Friday 8 March: By neglecting pensioners, the Budget has alienated more of the Tories’ natural supportersFriday 8 March:

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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

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

901 thoughts on “Friday 8 March: By neglecting pensioners, the Budget has alienated more of the Tories’ natural supportersFriday 8 March:”

  1. Good morrow, gentlefolk. Today’s (recycled) story
    A LESSON IN DEMOCRACY,

    A black kid asks his dad, “Dad, what’s democracy?”
    (Wait…the kid doesn’t know his Dad…let’s start again…)

    A black kid asks his mom, “Mama, what’s a democracy?”
    “Well, son, that’s when whites work every day so we can get all our benefits!”

    “But mama, don’t the white people get pissed off about that?”
    “Sure, they do but that’s called racism!”

  2. Good morning, chums. First today. Oops! Sir Jasper beat me to it.
    AND, I failed at Wordle today.Wordle 993 X/6

    🟨⬜⬜⬜⬜
    ⬜🟨🟨⬜⬜
    ⬜🟨🟨⬜🟨
    ⬜🟨🟨⬜🟨
    ⬜🟨🟨⬜🟨
    ⬜🟨🟨⬜🟨

    What on earth happened there? I accept that the first line should have been yellow, but the next four should have all been green. Is the Spectator messing about with me too?

    Anyhow I should have started by wishing MLE (Middle Land Expert), i.e. our dearly beloved Geoff, a Very Happy 67th birthday. Hat tip to Mr and Mrs Rastus for the reminder last night. Have a great day, Geoff.

    2. That’s an interesting sequence. I managed to unearth the solution but only just.
      Wordle 993 5/6

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

  3. Good Morning Folks

    Bright frosty start here

    I see that Biden’s state of the union address was very short.
    When challenged he said that he had forgotten where he lived

  4. By neglecting pensioners, the Budget has alienated more of the Tories’ natural supporters Friday 8 March:

    I can understand his thinking with the election not coming until October or early New Year, the fully jabbed pensioners wont be much of an issue

    1. He kept the triple lock which should be abolished along with all other unaffordable pension percs. We need to drastically reduce the size of the state, Milei style

      1. See how your attitude might change when/if the pension is all you have to live on.

        1. Your’s is a fair point of view but without dramatic cuts to the size of the state it will go bust and then the cuts will be truly epic. We have no money for Defence, roads or nuclear power because of the size of the state and welfare Budget.
          The issue is that the welfare system disincentivises people from working, as does the student loan system. Hunt’s cuts to NI make some sense in this context but the non indexing of the tax free and other allowances is awful and regressive.

          1. Immigration, Ilmmigration, Immigration and add (subtract) Net zero and Climate Change and we’re back to normal

          2. Immigration is a massive drain on the Treasury as some reports are now saying, but the fundamental problem is that every household with an income just under £40k is a drain on the Treasury. That’s most of them and many millions contribute zilch and feel a sense of entitlement.
            The time limiting of working age benefits needs to be introduced, perhaps 6 months maximum in any 5 years.

          3. I should have added the cost of benefits in my post to Michael above. The triple lock is not a benefit but a way found in the past to solve the problem of our contributions to the pension system being squandered by successive governments.

          4. One of the problems is the categorisation by politicians of the standard state pension as “benefits”.

            To some extent this is true: the emerging state pension is sometimes somewhat greater than could have been achieved by the notional investment return on some people’s contributions (which aren’t invested anyway, but frittered away by governments). Had there been an investment pot, as is the case for example in some Scandinavian countries, then there would be a proper fund to mitigate (even if not fully meet) the costs when pensions come into payment. This would also be a counter-argument to those in Gen Z who resent their taxes being spent on supporting the oldies – they forget that our taxes were also spent on previous generations of oldies.

            Then there is the misallocation of pensions, for example the ability of each of four wives of a certain demographic potentially getting a state pension each – and if they haven’t paid enough NICs they can often get Pension Credit., which is totally a welfare benefit.

      2. I beg to differ, Michael. Keep the triple lock as promised; what is needed is cancelling the cost of sending our money to Ukraine and more money to hotels giving “free” accommodation to illegal immigrants. Incidentally, keeping the triple lock is only a promise until the next General Election when – whichever party is in power – it will be found to be “no longer affordable”.

        1. I certainly agree with cancelling both of them. But I’m afraid I do still believe the triple lock needs to be reduced to a double lock

    2. Being a totally UNjabbed pensioner and ex-Tory voter, I hope to cause him problems.

  5. Morning everyone. I note that there has been a little friction, though nothing serious as yet, between the New Nottlers from the Speccie and Residents. This is only to be expected. New acquaintances have unknown sensitivities. It is necessary to take this into account and not fly off the handle when they surface. Taken overall I think this influx is not only desirable but necessary. It is only last Monday that Grizz posted a comment about the number of people Nottl has lost in the last five or six years. We need to make these up or we will sink into a torpid Rest Home for Retired far-Righters. None of us should doubt that the PTB regard all of us as their enemies and will do everything possible to prevent the views that we all represent being broadcast online. The Speccie move was only the latest.

      1. I sincerely hope not, Bob3. In the last few days many have suggested that Pretty Polly is back under a new pseudonym.

        1. Polly upvoted all my posts the other day – most of which were somewhat dismissive of her repetitious posts.
          Edit: my phone changed Polly to Pollution. For some reason.

        2. Polly upvoted all my posts the other day – most of which were somewhat dismissive of her repetitious posts.
          Edit: my phone changed Polly to Pollution. For some reason.

    2. Agreed but if some of them seem to lack any sensitivity, then “settling in” might take a while.

      1. This is inevitable. For what it is worth I suspect the vast majority will fade away as Nottl’s format will not appeal to them!

    3. I’m pleased to see new people posting, it stops NoTTL being too much of an echo chamber. And I’m getting used to the new characters as well, so overall, a positive thing. I hope the old NoTTLers don’t fade away, that would be a very sad event.

    4. My journey was far from the Rest Home in Tunbridge Wells. I started my online rabbiting with the BBC ‘Today’ programme, when they allowed comments. When they ceased to be interested in anything other than official propaganda, I went onto Yahoo! Answers, but they then got at that with a redesign of the user interface, rendering it unworkable. So I went onto the New Statesman, but Helen Lewis then declared that the concerned public was not better than those who scribble graffiti on toilet walls, and their columnists were getting sick of their readers arguing with them, especially the feminists, so they stopped comments, and I went over to The Spectator. I am not a natural Tory, having voted Conservative just once in fifty years of general elections, but I relished the prospect of being a cat among the puffins. For a few years, I would go there to comment on specific issues, and here to be among friends, who do not care about one’s politics so long as one is adequately and respectfully argumentative.

      To help me get to sleep, I set about designing Disqus as I would have it. First off, all the links to topics and first lines of new threads would be on one line of text, no more and definitely no graphics or flashing animations. That way, I could see twenty or thirty items to choose from on a screen, rather than two or three. Each topic would have an unlimited time period in which to comment, and rather than repeating the same topic a week later, threads could go on for months or even years. For example, there is no reason to repeat threads about Gaza or Ukraine every other day, with old threads soon vanishing into the memory hole only to be brought up again. This would offer a constant smorgasbord of topics to choose from, with new topics at the top, rather than repeats of old ones.

      Next off, I would discourage repeating the same comment on a thread, and instead allow editing of an existing thread, which could change drastically from the original. This would require a link to edit history, so that responders could know when and how a comment has changed, and remark accordingly. There is nothing more irritating that spotting a typo or a misword, but having the dreaded “edited” label when making minor corrections. Major rethinks of a post could also be documented and may make fun reading for the saddos among us.

      There would be a link to responses, rather than having them under the main comment. Conversations, chatter and online feuds would not then clutter up the main thread, but could be delved into at will. For those with the time for a lengthy read, there could be an Expand All button, where responses could then be written out in full.

      There could be two sites – one would be a place to discuss issues, and the other like this one, a Common Room where friends could gather, and sometimes refer to specific threads on the other site.

      In short, going back to the old interface that existed when software developers treated us like intelligent humans, rather than sales fodder for their AI.

  6. I was watching some Andrew Lawrence to cheer myself up (lol) and beneath one of the videos someone had posted this.

    “ This is important, and it comes from Danish political journalist Anders Bruun Laursen. ……….. He managed to squeeze out of the former Danish Prime Minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen at a dinner party, the fact that, when the EU signed the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership (in 1995, and in effect since 2010) deal with Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, the Palestine Authority, Israel, Lebanon, Syria and Turkey, secretly bound up inside it was THE FREE MOVEMENT OF PEOPLE. That means, basically, that people from these countries are in the EU at the EU’s own invitation. The EU just didn’t want anybody to know, but that is why there is no political will from the EU to prevent mass immigration into Europe from the other side of the Mediterranean.”

    I don’t know about you, but I’m prepared to believe this.

    Migration Pact signed by Theresa May in secret before she dropped off our radar

    1. I’m equally worried by the reputed Lancaster House agreement in the 1970s in which Western governments agreed with Gulf States not to oppose the Islamification of Europe in exchange for keeping the oil flowing. I have seen old footage of interviewed delegates but never any official recognition of what was agreed.

  7. I was watching some Andrew Lawrence to cheer myself up (lol) and beneath one of the videos someone had posted this.

    “ This is important, and it comes from Danish political journalist Anders Bruun Laursen. ……….. He managed to squeeze out of the former Danish Prime Minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen at a dinner party, the fact that, when the EU signed the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership (in 1995, and in effect since 2010) deal with Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, the Palestine Authority, Israel, Lebanon, Syria and Turkey, secretly bound up inside it was THE FREE MOVEMENT OF PEOPLE. That means, basically, that people from these countries are in the EU at the EU’s own invitation. The EU just didn’t want anybody to know, but that is why there is no political will from the EU to prevent mass immigration into Europe from the other side of the Mediterranean.”

    I don’t know about you, but I’m prepared to believe this.

    Migration Pact signed by Theresa May in secret before she dropped off our radar

  8. Have a Happy, happy day, Geoff, followed by 364 happy unbirthdays.

    Clear eyesight would be a great gift but not one I can bestow. A quick prayer to Him upstairs might help!

    1. Could always try washing the spectacles with Fairy liquid and warm water. Works a treat for me when things get a bit blurry. Or, stand a bit closer!

      1. Fairy liquid is good but be careful with the temperature of the water if your spectacles have an anti-scratch coating. Hot water can de-nature it and leave the lenses looking murky in patches.
        BTW, those of us in the twilight years usually need to stand further away rather than nearer.

        1. That’s the problem with becoming long-sighted with age. It doesn’t correct or counteract any pre-existing short-sightedness; one just ends up with both… :o(

      2. Fairy liquid is good but be careful with the temperature of the water if your spectacles have an anti-scratch coating. Hot water can de-nature it and leave the lenses looking murky in patches.
        BTW, those of us in the twilight years usually need to stand further away rather than nearer.

  10. Help! One in five people in Britain does not know where the Beatles came from.

    ONE in five Britons is unaware that the Beatles came from Liverpool, according to a survey into the nation’s knowledge of music history.Two in five do not know that Oasis hail from Manchester, and more than half have no idea that the British punk scene originated in London.

    The survey of more than 2,000 adults was conducted on behalf of National Rail to mark the launch of a new set of travel guides exploring Britain’s musical heritage.

    Jo Whiley, the Radio 2 presenter, narrates the stories of 30 cities and the “music gems” they contain. They range from the well-known, such as the Cavern Club in Liverpool, to the more obscure. The guide to Peterborough mentions the Nene Valley Railway, where Queen shot the video to their 1989 single ‘Breakthru’ on a platform attached to a moving train.

    The survey also found that only 12 per cent of Britons know that trip hop originated in Bristol, 40 per cent are aware that grime was born in London, and 9 per cent mistakenly believe that Madonna is British.

    The guide for Stevenage references Knebworth House, which has hosted record-breaking concerts, but also Coda, a musical instrument shop on the high street where members of the Prodigy and Supergrass reportedly shop.

    Doncaster gets its own guide as the home of former One Direction star Louis Tomlinson and singer Tony Christie. Watford is linked to Sir Elton John, as honorary life president of the town’s football club, and to George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley, who went to school in nearby Bushey. Birmingham is “the home of heavy metal” and the guide signposts the Crown Pub, close to New Street Station, where a local band called Earth played their first gig in 1968. They subsequently changed their name to Black Sabbath. The Widnes guide begins with the tale of Paul Simon writing the lyrics to Homeward Bound as he waited for a train, and ends with the town’s other musical place in history: Spike Island, where the Stone Roses played in 1990.

    Several London railway stations have their own guides. The London Bridge edition includes the story of Keith Richards and Sir Mick Jagger meeting down the line at Dartford station. The Euston edition journeys to nearby Camden, with its history of punk, Britpop and Amy Winehouse.

    Whiley said: “I’m very passionate and proud of Britain’s musical heritage, and I’d hate for people to lose their connection to it. I believe that you can appreciate music on a whole new level when you get out there and experience the places that influenced it.“

    “Working with the rail industry, I’m hoping to inspire fans to take a trip, by train, and discover more about their favourite bands and genres of music.”

    This is down to a combination of three unassailable facts: The exponentially accelerating rise in human stupidity; an unstoppable nosedive in the calibre of parenting; and the inexorable plummeting of the standard of education.

    Today’s imbecilic excuse for a future generation have their faces permanently glued to a technology that could give them an instant access of reference that required a trip to the library for previous generations; however, they choose to use those electronic devices for no other reason than to ensure their ever-increasing moronity.

    1. Who on earth is Sir Elton John, Grizzly. Are you referring to Sir Reginald Dwight?

      2. I have not made any reference to anyone, Auntie Elsie. I did not write that DT article.

    2. Sorry, George, but it’s unlikely that the knowledge of where a particular music genre originated, is going to badly affect our cultural heritage.

      1. Yo Sir J

        Soon, the only music allowed, will be from the million mosques, via loud speakers

        1. I thought music was haram. The NHS could do a pretty nifty Call to Prayer though when they run out of anaesthetics.

      2. You are missing the bigger picture, Tom. It’s not just about ‘cultural heritage’ it’s about the unstoppable stupidity of the species.

    3. There’s a clue at the very top in the headline, although contradicted in the next paragraph. “People in Britain” is not the same as “Britons”. I’m not at all surprised if 20% of “people in Britain” do not know where The Beatles hail from.

      I know the Coda shop on my town’s High Street, but not its Prodigy and Supergrass links. There are a couple of other music links my town has. Ken Hensley of Uriah Heep was brought up here after his family moved from London and John Cooper Clarke, the punk poet, lived in the Old Town for a couple of years. He liked it here.

      https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Hensley
      https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2018/oct/28/john-cooper-clarke-my-trousers-river-island-or-ms-the-skinniest-they-do

      1. She should list my local pub – it’s where Supergrass played before they made it big. The brother of one of them still has my geology books that I lent him thirty years ago. I wonder his superstar singer brother could afford to buy him his own now.

        2. Huh! I sold my Sun record Elvis LP for 6d to a chap I fancied at school.
          The rat never paid me.

      2. Uriah Heep, in the David Byron era, with Ken Hensley, Mick Box, Gary Thain and Lee Kerslake they were my favourite 1970s rock band. I saw them at Sheffield City Hall and at the Empire Pool, Wembley.

          1. I’m hoping that it is just over 3½ months or there will be Tears In My Eyes until Sunrise on July 1, Dukke.😘

          2. Perhaps then you will Look at Yourself happily in the mirror (that’s not to imply that you can’t do just that now!)

            PS I can’t count any more – or maybe I’m just an optimist!

    4. The Beatles broke up forty years before many of today’s teenagers were born.

      I doubt I could state where those music hall acts killed in the First World War came from.

      1. Gracie Fields came from Rochdale and ended up on Capri.

        I know that because my grandmother told me, as part of my all-round education. Something that has died the same death as the abacus, the goose-feather quill, mental arithmetic and general knowledge.

      2. He’s just a long-festered corpse from the bible-belt who croaked on a cocktail of drugs and an unhealthy obsession of eating fried sandwiches filled with a disgustingly unholy concoction of monkey-nut paste and grape jam.

    6. I know the Beatles came from Liverpool, as for the rest of the British popular music from the ’50s to the ’80s I’m quite au fait with that. The musicians’ places of birth or where they started playing together has never held any interest for me. The same with music from other parts of the world, it’s just the music I’m interested in.

    7. ” Birmingham is “the home of heavy metal” and the guide signposts the Crown Pub, close to New Street Station…” The Crown (b 1368) is about half a mile from New St Station. Hardly close. Anyway, these “surveys” seem pretty contrived.

      1. Do they serve decent cask-conditioned English ale at The Crown?

        Seeing as it’s Brum, I’m guessing Mild rather than Bitter.

  12. Nice little two to start the day

    Wordle 993 2/6

    🟨🟩⬜🟨🟨
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  13. Theresa May to stand down as MP at next election. 8 March 2024.

    Former prime minister Theresa May has said she will be standing down as an MP at the next election.
    In a statement, she said she had taken the “difficult decision” to vacate her Maidenhead seat after 27 years.

    Alas 27 years too late!

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-68509239

    1. She’s useless, not blind. She knows what’s coming. Who will they parachute in to replace her with?
      Couldn’t do any worse than a turnip.

    2. And when Maidenhead is won by Labour the deluded, repulsive Gorgon will deceive herself into thinking that the Conservatives lost the seat because she was not standing.

    3. With her lemon lipped permanent grimace it’s probably the only way for her to lose her Maidenhead.

  14. My Irreverend podcast has just popped into my podbox. Looking forward to 1 3/4 hours of fun with the ladz.

    1. Is there a Youtube link? Those excellent vicars might cheer me up after the appalling behaviour of our soon to be ex-vicar last night.

        1. The haircut is certainly quite a change. It took me a second and a third look to recognise who he was.

          1. Me neither. Especially when I’m standing on the tube 9 inches away from someone, but their hair is in my face and up my nose. Thank goodness I don’t have to travel to work any more!

  16. Good morning, all. Sort of blue sky. Chilly.

    I watched Prince Philip’s funeral again last evening. Apart from the shocking image of The Queen alone in a black face cloth – I had forgotten that virtually everyone wore those awful masks – bearer parties, troops hither and yon. Three years ago (nearly).

  17. Good morning all.
    A tad under 2°C, heavy overcast, dry, but no mist for a change.

  18. Good morning all and good morning troopers of the 77th,

    Grey overhead McPhee Towers, wind in the East, 4℃ with the Met Office climate cultists promising 10℃ today, staying dry.

    So, Treason May, the woman who played the leftists’ game for them by appending the ‘nasty party’ label to conservative members, did her best to frustrate Brexit, had Britain sign the UN Charter on Migration and gave us Net Zero, is standing down. Another who doesn’t want to be around when the bovine ordure hits the rotating cooling device. As it will. But we’ll remember her, won’t we. She can run, but she can’t hide.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/80d3dc37b242b756499c49d9d9be5f4dafd10a4c51486033a046a080a1ac565e.png

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/03/08/rishi-sunak-latest-news-theresa-may-mp-general-election/

    2. I can’t imagine that the decision to stand down was the least bit “difficult” for her. She’s probably looking for out of sight out of mind anonymity in which to enjoy her husband’s wealth (and her ill-gotten gains).

  19. Truly excellent article by Ewen Stewart, one of the best City economists around, in TCW today on the real state of the economy. Well worth a read.
    I long ago concluded that the state is the author of almost all of our current problems.

  21. Good morning, all. Blue sky all around means there’s concrete to be mixed and posts erected.

    Reality.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/97f092f2656f2453cd8c2d91ff2edf0f3013df736b13aea59ce5b8952e0e18ba.png
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3dadbc3b62f46afb7450cef986356af173b57becf7361685822bbf6e2aebbfff.png
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e13123e5255da014c78d48fddfb0c931eb4a7d28b991f05c1becb416d60cddad.png

    Dream on!

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d5cdb0a136064fe1c8d0dec211cb236cc3035ad282d3d26413e5d0bbb502c450.png

    1. Gollox Korky

      Blue sky all around means there’s concrete to be mixed and posts erected.

      SWMBO and me are Bennidooming again soon,

      Do we have to take shovels and the like, not our Cossies?

      1. Whatever floats your and SHMBO’s boat, OLT. I’ll be posting both here and in my garden.😎

    2. In case somebody reads to much into that last cat one, the clocks don’t go back until the end of October but may go forward this weekend in the USA if I remember right. We will have to wait till the end of the month for this artificial summer time.

      1. Spring forward, fall back. We are the last Sunday of March which will be Easter Sunday (and my parents’ 60th Wedding Anniversary).

        Edit. I always find it hard to contemplate that my parents have been married for longer than I’ve been alive!)

          3. If not the full nine months…

            Edit: nowadays it is not unknown for people to get married for Inheritance Tax purposes (not suggesting for a second that this had anything to do with molamola’s).

        2. We do things backwards chez mola. We married 4 months ago but have lived together 44 years and the children are 31 and 36 years old.

          1. I expect to hear of your engagement in due course followed by news of a woman you’ve begun dating after living together for nigh on 50 years, sometime towards the end of the present decade.

      2. Spring forward, fall back. We are the last Sunday of March which will be Easter Sunday (and my parents’ 60th Wedding Anniversary).

        Edit. I always find it hard to contemplate that my parents have been married for longer than I’ve been alive!)

    3. They can’t see the wood for the trees. Maybe they will after they’re gone.

      1. You don’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone. They took all the trees. Put ’em in a tree museum.

  24. 384466+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    A glimmer of good fortune settles upon us, heaven be praised.

    Theresa May, the former prime minister, has said she will stand down as an MP at the next general election.

    After the leadership farce she took the baton over from the wretch cameron, then took the high road of RESET treachery.

    Give her credit she made rhetorical silence pay handsomely in millions for speeches not uttered
    but the muted Chinese laundry blues playing in the background.

    Mrs May, who led the country between 2016 and 2019, down the road to RESET I believe ,she believes she has done “her bit” appertaining to the destruction of the United Kingdom RESET / NWO campaign and now is the time for her to enjoy the fruits of treachery.

    2. I was checking to see if anyone else had picked up on this before posting. And here you are.

      Queen Rat doing a runner: good riddance.

    3. The glimmer of good fortune settles upon us only briefly Og, spoilt when you remember that, after all the damage she did to this country, she’ll likely end up on the Lords and life a life of tax-payer funded luxury on her fat pension and speeches to the Globalist ‘elite’.

      1. 384466+ up ticks,

        Morning TA,
        Either way she will eventually fall foul of the chopping block via the peoples civil unrest or the mullahs takeover.

        2. The people are only stirred from their apathy by Black Lives Matter, climate change and Gaza.

    5. I’m puzzled. One of the stories in yesterday’s Telegraph had the headline ‘Sunak refuses to rule out May election’.
      https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/03/07/rishi-sunak-latest-news-jeremy-hunt-national-insurance-tax/

      But if she’s standing down, that must mean she’s ruling herself out?

      😉

          1. Well, my suggestion worked perfectly for me. And I am cack-handed and PC illiterate!

          4. It’s not new – It’s a back up account. For some reason I was unable to access the comments on TCW a couple of days ago with my usual one. When I could I found I’d switched to this one. I usually use the right-facing elephant on my phone and the left – facing one on the laptop.
            The image is a Kenyan sunrise a couple of years ago.

    2. Just what will be the height of effing stupidity that these political morons will reach ?

    3. One can only conclude that these men and women look at their own genitals and those of their partners and that what they see is the same size, thus concluding that a clitoris is a penis.

    4. What is ‘lunar text’? Is this how ‘lunatics’ is interpreted by either Alexa or Siri? If so, it’s little wonder that ‘barmpots’ is rendered as ‘barn pots’.

    2. Don’t get me started again!

      Wednesday’s lack of cake for this cause was bad enough. They provided the cakes yesterday as most of us WFH on Friday. I boycott the cake on principle.

      1. There was vegan cake in the office here yesterday. I asked what it was made of and with a large grin [no, not gin] was told that the main ingredients were sugar and water.

    3. Happy Birthday dear Geoff!! Belting it out from the rooftops on a beautiful day in Buenos Aires, with some completely unnecessary ornaments, an interpolated high note, and enough rubato to keep any organist on his to… ooops! 🤣🤣

      Much love, and I hope you have a wonderful day!

      Katy x

  29. Happy birthday 🎂 🥳 🎉 🎈 🎁 🎊 🥂🍷🧁💕🍰🥂 Geoff! And many more Nottling years!

  30. A good one from Michael Deacon on the Real Problem With Rule, Britannia. She doesn’t.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9d4bd4e55259ef6e34b8a830907ef35fa6fed8ee4b721020db53e8a63cff924b.png

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/columnists/2024/03/07/rule-britannia-proms-slave-trade-modern-britain-history/

    I’ve taken the liberty of improving his final paragraphs.

    Come to think of it, there’s one other problem with Rule, Britannia!’s lyrics. In this age of rapidly advancing AI and the WEF’s 4th Industrial Revolution, it feels rather complacent to predict that Britons never, never, never will be slaves.

    Ultimately, I suspect, that will be a question for our robot WEF masters. They’ve already decided we aren’t up to the job.

    1. Spot on Mac. But it’s even worse than that. It looks like that they have decided that we are useless mouths and therefore expendable.

  31. A good one from Michael Deacon on the Real Problem With Rule, Britannia. She doesn’t.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9d4bd4e55259ef6e34b8a830907ef35fa6fed8ee4b721020db53e8a63cff924b.png

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/columnists/2024/03/07/rule-britannia-proms-slave-trade-modern-britain-history/

    I’ve taken the liberty of improving his final paragraphs.

    Come to think of it, there’s one other problem with Rule, Britannia!’s lyrics. In this age of rapidly advancing AI and the WEF’s 4th Industrial Revolution, it feels rather complacent to predict that Britons never, never, never will be slaves.

    Ultimately, I suspect, that will be a question for our robot WEF masters. They’ve already decided we aren’t up to the job.

  32. Morning all 🙂😊
    Not quite as bad as recent starts to the day and promising.
    As far as I am concerned, as a pensioner and after the way our political idiots have let our nation down over the past 20 plus years. If I do bother to talk a walk to the ‘house of the ballot box’ unless reform or a similar party are on the list of candidates my felt tip pen will leave my message NOTA.
    And if they don’t understand why, it will just show once more, how out of touch with reality they all are.

    🎶Happy Birthday to you dear Geoff 🎶 🎹🎹
    Thanks for everything you have done. 🥂🍾 All the best to you today and all ways. 🤩🤗

  33. Dear Geoff,

    You are still a youngster and a wonderful host , despite the appalling trauma you have had with your health and especially so by adapting to a prosthetic leg life amongst difficult accommodation circumstances xxx

    Your Nottler site is a sanctuary for commonsense and free speech , and so with huge gratitude and lots of virtual hugs , here is a piece of birthday music you may have heard before , but in a different medium xx Happy birthday to you 🍷😙

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wu1Altb1N6A

        1. I am lunching with him this coming week. I have a present for him. I will tell him it’s from all of us.

  34. I suddenly saw the name Helen Lewis, whom I completely forgotten. It gave me a nasty turn.

  35. To whom it may concern:

    My collected works of Shakespeare weighs 7.94 lbs, oddly enough outweighed by my collected works of Jane Austin, which weighed in at an impressive 8.82lbs.

  37. Hail to the Chief this 8th March. Without him and his efforts, we’d none of us be here.

  38. From The Grimes this morning:

    “The Institute for Fiscal Studies’ post-budget briefing is where budgets traditionally go to die. Its director, Paul Johnson, the Wonk King, stands up in front of the assembled wonks and nobly fulfils his role of national post-budget extractor fan. The smoke is sucked away. The mirrors smashed.

    All the Treasury’s meticulously crafted phraseology, its double-counting, its, at times, complete liberation from reality, are dismantled with the precision with which they were created.

    Not that long ago, it took place over in Soho and was standing room only. These days it’s on Zoom, but it’s no less diminished for this.

    As has now become entirely routine, Johnson stared into his laptop in the corner of his corner office and set about shattering illusions.

    “Nothing that Jeremy Hunt did yesterday changed anything,” he said. Quite the opening. “We are still heading for a parliament in which living standards will be worse at the start than at the end. That’s pretty much unprecedented.””

    1. That measly £1 million and the point where it was announced changed everything.
      We now know who our rulers are: the ones who cannot be criticised.

  39. An excellent, if thoroughly depressing, analysis. Worth working through.

    The explanations for this weird outsourcing of Britain’s collective emotional life overseas are diverse but codependent: a Muslim population, swollen in the past 25 years by unprecedented high tides of immigration. A radicalized left still buzzing with the background radiation of the Jeremy Corbyn era. Generation Z with its Instagram-addled understanding of the world as slogan and spectacle. And a fortifying dose of what Walter Benjamin called bureaucratic romanticism: the tendency of the liberal middle classes to indulge a taste for revolutionary violence from afar, a rare excuse in these days of moral relativism for guilt-free ethical clarity, transposed to an agreeably abstract context where the boundaries between good and evil seem to be clearly delineated and a side can be picked and cheered on well out of sight or earshot of the actual fighting and, indeed, the actual issues.

    https://www.takimag.com/article/britains-political-staycation-foreign-affairs-at-home/

  40. Good morning all

    Overcast and cold this morning . 6c

    The Blizzard in the West
    It was on Monday March 9, back in 1891 that the giant blizzard struck the county. The fine weather of the past weeks suddenly ended, the temperature dropped quickly, and snow began to fall as the wind increased in strength. There was tremendous damage to property in the next few days, trains were de-railed, many ships wrecked around the Cornish coast, and throughout the county there were stories of lives lost in snowdrifts…

    On the railways in Cornwall and Devon some passengers were snowed up in a train for 36 hours… During this week the takings on the Great Western showed a drop of £12,980… A train that left Penzance at 6.25 pm that night arrived at Plymouth at 3 pm next day. There was a drift of snow 20ft high at Grampound… When a gang of men arrived to clear the track the cold was so intense that the snow froze on the men’s clothes, practically encasing them in ice…

    Source: Clive Carter, The Blizzard of 1891 [Newlyn Archive 3977]

    1. Wow. Imagine the howls of anger if that happened today (passengers being snowed in)

    2. I recall the ‘wrong type of snow’ incident which affected the lines between Kings X Liverpool Street and Cambridge. I left the office in Seymour Street at 3.00pm and finally arrived in Cambridge at 3.00am the next day.

      Thereafter I opted to drive from Cambridge to London, park at Snaresbrook and go in on the Central Line. Not that that was plain sailing.

  42. A comment on DT letters page , yes , we could all agree with this .

    Susan Hills
    9 MIN AGO
    We need a brave new government.
    We need the NHS taken to pieces and rebuilt we should get 500,000 staff out of that to put elsewhere.
    We need Whitehall taken to pieces and rebuilt we should set 200,000 staff out of that to put elsewhere.
    We need to go to war with the Home Office and make the staff reapply for their jobs.
    We need to close down the amazingly awful OBR.
    We need to send Welby on a project to Africa.
    Stop immigration completely at very short notice so we can go door to door find out who exactly is living here.
    A Brave new government.

      1. There are bits that aren’t.
        Northern Nigeria could do with a spot of his evangelical zeal.
        As a past oil executive, he would speak their language.

        1. Good thinking Anne. I was thinking more of Kenya where I was recently. Most of the people I’ve met in Kenya are far more devout Christians than most nominally Christian people here.

  43. Just got the hang of this and have copied it from yesterday’s page so some peeps might see it twice! Not about the budget though, but a close relative and it made me feel better.
    In another organ, Biden is seen as a stable force who listens to his advisers! What?! He’s supposed to direct, not take instructions from
    advisers. what is the point of having a vote in that case.
    It seems that only unelected people who are chosen get to decide how Americans live and under what rules, with the president playing Father Christmas with the power goodies.Very democratic!
    The difference in this country is that we have a puppet government enthralled to the civil service, big corporations and the public sector and certain special interest groups. It makes a big show of pretending to do what people want and then complains that it wasn’t their fault, those big boys stopped me just when I was about to do it.
    The point of expert advisors is to advise you on the best and fairest way to get your and your vision realised, which is your manifesto that people voted for you on. The civil and public services should then enact that plan.
    This does not mean they should be allowed to dump the whole lot in the bin and do what they’ve always wanted to do if they ever got anywhere near power.
    It’s been a lovely system most of the last thousand or so years, evolved to suit this particular little country and the buildings are excellent.
    However we can’t have idiots getting into powerful positions where everyone else’s lives hang in the balance and are dependent on their current whims and beliefs.
    The world is too big now for countries who still want to play in it to joined up individual local say over the country they”manage” for the world leaders.
    We either stop prancing about the world, joining international clubs of world power; dump
    international law in favour of our own and recreate our island home to suit our needs.
    Or the other is to completely dump the parliamentary system and the lords and create something that can truly hold these supposed leaders to account without wasting five years whilst they finish mucking things up for the next lot, or having to pay for more appeals than Man asylum seeker, or an enquiry that goes on forever, tells you nothing and no one carries the can.
    To end this rant; if I hear the words”we are very sorry for the pain/death this has caused and our hearts go out to the families affected “, or, worse of all, “lessons will be learnt”, one more time, I cannot guarantee to be responsible for my actions!

    1. Our gov’t and the snivel serpents (including the king) are all shills for WEF et al.

  44. This was hidden in my email inbox ..

    How on earth have they found my email address?

    Shell is suing us because 6 brave Greenpeace activists peacefully protested on one of their oil platforms last year. [1] The platform was heading to the North Sea where it was going to unlock new wells – so our activists peacefully occupied it to demand that Shell stops drilling for new fossil fuels and starts paying for the damage the climate crisis is causing across the world. [2]

    Shell’s multimillion dollar lawsuit is one of the biggest threats Greenpeace has faced in our 53 year history. This is a David vs. Goliath fight, but we’re not giving up and we’re not backing down.

    We have to fight this case with all we’ve got and we need you to stand with us every step of the way. Shell may have billions of dollars, but we have millions of people like you on our side.

    So we’ve just launched an open letter to Shell which we plan to draw attention to when we have our day in court. If enough people sign this letter, it will show the court and Shell just how outraged the public are by this lawsuit. Every signature shows that the public is firmly on our side – so please add your name now!

    We have been forced to take Shell on because our Government is repeatedly taking the side of Big Oil instead of ordinary people – who want cheaper bills and a safer climate.

    But believe me when I say that we can win this fight against Shell. Over the years we’ve come together in our millions to build powerful campaigns that have forced Shell to back down [3,4]. This is what people-power looks like – so let’s get out there and win again.

    Thanks for everything you do,

    Aiyan Maharasingam

    Greenpeace UK

    Green peace are idiots

    1. Greenpeace are dangerous idiots. I once saw them refusing to get out of the way of a 250,000 tonne fully laden oil tanker going up the river to Rotterdam. They were in a tiny sailing dinghy and maintained that ‘steam gives way to sail’ and that they had every right to carry on as they were, protesting about some lunacy or other. The tanker had a 15m draught and wholly unable to stop or maneuver and almost ran the idiots down.

      1. Probably signalling that she was ‘constrained by draught’ and kept her course!

        1. Correct. She had no choice. But the only thing that shifted to loonies was when she started blowing her horn at them. Scared them witless.

        1. I was reading about a chap recently who set himself the goal of shucking one million Oysters. He did it. Don’t know how long it took and he didn’t do them all on the same day. I love oysters but they go right through me. Fast.

          2. Yes, me too (Prince Edward Island oyster in Canada). I didn’t fancy repeating the experience.

          3. They say it’s like diving into the sea…..I just found it made me feel seasick. Posted on wrong comment.

    3. Somewhere there was a rainbow
      Sunk by the French
      Let’s hope Shell sinks those loonies
      I’ll watch from a sunny bench

        1. I think they just use an innocuous petition to harvest the email addresses. Which is why I have two – equally valid but one for personal use and the other for marketing/petitions and suchlike. Also the hedgehog one.

        1. They say it’s like diving into the sea…..I just found it made me feel seasick.

    5. I had a junk email this morning offering me 10 million email addresses for $1000.

  45. Belated Morning All

    I seem to be sleeping in later I wonder if it’s my new painkiller Gabapentin anyone else used this jollop??

    Meanwhile Medley Time

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/23b3818394e58bf445b1caf8f88be005e857cc36bb137b8a7c22d52c92fe6e65.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f7c434f00d407930c55e090d5bc525aaaeefc02425f8ba362faabb675535ed4c.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8725b54f368fe16894d1e651f57cfe306f34e0cba42749b24817a5da58a7070c.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/efb6ba9fe586ada959cd2544a753fa200220ce0e9cdefc2725c027c5ffc4eb7f.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9b9335eed3617c271401a8a42c75b4f7ade1fda1d8c141f2c151b1ec929beae6.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/fc79b20629e2c2017047dedd58f3336e1ed4e6d6465ec9bd4183b9247ecea5cf.jpg

    Oops

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/aca60384ba8d9e43ba2c8857f5568486c534fbab1ad008d20c826d2fe274f446.jpg

    1. If ‘Black Alien’ had hacked off his hands, no doubt he would be complaining about prejudice in a disablist society.

      2. On the other hand when they remake Star Wars he’s a shoo-in for the Cantina scene……

    3. Gabapentin is used to treat epilepsy.
      It’s also taken for nerve pain, which can be caused by different
      conditions, including diabetes and shingles. Nerve pain can also happen
      after an injury. In epilepsy, it’s thought that gabapentin stops
      seizures by reducing the abnormal electrical activity in the brain.

      NHS

      No me. I’m on Zapain. And on top of that i have delerium tremens this morning. I wouldn’t normally have a drink before lunch but today is the exception.

          1. I take two at a time before bedtime, but never for more than three days in a row without taking a break.

    4. My dog used to take gapabentin for his neurological condition. He also had to take it with trazadone to knock him out to go to the groomer’s and the vet’s. It took two hours for the combination to work and then he was away with the fairies.

    1. That is the money physically extorted by the local councils.
      The other 75% that they actually spend on roads, bins, parks etc…. comes from central taxation.

  51. 384466+ up ticks,

    Britain to pay Libya to stop migrants crossing the Mediterranean
    North African country to receive £1 million to help fund the return of people to their countries of origin in pioneering deal

    One million won’t go far when divvied up among the Libyan overseers, two / three new limmos …….

    How about the french and the ENGLISH channel crossers, regular payment to them has had a reverse affect and increased the numbers.

    Our political overseers regarding the incoming invasion numbers, are NOT paying to stem the flow, but to increase it.

    1. If the Libyans have any sense, they’ll follow the French example by pocketing the money and doing little or nothing.

      1. They don’t even need much sense – it’s bloomin’ obvious. The place where sense is needed is the British authorities, but they don’t have any. A veritable conundrum…

    2. 1 million. Do they realize that is chump change to the Libyans? They made $5 billion in the first 6 months of 2023 from oil and gas.

    3. 1 million. Do they realize that is chump change to the Libyans? They made $5 billion in the first 6 months of 2023 from oil and gas.

  52. It’s not only pensioners who are being treated shabbily. Just about everybody who works and contributes, or who has contributed is being right royally shafted. In fact, the country itself is being shafted as this is completely a woke, globalist civil service budget designed to increase the power and size of the state and accelerate our decline as a nation, no doubt in order to get us back into the failing EU and to meet the sinister net zero targets.

    Plenty of dosh to splurge on favourite groups like Muslims and immigrants though, and don’t get me started on those milking the green subsidy trough.

    2. There’s no need to rejoin the EU. Just pass legislation and adopt policies which mimic theirs.

      To be honest, there’s little reason to complain. Surely Boris’s much vaunted restoration of the crown stamp on pint glasses – although never outlawed in the first place and remaining an entirely voluntary mark – is a powerful enough symbol of the hard fought battle to regain national sovereignty and pride.

          4. I’m a new NoTTLer Bill, a Speccie refugee. And it’s not a typo really, it’s just that my left hand types faster than my right. It’s called ambidisastrous syndrome you see, so you shouldn’t mock the afflicted!

          6. Yes we do. DON’T mess with the English language – and that includes apostrophes and the difference between No, Know and Now.

            There are also 3 tos in the English Language, To, Too and Two.

  54. So “Black Alien” is not being hired by anyone. It’s unconscious bias, innit?

  55. Presumably if the Chinese Dupe Stooge DID “abolish” NI – he’d simply stick 10p on income tax rates…..

  56. Presumably if the Chinese Dupe Stooge DID “abolish” NI – he’d simply stick 10p on income tax rates…..

  57. Family, Angelina, is exactly how I view this site and its family members.

    Thank you for your comment.

      1. When one logs onto some websites, (such as Discurse) they want to know if you are human rather than a bot. So they put up a series of pix and ask you to select particular types of image.

  62. And Mrs Armstrong tells me her taste in shoes is appalling. Expensive, but appalling.

    1. Court shoes suit ladies. As Her Majesty showed us. Though i quite like stilettos. Not that i can walk in them. :@)

  63. Terror attack likely in Moscow today, UK and US warn. 8 March 2024.

    The UK and US embassies in Russia have warned that a terrorist attack could take place in Moscow within the next 24 hours.

    The security alert, issued by the US embassy and repeated by the UK, urged American citizens to “avoid large gatherings over the next 48 hours”.

    The embassy said it is “monitoring reports that extremists have imminent plans to target large gatherings in Moscow, to include concerts,” but it did not specify what kind of threats it referred to, or who might be behind them.

    What’s this? A False Flag operation aimed at Vlad?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/03/08/ukraine-russia-war-latest-news2/

    1. I bet they won’t be allowed to prance around Tverskaya Street on Saturday intimidating shoppers.

      1. The UK and US embassies in Russia have warned that a terrorist attack could take place in Moscow within the next 24 hours. No doubt they know because they are planning it, or planning to cause fear.

        1. The recently ‘retired’ Victoria Nuland threatened a surprise event targeting Putin four weeks ago. This was during her flying visit to Kiev presumably to advise Zelensky about her plans.

          Shortly after Nuland’s visit there were changes in the top military.

          There is widespread panic in the collective west given the imminent collapse of Ukraine and overwhelming success of the Russian operations. The US might be planning a last ditch crash and burn attack on Russian territory.

          Having failed in Ukraine the US will walk away and turn its warmongering attentions on China under the pretext that Taiwan is under threat. Taiwan is in fact a territory of China.

    2. I got the captcha reference, but what about the ‘how do we know if we are human’ bit?

      1. Non human machines cannot do captcha, or so we are supposed to believe.

        1. AI have found a way around captcha. There are businesses which employ people who will perform almost any service for a fee. The AI contacted the business with a request to do the captcha. How it paid for the service i don’t know.

      2. Blade Runner maybe? The storyline is that the androids are lifelike and endowed with false memories so that they don’t even know themselves whether they’re robots or human.

      3. It’s supposed to be a big, deep, philosophical question, however it can be answered with a traffic light captcha apparently…

      4. It says, prove you’re not a robot (and then an automated system checks you out – oh, the irony!).

  65. Wordle 993 4/6

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

    A boring par

  67. I comment on here, pretty well every day, even if it’s only the funny story – which seem much appreciated.

  70. If you correctly identify the squares containing traffic lights, it’s sufficient evidence that you’re not a bot.

  71. A couple of days ago I posted that a large part of our law and order problems were not the police but the CPS and our Judiciary

    “When 21-year-old Kel Thompson was arrested at his home on Lodge Lane

    in New Addington officers found a second weapon – a huge sword with a

    curved serrated blade.Ms Langevad told the court that Thompson

    has five previous convictions including a robbery with a rambo knife in

    2020, a violent robbery where he broke someone’s nose in 2021 and being

    caught by police with a 15-inch knife in 2022”

    https://uk.news.yahoo.com/knife-fanatic-threatened-man-20-155230988.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly9kaXNxLnVzLw&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAC5TO69eb2c3Mf82TbfisMiuE5Fqm6pVZCXqsbBjKGWJiO6_u-YAVaMO5UwvK_W-7hq4wXT2XpJpccSlgHu__S9hREYOnoUfUEi2YM4W108YXqhqMC9owjTKFmcfnGrUAa5DgA9VuTSmCqFVatwOAxrmx_gGlRfsMSLON5sPOWA0
    What the hell is this serial violent thug doing free on our streets to commit knife crimes??
    Two years 8 months,out in 16 months that’ll learn him………………..not!!

    1. Morning Rik. The Criminal Justice System like pretty well every other Government Institution is destroyed.

      1. Justice was never its strong point when I worked, for 10 years, as a Magistrates Court Usher from 2001-11.

    2. Perhaps he has an infestation of Japanese Knotweed.
      (Maybe I should retrain as a social worker.)

      1. Just trying to see whether I can ‘Follow’ Not the Telegraaph Letter’ via Disqus … Posting a comment is the easiest way to add the blog to my followed sites list.

  74. Back in the 1970s I lived for a while in Hayes, Kent and worked in the West End so had to travel by rail between Bromley South and Victoria. The trains were the old slam door kind and one morning we ground to a complete halt, probably near Battersea, in a blizzard with just clouds of white stuff visible through the windows. A lone voice piped up, “Where are we”? Another answered from the other end of the carriage, “Vladivostok”.

    2. I was on a slam door train once with a woman and child sitting opposite. The child was standing in front of the door looking through the window while fiddling with the door locking mechanism. The door swung open with the child dangling from it. We were moving quite fast. The woman calmly got the child by the scruff of the neck and hauled it in. I was shocked but she didn’t seem bothered.

    3. Must have been a similar time as I was travelling from Maidstone East to Victoria. Pulled out at 7.38 am got as far as Barming stopped and didn’t move for three and a half hours. Engine burnt out. Got to work at 1pm had lunch and was told I could go home. What a day.
      Fortunately there were a number of bridge schools in the train and we kept ourselves amused even though it was cold.

      1. Made me laugh! Reminded me of when I introduced the new man in my life to a dear friend who was a priest and who had actually both married us and buried my husband, about three years after I had been widowed. My husband had quite a fiery temperament (to put it mildly!) and I said to my friend that X had such an amazing temperament that in the year or so we had been together we had never even had an argument. My friend fixed me with a piercing look and said “Peta, you clearly aren’t trying hard enough!”

  76. A vicar, a priest and a rabbit are discussing blood groups.
    The priest says, “I think I’m a Type A”, the vicar says “I think I’m a Type B”. The rabbit says “I think I’m a Type O”.

    Ba boom-tish.

    1. Send in the SAS assassination squads. to WEF, WHO, UN and Bill & Melinda Foundations.

  81. Good moaning.
    My ear worm for today comes from “Annie Get Your Gun”:

    “He’s just died at 93
    Doin’ what comes naturaleee….”

    For some reason, it sprang into my mind when reading about Murdoch’s fifth marriage to a Russian divorcee with ‘connections’. I wonder if the new Mrs.M is a dab hand with novichok flavoured Complan?

    2. Complan! Gosh – a name from the past. Like wall-paper paste, I always thought.

  82. Getting a bit crowded on here now. Welcome to all the newcomers.

    Something to lighten the day and enlighten the naive:

    Theoretically and Realistically
    A small boy has a school homework question to answer, so he asks his father
    “Hey Dad, what’s the difference between ‘theoretically’ & ‘realistically’?”
    His Dad thinks for a while & then says; “Right-o son……go & ask your mother if she’d sleep with David Beckham for a million quid.”
    The boy trots off and comes back saying “Dad, dad, she said she would! She would sleep with David Beckham for a million pounds.”
    “OK son,” says his dad. “Now go & ask your sister the same question.”
    The boy toddles off, & comes back saying “Dad, dad, she said she would too!”
    So then his dad says “Right, son, now go & ask your elder brother if he’d sleep with David Beckham for a million pounds.”
    The son comes back excitedly saying “Dad! Dad! He said he would too!”
    “Well there you have it, son,” said his dad.
    Theoretically we could be sitting on three million quid.
    .
    .
    .
    .
    Realistically we’re living with two tarts & a poof.

      2. After your craftily planted ear worm, I tried to dispel it with another 1940/50’s favourite.
        However, as the weather was cold, grey and windy “Oh,What Beautiful Morning” didn’t cut the mustard.

        1. Sunny and blowing a howling gale here. Hung out two loads of washing and hopefully it will dry.

  83. You are and we are aware that GCMG stands for “God calls me God”?

    Why should we listen?

    1. I elevated myself in protest when Bloody Blair got begonged… I believe it is called ‘bootstrapping’…

  86. I’ve met Ethiopians in London who keep all the saints days and wouldn’t dream of eating meat on a Friday.

  87. Just risked half an hour in the garden. Lovely sun – but a bitter easterly wind. Howevar (as the young peepul say) it was 23ºC in the greenhouse – a haven! Might try some seed sowing this weekend. Sure to be a blunder – but who kno?

    2. Kale, chard, perpetual spinach or true spinach should be ok, but I always sow in pots in the green house else the rabbits get them outside.

      1. I start with tomatoes. Always in electric propagators in the greenhouse. Chard and kale and cavolo nero; broccoli. Salad leaves. And, of course, trombetti. The wonder plant.

    3. Easterly or from just about any direction whenever Spartie and I turned a corner.
      Straight from the Urals, I reckon.

  90. Britain to deliver Gaza aid by sea alongside US
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/03/08/israel-hamas-war-latest-news-updates-idf-aid-palestine/

    Britain will work alongside the United States to open a maritime corridor to deliver aid directly to Gaza, Lord David Cameron, the foreign minister, said on Friday.

    “Alongside the US, the UK and partners have announced we will open a maritime corridor to deliver aid directly to Gaza,” Lord Cameron said.

    At last! They’ve found a use for all those dinghies lying about in Dover.

    1. David Cameron = Soros operative.

      That’s why he’s back. Because Sunak is too!

        1. If you’re asking if I’m a Soros operative, the answer is no.

          But I have plenty of evidence to prove beyond reasonable doubt that David Cameron is a Soros operative, and also Tony Blair.

          With very strong likelihoods for the other PMs from John Major onwards.

    1. They should try taking our Freedom Passes away. Especially in London, where it covers trains as well as buses.

    1. We all know this and still the mindless will keep on voting in the uniparty. I despair.

  100. I think it came from a Monty Python sketch where in he couldn’t pronounce words that began with ‘C’

  101. I don’t think either side is too keen on winning the general election.
    Even Hercules would baulk at trying to divert the Thames through Whitehall and Westminster.

  103. I was pondering just the other day about that transitional period when motor vehicles were beginning to replace horse-drawn ones. Was it chaotic? Were there many accidents? What were the rules, if any, about sounding horns and frightening the equines? I’ve seen old film footage and it looks rather less orderly than today.

  104. Off topic.

    Well done Oliver Bearman. The 18 year old British driver will race for Ferrari in the Grand Prix after Carlos Sainz was diagnosed with appendicitis.

    It would be good if he won or gained a podium place, then Ferrari could tell Lewis Hamilton to find another car.

    https://www.bbc.com/sport/formula1/68511360

      2. My sister was the first lady referee ever to referee on a Football Association ground! She is not in a museum!

  105. I have a bus pass but rarely use it as the nearest bus stop involves a walk either up or down hill. Only if I go into Gloucester is it any use to me.

  106. My first thought was that she wanted to avoid a humiliating defeat at the next General Election, but Maidenhead is a rock-solid Conservative seat that even Sunak & co cannot undermine.

  108. Trouble is, Richard, Joe Public hasn’t a Hope in hell of doing anything about it. Whereas the MPs …

      1. Maybe perhaps annoying the elite will backfire when it gets to the point where addressing the problem becomes easier than just saving the mucky mucks.

        Quite a few official events are being disrupted over here and my despised leader cannot go anywhere without being chased by a group of hamas loving thugs. At some point the ned for sanity might outdo the loss of Muslim votes

        Nope, just wishful thinking.

      2. Natch – could we ever have thought any different? It was on the cards years ago – if it wasn’t extra security for one concocted reason it was going to be extra security for another concocted reason. The truth is that they know that the population is getting angry. Very angry.

      3. Natch – could we ever have thought any different? It was on the cards years ago – if it wasn’t extra security for one concocted reason it was going to be extra security for another concocted reason. The truth is that they know that the population is getting angry. Very angry.

  109. The out-of-control HR state is crushing the life out of Britain. 8 March 2024.

    Let’s return to that explosion in worklessness. Many of those receiving incapacity benefits are doing so for mental health conditions, with the number of Personal Independence Payment claims based on psychiatric illness rising over 50pc since 2019. Some 1.3 million people now fall into this category.

    This rise, in turn, has been driven in part by sharp increases in the numbers claiming depressive disorders, stress reactions, anxiety disorders or autistic spectrum diagnoses. Even the NHS isn’t immune from this trend: anxiety, stress, depression and other psychiatric illnesses account for over a quarter of all sick days in the organisation.

    I’ve been to work in the face of threats and physical (my car was trashed on one memorable occasion) intimidation as well as acute depression. No one ever suggested that I should see a doctor and sign off.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/03/08/out-of-control-hr-state-crushing-life-out-of-britain/

  116. Never tried trombetti. I’ll look into it.
    Probably me, but my earlier toms never seem to thrive, or at least as well as ones sown on 1st April.

      1. PS – NoTTLers are very rude about it – except for those who have grown it…!!

        Seeds are available in the UK from Franchi (google it).

        1. I don’t know why. There’s nothing remotely phallic about them. 😏

      3. It looks like a giant courgette with a hint of cucumber in its family tree. I’m guessing the taste is closer to courgette?

          2. We grew trombetti a few years ago – four seeds – we didn’t use a frame as such, just a bit of wire netting and it was forever trying to escape from the garden, we couldn’t keep up with it.They produced a large crop, we couldn’t eat it all ourselves. It took forever to germinate, we nearly gave up, but when it did there was no holding it back. Delicious barbequed.

          3. Set more seed than you think you need. I sow a dozen – pick the 8/9 best plants and nurture them. One CAN grow them on the ground – OK in warm countries – NBG here.

  117. Agree. Neither of them wants to take responsibility for the collapse of the currency, the riots and murders that will ensure and the CBDC slavery that will be the final solution.

  118. They said I’d never be any good at Poetry because I have dyslexia but so far I’ve made three jugs and a vase!

    2. They said I’d make poet
      So I threw one up in clay
      They fired it ’till it cracked
      So I smashed it anyway!

  120. In the last year or so almost 300 fire arms police officers have resigned. A massive advertising campaign, heavily aimed at the diversity mob, produced just six applicants.

    Who would want to be an armed policeman or a soldier these woke days?

      3. Under construction Steph. it’s up for you to submit your email address for updates as to when it will be running. freespeechbacklash.com.
        I’m writing pieces all the time, and you are welcome to submit an article if you like. Hope to get it running shortly after I get back from China at the end of the month.

    2. They should have told the diversity mob that they didn’t have to bring their own, weapons would be supplied.

    2. It’s the weekend for the great daylight savings time switch over here.

      The amount of “advice” being offered on how to survive such a body shattering change to routine is overwhelming. If people cannot manage summertime Armageddon, before has a valid point.

      2. You may mock, but BST plays havoc with my body clock and disrupts my sleep pattern. I am the equivalent of jet-lagged until time goes back to normal.

  126. For those interested in such matters. I know I’m not the only one here. This is the earliest known Christian critique of Islam. What is depressing about it is that you clearly see that Islam has not leaned anything in the interim.

    St John of Damascus: The Earliest Critique of Islam – Part 1
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qt63z7CYVD8&t=3s

    St John of Damascus: The Earliest Critique of Islam – Part 2
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3JT_cG_AB8&list=TLPQMDgwMzIwMjSGM-CrFYCRNA&index=2

    3. Send all those fighting age gimmegrants to Ukraine.
      I’m sure Zelensky would find a use for them.
      He might even offer citizenship to the survivors.

      1. Sort of selective conscription? If it were to happen I bet crossing the Channel in a rubber Dinghy would stop immediately!

        1. Off the boats straight onto a plane for Kiev.
          It would probably only require two or three days worth and the people smugglers would be out of business.

    4. “I’m in Kyiv to raise the alarm to the democratic world about militant Islam”

      Just two days after the Chancellor was constrained in his tax policy because we are no longer a sovereign, democratic country given our continued ‘hitching’ to the EU.

      1. Macgregor has a good handle on current and military affairs and talks a lot of sense on Ukraine and US domestic issues. His attempts at historical analogies however, are often wide of the mark and, in my opinion at least, his catergorisation of Israel’s war on Hamas as genocide is wholly and completely wrong.

        1. He has been consistently wrong on everything from the start. The truth is no one forecast how effectively the Ukrainians would resist but for Mearsheimer and other Putin fanboys victory is always just around the corner.

        2. Feel the same about Peter Lavelle at RT. I stopped watching CrossTalk because while he and his guests are very good in assessing the Ukraine debacle, they speak from a position of blind prejudice against Israel. Lavelle loves to accuse others of not knowing history while clearly having very little grasp of it himself.

    6. I’m slow on the up-take. This is a reference to Shapps going by a number of aliases?

    7. He is a blithering idiot. WHY is U.K. government pushing this war and, more to the point, how much is U.K. borrowing to send “military support package”? The other day I read that our pilots were having to train other than in U.K. Ukraine, by any chance? They’re dragging us all into WW3.

      2. Actually yes, it’s just harder to engage with them. Lewis still posts for example, and Beachcomber and a few others. Lots of newcomers there too.

    1. Shome mishtake, shurely. They are minutes from a stunning victory – and have been for over a year.

          1. Not long after he had been housing minister he and his wife moved from their (I’m told) modest home in Hatfield. To a masion at Brookmans Park.
            No suggestions inferred.

      2. Ukraine never had a chance, It was sacrificed on the arrogance and vanity of US globalists hoping to damage Russia in the process. The humane thing would be to stop the war now and seek a settlement with Putin – like Zelenski did in March 2022 until war criminal Boris Johnson legged it to Kiev on orders from the Biden regime to order him to carry on. Johnson has up to 500,000 Ukrainian deaths on his hands.

        1. Even though Kiev was supposedly under fire he never wore a flack jacket but wore a stab vest when visiting Liverpool.

        2. So you and those like you keep saying, but here we are over two years on and Russia has lost most of the territory it took in the first fortnight of the invasion, and Ukraine has driven the Black Sea Fleet from the sea, inflicted horrendous losses on Russia including most of its frontline armoured vehicles and is now shooting down increasing numbers of Russia’s remaining frontline combat aircraft. If the West keeps up the supply of munitions, hopefully saner heads in the Russian elite without an obsessive interest in their historical legacy will say ‘enough’s enough’.

          1. Always worth remembering that truth is the first casualty of war. We won’t know the full damage to either side until it’s all over. When it is the victor will write the history.
            Edit remove ‘s

          2. There are reputable independent analysts using verified and witnessed destroyed equipment, backed by Western intelligence assessments. Losses on both sides are of course likely to be higher than that observed by third parties but there’s no doubt that Russia’s forces have been massively degraded. The issue is the West is only giving them enough to stay in the fight and not to win.

          3. Yes and Putin has been on the verge of death from numerous illnesses, if you believe the stories.

          4. Quite another matter. but an eminent NHS consultant I know who specialises in CNS and brain disorders say he has all the obvious symptoms of Parkinsons and the puffiness often observed in his face and neck is the classic side effect of the strong steroids used to treat the condition. Of course Parkinsons is a long term degenerative condition with no cure – the issue is the speed of decline. Putin will get the best treatment available but running a long term and huge war which has gone badly for Russia is hardly going to help his condition. Of course, with the succession open and surrounded by ambitious wolves constrained only by their fear of him, any signs of increasing weakness does not bode well for him for the next few years.

          5. This is what the GPs do give a diagnosis from a photo. In my personal experience they are not very reliable.

          6. This is not a GP, but one of the most eminent specialists in the discipline. The crabwise walk, the twisting on the limbs of one side of the body etc are classic symptoms.

          10. Lucky so far for you but the fact remains that Putin’s has all classic symptoms of Parkinsons. Actual diagnosis by brain scan will of course be a state secret.

          12. Better still doing a blood pressure test on the phone (as happened to me recently…)

          17. I care not one jot about Putin’s health, but can you ask your eminent mate for his opinion of the state of Mr Biden’s mental and physical condition.

          24. I’m not one myself but this person has three doctorates in various clinical fields and I know they lead on Parkinsons, similar conditions and Long Covid for the NHS in a sizeable chunk of the country. They’ve never mentioned dementia to me but might well deal with it. Whatever, it does not distract from their observations of Putin’s symptoms shown in repeated films.

          25. So you keep saying JD, but you ignore the fact that Russia’s invasion, right or wrong, was obviously intended to bring about settlement talks, as the number involved, less than half the size of Ukraine’s army, was obviously not intended as a full invasion force. The Ukrainian army fought well, yes, but the withdrawal was strategic not a defeat. Yes, Russia has lost ships, but that is a side show as it’s a land war and the MSM estimates of Russian losses of men and equipment are pure propaganda. Russia has total air superiority and the internet is full of photos of burned out Bradley and Leopard tanks,

            The fact is that the Russians are advancing, slowly and methodically, on all fronts. Ukraine has lost and the sooner the war is stopped the better. And Russia has almost all the territory it wants, the Russian speaking areas. If the West backed off there is no reason why it could agree peace with Ukraine. The problem is the West’s globalists.

            (Ps. You need to pay attention: the West has run out of munitions and does not have the productive capacity to replenish itself let alone Ukraine.

          26. Putin’s invasion was intended to take Kiev in 72 hours, annex much of the East and install a satrap in the rest. On every measure of success it’s been a disaster for Russia, especially its suffering people. We’ve had enough of Mussolinis dreaming of glorious historic legacies.

          27. Sorry JD, you are just reproducing western propaganda, with no basis in fact. The size of the Russian invasion force was wholly inadequate to take Kiev in 72 hours.

          28. So the failed coup–de-main at Hostomel and the armoured spearheads attacking from the north and east were just a feint?

          29. Hang on – we still have two fantastic aircraft carriers (no planes) that almost work, sometimes. Hawks that can’t fly because of engine ishoos, drones that, er, don’t. And both our planes were here on Wednesday afternoon burning up the Avtag – and annoying the hell out of livestock. And a few dozen soldiers – you can tell by their rainbow uniforms…

            I scent victory…

            (SARC).

          31. Bullshit.
            If what you say is true why is Ukraine not winning, conscripting old men, losing young men fleeing conscription and holding out the begging bowl?

          32. Ukrainian enlistment starts at 27.
            The frontline is extremely long for both sides and the Ukrainian forces are smaller.
            Some people will always flee – over I million young Russians fled abroad in the first year alone.
            Ukraine is winning by not losing.

          33. It might start at 27 but they are hauling in people twice that age and older.

            We shall see, but one thing is absolutely certain, Ukraine isn’t actually winning anything.
            Infrastructure is being destroyed, a generation is being killed, they couldn’t fight at all but for the warmongers of the West giving them old armaments so that their own arms manufacturers can be kept working replacing the stockpiles, a great form of indirect money laundering of their taxpayers money.
            Even if Russia withdrew tomorrow Ukraine will end up selling its land and productive capabilities and will be utterly indebted to the West. And just how do you think they will replace those dead?
            The whole war is a disaster for both sides but it will harm Ukraine far far more than it will Russia and that presumes Ukraine gets everything back. It won’t.

          34. It’s the choice of the Ukrainian people to resist. They are doing so, hard and effectively.
            That’s what matters.

          35. That’s why they are busy press-ganging conscripts is it?

            The people can’t even be allowed to vote on it; Zelensky has effectively shut down the opposition.

            This is a proxy war, pure and simple, brought about by the West to promote Western interests and to hide what has been going on in Ukraine since the legitimate but not pro-Western Government was overthrown through US connivance in 2014.
            And that’s really what matters.

          36. Putin’s Russia being such a paragon of free speech, democracy, etc. lolz
            Zelensky’s government won a free election.
            In war time enemy sympathisers are rounded up and interned as we did in WW2.

          37. I’m certainly NOT saying Putin’s is better, and indeed Zelensky won a resounding victory, but Zelensky is carrying on the Ukrainian tradition of being the most corrupt country in Europe and one of the most corrupt countries in the world against some very stiff competition. As they say in banking, words and figures differ. He’s all mouth, no trousers.
            Free speech is no longer, political opponents are marginalised at best, imprisoned at worst.
            I agree that in time of war elections should be suspended, but I don’t agree that the opposition should be silenced.
            There are large sections of the Ukrainian population who are very pro Russian. There was an excellent series on the BBC R4 covering reports from all parts of Ukraine which gave a very balanced overview of opinions and Zelensky is NOT as popular as you pretend and neither is Putin as hated in Ukraine as you suggest. He has banned many areas where Russian (NOT Putin’s) influence is greatest.

            You do realise that there can’t be elections even though they are due this month because they declared martial law?

          38. We have recordings of Victoria Nuland discussing the replacement of the elected President in 2014 and naming those she wished to see put in place in the Ukrainian government.

            Zelensky is too scared to stay in Kiev and persists in hopping around the globe with his begging bowl to avoid facing reality.

            Zelensky has banned the use of the Russian language and closed down Russian Orthodox churches. Zelensky murdered Gonzalo Dias.

            Medvedev and Putin have stated clearly Ukraine is Russia.

            Where have you been?

        3. So you and those like you keep saying, but here we are over two years on and Russia has lost most of the territory it took in the first fortnight of the invasion, and Ukraine has driven the Black Sea Fleet from the sea, inflicted horrendous losses on Russia including most of its frontline armoured vehicles and is now shooting down increasing numbers of Russia’s remaining frontline combat aircraft. If the West keeps up the supply of munitions, hopefully saner heads in the Russian elite without an obsessive interest in their historical legacy will say ‘enough’s enough’.

      3. Yes, I think he is doing his best to prevent his country from being subsumed by Putin’s delusions of a ‘Greater Russia’.

        The murder of Alexei Anatolyevich Navalny, in the Siberian gulag, is a small peek at the thugocracy that constitutes gov’t in todays Russia.

  132. No – quite unlike courgette. No bitterness; no seeds to deal with (they gather in the “bulb” at the end of the fruit.

  133. OT – I wonder whether the Duchess of Woke has had a nervous breakdown…. Living the life she does might make one susceptible

    2. The truth will eventually come to light and I’ll reserve judgement until then.

      1. Natch. It was just that the total silence from the RF suggested more than just post-operation issues. They would keep quiet about any problem of nerves – even though the Wokes are very keen on “talking over mental isshoos”.

    3. That is a possibility, also I don’t think she is well nourished, to be as slender as that at her time in life I would have to live on a diet of dandelion and lettuce leaves. Should she have had ‘the jab’ she could have had a stroke or heart problem. It is all very strange. There are other rumours coming in from outside the country, Spain and the US, that all was not well in the household. Closed doors and all that.

    1. Thanks JD. Might be interested in my recent post re latest reply from Jack/Spectator Team. Faint glimmer they’ve heard our suggestions/complaints and are listening. We’ll see.

      1. I suspect they will be happy to have decimated the comments, if only because of the threat of the Online Harms Bill.

        1. Have you seen the Canadian one? They will be able to lock you up if someone just thinks you might say something offensive – and they will stay anonymous too 😱

        2. We’ll see how it turns out, JD. And what progress, if any, Jenrick makes in the House.

  136. Wow, so many new names and a dramatic increase in the comments posted. It certainly changes my early morning routine of scanning through just a hundred or so messages to find Tom’s joje of the day.

    The latest online censorship bill continues its passage through parliament under the guise of protecting children from hate. As it is not yet a law may I express my feelings – F*** Trudeau.

      2. If that bill makes it into law, such a comment could cost me up to $50,000 or life in prison.

        But don’t worry they say, it will not be regular law courts but specially selected bureaucrats imposing the fines.

        1. You’ll have to use Tor Browser to create a new email account, and then a new Disqus account, and not reveal to anyone who you really are… And this is Canada, not North Korea.

    3. I do try to be No 1 on the new page, Richardl but sometimes I don’t want to get out of bed. (Rare but true).

      1. You are allowed these lapses. Just think your joke du jour will be new to some of our recent arrivals!

    1. I know that has been the implication of all the mystery. Just saying that the great silence may have another reason.

  138. Ref those still photos put here yesterday of the new film set in rural England between the wars. The one with several black countryfolk.

    It occurred to me during the night that that must be a false representation because we now know that the countryside is racist and that bames are discouraged from even daring to set foot in a field.

    I’ll get me galabeya….

    1. Yes, it’s tragic. It was the severe winter of 1947 that finished off the last of our historical rural BAME communities, compounded by the racialist policies of the Thatcher government: as late as 1948 they were still refusing to send extra firewood to the ancient West Indian villages in the Fens and Broadlands, claiming it would be counter-productive in their traditional reed huts.

      A tragic mis-labelling of coal supplies in Hindi instead of the locally-dominant Urdu meant that the Asian communities in north Essex and the Suffolk borders ate the fuel instead of burning it, with terrible consequences.

      And racialist recruiting policies on the railways meant that the predominantly white train drivers and management would not deliver food or fuel to the nomadic Fulani communities of Sussex, who were forced to migrate to Kent, and thereafter sought asylum in France.

      It was like the Bengal famine all over again.

      It wasn’t until the New Labour government of Tony Blair won in his great Windrush landslide of 1956 that the restoration of our ancient counties under the traditional BAME inhabitants was begun.

    2. Yes, it’s tragic. It was the severe winter of 1947 that finished off the last of our historical rural BAME communities, compounded by the racialist policies of the Thatcher government: as late as 1948 they were still refusing to send extra firewood to the ancient West Indian villages in the Fens and Broadlands, claiming it would be counter-productive in their traditional reed huts.

      A tragic mis-labelling of coal supplies in Hindi instead of the locally-dominant Urdu meant that the Asian communities in north Essex and the Suffolk borders ate the fuel instead of burning it, with terrible consequences.

      And racialist recruiting policies on the railways meant that the predominantly white train drivers and management would not deliver food or fuel to the nomadic Fulani communities of Sussex, who were forced to migrate to Kent, and thereafter sought asylum in France.

      It was like the Bengal famine all over again.

      It wasn’t until the New Labour government of Tony Blair won in his great Windrush landslide of 1956 that the restoration of our ancient counties under the traditional BAME inhabitants was begun.

  139. Why are Rishi Sunak, David Cameron, Grant Shapps, Emmanuel Macron and Jo Biden so keen to risk WW3 with Russia?

    Likely because Soros is pushing them to throw Russia out of Ukraine where he has substantial “business” interests. Probably aid laundering in Kiev with the crooked Democrats and a few RINOs. All five of them are Soros agents and of course all their policies are identical to Soros’ policies. Putin also threw Open Society out of Moscow so Soros doubtlessly wants payback. Soros attended a meeting in the Lords in September 2022 and was pushing for his Ukraine plan to be accepted.

    Soros also wants a two state solution to the Israel crisis and an immediate ceasefire and of course Sunak and Cameron want the same.

    Grant Shapps has been working closely with Soros’ friend Bill Gates. When Shapps was Transport Secretary, Shapps suddenly announced there would be a new state run booking service for all the train companies. Before Shapps’ announcement, Soros had hugely shorted Trainline so made another massive fortune as Trainline’s price collapsed. Then when Soros’ profits were safely banked, Shapps cancelled the proposed state run service. Was it a coincidence or was the plan a spoof to fix the market?

    So many politicians are terrified of Soros because he could reveal who has been taking his money. Allegedly, Soros also knows a lot about who did what with Epstein.

    1. Genuine question Polly: do you think Soros Junior will be a malign force in the world as much as his father has been, once he finally pops his clogs? From what I’ve seen Soros Junior is even more of a wrong un

      2. Oh. That’s Polly – I had been led to believe it was RichardSK whose comments came up with ‘Content Unavailable’ but if it’s Polly, leave her blocked.

      3. I agree. I think Alex Soros is deeply unpleasant and unfortunately he knows a lot about a lot of people.

  140. HMS Northern Princess (4.06).
    A/S trawler.
    .
    Complement:
    38 (38 dead – no survivors).

    On 8th March 1942, HMS Northern Princess (4.06) (Lt D.B. Phillipson, RNR) was torpedoed and sunk by U-587 (Ulrich Borcherdt) off the Grand Banks, Newfoundland. The vessel was reported missing after she was seen for the last time at 20.43 hours on 7th March. The commander, three officers and 34 ratings were lost.

    Type VIIC U-Boat U-587 was sunk 19 days after the above attack on 27th March 1942 in the North Atlantic south-west of Ireland by depth charges from the British escort destroyers HMS Grove and HMS Aldenham and the British destroyers HMS Volunteer and HMS Leamington. 42 dead (all hands lost).

    https://uboat.net/media/allies/warships/br/trawler_hms_northern_princess.jpg

    2. “In September 1939 requisitioned by the Admiralty and used as armed boarding vessel. Converted to an A/S trawler before loaned to the US Navy in February 1942. ”

      A/S? Anti-submarine?

    5. I just noticed a notification from my ADS-B setup that an RAF Hawk trainer passed here an hour ago at low altitude.
      “Royal Air Force British Aerospace Hawk T.2 ZK024 (No callsign information) (43C55B)
      First seen at 150 ft above sea level.”
      Interesting. Our Welsh valley is 700ft asl.

        1. Did I read somewhere that flight time is down because we don’t have enough trainer aircraft – the Hawker?

    6. And he looked up in pained surprise
      As the concrete hardened crust
      Of a stale pork pie caught him in the eye
      And Abdul bit the dust
      Poor Abdul

    9. That angry old fart Biden in his State of the Union rant has promised to build a port in Gaza to deliver aid supplies by sea. A long term project destined to failure like every other initiative the mad creep launches.

      1. As my Great Uncle George could attest (had he not been shot down on a training flight).

  142. Just mowed the lawn – actually a field – for the first time this year. There are so many tunnels dug in it, it’s like the Gaza Strip!

        2. Piles of leftover snow here, half as high as a house… Pics tomorrow, in daylight.

    2. Mongo has tried to burrow through the paving stones since we moved in. He’s made a small dent. It won’t stop him though. He’s an idiot.

        1. Yes. It covers a concrete garage base. Garage is gone and i put up a pergola and use it as a garden room. The ‘turf’ is rather good at removing dead skin from my feet. :@)

          3. The ‘turf’ is rather good at removing dead skin from my feet

            Yours . . . ?

    4. The call of the Greater Spotted Mountfield willnow be heard, countrywide, until Autumn

      Mountfield are one of the UK’s best selling makes of walk behind mowers,

      1. If I mowed the lawns, although they are more like a field, walking behind such a push/powered mower, I would have to walk well over 30 miles each time!

  143. Coo!
    The sun’s finally got through the overcast!
    Still a bloody chilly wind out though.

    1. Yep. Had the little bar heater on all day and nipped between rooms as everywhere is sodding cold.

  145. A premature Par Four!

    Wordle 993 4/6
    🟨⬜⬜⬜🟨
    ⬜🟨🟨⬜⬜
    🟩🟩⬜🟩⬜
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. Me too!

      Wordle 993 4/6

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

      1. I must admit, we cheated a bit because I saw your entry before we did ours…
        Wordle 993 2/6

        🟨🟩⬜🟨🟨
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    2. Better for me today.

      Wordle 993 3/6

      🟨⬜⬜⬜🟨
      ⬜🟩🟩🟨⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    3. Just back from Friday 5 o’clock club at me local. Got a glass of wine in front of me and will commence Wordle.

    4. I know Sue’s start word so I feel a bit guilty. Normally I do it before she posts.

      Wordle 993 2/6

      🟨🟨🟨⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  146. That’s me for this sunny but bitterly cold day. Have to get ready for the “War Dead” talk in church at 6 pm – by the hopelessly bad public “speaker”.

    I must be there because I have to read a poem.

    Have a spiffing evening.

    A demain.

    1. This one perhaps, Bill?

      In Flanders Fields

      In Flanders Fields, the poppies blow
      Between the crosses, row on row,
      That mark our place; and in the sky
      The larks, still bravely singing, fly
      Scarce heard amid the guns below.

      We are the dead. Short days ago
      We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
      Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
      In Flanders fields.

      Take up our quarrel with the foe:
      To you from failing hands we throw
      The torch; be yours to hold it high.
      If ye break faith with us who die
      We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
      In Flanders fields.

  147. From Dr Jordan Petersen via the DT – his address to the US Congress:

    There are now 700 million CCTV cameras in Communist China. Those electronic eyes are attached to the most complete state apparatus of surveillance yet imagined. It has the ability not only to recognise faces at a distance, but gait itself when facial features are hidden or obscured.

    Such capability can, and soon will, be augmented to the point where the movements of eyes themselves, monitored by intelligent cameras, will be sufficient to identify any active party.

    The demented, naïve engineers who so enthusiastically helped build this system call it “SkyNet”, after the rogue and all-seeing technology that take such a dreadful wrong turn in the science fiction Terminator series, where artificially-intelligent robot minds hell-bent on protecting themselves end up destroying humanity as a consequence. The name also references a well-known Chinese phrase describing the reach of the divine itself – “the net of heaven is vast, yet it misses nothing” – which aptly describes the capabilities of the new state apparatus.

    This system is integrated with the so-called Chinese Social Credit System which awards its involuntary participants with a score indicating their compliance with the dictates of the Party, allowing for full control over access to everything they possess electronically – most ominously their savings and access to travel, including, as more electronic gates appear, walking.

    If you are Chinese, or even just a visitor, if your Social Credit Score falls beyond an arbitrary minimum your access to the world can be reduced to zero. This allows you to be shut out of all activities that can be virtualised: driving, shopping, working, eating, finding shelter; even fraternising with friends and family (as merely being in the presence of someone with a low Social Credit Score means that your own score can be lowered).

    This has opened up the opportunity for the government to extract slave-like labour from its citizens. The donation of free work to the state constitutes one means whereby erring men and women citizens can increase their score and remain part of society. This is precisely the payment system most desired by the most tyrannical: not the “work for me and benefit thereby” that constitutes the contractual arrangement undertaken by free citizens, but the “work for me and I will lift the deprivation I imposed” that has always been the leit-motif of the slaver.

    A dystopian world of our own creation

    Why is any of this relevant to people in the West?

    Because the technology that the Chinese Communist Party employs is an extension of Western technology.
    Because we already recently fell prey to the terrible temptation of lockdowns employed by that state in the face of a hypothetical crisis.
    Because we are walking, step by step, in the same direction – partly because of the hypothetical ‘convenience’ of universal and automatic recognition of identity, partly because any problem whatsoever that now confronts us can easily be used to justify the increasing reach of the security and nanny state.

    It is said that stone-age people, first confronted with cameras and their resultant photographs by modern anthropologists, objected to having their images captured, as they feared the captivity of their souls. It turns out that such fear was prescient: the images that we leave behind while navigating virtual space are such close duplicates of our actual selves that the capture of our essence is, at this point, all but guaranteed.

    We all now have our doppelgangers. We all live so much in the virtual world, thanks to our purchasing habits and modes of electronically-mediated communication, that our very selves have become reducible to a frightening degree as mere ‘data’, the modern equivalent of our footprint, with that same data making up an image of our identity. This identity can be – and is increasingly – bought and sold by invisible corporate brokers that use it to sell us what we so desperately and carelessly and conveniently want, but that can also be used to track, monitor and punish everything we do and say.

    Behavioral scientists facilitate this process with their reprehensible nudging: the practice of pushing people in a given ideologically-determined direction by manipulating invisible incentives behind the scenes. Corporations track purchasing decisions, developing algorithms that with increasing accuracy track our patterns of attention and action, allowing for the prediction of what might next be most enticing, doing so not only to offer us what we want, but to determine and shape what we need.

    Governments can, and are, colluding with these corporate agents to develop a picture not only of our actions but of our thought and words so that deviation from the desired end can be mapped, rewarded, and punished. The development of such a digital identity and currency is nothing more than the likely end consequence of such inclinations – and the combination of both will facilitate the development of a surveillance state the scope of which optimistic pessimists of totalitarianism such as George Orwell could scarcely imagine.

    The ultimate fascist collusion

    The rapidly emerging new AI systems do nothing but increase this danger, providing for the possibility of a super-surveillance whose scope exceeds anything that mere unaugmented humans could imagine. They could ensure that our attitudes, conduct and personalities can be manipulated to the degree that we will not even be able to see a reality outside that which has been constructed by the superstate: the ultimate fascist collusion between gigantic self-interested corporations and paranoid security-obsessed anti-human governments.

    We are already selling our souls to the superstate for the purposes of immediate gratification and convenience, while being enticed to do so by fear-mongering ideologues, guaranteeing to us the security which we so desperately and increasingly crave.

    This is by no means a partisan matter. In my country, Canada, the most egregious over-reach of the superstate occurred in the aftermath of a working-class protest against – ironically – state over-reach during the Covid lockdowns, when our increasingly delusional and totalitarian federal government determined that it was appropriate to suspend the access of protestors and their supporters, however minor, to their own assets, in collusion with Canada’s big banks.

    Such an event did, and should, send a chill down the spines of anyone concerned with the maintenance of personal security, privacy and autonomy, signalling the increasingly ability and willingness of state and corporate agents to act in sync with regard to the data they now possess and means of control at their fingertips, and to punish their customers and citizens for their political views, however widespread those views might be. What views are deemed unacceptable will be precisely determined as those that oppose the interests of whomever is currently wielding the baton of power, left or right, corporate or governmental.

    It was recently determined in Canada that such a move was literally unconstitutional. But that has not stopped the over-reach of the state. New legislation proposed by the same government mandates the generation of a soon-to-be giant bureaucracy to monitor and punish in an extra-judicial manner so-called “crimes of hate”, soon defined as any speech or act that the bureaucrats and corporations in charge of the definition themselves object to.

    The same legislation now even defines what might be well regarded as pre-crime: if a court agent now judges that a Canadian citizen might perpetrate a so-called hate crime in the future, that person can be fitted with an electronic surveillance device, restricted in his or her ability to move or communicate, all to monitor their compliance with the dictates of the state.

    With increasing ability to monitor not only the actual attention patterns and behaviors of its citizens, but to predict those that are most likely, the persecution of such potential crime becomes ever more likely. “If you have nothing to hide, you will have nothing to fear,” will be the slogan commandeered by those most likely to turn to surveillance to protect and to control.

    What was the famous Soviet totalitarian joke, attributed to Lavrentiy Beria, head of the secret police? “Show me the man, and I’ll show you the crime.” Those words were true enough in the time of Joseph Stalin’s terror – and the police were secret enough then, as well. But that’s nothing compared to what we can and likely will produce now: a police so secret that we will not even be able to detect their comprehensive and subtle activity, monitoring crime so pervasive that everyone under the dictates of the system will have something to hide and much to fear.

      1. He’s just the middle manager. Have you read David Webb’s comment on Soros in The Great Taking, Polly?

        1. Soros works at the coalface. He’s made multiple fortunes colluding with politicians but there are others who don’t want to get their hands dirty.

          Can you name some names?

          1. I’m not really that bothered, at least I wouldn’t be if they would just get on with being rich and stop trying to kill me.
            Dr Zelenko published a list of names before he died. IIRC it included Rothschild, Warburg, Israel Moses Sief, Orsini, Windsor, Bush

          2. I’m sure you’re right. Especially about the Rothschilds. None of them want to get their hands dirty though. Schwab, Gates and Soros do that.

    2. Or Return to Sender.
      Address unknown, so they turn up here and moan for ever.

    3. How about Jerusalem – William Blake’s stirring words. Oh, whoops, perhaps not.

      |Nothing wrong with rule Britannia, and if uneducated morons want to criticise it because of the reference to slaves, then more fool them.

    4. Given half a chance the Left would choose the Imperial March or Horst Wessel Lied.

    1. Extreme provocation, so she really couldn’t help it. Provoked by the attitude of the far right.

      1. Provoked by him being old and white, and oil painting being a European achievement.

  150. Pro-Palestinian protester damages portrait of Lord Balfour at University of Cambridge
    Former PM was one of the chief supporters of creating a Jewish homeland in Palestine, cemented by the 1917 Balfour Declaration
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/08/pro-palestine-protest-trinity-college-lord-balfour-portrait/

    ‘Damages it’ ! What testicular litotes – she sprays it with red paint and then slashes it to pieces.

    Why did the person filming the gross vandalism not stop her rather than film her?

    BTL

    Deport her to Palestine and let Hamas use her as a human shield! (Or treat her as they treated innocent women on 7th October.)

    1. The Instagram video was accompanied by a caption that read:

      Palestine Action spray and slash a historic painting of ‘Lord’ Balfour in Trinity College, University of Cambridge.

      Written in 1917, Balfour’s declaration began the ethnic cleansing of Palestine by promising the land away – which the British never had the right to do.

      After the Declaration, until 1948, the British burnt down indigenous villages to prepare the way; with this came arbitrary killings, arrests, torture and sexual violence including rape.

      The British paved the way for the Nakba and trained the Zionist militia to ethnically cleansed over 750,000 Palestinians, destroy over 500 villages and massacre many families. The Nakba never stopped, and the genocide today is rooted and supported by British complicity.

      A bit of exaggeration in there, perhaps…

      1. Aye, but who cares about facts? A good narrative is all that’s needed!

    2. The person filming the vandalism is in on it? Either way that person must be traceable and should be charged as an accessory.

      1. I have actually read the Balfour Declaration. I know what hen’s teeth feel like.

    3. These thugs are too young and spoilt to understand that it is difficult, it takes time and training and concentration to create anything, whether it’s a work of art or a career. It is very difficult to watch the wanton destruction of a painting by a silly brat.
      I can’t help feeling that the violence aimed at the painting would be aimed at white men if they thought they could get away with it.

    4. I don’t know why they call her a protester. Surely she’s “the suspect wanted in connection with an offence of criminal damage”?

      I always thought that’s how media usually refer to criminals. I don’t recall when Brinks-Mat robbery went off, for example, them reporting that ‘protestors demonstrating against the storage of valuables made off with £26 million in gold bullion from a Brinks-Mat warehouse.’

    5. Should do the same to her face.

      Folk don’t get involved because usually officialdom comes down harder on the innocent.

    2. They certainly did, the border has been left unmanned. They are refugees from the Spectator comments btl.

    4. If you’re a Spexile come into our NottL,
      There’s a welcome here for you;
      If your name is Tom, Angel or Pat,
      So long as you come from T’ Speccie
      There’s a welcome on the mat,
      If you come from Going Postal,
      Or TCW so blue,
      We’ll sing you a song and we’ll make a fuss,
      Whoever you are you are one of us,
      If you’re an exile, this is the place for you!

      (With Apols to Willie Brady)….

    4. Every day Junior gets a packed lunch made. I used to make it but he does it now. He has a salad filled chicken sandwich, a couple of new potatoes (if I’ve made them) or some other of the snack larks, such as a chorizo pastry thingy, a tub of unsalted nuts, another of raisins and sultanas, apple, grapes or a little tub of fruit salad.

      He also has bits of ham, sausage or chicken for additional protein. He can have as much of that as he likes.

    6. Judging by what pupils chose to eat when I was on dinner policing duty, those meals would be returned untouched.

  153. Britain’s rural communities ‘being targeted by foreign drug gangs’

    Foreign gang members are travelling to the UK to steal from farming communities in order to help fund international drug smuggling organisations, a new report has found.

    The research revealed that organised crime groups from Eastern Europe were sending teams of lower ranking recruits on raids to countries across the continent “with the sole purpose of victimising” rural areas.

    The groups operated within a “rigid hierarchy” and primarily targeted high value GPS systems, worth tens of thousands of pounds on the black market.

    The profits were then fed back into the organisations, which were involved in drug selling across Europe, according to the report, which was carried out on behalf of the National Rural Crime Network (NCRN).

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7f0624ded0beedac8c26d8c538ea4c29baea69149cdcffc66735f0489a26ef17.jpg
    In November last year, two Lithuanian gang members from another organisation were convicted at Hull Crown Court after stealing GPS devices.
    Tomas Staukauskas, 32 and Mantas Palionis, 31 were jailed for four and three years respectively after using drones to carry out reconnaissance before stealing almost fifty GPS systems worth a total of just under £250,000.

    Staukauskas also admitted entering the country in breach of a deportation order served on him in December 2017 while he was in prison. He had come back to this country illegally four times.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/08/url-britain-rural-foreign-drug-gangs-crime/

    Europe’s criminals have been stealing farm equipment for 20 years. It used to be whole vehicles – tractors, trailers, cultivators, 4x4s et al. GPS boxes are obviously smaller and easier to secrete away. What a great idea it was of the EU to promoted absolute freedom of movement and expansion in the east.

    Sometimes I’m lost for words. It’s all too depressing. And just imagine the outrage from the media when a farmer kills a towelhead for butchering his stolen sheep on his land.

    1. Only when Home office/border farce officials are held accountable for the crimes of illegal immigrants will anything change.

    2. Legalise drugs. The price and crime levels will come down. If stupid people want to poison themselves let them arry on.

  154. Why has lazybones Britain become the slacker of the G7? Riddle me this, Rishi! Millions of people are missing in action from the jobs market.

    The hospitality industry can’t find staff. And most humiliatingly, our work ethic lags woefully behind the rest of the continent – including France, where most of the day is taken up by lunch, Spain, where they don’t sit down to dinner until midnight and Italy, where they eat cake for breakfast.

    Whatever happened to Keeping Calm and Carrying on? Stiff upper lips on the Clapham omnibus? The shutters are falling on our nation of shopkeepers as quiet-quitters, long-term-sickers and early retirees walk away.

    And that bodes ill for the rest of us who have not just tax coffers to fill but an international reputation to maintain.

    At the risk of bringing the Witchfinder Wokerati to my door (again), a quick recap of the natural order of things, courtesy of this classic EU gag.

    Heaven in Europe

    Is where

    the English are the policemen

    the French are the cooks

    the Germans are the mechanics

    the Italians are the lovers

    and the Swiss organise everything

    Hell in Europe

    Is where

    the Germans are the policemen

    the English are the cooks

    the French are the mechanics

    the Swiss are the lovers

    and the Italians organise everything

    See, kids, not all stereotypes are offensive. Oh stop it. Even if they are, that doesn’t detract from the fact they are a jolly useful starting point for geopolitical diplomacy and macro-economic analysis.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/columnists/2024/03/07/unemployment-work-jobs-market-staff-economy-labour-sickness/

    JR

    John Roberts
    1 HR AGO
    Many of us don’t want to pay taxes to support people who live off benefits and tax credits. The government should realise that this is why many people aged 55 and over are stopping work as soon as they can afford to. Let some other suckers pay for the idle.

    Comment by Ian Norris.

    IN

    Ian Norris
    1 HR AGO
    Insulting to many working hard in the UK.
    Just like the anti WFH articles that come up so regularly in the DT when the authors of said articles are not in the office,

    Comment by graham matthews.

    GM

    graham matthews
    2 HRS AGO
    If you build it they will come. The coalition launched PIP in 2012 to replace DLA. PIP payouts are now £40bn a year, projected to be £60bn a year in 2029 , around 2% of GDP, same as defence spending. In 1986 there was £1bn of DLA paid out. To launch a non-means tested benefit in a period of so-called austerity was insane, and its definition has only ever expanded so that now it covers mental health. Everyone tries to claim PIP because it is also the route to a Motability car (of which there are 650,000 on the road costing £3bn a year). All this was done by that arch tory hawk….Ian Duncan Smith….. EDITED

    1. Nowadays the last thing Europe would need is our current crop being the police.

      1. Yeah, I think TB is looking back on the middle of the last century. A very nice thought though.

      2. So what you are saying Sos is the Rozers of Yore have morphed into the Tossers of today?

    2. Fellow on the toady programme this morning argued that people were not leaving the job market because of high taxes but because they wanted to. This sort of desperate deceit is comical. The government just cannot accept that high taxes drive people out of work. High taxes destroy jobs. They destroy aspiration. People work less because it’s just not worth bothering.

      1. High taxes on high earners makes them either move abroad or move their finances abroad.
        Higher taxes on those who can’t do that, in the middle, just makes them miserable and angry.
        Taxes generally and availability of benefits, make some of those who can’t be bothered to work, not bother to work.

      2. High taxes on high earners makes them either move abroad or move their finances abroad.
        Higher taxes on those who can’t do that, in the middle, just makes them miserable and angry.
        Taxes generally and availability of benefits, make some of those who can’t be bothered to work, not bother to work.

    1. It’s quality not quantity that counts.
      I bet they don’t even do fishi puns about the Hi risk anus

          2. Well it is spring, ice always gets thin at this time of year
            Have we haddock with fishy puns or are people going to mullet over.

          3. I think we ought to Roe back on them unless the Spexiles think we are off our Rocker salmonn

  156. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d6743400758a1c023a7058385316c98d318ea59684c518a3f246f97e029d87bd.jpg

    These miss the point. The state shouldn’t interfere with energy markets at all. Instead of constantly fiddling with energy, taxing conventional fuels and giving it to unreliables, slapping tax on bills and socialising losses on to customers, simply restore a market for energy.

    Yes, we need to get fracking, but that means we also need an energy policy that builds new power stations. Here I’ll row back and say yes, the state should lend monies to build new power stations at 0% interest. Then that loan is returned via profits. Anything else the operator gets to keep.

    The intent must be to have power generators compete against one another, not collaborate to get the highest price. If a coal station can sell for 6p then it’s up to Nuclear to sell for 5 and gas for 4p. Let customers choose who they buy from. If a greeniac wants to buy solely from windmills, fine. But they are going to buy at cost with no tax payer subsidy.

    The only mandate ofgem should have is to ensure there is a 20% surplus of gas and electricity from our coldest day as an average of the ten coldest years.

    1. How will you ever get real competition, rather than cartels, nowadays? Competition is the lead-in, once the biggest players have established themselves, competition becomes a chimera.

      1. ‘competition becomes a chimera’ – and there was me thinking it became an oligopoly…..;-)

          1. Oops, now you’ve done it.

            His viewing position tends to be POV, as Phizzee would say…

          2. As someone once wrote I’d love to see your point of view but I can’t get my head that far up my ar5e!

          3. As someone once wrote I’d love to see your point of view but I can’t get my head that far up my ar5e!

        2. Anyway, there are many routes to the same place, and many words in our rich language to describe nuances of the same (or very similar) concepts.

      2. True, and I don’t know. This is where the regulator has to function rather than collude.

          1. He wants to keep his slot on Youtube. He makes pointed hints, rather than accusations.

    2. Yet it didn’t have to be like that. They’re missing the fundamentals that bind functioning societies together.

      1. The operative word being “functioning”. But I am wondering about ours, at the moment, too.

      1. I didn’t particularly find FT funny, but I’ve upticked you for your second sentence 🙂

  161. Charles Moore slips a knife between the ribs. Blink and you’ll miss it.

    Why Theresa May, a good MP, should never have been prime minister

    Her elevation to PM did not reflect how people had voted on Brexit. Her successors were left in office, but not in power

    CHARLES MOORE • 8 March 2024 • 7:00pm

    It is sad that Theresa May will stand down at the next general election. She is a good constituency MP and an effective backbencher. Everyone can see that she is public-spirited and is not swayed by greed for money.

    She also set a good example by staying in the Commons after being forced out of Downing Street in 2019.

    After David Cameron (in 2016) and Boris Johnson (in 2022) resigned as prime minister, each also subsequently resigned his seat in Parliament, causing a by-election. This created a bad impression. It looked as if both men were MPs only for what they could get out of it. Their decisions contributed to the trend, first set by Tony Blair, by which being prime minister is seen not as the pinnacle of public service, but as something to bolster your CV. Mrs May was never like that.

    Having paid due tribute, however, I must say bluntly that Mrs May was a sadly unsuccessful prime minister, and in a way which continues to do damage.

    Some of this is related to her own defects as a leader. Most of it relates to something else. So I shall get the former out of the way quickly.

    As a leader, Mrs May was narrow-gauge, mistrustful of colleagues, suspicious of talent, controlling. She shared with Margaret Thatcher a super-seriousness which was almost comical, but entirely lacked that strange combination of actress and preacher which enabled Mrs Thatcher to galvanise an audience and lead her country down her chosen path.

    For someone who shows no obvious signs of being conceited, Mrs May was remarkable for promoting herself rather than the party which she famously christened “nasty”. Her slogan “strong and stable leadership” meant her alone. The manifesto on which she campaigned so disastrously in the 2017 general election was much happier with the words “Theresa May” than with the word “Conservative”. After that empty campaign, her leadership could never be strong or stable again.

    Although certainly not unprincipled, in the sense of being unscrupulous, Mrs May never showed coherence in the principles she seemed to espouse. Indeed, she was always anxious to avoid discussing whatever it was she believed. We journalists used to call her “the worst lunch”. She would accept our invitations, appear politely and on time, but then stubbornly refuse to engage in any conversation which might reveal anything whatever about principles, policy or politics.

    Did she, for example, understand the issues at stake when she sacrificed the rights of “our precious Union” to give the EU the Brexit deal it wanted in relation to Northern Ireland? Or when she supported the right to self-ID for trans people? Or how her modern slavery laws could be twisted into excuses for illegal immigrants staying in this country? Or when she tried to fight crime by reducing police numbers?

    Did she understand the free-market argument that an energy price cap quickly produces ridiculous distortions and stupefying costs? As she rushed to impose net zero by 2050, did she inquire whether this was necessary or what burdens it would lay upon the shoulders of the “just about managing” with whom she said she sympathised? She was a closed book, which made it hard for her to run an open society.

    But the bigger problem than her own defects was the choice of Mrs May as Conservative Party leader – which made her prime minister – and why that choice was made.

    In the 2016 referendum, the largest number of people in British history ever to have voted for anything voted to leave the EU. They naturally assumed their victory would guarantee that this would happen.

    Not so. Conservatives – Boris Johnson and Michael Gove – had led the Leave campaign, but the Conservative government put together by David Cameron and George Osborne had campaigned for Remain. Even though both men went, the political logic of their Brexit defeat was not followed through. So great was the establishment’s horror, even in the Conservative Party, about the Brexit result that they cast about for some means of frustrating it.

    In Labour, this meant Sir Keir Starmer, not yet the leader, calling for a second referendum. In the Tory government, it meant finding a leader who would seek what later became known as BRINO (Brexit In Name Only).

    Although a Remainer, Mrs May had astutely sat out the referendum dance. Once Michael Gove had stabbed Boris Johnson in the back, shortly after the referendum result, she was uniquely well placed – a leadership candidate who could scoop up most Remain votes and get the support of a sufficient number of Leavers who had no rooted objections to her.

    She won. Gnomically declaring that “Brexit means Brexit”, she went on to prove that she, as well as the rest of us, did not know what she meant.

    The consequence was nearly three wasted years. After two of these, Mr Johnson resigned as foreign secretary over Mrs May’s proposed Brexit deal, but it took almost another year before challenges to that deal in the Commons brought her to resign.

    Boris became leader, with more than twice as many MPs backing him as backed his opponent in the final round, Jeremy Hunt. He therefore entered 10 Downing Street. A constitutional crisis then ensued in which, through John Bercow’s abuse of his position as Speaker, elements of the House of Commons tried to take over the government of the country.

    Boris overcame this and called a snap general election. Campaigning to “Get Brexit done”, he got a convincing mandate – an overall majority of 80 – because most people did not want the referendum vote frustrated.

    Brexit did indeed get done, though imperfectly. We did leave – as, once the people had so voted, we were morally bound to do. Things soon went dramatically wrong because of Covid, but that is another story.

    The May disaster lay chiefly, therefore, in the fact that her appointment did not truly reflect the way people had voted in the referendum. Mrs May could have put this right by campaigning, despite her earlier Remain support, for a genuine Brexit, but this she did not do. She sought a compromise which could not be sustained.

    By the way, I think a comparable lesson, though with a much slower burn, can be learnt from the Scottish independence referendum of 2014. By roughly 55 to 45 per cent, Scotland said No when Alex Salmond’s SNP government had campaigned for Yes. That was a defeat which the SNP has not been able to overcome.

    It was only much later, and under a different first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, that things really began to fall apart. But it was not expensive camper vans and photos of bewigged trans rapist prisoners which sowed the seeds of downfall. It was the much earlier defeat at the ballot box for the SNP’s big idea. The party’s repeated calls for indyref2 were a standing insult to referendum voters. They remain so. Therefore, the party’s support declines.

    In the Tories’ case, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak have had to try to lead under the long shadow of the May disaster, delegitimised because the public have had no say in their appointment. I am not arguing that our constitution should insist that every new prime minister must at once be confirmed by a general election.

    But I do think that the party’s behaviour, starting with its appointment of Mrs May over Brexit, has kept it, in Norman Lamont’s famous phrase, “in office, but not in power”.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/08/theresa-may-good-mp-should-never-have-been-prime-minister/

    1. Fairly soon to be out of office and out of power – how’s that for Net Zero!

      1. Johnson’s $10 million property deals weren’t Net Zero, they were because of it, and because he did what Gates wanted during covid.

    2. It is somewhat bizarre for Charles Moore to complain about Boris resigning from the Commons, making it look as if he was on in it for what he could get. Has he forgotten that the Standards Committee, by dint of corrupt practice (installing a chair who had already publicly pronounced him guilty, retrospectively changing the rules and then introducing an unprecedented level of suspension) ensured that Boris would be subjected to a recall petition. True he could have stood again at the by-election but there could be little doubt that he would have been stitched up by other parties acting in coalition.

    5. If she didn’t sell us out for money, then what was the motive?
      It makes me think even worse of her!

  164. Gove’s plan is bad enough but Tugenhat lives up to his nickname.

    Gove to appoint adviser to tackle Islamophobia

    Fiyaz Mughal, an outspoken critic of extremism, thought to be a leading contender for new post

    Charles Hymas, HOME AFFAIRS EDITOR • 8 March 2024 • 8:58pm

    Michael Gove is to appoint a new adviser to tackle Islamophobia as he prepares to unveil a crackdown on Islamist and Right-wing extremism.

    Fiyaz Mughal, an outspoken critic of extremism and a campaigner for closer links between Muslim and Jewish communities, is understood to be a leading contender for the post. Mr Mughal will work in tandem with Lord Mann, Mr Gove’s independent adviser on anti-Semitism.

    Next week, Mr Gove will unveil a new, broader definition of extremism to enable Government, universities, councils and other bodies to ban funding for or engagement with Islamist and far-Right groups. Writing for The Telegraph on Thursday, Robin Simcox, the Home Office’s independent adviser on extremism, urged the Government to make greater use of its powers to tackle extremist groups that had gone “unchallenged for too long”.

    He also warned that pro-Palestine protests were turning London into a no-go zone for Jews.

    There has been a seven-fold increase in anti-Semitic incidents since the Oct 7 Hamas attacks on Israel, while incidents of anti-Muslim hate have risen six-fold, according to research by Tell Mama, a national project set up by Mr Mughal to support victims of Islamophobia.

    Mr Mughal has been a critic of Islamist extremism, backing an overhaul of the Prevent counter-terror programme by Sir William Shawcross last year. He has previously warned: “Tackling extremism means tackling the views, values and toxic social narratives that fuel the division and dehumanisation so associated with extremism.”

    On Friday, Tom Tugendhat, the security minister warned that Oct 7 was being “weaponised by small groups to push a hateful and divisive ideological agenda and to try to radicalise people here in the UK”.

    He said: “They’re pitting Briton against Briton in an attack on our shared identity,” suggesting there were “several thousand individuals in the UK” who supported violent extremism or were engaged in Islamist extremist activity. Their primary target is our society,” he said, warning that “hostile actors” would try to use the conflict in the Middle East to radicalise people in the UK, which could lead to terror attacks.

    “Their recruitment process is well established,” he said. “First, they divide and polarise. Then they isolate, target, radicalise and finally operationalise people to carry out acts of terror here.”

    On Friday, Downing Street said Rishi Sunak took concerns about the impact of regular pro-Palestine protests “extremely seriously” following the warning by Mr Simcox that they were was turning London into a no-go zone for Jews at weekends.

    A Number 10 spokesman said the Prime Minister was “acutely aware of the fear and distress that many people have been feeling”, adding: “That’s why he’s very clear that some of the behaviour that we’ve seen in recent weeks is unacceptable and it doesn’t reflect the values that we have as a society.”

    Mr Simcox’s comments were echoed by Mark Gardner, the chief executive of the Community Security Trust, which provides security for Britain’s Jewish community. He said: “I think as a headline it’s deeply troubling, but it also contains a huge element of truth.”

    He added that his organisation had received multiple statements from “people saying I’m not going into town at the weekend because of these demonstrations”.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/03/08/gove-to-appoint-adviser-to-tackle-islamophobia-as-he-prepar/

    2. Another invented item to facilitate greater control. There is nothing irrational in fearing an ideology that is intent on making you submit to its rule and which tells its adherents to behead those who don’t subscribe.

      1. Hi Steph, we have something in common the first few letters of our names….

  166. Evening, all. One can only assume the Tories (TINO that is) are desperately trying to lose the election and get out before the SH/1T hits the fan.

    1. Pro-Palestine demonstrators are making the capital of our country inhospitable to both Jews and Christians and every other British patriot of whatever faith.

      We need a Police FORCE prepared to control these hateful anti-British marches and demonstrations who consistently issue threats and hate speech targeted against our indigenous population.

      Those foreigners ranting against our country should be detained and deported directly. Our Courts are a sham and need to be reconstructed to meet the highest standards of jurisprudence we were once famed for the World over. At present the British courts are a feeble, appointed and politicised bunch of mediocre men and women in wigs.

      1. That requires someone at the top with the will to sack an awful lot of people across government, the police and the judiciary. Get us out of the European courts, scrap the Supreme Court and about a thousand other things.

        2. The Supreme Court is an abomination. This was a construct of the Blair government and has so far proven a disaster.

          The Supreme Court was of course stocked with Lefty idiots promoted by Blair to their positions. This left the senior law officers in the Lords to watch the disintegration of our legal system, a disintegration which is presently ongoing.

          As an architect I would also mention that the “conversion” of Middlesex Guildhall to facilitate this Supreme Court was an abomination.

          I can think of few other misappropriations of great civic buildings to the Satanic Freemasonic crafts controlling our judiciary.

Comments are closed.