Sunday 30 June: Labour can’t deliver economic growth while the green agenda stifles business

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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787 thoughts on “Sunday 30 June: Labour can’t deliver economic growth while the green agenda stifles business”

    1. A B seems to be one of a few that makes any sense.
      Which obviously suggests that as we know that he's one a a few that would be good at the top job.
      He won't get anywhere near it.

      1. 389019+ up ticks,

        RE,
        The reason being that the lab/lib/con supporter / voter have a preference for a member of their party in number 10, regardless of consequence.

  5. Good morning, chums, and thanks to Geoff for today's NoTTLe site. And today is the my best ever effort with Wordle:

    Wordle 1,107 2/6

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    2. Well done! Average here.

      Wordle 1,107 4/6

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    4. A phew for me.

      Wordle 1,107 6/6

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      1. My dat started really badly but good guess helped.

        Wordle 1,107 4/6

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  6. Morning all 🙂😊
    A little rain, but nothing like the thunder storm that brought the German Danish game to a halt last evening.
    Labour don't have a clue about anything they are a disaster waiting to happen.
    The bank of England are already threatening those with mortgages. But someone has to pay for all the ongoing eff ups made by our idiots in Wastemonster and Whitehall.
    When will they ever learn ?

    1. 389019+ up ticks,

      Morning RE,

      Never confuse idiocy with treachery and a well planned & executed WEF / NWO campaign.

      1. I don't really Ogga, it's just a general term that suits all the AHs who wreck everything they come into contact with.
        It's impossible for anyone outside of the vicious circle to understand what they are actually trying to achieve. None of it makes any sense whatsoever.

    2. Yo RE

      You could also say "Will they ever learn?" or "Will they never learn?". All of these (interestingly) have the same meaning, which is a rhetorical question which expresses amazement that they have not learned so far.

  7. Labour can’t deliver economic growth while the green agenda stifles business

    Labour can never build economic growth even without net zero, they take all the spare money from people in tax, if people have less money to spend on goods and services then everything slumps.
    More small businesses will go broke, that's what the powers that be want, I suppose.

    1. I think that all that the parties in general want is simply to win, hence the wild promises made and the bad-mouthing of all others. The one exception that I can see is Reform, so I shall cast my vote for them rather than pointlessly abstain.

      1. Yes, the other parties seem to think the whole thing some kind of political game with us the pawns.

    2. I think that all that the parties in general want is simply to win, hence the wild promises made and the bad-mouthing of all others. The one exception that I can see is Reform, so I shall cast my vote for them rather than pointlessly abstain.

    1. Good Morning, I could only manage a six

      Wordle 1,107 6/6

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  10. Good morning all.
    A bright start, clear blues sky to the South West, but overcast above and a bit of a breeze. Cooler at a tad below 8½°C on the Yard Thermometer.

  11. Sir Elton John endorses Labour in general election. 29 June 2024.

    Music legend Sir Elton John has endorsed Labour to win the next general election.

    The singer sent a video message alongside his husband David Furnish and called on voters to back the party when they head to the polls on Thursday.

    Well that’s as good a reason as any not to vote for them.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/06/29/politics-latest-news-rishi-sunak-armed-forces-starmer-nigel/

    2. Music legend, that's a little bit funny, Bernie Taupin wrote most of his lyrics probably most of the tunes as well.

        1. I have admit that he seems to be a very poor knock-off of the rockers of a decade earlier.

        2. Read my comment above Minty.
          I've never liked him since that night in question.
          He's taken all the credit for his own success but Bernie was hardly ever mentioned.

      1. Back in the day my old buddy and I drove from our dwelling in Whetstone to Brighton where he was supposed to be performing at the Big Apple club.
        He didn't turn up. Not well, one can't speculate. Status Quo filled the gap. So we found a pub with a restaurant. Had a couple of pints and a steak and I drove home.
        But I remember when he was only the piano player Reggie Dwight in the Long John Baldry band.
        Elton Dean was the sax player.
        Work that one out.

    4. Only the seriously rich – living elsewhere – can afford a socialist Blighty.

    5. Where does Elton & hubby live? Somewhere with a reasonable government, perhaps, like Switzerland?

      1. Presumably not Tower Hamlets – the residents of which will, of course, be voting Labour. Maybe they live in Palestine.

        1. A pity he doesn't live in Tower Hamlets, he could have flying lessons sans benefit of aeroplane.

      2. Where Does Elton John and his husband Live?
        Elton John has numerous homes located all over the world. When he’s in the States, Elton enjoys spending time at his estate in Los Angeles and his luxury condo in Atlanta. The poor man is down to his last $650 million USD.

        Beverly Hills (Former) March, 2022, Elton sold this pokey villa for $75 million!

        Atlanta (Current)

        Los Angeles (Current)

        Windsor and Queensdale, London (Current)

        Venice Italy (Rumored) Spent his honeymoon with his husband here.

        Nice, France (Current)
        https://blog.stkimg.com/media/2020/02/23164522/Elton-John-House-Featured.png?format=webp

        1. People have one home, or none. Mr & Mr Dwight-Furnish may own several residential properties, but their home is likely to be near their children's school.

    1. which is why this song is top fav amongst the youngsters.

      Je Partira Pas (I won't leave.. Yes, you will leave).

      1. Labour are hoping to finagle their position as the permanent government by lowering the voting age.
        Apart from 'no taxation, no representation' (i.e. if you cannot work and pay taxes) I think their ploy could back fire on them.
        Anti-immigration = a change from stale 'centrist dad' policies and the young tend to like change.

        2. They hope to become the permanent government by setting up Regional groups who will eventually be able to pass laws without going through Parliament. I haven’t explained it properly but that is their intention.

  14. Good Moaning.
    Well, yesterday was a bitter sweet day.
    It was our grandson's final speech day at RHS. We now have no grandchildren of school age.
    Throughout divisions and the church service – and even the family picnic – we were aware of a passing era.
    And the political future just doesn't bear thinking about.

    1. Yes, the feeling of time marching on and age catching up, Anne?
      At least you have grand children.

      1. True. Whenever I mention them, I am horribly aware that not everybody does.
        I am not boasting; I am seriously worried about what the future holds for them.

        1. I don't even know if I have any. Both my daughter (37 years old) and my son (35 yesterday) are estranged, and it is long since I knew their address. I last saw my daughter ten years ago, and my son in 2001.

          The last I heard was that my daughter has been diagnosed on the autistic spectrum and is a struggling artist and illustrator somewhere in North Wales. She wrote to me some years ago that she does not believe in love; it only brings suffering, and has no intention of ever having children or even a male partner other than as a platonic friend.

          As for my son (and there is some doubt as to his paternity, which I have never been allowed to clear up), he was last heard of being Chief of Staff for a global private equity firm TMF Group, and living in North London, just a couple of miles from my sister in Finchley and my mother in Belsize Park. He has never made contact. I saw on Facebook that he got married in 2019, and his wife, a barrister, was once legal officer for a charity in Finchley. They could be passing my sister and her family in the street and nobody would know. I don't know if they have a family – when my daughter last wrote, she said they preferred cats to children.

          I did meet their maternal grandmother, who turned up at a concert I was singing in fairly recently and also heard me cantor at Evensong in Gloucester Cathedral, but apart from exchanging pleasantries, she had nothing to say about my family.

          Yes, I do worry about the future of today's young. If it weren't for "Safeguarding" always keeping me away from children, I have reached the stage of life to hand on what I know and love to a generation who have enough time left to benefit, but this is denied me. I am deemed a "potential abuser" for the crime of being an old man in a society that has only scorn for these creatures. Therefore, all I can do is to be grateful for living when I did and trust that the young can work things out for themselves. As the teachers once said to me when I gatecrashed parents' evenings yonks ago "they're doing very well without you". All I can do now is to pray and leave it to fate.

          1. That's the saddest thing I have read in a very long time, Jeremy. I don't know how to respond, apart from to express, inadequately, my sympathy.

          2. Thanks for the sympathy, and it does help to feel that someone is on my side.

            However, life is too short, even at my age, for self-pity, and every one of us have crosses to bear and difficulties to sort out. There are some problems I do not have, but plague others, and I am very grateful to be spared much of what others must suffer. I do not live in a war zone, for example, and have paid off my mortgage. Swings and roundabouts. Buddhists aspire to Nirvana, a state of enlightened perfection where nothing goes wrong, but I cannot think of anything worse than a life without challenges. It would be so boring, like endless re-runs of Strictly on daytime TV.

            There is also a danger in playing the victim in that it attracts bullies.

          4. Your children are missing out on the wealth of experience, kindness and life observations that you bring to NOTTL. I always enjoy reading your take on things, which is often very different from mine!

          5. My heart goes out to you Jeremy. You are carrying a very heavy burden. I wish you well and hope it sorts itself out.

        3. I try to console myself that they are growing up in the current maelstrom and may be better adapted and prepared for what is coming than I am.
          None of mine are of voting age, so they won't even get a say in what happens, except through protest.
          I pray that I am being unduly pessimistic but experience suggests that I am not.

          1. Someone pointed out to me that each generation seems to cope better with the era into which they are born than the generation that has passed through. Look at the young people intending to vote Reform at this time.

        4. Each generation faces its own unique difficulties. Your grandchildren will be fine.

        5. We have three, 22, 21 in August and 20 in August. If any of them were to ask me I would tell them to find work in another country because of what I fear for the future in this.

          1. That really gets to us.
            We cannot see a future for intelligent white youngsters in this country.

      1. The Royal Hospital School is an independent co-educational boarding and day school for 11-18 year olds, providing an outstanding, full and broad education enriched by a unique naval heritage and fit for the modern world. Founded in 1712 in Greenwich, London, it moved to its spectacular site, set in 200 acres of Suffolk countryside overlooking the River Stour, in 1933. The School has continued to develop its spectacular purpose-built site and grow in size and reputation to become one of East Anglia's leading independent schools.

  15. Morning, all Y'all.
    Overcast. More farmwork today – not entirely sure what yet, so more coffee first.

      1. Mine began with a sledgehammer and wonky fenceposts. Totally effed by morning coffee (and I don’t mean I got lucky, either…)

  16. 389019+ up ticks,

    Is there no law which safeguard the peoples against politico's / parties going rogue as in, a probationary period of say one year when taking office ?

    After one year a referendum on the parties actions, if found to be lacking in substance then put in the opposition for a probationary year, surely better than a five year guarantee failure program.

    Why must the sufferance be in five year instalments, we the peoples lock ourselves into.

    1. It usually takes two years to sort out the inertia in the Civil Service, who are used to doing things and thinking things in a certain way, and will not be moved without a great deal of push.

      By this time, the crises had been piling up, and the next two years are spent firefighting, leaving just a year to prepare the handouts ready for the next election.

      This is perhaps why is it wise for a competent electorate to consider not only where the incumbents have failed, or even state what needs to be done, but rather have a very clear idea before the election how this is to be implemented and barriers and hurdles (and there will be many, placed by those with much more experience in this sort of thing) taken down in weeks, rather than years.

      1. 389019+ up ticks,

        Morning JM,

        The word change means there will be no catering to the civil service ballerinas, they will be given the same as other politico prima donnas as in
        shape up NOW or ship out NOW.

        Things would surely be rough for starters but time would heal, not as we are suffering currently with the political poison topped up every five years, ongoing.

  17. Just a reminder for you to pop over to freespeechbacklash.com for a browse or a chinwag. Our Arts and Culture section isn't seeing much traffic, which is a pity as it contains some treats, such as versatile Taiwanese musician Nini. Here's a short clip of her playing Ghost Riders in the Sky.

    https://www.youtube.com/sho…

        1. That’s what prompted me, Tom. I meant the daily reminder I thought was coming from the new website. Weekends always busy due to various commitments bujt will take a look later, time permitting. Hope it’s going well 🙂

          1. Always welcome! I also look at this excellent site, and like to leave a reminder when I do. It’s going well enough, but early days and I need to get the word out.

    2. Tom, I’m sure the Squire would be interested in your new site, he’s a pianist, assuming you can find him, he’s not here anymore. Btw I checked the Spectator articles someone called ‘ Just a Display Name Now ‘ ( clearly sarcasm towards the Spectator ) was asking names they knew whether any of them knew how to get to your new site, clearly having problems. Its an issue as there isn’t any notification boxes there and you have to catch people individually at the moment the post, I guess. Just thought I’d let you know someone was having an issue finding your new site . Best of luck with it btw, I’ve had a look and it looks superb and varied .

      1. Thanks a lot. I’l nip over and try to spread the word. It is very encouraging that people like you approve of what we’ve done. I’ve never done anything like this before and I’m still groping my way around, but we are here to stay.

        1. I would like to offer you some advice, if you don’t mind me doing so,
          Some years ago I used to write articles and be a moderator on a small site . You’ve a fledgling site that is professionally designed which is very varied in subjects , somewhat like the Spectator. I did take a look at your site and your the editor . I’d ask you not to box yourself onto any political ideal regardless of your own views, do that and you’d have a limited appeal. Not everyone hates the Conservatives, I am one ( even if I cannot support the party atm ) and certainly not many away from this site and the majority of Spectator posters don’t support Russia – if you are already setting your stall, that’s your right but it might be limiting.
          I’m very impressed with your variety of topics . The world we live looks very interesting, and the section on potholes. Politics of course is very topical. And Art, life and nature. I would ask whether ” Gossip Corner ” is the best wording maybe you might consider ‘ Off Topic discussions ” which are already known words for general friendly chatting which is off Topic . I hope you don’t mind me saying such things, you can of course ignore it all .

          1. Your advice is welcome, and well received. I fully agree, but as I am almost the only writer it is difficult to present the full range of opinions I would like. if I write a piece pointing out western culpability in starting the war in Ukraine (I don’t support Russia by the way), I would welcome someone writing a counter-argument. I have the same internal discussion about my next article, which is supportive of Israel, and obviously many do not support it all. But what do I do? I can either write bland, give two sides of a story, or make a case in the hope that somebody will write an opposing article. Same applied to the Conservative Party, I will welcome any Tory making a pro-Tory case.

            I think I’ll take your advice on gossip corner. And, if you feel like, become a moderator here, and better still, write a few articles yourself.

          2. You might like to pop over to the Speccie – Steerpike an article about Reform candidate voting Tory . They’re sick of the Spectator and posters want to leave. Just read It, Nottl and your site has been mentioned.
            I see more Spexciles soon.

          4. There who is someone on your site called ‘ Kim Boland ‘ .
            Only made two comments, keep an eye on that sort of thing, it can be a bit odd – there are troll bots . Just be cautious .

          5. Where? What to troll bots do except troll? We have our own bot, botlash, I’ll go and ask it.

          6. Geoff can explain the oddities of disqus bots better than me. I might be wrong, i looked into this person’s account details just 3 comments ‘ 2 comments to your new site and another comment at a site called ‘ down voter ‘ a year ago on a four year old thread. Editors and moderators spend a lot of time deleting and banning . Just be cautious please, that’s all .

          7. All noted, with thanks. I'm instinctively against deleting and banning, we are after all supposed to be defending free speech, but if necessary it will be done.

            I'd never heard of diqus bots so i asked our resident bot, botlash (available to our site) about them. It replied:

            Disqus bots are automated programs designed to interact with the Disqus commenting platform. Disqus is a popular service that provides a commenting system for websites, allowing users to leave comments, reply to others, and engage in discussions. Bots on Disqus can serve various purposes, both legitimate and malicious. Here are some common types of Disqus bots:

            1. **Spam Bots**: These bots post spam comments, often containing links to external websites, advertisements, or malicious content. Their primary goal is to drive traffic to certain sites or to spread malware.

            2. **Moderation Bots**: These are used by site administrators to help manage and moderate comments. They can automatically filter out inappropriate content, flag potential spam, and enforce community guidelines.

            3. **Engagement Bots**: These bots are designed to increase engagement on a site by posting comments, liking other comments, or replying to users. They can be used to create the appearance of a more active community.

            4. **Data Collection Bots**: These bots scrape comments and user data from Disqus threads for various purposes, such as market research, sentiment analysis, or competitive intelligence.

            5. **Support Bots**: Some organizations use bots to provide automated support within comment threads, answering frequently asked questions or directing users to relevant resources.

            While some bots can be beneficial, such as those used for moderation or support, others can be harmful, like spam bots. Disqus and website administrators often implement measures to detect and mitigate the impact of malicious bots, such as CAPTCHA systems, machine learning algorithms, and manual moderation.

          8. You’ve mentioned practically all of them. There was once, a couple of years ago called the upvote stealing bot – only disqus can remove upvotes , it affected only the disqus free sites of which NoTTl was one of them as that point ( not anymore ) it was a disqus bug – if you look at Ndovu for example- she’s got 0 upvotes but they were returned to the disqus American sites – it was a couple of years back, don’t worry . It’d be helpful if you were with Discuss Disqus – if you have any issues even tiny ones with your site such as notification boxes being slow etc or disqus updates are being annoying. They are helpful .
            Just be on your guard with someone whose only made 3 comments on their account and two of them were to your new site . The third comment was on a site a year ago called ‘ down vote detector ‘ where he/”she mentioned a bot ‘ to speak to. Just be on your guard to protect your site and you might need moderators at some point .

          10. Another Spectator article this morning ‘ The Selfish Case for Immigration ‘ they’re taking the pee and winding up everyone whose posting at the Spectator , the Speccie really doesn’t like its readership .

          12. They will support Labour which Is obvious and they wish to change their readership to one they prefer .

          13. Yes. You can see that BTL. Many new names and most drifting leftwards, or ‘centre right’ as nelson would call it.

          14. I found out via Rob 232 who showed Peta the information the Speccie have . The Speccie keeps track of all its posters via secret accounts that look like disqus but only the Spectator can see.
            We just see reply boxes whereas they can keep track of what articles we post on and who we speak with, I’ll send you yours, I’ll find it .
            It’s all very underhanded and stasi .

  18. Yo all and Good Moaning

    Labour candidate says arms sales to Israel will stop after party takes power

    Fabian Hamilton, who was a shadow foreign minister until last year, made the comments during
    a hustings at the Baab-Ul-Ilm mosque in Leeds

    The direction of how life in UK will be in the future , writ loud and Clear

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk…

  19. Cool and grey:
    Wordle 1,107 4/6

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  21. Good morning all, dull cloudy day here , feels heavy , slight breeze .16c.

    Elections come and go, but this one next week is being cast as a new terror we don't need .

    The way I feel now ( me being miserable ) is that perhaps I will never ever experience another election again , because of the age thing .

    I had an interesting conversation with the South Dorset Lib dem candidate , I felt , what the hell , shall I or shan't I?

    Will Reform be too similar to the Tories , will they take care of the polluted rivers , over use of chemicals , the countryside , and the tenderer things that I feel are important, care in the community , sorting the wastage in the NHS out etc .

    I really don't know , is this a getting older feeling?

    1. IMHO The problem we have TB is ground shift due to 'circumstances'
      none of them keep the promises they make. But if reform does become our new government, at least they might try to keep their eyes to the front.

      1. What is the use of that when foes are coming at you from the side or behind?

        1. When that happens you need principles to know how to act. Without them you end up like your enemy.

          1. You cannot surely be suggesting that Sir Keir Starmer will end up just like the Tories, a sort of zombie Liz Truss, because he has no principles?

          2. I can and I am. He’ll do just what he’s told by the amorphous globalist blob who really run the country.

          3. I can and I am. He’ll do just what he’s told by the amorphous globalist blob who really run the country.

          7. Ahem Jeremy
            "Which do you prefer Keir Westminster or Davos??
            Answer
            Davos
            Starmer is just another globalist Tool(maker)

    2. The real hazard of getting old is having seen it all before. At least the young have the benefit of fresh eyes!

      I have decided to vote Lib Dem this time, if only because they are no longer the idiotic single issue anti-Brexit party they have been recently, and they have put up a decent candidate this time, after some real shockers in 2010, 2015 and 2017. Apart from betraying the students, Nick Clegg addressed a rally in Malvern (they still had these in 2010) saying he would beef up border control after the deaths by misadventure of immigrant Chinese winkle pickers in Morecambe Bay, but I think he got distracted after the election.

      I don't agree with them over some things, such as smothering productive farmland with power plants and social housing for economic migrants, but hopefully others will hold them to account over that.

        1. Indeed they are, but this is no longer an issue, let alone the only issue to campaign on, thank goodness.

          It was so with the Liberals even in 1974. It didn’t stop me voting Out in the referendum the following year.

          1. Ah, but you won’t be given a chance to vote out again. You’ll have given them a mandate to take us back in. It only works one way these days. They miscalculated once and they won’t make the same mistake again.

    3. I'm just praying for a hung parliament – leading to a lot of hangings, both in Wastemonster and Shitehall.

    4. It comes to us all at some point. W B Yeats wrote Sailing to Byzantium about his feelings on becoming old, unfashionable and neglected despite having amassed great knowledge and developed religious beliefs.

    5. There is more chance of Reform taking care of polluted rivers and the countryside, plus the other things that you worry about, than there is of those who've been in charge for the last few decades. They have done sod all, so you have experienced their mismanagement. Might as well give somebody else a go in case they actually do some good.

    1. Which article is that, Ndovu?

      Edit: oh, sorry, my brain read the letters DT, but my mind converted it to DM! I can't bring myself to pay for the DT after its betrayal of conservative values back in 2016. We used to have it delivered on a daily basis.

      1. I did many years ago – but as no paper boys ever deliver here we reduced our intake of DT to Saturdays only. Then we got fed up of paying nearly a fiver for that. I got seduced at the beginning of May for a sub at £25 for a year.

    4. The one implying the state pension is a benefit, and that the “rich” shouldn’t have it?

    1. The CIA can reasonably be called the world's biggest terrorist organisation. Check out my article 'The West is the new Evil Empire' at freespeechbacklash.com

  25. Okay.. lengthy but I am happy to be reminded .

    On Tuesday, the BBC led with a report about personal protective equipment (PPE) worth nearly £1.5 billion going unused. It was, we were told in scandalised tones, rotting away in warehouses.

    Opposition parties were invited to comment. Labour primly called the surplus a “staggering waste”. The Lib Dems concurred, promising to “take steps to ensure such a colossal misuse of public funds never happened again”.

    But hang on. Didn’t the BBC, along with the opposition parties, spend the lockdown howling about the need for more PPE? Didn’t it tell us that NHS staff were being treated like “cannon fodder”? Didn’t it finish every report with a quotation from some public-sector union to the effect that ministers weren’t doing enough? Wasn’t it running headlines like “Covid PPE: How healthcare workers came to feel ‘expendable’”?

    Have we forgotten the demented atmosphere of those days? The pretence that every failure by our procurement-wallahs, whether on PPE, ventilators or testing, was the fault of Boris Johnson? The scramble for kit, which saw reporters despatched to follow a single consignment from Turkey?

    I think we have. And I think our amnesia, not just about PPE, but about the lockdown in general, helps explain what is going to happen on Thursday.

    We don’t want to think about those phantasmagoric months. We don’t want to remember the enormities, indignities and absurdities we endured. And we certainly don’t want to admit that a policy we ourselves demanded might be at the root of Britain’s problems.

    It takes an effort, four years on, to think about what we went through. The taped-off playgrounds. The insolent police. The bankruptcies. The school children who never got their chance to perform their solo, captain their team or say a proper goodbye. The pensioners suffering in solitary confinement. The mounting national debt. The mental health problems hatching in silence. The snitching. The furlough scams. The money-printing. The cancelled weddings. The missed cancer screenings. The police drones pursuing hikers.

    God, it was awful. But the worst thing was how popular these restrictions were. Ninety-three per cent of people backed the first lockdown, 85 per cent the second, and a sizeable majority opposed the lifting of restrictions in 2021.

    Already those numbers feel ridiculous, don’t they? A lot of people have edited their memories, and now complain about restrictions which, at the time, they wanted to be harsher. Psychologists call it “hindsight bias”.

    Having opposed the lockdown from day one, I can’t forget the abuse hurled at the tiny number of sceptics. Those who did the hurling, naturally, find it easier to forget.

    Thus, Labour, which fulminated about ministers being “slow on protective equipment,” now has the gall to complain that they bought too much of it.

    The Lib Dems, who tore into the Tories for their “failure to ensure adequate supplies of protective equipment reaching the frontline workers”, now chastise them for having over-ordered.

    They get away with it because the country as a whole has done the same thing. It is as if we have woken with a terrible hangover, uneasily aware that we behaved foolishly the night before, but unwilling to think about it.

    When Rishi Sunak was challenged about NHS waiting lists during the first leaders’ debate, he replied that Britain had been through a pandemic, but that Conservative-run England had shorter waiting times than Labour-run Wales. The audience groaned. If you don’t want to be reminded of the lockdown, any reference to it by a politician comes across as whingeing.

    Yet the lockdown cannot be wished away. It squats like a poisonous toad in the middle of every policy discussion. We edge carefully around it. We affect not to see it. Yet there it is, wart-covered and malign, regarding us with cold, protuberant eyes.

    Take any issue you like. Education? The number of children “persistently absent” from school has surged since before the lockdown.

    The economy? Growth remains sluggish because people haven’t returned to work. It makes life tougher in lots of small ways. Suitcases are slow to reach airport carousels because there are fewer baggage handlers. Trains run less punctually because there are fewer railwaymen. A secondary market has developed in dates for driving tests.

    Figures from the ONS suggest that, while the private sector has more or less recovered its pre-lockdown productivity levels, the public sector is years behind. It turns out that government staff who insist on working from home are less efficient. Who’d have thunk it?

    What goes for education and public services goes for everything else.

    Tax? We dropped the better part of half a trillion pounds on the lockdown.

    The NHS? The lockdown caused the waiting lists.

    Human rights? There has been no more grievous violation than the confinement of the population to house arrest; yet our activist human rights lawyers cheered it on.

    The cost of living? To pay for the lockdown, we printed money like Robert Mugabe on speed. The surge in sickness benefits claims? Once people had become used to… oh, you get the picture.

    We talk as if our troubles were wantonly inflicted on us by malicious ministers. But one of the reasons taxes have risen with no commensurate improvement in public services is that we paid people to stay home for the better part of two years, borrowed money to do it, and still don’t want to return to work.

    Tolstoy wrote that “everybody thinks of changing humanity, and nobody thinks of changing himself”. He was right. Ask people whether they want change, and every hand in the room will rise. Ask whether they want to change and the arms snap back down. That’s what’s so clever about the slogan “Britain needs Reform”.

    Those months of being paid to stay at home altered the relationship between state and citizen. We have become more demanding, less willing to acknowledge trade-offs, readier to blame any annoyance on the supposed meanness of the government.

    One politician who recognises the cost of the lockdown is Nigel Farage, who told a crowd in Sunderland on Thursday that the second and third lockdowns had been the worst mistakes made by a British government in peacetime.

    It is to his credit that he says so. But what about the first lockdown, which was more severe and more economically damaging? Why does Farage not count it? Is he generously allowing that decisions made during those heated weeks necessarily look different in retrospect?

    Or is it that he himself wanted the first lockdown? Our memory-holing of the whole episode means that we rarely recall Farage calling the original strategy of controlled spread “immoral” and demanding that Tony Blair lead a vaccine task force. We forget the sight of him, in a plum jumper and mustard cords, banging his saucepan for the NHS.

    Not that I blame him. Most of the country followed the same trajectory, first demanding a crackdown and then moaning about its effects. Farage came around far quicker than most and was indeed a critic of the later lockdowns. But governments, unlike commentators, are not permitted such inconsistencies.

    The paradox of the current election is that both Johnson and Sunak were more sceptical of the lockdown than most of those who now blame them for it. Recall that Keir Starmer opposed the loosening of restrictions, and even wanted them reimposed at the end of 2021.

    Except that no one does recall it. Our anger, whether directly over the lockdown or, more commonly, indirectly over its costs, is aimed at the politicians who held out against pressure to go even further. Funny old world.

    Related Topics
    PPE, UK coronavirus lockdown, Conservative Party, Keir Starmer, Rishi Sunak

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/06/29/conservatives-paying-price-for-britains-lockdown-amnesia/

    1. 1.5 billion will hardly buy anything nowadays after the politicians take their cut.

      it's only a waste if the stockpile is not managed properly and older stock is allowed to go beyond its Use by Date.

      This is best exemplified over here by a pile of $10,000 ventilators being sold as scrap for $5 each.

  26. Thanks for all your comments yesterday regards my fall and subsequent patching up. New stitched lip healing nicely, still look quite a sight with various blood scabs but it does look as if I am on the mend. Managed a longish afternoon walk yesterday afternoon and just about to head off to church, 2 mile walk. I don't have a car these days for various reasons but determined to exercise my limbs and Friday's hick-up hasn't stopped me! Bit of a change in the weather though, pretty cloudy and light shower earlier, guess it is all global warming…

    1. Do you use walking poles?
      I can't comment from personal experience, but friends who use them swear by them for helping to prevent slips on slopes.

      1. Yes, I see (mostly elderly) walkers out with them, striding along…some have just one but majority have two.

        1. We lived in Bavaria for 4 years – a high percentage of local walkers, of all ages, used poles – always 2, never 1 as they consider it unbalances the body! I have used 2 poles ever since – if nothing else I think it helps on hills, and eases the load on the knees? Also very useful when Geocaching for poking around in vegetation.

          1. Good examples Bleau, thanks. Used to get a lot of walkers pre-Covid/Lockdowns, elderly in groups and many with walking sticks – not so many now. I no longer find the litter I used to – empty booze bottles, Playboy magazines, underwear, no needles (thanks be), no way would the elderly be responsible, neighbour and I have the theory the ones who were responsible went online during lockdowns and never ventured out again. Plus we no longer get cars parked in random places. Result!

      2. No, never tried poles but I can see the advantages. But it is extra stuff to carry and since I get to my walks by train/tube etc a bit inconvenient. It has occurred to me that being usually alone I am at a disadvantage, couples walking together would instinctively hold arms on these steep slopes, a singleton has nothing whatsoever to cling on to.

        2. I used to use a thumb stick when I was out and about in the country on foot (following the mink hounds).

    2. Do you use walking poles?
      I can't comment from personal experience, but friends who use them swear by them for helping to prevent slips on slopes.

  27. Good morning.
    So yesterday we had two incidents at Glastonbury, both of which beggar belief.
    Hamas merchandise being sold AT A MUSIC FESTIVAL, and Banksy launching a dinghy of migrants into the crowd – the same crowd that is partying safely behind a giant guarded fence. Among the reaction on Twitter, several people report teenage girls in their area being approached by migrants asking them for sex.
    Banksy started by mocking the establishment, but pretty quickly made his WEF program allegiance clear.
    The scum at Glastonbury should be forced to live in the UK's poorest areas for six months and see how keen they are on more young men in dinghies after that.

    1. Luvvies and the glitterartis can afford to glamp and be seen , and their political support at places like that is sickening .

      I am also furious that Laura Kuennesburg is being her usual leftie self on BBC1, interviewing Rishi. is slagging Brexit off..

      1. Just finished watching QT special with Bruce/Farage. Audience seemed handpicked, but if representative of country as a whole, not exactly Brexit fans, and definitely not Reform supporters.

        1. Therefore totally unrepresentative of the country. They represent the Bbc's idea of what the country should be like.

      2. It's bad for your blood pressure to watch the BBC.
        I've avoided any electioneering or news.
        If it wasn't for OH watching sports, our telly would be redundant.

          1. Since covid, I have no patience with Westminster politics any more. It's juvenile theatre and all the actors are just in it for the $$$ they can get.

          2. Yes, I think Westminster is just theatre now: lots of influential, globalist unaccountables pulling the strings of 'our' MPs. Maybe one day they'll make a musical out of it.

    2. Luvvies and the glitterartis can afford to glamp and be seen , and their political support at places like that is sickening .

      I am also furious that Laura Kuennesburg is being her usual leftie self on BBC1, interviewing Rishi. is slagging Brexit off..

    3. Do you remember that Hitler Fried Chicken shop opening up somewhere in Thailand? I am tempted to open up a franchise in Golders Green. There is a rogue streak in me, the same mentality that wonders, every time I walk over the city bridge in Worcester, what would happen if I threw my keys in the river, that imagines forming the Troll Party – to campaign calculatedly on the issue most likely to offend the local electorate, just for the hell of it.

      It is long time that some expert satirists made a mockery of Glastonbury, rather than treating it with undue reverence.

    4. Do you remember that Hitler Fried Chicken shop opening up somewhere in Thailand? I am tempted to open up a franchise in Golders Green. There is a rogue streak in me, the same mentality that wonders, every time I walk over the city bridge in Worcester, what would happen if I threw my keys in the river, that imagines forming the Troll Party – to campaign calculatedly on the issue most likely to offend the local electorate, just for the hell of it.

      It is long time that some expert satirists made a mockery of Glastonbury, rather than treating it with undue reverence.

  28. Tory Remainers are the authors of their party’s defeat
    Just as Europe recognises the costs of the EU, we’re about to make a terrible mistake
    Robert Tombs : https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/06/30/too-many-people-believe-the-great-remainer-lie-about-brexit/

    It is ironic that the aptly-named author of this piece blames the Conservative Remainer MPs for the grave interment of their party.

    BTL

    The disaster was the mendacious Theresa May who said "Brexit means Brexit" and "No deal is better than a bad deal" when she was determined to wreck Brexit with endless procrastination and the presentation of the proposition of a catastrophic deal which was made even worse by MPs such as Hilary Benn. And then, of course, Boris Johnson lied when he said he had an 'oven fresh' Brexit deal ready – when the truth was that all he had was May's pathetic surrender deal leaving us with the betrayal of Northern Ireland and UK fishermen.

    I also blame Nigel Farage. He was outwitted by Johnson and stood down Brexit Party candidates in all seats held by Conservative MPs whether they were pro or against staying in the EU. This gave Johnson his 80 seat majority which he squandered by not getting Brexit properly done. Farage should have only stood down Brexit Party candidates in Conservative seats held by committed and vociferous leavers and vigorously contested the Conservative seats held by remainers.

    Yes, I know people will say it is easy to be wise after the event but many of us at the time foresaw that Johnson did not truly believe in Brexit and needed a gun held to his head.

    1. It was obvious all along that what Johnson wanted was a better bargaining position with the EU negotiators than that which Cameron had. In his heart, he wanted EU membership, but on better terms, and was probably closest to the position Margaret Thatcher took. It took a quango that insisted that just one organisation campaigned for Leave, to sideline Farage and his band of true believers.

      You may scapegoat HIlary Benn, but far more relevant to this forthcoming election is the behaviour and attitude of Labour's Shadow Brexit Secretary in 2019. I wonder what became of him?

          1. Surely you don't mean Sir Keirs shadowy manoeuvres with EU unelected despots to shaft the UK and negate the biggest democratic mandate in British electoral history? Wouldn't the press have been on to this like a ferret up a drainpipe?

      2. Of course Hillary Benn's father was vehemently opposed to the EU. Maybe Hillary displayed a spirit of filial rebellion and resentment knowing that he would never be a patch on his father!

        The main executive officers of the EU, such as Fonda Lying, are chosen by their friends and not by popular vote. Tony Benn put it very succinctly when he said:

        "The test of democracy is whether you can get rid of the bugger!"

        1. Haven't they just carved it up at the top of the EU again? The pretendy parliament goes right leaning and yet the corrupt and incompetent lefties running the whole shebang keep their grubby paws on power. There is is a demon in the EU's version of democracy, to be sure.

          1. The EU Parliament is ineffectual. Not like our Parliament in which proper debate can ensue. The 750 MEPs are only allowed to speak for a couple of minutes each and the main policies are handed down from the Commission to rubber-stamp. The main policies have already been selected and thrashed out by the Commission before they are handed down, I understand. There's a council in the mix too (never really sure what it does which is worrying as it comprises the Heads of State; backroom politicking baked in, I think). Basically the powers are split to be meaningless, in effect. With the main decisions already largely made and legislated for by unaccountable, distant entities.

            Please, anyone, correct me if I'm wrong but the Council comprises Heads of State; the Commission members are selected by Heads of State and the Parliament are voted in by electorates of States. There are 750 MEPs for 350 million Europeans (there are 650 MPs for 65 million of us). So yes, the EU Parliament looks democratic but it is a very diluted form of democracy – to the point of ineffectuality.

          2. I think you've got the roles correct there, yes. It isn't a democracy at all. It is a complete misnomer referring to it as a parliament too. The assembly cannot instigate legislation, have no power in any executive sense and none of its members represents his or her constituency in any meaningful way.

            It's a model for our very own "citizens assemblies" being mooted for the UK, ostensibly supposed to increase democratic representation. No wonder Remainers, Rejoiners and our MPs love it.

          3. There is a statue at the entrance to the Strasbourg parliament which represents a copulating couple – it's an unintentional metaphor for Europe being shafted.

          7. I've seen the Strasbourg parliament in action. There is no time for debate at all; voting takes place at a machine-gun rate of knots – "for, against, abstain" and they press their buttons. Its only purpose (apart from acting like a nice little earner for Strasbourg every 6 months) is to rubber stamp what's already been decided.

          9. The EU Parliament is ineffectual. Not like our Parliament in which proper debate can ensue. The 750 MEPs are only allowed to speak for a couple of minutes each and the main policies are handed down from the Commission to rubber-stamp. The main policies have already been selected and thrashed out by the Commission before they are handed down, I understand. There's a council in the mix too (never really sure what it does which is worrying as it comprises the Heads of State; backroom politicking baked in, I think). Basically the powers are split to be meaningless, in effect. With the main decisions already largely made and legislated for by unaccountable, distant entities.

            Please, anyone, correct me if I'm wrong but the Council comprises Heads of State; the Commission members are selected by Heads of State and the Parliament are voted in by electorates of States. There are 750 MEPs for 350 million Europeans (there are 650 MPs for 65 million of us). So yes, the EU Parliament looks democratic but it is a very diluted form of democracy – to the point of ineffectuality.

          10. Ursula was a disaster as German Defence minister and failed upwards to become EU leader.

            In England when some civil servant proves as good as useless we too ‘kick them upstairs’ where it is assumed they will do less damage than if left on the ground.

      3. In the event there were several organisations campaigning to Leave, of which the official one was the most lacklustre (by design). GO, Leave.EU and UKIP all campaigned (I have the T shirts!) as well.

    2. It was obvious all along that what Johnson wanted was a better bargaining position with the EU negotiators than that which Cameron had. In his heart, he wanted EU membership, but on better terms, and was probably closest to the position Margaret Thatcher took. It took a quango that insisted that just one organisation campaigned for Leave, to sideline Farage and his band of true believers.

      You may scapegoat HIlary Benn, but far more relevant to this forthcoming election is the behaviour and attitude of Labour's Shadow Brexit Secretary in 2019. I wonder what became of him?

  29. Mary Beard: ‘Nigel Farage is today’s Julius Caesar’. 30 June 2024.

    Take Nigel Farage for instance, who, in a recent entry on her long running TLS blog A Don’s Life, an incisive bitesized comment on the issue of the day, she compared to Julius Caesar:

    “I actually dislike drawing crude lines between the past and today, but a lot of modern-day populism is taken from the playbook of Caesar,” she says.

    “Caesar begins his speech by saying I’m going to make Rome great again and I’m going to drain the swamp, and by the way I am talking directly to you. And stuff the metropolitan elite.

    “Farage’s speech [when he announced that he was becoming leader of Reform and would stand in the forthcoming election] was pretty much Julius Caesar’s, this idea that I am only intervening because I know you want me to do it. The populist song sheet hasn’t changed very much.”

    Though I am something of a supporter of Mr Farage; aside from being simplistic, this is simply not true. I wish it were. It is true that Caesar was a matchless orator and a supporter of the Plebs against the Political Elites but he was also an operator of real genius. Caesar had that gift of seeing things and people as they truly were. A quality that Nigel with his poor personal judgement of his allies and supporters lacks. This said he also wants for the ruthlessness that motivated the Great Roman. Whether this will prove to be a curse or a blessing is yet to be seen.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk…

    1. BBC presenter, I think? As is Fiona Bruce, just finished watching the episode of QT with Farage. Not many Reform supporters in the audience by the look and sound of it. What a surprise.

    2. BBC presenter, I think? As is Fiona Bruce, just finished watching the episode of QT with Farage. Not many Reform supporters in the audience by the look and sound of it. What a surprise.

    3. The nastier they make out Farage to be the nicer he turns out to be? I am not sure

      But the words of Antony over the assassinated body of Julius Caesar are very memorable:

      O, pardon me, thou bleeding piece of earth,
      That I am meek and gentle with these butchers!
      Thou art the ruins of the noblest man
      That ever lived in the tide of times.

      My mother's family placed words about Brutus from the same play on the tombstone of my maternal grandfather, Charles Bowen Cooke, the railway steam locomotive design engineer.

      'His life was gentle; and the elements
      So mixed in him, that Nature might stand up
      And say to all the world, "This was a Man"

      I never met him as he died when my mother was only 16:

       https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f2aa6c09557bf62444006f90090b546f9b6d3a5146b1b134b07ac473e51b1b22.jpg

    4. Caesar refused the crown three times wasn't it? Reluctantly, apparently he finally accepted it. There's a parallel I think. Beard ought to widen her comparison if she wants to be more accurate. Britain is a bit like Rome now. Bread and Circuses, slavery going on all over the country, corruption in high office are but three analogous conditions. Whether Farage gets 32 stab wounds in the back eventually is yet to be seen.

  30. Mary Beard: ‘Nigel Farage is today’s Julius Caesar’. 30 June 2024.

    Take Nigel Farage for instance, who, in a recent entry on her long running TLS blog A Don’s Life, an incisive bitesized comment on the issue of the day, she compared to Julius Caesar:

    “I actually dislike drawing crude lines between the past and today, but a lot of modern-day populism is taken from the playbook of Caesar,” she says.

    “Caesar begins his speech by saying I’m going to make Rome great again and I’m going to drain the swamp, and by the way I am talking directly to you. And stuff the metropolitan elite.

    “Farage’s speech [when he announced that he was becoming leader of Reform and would stand in the forthcoming election] was pretty much Julius Caesar’s, this idea that I am only intervening because I know you want me to do it. The populist song sheet hasn’t changed very much.”

    Though I am something of a supporter of Mr Farage; aside from being simplistic, this is simply not true. I wish it were. It is true that Caesar was a matchless orator and a supporter of the Plebs against the Political Elites but he was also an operator of real genius. Caesar had that gift of seeing things and people as they truly were. A quality that Nigel with his poor personal judgement of his allies and supporters lacks. This said he also wants for the ruthlessness that motivated the Great Roman. Whether this will prove to be a curse or a blessing is yet to be seen.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk…

  31. Mary Beard: ‘Nigel Farage is today’s Julius Caesar’. 30 June 2024.

    Take Nigel Farage for instance, who, in a recent entry on her long running TLS blog A Don’s Life, an incisive bitesized comment on the issue of the day, she compared to Julius Caesar:

    “I actually dislike drawing crude lines between the past and today, but a lot of modern-day populism is taken from the playbook of Caesar,” she says.

    “Caesar begins his speech by saying I’m going to make Rome great again and I’m going to drain the swamp, and by the way I am talking directly to you. And stuff the metropolitan elite.

    “Farage’s speech [when he announced that he was becoming leader of Reform and would stand in the forthcoming election] was pretty much Julius Caesar’s, this idea that I am only intervening because I know you want me to do it. The populist song sheet hasn’t changed very much.”

    Though I am something of a supporter of Mr Farage; aside from being simplistic, this is simply not true. I wish it were. It is true that Caesar was a matchless orator and a supporter of the Plebs against the Political Elites but he was also an operator of real genius. Caesar had that gift of seeing things and people as they truly were. A quality that Nigel with his poor personal judgement of his allies and supporters lacks. This said he also wants for the ruthlessness that motivated the Great Roman. Whether this will prove to be a curse or a blessing is yet to be seen.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk…

  32. The initialism many of us will be using after the upcoming election and it's effect on the future of the United (sic) Kingdom
    TCIAO
    Thank Christ I Am Old

    2. My hairdresser and I always have that conversation. Thank goodness we’re the age we are (both in our sixties). It’s been a good life. We’ve lived through the best times.

    1. They're all hunkered down now. We're off to our swiftie friends today but I doubt the swifts will put on much of a display unless it brightens up.

  34. Labour whittering on about the past fourteen years of austerity , but hang on didn't Labour leave the country in a blinking mess 15 years ago ?

    1. Morning Belle, yes they did. But then that's because they always do. "Labour can't deliver economic growth while the green agenda stifles business."

      That's a better way of expressing Labournomics. I don't know why newspapers still entertain the notion that if only Labour did something, anything, that it would become fiscally responsible. Labour is and always has been a consumer.

      1. Not in the sense that it happened when I was born just after the war. Still rationing in place (and Labour even managed to put bread on ration), no materials for repairing bomb damage, still paying off the lend-lease loan …

        1. Do you mean the pound of flesh with no drop of blood demanded by the USA, our very special friends?

        2. Do you mean the pound of flesh with no drop of blood demanded by the USA, our very special friends?

    1. By the time the PTB wake up to the threat of Islam it will be too late.

      (I fear that it is already too late.)

      Douglas Murray's "The Strange Death of Europe" should be compulsory reading for all those going into the Sixth Form.

    2. Yes, it was. It was actually the world centre for diamond sorting and cutting. How do I know? My grand-father was one of De Beer's top diamond sorters and he trained and worked for several years there 🙂

    3. Yes, it was. It was actually the world centre for diamond sorting and cutting. How do I know? My grand-father was one of De Beer's top diamond sorters and he trained and worked for several years there 🙂

  36. I just caught a brief glimps of Kunessberg grilling Richie. I had to turn it off before the bbc persuaded me to vote Conservative in sympathy. What an effing hate filled biatch, she just kept interrupting him as he spoke. Talking over almost everything he said in answer. But he did manage to ignore her dreadful preconceived vile bbc adgenda.

    1. More fool them for turning up unprepared. I think it was Murray that first revealed that BBC etc have a "manual" on aggressive loaded questioning cum interrogation techniques, and the accompanying dirty tricks of yawning, interrupting & paper shuffling.

      Armed with that knowledge Murray handles them perfectly, and ties them up in a knot. So much so that they've given up interviewing him.

      For examples.. see Elon Musk deal with BBCs James Clayton. Clayton just gave up mid interview and flounced oft.

    2. More fool them for turning up unprepared. I think it was Murray that first revealed that BBC etc have a "manual" on aggressive loaded questioning cum interrogation techniques, and the accompanying dirty tricks of yawning, interrupting & paper shuffling.

      Armed with that knowledge Murray handles them perfectly, and ties them up in a knot. So much so that they've given up interviewing him.

      For examples.. see Elon Musk deal with BBCs James Clayton. Clayton just gave up mid interview and flounced oft.

    3. More fool them for turning up unprepared. I think it was Murray that first revealed that BBC etc have a "manual" on aggressive loaded questioning cum interrogation techniques, and the accompanying dirty tricks of yawning, interrupting & paper shuffling.

      Armed with that knowledge Murray handles them perfectly, and ties them up in a knot. So much so that they've given up interviewing him.

      For examples.. see Elon Musk deal with BBCs James Clayton. Clayton just gave up mid interview and flounced oft.

  37. Sorry, Gentlefolk, I've been sleeping but…
    Good morrow, Gentlefolk, today’s (recycled) story

    What a Woman Says:
    "This place is a mess!
    C'mon, you and I need to clean up.
    Your stuff is lying on the floor,
    And if we don't do laundry right now
    You’ll have no clothes to wear    ."

    What a Man Hears:
    Blah, blah, blah, blah, c'mon
    Blah, blah, blah, you and I
    Blah, blah, on the floor
    Blah, blah, blah, right now
    Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, no clothes.

    We wish!

  38. ITV's James Mates crying into his tea this morning, lamenting the demise of the old system that ensured a "Centrist" always stayed in power in France. How has it all gone wrong, he asks. Then:

    "the answer is crime and immigration. Or, to be more precise, the fear of crime and immigration."

    So no real problems with either then, just fear and hatred of these whipped up by the "far right".

    Electorates eh? Can't live with them, can't live without them.

  39. Jay Slater search called off by Spanish police. 30 June 2024.

    Spanish police have called off the search for missing British teenager Jay Slater almost two weeks after he disappeared.

    A spokesman for the Guardia Civil told the Telegraph: “The search for Jay Slater ended yesterday. The case remains open and any new clues will be investigated.”

    It has crossed my mind, for I know not what reason, that Mr Slater has done a bunk.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/06/30/jay-slater-search-called-spanish-police/

    1. I think it has something to do with a stolen Rolex.
      There is much more to this story than is being published.
      It’s rather strange that there has been much media attention, that the Spanish police investigated so thoroughly, that the British police wanted to get involved and their help was refused.
      Many unanswered questions ; I think the Spanish police know what happened but they don’t want to make their suspicions public.

      1. I think you could well be right, but it still doesn't answer the question of where Jay Slater actually is – dead or alive.

          1. I do too but with one caveat. Islands are very difficult places in which to hide without a local accomplice. So it is either that or he has been well and truly disposed of.

          2. Many, many years ago a rather naive young sailor decided the Royal Navy wasn't for him, and that he would desert! Sadly he decided to do so in Gibraltar, at a time when the border with Spain was closed – he wasn't the sharpest tool in the box!

          4. Playa de las Americas is awash with drugs. That means drug dealers and some serious hombres. Slater is no saint and was involved with gangs.

          5. The two mysterious men were collecting drug debts.
            Or they were related to his victim.
            The girl friend and the amounts of money raised via Just Giving seem somewhat hooky.

    1. I wouldn't take any notice of what Mrs Elton says – he/she/it takes everything the wrong way.

  41. 'Morning All
    I've got a cunning plan……….
    We have a vast array of the virtue signalling wankeratti safely caged behind 20' Superfortress fences to keep the unwashed out
    What they haven't thought about is that those fences also fence THEM IN
    Time for a few sturdy yeomen to take control of the exits and if they wish to leave each will be assigned their very own gimmegrant to take home to love cherish and support after all how could they refuse??
    Any refusniks would be refused exit to enjoy an oil free environment for a few weeks as the gennies run out
    Win/win

  43. There seems to be a black hole in the MSM that has sucked any mention of Galloway's party out of the media
    Here's a fun idea
    https://x.com/georgegalloway/status/1807133801299992658
    He's not my cup of tea but this would be epic
    Rest
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/cecb824e98215a133114b28acfb297dd346ec232d06ad15475cf8b359ec5a217.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2f9fe5d47b77194a1f30fc70406aad3b15029e2c72948e4353a2b45135e21cb4.png
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4cdb789c43be58b7639164e575e3e6f8e8e270388a975cf354f771a0259846a5.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4859010e08dffad9cafd83122702ab12b5d917b884314dfc6104d14e35a65990.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/683f83d3ca7ad8e23f507ea4a8a0c7618e7b7273c73c1d95b97f684c4351dcf0.jpg

    1. From Coffee House, the Spectator

      Channel 4 hit back at Reform over ‘actor’ activist claims
      Comments Share 28 June 2024, 1:42pm
      When you’re in a hole, stop digging. It seems that those words of wisdom aren’t being heeded by Reform as the party battles to handle the fall-out from last night’s Channel 4 exposé. The broadcaster released an undercover report into the party’s campaign in Clacton, featuring examples of anti-migrant rhetoric, homophobia and one canvasser called Andrew Parker ‘making racist and offensive remarks’.

      Parker was swiftly booted out of the party but attention has now focussed on his professional background as a part-time actor. Both Reform’s leader Nigel Farage and party chairman Richard Tice have been quick to jump on suggestions that this might explain his comments in the programme. Farage wrote on Twitter/X this morning that: ‘His own website says he is “well spoken” but from the moment he arrived in Clacton he was doing what he calls “rough speaking”. This whole episode does not add up.’

      However when GB News got in touch with Andrew Parker he dismissed such theories and said that while he was goaded by the undercover reporter, he rejected any suggestion that he was a ‘paid actor’ set-up to make Reform look bad. And now a spokesman for Channel 4 News has hit back at Farage et al by telling Mr S that:

      We strongly stand by our rigorous and duly impartial journalism which speaks for itself. We met Mr Parker for the first time at Reform UK party headquarters, where he was a Reform party canvasser. We did not pay the Reform UK canvasser or anyone else in this report. Mr Parker was not known to Channel 4 News and was filmed covertly via the undercover operation.

      Tice though is not taking it lying down, posting on Twitter/X his reply. ‘Desperate stuff from Ch 4’, he wrote. ‘They are not going to admit they broke the law. But they do need to explain why a volunteer would use their acting voice not their normal voice when making horrific statements.’ Tice subsequently suggested that the comments might not even be real, tweeting:

      This man Parker makes stuff up. He is an actor. Thats what actors do. I have no doubt the horrific comments were made up to suit the objective of Ch 4.

      Sounds like this one is going to run and run…

      1. If this agent provocateur was employed by the Conservative Party, I would not expect him to be known by Channel 4 news reporters. Probably why he was chosen.

        It's an interesting campaign tactic, and one perhaps that could be repeated. Anyone aspiring to defend the nation from hostile attack should be prepared for any nature of "dirty tricks" employed by an enemy. It may have taken Reform a short while to cotton on, but it's good experience, and they'll know better next time.

        When I was an Area Party Chairman with the SDP, there was this trade union type – modelled on Peter Sellers' Mr Kite from the old film 'I'm Alright Jack', who liked to sabotage meetings with his relentless filibustering about rights. Nothing could be decided while he was around, so I threw him out. Being a former trade union rep. myself, I knew very well the stereotype, and that real union reps were far more interested in saying little and doing much.

    2. George Gallloway has won his seat on the basis of reading his consituents' perception of historic Tory and Labour government achievements together with the common flak that both he and Nigel Farage receive from 'bad actors'.

      George sees a common theme of disruption with which both he and Nigel aspire to challenge the accepted dominance of the prevailing two party democratic system albeit from different directions.

      Rik's reference to the threats by Stellantis to close down UK based car production underlines how serious are the main party positions in maintaining a UK net zero deadline policy part of which is to fine car manufacturers for not producing enough EVs.

      EVs are just not capable of replacing the cheapness, safety, functionaliy, characteristics and ease of use of fossil fuel engined cars which not only create income for the oil industry that remains at the core of UK's GDP but also is an important income for the Treasury.

        1. 10,000 bodies could be a good reason to support George Galloway.
          Could be a good bet to back a GG if you support the Palestinian cause.

          1. I was never sure whether the 10,000 would be the Muslims protecting a woman from being 'de-burquaed' or the Islamophobes dying in the attempt.

          3. I was never sure whether the 10,000 would be the Muslims protecting a woman from being 'de-burquaed' or the Islamophobes dying in the attempt.

    3. George Gallloway has won his seat on the basis of reading his consituents' perception of historic Tory and Labour government achievements together with the common flak that both he and Nigel Farage receive from 'bad actors'.

      George sees a common theme of disruption with which both he and Nigel aspire to challenge the accepted dominance of the prevailing two party democratic system albeit from different directions.

      Rik's reference to the threats by Stellantis to close down UK based car production underlines how serious are the main party positions in maintaining a UK net zero deadline policy part of which is to fine car manufacturers for not producing enough EVs.

      EVs are just not capable of replacing the cheapness, safety, functionaliy, characteristics and ease of use of fossil fuel engined cars which not only create income for the oil industry that remains at the core of UK's GDP but also is an important income for the Treasury.

    4. George Gallloway has won his seat on the basis of reading his consituents' perception of historic Tory and Labour government achievements together with the common flak that both he and Nigel Farage receive from 'bad actors'.

      George sees a common theme of disruption with which both he and Nigel aspire to challenge the accepted dominance of the prevailing two party democratic system albeit from different directions.

      Rik's reference to the threats by Stellantis to close down UK based car production underlines how serious are the main party positions in maintaining a UK net zero deadline policy part of which is to fine car manufacturers for not producing enough EVs.

      EVs are just not capable of replacing the cheapness, safety, functionaliy, characteristics and ease of use of fossil fuel engined cars which not only create income for the oil industry that remains at the core of UK's GDP but also is an important income for the Treasury.

  44. Russia wants to confront NATO but dares not fight it on the battlefield – so it’s waging a hybrid war instead. 30 June 2024.

    When someone tried – and failed – to burn down a bus garage in Prague earlier this month, the unsuccessful arson attack didn’t draw much attention. Until, that is, Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala revealed it was “very likely” that Moscow was behind it.

    The accusation prompted alarm among security officials and governments because several similar incidents have occurred across Europe in recent months. The Museum of Occupation in Riga was targeted in an arson attack in February. A London warehouse burnt down in March and a shopping center in Warsaw went up in flames in May. Police in Germany arrested several people suspected of planning explosions and arson attacks in April, and French authorities launched an anti-terror investigation after detaining a suspected bomb-maker who was injured in a botched explosion earlier this month.

    This latest iteration in anti-Russian propaganda will not lack for incidents. Somebody nicked your bike? It was Russia. Your holidays were cancelled? It was Russia. No evidence needed. Obvious innit?

    https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/30/europe/russia-hybrid-war-nato/index.html


  45. Prince Harry gets an ESPY! Duke of Sussex to be handed 'Pat Tillman Award for Service' at glitzy LA bash hosted by Serena Williams

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/othersports/article-13576071/Prince-Harry-ESPY-Duke-Sussex-Award-Serena-Williams.html

    Pat Tilman's mother is not happy.

    This is Pat Tilman. He was 27 when accidentally shot by his own side…

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/93b99ece9618887a08c52d03e9b28f185cdc8a7c1c948a73d6c5f03f523cde4f.jpg

    1. Harry gets an award for being, well, Harry. Pat gets dead.
      Now we see how the King gets a chestful of glitter that would shame an old North Korean General.

    3. I had to look up what this latest award thing was.
      I doubt that the ginger winger would have qualified for a real award in any of their sporting categories.

      the prat of the year award goes to . . .

      1. Harry was never in any danger when he was in the war zone. He was safely back at base playing his X box. All the footage and pictures of him were staged PR.

    1. Just taken doggo for a walk, it was very quiet out there, only saw two people jogging, no-one else with a dog. Usually on a Sunday we have to keep Rico on a lead because so many are walking their dogs. I hope this is a good sign and that they are all watching Farage.

    2. A bit Americanised but a powerful presentation nevertheless – excellent stuff

      1. Not all things American are bad. I thought the production values were high. Nice to see Widders on the battle bus !
        I thought the speeches were relevant and of good quality.
        It made Plastic Sunak and Wooden Starmer look like amateurs.
        I am voting Reform ! Least worse choice. Given all politicians promise us all the gold we can eat. :@)

  47. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13579941/Calling-British-Muslims-antisemitic-Hamas-terror-attack-Israel-Islamic-extremism.html
    UK could be hit by wave of homegrown jihadis if British muslims are called antisemitic after Hamas terror attack on Israel, scholar warns

    Branding British Muslims anti-Semites in the wake of October 7 could lead to an increase in Islamist extremism, according to an Islamic scholar.

    Dr. Mohammad bin Abdulkarim Al-Issa, Secretary General of The Muslim World League, said 'unwarranted suspicion' of Islam could drive moderate followers of the religion to form the hardline views that lead to terrorism.

    He also warned against the rise of anti-Semitism, after vile chants were reported at several pro-Gaza protests across the country.

    In a chilling assessment, Dr. Al-Issa – who is holding private meetings with politicians and Jewish community representatives during a UK visit – said, 'We fear the rise of both anti-Semitism and Islamophobia and warn against pushing moderate Muslims towards political Islam and extremism, which could happen if they are repeatedly described as anti-Semites.

    'We must encourage the moderate Islam of the vast majority of Muslims in the United Kingdom, who live here peacefully and contribute to its economy and prosperity.'

    1. We must encourage the moderate Islam of the vast majority of Muslims in the United Kingdom…

      There are no such Muslims in the UK.

      2. Didn’t Erdogan say that there isn’t any such thing as moderate Islam, there’s just Islam? Or words to that effect.

    4. There is no "moderate islam" (see Erdogan) and it's a lie that the majority "contribute to the economy and prosperity" because more than half of them are economically inactive. Taqiyya again.

      1. Try doing anything the “moderates” disapprove of and you’ll soon discover the truth.

        1. You don’t have to convince me! It’s a pity that more people aren’t aware of the true nature of “submission”.

    5. So the vast majority of Muslims are moderates who live here peacefully, but don't call them anti-Semitic or they might get violent. Sure.

      1. Indeed, don't do anything that they don't like or you'll be for it – and will, of course, have deserved it as a kuffar and an islamophobe.

      2. Indeed, don't do anything that they don't like or you'll be for it – and will, of course, have deserved it as a kuffar and an islamophobe.

    2. The Right are always "hard" or "far". I don't like the laziness of the language, nor the attempt to imply something that's normal, not "extreme".

      1. Do you admit therefore the existence of the "soft centre" as in the choccies left in the box after it's been round once?

      2. It is well known that if you tell the same lie often enough it becomes the “truth”.

    3. Good to see you, and learn that you are still telegraphing…hope you're better, back to yourself 🙂

        1. Good to know 🙂 I’ve had what GP calls setbacks, apparently number diagnosed not with long covid but ‘long covid vaccine’. Feeling better today, Farage video cheering me up….hope to see you again, soon, and regularly 🙂

          1. Yes, a bombshell report has come out quite recently from a doctor in the US who treats mostly “long covid” patients. He said that it is not caused by the virus but by the vaccines, specifically the mRNA ones.

          2. Thanks PJ. My first was AZ, next two Pfizer – especially the second. I think Pfizer was hoping to introduce other mRNA vaccines, seems to have been suspended now but who knows for how long. RFKJr very interesting on vaccines, you’ve likely seen/heard him.

          3. Yes, I do look at RFKJr’s CHD site and it is very interesting. I didn’t see this report there though, could have been the Daily Sceptic or UnHerd.

          4. Ha…we still read the same/similar items. Sent you a note of headline I just saw on Bloomberg re: voter turnout in France highest for 40 years?!

        2. Just seen a Bloomberg headline 'French voter turnout is the highest in nearly 40 years in a pivotal snap election.' Doubtless more details will follow…….

          1. Yes, it’s all over the news here too. It was over 25% at 12 noon which is almost unheard of – especially given it’s a Sunday! Now I think it is close to 70% which is huge.

          3. Yes it is always a Sunday, but they don’t usually vote in such numbers quite so early :D!

          5. My mail all out of syn..maybe increased traffic…70% that’s voting with intent, people had enough…when do you expect final vote to be announced?

          3. Sorry – had a senior moment and was thinking of the EU elections🤣 In fact she already is an MP and has just re-taken her constituency with 52% of the vote in the first round. Bardello is dating her niece – her older sister’s daughter, so is sort of “family” :))

          4. I looked him up after you said earlier…he’s her ‘deputy’…so you were in fact correct 😀 As if I believe you have senior moments…can’t kid a kidder 😀

    6. So the teenagers don't know (wilfully ignorant or in denial?) that the Nazzies were hard LEFT, then. It's in the name; Socialist.

    1. It is the only conclusion to which one can come. Otherwise it would do something about it. Govt wants them here.

      1. There are many areas of attack. Those boats would at least require a transit van and be delivered to the beach. They could stop and search but don't.
        The people traffickers use networks that are monitored but allow them to continue.
        Someone is supplying outboard motors. They could identify the source and shut them down. But don't.
        The charities at Calais should be investigated but aren't.
        None of the boats in French waters are legal under French law which is not enforced.

        I could go on but you know what i mean.

        Yes. The Government wants them here.

    2. Looking at the points of origin of so many of them might one conclude there is a common denominator for many of them?

        1. Whilst one must sympathise with the family, why should Britain take them in if nowhere else will?

          1. Precisely, UK has successfully passed legislation to be able to protect its borders in spite of human rights lawyers who rely on altruistic arguments to allow stateless individuals to remain indefinitely in this country.

            There were signs that the UK Government’s legislation to deport illegal and undesirable individuals to a safe country were actually starting to work. Labour is committed to destroying that progress.

    3. I wonder how many asylum seekers claim asylum at their point of entry into Europe and how many go benefits shopping instead?

    4. There you go, Oberstleutant. Worth noting illegals are around 10% of the total, 90% legals. Apparently we need to leave ECHR which we can't do unless we want to scupper the NI Agreement. Or something.

      1. I would have thought the Irish might want to scupper the NI Agreement – or at least parts of it, as a result of all the immigrants crossing the non-existent border with the UK…

        1. Exactly so, Hertslass. It’s a border that can be whatever it’s wished to be, depending on who’s doing the wishing and why.

  50. The hunt for Jay Slater has been called off, the search ended – nothing found but the case remains open.

    There is a whiff of the Corrie McTeague case in all of this, the young RAF gunner who went missing in the early hours of Suffolk back in 2016.

    1. Wasn't the poor lad found at a landfill site and thought to have kipped in a wheelie bin or something?

      1. I thought there was something strange about that. I mistakenly put egg shells in my recycle bin which is a no no. The bin men refused to take it. I would think a body would be a bit more obvious. Poor soul whatever happened.

        1. We can put egg shells in our food recycling. I put my egg boxes into the general recycling bin as 'paper and card'
          Something though is not right as you say with this case. I am sure something would have been found now if he was indeed in the area they say.

          1. We don't have food recycle bins here. So the shells needed to go into the general rubbish and not the blue recycle bin. They did leave me some extra bags so i could sort it out.

          1. We are never told the truth from PR or journalists. We can make our own minds up. I don't even believe the pervert supposedly responsible for Maddies disappearance was anything to do with it.

      2. No, his body was never found. The conclusion of an inquest in 2022 was that he had died, after climbing into a commercial waste bin, as a result of "compression asphyxia in association with multiple injuries".

      3. His body was never found and will be burried under several thousand tons of landfill by now.

      4. That was the official, sanitised version in order to wrap it all up. There were a lot of unanswered questions and his body was not actually found.

  52. Farage says Russians are not boosting Reform . 30 June 2024.

    Deputy prime minister Oliver Dowden said allegations that Russian bots were influencing the general election with social media content were “gravely concerning”.

    Mr Dowden was responding to a claim by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) that it had uncovered a suspected Russian influence operation.

    According to ABC, it monitored five coordinated Facebook pages spreading “Kremlin talking points”, some of which supported Mr Farage’s party.

    The broadcaster said it shared its findings with disinformation experts who claimed the activity had the hallmarks of a Russian influence operation.

    Nigel is standing in Australia as well?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/06/30/politics-election-latest-news-sunak-farage-bbc/

  53. Farage claims that many of his Brexit supporters "would not vote at all" if He or Reform UK weren't on the ballot.
    Farage has a point.. especially if the good people of UK wake up on Friday morning to the news that..

    17,410,742 voters said No to Invasion.. on 4th July.
    17,410,742 voters said No to Islam.. on 4th July.
    17,410,742 voters said No to Climate scam.. on 4th July.
    17,410,742 voters said No to Gender-woo-woo-nonsense.. on 4th July.

      1. There's a seal up in the clouds.
        Plus, so far, I've spotted a duck, a dog, a cat.
        I've sent it to friends and family who will probably never speak to me again.
        Oooh …. just seen a fish.

        2. There is also some sort of bird with a longish curved beak.
          (I really must do the baking that I'm putting off.)
          There's a second bird that looks like a seagull diving into the ground.
          (Yes, yes, the butter is now soft enough ……)
          And MB's just spotted a blackbird … again diving into the earth…..

          1. I was like that too. Stared at the blooming thing for ages, was about to give up when I suddenly spotted lots of things in a row! In exactly the places I'd been staring at too.

      2. There's a seal up in the clouds.
        Plus, so far, I've spotted a duck, a dog, a cat.
        I've sent it to friends and family who will probably never speak to me again.
        Oooh …. just seen a fish.

    5. Technology has become cleverer, not me. Enlarging the picture onscreen makes the hidden things easier to spot.

    6. I see an unside down dog just to the right of the black squggle on the bottom left.

      Is there a fish pointing downward on the centre trunk to the right of the shadow?

    7. I see an unside down dog just to the right of the black squggle on the bottom left.

      Is there a fish pointing downward on the centre trunk to the right of the shadow?

    9. Dog, fish owl, goose, mallard, blackbird, cat, man's head, robin, seagull, seal, maybe a hedgehog behind the water wheel?

  56. Friday was difficult. Took Mongo to the children's hospice and he was a good lad while there but barked, whined and grumpy on the way back. Wouldn't get out of the car, went for me when I went to unclip his harness. On getting him out (by leaving the ramp in place and the thing undone – he buggered off into the tree line and stayed there until Junior got him out at 5 and then clearly wanted to stay there with him, rather than come inside.

    Today I go to see my brother who has been biting people. He also went for me only with more alacrity and a lot less guilt. Always fun to come home with blood running down your forehead.

    At least he's eating now, where he wasn't before. The warden entered his flat when he didn't answer for evening tea (the warden goes around with a pot of tea and a packet of biscuits. It's to see if the resident is ok more than the tea (and to give folk someone to talk to – and found the berk slumped on his bed from dehydration as 'water is bad for you' and he'd run out of juice in his fridge.

    Thus if anyone wants a large dog to borrow (he really is a lovely boy) to act as a doorstop, draught excluder, hot water bottle, pillow, baby sitter I've one – well, 2, but the other howls if away from a blonde.

    My brother… goodness knows. a more patient brother, I think.

        2. I would leap at the chance, but it would be rather a stretch from Buenos Aires…

          Good luck with your brother.

    3. My heartfelt sympathy, for you and for BobofBonsall. It is not easy dealing with psychologically disturbed adults, even with what help the system affords.

    4. How is he with naked cats? I’m sure he’d love Dobby and weird Phoebe!
      You’re doing fine wibbles! Diven’t fash yersel’!

      1. He is, despite folk thinking 'just a dog' a sensitve chap who can feel the suffering and pain going on. It gets to him. He's had bad times before when he's dashed off to the corner of the garden to hide and be alone. He just has to process it. He's a good boy and a reminder that we all have limits – even the dog shaped ones.

  58. Afternoon, all. I've succumbed to the cold and lit the Rayburn. I'll need to put off organising having the chimney swept until such time as I can rely on it being warm enough to let it out to cool down!

    Labour can't deliver economic growth regardless of the green crap. It's too wedded to high taxes, wasteful spend, big state, over-regulation to control everybody and the Five Year Plan mentality.

      1. That's ok, as the Tories have taxed the fuel for the bike, confiscated the riders licence and regulated (EU demanded) amount of fat, dough and toppings on the pizza. As a final hurrah they added a 'bad for you' tax to the sale so no one could afford it anyway and an 'on line ordering' tax on top of increasing business tax by 32%.

        This made a lot of people miserable, put the delivery man out of work, the pizza makers made a man redundant as fewer pizzas were bought. Upward in the supply chain 3 more jobs were lost.

        Tory HQ shouted what a success this was as they reduced choice, tied us to globalist control freakery, destroyed a mass of jobs and made a product more expensive.

        They didn't understand why people thought all this regulation and taxation was a bad thing and people didn't want to vote for them.

    3. You lucky son-of-a-gun….had an Aga one time…sigh….only time I didn't like it was when offspring home from Uni, hanging around it.

    4. Absolutely right – they just don't understandthat growth comes from individuals spending their own money on things they want. That to enable that means cutting taxes on the well off so they invest and spend creating jobs and buying things which spreads throughout the supply chain.

      As much as Labour hate to admit it, trickle down economics exists and is a real, palpable thing.

      Lefties just don't understand – more, won't accept – that success means less government, less intervention, less state

  59. Ha ha ha ha ha
    Deep breath
    HA HA HA HA HA
    Particularly after the Banksy nonsense.

    Glastonbury Festival has been thrown into chaos as hundreds of people snuck in for just £50 – causing stages to be shut down from overcrowding and people to panic from the crush.

    An exclusive video obtained by MailOnline shows people in the early hours of the morning jumping over the high walls and running into the festival which already hosts more than 200,000 ticket holders.

    Pictures also reveal a queue of those who didn't get a ticket forming outside the festival walls and people climbing up a ladder to get in to jump down.

    One successful infiltrator told MailOnline: 'It was ridiculously easy to get in. I joined a Reddit group chat of about 300 people and everyone was sharing tips and contact details of people who could break you in.'

    Official tickets are £350 but hundreds joined forums on social media sites and for just £50 they are snuck in by seasoned pros.

      1. Be mad as a rat if you were someone paid full whack, James…oh the luvvies, what a pity never mind. Security enhanced next year.

        1. Yes KJ, but “Glasto” not getting a good press all round this year. What with the celebrating of terrorists at a music festival who carried out their murders at someone else’s music festival, etc. Lefties tend not to get irony or humour and so I suppose only to be expected. Then there’s 6th form artist Banksy doing his bit for illegal immigration while people illegally immigrated over the walls too. Ya couldn’t make it up. Truly the Radicalism of Fools.

          1. Good post, James. Almost feel sorry for the poor blighters…almost. Coldplay sounds to have been the best item, as per. The mess left behind has to be seen to be believed, farmer must find it worth his while.

      1. They are darn lucky that the gate-crashers weren't newly arrived young men who've heard that Britain is the land of free money and white girls who put out.

    5. And only yesterday they were praising massive uncontrolled criminnal invasion! How shocking that they don't like it when it's them on the end of it.

      Oh! The hypocrisy!

  60. If Biden decides to stand down, what's the betting he'll do it on 4th of July to maximise the handover as the patriotic thing to do for America, and claim all Americans should vote Democrat because it's patriotic.

    1. If he does, he does. He's been unwell for some time and the party can't protect him any more.

  61. The advantage of the Rayburn over an Aga is that this runs the central heating as well as cooking the food and heating the water.

    1. Yes, friend of mine had one, would eat anything. Aga was LPG, too expensive. Especially with couple of teens draped over it 😀

        1. We have a wood burner now, luckily an area to cut for it. I reckon the coming winter could be quite cold, nature wheel turning as it eventually does.

          1. I also have open fires. The dog grate will burn anything (but not, hopefully, my dog!).

          2. Hear you…sometimes can’t get near it for terriers…both old now and sleep a lot. When they’re not blocking, family are…:-D

          3. My Patterdale cross used to creep nearer and nearer until his head was in the hearth. He even started to smoke on one memorable occasion when a piece of coal flew out and landed on his fur! He had to be put out (the ember, that is) and physically moved away from the fire. He never learned. He was 17 when he had to be put to sleep because he went off his legs.

          4. Again, sorry for late reply – this time in my junk mail. Yes, one is a Patterdale and yes he’s crazy. Has to have eyes on me 24/7, been that way ever since he saw me at 6 weeks old. Obviously recognises a sucker when he sees one 😀 He’s 15 now, looks like he’s wearing goggles due to white bands around his eyes, plus white muzzle but otherwise fit and healthy, cross fingers. Hates the vet with a passion. Have had around a dozen or so dogs in the past…putting to sleep, been there done that. Glad you enjoyed him whilst you had him, good to read :-))

          5. My border x cairn had what we used to call "Biggles goggles". He lived to be nearly 17 and a half. I loved all my dogs, but unfortunately, they live shorter lives than we do. We must enjoy them while we've got them (and tell them how much we love them, too).

          7. I am definitely a dog person, but I like cats and they like me (much to the annoyance of one of my friends who is a total cat person, but whom cats ignore). I just don't have any because the road outside my gate is very busy and I don't think they'd last long. This was the problem I had as a child when the cats would try to cross the busy road between us and the churchyard. It was like Russian roulette and they all lost out sooner rather than later.

          8. I’ve had rescue cats too, once moved house, everything in the back of a landrover including cats n dogs..bit ‘hairy’ 😀 I had a collie used to go to the cemetery, puzzled about that until I realised the long grass between the graves was full of field mice…the dog that thought he was a cat. My grandad didn’t like cats, but he was infirm and couldn’t get my aunt’s cat off his lap..said cat had smelly wind…children all thought it really funny.

          9. I'm a neither person – hate both cats and dogs equally (for different reasons).

            I also dislike children.

            But I'm not all bad, honest!

          11. Ah go on with you Angus..:-D ….actually I don’t always like cats, dogs, children..and generally for the same reason…behaviour/manners…

          12. Hectic day, Conway – apologies if I replied earlier. Definitely not your dog…I once had a whippet would stand side on to coal fire…singed fur as witnessed by the smell…:-D

          13. When we first moved into this house, the previous owners had installed gas fires in the fireplaces. My Irish setter used to lie in front of them whimpering because he was too hot. We called this his "move me, I'm burning" moment.

          14. Irish setter…how handsome they are, what was his temperament like? (apart from the burning moment..) I’ve had several rescues, one taken into police station on a piece of string…skin and bone, no fur, turned out to be a blond greyhound, very beautiful face huge dark eyes and very soft temperament until she saw a rabbit…down in one…

          15. He was an utter gentleman. I got him from the Irish Setter Rescue people at the age of 6. A bit set in his ways (one rose at 07.00 and retired at 22.00) and the only foible was I had to watch him if someone opened a car door while we were walking past because he'd think, "oh, a lift! How kind!" and try to get in the car. Apart from that he was adorable.

          16. I actually had a dog that did that too, she loved to play football with the boys:-D Every dog seemed to like a routine, especially when it came to mealtimes. These two I have now are neutered – pretty sure they’d eat me if I up and died. One dog, a rescue, came in and instantly bit one I already had, without provocation, only dog I ever returned. I’m in my mid-70s now, not sure I’ll get another dog, not sure it’s fair….

          17. Get a rescue oldie. They are ignored by people going to dogs' homes because they want a pup. Oscar was 11 nearly 12 when I took him on. I outlived him, sadly (my dogs have been willed to my best friend who adores dogs). I like to think I gave him the best 2yrs 8 months of his life.

          18. Very good advice. I likely will (have you seen the prices of pups…good grief, it’s wicked). Vet friend of mine once told me many rescue dogs euthanised as unlikely to be re-homed. One time, rescue places would gladly accept a donation, now there’s a charge, £90 per dog £75 per cat, guess it shows how serious the prospective owner is. Sounds like Oscar landed on his paws…well done Conway, thank you for your care 🙂

          19. He was the most challenging of all my adult dogs (and I've had some challenges!), but he turned round in the end and wouldn't go to bed without a cuddle. At the beginning, I used to tell him, "you're a snappy, grumpy old misery-guts – but you're my snappy, grumpy old misery-guts so we're going to have to get on with it!

          20. We are so soft…:-DDD..right now, I’m sitting at the table half watching the TV (England won)…he’s on the sofa, head hanging over the back, beady eye on me …

          21. Mine is asleep (seemingly, but I know if I get up to go to the kitchen to pour another drink, he'll be there in a flash!) on the fleecy rug of which he is now in sole possession – he and Oscar used to vie for possession of it and Oscar, being bigger, used to win out most of the time so Kadi had to settle for Charlie's old rug which, while fleecy, is not as thick and fleecy as the one I bought for Oscar.

          22. We’re just slaves aren’t we Conway….he’s zonked right now so I can also go and pour myself another drink…vodka or coffee…coffee or vodka…hmm…

          27. I got up to wallow in a nice, hot bath – cue one small dog leaping up and sticking to me with a face that said, “you aren’t leaving me behind, are you?” Of course I wouldn’t. He came up, lay guard outside the bathroom door and then retired to bed 🙂

          28. That’s a dog that knows his job…mine is a bit of numbskull, have a wooden floor here and he gets on my wires pacing round when he wants something, usually to eat 😀 I’m off to bed myself shortly, he’s already eyeing me….

          29. It’s quite funny; when I had Oscar on his own, he used to follow me into the loo to make sure I was okay (more likely to check that I wasn’t stashing away food that he didn’t know about). As soon as I got Kadi, he stopped doing it and delegated that task to him!

          30. That IS funny, planet Dog. He did similar when he was a puppy, now sleeps around 20 odd hours a day – waking to eat, drink, relieve himself. Never had a dog this age, apparently ‘normal’ whatever that means where pets are concerned. I remember Peta telling me her cat would sit on her lap while she worked at her desk, writing. When she stood up, the cat kept clinging to her clothing…’don’t go style, let’s stay here’….carrying a cat…:-D

  64. Are cucumbers the stupidest plants in the world?
    I helpfully put twigs in the ground for them to grow up…and they grow away from them! Not just one plant either – all of them. Putting their little tendrils out into deep space and completely ignoring the sturdy twig just behind them. Dimwits!

  65. Somebody called Kit Harrington has just told people to vote Labour apparently. Twitter is not impressed.

    Bo
    @KingBobIIV
    Oh Good, an actor is telling us how to vote. Thank God, because I was incapable of making a choice

    1. I think he was in that ‘Game of Clones’ thingy. Seems to suit his virtue signalling persona.

  66. In a way, it's a pity they weren't; it might have brought a dose of reality to the proceedings.

    1. I think those creatures are so far gone that even if rped by a migrant, they would be keeping quiet for the sake of diversity or something like that, or they would think it was a far right agent impersonating a migrant. I’ve spoken to them and they are capable of dreaming up whole fantasies to support what they want to believe.

  67. You've put the twigs in the wrong place – if you'd put them where the cucumbers are growing, they'd have grasped them 🙂

        2. My army of twigs!
          I prune a hawthorn and a hazel nut heavily each year which provides me with an endless supply of twigs and bean-sticks. I haven't bought bamboos for around ten years.

  69. – I think the England tactic for today will be to start off slowly with bit of nifty side and back passing, while Slovakia sit back and watch.
    Then in the second half take the pace down a level and wait for the penalty shoot out.

      1. They are on track for that.

        they have more yellow cards than the other side, does that count for something?

  70. A matey Par Four?

    Wordle 1,107 4/6
    ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
    ⬜⬜🟨⬜🟨
    🟨🟩⬜⬜🟩
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

        1. There you be
          Wordle 1,107 4/6

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

          How’s that for a bad start.

    3. Only just.

      Wordle 1,107 6/6

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

      1. Wow, 10 blanks to start with!
        Wordle 1,107 5/6

        ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
        ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
        ⬜🟩⬜⬜🟩
        ⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    4. Me too, pal!

      Wordle 1,107 4/6

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

    5. A poor five. I always make the mistake of thinking of an English word before an American one…

      Wordle 1,107 5/6

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

  71. Just watching Brave New World (2020) again.
    The Director of Social Stability speech.

    Oh so familiar.

    I wonder if the elites that cover up all the rapes, stabbings, bombings think their children will be safe behind their paper walls.

    Before we bombed the shit out of Libya and Iraq those countries were modernising. Free education and healthcare.

    I thought at the time it was all about $ oil.

    1. I never visited Iraq, but was often working in Libya.
      What was done to the Libyans by the West was shameful. It was a fine, modernising country, that also provided a bulwark against the islamic hordes. No more.

      1. Remember Beirut. This plan has been a long time in hatching. The eggs are cracking open everywhere.

          1. Indeed, and one didn't diss Ghaddafi or his relatives, but the rules were simple. The country was developing, getting richer from oil, and maturing to some kind of a reasonable member of the world economy.

    2. Bliar had to have his day in the sun. Everyone has paid since for his megalomania. I note, now that Iraq is on the verge of getting actual WMDs not a peep out of him about taking positive action.

          1. I must have watched it a dozen times. It never gets tired. The orgy scene in the firefall episode was extraordinary !
            Other parts had me burst out laughing.

  72. Good evening, each. Just passing through – will be more on the ball tomorrow.

    Just back from two French weeks – one in north Brittany by the sea. Wonderful – especially as the Wet Office lied and the weather was much better than predicted.

    Second week in a house on the beach (10 feet away) at Asnelles – where many thousands of British – and Allied) troops came ashore on D-Day. A very moving week – I'll tell more later on. I'll whet your appetite with this snap taken by the MR on the evening of 26 June – of sunset over the Mulberry Harbour.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/cb180ee292a063b4cd52f4a344331b1a8484dac3767409a68e831feb0b44f537.jpg
    A demain.

    PS, I cannot fault the enormous efforts yer French in Normandy have put in to make the 80th anniversary really memorable.

    2. I think we're taking a break from online at the same time Mr T, passing through is a good term for popping head around the door and saying hello to friends. Your trip away in France sounds splendid and what an enchanting photo.

  73. DAVID FROST
    27 June 2024 • 6:42pm

    ‘Good-morning, good-morning!’ the General said
    When we met him last week on our way to the line …
    “He’s a cheery old card,” grunted Harry to Jack
    As they slogged up to Arras with rifle and pack.

    But he did for them both by his plan of attack.

    Conservative candidates slogging around their constituencies in these last few days of the campaign could be forgiven for having Siegfried Sassoon’s masterfully brief and bitter poem in mind. As they line up in the trenches next Thursday, waiting for the off, they know in their hearts that all too few of them are going to be returning to Parliament in a week’s time. And, as in 1917, it’s the leadership that has done for them with its plan of attack.

    Six weeks back, when the election was called, I urged Tory voters to return to the colours. I didn’t know then, of course, that we were planning to run a political-campaign equivalent to the first day of the Somme. Strong Conservatives, MPs who have stood up for Brexit and conservative values, dedicated party workers, all have been pushed out into a campaign that could never succeed, fought on the wrong ground, based on the wrong issues, ineptly conducted and run. It is they who will pay the price.

    For it is important not to engage in self-delusion, the besetting sin of the Tory party in recent months. At best we face a 1997-style disaster – a result that would now be regarded as a triumph against the odds – and it could easily be a lot worse.

    Almost everyone is going to be saying this in a week’s time. But no one is going to be listening then. The attention will have switched to Labour. That’s why I say it now. After all, maybe a sufficiently bleak and honest prognosis might yet encourage some discontented Conservatives to hold their nose and come out and vote for us to help limit the disaster. Don’t give Labour a supermajority – or the “we’re beaten, but please don’t be mean to us” strategy, as some have described it.

    So let us hope we can yet avoid the very worst. But it’s going to be bad – and it’s important to put responsibility in the right place.

    Yes, Nigel Farage and Reform UK have split our vote. But the Conservative Party doesn’t have a God-given right to occupy the Right of British politics. Reform is perfectly entitled to stand against us if it wants to. It’s not up to them to care about the institutional future of the Conservative Party. That’s our job. The only reason Reform is damaging us is because we have been such poor representatives of genuine conservative politics ourselves.
    dvertisement

    Which takes us to where the responsibility really lies – on the party leadership, their advisers, and their ministerial supporters, outmanoeuvred, surrounded by yes-men, oblivious of public opinion, blind to the consequences of their decisions.

    Since the autumn reshuffle and the disastrous mistake of returning to Cameronism (including by bringing back the man himself), since the persistent failure to do what was necessary to control the small boats problem, disaster has been inevitable. The only question that remained was when our troops would be asked to go over the top into the machine-guns.

    A poor campaign has been compounded by the appalling betting scandal and its ponderous handling. I admit that, as it spread, I seriously considered cutting up my party card. If, as it seemed, some Conservatives’ first reaction to an election campaign was to think about making a fast buck from it, maybe some in the party really were as venal and heedless of the national interest as our opponents said.

    Advertisement

    My sense of disgust has dissipated, but my sense of anger has not. A majority of 80 has been wasted, with the only real achievement being delivering the 2016 referendum result. We face years of self-righteous hectoring, controlling, damaging Labour government, and there is nothing we can do about it.

    Well, almost nothing. We can come out and vote for Conservatives on July 4. And then, beginning on July 5, we must rebuild. The Conservative Party as we know it may well be badly damaged or even largely wiped out. So to revive conservative ideas, to bring real conservatives together after the cataclysm, perhaps we will need to create a new movement, one for “reformed conservatism”, to coin a phrase.

    Not a new party, but a movement to revive Conservatism based on conservative ideas, and reaching out to everyone who wants to see them prosper one day again.

    This movement cannot include people who should really be in parties to our Left. It certainly can’t include those responsible for the strategy leading to the current disaster. What it can include are all those who want to rebuild genuine conservatism once again – wherever they may sit now. And what it can do is to start work on a fresh conservative programme with a truly national appeal which, eventually, can offer the British people the genuine choice that they haven’t had at this election.

    So vote wisely on 4 July. And let’s start rebuilding the day after.

    1. Sunak today has said he'll still win despite the disastrous campaign. He took time to add that Brexit has been bad for some businesses. I wonder why people aren't enthused by him…

      A real no hoper.

      1. Thanks to him and his remainiac party, we haven't had Brexit. If it's been "bad for some businesses" it's because it has been bastardised and the result has been bad.

        1. Indeed yes, he cannot even see his part in it. The remainiacs need clearing out altogether.

    2. It is a little offensive to compare arrogant troughers who voted for lockdowns and jab mandates losing their seat on the gravy-train to young men dying in the Great War.

    3. The reason the Cons are going to have such a kicking is because they have NOT been on the Right of British Politics. They haven't even been right a lot of the time.

      1. An unusually politically astute member of the congregation accosted me after today's service. "I like Reform UK's "contract", but my local candidate doesn't appear to have a grasp of English grammar. What should I do?"
        Resident in Wokingham constituency, she has enjoyed the security of having Sir John Redwood as her MP for a long time. He's stepped down, presumably to spend more time dealing with Pretty Polly's incessant messages…

        My response went something like "if you're happy with fourteen years of betrayal by the Tories, vote for Redwood's successor. I don't think you are happy with that prospect. Reform won't win in Wokingham. It is most likely to be taken by the Non-Liberal Undemocrats. So voting or not voting for Reform will make no difference. Except you'll be able to look yourself in the mirror, and sleep soundly at night, knowing you voted for what you believe in…"

          2. One should always behave so that, in the morning, you can look yourself in the eye in the mirror.

          3. Unless, of course, like me you have shrunk so much that you need to stand on something even to see in the mirror!

          6. Well, true, Conners!
            If you have balance like mine, don't go standing on things to do the looking… balance can't cope.

        3. Well said, Geoff. If the candidate is young, his/her lack of grammar is probably down to Blair's education reforms, for which the candidate can scarcely be be blamed.

    4. "But the Conservative Party doesn’t have a God-given right to occupy the Right of British politics."
      Does it occupy the right? I see precious little Right-ness, and that's why the bastards are going to get canned.
      Labour won't win, the Tories will lose by their own hand.

      Edit: Delivering the 2016 referendum result? HA! HA! HA!
      Another reason to be canned.

    5. Which takes us to where the responsibility really lies – on the party leadership, their advisers, and their ministerial supporters, outmanoeuvred, surrounded by yes-men, oblivious of public opinion, blind to the consequences of their decisions.

      Drivel.

      Whilst there may be a low level of the above, it would be surprising if there was none of it in the world Frost is commenting on.

      The responsibility lies on those within the Conservative party who have allowed their judgement to be unduly influenced by outside interests e.g. the WEF. The latter's policies are undemocratic, totalitarian and very much anti-people i.e. people who do not match up to the self-appointed elites' standards. Ergo, the untermensch have to be herded, goaded and controlled by their self-acclaimed betters.

      The Tories have had a run at doing the WEF's bidding and will pay the price for their efforts. After receiving the baton, Labour will have their attempt to break the will of the British people. How long will they last now that many more people are awake to the devious machinations of the Westminster cabal?

    1. That was my Father (1895 – 1955). Volunteered in 1914 in the Queens Westminster Rifles. Also fiddled his way into the Army in 1939.

  75. Well, I have finally put brush to wall and started the Great House Painting job.
    We've all been a bit down in the dumps recently, and it finally dawned on me (brain working at the slow, relentless speed of a slug eating one of my cabbages) that the general shabbiness of the house was contributing to it. So we have embarked on a smartening up.

    1. We painted the outside of Firstborn's place a few years ago. It's all wood panelling, so we first washed the entire outside of the house, then painted using a paint sprayer that just sucked straight from the pot.
      It took longer to move the wheeled scaffolding than paint another stripe on the house. At first we thought we'd underestimated the paint volume, it went down so quickly, but no: it was the rate we were putting it on the wall.
      I thoroughly recommend that kind of gadget. Next thing we paint (the barn) is now no hinder – we know we can do it in a trice.

  80. Sir Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves are to begin a housebuilding blitz within days of gaining power if Labour wins the election.

    At least three housing announce­ments are expected to be made in the first fortnight of a Labour government. Speaking to The Sunday Times, Starmer promised to “hit the ground running” and turbocharge housebuilding from “day one”. This will include a local authority-led review of green belt land.

    Before the end of next month, Labour intends to publish a draft national planning policy framework, reimposing targets to ensure that councils are meeting local housing needs. Most young people cannot afford to buy their first home without financial support.

    In their first joint newspaper interview, Starmer and Reeves, the shadow chancellor, described their plans to reinvigorate the economy if predictions of a landslide Labour victory proved correct.

    The Labour leader said: “I want to make sure that we can make a start on this on day one.”

    Reeves said there was an “urgency” for Labour to become the party of housebuilders because “we know that for kids like us today [from working-class backgrounds], some of those opportunities [to own a home] don’t exist”.

    If all goes to plan, at the beginning of the party’s second week in power Angela Rayner, the incoming housing secretary, will announce a housebuilding programme.

    Play Video
    Starmer calls for voters to give him a “clear mandate”
    By the third week, she will have written to local authorities to tell them to start a process of “regularly reviewing” their green belt boundaries to ensure they are hitting housing targets.

    The intention is that councils will identify areas to be reclassified for development — a move likely to prompt early confrontations with the Tories.

    Building on green belt land is strictly controlled, originally to limit urban sprawl. Reclassifying just 1 per cent of it in England could produce as many as 738,000 new homes, according to research by Searchland, a specialist development site sourcing company.

    Starmer with his wife, Lady Victoria, at an event in London for the campaign’s final weekend

    Reeves, who has previously called for a “common sense” approach to building on the green belt, said: “We all know that there is building on greenfield [sites] today, but it’s chaotic. We also know there are different types of green belt land. Just because something’s designated ‘green belt’ does not mean it’s green.”

    A recruitment drive for 300 planning officers, to help speed the rate at which local authorities grant permission for developments, will follow, alongside a “first dibs” scheme, prioritising new homes for a certain number of local residents to prevent properties from being sold to overseas investors.

    These policies will underpin Starmer’s central pledge to build 1.5 million homes over the course of the next parliament.

    The Conservatives never met their 2019 manifesto commitment to build 300,000 homes a year.

    Challenged on whether Labour would deliver 300,000 homes in the first year, Starmer said: “It’s more likely, I think we’ll ramp up over the parliament. Therefore, towards the end of that, we’ll be doing more than the 300,000 [a year].”

    When the Labour leader sat down with The Sunday Times on Friday, he was anxious to get home to his wife, Vic, who is Jewish, for Shabbat. As is tradition in the Starmer home, they had plans to sit down to watch the Channel 4 series Friday Night Dinner and eat together.

    It is likely to be the last time that Starmer, who has been on the road for the past 37 days straight, will get to spend time with their 15-year-old son and 13-year-old daughter in the family’s north London home.

    Barring the Tories pulling off what they themselves have admitted would need to be the greatest comeback in political history, the former director of public prosecutions will become Britain’s next prime minister.

    When we meet in his constituency, he is accompanied by his soon-to-be Downing St neighbour Rachel Reeves.

    The couple are intent on emulating the harmonious working relationship between David Cameron and his chancellor George Osborne, a feat their Labour counterparts Tony Blair and Gordon Brown failed to achieve.

    The “stability of the economy and the stability of the team that is running the country” is something they believe investors will be looking for as they make choices about where to spend their money.

    Starmer and Reeves are preparing to attract private investment worth billions of pounds in the first months of a Labour government, which they hope will help the party meet its ambitious growth target and avoid tax rises and spending cuts.

    Sitting at Reeves’s side, Starmer, 61, said: “The strength of the relationship between Rachel and me has been there for years because this has been a joint project. We both knew what we had to do with the Labour Party. It’s been four-and-a-half years of hard work, but it’s been a joint initiative and that’s required a steely toughness and a clarity of purpose on both our parts at every step.”

    He added: “It will be very good for the country to have, if we get over the line, a prime minister and chancellor who are very close personal friends with a shared political project, working closely together.”

    Rejecting the warnings from senior Tories, including Grant Shapps, that handing Labour a “super-majority” would give the party “unchecked power” and put the country in a “dangerous place”, Reeves, 45, claims it will give investors more confidence.

    “What businesses say to both Keir and me is that there is a wall of money ready to invest … but businesses won’t invest unless they feel confident that there is some stability in the economy. There hasn’t been. We’ve had five prime ministers, seven chancellors these last 14 years. That is not the stability that the businesses want and need.

    “This is a great country, but in the last few years, businesses have looked at Britain and looked at other countries around the world and see stability elsewhere and not in Britain. If we can get that strong mandate next Thursday, then I think that, once again, businesses will look at Britain.”

    With President Biden facing calls to stand down and a shift towards the far-right in France, Starmer claims that a strong majority for Labour will make the UK look like a safer bet.

    “We actually think Britain’s a good place to invest, but that’s not going to happen while we’ve got chaos and a lack of mandate,” he said. “With what’s going on in France and what may be going on in America … these investors are looking around to say, ‘Which is going to be the country that looks as if it’s got a stable and strong enough mandate for us to put our money into it?’”

    While Labour may be only days away from power, questions hang over its plans. Key among them is the party’s drive for growth. Starmer has previously said the British economy could grow by 2.5 per cent under a Labour government. So how will they achieve it?

    Labour has said it will stage a global investment summit in its first 100 days in office where foreign investors would be invited to see what the UK has to offer. Reeves has also held meetings with the British Infrastructure Council to discuss how UK-based and international investment firms can unlock private capital for national infrastructure projects.

    • Rachel Reeves: ‘I always feel like I need to prove myself’

    Attendees of the meetings have included representatives from BlackRock, Lloyds Banking Group, Santander, HSBC, Phoenix Group and Fidelity International, among others.

    The plans are a throwback to the last Labour government in the late 1990s and early 2000s when, under Blair and Brown, private finance initiatives and public-private partnerships were expanded.

    Dismissing claims that an incoming government cannot fix Britain’s stagnant economy, crumbling public services and infrastructure without raising taxes, Reeves said: “The debate around tax and spend is very frustrating because it misses out on the most important part of the economy, which is the growth in the economy.

    “I can understand why the debate about the economy has reduced to tax and spend because that’s all you’ve had from the Tories these last few years, because you haven’t had growth. Without growth, the only choice is what tax to put up to pay for this needed spending. But there is a different way of doing things, and that is growth.”

    Labour’s programme for government will be tightly focused around the party’s five national missions. They include a commitment to setting up Great British Energy, a publicly owned clean energy company, to help reach decarbonisation by 2030.

    Asked how credible the party’s climate change goals are in the wake of widespread scepticism, Starmer said they were backed by Patrick Vallance, the government’s former chief scientific adviser.

    “Vallance is an incredibly powerful endorser because he did a lot of the work that drove the [Covid] vaccine,” he said. “I’m sure when they started that somebody said to them, it is not possible to get a vaccine, it will take at least five years for the testing and they made it a national mission and they did it in a very short period of time.”

    Another key focus for Labour will be on illegal migration after Labour pledged to ditch the Conservatives’ Rwanda policy.

    Asked to explain his plans to stop the boats, the Labour leader said Britain needed a “better security arrangement with the European Union” over border security and needed to work more closely with the French. Although it was known that Labour was seeking an ambitious new UK-EU security pact, this is the first time it has been suggested that this would also encompass border security.

    “We need to work better with the French authorities,” said Starmer. “We want a better security agreement with the EU when it comes to border security.”

    Throughout the interview, Starmer and Reeves displayed a steely determination, which they will need in spades if they are swept into Downing Street. They believe a lack of aspiration is what has been holding the country back.

    “It’s a psychological barrier that we need to get through,” said Starmer. “The story of aspiration and social mobility has been lost in the last 14 years and the sense that things will get better.”

    George Michael
    20 HOURS AGO

    They will carve up the green belt and destroy the countryside that is part of the inherent and inimitable beauty of this country that belongs to every single person born here. Think the country has been changed by the Tories? It will be unrecognisable by the time Labour leave power next.

    J Wickam
    20 HOURS AGO

    While our population continues to

    increase by 700,00 a year the housing crisis will never be solved

    https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/keir-starmer-rachel-reeves-interview-general-election-mzrkjd5rz

    Britain will soon resemble Bratislava in the bad old days .. and of course if more flats are built there will be more fires .
    Behailu Kebede lived in apartment 16 on the fourth floor of Grenfell Tower, a 24-storey block in west London where the fire started.6 Jun 2018

    LONDON (Reuters) – The man in whose apartment a huge fire broke out, killing 71 people in a London tower block a year ago, was not to blame for the disaster but has been subjected to "sleazy accusations" and innuendo, his lawyer told a public inquiry on Wednesday.
    Behailu Kebede lived in apartment 16 on the fourth floor of Grenfell Tower, a 24-storey block in west London where the fire started.
    On Wednesday, the lawyer for Kebede, who is originally from Ethiopia, called for the inquiry to clear him of any responsibility for the blaze, Britain's deadliest on domestic premises since World War Two which raised questions about UK social housing, building regulations and fire safety rules.

    1. Labour hates the countryside. Of course it will be hell bent on destroying it to house its chosen population (that all hate us because we're kuffars and lower than cattle).

        1. Is that you, Grizzly? I like the plaited beard and do that to one of our horses ( a "Traditional")

          1. No, I am nowhere near as hirsute as that. Those are photos of a long-standing former NoTTLer, Peddy the Viking, who has disappeared to … no one knows where!

    3. 389019+ up ticks,

      Evening TB,

      I do believe that a well established list is being added to daily … in Calais.

  81. Sir Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves are to begin a housebuilding blitz within days of gaining power if Labour wins the election.

    At least three housing announce­ments are expected to be made in the first fortnight of a Labour government. Speaking to The Sunday Times, Starmer promised to “hit the ground running” and turbocharge housebuilding from “day one”. This will include a local authority-led review of green belt land.

    Before the end of next month, Labour intends to publish a draft national planning policy framework, reimposing targets to ensure that councils are meeting local housing needs. Most young people cannot afford to buy their first home without financial support.

    In their first joint newspaper interview, Starmer and Reeves, the shadow chancellor, described their plans to reinvigorate the economy if predictions of a landslide Labour victory proved correct.

    The Labour leader said: “I want to make sure that we can make a start on this on day one.”

    Reeves said there was an “urgency” for Labour to become the party of housebuilders because “we know that for kids like us today [from working-class backgrounds], some of those opportunities [to own a home] don’t exist”.

    If all goes to plan, at the beginning of the party’s second week in power Angela Rayner, the incoming housing secretary, will announce a housebuilding programme.

    Play Video
    Starmer calls for voters to give him a “clear mandate”
    By the third week, she will have written to local authorities to tell them to start a process of “regularly reviewing” their green belt boundaries to ensure they are hitting housing targets.

    The intention is that councils will identify areas to be reclassified for development — a move likely to prompt early confrontations with the Tories.

    Building on green belt land is strictly controlled, originally to limit urban sprawl. Reclassifying just 1 per cent of it in England could produce as many as 738,000 new homes, according to research by Searchland, a specialist development site sourcing company.

    Starmer with his wife, Lady Victoria, at an event in London for the campaign’s final weekend

    Reeves, who has previously called for a “common sense” approach to building on the green belt, said: “We all know that there is building on greenfield [sites] today, but it’s chaotic. We also know there are different types of green belt land. Just because something’s designated ‘green belt’ does not mean it’s green.”

    A recruitment drive for 300 planning officers, to help speed the rate at which local authorities grant permission for developments, will follow, alongside a “first dibs” scheme, prioritising new homes for a certain number of local residents to prevent properties from being sold to overseas investors.

    These policies will underpin Starmer’s central pledge to build 1.5 million homes over the course of the next parliament.

    The Conservatives never met their 2019 manifesto commitment to build 300,000 homes a year.

    Challenged on whether Labour would deliver 300,000 homes in the first year, Starmer said: “It’s more likely, I think we’ll ramp up over the parliament. Therefore, towards the end of that, we’ll be doing more than the 300,000 [a year].”

    When the Labour leader sat down with The Sunday Times on Friday, he was anxious to get home to his wife, Vic, who is Jewish, for Shabbat. As is tradition in the Starmer home, they had plans to sit down to watch the Channel 4 series Friday Night Dinner and eat together.

    It is likely to be the last time that Starmer, who has been on the road for the past 37 days straight, will get to spend time with their 15-year-old son and 13-year-old daughter in the family’s north London home.

    Barring the Tories pulling off what they themselves have admitted would need to be the greatest comeback in political history, the former director of public prosecutions will become Britain’s next prime minister.

    When we meet in his constituency, he is accompanied by his soon-to-be Downing St neighbour Rachel Reeves.

    The couple are intent on emulating the harmonious working relationship between David Cameron and his chancellor George Osborne, a feat their Labour counterparts Tony Blair and Gordon Brown failed to achieve.

    The “stability of the economy and the stability of the team that is running the country” is something they believe investors will be looking for as they make choices about where to spend their money.

    Starmer and Reeves are preparing to attract private investment worth billions of pounds in the first months of a Labour government, which they hope will help the party meet its ambitious growth target and avoid tax rises and spending cuts.

    Sitting at Reeves’s side, Starmer, 61, said: “The strength of the relationship between Rachel and me has been there for years because this has been a joint project. We both knew what we had to do with the Labour Party. It’s been four-and-a-half years of hard work, but it’s been a joint initiative and that’s required a steely toughness and a clarity of purpose on both our parts at every step.”

    He added: “It will be very good for the country to have, if we get over the line, a prime minister and chancellor who are very close personal friends with a shared political project, working closely together.”

    Rejecting the warnings from senior Tories, including Grant Shapps, that handing Labour a “super-majority” would give the party “unchecked power” and put the country in a “dangerous place”, Reeves, 45, claims it will give investors more confidence.

    “What businesses say to both Keir and me is that there is a wall of money ready to invest … but businesses won’t invest unless they feel confident that there is some stability in the economy. There hasn’t been. We’ve had five prime ministers, seven chancellors these last 14 years. That is not the stability that the businesses want and need.

    “This is a great country, but in the last few years, businesses have looked at Britain and looked at other countries around the world and see stability elsewhere and not in Britain. If we can get that strong mandate next Thursday, then I think that, once again, businesses will look at Britain.”

    With President Biden facing calls to stand down and a shift towards the far-right in France, Starmer claims that a strong majority for Labour will make the UK look like a safer bet.

    “We actually think Britain’s a good place to invest, but that’s not going to happen while we’ve got chaos and a lack of mandate,” he said. “With what’s going on in France and what may be going on in America … these investors are looking around to say, ‘Which is going to be the country that looks as if it’s got a stable and strong enough mandate for us to put our money into it?’”

    While Labour may be only days away from power, questions hang over its plans. Key among them is the party’s drive for growth. Starmer has previously said the British economy could grow by 2.5 per cent under a Labour government. So how will they achieve it?

    Labour has said it will stage a global investment summit in its first 100 days in office where foreign investors would be invited to see what the UK has to offer. Reeves has also held meetings with the British Infrastructure Council to discuss how UK-based and international investment firms can unlock private capital for national infrastructure projects.

    • Rachel Reeves: ‘I always feel like I need to prove myself’

    Attendees of the meetings have included representatives from BlackRock, Lloyds Banking Group, Santander, HSBC, Phoenix Group and Fidelity International, among others.

    The plans are a throwback to the last Labour government in the late 1990s and early 2000s when, under Blair and Brown, private finance initiatives and public-private partnerships were expanded.

    Dismissing claims that an incoming government cannot fix Britain’s stagnant economy, crumbling public services and infrastructure without raising taxes, Reeves said: “The debate around tax and spend is very frustrating because it misses out on the most important part of the economy, which is the growth in the economy.

    “I can understand why the debate about the economy has reduced to tax and spend because that’s all you’ve had from the Tories these last few years, because you haven’t had growth. Without growth, the only choice is what tax to put up to pay for this needed spending. But there is a different way of doing things, and that is growth.”

    Labour’s programme for government will be tightly focused around the party’s five national missions. They include a commitment to setting up Great British Energy, a publicly owned clean energy company, to help reach decarbonisation by 2030.

    Asked how credible the party’s climate change goals are in the wake of widespread scepticism, Starmer said they were backed by Patrick Vallance, the government’s former chief scientific adviser.

    “Vallance is an incredibly powerful endorser because he did a lot of the work that drove the [Covid] vaccine,” he said. “I’m sure when they started that somebody said to them, it is not possible to get a vaccine, it will take at least five years for the testing and they made it a national mission and they did it in a very short period of time.”

    Another key focus for Labour will be on illegal migration after Labour pledged to ditch the Conservatives’ Rwanda policy.

    Asked to explain his plans to stop the boats, the Labour leader said Britain needed a “better security arrangement with the European Union” over border security and needed to work more closely with the French. Although it was known that Labour was seeking an ambitious new UK-EU security pact, this is the first time it has been suggested that this would also encompass border security.

    “We need to work better with the French authorities,” said Starmer. “We want a better security agreement with the EU when it comes to border security.”

    Throughout the interview, Starmer and Reeves displayed a steely determination, which they will need in spades if they are swept into Downing Street. They believe a lack of aspiration is what has been holding the country back.

    “It’s a psychological barrier that we need to get through,” said Starmer. “The story of aspiration and social mobility has been lost in the last 14 years and the sense that things will get better.”

    George Michael
    20 HOURS AGO

    They will carve up the green belt and destroy the countryside that is part of the inherent and inimitable beauty of this country that belongs to every single person born here. Think the country has been changed by the Tories? It will be unrecognisable by the time Labour leave power next.

    J Wickam
    20 HOURS AGO

    While our population continues to

    increase by 700,00 a year the housing crisis will never be solved

    https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/keir-starmer-rachel-reeves-interview-general-election-mzrkjd5rz

    Britain will soon resemble Bratislava in the bad old days .. and of course if more flats are built there will be more fires .
    Behailu Kebede lived in apartment 16 on the fourth floor of Grenfell Tower, a 24-storey block in west London where the fire started.6 Jun 2018

    LONDON (Reuters) – The man in whose apartment a huge fire broke out, killing 71 people in a London tower block a year ago, was not to blame for the disaster but has been subjected to "sleazy accusations" and innuendo, his lawyer told a public inquiry on Wednesday.
    Behailu Kebede lived in apartment 16 on the fourth floor of Grenfell Tower, a 24-storey block in west London where the fire started.
    On Wednesday, the lawyer for Kebede, who is originally from Ethiopia, called for the inquiry to clear him of any responsibility for the blaze, Britain's deadliest on domestic premises since World War Two which raised questions about UK social housing, building regulations and fire safety rules.

    1. The photos showed the bloke wearing a shirt like one that Peddy the Viking wore.

      1. The man on the 6 floor who allegedly had fuel stored in containers in his flat. Presumably for his taxi.
        And amazingly his family were elsewhere the night his fridge caught fire and set all the insulation in the out side walls on fire.

        1. Recollections may differ. The cab driver was allegedly subletting two bedrooms in his flat to 'princesses of the night', and his family lived elsewhere. No mention of petrol or diesel fuel stored indoors, but if a refrigerator is pushed close against a wall during a hot summer, there appears to be a possibility that it may combust; as modern fridges contain a hydrocarbon coolant (eg R290, propane), a fire would be difficult to extinguish, especially as the foam insulation burns well and produces toxic smoke. . A multi storey block of flats is a variant of a house in multiple occupation (HMO), so there should have been (IMHO) a fire alarm system with a central control panel installed as well as the smoke and CO alarms. Also sprinklers and an evacuation plan passed by the fire brigade. If there was any vandalism, the answer would have been to shut the place for repairs. With an air gap, the exterior insulation was ineffective, except against windchill, and a friend who used to know those towers in the 1970s doubted that the recent cladding work had been done competently; the tricky part was to install some type of horizontal metal spacer bar, but as that was difficult to inspect, workmen may have skipped that task. (E&OE)

          1. There seems to be a lot more to the terrible tragedy than appears to have been disgust at the public enquiry.
            I doubt if the fridge was against an outside wall in a kitchen the size of a multi storey flat. Most of that part of the room would have been window, kitchen worktops and a sink.
            There was also earlier mention of rubbish chutes being blocked by over use and large items and lazy occupants leaving their rubbish in the hall ways and the stair wells.
            But it seems that the blame has been firmly placed on the inanimate object, that being the insulation.
            People who have had loft conversions in the UK should be very aware, more likely than 90 % of loft conversions have the same type of foam insulation.

          2. There seems to be a lot more to the terrible tragedy than appears to have been disgust at the public enquiry.
            I doubt if the fridge was against an outside wall in a kitchen the size of a multi storey flat. Most of that part of the room would have been window, kitchen worktops and a sink.
            There was also earlier mention of rubbish chutes being blocked by over use and large items and lazy occupants leaving their rubbish in the hall ways and the stair wells.
            But it seems that the blame has been firmly placed on the inanimate object, that being the insulation.
            People who have had loft conversions in the UK should be very aware, more likely than 90 % of loft conversions have the same type of foam insulation.

        2. Recollections may differ. The cab driver was allegedly subletting two bedrooms in his flat to 'princesses of the night', and his family lived elsewhere. No mention of petrol or diesel fuel stored indoors, but if a refrigerator is pushed close against a wall during a hot summer, there appears to be a possibility that it may combust; as modern fridges contain a hydrocarbon coolant (eg R290, propane), a fire would be difficult to extinguish, especially as the foam insulation burns well and produces toxic smoke. . A multi storey block of flats is a variant of a house in multiple occupation (HMO), so there should have been (IMHO) a fire alarm system with a central control panel installed as well as the smoke and CO alarms. Also sprinklers and an evacuation plan passed by the fire brigade. If there was any vandalism, the answer would have been to shut the place for repairs. With an air gap, the exterior insulation was ineffective, except against windchill, and a friend who used to know those towers in the 1970s doubted that the recent cladding work had been done competently; the tricky part was to install some type of horizontal metal spacer bar, but as that was difficult to inspect, workmen may have skipped that task. (E&OE)

      1. Indeed they do. I just hope, come 10 pm on Thursday, they'll find out their mistake.

      2. Indeed they do. I just hope, come 10 pm on Thursday, they'll find out their mistake.

      3. Hi Sue. The anti-Reform media pile-on for the last week or so would tend to support that view. I think there may be some surprises on Friday.

        2. "…The anti-Reform media pile-on"

          Can only lead to greater support for Reform

    2. How interesting. I tried to post something in response to the actor pretending to be a Reform activist as I’d come across something similar but it didn’t make it. I couldn’t work out what I’d said to upset Disqus but if the Spectator is using human moderators that might explain it.

    3. Might you please tell Tom Armstrong to be cautious, someone turned up on his site whose only made 3 comments on their account- two on his site and one on a odd site called down voter 4 years ago . Will remember the odd disqus bot things – he'd not know . It might be innocent and genuine but he needs to be on his guard.

    4. Just had a couple of these on the Spec, Geoff. Given up, and they can stuff their cheap subscription, but I will wait 'til after the general erection

    2. Manchester Arena May 2017. Music Festival Israel October 2023. Which religion did the perpetrators belong to? Do the attendees at Glastonbury stop to think about this when they express support for 'Palestine'?

        1. An old friend told me yesterday that women should be able to walk naked in public and not be molested. I pointed out that there is a problem with human nature and also, most third world cultures don’t agree with her. (This is someone who loves open borders and multiculturalism.) She didn’t respond.

          1. I believe that occupants should be able to leave all their doors and windows wide open when not at home and return to find everything untouched. They'd be fools to do so, though.

          2. In Nigeria 50+ years ago, most lived in a circular mud hut. No door, locks, whatever.
            No theft. Why? Because, when a thief was caught, they'd hammer a nail/cartridge case into his forehead and send him away to die.
            Any lessons worth learning?

          3. But we never locked our doors and windows growing up in a not especially salubrious environment. I do think that people were more decent then, and that if they were'nt they knew it was wrong and felt shame.

          4. Sounds mean to say, Sue (not an emotion I like to equate with myself), but I think it would be good if she never had any children – it's an increasingly tough world.

    3. The British did not go on to kill tens of thousands of Irish in the aftermath.

    1. The Japs called them "the Whispering Death". They must have been deaf as a post! One of my friends (now, alas, no longer with us) flew Beaus in the war and was stone deaf as a result.

      1. There's a bit of difference between being in the plane and on the ground.

        The radial engines had sleeve valves, quieter than the tappet valves of typical inline engines.

        1. I confess I've never heard a Beaufighter in flight, the initial remark was originally made by someone else. Alan always attributed his deafness to his time in Beaus.

  88. From https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2024/06/30/france-snap-legislative-elections-results-macron-bardella-le-pen
    "Support for French President Emmanuel Macron has tumbled, in the first round of selections for 577 members of the National Assembly.

    National Rally, the far-right party led by Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella, has surged to first place in the first round of legislative elections, according to a projection produced by Ipsos Talan today (30 June) after polls closed.

    The National Rally may have gained 34% of votes cast, according to the poll, a slight decrease on opinion polls last week which put the party and its allies at 36%.

    If confirmed, that would represent a significant surge for Le Pen’s party, formerly called the National Front, as support for centrist President Emmanuel Macron falls.

    Macron’s Ensemble coalition reached 20.3% of the vote, the poll suggests – down on where he was at the equivalent stage of 2022 legislative elections, but an improvement on recent EU elections, where he gained just 14.6%.

    Left-wing parties including the New Popular Front, an alliance formed after elections were called from the Socialist Party, Greens, and Jean-Luc Melenchon’s France Unbowed – reached 28.1% of the vote, the projection said."

    2. Macron will resign and be gifted a sinecure in his old industry banking or investment banking. After a few years out of the spotlight and in the hope that he will be rehabilitated into WEF he will likely return as IMF chief. It is all so obvious. The French own the IMF.

  89. Of course they don't. This is what makes it doubly offensive. These shallow drones are dedicated followers of fashion.

      1. Such is the depth of their self-delusion, I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't try to excuse it.

  91. To be serious for a moment, on the subject of people and emotions. I'd hope for some advice.
    A good mate, a Brit, fell in love some years ago with a married Malaysian lass, with three children.
    She divorced her then husband, and married my mate. They were very much in love. I met her a few times, she was a lovely, tiny lady.
    She died a year or two ago now, of cancer, and he can't get past it, he keeps bursting into tears, and is unable to move on.
    It really upsets me, the man's a wreck (about 62 now), and needs some help to move on and get his head together.
    Can you all give any advice? It's past my experience, I have no idea how to help him move on.

    1. Tinder. Or something similar, perhaps a pet or even some form of volunteering to help with people who are seriously unwell.

    2. Kindness goes a long way, gently nudging his attention into other subjects. Don't let him sit at home on his own, watching daytime TV, encourage him to get back into society, even if it's just food shopping. If he has interests, sport, art, etc…maybe encourage him to get involved, local team, art club etc. What I would definitely not recommend, from acquaintance experience is a) prescription antidepressants – seem to be a bit addictive, and difficult to wean off b) NHS Talking Therapy, again acquaintance experience, on it for several years – to keep doing it for a long time seems to keep reinforcing the grief. If he's religious at all, perhaps priest/vicar could help? Sounds hard to say, but try not to let him draw you into his sorrow – been there, done that – gradually nudge him back into living his life if possible. Good luck. Welcome further posts from you on his progress?

      1. Those look like perceptive points – many thanks! Appreciate the feedback about talking therapy particularly.
        From my side, it makes me anxious – back in 2000, I found out that my friend Elaine had killed herself with pills in her car, leaving husband and two small boys. I did not know she was in a bad way (being a bad friend?) but clearly didn't do anything useful about it. The distress that has caused me is amazing, and I'm not prepared to allow my mate to do the same without my doing everything reasonable to save him.

        1. You sound like such a good person…I’ve been through my own dismal times (covid vaccine), have been near the edge several times, it’s truly distressing. Now it’s somewhat improved, sufficiently for me to think more clearly, although I still have memory lapses. So I understand to some degree how Elaine was feeling – and some of us aren’t good at opening up, so don’t blame yourself – we none of us can fully know what’s going on in someone else’s life especially in these online times. I applaud your support for your mate – it’ll go a long way to help him, especially if you also spend time with the boys even just kicking a ball around he garden, and he won’t forget your kindness. And don’t forget to be kind to yourself, wish you all the best:-), Kate.

        2. Well done, feller. Don't worry, I'm not suicidal – yet. Another Scotch and I'm off to bed.

        3. Well done, feller. Don't worry, I'm not suicidal – yet. Another Scotch and I'm off to bed.

    3. Poor man , he is still too young to be a widower .

      The same age my father lost my mother in tragic circumstances (car crash, died on her own )

      Dad was very lonely inside , he had chums , and interests but losing mummy was the end of his world .

      Time sometimes heals , no real interventions needed , and no , the bottle or pills are not the answer.

      Good pals help , the loneliness in the soul remains , but eventually the sorrow eases , especially if he could take part in group bereavement counselling .. which can be very helpful.

      Five years after Mum died , Daddy met a lady who lifted his spirits , and he married her ..

    4. Poor man. Your friendship will be so helpful, just listening and accepting that he needs to cry sometimes, just be quiet and patient with him. At our bowls club we have several windows and widowers round about that age and older. We all get on very well and are happy to have new members. There are winter activities too, as in whist, table tennis and quiz nights. Perhaps there is something like that where he lives, if he is unwilling to go to bereavement counselling.

  92. Are there counselling centres in Norway? It seems that he needs that sort of help.

    1. He lives in Bristol.
      I suggested professional help.
      Problem is, I just don't know what to say.

      1. Ask him if he's considered getting help because, although it was very traumatising, and it's very natural that he should grieve, he should be working through the loss after this time and having someone with professional expertise in this field to talk to would greatly benefit him.

          1. There are several stages of grief – denial, anger, bargaining, depression before acceptance. It seems he's at the depression stage.

          2. I think to some degree Conway, depends on his character. My dad lived for 21 years after mum died, never stopped talking about it, but always from his own point of view, nothing would move him from being inward-looking.

          3. My Dad, KJ, hijacked all the grief and had no awareness or interest in the fact that we had lost our mother, to whom he was not terribly kind when she was alive, when she would have appreciated some kindness.

          5. Identify with that, opopanax. He made more fuss when she died. Wasn’t religious at all, but had a huge ceremony church, crematorium. Then went on holiday, I collected the ashes, he had them buried in the Cemetery in an area called Garden of Remembrance, few weeks later decided he wanted them scattering instead, had to get Bishop’s permission as it was Consecrated Ground. Had the ashes dried out at the Crematorium, he went away again, but asked me to scatter them. Sorry to bang on, don’t think I’ve told anyone before, was a pretty dismal time.

          6. There are several stages of grief – denial, anger, bargaining, depression before acceptance. It seems he's at the depression stage.

      2. Perhaps he could drop in to his local hospice – they will have an expert in coping with grieving who may be able to help?….

  93. I agree with your friend, Sue. Practically, it's a non-starter, I'm afraid.

  95. England 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 actually won a game.
    After extra time.
    I was seriously feeling sorry for all fans over in Germany. They'll have to go through it all again now. 😉😄

  96. Finding good counselling isn’t easy but it can be enormously beneficial. What happened to the children?

    1. He has them. They aren't the happiest, because they were fathered by her first husband, an ehnic Malay, so that complicates matters.

  97. Yes, likely.
    I'll think about how to put it to him the right way.
    Thanks, Conners.

    1. I hope it's helped. It's very difficult to find the right words – and even more so when you're trying to do it at a distance.

  98. Southgate must have played Farage's Birmingham Rally Speech to the England side at half time

    2. Well he mustn’t have read it! As soon as we went ahead, they all dropped back! 11 men in our half….🤦🏻‍♀️

        1. Pickford wouldn’t have done…..he plays further forward than the strikers…

    5. From Coffee House, the Spectator

      Reform candidate ditches party over ‘racism and sexism’
      Comments Share 30 June 2024, 5:34pm
      Another day, another election campaign drama. Now it’s Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party in the limelight with more candidate controversy. Only this time it’s not the party defending contentious comments. Instead, one of the party’s candidates has turned on Reform. Oo er.

      Liam Booth-Isherwood, formerly a Reform candidate for Erewash, has today disowned the party over allegations of racism. The former Farage man has instead decided to endorse the Conservative party, backing the Tory contender – Maggie Throup – in the election.

      ‘Over the past few weeks, I have been increasingly disillusioned with the behaviour and conduct of Reform,’ Booth-Isherwood claimed in a statement, adding:

      Whilst I have campaigned alongside many decent, honest and hardworking people during the course of the general election campaign in Erewash, the reports of widespread racism and sexism in Reform have made clear that there is a significant moral issue within certain elements of the party, and the failure of the Party’s leadership to not only take this matter seriously, but also to fundamentally address it, has made clear to me that this is no longer a party I want to be associated with. As a result, I am announcing my endorsement of the Conservative Party candidate, Maggie Throup, for Erewash. Only she can stop Labour.

      Good heavens.

      The surprise move comes amidst a rocky week for Reform – after one of the party’s canvassers was recorded using a racial slur against the Prime Minister. Rishi Sunak has since said that the remarks made him ‘angry’, adding that party leader Farage had ‘some questions to answer’. For his part, Farage suggested this morning on Sky News that the racism row activist could be an ‘actor’ and insists he has always ‘fought harder than anyone to drive the BNP out as an electoral force’.

      The party has long been dogged with candidate troubles. The party’s Welwyn Hatfield candidate came under fire for remarks he made in relation to a pseudoscientific theory about multiple personality types – in which he described Adolf Hitler as ‘brilliant’ and ‘able to inspire people to action’. Another was recently booed by a Salisbury crowd after saying that Putin ‘seemed very good’. And even before the election was called, the party had to drop ten prospective candidates over controversial comments and online posts.

      Booth-Isherwood’s attack is the latest development for the Farage-founded party and at only four days before the national poll it’s hardly helpful timing. Will it affect the party’s vote share at this election? We’ll find out on 5 July…

  101. Get in England!

    A regal procession into the last 8 – it was never in doubt…….

    In Jude (and Harry) We Trust……

      1. Absolutely PJ! Altogether now…

        Are you watching? Are you watching? Are you watching all you Jocks??

        Bring on the mighty Switzerland, it's gonna be Toblerones all round!…..

  102. A proper game of football now. Spain v Georgia. More diving I expect.
    Bed before it ends.
    Night all 🤗
    Job tomorrow…..clean all the windows, inside and outside. Outside from the inside fortunately. Expect rain later.

    1. Georgia have played extremely well all tournament. The most entertaining matches. They don't do the Prima Donna bit.

  104. It isn’t easy being English when we’re involved in a football tournament.
    (Purposely didn’t call it a match).
    😂

      1. Yes but when I’m coaching bowls player I always ask would rather be a good player or a lucky player. Of course the correct answer is a lucky player.

  105. Deport his head today and his body the day after. Give him a taste of his own medicine.

  106. Funny, the words "Tory plant" entered my head too. I suppose Reform is now without a candidate in that constituency? Oldest Oxford Union trick in the book – put up a fake candidate and have him withdraw at the last minute.

  107. Just looked it up out of curiosity…it was Slovakia FFS…would surely have been deeply embarrassing not to beat them?

    1. Exactly. An equaliser in the 90th minute and winner a couple of minutes into extra time.

      1. Thank you. A sad day for me tomorrow as I clear the boat of my personal possessions as I've put her up for sale….

        1. Does this mean your retirement from Britain's waterways or an intention to acquire a new vessel?

          1. Almost certainly the former. I've signed up to try my hand at Archery so I've got something to look forward to (joining my local Fyrd in due course!!!)

          7. In all seriouness, I'm sure you've made this decision with very mixed feelings. You've entertained us for some years by recounting your ventures and providing us with some delightful pictures. Nobody would give that up lightly. I hope your new interest gives you as much pleasure as that you are now likely to wish a fond farewell to. Best wishes, Stephen.

          8. Thank you David. I have thought long and hard. The locks are deteriorating taking more physical effort to operate and I am aging. Friends who 'encouraged' me to take the plunge and acquire a narrowboat and who subsequently shared some delightful adventures (think 3 men in a boat!) are older than me with health /family issues. One set of grandchildren are so young that by the time they are old enough to go boating I will be approaching 80. The boat itself will need repainting in a few year's time. To do it properly requires sand blasting to remove rust and then spray painting – it would be a bill in excess of £7,000. So yes I have mixed feelings. But que sera, sera…

          9. A big decision, Stephen; I cannot imagine you living as a landlubber; however, I wish you all the best!

          11. Off to the butts with you, knock a few goose feather fletched shafts and loose them at your leisure.

          1. Thank you sos. They will I have 1000s of images and a journal of over 50,000 words (The Bath-Chester Chronicles) as well as copies of 20 published articles…

        4. Oh heavens! What a decision, King Stephen! Sleep well and dream easy on your floating home!

  109. It will seem trifling but it somehow encapsulates why England footballers have been so mediocre of late. As they lined up in the tunnel to take the field, the England players had, to a man, rolled their socks up above the knee. None of the Slovaks had done so. What a bunch of poseurs was the thought that crossed my mind.

  111. This time next week we'll have a new government, if its Starmer with a 400 seat majority God help us. I've just noticed it's getting dark earlier. On a more cheery note at least summer has arrived .

        1. Maybe David – but of all the parties contesting the GE only one – Reform – is committed to fully achieving Brexit.

          3. By no means, after 8 years, are all the 17 million still either living or sufficiently sentient to cast a vote.

          6. I can't imagine anyone in their right mind would seriously want to rejoin the EU. Many countries within it are trying to undo the harm it has caused them whilst being scared or forbidden to actually exit. Particularly those that have been net recipients and are now expected to contribute.

          7. I don't think reform will get 17+million votes. For example, our Reform candidate has tried in three other seats and is very coy about telling us anything about himself or his personal view (we know nothing). His photo, which I eventually tracked down, shows him to appear to be very young indeed. There is no way I can vote for him as an unknown quantity and someone so backward in coming forward.

            On the other hand we have a really good constituency MP who has made the mistake of being loyal within the Con party, someone I know personally, socially and professionally to be a thoroughly decent bloke. And I do value loyalty, even if its misplaced (with hindsight).

            So even though I am as angry as the next person with the con party as a whole and with its disastrous waste of a huge majority I will most probably vote for our local man.

          8. No ability to remove cross out. Wake up disqus. Clicking on the 'font size' reveals the other options. Found out the hard way!

          9. What I've found is that if you select the strikethrough text and click on the S with a line through it, the strikethrough is removed – at least when composing initially. I'll try editing to remove strikethrough.
            Test
            Yup, works in edit mode as well.
            Hope this helps.

          10. When anything, apart from the 'font size' is NOT available (because disqus is shite) then you don't have that option.

            Clicking on the 'font size' reveals the other options. Found out the hard way!

          11. What I've found is that if you select the strikethrough text and click on the S with a line through it, the strikethrough is removed – at least when composing initially. I'll try editing to remove strikethrough.
            Test
            Yup, works in edit mode as well.
            Hope this helps.

          12. When the vote came in I said “it will never happen”. And whoever gets in nothing will change.

        2. People that vote labour or Tory are saying they want more of the same, but now there is a real altenative.I rule nothing out.

          1. If Starmer secures a substantial majority, it's more likely to be to punish the Conservatives, regardless of the consequences, even if it's more of the same or even worse. Vengeance is a powerful motive.

          2. I'm not sure that voting Labour is punishing the Tories. Apart from the last 3 or 4 weeks they have been running almost parallel agendas. Both support mass immigration, neither has a clue about economics and both support an impossible Net Zero.

          3. I think this is because those are the policies of the state, not the policies of government.

          4. In a way, you are supporting my point. To vote for more of the same is the very essence of punishing the party, not its policies, for what happened during its time in office. There are millions of irrational and vengeful people out there.

      2. Sadly even if Reform win every seat absolutely nothing will change. The time it'll take to undo the damage and control of the Left will take many years and consume the entire time in office.

        Throughout they'll be combatting media assaults, spin, leaking from civil servants against them: then they'll have to fight an election having achieved nothing.

        1. That's probably true, but we all know that won't happen. 5 to 15 seats would be a good start. PM's Question time would be much more interesting at least.

          Edited in PM's.

    2. Midsummer Day is, by tradition, June 24th, 3 or 4 days after the solstice. I wonder if the 25th was when our forebears of centuries past, with their ancient instruments, detected the first day with less daylight.

      1. Which? The size of Starmer's majority, or even achieving one, or the (slightly) earlier sunsets?

    1. As they'll swiftly find the hegemony will ensure they can do absolutely nothing.

  115. Just about every administration comes up with something controversial that isn't in its manifesto. My forecast for Mad Max? A referendum on the monarchy, probably after giving the the vote to 16-year-olds, EU migrants and, having been granted amnesties, all hitherto illegal immigrants.

    2. Speaking as a passive republican, a referendum on the future of the monarchy would have no hope of a vote for abolition. Any government would have learnt its lesson on referenda from the 2016 Brexit vote – Don't give the electorate a chance to reject what the government wants.

      1. My take on the monarchy is it's the only government department to make money. While it does we keep it.

        Starmer will give votes to 16 year olds – or he'll try to. He will feverishly enforce uncontrolled gimmigration.

        1. I think the vote for 16 year olds will backfire on Max. Many of them are not stupid, nor are they brainwashed – but they are becoming very angry at what is being done to them. I doubt they will be voting uniparty.

  119. 389019+ up ticks,
    Treacherous
    Theresa May’s chief Brexit negotiator in talks to work with Labour
    Sir Olly Robbins, who quit the Civil Service when Boris Johnson won a landslide in 2019, has reportedly spoken with Sue Gray

    Sounds about right, should fit in nicely.

  120. I've seen Mongo doing that. It's an absurd and daft look of utter joy at simply being loved and wanted.

  122. Yes, Starmer will give the vote to 16-year-olds. He knows that young people are more likely to vote Labour, so it's a no-brainer to increase the vote for his party. "If you are not a Liberal at 25, you have no heart. If you are not a Conservative at 35 you have no brain" – quote attributed to several different people, including Winston Churchill.

    1. Well, regardless of received wisdom. I know a whole phalanx of 16,17,18 year olds who are both disaffected with the uniparty and politically engaged. These thoughtful and intelligent young people have spotted the scam and will not be voting for Davos and the WEF. They are so angry at the fraud perpetrated upon them that they will probably bother to vote.

    2. Young people tend to vote as their parents do. It happened when they dropped the age to eighteen and if they drop it to sixteen it will be the same.
      I used to teach many young people and if they came to talk about politics, some took the Che Guevara line but the norm would be very conservative or trade union or whatever mum and dad or grandma had told them to think. It isn’t a slam dunk that they’re going to vote Labour.

  124. I'm ashamed to admit it but in my youth for a very short time I was a rampaging unionist. I honestly thought unions were the right choice to protect workers. Then when I was made redundant (it was a university job) I thought.. sod this. Just get another job. What's the use of unions?

    What was most notable was it became not worth working because fuel was more expensive than the wage paid. That was the best lesson on how to help the poorest – cut the cost of getting to work. Make fuel and energy and transport cost less.

    1. I had a copy of The Little Red Book, on the thoughts of Chairman Mao. then igrew up. They sent me one for free.

      1. Youth is usually idealistic and anti-establishment. Today's youth is catching up with the realisation that the establishment is Marxist, a failed and fundamentally flawed ideology. It's quite interesting how many young mothers I know who are shaking their heads over how right-wing their offspring have become.

        Common sense is back on the table

        1. Thank God for GOOD sense. I won't call it common-sense because it ain't that common!

        3. The youth nowadays do no longer obtain their political news from the mainstream media. They sensibly eschew the mainstream media and whether their source material is from tik tok or Dan Bongino or Alex Jones or any of the other podcasters appears to be lost on the mainstream media.

          Everyone despises the BBC, only fools follow Channel 4 and nobody bothers with the Telegraph, Guardian and Independent newspapers. Those following the Daily Mail are more interested in revelations about the indiscretions of celebrities by which definition I include our very own Royals. It is all about gossip and innuendo.

          Perhaps we are genuinely fucked as a nation state but I still trust in enough of us to reject the utterly discredited Labour, Conservative, Liberal Democrat and Green Parties and to vote for Reform.

          We need to achieve a hung Parliament whereby the evil Starmer imbecile is restricted in his powers. Please all vote Reform.

        4. The youth nowadays do no longer obtain their political news from the mainstream media. They sensibly eschew the mainstream media and whether their source material is from tik tok or Dan Bongino or Alex Jones or any of the other podcasters appears to be lost on the mainstream media.

          Everyone despises the BBC, only fools follow Channel 4 and nobody bothers with the Telegraph, Guardian and Independent newspapers. Those following the Daily Mail are more interested in revelations about the indiscretions of celebrities by which definition I include our very own Royals. It is all about gossip and innuendo.

          Perhaps we are genuinely fucked as a nation state but I still trust in enough of us to reject the utterly discredited Labour, Conservative, Liberal Democrat and Green Parties and to vote for Reform.

          We need to achieve a hung Parliament whereby the evil Starmer imbecile is restricted in his powers. Please all vote Reform.

    2. wibbling: I was convinced that communism was the answer but knew that it didn't work well for eg Russia and co., and also knew about the brutal mass murders. That took me firstly to a squalid squat in London (will not enlarge on that) thence to Israel and the kibbutzim. I learnt a great deal from this, not what I was expecting and not at all comfortable – for example all the teenagers my age serving their country without complaint and the need for constant armed guards (not the peace and lurve I was expecting in utopia).

      I have a great tenderness for Israel. These are turbocharged Tiggers with self belief, who have made the desert bloom through sheer hard work. I could say so much more but won't.

  125. He and the odious traitor Gray woman clearly worked together. One heart, one mind.

    2. Surely the Glastonbury goers would be happy to throw the gates open to those not able to afford tickets.

      1. I saw a bit of the Glasto coverage – pictures of the crowds.
        Hideously white – they should be ashamed. Close it down NOW.
        Next year they must give free tickets and accommodation in the glamping tents to all the dinghyites.

    1. Ah, found it.

      "Arthur C. Clarke: 'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.'"

      1. Absolutely, mola. The stuff we are seeing today is the stuff we would have dismissed as science fiction in our youth.

    1. Ah, Banksy! What a businessman. Legendary! Someone who has risen to such importance within the elite, made so much money, all from pretending to be anti-establishment. A role model for us all.

      1. An inartistic rat who uses stencils to spray the buildings owned by others to leave his mark. I liken Banksy to a rather lazy graffiti artist crossed with an alley cat marking its territory.

        The fact that the bastard hails from Bristol is a particular annoyance as I am a Bathonian where we were once more civilised.

      2. As I said the chap used spray paint and prefabricated templates. That is not art but rather imbecilic state sponsored propaganda by symbolism.

  132. Eenin' all. VVLOP
    I've had a v productive day. I worked a night shift last night and instead of going to bed wen I got home I decided to power through.
    I made three tiptrips with stuf that has been in my back garden for a while after having some work done in the house a few months ago, including the cushions from an old settee.

    As I was driving to trip, something caught my eye in the rear mirror – a tiny mouse/vole scampered across the pile of cushions in the back. Made me jump, I can tell ya.
    I pulled over to try to let it out and opened the hatchback door but couldn't see it. I was afraid it might jump into the front and startle me into swerving into an accident so I pulled the cushions out and found three cute little meeces, tiny, about an inch and a bit long. It took me ages to get them out but I managed eventually and they scampered into the hedgerow.
    They must have made a nest in the cushions.

    I hope there aren't any others still in the car, hiding under the seats. I don't want to end up with a dead mouse in the car.

  133. Phew!
    A walk to the Fishpond for the Open Mic Session and then home again. A very enjoyable night!
    Going for a quick bath then bed.

  135. Another day is done so, I wish you a goodnight and may God bless all you Gentlefolk. Bis morgen früh. If we are spared!

  137. Good night, chums. Sleep well, and awaken refreshed. See you all next month.

    1. …and extra points for sentence construction, as well, Elsie. A plus point for use of 'awaken', rather than just 'wake'.

      1. Good morning Sue ..

        The months are whizzing by .. July is here already .

        As Millicent Martin used to sing , That was the week , that was ..

    2. Which politician did they buy off, Stanley? Was it your son? He has suddenly become very wealthy.

    3. They just don’t listen nor get it.
      We don’t trust any of you politicians because you’re only in for what you can get out of it. You don’t give a damn for the public you are supposed to represent. If I had my way I’d lock you all up and throw the keys away and let you rot.
      You’re lucky I don’t tell you how I really feel.

    1. 'Morning, Geoff and thank you for all the work and effort you have put in to keep us all going. Well done!

    4. https://disqus.com/by/spect… This is you at the Spectator since the new comments sysyem started ( i found out about these from Rob 232) . They look like accounts but theyre not, they are for the Spectators use only and are used for spying and control, so see what the posters are saying . very sinister indeed and no one at the Spectator is aware these exist .

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