Monday 6 March: Our leaders must be held to account for the tactics of fear deployed during lockdown

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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593 thoughts on “Monday 6 March: Our leaders must be held to account for the tactics of fear deployed during lockdown”

  1. Good morrow, Gentlefolks, today’s story

    Rabbits:

    Leading drug companies have announced that live rabbits will no longer be used in scientific experiments.

    Muslims will now be used instead.

    A top scientist has stated that the advantage of using Muslims is they breed just as fast as rabbits, but you don’t get fond of them!

  5. Monday Medley

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e7ff4880bd52fb8faf008ba0dd95e50cfb98c4a5e51bc5d6b0d365d362e2ffcf.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5cbc98e5871f095dc8f27cb37b7d90f1d27ca5b73210a6926f11609e19d09614.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3690e6d08df9b5ab08117b37be169ca378f833e44a7abee4b27605a7ecfcef88.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/afd874bfc9165d2c90bfe3e6528fad94af07f58316968b4210003129abd12510.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b1f825cc4fb845e686eff3f06b49f3629ebce60c47cda916c57bfb827a8cb549.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/16b4959268c2fce1bada55397803043ce72c030b600b13f7bf8af7bc0a6f4a0d.png

  7. Putin’s troops ‘fighting with shovels’ amid ammunition shortage. 6 March 2023.

    Russian soldiers are likely using “shovels” in hand-to-hand combat because of a shortage of ammunition.

    The UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) described how in late February Russian troops were ordered to attack a Ukrainian position armed just with “firearms and shovels”.

    Just a couple of minor points here. The use of entrenching tools (not shovels) in close quarters combat has a long history! It’s not a sign of lack of ammunition!

    Putin’s troops! The MSM never say Rishi’s planes or Biden’s tanks. It’s a propaganda convention to personalise the reporting.

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/ukraine-news-russia-war-putin-bakhmut-b2294082.html

    1. Well lets see who wins in the end. We have no idea what is going on behind the media lies.

    2. It’s less than twenty years since British troops had to resort to bayonets (I think it was in Iraq but possibly Afghanistan) when their position was overrun and ammunition, according to the media, was low. Bringing a weapon to bear in close quarter battle, when lines of battle are in turmoil, could endanger squad mates as easily as the enemy force. A bayonet, or trenching tool, will do the job whilst reducing the chance of ‘friendly fire.

      1. Very true.
        In a hand to hand melé a rifle is an embuggerance more than advantage.

        1. He’s a crisis management specialist so it is likely he was approached by Hancock or his team.
          After that bollock drop I suspect he is now Hancock’s ex-crisis management solicitor.

          1. He admitted he had been approached. If he’s any good and Hancock hired him I suspect he will hang on to him.

          2. …and, boy, does Hancock have a crisis that needs management.

            Throw Boris into the melting pot as well.

          3. Much as I do not trust or like Boris Johnson I fear that Rishi Sunak is far worse.

            His Windsor Deal with the EU is a surrender – a complete sell-out and has probably finished off Brexit for good. and Sunak is far too “clever” actually to understand that! Common sense should trump cleverness.

            I am beginning to think that the only way to save Brexit would be for England to dump Northern Ireland Scotaland and Wales and go it alone!

          4. Casting my mind back to the start of the Partygate revelations, several persons on this site wondered why it was being leaked and who was doing the leaking.

      2. To be fair when they showed him the message he did apologise and take the blame! Obviously not a politician.

    2. TBF, having had his rant, he apologised and took full responsibility. He’s obviously got no intention of entering politics or joining the snivel serpents.

  10. Our leaders must be held to account for the tactics of fear deployed during lockdown

    So must our mainstream media

      1. Alas, I’m too old to lead it, Minty, but it’s what I’ve been fomenting for ages.

        We need to tear down the Government, depose the King and the equally woke PoW and get real leaders and parties with acceptable manifestos in place. George will make a good king, once removed from his father’s influence and a suitable Regent employed.

        If it takes tumbrils and a modern equivalent of the guillotine, so be it.

        1. We’re too bloody old to lead a charge Nanners but give us a rifle and a barricade and we would hold until overrun taking as ,many as possible with us!!

          1. Never mind a rifle, give me a Bren gun and sufficient ammunition, I’d hold ’em off for weeks.

          2. Make it the 7.62 L4A3 LMG version and give me an L1A1 and I’ll give you a hand.

          3. Too modern for me to know of what you speak, BoB, but I was just a simple airmen and the Bren was as far I got with Ground Defence and airfield security.

          4. Using the 7.62 L4 series is exactly the same as the .303 version except that the magazines lack the two horns that held the bolt open when the mag emptied.

            Good lord! Amazing the things you remember!

    1. Oakeshott and Tice are a ‘pair’ in more ways than one.
      Tice shot from the lip re Bridgen and brought opprobrium and doubts about his political wisdom on to himself and as a consequence, Reform: Oakeshott now follows suit.
      On two very important matters that clearly hold concerns for many people these two have failed in the art of keeping one’s counsel and taking time to think about making a measured reply.

    1. Zelensky will play “You’ll Never Walk Alone” on the piano with his cock…

      Gives a whole new meaning to tickling the ivories.

      Will the purveyors of erectile dysfunction products chip in to the begging bowl?

  14. Outrage over the war isn’t universal.6 March 2023.

    Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov made headlines over the weekend when his claim the Ukraine war was “launched against” Russia provoked laughter from the audience during a forum in India.

    But I was in the room and can report he also received applause and indifference. Understanding why can help explain the differences in views on the war between developing countries and the West.

    The incident happened at the Raisina Dialogue, India’s premier geopolitics forum featuring more than 26 foreign ministers and six current and former heads of state. Many represented the developing countries in Latin America, Africa, Asia and the Pacific that have variously been called the “Global South” or “majority world”.

    This is worth a read to counter all the propaganda in the MSM about the entire world being against Russia. The sanctions are much touted but they are mostly implemented by those on side with the US or too weak to resist the diplomatic and economic pressure. The plain truth is that the majority would probably like the Russians to win though they are not so foolish as to say it out loud. This is not because they have anything against Ukraine or wish it ill but because they are all aware of the US Hegemon and its history. The Arabs have already refused to help while the South and Central Americans are particularly conscious of the Monroe Doctrine and how it is used to meddle in their affairs. Not a few of them can recall American troops arriving on their streets uninvited. They are not alone. Most of the Global South is with them. A win for Russia would not impede their security in the slightest and it would make the US more appreciative of their support in the future!

    https://theconversation.com/russias-foreign-minister-got-laughter-cheers-and-shrugs-in-india-outrage-over-the-war-isnt-universal-201163

    1. Russians using spades to help Ukrainians shovel off this mortal coil?🤦‍♂️

      I’ll rake out me hoe, hoe, hoe!🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️

        1. Have a heart, at least he calls a spade a spade, rather than club one for his diamonds…

  17. Spiked

    “Not safe’ for children. That

    was the damning official verdict of Dr Hilary Cass, who had been asked

    to review the NHS’s Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) for young

    people. In an interim report published last year, Cass explained that

    clinicians at GIDS, which is part of the Tavistock and Portman NHS

    Foundation Trust, were under pressure to ‘affirm’ children’s preferred

    gender identities and were prescribing puberty-blocking drugs that lack

    an evidence base. Cass’s scathing review prompted the NHS to announce

    that GIDS would close at some point in the near future.

    And yet, as The Sunday Times reported last month, GIDS continues to operate and refer children for puberty blockers.

    Furthermore, there are still 8,000 children on the waiting list. This

    is a worrying situation given the fact that the clinical approach taken

    by GIDS is so deeply flawed. And I should know. I resigned as a governor of the Tavistock in 2019 precisely over its refusal to address staff concerns about the inadequate care on offer at its gender clinic.

    A fundamentally flawed approach

    From my perspective as a psychotherapist, clinical work should be

    based on observation, outcome monitoring and long-term research. It

    should involve debate and discussion about the pros and cons of any

    treatment approach, and it should safeguard against the risk of doing

    more harm than good in the long term. But that has not been the case at

    GIDS.”

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/03/05/what-i-saw-inside-the-tavistock/

    I suppose these idiots would support this as well………

    https://twitter.com/hypnoksa/status/1632537750728523776

  19. Yo and Good Moaning all

    This increased patient contact and valuable clinical experience would assist with staff shortages as well as being of educational benefit.

    Emeritus Prof Irving Taylor FRCS

    With views like that, Prof Taylor could be following in the footsteps of Dr David Kelly!

  20. Good morning all.

    Foreseeable tragedy in Wales.

    Three people reported missing after night out in Cardiff found dead

    Two other missing people were taken to hospital with serious injuries.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk…

    The web indicates that one male of the group has or had a criminal record for indecent exposure & a driving ban after having tested positive for cocaine; another male seems to share a surname with someone who was on the fringes of the drug trade in Wales.

    1. Tim, your link is not visible to me because I refuse to pay the Telegraph a fee and thus I have no idea what this story is about. Your statement that one of the group has “a criminal record for indecent exposure” made me laugh, however, because it conjured up for me visions of the man stripping off in last night’s sub-zero conditions as the reason for his death. Lol.

      PS – After seeing the full story about a car crash in which 3 people died and 2 were taken to hospital with serious injuries, I still don’t follow why you think this tragedy was foreseeable, Tim. I understand that one male had a driving ban, but there is no evidence that he was the driver – am I correct? The same goes for the other male who had the same surname as a person on the fringes of the drug trade in Wales, because nothing has been said about him being either the driver or banned from driving – yes? Could the driver have been one of the two girls? Could the crash have been the result of black ice on the road? Or another motorist ending up on the wrong side of the road and causing the victims to swerve to avoid this possible motorist?

      I accept that (excessive) drink, drug-taking and convictions for indecent exposure are not characteristics of people we would like to associate with, but the tragic accident which resulted in death and serious injury could happen to the nicest of people, even NoTTLers such as you and I, couldn’t it?

      1. Sorr Elsie, I did not want to be ghoulish. 3 young people are dead after a night out, awful.

        Google ‘Maesglas’ in google news.
        My underlying point is that the UK’s criminal justice systems do not yet take into account the information freely available on the internet. And as for Whatsapp…

    2. If the car crashed one wonders why it took 48 hours, or thereabouts, to find it.

      2. Depends what the roadside conditions were like.
        Big ditch and thick hedge would be more than enough to hid a vehicle.

        1. You’re probably right, but no skid marks or hedge damage and no other drivers noticing, it seems odd.
          I hope that the ones who died were not suffering long.

          1. A tragic loss of life, but I think the post mortem will yield the expected results.

    3. The proposed blanket 20 mph speed limit in Wales will sort this out.

      /sarc.

  21. Morning, all. Light frost to start followed by light high cloud and brightness. Calm and dry.

    Further revelations but will the madness stop? ICAN – Informed Consent Action Network – the non-profit behind The Highwire have extracted further information from the CDC: our equivalent is the MHRA.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3e51deda5cced1f25b156390c6a7cad936a892347f4d0f0b23dffd385594d1b5.png

    If the CDC doesn’t have this information is it also the case that our MHRA is in the same position? Making decisions that can affect people’s health, including death, without the data to support that recommendation is beyond belief.

    ICAN – CDC Admits No Data to Support CV-19 Booster Jab Recommendation for 12 to 49 Year Olds

    1. The world and his wife. The dogs in the street. Cut to the chase: was there anything wrong with her report?

      1. Unconscious bias, like unconscious racism on the part of a white man, makes her guilty in the modern world. Of course in the “old world” she should have refused the assignment.

        I suspect that there was little wrong with her report except possibly sins of omission.

      2. When the Partygate revelations were being made, there was much speculation as to Who was releasing the photos and Why.
        I am open to the possibility that Boris knew nothing about the gatherings and being caught unawares by them, was an open target for a stitch-up.

        1. Had he not stitched-up the country with all the lockdown crap, I might have felt some sympathy and outrage for him, but now… fcuk him. He deserves it.

          1. Continuing his nepotism, Paul, by giving his father a knighthood and helping his brother Joe into the Lords, another rat’s nest that needs cleansing.

      3. Why did Starmer and Rayner get off Scot Free?

        Talking of which, maybe we should become Scot Free and campaign for independence for England! The leader of the movement for this was on GBNews last night.

    2. If Johnson is finished for ‘partygate’ then Starmer and Rayner must be finished for their lies about ‘beergate’.

  23. In reply to Conway’s comment on mine, the remark about the Home Office not being fit for purpose is attributed to John, now Lord, Reid, not Lord Blunkett. However Lord Reid says that it actually said by a senior civil servant

    1. My apologies – all these Labour Lords, ex-politicians, all look and sound alike 🙂

  24. 371832+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Monday 6 March: Our leaders must be held to account for the tactics of fear deployed during lockdown

    Very tempting to demand the death sentence but that would
    mean we would be levelling down with them making incarceration the only way to go.

    May one suggest that a token , a score of current
    member / voters, join them charged with knowingly aiding & abetting a felony time and time again.

    Last time in comparison these odious evil events took place was in the 1930s and will have the very same closure, a great many
    innocents dead, ALL via the voting booth.

    Ps,
    6000000 dead and there are peoples denying it happened, it happened alright and an action replay is today on the cards.

  26. ‘Morning, Peeps. Another miserly 7°C here in today’s forecast. Never mind, a massive massive 10° due on Sunday…

    SIR – In the past week or so, I have been gripped by the brilliance of Sally Wainwright, writer of Happy Valley; Russell Lewis, the masterly creator of the Morse prequel, Endeavour; and Chris Lang, with his complex and beautifully layered Unforgotten.

    These are dramas of the highest quality, and all are on terrestrial television. In these days of multiple streaming channels, it is good to be reminded of the huge dramatic talent at the BBC, ITV and Channels 4 and 5.

    Nick Stewart
    London SW6

    This Mr Stewart of London SW6, perhaps hoping to ingratiate himself with the terrestrial broadcasters??

    https://www.nickstewart.net/about

    2. I just watched episode 2 of Endeavour (I missed the first one). It seems to be set in the ’70s (one of the cars was a Stag), yet there were several blacks in the Town (as opposed to Gown) of Oxford. My experience of the seventies, even in a university setting, was that they were very thin on the ground, I can’t remember any, in fact, although there were more in the early eighties.

        1. I’ve just watched the first episode on ITV X. The tax disc on one of the cars was Dec 65, so even earlier than I thought. Definitely not blek or woke in those days (I was still at school and I’m sure I would have noticed!).

          1. This being the final series the signs are not good for the survival of all the main characters in the final episode on Sunday! Strangely, Morse warned Thursday about the security risk to Strange in particular and yet the final scene in Ep 2 Morse answers his doorbell, alone, late one evening…having survived a previous beating up by two coppers. Slight inconsistency there perhaps? Still a great series though and I shall miss it!

          2. I thought it was a nice touch when Thursday asked Morse where he saw himself in the future and he looked in the rearview mirror and saw John Thaw’s face.

  31. SIR – Gary Read (Letters, March 4) is right that “nobody was prepared” for Covid – but we should have been.

    Some years ago, when Jeremy Hunt was health secretary, Exercise Cygnus was carried out – a huge investigation into whether Britain was capable of coping with a serious pandemic. The resultant report stated that it was not – the NHS had insufficient supplies of PPE, too few intensive-care beds and inadequate numbers of ventilators.

    Yet the report was not published, and action was not taken. And now Mr Hunt is our Chancellor.

    Captain Graham Sullivan RN (retd)
    Gislingham, Suffolk

    I regret to say that Capt Sullivan has yet to acknowledge that even the most basic requirements for running a country no longer exist here. In short, very little now works well – or at all.

  32. The major energy input into the Port Talbot site is in the form of coal which accounts for the majority of all delivered energy.

    This coal is converted to coke in the coke oven plant and the arising by-product gas (Coke Oven Gas) is distributed throughout the site for use as a fuel. Additional coke is imported.

    If you ran inland from Margam Steel Works in Port Talbot for 15 Minutes, you would come across a shutdown coalmine.

    But, if you walked out to sea, you would stumble across a ruddy great ship carrying coal.

    Is not Net Zero wonderful

    1. Net Zero and most of green politics is a complete fraud and it is probably now too late to wake up to the fact.

      Let us hope it is not also too late to wake up to the fact that the Covid ‘vaccine’ is also a fraud.

      Brexit is now lost with Sunak’s submissive surrender to the EU.

      And is it already too late to reverse Britain’s submission to Islam?

    5. I haven’t seen anything like that since I was trekking around Mongolia. The locals put on shows in Kharakhorin and Ulaanbaatar.

    1. Just the sort of lawyer one wants, eh? One who leaves out a vital word. Just imagine what he could do to your will!!!

    2. Good morning, Bob

      I was about to look for that clip and post it but you beat me to it!

      At least the chap apologised unreservedly!

    1. Rest assured that if she falls off, some hapless motorist will be blamed.

    3. I expect she’d have an extensive insurance policy, as all cyclists do these days……

    4. Why just for women? It’s OK that blokes go under the wheels of a truck that will magically avoid a lass on a bike?

    3. I believe they closed part of the footpath for a Muslim wedding, you can see the plodistani guards in the background.

      However, I’m not certain the wedding was on Tower Bridge, so this may be a different two fingered salute to the British.

  37. Nepotism …to the endth degree

    Boris wants his cruel bullying father knighted .. the father who despatched his wife to the loonybin .

    2. Our country needs its ‘cleaning services’ ramped up and brought into order.
      A lot of tidying needs to be carried out. PDQ.

    3. Stanley is a deeply nasty man and a green fanatic and a fanatical supporter of the EU.

      I sometimes wonder how he managed to afford to send his sons to Eton and his daughter to St Paul’s Girls’.

  38. Morning all 😉 😊
    Same old out there.
    It looks as if ‘Richie’ is going to get some “bigger boats”. I don’t think he mentioned stopping the invasion at all.
    Just stopping the small boats arriving.
    As I’m still waiting for a reply to the email I sent a month ago. I’ve been making checks at the cardiology department. And it comes to light that the consultant I was apparently under the care of. Is no longer listed on the website.
    Thanks for letting me know who ever is responsible for this administration faux pas.
    It appears this is likely Another NHS blundering error. But but hey diversity is far more important than patients welfare.
    Chin up, I’ll just have to get in touch with my GP practice, that’ll do the trick……..

  39. Good Morning Nottler Friends

    A rather gloomy article – but worth reading – in The Conservative Woman today.

    Britain is completely lost and when Sunak’s Surrender Sell out goes ahead this week all hope of reviving Brexit will be lost.

    Welcome to Englandistan : Roger Watson

    THE first thing which surprised me as I began writing this was that the word ‘Englandistan’ in the title was spell-checked by Word. You could have fooled me as it is apparent that we are already part of an Islamic caliphate. Think I’m exaggerating? Read on.

    A lad at a Wakefield school, with three of his chums, has been investigated by the police for allegedly smudging a copy of the Koran. You read that correctly, I did write ‘smudged’ and ‘Koran’. There is just so much wrong with all this. First, regardless of the status of the Koran as the holy book of our growing Muslim population, what kind of medieval thinking leads anyone to feel that smudging it is worth getting angry about?

    Then, let’s remind ourselves about theKoran. Its sacred status amongst our Muslim neighbours should be as irrelevant to the police as if they had smudged a copy of Winnie-the-Pooh. Blasphemy laws were long ago abolished in this country. In any case, they applied only to the established churches north and south of the border. Catholics, Baptists and Methodists, for example, were not protected if the alleged blasphemy was about something specific in their creed.

    The fact that the police have become involved clearly indicates that they have not dropped their investigation of non-crime hate incidents (aka non-crime incidents, aka non-crimes). Why would the police even get involved, especially when they do nothing to stop the local elders utterly humiliating the boy’s mother and making her plead with them not to kill her son? You would have thought, perhaps, that the words ‘kill’ and ‘my son’ in the same sentence would have alerted the police to the fact that some action was needed. But, no, that is trumped by a smudge.

    Much has been made in the media of the fact that the young lad at the centre of the controversy is ‘on the spectrum’, in other words he is autistic. This is an irrelevant deflection as it should matter little if he was in control of all his faculties and stamped on a copy of theKoran; no law would have been broken and, frankly, the vast majority of the country would not care.

    Anyone who thinks this is an isolated incident may need reminding that only a few miles from Wakefield, a teacher and his family remain in hiding with death threats hanging over them and the police do nothing. Around the country there were protests against a film which portrayed the wrong kind of Islam, or something like that. They have every right to protest, in my view, but the cinemas cancelled the film and the protesters, who intimidated cinemagoers regardless of which film they were hoping to watch, proceeded with impunity.

    Imagine a protest outside a mosque about grooming gangs or female genital mutilation. Plod would be in there in minutes, batons flailing, like Saladin’s forces taking on the Crusaders to quell the protests. Juxtapose the above against people silently praying outside abortion clinics who get arrested for their trouble.

    We are clearly living in a country which is taking the knee to Islam, where the rule of law is unevenly applied in favour of Islamists and, from the evidence of the mother in Wakefield, where a blind eye is being turned towards Sharia courts. We are not in a battle against Islam: we have already lost.

  42. More total insanity

    Controversial lab studies that modify bird flu viruses in ways that

    could make them more risky to humans will soon resume after being on

    hold for more than 4 years. ScienceInsider has learned that

    last year, a U.S. government review panel quietly approved experiments

    proposed by two labs that were previously considered so dangerous that

    federal officials had imposed an unusual top-down moratorium on such

    research.

    One of the projects has already received funding from

    the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH’s) National Institute of

    Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) in Bethesda, Maryland, and will

    start in a few weeks; the other is awaiting funding. The outcome

    may not satisfy scientists who believe certain studies that aim to make

    pathogens more potent or more likely to spread in mammals are so risky

    they should be limited or even banned

    https://www.science.org/content/article/exclusive-controversial-experiments-make-bird-flu-more-risky-poised-resume#:~:text=Two%20%E2%80%9Cgain%20of%20function%E2%80%9D%20projects,passed%20new%20U.S.%20review%20process&text=Controversial%20lab%20studies%20that%20modify,for%20more%20than%204%20years
    Why for god’s sake just why??
    I think we can see where Gates will get his next “vaccine” billions from………….

    1. But but but, how can they do that when the Ukrainian labs are under attack and the Chinese are on the naughty step?

      Are there any suitable labs in Iran or Pakistan that the Yanks could use instead?

    1. But, but – Cur Ikea Slammer wants them just as much….. So if Fishi is outed, the same old same old will replace him.

    2. No, it won’t. His real eye is on a post with the UN or WEF. A nice 2 days a week half million a year, another half million in expenses, free house all on the taxpayer.

  44. Sue Gray’s appointment is unconstitutional – and Keir Starmer should have known better

    Labour should never have approached a senior civil servant with an offer of a post. It risks undermining the whole system of government

    VERNON BOGDANOR
    5 March 2023 • 8:00pm

    If Sue Gray becomes Sir Keir Starmer’s chief of staff, she would be setting a dangerous precedent. Her appointment would be both unprecedented and unconstitutional.

    Lord Kerslake, a former head of the Home Civil Service, has compared it to the appointment of Jonathan Powell as Tony Blair’s chief of staff in 1995. But the circumstances are quite different. Powell was comparatively junior – a second secretary in the Foreign Office – and his postings were mainly abroad. Sue Gray, by contrast, is a senior official who has worked at the very centre of government.

    She is best known for her work on ethics and propriety, but since 2018 she has, in fact, been in policymaking roles, responsible for finance in Northern Ireland, and more recently as second secretary in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, for policy on the Union and the constitution under the ministerial leadership of Michael Gove. She was also the sponsor for the Grenfell Tower and Infected Blood independent inquiries.

    She has, therefore, been in senior and sensitive policymaking roles involving day-to-day contact with key governmental decision-makers. She has had access to privileged information, not publicly available. Were it to be made available to Sir Keir Starmer, it would give Labour an improper advantage in political battles with the Government.

    The Civil Service code requires officials not to take part in any activities that might involve the disclosure of official information or draw upon experience in their official capacity without prior approval from the head of their department. How is that provision to be monitored and enforced? Were Sue Gray to seek approval from her boss, the Cabinet Secretary, Simon Case, she would be putting him in a highly embarrassing position, since he too might have to work for Starmer, were there to be a Labour government.

    So we have to rely upon Sue Gray being a “good chap”, in Peter Hennessy’s famous words. But leaping from a post requiring political impartiality to work for the Leader of the Opposition must cast some doubt on Sue Gray’s credentials as a “good chap”.

    Some Conservatives have long believed that the Civil Service veers to the Left, is hostile to Brexit and seeks to frustrate the policies of Tory governments. I have never shared that view. Indeed, I greatly admire the skill with which officials implement the policies of different governments.

    Nevertheless, the damage to the Civil Service could be severe if senior officials can resign from their posts to jump immediately into a job with a party whose policies are opposed to those of the government that they have served. It would be unsurprising if ministers, in consequence, were to lose confidence in their senior officials. Were that to happen, the cause of good government would suffer. So would the country.

    There is a further complication. For Sue Gray has published reports on the partygate allegations concerning former prime minister Boris Johnson, which condemn him for breaking lockdown rules. Was she being considered for a post with the Labour Party while compiling her reports?

    On Channel 4 News on Friday, Keir Starmer was evasive as to when the approach was first made, saying merely that everyone knew that he was seeking a chief of staff. Presumably if the approach had been made after publication, Starmer would have said so. The issue is important, since, if the approach was made before publication, the hope of future employment might – even if only subconsciously – have influenced its content. So it would not be possible any longer to regard Sue Gray as an impartial investigator.

    Sue Gray is required to seek advice on the appointment from the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments – Acoba – whom she has, apparently, not yet approached. But here too there is a complication. For it is alleged that Sue Gray sat on the committee that appointed three of the eight members of Acoba. These three would presumably have to recuse themselves from giving advice.

    Acoba, in any case, can only advise. It has no enforcement powers. The Prime Minister could, in theory, veto the appointment, but that would put him in an embarrassing position.

    As a former Director of Public Prosecutions, Sir Keir Starmer knows the conventions of the constitution better than most. He should never have approached a senior civil servant with an offer of a post; and Sue Gray, if she wishes to maintain her reputation for integrity, should turn it down.

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

    1. Sue Gray did not inform ministers of contact with Labour despite civil service rules

      Sir Keir Starmer’s new chief of staff should have informed her ministers about any contact, according to civil service rules

      5 March 2023 • 11:57am

      1. The Snivel Serpents regard Civil Service Rules as being there to be ignored and broken, if their wokism demands it.

    2. “…the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities,…”

      What a misnomer and complete waste of space.

    4. Cursed Harmer knows exactly what he is doing.
      Anything, however trivial, that can be used to destroy the UK and its institutions will be on his to do list.

      1. Given that it has been taken by Left Wing apparatchiks as part of the Long March Through The Institutions, the one institution he will not want to destroy is the Civil Service.

    5. Yes, it stinks. No, it’s not improper. We all know the civil service is biased. Anyone who thinks otherwise I’ve a bridge to sell them.

      Boris’ government brought the wine in during covid. They drank it in garden parties. They chose to flout the rules. They got found out. The person put in charge of the investigation found that they had, but nothing happened apart form Boris losing his job, the respect of the nation and crushing the covid hysteria.

    6. The question is, was she offered the job BEFORE or AFTER her infamous report?

  45. Met. Office slowly back tracking on their Daily Mail led doom forecast for ice and snow. -3 for tonight is now down to -1

    1. Ghastly right wind neo Nazi fascists. How dare they! They should just accept the erasure of their culture and society.

      I do wonder when someone will point out that the Nazis were/are? ardently Left wing, but hey ho. It suits the state to smear.

        1. Ahh, look at him there, jackbooted Nazi thug! Evil Right winger covering his hands and hiding behind glasses! Hideously white, of course!

          The simple fact is the illegal immigrants shouldn’t be here. If they had been turned back at the channel these protests wouldn’t exist. I still advocate housing them with Home Office staff.

      2. Extreme Left = Total control by the state.

        Extreme Right = Total control by the state.

        So if there is no space between the extreme left and the extreme right there will be no space in which freedom and personal control of one’s life will be able to thrive.

        Last week Sadiq Khan said that anyone who does not agree with him is extreme right!

        1. I don’t believe an extreme right exists. It’s simply not in the mindset of the individualism to seek such paranoid control over other people’s actions.

          1. Since the Left are all for collectivism, extreme Right is the opposite, whatever that can be called – extreme individualism?

  48. The BBC are keeping us informed of the struggle against their backsliding former political friends, the Soviet Union. Apparently the Russians are suffering seven time the deaths and casualties of the brave resistance fighters of the Ukrainian forces and are being so heavily defeated in Bakhmut and other border towns they are having to retreat even further into Ukrainian territory to avoid annihilation. That’ll teach ’em!

  49. Morning all! I’m home. Arrived home yesterday evening. Tired, but it was a good trip. Been sorting out my bagful of dirty washing. Hundreds of photos to sort through later on.

    1. Welcome back. Glad it all went well. Looking forward to a election of the best snaps!

      1. Will probably be able to bore you to tears…….. saw most of the wildlife I wanted to see, but no leopard this time. Met some interesting people. It’s different, travelling on my own, but I got very good, personal service from guides and staff, as the camps were quiet.

      2. Oh my Gawd.

        Does that mean we have to vote for them Bill?

        No insult to you, Jules, I just wish Bill could hone his typing skills – no good blaming it on his keybrod.

    3. Welcome home! You can bend your husband’s ear for days now with all your tales.

      1. I will do! He’s currently learning a new piece to play on the piano. A Chopin nocturne, with lots of flats and key changes – quite challenging.

    4. Pleased to have you back. This lot on here have run riot since you’ve been away. :-))

      1. Well – I did pop in from time to time when wifi was available. I think there has been a bit of news to catch up with – I gather Hancock’s been taking a roasting.

        1. I diversionary tactic to deflect from even greater misdeeds as we give NI to the EU and get ready to sign away our health to WHO.

          1. Disgraceful………I haven’t been able to rread the details yet of Rishi’s give-away, and let’s hope the African countries save us once more from WHO.

    5. Glad you’re home, I bet, and it seems, Jules, that you had a good time. V happy for you.

    7. Seems only two minutes since you left! Welcome home. Good to see you back. Enjoy going over the whole trip again with your photographs.

  50. Meandering through my You Tube Feed I came across this video of my local town. To be accurate I’m equidistant between Midhurst and Haslemere but when I went out I always preferred to go to Midhurst because I used to live in Stedham, which is in walking distance of Midhurst. You will note that some of the buildings are daubed in a rather unpleasant yellow, these buildings belong to Lord Cowdrey who likes to metaphorically urinate on his territory like some sort of dog.
    Does anyone else here have videos about the place they live? would be fun to see.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDDJQhM6CM8

      1. Thanks for posting. The opening shot has a Shop sign: “Just Cremations”. It caused me to wonder if there were ever any unjust cremations in that neck of the woods (a la Jean “dArc)?

          1. At my mother’s cremation one of her friends and work colleagues said after as i was looking at the flowers that she could smell roast pork. I just gave her a withering look.

            I was surprised that smells were leaking out but they are so busy it’s like Auschwitz.

      2. Thanks for posting. The opening shot has a Shop sign: “Just Cremations”. It caused me to wonder if there were ever any unjust cremations in that neck of the woods (a la Jean “dArc)?

      3. You poor lamb Pip, how were you shipwrecked there? It just isn’t you! I imagine you in a place like my old place, Stedham
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iba7dW1U9g&t=43s
        The Hamilton Arms is run by Thai’s and is famous for its excellent Thai food. Interesting combo. Traditional pub and Thai restaurant.
        Your house isn’t shown. It is the oldest building in the village, mentioned in Doomsday and is a compilation of features going through the centuries, Medieval, Elizabethan, Georgian etc. it is lovely and no one lives in it. Owned by some very wealthy woman in London, well maintained but never used. Sad. This painting is all I could find of the house. It doesn’t do it justice.
        https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-BsiACjelfF8/WR6XxmQWMQI/AAAAAAABtcM/sWd9WwzudcscMyAxfXMv33fgV1omOtt-wCLcB/s1600/At%2BStedham%2Bnear%2BMidhurst%252C%2BKent%2Bwatercolour.jpg

        1. Very nice.

          Fareham is the nearest town to where i was born. Ooh the attraction of the big city !

          What i like about it is that it is dull. No nightlife. Quiet. I did five years in Birmingham and five years in London and did all the usual things.

          The noisiest thing where i am now is the wood pigeons. I’m also just a couple of miles from the sea in a southerly direction and even closer to the south downs.

          I think as a place to end up for the last hurrah.

          We also have had a Conservative council since they invented local councils. A lot cheaper in council taxes than Labour benefits Gosport.

          I have lived in less salubrious places like Wapping and Canary Wharf !

      2. The sign: “A different language, a different vision of life.” So true. We take it so much for granted that everyone thinks the same. Just not true. Rather like your town, is it all modern?

        1. Pretty well modern. Non-modern houses away from the centre, but these are wooden with a tendency to combust now and again, also easily replaced by modern concrete.

    1. Yes, all modern Mercedes automatically send a 999 call with their present position when involved in an accident.

      1. Yes they hide on private property and get innocent motorists like me for speeding

  55. Steerpike
    Watch: Starmer squirms over Gray job offer
    6 March 2023, 10:19am

    Oh dear. Just this morning Mr S was wondering how Labour can justify its job offer to Sue Gray. And it seems Sir Keir is having similar difficulty in doing so too. Appearing on LBC this morning for his weekly ‘Call Keir’ segment, the Labour leader was asked six times about when the party first approached the senior civil servant but Starmer refused to answer. Quelle surprise…

    Presenter Nick Ferrari did his damnedest, asking whether Gray was first approached this year or last year. Sir Keir declined to answer, only saying it was a ‘recent’ approach, following the departure of his previous chief of staff in October. It was, he said, after he had a period ‘working through in my own mind what I wanted from a chief of staff.’ Despite Ferrari’s dogged efforts, Starmer could only insist that ‘there’s nothing improper.’

    So much for all that talk about transparency, eh?

    https://youtu.be/_HoUYz_OF1Q

    *********************************************
    Hungerpang
    an hour ago
    Jeez. And this guy is going to be our next PM?
    I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Starmer is one of the few politicians who makes Boris Johnson look honest.

    JAHM yahng
    an hour ago
    I am please Sir Keir was able to tackle this difficult issue and assure us, in his own way, that he is the lying pr1ck I always thought he was. Perhaps Labour could draft Shami Chakrabarti in to check this out and offer further reassurance.

    2. Nice try Nick! The more slimy barstewards like that tell me “there was nothing improper” while still not answering the question, the more I feel that there probably IS something improper going on.

    3. Well if he doesn’t know what a woman is, he probably doesn’t know the time of day let alone when he made employment approaches towards one.

    1. The WHO had the aim of promoting “the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health” across the globe — whereby health was understood, crucially, as “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity”.

      I understand that latter is only achievable in a coma…..

      1. And it is “run” by that chap who is wanted for genocide in his own poxy country….

  57. What is driving Russian leader’s relentless assault on Ukraine? 6 March 2023.

    Anger may well be a motivation for Putin to act as he has. But there are at least three other popular preconceptions about what makes him tick that I would challenge. The first is that he is lord and master of all he surveys – a latterday Tsar if you like. Before the Ukraine war there was plenty of evidence that regional officials could and did operate outside Moscow’s control. The war has no doubt reduced their room for manoeuvre, but some regions acted on the instruction to mobilise reservists more diligently than others.

    A second concerns the speculation about his vast (and, it is alleged, corruptly acquired) wealth. This is one of the many sticks Navalny has used to attack the current order in Russia. But while people around Putin have certainly benefited mightily from their association, it seems to me that wealth is not what primarily motivates Putin

    And a third – most pertinent in the context of the Ukraine war – is the accusation that his ambition is to restore the Soviet Union or the Russian Empire. He is on record as saying: “Anyone with a heart cannot fail to regret the passing of the Soviet Union, but no one with a head could possibly want to bring it back.”

    This is a pretty good résumé of Vlad and his career and motivations for those interested.

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/putin-statement-health-ukraine-russia-losses-b2294818.html

    1. The focus on personalities is still irritating. Vlad doesn’t act without the backing of the Duma and the Duma represents the people. Unlike his purported heroes, Peter I and Catherine II (and in my humble opinion that shows good taste), Putin is not an autocrat. A strong leader yes but not an autocrat.

      1. A tad simplistic, Our Susan. You won’t be “elected” to the Duma unless you are on Putin’s approved list. And, once elected, it is (literally) more than your life is worth to speak out against Putin.

        Just saying…

        1. If you had watched his annual long form press interview, on You Tube,, a couple of hours each year worth watching and highly instructive, you will notice that people have no fear of criticising him and criticising him heavily. He doesn’t seem to like yes men at all and there are certainly people in the Duma that oppose him politically. So I think it false that it is “…more than your life is worth to speak out against Putin.”

    2. “…but no one with a head could possibly want to bring it back.”

      That sort of blows a huge hole in your argument, Independent.

    3. With regard to the second concern listed. I pointed out a while ago that one of the things that put Putin on the blacklist for the USA was his refusal to take bribes which had become, before he was President, the standard way of the Americans and other foreigners doing business in Russia.
      Wealth does not seem to motivate Putin either, he is sometimes nicknamed “The Monk” for his personal habits which border, apparently, on the ascetic. He also, in that regard, likes to frequent monasteries and has visited Mount Athos several times. It is not an act or an attempt to curry favour as his Western detractors would have. Lets face it, Putin could be as upright as a saint and the corrupt Western world would still pretend he was guilty of everything under the sun. In fact they do in their crude attempts to smear him as the second coming of Adolf, amongst other egregious accusations.

      The truly evil Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who murders his opponents, suppresses all opposition political parties and media and encourages neo-Nazis who think that all Russian speaking Ukrainians are rats and vermin to be exterminated, men, women, and children. We pretend is a bastion of democratic values and is a saint.
      It’s enough to make you vomit!

      1. Wealth certainly motivates Zelensky.

        Just watch, when he is finally beaten, he will quickly high-tail it to another (warmer) clime, with the zillions he has ripped off from the West.

        Who’s the stupid boy then?

        1. Warmer clime is correct. I am guessing that you know he has a mansion in Florida? Went for a song at $35 million.

  58. Off topic
    Since we’ve been here, we have very occasionally seen an egret in the garden, perhaps a couple very few years.

    This year on separate days we’ve seen several striding around the grass hunting, coming quite close to the house. I hope they become more frequent visitors.

          2. You can take a teacher out of the classroom … 🙂 I remember remarking to a French acquaintance while I was abroad when he commented, “prof”, that “cela se voit” (you can see it), only to be told, “non, cela s’entend” (no, you can hear it) 🙂

      1. Ah you’re back, I trust all is well.

        They seem to have three styles, a stand still and strike, a steady slow gait and a strike and sometimes they run after something and strike. Usually we see them at the bottom of the valley near the cattle; I wonder what has brought them here.

        1. Fine thanks. Was getting a bit down with the news. Then came the whatsapp leak. This is going to run and run.

          The egrets might be attracted to the insects which in turn are attracted to the dung.

          1. We get lots of good sized insects, but it’s a little early for the crickety types.

    3. Get some cows.

      When driving through France we have often seen Egrets and Cows ‘co-inhabiting’ the same field

      The cattle egret and grazing cattle in close association is a classic example of commensalism.
      The egrets always forage close to where the cattle are grazing because the cattle, as they move, stir up and flush out insects from the
      vegetation that otherwise might be difficult for the egrets to find and catch.

      The Egrets also eat ticks off the cows backs

    6. The interesting aspect is that the object has been incorrectly described since it was unearthed between 1848 and 1853. The inscription was incised before firing but after the glaze had been applied.
      The ‘vase’, possibly a drinking vessel, has been incorrectly described since it was unearthed between 1848 and 1853. The inscription was incised before firing but after the glaze had been applied. The design is generic, but it is likely that a batch was produced to commemorate a specific event. The swastika symbol is the wrong way round because the figures were moulded and when dry were applied as sprigs. Some of the decoration would have been piped, like icing on a cake.

  61. Apropos WhatsAppGate – Shitts has been VERY quiet in the last few days. Most unlike him. I wonder if some shyte is about to hit a fan or two….

  62. A Nobel peace prize nominee has accused the director-general of the World Health Organisation of allegedly aiding genocide in Ethiopia.

    American economist David Steinman accused WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus,

    55, of being a ‘crucial decision maker’ who directed Ethiopia’s security

    forces actions from 2013 to 2015.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9052247/WHO-chief-Tedros-Ghebreyseus-accused-aiding-genocide-Ethiopia-nobel-peace-prize-nominee.html

    Dec 2020

    3. You do realise you great dildo, that you’re living in a predominantly WHITE country.

      If you wish to reverse it, go back to Pakiland. I’m sure we’d be delighted to deport you for race-hatred.

      1. go back to Pakiland,

        where soon all the corner shops will be run by WASPs (White Anglo Saxon People) trying not to be in an Effnic Minority in UK

    4. Let’s give Scotland their independence and send every non-white illegal immigrant who has arrived on the South Coast of England to Scotland in order to make up their shortfall.

          1. I did once see a photo where HMQ sat amongst some officers and you could see one of the seated’s bits and bobs.

  64. In words

    ‘As you know, I’m anti-crime.’

    – Charles Bronson during his parole hearing.

  65. Bizarre story in The Grimes (can’t show it because it is not in the online edition) that the National Glass Centre in Wearside could be shut because of a range of structural defects “including cracked glazing”……

    Can’t get anything right, can they?

    1. My wife’s response as usual is:

      “Is this true, and if so what is the evidence? Any links?”

  68. Did Sue Gray break the rules?
    By James Heale

    Lawyers know which questions to duck – as Keir Starmer demonstrated on LBC today. Appearing on his weekly phone-in, the Labour leader refused ten times to answer questions over when he first made an approach to Sue Gray about appointing her as his chief of staff. The Spectator was the first to report – in November – that Starmer was seeking to hire a senior civil servant for the role. So was an approach made to Gray five weeks ago – or five months ago? Starmer refused to say. When news first broke that Gray was being considered for the role, party sources suggested that Starmer personally initiated contact ‘several months ago’. Now, Starmer will only say that he has been in discussions with her for ‘a little while now.’

    This matters because there are strict government guidelines around civil service impartiality and accepting party political roles. Gray is expected to tell Acoba today when exactly an approach was made. But Conservative MPs are not content to wait for the watchdog’s recommendations to be made public. Sir Robert Buckland has secured an Urgent Question on the appointment, which will be debated in the House at 3.30 p.m. Some are furious about Gray’s role in the partygate probe and have publicly suggested that she was biased in her investigation. Others want to know why she did not inform ministers of any contact with Labour figures to discuss her new job – even though it is a requirement under civil service rules.

    Gray’s proposed appointment doesn’t invalidate the work she carried out during partygate. However, the timing and manner of the approach are the things that concern many in Whitehall. Susan Acland-Hood, the Permanent Secretary at the Department for Education, reportedly reminded her colleagues last week of the importance of flagging any contact with Opposition figures. The irony is not lost on many in SW1 about a former head of the Cabinet Office’s Proprietary and Ethics team being under suspicion of breaking the civil service code she was meant to uphold.

      1. Spring is coming!! Eeyore is being light-hearted!!

        [You’ve been saving that one for at least 24hrs, haven’t you!]

        1. “Spring is the time of a young man’s fancy…

          Summer sees him even fancier…”

          Late David Frost.

          1. In the spring a livelier iris changes on the burnish’d dove.
            In the spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.

      2. With apologies to our resident Essex girl.

        An Essex girl is involved in a nasty car crash and is trapped and bleeding. The paramedics soon arrive on site.
        Medic: ‘It’s OK I’m a paramedic and I’m going to ask you some questions?’
        Girl: ‘OK’
        Medic: ‘What’s your name?’
        Girl: ‘ Sharon.’
        Medic: ‘OK Sharon, is this your car?’
        Sharon: ‘Yes.’
        Medic: ‘Where are you bleeding from?’
        Sharon: “Romford, mate.”

    2. Break the rules?????
      She drove a coach and horses through them more like!
      We don’t know the half of it!!

      1. She’d be out of luck, too old, female and insufficiently black or Eastern European looking

        2. A reprise of Fanny-Mae and Freddy-Mac.
          Billions of dollars worth of junk bonds that can evaporate in a flash. The tw@s NEVER learn.

          1. The issue wasn’t just the Federal mortgages, they happened to be particularly bad because they were essentially Government backed so the US tax payers took the hit.
            The film “The Big Short” provides a pretty good explanation of what happened.

            The real underlying culprit was the global housing bubble.
            The greedy bastards in the banks and trading houses fed on it and when the bubble burst the tax payers got hit.

            Northern Rock, whilst a bit part in the great scheme was one of the catalysts, those congenital bloody idiots were lending up to 125% of the property valuations.

      2. I’ll ask the wife. She worked there.

        Says it’s bolloix, or, if true is someone using big words to explain ‘Is owed debt.’

    2. Somebody pretending to be clever.
      Credit Suisse has been badly managed and is not the force it once was.
      Deutsche bank similar. They have both been caught up in several scandals and came out of the 2007/8 banking crisis badly

  71. Re the headline of the letters about “our leaders”. Sorry, but they are not my leaders. They have lied, betrayed the people of this land and have no remorse about any of it. The corruption oozes from every single one of them.
    I don’t care what they say or propose or try to make us do- I, and my husband, will be ignoring all of it. Hancock, I am more than a match for you!

    2. FM Montgomery in his book, The Path to Leadership writes:

      …what is leadership?
      Expressed in its simplest terms, a leader is one who can get people to follow him. Such a person can, of course , be good or bad…

      …There are many brave and strong-minded people whom one wouldn’t follow on any account – because one doesn’t know what they stand for, or where they are going.

      Does anybody know what Sunak, or for that matter, Hunt and the remainder of the gang in the Cabinet stand for? Certainly not Conservative principles or for the people’s innate rights and freedoms.
      Where are they going? That is not the question with these people; where they are trying to put the people is the right question and the answer is a dystopian World with all that portends for the younger generations.
      Do not comply must be the people’s watchword.

      1. They are greeniac, eco-freak Limp Dumbs – who care neither a jot nor a tittle for people who know what Conservatism is.

        3. I didn’t comply, which is unusual for me as I am quiet and not particularly rebellious, at least, not for the sake of it. You wouldn’t notice me in a room full of people. However! – my very first day at school was marked by my walking out at the mid-morning break and walking a mile back home, across parkland, across a main road, and through lots of little streets. And then, shock horror! I arrived home to find no-one was in. I then remembered my mum was going to be at a relative’s house in the other direction past the school, so I trudged all the way back again. And past the school. I arrived in time for it to seem reasonable to have been let out from school a few minutes early, although my dad was going to collect me on his way back from work. He must have been frantic to discover I wasn’t there. And the strange thing was, nobody at school noticed I was missing! So having had a successful first day’s escape, I tried it on a second day, but two girls snitched in me (I can see them still!) they saw me leaving the playground, although I still did get home to my mother’s great surprise. All the way through, I never liked school, the noise, that school smell, the restrictiveness of it all. And this, I think, is from where my whole attitude to the covid débacle stems. That and my own nature.

      3. 371852+ up ticks,

        Evening KtK,

        Gerard Batten tried his best with
        “Road to freedom” as for leadership he could NOT be faulted

  72. Max Pemberton in the Daily Mail on Ginger Windsor.
    MB and I can heartily agree with him.

    “Speaking objectively, from a distance, he doesn’t look to me like a great advert for marijuana, cocaine or anything else.

    He appears neither particularly happy nor stable. Looking at the recent outcomes of his life, he has left his home country, broken off relations with members of his family, seems distanced from his friends back home and no longer has an Army career.

    That doesn’t strike me as a ringing endorsement for self-medication with mind-altering substances.”

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/columnists/article-11823945/Prince-Harrys-words-cause-huge-harm-says-psychiatrist-DR-MAX-PEMBERTON.html

    1. When all is considered I don’t think many people will be bothered or even slightly interested in those two anymore.
      I expect the lives these wealthy, over privileged, self-righteous pair have chosen to lead, has no further interest to those outside the world they have chosen to surround themselves in.
      I use to quite like Harry. What a fool he has proven to be.

    2. If he had no money , and no home he would be begging on the streets for cups of coffee and muggins like me would be handing him food and giving him few pound coins , knowing the drink drug habit would wipe him out one day.

    3. People introduced to mind altering substances often realise that is changing them, but if they were unhappy before…they don’t care. I speak from experience. (watch the film Trainspotting)

      It can be just a phase or just wanting to try something prohibited but in Harry’s case the vultures landed and started pecking.

      In a partylike atmosphere where everyone is smiling and happy (looking) it is difficult to refuse. My question is….what were his minders doing?

      Cocaine, cannabis, LSD and MDMA were freely available in London…everywhere. I liked the occasional joint and i danced my tits off all night long on ecstasy for a while. And thoroughly enjoyed myself.

      I woke (arggh) up and moved away. Harry is being controlled.

  73. Well, I did 4h in the “garden” today largely chop-sawing sticks and filling a dozen mushroom trays for next winter, but also dropped another of the smaller, 4″dia, dead elms to join the 5 I felled yesterday.
    I’m holding off doing the concreting for the next section of wall as I do not want it left to go off in frosty weather.
    A few pictures of progress so far:-
    Ready for concrete:-
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4356eac076a1a2a8b611ea76018d8251d1c0a8bace3ff928279a448f59f2d58e.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/6317e9d933a756c0bbe923419fc44dcde4fd51d0d44361e2d47daab997229dd3.jpg

    The largest rock I’ve had to dig out so far, but if you look behind it, there is an even bigger one I will need to shift!
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/74e09a04480ecb55882ce4ce472fe0a032fb9d0cf016513dd9bf7939b6a3ab76.jpg

    And we have some snowdrops!
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1de2b29cbfd3efe85f08a8d6a30acb52b5117b8d45d06af20ced0414650a4671.jpg

    Another view with the big rock and the even bigger rock just down from the bucket:
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5b92696ff82b735be544ba97f375872f0902173c3e3da4190854b99caab7d697.jpg

    And a last one of logs from the elms I dropped a week or so ago, all ready for further sawing and splitting when the Hollybush stack, currently about ¼full, is emptied in a week or two’s time.
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/aa756ccc3c0efd91cf2cfba035fb8af5cf78a73f8f4d6a00c90aff1220a8c469.jpg

          4. I thought you already kept your jewels in your pants? Perhaps you’re different to the rest of us?

          11. Oh…i only have cash and they only take cards ! I’ll spot you next time….ahem…

          13. Our Bob will take us on an extended pub crawl….and, if you are very good and we are very lucky, he will burst into song with everyone thereabouts joining in. Memorable, it will be.

      1. Well, they were here when we got here 30y ago so one presumes they were planted before the previous occupant inherited the place.
        Though we do have a couple more patches round the place that may be self seeded.

  74. According to the Beeb:

    “GB News broke broadcasting rules last April when ex-presenter Mark Steyn made “potentially harmful and materially misleading” claims about Covid-19 vaccines, regulator Ofcom has said.
    He spoke about “only one conclusion” from official data, about the third jab’s “significantly greater risk” of “infection, hospitalisation and death”.
    Ofcom said that was wrong and “may have resulted in viewers making important decisions about their own health”.

    But according to Dr Hoffe:

    https://vigilantfox.substack.com/p/damaged-immune-systems-pandemic-of?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=975571&post_id=96968923&isFreemail=true

    1. Big government wants the UK crippled as it’s easier to demand they get more control/money/power. The MPs fail to do anything useful whatsoever because the civil service machine fights everything.

      The state wants decline. It wants poverty and high unemployment. It all means more power to them.

      1. Me neither. Could be that since Bob posted it, it’s been deleted from Twitter. Happens sometimes. Panorama tonight is about Twitter. Bitch bitch…Elon Musk…bitch bitch…almost certainly?

        1. I noticed in another story about Mr Musk that trolling is worse than ever.

          Add bleach to that statement and what you find is the Leftie dialogue no longer gets a free pass.

          They don’t like it up ’em. Actually…………..scrub that.

        2. **Uncle Bill & Our Susan**

          The missing photograph depicts 3 boarded up shop windows in a typical UK town High Street. We’ve all seen it before.

          Panorama tonight is to be avoided, as always.

          2. I thank God, that I don’t have a TV so will not be likely to be subjected to this Propaganda.

        3. Twitter is experiencing major problems with posting some images and links, the second time within a week that the platform has suffered problems.
          Clicking on links embedded in posts results in an error message.
          Twitter said some parts of the service “may not be working as expected right now” and blamed an internal change that “had some unintended consequences”.

  76. Par Four today.

    Wordle 625 4/6
    ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜
    ⬜🟩⬜⬜⬜
    🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    2. Me too. Silly word.

      Wordle 625 4/6

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

    4. A ruddy bogie for me.
      Wordle 625 5/6

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

    1. So true.

      Patrick McGoohan was a regular in my local pub. The Adam & Eve The Ridgeway NW7. A decent sort of a bloke. Often told us youngsters jokes and showed card tricks.

  80. That’s me gone. A chilly, sunless day – now raining. Same expected tomorrow. Then two cold days – then a mini-heatwave at the weekend…..or not.

    Have a jolly evening preparing your CV for Cur Ikea Slammer’s “chief of staff” (one has to larf at the pretentiousness of that title…!!)

    A demain – one hopes.

    1. They’ve issued a yellow snow warning for us – and they don’t mean “don’t eat it”. The forecast is for blizzards and, just to add icing to the cake, loss of power, gas, water and utilities. We is a third world country! The irony of it is, at the end of the doom and gloom message, there was an injunction if we are vulerable and/or over 65 to heat our houses to at least 18 degrees C! Ha ha! With no power or gas, how are most people, particularly those in all-electric shoeboxes with no, or only fake, chimneys to do that?

      1. 18°C?????
        Bloody hell! In the mornings I’m lucky if the temperature down here is 8°C!!

      1. Funny – great minds etc. I thought of him just after I signed off. When soldiers were soldiers.

  82. Evening, all. I am here because my meeting tonight has been postponed until next week. Good job I checked my emails before I set off! What should happen and what will happen are two different things. Accountability does not appear in Westminster’s vocabulary.

  83. The time has come for me to revert to my bed and just hope to sleep through the maelstroms of my mind.

    All I may say is, Goodnight and God bless, Gentlefolks, I can only hope that we all meet again in the morning’s light.

    2. 371852+ up ticks,

      KtK,

      16 plus years the rotherham cover-up, as with many parts of the nation ,ongoing.

      Mass treachery/ treason, mass murder, mass paedophilia, mass fear taking its toll of the elderly and those unable to resist ALL of it still finding support via the polling booth.

    3. I also posted that last week.
      Did you hear what the narrator said about the police who were beating up the Kiwi demonstrators?
      She had the distinct impression that they were not from the islands.
      Perhaps they been flown in.
      Or arrived in ‘rubber boats’.

      1. RE, I didn’t see your post last week. I would certainly have remembered if I had.

        There were rumours that the thugs who broke up the Canadian Truckers demo were from outside Canada. At least one large airliner landed on a nearby base a day or so before the attack.

        1. It’s good to have more than one set of the same information KK, it helps in the disruption of all of the facts.
          I didn’t know about the Canadian truckers demo.
          But it certainly seems that the globalist scum who think they are more important than the public need bringing to order.

  86. Stanley Johnson for the House of Lords?

    I think not; Stanley is an antediluvian, self-aggrandising, non-achieving egotist.

    4. And hates U.K.! Loves EU and keeps promising to go and live in France. (What’s stopping you Stanley?).

  88. I think I’ll drift off to bed.
    It seems that the forecasts recently presented over the weekend are considerably different to those presented this evening. Oh good, Glow Ball warming has been postponed again.
    Night all.

    1. Sorry, Rik, I’ve just posted that too! I’ll delete mine.

      Edit. This is getting interesting… from where we least expect it. It will do in the leftists heads, anyway…. in the right hand we have… but in the left hand there is….

  90. Here’s a short video of Lavrov explaining how the Americans threaten foreign politicians, according to him.
    https://twitter.com/timand2037/status/1632295607955247105
    I think it could have been Gerhart Schröder who said “The Americans are your best friend, they tell you how much they like you. Then when you don’t do what they want, they pull sad faces and remind you that they saved Germany from the Nazis in 1945. Then when you still don’t do what they want, they start threatening you.” The alleged threats were not specified. Lavrov specifies them.

    1. The Left are mortally terrified of Petersen. They seem terrified of everyone who thinks differently to them. So desperate are they to insult normal people who disagree with them that they post endlessly about bots and promoting how evil those they hate are.

      It shows we’re winning, and that they, and their bitter, twisted hatred won’t last. Like a slug over salt, or a vampire in ssunlight they are dying.

  93. Don’t all faint but I have been good today. I did the shopping as my husband is more mobile but the supermarket is still beyond him. Plus, I bought a small bouquet for our friend round here who has been so nice to us, supportive and thoughtful. I went round to see her and we had a nice chat, she is so sweet. The flower colours were gorgeous; red roses, violet irises and some yellow flowers.
    Cooked a nice dinner and am now relaxing. And, as you may have noticed, I am being good here also………

    1. Sounds like you had a really good day, Ann. I hope you and your other half continue to enjoy life as much as today.

        1. And here is not being good- at least in terms here. I simply cannot believe some of the comments re contrails and the Obama’s daughters.
          Get a grip people; yes our govt and world govts have lied to us over the last several years but that does not mean everything else is a bloody conspiracy.
          And why are so many people obsessed with the USA? Surely the main focus for us here in the UK should be the UK!
          We should focus on what is important in our own country and the indigenous people.

          2. chemtrails; maybe. I think we’d all be shocked if we knew the truth about what goes on in the world.
            Obama; it is a particularly nasty insult to deny someone’s femininity. It is also a product of the left’s gender-bending movement that was tacitly encouraged by the Obamas. I don’t like it or see any good reason to believe it, but frankly I would put nothing beyond the Obamas either.

  95. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11826719/dubai.html

    Smuggling cash out in suitcases is a good wheeze. What it shows is how useless border security are, how desperate big government is to rob us blind.

    Of course, organised crime is rife because Labour made sure to bring anyone in it possible could to create a voting block. The refusal to do anything about it has just made the situation worse. Then the state hammers us with taxes and regulation leading to the inevitable turn to crime.

    1. Don’t forget that crime often starts from the top of the ladder and many people are led by example.

  96. Having pissed off many people here, I am shutting down. It’s all too much these days. Health wise, I wonder how long either of us can go on.

    2. Lottie, what’s happened since your post an hour ago? You sounded quite content so has somebody pissed you off?

      ETA: Have just read further back and now I understand.

  97. Goodnight, folks. Keep the home fires burning to stave off hypothermia from the Beast from the East.

    1. We have a new boiler expected later this week, it has been 10 days now since our old one conked out. No gas in the village, we have LPG – which was also running out, not much left in our tank. We got a rationed (!!!) fill up to 60% on Friday, hurrah, so we can now have our lpg fire lit so we are warm and cosy in the living room but brrr in the rest of the house.

      1. It’s 2 degrees C out but 25 degrees C in thanks to the Rayburn. I’ve just cooked my tea in the oven, too 🙂

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