Monday 19 April: It is inhuman that grieving widows such as the Queen must stand alone

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2021/04/18/lettersit-inhuman-grieving-widows-queen-must-stand-alone/

495 thoughts on “Monday 19 April: It is inhuman that grieving widows such as the Queen must stand alone”

      1. And doesn’t “Its” need an apostrophe? Oh, it’s short for “litres”. Anyhow, no problem, because spelling and grammar are unnecessary, after all language is constantly evolving. (Sarc.)

    2. Maybe the Duke of Edinburgh had not confused his idioms after all when he misappropriated the term cowboy builder!.

      1. A survey of house names in the Welsh language showed that one name was very popular. It appears it was “Beware Of The Dog”. (Anecdotal!)

  3. UK warships will set sail for the Black Sea within weeks as tensions between Russia and Ukraine soar. 19 April 2021

    British warships will sail for the Black Sea in May amid rising tensions between Ukraine and Russia, according to a report.

    The deployment is aimed at showing solidarity with Ukraine and Britain’s NATO allies, the Sunday Times newspaper reported, citing senior naval sources.

    One Type 45 destroyer armed with anti-aircraft missiles and an anti-submarine Type 23 frigate will leave the Royal Navy’s carrier task group in the Mediterranean and head through the Bosphorus into the Black Sea, according to the report.

    Morning everyone. We are not an ally of Ukraine. We have no business in the Black Sea. One suspects these are Sacrificial Goats!

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9485589/UK-warships-set-sail-Black-Sea-month-tensions-Russia-Ukraine-soar.html

    1. So what you are saying Minty is ‘It’s looking like a new Yankie Incident…..’?

    3. Yo Minty

      UK warships will set sail for the Black Sea

      May I correct a small typo

      The UK’s remaining seaworthy warship (HMS Victory, will set sail ………..etc

      I was on the first RN/NATO warship to enter the Black Sea, since the end of WWII, back in theearly ’80s,(after ‘The Wall’ came down

      when it ceased to be the USSR private lake.

      It was not worth the visit

    4. The deployment is aimed at showing solidarity with Ukraine and Britain’s NATO allies,

      The RN does not send ships in support of NATO

      If their were a realistic threat, the ship(s) would beattached to a NATO Standing Force (Fleet ) and placed under the control of
      a NATO appointed Fleet Commanding Officer

    1. Morning M.Thomas et al.

      Brilliant Sunshine here in Bath in cloudless blue skies. Mars appeared low over the horizon just around dawn.
      No appreciable rain here for three weeks or so . The ground is rock hard.

    2. Morning M.Thomas et al.

      Brilliant Sunshine here in Bath in cloudless blue skies. Mars appeared low over the horizon just around dawn.
      No appreciable rain here for three weeks or so . The ground is rock hard.

  5. Yo All

    Before the Premier league ‘breaks down’ the the government should take further
    steps,in the case of a certain virus that has caused untold damage
    over the past year.

    Not Covud, but the BLM bended knee

    1. Football has always been the game of the proletariat – of course now that the proletariat has been empowered and encouraged to grab what it can get for itself it is no surprise that those who can do so will cynically take what they can get from the proletariat.

      1. Not true. Association Football was intended to be the game for gentlemen. Rugby was supposed to be the game for proles.

        1. The old adage was: Football – a game for gentlemen played by yobs; Rugby – a game for yobs played by gentlemen.

          Have you read The Good Companions by J.B. Priestley. It gives a good description of the proletariat’s love of the ‘beautiful’ game

          But you are right in that the Old Etonians once won the FA Cup but the game existed long before the professional game came into being. Indeed, Regan’s odious groom, Oswald, is described by Kent in King Lear as a base football player.

          Rugby was ‘invented’ at Rugby School where the father of the poet Matthew Arnold was headmaster.

          1. According to legend, William Webb Ellis picked up the ball and ran with it during a school football match in 1823, thus creating the “rugby” style of play. Although the story has become firmly entrenched in the sport’s folklore, it is not supported by substantive evidence. It is true that running with the ball in hands became common in 1830s at Rugby School and Rugby School football became popular throughout the UK in the 1850s, and 1860s.

            The only time I visited Rugby Scholl School was to umpire a cricket match !!!

          2. The only time I visited Rugby Scholl was when I needed some new arch supports for my shoes.

    1. In North Essex a light mist is lingering between the trees and over the fields. No sign of the Sun but with the bonus of no frost.
      Good morning to all Nottlers.

  7. ‘I fear I will be murdered’, says teacher who showed Mohammed cartoons. 29 March 2021.

    The teacher who prompted protests after showing a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed fears that he and his family will be murdered, his father has said.

    The religious studies teacher remains in hiding after receiving death threats and has told his family “it’s all over” and he will never be able to return to his job or his home.

    Just a little reminder Nottlers from March 29. This guy has since vanished from the ken of man. He’s probably sharing a shallow grave with the Skripals!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/03/29/fear-will-murdered-batley-teacher-tells-father-amid-worries/

    1. And yet our politicians – who despise the indigenous population and its religion and culture – do nothing to get rid of this scourge.

      Those who despise their own culture despise themselves and are contemptible.

      That nature, which contemns its origin
      Cannot be bordered certain in itself.

      [Albany in King Lear]

  8. Monday 19th April 2021

    Devonian in Kent

    Have an Excellent Birthday

    and

    Very Many Happy Returns

    With best wishes

    from

    Rastus and Caroline

    2. Wishing you a very happy birthday,John! Hope the sun shines on you and you have a great day! 🎉🎂🍾

    3. Happy birthday, DK.
      Is this the moment to ask about the topping on his birthday tea scones?
      Just don’t invite any Cornishmen to your party.

  9. It is inhuman that grieving widows such as the Queen must stand alone

    Boros and Co are completely destroying family life and their mourning for the dead, with their
    inhuman, inensitive Rules

    They dia not prevent the Rules being broken in the case of an IRA terrorist and I m sure, that many Islamic funerals

    have gone ahead, again in the way that way that the mourners wanted

    HM was just being ‘toonice’ in not having at least Chrles in support. They will have been in a Covid free environment,
    much to the sorrow of Boros

    2. 331760+ up ticks,
      Morning OLT,
      May one suggest that the electorates misplaced tolerance over the last three decades has given the likes of johnson & co carte blanche and encouragement via the polling booth, to do as they see fit.

    3. Boris Johnson’s constant adultery, fornication and treatment of his wives, mistresses and harlots has shown that he does not give a toss for conventional family morality.

      1. Beat me to it.
        I’m all for live and let live, but I agree that in Johnson’s case a complete indifference to any family tie has probably allowed him to let the current situation develop.
        Looking at his father, you can understand how this attitude came about.

  10. Morning all

    SIR – One could not see pictures of the Queen on her own at the funeral of Prince Philip without feeling profound sadness at what we as a country have inflicted on those grieving at funerals.

    When we can go to pubs, gyms and shops, and have widespread testing, it is inhuman that a grieving widow can’t have anyone to comfort and support her, be it a queen or anyone else.

    Norman Inniss

    London SE9

    SIR – Those decrying the heartlessness of the government rules (Letters, April 16) in making the Queen wear a mask and sit alone at her husband’s funeral are misguided.

    I doubt anyone told Her Majesty what to do. She and her family showed solidarity with the millions of her subjects who have had to say farewell to a loved one in similar circumstances over the past year.

    David Simkins

    Lower Stondon, Bedfordshire

    SIR – The wonderful performance by the the singers in St George’s Chapel at the funeral of Prince Philip demonstrated the power of music to raise the spirits even in times of great sadness.

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    Hugh Davies

    Upper Longdon, Staffordshire

    SIR – William Whiting, who wrote the words of Eternal Father, Strong to Save in 1860, was then schoolmaster of the Winchester College Quiristers (choristers), who were part of William of Wykeham’s foundation of 1382 and are still going strong.

    Winchester College had two visits from the Queen and Prince Philip, in 1955 and again in 1982 for its sixth centenary. The hymn was No 222 in the first edition of Hymns Ancient and Modern, published in 1861, set to a tune by the Rev J B Dykes called Melita – a name appropriate in so many ways for Prince Philip’s funeral. It is derived from the name of the national personification of Malta, from the ancient Greek Melite. St Paul was shipwrecked there during his voyage to Rome as a captive: “And when they were escaped, then they knew that the island was called Melita. And the barbarous people showed us no little kindness: for they kindled a fire … because of the cold” (Acts 28: 1-2).

    Fittingly, Malta was where Prince Philip and the Queen, then Princess Elizabeth, spent two happy years when he was stationed there in 1949-51.

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    Fiona Smith

    Winchester, Hampshire

    SIR – My sister Fiona wished to be carried in her eggy-yellow Nissan Micra.

    Upon her death her husband had to dismantle the interior, fit a plywood platform and negotiate with the undertaker for a small enough coffin. Not quite as dignified as the Duke’s version, but equally striking.

    Dorian Wood

    Castle Cary, Somerset

    SIR – Rather than a new royal yacht in memory of the Duke (Letters, April 18), would he not have preferred an existing vessel to be converted?

    Lord Leigh of Hurley (Con)

    London SW1

  11. Morning again

    SIR – Congratulations to Ian Bolden (Letters, April 15) on completion of his operations on his cataracts, hip and hand by the NHS.

    In six days’ time I shall be receiving a new hip, too, but unlike Mr Bolden I shan’t have the NHS to thank. After a considerable length of time in constant agony – I can now hardly move around the house – my wife and I will be loosening our purse strings in a desperate effort to solve the problem.

    In the NHS’s books, I still have aeons to wait.

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    Clive Kaiser-Davies

    Lingfield, Surrey

    SIR – My chiropodist said recently that he was unable to mould a silicon cover needed to protect a toe. Anti-Covid rules prevent him from touching feet with bare hands, which is required as silicon sticks to plastic gloves.

    With suitable precautions, surely it is time for some hands-on care and a modicum of common sense.

    Joanna Owens

    Bovingdon, Hertfordshire

    SIR – Dr James F Sharp (Letters, April 15) is clearly a dedicated GP. However, a telephone consultation followed by a face-to-face appointment delays any necessary hospital referral.

    As a hospital physician I worked through outbreaks of flu, Sars and norovirus, and did not have the option of the patient phoning me first. Phone consultations shouldn’t happen unless specifically requested by the patient.

    Hugh Simpson

    Bradfield, Berkshire

    1. Some GP’s have behaved appallingly as have the majority of doctors whose failure to save lives with safe reliable cheap medicine will be recorded as one of the most disgraceful events in the history of medicine.

      1. Our GPs didn’t behave appallingly, they closed for two months leaving an answerphone message stating “if you are ill, go to the nearest A&E”

        I wonder whether they were paid for that two months?

        1. Their GP contracts will not have been cancelled. We’d have become aware of the court cases. The opposite is the case. As well as continuing to receive their per capita contract payments, GPs have been given more money for vaccinating people.

        2. While I arranged cover for my team of 6 over lunches, I found that the surgery just closes up for two hours.

          I don’t begrudge them a lunch hour. I do expect there to be a person there – a person I employ – to answer the telephone.

  12. Don’t resist arrest

    SIR – As a former police officer, might I offer advice to those who are arrested in America? Do as the policeman tells you. It’s that simple. If you do not resist arrest you will not be shot.

    In the latest unfortunate incident in America (report, April 17), a policeman chased an armed offender into a dark alley in the full and certain knowledge that he might be killed. For that alone he deserves some acknowledgement.

    Instead, with his adrenalin levels off the scale, he is castigated for making a split-second decision which, in the cold light of a video recording, seems to have been wrong.

    Stephen Rees-Jones

    Dulverton, Somerset

    1. If you do not resist arrest you will not be shot.

      I’m sure Cressida Dick explained this to Jean Charles de Menezes!

      1. She has leant over backwards (?) since, to enure that bad boys live and good guys die.

        Police heirarchy are even given Getaway cars, in case, they encounter murder or mayhem on a Bridge

    2. A post I put on the YouTube video of the moments up to the shooting:-

      Some questions.
      1: Did the officer SEE the lad dump the gun?
      2: How long was it between him starting to turn & raise his hands and the officer firing?
      3: Did the Officer interpret the lad’s actions as a threat and was thus squeezing the trigger as he turned?
      4: And perhaps the most important question, WTF was a 13yo lad doing with a gun at that time of night in the first place???

      1. Some reports criticise the shooting of a child. How could the police officer know how old the fleeing figure was?

    1. Morning Korky. This is probably the first time in history that the Elites have arranged the Genocide of their own people!

      1. 331760+ up ticks,
        Morning AS,
        Agreed,
        May I add, IMO given carte blanche by many of the peoples.

      2. I’m not convinced that genocide is their aim, certainly a culling of the old and infirm happened re the care home fiasco last Spring.

        I’ve read a number of articles that describe the current “jab” and the previous attempts to produce very similar potions for SARS-1 a decade or so ago. All previous attempts ended in failure, usually at the animal testing stage when the animals either died or became seriously ill when exposed to the wild virus.
        If the problem re the wild virus has not been eradicated from the current potions then the government has been playing with fire with regards to jabbing millions of uninformed people. I really do not know how these people sleep at night.
        I believe that a traditional vaccine i.e. created from inactive/dead cultures of the virus and not containing modelled genetic material, for SARS-2 is currently being tested.

    1. If he hadn’t done so much damage I’d almost feel sorry for the pathetic little man.

  17. 331760+ up ticks,
    Morning Each,

    Monday 19 April: It is inhuman that grieving widows such as the Queen must stand alone

    That is just the current apex of a long,long,list.

    Since the major era especially there have been acts of inhumanity dealt the peoples of this Nation revealed on a daily basis, a prime
    issue being mass foreign paedophile activity & the mass rape / abuse of the people’s children ( Jay report) rotherham / countrywide.

    This is a shared evil consequence of the mass uncontrolled immigration LLC coalition party no if’s or buts to salve conscience that is fact.

    To add salt to the paedophile, odious open wound in society, the peado
    on termed served is back on welfare as deportation is heavily frowned upon by the overseers, to a point of being NON existent.

    In short we are giving succour every time we kiss X a lab/lib/con candidate,”it”, the candidate, may very well be a Saint but it is the leading hydra heads, cross coalition, that have the shout.

    Example is the open treachery as seen on the Dover beaches, on a daily basis.

    1. 331760+ up ticks,
      O2O,

      Old Blighty is taking left / right to the head ongoing
      at every voting opportunity it would seem, maybe the time has come to hand over the nations reins to
      others.

      That does seem to be the political course being steered via many of the politico’s & their actions.

      Given time the peoples will find that mask wearing under a burka will be accepted via the polling booth.

  18. Jane Austen’s tea drinking will face ‘historical interrogation’ over slavery links. 19 April 2021.

    Museum dedicated to the author will reevaluate her colonial roots due to father’s plantation in the wake of Black Lives Matter protests.

    Jane Austen’s tea drinking will be subjected to “historical interrogation” over its slavery links, the director of a museum dedicated to the author has said.
    Staff at the museum are now re-evaluating Jane Austen’s place in “Regency-era colonialism” in the wake of Black Lives Matter protests.

    The museum’s director has stated that Austen’s tea drinking, a key social ceremony in her era and her novels, also links the writer to the exploitation of the British Empire.

    Tea of course is a Chinese discovery so it is undoubtedly linked to foot-binding, the Taipeng (50 Million lives) Rebellion, the Boxer Uprising and the Cultural (20 Million dead) Revolution so they should stop drinking it. Has anyone mentioned this to them?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/04/18/jane-austens-tea-drinking-will-face-historical-interrogation/

    2. Strange how the only people who have ever harmed blacks are whites and how the only people who have never been harmed by other peoples are whites and equally strange how the vast majority of the harm to blacks is the fault of the British.

    3. But that’s appalling. Appalling, I say.
      How can the museum director remain in post and still look herself in the eye? She must resign immediately, with immediate effect, or she’ll be a hypocrite.

  19. Jane Austen’s tea drinking will face ‘historical interrogation’ over slavery links. 19 April 2021.

    Museum dedicated to the author will reevaluate her colonial roots due to father’s plantation in the wake of Black Lives Matter protests.

    Jane Austen’s tea drinking will be subjected to “historical interrogation” over its slavery links, the director of a museum dedicated to the author has said.
    Staff at the museum are now re-evaluating Jane Austen’s place in “Regency-era colonialism” in the wake of Black Lives Matter protests.

    The museum’s director has stated that Austen’s tea drinking, a key social ceremony in her era and her novels, also links the writer to the exploitation of the British Empire.

    Tea of course is a Chinese discovery so it is undoubtedly linked to foot-binding, the Taipeng (50 Million lives) Rebellion, the Boxer Uprising and the Cultural (20 Million dead) Revolution so they should stop drinking it. Has anyone mentioned this to them?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/04/18/jane-austens-tea-drinking-will-face-historical-interrogation/

  22. Equivalence is dead … the UK must lose EU shackles

    It is time to embark on the three steps that will let global finance flourish in the UK

    BARNABAS REYNOLDS
    17 April 2021 • 9:30pm

    The UK’s vaccines are not the only victims of the EU’s approach to British successes. The EU is also in the process of using regulation and protectionist policies to control markets and take business from the UK’s global financial services.

    The signs are that the EU will continue, in the near future, to drag its feet on co-operating with UK financial firms on equal terms to facilitate equivalence-based access to the EU markets. Given these signals from Brussels, the UK must accelerate reform in developing its legal and regulatory framework.
    *
    *
    *
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/04/17/equivalence-dead-uk-has-lose-eu-shackles/

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

    Arthur Pewty
    18 Apr 2021 6:44AM
    As a Brit who has lived and worked overseas for a large part of my life, there is one simple factor that seems to be evident when comparing the UK to the EU.

    Rules Compliance.

    The EU creates rules for everything. Why? Because the principle is that everything is forbidden, unless it is authorised by a rule.

    In the UK, the opposite applies. Everything is allowed, unless it is controlled or banned by a rule.

    That, is the fundamental difference between anglo-saxon thinking and French cartesian thought. Napoleon has his mark all over southern Europe, and Germany operates the same way.

    How does this work?

    When a rule is made, the EU countries accept it, put it in their little black book of rules, then carry on as before. Nothing is done to follow up compliance. The UK, puts the rule into statute, the creates a programme of inspections to ensure the rules are met. We get hot under the collar about stupid rules; the EU countries shrug their shoulders and ignore them.

    Example: French catering rule compliance was proudly quoted as being met by 30% of all Parisian restaurants a few years ago. In the UK, the inspection process ensures that pretty much 100% of restaurants meet the standards.

    If there is a case of food poisoning in France, and, by some miracle, there is an investigation that proves the restaurant was at fault, the punishment will include additional fines for non-compliance with the rules. So, they are only punished if found out. In the UK, they aren’t allowed to sell food unless they already comply.

    See the difference?

    Answer – ignore EU rules, get on with what we want to do and let them try and catch us out…..

    Freedom Addict
    18 Apr 2021 6:57AM
    @Arthur Pewty it was once eloquently put to me that “the EU was always a bad idea For Britain because it combined the European love of writing laws with the British love of enforcing them”

    Your example neatly illustrates the point. Historically (until the Blair government) we had relatively few laws under our common law system. Therefore those that we did have actually mattered.

    How I long for those days of the early 1990s, the last days of freedom before Maastricht, Lisbon and now worst of all, the totalitarian Johnson government, which wants to do away with common law altogether.

  23. Good Moaning.
    Aargghhh …. ouch …. erk …… Oh well, at least the garden furniture is looking spruce; so what price a protesting lower back.

    Tim Stanley in the DT.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/04/19/queen-should-not-have-had-sit-alone-duke-edinburghs-funeral/

    “The Queen should not have had to sit alone at the Duke of Edinburgh’s funeral

    The rules around church services are contradictory, make no sense and have been drawn up without any regard for spiritual and moral needs

    19 April 2021 • 6:00am

    Saturday’s funeral for the Duke of Edinburgh was moving and sublime. The only niggle was compelling a 94-year-old widow to sit alone in a chapel capable of holding hundreds. I’m sure the Queen, being a brilliant public servant, wanted both to obey the lockdown rules and be seen to obey them, to show that the Royal family can make a sacrifice, too. But that only brings me back to how wrong the rules are, not just in the letter but the principle.

    The letter is ridiculous. Ignore the obsession with masks, which were even worn by some young people while standing outside, and take the mad rule of only permitting 30 at a funeral. From what one reads on the Government website, the number permitted at a regular service is unspecified, judged instead by the “capacity of the place of worship following an assessment of risk”. Thus I could go to a cathedral, a large building, on a Sunday and be surrounded by, say, 120 socially distanced congregants. If I was knocked down by a bus on the way home, my funeral in the same building the following week could not exceed 30. The number for weddings is 15.

    That’s just daft. The serious injustice is that in the middle of one’s grief, the state thinks it’s appropriate to shout “No touching!” at mourners. One can only conclude that the rules were set by bureaucrats with little sense of ethics or compassion, let alone spirituality. A friend whose church was visited by a state risk assessor said the civil servant was so visibly unmoved by the sacramental quality of the building that “she might as well have been inspecting a warehouse”.

    Church spaces are public and private: you’re surrounded by people, yet you can also be lost in prayer, at one with your God. Ironically, the rules emphasised this paradox rather well on Saturday. Normally royal occasions are teeming with politicians, climbing over each other to be seen by the cameras – the sort of thing for which the Duke had a very low opinion.

    But this service, by default of diktat, was a sparse, family affair. It felt intimate. Perhaps the lockdown conspired, quite by accident, to give the Duke the kind of “no fuss” funeral he would’ve wanted.

    Modern tastes simply aren’t up to those of our forebears

    Not knowing much about the Church of England, I assumed the order of service was a standard liturgy. Apparently it was largely bespoke. It says a lot about Prince Philip’s superb taste that he could take different bits of prayer and music, piece them together and produce something that looked like it had been done that way for centuries. Could anyone under 70 pull off that trick?

    I’m intensely jealous of his generation. I know he wasn’t exactly representative – he was a well-educated aristocrat – but many folk of his era, including within my own unexceptional family, have a far higher standard of culture than we do today. I’m probably considered part of the elite of this silly century (I do shop at Waitrose after all), but I speak no languages, can’t paint, don’t sail, can barely mount a horse without falling off the other side and I don’t know my Thomas Arne from my Edward Elgar – yet Prince Philip not only did these things, he let them speak for him. There was no sermon at his funeral. No eulogy. Neither was necessary. Cranmer and Benjamin Britten did all the talking.

    Youngsters who think the elderly don’t express their feelings enough aren’t listening properly. What one appreciates, how one dresses, how one carries oneself and, crucially, how you treat others, speaks volumes.

    Walking around London that day, I think I was one of perhaps four people who wore a black tie. Would this have been the case 50 years ago, or even 10? I’m jealous, too, that Philip’s generation was united by the war: jealous not of the killing or the dying, such things horrify me, but of having a shared, sacred memory, and the etiquette that went with it. Beyond when we were born, I’m not sure my generation has much in common with itself at all, and the music is absolutely dreadful.

    I must write a will and stipulate in big letters: “no Elton John at the funeral”.

    What’s gone wrong with New Zealand?

    What is going on in New Zealand? I always imagined it to be a rugged, pioneer society; now I read that the government is considering a ban on selling cigarettes to anyone born after 2004. The prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, has also let it be known that she voted for legalising cannabis in a referendum.

    See, it’s not just about health: it’s about liberal elite taste. Ciggies bad; spliffs, good. Saint Jacinda also favoured legalising euthanasia, which is famously bad for one’s health, and I suspect it’s all part of an existential war on waste. The new puritans want zero disease, zero carbon, zero tobacco and, on some primal level, zero people.

    I’m told that the Kiwi PM’s appeal is that she’s got fantastic emotional intelligence, which usually means someone who talks too much. But where is the empathy for those who reach out for a crutch, usually booze or cigarettes, often because they’re poor or, for whatever reason, just can’t cope?

    It’s strange. I’ve gone most of the year without seeing anyone, but I’m so tired of being told what to do, my overwhelming desire right now is to be left alone.”

    1. I had the same reaction (feeling desperately inadequately educated) upon reading Patrick Leigh Fermor for the first time just over a year ago. Interesting.

    2. Relatives of ours in NZ told us that dear Jacinda gave large amounts of government(taxpayers’) money to the Press.

      Since then the Press enthuses over her every move.

      The rest of the population — not so much!

  25. Has WW3 been planned for over decades?

    The only other plausible reason for importing millions of fighting age Africans into Europe and the UK plus South Americans into the US would be to create massive armies to counter the Russians and the Chinese.

    After all, all other reasons are pure folly.

    1. 331760+ up ticks,
      Morning H,
      Maybe in the UK currently we have the working from home warrior who’s only input is to hit the polling booth with a lab/lib/con mass uncontrolled immigration vote, thereby giving Dover credence as a
      landing bridgehead for a future occupying force.

      1. Morning O…

        First and foremost, I’m with everybody else on this…

        Mass immigration is part of the redistribution of wealth as per the NWO and Agenda 21 but every year or two I ask the question as to an alternative reason.

        Not everything is as it seems and often the real reasons are disguised as something else.

        1. 331760+ up ticks,
          H,
          To be nearer the truth at this moment in time one has got to be an “out of the box thinker”

    2. You don’t imagine those Africans will be doing any fighting, do you? Not for this country, anyway. They’re good at fighting each other.

  26. Good morning all from a bright Derbyshire with -1°C on the yard thermometer.
    Was up for a mug of tea at 4 this morning and it was -2° then.

    Just catching up with the Obits and have just put a comment on the one for Paul Marland who took on Edwina Currie over her Salmonella comments:-

    Paul Marland, Tory MP and gentleman farmer who took on Edwina Currie over salmonella in eggs – obituary
    He secured 19 million compensation for egg producers and, post Aids, called for condom machines to be installed in Conservative clubs

    By
    Telegraph Obituaries
    15 April 2021 • 3:03pm

    Paul Marland, who has died aged 81, was Conservative MP from 1979 to 1997 for West Gloucestershire, the constituency embracing the Forest of Dean – the only Tory to hold it during the 20th Century.

    To some, he was one of the last gentlemen farmers to serve in the Commons, showing near-total loyalty to the leadership of the day in return for an annual pass to go shooting with friends on North Uist.

    Yet Marland was considerably more than that. After Edwina Currie’s bombshell comment about salmonella and eggs, he was one of the farming MPs who persuaded Margaret Thatcher late in 1988 that she would have to go, securing £19 million in compensation for egg producers in the process.

    He chaired the Conservative backbench agriculture committee for eight years, was for three years PPS to the agriculture minister Michael Jopling, and was an incisive questioner on the Agriculture Select Committee – notably when he took on Mrs Currie over her “exaggerations” after her forced resignation.

    Marland opposed efforts to ban hare-coursing, and called for the disabled to have access to self-loading rifles. Yet he was no dinosaur: when the Aids pandemic struck, he called for condom machines to be installed in Conservative clubs.

    A Right-wing Selsdon Grouper and Eurosceptic, he was at home politically between 1981 and 1983 as PPS to the Treasury ministers Jock Bruce-Gardyne and Nicholas Ridley. He supported corporal punishment and spoke out against “scroungers”, telling the 1970 party conference Labour’s over-generous social provision encouraged “idleness and indolence”.

    Marland was one of the 40-odd Tories who harried Jim Prior to go faster and farther on trade union legislation. And in 1984 he defended Mrs Thatcher’s ban on unions at GCHQ, some of whose staff were his constituents, as necessary “to defend our shores and lives”.

    It was also Marland who, having virtually lost his shirt at Lloyd’s, not only claimed the market was poorly regulated and riddled with fraudulent practices, but asserted in one late-night debate that investors had been the victims of insider dealing.

    Marland’s losses of £480,000 made him one of the worst hit of the 51 Conservative MPs who were members of Lloyd’s. He was in Syndicate 298, which in 1989 ran up a 730 per cent loss on “names”’ investments, and Syndicate 290, which reported a 386 per cent loss, and one of the 3,095 “names” on Gooda Walker syndicates who sued their underwriter for £629 million for allegedly negligent underwriting.

    Marland applied to the Lloyd’s Members Hardship Committee, run by Mary Archer, to negotiate a settlement of his debts, but at his financial low point did not rule out going bankrupt – which would have triggered a by-election.

    Successful applicants to the hardship committee were allowed to keep a house (valued at up to £150,000 in London) and net income of £17,500 per year for a married couple. Marland’s only significant assets were his 1,100-acre farm between Cheltenham and Stow-on-the-Wold and a flat in Pimlico, but his second wife was a successful businesswoman: Caroline Rushton (Dawood), who in 1995 became managing director of The Guardian.

    Marland attacked the hardship committee as “just a way of getting money from spouses as well as ‘names’. Lloyd’s are not only the thieves of yesterday but they are now trying to steal from family members and their inheritances.” Fortunately, he managed to survive financially.

    Paul Marland was born in Birmingham on 19 March 1940 into a farming family, the son of Alexander Marland and the former Elsa Young. From Gordonstoun, he took a degree in Commerce at Trinity College Dublin, completing his studies at the University of Grenoble.

    His first jobs were with Hopes Metal Windows and in advertising with the London Press Exchange, but in 1967 he followed his father into farming. Marland farmed 1,100 acres of arable plus a pig fattening unit, though he joked: “I am trying to grow a crop of caravans, but am severely restricted by the local planning authority.”

    He chaired North Cotswold Young Conservatives in 1968, and the next year was elected to the local council. At the 1970 election he took on the hopeless seat of Bedwellty, pitched against the young Neil Kinnock.

    West Gloucestershire had been Labour since its creation in 1950, but had become increasingly marginal. In February 1974, despite a national swing to Labour, Marland’s campaigning led to the sitting MP Charles Loughlin increasing his majority only from 1,107 to 1,624.

    With a further election certain, Loughlin decided to retire, and that October Marland cut the majority of a fresh Labour candidate, John Watkinson, to just 409.

    In September 1978 James Callaghan looked certain to call a snap election. Mrs Thatcher was in Coleford campaigning for Marland when it was announced that Callaghan would be making a broadcast that evening. Asked for her reaction, she said: “He wouldn’t be going on television unless he was calling an election”, and ploughed into the day’s campaigning. That evening, Callaghan announced that he saw no need for an election, leaving Mrs Thatcher furious.

    When the election did come in May 1979, Marland took West Gloucestershire from Watkinson by 4,041 vote. In 1987, his majority peaked at 11,499.

    Prior to the 1997 election, West Gloucestershire was replaced by a new, less winnable, Forest of Dean constituency. Marland went for it, but as Tony Blair swept to power he lost by 6,343 votes to Labour’s Diana Organ.

    In 1999, he stood for the European Parliament in the South West England constituency, but finished last of the eight Conservative candidates, five being elected.

    Marland was subsequently vice-president, then in 2005 president, of the National Conservative Convention, the former National Union which runs the party. As such, he hosted its 2005 Blackpool conference, at which David Cameron overtook David Davis in the race for the leadership.

    Paul Marland married firstly, in 1965, Penelope Barlow. The marriage was dissolved in 1982, and in 1984 he married, secondly, Caroline Rushton. She survives him with a son and two daughters from his first marriage.

    Paul Marland, born March 19 1940, died April 7 2021

    Robert Spowart
    19 Apr 2021 9:06AM
    @Peter Nixon I seem to recall reading that there are numerous strains of salmonella, of which only a few actually cause illness. The strains endemic in the national flock were of the more benign varieties and their presence blocked the infectious strains from getting a foothold.

    Also, Mrs. Currie was only repeating what had been released in the news 4 or so days earlier. Somewhere in my junk in the attic I may still have a cutting of the Mail article.

  27. The Guardian reports, “A massive buildup of Russian combat troops near Ukraine’s eastern border.” Well, why no massive buildup of circus troops, dancing troops, cafe troops, line-dancing troops, sympathetic troops, palliative troops, or simply non-tautological troops?

    1. The DE has a massive build-up of Russian troops on the Ukraine/Crimea border.
      I hope they’re not too close to the border as more than half of it runs through the middle of Syvash Lake!

      1. Vert good question. In thr 60s one of my colleagues was a captain in the yeomanry and was in charge of a mobile bath unit. He would go on exercises to Germany where they would pretend to resist the Soviets sweeping across the North German Plain to the North Sea. The exercises always ended in the use of battlefield nuclear weapons. I was never convinced of the usefulness of a mobile bath unit. However, he did tell me that it was ideal for smuggling goods into the UK.

  28. The conduct of David Cameron is a case study in shamelessness
    It appears that personal interests have been allowed into the heart of government under the guise of public service

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/04/18/boris-johnson-must-stop-public-service-corrupted-private-gain/

    As is too often the case – no space for BTL comments is allowed!

    Is this because the Daily Telegraph doesn’t give a toss about its readers’ views or is it because it wants to protect the pampered piece of excrement from hearing these views?

    1. Morning Rastus. It’s quite amusing really – NicknTimothy writes as if it’s news to him!

  29. New 95 per cent mortgages now available in boost to first-time buyers
    Housing Secretary has vowed to create ‘Generation Buy’ through scheme to help people with 5 per cent deposits on to housing ladder

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/04/19/new-95-per-cent-mortgages-now-available-boost-first-time-buyers/

    Why do governments never understand that the more money they pump into the property market the higher the prices will rise and the deeper the debts incurred by those desperate to own their own homes?

    Or perhaps the politicians want to have an enslaved population?

    1. Personally, I think it’s a combination of their desperate desire to be seen to be doing something nice for a target group, and a disregard of the consequences. Either that, or they are stupid. Hmm…
      Morning, Rastus!

    2. While at the same time we are paying for the housing of our replacements – and everything else they get supplied with.

    3. More debt means more control.

      Folk don’t seem to understand that biggest, and most damaging landlord is big government. We are forced to pay to keep wasters in a home whie those saving can’t afford it.

    1. Has the gas man done something to upset the police and they are taking revenge? Or is it that the gents outfitters already has two people inside and the tailor is taking the gas man’s measurements in the street?
      (Or am I simply being a nit-picking wazzock?).
      Answers on a postcard, please, to David Cameron c/o Contracts Department , HM Treasury, 1 Horse Guards Road London SW1A 2HQ

  32. 331760+ up ticks,

    Hay making time come early this year, digitdick is pitching in again.

    breitbart,
    Delingpole: Matt Hancock Embroiled in Yet Another Government Procurement Scandal

    1. A old engineer from Bengal,
      Discovered the weight of his ball
      Plus his scr*tum times three
      Was approximately
      Two thirds of four fifths of f*ck all

  35. Infections of South African and Kent coronavirus variants have already been recorded in vaccinated people, NHS expert warns
    Cases of people getting South Africa and Kent variants after vaccine recorded
    Dr Susan Hopkins said vaccines acted as ‘primer’ for the immune system
    She said the cases were to be expected as vaccines aren’t 100 per cent effective

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9485199/Infections-South-African-Kent-variants-vaccinated-recorded.html

    Well, well, who would ever have guessed?
    The seventh wave will be a monster.

    2. Frankly I think this is fake news. Those decent chaps in White Helmets (the ones who KEEP ON saving the same child) would never stoop to infiltration, would they? Impossible. (sarc)

    3. This is not news……..

      About three years ago ISIS gave out a Press release stating they were sending ISIS fighters amongst the refugees.

      Fortunately the British government refused to believe them and are still allowing real and bogus refugees to enter Britain unhindered.

    1. And BT called you. Same for any government agency. Tax office here, you’re due a refund of £1000, just give me your bank details and a security payment…

      Bug off! The treasury don’t deign to speak to people! As it is, giving you money over the phone? They’ll send a cheque, as slowly and as inconveniently as they possibly can.

  39. #CovidClownWorld

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f373edf08651980d02a9e767e6fa0b59960cbcd2a4158194a9fb6ada4824fe8a.png

    https://twitter.com/petedjackson/status/1383905843100348417?s=20

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9c76da358964acb71d844147274061fcb06ff8aeae93d2672d9c1c189addf7a7.jpg

    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d5d8cd15e8aca3a437c149f81319f31a5f8885ffe7d0222696a8b114beecf2ae.jpg

    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0ef7ccee3b4edd71e12e5cb53b196ace293d21222f4400d30e2983fad09a42df.jpg

  42. Last year after the first lockdown ended , I attended a meeting , it was probably in late May .

    The weather was fine , so we sat outside in a large wide group . The chairwoman, who is efficient but bossy brought a 6 foot cane with her to make sure we and our chairs were all socially distanced . It was a bit of a laugh and drew gasps of shock when she waved her cane around . At that time we were all maskless.

    None of us were youngsters , but the shiver of Covid 19 awareness was still in it’s early stages . Here we were in a tranquil village , out side the meeting hall discussing various fund raising issues , food banks and such like .

    There were about 10 of us , one lively prominent lady , well known in the village , all heart, jollity and loads of warmth with a dog collar , suggested lists we could use to assist house bound people who were sheltering etc.

    The point I am getting at here , social distancing , fear , contingency plans , thinking about others etc etc , all discussed .. and the meeting wound up, when we had to wipe our chairs down and leave them stacked . No visits to the loo , and a breeze had built up . the Chairwoman chatted to the happy jolly lady , distanced of course , we all said goodbye , and that was it … oh yes and not forgetting the 6 foot cane .

    The Lady in the dog collar died nearly 2 weeks ago .. brain tumour , and the service will be this week , she was probably only sixty years old … it was all so sudden , and a shock for everyone .

    Did the NHS fall apart for her when she most needed it , we will never ever know.

    Sorry to sound bleak on this sunny morning .

    Life can be a real bitch sometimes .

    1. Yes, it can. It takes the best of us too early. Too many people do not care about others and the dignities of the deserving are trampled without justice.

  43. The DT lowers itself further by a clickbait article from some obscure Canadian author with a book to plug calling Sir Arthur Harris a psychopath. Such a cheap shot.

    Harris may have been single-minded in his pursuit of ending WW2 with the minimum of British and Allied casualties but he was no more of a psychopath than Churchill and the War Cabinet that put him in place, gave him his orders and kept him in place to carry them out. War is inhumane, but the Germans only have themselves to blame, not least for doing first to everyone else what they later had visited on themselves, killing far more civilians by bombing than they had killed (remember to count the East alongside a whole host of Western nations where they deliberately bombed civilians). As much as civilian deaths are regrettable, the strategic bombing campaign saved far more lives than it cost by shortening the war early.

    1. During my stint in the government we produced simulated battle plans. One of my presentation was the whole slaughter of as many people as possible to break the will to fight. If the enemy sees such carnage, the war ends, and in the long run more lives are saved.

      Weirdly, we continue to fight wars according to rules and laws. This is ostensibly because we’re better than the enemy, but the enemy kills our soldiers and doesn’t care if they kill civilians. Women, children, non-combatants. They don’t care, and we die. Our laws of war are pretty pointless when the coffins come home.

      1. ‘Morning, Wibbles, “One of my presentation was the whole slaughter of as many people as possible to break the will to fight.”

        Straight out of the Hiroshima/Nagasaki playbook.

      2. So when the vaccinated are dead, the unvaccinated will have lost the will to fight. Although I haven’t seen much resistance, let alone fighting, going on.

      1. A blurred video of the surface of a Picnic bar would have been more realistic.. Or a Toblerone Bar for a mountain range?

    4. They have clearly cut the budget for the Department of Fake Landings (Lunar and Martian).

  45. Not sure if it has been mentioned before that Covid Self-Test kits, available on request, are made in China!

    1. That’s a really good idea Mr VOM.

      Not one of the many variants spreading around the world originated inside China, despite being such a large land mass.

      Such good luck.

      Lucky, lucky China.

    2. Its been well over a year.You would think with all the entrepreneurs in the West they would have the market sewn up.

      1. The local entrepreneurs got the contract but then found that they could cut corners and buy from China.

    3. I read something in an online daily paper earlier today, that almost conformed the Corona virus did come from Wuhan, from infected animals sold on the market.

    1. Good, as a long term but now slightly disinterested Spurs supporter, but i don’t like the new proposals for a ‘Special one’s’ selected European league. It’s not about the game of Football it’s all about money.
      The clubs in the lower divisions will suffer massive hardships and probably many will go broke. I expect that many of them are teetering on the edges of bankruptcy already.

      1. Jose is totally against the new league! You might not like the guy but he does have morals.

        1. Perhaps it’s Why money grabbing Levi sacked him. But he hasn’t had much success with a pretty decent team. I read the club are in debt to bank loans of 500 million.

      2. Noticed that the clubs starting their new Meghan league are owned by corporations, not individuals or football fans. So, they are maximising their investment by going for the money.

        1. This is exactly what was express years ago Obs when Man U was taken over by American big business. I remember when Beckham was sold, the club he went to made enough money from selling shirts and other merchandise to cover the purchase costs.

    1. That’s so funny and fairly familiar.
      My personal quest in life has been never in any circumstances leave the seat or the lid up. And so far i’m proud of my achievements. 😎🤩

    3. I made a storage closet thing with 20 or so draws, and foam cut outs for all the paraphenalia the wife has.

      1. But does she use it?
        No woman I ever met ever uses all the wee organiser pockets in her handbag, with phone in this one, credit cards in that one, notebook, keys, etc…

  48. Happy Monday all Nottlers, its damn hot today in Tel Aviv 38’C at 14:26 PM , its what is known as a Sharav– hot dry winds from the deserts that can last from a few days to a week. We have this extreme weather fluctuations during our relatively short Spring & long and even hotter & very humid summer .

    1. Afternoon Hatman. If that Moses had kept going you could have rested in the shade of the Cedars of Lebanon!

      2. Good afternoon Minty, if you recall from your bible that Moses stuttered as a result of having his tongue burnt as a toddler. Whilst asking the Lord for directions on where to lead the children of Israel to out of Egypt he tried to say ” Of Lord of Israel we Israelites wish to go to C… C….C….C…Can….Can….. ” Which the Lord understood to be Canaan when in fact Moses was asking for directions to Canada !

        1. Well someone who wandered for Forty Years in the Wilderness obviously had no sense of direction anyway!

      3. Good afternoon Minty, if you recall from your bible that Moses stuttered as a result of having his tongue burnt as a toddler. Whilst asking the Lord for directions on where to lead the children of Israel to out of Egypt he tried to say ” Of Lord of Israel we Israelites wish to go to C… C….C….C…Can….Can….. ” Which the Lord understood to be Canaan when in fact Moses was asking for directions to Canada !

      4. Good afternoon Minty, if you recall from your bible that Moses stuttered as a result of having his tongue burnt as a toddler. Whilst asking the Lord for directions on where to lead the children of Israel to out of Egypt he tried to say ” Of Lord of Israel we Israelites wish to go to C… C….C….C…Can….Can….. ” Which the Lord understood to be Canaan when in fact Moses was asking for directions to Canada !

      5. If only Moses had turned right, instead of the Land of Milk and honey. they would have got all the Oil!

      6. If only Moses had turned right, instead of the Land of Milk and honey. they would have got all the Oil!

      1. Afternoon Phil. I am a very light drinker, last time I had a beer was back in 2019 in the summer & I had just a glass of red wine last month with my Passover meal, its rare that I ever drink more than one glass of wine even at party or celebration.

  49. Good afternoon, all. From the Daily Express:

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/144025028cc672552d3cb5e7eb9355ce8d1ee7adc30c8999fdbbce10d6b067f2.png

    In an interview with a British newspaper, Mr Juncker said: “I still have the sciatica. I still limp. And yet they say the guy is drunk again.

    I’ve never been drunk in my life …… and I’ll never do it again.” he added.

    https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1424863/EU-news-Jean-Claude-Juncker-drunk-sciatica-interview-latest

    2. I’m not a frunk…grunk….a DRUNK! I can sheee perk hicc…

      He’s a drunk. I hope he seeks help.

    6. I’ve had sciatica for 20 years and I’ve been drunk..err..quite a few times. I can tell the difference.

  50. Yesterday after his round of afternoon golf we had our eldest and his family come for a long awaited roast beef late lunch/dinner. Whilst daddy played golf I played for hours in the garden with my 5 1/2 year old grandson with his leggo ninja figures in a wheel barrow half filled with dry sand, playing,… well ninjas. I made paper (learned from my child hood Rupert books) planes to attack them. But we had to borrow a cullender from the kitchen to sieve around and find all of the actors. Then when she arrived later with her mother, i was asked to look after my lovely little grand daughter, 15 months old, she ‘explored’ everything in the garden. Good job i’d cut the grass the day before. A few trips but soft landings. What a treat for me.

    Talking of Golf i heard that Luton council have decided to sell off to developers, a Bedfordshire golf course and leisure facility known as Stockwood Park.
    I thought this is a disgusting thing to do, i checked out the list of Labour councillors and the overall majority are mainly not descended from British stock and therefore have seriously opposed the will of the majority of the members and players of this inexpensive well used and treasured golf facility. I might even suggest that it’s well on the way to bordering on a form of underhand racism. I have heard that quite often people playing the course have found it difficult to finish a hole because of local families either having picnics on the putting greens or letting their children run amok even with large toys on the nurtured tailored green arears.
    And have been very aggressive when asked to mover out of the way. Perhaps this was an organised precursor to the plan. In recent times the whole of the old Luton Vauxhall car factory has already been turned into ‘social (Free) housing’. But that of course was designated as a ‘Brown field’ site. But this well established and popular golf course and all it’s surrounding trees and shrubbery wildlife etc is certainly not brown field. It’s another stinking left wing conspiracy.

    1. Just wondering….. into whose pockets will the sale of the park go? If the council is non-indigenous who is to say where it will go. What, and to whom, is the accountability?

      1. The buyer would have to negotiate with the said Council so it’s probably a scam. They will have set up a cartel!

        1. I understand from a throw-away comment from him, that my friend Mr Rashid has a hand in it….

      2. It’s where all the crooked wheeling and dealing starts, at local council level and bringing other cultures into the frame will make it all far worse. We can all see what Kahn has done to London.

    2. Some one told me that there is a huge infiltration of of those not descended from Anglo Saxon stock into local government , check out the Mayors and councillors !

      Those ignorant younger twerps who are of Anglo Saxon stock will soon stop us all drinking tea before not too long!

      1. I’ve been saying similar things to our sons for years TB, they don’t take any notice.

    3. Up to the voters of Luton; I’m not sure of the demographics, but presumably the non-native candidates tend to be Labour.

      1. There is a petition on line it has almost ten thousand signatures but i doubt if the money grabbers will take any heed from it.

      2. All my replies have vanished Anne i haven’t got the energy to type them all again.

  51. 331760+ up ticks,
    A very sad state of affairs commiserations to victim & family,

    breitbart,
    ‘Foreigner’ Arrested After Swedish Woman Murdered in Broad Daylight: Report

    We in the United Kingdom have a political overseeing fraternity that are really doing their damndest to murder a Nation and are finding support in their quest.

    1. A god send.

      However, it chews through fuel. And fuel costs a fortune – over 10,0000% of the cost is tax, after all. Is plod trying to make us pay more tax?

      I counted 14 sets of traffic lights in 2 miles. 10 of them in the last mile. The stupid council then blithers on about congestion and pollution – it causes both!

      1. That will be an interesting conundrum in an EV. Do you risk turning off the AC to make it all of the way home or do you follow the rules and risk being stuck changeless beside the road?

  53. Our friends in the DT Letter comments page seem to be squabbling a lot at the moment with some personal abuse being thrown about.
    Our site seems much more relaxed with more humorous additions to our comments to lighten the proceedings.

    3. It was all very tedious! Old Am Fagash was giving it large from his swampy hillock!

      1. Am Fagash is really a problem; he renders swathes of comments unreadable because he picks on every post and it just gets tedious.

        2. I notice you try and get in before he’s crept out of his miserable swamp! Very wise! Actually I tried for the free month, last week and even put in my card details! Don’t know what happened but now they’ve put the price up! I’ll see you there next time it’s £2 per month!

    2. Can’t agree with you, sos. Useless he ain’t! Would love to have him replace the ridiculous old dinosaur at St. James’s Park. The fans would love him as well, Sir Bobby had a lot of time for him!

      1. He has not been successful unless he has taken over at a club that was already on an upward trajectory AND been given shedloads of money.

        Newcastle should be grateful.

        Robson liked him from their days in Portugal. Robson was almost certainly his mentor and Mourinho’s initial successes were off the back of Robson.

        1. So what about Porto, Chelsea, Inter Milan? They weren’t exactly fizzing before he arrived! I only wish he’d taken up Sir Bobbys offer in 2000!

          1. Porto: was on the UP and your man Bobby did that. He took over.

            Chelsea: he had all the money that he wanted, shedloads of it.
            Inter Milan, same again, as much money as he wanted.

            Mourinho is a fraud. When it goes wrong it is ALWAYS the squad, not enough money, etc.; never him. It’s always all about the special one.

            Look at how he did when he didn’t get the money.

            Chelsea second time around,

            Man Utd (compare his achievements there with Solskjear)
            and Spurs.

            If you want a REAL manager, look no further than Claudio Ranieri.

            Hells teeth, if I had the kind of money that he had I think even I could have made a reasonable side.

          2. Voted 9th best manager in the world ever! Sorry sos but you sound like a bitter! Agree that Ranieri was pretty good!

          3. I’m a realist. Show me one side where he has not bought his titles.

            Look closely at his record and you will find that whoever voted didn’t actually look at what he achieved with what he took over. He always spent heavily. For me, a truly great manager is one who stays the course, makes the best use of what he has, brings on the junior players and

            Any half decent manager at that level, given unlimited funds, can succeed.

            I would not be at all surprised if he actually had looked at Newcastle, the funding and the squad, and decided he couldn’t do it, so didn’t take Robson’s offer.

            As I noted before, at Chelsea second time around he had to buy his title and then was fired the following year, at Man Utd he spent hugely again but still got fired, and at Spurs he was a failure.

            I acknowledge his successes, but I don’t think he is even remotely as good as he thinks he is.

          4. Voted 9th best manager in the world ever! Sorry sos but you sound like a bitter! Agree that Ranieri was pretty good!

          5. Porto: was on the UP and your man Bobby did that. He took over.

            Chelsea: he had all the money that he wanted, shedloads of it.
            Inter Milan, same again, as much money as he wanted.

            Mourinho is a fraud. When it goes wrong it is ALWAYS the squad, not enough money, etc.; never him. It’s always all about the special one.

            Look at how he did when he didn’t get the money.

            Chelsea second time around,

            Man Utd (compare his achievements there with Solskjear)
            and Spurs.

            If you want a REAL manager, look no further than Claudio Ranieri.

            Hells teeth, if I had the kind of money that he had I think even I could have made a reasonable side.

        2. So what about Porto, Chelsea, Inter Milan? They weren’t exactly fizzing before he arrived! I only wish he’d taken up Sir Bobbys offer in 2000!

      2. He has not been successful unless he has taken over at a club that was already on an upward trajectory AND been given shedloads of money.

        Newcastle should be grateful.

        Robson liked him from their days in Portugal. Robson was almost certainly his mentor and Mourinho’s initial successes were off the back of Robson.

  55. New powers to kick out spies from hostile states as concerns mount over Russia and China. 19 April 2021.

    Foreign spies operating in Britain face being prosecuted and deported under new laws to protect the nation from hostile states such as China and Russia.

    Boris Johnson will use the Queen’s Speech on May 11 to announce a bill to counter hostile states, including a requirement for all individuals working on behalf of foreign governments in Britain to register their presence. Failure to do so would be a criminal offence.

    Line up! Line up! EU spies in number one lane. Russian and China in two. Scotland in three.

    Just as a matter of curiosity, what if they don’t want to go? What if they have cats or wives that need feeding? What if they appeal to the ECHR? We’ve been trying to deport half a million illegal immigrants for the last twenty years and they are still here!

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/new-powers-to-kick-out-spies-from-hostile-states-as-concerns-mount-over-russia-and-china-zqfsxdjv9

  56. As Anti-President ‘Creepy’ Joe Biden fulminates against Russia and threatens more sanctions if Alexey Navalny dies from his self-imposed hunger strike, the British Foreign Office released this statement.

    “The UK is deeply concerned by reports of the unacceptable treatment of Alexey Navalny and the continued deterioration of his health. Mr Navalny must be given immediate access to independent medical care. We reiterate our call for his immediate release from his politically motivated imprisonment.

    And this from the regime that had Tommy Robinson arrested on trumped-up charges, denied him proper legal counsel, sentenced him to a term of imprisonment and then deliberately transferred him to Belmarsh maximum security prison – a prison which seems to be run for the benefit of Muslim terrorists – where he was obliged to spend his time in solitary because he was at serious risk of being killed and where he had to live out of tins, to prevent Muslim inmates tampering with his food.

    Those bloody hypocrites in Westminster and Whitehall know a thing or two about ‘politically motivated imprisonment’ .

    “Quid autem vides festucam in oculo fratris tui, et trabem in oculo tuo non vides?”
    — Mat. 7:3

      1. Only thing is, by time the day comes that they ‘get theirs’, I fear we’ll have long since ‘got ours’.
        :¬(

        2. I am just waiting for Pelosi and Trump to be placed in the same cell in purgatory.

          Unfair on Trump of course but someone has to suffer for the good of all.

      1. The arrogance of the kneeler knows no bounds telling the publican that his staff had been working since 6 in the morning and didn’t need any lectures from him!! What a t****r!

        1. Afternoon Sue. They are all deeply unpleasant scum. I remember catching a short clip of George Brown many years ago berating his chauffeur in a way that you wouldn’t address a dog. The guy should have whacked him!

          1. I was returning from Hantergantick and De Lank quarries in the mid eighties having viewed the granite production for Richmond House Whitehall with the contractor’s engineer. We were sat alone in the restaurant car when Lord George Brown made his loud presence felt, accompanied by his ‘physician’.

            The bombastic bastard made the journey a nightmare drinking bottle after bottle of claret as he mouthed off.

            When the train arrived at Paddington George Brown was so drunk that the porters had to stretcher him off.

          3. “Attending a glittering official reception at the Palace of the Dawn on an official visit to Brazil, with all the military officers in full-dress uniform and the ambassadors in court dress, he is said to have made a bee-line for a gorgeously crimson-clad figure.

            A colleague later recalled: ‘George said: “Excuse me, but may I have the pleasure of this dance?” There was a terrible silence for a moment before the guest, who knew who he was, replied: “There are three reasons, Mr Brown, why I will not dance with you.

            ‘“The first, I fear, is that you’ve had too much to drink. The second is that this is not, as you suppose, a waltz that the orchestra is playing but the Peruvian national anthem, for which you should be standing to attention. And the third reason why we may not dance, Mr Brown, is that I am the Cardinal Archbishop of Lima.”’

          4. Harold Wilson visited my Catering College in Newcastle in 1974 and I was serving him on the top table. He had a ring of grime round the inside of his shirt collar, and he was very condescending!

          5. That ring of grime was probably a cunning wheeze to stress his working-class roots and show that he was a ‘man of the people’.
            ;¬)

          6. Funny you should say that, Duncan! My mother made a similar remark when I got home and told her! Gateshead was pretty red wall!

          7. When Harold Wilson made a comment about not having boots to wear to school, Macmillan retorted: ‘If Mr Wilson did not have boots to go to school that is because he was too big for them.’

          8. Harold Wilson put on the “man of the people” act; he spoke RP when he was at Oxbridge and assumed the regional accent for his political career.

        2. Afternoon Sue. They are all deeply unpleasant scum. I remember catching a short clip of George Brown many years ago berating his chauffeur in a way that you wouldn’t address a dog. The guy should have whacked him!

      1. And just to make sure he didn’t go hungry they could have pelted him the substantial meal of scotch eggs. Not forgetting his just desserts of some custard pies in the face !

          1. Now you are just being cruel. A boot up the backside at the top of the staircase would be sufficient.

    3. Not quite sure what this is all about. Is the landlord strongly against Keir Starmer / the Labour Party? Has a landlord the right to refuse admission to anyone who is neither drunk, nor rowdy, nor complying with the virus rules? I’m not quite sure of the legal position.

        1. I suspected that was the case. As a former cinema manager, I was aware that I too could refuse admittance to anyone without giving a reason.

      2. Afternoon Elsie. He probably thought that it was the opportunity of a lifetime and not to be missed!

      3. 331760+ up ticks,
        Afternoon EB,
        It has always been the right of the landlord to serve or not to serve, that landlord should NEVER have to buy a pint if touring GB pubs,
        never,never,ever.

      4. The landlord kicked him out for failing to be an effective opposition with regard to lockdown. Punishment fitting the crime, here, I think.

        1. If that is the case, then I agree with you. However, none of this was explained in the “news” item.

          1. I heard the landlord yelling this at Starmer in an early clip I saw, I don’t know where, now, I see so many during the day! It could have been on Twitter, now I think about it. I suppose it got quickly edited out; our leftist media would not wish the population at large to remotely realise that the opposition was being ineffective.

          2. I did reply via the notification system but I cannot see it here – Disqus, honestly! It is a pain. Shortened version of earlier reply: I saw an early clip (on Twitter, I think) of the landlord explaining loudly to Starmer that he was forbidding him entry because he was not leading, and had not provided, an effective opposition to the lockdown. He was very assertive about it. Perhaps it got edited out later; al beeb and the media wouldn’t want any labour supporters suddenly realising that the opposition was not being robustly effective, indeed not being effective at all! Night night, Elsie.

  58. 331760+ up ticks,
    When the NEW overseers break cover as the way they are coming in
    dictates they will shortly, which of the toxic trio will be left a dry husk ?

    All of the lab/lib/con coalition are partial to a bit of knee bending, forelock touching appeasement, hard to judge, maybe the “brexiteers”
    could have a referendum on it seeing as they handled the last one so well post 24/6/2016.

    The politico’s are probably hoping to keep a head, start, it won’t work.

    https://twitter.com/Steve_Laws_/status/1384090490795028485

  59. The $ seems to be taking a bit of a pounding today..no idea why.
    €..$1.2027
    £..$1.3954.

    1. My long term investments are in USD so i’m alright jack.

      With the flotation of Coinbase my Crypto has quadrupled.

      It will go much higher with a mini war/skirmish on the Russian border.

      ***dances naked round the garden…

    2. The first time I went to the US, in 1970, the exchange rate was $2.40 to the pound so one cent = one penny.

      1. Yep..i had a Texas Instruments TI99/4A computer so i used to get stuff from the US…at 2.40

    2. Well, from the piccie it is obvious: the steering wheel is on the passenger’s side

        1. …the vehicle would then be forced to do an emergency stop and two large inflatable devices would be deployed in the front seats.

    4. Why does a car need to recognise a face before it avoids a collision? Would it just drive over a straw figure?
      I read somewhere a while ago that Teslas struggle to avoid the London cab, as nobody had programmed them with what a FX4 looks like! Why does the vehicle type matter when taking avoiding action?

      1. I think that is a general reflection of how stupid and easily confused artificial intelligence is.

  61. RT
    President Vladimir Putin will address the Federal Assembly on April 21 at 9am GMT. Details of the livestream to follow.

    I’ll be watching that!

  62. Jose Mourinho was seen leaving Tottenham’s training complex after his axing
    With Spurs set to miss out on the top four, Mourinho was dismissed on Monday
    The coach looked downbeat in the passenger seat of a black car after he left
    He is expected to walk away with a compensation package of up to £20million
    RB Leipzig coach Julian Nagelsmann is the early favourite to replace Mourinho
    Mourinho’s sacking comes just hours after Tottenham joined the Super League

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-9487681/Downbeat-Jose-Mourinho-pictured-leaving-Tottenhams-training-base-time.html?ito=push-notification&ci=133617&si=26738248&ai=9487681

    Why is this sacked chap being rewarded for being a bad team leader , I really just don’t understand , do you?

    2. Why downbeat? £20 million should let him dissappear into a nice retirement somewhere.

    3. What does he think he is: a Quangoite or Snivel Servant.

      The bets will now be on, to how how long it takes him to get a Similar Job with another Knee Bending Side

      (It will not be a ‘New Job’ he will still be a footie manager!

  63. The French government is going to give €1bn to winegrowers whose wine harvest has been ruined by frost. This is in the same EU that made sure that UK businesses went under rather than receive state aid from the UK government. Quelle Surprise!

    https://harpers.co.uk/news/fullstory.php/aid/28676/Pledge_of__801bn_made_to_mitigate_France_92s_frost__93disaster_94.html?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=e-mail&utm_campaign=Harpers%252Bnewsletter%252BIssue%252B1111

  65. Gorgeous afternoon (despite chilly north east breeze. Pruned half a dozen hydrangeas. Was entertained by Pickles demonstrating what to do with a mouse….

  67. Steerpike
    The United Nations race report hypocrisy
    19 April 2021, 10:30am

    Oh dear. Four weeks after the government’s Sewell report on race relations was released, a group of United Nations experts has decided to weigh in, claiming that it attempts to ‘normalise white supremacy’ and could ‘fuel racism’ in the UK. According to a lengthy press release issued today, the UN Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent on Monday ‘strongly rejected’ the ‘stunning’ report, arguing it ‘repackages racist tropes and stereotypes into fact, twists data and misapplies statistics.’

    It argues that: ‘The report’s conclusion that racism is either a product of the imagination of people of African descent or of discrete, individualized incidents ignores the pervasive role that the social construction of race was designed to play in society, particularly in normalizing atrocity, in which the British state and institutions played a significant role.’

    Strong stuff but Mr S cannot help but ask where was this energy last October when China was re-elected last October to the UN Human Rights Council? In vain did Steerpike search for a statement from the group looking for a comment in solidarity with the Uyghurs of Xinjiang. Other members of the council include Russia and Saudi Arabia where there are numerous reports of African migrants being mistreated such as those ‘left to die’ in the country’s Covid detention centres.

    Mr S wonders how much of a ‘significant role’ such states can be said to be playing in ‘normalizing atrocity’ at home and overseas?

    https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-united-nations-race-report-hypocrisy

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

    The RanMan • 4 hours ago
    The UN is just another captured institution. Led by a socialist, infested by woke globalists, it spouts extraordinarily vicious attacks on liberal democracies like Britain, Israel and the US – all while ignoring the genuinely evil actions of the thugs who openly bribe its holier-than-thou officials. Marxists, Fascists and Islamists are given a free pass on their crimes – up to and including genocide – while idiot ‘special rapporteurs’ blither that the U.K. is more sexist than Rwanda (ffs), that black people in the U.K. are white supremacists (ffs), and that Europe must forever grovel in supplication for the actions of our great-grandfathers (natch).

    This was an organisation set up to keep the peace between the Great Powers and ensure the crimes of the Nazis never happen again. Instead, it now wants to dismantle capitalism, crush national sovereignty, promote Islamic blasphemy laws & demand ‘reparations’ (including from countries that didn’t have empires or enslave Africans). All while paying one another very large amounts of taxpayers’ money, and indulging in a masturbatory orgy of anti-western, anti-male, anti-Semitic hate.

    [In the interests of balance, they do occasionally break off from their pro-Castroist circle-jerk and post some blue-helmets to either a) watch on impotently as innocents are massacred before their eyes, or b) rape all the local women and children that Oxfam hasn’t already got to.]

    The UN are bad guys – led by bad guys, run in the interests of bad guys.

    1. The UK should have left the UN some time ago. As well as NSTO and the International courts.

      1. If there was one thing I would have liked Trump to have have done, it was to expel the UN from its cosy offices in NY.

    1. This point — that we never know what someone is thinking, beneath a plausible manner — applies to the entire business of prisoner rehabilitation: but especially to those, such as Usman Khan, committed to an extremist ideology whose moral code is so depraved.

      Anyone sentenced for a violent crime who wishes to meet the requirements of the parole board for early release is required to acknowledge guilt, and to appear penitent, determined not to re-offend. It is a system which incentivises faked repentance.

      This is why we should simply make people serve their full sentences and then be done with it. If they reoffend again then no one is to blame other than the perpetrator, though obviously Capital Punishment would be even better. Our ancestors were wiser men than we!

      1. We could hang Parole Board members if they release someone who then commits a crime.

      2. I read that stuff with disbelief. He recanted – and those idiots BELIEVED him?
        I guess the propensity of criminals to lie wasn’t covered on their course.

    2. About time a “politician” actually heard – face to face – what the public think about them.

      It is impossible to have any communication with an MP which does not end up with you receiving reams of bumph from head office supporting the official government (or opposition) line.

    3. About time a “politician” actually heard – face to face – what the public think about them.

      It is impossible to have any communication with an MP which does not end up with you receiving reams of bumph from head office supporting the official government (or opposition) line.

  70. I know which pub I am going to have a pint in next time I visit Bath.
    That landlord is absolutely correct, there is no opposition party to hold the buffoon to account.
    Sir Cur is still talking bo****ks, the NHS overwhelmed. Not according to the FOI figures quoted by the Sussex hospital trust published on this forum yesterday.

    https://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/news/article-9487383/Keir-Starmer-THROWN-Bath-pub-astonishing-bust-Labour-supporting-landlord.html

    4. “But you’ve landed on one of my hospitals – have you got a discharge COVID-free card?”

    5. “I’ve got my: ‘I’m an illegal immigrant, get out of quarantine free’ card.”

  72. Biden is watching the Derek Chauvin trial ‘closely’ and fears the
    verdict will ‘inflame racial tensions’ and deepen ‘the crisis of
    confidence’ in cops

    Terrified that the jury might actually start from their required base of presumption of innocence unless the prosecution proves the charges beyond reasonable doubt?

    1. When I saw them boarding up shops, I did allow myself to hope that justice might prevail.

      1. There will riots and looting whatever happens.

        Chauvin gets hit by the worst: celebration riots and looting.
        Chauvin gets manslaughter: disappointment riots and looting
        Chavin is acquitted: riots all over America, murders of cops and looting galore.

    2. When I saw them boarding up shops, I did allow myself to hope that justice might prevail.

  76. That’s me for the day. Brilliant to be out all afternoon in the garden. And for G & P to be able to roam and hunt and play unhindered. We are immensely fortunate to live where we do.

    I hope to be with you tomorrow – where more warmth is forecast (then global warming ensures that it reverts to the usual chill).

    A demain.

  77. What sorts of person conspires in the closing down of all hospitality for months on end,
    Then expects some hospitality when he visits a pub?

    1. A photo opportunity where the flash smoked his face, ha ha ha, deep breath, HA HA HA.

    2. It’s brilliant, but the same should apply to Boris and Hancock!
      I doubt the lizards that formulate pseudo-scientific policy ever go to the pub.

    3. It’s brilliant, but the same should apply to Boris and Hancock!
      I doubt the lizards that formulate pseudo-scientific policy ever go to the pub.

    4. Being what it is, the BBC tried to deflect some of the attention away from Max Headroom on its ‘PM’ programme on Radio4. Johnson was also out on the stump.
      Interviewer: “Do you know who the West of England mayor is?”
      Johnson: “I’m very much in favour of, er, of, er powerful mayors…blether, blether…London…um…West Midlands…”
      I: “You have a Conservative mayor at the moment. I wonder if you know who that person is.”
      J: “Well, I can tell you I’ll be out campaigning for the West of England mayor and all the Conservative candidates in the weeks ahead.”
      And off he went…

  78. Historic Turkish baths in Harrogate is set to ban nude bathing to ‘promote inclusivity’
    Harrogate’s Victorian spa offered swimwear-free options at single-sex sessions
    However, plans suggest swimwear will become mandatory for men and women
    Management say move will ‘promote inclusivity’ as there was ‘a concern’ over access to the bath’s single-sex sessions by ‘those of varying gender categories’
    It also has had to reverse plans to ban single-sex sessions in favour of mixed gender sessions only after customers said changes would stop people coming
    By KATIE FEEHAN FOR MAILONLINE

    PUBLISHED: 16:41, 19 April 2021 | UPDATED: 16:59, 19 April 2021

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9487691/Historic-Turkish-baths-Harrogate-set-ban-nude-bathing-promote-inclusivity.html

    1. Going to the Turkish Baths brought a whole new meaning to “seeing one’s friends”.

    2. Going to the Turkish Baths brought a whole new meaning to “seeing one’s friends”.

    3. I take it that it must be beyond the wit of man to have three sessions.

      Male, female and the rest.

    4. I take it that it must be beyond the wit of man to have three sessions.

      Male, female and the rest.

    5. I can’t even get my head around what they are trying to promote here.

      I feel excluded.

    6. Maybe the special category of men that identify as women were insistent on flagging their excitement in the ladies only times.

  79. Am I missing something? A couple snippets from Nick Timothy’s article on Cameron’s money making sca scheme.
    Wouldn’t it be easier and certainly cheaper for the taxpayer if the government paid its staff and bills on time?

    …”His firm would pay suppliers on behalf of public sector customers, early and in full, and retrieve the cost – with fees charged to the taxpayer – from those customers later.”

    … “For it was not just supply chain finance at stake. Mr Cameron justified lobbying on behalf of Greensill’s Earnd scheme because it helped public sector workers access their pay daily, rather than waiting until payday. He called this an “antidote to exploitative payday lending schemes”, but it was just a posh version of the same thing. Participants would not have paid interest on their advances in wages, it is true, but Greensill would have taken a cut from their employer – which could only have come from the overall wage bill or other publicly funded budgets – and converted the future payments into bonds it could sell on to banks. When Cameron pitched Earnd to Australian ministers, they rejected it, reportedly because it was too similar to a payday lending scheme.”

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/04/18/boris-johnson-must-stop-public-service-corrupted-private-gain/

    3. Wow, just wow. Cameron of course has no clue what it feels like to have extra month left at the end of your salary.

      “The David Cameron effect” viz the ability of a person or organisation constantly to surprise you by sinking to new depths which you had previously not though possible.

    1. WOWEE-ZOWIE, just look at how many of our esteemed politicians think this might be important.

      1. Robert Jenrick
        @RobertJenrick
        ·
        1h
        All of us have important roles to play in making Hong Kongers feel welcome, and to support their integration into British society.

        I am confident that we will step up to the moment and embrace this golden opportunity.

    1. The European Super League:

      “To Kneel, or Not To Kneel”, that is the question …

      1. Thank you so much, Maggie. That really is news.
        I’ve forwarded it to to my brother and sons.
        They must have built onto the back; there was no way it originally contained 5 bedrooms; we used to doss down in our sleeping bag in the ‘front room’.

        1. Some one from West Lulworth on F/B recognised it and pointed me in the right direction. So many homes have been extended and are now being used as money earners .

          I couldn’t get down there over the week end because of the parking and traffic flow , but one evening I will pop down and take a look. I guess the address correct ?

          Phew , that really took some time though to investigate re the change of name etc .

        2. Some one from West Lulworth on F/B recognised it and pointed me in the right direction. So many homes have been extended and are now being used as money earners .

          I couldn’t get down there over the week end because of the parking and traffic flow , but one evening I will pop down and take a look. I guess the address correct ?

          Phew , that really took some time though to investigate re the change of name etc .

      2. Thank you so much, Maggie. That really is news.
        I’ve forwarded it to to my brother and sons.
        They must have built onto the back; there was no way it originally contained 5 bedrooms; we used to doss down in our sleeping bag in the ‘front room’.

      3. If that’s up for rental the balustrading on the terrace might probably be considered illegal not up to current building regulations. The gaps between the square spindles are more then 100mm, a danger to children ……just sayin’

      4. Well, you have started an email storm.
        The front garden appears to have been level out – presumably ‘elf and safety played a role in a holiday let.
        The two front rooms seem to have been extended out onto the veranda. This is the room we dossed down to on our way to a soggy two week break. This view of Bindon is the one I remember when we woke up in the morning – quite a change for a girl from the Essex flatlands.

        https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/df9cf5724aae01285f9c66aa1510eba0055913aae07742cbe9d6e5f0a963fada.jpg

  87. The ONLY thing on the BBC news channel is the George Floyd court case…

    Hours and hours non stop and probably more coverage than the funeral of Prince Philip.

    On and on and on all the way from America!

    1. ITV Evening News – reporter said “George Floyd’s family is waiting for the jury to deliver or deny them justice”. Biased or what?

      1. If the cop is found guilty…

        The crowds will be out celebrating by wrecking stuff and if the cop is found not guilty the crowds will be out commiserating by wrecking stuff.

        The BBC is hell bent on causing racial tensions and hoping to bring it to these shores.

        1. As it is on Panorama , just now !! Talking about Black vicars encountering racism.

          We have had enough , so I switched over to Hairy Bikers .

        2. As it is on Panorama , just now !! Talking about Black vicars encountering racism.

          We have had enough , so I switched over to Hairy Bikers .

      2. I thought the bastard’s family had already been gifted $27 million in compensation for the death of their hideous and evil son.

        America has a screw loose for sure. The same shit is taking hold in Blighty.

    2. ITV Evening News – reporter said “George Floyd’s family is waiting for the jury to deliver or deny them justice”. Biased or what?

    3. What a political case that is. I’d be amazed if he isn’t found guilty, regardless of the reality.

      1. It would take exceptional courage for any juror to acquit him, let alone all of them.
        An acquittal would mean having to go into hiding with all your family.
        What would you do?
        Chauvin is a dead man walking.

      2. Reminds me of O.J. Simpson in reverse. Everyone knew Simpson was guilty but everyone also knew that the court would not give that judgement.

      3. Reminds me of O.J. Simpson in reverse. Everyone knew Simpson was guilty but everyone also knew that the court would not give that judgement.

    4. Poachers should be flayed alive, crucified and an adrenaline drip hung so they’re alive for as long as possible.

        1. There are one or two breeders of tigers in South Africa – breeding for the canned hunting and bone trade.

    8. Back in the late 90s a chap named Gary came to England to bring to the attention of our government the mindless slaughter of elephants in southern Africa for their tusks. He was a guide at the game reserve called Mana Pools eastern end of the Zambezi in Zimbabwe. A really nice honest down to earth sort of a guy. He stayed with some local people he had met when they were staying at the Pools Lodge. he went into London to lobby an MP and had run out of money i gave him a job for a few weeks and paid him accordingly he then was able to return to Africa one of the things he told me over a pint in the local pub was he wasn’t sure what reception he might get when he returned to Mugabeland. I tried many times to contact him to no avail and never received a single reply from the people at the game reserve where he worked, they must have known him of course. I had to reach the sad conclusion that he was murdered by the Mugabe government spooks for daring to be a champion for African Wild life. I can’t for the life of me remember his second name. But he had very smelly feet and he left his pair of old boots under the slated seating at a local bus shelter, they were there for weeks. As i am now i often think of him, a vey brave chap.

      http://www.game-reserve.com/zimbabwe_manapools.html

        1. I just sent another message to Mana Pools hoping some one might remember him. He also told me he might have to ‘go bush’ when he returned home for his own safety.
          I’ll let you know if i hear back from them.

        2. I just sent another message to Mana Pools hoping some one might remember him. He also told me he might have to ‘go bush’ when he returned home for his own safety.
          I’ll let you know if i hear back from them.

    9. Back in the late 90s a chap named Gary came to England to bring to the attention of our government the mindless slaughter of elephants in southern Africa for their tusks. He was a guide at the game reserve called Mana Pools eastern end of the Zambezi in Zimbabwe. A really nice honest down to earth sort of a guy. He stayed with some local people he had met when they were staying at the Pools Lodge. he went into London to lobby an MP and had run out of money i gave him a job for a few weeks and paid him accordingly he then was able to return to Africa one of the things he told me over a pint in the local pub was he wasn’t sure what reception he might get when he returned to Mugabeland. I tried many times to contact him to no avail and never received a single reply from the people at the game reserve where he worked, they must have known him of course. I had to reach the sad conclusion that he was murdered by the Mugabe government spooks for daring to be a champion for African Wild life. I can’t for the life of me remember his second name. But he had very smelly feet and he left his pair of old boots under the slated seating at a local bus shelter, they were there for weeks. As i am now i often think of him, a vey brave chap.

      http://www.game-reserve.com/zimbabwe_manapools.html

    1. Richard Feynman: “Better the question that cannot be answered than the answer that cannot be questioned.”

      1. Covid ‘experts’: “Better to avoid being asked the question at all, than to be challenged and found to be wrong”

      2. Covid ‘experts’: “Better to avoid being asked the question at all, than to be challenged and found to be wrong”

  91. In answerto T_B post.
    Disgust has thrown me out of the Nottle page 8 times in an hour

    Asda is now on the proscribed list with

    National (dis)Trust

    Warburtons (Halal Bread …always

    Walkers Crisps….. Lineker

    Coca Cola Zil Lanes …….London Olympics

    Star ucks ..would not reduce the price od coffee for those troops in Afghanistan

    etc

    2. What has Asda been up to?
      That’s more or less my proscribed list too, except that I avoid Starbucks for general phoniness and cost…did not know about the other.

  92. I’ve been watching the defence lawyer in the Chauvin trial live, in the session before the lunch break.

    Sorry Mr Chauvin, but judging by that session, you chose/were given a duff one, Atticus Finch he ain’t.

  93. Well i’ve had another busy day, which is nice, digging out the garden compost bins for mixing with sharp sand and filing umpteen pots for all the dozen or so plants my lovely wife brought home, after only going to the garden centre Sunday morning to buy one a bag of potato’s forgotten from her previous day shopping trip, . And I spent another afternoon looking after another 13 month old grand child.
    We have boxes of toys and one containing the large version of leggo, every time made him a tower he fastidiously pulled it apart. We have a box and farm house of small plastic farm yard animals and he can almost say all of the animal names, but you have to listen carefully as some of the letters are missed. But it’s good fun. And he loved the garden up and down up and in to everything just like his little cousin Lilley yesterday. We have a white chippings circle around a planter on the terrace and without any prompting at all, he did the same as his cousin did, picked up as may as he could and chucked them all over. But easy to sweep back into place when daddy had taken him home. But i wish i could squat on my haunches like they do.
    I need an early night………

    2. Years ago, in Nepal I met two Tibetan ladies who were squatting on their haunches. I joined them but got it wrong and tipped over onto my back………..they laughed!

      1. I had to lay on the floor to play with him, and then it’s a struggle to get up again.

    3. Years ago, in Nepal I met two Tibetan ladies who were squatting on their haunches. I joined them but got it wrong and tipped over onto my back………..they laughed!

    4. Lovely!
      When our boys were little, we played a lot with wooden blocks, including how to make a pyramid that stands on its point. That’s quite impressive from a young child.

      1. I missed all of the early stages when our boys were young, i was working 6 days a week.

  97. No 10’s extreme terror of mutants risks keeping Britain locked down forever

    Yes, there is a chance of a dangerous Covid variation, but the Government should not be running scared

    SHERELLE JACOBS

    Boris Johnson’s abandoned trip to India is a disquieting symbol of the UK’s pandemic defeatism. Far from returning with a bang this spring, Global Britain’s parade has been rained on by Covid safetyism. The planned visit was a geopolitical stroke of genius – a chance to establish that Brexit plc is back in business, and to flatter New Delhi into speeding up a free trade deal. With India now the UK’s second-largest source of foreign direct investment, No. 10 is eager to procure if not the jewel in the crown (a US trade agreement) then at least a pearl-encrusted tiara. Despite a new Indian Covid variant and surging cases in the country, No. 10 initially briefed that the Prime Minister was determined to go ahead. In the end, he relented.

    Such tortured ambivalence has come to define the easing of lockdown more generally. The Government not only lacks a message, but a mood. Does Johnson embody the effervescent promise of beer garden gatherings, or skiving off work and hiding under the bed? Does he stand for fear or hope? Recent developments hint that the Prime Minister is genuinely torn.

    On the one hand, he is keen to put the spotlight on Britain’s vaccine rollout triumph, not least as he hopes it will give the Tories a boost in the May elections (for this reason, a visit to an AstraZeneca factory in western India was set to be the focal point of the aborted trip). On the other, Johnson’s warning that lockdown has done “the bulk of the work” in bringing down hospital admissions and deaths, rather than the jabs flirted dangerously with vaccine-scepticism. Equally conflicted is the Government’s stance on travel. The blueprints from May suggest a commitment to easing restrictions. Still, the Tories seem intent on making foreign trips if not impossible then as difficult as they can be.

    What is going on? Why isn’t the Government following the logic of the vaccines and reopening society without prevarication? The answer is simple: Covid is mutating. Thus far we have been lucky, with new strains that do not appear to override the protection offered by the vaccines. But the situation could change, and ministers cannot make up their minds as to the answer to one particular conundrum. Is the risk of a vaccine-resistant escape variant manageable or a paralysing threat to humanity that could take us back to square one?

    The Government’s inability to answer this question is partially understandable. Because of the complexity of virus mutations and the dearth of historic research into coronaviruses, it is impossible to estimate even the ballpark likelihood of a truly dangerous new variant, though many experts are reassured by the fact that Covid mutates more slowly than flu. Scientists seem to agree, however, that immunity as a result of natural infection or treating Covid patients with antivirals in hospital makes a vaccine-resistant strain at least plausible. (Which also means that a variant is just as likely to mutate in a Horsham hospital as it is to hitch a ride from Hyderabad to Heathrow,)

    Whether an escape variant necessarily takes us back to square one, however, is another matter. British scientists are developing a range of “variant-proof” second-generation Covid vaccines, and aim to get clinical trials underway shortly. Other manufacturers say that they will be able to adapt booster shots for later in the year, to take into account any dangerous new mutations. Britain is the world leader in genomic sequencing, which means we are better disposed than any country in the world to find a new variant first. A ground-breaking technology is set to halve the time it takes to identify if a positive Covid-19 sample contains a variant of concern.

    The variant risk, then, is no more immediately terrifying than our five-year NHS backlog or that cancer research now faces its biggest setback in generations. And yet the Government seems captivated by the horror of a mutant punishing us for a sinful orgy of summer freedom. This is only in part explained by its fear that, after delaying the first lockdown, they will be accused of failing to act again. It is, more disturbingly, testament to the psychological power of the precautionary principle. Policy makers have become bewitched by the potentially infinite damage from existential risks, however remote or manageable they are in practice.

    Over 40 years, the precautionary principle has mestasised from a fringe worldview propagated by environmental lobbyists to a groupthink mantra incorporated into everything from the Maastricht treaty to pesticide control. Despite its unscientific principles, demanding a level of certainty about safety that can never be reached and replacing trial and error with the elimination of error by banning trial, a weird synergy with predictive modelling has lent it academic credibility. Its intrusive hyper-caution has an aesthetic appeal for big-state politicians.

    This is a recipe for disaster. If Johnson accepts that variants are an intolerable and infinite risk, the precautionary principle demands that he has no choice but to keep us in some form of lockdown until the UK has zero Covid cases. This is lunacy. Not simply because the cure will be worse than the disease; the cure is snake oil. There is so much low-level non-compliance in a free society that even if we tightened restrictions, we would likely reach “peak lockdown” with the virus continuing to circulate.

    I am not arguing that there is no risk of a dangerous escape variant. But there is a better way to manage that risk: the principle of As Low As Reasonably Achievable (ALARA). Alara – which forms the basis of Britain’s 1974 Health and Safety at Work Act – underpins many aspects of British innovation that the precautionary principle has yet to reach. It states that you mitigate risk as far as you can, and accept when you have done all that is possible. Its sensible influence on risk management is epitomised by the Government’s response to AstraZeneca clots – which has sought to minimise the potential risk to young people, by continuing the national rollout with a view to eventually offering under-30s an alternative.

    Alara could help No 10 shift from agonising about whether reopening is safe to interrogating what level of risk reduction is reasonably achievable. Any hope of a recovery rests on pragmatic British optimism not zero risk utopianism.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/04/19/no-10s-extreme-terror-mutants-risks-keeping-britain-locked-forever/

  99. ‘Woke weaning’ is coming to a school near you – and parents are too scared to question it

    Certain US schools are taking the sledgehammer approach to race and equality, and teachers and parents are too afraid to speak up against it

    CELIA WALDEN

    Imagine your little boy coming home from school and announcing that he is “bad” because he is white, “and that makes him racist and an oppressor”. Imagine a school where white teachers are told, as part of their strident Diversity, Equality and Inclusion (DEI) programme, that they have been guilty of “spirit-murdering” black children, a school where traditional “white” texts such as To Kill A Mockingbird and Little Women have been banned, in favour of literature with titles such as Racism, Antiracism And You, and Yaqui Delgado Wants To Kick Your A–.

    Imagine a world in which “woke weaning” is the dominant educational ideology – one you, as a parent, are too scared to question.

    That world was blown wide open in a US-based exposé published on Sunday – one in which, tellingly, not a single parent from any of the schools mentioned wanted to be named. “There is a growing group of parents who are desperately unhappy with how things are going,” said the mother of one child at Harvard-Westlake in Los Angeles, the £31,000-a-year school of choice for the kids of Hollywood’s elite. “But we talk in secret.”

    Parents of pupils at New York’s Grace Church High School also chose to remain anonymous as they decried the institution’s 12-page Grace Inclusive Language Guide, which suggested that phrases such as “Mum and Dad” and “boys and girls” be avoided, as the school works to “do more than ban hateful language”. Because to speak out against the narrative being perpetuated at the San Diego Unified School District, for example – where, according to one whistleblower, teachers attended a training course in which they were told schools “don’t see blacks as human” – is to risk everything.

    That world could only exist in the US, right? In La La Land and the kind of liberal American states so famous for their extremist stances that they sometimes appear to be spoofing themselves?

    Wrong. If this exposé into the phenomenon known as “woke weaning” tells us anything, it’s that we can no longer afford to feel the smug enjoyment we once did at reports such as these from across the pond. Because it’s a world we’re all living in now, and the seeds of woke weaning have already been sown here.

    It was three years ago, after all, that after questioning on this page the extreme identity politics narrative being propagated in schools, I received some of the most impassioned emails I have ever read from Telegraph readers. Those emails came from doctors, psychologists and teachers, but most of all from parents who were questioning the reading material being given to children as young as three. Books such as Michael Hall’s Red: A Crayon’s Story – about a blue crayon mistakenly labelled red who is suffering an identity crisis – and Sara Savage’s Are You A Boy Or Are You A Girl?

    One teacher emailed to tell me of the “transgender organisations coming to talk in schools like mine and giving really aggressive advice”. Another got in touch to say that many school staff members were “too scared to speak up”. All stressed that they wished to remain anonymous.

    And when I asked a London-based friend whether she might consider speaking out on the record about the “talk” her son was given in the wake of Sarah Everard’s tragic killing – a talk in which all the Year 7 boys were taken aside and urged to “respect girls and women” – she declined. “Of course children should be educated about misogyny and harassment,” she told me, “but the narrative seemed to be that boys were, by definition, not just ‘bad’, but capable of extreme evil. That’s a lot for an 11-year-old to take on.”

    Woke weaning may have started with identity politics here in the UK, but it took hold more broadly with race after the horrifying death of George Floyd. While it was imperative for schools to address the topic, the school governor and former teacher Calvin Robinson – who is himself mixed race – warned against the perils of critical race theory in this paper last year. Presenting “unconscious bias” and “implicit racism” as “unchallenged facts”, he wrote, not only fully met the definition of indoctrination – “the process of teaching a person or group to accept a set of beliefs uncritically” – but risked doing “more harm than good” in the long run.

    I thought about what that long run should look like when my daughter’s school sent us all a letter about the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) last month. Right there, listed in the general principles, were “Respect for the views of the child: every child has the right to express their views, feelings and wishes in all matters affecting them”, and “Freedom of expression: every child must be free to express their thoughts and opinions and to access all kinds of information, as long as it is within the law.”

    No parent should have to explain to their child why those rights have been taken away – much less that they no longer apply in adulthood.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/woke-weaning-coming-school-near-parents-scared-question/

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