Sunday 19 June: The PM’s failure to cut taxes leaves businesses short of cash and confidence

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here.

695 thoughts on “Sunday 19 June: The PM’s failure to cut taxes leaves businesses short of cash and confidence”

  4. Fears that Putin’s spies are ‘active at all levels of British society’. 19 June 2022.

    Fears have arisen that Vladimir Putin’s spies are ‘active at all levels of British society’ – with MI5 spyhunters placed on alert for possible cyber attacks amid the UK’s support for Ukraine following Russia’s invasion.

    Up to 50 Russian spies could now be roaming in the UK amid concern that Putin has ordered all sleeper agents to be ready to respond to tasks.

    Oooer! 50! We don’t have to worry about the hundred a day coming across the Channel then?

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10930811/Fears-Putins-spies-active-levels-UK-society-MI5-spyhunters-alert-Russian-agents.html#comments

    1. I thought we were supposed to be worrying about ‘far right extremists’ this week !

      1. Morning Phizzee. How, one wonders, did they arrive at 50? It is obviously whimsical. They cannot actually know how many; if any, Russian Agents are operating in the UK. One is minded of the scene in the Manchurian Candidate where the monstrous Mrs Iselin in an attempt to fix the number of communists in the Defense Department in her husband’s empty head chooses 57 off the Heinz Tomato Sauce bottle on the table. Is 50 just enough to get people looking at their neighbours but not too many to cause real alarm?

        1. Good morning, Minty.
          50 is a good round number.

          Of course this is to detract attention from the 50,000 Chinese spies already embedded throughout the UK.

          I know this for a fact. Chris Steele told me…

    2. Putin’s ‘spies’ or Blair’s minions, it’s a quandary as to who will cause the most damage to the fabric of our country.

  5. Good morning all. Been awake for a while. I am staying in the Bel and Dragon at Kingsclere. Opened for business in the 15th Century. Now i know what Net Zero actually means. Cold, damp and miserable. All my clothes are damp too. If i didn’t know any better i would think i pissed the bed it’s so wet.

  7. Good morning all.
    A rather cool 4°C outside with a clear sky giving a bright start.
    And where did the rain go to yesterday? We had some desultory scattered dribbles through the day that barely wet the ground and evening shower.

  8. Britain’s moral superiority over Europe is becoming increasingly clear
    While European leaders dither and delay, the UK is standing to shoulder to shoulder with Ukraine

    I’ve had a right old ding-dong with those in favour. I started by stating:

    “All this lauding brave little Ukraine pays no attention to the Ukrainian Army and its Neo-Nazi Azov brigade slaughtering 14000 fellow Ukrainians because they lived in Donbass and spoke Russian, as did their near-neighbours just across the border. In an attempt to ameliorate this the Minsk Agreement was signed and the then democratically elected government was overthrown by Zelensky with the help of the EU and US, the Minsk Agreement was torn up and Zelensky’s political opponents jailed and thrown out of government.
    Small wonder Putin was worried not only for his Russian-speaking neighbours but the proximity of the EU, the US and soon to be NATO on his border. Think Cuba October 1962.
    Think twice before lauding Ukraine.”

    But was soon abused of that idea.

    Paul Milner31 MIN AGO
    Putin is worried because he has united ‘the West’ in total against him, no other reason. He is a murdering megalomaniac and Tom you appear to be an apologist for this person.

    Tom Hunn27 MIN AGO
    Reply to Paul Milner – view message
    Hardly an apologist but more a realist. ‘The West’ is in the throes of globalism and Putin will have no truck with it. Hence his attitude to the West.

    Owen Sanders26 MIN AGO
    Reply to Paul Milner – view message
    Yeah being grounded in the complex realities of geopolitics makes him an apologist

    Tom Hunn27 MIN AGO
    Reply to Owen Sanders
    Thank you, Owen

    Patrick Patterson25 MIN AGO
    Reply to Tom Hunn
    Not even Sergey Lavrov could paint such a lily white picture of the new Peter the Great with a straight face.

    Tom Hunn20 MIN AGO
    Reply to Patrick Patterson – view message

    You see what you want to see, Patrick, as you stand atop your dungheap crowing your virtue-signalling.

    At this point, there was not much more fun to be had so I returned to NTTL.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/06/18/britains-moral-superiority-europe-becoming-increasingly-clear/#comment

    2. I sometimes make comments on the DT site, my line being, it would better to pursue peace rather than war. The conflict is damaging us all. Quite a lot of abuse received and very few in agreement along with accusations of working from Moscow. All very surprising from DT readers.

    3. These people are just not thinking. Why on earth is the U.K. encouraging war, maybe even leading to nuclear war, instead of sending diplomats? Why is there no talk of jaw jaw and not war war? Why are we helping Ukraine, money wise and weapon wise? It is nothing to do with us, we have no ties to Ukraine and yet our BPAPM has visited there twice in recent weeks. Why would any so called Prime Minister visit a war zone! Crack pots the lot of them. But dangerous crack pots. All to deflect our attention from the abysmal U.K. government. And nobody in authority seems to raise their voice against it.

          1. Yes quite right Paul, but she sees herself as the next Thatcher just like May did.

    4. Democratically elected government overthrown?

      It was an election not a coup. Poroshenko had been in power for 5 years.

      He’s very popular with the Ukrainian people it seems.

      1. Poroshenko was indeed elected – after the violent coup that overthrew Yanukovych, which is what NtoN should have referred to.

        1. Yes he was elected in 2014 and so had to call an election in 2019 which he lost. He was the first to say it was a fair election. NtN seemed to say Zelensky took over in a coup.

          1. NtN’s point is (should be) that the troubles stem from that US/EU coup and the subsequent Ukrainian assault on the Russian-speaking eastern provinces.

          2. Which he blames Zelensky for yet it wasn’t him….

            “In an attempt to ameliorate this the Minsk Agreement was signed and the then democratically elected government was overthrown by Zelensky with the help of the EU and US, the Minsk Agreement was torn up and Zelensky’s political opponents jailed and thrown out of government.”

            That quite clearly blames Zelensky.

          3. “That quite clearly blames Zelensky.”

            Read the sentence that precedes it. It most certainly does NOT blame Zelensky for the coup and the attack on the Russian east.

          4. OK. The Azov brigade are not part of the Ukrainian army they are volunteers. The Azov brigade are themselves Russian speakers. The massacre happened in 2014 I think, five years before Zelensky. The Minsk agreement was late 2014. It didn’t work and was superseded by the second Minsk agreement in 2015. Minsk II was also a bit of a failure. It was Putin that declared the Minsk agreements obsolete not anyone Ukrainian but that didn’t happen until this year, so Putin was quite happy for these neo-nazis as he calls them to roam around for 8 years and now all of a sudden he wants to do something about them?
            I’m sure Tom maybe meant Poroshenko rather than Zelensky but he’s letting that misunderstanding make him become almost an apologist for Russia as others have accused him of. Anyway Putin did nothing whilst Poroshenko was in power for the entire five years. Why attack now?
            It’s quite clear that Tom is misinformed or completely wrong.
            Putin saw what he thought was a weak leadership being friendly to the west, the guy is a comedian and actor not a politician, and he’s made a land grab. Well Zelensky isn’t as weak as Putin thought. An actor and comedian he may well be but he’s also a Ukrainian patriot. IMHO he’s been a surprisingly good leader.

          5. The massacre? We’re talking about a five-year campaign against the eastern Russians, started after the 2014 coup. Maybe Putin’s patience (if he had any) finally ran out. Perhaps he thought a change of president might bring a change of attitude. It didn’t.

            “The Azov brigade are themselves Russian speakers.”

            How is this relevant? The enmity between Ukraine and Russia goes back to the days of Stalin. The AB are the inheritors of those who fought alongside Nazi German soldiers in WW2 because they sought revenge against Russia for the Holodomor.

          6. Most of the killing occurred in 2014. Minsk II was semi-successful. Most of the Azov Brigade come from russian speaking parts of Ukraine. I don’t know about links to the Ukrainians that were starved by Stalin, i can’t comment on that.
            The question remains, why did Putin allow this to go on for 7-8 years before taking action if he was so worried about russian-speaking ukrainians being tortured and annihilated by the AB?
            Cant really understand the need for invasion. Nor it seems can most of the rest of the world.
            Anyway off to bed now, i need some sleep. see you later.

          7. I’m surprised that you unaware of the links to Ukrainian support for Germany in WW2. The media don’t like talking about it (if they even admit to knowing about it). When they and the public express their bafflement, even contempt, at Putin’s references to neo-Nazis in today’s Ukraine, they are expressing their utter ignorance of this episode in history – or, perhaps, their desire to shut out a most inconvenient truth.

  9. Looking through the lens of Minty i am rethinking what actually happened to flight MH17.

  10. Outrage over scheme to electronically tag refugees arriving in the UK. 19 June 2022.

    Under the 12-month pilot scheme, which began last week, some of those arriving aboard small boats from France or in the back of lorries will be tagged. The Home Office has said the trial will examine whether electronic monitoring can help maintain regular contact with migrants and help to progress their claims. It will also collect data on how many people abscond from immigration bail.

    However, critics said that there was no evidence that asylum seekers were absconding. Clare Moseley, founder of the Care4Calais charity, said: “I think it’s outrageous. Refugees in general do not abscond. There’s no data that shows that they do – they never have done. They are here to claim asylum, so why would they? They’re not criminals, they’re victims. Things happen to them. They didn’t cause it. It’s just another part of the government criminalising refugees, which is basically victim-blaming.”

    Lol! We see here a Government (such as it is) powerless and without credibility floundering in an attempt to try and look as though they actually control events.

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jun/19/outrage-over-scheme-to-electronically-tag-refugees-arriving-in-the-uk

      1. “Clare Moseley is said to be taking a period of absence from the charity due to ‘health issues‘”

        Yeah, Mental (lack of) Health issues.

    2. Whitehall, Westminster, HoC and the Home Office have merged into 🤡🤡🤡 city. Pledges, not workable policies, reign supreme and fall from the ringmaster’s mouth with monotonous regularity. This risible government is the saga of the Titanic writ large.

    3. A good sharp knife or hacksaw blade and it’ll be dumped in the nearest river, lake, sewage farm, whatever.

    4. The illegal immigrants, in the main document and/or passport-free, need documenting by; DNA sample, finger printing, dental records and retina scan. Try removing those.

  11. Good morning, all. Overcast at the moment here in N Essex.

    Has anybody outside of Essex who experienced light showers yesterday noticed any ‘dust’ that settled on their vehicles? I had to use my screen washers after every shower.

    As for shortages of food, or worse, famine, being on the menu…
    …I’ll leave these here.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/99660f1b24f17c008e9dcf0b03b5dfa8e4509f419a44d08cb5ac5880b4376762.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7d6789b2908486b9733413b97d8311eaeb48aac1d9065eb4dd37d79826261206.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/716854133051d0cfb694696c1b4413999b19ced8762b7c2031edc63acfbd6960.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/dbf73c775a8a91f1cba02f105260fc82b36ea7744868d94f6da0a52d75398ce0.png

    I am unable to copy and paste GETTR posts (cookie problem?) so I cannot show the video that has USA farmers talking about the crop destruction options being issued by Biden’s administration.

    2. We had heavy rain here yesterday evening and it’s bright and sunny this morning. The windscreen was very dusty when we went out. We had to use the washers in spite of the rain.

    3. It’s sunny atm in Peterborough, but it probably won’t last. It rained all day yesterday and we seem to have above average winds all the time. I suppose that’s because we’re very close to Lincolnshire and the fens.

      1. Good to see you active here again, Thayaric. Keeping us on our toes!
        How are you keeping? All well, I hope?

        1. We’ve moved to Peterborough. Just had the walls half ripped down and a new damp course put in. Still carless. Haven’t found a job yet but I think because I am carless, it’s hard to get anywhere there’s work. I’m well, still fat but well. I’m walking a lot trying to lose weight, it’s not working. Been here six weeks, walked about 200 miles. I use Pokemon Go to keep a record of my walking.
          I never left but some days I didn’t come, others I’d pop in for a few mins just to see what was going on. I didn’t comment much.
          Still arguing too much with SWMBO and haven’t had nookie now for close to 18 months but otherwise all fine and dandy.
          We have a lovely house, a semi between Fletton and Woodston close to the river and city centre. It’ll take a few years before the decorating is done and we need save for a new kitchen and perhaps a bathroom but we like it here a lot.
          How are you Paul?

          1. Glad you have a place to lay your head! Looks like some kind of balance… sort of… Me, I’m stressed due to clearing and slling Mother’s house to pay for Gods Waiting Room in Penarth (apparently, the best one around) at about £100 a day. House sale is by auction, hammer down on Thursday, then we need to fly over and empty the place. A pity there’s nobody who will buy the memories… Pretty well everything is planned and booked, so it’s just to get on with it on 5th July for 2 weeks.

          2. I saw the post you made about that. I liked the floorplan. A house with a lot of potential. Sadly it’s in Wales!

          3. I like Wales. It’s OK. Just the Welsh are a bit different to the English, and there’s no harm in that.
            If you want to offer a couple of million, to secure the sale… ;-))

    1. Nor have sea levels. The Maldives were supposed to be under water in 2020. Still there apparently.

      1. Supposedly seas are rising at about 3.5mm per year. That’s probably less than the rate of sand deposition.

          1. I did say supposedly. Cant say I have personally noticed any sea levels change.

      2. Land area of Maldives remained stable at 300 sq. km over the last 10 years.

        The description is composed by our digital data assistant.
        What is land area?
        Land area is a country’s total area, excluding area under inland water bodies, national claims to continental shelf, and exclusive economic zones. In most cases the definition of inland water bodies includes major rivers and lakes.
        https://knoema.com/atlas/Maldives/Land-area

    2. Well done Neil. Old stuff for Nottlers of course but it must be new to his viewers to hear the truth!

    3. Spot on again Neil.
      It’s difficult to believe what these scumbags will do for their own personal gain.
      I hope you see this Neil, but did you know that our political classes took home nearly 132 million pounds in ‘expenses’ between them last year.

  13. Prepare to fight and beat Russia in a Third World War, Britain’s top general warns: New UK Army commander tells troops to brace for European land war in tub-thumping message as tyrant Putin menaces ex-Soviet states
    Britain’s top army general has warned UK troops to prepare to fight and beat Putin’s armies in a land war
    General Sir Patrick Sanders warned soldiers ‘we must prepare the Army to fight in Europe once again’
    It comes as Russian tyrant Putin menaces NATO countries and taunts ex-Soviet states in Europe

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10930527/Prepare-fight-beat-Russia-World-War-Britains-general-warns.html

    2. By the time they get around to mobilising, It will time for Mother Russia’s greatest defence to step in – winter.

      Time for Sanders retreat from Moscow. Nobody learns from history.

      1. Winter works in Russia’s defence when anyone in the West gets an attack of hubris and actually believes it can march into that god-forsaken country against a foe that has always regarded bitter Siberian weather as a dear and protective friend.

        Taking on Russia always means knowing when to stop.

    4. Are we really going to start a land war against a madman who controls one of the world’s largest nuclear arsenals?

      He’s probably dying of cancer. His mind isn’t right at all. Dangerous game to be playing.

      1. I would hope not, but looking at the way the world is being screwed over nothing would surprise me

    5. I do think that the Ukrainians are better placed to know the best military tactics to use against a Russian foe.

      As I see it, the Russians cannot rely on their own troops to act competently, and all too often descend into an undisciplined mayhem of opportunistic raping, looting and pillaging. Their simplistic mode operandi is to pulverise everything in sight and then march triumphantly over the ashes simply because there is nothing left to put up a fight. Armed with this “Shock and Awe” fear, they rely on those with any sense retreating and surrendering fairly quickly, so that the victors can pick over the spoils without too much fuss. Eventually they will meet an equal force coming the other way, and then they will stop. There is one term for this “Might is Right” approach to colonisation – “Realpolitik”.

      The counter to this is equally brutal. If you want to keep your civilisation reasonably repairable (intact is perhaps too much of an ask), then whatever is doing the pulverising must be taken out, using whatever weapons one can get hold of that will do the job. Precisely what Zelenskyy is asking of his allies.

      Is it in our interest to supply Zelenskyy with what he needs. Well, it all depends how much we value Ukrainian cities, towns, villages and the breadbasket in between. If we leave Russian artillery intact, sooner or later, it will meet the equal force coming the other way, which is us. I would have thought the less firepower we must confront then, the better. Hence, the reason it is militarily in our interests to supply Zelenskyy with what he is asking for.

        1. Before 24th February 2022, I might have agreed with much of what you said. Ukraine has, for many centuries, been divided between West, most notably Lithuania and Poland, which are now NATO/EU countries, and Russia. Indeed Genghis Khan’s relentless march west was halted by the Kyivan Rus, and Moscow owes much of its existence to “brave little Ukraine”.

          After the breakup of the USSR and most of the old Warsaw Pact making new alliances with the West, partitioning Ukraine seemed inevitable at some time. It was held off because the two factions were well balanced, so we ended up with a touchy co-existence that could be made as stable as that between the Walloons and the Flemings in Belgium.

          When Crimea was reincorporated into Russia, and the two little provinces around Luhansk and Donetsk declared UDI and allied themselves to Russia under the Minsk Agreement, it did set off a counter-insurgency by the loyalist paramilitaries in Mariupol. However, it also tipped the balance of the residual Ukraine in favour of integration with NATO and the EU, with strong connections to Lithuania and Poland, turning the Russian areas into a minority. That was the price Russia had to pay for claiming the prize of Crimea and the Sea of Azov.

          I would have hoped that they accepted this bargain in good grace, and carried on with their work shifting the entire continent in their direction and away from America with the promise of cheap gas and oil. There are also cultural affiliations Russia shares with Europe more than America, not least concerning woke culture and political correctness. I lament what happened on and after 24th February 2022, as Russia chose instead to descend to abject brutality.

          1. Ukraine should accept the loss of the Eastern provinces and settle for a ceasefire.

          2. The fact that Russia used Crimea and the Eastern provinces as a springboard to mount further offences, not least around Odesa, rules out any way Ukraine can accept appeasement.

            Here is the UK, we are still haunted by Neville Chamberlain handing over the Sudetenland in the belief that this would put a stop to any prospect for a world war.

          3. If the French invaded Cornwall and took over everywhere to Oxford and Southampton should the UK accept those losses?

            That’s pretty much what you’re saying Ukraine should do.

          4. At least the eating would be better. And they’d have my In-Laws, so what’s not to like?

      2. If Russia really was acting as you imply Kiev, and other cities would already have been flattened and the civilian population would not be cavorting on beaches.

        1. The reason it wasn’t might have something to do with the Spring rain making the fields too muddy to drive tanks and rocket launchers over. Stuck on the main road in a 40-mile convoy, it was simple enough for any decent Resistance partisan to take out the one at the front and the one at the back, leaving one monumental traffic jam not close enough yet to take out the capital.

          Then supply lines to these tanks depended on the goodwill of Belarus. Now Lukashenko is eager enough to give the Russians all the help they need, but a lot of his subjects are as morose and cynical as anyone during Iron Curtain days, and would need a lot of kicking to get the produce to the front on time.

          Strategically, if there is to be a swift regime change, it is important that the broadcasting facilities and the presidential palace are left intact long enough to declare victory and subjugate the people. I’m not sure that Russian heavy artillery is precise enough not simply to flatten everything rendering a quick surgical takeover impossible.

          Five Russian generals at least were slaughtered because they couldn’t rely on their colonels. The surviving general knew enough about military strategy that it was better to be patient, concentrate one’s forces, work steadily and thoroughly and not stretch the supply lines, and then wait until the enemy runs out of high grade soldiers and ammunition before pushing on. Also in winter, fields are a lot easier to drive over.

          3. I’ve seen numerous reports from outside the immediate areas where it is clear that buildings are intact and life is looks to be fairly normal. If Russia really was behaving as the MSM reports those would be rubble.
            The tales of “the ghost” fighter pilot have also been discredited.
            The tale of the defenders being asked to surrender telling the Russians to get lost, who were then all killed, again found to be false, there are other examples.
            The MSM is totally and utterly one-sided.

            Who is really bleeding badly over the sanctions? You’re told it’s Russia, but just look at what is happening on our side.

            I think Putin was utterly wrong, but I also think Ukraine and the West (EU/USA/NATO) are reaping the wind they sowed.

    1. I thought it was Chile!

      Morning Angie – Thanks for posting

      Morning all – I think we need more of these good news stories on Nottl!

  16. 353324+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Sunday 19 June: The PM’s failure to cut taxes leaves businesses short of cash and confidence,

    Then surely the majority lab/lib/con supporter / voter must be highly satisfied to see a political construct they have been, these last near forty years, begin to pay dividends on coming to fruition.

    the herd ARE content with supporting the toxic trio ? in name only party’s, who by the by are bordering on being crime syndicates
    so may one ask, JUST WHAT IS THE CRIB. ?

    You are achieving your aim of returning to the overseeing poisonous political parent the eu, so why the continuous WHINGE.

    1. Corporation tax is 19% 2.5% lower than the EU average, on par with the asian average, 4.5% under the global average.

      Cutting taxes now will in theory feed the stagflation.

        1. Some targeted tax cuts might be nice, but with inflation around 10% and predicted to go higher, supply chains still down, businesses still not realising just in time supply is pretty stupid, a large food producer at war, energy prices still high, and the current geopolitical situation we’d have to be very careful. However businesses don’t really pay tax as it just gets passed on to consumers, or employees, or their landlord, or their shareholders, or a combination of the four.

          1. Just In Time (JIT) is a cost saving element but should also be identified with any need for safety stock, as identified by Pareto Analysis of total yearly sales to identify A,B and C class stock.

          2. Do you not think there are any benefits to be had from cutting business costs? It might just help some of them to stay alive and keep down costs to the public whose domestic budgets are also severely stretched.

            Tax cuts can be inflationary in an economy that is relatively healthy. Ours isn’t.

          3. We already have inflation so tax cuts (usually a good idea) right now would be a poor idea. On the other hand the recent tax rises were also a poor idea.

            Taxes are not really a cost to businesses as they are all passed on. The only tax that really hits businesses is BR and even then only in the case where they own the land they use. There are some short term effects but in the medium term taxes are reasonably neutral to businesses. BR is paid by the landlord. Although the business sends off the cheque if there was no BR the business would pay a higher rent. Just look at rents in enterprise zones. Corporation tax hits employees and customers and shareholders in different proportions depending on how much competition there is. A very competitive business cant raise prices so cuts raises and dividends. A near monopoly business can raise prices instead. VAT is mostly paid by consumers. Employers NI is paid by employees, although again like with BR the business may feel it’s a cost but it’s not really as the owner factored that in when setting the employees wage.

            People are taxed too highly. Business tax is probably about where it should be.

          4. Why would they be a poor idea? Businesses will fold if their products become less affordable and the public spend less. We’re not talking about luxury consumer goods but the basics.

          5. That’s going to happen anyway, we’re about to enter the mother of recessions as we always do when essentials inflate badly. We are going to pay badly for holding wages down for close to 15 years.

          6. “We are going to pay badly for holding wages down for close to 15 years.”

            And how did that happen?

          7. Unnecessary austerity based on ideology that doesn’t suit a fiat money economy.

          9. Partly, but the big issue was Osborne and Cameron and their love for austerity. The whole austerity fiasco was based on an economic paper that was totally debunked by a student. The paper was called Growth in a time of debt, written by Rogoff and Reinhart. It’s basically toilet paper. It’s worthless. Yet it led to us taking on austerity because it suggested that austerity is good for growth. Any normal thinking economist will tell you that’s preposterous, and many did tell Osborne exactly that but he refused to listen.
            We were just returning to positive and good growth after a once in a hundred years global banking system disaster after just two years. Unemployment was falling, wages were rising, then along comes the toxic twosome and they undid all the good work and created a mess. The money supply barely grew, so there could be no growth and that’s pretty much what we got between 2010 and 2015, an economy running at one third its normal speed. Public sector wages were frozen or cut. Benefits were frozen. Wage rises across the economy got put on hold. People were forced into self-employment without much work just to access benefits. Food bank usage took off. Homelessness and rough sleeping got much worse. All to kill off a deficit that wasn’t an issue but Rogoff and Reinhart said it was. And to top it off nothing worked which didn’t surprise me but it seemed to surprise Osborne. He actually thought he could take money from the economy and still create growth. The BoE did all it could to ameliorate the austerity by continuing the ultra-low interest rates and expansionary monetary policy but it wasn’t enough. Underemployment took over from unemployment as full-time jobs got turned into two or three jobs to cut employers NI bills. The gig economy took off which made unemployment figures look good but none of these people were really earning much.
            Of course immigration had an impact on wages, but not the kind of impact the toxic twosome had. Immigration made it harder to find work because more people were competing for jobs which held down wages. Often employers would get 200 CVs per day for a single job. The media then lambasted Brits as workshy and poles as industrious. Agencies were set up to ferry workers directly to jobs that were never even advertised in the UK. That much immigration was bad for the UK but that was the price of being in the EU. And even all that wasn’t as much of a drag on wages as the first Tory administration.

          10. “The BoE did all it could to ameliorate the austerity by continuing the ultra-low interest rates and expansionary monetary policy but it wasn’t enough.”

            The problems of 2006-09 were a consequence of Brown’s cheap money/low inflation policies. The BoE did nothing to stop this.

          11. No they were a consequence of Clinton doing what Boris is doing. Benefits to bricks. Subprime debt packaged up and given high ratings by credit ratings agencies then sold around the world. As the world’s second largest financial centre our banks gorged on those packages. They were worthless in reality.

          12. I know about Clinton’s bribing of the banks and the revival of Carter’s absurd Community Reinvestment Act. Brown could have prevented a lot of the damage but his undermining of regulation, his granting of ‘independence’ to the BoE and his own bone-headed arrogance took the economy down.

            There can be no excuses for that man and his even more appalling leader.

          13. The BoE is not and never has been independent. It’s the MPC that’s independent.

            No regulators anywhere caught these debt packages because the credit ratings agencies gave them top grades.

            Lawson admitted that the GFC was caused by the Big Bang reforms, and Brown admitted getting the regulation wrong because his regulators were focussed on individual banks and not the banking system as a whole but the same mistake was repeated around the globe.

          14. “…his regulators were focussed on individual banks and not the banking system as a whole…”

            Quite. Brown meddled with banking regulation so that it became ineffective; responsibility was split between the BoE, the Treasury and the FSA. The BoE was supposed to keep an eye on lending. It could have done. It should have asked questions. It didn’t.

            Peter Lilley warned of the dangers of Brown’s reforms in the HoC in Nov 1997:
            “…with the removal of banking control to the Financial Services Authority – the ‘super-SIB’ – it is difficult to see how and whether the Bank remains, as it surely must, responsible for ensuring the liquidity of the banking system and preventing systemic collapse.” (Hansard, 11 November, 1997)

            Of course, nobody was listening to the Tories by then. Brown owned up in April 2010, just before the GE.

          16. Stop making excuses. Borrowing was running out of control. Did nobody notice? Really?

          17. The level of government debt and private debt is always noted. Neither one caused the GFC although the level of private debt was worrying, then Osborne increased it massively.

          18. Do you not think there are any benefits to be had from cutting business costs? It might just help some of them to stay alive and keep down costs to the public whose domestic budgets are also severely stretched.

            Tax cuts can be inflationary in an economy that is relatively healthy. Ours isn’t.

      1. NoTTL is an oasis – we mustn’t forget the howling desert that surrounds us.

      2. 353324+ up ticks,

        Morning N,
        My way of thinking is that some forms of thinking are very dangerous, fool me once, shame on you ,fool me twice shame on me …… .
        The electorate seems to me to have been fooled thrice upon thrice, is it a
        party supporting addiction ?

    1. 353324+ up ticks,

      O2O,

      Making these decisions you would think would be responsible peoples, you would be SO WRONG.

      These are placement peoples via the ballot booth & the lab/lib/con coalition crime syndicate.

    2. I had to stop giving blood five years ago after having donated for 35 years. I remember the questionnaire one had to complete before each session, and seem to recollect that there were specific questions for men and women – e.g. skip question x if male/female. I don’t see why this method should change just to please trans rights campaigners.

      1. I was asked the pregnancy question when I went for my jab. Not many 70+ women get pregnant even these days.

        1. Seeing as the current trend is for couples to say “We’re pregnant”, I think some fathers to be should tick ‘yes’ and see where that takes them.

      2. If I hadn’t had to give up donating I think there is a good chance that I would have ripped up the form and left – for good. Not easy after many years donating to a cause I believed in, but there comes a time when a stand has to be taken against such moronic claptrap.

    3. Something else now that our political classes and civil service have effed up.
      What ever will they think of next ? 🤔

      1. 353324+ up ticks,

        Morning RE,

        I do believe “intentionally” is missing in your post
        I do not believe that a party could be so consistent inept without having a covert cause to follow.

        1. Well intention is the reason they all go into politics. No morals needed. They would have no means of income at all if such opportunities didn’t exist.
          20 people could do as much damage to our lifestyle and our country as the 650 and staff do. But they have tricked us into voting for them and furthering their dusgustinly crooked careers.

    4. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand the question. What does ‘pregnant’ mean?”

  18. I got bored and did the Wordle before this page was up. Pretty easy today…

    Wordle 365 3/6

    ⬜⬜🟨⬜🟨
    🟨🟩🟩⬜⬜
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    2. Ditto

      Wordle 365 3/6

      ⬜⬜🟩🟨🟨
      ⬜⬜🟩🟩🟨
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  19. Morning all 😃
    Come on you weather presenters warm it up a bit for the father’s day BBQs you know it makes sense. And it’s the solstice in a few days from now and all down hill from then on. Sort it out 🤔😏🙏 this guy will be on his way soon 🎅 !

    1. RNLI are disinherited from my will. Aiding & abetting illegal immigration is a criminal act.

      1. Have you told them so? I wonder how many people have disinherited them – and how many of those the RNLI are aware of. It might make them sit up if they realised how many people are withdrawing their support.

      2. Have you told them so? I wonder how many people have disinherited them – and how many of those the RNLI are aware of. It might make them sit up if they realised how many people are withdrawing their support.

          2. To taxi them to the UK with dry feet? The post says they were collected from a French vessel and brought to the UK by RNLI. Why did the French vessel not take them back to that war-torn hell-hole, France?

    3. My reply:

      Replying to
      @VerhofstadtQ
      and
      @RNLI
      I note the video won’t play. Have the RNLI had it censored because of their seemingly blatant misuse of rescue equipment?

    1. Someone I know had an accident wearing a mask recently, couldn’t see a step and fell over.
      I always said that wearing a mask was bad for you, I said.
      You could have heard a pin drop.

  24. ‘Morning, Peeps.  Some letters to follow but until just now this little gem of a story had passed me by.  I suppose it comes as no surprise that the Snivel Serpents have been finding ever more inventive ways of helping themselves to taxpayers’ money (and full marks to the TPA) but it still stinks.  If they want to form such groups they should do so via subscription.  Once again we are paying for wokery.

    From the DT:

    Revealed: The £300,000 Civil Service social clubs funded by the taxpayer

    Amid cost of living crisis, figures show public money was used to fund ‘wasteful’ Whitehall networks in areas such as baking and meditation

    ByChristopher Hope, ASSOCIATE EDITOR (POLITICS) and Juliet Samuel

    17 June 2022 • 10:03pm

    Hundreds of thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money is being spent on Civil Service support groups, despite efforts by ministers to cut Whitehall costs.

    An investigation by The TaxPayers’ Alliance has found that at least £309,090 of taxpayers’ money has been spent to support 187 staff networks across 12 departments over the past three years. Not all of the groups received direct funding from the taxpayer.

    The overall number of groups is likely to be much higher, owing to departments including the Cabinet Office, the Ministry of Defence, the Department for Health and Social Care and the Treasury refusing to provide information.

    The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport has 31 networks, including a flexible working and job share network, a bake club, a film club, a board games club and a meditation club.

    Groups for inflammatory bowel disease

    The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has 25 networks, including the Stammering Network, Inflammatory Bowel Disease Network, and the Male Allyship Network.

    The Home Office has 20 Civil Service networks, although it could not provide information on expenditure. These networks include the Gender Support Network and the EU Nationals Network.

    The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, said it had 16 networks, including BAMENet, LGBT+ and LGBT+ Allies.

    One network, the Faith and Minority Ethnic Network at the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, held 37 events in 2021-22 alone, including an event titled “Is there any hope in a world dealing with climate change?”

    Dedicated working hours for networks

    As well as providing direct funding in some cases, multiple departments also allow staff to dedicate working hours towards running the networks.

    For example, the Ministry of Justice allows chairmen of networks to devote eight working hours per week to network activity.

    The Department for Education had 11 “core diversity staff networks”, including those for the over-50s, carers, disability, EU national, interfaith, neurodivergence, parents and social mobility, which each received £3,000 a year. Their chairmen were allowed to work for 10 per cent corporate time allowance for leading network activities.

    Its remaining staff networks, which did not receive a budget or corporate time allowance, covered bereavement, coaching community, eating disorders, fertility, governor and trustee, greener, Hindu, positivity wellbeing group, Sikh, vegan, women of colour, working through cancer, and young people.

    ‘An appalling use of taxpayers’ money’

    John O’Connell, the chief executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: “Many of the networks are an appalling use of Civil Service time and taxpayers’ money.

    “While Brits wait patiently to receive their driving licences and passports, bureaucrats are busy with right-on lectures and social events. Ministers need to scale back these wasteful Whitehall networks.”

    Conservative MPs criticised the expenditure. David Jones, a veteran Tory MP, said that he would be writing to Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Government Efficiency Minister, to complain.

    He told The Telegraph: “It sounds like a ludicrous expense of public money. If people want that support, they can pay for it themselves. It is not the sort of fringe benefits one would expect from an employer, not in the public sector. That is a complete waste of money.”

    A government spokesman said: “Civil Service employee networks provide support and guidance to staff across a wide range of areas, such as the carers network, bereavement network and the working through cancer network.

    “While we are committed to rigorously ensuring every pound of taxpayers’ money is well spent, we also recognise these networks can provide important practical help to staff and we are proud of their work they do to support people who need it.”

    * * *

    I am willing to bet that those departments that refused to provide the information also have such groups, and that the figure of £300,000 Is much higher.

    Some of the top BTLs:

    Ben Goddard1 DAY AGO

    That’s just the tip of the iceberg. The amount of hours given away to clubs, ‘volunteer’ days, non work related training, team building, diversity courses and unchecked sickness is mind blowing.

    Jean P Magee13 HRS AGO

    No Ben is spot on. I was employed in the recently disbanded PHE for 7 years. The amount of time wasted on non core activities is disgraceful – especially by the senior staff.

    I understand from former colleagues now in UKHSA that it is just as bad if not worse at the new organisation.

    J E P Newman22 HRS AGO

    We pay huge amounts of tax for defence, education, health, collection of rubbish and maintenance of roads, to name a few. We should not pay for ‘out of hours’ social support in public sector work time.

    There is nothing wrong with these networks if they want them, but they should not come out of taxpayer funded time or use taxpayers’ funds.

    Steve Sidaway22 HRS AGO

    Let’s see if I can paraphrase the ‘government spokesman’.

    “Most of our civil service infrastructure is run by liberal-progressives now.

    The universities have churned them out for years, and our recruitment process ensures they have key jobs.

    These ‘support networks’ make sure that our snowflakes can’t stand on their own two feet, and waste as much of their taxpayer paid-for time as possible.

    I’d say more but I have a meeting of the Government Spokesperson LGBTQ+%£I? Combatting Endemic Racism In Chess Players Support Group to chair…”

    Jason Ellis1 DAY AGO

    The frivolous way the government spends the money it extorts in taxes is just shocking. People have to work hard to earn enough after tax to pay their mortgage or rent, save for their retirement and pay for the necessities of life and the 20-60% taxes they take are spaffed on parties for civil servants, “charities” that campaigning against the government or the people of the country, any hair brain scheme that passes by the tools who administer foreign aid, 30,000 hotels for Calais Benefits Shoppers…. The list goes on. The government has enough money to blow on anything it wants but it can’t reduce the £50 tax on every tank of fuel or the £700 or so it taxes in “green” taxes and VAT on home energy. Who will rid us of the lying stealing despots we elect to serve us but who think they rule us?

    1. Immediately cancel all funding for anything relating to gays, ethnics or any other irrelevant, such group. If they want such, they can pay for it.

      1. Then to be fair you’d have to cut all funding for straights and whites and redheads and so on.

  25. US to begin vaccinating children as young as six months against Covid. 19 June 2022.

    The vaccination programme is expected to start as early as next week.

    It will mean the US will vaccinate the youngest age group in the world, with the exception of Nicaragua, which extended the programme to all ages in December.

    US president Joe Biden hailed the move, describing it as a “monumental step forward in our nation’s fight against the virus”.

    “For parents all over the country, this is a day of relief and celebration. As the first country to protect our youngest children with Covid-19 vaccines,” he added.

    Wow! Makes 1984 look like the Teletubbies!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/06/18/us-begin-vaccinating-children-young-six-months-against-covid/

    1. This morning I heard an American saying that Covid KILLS children. I am sure a few children have died of the wuflu but her statement implied than any youngster catching it would perish and is clearly a bare faced lie.

      3. Steve Kirsch has done a study on child deaths from covid and found there were none.
        But American kids who have been vaccinated are dying in their sleep.

  27. Today’s leading letter:

    SIR – I don’t know what voodoo economics the Treasury has used to convince the Prime Minister that tax cuts now are not essential, but the argument is nonsense.

    The economy is slowing down. I run a medium-sized business and see it in my sales. We are not replacing staff who leave. We are pulling in the belt a couple of notches. We’re sitting on a big investment decision on a new area of business, but with the Government depriving us of more money than ever we are worried about cash.

    Who sets off on a journey with little fuel (cash) in the tank, without the confidence that they will be able to top up the tank while on the journey? You don’t – you stay at home, batten down the hatches and play it safe.

    I’m afraid that the PM goes from bad to worse. It seems like he has again conned his parliamentary colleagues, having promised tax cuts only days ago. Tax cuts need to happen now, not later, to avoid stagflation. Leaving them to later by listening to the same economists who thought they had cured inflation is just naive.

    Mike Lane
    Nelson, Lancashire

    Very well put, Mike Lane. As we predicted, the promise of tax cuts sprayed around by Johnson shortly after the huge vote of ‘no confidence’ by back-benchers was just more lies. Whoda thunkit?

    1. And just what will happen to inflation if everyone has too much to spend?

      We’re entering a recession. People are not spending because of the cost of essentials. If we gave people money to spend Mr Lane would soon be moaning about the rate of inflation never coming down.

      Quite a few businesses are having trouble getting materials, do you think they want more customers right now?

    2. This is because the Treasury thinks only of what the state wants. Ther eis no interest or thought in the real economy. It is just another inefficient, self serving government department so navel gazing it is now just destructive.

      Government is a parasite, a bloated tic sucking away at the real wealth creating economy.

  28. SIR – Boris Johnson seems to have no comprehension of the poverty that so many people face, particularly in the so-called Red Wall constituencies.

    Does he really think that offering voters the right to buy will bring about levelling up, when huge numbers of people cannot afford food, fuel or rent (“‘Benefits to Bricks’ is no solution to Britain’s housing woes”, Gerard Lyons, Comment, June 12)?

    He and his Cabinet colleagues are so divorced from the realities of life that they cannot see that people need actual money in their pockets to afford the essentials of life, and unless he takes action to cut taxes he will have no chance of remaining in power – and that goes for the Tory Party as a whole.

    I have voted for the Tories for the past 60 years but I despair at the choice I will have at the next election, and for the first time in my life will in all probability not vote.

    G F Gooden
    Woodbridge, Suffolk

    Of course he has ‘no comprehension of the poverty that so many people face’. That’s because he’s a born-to-rule Bullingdon Boy who has no idea what it is like to exist on or below the breadline.

    1. I have never really understood the levelling up debate.
      Since when has introducing left wing policies ever levelled anything up.
      They have always levelled down, just look at what happened when they got rid of grammar school.

      1. As a fatuous phrase, ‘levelling up’ is … um … up there with ‘the big society’.

        2. It was when some monkey said ‘government is better suited to levelling up than the market’ it was clearly just another attempt at enforcing socialism. Government does nothing. It is a wasteful, pointless entity.

      2. “Levelling-up” logically means paying everyone the same as Premier League footballers. I’m sure the Magic Fairy can afford it.

      4. The welfare state? The NHS?

        Thatcher got rid of Grammar schools. It was her that also replaced the old GCE/CSE system with GCSEs.

        The left? You do make me laugh.

        1. “Thatcher got rid of Grammar schools.”

          You might like to think again about that.

          1. I don’t need to, she holds the record for grammar school closures as Heath’s education secretary.

          2. You wrote it as though it was a Thatcher government that passed the legislation. A bit lazy really, especially after having criticised NtN for his muddled remarks about Zelensky.

            FWIW, I was surprised by her part in this. It was Heath’s poison chalice. She could hardly have refused to carry out the legislation – except, of course, to have refused the role of education sec…

          3. She could have. She actually took a poll in Finchley and found 80% of her constituents didn’t want selection, and so she went mad making grammars into comprehensives. The legislation came from 1965 and Labour but there was no timescale it was left up to local LEAs.

          4. Only because Labour had enacted legislation to delegate the changeover to the LEAs and, as Heath was unwilling to repeal that legislation, she had little power to act otherwise.

    2. Meanwhile, Boris and his generals are going full guns for prolonging the war and hinting of direct involvement. Where are the snowflakes and Stop the War lot when you need them. I find the seemingly overwhelming support for a war in Europe which is severely damaging us all to be quite surreal.

        1. M.Macron is helping Mr Putin so it’s likely France will be spared a la Vichy….

      3. I asked people at our club on Friday what historical ties we had to Ukraine and why was the government sending weapons and complaining that Russia is killing people. Why aren’t they using diplomatic channels.
        I also asked why they did nothing since 2014 when the current and previous Ukraine governments killed 15,000 people in the Dombass area.

        There was a dumb silence. I was not surprised.

    3. In fact he’s is causing the poverty by allowing supposedly destitute people to arrive on our shores and enter our country illegally. Each year he uses 13 plus billions of tax payer’s money to support these illegal entrants. And inflates our costs and taxes the backside off the workforce. To pay for it.
      If that isn’t the work of a delusional moron I don’t know what might be.
      Frankly I rather have Vlad running the country instead of that nob.

      1. Just wondering that if Hitler had won the war , whether we would be the mess we are in now .. I say that with tongue in cheek of course

        1. The trains would run on time and there would be no speed limits on our roads. Win win.

        3. The Nasties were, well, nasty. Back-stabbing, self-promoting, cheating, lying scum.
          Just like modern-day politicians, in fact.

      2. The immigration farce is intentional as punishment for Brexit. The state is simply taking revenge for not getting it’s own way.

        1. The pathetic french hierarchy hate us, they’ve never been able to get over Crecy or Agincourt let alone the other huge defeats and rescuing them from German occupation.

    4. He’s talking about the man who described his one morning per week job for the DT paid a quarter of a million per year as ‘Chicken-feed’.

      Even with his huge bill for child support he’s not exactly been short of cash ever.

    1. General Sanders, newly appointed Chief of the General Staff is a moron. I believe his early education at Worth Abbey, a Benedictine monastery school, has had a profound impression on him. He recently punished an entire Parachute Battalion for the misdemeanours of half a dozen two?squaddies who indulged in heterosexual ‘orgy’ with a scrubber from the local community. If it had been an unrestricted LGBT saturnalia he wouldn’t have dared mentioned it.

      1. I agree, Ped. That’s not leadership, it’s unbridled, v-s inspired stupidity.

    2. If proof were needed that t6he West wants war, this is it. What is particularly pathetic about this situation is that people in the West are not being told that the war is over and has been for some weeks, Russia, rightly, won. But our propaganda machine still persists in pretending that war continues in order for Western countries to deflect from their own incompetence’s at home.

  30. A selection of forehead-slappers from https://www.bbc.com/news/uk
    “Ambulance Service staff unable to drive new vehicles due to height”
    “Companies must help cut living costs, says new cost of living tsar” – no powers to cut taxes.

    1. There’s a cost of living tsar now?

      Is he the guy they are going to blame?

      Job :- Government scapegoat
      £200k per annum.

      Don’t expect the job to last more than 12 months.

  31. SIR – If ever there was a figure who should keep calm and carry on, surely it is the Governor of the Bank of England. This should not only be evident in words but also in his actions.

    Instead, we have a Governor who warned that increases in the cost of food would be “apocalyptic”, and publicly stated that the Bank is “helpless” to do anything. No wonder this has led to a plunge in the pound, in particular against the US dollar. This of course leads directly to yet more inflation by making imports, notably oil and gas, more expensive. What an own goal.

    Christopher Cross
    Boxted, Suffolk

    It certainly was, Mr Cross! If anyone was in charge it should have been P45 time for the Governer of the B of E. He has failed to act when he should have done and this is costing us dear. I think he should go at the earliest opportunity, and find some other mugs who will pay him £495,000 p.a. to foul things up!

    1. SIR – If the Governor of the Bank of England needs to spend four months and £200,000 of taxpayers’ money to create a “mission statement” (report, June 12), then he has truly lost the plot.

      May I suggest the following: maintain a consistently low rate of inflation, no higher than 2 per cent. Job done.

      Nigel Lewis
      Farnham, Surrey

      Quite so, Mr Lewis.

      1. And bank viability? Currency management? BoE management? Monetary stability? Economic stability? Bank regulation?

        His job is a lot more than monthly MPC meetings, which are actually different from his job at the BoE.

    2. I believe Chicken Licken is looking for a job.
      We could do with some clear, calm thinking.

    3. The governor of the BofE is just playing an elaborate charade. He knows perfectly well that this fiat currency has reached the end of the road, just as every fiat currency in history has done. He knows that the covid response was a hoax that extended the fiat currency’s life for several more years. He knows that printing money causes inflation, and he knows that they intend to make us suffer, because that is the only way that they think they will get us to accept the CBDC.
      Keep raising awareness about the digital pound and its implications with everyone in real life!

  32. Good Moaning.
    After nearly experiencing the fate of Dunwich, we now have a bloody great yellow ball in the sky.
    We’re doooooomed. Only tax, more tax … even tax on extra tax will save us.

  33. There was an interesting programme about how the British King Edward VIII provided to Von Ribbentrop detailed information about weaknesses in the French Maginot Line, which were then used during the invasion of France. The Duke of Windsor also advised Hitler to bomb London and other cities to break the spirit of the British, so that they would sue for peace.

    Two things – we should be jolly grateful to Wallis Simpson for saving the nation, and also that while the Luftwaffe was blitzing London, the RAF was fixing its airfields up.

  34. SIR – It is very concerning that advertising agencies continue to boycott GB News and therefore collude in damaging its business (Business, June 13).

    Stop Funding Hate – ironically a rather hateful social media campaign group – bullied businesses into shunning GB News before it had even started broadcasting just over a year ago.

    Of course there may be Right-leaning figures like David Starkey, who have been “uncancelled” by this channel, but there are necessarily many eloquent Left-wing or woke commentators participating in excellent debates which are the hallmark of this channel.

    It is fascinating to see the discrepancy between the warmth and diversity of GB News and the ill-informed clichés of virtue-signallers who never actually watch it.

    Marc Versloot
    Rusthall, Kent

    I am delighted that GBN is ruffling some v-s and pc feathers, and long may it continue to do so!

    1. I wasn’t aware that GB News was still being boycotted. Doesn’t seem to be doing it much harm. Was a little lukewarm about the station until recently. Now I watch it every night, online, from 7.00 pm to around 10:00 pm, sometimes later. Far more interesting and innovative than the stodge that passes for news on the other stations which are decidedly not worth watching. And long may it continue, indeed, and go from strength to strength.

      1. They have many absurdly woke lefties on their discussion panels and the channel certainly tries to present a balanced view even though the presenters of the evening shows: Farage, Stein and Wootton, are more to the right.

        Two or three of the panellists are sheer poison: Amy Nickel, Benjamin Butterworth and Ashley James for example.

        1. Actually I think that is good, the poisonous people, because they get shown up for what they are by those on the right. That happened last night when the union supporter got an earful by the rest of the panel about how morally reprehensible the train workers were. You wouldn’t get that on the BBC or Sky. I think he probably went away less sure of his righteousness in ruining the lives of the poor.

    2. Hate not hope are the very epitome of fascists. Normla people aren’t frightened of dissenting voices. The Left though, the Left can’t stand them. This is because they exist in a permanent state of cognitive dissonance – truth, and their opinions.

      They cannot tolerate a different opinion because it’s challenge. Challenge gives people a different view. The Left want you to have only one view – theirs.

      1. You don’t think you are narrow-minded?

        Imho you are one of the most narrow-minded amongst us.

  35. SIR – It is very concerning that advertising agencies continue to boycott GB News and therefore collude in damaging its business (Business, June 13).

    Stop Funding Hate – ironically a rather hateful social media campaign group – bullied businesses into shunning GB News before it had even started broadcasting just over a year ago.

    Of course there may be Right-leaning figures like David Starkey, who have been “uncancelled” by this channel, but there are necessarily many eloquent Left-wing or woke commentators participating in excellent debates which are the hallmark of this channel.

    It is fascinating to see the discrepancy between the warmth and diversity of GB News and the ill-informed clichés of virtue-signallers who never actually watch it.

    Marc Versloot
    Rusthall, Kent

    I am delighted that GBN is ruffling some v-s and pc feathers, and long may it continue to do so!

  38. Ahem

    “During the last few decades, the economy of the US and Europe has

    been falsified on a level that is difficult to believe. We in the West

    have been living far beyond our means and our currencies have been

    massively overvalued. We have been able to do this through two

    mechanisms:

    The first one is the reserve status of the dollar and the

    semi-reserve status of the euro which have enabled the West to export

    digital money and receive goods in return. This has created enormous

    financial power for the West and enabled it to function as a parasite on

    the world economy. We have been getting a lot of goods for free, to put

    it mildly.

    The second falsification mechanism is the increase in debt to a

    level where we have essentially pawned everything we own, including our

    houses and lands, to keep up our living standards. We own nothing now

    when the debt has been subtracted. The debt has long since become

    unserviceable – far beyond our ability to pay interests on – which

    explains why the interest rates in the West are in the neighborhood of

    zero. Any increase would make the debt unserviceable and we would all go

    formally bankrupt in a day.”

    I comment the whole article to the house,it explains much……..

    https://thesaker.is/world-war-3-for-dummies/

    1. I have always had a horror of debt and the only time I borrowed was when Caroline and I bought our house in France in which we still live 33 years later.
      But happily we were able to pay off this loan relatively quickly.

      The majority of us here are probably not heavily in debt and our mortgages are paid off. I feel very sorry for those who are in debt which is why I think that the way students have been conned into taking out unrepayable loans at rates of interest up to twenty times more than the BoE base rate is disgusting and indefensible.

      As I have said before here, Caroline’s parents and my parents paid respectively for our university expenses so we both arrived in the world of work free of debt. We thank God that we managed to pay for our boys’ education so that neither of them left university with a monstrous debt around their necks.

  39. If you do not tolerate evil you are an enemy of the Open Society.

    Everything you are commanded to tolerate benefits people who are not

    you. Tolerance is what is taught in the defence of the destruction of

    morality, of conscience, of the innocence of children. It is pushed to

    promote the destruction of your homeland by waves of men with no

    attachment nor love for you nor your country. It is to make you

    complicit in the devaluation of your wages, of your profession, of

    everything of value.

    Tolerance is the magic word of the boiling frog, which teaches it to

    welcome the ever-hotter water. Say no to tolerance. It is the gateway

    drug to every evil. So, instead of putting up with everything, try

    putting down that burden and walk awhile without it.

    https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/tolerance-the-gateway-drug-to-every-evil/
    ConWoman,spot on

    1. Tolerance is good but it needs using with discretion and intelligence.

      Relationships for instance shouldn’t break up because your partner farts too much or coughs too loudly. That can be tolerated. On the other hand you’d be a moron to tolerate getting punched in the face by a partner.

  40. Good morning , a bit belated .

    The storm that was forecast last night , never happened . Just strong winds last night and this morning , and the boiler blew out , so no hot water this morning .

    Slight drizzle early yesterday evening , but garden is really as dry as a bone .

    During the day , we found dead / damaged fledglings in the garden . 2 sparrow babies , baby bluetit, one starling and a young thrush , all maimed by one of the many cats that boldly enter our garden . I felt very tearful . What a waste .

    3. You might as mentioned TB find it’s the magpies, they are known for killing fledglings and consuming them.
      I’ve seen them doing it in our garden.

        1. Ah, I thought it might be the double-regurgitating floggle-toggle that stops the fu-fus getting up the jig-jig pipe.

    2. Ask them why they insist on having a black person in every screen shot. Surely it’s an act of some sort of blatant tribalism.

  43. I’ll be off until later, Happy Fathers day guys. We have our three sons, wives and grandchildren coming to see us later.
    Just a fun afternoon and a few beers.

  44. 353324+ up ticks,

    At least many of us long termers tried so no shame there, unlike the toxic current coalition member / voters.

    Gerard Batten
    @gjb2021
    ·

    Gerard Batten
    @gjb2021
    ·
    19m
    Just as I predicted they would, way back in 2014 in my book The Road to Freedom.

    previewImg
    Pessimist Remainer elites are ‘stopping Britain from reaping benefits of Brexit’ — The Sun

    BRITAIN is failing to reap the benefits of Brexit because of the defeatist mindset of ruling elites, a report reveals.

    apple.news

    https://gettr.com/post/p1esypcad52

    1. I thought she’d owned up to this years ago? It was talked about after her success at the 2004 Olympics.

      1. It was well known when I was serving that women in the Postal and Courier services were overwhelmingly gay.

          1. I went to visit my sister (ex QA) for Christmas 75. Hubby was RCT 68 sqn in Rheind. Went to the Sqn bar. What an eye opener for a young lad!

          2. We had a WRAC girl posted into 16 Sigs who had been a postie. She had complained about lezza harassment and got beaten up for her pains, so she re-traded and came to the R Signals. A second sister also joined the QARANC and after basic training, moved on to Woolwich for nurse training. She was harassed by the ‘sisterhood’ and bought herself out.

    5. Hey, I’m heterosexual after 78 years and two daughters I need to do this now

    1. The Left seek to pervert everything, to remove any concept of truth and impose chaos. Then they make themselves the only order allowed. It’s what Stalin did, Hitler, Orwell documented this very fascism in 1984.

      The sad thing – perhaps comical – is that they believe themselves heroes, fighting a grand battle. They’re not. The Left are, and have always been, evil.

      1. It’s not the left. It’s liberalism which is linked to the right wing. We have no left bar a few relics in the HoC, less than a handful. We haven’t had a meaningful left since the early eighties. That’s why the media nowadays refers to the political consensus which is like Mandelson when he said “We’re all Thatcherites now”.
        Liberals believe in individual freedom and one freedom they believe in is how you identify.
        Seems to me that there’s less freedom than ever thanks to liberalism.

    2. That is vile and disgusting! But I can believe anything about Harvie and his foul, depraved mates.

        4. “Sex assigned at birth”…? Surely that was decided when the sperm met the egg, and is not a bureaucratic inconvenience?

        5. Nothing says inclusiveness like turning someone away for not agreeing that men can get pregnant….

          1. Trouble is, none of the Lefty turds can assimilate common sense: they’ve had it all washed out of their tiny minds.

    1. Ah yes, Hallmark cards midsummer revenue booster, invented in the 1960s I seem to recall!.

  51. A BTL comment under the ST Letters by a Chris Harris:

    “The thing I can’t understand about this debacle is that when these economic migrants are in France and are camping for months in forests, near motorways and the like, nobody cares about their human rights. Nobody says to the French government that they have a “duty of care”.
    “However, once they successfully cross the Channel and arrive in the UK they are given housing, health care and cash, but apparently the UK does have a duty of care and obligations under the refugee laws of 1951. It’s a very strange world in which we live. To top it all, the UK seems unable to deport illegal immigrants.”

    Thinking about it, it is major-cockup’s fault. Prior to him signing Maastricht I naïvely thought that John Major would bring entitlement to social services etc into line with those of Germany and France ie. something like a 2 year wait but no. Nothing was thought through. As per usual in cessminster and white-flag-hall , save for their salary and way OTT pensions provisions!”

    Of course the UK always tried to virtue signal by gold-plating EU regulations and imposing them far more harshly than other countries did. The Mayor of Calais does not like the fact that her town is clogged up with human detritus en route for Britain because of the absurdly generous way UK treats illegal immigrants.

    1. Most of the important jobs on the front bench are in the hands of foreigners,
      including an American pm ,whose father has escaped to France and asked for
      citizenship!!!!!!

  52. Zelensky says ‘we will definitely win’ as he visits frontline. 19 June 2022.

    Volodymyr Zelensky has said Ukraine will “definitely win” in the war against Russia, as he visited troops on the frontline of the southern Mykolaiv region.

    The Ukrainian President handed out medals and posed for selfies with soldiers in what appeared to be an underground bunker.

    He posted a video of the meeting on his Telegram account on Saturday, but did not confirm when the visit took place.

    “Our brave men. Each one of them is working flat out. We will definitely hold out! We will definitely win,” he said.

    Bearing in mind this public relations visit and the lack of any reported progress for several days now one wonders if Ukrainian forces have shut down and gone to ground as did the French in WWI. This would be kept out of the news of course and there would be no leave allowed to prevent it spreading.

    Just saying

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/06/18/ukraine-news-russia-war-conflict-latest-putin-sanctions-troops/

      1. I heard on the grapevine a month ago that Nigerians were going to Ukraine to join up purely in order that they could cross the Polish border into the EU … hope their staying at the back skills are good enough, otherwise they might not survive long enough.

  53. Dame Kelly Holmes shares relief at coming out as gay BBC propaganda article

    I always thought ‘it’ was a bloke anyway.

    2. Soz DKH but Snore……….
      I suspect that means she’ll now be seen on TV more often.

    4. Will they now convert her Damehood to a Knighthood?

      We always knew she was queer since she never had any bloke in tow.

      1. Indeed, but why is there such a song ‘n dance about it all? So she prefers women. So do I. Big deal, she should get over herself.

    5. It might have been members of her own cultural background that would be shocked rather than the society in which she lives. But a bit of victim-hood aimed at those who don’t care is always a bonus in these fragile days.

    6. But why assume that we give a flying one who she sleeps with! Why is it so important? How loud can I be? I DON*T CARE!

      1. But these days they like to tell us to make themselves feel better. It’s about their demanding validation from others.

  54. Just had thunder and lightning followed by a cloudburst. My kitchen was flooded and the water has run through the house and out the front door. I was supposed to be attending a parade of tractors in the local town where my friend is taking part with his restored Fordson. I will join him tonight in the bar for a commiseration-ary drink.

    4. That’s bad luck, French cloudbursts can be absolutely torrential.
      We had a massive thunder and lightning session but no rain at all here.
      Rain due later, I hope we don’t get similar.

    5. MOH’s great aunt had a small stone cottage in South Devon. There is a photograph of her Circa1900 sitting on a chair in the kitchen with her feet up on a stool with a stream running in through the backdoor, under her legs, across the flags, and out through the front door…..

  55. Just had thunder and lightning followed by a cloudburst. My kitchen was flooded and the water has run through the house and out the front door. I was supposed to be attending a parade of tractors in the local town where my friend is taking part with his restored Fordson. I will join him tonight in the bar for a commiseration-ary drink.

  56. Just had thunder and lightning followed by a cloudburst. My kitchen was flooded and the water has run through the house and out the front door. I was supposed to be attending a parade of tractors in the local town where my friend is taking part with his restored Fordson. I will join him tonight in the bar for a commiseration-ary drink.

  57. 353324+ up ticks,

    BORISUKMIGRANT CRISISEUFAKE CONSERVATIVESFARAGEGERMANY
    UK Army Commander Tells Troops to Prepare for a Land War in Europe

    Anything said about the civil war surely about to break out on the home front first ?

    I mentioned in prior post the need for Tommy Atkins being awakened from his pavement mattress to combat trouble on the home front that is already with us but not to be recognised as such by “party first dangerous fools”.

    The British were fighting / dying on foreign fields in the past what did that do for us in the long run but gave us the killing fields of london plus.

    Let those above tjhe rank of sergeant, ALL the politicians, & the civil service turn out & lead from the front.

      1. 353324+ up ticks,

        Afternoon BB2,

        Batten or the Army Commander ?

        Batten is so far right,

        The army commander see’s glory in distant lands
        wishful thinking , maybe

  58. Are all tradesmen messy? I keep finding plaster – dust, streaks and blobs – all over the place – miles from the place being plastered. When the doors were done the floor was just sawdust. No attempt at hoovering. In fact, the only guys who were tidy were the bathroom folk and only because i hoovered every bally evening.

    The water damaged floor gets replaced tomorrow. The laminate goes down on Tuesday. I’m not especially happy, as I know the blasted stuff will move about, come apart and generally be rubbish. Why isn’t it made better?

    1. Tell me about it. You should try internal block-work wall demolished; entire ground floor boards & skirting boards removed entire house re-skimmed, entire plumbing and electrical services replaced, bathrooms & wet room tiled (tiles cut in situ!) 15 new doors hung ;Oh I nearly forgot all windows replaced. One Dyson couldn’t cope with the muck and has gone to the great vacuum in the sky (OKA the Recycling Centre) the other is under the care of a lung specialist!

      1. Blooomin’ heck! In that event I’d move out! MiL’s little flat is turning into a money pit – moving a plug found that the wiring was fraying and needing replacing. The kitchen plumbing was moved and didn’t run true and needed to be moved. The ceiling plaster is pulling the artex off and thus both cracked and came off, falling on the floor so new plaster board is needed.

        It’s potty.

        1. Is all this work because you a planning to move? Or is the place you’re planning to buy?

          1. The move. I keep getting lectured to leave it and stop fiddling, but it’s one thing, then it’s another thing.

            When we relayed all these issues to a surveyor we had lunch with she said ‘none of those would be noticed unless the buyer requested a full survey, and even then some might be missed.’

            So maybe a waste of money, but given the economy I’m very nervous of moving and if we do a few little bits it makes the place nicer to live in.

          2. Maybe better to stay until the economy picks up a bit then. Or house prices might fall.

    2. Professional standards are deteriorating at the same rate as human intelligence is.

      1. He’s a nice bloke and his work in the hallway was great but I keep finding plaster spatter – the washing machine door is concave (it goes in – apols if I got the name wrong) yet was caked with plaster!

        Gah! Maybe i am picky.

  59. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/976161feb24f98a1188d4ae4fd9a6843331f739dffb7663c6c829e136b2f5d00.jpg I had a lovely surprise, yesterday, when out on my nature walk. I saw a couple of male Beautiful Demoiselle Calopteryx virgo damselflies squabbling over a piece of territory in the reed-filled stream where the Marsh Warblers breed. I’ve often seen the related Banded Demoiselles C. splendens in the UK, but this was my first encounter with the ‘Beautiful’ variant. I was utterly enchanted.

    2. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0451713698a34f1aca94b5366cef8e37b9af98e3eab2dc4df14cc7fdd3e514bb.jpg

      https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4b2234e23ef568a13f6afa3efb9478771ae7d9598e60f1d9902694f6c7f735da.jpg

      https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/05507e3a6d6b0a7891f10da4b2f8f149795bb5a8b9edc49616a14161c4a520cf.jpg

      https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/985cdfb1fa5138a432dd6dba3c379b85e5fe8f9e38450191873145be32a8d0ef.jpg Also, whilst out and about, I took some more snapshots of the extensive poppy-filled prairies nearby. Good job I did since it was 23ºC and very warm and sunny. It clouded over in the afternoon and, in common with other parts of Europe documented on this forum today, we had a thunderstorm cloudburst during the night and the temperature has dropped considerably. I imagine that many of those poppies suffered the same fate as mine have done, completely trashed by the deluge.

      1. Grizz, a tip for enhancing your splendid photos – leave a space between them!

      2. Ah, waiting for poppy seed heads and then bleeding them for heroin. All in a day’s work.

    4. Gorgeous photo, Grizz! I just love the iridescence!
      Firstborn’s farm has these – fabulous when the clatter by you like some kind of badly-made clockwork toy, but oh, so beautiful! SWMBO has a few photos, but they don’t hold a poe for very long. He also has copper-coloured ones.

      1. They are simply gorgeous, especially when the sun highlights their iridescence.

          2. She was probably in CND earlier. Who was that Barbara woman at Greenham Common?!

          4. She was probably in CND earlier. Who was that Barbara woman at Greenham Common?!

      2. She was part of a bigger protest, I think. The USA has just released the jabs for toddlers.
        One doctor simply posted on Twit today that parents should protect their children, as he doesn’t want more patients with jab side effects, he already has enough of those.

          2. Slight overreaction, possibly. He was rude about the old lady in the photo – misunderstanding perhaps. We don’t all have to agree about everything.

          3. I am glad that the post seems to be still up. Cancel culture not good!

            Am talking too much, and alcohol is not even involved! Better get back to doing my tax 🙁

      3. Yanks call jabs “shots” for some weird obscure reason. Probably because they are gun-obsessed.

        1. My shots come from a shotglass, and in the main consist of home-made shine!
          Cheersh! Hic!

          4. Not so easy to make. Takes more skill… we will have apples, and no corn, so we’ll try Calvados this year.
            One ambition is to make Weegie whisky…

          6. Always welcome, mate.
            We have “antibac” (handwash) as an aperitif, then some quite reasonable vodka. This years project – calvados.

          7. That omits tell of the arsenal downstairs, of course… ;-)) Mum’s the word!

  61. Authored by Tom Luongo via Gold, Goats, ‘n Guns blog,

    Russia is done with the West. The divorce is nearly complete. In the past few days we’ve heard from all major Russian leaders the same thing, “The West will play by our rules now.”
    You can decide for yourselves whether Russia is writing checks they can’t cash, but in the words of Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov telling the BBC bluntly, “We do not care about the eyes of the West.” Lavrov has always been the soul of politeness and discretion when dealing with European media.

    His open hostility towards his BBC interviewer was not only palpable, it was hard to argue with. He followed that up with:
    “I don’t think there’s even room for manoeuver left anymore,” Lavrov replied.
    “Because both [Prime Minister Boris] Johnson and [Foreign Secretary Liz] Truss say publicly: ’We must defeat Russia, we must bring Russia to its knees. Go on, then, do it.”

    Russia’s leadership never talks in such openly blunt terms. It’s almost like Lavrov was channeling comedian Dennis Miller who used to say, “Feeling froggy, take that leap.”
    See where it gets you.
    Russia knows it has the West on the ropes. We need what they produce and now they are determined to set the rules on who gets them and for what price. It knows that European leaders are puppets with Klaus Schwab’s hand up their asses.

    And it knows Davos has zero leverage over Russia’s actions from here on out.
    Which brings me to the statements linked above by Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller, speaking at a panel at the St. Petersburg Economic Investment Forum (SPEIF) who just put the situation in the starkest terms there is.
    “The game of nominal value of money is over, as this system does not allow to control the supply of resources. …Our product, our rules. We don’t play by the rules we didn’t create.”
    Miller’s statement should be thought of as a statement of principle across all theatres of operation for Russia. This doesn’t just apply to natural gas or oil. This is everything, all of Russia’s dealings with the West from here on out will be on its terms not the West’s.

    This is clearly the biggest geopolitical middle finger in the post WWII period.

    Miller is clearly laying out the rules for a new, commodity-centric monetary system, one based on what Credit Suisse’s Zoltan Poszar called ‘outside money’ — commodities, gold, even bitcoin — rather than the West’s egregious use of ‘inside money’ — debt-based fiat and credit — to perpetuate old colonialist behavior well past its use-by date.

    I laid out the basic problem in an article from March after Russia soft-pegged the ruble to gold.
    Today’s “Inside Money” standard, known colloquially as the Dollar Reserve standard, is actually what I like to call “Milton Friedman’s Nightmare.” It is nothing more than a system of competitively devalued and inflated debt-based scrips running around drinking each other’s milkshakes until everyone’s glass is empty.
    Miller is definitely a glass full kinda guy now.

    1. So ‘The West’ what’s your answer. MAD in a fit of pique?

      You can be sure that Russia has all its ICBM silos greased within an inch of their lives.

      Schwab, “You will have nothing and be happy with your nuclear destruction.”

      This is the best and clearest riposte from Russia to ALL the Glob Blob. Johnson, Biden, Prince Charles. U-turns are.about due.

    2. Pegging a currency toa commodity is a sure fire way to stabilise it. Note the Swiss and Singaporeans do the same, and ae not suffering the rampant inflation caused by the childish frenzy our lot have created by printing money.

      The state has devalued ur already debased currency for it’s own purpose. It has destroyed it by crushing interest rates and now the final whammy was adding yet more taxes to it. These people are fools and shuld never again be allowed to destroy our lives. We must stop them being able to print money.

      We need energy, and Boris needs to get on with that. No more dithering. The state must spend less. A lot less, such as half what it does. The era of profligate socialism must end and the budget put into surplus and that surplus must include significant tax cuts.

      There is no alternative now. We’re heading for the buffers and Sunak’s laughing as he calls for more steam.

      1. Come on, Wibbles, how, apart from insurrection, do we remove these idiots from the levers of power?

        2. We can’t. However, when they leave us no choice, that’s the only option.

          The state can only exist because we permit it to. We have to remmeber that. They canonly levy fines, taxes and so on when we comply. When we remove the power – and it is all lent to them by us – they are powerless. Dragging Khan behind a car by the neck becomes a rational choice when it is proven how malignant he is.

          1. What a beautiful idea, not only Khan but Johnson as well. Beats the hell out of tumbrils, though there is a certain romanticism there.

      2. Some years ago, long ago, we were told weekly, even daily, of where we stood in respect of our “Balance of Payments”. I do not recall that being mentioned at all for some time. Must be very unfavourable, I would guess.

  62. Network of Syria conspiracy theorists identified. 19 June 2022.

    Others include Canadian independent journalist Eva Bartlett who appeared on a Syrian government panel at the UN, alleging that the White Helmets stage rescues. One version of the talk has been viewed 4.5m times on Facebook.

    White Helmets volunteers are the most frequently attacked targets with more than 21,000 tweets designed to discredit the group or encourage attacks against their first responders. Hamid Kutini, a volunteer in north-west Syria said: “The [Syrian] regime and Russia makes our lifesaving work extremely risky through double-tap attacks. When we go to save people from a bombed site, they re-target the same area to kill the first responders.”

    This is a revisionist attempt on the reality of what happened in Syria. Eva Bartlett’s testimony is unimpeachable as are the photographs showing the same victims in multiple settings. The holes in the details of the official narrative are many but all you really need to know is that the White Helmets were financed by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (MI6) and operated exclusively in Jihadist territory.

    They could not do that unless they had an understanding with them!

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jun/19/russia-backed-network-of-syria-conspiracy-theorists-identified

    2. Eva Bartlett is one of that dwindling band of journalists who have integrity and report honestly what they see. “White Helmets” militia were seen killing and robbing their victims. I disagree with Ms Bartlett on the “Palestinian issue” but that doesn’t detract from my respect for her work. I believe she’s also reporting from Ukraine?

          5. I found your comment quite easily – if you follow me you will probably find mine more easily.

          1. It’s just 50·5% now, Tom. Looks like the common-sensists have come home from the pub to vote.

  64. Good afternoon NoTTLers, I’m late on parade – and just passing through on my way to the bar – golf first thing this morning, then round to my folks to drop a bottle of Grey Goose off for my dad. It was a minor family reunion, both sisters and one brother were there with associated other halves. Nice to catch up, though mostly about the grandchildren/nephews/nieces and great grandchildren/nephews/nieces. Good times.

  65. Here’s a bloke who gets my respect! Eric Brown.
    https://youtu.be/cJ1Mbq6jQRA

    German speaking Test Pilot, Capt Eric “Winkle” Brown, went into post WW2 Germany to find and test their aircraft. He was asked to interrogate high ranking Nazis as well. In interviews later in life he talks about this time and the astonishing aircraft he flew.

          1. Mistake was to become a politician and a fat, blubbermouth.
            Bastard. Leading Nazi, hope the suicide hurt.

  67. Email from pal in GA- from the beach! She said it was so hot in north metro Atlanta that she and her husband went to the shore. Still hot but a sea breeze.
    Roast lamb, spring greens, other green veg and spuds tonight for Dad’s day.
    Hope all you dads out there had/are having a nice day.

        1. I’d like to think that I step up to that plate but, two failed marriages and a fcuked up relationship says, I’m better on my own.

          I shall go and (hope) to lick my wounds north of the border.

          1. That’s a sad little post.
            I’m sorry, Tom. Life can be a bitch sometimes.
            I’m sure you have, and will continue, to step up when required. KBO!

          2. So sorry to hear that Tom. Life ain’t always easy and relationships can be tough.

          5. Thank you, Ann, I do get confused between you and Damask Rose (Ruth). You’re both lovely caring ladies, the heart and soul of this exchange.

          6. Have you got somewhere to go, Tom? I’m sorry things have gone sour with the (formerly) Best Beloved.

          7. I’m off up to Scotland, (Moffat) during next week, as RAFA might help. As usual, I’m optomistic.

          9. They make a very good toffee in Moffat! Take care Tom and hope life becomes a little happier.

          12. A word to the wise, be optic-mist-ic

            A well filled optic can create a mist that leaves you in charge!

          15. Hoping that RAFA might provide. I can always doss under the (railway) arches. No internet though.

          16. I hope you’ll be able to keep in touch with us.

            Have you got a phone with wifi?

          17. What that says is that you’ve not met the right person. I dated two narcissist before I even knew what the term was and very nearly went out completely then, one day aged 36 and staring singleton in the eyes and thinking this is it, some daft bint stepped in front of the car and I drove into a hedge as my eyes followed her. Remember that you were only half responsible in those marriages. It takes 2 to make them work and they are hard because people are utter prats.

            While the Warqueen and I rarely argue, it took her some time to realise I would be brutally honest with her because I was sick of dancing around lies – even the petty ones. ‘Does my bum look big in this’ Yes. But you really mean do I look attractive to you and that’s yes. I love you, but really, what you look like is a tiny part of WHY I love you so stop looking for validation I can’t give.’

            Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. I know I was lucky. Your actions are half chance. Be kind to yourself.

          19. You’d better believe it, Wibbles, that I’ve tried, and for me at 78, I think I will be better off as an old and disillusioned batchelor for the remaing years left to me.

          21. Although I paid for her from Blue Cross as a rescue dog, Dotty is besotted with Judy and I wouldn’t/couldn’t tear that bond asunder.

          22. Is that why you haven’t been sleeping , Tom .

            What happened .

            It is a bit late in life to have so many complications, really and truly x

      1. Paul, You, your coments and the fact that you have a family that cares, speaks volumes. Long may they reign. I just wish.

    1. Hole in one here,
      Okay my daughter did it earlier in 3

      Wordle 365 1/6

      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    3. You are indeed, sweetie ! … x
      Mine’s a Par Four today.
      Wordle 365 4/6

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

    4. Lots of us around.
      Wordle 365 3/6

      ⬜⬜⬜🟩🟨
      🟨🟨⬜🟩⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

        1. Since the NYT took over Wordle, I have a policy of starting with “LIARS”. It was wrong, but the remaining letters had only one solution.

          1. I don’t play it, I’m a Solitaire man, but liars for the NYT seems a good choice.

    6. I nearly was the word today. You see what happened.
      Wordle 365 5/6

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

    2. If they’re on a French warship then they are, inherently safe and should be returned to France. Why is the coastguard going out to collect perfectly safe criminals?

        1. I’m honestly tired of this farce. Until we go out, turna shot gun on them and make them go the feck away nothing will change. Why are we being lumbered with this dross? They’re rapists, paedophiles and criminals. They’ve no value, use or skill. They’ve broken a slew of laws, passed through endless countries where they should have stopped and been processed. Why do they even get here?

          3. Maybe, ’tis time the population rose up against them – and their Muslim friends – and said, “Enough is enough, get out, we don’t want you.- Take your families with you.”

            We wil hunt you down until no trace remains.

            Remember how the Nazis dealt with the Jews. Do we need to do the same to you?

      3. I have supported the RNLI for several decades.

        I wonder how long it will be able to get enough support from the British public to carry on.

        Incidentally, the RNLI sends me their magazine every quarter which gives accounts of the heroic rescues they do. Funnily enough the magazine contains nothing about the taxi service they are offering to illegal immigrants.

        1. I expect Soros, Gates etc will make up the shortfall as they’re doing such valuable work for them.

        2. WHy don’t you just return the magazine to sender with a small note saying why you don’t want to hear from them again? You are simply continuing to support them otherwise. Fine – if that is what you want to do.

  71. HAPPY HOUR

    Watching tennis at Queens earlier, wonderful faux pas
    from John Lloyd….

    ” Grass is not just for cows”….

  73. I cannot believe that I would ever agree with Gordon Brown!

    Gordon Brown predicts Rishi Sunak will have to scrap rise in Corporation Tax at the Autumn budget and warns of a ‘global recession’ in repeat of 1930s

    DM Story : https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10931731/Gordon-Brown-predicts-Rishi-Sunak-cut-taxes-autumn-warns-repeat-1930s.html

    Just when Britain should be trying to support business and become more profitable and business friendly than the EU they decide to raise corporation tax from 19% to 25%.

    This suggests that The Conservative Government is anti business, anti-Brexit and pro-EU.

    Brexit was an illusion – Nigel Farage was mad not to contest every Conservative held seat in the 2019 general election.

    1. None of them are saying openly that this is what happens when a fiat currency dies, due to too many grubby fingers in the pie and too much printing!
      Therefore, I cannot take Brown’s latest utterances too seriously. He’s as bad as the rest of them (GOLD!).

      1. Brown was the most devious, lying, prestidigitating Chancellor ever. The perfect foil to the wrecker in chief.
        Between them they did the UK more long term harm than even WW1 and 2 combined.

  75. The West blames Islamic butchery of Africa’s Christians on ‘climate change’

    IMAGINE if after the Manchester Arena bombing of May 2017 a foreign head of state had attempted to excuse Salman Abedi for the murder of 22 people, ten of them aged under 20, and the horrible wounding of hundreds of others by claiming that ‘climate change’ was to blame.

    This is precisely what happened after some 40 Nigerians, including many children, were butchered by Muslim terrorists calling themselves the Islamic State West Africa Province at a Catholic church on Pentecost Sunday.

    Irish President Michael D Higgins, in his great wisdom (Pope Francis once described him as a ‘wise man of today’), offered moral parity to the killers by suggesting they too were suffering, but from the harm done to their planet by white people enjoying foreign holidays and driving cars fuelled by diesel or petrol.

    News travels fast even in sub-Saharan Africa in the internet age, and Higgins’s insensitivity to the victims of the slaughter provoked a backlash which must have surprised him, given that he has since denied blaming the atrocity at St Francis Xavier Church in Ondo State on climate change.

    So, for clarity, this is exactly what President Michael D Higgins said in his message of condolence: ‘That such an attack was made in a place of worship is a source of particular condemnation, as is any attempt to scapegoat pastoral peoples who are among the foremost victims of the consequences of climate change.

    ‘The neglect of food security issues in Africa for so long has brought us to a point of crisis that is now having internal and regional effects based on struggles, ways of life themselves.

    ‘The solidarity of us all, as peoples of the world, is owed to all those impacted not only by this horrible event but in the struggle by the most vulnerable on whom the consequences of climate change have been inflicted.’

    It is obvious to many that some political ideologues are foolish beyond belief (remember that Abedi was allowed to stroll into the Manchester Arena with a bomb strapped conspicuously to his back because security staff thought it would be racist to check him). But this is taking it to a new level.

    The Catholic Bishop of Ondo, Jude Ayodeji Arogundade, was not going to let the statement of the ninth President of the Irish Republic pass without comment, and condemned it as ‘incorrect and far-fetched’.

    He said: ‘To suggest or make a connection between victims of terror and consequences of climate change is not only misleading but also exactly rubbing salt to the injuries of all who have suffered terrorism in Nigeria.

    ‘The victims of terrorism are of another category to which nothing can be compared. It is very clear to anyone who has been closely following the events in Nigeria over the past years that the underpinning issues of terror attacks, banditry, and unabated onslaught in Nigeria and in the Sahel Region and climate change have nothing in common . . .

    ‘Terrorists are on free loose slaughtering, massacring, injuring, and installing terror in different parts of Nigeria since over eight years not because of any reasonable thing but because they are evil — period.’

    Lord Alton of Liverpool, the crossbench peer and human rights campaigner, said: ‘It is striking how quickly politicians and commentators trot out the same discredited banal narrative that the drivers for such carnage are climate change and lack of resources.’

    Last year 4,650 Nigerian Christians were murdered for their faith, with a further 900 perishing violently at the hands of jihadists in the first three months of 2022.

    Nigeria is rated the seventh most dangerous country in the world for Christians by the Open Doors human rights group. These Christians owe their faith to the many Catholic and Anglican missionaries from the UK and Ireland who made huge sacrifices to spread the Gospel among them, and they are surely justified if they feel they have been deserted to carry their cross alone.

    It is true that the West has contributed to their suffering, but not by creating a ‘climate change’ crisis. Rather, it started wars it couldn’t finish, it recklessly recruited and armed jihadi radicals to fight for its interests in places such as Syria and Libya, and then turned a blind eye to the vast amounts of high-grade weaponry that found its way south across the Sahara where it is deployed against black Christian civilians.

    This doesn’t bother US President Joe Biden who last year decided that Nigeria should not be designated as a ‘Country of Particular Concern’ – almost as irresponsible as unilaterally withdrawing from Afghanistan and allowing the Taliban to walk straight back into Kabul.

    Nor is it only Nigeria and Afghanistan which have been left to fend for themselves by the leaders of the free world. Most of the nations of the Sahel – the southern shores of the Sahara Desert – have been witnessing massacres of civilians by jihadists on an unprecedented scale since the fall of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya at the hands of the rebels of the Arab Spring with the help of the UK and France.

    What naïve folly it was to hope that the demise of Gaddafi would usher in a golden era of liberal democracy for North Africa. Instead, it was the catalyst for anarchy, for mass movement of migrants across the Mediterranean and for the attempted violent conquest of the non-Islamic regions on the periphery of the Sahara by Islamists who were suddenly heavily armed from the Libyan conflict and heavily indoctrinated in Salafi and Wahhabi ideology.

    Countries including Mali, Chad, Burkina Faso, Mauritania and Niger have been attacked by groups like the Al-Mulathamun Battalion and by the Al Qaeda-affiliated Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin. Boko Haram has kidnapped and butchered its way across northern Nigeria and parts of Chad and Niger, but few outfits compare in ruthlessness and efficiency to the Islamic State of the Greater Sahara, which was founded in 2015. This group seeks to turn Nigeria into an Islamist state under the rule of Sharia law and spread violence to neighbouring countries including Ivory Coast, Togo and Benin.

    These lands have become a front line in the struggle against Islamists who seek the destruction of Christian civilisation and the advance of their own ideology. The wars that have marked the early part of the 21st century are not over yet. But don’t expect to hear too much about them because Western politicians are uninterested in the plight of the real victims and intellectually dishonest in their analyses of the problems. They probably think they have enough on their plate with Russia.

    So they prefer to pretend that every Islamist massacre is a result of something else – something fashionable like ‘climate change’ – revealing not only their incompetence but how perilously and manifestly unfit the West has become in rising to meet the real challenges of this age.

    https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/the-west-blames-islamic-butchery-of-africas-christians-on-climate-change/

  76. After chipping the plaster blobs off the plug sockets, walls, tiles, from the cupboard tops, changing the bins, putting the kitchen doors back on, hoovering… hoovering, and hoovering as one bit after another fell to the floor, then moving the things that were in the living room back in to the kitchen, doing the washing up, mopping the floor ….. the place is almost liveable.

    If you ignore the mess.

  77. Wordle 365 1/6

    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    That’s better, albeit a fluke. I couldn’t get yesterday’s at all.

    Ps – update for the Bel and the Dragon posse – I started getting bad stomach cramps on the way home – now in A&E 🙁 just to be on the safe side.)

    1. Oh dear Stormy
      We hope all will be well for you.
      Lovely to see you again.

    2. Oh goodness I do hope you’re seen very quickly and sorted out. Hopefully lots of fluids will do the trick. Look after yourself Stormy. Lovely seeing you again.

      1. Thanks Vee.
        Twill be fine. Still sitting here – been seen by a nurse, waiting to see a doc.

        1. Take care, you hear? Chicken soup and dry bread for the next couple of days;-))

    3. Oh, blimey, Stormy!
      :-((
      Hope it’s all a bout of gas and nothing serious!
      Be well, y’hear?

      1. Thanks Obers. I don’t think it’s serious but thought I’d get checked out just in case.

        1. If anything doubtful about the food is found, make sure the hospital keep the sample they must have tested. You (or others) can use that. Or at least ask for a report of what was found…

          Hope you feel on top of it very soon!

          2. It was really good seeing you, I do hope that you are feeling better now. Personal email coming.

    4. I thought you were travelling somewhere in an unreliable car.

      I do hope you are being looked at and are not hanging around for hours in A+E.

      1. That was yesterday. Today, completely unrelated, ate some tainted food but will be OK, I’m sure.
        Thanks for the well wishes.

    5. Blimey, Stormy! You’re not having the jolliest of weekends! Hope all is well and that you feel better soon! 🌹

    6. Good luck. Presumably you made it somewhere close to home? No ill effects here, yet, so hopefully there’ll be a new page in the morning…

    7. Sometimes Nottle produces bad news from and about regulars.

      You’ve had far more than your fair share over the last few days.

      I hope it changes to today’s wordle route, brilliant all the way!

    8. Office’s Scrabble Dictionary claims there are 8,996 available words with five letters while other sources claim that there are only 5,350 words that you can create with five letters in word games.

      How long is yer nose?

    1. What a sad song…I know what it felt like though – with someone I nearly married. His deceased wife had once said that she was upset at the idea of him being happy with anyone else, and he had not yet got over that.

      I didn’t say what I thought of her for that, but I know what I felt about it.

      1. Oh, blimey.
        I didn’t mean to bring that kind of thought out, H. I think Melissa has a very atmospheric voice. It goes well with the Swedish song.
        If she truly loved him, she’d be delighted that he found someone else to be together with.

          1. One of my favourite Lady singers. Lovely expressive voice. Together with Amy Macdonald.

          1. It takes two to keep a relationship alive.
            Maybe one comes to tthe concluson that the other has no value (however you might describe value) as a friend or whatever. Or, is just dull, boring, or whatever.
            When I find out how it works, I’ll write a book about it.

          4. Yes, they can be. Some are not. My husband knows that I am dreading tomorrow and has been support and kindness itself today. We both wish we had met 40 years ago when we were both working in south London- same area but never met.
            Last relationship lasted mainly because he was away a lot and I was working- the move to NC kiboshed that.

          5. Here’s one for you, Ann: Crank up the volume, it’s metal in German!
            https://youtu.be/LIPc1cfS-oQ
            Unlikely as it seems, a love song about missing the loved one…
            SWMBO and I had some hard times when young, and quite a bit of separation. Maybe that’s what held us together? “Absence makes the heart grow fonder” kind of thing?

          6. I meant the someone who didn’t want their spouse to be happy with anyone else, even after they had died, which tugged at the conscience of the survivor.

          7. I am sure my ex is really pissed off that I found happiness with another man. Don’t care, to be honest.

          8. That’s different – you two broke up. I had a nasty divorce (after a miserable marriage) and I would be delighted if my ex- was uptight about my new-found happiness. Good on you!

  79. Oh Blimey,daytime drinking,great company crap food good day apart from the impending hangover…….

    Night All

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/29d307b88656c268bc570461089e2231caeb075736d27f59a15eccd60973f885.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/22ecdba1f69427b7f0451c74724c15e6fc8b6eff755b298df80352a2e899bbe6.jpg

    Luckily I’m not suffering like Stormy………

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ceedbef224e76e5b9dbc84872716e4a516cb763b69ea6536d6f9993784a719eb.jpg

  80. Ped’s storm has arrived.

    Pool will be topped up, grass and the potager will be pleased, the house temperature will drop 30 degrees in old money, so it’s not all bad.

    All I ask is for no flooding and no electric outages. the ‘net has blown a couple of times already; it sure doesn’t like lightning!

  82. Thought for the day.

    At the end of every modern rainbow there’s not a pot of gold, there’s a cess pool

    1. No there isn’t, no there isn’t – after my first marriage was over I thought NEVER AGAIN. EVER. EVER. I am not going to let anyone do that again.

      After the crying and the subsequent mistakes, eventually an unlikely person came along and made the sun shine, and there was a rainbow.At the end was something far better than a crock of gold…

      2. You and me both! Somewhere we find it, the rainbow connection, for dreamers and lovers….

      3. Glad things went well, but I was referring to all the various types of pride rainbow

  83. OT

    This morning at 10.00, my Lesser black-blacked gull – Larus fuscus – Morag, (first seen nesting on a neighbouring gently-sloping roof on Thursday 9 June), produced two chicks.

    She made a lot of noise (a visual judgement through my telescope from sixty yards) and called in Hamish, the Dad.

    He coped – with difficulty – for about four hours.

    At 4.00 p.m., I was shocked to see a deserted nest with no visible signs of life or activity and perhaps another egg.

    However, Hamish returned and proceeded to reincarnate two lively chicks (Are they programmed to ‘lie doggo’ when the parents are away?

    About 5.00 p.m. I was greatly relieved to find Morag back in charge and all is well.

    Hamish and Morag are clearly distinguishable – he has a masculine face with brownish tip to his upper bill

    1. That’s lovely news! I hope you’ve a paintball spray gun for any marauding alien birds.

          1. I enjoy it, but the pool temperature here is nudging 30, so it’s too warm for my taste, HG on the other hand, is happy as a clam!

    2. Been hot and sunny all day here – cut the grass , trimmed a hedge and made a big batch of oatcakes thanks to the free electricity

      1. Hot and sunny all day, until dusk; rain evening and over night, then hot and sunny.
        Rinse and repeat.
        Life here is good!

      1. It is. And surprise, surprise, the car more than the driver is the deciding factor.

        1. But funny that is being said now that LH is losing but when he was winning everyone kept referring to him as the GOAT driver

          1. I wasn’t.
            He may be one of the most successful, and certainly a fine driver, particularly in the wet, but the greatest? I don’t think so.

    2. Err? Russell was 4th, behind Hamilton in 3rd! I think that means Hamilton beat Russell?

    1. Well I think the general public have maybe already realised that we are already paying up to 13 billions a year to support the illegal immigrants. I don’t think we need anymore people scroungers here. The rest of Europe has plenty of room to house them.
      Virtue signalling gets us nowhere.

  88. Update:
    4hrs in A&E – blood tests and ECG and I’m fine. Home about 30 min ago.

    I’m so sorry, Phizz, that your lovely day was marred by substandard service from the B&D. Nonetheless, I enjoyed myse.f very much – it was lovely to see everyone. I hope they gave you a hefty discount.
    I’ll be following up the environmental health report and will let you all know if there is any outcome.

    2. So glad you’re ok – but what a shame that the get-together was marred by poor food.

  89. We had a lovely day with our family. A game of cricket in the garden with our 6 and a half year old grand son. Great eye and hand coordination (takes after his grandad) a future cricket, tennis player or golfer. Little sister destined to be a banker, likes counting the change in my pocket. Their cousin loves playing with all the old cars and other toys from nearly forty years ago and lego still going strong.
    Children are so entertaining. While we ate drank fizz and chatted. Of course the little-uns had ice cream with chocolate flakes in for their pudding.
    Father’s day…I love it.

    2. Sounds like you had a lovely day. Out of our two grand monsters, I would say the girl is destined to be a good cricketer- boy- even at 5 she could whack that ball. Great hand to eye co-ordination.

  90. Reluctantly, I am going to bed. Feel like I want to stay up all night…but must be sensible.
    See you sometime tomorrow, I devoutly hope.
    Goodnight and sleep well Y’all. X
    I’m such a drama queen ;-))

    2. Sleep well , relax and be nice and fresh and alert for tomorrow .

      All will work out in the end , you will heal , things take their time ,just go easy .

      Warm wishes and a virtual hug to you .

    4. Sleep well, dear lady and prepare for the morn’s battle with the NHS administration.

    5. Good luck for today x

      PS Nothing wrong with being a drama queen from time to time 😉

      1. Thanks- been up since 5.30. Mixture of terror and relief that it will soon be over.
        Keep thinking of the first line of Emily Bronte’s poem……”No coward soul is mine…! I wish ;-))

        2. “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear.” ~Mark Twain

          Onwards and upwards, I hope that in a few hoursyour feeligs will be completely of relief, and then happiness. Thank goodness you have your lovely husband to help you.

  91. Police fail to solve a single burglary in nearly half of the country
    Victims speak of ‘violation’ of their homes as Telegraph investigation reveals raiders avoid justice in thousands of neighbourhoods

    DT Story https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/06/19/police-fail-solve-single-burglary-nearly-half-country/

    We help our students get top grades in their “A” level French exams and thereby they go on to top universities. That’s what we do and that’s what our students’ parents pay for.

    How long would we stay in business if we had the same success rate as the police who are paid to solve crimes?

    1. We have a lady friend who is very nearly 100yo living on her own. Following a burglary around 5 years ago her family installed intruder alarms. A week ago at night, these were set off by an intruder, who was apparently well refreshed by the sound of his voice as he shouted out: “How do you turn this bloody thing off!”

      Automatically alerted by the alarm system, family members called the police. However, the chap had scarpered by the time they arrived. Not withstanding the fact that he had busted through the front door, he was a thoughtful chap because on entering her home he had taken his trainers off. The police caught him sans footwear in the nearby high street!

  92. Goodnight my NoTTLing friends, sleep well and God bless – especially Maggie who has been an ever-present help in times of need. I wish I could meet the likes of you.

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