Monday 1 February: The EU’s chaotic vaccine programme has reinforced the case for Brexit

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its comments facility (now reinstated, but not as good as 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:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2021/02/01/letters-eus-chaotic-vaccine-programme-has-reinforced-case-brexit/

697 thoughts on “Monday 1 February: The EU’s chaotic vaccine programme has reinforced the case for Brexit”

  1. Sam Grant will ride again. SST. 1 February 2021.

    The Left is now speaking clearly about what it, as a collective, has in mind for you Conservatives.
    Pelosi, AOC, Jake Tapper, the Washington Post, the academy generally, etc., etc., ad nauseam are resolved to project a vision of white supremacist insurrection that they believe will convince enough citizens and most importantly the military that Conservative Organizations and Conservative Opinion must be suppressed and proscribed.

    They forget that the excesses of the Grant run occupation of the South led directly to a “Bourbon” restoration that ruled the South for a hundred years and which was focused on African-Americans as the supposed cause of the economic and demographic misery of the South’s condition. Do they think that a new Occupation Regime can be imposed on 75 million people? If so, they are massively and probably irredeemably deluded.

    As I have written here before, the US military is a badly flawed instrument for the imposition of a leftist occupation of the US. Careerist generals and admirals in the Regular forces may be willing to swear allegiance to wokism but their people, both officers and enlisted, in the main are of the despised Smelly and Deplorable classes. Would the flag grandees not understand that they probably cannot simply order Regular Amy and USMC units to fight and oppress their own people?

    And then there is the National Guard. These are citizen-soldiers. Good luck on using them to suppress the citizens of their states.
    The FBI, the ATF, federal marshals? A few hundred policemen. Good luck to the left.     Pat Lang.

    Morning everyone. Colonel Lang’s analysis of the intentions of the Biden administration’s intention to project the image of a “white supremacist insurrection” is almost certainly correct; witness the MSM talk and legislation about “Violent Domestic Terrrorism” and the description of the Capitol melee as an insurrection. Where he falls down is in his opinion is that the military will not follow this lead. Experience shows (Germany, Soviet Union, China) that with a little judicious propaganda any body of disciplined men will do almost anything they are told!

    https://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2021/01/httpswwwmsncomen-usnewspoliticswhat-ulysses-grant-can-teach-joe-biden-about-putting-down-violent-ins.html

    1. I fear you may be right Minty. After all Decimation worked wonders for discipline in the Roman Legions so I’m told.

          4. I have indeed, Peddy. See my earlier post above/below. And apologies for writing Who’s as Whose – now corrected.

          6. I made enough jars for two years (24 jars), and put the remaining oranges (enough for another two years) in the freezer. Then I made a start on Grizzly’s diet – no alcohol and no sugar. Aaaarghh!

  4. Had a flick round between Sky and BBC news earlier, they are reporting huge protests in Russia.

    Switched over to RT news, they are reporting huge protests all over France and Europe.
    They did give a bit of a report on the protests in Russia.

    So it looks like RT news gives a more balanced and fairer coverage to world events than our own news media.

    1. Morning Bob. I did catch the RT coverage of the Russian protests. It seemed eminently fair and well balanced! I cannot say the same for the BBC!

      1. Both RT and Al Jazeera are streets ahead of the BBC both in its editorial content and its sense of partiality.

        You have to make a few allowances for RT. There was a fairly comprehensive demolition of Ukraine’s reputation yesterday. With very little subtlety, they laid into them, suggesting they were in league with the Nazis and massacred Poles and Jews and Russians with gay abandon, and that Khrushchev only gave away Crimea because he himself was Ukrainian.

        A case of what you get on RT if you poke the bear, but it’s so brazen, it’s easy to spot and for that reason I find it more honest rather than sneaky burying of bad news under a cooked-up historic abuse scandal we get here.

        1. There was a fairly comprehensive demolition of Ukraine’s reputation yesterday. With very little subtlety, they laid into them, suggesting they were in league with the Nazis and massacred Poles and Jews and Russians with gay abandon, and that Khrushchev only gave away Crimea because he himself was Ukrainian.

          Unfortunately that too is fairly accurate Jeremy. Ukrainians formed most of the prison camp guards to the Nazi’s and in the form of the HIWI’S made up around 10% of the German forces in Russia.

          1. When I was working in Poland in 1979, I visited the village of Kryłów on the River Bug. After the Molotov/Ribbentrop pact, when Germany invaded Poland from the West, the first thing that happened was that Ukrainian nationalists crossed the Bug from the East and massacred the Polish villagers, so they could claim the village for themselves. There were very few survivors.

          2. HIWI’S. Hello Ingid, Welcome Ingrid’s Sons? (I do so hate the current proliferation of UAs (Undecipherable Acronyms).

          3. Morning Elsie and welcome back. Sorry about that!

            Hiwi ([ˈhiːviː]), the German abbreviation of the word Hilfswilliger or, in English, auxiliary volunteer, designated, during World War II, the member of different kinds of voluntary auxiliary forces made up of recruits indigenous to the territories of Eastern Europe occupied by Nazi Germany. Adolf Hitler reluctantly agreed to allow recruitment of Soviet citizens in the Rear Areas during Operation Barbarossa. In a short period of time, many of them were moved to combat units.

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiwi_(volunteer)

          6. Not only Russia. Some years ago MOH met a Ukrainian who had been in the German forces in Normandy.

            After the war he decided not to go home, but stayed to work for the NHS.

          8. And of course you had the “MOJOs” of the MSO who provided the bulk of labourers, drivers and guards for the British Army in Germany for decades after the war.

          9. The MSO tended to be grouped together by nationality/ethnicity. Our MSO in Verden were Yugoslavs. I once asked their senior man why he couldn’t go back home. Turned out he had served in the Wehrmacht.

          10. One of our duties was providing the secondary guard for the Hagenhausen Ammunition Compound, the primary guard being MOJOs.
            One of our lads, had Polish parents and, as well as Polish & German, also had a smattering of Ukrainian and one or two other Central European languages. He told us that an average MOJO conversation would include at least three, often more languages!

          11. We had a control exercise (Non-tac) in Hildesheim in 76. We had to put up marquees for large group of MSO from many garrisons. A day later, we had to put up a smaller marquee for our Yugoslavs. Apparently, some ‘cultural’ differences had come to a head with the others in the big tent.

          12. He was lucky. The Ukrainians working in Germany were rounded up and sent back to Russia to be murdered by Stalin after the war. A disgraceful episode, agreed and facilitated by the Allies.

          14. Was it called that? I only know about it from the German side. The story is too sad and too personal to repeat here.
            Those men (mainly men I think, because the women scrambled to find a German man to marry them so that they could stay) sacrificed themselves because their families would have been murdered if they hadn’t.

          15. Wiki has the sanitised version of events but basically, at the Yalta Conference, the western allies kowtowed to Stalin’s request to have Soviet citizens in the West returned to the East. Where, of course, they faced the obvious consequences of being anti-communist

            Quite why allied commanders could follow such orders defies belief but it is noticeable that the politicians of the day ducked for cover by giving full responsibility to the military. It’s almost as if they were ashamed of their decisions.

          16. Blackmail with the Allied POWs “liberated” by the Russians being used as bargaining chips.

          17. That makes sense but the politicians, having made the deal, obviously realised what it meant for those being returned to Stalin’s clutches. Which is why they attempted to disassociate themselves from the process and subsequent blame, no doubt saving their efforts for reflected glory elsewhere.

          18. When I trained and worked in the local mental hospital, many of the senior foreign nurses had backgrounds that didn’t bear too much examination.
            Although there was a silence, knowing which countries they came from and when (roughly late 1940s) plus casual comments in conversation certainly gave food for thought.

          19. And, of course, it is conveniently forgotten that The Ukraine, Georgia & the Baltic States, initially st least, viewed the Germans as being liberators from the oppression of the USSR.

          1. They don’t like Aung San Suu Kyi since her government dealt with terrorism in their country.

    3. It was very noticeable that the police in Moscow handled the demonstrators far more gently than did the Met in London. The Eastern cities saw rougher handling though.

  7. ‘Morning, Peeps.

    This is the leading letter, although I’m not sure why – if the inability to take a pork pie into Finland generates “bitter disappointment” for Michael Price then I think we are entitled to assume that he’s a bit of a snowflake. How does he cope when something really bad invades his little world?

    SIR – I was never a committed Brexiteer, but after much soul searching I voted Leave in the referendum as I felt that, on balance, Britain’s interests were best served as an independent nation.

    I was bitterly disappointed to learn that I could no longer take a pork pie to treat my son and grandchildren when next we are able to visit them in Finland and began to wonder if I had made the wrong decision.

    The recent chaos surrounding the European Union’s vaccination programme and its attempts to bully Britain and AstraZeneca have convinced me that I was right all along.

    Michael Price
    Ashford, Middlesex

    1. Indeed.
      What a pathetic selection of letters today. Not worth commenting on.
      Pork pies indeed! Arse.
      Good morning, Hugh!

  8. More on the disastrous (for the EU) decision to use Article 16:

    SIR – It took just 28 days for the EU, as predicted, to throw Ireland under a bus.

    Jill Davies
    Northampton

    SIR – The triggering of Article 16 of the Brexit agreement by the European Commission only serves to illustrate a lack of democratic control in the EU.

    The unelected Commission is a permanent bureaucracy similar to our Civil Service, and its president, Ursula von der Leyen, is the equivalent of our Cabinet Secretary, Simon Case. If Mr Case took such action it would be called a coup.

    Ian Allard
    Woking, Surrey

    1. What is more important is that this was done before the Brexit Agreement was ratified by the 27 nations.

      You can decide in your own minds whether the Europeans have the slightest inclination to follow the terms of the Brexit agreement.

  9. Good morning to all NoTTLers, and “A Pinch And A Punch” plus “White Rabbits” to welcome you into a new month. I hope you all had a Guid New Year, and a belated “Happy Birthday” to Poppiesmum (Jan 2), Lady of the Lake (Jan 7), Rough Common (Jan 8), Legal Beagle (Jan 16), Bug Spotted Knees (Jan 18), Damsk Rose (Jan 23) and Ciroen 1 (Jan 27).

    The purpose of my taking a break in January was to catch up on the myriad outstanding odd jobs which I had fallen behind on. (Some hope!) But I did break my resolution once – to wish Uncle Bill a really happy birthday.

    From time to time I looked in on this site for a laugh (thanks especially to RixRedux), to watch the progress of Gus and Pickle, and to upvote the odd comment I agreed with. Whilst scanning your posts, I discovered that apparently there is now some kind of craze on this site of “outing” the identity of many of the posters. I would like to join in this game, and can reveal the following aliases and their real names, viz.

    Peddy the Viking is really Peddy the Dentist
    Legal Beagle is really The Man with the Ladder
    Grizzly is really A. G. Bear
    Fallick Alec is really Car Recovery Man
    Anne Allan is really The Pushy Nurse who is useless at Maffs
    Ogga1 is really Gerrard Batten Junior
    Pretty Polly is really Secretary of the “I don’t like Mr Soros” brigade

    (Well, that’s all I can think of at present – do I win a prize?)

    Keep smiling (in these difficult times).

    Elsie Bloodaxe (sometimes mistaken for Mr Harry Lime a.k.a. The Master)

  10. For those suffering seelf-imposed Dry January, today is February 01 – just saying…
    Glug, glug, glug.

    2. I am now on a Grizzly recommended diet, so no alcohol for the foreseeable future – if ever. The only difficulty was missing my haggies, neeps and tatties laced with several tots of whisky on January the 25th. (Made worse, of course, by AnneAllan’s long posts about her haggis purchases).

  11. WHO team visits Wuhan market where Covid-19 first detected. 31 January 2021.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/972985823be613264c8a48bce18222e027e559bc857cc4eafd4a9fac5a3505c3.jpg

    A World Health Organization-led team of experts investigating the origins of Covid-19 have visited Huanan market, the now shuttered wholesale seafood centre in the Chinese city of Wuhan where the virus was initially detected.

    The team arrived at Huanan amid heavy security, with additional barricades set up outside a high blue fence surrounding the market, and left in a convoy after about one hour. The experts did not take questions from journalists.

    Can someone explain to me how a bunch of apparatchiks, who take no samples, who no Chinese with an ounce of sense would talk too, can discover the truth about something as esoteric as virology?

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/31/who-wuhan-market-covid-19

    2. It’s a sham and yet another blatant example of the disdain these people have for thinking people; the latter appears to be a diminishing resource as indicated by the example set by people that I have come across recently.

  12. SIR – The British Government should immediately undertake to match the supply of EU-funded vaccines to the Republic of Ireland.

    This can easily be justified because of the Common Travel Area, our deep and well established family links and our long historical association.

    The EU is currently providing only 40,000 doses per week to Ireland, which would hardly make a dent in the British vaccine supply. It will also have the benefit of helping the EU’s sadly deficient vaccine programme.

    Peter Fernie
    Oranmore, Co Galway, Ireland

    Really? After all the bitterness and rancour on the part of the EU over years of Brexit, I can see no good reason to dig them out of a hole of their own making. Let them stew; we should not miss a golden opportunity to show the world what a bullying EU really looks like. “Our friends and partners” have shown themselves to be nothing of the kind.

    1. I have distant family over there, and I only spoke to them last month. In their words they say there is still anti British feelings rife through the country. When I talked about the fact we both joined the EU at the same time, do they not consider leaving as well, the answer was “follow the Brits like puppies, no thanks”. It is likely they would chuck the vaccine back in our face.

      1. Quite right, Oldie. Any sign of weakness now will simply encourage them. They need to understand that the days of being pushed around by this undemocratic and incompetent shower are over.

    2. The Irish brought this on themselves.
      For the last century the Irish have enjoyed all the benefits available to UK citizens. For the last four years they have done their best to thwart Brexit and screw the British people.
      All that baloney about the border, when the Good Friday Agreement says not one word about the management of the border.
      Ireland and that simpleton Veradkar and his crony Coveney have been willing catspaws of the EU. Article 16 was ditched when it suited the EU, faster than an Irishman seizing a free pint of Guinness.
      Have a good look at what has just happened. The EU does not care about them, not a jot. Expect Eire to be ditched when it suits them.
      Serves them right.
      Oh, I and many I know have stopped buying anything Irish, sausages, butter, and my beloved Guinness.

      They should get nothing.

      1. I’ve never liked Guinness but do enjoy many of the stouts & porters that are were available from a multitude of breweries before shut down.
        If you can get them, I’d recommend “Dark Drake” by Dancing Duck Brewery and Titanic Brewery’s wonderfully fruity “Plum Porter”.

        http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jYck3Mgr4Q8/UCJ4pdP_GII/AAAAAAAAAMs/dLGuAl7Fwsw/s1600/darkdrake.png

        https://www.nicholsonspubs.co.uk/content/dam/nicholsons/images/content/ales/summer/16-titanic-plumporter.png.asset/1529061294825.png

        1. Hmmm. I did check online, and the information was that Park Royal had closed and the Guinness for the UK was brewed in Dublin.

          1. I’m going back 30 years so I can believe it. The UK stuff was crap compared with the real stuff. On reflection the Warrington site may have canned it.

          2. Back then, actually a bit further back, a company called “Porter’s” bottled Guinness, and it was considered the best. (This from memory.)

          3. I never frank the bottled stuff but I did like the canned Draught Guinness but if that was unavailable Murphys was a good substitute

          4. Whatever you do, avoid Namibian and Mauritian Guinness like the plague. They’re brewed locally under license and are unspeakably foul. I did it so you didn’t have to.

  13. SIR – Of course it’s not too late for Alan Cochrane (“As a dyed-in-the-wool Remainer, I now wish I’d been a Brexiteer”, Comment, January 31) to join us Brexiteers.

    Like Mr Cochrane, I enjoy Bordeaux wine and holidaying in Europe, and still think of myself as European. I just don’t like the authoritarian, unaccountable and undemocratic European Commission.

    Jonathan Selby
    Richmond, Surrey

    I and 17.4 million others cannot fault your last sentence, Mr Selby!

      1. Britain is part of the continent of Europe. That makes JS British & European. You might just as well argue that Mallorca, Malta, Sicily, Crete & the Danish Islands are not part of Europe.

  14. What is one of the first actions taken by the new ultra liberal Secretary of State of the United States, Mr. Antony Blinken?

    Tell China to back off? Continue Trump’s very successful peace process in the Middle East? Tell Iran to stop its terrorist activities before any discussions on a nuclear deal?

    No! He has ordered US embassies around the world to fly the ‘rainbow flag’ to reiterate the Biden government’s support for 2% of the population!

    I have no problem with people in this group as long as they behave with dignity. But now we have confirmation that the BIden administration wants to undermine western civilisation by pandering to the far left.

    As many are asking: “Do you miss Trump yet?”!

          1. Morning Minty, history has shown any country with Peoples Democratic in the title is anything but. As you say the name change must surely come for they are starting to resemble the old East Germany, North Korea, Yemen or Vietnam

    2. He is years behind the UK foreign office who wanted British Embassies to be used to put on gay “marriages” in countries where this is illegal.

    3. Really? That’s not international representation, it’s virtue signalling. It ignores that many, many, many countries don’t care much for homosexuality. It’s juvenile and will set back relations even further.

      Besides, being gay is a lifestyle choice. Nothing more. That shouldn’t be praised, in fact, it should be completely ignored as irrelevant.

  15. SIR – Lord Carey of Clifton (“The Church has created an unjust culture of fear”, Comment, January 30) is right to criticise the Church of England’s processes for dealing with allegations against clergy. I am increasingly concerned about the flawed, slow and secretive procedures of what are called “core group” investigations.

    I have three senior clergy friends whose cases have been, to put it mildly, badly handled by the core group: Lord Carey; Christopher Lowson, Bishop of Lincoln, and Martyn Percy, Dean of Christ Church. Their permissions to officiate have been humiliatingly withdrawn long before the resolution of the complaints against them or their exonerations could emerge.

    Such delays are not tolerated when it comes to complaints against parliamentarians, civil servants, business executives or prison and probation service staff. Why should clergy be treated so much worse?

    The culture of fear and secrecy is a big factor here. At my old Oxford college, Christ Church, the Charity Commission is asking vital questions as to whether the 60 trustees on the governing body have properly exercised their responsibilities by ensuring due diligence at meetings and avoiding conflicts of interest. It is also examining the legal advice leading up to the current imbroglio, which has cost the charity in excess of £4 million in legal fees and lost donations.

    Root-and-branch reform of the Church’s disciplinary procedures and Christ Church’s governance is needed.

    Rev Jonathan Aitken
    London SW5

    Some years ago now Jonathan Aitken visited our church, to take part in a series of “An Evening With….” interviews, and afterwards I had a brief opportunity to chat to him. From the disaster of his ‘sword of truth’ lies here was someone who repented and who completely turned his life around after his political career was well and truly over. It came as no surprise to me when he later sought ordination. Like others, no doubt, I despised his terrible errors of judgement, but in the end he became a thoroughly decent individual. Life is full of surprises, and just occasionally some of them are pleasant ones!

    1. Christ Church is mixed in with the University, so it’s no surprise if it adheres to the lowest standards in Britain.

    2. BTL Comment:-

      Robert Spowart
      1 Feb 2021 9:22AM
      @Brian Thorne Sadly, he’s on a losing wicket. It’s almost as if The Church of England’s “leadership” is deliberately taking actions to sow discord and distrust as part of it’s efforts to weaken it’s position in the national structure.

      DeleteLike
      Reply

    3. Forgiveness is a core part of the Christian faith Britain used to espouse.

      It is amazing how unforgiving many newly British people are of the slavery suffered by their ancestors imposed by the people who led the world in eliminating this blight over 200 years ago.

      No good deed should go unpunished.

  16. SIR – I am a keen environmentalist who worked for many years in the steel industry. I read with some consternation of the bandwagon on to which people have jumped with regard to the proposal for a new coal mine in Cumbria (report, January 30).

    Their criticism shows a total lack of understanding of where steel comes from and of the fact that unfortunately a large proportion of the steel produced in this country and abroad relies on coking coal. Surely it is better and more environmentally friendly to burn our own coal rather than import it from Australia, Brazil or elsewhere.

    The only other alternative is to shut down steelmaking in this country, say goodbye to another essential and strategic industry and import inefficiently made steel from China.

    Please let’s protect the planet, but also stay in the real world until alternative methods can be found.

    Tim Andrew
    Bridgend, Glamorgan

    Well said, Tim Andrew and well done for sticking your head above the greenie parapet!

        1. Aeroplanes use an inflatable rubber boot. Or internal hot air system (for a turbine engine), or electrical skin heating. Nobody uses a helicopter.

    2. We pay a lot of money to consultants who do little but spout social theory and rake in public money into their offshore privatised accounts. For this, we go on one knee and tear down our national monuments and heritage, and wreck the institutions of civilisation that have taken many centuries to build up and evolve to support us.

      Here though is an excellent case for a proper and rigorous environmental audit into the global steel industry, with a remit to mitigate and minimise environmental damage, and to present the monetary cost of the various options. Then a cost/benefit analysis can be done and an optimum programme pushed through the appropriate channels, using a combination of the free market and tax and subsidy regimes in order to modify the market to this end. Legislation being a final resort, but certainly that too.

      Although open cast coal mining in Durham is counter-intuitive and messy, does a lot of damage to the landscape and may well make a contribution to the unbalancing of the carbon/oxygen cycle that regulates climate patterns on this planet, it may well prove the best option open to us, if the alternative is to leave it to the social conscience of the Chinese Communist Party.

      Environmentalists (and I certainly include myself as one) should keep an open mind and consider the evidence without political weighting.

      1. The cement works at Dunbar is an open cast operation. The topsoil is ripped off, the limestone stuff is removed and the topsoil is put back. The whole operation crawls across East Lothian with little overall reduction in agricultural output. There was a one time loss decades ago when the mine was created, but that was all. The lost strip of land crawls across the landscape. That too will be replaced when the operation ceases.
        It’s very impressive with a huge walking dragline. I visited it in 1964 on a school trip – the geography teacher took all five of the class in his car on various trips.
        https://dunbar.tarmac.com/about-us/

    3. Hold on – does this mean the election was fairly held and the government democratically elected but the state just didn’t like it?

    4. We are no longer the colonial Government of Burma, so we should keep our nose out of it and let them sort their own problems out.

  18. SIR – I am a keen environmentalist who worked for many years in the steel industry. I read with some consternation of the bandwagon on to which people have jumped with regard to the proposal for a new coal mine in Cumbria (report, January 30).

    Their criticism shows a total lack of understanding of where steel comes from and of the fact that unfortunately a large proportion of the steel produced in this country and abroad relies on coking coal. Surely it is better and more environmentally friendly to burn our own coal rather than import it from Australia, Brazil or elsewhere.

    The only other alternative is to shut down steelmaking in this country, say goodbye to another essential and strategic industry and import inefficiently made steel from China.

    Please let’s protect the planet, but also stay in the real world until alternative methods can be found.

    Tim Andrew
    Bridgend, Glamorgan

    With Lustig being an unusual name, I wonder whether he is related to Robin Lustig, whose calm and authorative voice is so missed on R4’s The World Tonight?

    3. It is not about being green it is about the security of this country. We cannot stroll into the future relying on steel from China or the EU. We have just seen the naked face of the EU revealed as being as vicious as any monster from Hell. They don’t like us and will destroy us at every turn.
      We don’t have many friends in the world except Uruguay. The only thing we can take from those cowardly catspaws in Ireland is the motto, “Ourselves Alone”.

      1. We need a new deep freeze. A new one will cost £500 which, given the fact that our business now provides us with no income at all, is quite a lot.

        The freezing mechanism of the machine still works perfectly. However the door seal is frayed in places which means the machine is not airtight so the inside furs up with frost and we use more electricity than we should to run it.

        New seals are not available – the only possible solution would be to have a new door with a new seal but this would cost £300 so is it worth it?

        A small fray in a piece of plastic seal will probably mean that we shall have to take the freezer to the tip and it is a big unit measuring 180cm x 70cm x 60 cm.

        Do you remember Moron Gove was telling us all not to have woodburning stoves in order to ‘save the environment’ and to repair things rather than replace them for the same reason. He is not the liveliest adder in the bosom is he?

        1. Politicians are thick. Their ideas are focussed solely on themselves. Being so deep in the trough they just don’t care about the nonsense and chaos they cause.

        2. Well, he is probably not the type that rolls up his sleeves and repairs things.
          We had a Lec freezer. It worked fine until the door seal went. As you have found with yours it was not possible to just buy a seal. I suspect that those who repair these things professionally have great reels of rubber seal at their disposal. Of course they will charge nearly as much as for a new one.
          We bought from Comet an inexpensively priced fridge that worked well for many years, a Scandinova*, until the thermostat broke. Again it was impossible to fix. A new thermostat with long wire was obtainable, but installing was not possible for me as it would have involved taking the fridge to pieces and no guarantee it would work. I am not really mechanically gifted.
          I suspect that there may be well priced reliable freezers and fridges out there, but finding them is hard going. Most now seem to be made in Turkey.

          * from forum on fridges: “To replace the old, quality made Scandinova you will need to look at the premium refrigeration brands like Bosch, Liebherr and Miele to get anywhere near the same build.”

        3. If in the same position, I would be tempted to find the heaviest duty stick on draught excluder I can, totally remove the door seals from the fridge or freezer and replace it with the excluder and a couple of small catches to hold the door shut in place of the magnetic strip.

    4. It’s the comical idea that if we don’t produce steel no one else will and we will all live in a shiny green future with trees everywhere and a permanent sunshine all singing and dancing in a circle until the end of time.

      We won’t. China will produce it and be far, far more pollutting than we would ever be. It’s time to throw away the green nonsense and so what needs to be done.

  19. Months after Boris Johnson vowed to end witch-hunt, more former soldiers who served in Northern Ireland are under investigation over conduct. 1 February 2021.

    Another 12 Army veterans are facing charges including murder relating to Troubles shootings almost 50 years ago, the Daily Mail can reveal.

    Despite ministers’ pledges to protect those who served in Northern Ireland, the province’s Public Prosecution Service has received files relating to a number of historical incidents and decisions on charges are imminent.

    Many of the incidents relate to an experimental military group set up to ‘eliminate’ suspected IRA members at the height of the Troubles.

    I never believed the assurances of the British Government so I’ m not disappointed. One could wish for one that represents the British People but sadly that is no longer the case. They are actually our enemies as much, or perhaps more, as any Foreign Power may be said to be!

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9207991/Another-12-former-soldiers-served-Northern-Ireland-investigation-conduct.html

    1. This is a national disgrace. Former soldiers are to be propersecuted for doing the job that our Government sent the Army to NI to do, while murdering PIRA scum are as free as birds, their freedom guaranteed by Bliar’s shameful “comfort letters”. As this Government clearly demonstrates, pledges from ministers to protect soldiers from such vindictive and vexatious charges are worth absolutely nothing. I hope today’s soldiers will take note.

      The only thing we were guilty of was doing our job too well, which the PIRA-run PPSNI can never forget.

      1. I was told by an Army friend that the IRA was all but defeated, recruitment was proving difficult, because the army and undercover people were nailing them, and that the net was closing on Adams and McGuinness.

        Then the “peace” agreements with such hidden aspects as the “comfort letters” gave them a totally new lease of life.

        Everything Blair ever touched hurt the UK.

        1. That’s true, Sos, we had the bastards beaten and they knew it. These prosecutions have nothing to do with justice, they’re motivated by pure revenge, nothing else. I am beyond angry.

        3. Wasn’t it the City bombs that did it? If the big banks had left, UK would have been in serious trouble.

          1. It was a sign of their desperation.
            Bomb warnings had been a regular occurrence.

            Nobody showed signs of moving out of London , as far as I am aware, even after Bishopsgate.

    2. The one reason that Auberon Waugh gave for being in favour of the EU was that he could not imagine that European politicians could be so foul and treacherous as British ones are. I think that Boris Baby Powder Johnson and Ursula Fonda Lyin are, to borrow from George Galloway’s metaphor, two cheeks of the same arse.

  20. We need more people like Murray Jones…

    Lt-Cdr Johnnie Murray Jones, wartime submariner who became a successful businessman – obituary

    He enjoyed an unexpected poultry feast off Sumatra and postwar he founded a global money brokers and the security firm Guardforce

    By
    Telegraph Obituaries
    31 January 2021 • 6:20pm

    Lieutenant Commander Johnnie Murray Jones, who has died aged 99, was a submariner in the Far East during the Second World War and later founded a global money broking firm and the security company Guardforce.

    In June 1944 Murray Jones’s submarine Truculent had attacked a Japanese convoy and landed special forces on Simalur island, west of Sumatra, when she sailed from Trincomalee with orders to “capture some Sumatrans to help with intelligence”.

    Murray Jones was on watch on the surface at the southern end of the Malacca Straits, “the night as black as only a moonless tropical night can be”, when he saw through his binoculars an even darker patch of night which was the sail of a junk lying becalmed on the glassy sea.

    As first lieutenant, he was also the boarding officer, and as Truculent slid silently alongside the junk he and his men, armed with pistols, hand grenades and knives, jumped on to the deck, expecting to meet Japanese soldiers. Instead, they found a startled native crew whom Murray Jones bundled into a sampan and pointed towards the shore, while taking the indignant captain prisoner.

    The cargo included baskets filled with poultry, and as the submarine crew’s diet was reduced to “babies heads” (tinned individual suet puddings filled with mince) and “train smash” (tinned tomato and bacon), the baskets proving too large for the boat’s hatch, the birds were hurriedly thrown one by one down the conning tower, before the boat dived.

    As the lights came on, he saw chickens and ducks hiding behind the pipes, valves and machinery. Two had dropped down the periscope well, and were crushed when the periscope was lowered, so that the blood had to be wiped off the eyepieces when it was next used.

    Their mangled remains were delicious nonetheless and when a stoker owned to having been brought up on a farm, he was promoted to chief poulterer. The two most beautiful ducks were spared as pets, and in harbour they would be thrown overboard with a collar and line and allowed to swim.

    When invited to the depot ship Wuchang, however, Murray Jones did not enjoy dinner after being told by her captain that “My cook tells me that he has managed to get hold of a really nice duck for us”.

    For this, and other deeds, Murray Jones was mentioned in dispatches.

    Paul Murray Jones was born in Portsmouth and raised in Wye where his father, a retired naval surgeon, had a practice. His grandfather was Paymaster Rear-Admiral Sir Francis Cook Alton KBE CB CMG who had fought at the Relief of Peking during the Boxer Rebellion in 1900. Young Murray Jones joined Dartmouth in the Benbow term of 1935.

    His early war years were in the Atlantic in the destroyer Sardonyx, before he specialised as a submariner. In 1942-43 he undertook patrols in Taku in the Mediterranean, before joining Uther briefly as first lieutenant.

    In 1946 he passed the “perisher”, and commanded the submarines Saga, Sentinel, Solent, Trump and Taciturn, but when it became clear that he would not make commander, he retired from the Navy in 1961.

    After a failed car-wash business and an unsuccessful foray into winebroking, Murray Jones advertised his services in the personal columns of The Times – “ex-submarine captain with lots of intelligence and efficiency seeking a job” – and was recruited by a firm of foreign exchange brokers.

    In 1965 he started his own firm, PJ Murray-Jones, initially operating from a call box on the corner of Watling Street and Bow Lane. When business prospered he acquired premises, putting the surplus ground-floor to use as a wine bar which became Bow Wine Vaults.

    Murray Jones grew his business into a global money broking company. His attention to detail meant staying late to deadhead flowers and check menus for directors’ lunches.

    His life changed again after a friend, the banker Christopher Hoare, helped him to sell his company to the discount house, Gerrard and Reid. As a midshipman Murray Jones had served in the cruiser Danae in the Far East and had enjoyed life ashore in Hong Kong. He decided to settle there.

    At Chinese New Year 1970, however, his house was broken into and he received 17 knife wounds to his chest and stomach. The robber, who had been struck on the head by the family nanny, was later found dead in a pool of blood on the golf course.

    Disappointed by the response of the police and of private security guards, Murray Jones established his own security company, Guardforce, which was soon supplying the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank offices with guards, armoured cars, alarm systems, and even the huge vault door of a new headquarters building.

    Guardforce also won the contract for security of a new Swire-owned container terminal. Murray Jones subsequently sold the company to HSBC.

    Murray Jones had a talent for design, which he fulfilled in building a yacht, Bluejacket, to the highest specifications of teak and brass. In 1997 he built a house in Andalusia, on a hill looking out toward Africa, the entrance incorporating vast, antique wooden double doors and the courtyard planted with lemon trees, and filled with rescue-dogs of which his favourite was the Jack Russell, Bono.

    He had a reputation for being irascible, fussy, litigious and spontaneous – he once bought a car he liked while stuck alongside it in a traffic jam – but he was also generous and kind-hearted, and a good employer who delegated well.

    Murray Jones married three times: first to Elizabeth Grayburn, daughter of the Chief General Manager of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank; secondly to Pauline Anderson; and thirdly in 1988 to the Hong Kong QC Alice Mok.

    She survives him with their daughter and a son and a daughter from each of the early marriages.

    “Johnnie” Murray Jones, born September 26 1921, died January 4 2021

    1. IN AN online Cambridge Union debate last Thursday, students voted by 362 votes to 309 to approve the motion ‘This House believes lockdown was a mistake’. Astonishingly, this defiant vote against the government and mainstream opinion received no media coverage at all. This is particularly surprising given the seniority and status of the Conservative proposer of the motion: Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 committee of backbenchers.

      Astonishingly? That speaks more to the naiveté of the author than reality!

      1. I wouldn’t give too much credence to any student union debate.

        The King and Country Debate was a debate on 9 February 1933 at The Oxford Union Society. The motion presented, “This House will under no circumstances fight for its King and country,” passed at 275 votes for the motion and 153 against it.

        2. Tommy Robinson spoke very well and with great coherence and conviction at the Oxford Union.

          Fat lot of good it did him personally but it did draw attention to the fact that he has been scandalously targeted and attacked by the politicians, the police and the courts.

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YQ94jFg_4A

          1. Once upon a time the OUS and the CUS held serious debates with many excellent speakers who were given a platform to air views that would appear nowadays to give students a nervous breakdown.

            Debates were courteous, even when heated, and the results would usually reflect the quality of the debating rather than the personal views/prejudices of those voting.

  23. More dodgy proof-reading from the DT!

    Fuel duty rise now inevitable, say Tory MPs

    Several MPs in ‘Red Wall’ seats claimed they could potentially accept increases in corporation tax and changes to the pensions tripe lock

    1. But… but… but… tripe and onions is one of my favourite dishes. How dare they lock it away from my family butcher!

      1. My mother eats it raw & cold from the fridge. So disgusting, it makes me want to throw, so it does.
        Morning, Elsie. :-))

        1. Morning, Herr Oberst. As a child in Argentina I regularly ate it in white, rich, creamy, onion sauce. Absolutely delicious. I wish I had the recipe.

          2. It is disgusting stuff. It is like chomping on a piece of thick, woolly blanket. My mother presented it to me when I was a small child. I promptly choked on it, the stringiness of the texture when chewed was hard to swallow. I frightened her to death, and tripe was never again seen on our table.

          3. My mother said it was like stewed knitting, so it was never on the menu at our house. Our next-door neighbour used to cook it and it smelled good but that was just the onions.

          4. My mum used to buy and cook tripe as a treat for herself, as the rest of the family wouldn’t touch it. I never tried it. The appearance was enough to put me off. She once bought eel to cook and try for herself too. It stank.

          5. Morning, Auntie Elsie.

            Mum use to serve it cold with salt, pepper and vinegar, and slices of bread and butter.

          7. I’ve never had them but I’m game to try anything once.

            I’ve eaten surströmming and it is quite tasty; even if it smells like a sewage farm!

        2. It’s not raw Paul. It is very thoroughly washed and then it is cooked before it is sold. Cold tripe with vinegar used to be very commonly eaten though I haven’t tried it. I have eaten tripe poached in milk – it’s perfectly edible and I would eat it rather than starve, but it has little taste and an unpleasant texture and I wouldn’t eat it by choice.

          When I worked on a large estate in the summer before I went to university there were 14 or 15 gamekeepers with a kennel full of dogs apiece. The slaughter-house used to deliver green trip (rinsed, but not properly washed) twice a week which was boiled up in a large copper and all the keepers took what they needed. The smell when it was cooking, was very nasty indeed.

        1. You are not very keen on kidneys or tongue as a consequence of spending some of your childhood in India and Iran.

          1. I can understand that, when you get the smell of fried piss kidney, it’s not appetising.

        2. I’ve never had it. The sight and smell is enough (opening a tin of dog food).
          But, I do like pigs’ trotters, so I’m probably being rather pathetic.

    2. What happened when fuel duty fell the last time? There was a boom. Spending, travelling, the works.

      Brown, because he’s a malignant twerp with the brain of an ant, immediately hiked fuel duty. The boom ended, spending halted. Then, comically he couldn’t understand why!

  24. Good morning all, fine and dry , for a while , the garden is almost a quagmire .

    The Misadventures of Romesh Ranganathan BBC2 last night

    Romesh travels around Zimbabwe, gets caught in biblical lightning storms, re-enacts the film Titanic on a Lake Kariba houseboat and tries the home-brewed beer he made in a bathtub in Bulawayo.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m00077gn/the-misadventures-of-romesh-ranganathan-series-2-1-zimbabwe

    Blatant leftism and appalling .. We couldn’t believe that the BBC allowed that dreadful man to aid and abet the BLM movement and misrepresent so many issues .

    Yes he rattled my teeth , and I am certain he rattled many others as well.

    The current situation has not changed out there , poor old Zim is in a mess as much as SA is now.

    1. You might notice that the BBC will not employ comedians unless they are publicly and blatantly left wing.

      Whether they hold these views in private I don’t know.

      1. Seems these days that the “jokes” are all about genitalia. Problem is, it ain’t funny.

    3. I still call the place Rhodesia.

      But everyone I know foresaw that SA would be in the same state within a couple of decades. Their foresight has been proved completely right.

      1. A friend of MOH lives in South Africa.

        His reports of what is going on there are amazing.

        I’m so very surprised that the BBC hasn’t reported them as well.

        The BBC hasn’t even reported on Cabo Delgado…!

    5. Glad we didn’t bother watching that then. We caught up with one of the David Attenborough ones.

      Apart from his obligatory pushing of the climate change agenda and the over-enthusiastic celestial choir muzak, the photography was superb.

  25. A belated Good Morning to all.
    Bright, sunny & frosty here this morning with -3°C in the yard.

    I’ve half a van load of wood that I scavenged on Saturday to get sorted and another full load of wood in the van to be unloaded & dealt with, so I think i’m going to be busy today!

  26. Good morning, all. Late. Stuff to do – log stacking a bit later.

    I see that the rampant Burmese nationalist “leader” has been arrested in – ye another – military coup.

    Couldn’t happen to a nicer chap….

  27. Entertainment Night

    It was entertainment night at the senior citizens’ centre. After the community sing-song led by Alice at the piano it was time for the Star of the Show – Claude the Hypnotist!

    Claude explained that he was going to put the whole audience into a trance … “Yes, each and every one of you and all at the same time,” said Claude.

    The excited chatter dropped to silence as Claude carefully withdrew from his waistcoat pocket a beautiful antique gold pocket watch and chain … “I want you to keep your eyes on this watch” said Claude, holding the watch high for all to see.
    “It is a very special and valuable watch that has been in my family for six generations” said Claude.

    He began to swing the watch gently back and forth while quietly chanting … “Watch the watch – Watch the watch – Watch the watch”

    The audience became mesmerised as the watch swayed back and forth, the lights twinkling as they were reflected from its gleaming surfaces. A hundred and fifty pairs of eyes followed the movements of the gently swaying watch. And then, suddenly, the chain broke!!!

    The beautiful watch fell to the stage and burst apart on impact!

    “SHIT” said Claude.

    It took them three days to clean the Senior Citizens’ Centre and Claude was never invited to entertain again!

  28. 328963+ up ticks,
    Morning Each,
    “The EU’s chaotic vaccine programme has reinforced the case for Brexit”

    Why did it need reinforcing ? surely the decision taken on the
    24/6/2016 was to trigger our emergence once again as a free
    trading Nation.

    Instead, those that chose freedom also returned to supporting the very pro eu political contingent ie the lab/lib/con pro eu mass uncontrolled immigration, paedophile umbrella coalition party expecting overnight change in the
    rubber stamper party’s.

    Total severance was the way to go back in 2016 but sadly the party first & HOPE brigade won the day leading to the “deal” AKA the tie,never kick a good scam completely into touch.

    Surely the electorate of these Isles MUST lead the field
    worldwide in back lashing rod production.

  30. I see that the Teapot gave a withering attack on the EUSSR over the weekend. Fat lot of good it will do him, of course.

    There is also an attack on the Hitlerine by a German in The Grimes today.

    Whatever the hurdles – thank God we are out of it.

  32. 328963+ up ticks,
    Is this not setting a precedent for puncturing policemen ?

    Khan’s London: Mohin Hussain Gets Short Sentence for Stabbing Policeman

  33. We live in extraordinary times…

    This last weekend there have been some 60-odd demonstrations throughout France against a proposed wide-ranging law on bioethics which will, amongst others:

    – allow abortions “for psycho-social reasons” up to the day before birth
    – deny children the right to have a father, but give all women the right to have a child
    – make medically assisted procreation (as it is called here in France) available and free for all who request it, rather than only for those couples who have a medical need for this.

    As I was looking at the newspapers last night and this morning, I am amazed to see that the French MSM are not reporting these demonstrations. There are headline articles in France-Soir (an independent news website) and Aleteia (a Catholic website), but no headlines in Le Figaro (centre-right) or Le Monde (lefty intellectual).

    This government has buried the debates on this proposed law in the National Assembly and in the Senate under all the Covid-related stuff, and also under the debates on another law on managing religion in the country.

    What price human life?

    1. Good morning Caroline

      What price human life ?

      Dog-walking couple in their 20s are left distraught after discovering body of baby boy in woods at golf course as floral tributes are left at scene and police scour area
      Couple in their 20s discovered body of baby in woodland on Friday afternoon
      Forensic officers have been at the Wirral, Merseyside golf course over weekend
      Force said it is not clear at this stage how the infant died or cause of death

      https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9207501/Dog-walking-couple-discovered-body-baby-boy-woods-Wirral-golf-course.html

      1. In the 19th century, infanticide was very common. In these days of easily obtained contraceptive methods, there is really no excuse for it at all. I don’t include abortion as a contraceptive method, though I do accept that sometimes it can be necessary in some circumstances. Certainly not at a very late stage.

        1. I understand that the crammed Romanian orphanages were the result of the Ceaucescus banning contraception to increase the population. Many of the children were mentally and physically disabled because their mothers had tried various abortion methods during pregnancy.
          And then there were (are?) the feral children living in their tribes under the city streets.

          3. Of course we are reading more and more reports of children being born malformed to ethnic families in Britain .. by virtue of incestous relationsships , they must be costing the NHS an absolute fortune .

            By the way , what became of the panic that the Zikka virus brought to pregnant women .. What happened there and does that mosquito borne virus still exist ?

          5. I was wondering that. It seemed to cause microcephaly and mental handicap in babies if the mother caught it during pregnancy.

          6. In cases like that I think abortion at the earliest stage after diagnosis would be justified.

          7. I agree. However, it mostly seems to be poor women living in the favelas, who don’t have the choice.

          8. In Turkey, where arranged marriages between cousins is still the norm among the less educated classes, there is a huge problem with malformed babies, many of whom are put away in special homes – out of sight, out of mind, but it costs the state billions. The answer to this has been to impose DNA testing of fiancés – if the DNA is too close, you are not allowed to marry.

            I don’t know if this check is also applied in other countries where there are many arranged marriages within extended families.

            Of course the whole policy falls apart when marriage is no longer a social requirement for having children!

          9. A pair of our friends who lived on their boat in Turkey decided to get married. When they presented themselves to get the necessary paperwork and permits they were told that the DNA tests would not be necessary. They were both English and over 65!

        2. Not only was infanticide a widespread crime but the very similar offences of child-destruction, concealment of birth and abandonment of a child (which held varying degrees of culpability and punishment) were also commonplace.

    2. Horrible, absolutely horrible.

      There are even posters to this site who think that as far as late abortions are concerned that a child doesn’t exist until it has been born and that a woman should have the right to abort it.

      1. Good morning, Sos.

        ‘There are even posters to this site…’

        I know of only one who, some time ago
        insulted a poster and his wife, after he
        shared their sense of loss after a miscarriage.

        To me that attitude sums that person up.

        1. There have been numerous debates here on abortion and the woman’s right to choose, which have produced some viewpoints that I find abhorrent.

          1. I accept that there may be occasions
            where an abortion may be medically
            recommended but to use it as a form
            of birth control is an anathema to me.

          3. It’s tricky. There was a female author (in the health & social services area) who commented that some children’s lives are not doomed from birth, but from the moment of conception. However, most babies are infinitely adorable.
            Edit: have just realised where Nottlers come from, oh dear.

    4. France under Macron is well on the way to no longer being a civilised country. Next thing we know is that parents who decide they don’t want their children should be allowed to do post-natal abortions up to one year after the child’s birth.

      We had a pair of married friends to supper over the weekend and both of them were pro-abortion – but not on abortion as late as Macron wants. This couple have had no children and I wonder if having children alters one’s perspective on such matters. I did not marry until I was 41 and did not become a father until I was 47. I was an employee rather than self-employed up to the age of 43 and so my outlook on many things changed.

    5. Why wait until the day before birth? Why not wait until the child becomes a pest and do it then? Anything from two to fifty years after birth.

      1. More or less what I said. However taken to its logical limit there is a strong case for post facto abortion when the child hits adolescence.

        2. 328963+ up ticks,
          Afternoon R,
          I do believe the electorate
          look after that via the polling booth, multiple ways for premature deaths are practised / carried out
          and witnessed on a daily basis.

    6. In 2019 There were 207,384 abortions for women resident in England and Wales, the highest number since the Abortion Act was introduced.

      Source ONS.
      Absolute tragedy and a phenomenal waste of NHS resources.

      1. Similar figures in France.

        Like Ndovu and others here, I can see that abortion can sometimes be medically recommended. But these figures show that it is now commonly used as a means of contraception and that, surely, is an abomination.

        1. Don’t doctors have any medical ethics anymore ..

          I cannot cope with the idea that full term babies are aborted and murdered.

          Aren’t modern women educated in the many forms of contraception that are available ?

          1. One of the nasties in this proposed law is the suppression of the “conscience clause” for doctors who will no longer be allowed not to carry out an abortion on the grounds of their own conscience.

            Another novelty is that midwives will be allowed to perform early, uncomplicated abortions.

          2. That is very wrong. I’m neutral on the subject of early abortion, but medical – and other staff – should be allowed to treat it as a matter of conscience.
            Years ago, I read that many Soviet women treated abortion as contraception because the supplies were so poor. 6 or 7 times was common.

        2. It is an abomination, but I don’t see any way to prevent that by law. If abortion’s available by law, it will be abused.

          1. And taking the abuse of the abortion laws as an example, can anyone feel confident that the much demanded Euthanasia Laws would not be similarly abused?

          3. This is my argument against euthanasia laws as well. Particularly in the light of the creep of abortion laws from “two doctors must sign that continuing with the pregnancy would harm the mother” to abortion on demand of a healthy baby because the baby is the “wrong” sex (Thank you, Keir Starmer, DPP).
            All this happened without any change in the actual law!

    7. These are appalling 🙁
      Especially the abortion one. In the light of medical advances since the 60s, we should be pushing the last date for terminations back (earlier), not forward.
      Legalised infanticide will be next. It is already advocated by extremists.

  34. DT Article
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/02/01/union-isnt-just-keeping-scotland-happy/

    England should have its own assembly. The West Lothian Question has never been properly resolved.

    My solution was that instead of spending any more money each elected MP should spend half the week in Westminster and the other in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland while English MPs should spend the other half of the week staying put in Westminster. This would avoid the cost of building more parliamentary buildings and the cost of employing two sets of MPs for each country as the same MP could cover both functions for his or her constituents.

    Government hired Coaches and/or chartered planes for travel and government owned flats should be provided for the MPs in Scotland, Wales so that the MPs have less scope for fiddling their expenses for travel and accommodation.

    A BTL comment on the Scottish Independence Referendum which might appeal to some NOTTLERs:

    Krankie and the Scots have had their once in a generation referendum’ now let the English/Welsh/Northern Irish have a referendum to see if we want them to leave.

    1. The idea that England should have its own assembly is plain bonkers. All it achieves is another costly layer of bureaucracy and is divisive. Anyway, England already has its own assembly – it’s called The Palace of Westminster.

      A far more effective and uniting solution, is to dissolve the Wee Pretendy Parliament and remove the Welsh and Northern Irish Assemblies, putting responsibility and accountability back where it belongs with the elected MPs from all parts of the current Disunited Kingdom.

      1. Yes, but you would save the costs of employing two sets of MPs in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and not have to employ any more English MPs or build any new buildings with the Rastus double-up plan!

        1. Banish all the local “pretendy” administrations and install a central parliament for the whole of the UK at York.

      2. The Holyrood Super Council budgeted £50m for a talking shop & spent £375m
        Jobs for the lefties

        1. What? Did you never watch the wonderful Auf Wiedersehen, Pet back in the 80s?

          “Why, he’s a canny gadgie, though but, wor Brenda.”

    2. Yet…. no one seems to shout ‘this is unfair.’ No one points out that the emperor is not wearing any clothes.

      1. People are shouting. The BBC has been cancelled by a lot of trans folk for not being supportive enough of their agenda.

        1. Outlaw all sex distinction in sport: all people who identify as men, all people who identify as women and all people who identify as trans should compete on level terms in all sporting events – and, to emphasise their p.c. credentials, they should agree to share the same communal showering and bathing facilities.

          1. Or we could go back to the Greek way of doing things and then such difference will be glaringly obvious!

  36. Inaya Folarin Iman, a Founding Director of the Free Speech Union, is launching a new venture today called the Free Speech Champions Project, along with a group of students and recent graduates. (The Mail on Sunday ran a story about it yesterday.) Below is an extract from the press release.

    The Free Speech Champions Project is an exciting new initiative which aims to inspire the next generation about the importance of free speech. It has been set up by a socially and politically diverse group of university students and recent graduates to create a space for challenging thinking. It will do this by creating a network of young ‘free speech champions’ across the country who will host events on free speech, support and encourage the development of free speech societies, and develop the information, ideas and arguments about free speech needed to inspire the next generation. The Champions will collaborate with individuals, groups and organisations who share their commitment to free speech.

    The Free Speech Champions Project is led by Inaya Folarin Iman, a 24-year-old graduate of the University of Leeds, and developed in collaboration with the Free Speech Union and the Battle of Ideas charity.

    Inaya said: “Freedom of speech is essential for open enquiry to flourish. Social and human progress depends on courageous individuals who are prepared to think for themselves. Too often, the places where free speech should be valued most highly – universities and online spaces – are where it is in most jeopardy. We need to re-articulate why free speech matters, especially to young people.”

    A 2020 survey carried out by ADF International revealed that 40% of students self-censor out of concern for their future careers.

    Inaya said: “A lot of attention has been paid to the problem of explicit censorship on campus – no-platforming of speakers, the closing down of debates. It is a good sign that a lot of people instinctively feel that this is wrong. However, a more subtle pressure to self-censor has also become far too prevalent in places of education. This is not about being ‘polite’. Too many young people are holding themselves back from exploring ideas because they fear the potentially negative consequences of using the wrong words or of honestly sharing what is on their minds.”

    The Free Speech Champions Project will go to where young people most need the space to think and speak freely – schools, universities and online communities – and inspire support for freedom of speech.

    Toby Young, the General Secretary of the Free Speech Union, said: “The Free Speech Union is delighted to be supporting this project, along with the Battle of Ideas charity. If free speech is going to endure it’s essential that young people understand why it matters and needs to be defended.”

    You can find out more about the Free Speech Champions Project by visiting its website. And if you’re a student or recent graduate who would like to get involved, please fill out the form on this page.

    New Organisation Set Up to Help People Resist Woke Ideology

    Another new organisation has just been launched called Counterweight. Started by Helen Pluckrose, co-author of Cynical Theories: How Activist Scholarship Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity – and Why This Harms Everybody, it aims to help individuals resist the intrusion of woke ideology into their day-to-day lives. Like the FSU, it’s primary purpose is to help people who’ve fallen foul of this ideology, providing resources, advice and guidance, including referring them to the FSU if it thinks we can help. Another of the people involved is Carrie Clark, who wrote the essay about Unconscious Bias Training that we published on our website last September.

    This is what it says on Counterweight’s website about the organisation’s care values:

    Counterweight is a liberal humanist organisation that values individualism, universalism, viewpoint diversity and the free exchange of ideas. We defend scientific, reasoned, rigorous and empirical approaches to knowledge production and to justice and equality.

    Our main focus is Critical Social Justice, though we oppose authoritarianism and censorship of all kinds. We do not support attempts to ban Critical Social Justice ideas. People must have the freedom to believe and advocate whichever ideas they wish. We only ask that they do not force their beliefs on anyone else.

    Counterweight works with and for people from all over the political spectrum, with a wide variety of cultural, ethical, religious and philosophical views. Not all of these people identify as liberal humanists.

    We do, however, expect them to support equal freedoms, rights and opportunities for all human beings under the law and to view all human beings as equals, regardless of race, gender, sexuality or any other identity category.

    If you’d like to find out more – or reach out to Counterweight for help – you can find its website here.

    Australian Academic Under Fire for Defending J.K. Rowling

    J.K Rowling attends the UK Premiere of Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes Of Grindelwald at Cineworld Leicester Square in London, England. (Photo by Samir Hussein/WireImage)

    Australian academic and FSU member Dr Petra Bueskens was mobbed on social media last week – and denounced by her professional association – and needs your support. Her sin? Writing the most popular piece of 2020 on Areo, an online magazine, defending J.K. Rowling from trans activists. The Australian Sociological Association (TASA) initially published a tweet warmly congratulating Dr Bueskens on her article, but after some of its members replied with negative comments it deleted the tweet and then published another one, this time apologising for the “hurt” it had caused and denouncing Dr Bueskins for “transphobia”. Needless to say, there was nothing transphobic about Dr Bueskens’ article.

    Dr Bueskins has written an open letter to TASA in response that you can read here. She doesn’t pull her punches:

    Let me make a bold claim: the confluence of neoliberalism and postmodernism has produced a cadre of academics who lack imagination, passion, flair, originality or courage; they are all in lock-step with each other, more like a school of fish than a cohort of scholars. To my colleagues I say this: honestly, stop pretending you are victims of anything other than your own limbic hijack and petty careerism. Most of you are so busy checking metrics, expanding CV’s, meeting KPIs, applying for grants, attending nauseatingly boring Zoom meetings, self-promoting, networking, virtue signalling and ensuring you support the corporate brand formerly known as the university that there is no time for thinking as an end in itself.

    She continues:

    Those tenured academics protesting their victimisation and hurt while staying safely inside “the gated institutional narrative” are Orwellian double-speakers. They are neither harmed nor threatened. On the contrary, theirs is the only view allowed! As a normative principle, freedom of speech – especially within academia and the media – is the lifeblood of liberal democratic societies. We are nothing without this capacity to reflect on ourselves, our institutions, our laws and our ideas. Speech is never free: it is both costly and uneven, but upholding its normative value remains critical to the pursuit of truth.

    Dr Bueskins is currently an Honorary Fellow in the School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Melbourne, but she doesn’t have a tenured position and there’s a danger her university may withdraw her fellowship if her professional association continues to denounce her. To prevent this happening, some colleagues of hers have written an open letter to TASA asking it to apologise to Dr Bueskins and affirm its commitment to academic free speech. If you would like to sign this letter – particularly if you’re an academic – please email Andrew Glover at theandrewglover@gmail.com.

    It seems incredible that we have to mobilise support for someone who is at risk of losing her livelihood because she had the temerity to defend the best-selling children’s author in the world. But that’s 2021 for you.

    US Branch of the FSU has been Incorporated

    We have always envisioned the Free Speech Union as an international organisation, with branches across the Anglosphere and beyond, and I’m happy to report we’ve now incorporated our first overseas branch in the United States. The plan is to launch it later this year. So far we have a four-person Board of Directors, an acting CEO (not me!) and are in the process of assembling the Advisory Council.

    We haven’t set up the website of the US branch yet, but you can register your interest and receive updates about our progress by filing in a form on this placeholder site. If you’re interested in getting involved and would like to volunteer, please email me at info@freespeechunion.us.

    FSU Hires New Deputy Research Director

    Emma Webb

    The Free Speech Union has hired Emma Webb as its Deputy Research Director. Emma, a long-standing champion of free speech, is also an Associate Fellow of Civitas and the Co-Founder of Save Our Statues.

    Emma recently wrote a piece for Spiked about the involvement of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex in an organisation that wants to “eliminate” online hate (e.g. defining a woman as an “adult human female”) and gave an interview to Mike Graham about it on talkRADIO.

    If you’d like to contact Emma – with an idea for a policy paper the FSU should publish, for instance – you can reach her on emma@freespeechunion.org.

    The Workers of England Union

    A quick reminder that if you’re worried you might be put through a disciplinary procedure at work because your beliefs are at odds with your employer’s, you should consider joining the Workers of England Union. The WEU has won tens of thousands of pounds for members whose philosophical beliefs have been discriminated against.

    We’ve negotiated a deal with the WEU whereby you can become a member for a fee of £25. Unlike other unions, the WEU will go to bat for its members as soon as they sign up. If you’d like to take advantage of this offer, you can join online here, but don’t forget to email them here first, letting them know you’re a member of the FSU.

    Thanks again for becoming a part of the Free Speech Union. 2020 was possibly the worst year in history to launch a new organisation that aims to organise events and speakeasies as part of its mission to encourage people to engage in civil debates about controversial issues in the public square – and the U.K. doesn’t look like it’s going to reopen any time soon. To date, our activities have largely been confined to case work, research and staff recruitment. Nevertheless, we’ve managed to sign up over 8,000 members and, so far, have done a reasonable job of standing up for their freedom of speech.

    Kind regards,

    2. The scariest thing is that we need an organisation to protect free speech – something won with so much blood.

      The Left give it away so easily – yet again, they won’t stop untio we force them to stop. The Left have got to be crushed again before their malice and spite starts yet another world war.

      1. 328963+ up ticks,
        Morning W,
        Nobody can in all honesty deny the fact we HAD ONE in the party that designed & triggered the referendum.
        Kicked into touch by the lab/lib/ con close shop party’s / supporters & treachery.

    3. Nice to see some resistance being organised. I expect to see them being interviewed by the BBC and Sky very soon.

      1. “I expect to see them being interviewed AND APPLAUDED by the BBC and Sky very soon.”

    4. I recently spoke to a university academic about this issue (defending academics accused of transphobia). The reply was along the lines that “they have a very well paid job, and if they wish to keep it, they should not blurt out their opinions for self-aggrandisement. If they want to let their opinions be known, they should resign from the job”
      I said, you have just given me a good defence for authoritarian censorship!

      1. That’s fine, but does the same go the other way? If an academic starts bleating about gays and the mentally ill man who thinks he’s a woman do they have to resign as well?

        1. I think this person’s stance was that anything that doesn’t rock the boat is absolutely fine.
          It is terrifying how far down the rabbit hole they have gone.
          I wouldn’t have minded if they had come out and said “it’s more than my job’s worth, and I daren’t say anything”
          That would at least have been honest.

    5. Good. Peter Whittle and the New Culture Forum have been doing sterling work defending free speech. Emma Webb has been working with Peter and others to defend people who have been cancelled, objecting to official sanction assaults on English heritage and culture and supporting counter initiatives todefend what Douglas Murray termed ‘what we all believed in yesterday’.

      1. I think we have the best people on our side, and that is always the start of winning.
        The politically correct, the global marxists, the professional victims – they are now the establishment, against which the next generation will rebel.
        Especially when Gen Z wakes up to how their life chances have been thrown away.

        1. There are glimmers of hope; the best weapon we possess in many ways are the people we are up against. However, even those of us with modest resources must be prepared to ‘put our money where our mouth is’, A small amount helps.

          1. Well, organisations like this get some of the money that I would otherwise have donated to charidee. My last small donation was to CW just before Christmas, but the time is rolling round again, so maybe the FSU this time. Or the Freedom Alliance. Or Christian Concern. Or the Campaign for Marriage. Or Radio Horeb. All excellent organisations!

  37. In for a finger warm up & mug of tea after tidying up the mushroom trays full of small sticks and stacking the 1½ dozen I filled yesterday and then chopping what needed to be chopped from yesterday’s cutting.
    After working in bright sunlight to begin with, it moved round to behind the mill water tower before it did anything to warm up where I am working.
    At least when it clears the water tower in an hour or so the sun will still be in the sky and not dipped down behind the edge of the valley.

      1. I’m in for my 3rd cup of tea.
        The sun has now dipped below the valley side so when I go out again I’ll be putting the saw away then start slinging the wood I’ve cup & chopped over the holly bush stack ready to carry on filling up the triple stack.
        I’ve made a decent start on yesterday’s scavenging and the DT gave me a hand unloading the van.

  38. Two Masks of Zorro!

    From the Peoples’ Democratic Republic of America (H/T?)

    The Center for Disease Control has issued a new coronavirus order requiring DOUBLE masks to be worn for all forms of public transportation in the United States.
    From CNN:

    The CDC announced an order late Friday that will require people to wear a face mask while using any form of public transportation, including buses, trains, taxis, airplanes, boats, subways or ride-share vehicles while traveling into, within and out of the US.

    The order goes into effect at 11:59 p.m. Monday.

    Masks must be worn while waiting, boarding, traveling and disembarking, it said. The coverings need to be at least two or more layers of breathable fabric secured to the head with ties, ear loops or elastic bands — and scarves and bandanas do not count, the order says.

    The CDC said it reserves the right to enforce the order through criminal penalties, but it “strongly encourages and anticipates widespread voluntary compliance” and expects support from other federal agencies to implement the order.

      2. Questioning orders is an offence. Report to your local Re-Education Centre at one. Do not pack a suitcase.

    2. How will law enforcement agencies know if the mask is two layers of fabric unless the wearer removes it for inspection, in which case – it is no longer effective!

    3. Why is just covering the nose and mouth thought to be an effective way of preventing a microscopically tiny virus from entering the respiratory system?

      It may enter, in any case, via the eyes or ears. Tears drain through the tear ducts into the nasal cavity. The eustachian tubes connect the ears to the nasal sinuses. No one is advocating preventing ocular or aural infestation by this virus.

      Why?

      1. Also given the virus can be found via anal swabs – why isn’t everyone forced to wear nappies to reduce the risk of transmission via flatulence?!

        1. I bet all those rubber fetishists will be loving this – a licence to practice in public…

      3. It can probably enter through the pores of one’s skin and scalp. Next step – head coverings.

      4. Some people here have the industrial type visor that sits a few inches in front of their face – sidewards and downwards there is absolutely NO restriction to the open air – in OR out.

    4. As the order said scarves and bandanas do not count.

      Many of the naysayers have been wearing very loose fitting bandanas that look macho but will not even keep your chin warm in the cold weather

      Most masks sold here have two or three layers of cloth so no change for the good and meek.

      1. It is a delightful place , we go because I try to avoid the throng in town when I am shopping , so buy my dog food there , bird table stuff, eggs etc

        They sell some nice plants , sacks of spuds and other veg .

        It is near Corfe Castle , so I purchase what I need then give the dogs a good gallop on the heathland afterwards. only a short run out from where we live.

  41. Before I tackle the ironing, a profound thunk.
    Fonda Lyin’ is a Merkel appointment. Now Blighty has left the EU, Germany is on the hook for increased membership fees. Did Merkel shove her known-to-be-useless protege to the front of the queue to ensure that the EU collapsed and Germany would save a lot of money?

    2. Germany, the Germany that insisted the bloc must buy vaccine’s as one and therefore delayed purchase until the crisis reached German land, has suggested it might now go it alone and buy from … Russia (Novichok anyone?) and … wait for it … The Covid People’s Republic of China! No one can find any conclusive condemnation for the behaviour of the E.U. that comes anywhere close to what it does unaided. Yet, still the Remainers will see nothing wrong here.

      1. I’m just thinking about the growing medium for Chinese vaccines.
        It makes 2 baskets of ironing seem positively inviting.

        1. The growing medium for Chinese vaccines?How about festering bats’ wings and putrid pangolin viscera. You can of course have a side order of egg fried lice thrown in for good measure.😎

    3. The survival of the Fatherland whatever the cost? Withdrawing to regroup? Yes, you could be right.

  42. Building up,time to drop some off

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/36a1dce5adf0c3b4a7e5262dfaf1ef4da15cce2b078ccfa8a8298012eb858cf2.jpg

    https://i0.wp.com/politicallyincorrecthumor.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/government-repair-kit-nooses.jpg?w=495&ssl=1

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7b788a30e4be4b583868bf25f539232a1e749e8f1e54d2cbfc9c09e04479e858.jpg

    https://i1.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2021/01/Screen-Shot-2021-01-23-at-8.20.52-PM.png?resize=600%2C343&ssl=1

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/50dffa08de6dfc52b4e38ffefafffca021efab7e400b46851662e8d3b94ede17.png

  43. Harry says Mail on Sunday underplayed gravity of false claim as libel case settled. 1 February 2021.

    The Duke of Sussex has accused the Mail on Sunday and Mail Online of underplaying the seriousness of an error in a story about his relationship to the British armed forces as the two sides formally settled a high court libel claim.

    In a brief remote high court hearing before Mr Justice Nicklin on Monday setting out details of the settlement of the claim, the solicitor for the duke, Jenny Afia, said the apology – published before the final conclusion of the settlement – “used wording which significantly underplayed the seriousness of the accusations made against him” and “did not expressly acknowledge that the allegations were false”.

    Afia said that while Associated Newspapers had offered to make a donation directly, Harry had decided to make a donation of the amount received in damages directly to the Invictus Games Foundation himself “so he could feel something good had come out of the situation”.

    While Afia acknowledged the wording of the apology was agreed between the two parties, she said it “did not, therefore, accurately represent what happened in that respect”.

    I will stand to be corrected but after wading through this double tongued waffle I strongly suspect Harry and Meggy have given up the ghost on this ill-advised attempt to sue the Mail!

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/feb/01/harry-accuses-mail-on-sunday-underplaying-seriousness-false-claim

  44. Harry says Mail on Sunday underplayed gravity of false claim as libel case settled. 1 February 2021.

    The Duke of Sussex has accused the Mail on Sunday and Mail Online of underplaying the seriousness of an error in a story about his relationship to the British armed forces as the two sides formally settled a high court libel claim.

    In a brief remote high court hearing before Mr Justice Nicklin on Monday setting out details of the settlement of the claim, the solicitor for the duke, Jenny Afia, said the apology – published before the final conclusion of the settlement – “used wording which significantly underplayed the seriousness of the accusations made against him” and “did not expressly acknowledge that the allegations were false”.

    Afia said that while Associated Newspapers had offered to make a donation directly, Harry had decided to make a donation of the amount received in damages directly to the Invictus Games Foundation himself “so he could feel something good had come out of the situation”.

    While Afia acknowledged the wording of the apology was agreed between the two parties, she said it “did not, therefore, accurately represent what happened in that respect”.

    I will stand to be corrected but after wading through this double tongued waffle I strongly suspect Harry and Meggy have given up the ghost on this ill-advised attempt to sue the Mail!

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/feb/01/harry-accuses-mail-on-sunday-underplaying-seriousness-false-claim

  45. FOAD

    Door-to-door testing for the South

    African variant of coronavirus is to start in Surrey after cases were found with no

    known links with travel or previous cases.

    So far, cases of the variant in the UK had been traced back to South

    Africa – but experts say two people in Woking found with the variant

    have no such known links.

    Local council workers will go house-to-house to offer swab tests for 9,500

    people in the Goldsworth Park and St Johns areas of Woking, Surrey, from

    this afternoon – with house checks also planned for nearby Egham later

    in the week.

    Surrey’s

    Local Resilience Forum urged people in the affected areas to “remain

    calm” and continue to follow the rules on lockdown and self-isolation.

    It’s understood surge testing will also be carried out in the other parts of England with cases of the variant.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-55884275
    Not enough normal false positives to keep ramping up the fear??

  46. 328963+ up ticks,
    We have witnessed the placement of the instruction manual
    (the oath taking permit to lie to non believers) between the dispatch boxes, and the inclusion of halal nosh on the parliamentary canteen menu so the placements are set.

    Guess who’s coming to dinner ?

    breitbart,
    Public Ban on Islamist Hate Preacher Anjem Choudary to Be Lifted: Report

    1. 328963+ up ticks,
      O2O,
      These governance party politico’s Og must surely be on one hell of a promise.

      They have many of their supporters down on one knee & getting them down on two is work in progress as is plain to see.

      Appeasing / submission is NOT the way
      ahead or the way of keeping a head what the politico’s cannot take in is the fact that the islamic ideology have more superior liars than them & have been at it a lot longer.

      I am wondering which of the lab/lib/con coalition are going to exit the closet first in it’s full burka regalia, all the signs are there if ones dares to look behind the three monkeys.

        1. That’s quite a lazy cartoon.
          Their meaning should be obvious, like Matt’s and Bob’s are. If it needs explaining it’s not hit the mark.

          1. I didn’t think much of it, but I knew what it was about as soon as I saw it.

            But to be fair I had recently heard a care home company CEO commenting how successful they had been.

        1. And now – if anyone dies there it definitely will NOT be reported as a Covid death – even if it is. The authorities will make sure of it.

      1. Very soon there is going to be the sound of coordinated head slapping when it is explained and we all wonder why we did not see the obvious.

        1. I’m not certain it was obvious unless one knew that the vaccination programme for care homes is almost complete.

      2. Sometimes a political cartoonist deliberately makes a point more subtly. I didn’t particularly like this one.

        If I may, did you mean abstruse “hidden” rather than “obtuse” thick? I don’t think Adams is thick but some of his cartoons can be hard to follow.

        1. I meant abstruse regarding the cartoon, thank you for your comment, I will edit the comment.

    6. BBC news headline: “…confirmation expected later today that all older residents in England’s eligible care homes have been offered a vaccine”.

  48. Oof………….

    Lockdowns anyone??

    “Even when it became glaringly obvious that trench warfare was an utterly
    bankrupt strategy, Britain’s army chiefs stubbornly insisted there was
    no other way of winning the war.

    They’d expended far too much blood and treasure to admit they’d got it all horribly wrong.”

    1. Where the FOXTROT did that load of garbage come from?
      What alternative tactics were there?
      Trench warfare on the scale of the Western Front was a new concept in warfare and for three years, trying to formulate new tactics to break through was beyond the ability of not just the British, but the French (Verdun anyone?) and the Germans.

      It was fortunate that the British Imperial Forces had begun to train in new tactics, largely centred round tanks, so that when the Ludendorf Offensive, it’s self largely in line with the trench warfare tactics of the previous years, the Allies were able to turn the tables and take to offensive.

  49. My friend Mr Rashid vigorously denies being involved with the fake covid test certificate scam. All his certificates are genuine, he assures me.

    2. At the weekend, some poor guy flew back to Canada on a perfectly valid test certificate (or at least that is what he claims) but by the time that he got as far as boarding his connecting flight out to Atlantic Canada, the test was deemed to be out of date. He is now sleeping rough at Toronto Airport as he waits for the result of a new test.

      In another example of joined up thinking, our lords and masters have stopped Canadian airlines from flying to Mexico or the Caribbean, US airlines appreciate the increase in passengers and farmers are wondering how they will be able to get the seasonal workers here (from the Caribbean and Mexico)..

  50. That my 2nd mug of tea drunk and, with all the wood from Saturday’s collection cut & either put into mushroom trays or, for the larger bits, chopped & stacked ready to be chucked over to the next stack to be refilled, I’m not off to begin on yesterday’s scavenging that’s still in the van!

  51. The BBC has just published this snippet about fake Covid vaccination certificates.
    As usual, they are not very thorough, as there are no names, addresses, or contact details to enable one to acquire a certificate. I’m guessing Mr Rashid is too wily to be found by the BBC.

  52. I think my young son may have fallen for a scam. He drove his car somewhere in North London to his garage where he gets it serviced. He works in Enfield. He later discovered he had a fixed penalty to which was an added penalty for late payment. In total £195. He discovered he had driven down a road which had been closed to non -resident cars. The council had apparently taken the decision to do this to make the road quieter for the residents. Several other roads were similarly restricted.The enforcement was done by a private company. I didn’t get the precise information but it looks like a scam to me. He paid up in his panic but is taking up with the Council.

    1. Some years back, a ‘private firm’ tried a similar trick with MB in a motorway carpark.
      We studied the picture and the timing and realised it was an attempted shake down.
      Yes, your boy should definitely take it up with the council.

      1. Good afternoon Anne – My young son has been warning me about scams for several years. I lost about £50 last year and despite the Bank’s fraud squad on the case I think I have lost the £50.
        I suspect it is a fraud. My son has friends in the Council so he will find out soon if he has been fooled. The internet is a dangerous place and is infested with criminals.

        1. I was lucky two years ago as Barclays fraud people noticed before I did that my card had been used without my knowledge or presence. It was a total of less than £100 on meals at Just Eat, where I’ve never been.

          They cancelled my card and sent me another straightaway and refunded the money stolen.

          1. I don’t know if the Bank’s share their fraud discoveries with each other or if they have a central Fraud Department.My notification to the Bank of Scotland fraud section included the name of the fraudster’s company account which could have been notified instantaneously to other banks and that account could have been b—k listed. Strangely the bank couldn’t take action to retrieve my money until after it left my account.

          2. I had a form to identify the fraudulent transactions some time later and eventually those items were removed from my statement.

    2. Oh dear. Has he returned and taken photos of nonexistent notices? Hope he gets some joy from the council.

    3. As the ‘private company’ doesn’t own the road they can’t do that unless they have a contract with the council and there are adequate signs

      1. A photo of the “offence”? Time/date? Details of the company and contact details? The threat of the “late payment” how long till it becomes a “late payment”?

    4. As it’s a private company it will be a Parking Charge Notice better known as an invoice. They normally apply to parking on private land/car parks.
      The council can enforce fines only if they have been authority to do so. Alternatively you can go to Court (County Court an civil court) and defend your action. As it was a public road did the council have authority to change its use? If so ask for the Statutory Authority for doing so.

    1. Bonding with gravity = she fell off her chair?
      .
      Words fails you, common sense fails her ( should that be him /it?)

      Beyond that, If they are signing a joint card, wouldn’t there be a risk of catching some bug by passing the card round? ?

        1. Afternoon Garlands. Goodness me there is absolutely no need to apologise, I can turn the air blue with great enjoyment, especially about the virus. Ask Alf.

          Our Avro meter reader just visited and was in the garage when I went to walk past him to put something away and he backed away from me as if I had the plague. So I said I don’t mind if you don’t social distance and he said I do. OMG. Can you believe it? And still people are walking along with a mask on as well as jumping in the road rather than pass by closely. (Heaves heavy sigh).

          1. He’s got a dangerous job going into houses where people have hardly seen the light of day for months……
            I didn’t know they still did meter reading!

          3. Yes, we do monthly readings but a meter reader (for several companies, I think) appears every three months or so.

          4. This from Avro only read the electricity meter despite us having gas as well.

            Why not both I wonder.

          6. I don’t think anyone’s been here to do that for several years. Mind you, we left Scottish Power some time ago and switched to Bristol Energy – who promptly put the price up.

    4. Moorland Queering is where they navigate from one pouffe point to the next using just map and comparse, also called Orientqueering.

    5. I suspect if you tried to make an obvious comment you’d probably be attacked for child abuse.

  55. Reversing many of Trump’s executive orders seems to be Biden’s modus operandi and a way of saying that he is serious about making changes. However, this will not necessarily have successful results. One of Trump’s executive orders, the ban on certain nationalities from entering the US, colloquially known as the “Muslim ban,” in fact included bans on obtaining visas for citizens of countries including North Korea.

    The next few steps that Biden will take in the Middle East, especially on the Iran nuclear deal, will be instrumental in securing the region and the security of the US itself. Welcoming the Iranian regime with open arms given its track record of supporting terrorism and violence in the region just to spite Trump would be a disaster in the making and would resemble former president Barack Obama’s signing of the disastrous Iranian nuclear deal that enabled Iran to rapidly regain its economic balance and unleash its aggression across the Middle East.

    Biden’s baptism by fire as the country’s new president may be costly to the United States and the Democratic Party media machine, which has showered the American public with promises that are likely to be beyond his means or capabilities as president. This is all the more the case as in its present situation the United States cannot afford to entertain political decisions that are based on showmanship and partisanship.

    …….

    No, those are not my words. They are part of an opinion piece in an Egyptian newspaper, Al-Ahram.

    Many people around the world, especially in the Middle East, are terrified of Biden’s destructive lurch to the far left. It will all end in tears, I’m afraid.

    1. Everything is being reversed. There was a Trump executive order reducing the price of basic medications such as insulin. That went in one of Bidens signings.

      Orange man bad does not equate to everything Trump did is bad.

  56. Just after 9AM and I have had more than enough of the hype around black history month.
    Thank God its a short month, there cannot be enough black history to fill a whole month.

    3. and, for the other 11 months, us Whiteys are not allowed to mention our history at all, at all.

      Seems a bit unfair to me, infact it is racist: when are the governments of the world going to wake up to this fact

    5. I’d point out that racism is defining an entity solely by it’s race or colour. The Left seem fond of racism.

    1. They are politicians, they do not understand commercial reality. In their world, if you make a storm on Twitter and play the victim, you get what you want.

  59. Two police forces have been criticised for mounting an ’embarrassing’ diversity recruitment campaign which resorted to hiring actors to pose as ethnic minority and gay officers.

    A series of posters released by Hampshire and Essex Police features black and ethnic minority ‘officers’ alongside the proud slogan, ‘We Value Difference’.

    But the only difference in the photos of the actors used by the two constabularies is the cap badges which have been swapped using photo trickery to distinguish them.

    https://twitter.com/True_Belle/status/1356257477764018182

    1. “Essex Police said officers were too busy” – probably arresting people for sitting on a bench?

    2. Similar things seem to happen on TV news footage, sometimes it seems the camera crews will spend all day waiting for people of obvious different religious beliefs to walk in view of the cameras. And there is far too much focus in schools and random crowds on the same subjects. The BBC have been doing that sort of thing for many years.

    3. Surely the police would get more recruits if they emphasised those areas that draw people to join the police?
      Driving fast cars well over the speed limit, engaging in car chases, setting dogs on people, bursting into homes long before dawn, punching old ladies, kicking people on the ground, suffocating the obstreperous, harassing the innocent, weapons training and shooting unarmed people dead , all without censure and with a complete guarantee of not being prosecuted.
      What’s not to like? Did I mention free housing/generous housing allowance?

    3. It would be a bit of a waste of a building there’s only a handful in there now.
      All sat at home claiming expenses for everything they can possibly think off.

    1. The EU Commission don’t get the UK. Full stop. The european continent never really has, but in the past has laughed with us and has certainly taken anything we have given to them. Except the French – who have demanded and thrown in back in our face when we have given money, lives, and our all to protect them. “Friends” hah! Never.

    2. It is all very well, Rik,
      posting a picture of nipples.
      A large proportion of posters
      here are ‘yer girlies,’….. how
      about a picture of Keanu Reeves
      as balance?….. or, corrrr…….

  65. Hello all!

    To those of us who like Coopers of Stortford (I do) and who don’t want to support EU enterprises, I have just found out:

    Cooper is owned by Damart, the French company.

    Damn, damn, damn….

      1. All sort of stuff that I never knew would make my life in the kitchen/cleaning/garden etc. easier. I have been buying stuff from them for years. Not any more. I boycott what I can that is EU owned – especially by the Germans and the French.

        Edit: have a look at their website

        https://www.coopersofstortford.co.uk/

        2. I don’t fully understand that. The items are made by people doing a job. That those nations are in the EU is not their fault, it’s simply where they are. There is no need to stop buying goods from the nations in the EU.

          1. Well, I have had this argument many times. The first time was with priest who owned a Volkswagen. He depended on weekly contributions from his British parishioners for his income. VW contributed nothing. I suggested that buying British would be more moral. He didn’t agree.

          2. It’s the fact that an English company, with profits going to that company, have been taken over by a French company, and the profits go to France.

    2. Hello, Lass.

      The ENGLISH company I worked
      for was taken over, by ‘yer French’
      [I hardly dare mention it here]
      …I cannot fault their management
      or work ethic.

      1. Neither do I, as a customer. I wonder when it happened – I just don’t want to support the frogs unless I have to.

    4. it is like saying that we will not buy Chinese, it’s hardly possible to completely boycott products that were made in China, contain components from China or are made by a company owned by the Chinese.

      Governments have allowed manufacturing to go global and in the quest for the almighty dollar, ownership and production have gone where it is cheapest.

    5. I have heard a rumour, that even our Roayal Family have a German in the woodpile.

      One of the current ones is BLMing too

  66. France Soir, an on-line French newspaper, has postulated that people have put up with the tyrannical impositions of the state over lack of freedom, lockdown and restricted social contact with others because they have developed a sort of Stockholm Syndrome (as the kidnapped Pattie Hurst the newspaper heiress developed) and have begun to sympathise and empathise with their oppressors.

    1. Well, it’s a theory. The Stockholm syndrome has not yet got hold of me. However, people have been conditioned to the State doing everything, and providing everything, even those who are only minor recipients.

    2. I just hope our own government don’t have anymore thoughts of importing the German made Pfizer vaccines………I don’t feel safe having read, ‘I am Pilgrim’ By Terry Hayes.

      1. Had a lift home from church yesterday with a retired surgeon, who has volunteered, and – against all odds – is helping out with vaccinations. He’s had Covid, as have most of his family. They’ve all survived, and he clearly regards that as granting him immunity. He’s also had the jab – Pfizer in his case. He expressed surprise that I hadn’t yet been vaccinated “with my health issues”. My response was that I’m in the sixth level: ‘all individuals aged 16 years to 64 years with underlying health conditions which put them at higher risk of serious disease and mortality’. I’m uneasy about the mRNA vaccines, being obviously untested for long-term effects, but the O/AZ version seems to be relatively conventional. Which is prolly why Macron et al want it…

    3. That could explain a lot about the liberals in Canada just accepting the restrictions and limitations that we now see here.

      They were in love with poster boy Trudeau before the chaos started and most are still sitting there lapping up every word he says.

    4. 328963+up ticks,
      Afternoon R,
      Have mentioned the same in comments over the last few months they do believe, I believe, they are in a Shangri la type polling booth comfort zone, suffering Stockholm syndrome.

      The herd seemingly are pigging out on loco weed.

      But being a far right racist I would say that wouldn’t I ?

      1. Many folk believe the politicians when they say they are ‘following the science’. From the start in March last year we had a series of press conferences where some dolt politicians stood centre flanked by Vallance, Whitty and an assortment of weirdo ‘scientists’.

        It is much the same with the Climate Change activists. They put up some cretinous schoolgirl to spout ‘the science is fixed or settled’ and a multitude of fools swallow the nonsense wholesale.

        When pseudo science is used as a political tool by brazen politicians we are on the path to tyranny.

        1. In the Wuhan Hysteria as well as Global warming, the term “following the science” is false. They are really following Scientific Opinion specially selected to support their policies.
          The opinions of any other scientists, including specialist in the particular field, are ignored.

          1. There is no such thing as “the science”. As you say, “science” is a series of postulations which hold sway until challenged by another postulation which is then accepted, based on verified and credible evidence. History is full of such advances from believing the earth was flat, believing the sun orbited the earth an so on. I have littĺe if any faith in any government “science” postulation as none have to my mind been vigorously or expertly reviewed or supported by credible evidence. The accepted views are limited to those that support a predefined agenda and have little if any adequate supporting evidence.

          2. I agree. There are thousands of clinical and research scientists, specialists in immunology, signalling, genome sequencing, virology and related disciplines whose dissenting views have been completely ignored.

            In addition there are many who believe the lockdowns to be ineffective and causing more societal harm than good.

            There is no effective swab test for Covid if the spittle is not analysed in clean laboratory conditions using the magnification tools at hand. Swabs taken from nose and throat in a tent on a windswept disused car park and subjected to PCR at high cycles are proven to be misleading giving almost 100% false positives.

            It is as though our political masters have shielded themselves behind a crumbling wall of pseudo science and pinned their ears to the Vaccine mast to get out of their responsibilities for the mess.

        2. ‘Afternoon, Cori, as the German people were from 1933 until 1945. Cowed into believing what their tyrannical masters told them, was the truth.

        3. 328963+ up ticks,
          Evening C,
          “On the path” C, many of the electorate in my book have for years, been helping to construct & lay down the path,

  67. Latest Breaking News – Door to door covid testing is to start in Surrey and other areas.

    Well they are not putting their probes in my key hole and letter box, I’m keeping my porch firmly closed

    1. I think Rik, Alf and VW are closest to that nonsense, but will prolly escape. Rewind 15 years or so, I was actually living in what I regarded as St John’s, but Woking BC insisted was Goldsworth Park.

        1. Are you in Merton, Bob3? I worked in Miles Road, Mitcham, for a couple of years. Merton was always the first point of call on the Northern Line, but there was never anywhere to park. Later I worked out that I could park on Clapham Common North Side, and get a tube into the smoke. My old employer in Mitcham (TCL Granby) seems to have evaporated. Such is life, in the Construction Industry… :-((

          1. I grew up in Mitcham, went to the school just along Church Road.
            Miles Road is part industrial part residential.

      2. Yes Geoff, we’re a couple of miles from that. I made a tongue in cheek comment to Anne Allen a couple of days ago saying that after the Kent variant they will go around all the counties with different variants and then they’ll start on town variants. Having got most people to do as they’re told the politicos are not going to give this up lightly.

        1. Indeed, John. It’s a long time since I lived in Waterside Way, and I always felt the Basingstoke Canal isolated me from Goldsworth Park, but WBC had different ideas. The so-called Kent variant is only named as such because we’re better than most nations at identifying different strains. No doubt, there’ll be a Woking variant soon. Still – it’ll discourage the Duke of York from visiting Pizza Express, if nothing else…

        2. Downvoting?
          you call that downvoting?
          16,000+ done nearly 8,000 votes.
          Pah!

          66,000+ done 0 votes.
          And that’s only non-league standard.

          103,000+ done 0 votes, now that’s class.

  68. “The rise of dangerous conspiracy theories in the UK”

    “calmly listing the so-called truths she and her fellow QAnon supporters believe to be part of “the great plandemic”: that the world is secretly run by a satanic cult of paedophiles and liberal elites; that Covid-19 was planned to shut down the world’s economy for a “reset”; that Donald Trump was the superhero sent to save them from this cult and usher in a global utopia.” etc etc.

    https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/newslondon/the-rise-of-dangerous-conspiracy-theories-in-the-uk/ar-BB1dhL3y?ocid=entnewsntp

    1. The Left are obsessed with QAnon for some reason, I think they were a double bluff false flag group, like BLM

      1. They hate – absolutely hate – not being able to control the message. A group of people who disagree with them? Of course they’re obsessed. Imagine Lenin and capitalism.

    3. “Among the most dangerous beliefs are that Covid was planned…”. Does anyone seriously believe that it was not planned?

      1. I’d say that:

        1. The CCP deliberately let the virus escape the country to neutralise any serious outbreak at home (hence why they isolated Wuhan province from the rest of China but not from the rest of the world – and TOLD NO GOVERNMENT for 1-2 months whilst secretly buying up loads of PPE, medical equipment, etc) by knowing what it would do worldwide;

        2. The crony coprorations, especially in big pharma, big tech/social media and internet shopping giants have, to varying degrees, moved to push to greater lockdowns, mask wearing (despite no evidence saying they work outside of the medial setting) and working from home which destroys traditional ‘town centre’ competition at a stroke, significantly boosts profits and gives them far more power over governments via weak or corrupt civil service scientists/clinicians who have no idea about what goes on in the real world, PR or how to handle such big issues.

        Many only concentrate on their own speciality, which is often to the significant detriment of everything else (e.g. the economic [and thus personal] impact of lockdowns and authoritarian moves). That many come from the Left makes the situation far worse, because they are used as useful idiots by those maniuplating the show from on high.

        3. The legacy (print/TV) media have also been used – quite willingly – as useful idiots to spread fear and help the moves of those above because it means they’ve gained readership/viewership just at a time when most were in serious and probably terminal decline, following the Internet/Social Media wars that have persuaded many to go elsewhere for news and opinion, or even to not get it at all. That they don’t care that they are making things significantly worse just shows how bad they are, especially as many have IMHO been paid by the very people and organisations mentioned above over the last 10 years to do their bidding, and now they are just parroting the ‘party line’ for the Establishment.

        4. The World Economic Forum is essentially the not-so-secret think tank that co-ordinates much of the response for the biggest players. Again, whilst plans were likely already in place for such events, I think they were there in readiness for another pandemic type event (highly likely) coming out of China as most have. All they’ve done is been able to follow through to the next phase this time, unlike in 2010/11 with swine flu because the virus itself wasn’t so easily transmissible and they didn’t have a willing, able and naive/selfish media back then to be their propaganda arm.

    4. MSN is hardly the bastion of quality journalism – it mostly regurgitates establishment groupthink. Whilst I don’t believe there was some deliberate plan by a worldwide ‘SPECTRE’ type organisation to release COVID-19 for a pre-determined plan to take over the world, there have been many powerful people, organisations and companies who have taken advantage of the pandemic for their own ends – many of their aims and agendas intersect, especially because they involve gaining more power over smaller rivals and away from the public.

      What is also very telling is that a high percentage of those in positions of power are deliberately silencing ANY legitimate questions about what has been going on, and are using the media and big tech to do their dirty work – with no proven evidence given to back them up. When some here (sorry – I can’t remember who exactly) posted a link to NZ doctor Sam Bailey’s YT channel, I watched a number of her videos, including responses where she was ‘fact-checked’, which I think she easily shot down every claim with facts and sense.

      That similar claims as the ‘fact checkers’ (who fact checks the fact-checkers?) come from Dr Fauci, Prof. Whitty, etc etc and many people in the media (e.g. on the viability/reliability of PCR testing on COVID-19 in the community, use of facemasks, etc), you have to wonder are they either all incomptent, or is there some other factors at work? I seriously doubt that our PM is involved – more along for the ride, as I suspect many are.

      If there’s anyone ‘directing’ events once the pandemic broke for their own (nefarious) ends, then I’d look to big pharma, big tech/multinationals and, of course, China who have taken advantage of (as well as pushing governments for) lockdowns and other authoritarian restrictions for huge gains in money and power, as well as their ‘useful idiots’ in the world’s civil services and legacy media (the later which was on the way down before this).

      Bear in mind that big pharma has form on this:
      https://youtu.be/i5PyUrkAvwY

      Channel 4 News exposing their swine flu fake pandemic in 2010/11 – before the MSM went nuts. (apologies for inadvertantly cancelling someone’s reply by editing my comments – please try again)

        1. Wasn’t sure (thanks Big guy) – I was scrolling down all my posts on my Disqus Home Page and had yet to find the post in question. An excellent YT channel (and she also has a mirror channel on BitChute) where she speaks common sense and isn’t afraid to speak the truth. I’m just suprised that YT hasn’t deleted her channel yet, given what she’s said. I’m just glad they haven’t.

      3. Thanks, EA. I believe that those of us in possession of more than single figures of brain cells can see that we are being ‘gaslighted’. I have an open mind as to whether the ‘Rona was released deliberately. What seems abundantly clear is that it has been seized upon by various special interest groups – the most obvious of which is that controlled by Blofeld Herr Schwab (peace be upon him). I’m tempted to set up a crowdfunded appeal for Schwab’s white cat…

  69. How much is a fake crowd worth?

    Yesterday, on BBC 4, there was a gardening programme complete with virtual crowd. Ever utterance was accompanied by raucous cheering, shouts of delight and copious applause. What for? How much clapping is required for the judicious use of a dibber or how often one of the panel písses on his turnips or whether Gucci wellingtons are more efficacious than Hunter’s when driving ones Rover to the flower show? Not satisfied with that, today there was a cookery programme with more cheering, guffaws and raucous outbursts than you might find in a mental asylum showing pictures of past politicians.

    That, and the incessant and intrusive background music which accompanies almost every other programme, is not just produced on a whim. It is an underhand, fraudulent means of transferring licence and taxpayers money from the BBC coffers to the favoured few. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of poorly qualified, left-wing leeches whose only monetary sustenance is their LGBT partners. What easier way to provide for these poor mites than to employ them as ‘sound engineers’ at the public’s expense.

    The whole thing stinks to high heaven.

    1. BBC, the home drama programmes with loud frontground music and background incedental speech

    2. If they are paid on a “virtual per capita” basis, the ones providing the spectator noise at football matches, rugby matches and other sporting events must be raking it in. I now watch sports with the sound off. Between fake spectators and commentating teams whose members chat inanely to each other, the sound is unbearable.

    2. Hapless Hezza continues campaigning for Britain to rejoin the EUSSR.
      Hezza and the European Movement latest missive bangs on about ‘building back what we lost’
      Where has he been ……!

  71. It’s amazing how the covid story keeps developing, now we all have to be afraid of a South African mutation,
    This reminds me of watching Dr Who back in the day, each episode would have some terrible thing about to happen so you would watch again next week.
    I think EastEnders does the same thing, although I never watch it.
    This could go on for decades.

    1. I overheard reference to a “Southampton mutation” and thought how close to home it had all come…{:¬))

    2. Just for sake of argument:
      The virus is mutating all over the world.
      Who is bothering to investigate whether certain individuals who have similar genes/DNA are also producing the same mutations as their bodies try to fight it off?

      Presumably, given the same external criteria the virus will mutate in almost exactly the same way?

  72. That’s me gone. Manuscript to read for covidcult chum. Quite interesting, actually. All about the Georgian Poets. Amazing the vitriol that competing factions could hurl at each other.

    A demain

    2. Thanks for Posting – I decided to watch the film for only the second time in about 50 years. V.good!

  75. 328963+up ticks,

    ‘Country Closed Yet Border Open’ – Even LABOUR Say Tories Too Lax on Controls.

    Do peoples not realise that has got to be the case when changing a race.

  76. Did anyone listen to the BBC R4 News at 6.00 ?

    In the introduction, was it announced that John Major is to lose his knighthood ?

    2. I hope so, Quisling number one. He should think about what happened to people like him in the last war like lord HawHaw for example.

    1. There are 3 grey squirrels coming through the trees into our garden every day and nicking the wild bird food I put out. We’ve got a biggish oak which they use for acorns. I’ve got a decent air rifle, but I just can’t bring myself to pot them in the head. I deliberately miss by a few inches and it gives ’em a scare, but not for very long.

      2. When I was a lad we used to have cross country running at Parliament Hill fields and there was a notice saying either 1/-d or 2/- paid for the tail of a grey squirrel. They were then deemed a pest which they still are but now are seen as cuddly little rodents. Rats with fluffy tails.

        Edit added paid.

        2. I know they are an introduced species that are responsible for the decline of our native reds. I know they prey on our songbird eggs and chicks. But then I think to myself, unless you’re in a deer park, how many wild mammals do we regularly see. Some, like rats, we don’t particularly want to. If very occasionally I see a stoat or weasel or hedgehog, it brightens my day. The greys are common, but even so, I find it hard to kill them.

          1. They actually found out that pine martens (a vicious type of weasel) were a most effective control of grey squirrels, their favourite food. Pine Martens chase the reds too, but the reds are smaller and lighter and can climb out of reach onto branches too light to bear the pine martens. The greys though are harried and chased and those not eaten are too stressed to feed.

          2. We’re not in a deer park, Mola but we have both Roe deer and Muntjac running wild through the fields here in Suffolk, in an area that they want to cover ove 400 acres with solar panels with 10′ high fences around. They stupidly say that there will be little gates at ground level suitable for small mammals like badgers. It’s obvious that they’ve never seen a badger – it ain’t vole-size!

          4. I’ve come from Richmond Park to Cornwall. From Red and Fallow deer to Red and Fallow and Roe and Muntjac, oh deer.

          5. The dog was chasing a roe this morning on Kit Hill. Twice I saw them in the distance. Oscar retuned knackered and trembling after 10 minutes, almost crawling.

          9. I agree although I am very fortunate to have many species visiting my back garden, squirrels whose acrobatic antics I enjoy, deer especially the young fawns in the Spring, groundhogs (I bet we will not see him tomorrow, we have about a foot of snow) foxes, and wild turkeys.

          10. We get foxes, badgers and deer, but not seen too frequently. In fact you see more foxes in the towns than out in the sticks.

      4. They shoot and eat them in Norfolk. You had to shoot things in Norfolk or you would be overun.

    2. There are 3 grey squirrels coming through the trees into our garden every day and nicking the wild bird food I put out. We’ve got a biggish oak which they use for acorns. I’ve got a decent air rifle, but I just can’t bring myself to pot them in the head. I deliberately miss by a few inches and it gives ’em a scare, but not for very long.

  78. Out of China
    1957 Asian ‘flu
    1968 Hong Kong ‘flu
    1997 Avian ‘flu
    2003 SARS and different avian ‘flu

    2017 Yet more different avian ‘flu

    2019 Covid

    Might there be a pattern here?

      9. 328963+ up ticks,
        Evening EA,
        I am led to believe it was trotters yard that was the epicentre

        1. The above also coincided with the middle of the Wolf Solar Minimum.

          As it happens we are in a solar minimum and in 2019 China lost half of its national herd of pigs to African Swine Fever…..

    4. I had the 1957 Aisian flu I was off school for 3 weeks. and only 3 people in our class did not get it. Its the worst flu by far that I have had.

    1. That is why silver is up 7% on the spot market today, 14% on the week.

      Games top and silver might not be the same scam but there is a lot of silver being bought.

      1. Silver attracts VAT at 20% on top of the 10% premium when non-insiders try to invest. You need a 30% return to break even if you are a small investor, whereas insiders can make a killing in milliseconds.

        1. Irrelevant to the price hike.

          I didn’t claim that buying silver would be a wise decision and if you pay vat on bullion purchases there is no way that you can make a profit.

      2. Not by the reddit crowd that bought Gamestop. It’s a false flag manouvre by the crony MSM and big money/market traders to get rid of the little guy by fixing things. I note that today the ‘authorities’ in the US and brokers in the UK stopped all buying of Gamestop shares but only allowed selling.

  82. Notice how masks have killed the art of conversation?….

    First you have to recognise who’s behind the mask and stay 2 yards 6″ apart. If you engage in conversation you have to raise your voice so others can hear you. Of course you can communicate electronically except other eyes and ears could be watching and listening.

    When the virus hit we were told that masks were useless so how come they work now?

    They don’t want people whispering to each other and if we start using carrier pigeons they’ll no doubt cull them after a new avian flu strikes!

    1. They do not work. They are worn to defend against splash not virus. As I do not wear them its no problem.

      2. That’s right, for the longest time now they have said that a mask helps stop you sneezing, coughing or just breathing droplets over others so you are supposed to wear a mask to protect others just as others are supposed to wear a mask to protect you.

        Selfish is as selfish does.

      2. Masks and lockdown are tools designed to shut down normal discourse. It is a very old trick and I remain fearful that so many have fallen for this device.

  83. Mercola again, folks. Sorry. I know he got a pasting yesterday, but “It’s worth noting that in areas where hydroxychloroquine is hard to get a hold of, the nutritional supplement quercetin may be a useful (and perhaps even better) substitute, as its primary mechanism of action is identical to that of the drug. It also has antiviral activity of its own.” some of you may know better, though. Discuss. And get back to me. I would like to know. Is it worth buying to have on the shelf just in case? https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2021/02/01/hydroxychloroquine-and-zinc-for-coronavirus.aspx?ui=4697793730bd3463975d8bacf9d5a20a4aa7029902e3afe3b899f7d660c3b478&cid_source=dnl&cid_medium=email&cid_content=art1ReadMore&cid=20210201&mid=DM784156&rid=1072790882

    1. If it doesn’t kill you, why not try it. If you believe it can do good, maybe the placebo effect will help and if it does actually work then no one will believe you anyway.

      At the least you will not catch malaria!

    2. Not to worry. The alternatives and the promotion of rushed vaccines is certainly far worse.

      The best advice is to take Vitamin D3 in higher doses (5000 ius), taking zinc tablets, Omega 3 via Codliver Oil, and other supplements as necessary.

    3. I take Quercetin every morning. I have done for years. I get spontaneous bruising and I am betting that Quercetin helps minimise this by helping the collagens and thereby strengthens the capillary walls. I do not know for certain. My GP could not have cared less about the bruising, so I did this myself.

    2. Just like the EU, Mags, couldn’t find their own backsides with the aid of both hands and a torch and the response is…

      …too little, too late.

    3. Was Osborne an even worse chancellor than Gordon Brown?

      I think he was – at least Brown did not take us into the euro.

      1. Nobody is more incompetent than Broon! Probably couldn’t work out how to fill in the application form!

  86. Good night, gentlefolk, let’s hope tomorrow brings better news, like

    John Major loses his knighthood
    Boris ditches Carrie and comes to his senses
    The €uro collapses and then
    The EU implodes.

  88. Any comment would be considered unkind… … but anyway, it is something of a reverse triumph for the government. Tom’s family are with him. How many families have been brutally excluded from the deaths of their own Tom, Dick and Harrys? How might they feel about this?

    Captain Sir Tom Moore’s family are with him in hospital after he was admitted with coronavirus, the hospital has said.
    The 100-year-old, who raised almost £33m for the NHS, was taken to Bedford Hospital on Sunday after requiring help with his breathing.
    Bedford Hospital states on its website that visitors are not permitted due to current restrictions, unless there are exceptional circumstances.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-55895576

  89. Good morning from a cold & white Derbyshire Dales. No idea what the temperature is as it’s 3:33 and I’m sat up in bed with a mug of tea. Given the weather, I seriously doubt if there will be much outdoor work done today.
    I see I’ve just been given another £25 consolation prize off ERNIE.

      1. True.
        DT & myself get whatever we win paid back in as more premium bonds and over the past year I’ve received £200 worth of consolation prizes.

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