792 thoughts on “Sunday 13 October: HS2 is an expensive, unpopular vanity project – and must be stopped before it’s too late”

  1. If Trump denies the Dunns justice, he is betraying Britain. Ben Sixsmith. 12 October 2019.

    If President Trump persists in shielding Sacoolas it will represent a betrayal of Britain, both because he is standing in the way of justice and because he is demonstrating how little its supposed independence can be worth when a stronger power refuses to respect its valid interests. He talks a big game about the nation state, but looks as if he will not lift a finger to help one of his most significant allies secure its basic right to justice for its citizens.

    Morning everyone. One could observe simply that Trump is the President of the United States and not the Prime Minister of the UK so he cannot betray Britain any more then Boris Johnson can be disloyal to the US but that is not the purpose of the article, which is a faintly disguised attack on Trump, (with a couple of sideswipes at Brexit on the way) using the tragedy of the death of a young man outside a US Air Force base as leverage. This rather grubby mechanism allows the author to indulge in some sarcasm, faux sympathy and not a little po-faced sanctimony.

    Diplomatic Immunity exists for very good reasons. It prevents minor incidents outside the Diplomatic Sphere being blown up into political pawns (as here) that effect the relations between countries. That it is misused and abused can be taken as given since the range of possible incidents is beyond calculation and legislation. This allows Foreign Embassy staff in London to avoid £105m in unpaid congestion charges, drink and drive, carry a firearm with intent and commit rape without the MSM raising one word in protest. It is true that this is a particularly egregious example but it is an accident and not a deliberate attempt to kill or even injure. To set Immunity aside in this case is to create a precedent that will almost certainly come back to bite us another day.

    https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2019/10/if-trump-denies-the-dunns-justice-he-is-betraying-britain/

    1. Morning, Araminta.

      LBC have reported in their 07:00 news that the woman allegedly involved in this accident does not have diplomatic immunity. No more detail, I’m afraid.

      1. It seems by fleeing the scene of the crime before it being granted has given Raab the licence to apply for her extradition. Not that the Americans would give it – they are hardly honouring their loyal friends right now.

        The best that is on offer is a Cleggian apology to the bereaved relatives.

      3. According to the BBC the parents of the deceased are going to the USA where the lady driver has agreed to meet them.

    2. It seems to me though that this is merely a cover to a far more serious outrage against Trump personally that has wiped out all his diplomatic credibility, and that is the phone call that gave Erdogan the green light to invade Syria, massacre the Kurds (our and his country’s most loyal ally in the region) and release Islamic State prisoners to regroup and resume their hateful carnage.

      America is no loyal ally of ours until Mike Pence is installed in the White House.

      1. America is no loyal ally of ours until Mike Pence is installed in the White House.

        Morning Jeremy. Be careful what you wish for!

        1. Indeed – we know very little about Mike Pence, but he could hardly do worse than Trump did by chumming up to Erdogan. His close family boniding with the Bolsonaro family is hardly healthy either. Nor is the precedent set about cross-border brutalisation, lying and racial scapegoating and perverting free speech in this country set by another of Trump’s chums Benjamin Netanyahu,

          My understanding is that Pence represents the views of the mainstream GOP, which are as horrified by that phone call and the betrayal of the Kurds as I am.

          2. I see the D Notice has reached you.

            The one that informed Erdogan that Trump was ordering American troops away from guarding the Syrian/Turkish border.

          4. Are you denying that as a result there was a major incursion into Syria by Turkish forces with the intent of killing the Kurds there? This could not happen for as long as there was even a tiny garrison of American troops stationed there.

            You are right in that had nothing happened, I would not have known or cared about any conversation between Trump and Erdogan.

          5. So you know nothing about any alleged phone call.

            As it happens, there was a small number of US troops in the area and the Turks attacked them.

          6. So are you denying that Trump ordered out the garrison protecting the border, and informed Erdogan that he was doing so? If Erdogan jumped the gun and moved in before all the GIs moved out, does that make it any better? What does America feel about this?

          7. What “garrison” ?

            There were only about 200 US troops in the region and the Turks attacked them.

            You make it sound like there were many thousands of fully equipped US troops with tanks all withdrawn overnight.

            What evidence do you have of this huge alleged US army ?

          8. With the Peshmerga properly supported, there was no need for a huge US army to keep the peace, just a token presence to signal intent to Erdogan not to try anything stupid.

            Why do you persist in insisting that commenters on this British forum know and are prepared to disclose official secrets of foreign powers?

          9. You’re very badly informed.

            There was a ”token presence” of US troops.

            They were attacked.

          10. If this is so, why isn’t the US going to the UN Security Council on a charge of aggressive action in violation of international law, as well as bringing in Jens Stoltenberg to consider Turkey’s rights to the protection of NATO?

            I understand the Arab League has tabled a motion.

      2. America is in it for America, and so why people keep whining about special relationships and that the US looks out for the US beats me. About time the UK took the same attitude.

        1. Maybe there is some mileage in moving the UN Headquarters away from New York and installing it in Vienna, which at least is civilised and has pretty music?

        2. On that, I quite agree.
          British politicians on the side of their country. Now there’s a novel concept.

          1. You still haven’t explained how you know what was said in Donald’s alleged phone call.

          2. Do I need to? I don’t know what was on that piece of paper Neville Chamberlain was waving around at London Airport in 1938. It was reported at the time as “Peace in our Time”.

            History is fairly conclusive though that it contained a deal between the German and British leaders to give free rein for Germany to annexe a corridor in Czechoslovakia in order to safeguard the interests of the German people, and to mount a punitive raid on “terrorists” (or whatever H*tler called them). Sounds familiar?

            I have the same message to Trump that Parliament gave to Chamberlain: in the name of God, go!

          3. Your posts make no sense.

            First you claim to know all about a “green light” phone call.

            Then it transpires you know nothing about any phone call.

            You claim US troops had pulled out.

            Yet US troops were attacked.

            So really it looks to me like your posts are a complete waste of space.

          4. You tell me then what went on between Trump and Erdogan the evening before the invasion. I have heard few rebuttals on how it was reported, apart from your own ignorant bluster.

            You may as well deny WW2 ever happened. Is this what has become of your concept of “sense”?

            It is quite possible that Erdogan threatened America whether its garrison moved out or not, so determined was he to get at the Kurds and please his own partisans in Turkey. So why didn’t Trump read him the riot act, rather than cave in like a pussycat?

            Answer my question, please.

          5. What is “ignorant” is to claim you know all about “green light” phone calls when you know precisely nothing.

          6. What is the point of further feeding this troll?

            I’ve got a diplomatic event with the Chinese Ambassador to prepare for.

          7. I think you’re the troll.

            You made up knowing about a “green light” phone call, and you didn’t know US troops were attacked.

            My advice. Check your facts before going online.

    3. Morning, Minty.
      I can understand the reasons behind diplomatic immunity.
      But: what sticks in the craw is the deliberate whisking off to the USA of a woman whose diplomatic immunity – and that of her husband – seems questionable.
      This is not a matter of parking ticket evasion. A young man, a subject of a friendly country, was killed by a driver not paying attention. It wasn’t deliberate, but it was careless and a life has been needlessly cut short. At the very least, Trump has been tone deaf; not all Brits are Mayor Khan.
      I very much doubt that the same understanding would be applied to the wife of a British serviceman who did the same thing in the US.

      1. I very much doubt that the same understanding would be applied to the wife of a British serviceman who did the same thing in the US.

        I doubt it too Anne but the world is as it is. I don’t blame the family for their efforts to gain some sort of justice for their son but they are being used to serve a political end!

  3. One day it will be impossible to criticise the fanatics of Extinction Rebellion. Until then, I’ll tell the truth about those irrational zealots. Mail. Peter Hitchens. 13 October 2019.

    Look at the facts: an enormous 259 gigawatts (180 Didcots) of new coal-fired capacity are under development in China. That’s on top of the 993 gigawatts of coal-burning capacity China already possesses (690 Didcots).

    The UK’s whole electrical generation capacity, in all forms of power, is 85 gigawatts (59 Didcots). If we gave up using electricity entirely, it would make no difference at all to the impact of Chinese coal burning on the atmosphere.

    None. Not any. Zero. If we completely abolish all our fossil-fuel generation, including gas, it would likewise not matter in the slightest – except to us, our economy and our standard of living.

    One would have thought the truth of Mr Hitchens observations would be obvious to Climate Deniers and ER activists alike. The problem is of course that Truth has been abolished in the UK, and not just over Climate Change. We are now in a Cultural Marxist Britain where facts are no longer viable tools in arguments. Instead we have a version of Magical Realism where words mean what you want them to mean and unpleasant reality is ignored for the false security of Opinion and Belief. No Society or Civilisation can long function under such a system as the fate of the twentieth Century Marxist states so well illustrates!

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7567013/PETER-HITCHENS-Ill-tell-truth-fanatics-Extinction-Rebellion.html

    1. Listening to a leading ER activist attempt to answer Andrew Castle’s question, “Why don’t you go and protest in China, India, Brazil etc?” was enlightening. Finally lost in a mass of verbiage from which it was impossible to find an answer, it had started with a pause and a croak as the interviewee had to think on his feet as his prepared propaganda clearly couldn’t supply a meaningful answer. Surprising that this anarchist didn’t have a clear and concise answer to this most obvious and often asked question.

      1. They don’t want their skulls cracked and to then spend several years in very unpleasant re-education facility.

      2. Morning, KtK.
        Amazingly, Stuart White on Look East asked some ageing crustie the same question – specifically about demonstrating in China.
        Out of the verbiage came the weaselly justification that China caused less pollution per person and was doing something about it.
        Nothing to do with – if this loon was even allowed into the Middle Kingdom – being dealt with by the Chinese police force and probably ending up very dead, or, at least maimed if he got off lightly.

          2. Quite like stoats and pine martins too – apparently honey badgers aren’t nice though, and same for Tasmanian devils, rats and pigeons – you can feel free to use any of those!!!

        2. Surely not as serious as that. As Monty Python once said of the Whizzo Chocolate Assortment, lightly killed and seasoned with lark’s vomit should be the worst they should expect.

        3. ‘Morning, Anne, I saw it as well and my reaction was much the same; I noticed that Stuart White didn’t even mention India.

      3. I write as an environmentalist long sympathetic to many (but not all) of the sentiments expressed by ER, but must admit you make a very valid point indeed,

        Maybe it’s because Trump would collude with the local bully tyrant and their gangs of thugs and have them shot?

  4. There isn’t any real Finishing Line on 31st October. It’s very unlikely that Boris’ fudge could be ready to go to the HoC by then and with Remainers in charge of all proceedings they will cause month after month of kerfuffle until they get their form of second Referendum. No10 may believe that there are ways around the Benn Surrender but will they risk the Remainer organised unrest on the streets by going down that route? A General Election is the only way through this morass and a time must come when Remainer resistance to it will be shouted down by The Great British Public.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/news/2019/10/12/BOB131019_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqCK5qqxc8Xb_dJ844OItTlAKLmy6F6IRVFVrHX2Fd2NQ.jpg?imwidth=1260

  5. Sir John Major recently described the Conservatives as a “Brexit Party Tribute Band”.

    The opening line of a short article from Brexit Central making comparisons between the Brexit Party and Johnson’s Tories.

  7. ‘Queen of chess’ says it’s hard to imagine women competing at same level as men. Leon Watson. 12 OCTOBER 2019.

    The gender gap in sport may be narrowing, but in the game of chess women may never reach the levels of their male counterparts – according to the world’s best female player.

    University of Oxford student Hou Yifan said the cerebral game won’t get a female world champion for decades because women “are less focused” than men, don’t train as hard and are at a physical disadvantage.

    One would expect this woman to be drummed out of the Chess World and subject to vilification on a grand scale in the near future for voicing these self-evident truths since they contradict Cultural Marxist doctrine. No comments allowed needless to say!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/10/12/queen-chess-says-hard-imagine-women-competing-level-men/

  8. Just back from buying a loaf. It isn’t raining as such – just the air is very wet. Gale blowing. About 20ºC. Weird.

  9. Did any NoTTLers know that Prince William has a mistress?

    Apparently I am one of the last to discover this improbable fact.

    4. But William married the good-looking one who is not a Politically Correct robot. I have heard nothing of this.

    5. Silly twit. Him, not you, Bill. I didn’t know and now that you have told me, I don’t actually care.

    6. Frankly, I don’t care.

      This is something he needs to sort out with the Duchess of Cambridge, and I have complete respect with whatever this couple decides is the best way to deal with it. A hearty and sardonic chuckle over breakfast over the gullibility of the popular press and their idiot readers (can they read, or do they just look at pictures?) probably the best and most likely way.

      There was a French magazine that had a fresh shocking revelation about the British royal family each week, None of it was ever true.

  10. Voters will have to show ID before casting their ballot to prevent electoral fraud, Government to announce. 12 OCTOBER 2019.

    Voters across the country will have to show identification such as driving licences or passports before casting their ballot, under plans to be unveiled in the Queen’s Speech.

    Ministers are planning to introduce a legal requirement for voters to produce photographic ID, in order to safeguard against electoral fraud.
    A new Electoral Integrity Bill will also limit the number of relatives for whom anyone can act as a proxy, and outlaw the “harvesting” of postal ballots by political parties and activists.

    TOP COMMENT BELOW THE LINE.

    The Cross of St George 12 Oct 2019 9:22PM.

    Ban postal ballots! They are wide open to abuse, fraud and gerrymandering.

    Amen to that George!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2019/10/12/voters-will-have-show-casting-ballot-prevent-electoral-fraud/

      1. Exactly, Anne. How will these proposals reduce the fraud in the ‘communities’ so beloved of our elected overseers? The cheats have their methods finely honed and will be ahead of any bureaucratic controls. Expect the government’s rules to be based on the Swiss cheese method and as such, be useless.

    4. Were it not for postal ballots I would not have been able to vote in several elections over the past 25 years.
      However, postal voting does need to be tightened up with better checks on who is applying and why.
      Also, the current process of postal ballots being mixed in with those from polling stations before counting needs to stop and both to be counted separately.
      Then, should there be a large discrepancy between postal and polling station ballots, the declaration of the result to be deferred until enquiries have been made.

      Should evidence arise of electoral fraud, the ballot to be declared null and void and re-run and anyone against whom there is proof of participation of the fraud to be prosecuted and the party in whose favour he/she acted to be banned from the re-run and made to pay the costs.

      1. There is more fraud at the polling stations than with postal voting. The mass area of fraud with postal votes is the mass collecting of them by political parties and the mass handing in of them at polling stations. It is clear as well that signatures are not being checked. Properly checking a signature is a slow process about the only signature check they do is to see if the form has been signed/ Perhaps using the ebanking approach where you have to get a security number sent to your mobile phone should be deployed

        1. Postal votes should be exactly that, postal. Handing in at the polling station should not be allowed and, as for the massed handing in of collected PVs, that should have been investigated in the greatest detail.

      2. If we want a postal vote in Canada, there are several hoops to jump through before getting the ballot paper, you certainly just download a form and send it in.

        It really is possible to control postal votes – ours will not be perfect but better than the non control that you have.

      3. Should evidence arise of electoral fraud, the ballot to be declared null and void and re-run and anyone against whom there is proof of participation of the fraud to be prosecuted and the party in whose favour he/she acted to be banned from the re-run and made to pay the costs.

        This is all very well Bob but as Peterborough illustrates such measures are no longer reliable.

        1. What measures?
          Very little has been done regarding voting fraud and, even when it was as blatant as Tower Hamlets, the Electoral Commission had to be dragged kicking and screaming into court by a local activist group before it was prepared to take action.

      4. I think postal votes should be available for those who really need one, but appliction should be made for every election and not be a permament state of affairs. And you must be able to show that you cannot attend your polling station on the date in question.

    5. We are told that this would affect “poor disadvantaged people”, well, I wonder how these people identify themselves when claiming benefits?

  11. Here’s a slight variation on a theme recently published;

    SOCIALISM
    You have 2 cows.
    You give one to your neighbour.
    The government charges a gift tax.

    COMMUNISM
    You have 2 cows.
    The State takes both and gives you some milk.

    FASCISM
    You have 2 cows.
    The State takes both and sells you some milk.

    NAZISM
    You have 2 cows.
    The State takes both and shoots you.

    BUREAUCRATISM
    You have 2 cows.
    The State takes both, shoots one, milks the other, and then throws the milk away.

    TRADITIONAL CAPITALISM
    You have two cows.
    You sell one and buy a bull.
    Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows.
    You sell them and retire on the income.

    Goldman Sachs (VENTURE) CAPITALISM
    You have two cows.
    You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so that you get all four cows back, with a tax exemption for five cows.
    The milk rights of the six cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman Island Company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who sells the rights to all seven cows back to your listed company.
    The annual report says the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more.
    You sell one cow to buy a new president of the United States , leaving you with nine cows.
    No balance sheet provided with the release.
    The public then buys your bull.

    AN AMERICAN CORPORATION
    You have two cows. You sell one, and force the other to produce the milk of four cows.
    Later, you hire a consultant to analyse why the cow has dropped dead.

    A GREEK CORPORATION
    You have two cows.
    You borrow lots of euros to build barns, milking sheds, hay stores, feed sheds, dairies, cold stores, abattoir, cheese unit and packing sheds. You still only have two cows.

    A FRENCH CORPORATION
    You have two cows.
    You go on strike, organize a riot, and block the roads, because you want three cows.

    A JAPANESE CORPORATION
    You have two cows.
    You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk.
    You then create a clever cow cartoon image called a Cowkimona and market it worldwide.

    AN ITALIAN CORPORATION
    You have two cows, but you don’t know where they are.
    You decide to have lunch.

    A SWISS CORPORATION
    You have 5000 cows.
    None of them belong to you.
    You charge the owners for storing them.

    A CHINESE CORPORATION
    You have two cows.
    You have 300 people milking them.
    You claim that you have full employment, and high bovine productivity.
    You arrest the newsman who reported the real situation.

    AN INDIAN CORPORATION
    You have two cows.
    You worship them.

    A BRITISH CORPORATION
    You have two cows.
    Both are mad.

    AN AUSTRALIAN CORPORATION
    You have two cows.
    Business seems pretty good.
    You close the office and go for a few beers to celebrate

    A NEW ZEALAND CORPORATION
    You have two cows.
    The one on the left looks rather attractive…

  12. Morning Each,
    There seems to be a feeling abroad that if johnson follows mays lead then
    the General Election would show the peoples feelings, is that not a tad late in the day ?
    He , johnson realises surely that a devious move will bring about the downfall of the tory party but isn’t that the ultimate end aim of the
    toxic trio, submission to brussels.
    What difference will the Brexit group make if it gains seats in parliament ?
    post boris, supposing that boris does the dirty ?
    The mayday caused enough problems, what will he sign us up for ?

    2. Cold and chucking it down here in mid-Derbyshire and if the Met’s rain radar is to be believed lots more on the way.

      1. In Sarf London average monthly rainfall for October (the wettest month of the year) is 61mm we’ve already had more rain than that and a lot more rain is forecast……

  14. ‘We knew this would happen’: Kurds in Nashville say Trump betrayed them. 13 October 2019

    This week, Donald Trump announced he was pulling US troops from Syria’s border with Turkey, seemingly giving the green light for Turkey to attack Kurdish forces allied with America. For many Kurds in Nashville – many of whom came here and prospered after fleeing for their lives – the sudden reversal was nothing short of a betrayal.

    It is more than probable that his Syria decision will do for Trump what the Russiagate, Misogyny, Racism and the Democratic Party hacking accusations have been unable to achieve. His refusal to run in 2020! The American People no more than any other do not like to be seen as base or cowardly and as this Turkish Atrocity proceeds his support will ebb away.

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/oct/13/kurds-in-nashville-say-trump-betrayed-them

    1. I really hope not. The alternatives to President Trump do not bear thinking about. I would hope that the vast majority of those who voted for him the last time will be more than happy to see their fighting men and women coming home again. Not dying in a country in a futile attempt to stop people who hate our way of life from killing each other.

      https://youtu.be/jl20jlVnvYs?t=1m17s

      1. I prefer Trump to the alternatives M but to quote Talleyrand, “C’est pire qu’un crime, c’est une faute”

        It was worse than a Crime it was a Blunder.

        1. There were only 200 US troops in the region.

          What do you want ?

          Half a million US troops flown in ?

          1. We’ll need them now, if we are to avoid an Islamic State breakout. They are shooting the prison guards.

        2. We don’t know, with certainty, the content of the phone call.

          If Erdogan told Trump that he was going in, come what may, what is Trump to do; bomb Turkey, impose sanctions?

          I would not have put it past Erdogan to have done exactly that, and given the underlying threat that he would also open the borders and encourge Turks all over the world to cause trouble.

          Trump has always been open about wanting to bring troops ome. He recognises that having troops in any of these Hell holes is going to result in more American dead and zero real, long-term benefits.

        1. I think I know what you are saying, but the comment was slightly unclear. One thing that is clear is that if we flooded the region with 500,000 “Western soldiers” for the next 100 years, it will not make muslims give up their cult and become peaceful. They will start killing each other again whenever we leave. Why have thousands of our soldiers killed there for nothing?

          1. The Pentagon had actually got themselves in a pretty good position as regards the squabbling Muslims. The Kurds were keeping some degree of order, and are the most tolerant to Christians, Jews, Yazidis, other Muslims etc. It was a delicate arrangement, but only needed a token force to keep it going, certainly not 500,000 “Western soldiers” and the Americans were not actually asked to do any dying, merely to be a presence and a threat to anyone thinking of trying it on.

          2. The inhabitants of the Middle East have been murdering each other for at least 5,000 years.
            Mo merely gave extra impetus to a regional pastime.

  15. Morning, Campers.
    An article from the Spekkie that I found interesting. Hope you do.

    “To solve Britain’s social care crisis, follow the Dutch example

    Buurtzorg is a real success story. So why won’t the NHS adopt it?

    Kate Gatacre
    12 October 2019 9:00 AM

    More than a decade ago, four Dutch nurses decided something needed to be done about their country’s care in the community. Back then, it was almost as bad as it is in Britain now — where a recent report found that at least 400 pensioners a week sell their homes to pay for social care. Nursing in the Netherlands had taken a terrible turn in the 1990s, when the government decided healthcare should be more ‘professional’. The ensuing bureaucracy and management doubled the cost, and the quality plummeted. Nurses were forced to spend more time on paperwork and, for want of help, elderly patients ended up in hospital when they could and should have been at home. The solution the four nurses, led by Jos de Blok, came up with was a revolutionary model that they named ‘Buurtzorg’, ‘neighbourhood care’. They had three aims: better care for patients, happier staff and lower costs. And I can tell you that they succeeded because when both my parents, who live in the Netherlands, were seriously ill last year, I experienced Buurtzorg in action.

    The big idea was that each team of nurses would have complete autonomy, supported by a central office for administrative matters. So Buurtzorg nurses would not only control how and when they treated patients, but also their budget, who they employed and their own planning and organisation.

    Buurtzorg started with a pilot of ten teams in 2007, which has grown to 950 in the Netherlands (employing 10,000 nurses) with successful expansions in 23 other countries. Each team has a maximum of 12 nurses to ensure there is no hierarchy or manager needed to lead them. The central office is run by 50 people, with some administration, such as payroll, outsourced. There are 20 ‘coaches’ to help set up new teams or to help teams that are failing to solve a specific problem on their own. There is no call centre, no HR department, no middle management. In the 13 years since it was founded, there has been not one single management meeting. There is no CFO.

    Buurtzorg is a real success story. Independent evaluation by Ernst and Young in 2009 showed that patients needed nursing care for half as long, hospital admissions were reduced by a third, and hospital stays were significantly shorter. Where Buurtzorg provides district nursing, costs are down by 40 per cent, and the organisation has won Employer of the Year in four of the past six years. The 5 per cent profit it makes goes towards further education for its nurses. Around half of the 10,000 are educated to degree level.

    One of the most surprising results is that the amount of care that patients receive from district nurses has been reduced by nearly 50 per cent. This is in part thanks to the nursing teams collaborating with the patients, their support networks and local voluntary organisations. Another factor is that the teams know their patients and their needs, so less time is wasted. Most importantly, patients are improving faster, disease prevention and self-care have been improved, and so fewer hours of care are needed. The nurses and their patients assess what is needed and form a care plan together, and nurses have the freedom and flexibility to practise their craft without interference from a team of managers. A simple IT system has been developed with input from the nurses, so problems and solutions can be exchanged on a wider scale.

    When my parents needed care, they found that Buurtzorg nurses would visit three or four times a day, sometimes for a few minutes, sometimes for up to an hour. I had gone to help care for them, but just as my parents were improving, I was bitten by a dog. Infection set in and the wound required twice-daily flushing and dressing for two weeks. The team organised it so that the same two nurses performed the procedure- — which was complex and painful — even on their days off. As my parents recovered, nurses brought them kefir to help with the effects of antibiotics, and high-calorie drinks to help my mother regain weight. They discussed the best food for recovery (chicken and beef broths, of course), delivered medicines, helped make beds and got my father up and moving. They also talked to the doctor, the physiotherapist and, above all, us.

    So why not introduce Buurtzorg-inspired teams here? Well, the odd thing is that we have. In 2013, Brendan Martin, who runs Public World, a social enterprise consultancy, had been his parents’ main carer and experienced the best and worst of home care: ‘The care workers were good people undermined by a bad system.’ He did some research, came across Buurtzorg and set up a partnership with Jos de Blok in 2015, with the intention of working within the NHS and local government authorities to pilot the model.

    But our tenacious bureaucracy doesn’t relinquish its hold easily.

    ‘We’ve set up 20 pilot schemes,’ says Martin, ‘But we haven’t been able to break away from the current management style of the NHS. Nurses don’t have the level of autonomy they need to succeed at scale using the Buurtzorg way.’

    Martin isn’t giving up on the Buurtzorg model or something similar being adopted here: ‘I believe in their motto — “Humanity over Bureaucracy”.’ We’ve shown that the teams can work independently, and that they and their patients flourish when they do. That’s the easy part. Challenging the institutions and systems at play within the NHS and local government is the hard part.’

    In the meantime, in the Netherlands, Jos de Blok has been asked to adapt the Buurtzorg model for acute care departments in hospitals and to consult on how systems could be adapted for the police. If Britain can only get Buurtzorg nursing right, it could be just the beginning of a Dutch-inspired revolution.”

    1. Quite often good ideas are wrecked, sometimes deliberately by superiors who give the go ahead for bits of an idea

      1. T’was ever thus.
        During the attempted Thatcher reforms of the then DHSS more than a few managers tasked with implementing the reforms quietly bragged that many of the problems were caused by their deliberate misinterpretation of the rules.

          1. Not bad, but had a bit of a disturbed night with some abdominal discomfort I’ll be mentioning to the GP when I see him tomorrow.

            I think the scare I’ve just had has made me realise I am mortal after all!

          2. One of the most difficult things for an active person is to “take it easy”.

            But KBO.

          4. You are meant to be taking things easy not doing this

            “A couple of hours of quietly putting up some of the T&G cladding I’d planned doing last week. it is fairly light work so no problems there.
            Ladder put up to get into the attic to dispose of dead mouse and reset trap after it went off in the small hours.
            Just had 3rd mug of tea and am about to go & do a 4th and put some soup on for my lunch.”

          5. Heyup Lass!
            None of those activities did anything to raise my heart rate so I’d class them as part of “Light duties”.
            The problem I have is that sitting down and doing nothing is probably more stressful than gentle work like i did yesterday.

    3. The big idea was that each team of nurses would have complete autonomy, supported by a central office for administrative matters.

      That’s where it falls down! Autonomy is anathema to the UK Elites. They want to control everything, be seen as the fount of all activity!

      1. Many of those in the “establishment” are not the sharpest tools in the box. They need to create lots of middle-management positions for themselves and their friends, because they would starve to death if they needed to work in the real world that required talent.

        Those civil service pay-offs for being retired from a position, only then to be rehired again 2 months later, also help to stock the wine cellar.

        1. I saw this happen at first hand when they privatised the Property Services Agency in the early 1990s. Grade 7s were given golden handshakes well into six figures only to be taken on a fortnight later as directors of consultancy companies advising the Department about how and where to issue contracts for the work that previously had been done in-house. These directors doubled their salary, and also went onto renumeration packages linked to the profits they could make from these contracts. The taxpayer footed the bill, which inevitably led to cuts in other services.

    4. Good morning, fellow Camper! At a purely anecdotal level, I can tell you that my sister set up one of the ten pilot teams back in 2007. I remember she did this with some trepidation as nobody knew if the scheme was going to work in the long term. But she took the plunge, gave up her job and hasn’t looked back – moving on to other things on the back of the success of her work. As a result of her experience in the “buurtzorg” she came across a whole lot of homeless people and set up a local charity for them.

      But before the UK starts following the Dutch model, be careful of what you wish for: one of the things few people realise is that in the Netherlands, if you haven’t paid your national insurance contributions, you will not receive medical care – “buurtzorg” or any other. My sister and her team regularly dug out doctors who were willing to care for homeless people free of charge; my sister herself had to look after “her” homeless people out of working hours after she was told off for doing this as part of the job.

      And it is even worse than that. If a homeless person wants to “re-integrate” into society, he will only regain his entitlement to care once he has paid all the arrears of his national insurance contributions. Which is one reason why so many homeless people simply remain homeless in Holland – they can’t afford not to! And so there are much-needed charities – like my sister’s – who look after them.

      Of course if people come into the Netherlands from abroad and start paying their NI contributions, they will immediately be entitled to care. It is only if you are already in the country and then drop out while remaining in the country that you lose your entitlement. Which is just another reason for resentment against immigrants amongst the Dutch.

      1. Thank you, Caroline.
        I’ve cut and pasted your reply and sent it to my sister-in-law who is a lecturer in nursing at Anglia Ruskin.

  16. We held a referendum on leaving the EU. We voted to leave. We voted for Brexit.
    The concept of a “deal’, and its opposite, the “no-deal” scenario, were introduced after the result of the referendum was known. The “deal”/”no deal” dichotomy was a creation of the Remainers. The Remainers also created the Brexit lexicon, including expressions such as”cliff edge”, “crash out” and so on, in order to frighten the population. This Project Fear has been supported by foreign money. It has been promulgated day and night by the mass media, most obviously by our State broadcaster, the BBC. The BBC has supported the fifth column, foreign powers and their agents, and Quislings who have been bribed.
    There has been almost no support for the referendum result amongst our elected representatives, our MPs. What show of support there has been has almost all been a sham, with MPs paying lip service only, while acting against Brexit. Lip service, in the hope we won’t notice and that we will keep them in their sinecures.
    There was no suggestion of us requiring an arrangement, or an agreement, or a “deal” before the result was announced. There was no suggestion, and there is no legal basis for the notion that we need permission to leave. There was never any formal requirement for an extended transition period. The two year maximum transition period suggested in Article 50 is well past.
    The only “B” word with any meaning is the word Betrayal.

    2. Excellent post, HP. Take a few million upticks. May I also add that if the Conservative Party fails to deliver what the majority voted for, it deserves everything coming to it – complete annihilation I hope. Furthermore, this outcome will be, in no small measure, down to the betrayers, traitors and wreckers in the House of Clowns, most of whom appear to be so-called Conservatives. One of these days the electorate will have its revenge – call a general election and give us the opportunity to drain the swamp of these wretched people.

    1. If you are going to call him a cloggy, a la Hollanders, at least spell it correctly. Your version is pronounced with a long ‘o’.

      1. Morning NtN,
        I worked Holland a few times, was offshore for them also, good
        peoples, as for spelling I do type with a lisp at times but in this instance it that such a big deal ?
        Tell me, is it the spelling ie clogie, or the confessed down voters
        ludicrous post’s that offends you most.

  18. Brexit plans centre stage in Queen’s Speech

    Measures to help the UK prosper after Brexit are to be set out in the Queen’s Speech, the government has said.
    Plans to end the free movement of EU citizens into the UK and provide faster access to medicines will be unveiled.
    Ministers say a Brexit deal is a “priority” and they hope one can be passed through Parliament “at pace”.

    The government says the Queen’s Speech will outline 22 bills including some that will introduce measures to allow the UK to “seize the opportunities that Brexit presents”. Other proposals include:

    An Immigration and Social Co-ordination Bill to end freedom of movement and bring in a points-based immigration system from 2021

    Scrapping the rail franchise system – the contracting out of services introduced when the rail system was privatised in the 1990s

    Plans for an NHS investigations body intended to improve patient safety and a pledge to update the Mental Health Act

    An environment bill that will set legally binding targets to reduce plastics and cut air pollution

    There are also proposals to tackle serious and violent crime, improve building standards, and increase investment in infrastructure and science.

    But Labour has criticised the decision to hold a Queen’s Speech before any general election as a “stunt” and “a pre-election party political broadcast” for the Tories.

    1. All this, “seize the opportunities that Brexit presents”, talk is so much rubbish and a smokescreen to cover a fudge. Ditto all of the earlier spending increase promises. If Johnson gets us out clean then I’ll see him as worthy of some praise, else…

  19. XFactor Celebrity

    Interestingly in my view only one of them could sing and that was Jenny Ryan and I was not expecting her to be able to sing.

  20. Timeline: What’s happening ahead of Brexit deadline?

    Monday 14 October – The Commons is due to return, and the government will use the Queen’s Speech to set out its legislative agenda. The speech will then be debated by MPs throughout the week.

    Thursday 17 October – Crucial two-day summit of EU leaders begins in Brussels. This is the last such meeting currently scheduled before the Brexit deadline.

    Saturday 19 October – Special sitting of Parliament and the date by which the PM must ask the EU for another delay to Brexit under the Benn Act, if no Brexit deal has been approved by Parliament and they have not agreed to the UK leaving with no-deal.

    Thursday 31 October – Date by which the UK is due to leave the EU, with or without a withdrawal agreement.

    2. Good timing by me though. I arrived as parliament was shut down and will be on the way home before the resume their bickering.

      Will the parliament last until Saturday or will Boris manage to force a confidence vote on a Queens speech? What if Queenie announces the immediate abandonment of postal votes and implementation of constituency boundary changes. Can Corbyn be pushed into a confidence vote?

  21. Still no sign that Nottlers really understand the anti Brexit conspiracy and it’s background despite recent revelations !

    1. What kind of sign are you looking for, Polly? Fists full of dollars mysteriously materialising over a figure of Soros in the air? We know all right.

      By the way, to do a Peddy it’s “its background”.

      1. Well, the word ”conspiracy” is never used by Nottlers so presumably they don’t think there is one.

        You would think they’d be busy joining the dots, but there’s hardly a word of analysis.

        Then to underline my point, a central member of NOTTL told me……..

        sosraboc Pretty Polly
        ”You are a Soros shill.

        Constantly used as his vomiting hole, to pretend that he has more influence than is the reality.

        Does he pay you to produce your garbage?”

        I rest my case.

        1. I’m correct.
          You are a shill.
          You spend your whole time disrupting sites with your Soros speculation.

          1. Since your silly ”shill” post, sosy, new info emerged about G S funding.

            £52,000,000 is just for 2018 and an uplift of about 75% on 2017.

            What do you think the funding will be in 2019, maybe £70,000,000 or more ?

            If this isn’t sufficient evidence to say there is a conspiracy, then what evidence is necessary in your opinion ?

            https://twitter.com/BrugesGroup/status/1181569492792598531

          2. One wealthy man pushing his own agenda with useful idiots and shills lke you taking the money.

          3. Come on, sosy, you’ll have to do better than that.

            You said that I post ”garbage” which means you don’t believe there is a conspiracy.

            Surely the huge funding of £52,000,000 in one year alone shows that you are completely wrong ?

          4. Show us the recipients of the funds and what they were required to do for the money with proof instead of your usual boring open-ended speculative shilling.

          5. Oh you mean you want me to go through the accounts of all possible recipients and have a look under their beds for fat brown envelopes.

            Oh dear, yet another silly sosy post !

          6. Why not, you’re constsntly pretending you know so much about your conspiracy.
            Come on show us the proof.

          9. I think you’re the pretender, sosy.

            After all, peeps who ask the impossible are not being serious.

          10. You can’t answer because you don’t know.
            You pretend to know, with your boring, boring rhetorical questions every day but you actually know no more than anyone else.

            All your regular, “it’s Soros” is nothing other than shilling.

          13. sosy, you’re digging an even bigger hole for your argument now that you deny it’s impossible for me to go through accounts of possible recipients and check under their beds for brown envelopes.

            So the only conclusion to draw from this exchange is that you are the one who is posting ”garbage”.

          14. In for a pound, out for a shilling!

            (Grab it while you can you’ll soon have to pay in euros)

        2. You can’t extrapolate on what one NoTTLER, who doesn’t get on with you, says. We don’t have to use a particular word to know the meaning and the effect. There are other words.

          1. You I think are one of the exceptions.

            Amusingly another denier just turned up….

            Bersty was recommending sosy in his long diatribe !

          2. I don’t have time to search Nottler, sadly. I( often have to go on the newest posts, and then notifications.

          1. After suffering a very nasty dose of ‘flu two years ago, we opted for the French vaccinations last year and had a ‘flu and cold free winter.

            We’re taking up the offer again this year.

  23. For music lovers, France Musique is ending its “British Week” with a two hour prog (on right now) about London’s Orchestras.

    Very well informed presentation. Worth listening to on catch up.

  24. SNP gathers amid growing pressure over independence strategy

    The SNP’s autumn conference is to open in Aberdeen.

    The conference is being held as party leader Nicola Sturgeon faces mounting pressure from some members over her independence strategy.

    Ms Sturgeon wants to hold a referendum next year – but the UK government has already ruled out granting the consent she says is needed to make it legal.
    Some activists are growing impatient and have called on Ms Sturgeon to set out a so-called Plan B.

    Speaking on the first day of the conference, the party’s Westminster leader Ian Blackford is expected to say the SNP will retain its majority of Scottish seats at Westminster to reaffirm its mandate to hold a second referendum “if that’s what it takes for any UK government to listen”.

    He will tell delegates the “only option” to address the Brexit “crisis” is to call a general election.
    He will say: “The excuses for keeping Boris Johnson in office are running dry, and the patience of people in Scotland is running out. We must take the power out of Boris Johnson’s hands – and put it back in the hands of the people.”

    1. SNP showed themselves to be cowards when they had a huge majority of MSPs and all but two of the Scottish MPs. A joint convocation and a vote to secede would have done the job, but they did not do it. They then lost a referendum.
      I have come to the view that “independence” is a slogan only, intended to attract duped voters and get the political party into power.

      1. Interestingly it was th Scottish Assembly and PR that got them established and it is FPTP that keeps them their seats in Westminster

        Looking at the actually data the SNP is no where near as strong in Scotland as it makes out. Certainly at Westminster it is FPTP that keeps them in their seats

  25. The Queen might be admired, but the crown has seldom seemed so empty. Catherine Bennett. 13 October 2019.

    In these turbulent times, her once steadying influence now counts for little.

    Well while you were probably reading A Childs Guide to Das Kapital the Monarchy was abolished and the position of Head of State was taken over by the Supreme Court!

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/oct/13/queen-might-be-admired-crown-has-seldom-seemed-so-empty

      2. Well we dont really know but the majority of the rumours suggest it is looking to be a good deal. WE leave the Single Market & Customs Union meaning we can negotiate out own trade deals. The Back stop issue looks as if it will be resolved. This will require some compromises as we need to square the circle

        The issue but simple is how you collect tariffs flowing across the NI land boarder without actually having a border

        A simple but not sensible system is all the goods from NI going to Ireland are shipped to Scotland and then to Ireland. IT solves the problem but is totally impracticable

    5. Neither – and he lacks Chamberlain’s backbone.

      Perhaps one of his paramours would confirm whether he is even much good at bonking?

    6. I remember the song from the early 1950s – “Cigareets and Whisky and Wild Wild Women” (they drive you crazy, they drive you insane).

      Well, Churchill covers the cigareets and whisky, and Boris, the wild, wild, women. Neville Chamberlain was, I think, very much a dull boy guided by his (often utterly misguioded) father, Joseph Chamberlain.

      Funny to recall now that Johnson’s career was supposedly on the brink of collapse due to him spilling some red wine on his GF’s settee.

    2. Allegedly it’s run from Coventry., amazingly………….

      Organisation
      The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights is run by “Rami Abdulrahman” (sometimes referred to as Rami Abdul Rahman), from his home in Coventry.[12] Abdulrahman is a Syrian Sunni who owns a clothing shop. Born Osama Suleiman, he adopted a pseudonym during his years of activism in Syria and has used it publicly ever since.[12] After being imprisoned three times in Syria, Abdulrahman fled to the United Kingdom fearing a fourth jail term and has not returned.[5]

      The SOHR has been described as being “pro-opposition” and anti-Assad.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_Observatory_for_Human_Rights

    1. I just noticed their rugby team’s symbol. Lapwing or certainly a plover I thought. It turns out to be the southern lapwing.

  30. DT Headline

    Jacob Rees-Mogg: Boris Johnson won’t concede too much to EU

    Any concession to the EU is too much.

    Remember both Boris and Grease-Slime voted to make Britain into a vassal state when they voted for May’s Surrender WA the third time it was presented.

    We are probably now lost – but so is the Conservative Party.

    1. Afternoon R,
      In the minds of politico’s in power currently is that
      shedding the tory party is a necessary step to take on the path forward.
      The whole lab/lib/con coalition understand this and have been seriously working for it since the time the knife entered Thatchers back.

    2. If Johnson is starting from May’s capitulation treaty what the hell has he got left to concede?

  31. Good Morning, all

    SIR – I am yet to hear a single advocate of another EU referendum explain why anyone would trust Parliament to implement the result.

    If the first referendum was advisory and the electorate did not understand the question, why would a second referendum be binding and clear?

    Moreover, since the Remain side has already been defeated by the decisive margin of 1.3 million votes, the only democratic choice available on a hypothetical ballot paper would be between the Withdrawal Agreement and leaving without a deal.

    Britain’s Remain-backing establishment risks undermining the principle of democratic consent with its determination to overturn the result of the “once in a lifetime in/out” referendum.

    Philip Duly
    Haslemere, Surrey

    There is no way that the Remain Alliance will allow any second Referendum to be a choice between Boris’ Withdrawal Agreement (whatever that may be) and leaving ‘without a deal’ i.e.WTO. The Electoral Commission would be nobbled, not that they need nobbling being 95% Remain. The objective of any second Referendum is not to heal ‘our divided nation’ or any such guff; it is to deliver a Remain majority, no matter how small, by whatever crooked or foul means. It won’t be long before there will be an interpretation of the law deeming any mention of WTO Exit to be Hate Speech and we’ll have Plod on our tail.

    Never forget about the immutable veracity of politicians’ promises
    https://youtu.be/iPcmebRH904

    1. The Electoral Commission doesn’t need nobbling.
      Its members are cut from the same cloth as the Chicken Supreme Court.

    2. If there were to be a second referendum with the same choice – Leave or Remain – and Leave were to win again, then there would be no change in the current situation. Remainers would still argue that Leave is undeliverable. As you say, the only reason to have a second referendum is to reverse the result of the first one. Remainers would not be satisfied with anything else.
      Edit: changed Leavers to Remainers in final sentence!

      1. The Libdums have already said that they will ignore any leave vote – so what’s the point of one?
        Get in the piano wire.

    3. “If the first referendum was advisory and the electorate did not understand the question, why would a second referendum be binding and clear?” Because the second referendum would be a choice between remain and stay in. Having reached a remain verdict, the result would then be binding (even if the majority were only one vote) in perpetuity.

  32. That stench isn’t people eating on trains. It’s the rotting corpse of good manners
    Rod Liddle

    One of the pleasures of travelling by train is the arrival into your carriage, sooner or later, of Jaydon and Roxanne Skank and their five children — Lourdes, Brooklyn, Liberte, Tyger and Thot* — and their seven party buckets of deep-fried recovered meat by-products with dipping sauces (bar-b-q and Thai chilli). The Skank family may number seven, but they take up 12 seats, such is their girth, and an extra seat for the family vat of insulin.

    The lids come off each bucket — “Gorn, eat ya nuggets you little t***” — and a vile aroma fills the train. It’s the slightly sweet stench of impending death and dissolution. This is a mid-morning snack for the Skanks. They have had breakfast and are on their way to luncheon, but it’s four stops on the train and they might get a little peckish.

    The gorging begins, interspersed with liquid grunts of appreciation, the fat running down seven pendulous jowls, the kids with livid sauce smeared on their faces, as if they had all just been punched in the mouth. Then out come the fizzy drinks — Diet Coke, natch, because they’ve been told to watch their weight and they are wise enough to take good advice, when it comes their way.

    Two-thirds of us are obese, apparently. I’m overweight: this could be from drinking white wine (in an attempt to regulate myself, I now never open a bottle until Thought for the Day has finished) but I suspect it is because, like the vast majority of people in this country, I have a sedentary occupation and don’t get enough exercise.

    I blame Brexit. I used to walk 10 miles a day with my dog and weighed a svelte 12st 6lb. That was in 2016. Now I don’t have three hours to spare for that walking because I’m required to write something else about the, if you will excuse the term, shitshow in parliament. That’s my excuse, anyway.

    By and large the obesity epidemic in this country is not due to an excess of sugar and fat. It’s mostly down to bone idleness, some of it enforced, some of it not. Nonetheless we do have a certain penchant for oral gratification — that has to be said.

    Last week the UK’s Stalinist uber-nanny, Professor Dame Sally Davies, the chief medical officer, demanded that people be banned from eating on trains because this encouraged a “snack culture”. As it happens, people who are a healthy weight tend to eat more often during the day than the lardbuckets (although they eat different things); but on this occasion I agree with Dame Sally, although not for the reasons that she advanced. Let me turn for a moment into Jacob Rees-Mogg.

    Eating food on public transport is undignified and an unpleasant imposition upon fellow passengers. It betokens a lack of that thing we once valued, deferred gratification; and also a lack of that other thing that we used to have in abundance, community spirit — a respect for the people around us.

    The question, then, is why this has happened. My suspicion is that it is because we have had imposed upon us for these past 30 or 40 years a highly individualistic culture, a laissez-faire approach to living in which everyone is enjoined to fill their boots, regardless of the effect this might have on society — because, as Margaret Thatcher once put it, there is no such thing as society.

    A lot of this has come from the neo-liberal right — the undermining of that fragile stuff that once held us together, the communitarian ethos. In its place we have an ever more transient society in which we don’t know our neighbours. But it has also come from the liberal left, with its insistence that we shouldn’t judge others, and certainly not by such bourgeois standards as whether or not they are behaving with dignity.

    The right has tried to abolish society. The left has tried to abolish blame and responsibility. Between them, they have just about succeeded.

    The price we all pay is much more than just the unpleasant stench from the Skank family’s noisome elevenses, of course. The fill your boots/don’t judge me culture is there in a countless number of our social ills — from extraordinary levels of personal debt to broken homes, from alcoholism to littering.

    So thank you, Dame Sally. But the truth is, the Skanks are the least of it.

    *My teenage daughter tells me that “Thot” is the insult du jour for a girl of questionable repute, an acronym of “that ho over there”.

    Climate change protest
    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/imageserver/image/methode%2Fsundaytimes%2Fprod%2Fweb%2Fbin%2F431f0dd6-ed04-11e9-9861-f093f6623161.jpg?crop=1500%2C1000%2C0%2C0&resize=600

    Bee-minus for maths
    Scientists have just discovered, with some surprise, that bees can count up to five.

    A leading member of the Wasp Democratic Alliance responded yesterday: “Well, that’s not going to get the useless, bumbling bastards very far, is it? I’m telling you, we have wasps who can solve Fermat’s last theorem and know exactly what Heisenberg was uncertain about.

    “Clod-hopping, pollen-laden idiots, bees. They can’t even sting properly without their arses falling off.”

    Extinction sounds awful: the album
    It takes a lot of commitment to take a week off work, if you work, and spend it sitting in the middle of London making people’s lives slightly more miserable than usual. All the more so if you have to do it while countless straggle-haired and possibly unshowered women are keening at you over an acoustic guitar.

    I was at the Extinction Rebellion protest last week (it was a cross between Glastonbury and Waitrose) and could take everything they flung at me apart from the folk singers. I never knew Joan Baez had so many musically challenged offspring. While listening to the tortured screaming, I finally embraced the notion that we’re all going to die very soon, and did so with warmth and expectation.

    Liberals win Nobel in taking offence
    Congratulations to Peter Handke on winning the 2019 Nobel prize in literature. I’ve always enjoyed his work, especially the play Offending the Audience, in which the cast inform the theatre-goers there will be no play and instead hurl insults at them. My kinda fella.

    Handke’s award has aroused anger among liberals because he supported the Serbs in the Bosnian War. The don Peter Frankopan argued, with numbing predictability, that his prize should have gone to a woman from somewhere else in the world. What, any woman?

    I looked this halfwit up. He and his wife are also hoteliers whose main, arduous, occupation is spending money from the Sainsbury family, of which the missus is part. There are none more insufferably, stupidly “woke” than those who have been given the earth.

    1. Rodders cooking on gas.
      But – he should know better than this deliberate misquote: …. “because, as Margaret Thatcher once put it, there is no such thing as society.”

    2. “I now never open a bottle until Thought for the Day has finished” – I thought it had been proven scientifically that Thought For The Day actually drives people to drink….

      1. Some woman who fell hook, line and sinker for the ‘fat is the Devil’s work’ school of thought.

  35. Well talks at the EU are still going on which indicates good progress is being made. I would expect a possible provisional announcement to be made later today as Boris will be back in London Monday morning for the Queens Speech

  36. Some remainer politicians are saying that we need another referendum to resolve Brexit, are they assuming that remain will win? do that think that will be the end of it if they do win, given now that everyone knows that the EU is not a friendly club for trade and for economic benefit, everyone now knows that we are part of an evil empire come superstate that we cannot leave and our electorate has no democratic ability to change or influence, that it has supreme control over everything we do and their agents are on the gravy train in every position of power and influence working for the benefit of the EU project and not for them, we are a country under occupation.

    1. Bob3, if Remain get to ask the question then they will win any referendum, it is as clear as day that there would not be a Leave option on any ballot organised by Remain. Whether or not they win the argument is another matter all together.

      1. How do they think that would resolve anything, do they think that over half the population at least will just do as they are told?

        2. Yes, they will believe that the people will do as they’re told. It’s the EU way and there are precedents in Ireland and Denmark of re-running referendums until the ‘correct’ answer was given. The people running Remain are imbued with the EU way of doing things; totally undemocratic, autocratic, repressive etc. The likes of Starmer et al. attempt to put on a face of reasonableness but behind that front are implacable EU apparatchiks. Brexit has exposed them and our problem is how can we defeat them. They hold Parliament with the Speaker’s support but do they hold the Country?
          Personally, I think a move to fix a referendum would cause an upset in this Country not seen for centuries: the Remainers have got it wrong.

          1. Keir Starmer was on the news this morning pushing for another referendum. He said that the vote should be a choice between whatever deal is brought back from the EU (by Labour or the Conservatives,) and Remaining. So in his view the choices are:

            1: Remain in the EU and give them massive control over the UK with the Withdrawal Agreement, or,
            2: Remain in the EU as we are now.

            Even if there is a Leave option on the ballot they ignored the last result, why would they not ignore the next one? That crazy Lib Dem bat has already said that she would not accept a vote to Leave if there were a second referendum.

          2. Just listening to John Redwood demolishing the second referendum scenario in discussion with Andrew Castle. Starmer has compromised his claims to be a democrat by his behaviour over Brexit. Totally untrustworthy like so many others in the HoC.

          5. And even if we have a general election, what guarantees do we have the ‘wrong’ (i.e. a stonking – or even marginal – majority for Leave supporting parties) would be respected?

  37. USA 12 vs 7 Tonga at half time, which flatters USA

    C’mon Japan (the game vs Whingeland in Yokohama is going ahead)

    The Whingers were cheering on Hurricane Haggis in the hope that it would wipe out the Ireland vs Samoa game and now deserve to lose (or win by a margin of less than 4 points which would send them back home)

  38. I just checke the pound/dollar rate.£1.00 = USD 1.26499
    For evey winner there is a loser. Never did understand how speculation works.

    1. I can help here.

      You invest some spare money into a plan that says ‘value can go up as well as down’ and then you lose your money while the investment company makes lots of it at your expense.

      You try a different company another year and the same happens. It’s like paying tax. You earn it, they spend it.

    2. We lent my cousin in the U.S. some money.
      When she paid it back, three years later, we made money because of the change in $/£ exchange rate, which sort of made up for the interest we didn’t make by investing it here.

    2. I have to produce id when I go to my local rubbish tip. I have to produce id when I collect a missed delivery from the Post Office. I have to produce id when I collect goods from certain shops.

    3. Sad Khant moaning about voter ID; you might think that he would have something to lose if it was implemented.😎

    4. He can’t be honest and say ‘Sheeet! My voter base will be obliterated if they cna’t cheat the system!’

      Even I find it hilarious that I can rock up to a polling booth and just tell them my name. I suppose they were made for a gentler, more honest time – circa 25 years ago.

    5. Sadie Khant talking utter BS as usual.
      It’s nothing to do with voter suppression, and he knows it.
      It’s about preventing voter fraud, something the left are very good at, and the racism of low expectations, i.e. those poor, dumb minority groups can’t manage to do anything for themselves so we’ve got to do it for them.
      He’s a vile, dishonest, a**hole.

    1. “You’ve Never Had It So Good.”
      From the days when SuperMac didn’t mean a gut busting triple burger.

    2. About the time Coronation Street started on the Telly, it just seems it was longer ago

    3. I shall start a petition for the return of sub editors. Well, I would if I had a DT sub. Which I haven’t.

    4. ‘Morning, OLT, the example of bad sentence construction given to us in Primary School was, “The piano was played by the lady, with thick legs..”

          1. 🙂 We all wore those thick divided skirts made of some serge type material.
            They were probably the most uncomfortable garments devised by mankind.

    5. I shall start a petition for the return of sub editors. Well, I would if I had a DT sub. Which I haven’t.

  42. Father Christmas Corbyn has added another gift to the List he is going to sort out all the seaside resorts

      2. Cannot be long before he comes up with Free Cocaine on the NHS. Labour and the Lib-Dem’s are fast moving in that direction plus benefits as well as most will claim to be incapable of working

        1. AND they tackle low and hard, very little of the chest high rubbish, where they can be shaken off.

    2. The half time analysis is very interesting. IM in particular.

      Townsend is really going to have to earn his corn in the Scottish dressing room.

        1. I should have thought that my inherent cynicism would have made it clear that I was being, er, cynical….

    2. “Who is going to lread the Rebellion against Extinction Rebellion?”

      May I insert the Jill Backson version of your first sentence.

  46. Why are the police failing to properly real with the protesters. It is not as if there are that many of them. Even dafter is in central London today the policed have roads closed and there are no protesters there. Id it to make it easier for them to set up camp again on Monday

    I am not suggesting jailing them but give them say a £500 fine and ban them from Central London

  47. Thomas Cook collapse a big threat to Spain’s tourist industry

    This cannot be true it has to be fake news. The EU keeps telling us that the UK is not importent to them and are not concerned at us leaving.

    1. Polish lawmaker, Dominik Tarczyński.: “The communists used to fight against the family, the church, and national identity,” the MP explained.

      “We are now getting back our dignity as Christians, as Poles, as Europeans, and they don’t want us to take this dignity back; they don’t want us to win — but we have to fight for our Christian roots, for our Christian culture, for the principles of Roman law and Greek philosophers,” he added.

      “This is what they hate. They hate values, they hate virtues, and we are fighting for values and virtues. They don’t like it. They like Muslims, they like cheap labour, and [migrants] who will vote for them — but it’s not going to happen; we’re going to save Europe, and I’m serious about it.”

      Let’s hope he’s right.

    1. Except they are currently playing into Scotland’s hands.

      They were much more successful playing it through the hands, not via close drives.

  51. Russia ‘bombed four hospitals in Syria in four hours’, report finds. Evan Hill. 2 hours ago.

    Russian Air Force has long been accused of striking hospitals in support of Assad’s campaign, now evidence traces a series of attacks earlier this year directly to Russian pilots.

    This article is a clone of one from the New York Times that produced a ridiculous story last week about the “secret” Russian organisations seeking to overthrow the EU. Like that, this one will do the rounds and appear in all the usual suspects. The question we have to ask about this particular piece is how many bloody hospitals does an isolated terrorist organisation have to have destroyed before it runs out of them? Quite inadvertently (I’m sure) the answer is provided in the last paragraph.

    “The truth is that after hospitals are hit, and in areas like this where there is just one hospital, our houses have become hospitals.”

    So there you are. While ever there’s a house standing there’s a hospital!

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/russia-syria-bomb-hospitals-war-kurds-putin-assad-idlib-a9153786.html

    1. The problem of course is that we no longer believe anything that the media throw at us. They have cooked their goose too many times.

      1. Yes, Cry Wolf is a fairy story but it enshrines a truth. We haven’t of course yet gotten to the latter part where the PTB require us to believe what they tell us to save their arses but one suspects their fate will be the same as the boy!

  53. More than 1,000 police will secure the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge in Pakistan next week as the couple begin a visit the country hopes will dispel its image as a terrorist haven blighted by violence

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2019/10/13/1000-police-secure-duke-duchess-cambridge-pakistan-hopes-visit/

    We know in our hearts that Pakistan is a terrorist haven blighted by violence .. and especially towards educating women , the polio campaign , arrange marriages , corruption , money laundering, Halal, marrying cousins , in breeding and vicious behaviour all round.

    The Cambridges are being used as stooges .. and sadly one in the eye towards India .

    1. If something does happen to Prince William (and we can be sure one of these Islamic State travelling mercenaries let loose by Erdogan would be more than willing to bag him), then we must hope that the Queen and the Prince of Wales live long enough to keep us from a Sussex regency until Prince George comes of age.

    4. “one in the eye towards India”

      Not a very smart move. Actually, perhaps the stupidest thing ever done by any member of the Royal family in the last century, including visiting the German Chancellor.

  54. Phew – just getting my breath back…{:¬))

    Some cracking BTL comments on the Telegraph and the Grimes about yer Scots…..

    Not over popular, it appears…!!

          1. As far as I understand it, although one may not be able to read “premium” articles, one can still see the BTL comments. Although not be able to comment, obviously.

    1. Genuine question: Does anyone recall Mr Carney ever being right on any subject since the day he was appointed?

        1. As you indicate when it comes to fertilising the sward they are, how shall I put it, Assiduous……

      4. He was installed to replace King because King kept telling Brown he was a moron risking the economy. Brown didn’t like being told the truth.

  56. Are we heading for a climate apocalypse? Not again. James McSweeney. 13 October 2019.

    I was five years old when the world first ended. That was in 2000, the year that a United Nations official predicted 11 years before that entire nations would be wiped out by rising sea levels. Since then, I have survived the Arctic melting on at least six separate occasions (2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2018), to say nothing of the geopolitical chaos that followed the oil shortages of 2015. As of last year, my troubles have been worsened by the complete submersion of the Maldives, which has narrowed my holiday options.

    This week, as I ventured into London to shop for a woolly jumper and flippers ahead of next year’s ‘Siberianisation’ of England and disappearance of the Arctic, I was surprised to be confronted with a street full of lively campers with placards. Above the Extinction Rebellion protesters I encountered the words ‘Tell the truth’ and an image of a skull emblazoned on a large pink banner. A young woman patiently explained to those gathered that the planet was headed for catastrophe. Again, I thought? I asked her for an exact date so I could add it to the calendar I keep tacked to the wall of my bunker. Frustratingly, she wasn’t quite sure.

    The whole thing is pretty good!

    https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2019/10/are-we-heading-for-a-climate-apocalypse-not-again/

    1. Was amused to read certain Extinction Rebellion characters are not happy with the consequences of their newly-acquired criminal records. “Nobody told us” is the cry. More likely they were happy to accept to accept £400 a week expenses (funded by who, I wonder?) but didn’t read the small print regarding being ‘useful idiots’.

      Read a suggestion that those who disrupt air travel should be put on a ‘no-fly’ list, with the logic that they who inconvenience others should suffer a similar fate. Surely this wouldn’t upset these ardent anti-flyers you might ask? Not so, last Christmas one of ER’s upper echelon sent pictures of himself in Bali. Don’t think he walked or cycled there, or has super-rich friend with racing yacht to transport him.

      1. The criminal record element well might be the best way to deal with this. Give them the maximum sentence permissible but suspended, so that they don’t clog up prisons.
        The criminal record with the sentence length might be sufficient to curtail their travel quite considerably as visas can be refused.

        1. Plus a ban on going with a mile of any airport; government office; Palace of Westminster…..

          1. Indeed.
            The airport one might spoil quite a few holiday trips to exotic locations.

            It might also make it difficult for them to get jobs. Yes, yes I know, but it might make a few take notice..

  57. What crap is this? I do not like the opening, “Sign this deal,” as I, and many others, have grave doubts about what Johnson is up to. As for, “or let us go,” what is that all about? This idea that we have to ask the EU permission to walk away from their fetid and corrupt club seems common currency among too many people. We are in the position to take our own decision to just walk away and Brussels’ consent is NOT required. Poor script from a Brexit entity.

    https://twitter.com/BrexitCentral/status/1183291418762235904

    1. Afternoon all from sunny Portugal – we’re waiting to be picked up now to go to the airport.

      We have never needed an agreement or deal to leave the bl..dy EU, people seem to have been brainwashed into accepting that we do. It’s all a bl..dy great big con. We should have just left after the 2 years were up. Have not kept up with what’s happening or not happening and the news doesn’t seem to have changed in the last week.

  58. Police across country put on standby for London’s million-plus protest day- ( next Saturday ) –
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/oct/13/police-on-standby-london-peoples-vote-extinction-rebellion-million-plus-protest-day
    I do not believe the one million figure; whatever, this immense disruption should simply not be permitted. If it was a pro-Brexit demonstartion if would be banned automatically.
    Next time there is a fuss about how they handle these things in China, Egypt, or Turkey, I will tell you which side I will be on.

    3. I watched some of the footage of that big march they had back in October 2018, and the organisers on the ground said that there were “around 200,000” people there, which I took with a pinch of salt as the left are known for massive exaggerations (lies) about their support. Then in the headline reviews that night, the Guardian had more than tripled the organisers figures(!) Clearly playing the “sheer fantasy” card to pretend that stopping Brexit was popular. The Police had declined to comment on numbers. No surprise there.

      Not long ago the “official estimates” of the numbers were released and it was around 250,000 (which still seems far too high, but what can you do.) You have got to hand it to the Guardian though. Tripling the figures reported by the organisers themselves. That takes some corruption.

      Guardian 700,000 story:
      https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/live/2018/oct/20/peoples-vote-march-london-second-referendum-brexit-live

      “Real figures” of 250,000 story:
      https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2019/01/05/peoples-vote-march-attended-third-number-organisers-claimed/

    2. Regrettably there are millions of cars displaying the yellow stars on numberplates indicating slave ownership….

      1. I covered the EU circle with our countries flag and the letters “UK” 5 years ago, and it is only now starting to fade slightly. Like so many other things.

        But I can easily buy another set. They are very inexpensive on Amazon.

    3. I appreciate they’re thick, but in what way is leaving the EU treason? Against whom? Treason is betraying the country toa foreign power. The EU is retaking power from that foreign power.

      It is the exact opposite of treason.

      Little Britain? By leaving the EU we stand independent, great again.

      Dear life. The cognitive dissonance of the Left is boggling. They’re deranged.

    2. Ha ha ha!
      See that fitting its own snow chains to cross the mountains! And check & secure its own load!
      Ha ha ha!

      Just fitted the chains on Firstborn’s tractor. Hard work, that.

          2. Where has he gone?

            I seem to remember he disappeared before only to return a month or two later.

          4. Are you saying he has gone off like a Bear with a sore head?

            I quite like his forthright no-nonsense posts even when I’m occasionally in the firing line!

          5. Grizzly does his own thing. Sometimes here, and when he’s had enough he goes, without tantrum or huff, just quietly leaves. Pretty civilised, IMO.

            He seems to have found contentment. Good for him.

          8. He’s probably thoroughly pissed offf with the constant repetition & echoing of posts.

        2. Dunno.
          It’s not insurmountable, but even so, difficult to account for local conditions.

          1. Au contraire – realism.

            I saw an article a few months back about an electric heavy vehicle (something to do with road making or mixing concrete – can’t remember) which took 12 hours to charge for a two hour working time.

  61. Ministers have now been briefed on the proposed deal and its progress to date. It looks if we are heading towards concluding a deal short of a last minute fallout

    1. A sell out? I say from the Algarve as we prepare to fly home later. 22 degrees and sunny.

  62. I understand the Caledonians (but none of Scots NoTTLers) are blaming the referee…..

    Little changes….

    1. That would be the referee who argued that Gray should not be sent off, where in every other match so far he would have been.

      1. The very one. He’s a Kiwi – New Zealanders never get sent off – so why should he create a precedent?

  63. Great Eastern Run Cancelled half hour before the start on police advice following suspicious activities

  64. Why Britain’s first saint almost 50 years could hold key to reform in Catholic Church

    I know he has his fingers in many pots, but did not realise the fellow in the purple hat (next door but one to Charles) Jeremy Korbynski

    was a cardinal

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/news/2019/10/13/TELEMMGLPICT000212882678_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqAiJQrZkdRSYRHeCDHXkbf6Ii28cHE832aQ649NGemwU.jpeg?imwidth=1240

    The prince of Wales attends a Mass for the canonisation of 19th-century British cardinal John Henry Newman

    2. It has already sort of been reforming or rather pushing it back to the people so things like birth control are now down to the individual and is not as such a sine although the church is still notionally against it

  65. Extinction Rebellion

    I think the aim off this bunch of anarchist is to wipe out the population

    Their stories are not totally consistent but broadly we cease in a few years time using all fossil fuels. Slaughter most animals. All but ban fling and ships. Now given the UK imports about 60% of its good that would be a massive problem. Getting in goods through the channel tunnel will probably be ok as long as the wind is blowing but the tunnels capacity is tiny

    All non electric train services would cease and be replaced by what? Horse drawn trains perhaps

    All non battery powered cars would be banned. How hey would be charged is another mystery as well where all these cars would suddenly come from

    All UK cereal production would all bus cease as the tractors and etc needed are diesel powered

    I guess we go back to using horses and even there its a problem as the type of horse nee is all but extinct in the UK

    Gas cooking and Central heating would also be banned

      2. #MeToo

        Loved the banning of …”ban fling and ships.” and “…UK imports about 60% of its good…”. That begs the question, is the remaining 40% bad and endemic?

      3. I presume much s predictive text, such as using a tablet to post. It’s good, but not ‘that’ good to type on.

  66. Apologies if this has already been posted: the second part of Peter Hitchens’ article.
    A Guy Gibson’s dog moment.

    “Hate speech is no crime – so long as you’re a vicious Lefty

    What would you think would happen to a man who posted on Twitter the following words: ‘I dearly wish a reactivated IRA would successfully blow up that scumbag Johnson and his evil cabinet’?

    Given what happened in Brighton on October 12, 1984, is this not especially revolting?

    Lest we forget, the IRA, by planting a bomb in the Grand Hotel, murdered Sir Anthony Berry, Eric Taylor, Lady (Jeanne) Shattock, Lady (Muriel) Maclean and Roberta Wakeham.

    Many others were severely injured, including Lord (Norman) Tebbit and his wife Margaret. Not funny.

    Surely the police, who relentlessly patrol Twitter for signs of political incorrectness, failures to respect the transgender community and so forth, would react with speed and strength?

    Well, more than a month after the offending tweet was posted on August 20, they did visit the author, a Mr Mark Powell who tweets under the name ‘Markhayo’.

    But there was no heavy-footed dawn raid, of the type so often favoured by the modern police.

    Nor was his house suddenly flooded by officers going through his bedroom, as happened to Field Marshal Lord Bramall after a mad fantasist accused him of child abuse.

    No, he got a wimpy letter from a police person saying, with almost unbelievable feebleness, and a clear signal that he was in no danger of prosecution: ‘I apologise for the unsolicited nature of this letter, and do not wish to cause you any undue alarm; however, I do need to discuss some sensitive issues that may concern you. I would like to stress that this letter has not been sent as part of any criminal proceedings, nor are you in any trouble whatsoever.’

    It sought to arrange a ‘convenient time to meet’.

    Mr Powell displayed this letter on Twitter, saying the police had been ‘very civil’. But he hadn’t been. He boasted that he’d sworn at the officers, and refused to withdraw his words.

    He later apologised for the swearing in an email to the officers, but repeated that ‘I shouldn’t be sorry to see this Cabinet of traitors blown up by a rejuvenated IRA’. He then posted that email on Twitter.

    One of those who had reported the outburst, a Tory councillor from Aylesbury called Gary Powell (emphatically no relation), got in touch with me after getting nowhere with Scotland Yard.

    He’d been told by a ‘staff officer’ to Commissioner Cressida Dick that the National Digital Exploitation Service and the National Counter Terrorism Security Office had deemed the tweet to be an offence.

    But because it was a single incident, nothing was done except ‘words of advice’. So there you are. You can call for the IRA to blow up the Cabinet, and nothing will happen to you.

    Alison Saunders, then Director of Public Prosecutions, announced in August 2017 a tough new policy for people who incited hatred on Twitter.

    Saunders said: ‘Left unchallenged, even low-level offending can subsequently fuel the kind of dangerous hostility that has been plastered across our media in recent days. That is why countering it is a priority for the CPS.’ Obviously not in all cases.

    Someone should tell Norman Tebbit, who knows in great detail what it is like to be blown up by the IRA. He might have some ‘words of advice’ for Dame Cressida.”

      1. If it the EU accept the deal we will have to wait probably until Monday to see the details. There seems to be Key differences between May ‘s deal and Boris’s deal in that Boris’s deal takes us out of the Customs Union & Single Market
        At the moment it is not totally clear what the replacement for the backstop will be. It seems as if the NI parliament well be able to end the arrangement . The other bit of the plan seems to be the UK will collect the tariffs for good going across the NI border and forward them to the EU

        2. Key difference? Not if everything else is the same.

          Edit I also thought that we were NOT going to be the EU’s tariff collector – we won’t be paid for our trouble and admin.

          1. If we are out of the Customs Union and Single Market and the backstop is resolved what is the problem ?

          6. How do you know? Just without backstop. What IS the proposed new deal in all of its aspects then?

          7. Full details are not know but it takes us out of the Single Market & Customs Union. There is confusion over the position of NI some are starting NI will be half in and half out of the Customs Union others are saying NI will be out but because of the Land Border a fudge is proposed which seems to mean the UK will collect the tariiffs for goods going across the Land Border. WE will have to wait and see the details

            What is clear though that control goes to the NI parliament they can pull out of the deal if they wish

          8. Do you actually know what the rest of the “deal” is, including the PD? Do you know what is in those poisonous documents? From what you are writing, you have been asleep for the last couple of years..

    2. The BBC Radio this morning, either 5 Live or Radio 4 were talking about a group of “Rebel” Remainers who were preparing to scuttle the agreement as their aim is to stop Brexit altogether. I suspect the EU will reject the deal anyway. I just hope Boris is prepared for a rebuff and can get us out cleanly and on time.

      2. I don’t see how they can vote against a deal, having passed legislation to enforce one. Oh wait, they don’t actually want Brexit…

      4. As I understand it the EU have already provisionally agreed the deal but they will need to vote on the final deal

        The last vote in Westminster was just an indicative vote. The vote on this deal will be whipped so should get through the commons if they can get the DUP on side

        1. It seems to me that the only folk being whipped are those who had the temerity to vote leave….

  69. It appears that Ken Clark was on the radio in the Midlands indicating he may vote for Boris’s deal which came as quite a shock. I though he was a definite vote against it

    1. That depends on what the deal is. If it is only as you describe, I’m not surprised Clark would vote for it.

          3. is that “No, better.” or “No better – might be worse.”

            See the difference that accurate punctuation might make.

        2. On the backstop – or completely different? I’ve only read that it is the former. That is gaol for the UK while the EU asset strip the UK, PLUS we pay them a fortune to do it.

          1. Until there is a clear definition of what Johnson has agreed and that it turns out to be opposite of May’s capitulation, I’m with you. Why would the EU give up the chance to completely dominate and ruin this country?
            I do hope that Johnson and his team are on the ball and are not getting carried away by promises of success. The EU are notorious for their long-winded and worded legislation that leaves much to interpretation and then having the ECJ rule on any disputes.
            I await Martin Howe QC’s diagnosis of the “deal”. If there’s anything iffy he and his team will find and expose it.

          2. But such exposure will not make Johnson and the other turncoats change what passes for their minds.

          2. NO probs. poppiesmum. I often have unfinished points and leave the last part unwritten, many times by three dot ellipses. Just my way, and probably rather lazy of me!

        1. HL,
          In my book a deal in any shape or form = continued attachment
          total severance = clean break.
          After a short period of time get a trusted patriotic, politico, from a proven patriotic UK party to accept calls from brussels.
          Any signs of dictatorial rhetoric incoming the phone goes down.
          The UK dictates what it wants going forward.
          We have, over four decades, had enough political sh!te surely well past time to take another tack, inclusive of common sense,
          decency, & self respect.

      1. If the rumour are correct no as Boris;s deal it appear it takes us out off the single market and customs union

        1. The mainland perhaps, not NI tho which will remain in both the single market and the customs union and a hard border down the Irish Sea, the deal that Theresa May said no British politician could ever vote for.

  70. “The Budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled,
Public Debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be
tempered and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be
curtailed, lest Rome will become bankrupt. People must again learn to work
 instead of living on public assistance.” – Cicero, 55 BC

    1. The same problems crop up time and again throughout history, and yet ‘we’ learn nothing. The lunatics are always in charge, doing the same thing over and over again with the expectation things will change.

    2. The key thing is the Deficit and they started of with a plan to eliminate he deficit. They keep missing the target and then decide to drop the idea of eliminating the deficit which is crazy . Whilst we have a deficit the National debt keeps growing and remember we have to pay interest on that as well

      What the politicians like to do is express the National debt as a percentage of GDP as that makes it sound less.

          1. Quite a few that win the lottery do.. I Guess quite a number of those living on benefit play the lottery and they have not a clue as to how to budget

            Most of the so called poverty in the UK is down to people that are simply incapable of budgeting if they have a £100 a week they will be broke if they win £1M they will be broke just takes them a bit longer to go broke

      2. The problem is summed up by this statement:

        “We need these new taxes to decrease the deficit.” (Cameron)

        Politicians do not understand taxation. They think that if they take more, they have more. In reality, it’s like mugging a child:
        Tthe kid doesn’t buy those sweets.
        The shop loses the sale.
        Over time, the higher taxes the shop pays put it out of business.
        The two people who ran it are now out of work.
        They can’t find new work for a variety of reasons.
        They live on welfare.
        The state has to pay more to support the people they, through taxation have put out of work.

        The cost of unemployment always outweighs the income from the new/higher taxes.

        If the state wants to raise money it has two choices:

        1. Cut taxes.

        2. See 1.

        You can argue to reduce welfare and I’d agree with that, but the reality is that this doesn’t push people to employment, it creates a black economy where less tax is raised. Cutting taxes means the state has to do less. Comically, people always argue that the shortfall should be made up by soemthing else. Why? Why must the state remain the size it is? It is ineffficient, expensive and failing.

        1. The other false claim of the politicians is that for every £1 we borrower it generates £5 of revenues,

  71. Labour in confusion again Keir Starmer saying there needs to be a referendum on the deal and Cobyn says No

  72. Nicola states she want an Independence vote within weeks. THe media does not seem to have picked up on this

    1. I can think of millions of folk who will vote for dear Nicola to be totally independent from the UK….

    2. I approve. Let’s give her an independence vote and this time, England gets included.

      Scottish independence here you go! Of course, the withdrawal agreement we will insist upon will: state you continue to use the pound. That you must run a budget surplus of 20%. That you cannot borrow money from anywhere except the UK treasury, at 400% interest. That you must send all your trade through England, to be inspeccted or siezed without recompense. That wee have access to your oil and you give it up permanently. That you surrender your waters for English fishing. That the Scottish never again have a say in UK affairs – but have to obey all English laws, espeecially tax ones. The absolute end of all subsidy and monies from the UK and repayment – with interest set by the UK at amounts the UK will set to end when the UK says they will.

      Frankly, compared to May’s hideous withdrawal agreement that’s pretty mild.

      1. Scotland’s Oil?
        I wonder. Many decades ago I remember seeing a map shewing how the North Sea had been divided into National Oil Exploration Areas.
        Basically, when the line of the border between two countries reached the coast it was projected out on the same bearing.
        If one now looks at the border between England and Scotland when it reaches Meg’s Dubb, just North of Berwick and project that out into the North Sea, it continues in a North East direction placing a lot of the waters off Aberdeen in the English OEA.

  73. Current state of play(Provisional)

    ERG Onside
    CUP Onside
    Conservatives on side
    Ex Conservatives (Excluding ones gone to Lib-Dems) most are on side)
    Labour who knows which way Corbyn will go but a few Labour Rebels will come onside

      1. Offside rule for women …

        You’re in a shoe shop, 2nd in line before the till.
        Behind the till is a pair of shoes you absolutely don’t need, so are naturally desperate for.
        However, the girl in front of you also doesn’t need them, therefore is equally desperate to buy them.
        You’ve both left your purses at home, but your friend is out shopping, senses your desperation and throws you her purse, ahead of the other girl.
        As soon as the purse has left her hands. you are able to slip round the girl in front to catch it.
        Remember, until the purse has left your friend’s hands, it would be wrong to jump in front of the other shopper.
        That would be offside.

        Does that help – foxhole here i come …

        1. Why would you buy shoes you don’t need?

          Why would you go shopping without your purse?

          How would the friend know you wanted to buy shoes you didn’t need?

    2. Before death? What will they do with it? gGve it to a nurses college for training purposes?
      Or after death? Who cares?

      1. Ha! Had to snigger during “Come ye thankful people come” and ” We plough the fields and scatter” to the references to rain – it was bucketing down! I have a flood outside my studio because the drain can’t cope with the downpour.

    2. Just back from the Harvest Festival Service and I nearly stood up and blasted the Vicar for his load of twaddle on environmental care and the BS he spouted about Carbon Dioxide and the current poverty In Africa as if we, the evil British Empire, didn’t try to get them to help themselves but that they’re too idle and fecund to try looking after themselves – despite the means being available.

      Best Beloved tried shushing me because I insisted on saying the Lord’s Prayer as I was taught (and understood some of the archaic English) and as I loved it for the sentiment it expressed. The modern version might well be the local Bus Time-table for all the magic and feeling that it fails to deliver.

      No creed – just another load of twaddle. Small wonder we oldies shun the chrch.

      2. Have to say our vicar is strictly neutral and just said we should take care of the gifts God had given us, although he did say we should share with those who had less. The Lord’s Prayer is always as in the BCP, although other prayers have been “modernised”. I, too, stick to the old wording, including in the hymns.

  80. A little late in the day to damage Bercow and probably too late to have an effect on his performance this coming Saturday. However, the very fact that people, including those in the legal profession, are going after those in public life and especially those sucking on the public teat, could make the next Speaker think twice before going rogue. Bercow has set dangerous precedents in behaviour and whoever follows must be made fully aware that any attempts to emulate him will not be tolerated.

    https://twitter.com/rebeccabutlerm2/status/1183411822587731970

  81. That’s me for this grey, damp day. Enlivened by the best rugger match I have seen in years.

    A demain (in the rain).

    1. Don’t forget that the highlights are on at 8pm ours 7pm Scottish time on ITV 4.
      Well worth a replay!

  83. Trouble with some of London’s Electric Buses

    Having them disappear off road for months on end but this is the first time I am aware off they have actually withdrawn some

    Metroline’s five early production BYD electric double-decks at Willesden (BYD 1471-75) were summarily withdrawn from service on 4th October, although the reason has not been announced.

    1. He states it clearly, but even the dimmest of Remainers must all see the hypocrisy in demanding a second referendum because they lost the first.

    1. You are forced to ask yourself how much weight and gravitas should be applied to the small-minded, virtue-signalling, political ravings of a clearly brainwashed individual who gives himself the name:

      hotboykennedy

      Unless it is a delicate play-on-words based upon the political history of the United States of America. But I think that we all know that it is not.

  87. Goodnight, everyone. I’m turning in early as I have a busy day tomorrow; funeral early and racing in the evening, assuming the gannet eats up (I didn’t manage to go last Saturday because the delicate little flower left her meal and was withdrawn). TTFN.

        1. Two pack paint and Greased Lightning “Showroom Shine” and an absolute bu@@er to keep it looking that way with wet, grit and mud laden ropes……

    1. Why are they against it? Is it because they don’t want to stop illegal immigrants from voting, or those who have no identification to vote? Or those sub letting many times over to be prevented?

      This is important to stop voter fraud. Comically, whenever the Left talk about democracy what they really mean is fascism.

    3. If this were to be true then Erdogan knows as a NATO member “An attack on one is an attack on all” – Time to change the terms of reference in the case of adventurism.

          1. Yes, so if Syria fights back then does the “one for all and all for one” clause count? Does NATO mobilise in this case?

          2. I think our Government would see what a national anti- war march on parliament really looks like.

          5. I am keeping my whereabouts secret.

            Not many of us left who have operated on Proper Aircraft Carriers

          7. Don’t bank on anything with Trump. It all depends on what comes into his head at any given time.

    4. Aftenposten reports Syrian forces moving towards Turkey’s border, so can easily be right.
      :-((

      1. Except that Syria is backed by the Russkis, and Erdogan did order one of their planes shot down not too long ago. They just might to balance the books.

  92. Watching the highlights of Scotland vs Japan and listening to the commentators, I’m glad that the match went ahead, even though I would have been very happy if it had been cancelled to send Japan through.

    The fact that it was played AND Japan won means that we won’t have to listen to four years of Scottish whingeing about how they was robbed by a typhoon!

    1. Um, thanks. You have already pointed out that Scotland was signed up to going out on a cancellation, not having done well enough to stay in.

      PS: We was robbed by the ref.

      1. Ho ho.
        That will be the same ref who let Mr Gray stay on the pitch when in every other match so far he would have been out for at least 10 and probably 50 minutes?
        };-O

        1. Yes, that one. I’ve replied to you further down (or up). I thought red card, but on viewing the re-runs just yellow.
          I’m not much impressed by the refs. The ref in the Welsh match completely lost the plot in the last five minutes.

          1. Oddly enough, I agreed with the commentator who said something along the lines of “incidents of rugby.”
            The precedent was set the wrong way too early in the competition

            The problem I have seen is that players now appear to deliberately duck into the tackles, hoping for yellow and red cards.

            Spear tackles, off.
            Well above the horizontal, where it looks deliberate, off.
            Clothes-lining, off
            But head on 50/50 leave well alone.

            Either that or change the rules so that ALL tackles must be below the waist and no offloads allowed after the tackle, when the carrier’s knees touch the ground.

            I think it might make the game more free flowing. I get very bored with pick and drive, pass and drive ad nauseam.

          2. I broadly agree. My yellow was in line with what the refs have supposedly been doing, albeit inconsistently. After, all no sensible person deliberately hits someone else with their own head (not if they have an Austin 7 starting handle).
            The tackling by the Uruguayan team was exemplary, old-fashioned low tackles. They made lots of them.
            The game is surely about running and not about great lumpy forwards bashing into each other. The recent popularity of the maul has added great volumes of dullness.

          3. Final thought. If the ball carrier attempts to jump out of a tackle it is dangerous play. Maybe ducking might be the same – difficult to define etc?

    1. Well if he had not given Turkey the OK to go to war in Syria, this would not be an issue. If the Turks are not reined in, the Kurds will go the way of the Armenians.

        2. Well reported here across the board (and on the record), when Erdogan and Trump got together. Trump only started back pedaling when the Senate GOP raised h*** about it. Even then his first action was to defend his decision by saying he had promised to pull US forces out of the Middle East, and that’s what he was doing. But Erdogan is another pseudo dictator that Trump admires, along with Kim and Putin, so he will not do anything much except bluster.

          2. Please link your ”on the record” evidence.

            If you only have the fake news media such as WAPO, NYT or CNN keep on looking..

      1. It was posted as far as I can ascertain on Sept,10.19
        Source, Harvard University press, 97.
        Regardless of when, the only change in lab is to get progressively worse.

    3. The Left have never understood or accepted that their miserable ideology has slaughtered hundreds of millions.

      Some kiddie fool once said ‘how many people has capitalism killed?’ – the answer is none. It’s an economic approach, not a social construct. Communist misery is where the EU will end. It is inevitable.

    4. I thought Blair got rid of the Red Flag as Labour’s “hymn”.

      The working class can kiss my a***,
      I’ve got the foreman’s job at last.
      So now that we are on the dole,
      You can stick that Red Flag up your ****.

      Much better words.

      1. Evening Jtl,
        Been there come out the office whistling it after receiving the key to the elite bog.

  96. Ms Krankie has refused to rule out a separate Scotland having a hard
    border with England as she confirmed she will ask Boris Johnson for a
    referendum within the next few weeks

    The only ‘true’ way ahead, for a referendum affecting the make uo of UK, is for ALL UKers to vote

    The separation of Scotland from England MUST not cost us a penny and we are paid for our previous investment up there

    Barnett can get on the Clapham Omnibus

    No MPs for Scottish Constituences to vote at Westminster after the result is declared

    Scotland Rugby team to play in ‘2nd Tier’

    UK minus not to give any Defence Contracts to Scotland

    Visas will be required for them to travel South.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2019/10/13/nicola-sturgeon-fails-rule-separate-scotland-having-hard-border/

    1. With apols to our friends in Scotland it has already been suggested that all that’s required is to rebuild Hadrian’s wall with lettuce….

          6. In January 2018, it was announced that Colman’s was to leave its base in Norwich where the condiment has been produced for 160 years and would move its production to Burton-on-Trent and Germany. ( wiki)

          7. That’s really sad, JN. I recall a Norfolk Broads holiday many years ago when we sailed past the Colmans factory. Essentially, you’re saying that “English Mustard” no longer exists… :-((

    2. Much as I rejoice when Scotland lose in the rugby, I would not wish to lose them to the EU.

      1. I think, if we ‘all’ voted, the results

        Scotland would vote to remain
        England would vote for them to leave
        Northern Ireland would be a draw
        Ireland would demand to be included
        Wales would be a draw (they would be looking to be the next to leave)

        The folk in swathes of ‘English’ multi-culti towns would abstain (as they do not know where Scotland is), unless Mr Rashid ‘helped’ them

        1. Scotland has no money. It has no indsutry of note. It’s poor. It is dependent on English money.

          Were it to vote to be independent it doesn’t meeet the criteria to join the EU. However, as the EU is an expansionist state, it wil happily soak up Scotland. However, Scotland is a net drain, so it means even more mouths to feed, accelerating it’s demise.

          Of course, when Scotland begs to be readmitted we bring it to it’s knees and stop having it as the boat anchor, make it stand on it’s own two feet and then, as partners we step forward into the world together. One can dream.

          Oh dear. How sad. Never mind.

  97. I do believe that a cricketer campaign has got to be mounted if ever a time that a boycott was called for it is now.
    Seemingly the only non halal bread is Hovis, I also believe that Tesco’s are removing it from their shelves.
    Every last loaf of Warburtons is halal,there is a symbol on the products to look out for.
    Mccains oven chips have also submitted.
    It will be a short list shortly of what is not halal.
    Our house is a Hovis house.

      1. Do they realise that Grindr and Tinder after going through the Blendr might get the users thrown off the skyscraper

      2. Evening GG,
        Wheat the unhealthy whole grain,
        I jest not when I say the slaughter of wheat should be top of the menu.
        For conformation check out Dr William Davis author of
        Wheat belly, see U tube.

        1. I bake my own (well, the breadmaker does). I use Waitrose Canadian and Very Strong White Bread Flour. I’m able to sleep soundly at night, safe in the knowledge that Mr Trudeau would never allow such barbaric practices in his nation… Probably…

          1. Try Morrisons organic white bloomer and their brown sour dough its the size of a paving slab and very good. also morrisons crumpets are the best i have ever had.

          3. Ditto except I use 300 grams of Waitrose Canadian Wholemeal and 200 grams of Canadian & Very Strong White Bread Flour in every loaf…

          4. Not keen on wholemeal. I have the Panasonic (stupidly expensive) Croustina breadmaker, which is designed to (and succeeds in making) very crusty loaves. When I have the time, I do their ‘simple sourdough culture’, with the aforementioned Canuck stuff. Once it has proved, after 12 hours, I’ll add more of the same, or their Seeded Malted Bread Flour. It’s actually rather bloody marvellous… :-))

          5. I’ve got the Panasonic SD 2500 – and often add multigrains. Very occasionally I’ll add some fennel seeds which when the bread is toasted and there’s lashings of butter and marmalade I find exquisite!

          7. He Kneeds to get with the programme – It takes me about 2 minutes to assemble the ingredients and the machine does the rest perfectly every time (over 10 years experience).

          8. Indeed. The only issue i have is that the sourdough culture is the most effective adhesive known to mankind. The slightest, stray, drop in the sink requires nothing less than a hammer and chisel to remove it…

  98. You can almost set your watch by these barstewards’ actions. They’re treating Johnson just as they treated May. For goodness sake Johnson, just pull the negotiating(sic) team out and come home.

    MICHEL BARNIER tonight warned EU capitals it will be “very difficult” to strike a Brexit deal in time for this week’s European leaders summit unless Boris Johnson offers further concessions.

    Express – Barnier Demands Further Concessions

    1. I recently got myself into hot water with most of my Facebook friends (lovely people, but Lefties almost to a woman/man) by posting a meme which listed all the apocalytic predictions on climate change which have been made over the last 50 years. The alarmists have been wrong so many times, for so many years (and have also been caught out fiddling their figures to make their models match reality) that it doesn’t seem unreasonable to be slightly cynical of this latest ‘climate emergency.’ And this time, instead of a besuited politician/businessman like Al Gore, they are using a 16 year-old autistic child as their spokesperson. Kind of like a child soldier, you can’t really win against Greta, I mean who could possibly criticise such a cutie? You big meanie!

        1. I actually feel quite sorry for her. She is being used and manipulated by her parents and other shadowy backers. I think she genuinely believes that only she can save the world from this looming ‘mass extinction event.’ At least Al Gore was a grown man who could stand up for himself. Using an autistic child in this way is nothing short of child abuse.

          4. It is so easy to research the yawning gap between the predictions and the reality. As for instance…

            http://humansarefree.com/2018/01/al-gores-10-global-warming-predictions.html

            I am sick to death of our young people being needlessly frightened that they won’t get to grow up “because climate change.” One FB friend asked me why scientists would make this stuff up? Well, just check Al Gore’s bank statement and it might give you a clue! Also, there is a real hard-Left, anti-West/capitalism streak to the greenie movement. As James Delingpole says, they are watermelons!

          5. It’s worse than you can ever imagine the propaganda aimed at infant and primary school children is unforgivable!

          6. I know. I think it is just another front in the war against Western civilisation (along with the transgender madness). The biggest world polluters are China and India, but they never seem to be on the receiving end of ER’s ire. I wonder why?

          7. You are an ER protester in China.
            Next stop re-education camp for 10 years.
            Does that answer your question?

          15. The Greenies have to keep the climate hysteria going, otherwise people might start to question why their taxes and heating bills have to go up to fix this ‘problem.’ So, they have to keep going with the frightening predictions. But here’s the rub – nobody cares if you make predictions in the far future, who is going to spend trillions now to fix climate change in 500 years? So you have to go with the ‘100 months to save the world’ type predictions (how’s that working out HRH? Oh yes, https://www.climatedepot.com/2019/07/16/prince-charles-at-it-again-issues-yet-another-climate-tipping-point-deadline-after-previous-100-month-deadline-expires/).

            They end up looking a bit dumb when the world keeps turning despite their doomsaying! Kind of reminds me of Remainers…

          16. The great pity is that all those “climate scientists” whose predictions have been spectacularly wrong over the last 30/40 years have not been crucified, yes I mean that literally.

            It might encourage the others to be a little more circumspect and possibly accurate in their “guesses” I use guesses because the word theories is not approriate.

          17. When I was a kid I used to love David Bellamy. He was a great man, a conservationist, botanist and a wonderful TV presenter who got children interested in conserving the environment. But once he started to question man-made climate change, he was dropped like a shot.

            Is climate change a science or a religion? If it is a science, then it should welcome competing theories and alternative points of view. But if it is a religion, well we know how religions deal with heretics…

            https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/david-bellamy-i-was-shunned-they-didnt-want-to-hear-8449307.html

          18. I was a Bellamy fan too. And I think you’re bang on the money with it (climate change) having become a religion.

          22. A lot of chatter in the background. Caterers?

            Sack them.

            Adjacent bar? Close the door and tell the buggers to shut up.

          24. I’m sure it would be for her own good!

            These people never, ever apologise when they get it wrong. How much unnecessary panic and hysteria has been caused over the decades by their incorrect predictions? How many trillions of public money have been wasted in trying to fix a problem which doesn’t exist, which could have been put to much better effect? But no, they just move on to the next catastophic prediction. Sadly for them, there’s this thing called the internet which contains many an “Inconvenient truth!”

        2. I’d rather Lefties didn’t read such literature. They tend to take them as guide books. After all, they’re pushing 1984 on us with great alacrity.

      3. I wonder how life on Earth will be in 2000 years time. when the Little Brat is the new Christ and worshipped Globally.

        Sweden will be the HQ of the Gretan New Church, having usurped the Vatican in 3012 ( 993 Post Greta) and Ali’s Snack Bar in Mecca in 3999 (1980 PG)

    1. There would be no problem had not the traitors made a request for an extension compulsory in law.
      The Remainer traitors are far, far, worse than the Europeans.

      2. If the EU agree to Boris’s deal the extension will be off the table The EU will not offer one well unless they are trying to stitch Boris up

      3. As has been suggested, there can be two letters – the Request (which the EU would grant with conditions) and a threat, saying that we will not comply with any conditions or anything else during the extension period a la leaked note from No. 10.

        Or don’t put in as request and let time take us out. I wonder what the ECJ (or would it be the SC by then?) would make of that. Doing things retrospectively is always more difficult.

        Edit Undoing things rather than doing things…

  103. I am grateful to the Guardian for directing me to this very sad story. Please have your hadkerchiefs ready.

    ”

    Three orphans who are thought to be British have been found in a camp for people affiliated to Islamic State in an area of north-east Syria, which has come under attack by Turkish-backed forces.
    Amira, 10, her sister, Hiba, eight, and their brother Hamza, who
    appeared to be about the same age as Hiba, are believed to have
    travelled to Syria
    with their parents from London five years ago. Their mother and father,
    an older brother and two other sisters were killed in an air assault on
    Isis-controlled Baghuz, which finally fell to Kurdish led-forces in
    March.

    The children were discovered at the Ain Issa camp by a BBC reporting team,
    which broadcast an interview with Amira on Sunday in which she
    described being keen to get back to the UK. She said she and her
    surviving siblings have a grandmother, but she did not know her name.
    The children speak Arabic, but speak English when they are together and
    Amira has traces of a London accent. Hiba showed the camera a large scar
    on her abdomen, indicating the violence they appear to have endured. “

    1. Just a further example of irresponsible parents in the Muslim UK who think they must join the conflicts that are rife in their homelands. Look at the wrath of God that is being visited on children, even unto the third and fourth generations.

      Those children will eventually be brought back to the UK and into the arms of their (probably) biased Grandma, who will teach them that it was western policies that caused their parents’ deaths – so go and declare Jihad on the west.

  105. Extinction Rebelion under investigation

    They are being investigate by HMRC for non payment of tax and for possible non compliance with the data protection act . They are also being investigated for not registering ass a fund raising organisation

      1. I suspect with regard to the fund raising organisation they may try to claim they are not an organisation . I would say they are an organisation whether they are in law an organisation I dont know

        1. If not an ‘organisation’, then a named Fund Raiser must be responsible for ALL accounts and tax etc

          1. If someone is distributing money we need to know who he is and where it came from, and if it is called ” expenses “, whether it includes duck ponds.

          2. LOts of people try it on Just Giving is full of people that try it on. They were rapped over the knuckles as lots of people setting up just giving pagers were registering for Gift Aid but were not elegible for it as you need to be a registered charity to claim the tax

  109. Not so bright police. They were searching for a girl on a beach when they got cut off by the tide and had to call the RNLI out

    1. I remember the evening in early 1978 when just as I was about to get out of my car the news came over the radio that she’d died.

      Who knows where the time goes?

        1. I can’t hear it enough. It’s beautiful.

          First heard it when I heard Unhalfbricking at my mate’s house when it first came out. What an excellent album that is. 50 years ago, frightening.

          3. My son lives in Bristol. I’ll tell him to get himself along.

            (He won’t. He never takes any notice)

          5. My original recording is on the Double Album: The History of Fairport Convention: from 1972..

  112. Good morning –

    Project Fear – the last shot –

    ” Winemakers of La Rioja will look elsewhere if there is a no-deal Brexit ” ( The Times )

    There’s always home-grown Buxton Sparkling Spring Water.

    1. Good morning, Tony.

      !!No Rioja!! I can’t believe it! (why will they look elsewhere? to spite us? isn’t our money good enough?) How will we survive? I am shocked…..!

      Oh, I forgot. There is always Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Malbec, Shiraz – from Argentina, California, South Africa,
      Chile, Australia…..

      I’m away back to sleep now.

  114. The DT TellySubbies are having a field day, today

    Hands up.those who see a pedestrian
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/politics/2019/10/13/TELEMMGLPICT000194857375_trans_NvBQzQNjv4Bqbp882ZYJlBFxnyQgxUcRs7ETk8P9H3T_ZmHI76ctXA8.jpeg?imwidth=1400

    A pedestrian walks past graffiti that has been amended to read “IRA are done. Defeated Army”
    instead of “IRA undefeated Army” in the Creggan area of Londonderry Credit: AFP

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2019/10/13/ira-plotting-lure-ambush-police-customs-posts-no-deal-brexit/

      1. Could be, but as the only person there is a a cyclist. I find your comment ‘Pedestrian’

Comments are closed.