Sunday 9 January: The poor need a VAT cut on energy bills, even if the rich get one too

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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693 thoughts on “Sunday 9 January: The poor need a VAT cut on energy bills, even if the rich get one too”

      1. It’s a good motto, Johnny, but I’m afraid I can’t cope without an afternoon nap, which means I get up much earlier in the morning, after about 5 hours’ sleep. Despite an early post last night, I didn’t get to bed until around 1 am. (See my final post last night.)

  3. Good Morning all.

    All quiet on the Fisty Cuffs Front:

    From: Al-GB-jeerus:
    Covid: Thousands protest in France against proposed new vaccine pass
    “France is one of the most highly vaccinated countries in Europe, with more than 90% of over-12s eligible for the shot fully vaccinated.
    But despite the vocal protests, opposition to the new measures is not widespread and recent polling suggests the vast majority of people back the vaccine pass*.”

    *Must be all that nostalgia and longing for a repeat of the genuine Nazi Occupation Experience….

    From: https://twitter.com/ClintEhrlich/status/1479517789450911747

    Why The Kazakhstan Crisis Is A Much Bigger Deal Than Western Media Is Letting On

    Have a nice day….

    2. There may be trouble ahead but Spunik News recently reported that the troops being deployed in Kazakhstan are not from Russia per se, but from the Collective Security Treaty Organisation – CSTO – which includes troops from; Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kyrgyztan and Tajikistan.

      It may be that, much as the US provides the majority of NATO men and material, Russia is in a similar position regarding support of the CSTO but that differs from Russia sending troops in.

      1. Troops from Kyrgyztan, Feargal? I thought that the planet was destroyed after baby Superman left it?!?!? Lol.

    3. Thanks for posting. The thread on Kazakhstan does make sense. Why can’t the West leave Russia alone?
      Their talk of democracy as they are busy dismantling it in the West is particularly disingenuous. One can only assume that Mr Global has decided that he needs another war.

    4. On the subject of France, can any NOTTLer who lives there explain that country’s near-total capitulation to their new vaxx overlords?
      The spirit of the revolution appears to have died.
      Is it because they are all hypochondriacs? no, can’t be, nobody in Europe is a bigger hypochondriac than your average German, and Germany is less vaxxed.
      Is it because they believe everything Napoleon says? Surely not!
      Is it because they couldn’t bear being banned from restaurants?
      Any other reasons….?

          3. Is the figure of 90% over 12s vaccinated in France true, or just another government lie?

      2. There is very deep resentment against Covid tyranny in our part of Brittany but it has not yet reached a stage where there is spontaneous and effective uprising.

        A couple of teenagers we know – the offspring of good friends of ours – are trying to get Covid as it will enable them to postpone the mandatory jabs they must have before returning to school. They are going to parties and seeking out people who might have Covid and hugging them and kissing them – but so far to no avail – they remain stubbornly Covid free.

        The compulsory vaccination of children will one day be seen as the greatest crime against humanity that the world has ever seen.

        1. I agree. Apart from all the other emotions, I’m appalled that a crime of such magnitude was even attempted.

  4. As order is restored in Kazakhstan, its future is murkier than ever. 9 January 2021.

    For many Kazakhs, the full story behind the unrest of the past week remains as murky as the mist that enveloped Almaty, the country’s largest city and the centre of violence, at the same time.

    People were unable to access accurate information, as an internet blackout froze almost all access to the outside world during a tragic few days of violence in which military vehicles rolled through the streets, government buildings burned and state television carried rolling threats that “bandits and terrorists” would be eliminated without mercy.

    The more one looks at this the more it looks like some half-cocked CIA regime change conspiracy going off before its time. Assaults on Police Stations usually only come after long civil protests and intense rioting later still. Here there was no warning at all! The attackers were armed in advance their savagery more redolent of revolution than protest.

    Did the Americans set it off to distract from Ukraine? It will probably take several years for the truth to seep out so we must wait and see.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/08/as-order-is-restored-in-kazakhstan-its-future-is-murkier-than-ever

    1. A BTL observation:

      Dec 16, 2021.
      The US Embassy in Kazakhstan issues a travel warning for major Kazakh cities because of “upcoming demonstrations and warns of possible riots and mass arrests.

      Source:
      [https://kz.usembassy.gov/demonstration-alert121521/]

      Well, well, well. That’s some magic Crystal Ball the US Embassy in Kazakhstan has. They issued travel warnings about demonstrations and mass riots three full weeks BEFORE there was even any sign of such things. Gee, I wonder how they could have known?

      1. Ear to the ground, good contacts in government, opposition, the media and the people. That and the fact that the agents organising it all were based in the Embassy basement?

    2. It wouldn’t be the first time the CIA behaved in this way. How do i know this? From their own published records.

      Morning, Minty.

  6. The poor need a VAT cut on energy bills, even if the rich get one too

    Huge rises in the cost of energy bills, now who could have predicted that?
    Greta has stolen our future.

  7. Morning all

    The poor need a VAT cut on energy bills, even if the rich get one too

    SIR – Boris Johnson’s excuse for rejecting a VAT cut on energy bills employs a false logic (“VAT cut on energy bills would help a lot of people who don’t need it, says Johnson”, report, January 5).

    It will cut no ice whatsoever with those in fuel poverty who need such a tax cut most, for it would make no practical difference whatsoever to these groups whether higher income groups were also to benefit similarly – though by definition this benefit would be smaller proportionally.

    Moreover, it is the middle-income classes, not the “rich”, who have long been the hard-pressed cash cows for successive governments. It is about time the Tories did something to ease their tax burden.

    Nigel Henson

    Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

    SIR – The letter (January 2) from Conservative MPs on easing energy costs called for the Government to scrap VAT and levies on energy bills to help consumers, particularly those on low incomes, cope with the consequences of the surging wholesale price of natural gas.

    These actions would lead to savings for all households, cutting almost £250 from the average annual dual-fuel bill, but would benefit the smallest consumers least in absolute terms.

    However, removing the levies would also de-fund the Warm Home Discount, which provides rebates of £140 on winter energy bills for more than 2 million pensioners and low-income households. Surely the letter’s signatories should be calling for the discount to be increased and extended.

    They also suggested that Britain’s energy security would be improved by seeking to extract more natural gas from the depleted reservoirs of the North Sea. But without significant cuts in our gas consumption, half of which is met by imports, this would not end our dependence on other producers and our exposure to the volatile prices of international gas markets.

    The best way of ensuring affordable, secure and sustainable energy in the future is to invest in further development of clean domestic energy sources, particularly renewables, together with electricity storage, smarter power grids and better insulation for homes and businesses.

    Bob Ward

    Policy and Communications Director, Grantham Research Institute on Climate change and the Environment

    SIR – My one-year fixed dual-fuel contract renews this month. The current one-year cost is around £1,400. To renew on the same basis would cost over £4,000. By taking a two-year deal, that comes down to around £3,300.

    I have searched and there are no better deals, and the recommendation is to stay with your current supplier anyway. Naturally I am amazed, but I also think of those who are less well off and simply will not be able to afford to heat their homes. Who is going to help them? I suspect no one.

    Richard Pearce

    Leigh-on-Sea, Essex

    1. Mr Ward, you’re obviously a complete moron.

      Clean domestic energy is a unicorn.

      Sustainble energy is a nonsense.
      You cannot store electricity – ah, of course, you mean forcing everyone to get an electric car – which will sit idle as it’s now a battery for the grid.

      Your smarter power grid is one where you shut down parts of it so the unreliable, inefficient ‘sustainable’ energy grid can exist.

      It is vastly more sensible to remove the taxes and debt on green than to continue it. If energy is affordable because supply isn’t deliberately restricted, then energy gets cheaper and the subsidy to the elederly isn’t needed. You see? Markets at work rather than demented, idiotic Lefty government controlled nonsense.

      So actually, you’re talking twaddle. You know this.

    2. The Warm Home Discount? If the pension were comparable with the rest of Europe AND the swingeing taxes were removed from heating fuels, there’d be no need for this extra layer of bureaucracy (more civil servants to administer it) to exist.

  8. Tories should see the moral case for hunting

    SIR – What a shame that Carrie Johnson has not had the chance to spend more time alongside the rural and farming communities of this country (“Carrie animal group pushes for trail hunt ban”, report, January 2). Had she done so, she would be aware of their high standards of domestic and wildlife management.

    She would have seen that the quarry species exist in balanced numbers and in better health where they are managed. Where hunting took place when it was legal, foxes flourished in much greater numbers than now, and it was rare to find a sick fox with mange or a broken limb because they were swiftly caught by hounds.

    On the trail: a hound sets off as the Avon Vale Hunt gets under way in Lacock, Wiltshire

    On the trail: a hound sets off as the Avon Vale Hunt gets under way in Lacock, Wiltshire

    We do not expect Carrie Johnson and her followers to be converted overnight and become subscribers to the Heythrop Hunt, but we had hoped that the Conservative Party would guard the freedom of conscience of members of the rural community who, after a lifetime of experience with animals, see that there is a strong moral case for hunting with hounds.

    The stock farming community of Britain is familiar with all stages of the life of animals: birth, maturity and death. Most are highly respected for their knowledge and care of all animals, and welcome the hounds. Why are they to be dictated to by a section of the Conservative Party that has become detached from the countryside and ruthlessly intolerant of views with which it has no patience?

    The Conservatives must regain their reputation for respecting freedom of conscience for all people of good will and rational thought if it wishes to retain the rural vote.

    Stephen Lambert

    Moreton-in-Marsh, Gloucestershire

    1. The anti-hunting fanatics are trying to get trail hunting banned on land where it doesn’t even take place!

  9. Morning again

    Lycra in the dark

    SIR – Could a cyclist or two (Letters, January 2) tell my why they wear black Lycra while out on their bikes?

    They are so hard to see, particularly in the winter with a low sun or on a dark, dismal day – they virtually disappear from sight. It is so dangerous. Some must be car drivers; don’t they realise this?

    Sylvia Western

    Darlington, Co Durham

    SIR – I used to cycle to work before I retired. I drive more now, being over 70. I would like to see a Government-sponsored advertisement that urged cyclists to “wear white at night”. The number of times I have nearly run into cyclists as they had no lights and black clothing makes me shudder.

    Veronica Leon

    Harrow, Middlesex

  10. SIR – I disagree with Oliver Brown (“Rules are rules – unless you are rich and famous”, Sport, January 5). Being wealthy does not protect anyone from being victimised, especially not on social media – just ask J K Rowling. Novak Djokovic is a victim of the hubris of the Australian government.

    It is inconceivable, given the level of advice that would be available to him, that prior to setting off for Melbourne he was not quite certain that his paperwork was in order. His detention therefore is quite simply an act of spite, compounded by incarcerating him in a quarantine hotel known for its inadequate facilities.

    It is little known that in 2007 and at the age of just 20, Djokovic set up his own foundation from his earnings, initially to support the education of under-privileged children in his native Serbia. Since then it has built over 40 schools and supported more than 20,000 families, but that is by no means all.

    He has contributed millions to many other causes, including $1 million for ventilators at Covid-stricken hospitals early in the pandemic, and a separate donation to hospitals in badly hit Bergamo. Last year he gave $25,000 AUD of his winnings to the wildfire fund in Australia. His record on philanthropy is as illustrious as his playing career.

    His critics, and those revelling in his present discomfiture, which is not, as so many seem to feel, self-inflicted, should hang their heads in shame.

    Peta Seel

    Lahitte-Toupière, Hautes-Pyrénées, France

        1. We have family there, and no, we are in no rush to visit the way things are over there.
          Conversations with them makes me think they are turning to the dark side, the behaviour of their police and politicians are unpleasant but necessary they say!

        2. There was an old joke about why people would want to visit, Europe, America, and Asia. But Australia? Everybody knows where it is but nobody wants to go there.

          1. Been to Oz three times, two for work. Really liked it, and amazed it became so fascist over covid. Very saddening.

          2. Left wing government. Plus ,the police always abuse their powers when given free reign. Just see what happened in Catalan. Catalan police defending the citizens from national police.

    2. And of course the nastiness of the Australian state is fuelled by envy and spite – no Australian player has won the Australian Open since 1976 and Djokovic has already won it nine times.

    3. A former Minister of the Oz government appeared on the BBCNews today. He said something along the lines that the rules are rules, and that lots of people were greatly distressed at not being allowed into Australia to visit relatives and he was most upset for them.
      He did not explain why anyone at all should ever have been stopped from entering Australia. All “evidence” suggests that nothing, not masks, travel restrictions, tests, isolation periods or repeated “vaccinations” makes the slightest difference to progress of these diseases.

  11. Boris Johnson has utterly failed to back up his anti-woke rhetoric with action. 9 January 2022.

    As the Mayor of our capital city attempts to rewrite all of British history to suit his particular political and cultural preferences, where are the voices in government or the whole apparatus of state that we taxpayers pay for actually willing to speak for our own cause? Just as conceding to the green extremists makes them act more extreme, so every pitiful begging for mercy from the historical revisionists who hate everything in our past merely eggs others on to acts of greater extremism.

    Now there’s a good question! I think Nottlers worked it out long ago!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/01/09/boris-johnson-has-utterly-failed-back-anti-woke-rhetoric-action/

    1. The woke agenda appears to be a global pursuit that our governments somehow are pressured into adopting, just like climate change and the vaccine digital passport.

      1. Morning Bob. Yes. They are of course all Globalist Policies. Most Western Governments are now simply agents for this change. Only the Visigrad States and Russia, and that depends on one man, are opposed to this!

    2. More and more people are in a rebellious mood. Many of our friends in France have had the vaccines in order to keep their jobs and try and maintain a modicum of what used to be normal life. But these people are not happy to have had the jabs; they do not feel any more safe from the disease and they feel very deeply resentful of the politicians.

      Bill Gates is hoping that if the vaccine does not fulfil its main purpose – to reduce the human population – then civil wars and revolution will break out throughout the world to to do the job for him.

      1. Why bother with the vaccine if the population needed to be bumped off? Heck, it was killing people.

        If we want to reduce the population the state merely needs to stop paying people to breed – because it’s always the wrong people breeding. Scrap child benefit. Make people responsible for their own blasted life choices!

  12. ‘Morning, Peeps.

    Article in today’s DT:

    Lord Frost tells Boris Johnson: Be a Conservative or face election defeat

    Former Cabinet Office minister says Tories must appeal to voters with ‘free markets, free debate and low taxes’

    By
    Jack Hardy
    9 January 2022 • 6:00am

    Boris Johnson needs to bring his Government back along traditional Conservative lines to avoid defeat in the next general election, Lord Frost, his former Cabinet Office minister, has warned.

    In his first public interview since dramatically quitting as Brexit Secretary last month, Lord Frost said Britain needs to “focus on rebuilding the nation and be proud of our history”.

    He told the Mail on Sunday that a fresh appeal was needed to ordinary voters, centred on the principles of “free markets, free debate and low taxes”.

    A change in the “direction of travel” was required to “get out of this little trough” and win the next election, he warned, as the Tories continue to struggle in the polls.

    Lord Frost quit the Cabinet in December over concerns about the Prime Minister imposing fresh Covid curbs, as well as the Government’s economic policy, including its planned National Insurance hike.

    In his resignation letter, he also urged the Prime Minister to “deliver on the opportunities” of Brexit by moving “as fast as possible” to “a lightly regulated, low-tax, entrepreneurial economy”.

    On Saturday night, Lord Frost insisted he did not wish Mr Johnson to stand down – but instead shake up both his policies and his top team.

    He told the newspaper: “The PM has a right, when he wants something to happen, for the levers that he pulls to actually produce something.

    “And he has the right to the best possible advice around him. So I think there needs to be machinery changes and there probably need to be some different voices around him to make sure that he gets the best possible advice.”

    Lord Frost had initially been persuaded to delay his resignation and stay on until the New Year.

    He was then forced to quit with immediate effect after news of his resignation leaked.

    A former adviser to Mr Johnson during the Prime Minister’s time as Foreign Secretary, he was among a series of Cabinet members opposed to new restrictions.

    His intervention comes after a recent poll suggested Mr Johnson could lose more than 100 seats at the next election amid a collapse in support for his party in the “Red Wall” seats.

    Polling released on Saturday by Opinium showed the Tories had recovered some of their lost lead, with support rising two percentage points to 34 per cent, compared to 39 per cent for Labour.

    However, Mr Johnson’s personal rating remains deeply negative.

    A leading BTL – and there’s plenty more where this came from!

    David Andrews
    1 HR AGO
    Frost at least must be listening to the grassroots. The message is loud and clear: Stop acting like a Labour PM, and bloody well be a conservative! Ditch the mad tax rises, the insane greenery, and the woke bollux and use that 80 seat majority to actually get some conservative policies enacted, while the window of opportunity is there.

    1. Boris Johnson has made a pledge to Nut Nuts that he will

      GET BREXIT UNDONE.

      The only thing that can give us any hope is that Johnson never keeps his pledges.

    2. Yep, get on with it.

      It won’t be 80 seats, it’ll be 120-150. Electoral obliteration. Thing is, we’ve gone from a Labour man to a Conservative here and nothing’s changed, in fact, things have got markedly worse.

      There’s still litter, still chavs, the workers have less, the lazy have the same, the very well off are quite rightly hiding their wealth from the state. Services are no better, council salaries – managers, not workers – have risen of course.

      We’re working ever harder for less. I’ve a choice – offer a contract for the same costs as 3 years ago or up them to reflect the new cost of hardware and the sub contractor wages, risking not getting the contract? It didn’t have to be this way.

      Brexit could have been a clean cut off, corporation taxes radically cut immediately. NI shredded, VAT scrapped. The state doing far, far more with far less money – forced to be efficient. Council tax should have been cut or at least trapped with a referism call.

      Is there social care to pay for? Yes. So let’s shut down those waste in the state to pay for it, not force ever more from a shrinking tax puddle. It’s as if the options were lined up, the right ones and the wrong ones and Boris leapt at pulling all the wrong ones like a spaffing child. Does he want to be popular? Almost certainly. Is he intellectually lazy? God yes. He doesn’t seem to understand that the wrong decisions are not the poopular ones. The right decisions, over time – tax cuts, small state – are.

      1. You can’t expect problems caused by neoliberalism to go away by enacting more neoliberalism.

        You voted for cuts in spending and higher taxes, that’s austerity.

        The Tories won’t scrap taxes the way you want because they have a pathological belief in ‘sound finance’. Scrapping business taxes and consumption taxes would have put 10p or more on income tax instead to maintain sound finance. Then you’d moan about your personal taxation.

        I agree with you somewhat. We need to completely overhaul the tax system after being completely honest about why we are taxed and how the government truly spends, and exactly what the role of government bonds is. They will deny those truths until they are blue in the face because they use the myths to play one group of people off against another. The problem with doing so is that this will cause a ballooning deficit, it would be quite some experiment which in theory would be good for us if we can ignore the ‘debt levels’. You however while wanting this vote for its opposite, austerity and sound finance.

    1. ‘Morning Rik. One of many BTLs on this subject:

      Jeffrey Spong
      11 HRS AGO
      Along with, it appears, many others, I simply do not believe any politician, medical “expert”, NHS Dame, senior civil servant or the media any more. I am tired, bored and angry with them all. There is no trust any more. This is one messed up country. And me? a lifetime Conservative who voted for Boris but who now simply wants a caring, pragmatic, common sense Conservative Government again.

    2. I heard that report yesterday – back to the “within 28 days of a positive test” – absolute bolleaux!

        1. Lots of people will have been long-term inpatients who will have had Covid at some point during their illness and that will probably be the reason.

          1. Like my Mother. Tested positive after infection in hospital, isolated, no symptoms, no longer positive.

    3. Good morning.
      Just what wise Nottlers, and others who bothered to think, have been saying all along.
      Our death from convid true figures will be similar.
      The economy in massive debt (more than normal), livelihoods destroyed, untimely deaths (already and more to come) from non-referrals and refusing investigations and treatments for cancer and other life-threatening diseases by the convid-only NHS, children’s education being disrupted, many elderly in care homes have died prematurely through abandonment and the list goes on.

      1. It took our parents’ and our generation until 2006 to pay off our WWII debts – to the US that rebuilt Germany and Japan free of charge.
        This suggests that the current farce will burden us, our children and our grandchildren until 2080 – at the very least.

        1. With such largesse, it’s no surprise that the major aggressors of WW11 were able to rebuild, modernise and develop faster than us.

    4. While I would be delighted if the figures shown here are true – is there a shred of evidence that this is not simply a fake?

      1. It depends how you wish to play with the figures;
        https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-italy-deathsnotreduced-idUSL1N2S0014

        The analysis reported a total of 130,468 deaths that had been registered as of Oct. 5, 2021. (For the latest data on the country, see the Reuters tracker, here )

        Of those who died in hospital, data was available for 7,910 people on their comorbidities diagnosed before the SARS-CoV-2 infection (meaning having two or more diseases at the same time) ( here ): 2.9% presented with no comorbidities and 97.1% had one or more condition listed aside from COVID-19, such as ischemic heart disease, heart failure, type-2 diabetes, obesity or autoimmune disease (see Table 1 here).

        VERDICT
        False. Italy did not downgrade its COVID-19 death toll by 97%. Rather, posts misconstrue an analysis by Italy’s National Institute of Health on the characteristics of the patients who have died of COVID-19 in the country.

        I think that that fact check is highly biased and insufficient stress is placed on how few appear to have died “purely and simply” from Covid and its effects.

    7. Happy Birthday! Thayaric. I do look out for your critiques on matters of the economy and finance…

    8. Happy Birthday Thayaric! Have a great birthday! Bonus: the sun really is shining today! At last!

      1. I leave being omnipotent to the wife.

        She seems to have acquired that around the time my daughter was born.

    14. Thanks Richard and Caroline.

      I’ve had a quiet day. Played a game for a bit. Read my current book for a bit. Haven’t eaten much, or drank anything, but I do have some nice bud to toke.

      Took this week off work as Tuesday was supposed to be Amy’s graduation ceremony but that’s been postponed again.

    1. Morning Bob – thank you!

      Edit: I should explain. The Toys’ song is based on a melody recorded in the Anna Magdalena Notebook. Whether Mrs Bach composed the tunes found there or just noted down melodies she’d heard and liked, isn’t known. Probably a combination of both?

  18. Edinburgh’s slavery review is strangely superficial. 9 January 2022, 7:00am.

    I am all in favour of public discussion and academic debate about these issues, and I believe there is actually a wide knowledge and consensus about the evils of slavery and colonialism. Efforts to encourage people to think deeply about the history of their surroundings, including the ugly and morally troubling parts of those histories should be welcomed as well into everything around us.

    I Personally think we should classify all Roman Remains as War Memorials and all Norman Churches should be demolished!

    https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/what-edinburgh-s-slavery-review-gets-wrong

    1. I would dearly wish that when slavery is discussed then the complete story should be told. I have only just become aware in the last few years of the Barbary Slavers activities in Europe, the West African Squadron and most recently the East African Slave Trade which arguably traded more souls ( and treated the captured with greater brutality ) than the Atlantic equivalent, I’ve seen some unverifiable figures of circa 12m. The East African Trade was totally controlled by the Arab Muslims and I found the following quote interesting:-

      “what happened in East Africa over the centuries should be openly discussed. African authors have not yet published a book on the Arab-Muslim slave trade out of religious solidarity. There are 500 million Muslims in Africa, and it is better to blame the West than talk about the past crimes of Arab Muslims.”

      1. Morning Datz. Slavery and Colonialism are just Globalist tools to discredit the present system and bring in a Marxist tyranny!

  19. ‘Morning again.

    The NT shows no sign of retreating from its stupidity. To cast off someone of this calibre makes no sense at all. Too white and too knowledgeable? Insufficient dedication to the Disneyfication of our wonderful heritage?

    From today’s NT:

    Seasoned art curator’s renaissance makes National Trust’s cost-cutting look redundant
    Andrew Loukes was laid off as part of an efficiency drive despite running hit shows, but now he is back in charge of a private collection

    By
    Hayley Dixon,
    SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT
    8 January 2022 • 8:00pm

    When Andrew Loukes was made redundant by the National Trust on the grounds that he did not have enough experience for the job almost identical to the one he had been doing for a decade, the art world rallied to his defence.

    More than two dozen leading directors, curators and academics from institutions including the Tate, the V&A and the National Gallery wrote references telling the trust why they should hold on to the man who had curated celebrated exhibitions featuring the likes of Turner, Constable and Blake.

    The decision was overturned on appeal, only for the trust to turn him down a second time on the basis that he did not have the “capability to attract new audiences” to Petworth House, West Sussex.

    Lord and Lady Egremont, the family who donated the Grade I-listed mansion to the charity and still live within it, had opposed the redundancy and immediately employed him to look after their much larger private collection.

    But in losing his job at the trust, Mr Loukes was not alone. The charity made almost 1,800 people redundant last year, at a cost of more than £22 million in the short term.

    Trust bosses have faced questions over why the cuts were necessary when their total funds stand at £1.46 billion, an increase of £175 million from the previous year.

    The charity insisted that curatorial standards are a “top priority” and expertise was “prioritised and protected” during the redundancy process.

    However, the art and heritage world has decried the loss of experience. Sir Nicholas Penny, the former director of the National Gallery, accused the Trust of using the pandemic as the “perfect cover” to get rid of “troublesome experts who actually know about the history”.

    Mr Loukes, who curated displays of classic works from some of Britain’s greatest artists, agreed that the redundancies were “an opportunity to remove staff whose faces were perceived as a problematic fit”, saying that his treatment illustrates that.

    He joined the trust from roles at the Tate Britain and Manchester Art Gallery, and had been house and collections manager at Petworth since 2009. It was announced that his role was at risk in August 2020 and he was invited to apply for the new role of property curator.

    He interviewed as the sole candidate but was told that he did not have “sufficient curatorial capability” for the job, which was on the same pay scale and incorporating many of the same duties as his old one.

    Mr Loukes, whose family home on the grounds of Petworth House came with the job, was shocked. He had organised “ambitious art exhibitions” that were a first for the National Trust and had achieved both national acclaim and clear profits of about £1 million.

    This was unusual, he said, particularly in a property where he had seen hundreds of thousands of pounds spent on projects which had amounted to virtually nothing.

    An internal appeal found that his interview had produced a “perverse outcome” and the decision was overturned.

    However, to his “amazement”, despite addressing all the negative feedback, he failed a second interview, scoring even lower marks. This time, he was told that he was not capable of attracting “new and different audiences”.

    Just the year before, he had been asked to write for the trust’s annual staff journal about his successes, an article ironically headlined “New audiences for old art”.

    Lord and Lady Egremont immediately employed him as the curator of the private, much larger, collection at Petworth and found his family new accommodation within the grounds.

    However, he remains “utterly baffled” as to why he was treated in this way, particularly as his redundancy came at a “considerable financial cost to the National Trust because of my substantial settlement”.

    He remains unclear on how they plan to attract new audiences, and is confused over why he lost his job when it became more curatorial as that was exactly what he had been pushing during a decade in the role.

    However, Mr Loukes still sees himself as one of the lucky ones. He loves his new job and still gets to work alongside his old colleagues, many of whom spoke out in support of him during the redundancy process.

    Many other curators have not been as fortunate. The loss of expertise is one of the fiercest of the many battles that the Trust has faced over the past 18 months.

    Restore Trust, a member campaign group, have accused the National Trust of favouring “visitor experience” and making money over arts and heritage, a direction which the group said at the AGM was “engineered by undermining the curators, depriving them of authority and greatly reducing the numbers”.

    Bosses were accused of “arrogant abuse” of properties in their care and choosing “gimmickry” over heritage.

    But quietly, there is now hope that René Olivieri, the newly announced chairman who has a background in heritage, will address the concerns that have been raised over the Trust’s direction.

    A National Trust spokesman said: “The National Trust’s houses, collections and gardens are as important to us as they have always been. Each year, on average, about 75 per cent of our conservation budget is spent on houses, collections and gardens, with the remainder (25 per cent) going towards coast and countryside.

    “We have made it crystal clear that curatorial standards remain a top priority for us. We have more than doubled the number of curatorial roles at the trust in the past five years, from 51 to 106.

    “As part of our cost saving during the pandemic, our curatorial expertise was prioritised and protected, with only four curators being made compulsorily redundant – a smaller cut than any other area of the trust.”

    No prizes for guessing the general tone of the BTLs:

    Camlock Trelawney
    10 HRS AGO
    The NT’s claim that, “We have more than doubled the number of curatorial roles at the trust in the past five years, from 51 to 106” is disingenuous. They have redefined the curator role to include visitor experience managers i.e. marketing managers who don’t need any historical expertise whatsoever.
    Hence why they think putting a 2m plastic cube in a historical house is a good idea.

    Josiah Crawley
    9 HRS AGO
    I visit Petworth regularly , it is marvellous.
    But I do hope this expert curator is replaced by a one-legged, sexually dissonant, diversity officer of colour with mental health challenges.

    Christine Marland
    5 HRS AGO
    I think we should support Restore Trust, their work, and in particular, be ready to support their members within the National trust at the next AGM. Many people believe the executive at National Trust abused their proxy votes st the last AGM.
    The experience held by these curators is extremely valuable to our knowledge of British history. It is extremely disappointing that some have lost their jobs at NT. I am hoping that the new man at the top of executive at NT will make this a better year for NT. I would like him to show in his dealings respect and appreciation for the unpaid volunteers and the hours they put in. I would like an end to this slant of dumbing down the knowledge in these houses. The members and visitors who pay to come are not children, and so the endless marketing towards keeping children amused at these NT houses and garden should stop.

    1. Blue skies here, too (thank goodness; I can see to paint), but a hard frost. Beautiful.

    1. He probably has no idea how stupid that makes him look, or how many normal people must be laughing at him. At that size, probably morbidly obese (in real language – very, very fat), he might not last long enough to collect his state pension. A minor saving in the grand scheme of things but ‘every little helps.’

      1. To be fair Nolan, who I don’t like, has lost 8 stone since that photo was taken and now looks a lot fitter! Still nothing like as fit as Jock O’Vitch though.

  23. I see that the LFT are no longer to be free. When I saw that headline, my first thought was – thank God – they have scrapped them for good.

    But no. So – within days they will be £30 a go – each one – not the box; BUT the government will STILL demand that people take them before doing anything or going anywhere.

    EDIT: For the avoidance doubt – my tongue was in my cheek when I ht on the £30 figure. It was based on stories about folk paying £250 for a PCR test.
    Suffice it say that NOTHING surprises me about this shitpile governmen.

        1. Ah.
          Didn’t read the small print: “Other prices are available“.
          Morning, Bill

    4. At least people will realise they are paying, unlike the ‘free’ ones where the government is putting the cost on each taxpayer’s credit card.

    5. Chums have just returned from a trip to Vancouver to visit family and friends.
      It cost them £700 in tests alone to make the trip.
      “Never again,” were the husband’s first words as we opened a bottle of belated Christmas/New Year fizz.

          1. Indeed it is. Lake Van. You said your chums were just back from Van. I foolishly assumed that you knew what you were saying…{:¬))

    6. Any test you take that is covered by the NHS Test and Trace service
      should not be used for purposes of international travel. You can
      purchase a private test if required      . This is to ensure that those
      requiring a test have access to one.

  24. I’m afraid that I’ve now come to the last in the Joke book – and I might have nicked that from here – I’m sure George will tell me.

    Get your ‘crushes’ right

    The pastor asked if anyone in the congregation would like to express praise for an answered prayer. Suzie stood and walked to the podium.

    She said, “I have some praise. Two months ago, my husband, Frank, had a terrible bicycle accident and his scrotum was completely crushed.
    The pain was excruciating and the doctors didn’t know if they could help him.”

    You could hear a muffled gasp from the men in the congregation as they imagined the pain that poor Frank must have experienced.

    “Frank was unable to hold me or the children,” she went on, “and every move caused him terrible pain.”
    We prayed as the doctors performed a delicate operation, and it turned out they were able to piece together the crushed remnants of Frank’s scrotum, and wrap wire around it to hold it in place with metal staples.”

    Again, the men in the congregation cringed and squirmed uncomfortably as they imagined the horrible surgery performed on Frank.

    “Now,” she announced in a quivering voice, “thank the Lord, Frank is out of the hospital and the doctors say that with time, his scrotum should recover completely.”

    All the men sighed with unified relief. The pastor rose and tentatively asked if anyone else had something to say.

    A man stood up and walked slowly to the podium.
    He said, “I’m Frank.” The entire congregation held its breath.

    “I just want to tell my wife that the word is sternum.”

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/94f1443a8933b4282cbe060611bc5e86d06c580de9694cf2df496be38e11ffb7.gif

      1. Reporter: “Excuse me, may I interview you?”
        Man: “Yes!”
        Reporter: “Name?”
        Man: “Abdul Al-Rhazim.”
        Reporter: “Sex?”
        Man: “Three to five times a week.”
        Reporter: “No no! I mean male or female?”
        Man: “Yes, male, female… sometimes camel.”
        Reporter: “Holy cow!”
        Man: “Yes, cow, sheep… animals in general.”
        Reporter: “But isn’t that hostile?”
        Man: “Yes, horse style, dog style, any style.”
        Reporter: “Oh dear!”
        Man: “No, no deer. Deer run too fast. Hard to catch.”

    3. A worldwide survey was conducted by the UN. The only question asked was:

      “Would you please give your honest opinion about solutions to the food shortage in the rest of the world?”

      The survey was a huge failure.

      In Africa they didn’t know what “food” meant.
      In Eastern Europe they didn’t know what “honest” meant.
      In Western Europe they didn’t know what “shortage” meant.
      In China they didn’t know what “opinion” meant.
      In the Middle East they didn’t know what “solution” meant.
      In South America they didn’t know what “please” meant.
      And in the USA they didn’t know what “the rest of the world” meant.

      2. shortage, noun.

        A situation artificially engineered by government intent to disrupt a market with the sole intention of hiking taxes.

    4. A worldwide survey was conducted by the UN. The only question asked was:

      “Would you please give your honest opinion about solutions to the food shortage in the rest of the world?”

      The survey was a huge failure.

      In Africa they didn’t know what “food” meant.
      In Eastern Europe they didn’t know what “honest” meant.
      In Western Europe they didn’t know what “shortage” meant.
      In China they didn’t know what “opinion” meant.
      In the Middle East they didn’t know what “solution” meant.
      In South America they didn’t know what “please” meant.
      And in the USA they didn’t know what “the rest of the world” meant.

  25. Which governments in history, anywhere in the world, have been more oppressive and more controlling of their people than the present Conservative government?

    2. 343850+ up ticks,
      Morning HP,
      With the peoples majority consent, no good saying ” no other options” and supporting more shite, it is a proven case of the peoples putting their “party” before their country AGAIN, again,& again.

    3. Many, but the difference is here we just don’t expect that level of paranoid sociopathy.

      The West has adopted the worst aspects of such fascist states. Much of this comes from the EU’s intentional dismissal of democracy which national leaders have adopted to fit in with that hated institution.

      Governments are run by paranoid fantasists who think they can do better than individuals. They surround themselves with people who tell them they can and the administration adores the EU model of power without responsibility and the annoyance of democracy .it’s a toxic collage of idiots whiffing their own farts.

    1. Good morning. Sunny here too. Looks like BBC weather have been making it up as they go along.

      1. Good morning Phizzee

        BBC weather seems to be not fit for purpose .

        Clear sky this morning , birds were singing , and I have just taken ages topping up my bird feeders . The lawn is a quagmire , slightly sloping lawn . The lambs are bleating for their mummies , and Moh has a golf competion and I bet your bottom dollar that the course will be soggy as well, and I expect the bunkers will be full of water.

        1. Good morning, Belle.

          Did he take his snorkel and flippers for his session of aquatic golf?

          1. Funny you should say that , because all he has to do is avoid the bunkers .

            He is in a happy mood because Saints did well last night in the footie match against Swansea.

  29. Top BBTL comments under Douglas Murray’s article:
    https://twitter.com/truthbeforepc/status/1480116047625785346?s=20

    Carolyn Bates
    3 HRS AGO
    An excellent piece, as usual, Mr Murray.
    You are absolutely right in all of your observations, and no one was more angered at the treatment of Tony Sewell’s magnificent report than I.
    The plain truth is, that this Government is completely gutless, headed by the most cowardly leaders of them all, Boris Johnson. That he has just sat back and watched as the virtue-signalling, woke minority has endeavoured to rewrite our history, disrespects our culture and makes their feeling known further by tearing down our statues and defacing our war monuments, is not only inexplicable, but is now allowing these people to go against the directions of trial judges.
    The Colston four have set a terrifying new legal precedent and the Attorney General is correct to seek redress, no matter how unlikely. That Emily Thornberry came out on the side of the thugs, was hardly surprising, but when our own Conservative PM says nothing in response to the verdict, it is shocking.
    It seems that these woke warriors no longer just want to defund the police – an objective of BLM – but they now want to defund trial judges as well. As Lord Sumption rightly pointed out yesterday, justice was not served at this trial and despite the overwhelming evidence against the accused, they walked from Court laughing in the face of the British legal system, and the cowardly leadership in Downing Street. EDITED

    REPLY
    168
    FLAG

    RK

    .Richard Kenward
    2 HRS AGO
    As usual Douglas your forensic approach is compelling. Unfortunately Bunter is not the man we thought he was and the people he’s picked are equally dismal. It’s a government of chaos driven by tactics and PR rather than strategy and a grand vision.
    Woke will continue to cancel our history, our culture and divide us as a nation. You only have to look at TV advertising to see the narrative displayed. It would appear BLM are winning as every ad has a black hero or mixed race family. White people and especially white men are being airbrushed out. Then look at online products and clothing and it’s hard to find a white model.
    On top of this today George Osborne no less showed his support for the Colston 4, which makes me suspect that the elite in this country actually enjoy rubbing the noses of us white peasants in wokery!

    REPLY
    7 REPLIES

    1. Good to see Carolyn Bates on good form again! That George Osborne is pro Colston 4 comes as no surprise – he’s odious even by Fataturk’s standards.

    2. I am very anti the so-called Colston 4, but I am even more against jury verdicts, however bizarre or politicised they may themselves be, being overturned to suit the State or the mob.
      In this case the police, ie the State, merely stood by and watched without any intervention and it wasn’t until there was a huge outcry that much was done to charge those involved.

      If I had been on that jury I suspect I would have found them guilty.

      It will be poetic justice if the case results in people taking the law into their own hands with respect to ER and similar demonstrations, giving the protesters a vigorous response.

      1. Agree, Sos.
        Once a precedent is set that juries verdicts can be overturned when the state doesn’t like it, you might as well find everybody guilty straight away – in fact, don’t bother with a trial at all, just accept the word of he police and bang ’em up.
        In this case, the jury seems to have been perverse, but that doesn’t justify scrapping the whole scheme that has worked pretty well for centuries.
        The police standing by and watching it happen suggests official approval of the actions of the vandals.

        1. Our good friend Tony Blair overturned the rules against “double jeopardy”. Another nail to harm Britain from his coffin’s endless supply.

        2. Since the Blair Beast did away with double jeopardy they should find some procedural irregularities and try them again.

          1. I think you’ll find that was to fit in with EU law (corpus juris) which allows retrial for the same offence.

      2. Good morning Sos,

        The Colston 4 could be regarded as a modern day lynch mob .

        I see that incident as similar to a terrorist massacre, this is what terrorists do , thinking about the dear soldier who was nearly beheaded , slaughtered by 2 black men in Britain .

        Any massacre that occurs because of hate and twisted values is madness, and I believe that the Colston 4 who caused a near riot of hate and fury could have done the same to a living person instead of a statue made of metal !

      3. Quite. Thank God for juries, say I.

        The irony is that these four tossers who so loathed Mr Colston – will be forever known as “The Colston Four”. They must be livid!

      4. As someone said though, the rot started with the police standing by and letting it happen.

        1. Hence my comment re police standing by.

          I believe that even one of the four commented to that effect.

    3. 343850+ up ticks,

      LD,
      Peoples really should not confuse “gutless” with ” treacherous.

  30. If the precedent is set for all former PMs to receive the Order of the Garter then will Brown, Cameron, May and Johnson get their gongs while our current queen still lives or will Charles have to announce these honours?

    Just imagine if it were one of the first things he did on ascending to the throne – it would give a tremendous boost to the republican movement and the monarchy’s days would be numbered.

        2. Oh Grizzly, too early to be pedantic.

          The word hero /heroine has also been reduced in value .

          Bravery carries more weight , wouldn’t you agree?

          1. Too early, Maggie? It’s midday!

            Courage is a wonderful quality and the young lass deserves all the accolades she can get. I wonder why her brave and selfless actions didn’t award her a higher-rated medal?
            [Notwithstanding that, I shall not cease my attacks upon the woke and their ridiculous ongoing destruction of proper English.]

          2. Perhaps the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross would have been an option, but certainly not a Victoria Cross as that has far too many colonial connotations.

          3. Those in the ranks are awarded medals. Generally, only officers are awarded crosses, the exception being the Victoria Cross – there is no Victoria Medal.

          7. And the DFC. I know one DFM holder who said he was proud of having the DFM, rather than the DFC, because it was harder earned (sergeant pilots didn’t get gongs as often as their officer equivalents).

          9. Just been looking at living holders of the VC and find there are only 5, as far as I can make out.

          10. Nowadays it seems to me, that with few exceptions, one has to die in the act of bravery to be awarded one.

          11. Probably for the best, these days all the loonies would be checking VC holders for tweets and online comments as well as having touched up the sergeant major in ’92.

          12. I think, if you look at the awards over the years, that observation still holds mainly true 🙂

      3. Well done. Bonus points for being female; that must have really pee’d off the goat herders.

    2. This loathesome sequence of globalist lackeys will no doubt be “honoured” – though not by the victims the destruction of the United Kingdom.

  32. Kazakhstan underlines the weakness of the West’s approach to Russia. 9 January 2022.

    Will Mr Biden finally be able to demonstrate the leadership and strength of character necessary to deter Mr Putin from further acts of aggression in the coming weeks? That the answer to that question is not immediately obvious illustrates the dangers facing the free world today.

    Free World! That brings back memories of the sixties when despite all its faults the US complied with that description. No longer I’m afraid. Now oddly enough it espouses all the vices of its then opponent the USSR. The UK is in an even worse condition; now a tin-pot Police State more redolent of East Germany than what was once one of the glories of Western Civilisation where all could sleep safe from the knock on the door and speak their mind without fear.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/01/08/kazakhstan-underlines-weakness-wests-approach-russia/

    2. I think the US/NATO are in for a wake-up call at the meetings this coming week.
      If they try to delay the decision-making there will be Russian nuclear missiles appearing on the European borders of Belarus and Kaliningrad .

  33. Phew! Time for a breather!
    I had a large builder’s bag of sand & couple of bags of cement delivered on Thursday. The cement went straight up the garden, but the weather intervened before I could get started shifting the sand.
    Friday, had a sort out up the “garden” to make room for the stuff, then filled & shifted six bags of approx. ½cwt each, tipping them into a 2nd builders bag so they could be reused, before the snow started.
    Yesterday, after a frustrating run to Derby to get started on cleaning stepson’s flat & deliver some fags for him, I filled & shifted another two batches of six bags, including taking time to shore up the roof of the wood shelter I hoik them up onto after it partially collapsed!
    And today I’ve just done the 1st batch and plan doing another couple.

    2. I was wondering if you could pop round and clear the gutters when you have a bit of free time, Bob.

    3. Morning Bob

      Similar to Anne, I feel exhausted reading about your hard work, sweat and toil.

      Wouldn’t you and your dearly beloved feel happier living somewhere not so exhausting?

      1. I like reading Bob’s posts; they are inspiring! Currently trying to kick myself out of being so lazy!

        1. I like reading them and then thinking, then of course I’ve got that damn 1920s downpipe that has now rusted off the wall and I’ve had to bodge up with plastic pipe and a piece of old roll cage foam tube to bridge the gap. Really needs doing properly, but such a bore, and I don’t like climbing ladders any more… I’ll think about it…

          1. We professional software developers call that a workaround…if it passes the tests, it’s good to go…

    4. You make me feel exhausted just reading all that! 🙂 I’ve finally got around to putting all the Christmas decorations (neatly packed in their storage boxes) away and I’m shattered 🙂

  34. This was published on 1st January, but I missed it at the time
    https://rumble.com/vrruw8-shocking-escape-covid-whistleblower-abused-in-uk-hospital-rescued-by-friend.html
    It’s about John O’Looney’s stay in hospital over Christmas. This was reported in the Mail a couple of days ago as one of those “ha ha anti-vaxxer in ICU with covid” stories, but it is a little darker than that.
    I didn’t know the NHS was still offering the notoriously dangerous Remdesivir – even threatening J O’L that if he didn’t sign that he agreed to take it, he would die.
    Does anyone have any more information on this incident?

    If any medical person asks me for my vaccination status, the answer will be “it’s private information.”
    I’m not aware of any valid medical reason for asking that question.
    And if anyone offers me Remdesivir, my answer will be the same as John O’Looney’s!

    Incidentally, the Bavarian minister president Markus Söder, who has taken a very strong pro-vaxx line, is currently in hot water for assuming that every hospital patient who didn’t give their vaxx status was unvaccinated. People are calling for his resignation, sadly though, I doubt that this favourable outcome will happen.
    Apparently he gave a TV interview in which he indiscriminately lumped the unvaxxed number together with the unknowns, and called that total the number of unvaccinated hospital covid patients.
    He would probably have got away with this creative interpretation of the figures if he hadn’t built on his magic number to demonise unvaccinated people as selfish bed-blockers. His attitude towards unvaccinated people is so strong that unfavourable comparisons have been drawn with historical figures.

    2. The vaccine only protects the individual. Yes, there’s a consideration of herd immunity but it has been shown that viruses travel from host to host. Therefore, any vaccine is the rright and choice of the individual, not the state.

      The state can present it, offer it and say ‘t does actually help’ but it should never, ever force it on people.

      That it does is where the resistance comes from. The state cannot be trusted.

    3. Picked that up a couple of days ago from the Stew Peters Show. Disturbing events for a Whistleblower to endure.
      On the non-vaccinated ‘bed-blockers, despite evidence to the contrary a number of ‘tweeters’ remain who are claiming as high as 90% of ICU beds are occupied by the non-vaccinated. This misinformation is akin to the earlier false claim that paediatric wards were full of children suffering from the bug. Some people, including so-called professionals in the health sector, will lie to further their aims: as if we do not have more than enough lying ministers and other political low-life doing the same.

    2. Behind the curve on Nottle again.
      Posted yesterday:

      Still think Epstein committed suicide?
      https://www.takimag.com/art…

      And on the same issue,

      In a world exclusive interview with the Daily Mail, Carolyn Andriano says Miss Roberts texted her from London in March 2001 to say she was going for dinner with Andrew, Maxwell and Epstein.
      Miss Roberts is alleged to have shown the picture to Mrs Andriano back in Florida, saying of the prince: ‘I got to sleep with him.’
      Mrs Andriano, 35, gave harrowing testimony against Maxwell at her trial last month. Four of the five guilty verdicts against her were underpinned by the evidence of the married mother of five, including the most serious charge of sex trafficking a minor which carries a maximum 40-year jail term.
      Today Mrs Andriano bravely waives her legal right to anonymity to tell the full story about her horrific ordeal in Epstein’s ‘House of Sin’ in Palm Beach, Florida – when she was aged 14 to 17 – and her then friendship with Miss Roberts, who she says, recruited her into Epstein and 60-year-old Maxwell’s sexual abuse ‘pyramid scheme’.

      That suggests to me that Virginia Roberts should be on trial too, as a procurer of underage girls, AND that if she was shagged by Andrew she was a willing accomplice.
      https://www.dailymail.co.uk…

      1. Roberts was not underage under British law at the time the alleged offence in London with Prince Andrew took place. While I don’t doubt Handy Andy is no saint, she knew exactly what she was doing. After all, why fly to London if you know you will be ‘mistreated’? Her parents were also benefited from hospitality at Epstein’s palace.

        1. Didn’t she do the deed three times with him? Hardly a victim of ‘sex trafficking’ – more like the behaviour of a prostitute, especially if she was paid.

        2. The whole thing stinks to high heaven.
          The comments in the Taki article show just how corrupt the so-called elites are and how they all appear to protect those within the cabal.

        3. An integral part of controlling abuse is persuading the victim that they are a willing party to the abuse (you took the money, so you owe us.
          We paid for your ticket, so you have to do what we say. If Andrew is interested in you, you might get invitations to the Palace, we were invited there last year. You could meet one of his rich, aristocratic friends! If he sleeps with you, it means he’s interested – you could become his long term girlfriend – the sky is the limit!)
          Epstein and Maxwell were far older, wiser and more clued up, and it was child’s play to them to dazzle naive young girls with promises of a jetsetting easy life, just like girls in Rochdale are groomed by rape gangs.
          Abuse is far more shades of grey than black and white. Anyone can avoid an abuser who beats them every time they see them; fewer can avoid an abuser who makes them feel good half the time, and humiliates them the other half. So which strategy do you think a smart abuser will employ?
          I don’t for a moment think she or any of them knew what they were doing. When they got a bit older and wiser, they did realise it, and they are angry now. That was never in the script, they were supposed to hide their hurt, shame and guilt and go quietly away, as generations of silly girls have done before them.
          It seems that they have definitely been warned off going after the American men that they slept with.

          1. High class hookers , all of them ..

            How did that song go , Hi , I’m Mandy , fly me !

            Cheap Chi chi exists everywhere , that’s why people clear off to the far east !

          3. I take your point, but in my early teens I know darn well you didn’t put it about.
            That is why the Jerry Lee Lewis thing was so exciting; imagine, being married at thirteen and doing ‘it’.

          4. That’s an education that many girls don’t have since the sexual revolution, thus removing the only thing that protected them from exploitation.

          5. The younger girl, Carolyn, was already sexually active with the 17 year old boyfriend, when she was introduced to Epstein and watched her friend willingly having sex with him. Virginia may have regretted her behaviour later, but she knew what she was doing at the time. 17 is well over the age of consent in this country, and I wonder how many girls are still virgins by then.

            It’s clear they were attracted by the money, and not necessarily the sex, but Carolyn’ s story that Virginia was cock-a hoop after sleeping with a prince rings true – the photo confirms that. She was willingly there.

            I wonder how many American men are on Maxwell’s hit list.

          6. There is a world of difference between a teenager having a teenage boyfriend, and the same teenager being farmed out by adults in their forties!
            She was willingly there because she had no education and no life experience, and two experienced manipulators exploited that.

          7. And so, older and wiser, she exploited them – by settling with Epstein and persuing Andrew through the courts.

          8. They deserve it. The trash they thought they had thrown out turned round and bit them.
            It’s a pity the others who are known to have been on the plane eg Gates and Clinton seem to be getting off scot free.

          9. Those girls were also able to escape at a time of their choosing. It’s more difficult to escape an abusive husband or partner if you will lose your home and possibly your children by doing so.

      2. Finally, it’s odd that our government wasn’t concerned about how much blackmail material Epstein had gathered on high-level U.S. officials. Doesn’t the FBI try to prevent that sort of situation? Or the Secret Service?

        How was it that all these agencies let Epstein keep up his activities for so long?

        Also very odd that as the ‘body’ was removed from the prison cell there were TV cameras filming it and the face covering conveniently fell off reveling a head but it certainly did not look like Epstein. And let’s face it he’s far too rich and too well connected to have committed suicide. He’ll be out there some where.

        1. I have little doubt that she was groomed, which is wrong, but I also suspect she started to enjoy the lifestyle and encouraged others. A vicious circle. They are going for Andrew as a softer touch. Everyone one of their clients should at least be named and shamed, but it won’t happen. Certainly if they hope to live much longer.

    3. From today’s Sunday Grimes

      CAMILLA LONG
      The case is proven: Andrew’s not guilty of harbouring any brain cells whatsoever

  36. VAT and green taxes should be scrapped on all forms of energy. Also, any subsidy abandoned. If it cannot survive in the market then it cannot survive.

    Government should be spending money on thorium, fusion and hydrogen. Genuine next generation fuels.

    1. But we have the absurd position where the government taxes our fuel bills in order to give money to solar and wind power companies that they then spend on PR and lobbying to fight nuclear power and fracking, much to our detriment. These companies know very well that if nuclear power plants are built then we wouldn’t need their companies, the high capital but low marginal costs of nuclear being incompatible with back-up power production.

  37. Like Grizzly, (and who doesn’t!) I bung off the occasional letter to the DT without much hope of it getting published. Here is a copy of one I have just sent. Expect not to see it in the DT Letters section next week!

    Sir,

    One of the criticisms most frequently levelled at government ministers is that they are completely out of touch with the views of Conservative supporters on matters such as Covid restrictions, compulsory vaccination and immigration. However, in the newspaper most read by traditional Conservative supporters, The Daily Telegraph, space for comments underneath articles on these matters is often not given.

    Surely the Telegraph would be doing a better service for the government in showing it just what its core voters think?

    Richard Tracey

    1. Well said! Of course, you are assuming that this alleged conservative government gives two hoots what its core voters think, never mind what the ‘red wall’ voters think.

      1. I wonder if CCHQ has accurate/understandable figures for its current membership?
        Soviet Russia (a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma) was, compared with the party membership list, crystal clear and refreshingly open.

    2. Since that idiot Major was heave hoed into the job, it seems to me the all members of government deliberately set out to alienate their supporters, it just underlines that the agenda is being set by those civil service not government.
      A classic example is when a cabinet minister is put into a new job over night. They have very little to no knowledge of the job ahead.

    1. If there were any real justice in the USA, and if “pay for play” or stealing from the public funds was a crime which interested the elites in Washington, the other two would have been arrested long ago.

    1. He is a woke, leftie remainiac. So far up himself that his head sticks out of his mouth.

        1. Can’t stand the wanker. Especially his carefully contrived “wild” hair (cf Grinning Haircut – “historian” bloke on Yesterday TV etc etc)

          1. Most presenters seem to be that way. At least his travels take him to places I wouldn’t wish to get too close to and I find them informative.

          2. Agreed about the places. It is his endless bleating about (a) Brexit and how terrible it is and (b) his eco-freakery. If he wants to be green – then stop poncing round the word with a film crew and using aircraft and expensive to run vehicles. Wanker. (Him – not, er, you!!)

          3. I’ve not heard him on Brexit.
            Give me someone like him as opposed to all the twats attending COP conferences in their private jets and with their multiple, high carbon properties etc. at least he recognises what is happening and shows us. Attenborough’s shows are far worse.

          5. He seems to stir up as much controversy as he possibly can.
            Just like that pratt Tom Heap on country file.

      1. Hi Belle….
        Just about to cook sprouts in a cheese sauce….!
        Appreciate your culinary skills, Belle…..help!

        1. Half ounce of butter. Half ounce of plain flour. Whisk together over a medium heat until it resembles a sandy texture. Throw in half a pint of warm milk and whisk until it thickens. Add grated cheese, salt and pepper and whisk again until smooth. Et Voila. Cheese sauce.

    4. Then kill yourself, Simon Reeves, as you breathe out CO2 just by living. Or, just STFU.

      1. At least he has sufficient self-awareness to realise that he’s somewhat hypocritical.
        He comments on pollution and population pressures and I don’t particularly recall him making as much of a song and dance about climate change being down to man as so many others do. Nor do I recall him pretending that the UK’s approach to net zero is world-leading.

  42. If a student needs a ‘trigger warning’ before reading these classic novels, then they should be in some sort of institution being treated for feeble-mindedness. They certainly aren’t capable of or suited to read for any degree.
    These are books which have been read by generations of schoolchildren for ‘O’ levels and GCSEs.
    Salford ‘university’ warns undergraduates: “There are scenes and discussions of violence and sexual violence in several of the primary texts studied on this module. Some students may find the content of the following texts distressing.”
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10382323/Read-Jane-Eyre-dare-University-students-given-trigger-warnings-classic-literature.html#comments

    1. Th next generation are weak, pathetic and imbecilic. However, I imagine it’s actually not the students, but the teachers and the state hectoring. It’s all enforcing and encouraging weakness.

    2. When many of us learnt the ‘facts of life’ in the school playground’s whispering grapevine at the age of about 7 or 8 our reaction was disbelief and coarse laughter. Mummy, we said, would never have allowed Daddy to do that – and why on earth would he have wanted to do it in the first place?

      1. My mother gave me a book and sat me down and explained everything and answered all my questions without a grin.She ended by saying it was no point in asking your father to do it as he is hopeless at things like that.

    3. It’s pathetic. People shouldn’t study Literature if they can’t handle examples of cruelty etc. Goodness me, Wuthering Heights would have them fainting to the floor.
      I don’t know who’s worse- the colleges etc for pandering to this nonsense or the feeble little students who get so upset so easily.

    4. I can remember death of Ginger in Black Beauty (the opening scene in BB is a young man breaking his neck when his horse jumps a fence); Bambi’s mother being shot; the three girls in ‘Ballet Shoes’ overcoming all sorts of obstacles and disappointments that would have the snowflakes screaming their little heads off (apart from being orphans to start with).
      ‘Susannah of the Mounties’ was sent by her parents to Canada to stay with her uncle; her parents were traveling for work purposes and the only companionship Susannah had on the journey was a mopey, depressed nanny. I used to skip the chapter where Susannah made fools of the entire RCMP by joining an important parade; it was just too embarrassing even to read about.
      In most children’s books the parents were usually absent (either away for some reason or actually dead); the lesson we learnt was to stand on our own two feet and enjoy life as best you could.
      Oh, and does anyone remember “The Swish of the Curtain” (written by a Colchester girl) or “The Family who lived in a Barn”? Parents noticeably absent from the narrative and all the better for it.
      Edit: Oh, and Famous Five and Secret Seven.

      1. Swallows and Amazons too.
        How did we survive without becoming severely emotionally scarred?

  43. Dear Richard: ‘I’m afraid my tattoos will ruin my job prospects’
    As The Telegraph’s Agony Uncle, I weigh in on your dilemmas – the good, the bad and the ugly

    Richard Madeley : https://www.telegraph.co.uk/family/life/dear-richard-afraid-tattoos-will-ruin-job-prospects/

    I must admit that I was completely wrong about tattoos.

    When they became fashionable over 20 years ago I was convinced that this was a fad that would soon come to an end as people looked with revulsion, self-contempt and horror at how they had sullied their bodies with tasteless graffiti daubed in permanent ink injected into their skin. I was sure that an aspiring dermatologist with entrepreneurial acumen would be trying to find a way of getting rid of these foul body defilements and then, when he had found it and marketed it, he would become a multi-millionaire.

    But I was wrong – this bizarre craze for self-mutilation goes on just as fervently as it did 20 years ago. However, all the leading BTL comments under this article show that most wrinkly old DT readers such as I share my views on body graffiti.

    1. Dear Tattooed,
      please do not hold back from inking yourself on our behalf. It enables job interviewers to assess your ability to make good judgements.
      Yours, almost every job you’ve ever interviewed for.

      1. I never recruited anyone with visable tattoos. ( and I recruited many people all over Britain).

    2. Mass mutilation is a form of self abuse . People hate their bodies , and they forget that the skin is the largest organ .

      I will never forget the idiot Dimblebumb posing with his tattoo on his shoulder , for a media article .

      They are all at risk of skin cancer especially with the variety of colours on offer .

      1. Some inks (black & red particularly) contain iron, and so mean you cannot go into a MRI machine – as the iron heats up…

      2. My niece has to get as much details as possible as where and when the tattoos were done.
        The dyes can vary rather a lot.

    3. People who hate themselves for whatever reason go in for self-mutilation, Rastus.
      Just saying.

    4. I thought the fad of wearing plumbers overalls would come to an end ( blue jeans). I never did I am pleased to say .

    6. On the plus side, my niece is doing well out of it.
      She is doing the C21 equivalent of scraping parchment for re-use by lazering off the ‘artwork’ so the numpties can get something more up-to-date.

  45. Funny thing telly/films. They can’t get fundamental details right.

    There is a new film about Neville Chamberlain “brilliantly played” by Charles Ryder Jeremy Irons.

    Chamberlain parted his hair on his left. All the photo images show that. Mr Irons’s hair in the film is parted on his right. What’s the matter with the make up people?

    It was a disappointing novel, anyway, by that arch woke, leftie millionaire, remainiac Robert Harris. A false premise.

    1. His acting is always solid. He played a brilliant Rodrigo Borgia and his role as Gabriel in The Mission was unforgettable. Especially when he goes over a waterfall backwards nailed to a Cross playing an oboe.

      https://youtu.be/2WJhax7Jmxs

    2. They get reference photos etc from the costume designer. Would only take the main one being accidentally reversed. Make-up people are generally pretty thorough.

          1. Seriously, though – the photo of Chamberlain at Heston Airport with his “bit of paper” is a classic.

            Someone could have checked in 15 seconds…. Grrr!

    1. I’ve just watched Nadim Zahawi on television claiming that the “booster” jab is responsible for the low number of Omicron cases in hospital!

      1. The low numbers in hospital couldn’t be anything to do with the fact that it’s mild and described as a cold, could it?
        Just heard of a friend’s D-i-L, an avid “vaccine” fan who asked her S-i-L and family to run LFTs before meeting on Christmas Day, had her ‘booster’ last week and now is infected along with her husband and kids. All having to isolate. Really, you couldn’t make this stuff up.

      2. Was that the interview earlier today where the presenter beautifully dismembered him? I missed the beginning. Zahawi answered none of the questions but was kept on the hook.

    2. 343850+ up ticks,

      Afternoon KtK,
      I do believe those figures have been faithfully promised to be revealed within ten years of the Dumblane revealance.

    3. The globalists will move on leaving their patsies to take the flak. The next part of their attack will be aimed at financial collapse. Followed by famine and war. We’re not out of the woods yet.

      1. There will be no written orders from above to the patsies, far too dangerous a thing to do. Secret meetings, war gaming exercises etc. where verbal acknowledgement, a nod and a wink would suffice. Wasn’t there a mention a month or two ago of the possibility of smallpox re-emerging?
        Climate Change is another of the globalists’ scams to impoverish countries and their populations. Re famine, hasn’t that bunch of cretins in the government been suggesting farmers re-wild their acres, end beef and pig farming and import meat from Australia etc instead? All for the green cause, of course. What have we done to deserve people who hate us being placed in positions of authority via our electoral system and how did so many wrong ‘uns slip through the net?

        1. I don’t know, Korky, but I’ve done my bit in campaigning for an alternative candidate. Unfortunately, voters keep choosing the same old, same old – and then they are surprised when that’s what they get!

    2. I really do think that they thought their staff would all turn up, meekly stand in line with their sleeves rolled up. Well, now they know. It is one thing to issue a threat but quite another thing entirely when the threatened start to stand up for themselves.

        1. I vaguely remember it but You Were Made For Me was the big one that it is hard to forget but the world did forget Freddie.

          1. I met him at an off-road driving day up in Fife! He was staying with the guy hosting the event and just joined in! He was an absolutely lovely man, completely unassuming and charming, and our daughters (much younger) thought he was wonderful!

          3. Now I don’t know if you’re joking! ‘ No milk today’ Now where did he get that idea?

    2. More likely distracted by the sound of the cheeks of her ar@e rubbing together as she walked by.😎

  53. ‘Use the sniff test’: Morrisons to scrap use by dates from milk packaging. 9 january 2022.

    Morrisons will remove “use by” dates from milk packaging at the end of the month in a bid to save millions of pints from being thrown away unnecessarily every year.

    The British supermarket is asking customers to use a simple and time-honoured test to work out if cow’s milk is usable: sniff it.

    There’s one slight problem with this. To sniff it you have to break the seal. Ergo you either have to buy it first or leave it exposed for someone else. It contravenes the very nature of food security. How do you know that someone hasn’t spat in it or even worse?

    https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jan/09/use-the-sniff-test-morrisons-to-scrap-use-by-dates-from-milk-packaging

      1. The decline in standards continues jd. The next thing will probably be a DIY cow in the Dairy Section!

          1. “It ‘asda be ASDA”……….I don’t think I’ve ever shopped there in my life. I like Morrisons because they support Briish farmers and don’t sell foreign produced meat without labelling it.

          2. I admire Morrisons – a shop which, pre-plague, I avoided – because they behaved admirably and, above all, very sensibly during the bollox. They adapted the “rules” to fit common sense. Minimum of buggerment. They now have two loyal customers.

          4. Bill and the MR spend masses on mouse flavoured cat food and red medicine, so they probably keep Wivno Morrisons going!

          5. Wivno is 98 miles away. G & P source their own mouse flavoured, er, mice.

            Cat food is bought from Zoo Plus – excellent value.

          11. No Morrisons in Wivenhoe, that place is a large village. However, two exist in Clacton-on-Sea about 12 miles away but Morrisons haven’t set up business in Colchester.

          14. We have a newly opened Lidl now not far way but I haven’t been in there yet. I am a creature of habit. Went into Tesco yesterday because it was on the way home from table tennis club – but it’s much too big and I couldn’t find what I wanted.

          15. You will be surprised when you do. If you like olives they will be selling a large jar of large olives for under £2 on Thursday -( i’m planning on buying 5 jars).

          16. I know things are quite keenly priced but as OH won’t eat olives I’d find it hard to eat a jarful that size.

          17. Do try them, Ndovu! Some of their cold meats, preserves, coffee and veg are wonderful, and their own brand items. Plus they use local suppliers and farmers. Their fresh bakery goods are yummy! Take a bit of time and wander! It’s eye-opening, and no, I’m not on commission!

    2. How will they know to remove out of date stock from the shelf? I take little notice of the dates apart from using things in date order if possible. Certainly the sniff test works but you can’t do that before buying the product.

        1. It really is shocking the amount of food that is wasted and thrown away in this country. We waste very little – you can usually make use of dried up bits and pieces in a sauce or something. I hardly ever throw stuff out because I regulate carefully what we need to buy. If I slip up and buy too much it finds a home in the freezer. Sometimes stuff stays for years in there but is perfectly usable when I need it.

          1. I have a very strong aversion to throwing food away. This said, to avoid running short, I overbought this Christmas as I nearly always do, and found myself doing it. I’ve only just managed to return to normal this weekend.

          2. We’re finishing off the Christmas pate, and tonight we’re having the gammon joint. I may have to make some more mince pies to use up the brandy butter!

          4. We’ve got a few nice cheeses left over, but they shan’t go to waste, just trim off the dodgy bits.

    3. OK – I see from the article that they will still have “best before” dates – so you can stll avoid buying out of date stock.

        1. We have that here: “Beste før XX/xx/202X, men ikke dårlig etter” – Best before, but not bad after.

    5. Milk is a very perishable foodstuff so should always have some indication of freshness. Surely, removing this information will lead to a lot more waste, not to mention more stomach upsets. Customer buys a bottle which turns out to have only a short shelf life thanks to supermarkets’ inability to rotate stock with newest at the back.
      Once the milk is opened, then yes, the sniff test is a different matter.
      We don’t use much milk, just enough for a few cups of tea each day so a 2 pint bottle lasts us for over a week. With that in mind, I always check the ‘use by’ date before buying.

      1. Milk goes sour when it goes off. Not good on your cereal however there are plenty of recipes that use sour milk. Pancakes for instance. Which you can then freeze.

      2. I have frozen milk in my freezer and use it in rotation when I run out of fresh milk, it lasts well beyond the ‘use by’ date.

        2. I used to do that, but now I buy long life stuff (I don’t use much milk now MOH has gone).

          1. I did the reverse until I found the long life didn’t taste as good and was twice the price

          2. I use so little milk now I was finding that the frozen stuff didn’t taste brilliant, either, as I didn’t use it up fast enough.

    6. I believe it is buy before you sniff. It should be fine on the supermarket shelf. If milk is in the fridge at home it’s easy to tell if it is off or not. I don’t understand people that throw out perfectly good food because of a use by date. Ignoramuses.

      1. Don’t get me started. One of the premises behind Tony’s “knock off” stall at Fakenham market is perfectly good food that is very close to, at or past its “sell by date”. Tremendous value.

        1. On my Waitrose order if anything has a short date they give it to me free. Had some real bargains.

          4. Haha. Yes as it happens. In the case of one lady Nottler half a dozen times. Two more events this year organised already.

    7. If it’s got the best before date on it I don’t see the problem. It’s probably illegal to sell beyond its BB date. I always look for all fresh goods’ ‘sell by’ and best before, usually a bit of rummaging finds me with my arm at the back of the cold shelves.

        2. My Oscar has a car harness, too. He used to use Charlie’s but it was a bit big really, so I had to get him one of his own.

  55. I saw a car this morning with a bumper sticker that said “This vehicle runs on own generated solar power”
    It’s a good thing they specified solar power, or I would have assumed it was sewage gas from all the shyte they’re full of.

      1. No, but my daughter and I were joking that it gets one outing a year and it’s charging the rest of the time.

  57. Hospital staff wore hijabs and went to mosque four times a day… yet my little cross was deemed so dangerous I lost the job that I loved: Christian nurse forced out for wearing a crucifix tells her troubling story for the first time

    Christian nurse was forced out of a south London hospital for wearing a crucifix
    Mary Onuoha’s small gold cross is a symbol of the 61-year-old nurse’s faith
    She was effectively forced out of a job she loved ‘because of her religion’
    She won a case against Croydon NHS Trust on the grounds of harassment, victimisation, direct and indirect discrimination, and unfair dismissal dismissal

    Alas, Mary’s employers at the south London hospital where she worked as a theatre practitioner for 19 years took a different view, and in recent years she was repeatedly asked to remove the cross, a present at her baptism.

    Mary was told that the necklace ‘harboured bacteria’, but she believes she was targeted for displaying a symbol of her Christian faith – even though many colleagues were allowed to sport other items expressing their religious beliefs, be they turbans, hijabs or bracelets.

    On one occasion a manager even called her away from her nursing duties in an operating theatre in the middle of surgery to discipline her for wearing it – potentially risking patients’ safety, she claims.

    When she refused to take it off, Mary was moved to clerical duties and became subject to what she describes as a sustained campaign of bullying that left her unable to work.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10382789/Christian-nurse-forced-wearing-crucifix-tells-troubling-story-time.html

    When working in theatre , no jewellry , no nylon underwear and no make up… I guess times have changed a hell of a lot these days .

      1. I think scrubs are usually V necked so it would still be visible unless she had a long chain.

    3. Jewellery can harbour germs. However if you are going to allow a Sikh bangle then you should allow a necklace.

      I remember the Air Stewardess who was ordered to remove her Crucifix.

      Also, They are removing the Crucifixes from our churches so as not to upset the newcomers.

      Pandering to their intolerance is a huge mistake.

      1. I can certainly see the Colston approach being adopted toward crosses and the like anywhere close to Muslim majority areas.

  58. Douglas Murray’s article (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2022/01/09/tories-brink-war-tax/ ) makes me think that there has never been a better time for the Conservative Party to divide.

    The wokists and virtually every member of the useless cabinet can stay with Johnson while the rest can join Steve Baker and either form a new party or join forces with Richard Tice in the Reform Party.

    There is a tide in the affairs of the Conservative Party which must be taken at the flood as that will lead on to fortune. But if they fail to take this opportunity then the Conservative Party will remain bound forever in shallows and in miseries.

    2. Richard, you are really Shakespeare’s Brutus (Et tu Brute) and I claim my five bob postal order.

  59. Douglas Murray’s article (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2022/01/09/tories-brink-war-tax/ ) makes we think that there has never been a better time for the Conservative Party to divide.

    The wokists and virtually every member of the useless cabinet can stay with Johnson while the rest can join Steve Baker and either form a new party or join forces with Richard Tice in the Reform Party.

    There is a tide in the affairs of the Conservative Party which must be taken at the flood as that will lead on to fortune. But if they fail to take this opportunity then the Conservative Party will remain bound forever in shallows and in miseries.

    1. and police said there were no suspicious circumstances

      I don’t know about you, but I would have thought almost any death of a twenty year old must have something odd about it, if only doing something against medical advice.

        1. The only really good piece of medical advice I read about came from a GP who was asked for advice on the best exercise for losing weight. The GP said: “When offered second helpings shake your head slowly from side to side…”

          1. I’ve been taking that advice for the past two years (and really in earnest since Sept 3 last year).

            I weighed myself on Friday to discover that I have now lost 3 stones in weight since I started my diet. I feel as chuffed as I feel fitter.

          6. Well done, Grizzly. Your example, as you know, has inspired me too to lose weight. However, after some “treats” over the Christmas period I am now knuckling down to reducing the pounds I have put on over Christmas. (Memo to self: stop making rhubarb crumble.)

  62. With this case involving Prince Andrew one wonders how important the age of his accuser will turn out to be.

    However willing the girl is, and however much she protests that she is over the minimum age and however mature she may look it is still rape if it turns out that she is not legally over the minimum age. A young tarty-looking girl was therefore described as potentially being ‘jail bait’.

    There was a notorious case involving the famous film star, Errol Flynn, who was accused of statuary rape of a girl of under 18. He won the case but thereafter he posted a notice on his front door saying that each female visitor must present her birth certificate on arrival.

    If Prince Andrew decides to do more foreign travel he might be wise to print out the following information to carry around in his wallet.

    The legal Age of Consent varies from 11 (Nigeria) to 21 years old (Bahrain) from country to country around the world. In some countries, there is no legal age of consent but all sexual relations are forbidden outside of marriage. Choose any country for more details about local laws.

    Afghanistan Asia Must be married
    Albania Europe 14
    Algeria Africa 16
    American Samoa Oceania 16
    Andorra Europe 16
    Angola Africa 12
    Antigua and Barbuda North America 16
    Argentina South America 18
    Armenia Europe 16
    Aruba North America 15
    Australia Oceania 16
    Austria Europe 14
    Azerbaijan Europe 16
    Bahamas North America 16
    Bahrain Asia 21
    Bangladesh Asia 14
    Barbados North America 16
    Belarus Europe 16
    Belgium Europe 16
    Belize North America 16
    Benin Africa 18
    Bhutan Asia 18
    Bolivia South America 14
    Bosnia and Heregovina Europe 14
    Botswana Africa 16
    Brazil South America 14
    Brunei Asia 16
    Bulgaria Europe 14
    Burkina Faso Africa 13
    Burundi Africa 18
    Cambodia Asia 15
    Cameroon Africa 16
    Canada North America 16
    Cape Verde Africa 14
    Caribbean Netherlands North America 16
    Central African Verde Africa 18
    Chad Africa 14
    Chile South America 18
    China Asia 14
    Colombia South America 14
    Comoros Africa 13
    Cook Islands Oceania 16
    Costa Rica North America 15
    Croatia Europe 15
    Cuba North America 16
    Cyprus Europe 17
    Czech Republic Europe 15
    Democratic Republic of the Congo Africa 14
    Denmark Europe 15
    Djibouti Africa 18
    Dominica North America 16
    Dominican Republic North America 18
    East Timor Asia 14
    Ecuador South America 14
    Egypt Africa 18
    El Salvador North America 18
    Equatorial Guinea Africa 18
    Eritrea Africa 18
    Estonia Europe 14
    Ethiopia Africa 18
    Federated States of Micronesia Oceania 14
    Fiji Oceania 16
    Finland Europe 16
    France Europe 15
    Gabon Africa 18
    Gambia Africa 18
    Georgia Europe 16
    Germany Europe 14
    Ghana Africa 16
    Greece Europe 15
    Grenada North America 16
    Guam Oceania 16
    Guatemala North America 18
    Guinea Africa 15
    Guinea Bissau Africa 16
    Haiti North America 18
    Honduras North America 15
    Hungary Europe 14
    Iceland Europe 15
    India Asia 18
    Indonesia Asia 16
    Iran Asia Must be married
    Iraq Asia 18
    Ireland Europe 17
    Israel Asia 16
    Italy Europe 14
    Ivory Coast Africa 18
    Jamaica North America 16
    Japan Asia 13
    Jordan Asia 16
    Kazakhstan Europe 16
    Kenya Africa 18
    Kiribati Oceania 15
    Kuwait Asia Must be married
    Kyrgyzstan Asia 16
    Laos Asia 15
    Latvia Europe 16
    Lebanon Asia 18
    Lesotho Africa 16
    Liberia Africa 18
    Libya Africa Must be married
    Liechtenstein Europe 14
    Lithuania Europe 16
    Luxembourg Europe 16
    Macedonia Europe 14
    Madagascar Africa 14
    Malawi Africa 14
    Malaysia Asia 16
    Maldives Asia Must be married
    Mali Africa 18
    Malta Europe 18
    Marshall Islands Oceania 16
    Mauritania Africa 16
    Mauritius Africa 14
    Mexico North America 17
    Moldova Europe 16
    Monaco Europe 15
    Mongolia Asia 16
    Montenegro Europe 14
    Myanmar Asia 14
    Namibia Africa 16
    Nauru Oceania 17
    Nepal Asia 16
    Netherlands Europe 16
    New Zealand Oceania 16
    Nicaragua North America 18
    Niger Africa 13
    Nigeria Africa 11
    Niue Oceania 19
    North Korea Asia 15
    Northern Cyprus Europe 16
    Northern Mariana Islands Oceania 18
    Norway Europe 16
    Oman Asia Must be married
    Pakistan Asia Must be married
    Palau Oceania 16
    Palestine Gaza Strip Asia Must be married
    Panama North America 18
    Papua New Guinea Oceania 16
    Paraguay South America 14
    Peru South America 14
    Philippines Asia 12
    Poland Europe 15
    Portugal Europe 14
    Qatar Asia Must be married
    Republic of the Congo Africa 18
    Romania Europe 15
    Russia Europe 16
    Rwanda Africa 18
    Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic Africa 13
    Saint Kitts and Nevis North America 16
    Saint Lucia North America 16
    Saint Vincent and the Grenadines North America 15
    Samoa Oceania 16
    San Marino Europe 14
    Sao Tome and Principe Africa 14
    Saudi Arabia Asia Must be married
    Senegal Africa 16
    Serbia Europe 14
    Seychelles Africa 18
    Sierra Leone Africa 18
    Singapore Asia 16
    Slovak Republic Europe 15
    Slovenia Europe 15
    Solomon Islands Oceania 15
    Somalia Africa 18
    South Africa Africa 16
    South Korea Asia 20
    South Sudan Africa 18
    Spain Europe 16
    Sri Lanka Asia 16
    Sudan Africa Must be married
    Suriname South America 16
    Swaziland Africa 16
    Sweden Europe 15
    Switzerland Europe 16
    Syria Asia 15
    Taiwan Asia 16
    Tajikistan Asia 16
    Tanzania Africa 18
    Thailand Asia 15
    Togo Africa 16
    Tonga Oceania 16
    Trinidad and Tobago North America 16
    Tunisia Africa 18
    Turkey Europe 18
    Turkmenistan Asia 16
    Uganda Africa 18
    Ukraine Europe 16
    United Arab Emirates Asia Must be married
    United Kingdom Europe 16
    United States North America 16 *
    Uruguay South America 15
    Uzbekistan Asia 16
    Vanuatu Oceania 16
    Vatican City Europe 18
    Venezuela South America 16
    Vietnam Asia 18
    Yemen Asia Must be married
    Zambia Africa 16
    Zimbabwe Africa 16

    * In the USA the age of consent depends upon which state you are in.

    1. In Nigeria it seems you may rape little girls aged 11. No wonder it has the largest population (mainly nonces) in Africa and one of the largest on the planet!

    3. These stats are interesting but they don’t tell the whole story. For example, in Germany it’s 14, but there are some complicated laws to try and protect teens from older abusers. The law tries not to criminalise teenage relationships, but you have to be 18 iirc to have a relationship with someone of Andrew’s age.

      1. And, even sadder, no notice AT ALL will be taken. Indeed, I expect he’ll be harried by the Australian Stasi.

  64. 343850+ up ticks.
    I honestly believe those that continue to support & replace these political cretins under the same treacherous party banner really do deserve the jab, as in a left & right to the head followed by a slapensilly 10 minute session until
    a feeling of sanity / decency returns.

    Continuing the same voting pattern is endangering us ALL
    Supporting / voting lab / lib/con incurs serious injury, paedophilic rape & abuse & kills.

    YOU should be telling spamo to look for another job as we are looking for another government.

    https://twitter.com/UnityNewsNet/status/1480185483590262788

    1. It is a stupid plan carried out by a stupid government solely for political power.

      Authoritarian, arrogant, spiteful, stupid. Practically a summary of this government’s entire policy agenda.

    2. Threatening people with some principles will be their downfall, amongst their other failings of course.

    1. She’s a disgusting character who needs a slap. No, in fact, she needs to be de-selected, arrested and then slapped.

    2. And it is said: “Crime doesn’t pay.”.. (It’s also said you can’t take it with you….)

        1. It provides a contrast, like Yin & Yang. It makes the spring so much more to look forward to, you can see the seasons tick by, each one with it’s beauty (apart from the bit between autumn & snow. That’s just dismal). Spring moves to summer, with more rain but warmer, summer moves to autumn where the air gets softer and the colours to die for, then winter again, with snow to play with.
          I love it. Couldn’t think of anywhere better.

          1. After a lifetime in cinema management when I seldom if ever got home until it was pitch black, I now enjoy every season which I never really was totally aware of.

          2. Did you ever read a funny novel about a youngish man who inherited a cinema (in London I think), very funny goings on and there was something about a van that sold ‘greenburgers’ (veggie burgers maybe)? Set in the 50s or 60s.

    2. I might have said the Darwin area NT Australia some time ago, but too many places are showing their true colours. Perhaps somewhere closer to home like Poland or Hungary. Meanwhile, Plum, it ain’t so bad in Cornwall with its friendly population.

          1. Because neither Labour/Libs or Cons get enough votes and of course she’s in bed with the Greens (spit spit) now to get a majority

          2. FFS. How come that an ‘English Nationalist’ Party would be regarded as the Nazi Party?

          3. That’s the way the English have been cancelled; it’s fine to be Irish, Welsh or Scottish and celebrate your nationality, but mention that you’re English and proud of it and you are immediately labelled a nasty, racist bigot 🙁

    4. I kind of agree with Mola except I would have chosen Freemantle or Perth WA. Not now for sure.

      1. Good man, Horace. And as well as Tango (imported from Argentina) they produce some superb Merlot wines.

        1. “Full of Japanese. And Indians….”

          Wrong, Bill!

          Inundated with Chinese!

          Sadly, they buy attractive traditional homes/ buildings and tear ’em down for ‘development’.

          Indians? Do you mean indigenous, Canadian Indians*? – or East Indians?

          Wrong on both counts.

          *In Canada, the term “Aboriginal” or “Indigenous” is generally preferred to “Native.”

          1. On frequent Manitoba Government trips to Ottawa, I became acquainted with Ovide William Mercredi.

            He is Cree – and was then National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations.

          2. On frequent trips to Ottawa, I became acquainted with Ovide William Mercredi.

            He is Cree – and was then National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations.

      2. Several times – on business from Winnipeg, 1989 – 1994.

        Best advice: take an umbrella, sweetie … x

          3. Non!

            I reckon ‘English’ Canadians were pioneers of ‘Political Correctness’, selection bias, ‘Positive Discrimination’ – and All things ‘Woke‘ …

      3. I have a half-sister-in-law there. She’s getting on a bit, but she has a few family that I’ve met who live in the nearby countryside (bordering on wilderness) and it seems appealing. Good fishing too.

      4. Was due to go there last may for my Youngest daughter’s wedding on Vancouver Island. Covid bolloxed the plans….

    8. Back in 1976 I applied to emigrate to Canada. I had a contact there, just outside Toronto, who offered to sponsor me and had found me a job. I was accepted.

      I declined since it meant leaving the UK police and going back into the job that I’d left to join the police for: fabrication and welding engineering. I had wanted to join the Canadian police but you needed to have citizenship rights before you would be accepted. Consequently I didn’t emigrate there.

      I have often pondered on that decision since.

      BTW Vancouver (and the Pacific Coast area) always had a fascination for me too. Reading Mike Tomkies’ marvellous account of his time there living in the wild, Alone in the Wilderness, reinforced my opinion of the place.

      1. In the early seventies I considered emigrating to Australia. In the end, I bought a house here and got married. Choices, eh?

    12. I would seriously consider living in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, capital city of Gran Canaria (and joint Capital City of the Canary Islands), off the Saharan coast on the Atlantic Ocean.

      I have been there five times, once in September, four times for ten-day pre-Christmas breaks

      The climate is superb all year round; thanks to Atlantic breezes, it is Bug-Free: no Mozzies.

      It is far from the hideous ‘Resorts’ on the south coast – and popular with snowbirds from Scandinavia, France and Switzerland.

      It is cosmopolitan – has a Caribbean influence thanks to Christopher Columbus – and has a fabulous beach lined with a wide range of good & inexpensive restaurants.

      Fancy surfing? a perfect beach? a museum or two? – shellfish? or an Argentinian steak?

    5. Heh, the cat sleeps in Mongo’s kitchen bed. If he’s in it, she swipes him until he moves.

      Thatsaid, I’ve come downstairs to find them both happy together, one great paw draped over this absurdly smug looking feline.

      I should really find out if the cat is male or female. Difficult to tell as ‘it’s’ mostly fur.

      1. My Maine Coon was like that- everyone thought he was a real fatso but it was all fur.

        1. He’s lovely. What do you do if the cat isn’t quite so decent and a bit more on the side of a pit fighting battle cat?

          That’s actually what I call him/her. As it doesn’t answer I don’t suppose it matters. I think we’re all a bit scared of him though.

          1. Yeah! The ears are a dead giveaway! As a hairless cat he loves skin contact, and he sleeps down the bed under the quilt. He lies right up against us, and complains if we move! And he bites!

    1. The government supports this, they want more of these paedophiles, rapists and terrorists here. If they didn’t they’d prevent them getting here in the first place.

        1. Or drop them all in here

          The Gates of Hell will be CLOSED! Turkmenistan president orders ministers to find experts who can seal off the 230ft-wide methane-belching crater that has been burning since 1971
          Turkmenistan’s president Berdimuhamedov has ordered a fiery crater in the Karakum Desert be extinguished
          The ‘Gates of Hell’ has been burning constantly ever since it was ignited by bungling Soviet scientists in 1971
          Belching methane constantly, the 230ft-wide crater stays alight only by burning up a valuable resource
          President Berdimuhamedov said the fire hurts locals’ health at the same time as wasting saleable methane
          Thousands of tourists flock to Karakum desert every year to get a look at the flaming hole in the ground
          By WILL STEWART

          https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10383759/Turkmen-president-orders-scientists-extinguish-Gates-Hell-230ft-wide-fiery-crater.html

          2. I’m afraid not, Alec. He died in August 2004. (Neither of nor with Covid, although I wouldn’t be surprised if someone claims that as the reason (or because of Brexit, Global warming, etc., etc.)

          5. I’m afraid not, Alec. He died in August 2004. (Neither of nor with Covid, although I wouldn’t be surprised if someone claims that as the reason (or because of Brexit, Global warming, etc., etc.)

          6. Put it out, and then what? A huge cloud of methane gathers and blows along until it finds a source of ignition (such as a car engine), then half of Turkmenistan blows up. Man’s an idiot. You have to seal it before extinguising it.

  70. That’s me for this sunny but decidedly chilly day. Grey and damp weather forecast for the next few days. Still, that will enable us to complete the very satisfying jigsaw.

    Have a jolly evening.

    A demain

    1. And people think we should keep foreign aid. It’s borrowed money as it is. If it were a surplus, maybe; but when it is simply debt it is wasted money. But then, government doesn’t care. It’s not their money – and that’s the problem.

    2. Why didn’t the [I❤️GB] clown, who posted that, check the correct spelling of Miliband‘s surname before announcing to the world what an illiterate knob he is?

      1. Probably for the same reason that you posted 2 million when you meant 2 billion, the other day..

          2. Two million humans on a planet the size of earth is an optimum number that would not squander the planet’s resources nor destroy the vital biodiversity. It was moving into the billions that has done all that.

            Disagree with me if you must but don’t be a lout and insult me.

          3. Why don’t you admit that you made a typo?
            The Earth can support far more. And you know it.

          4. Errr… 2 million humans would get lost in the UK, let alone anywhere else.

            Given that we’ll never get to that population level again on the planet, why do you believe that number to be accurate?

    3. Is it a spot the difference competition? If so I can’t spot any differences; on second thoughts is the banana less bent?

      1. 343850+ up ticks,
        Evening S,
        A matoki politician I would like to observe them one day hanging in bunches.

  73. Dear Luke,

    Many of us had worked this out long ago.

    1,400 hundred words to state the obvious.

    Why some people keep getting Covid – and others never at all

    We all know somebody who seems untouchable while all around them fall ill, but that may be down to more than sheer luck

    By Luke Mintz • 6 January 2022 • 5:00am

    It’s the question on everyone’s lips. How come I’ve had Covid twice, despite being fully vaccinated? How has my neighbour – who spent the last month isolating with her fully-omicronned children – managed to avoid catching it? Why do some people fall foul of coronavirus again and again, and others remain steadfastly immune? Is it luck, genes, or what?

    Yesterday, Sir Keir Starmer tested positive for Covid for the second time in just over two months. It came four weeks after the Labour leader received his third vaccine dose. It is the sixth time Sir Keir will have to self-isolate since the beginning of the pandemic. Few people in Britain have been locked in isolation as many times as Sir Keir.

    There are people like Sarah, who in October last year, assumed Covid had finally come for her. The 25-year-old teacher had until that point managed to dodge the virus. But then a colleague at her central London primary school tested positive. Then another, and another. Eventually, the school had to close. Sarah had been in close contact with some of the positive cases, in meetings and in the staff room.

    But curiously, her lateral flow tests kept returning negative results. Then, two months later, two of her three flatmates tested positive. Fuelled by the omicron variant, Covid cases were exploding in London among Sarah’s age group during that week, ONS figures show. Every time she checked her phone, her social media was flooded with more positive results from friends. But still, Sarah’s test results remained stubbornly negative.

    “I was just waiting to get it; I definitely felt like it was coming for us all,” she remembers.

    We all know people like Sarah: the seemingly untouchable Covid “never-getters” who remain standing while everyone around them falls ill. Sebastian tells me he was the only person among his six flatmates not to fall ill last year. Hannah, 37, says she had a close dinner with her Covid-positive mother-in-law, then saw her partner fall ill. All the while, she stayed negative.

    On the other side of the coin are those unlucky souls who seem to catch Covid again and again. For a long time, the question of why some caught the virus more than others was written off as a consequence of sheer luck. Whether or not you catch Covid can be explained by something as random as whether you talk to a certain person at a party, or whether you sit near an open window on a bus, virologists say. Testing issues are also a factor; some people are simply better than others at swabbing their nose and throat.

    But now, top immunologists suspect it might have a more profound explanation. Researchers in Britain and Brazil are looking at whether some people might possess a natural immunity to the virus. Even before the pandemic began, their immune systems already knew how to fight the virus, it is believed. If their blood and cells are studied carefully, this fortunate few could give scientists crucial insights into the nature of immunity. And they might just hold the key to the holy grail of pandemic research: a universal Covid vaccine, with the ability to knock out any variant.

    We tend to think of immunity as something of an absolute – either we’re immune to a virus, or we’re not. But that hides a world of complications, says Danny Altmann, professor of medicine and immunology at Imperial College London. The genes that control our immunity are among the most diverse in the human body, he says, differing hugely from person to person.

    When thinking about something like your blood type, he says, “there’s a very limited chequerboard” of gene combinations. But for immunity, “I’m talking about thousands of possibilities on your chequerboard; no two people will ever look the same.”

    As a result, we shouldn’t be surprised that some are more prone to catching viruses than others. We can see this happening in real-time in the laboratory. Researchers at Oxford University and Imperial College London are currently carrying out “challenge studies”, where volunteers are deliberately exposed to Covid, usually through a liquid solution sniffed into their nose, then kept in isolation and observed for two weeks.

    All volunteers have received the same number of vaccines, and all are exposed to exactly the same quantity of Sars-Cov-2 (the virus that causes Covid), in exactly the same way. And yet, if it’s anything like previous challenge studies, scientists expect volunteers will mount notably different immune responses. Some will see their antibody and T-cells burst into action; others will not.

    We can also see this playing out in hospitals. At the beginning of the pandemic, researchers at University College London recruited a large cohort of London-based healthcare staff for their COVIDSortium study. All of the volunteers were probably exposed to Sars-Cov-2 during their jobs. Their test results were monitored thoroughly. At the end of the trial, about 20 per cent of the healthcare staff showed signs of a clear-cut Covid infection, whilst 65 per cent had clearly not been infected.

    But most interesting was the remaining 15 per cent. Members of this third group appeared to have experienced low-level “abortive infections”, not picked up on PCR tests. They didn’t have Covid antibodies in their blood, but they had a much higher T-cell count than average, with particularly high levels of the specific T-cell known to combat Covid. Essentially, their T-cells had nipped the virus in the bud before it ever got the chance to set up camp inside their bodies. It looked as though their immune systems already knew how to fight Covid, even though it was still the early days of the pandemic.

    “They didn’t completely resist the infection, but they eliminated it so rapidly that it couldn’t be picked up by the standard test,” says Mala Maini, a professor of viral immunology at University College London, and lead author of the study.

    Here was clear evidence that some people may be naturally immune to Covid. Prof Altmann, who was not involved in the study, says the results look “convincing”.

    But what explains this natural immunity? The most likely theory is that these people’s immune systems have already been exposed to similar viruses, years or decades earlier. Sars-Cov-2 is one of a family of seven human coronaviruses, most of which cause the common cold. All of these viruses look fairly similar. When your T-cells learn how to fight one, they get better at fighting them all, it is thought.

    Another, less well-researched answer lies in our genes. Some people might simply be born with an immunity to certain viruses, scientists suspect. This possibility emerged in 2008, when virologists in Kenya found a group of sex workers who had never caught HIV, despite having unprotected sex with numerous positive cases. It turns out their cells lacked a crucial receptor – the same receptor used by HIV particles to break into our cells.

    “Big studies are going on now to see if something similar might be happening in some people with Covid, but there’s no clear evidence for that yet,” says Prof Maini.

    Indeed, at the University of São Paulo, researchers are recruiting 100 cohabiting couples. In each case, one half of the couple tested positive for symptomatic Covid, whilst the other stayed Covid-free (with blood tests confirming they had no Covid-specific antibodies). All 200 will have their DNA analysed to search for genetic differences.

    If it turns out that some people are indeed naturally immune to Covid, it’s wonderful news for them. But it might also help the rest of us, speeding up development of a pan-coronavirus vaccine capable of defeating any variant. The current generation of Covid vaccines were all designed to target the spike protein, on the virus’s outer edge. But the spike protein also changes frequently, each time the virus mutates. This means vaccines are slightly less effective against each new variant.

    But natural immunity appears to work differently. In the UCL trial, researchers looked carefully at the blood of those volunteers who seemed to have pre-existing immunity to the virus. Rather than targeting the spike protein, their T-cells were targeting proteins at the centre of the virus. These proteins are much less likely to change from mutation to mutation. In fact, they tend to be found in most coronaviruses, not just Sars-Cov-2. If a vaccine could be built to target these inner proteins, it might just be able to defeat all variants – as well as a range of other coronaviruses.

    Experts stress that the science is still in progress. Nobody should “go around feeling Teflon-coated in some way”, Prof Altmann urges. But as we enter our third year of the pandemic, it’s certainly a hopeful sign.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/health-fitness/body/people-keep-getting-covid-others-never

    1. I strongly suspect that my T cells would have nipped Covid in the bud if I hadn’t been extremely stressed, very wet and very cold trying to get home during Storm Brian in February 2020.

        1. Yes, I know. When I was working (and highly stressed) I went down with everything that was going.

    2. Given where it is and looking at the demographics of the area I would err on the side of it being either a “white” local or an outsider chancing his arm

  75. When I was 18, 80,000 people died of flu. So far, if anyone has died of Moronic it is likely they will have tyre marks on them as well! Flu is nasty even if it’s just a runny nose. Moronic is simply re-branded flu. The other fact that one might possibly consider a clue is that deaths from flu seem to have become things of the past!!!!

    The reality is that the real threat is the Fauci Cure, aka AIDS, which is steadily being conferred on the man’s lucky jab patients. 10,000 in the three months from July last – the evidence is now started to gallop in. And the threat -even greater than that – is the totalitarian lying gangsterism that continues to promote this violence upon the people of the world.

    Each person promoting the jabs is now known to be committing as serious offence as if an intromittent organ had been inserted instead of a syringe. Readers will recall that the lad who did that to ten men got a long jail term, and he didn’t even work for the NHS!!!

    https://www.tarableu.com/links-here-to-1000-peer-reviewed-studies-that-say-the-jabs-are-dangerous/

    2. Covid deaths Norway, after 680 days = 1 349 or 1.98 a day
      Influenza deaths Norway, 2018 = 1 400 or 3.84 a day (assuming 365 days) or 7.7 a day assuming 6 months influenza season
      Suicides Norway 2018 = 1.84 a day.
      Total deaths 2018 about 40,000 or nearly 110 a day.
      That’s the scale in a small country.

      1. I rather think the gate is government and the struggling cat the vast majority, the jumper the corrupt scum like Blair, Milioaf, Gummer and all the other useless vermin.

  80. More and more people around the world are suffering because their immune systems can no longer tell the difference between healthy cells and invading micro-organisms. Disease defences that once protected them are instead attacking their tissue and organs.

    Major international research efforts are being made to fight this trend – including an initiative at London’s Francis Crick Institute, where two world experts, James Lee and Carola Vinuesa, have set up separate research groups to help pinpoint the precise causes of autoimmune disease, as these conditions are known.

    “Numbers of autoimmune cases began to increase about 40 years ago in the west,” Lee told the Observer. “However, we are now seeing some emerge in countries that never had such diseases before.

    For example, the biggest recent increase in inflammatory bowel disease cases has been in the Middle East and east Asia. Before that they had hardly seen the disease.”

    Autoimmune diseases range from type 1 diabetes to rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease and multiple sclerosis. In each case, the immune system gets its wires crossed and turns on healthy tissue instead of infectious agents.

    In the UK alone, at least 4 million people have developed such conditions, with some individuals suffering more than one. Internationally, it is now estimated that cases of autoimmune diseases are rising by between 3% and 9% a year. Most scientists believe environmental factors play a key role in this rise.

    “Human genetics hasn’t altered over the past few decades,” said Lee, who was previously based at Cambridge University. “So something must be changing in the outside world in a way that is increasing our predisposition to autoimmune disease.”

    This idea was backed by Vinuesa, who was previously based at the Australian National University. She pointed to changes in diet that were occurring as more and more countries adopted western-style diets and people bought more fast food.

    “Fast-food diets lack certain important ingredients, such as fibre, and evidence suggests this alteration affects a person’s microbiome – the collection of micro-organisms that we have in our gut and which play a key role in controlling various bodily functions,” Vinuesa said.

    “These changes in our microbiomes are then triggering autoimmune diseases, of which more than 100 types have now been discovered.”

    Both scientists stressed that individual susceptibilities were involved in contracting such illnesses, ailments that also include celiac disease as well as lupus, which triggers inflammation and swelling and can cause damage to various organs, including the heart.

    “If you don’t have a certain genetic susceptibility, you won’t necessarily get an autoimmune disease, no matter how many Big Macs you eat,” said Vinuesa. “There is not a lot we can do to halt the global spread of fast-food franchises. So instead, we are trying to understand the fundamental genetic mechanisms that underpin autoimmune diseases and make some people susceptible but others not. We want to tackle the issue at that level.”

    This task is possible thanks to the development of techniques that now allow scientists to pinpoint tiny DNA differences among large numbers of individuals. In this way, it is possible to identify common genetic patterns among those suffering from an autoimmune disease.

    “Until very recently, we just didn’t have the tools to do that, but now we have this incredible power to sequence DNA on a large scale and that has changed everything,” said Lee. “When I started doing research, we knew about half a dozen DNA variants that were involved in triggering inflammatory bowel disease. Now we know of more than 250.”

    Time to engage brain , because the author of this article has not put 2+2 together .

    Global spread of autoimmune disease blamed on western diet
    New DNA research by London-based scientists hopes to find cure for rapidly spreading conditions

    Such work lies at the core of Lee and Vinuesa’s efforts, which aim to find out how these different genetic pathways operate and unravel the many different types of disease doctors are now looking at. “If you look at some autoimmune diseases – for example, lupus – it has become clear recently there are many different versions of them, that may be caused by different genetic pathways,” said Vinuesa. “And that has a consequence when you are trying to find the right treatment.

    “We have lots of potentially useful new therapies that are being developed all the time, but we don’t know which patients to give them to, because we now realise we don’t know exactly which version of the disease they have. And that is now a key goal for autoimmune research. We have to learn how to group and stratify patients so we can give them the right therapy.”

    Lee also stressed that surging cases of autoimmune diseases across the world meant new treatments and drugs were now urgently needed more than ever before. “At present, there are no cures for autoimmune diseases, which usually develop in young people – while they are trying to complete their education, get their first job and have families,” he said.

    “That means growing numbers of people face surgery or will have to have regular injections for the rest of their lives. It can be grim for patients and a massive strain on health services. Hence the urgent need to find new, effective treatments.”

    … https://www.theguardian.com/science/2022/jan/08/global-spread-of-autoimmune-disease-blamed-on-western-diet

      1. Yup, ceteris paribus, in just over 100 years there will be some 9 billion new human beings wondering what the fuck happened?!

          9. Thank goodness that Thomas chap has retired to his bed.
            Pan.
            You would have over excited him, poor old boy.

          11. MIGRANTS crossing the Channel in boats add almost £1million a day to the cost of Britain’s asylum system, figures show.

            The 28,431 people who made the perilous voyage in 2021 have landed taxpayers with a bill of £336million to process their claims.

            And the cost — the equivalent of £920,619 a day — is thought to be just the tip of the iceberg as it does not cover healthcare, education or housing costs for new arrivals.

            Alp Mehmet, of Migration Watch UK, said: “This is another shocking reminder of the Government’s abject failure to control our borders.”

            Every time a migrant lands on the Kent coast, it adds £12,000 to the bill for processing their application, detention and living allowances while their claim is assessed.

            It also covers a share of staff costs to deal with the backlog of 100,000 people stuck in the system.

            The bill has more than doubled in the past three years — and is up by 42 per cent in the past year alone.

            It raises fresh concerns about the state of Britain’s asylum system, which Home Secretary Priti Patel says is broken.

            New figures from the Home Office show the bill for dealing with asylum claims has hit a new high of £1.4billion, while a record 55,000 applicants wait more than three years for their case to be completed.

            The Home Office said: “The asylum system is broken. Our Nationality and Borders Bill will introduce a firm but fair system.”

            https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/17263107/migrants-crossing-1m-a-day/

          15. Just don’t let them in in the first place and process ALL asylum claims off-shore – preferably somewhere cold, wet and miserable.

          18. “Somewhere cold, wet and miserable….” you have just described most of England.

          21. It’s easy to ‘process their claims’. When the boat demands rescue, it is dragged back to France, destroyed and those in it swim for the shore.

            It’s a simple as that. The ones that are here are deported immediately, without any bothering to check. They can apply again. Then all such sponsors, visas and offers are forbidden.

            Child benefit and housing benefit are withdrawn from all immigrants and back dated demands sent to those here.

        2. If Grizzly is correct, there will be 2 million wondering what happened to the other 8,998,000,000

  81. Right, that’s it for me on this site. I wish you all a very good night. (Just for clarity, I am not off to bed at present. I shall watch a film of interest on YouTube, but hope to head up the stairs by 11 am to ensure I get a good 7 hours’ sleep.)

    1. To bed, To bed,
      Says Sleepy-head.
      – Tarry a while, Says Slow.
      – Put on the pan,
      Says Greedy Nan;
      – We’ll sup before we go!”

      Goodnight Elsie.

  83. Always worth a read:

    If we had to mark the precise moment when this country finally disappeared up its own digestive tract, it was the day when Anthony Blair became a Knight of the Garter.

    This title is a personal gift of the Queen, our Crowned and Anointed Monarch, the last true sovereign in Europe and the heir to a thousand years of law and splendour. She did not have to do it.

    Because I cannot bear to believe any other explanation, I will assume that Her Majesty was making a bitter and sarcastic joke.

    For, while it was famously once said that there is no merit in the Garter, there is honour. And even more, there is tradition. In all this flummery of banners, velvet and feathers there is a last persistent whisper of an older, fiercer, braver world than the one we live in.

    And the Blair creature hates all that. On September 27, 1999, in Bournemouth, he made a speech attacking the ‘forces of conservatism’. Much of it could have been delivered by the Bolshevik fanatic Leon Trotsky.

    As is the rule with revolutionaries, he pretended that the damage he was doing was justified by the benefits it would allegedly bring to the poor and needy, which of course it did not bring.

    He derided the lawful opposition with personal abuse and openly promised to smash it forever. He proclaimed himself and his government ‘the new progressive force in British politics which can modernise the nation, sweep away those forces of conservatism to set the people free’.

    He kept saying that thing about freedom, something for which he has little respect in fact. His semi-literate diatribe ended with the words ‘now, at last, Party and nation joined in the same cause for the same purpose: to set our people free’.

    These words reflected the astonishing, megalomaniac claim in his 1997 manifesto that ‘New Labour is the political arm of none other than the British people as a whole’.

    But, until 1999, it was useless to warn the many worshippers of Blair (you know who you are, though you deny it now) of what this man and his party were up to. I can hardly bear to think of all the people, patriots, social conservatives, decent persons, who maddeningly assured me, in the first months of his premiership, that Blair was ‘the best Tory Prime Minister we’ve ever had’.

    Then it happened. The taxes and the spending went wild, as did the mad borrowing of the Private Finance Initiative. The cheap, empty promises on crime and education went sailing out of the window.

    The police, the Civil Service, the judges, the Armed Forces, the Speaker of the Commons were ruthlessly politicised.

    The hereditary principle – on which the Crown was based – was directly attacked by the massacre of the old House of Lords (and who now says that what followed was an improvement?). Immigration on a scale never previously seen was encouraged.

    The country was irrevocably broken up by the sabotage called devolution. The enemies of Britain could not have come up with a better scheme to smash us up and it remains one of the worst and most avoidable political mistakes ever made by any London government.

    Instead of defending our national interests against our enemies, the Armed Forces were misused as mercenaries in wild, futile, immoral and doomed Left-wing interventions in Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan.

    By contrast they were forced to surrender to the worst terrorists in Europe, the Provisional IRA, an action for which Blair is still bizarrely praised by people who should know better. He then went off and smeared himself by advising foreign despots in return for dollars.

    Why would such a person even want to be a Knight of the Garter? If he wants a shiny decoration, you can buy Orders of Lenin in good condition on the internet.

    The only possible reason would be to mock and undermine the thing he joins, as he mocked and undermined Parliament. And here is the clue. There has never been a revolution like this before.

    Cromwell killed the King. Robespierre openly despised the French Crown. Lenin dispersed Russia’s first democratic assembly with bayonets and ruled without it.

    Iran’s ayatollahs drove the Shah from their land. But the Blair revolution left all the buildings standing, all the outward forms in place, but ripped the spirit out of the country.

    Jury system has to be cherished
    Please do not join in the attacks on juries, which many are making, after the Bristol verdict. First of all, the real failure of British law, when demonstrators openly threatened to pull down the statue of a slave-owner, was the performance of the police.

    This Blairised organisation no longer stands for law and justice. It is there to negotiate between ‘offender’ and ‘victim’ on the assumption that the ‘offender’ probably has a good excuse. I do not know why we do not disband these futile militias of paramilitary social workers and replace them with real local police forces, which serve the public.

    Secondly, the fact juries can make totally independent decisions is exactly what makes them so valuable. As Jacob Rees-Mogg said last week, juries are ‘such an important protector of our liberties that we must take the rough with the smooth’.

    Most British people have no idea how rare juries are in the rest of the world and how much power the state has where there are no independent juries. It is this one thing that, above all, has prevented political trials in this country for centuries.

    We have, alas, already lost two other priceless defences against despotism, thanks to foolish public outcry. Michael Howard abolished the right of silence and the Blairites abolished the protection against being tried twice.

    Juries do need reform, as I have been urging for years. But they need to be more independent, not less. Weaken them much further and you’ll be about as safe from state power as you would be in Romania.

    Why can’t Sadiq smell a rat?
    Does Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, have no sense of smell? If his nose is in working order, how can he be unaware that the vast city over which he supposedly reigns smells of marijuana from end to end, and from side to side?

    This is because, like the rest of the country, it has been the unwilling victim of a 40-year experiment in stupidity and laziness. Drug legalisers like to point to Portugal and Amsterdam as examples to follow (they are not). But the biggest drug liberalisation scheme in Europe is right here in the UK.

    Although marijuana possession is technically illegal, the law is simply not enforced. Unsurprisingly, this means that its use has increased and is in some places virtually normal. Yet Mr Khan thinks we are too hard on dope smokers and wants to be nicer to them. Why on earth? Given the correlation between this vicious, potent hard drug and violent mental illness, the de facto legalisation of cannabis might even have something to do with the frightful knife crime which Mr Khan claims to be so worried about.

    But it is not just a sense of smell that modern politicians lack when it comes to the subject of marijuana. With very few exceptions, they know absolutely nothing about the matter.

    Yet they are Olympically gullible when the Big Dope Lobby comes along and feeds them propaganda about how the war on drugs, which does not exist, has failed and we must be even softer. How can we change this?

    https://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2022/01/peter-hitchens-if-tony-blair-wants-a-gleaming-gong-he-can-buy-an-order-of-lenin-on-the-internet.html

    1. Khan is scum. Blair is scum. Neither give a stuff about this country. Khan doesn’t give a stuff about London, the verminous toad is solely trying to destroy something that was beautiful and make it into his home in Pakistan.

      1. Khan is british you wally.

        Born in London, educated in London, lives in London, works in London, MP for London constituency and now Mayor of London. He’s never lived in Pakistan.
        The ‘destruction of London’ was already well underway when both Khan and I were only schoolboys.

        Blair only cares about himself. He’s such a narcissist.

        1. You can take the Pakistani out of Pakistan, but you can’t take Pakistan out of the Pakistani.

          1. Except he’s british, he’s never been pakistani. His parents were but ‘the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father’.

          2. You mean he isn’t a muslim, he didn’t have any exposure to Pakistani culture via his parents? There’s more to being “British” than simply being born here and holding a passport. I refer you to the Duke of Wellington about being Irish.

          3. Religion is different to nationality.

            There actually isn’t much more to being British than being born here. It’s how the rest of you qualified.

        3. “Born in London, educated in London, lives in London, works in London, MP for London constituency and now Mayor of London.”
          “Blair only cares about himself.”
          Fuck Khan and Blair. Both enemies of Britain.
          Happy birthday BTW.

  85. Evening, all. Tax cuts (not just VAT) are long over-due. This so-called “Conservative” government (at least they live up to the ‘con’ part) is as high tax, wasteful spend and big state as a Labour government. It would be no surprise at the next election to find that voters choose the real thing – at least then they know the disaster they’ll be getting.

      1. Hello, Maggie. I doubt they would publish it – they don’t seem to like mentions of reality.

          1. I have, in the past, had letters published, but that was when the DT was a proper newspaper.

    2. 343850+up ticks,

      Evening C,
      Lets face it they have had near 4 decades of practice in getting it wrong they have horned it to perfection

  86. Fine BTL Comment:

    slayerofthethick
    1 MIN AGO
    you do realise the combination of Delta (and) Omicron is an anagram of…….media control

  88. Raise a glass to England’s heroic cricketers who managed to avoid defeat in Sydney today (don’t mention the 60 overs lost to rain during the match). They’re all off to chilly Hobart for the final match on Friday. With a bit of luck the weather will intervene there as well…

  90. That’s me for today. Work tomorrow. Arbeit muss sein… goddnight, Gentles all.

  92. Watching How The West Was Won, enjoying the feeling of being back in the 60s. Innocent entertainment. ‘Night all.

  94. Haitink on BBC FOUR a very thoughtful man.

    Gives the lie to the idea that the Dutch were on our side but who even then many were on the side of Hitler. Like the French they falsified allegiances when Hitler lost the War.

  95. Monday 10th January, 2022

    Hopon

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/315acdb13e1bb101911b1b9b0fdeb805847b47065b8d5098a98037d7986eed43.jpg

    And many more joyous celebrations for many more years to come

    With very best wishes from

    Caroline and Rastus

    Please visit us more often in 2022 – we need the young blood! According to our list there are just seven Nottlers who were born in the 1960s – so you are definitely one of these:

    (This was released on 11th January, 1962 when you had just celebrated your second birthday!)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxNohANhJiA

    1. I may have just turned 68 but I still think of myself as a young one. Until I attempt to leap out of my chair;-)

  96. BTL Comment (One for Grizz)

    “Peak Degeneracy.
    Rome wasn’t even close when it fell.    ”

    “Influencer” Who Made $200K Selling Farts Retires After Heart Attack “Scare” Caused By Eating Too Many Eggs

    While rugged Chinese and Russian citizens prepare for the vigors of geopolitical turmoil on a global stage as each country looks to potentially expand their geographical presences, U.S. citizens are giving themselves heart attack scares from farting into jars and selling them.

    Just ask 31 year old Stephanie Matto, who has been making more than $50,000 per week selling her farts.

    https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/woman-who-made-50000week-selling-farts-retires-after-heart-attack-scare-caused-eating-too

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