Sunday 1 August: The Government should resist the slippery slope of ‘jabs for jobs’

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/2021/07/31/letters-government-should-resist-slippery-slope-jabs-jobs/

692 thoughts on “Sunday 1 August: The Government should resist the slippery slope of ‘jabs for jobs’”

    1. Morning Minty.
      Morning Geoff.

      Miserable day ahead. I’ve just got home from a night shift so shan’t miss much by spending the day in bed asleep.

      1. I envy you your ability to sleep in the day. I can’t sleep (much) at night and can only doze during the day.

        1. I usually manage to sleep deeply for two to three hours. Once I wake up, I then just doze on and off. It’s not as restful as a proper night’s sleep. I don’t think I could work on permanent nights, at least I would have to buy better curtains to keep out the light.

          2. I have heard that it’s actually better for your body if you do work permanent nights, as opposed to occasional night shifts, because then your body rhythms acclimatise and become regularised. I don’t know how true that is, but it makes a sort of sense.

    1. I just went and watched the famous interview in full for the first time. Cathy Newman just isn’t as clever or broadly educated as she thinks she is. The phrase “So you’re saying…” must have been repeated a hundred times as she struggled to keep up with concepts that didn’t come out of the left wing rule book.

      It is a useful technique to be able to detach oneself from the emotions generated by a verbal attack, criticism and insults. I started to learn how to do it when married to an abusive husband, but it works well in many situations.

  6. How Greeniac is My Valley………

    Commenter X Tory on Redwood’s:

    “From
    september a new fuel will be appearing on the forecourts: E10. It is
    called E10 because it contains 10% ethanol, which is supposed to make it
    more environmentally friendly, as it produces very slightly less CO2
    than 100% petrol. All well and good, but … an analysis a few years back
    comparing E10 with normal petrol showed that using this fuel leads to a
    lower mpg. The reduction in mpg varies from car to car, but on average
    is 8.4%. So you need to use MORE fuel, and that this means that, even
    when you take into account the reduction in E10’s CO2 output, you end up
    producing MORE CO2! Yes, that’s right – this is MORE polluting! And of
    course, it costs us all more, because we have to buy more of it. But the
    farce doesn’t end there, because where do you think the ethanol comes
    from in the first place? Mostly from sugarcane. The environmental morons
    say that the crops absorb CO2 when they are grown, but of course this
    is released when they are burnt. And besides, where is most of this
    sugarcane grown? In Brazil, on land that was previously Amazonian rain
    forest!

    So thanks to Boris the lunatic, we will be spending more
    money, to drive less efficient cars, producing more CO2, and cutting
    down rain forest to do so. All in the name of protecting the planet! And
    still the Tory backbenchers refuse to rebel against this madness!”

    1. ‘Morning, Rik.

      Do you know if here is going to be a new diesel fuel equivalent?

    2. 336156+ up ticks,
      Morning Rik,
      It surely must have been established by now that this tory (ino) party is a close shop itself, within a close shop lab/lib/con coalition.

      Some play opposition but never quite succeed in stopping the ratchet click, they fight a good rhetorical fight but never quite make ………..

    3. It also has a nasty tendency to foul up small motors on garden equipment so that lines clog and the engine becomes less efficient and eventually cease working without replacing parts. Avoid it like the plague for your strimmers, saws, cutters and lawnmowers.

    4. Ethanol is less calorific than gasoline, burns hotter, and has an unfortunate tendency in diluted form to cause cracking in steel lines for reasons somewhat unknown, but thought to be a form of hydrogen cracking.
      Plus the use of foodstuffs to create the stuff, and it looks like yet another a really bad idea dreamed up by fluffybrained ecoloons who haven’t thought it through properly.

    5. Johnson, the science illiterate who it is reported, “Does not do detail,” making decisions on scientific projects that require attention to detail. No doubt his advisors all sing from the Johnson duo’s hymn sheet.

    4. I was spared this. It’s a Twitter feed, which doesn’t work on my system. Twitter, like smart-anything, is something I can quite happily live without.

    5. I just watched the whole thing, it went up through the ranks to the Chief Constable waving the flag and making the pledge.

      Absolutely appalling.

    6. 16 seconds, but only because I couldn’t hear the first fool. Now I understand why Merseyside is such a sh*hole.

  8. Carrie Johnson has shown courage. 1 August 2021.

    Carrie Johnson should be commended for having written so bravely on social media about her experience of suffering a miscarriage earlier this year. She is now expecting a second child with the Prime Minister, and told her followers on Instagram that she felt “incredibly blessed” but “like a bag of nerves”.

    Mrs Johnson has found it a “comfort” she said, to hear from those who have also experienced a loss, and wrote “I hope in some very small way sharing this might help others too.”

    That’s our Carrie. Never misses a trick. The new ankle biter will keep Boris to heel for another few years as well!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2021/07/31/carrie-johnson-has-shown-courage/

    1. Announced the same day Dilyn got the snip
      I think they sent the wrong one to the Vet

    2. Am I alone and cynical in thinking that one very unpopular woman, The Duchess of Sussex, tried to get sympathy for herself by publicising the private matter of her miscarriage and another equally unpopular woman, Princess NutNuts, thought she would use the same ploy?
      We probably all know people who have very sadly had miscarriages and some find that they cannot have children again which makes their experience even more distressing. But most of these people do not want to publicise and exploit the matter.

      1. P nuts isn’t in the same league as the Duchess. She hasn’t had a Royal Wedding, and hasn’t been on TV to piss all over her husband’s relations, doesn’t appear regularly whining in the press how awful it is, I must have privacy.

  10. Good morning, all. Grey and blustery. And the weather is much the same.

    Anything exciting happened?

        1. If only you had thought of representing the fake victims of war crimes by British troops in N. Ireland, Afghanistan & Iraq before the odious Phil Shiner you would have made a good few million by now & have relocated to a private Caribbean island with no extradition treaty to the UK & could have gold plated your Trombetti’s !

    4. Yes I am able to use my computer & annoy you with my rants, mind you nobody will notice them among all the daily rants by the Anti-Vaxxers on NTTL

  12. Filmmaker hospitalised after violent attack by anti-vaxxers captured on video. 1 August 2021.

    A man who describes himself as an advocacy journalist claims he was assaulted by anti-vaccine protesters in Los Angeles, resulting in injuries that required his hospitalisation.

    Anti-vaccine protesters have been gathering frequently outside a restaurant in Harlowe to protest its policy that requires customers to show proof of vaccination or a negative Covid-19 test to enter.

    “The group returned for a second night with their brand of aggression and anti-semitism, once again comparing a vaccination mandate to the Holocaust and at one point point chanting, ‘No Nazi Restaurant! No Nazi restaurant!’” the WeHo Times, a neighbourhood publication, reported on Thursday.

    The publication reported that many of the protesters were also present at pro-Trump rallies in Beverly Hills last year, and that the group has a reputation for being hostile.

    Lol! They were not only “anti-vaxxers” (a term first coined against those refusing the MMR jab and now co-opted for its familiarity and pejorative value against Covid) but aggressive, anti-Semitic Trump supporters! You couldn’t make it up! Except they have!

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/vishal-singh-attack-antivaxxers-b1894105.html

    1. “No Nazi restaurant” is anti-Semitic? Looks like the woke Bullshit Bingo to me.
      Not anti-vax either, just anti-discriminatory control.

  14. We are honouring our Afghan heroes by allowing them sanctuary in the UK. 1 August 2021.

    We are constantly looking at how we can improve the scheme to further accelerate the pace of relocations, which is why we have now taken the decision to allow all eligible Afghan former staff and their families who are no longer in Afghanistan to apply to the scheme, regardless of where they are in the world.

    This will allow those who have taken the incredibly tough decision to leave their home to come and make a new one in Britain to apply, and we intend to implement this in the next month.

    The generosity of these people knows no bounds, particularly with that which does not belong to them and that they have no authority or mandate to deliver!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/08/01/honouring-afghan-heroes-allowing-sanctuary-uk/

    1. 336156+ up ticks,
      Morning AS,
      Sad truth is they ( the overseers ) could have / will have at the next General election via a never changing voting pattern.

    2. Those that worked for the British in the Stan probably have one of the better claims to sanctuary, as they will be high on the Taliban list for being cancelled with extreme prejudice, and their families with them.
      However, moving to a better country is not an “incredibly tough decision” – it’s similar to getting a better paid job, and about as stressful.

      1. Working for a foreign occupying military force is generally regarded as treason. Traitors are not liked by those whom they betray nor by those they serve. Why do we allow them to come here, let alone invite them? They have nothing to offer us. What they had to offer, they have already been paid for.

        https://www.britannica.com/topic/Tarpeia

  15. Good Moaning.

    A little something to gee up the blood pressure. At least they can afford their own pizzas.

    “Profits of ping: the eight NHS Test and Trace directors earning more than the PM

    Gareth Williams, formerly chief people officer and now chief operating officer: £240,000 – £245,000

    Ben Stimson, chief customer officer until he left in May: £240,000 – £245,000

    Mark Hewlett, testing chief operating officer: £220,000 to £225,000

    Adam Wheelwright, chief information officer: £200,000 to £205,000

    Simon Bolton, then chief technology and information officer: £200,000 to £205,000. Left in June to become NHS Digital interim chief executive, earning the same salary

    Robert Howes, director of the “megalab” in Royal Leamington Spa: £180,000 to £185,000

    Philip Huggins, Test and Trace chief information security officer: £180,000 to £185,000

    Faran Johnson, Test and Trace chief people officer: £160,000 to £165,000

    Source: Senior civil servant data on roles and salaries (DHSC), quarter 1 2021/2022”

  16. 336156+ up ticks,
    Morning Each,

    NOT THE TELEGRAPH LETTERS

    Sunday 1 August: The Government should resist the slippery slope of ‘jabs for jobs’

    Once again one odious issue is running cover for another as in jab for jobs takes the eye from the replacement campaign running at DOVER.

    You put the intake of one month, in one town, in no time you have a
    potential council vote changer.

    In six months their difference would be felt in a General Election next thing you know certain elements WILL have a shout in parliament building into a nationwide call to prayer.

    1. That scandalous story was in the DT yesterday. There will be lots of personal accounts coming to corroborate that.

      1. Well with your French contacts you are probably aware of the video contents.
        The other is a Mirror repeat of a behind the paywall article of yesterday’s Telegraph.
        I am also interested that there are journalists at the Mirror and at the Telegraph that think the eugenic treatment of the elderly is a story worth putting out there.

        1. There was a similar large demo in Nice – the local rag reported it. “A motley crowd of protesters”….

  18. Left-wing scientists are far from omniscient

    We should lay to rest the notion that science represents a neutral form of knowledge that is somehow distinct from the political melee

    FREDDIE SAYERS
    1 August 2021 • 7:00am

    Who was your favourite scientist of the pandemic? Did you stay loyal to Neil Ferguson with his definitive tone and colourful private life, or did you move on to John Edmunds, attracted by his haunted look and prophesies of doom? Perhaps you preferred grandees like Sir Jeremy Farrar who kept their interventions to high-status interviews on Radio 4 — or did you hold a flame for the biggest star of them all, Anthony Fauci, with his New York sparkle in the eye?

    If we are in the final stages of the Covid epidemic in the UK — and there is good reason to hope that we might be — we are going to have to work out what to do with all these celebrity scientists. A whole new class of public figure has been born, tempted out of obscure laboratories and dusty committees with the reward of vast social media followings and regular slots on prime time TV. They have become used to their utterances moving markets and being reported as front page news; even our elected representatives doff their caps to their superior authority.

    One thing these characters will not do post-pandemic, however much we might wish it, is pack their bags and slope off back to their university seminars and academic journals. I don’t think it is impugning their integrity to suggest that they have enjoyed their new-found power — who wouldn’t? It is against human nature to relinquish influence once you have it. So keep that slot open on Question Time: the voice of science in the public debate is likely to be a constant feature from now on. On a whole raft of issues — from obesity and alcohol to climate change — scientists will be organised and visibly pursuing their agenda on the airwaves.

    In part this is the result of a long-term move towards interdisciplinary academic fields that cross over into politics. “Public Health”, for example, which has provided some of the most visible commentators on Covid, is the science of how best to organise society to achieve the best overall health outcomes — it is therefore collectivist by design. As SAGE member Susan Michie put it to me in her UnHerd interview, “there is an ideological difference with Public Health science taking a more population-wide view of things” rather than being concerned with “individual freedom or individual rights.”

    Then there’s the even more fashionable new discipline of “science communication” — Imperial College offers a degree in it. The most famous “science communicators” are people like marketing executive Tomas Pueyo, whose blogpost early last year called “the hammer and the dance” was read over 60 million times and is widely credited with pivoting Western governments into lockdowns. Every year, hundreds of graduates of programmes like these are going out in the world as hybrid scientist-activists, looking for ways to influence the public conversation from a scientific vantagepoint.

    This has been happening for years — the pandemic just made it explicit. Pandemic groups like “Independent SAGE” were put together to offer an alternative to the official government committee, rather like a political party in opposition. And the “Zero Covid Coalition”, which aims to persuade the Government to continue restrictions until the very last case of Covid has been eliminated, proudly states how it was “jointly convened by Diane Abbott and the Morning Star.” If it’s political neutrality you’re after, it might be best to look elsewhere.

    The answer, then, is not to hope that this new fusion of science and political campaigning will be dismantled in the post-pandemic world: it won’t. But we should lay to rest the notion that science represents a neutral form of knowledge that is somehow distinct from the political melee. As we’ve seen in the past eighteen months, it has become another lobby group, just like business groups or trade unions, and should be treated accordingly with due scepticism and care.

    We needn’t wring our hands about this — I’d say it’s a good thing, and allows us to be more clear-eyed going forward about the role of scientists in the political conversation. Just as we should ignore conspiracies that try to attach sinister ulterior motives to them, let’s also consign to history the “trust the science” platitude with its naive reverence. The scientific viewpoint, while vital in many ways, also brings its own politics and priorities, a particular idea of what constitutes virtue, and a blindness to values that can’t be measured or put on a chart. Ferguson, Michie, Dingwall, Fauci —welcome to the political party, but special privileges are being withdrawn.

    *****************************************************
    Len RMaC
    1 Aug 2021 7:45AM
    I think the author, along with all his media colleagues, ought to look in the mirror for the causes of the “rise of the leftie scientist”

    Their hunger for the sensationalist headline meant that anyone with an O level in needlework and above who utters a doom like end of civilisation word gets front page coverage, Shock – Horror! that’s what YOU wanted.

    Sorry media, these scientists are of your making, and your problem, the rest of us don’t believe a word they say anymore and couldn’t care less about them.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/08/01/left-wing-scientists-far-omniscient/

    1. ….. “we are going to have to work out what to do with all these celebrity scientists.”
      Words like stocks, pillories, rough music and public hangings are currently coursing through my mind.

  19. Good Morning Folks,

    Cloudy damp chilly start, I always said that August was an autumnal month.
    Despite climate change.

    2. ‘Morning, Bob.

      August is the first month of Autumn in the Celtic calendar.

      1. Autumn starts at home pretty close to the end of August, but at Firstborn’s place more like the middle of August.

        1. There was always a firework display on the lake at Lindesberg on July 31st to mark the end of Summer.

  20. We failed so badly in Afghanistan. But to throw in the towel now would be an act of betrayal. Dan Jarvis. MP. 1 August 2021.

    What makes our failure such a bitter pill to swallow is that we knew about the flaws in our strategy all along. And yet we chose to do nothing about them.

    We had one overarching goal in Afghanistan: to build a government that had the legitimacy, competence and means to survive without us. A government capable of mediating between competing political forces adequately enough to avoid major conflict would have provided us with an exit strategy. We failed in that pursuit because we never made it a serious objective.

    This was common knowledge but we did not tackle the underlying problems. Instead, we turned a blind eye to strongmen engaged in land grabs and murders, to a colossal bank fraud that threatened the entire economy and to widespread electoral fraud.

    Who is this we? No one asked me what I thought! If they had I could have pointed out that every Foreign Policy decision reached by the UK Government in the last fifty years has been a catastrophe. Not just for those people we have attacked, but for ourselves also. This is readily observable but Parliament makes no attempt to influence events as they inevitably spiral down to disaster.

    The greatest failure is yet to come, as this outdated, corrupt and useless entity presides over the extinction of the British People and their Country!

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/01/our-failures-in-afghanistan-have-been-legion

    1. That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons that history has to teach.

      Good morning Minty .

      1. If men could learn from history, what lessons it might teach us!

        Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

        Morning Belle.

        1. Bit obscure for this time of the morning , but referencing Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World , which frightened me when I tried to read it when I was younger .. and now just wondering about this …..

          “Mustapha Mond, Resident World Controller of Western Europe, “His Fordship” Mustapha Mond presides over one of the ten zones of the World State, the global government set up after the cataclysmic Nine Years’ War and great Economic Collapse. Sophisticated and good-natured, Mond is an urbane and hyperintelligent advocate of the World State and its ethos of “Community, Identity, Stability”. Among the novel’s characters, he is uniquely aware of the precise nature of the society he oversees and what it has given up to accomplish its gains. Mond argues that art, literature, and scientific freedom must be sacrificed to secure the ultimate utilitarian goal of maximising societal happiness. He defends the caste system, behavioural conditioning, and the lack of personal freedom in the World State: these, he says, are a price worth paying for achieving social stability, the highest social virtue because it leads to lasting happiness.”

          BORIS?

          1. Firstborn’s two pigs are happy to live inside their electrically-fenced pen, because they have food, shelter and some protection from the outside world.
            We extended yesterday, meaning opening the fence after switching it off, and doubling the size with a new roll of electric mesh. Pigs didn’t try even to walk out of the huge opening, never mind run away.

          2. The pigs are just pretending, just waiting until someone forgets to switch the power back on.

          3. Afternoon, Paul.

            Just think: you’ll be able to do your own slaughtering; make your own black pudding, bacon and sausages, and your own pork pies. What’s not to like? 😊👍🏻

          4. I feel a bit sorry for the pigs, Grizz. Imagine it – not only to be killed and minced up, but then shoved up your own arsehole. A fate that should be reserved for politicians!

          6. Epsilon Semi-Morons are easy to control with a bit of sex and soma……..
            Now,about our education system and drug tolerance policies

          8. “Epsilon Semi-Morons are easy to control with a bit of sex and soma..”
            But that’s enough about the Prime Minister’s home life.

          9. There is light at the end of the tunnel Belle, even in that story.

            Though we are unlikely to see it in our lifetime, bloody rebellion ensues. The structures and strictures destroyed and the people flee.

            Incidently, in the recent TV series of BNW, Mond was played by a black woman. I thought she did a splendid job.

    3. Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result = insanity

        1. Lessons are often stated to be ‘learned’, when what they actually mean is ‘identified’.

    4. Our great Enlightenment civilisation has no respect for the strength of religion. It was built partly on a misunderstanding and misrepresentation of Catholicism which it thought it could replace without proper respect for the ethical and rational and material presuppositions it thought it was improving. And this generation has completely forgotten that they stood on a foundation of Judaeo-christianity.

      So they think they can just go into a completely different culture and show them the right way to be human and everything is going to be hunky-dory. And the Afghans who are hard as nails and simply not susceptible to our short term, one election to the next way of doing things have just brushed them aside.

      At massive cost. What a shit show.

    5. If anyone is capable of furnishing me with any evidence — whatsoever — that the human species is not in retrograde evolution, and is not getting stupider by the second, then please show me.

      I shall not hold my breath whilst waiting.

    6. If anyone is capable of furnishing me with any evidence — whatsoever — that the human species is not in retrograde evolution, and is not getting stupider by the second, then please show me.

      I shall not hold my breath whilst waiting.

      1. 336156+ up ticks,
        Morning Bob,& Boc,TA,
        Currently with deceit / treachery in and integrity & self respect OUT via the polling booth it is the chosen way to do business.

      1. 336156+ up ticks,
        Morning SiadC,
        If in hostile mode the helmets would be mounted on canisters.

  22. The under thirties are being offered a free kebab for getting vaccinated.
    What will they offer the over sixties?
    For some reason it all reminds me of a Brothers Grimm fairy tale

    2. The over 60’s will be offered a free hearing aid , the Blacks a free home knife sharpening kit & the Muslims a free Goat ( for whatever sexual purpose they wish with the option to breed with it )

          1. The dead? Don’t be silly, they’ll be too busy filling out their postal voting forms.

    5. I’d settle for a tapestry design program for my laptop.
      Bu88er – just remembered I’ve already taken one or rather two – for the team.
      I’d decided to avoid any autumn booster, but ….. (Are you listening to me, Health Secretary?)

    6. 1. This is ageist
      2. Can those of us who are already jabbed claim retrospectively?

  23. Just read corri’s post from late yesterday. To reinforce what corri wrote, I recommend watching what I’ve linked to below. Great research by investigative journalists and real science from doctors, virologists etc. The entire video is around two hours long but is well broken into segments that make for easy watching. Passionate? Very much. Theatrical, yes but that comes from the passion Del Bigtree has for fighting this great wrong that is being done to the human race. The segment where he exposes the stupidity of the head of the CDC in the States is startling. The visions of those affected by the potion are heartbreaking.

    I think that it is now abundantly clear that this “pandemic” has been exploited but the perpetrators have lost control. The forcing on people of their planned solution, the “vaccine”, has created variants/ADE and the perpetrator’s sole response is more of the same that didn’t work first time around. They were warned by scientists, doctors, virologists etc but decided to turn a deaf ear or worse, defamed those good people e.g. those who signed the Barrington Declaration. The evil doers sowed their version of the wind and the people are reaping the whirlwind.

    The Highwire Episode 226 – Del Bigtree

    1. It’s a socialist mindset, Korky – and good morning, as well.
      Socialism doesn’t work, as has been proven often enough for even the dimmest to see, but the explanation is that it “wasn’t socialist enough”. Same with lockdown, face-nappies and so on – it wasn’t severe enough.
      Well, look at Sydney, in a country filled with what I thought were roughy-toughy, independent thinking types but actually are pretty well the most cowering. They have had über-lockdown for so long, nearly at the stage of shooting people in the street, and how’s their infection rate? Sky-rocketting. At some point, the population must see that the strictest lockdown doesn’t help, and should be lifted (I wonder how much herd immunity there is against Covid and other diseases now?), rather than strengthened – but I wonder.

      1. Morning, OB.

        Bigtree ends his video with an exhortation to go out and get natural immunity. It’s innate, its power has evolved over millions of years and it’s non-specific unlike the “vaccine”. People spreading the lie that the “vaccine” is the answer are charlatans of the first order with an agenda to push.

  24. PETER HITCHENS: Which is worse? Having an opinion or failing to tell readers the facts?

    PUBLISHED: 00:11, 1 August 2021 | UPDATED: 00:24, 1 August 2021

    Today our society takes a dangerous step towards semi-official censorship of opinions. In this case it is my opinions but once we accept this in our midst, it will affect everyone else’s.

    The Mail on Sunday today publishes a ‘correction’ of something I wrote in my column about facemasks.

    This is mandated by the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO), to which this newspaper belongs and whose rules I am pledged to follow.

    Most people in British journalism accept, as I do, that the existence of IPSO is preferable to the state regulation which the growing legion of enemies of freedom wish to see. We at this newspaper strive very hard to abide by its code.

    But that does not mean that we cannot criticise it or say that it is mistaken. Now, many people disagree with my opposition to the compulsory wearing of masks.

    But this is a claim that my expression of opinion is a false or inaccurate statement.

    This is a giant pole-vaulting leap in IPSO’s function and powers. Once it has been accepted as just, no opinion is safe.

    I said (in a tiny passing reference in an article about something else on December 13) that a major study had shown that facemasks were useless. This was plainly an expression of opinion.

    No news account of such a matter in this newspaper or any other would use a word as broad and critical as ‘useless’. And it was an expression of opinion which referred to factual accounts of the matter I and others had given some weeks earlier.

    Interestingly, no complaint has been made or upheld about my factual report of the Danish Mask Study, on November 22. I will republish this account on the Peter Hitchens Blog for those interested.
    *
    *
    *
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-9847621/PETER-HITCHENS-worse-Having-opinion-failing-tell-readers-facts.html

    1. Climbing on the roof gets my blood racing, Elfin, never mind blondes with musical talent.
      In fact, I think I’ll go and take a lie-down and recover…

          5. I’d put anchors on her boots & I would welcome the rain right now as the temp has already shot up from 29’C to 32’C and being August it can reach 40’C some days here in Tel Aviv, an absolute killer if you have to venture out!

  26. 336156+ up ticks,
    There ain’t ever been, never will be a free lunch, especially via the politico’s parliamentary canteen halal riddled menu,

    Shopping vouchers and pizza discounts to boost vaccinations among the young
    Ministers in talks with dozens of companies, including coffee and cinema chains, about voucher scheme in bid to revive ailing rollout

  27. A bit of background on some of the lefty Common Purpose civil servants who rule us…

    REVEALED: Secretive cell of Civil Servants Government ministers blame for the Covid pingdemic
    Covid-19 Task Force sits in on meetings held by Ministers and offers advice
    Cabinet Minister told MoS group is ‘huge pain in the a***’ akin to Yes Minister
    Claimed group has increasingly flexed its muscles such as stopping end of rules

    https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2021/07/31/21/46136181-9847791-image-a-8_1627764334068.jpg
    Andy Helliwell, a career civil servant who makes his personal views clear on his Twitter page, proclaiming his support for gender-neutral language and his criticism of Britain’s colonial legacy

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9847791/Secretive-cell-Civil-Servants-Government-ministers-blame-Covid-pingdemic.html#comments

  28. Good morning from a bright Derbyshire. Damp after last night’s rain with 9°C in the yard.

  29. Morning all

    SIR – Dominic Raab, the Foreign Secretary, thinks that forcing people to be fully vaccinated before they can return to work is a good idea.

    Has he not considered the implications? Would he approve of companies insisting that employees reveal all of their medical conditions?

    Where will that lead to? Employers checking how many glasses of wine employees drink each night, or how many cigarettes they have smoked, or whether they are overweight?

    It is time that the Government dropped its continuing interference
in our lives and got back to what it is supposed to be doing: running this country effectively for the people who elected it.

    Alan Billingsley

    Whitworth, Lancashire

    SIR – If employers insist on full vaccination as a condition of returning to work, I wonder whether the Government will be prepared to indemnify them against any subsequent claims, as it has done with the pharmaceutical industry.

    ADVERTISING

    A M Holgate

    Derby

    SIR – The Tory MP Steve Baker is reported to have said that “the Government is now encouraging discrimination in relation to vaccinations”, which he finds “at best distasteful and at worst disgusting”.

    Either he hasn’t thought his argument through or he is just playing to the awkward-squad gallery. There is nothing wrong with “discrimination” if it is in the public interest, which it clearly is when its purpose is to protect health and save lives.

    If Mr Baker could bring himself to bite his tongue instead of constantly criticising the Government, he might one day be invited to join it so that his undoubted talents could be put to use.

    Col James Stythe (retd)

    Pewsey, Wiltshire

    Placeholder image for youtube video: iWZ9dmy62DY

    SIR – Alexandra Seear (Letters, July 25) wonders whether “the Covid pass, with its sinister implications for freedom, is to be Britain’s Berlin Wall”, and asks: “ If I fail to leave now, will my child face a future of government monitoring, digital tracking and a Chinese-style social-credit system?”

    I share her concerns, but can someone point me to a country that is not planning the same things?

    Advertisement

    Margaret Perry-Freese

    Saxmundham, Suffolk

    SIR – Am I being cynical in thinking that Labour’s Covid strategy is simply to oppose whatever measures the Government proposes, thereby politicising a serious pandemic?

    Early this week it accused the Government of being “reckless” in opening up travel with the EU and US, but by Friday it felt the Government was being too cautious in refusing to bring forward the change to self-isolation rules. A part of me wonders what Labour would do in power; a far greater part of me shudders at the idea.

    Wesley Hallam

    Ubley, Somerset

    2. A least the Scottish government is not yet planning to put young vulnerable people into special camps.

      “Teenagers with certain health conditions will be vaccinated before schools return from the summer break, according to the Scottish government.
      Jabs will be offered to around 4,000 young people aged between 12 and 17 before 16 August.
      It will include those with Down’s Syndrome and learning difficulties, as well as children with low immunity.”

      That approach reminds me of something…

      https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-58042470

  30. NHS reform

    SIR – A national inquiry into the NHS could have resulted in a radical reorganisation, but the Government appears to have pre-empted this by appointing a successor to Sir Simon Stevens. Nobody can foretell how any new leader will behave, but the odds are against breaking the mould. Amanda Pritchard inherits the largest debt ever incurred by the NHS, and huge waiting lists.

    If ever there was a time for a more devolved approach in the NHS, it is now. Only an assessment of the resources needed will enable local clinicians to drive down waiting lists to acceptable levels by treating common conditions promptly. It will also enable the NHS to determine what staff, training, equipment, managers and premises are required, in order to limit waste and bureaucracy.

    To achieve this goal, a clinician needs to be in charge in each locality. The public must realise that managers may not be medical experts at all, and that they are a ruling group in the NHS which has become unaccountable.

    Reducing expenditure on new hospitals and giving essential resources to clinicians could help reduce waiting lists. Parliament will need to assist this process.

    Dr Ramon Gardner

    Emeritus Consultant Psychiatrist

    Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge

    1. Morning! That’s hardly going to go down well with clinicians currently on full pay for doing as little as possible. It would require them to actually work.

      1. I am awaiting routine surgery. An angioplasty in the groin area.

        The consultant’s Nurse told me as it wasn’t an emergency it would be about 4 weeks. Two months after that deadline i have heard nothing.

  31. High street hardship

    SIR – The Government’s attempts to rectify the high-street disaster – which it helped to create – are hot air.

    It is “breathing new life into empty buildings” but offering no help to (now desperate) landlords to achieve this. It is “supporting high-street businesses” but with nowhere near the compensation they require to recover from lockdown. It is “celebrating local communities” while crucifying them with high taxes and unreformed business rates.

    Big handouts to councils have been wasted while cash-strapped businesses and landlords are to receive nothing. It is clear that virtually no one in the Cabinet has a clue about retailing, entrepreneurship or investment.

    Rodney Atkinson

    Stocksfield, Northumberland

    1. A political party such as the Conservatives, which is supposed to support private enterprise, should have a large proportion of its parliamentary candidates who have experience of being entrepreneurs and setting up and running their own businesses.
      I spent half my working life working as an employee before setting up our small business with my wife. It was extremely instructive to experience having no money magically arriving in our bank account at the end of each month, no holiday pay, no maternal or paternal leave or any of the perks that employed people have come to expect.
      And the people who have been hardest hit by the pandemic chaos are those running their own businesses. So the government thinks it will encourage the resurrection of small businesses by welcoming HMRC’s statement that they will go after the self-employed and the private sector as soon as they start trying to recover and by raising corporation tax from 19% to 25% from 2023.

    2. A political party such as the Conservatives, which is supposed to support private enterprise, should have a large proportion of its parliamentary candidates who have experience of being entrepreneurs and setting up and running their own businesses.
      I spent half my working life working as an employee before setting up our small business with my wife. It was extremely instructive to experience having no money magically arriving in our bank account at the end of each month, no holiday pay, no maternal or paternal leave or any of the perks that employed people have come to expect.
      And the people who have been hardest hit by the pandemic chaos are those running their own businesses. So the government thinks it will encourage the resurrection of small businesses by welcoming HMRC’s statement that they will go after the self-employed and the private sector as soon as they start trying to recover and by raising corporation tax from 19% to 25% from 2023.

  32. Burglar’s worst enemy

    SIR – Philip Johnston discusses ways to tackle burglary.

    He might also have mentioned dog ownership. Some years ago I met a cat burglar who was regarded as the most successful in London. He told me that the best burglar alarm was a dog, as being silent was essential.

    A dog can sense the presence of an intruder and will start barking. So he never burgled a property if he thought there might be one inside.

    James Wilson-Turret

    Skelmorlie, Ayrshire

    4. I was once told by a policeman that having a “beware of the dog” sign on my property would make me liable if my dog did attack anyone there as it implied the dog was dangerous. I had to bite my lip to prevent myself saying that I needed a dog to protect the property and deter burglars because the police were never anywhere to be seen and if you were broken into, the best you got was a crime number.

  33. Burglar’s worst enemy

    SIR – Philip Johnston discusses ways to tackle burglary.

    He might also have mentioned dog ownership. Some years ago I met a cat burglar who was regarded as the most successful in London. He told me that the best burglar alarm was a dog, as being silent was essential.

    A dog can sense the presence of an intruder and will start barking. So he never burgled a property if he thought there might be one inside.

    James Wilson-Turret

    Skelmorlie, Ayrshire

      1. Yes. Funny thing, Craig Murray former UK ambassador is imprisoned after his request to appeal was turned down flat.

  36. A thought arising from governmental blanket indemnities to the pharmaceutical industry.

    Do they prevent people who are badly affected by the vaccines from suing the companies altogether, or merely promise to pay any damages awarded out of the public purse?

    If it’s the latter, the taxpayer may find that taxes are going to go through the roof.

  37. I suspect that anyone coming fresh to today’s Nottl page, and by definition not previously had the opportunity to build up any immunity, having reading the threads from the earliest up to this point would by now be completely clinically depressed!

    Have a good day…S

    2. BelleRose posted some good news! An apology from Bild newspaper for their part in the panic!

    1. As a former South Londoner living in Herne Hill, I was as a child familiar with the Camberwell Beauty ( Nymphalis Antiopa ) which was a regular sight in areas like Ruskin Park which bordered Herne Hill & Champion Hill ( just up the road from Kings College Hospital & Camberwell Green. ) I did not catch butterflies very often in the park except in a jar & bring them home alive & release them in our garden.
      https://butterfly-conservation.org/sites/default/files/styles/masthead/public/2019-11/37056228480-nymphalis-antiopa.jpg

      1. That is such a sweet picture of you as a child wanting to release butterflies in your garden. There’s a painting in there somewhere.

        Most of the butterflies I see are cabbage whites, due I think to the large amount of oilseed rape grown round where I live. Yesterday, I was at a nursery that sells buddleias, and their flowers had attracted all kinds of different species. The sunniest spot in my garden is in a neglected corner behind the garage, so I bought a dark purple one home, and hope to attract some of the butterflies too!

          2. Yes. I have to keep chopping it back. You can get white and also yellow varieties as well, I believe.

          3. There is a variegated Black Knight at my parents’ house which is much less vigorous than the standard one. I foresee a lot of hacking it back or it will start seeding all over the garage roof. But I still want to have it anyway.

          4. I have a variegated (yellow-leaved) variety in the front garden. That, as you say, is much less vigorous. The grey-leaved one is about 6′ high.

      2. Butterflies are sadly thinly distributed around here , despite living near ag fields , woodland and Dorset heathland .. the strange thing is though that I have seen more insects and Butterflies around the the vicinity of the army ranges , protected from chemicals and heavy farming .

        1. It’s the pesticides and chemicals that have done so much damage to insect life – nothing to do with ‘climate change ‘.

        2. I have not been back to my old South London neighborhood for about 40 years as I have no reason to visit the place when I come to the UK simply because all my now elderly relatives & friends have long since departed Londonistan in the late 60’s, 70’s & 80’s and live in peaceful rural Essex & Yorkshire rural locations & a few in Edinburgh. Without exception all their children & now grandchildren were born outside of London and also because of the terrible crime & terror in London rarely if ever visit the capital except to visit a grave of a parent / grandparent or go to see a popular theatre show in the West End.

          3. Like you, Hat, I see no reason to go back to such a dangerous, crime infested s**thole run by a demented Muslim.

          4. Who has at least one relative who is Muslim Brotherhood supporter & will never tackle the crime & terror in London because those folk are his core voting base .

          5. Some 40 years ago, lived in Bow, then Milwall / Isle of Dogs. Not been back ssince.

      3. Happy Sunday, Pud.

        The Sorgmantal (“Camberwell Beauty”) Nymphalis antiopa is a fairly common butterfly here in Southern Sweden.

        1. Happy Sunday Grizz , long may it be a common sight in Southern Sweden & the Musulmanus vehementi be an extremely rare sight & only seen under arrest.

    2. We have seen only cabbage whites this year, despite having buddleia and other stuff intended to encourage butterflies.

    3. This has probably been our best ever year for butterflies, clouds of them and numerous varieties.

    4. Who is the big butterfly count and what are we being asked to join him in doing?

  39. A little not-so-light reading for a Sunday morning.

    https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-troubling-truth-about-britains-nuclear-deal-with-china

    “The troubling truth about Britain’s nuclear deal with China

    Ian Williams

    The most shocking thing about the news that the government is looking to remove China from Britain’s nuclear power programme is that it has taken so long. But it will not be a straight-forward process. It will likely provoke tantrums from Beijing, as well as grumbles from a nuclear lobby that will have to find somebody else to stump up the billions needed for their pet projects.

    China General Nuclear should never have been allowed anywhere near such a critical piece of national infrastructure. The state-owned company has been accused by the US government of stealing technology for military use and placed on a national security blacklist which severely limits US companies from doing business with it. Washington has warned Britain against partnering with the company.

    More recently CGN has shown a lack of transparency over technical issues at a major nuclear plant in Guangdong province, less than 100 miles from Hong Kong. That we know the Taishan plant has issues at all is down to the junior French partner EDF, which was required to inform the US authorities when it sought technical assistance. It reportedly warned of an ‘imminent radiological event’ and said the Chinese safety authority was raising the acceptable limits for radiation detection outside the plant to avoid having to shut it down.

    This month EDF forced an extraordinary board meeting in Taishan in an effort to get to the bottom of what it called an ‘evolving’ issue. In a statement after the meeting, EDF said that in France it would have shut down the reactor for further investigation, but in China that decision lies with CGN, which is continuing operations. Since June, when the problem emerged, CGN has remained largely silent, the plant issuing bland statements of reassurance that all is ‘normal’.

    If Britain excludes China from its nuclear programme, the gloves may well come off

    On a technical level, the issue appears to be centred on a small number of damaged fuel rods, and cannot be compared with the Chernobyl meltdown, but the opaque way in which it has been handled by CGN is right out of the corrupt, secretive playbook of the bureaucrats who oversaw the nuclear disaster in Ukraine in 1986. Furthermore, the plant in Taishan is the same model being built at Hinkley Point in south-west England, where CGN is the junior partner to EDF, and proposed for Sizewell in Suffolk.

    China’s involvement in Britain’s nuclear programme is a product of the Cameron-Osborne ‘golden era’ of relations, when it seems due diligence on any investment from Beijing depended on the number of zeros on the cheque. The precise deal struck is almost as opaque as CGN, but appears to involve a quid pro quo whereby China would stump up cash for French-led projects at Hinkley Point and Sizewell and in exchange be allowed to build its own nuclear power station at Bradwell on the Essex coast.

    Hinkley Point construction is under way and well over budget. It is on course to be the world’s most expensive energy project at £22 billion, and CGN has a 33 per cent stake. When completed in 2026 it will produce enough electricity to meet around 7 per cent of Britain’s needs — at a considerable price to consumers. To make it worthwhile for the French-Chinese owners, the government has agreed to pay an inflation-linked guaranteed price twice the current UK wholesale price — and well in excess of renewables.

    Sizewell in Suffolk has yet to begin construction. As is so often the way with Chinese investment, the goals are strategic, with Bradwell as the real prize — the first Chinese-designed plant outside its own borders, which Beijing sees as a springboard for international sales of its technology.

    There are parallels here with Huawei. In 2005, BT awarded the company a contract as part of its £10 billion network modernisation. BT’s decision to exclude Marconi sounded the death knell for Britain’s once mighty technology giant, and provided a launch pad for Huawei’s international expansion.

    The technical design of the Chinese reactor has yet to get regulatory approval, but in a little-noticed decision in December, Ofgem, the electricity market regulator, granted a generating licence to a company created by CGN to build the reactor in the Essex marshlands. The decision was hailed by the China-controlled Bradwell Power Generation Company as a ‘milestone’.

    The government reportedly is now looking for ways of removing CGN from Sizewell and blocking Bradwell, but since all three projects are linked in the original deal, a spurned CGN is unlikely to stick around at Hinkley Point if it is turfed off the others. That will create an enormous financial black hole, and the government will have to either find other investors or stump up the money itself. That’s no easy task.

    Protecting critical national infrastructure is supposedly a national priority. GCHQ’s National Cyber Security Centre is charged with doing just that, and its head, Lindy Cameron, recently boasted that ‘our ability to do this is the envy of the world’. She named China as a key adversary. Infrastructure doesn’t get much more critical than nuclear power stations, and Cameron’s words sit rather uncomfortably with the presence of CGN — a company accused in the US of benefiting from the very cyber espionage GCHQ seeks to protect us from.

    The importance of the nuclear deal to China goes some way to explain why Beijing was relatively restrained in its response to Britain’s banning of Huawei from its next generation 5G networks in spite of dark threats to make us ‘suffer’. But if Britain excludes China from its nuclear programme, the gloves may well come off. Look no further than Australia to see Beijing’s commercial and political vindictiveness.

    But Australia also tells another story. It was hit by a trade boycott after calling for an independent inquiry into the origin of Covid-19. It stood firm, and in spite of early fears the boycott has had limited impact economically. The experience has alerted Australia to the reality of Xi Jinping’s China, and the country is examining every facet of its overdependence on Beijing.

    Little wonder that the UK government regards the nuclear decision as ‘sensitive’. Boris Johnson still appears to believe commercial relations with China can somehow be separated from politics. This was always a fallacy. Beijing does not hesitate to use trade and investment for coercion — and nuclear power is no exception.”

    1. I reckon the commercial deal was struck to make nuclear energy uncompetitive and provide justification to close it down in favour of renewables. All part of the plan.

      1. Winfrith? The heath that Eustacia Vye used to wander over? (And my family chose to camp on during the worst thunder storm I’ve ever witnessed!)

    2. Morning DM

      Makes you wonder , doesn’t it, and a little bit of anxiety went through my mind when the excavations for HS2 were first undertaken .. reminding me of Plague Dogs and Quatermass and the Pit!

  42. Bank On It
    A little old lady went into the Bank of Canada one day, carrying a bag of money. She insisted that she must speak with the president of the bank to open a savings account because, “It’s a lot of money!”

    After much hemming and hawing, the bank staff finally ushered her into the president’s office (the customer is always right!). The bank president then asked her how much she would like to deposit.

    She replied, “$165,000!” dumping the cash out of her bag onto his desk. The president was of course curious as to how she came by all this cash, so he asked her, “Ma’am, I’m surprised you’re carrying so much cash around. Where did you get this money?”

    The old lady replied, “I make bets.”

    The president then asked, “Bets? What kind of bets?”

    The old woman said, “Well, for example, I’ll bet you $25,000 that your balls are square.”

    “Ha!” laughed the president, “That’s a stupid bet. You can never win that kind of bet!”

    The old lady challenged, “So, would you like to take my bet?”

    “Sure,” said the president, “I’ll bet $25,000 that my balls are not square!”

    The little old lady then said, “Okay, but since there is a lot of money involved, may I bring my lawyer with me tomorrow at 10:00 am as a witness?”

    “Sure!” replied the confident president.

    That night, the president got very nervous about the bet and spent a long time in front of a mirror checking his balls, turning from side to side, again and again.

    He thoroughly checked them out until he was sure that there was absolutely no way that his balls were square and that he would win the bet.

    The next morning, at precisely 10:00 am, the little old lady appeared with her lawyer at the president’s office. She introduced the lawyer to the president and repeated the bet,

    “$25,000 says the president’s balls are square!”

    The president agreed with the bet again and the old lady asked him to drop his pants so they could all see.

    The president complied. The little old lady peered closely at his balls and then asked if she could feel them.

    “Well, Okay,” said the president, “$25,000 is a lot of money, so I guess you should be absolutely sure.”

    Just then, he noticed that the lawyer was quietly banging his head against the wall. The president asked the old lady, “What the hell’s the matter with your lawyer?”

    She replied, “Nothing, except I bet him $100,000 that at 10:00 am today, I’d have The Bank of Canada’s president’s balls in my hand”.

      1. His appearance did startle me and because of that I almost overlooked the clip. I found I was guilty of judging a book by its cover.

        1. Even so he is just another angry kid seeking his 15 minutes of fame ( actually 1.36 minutes on tiktok ) & I don’t take advice from kid wonders be they this guy or on the other extreme Saint Gretta

  45. I know this has already been alluded to, but here is the account in all its gruesome glory.

    No. Please don’t laugh. Titter ye not. It’s cruel to mock the afflicted.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/07/31/five-trustees-quit-vegan-society-one-labels-not-safe-place-young/

    “Five trustees quit Vegan Society as one labels it ‘not a safe place for young, black, queer or any other marginalised people’

    Resignations were culmination of a row about whether veganism was cultural appropriation of foods and traditions from Africa and Asia

    31 July 2021 • 3:55pm

    (*** This space contains picture of ze.

    Eshe Kiama Zuri describes themself on their personal website as “disabled and non-gendered”, meaning they do not identify as either male or female.)

    When the Vegan Society was established 77 years ago, its founding fathers proudly claimed to have created a way of life everyone could embrace to prevent cruelty towards animals.

    But that compassionate ethos was said to be woefully lacking in the charity’s treatment of humans after five trustees quit last month amid claims of racism and intolerance.

    The spate of resignations was the culmination of a bitter row about whether veganism – a word coined in 1944 by the society’s founder, Donald Watson – was actually cultural appropriation of foods and traditions from Africa and Asia. It even resulted in one resigning trustee accusing the society of being institutionally racist.

    In the summer, the Vegan Society commissioned Ijeoma Omambala, QC, to investigate claims the then vice chair, Eshe Kiama Zuri, had posted racist comments online.

    Her report, published in June, found Zuri had in fact written two “unprofessional and inappropriate” comments about the society, but neither was racist.

    The barrister noted how the “vast majority” of complaints against Zuri were unfounded but appeared motivated by an anonymous person’s “profound personal animosity” towards Zuri due to their “identity and protected characteristics”.

    Zuri, 25, describes themself on their personal website as “disabled and non-gendered”, meaning they do not identify as either male or female.

    The activist, who also boasts on the website of being a campaigning “loud mouth”, has written how veganism was coined by a “white man” but “hippy vegan food” is based upon culinary traditions including dal from Pakistan, tofu and wheat from China and hummus from the Middle East.

    The barrister’s report to the society added how during its council meetings Zuri had been “mis-gendered” – referred to by a sex they do not identify as – and the council “is not equipped to have mature and constructive conversations on diversity and inclusion matters; nor is it able to deal effectively with challenges to prevailing orthodoxies”.

    The publication of the barrister’s report saw Zuri, Robb Masters, Joel Bravette, Michele Fox and Sally Anderson quit as trustees last month.

    Zuri’s resignation letter states they had been “naive” joining the council in 2019 as a “multiply marginalised trustee, being black, queer, disabled and working class” accusing the charity of being “institutionally racist”.

    Explaining how they had been “forced out” due to a “smear campaign”, Zuri adds: “I can confidently say that the Vegan Society is not a safe place for young people, for black people, for queer people or for any other marginalised people.”

    Zuri claims to have “brought a perspective to council that challenged not just trustees as individuals, but also the systemic racism and oppression that exists in any organisation set up without any time taken to look at diversity or inclusivity … and with a white supremacist structure…”

    Zuri, who is believed to have been active in the Black Lives Matter movement, adds how wearing a jumper emblazoned with the word ‘Token’ was deemed “inappropriate”.

    In his resignation letter, Robb Masters, the former chairman of the society’s council, complains of a “toxic environment” which saw Zuri face “hostility”, with other “oppressions” being commonplace, including transphobia – prejudice against transexual or transgender people – and ableism – discrimination in favour of able-bodied people.

    After joining the council in 2018, his hopes that “while we continue to focus on challenging the exploitation of other animals, we strive not to uphold the oppression of marginalised humans as we do so” were short-lived, he wrote.

    Instead, he said he became the victim of a “public smear campaign … instigated by certain trustees” who prioritise “income over ethics while preserving a predominately white, predominately male, predominately cisgender, heterosexual, able-bodied and neurotypical stranglehold over the Vegan movement….”

    Ms Omambala found complaints Mr Masters supported alleged racism by Zuri were also unfounded.

    A spokesman for the Vegan Society said there had been “conflict” within the charity’s board of trustees which it had been “working hard to address”, adding how it was “regrettable” the resignations were received the day before a planned mediation session.

    He added how the charity was seeking to implement “as quickly as possible” the recommendations listed in the barrister’s report.

    “As with many charities, the Vegan Society has a number of challenges that we must address as we evolve into an even more diverse and inclusive organisation.

    “This is something we are actively working on, supported by respected external ED&I consultants, and our commitment is to foster an inclusive environment for all of our staff, trustees, members and supporters.”

    3. And, to boot, the meetings are in English, that language of Empire, colonialism and White Supremacy.
      Cancel them all!

    4. i”Zuri, 25, describes themself on their personal website as “disabled and non-gendered”, meaning they do not identify as either male or female”

      But “they” do identify as plural. Isn’t that appropriation from Siamese conjoined twins?

      If being referred to as ‘he’ or ‘she’ really is too much to bear, these oddities should be referred to as “it”, if anything.

          1. Oh dear – what punishment should I expect? Perhaps having to read the excruciating minutes of their meetings.

          2. Oh dear – what punishment should I expect? Perhaps having to read the excruciating minutes of their meetings.

    5. Aah, poor little loves – did they say naughty things to you. There, there, here’s a baked bean to suck.

    6. The only people marginalised in our society are white heterosexual males.

      Time to put another steak on the barbie.

        2. I suppose – as Michael Jackson proved – that if you can can trans from one sex to another you can trans from one race to another.

    2. I trashed my last wrist watch – all fiver’s worth of it – by sticking my left arm down a storm drain to clear impacted leaves.
      i haven’t bothered to replace it.

  48. Kebabs for jabs…

    Following a government initiative to get people off junk food they embark on giving away free junk food as bribes for jabs.

    One step forward and three steps back.

  49. I see that the Olympic athlete, Dina Asher-Smith who failed to qualify for the 100 metres,has pulled out of the 200 metres, claiming to be injured yet still intending to take part in the relay . .

    No doubt she still hopes to perform the stunt of “Taking the Knee”, in support of the BLACK LIVES MATTER movement, on the winner’s podium, should the team manage a result . .

      1. It’s amazing how many adults don’t know how to hold a knife properly at the table.

      2. It’s amazing how many adults don’t know how to hold a knife properly at the table.

      4. Currently there appears to be too many woke-os trying to move society and advanced cultures back to the middle ages.

    2. As said many many times before – – they DON’T “want a better life” – – they want THEIR life – in a better country where the infrastructure has already been built. They want houses, power, fresh water, sewage systen, etc etc – – they do NOT want us. – and the govt is giving it to them.

      1. And now there are enough of them here to be able to vote carp like this into office.

          1. The real invasion isn’t on the beach. It’s in town halls and council offices where their abusive agenda infests the state machine.

          2. Am laid up with back probs – so radio on full time – and on sunday evenings is “foreign time” as I call it – – even there it is always “whitey bad – we are the victims” – – it really is sickening. If they hate us so much why are they so desperate to come and live better here – – don’t they have the intelligence to realise they are destroying what they come for – I know the answer already btw. – they end up with what they left – – once whitey has been annihalated – who will they blame then?? and where will they go after turning it into a 3rd world planet?

      2. 336156+ up ticks,
        Afternoon W,

        Governments, I say governments, so WHO is responsible
        for putting these government types into power again &
        again, tis NOT the sheep.

      3. They’re very eager to destroy the very people who pay for it all though.

        Odd, we go 2500 years refusing the invader and build a functioning, beautiful country and society.

        Labour get in, let in endless hordes of foreigners and undo all that work in a decade.

    3. These people really need to be removed. They’re guests and are infiltrating our entire society to remake it in to the third world they left.

      1. 336156+ up ticks,
        Afternoon W,
        Bit late for ” and are” they are well established and building on bigger fiefdoms, one would think that an indigenous housing waiting list had been erased totally.

        Besides the lab/lib/con mass uncontrolled immigration
        coalition favour them & the electorate favour the coalition, shown by the very fact that the “guests” are in residence.

  53. From free meatballs to forced jabs: How countries are pushing COVID shots as the
    vaccination curve flattens.
    https://fortune.com/2021/07/14/covid-vaccine-incentives-vaccination-rates-globally/

    IF MEATBALLS ARE NOT YOUR BAG……
    Young people are to be offered free taxi rides, takeaway and supermarket discounts if they have their Covid vaccinations, as part of a government jabs drive, according to the front page of the Sunday Telegraph. Ministers are said to be a discussing a voucher scheme with dozens of firms to be launched later this month. It says the government is “desperate” to boost vaccine uptake among the young – with just 67% of under-29s having received their first dose. Cabinet ministers have told the paper that if uptake is boosted to more than 80% this could remove the need for Covid passports in venues like nightclubs.

    1. If the ‘sweetener’ doesn’t work we can always fall back on blackmail.

      That is about as good as our government gets.

      They could have tried education and the truth but they don’t have them in their box of tricks.

    2. 336156+ up ticks,
      Afternoon P,
      Heard that the current politico’s ie, gove, leadsom, may, b liar, have been recognised for the parts they have played in many a political farce of late that they are naturals for a United Kingdom version of the,
      based on fact, Soprano’s.

      Good reports from critics who say “It will kill us”

      1. Au contraire, Eddy.

        The tastiest meatballs are made with a mixture of beef and pork mince (as are the best rissoles, which are larger, flatter version of a meatball). My meatballs are yummy.

        1. THE CANNIBALS’ SONG

          ♫ “Boiled c*ck and b*llocks,
          Boiled c*ck and b*llocks!
          That’s the stuff for your ‘Derby Kell’
          Makes you fight and f*ck like Hell
          English lords eat fish ‘n’ chips
          While sitting in their castles
          But we eat c*ck and b*llocks stew
          And rissoles from arseholes”♫
          ;¬)

          2. Don’t knock it if you’ve not tried it, Duncan! 🤣

            Many sausages and haggises are nobbut minced up cock and bollocks!

        2. I made some at home on Friday Grizz lots of fresh sage and onion in them, tomato red wine beef stock suace with soft cheese and yogurt stirred in at the finish, delicious. But my point was, they wont work in encouraging certain members of the fast growing communities we now have in the UK.

          1. These fast growing communities DO eat pork products – – they jusi don’t admit it. Especially to others of the same group.

          2. My brother lives in Dubai (he is food and beverage consultant for Emirates Airlines). When I asked him how he manages without pork or alcohol he laughed! His local supermarket has a special “Non-Muslims” section where he (and others) may buy as much pork products and booze to their heart’s content. The UAE is not Saudi and they know a lot of their successful economy is based on outsiders doing jobs that locals are not qualified for.

          3. Grizz – -I have seen a Muslim taxi driver, here in the UK eat a hamburger, middle of the day, during Ramadan. A mate who lived in Qatar regularly did bacon sarnies for muslim workers who came to his house.

          5. Similar scheme in Bahrain, Grizz, where I saw the biggest bottle of red wine in my life – about a bathful! It was about £2 000 as well, so I politely declined to buy.

        3. He means that if the meatballs have pork in them, they are not going to entice the Moslem youth to get vaccinated.

  55. BBC Sport mentions Lewis Hamilton ‘booed by thousands of Dutch fans’.

    Only the Dutch?

  56. Well we went out yesterday to visit old friends we haven’t seen in person for over 18 months. We got onto the M1 near Luton and it immediately chucked it down. It was my oldest mates Birthday and his close family where in attendance. Lovely to sit in the conservatory and chat with them all and catch up. Their little 8 year old grand daughter was very chatty and an absolute star, but I failed to persuade her that the controlled sunlight reflection of my watch face was a fairy dancing on the wall and other peoples clothing. But she liked the idea of being allowed to ‘tidy’ the plate where the chocolate log birthday cake had been sliced. Good job the candles were restricted the fire brigade might have been called in. But the old boy managed to blow out the representing 6 as part of his age.

    1. A well written article that joins the dots on information that we already knew, specifically what happened to all the midazolam.
      This should be the top headline in every newspaper and TV channel, followed swiftly by resignations in disgrace and prosecutions.
      They just went into full on scaremongering and panic mode without even looking at treatments. And they call us conspiracy theorists!

        1. Agreed, and they should be imprisoned under conditions so harsh it would make life under the ‘Strict Regime’ in an old Soviet gulag seem like Butlin’s.

      2. I got this reply from Cochrane – formerly of this parish – today on Twitter in connection with What is Going On (a statement, not a question! and not to this article specifically).

        “And I can’t believe the rabbit hole you’ve gone down to actually believe there’s a conspiracy to murder millions of older people. For God’s sake stop believing the nonsense posted by Corim, DamaskRose etc”

        I blocked him.

        1. Well frankly, I don’t see any other explanation. They went into full panic reaction, not because they panicked but because that was needed to get everyone to take the vaxx. The elderly and disabled – don’t forget the residents of disabled homes! – were just collateral damage in the cause of big business making a lot of money and big malthusians satisfying their control freak ID2020 fantasies.

          1. Neither do I, right from the start I felt that things were suspicious – Johnson ramping up the fear factor from the word go (when he should have been calming a jittery and worried nation) with his first speech “Some of you are going to lose loved ones. Some of you will die.” I resented being made anxious by this twerp and that resentment made me look at things differently. I knew of Gates’s vaccine background and that of his family and how he had said that vaccines could solve the world population problem. Also Johnson’s father’s interests and writings, that he had worked with Gates’s father at Planned parenthood in the US, and Johnson’s article 2007 in the DT about the world’s ‘population problem’. I smelled a big, fat rat from way down the covid hole, but I have been horrified at how far they have been prepared to go to achieve their long-planned ambitions.

          2. Ah…I didn’t know that Stanley Johnson had worked with Gates senior, or that Boris was on record as wanting to reduce the population.
            I did believe it at first. The tipping point for me was the insane idea that we could or should vaccinate our way out of a virus epidemic, that would be gone within a year or so. The link to ID2020 made far more sense than the official explanation, with the ludicrous bigging up of those two female scientists, shamelessly talking about them working night and day to bring rescue.

          3. That is all people need – something vital, made by an overtired scientist. – guaranteed success.

          4. Not surprising one of them (female scientists) looked sheepish and embarrassed at the standing ovation given during Wimbledon.

            Regarding Johnson – when you know of, and join the dots, the only conclusion that can be reached is that Johnson got the PM’s job by design, with all that it implies. How else could we have got the worst possible Prime Minister at the worst possible time in the worst possible prevailing circumstances?

          5. Boris has been a future PM ever since he was at Oxford, so that part of it isn’t surprising to me. Gove would have done no differently, and he was the other leading candidate. The whole parliamentary party was hopelessly corrupted under Cameron and Gove and their notorious A-List of preferred candidates. Finchley 2010, Westminster 2010 etc.

    2. So Hancock was deliberately sending those infected with Covid from hospital back to care homes in order to kill of the elderly in care homes? Would the charge against him be attempted murder or attempted manslaughter?

      1. That’s only a small part of it. They were not sending the residents to hospital for any reason, they were just dishing out midazolam to get rid of them instead.
        This ties in exactly with what that undertaker said, that he was called out every night, but only to care homes during March/April 2020.

        1. Bet it won’t be given to old parents of MPs who know about this. Can’t imagine BJ saying to Stanley – sorry dad – your turn.

          1. But Boris Johnson has betrayed every woman with whom he has ever been involved so I doubt very much if he would have too many scruples about betraying his father!

      2. Its secret UK Government policy to kill elderly White pensioners in order that the money from their state pensions can be reallocated for the welfare needs of illegal migrants from the 3rd world as they are the future voters who will decide which criminal gang forms the government

        1. Once all the replacements have wiped out whitey – whose taxes will be paying for the replcements houses, benefits, NHS etc etc?

        2. Not so secret hatters, there is also currently a huge TV advertising focus on funerals, cremation costs and Property Equity release.
          If you do go into a care home they rob you blind.

          1. Thanks Eddy. The Globalists in government, the civil service & every arm of public life are corrupt & evil people who want us elderly dead ASAP .

        4. I’m sure that if they ever get round to reporting it, the BBC will manage to find the one and only Pakistani lady who died, but of course by its very nature, this campaign against care home residents is a white genocide.

  58. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/539207a9c641a9e02aa41336675336d648cd100f694e0440edaaa020f8ad00c0.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4d944faa00ef9dd683ff72344e2da7dde399553d0e726b8eea1efa4257ebcb57.jpg Yesterday I attended the baptism (Lutheran church) of the grandson of a couple of good Swedish friends on the tiny Swedish island of Ven that is situated in the Öresund between Sweden and Denmark. We all caught a (very full) ferry from Landskrona to the island, which was bursting at the seams with bicycle-riding tourists. The church service was conducted by a very Jennifer Paterson-looking, happy-clappy female vicar. As part of the service she asked every member of the congregation to hold hands with whoever was next to them to form a chain of around 80 people. I’m not sure if this is the modern way but it was certainly a million miles from the staid tradition of my childhood. Since the entire service was conducted in Swedish, I didn’t have a clue what was being said (or sung) so I just watched on in bemusement.

    Afterwards we all walked down a steep hill to a beach where food and champagne was served. After a while a thunderstorm came over and we all squeezed into a tubular steel-framed, tarpaulin-roofed tent, to escape the torrential downpour, which lasted around 20 minutes. Various speeches were given inside the tent and a generally good time was enjoyed by one and all.

    The most important aspect of the entire day was that at no stage did I see anyone wearing a face-nappy … anywhere. We were squeezed together in both small church and tiny tent. Hugging (and hand-holding) went on as if it were going out of fashion and “personal space” was a concept that simply did not exist. We were happy to breathe one another’s air and life went on as it had always done in far more enlightened times.

    1. I’m really pleased for you folks. It looks a lovely ceremony and properly done as a celebration, not a staid lark.

      1. The 6’4″ tall bloke on the right of the photos is Henrik, the younger son of our friends and father of the baby. He is a middle-ranking officer in the Swedish Navy and an all-round nice chap and good egg.

          1. Good of the Swedish Muppet to find time, in her busy, global schedule, to attend…!

    1. Caroline has just found the report in Le Figaro and was about to post it for the Nottlers but you have have beaten her to it.

      Many of us here find the Ossie version of Sky News refreshing and very different from the MSM in Europe; it’s very happy to express unwoke points of view so it is not surprising that YouTube has taken it down.

      I wonder if Toby Young will be talking about this and whether GB News will be prepared to nail its own colours to the mast on this attack on free speech? We shall see.

    1. I added the following comment, as I believe it is the only sensible option:

      “Time to build secure camps on offshore islands as Australia did with its ‘Boat People’. Reducing the cost of housing these scroungers and deterring others who might want to come.“

      1. The fact that they are quite happy to leave ex-service people with mental health issues on the streets exposes their true agenda.

        I went passed Collingwood today and noticed all the recruitment banners.

    1. That was a good way to get rid of tons of domestic waste. It reminds me of the early 70s when the Garbo’s were on strike.

      1. I think their remit was to create something ugly, useless and expensive in a prime tourist location. I think they succeeded.

  62. Some will benefit from the great reset….

    As a not very well off pensioner I’m looking forward to certain aspects of the Agenda 21/30 great reset because it will heavily impact the more well off assholes who care very little for anyone but themselves.

    When I’m alone rowing my little dinghy (cost less than £100) I’m looked down upon by people in larger or more powerful craft. Larger craft pass close to me at speed to send a wake my way as if they are wanting me to give up my pastime. Expensive jet skies whistle pass at speed and sailing boats seem to think they own the waterways. I gave way to a multi-million yacht but was screamed at for being too close. As it passed by there was a strong environmentally unfriendly stink of diesel while zero emissions came from my oars.

    When I ride my bicycle I’m screamed at by drivers of expensive Landrovers and BMW’s as they rev their environmentally unfriendly engines compared to my carbon free peddles.

    Plans within the great reset means that these wealthy assholes will lose a lot more than me thus affording me the freedom to cycle on empty roads and to row around the deserted and decaying marinas feeling as free as a bird.

    Remember…never succumb to the negatives of government policies because some of us mere mortals will soon be enjoying much more freedom than we are now or in the recent past.

    1. O/T . A few years back in the Medical Journal ‘World Medicine’ there was a report of a strange case of a chap who whenever he farted it sounded like Hondaa. Eventually the doctors discovered that this was caused by an abscess in his anal track. They concluded that the abscess made the fart go Hondaa

    2. As long as you don’t also have to scavenge through the ruins of an abandoned supermarket looking for a rusted tin of beans 12 years past its ‘best by’ date.

      2. My dinghy provides me with a platform to catch fresh fish which tastes much better than beans in a rusted tin 12 years past it’s sell by date.

        1. I have a cupboard full of tinned food…have done for years. A large freezer in the garage full of frozen fresh veg. Long lines and crab pots ready to drop in the ocean and rods and reels for any size of fish.

          1. You should keep quiet about all that. If things get really tough, food burglary may become common place.

          2. May become commonplace? I have heard through the grapevine of certain areas where people with allotments growing their own vegeatables are finding stuff going “missing” overnight – started after certain groups of East Europeans not noted for honesty moved into the area.

          8. Yup, if civilisation suddenly went tits up, imagine how good the fishing would get in just a couple of years.

    3. On the contrary, the majority of people will be worse off from the Great Reset, as only the very wealthy will still retain their toys and the rest of us will be impoverished.

      1. You need to draw a line between the elite and the wealthy plebs….

        Mere millionaires below the line will be more impacted by the cuts than the less well off as they will have to pay a premium to travel…will lose or be heavily taxed on their Chelsea wagons while their large gin palaces with be dispatched to Davey Jones locker.

        I’ll still be enjoying my cheap dinghy and push bike.

      1. We have less to lose so the impact will be minimal for us. I comment much less these days and instead look for ways of turning the negatives into positives. Years of repeating the same things on threads like this don’t work. Use what you know to an advantage so you’ll do better than the sheep who play into the establishments hands.

    6. Those sound like nasty people, nasty because they are, not because they’re well off. I know a property developer person with about half a town in his portfolio who loves sailing, is unfailingly polite and decent.

      Yes, he drives a landrover but he’s a careful and respectful driver. He much prefers his old mini.

      I don’t believe anyone should have their freedoms – of any sort – curtailed by the state machine but I do believe fundamentally that we should be ‘free from’ the behaviour of others.

  63. I have “borrowed” this from Tony from Leeds , a former NTTL poster

    Death The Vaccinator

    In 1853 the Anti-Vaccination League was founded in London as an immediate response to the Vaccination Act of the same year, which called for compulsory vaccination for all infants in the first three months of life. Parents who did not follow suit were liable to a fine orimprisonment. Here we see a police officer reminding a mother to
    vaccinate her young child, while a skeleton (death) is touching the child where the vaccine is routinely injected. The League and other anti-vaccination groups used images in pamphlets and their own journals as a common and easy way to get the public’s attention to the League’s belief that the vaccines caused more harm than good.
    https://www.historyofvaccines.org/Death-The-Vaccinator
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/48b79d0de6b8a642f2de503b211daa8e121007c2c37cd62f64c01c8f85085199.jpg

    1. I think teenagers is a post WWII term.
      Vlad may have used some of the methods, but I doubt he thought about teenagers as a specific group.

  65. Don’t read if you are of a sensitive nature…..

    A tourist was returning from Thailand and stopped at customs, “Anything to declare?”
    “Well, I bought these for some fun”.
    “What are they?”
    “Dried vaginas”
    “I need to check them to see if you need to pay duty.”
    The customs official then proceded to dunk the items in warm water and examine them, holding them up to his eye and peering inside them.
    “I’m afraid you’ve been swindled, these must be confiscated as contraband.”
    “Why, what’s the matter with them?”
    They aren’t vaginas, they’re arseholes.”
    “That’s a bummer, I paid a lot of money for them. What will you do with them when you confiscate them?”
    “Send them to the House of Commons.”

  66. 336156+ up ticks,
    Dt,
    Tories urged to rethink controversial plans for green-belt land amid fears they could otherwise pay the penalty at the polls

    Macabre black comedy at its best the three – ucking parties are NOT FIT FOR PURPOSE NO GOOD, SH!TE, they have overseen mass uncontrolled immigration, never missed a day, ongoing.

    Mass foreign paedophilia never missed a day, ongoing that means kids getting raped & abused countrywide.

    Allsorted killings & serious injuries never missed a day ongoing.

    The results of the electorate and their lab/lib/con party addiction every square foot of green belt WILL be BUILT ON to such an extent that a burial appertaining to a death will have to be via a tower block basement.

    It shows, that quite clearly many of the electorate will be happy
    with the nation in its death throes as long as their party is in number 10.

    1. I think you will find that due to positive efforts to integrate new arrivals, Council Housing departments now have lots of kinsmen & women in senior positions….

      2. 336156+ up ticks,
        Afternoon S,
        As I posted many moons ago join the dots Countrywide and behold the shape of a giant mosque will appear.

        Read up on Gerard Batten who has been warning of
        islamic ideology rhetorically & in book form since 2005
        but then he was tagged as a far right racist so……

      3. 336156+ up ticks,
        S,
        Are the electorate aware of grandfathers axe, when you replace the head then the shaft who then can be called the true owner.

    1. If all the cars were fitted with bumper strips all round – no wheels could get knocked off etc – – That would be fun !!!!

    2. How many cars does the Black Knight have to drive off the track to enable him to finish first?

  70. Am I imagining it or is it the same relativists telling me that objective realty doesn’t exist, there are no moral absolutes and a man is a woman if he thinks he is, regardless of material realty, who are now screeching, “We’re following The Science” and “The Science is Settled”?

    Nice to have communal singing back in church this morning. Toons included Cym Rhondda and Haydn’s Austria (which was, after all, written as a hymn not an anthem). A good sing.

    1. “Science” as they understand the term, is stuff that confirms their beliefs and keeps them happy.

      2. Possibly Welsh. Marcus read out the banns, including so and so of All Saints…long pause, “I think it’s in Wales”.

        1. There’s lovely.

          I went to church this morning, out of courtesy. Our very agreeable Rector (apart from his politics) retired yesterday and today was his last Communion. So my attendance was a village rather than a religious one. There were 35 people in the congregation. Very good for a small village. Virtually everyone wore masks – to my surprise – but there were hymns which we we allowed to sing.

          We now have an interregnum – though rumour has it that the new sub-bishop (female) “has someone in mind…” Black, lesbian in a wheel-chair, I expect – keen on guitars and diversity and ugh) messy church. We’ll see.

          We have a woman deacon who takesall our services when th rector is dealing with hi large parish in Fakenha- a lovely person, pillar of her village five miles away. She has come on tremendously in the last few years – almost lost the “Janet and John” approach. Indeed, she told the MR that while she is looking after services as the selection process chunters on – she will use the Prayer Book lectionary and the proper Bible – not the junk foisted upon us by modernists…

          As a former church-goer, I shall watch with interest.

  71. Doh heavy rain now and I’ve just sprayed weekkiller on the patio, that’s pricey stuff nowadays

  72. I hadn’t set up a Stand in the Park until now, as I’ll be moving on once my late mother’s house is sold, but reading a wonderful article* convinced me it was now or never, so I set one in motion.

    There were only a few of us, and it was not what you might call a balmy summer’s day, but it was lovely to meet new people who can see through the whole scam.

    Plus a bonus greyhound with the silliest, silkiest ears imaginable. A good morning.

    * Phone not playing ball. If you are interested, Google Julius Ruechel; the article has the Emperor’s New Clothes in the title and is about three entries down on his website. Intelligent and rational; no ranting.

    2. Thanks for the heads-up, atd. Link saved, copied and printed out a dozen times. I shall spread Julius Ruechel’s article as far and wide as I can.

    3. Yo, K. Well done. I’m exploring the Reichel article; thanks for posting. I’m afraid I’ve not yet managed to attend any demo or Stand in the Park, but all have my support. We were allowed to sing this morning for the first time in seventeen months. Unfortunately, the choir has voted with its feet and left, so we had me at the organ (despite ulnar nerve issues and two numb fingers), and the dozen or so in the congregation apparently singing, but I couldn’t hear them. The future is less than bright…

        1. A couple of months. I had bursitis of the left elbow within very few days of the first AZ jab, and this numbness within a week or so of the second. Prolly no connection, but who can tell? I’ve had nerve conduction studies and ultrasound scans. The GP told me (by phone, since all GPs are WFH) that I have thickening in the Ulnar nerve, and I’m being referred to a musculoskeletal specialist.

          6. In case you thought I as being insensitive, Geoff has been tolerating my “get a step on it” jokes since before he had the (ghastly) operation.

            In my late son’s last two years, black humour got us both through. Oh, and Spikey’s awful groan jokes. Jim would e-mail and beg me not to send any more.

            Just saying.

          12. Throw one of your old shoes at them. Supposed to be the ultimate insult in some places.

      2. Sadly my previous choir’s membership dropped to 20 and is no longer viable to the point that they resolved to call it a day and distribute its choral music scores free of charge.

        1. Frankly, I’m prolly in a similar situation. We had two choirs in our united (or should that be “untied”) parish. One has had two deaths, neither due to Covid. The other has mostly left because they have fundamental disagreements with the Rector. I’ll say no more, since he’s aware of this blog. There’s no pleasure in what I do any more. I hope to be able to hang on for another eighteen months, at which point the state pension kicks in. But I’ll hate every minute.

          1. You’ll be amazed how quickly 18 months passes… it seems only yesterday we needed just three weeks to flatten the curve….

      3. Oh bugger! I am sorry. If I were nearer I’d come and get them singing for you!

        And those of us who can get out there know we’re doing it for those who can’t, as well.

      4. It was similar with us this morning; August is the choir’s month off. We happy band of about ten to fifteen struggled manfully (and womanfully, of course) to sing, but the Director of Music, for some reason unbeknown to anyone but himself did not use Deutschland, Deutschland ueber Alles as the tune for Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken, Zion City of our God. Instead there was some wimpy version that nobody (including me) seemed to know.

  73. After a light lunch…sherry included, I settled down to watch an earlier BBC recording of Rachmaninov . Not a good idea on a Sunday. However I was looking forward to it….tissues at the ready…!.
    After five minutes I became rather annoyed at the constant interuption by the presenter….
    I tuned in to listen to the heart -rending strains of old Rach not the biased opinions of a BBC presenter….just STFU and listen….

    1. They seem to think their opinions are in any way valid. Probably think they get paid per word. Try YouTube next time.

      2. If you think they are bad, you should hear German commentators, comperes or programme hosts. The worst of the bunch was Dieter Thomas Heck, whom I referred to as D. T. F*ck.

  75. Good nice people are confused by the current situation.

    Went to Sainsbury ‘s this morning to sniff around what might be available , little things like almonds and saltfree peanuts for Moh, flour for the breadmaker , laundry stuff , bottles of household bleach and Weetabix..nearly empty shelves

    Shelves are bare, dry stuff limited , tinned veg , wow where and who buys that, cleaned out, tinned tomatoes zilch , pasta , rice nope. Loo paper and kitchen roll pretty scarce , and cleaning detergents .

    Painkillers etc low , women’s stuff, baby stuff low ..

    Plenty of meat and fresh veg , milk etc , limited fruit .. grapefruit .. shelves are full of grapes , but who eats grapes?

    No shortage of booze either ..

    A sociable chap, shopping , commented to me that the empty shelves reminded him of some where in the old Soviet Union , or parts of Africa . I agreed .

    He suggested that the DVLA were slow in renewing driving licences , lorry drivers were thin on the ground or had cleared off back to Europe , and that he had heard that distribution depots were amazingly short of staff, and that people had forgotten how to work , and had lost the will.

    We discussed this and that , and he said the state of the UK was bad for his heart .. and feared trouble ahead .

    Anyway I left with my bits and pieces , and came on home , and when I got nearer to home did a small detour to see how Camp Bestival was doing … nothing to see, because the whole event was behind acres of walled parkland .. could hear the sound of generators and music , thats it , oh yes and lots of security guards sitting on chairs at various traffic pinch points .. the guards looked like tiny little rag heads , lost in the dayglo safety jackets provided for them .. Not from these parts, anyhow , I am sure thousands are having fun , been drizzly on and off , but they all survived the gale that wasn’t anything but a force 6 . Tents and Yurts, Wigwams and all the other festival paraphanalia that people love to spend the night in .

    Son attended a dog show with younger wuffle this morning , took part in the agility , and thoroughly enjoyed it .

    Son also went to the https://www.greatdorsetchillifestival.co.uk/ yesterday . The public are hungry for events , and he said that there were crowds of people attending … including a competition for those who could eat strong chillies !!

    1. Read that lorry drivers were short on the ground ( cue the jokes ) – needing 100’000 more drivers – so we should employ the replacements- – what could go wrong with sticking 100’000 . . . . 40 ton lorries in the hands of “you know who”?

    2. DVLA are still WFH. I understood that the Medical Unit had a massive backlog when I submitted a renewal application around three years ago. I’ve since moved. I’ll have another go. Truth be told, I’m now four minutes from a railway station. The only problem is getting to various churches, none of which have any public transport. Especially on Sundays. Since the parish has kicked me out of the Verger’s Cottage, and assured me that they would take care of transport between the churches, this was in pre-Covid days.

      Prosthetic legs notwithstanding, I can get home from all four churches. Uber will generally take me to them all, but the Muzzie drivers are not above cancelling my trips.

      Three weeks ago, mu usual lift home wasn’t there. So I walked home. Four miles are achievable, but a totally flooded / muddy path is a bit of an issue. I had decent shoes on…

      1. Geoff, if you attend a standard Church service (ie not something dreamed up by Hammer Horror) wouldn’t there generally be someone under the age of 88 willing to give you a lift?

        1. When I was told they’d be selling the Verger’s Cottage I was living in, they said “don’t worry about transport, we’ll sort it”. That was before Covid. I’ve learned not to ask for lifts, since the horrified reaction is that I’m trying to infect and murder them with the plague. There’s one – former – churchwarden who is happy to give me a lift home, but – being somewhat independently minded, I at least try to get there under my own steam. Besides, Uber will eventually pick up here, but not from out in the sticks where the churches are.

      2. I wouldn’t touch Uber even with your prosthetic legs. Are there no other choices?

      4. I take my hat off to you, Geoff (today it was a panama, after Ascot and Goodwood). I would struggle to manage four miles and I have both my feet!

    3. We eat grapes!

      Did our weekly shop on Friday and didn’t notice any particular reduction in supplies. Got everything we wanted, apart from the Rolo desserts that OH likes – and they’ve been missing for weeks and weeks. Oh – and garlic – only ones available were nets of four small ones – grown in China. I declined to buy those.

        1. My recent purchase of Duchy organic garlic bought from Waitrose came from Spain. I think I will complain to Charlie under the trade descriptions act.

        2. For some reason that’s all they’ve had in Morrisons the last few weeks. I did buy some shallots from New Zealand……..whatever happened to “food miles”?

  76. Went to the Garden Centre earlier today, Dobbies, plenty of people all masked up for some reason, but were happy to take them off to eat, even though they were sitting on high chairs that made them the same height as the people that were walking past them with masks on or not.

      1. That’s interesting, Belle, have you actually tried to smell flowers through a mask? If one knew the size of the volatile organic compounds’ molecules we might be able to estimate how effective those masks are.

      2. If they will not let you in without a mask, leave and go elsewhere. We have a plethora of garden centres around here. I would certainly refuse to wear one now, and I stopped wearing one very soon into this fandango. Nobody has the right to impede that most basic of rights, the right to breathe freely and unobstructed.

          1. It will happen. If they get away with this they will become ever more imaginative.

      1. And the virus has very good manners, it would never bother anyone while they were eating a meal.

    4. Seems that those who advocated the abolition of Grammar Schools 30 years ago have succeeded beyond their wildest imagination in dumbing down the population….

      1. I partly agree with you, except that most of the masketeers appeared to be of an age when grammar school were still going.

    1. While all those lovely paid not a penny migrants are in free hotels, free power, free food, free broadband, free water, free bed, free everything – and free tv.

      1. I imagine that the free TV will be from whatever hell-hole country they have escaped from (such as France)…

        1. 336156+ up ticks,
          Evening P,
          Been in evidence these past three decades as in lab/lib/con coalition.

    2. Anyone noticed that our retired and elderly are refused resuscitation/operations and care in carehomes unless they pay privately. On the same day that Countess Monkton sees off some bailiffs for unpaid water bills? Which weren’t.

      I would like to know which judge authorised the bailiffs in the first place.

      Let alone the persecution of Lord and Lady Bramall and others. I think i see a pattern emerging.

      Time to sharpen the walking sticks.

      1. I asked Mother’s carers to look out for a licence demand, but no response.
        I assume she will end up with bailiffs…

    3. And let us not forget …The free TV licence was introduced in 2000, but the BBC agreed to take on responsibility for funding the scheme as part of the charter deal with the Government in 2015 . An agreement the then boss of the organisation described as “a good deal for the BBC” – it’s the BBC that have unilaterally decided to renege on that agreement, and of course the Government haven’t insisted that hey keep to their side of the bargain!

    4. And let us not forget …The free TV licence was introduced in 2000, but the BBC agreed to take on responsibility for funding the scheme as part of the charter deal with the Government in 2015 . An agreement the then boss of the organisation described as “a good deal for the BBC” – it’s the BBC that have unilaterally decided to renege on that agreement, and of course the Government haven’t insisted that hey keep to their side of the bargain!

    5. And let us not forget …The free TV licence was introduced in 2000, but the BBC agreed to take on responsibility for funding the scheme as part of the charter deal with the Government in 2015 . An agreement the then boss of the organisation described as “a good deal for the BBC” – it’s the BBC that have unilaterally decided to renege on that agreement, and of course the Government haven’t insisted that hey keep to their side of the bargain!

    6. “Where should I put this one, Mr MacKay?”
      “Put her in with the woke ex-tennis pro, Mr Barrowclough?”

  78. Time for me to go. Been busy today, preparing for my DIY bodgery on one of the woodsheds. There was something nasty in it……..

    When we were three-quarters of the 500 yards to church this morning, the MR heard squeaking (neither G nor P ca miaow). We turned round and there was Pickles trotting along to catch us up – right in the middle of the road… He’ll be squashed one of these days. Stupid boy. I took him home.

    Have a lovely evenin’ (as I gather they now say on beeboid television….)

    A demain.

    1. Should have picked him up and taken him to the service. Bit of cat odour would keep those all church mice on their toes.

      1. And of course God loves all creatures great and small. If it annoys the happy clappy vicar…Bonus !

          2. Just tenderising their food. I do the same with steaks. Admittedly the steaks are already beyond resuscitation. A bit like our elderly relatives in care homes.

          3. They do it to annoy their human owners who dangle feathery/furry toys in front of them.

    1. 336156+ up ticks,
      O2O,
      Give The platform to Anne Marie Waters trigger the peoples reset and return self respect to the Nation.

  81. And on the radio – foreign time – actually mentioned the abuse of young girls by “Asian men” – – strangely enough they are saying the institutions that should protect them more – – – so NO blame on the scum that are doing it then??? – – NEVER THEIR FAULT.

    1. I hate it when you ring somewhere and ask for a certain dept – whats it about? – and then the nosy cow on reception wants to know every little thing before she will put you through, by which time BP is through the roof – and then you have to start saying the same to the person you’ve just been put through to.

      2. Much like speaing to a bank. They won’t put you through until you’ve answered every security question. They do this to ensure they can save money by making the computer answer you. When you do get through to a human, they ask you the same pointless information again. All of it far too much for necessary security.

        It’s almost as if they’re forcing us to do the work for them rather than for them to get off their backsides, hire enough people and answer the telephone.

  84. Evening, all. Good day, today; went to church (there’s a vacancy so we have to take pot luck about who celebrates and today’s version was wokery personified – the sermon was all about what a shame it was we had reduced our foreign aid budget and how shameful people needed food banks and we were all one global nation, not separate nations. When asked what I thought of the sermon, I said, “I didn’t like the political bits”), then took Oscar for a visit to a local garden. It so happened that there were horse trials in the grounds, so double plus good! The rain held off, I had a cappuccino and an ice cream in the cafe, Oscar had the end of my waffle cone and a drink of water and the gardens were still colourful, although a lot of stuff had gone over. Very pleasant all round!

    1. Should also add, for good measure, said woke vicar even managed to quote from Brash and Trash’s wedding in the sermon! If he wanted to p1$$ me off, he couldn’t have done a better job. I come to church to get away from things like that.

    2. It is shameful that people need food banks in this country – odd that they didn’t need them in the fifties when we were all poor just after the war – you either spent your limited funds wisely on necessary food and essentials or went hungry. Now that nobody is starving, suddenly (whenthe Tories were returned to power over 10 years ago) the need for food banks arose. Perhaps if people reduced their expenditure on things like phones, Sky and drugs, they might be able to budget for food.
      Maybe you might think I’m mean, but I’d rather support animal charities than food banks.

        1. I have done; I had to cut out all luxuries and make a priority of paying essential bills.

      4. Me, too. He actually spoke about “austerity”! What austerity? Austerity is rationing and not being able to repair your bomb-damaged house! Didn’t say anything about the homeless vets when invading dindoos are being housed in hotels – strange, that.

    3. Student Son & Self called into a Shire Horse Show at Duffield after we’d done a friend of t’Lad’s a favour.
      A very pleasant afternoon.

  85. Evening, all. Good day, today; went to church (there’s a vacancy so we have to take pot luck about who celebrates and today’s version was wokery personified – the sermon was all about what a shame it was we had reduced our foreign aid budget and how shameful people needed food banks and we were all one global nation, not separate nations. When asked what I thought of the sermon, I said, “I didn’t like the political bits”), then took Oscar for a visit to a local garden. It so happened that there were horse trials in the grounds, so double plus good! The rain held off, I had a cappuccino and an ice cream in the cafe, Oscar had the end of my waffle cone and a drink of water and the gardens were still colourful, although a lot of stuff had gone over. Very pleasant all round!

  87. Mate just called – his 94 yr old m-law had a fall – fractured her shoulder – said ambulace was hours before it got there..

      1. He said it’s doubtful she’ll return home given the circumstances. Care home if she eveb comes out of the hospital. Don’t know if she owns her house or not. Never met her.

      2. Definition of being elderly: ‘having a fall’, rather than ‘falling over’.

      1. Went past the hospital when I went to town last Monday – about 20 anbulances waiting outside to unload their patients.

    4. As I reported at the time, it was 15 hours for my 87 yo mother who was found to have broken her hip after a fall. She is still in hospital 7 weeks later and I’m not expecting her home. I have a long letter from the ambulance service after enquiring as to whether they thought that a 15 hours wait for an ambulance is an acceptable standard. I would have taken her to hospital myself except that she was in too much pain to move.

    1. By that rule then, if man was not around to witness climate change in the past.
      Then it never got warmer or colder.
      Therefore climate change is man made
      .

  90. And on foreign time beeb just now on the radio – woman saying that the asylum seekers here are living in terrible conditions, destitute and in poverty – – – – who the hell does she think is paying for all their freebies????? moan moan moan. They expect to just walk in and get everything WE have to pay for – – for free. Also says they don’t access health treatment???
    She was also complaining that they are not allowed to work – -what skills have they got??? getting into a country by dinghy??? – losing documents??? freeloading??? and also ANYONESHOULD BE ABLE TO JUST COME HERE – – 100 million ok???
    And when the sewage system can’t cope? – or anything else??? Blood is boiling.

    1. I’m watching “Genevieve” (yet again) on Talking Pictures. Blood not boiling.

    2. Did the BBC presenter suggest that she then pay for it from her own pocket? Of course she didn’t, but that’s the only way to silence these fools: expose their hypocrisy.

    3. Did the BBC presenter suggest that she then pay for it from her own pocket? Of course she didn’t, but that’s the only way to silence these fools: expose their hypocrisy.

    4. Best Western Kensington Olympia. Apparently the migrants are bored.

      Personally, if i were a refugee i would be licking the wallpaper.

    1. I really don’t know how Jacob can come out with that rubbish with a straight face. Typical Tory, always party before country. It’s not as though JRM needs the money – what hold do they have over him?

          2. yes, he is.
            I do hope the explanation is not as simple as the Rees-Moggs having a load of windmills on their land, or similar.

      2. Perhaps his thickness outstands his integrity?

        He hasn’t said anything intelligent in he last year.

      1. I am delighted to see Nigel Farage taking daily opportunities on GB News to call time on Carbon Zero and Greenie rubbish!

      2. I would like to see the face of the Mogg when ‘they’ order him to remove all his boilers and go over to heat pumps. Spoil the look of his 10 million townhouse i should think.

  92. Collective wisdom sought…
    What is the correct ettiquette when you are lunching at a hotel in the town where you live and you are served by the husband and wife who own the hotel (mortgage free)..their daughter was in the same class as yours at school, and both of you know that while business has been tight recently, they own a property with large garden worth about six time the price of your humble cottage?
    Normally you would leave a tip…what would you do in this case?

    1. I’d leave a tip if the service was good. After all, they’ve provided a service and that’s what your gratuity is for – to recognise that. If the service was lousy, don’t leave anything.

      1. It’s just embarrassing to leave a tip when you know people, unless it’s a friend’s daughter on min wage or something like that.
        They work darned hard.
        We did leave a good tip, but I felt vaguely embarrassed, given the disparity of our fortunes.

        2. It becomes even more confusing with some cultures that consider any tip to be insulting.

          Gracing them with your presence and custom is good enough if you are unsure.

      2. I don’t see the relevance of the owners having a hotel which is mortgage-free. Surely the mortgage has been paid off over the years by their own hard work and efforts?

    2. If they are the owners, and you are served by the owners, you don’t leave a tip. You tip only the people who are employed by the owners who have given good service. Hope this helps!

      1. There’s always the cook though, and if they have a communal tip fund, the cleaners.
        I never tip my hairdresser, because she is the boss, but I feel embarrassed about that too. I suppose I should just stop being so English.

        1. You could ask if there is a communal box you could pop something in rather than directly handing it to the owners.

          3. The taxman estimates what your tips are and takes it from a percentage from your weekly wages. That was my experience.

            25 hours a week at a rate that didn’t incur any extra extra expense for the employer but any extra hours were subject to tax and that included £10 a week for tips.

            Work 30 hours a week and you ended up with less money.

            And they wonder why there is such a shortage of hospitality staff.

            Let alone nurses and doctors being worked to death.

        2. It always depends. If you can… then do.

          I tip my barber extravagantly but then he does do my nose, eyebrows and ears !

      2. Spot on! If the meal has been particularly nice you could follow blackbox2 and offer a tip ”for staff Xmas box”.

        1. Many businesses have a tronq. Staff are not allowed to put money in their pockets. Even if they actually have pockets.

          Then there is the pourboire.

          If the owner/manager doesn’t get you the tax man does.

    3. You leave a tip for the staff, not the owners. Though if they are serving as well, they are the staff. And do you know that they’re not mortgaged up to the hilt to keep the business going?

      1. I rather suspect they are not, but it is possible, I suppose. I know other businesses have dug into their savings over the last eighteen months.

      2. Hi Jules, I’ve had computer problems again today so I’ve been off line for hours & did not notice that I had a message from one of the Mods from my own blogs @Scradje:disqus who has had 2 of his recent posts on NTTL go into Pending . Would it be possible to add him as a Trusted User of NTTL & if possible also approve his Pending posts ? I vouch for him 100% & he is British & pro-Brexit

        He posted me a message on yesterdays NTTL page a few hours ago:
        Discussion on Not the Telegraph Letters 678 comments https://nttl.blog/saturday-31-july-futile-policy-based-not-on-those-ill-with-covid-but-on-tests-for-the-virus/
        Saturday 31 July: Futile policy based not on those ill with Covid, but on tests for the virus
        Scradje
        Scradje Elf & Safety 2 hours ago
        Happy Sunday pudders! A few days ago I replied to your post about “Igor” (Marty Feldman) on the Notlers with another classic Marty sketch: the one in the bookshop with John Cleese. Cleese’s favourite sketch in fact. For some strange reason it went into moderation. So I sent it you again and it went into ‘pending’ again. Some sort of ban on Marty Feldman sketches?!

        1. I approved his posts yesterday that went into pending – but as he’s an infrequent poster here he’s not yet been added to the trusted list.

          2. As we are still subjected to sporadic spammer attacks any post with links goes into pending unless the poster has been cleared for the trusted list. I do keep an eye out for them.

    5. Ask for 2 extra glasses and then pour them each a glass of (probably) overpriced wine.

    6. Leave what you would normally tip. Smile nicely and tell them how much you appreciate them.

  93. Trip to Derby with Student Son to do a favour for t’Lad’s friend of shifting a fridge-freezer she’s just bought 2nd hand.
    Then, on the way back, we called into the Shire Horse Event at Duffield, walked up to Croot’s Farm Shop and, after doing a bit of shopping, we shared a pot of tea & had a scone each whilst admiring the view across the Ecclesbourne Valley to the Chevin. The ridge that runs from Duffield to Black Rocks above Cromford.
    Very nice!

    Then up the garden to empty out one of the builder’s bags full of soil to level off the small bit of wall I did t’other day.

    1. I took out the old lino in the lavatory, and discovered that it was backed by newspaper dated 1983! It was on its last legs! Put some rawl plugs in the wall to attach some patent system for concealing exposed electrical wires. Tidied the garden and gave the forsythia its summer haircut. Cooked a roast dinner with apple and peach crumble. Thank goodness the dishwasher washed up!

      1. The lass I was doing the favour for has sever spinal problems and hes physically shrunk over 4″ in recent years.

  94. 336156+ up ticks,
    Devilishly clever,every advert inclusive of a black chappy in every family setting is part of the softening up campaign financed by the licence fee payer regarding the final solution for the DOVER incoming mass treachery.

    You are viewing a trailer for the future via compulsory boarding, courtesy of the lab/lib/con coalition.

    1. Do you remember when Leo Sayer started out in a clown’s costume? I saw him on stage as a support act.

        2. Same here. I don’t like circuses, fairs, conjurers, ventriloquists, magicians, etc.

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