. Even the wallflowers bloom.

    2. Nice to see you back, Bill. Hope it’s not just a brief visit! Hope you and the MR survived your move back to Norfolk…no tales of woe?

      1. Thanks, jill. Tales of woe? Where do I start…..? (Don’t worry, I won’t.)

  46. Well I’ve been for a walk up by the river. It is a beautiful spring day. The sun is shining and there’s a gentle breeze. There were quite a few people about and the allotments were all busy. Saw one Police car and called in at Morrisons and Iceland. There were no queues at either and I walked straight in. There was a lack of salad stuff but everything else seems to be returning to normal, particularly bum fodder and kitchen towels. I doubt they will sell another pack for the next six months.

    1. Well I shall keep the couple of extra packs I bought back in January safely in the cellar if we don’t have to use them up. Now we know that lav paper is the first thing to disappear, in any national crisis, I will not risk being caught short 🙂

  47. From that used-to-be-a-sort of newspaper-till-they-appointed-the gossip columnist as editor, the mail, Harry Cole’s column:

    “Red faces for the boys in blue after a hastily deleted advert jointly
    put out by Surrey and Sussex Police. The rozzers are hoping to coax
    retired colleagues back into temporary duties during the coronavirus
    outbreak as Police Emergency Response Volunteers. Which has the rather
    unfortunate acronym PERVs.”

  48. Morning, Campers.
    Crumbs, looking at the posting figures, NOTTLers seemed fired up.
    A couple of TCW links for your enjoyment:

    https://conservativewoman.co.uk/its-panic-thats-killing-so-many-italians/?utm_source=TCW+Daily+Email&utm_campaign=babec6da50-Mailchimp+Daily+Email&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_a63cca1cc5-babec6da50-559682581

    https://conservativewoman.co.uk/lockdown-survival-hint-stop-watching-tv-news/?utm_source=TCW+Daily+Email&utm_campaign=babec6da50-Mailchimp+Daily+Email&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_a63cca1cc5-babec6da50-559682581

    3. Very clever Caroline – I had seen it before but certainly enjoyed seeing it again

      1. Yup. Amble boat club, with Warkworth Castle in the background.

        The ex-lifeboat was having the finishing touches put to its paintwork a couple of weeks ago. It should have been out today taking visitors out to see the thousands of puffins that have just returned to Coquet Island for the breeding season.

          1. Moderate SE blowing cross-shore here, sunny 11°

            Might have been a bit too lumpy for a trip today. They go several times a day on two boats the family has, weather permitting. It’s a short season though. The puffins turn up en masse around or just before the last week in March and a week into August they vanish almost overnight as the chicks leave the burrows and take to the sea.

            The terns on the island (Sandwich, common and roseate) and the grey seals are there a while longer and the trips continue , but the puffins are the big pull.

            The island is about a mile offshore, but no landing is permitted.

          4. I just use the Text tool in my editing software (I use photoshop elements). Then I use the ‘opacity’ slider to make the text layer transparent, sliding it down to 25%, 15% or whatever. Saving the image as a Jpeg then makes the text part of the image.

          5. Thanks. I use Affinity Photo (which is similar to Photoshop) and has much the same versatility.

          6. We see an occasional puffin, but razorbills and guillemots are far more common. All pretty birds but the puffin has that public appealing beak I suppose.

          7. I can’t remember the number offhand, but I think it’s about 15,000 pairs of puffins on that island with greater numbers on the Farnes. Plenty of guillemots and smaller numbers of razorbills.

      2. Yup. Amble boat club, with Warkworth Castle in the background.

        The ex-lifeboat was having the finishing touches put to its paintwork a couple of weeks ago. It should have been out today taking visitors out to see the thousands of puffins that have just returned to Coquet Island for the breeding season.

      3. Yup. Amble boat club, with Warkworth Castle in the background.

        The ex-lifeboat was having the finishing touches put to its paintwork a couple of weeks ago. It should have been out today taking visitors out to see the thousands of puffins that have just returned to Coquet Island for the breeding season.

  53. Ah Bless,I know many of us have been wondering what stories are being quietly buried

    Here’s one Global Warming isn’t

    “Not that there has been any coverage

    in the media, which usually reports climate issues assiduously, since

    the figures were quietly release online with no accompanying press

    release – unlike six months ago when they showed a slight warming trend.

    The

    answer to the third question is perhaps the most familiar. Your bills

    are going up, at least in part, because of the array of ‘green’

    subsidies being provided to the renewable energy industry, chiefly wind.

    They will cost the

    average household about £100 this year. This is set to rise steadily

    higher – yet it is being imposed for only one reason: the widespread

    conviction, which is shared by politicians of all stripes and drilled

    into children at primary schools, that, without drastic action to reduce

    carbon-dioxide emissions, global warming is certain soon to accelerate,

    with truly catastrophic consequences by the end of the century – when

    temperatures could be up to five degrees higher.

    Hence

    the significance of those first two answers. Global industrialisation

    over the past 130 years has made relatively little difference.

    And

    with the country committed by Act of Parliament to reducing CO2 by 80

    per cent by 2050, a project that will cost hundreds of billions, the

    news that the world has got no warmer for the past 16 years comes as

    something of a shock.

    It poses a fundamental challenge to the assumptions underlying every aspect of energy and climate change policy.”

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2217286/Global-warming-stopped-16-years-ago-reveals-Met-Office-report-quietly-released–chart-prove-it.html
    We all knew the warmists were full of shite,it was all only ever about Global Socialism

  54. Further constraints on exercising outdoors could mean you shouldn’t be seen talking to your neighbour outside their house/dwelling (which you shouldn’t be doing now anyway) and also you shouldn’t talk to each other whist jogging elsewhere together even if you kept six feet apart.

  55. Another, ‘the death of the Eurozone is greatly exaggerated,’ story, or is the end nigh?

    The Eurozone is teetering in the edge of a collapse. The massive economic costs caused by the coronavirus outbreak and the draconian measures needed to contain it are pillaging the world economy. However, they will deliver their worst hit on the Eurozone.

    This is for the simple reason that the Eurozone has become extremely fragile. The monetary union and banking sector have been mishandled for years. This, not the Covid-19 outbreak, is the true reason, why we are on the edge of a collapse.

    Reaction Life – Looming Collapse of the Eurozone

    1. Instead of the barbarians crossing the frozen Rhine, we have a bat bug flying cattle class.

      1. 317849+ up ticks,
        Morning BB2,
        Is there anything left ? even our security what there is of it, is in jeopardy as in appeasing the chinks with the keys to the door.

          1. 317849+ up ticks ,
            Afternoon LF,
            Most definitely this Island 650 politico’s are spaghetti chain mail knitters of great renowned, & cannot be surpassed in treachery.

    1. An interview with this chap was shared here a couple of days ago. The interviewer let him talk without interrupting him. He was clear and logical.

      1. 317849+ up ticks,
        Afternoon HP,
        Then currently little chance of being listen too
        but every chance of being suppressed.
        The price of the pill has not been
        settled yet, my personal view.

  57. It’s a warm and sunny day today. Quite delightful, might venture into
    the garden .

    1. It’s warmish here, but very windy. I wouldn’t say it’s the predicted 20C….

      1. Hello Mr Viking, no I shan’t do that. I was just going to wander around the pond
        not sun – worshipping .

    3. Clouded over, here….And the air temp isn’t up to much…10.3C. Metcheck thinks it’s 17C here. They are wrong…
      EDIT: NO. They are right. I’d forgotten to switch autoupdate on, on the weather browser page…. It’s 17.7C… No real sun though since this morning…

    2. Nobody is going to take anything she says seriously after this.

      I don’t think that I ever have done!

    5. This is not a resignation matter. This is gross misconduct. Instant dismissal, after due process, takes about 3 days including appeal. No compensation .

    6. If they weren’t going to shoot him, why didn’t the police use the van to break his legs against the bumper of the other vehicle?

        1. To answer my own question, they probably didn’t want to damage the crumple zones.

    1. We have to be given a credible alternative to vote for. The PTB and Marxist media will ensure that we’re not.

      1. 317849+ up ticks,
        Afternoon IMS2,
        So for many submission has worked if that is the case then touching the forelock will soon be back in play then when passing a politico.
        Mass uncontrolled immigration, leading to mass murder, mass treachery, mass rape & abuse ongoing to this day consequences of these parties policies.
        Yet they still find succour/ support/ votes resulting in more of the same.
        Individual self respect has been kicked into touch by many methinks.
        Sorry but you don’t have to be “given” anything, you work to obtain it.

    2. If they got rid of Blair’s postal vote factories, Labour would struggle to get 100 MPs!

      1. 317849+ up ticks,
        Afternoon BB2,
        Post rotherham & the Jay report I would like to see lab/lib/con ALL politico’s struggle with a life long sentence, as in ,life long.
        Their current supporters / voters two days more.

  61. Good afternoon all. …. we shall not be defeated …

    The Battle of Britain

    Years
    ago during the Battle of Britain (a small island off mainland Europe
    for you chaps reading in the states!) a famous French (From the noun
    France meaning a bigger country on mainland Europe situated close to
    Britain!) fighter pilot had evaded capture by the Germans and was now
    the RAF’s (Royal Air Force chaps) top flying ace.

    Having
    come back from one harrowing sortie, Herve (pronounced Ur – vay) the
    sole surviving member of the squadron crash landed his damaged &
    smoking spitfire on the grass runway..

    “Fuel up another one” shouts Herve “I fight the dreaded Germans on my own”

    He
    duly got into a new plane flew across the channel (a sea between
    Britain & France) and when over northern France encountered a large
    squadron of German planes. Throwing caution to the wind Herve lined them
    up in his sights and dived into attack.

    He was promptly, unsurprisingly, shot down and crashed in a farmers field.

    Climbing
    from the smoking wreckage Herve is confronted by an angry farmer
    brandishing a shotgun and threatening to “blow his German head off”.
    (the French fought the Germans in WW2 and were on “our side”).

    “Non non” says Herve “I am Herve, the famous French fighter pilot, and have been shot down, you idiot farmer”

    The
    fame of Herve had even spread to this little farm in northern France
    and now reassured the farmer was delighted. Taking Herve’s flight bag in
    one hand and supporting the tired Herve with the other the farmer led
    our intrepid hero back to his simple farm house for some warming food
    and a glass of wine (this is an alcoholic drink favoured in France. It
    has absolutely no relation to similarly labeled drinks sold in the US –
    it is actually rather pleasant).

    On
    entering the house the farmer introduces Herve to his wife and his
    beautiful blonde 18-year-old daughter Nicole. After a fabulous meal and a
    few more glasses of real wine, the farmer announces that it is time for
    bed. But there was one problem, there were only 2 bedrooms, one for the
    farmer & his wife the other for Nicole (the lovely young daughter –
    concentrate).

    Herve swore on his
    honour that he would not lay a finger on Nicole and could be trusted to
    share her bed for the night before escaping the next day across the
    channel to Blighty (AKA Britain see comment line one).

    Needless to say that no sooner had Herve closed the bedroom door he jumped the lovely young Nicole.

    “Oh Herve, kiss me! kiss me!” cries Nicole

    Herve
    reaches into his flight bag and brings out a bottle of Merlot (see
    previous comment on wine) and splashes it on Nicole’s lips.

    “What are you doing, Herve?” says the startled Nicole.

    “I am Herve, the famous French fighter pilot! When I have red meat, I like to have red wine!”

    She smiles and they start kissing.

    When things began to heat up a little, Nicole says,

    “Herve, kiss me lower.”

    Herve tears her blouse open, grabs a bottle of Chardonnay from his flight bag and starts pouring it all over her breasts.

    “Herve! What are you doing?”, asks the bewildered Nicole.

    “I am Herve, the famous French fighter pilot! When I have white meat, I like to have white wine!”

    They resume their passionate interlude and things really steam up.

    Nicole leans close to his ear and whispers, “Herve, kiss me lower!”

    Herve,
    grabs a bottle of Brandy (a highly combustible alcoholic drink made
    from grapes and much stronger than Budweiser) and pours it in her lap.
    He then strikes a match and lights it on fire.

    Nicole shrieks as she bats out her flaming bush then shouts angrily at Herve,

    “Herve, what the hell do you think you’re doing?”

    To which Herve replies,

    “I am Herve, the famous, French fighter pilot, and when I go down, I go down in flames!”

    2. Is that Spitfire snobbery? The chances are he would have been flying a Hurricane!

  62. https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/does-matt-hancock-really-think-banning-all-exercise-is-a-good-idea-

    Does Matt Hancock really think banning all exercise is a good idea?

    Matt Hancock has threatened that the government will ban all forms of outdoor exercise if a ‘minority’ of people continue to ignore social distancing rules.

    Ministers had been worrying that this weekend, which is sunny and warm, would see people trying to get around the lockdown by congregating in parks. Yesterday there were reports – not all of them hugely reliable or conclusive – of large numbers of people turning up to their local parks, with police forces dispersing groups and stopping people from sunbathing. Lambeth Council has announced Brockwell Park in London will be closed today after too many people converged on it.

    Hancock’s threat looked inevitable before the weekend had begun, but given today’s weather is going to be even lovelier, he issued this warning on Marr:

    ‘My message is really clear: If you don’t want us to have to take the step to ban exercise of all forms outside of your own home, then you have got to follow the rules.

    ‘The vast majority of people are following the rules. Let’s not have a minority spoiling it for everybody.’

    Ah, yes, the ‘punish everyone for the transgressions of a few’ approach. I’m sure we’ll all just forgive and forget when this is all over.

    1. The vast majority of people are following the rules. Let’s not have a minority spoiling it for everybody.

      Isn’t that a quote from Rudolf Höss?

      1. After an irritating walk with Spartie, it really bothers me how many Britons have embraced the police state.
        As I’m a cripple, and Spartie has to investigate every clump of nettle, sniff every blade of grass, etc…. the brain washed spend an awful lot of time cowering in the shrubbery.
        Just as they relax and creep out, I cough.

        1. It’s the opposite here; I had to wait for a chap on a bike to move (he was fiddling with his saddle while parked on the pavement). When I finally attracted his attention, he indicated he was waiting for his girlfriend to arrive on her bike. Eventually they moved off and I was able to achieve 6′ separation. Then we had the ditzy mother pushing a pushchair accompanied by a loose brat on a scooter. She yelled to the wayward brat to stop – it did, 2 feet away from me and stared at me as though I’d dropped from outer space. I keep my dog on a lead (not that he needs it) when others that he doesn’t know are about. Why can’t dozy mothers keep their feral offspring under control and six feet away from other pedestrians? I sense a case of separation rage is not too far away!

  63. Further to my post earlier about the lockdown in Dubai. Our daughter has confirmed that all places of worship are closed. If it’s good enough for the muslims in Dubai, the majority, then it should be good enough for us.

    1. Some Islamic countries crack down much harder on ‘Islamic’ practices than we do in the UK e.g. wearing the veil. Proving that some Muslims adopt these practices in the UK just because they can get away with it.

          1. Indeed it is. It is NOT a religion, more like a cult. There is no separation between mosque and state.

  64. Sometimes they strew His way, and His sweet praises sing
    Resounding all the day, hosannas to their King
    Then “Crucify!” is all their breath
    And for His death they thirst and cry


    A verse describing how the fickle crowd that strew palms on the road in front of Christ only to clamour for his crucifixion a short time after. This is one of my favourite hymns with a sublimely beautiful melody which we sang at our wedding which took place on Easter Saturday in 1988.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMart4wXsI0

  66. I’ve just watched Cochrane on my recording of the Andrew Marr Show. He has managed to reconcile the anomalies in his early advice and Marr was suitably unctuous. His demeanour seems to be much more urbane in real life than when he is dispensing wisdom on the internet.

  67. Keir Starmers speech has been described as Churchillian on LBC this morning just heard a bit of it

    We wont go on the beaches, we wont go on the landing grounds, we wont go in the fields and in the streets, we wont go in the hills; we shall never go out

      1. Unless they’re the victims of Pakirape gangs in which case they’ve “Made a lifestyle choice” and can be safely ignored for the sake of “Community Cohesion”
        I struggle for words to express just how much I hate these scum

      2. Welcome back – let us hope this will be far more than just a fleeting visit.

        Our first week of Skype courses went very well and was very much appreciated by the parents and the students. As she always is, Caroline was magnificent and her charm, lucidity, good humour and ability to overcome the lack of physical presence of her students has won golden opinions from everyone which should be worn in the newest gloss.

        The second course begins with an Introductory session this afternoon.

        I have written an article for the DT about how to run a residential French course in France for students who have to stay in Britain but have received no acknowledgement from them. We shall send you and the MR a copy of the text. Perhaps you can let us know why they prefer to publish an article about women who decide to shave their heads bald to pass the time during the lock-down.

        3. Well done Caroline.
          Neither the DT nor any other form of media will ever print/report your success as it’s good news and was carried out by individuals showing their entrepreneurial, organisational and common sense skills. You would be castigated for showing initiative and not waiting months for nanny state to tell you how to do it.

      3. Hello Bill. Great to see you. You have been missed. Please don’t go missing again, gg.

      4. Also excepting victims of Jimmy Saville – see the post further down this thread.

    2. 317849+ up ticks,
      Morning B3,
      Power to the politico’s,
      We the peoples shall surrender on all fronts.

  68. For some time now, folk have been complaining that the police response to reported crime – rape, theft of all kinds, burglaries, crimes of violence, etc. – has been less than positive and police officers prefer to sit at their computers, trawling through social media websites, searching for so-called “hate-crime”, or indeed “thought-crime”.

    Now we are confined to our homes – under Government imposed house arrest – the police are everywhere to be seen, on foot-patrol stopping walkers and questioning them, setting up roadblocks demanding to know why drivers are driving, I haven’t seen such an overwhelming police presence on the streets and highways of Britain for fifty years. Clearly they have the numbers to police the country pro-actively when it suits them.

    Would it be too much to expect that when the present coronavirus crisis has passed, they will maintain these patrols to address the ever increasing incidents of REAL crime and protect the public from REAL criminals instead of returning to their safe-spaces and their computers?

    I suspect we all know the answer to that question.

    1. I suspect we all know the answer to that question.

      Regrettably we do Duncan but it is much more important that the peasants should do as they are told!

    2. I read a report the other day that police have been raiding known drug dealers’ properties because the lockdown means that many will be at home.

      1. If only they had been occupying their time so constructively! The police, I mean.

          1. Well, that is a bit of rare good news! Caught at home with the evidence on them.

    3. I haven’t seen any here in Woking but we do have a sizeable “foreign” population 🥴 nudge nudge 😉 wink wink.

    5. A patrol car moseyed on down the high street bordering our village green this morning like a cruising shark, looking for groups of more than two persons, I suspect. There were far more people out and about on this sunny Sunday morn than ever we usually see.

  69. Closing down to prepare for our Great Escape – If I’m not back by tea-time send for help. Oh. wait a minute…

  70. I understand from BBC TV this morning that there are three states you can be in:

    Clean: No virus , No antibodies
    Infectious: No virus, Have antibodies (been in contact with Infected person and can make clean people become infectious)
    Infected: Have Virus, Are Infectious.(can turn Clean people into Infectious people but no effect on Infectious people)

    Is that right?

    in that case stopping clean people from becoming Infected or Infectious is pointless because there will a second wave.

    That’s why the whole herd has to get slaughtered?.😟

    3. If they can slow it down so that the number of people needing ventilators doesn’t exceed the available ventilators, then they will minimize the number of deaths.

      1. There has been no evidence yet presented, eg real figures, to suggest that anyone at all has survived being put on a ventilator.
        We have seen “survivors” being cheered by dozens of staff as they were wheeled out of the hospital. Is that not a bit odd? If people routinely survived they would leave in the same way as someone with a leg in plaster, being pushed by a porter and that’s that?

        1. I was a bit surprised that they said only 50% of patients on ventilators would survive. I wonder how this compares to other countries.
          Also, whether any of the ventilator patients will recover 100% of their previous health.

        2. This deserves wider reading.

          Ventilators aren’t a panacea for a pandemic like coronavirus

          Dr Matt Strauss

          https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/Ventilators-aren-t-a-panacea-for-a-pandemic-like-coronavirus

          More ventilators!’ cried the journalists on Twitter. ‘Yes, more ventilators!’ replied the politicians. ‘Where are the ventilators?’ demanded the journalists, now screaming on television. ‘Yes, even more!’ replied the government, somewhat nonsensically.

          I am a critical care physician, specialising in the use of such machines. I’m flattered by all the attention our tools are receiving. But I fear the current clamour reminds me of nothing so much as the panic buyers of toilet-paper stampeding over each other in early March. When the history of the Covid-19 pandemic in the Western world is written, I do not believe ‘massive ramp-up of ventilator manufacturing,’ will be credited with our deliverance. Let me explain why.

          Ventilators do not cure any disease. They can fill your lungs with air when you find yourself unable to do so yourself. They are associated with lung diseases in the public’s consciousness, but this is not in fact their most common or most appropriate application.

          There are many reasons a person might not be able to fill their lungs with air. Undergoing a major abdominal surgery under general anaesthesia is perhaps chief among them. Other causes of coma, like drug intoxication or head trauma, also necessitate mechanical ventilation. While some neurological disorders, such as Guillain-Barré syndrome or polio, leave a person awake, but too weak to work the bellows of the lung (the diaphragm.) In all of these cases, the ventilator pushes fresh air containing oxygen into healthy lungs which can transmit the oxygen to the bloodstream.

          Conversely, when a person has a severe lung problem, you might imagine that some proportion of their lung tissue continues to receive air when they breath, but fails to transmit this oxygen to the bloodstream. To compensate for these malfunctioning bits of lung tissue, the person breathes harder and faster, as though they were running a marathon.

          One can only run a marathon for so long before those same bellows of the lung fatigue, and eventually fail. My job is to identify those folks before their lungs stop working, and to put a plastic tube down their windpipe, hooking it up to a ventilator to do their breathing for them. This drastic step is generally predicated on the hope that I can do something to treat their lung problem and liberate them from their ventilator dependence within a few days. This might typically involve antibiotics for a bacterial pneumonia, or anti-inflammatories for asthma.

          Clinical trials of new and old medications are ongoing. But right now, I am sorry to say there is no proven treatment for Covid-19 infection. It is therefore at least conceivable that putting patients on ventilators for Covid-19 pneumonia could be a bridge to nowhere.

          Now of course, hope springs eternal. The patient may recover on their own while we keep them alive with our machines. But this is not a risk-free wager. Dr. Paul Mayo, perhaps New York City’s most illustrious critical care doctor expressed the risks pithily: ‘putting a person on a ventilator creates a disease known as being on a ventilator.’

          When we mechanically blow air into your damaged lungs faster and harder than humanly possible, ventilator-induced lung injury may result. Generally, for a person to tolerate the undertaking, we have to sedate them, leading to immobility and severe weakness. While sedated, the person cannot cough or clear their airway effectively, leading to superimposed bacterial pneumonia.

          This is an awful lot to survive. And in the case of Covid-19, the preliminary outcome data is rather dismal. On Monday, the New England Journal of Medicine published a case series of very ill Covid-19 patients in Seattle with data up to March 23: of the twenty patients who went on a ventilator, only four had so far escaped the hospital alive. Nine had died. Three remained in suspended animation, going on three or four weeks of ventilation. Four escaped the ventilator but remained in hospital.

          Data from NHS intensive care units are broadly in line with the Seattle series. As of 27 March, of the UK’s ventilated Covid-19 patients who left ICU, only one-third were alive. Not reported is how many of those made it home.

          There has never been a placebo randomised control trial of putting people on ventilators versus letting them struggle on. We therefore do not, strictly-speaking, know whether those who survive their time on ventilator may have survived anyway, or whether some would-be survivors died because they were committed to a ventilator.

          There will never be such a trial. Sometimes we feel that a person will definitely die immediately if a mechanical ventilator is not applied, and therefore nothing can possibly be lost in the attempt. But mission-creep affects us all. Every clear-eyed critical care doctor will admit that we sometimes ventilate people more out of wishful-thinking, desperation, or fear of lawsuit, than scientifically-based hope for recovery.

          I spoke with Dr. Mayo because, as a New York City critical care doctor, he really is in the belly of the beast as far as this pandemic goes in the Anglosphere. (Also, as he is currently home sick with Covid-19, he had plenty of time to talk.) He described increasing pressure from hospital administrators, throughout the city, to put Covid-19 patients on ventilators earlier than would otherwise be recommended. The administrators believe that hooking Covid-19 patients up to a closed-circuit breathing apparatus (i.e. the ventilator) may decrease their infectivity to hospital staff. But does this mean we have the patient’s best interests at heart in hooking them up to a ventilator?

          To put it simply, we do not know how many lives ventilators could or will save in the UK. It seems that at least two-thirds of attempts to stave off death with their use will fail in the short term. Of the remaining third, we do not know how many will be successful in the medium or long term. This doesn’t quite seem like a convincing rationale to shut down the British economy, redirect previous manufacturing output towards ventilators and suspend civil liberties to give us more time for the attempt. And those bemoaning the government’s failure to demand more and more ventilators should pause for a moment and ask themselves whether that is really the right solution.

          Matt Strauss is the former medical director of the critical care unit at Guelph General Hospital, Canada. He is now an assistant professor of medicine at Queen’s University

          1. That is interesting. I have suggested that going on to a ventilator might make things worse, from purely a thought experiment.
            My earlier question regarding how many survive after being put on a ventilator has been partially answered. A minority survive.
            From that it looks very much as if the best route if infected is to stay at home, if practical, and deal with treatment, eg chicken broth and hot orange drinks, as necessary.
            One may die at home, but that might be better then being in hospital where they don’t have any treatment to offer that has nay real hope of success.

    4. What about: have had the virus and recovered, so have anti-bodies because your immune system has fought it off?

  71. Morning all. Lovely sunny day in Surrey and a lovely blue sky.

    We have to consider ourselves lucky in the U.K. in Dubai our daughter has just informed us that they’re in complete lockdown. You may go shopping, to pharmacies, hospitals and to ATMs only . Everybody drives everywhere, nothing is “local” enough to walk to. And there are cameras on the roads to catch you speeding, with monthly notification of your fines, and these same cameras of course show that you are out. They have to keep their receipts to prove shopping, pharmacy, hospital or ATM visit, because you may have a phone call/visit from the police. No outdoor exercise is allowed, no walking, cycling, running etc. and masks and gloves are mandatory when leaving the house.

    Nightmare.

      1. All places of worship are closed I’m reliably informed. I suppose they all have their prayer mats at home still.

        1. Possibly Eddy has the answer. But, there are the cameras everywhere, and there are no supermarkets etc. In the desert.

    2. I’d take issue with the word “lucky”. It is not luck. It is the outcome of centuries of toil, argument, fighting, debate, discussion and blood. Now at a stroke the Government is on the verge of abolishing our freedoms. Very soon, we will say, “Enough!”

      1. I meant “lucky” in that we haven’t reached the same as in Dubai. But it would seem that it may come to that soon according to posts below.

        I have never agreed with what’s been heaped upon us. But we as a people are not revolutionary, more’s the pity, and will probably grit our teeth and comply as usual.

      1. Depressing soulless place with no gathering of people in friendly neighbourhoods only in malls with spy cameras everywhere and a boasting Sheik outbuilding everyone else with his easy pickings from under the sand.

      2. It is a dictatorship, yes, one man one vote and the Sheik is the one with the vote. However ex-pats have a fabulous lifestyle out there, at least, our family does but then they live in a lovely big house, unlike the “workers”, who are mostly Indian, Pakistani (but no rape gangs) or Sri Lankan. I wouldn’t want to live there but then I’m not of working age. And if an ex-pat’s job comes to an end then so does his welcome – I think you have 4 weeks to leave the country. Unlike the U.K. your passport is stamped in and out. It’s a wonderful life with lots of sunshine and facilities for every imaginable sport.

        It’s interesting to visit, for the amazing architecture, but we would never want to go there other than visiting family.

    4. Hiya,

      My brother moved to Dubai (from Hong Kong) a few months back. He is the head of first- and business-class food at Emirates Airways for the eastern Asia and Australasian regions. He hasn’t yet informed me of these new changes but I expect that he shall do presently.

      Strangely he admits to loving it there (as he did in Hong Kong) but I suspect that has a lot to do with a large salary coupled with zero taxation.

  72. Thoughts:
    The important point is that a 300+ page Bill was passed almost instantaneously to bring lots of new restrictions into law. One of them presumably being the ability of police constables to impose summary, on the spot fines, because he feels like it. This new Continental thing is very radical. Anyone resisting payment can have the fine doubled and doubled to £960. At that point I suppose a prison sentence may be imposed. This is not good.

      1. No you won’t it’ll be full of oldies like us who haven’t paid the fines.

      2. Well, no. The prisons are being emptied of prisoners and half the staff have already stopped putting in an appearance.

    2. Not having read the terms of these on-the-spot fines – is there no right of appeal? You can appeal against other types of fine e.g. a speeding ticket, so surely there must be the same right of appeal against these new fines? Aren’t courts closed at the moment? If so, there would be a backlog of appeals when the courts resume, if everyone were to refuse to pay them. This would probably lead to an amnesty.

      1. That is not my key point. My key point is that some 22 year old policeman can decide to fine you on the spot. Any appeal means turning up in court at some point.

        1. True, and most people will just go with the flow and pay the ‘reduced’ £30 rather than having to pay £60. It’s only the most committed who would risk the possibility of the courts not pursuing them for non-payment.

      2. There is no appeal process at all.

        All you can do is fail to pay in which case you’ll end up in court.

        1. I don’t know, which is why we need a legal beagle to advise us. I see that that Bill has decided to rejoin us…

    3. I am confident that we will get freedom of movement back, at least while the Tories are in power.
      What concerns me at the moment is

      – abortion – giving out abortion pills like sweeties in reply to email requests is extremely dangerous, and is something the abortionists have been campaigning for for years. I guess they’ve never lived with a violent, controlling abuser.

      – cash – one local supermarket near me is refusing payment in coins, while putting heavy pressure on people to pay with contactless cards. So the Gubmint knows just who was doing the anti-social stockpiling now! There is a very real danger that once this is over, shops will carry on refusing or restricting cash payments.

      1. Paying with a contactless card is all very well but the £30 limit doesn’t go far with a few days’ groceries.

          1. Thanks. I didn’t know that.

            I visit the supermarket once a week & the bill is always north of £60. Offers have become very scarce.

          2. I usually spend between 85 and 105-110 depending on any extras I might have chucked into the basket (litre of Tanqueray on special for 20 quid sort of thing)

        2. I looked on the internet to find out how secure contactless cards are.

          I was absolutely delighted to be reassured that they are very secure indeed. How? Because contactless card readers are only sold to licenced, legitimate traders!

          Go figure….
          If these things were secure, they would be able to sell the readers to anyone. I found one case where researchers “stole” someone’s contactless card details and were able to use them to buy something on the internet, without the 30 pound limit. I don’t know if that hole has been patched, but I wouldn’t bet on it.
          Yes, I am security paranoid, but I’ve cancelled the contactless function on my card, while I contact the bank and ask them exactly what that means, i.e. is my card still spewing out information, with some field that says “use contactless payment” set to “false”?

          1. In theory it’s possible to steal card details from a contactless card. In practice it requires close proximity and a degree in electronic engineering to construct a homemade receiver. The cards are only readable from a few inches away.

          2. How fortunate then that no criminals have degrees in electronic engineering, or ever come close enough to passengers on trains or at the airport.

          3. I’ve seen it done in practice. It was cracked by a professor at a London university and his PhD students. They had a laptop in a rucksack, a sensor in the left sleeve close to the wrist. They were virtually having to hug people at tills but details were stolen. It’s improbable and impractical but not impossible.

          5. I know that, however, they are a nuisance to use, and I would prefer a card that doesn’t need them.

    1. Fair enough, she broke the rules, but why on earth is going out for a drive in your car on you own or with your wife/husband/children banned? No good reason at all. It will just cause more strife on the home front than necessary as people get far too “cab happy”.

      It’s the same here, by the way.

    2. Fair enough, she broke the rules, but why on earth is going out for a drive in your car on you own or with your wife/husband/children banned? No good reason at all. It will just cause more strife on the home front than necessary as people get far too “cab happy”.

      It’s the same here, by the way.

      1. I gather it is because you might break down or have a crash – and then lots of other people would become involved and have to be close to you.

        Allegedly.

        1. AND taking valuable resources away from the NHS and front line police who would otherwise be stopping people going about their lawful (or otherwise) business.

        2. Nanny state is absolutely loving this. This’ll teach the plebs to vote Brexit.

          Edit to try to make sense of wot I rote.

        3. The roads around here are so quiet you would have to go looking for someone to run into.

      2. She has been on the TV telling us not to do it and that is why she should be fired. I have written to my MSP suggesting that they demand that the Government do just that. It is a brazen classic case of do as I say, not as I do. The rules do not apply to me, just to the little people like you.

        1. Indeed. Do as I say, not as I do has never gone down well. One law for all is what we expect (although seldom get).

      1. No perlice round these parts………. we saw three other walkers, one with a dog, and three cars. Also a horse, a muntjac and some cattle. Chiffchaffs were calling and there were some lovely flowers in the verge by the hedge.

  76. Have the Chinese invaded yet………………

    I’ve been allowed out on parole for 20 mins….

  78. With a tear in either eye, I attach snaps of the wisteria at our old house in Laure – taken this morning. It wasn’t out when we left; and it will be over by the time our charming and delightful buyers are able to move in – mid/end May.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/fc6f15f1399dc870dbd0fba5de7c37c757b6c20b14f44bb8563171a69c0d6d18.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/583614f6896fa8c73f7c680913d53198b9ab099fbfbd1105b888ffdc60b614ff.jpg
    Gosh, we had some fun there.

    5. That looks very beautiful, the stonework is very nice too.
      Are you still in that area, it looks wonderful.

  79. I watch the clamour for footballers and the like to take paycuts.
    Private sector paycuts will harm the exchequer, lower tax takes, and profit the owners.

    If anyone should be seeing their pay cut it should be the senior people in the public sector say those earning over £120,000 a year, because that helps the exchequer. Add to that those people in jobs that are now vastly restricted, eg MPs, Quango chiefs and charities.. If £30,000 is enough for Joe Public, it should be enough for them.

    1. If you cut pay, you also cut the tax they’ll pay. Instead, everyone earning over £10k should be made to pay a £1m donation by law.

      1. Did you mean £10mn rather than £10k?

        That tax drop applies to the private sector, but in the public sector the exchequer keeps 100% of the cut instead of the tax paid.

          1. That’s a little harsh, £520,000 “earned” having to make a £1,000,000 donation.

            };-))

    2. In R of Ireland the public sector workers had their pay cut by 10% right across the board in 2008/9. I think that’s a great idea for the U.K.

      1. The public sector here had a virtual pay cut from 2009 onwards as they were limited to 1%.

        1. But only if you were at the top of the top grade. Progression went on as normal.

          1. The lower orders don’t earn a huge amount. Anyone on the max for the pay scale was affected.

          2. They still got an increase. Plus pension accrual.

            In the private sector, many got no increase at all. Plus a minimum contribution into their non-final salary schemes. The public sector did not do that well, but they did a great deal better than a lot of the comparable private sector workers. Who also were without public sector security of employment.

        2. However as far as I understand it they still had their cost of living rises automatically? Perhaps you know differently?

          And as sosraboc says above 10% of £20,000 hurts a great deal more than if you’re paid £125,000.

      2. I’m in two minds.

        Losing £2,000 gross when on £20,000 hurts a hell of a lot more than losing £12,500 gross when you’re on £125,000.

  81. Brendan O’Neil

    Middle-class busybodies and jobsworth cops are ruining this country.

    Brendan O’Neill

    “‘Can I ask what exercise you’re doing, sir, apart

    from exercising your thumbs?’ The copper is wearing a perfect sneer. I

    get the impression he has been waiting his entire jobsworth’s life to be

    able to reprimand someone for sitting on a park bench and writing a

    text message. ‘I’ve been cycling and walking and now I’m resting for a

    couple of minutes’, I say, horrified by my own words; horrified that I

    am having to explain perfectly lawful, perfectly safe behaviour to an

    agent of the state as if I were in the Soviet Union rather than sitting

    by the Serpentine in the heart of London. ‘Well, move on’, he says,

    balefully and gleefully, like a character from a Kafka novel.”

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/04/05/tyranny-comes-to-hyde-park/

    1. The politazis are loving it because the chances of getting into a punch-up row are vanishingly small and they can order people around almost with impunity..

      1. I think after this crisis is over, one or two coppers are going to get jumped. Then everyone can stream out of their houses banging pots and pans and clapping.

    2. “Hyde Park is swarming with police.”

      I’d like just two to turn up at our end of town to deal with the **** currently smoking out the neighbourhood with his bonfire. Two hours of it now. Ring the police on 101 and they tell you to ring the fire brigade. Ring them and they tell you ring the council. In the morning. Brilliant.

      The useless plods would be around in a flash if any of us threatened to go around with garden spades and do bit of beating of our own. Of the fire, of course…

      1. Tell yer plod that the two chaps doing the bonfire are less than 6 feet apart….

        They’ll send a helicopter and snatch squad.

      2. …a little lesson:

        How To Call The Police When You’re Old And Don’t Move Fast Anymore.

        Phillip Hewitson, an elderly man, from Norwich, was going up to bed, when his wife told him that he’d left the light on in the garden shed, which she could see from the bedroom window. George opened the back door to go turn off the light, but saw that there were people in the shed stealing things.

        He phoned the police, who asked “Is someone in your house?”

        He said “No,” but some people are breaking into my garden shed and stealing from me.

        Then the police dispatcher said “All patrols are busy. You should lock your doors and an officer will be along when one is available.”

        George said, “Okay.”
        He hung up the phone and counted to 30.

        Then he phoned the police again.

        “Hello, I just called you a few seconds ago because there were people stealing things from my shed. Well you don’t have to worry about them now because I just shot them.” and he hung up.

        Within five minutes, Six Police Cars, a SWAT Team, a Helicopter, two Fire Trucks, a Paramedic, and an Ambulance showed up at the Hewitson’s residence, and caught the burglars red-handed.

        One of the Policemen said to Phillip, “I thought you said that you’d shot them!”

        Phillip said, “I thought you said there was nobody available!”

        (True Story)

    3. That’s the thing: the speed with which this has all happened, the ease with which police took to their new role of reprimanding perfectly legal and safe behaviour, the glee with which moralistic hacks and curtain-twitching tweeters embraced their role as grasses naming and shaming people for sitting in a park, confirms that this rotten culture was already here.

      Yes Brendan. It was already a Police State, it’s just become obvious!

  82. All over the county the police are patrolling the Nations beaches this sunny day.
    They are not looking for people,
    They have been instructed by Hancock not to let the tide go out.

      1. 317849+ up ticks,
        Afternoon N,
        “They” are trying still IMO to write off her Country also.
        Started long ago, slowly,slowly, catchee the three monkey type voters, first no more standing for the national anthem at the cinema, then no cinema.
        Great lack of Union Jack,
        Applies to many issues building up to the ultimate as in silence is golden, AKA loss of freedom of speech.

    2. I have a strong suspicion that a lot of “awkward squad” patients may be benefitting from just that sort of treatment.
      Part of me feels that if the choice is me or a child then the child should take priority. But at least let me have some input in that decision.

      1. 317849+ up ticks,
        S,
        That decision should never have to be made in a country of such affluence nice gesture but long term, you was a person who could prolong life ie surgeon etc,etc, and the child was a hindley / west type, what would the future hold ?

        1. Oddly enough I was thinking the same thing as I wrote my comment.
          There was a short story I read many years ago where a priest had the power to bring people back to health.
          He was asked why he suddenly refused to use his power.
          He described how he had once saved a young soldier’s life in WW1. That soldier was Adolf Hitler.

          I still think a child should take priority over me.

          1. 317849+a up ticks,
            S,
            As is your right …. at this moment in time.
            To me my post was thinking it through & common sense, but being a real UKIP member
            ( not a ersatz NEc UKIP ) follower, I would say that wooden eye.

      2. A decent functioning healthcare system would mean that you would not have to make that choice.
        Euthanasia, if legalised, will mean putting this choice in front of older people all the time. You’ll get tired of taking the selfish option after a while.

        1. Agreed.

          I am extremely wary of legalising euthanasia/assisted suicide.

          The pressures on the elderly, who “don’t want to be a burden”, from avaricious relatives/charities/the state will be intense.

          1. In the Daily Mail, they regularly have pro-euthanasia articles about poor people with terminal illnesses, who just want to die, but the wicked government has forbidden anyone from helping them.
            The comments and upvotes underneath are always strongly in favour of legalising euthanasia. Actually, they don’t publish comments against it.
            My feeling is that it will overnight become the quickest, cheapest treatment in the NHS’s book. And the government won’t have to pay people’s pensions either – win, win situation for them!
            People learned nothing from the abortion law – it was introduced supposedly to protect the health of the mother – without ever being changed, it has invisibly morphed into abortion because you want a baby of the opposite sex being legal in Britain (this was proved a couple of years ago).
            Yet nobody ever voted on this change.
            There is a very high chance that euthanasia laws would go the same way.

          2. I always hesitate to use “slippery slope”; but time and again it happens.

            As the mercy killing, I fear so. I look at how innovations such as “The Liverpool Pathway” were quickly abused.

            Another example is “life will mean life” when capital punishment was abolished. How many innocent victims have there been of murderers having been released to kill again? One is too many, the actual numbers are dreadful.

          3. You are so right – but we never seem to learn.
            I think the prospect of ventilators being refused to the elderly might focus people’s minds a bit more on the reasons why the authorities are so keen on euthanasia. I hope so.

          4. Be careful what you wish for.

            I suspect that there are many, many people, in positions of power and influence, out there who would be very pro-rationing to exclude the elderly.

            Not least pension providers, local authorities, the NHS and the Exchequer.

    3. Complain to the GMC they’re independent the review will be by ……..Oh………doctors. Perhaps don’t bother.

  84. Latest advise from the Government to quieten down unruly children,
    Just tell them that Matt Hancock wont let Santa out this year

  85. 317849+ up ticks,
    You are more likely to come across the rainbows end & a pot of gold than to see action regarding looking for assurance from these proven political
    ( grass is greener in the eu) cretins.
    A lab/lib/con coalition vow is worth two promises, two promises are worth one pledge, a combination of all three is stable diet for many of the herd,
    the political elite view it as fodder for fools.

  86. Four letters from Saturday’s Telegraph:

    SIR – A catastrophe from this outbreak is that when it is all over, the NHS will be thought untouchable.

    Public Health England has proved spectacularly unfit for purpose and the bureaucracy of the NHS has proved inadequate to the distribution of PPE.

    There is a lesson there for those with the wit to see it. If supermarkets have managed in so short a time to up their game, and are crying out for the lists of the vulnerable to be released so they can be prioritised, why cannot government bodies act similarly?

    Charles Penfold
    Ulverston, Cumbria

    SIR – As a person whose working life has taken me into molecular biology laboratories since the Seventies, I am distressed by our Government’s response to the Covid-19 crisis.

    It appears the Cabinet relied on Public Health England to drive the response to testing, PPE and isolation. I have been perplexed that major laboratories that routinely work with viruses have not been recruited to provide a screening service.

    We surely need a crisis manager to be brought in to take control of Public Health England and make it fit for purpose. We need testing and tracking of individuals to identify infected personnel together with antibody screening to get previously infected NHS staff back to work.

    Dr Jeff Slater
    Kelso, Roxburghshire

    SIR – A few days ago, my 51-year-old daughter died of pneumonia (not through coronavirus) after 10 weeks of intensive respiratory care. Had she survived, she faced many more months in hospital. I know what it involves.

    Therefore please allow me to support the sentiments expressed by Darryl Davies (Letters, March 21) about the folly of the Government’s current policy. Wrecking the economy to prolong the lives of those who must anyway die in the next few years, often in much discomfort, is a total waste of money and may well have wider disastrous consequences. If I should succumb to coronavirus infection, do not put me on a ventilator, but let me go the old-fashioned way.

    Dr Alan Richardson
    Penrith, Cumbria

    SIR – I am happy to applaud my colleagues in the NHS, but I cannot support politicians who have decided to stop cancer treatments. Who decided that it is better to die certainly of a malignancy, rather than risk the small chance of dying of coronavirus?

    David Nunn FRCS
    West Malling, Kent

  88. My bank sent me an email today telling me that my 0.075 interest rate was being cut to 0.010. I sent them a letter bomb.

    1. One has to remember when looking at the names of some organisations that the names are on a parallel with “gay”. They mean the opposite.
      No organisation has been truthful and brave enough to call itself “National Abortions”, or “Baby Murderers” or similar.

      1. 317849+up ticks,
        Afternoon HP,
        A salve title for many along the lines of the three monkeys in the ballot booth.

  90. Funny really but the illegals continue to float actoss the channel , and no one says aw ord about that.. the media nor MP’s ..They seem to be encouraging people to flock over from France . Where are they being quarantined.

    Sorry to sound hard hearted , but it looks as if the poor deceased 5,000 victims of Covid19 will soon be replaced just as quickly.

    1. Where are they being quarantined.

      The same place used to test and quarantine all those flying in? The latter are not being checked.

  91. Are we the same size as Venezuala

    Why is Venezuela in crisis?
    Political corruption, chronic shortages of food and medicine, closure of companies, unemployment, deterioration of productivity, authoritarianism, human rights violations, gross economic mismanagement and high dependence on oil have also contributed to the worsening crisis.

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

    1. Venezuela has oil pouring out of its wells into the sea and the fishing industry has to wash it off before they eat the fish.

      In the UK however the oil is pouring out of the Arab states and is on the way to us in tankers but we can’t use it.
      OPEC needs to reduce supply to keep the price above $50 a barrel but the Russians who are not in OPEC don’t agree.
      After all they can make American oil uneconomic to drill by running it down what could be $10 a barrel and that would shut down more rigs.

    2. Corbyn is now free to go and join a country he so admires. They are welcome to him!

      1. Corbyn fully understands that millions must die for communism to work properly. It’s a price he is happy for others to pay.

  92. Wish someone had told me the Queen is making a speech today.

    I haven’t even got the Turkey in the oven !

  93. Richard Branson and Philip Green are among the British billionaires who have demanded taxpayer bailouts due to Coronavirus.

    I propose we let them claim back every penny of tax they’ve paid into the UK over the years.

    1. Just this minute taken the pork joint out and had a strip of crackling as I put the veg on to boil/steam.

        1. I’m having mushroom risotto followed by vanilla ice cream with passionfruit curd.

    2. Finishing off salmon from last night for a nicoise salad for dinner tonight with (I hope) a nice bottle of Sancerre that we have been saving, for what I don’t know!!

    3. Just had (British) sirloin steak, done on the barbecue, served with Mediterranean vegetables roasted in olive oil and washed down with a bottle of Pecharmant from a nearby vineyard.

  96. Made some bread this morning. No bread maker, did it the traditional
    way. Didn’t go for the once a day lockdown allowed walk today , i assume that doesn’t
    mean I can go for two walks tomorrow.

      1. He’s over 70. Disposable; like the Chinese tat we festoon our houses with every December.

        1. That reminds me, Anne, I must take my Christmas cards down.

          As for bearded gents, my usual life in the slow lane has dropped onto the hard shoulder and my lazy ways have given my razor a rest. At the current rate, my developing beard should be ready for Christmas.

    2. Yep! We’ll all go down with it once they let us out. It’s only a delay while they get the new hospitals ready.

        1. As I understand it, death rates so far have not exceeded those during the normal late winter flu season. There have been headlines each winter for several years now, reporting on the apparent overload on the NHS at this part of the year.
          The difference is that none of us have had a flu jab designed to combat Covid19.

      1. I’m bending my other side today, getting all steamed up again.
        🔥💨↪

      1. Well, as I said, a very colds-and-flu resistant ex-colleague informed me that he caught a Covid-like flu last september in Cyprus.

        BTW, low Chinese death rates 2020 may be due to the fact that it raged through in 2019 and, now, there’s a lot of herd immunity.

  102. Evening, all. It has been a lovely day here; lawns have been cut (after a protracted struggle with a recalcitrant mower – it’s always a bit of a diva, but after a winter’s lay off it clearly saw no reason why it should co-operate and do two lawns!), the front border has had a bit of weeding (it’s a big job and will need several days of intense work to sort it), some plants have been moved from their pots into the beds and the greenhouse has been emptied (I don’t need a late frost!). Spent a bit of time recovering on the chaise longue with a cappuccino and a book. I have now imbibed some fortified wine (it is Palm Sunday, after all) to stiffen the sinews.

    1. I’ve found that leaving the mower out in the sun for an hour does the trick for some reason

      1. I agree, it seems to evaporate the fuel and leave enough of a gap in the system that it can start and continue.

        Mine often fires well but conks out. If left in the sun, it fires and works perfectly.

        1. If only! It isn’t that sentient 🙁 I saw one of those self-propelled, independent mowers at Leeds Castle when I was there a lifetime ago (in reality, last September!). I was not impressed. At least it didn’t fall into the moat.

          1. I have one. Bought it after I had my legs trimmed, but the little blighter couldn’t cope with the slope at one edge of the garden. Used to bury itself in the hedge, then send me a text message saying it was stuck. Last year, I bought a cheap petrol mower, and all is well. ‘Mowhammed’ is going on Ebay.

    2. A few decades back I remember my American niece stomping indoors after trying to mow her parents’ lawn and exclaiming, “That mower SUCKS”! I wasn’t familiar with US colloquial usage of “sucks” up to that point.

      1. It took me a long time to get used to that Americanism! In fact, I cringe now whenever I hear it.

      2. Electrolux, who used to make vacuum cleaners, had a slogan in Europe some years ago which they clearly didn’t realise what it meant in the wider world. “Nothing sucks like an Electrolux”. It didn’t last long…

    3. Walk into Cromford this morning, having a word with the Constable detailed to investigate the possible break in I reported at UK Slipform, walk back with a couple of lumps of tree.
      A later walk up to Groaning Tor and round back home via the side of Slinter Quarry, again with a lump of tree on the return leg, and then got the dinner ready.
      Dinner was vegetable and sliced turkey reheated in gravy from the 4kg crown I picked up from Sainsbury’s on Friday at £1 per kilo reduced from £8/kg! The rest of it is in the freezer for future use.

  103. Back in again. Nice and sunny, But a chilly south-easterly blowing in from the sea.

    I was careful not to sit down on any grass while I was out in case the enjoyment police accused me of sunbathing, but I do admit to briefly ‘touching a surface’ when I climbed over the roadside fence to take a photo. I hope that won’t get me locked into quarantine in a dungeon.

    My social distancing did briefly break down when a guy on a bike whizzed past me on the path. Hopefully we will both survive the encounter.

    1. The Derbyshire police would have regarded taking a photo as non essential!!

    2. We went down a joint bike/ pedestrian path – what a mistake! Lycra clad morons were whizzing past us every few seconds. There were no other walkers, I guess they had already tried this path once and thought better of it.
      On the way back, we spotted another walker crossing a field, and followed in his footsteps to avoid the bike motorway.

    1. The European Union exemplifies the global economic and social earthquake the coronavirus pandemic has caused. It is the type of grave event we were told the EU existed to manage smoothly, through international cooperation and co‑ordination in public health, cushioning economic shock and ensuring a smooth take-off after the crisis.

      Instead, it has been every man for himself; borders closed, essential medical supplies not exported, the EU’s liberal ethos gone. One head of government, Viktor Orban in Hungary, now rules by decree. Public order is breaking down in Italy. All the EU’s weaknesses and federalist fantasies are exposed. As with much European commerce, it is unlikely to be business as usual for “the project” ever again.

      The EU has proved clueless in tackling the economic aspects of the pandemic. An attempt to share out the debt incurred on rescue packages – “Coronabonds” – ended in indecision. Different states face vastly different outcomes. Rich ones, such as Germany, can attempt to take the hit; but those already in dire straits, such as Italy or Spain – the two worst‑affected EU countries – may demand massive handouts from the European Central Bank.

      If forthcoming, they could break the eurozone, potentially driving down the value of the currency; if not, a refusal could destroy the EU, as poorer countries feel undermined. Through most of Europe, prosperity will take years to return to its previous levels.

      In what amounts to an arms race of taxpayer-funded largesse and printing of money, governments around the world have sought to outdo each other in their efforts to shut down their economies in order to “protect” their health services. Now, as the public becomes bored, frustrated and restless under house arrest, attention is turning to the economic effects of a near-total shutdown.

      The collapse in productivity necessitates far higher borrowing, but in the end greatly increased taxation must fund this strategy. That is how we in this country paid for two world wars: though, unlike now, the workforce was entirely occupied, with those not in uniform working in essential war and agricultural production – even during the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic. Thus there were huge revenues immediately from direct and indirect taxes. With sales of non-essential goods plunging and shops closed, the VAT take is down, and millions are producing precisely nothing.

      The Second World War ended the Thirties slump. That had lasted longer in America than in Britain, partly because America delayed leaving the Gold Standard, making its currency wildly overvalued and depressing exports. Neville Chamberlain, first as a chancellor who reduced debt as rapidly as he could and initiated great infrastructure projects, then as a prime minister who, contrary to his appeaser image, expanded defence spending, ensured unemployment peaked earlier, and at a far lower level, than in America. It was not until after Pearl Harbor that America’s economic troubles were over.

      One hopes it will not require a world war to re-boot the world’s economy now, but governments must recognise the threat that economic collapse poses to the international order.

      The United States Congress has announced a $2 trillion stimulus package, but America now has six million unemployed, many of them Trump’s core supporters. Australia’s centre-Right government has torn up years of market economic doctrine and embraced a form of socialism. China, in recent years one of the main drivers of the world economy, could become a pariah when causes of the pandemic are understood, and possibly subject to sanctions that, like all restrictions on trade, will drive up costs.

      In turn China, Russia and other despotisms could claim the crisis is proof that capitalism has failed and a new economic system is needed – one that would bring with it not just lower living standards, but also further curtailments of personal liberty.

      Our whole way of life is at stake here. After the 2008 crash we got used to austerity. After this pandemic the crash could be far worse; and worse still the longer the delay in re‑liberalising.

      Governments across the globe, not least our own, have set an economic template for handling pandemics that will raise expectations if and when one occurs again. It ought to be clear that we cannot really afford these subsidies now and there is already a grave risk that we are storing up an unmanageable burden for future generations. Were a second wave to arrive next year, as in 1918, to repeat the measures would quite simply bring economic ruin, and catastrophe to the social order.

      1. Thanks Geoff..

        Comment
        Margaret Burton 5 Apr 2020 5:57PM

        …. the Chinese are proving to the western governments that they can disrupt western economies at will. First they encourage their student population to acquire western technology from our universities. Then they invest in essential infrastructure projects, followed by the purchase of important western businesses.

        The next step in world domination is to manufacture biological weapons like SARS, MERS and now the latest Chinese virus COVID-19. Once they disseminate the virus first at home, then later in the west, they proceed to set about causing a world shortage of PPE, ventilators and other essential medical supplies.

        Once they are satisfied that sufficient of their own nationals have been sacrificed and the home contagion is under control, they then appear philanthropic by offering to release the stockpiled PPE, etc, back to countries in need. In the meantime the western economies are severely damaged, furthermore, they hope that the west will be forced to lift the economic sanctions forthwith. Clever this communistic, capitalist Chinese dictatorship ….

        1. They’re wily little so-and-so’s. Jeremy Hunt said his wife was Japanese when in fact she’s from Xi’an. {:^))

          1. I’d not like that, unless there’s no round chambered. Glock has no decocker or safety. Easy to pull the trigger unless properly protected by a holster.

          9. A bit…… but he doesn’t know how to kill people with his bare hands in interesting ways. 😀

          10. I dont know, he’s handy with a knife from behind.

            And ofc he can always bore people to death by talking, or take the bag off his wife’s face and scare people to death.

          11. I’ve an old Webley .22 air pistol that will knock a rat off and a .22 break action air rifle with a little bit more poke.
            Did contemplate getting one with an air reservoir instead of a pump action, but they are a little bit too expensive.

          12. I have a few nice Air rifles. Two with telescopic sights. Bagged two magpies today. The gits were raiding the nests in the hawthorn. Don’t tell Grizz ! He might go all Packham on me.

  105. Catherine Calderwood should have been told: “Resign immediately and you might get a new government job in due course.”

    “Either that, or I’ll fire you tomorrow and you’ll never see the light of day and we’ll deselect you.”

    Hypocritical bitch.

  106. Surprise, surprise. Starmer has revealed himself (well, to those who might not have been paying attention) as just another thick, bone-headed, socialistic thief.

    Key workers have been “overlooked and underpaid” and there will have to be a “reckoning” after the coronavirus crisis, the new Labour leader has said.

    Sir Keir Starmer told the BBC’s Andrew Marr: “They were last and now they’ve got to be first.”

    He said another decade of austerity would be a mistake, saying it was “inevitable” that the wealthy would have to pay more.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52169648

    That’s right. All the key workers are paid out of taxes. Dunce.

    Here are a few helpful tips for the Labour leader (and HMG, which is sounding worringly Labour-like). Cut employment costs to promote a healthy private sector (and bring home manufacturing lost to low-wage countries). Scrap DfID. Scrap the Climate Change Act. Change the law to make foreign companies pay more here in corporate taxes. Prevent foreign companies owning utilities (including railways) and residential property. Deal with the immigration problem.

    I’m sure members can think of other measures to raise more tax and reallocate that which is wasted, to reduce employment costs, and to reduce living costs for the poorest (housing is a diffcult one thanks to Fat Gordy).

    3. Get rid of VAT (part of it goes to Brussels) and introduce purchase tax (at a low rate to acknowledge the fact that all of it will go to our treasury).

    1. I always thought those 2 were worth putting up with just for laughs and showing the party up for the twattish lot they are.

    3. I gather that both Diane Abbott and John McDonnell resigned late last night before they were dispensed with.

      2. I thought she’d already returned to the back benches, though to be honest, it is well past time she retired.

      3. ‘Evening, Elsie, McDonnell needs to go back to being a shop (bar) steward for one of the Clyde Shipbuilding operations. Yep, non-existent today.

        Start up again my boyos, let’s revert to British Industry, kick the Unions’ collective arses and get on with a new industrial revolution.

        I know how to do it but there’s only one of me and I’m old and knackered. But I can teach!

    4. It would be hooray , if I could access it , but I can’t.

      Would you mind copying and pasting the article . I am not a subscriber

      1. Full list: Keir Starmer’s new Shadow Cabinet
        5 April 2020, 4:04pm
        Full list: Keir Starmer’s new Shadow CabinetFull list: Keir Starmer’s new Shadow Cabinet

        Keir Starmer, the newly elected leader of the Labour party, has begun the process of reshuffling his shadow cabinet – promising a ‘balanced’ team from across the country and party.

        The MP for Holborn and St Pancras, who replaces Jeremy Corbyn after five years at the helm, won in the first round of voting. A former human rights lawyer and director of public prosecutions, Sir Keir won with 56 per cent of the vote, defeating Rebecca Long-Bailey (28 per cent) and Lisa Nandy (16 per cent).

        Ian Lavery, Barry Gardiner and Jon Trickett have been ‘stood down’. Lavery and Gardiner were key Corbyn allies with Gardiner previously considering running for the leadership himself. Meanwhile, Trickett has served on the payroll of every Labour leader since Tony Blair.

        Below is the current make-up of the opposition frontbench – the list will be updated as new appointments are made.

        Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer: Anneliese Dodds
        Formerly: John McDonnell
        An Oxford PPE graduate, Dodds is a long time supporter of Starmer’s leadership campaign. She has served as a shadow Treasury minister since July 2017. She had even been tipped for promotion by the former Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell in early March, as he said he was ‘hoping she gets a significant role in the new administration’. Dodds is the first woman to be appointed Shadow Chancellor (and potentially Chancellor, if elected to office).

        Deputy leader of the Labour party: Angela Rayner – elected to the role with 52.6 per cent of the vote

        Formerly: vacant after Tom Watson’s resignation

        Foreign and Commonwealth Office: Lisa Nandy
        Formerly: Emily Thornberry

        Having come third in the leadership contest, Lisa Nandy had been promised a ‘top job’ by Starmer.

        Shadow Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport

        Formerly: Tracy Brabin

        Shadow Home Secretary: Nick Thomas-Symonds

        Formerly: Diane Abbott

        Shadow Lord President of the Council

        Formerly: Jon Trickett

        Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

        Formerly: Luke Pollard

        Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury

        Formerly: Peter Dowd

        Shadow Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

        Formerly: Rebecca Long-Bailey

        Shadow Minister (Cabinet Office) (Voter Engagement and Youth Affairs)

        Formerly: Cat Smith

        Shadow Leader of the House of Lords: Baroness Smith of Basildon

        Formerly: Baroness Smith of Basildon

        Shadow Lord Chancellor and Shadow Secretary of State for Justice

        Formerly: Richard Burgon

        Shadow Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union

        Formerly: Keir Starmer

        Shadow Secretary of State for International Development

        Formerly: Dan Carden

        Shadow Secretary of State for Education

        Formerly: Angela Rayner

        Shadow Chief Whip (Lords)

        Formerly: Lord McAvoy

        Shadow Leader of the House of Commons

        Formerly: Valerie Vaz

        Shadow Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government

        Formerly: Andrew Gwynne

        Shadow Secretary of State for Transport

        Formerly: Andy McDonald

        Shadow Secretary of State for Women and Equalities

        Formerly: Dawn Butler

        Shadow Minister (Cabinet Office): Rachel Reeves
        Formerly: Christian Matheson, Jon Trickett, Ian Lavery
        A former Bank of England economist and Oxford PPE graduate, Reeves chairs the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Select Committee. Reeves is someone who was critical of Corbyn when leader so her return to the frontbench is a sign of Starmer diversifying the top team.

        Opposition Chief Whip (Commons): Nicholas Brown

        Nick Brown first held the job of Chief Whip in 1997, he has now served in the role under five Labour leaders.

        Formerly: Nicholas Brown

        Shadow Secretary of State for Housing

        Formerly: John Healey

        Shadow Secretary of State for Defence

        Formerly: Nia Griffith

        Shadow Secretary of State for Health: Jonathan Ashworth

        Formerly: Jonathan Ashworth

        Shadow Secretary of State for Employment Rights

        Formerly: Rachael Maskell

        Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions

        Formerly: Margaret Greenwood

        Shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland

        Special subscriber offer
        Formerly: Tony Lloyd

        Shadow Secretary of State for International Trade

        Formerly: Barry Gardiner

        Shadow Minister (Mental Health and Social Care)

        Formerly: Barbara Keeley

        Shadow Secretary of State for Wales

        Formerly: Christina Rees

        Shadow Attorney General

        Formerly: Baroness Chakrabarti

        Party Chairman

        Formerly: Ian Lavery

        1. Phew , thanks for that.

          Nick Brown . Blairite with an earing?

          Who made a hash of the Foot and Mouth crisis , amongst other major errors ?

          1. His tenure at MAFF saw several animal health crises ending with the 2001 foot and mouth crisis. Brown’s handling of the outbreak, which some in the media and politics used to attack the government, was criticised, though throughout he maintained the support of the farming and food industries and the veterinary profession.[citation needed] Suggestions that a vaccination strategy should have been practised in preference to the culling of hundreds of thousands of animals, made with the benefit of hindsight, did not help his cause, and he was demoted out to be the Minister of Work, with non-voting Cabinet rank, at the Department for Work and Pensions after the general election of 2001. In June 2003, he was dropped from the Government altogether, receiving news of his sacking by Tony Blair during the course of a party held to mark his 20 years as an MP.

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

          3. Labour has never understood the countryside and how it works. They see it as a theme park and country people as inconvenient, uppity serfs.

        2. With the departure of Barry Gardiner, the IQ rises; with Brabin, the dress sense improves.

        3. Question: Why do we need so many Ministers in the Cabinet? When I worked in industry – when we had some – the maximum number of people who reported to a Board Member was always, ideally, six. Johnson cannot keep tabs on over 30 troughing Ministers. Cut the Cabinet down to:

          PM

          Foreign Secretary

          Home Secretary

          Chancellor

          Scottish Minister (kill the wee Pretendy Parliament)

          Welsh Minister (kill the silly Assembly)

          Northern Irish Minister (kill Stormont)

          All the others, Health, Transport, Culture vultures etc are subordinate to one or other of that initial six (all of whom need to be very aware not only of their responsibility but also, their accountability). Cock-ups are a resigning offence.

          Ye Gods, why am I not Prime Minister?

        4. Most posts are presently unfilled.

          Why on Earth do the Labour Party, a clanking socialistic nonsense, need so many Shadow posts?

          Of course the real damage will occur when the Abbotts and McDonnells are elevated to the effing Lords.

          Er… perhaps Starmer has left most of Corbyn’s useful idiots in post.

          1. ‘Evening Cori, the way to counteract the effects of the effete being elevated, is to cut the attendance at the Upper Chamber to ONLY the hereditaries, the Bishops and the Law Lords.

            They are the ONLY peers who have the long-term interests of the country in line with their own self-interests.

            All the remaining, political hoi-polloi may be shipped off to York with their attendance dependent upon them paying their own expenses to get there, in order to receive £100 per day s(h)itting fee.

    6. I don’t think that’s a good deal at all. We lose the two biggest comedians, and get a smarmy, Saville-friendly stinker instead.
      Still, I see that he is appointing gaumless wimmin all over the place, so they won’t be looking too electable.

  108. Message from daughter in Dubai

    Total lock down here as of last night. No outdoor exercise/walking/running etc. Masks and gloves mandatory when leaving the house to go to supermarket.

    Then this

    العميد عارف مرشد
    من شرطة دبي

    Brigadier A’aref Murshid-Dubai Police said: you may go out to buy your food stuff from supermarkets, to pharmacies, hospitals or the bank (ATM) for necessity but keep all receipts to prove your reason if the radars catch you. Radars are operating 24/7.

    Police will call you before raising the fine and request your proofs

    1. This is what daily life will be like under Sharia Law and the New English Caliphate.

      ‘Morning, Alf, better get practicing that arse-up attitude.

      1. ‘Morning, Tom. I passed over the first occurrence, but can’t ignore the repeat. I see that you are now acclimated to the American spelling of the verb form!

        1. I did, think about it John but got it arseways as I thought the one with an ess was the Yank version and I’m surprised that they don’t use a zed instead.

          Good morning, old troop.

          2. Sorry, trousers up and zipped – no end here to be in sight with or without BOHICA.

            Let’s make it clear, what does BOHICA stand for – it’s not a well-known English acronym? Without knowing, the whole point of the video is lost.

          3. I’m struggling to come up with a “Last Of The Bohicans” pun but can’t quite figure one out.

          4. Ah, apologies.
            It is explained BTL in the link, however (those of a nervous disposition look away now) BOHICA = bend over here it comes again.
            The mournful sigh of the put-upon.

          1. Juan is a family man, and never utters a profanity in his videos. This is the nearest he has come to it. He reached off camera, held the board for a moment, without comment, then put it away.

    2. Another bunch of cops with not too much to do except question the movements of the public.
      And of course putting themselves and their own families at risk.

      1. You don’t actually see many policemen or vehicles in Dubai but they have plenty of cameras on the road. You know where they are because of the stream of brake lights.
        All expats have an account and any tolls/fines are automatically charged to it and a direct debit removes money from your bank account on a monthly basis.

    2. You can go out into your garden, but DON’T DO ANY PRUNING OR MOWING! Just look at the ever-increasing wilderness.

    3. Unfortunately the software used to calculate the Council Tax includes the following lines:

      If (nextYearsCouncilTax < thisYearsCouncilTax) { nextYearsCouncilTax = thisYearsCouncilTax * 1.25; myBonus++; councilPensions++; diversityCourses++; bool isLoss = RecalculateAccounts(nextYearsCouncilTax); if (isLoss) { dustBins--; libraries = 0; potholes = YOURAVINALAFF; } }

      1. ”
        myBonus++;
        councilPensions++;
        diversityCourses++;
        ”

        Tut tut tut. Unneeded temporaries. Poor performance, although the compiler optimiser will rearrange it correctly it’s poor form to use postfix increments when they aren’t needed.

          1. Link works for me. I never post vids, i don’t use twitter or any social media. Your best bet is to make a youtube channel and post it on youtube John. I went through the steps at the site i used and can’t see why it only works for me.

        2. Actually, they are instances of C# classes, and operator++ is what I have defined it to be elsewhere in the code. You’re welcome.

          1. Postfix and prefix increments/decrements work the same in C# as they do in C++ and yes I know through operator overloading you can change functionality but postfix always creates a temporary to store the original value to be returned unless the optimiser does away with it once it sees it is unused.
            I’ve never used C#. It’s useless for systems programming.

            What field are you working in?

    4. Anything else we shouldn’t be doing during our period of incarceration?? 😡😷

      2. Similar to the annoying announcers on the BBC, specially selected for the way the pronounce BBC iah Playarh.

        1. Most continuity voice-overs on TV (and in advertising) now appear to conform to OBVO – Obligatory Black Voice Over.

    2. Indeed.
      We watched via C4 News. The Queen’s speech was introduced by a moslem presenter. I felt a little uneasy with that. It must be me, I suppose.

      1. I know who you mean, large facial appendage, part of the C4 far left adgenda. Rubbing our noses in it.
        She use to be a reporter on Look East. Probably out of Luton.

      2. We watched C4 also .. and thought what the hell is she doing introducing our Queen ..who is a symbol of power and free speech with no subserviance to a strange cult!

        2. They’ll be cock a hoop, at subversive C4 news with the sheer amount of predicted annoyance caused.
          Very similar to how the bbc are using two people of colour to present the predominantly farming programme Country File.
          Good presenter that they might be.

          1. That’s because they were lamenting that not enough effniks visit the countryside. They are bent (sic) on improving the numbers.

          3. Conners, With great admiration for them, I sometimes watch the farmers programmes on TV.
            They work so damn hard and quite often the children of the sometimes large families join in with the work. It’s a joy to watch. The annual farmers fairs and prize givings are usually included.
            Of course all the families ”are hideously white”.
            Except out of nowhere the occasional presenter is of ethnic origin. That is such a pathetic attempt by our equally pathetic media to justify ethnicity by the back door. The closest most ethnics come to farming is halal meat and shopping in Tesco.

          4. There was the Black Farmer once. He received a disproportionate amount of coverage, I always felt. I’m off to give myself up as a waysist 🙂

          5. I must have missed that.
            But slammers are not very sheep friendly are they.
            After another day in my ‘work shop’ aka shed I’m sitting in the late sunshine enjoying 500 ml of Adnams Southwold bitter.

      1. Pedantic trainspotter note: The loco depicted above is clearly a British Railways Standard Class loco – too modern for WW2.

        Looking up 75014 I see that it’s a Standard Class 4 4-6-0 completed at Swindon works in November 1951 thus missing the end of WW2 by well over six years.

        She still exists and is based at the Dartmouth Steam Railway.

        http://www.cornwallrailwaysociety.org.uk/uploads/7/6/8/3/7683812/181217b-the-light-is-fading-at-paignton-a-scene-before-the-trainload-arrives-copyright-roger-winnen-copy_orig.jpg

      2. I think that’s what queenie was referencing to NTN.
        I’m not sure she is right.

  112. Border force rescues 53 people including Iraqi and Syrian nationals from the straits of Dover, just two days after another 52 migrants were intercepted in the same stretch of water. 5 April 2020.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/96a3fb153a3b13d421e98843aa9fce25c93c366ec1eef772086d17e75a4c8336.jpg

    More than 50 migrants have been rescued trying to cross the English Channel, just two days after at least 52 people, including five children, were intercepted.

    The 49 men and four women were intercepted by Border Force officials near Dover after a series of crossings in the early hours of Saturday morning.
    They travelled on four boats which were picked up between 2.20am and 6am.

    I’ve only put one up here but all the pictures are an absolute treasure trove of social distancing not!

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8187583/53-migrants-including-Iraqi-Syrians-intercepted-near-Dover-just-two-days-previous-rescue.html

    2. How is it that they can find the dinghies but they can’t catch and sink the boats that bring them across the channel from France. Collusion?

      1. Collusion?

        Well yes. It’s quite obviously arranged. The Border Farce as you describe them below, picks them up and hastens them on their journey. They are all going to prearranged addresses with friends and relatives!

    3. Funny Old World
      Yer French need to see a permit for Granny to pop to the shops,250,000 fined for breaches,gawd only knows how many stopped and questioned
      Yet the illegal gimmigrants can swan around,launch their boats unquestioned,unbothered by les flics…………….
      Just lucky I guess…………………………….

      1. This incursion has been going on for some time and it would be a surprise if the French authorities didn’t know the source(s) of supply of the dinghies and be able to stop the deliveries. Just how many new dinghies are required weekly in the Calais area?
        Appears that the French are turning a blind eye to the traffic and our Government and their proxy, the Border Farce, are colluding in the transportation arrangements.
        I think Bill Jackson had it right when he claimed, on more than one occasion, that the dinghies were being brought over on larger seaworthy craft and then launched from a few miles out. This looked pretty clear when the arrivals turned up even when the sea was quite rough. I thought we had modern radar monitoring our shoreline.

    4. Should that have read
      Border Farce provide private taxi service fir 53 illegal immigrants……..

  113. I was hoping the Queens talk was going to say she’s going to seize royal power and take over.
    That she’ll also send a few to the tower of London, but alas!

    2. How does she self-isolate, given that there’s more than one of her? I mean, she’s always talking about ‘we’, isn’t she?

      1. ‘Evening, AA, in referring to ‘we’ it is the Royal ‘We’, inasmuch that she refers to herself as Head of State and her Government who (should) act as required to fulfil the country’s needs.

        Let’s wait and see if it happens, despite the ‘blob’.

    4. Since I’ve just heard that Boris has been hospitalised due to his bout of WuFlu, who will take over in the meantime?

      I plump for Priti Patel as she shews that she professes to have balls. Well, go for it Girl, reconvene Parliament, even if it’s only the non-wusses, so long as you have both a quorum and a majority.

      Then repeal the Coronavirus Act, get the economy moving and steal a march on the USA and Europe (China are already streaking ahead). Having done that, concentrate, in your role as Home Secretary, on kicking the Police Farce and the Border Farce up their collective backsides to do their jobs without fear or favour.

      If Mohammedans and/or pikeys complain, bang ’em up. I repeat – go girl. The majority will be behind you. Now is the time for strength.

  114. Have a laugh and relieve the boredom.

    1. Ted Walsh – Horse Racing Commentator –
    ‘This is really a lovely horse. I once rode her mother.’

    2. New Zealand Rugby Commentator –
    ‘Andrew Mehrtens loves it when Daryl Gibson comes inside of him.’

    3. Pat Glenn, weightlifting commentator –
    ‘And this is Gregoriava from Bulgaria .. I saw her snatch this morning and it was amazing!’

    4. Harry Carpenter at the Oxford-Cambridge boat race 1977 –
    ‘Ah, isn’t that nice.. The wife of the Cambridge President is kissing the Cox of the Oxford crew..’

    5. US PGA Commentator –
    ‘One of the reasons Arnie (Arnold Palmer) is playing so well is that, before each tee shot, his wife takes out his balls and kisses them ……..
    Oh my god !! What have I just said??’

    6. Carenza Lewis about finding food in the Middle Ages on ‘Time Team Live’ said:
    ‘You’d eat beaver if you could get it.’

    7. A female news anchor who, the day after it was supposed to have snowed and didn’t, turned to the weatherman and asked,
    ‘So Bob, where’s that eight inches you promised me last night?’
    Not only did HE have to leave the set, but half the crew did too, because they were laughing so hard!

    8. Steve Ryder covering the US Masters:
    ‘Ballesteros felt much better today after a 69 yesterday.’

    9. Clair Frisby talking about a jumbo hot dog on Look North said:
    ‘There’s nothing like a big hot sausage inside you on a cold night like this. ‘

    10 Mike Hallett discussing missed snooker shots on Sky Sports:
    ‘Stephen Hendry jumps on Steve Davis’s misses every chance he gets.

    11. Michael Buerk on watching Philippa Forrester cuddle up to a male astronomer for warmth during BBC1’s UK eclipse coverage remarked:
    ‘They seem cold out there, they’re rubbing each other and he’s only come in his shorts.’

    12. Ken Brown commentating on golfer Nick Faldo and his caddie Fanny Sunneson lining-up shots at the Scottish Open:
    ‘Some weeks Nick likes to use Fanny, other weeks he prefers to do it by himself.

    3. Murray Walker:

      “There’s no damage to the car, except to the car itself.”

  115. Telegraph letter:

    Knowingly unready

    SIR – I was shocked by the findings of Exercise Cygnus.

    This took place in October 2016 to model the effects on the NHS of a pandemic. The conclusions were “terrifying” and highlighted a dire lack of intensive-care beds, ventilators and protective equipment for doctors and nurses. And yet the powers that be did nothing to remedy the situation.

    Jeremy Hunt, who was health secretary at the time, and Sir Simon Stevens, the chief executive of NHS England, must be held accountable.

    Captain Graham Sullivan RN (retd)
    Gislingham, Suffolk

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2020/04/04/lettersbritain-needs-reassurance-curbs-liberty-wont-last-indefinitely/

      1. I knew Hunt at university. I later read in the newspaper that one of his employees had referred to him as an “amiable lummox”.
        I can only second that!

    2. This reminds me of the ERM fiasco.

      The ERM was a test to see if a common European currency would work. The test proved conclusively that it would not – so they went ahead anyway.

  116. Another letter:

    SIR – The chief medical officer, Professor Chris Whitty, has banned doctors from treating Covid-19 with anything other than paracetamol and, in severe cases, oxygen.

    Colleagues have rightly condemned this response, which ignores the experience of doctors overseas. Professor Whitty’s position is that British doctors may not use therapies that have not undergone double blind controlled trials here. This could condemn many thousands to avoidable death through a failure to recognise that different rules should apply when patients are dying at such a rate.

    The drug, hydroxychloroquine, is well-known, with a well-understood side-effect profile. It is safe. It also has a recognised mode of action in preventing replication of the virus. Comparison of the death rates in South Korea and Italy strongly suggests that it works to dramatically reduce the death rate. Evidence from India is similarly encouraging.

    What sort of society do we live in when professors of rheumatology and consultants in respiratory medicine can only object anonymously? It is distressing that colleagues are too scared for their professional positions that they cannot advocate for their patients. Right or wrong, we have a duty to profess that which we believe to be true. To do otherwise brings into question our role in society. Are we doctors or are we civil servants?

    Dr Steven R Hopkins
    Scunthorpe, Lincolnshire

    This is like I said, the NHS discourages local innovation – like in Gorbachev’s Russia it founders on the “one size fits all” and that size is handed down by the centre – but in addition it seems to have ostriches at the centre …

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2020/04/04/lettersbritain-needs-reassurance-curbs-liberty-wont-last-indefinitely/

    1. Steven Hopkins is a prison psychiatrist.

      Hydroxychloroquine is not ‘safe’ it can have lethal effects in people that are diabetic, prediabetic or suffering from arrhythmias. Even after so many years of use pharmacologists still do not understand completely how it works, yet this prison doctor says… ” It also has a recognised mode of action in preventing replication of the virus”. It has shown this action in vitro without proper controls, but it was tested against influenza which it also has action against in vitro and it was found to have no discernible effect.
      It’s also given with an antibiotic that’s fairly lung specific and a zinc supplement which has well known effects for boosting the immune system against viruses and bacteria.
      Supplies are already running low for the people with lupus and rheumatism that need it. They are on a high dosage which should never be just withdrawn.

  117. Well, that’s all right.
    Handycock has announced that we have lots more ventilators: from China.
    Satirists – just give up and go home. You cannot top that one.

  118. That’s me for the day. Thank you, chums, for your welcome.

    Tomorrow we venture out to look for flour. And onion seeds.

    2. Seeds or sets? Sets are faster unless it is some curious Francophilic variety you are after?

    3. Welcome back, Bill. I knew you would return eventually. We are, all of us, just so……. irrestistible.

        1. Good. We shall hear about your exploits tomorrow then.

          We has a similar experience driving back from in the drive through lanes South Carolina as you did driving back through France, everything was closed except for a few essentials. The drivers of the big transports are reporting significant difficulties finding places to eat, places that remain open are drive through only and those big trucks don’t fit in the drive through lanes.

          Welcome back, stay healthy.

    1. Dear to whom it may concern.

      Look you nasty old pleb.

      Die.
      Die quickly.
      Die in your own home.
      Save the NHS.

      With all best wishes for your, and the NHS’s, prosperity.

      Boris, you can call me Saviour, Johnson.

    4. Not at all. See my letter to H. M. The Queen appended to the first posts on this page today, P-T.

  122. Hancock has threatened us with even more restrictions if we are not good girls and boys and do as we are told. That’s very EU of him. If a little control does not work, try more control to fix it. Has he forgotten who we are? We did not paint the map red by doing what we were told. We did not establish trade and prosperity in colony after colony by being good little boys. We did not tame the savage and enlighten the heathen by being submissive ourselves.
    I cannot think that we have been told any truths or been given any facts that would suggest that any of us are better off in this “lockdown” or have better prospects for the future.
    Any further restrictions would make us no better off than political prisoners who have been incarcerated and silenced. When making these threats has he given thought to how they may be enforced?

    2. As I rarely see plod at the best of times (and these days in a show of force they only go around in a van) I can’t see anybody stopping me walking my aged hound. They’ll cop more than they bargain for if they try to stop me, that’s for sure! In 1940, the consensus (written now) is that it was suicidal to decide to fight on, but they omitted to take into account the stubborn nature of the British (the real ones, that is). There are still quite a few of us left.

  123. On my way down to contemplate Old Father Thames this afternoon I overheard a disturbing snippet of conversation. An older woman saying to a young man, “They euthanise them on arrival at the hospital”. She pronounced it “euthanase” but spellcheck tells me that’s wrong. Anyway, I daren’t linger, so no idea of context.

          1. One of those new countries in the Pacific. Their people play rugby for England.

          4. Euthanasia was a young lady pursued by Bertie Wooster in Talk to the Hand, Jeeves.

      2. Euthanise, euthanase – neither do you any good …. but entirely appropriate for recalcitrant sunbathers.

        1. I still haven’t seen any sensible explanation, or any explanation at all, as to why sunbathing, with appropriate social distancing, breaches the new regs.

          Any clues?

          1. Pettyfogging jobsworths cannot allow anything that people might actually enjoy.

          4. The bottom line is that they don’t want us to be having fun or anything approaching fun when it’s a national emergency.

            That’s why it’s OK to play sardines in a tube train, but you can’t have a barbie on an otherwise empty beach with three of your pals.

          5. I reckon it was a big mistake by Plod, and now the politicians have to say the police were right, to avoid mass intransigence and rioting.

    2. COVID is taking out people who would have died within 10 years anyway as well as a few ‘healthy’ people with undiagnosed vulnerabilities. The NHS has up until now been artificially lengthening lifespan and that has now reached its limit. In financial trading it would be called a market correction.

      I am one of those who should have died several years ago but was brought back from the brink in time because I noticed an unusual feature on my pulse oximeter which was confirmed as SVT (supraventricular tachycardia) after I referred myself to A&E.

      If I have not developed COVID immunity from what we thought was just flu in January this year then I would not wish to be put on a ventilator. When you’re sedated for mechanical ventilation you cannot summon help in event of suffering due to oxygen deprivation.

        1. Something to praise the NHS for then, Tom. We’re so happy to have you with us.

          Mind you, the snap looks more like you’d upset the (then) missus!

          1. Yes, Angie and Good morning, Best Beloved’s Grandson did a good job with no fuss.

  127. Good night Gentlefolk and (to paraphrase a great Irish wit) may you God go with you.

        1. It depends on each state, the governor has the final say on how far to go with the ‘lockdown’ In our case, WV, Gov. Justice (you gotta love his name!) has restricted us somewhat, but as seniors, me with some health issues, we have remained confined unless needed sustenance is required!! But we have 7acres of woodland so we can take the air!

    2. All Trump has to do is to no longer make Covid a notifiable disease, job done
      They will just go back to having a normal flu year

  131. BTL comment, Telegraph:

    Sarah Grant 3 Apr 2020 7:48AM

    According to this paper, the reason the German Health authorities are able to carry out far more testing is that they can go direct to the private market and purchase them whereas in the UK it is the right and privilege of Public Health England to authorise their use and it’s obviously more than someone’s job’s worth to rush into such a decision. The picture is rapidly forming that the monolithic NHS is far too slow moving to be up to the job of controlling this epidemic.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2020/04/03/health-bureaucrats-have-led-us-towards-ruin/

      1. Spiegel is a lefty publication that will talk Germany down if they can.
        My daughter is currently working in a hospital in an area bordering on Germany’s worst hit region, and they are having no problem with tests.
        (She is admin staff, not medical)

    2. Front line NHS always brilliant management level not so good.
      But I’ve heard that the NHS through the government has procured sanitisers from private business services companies. But then leaving the cleaning companies without the products doesn’t make a lot of sense.
      Our eldest went to Aldi yesterday and they had no sanitising liquid to wipe the trolley handles.

      1. Back in the seventies, we had student nurses who couldn’t wait to get their second qualification: RMN and SRN or SRN and RMN. The extra 18 months study meant they could get themselves off the wards and into a cosy office pdq.

  132. We are so lucky to live in a democratic constitutional monarchy and to have the magnificent Queen Elizabeth at its head.

    1. At 93, she is a star who just gives and keeps on giving.

      here are – and have been – times when I have wished that she could overrule Parliament and its self-seeking ways and told them, “Get on with it you bunch of shirkers, or you’re heading for the Tower and the execution block.”

      It would concentrate the mind(s) wonderfully.

      1. A friend in Nebraska watched the Queen’s address and immediately texted.
        Just saw the Queen, Excellent.
        She’s magnificent.
        We really are lucky to have her.
        Irreplaceable.

  133. Just received an email from the lady who organises how village courses/ lectures
    such as Iron age Britain, Witches East Anglia, Monachy that changed British ( that
    was cut short due to the virus but we have a history of parliament in September, hopefully ).
    She is one of those self isolating. A head teacher and a very fun lady who always saves me
    chocolate biscutes.
    She said self isolation has made her feel somewhat like Charlotte Bronte locked away peering
    out of her window in solitude. She spends her days making clear soups and eating pickled
    vegetables and writing as well as looking at her emails as the only voices from the outside
    world and of which cheer her up. She says, she’ll stay inside not bothering anyone and hope
    the world sorts itself out.

      1. I thought that too but didn’t question her cooking choices.
        She is Welsh, they eat strange things like leeks .

        1. He’s been looking more and more sick.
          Has had that temperature for a long while, lost lots
          of weight. Speaking as if his lungs were painful and had
          sores around his mouth. Get better soon Prime Minister.

    2. That’s bad.
      Hope it’s temporary, he’s been looking haggard recently.

    3. Boris has looked exhausted of late. I pray that he will receive proper treatment and make a full recovery.

      Hopefully his treatment will be more than Paracetamol and Oxygen as prescribed by that Whitty idiot.

        1. Yup. But the NHS or ‘our NHS’ is evidently not fit for purpose. That is not to demonise the health professionals but to note that the multiple layers of management are ineffective and mostly useless in a crisis of care. (They are useless in normal times).

          1. NHS England appear more interested in talking down to people insted of doing their job like preparing for a pandemic.

      2. Whitty apparently knows Bill Gates who wants full clinical trials before hydroxychloroquine is prescribed as a treatment for C-19.

        ”Until becoming CMO he (Chris Whitty) was Professor of Public and International Health at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM).[9] In 2008, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation awarded the LSHTM £31 million for malaria research in Africa. At the time, Whitty was the principal investigator for the ACT Consortium, which conducted the research programme”..

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

        1. I can believe that. The Gates Foundation, or whatever the fuckers call it, is heavily invested In China and in particular Wuhan. So are John Hopkins University, busily micro-managing the data we all read each day in our papers and in the MSM.

        2. The question is, is the desire to prove Trump wrong overriding common sense? The paper cited above talks about the Trump tweet, and actually cites the death of that idiot who drank fish tank cleaner! The anti-Trump motivation is clear.
          Also, if it does prove successful, presumably a lot of this drug will be pulled out of Africa and used in Europe and the US, which will cause a lot of hand-wringing from the usual suspects.
          If, on the other hand, a drug used mainly in the West had been discovered to be suitable to treat Ebola, I very much doubt that anyone would have raised a squeak about shipping all the supplies off to Africa to treat that appalling disease.

          1. Maybe more than that even. Perhaps to derail President Trump’s re-election prospects. It could also derail Brexit.

            It is a complete mystery why the British don’t use Hydroxychloroquine as a C-19 treatment. It works in many cases, the side effects are well known, it’s been in use for 70 years.

            There have been many thousands of C-19 patients in Britain for trials. There has been plenty of time. Yet the authorization is still not done and there looks to be no sense of urgency despite the terrible events unfolding before our eyes.

            So what’s going on ? It all looks very odd indeed.

            Gates apparently knows Soros.

          2. Gates is very much involved in Africa – I can believe that he would prioritise Africans getting the drug to protect them against malaria and cv before westerners getting it to protect themselves against cv.

          3. Gates is spending vast sums to perfect a C-19 vaccine which allegedly he wants to be compulsory for all Americans.

            Presumably there would be less urgency for a vaccine if Hydrocloroquine was shown to be a success and widely used.

      3. Boris has looked awful recently, very unwell and exhausted.
        Get better soon Boris.

      4. He hasn’t been resting enough! Mind you if I had Michael Gove dogging my footsteps hoping to step into my job, I probably wouldn’t relax much either.

  136. Why is it that hydroxychloroquine is being ignored as a C-19 treatment by some politicians, officials and influential individuals ?

    Is it because it’s use has been approved and advocated by President Trump ?

      1. From ”The Sunday Telegraph”……………..

        ”SIR – The chief medical officer, Professor Chris Whitty, has banned doctors from treating Covid-19 with anything other than paracetamol and, in severe cases, oxygen.

        Colleagues have rightly condemned this response, which ignores the experience of doctors overseas. Professor Whitty’s position is that British doctors may not use therapies that have not undergone double blind controlled trials here. This could condemn many thousands to avoidable death through a failure to recognise that different rules should apply when patients are dying at such a rate.

        The drug, hydroxychloroquine, is well-known, with a well-understood side-effect profile. It is safe. It also has a recognised mode of action in preventing replication of the virus. Comparison of the death rates in South Korea and Italy strongly suggests that it works to dramatically reduce the death rate. Evidence from India is similarly encouraging.

        What sort of society do we live in when professors of rheumatology and consultants in respiratory medicine can only object anonymously? It is distressing that colleagues are too scared for their professional positions that they cannot advocate for their patients. Right or wrong, we have a duty to profess that which we believe to be true. To do otherwise brings into question our role in society. Are we doctors or are we civil servants?

        Dr Steven R Hopkins

        Lincolnshire”.

        1. He’s a prison psychiatrist that really doesn’t know what he’s talking about. I dealt with his post below.

  137. Sky News.

    Boris Johnson has been admitted to hospital for tests ten days since confirming he has coronavirus.

    The prime minister still has persistent symptoms and went on the advice of his doctor, Downing Street said.

    A spokesperson added his admission is a precautionary rather than emergency measure.

    It is not known whether he will remain in hospital overnight.

    3. Hey everybody is saying that it is just flu, get back to business. In that case why not give Boris an aspirin and carry on.

      Maybe it is not normal and all of those refrigerated trailers outside the New York hospitals are not just delivering meals.

  139. My god. Can we not simply ban Chinese goods from entering our country.

    We have allowed millions of tons of Chinese crap to enter our country for decades. Enough is enough. And we should leave the rest to our wonderful
    NHS.

    2. The Chinese crap pulse oximeter that is my avatar didn’t last much over a year when the display faded out but then it would have been deemed out of calibration and clinically insignificant.

      In reality it is still in use permanently connected to my PC so that I can check my photoplethysmograph waveform (the finger blood flow representing my ecg) whenever I feel it necessary and I’m on the computer.

      I’m now on my third device which can display oxygen level, heart rate, perfusion index and respiration rate along with the photoplethysmograph waveform.

      This is the display a few moments ago:

      https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/441ae141cef5ba88dc402adf74bac4e2ed30708c7e1d8123c36a5cedea2351a2.jpg

      95% SpO2 is the anaesthatists target minimum when a patient is sedated during mechanical ventilation but it is clearly impossible for a patient to be on 15 minute obs when so many ventilators are in use at the same time due to lack of suitably qualified health professionals.

  140. CLASSIC fM

    is presenting classic music for stressed listeners with important news updates without dramatising fast changing events.
    Many small busineses are reported to be functioning and CLASSIC fM is promoting radio for their advertising.

    I noted that when listening to this radio channel should I wake up at night stressing about the curent situatiion CLASSIC fM can reduce my heart rate down from 85 bpm to 65 bpm. I know from nocturnal recordings from the pulse oximeter that my heart rate when asleep can go down to 40 bpm but if I wake up the screen will only display the rate caused by my sudden awakening.

  142. BBC World Service

    As supermarkets gradually return to normal stocking levels, farmers are faced with harvesting crops like asparagus to keep feeding the nation – the modern equivalent of dig for victory.

    Fortunately the COVID crisis has released a fit domestic labour force for the countryside to replace the EU workers.
    Farmers are just having to work around the new labour force disposition. They are already preparing for suitable isolatable accommodation on location.

    There is no Chinese word for crisis – the closest is opportunity.

    1. Sorry, is this serious?
      The implication is that they are going to import Chinese workers to do agricultural jobs?

      In other countries, they are calling on the students and unemployed to do these jobs.
      What about the 750000 or so who volunteered for the NHS? Isn’t providing food just as worthwhile?

    2. Sorry, is this serious?
      The implication is that they are going to import Chinese workers to do agricultural jobs?

      In other countries, they are calling on the students and unemployed to do these jobs.
      What about the 750000 or so who volunteered for the NHS? Isn’t providing food just as worthwhile?

      1. We should take a page out of the Chinese book on how to do things. Send all the common purpose teachers and University Dons into the fields.

Comments are closed.