Friday 20 January: Decades of broken promises on the NHS have left staff demoralised

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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714 thoughts on “Friday 20 January: Decades of broken promises on the NHS have left staff demoralised”

  3. First to complete wordle in 4

    Wordle 580 4/6

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    2. Morning Hugh.
      I think Matt is referring to news articles yesterday where people interviewed were saying they had never heard of levelling up. The Beeb spun this as a fault of the Govt. Levelling up has been talked about for several years – if people don’t watch the news its hardly the Govt’s fault.
      Bl**dy people.

      2. Those who did pay attention know it actually means levelling down…to the lowest common denominator. Eat the bugs, be happy!

    3. In Colchester, that money is going on producing even more cycle lanes.
      Not quite sure how that helps matters.

      1. ‘Moaning.

        They might produce considerable greenie smugness on the part of a few lunatic councillors?

      2. In our county it’s going on Shrewsbury (and nowhere else!). Shropshire is the largest inland non-metropolitan county in the country and most of it is rural.

  6. Decades of broken promises on the NHS have left staff demoralised

    Correction – Decades of enacted promises on the NHS have left staff demoralised

      1. Morning Sue. I’ve taken to wearing a wooly hat inside! It makes a significant difference!

  9. Morning. This was interesting- our French cousins apparently upset they had to do some work. I’m going to dig out my tiny tiny violin for all concerned.

    “FRENCH coastguards accused British Channel rescue services of abandoning a small boat carrying 38 migrants in distress.

    Coastguards from the union Solidaires Douanes claimed the UK had said it would rescue the boat when it entered UK waters but failed to do so, leaving the craft to drift back into the French part of the channel.

    They said the migrants, “exhausted, afraid and frozen”, were rescued by the French after their engine failed and were taken back to France….”

    4. “Coastguards from the union Solidaires Douanes…”

      Isn’t that their job – rescuing sailors (idiots) who deliberately put themselves into danger?

  10. Berlin asked for permission to send German-made Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine, Ben Wallace reveals. 20 January 2023.

    A country that operates German-made Leopard tanks has asked for permission from Berlin to give the heavy armour to Ukraine, Britain’s defence secretary has revealed.

    Ben Wallace did not say which nation he was referring to but it is likely to be Poland, which has made clear it would like to send some of its Leopard 2 main battle tanks to support Ukrainian forces in their fight against Russia.

    Pressure is mounting on Olaf Scholz’s government to allow the Leopard, one of the world’s most lethal and modern tanks, to be part of a new wave of increasingly powerful military aid to Kyiv ahead of what many believe will be a new escalation in the war.

    In many ways the present situation resembles the beginnings of the Vietnam War of sixty years ago. A completely false prospectus of what is happening is being sold to the public to gain support for a disastrous intervention in support of the US hegemony.

    So what is actually happening here as opposed to the MSM version? Well it’s not so much Scholz’s government, but Scholz himself, who is being subjected to enormous pressure both in the media and from Germany’s “allies” to allow the use of leopard tanks in Ukraine. To his credit he has so far resisted this vilification aided by public support, something not mentioned in the coverage. Why has he refused this and why is everyone so insistent? Well Germany has been strong armed into this war mostly by the destruction of the Baltic Pipeline by the Americans. They are now dependent on US goodwill to access the gas necessary for Germany’s economy. The tanks would be a significant step on their being frog marched into a full scale war with Russia.

    The irony of course is that those most insistent are as reluctant as he is to take this step. Poland has these tanks in their possession and could quite simply ignore Germany’s objections under the End Use contract and hand them over to Zelensky. They haven’t so far done this because they no more want to be responsible for starting WW3 than Scholz, and it is also a way of ensuring that the Germans stay on side in the resulting fracas! The US refusal to supply its own armour is grounded in similar thinking. They need to make sure that the Europeans do the heavy lifting in this war particularly when it comes to filling the body bags! The UK’s contribution is both risible and cosmetic. Fourteen tanks will make no significant contribution and so they need fear no Russian backlash.

    https://news.sky.com/story/berlin-asked-for-permission-to-send-german-made-leopard-2-tanks-to-ukraine-ben-wallace-reveals-12790563

    1. Without explanation, the headline is difficult to understand. It could be that Berlin was asking someone for permission, or Berlin was asked for permission.
      Sigh…
      Morning, all Y’all. Dark, and English-winter cold (that is, about zero and very damp, with a wee breeze that makes it all very unpleasant).

    2. I doubt that Ukraine has anywhere near enough trained tank operators and thus NATO soldiers could well end up in action.
      These idiots truly want to start WW3.

      1. A tank is just a big metal box until you man it with trained and experienced troops. It’s not for amateurs, they’ll just get badly hurt and the tank will be wrecked. They take the most amazing amount of maintenance, using specialised tools and lots of spares – did you see how long it took to mobilise for the tank attack in Desert Storm – and that was using the US’s huge logistics operations, too.
        Sending 14 tanks is a waste of time. They will all be broken within a week, or burned up as the Uke crews haven’t trained in how to fight with them.
        And – do they have rifled ammunition? with bagged charges and the wee pistol to fire them? Even the loading of the gun will be new to the Ukes, and need training!

        1. Surely some of the UK mercenaries, encouraged by Liz Truss will sort that out? On a related matter, I wonder how many of those Truss encouraged realise that as mercenaries they are not protected under the Geneva Conventions?

        2. “Dear Poland and Germany,
          We can’t get the hang of these damned British tanks, please send Leopards
          Yours
          Volodymyr”

          “Dear China,
          We can’t get the hang of these damned British tanks, please send money in exchange.
          Hunter will give you my details.
          Yours
          Volodymyr”

  11. From the letters page. I am very anti-VAT, specifically the complexity of it for small business owners caught in its trap, and the threshold which hasn’t changed in years (£80k-ish) – it acts as a real barrier to growing your business. MTD, making tax digital, has not helped either and necessitates spending more money on software that isn’t needed otherwise, just to file the damn tax returns.

    Truly, if we had ANY MPs who had even the tiniest experience of real life, they would stop this.

    Anyway, letter below:

    “ My wife and I run a launderette business. We currently trade below the VAT threshold but luckily agreed a low price with our gas supplier before the energy crisis.

    The Chancellor’s decision to freeze the VAT threshold until 2026 will force us to register for VAT within the next two years, just as our gas price triples. At this point our business will become unviable and close. Other small, energy-intensive businesses – many in catering – are in the same situation. At present, there are no viable alternatives to gas to fuel our businesses.

    Current government policies will see the collapse of the small business sector, the energy extraction sector and ultimately the British economy.”

    1. “Current government policies will see the collapse of the small business sector…”

      …and the loss to this stupid, short-sighted government of VAT and other small business revenues. Talk about cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face – Fools.

  13. 370252+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Friday 20 January: Decades of broken promises on the NHS have left staff demoralised

    Should read,

    Friday 20 January: Decades of broken promises have left the indigenous peoples and the Country demoralised and fit only for an assortment of foreign criminal types.

    Via the polling booth it took only a matter of four decades of rape and abuse both physically and mentally of the children and adults, inclusive of handing over the nations Capital city and allowing the enemy enamas to pitch their tents in parliament,the best of the worst ( A well used voting adage) is yet to come.

    We await the new agenda formulated via the political floaters
    ( shite) from the deadly,devious,dodgy dealings at Davos meet.
    .

  14. We could do with a few more of the calibre of this chap.  I often wonder what these brave souls must have thought about the shambles that this country is now…

    Colonel Ian Cartwright, SAS officer who helped to quell a rebel uprising in a secret operation in Oman – obituary

    The SAS had been threatened with disbandment but the success of the Oman mission put its future beyond doubt

    ByTelegraph Obituaries 19 January 2023 • 2:23pm

    Colonel Ian Cartwright, who has died aged 89, had an outstanding record of command on active service with the SAS, the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers and the security services.

    In late 1958, D Squadron 22nd Special Air Service Regiment (22 SAS) was withdrawn from Malaya in great secrecy. Cartwright and four SAS NCOs with sealed orders went by ship from Singapore to Aden.

    There, they slipped over the blind side of the vessel and were taken off by launch and flown to Sharjah in the UAE. From there they went by truck to rejoin the squadron at its base camp near the town of Nizwa, Oman.

    A rebel force under Talib bin Ali was challenging the Sultan’s authority. They held the Jebel Akhdar, or Green Mountain, an elevated plateau with precipitous cliffs of rock rising to a height of about 8,000 feet above sea level. The Sultan asked the British Government for help in dislodging them.

    This was a tough assignment for a force trained for the jungle and tired after several months of operations. The rebels were equipped with rifles, machine guns and mortars and held the few paths to the summit.

    Lieutenant-Colonel (later Major General) Tony Deane-Drummond arrived in Oman to take command of two SAS squadrons. On the night of January 26 1959, under a full moon, Lieutenant (later General Sir Peter) De La Billière, OC 18 Troop, led the assault.

    Cartwright, commanding 17 Troop, was his immediate back-up. The detachment from D Squadron, many of them with heavy loads, climbed throughout the night while A Squadron made a diversionary attack on the other side of the mountain.

    While still 1,000 feet below the summit, one troop was detached to deal with a rebel heavy machine gun mounted in a cave. The small force reached the plateau at first light. Supplies of water and ammunition were dropped to the SAS; this may have misled the rebels into thinking that they faced an assault by paratroops. Air support was called in and the remaining insurgents were captured or dispersed.

    The SAS had been threatened with disbandment but the success of this operation put its future beyond doubt.

    Ian Richard Cartwright was born in Manchester on June 17 1933. During the Second World War, his father John Henry Cartwright served in the Middle East with the RAF. His mother, Meg, was a casualty nurse in Manchester during the Blitz and much of his childhood was spent with his mother’s parents in Auchterarder, Perthshire.

    The lad’s Mancunian accent made him a target among his new classmates, but despite being punished for fighting he learnt to look out for himself. In the hills and glens he developed a lifelong passion for fishing and bird watching.

    He went to school at Morrison’s Academy, Crieff, but when he was 12 his father moved to London to work in the War Office and young Ian was sent to a grammar school in Croydon. He did well academically but turned down the offer of a place at Cambridge in order to do his National Service with the Lancashire Fusiliers.

    In October 1951, he joined the Lancastrian Brigade training centre and shared a hut with 17 “Scousers”. Many of his fellow recruits could not read or write and looked to him to help. He later considered himself a better officer for the insight that he gained into their backgrounds, the importance to them of their families, their cheerful cynicism and robust humour in the face of adversity.

    He attended the 18-month course at RMA Sandhurst. In 1953, at the Queen’s Coronation, he and his fellow cadets lined part of the route for the procession to Westminster Abbey. It was pouring with rain but they were ordered to remove their capes and put them at their heels. After the ceremony, they turned around to put them on again but members of the crowd had pinched the lot.

    Cartwright was commissioned into the Lancashire Fusiliers and posted to the 1st Battalion (1 LF). During a bitterly cold winter, they were stationed at Barnard Castle, Durham. In the officer’s mess, there was only one stove, which was monopolised by the senior officers. Irritated by this, Cartwright climbed up on the roof and poured a bucket of cold water down the chimney. The senior officers were enveloped in a cloud of scalding steam and cinders.

    When the Battalion moved to West Germany, he ran the swimming team which won the Rhine Army Championship, but he wanted more adventurous soldiering and applied for a transfer to the Special Air Service Regiment. Peter De La Billière was in the same intake and they both passed the rigorous selection process.

    In 1957 he joined 22 SAS in Malaya, where it was engaged in operations against Communist terrorists. He commanded a troop of D Squadron in the most challenging conditions – intense heat, leech-infested swamps, dense secondary jungle and bamboo forests.

    Deep-penetration patrols could be away from base for several months. They had to rely on re-supply from the air and effective deployment was only possible by parachuting into the tree canopy, by travelling up one of the rivers by boat or, more rarely, by helicopter once a landing site had been cleared. He was Mentioned in Despatches (MID) for “leadership, skill and personal courage over a sustained period of operations”.

    Cartwright returned to England after the operation in Oman. He was made Intelligence Officer and then adjutant of 1LF in West Germany before attending Indian Staff College in 1962. He served in Cyprus as deputy assistant quartermaster-general (Ops). During a period in late 1963 a local newspaper claimed that he was a military spy who should be shot on sight. He returned to England to be second-in-command of 21 SAS (Artists).

    Subsequently he commanded a company in Hong Kong on internal security duties during the upheavals and violence caused by Chairman Mao’s Cultural Revolution. Reorganisation of the British Army resulted in the Lancashire Fusiliers being subsumed into the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers (RRF) in 1968.

    After a period as SAS Operations Officer, in 1972 Cartwright assumed command of 3RRF. He took the Battalion to Northern Ireland and, operating in the testing Armagh and mid-Ulster areas, under his leadership they arrested large numbers of terrorists and recovered considerable quantities of weapons, bombs and ammunition. He was appointed OBE at the end of a most successful tour.

    During the Turkish invasion of Cyprus in 1974, the Battalion was deployed at short notice to protect the sovereign bases. When a Turkish armoured column fired into the base at Dhekelia, it was widely reported that Cartwright calmly drove up in an unarmed Land Rover to demand an explanation. He said afterwards that he had checked first that the RAF Phantoms were in the air.

    He greatly enjoyed a three-year family posting to America as the British Liaison Officer at the US Army Command and General Staff College. Much of the rest of his career, however, was taken up with high-level intelligence work based mainly in Northern Ireland.

    It was a most exacting period and his outstanding contribution was recognised by the award of an MID in 1979. He was advanced to CBE when he retired from the Army in 1983.

    He joined Provident Mutual, the insurance company, as a director and remained with the organisation until finally retiring in 1992. Settled in Abernethy, Perthshire, he remained active in the Fusilier and SAS Associations and became chairman of the Crieff BLESMA Home (part of the limbless veterans charity). He also enjoyed fishing, shooting, gardening, family life and meetings with friends.

    A man with considerable presence, he was the best of company and held in great affection by all who served with him.

    Ian Cartwright married, in 1958, Patricia (Pat) Ford, a nursing officer with QARANC. They were married in the Garrison Church at Kuala Lumpur. Pat was given away by Lt Col (later Major General) Tony Deane-Drummond. Peter de la Billière was the best man.

    Pat predeceased her husband and later Helen Campbell became his close companion. He is survived by his daughter and three sons, two of whom, Alistair and Guy, both served with the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers.

    Ian Cartwright, born June 17 1933, died December 2 2022

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0da687d364a47d7fb6a6e5085cfacf4d58b78c9b71bcce632811e289f51f7e8b.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/53fd336a123f235b85a1a582b4014f08518ac719a540d5d3c1691aa6533334af.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/184a11cb0c0bd7799e8c46b2ff6a21284a798d489a2dd51ee4757879c3cd3598.jpg

    * * *

    In case anyone isn’t familiar with what “21 SAS (Artists)” refers to,  this was originally the Artists’ Rifles, with whom I and my fellow ‘Light Blues’ spent a most convivial evening many years ago when on detachment at Bisley Camp.  In fact it was so good – as far as we could remember – we vowed to return at the earliest opportunity.  However, on subsequent duties there the clubhouse appeared to be closed.  (Their full title was 21 SAS (Artists) (Reserve), originally formed in the 1850s by volunteers such as musicians, writers, architects and others of the arts.)

  15. Morning all, some of you may remember I enquired about the Pneumococcal vaccine at the end of last year as I was invited by the local surgery to have it. As with most things at that time of year, it slipped out of the intray into the forgotten tray. I have recentley had another invite this time for a Shingles jab. Nasty thing Shingles, I remember my uncle suffering with it so I took up the offer which led to the
    Pneumococcal vaccine being reoffered.Both jabs received one week apart with no ill effects.
    The interesting part is the surgery is still asking patients to wear a face nappy but although I ignored the request nothing was said. No mention of any Covid jabs either, is there a light at the end of the tunnel or is it a WEF/WHO train approaching.

    1. My surgery seems to have given up on giving me a fourth jab. (Anyone would think they get paid extra per shot.)

    2. I agree with you over those two jabs. The pneumonia jab is for life and, like you, having seen people with shingles, that is definitely one to avoid.

      1. Good morning, as important they are tried and tested vaccines, not something rushed out to make big pharma loads of dosh with no liability for unknown side effects.

  16. SIR – Sir James Dyson (“Big government is wrecking the economy”, Comment, January 19) has given our politicians much food for thought. It is people like him – internationally successful entrepreneurs – that the Government needs to both recruit and listen to if we are to maintain our status as one of the top six richest countries in the world.

    Standing still, watching other countries being more adventurous in expanding and improving their economies, can result only in Britain becoming poorer and less attractive to investors. We need the biggest and best brains to advise politicians on the way forward.

    Paul Caruana
    Truro, Cornwall

    Well said, Mr Caruana. Therein lies the route to prosperity.

  17. Good Morrow, Gentlefolk. Here is today’s little list:

    Short and Sweet

    Now on sale at IKEA – ‘lesbian’ beds: no nuts or screwing involved, it’s all tongue and groove…

    A Muslim has been shot in the head with a starting pistol; police say it’s definitely race related…

    Due to a water shortage in Ireland, Dublin swimming baths have announced they are closing lanes 7 and 8….

    Paddy thought his new girlfriend might be the one but, after looking through her knicker drawer and finding a nurse’s outfit, a French maid’s outfit, and police woman’s uniform, he decided if she can’t hold down a job, she’s not for him.

    I got sacked from my job as a bingo caller the other day apparently, ’A meal for two with a terrible view’ isn’t the best way to announce number 69.

    After 100 years lying on the sea bed, Irish divers were amazed to find that the Titanic’s swimming pool was still full.

    1. This is true – at a local bingo hall the caller would shout Ghandi’s dinner when 80 came up. “Ate nothing”

  18. SIR – My wife and I run a launderette business. We currently trade below the VAT threshold but luckily agreed a low price with our gas supplier before the energy crisis.

    The Chancellor’s decision to freeze the VAT threshold until 2026 will force us to register for VAT within the next two years, just as our gas price triples. At this point our business will become unviable and close. Other small, energy-intensive businesses – many in catering – are in the same situation. At present, there are no viable alternatives to gas to fuel our businesses.

    Current government policies will see the collapse of the small business sector, the energy extraction sector and ultimately the British economy.

    Stephen Havill
    Torquay, Devon

    Crazy…and his final paragraph says it all.

    1. The government represents big industry, so they don’t care about the middle class, who only make tyrants’ lives harder, with their damned independent spirit and education.

  19. SIR – The matter of police reform (Letters, January 19) has arisen on several occasions since the late 1980s, when senior police officers began to be selected largely on the basis of their willingness to implement political agendas rather than their ability to catch criminals.

    As chaplain to two different police divisions – one county, one metropolitan – over 10 years, I saw crook chasers passed over for quota chasers. I also witnessed the detrimental effect this had on morale among the rank and file, who no longer trusted their superiors.

    In addition, it was the beginning of the precedence of equal outcome, diversity and other such principles over ability and merit – leading to many of the failures that have recently been highlighted. Changing this will, frankly, require a miracle.

    Rev R C Paget
    Brenchley, Kent

    Grizz is not alone!

    2. Changing this will, frankly, require a miracle.

      It’s beyond change or recovery. All we can do is look to ourselves. The state is lost!

  21. SIR – The departure of Ken Bruce from Radio 2 (Letters, January 19) will be the final straw for many listeners. The station once offered easy listening in the company of people who felt like old friends, but after recently being assaulted by the sort of noise you’d expect in an Ibiza nightclub, I had to check the radio was tuned correctly.

    The are no real alternatives. Radio 1 is unthinkable, Radio 3 a dumbed-down parody of what it once was, and listening to Radio 4 usually ends up in shouting at the wireless. Fortunately local BBC radio still provides a realistic option – at least, until that is cut too.

    I may yet follow Mr Bruce to his new home at Greatest Hits Radio.

    Charles Smith-Jones
    Landrake, Cornwall

    Sooner or later – and I hope it will be sooner – I look forward to reading about the final straw for the BBC. It deserves nothing less with its bias and Olympic-standard wokery…

    1. Well said Charles S-J! Radio 2 has been getting steadily worse for a good while – [c]rap music is appearing with ever increasing regularity and the current crop of “presenters” are vastly inferior to their predecessors, with very few exceptions!

  22. Latest Breaking News – After facing an investigation for allegedly not wearing a seat belt, he now faces further investigations for not using his booster seat.

  23. Good to see that the EV charging network is working really, really well…even what I thought would be a puff-piece for EVs on ITV yesterday evening seemed to be reasonably balanced for once.

    * * *

    The broken promises betraying electric car drivers

    Charging points remain an obstacle for motorists wanting to go green

    ByBenedict Smith and Genevieve Holl-Allen 19 January 2023 • 12:00pm

    It was almost a year ago that Boris Johnson, then prime minister, pledged a “green industrial revolution” to speed up the shift to electric vehicles. The problem, as many people are finding out, is that the pace of change is uneven. Car sales are pulling away and straining limited infrastructure, leaving drivers to fall through the cracks.

    Electric vehicle registrations are up 77pc since 2016, according to consulting firm OC&C. To support this, one expert points out, you need more than one revolution: you need several happening in tandem across energy, transport and communications. With sales of diesel and petrol cars banned from 2030, their electric counterparts have a lot of ground to make up.

    Driving home for Christmas is rarely a pleasant experience but electric car owners had a worse time than most. Some drivers report queues lasting hours, while videos on social media show lines of stationary Teslas waiting in the rain. At peak times, the charging network starts to creak alarmingly.

    A key reason for this is the paucity of chargers. According to Zap Map, the mapping service, there are about 664,000 electric vehicles on the road and 17.8 cars per charger. However, only a sixth of these are “rapid” or “ultra-rapid” chargers, with others taking between three and eight hours to power a battery.

    Even the speedier variants can take between 20 and 40 minutes; with a petrol or diesel car, by contrast, you can fill up and grab a Twix on the way out in a couple of minutes. For every rapid charger, there are about 96.2 electric vehicles – and often, quite a few irritable drivers waiting around.

    Of course, this is only the case if charge points are actually functioning – a dangerous assumption for anyone planning a journey. Electric car expert Jonathan Murray attributes this problem to outdated technology. “There’s no hiding the fact that we’ve got issues, particularly with the public infrastructure,” he says. “The sooner we get this replaced with modern, sophisticated charge points the better.”

    According to a BBC investigation last year, one in four of Scotland’s charging points are faulty, but the problem extends south of the border, too. Zap Map shows that a quarter of rapid chargers are malfunctioning in Brighton – where an ultra-low emission zone has been considered – while there are pockets like Stratford-Upon-Avon where half of all rapid chargers are out of action. The true numbers are likely to be considerably higher.

    Thomas Hardy, who has owned an electric Renault Zoe for four years, avoids driving it on long trips for this reason and relies on his petrol BMW 530i. “We’ve only ever used it with the home charger because charging infrastructure is still somewhat unreliable,” he says. “I’ve seen more than a few out of use and the few times we’ve decided to try them to see how things go, we’ve found out-of-order ones prevented us.”

    Why are so many chargers unusable? This is partly down to poor mobile coverage, which means operators will not be automatically alerted to a malfunction. Commentators envision a day when drivers will be able to book slots at chargers with their phones, but it needs a revolution in mobile service first.

    Darren Briddock, who installs EV chargers, believes there are not enough engineers to fix the faulty models. “When I go out to put chargers in people’s houses, usually the customer will say ‘I’m really pleased I’ve got this coming in because I can never charge on the public network,'” he says. “Often they’re not working or there’s not enough capacity.”

    Even if you count older, accident-prone chargers, the Government has its hands full with installation targets. By 2030, Britain is meant to have 300,000 charge points. This is almost ten times the current number, and would mean creating more than 3,000 chargers a month for seven years. Just 923 were installed last month.

    Conditions will only get worse as pressure increases on the public network. Campaign group FairCharge estimates that those without access to home charging will eventually grow from 16pc to 38pc, meaning more demand and longer queues.

    Some councils, like Hampshire, allow you to trail a charging lead over the pavement, but many do not. This means those without private parking who rely on public charging are being hit by energy costs and have to pay through the nose. RAC data shows it is about £10 cheaper to fill up a 55-litre petrol car than using a rapid charger, while diesel is almost £3 cheaper than ultra-rapid charging.

    The industry is still in flux, with the different companies overseeing different chargers creating a lack of consistency across the country. Some points require you to register on a website, while for others you need to download an app. Hardy is baffled by pre-registered RFID (radio frequency identification) cards, which you need to scan before charging.

    “Some chargers still seem to require smart cards which immediately renders them useless,” he complains. “They’re on the way out but some seem to hang around.”

    Murray believes these disparities are a double-edged sword which mean short-term inconvenience but bring long-term progress. “It is a market with a lot of innovation,” he says. “If you standardise things too readily or too early you can get into standardising around the wrong solution or stifling innovation.”

    There are even fears that car production will not be able to keep up after the collapse of Britishvolt. At one point the manufacturer looked like the answer to the Government’s prayers for a reliable supplier of batteries, planning a “gigafactory” to churn out 300,000 a year. Now neither the batteries, nor the factory itself, look likely to materialise.

    Rival companies might fill the hole left by Britishvolt, but the industry could suffer long-term damage as drivers are disillusioned by their experience of electric cars. Giles Coren, the columnist, recently decided to ditch his “laptop on wheels”, while the former Top Gear presenter James May is among those who keep a foot in both camps, with a petrol car for longer journeys.

    However many targets and laws ministers set, motorists will only be won over with real progress. If they look out of their windscreens and see queues, broken charge points and dissatisfied drivers, the “green industrial revolution” will end up half-finished.

    * * *

    And there you have it.  This farce will continue only until the majority wake up and realise that they have been well and truly screwed, in the name of ‘going green’.

    1. I think we are soon going to reach the point where they come clean and admit that the plebs aren’t going to be owning a car in the brave new world.
      Commodities are shortly going to become very, very expensive in the west, and the amount required to produce one of these monstrosities is obscene.

    2. I think we are soon going to reach the point where they come clean and admit that the plebs aren’t going to be owning a car in the brave new world.
      Commodities are shortly going to become very, very expensive in the west, and the amount required to produce one of these monstrosities is obscene.

    3. I’m so happy to hear that all is well in the EV and charging world.

      Come on, you greeniacs, look happy!

      1. Their smugness at saving the planet surely cannot last. Even the bloke in the ITV programme is due to sell his BMW EV. Quite why he bought it in the first place is completely beyond me.

        Edit: ‘ Morning, Nanners.

      2. Their smugness at saving the planet surely cannot last. Even the bloke in the ITV programme is due to sell his BMW EV. Quite why he bought it in the first place is completely beyond me.

        Edit: ‘ Morning, Nanners.

    4. Had a look at Zap Map – as far as I can see, it also shows domestic chargers – a lozenge with a house silhouette on it!
      Just what you need, some clown rocking up outside your house asking (or not) to use your car charger.

    5. I should have thought that LACK OF charging points remains an obstacle for [green] motorists wanting to go [anywhere].

  24. Good morning.
    I have just started reading Robert Kennedy Jr’s book “The Real Dr Fauci.”
    We were talking about the value of vaccinations the other day, and there is a lot on that subject in this book.
    Here’s a quote from the book:
    “Dr Fauci’s catastrophic failure to achieve beneficial health outcomes during the COVID-19 crisis is consistent with the disastrous declines in public health during his half-century running NIAID…..
    The “J Edgar Hoover of public health” has presided over cataclysmic declines in public health, including an exploding chronic disease epidemic that has made the “Fauci generation” – children born after his elevation … in 1984 – the sickest generation in American history, and has made Americans among the least healthy citizens on the planet. His obsequious subservience to the Big Ag, Big Food and pharmaceutical companies has left our children drowning in a toxic soup of pesticide residues, corn syrup and processed foods, while also serving as pincushions for 69 recommended vaccine doses by age 18 – none of them properly safety tested.

    (NB- all claims in the book are backed by references, which I am omitting)

    …Under Dr Fauci’s leadership, the allergic, autoimmune and chronic illnesses which Congress specifically charged NIAID to investigate and prevent have mushroomed to afflict 54% of children, up from 12.8% when he took over NIAID in 1984.
    ….Some 80 autoimmune diseases including juvenile diabetes and rheumatoid arthritis, Graves’ disease and Crohn’s disease, which were practically unknown prior to 1984, suddenly became epidemic under his watch. Autism, which many scientists now consider an auto-immune disease, exploded from between 2/10000 and 4/10000 Americans …. to one in 34 today.
    Neurological diseases like ADD/ADHD, speech and sleep disorders, narcolepsy, facial tics and Tourette’s syndrome have become commonnplace in American children…..

    What is causing this cataclysm? Since genes don’t cause epidemics, it must be environmental toxins. Many of these illnesses became epidemic in the late 1980s, after vaccine manufacturers were granted government protection from liability and consequently accelerated their introduction of new vaccines. The manufacturer’s inserts of the 69 vaccine doses list each of the now common illnesses – some 170 in total – as vaccine side effects”

    (end)
    He goes on to discuss other possible environmental causes like processed food, pesticides, mobile phone usage, flame retardants etc. and observes “But Tony Fauci controls the public health bankbook, and has shown little interest in funding basic science to answer these questions.”

    Possible vaccine related conditions including some mentioned above affect several members of my family. Had I known then what I know now about side effects, my children wouldn’t have had most of the childhood jabs that they did. Before the internet, it was just too easy for the establishment to control the narrative in the mainstream media.

    1. When I was a child, I knew nobody with an allergy apart from my father who had eczema on his hands – triggered, it was suspected, by the dye in his police issue gloves.
      The only sickly, allergy type children in our sons’ age group, were 3 boys whose mother kept a sterile house.
      When our granddaughter pops in with her friends, you can guarantee that one of them will have to ask questions about the ingredients of the cakes in the tin. (Not granddaughter herself, who can eat anything.)

      1. I suffered from a lot of reactions to food when I was younger, and I certainly didn’t come from a sterile house. The reactions seemed to disappear when my gut health improved in my late 20s – the last skin test I had showed a half reaction for wheat, for example.

  25. Yo and Good Morning all.

    I wish to say that I am “One of the Gang of Six” , ie men in UK, ( OK the world) who have not had their Endaway, with Trash, Cringe or any
    other psuedonyms Markle has used.

    My Lips are sealed as to the names of the other Five

    1. You can add me to the list, OLT. I would have no desire to partake in ANY antics with a twisted bitch like that.

      I’d join Clarkson in hurling ordure at it.

    2. She is a physically attractive woman, but that attractiveness is totally destroyed by her bizarre ideas on make up, exacerbated by the effect her foul nature has on her facial features.

  27. Rishi Sunak criticised after third domestic RAF jet flight in 10 days. 20 January 2023

    Rishi Sunak has been criticised for taking a domestic flight in an RAF jet for the third time in 10 days.

    The prime minister flew on a 14-seat aircraft to an event in Lancashire to hold the first of what is due to be a series of events where he will take questions from the public.

    But the event on Thursday was overshadowed by the row over his transport choices after it emerged he took a 40-minute flight for a journey that would have taken about three hours by train. It is the third time the prime minister has flown domestically in an RAF jet recently, after similar trips to Scotland and Leeds.

    Net Zero! Does anyone actually believe this ridiculous story?

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/jan/19/rishi-sunak-criticised-third-domestic-raf-jet-flight-10-days

    1. Yo Minty.

      The prime minister flew on a 14-seat aircraft to an event in Lancashire

      The Crabs (RAF) obviously do not like him, or the comment would be

      The prime minister flew IN a 14-seat aircraft to an event in Lancashire

        2. One normally flies in an aircraft.

          Perhaps Sunak has taken up wing-walking as a hobby.

          I can only hope he falls off!

    5. The excuse will be that the cost is zero as the flights were used as training flights. A pal was flown from Germany to Gibraltar in a Canberra bomber when his father was taken ill there, stayed a day then flew him back

    1. The only logical conclusion of Net Zero is that they are planning for a far smaller population.
      All attempts by tyrants to control agriculture in the past have led to widespread famines, yet that is exactly what they are doing with Net Zero.
      We should consider ourselves warned and act accordingly.

    2. ‘Morning, B3. I struggle to get through the Times paywall, any chance of a copy and paste?

      1. I signed up for three months for a £ 1 special offer but have to remember to cancel before it runs out

        The UK is in danger of falling behind in the global race for green technology as the US and Europe pump millions of subsidies into their industries, Rachel Reeves has warned.

        Speaking on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, the shadow chancellor told The Times that the UK needed to “crack on” with a net-zero industrial policy as rival economies rush to offer financial incentives to boost their companies.

        “Some country is going to be a global leader in the industries of the future and I’ve got every reason to believe it can be Britain,” Reeves said. “But other countries are trying to get a share of the action, whether it be in green hydrogen, carbon capture and storage, or floating offshore wind. We’ve got to crack on.”

        Reeves and the opposition leader Sir Keir Starmer met global business leaders at the WEF summit as Labour tries to woo bankers and industrialists. Yesterday Reeves met with finance chiefs including the Bank of America president Bernard Mensah, BlackRock’s European chief executive Stephen Cohen, Anne Richards, chief executive of Fidelity, and Lloyds’ chief Charlie Nunn at a private breakfast hosted by JP Morgan.

        In an opinion piece for The Times, Reeves says: “Keir Starmer and I have been setting out how a Labour government would make our economy stronger while also leading globally. Because . . . investor confidence in Britain has taken a serious knock in recent years.”

        Business Briefing: Morning and midday updates on financial and economic news from our award-winning business team. One-click sign-up
        The prime minister and chancellor did not attend the WEF, with the government represented by the business secretary Grant Schapps and the trade minister Kemi Badenoch.

        Starmer told a panel that Britain must end new investment in oil and gas exploration. “Obviously [gas] will play its part during that transition but not new investment, not new fields in the North Sea, because we need to go towards net zero,” he said.

          1. Dear Sir Kneeler & Mrs Reeves, make sure you have access to lots of good phone lines. Rishi will no doubt show you where he had them installed too. You will need them to keep in touch with your WEF masters who will no doubt be issuing orders as to what to do and how to continue to turn the UK into a third world shithole. (See Londonistan as an ongoing example)

        2. Thanks B3. ‘Green hydrogen’ is of course nothing of the kind as it is very wasteful to create.

          Perhaps the fact that we are not leading the green race might, ultimately, be to our advantage when reality hits home?

        3. This continual adherence to a Net-Zero policy will only end in tears.

          It is unworkable and unrealistic in reducing any CO2 emissions – which are NOT harmful to the planet.

          In fact they are beneficial to plant life.

      1. Morning, Bob. A heavy frost and the bird feeder of choice has peanuts. Fat balls have the odd bird. None of them are interested in the feeder with seeds.

  31. Good morning, all. Clear, cold and frosty, again!

    There’s that old adage, ‘when you realise you’re in a hole it’s best to stop digging’. Sadly, the Covidian PTB are not taking any notice, in fact they’re upping the ante and attempting to link the increase in heart problems with the latest ‘green’ attack on our way of life.
    This message from the PTB’s point of view is a double-edged sword attempt at propaganda: 1) heart problems are nothing to do with the “vaccine” and 2) gas stoves are bad for one’s health and therefore must be disposed of. They have no shame.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3d692560bd0754b81b51168394f5e75dee7e4767844dfcf7c090d5abb5891c89.png
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b5453b16fb809a7027ecbb61d9d85988790cc1e90d308ebf35ab0cfe801b08ca.png

  32. Good morning all, a calm, clear start to the day on the Costa Clyde, currently -2°C. I wouldn’t say it’s a hard frost but it’s stood outside in it’s t-shirt!

    David Crosby will be harmonising with the Heavenly Chorus. RIP

    2. Bob, Ardern had serious and determined support from the Press in NZ.

      It was reported that she gave NZ$50million of taxpayers’ money to the parts of the Press “who would support the Government”

      A large amount of money in a small nation.

      Interestingly an internet comment yesterday stated that “she has the highest popularity ratings of any Prime Minister”.

      Strange that it didn’t mention any of the numerous demonstrations against her.

        1. Wikipedia claimed that she worked for Blair after she left her post as leader of

          the New Zealand Young Communists (who have a socialist name)

      2. Much like the coalition (in all but name) government, running the convid scam in the UK for the past few years, The UK media received £500M in taxpayer-funded convid advertising support.

        It’s only now, after the fact, that some reporters/outlets are apparently questioning the clampdown on human rights over the course of the scamdemic.

        Too little, too late. #ScumMedia

        1. She’s another one like Blair, not just a puppet out of fear and love of money, but really ideologically in the whole reset stuff, craving power over other people.

        2. Almost certainly the WEF, considering the publicity photos a few weeks ago

          of her with Professor Schwab.

    4. Apparently she went into a cocktail bar in Auckland and said to the barman can I get a large aperitif ?
      He just replied I don’t think so. 😁

      1. “Can I get …?”

        “I very much doubt it, Shergar. You were a f*cking abject failure as PM.”

          2. Is there a Weegie version of ‘May I’?

            Languages are fascinating.

            In Japanese, there is no word for ‘love’.

            The closest is ‘duty’.

          3. It started in Yankland and has now spread throughout the entire English-speaking world (along with ‘train stations’).

          4. I heard it a lot when working in Scotland (1984 – 1995).

            “Can I get 2 fish suppers wi’ chips?”

          5. When I heard my brother say, “Can I get a coffee?” I said to him, “How the hell do I know what you are capable of?” All I got in reply was a confused, gormless stare!

        2. Ardern learned well from Blair. Step down and hand the ticking time bomb to the next mug, while she departs for the sunlit WEF uplands.

        3. Keep up chaps all people under 35 say “can I get”. Instead of the long established alternatives 😉🙃
          It’s part of the modern day mission in Americanisms.
          Same as young ladies who emphasise their spoken vowels by growling.

          1. That fuckwit Jeremy Rhyming uses it in his fatuous and patronising “video” about coffee cups and inflation.

          2. I had an American Girlfriend who told me that her stock answer to the question, “Can I get into your knickers?” was, “I already have one arsehole in there, why would I want another?”

            She had/has a fine sense of humour – for an American

          5. Not forgetting the imbecilic, Australian, inquisitive upward inflection at the end of every utterance.
            That drives me crazy.

        4. A chavism, along with ‘yes I do’ instead of ‘yes I have’.
          I have an idea that these americanisms might have their roots with German or Yiddish speakers who emigrated to the USA.

  35. Good morning all

    Nice frosty sunny morning , 2c.

    I crunched through the ice on the front lawn in my slippers and jim jams at 7am this morning , rubbish bin collection day, to put something in the bin , and when Moh asked me why I did that with out wrapping up, I told him I felt tinglingly alive .. fresh cold crisp air , then warmth again, I think I would have rolled on the icey grass , given a chance .. just to prove I could still feel sensations .

    4. No problem with that. When I get up to do the teas for self & the DT, I often don’t bother getting dressed until after I’ve finished making it & taken her tea & cereal up for her and if I empty a bottle of milk, it’s rinsed immediately and put straight into the crate outside! Enclosed yard so no one to see or get offended!

    2. FFS ?
      Come on Vlad please press the button, for the sake of and in the respect of the common people.

      1. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again:

        “Come errant missile and flatten this den of iniquity.“

        2. Many people on Twitter have tweeted them to him. Perhaps they’re going to go out with a bang. 🤞 😊

  38. Morning all 😉 😊
    Bright start, but not a good appointment at the docs yesterday.
    The NHS administration is dreadful he’s not had any information at all regarding all the tests they carried out when I was in hospital before Christmas. Some Medication has been missed.
    Fortunately being aware of these problems I had typed and printed all the info I had and made copies of letters and left them with him.
    I told my good old mate about this problem and he got back to me confirming the same issues with his recent hospital/ GO visits.
    It seems that old adages are coming to light. One hand and the other scenarios.

    1. Same has happened to me. Either the secretary at the hospital didn’t send or the receptionist didn’t update. There are big gaps in my records. Made worse by the fact that i don’t get to see the same GP.

      1. Can you imagine if it’s happening in this small circle, it’s a massive problem around the whole country.

        1. I paid £50 for a print out of my medical records. Huge glaring gaps.

          It also led to my never speaking to my family again given the three hospitalisations with concussion injury before the age of ten.

        2. I also found out that some of the staff fib or can’t be arsed to look things up. On Monday I asked if they had all my contact details down as his wife and next of kin. Oh yes, I was told. Well, Tuesday, I went to the desk and was again ignored, and spoke to a junior nurse and she looked at his paperwork. They did not even have my phone number. I gave it to her and she wrote it down. How long does it take to check a form and make sure?
          As I said yesterday, I am not impressed with the staff on this ward at all. Grrr.

    2. A few months ago, MB received a follow-up letter from his cardiac consultant.
      A copy had also gone to our GP.
      As we read through, things did not add up. The penny finally dropped when MB was described as a retired para-trooper.
      Going through previous paperwork, we discovered that the wrong case number had been used and the patient under discussion was a totally different chap. If mistakes had been made with a number of patients, I would imagine that the dept. must have had a busy time. MB drove to our GP’s surgery straight away to warn them and a stop was put on the correspondence.
      But, how many of the other patients and their families would have spotted the problem or known what to do about it?

      1. Early last year I received a letter on Saturday morning telling me that my next appointment in cardiology had been canceled. Monday at 10 am iI drove to the department and handed the letter to the receptionist. After she had read it she went to a computer screen and key board printed off a letter and passed it to me. Saying this is the letter you should have had. Telling me that I was also going to have an echo cardio gram at the appointment next month not a cancelation.

    2. Ah, but it won’t happen here because we all know multiculturalism works (the BBC/Left-whingers have spent 30 years telling us that if we disagree we are racist bigots) and that diversity is our strength….

  40. Scotland just recorded its highest ever weekly death toll.

    Sorry, it is a Twit thread, I know not everyone can see them. There is a video where the chap is talking about the statistics, very short.
    https://twitter.com/NickDTRT/status/1616071448501653505

    Surely this carnage will be top news story in the UK…however, a glance at the Mail shows me a headline about some TV celebs, and another one about a rapist.

  41. 371252+ up ticks,

    Give credit where due this really has been the decade of the BEAST ,aided & abetted via the electoral majority.

    Dt,

    Suspected paedophile ring at Met Police as serving chief inspector is found dead
    Richard Watkinson, due to answer bail on the day his body was discovered, was to be charged with a string of child sex image offences

  42. Any tennis fans know why a tennis match would start at 10 pm. The Scottish player managed to stretch the match to 6 hours of deeply unattractive grimacing thus finishing at 4 in the morning.

    1. Match viewing time in another country – such as the US? That way pulls in advertising revenues…

      1. Looking at the US and European markets, I suppose. Matches are usually about the 3 hr mark, so a 1am finish does not seem so bad when planning.

    2. Match viewing time in another country – such as the US? That way pulls in advertising revenues…

    3. Assuming it’s the Oz open, possibly because it’s too hot during the afternoon and early evening?

      1. They been having trouble with climate change recently. Not enough people using sun block.

        1. 5 years in Southern Spain and never used sun block.

          You quickly learned to stay in the shade and plan your route accordingly.

          1. I didn’t use it in the S of France either. And neither do I look like an old leather boot. I don’t like sunbathing, the shade of a cherry tree is perfect.

    1. In short she has screwed NZ and has probably been lined up for a great paying non job in the WEF.
      Much more attractive proposition than being told by the electorate to sling her hook.

      2. Why do none of her cabinet see what’s happening and push back? Are they all so supine??

          1. For being a tyrannical tyrant and getting 90% of the NZ population injected, many coerced and against their will, subjecting them to the harshest of lockdowns and following the WEF’s orders to the letter.

    2. Not surprisingly the mention of Blair and Shwab who were probably involved in her ruination of another decent and happy country.

  44. Pair broke into zoo and carried out ‘distressing’ attack on animals. 20 January 2023.

    The court heard a series of disinfectant bottles were thrown into enclosures, one of them kicked out at a tiger, and a giraffe was left with two deep gashes to its leg as a “consequence” of the distress.

    The pair were each handed a 12-month community service order on Thursday, consisting of 120 hours’ unpaid work and ordered to pay £750 compensation each to the zoo.

    They should have been locked in with the tiger!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/01/19/watch-two-men-plead-guilty-breaking-zoo-carrying-distressing/

    1. Read about that, they were not given jail time but “community service”, not enough punishment in my opinion.
      I was going to post this because I thought it was wonderful. So as a contrast to thugs practicing animal cruelty here is ‘The Dog Bus’. I came across it last night.
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4BgDh1pnuc

      2. Seems well organised.

        I suppose they know where to drop each one, when the trip is over.

        They all look as if they enjoyed their trip and meeting all their friends.

        Better than herding cats!

  45. Did you know the Roman Catholic Church gave Ireland to Britain.

    In 1155 Pope Hadrian IV
    (most often styled Adrian and sometimes Adrien) issued Laudabiliter to
    King Henry II of England. Laudabiliter states that King Henry could
    invade Ireland to root out the weeds of vice amongst the Irish people,
    who had supposedly steered away from the Catholic faith, and rule
    Ireland as its lord.

  47. Welcome to the FSU’s weekly newsletter, our round-up of the free speech news of the week. As with all our work, this newsletter depends on the support of our members and donors, so if you’re not already a paying member please sign up today or encourage a friend to join, and help turn the tide against cancel culture. You can share our newsletters on social media with the buttons at the bottom of this newsletter to help us spread the word. If someone has shared this newsletter with you and you’d like to join the FSU, you can find our website here.

    Gender Conversion Ban

    The Government announced this week that it would legislate to ban conversion therapy relating to gender identity as well as sexuality, with a draft bill to be introduced shortly (BBC, Guardian, Mail, Reuters, Telegraph, Times).

    The news comes almost a year after Boris Johnson’s Government said there was too much “complexity” for transgender people to be covered by the ban, and that assessment is shared by a number of senior MPs and ministers (Guardian, iNews, Times).

    According to the former Business Secretary Jacob Rees-Mogg, for instance, it will be “difficult to phrase this Bill without unintended consequences in a highly complex area”. Equalities Minister Kemi Badenoch, who is ultimately responsible for the Bill, pointed out that “many people do not understand how complex this area is” (Telegraph). In a written ministerial statement announcing the imminent publication of the draft Bill, Culture Secretary Michele Donelan warned: “this is a complex area” and “[t]he legislation must not, through a lack of clarity, harm the growing number of children and young adults experiencing gender related distress”.

    At first glance, talk of ‘complexity’ might seem a little odd. After all, most people would agree that trying to forcibly change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity – perhaps through pseudo-scientific quack ‘treatments’ – is wrong and should be outlawed.

    But the fact is we already have a criminal law framework that prohibits offences of “physical or sexual violence”, including provisions for aggravated offences in cases where a criminal act is perceived by the victim, or any other person, to be motivated by hostility or prejudice based on a person’s protected characteristics and they include sexual orientation and transgender identity.

    There is also very little evidence that conversion therapy of the conventional type is widespread in the UK. Indeed, when the Government asked a research team from Coventry University to study the evidence on conversion therapy the only examples it was able to find were drawn from the US. As Mark Jenkinson, the Tory MP for Workington put it: “From all the published evidence, it is clear that current laws are sufficient to cover the vanishingly rare number of cases of conversion therapy.” (Telegraph)

    Where the ‘complexity’ will come into play, however, will be in determining what is – or should be – meant by ‘conversion therapy’. At present, that term is too vaguely defined to form the basis of a workable new law, and if it remains devoid of precise, technical meaning – if its meaning can be extended to encompass whatever trans rights activists want it to mean – then any such law will inevitably have a chilling effect on free speech.

    The warning signs were already there when the prospect of a bill banning conversion therapy first came up under Theresa May’s administration, where it was clear that any attempt to change ‘gender identity’ (not just ‘sexual orientation’) could be considered a form of ‘conversion therapy’. At the same time, little attempt was made to define what ‘gender identity’ meant, which is a particularly acute problem given that it can mean different things depending on whether the context is scientific, medical, sociological or legal.

    If the new bill comes before Parliament in similar form, it will bring with it the risk that various legitimate medical activities – such as referring a young person with a history of mental illness who identifies as trans to a psychotherapist before they decide to embark on an irreversible medical pathway – might fall foul of a legal ban on ‘conversion therapy’.

    As Kemi Badenoch has pointed out, it’s even possible that a poorly-drafted bill would bring conversations between parents and their children within scope of the ban, effectively meaning parents who attempted to dissuade their child from taking puberty blockers could be prosecuted (Times).

    The obvious danger is that without appropriate – and ‘complex’ – definitional work, limiting the scope of the ban, the legislation will allow the state to police conversations between parents and children, as well as force clinicians to rule out treatment that in their professional view is in the best interests of their patients.

    It would be an infringement of a clinician’s right to free speech and not in the interests of their patients to legally prohibit one possible diagnosis and, in some cases, force them to break their Hippocratic Oath. Clinical professionals have both a right and a duty to recommend what in their judgment is the best clinical pathway for a patient who identifies as trans, particularly if that patient is a minor.

    Consider a condition like gender dysphoria, currently defined by the NHS as “a sense of unease that a person may have because of a mismatch between their biological sex and their gender identity”. For trans activists and ideologically aligned therapists, this is an innate feeling that must simply be ‘affirmed’, with the young patient’s problems potentially being solved by helping them to ‘admit’ that they’re transgender. Anything less, in their view, would be transphobic and something they would like to fall foul of a conversion therapy ban. Yet for many other medical professionals, research on and around gender identity is still in its infancy, and it cannot be ruled out that in some cases identifying as trans may be symptomatic of a mental disorder – ‘gender dysphoria’ still appears in the latest edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the Bible of the American psychiatric profession.

    Nor can it be ruled out that an adolescent who identifies as trans and wants to embark on transitioning is simply being swept along by a trend within their peer group or on social media and, if they’re not persuaded to wait before undergoing any medical procedures, such as a double mastectomy, may come to regret it. Is it really in the best interests of such children to criminalise attempts by parents or clinicians to make them pause and reflect before permanently changing their bodies?

    The government does at least seem alive to these dangers.

    Culture Secretary Michele Donelan has said that the draft bill “will protect everyone, including those targeted on the basis of their sexuality or being transgender”, but expressed the hope that during pre-legislative scrutiny of the bill experts in this area will make sure the legislation doesn’t “harm the growing number of children and young adults experiencing gender related distress, through inadvertently criminalising or chilling legitimate conversations parents or clinicians may have with their children”. Equalities Minister Kemi Badenoch, who is ultimately responsible for the bill, has also acknowledged that framing the law will be ‘difficult’ and has committed to ‘stringent’ pre-legislative scrutiny.

    Initially, the Government will respond to the public consultation that was launched by Liz Truss in 2021 when she was Equalities Minister, and closed last February. (You can read the FSU’s submission to that consultation here.) After that Ms Badenoch will publish a draft bill. The Government then intends to form a joint committee of MPs and peers from across the parties to scrutinise draft legislation before it is introduced to Parliament (Times).

    We’re asking our members to use our campaigning tool to send an email to their MPs raising their concerns about the negative impact of a poorly-drafted conversion therapy bill on free speech. You can find the tool here. Please do fill in the details and contact your MP. It only takes a couple of minutes.

    Regional Speakeasies – book your tickets here

    If you’re intending to come to our first live events of 2023, then please book your places now – because these events are open to the public, they are likely to sell out.

    Our latest crop of Regional Speakeasies began last night in Cardiff, and we’re heading to Manchester on 25th January and then Edinburgh the following day.

    Our speaker in Manchester is Thomas Harris, the FSU’s Director of Data and Impact. Tom joined the FSU from the corporate sector, where he had become increasingly alarmed by the embedding of ‘woke’ ideas within management structures and workplace culture. He now plays a vital role in helping the FSU understand the ideological capture of so many of our institutions, helping to shape our response to future political and cultural trends. Tom will be exploring questions like: Which professions and sectors of employment are the worst for free speech? Who is most likely to need our help? What are the most effective responses to members’ travails? How can we campaign most effectively? How can we keep on growing, so that we can help even more individuals and increase our ability to defend freedom of speech?

    In Edinburgh, Fraser Hudghton, the FSU’s Director of Case Management and FSU Scotland Director, will be joined by renowned political commentator and author Iain Macwhirter. There is clearly plenty to discuss right now about Scottish politics and we anticipate a lively evening with plenty of time for audience involvement. We have extra capacity in the venue, so do spread the word to members and non-members alike, using this link.

    Debating Free Speech and the Right to Protest – book your tickets here!

    London members can gather at our first In-Depth Debate of the year on Monday 23rd January. (Non-members are also welcome). The event takes place at the wonderful Art Workers’ Guild in Bloomsbury, and it’s a great opportunity to hear from all sides of one of the most fraught debates of the current moment – how to balance the right to protest with the right of other citizens to go about their lives. Should all ‘speech’ be protected, even if it’s speech intended to stop your opponents exercising their rights? Is the right to privacy acquiring too much weight relative to the right to free speech? When does speech become protest? These fascinating and important questions will be thrashed out by our excellent panel of speakers and, of course, the audience. You can click here to book your tickets for this live, in-person event. We would love to have as many of you as possible with us in the room, but if you can’t make it in-person, you can still listen in by joining our Zoom link-up.

    Jeremy Clarkson: Latest Victim of Cancel Culture

    Following reports that ITV is thinking of firing Jeremy Clarkson as host of Who Wants to be a Millionaire (Mail), our General Secretary, Toby Young, has written to Dame Carolyn McCall, the CEO of ITV, urging her to reconsider. Sacking Clarkson would be cancel culture at its most brutal, destroying a person’s livelihood because they’ve said something perfectly lawful, but which someone who thinks of themselves as a ‘victim’ finds offensive.

    Clarkson has apologised for any offence he caused and that should be enough. As FSU Deputy Case Director Ben Jones pointed out on Talk TV this week, as a society we believe in the possibility of redemption for hardened criminals. Why can’t we extend the same charity to someone whose only crime is to have said something offensive?

    You can read the letter here.

    Caledonian Fellowship – applications now open

    The Caledonian Fellowship is an award given by the Common Sense Society, and brings together recent undergraduates, graduates, and young professionals who have “demonstrated achievement in their professional or field of study” and who are “committed to preserving and advancing the principles of liberty, prosperity, and beauty”. Over six days of seminars with renowned scholars, Fellows explore the foundational principles of Western civilisation and culture, with a special emphasis on the thinkers and ideas of the Scottish Enlightenment. All materials, accommodation and meals are provided during the programme. Any up-and-coming young FSU members who fit the bill and would like to take part can apply here. The seminars take place on September 10th-15th, and the deadline for applications is May 20th.

    In Conversation – FSU international

    As many members may already know, the FSU has a growing family of overseas sister organisations. Earlier this week, Toby was joined by Sara Gon, Director of FSU South Africa, and Jonathan Ayling, Chief Executive of FSU New Zealand, to discuss a wide range of topics including how free speech is curtailed in the media, the importance of hearing contrary opinions, and the commonalities experienced by our respective organisations. The video is available in full on our YouTube channel – the link is here.

    Academic Freedom and Free speech – Toby Young to give annual NCUP lecture

    The FSU’s General Secretary will be at King’s College London’s Gordon Museum of Pathology on 28th February to give the annual National Conference of University Professors (NCUP) education lecture. The title of the talk is ‘Free Speech in Universities’, and you can register for tickets here.

    SLAPPs – join the fightback and show your support for two crowdfunders

    The UK Government is increasingly concerned that Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation – or ‘Slapps’ as they are more commonly known – represent a growing threat to free speech within the law and the rule of law, which are fundamental parts of the democratic tradition. And with good reason. According to the Times, Britain is now the “global capital for Slapps, with more court cases initiated here than in America and the European Union combined”.

    The complicated acronym in fact hides a remarkably simple tactic. According to the Ministry of Justice’s recent consultation on the challenges presented by the increasing use of this form of litigation, Slapps are libel or privacy cases brought by wealthy companies or individuals where the primary objective is not to win the legal action – which may in fact be all but guaranteed to fail – but to “harass, intimidate and financially and psychologically exhaust one’s opponent via improper means”.

    It’s in this context that the FSU has decided to share details of legal crowdfunders set up by two separate parties – Andrew Burgess and Vanessa Warwick. Both Andrew and Vanessa are currently being sued by the same person for defamation in what look like Slapp cases. The person bringing the lawsuits is Samuel Leeds, the man behind Property Investors, a company that was the subject of a recent BBC ‘Inside Out’ investigation. While we do not necessarily accept either defendant’s view of their respective cases – that is a matter for the Court – we believe that they should have a fighting chance of being able to defend themselves. To find out more about each case and to show your support should you want to give it, click here and here.

    Politically motivated financial censorship – a call for information

    The FSU needs your help. We’re looking for information regarding any examples of politically motivated financial censorship that you, or anyone you know, may have heard about or directly experienced. Here’s why.

    In the wake of PayPal’s attempted demonetisation of the FSU last summer, Sally-Ann Hart and Andrew Lewer tabled an amendment to the Financial Services and Markets Bill. The amendment addressed “refusal to provide services for reasons connected with freedom of expression” and stated that: “No payment service provider providing a relevant service may refuse to supply that service to any other person in the United Kingdom if the reason for the refusal is significantly related to the customer exercising his or her right to freedom of expression.”

    At the time, Andrew Griffith, the Economic Secretary of the Treasury and the Minister responsible for the Bill, said he “empathise[d] strongly with colleagues’ concerns on the principled issue and potential risks – of protecting customers’ freedom of expression – and whether or not it is possible for service providers with significant market positions to terminate customer relationships at will and at speed”.

    However, the amendment was subsequently withdrawn after Mr Griffith promised that the issues it sought to address would be included in the terms of reference of a forthcoming statutory consultation about the Payment Services Regulations.

    That consultation has now begun, and it’s great to see that it will cover the regulatory framework currently applied to over 1,000 firms authorised as payment and e-money services in the UK (Reuters). The existing rules, which Britain adopted when part of the European Union, already require payment companies to give customers notice when they terminate an account, but, as per the agreement with Ms Hart and Mr Lewer, the Review will now assess whether clearer guidelines are needed on when companies can withhold or withdraw services from customers and will pay particular attention to the issue of politically motivated financial censorship in its terms of reference.

    We think this could be an important moment – the Government appears keen to keep an open-mind on the matter, which means there is now a window of opportunity for us to shape an aspect of public policy that will help to check the creeping trend towards a Chinese-style social system in countries like ours.

    On the subject of the Government’s open-mind, it’s particularly encouraging to see that in the consultation (which you can access here), the Government makes it “very clear” that “the legitimate expression of differing views, is an important British liberty”, that it “does not support ‘cancel culture’”, and that “regulations must respect the balance of rights between users’ and service providers’ obligations, including in relation to protecting the freedom of expression of anyone expressing lawful views”.

    In order to provide the Government with as many examples of politically motivated financial censorship as we can, we’re asking our members and supporters to send us any examples they may have come across, particularly if it involves them. To be clear, we’re after examples of financial services companies (such as a high street bank), payment processors (like PayPal) and crowdfunding platforms (IndieGoGo) either withholding or withdrawing services from customers because they don’t like their perfectly lawful views.

    You can get in touch via our email address: help@freespeechunion.org. Alternatively, you can direct message us on Facebook (here), Instagram (here) or Twitter (here).

    Best wishes,

    1. Why is the government legislating on this issue at all? It is nothing to do with them. It is not the provision of essential, shared services, it’s plain social engineering.

      If a man wants to pretend to be a woman that’s his choice. If he then asks for medical support he should pay for it, but the hospital has a right to refuse until significant counselling and treatment of his schizophrenia.

  48. How beach huts went from 1950s cheap holiday to ultimate wealth symbol
    Some owners will be forced to pay a high price to keep hold of their treasured boltholes.

    https : http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/consumer-affairs/how-beach-huts-went-1950s-cheap-holiday-ultimate-wealth-symbol/

    BTL

    Beach huts have changed hands at absurd prices going up to the hundreds of thousands of pounds.

    The Victorians had the idea of bathing machines which were in effect beach huts on wheels. Maybe an enterprising young entrepreneur could start producing road worthy beach huts that can be towed behind a car so that holiday makers can go to the seaside and then wheel their bathing machines to the beach and then hitch them back on the car and take them home after having had their swim.

    The snark would be very pleased with this idea because of the five ways in which to identify a snark this is the fourth:

    “The fourth is its fondness for bathing-machines,
    Which is constantly carries about,
    And believes that they add to the beauty of scenes–
    A sentiment open to doubt.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c108d9a7ff323d3c6f2c7bf7cff6619d19404ea58ff7bc12df4fe9fc56355b52.jpg

        1. Adnam’s Broadside is a delicious tipple, especially when taken in the local hostelries there.

          1. I agree and Ghost Ship is a nice ale with a citrus edge. Had a nice pint of Rampant Ruby, brewed in Sudbury by Mauldons, last evening. Local pubs are giving the smaller brewers excellent exposure for their products.

  49. Putin’s Russia faces ‘incredible poverty’, warns ex-IMF chief. 20 January 2023. .

    Russia’s people face “incredible poverty” following Western sanctions in response to Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine according to the former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund.

    Harvard professor Kenneth Rogoff said the country is headed towards being a new Cuba, Venezuela or “a giant Iran”.

    Well in my view that’s a pretty good description of what is already happening in the West. Whether it applies at all to a Russia that has vast reserves of almost every conceivable natural product I doubt. Even now the former is still buying Russian oil and minerals!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/01/20/ukraine-russia-war-latest-ukraine-russia-war-latest-brimstone/

      1. Maybe that is how they aim to scare people into eating only organic meat (expensive, rare treat for most people) or insects.

  53. The BBC have apologised for unexpected pornographic noises heard during
    the live broadcasting of Match of the Day

    Said a Spokesperson: “We are deeply sorry for any offence caused and we
    will continue to do our utmost to ensure that heterosexual activities
    are not promoted by this corporation”

    1. In days of old there were three offences that carried instant dismissal from the BBC. Not paying your licence fee. Being drunk on the premises. Having sex on the premises. When I first joined in ’91 there were lots of jokes about how to accomplish all three in one go. Humour was still allowed.

      1. Not so long ago there was a fourth offence: that of being Tomasz Schafernaker.

        That offence was rescinded due to the number of old dears who wanted him back.😉

    5. The only one I’ve seen was on our boat in the North Sea on the morning following a large storm.

    6. The only one I’ve seen was on our boat in the North Sea on the morning following a large storm.

          1. We have the technology to divert it west. You Weegies like it more than we do! 🤣

            We had some snow on December 7 and then nothing until last week, which lasted just a morning before it melted. It has tried to sleet today but then the sun came out. Today we’ve had four seasons in one day! It is now drizzling with rain.

          2. The Finn brothers and Crowded House were among the better things to come out of New Zeland?

          4. Thank you for that blast from the past. We were all so lovely back in the day (but mostly didn’t realise it)

        3. It wasn’t what I thought it was, but we get more of these than the other one I guessed it might be.

    4. Whitty has become a titled millionaire. He doesn’t appear to be capable of empathy for the people he’s destroyed to get there. Also, he’s an epidemiologist. An epidemiologist is someone who deals in mathematical analysis of medical data and compiles statistics. At best he’s peddling circumstantial evidence. At worst he’s just making it up. It’s staggering that so many people accept mathematicians and communist ideologues as scientists whose authority can be trusted.

  56. Curious effect of global warming. The wind (and drizzle) has removed all signs of frost. The temperature has risen BUT it feels colder…

  57. At lunch today, we ate the very last tomato of the 2022 crop. Still luscious and full of flavour.

      1. A meal in itself. We did have home-made soup, home-made bread and a range of cheese and salad.

        1. Oh how I envy you! My old man is out for his Friday curry, and I have the twins! Today I will mostly be eating smoked haddock fish cake and broccoli, plus a couple white chocolate buttons if I ask to go for a wee wee!

          1. I need a real meal so am going to make a baked shrimp scampi. Shrimp defrosting and I have all the ingredients. Haven’t made it for a while but I need something other than bits and pieces.
            Edit- please bear with all the edits and typos. My mind is all over the place.

  58. Disappointing stuff in today’s Telegaffe including more from Hamish de Feckwit on tanks for Ukraine – I notice he doesn’t mention the still classified armour! Apparently GB are also supplying 600 Brimstone missiles to Ukraine – luckily we can afford it as we are in such a strong financial position [/sarc]. Meanwhile NATO are ganging up on Germany to get them to supply Leopard tanks to Ukraine, while the USA are making excuses as to why they can’t release their Abrams tanks. In other news the EU are saying how much they are looking forward to working with Sir Kneel. These people are morons!

          1. It was a joke, hence the “ho ho”.

            You really should try not to take everything quite so literally

          3. Why is it that you are almost invariably the one Nottler who never seems to spot jokes/irony/anything even remotely subtle, (and I do not restrict that comment to my own posts, you do it regularly) and queries or corrects or adds unnecessary information?

          5. Because I take other’s comments seriously.

            Whereas you just look for a chance to disrespect others.

  59. ‘Dirty wee torturers’: Northern Irish man tells of British army abuse during Troubles. 20 January 2023.

    In a life scarred by fear, that is Auld’s final dread: that his ordeal in 1971 as one of Northern Ireland’s “hooded men” could end up in a scientific paper that helps British and other security forces refine torture methods.

    That may sound like paranoia but Auld and 13 other men were singled out as guinea pigs for special interrogation techniques that were replicated by British and US interrogators in Iraq and Guantanamo Bay. “It was so similar to what we went through,” said Auld, in an interview at his Belfast home.

    This reticence to speak to professional counsellors etc. hasn’t prevented Auld making it public as here. Obviously torture is reprehensible; not simply because of its brutality but because it usually turns out to be futile. What this article doesn’t give us is a sense of whether Auld was in fact a terrorist. This would not of course justify his treatment, but it would make it to some extent explicable. This omission to some degree makes his present humanitarian attitude suspicious. If he was himself involved in the murders of others it would make him a hypocrite and deny him the right to complain.

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jan/20/northern-irish-man-british-army-abuse-troubles

    1. It is quite clear that torture does not work as far as getting information is concerned.

      There are several reasons why these methods are still used.

      One, is to demotivate, except it increases injustice so has the opposite effect.

      Two, it is performed with official sanction by sadists, which at the end of the day also has the opposite effect.

      And three, ‘they’ can’t think of a better way.

      1. “It is quite clear that torture does not work as far as getting information is concerned”

        I’m pretty sure if someone started to torture me I’d fess up everything on the spot 🙁

  60. I am furious and in tears of rage. My husband has been nil by mouth since midnight and was supposed to go for the endoscopy at noon. He just called and said he’s taken matters into his own hands and is eating and drinking. Not one bloody person has come and told him bloody anything. I stayed home today because going down when he was in recovery etc would have been a bit pointless.
    What is wrong with these sodding people? They don’t give a shit about the patients or their families but they consider they are worthy of socking great pay raises.
    “Our NHS”…it is their NHS and I am so angry I would do someone a harm if I was there.
    He’s going to call if he ever finds anything out otherwise I will go tomorrow and they had better watch out.
    I can remember when I was last this angry but it’s not relevant now.
    Sorry for language, no I’m not, and sod the NHS.

    2. The bugger of that is that he’s probably now stuck there until Monday at the very earliest.

    3. So sad, Ann.

      It appears that the NHS is so fragmented that left hand doesn’t know what right hand is doing (If doing anything).

      You swear and cuss as much as you want – I can lend you a few extra words.

      Time to bring ALL the NHS back under one umbrella – get rid of these NHS Trusts – make everyone responsible and accountable to one authority – and that authority has to have absolute sanction over any person working for – and drawing wing wages from – the NHS Authority.

      Any appeal has to be dealt within a maximum of 2 weeks.

      PALS has a big part to play in identifying the wrongs and ensuring that they are quickly escalated up to an responsible person.

      As usual, Ann, I can only wish you and OH, a sensible way forward. The very best of luck for you both.

    4. No idea what to say. I think this is all too human – something processes and line management are supposed to constrain.

    7. So sorry, Ann. These are the people who couldn’t give a toss about your husband or you. Their lack of care and communication needs to be highlighted.

    8. Lottie
      Sheer neglect and cruelty, witholding treatment and nourishment .. Your poor husband could end up with a UTI and dehydration through lack of fluids .. They have a duty of care .. what on earth are they playing at ?

    9. Christ on a bike. Do you know anyone who could help you cut through the crap?
      That is disgusting.

    10. I’m so sorry to hear that Lottie. It must be very grim for you both. Have you tried calling the hospital’s PALS department to get them to get the ward to pull its finger out?

        1. Saw them several years ago at the Concert Hall in Glasgow! They were absolutely fan-bloody-tastic and played an extra 45 minutes over their time! The stewards were going dolally! Graham Nash was very up himself!

          1. Stephen Stills was the formidable talent in that band.

            And just to think, he very nearly became a Monkee [but wasn’t considered ‘cute’ enough].

          2. I have a collection of Monkees Monthly (23 editions)! My era before I had a sudden shift to Deep Purple and ELP!

          3. The Monkees, a made to measure band of course, but they produced some timeless songs that we all know the words of by heart.

  63. UK vows to aid Ukraine bid for ‘criminal accountability’ over war. 20 January 2023.

    The UK vowed to help Ukraine “pursue criminal accountability for Russia’s illegal invasion”, as international support grows for a special tribunal to prosecute Russian leaders.

    Foreign Secretary James Cleverly branded Moscow’s renewed military assault on its neighbour, launched last February, “an outrageous violation of the rules-based international order”.

    He said London had accepted an invitation from Kyiv to join “a core group of like-minded partners” seeking legal accountability, with a new “hybrid” tribunal among the potential options to be assessed.

    I could support this; though I think Russian offences overstated and in most cases actually manufactured by the Ukies. That is if it wasn’t for the truly sickening hypocrisy of it all! Aside from Blair and Cameron, Westminster probably has more War Criminals per square yard than any other place on the planet. It’s MP’s have voted for countless acts of aggression, apart from wars, and its Civil Servants have implemented them with relish and been rewarded for it! Compared to the UK Russia is a model of innocence and restraint!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/01/20/ukraine-russia-war-latest-ukraine-russia-war-latest-brimstone/

    2. Perhaps a little education is required for the wider world:

      Why Putin Invaded Ukraine Pt I

      Too many people obviously have no idea as to why Putin invaded Ukraine.

      Here is the first reason:
      It was Zelensky’s Azov Brigade, ruthlessly slaughtering over 14,000 Russian speakers in Donbass and other Eastern Ukrainian provinces, that made him feel that someone should endeavour to put a stop to this slaughter of his near neighbours by a despotic tyrant.
      The sad thing is that the US, the EU and NATO all joined in on Zelensky’s side.
      I take it they all agreed that the slaughter was a good thing!

      Why Putin Invaded Ukraine Pt II
      Russia invaded Ukraine (a part of its country) in order to expose and eliminate U.S. funded bio labs. We are referring to US funded ‘gain of function’ research into bio-weapons research.
      This exposure was the objective of the Russian ‘special operations’.
      The US ‘gain of function’ research laboratories were placed in Ukraine for the reason that Ukraine, neither a country nor an independent state, is not subject to international weapons conventions and control of weapons.
      The ‘vaccines’ are proven to be gene therapies produced by companies specialising in the introduction of specific known pathogens into the world populations. These ‘vaccines’ aim to infect every recipient with synthetic mRNA nano technology. This renders human recipients as trans human in much the same way that mice, rats and ferrets are rendered transgenic in our research laboratories.
      My own research evidenced that Malaysia has already convicted George W Bush and our own Tony Blair as war criminals. Regrettably Malaysia has no international clout and these two criminals are above our decrepit international law, a law, if properly instituted, would condemn these war criminals to a life of servitude in gaol.
      The Truth will always out. Just give it a few more months and these fuckers will be exposed.

          1. You just set yourself up as a contentious idiot who is looking for a fight – i refuse to get involved.

      2. In 1962,I went to Highbury to see Arsenal play a Russian team,
        Dynamo Kiev.Kiev had winger, by the name of Ostrovsky,who had
        8 caps for Russia.I can remember him as a top class footballer.
        Years later I saw Cruyff of Holland the similarity of looks and
        play were so similar.I’ve always thought of Ukraine as part of
        Russia….

        1. …and has my post influenced you with any thoughts, outside Wendyball, about the current Ukraine – Russian involvement?

          1. No,but I can remember Ukrainians were not welcome in the UK after ww2 and many arrived and
            claimed to be Polish.But I was a toddler and did not understand.

        2. A new poster to me, welcome to Nottle.

          Doubly so if you’re a Gooner.
          Great result on Sunday, and had it not been City, a good result last night.

      1. Agreed, but I have little doubt he’s going to get his arm badly twisted, “Russian” sabotage of the new floating liquefied natural gas terminals anyone?

  65. A Blessed Birdie Three.

    Wordle 580 3/6
    ⬜⬜🟨🟨🟨
    🟩⬜⬜🟨🟨
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. Typical par 4 for me.

      Wordle 580 4/6

      🟩⬜⬜🟩⬜
      🟩⬜⬜🟩⬜
      🟩⬜🟩🟩🟩
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

        1. OLT, the grid explained:

          Green indicates that letter is in the right place.
          Yellow indicates the right letter is in the wrong place.
          Blank indicates that letter not included in the word.

          Cheers!

  66. Another ‘You could have knocked me down with a feather moment!”
    During Monday afternoon I applied on line for the renewal of my driving licence. The new one arrived via Royal mail at noon today!!

    2. Snap , the same as me , Moh did mine on line on Monday and the replacement arrived on Wednesday , and today I posted my old one back to the DVLA.. I am also amazed at the speed of renewal ..

    3. Perhaps it is because all the snivel serpents are on strike and the machines issue them automatically!!

    4. You’re lucky, I’ve tried many times to have just my address changed and I’ve tried so many times.

      Forget it, it’s just DVLA.

    5. That works for on-line renewals. Try getting your licence back if you want to retain your C1/D1 entitlement after the age of 70.

  67. Voters will need to show an accepted form of photographic identification next time they go to the polling station.

    Whilst there are no planned elections in Dorset Council area until May 2024, why not apply now so you have it ready should there be a snap election or by-election before then, and, if not, you’ve got it ready for 2024.

    The requirement to show photo ID at the polling station was introduced by UK Government’s Elections Act, which comes into effect for the first time this May.

    Accepted forms of ID include a UK, European Economic Area (EEA) or Commonwealth passport; a UK, EEA or Commonwealth drivers’ licence; and some concessionary travel passes, such as an older person’s bus pass.

    Voters will be able to use expired ID if they are still recognisable from the photo.

    The full list of accepted ID is available on the Electoral Commission’s website, along with more information about the new requirement and details of how to apply for the free ID once it has launched: electoralcommission.org.uk/voterID.

          2. Passport photos stipulate in your photo you must::-
            be facing forwards and looking straight at the camera
            have a plain expression and your mouth closed
            have your eyes open and visible
            not have hair in front of your eyes
            not have a head covering (unless it’s for religious or medical reasons)
            not have anything covering your face
            not have any shadows on your face or behind you.

            I assume other types of photo id e.g. driving licence have the same rules. If someone turns up at the polling station with a veil or mask, then these rules apply:-
            From 4 May 2023, if you are voting in an election that requires photo ID, you will need to show photo ID to vote. Staff will check that they are happy that it’s acceptable. A private area will be available. You can choose to have your photo ID viewed in private. This might be a separate room, or an area separated by a privacy screen, depending on the polling station.

          4. Somehow, I think it unlikely that someone turning up to perform their civic duty in voting would be the type to attack the staff at the polling station.

          1. “…the man with a Thousand (++++++) Face…”

            the man with a Thousand (++++++) Faeces

    2. One small step in the right direction but until postal voting is massively reduced it will be as effective a a sticking plaster for a stab to the heart……..

      1. Exacto (© Peddy) lets’s get rid of postal voting except for services overseas and ex-pats who are interested.

        1. Don’t forget people who have to travel abroad on business or civic duties (which would have been me when I was representing the Twinning).

      2. A few years ago, when friend Dianne still lived in Albert Drive, she had officers from Woking BC on the doorstep asking whether she had been pressured into voting for anyone in particular…

        By the way, when there were no trains, I took the charabanc* 520 bus to Woking a couple of times.

        Quite impressed with the new stuff, including M&S.

        *The bus is full of wrinklies, at least my senior by 20 years, and they all seem to know each other intimately. Thank God the trains are back…

    3. I wish I could be there to vote, Maggie.

      I’m too far North but have written to my MP and put him on notice.

  68. That’s me gone for today and until Wednesday – God Willing. Busy stuff in yer Narfurk to keep my nose to grindstone.

    Have a spiffing few days Beagle free.

    A bientôt.

        2. Tom – I’m in Carlisle for a funeral next Wednesday. Travelling Tuesday to Friday, by train. If you fancy meeting up for a pint on Thursday (either Carlisle of Moffat or in-between), I’m up for it…

          1. Geoff, that would be fantastic. Sue and I plus Richard tried this earlier but it never worked.

            Sue, do you have any ideas as to the where and when. I’d love to have such a meeting and it’d be good to meet Geoff ASAP.

          2. So, Tom – I’m theoretically available on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday evenings, but I’m hoping to catch up with a few old friends. Thursday I’m free all day. Happy to travel, if needed.

          4. Moffat would be good as I cannot travel far, Geoff.

            I’ve asked Sue Macfarlane to get involved – she knows this area better than I.

            Let’s see what it involves. Next Wednesday would be 25th January. Am I right?

          5. Funeral is on Wednesday 25th. So I’m tied up in the afternoon. I’m travelling Tuesday and Friday, which leaves Thursday daytime, but Tues, Wed and Thurs evenings are possible.

            As it happens, I’m staying at the Railway Hotel, which in prehistoric times was the County Hotel – with which Sue McF is somewhat familiar…

          6. I’ll try Geoff but it’ll probably have to be Moffat as I cannot travel far.

            I’m hoping that Sue Macfarlane could identify a rendezvous,

          8. Sounds possible, I’ve spoken with Sue on the ‘phone and she’ll try and get Richard Scott (tier 5 inmate) involved as well. I look forward to it, I’ve met so few NoTTLers But I heartily uphold what we all believe in.

          10. Hi Tom, I’ve had a couple of days of not nottling, been busy. You may be aware that Richard has kindly offered me a lift to Moffat from Carlisle, which rather simplifies the transport arrangements for Wednesday…

  69. How the language of politics deceives and twists. Reading The Grimes front page, the article is about CHunt freezing fuel duty and how this will “cost £6bn”. No it won’t effing well “cost”, it will reduce the tax income by £6bn. The language that makes the assumption that that taxpayers money already belongs to the Treasury is arrogant in the extreme. I wouldn’t mind if they said such a move would reduce the tax income by £6bn.

  70. The American website, Babylon Bee, really is very funny. I am a lapsed Anglican but find podcasts such as Irreverend, and Babylon Bee, quite reassuring.

    Anyway, for those who don’t know Babylon Bee, it is Christian satire and usually very funny. Like this:

    “ PHILADELPHIA, PA — NHL star Ivan Provorov declined to participate in the Philadelphia Flyers’ Pride Night or wear a rainbow-colored jersey, saying if he wanted to support the gay agenda he would have played soccer instead of hockey.

    “Listen, man, I got nothing against the gays,” said Provorov to a crowd of outraged sports writers as the rest of his team pranced across the ice gracefully in their colorful outfits. “But I ain’t wearing that thing. Let’s leave all that gay stuff in soccer where it belongs. Also, I believe in God and stuff, and I don’t want to disobey him, so there’s that.”

    The sports world expressed unbridled outrage at the decision. “The lives of LGBTQ+ people are in danger unless everyone on earth affirms their sex lives by wearing the special uniform and saluting the special flag,” said Sports Illustrated writer Gloop Schnixen (they/them) in an op-ed. “If Provorov refuses to show unquestioning fealty to our belief system, he is a fascist and must be punched until he complies.”

    Representatives for Major League Soccer confirmed that they celebrate Pride Night every night, and invited anyone who felt unwelcome in the NHL to attend one of their soccer games for free. So far, none have accepted the invite.

    At publishing time, the NHL courted more controversy after several players refused to wear sparkly princess dresses on Trans-Awareness Night.”

    3. There is a big difference between accepting (maybe grudgingly) other people’s gender confusion and running around dressed like a poofter.

      1. At a previous employer, there was one technician liked to dress in a dress. No makeup or falsies, just a bloke in a dress. I was impressed that the employer tolerated that, but there again, why not?

    1. So, more ‘consultants’ to help spend millions more to achieve absolutely zip! Too many useless chiefs and not enough over educated/paid ‘workers’.

      1. Not true, Sue, I’m an ex-consultant who totally believed in what the company wanted. I did my best to in many companies to deliver.

          1. That would have been a challenge I’d have happily undertaken. Alas it was never presented.

      2. You want more consultants? Try MKinsey. Close ties to the WEF and Canada has just blown about 100 million on their services

        The link between government and the wef is so obvious nowadays.

    2. Hang on. The state ‘refused’ tp hand out documents from the meeting? Do these wasters not realise whom they serve? They don’t get to deny it, they do as they are told.

      Until they learn that our boot rests on their neck they will never learn.

    2. I am told Mongo was very good with his puppies. I imagine he thought ‘this is great! I get to sit down, fart and eat all this food!’

  73. Rishi Sunak fined for failing to wear seatbelt

    New setback for Sturgeon as poll shows most Scots would vote against independence

    Oh dear. So sad.

  74. Evening, all. If anything would demoralise the NHS staff, I should have thought it was the amount of paperwork and record-keeping. Had to laugh, Sunak has been fined for not wearing a seatbelt. I hope he got points on his licence as well. Mind you, we the taxpayer will be the ones picking up the tab.

  75. My husband just called- he’s discharging himself. He told them he’ll go for an endoscopy but it won’t be there. He has to talk to a senior quack but has told me to leave the back door open- hell, I am going to wait up till he gets here.
    He’s had it with that place and, I guess, told them so in no uncertain terms. It won’t be easy here but he will do better at home and I can help him as best I can.
    Please keep your fingers crossed that it goes to plan. I am happy but nervous too.
    It will be a long night but it doesn’t matter one bit.

    1. Good luck with that for you both.

      I do know about discharging myself and I salute your OH’s courage in doing that,

      I can only hope that ii is for the better,

      Both of you – KBO and the best of luck.

    2. Good luck with that for you both.

      I do know about discharging myself and I salute your OH’s courage in doing that,

      I can only hope that ii is for the better,

      Both of you – KBO and the best of luck.

    3. Wow Ann! What a man! If he’s that fighting fit he’ll be better off at home, in your arms and with some decent food!

      2. I am sure his leg is still sore but if they can be bothered to give him some pain meds I’m sure he’ll manage.
        I shall be reporting that ward to the hospital. Shameful treatment.

        1. I know I keep banging on about it but email the CEO of the hospital with an official complaint. After he’s been out for 2 days write and ask for a copy of his notes covering the duration of his stay. It will be interesting to see what’s been going on.
          This link will take straight the NHS CEO email page. https://ceoemail.com/uk-nhs-chiefs.php Good luck Ann.

        3. There are huge variations in the quality of wards within one hospital; something I noticed when MB spent a week in CGH.

          1. As I was recovering from my ‘extreme chiropody’, someone in the ward asked if anyone had toenail clippers. I’ll leave you to work out the response… :-))

    6. Wasn’t the endoscopy supposed to be this afternoon, how can’t hey bugger up a simple procedure like that?

      I don’t see much help coming from the staff when he packs and leaves. Any chance of you taking your friendly taxi to go pick him up?

      1. There will be endless forms to fill out etc. I did sort his stuff out somewhat yesterday – just hope he remembers his phone charger.
        I think he will call when he gets the go ahead, although I am sure they will try and dissuade him.

      2. One expects a sudden emergency might get in the way, but no information all day, nor a break of the fast, is unforgiveable.

      4. They can bugger up anything. It’s what the NHS does. I’ve had pre-op assessments conducted by diabetic nurses (no – not diabetes specialist nurses – just land whales). Asked “what are you here for”, I did my best to explain, and when it came to meds, my contractor’s QS upside down reading ability showed that she was looking at a different Graham entirely. When the op happened, there was no record of the pre-op, so it all had to be done again.

      1. Thanks Sos. We are both very determined people. He’ll go mad if he’s there any longer. As I said, it won’t be easy but that doesn’t bother me. One bolshy 6 footer is nothing compared to 60 5th graders in my library waiting to check out their books and the computers crashed.
        It won’t be easy but I’ll manage.

    8. I’m certain that being home with you Ann will be the best tonic both of you could have.

    10. Is there another nearby hospital where he can have the endoscopy done?
      The current one sounds an absolute stinker.

      1. Yes but I really don’t think it’s that urgent. They wanted to do it because a tiny bit of vomit had a red tinge. He had one in August last year and all was OK. I think the hard fall and the surgery mucked up his innards.

    11. Just catching up with y’all news, what a terrible day both of you have had, thoughts and positive vibes on their way to you. Take care.

    14. Oh goodness Lottie, he must be seriously pi&&ed off to discharge himself. Do hope he takes care on the way and I know that you’ll look after him when he arrives. Thinking of you both.

  76. What a day. After more than 3 months I managed to have my hair cut. I thought I was going back to the 70s as it grew longer. I was lucky, I popped in by chance to the local hairdressers. He usually has pre booked only clients. He said take a seat as I was puffing and blowing short of breath. But the 3 o’clock client didn’t turn up. Job done.
    What luck.
    We are watching monty Don in Croatia. I think I want to live there.
    Feeling very sad right now for our 3 year old grandson.
    He’s been in hospital with high a temperature since Monday. Poor little chap has lukiemia. There are so many complications. His Mum and Dad deserve awards.

    4. 3 months? I haven’t had a ‘professional’ haircut since they made it illegal three years ago. I don’t have much hair these days, and – having bought clippers – I’ll keep using them…

      1. I have clippers. They cost less than one pro haircut. Bought nearly 20 years ago, still going strong!

        2. We have dog clippers, I use those on poppiesdad’s head. He is due a clip tomorrow, we are meeting family on Sunday for lunch. He has a wild professor look about him at the moment (he isn’t a professor btw),

          1. I am lucky inasmuch as the daughter of one of my friends is a professional hairdresser (although she now works in another field) and she is happy to cut my hair to keep her hand in. I now stand back and await the ribald comments about exactly what she keeps her hand in … 🙂

      3. But …….mine still grows like crazy GG.
        When I meet old friends I haven’t seen for some time they give it a sly tug.
        Thinking it’s a wig 🤔🤪

    6. Poor little lad.
      Why don’t the evil buggers like Bliar and all those in Davos get this. Nobody would be concerned for them.
      You are all in our thoughts.

    8. What can one say?

      I hope they have caught it early enough, they did for my brother and I hope they have for your grandson.

    10. The poor parents, they must be stressed out. Having your child ill and really ill at that is the worst feeling in the world.

    2. Never knew that A4 existed. Cool!
      A4 Sir Nigel Gresley is back on the rails after a long rebuild at North York Moors railway, with YouTube showing runs North from Kings X. Fabulous locomotive – but I’m not convinced with the black paint, though.

    3. Could do with the attention of a hammer and dolly on all those dents, though. Poor old loco looks really scruffy with so many dings.

      1. I might not be in tip-top condition if I were 88 years old, Paul. It doesn’t look half as bad in the video.

      1. That still from a video doesn’t make DDE look in a good light. The video it is from is just lower down this thread, where you can see that he does, indeed, get a lot of TLC.

    1. ‘Night, Eddy.
      Sending positive thoughts to your Grandson, on the off-chance it’ll have a positive effect.

      1. Been there, done that in 1998 and here to tell the tale.
        Hope you’re OK, Tom, and not suffering too much in this freezing weather.

        1. I’m lucky, Alf as £45 is included in the rent for heating so it’s turned up to max everywhere in this flat.

  80. I posted this on the article about cancer

    I am lucky, I have had Bowel Cancer and survived, but with shortened internal plumbing.

    When you go the the loo, for No 2, check if all looks OK

    I noticed it did not look right me:dark/bloody mess on loo paper.

    I went to see GP, 14 Days later on the operating
    table, then a stoma bag for a year. Pipe work reconnected, all now OK

    “The job is not finsihed, ’til the paperwork is done”

    Sorry if this sounds rude and crude, but it could be a life saver

    2. I did the bowel cancer postal service a year or two ago. Quite a relief when it comes back negative.

    3. I had similar 25 years ago this coming September.
      I’m now a pain in the arris to everyone else.:-))

        1. Well done. I’m sure it makes a difference going to the doctor as soon as there is a change in the bowel habits. Well, it did all those years ago but not so sure nowadays.

    6. Mozart used to sign off his letters with, “Shit well”! The importance of a healthy movement was well understood and maladies all too common of course.

          8. Haha;-) No, it’s story of former young sweethearts who get back together in their later years.

          9. Years ago in Suffolk I saw a sign outside a village church hall – the hall was being closed and they were holding a dance that saturday night, some wag had written on the notice “Last Tango in Parish”

          10. If you’re talking about the Building Society of that name, just don’t. I won’t elaborate, but they made my life h3ll for two or three decades…

          2. I have lots of shirts and ties (although I only wear them when I’m riding), but my biggest ties are Oscar and Kadi. I won’t put them in kennels, so we’ll holiday in England together.

    14. Gosh, ashesthandust, your photo has made me very nostalgic for Argentina. Enjoy your holiday!

    1. No doubt the msm will report a small protest by a few hundred extreme right protesters. That is if they mention it at all.

    1. I will never forget the Czech Philharmonic playing Mahler’s 1st in Sheffield City Hall early seventies. There was a massive orchestra and about seven or eight double bass players all in perfect synchronisation.

      I would need to find the programme to be more specific but the programme is amongst other papers in a plastic case in the shed at present. May have been Vaclaw Neumann.

  84. Am I alone in finding the amateur clown show in Davos funny. I just watched a clip of some entertainer, a woman I think, cooing like an off pitch songbird to the strumming of a classical guitar. Hilarious. The audience clapped the crap approvingly.

    Earlier the sorry sight of one Tony Blair ranting demonically about the vital necessity for all to be vaccinated and to have vaccination status kept by his world government in readiness for the many ‘vaccines’ envisaged in the future. The ghastly Mickey Mouse character is certifiable.

    The most gratifying clip was of Schwab himself spouting about microchips implanted in the brain in that weird voice of his. Doubly certifiable.

    It seems that many invitees failed to attend, no Putin, no Modi, no CCP politburo members. Bunter could be seen avoiding questions, Kemp of Georgia infamy was there (not sure why unless talking about cheating at elections), then Bourla of Pfizer being hounded by Rebel News reporters and refusing to answer questions about his ‘vaccines’.

    The clown show highlights included turns by Al Gore, mad as ever but now enormously wealthy and morbidly obese and the comical genius John Kerry whose pitch was that of a Croesus to plead for more money.

    In summary I reckon we might have seen the last of WEF and Davos as an influential place for the movers and shakers. The EU contingent appeared nondescript and unimportant, especially the German plant Ursula von der Leyen.

    The brightest event, the stepping down of the truly evil witch Jacinda Ardern, made my day.

      2. That is the clip I referred to. And I thought Cleo Laine was bad enough.

        Curiously in the last few weeks when Jeff Beck and David Crosby have passed, creators of great music, the WEF commission this shite.

        Just a thought from a ‘retired’ architect. I witness the most hideous buildings, things of no beauty erected without thought or philosophy, raising their ugly heads all over the world and claiming to be Architecture. They are not Architecture but ugly monstrosities representing the vile disintegration of society. Some lean in, some lean out at alarming angles, some stagger, jerking around, few are vertical whilst functionally even the worst monstrosities are mostly horizontal for level purposes.

        I see much the same in what now passes for music. Cacophony coupled with exaggeration, performance rated above musicality, utter discordance.

        I just trust in God that this hideous nonsense ends soon.

        1. I am just reading “How to lose friends and alienate people” by Toby Young, and he describes going to Harvard in the late 80s and finding political correctness in full swing there. One of the things he comments on is the rejection of beauty.
          I think it’s been pushed deliberately by inferior minds in academia, part of the Frankfurt school ideas to destroy society like the promotion of minority rights.

    5. Davos is beginning to attract significant negative attention and oh the horror! Schwab is being mocked on the internet.
      The mainstream media is as sycophantic as ever though.

  85. Youse want a challenge? Berliner Zeitungen has started with Wordle – in German! It’s quite difficult enough in English, never mind Deutsch…

  88. Goodnight, folks. I’m off to stoke the Rayburn and heat up some hot water bottles ready for bedtime.

    2. Good job, girl, Now lavish all your love and care as I’m sure you will,

      Our wishes don’t stop here. We’re still behind you and want the best for you.

    3. Really pleased to hear this. A good night’s rest and a peaceful day tomorrow for you both.

    4. What wonderful news, Ann. I’m looking forward to hearing the full details on Saturday’s NoTTLers’ page.

  92. Goodnight and God bless, Gentlefolk, I’m off to see if my efforts with changing the bedding, particularly the duvet and the cover have borne fruit. But I think we’ll manage.

    Now we just have to wash and dry the ‘old’ bedding. It’s only been on there since last August! What a disgusting old man you are.

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