Saturday 25 April: Mission creep makes lockdown an end in itself for an indecisive Cabinet

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/2020/04/24/lettersmission-creep-makes-lockdown-end-indecisive-cabinet/

831 thoughts on “Saturday 25 April: Mission creep makes lockdown an end in itself for an indecisive Cabinet”

  1. Good morning, Nottlers, all.

    A woman answered the knock at her door and found a destitute man. He wanted to earn money by doing odd jobs, so she asked: “Can you paint?”

    “Yes,” he said, “I’m a pretty good painter.”

    “Well, here’s a gallon of green paint and a brush. Go behind the house and you’ll see a porch that needs repainting. Be very careful. When you’re done, I’ll look it over and pay you what it’s worth.”

    It wasn’t more than an hour before he knocked again.

    “All finished!” he reported with a smile.

    “Did you do a good job?” she asked.

    “Yes, but lady, there’s one thing I’d like to point out to you. That’s not a Porsche back there. That’s a Mercedes!”

  2. Was Trump being ‘sarcastic’ with his disinfectant comments? You decide. 24 April 2020.

    On Thursday night, at a White House press briefing, Donald Trump appeared to give some pretty unorthodox suggestions about using disinfectant or sunlight to treat the coronavirus. But now he is backtracking – he says he was being sarcastic.

    Following a report which showed disinfectant can kill a virus within minutes when applied to different surfaces, the president addressed the press conference with a startling revelation. He said he had asked his medical advisers to look into whether light could be “brought inside the body”, and whether with disinfectant “we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning?”

    Morning everyone. I’m reluctant to do this because you could spend every single day posting defence of Trump. The above quote follows the usual pattern of misreporting speech and events and then commenting on them as if they were reality. It can be seen quite clearly in the second video accompanying the article that Trump is indulging in layman speculation and paraphrasing from one of his advisers Dr Birx, and getting her approval for what he is saying . She is actually sat there! If anyone should have been asked to clarify the “unorthodox” suggestions it is her.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/trump-disinfectant-bleach-sarcastic

    1. I have listed to it and all he did was ask a question. It is a fair question as some of our troops in WW2 in the far east took a tiny ammount of TCP on a spoon every day to avoid the tropical deseases and it worked.

        1. I still use Euthymol and have a stock of the now discontinued original Listerine.

          1. The Euthymol you buy now has been mucked around by EU regulations.
            Ditto Coal Tar soap.

      2. Yep, In a world where we now don’t bat an eyelid at medicines containing Warfarin, Deadly Nightshade and TNT maybe it wasn’t such an unreasonable ponder for a layman.

    2. There was a time when saying the Earth went around the sun would have you on the Bishop’s hit list.

  3. ‘Morning, Peeps.

    This is the Government’s response to the petition for the release of the review about grooming gangs (sorry, make that rape gangs):

    https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/300239?reveal_response=yes

    It is just a stream of diversionary waffle, and fails miserably to address the whole point of the petition. Have just vented my spleen on my MP, for all the good it will do.

    Apologies to those who have already seen the response.

    1. ‘Morning, Hugh, no apologies necessary; as soon as I started reading it, I realised it was a fudge and totally failed to address the petition’s desire.

      Show us the report, damn you.

    2. First thing I read this morning. It’s a corking example of Whitehall obfuscation.

    4. Morning HJ,

      “ Extremists may also seek to exploit legitimate concerns to sow further division. The Government will continue to challenge these views and to help communities unite.”

      Ignoring the real crimes but clamp down on anyone who points out the obvious correlation between the rape & abuse gangs and the R o P. They will immediately branded “Far Right”, arrested and in front of a judge within days.

      “ Child sexual abusers come from all walks of life, and from many different age groups, communities, ethnicities and faiths. Abuse is abuse, and misplaced sensitivities must never be allowed to put any child at risk.”

      Don’t worry about Muslim rape gangs, loads of other (white male) people commit child sexual abuse. Plus they are easier to get into court without upsetting teh local community.
      Misplaced sensitivities have ruined victims lives – why are those responsible not facing prosecution?

  4. Good morning, all.

    Grey start to the day. Cloudy but still. So much for the weather forecast.

    A neighbour has invited us to a distance drinks party at 5.30. We will all stand six feet apart – having brought our own glasses. Sounds fun…

      1. Last evening, the forecast was for a sunny start. Not a grey one.

        I care not – because it will be “brighter later” – just like me.

  5. Scientists criticise UK government’s ‘following the science’ claim. 24 April 2020.

    Neil Ferguson: the workaholic.

    Ferguson leads the modelling behind the UK response through the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis, which he founded with colleagues at Imperial College. He has a long history in modelling epidemics, originally with Roy Anderson’s unit at Oxford University, where they worked on BSE, vCJD, foot and mouth, Sars and swine flu – sometimes attracting controversy.

    Ferguson is a mathematician, an epidemiologist and a workaholic who, before the lockdown, moved seamlessly between Downing Street, university and press briefings. Even while recovering from Covid-19 himself, he gave evidence to MPs and did interviews. His team’s work is at the heart of the lockdown strategy, predicting the numbers of deaths it will save.

    It’s worth taking a closer look at Ferguson since even though the Government have now quietly given him the boot they are still perforce following his lockdown policy. One has to ask in view of his record and present conclusions if he is really this omniscient number cruncher depicted in the MSM or is he something much less exalted?

    When he said to his Oxford mentor Professor Wheating. “John, I’ve decided I’m not smart enough to carry on as a theoretical particle physicist.” Was this an unguarded admission too far? A confession that he does not in fact possess any of the intellectual equipment to be viable at the higher levels of his profession and that he would have been exposed and humiliated if he had continued in that path? While his PhD thesis is suspect in itself why did he choose Mathematical Biology out of all the possible avenues open to him? Perhaps because it requires only a modicum of analytical skills that anyone can fake given that it is a team effort with students and colleagues to propagate theories and do the research?

    It could be pointed out that even given these advantages his record is still largely one of unmitigated disaster. The Foot and Mouth outbreak that he got so disastrously wrong. The BSE forecasts. The Swine Flu fiasco. The recent gross overestimate of CV casualties that is leading to economic disaster. None of this speaks of someone who should be sitting at the table giving advice that affects the lives of millions of people.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/23/scientists-criticise-uk-government-over-following-the-science

  6. BTL@DTletters

    C Louseau

    25 Apr 2020 6:10AM
    ‘Record breaking month for migrant Channel crossings, as more than 500 arrive since coronavirus lockdown’

    … and two men were arrested for putting up posters which read …

    ‘Pubs Closed : Borders Open’ !

    Criminal !!

    1. Who polices the police, who judges the judges and who controls the controllers?

      2. ‘Morning, Richard, “Quis custodiet ipsos custodes” a long established caution but currently, seemingly ignored by our Home Secretary.

  7. SIR – I was appalled at the clinical way in which Chris Whitty, the Government’s Chief Medical Adviser, effectively told us to curl up in our lockdown cells for months to come.

    A nation’s health demands more than just being freed from Covid-19. It needs hope, psychological well-being, friends, family, holidays, and a future to look forward to, not an indeterminate period of house arrest.

    As a medical and scientific historian, I have long been interested in the history of epidemics and plagues, bacterial or viral. What nearly all plague survivors from centuries past emphasised was the need for people to have something to hope for. But in the present circumstances, that is the last thing anybody in government seems to think about. Only an interminable lockdown.

    Why, if other scientifically advanced European countries are beginning to speak of a measured easing of lockdown, even before a vaccine is available, is nothing so hopeful coming from our own leaders?

    Dr Allan Chapman
    Wadham College, Oxford

    1. The usual pattern in adversity is to seek to boost morale. Here we are destroying it!

      1. 318548+ up ticks,
        Morning AS,
        I have a strong feeling that lock-down in many respects shows out as doing penance for past actions taken by the peoples.
        Example being 24/6/2016.
        Contrary to many peoples feeling the politico has no love for the peoples.

        Date rectified.

        1. Ah, the early hours of 24/6/2016 are still fresh in my memories. Drinking a nice white wine and watching the meltdown of remainers on the box.

          1. 318548+up ticks,
            Morning M,
            Good werntit,
            Your date jogged the “something wrong” department in my canister, my date in original post now rectified, thanks.

          3. I drove home from the count thinking I was now living in a free country – how naive was I?

      2. Reminds me of that old military saying, “all leave is cancelled until morale improves”.

    2. SIR – The Government is failing in two respects. There is a lack of leadership, resulting in an indecisive Cabinet, and there is “mission creep”.

      The original goal was to contain Covid-19 enough to protect the NHS from being overwhelmed. This has been achieved, in that the Nightingale hospitals have hardly been used and there are 3,000 intensive-care beds available in hospitals.

      With social distancing and measures such as the use of face masks, it is time to start lifting the lockdown.

      Boris Johnson is needed back in charge to provide leadership and to get a grip on things – and on his ministers.

      Giles Nevill

      Castex, Ariège, France

      1. I am afraid that Boris will not be back to full health for a long time, and may have suffered permanent effects. One thing is certain, he is not the same man who won the election.

        1. There have been no details given in respect of the condition of those who survive Covid-19 after being on a ventilator. The information on the disease suggests that the internal organs of such survivors will have been damaged by the disease.

          2. I think Putin wishes he had a tenth of the influence in Western Affairs that the MEEJAH ascribes to him.

          3. Um, no. I meant in general. As 50% of those on ventilators die, it is hard to imagine that the survivors are unscathed.
            Although I would say that Russian rumours trump BBC “facts”.

      2. Went for a long walk yesterday and we both commented how much more traffic their was. No where what it normally is, but certainly more. Crossing the road had us waiting for cars to pass where before we could easily have stood in the middle of it for a good while.

        I think people are ignoring it. Certainly the scum who roar along our road are.

    3. Is Whitty a member of XR or some other climate change organisation? he couldn’t have done a better job in doing what they have wanted.

    4. ..And from Stanford University:

      Some 22 million Americans are currently out of work because of the
      COVID-19 shutdown. Yet the fact is, the overwhelming majority of
      people do not have any significant risk of dying from the
      coronavirus.

      A recent study by Stanford University now estimates the fatality rate of COVID-19 is
      likely 0.1% to 0.2%. That’s far lower than previous estimates from the World
      Health Organization that were 20 to 30 times higher.

      1. 0.1% of US population is 330,000. 0.2%= 660,000 – not a winner at the polls come November and it could be out by a factor of 10 or more as
        14% of Americans are over 65 = 47million and more vulnerable ADD to that figure does not include younger but vulnerable people with health issues, the poor & illegal immigrants with no access to health care…………… .

      2. 0.1% of US population is 330,000. 0.2%= 660,000 – not a winner at the polls come November and it could be out by a factor of 10 or more as
        14% of Americans are over 65 = 47million and more vulnerable ADD to that figure does not include younger but vulnerable people with health issues, the poor & illegal immigrants with no access to health care…………… .

  8. Morning all

    SIR – I was incensed by your picture of a customer wheeling away a trolley full of bedding plants from a re-opened B&Q store (April 24).

    Our local nursery, in its struggle to survive, is delivering outstanding emailed orders until 10pm every day of the week. It is grossly incongruous that garden centres are not allowed to open but stores like B&Q can.

    Peter Harrison

    Poringland, Norfolk

    SIR – On a beautiful day this week, three ladies, all over 90 years old, were sitting in the sun in the garden of their sheltered housing flats, all far more than two metres apart, having a chat.

    Police officers demanded that they go inside “to be safe”.

    They have not been allowed to see their children or grandchildren. They cannot go to the shops. They cannot go to bingo, to church or for a walk. And this may well be their last spring.

    And while this was happening, bicycles were still being stolen from staff at the Royal Sussex Hospital. But it was easier for police to drive old ladies into depression than to catch criminals.

    Christine Hearn

    Brighton, East Sussex

    2. My (late) Great-Aunt Hilda would have told them, politely, to eff orff, and would have offered to fight them if they insisted. About 4’8″, she was a real battling granny.

    3. When I was a postman in Dorking in the early 1980s, there would be a dawn chorus of them between 5am and 7am doing the inward sorting preparing for the morning deliveries. It was pandemonium with singing, banter, frame-banging and “shut up that bloody row!” coming from the Postman Higher Grade locked away in the cage with the keys for his own good.

      Like today’s coppers enforcing lockdown, they had a robust response to anyone caught coughing. None of this social distancing, out would come the cry “die you bugger!”.

    4. I hope they said “No. We won’t”. What would plod have done then, frogmarched them inside?

      1. Sadly, wrong generation. They were brought up in the days when British officialdom was worthy of some respect; though WWII should have alerted us to the less pleasant types it could attract.

      2. ‘Morning, Mum, I’d have liked to have seen plod try and leave himself wide open to an unwarranted assault charge.

        I’d have told him, “Get back in your car little boy and go and catch some criminals.”

  9. Morning again

    SIR – The proposition from Sir Michael Wilshaw, a former chief inspector of schools, that children in Years 10 (aged 14 to 15) and 12 (16 to 17) should repeat an academic year (report, April 22) is both unnecessary and impractical.

    Where would schools find the space and teachers for two additional forms? And how would the further and higher education sectors manage if two whole cohorts of students were unavailable because they were repeating a year at school?

    One hopes that schools are already making provision for online teaching, and that it will become more effective as the software and hardware are developed further.

    Teachers will become more skilled at making use of the technology and computer programmes, and more skilled at designing and revising programmes of study in the light of experience, feedback from pupils and the outcome of assessments.

    If necessary, attendance at school during the seven months running up to Christmas could be rescheduled for all pupils, or for those pupils who will be sitting public examinations in 2021, perhaps by dividing the period into four “terms” of seven weeks, with a one- or two-week break between each.

    Pupils in Year 11 generally don’t attend school during the half-term following their GCSEs. To make better use of this time, perhaps they could start on their A-level courses early, even if they do not have their GCSE results – if, of course, teachers really believe that their assessment of pupils’ performance is reliable.

    Professor John McIntosh

    London SE1

  11. The Bells, the Bells……

    SIR – Social distancing will prevent bellringers from performing celebratory peals for the Queen’s official birthday on June 13.

    Therefore, at noon on that day, I shall set up my gramophone in front of the house and play, at maximum volume, an old 78 recording of the bells of St Edward, Stow-on-the-Wold, high on the Cotswolds. They will be ringing a well-struck touch of Grandsire Triples. This we have done before on special royal occasions – pleasing all within earshot.

    Bernard Parkin

    Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

  13. SIR – I have clocked up over 500 hours on duty as a volunteer for the NHS without a single referral, having applied online as instructed. I have the necessary Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check in place, as well as all the other clearance required, and have downloaded the relevant app.

    Due to my age, I can only offer telephone support. I find it hard to believe that nobody out there might like to chat with me. What an embarrassing shambles this project has become.

    Philip Page

    London N21

    SIR – No wonder that the army of NHS volunteers has little to do (report, April 23). My husband, officially classed as extremely vulnerable, needed the help of a volunteer last week – but nowhere could we find how to register that task.

    We eventually found a local helper through the Royal Voluntary Service, but making contact was not easy. More publicity is needed about how to register a task with the NHS scheme.

    Diane Ribbins

    Tunbridge Wells, Kent

      1. I think a lot of ‘vulnerable’ people are being helped by friends and neighbours.

        1. As yet I don’t require help but 5 of my neighbours have offered their help if needed.

          1. Our neighbours, who are about our sons’ age, offered their help.
            We felt rather embarrassed telling them we were fine.

      2. Rather like donating pots, pans and garden railings to build Spitfires. It makes people feel useful.

        1. Using the cast iron railings was relatively simple as reprocessing the metal to produce steel is relatively simple.
          However, the aluminium pot & pans were much harder to reprocess as they were totally the wrong type of alloy for aircraft use. Some may have been used to manufacture mundane items like mess tins, but apparently quite a lot was dumped.

          1. Good one. Tip is closed. I think yesterday, CBC deigned to take bottles and cans.
            edit: Nope, I was wrong. Boxes still sitting outside gateways.

    3. Perhaps families are helping, as they should. Many are not doing very much. I am a volunteer in the local area, have collected one prescription.

  14. SIR – Hospitals must resume treatment of cancer patients quickly, or the health service will be responsible for more early deaths from cancer than the number it prevents from Covid-19.

    Cancer Research UK has highlighted the cancellation of cancer screenings (Features, April 23) and urged people to contact their GP if they have symptoms that might indicate cancer; but to what end, if hospitals will not treat them?

    A friend of mine had positive biopsies and was sent to hospital to see a consultant on the Friday before the lockdown began.

    The consultant confirmed that my friend had early-stage breast cancer, but said that nothing could be done about it for at least six months, and she would then have to go on a waiting list. In despair, she and her husband decided that they had to use their savings to seek help in the private sector.

    She had a telephone consultation with a private consultant who confirmed the diagnosis, but said that they could not operate because all the hospitals had been commandeered for coronavirus patients. All he could offer was an oestrogen-suppressant drug that would slow the growth of the tumours and buy some time.

    Knowing that breast cancer is possibly the most successfully treated form of cancer when it is caught early, and then reading that some hospitals are now to resume elective surgery for knees and hips, it seems very cruel that cancer treatment is being put on the back burner, and that cancer patients are apparently considered collateral damage.

    Marion Draper

    Bembridge, Isle of Wight

    1. This is a most dreadful indication not of the dedication of doctors but of their neglect of their duty which not many years ago would be impossible to contemplate. No surgeon could have seen a patient with a malignancy demanding immediate attention only to defer to grotesque rulings that denied his medical duty.

    2. Cancer is dull. There will be no mega-breakthroughs and worldwide fame. Corona, now, that’s new and exciting! Applause in the streets! Firefighting, looking sweaty but unbowed! Firefighting is always much more exciting than fitting smoke alarms and sprinklers to prevent it – whoever saw a series with hunky blokes and babes on TV called “London’s Not Burning”?
      Bah. Pisses me right off, it does.

    2. ANZAC day, I believe.
      Where the Aussies and Kiwis showed what true friends they are for the UK.

  16. Morning all 😕
    Grey day and a tad chilly.
    Suits the mood of the country.
    Barnier moaning about everytning including fishing again. Grow up man !
    Why don’t our negotiator’s get up and leave, job done.

    1. 318548+ up ticks,
      Morning RE,
      Surely peoples have learnt by now never to take negotiation issue at face value, rhetorically pushing for leave is fodder for 52% of the herd.
      In reality partial re-entry to be built on is still, in my book, a political aim.
      NONE I can see has gained any trust, after the 24/6/2016 result they ( political hierarchy) had to “seem”
      to comply regarding the 52% but their actions since shows us the opposite quite clearly.
      The coastal daily invasion is a blatant, arrogant, pointer
      as to the way things are going to be in the future.

      1. Agreed – but it passes over the heads of the arrogant “elite” wot runs the country.

  18. I’ve heard from various people that the NHS consider to be vulnerable, that they are getting calls putting the frighteners on them about going out, one chap just turned fifty had a stent fitted about two years ago was asked if he wanted to be resuscitated if he caught the virus and had a heart attack, of course I do he said, then they went on to say that because of the blood thinners he is on he would most likely bleed to death internally, upsetting for him and his young family.

    1. Sounds as though the NHS are behaving with their normal ignorance and incompetence.

  19. Malicious forces creating ‘perfect storm’ of coronavirus disinformation. 24 April 2020.

    While Russia and China have been the focus of scrutiny for some of the attacks, others have originated in the US and mirror misinformation and untruths propagated by Donald Trump and some of his most prominent supporters in the US media.

    So essentially it’s Trump, Putin and Xi against the world? I always ignore accusations of the sources of “Fake News” on Social Media because there is no way that any ordinary person can know if they are true. It’s also wise to bear in mind what the definition of disinformation is in this context. It is anything that contradicts the approved narrative!

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/coronavirus-sparks-perfect-storm-of-state-led-disinformation

    1. ‘Morning, Minty, I always ignore the maunderings of the Graudian – lies, damned lies and no real statistics to back ’em

      1. Reminds of the taxidermists’ dummy that the Russians wheeled out to pretend Brezhnev was still alive.
        Not that delaying the planned succession … um …. succeeded. Two died in short order of common colds.

      2. She comes from a family of gangsters, so it would be unrealistic to expect that she would be any better.

        1. Wasn’t the only member of that family who showed signs of humanity wiped out by ‘pranksters’?

          1. It is just a very sad situation, especially when you think of all the captive people in north Korea. Another thing to lay at China’s door, since they are enabling the Kims.

  22. DT Headline: “Government tells UK businesses: time to get back to work”

    There is an implication in that choice of words that the country has been slacking – bunking off instead of noses to grindstone…

    Offensive.

    2. Some businesses that were allowed to be open under the new law chose to close, exacerbating the impact of the lockdown. The carrot of government payments proved too much for them to ignore.

      Hardware & DIY stores are allowed to be open. There is one on a corner just down the road in the next town, a small family-owned business operating normally apart from allowing only two people at a time into the shop and the rest are spaced along the pavement outside in a queue. Good for them.

      In the meantime, I am informed by my son that Homebase in Alnwick is closed.

      1. Homebase was in trouble before the current hoohah.
        I think it will be used as an excuse the close the stores that remain.

      2. Thank you.

        Does anyone know whether the famous government payments have actually been made? I mean, has any business, large or small, received any dosh from HMG?

        1. Hi Bill, we “furloughed’ some staff through part of March and all of April. The Gov website opened last Monday to apply for the 80% salary payments. A little complicated to calculate but instructions were clear. Payment arrived into the company account yesterday.

          It will make a big difference to our chances of surviving this chaos and means we have kept all our staff. Without it we would probably have needed to lay off two or three people.

        2. From Charles Williams’ site, 17th April:

          “We now get the news about how we claim ‘furlough’ for individual staff
          members which we can do online from next Monday using the PAYE/employee
          database. It is going to be pretty complicated. The government will then
          pay the 80% of the wages (including employer’s national insurance and
          pension) back to us within six days of our completed submission. We will
          pay the wages (ie 80%, or 100% to others despite the furlough, or 100%
          to those still working) a week today and, if it all works, the
          government will repay us on the following Monday or Tuesday. We can
          cover the cash shortfall easily enough this month but, in a month’s
          time, we may end up exceeding our overdraft limit for a day or two.”

          http://thediary.caerhays.co.uk/april/17th-april/

      3. I ordered a few things on-line. Order acknowledge, order shipping but it has failed to arrived.
        Called the small business, sorry for the delay BUT there are only 3 of us working(family members) the 6 employees are all taking 80% wages for doing nothing.

        3 family members working 6am to 8pm – he had even offered them 2 shifts – morning & backshift to cut down the numbers at work but lie ins & no work won over earning 20% more.

        My goods – arriving Tues or Wed
        PS He was a really nice chap, just outside Belfast trying to keep his business afloat – backlog is 4,000 orders and he is limited in what the Parcel Post will take on any one day – the Belfast sorting office is the bottleneck

        1. That’s interesting, as I had a parcel (Junior’s lego) split into two boxes rather than the obvious 1.

          I didn’t expect the post office to work on reduced staff but then if thy’re trying to keep to the rules as well so be it.

        2. It’s the small operator who has proved the most flexible in all this mess.
          I always thought that staff in a shop or similar should feel the need to give service in a similar way to the owner – especially when I am trying to pay, being ignored ‘cos she is chatting on the phone! Maybe they should get a %age of the weeks takings as salary? and yes’ I know of what I speak, being in business development (until there’s enough business to support me), on basic plus performance-related bonus that shares some of the profits – when there are any.

  23. SIR — Those such as Garry May (Letters, April 21) who advocate a cash-free society have not thought it through.

    How will Mr May do his supermarket shopping without a trolley?

    Diana Crook
    Seaford, East Sussex

    If he’s like me, Di, he’ll simply use a basket. I never use a trolley when I go shopping.

    1. #MeToo. But like you, Grizz, I live alone, so a basket suffices. Maybe the Mays have children at home.

      1. Has either of you thought what the partially disabled are supposed to do without a trolley?

        1. Why on earth should that concern me? Such people can make their own arrangements.

          I was talking about no one other than me.

      2. Maybe they do, Joe, but that is an unknown.

        Moreover, when I go on a shopping expedition in a town or city, I don’t lug a trolley around the streets with me.

    2. Yo Grizzle

      But, how would you get

      32 packs of Bog Paper
      12 bottles of hand sanitiser
      7 packs of soap,
      10 boxes of paper hankies
      etc

      into a basket?

    3. ‘Morning, George, I have to use a trolley in order to get round the store without having to sit down and no, I’m too big to sit in the trolley seat.

      1. ‘Morning, Tom.

        Americans refer to shops as “stores”. I wonder if they take their “storing bags” on “storing expeditions”. 😂

        1. I understand that but I am referring to a supermarket, like ICA, which, being larger than the average ‘shop’, I prefer a short-form noun.

          1. You’ve lowered the tone now mentioning ICA! :•(

            Depressing places. I get homesick for Morrison’s, Waitrose and Sainsbury’s every time I walk into an ICA.

          2. Knowing that is probably the only ‘store’ available to you of such a size, I cannot remember if there are others. It was always the one favoured by my former wife in Norrköping.

            Oh, yes, there is Konsum that always reminded me of the Co-op.

          3. ICA and Konsum amalgamated into one entity (ICA-Konsum) a few years back.

            We also have LidL, Willy:s and Coop (unhyphenated) which might be related to the Co-op but I can’t be sure.

      2. I love the baffled expressions you get when you ask the mother “which aisle are the small children on”? when they have one in their trolley… I expect one say to be arrested for having a warped sense of humour, so it’s best used up first!

    4. We use these wheeled baskets – or are they baskeys or trollets?
      Morning, Grizz.

      1. Morning, Paul.

        Thos things are all they have in LidL in Sweden. ICA and Willy’s have smaller baskets too.

    1. If often wonder when he speaks whether he actually understands the words that fall from his mouth.

          4. Nice. I like cheese.

            Incidentally, one is familiar with the phrase, “A big cheese” to describe someone like yourself – a very important person.

            But have you ever heard anyone called a, “small cheese”?

          5. That’s better!
            Small cog – hard cheese but never small cheese.

            The cheese in the photo is Gran Padano. The dairy has at least 20 aisles of cheeses.. I calculated the retail value at around £5,000,000.
            During the maturing process the cheeses have to be turned over and the tops brushed off. They have a machine which does this automatically three cheeses at a time. After hours the premises are guarded by a pack of Dobermans….

            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c57ce73d0ab8abf2f7d540c6b8f0c8dadbf904faf829b5611c26480b9eadd7e3.jpg

          6. A pack of Dobermans – so mo one will be tempted to Pincher cheese.

            I’ll get me coat.

          7. Now I understand why an old boy in the village where I was a lad had a vicious Doberman called Chapman.

          8. 1135 – 1154 if my Common Entrance memory still serves and squeezed in between Henry 1st and Henry 2nd?

            (Willy, Willy, Harry, Stee, Harry, Dick, John, Harry III, One-Two-Three Neds, Richard II, Henry IV, V, VI then who? Edward IV,V, Dick the Bad, Harries Twain, and Ned the Lad, *, Mary, Bessie, James the Vain, Charley, Charley, James again, William and Mary, Anna Gloria, 4 Georges, William and Victoria – then an Edward, George the Vth, another Edward, George VIth, now our Brenda all alone sits upon the once great throne, and for outrageous Fortune’s slings another Charley’s in the wings)

            * Mustn’t forget Lady Jane Grey.

          10. Thanks, Richard, I only ever knew the first line and it would have helped so much when, at age 7, our Father insisted we learn all the Kings and Queens, with their dates, off by heart.

    2. He clearly belongs on a golf course. With all the other divots.
      Fortunately during lockdown all replaced divots are recovering.

    3. Tell them to take a pay cut, something that represents their involvement. Something like 40,000.

      And you Khan, you can join the p45 queue as well. You’ve a pointless waster who’s done tremendous damage.

  25. Young Un is supposed to have a child. Little Un – who is about 3. There is some talk of a “regency”.

    If Young is dead, I don’t think I’d buy shares in Little Un – not with Auntie Macbeth around.

        1. Lady MacBeth’s Christian name.
          The MacBees did exist, albeit not quite as Billy portrayed them. Apparently MacBeth was an enlightened king by the standards of the 1050s.

          4. Speaking of witch, or whom, there are rumblings that she recently broke her own ‘social distancing’ rules and nipped over to Brussels to see her lezzy lover (wife of an EU apparatchik) [You may recall that she dismissed her Health Minister for breaking rules by twice retreating to her country des.res.] Not sure if the Scottish Sun on Sunday will have the guts to run the story given the current injunction against publishing any nasties about Herself. However, Alex Salmond may give a wink and a nod to any story just to keep the dogs off.

          6. Of course there are no links….La Murrell has been plastering the media landscape with injunctions since many months ago….there was speculation about what Salmond might choose to blurt out when under oath at his trial….sufficiently damning to ensure a verdict of ‘not proven’ to be returned?

            https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-52078493

            I may try to convey additional info via bush telegraph/cleft stick {:^))

          7. Thanks for phoning Your call was important to us…{:¬))

            Explained a great deal. The more politicians try to hide skeletons, the more likely it is that they will eventually be found out.

  26. I posted this in the Delirium Tremens this morning in response to a puff piece about the Chancer of the Exchequer. I expect it to be taken down before long:

    “Don’t know about anyone else, but just feel a seething anger and loathing for the group of muppets who have ruined my small business. It cannot be resurrected, and I have never borrowed money from the banks for pretty obvious reasons. I will never forgive the fools for what they have done to small businesses like mine and the UK economy in general.

    And now, it seems, we ‘elderly’ are to be subjected to indefinite house-arrest – for our own good, of course. Meanwhile a certain section of society which has been widely reported to be particularly at risk from Contrick19 will most certainly not be told to stay in for the simple reason that the govt would inevitably be accused of rac is m if it tried it on.

    Elsewhere in this newspaper it is reported that Professor David Hunter has said, “For this next phase, the government must give us more than a three word mantra”. In an effort to assist, may I suggest, “Two metres good, one metre bad”?”

    1. What is/was the nature of your small business, Caratacus? Some members of this parish are working on something to be of assistance to floundering SMEs.

      1. That’s very kind, Citroen1, but the decision has been made. It was a small specialist recycling service dealing with pressurised vessels and I was already having trouble with the numpties in the Environment Agency (a self-funding quango which can ruin a SME by imposing arbitrary and inflated fees for invented “services”); the government Contrick19 was the straw that broke the camel’s back. But thanks again for the thought.

        1. I was called up yesterday and ask to join in a team which is planning to
          do some free online clinics to help business survive and regenerate.
          One of the people involved is a very high level influencer. This is all
          in set up mode at the moment but I will keep you all posted here.

  27. 318548+ up ticks,
    Morning Each,
    To my way of thinking I will give benefit of doubt to this being an initial
    sensible reaction to the virus & not an orchestrated screw-up.
    But then the politico’s saw the potential for muscle flexing & control regarding the herd.

    Hence / commence the head down / @rse up campaign & that campaign
    has twin connotations first being the power play in totally ignoring the daily mini invasion & tother is that prayer mats should be used voluntary otherwise it will, in due course,be made mandatory to comply with the unwritten rulings of Submissive,PCism& Appeasement.

  31. One of my spaniels needed a repeat prescription from the Vet .

    Phonecall , pay for the medicine over the phone .. Phone when you arrive .. Vet assistant will come out of the surgery door , depositing the medicine in a reception box which is a few yards away from the front door . I then get out of the car , put on gloves , retrieve the drugs which are in a paper bag from the box and drive home .

    If my dog needed a consultation , the consultation would take place in the open one assumes, I didn’t dare ask . Blocked Anal glands can also be an issue for my spaniels .. we will just have to manage!

  32. ‘Morning again,

    Apologies if already posted yesterday (a bit busy, not enough time on nttl). Although still bloody cross about the BBC’s deafening silence over St George’s Day, it is at least encouraging that the unpatriotic bastards are content to go on digging their own grave:

    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/04/24/uk-health-sec-thanks-muslims-for-lockdown-sacrifice-on-st-georges-day-doesnt-mention-st-georges-day/

    Off to breakfast now before my head explodes.

    Slaters.

    1. You cannot trust the BBC. In fact I hate them for what they are doing to our country.

      2. Fatima Salaria has been made the new commissioning editor for ethics and religion making her responsible for all the BBC’s religious content, including Songs of Praise.

        Ms Salaria has previously commissioned Muslims Like Us, a reality style show and produced Britain’s Jihadi Brides.

        She was made an assistant commissioner in 2015 during a BBC diversity drive.

        Discussing the religion strategy for BBC programming on the corporation website, Ms Salaria says: “What I’m really interested in with religious programming is the fact that I want it to reflect the country that we live in.

        “So rather than use that big word diverse, what does that actually mean, I basically want to reflect all of the different kind of faiths in this country.”

        According to the latest ONS figures, in 2011 Christianity remained the largest religion with 59.3 per cent of the population identifying themselves as Christian.

        Muslims made up the second largest religious group with 4.8 per cent of the population of England and Wales.

        https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/772016/bbc-muslim-editor-religious-television-programming-fatima-salaria

        1. Morning TB, horrendous does not fully describe this appointment. Another one just promoted because of her ‘diversity’ irrespective of any minuscule amount of skills she may have.

          “ She was made an assistant commissioner in 2015 during a BBC diversity drive.”

          FFS.

        2. Seems rational to promote Christianity and such about 12 times more than Islam.

          Yet why are there so many Muslims in this Christian countryI do wonder what the population proportion was like before Labour kicked the door down, removed the hinges, frame and sacked the guards.

          I also wonder what proportion of criminal activity – stabbings, rapes, murders, forced marriages and so forth were prior to as well.

          I’d bet next to nothin – apart form the stabbing. There are some people who can’t help themselves. If all this horrid criminality is a result of Labour’s malice, why is it not being publicised that quite clearly, not only did Labour ruin the economy, lumber us trillions – 16tn and counting – in debt, but they forced a massive crime wave and social unrest on this country?

  35. This seems to be what is news to the Grauniad – The Guardian leads on claims that the PM’s chief political adviser, Dominic Cummings, has been part of the secret scientific group advising the government on coronavirus. It says a list leaked to the paper shows Mr Cummings’ name was among 23 people
    who attended a “crucial” meeting of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) – the day the UK lockdown was announced    . [BBC papers review]

    They seem to have forgotten about Campbell not only attending intelligence meetings during the run up to Gulf War 1 but actually chairing them and then writing the minutes! I don’t recall the Grauniad making a fuss about that?

    1. That was exactly my thought too when I heard an indignant-sounding BBC ‘news’ reader doing the review, starting with – well I never – hot news from their chums at the Grauniad. I suspect that most people would expect the PM’s chief advisor to be at or involved with all kinds of events, if only to keep tabs on what is happening so that he can brief his PM. Campbell had no security clearance for his preposterous involvement in security matters; let us hope that the same cock-up isn’t being repeated.

      ‘Morning, SB.

  36. Troops to be issued new insect repellant in fight against coronavirus. 24 April 2020 • 7:41pm

    Troops battling Covid-19 are to be issued with an insect repellent that might offer a new layer of protection against the virus, the MoD has said.
    The product, called Citriodiol, is thought to kill types of coronaviruses.

    Did someone not make fun of Trump yesterday for suggesting disinfectant as a prophylactic against CV?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/24/troops-issued-new-insect-repellant-fight-against-coronavirus/

    1. Just like the Chinese spraying the streets, and airlines spraying the passenger cabins before take-off.

      1. 318548+ up ticks,
        Afternoon N,
        The germans also done a great deal of spraying via the showers 1939 / 45, lest we forget.

  37. SIR – The time has surely come for a lockdown Rubaiyat. A couple of quatrains to start us off:

    Awake! For morning in the bowl of night

    These golden flakes has flung. A cautious bite.

    Back of the shelf, well past the best before.

    Don’t tell the kids – I’m sure they’ll be all right.

    During the day I tune in now and then

    To hear the news and endless argument

    About it and about who’s doing what,

    Or not, and why, and where, and how, and when.

    Gordon Wright

    Gazeley, Suffolk

  38. This article is a chewy read but it reveals the convoluted lengths Big Tech & Co go to to reduce their tax bill and keep their profits high. Giving another reason why ‘beardy’ Branson should be told to dig himself out of the hole he claims he is in.
    The author’s summary is quite clear:

    The UK taxpayer has no possible interest in sparing the Irish banking system from credit losses that derive from a scheme which services Big Tech in reducing its Irish tax bill, on the back of its already having reduced its UK tax bill.

    Airline Bailouts Mean Sending Our Money to Big Tech, Irish Banks & the Irish Government

  39. Are hula hoops making a come back in these difficult times. I saw a young mother this morning coming back from town with 2 hula hoops hanging on her neck.

  40. NS&I has cancelled its recent interest rate cuts and is now one of the best places for savings. Money programme on BBC Radio 4

    2. Wot? Government can’t get money from the markets any more? I hope the same thing happens to local authorities. I used to like those days before they discovered, or were allowed to use the markets and you could invest cash in your own local authority for their borrowing needs, assuming it was of the correct political persuasion. And if not, you could find an LA of which you approved, and who appeared to be behaving sensibly, and put your cash there…

  41. If Oxford Uni comes up with a treatment or vaccine for C-19. will Britons get it first ?

    No, says the British government.

    We signed away that decision to the World Health Organization, which means Bill Gates will decide who gets it first as he’s the leading sponsor.

    Sounds like Britons will have to bow low to Bill Gates, or Britons won’t be saved.

    Welcome to World Government thanks to Boris Johnson.

    1. If the Gates vaccine is poison and part of the NWO plan to reduce the world population, let them start microchipping elsewhere.

      1. Why did Johnson sign up with Gates ?

        Why didn’t Johnson do the obvious thing and give Oxford Uni the money and tell them to do it ?

        Is there something in it for Johnson by going with Gates ?

        1. Why do people that are genuine conservatives or neocons much like yourself scream for public money to be thrown at something instead of private investment? Isn’t that against everything you believe in?

          1. Well ok, if private organizations want to fund Oxford then fine.

            But that isn’t how it works now in socialized Britain.

          2. Most university research is funded by private investment. Our R&D public budget is pathetic.

            We are not a socialised country. We are a neoliberal country with a rent-seeking problem with a mixed market economy.

          4. Yawn.

            You don’t even seem to know the economic system this country has used for 40 years.

          1. And you can get them with pictures you can colour in yourself! And they have the Presidential Seal of Approval!

    2. Reminds me of the Two Ronnies’ library sketch, where the books are sorted by size AND colour.

      1. Years ago there was a cartoon about a city planners department. The clerk was proudly explaining how he had sorted the files in alphabetical order:

        Eight street
        Fifth street,
        First street
        Fourth street
        Second street
        Third street,

        . . .
        Well it makes sense over here with numbered streets!

    3. Bookcase fillers: when we first came to France we found that a French supermarket was selling the equivalent of Heron classic faux-leather bound books by the kilo. We confess we bought a few kilos at 2 French Francs a kilo to stock the library in our students’ house only to discover that several of the books had pages omitted. The sellers doubtless relied on the fact that these books were generally bought to ‘impress’ and not to read. ‘Books’, as Anthony Powell noted in the title of one of his Widermerpool Dance to the Music of Time novels ‘Do Furnish a Room‘.

      2. We have a need to reduce our technical library, books accumulated on the way from undrgraduate to fogey. Problem is, I love books, pretty well regardless of the content, and am loath to dispose of them, even to charity. I like them! It’s like junking an old friend, very difficult to do. But we have space problems, and to be honest, many of them haven’t been referred to for many years. Even so… :-((

        1. I was most impressed to the answer Richard Burton, the film-star, gave when he was asked which of his many houses he considered to be his home. His response was:

          “Home is where the books are.”

          1. Burton went to the same school, as my late father-in-law.

            They were not there at the same time

          1. I found a hardback book once, in tur rain by a skip, and felt sorry for it, all wet & unloved. So I brought it home & dried it out, put it in the bookcase

        3. I was like that.

          Then I got a Kindle.

          I simply replace books with ebooks. Living in a flat with no storage space really showed me my library was far too large. For instance the Wheel of Time. is 14 books, took up a whole bookshelf. All on my Kindle now.

          The only real difference is you don’t get that new book smell. Lovely, like sitting next to a freshly creosoted fence, it’s addictive.

          2. These 1970 & 1980s books and me, we have shared history. Parting with them will be difficult.

          1. Don’t look too hard.

            It will come as a great shock when you discover you no longer understand it.

            };-O

    4. My Father filed his record collection in chronological order, not by composer or genre. Made it a bitch trying to find the piece of music you wanted to listen to. Naturally, he could go straight to it.

    2. At first sight it looked like the fruit and veg aisle so I was about to call fake news.

      On second viewing, cake news.

  44. Amusing, not, how Boris Johnson was so keen to “take back control” from the EU, and then to give that control to Bill Gates, the UN, the WHO, and, increasingly, to the Chinese.

    Who comes up smiling ?

    Has George Soros found there are always other routes to globalism, and “leveraged” things that way ?

    1. The UN and the WHO are advisory bodies.

      Bill Gates is a rich philanthropist with an interest in vaccinations particularly in the third world. OK he did screw up with polio vaccine and seemed to give a few people polio but I don’t really think that was a deliberate attempt at depopulating the world re agenda 21 from the UN under the control of General Soros.

      1. Britons are doing everything the WHO says. Including signing away their rights as an independent nation.

        1. We are deferring to expert advice, control remains in the hands of Buffoon Boris.

          We signed away our rights as an independent nation in 1992, we’ve since reclaimed some of those rights, but not enough for my taste, I’m pretty unhappy with the Buffoon_Brexit.

          Where else have we signed away our rights as an independent nation? Be as specific as possible.

          1. What makes you think it’s “expert advice” ?

            Net Zero. A Soros policy rolled out through the IPCC which he helped set up, and the UN.

            Increasingly to China, either thanks to back handers or finance or both. Britons are being steadily bought up by the Chinese under their “belt and road” program. If that continues Britain will eventually become part of Greater China with everything that implies.

          2. Who have they bought? Is there a list? They could have bought me for only 50 million quid. I’d never have to work again 🙂 No such luck so far. I hope when the offer comes it isn’t in Mandarin, i can’t read that crap 🙂

          3. The Chinese “belt and road” program is global and available to any nation stoopid enough to get caught up in it. Once in, all citizens become part of it as Chinese finance increasing supports their currency.

            It’s perfect for countries like Britain that can’t pay their way thanks to the demands of socialism. In effect, socialism looks likely to turn Britain into part of Greater China.

            Shame Clement Attlee doesn’t know. It might have made him less enthusiastic.

          4. It’s just infrastructure spending via development banks. China has run a trade surplus for years and has acquired a vast amount of funds, it’s just looking to invest them mainly in road, rail, deep-water ports. This will aid trade. We haven’t really got involved with it at all, nor has much of the EU. Most of it so far is Africa and Asia centric.
            We are a social democratic country not a socialist country, even what Attlee did could hardly be described as socialism.
            Britain has no problems paying it’s way, all of our debt is denominated in sterling and only 25% of it is external.
            You worry far too much about all the wrong things.
            What China is doing with its BRI is no different to what we do and what USA does and many other countries.

          6. Or perhaps I have a far better understanding of macroeconomics than you do and don’t see bugbears in every direction I look.

            I’m 100% sure a country that hasn’t made a serious effort to reclaim land that is theirs in 70 years is not going instead to take over the entire world by foreign trade policy.

          8. Spurs will win the premier league long before the Red Army marches down Whitehall. And I really don’t think we’ll win the premier league inside 200 years 🙂

          10. Taiwan isn’t going anywhere – they have no urgency to invade it. They know they will get it one day.

          11. Road, rail & ports also being crucial to the economy, and very useful in throttling trade.
            Just saying.

          12. This is about bringing trade to Chinese companies and profits to chinese banks. What sensible reasons are there for such throttling? They are building high speed rail where none existed, roads joining places for trade, such as the bridge between hong kong and macau. What else are they going to do with all the currency they have built up, it has to go home sometime.
            If we send pounds around the world those pounds eventually find their way back to us, whether that by property deals, or buying shares in our companies, or helping us build better rail and road. It’s a perfectly normal operation for many countries in the world but in true chinese style they’ve given it a fancy name and off go the conspiracy theorists.

          13. Well duh, we don’t want to be on the receiving end of some of our foreign policies!

          16. I’m good, thanks, and family the same. Not so much fuss in Norway, lockdown easing from this weekend with some schools and many offices reopening. But how are you getting on these days?

          18. Because he clearly is, and has been throughout his political career. Don’t get me wrong, I like him, not as a PM, or minister or MP, but as a TV presenter and writer.

      2. Morning Thayaric and Nottlers.

        I read about a week ago that one of his vaccines, used in Africa, turned out to sterilise the girls and women it was given to. I’m sorry I don’t have a link to the report and can’t remember where it was published but it mentioned Robert Kennedy Junior as pointing this out.

        1. I’ve tried to find the report but no luck. However have turned up some articles in which RKjr is vilified and it seems he is an “anti vaxxer” so my post above may be completely erroneous. I don’t have the time or inclination to delve any further, life’s too short!

          1. The only thing afaik where he went wrong was using a live polio vaccine which gave a few people polio, but that was a few years back now.

          2. If you search “Bill Gates vaccine Kenya women” there is quite a lot of stuff not published by anti-vaxxers.

  45. Sky News now reporting that Trump is saying that he never meant something that he didn’t actually say.

    1. ‘Morning, Anne.

      I don’t know about the day but it seems that the sun has been startled.

        1. ‘Morning, Anne, that’s why I’ve switched it off, no matter where it raises its ugly head.

    2. It’s fair to say that the world has been relatively slow to perform serosurveys in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, but the first major one appeared last week, from Santa Clara County, California. The results of the study, performed by a team from Stanford University, were startling. Although they estimated that 50,000-80,000 people in the county had been infected, there had only been around 1,000 confirmed cases. In other words, for every person with symptoms, 50 to 80 were shrugging the infection off, exhibiting mild symptoms or none at all. There had been only 100 deaths from the virus in the area, so this implied that only one or two people were dying per thousand infected. This was strong evidence that the virus was not particularly dangerous.

      So it was all bull then?

      1. ‘Morning, Minty and what the flying ffff is a serosurvey.

        When Googled, Merriam-Webster (for what that’s worth) defines it as “a test of blood serum from a group of individuals to determine seroprevalence (as of antibodies to HIV)” Whatever that may mean to a non-medical bod like me (or should that be in modern parlance ‘myself’?)

        My God I’ve never in all my life, had to type such BS couched in such unintelligible English.

      2. ‘Morning, Minty and what the flying ffff is a serosurvey.

        When Googled, Merriam-Webster (for what that’s worth) defines it as “a test of blood serum from a group of individuals to determine seroprevalence (as of antibodies to HIV)” Whatever that may mean to a non-medical bod like me (or should that be in modern parlance ‘myself’?)

        My God I’ve never in all my life, had to type such BS couched in such unintelligible English.

        1. “myself personally”, Tom.

          Good morning, if it is a good morning, which I doubt.

        2. Morning, Tom. You’d best get used to it, there’s more where that came from.
          Just watched a YouTube video about the US procurement of the Bradley APC. Never heard such a pompous jumble of polysyllabic words and management-speak in my life. I can’t recall what was said, as I was laughing too much!

        3. It was Noah Webster, more than anyone else, who started the fad amongst Americans for poor spelling and poor pronunciation. He suggested that all English words with a “strange” spelling should be shortened to make it easier for Yanks to pronounce them. Hence flavour became “flavor” and defence became “defense” among many other atrocities.

          He wanted to go even further in his Webster’s Dictionary but some of his wacky suggestions were deemed too idiotic even by his standards.

          1. Being a biliophile, I had a copy of Webster’s (published in 1894) rebound as it was a beautiful book given to my Father by my Mother as a Christmas Present. It was also useful in checking the etymology of some Americanisms.

            My Father always delighted in telling of a put-down to an American who claimed that American made common-place words shorter, to which my Father responded, “Is that why you call a lift an elevator?”

  47. Apparently Baroness Altmann has suggested that the elderly should stay at home for almost the rest of their lives.
    I’m not sure if she realises that people of ordinary status do not receive 320 plus a day by staying at home from the uk taxpayer.
    Please see correction below.

          1. And thus bending down to weed the 100foot herbaceous border gets more challenging. It’s why some years ago I started moving my garden towards ornamental shrubs that could take up lots of space without weeding…

          2. Mine got bigger, how old do I have to be for shrinkage 🙂

            I could really use some.

    2. Correction:-
      The baroness expressed her concerned that it was amongst discussions.
      But it still has the same financial implications for older people. Unlike the people in the political sector, who are ‘self allowing’, in the fact that they help themselves from the public purse.

      1. Yep. She forgets that for some £320 is three weeks on the state pension, not per day.

  48. Just disturbed my little voley friend who was having a quiet sunbathe on the terrace. He seems to have survived his slug pellet diet, assuming it’s the same one..

        1. Apropos our conversation, I googled the first name, the surname and the “L” word and found several sochul meeja links which indicated that you are not alone in your views!

          3. Apropos my “ageist” question on Monday 27th – there is a theory that Henderson is, in fact, the frightful Tony in a new guise…

            If it is – I shall avoid like the, er, plague.

      1. Dunno, he rushed off into the undergrowth knocking down a wall in the process…

  49. Hi folks,

    I hope you are all having a good Saturday.

    @caractacus Your message regarding your business woes has been forwarded to me.

    I was called up yesterday and ask to join in a team which is planning to do some free online clinics to help business survive and regenerate. One of the people involved is a very high level influencer. This is all in set up mode at the moment but I will keep you all posted here.

  50. Just as Sky News Australia seems to come from a different planet (one that broadcasts real news) the Aussie Daily Telegraph seems to have had a big fat dose of testicular fortitude too………………

    “Our flubie friends at Sydney’s Chinese Consulate have been in contact again, this time to register Beijing’s official rage over an excellent Daily Telegraph illustration:”

    “What the Daily Telegraph has done is not only

    ignorant and contemptuous of science, but also shows disdain for the

    tremendous efforts and sacrifices made by the Chinese people in fighting

    the pandemic.

    Speaking of Chinese people fighting the pandemic, how’s the silencing going? And the disappearing? Hope you’re meeting the quotas.

    The national emblem of China is the symbol of the People’s Republic of China and is inviolable.

    Go suck a bat, collectivist freaks.”

    Rest here,Oi Laffed

    https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/blogs/tim-blair/latest-chinese-consulate-pansygram-arrives/news-story/be41045ed6624e7f3fa0f7cba40bc56d

  51. So the latest scandal to hit Johnson’s hopeless government is widespread C-19 infection in care homes.

    Thanks to Johnson’s “experts” unloading elderly recovering patients from hospitals without 100% certainty they were no longer infectious.

    That’s why care home deaths have gone through the roof.

        1. When things are delegated it’s always somebody else’s fault when things go tits up. It’s just image protection.

      2. Correct. And we take residents placed by councils, and relatives, and even the odd self-placer, but i imagine the biggest vector is the staff.

    1. Morning Anne, there really is a massive sub culture of humanity in this country. It’s like a different world.

  53. DT Article today

    How the BBC can avoid accusations of bias – and keep everyone happy: Michael Deacon

    The very fact that for many years the BBC has recruited exclusively from advertisements in ‘The Guardian’ ensures that its staff will be predominantly left wing.

    There should be an independent, politically neutral appointment process so that for every left wing appointee there is one recruited from the right – but of course this will never happen.

    1. A noble ideal Rastus, but in reality the Left wing attitude will take over. such is the nature of the beast.

      The problem is how it’s funded. While the cash flow is guaranteed and enforced by law rather than choice any organisation will start to support it’s own customer – itself – rather than the one paying the bill.

      I’ve no problem with the BBC creating endless programming promoting Muslims and using every bombing, stabbing and car murder to wheel on a friendly Muslim to say how horrible white people are – I just don’t want to pay for it (not that I do). Very swiftly If it were funded by people wanting that output, fine. The BBC then wouldn’t be a massive multinational but a small studio in Luton.

      1. If one considers the pattern of the BBC organisation it seems clear that it has been planning to face a break-up in the future. There are several divisions, divided into smaller cells. Much of output is made for the BBC by “independent” production companies. There is a lot of transfer out of the BBC of BBC trained staff and BBC paid for intellectual property to private companies entirely dependent on the BBC for work.
        If the BBC is sold off it will disintegrate into a myriad of small operations owned and controlled by those who worked for it. No one associated with the BBC will lose money. This will be pre-packaged deal and no money will find its way into the National Exchequer. It will be one of the biggest privatisation scams in history.
        Consider this. How did Top Gear get to be a privately-owned business?

      2. Agreed. The BBC can be as loopy as they like, as long as they are subscription based.

    2. That wouldn’t work – all the upper echelons are overwhelmingly various shades of lefties and the career of any ‘normal’ new recruit would go down the plug-hole before you could say “Orwell”. The institution needs to be beheaded first…then the remainder of the corpse might be reconstituted.

      1. 318548+ up ticks,
        Morning C,
        Well the electorate in the main are doing their bit
        via the polling booth / voting pattern & the first part of the “needs”

    3. S0d that. Just close it down.
      Extra regulations is playing the buggers at their own game.

  54. 318548+ up ticks,
    My heart really goes out to the UKs politico’s & their dilemma, I mean to
    be hard & fast rubber stampers for nigh on four decades, brought to an abrupt halt on the 24/6/2016 is enough to upset any scammer so do they really want to refuse, that is the question,

    Barnier: UK ‘Cannot’ Refuse to Extend Transition If It Will Not Submit to EU Brexit Demands

  55. Yo all

    This is my reply to Thayaric, who disputes my view that the No 2 message ‘Protect the NHS’ should not be the task of the 98.5% of the populaltion who are not NHS employees,

    It is the responsibility of the NHS, as detailed by current Health and Safety legislation, to protect their employees.

    It is not the task, or responsibility of the Public at large to do.

    Advice should be given and implimented, to and by the public on how they can give positive support,in ways which they can reduce dangers to NHS Staff.

    This in no way devolves the NHS management of their reponsibility.

    When the dust settles, the PPE fiasco MUST be investigated, in a similar way that Grenfell Towers was. Corporate manslaughte charges should be
    brought against those who failed to do their duty

    1. I strongly disagree. At the start of the C19 campaign, the Government was clear that the purpose of their advice on frequent hand washing and social distancing was to ‘flatten the peak’, so that the limited resources of the NHS could cope with the expected number of C19 sufferers, and thereby save lives that might be lost should those resources be overwhelmed. At no point did it claim that ‘the NHS was to be protected’, except through the use of a memorable but thoroughly misleading slogan: ‘protect the NHS’. Unfortunately, the average punter wouldn’t remember, let alone understand, the less-snappy but more accurate slogan: ‘Reduce the load on the NHS by minimising your chances of catching CORVID-19 and having to be admitted to hospital’.

      1. “…minimising your chances of catching CORVID-19…”

        It’s not bird flu…

      2. I totally agree, however, in BIG LETTERS is :”Protect The NHS”

        The concept is correct, but (there is always a BUT) it is portrayed incorrectly

        The UK does not even protect its Armed Forces.

        A more aptesterer Slogan would be ” do not endanger the NHS”

    2. One Last Try – why bother? NHS management don’t give a stuff. The PPE farce will never find anyone responsible. Grenfell blamed the company putting the cladding on. That’s like blaming John Lewis for London knife crime.

      It lets the criminal off and avoids the state accepting the blame. Let’s not waste the money of an enquiry. They never accept responsibility and never, ever take the blame and nothing ever changes. The state blunders on like a drunk in a glazier: uncaring, irreponsible, uninterested.

  56. My sheltered housing complex is at war……………
    On one side you have the curtain twitchers who are taking piccies of their fellow residents enjoying the sun (some social distancing) and reporting them to head office demanding ever stricter rules
    On the other you have the awkward squad,having self isolated well over any possible incubation period,saying bollocks to this and chatting to their mates in the garden on the basis I can’t possibly infect anyone else and if I get it so be it

  57. ‘Morning All

    On a morning when we all get a big F-You over the grooming gang report (hang on a minute the Guardian is good at leaking reports,what do you mean not THIS one)

    I am pleased to show our government can still take swift effective action…………………..

    “Tommy Robinson roughly gained 22,000 followers on TikTok, he had over one million
    views in the first week alone. His online following was growing in
    number every single day. Perhaps it was this rapid growth in popularity
    and following on this social media platform that prompted Labour MP
    Afzal Khan, the Shadow Deputy Leader of the House of Commons, to take
    decisive action and pressure the UK Government to persuade China to ban
    Tommy Robinson from TikTok.”
    Pretty clear who calls the shots ain’t it………………….

  62. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8255307/Man-arrested-suspicion-attempted-murder-opening-fire-Manchester-Mr-Ibiza-funeral.html

    The police can posture all they want. These people broke many laws: disruption, murder, owning an illegal weapon let alone the covid restrictions.

    You didn’t get involved because they’re pikeys. A bunch of vicious thugs who fight back. You should have gone in and shot the swine. If they won’t behave, they shouldn’t get the protections of law the rest of us do. It’s hypocrisy, cowardice and idiotic. You’re showing them they can do what they like.

    1. If people are really offensive they can get away with it as the police are terrified of meeting any resistance. I am sure that part of the Hendon Modern Police Training Course instructs young police men and women how to select ‘offenders’ who are likely to ‘go quietly’ and make no fuss.

      1. Shame none of them were law abiding 90 year olds enjoying the sunshine.
        Now THAT’s serious law breaking.

        1. Law abiding 90 year olds enjoying the sunshine also make easy targets for trainee police marksmen, as they are often slow-moving, somewhat bulky and clearly distinguishable and are not expecting trouble.

      2. Like an Asian man dragged off a plane in the US, because Asians don’t like to make a fuss.

    1. Bloody right too. Londoners should never be allowed out unaccompanied beyond the M25.

      When they are let out into the real world they spend their entire time whingeing about bells, noisy cockerels and the smell of cowshit. Make them stay at home where they can whinge about Big Ben, the traffic noise and the omnipresent smell of human effluence.

  64. I mentioned a few weeks ago that today is our 50th wedding anniversary and that we had to cancel the party.
    To make up for missing out on the family, friends and food, I have ordered, thanks to Anne’s information, a meal from a local pub. Simple fare but it saves me cooking this evening.
    In addition, I have opened a bottle of sparkling wine, not Champagne, although I do have a couple of bottles hanging about, but an Italian wine from a small vineyard that our hotelier put us in touch with back in 2011. To be honest I had forgotten this bottle and found it when I was having a sort out. Dated 2008, it remains very good but not for much longer.😎
    I thought I’d put up a few photographs of our day, it was typical April weather as the chauffeur’s umbrella confirms. As I left the pub across the road escorted by my best man we were hit by a heavy shower. Light grey suit became light grey, dark grey spotted with the rain.

    One very excited 18 yo with her foster father – he and his wife looked after this young lady, along with her older sister, for 17 years before I took her off of their hands. There’s another story behind this gentleman and his wife but that will do for another time.
    A very happy and beautiful, just married young lady.
    The beautiful young lady with some dark haired young man whom I do not recognise.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/277829d7cd75e48e2ead054220a246f1e0e19ea274e4ad7d0a92a24d95c060b8.png https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/879120fe7dd57c403000e348d668c61d88b91a84a369d4e778c5d021a44f0ea8.png https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8eb8192dc7484cfa7f29e1a745d6fffc31ac8463519b74ceea86845fd452ae40.png

    4. Many congratulations! You both look so happy in the photo – and Mrs Korky looks absolutely lovely. Enjoy your anniversary today; you can always catch up on family, friends and food later and have a second celebration!

      1. Thank you, Caroline. We certainly intend to hold our party as soon as this virus has faded away.

    8. Happy Golden Wedding Anniversary to you both.
      You both must have been good to and for each other.
      Pleased to welcome you both to the 50+ club.

    9. That is a lovely story and a beautiful set of photos KK.

      You are so romantic and loving .

      Happy Golden anniversary to you both and to the many more ahead.

      1. Notice that I’m only in one and there’s a good reason for that, Mrs K stole the show.

        2. Lovely photographs – happy Golden Wedding to you both – she is a beautiful bride. And oh, the simplicity of those days – looking at your photographs has reminded me of how complicated and different our lives have become. A gentler era, then.

    11. Congratulations to you both! Hope you have a memorable day in spite of the lockdown!

    16. Excellent and thank you Korky. Congratulations … enjoy this special anniversary.

    17. Very many congratulations to you both.

      It can take hard work on both sides to stay together happily and for so long.

      1. Yo sos

        As I have said before, Tintenters have an advantage over many others when it comes to long-time married or the Lockdown

        If you work out the hours in a day the average couple spend together, but not doing household chores or sleeping, it is probably 4/5 hours at the most and that is in house which will have at least four rooms/places to hide

        Tintenters are together 24/7, apart from trips out ect, in one big room

        You have to get on, or split or sell tintent

        We have been in ‘Lockdown’ since the beginning of February and we are still friends…. it is an attitude of mind, like 5o years of marriage, but it takes just 20 years.

        We have been doing the tintent for 35+ years and still enjoy it.

        PS Although we sold our ‘van in Spain, we have another pining for us in stoarage nearby.

        Friends of ourrs, who were in Spain with us, said they heard our van sobbing, when thay put theirs back into the same Storage as us

        Well Done Mr and Mrs Kat

        1. I’ve always thought it takes a certain type to enjoy it.

          We always liked camping but caravaning never appealed to either of us.

          One of our regulars in the cottage had never done anything other than their caravan and motorhomes until they decided they were too old for the extra effort. We were their first gite. They said they wished they had found us earlier and they’ve been returning ever since.

        2. Had to smile when I took my dog for a longer walk this morning; someone had put a caravan outside their garage at the back of their property, surrounded it with windbreaks and had tables and chairs in the enclosure. Obviously, they were having a “holiday” during lockdown.

      2. To be honest I don’t entirely agree – with love it is easy and it comes naturally so you don’t have to work. Not for one second have I not wanted to be with Caroline and I can tell that Mr and Mrs K feel the same about each other..

        1. You’re very lucky if you’ve never gone through difficult times.

          Staying in love through the whole of the for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, can be tough.

          1. All the difficult times in our 50 years have fallen on my wife. When we married we knew that she would one day be crippled by the arthritis that was already gnawing at her joints. It took brilliant help from her specialist and our GP to set up a drug regime that would give her the chance of one, and only one, pregnancy. It eventually happened and we have one son, a very successful man working for a large international investment company. For better for worse, in sickness and in health has real meaning in our marriage, we’ve lived it.

          2. And all the more congratulaions to you all.

            It’s surprising how often adversity can strengthen the bond.

          3. Yes you are right – we are very lucky.

            My namesake, Richard Tracey former M.P. for Surbiton and his wife, Kathy, came to tea with us at Le Grand Osier a few years ago.. We read in the Telegraph that he had died recently so we wrote to his widow and received this very sweet reply:

            We only have happy memories which makes it easier at this time. My children say they cannot remember him ever raising his voice in anger which is a very good memory to have although I am sure it cannot be completely true! I can honestly say in 46 years of marriage we never had a serious argument..

            They were clearly a very decent couple. Caroline and I never row but we have had the most miserable rows with our elder son.

          5. …and never part (even if you’re just going to the shops or whatever – you just never know), or go to bed with something hangiing over, but always a kiss/cuddle.

          6. …and never part (even if you’re just going to the shops or whatever – you just never know), or go to bed with something hangiing over, but always a kiss/cuddle.

    19. Many congratulations Mr and Mrs Kat! Hope you have a wonderful celebration!🎉🍾

    1. My next-door neighbour’s 10-year-old son tripped and hurt his foot yesterday. They took him to A&E at 7:30pm, he was seen straight away and they left the hospital at 9pm. Broken metatarsal, foot in a boot. A&E was empty.

      1. Our younger son was sent to hospital by his gp with a suspected appendicitis yesterday. He was kept in overnight in a completely, utterly empty, ward. He was sent home this afternoon with an armful of antibiotics and a week’s supply of same.

    2. Or perhaps they think they will contract C19, given that most hospitals have still to set up proper C19-free areas.

    3. Particularly worrying since so many are suffering from the clap (Thursdays at 8pm).

      1. If you see big high sided lorries now, they have a ‘curved’ roof, to get the best drag curve

        1. I used to see them daily in off the sea at low level over our house in the 70s and 80s. Along with all the others; Vulcans, Canberras, Phantoms, Jaguars, A10s, F111s, Tornadoes… We lived in a good spot. Our boys loved it.

          2. Northumberland coast. They’d come in from Druridge Bay on their way to Otterburn. I believe Coquet Island at the north end of the bay was a marker, but they generally came in a couple of miles or so south of that.The whole area was a low-flying zone and although they were generally at about 500 feet they were allowed down to 250 feet. Those phantoms could give you a turn if you didn’t see them coming first.

            If only I had the camera gear then that I have now. Even saw the odd starfighter when there was a Malletblow exercise on. Their howl would get you out of the house double quick. Drakens, Super Sabres and various other oddities. Even a Gannet on one or two occasions.

          3. A bit the same as when I was on the Ark.

            My bunk was directly below the waist cat, where Phantome went from standing still to about 180 knots in just over 240 feet.

            The engines in max reheat supplied 44000 lb of thrust, the catapaolt another 40000.

          4. I remember one dark moonless but clear winter night when I was fishing for cod on the beach at Foxton, just north of Alnmouth. There was some small arms fire happening at Boulmer radar base that was just behind me. They must have been having some sort of exercise. Apart from that there was just the sound of the surf.

            Until a Tornado came hammering in out of the darkness over the sea, right over my head, minimum height. Afterburners on, with two streams of violet light filled with Mach diamonds issuing from the tailpipes.

            Whoosh.

          5. In 1992, a Buccaneer pilot was on his last flight in one of these beasts and decided to ‘buzz’ RAF Catterick, then the depot of the RAF Regiment, at the request of some RAF chums based there. Unfortunately, he turned and banked over the training area and Walburn rifle range where my training wing colleagues and I were running a live firing exercise where 100s of rounds were going down the range.
            The plane appeared from behind a hill right in our line of fire as we frantically screamed “Stop! Stop!” to the troops.

            On the reverse side of the hill whence he appeared were Bellerby ranges where live firing was also taking place. The incident was reported – that’s how we found out the background story. We never found out the outcome, but wouldn’t it have been ironic if the beast had been brought down by a few rounds of 5.56mm?

    2. That is Buccaneer Mk 1. with Gyron Junior Engines

      The Mk 2s had the Spey RB, virtually the same ECU as used in BAC 1-11 commercial jet

      The Bucc S50, built for the South Africans had rocket Assisted Take off, as the airfields were at an altitude of 5000ft

      T

          3. Also shown in the documentary – you may have been filmed!

            Had a couple of glider flights from the aerodrome at Arbroath – a KI and a competition gilder from memory.

          5. “You may have been filmed.”

            This reminds me of the occasion, c. 1980, while working on a private housing development to the North of Carlisle, I decided to nip to the parental home to the South of the Great Border City for lunch. Finding my car blocked in by the site forklift, I, er, ‘borrowed’ the Crewbus, resplendent in Laing livery. As I parked up at home, I was initially puzzled that the diesel engine apparently hadn’t stopped (in those days you had to pull a knob to turn off the fuel). Eventually, I twigged that the noise I could hear wasn’t the engine: there was a Sea King helicopter hovering just overhead.

            A few days later, I was presented with an aerial photo of Mum’s house, plus the aforementoned Transit, by my friend (not quite the girl next door, being 16 doors away), whose elder sister’s fiancee, a Fleet Air Arm pilot, needing to ‘run in’ his new engine, had flown up from Culdrose to take some snaps to impress his future in-laws…

    3. Fine BTL comment:

      Dorien Sutherland
      3 weeks ago
      I did read somewhere that the Brits went to the Red Flag Exercises in the US with these planes. American pilots were amused … not supersonic, looked weird etc. An RAF pilot invited a USAF to ride in the back seat for a flight. After landing the US pilot visibly shaken said `fuck, that thing was so low we had to climb to avoid hitting a horse` Not so amusing after all.

  67. 318548+ up ticks,
    The proof of the truth is in being asked to swallow the pudding the current
    ersatz UKIP has on the menu, Gerard Batten HAD to be suppressed by crook or by crook, check out ben the bent builder current chairman.
    The charge against Gerard Batten on standing in the leadership elections,
    NOT of good standing within the party.
    https://twitter.com/GerardBattenUK/status/1253989227865481216

  68. New next door neighbours having a gathering with guests. Can’t see ‘Lockdown’ lasting much longer (unless there is a massive spike in Covid Deaths in the UK)…

  69. Rod Liddle
    Our impatience will end the lockdown
    25 April 2020, 1:26pm

    https://images.contentstack.io/v3/assets/bltf04078f3cf7a9c30/blt6e28c679b534b5cb/5e395cb3443f8b30287b3baa/Notes-on-country-house-opera.jpg?auto=webp&format=jpg&width=50&height=50&fit=crop

    At the farm shop this morning there was a chap panic-buying a large metal and plaster flamingo. It was the last one in stock and he looked very pleased with himself. I wondered if he had a few score more at home, hoarded in the attic. And then his long-suffering wife saying, when he arrived home: “Did you get the milk and chopped tomatoes?” And him replying with excitement: “No, but I managed to get another one of THESE, love…”

    As I mentioned in my column this week, the government will be a fait accompli to the ending of lockdown. The glorious silence of two weeks ago is already a fading memory. Nobody at the farm shop this morning was buying “essentials”: instead garish lawn ornaments, flowers, chocolate cakes and, in my case, clotted cream for some strawberries. The road on which the shop is situated is as noisy at it was in pre-plague days. McDonalds is to re-open in a week or two, the government is discussing practicalities with the Premier League. It will not be long before the flights take off for Aya Napa. So let me be the first columnist to wallow in lockdown nostalgia. Yes, it’s ok for me having a house with a garden in the countryside and a couple of very good local shops a short drive away. But I can’t deny that I actually preferred life lived that way. And the thing that will have broken lockdown will not be government edict, but our lack of discipline, our impatience. More understandable if you are living in London, sure, but indiscipline and impatience nonetheless.

    https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/our-impatience-will-end-the-lockdown

    1. Any chance you could post the article, Michael? The old esc key trick doesn’t seem to work.

    2. 318548+ up ticks,
      Afternoon TB,
      Some viruses travel in pairs as does the corona virus,
      the tw@tvirus is known in medical circles to only find a home in anti common sense hosts.
      The experts say stricken numbers will amount to 48%
      of the electorate.

    3. One aspect of fasting is to experience how many of the world’s hungry feel every day. Taking away the social aspect of a family get together after sunset for a huge feast probably puts the participants a little closer to the meaning of the tradition. So hardly a great loss in the big picture.

    5. I’ve never seen the big deal of this.

      For most of the latter part of my working life I ate one meal a day. I’ve often gone more than 24 hours between meals.

    6. Muslims skip lunch. That’s it. It is not fasting as there is no limit to calorie consumption.

    8. It s not that he is mad that I object to it is the fact that he is a complete piece of excrement that I cannot tolerate.

    9. Let us hope the nutter dies from malnutrition or much more likely he will stuff his face come midnight and hopefully keel over like King John.

      The Lib Dems would sell their grannies for a few Muslim votes. Despicable creep.

    10. Here’s one comment of many – “You will literally do anything for votes, that’s how low you have fallen. How very pathetically sad and another good demonstration of why you no longer have my membership or support.” Even ex Limp Dums think he’s lost it!

    11. WTF? Ed Davey can’t wait for the day when we’re prosecuted for eating in front of msulims during ram a dan?

  71. See, you’re all wrong, you haven’t had IT:

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/24/winter-flu-sufferers-think-have-had-covid-19-warned-against/

    ”

    Experts have warned winter flu sufferers who think they had Covid-19
    before it officially reached the UK against falling into a false sense
    of security.

    Social media sites are littered with claims from those saying they contracted Coronavirus before the first case was confirmed in England on January 31.”

    1. Case confirmed 31 Jan, but how long had infected people been arriving until then?

      1. Makes a complete mockery of that Israeli general’s assessment the other day, doesn’t it?

    1. No one has dared ask her about the grooming report nor the the huge amount of trafficked illegals across the Channel, or in fact the comings and goings from our airports and the lack of testing .

        1. Ms Patel still has some bruises from the last time she actually tried to do her job properly.

          1. It may be unreasonable for us to expect her to have testicular strength but if, as Kipling points out: The female of the species is more deadly than the male, we should expect her to have even better ovarian strength and if she lacks enough of it to do the job properly she should resign.

          2. Give her a chance. They are all lined up against her. As well as the MSM and the Civil Service mandarins, you can be sure that half the Cabinet are opposed to her, just as they are opposed to curbs on immigration, free movement, and being hard on the EU.
            Anyways, is there any one better?

          3. I apologise if I was a bit abrupt. It’s me, not you. Ms Patel has been in the job for a few months and has had more to deal with than most Cabinet members have to handle across an entire Parliamentary term. In a new, senior, job the settling in period is reckoned to be 6 months.
            Her introduction to this Cabinet could only have been worse if civil war had broken out. That may yet happen.

  78. BBC apologises after mistaking Brighton Pavilion for a mosque during a news report on Ramadan
    Gaffe took place on BBC Wales during a news report about Ramadan on Friday
    Building’s architecture is Indian-inspired and it boasts minarets and domes
    Brighton Pavilion was built for King George IV in the nineteenth-century
    Construction started in 1787 and finished in 1823

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8256557/BBC-News-apologises-mistaking-Brighton-Pavilion-mosque-report-Ramadan.html

  80. BBC Any Answers 14:00 hrs with Anita Arnand

    A stroke consultant phoned in to say that there was a remarkable lack of stroke referrals to A&E even given the concerns about mixing with COVID patients. He was surmising the possibility of COVID-19 having haemorrhagic side effects at some stage of the infection effectively meaning that infected patients were unwittingly getting a beneficial dose of anti-coagulant.

    This postulate has already been made in this paper:

    https://www.thailandmedical.news/news/must-read-research-reveals-that-covid-19-attacks-hemoglobin-in-red-blood-cells,-rendering-it-incapable-of-transporting-oxygen–current-medical-protoco

    High ferritin levels are associated with anaemia (low red blood cells) and problems with coagulation:

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3068374/

    This could explain how COVID-19 can rapidly lead to muliple organ failure that unfortunately may be further exacerbated by current methods of inappropriate treatment.

    1. When/if it turns out that the treatments being offered have been entirey wrong I wonder when the lawsuits will start.

    2. I cannot take Anita Anand at all seriously for two reasons.

      Quite a long time since now, she used to be part of an afternoon show on Talk Radio. I used to catch it sometimes if I was out in the car at work and avoiding 5 Live on tthe car radio. One day the main presenter was telling an anecdote of some sort and he mentioned a weasel. I can’t remember the context, but I do remember her response. ‘A weasel? What’s that? Is it some kind of animal?’ and she was being serious.

      More recently she appeared in a newspaper article saying that she didn’t ever visit the countryside ‘because you can’t wear nice shoes there’.

      Now the fact that these two comments are in some way nature-based is coincidental to my point.

      They do to me indicate that it isn’t necessary to have a towering intellect, or even any intellect at all to be allowed to host a ‘serious’ BBC current affairs programme.

      1. The first time I heard her, I thought it was the ditsy hindoo woman in the Archers who – most improbably – married the vicar.

      2. On a longish trip offshore, before the days when a supply ship would supply us at sea, I remember an American technician walk into the instrument room and announce, “Cooks say we got weasels in the flour!”

      3. Does the same go for POTUS?
        Could bleach actually turn red blood cells white?

  81. I am signing off now. Must go an find suitable protective clothing to wear to neighbour’s outdoor Pimms party.

    Should I survive – it is only my fifth time of leaving the house since 21 March…. – I’ll report on how the drink reached the glass.

    Have a spiffing evening composing letters to Pretty Awful asking her why she lets hundreds of illegals in every week.

    A demain.

  82. I’ve been watching the CV briefing and the news.

    I have one observation.

    Look you stupid bastards, if you completely wreck the economy, as it appears that you are aiming for, you will ensure that the NHS will cease to exist as you know it.

    You will have killed the golden goose that pays for it all, and the NHS that remains will be nothing like the NHS you have now.

    Health care will be strictly rationed, nice to haves, IVF, new knees, hips, gastric bands etc etc etc won’t be on the menu.
    Even cancer/heart/mental health care will be rationed.

    1. 318548+m up ticks,
      S,
      Especially over the last 3 decades the GB dismantling
      campaign is coming to fruition.

    2. Well gastric bands, IVF and so on shouldn’t be there in the first place. Nor procedures like gender reassignment and back again.

    3. With an austerity favouring neoliberal government you may be right, however we can have and afford whatever level of healthcare is deemed appropriate.

      Revenues do not pay for services. The government doesn’t have a solvency constraint, it’s constraints are inflation and foreign exchange risk.

      Here’s Professor Bill Mitchell on the subject…
      http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=9281
      Yes he’s a left-wing economist who specialises in MMT.

      Here’s a little from a right-wing neoliberal economist Cullen Roche…
      https://www.pragcap.com/say-americas-bankrupt-one-more-time/

      I couldn’t find the article I wanted to post from him but that’ll do for now. I have a train to catch.

      1. Healthcare is going to be rationed either by ability to pay or by controlling the amount of care available.

        2. Strange it’s not billshirt though.

          Deficits are nothing to be scared of.

          There are obviously constraints on spending but they are not what you think they are . There is no solvency constraint for the UK government. Even the most neoliberal economists acknowledge that.

          The government is not a household. It’s a bank, a bank that actually doesn’t have to balance it’s books but does so to create a savings vehicle particularly for pensions and insurance companies.

          1. So explain again why so many countries have gone bust, their peoples pauperised and their money became wothless.

            You might not believe it, but a country can go bankrupt.

          2. I’m fully aware that can happen in some countries. Pick a country and we’ll see why it happened.

            Countries inside a currency union can certainly not necessarily ‘go bankrupt’ but could have major economic issues.

            I never said we can print to the moon and bank, obviously there are constraints, I’ve never denied that, but solvency isn’t one of them for us because we have a currency that’s sovereign, fully fiat, and free floating, and we don’t have issues here like a US dollar only market.

            Try reading this for starters…
            http://home.hiwaay.net/~becraft/RUMLTAXES.html

          3. I’ve read it before.

            It can’t happen, we know best is the mantra.

            Like many other things that can’t happen, sometimes they do.

            If the banks had blown up in 2007/8 as they so nearly did, it would have happened here.

            If nobody will use your currency nor lend to you, because they think you won’t repay them, you are stuffed.

          4. It did happen then or at least the potential was there. We guaranteed a trillion almost in bad debt for which we charged banks a couple of billion for use of the facility.
            If we had had to pay that out where do you think it would have come from?
            We could hardly borrow a trillion off the banks to protect the very banks having trouble with bad debt. A trillion is a full six months GDP, far too much to tax on top of current taxes.
            Taxing for revenue is obsolete in the UK. This is not academic, it’s actually how the system really works. Japan has done it absolutely during Abenomics. Has the world made Yen worthless? For 30 years the yen has been basically trending flat against the dollar.

          6. Tax is a necessary evil.

            The purpose of tax is to withdraw purchasing power. This is part of the fight against inflation.
            The second purpose of tax is to create demand for the currency. In the UK all taxes must be paid in pounds Sterling. You can work for shirt buttons, marbles, or anything but you must find pounds to pay taxes.
            Another purpose of taxation is to change behaviour. For instance fuel duty, alcohol duty, pollution taxes, tobacco duty, etc.

            We do not tax for revenue. The government spends long before it taxes or borrows. In fact borrowing is the very last thing we do and we do that to ‘balance the books’ superficially, and really to create a guaranteed savings vehicle.

          7. But by your logic there should be no need for it.

            Without tax people could be paid much less, equally thus reducing purchasing power.

            If the currency becomes worthless at home why would anyone abroad want it?

            As to using it to change behaviour: legislate.

            You are not going to persuade me that the UK can just print its way out of this, if the recession/depression I believe is coming unless we get out of this impasse soon should happen.

          8. Of course there’s a need for tax. Domestic demand for the currency, and part of the fight against inflation. Those are the major functions of tax.

            Paying people less would reduce purchasing power but it wouldn’t drive demand for the currency.

            We don’t have much external debt. About 400 billion.
            Overseas players will want pounds if they need to buy something only available in pounds.

            We are something like the fifth largest economy, something like the sixth biggest exporter, we have strong institutions, a productive economy, very little foreign debt. We’re in quite a privileged position economically speaking. Our currency is also the third or perhaps fourth most kept reserve currency by the world’s central banks.

            Money printing happens every day quietly but many people don’t even seem to realise it. Everything the government spends is ‘printed’. Everything banks lend out is also ‘printed’. Sometimes this printing is vast amounts. We use names like credit bubble which is nothing more than banks creating deposits for more borrowers than normal.

            Of course there are constraints, but not the constraint you are thinking of. Government is self-financing in the UK, and we can meet any bill we choose to that’s denominated in pounds. That’s not to say we will, it’s possible for politicians to say sod that and cause a default, but the facility is certainly there. Governments also don’t have to balance the books. Outright monetisation is always a possibility as long as the government isn’t silly about it. Japan has been quietly monetising debt since the late 90’s.

          11. By external debt I mean the proportion of the national debt held by overseas banks and investors. That’s less than a quarter of the national debt. At least 75% of our debt is domestic, held by UK banks, investors, pension funds, insurance companies etc.

      3. You’ve said this before Thayaric. If tax does not pay for public services, what do you think precisely does?

        No, we can’t afford whatever we want, same as we can’t have ten million men under arms nor streets paved with gold. Resources are finite and controlled by income. If too little is raised, the state and can keep spending all it wants until we end up unable to pay the bill then we go to the IMF and they then set our budget for us – with significant spending restraint.

        Government has no money. Not a penny. It all comes from private wealth creators. The UK struggles witha flexible, responsive economy because it is over populated and monstrously over taxed. That makes it inelastic. Now, most of this investment is the public sector buying services from the private. That’s fine, but the question must be asked if the state needs to do this and if it must, what does the rest of that huge organisation do? We found from Rutnam that the Home office bureaucracy – not service wing – employs 35,000 people. Roughly the same as HP. Yet it also employs over 300 contractors and consultants from Cap Gemini on about £1000 a day each. Why?

        Simply, the state is limited by the extent of the damage its tax levies do to the functional, wealth creating economy. Too much damage and it collapses under it’s own weight.

        All the economic instruments in the world cannot protect us from the ultimate contraction, recession and reset. Brown tried and – thankfully – failed. Zero interest rates and high taxes mean no spending and lots of borrowing which means no backup and high risk. It cannot, it will not; continue.

        1. They’ll do what nearly all British governments from Attlee until Thatcher did, and what has been done since 2008. Print money. The limiting factor on that strategy is inflation, which again we saw as “normal” pre-Thatcher. It does have the positive side effect of cheaper exports, and a corresponding negative of more expensive imports. But it keeps the punters happy, as while the pound in their pocket is worth less, they think they are ahead because they have more of them.

          2. Just pointing out that “borrowing” is not essential. And quite honestly, I don’t think anyone knows how to get out of the current financial mess. You can’t just go back to business as usual, since the economy would probably never recover. And since we are going to be stuck with some form of social distancing for probably a couple of years, it will be even harder than the 2008 recovery.

            That doesn’t leave too many other options. The US is just running up its deficit like there is no tomorrow – though we do have nitwit politicians suggesting just declaring bankruptcy and starting again is the thing to do. Worked for Trump and his empire – was it 4 or 6 times? And he ended up president, so it can’t be all bad…

        2. OK here we go again….

          ” Resources are finite”

          True. Obviously. But money is not a resource.

          ” controlled by income”

          False. Resources are controlled by the market and by government policy.

          “If too little is raised, the state and can keep spending all it wants until we end up unable to pay the bill”

          False. We can afford any amount in Sterling if the political will is there. It’s not a question of economics, it’s politics that sets spending and taxation levels.

          “we go to the IMF and they then set our budget for us – with significant spending restraint.”

          False. We have never defaulted nor are we likely to as our debt is all denominated in pounds. We can only default on our debt if politicians decide to default. We can’t hard default, we can only soft default.

          “Government has no money.”

          Absolute tosh. All of our money comes from one of two sources, the government, and private banks. The government has infinity (or I suppose more correctly infinity minus one) pounds at its disposal.

          “It all comes from private wealth creators.”

          More Tosh. See above.

          “The UK struggles witha flexible, responsive economy because it is over populated and monstrously over taxed.”

          Tosh. The UK struggles with this because we have changed to an economy strongly based on financial services. As for overtaxed there’s a difference between the amount we tax and where we take it from. Some people and companies are overtaxed, others are not. Thatcherism took a large part of the tax system and shifted it away from the wealthy and onto the poor, which is why the GINI coefficient shot up in the eighties and has stayed there since. New Labour managed to make this even worse with even more stealth taxes added on top of those that Thatcher and Major gave us.

          “That makes it inelastic.”

          One thing the UK isn’t is inelastic. We respond to increasing demand with increasing supply pretty well.

          ” Now, most of this investment is the public sector buying services from the private.”

          We do have a problem with underinvestment and malinvestment. We like investing in land rather than productive capacity as land is largely untaxed. The incentives are for rentseeking in neoliberalism. This is one of my biggest gripes with the current fiscal system. We want people to invest in new tech, we want them to invest in companies so that they create jobs and more supply, instead we buy 2nd, 3rd, xth homes.

          “We found from Rutnam that the Home office bureaucracy – not service wing – employs 35,000 people. Roughly the same as HP. Yet it also employs over 300 contractors and consultants from Cap Gemini on about £1000 a day each. Why?”

          Write and ask the minister concerned. Even better have Corim do it as Priti Useless is his MP.

          ” Zero interest rates and high taxes mean no spending and lots of borrowing which means no backup and high risk. It cannot, it will not; continue.”

          In theory zero interest rates should stop saving and make people look for a better return so they should invest instead of save. Trouble is they don’t invest where we’d like them to, see above. The level of taxation and the level of spending are political choices not economic ones. There are economic constraints but solvency isn’t one of them. Government borrowing isn’t real borrowing, it’s the creation of a savings vehicle.

          We live in an era of spreadsheet money. Our currency is fully fiat, free floating, and sovereign. It meets every condition the government needs to avoid solvency issues.
          You are acting as if we were on Either the Gold Standard, or fixed exchange rates. We had fixed exchange rates under Bretton-Woods and during the ERM mechanism, we don’t now.
          It’s a shame that most of this post will go flying over your head because you are set in your ways and educated when things worked differently. The world has changed, perhaps change with it.


    5. ” … mental health care will be rationed.”

      Experts threaten to lead us into a dystopia of inhuman mass paranoia

      JANET DALEY

      Time to get real about the ‘realistic’ measures presented by scientists and hysterical broadcasters

      When the Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty pronounced those devastating words last week, in the preternaturally calm voice that says, “Never mind the guff you hear from politicians – I’m the expert authority around here”, you had to wonder whether he had any sense of their impact. You may recall, as I do with appalling vividness, the precise utterance that reverberated through the rest of the official Downing Street briefing.

      What Professor Whitty said was that any possible exit from the lockdown “in the long run” could come only when we had either a successful vaccine, or drug treatments effective enough to prevent death. And, he went on, “the probability of having [either of] those anytime in the next calendar year are incredibly small”.

      So forget about the Government’s light at the end of the tunnel and the significance of having passed the peak. To be “realistic”, he said, we must expect the sort of restrictions on social contact which now prevail to continue until – when? Whenever either of those two extraordinarily unlikely discoveries is definitively proven. Well then, since being “realistic” is clearly the order of the day, let’s get real.

      If the present social distancing measures are to continue for at least the remainder of this year, what exactly would that mean? To begin at the beginning, with the youngest among us, a generation of toddlers and small children would spend a formative year of their lives never being touched by, or coming into close physical proximity with, anyone outside their own immediate family – which might mean with one single parent.

      Slightly older children of primary school age would not be able to mix freely with classmates (even assuming that the teaching unions agreed to re-open their schools) or friends, and would thus miss out on a crucial stage of their psychological development and their acquisition of cooperative attitudes.

      For those in their teens for whom social experience is absolutely critical to the process of maturing, there could be none of the emotional (and sexual) initiation that is a normal part of becoming an adult. Virtually all of the personal, familial and cultural events that give the young an understanding of life’s communality and meaning, would be prohibited. Since the epidemiologists who are now apparently in charge of government policy do not seem to see how grotesquely unnatural all this is, could the experts in childhood and adolescent psychopathology please speak up?

      What would be the “new normal” for a whole tranche of the population is a kind of institutionalised paranoia about bodily contact. Even adults able to recall what real life used to be like would be locked indefinitely into a simulacrum of psychosis in which every stranger represents a mortal threat. Surely this cannot be allowed to go on for long because it is – in the literal sense of the word – inhuman.

      Our species is not designed to live in a state of isolation and we will, for perfectly legitimate reasons, find it necessary to resist the enforcement of it. Because of the way it is being presented, this will create unbearable conflict with our sense of duty to others – and that will cause further emotional stress. Yes, this is reality: the whole of it, not just the cold-blooded “scientific” part. (In truth, of course, what is publicly on offer does not represent the entire scientific canon, just a specialised portion of it. )

      The immediate damage to the economy has been exhaustively discussed, but this will almost certainly be repaired eventually. The proposed incarceration of the elderly too, has been properly attacked as cruel and arbitrary. But not nearly enough has been said about the psychological and developmental consequences of an entire society adopting modes of behaviour that are alien to our most fundamental emotional needs. In time, no doubt, human resilience being what it is, the recovery would come but the cost in damaged personalities and the ability to form relationships could be dreadful.

      For the moment, the country is being sold the epidemiologists’ picture of “reality” with relentless efficiency. The government is famously “following the scientific advice” and the broadcast media is going with it big time, led by the twenty-four hour news channels which are running round-the-clock Plague TV. Since the epidemic is their only subject, they are filling many of the empty hours with horrific mini-documentaries filmed in intensive care units, which recount, in terrifying detail, the agonies of patients who are unlikely to survive or who have been – miraculously and against the odds – saved.

      You might argue that this is a perfectly justifiable function of television journalism under the circumstances. But the fear that is being encouraged has probably led directly to the deaths of heart attack and stroke victims who are now afraid to go to hospital. Had there been a similar glut of film productions over the past decade featuring, say, the deaths caused by sepsis resulting from antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections contracted on hospital wards, a similar panic might have ensued. But there wasn’t. Nor have there been endless film reports of the final days of cancer and heart disease patients – even though you are still far, far more likely to die of one of those diseases than of coronavirus.

      Add to this the quite noticeable reluctance of the news media to cast any bit of information (even a decline in death rates) as encouraging. I do understand that, for morally justifiable reasons, no one wants to describe any number of deaths as “good news”, but there does need to be, as Professor Whitty might put it, a realistic assessment of how things are moving.

      It would be quite possible to conclude that the Government – and the media – want you to be as afraid and demoralised as it is possible to be because that will make you less inclined to challenge the prolonging of extraordinarily repressive measures. But the reckoning is going to come. And the people who are making judgments now about what the limits are to a life that is worth living had better be ready to answer.

      https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/25/experts-threaten-lead-us-dystopia-inhuman-mass-paranoia/

      1. A good article as far as I’m concerned.
        One line struck me:
        The immediate damage to the economy has been exhaustively discussed, but this will almost certainly be repaired eventually.

        Eventually?

        We still haven’t repaired 2007/8.

        1. Why do Italy and Spain have so many deaths when they implemented a really strict lockdown?

          The standard response is often that there ae so many Chinese workers in Italy, but is that it? What effect is their quarantine having?

          Ni idea, just asking.

          1. My guess is that that is a combination of culture: touchy feely people who live close together and are relatively long lived and the people suddenly getting a bug that kills the elderly.

          2. The big thing is population density. When people live on top of each other, any aerosol transmitted disease will quickly spread. When areas are sparcely populated there are far fewer opportunities for that to happen. Compare Britain’s Covid stats with Sweden, which has one tenth of the population density, and by British standards, no large cities. It’s also very noticeable here in the US – high population density states and areas within states get hammered, the more rural, low population areas do not.

            p.s. now it’s killing younger people as well – we are seeing a spate of unexplained serious strokes in the younger age groups. It seems that they don’t get the “standard” CV19 symptoms and go straight to the organ damage/blood clotting phase.

          3. I’m sure that is a significant factor.

            What worries me is that the “wave process” will scare the politicians into constant lockdown.

            Ultimately it might well be better to let thousands die now rather than millions die later.

          5. The BBC claims that half the deaths are of people over eighty.

            No, they didn’t say where they got their figures from

          6. The way covid-19 is put down as cause of death is probably variable from country to country. The 8,000 ‘extra’ deaths in the UK ONS statistics (from the 21st April) are significant. The 28th April ONS figures will be interesting. Just a shame that the statistics are always 11 days in arrears.

          7. I’ve wondered why Spain has suffered to such a degree. Most towns have a chinese run ‘pound store’ and I’ve wondered if that is the source of the high levels of infection. They’ve had a very tough lock down policy and are only now starting to allow children under 14 out for 1 hours walk per day within a km of their home. It must have been very tough on families as a high proportion of the population appear to live in flats in urban areas.

        1. Aren’t they at the back of the queue, way after restaurants?

          Cue the stale sandwich placed in the table just like in ths old days when Scottish pubs could only serve drinks to diners.

          1. If a pub only sells crisps it should be ahead of restaurants. A pub supplies a very therapeutic environment for a lot of people. They stop a lot of uxoricides and mariticides.

          2. Are you talking common sense again?

            It could well kill the atmosphere of a pub but let them open if they follow simple distancing guidelines.

          3. With the poor aural ability of a lot of the locals there would just be lots of shouting, “What’s that you say? Strung up from lampposts? Too good for ’em.”

  83. “North Korea’s Kim Jong Un Reported By Japanese Media To Be In Vegetative State” Nothing new there then…..

    2. No reason for him not to be Dear Leader, his father has been dead for years and he is still head of state.

  84. Good evening from a Saxon Queen with Longbow and Axe ( both in handbag).

    Just started cooking dinner, it was meant to be a Chilli type thing with red kidney beans, rice and
    cubed beef. I got some meat out of the freezer that last night that i thought was beef
    only this morning to realise it was minced lamb. So it’s a shepherds pie instead .

    1. How did you transmogrify the red kidney beans into mashed potato?

      With the Longbow – or the Axe?

  85. Claire Fox
    Staying at home doesn’t make us heroes
    25 April 2020, 8:30am

    Idon’t particularly like the constant war analogies used about fighting coronavirus. However, when someone like Matt Hancock conjures up the Blitz spirit, urging us to pull together ‘in one gigantic national effort’, I think of that cliched question: ‘What did you do in the war, Daddy?’ Forget the sexism, what will our answer be to future generations? The fact is that millions of us will have to reply: ‘I did nothing, I stayed at home.’ That raises a real dilemma of lockdown society: are we being socialised into concluding that passivity is a positive virtue?

    In the 1915 war recruitment poster ‘Daddy, what did YOU do in the Great War?’, designed to shame people to enlist, a daughter poses the question to her father sitting in an armchair, while her brother plays with toy soldiers. The propaganda may have been crudely guilt-inducing, but historically heroes don’t earn plaudits for sitting out any call to arms on the sofa. You don’t need to be a fan of wars or militarism to note that heroic action – whether being prepared to be jailed as a conscientious objector or putting your life on the line by joining the resistance – creates a sense of meaning when society faces a huge challenge. Facing the Covid-19 enemy, what meaning will we derive from being told we’re brave for doing nothing?

    This is not an argument against lockdown. I have mixed views on its efficacy, but am prepared to consent to its temporary demands as a necessary evil. However, I am arguing that we shouldn’t celebrate lockdown society, and I have a warning: we need to be careful of the cultural conclusions we draw in responding to any major crisis. Another iconic war poster illustrates the point.

    Rosie the Riveter symbolised the heroic quality to being actively engaged beyond hearth and home. The drafting of women to work in factories and on farms as part of the war effort may have initially had a coercive element. But many relished that, at last, they were making a positive, practical contribution beyond the confines of home. It gave millions of women a new taste of freedom. Here was a chance to acquire new skills, to be treated as equals in the workplace.

    Hence a wartime mobilisation became a collective experience of playing a socially useful role in the public sphere. Its cultural and political reverberations shaped social change in the decades that followed, sowing the seeds of the women’s liberation movement. In contrast, the present ‘war’ against a virus is social segregation; we are demobilised back into the private sphere, freedoms restricted, our skills left to go to seed, our work ethic damped down. When we ask, what can we do to help, we are told to stay put, do nothing, watch Netflix. In such circumstances, it is difficult not to become lethargically alienated from taking responsibility for the fate of society. Is there a danger that our role as active citizens will become side-lined as a consequence?

    One lesson of the vote for Brexit was that citizens were fed up being treated as bystanders. One of the gains of Leave was the flourishing of a sense of agency and self-determination that it afforded to many. Years of being ‘done to’ by well-meaning but paternalistic technocrats had created a climate of demoralising defeatism. When offered a chance to ‘take back control’, millions seized the chance. An anti-establishment rebellion actively engaged people as citizens, with an appetite for being players in the project of social change. How can this optimism be retained when so many citizens are now reduced to watching from the side-lines as our fate is announced at daily press briefings?

    Initially, the government emphasised it trusted us all as grown-ups to do the right thing. Over time, messages have become shriller, bossier. Even the limited activity we are allowed is marshalled and policed. The mandated physical daily exercise has become fraught with do’s and don’ts. We sheepishly dread a walk in the park in case we are accused of endangering fellow citizens if we sit on a park bench to catch the sun, or jog too close to others. Surely there’s a danger that such official prescription undermines people’s confidence in their own judgement? Infantilising us with simplistic slogans and patronising advertising campaigns certainly makes a mockery of the notion of us as consenting adults.

    Softer messaging poses another danger. Government adverts that preach the positives of lockdown: all home baking, time with the kids, film nights. These seem to want to make a virtue of a terrible necessity. Yes, for all those whose work hours and conditions are usually arduous, having time to read the Hilary Mantel trilogy, flake out on the couch or clean out the attic can be a boon. But don’t let’s oversell this as heroic, life-saving activity. I understand the search for silver linings, but worry that those on social media who are preaching the virtues of Zoom yoga, the joys of bread-making, Zoom-drinks, home-working and more are in danger of being apologists for our anti-social plight, of presenting lockdown as a fashionable lifestyle choice, of normalising a grotesque perversion of social interactions.

    We already know that the experience of lockdown is a mixed bag. It is increasingly recognised that for many it can be hellish. Enforced leisure – if you are crippled with worry about debts, insecure job prospects, your family’s health – is no holiday. And imagine what it’s like being locked up in a cramped flat with an alcoholic partner, an autistic child or a hyper-anxious parent with Alzheimer’s. As to older citizens forced into isolation: there’s a reason why solitary confinement is considered one of prison’s most cruel punishments. In the bigger picture, psychologically we are robbed of what makes us human – our role as social beings, defined by how we relate to each other and our capacity to act on the world to change it. Being left with no useful role to play can be grindingly frustrating and deeply debilitating.

    Moving forwards, despite a strategy that has confined the majority to barracks, perhaps the government can come up with creative ways of allowing citizens to practically help the country take on the pandemic. Millions want to contribute to the national effort. Hundreds of thousands have signed up as NHS volunteers – so many, in fact, that there are complaints of not enough to do. DIY initiatives continue to inspire. It’s been brilliant watching the flowering of community action: streets and estates organising to make sure their vulnerable neighbours are catered for, the homeless are fed, sending cards and flowers to the lonely. Two of my favourites are the cycle clubs who have organised to deliver prescriptions and Scrub Hub, which has involved everyone from theatrical costume-designers to amateur dress makers in creating tunics and trousers for NHS staff. Can’t some cross-party parliamentary committee harness this itching-to-get-hands-dirty mood into a version of the peace corps, that can help kick-start society’s post-lockdown reconstruction?

    It already feels a waste that the relevant authorities haven’t used the empty roads and infrequent trains to do more essential infrastructure work, from filling in potholes to rail engineering works. But while such projects would involve workers in specific industries, the many public-spirited self-employed and furloughed employees are also stir crazy. Can they be deployed productively on socially useful projects, perhaps sprucing up the outsides of social care homes or repairing and enhancing playgrounds?

    And let’s get the young involved. All that excess, cooped-up energy is looking for an outlet. Even the initial enthusiasm for hours of unlimited gaming, Instagram and Tik Tok is running out of steam. Could we set up fast-track apprenticeship schemes and involve them in new house-building projects? And then there’s fruit picking…

    In March, Defra announced Pick for Britain, a modern-day Land Army scheme aiming to recruit students and laid-off hospitality workers to help pick crops. Although it was all a bit too Dig for Victory for my taste, what a shame the initiative seems to have withered on the vine. It at least had the merits of attempting to rally people behind a positive campaign to help society at this challenging time.

    Perhaps it’s not too late. The much-publicised emergency airlift of Romanian farm workers became tangled up in the Brexit wars. Beyond that, could young recruits be trained up by experienced European fruit and veg pickers to temporarily support the farming industry? Of course, pay the pickers well, whatever their age or nationality. Regardless it could be a positive appeal to the young to rise to the challenge of public service.

    Such schemes would also reinforce an important message that I fear is getting lost: society cannot carry on consuming at home if it does not produce. What we need now is a huge surge of popular enthusiasm to kick-start dynamism into economic and social life, to urgently regain the habit of productive activity. This is a tough call. How easy will it be to energise people who have been told they are heroically saving lives by staying at home? We can expect new battle lines. When I recently suggested that I couldn’t wait to return to normal, and relished the prospect of hugging people again, I was met with incredulity and admonished for being irresponsible.

    Opinion polling seems to show the public are more pro-lockdown than anyone in power might have expected. No surprise. Focusing on people’s vulnerability, making safety a virtue, depicting ill-health as the most frightening of enemies, promoting inactivity as heroism: this all adds up to a narrative that suggests state protection is the answer to all ills. All these things will have cultural consequences.

    However, nothing is fated. It is up to us as citizens to decide not to concede to a prewritten script of passivity. Retreating to indefinite lockdown culture would mean surrendering what makes life worth living, a far more tragic cost than anything inflicted by a virus.

    The spirit of the silent-front line would be worth emulating to spur us back into the public sphere. Tesco supermarket worker Laura McLellan says she felt proud when she realised there was public recognition for her team of checkout operators as key workers She admitted that at the start, it took guts to be customer-facing in the face of a infectious pandemic. But she was ‘conscious not to show fear in case it would “ripple down” to her colleagues.’ She is right. Fear can be as contagious as any virus. By keeping calm, we can help each other tackle it.

    The real battle lies ahead. For the next phase, we will need new heroes: active citizens who are prepared to lead the charge in kick-starting economic and public life. So let’s brace ourselves for the fight of our lives – to overcome our fears and put ourselves back centre stage. Dare I say it: to take back control.

    https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/let-s-not-pretend-we-re-heroes-for-staying-at-home

    1. Clair Fox has a bit on twitter where she is speaking at some forum – my word she is so telling Labour what she thinks of them!

  86. Just back from shopping. Wine & cider.
    There was an older guy in the car park, wearing the spitting image of trousers my Father used to have – a faded pink chino style. Brought back memories, that did, leaving me feeling saddened over that my Father died back in ’97. Ah well.

    1. It’s the small things that catch you out.
      It was at least ten years before I stopped looking at items in garden centres and thinking “Mim would like that for her birthday”. (Mim was our name for my mother.)

      1. Took ages to stop wondering why our old cat, Magnificat, wasn’t in his usual place by the front door, after he died. He was an excellent cat, didn’t even bring too many small dead things into the house, either. Still miss him.

      1. Is Happy the right word – I’m not sure that’s the aim of a month of fasting – maybe ‘Have a Hungry Ramadam’.

        1. In the Middle East, they actually put on weight. Feasting & partying all night, farting in bed all day.

      2. Let’s give it a try. ‘Happy ‘ckin Ramadan to the arse-in-the-air brigade’.

        I’ll see if I’ve been banned in the morning.

      3. Not as long as they say it two dozen times whilst washing their hands under the hot water tap. And at regular intervals.

        :-))

      4. 318548+ up ticks,
        Evening AA, whoops he’s gone.

        in reality & currently you would get some establishment reward.

    1. Actually they are preservatives. Our bodies produce formaldehyde and we can tolerate that in small amounts. Although in general aldehydes tend to be carcinogenic which is why we are urged not to char food or use cooking oil repeatedly for too long.

      There is certainly ongoing discussion about Thimerosal as it’s an organomercurial compound. It’s generally considered safe at the levels given but our bodies can’t use Hg at all.

      He then went on to talk about bathing in strong UV light. The same UV light that causes skin burns and cancer. I wonder what the stats are on CV and sunbed users.

      1. Obviously yours produces too much which explains that weird look on your face..

    3. I wonder which ‘Chorus’they mean

      Noun

      1. a part of a song which is repeated after each verse.

      “strong guitar-driven songs with big, big choruses”

      2. a large organized group of singers, especially one which performs with an orchestra or opera company.

      “he has words of praise for the RSNO Chorus”

      verb

      verb: chorus; (of a group of people) say the same thing at the same time.

      “‘Morning, Sister,’ the nurses chorused”

    2. The problem is that with the passing of the big mainframe transaction processing applications, no-one knows how to design for performance any more. Just look at the sheer processing power in an average desktop computer today (an awful lot more than the older mainframes), and there are still “performance” issues.

      That’s why, when you really, really need it to work and handle thousands of simultaneous users, you still call up IBM, not your local “IT” outfit.

      1. IBM recognised that and decided to concentrate on mainframes. The unintended consequence was Bill Gates and his viruses.

  92. “North Korea’s Supreme Leader/dictator Kim Jong-un has reportedly died, or is on his death bed with no hope for recuperation — according to media outlets in China and Japan.”

    You pays yer money and you takes yer choice …

          3. I keep looking at my beard clippers. Only bought while I was in horse spittle, since i hadn’t shaved for several days, and was beginning to look like Catweazle…

        3. You and me both Geoff. I’m starting to look like an inverted floor mop. I might have to do a ‘Stringfellow’ back-brush with the risk of a mullet at the back.

          1. Tomorrow, I may have a go with the beard clippers. Slightly narrower than hair clippers. What could possibly go wrong. It’s said that a bad haircut doesn’t last for more than two weeks…

        4. That’s another thing. I got my number ‘0’ cut at my local pub every second Tuesday of the month at 1700 hrs. Now I do it myself in the garden, clippers with the extension cord, and have to beg and scrape for MOH to QC it and mop up any surviving follicles.

        5. I started with a shortish cut. By the time they let us go to the barber, I will be back to having hair again.

          2. There is a proper local barber, barber pole out front the whole thing — but with 100% female staff, been going there for years now. Cheap cuts and nice people.

        6. Ah, Best Beloved did mine last evening, I showered, brushed and combed – beautiful, though I say it myself.

          ♪♫Oh, why was he born so beautiful
          Oh, why was he born at all.
          He’s no fucking use to anyone,
          He’s no fucking use at all.          ♪♫

          RAF and Rugby coach trip music.

    3. BTL Comment from ZH: “So basically he’s now in the same condition as Joe Biden”

    5. “You pays yer money and you takes yer choice …” I don’t think they get much of a choice. Will N Korea’s plebs be any better off, I doubt it. They’ll probably have to have an enforced 6 month mourning period. We think we’re having a tough time, but let’s give a thought to yer average North Korean.

  93. Finished the bubbly and about to sign-off. A big thank you from my wife and me for all the kind words from the Nottlers on our anniversary. Have a pleasant evening and ‘see’ you tomorrow.

    2. Very pleased to read you had a splendid evening.

      Onward and upward.

      And when you wake up tomorrow, a big sloppy kiss is in order, nobody is looking.

      };-))

    3. So sorry that I was unaware of your “Special Day” today, Korky. I hope that R and L had a great time.

  94. “The weekly Shukan Gendai reported Friday that a Chinese medic sent to North Korea as part of a team to treat Kim believed a delay in a simple procedure left the leader severely ill, Reuters reported.”

    “Simple delay” While the poison took effect?

  96. D Express headline ‘Kim Jong-un dead’
    I always thought he was a bit of a zombie.

      1. The undead bit was my point from the start, but no one else seemed to see my ghoulish attempt at humour.

  97. I had assumed and hoped that the Nightingale Hospitals would deal with Covid-19 patients and that the principal UK Teaching hospitals would carry on as usual treating seriously ill patients and carrying out the hip replacements, cancer therapies and all the rest bread and butter activities.

    Blow me! The Nightingale Hospitals are devoid of patients and the other hospitals are half empty and often deserted whilst millions remain at home whether ill or not. Overworked hospital ‘Angels’ have time on their hands to perform theatrical ‘dances’ and ‘Haka’s’ for our bemusement.

    That the advices of a bunch of theoreticians from Imperial College London should be given such political power is tragic. Professor Whitty is clearly deranged if he believes that twelve months of social distancing will save us; this measure if enacted would leave the country in penury and at the mercy of the Chinese.

    Needless to say, Whitty and his former and present cohorts at Imperial College London are readily accepting the Chinese millions and accepting tens of thousands of their Chinese students aka future spies.

    I cannot think of any catastrophe of similar dimensions in my lifetime.

    2. ‘Evening, Cori – to me it’s all a scammy con. Others may differ but Sweden seems to be weathering the storm – why can’t we?

    1. Current view of Earth from the Space Station.
      (or at least what the MSM want us to believe it is)

    2. Current view of Earth from the Space Station.
      (or at least what the MSM want us to believe it is)


  103. If you can take any more of “On the one hand…but on the other…”

    If Sweden succeeds, lockdowns will all have been for nothing

    DANIEL HANNAN

    When foreign commentators discuss Sweden’s light-touch response to Covid-19, they tend to adopt an affronted tone. Which is, on the surface, surprising. You’d think everyone would be willing the Nordic country to succeed. After all, if Sweden can come through the epidemic without leaving a smoking crater where its economy used to be, there is hope for the rest of the world. So far, many signs appear encouraging. The disease seems to be following the same basic trajectory in Sweden as elsewhere.

    Although we must wait for complete data, modelling by country’s authorities suggests that the infection rate in Stockholm peaked on 8 April. If so, we need to consider the implication, namely that, once basic hygiene and distancing measures are in place, tightening the screw further perhaps makes little difference. Which would be good news for the rest of us. Adopting Sweden’s more laissez-faire response might not restore our economies to full health, but it would at least allow us to bring them out of their induced comas.

    Sweden is, broadly speaking, sticking to the approach that Britain followed in the week before the lockdown – the approach, indeed, that our strategists had wargamed in cooler-headed times. On 23 March, in an abrupt shift, Britain’s shops were closed and its people told to stay at home.

    What had changed? Was it the hysterical media demand for a Continental-style crackdown? Or the furious reaction to people visiting beauty spots on Mothering Sunday? Or was it the Imperial College model, published a few days earlier, which warned of hundreds of thousands of deaths unless there was a mass quarantine? Whatever the explanation, the lockdown soon took on a momentum of its own, with every new death turned into an argument for tighter restrictions.

    It is important to stress that Sweden is not being insouciant. Its people have been told to work from home if they can and to avoid unnecessary contact. Sports fixtures and meetings of more than 50 people are banned. Cafés can serve customers at tables, but not at the bar. Many Swedes, especially the elderly, are isolating themselves by choice. Personal spending, measured by bank card transactions, is down 30 per cent – though, by comparison, the fall in Norway is 66 per cent and in Finland 70 per cent.

    “I was sceptical at first”, a friend in the southern county of Blekinge tells me. “But every day I feel more confident. Our public health people look like they made the right call”.

    Most Swedes agree with her. According to the pollster Novus, 76 per cent support the public health agency. “It’s bad news for us politically,” a Rightist MP admits. “The socialist government is up 21 points. But I am a patriot, and I want what is best for my country. I criticise ministers for not helping small businesses. But I don’t criticise them for sticking to the science when other countries gave in to populism.”

    Sweden’s domestic consensus is not reflected internationally. “We fear that Sweden has picked the worst possible time to experiment with national chauvinism,” chides the Washington Post. Donald Trump, justifying his own retreat from openness, claimed that Sweden “gave it a shot, and they saw things that were really frightening, and they went immediately to shutting down the country.”

    The Guardian now purses its lips when it mentions its erstwhile pin-up. Its recent headlines have included “Critics question Swedish approach as coronavirus death toll reaches 1,000,” and “Anger in Sweden as elderly pay price for coronavirus strategy”.

    True, Sweden has had more deaths, proportionately, than its Nordic neighbours (though fewer than Spain, France or Britain – this is partly because the virus tragically found its way into care homes). But it is worth bearing in mind that the Swedish strategy always allowed for the possibility of a higher initial death rate.

    Britain, remember, closed its economy in order to “squash the sombrero” – that is, to spread out the number of infections and, avoid crippling the NHS. The policy seems to have succeeded: there are more spare critical care beds available than before the pandemic started. The Swedish authorities calculated that their hospitals did not need a delay, and believe they have been vindicated. Sweden’s public health agency says that a third of Stockholm residents will have been infected by May 1. If having had the disease leaves a measure of immunity, Sweden will emerge from the crisis much earlier than the countries that are dragging things out.

    That is still a big “if”. But public policy should rest on the principle of proportionality. It should not be up to me to prove that lockdowns definitely don’t work. The burden of proof lies on those who propose to remove our freedoms, not on defenders of the status quo ante.

    When Britain’s closures were announced, they had a clear goal: to buy time for the NHS. It worked: we were spared the horror that overtook parts of Italy. The government believes that fatalities peaked on 8 April, suggesting that the rate of infection peaked around 18 March – in other words, when Britain was still pursuing a Swedish-style policy of maintaining distance and hand-washing.

    So why not return to that policy? How did “flattening the curve” morph into “avoiding a second peak”? It is hard to see how ending a mass quarantine won’t lead to some uptick – just as it will lead to an uptick in common colds and traffic accidents. Our goal, surely, should be to ensure that this uptick does not overwhelm the system. In other words, we should aim to prevent people dying for want of medical attention, not to prevent all deaths – which, in the absence of a cure, is impossible.

    One of the most dangerous human biases is the sunk costs fallacy, the idea that we have sacrificed too much to give up now. That notion can lead to disaster. Every belligerent nation in the First World War, for example, suffered more than any conceivable war aims could justify; but, once the slaughter had begun, it became its own justification. Agreeing terms would mean that all those young men had died in vain. Nothing less than total victory would honour them.

    Listen to the phrases we hear at the 5pm daily briefings. We must not take our foot off the pedal, we keep being told, or everything we have achieved so far will have been for nothing. We have, as Matt Hancock put it on Thursday, “travelled too far together to go back now”.

    But what if the harshness of a lockdown has little bearing on the overall rate of mortality? In Europe, France, Spain and Italy, all of which imposed heavy restrictions, have suffered worse than, say, Sweden. There may, of course, be other explanations: demographics, population density, cultural habits. But, to repeat, it is for proponents of unprecedented state coercion to prove their case, not for their opponents to prove a negative.

    Could it be, as Isaac Ben-Israel argues, that the disease traces a similar arc however strict the lockdown? According to the Israeli scientist: “It turns out that a similar pattern – rapid increase in infections that reaches a peak in the sixth week and declines from the eighth week – is common to all countries in which the disease was discovered, regardless of their response policies.”

    He may be wrong, obviously. But it will not do to respond by saying: “Let’s keep the lockdown going a little longer, just to be sure”. The default position should be to retain our freedoms unless there is solid evidence that abandoning them will make a significant difference. In any case, at £2.4 billion a day, time is a luxury we don’t have.

    The resentment aimed at Sweden reflects an uneasy sense that the rest of us may be condemning ourselves to years of needless poverty. Sweden is like the control in an experiment. If it succeeds, the lockdown enthusiasts will never be able to claim that, but for their measures, things would have been even worse. No wonder they sound so tetchy.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/25/sweden-succeeds-lockdownswill-have-nothing/

    1. All the “expert” bastards are salivating on the side-lines.

      They are hoping, nay praying, that Sweden’s approach will be a total disaster..

      Damn them all to Hell.

      1. “They are hoping, nay praying, that Sweden’s approach will be a total disaster..”
        That’s the tragic fact, that all politicians, above all else, want to convince their peoples they pursued the right strategy. Deaths and suffering don’t come into their self aggrandising actions.

    2. I haven’t read it all but from what I have seen, I can only wish the Swedes well and say to our own creepy, pontificating government, take your finger out, end this lockdown, advise maintaining social distancing and personal hygiene, look out for your neighbours, particularly the older ones, and GET BACK TO BUILDING THE ECONOMY!

    3. With the news today that having had CV is no guarantee of not catching it again is going to make ‘Groundhog Day’ like a children’s fantasy tale, with multiple waves going on forever. Perhaps the Government will be able to adopt a different tactic each time…

      1. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

        That apart, the genie is out of the bottle. It’s a virus like the common cold and flu. It isn’t going away. We’ve got to learn to live with it.

  104. Decided to watch another Midsomer Murder, don’t know why, still politically correct as the previous,
    and it was about circus and clowns, I really have never liked clowns since a child. I find them creepy.

    1. Nobody like clowns. I really don’t know how they get voted into parliament every 5 years.

    2. I have a friend who, despite being highly intelligent and rational, has a clown phobia. Strange to me.

    3. I hated circuses when I was a child – still do. Oh, & strawberry flavoured ice cream.

      1. I’ll be doing other things shortly, Peddy, so I’ll wish you a good night now in case you are just about to retire and read your English/German thriller.

        1. I have one more chapter to go with the German satire, Elsie, so I should finish it tonight.

  105. Boris Johnson must overcome any public sector inertia

    TELEGRAPH VIEW

    Publicly, the Government is sticking to its “stay indoors” message. Behind the scenes, it is ringing around businesses, discussing how they can return to work. It’s a good step forward: we need to prepare for a post-lockdown economic recovery and the sooner things start to reopen – in a safe and proportionate manner – the better.

    But this is only possible if the public sector plays its part. Public transport is going to have to adapt. Teachers must go back to work. It is difficult to see how we can move forward as a country until the schools reopen. It’s the story of this crisis: the private sector responds with innovation and energy, while government bureaucracies, on whose shoulders so much responsibility has been placed, are slow to act. “London is open,” Mayor Sadiq Khan likes to say: but it is not. The authorities have effectively shut it down and seem reluctant to talk openly about the options.

    The conversation is very different on the Continent. Danish hairdressers have been overwhelmed since they went back to work; Belgium is opening up DIY stores and garden centres. Milan city council is looking at widening pavements and extending cycle paths. In Denmark, nurseries and primary schools are operational again. Pupils attend smaller classes now, with desks set wide apart and frequent handwashing.

    In Britain, meanwhile, the teaching unions seem reluctant to return to the classroom until the safety of their members can be guaranteed, and while reasonable steps should be taken to do that, ultimately the UK is going to have to live with a degree of risk. What is the alternative? Stay at home until the virus has been totally eradicated? Common sense says that’s ridiculous, and yet the philosophy appears almost validated by the Government’s five tests for lifting the lockdown. Test #5 is being confident that any adjustments won’t risk a second peak. It’s a condition that many fear can’t be met – a recipe for indefinite furlough.

    Boris Johnson is hoping to return to work on Monday and he has got to shake things up. Britain cannot be governed on the basis of public health modelling alone: the job of a leader is to weigh up all the options and act in the round, in the widest possible national interest. Mr Johnson should encourage volunteerism and initiative. Public sector inertia must not prevent the UK from getting back on its feet.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2020/04/25/boris-johnson-must-overcome-public-sector-inertia/

    1. Why the secret discussions about people returning to work? This should be made public so as to prepare everyone for normality as near as makes no difference. And for the public sector they should know that nobody can guarantee that their members will not catch the virus.

    2. There is lots of “It can’t be done because” emanating from the powers that be as well as from know it alls.

      Heaven help them if they ever get into a real job where you need to adapt and roll with the punches.

    1. I received the standard, mealy-mouthed email. No mention of the large scale, organised child grooming gangs full of slammers.

      1. 318548+ up ticks,
        Evening Mib,
        Seeing as the political hierarchy in the governance parties use submission, PCism, Appeasement as tools to their advantage you are hardly likely to hear.
        It honestly amazed me that lab was still operating after the JAY report, not only lab
        but to a certain extent any mass uncontrolled immigration parties.

    2. 318548+ up ticks,
      O2O,
      Read & weep, If this does not call for far right racist
      of the Tommy Robinson Gerard Batten ( state judgement) calibre, as in a multitude of such are needed , then I do not know what it will take.
      Mind, on the side of the governance power wielding parties, we have / had such politico’s as big Cyril with
      lordy steel running cover, keithy vaz daisy chain manufacturer ( preference, foreign snorting rent boys)
      these types would sit in judgement of decent peoples
      they would condemn as being, you got it, far right racist.

    1. Good night, Peddy. Enjoy your final Chapter, then switch off the lamp and leave the Dean until tomorrow.

      :-))

        1. I’ve been reading a 400P satire based on the imaginary return of Hitler. It has been rather heavy going as it’s written mostly in pre-war German.

          2. Not for you, perhaps D in K, but it seemed to me that Ndovu didn’t get it. No offence to either of you.

    2. I usually pop in to bed before I go to sleep. (Good night, Conners, and all NoTTLers.)

        1. Remember, please, my German is what I learned in the late 1960s in what was then, Neiderrhein, Westphalia, plat Deutsch at its best.

          2. Point taken, Conners, mein Schwegerin (Sister-in-law) was from Hannover and spoke haupt Deutsch. When I tried my German on her, her response was on the lines of, “Mein Gott, Tom, du sprecht Deueutsche vie ein bauerlander!”

            My God, Tom, you speak German like a farmer. You may only repeat what you have learned.

          4. Con permiso…

            Man hat mir gesagt, dass ich wie ein Südbayern spreche. Gute Nach, Alle.

          5. Vielen dank, Herr Peddy. Aber sagt man nicht “Gute Nacht, meine Herrschaften”?

            :-))

          6. Man kann das sagen, aber Herrschaften ist ein Wort das etwas Vorsicht fordet

            It is somewhat altmodisch & can sound patronising. Best left out until you are familiar with the nuances.

          7. That must be because I learnt my basic German in the late 1950s and early 1960s. I learnt “der Knabe” and “das Madchen”.

        2. Mit Verlaub… Aber selbstverständlich…

          Ich auch. Gute Nacht, Elsie, schlaf gut und süße Träume

  109. Sometimes the BBC gets it right. This evening’s ‘Profile’ on Radio 4 was a gentle hatchet job on Matt Hancock. Fraser Nelson described him navigating his way through Westminster, the survivor, the ‘consummate politician’. George Osborne was Shadow Chancellor when he spotted him at a drinks reception in London: “I could tell he was clever…I needed my own Ed Balls.”

    Just 14 minutes long: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000hmxq

  110. Good night, Gentlefolk and may your God bless you. I’m going to cuddle up to Best Beloved who is all the world to me.

      1. Actually the Trump comments have done the country a world of good – they’ve got lots of people laughing. And we all need something (or in this case, someone) to laugh at.

  113. People will die as a result of this latest coronavirus. It is inevitable and we have to expect our politicians in truth to minimise its effects

  114. Good morning all.
    Excellent article from the Hefferlump, though no doubt Common Purpose are working had to correct the situation:-

    This crisis has exposed that the Army is the only part of the state that actually works
    SIMON HEFFER

    It remains the British instinct to believe that, if all else fails in a crisis, the Armed Forces are always there to pick up the pieces. So it is during the coronavirus. the RAF was, eventually, sent to Turkey to collect personal protective equipment (PPE), once the Government remembered to order it. Soldiers are distributing it. But, according to a briefing from an unnamed senior officer, the Army – which makes a point of doing things properly – has found the incompetence of the NHS in directing equipment to where it was needed “appalling”. It was shocked that scarce resources were apportioned to hospitals without regard to relative need. The officer described the NHS’s logistics as “knackered”; and highlighted the lack of leadership that had led, among other things, to a failure to implement rationing of items that are in short supply.

    The Army implied matters would improve if it, rather than the NHS, were in charge of distributing PPE; and since most regiments have officers and men dedicated to solving logistical problems, the implication is probably justified. Tobias Ellwood, chairman of the defence select committee and a former soldier, suggested that however good the NHS was at saving lives, it lacked expertise in procurement and distribution; and that a military man with logistical expertise should take charge instead.

    Mr Ellwood is to be congratulated on his tact and understatement: what, presumably out of party loyalty, he forbore to say was that ministers should have spotted this need from the moment they realised special equipment would have to be procured and distributed. The NHS, we now realise, doesn’t excel in non-clinical respects. The Government last week belatedly appointed Lord Deighton, chief executive of the 2012 Olympics, as “supply tsar”, to organise procurement. Assuming he finds the equipment, he will need the Army to get it to where it needs to go.

    The Armed Forces seem, for the moment, to be the only public service in the country that actually functions properly. This is thanks not least to the rigour of their training, but also because of the high traditions of the services in which their members are schooled, and which are largely immune to political interference. That is not true of other public services.

    The administrative side of the NHS appears largely spavined, a point underlined by the crashing of the much-vaunted virus-testing website on Friday. The heavy-handedness and zealotry of some police forces suggests they lack effective leadership and self-knowledge, with politically correct senior officers throwing their weight around with harmless people – such as allowing the checking of supermarket trolleys for “non-essential items” – in a way the public rarely perceives them doing with criminals.

    Sadly, the example is set by government itself, too many of whose ministers are inexperienced not just in their profession but in life itself, out of their depth, incompetent and indecisive, and in one or two cases engaged in absurd squabbles with each other.

    But the Armed Forces cannot be expected to come to the rescue of an inept government if they are continually demoralised, run down and underfunded. General Sir Peter Wall, until 2014 chief of the general staff, observed last week that defence spending would have to rise by £20 billion if the Armed Forces were to be equal to the job of defending Britain – a shocking indictment of the policies of recent administrations. The Cameron coalition cut 20,000 soldiers from the Army in its 2011 defence review, preferring to spend taxpayers’ money on grandstanding projects such as the overseas aid budget. Maintaining the Armed Forces at a strength where they may be able to function effectively within Nato became a low priority.

    There are now just 79,000 regular soldiers – around 3,000 below strength – and 27,000 reservists, enfeebling the Army not just against the Queen’s enemies, but in supporting the people in a crisis such as we are now experiencing. Luckily, the 13,000 personnel said to be self-isolating a few weeks ago is now massively reduced. However, the Army struggles to find recruits, not least because of a perception that the Government doesn’t really care about it. In its desperation for fresh blood, the Army has in recent years lowered its entrance requirement: 4,000 recruits in the three years up to 2019 had a reading age of less than eleven, and 50 of them less than seven.

    Inevitably, politicians make a cult of the NHS in these anxious days; but if they continue to run down the Army and take it for granted, it may be incapable of cleaning up the mess next time, or of doing even more dangerous work in a more terrifying national crisis.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/04/25/crisis-has-exposed-army-part-state-actually-works/

    1. Am I right that the Army is also the one part of the state not completely taken over by Common Purpose?

      1. Their wimpish recruitment adverts in the last few years would suggest CP is at work there, too.

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