Friday 27 September: Consider the ethics of assisted dying before rushing into legalisation

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its commenting facility (now reinstated, but we prefer ours),
Intelligent, polite, good-humoured debate is welcome, whether on or off topic. Differing opinions are encouraged, but rudeness or personal attacks on other posters will not be tolerated. Posts which – in the opinion of the moderators – make this a less than cordial environment, are likely to be removed, without prior warning.  Persistent offenders will be banned.

Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here.

549 thoughts on “Friday 27 September: Consider the ethics of assisted dying before rushing into legalisation”

  1. Good morning chums, and thanks to Geoff for today's NoTTLe page.

    Wordle 1,196 4/6

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    1. Par four, too. 'Morning Elsie.

      Wordle 1,196 4/6

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      1. 393578_up ticks,

        Morning EB,
        You find me in a state of deep sorrow, how can you ever forgive me for not scrolling down,

        1. You are forgiven, oggie. But if it happens again I shall call you a Very Silly Hostage, er Sausage. Lol.

          PS I used to be able to type Hostage with a line through it, but can no longer do so. And the same with bold type and spoiler hiders. Can anyone help me?

      1. Do they, Annie? (Good morning, btw.) I thought that many of them asked for an original (or photostat) to frame and put up on the wall.

  8. Streeting’s £20k fundraiser with McKellen hosted at Lord Alli penthouse

    Health Secretary is the third Cabinet minister to have used property owned by donor in Starmer gifts row

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/politics/2024/09/26/TELEMMGLPICT000286779508_17273689272800_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqLqyfQGdl3mAr9NzcrvA2J7AocpkOWdStzj10K5gj2sM.jpeg?imwidth=680

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/PortalPictures/september-2024/395621249__streetingmckellen_ls.jpg?imwidth=350 *
    *
    *
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/09/26/wes-streeting-minister-lord-alli-flat/

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

    Comments closed

    James Baker
    12 hrs ago
    I’m not sure making jokes about being deceitful to the British public is wise behaviour.
    Starmer really does have frighteningly poor judgement and a horribly inflated ego.
    I guess poor judgment is why he let the public down badly in previous roles too.

    PJ Spiers
    10 hrs ago
    Reply to James Baker – view message
    Politically, Starmer is already a dead man walking – he is in denial and totally out of touch with reality.
    The stench of corruption and hypocrisy from these Marxist ideologues will possibly be existential for Labour –they are staring oblivion in the face.
    Things are going to get very interesting and a lot sooner than most of us expected.

  9. Morning, all Y'all.
    Windy – and I didn't have curry last night, either.
    Looks like an interesting few days ahead, in British politics. Thank goodness we're coming over on Monday, to experience it first-hand! (with Thatchers cider in hand, too!)

      1. Squeeze some lemon juice onto it or a slosh of red wine – calms it down nicely. Plus some grated dark chocolate for a rich taste.

      2. Same here, a couple of days ago.
        I can’t taste much these days (SWMBO says I never had any taste…) so managed to overchilli the chilli. I still couldn’t taste any chilli, but I could feel it in my stomach. SWMBO couldn’t eat it at all.

    1. His role as the sacrificial scape goat appears to be much deserved.
      Hopefully he will not take his role lying down and will drag others down with him.

  11. £93578+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Ieave things as is one, reason being you will be aiding & abetting the political enemy enamas in their quest for countrywide total domination.

    As things go I jest not, currently give the likes of these political cretins their way we will find ourselves with an allotted lifespan
    "COME IN JOHN BULL" your time is up, will be the order of the day.

    If any of these odious politico's would veer from their proven
    RESET / WEF / NWO pro eu agenda and pushed for assisted
    LIVING via financing medical research instead of researching & financing more efficient killing methods, we would as a nation be, once again, WORLD LEADERS.

  12. £93578+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Ieave things as is one, reason being you will be aiding & abetting the political enemy enamas in their quest for countrywide total domination.

    As things go I jest not, currently give the likes of these political cretins their way we will find ourselves with an allotted lifespan
    "COME IN JOHN BULL" your time is up, will be the order of the day.

    If any of these odious politico's would veer from their proven
    RESET / WEF / NWO pro eu agenda and pushed for assisted
    LIVING via financing medical research instead of researching & financing more efficient killing methods, we would as a nation be, once again, WORLD LEADERS.

  14. Reeves should cut WHO pandemic funding to pay for winter fuel, says Farage

    Reform UK leader says World Health Organisation is ‘empire building’ by proposing a global monitoring system for potential pandemics

    Gordon Rayner
    Associate Editor
    26 September 2024 9:00pm

    Rachel Reeves should cut UK funding of the “scaremongering” World Health Organisation (WHO) and spend the money on winter fuel payments for pensioners, Nigel Farage has said.

    Britain sends around £200 million per year to the WHO, a figure that is likely to leap into the billions thanks to a pandemic preparedness treaty currently under negotiation.

    The Reform UK leader says the WHO was “empire building” by proposing a global monitoring system for potential pandemics the cost of which will dwarf the organisation’s current budget.

    Some global health experts argue that the monitoring system – which could cost £320 billion in its first decade – is needless because pandemics are becoming less and less likely as standards of health improve in poorer countries. They also say that if Covid-19 was caused by a laboratory leak, a monitoring system would not have helped.

    Earlier this week, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the WHO, told the United Nations General Assembly that “the world needs the pandemic agreement”, but Mr Farage says he is “scaremongering in yet another bid to build his empire”.

    Writing for The Telegraph, Mr Farage, a member of Action on World Health, which campaigns to reform the WHO, says: “While Rachel Reeves insists there is no money for pensioners to keep warm this winter, you can guarantee she will find money to help the WHO fund this.

    “Just like international aid, housing illegal immigrants and funding large public sector pay increases, this Government will raid taxpayers’ hard-earned money to keep this latest globalist project on track.”

    Dr David Bell, a public health expert who previously worked for the WHO, told The Telegraph that the organisation should be concentrating its resources on eradicating major killers such as malaria rather than trying to predict once-in-a-century pandemics.

    He said: “The risk of pandemics is being grossly exaggerated. People who support the pandemic preparedness treaty are quoting data that says there is an exponential increase in the number of outbreaks [of viruses and diseases] but that is almost certainly because we can detect them now when we couldn’t before. It’s primary school stuff.

    “Mortality has been going down since 2010 because of better nutrition, better treatment, better hygiene and reduced poverty.

    “The WHO’s entire budget at the moment is about £5 billion, and they are talking about increasing that eight to ten times to pay for surveillance of potential threats. It will build an industry whose reason for existing is to find threats, and of course, if you increase surveillance you will find new viruses, but probably ones that have been around for thousands of years.”

    He pointed out that the mpox virus, which was declared a public outbreak of international concern by the WHO, has caused 55 laboratory-confirmed deaths since 2022, mainly in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In the same period around one million people, most of them children, were killed by malaria.

    Dr Bell, who co-authored a report on the cost of pandemic preparedness for the University of Leeds, said: “They are talking about spending many times what they spend on malaria to monitor these tiny disease burdens and theoretical threats.”

    Because the pandemic preparedness treaty is still being negotiated it does not have a budget, but the University of Leeds study said it could reach £320 billion in its first 10 years. Britain contributes around 4 per cent of the WHO’s annual income, which would equate to £12.8 billion if it paid a similar proportion of a £320 billion budget or an average of £1.28 billion per year. The winter fuel payment cut is worth around £1.5 billion per year to the Treasury.

    This Government must opt out of WHO’s amendments to International Health Regulations
    By Nigel Farage

    While our backs were turned during the general election, the 77th World Health Assembly took place in Geneva at which UK civil servants and diplomats agreed to the biggest loss of sovereignty since the Maastricht Treaty, and the biggest infringement on our right to choose what we do with our bodies.

    Amendments to Article 18 of the WHO’s International Health Regulations (IHR) set in stone their powers to recommend countries implement vaccine mandates, border closures, and quarantines during future pandemics; and contrary to what the globalists tell you, the IHR are an instrument of international law that is legally-binding under Article 22 of the WHO constitution.

    WHO bureaucrats also agreed among themselves that the appalling Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, and future director-generals, should be given the power to determine public health emergencies, including pandemics, under amendments to Article 12. You will have seen him scaremongering at the UN General Assembly this week in New York in yet another bid to build his empire.

    But the power grab did not stop there. The new changes oblige countries to set up or expand surveillance networks and report back to their global public health lords and masters in Geneva (under amendments to Article 5); create National IHR Authorities (“mini embassies”) to oversee countries’ implementation of the regulations; and establish the Soviet sounding “States Parties Committee” to supervise their implementation between countries.

    None of this should come as a surprise. Indeed, Dr Abdullah Assiri, co-chair of the WHO’s Working Group on Amendments to the IHRs let slip what the WHO wants in a clip of its proceedings where he admitted: “Prioritising actions that may restrict individual liberties, mandating and sharing of information, knowledge and resources and pandemic control efforts are all necessary during a pandemic.”

    If the thought of losing control over your body during a pandemic doesn’t worry you, nor your country losing control over an important area of public health policy, then the enormous cost of expanding the WHO’s empire should.

    The findings of a recent preliminary report from the University of Leeds analysed data from G20 nations, the World Bank, the WHO, and the WHO Secretariat, and estimates that the proposed amendments to the IHR, plus the ongoing work to a new “Pandemic Preparedness Treaty”, could cost taxpayers across the world as much as US$357 billion (£266 billion) over ten years to implement.

    Taxpayers’ hard-earned money
    While Rachel Reeves insists there is no money for pensioners to keep warm this winter, you can guarantee she will find money to help the WHO fund this. Just like international aid, housing illegal immigrants, and funding large public sector pay increases, this Government will raid taxpayers’ hard-earned money to keep this latest globalist project on track.

    The UK already pays a hefty amount to the WHO, contributing £396 million in the last biennium budget cycle, the fourth highest of every country on the planet. But, of course, more money can always be found for the things that globalists care about.

    Much like Maastricht, the people have not been allowed a referendum on these dangerous and expensive proposals. But at least in the 1990s, MPs were allowed to debate and vote on our entry into the EU. Our new Prime Minister, the ultimate dictator of course, has no wish for MPs to discuss these major changes in the House of Commons, but in my view, we absolutely should.

    Only four countries raised any reservations and discussed the possibility of rejecting the IHR amendments at the World Health Assembly, including Argentina, Iran, Russia and Slovakia. No other nation did, and that is frankly shameful.

    With only six months left for national governments to decide if they will opt out of the new IHR amendments, time is running out if we are to save our sovereignty, our individual rights, and our money from the clutches of the WHO.

    I therefore urge my fellow MPs to join me in calling for an urgent debate and vote in the House of Commons so we can block this dangerous, unnecessary, and expensive “pandemic power grab”.

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

    Dave Sutton
    10 hrs ago
    Common sense from Sir Nigel.

    J T Jones
    9 hrs ago
    Well said Mr Farage!
    Reform gets stronger by the day.

    Marie Gerrard
    9 hrs ago
    Elsewhere in the DT- Whitty says we might have exaggerated the risk of Covid- the result being the disaster we see all around us.
    The WHO were pushing for the hysterical response- and we want to give them even more power and money?
    Tedros is an Ethiopian terrorist who is out of control

    Jason Bourne
    10 hrs ago
    Its time this country realised its not a global power any more and to stop spending abroad as if money were no object. Too many issues at home to sort out first.

    graham merritt
    48 min ago
    Reply to Jason Bourne
    We are 26th in the GDP per capita list. Yet we are 4th in funding the WHO. Madness!

    1. Don't let up NF, keep the pressure on. At least you understand what the way the general and tax paying public would like this country to be run.
      It's about time someone took a pop at these labour looneys and started making life as difficult for them as they are making it difficult for us.

    2. Two sorts of people who spends your money,
      1 Yourself who normally exercises some control on how much and how often.
      2 Politicians who always spend as much of your money as they can possibly can as often as they can.

    3. This measure has nothing to do with public health.
      Convid was a trial run, and boy, did it exceed all expectations.
      These organisations find what they want in order to ensure the hot and cold sinecures are still running.
      A child sneezes in the Congo and the whole word is forced to shut down.

  15. Morning all 🙂😊
    Cold wet and windy, one word covers it, horrible.
    It's put back my planned second apple picking today. First batch bubbling away very nicely original gravity of 1.035. And quite sweet this year. Could be strong zyderrr.
    Oh well baking is next on the list I'll have to pop out and buy some more flour, later.
    Assisted dying, that one won't go away will it.
    Is there a list yet, from the top down ?

    2. And there was I thinking Slavery had been abolished! How could I be so wrong?

      Why isn't there an Act of Parliament which simply says 'Anyone promoting or practicing slavery in the UK should, if found guilty, be jailed for life'?

      1. 393578+ up ticks,

        Morning S,
        probably because in the land of common sense & law prisoners are not allowed to vote.

      2. "I stand here although I am actually sitting also as a Black man whose ancestors were taken in chains from Tottenham, at the barrel of a gun to be enslaved, whose ancestors rose up and fought in a great rebellion of the enslaved.."

          2. Both in bed too, at the moment; I’ve got a stonking cold and a racking cough, and feel dreadful.

  18. Streeting’s £20k fundraiser with McKellen hosted at Lord Alli penthouse. 27 September 2024.

    A third Cabinet minister used one of Lord Alli’s homes, it has emerged, leaving Sir Keir Starmer facing growing questions about his closeness to the Labour donor.

    Wes Streeting, the Health Secretary, hosted a fundraising event at Lord Alli’s London home where the guests included Sir Ian McKellen. Mr Streeting declared the value of the event as £4,600, which included the cost of drinks and catering paid for by Lord Alli.

    The MSM are still being a little coy. How close is close?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/09/26/wes-streeting-minister-lord-alli-flat/

    1. Private residences have always been used for fund-raising events, whether it be Mrs. Miggins coffee morning in her bungalow that (with raffle) raises £57.10 for the local association or something rather more highpowered.
      With that, I have no problem.
      It's the individual gifts to carefully selected (useful?) people that is pernicious.

  20. Consider the ethics of assisted dying before rushing into legalisation

    But if it reduces our CO2 it can help save the planet for the greater good.

      1. The cemeteries are getting full; the Peaceful ones insist on burial, and they also jump the queue for that as their customs dictate that burial must be done within a short space of time. How about someone teaching them "when in Rome".

    2. When cremating the obese, should it be taxed more lightly, under Net Zero provisions, because fat people burn more efficiently and therefore use less fuel, or more heavily because they emit more CO2 doing so?

  22. Good morning all,

    Dreich at Castle McPhee, wind North-West, 8℃ with 12℃ forecast. it should stop raining in the early afternoon.

    The headline drew me because I'd be classed as a 'wealthy pensioner', never mind that it could all disappear overnight in a catastrophic market crash.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f76bf6c0a24924dd91b80a10336fc4f02ebd046101cca1a2e2fc4440c043a45d.png
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/pensions/wealthy-pensioners-face-80k-hit-labour-tax-raid/

    It is misleading. It's not 'wealthy pensioners' who would be hit, it's those who would like to be 'wealthy pensioners' sometime in the future. It's the good old socialist technique of levelling down. You make it. they see it, they want it, so they take it because they don't want you rising above your station and having spare income with which you could do something interesting or threatening with. Threatening to them, of course.

    So, a flat rate of income tax relief for pension contributions? What about a flat rate of income tax then? It's the logical extension, entirely fair, and you know it makes sense. It won't happen of course. Double standards again.

    The next things they'll have their eyes on is bringing back the lifetime limit at a low figure and ending the exclusion of private pension pots from our estates so they are subject to IHT which at the moment they are not. That's because, well managed and not over-drawn on, they are a good vehicle for inter-generational wealth creation.

    The other thing, of course, is that this would only apply to PRIVATE pensions. I think many state occupational pensions are non-contributary. I know the Armed Forces pension is/was non-contributary and I suspect the Civil Service pension is too. And, of course, they cannot be handed on to the next generation.

    1. The Armed Forces pension was certainly supposed to be "non contributory" according to the MoD, but many people noticed that the Armed Forces Pay Review Body often mentioned that their recommendations would have been for higher pay rises but they had taken into account the pension arrangements! So in effect admitting that pay was capped to offset the pension. Incidentally most of us also noticed that although the various pay reviews bodies made recommendations, the Government was always careful to stress that those recommendations were only guidelines – curiously the only set of recommendations that I recall being fully implemented every year were those for MP's pay increases!!

      3. Forces pensions are a sore point. I did 16 years and came out without any pension as at the time you had to complete 22 years. They changed this a year after I left – now everyone gets a pension regardless of how long they served. It wasn't backdated either despite the representations of lawyers for those affected.

  23. Good morning all.
    A brighter start and dry after heavy overnight rain. 4½°C on the Yard Thermometer with little wind.

  25. A hero of mine:

    Detachment Leader Thomas Hopper Alderson, GC (15th September 1903 – 28th October 1965), Bridlington rescue and demolition party.

    A pair of semi-detached houses at Bridlington was totally demolished in a recent air raid. One woman was trapped alive. Alderson tunnelled under unsafe wreckage and rescued the trapped person without further injury to her. Some days later, two five-storey buildings were totally demolished and debris penetrated into a cellar in which eleven persons were trapped. Six persons in one cellar, which had completely given way, were buried under debris. Alderson partly effected the entrance to this cellar by tunnelling 13 to 14 feet under the main heap of wreckage and for three and a half hours he worked unceasingly in an exceedingly cramped condition. Although considerably bruised he succeeded in releasing all the trapped persons without further injury to themselves. The wreckage was unsafe and further falls were anticipated; coal gas leaks were of a serious nature and there was danger of flooding from fractured water pipes. Despite these dangers and enemy aircraft overhead the rescue work was continued. On a third occasion, some four-storey buildings were totally demolished. Five persons were trapped in a cellar. Alderson led the rescue work in excavating a tunnel from the pavement through the foundations to the cellar; he also personally tunnelled under the wreckage many feet into the cellar and rescued alive two persons (one of whom subsequently died) from under a massive refrigerator, which was in danger of further collapse as debris was removed. A wall, three stories high, which swayed in the gusty wind, was directly over the position where the rescue party were working. This was likely to collapse at any moment. Alderson worked almost continuously under the wreckage for five hours, during which time further air raid warnings were received and enemy aircraft heard overhead. By his courage and devotion to duty without the slightest regard for his own safety, he set a fine example to the members of his Rescue Party, and their teamwork is worthy of the highest praise.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/41cb2abc441f7a4d8ea2969d3df80946b88769280f9ca8414342502bc5fef62c.jpg

        1. I do hope that, as well as doing a risk assessment to best practice, they asked those buried in the rubble to fill in ethnic questionnaires and to declare their preferred pronouns so that they could be properly prioritised, complying with Equality law and directives from the international legislature. They also need to complete a customer satisfaction survey for quality assurance purposes.

          Only then would someone be authorised to attempt a rescue.

    1. I wrote about another (no name mentioned) labour MP who seemed to be in the same boat as others in Parliament. And today ‘hey presto’.

  28. Migrant Shelter Volunteer: Women and Children Were Brought in For the Cameras

    https://media.breitbart.com/media/2024/09/GettyImages-2149172380-e1727296018624-640×481.jpg
    Former student volunteer at a Europe Migrant Crisis-era refugee centre relates how the reality on the ground was carefully stage managed for the cameras and how the scales fell from her eyes in 2015.

    Caroline Bosbach, a former volunteer at a large Berlin migrant shelter and now a candidate for election in the 2025 Federal votes has told a major German newspaper that she witnessed first-hand manipulation of the media during the 2015 migrant crisis. Describing her own political awakening — after she had previously sworn off a political career, believing it to be antithetical to a happy family life — Bosbach described the shelter where she worked and how it arrived on the day a camera crew arrived.

    She told Die Welt of her time volunteering at a migrant shelter as a student: “In 2015 everything changed, I became political. I worked in the refugee reception centre in Tempelhof [Berlin].

    “There were 5,000 young men there and violence was the order of the day. And then the press came for a tour. And suddenly there were people there who hadn’t been there before, who were being filmed: women, children, families. I thought to myself, that can’t be right.”

    Making the point explicit, the paper spells it out, stating bluntly: “She thinks they were brought there for the pictures to show that it wasn’t just young men who were coming to Germany”. Describing the situation at the time, she asserted there were constant crises in Germany during the 2015 migrant surge, but “the response from large parts of the media and politicians was: everything’s fine. There’s nothing to see here.”

    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2024/09/26/migrant-shelter-volunteer-women-and-children-were-brought-in-for-the-cameras/

    1. I'd always thought it was the women and children and old people that were slaughtered in the kill back at home, and it was the men of fighting age who could get away.

      If I recall, some 70,000 ISIS fighters were spirited away in buses to Turkey and Israel when Mosul fell to the Kurds. I wonder where they ended up?

  29. Today's Tale
    Johnnys Parrot

    Johnny’s parrot had just fallen off its perch and died. It was lying on its back on the bottom of the cage, its legs pointing upwards. Johnny asked his father, “Dad, when birds die, why do their feet always point upwards?"

    "Well. Johnny, they do that so that God can reach down, take them by the claws and pull them up into Heaven."

    Next day when Dad got home from work, Johnny rushed over to him and said, "Gee Dad, we nearly lost Mum today.”

    “What do you mean?” queried his father.

    “Well, I heard these noises upstairs so I rushed up to see what was happening. There was Mum, lying on the bed, with her legs pointing straight up and she was yelling, ‘God, I’m coming.’ If it hadn’t been for the gardener holding her down, we’d have lost her for sure.”

  30. 393578+up ticks,

    I do want to believe that the decent indigenous folk in reply to the political overseers call to arms would demand a war type
    warm up in the shape of a justifiable civil war.

    Lets face it, only the treasonable simple minded would fight for these political capos and endanger their own children & elderly
    instead of fighting to protect them.

    https://x.com/UnityNewsNet/status/1839374881626182117

    https://x.com/UnityNewsNet/status/1839374881626182117

    1. What actions did your splendid Black and Arab slave traders take to abolish slavery once they decided it was morally indefensible?
      None?
      Oh, they still practice slavery, clearly it doesn't count if Blacks or Arabs do it.

      1. Ah but you see, savages are savage because…because…white people. The idiocy that is intersectionality.

        1. I'm getting rather sick of the race-baiters. They are opportunists, holding out their hands for "compensashun" – i.e. free money. They can FO and when they have done that they can FO even further.

    2. Bob does the DH realise that the sweetly named 'barbary pirates' aka Arabs, use to sail around the coasts of Britain and Ireland and capture young children. They were kept in caves near the Alhambra Palace for the use of.
      And fed to the pet lions when the Arabs had finished with them.

    3. Yo Bob

      Either you are right about how the slaves were gathered, or it is back to my theory that the Routemaster bus was invented in the 18 Century, to move the poor souls to the coast

    4. Morning, BoB.
      Remember, the Labour Party conference is over and a thousands of numpties find time hangs heavy on their hands.

    5. "Atlantic Trade Slaves were allowed to to have families.
      Male slaves in the Arab Trade were castrated."

      The wily Islamists foresaw the clamour for reparations from the descendants of slaves in times to come so they took what they deemed to be a sensible precaution and nipped that possibility in the bud!

      1. I believe that chromosome analysis suggests that a large proportion of Afro-Caribbeans are descended from white males ie the slave owners and/or overseers. This obviously doesn’t reflect well on those men but it does mean that the average West Indian has a bigger family connection to the people who directly profited from slavery than the vast majority of ordinary Brits, descended as we are from miners, servants, farm hands and factory workers.
        You can choose your friends but you can’t choose your family as various celebrated diverse Britons have found on ‘Who do you think you are?’.

  32. 393578+ up ticks,

    Morning OLT,

    I remain in the land of the skint unless satisfaction counts,
    Cast ones mind back to when they started reversing up ticks, intentional, maybe, so I continued doing my own, still do.

      1. 393578+ up ticks,

        Well spotted,my excuse, sausage fingers.

        Still the explanation keeps the grey matter active.

  33. It is an alien practice, but who am I to impose my own cultural norms on those beyond any legislator I have democratic control over? I could not even stop the redefinition of marriage here eleven years ago. The Age of Consent varies from place to place. In some cultures, it is set at puberty, and in others it can be as late as 25, the age when the brain stops developing and maturing. It can also depend on the size of the age gap between partners, on parental approval, or whether one party has a duty of care over the other, such as a teacher or similar authority figure.

    From what I could read into the article, and the before and after photographs, in this case, she seems to have taken it philosophically, saying she would have preferred to go to college and get an education, but her new husband is not too bad, and she may even grow to love him.

    I cannot say this is true for others in her position. In India, which operates a dowry system,occasionally a successful bidder and his family are happy with the money, but dispose of the wife.

    What part does love play these days generally?

  34. Morning folks.

    Over on the DT website there's a short piece stating that Europe is facing a shortage of Gas this winter. It mentions several causes e.g Pipeline maintenance. Curiously it doesn't mention the destruction of Nord Stream 2. I wonder why?

  35. This will not come as a surprise…

    The German federal government has “miscalculated” billions in welfare payments, known as citizens’ money, with their initial estimate of €36 billion far short of the €46 billion reportedly needed.
    In documents obtained by Bild newspaper, the German labor ministry assumes an average of 2.9 million people are in need of welfare parents in the documents for the “2025 budget,” dated from August 2024. However, this document indicates that the expenditure on standard rates and accommodation costs is expected to total €45.6 billion, which is a far cry from the €36 billion set in the 2025 citizen’s allowance budget.

  36. Good morning, all. Raining and breezy here, housework is on the cards.

    If there's one, and only one, thing that can be said in Al Gore's favour it is that he's got staying power. His long term skill at predicting disasters that never occur is legendary but still he carries on, unabashed. One has to wonder what fuels his beliefs.

    Now, if Gore predicted that our own 'Climate Guru', one Miliband minor, was going to complete the crashing of both the economy and our industrial base along with plunging the UK into darkness and cold, he might for once come very close to being on the money.

    https://x.com/wdunlap/status/1839324461717487629

    1. Al Gore missed out on power..
      However, his deformed cousin Ed Milipede became Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero of the United Kingdom.

  37. There is something very unappealing about that smug git Sweeting. Let us hope that some frightful skeleton can be found in his closet. Soon.

          1. You're especially cheerful this morning. I've just been out and it;s cold mizzle here too.

            In case you didn't know, Our Phil is making an effort to eat at a list of (sometimes formerly) distinguished establishments before he becomes too decrepit like some people.

          1. Eating out is not good enough anymore and its far too expensive. I diont eat hamburgers our mock Italian food, the fish is never fresh enough etc.

          3. Did I miss something?
            Was it worse than our last visit (several years ago) to the local Harvester?

          4. No. The food is good if you know where to go but the traveling and extra expense is putting me off. Besides being over run by wogs.

          5. I stopped going to the Globe.
            The tickets themselves were reasonable by London standards.
            The hassle and expense were worthwhile as the productions were good and broadly traditional but without becoming museum pieces.
            That has changed, and I have neither the money nor the patience to be presented with "challenging" interpretations.

    3. There may be other skeletons but he's not trying to hide these.

      Wiki:

      Wesley Streeting was born on 21 January 1983 in Stepney.[2][3][4] His parents were teenagers when he was born.[3] He has five brothers, a sister and a stepsister.[3][5] His maternal grandfather was an armed robber who spent time in prison, and his grandmother became embroiled in his crimes and ended up in Holloway jail, where she met Christine Keeler (a key figure in the Profumo affair). According to Streeting, they "stayed in touch, they became friends". His grandmother was released from prison to give birth to his mother at Whittington Hospital.[3]
      *
      *
      Streeting lives in Redbridge, London, with Joe Dancey, a communications and public affairs adviser,[84][85] and in May 2022 they were engaged to be married.[3] In October 2023, Dancey was selected as Labour's prospective parliamentary candidate for Stockton West at the 2024 general election[86] but he did not win the seat and was the only unsuccessful Labour candidate in the whole of the North East of England.[87][88] Streeting, who is a practising Anglican, has said his faith is "about compassion, not walking by on the other side", and that it caused serious problems when it came to his sexuality: "My faith was a really big obstacle to accepting myself … I spent many years choosing not to be gay."[3] He has been engaged to Joe Dancey since 2013.[3]

  38. "Lord" Comical Alli seems to have his fingers in lots and lots of Liebour pies….

    Wonder when his comeuppance will arrive….

  39. The 'ethics' of 'assisted dying' lead straight to murder.

    On Free Speech today we have a must-read by article by Demosthenes on the Perils of Political Islam – a much needed debate the autocrats do not want us to have. Central to this debate is the politicial influence that seems to protect Muslims in the courts, and whether or not moderate Muslims can be brought over to our side. Please read and leave your views in a comment.

    And if you missed it, I recommend Elizabeth Nickson's article, ' Welcome to Absurdistan ' on the MSM's lies and distortions when reporting about immigration.

    (Click on the link in blue for direct transportation to the article, thus saving a few clicks,)

    freespeechbacklash.com

  40. A lawyer married a woman who had previously divorced ten husbands. On their wedding night, she told her new husband, “Please be gentle, I’m still a virgin.” “What?” said the puzzled groom. “How can that be if you’ve been married ten times?” “Well, Husband #1 was a sales representative: he kept telling me how great it was going to be. Husband #2 was in software services: he was never really sure how it was supposed to function, but he said he’d look into it and get back to me. Husband #3 was from field services: he said everything checked out diagnostically but he just couldn’t get the system up. Husband #4 was in telemarketing: even though he knew he had the order, he didn’t know when he would be able to deliver. Husband #5 was an engineer: he understood the basic process but wanted three years to research, implement, and design a new state-of-the-art method. Husband #6 was from finance and administration: he thought he knew how, but he wasn’t sure whether it was his job or not. Husband #7 was in marketing: although he had a nice product, he was never sure how to position it. Husband #8 was a psychologist: all he ever did was talk about it. Husband #9 was a gynecologist: all he did was look at it. Husband #10 was a stamp collector: all he ever did was… God! I miss him! But now that I’ve married you, I’m really excited!” “Good,” said the new husband, “but, why?” “You’re a lawyer. This time I know I’m gonna get screwed!”

      1. Took me at least 30 seconds. I can be slow on the uptake sometimes…well, often actually. And most stamps these days are self-adhesive.

        1. Dialogue in a film I once watched: “I want a husband who knows how to use his wallet; and a lover who knows how to use his tongue.”😋

  41. 393579+ up ticks,

    I do believe the laughter was deemed to be to be deeply hysterical

    Dt,
    Starmer laughs off calling Israeli hostages ‘sausages’ in Labour conference gaffe

    1. At last our beloved leader aspires to greater greatness than that icon of the 1970s, the talking terrier on 'That's Life'.

  43. 393578+ up ticks,

    You and a multitude of patriots gave it your best shot 2018 / 19
    tis very hard to overcome internal treachery as we are finding out, to our cost.

    Gerard Batten
    @gjb2021

    ·
    10h

    Dumb & Fanatically Dumber.

    The man who thinks Marie Antoinette won a Nobel Prize for Science & the man who can’t eat a bacon sandwich without looking mentally retarded (remember that?).

    They are going to dedicate Britain’s foreign policy to fighting a non-existent climate emergency while they can’t defend our borders & Britain crumbles around us.

    May God help us – no one else can.

      1. 393578+up ticks,

        Morning HL,
        in many cases it is the peoples that are at fault
        ( the majority voter)
        The MP the spearhead, the peoples the shaft, and the cause in many ways of decent folk being shafted on a regular basis.

          1. 393578+ up ticks,

            Afternoon HL,
            Precisely, time again,again, over near four decades of family tree, tribal voting, surely tells even the dimmest something is badly wrong.

  45. In the gale – just watching the poor old birds trying to fly north – they are having the hell of a time being blown off course.

    1. Probably heard that there's no longer any ice in the Arctic, so for a change thought they'd fly North instead of South ……

  46. Labour’s bitter war on wealth has already flopped
    Non-dom clampdown will force Reeves to raise other taxes or else increase borrowing
     https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/09/27/labours-bitter-war-on-wealth-has-already-flopped/

    An excellent BTL Comment by a poster who calls himself Prester John

    Society fails where politicians call the productive the privileged.

    If you make my buy to let no longer meaningfully mine because I can’t repossess it, I’ll sell it and not only will rents soar, but the remaining landlords will put tenants through far stricter guarantees, checks and deposits.

    If you make it so I can’t get rid of a new bad employee because they can now play the tribunal game to their advantage from day one, I’ll employ fewer people, or only use temporary contracts, so permanent contracts will collapse, rendering millions of employees unable to gain mortgages.

    If you maintain punitive corporation tax, I’ll relocate to Ireland, saving hundreds of thousands of pounds, which I’ll put in my pocket.

    If you make inheritance tax more punitive, I’ll plan for it better and you’ll get less.

    You can play your “many not the few” and “working people” songs as loud as you like, but sow the wind – reap the whirlwind.

    1. I came up with a solution yesterday here: https://www.freespeechbacklash.com/daily-gossip/thursday-26-september-israel-hezbollah-ceasefire#comment-6558009111

      "It is such a pity that the New Statesman does not allow comments, and the Labour Party's reponse to open debate is to bundled out of the room by a brace of heavies.

      I wrote today about how very toxic is the Laffer Curve (the phenomenon whereby the more one is taxed, the more one is inclined to scarper abroad with the loot), and is the bane of any government ever hoping to balance the books without caning the thrifty and the loyal.

      My solution I proposed yonks ago was ignored by my betters, who simply haven't a clue what to do about the Laffer Curve.

      I would first of all open a National Investment Bank, run by the Government and independent of the Treasury, which would provide funds for investment lending in the national interest on better terms than that currently being offered by the banks and the loan sharks.

      Rather than taxing the super rich, confiscating their sometimes well-earned wealth, I would set up upper allowance for income, say £300,000 per annum. Any income over this free of existing tax would be placed on deposit with the NIB. On paper, it would belong to the depositor, and would attract interest at the bank rate.

      It could be drawn on for a number of things – for investment in a business venture of benefit to the nation, and the criteria would be wide and generous, for donation to charity, for provision to family members that spares the taxpayer expense, such as private education or medical treatment, and can be drawn on proportionately should the depositor's income fall below the threshold. Otherwise, it sits in the NIB where it can do some good for the country, rather than being blown abroad or on ostentation and bling."

      Of course I am being ignored by those who assert over me they know better. They would much rather insist there is nothing that can be done, and we'd better like it and lump it.

      1. Hmmm… so, in summary, take the income out of the control of those that earned it and use it to support the government's often daft investment proposals? I might support that if the second part was to be run by a government that had any clue about business, and invested for reasons other than political ones or to grease their friend's palms with silver. Problem for me is the first part – it reads too much like confiscation to me.
        I admire that you have actually come with something new. Most folk don't, they just subside into a heap of moaning.

        1. Government has a duty to act in the public interest, although all too often it doesn’t. A lot of this is down to the electoral system and the negligence of the electorate to come up with and elect decent rulers, and only a small part down to the King, considering that he has had pretty well all his political powers taken from him.

          The quango Trust (for that is what the NIB would be)would be separate and independent from Government. There should be a lot of local involvement in the decision making, and it should be overseen by a Royal Commission under the authority of the King.

          Taxation could then be levied on those businesses and organisations profiting from investment, but unlike the corporate sector, more emphasis should be placed on the public good, as much as return in the form of money dividends and bonuses. Clearly there must be a mechanism in the courts to address instances where money has been directed corruptly, and it should have teeth, which it currently doesn’t. How many of those rogue financiers from 2008 (including the Post Office board) ended up in prison?

          My grandfather was a branch bank manager in Surrey in the 1930s, and he had considerable authority over whom to lend money to. He was in effect a Captain Mainwaring in real life. He reckoned he could accurately evaluate the character of an applicant and a business plan in ninety seconds of conversation. He possessed the same set of skills as the Dragons in the TV show.

          The authority to make investment decisions was taken away from branch managers when they centralised in the 1960s and lost it entirely with deregulation of the City in 1986. The result was all sorts of sharp practice that made some people a great deal of money and ruined many others.

          My proposal is emphatically not confiscatory, since the money would still belong to the depositor under certain conditions that are in the national interest. It does however slow up the movement of money out of the country to the lowest bidder under the current “Beggar Your Neighbour” system of global finance.

          It is the money equivalent of beavers whose dams slow up the passage of storm water, creating both superb wetland habitats upstream, water conservation and flood prevention downstream in one go.

  48. So many words. so many wrong!
    Wordle 1,196 5/6

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

  49. Good morning ,

    Brrr , cold start to the day, very windy . 9c

    Moh moaning like mad , 1, it is cold , and the prospect of cold golf days ahead . 2, the resident mole has created a wonderful huge molehill by the patio , this was discovered last night when we let Pip out into the garden at 11pm .

    I told him the mole was hungry , Moh is in a foul mood this morning , levelling the ground and he won't scare Mr Mole , it won't be intimidated .

    We have had months on no mole activity , so where do they appear from and how do they breathe underground?

    The front lawn has got smaller mounds , there is no heart in Moh , his temper is evident ..

    I managed to get a doctor' appt yesterday afternoon , antibiotics prescribed , I have a rattle in my right lung and aching ribs .

    Autumn is really here.

    2. It is the rain – as soon as the ground is wet, worms start moving about then moles get active searching for worms.

    1. That reminds me of the man who asked for a simple 'She was Thine' on his wife's headstone.

      When he came to view the grave, the headstone read 'She was Thin' – he remonstrated with the mason – 'you've forgotten the E!' – and received profuse apologies and was told to return a week later when all would be corrected.

      He returned a week later. The headstone read 'Eee, She was Thin'…… I'll get me coat…

        2. "Thine" = a biblical and northern English "yours".

          "Eeee" = a northern "well I never" or "'pon my soul".

  51. 393578+ up ticks,

    May one ask, turning nonsensical rhetoric uttered by chief capo
    into something beneficial to all, by encouraging ALL of the islamic breed to return from whence they came by giving
    PORK SAUSAGES a major daily BOOST.

  52. Israel’s objective
    SIR – The objective of Israel is simple (“Netanyahu says Israel will ‘keep fighting at full force’ in Lebanon”, http://telegraph.co.uk , September 26). Its people just want to live in peace and safety within their borders. Left alone, they have built a beautiful, modern and prosperous country, comprising Jews, Arabs and other peoples. They have indeed made “the desert bloom”.

    The objective of the terrorist groups on its borders is to eradicate Israel and the Jewish people.

    Is Israel obliged to accept atrocities committed against its citizens, rocket attacks forcing the evacuation of its northern lands, and ballistic missiles being fired at its cities? Is Israel not justified in its determination to destroy the terrorists, who wickedly use civilians as human shields in hospitals and homes?

    The Prime Minister urges the Israelis to pull back from military action, but how will this end the attacks upon Israel and its people?

    John Twitchen
    Leigh-on-Sea, Essex

    1. Under the doctrine of "an eye for an eye", the Israelis are dishing out to their ill-defended and barbarian neighbours in spades what they are successfully defending themselves from. Pure projection and an act of chutzpah to claim moral superiority.

      Such a pity – Israel could have been the Switzerland of the Middle East and risen above the brutality of human nature, rather than getting stuck in with a vengeance.

      Is it not reasonable for the enemy to live in homes and their wounded to be treated in hospitals, especially when their barracks are the first to be targeted?

      1. They situate their barracks under hospitals and schools. They set up command centres in residential neighbourhoods.

        1. Of course they would say that to excuse widescale demolition of hospitals, schools and residential neighbourhoods. Even if it were true (and who is to have the forensic to sift the rubble for evidence?), does that give carte blanche to go in heavy-handed into civilian areas in the hope of flushing out the enemy?

          The question always needs to be asked – what if the enemy copied precisely the same methods and presumptions against Israel. So far, Israelis have been protected by Iron Dome and strong military support from the USA and Britain, but if that falters, where does that leave Israelis against a foe determined to do what is necessary to stop Israeli rockets bombarding their civilian areas?

          Netanyahu is relying on Hamas and Hezbollah being the only foes powerful enough to threaten Israel. By wiping out their command structure, Netanyahu reckons this will guarantee peace for Israelis. But what if he is wrong, and there are others waiting to take over where Hamas and Hezbollah left off? Must they all be eliminated, even if this floods Europe with angry and displaced refugees?

          Then there is the question that for as Netanyahu prolongs the war, he is immune from prosecutions that are hanging over him and waiting for when he loses power. He daren’t let up now, so any pretext to carry on with the carnage is welcome. How long will the UN put up with that before that organisation loses its credibility and the whole world descends into catastrophe, at the mercy of those who think they can get away with military aggression?

          I made a comparison with Switzerland. Thinking about it today, perhaps one reason Switzerland was not trashed during WW2 was that a great deal of Nazi loot was stashed in Swiss banks. Surely it is not beyond the wit of Jews to offer secure banking facilities for squabbling Muslim factions?

      2. " Israel could have been the Switzerland of the Middle East"

        Did Switzerland ever have to suffer constant bombardment from Islamists who wished to exterminate their state?

        1. Switzerland was once completely surrounded by hostile and aggressive regimes. At least one of them had an intent to conquer Europe and rule it with a rod of iron, and weren’t too squeamish about exterminating people that did not come up to standard.

          Switzerland also has its fair share of bother from Islamists. I remember a cartoon there that drew minarets as ballistic missiles, warning people about adopting their ways.

    2. There was a superb but harrowing documentary on BBC 2 last night: “Surviving Oct 7th: We will dance again”. If anyone doubts the pure evil of Hamas, they should watch this documentary.

  53. SIR – While it may be true, strictly, that “all parties” are committed to a “low-carbon future” (“Miliband is poised to wreck the UK – Starmer has little time to rein him in”, Comment, September 25), it is also true that one party is committed to a more sensible, pragmatic approach.

    Reform UK, which won more than four million votes at the general election (albeit resulting in only five seats), advocates removal of unrealistic targets and further expansion of our North Sea oil and gas extraction (together with fracking where viable). It also recognises the sheer folly, in both economic and security terms, of carpeting over productive agricultural land with acres of solar panels.

    John Waine
    Nuneaton, Warwickshire

    Yes, they are carpeting over productive agricultural land with acres of solar panels here , yet we are living near a decommissioned experimental nuclear power station , Winfrith , which still has it's licences ..

    There are 4 huge wind turbines , second hand , erected in an old quarry , over four hundred feet .. guess what, they haven't worked / rotated for a year , since their erection .

    I think Mechanical Biological Treatment / RDF would be useful, except Greenpeace and other would slam the idea .

    There are huge areas where landfill is impossible , clay beds etc , so why not have mini MBTs for each town / city .

    1. Those useless wind turbines are giving Millipede an erection though. Nuclear energy is clean and safe but remember when Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace et al were telling us it would result in creatures with two heads? Bring it on. The second head might have a brain in it.

    1. "Speculation as to whether or not Starmer is secretly gay achieves NOTHING."

      Whether he is gay or not, I'd be more than happy to bugger him.

      With a chain saw!

      1. He's in the hedgehog class – he should not be buggered at all.

        Recent research at Harvard
        By Henderson, Hallet and Hall
        Has shown that the poor old hedgehog
        Just cannot be buggered at all.

        But why do those fellows from Harvard
        Take after those fellows from Yale
        Who successfully buggered a hedgehog
        By shaving the spines from his tail.

  58. Britain has one last chance to steer off this potholed road to perma-decline. 27 September 2024.

    I bumped into a former leader of a friendly country the other day. This regular visitor to Britain had just spent a few days outside London for the first time for some years. Their message was simple: “Do you realise how run down your country looks nowadays?”

    What did he expect? It’s a third world cr*phole.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/26/britain-last-chance-steer-off-potholed-road-perma-decline/

        1. My first teaching job was in a small independent school in Bideford. I lived in a rented house in Appledore overlooking the River Torridge.

        1. Rudyard Kipling was at the Imperial Service College in Westward Ho! and his novel Stalky and Co is based upon the school which has moved to Hertfordshire and amalgamated with Haileybury.

          There used to be an excellent second-hand bookshop in Westward Ho! from which I furnished myself with several volumes for mine own library.

          Charles Kingsley wrote a novel called Westward Ho! about an adventurer called Amyas Leigh, a man after (or rather before) my own heart as he sailed to Barbados!

          2. I played the part of Mr Bumble at a school near Romsey when I was doing my teaching practice at Southampton University. I would have loved to have played in a Rodgers and Hammerstein musical but it was not to be.

            Which character in either Oliver or Oklahoma would you have liked to play? Judd, the villain, or the travelling salesman would have been good roles.

        2. Rudyard Kipling was at the Imperial Service College in Westward Ho! and his novel Stalky and Co is based upon the school which has moved to form part of Haileybury.

          There used to be an excellent second-hand bookshop in Westward Ho! whence I found several volumes for mine own library.

    2. Ipswich town centre. Run down, grubby and with dubious types forever lurking. A far cry from the town we used to visit for a nice day out, shopping and having a bite to eat.
      Even a strapping 6ft male friend admitted he felt unsafe in it now.

    3. Had a driving holiday last summer, I immediately knew I was back in the UK when I started driving on UK roads.
      And yes I noticed how run down the country looked and that was only after 2 weeks, how others who are away far longer than that see the state of the country I can only imagine.

      1. It doesn't help where councils try to save money by allowing so called 'rewilding ' in order to spare the planet. Verges and roundabout left scruffy with dead plants and weeds abounding, and of course the ever present and increasing potholes.
        it looks and feels like a true Labour administration

        1. Yes but in fairness this slide into decay has been happening long before TTK became PM.
          These days of course they can truthfully plead poverty, welcoming the third world with all the benefits on offer to them doesn’t come cheap.

          1. I don’t care about fairness towards labour, they show no fairness to the 80% that didn’t
            want them as a government.

          2. I like to show fairness and balance towards both parties, that way I can treat them with equal contempt.

  59. Pressure Mounts on Starmer Amid Electoral Law Issues

    Last night, Guido revealed that Keir Starmer may have breached electoral law not once, but twice, all while enjoying Lord Alli’s swanky £18 million penthouse. Starmer’s nomination papers claim he lived in Holborn and St. Pancras, but we know he was holed up in Alli’s pad over in the Cities of London and Westminster. He claimed he moved so his son could study for his exams —though even those dates don’t add up. If true, this little arrangement wouldn’t be counted in Labour’s general election expenses… unless, of course, Starmer was using it for a bit of campaigning on the side…

    Now others are starting to smell blood. On BBC Question Time, Reform UK’s chairman Zia Yusuf weighed in, saying:

    “There is now news just hitting the wires a few hours ago that potentially the Prime Minister has breached electoral law by misstating where his residence was… he was talking about moving to Lord Alli’s apartment apparently because [of] his son but if you spend time there overnight potentially there is a case to be had.”

    The sheer hypocrisy of Starmer, who berated the Tories for breaching Covid guidance and hammered them on declaring donations improperly is one thing that cannot be ignored. Though if Starmer broke electoral law, the position of the so-called “forensic lawyer” would be shakier than ever. Zia pressed Labour MP Nick Thomas-Symonds last night, asking, “if it is the case that Starmer breached electoral law, would you call on him to resign?” Nick didn’t have an answer…

    1. Reminds me of TTK before the election: one of my few excursions into the Bible.
      "The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess."

          1. Thank you for finding this photo.

            He survived the war owing to the drunkenness of a surgeon who bodged the setting of a broken leg which he had received playing rugby. The operation was so badly performed that his leg had to be re-broken and set again and while he was convalescing away from the front his unit was wiped out. His oldest brother, Geoffrey, was killed aged 19 at the beginning of the war while his older brother, Leonard had a distinguished war and was awarded the M.C . He had three younger brothers, Basil, Hugh and John, who were respectively a surgeon, a Doctor of Music and a G.P. His father had also been a G.P as had his elder sister, Lilian, and his younger sister Decima.

            My father was the sixth child in a family of eleven. He studied Classics at Cambridge and then went into the Sudan Political Service. His great interests were sailing and painting watercolours. I admit that I may be biased but he was a magnificent man!

          3. Yes.

            He had a special racing dinghies designed and built in England and then shipped out to the Sudan so that people stationed in the Sudan could race against each other at the Blue Nile Sailing Club of which both my parents were keen members.

            My father commissioned Laurent Giles to design special 12 Square Metre Sharpie dinghies made of steel. Wooden ones were not practical because the decks would not withstand the sun and became far too hot to sit upon. Steel was chosen because steel is a good conductor of heat so the boats remained at water temperature and so could be sat on comfortably.

            He designed centre boards to be added to some traditional Nile dhow-rigged felucca designs to enable the boats used to transport cargoes up and down the river to sail to windwards. These boats were known as the Tracey Boats and one or two of them were still in service at the time of his death in 1984 we were told.

            My father also developed his love of painting when he was in the Sudan and we have many of his lovely water colours hanging in our house.

            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7618caf11b9ff562b823905cd50ad61bf70b8a85d783d79e176b15a626f84988.jpg

    2. After much deliberation Darren Tierney Director General Propriety and Ethics has concluded that Sir Keir acted within the rules.. (with Sue Gray lurking in background).

      A gentle reminder from David Starkey..
      Sir Keir Starmer & Sue Gray believe human society should be constructed to rules made by people like them. Which are enforced by people like them. And prevent any person that are not like them.. from having a say in anything.

      Carry on as you were.

  60. Britain to ship in water from Norwegian fjords under drought plans

    Southern Water proposes shipping 45 million litres of glacial water daily for six weeks – and customers will foot the bill

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/27/britain-southern-water-supplies-norwegian-fjords-drought/

    Just take it from the M5 and the railways

    Train tracks flooded and motorways blocked as rain batters Britain

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/27/m5-blocked-by-abandoned-cars-as-rain-and-floods-batter-uk/

    2. You really could not make this up. We live on islands, on the East side of the Atlantic Ocean, within the temperate zone, surrounded by water, inundated and saturated from time to time and with much of the soil and substrata spongy in nature. Who are these people?

      2. People who don't want to spend money on infrastructure but do want to pay massive bonuses to foreign investors.

    4. Didn't the EU which we are not members of, State and forbid Britain from building any new reservoirs.
      This is just something else our stupid useless political classes have effed up.

      1. Is there any space for reservoirs, especially where they are most needed – ie, South-East?

        1. Plenty. The land isn't just owned, the water companies have asked for planning permission and it has repeatedly – by the environment agency – been denied under the pointless EU water control regulation that is designed for Spain.

        2. Abberton reservoir has doubled (?) in size.
          A friend had battle royal to get a decent payment for her family home that has disappeared under the water.

        4. Yes, Southern Water is building one in Kent in a small valley.

          They announced that it would take nine years to build.

          Compare that with Kariba dam in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) that took three and an half years to build.

          Evil white men constructing national infrastructure for the benefit of all.

        5. Yes, Southern Water is building one in Kent in a small valley.

          They announced that it would take nine years to build.

          Compare that with Kariba dam in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) that took three and an half years to build.

          Evil white men constructing national infrastructure for the benefit of all.

    5. What's worse is they are using wind turbine generated power to melt glaciers which is then tanked and shipped here.

    1. Having seen the webcam at La Turballe (where we stayed two weeks ago) I am not surprised. Gale and wild sea and rain – and still three hours to high tide….

      1. Yeah… about that…. when the country we've a contract with needs that energy for itself, do you think it'll honour that contract?

        Or if there's a prolonged disruption to power, or an emergency locally: would they still sell us that energy?

        The dependence on interconnects is the height of stupidity. We need abundant, cheap energy now. Unreliables and interconnectors cannot provide that on either case.

        1. Of course they wouldn't, wibbs.

          You may have gathered that I started off as an engineer before going to rack and ruin as an Energy (Oil, Gas, and Electricity) Banker and my subsequent tracking of Rake's Progress has not ceased.

          Thankfully I have never been a lawyer but it seems wise to omit some specifics below because 'Damages are still being Sought' in International Courts.

          You may recall a good few years back when we (UK) had gas supplies under contract from a 'North European Supplier' which were to be routed to us via the extensive Dutch lynch-pin pipeline network in the North Sea with UK interconnectors at multiple points. One winter, a severe cold spell swept in from the Urals or somewhere like that and Northern Europe's gas demand rocketed. The Dutch couldn't meet their domestic demand from their extensive North Sea production (I must be careful here because the cross border meter readings are still disputed) and in the space of a few hours UK gas supply via the interconnectors dropped off the scale. Our 'Northern Supplier' was accused by the Dutch to have curtailed supplies. Wading through lots of data, it's clear to me that 'Northern Supplier' did more than his level best and the bloody Dutch nicked our gas to feed their domestic (voter/taxpayer) market, blatantly violated their contractual obligations and have been lying about it ever since. Theft.

          That tale relates to the mere transmission of energy supplies, not the sourcing. On a good day, I am more inclined to trust the Dutch than the French (which must make me a bigot of some sort) but your point is valid and non-trivial.

  64. No. I live in the interior and I’ll probably be returning this weekend.
    I’ve been here off and on since late June.

  65. Just lit the woodburner – and have started using "proper" logs instead of windfallen deadwood. G & P sulking. Holed up in their baskets in the porch – firmly refuse to come indoors. They hate bad weather and blame us for it!

    2. Our two get anxious when it's windy (outside). Come over for reassuring cuddles, which from a cat the size of a small toddler, seems a bit bizarre.

  66. Some people will never 'get it'….

    Quote of the day

    ‘I was worried at the beginning. I still worry, actually in retrospect, about whether we got the level of concern right.’

    – Chris Whitty tells the Covid Inquiry that he wonders if the government overdid the fear messaging at the start of the pandemic.

    1. He can hardly say, "Well I knew there wasn't any risk at all but I was being paid around £3-4m to scare the pants off the blighters and well, maybe, just maybe we did that a bit too effectively". Even though that is shurley closer to the truth?

      1. Honestly? No idea. My default assumption is that initially there was genuine concern and no idea what to do, so the state reverted to terror. After a while I think they got used to the limelight and quite enjoyed the power it gave them.

        Notable issues: the statistics were not comparable from week to week. Each time the calculations were fiddled. That, after each releaseform lock down they didn't say 'infection rates will rise defacto – what's important to note is the percentage increase from the last lockdown'.

        Hancock, though, Hancock was a toad.

        1. The western world reaction was too orchestrated and similar. It was a wonderful experiment in control and, boy, did it work.

          1. Aye, but requires getting too close to the problem. I'd still go for a longbow party on the shore. Rain down from above, get them while they're still in the boat.

      2. I have a Swiss Army Knife. I could make twenty different holes with just one blow. Every RNLI member should have one.

        1. They are utter blunt rubbish! I have the far superior and much sharper Swiss Navy Knife. More suitable for operations on the briny.

          2. Indeed. I get razor sharp finishes in my lapping (sharpening and honing) station. I have a Robert Sorby professional sharpening belt, a set of six (x2) honing stones, and a Tormec T4 water-cooled grinding/polishing wheel.

  68. Just been offered (courtesy of the NHS) a vaccination against Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV). A disease of which I have never heard. I shall have to decline this generous offer and try and remain in the land of the living for a while longer. .

    1. Give your 'Vaccination Rights' to Chris Whitty and then claim the value as a tax deduction. Win-win! {:^))

      2. My GP says I'm too old to be offered an RSV jab.
        My Community Nurse Prescriber daughter says its a bit too new to try out on very old people and anyway the last thing she wants to do is send them back into hospital.

    3. It's a horrible illness, makes Covid look like a grazed knee.
      Imagine a terrible cough combined with influenza symptoms.
      Like the current 100 day cough, it is an illness well known to Google but generally ignored by the MSM and PTB.
      Knocked me out for weeks. But I would avoid any jab from a health service capable of spending thousands of hours every year asking men and old women if they might be pregnant. (think 111, and diagnostic imaging)

    4. It's a horrible illness, makes Covid look like a grazed knee.
      Imagine a terrible cough combined with influenza symptoms.
      Like the current 100 day cough, it is an illness well known to Google but generally ignored by the MSM and PTB.
      Knocked me out for weeks. But I would avoid any jab from a health service capable of spending thousands of hours every year asking men and old women if they might be pregnant. (think 111, and diagnostic imaging)

  69. Will ‘flatgate’ damage Keir Starmer? 27 September 2024.

    Labour conference has been and gone and still Lord Alli remains in the headlines. The latest claims regarding the multimillionaire peer surround his £18 million penthouse flat in Covent Garden which Keir Starmer used repeatedly during his time as Leader of the Opposition.

    Two periods in particular are being scrutinised by the press. First, the use of Alli’s flat by Starmer during the later stages of Covid. Second, his decision this spring to move his family there to allow his son to revise for his GCSEs. While the criticism of Lord Alli initially centred on claims of wealthy donors and ‘cash for access’, the story has now moved on to whether Starmer has been honest in declaring his use of Alli’s flat.

    It’s his use of "Alli" that intrigues me.

    https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/will-flatgate-damage-keir-starmer/

  70. Will ‘flatgate’ damage Keir Starmer? 27 September 2024.

    Labour conference has been and gone and still Lord Alli remains in the headlines. The latest claims regarding the multimillionaire peer surround his £18 million penthouse flat in Covent Garden which Keir Starmer used repeatedly during his time as Leader of the Opposition.

    Two periods in particular are being scrutinised by the press. First, the use of Alli’s flat by Starmer during the later stages of Covid. Second, his decision this spring to move his family there to allow his son to revise for his GCSEs. While the criticism of Lord Alli initially centred on claims of wealthy donors and ‘cash for access’, the story has now moved on to whether Starmer has been honest in declaring his use of Alli’s flat.

    It’s his use of "Alli" that intrigues me.

    https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/will-flatgate-damage-keir-starmer/

  71. The NI Government is currently running a public consultation on the Orwellian Public Health Bill. The new Bill is seeking to upgrade and strengthen the existing Public Health Act and bring it into alignment with the World Health Organisation’s notorious International Health Regulations. Human Rights Lawyer Michael Brentnall has analysed the 79-page policy document in detail and explains what he found in a highly informative video interview. He describes the proposed NI Public Health Bill as “spine-chilling” and “the most frightening piece of proposed piece of legislation I have ever read”. Mr. Brentnall says that this Bill has “the potential to take us to a dystopian future whereby we are under the jackboot of the state”.

    The Bill would give the authorities unprecedented power in a health emergency, including the ability to mandate vaccines and preventative treatment for individuals, potentially opening the door to forced vaccinations. It also seeks to give authorities the power to:

    detain and quarantine individuals for up to 28 days;
    mandate the wearing of “medical clothing” e.g. face masks;
    force medical examinations and health monitoring;
    forcibly enter premises and confiscate belongings without a warrant;
    require children to be kept off school;
    close businesses and keep adults off work;
    breach medical confidentiality and privacy by allowing wide data sharing of patient medical information with various state bodies;
    require an individual to answer questions regarding their health status;
    require a person to attend “training or advice sessions”;
    legislate as to “where the person may go or with whom the person has contact”.
    A court would simply have to ascertain that a person “may be infected” or “could present” a risk to human health and infection or contamination of others. This is far too weak a position to justify the draconian and extreme restrictions and requirements detailed in the document. Forced medical examination, forced vaccination, removal and detention of a person and the restriction of movement, on the basis of an unproven risk, are gross violations of medical ethics and fundamental human rights.

    The provision to remove a person to a hospital or “other facility” and detain his against his will is sinister and a breach of fundamental individual freedoms and rights. This power was greatly abused in New Zealand and some Australian states during the Covid lockdowns and amounts to internment without trial, based on unproven and unreliable testing procedures such as PCR tests.

    The proposed isolation of individuals was a measure used during Covid and had serious detrimental effects on the mental and physical health of many. The risks to the individual and society far outweigh any purported benefits. Human beings are sociable, needing human company to maintain overall physical and mental health. Isolation benefits no-one, particularly children.

    The legislation extends to premises, people and things, and gives the authorities (in the form of the police and other unspecified enforcement agencies) powers which they have never previously had, including powers to seize people’s property, to enter premises to disinfect or decontaminate, and to “require a person to answer questions”. There is no doubt that these powers will be open to abuse by overzealous officials or poorly trained constables.

    Do we really want to create a society where officials can forcibly enter people’s homes and take them away? If someone invoked her legal right to remain silent, would the officer have the right to use physical violence to force that person to answer a question? Orders could be imposed by magistrates’ courts simply on the belief that a person may be infected or contaminated. This is an extremely vague formulation which is open to abuse and panicky decision-making at times of crisis.

    The proposal to force a person to be vaccinated or to receive other prophylactic treatment, against her will and without her consent, is abhorrent and a direct assault on the principle of bodily autonomy. It violates all the current laws and codes around informed consent and ethical medical treatment. This is a hard red line that should never be crossed by the state. This clear ethical boundary between the state and the individual exists to prevent the state abusing its power to force medical treatment on a sovereign individual. Where there is risk there must be choice.

    It is encouraging that last week the Northern Ireland Health Minister Mike Nesbitt spoke out against mandatory vaccination, saying:

    I am not in favour of mandatory vaccination even in limited and tightly prescribed circumstances. Nevertheless, it is right that we have a public conversation about all potential options in the public consultation, as we decide what should be in the final Bill to protect us all.

    But we must not be complacent. In point 10 of the Annex of the consultation document (page 76) it states that one of the reasons for the consultation is that “Opinion is divided as to whether there should be a power to impose medical treatment on an individual”.

    It is important to remember that medical ethics and laws protecting individual rights exist for emergencies, when decisions are often taken in panic or fear, and when abuse and atrocities are most likely to occur. We cannot allow the desire for safety to override individual autonomy. There appears to have been no consideration of the serious costs and harms resulting from the list of restrictions and requirements – on both the individuals affected and wider society – or any safeguarding of the right of individuals involved to challenge these orders.

    The proposed Bill would give unprecedented and highly authoritarian powers to the state, with minimal and flimsy protections for individuals. The scope of powers proposed constitutes a gross overreach by the state into areas of personal autonomy and responsibility. The state appears to have lost sight of the fact that, in a democracy, its role is to serve the public, not rule over them. This proposed bill is not a response to public demand for more restrictions, but instead is driven by a clear desire by public health authorities to expand their powers and further encroach into decision-making and risk mitigation for the public, which individuals are quite capable of doing themselves. It is an attempt by the authorities to micromanage the life of individuals in a vain attempt to eliminate risk caused by a natural agent such as a virus, infantilising the public in the process.

    The experience of the last four years clearly demonstrates that no amount of state micromanagement of public life had any significant effect on the mortality or morbidity from Covid, but that the abuse of state power in fact caused devastating collateral damage to individual physical and mental health, children’s education, societal cohesion and the economy. The lessons learned from Covid should lead us instead to restrict the powers of the state in an emergency and put a higher protection on individual freedoms and medical ethics in all circumstances, trusting in people to be able to assess their own risk, make their own decisions and take responsibility for themselves and those around them in a humane and balanced way.

    The deadline for the public consultation has just been extended from September 27th to October 14th 2024, due to “significant public interest”. Predictably, the authorities have not made it easy for members of the public to respond, as it involves answering nearly 50 detailed questions relating to complex proposals in the 79-page policy document, which is a time-consuming process.

    In his interview, Michael Brentnall announced that he and his colleagues are instigating a legal challenge to the Public Consultation itself – which is required in law to be both clear and concise, to make it easy for the layperson to engage with. I can attest to the fact that it is neither! I spent about four to five hours last weekend completing the UKMFA submission, objecting to the Bill in the strongest possible terms.

    We have published the UKMFA submission on our campaign page, along with other resources and links, to help the public engage with the consultation. There are also links to helpful template letters prepared by Together and Stop the NI Health Bill group for Northern Ireland residents to send to their MLPs.

    This is a deeply disturbing bill, seeking to expand the powers of the state in ways which would violate fundamental principles of medical ethics – informed consent, bodily autonomy, medical choice – and also infringe many other human rights. These new measures would give the authorities the ability to exercise even more power than they did with Covid – and Northern Ireland could be used as a model for the wider U.K. It is vital that ordinary people make their voices heard before the October 14th deadline.

    Dr. Elizabeth Evans is CEO of the U.K. Medical Freedom Alliance.

    https://dailysceptic.org/2024/09/26/mandatory-vaccination-and-confinement-included-in-draconian-health-bill-for-ni/

    2. The erosion of personal responsibility has been going on for some time. It struck me as I was driving along that it started with double white lines to stop people making the decision to overtake if they felt there was room.

      1. To be fair, there are some people whose decisions would be highly dubious. I think double white lines are probably on the whole justified.

        1. But then, you could say the same (dubious decisions) about so many aspects of daily life. It’s all for our own good, having no personal responsibility or choice.

  72. Have just stumbled across the following in a back edition of MSM as regards Our Shiny New Ruling Elite:

    Health Secretary Wes Streeting joked at an event at the Labour Party conference in Liverpool, “It’s going to get worse before it gets better. Sue Gray is hiding Lord Lucan and shot JFK, and I can’t even tell you what she did to Shergar.” Adding sarcastically, “I don’t know how we’re going to recover from this, frankly.” It has not gone unnoticed that Gray, who accompanied Starmer to the recent North London derby between Tottenham and Arsenal, decided to stay away from Labour’s first Party Conference in government since 2009.

    This was before the world knew about Wes's party with Sir Ian McK et al in M'Lord Alli's Soho penthouse. Wes's world is unravelling a lot faster than even he (jokingly) anticipated just four or five days ago.

    Schadenfreude moi??

          1. Careful Minty…I am no grammarian but I think you need a comma between 'fits' and 'Bill' lest our NoTTLer readership thinks you are making a startling revelation that even MR doesn't know about…

          3. Careful Minty…I am no grammarian but I think you need a comma between 'fits' and 'Bill' lest our NoTTLer readership thinks you are making a startling revelation that even MR doesn't know about…

      2. Just a coincidence or a prescient quotation:

        Anthony Burgess's 1980 novel Earthly Powers uses the word in its opening sentence: "It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announced that the archbishop had come to see me."

  74. The Duck Curve

    Gary looks at how electricity generation from wind and solar in California has impacted on the state's policy of rewarding customers with solar panels with a feed-in tarriff. He shows how of the policy of a country focussing on renewable energy from solar and wind will result in daytime energy becoming worthless through daytime overproduction. This results in the well known electrical energy production curve resembling the shape of a duck. He explains the implication for the.evolution of the duck curve in the UK and the implications for people who think they will make money from the electricity thay can make by installing solar panels:

    https://youtu.be/4loz5EAHVUY?si=k1LDQHeWJQlwkWpW

    1. If the solar were wanted the export price would be higher than it is. It's about 15p at best, usually around 6p.

      It's far better to send wasted solar power to either a water heater or batteries. However, the days when you need energy, because you can't put clothes outside and cooking more often there's far less sunshine so the solar generation (ours, for example) is in the watts, not the hundreds or even kW.

    2. You don't make any money from them now because of the low FiT but those, like me, who've had them 10 years are now making money because the initial outlay has been recovered and I've got another 10 years of contracted FiT

    3. Maybe the answer in California is to build water reservoirs on the tops of mountains. Soak up the excessive daytime electricity pumping water uphill and then power up the hydro turbines on the way down.

  75. The Duck Curve

    Gary looks at how electricity generation from wind and solar in California has impacted on the state's policy of rewarding customers with solar panels with a feed-in tarriff. He shows how of the policy of a country focussing on renewable energy from solar and wind will result in daytime energy becoming worthless through daytime overproduction. This results in the well known electical energy production curve resembling the shape of a duck. He explains the implication for the.evolution of the duck curve in the UK and the implications for people who think they will make money from the electricity thay can make by instslling solar panels:

    https://youtu.be/4loz5EAHVUY?si=k1LDQHeWJQlwkWpW

  76. "Nevertheless, despite all the terrible privations I placed on people, and no matter how many died as a result of these utterly idiotic — and ultimately wrong — governmental orders, I still managed to get a knighthood out of it, so it couldn't have been all that bad."

  77. Warsi quits, Cons too far right apparently. As a coincidence, she was about to be investigated for diversive language. DT

          1. Dave believed yer average Conservative was a racist red neck.
            I never really understood why he joined the Conservative party.
            He's rich and arrogant enough to be a natural Labourite.

          2. Indeed! His backers probably judged (correctly) that Labour voters wouldn#t support him, but Conservatives would be taken in.

    2. In a statement on X, formerly Twitter, Baroness Warsi said: “It is with a heavy arse that I have today had my arse whipped and decided for now to no longer take the Conservative backhanders. Independent

    2. That's sad. This generation seem to be dying younger. For instance Olivia de Havilland lived to 104 (1916-2020), which wasn't that unusual for people of her vintage. My mother lived from 1915 to 2013 and her sister from 1919 to 2020.

      1. Blimey, don't share that with the BBC pension scheme trustees. On a more serious note, life expectancy is (or appears to be, etc etc) a function of genes and life style. Olivia's sister Joan lived to be 96, and their father to 95, their paternal grandfather to 78. Olivia's paternal grandmother was a member of the long-living Molesworth family.

    7. She was a marvellous actress and, given that so many 'actors' seem to think themselves social commentators about things they know nothing she was remarkable for her disinterest and focus.

  81. Nooooo.. don't they realise people are lidderally boiling in their skins in Britain?

    Phoebe Plummer has been sent to prison for two years..

  82. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d4bde7246c46357f2a15071c5297bf150227f1d40fd3237f4e30cdc4f6598f49.jpg Where's Philip?

    I've just roasted and pressure cooked two packs of oxtail (and a couple of onions). After pulling off the meat and most of the connective tissue I have been left with sufficient tender, highly-nutritious and beyond-delicious beef to make at least six beef pasties. I've also got three pints of deeply-flavoured beef stock that I shall freeze into cubes and use whenever I fancy a cup of hot beef broth.

  83. I often wonder if politicians are deliberately thick or just mendacious.

    They all proclaim to want to help the lower earner.
    Then they hike fuel duty, standing charges, council tax and energy taxes.

    Then, being so gracious they rig the labour market to fix the price of workers, forcing redundancies. Not huge numbers, no, but it's the lower paid, the lower skilled who can least protect themselves.

    To counter this, big government then invents working tax credits. A gracious and idiotic way of letting people get some of what they paid in tax, back. Of course, this all washes through companies who make sensible adjustments and then limit pay increases.

    Then of course government borrows money to fund things the poorest don't want or need, creating inflation which, fuelled by high taxes, expensive energy and fuel makes food ever more expensive.

    At the top end the very wealthy simply choose not to pay tax through proper structuring thanks to an appalling tax code. The middle can't do this as they're PAYE but their response to high taxes is to spend less on discretionaries, again destroying low skilled jobs. The very rich don't invest, preventing the creation of opportunity, the government forces tens of millions of dindus on the country who take the really low skilled jobs and the end result is….

    An ever accelerating decline into poverty at every level.

    2. I think by now we already know that politicians are useless ar*s h*les that have nothing better to do than try and look and seek to appear important.
      And try to look busy most of the time, if not all all of it. While other people actually carry out all the important tasks the lay claim to.
      An old friend of mine's daughter use to "work hard" for a Conservative mp and wrote all of his speeches. But he's never told me who it was.
      I wonder how Cur starmer will get on with Donald Trump.

  84. Well, it turned into a lovely day!
    I began by getting a some more mushroom trays filled with sticks then moved on to tidying up a lot of the wood I've already dragged down the hillside and finished off with sorting out a bit of the heavier stuff further up the hill.

    I'm feeling a bit full at the moment. Braised pork steaks with apple and served with potatoes and vegetables.

  85. A pious Par Four?

    Wordle 1,196 4/6
    🟨🟨⬜⬜⬜
    ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
    ⬜🟨🟨⬜🟨
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. Or miraculous three.

      Wordle 1,196 3/6

      🟨⬜🟩⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩⬜🟨
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      It still amazes me when I get this at all.

      2. I was undecided between your 2nd and 3rd row, but eventually went for the latter
        Wordle 1,196 2/6

        🟨⬜🟩⬜⬜
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    3. Steady as she goes. Par again.

      Wordle 1,196 4/6

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

  86. "Fresh attack on Van Gogh’s Sunflowers after Just Stop Oil activists jailed"

    Three more of these loonies throw soup over the same painting that the two sent to prison attacked.

    If only they could be put in the stocks for a week. No "comfort breaks", no duvet at beddybies time. Just a week tied up in the open air – where passers by can have a go with anything they care to throw or pour or daub.

    Much cheaper that 10 months in chokey. And far more satisfying for the long-suffering public.

    If only….

    1. Quite. I'd be willing to pee into a bucket for a day to collect enough to dump on them. It would be both satisfying and wholly justified.

    1. Unemployed Smith was heard asking care worker Sullivan to 'w*** me off' before she was seen arranging several coats over his lap, according to The Sun.

      But three passengers including a teenage girl with her mother spotted 'vigorous hand movements' beneath the coats and reported the couple to flight attendants.

  88. Is that A Allan chap around these days? As a retired health professional she kindly posted an article about Nurse Letby and the Thirlwall Inquiry, or NHS suicide note as I call it.
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/22/lucy-letby-hospital-critical-equipment-infant-death-spike/
    Well, the Telegraph has added a correction at the foot of the article, of the sort that would lead any experienced barrister to make whoopee.
    Here are my draft thoughts: why did the Countess of Chester labour ward and the intensive neonatal unit each have their own blood gas analyser? They cost about £5,000 each, plus disposables, so surely the nurses could share one machine? What's that? You are saying that there is a small risk of infection? So for more than a year staff were walking backwards and forwards between a non-sterile area populated with healthy babies and an intensive care unit where any type of infection could have fatal results? And is it true that pseudomonas can be spread by touch, or even be airborne?
    Was it management policy to endanger neonatal patients to save a few bob?

    Methinks that Lucy Letby might look guilty, but that she was ill-served by her legal team.

  89. Well, that was odd. I was about to write that it has been quite sunny since lunch (though the gale is still blowing) when it suddenly rained – out of a bright blue sky – for five minutes. Now back to t'sun again. Global boiling lives….

  91. Third World Britain. My brother-in-law arrived at Heathrow this morning at 5.15 from the Gulf where he had been working.

    Two and a half hours later – he reached Border Farce. It took the airport/airline that long to arrange a bus – there were no gates available……

    He is far from gruntled….

    1. I fly from Bournemouth and you pretty much walk straight through passport control and security. Arriving a Luqa they seem to arrange it so 4 other planes have landed at the same time and it takes an hour to get through.

    2. Saw something similar in Brussels some years ago.

      Many idle baggage carrousels, just one in use for multiple flights arriving.

    1. Where did the three children suddenly appear from?
      I can't help thinking these people are trying it on.

    2. The British people are being pushed closer and closer to the edge of the landscape that use to be used to emphasis our defences.
      The white cliffs of Dover.

    2. It's not unusual when the attack and even murder shoe is on the reverse foot, as it sometimes is. Only then for the media to continuseriously emphasis the crime.
      But they never seem to go out of their way to over stress it, when certain people are involved in such increasingly vile and disgusting crimes.

  96. Hmm
    A private members bill in the Canadian parliament would make questioning the as yet unproven mass indigenous graves at residential schools a criminal offense.

    Not one of the surface penetrating radar anomalies has been dug up to see what is there, not one unmarked grave has been discovered but we are supposed to just shut up, repent and pay billions of dollars compensation.

    Free speech anyone?

    1. What's with this sudden restriction of any comment, however reasonable, about things it's reasonable to comment on – such as "What's under the ground here?"

    3. It’s all such crap, isn’t it. Like paying reparations to people of African descent to make up for them having a much higher standard of living in America. Likewise the tribal people were Stone Age and lived in abject poverty before the Europeans arrived and gave them stuff like metal tools. As for giving them diseases they hadn’t encountered before, that relies on germ theory being more plausible than it is and besides, we don’t know what they suffered from before. They had no written language and left no records.

  98. That's me for today. A miserable day, despite the "sunshine". Cold and a gale. What is to like?

    Thank God for the woodburner. Even the cats realised that it was better to sleep in front of that than in the porch.

    Have a jolly evening thinking how you'd spend time with Wes Sweating (sic)….

    A demain – with luck.

    1. Me too, Grizzly. I haven't watched any television for years, nor the rest. Other people's opinions are tedious, especially when they receive a fee for dispensing them.

    2. I used to like Question Time with, who was it, Robin Day? – a real pro.

      Now it seems, with its obviously rigged audience, like a Party Political Broadcast for the Socialist Workers Party!

      I do like the fragrant Ms Bruce, however……

    3. Haven't watch QT for at least ten years.
      One of my favourites use to be HIGNFY. That's been ruined by Dopey Wokies.

    4. I am of the view that too many scroungers are arriving, full stop.

      If a million plus white people were pouring into the UK every year claiming benefits, housing, healthcare etc you can bet your last penny that the welcome them all brigades would be up in arms about it.

      So, who are the real racists here.

      1. They must have these special programmes ready made up for such occasions. I did like her but she was formidable. Too many adverts too little program for me.
        Sad but inevitable and well remembered.

  101. Hi all! Back online again after a thunder and lightning storm knocked it out. Long journey this morning to our current home on a floating hotel on the Cuiaba River. Might see a jaguar here if we're lucky.

        2. Mind you cycling into town on the canal tow path earlier I was joined along the way for about 400yards on the opposite bank by a King Fisher….

          2. On the subject of kingfishers From my journal:

            Saturday 23rd June 2018 5:30 am
            The Brewood moorings are set in a cutting shaded by tall trees. However, the sky this morning is clear blue and there is a fine day in prospect. Looking at the water in the canal is like looking at a pane of glass edge on. From this perspective the density of the glass gives it a solid green colour. So too with the water. However, the water is clear in much the same way a window is clear. You can see that quite clearly in the first couple of inches especially when a few dace appear close to the surface. Then literally out of the blue a pair of Kingfishers perform a fly past one about three feet in front of the other and both just two feet above the surface of the water. It is a fantastic dazzling display. Their brilliant turquoise blue and orange plumage flashing brightly against the backdrop of dark green foliage, which itself is reflected in the khaki-green of the canal. By now the rising sun has lit up the treetops on the west bank opposite. Let there be light indeed!

          4. Agreed. I counted 14 single ones along a lengthy stretch of the Thames upstream from Windsor but the Brewood (pronouced locally as Brood) sighting was the only time I've ever seen a pair of Kingfishers…

          6. Gosh, that is brilliant! And so evocative – I’ve only seen one once, it was down in Exeter (my sister lives there) in the Exe estuary – it took my breath away!

          7. Thank you.
            Petroc Trelawny read this passage out on his Breakfast Radio Programme:

            An hour after dawn at 5:20 am on the 20th June 2018, it is easy to forget that when you are dozing in your bunk bed much of the World is wide-awake. Ahead of me there are four boats moored broadside on to the early morning Sun’s rays. The photons lighting up their brass and chrome work. And whilst their crews sleep a dog walker and early morning jogger pass by in opposite directions. The cool summer breeze carries the faint noise of distant traffic, with drivers on their way to or from the world of work. The breeze also creates ripples on the surface of the canal and between them the photons and the whimsical breeze throw up myriad shadows on the white painted cabin ceiling inside the boat. The shadows flicker so fast that it is impossible for my eye to dissect time. For a brief moment in Great Haywood peace reigns supreme. It is a sparkling jewel of an instance in all eternity.

            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9280fc6c734598825d8de8fb712108ba594b1af2d31e6ae8cf92b6b19884ac06.jpg

      2. Got past the council’s “ring of steel” did it, must have sneaked past all their cycle lanes. 🤭

    2. Must be wonderful in amongst it all.
      We have a set of 8 David Shepherd animals, Tiger etc.
      Would you or anyone you know like them? No charge just post and packing.

  103. I have discovered Robbie Cummings’ Canal Boat Diaries on “U & Yesterday” and have been totally mesmerised by it. Absolutely brilliant.

        1. Cheers Stephen, I’ll give it a look – although it was as much to do with their heartwarming relationship (vis a vis Pru’s dementia) as it was the undoubtedly wonderful scenery.

          1. Agreed – I've watched most of their episodes as well as Timothy Spall's adventures in 'Matilda'

        1. Yes I had an F Pace, a superb car with awful electronics. I should have named it Cameron, it had to go!

  106. Yes i think so. And you can watch it on the “U & Yesterday” app! This is exciting as i am on a business trip to India and Indonesia shortly and I will be able (hopefully) to watch them in the evening in the hotel.

  107. I haven't been called that before. But one of the boatbuilders in his facebook post referred to me as "a fearless warrior of the British Waterways" Which is nice….

  109. One for tomorrow. What is all this “secret” stuff about two-tier? I have surmised he is both gay and has a love-child, although that doesn’t make sense!!!

    Edit. Ahhh. It’s under intense discussion on free speech backlash!!!!

  110. Well, chums, it's bedtime for me. So I wish you Good Night, sleep well, and see you all tomorrow morning.

  112. Good evening, all. Have just come back from a very nice harvest supper (melon, tender beef with veg and gravy, followed by apple pie and cream). We sang We plough the fields and scatter and Jerusalem afterwards.

    It is inevitable that assisted dying will suffer from mission creep, like abortion. Any safeguards will be eroded. It's a very dangerous slope to start sliding down, especially as it's Labour making the laws. We've had plenty of experience of Labour's laws to know they don't do due diligence and there are unintended consequences.

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