Friday 8 April: It feels as though the outrages that Ukraine suffers were happening to us

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its comments 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.

603 thoughts on “Friday 8 April: It feels as though the outrages that Ukraine suffers were happening to us”

  2. Morning, all Y’all.
    Sunny. Cats back-combed by a cold wind, they look like fluffballs…

    1. As we crossed the Millennium Bridge yesterday, most people had to hang onto the railings. In the middle, the bridge was moving as if the dampers had never been added.
      Exhilarating but also a smidge scary.

  5. ‘Morning, Peeps.

    From today’s DT, and it’s breathtaking stuff!

    Family barred from hosting Ukrainian refugees because home has bare floorboards

    Checks being rolled out by local authorities come amid growing anger from UK hosts over red tape and delays

    ByCharles Hymas, HOME AFFAIRS EDITOR and Mason Boycott-Owen
    7 April 2022 • 9:

    A British family has been barred from hosting Ukrainian refugees because their home has bare floorboards, as council officials start to check Homes for Ukraine accommodation.

    One householder was ordered to board up an internal glass door even though it had safety glass, while another was told they would be rejected if they failed to put locks on all their windows.

    Council checklists warned against stairs that were “excessively steep”, bannisters with gaps that were more than 100 mm wide, looped cords or chains for blinds, low windowsills, poisonous plants or any damp or mould.

    The checks being rolled out by local authorities come amid anger from British hosts at red tape that has left some out of pocket after paying overseas hotel bills for delayed refugees. Others are still waiting for applications to be granted after three weeks.

    Sue Clifford, who has set up a Facebook group for Homes for Ukraine hosts and taken in a family of three Ukrainian refugees, said: “These people are fleeing tanks and bombs. We are going to keep them safe. We are not putting them at risk.”

    The Government has provided “light touch” guidance on accommodation standards, leaving it largely to councils, which has led to a range of approaches.

    Coventry said it was applying standards adapted from those for foster care placements and had so far rejected two prospective hosts’ homes. A spokesman said: “The very vast majority of properties we have inspected so far are normal family homes with appropriate spare bedrooms for the size of guests due to arrive.”

    A couple in Hull taking in a lone Ukrainian refugee from Sumy said they were told they needed to pay for a service for their two-year-old boiler, while friends taking in a family were told to update their electrics and lighting, costing them £850.

    It followed BBC reports of families being rejected because plug sockets were too low for children or being told to drain their ponds if they were taking in children.

    A woman hosting four refugees in a two-bedroom flat above her hairdressing salon had to spend £450 after two visits by a council inspector judged that her five smoke alarms were not adequate and that she had the “wrong type of plaster” in the shop ceiling.

    The Government has suggested homes need to be safe, in a “clean, reasonable” state, have adequate kitchen and bathroom space, smoke detectors on each floor, a gas safety check within the past year and doors and windows at entry level that lock properly.

    But some councils have gone further. South Derbyshire District Council asked on its form: “Is the property free from hoarding?” Buckinghamshire required that outdoor play equipment should be safe and securely attached and greenhouses should have safety glass.

    On Friday, ministers are expected to reveal that the number of granted applicants under the Homes for Ukraine scheme has passed more than 10,000. It was 9,000 of more than 32,000 applications on Tuesday, but it is thought around only 1,000 refugees have arrived.

    However, there are still families who applied when the scheme officially opened on March 18 who have yet to be approved, even though they have been waiting nearly three weeks.

    The Earl of Shrewsbury, a Tory peer, told the Lords: “What on Earth is going on? Every country in Europe is accepting these displaced people, yet we appear to be placing every barrier in their way. It’s a total disgrace.”

    * * *

    No comments allowed.  However, here’s one: whatever your views are on taking in genuine refugees fleeing a war zone, we clearly have too many local authority staff – employed by us at vast expense – who see this as an opportunity to flex their muscles when there must be so many other problems that should be occupying them.

    1. When you just escaped from having your ass blown off by a shell, I’m sure bare floorboards are at the front of your mind when the choice is to sleep in a ditch or in a warm house.

      1. So ridiculous. We have bare floorboards with rugs on. What on earth is wrong with them?

        1. Look on the bright side – if “they” apply those rules then you surely cannot be expected to house any “refugees” in the future. Luckily our house fails on many of those “faults” – steep stairs, bannister gaps, looped cords and mould!

          1. Allan Towers fails on many points. Thank goodness. Our grandchildren survived, but then they aren’t desperate refugees taking shelter from bombs and shells.
            (The same problem occurs when trying to rehome a rescue dog; when we refused to cover our pond, Chihuahua Rescue lost interest. Guess Spartie’s favourite occupations in the garden! Sitting beside the pond watching the fish and frogs or splashing in the shallows of the smaller pond. There is also an expression for basic swimming – doggy paddle.)

          2. In order to be able to even apply for a rescue dog I had to have 6′ fencing round the garden, despite the fact that I’d had dogs since 1984 and had dog escape proofed it over that time.

    2. OMG – does that mean I’m not allowed any as a result of the newly laid engineered oak floor boards throughout the ground floor?!

      Bless the council officials for making sure no one fleeing war will come to any harm or be a burden on the NHS

    3. It should be a wake up call never to let the authorities into your home if you can help it. But some people will never learn!

  7. US ‘profoundly disappointed’ as UAE welcomes Syrian dictator Assad. 8 April 2022.

    US State Department spokesman Ned Price said Assad’s surprise trip on Friday had “profoundly disappointed” the US and urged allies to avoid normalising ties with a regime accused of “horrific atrocities”.

    “We are profoundly disappointed and troubled by this apparent attempt to legitimise Bashar al-Assad,” who “remains responsible and accountable for the death and suffering of countless Syrians,” Mr Price said.

    He added that “we do not support efforts to rehabilitate Assad, and we do not support others normalising relations.

    “We have been clear about this with our partners… (and) we urge states considering engagement with the Assad regime to weigh carefully the horrific atrocities visited by the regime.”

    I’m “profoundly” pleased about this. Assad is not; being elected; a “dictator” but one of the better rulers in the Middle East and the “Horrific Atrocities” were generated by the West’s clandestine program to overthrow him. In many ways Syria was the worst (at least so far) of these Regime Change operations; the loss of life alone exceeding the Iraqi and Libyan campaigns; though some elements are common to all. Sanctions, Personal vilification, massive negative propaganda, accusations of atrocities and War Crimes, undermining the financial system and of course the UK speciality; False Flag chemical attacks.

    Syria in large part explains my own attitudes today. When it began I simply followed the MSM narrative until anomalies began to surface and I realised that what I was reading simply could not be true or explained by error. I did, rather naively, write in on the old Telegraph threads to point this out and remember being taken aback at the response; my first experience of government trolls. Since then, as they say, it has been downhill all the way. Lol!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/03/19/us-deeply-disappointed-uae-welcomes-syrian-dictator-assad/

    1. Under Assad all religions were protected. Has the US not heard of the white helmets?

    2. This is clear to the other ME governments, and is, IMO, the reason why they are not poodling to the West, but instead taking a much more neutral stance, even veering towards Russia.

  8. SIR – Con Coughlin (Comment, April 7) is right to call for Britain’s planned defence cuts to be reversed. It is indeed extraordinary to hear government ministers misreading events in Ukraine to justify cutting Army manpower by 10,000 and reducing its war-fighting division to a shell. The Russian invasion represents a failure of Nato deterrence. It should be a wake-up call for the defence establishment, not a comfort blanket.

    Besides the essential utility of armour, which will become more apparent as Ukraine pivots to the offensive, contrary to the assertions of many in defence, Ukraine is showing that numbers do indeed count. Only infantry can seize and hold ground – and as you take territory, you quickly run out of them.

    This shortage of numbers alongside a failure to concentrate combat power have forced Vladimir Putin to reduce his ambitions in Ukraine and to seek 40,000 additional soldiers from Syria and mercenaries from wherever he can find them.

    Germany is increasing its defence spending this year alone by €100  billion; Poland will double its spending, and France, the Netherlands and even Sweden have pledged substantial rises. Britain, by contrast, will cut the Army’s deployable manpower by 11 per cent.

    It is simply not credible for ministers to conclude that, uniquely among its Nato allies, Britain has nothing to learn from the invasion of Ukraine, and that it has no implications for Britain’s defence planning and defence spending.

    Gen Lord Richards of Herstmonceux
    Chief of the Defence Staff 2010-13
    Lt Gen Sir James Bucknall (retd)
    Commander Nato Allied Rapid Reaction Corps 2011-13
    Blandford Forum, Dorset

    Like all other pleas not to reduce our service numbers, I reckon this is just another to fall on deaf ears.

    A BTL comment:

    Paul Isherwood
    6 HRS AGO
    Gen Lord Richards of Herstmonceux……. Worries about the defence of our nation.
    Do not worry Sir, we are an island with the English Channel to deter boarders……… what could possibly go wrong?

  9. SIR – Offshore wind generation is an excellent means of producing green energy. Increasing reliance upon this form of generation, however, poses a significant national security risk.

    The turbines are unprotected and an attack on them by an enemy could deprive the country of a large proportion of its energy needs. It could bring industry and transport to a virtual standstill and deprive us of the ability to defend ourselves.

    It is no good having the mentality of 1937-38, when the Armed Forces were being run down and it was believed that, after the 1914-18 war, another similar conflict was inconceivable. We need to look to the lessons of the past and plan accordingly.

    E W Parkman
    Eastbourne, East Sussex

    I would be more worried about the vulnerability of all undersea cables, the cutting of which really would leave us up a certain creek, sans paddle…

    1. Same could be said for power stations though. Also, the enemy is just as likely to work over the internet to disable software these days.

    3. True, except when he says offshore wind is an excellent means of producing energy. It isn’t. It is also not remotely green in any sense.

  10. SIR – There are those of us fortunate enough to live in the Great British landscape, and those who have to make the effort to visit it, but in the argument for and against onshore wind farms, it belongs to everyone. The Government has a duty, now more than ever, to minimise its destruction.

    I would hate the idea of it being ruined by turbines just as surely as if I still lived in Kingston upon Thames.

    Steve Haynes
    Sidmouth, Devon

    At this rate It seems unlikely that there will be any land left for turbines when the whole country has been covered in housing!

    1. Perhaps they should consider building real windmills; then there would be an intermittent power source AND housing.

      1. Sorry, Feargal, your point has been lost.

        I don’t want to refresh just now, as I’m currently so far down the comments.

  11. SIR – Allison Pearson (Features, April 6) wonders whether her daily contribution to the lavatory could be “harnessed to the central heating”. Not easily, is the short answer.

    However, all UK waste-water treatment companies recover methane gas from sewage sludge via anaerobic digestion, which is then used for on-site power generation, or cleaned and injected into the local natural gas distribution system.

    When used for power generation, the individual contribution yields about 80 watt-hours per person per day. When all contributions are counted, this is sufficient to make a very substantial contribution to the energy consumption of the waste-water companies.

    At Thames Water, where I worked as a chartered engineer before retirement, generation from sewage provides about 30 per cent of all electricity consumed by the company.

    David Linsell
    Lymington, Hampshire

    Enjoy your breakfast!

  12. SIR – I think the Chancellor is beginning to realise, if he hadn’t already, that politics is a particularly unpleasant occupation.

    Simon Morpuss
    Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire

    And conducted by some particularly unpleasant people, too.

      1. From comments read elsewhere; as far as I understand it, she pays taxes owed to the Indian Government on her Indian businesses, and pays her taxes to the UK Exchequer on her UK businesses.

        India does not indulge dual nationalities – much like the recent hoo-haa over an Iranian churnalist – thus she cannot do otherwise.

        1. but she is a Nom Dom. no tax paid. Who are they, where did they come from. They are unknown.

          1. The current Non Dom tax status was a creation of Blair/Brown, perhaps they had to change tack after Mandleslime’s involvement with the Hinduja brothers passport shenanigans. Regardless, as the law stands she has done nothing wrong.

          2. I would say they have not broken the law but have done wrong. Bad form you know for people in their position..

    2. The bloke’s a damned fool. He knew his wife was non-dom, he knew it would get out. It’s the hypocrisy that gets me – stay away from my wife! He cries. Well, no. SHe’s a public demonstration of why your policies don’t work. Money isn’t coming in to the country, it’s moved offshore. Clearly, big state high tax policies don’t work.

      This isn’t a personal attack, Sunak. It’s pointing out the obvious. You’re driving money away and punishing the productive worker with an offensive tax burden for absolutely no return.

  13. SIR – Can anyone tell me which government departments are today working efficiently?

    Gerald Penney
    Teignmouth, Devon

    I think we all know the answer to that one, Mr Penney: a big fat zero!

      1. OS is an amazing place which is terribly efficient. They’re a great bunch of people. Some of their HR work is bogged down, but that’s worked around by sensible managers. They do spend a bit too long talking about morale and ethos which contrasts with the people there thinking ‘I could be working now.’

        1. Knew a couple of OS lads when I was a volunteer on the Mid-Hants Railway.

  14. It’s cruel to deny trans children the chance to think again. 88 April 2022.

    Imagine your 13-year-old daughter is depressed and withdrawn and then, one day, she tells you she’s trans and will, henceforth, be known as Sean. You must no longer call her by her “dead name”. Even the most liberal parent may swallow hard and ask her (them) to have counselling with an experienced psychologist who can explore those feelings before the teenager embarks on drastic hormone treatment.

    A quick clip round the ear would have been the response a few years ago. That there is even such a term as “trans children” tells you all you need to know about how lost is the present in its neurotic navel gazing.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2022/04/07/cruel-deny-trans-children-chance-think/

          1. Oops…mixed my childhood heroes up! (But is she/he/it still a girl? This is after all light years on from Enid’s wonderful stories, much could have happened in that time…)

            ‘Morning, N.

    2. I’d probably say alright. Up to you. When they grow out of it 2 weeks later you forget it happened. Finding an identity is part of growing up. In a healthy family you explore who and what you are with a degree of support and challenge building a whole person.

      The trans bunch are simply lacking in that growing up bit and are still children, unsure of what they are.

  15. SIR – How is extra money for the NHS going to reduce waiting lists for surgery? The implication is that there is spare capacity in a system that was already failing to keep up with demand before the pandemic.

    Experience has shown that such funds are wasted on management consultants and bureaucrats. There is no pool of idle surgical and specialised nursing staff, especially in London, where American institutions have been building new private hospitals, which are poaching the very people needed by the NHS.

    Furthermore, the training of “junior” surgeons has been halted by the events of the past two years, and they are still being hamstrung by the nonsense of shift patterns dictated to us by Brussels, which should have been one of the first things to go after Brexit. The workforce of the future is woefully underprepared.

    I’m afraid that very many people waiting for their hip and knee replacements and their cataract surgery are doing so in vain.

    David Nunn FRCS
    West Malling, Kent

    Quite so. It needs shouting from the rooftops: ‘Until the the NHS is reformed any increase in funding is wasted’.

    1. The NHS is like the BBC a left wing organisation involved in all sorts of things it should not be in.

        1. …rather like the Snivel Serpents, so many of whom seem to think that working from home (and providing a rotten service in the process) is their ‘right’. The government seems quite incapable of shaking them up.

          ‘Morning, JN.

          2. Re the ‘rotten service’, I’m sure someone on here yesterday commented on the fact that HMRC Snivel Serpents ‘working from home’ had their targets cut by half. It would explain the more obvious delays at DVLA if they were similarly working to a more ‘relaxed’ timetable.

    2. A critical BTL post…hardly surprising!

      Dominic Savage
      5 HRS AGO
      NHS capacity
      David Nunn certainly knows more than me about NHS staffing.
      However when I speak to friends who are clinical staff in the NHS about how they manage to maintain staffing levels when people leave/are unwell etc the answer is always they recruit locums- nurses or doctors.
      I know some doctors, eager or needing a little extra money to do locum shifts outside of their scheduled shifts. The fees earned are jaw dropping.
      If employment agencies engaged by a desperate NHS can find staff for both immediate and planned placement, would I be wrong in thinking (yes if you asked anyone in the industry without explaining) there’s sufficient capacity in the country, just not in the NHS.
      As an aside, I was amused a while back when a trust chief replied to Nick Ferrari on LBC what would happen to front line staff who refused to be vaccinated? “We’ll redeploy them in other areas”. The intimation that the NHS is so vast and poorly managed that if someone doesn’t want to do their job, there are plenty of other roles in the organisation they can do instead.
      The health deity is running out of road fast. The cracks are showing. The spotlight will be turned on soon and the scale of the waste and mismanagement will end it in its current form. Should have happened decades ago.

    3. As I’ve said more than a few times recently, the NHS should not receive a single penny unless it has put forward detailed spending plans specifying:-
      1: What the money is intended for
      2: A detailed audit trail specifying who will be responsible for spending the money
      3: A timeline giving fixed times for each stage of the project
      4: A plan detailing how the NHS will, by cutting unnecessary bureaucracy and management, especially cutting “Diversity Managers,” they will meet at least 25% of the cost from their own funds.

        1. I rather like the idea of snivel serpents being meat. Not that I could eat a whole one.

      2. You’d need a management consultant to draw up those plans and a bureaucrat to implement them, Bob.

        1. They have enough of them in house so all they have to do is delay their departure!

      3. And failure standards, with responsibility attached.

        The plan should also specificy how it will directly affect patient care.

        In fact, because any such plan is nonsense and pointless, just pay them after they do the work. The NHS won’t understand this, but when there’s no money coming in it’ll light a fire under them. We have NHS numbers. The funding needn’t change, just the timing. The hospital sees the patient, arranges the operation, then gets paid.

        We would all love to be paid whether we achieved anything or not. The NHS has taken this to an art form.

    2. Dear life. They’re mentally ill people. That’s a man. It’s a man pretending to be something he’s not. We must stop indulging such people and expect them to seek help.

        1. Why, why, why do these men, who want to dress as women, have so much influence? They are NOT women. I bet that the vast majority of the population doesn’t give a flying fig about men dressed as women – just get on with it – but that does not make them women. And they should in no way be allowed into female only areas.

          They are a tiny tiny majority

        2. Can’t even use English “Relying” – yes, again and again – when he meant “Relaying”.

        3. Can’t even use English “Relying” – yes, again and again – when he meant “Relaying”.

  19. SIR – Rhiannon Davies, who had alerted the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to avoidable deaths at Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital Trust, said the CQC “never scratched beneath the surface” (report, April 6).

    Normally, CQC inspectors have checklists, which are known to the unit being inspected. The game for the unit is to respond to the lists by putting all the appropriate points in place prior to the inspection to satisfy the inspectors and achieve a good rating. Unsurprisingly, this usually happens and at the end everyone is very pleased.

    In large conglomerate units such as hospitals, inspections can take a few days. Consequently, there isn’t much time for the inspectors to go off piste and deal with the peculiarities of individual units. If the metrics listed in the checklists are not relevant to existing problems, they may well be missed.

    You have to ask if the system is reassuring, and if it is worth £227  million per year.

    Dr Gerard Doyle
    Chester

    The CQC was founded in 2008, so there has been plenty of time to uncover scandals such as this one. There is something very seriously wrong when it can miss most of no less than 19 years of scandalous neglect. If ever a public enquiry was necessary, this must be it.

  21. Good Moaning.
    Old Mother Allan predicted this right from day one. Anyone who has had dealings with clipboard jockeys knew this would be an absolute bonanza of negativity and nit picking. They have to justify their useless existence and inflated salaries and pensions somehow.

    Oh, and as a bonus, a video praising Bozza for stating something that wouldn’t have been an issue even a short twelve months ago.

    https://youtu.be/3_7bAaO0HHs

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/04/07/family-barred-hosting-ukrainian-refugees-home-has-bare-floorboards/

    Family barred from hosting Ukrainian refugees because home has bare floorboards

    Checks being rolled out by local authorities come amid growing anger from UK hosts over red tape and delays

    7 April 2022 • 9:00pm

    A British family has been barred from hosting Ukrainian refugees because their home has bare floorboards, as council officials start to check Homes for Ukraine accommodation.

    One householder was ordered to board up an internal glass door even though it had safety glass, while another was told they would be rejected if they failed to put locks on all their windows.

    Council checklists warned against stairs that were “excessively steep”, bannisters with gaps that were more than 100 mm wide, looped cords or chains for blinds, low windowsills, poisonous plants or any damp or mould.

    The checks being rolled out by local authorities come amid anger from British hosts at red tape that has left some out of pocket after paying overseas hotel bills for delayed refugees. Others are still waiting for applications to be granted after three weeks.

    Sue Clifford, who has set up a Facebook group for Homes for Ukraine hosts and taken in a family of three Ukrainian refugees, said: “These people are fleeing tanks and bombs. We are going to keep them safe. We are not putting them at risk.”

    The Government has provided “light touch” guidance on accommodation standards, leaving it largely to councils, which has led to a range of approaches.

    Coventry said it was applying standards adapted from those for foster care placements and had so far rejected two prospective hosts’ homes. A spokesman said: “The very vast majority of properties we have inspected so far are normal family homes with appropriate spare bedrooms for the size of guests due to arrive.”

    A couple in Hull taking in a lone Ukrainian refugee from Sumy said they were told they needed to pay for a service for their two-year-old boiler, while friends taking in a family were told to update their electrics and lighting, costing them £850.

    It followed BBC reports of families being rejected because plug sockets were too low for children or being told to drain their ponds if they were taking in children.

    A woman hosting four refugees in a two-bedroom flat above her hairdressing salon had to spend £450 after two visits by a council inspector judged that her five smoke alarms were not adequate and that she had the “wrong type of plaster” in the shop ceiling.

    The Government has suggested homes need to be safe, in a “clean, reasonable” state, have adequate kitchen and bathroom space, smoke detectors on each floor, a gas safety check within the past year and doors and windows at entry level that lock properly.

    But some councils have gone further. South Derbyshire District Council asked on its form: “Is the property free from hoarding?” Buckinghamshire required that outdoor play equipment should be safe and securely attached and greenhouses should have safety glass.

    On Friday, ministers are expected to reveal that the number of granted applicants under the Homes for Ukraine scheme has passed more than 10,000. It was 9,000 of more than 32,000 applications on Tuesday, but it is thought around only 1,000 refugees have arrived.

    However, there are still families who applied when the scheme officially opened on March 18 who have yet to be approved, even though they have been waiting nearly three weeks.

    The Earl of Shrewsbury, a Tory peer, told the Lords: “What on Earth is going on? Every country in Europe is accepting these displaced people, yet we appear to be placing every barrier in their way. It’s a total disgrace.”

    2. During my working life, like very many others, encountered considerable numbers of useless people in positions of power. Because they had
      no idea what they were doing, any specifications they issued were invariably ludicrously ‘over the top’, causing much inconvenience and expense and intended only to protect them from any consequence should anything go wrong.

      1. Don’t let the bu88ers get a toehold in your home.
        They are more difficult to eliminate than rising damp and rat infestations combined.

      2. Morning VOM. It is difficult, in fact impossible, to overstate the sheer dumbness of the managerial or ruling classes in the UK!

        1. Personally until Moldova is complaining about not being able to take any more, we certainly shouldn’t take any.

    3. A couple of comments on the video:-

      sapper82
      1 second ago
      Am I the only person who, whenever they watch Mercy Muroki speak, is struck by how intelligent, articulate and more than slightly attractive she is? She is an absolute delight to watch and listen to.

      GBNews
      19 hours ago
      Do you share Mercy’s sentiment towards Boris Johnson?

      sapper82
      1 second ago
      Of course.
      A Cock in a Frock is not a woman.
      And that goes in spades for that senior diversity manager in the NHS who wants to see man treated in women’s wards.

    4. Local councils are pettifogging morons desperate to ‘do’ something to prove they have use. They don’t. Such imbecility is absurd.

      1. The trouble is that the people who make these sorts of decisions are the sort of small-minded officious people who, dressed in a little brief authority revel in their ability to frustrate and thwart others.

    6. I’m glad someone is trying to stop them getting in. This country is full up.

      1. If we sent more criminals back to their home countries once they’ve served their sentences, then we’d have more room

        to welcome white, educated Christians.

    7. I’m glad someone is trying to stop them getting in. This country is full up.

    8. I think I’ll expose my bare floor boards then so I’ll be safe from occupation!

  22. An amusing BTL – if that’s the right word:

    Rusty Nail
    1 HR AGO
    One does wonder who would come to Britain’s aid if it found itself under attack by Russia via long range missiles, warships, submarines and aircraft?
    Obviously being a member of NATO one would expect support from fellow NATO countries. However, I rather suspect the EU would be very begrudging to get involved, especially the usual two suspects. And no doubt Ursula von der Leyen would probably wave her finger in a “This is what happens when you leave the EU” kind of way.
    Obviously Biden wouldn’t have a clue where the UK was, never mind come to its aid.
    The SNP would fret about the gender of any Russian troops ready to invade Scotland, and Sturgeon would insist the invasion only happened primarily because there was no IndyRef2.
    3 months after the invasion our national security services will suddenly realise Britain is under attack, and will blame the delay on a “error of judgement”
    Boris would call in SAGE again, and insist we all stay indoors, wear masks, wash our hands and refrain from having any garden or karaoke parties while missiles rain overhead.
    Carrie would insist on new wallpaper for No 10.
    The Establishment would insist on a return of conscription, but only if you’re white, working class or lower, and identify as a man. (Although our diverse/inclusive armed forces might have something to say about that!)
    The BBC and the Guardian will blame Brexit, white privilege, fossil fuels and meat eaters.
    Some local councils would be quite happy to see some old buildings destroyed by Russian missiles, as it would wash away even more of Britain’s “unacceptable” history.
    Some other councils, notably in Cornwall, would insist that children should continue avoiding eating daffodils, even if they find an UXB in the same field.
    And you still wouldn’t be able to see a GP!

    1. I think that would need efficiency defined. For example, achieving higher output year on year for the same input. Not running over a budget – and having the penalty clauses applied.

      For the DVLA it could be to clear the 5000 waiting licences within 20 days. Frankly, if we recuded all government manning by 20% no one would notice any negative change. It is inefficient workflows and processes – resisted under daft ideology – that they cling to to remain expensive and ivory tower.

      1. Having just watched the boxed sets of ‘Yes Minister’ and ‘Yes Prime Minister’ I have concluded that a) they are documentaries and b) are used as training aids for todays inept clowns that pass for MPs and Civil Servants

    2. Good morning, Grizzly

      I apologise to Gerald Penney but I am afraid I cannot give an accurate answer to his question though I suspect that the answer is “None.”

    3. Politicians don’t matter. It’s the remains of the Civil ‘Service’ that control things and determine national and local policies .

    4. Politicians don’t matter. It’s the remains of the Civil ‘Service’ that control things and determine national and local policies .

    5. Politicians don’t matter. It’s the remains of the Civil ‘Service’ that control things and determine national and local policies .

  25. Ukraine tells Nato: Donbas battle will be like second world war. 8 April 2022.

    Kyiv has called for more heavy weaponry from its western allies and “ruinous” sanctions against Moscow, saying the scale of any impending Russian assault on eastern Ukraine would remind Nato members of the second world war.

    Yes it will. This time there will be no pussyfooting about keeping casualties down or Russia/Ukrainian brotherhood. In fact the very opposite. Vlad needs a convincing and bloody victory over Ukraine to explain the losses so far. The problem is that an impending defeat would probably worsen the situation.

    We are nearing “crunch time” where the future of the world or its end is on the agenda!

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/07/ukraine-calls-for-weapons-weapons-weapons-from-western-allies

    1. I hope we are selling the weapons rather than giving them away – by all accounts Ukraine is awash with dodgy cash?

      1. The Press claims that we’ve been giving the Ukrainians Javelin missiles.

        Javelin missiles that were bought from the USA at £156,000 each.

  26. Reply to blackbox2 from yesterday:

    Thank you. I would buy lard … if it were for sale over here. It isn’t!

    Tomorrow, I shall roast a duck (for a Chinese meal, the carved breast will be served with a home-made plum sauce) and I shall save the wonderful fat for roasting potatoes at a later date.

      2. You need to get into the mind of yer average Swede, when it comes to food, to understand that. I’ve been trying for more than a decade and I’m still stumped!

        Only last week I gave a pork-loving Swede one of my precious pork pies and he was nonplussed by it. He didn’t enjoy it. Yet he will eat all manner of heavily-smoked fish (including eel) and wild pig.

  27. Reply to blackbox2 from yesterday:

    Thank you. I would buy lard … if it were for sale over here. It isn’t!

    Tomorrow, I shall roast a duck (for a Chinese meal, the carved breast will be served with a home-made plum sauce) and I shall save the wonderful fat for roasting potatoes at a later date.

  28. Today’s DT Leader…OUR fixation? I think not:

    COMMENT
    Our fixation with net zero carries great risk

    Over-regulation has made it far more difficult for the energy market to adapt to rapidly changing circumstances

    TELEGRAPH VIEW
    7 April 2022 • 10:00pm

    The principle behind the Government’s new energy strategy is a good one. Successive administrations have failed to take resilience and security of supply seriously, leaving the UK overly reliant on international markets and foreign expertise. The invasion of Ukraine has again highlighted the foolishness of countries being too dependent for their energy requirements on hostile states. While Britain is much less exposed to Russian oil and gas than the likes of Germany, that has not saved businesses or consumers from unsustainable price rises.

    The strategy, therefore, anticipates a big increase in nuclear power to reduce reliance on oil and gas, with the hope that by 2050 up to 25 per cent of the UK’s electricity needs could be catered for from that source. There will be an expansion of wind and solar generation, too, although in the case of wind it will be focused on offshore generation. More ambitious targets have also been set for alternative fuels such as hydrogen.

    But these are all medium to long-term ideas that will do next to nothing to help households with the immediate problem of surging energy bills. They also themselves carry great risks, not least that the proposed new nuclear capacity may prove extremely expensive within the timeframe set out. Ministers will admittedly launch a new licensing round for North Sea oil and gas. But there is concern that the Government’s fixation on net zero and its tendency to appease environmental activists has prevented it from taking more radical measures in the short term, including lifting the moratorium on fracking now.

    In recent years, the energy industry has been wrapped in red tape, a maze of environmental obligations and green levies. Governments have also developed a habit of attempting to pick winners and have not necessarily been honest with the public about the actual cost of some renewable energy sources, which have enjoyed generous subsidies. Over-regulation has also made it more difficult for the market to adapt to meet changing demand.

    It is all very well setting ambitious targets and goals, but much greater thought is needed on how they can be achieved without further loading consumers and businesses with extra cost. A lot of faith is also being placed in new technologies that promise no damage to living standards while shifting us away from fossil fuels. Let us hope that those technologies can actually deliver the goods.

    * * *

    Next subject, the bleedin’ obvious…

    Mentioning Net Zero to the BTLers is like a red rag to a bull:

    Joe Greaves
    2 HRS AGO
    I’m only a retired plumber, so no expert. But I’ve made a detailed analysis of ‘Net Zero’ and have come to the conclusion that, in simple plumber’s terms, it’s a load of woke, virtue signalling bo ll ocks.

    AR

    Andy RoadKing
    34 MIN AGO
    The Ecoloons think they can make the weather do what they want by covering out beautiful country with windmills that don’t work when the wind doesn’t blow (which is often) and solar panels which don’t work when its cloudy or dark (which is 80% of the time) and shipping 25 million trees from Canada and North America to burn in the Drax Power Station which is actually built on a massive store of old trees called coal.
    ‘Those whom the Gods wish to destroy they first make mad’ and this country and much of the West have gone stark raving bonkers.

    Peter Dennison
    4 HRS AGO
    The simple fact of the matter is that the country is facing a self-inflicted cost of living and energy crisis. It is time for the green lobby to be put back in their corner, allow the grown ups to deal with this existential crisis and restore production of domestically derived oil and gas. Only then, with the benefit of some semblance of economic and energy stability, will the country be able to consider exploring long term alternatives to fossil fuels. Any other fudged ‘solution’, placating the eco-loons, will be the undoing of the UK.

    William Munny
    JUST NOW
    “Our fixation with net zero carries great risk”, it’s not our, it’s a narrow band of politicians and MSM in their little Westminster bubble. They’re about to find out in May.

    PT

    Patrick Taylor
    8 HRS AGO
    “our fixation” -it’s definitely not mine, I think you’ll find that’s Boris, nuts nuts and the green psychopaths of metropolita.

    1. Great BTL comments – our heating engineer, who services our lovely old oil fired boiler, has considerable experience of heat pumps and considers them an absolute scam!

    2. Good morning, everyone. Calm outside following a light frost.

      Strategy:

      a detailed plan for achieving success in situations such as war, politics, business, industry, or sport,

      Does anyone believe that Johnson, Kwarteng et al. have a detailed plan, or more importantly, are even capable of formulating such a thing? Johnson’s ‘Net Zero’ idea is coming back to bite him as the infrastructure costs will be crippling for the Country and then add in the direct costs to the population of the alternatives on offer e.g. heat pumps, upgrading building insulation and it becomes clear that his idea is impracticable. The latest strategy appears to be a sop to the public in an attempt to deflect the criticism from his original nonsense. Long term strategy from a UK government that benefits the people, and a Johnson government (U-turn and Lies Central) at that? Fool me once…

      1. “… the infrastructure costs will be crippling for the Country and then add
        in the direct costs to the population of the alternative…”

        The state does not care. It has found something it can tax and is doing so, at a rapacious rate.

      2. Kwasi Kwarteng is talking detailed rubbish, and I’m sure that he knows it.

        He talks about 2050, which is 28 years away.

        Take any point in the last hundred years, add 28 years to it, and the outcome is always very different.

        Don’t take my word for it, try it.

      3. Not forgetting that heat pumps require a lot of (now hideously) expensive electricity that the Grid will struggle to supply, and new, larger radiators…

    3. We shouldn’t have t wait until May. The net zero nonsense should be repealed on our demand. Legislation passed that suits US, not them.

      It is this lack that most people forget. Government is there to serve, not dictate.

  30. 351887+up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Friday 8 April: It feels as though the outrages that Ukraine suffers were happening to us

    “Were happening to us” who is the author of this freaking missive, been happening here in a more supple form openly, for the last three plus decades.

    We as a nation have been dragged through conflicts due to politico’s of dubious, treacherous natures resulting in needless loss of life, these political rodents ;/ party’s
    still have a strong following.

    These political rodents STILL head up their own agenda as in mass ” controlled” illegal immigration via the Dover Campaign consequences being mass foreign paedophilia, mass killings withing a society
    policed by a force deemed by many to be totally inept seen in the main as establishment revenue collectors..

    This lab/lib/con mass uncontrolled
    ( gov.illegally controlled)immigration, paedophile umbrella coalition party are still supported via an electorate majority riddled with very dangerous imbeciles as shown by their continuing voting pattern contained within a political close shop.

  31. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/59b978709c789695952ac7a90caa3590469bbaf3f803230dd9fdfd7d85f9b526.png Er … NO, they haven’t “spotted” anything!

    They are looking (apparently) at something that existed 13·5 billion years ago (it has taken the light that comes from it 13·5 billion years to reach the eyes of those watching astronomers). Goodness only knows what is out there, in that very location, right now. They don’t know and no one else can even guess.

    2. I understand what you’re saying at a scientific level, but at least someone is looking up and out rather than selfishly toward their next whinging protest demanding special treatment.

      Imagine where we could be if we were driven by science, reason and that simplest of desires, to be more than we are, to look up and wonder ‘what if’ rather than the egotistical arrogance of spoiled, petty, littering brats?

    4. It’s all relative. Everything we see is from the past, whether it’s a zeptosecond away or 13⋅5 billion years.

    5. Good morning Grizzly and all Nottlers.
      Factoid: HD1 is a postal area of Huddersfield.

    9. If it is/was the home of the first stars, why is in known as Population III, what are I & II?

        1. Thanks for that Pip. Things like that tend to bother me until I know one way or the other. Trivial attitude, but all the same I will go to bed this evening without that bee in my bonnet. Very helpful link.

          2. I’m glad to say that both my short and long time memory are doing well. When the former starts going is the point I will seriously contemplate my options.

          3. It’s not so bad. I just have to make note of everything. Friends joke that i can watch the same film as often as i like. :@(

  32. The truth about Rome may be too brutal for the young to handle
    I’m all for teaching children the truth about the Romans. But do the writers of the Cambridge Latin course know what they’re getting into?

    Peter Jones: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/04/07/truth-rome-may-brutal-young-handle/

    BTL

    In the current obsession with historical slavery several things are overlooked , distorted or ignored – for example :

    i) The descendants of slaves from Africa have generally far more comfortable and secure lives and far more wealth than the descendants of those who stayed in Africa and were not enslaved;

    ii) The trade in slaves was not just conducted by white people; African chiefs were happy to sell their own people into slavery as were people of many other races. And white people were very much the target of the Barbary pirates who took white slaves who were very cruelly treated;

    iii) It was the British who succeeded in stamping out the slave trade through the inspiration and tireless efforts of Lord Wilberforce.

    Politicians are more than happy to let the proletariat blame people from and events from the past for their miseries – it takes their attention away from the total incompetence of so many people in power today.

    1. Here is the Peter Jones article:

      Some 50 years after its original publication, it has suddenly occurred to writers of the Cambridge Latin Course (CLC), which depicts happy slaves singing and dancing their way through life, that slavery is a bad thing. As a result, the course is going to be rewritten to ensure that pupils understand that slavery is a bad thing too.

      I’m all for teaching children the reality about Roman society. In fact, that’s probably the best way of interesting them in the study of Latin, Greek and the ancient world. The question is: how will CLC handle the topic?

      It will be a delicate task. Although it might be horrifying to modern minds, perhaps the CLC could begin by reflecting that, in Roman society, slaves effectively had the status of a tool. They were bought for a purpose – everything from, worst of all, working down the mines, to doctors, architects, jewellers or professors, who were purchased at great expense and expected to use their skills to the household’s advantage.

      And then there were the masters. There were those who understood about human relationships and how to get the best out of people. Uniquely in the ancient world, Roman slaves who did good service to their masters stood the chance of being freed. In that case they and their children would become citizens (and at once buy slaves themselves). There are thousands of monuments and inscriptions set up by such “freedmen”, announcing their pride in their achievements.

      Equally there were very bad masters. Life for their slaves would have been intolerable. And since one can assume that this is the picture CLC wishes to paint, for fear that innocent children will otherwise come away with the impression the slavery was wonderful, this raises a problem. How are they going to turn Caecilius, the male “lead” of the course, currently a good master, into a bad master?

      The point here is that we live in a world of trigger warnings, and the trigger warnings that the ancient world sets off will probably burst our sensitive pupils’ ear drums. For starters, the ancients had no concept of human rights. They had no belief even in the right to life.

      In such a situation, the treatment which bad masters meted out to their slaves is not fit for human consumption by anyone of any age, let alone under 16. Male and female slaves could be raped at will by the master and his sons, hired out as prostitutes, sold off to fight to the death as gladiators, or for almost any other purpose that human wickedness could devise.

      The CLC is right to want its pupils to have as accurate a picture of the Roman world as possible. But good luck to them on achieving that end on a subject as complex and, if we are to believe what we are told about the young, as traumatising as slavery.

      And once they have dealt with slavery, what about all the other no-go areas – colonialism (and its violence against men and women), violence in general, racism, sexism, gender, class and mental health. If that is enough to cancel Jane Austen, where does it leave the study of the ancient world?

      Some of us, however, would say that is exactly why the ancients demand to be studied. But perhaps humans cannot bear so much (different) reality.

      Peter Jones is an author and co-founder of the charity Classics for All

      1. Teaching ‘reality’ intrudes upon forcing ‘the message’. Comically, it ignores how far we have come – and shows the modern ‘woke’ (a group never more ignorant and asleep in history)how they are forcing society backward.

      2. The answer is quite simple and obvious of course. If ancient Rome cannot be depicted as a story of evil white people treating exclusively black slaves cruelly, then the whole subject will be cancelled because studying ancient white civilisations is clearly an expression of white supremacy.

      3. Good morning!

        I’m sure they’ll wallow in the undoubted brutality of the Roman world and completely ignore its massive achievements. It serves to distort the present and push the narrative that whatever is thrown at us today represents true enlightenment.

      1. Good morning to the Personification of the Beauty of Truth!

        We do hope that you and your beloved are back on form and are getting over Covid. Caroline and I were lucky in that Vitamin D, Vitamin C and zinc seemed to help us have it withourt being very ill at all.

        1. I really enjoyed basic Latin at school , we had a very demonstrative teacher, a very clever lady teacher who should have been on the stage … and she could also sing beautifully.

          I can still sing ‘Clementina’ in Latin , 2 verses of it , and can also remember Te Deums and all that sort of stuff.

          We also take our daily multi vit horse pills , the virus has attached itself to the golf fraternity and the village .. Many golf companions went down like a stone .. it is that age group….. seniors .

          1. Latin was the only subject the Headmaster deigned to teach and in my case, his efforts were rewarded by a pass mark of 45 at O-level. Just enough, but no more. I never want to hear or see anything about an agricola again…

          2. ‘Morning Jdgar, I too was an unwilling pupil taught first by my father at age 7 (together with learning great chunks of Shakespeare by heart) and then at the Grammar School (similarly headmaster) for two years before I gave it up in favour of woodwork.

            Strangely though, I find it has helped a great deal in later life with foreign languages. I can now get by in German, French, Swedish and Spanish. I could probably understand Italian as well but I’ve yet to be subjected to it.

            Fruere vita tua sine latin

          3. I did A Level Latin (only two pupils, but two teachers!) and found Latin made learning Russian from scratch at university an absolute doddle.

          5. Latin made understanding cases (Nominative, Genitive etc) easier when I started studying German O Level, but that was its only usefulness for me. As English doesn’t contain these cases, this discipline, by definition, has be learnt is a language which does.
            It might have been easier to cut out the Latin middle-man and go straight to German, which is far more closely related to English.

          6. Fero – ferre – tuli – latum was one thing but having to learn rego – regere – rexi – rectum was a bit of a bummer.

            .

          7. I was born in 1946 so I am pretty senior now! I am old enough to take a seat on a tube train rather than give it up to a younger female passenger without feeling caddish, selfish or ungentlemanly.

            Mind you I sincerely hope I shall never have to use the London Underground or the Paris Metro again.

    3. The Left have never, ever liked the truth. It gets in the way of their narrative.

    4. Quite interesting also, I was christened at the church and went to Sunday school there.
      And at my school Dollis Junior, which was almost opposite the bottom end of (Myles-pit) now Milespit hill. Terry Downes the boxer lived half way up on the right hand side. I was in the (yellow) Wilberforce House. Other school hoses were Pembroke, Garrick, but the fourth name escapes me.
      And actor Patrick McGoohan lived almost opposite Mil Hill School, he was often in the public bar of my local the Adam and Eve.

      William Wilberforce and St Paul’s Church Mill Hill
      On leaving Parliament, Wilberforce resided at Uxbridge whilst seeking a suitable retirement home. After a long search he purchased an estate of some 140 acres at Highwood Hill. At that time Highwood lay at the northern extremity of Hendon Parish in a group of hamlets – Highwood Hill, Bittacy Hill, Milespit Hill and Holcombe Hill, which collectively form the Mill Hill of today. The names indicate the topography of high ground with extensive views over farmland vales growing mostly hay.
      The parish was in the shape of a long narrow rectangle aligned north south bisected by a small river which, being prone to winter flooding, made north south travel difficult. The parish church was in the south some 3 miles distant. The choice of Highwood, apart from its rurality which appealed to Wilberforce’s love of nature and of walking, may have been influenced by the knowledge that the then vicar was intending to build a chapel at Mill Hill. When after three years it was not forthcoming, Wilberforce determined to build one for his and his neighbours’ benefit at his own expense. The actual siting, patronage and materials used in its construction caused controversy and delay such that though building commenced in 1828-9 the chapel was not consecrated until a few days after Wilberforce’s death in 1833.

      During the building period, Wilberforce’s financial circumstances changed dramatically when he undertook responsibility for heavy losses incurred by his son. He refused all offers of assistance from his many friends other than gifts for his new chapel. One such gift is the treasured ‘east’ window containing a painted glass panel by Charles Muss depicting the ‘The Dead Christ Mourned (The Three Maries)’; his only extant signed work. The church designed by Samuel Hood Page, is of brick, stuccoed and painted. It corresponds closely with the ‘Commissioners Gothic’ of 1818 in having a small chancel and a simple gallery at the west end supported on cast iron pillars

      parishoffice@stpaulschurchmillhill.co.uk | 020 8906 3793 | The Ridgeway, Mill Hill, London, NW7 1QU |

  33. Tower Bridge closed as Extinction Rebellion protesters ‘abseil’ from London landmark.

    https://twitter.com/talkRADIO/status/1512329362460262403?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1512329362460262403%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.telegraph.co.uk%2Fnews%2F2022%2F04%2F08%2Ftower-bridge-closed-extinction-rebellion-protesters-abseil-london%2F

    Simple answer, just cut their abseil rope and ditch them in the river. These people are breaking the law, they should be treated as such. The PTB are far too lenient.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/04/08/tower-bridge-closed-extinction-rebellion-protesters-abseil-london/

    2. Golly! Clear blue sky here with sun shining. I’m guessing not very far apart.

        1. Still sunny here in the Central Borders. Rain forecast later in afternoon.

    1. Always thought there were ‘fiefdom’ elements to Sturgeon’s Scotland, but hadn’t realised how prevalent it all is.

      1. Unfortunately it has always been so, which is why England has had and in some ways still has an antipathy towards the country.
        The Romans had the right idea: build a wall and let them get on with it.
        For a country that has so many well educated and capable individuals, I’m surprised the SNP has lasted so long.

        1. Judging by my experience, most of the well educated and capable individuals left the country (and a lot of them settled in Shropshire!).

    4. Time to dissolve the Wee Pretendy Parliament and the upstart crows of the Assemblies.

  37. Morning all.
    Lovey day yesterday with friends who visited for lunch, 7 hours later……… well it’s been a long time since we last saw them.
    And the chancellor says that people pointing out his wife pays no tax in the UK is a smear campaign, did he mean champagne i wonder ?

    1. Some years ago some parents thought that it was important that they got their children into the best State school possible. This meant that they had to live in the appropriate catchment area for the school. Some did not. They got round it by applying from the address of a relative or friend. Local authorities then began to follow children home to check where they really lived.
      Maybe the tax people could try that with Mrs Chancellor of the Exchequer? If she is living with Mr Sunak on an ongoing basis maybe she could be arrested for tax fraud, fined billions, and deported?

      1. Good idea but no chance of course. It has Been mentioned this morning on the radio that his wife is richer than the Queen.

    2. I like this BTL comment:-
      “It takes a lot of balls to win women’s competitions these days”.

  39. Yay!
    The Van passed the MOT yesterday, necessitated by my buying is back after it’s shunt 2 weeks ago, with flying colours!
    So I’ve an extra £3,825 in the bank AND a van still worth at least £1½k with fully comp insurance continued!!

    1. Great news !
      Mine on the other hand is dire. Oil leak. Because of where it is they have to remove the engine. 10 hours @£88 per hour. :@(

    1. Porc dans une couverture à la Gregg’s?

      And NOT the fat, mouthy barrow-boy, Wallace!

  41. I suspect that the insane, over-protected, woke, middle-aged adolescents who are weeping and wailing over Russia’s raid on the Ukraine are like they are because they have been brought up here in an envelope of socially imposed niceness.
    At school sports everyone gets a prize. In films, mostly cartoons, no one is hurt. They have seldom read, and understood, books. Disney took the literature landscape, written and oral, laid out for children since time immemorial and led the way in turning it into meaningless pap. Others followed.
    My favourite example is the Jungle Books. Living creatures are torn to pieces. In Cinderella, greed cuts off the feet of the ugly sisters. Peter Pan is a self-centred egotist with not a care for anyone else. The tales of the Brothers Grimm are grim indeed.
    The dangers, (see Little Red riding Hood), the warnings, and advice have been obliterated.
    The generation who missed all of that, are now fooling around with war. Ignoring the past, they do not want anyone to be hurt! Think of the children!

    1. Read Roald Dahl’s fairy tales- Revolting Rhymes! You’ll shudder when you discover what Red Riding Hood does to the wolf;-)
      Almost all fairy tales are scary, or they were. Think about Hansel and Gretl- mother or stepmother sends them off into the woods where it is known a witch lives. Etc.

      1. Was it Hans Christian Anderson or the Brothers Grimm who when they issued their fairy tales, toned them down for the general public? I have forgotten. Apparently many of the stories were to much, even then, for general consumption.

        1. Hansel and Gretl is by the Grimms. I am very familiar with it as I was in the opera at school- we performed it when I was in the 3rd year. I was The Sandman.

      2. Saki’s stories are masterpieces:

        The Storyteller (Saki)
        by H. H. Munro (Saki) (1870-1916)

        It was a hot afternoon, and the railway carriage was correspondingly sultry, and the next stop was at Templecombe, nearly an hour ahead. The occupants of the carriage were a small girl, and a smaller girl, and a small boy. An aunt belonging to the children occupied one corner seat, and the further corner seat on the opposite side was occupied by a bachelor who was a stranger to their party, but the small girls and the small boy emphatically occupied the compartment. Both the aunt and the children were conversational in a limited, persistent way, reminding one of the attentions of a housefly that refuses to be discouraged. Most of the aunt’s remarks seemed to begin with “Don’t,” and nearly all of the children’s remarks began with “Why?” The bachelor said nothing out loud. “Don’t, Cyril, don’t,” exclaimed the aunt, as the small boy began smacking the cushions of the seat, producing a cloud of dust at each blow.
        “Come and look out of the window,” she added.
        The child moved reluctantly to the window. “Why are those sheep being driven out of that field?” he asked.
        “I expect they are being driven to another field where there is more grass,” said the aunt weakly.
        “But there is lots of grass in that field,” protested the boy; “there’s nothing else but grass there. Aunt, there’s lots of grass in that field.”
        “Perhaps the grass in the other field is better,” suggested the aunt fatuously.
        “Why is it better?” came the swift, inevitable question.
        “Oh, look at those cows!” exclaimed the aunt. Nearly every field along the line had contained cows or bullocks, but she spoke as though she were drawing attention to a rarity.
        “Why is the grass in the other field better?” persisted Cyril.
        The frown on the bachelor’s face was deepening to a scowl. He was a hard, unsympathetic man, the aunt decided in her mind. She was utterly unable to come to any satisfactory decision about the grass in the other field.
        The smaller girl created a diversion by beginning to recite “On the Road to Mandalay.” She only knew the first line, but she put her limited knowledge to the fullest possible use. She repeated the line over and over again in a dreamy but resolute and very audible voice; it seemed to the bachelor as though some one had had a bet with her that she could not repeat the line aloud two thousand times without stopping. Whoever it was who had made the wager was likely to lose his bet.
        “Come over here and listen to a story,” said the aunt, when the bachelor had looked twice at her and once at the communication cord.
        The children moved listlessly towards the aunt’s end of the carriage. Evidently her reputation as a story- teller did not rank high in their estimation.
        In a low, confidential voice, interrupted at frequent intervals by loud, petulant questionings from her listeners, she began an unenterprising and deplorably uninteresting story about a little girl who was good, and made friends with every one on account of her goodness, and was finally saved from a mad bull by a number of rescuers who admired her moral character.
        “Wouldn’t they have saved her if she hadn’t been good?” demanded the bigger of the small girls. It was exactly the question that the bachelor had wanted to ask.
        “Well, yes,” admitted the aunt lamely, “but I don’t think they would have run quite so fast to her help if they had not liked her so much.”
        “It’s the stupidest story I’ve ever heard,” said the bigger of the small girls, with immense conviction.
        “I didn’t listen after the first bit, it was so stupid,” said Cyril.
        The smaller girl made no actual comment on the story, but she had long ago recommenced a murmured repetition of her favourite line.
        “You don’t seem to be a success as a story-teller,” said the bachelor suddenly from his corner.
        The aunt bristled in instant defence at this unexpected attack.
        “It’s a very difficult thing to tell stories that children can both understand and appreciate,” she said stiffly.
        “I don’t agree with you,” said the bachelor.
        “Perhaps you would like to tell them a story,” was the aunt’s retort.
        “Tell us a story,” demanded the bigger of the small girls.
        “Once upon a time,” began the bachelor, “there was a little girl called Bertha, who was extra-ordinarily good.”
        The children’s momentarily-aroused interest began at once to flicker; all stories seemed dreadfully alike, no matter who told them.
        “She did all that she was told, she was always truthful, she kept her clothes clean, ate milk puddings as though they were jam tarts, learned her lessons perfectly, and was polite in her manners.”
        “Was she pretty?” asked the bigger of the small girls.
        “Not as pretty as any of you,” said the bachelor, “but she was horribly good.”
        There was a wave of reaction in favour of the story; the word horrible in connection with goodness was a novelty that commended itself. It seemed to introduce a ring of truth that was absent from the aunt’s tales of infant life.
        “She was so good,” continued the bachelor, “that she won several medals for goodness, which she always wore, pinned on to her dress. There was a medal for obedience, another medal for punctuality, and a third for good behaviour. They were large metal medals and they clicked against one another as she walked. No other child in the town where she lived had as many as three medals, so everybody knew that she must be an extra good child.”
        “Horribly good,” quoted Cyril.
        “Everybody talked about her goodness, and the Prince of the country got to hear about it, and he said that as she was so very good she might be allowed once a week to walk in his park, which was just outside the town. It was a beautiful park, and no children were ever allowed in it, so it was a great honour for Bertha to be allowed to go there.”
        “Were there any sheep in the park?” demanded Cyril.
        “No;” said the bachelor, “there were no sheep.”
        “Why weren’t there any sheep?” came the inevitable question arising out of that answer.
        The aunt permitted herself a smile, which might almost have been described as a grin.
        “There were no sheep in the park,” said the bachelor, “because the Prince’s mother had once had a dream that her son would either be killed by a sheep or else by a clock falling on him. For that reason the Prince never kept a sheep in his park or a clock in his palace.”
        The aunt suppressed a gasp of admiration.
        “Was the Prince killed by a sheep or by a clock?” asked Cyril.
        “He is still alive, so we can’t tell whether the dream will come true,” said the bachelor unconcernedly; “anyway, there were no sheep in the park, but there were lots of little pigs running all over the place.”
        “What colour were they?”
        “Black with white faces, white with black spots, black all over, grey with white patches, and some were white all over.”
        The storyteller paused to let a full idea of the park’s treasures sink into the children’s imaginations; then he resumed:
        “Bertha was rather sorry to find that there were no flowers in the park. She had promised her aunts, with tears in her eyes, that she would not pick any of the kind Prince’s flowers, and she had meant to keep her promise, so of course it made her feel silly to find that there were no flowers to pick.”
        “Why weren’t there any flowers?”
        “Because the pigs had eaten them all,” said the bachelor promptly. “The gardeners had told the Prince that you couldn’t have pigs and flowers, so he decided to have pigs and no flowers.”
        There was a murmur of approval at the excellence of the Prince’s decision; so many people would have decided the other way.
        “There were lots of other delightful things in the park. There were ponds with gold and blue and green fish in them, and trees with beautiful parrots that said clever things at a moment’s notice, and humming birds that hummed all the popular tunes of the day. Bertha walked up and down and enjoyed herself immensely, and thought to herself: ‘If I were not so extraordinarily good I should not have been allowed to come into this beautiful park and enjoy all that there is to be seen in it,’ and her three medals clinked against one another as she walked and helped to remind her how very good she really was. Just then an enormous wolf came prowling into the park to see if it could catch a fat little pig for its supper.”
        “What colour was it?” asked the children, amid an immediate quickening of interest.
        “Mud-colour all over, with a black tongue and pale grey eyes that gleamed with unspeakable ferocity. The first thing that it saw in the park was Bertha; her pinafore was so spotlessly white and clean that it could be seen from a great distance. Bertha saw the wolf and saw that it was stealing towards her, and she began to wish that she had never been allowed to come into the park. She ran as hard as she could, and the wolf came after her with huge leaps and bounds. She managed to reach a shrubbery of myrtle bushes and she hid herself in one of the thickest of the bushes. The wolf came sniffing among the branches, its black tongue lolling out of its mouth and its pale grey eyes glaring with rage. Bertha was terribly frightened, and thought to herself: ‘If I had not been so extraordinarily good I should have been safe in the town at this moment.’ However, the scent of the myrtle was so strong that the wolf could not sniff out where Bertha was hiding, and the bushes were so thick that he might have hunted about in them for a long time without catching sight of her, so he thought he might as well go off and catch a little pig instead. Bertha was trembling very much at having the wolf prowling and sniffing so near her, and as she trembled the medal for obedience clinked against the medals for good conduct and punctuality. The wolf was just moving away when he heard the sound of the medals clinking and stopped to listen; they clinked again in a bush quite near him. He dashed into the bush, his pale grey eyes gleaming with ferocity and triumph, and dragged Bertha out and devoured her to the last morsel. All that was left of her were her shoes, bits of clothing, and the three medals for goodness.”
        “Were any of the little pigs killed?”
        “No, they all escaped.”
        “The story began badly,” said the smaller of the small girls, “but it had a beautiful ending.”
        “It is the most beautiful story that I ever heard,” said the bigger of the small girls, with immense decision.
        “It is the only beautiful story I have ever heard,” said Cyril.
        A dissentient opinion came from the aunt.
        “A most improper story to tell to young children! You have undermined the effect of years of careful teaching.”
        “At any rate,” said the bachelor, collecting his belongings preparatory to leaving the carriage, “I kept them quiet for ten minutes, which was more than you were able to do.”
        “Unhappy woman!” he observed to himself as he walked down the platform of Templecombe station; “for the next six months or so those children will assail her in public with demands for an improper story!”

    3. When George Lucas made Star Wars in 1977 he was careful that however much cartoon violence it might contain, there would be not a drop of blood seen.

  42. UK sanctions target the lavish lifestyles of Putin’s daughters. 8 April 2022.

    The lavish lifestyles of the Kremlin’s inner circle will be further targeted from today as the UK sanctions the daughters of President Vladimir Putin and his Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

    Katerina Vladimirovna Tikhonova and Maria Vladimirovna Vorontsova, the daughters of President Putin, and Yekaterina Sergeyevna Vinokurova, daughter of Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, will be subject to travel bans and asset freezes.

    The UK has coordinated these sanctions with the US, in another show of global unity on action against Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine. This follows the UK’s sanctioning of Polina Kovaleva, Sergey Lavrov’s step-daughter on 25 March.

    This is actually a Government Website bragging about the sanctioning of people who have committed no crime nor been tried in any court or convicted of any offence! One can imagine what Churchill or any of his predecessors would have thought of this. It is a fair demonstration of the utter moral collapse of the West. There are no depths to which it will not sink, no crime it will not commit.

    https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-sanctions-target-the-lavish-lifestyles-of-putins-daughters

    1. A long time ago I had a pea shooter. I swear it was 1000% more effective than these latest ‘sanctions’…..

      1. Morning Stephen. We’ve already run out of Sunflower oil! Crisp shortages shortly!

        1. That’s ok. If I remember correctly spittle provides adequate lubrication for a pea shooter…

          Morning Minty.

      2. Morning Stephen. We’ve already run out of Sunflower oil! Crisp shortages shortly!

      3. As I pointed out yesterday. The majority of the world ins not on board with these sanctions. All it does is have Russia switch to other markets and cause, shortages, difficulties and pain for the self-righteous Europeans and Americans. Apparently, along with going Woke goes a loss of intelligence and common sense and the childish posture of cutting your nose off to spite your face.

    2. I am a bit uncomfortable about this too. The most dreadful tyrants and criminals come and go freely from our country and use its financial institutions. Targeting three young women who haven’t been accused or convicted of any offence looks like spite.
      If the hereditary principle is so important, why did we get rid of the House of Lords and replace it with a house of trash?

    3. Like approving that murderous dictators who also polish off family members of those they don’t like.
      The difference between Western governments and fascist dictatorships lessens by the day.

    4. Would some legal brain care to explain how one retrieves one’s goods and possessions confiscated by the Government

      if you’ve done nothing wrong?

      It could be a useful bit of information for Nottlers.

  43. Don’t risk triggering new world war by responding to Russian Black Sea aggression, RAF pilots told
    RAF Typhoon jets deployed to Romania, where they are helping to police Nato airspace on border with Ukraine

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/04/07/dont-risk-triggering-new-world-war-responding-russian-black/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr

    We are being invaded everyday by hundreds of non English speaking escapees from safe Western Europe .. Aricans/ Asians and Eastern Europeans have been trafficked here on small boats for money, large amounts .
    The majority of them will abuse our hospitality by raping/ murdering/ stealing / by virtue of being disrespecful to our customs and heritage .
    We have enough high security problems here by virtue of foreigners trying to hurt and maim us .
    Our government cares not a jot about our own inland security.
    Of course at the moment we are rather land locked anway with 25 mile queues of lorries near Dover .
    We don’t need a war with Russia , nor any other war anywhere else.
    Our war is here at home , protecting our heritage , and saving our selves from eco loons and woke idiots .. and keeping ourselves safe and secure .

  45. Back from Narridge. Still sunny – not that warm, though. D Michaelangelo gave the MR complete satisfaction!!

      1. I remained in the car – watching the very fat people putting on their masks…

    1. “the sun has put his hat on”

      I have NEVER understood whether this means the sun has come out OR that it has clouded over.

      Help…!!

      1. Heaven knows what you would make of the next line, “He’s coming out to play”

        1. Really it ought to be “They are coming out to play…” !!!

          Or – better still – “They IS coming out to ply”

        1. I am very much obliged. That has solved a riddle that I have endured for 75 years.

      1. Hi FA,

        Still have a gungy cough, and a bit wearier than usual . Moh and I also commented on our brain foggy moments ..

        I hope we are not entering strange territory re memory stuff.

    1. How many litres are there in a gallon?

      Whatever the answer, we’re paying too much tax on fuel.

  49. Some of you have used the paywall blocker 12 Foot Ladder (https://12ft.io). My anti-virus software has just blocked this, identifying it as a phishing site.

    There are alternatives but I haven’t tried any yet. Some require installation, which always makes me wary.

  51. Welcome to the Free Speech Union’s weekly newsletter, our round-up of the free speech news of the week. As with all our work, this newsletter depends on the support of our members and donors, so if you’re not already a paying member please sign up today or encourage a friend to join, and help us turn the tide against cancel culture.

    Online Safety Bill

    As Lord Grade was confirmed as chair of Ofcom, the parliamentary Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee said “he appears to understand the importance of Ofcom’s new role in regulating the online space” but “his clear lack of depth when talking about social media and online safety gives us concerns”. In the Times, Benedict Evans explored the trade-offs in seeking online safety while trying to retain freedom of expression, with no clear rule underpinning the speech codes of different social media platforms, and that policing claims of “legal but harmful” speech might now fall to Ofcom, and hence the social media refusenik Michael Grade. In a New Statesman debate on the Online Safety Bill, Index on Censorship’s Ruth Smeeth said that the new “legal but harmful” speech codes could mean that things “we could discuss in the pub… would not be allowed to be on my Facebook page”. The Institute of Economic Affairs’s Victoria Hewson said: “The Online Safety Bill… is stretching the concept of safety beyond all recognition, to justify a massive extension in the powers of the state. I’m not sure that any of this is going to make us any safer.”

    Meanwhile, irony died as Ian Blackford, the SNP’s leader in Westminster, called for zero tolerance for online abuse of politicians.

    Edinburgh Event: Why Free Speech Matters

    Please join us in for a members’ event on 21 April in Edinburgh where internationally renowned free speech advocate and author Jacob Mchangama will be introducing his highly acclaimed new book, Free Speech: A Global History from Socrates to Social Media. The evening will be hosted by Toby Young, General Secretary of the Free Speech Union; Toby’s Spectator review of Jacob’s book can be found here. Toby and Jacob will be joined by a distinguished panel, including the SNP MP Joanna Cherry, to discuss the importance of free speech and how it can be defended today. Tickets can be booked here.

    Universities: FSU calls for a Cardiff inquiry, NDAs at Oxford

    The FSU has been signal-boosting a petition to the Welsh Senedd, asking for an inquiry into Cardiff University’s failure to protect members of its academic staff who received death threats after they publicly queried the University’s membership of Stonewall’s Diversity Champions programme. We have written again to the Vice-Chancellor of Cardiff about this, querying why the University is refusing to properly investigate the bullying and harassment of these academics. We also wrote to Welsh Minister of Education Jeremy Miles MS. Please sign the petition. If it gets 10,000 signatures, it will be considered for a debate in the Senedd.

    At Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford a student who claimed to have been raped was issued with a gagging order by the college. The student said that former Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger, then Master of the college, had tried “desperately to convince her not to complain”. In a leader, the Times said: “[T]hus far, no Oxford college has signed a pledge, launched by the Government in January, not to use non-disclosure agreements in misconduct cases. The university denies the use of NDAs; events at LMH suggest otherwise.” LMH subsequently said that it would sign a pledge to stop imposing gagging orders on students.

    Tide turning for free speech in law after Holbrook victory

    In Spiked, FSU Advisory Council member Emma Webb said that barrister Jon Holbrook’s win against the Bar Standards Board was “very good news”, but listed a number of other cases in which barristers “have fallen foul of the Bar Standards Board for expressing opinions it deems unacceptable” – such as the case of Allison Bailey, who was investigated by her chambers, Garden Court, for saying that “gender extremism is about to meet its match” when the LGB Alliance was launched. Webb said that “perhaps the tide is turning” and the Holbrook ruling “marks an important victory in the battle for free speech. But the war is far from over.”

    U-Turn on U-Turn on “conversion therapy”

    In a double U-turn – a 360° U-turn? – the Government said it planned to drop its pledge to ban conversion therapy, and then announced hours later that the ban would in fact proceed but with a carve-out for gender dysphoria. We welcomed the initial announcement, and were relieved when the Government made it clear that the ban wouldn’t extend to referring adolescents with gender dysphoria to therapists. You can read our response to the Government’s consultation about banning conversation therapy here. In our previous submission to the Government, we said: “Our concern is that ‘conversion therapy’, as currently under discussion, is too vaguely defined to form the basis of a new law and such a law would inevitably have a chilling effect on free speech.”

    In the Telegraph, former No 10 Director of Legislative Affairs Nikki Da Costa, who shares many of our concerns about the vagueness of the proposals and their impact on free speech and who had set out how existing legislation already bans conversion therapy in a viral Twitter thread, said that the Government should now take its time to draft any legislation carefully. Da Costa warned: “Lobby groups will whip up a social media storm, portraying anyone that votes against the amendment as transphobic and MPs will have to decide whether they have the courage to intervene or whether to hope that it will all be okay.”

    Respect My Sex if You Want My X

    In the Times, Lucy Bannerman looked at the history of transsexuality, such as the transition of the iconic journalist and historian Jan Morris, and asked how the debate around trans rights had reached its current toxicity, concluding that the aggressive #nodebate tactics of campaigning organisations and performative allies had fed a culture of secrecy and suppression of dissent in organisations such as the Tavistock. Bannerman said: “The trouble is that transgender identity is not like the struggle for racial or sexual equality. The civil rights movement did not seek to reclassify who is black and who is white. The gay rights movement did not seek to reclassify who is gay and who is straight.”

    In the Sunday Times, Robert Colvile was more upbeat, pointing out that beyond the online noise of the trans debate both Tory MPs and the British public were overwhelmingly supportive of trans people. The New Statesman ran an article quoting anonymous Labour insiders bemoaning the “clusterfuck” of the party’s handling of the sex and gender issue. In the Mail on Sunday, Dan Hodges wrote that Keir Starmer needed to “level with people, not least people in the trans community” and that he “needs to be clear that the only moral – and politically sustainable – position is one in which the rights of those who wish to self-identify are protected and guaranteed, so long as they don’t undermine the rights of others”. Otherwise, Hodges warned, the Tories would exploit Labour’s obfuscation – and they’d be “on the right side of the argument”.

    Ahead of the May local elections, Maya Forstater, along with Women Uniting’s Caroline ffiske and Women’s Rights Network’s Heather Binning, launched the ‘Respect My Sex if You Want My X’ campaign in the Mail in which they urged voters to question candidates in the upcoming elections about their positions on women’s rights and trans rights – and not to vote for them if they don’t endorse sex-based women’s rights. Labour’s Rosie Duffield publically signed up, prompting the question of whether this might bring her into further conflict with her party; Kathleen Stock backed the campaign, saying: “You can’t change material reality by unilaterally changing words. Instead, you merely create misunderstanding and set groups of people against each other. What we need is a free, open and honest debate that acknowledges the biological facts, one that elected politicians cannot shirk.” For Women Scotland adopted ‘Respect My Sex’ too, saying that anyone who did not answer “adult human female” when asked what a woman was could not be trusted on other matters.

    The Times reported that female cyclists are afraid to speak up about the proposed inclusion of trans cyclist Emily Bridges at the National Omnium Championships for fear of being accused of transphobia. While cycling governing body UCI eventually banned Bridges from that event, the prospect of a challenge under the Equality Act remains possible; the Chair of British Cycling described the issue of transwomen athletes as the biggest issue in women’s sports. Women members of British Cycling wrote to UCI asking it to rescind the rule allowing transwomen to compete in women’s cycling events, and Boris Johnson said: “I don’t think that biological men should be competing in female sporting events.”

    Johnson also said that he did not consider children to be Gillick-competent, and thus able to give informed consent for gender dysphoria treatment, and that some spaces should be exclusively reserved for biological females. Johnson added that he was “immensely sympathetic to people who wanted to change gender” and said: “That’s as far as my thinking has developed on this issue. If that puts me in conflict with some others, then we have got to work it all out.”

    In UnHerd, Hadley Freeman observed, of the difference between Labour’s “flailing” and Johnson’s straight talk, that the “Left have handed the Right this victory on a gold platter”. Freeman continued: “This was the week when the wheels started to come off the ideological bandwagon, when Stonewall’s grip on British politicians began to loosen.”

    Stonewall failed this week in its attempt to pressurise the UN to downgrade the Equality and Human Rights Commission; it and other LGBT organisations also boycotted the planned Safe To Be Me conference on global LGBT rights over the trans exemption in the Government’s conversion therapy ban, leading to the cancellation of the conference.

    A Times leader said it was time to go “back to basics” and ditch the victimhood culture on both the trans and gender critical sides of the trans debate, observing, of the question of whether women have penises: “It is lucky there isn’t an energy crisis or war to distract attention from this existential issue.”

    “Legal but harmful” Christian beliefs

    The FSU’s Toby Young discussed the risks of the Online Safety Bill for Christians in an interview with Christian Today, saying that the Online Safety Bill’s requirement that Big Tech remove “legal but harmful” speech would “almost certainly include some posts expressing orthodox Christian beliefs, although the big social media companies need no encouragement when it comes to removing them”. Toby added: “My advice to any orthodox Christian worried about their right to freedom of expression being eroded is to join the Free Speech Union.” In UnHerd, Lois McLatchie described a series of incidents across Europe in which Christians faced prosecution, arrest and slander, including two people in Finland charged with “ethnic agitation” and UK street preacher John Sherwood, who was removed from his soapbox by police for saying that God created Adam and Eve. McLatchie said: “Not everybody likes the Bible. But freedom to speak openly means that we will sometimes hear what we disagree with.”

    Musk disrupts Twitter

    Elon Musk bought a $3 billion stake in Twitter and joined the Board of Directors. Musk, a self-described “free speech absolutist”, had previously been critical of Twitter and asked his followers on the platform how it could better protect free speech. The Telegraph reported that Musk subscribed to the view that Twitter should be “the free speech wing of the free speech party” and that, while he had been close to Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, his relations with current CEO Parag Agrawal were less cordial: “Musk also posted an image to Twitter in December 2021 showing Agrawal as Joseph Stalin, airbrushing Mr Dorsey out of history.” As commentators speculated over whether Musk would push for further control, Matthew Lynn suggested in the Spectator that “if he takes control, Twitter may start to give libertarian, right of centre views as much space as it does the woke activists that all too often dominate it right now. That would be a very important shift.”

    Tip of the SLAPP iceberg

    Baroness Tina Stowell, chair of House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee, said that the committee had “heard concerning evidence that free speech is being chilled by the use of SLAPPs. We heard that the SLAPP cases we do know about represent just the tip of the iceberg because the claimants are successful in stifling investigative journalism and publishing.” Stowell described both costs and case numbers as “out of control” and said that the committee would be “writing to the Government to encourage urgent action on this issue”. The FSU is responding to the Government’s consultation on SLAPPs, which you can find here.

    Diversity of belief and democracy

    In the City Journal, Noel Yaxley described Britain as having “some of the most authoritarian restrictions on free speech in Europe” and described the Equality Act’s protected characteristics as the “basis for much of Britain’s censorious legislation”. In the Spectator, Niall Gooch asked where all the genuinely conservative reforms afforded by Johnson’s 80-seat majority have gone, saying: “Take the Malicious Communications Act 2003, frequently used by the police and the CPS to harass or prosecute people who send ‘offensive’ tweets. It would not be difficult to amend or repeal this part of the law. Or consider the Equality Act 2010, which embeds in policy-making and institutional action the following assumption: disparity in outcomes among different groups is ipso facto evidence of racism.”

    Matthew Syed interviewed GCHQ head Jeremy Fleming, who said: “Diversity of thought and speaking truth to power are some of our greatest strengths – not just in GCHQ but as a western coalition. It helps us to refine our decision-making, challenge our assumptions and – from an intelligence perspective – use the truth to counter disinformation.” And the Government came out for free speech for councillors, saying that British democracy was in its nature “robust and oppositional”, and that “free speech within the law can sometimes involve the expression of political views that some may find offensive”.

    Cancel Caecilius, and other arts and culture news

    Kathleen Stock wrote about the corrosive effect of identity politics and tone policing in academic philosophy in UnHerd, saying that she wondered if the notoriously aggressive environment of old-school, male-dominated philosophy “wasn’t the best of all possible worlds in comparison to what came next”. Stock identified the creeping Americanisation of academic life as part of the problem, and added that the new speech code of informal civility undermined the ability to pick apart a bad argument. As the demands to protect identity groups from philosophical investigation stacked up, Stock concluded that: “The traditional means of defending a position – using arguments – wasn’t fashionable in online spaces anymore. Instead, moves formerly condemned in first year logic classes were in the ascendancy: ad hominems, failures of charitable interpretation, begging the question, confusion of sufficient conditions with necessary ones, derivations of ‘is’ from ‘ought’, and all the rest.”

    In the US Free Speech Union Substack, Jon Zobenica and Benjamin Schwarz told the story of the New York Metropolitan Opera’s Russian soprano, Anna Netrebko, who was fired, even after openly criticising the war in Ukraine, for not adequately denouncing Putin himself. Zobenic and Schwarz compared the current fashion for blacklisting to the commitment to Western values of free expression in the post-war era, when Ezra Pound was awarded the Bollingen Prize for poetry while awaiting trial for treason after spouting antisemitic propaganda on behalf of the Fascist regime in Italy. Zobenia and Schwarz quoted leftwing American critic Dwight Macdonald on the importance of guarding against authoritarian instincts by not confusing the value of art with the value of its maker’s politics, and concluded that Netrebko’s cancellation was “what comes – at home no less than abroad – of the totalitarian tendency that Dwight Macdonald warned us about.”

    As Stirling University announced that it was replacing Jane Austen with Toni Morrison on a “Special Authors” module, Ella Whelan said that, while this was part of a pre-planned rotation and Morrison was an excellent author, the internal University memos noting that the move would be useful as part of an ongoing “decolonisation” project indicated that literary merit was not the only consideration. Inaya Folarin Iman said: “This is not decolonisation. In fact, it is yet another example of the hyper-Americanisation that has taken hold on campuses and in wider society in recent years… In Americanising under the guise of ‘decolonising’, we lose sight of Britain’s unique features – and problems. We downplay class and regional inequality in favour of an analysis of race in another country, leading ironically to a greater ignorance of the struggles against racial discrimination that took place right here at home.”

    In UnHerd, novelist Philip Hensher said that authors were newly timid when writing about class, noting that “it must be affected by a general squeamishness about making personal observations of a specific sort”. In the Times, Libby Purves argued that trigger warnings were not only condescending to children and young people, but also cheapened genuine PTSD by making casual claims about “trauma”. And the Telegraph announced that Cambridge Latin Course icon and slave-objectifier Caecilius might be next in line for cancellation, quoting Latin scholar Steven Hunt, who described the Roman world as depicted in CLC as “highly problematic” and recommended that teachers liven things up by translating Disney and Taylor Swift into Latin instead.

    We’re looking for people to help us set up Regional Speakeasies in Bristol

    The Events team would like to hear from anyone interested in helping with Regional Speakeasies in the Bristol area. Members have already got things going in Cardiff, but our research shows that there are lots of members in the South West for whom Bristol might work as an additional regional ‘hub’. While we realise that travel across the south western counties is not easy, we would nevertheless like to see what we can do to give members the chance to get together during the year. Please email events@freespeechunion.org to get in touch with Dr Jan Macvarish and Kate Howell on our events team.

    Free Speech Nation with Andrew Doyle: audience invitation

    FSU members and subscribers are invited by comedian and FSU Advisory Council member Andrew Doyle to join the live audience of his television show, Free Speech Nation, broadcast on GB News on Sunday evenings. Sign up for free tickets here – go to ‘Current Shows’ and scroll down for Free Speech Nation.

    Sharing the newsletter

    As with all our work, this newsletter depends on the support of our members and donors, so if you’re not already a paying member please sign up today or encourage a friend to join, and help us turn the tide against cancel culture.

    You can share our newsletters on social media with the buttons below to help us spread the word. If someone has shared this newsletter with you and you’d like to join the FSU, you can find our website here.

  52. Why the west’s Middle East partners choose Putin over principle in Ukraine war. 8 april 2022.

    But at a crucial juncture in European history, with Russia attacking Ukraine and threatening the entire post-World War II security order, the Gulfies are nowhere to be found.

    The west has been unable to count on the United Arab Emirates’ vote at the UN to condemn the invasion; and during Thursday’s vote to remove Moscow from the UN’s Human Rights Council after its alleged war crimes in Ukraine, all of the Gulf states abstained.

    The west has been unable to get them to ramp up oil and gas production, to stave off the effects of removing Russian energy from the markets. It has been unable to convince them to abide by sanctions, or even bar Russian oligarchs close to Vladimir Putin from parking their cash and yachts in the Gulf’s glittery cities.

    US president Joe Biden has been unable even to get the leadership of Saudi Arabia or the UAE on the phone, according to news reports.

    A reminder that these sanctions are not universal by a long way!

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/middle-east-moscow-putin-ukraine-war-b2053806.html

    1. The Arabs have seen the way the West teats them – giving them bombs with one hand, and bombing them with another.
      I suspect that the also feed disparaged and patronised by the west, as well. Who attacked Syria, and who supported them in their war with ISIS?
      Maybe their interpretation is a power shift towards Russia, and don’t want to blot their copybook already?

      1. I think you’re absolutely right, in that they see American dominance of word affaires is on a rapid decline. Russia, China and maybe India are on the rise and if the dollar no longer gives fiscal security, they need to realign their markets for oil & gas.
        America and Europe have made a big error in the way they have run roughshod over innocent Russian citizens, with their confiscation (theft) of property, bank accounts and trade deals that were perfectly legal before Ukraine hit the headlines.

    1. Well that’s one of the best summing ups of the present situation I have watched. Mind you the guy is toast!

  54. 351887+ up ticks,

    May one ask, seemingly alterations to property where refugee children are involved,drained garden ponds, electrical points elevated etc,etc. the question is where were these council / politico’s, so concerned with foreign children’s welfare when rotherham (ongoing) was in covertly full flow.

    These are undenighable facts NO child should be given refuge in this country
    until the paedophile plague is seriously sorted.

      1. No, you’re confusing her with Lady Ophelia Balls-Upforrit.
        Easy mistake to make.

        1. 6 years ago we were in Perth WA and it was Melbourne cup day talk about sozzled ladies………..all was good at the Perth Yacht club on the river, music dancing not too many drunkards. But a long way from Melbourne al the same.

    3. They look like scrubbers! Not a clue about how to dress appropriately for their figures.

    4. They don’t seem to care how they look any more – still….one mans meat and all that!

    7. A lass should have a big butt – it’s one of the (many) joys of a woman.
      Like ginger hair… wibble – or should that be dribble??

        1. I know. Just looked at the mail. Argh! There’s elegant, and there’s slapper… :-((

  58. Afternoon All

    Can’t stand to look at the noos so have some animals instead…..

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e225baeef71aa63d2fd75ba8acdf6032b51ff9ddab9f98d6e548c88f28ee7041.gif

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e06a18bcffca50aa8a53a0b25b9f931060522eb673a37322d6060461b54b9756.gif

    https://d1ozsoeh4648m4.cloudfront.net/693/cffb4/74f2/4531/9eb9/8b2c6f099c3a/large/256435.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f1d7f524b1c277b33c518a7acfe4aeaa36461a4cc266a71bd5e15f09ca6aa3c1.gif

    1. Mongo would just step on to the couch and walk over you, then flop down.

      If you’ve never had 90 kilos land on you, it’s quite an experience. The warqueen encourages him!

  61. OT – how terribly sad that Cur Loathesome Hamilton is doing really badly in his toy car this year.

    One might almost think that Mercedes are doing it on purpose…!!!

  62. Boris Becker found guilty after giving bankruptcy officials ‘runaround’ over missing trophies. 8 April 2022.

    Tennis legend Boris Becker has been found guilty of four charges under the Insolvency Act after giving bankruptcy officials the “runaround” over missing trophies.

    The six-time Grand Slam champion, 54, was accused of hiding millions of pounds worth of assets, including two Wimbledon trophies, to avoid paying his debts.

    It must be something to do with the name!

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/boris-becker-guilty-bankruptcy-trial-b2053916.html

  63. “Rejoice …. Rejoice.”
    Mrs. Bloodaxe’s postcard arrived today. It had taken a mere fortnight to travel from Harrogate to Colchester.
    Maybe it’s time to restore the stagecoach so we get prompter service.

  64. Finally some follow up. The hospital rang this morning- I had phoned them on Monday. Biopsies take 6-8 weeks but she was very nice and said if I hadn’t heard in a week to call and she’d chase it up for me.
    Actually saw the mailman today and he brought the report letter from my appointment 3+ weeks ago, although they did say that would take a couple of weeks.
    It seems likely that what I have is known as Bowenoid Keratosis which appears to be a benign lesion but they won’t know for sure until the biopsy results are in.
    They can call it what they like, it still bloody hurts.
    The NHS are obviously playing catch up after two years of being the covid system which is why everything is taking so long.
    Thanks again to all of you for listening to my moaning and groaning and for your support. Much appreciated.

    1. Keep us posted. The main point is that you should not have been kept in such state of distress because the government threw an hysterical fit.

    2. A diagnosis is halfway to a treatment, Ann. Google tells me you can get cream for it, and there should be no scarring.

    3. Ask them if you can use Lidocaine skin cream to numb the area. I believe you can buy it without prescription.

      1. We’re going to Boots tomorrow to pick up a prescription for MH- I will note the name and ask the pharmacist.

        1. Tell him/her what the problem is. They may be able to give you something even better.

          1. I shall, thanks. The trouble with me is the damn silly name of this thing. I can’t even read it without sniggering and how I’m going to say it out loud, I don’t know.
            It sounds like something the Klingons would have for breakfast;-))

          4. You write yours down, and I’ll write mine, and we’ll see who was right!
            ;-))

          5. Can we first ask Geoff not to ban us?

            What do Captain Kirk and loo paper have in common?

            They both circle Uranus looking for Klingons.

            ( Sorry folks.)

          11. Pharmacists are grossly under-rated – they can do a lot more than sell packs of condoms and paracet.

          12. GP’s are tied in to the deals they have done with big pharma. Pharmacists know more about drugs and their interactions.

          13. True!
            Edit- my son’s room mate at UConn was a pharmacy student; his course was 6 years, the same as an MD.

          14. True!
            Edit- my son’s room mate at UConn was a pharmacy student; his course was 6 years, the same as an MD.

          15. Pharmacists know drugs far better than any doctor. Our grandson is in his first year doing a Master’s in Pharmacy and is getting high praise for his knowledge already. It’s a 4 year course and then another year working for registration.

    1. Wordle 293 3/6
      ⬜⬜⬜🟨🟩
      ⬜🟨🟩⬜🟩
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
      Beginner’s luck still holding … yet!

        2. Started with ARISE. Sometimes I do ORATE, sometimes IRATE.
          ARS were correct letters but in the wrong place, the E was in the right place. Got it on the next line

          1. I meant show us your coloured diagram of fives.

            You shouldn’t reveal actual letters on the day of play – its a giveaway to many – Tut, Tut, vw!

          2. Sorreeee, don’t know how to show the diagram. I will give myself a smack on the bottom!

          3. Here goes, VW:

            Press the ‘chart’ symbol in TRH corner;
            Up comes your cumulative ‘Guess Distribution Chart’;
            Press ‘Share‘ in LRH corner.
            Open a new post or reply;
            Press and Hold he Word button followed by ‘v’:
            Up comes your colour chart!

          5. Open a new post or reply;
            To retrieve chart from clipboard:
            Press and Hold he Word button followed by ‘v’:
            Up comes your colour chart – hopefully !

    3. Wordle 293 2/6

      ⬜🟨🟨🟨🟨
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
      ‘Magnificent’, ‘It’ said …!

        2. Eric Morecambe would have said:

          ‘Four right Notes – each in the wrong Order’ !

  68. A friend suggested I put horse manure on my strawberries.
    I think I prefer whipped cream…
    I’ll get me coat.

  69. Apropos all those pretty well-dressed ladies at Aintree. Notice anything missing?

    COME ON – you are NOT trying….

      1. One came third in the “Best Dressed” competition – I thought he looked rather scruffy!

    6. Are you referring to the slags bursting out of their ill fitting clothes? We could start with decorum, self respect, taste, panties etc. all missing is my guess.

  71. HAPPY DAYS …..for JAYS
    Joy for birdwatchers as numbers are boosted…and greenfinches are flocking back to our gardens too, survey shows.
    Numbers of jays increased by 73% in British gardens this year.
    Greenfinch numbers rose by 8% this year, RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch found
    Redwings and fieldfares did less well, with numbers dropping by around 50
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10697909/Numbers-jays-soar-threat-greenfinches-increased-birdwatch-poll-shows.html

    I watched a pair of thrushes this morning make a beeline
    for the fatballs and seeds on the bird table. Hope they enjoy the menu and take up
    residence nearby….

    2. That’s global warming for you Plum.
      Some winners and some losers.
      We used to call it normal life.

    3. At last we have Blue tits nesting in my hand made bird box.
      I haven’t seen a thrush for years we also use to have Lesser spotted wood peckers and Jays in our garden. i’m not a believer in feeding them, it encourages squirrels. Our neighbour does that It also seems to encourage non indigenous noisy flocks Red neck (green) parakeets.
      The now missing varieties might have been driven away by al the Red kites we have flying around the area.
      We also use to have tawny owls and bats, I have bat boxes in a tree, one on a shed, in the garden at night, but i’m afraid newer young ‘must have’ neighbours revel in the unnecessary pollution of garden lighting and i believe that might have driven them away.

      1. I have squirrels too. They turn the peanut feeders upside down , remove the the top….peanuts all over the path……grrr

        1. We have a grape vine and hazel bushes but even though i net the vine we never get any mature grapes or hazel nuts. I use to have a decent air rifle but i can’t find it, I think one of our sons took it some where and lost it.
          But in their favour we have two walnut saplings now one in a pot but i’m not sure where the nuts came from but i;m going to plant one in a wood near our house and that will be my legacy.

    4. Saw a Jay in my garden two days ago. That is the rarest corvid I see: Magpies, Jackdaws and the odd Crow, I assume it’s a Crow as it’s always on its own, are more common visitors. I have tried to ‘train’ a Robin this year without success. However, a pair have set up home in my hedge at the front of the bungalow and one of them is ready ‘trained’: it comes up very close and enjoys the suet pellets I have ready in my pocket. After cutting down a huge out of control Pieris last year I lost my Dunnock but one has appeared and has settled in another Pieris closer to the bungalow.

  72. That’s me for this mixed day. Sunny. Grass cut. But chilly breeze – and a cold night forecast. Will defer potting on greenhouse seedlings until Monday.

    If anyone is interested, PBSAmerica is showing a two-part documentary by the ever reliable Ken Burns about Benjamin Franklin. Very informative. Among the many things which I didn’t know about him – he invented the “glass harmonica”…..for which Mozart ad Beethoven wrote pieces. And it was nothing like I had imagined it looked!!

    Have a jolly evening.

    A demain.

    1. My mother would come back from the hair dresser or somesuch and usually look the same, yet if you didn’t comment positively you’d get the cold shoulder – as would the rest of the house. Slammed doors, screaming, the usual tiresome nonsense.

      Thus we all became hypersensitive to it and ‘hair days’ would be a silent promoted knowledge so Dad wouldn’t forget and my sister and I would know, and we’d all comment on Mother’s wonderful new hair cut – whatever it was.

      It was incredibly stupid, looking back, but that absurd woman demanded patronising and pandering.

      The first time I did it to the wife she said ‘Stop it, I know you can’t tell or don’t like it.’ So I am honest with her. Some hair styles don’t suit her and she has sufficient confidence to accept my opinion while ignoring it.

      1. I have lost count of the times, during my working career, when a quite attractive female colleague with lovely long hair had decided, upon attaining some age in their mid-to late 30s, to have their hair cut into a quite ugly shorter style. Their initial entrance with this inappropriate coiffure was invariably accompanied by a plaintive look seeking the approval of all their colleagues.

        Now, I like a woman who has an attractive short hair cut that suits her; but unfortunately, the majority of those having their long locks hacked off had chosen a style that was most unflattering and they would brook no criticism of their choice of a new ‘manageable’ hairstyle.

          2. Been out of sorts for a while, George – lacking the mental/emotional energy to post.

    2. How is requiring people are eligible to vote damaging democracy? You don’t like it because you get in thanks to voter intimidation, postal votes, corruption and fraud. It’d collapse the gimmigrant muslim bloc. All those currently stolen votes wouldn’t necessarily go to your chosen waster.

      No, it’s a good idea. People should be required to identify themselves. Then we can start preventing some people from voting. End the immigrant tide, stop the postal fraud.

      1. Nor am I Plum. Unless it’s Widders, Lozza Fox or Neil Oliver and I doubt any of them will run for the top job.

        3. Ann, encorage those idiots to get their manifestos together and give us a viable, opposition vote.

    5. To the contrary mr kahnt i hope the government bypasses the opinion of all those farty old lord fops, that at one stage you would have voted for it to be shut down.
      It’s been evident in our now lost democracy for many years that people like your self have come to power by election ‘administration errors’.

    8. Ah yes, the same complaint that the Democrats are making. Anyway, isn’t the idea for free ID cards to be issued to people who don’t have driving licences or passports. Oh wait, they still have to prove who they are…

    1. Blacks have the highest single parent family numbers going. Over 70% of Muslim pakistanis are utterly welfare dependent.

      They are not starving. They’re economically useless. There’s a difference.

        1. And in steps welfare, to feed, clothe, house and pay for this dross, as apparently expecting people to work for a living is ‘wrong’.

      2. I read there are now more than 8 million people in the UK between the ages if 16 and 65 who have and will never pay a penny for their keep.

        1. I suspect it’s more than that. Maybe closer to 12 or even 16 million. I also suspect the majority of those are foreigners.

        2. Yet when the state wants taxes paid, it’s to whitey and the nuclear family that he turns.

    4. Starve then, you black bastards – we don’t need you, nor the Muslims. I shall be so happy to know that they are starving to death – all of them.

      Yes, I’m a white, supremicist, racist bastard, who wishes to see my country free of these freeloaders,

      Rakisha, you silly upvoting TWAT, we know what you’re about. Go home – we need you not.

    2. They closed garden centres and DIY stores, too. People could have kept much busier if they’d been allowed to do stuff like that.

    4. If they closed KFC the muslims and blacks would riot. Doesn’t take much does it? I think the lot of them have mental health issues.

  79. Oh, dear.
    https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/the-queen-traditional-maundy-services-buckingham-palace-b993381.html
    The Queen has pulled out of the traditional Maundy services, Buckingham Palace has announced. The Prince of Wales and Camilla will step up to represent Her Majesty. It is understood to be the first time Charles has represented his mother at the ancient royal event. It will take place at St George’s Chapel, Windsor on 14 April.

    The royal couple will be met by the Dean of Windsor, The Right Reverend David Conner KCVO and the Lord High Almoner, the Right Reverend Dr. John Inge.
    Following the service, The Prince and The Duchess will proceed to the West Steps where an official photograph will be taken of Their Royal Highnesses and the Royal Maundy party.

    It is understood the Queen was unable to commit that she would be able to attend. The monarch attended a service commemorating the life of the Duke of Edinburgh last week with senior royals and a congregation of hundreds. She has been carrying out virtual events and her other duties as head of state.

    There have been four occasions where another MRF has attended in Her Majesty’s absence:
    1954: The Lord High Almoner represented The Queen as Her Majesty was on a Commonwealth Tour
    1960: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother represented The Queen as Prince Andrew was born in February
    1964: The Princess Mary, Princes Royal, represented The Queen as Prince Edward was born in March
    1970: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, represented The Queen as Her Majesty was on tour in New Zealand

    I fear that Her Majesty is running out of steam, especially now Prince Phillip is not there to support her and give her strength. I hope I’m wrong, but…

    2. The bastard press just want her to die. So that woke Chas and even woker William can weepingly follow her.

    3. She has been an astonishing monarch and a great representative of this country. She is, perhaps our greatest Briton.

      However, if I might ask one final service of Her Majesty – hold on until your jubilee, then get shot of this country to join your husband waiting for you. I’m told we’ll get a bank holiday or two.

    4. As I have said before, I feel HM will not be seen in public much, maybe a couple of appearances over the Jubilee holiday. She will continue to do what she can via virtual stuff but, she will be 96 on April 21. She has led a life of service to this country and we should never forget that.

      1. Indeed, I wish I had such stamina as she does. And I’m nowhere near as old.

        2. And the same ability to be surrounded by fools and knaves, and not cut their heads off!

    5. God bless and keep our dear Monarch and may she be cannonised for sainthood upon her demise.

      A very great lady.

  80. Was going to put this into the genetic discussion down the page, but got white screened:-

    Klinefelter (XXY) syndrome
    Klinefelter syndrome, also known as 47,XXY is the set of symptoms that result from two or more X chromosomes in males. The primary features are infertility and small poorly functioning testicles. Often, symptoms are subtle and subjects do not realize they are affected.

    XYY syndrome is a genetic condition in which a male has an extra Y chromosome. There are usually few symptoms. These may include being taller than average, acne, and an increased risk of learning problems. The person is generally otherwise typical, including typical rates of fertility.

    Triple X syndrome
    Triple X syndrome, also known as trisomy X and 47,XXX, is characterized by the presence of an extra X chromosome in each cell of a female. Those affected are often taller than average. Usually there are no other physical differences and normal fertility. Occasionally there are learning difficulties, decreased muscle tone, seizures, or kidney problems. Triple X is due to a random event. Triple X can result either during the division of the mother’s reproductive cells or during division of cells during early development.

    Turner syndrome
    Turner syndrome, also known 45,X, or 45,X0, is a genetic condition in which a female is partly or completely missing an X chromosome. Signs and symptoms vary among those affected. Often, a short and webbed neck, low-set ears, low hairline at the back of the neck, short stature, and swollen hands and feet are seen at birth.

    1. I’m afraid that they won’t let scientific fact get in the way of fashion.

        1. I watched him at The Talk of the Town many years ago . It was a great show and a very good meal. Coffee and petit fours was 16/- each.

  84. Finland comes under cyber attack and a Russian aircraft enters its airspace as Zelensky addresses its parliament… just hours after politicians said the country will apply for NATO membership in weeks
    Finland’s main government website and the ministries of defence and foreign affairs were targeted in hack
    Russia’s state aircraft the IL-96-300 violated airspace for three minutes off the country’s southern coast
    Former PM Alexander Stubb said an application to join NATO will be submitted by Finland by the end of May
    He dismissed Kremlin threats as sabre-rattling despite Ukrainian horrors, but said he expects cyber attacks

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10700063/Finland-cyber-attacked-Russian-aircraft-enters-airspace-Zelensky-addresses-parliament.html?ito=push-notification&ci=em9OkziodC&cri=MC0idY128p&si=26738248&ai=10700063

    2. Universal diversity. In the 1970s, I knew of a white, female secretary who could do that and she only required paper and pens – no BLACK board required.

  86. Evening, all. The lead letter writer must have a very vivid imagination (or has been glued to too much TV propaganda). I don’t feel that anything in the Ukraine is happening to me. I have enough problems with my own bunch of destroyers in Westminster. On a personal note, Oscar has been in the dog house today. Returning from our walk he scooped up a half a Mars bar some scrote had dropped on the pavement before I could stop him. As chocolate is toxic to dogs (and I really can’t afford another hefty vet’s bill so soon), I tried to get it off him. The little B bit my thumb (and swallowed the chocolate). I was not happy, more grumpy. I told him that if he died, it would be his fault, and there was still time for me to send him back to the dogs’ home if he survived and did it again. It didn’t draw blood, but the site is sore (not helped by the fact the joint is already swollen by arthritis). Hence, he has been sent to Coventry and deprived of cuddles, treats, the remains of my meal and general fuss. It appears not to have registered as he’s snoring his head off without a care in the world. I shall have to wear my gardening gloves (thick leather) every time I take him for a walk now in case it happens again. I gave him the benefit of the doubt when he first arrived, but he’s had 10 months now to know not to do things like that to me.

    1. Two steps forward… Oh, well, by the morning, hopefully things will be better, including the thumb!

          1. Until the next time there’s an argument over food (whether it’s for his well-being or not). The solution is wearing thick leather gloves and then it won’t matter if he tries to bite, I’ll still be able to remove the offending item.

          2. A vet tried wearing thick leather gauntlets when giving one of our cats a checkup, the cat still managed to draw blood.

          3. To be fair to Oscar, although he bit me, he didn’t draw blood even without my wearing gloves. It was just painful (and I’ll probably have a bruise later).

    2. What a bugger. Not a nice thing to happen. Dogs, also children, will backslide now and again. Hope it’s less painful soon.

    3. Oh dear…….bad boy, Oscar. Did the chocolate make him ill, or is it too early to tell?

      Sadly I think he’s too late in his life for some of his lack of proper training when young to be eradicated.

      1. He seems to be okay so far. He has been sucking up to me, wanting a fuss. I held out for most of the day, but he’s had cuddles and treats now. I estimate it’s too far now from the incident for him to make the connection.

        1. That’s good – so at least he’s not ill, and you can both go to bed having made up.

          1. Never let the sun go down on your anger. If he has stomach ache it will serve him right! He should appreciate I’m only doing the best thing for him.

          2. Morning Conway

            Sorry about your bite from Oscar.. he probably showed great remorse .

            I have seen gundog people giving their dogs a small lump of Mars chocolate , when out and about on shoots .. Labs and spaniels work very hard , and a little lump is an energy fix, so I have been informed … Lots of chocolate not ver good , but I guess Mars has the glucose effect.

        3. Conners, perhaps he’d heard too much from humans about saving the planet (Earth) and he thought that by eating the chocolate he was saving planet Mars. Lol.

  88. What the hell did they expect? After two years of on and off lockdowns there have been consequences. Oh what a surprise. Obesity on the increase, childhood fine motor and other skills falling behind, domestic and child abuse on the increase, secondary school pupils falling behind in everything…..
    And now Boris the Moron says he can’t rule out more lockdowns. My husband and I will not be obeying any more stupid pointless rules from Boris and his asinine government. I cannot help but think that if both of us had been able to see the quack even last year, we would not be in the state we are in!
    I was tempted to email Mark Dolan tonight and tell him that I did not become obese during lockdown- in fact I lost 2 stone in weight.
    Stop micromanaging our lives and let us all make our own choices.
    God, I have had enough of this bullshit!!!!!

    Here endeth the rant ;-))

    1. A good book, glass of wine and music on headphones works wonders. Give one finger to them all and ignore the bullshit.

      1. I do that most evenings Andrew. I did start listening to my history talk on YT but got sucked into Mark Dolan. You might like the talks also- Reading the Past by Dr. Kat. She covers all sorts including Richard III.

        1. YouTube, I hate it 🙄 no… I tell a lie.
          It has become something I dip into and ration myself, otherwise I could spend hours jumping from one item to another.
          Will look for the Dr. Kat videos; did notice her name a few days ago when looking for info about Tower Hill.

    2. Boris Johnson and his repulsive cabal talk about Putin and War Crimes. The actual War Crimes have been and continue to be committed by Johnson.

      The poisonous vaccines, the dereliction of the NHS which became a Covid Service overnight postponing its normal work in healthcare and treatments, the dereliction of duty allowed by GP practices many of whom refused face to face patient consultations, the blatant coercion of the populace through fear and behavioural science manipulation (nudge units for chrissake), the weaponisation of the Police against those objecting to tyranny, the blatant corruption in the procurement of PPE and the purchase of worthless ‘vaccines’ and the psychological disaster wrought on the nation as a whole in particular children and teens.

      1. 351887+ UP TICKS,

        Evening C,
        We never had a lockdown or any jab,jabs, just carried on, only thing different was home deliveries.
        As I remarked it would not have surprised me to see grown men ,masked up, slapping their arses and breaking into a canter.

        1. We simply endured the Covid nonsense and watched in amazement that anyone could believe a single word uttered by Whitty, Vallance, Van Tam, Harries and that repulsive tub of rancid lard Johnson.

          These pitiful examples of the ‘ruling class’ seem to us utterly mad or else utterly corrupt.

          We wish to see the lot of them prosecuted and put behind bars for the universal misery and economic damage they have caused. Their finances should be investigated and their ill-gotten gains sequestrated and given back to the people they have robbed blind viz. British taxpayers.

    3. We have the other extreme. Our provincial politicians are saying that enough is enough but doctors, health officials, teacher and many lefties are pushing for the return of mask mandates and other restrictions. Many are taking it a. In and sheepishly continuing to wear masks for just another few weeks – again.

      We are also supposed to get a second booster shot now. Forwardbplanning at it’s best- they announced it just five days after closing down the mass vaccination clinics.

      Don’t get me going about yesterdays budget announcement, your rants will be nothing compared to what we think.

    4. If for no other reason, maybe those on here, in the depths of depression (or the heights of anger) need to get together for a group hug and a dispensation of one’s favourite tipple.

      Then we can do a unanimous, “Fuck I, Bigger I , Blast.”

    5. Good morning Ann
      What a very fine rant it was and you have expressed my feelings as well.
      We will not be participating in any more of his ‘party games’. Not that we did with the last lot.

    6. Good morning Ann
      What a very fine rant it was and you have expressed my feelings as well.
      We will not be participating in any more of his ‘party games’. Not that we did with the last lot.

  89. Can whoever put on the article by the Swiss ex NATO chap about the Ukraine conflict put the link on again. Thanks

  90. Finally something good.

    We went to an outlet shopping centre today and the boss did not spend any money on anything.

    Probably a first.

      1. No, Trudeau has killed manufacturing here, this was all good Chinese trash. Under US labels.

  91. I’ve got a phantom upticker following me. As soon as I post, I get a single uptick, God knows why. I’ve been awake these last two hours since 3am, so some person or bot must be truly dedicated!

    I blame Putin.

    Edit – the last five have gone by the names of Angela, Jessica, Denise, Marissa and Rakisha, I wonder if this harem of lovelies knows what i am truly like?

    1. It’s the new version of the downvote bot. They are apparently young women but really sex sites. Disqus blasted them a while ago, and now they are back. Don’t click, horrible things might happen to your pc.

    2. I would be particularly worried by Rakisha. Phizee tells me that she is an insatiable nymphomaniac.

Comments are closed.