Thursday 3 July: Sir Keir Starmer will struggle to recover from this position of weakness

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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486 thoughts on “Thursday 3 July: Sir Keir Starmer will struggle to recover from this position of weakness”

  1. Good morning, chums. And thanks, Geoff, for today's new NoTTLe page. Got today's Wordle in 3 (a Birdie). And I think I'm here first today!

    Wordle 1,475 3/6

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  2. Good morning, chums. And thanks, Geoff, for today's new NoTTLe page. Got today's Wordle in 3 (a Birdie). And I think I'm here first today!

    Wordle 1,475 3/6

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      1. Ditto. In a democracy we would be able to stop their gormless laws and neuter their stupid socialist idiocy. Alas, we are not a democracy.

    1. Good morning J,

      Cats, hello Jessie.

      Our visiting cat decided to wake me up at 5am, she jumped on the bed , didn't disturb Pip spaniel, and she nuzzled my hand and sat on my tum and purred loudly. Moh was fast asleep .

      The one cool night where I just wanted to have a decent night's sleep. prrrrrrrr

      1. It's quite nice when a cat does that. Now imagine it's an 82 kilo dog. Mongo really does think he's still a puppy.

      2. We’ve been awake for hours – I need some sleep 😴 💤 😪
        J went out to get the milk in then came back to bed about 5.30am.
        Jessie came into bed for a cuddle and a paddle with her paws. 💕
        I’ll have a job to stay awake all day and it’s a busy one.
        Meeting my old school friends for lunch and we’re going to the Forest.
        This evening a meeting and I take the minutes so I’ll need to stay awake.

    1. This is why the hard Left social democrats hate him so much. He keeps shredding their tissue of lies to point at the truth.

  11. Good morning all.
    A bright and sunny start to the day with a somewhat cooler 13°C on the thermometer.
    Forecast to become cloudier later.

        1. Now that they know how much they are annoying everyone they'll be more determined to stay put.

    3. Sir Keir Starmer affirms 'the cabinet have every confidence in The Chancellor'.

      The board expressed their profound gratitude to Reeves for the transformative influence she has had during her time with us. The high standards she established, the ambitious vision she shared with us all, and the truly memorable experiences she created will continue to inspire and guide us for years to come."

      2. She has transformed deby by massively increasing it, she has transformed edducation by destroying it, she's transformed inflation by setting it soaring, she has transformed so many lives – by making people redundant.

        She has no standards and is incompetent and useless. Her vision was enforced, accelerated decline. The only memorable experiences she has left behind are negative ones.

        Get out woman, and take your wretched group of goons with you.

  13. The events in parliament yesterday reminded of a scene from Star Wars when Darth Vader took a lightsaber to a failing commander as the crew looked on in poker face silent shock

    1. Which Star Wars film, Bob3? Episode 1, 2, 3, 4 (the original), 5, 6, 7, 8 or 9? (Good morning, btw.)

  14. It is a pity that the Royal Navy has lost a fine sailor with a lifetime's experience. And all for a silly fling. Seems hard to strip him of his rank and uniform.

    EXCEPT that his real crime was hypocrisy. Only weeks before the affair blew up in his face, he was pontificating pompously on how irregular sexual behaviour would never be tolerated in the Royal Navy.

    As ye sow etc etc.

        1. When my local GP was found to be carrying on with a patient’s wife the husband barged into the surgery and punched the doctor in the face then marched out.

        2. Then he should have known better.

          I do hope she has also been admonished seriously, because her being an officer also has consequences as well.

    2. If we're making hypocrisy a crime then there are 650 MPs and about 1200 members of the Lords we could get rid of.

    3. I doubt he got much support from the odious CDS, Radakin, who is waffling on about rightly expecting the highest standards [fine] but he included civil servants in his comment – I suspect if Ben Key had been a civil servant this would have all somehow vanished? The fact that Key apparently stood up to TTK probably didn't help either. Certainly I know of civilians who have lost things on trains and remained in post – which wouldn’t have happened to a member of the armed forces [unless it was a tow path!?]. All rather sad, but to be fair he did bring it on himslef.

      1. There is something very unappealing about Radakin. Not least his part in the suicide of Matt Holmes.

    4. I was in the Royal Signals which has many women in its units. There was quite a lot of rumpy-pumpy going on. If this approach had been taken, a fair number of 16th and 7th Signal Regiments strength would have been sacked. One new CO addressed the troops and said, quite openly that if he raided the barrack blocks one night, he would be unconcerned to "find a boy and girl in bed together" but drugs were a no-no.
      Inter-rank relationships (senior and junior ranks) were frowned on but generally, if discreet, tolerated.

  15. Morning, all Y'all.
    Hooshing with rain – Drizabone stockman's coat and massive leather hat brought into service to keep me dry on the way to work.

    1. Who gives a toss. She didn't when Thieves Reeves whacked tax on private schools to pay off Labour's union paymasters. She didn't when she taxed farmers. Now she's facing the sack for her malice she's upset? Well, bully for her.

      They're crocodile tears: from a weak, egotistical, arrogant person who has so abjectly been hoist by her own petard that she cannot see the ground any more. She thought she was invincible and behaved as such, did catastrophic damage to millions of lives and now we're supposed to feel sympathy for her?

      1. I find it hard to feel sympathy for her, but at the same time why was she in the House at all in that state? Did Starmer insist on it, as part of what seems to be his plan to throw her under a bus to try and save his own sorry skin? Speaking of throwing staff under a bus, is the disgusting Davie still in post after blaming the whole sorry mess on a newly installed subordinate? Oh, and has Bob Vylan been arrested yet??

  17. Lefties love Leftie lawyers in positions of power above everything else.. "they can pull any principle they choose out of thin air.."

    AfD Ban Looms Closer as New Far-Left Judge, Frauke Brosius-Gersdorf, Elected To Germany's Top Court..
    Oh btw she supports gendered language in the constitution, and backed mandatory Covid-19 vaccines…

      2. It's astonishing and tiresome. They can't win the moral or public argument, so they set bout destroying their enemies through lawfare. Thee Democrats tried it Frogs did it, now the Germans.

        When will someone say : stop behaving like sodding Nazis, you evil, evil scum?

    3. "Trains are impartial too, but if you lay the track, that's where they go."

  18. Letter and BTL Comment:-

    SIR – I’m British and not Jewish, but I have had Jewish friends all my life. They and I have always supported the existence of Israel, but none of us support the killing of civilians.

    I deplore what the Israeli Defense Forces are doing to the people of Gaza, but I also want free speech here in Britain. Let bands sing and play their music. Most of us can decide what we think for ourselves anyway.

    Rosie Collingwood
    Berwick-upon-Tweed, Northumberland

    Anastasias Revenge
    6 hrs ago
    Rosie Collingwood – "I deplore what the Israeli Defense Forces are doing to the people of Gaza"

    And I deplore what the Hamas are doing to the people of Gaza…

    I deplore what the people of Gaza, sheltering Hamas, did to the people of Israel on October 7th.

    I deplore what the people of Gaza allowed Hamas to do to Israeli captives – starve the Bibas babies to death for starters.

    I deplore the 4300 rockets (some say 5000 rockets) fired in less than 20 minutes at indiscriminate targets in Israel, from Gazan soil on the morning of October 7th, 2023.

    I deplore the 19,000 rockets launched at Israel since the October 7th attacks.

    I deplore the fact that Hamas could have prevented any necessary IDF attack (hand back all the captives) but refused to do so (and still refuse to do so).

    I deplore the fact that there isn't robust, loud, world condemnation for the war crimes still being perpetrated by Hamas.

    I deplore the fact that the billions of Arab people living over millions of acres treat the 7 million people of Israel, living in a tiny pocket of soil, as a threat to their existence.

    1. Rosie rather assumes the problem is the IDF, not muslim. She happily forgets that muslim started this conflict and want to continue it.

      It's really very, very simple: muslim has to be taught who has the bigger stick and that when they get uppity it will be used to beat them. If the threat is sufficient enough, they'll stop killing Jews. Clearly, at the moment the stick is not big enough.

      1. The problem is, you do not appear to be able to fix stupid. And we have a lot of stupid people in this country who do not appear to be able to think logically.

        1. I think it's both rabid Left wing antisemitisim – Lefties are by nature, a desperate need to support muslim, because muslim are so disgusting, so polluting that everyone sane wants them gone, so of course, hard Left nutjobs want more muslim, just to annoy their betters and a degree of utter and complete ignorance – more, a refusal to look at the facts.

          At every level big government, from the UN, EU, WEF hates Israel because they're all stock with Lefties and thus they only hire other Lefties in various forms of nutjobbery.

          The end result is the same tired, boring fascist Left trying to impose themselves on everyone else. That's why the Left so want these organisations and demand more money be given to them. The less chance the public can have a say and the more control ceded to remote, unaccountable institutions the easier it is for the Left to achieve their ultimate goal: extermination.

    2. I deplore what Hamas did to Israel and they are now reaping their reward.they should let their people go.

      1. Iranian backed Hamas, they have been launching attacks on Israel from schools and hospitals. Obviously done so Israel are forced to defend themselves and retaliate.
        But as always Israel gets the blame.

    3. I Totally agree and all of this displays the total and utter contempt that Muslims have towards anyone who is not one of their religious subjects.
      One thing sticks in my mind from a few years ago. During one of the many upsets in the middle east muslim refugees had no where safe to go. At this time in Saudi Arabia the wonderful area Mecca or locally Makkah where they all flock to to spend weeks on their knees chanting was totally empty.
      That area could have accommodated more than 10 times the amount of refugees. But obviously they couldn't be bothered.
      Because they don't really care.

    1. I stand with the Bladerunners. Not at all with Pakistani grooming, rape and torture gangs.

    2. Pity they aren't as diligent with those other organisations which spray paint everywhere and inconvenience the public

      1. If police had stopped ER when they first began annoying everyone it would never have escalated to JSO, etc. and all the other woke groups jumping on the various bandwagons.

  20. Be careful what you wish for regarding Reeves.

    Cursed Harmer could exact his revenge by appointing Rachael Maskell or David Lammy as Chancellor.

    1. Whoever replaces them you can guarantee we will see the same atrocious, stupid policies because they're ideologically blinkered and the Treasury thinks that all private wealth is theirs to consume.

      1. The presenter had to ask Sharron Davies what her sporting credentials were? Unbelievable.

  22. someone on the Speccy pointed to another brilliant “No brainier with Angela Rayner” on the subject of yesterday. I’m on my iPad right now which is old and slow so I can’t look it up and post a link – but maybe someone else can (or already has)

  24. Both Reeves and Starmer are hopelessly out of their depths and beyond resuscitation so CPR would be a total waste of time and effort.

    Not Waving but Drowning : Stevie Smith

    Nobody heard him, the dead man,
    But still he lay moaning:
    I was much further out than you thought
    And not waving but drowning.

    Poor chap, he always loved larking
    And now he’s dead
    It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
    They said.

    Oh, no no no, it was too cold always
    (Still the dead one lay moaning)
    I was much too far out all my life
    And not waving but drowning.

  25. A few little white clouds and a cool start:
    Wordle 1,475 3/6

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    1. I had a big spat with ChatGPT on this yesterday. I asked it if it believed in “climate change”. It said, it didn’t hold personal beliefs but could tell me that the scientific consensus is clear: climate change is real, it’s primarily driven by human activity – especially the burning of fossil fuels…the consensus being supported by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, national science academies from virtually every countries, agencies like NASA and NOAA…

      i asked, “are you sure the scientific consensus is clear?” and was told it is clear, robust and well-documented….

      So i said, “I don’t believe you” and asked how it squared using AI with “climate change” and it said that in 2033 US dada centres used 3% of total national electricity…and i then asked about the bird mincers….it said only 150,000 birds minced a year vs 200 million birds killed by cats…again which i challenged (the 150.000)…then i asked about the jobs created for the climate-change brigade and it said there are 13.7 million people working in renewable energy alone in 2022 according to the International Renewable Energy Agency expected to grow to 38 m by 2030 under current COP climate targets and conceded i wasn’t entirely wrong to accuse the movement as just being a job-creation scheme including the creation of “a huge ecosystem of grants, subsidies, compliance riles, ESG reporting, sustainability officers, and consultants” and that “a lot of people now depend on the climate agenda for their livelihoods”. It also concede that the planet “didn’t need saving” and a more honest slogan would be “acoid making the earth unlivable (sic) for ourselves and other species in the short term due to our own shortsightedness”.

      I then ran out of free questions.

      2. As for the birds killed by cats – only young cats are quick enough to kill them. Cats can live well into their teens – but they stop killing things mainly by the age of ten at the latest.

      3. Ask it if it's true or false that the biggest single driver of climate change is the sun.

      5. Science is about evidence, not consensus. Anyone claiming "consensus" should not call themselves scientists.

          2. Pollock – though talented – seems to be taking on some of the traits of M Smith. Showing off, for example.

          3. The Australians will focus on perceived weaknesses and take enormous delight in pole-axing Pollock, if he’s showing off.

    2. He is clearly a divisive figure but that's largely with the commentariat – I understand he is pretty much universally highly regarded by all the players.
      He can cover 10/12 certainly, although that's not really what was needed with Daly going!
      He also has the experience of 3 previous Lions tours and is a hard taskmaster in training who inspires those around him.
      If he can sort out his headhunting tackling I think it's a good move. I'll bet you the Aussies arent keen!!

      1. I think times have changed too much, referees and TMOs will be on the look out and whether he agrees or not, I believe he’s slowing down, which makes “dangerous” tackles more likely. Although one might argue that the slowing down could reduce them.

      1. 408797+ up ticks,

        Morning DB,
        The gist of it was as I see it, the TOOL PM
        was talking on behalf of the WEF/ NWO
        cartel, and not meant for sharing.

        Hence DELETED.

  32. Michael Deacon
    We’ve just had the first ominous taste of what the Blob will do to a Reform government

    A bureaucrat refused a simple request from elected councillors to take down a Pride flag. Call it what you like – I’d call it a warning shot

    03 July 2025 7:00am BST
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/news/2025/07/02/TELEMMGLPICT000430673525_17514679537780_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqkjSThrHlFsEZFG_bE4HEA_RJU7n6OPCBAXTKpnHs4fs.jpeg?imwidth=1920 Red flags: The chief executive of Warwickshire county council refused to remove a Pride flag flying outside the Reform-controlled council’s HQ Credit: Daniel Martin

    It would be easy to dismiss the story about a council chief executive in Warwickshire defying its new Reform leadership by refusing to take down a Pride flag. After all, it’s only a flag, isn’t it? How much can it really matter? Surely not enough to justify the rather wild response by Reform’s Zia Yusuf, who claimed that “unelected bureaucrats” have “seized control of the country”, and “a coup d’etat is under way in Britain”.

    Well, perhaps. All the same, I do think Reform’s supporters are right to take the story seriously. Because I suspect we’ve just had the first ominous taste of what the Blob will do to a Reform government.

    Imagine if Nigel Farage actually does win the next election. In his party’s manifesto, he will doubtless have promised to deliver radical change. And, whatever that change entails, it will presumably be a good deal more far-reaching than removing a flag from a council building.

    Bearing that in mind: how eager do we think Whitehall will be to help him enact this radical change? Any more eager than the council chief executive in Warwickshire, who loftily informed Reform councillors that “I will not be taking the action that you are requesting”, because “the Pride flag has been flown annually during Pride month for many years and I see no reason to diverge from this approach”?

    I hope no one will think I’m casting doubt on the scrupulous impartiality of our Rolls-Royce Civil Service. All the same, I’m sure Reform will have taken note of the lecture delivered in Oxford last month by a man with extensive experience of how Whitehall really works: Dominic Cummings.

    Behind closed doors, claimed the former No 10 chief adviser, civil servants are rather more influential than mere politicians. Or, in Mr Cummings’s words: we have “a system where the political ministers are essentially non-player characters in a video game, and the characters with real power are the unelected officials”. The result of this, he said, is that “for a very long time, the government has not controlled the government”.

    Mr Farage will already be familiar with these views, because, a few months ago, he and Mr Cummings secretly met for dinner, and one topic of conversation, the latter has since revealed, was “we have a broken Whitehall”.

    When Mr Cummings was in No 10, he didn’t get far with his own plans to fix it, as he was derailed by the pandemic, and then fell out with Boris Johnson.

    I wonder whether he might be interested, one day, in having another crack. And whether the same thought has occurred to Mr Farage.

    *******************

    Gene Freeman
    just now
    The Blob took down Johnson the very moment he entered No.10. Johnson was too up himself to notice. Tories indulged Whitehall, failing to realise that all out key institutions have been near totally captured. This rot is deep set – it is unlikely to change. Starmer is a perfect patsy for this to become dominant. Stooge Man PM.

    Karen Jones
    just now
    Sadly I doubt Farage & Cummings could work together. However Reform know what they are up against & I hope they are making plans now to deal with the blob, unions & lefties who will go to hell & back to derail a Reform government

    iain morrison
    1 hr ago
    If the Council chief executive of Warwickshire feels she can loftily override any decisions not to her liking, perhaps she should seek alternative employment.

    DM Barker
    1 hr ago
    Reply to iain morrison
    No perhaps about it. If she wants to make these decisions let her stand for election.

    PJ Spiers
    1 hr ago
    Reply to iain morrison – view message
    In the current political climate, council employees defying elected councillors are taking a huge risk. The rational majority have had more than enough of being treated with contempt by the establishment and are very close to taking things into their own hands. It will only take civil disorder in one area for a general revolt to spread nationwide.

    Jasper Derbyshire
    56 min ago
    Reply to iain morrison – view message
    It's more complicated that that. There is a web of employment and human rights law, administered and enforced by a politicised judiciary (i.e, the legal branch of the blob) which stands in the way of dramatic public sector reform.

    This needs to be fixed first.

    Only then will we get the changes to the way the public sector executive works that are needed.

    And boy, is change needed.

    1. I am more exercised by the 700 strong Muslim Network in. the Home Office. What are the numbers in other government departments?

    2. I posted yesterday the political make-up of Warwickshire County Council:

      Reform 23
      Liberal Democrats 14
      Conservative 9
      Green 7
      Labour 3
      Residents 1

      What combination can achieve the majority needed to order that flag to be taken down?

    1. The countryside, far from being “natural” is man made and a working landscape.

  37. The slow inevitable Islamification of UK. Death by a thousand slices of the scimitar.
    One apiece for the Leftie/Islamic Alliance.

    Firstly Labour's Ihtesham Afzal of Brent Council, plans to twin the London borough with the city of Nablus in Palestine.
    Then, LibDumbs.. Portsmouth City Council to build the bond with Birzeit, north of the Palestinians' administrative capital in the region.

    Here's the catchy slogan..
    These decisions "affirms the council's commitment to solidarity and shared values". LOL

    1. Then comes the inevitable smears & misinformation from the fa fa far right adjacent..

      The Scottish Government paid £750,000, to the UNRWA linked to Humza Yousaf's in-laws

    1. 408797+ up ticks,

      O2O,
      Heavens forbid come a extremely cold winter the
      frozen dead elderly can still do their bit in being part of the radical change barricades being put in place.

      2. My blood pressure only seems to go beyond WHO recommendations when my brachial artery gets obstructed.

  40. The Crying Game: Chancellor’s Emotional Breakdown Caps Week of Government Chaos

    Between midday and 12:10 p.m. sterling slumped three times. That was their response to Keir. But after 10 minutes, the markets had clocked the Chancellor’s face and the pound went into a vertical dive.

    She started out bravely but it was clear to sketch writers and other psychiatric diagnosticians she was suffering. She sat hunched, sunken, head dropped between her shoulders. It’s not a great place to be going through this sort of crisis, there on the front bench of PMQs.

    If she’d held it at that sad level, they might have got away with it.

    The PM was in great form. Joshing with the front bench opposite. “Proud” of this, “proud” of that, “proud” of his Government’s breakfast clubs and soaring business confidence and economic growth, proud of the record defence spending he not only promised but had “delivered” (sic).

    Behind him, his Chancellor’s mouth was working away, her tongue scouring her gums, searching through her cheeks as though clearing a cottonmouth. Then there was the twitching. The flickering expressions. Clearly, something was very, very wrong.

    Her badinage with the PM had been well rehearsed, it was a two-faced brave face. They were a team snatching victory from the defeat of the Welfare Bill she had fought so hard for. She even managed the most terrible thing, a smile. That was very painful to witness.

    Worse, much worse was to come. When Keir didn’t endorse his Chancellor, her mouth started a rhythm of ducking down at the corners and springing back up. She was swallowing hard, bringing it up, gulping it back. Ten-year-olds do this, when it all gets too much. The chin buckled, her lips quivered and then it was suddenly seen, the incredible thing, the unprecedented thing. As a climax of a crazed week of governmental chaos, two fat tears were rolling down either side of the Chancellor’s face.

    The woman – so boomingly proud of her pioneering position – will be now be forever known as the first chancellor to be seen openly weeping on the front bench in front of a global audience. It is to be hoped that this will not obscure the fact that she, singled-handedly, crashed the British economy, took bond yields to new levels, caused the flight of wealth creators, robbed Peter to pay Paul and then taxed Paul into bankruptcy.

    Kemi, by contrast, has found her voice. Her supporters may be rewarded for their obdurate loyalty.

    Today, she crafted her remarks rather than chucking a bowl of slops across the despatch boxes. She asked a number of questions that had answers. She was funny, indignant, angry, fiery. She even made a declaration of principle – her party always enjoys that . “The Conservative party believes that this country needs to live within its means.” A cautious step in the right direction – she may need to pick up the pace for an election in 2027.

    Fingers flashing (she has an enormous forefinger), eyes blazing, mouth smiling, she identified individual rebels, laughingly appointed Paul Waugh “Toady of the Week”, defended the Tory record on welfare reform, and noticed the decline of the Chancellor (still only in her hunched, cottonmouth stage). “She looks absolutely miserable. Labour MPs are going on the record saying that the Chancellor is toast . . . How awful for the Chancellor that he couldn’t confirm that she would stay in place.”

    Her amused manner stood in cavalier contrast to the puritan misery on the Government front bench. Arms folded, downturned faces, Yvette grieving, Angela registering a sewage leak. Nandy pitying but uncaring. Shabana wondering how a leadership run would help her career. Heidi Alexander magnificently unimpressed with “the calm, patient work of government”.

    Keir didn’t care. He gave every appearance of being even more in control than his appearance of control a year ago.

    It was a display of psychotic optimism. He has been through a catastrophic and humiliating collapse of authority but remains undaunted. His welfare strategy has been demolished by his Lilliputian backbenchers but he stands in the rubble, like a heroic dwarf, declaring victory.

    This isn’t Henry V rallying troops to the breech. This isn’t Churchill after Dunkirk. This is Keir Starmer of Arkham Asylum re-rendering reality to conform to his manifesto.

    At one point he even said, “The only way to get energy bills down is through renewables.” In the adjacent cell is Ed Miliband. They pass each other notes.

    So, ave atque vale Rachel Reeves. Her great failing was, alas, an egregious one in an economist. She seemed not to know that demand curves slope downwards to the right. It’s not exactly a law but it’s a rule. When its price goes up, demand for the product goes down. In one application, we see it in the flight of private school pupils. At another, in the deindustrialisation of Britain by the price of energy. And at a level so personal the Chancellor must at last understand it: now that the political cost of Reeves has gone up, the demand for Reeves has gone down.

    July 2 2025 @ 16:35

    ***********************************

    Mr Blue Sky
    17h
    I don't know what was more pitiful, Reeves blubbering or Starmer declaring he has "delivered" on energy, workers rights, the defence budget, NHS waiting times, more money in people's pockets, 1.5 million new homes, business confidence……….
    What colour is the sky on Planet Starmer?

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9e4ffb476c2ed2124531062e4fcb30b20143695379bdbc3c4903bd5db8326fdd.png
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5d1f4f73118173ab14254b18936c3722a273bd993a91597eaeebfedc537bad7d.png

    1. I like, "Angela registering a sewage leak". Who is the writer? Has Rachel booked her room in The Priory? If she folds completely, having destroyed so many others, she can afford top notch private care for herself.

      2. Ha! You don't think the wretched, corrupt, crooked Thieves Reeves would pay for her own problems, do you?

        She's a career expenses fiddler, a liar and thief.

    2. I don't see what Kier is proud of. All he's done is throw other people's money at a problem. Nothing he has done or is doing will make the slightest difference. Oh, 20 million new NHS places… for what? My appointment for my kidney stone is no nearer.

      Breakfastclubs are nothing to be proud of. It's a parent's duty to provide for their children. Forcing Peter to pay for Paul's brat so Paul can dump him and slope off to watch Trisha is a symbol of social decline.

      No, Keer, you've nothing to be proud of. Bugger off.

    3. If the Cons believe in living within their means it’s a pity they didn’t do that while in office.

  41. https://order-order.com/2025/07/03/listen-streeting-says-reeves-will-be-asking-herself-whether-she-should-have-cried-on-tv/#comments
    Pookie
    49m
    Very telling – in the quote above Streeting tells us twice in the space of a few sentences that politicians are "different".
    That's the whole problem. They think that the normal rules don't apply to them. Not just the tax rules, the covid rules and the law, but also the rules of morality and decency.

    Reeves is all happy when she's showing off about being the "first female chancellor" and doing her victory lap at the dispatch box, smugly lecturing us about how clever she is…but she can't take the pressure and she can't take responsibility for anything. She doesn't think she should have to. The whole LAbour front bench think they get a free pass, whether that is from being a convicted fraudster, from tax dodging or from all the lies they have told.

    Socialists always believe that they should be the ones in charge and the rest of us should just put up and shut up without questioning them or pointing out their disasters and mistakes.

    1. I like Leo. But the Eavis family farm at Glastonbury is a working dairy farm. Also, William Blake was referencing Glastonbury when he wrote, "And did those feet in ancient time, Walk upon England's mountains green". I don't suppose a single one of the dumb, spoilt, festival crowd has a clue.

  46. It's not racist to believe in English identity

    As with any people, there are fuzzy edges and exceptions. But the existence of these anomalies doesn't mean the people don't exist

    David Shipley • 2nd July 2025, 4:34pm BST

    The English "can trace their roots back over generations" and have a history which is "the legacy of our collective identity". This should be an uncontroversial claim. When the Venerable Bede wrote his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, almost 1,300 years ago, he felt no need to define the English, and even described "the English nation" as existing in the 6th century.

    The first King of the English, Æthelstan, was crowned in 927AD, and it was during his reign that the word "England" was first written down, by Ælfric of Eynsham. The English have been a people, and England a country, for a very long time. We are what the Bible calls an ethnos; a people and a nation.

    Yet when Matt Goodwin made these arguments in an interview with Spectator editor Michael Gove, drawing a distinction between Britishness, a wide, cultural identity, and Englishness, a "very distinct identity… which goes back for centuries", many commentators reacted with fury and disgust. David Henig, a trade expert, described Goodwin's remarks as "unashamed racism". Simon Schama, the historian, said they were "pure recycled Enoch Powell", and journalist Oliver Kamm posted that "it's alarming how far racism has become normalised in public debate".

    John McTernan, who served as Tony Blair's Director of Political Operations, went even further, saying that "the concept of the ethnic English is truly evil", in a tweet so unpopular that it had been viewed almost a million times, and attracted fewer than 50 likes before he deleted it. McTernan went on to claim that "races and ethnicities don't exist", despite having described himself as "Irish" and "never English". When I asked him to explain, he claimed that any definition of Englishness "is either wooly and meaningless or othering and malign". I find these reactions very strange. Is it racist to recognise that the English exist?

    I asked Oliver Kamm to explain his thoughts. He said "it's obvious what the subtext is, and it's alarming… moreover, the reasoning is spurious… very few people can 'trace their roots over generations' – my own ancestors, like many Central European Jews, came off the boat at Liverpool and settled".

    Is Kamm right? Can it really be true that "very few" English people can trace their roots in this land back for generations? Adrian Targett, a teacher from Cheddar in Somerset, has been shown to be the direct descendant of "Cheddar Man", a 9,000-year-old skeleton found in the area. And according to Laura House, Genetic Genealogist at Ancestry, "the majority of people from the British Isles will be able to trace their ancestors back to the 19th century… [and] for people with Christian ancestors… there's a good chance researchers will be able to trace at least one line into the 1500s".

    As with any people, there are fuzzy edges and exceptions. But the existence of these exceptions doesn't mean the people don't exist. Would these commentators say the same if the Irish, Igbo or Han identified themselves as a distinct ethnos? I suspect not. What is different about the English?

    Bijan Omrani, historian, churchwarden and author of God is an Englishman: Christianity and the Creation of England said McTernan's tweet is "unhinged". Omrani told me that the hostile response to Goodwin's interview is "an amazing manifestation of our intelligentsia hating itself", something he links to an education system which, since the 1960s "doesn't even want to pass on any knowledge or vision of Englishness". Omrani agreed with Goodwin that there is "undoubtedly an ethnic element to Englishness", although he sees this as one aspect, alongside language, culture and our Christian faith.

    To recognise the English as a people need not mean excluding others from Britain, or Britishness, nor does it mean that those who aren't English are lesser, merely different. To say that someone isn't English is no more a moral judgement than to say they aren't Tamil or Maori or French. To believe otherwise a person must think the English are uniquely bad, or uniquely good.

    It seems that this anger and horror that the English might identify as an ethnos is grounded in a prideful self-loathing. To suggest, as McTernan did, that it is "truly evil" to even conceive of the English as an ethnic group, is to deny our right to describe, recognise and understand ourselves. That is the true evil.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/07/02/its-not-racist-to-believe-in-an-english-identity

    1. If there is one disuniting part of the United Kingdom, it's that being Welsh, Irish or Scottish is always acceptable, but being English never is.
      I am English and proud to be.
      Without the input from English taxpayers the others would be significantly worse off.

      1. I'm English and have traced several of my lines of ancestors back to the start of parish records. Clearly they were here long before that time.

        1. My mother did her side of her family, after finding headstone laid down in part of our village. Went back quite a few generations, if I remember correctly.

    2. If you can deny heritage, you can deny history, culture and society and simply re-write it as you want.

      Surely folk remember Orwell in 1984?

      “Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.”
      ― George Orwell, 1984

      The Left want to label you. They don't want you to have an identity.

    3. It's not true that only white people are racist. I'm white, have worked with people different skin colours – everyone is racist to some degree, in thought, word or deed…'the other'..

    4. BTL

      DJ EA
      19 hrs ago
      It is the usual lefties utterly refusing to grant to the English what they demand for others.

      Second Tier
      18 hrs ago
      A great majority of indigenous English people can easily trace their roots back for centuries if they want to, and many do. There are excellent records which make this comparatively simple e.g. I was able trace at least two branches of English ancestry back to the early 1600s with fairly little effort from standard online records.

      The English are unquestionably a distinct race, culture and country, by any reasonable measure. Anyone who denies this is either ignorant or doing so for ulterior purposes.

      Jerry Markham
      18 hrs ago
      Of the Home Nations being proud of England and being English has been frowned upon for decades.

      I would postulate that the tip of the wedge that is wokeness and anti white was first released on the English.

      Every other Home Nation is allowed to proudly declare their roots. Their patron Saints’s days are boldly celebrated.

      However, flying St George’s flag or wearing England shirts and almost immediately accusations of racism or White Supremacy are thrown about like confetti.

      Why is it ok to be Scottish, Welsh or Irish but not English?

    6. I am English and my family go back a long way, although we did have Welsh marry into it.

  47. When introducing predators leads to disaster

    SIR – I was astounded to read that Tony Juniper, the head of Natural England, is keen to introduce wild lynx to our country, with the objective of reducing rabbit and deer populations (report, July 1).

    Sadly, lynx cannot be trained to do as you wish, and may find slower-moving sheep, domestic animals and ground-nesting birds much easier targets.

    The introduction of stoats in New Zealand to control the rabbit population ended in near disaster, with a ground-nesting parrot pushed close to extinction. Now, every effort is being made to eradicate the stoat population.

    If there are too many deer in this country, then issue licences to shoot them. This would be a more humane end than being mauled to death by a pack of lynx.

    Terry Lloyd
    Derby
    ________________________________________

    SIR – In the UK, we already have stalkers, gamekeepers and huntsmen who could control rabbit and deer populations – if only they were allowed to.

    Instead of "re-wilding" an animal that has been absent for 1,000 years, why not try some "de-wilding" of species such as the grey squirrel and the mink, both of which have been introduced here relatively recently? The grey squirrel has endangered our native red, and mink have decimated water vole populations.

    Grant Hawkins
    Oundle, Northamptonshire

    1. I don't think Lynx hunt in packs, a small family group while kittens are taught to hunt would be possible but packs of them, I doubt it.

      1. The lynx which were illegally released recently were captured (alas one was already dead) and are now settled in in a local wildlife park and are a great visitor attraction

        1. It's unlikely, but not impossible that I saw one here. It quickly climbed a fence post to get out of the garden and I've never seen anything remotely similar since.
          The house had been unoccupied for three years and another early spot, which I am certain of was a Grand Duc, it was perched in a dormer style window.
          Scared the living daylights out of HG when she woke up and saw it in the window. They are enormous birds.
          https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c8edad4a034c954e62de27403a944df7d3ee6ea91a473209c0511659df7da837.png

          1. About 40 years ago there was an escapee eagle owl on Richmond Hill. It would roost during the day in the same conifer and launch itself at dusk. A sight to behold but was captured after about a week. I remember thinking it was large enough to take a fallow fawn from the park or a smallish dog.

    2. In a natural ecosystem predators are managed against their prey. When 'green' pushes predators above the population's ability to support them those predators find other food.

    3. The mink was released by animal rights morons without thought for their effect on the rest of wildlife

      1. And earlier escapes had already given an indication of the likely impact.
        They really are cretins.

    5. Instead of "re-wilding" an animal that has been absent for 1,000 years,

      You mean those arriving at Dover?

  48. When introducing predators leads to disaster

    SIR – I was astounded to read that Tony Juniper, the head of Natural England, is keen to introduce wild lynx to our country, with the objective of reducing rabbit and deer populations (report, July 1).

    Sadly, lynx cannot be trained to do as you wish, and may find slower-moving sheep, domestic animals and ground-nesting birds much easier targets.

    The introduction of stoats in New Zealand to control the rabbit population ended in near disaster, with a ground-nesting parrot pushed close to extinction. Now, every effort is being made to eradicate the stoat population.

    If there are too many deer in this country, then issue licences to shoot them. This would be a more humane end than being mauled to death by a pack of lynx.

    Terry Lloyd
    Derby
    ________________________________________

    SIR – In the UK, we already have stalkers, gamekeepers and huntsmen who could control rabbit and deer populations – if only they were allowed to.

    Instead of "re-wilding" an animal that has been absent for 1,000 years, why not try some "de-wilding" of species such as the grey squirrel and the mink, both of which have been introduced here relatively recently? The grey squirrel has endangered our native red, and mink have decimated water vole populations.

    Grant Hawkins
    Oundle, Northamptonshire

  50. Why farmers are giving up on crop production

    SIR – There is a straightforward way to stop farmland being covered with solar panels (Letters, July 1): either pay a competitive price for food, or subsidise farmers to produce it.

    A solar farm is now being built on part of our farm, by a company that rents the land for a sum equivalent to four times the gross margin of crop production.

    This year, the benefit is even greater, with expected low yields following waterlogging and drought. What would other businesses choose in similar circumstances?

    Jeremy Chamberlayne
    Gloucester
    ________________________________________

    SIR – Rather than covering lakes and reservoirs with solar panels (report, July 1), it would be cheaper and easier if a law was passed stating that planning permission would be automatically refused for any building that didn't have solar panels on the roof.

    As things stand, councils often refuse developers' planning applications on the grounds that solar panels would detract from the local ambience. Buildings are then erected without them, and the new purchasers install their own panels, partly funded by a government department.

    Ann Salmon
    Heath Common, West Sussex

    1. Harry Metcalf again setting out how the 'national food strategy' (a misnomer if ever there was one) inherently punishes growing food and rewards farmers for not doing anything.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nH34jFSnIE

      Truly, we are heading for a communist dystopia where the state dictat just starves people: but then, that's the point of the net zero farce, isn't it.

  51. Took my dear wife to hospital yesterday for an echocardiogram and pre-assessment for a cardioversion next Tuesday. I am praying they get her out of AF. She can't walk 10 yards without stopping for breath so she is confined to home and her life is a misery.

    1. That sounds awful, Delboy. I hope she's sorted satisfactorily soonest, and without pain and too much worry on both your parts.
      It's hard when one's loved one is unwell.

    2. I hope you have good news. One thing I tried with my friend recovering from his own surgery was a couple of steps, then a stop. It took us a good hour to go ten yards, but who cares.

    4. Different problem, but I hope her heart treatments go as well as mine did.

    5. Hope it all goes well. One of my nephews, who is only 44, had a cardioversion a few months ago and it seems to have worked, though his wife tells me that he's also still on the full range of meds prescribed when his echo showed an ejection fraction of just 28% last December. I saw them at his mum's funeral three weeks ago (she had Alzheimer's) and he appears to be doing alright.

    6. Poor thing!

      Please give her a hug for me, and I hope it can all be sorted soon x

    7. So sorry your dearly beloved is suffering badly .

      When we met accidentally years ago at Compton Abbas airfield , both Moh and I were struck by the attractiveness of the pair of you , you both seemed to be tall and elegant and your wife a lovely tall fair haired friendly lady .
      Life is very cruel , some of us receive an unfair deal .

      Please convey our best thoughts to her . x

      1. How did you work it out?

        I wonder if i ever bump into (for example) Wibbling and his dogs whilst i am visiting my daughter in Soton if i have to give a secret code: “do you require less information?”

        Beware weird women approaching you saying those words!!!

        2. There can’t be many people who fit the description of wibbling and his dogs, surely?

  52. Cmon now.. one extra push.. record almost reached for a week.

    Monday alone 879 migrants crossed the Channel..

    in background the malfunctioning robot repeats.. ‘smashing the gangs’ ‘smashing the gangs’ ‘smashing the gangs’

    1. Matt Goodwin calls it..

      The obliteration of a British identity, culture and way of life that has existed on these islands for centuries.. one dinghy at a time, day in day out.

    2. Wouldn't it be far more sensible to hear 'boatful of violent savages ordered to return to France. They refused. RTB for re-arming.'.

      Starmer has no interest in stopping the invasion of criminals.

      1. The graph is a histogram? of the wireless channel bandwidth. The shaded bits are the radio signals.

        If you're (the device user) stuck inside a congested channel then you will find it hard to get a decent connection.

        TLDR: wireless is like a big dinner party. As more people arrive, everyone talks a bit louder to be heard over the din. Over time, you can't hear the person next to say and say 'What was that?' (retransmission) and eventually you drop out altogether (slow connections).

  54. This inner city London footie channel has a huge worldwide audience.. and is sponsored by Google.

    Also, it is praised for its competitive, combative and yet good nature compared to the ghettoes of France & South American where violence and drama breaks out every game.
    .
    hmmmm.. they seem to get along but but but..
    .
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PH6V7XUQDU

          1. I have been feeling a little fragile after yesterday lunch but a glass of Champagne soon put a stop to that !

            What wine would you serve with long pig?

          4. If I remember correctly, in the film "The Silence of the Lambs", Hannibal Lecter claims to have drunk Chianti with the census taker's liver, perhaps AI has a sense of humour?

  55. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/07/03/blob-reform-government-michael-deacon/

    This is, in microcosm, the problem Reform face. The blob simply saying 'no', and there being no recourse to force them to obey.

    I doubt Farage knows the laws he would need to repeal and impose (and that the Left would fight him on that very same law, tying him in knots trying to pass a law to allow him to pass laws). Until he does, and actively set about a plan to unravel the knot of red tape he will achieve nothing.

    The establishment have spent decades ensuring that nothing gets done they do not want done, with one law hinging on another on another on another to ensure absolute paralysis except statism.

    And no, for the cultural folk, the state has ensured the knot is so thick it cannot be cut by the proverbial sword.

  56. OT – at 9.30 this morning, ten miles from the nearest sea, we saw an Oystercatcher sauntering about on a bit of grass a few yards from us next to a farmshop. They are very common on the coast – but never seen one this far inland. Is it unusual??

    3. We have them on the field opposite us. We’re about 8 miles from Kincardine on Forth.

    1. Put barbed wire fencing around the Nightingale Hospitals unless they've been demolished. I whick case leave a load of bricks and cement and let them build their own accomidation before being deported.

    3. It's worth pointing out, if ew were to build such we would need one of these just about every 4 days.

      Every. Four. Days.

      That's the extent of the invasion.

  59. Repositioned ethernet/wifi repeater to end bedroom over mains wiring from router:

    still connected at 2.4GHz.

    Listed as channel 1 with 40Mhz bandwidth and spanning two other transmissions.

        1. I like the pretty colours, but have no idea what the heck the graph means. What do the x and the y axes represent?

          1. Signal Strength / Channel No

            Red = A O'E WiFi
            other colours = other users' WiFi signals nearby

          2. The y axis represents the level of power being transmitted by the various (colour coded ) WiFi routers that you are receiving by your PC, smartphone or tablet.
            The x axis represents how high up the frequency spectrum the various router transmissions are occupying – these are numbered in bands starting at 1 for the 2.4MHz band.
            It is better to be able to connect to a router transmitting in its own band and not overlapping others.

      2. Been seeing your posts,, so ran a speed check. Used two different test sites. Average 58 Mbps.

        Thank you Elon…

  60. Good Day!

    Today Elizabeth Nickson returns with Is The Feminist Stronghold Showing Cracks? – a cry from the heart on the degeneration of modern feminism from a cause both women and men could support to shrill, strident and angry man hatred that is ruining the lives of both sexes.

    We also have the 5th part of our series, No War With Russia, The covert terrorist war at sea , and ZYY's article on Emperor Xi, Behind the Red Curtain: The Cracks in Xi’s China .

    Energy Watch: Over the last 24 hours: Britain's electric power was sourced from Gas, 30.3%; Solar, 8.9%: Wind 17.9%; Imports, 12.7%; Biomass, 10.9%; Nuclear 16.3% and Miscellaneous, 3.1%.

    freespeechbacklash.com

    1. I don't doubt that all of the Labour front bench have done the same. Are they all going to be exposed and punished or is she the scapegoat?

      1. They're all going to have to take refuge offshore…Chagos Isalnds? Oops, can't go there…how about Gibraltar?

    2. Hmmm. The MSM is remarkably silent about this. There is nothing online anywhere about this "shock judgment."

      Sounds fishy to this old cynic.

      1. Yes, given that they're all up to the same game, would they really want it dragged out into the open?

        1. If it were true – there would be a report somewhere (the Fail, for example).

          1. I find it strange too. How could she amass a fortune when her parents were just primary school teachers?

          2. £76,000 a year rent for 10 years + interest at 4%…..= £912,000 – soon mounts up.

      1. My link (in very small letters top left corner) states "altered or synthetic content"

      2. I've tried a number of searches and can find nothing to back up this story – pity! Online that clip, in various forms, seems to have been around since late May!

      4. I'm sure it's not, unfortunately. There was something about starmer being finished, but that, again, unfortunately, was not true.
        Just somebody getting our hopes up.

  65. I posted the other day that my friend’s wife, “big” in Reform, reported that Yussuf has hijacked Welsh Reform for his mates – but, as she was one of only two women left standing after the putsch, we speculated she might be OK.

    Today i learn she has been “invited” to “resign” her rile as Chair of the Swansea (?) branch.

    Did i post the interview Nick Buckley did earlier this year with Catherine Blakelock and how she was stitched up by our Nige? I also had a good friend who was doing a lot of work for the Brexit Party, before being “stood down” for the 2019 election. He wasn’t happy.

    My Welsh friend is not hapy. He has underwritten his wife (i.e. Reform) to the tune of tens of thousands. It’s not about the money. It’s about the principle and the behaviours.

    What do we do?

    1. Honestly I don't think there is anything you can do. I doubt there is a formal mechanism for structure and certainly won't be one to manage the assignment of roles. I would imagine it is all entirely arbitrary with chums getting the posts and everyone else being ignored.

      Sadly, I imagine we all know that this isn't limited to Reform. All of them operate in a crony/jobs for the boys set up.

    2. All I can think of is sympathy. Bugger-all use, but nothing else comes to mind – the world of politics is not one I know about.

  66. Hmm Public Interest you say…..Well I'm damn well interested
    "Just received an FOI response from the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) over their prosecution of non-violent Southport protestors:

    The request sought internal documents relating to charging decisions, legal thresholds, and strategy.

    It also asked for any correspondence involving the Home Office, Ministry of Justice, or the Attorney General’s Office concerning such matters.

    Why?

    Because during the fast-tracked prosecutions—requested by Starmer—the CPS appeared to shift its legal approach.

    Instead of charging individuals under regular speech legislation like the Malicious Communications Act 1988 or Section 127 of the Communications Act 2003—which carry maximum sentences of 12 months to 2 years—the CPS turned to Section 19 of the Public Order Act 1986.

    The big difference between those acts?

    The Public Order Act carries a maximum sentence of 7 years.

    In effect, they used the broader context of violence, which these protestors did not commit and there was no material evidence proving they caused, to seek the harshest punishment available.

    According to reports, Attorney General Lord Hermer was instrumental in steering this strategy behind the scenes.

    The CPS has now confirmed it is applying a public interest test to determine whether the material should be released.

    It may uncover more details on what prompted the course of action they took—and whether political pressure played a role.

    They are legally required to respond within 20 working days.

    Will obviously post an update when they get back"
    . https://x.com/StarkNakedBrief/status/1940697446369153269

  67. A lot of Nottlers will know this group. Same age group.
    https://scontent-cdg4-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/514712186_10234311624946161_6981231995725399167_n.jpg?stp=dst-jpg_s640x640_tt6&_nc_cat=1&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=aa7b47&_nc_ohc=4Jks1chtrGwQ7kNvwGlWV8G&_nc_oc=Adm34n8T-DDkVcKK1AtfhsEksk2IKaERSiFdMQGT_8RSFbJmpDLGIqiT3N–e1JlTSk5uk5AKoPWzFTUZNDR9FUD&_nc_zt=23&_nc_ht=scontent-cdg4-2.xx&_nc_gid=47HlrKs76rUXRiQTCxZ4dg&oh=00_AfPSpPv0b0_LE_Y7hbMMDkCMPqUDYWm5LMde_-3r0xzWXg&oe=686C52A2

    1. Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Cliff Richard, Ringo Starr – and Me ! . . .

      "When I'm Eighty Four" !

  69. And now let’s bomb Glastonbury
    Rod Liddle

    Asmall yield nuclear weapon, such as the American W89, dropped on Glastonbury in late June would immediately remove from our country almost everybody who is hugely annoying. You would see a marked reduction in the keffiyeh klan, for a start, and all those middle-class Extinction Rebellion protestors would find, in a nanosecond, that their rebellion was pointless, because extinction had arrived even more summarily than they expected. Go on, glue yourselves to that, Poppy and Oliver.

    Street drummers, liberal politicians, provo vegans, radical rappers, spiritual healers, Billy Bragg, that bloke who owns Forest Green Rovers, druggies, tattooed blue-haired hags, almost the entirety of middle-class London – all evaporated. I am not saying that we should do this, of course – it would be a horrible, psychopathic thing to do. I am merely hypothesising, in a slightly wistful kinda way. One on Glasto, one on Brighton, and the UK would soon begin its recovery, with only a few chunks of gently glowing cobalt 60 left to remind us of what we are missing.

    The BBC would cease to exist, too. It identifies Glastonbury as an expression of the UK ‘coming together’, which shows you how much it understands about the country. It has poured millions of pounds of licence-payers’ money into its coverage, and 400 staff were there last weekend, including the director-general, Tim Davie. Or at least 400 staff were actually working there – I’ll bet another 400 or so were there in their little tents, desperate to surf the vibe or whatever the phrase is. All those people, then, and they still couldn’t get it right.

    Nor should we take seriously their claims that pulling the ridiculous Bob Vylan from air would not be anywhere near as simple as flicking a switch. It is every bit as simple as flicking a switch, in that all they had to do was flick a switch. They had rafts of presenters who could have filled the time, plus cameras at every other stage in the festival site. All it needed was someone with the merest vestige of sentience to make the decision – but, then, this is the BBC we are talking about. Whoever was in charge of output at that moment – almost certainly someone called ‘Johnny’ or ‘Ayesha’ – probably just thought the stuff about the IDF was ‘top bants’.

    In truth, I am not much worked up about the Bob Vylan (or Kneecap) stuff, per se. They were only doing what an endless list of hip young musicians have done at every summer festival going all the way back to Country Joe McDonald and ‘one-two-three-four what are we fighting for?’ – i.e., channelling infantile far-left agitprop devoid of nuance and context to an audience of gullible drongos. The difference is that the BBC decided to cover it, thinking – as it unquestionably does – that the majority of the country would be cheerfully humming along with Bob Vylan’s tuneful music and are entirely down with the sentiments expressed. That is the BBC’s real crime.

    It is worth a brief digression here on the nature of protest songs, of rock musicians playing politics and whether they have an effect or not. The BBC would argue that they do have an effect, that they tap into a perhaps previously unexpressed sentiment among the wider public and hence herald great change.

    Au contraire. In the mid- to late-1960s, the more protest songs and festival chants there were, the further to the right swung the rest of the electorate. As evidence, I would point you in the direction of Richard Nixon’s comprehensive victory in 1968 and then, after Country Joe had done his stuff at Woodstock, a landslide in 1972. They all seriously believed McGovern was going to win that one, so wrapped up inside their radical bubble were they all (including the broadcasters). All those youthful protests of the 1960s resulted in surprise victories for the right at the polls a few years later – in the UK with Ted Heath in 1970, in France with an unexpected win for Pompidou in 1969, and of course the USA. The more fervently they insist that they are right, the more likely it is that the rest of the country will tell them to get stuffed.

    I suppose it is possible that Bob Vylan will do for Tim Davie, the DG – although he is the least of the corporation’s problems, frankly. He knows he has a workforce which, in its arrogance, subscribes to a set of political beliefs unshared by the people who pay for its existence. And it is so endemic that there is nothing he can do about it. One little thing I noticed: the BBC News dutifully covered the Bob Vylan debacle and did so even handedly. But on every single occasion, on radio and TV, the story was immediately followed by a report of Israeli ‘atrocities’ in Gaza. Every single time. Do you think that is an accident?

    There was a programme on BBC Radio 4 on Monday, as part of the ‘Currently’ series, about Louise Lancaster, an environmental protestor who was finally (on her fifth conviction) handed down a four-year sentence (later reduced to three years) for organising a protest which seriously inconvenienced hundreds of thousands of people. You would be hard-pressed to find a more egregiously biased example of broadcasting. Lancaster – a middle-class teacher from Grantchester – was portrayed as a kind of saint, suffering state persecution for her entirely valid beliefs. The Sun and Daily Mail were mentioned disparagingly and every action taken by Lancaster lauded. The BBC decided first to commission this rubbish and then put it out. Can you imagine it doing a similar piece about Lucy Connolly? Not a chance.

    That is the real problem with the BBC. It is utterly incapable of recognising the bias it displays every day on an hourly basis, no matter how often that bias is pointed out. Bob Vylan, frankly, is the least of it.

    1. As Mr Liddle points out, the Left just don't understand why they're wrong. Even when it is obvious and staring them in the face, their inate hypocritical self righteousness blinds them to seeing how evil they are.

  70. Breezy afternoon, have had an early dog walk , not too far for me or Pip or Moh, why, because he mis swung his golf club in the garden off his practise mat , and then started hobbling .. too much swing , I think.

    Sprinkler on , the breeze is directing water to our few thirsty garden plants , and hydrangeas.

    Sadly had to console a lovely lady who had lost her elderly father last Friday, he was a really good person , and such a sharp happy man , with a huge sense of humour .

    Just saying , Moh and I enjoyed a little piece of cooked cold chicken breast , fresh tomatoes , celery , half an avocado and half a kiwi fruit flesh , altogether .. sprinkled with salt and pepper , very refreshing .

    Tennis is a bit tedious .

    That chancellor should be crying, she has ruined the economic health of the UK, and that shocking stiff https://media2.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPTg5OGZmOWM5dW1wZWhwMWl6dTN6NHpja205MWoyMDVqc29vcG9mNXhxYWw4aXlnOCZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/RRRkSOIufZkX20Sip3/giphy-downsized-small.mp4 called Starmer should call it a day and just clear off , taking his motley bunch with him.

  71. Breezy afternoon, have had an early dog walk , not too far for me or Pip or Moh, why, because he mis swung his golf club in the garden off his practise mat , and then started hobbling .. too much swing , I think.

    Sprinkler on , the breeze is directing water to our few thirsty garden plants , and hydrangeas.

    Sadly had to console a lovely lady who had lost her elderly father last Friday, he was a really good person , and such a sharp happy man , with a huge sense of humour .

    Just saying , Moh and I enjoyed a little piece of cooked cold chicken breast , fresh tomatoes , celery , half an avocado and half a kiwi fruit flesh , altogether .. sprinkled with salt and pepper , very refreshing .

    Tennis is a bit tedious .

    That chancellor should be crying, she has ruined the economic health of the UK, and that shocking stiff https://media2.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPTg5OGZmOWM5dW1wZWhwMWl6dTN6NHpja205MWoyMDVqc29vcG9mNXhxYWw4aXlnOCZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/RRRkSOIufZkX20Sip3/giphy-downsized-small.mp4 called Starmer should call it a day and just clear off , taking his motley bunch with him.

  72. Here is a controversial idea. On 6 June 1944 Britain lost 1400 men killed. Same the next day and for many days. This (what would now be called) carnage was an acceptable price to pay to win the war and retain our freedom.

    If the Royal Navy went out and sank all one day's rubber boats – several hundred lives would be lost. International outrage would follow, of course. But I'll bet you a shilling that the rate of crossing would drop like a stone.

    1. There’s a regular contributor in the Telegraph comments (who may have a couple of distant relatives in the Trumpton fire crew) who would call you inhumane for making such a suggestion.

      1. Ah! The delightful Edwin Pugh! Always a merry quip, and never an ad hominem attack!

    2. My bet would be that the people smugglers would just fill the next lot of boats with women and young children (assuming they could find enough), a Trojan Horse; and the politicians would then just open the gates to all comers when they found the RN had killed so many "innocents"

    4. I think the vast majority of British people would wholly Support that Bill.
      But we have the most obviously stupid pile of detritus ever known currently inside of Wastemonster..

      Back then in the war one of my father's elder brothers was aboard a hospital ship in the channel on the way home with many colleagues who had been wounded fighting at El Alamein.
      The ship was bombed by a 'king German pilot all lives lost.

      1. "Enslavement would be a good thing, wouldn't it?"

        Nasty, stupid ingrate. Not actually struggling for a income either, is she?

    2. Don’t link pensions with benefits. Most pensioners have paid in to the system.

  78. Who really built this country?
    Douglas Murray

    Anyone who has visited Canada or Australia in recent years might have noticed an interesting new tradition. This is the trend for issuing a ‘land acknowledgement’ at the start of any public event. Before discussion gets under way, some bureaucrat or other will get up and note that we are all fortunate enough to be on the land of X, and then garble the name of some not-especially-ancient tribe. The moment gives everyone a feeling of deep meaning and naturally achieves nothing.

    Even our King indulged in some of this in May when he opened the latest session of the Canadian parliament. Before getting down to the meat of his speech, Charles said: ‘I would like to acknowledge that we are gathered on the unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabeg people.’ You would have thought that by dint of his being King and addressing a parliament the land had been very much ceded.

    In any case this is the modern routine. Everybody pays tribute to an extinct or almost extinct tribe, giving the sense that anyone other than the members of the said tribe is an interloper and that indigenous peoples are everywhere and always to be revered. Their ways are forever understood to be the ways of peace. Their customs, habits, crafts and learnings are to be discussed as having a connection to some ancient wisdom, long lost to our own wretched materialistic societies.

    One interesting thing is that concern for indigenous rights has exceptionally firm borders. The delineation of those borders are clear. All indigenous peoples must be allowed to have rights, just so long as the people in question are not white and do not originate from our own continent.

    The brouhaha over last weekend’s Glastonbury festival nicely clarified some of this. Pascal Robinson-Foster, singer of the rap group Bob Vylan, has been much commented upon because of his ‘death to the IDF’ chant. But another of his charming ditties got far less attention. This one consisted of him jumping around screaming: ‘Heard you want your country back. Ha. Shut the fuck up.’ As he repeated this, things like ‘This country was built on the backs of immigrants’ flashed up on a screen at the back of the stage. I’m not sure that anyone could come up with a more irksome and divisive message if they tried. The taunt is clear: ‘If you are English and think this is your country then I have news for you. Nope. It’s ours now.’

    Others have been ratcheting up a similar message. At last year’s general election, a man called Shakeel Afsar ran as an Independent in Birmingham Hall Green and Moseley, and was only a few thousand votes away from becoming the area’s MP. He is the sort of person who is usually described by local media as a ‘firebrand’. I’m not sure that does him justice. His public life has mainly consisted of insisting that Birmingham will not allow the inventor of Islam – Mohammed – to be in any way criticised or ridiculed. Afsar is also not a fan of Prime Minister Modi of India, for obvious sectarian reasons. In a recent interview, he was asked about the line that a few brave souls have had the temerity to utter in recent years: that if you want to bring your Third World beliefs to our country and replay the same failed playbook here, then perhaps there are other countries – including your family’s country of origin – in which it might be better for you to live.

    This was how Afsar responded: ‘Our forefathers were instrumental in rebuilding this country after the second world war. It was our grandfathers who worked in the factories 20 hours. It was our grandfathers who came here and ran the infrastructure. It was our grandfathers who brought you the lovely curry which is your national dish. So how can you tell us to go? We’re not going nowhere. We’re here to stay. We’re not here to take part. We’re here to take over.’

    That would seem to me to be almost the definition of a threatening statement, and one almost perfectly designed to stir up the worst sentiments of the human heart. Personally I feel these sentiments throbbing through me when I hear statements like this, or those Mr Robinson-Foster decided to project from the stage at Glastonbury.

    Keir Starmer, Danny Boyle (who directed the 2012 Olympics opening ceremony) and others have long insisted that this country was effectively built by the Windrush generation. If they had pitched this ball a little shorter they might have been on to something. If they had said that our country had a rich and distinct history and that we owe ‘something’ to those who came after the last war then they might have brought more people along with them. But the suggestion that the British were an essentially uninteresting and bad people until the noble migrants came to rescue us is a story that is not only false but insulting.

    So back to the retort that this new type of anti-British demagogue inevitably wishes to provoke. They want a backlash along the lines of: ‘Actually this is not your country. It’s mine. Your grandfathers may have done something, but mine did far more for a lot longer and to much greater effect. The benefits of the recipe for curry we might litigate another time. But I prefer everything that was already ours.’

    And so the language of indigenous rights that has been pushed on our friends in Australia and North America finally comes back around to the people it was never meant to assist. Yes – many feel they would like their country back. Many do not wish their country to be taken over. We were here first, they’ll think. That’s how it works, right?

    ****************************

    Spectator User
    9 hours ago
    Across London are little brown plaques commemorating black immigrant social landmarks – the first black train driver, the first black gynaecologist, for example.

    However worthy these individuals may have been, it’s clear that the real message to the locals is, don’t dare suggest that immigration may have been a mixed experience – even though the singling out of this one demographic is its own proof.

    A balanced story of mid-to-late 20th century immigration has yet to be written. We know about the sometimes-vicious racism that black and brown immigrants endured and we know that many worked hard and sought to fit in and make a home here. Much less mentioned is the kindness shown, and the welcome offered, by many working class whites who had little to gain from immigration and much to lose – competition for housing and jobs for example.

    Never mentioned are the adjustments a largely traditional and conservative people had to make to a loud, flamboyant and increasingly assertive black population and a brown population that was often literally incommunicative, inward-looking and incomprehensible. Help was on hand for the newcomers. We locals were told our unease was due to racism and we need shut up and put up.

    Strangely absent from the ‘built by immigrants’ story is the Jewish contribution and, particularly, the Irish contribution. Is that because their story is far less equivocal and their assimilation more complete?

    TheSceptic Spectator User
    8 hours ago
    Surely, we should add plaques commemorating other great contributions? We could have, say, first immigrant terrorist, greatest immigrant terrorist, first leader of a grooming gang, and a few more.

    Hominoidal Tendencies TheSceptic
    3 hours ago
    …most rapes of white girls, most rapes of Sikh girls, most honour killings, most crimes enabled by knife or machete…

    Mark Forman Spectator User
    8 hours ago
    I continuously echo these sentiments . The Medway Towns opened their hearts to the Asian Ugandans kicked out by Idi Amin in the early 70s. Overnight my local secondary school took in teachers and pupils . There were no protests at school or in the areas where they were accommodated . They were welcomed with open arms and given lots of sympathy..

    AA-Bill Mark Forman
    an hour ago
    In Dorset it was somewhat a different story.
    The local job centres in Weymouth and Dorchester were advertising for cleaners, cooks and gardeners to be employed at a nearby disused army camp because the the newly arrived likes of Yasmin Alibi Brown kicked off because such menial tasks were beneath them, they were demanding servants.

    1. "…the Jewish contribution and, particularly, the Irish contribution. Is that because their story is far less equivocal and their assimilation more complete?"

      And others from Europe who settled quietly without much bother. I went to school in the 60s and 70s with the sons and daughters of Poles, Yugoslavians, Hungarians, Cypriots, Maltese and Italians.

      2. To be fair, Bill, I pay for my gas and electricity via Octopus, who always encourage us to play "The Wheel Of Fortune" for each reading we take. It seems that no-one ever wins. And yet, and yet, I once won something from Octopus: a £1 refund on my bill! (As a famous supermarket chain says: "Every Little Helps" Lol.

      3. To be fair, Bill, I pay for my gas and electricity via Octopus, who always encourage us to play "The Wheel Of Fortune" for each reading we take. It seems that no-one ever wins. And yet, and yet, I once won something from Octopus: a £1 refund on my bill! (As a famous supermarket chain says: "Every Little Helps" Lol.

  80. All done at the physiotherapist and the gp surgery. Physio very pleased with my progress, another appointment later this month. Nurse removed the dressing and I almost feel like playing tennis….it seems to be trending.
    I just read that more primary schools are to merge because of the falling birthrate.
    The political idiots have yet to realise that when they tax the backsides off the only people who are working and paying taxes they can't afford to have more children and are already supporting the none taxpayers all over the country. Costing us 15 billion each year.
    It's enough to bring a tear to 'ones' eye.

    1. If "family allowance" was only given as a tax break on earnings it might encourage people to go out to work.

      2. Apparently a large amount of those not working are claiming benefits on mental health issues.
        The way forward is to cancel all of this fictitious nonsense.
        Same old story every single thing the 'they' come into contact with they eff it up.

    2. Primary schools closing? But what about all the primary school aged men arriving in the dinghies?

  82. Wordle No. 1,475 4/6

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

    Wordle 3 Jul 2025

    A bloomin' Par Four?

    1. Managed a 3 today.

      Wordle 1,475 3/6

      ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
      🟩🟩⬜⬜🟩
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    2. Bogey for me today.

      Wordle 1,475 5/6

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

    3. Was a bit hesitant about going for a triple-letter answer, dont recall a previous one?

      Wordle 1,475 4/6

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

    4. Not golfing today but still a par

      Wordle 1,475 4/6

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

  83. Forgive me for being uncharacteristically cynical. A young wendyball player is killed in a car crash. Very sad. Happily married; three young children.
    A waste of a life (and that of his brother).

    But the press is turning the tragedy into a Lady Di Weepfest. Even (or, perhaps) expectedly, Woke Willy posts a tribute as a member of the "footballing family".

    Has everything gone barmy? Or is it just grumpy old me?

      1. Good afternoon, Ndovu. Do you mean that everything has gone barmy, or that it is just grumpy old Bill. Clarity of expression on this site often leaves a lot to be desired.

    2. I'm with you, Bill.
      Sad to see a promising life snuffed out, but it's not the end of the world.
      More positively, a project manager from my employer came across a 3 year-old and her mother, where the 3-Y-O had stopped breathing. He put his offshore first aid training to good use, and saved the wee lass: Joy unconstrained! Good on him. That's much better news to read!

    3. "Happily married; three young children?" Yet the story I read suggested that he only got round to getting married a couple of weeks ago. I hope he got round to family insurance a bit more quickly.

          1. Well at least she’ll have the benefits of being married when it comes to inheritance.

    4. Darwin Award
      PSV…Special Licence
      HGV…Special Licence
      Supercar ?? same Licence as Aunty Jo needs to take her fiesta down the shops
      10 min lead item on the lunchtime news total overkill
      FAFO

    5. No it isn’t just you. My neighbour was saying the same thing earlier. The world’s Topsy Turvy and there’s no sense at all.

    6. The starting price for a new Lamborghini Urus in the UK is around £191,564, but can easily exceed £200,000 with optional extras and customizations. Used models can be found from around £144,000.

      That is what he was driving , probably too fast.

      Young men who play football are paid to much .. Glamour cars claim many lives .

      1. I have owned and driven some fast cars in my life, but with age and experience, I learned to enjoy them without piling them up. Only got rid of my last one a couple years back – because getting out of it was becoming a challenge!

        The standard driving test almost anywhere, is no preparation for such vehicles. When I started driving, the insurance compamies would laugh at young drivers who wanted fast cars. When I decided to buy a Lotus Cortina back when I worked at Ford, my insurance agent (who I had used for years) told me point blank I would have to be 25 to get it insured.

        And now of course, we are seeing very high performance electrics in the mix, with equivalent horsepowers up in the 500-1000 range. Just the thing for immature, full of themselves, drivers.

        1. My little 1300 cc Alfa was powerful enough to be fun to drive, I didn't need a massive v12 turbocharged monster to be enjoyable.

          want the thrill of fast driving? There are plenty of fun racing car categories that can thrill you. I tried formula Ford – lowish powered open wheel racing without the F1 expense.

          1. Mine was not that exotic – just 400+bhp of late model Corvette. And Vettes have always been performance bargains. The current model will see off a Ferrari, yet costs a fraction of the price.

          2. Classic Mini, Cooper or otherwise, was really good fun to drive. My Traveller was magic, and when it's finished rebuilt, Firstborn's van will be something else! 1 400 engine, straight-cut gearbox, limited slip diff, …

        2. When I bought my first MG Midget I had just turned 25. If I hadn't, I probably wouldn't have been able to get insurance.

    7. A friend of mine who owns a joinery works and whose hobby is fast cars drives a very powerful BMW. The car was limited in its production numbers and he was required to satisfy the sellers that he was competent to handle the raw power.

      It seems from reports that the footballer’s car was powerful and a mishap occurred whilst overtaking. It is rare for modern tyres to blow out unless severely worn or damaged in some way. We will never be told the true facts.

      I agree that the comments by Woke Willy are unseemly. What does he mean with references to a football family and why does he associate himself with football anyway. He claims to be a supporter of Aston Villa which has always mystified me.

    8. no
      Everything IS barmy, because on some level the establishment knows that hyperinflation is just round the corner and a series of slushy, Netflix or Disney style stories, one after the other, fill the news as distraction because whatever you do, you must NOT lose faith in the fiat currency or withdraw your wealth from the financial system!
      plus it is summer
      and Woke Willy desperately wants to be relevant whilst retaining his parasite class privileges.

          1. I do like it when cartoonists pay homage to other cartoonists and artists – shows exceptional talent.

    11. Very clever accident investigation. Blown tyre apparently. Given that there was little left of the vehicle after the fire, apart from metal shards, that's a quick and clever finding.

    12. It's Liverpool.
      A combination of wendyball and Scouse sentimentality is deadly.
      (Not you, Spikey.)

          2. It wasn't so much a reference to Maradonna (I'm not really into football) as a reference to an Act of God.

    13. Sick joke of the evening:
      Doctors told him not to fly.
      He flew his car.
      His fault.

  86. Prevening all. Another scorcher so I have got little done. I was expecting a call this morning but my mobile, which was literally to hand, didn’t ring and just went to voicemail. No answer when I tried to ring back. I need to renew my motorhome breakdown cover and rang up (on the landline) only to be told there was a 30 minute wait. I requested a call back. I am still waiting.

    Chatted to one of my neighbours this morning when I was walking the dogs. She has definitely turned into a faaar right raycist. We had a good laugh.

    1. Once dog walkers start expressing even the vaguest of political/state of the nation thoughts, then things are dire.

      1. To be fair, I was the one walking the dog, although she has a dog. She happened to be weeding her driveway as we walked past.

      1. I have the utmost respect for Matt. I honestly don't know how he comes up with brilliant ideas day after day after day. Genius!

        1. He is great, isnt he! I mean it’s not like he’s just vaguely amusing – he seems to absolutely nail it pretty much every day….he’s that good I’m starting to think he might be some sort of AI…. God, I hope not…..

          2. Hmmmmm…. that might be a good call, it would be a bit of a shame (cos we dont think he is) but it might explain his constant excellence!

    2. I imagine the state wants to ensure he'll get let off, so they're looking for an all muslim jury so it, like they are thoroughly corrupt.

      In a decent society the decision would have been immediate: assault a police officer, noose round the neck, hanged; within a few minutes of the offence. Maybe as plod have guns a airports they could have shot him but them someone has to clean up the mess and even if the other pollution had been made to do it someone then has to clean up that mess.

      This farce has gone on too long deliberately to protect the slammer.

      Execute them and be done. Let justice be served.

  90. Allister Heath
    Reeves must stop covering for shameful Starmer. She should quit now

    Britain is now just one blunder away from an IMF bailout and becoming a failed state

    02 July 2025 7:05pm BST

    A tearful, broken Chancellor; a selfish, buck-passing Prime Minister who cannot even pluck up the courage to sack her; fanatical MPs determined to veto even the most modest of spending cuts: welcome to Labour Britain, a failing, unserious, ungovernable country.

    Sir Keir Starmer is our Potemkin PM, a widely despised figurehead. Rachel Reeves remains, for now, our Chancellor in name only, her raison d’etre obliterated, her final mission to serve as Starmer’s human shield. Morgan McSweeney, Starmer’s chief of staff, is finished.

    The real power lies with an economically illiterate, fiscally irresponsible mob on the Labour backbenches, and their Cabinet allies, Angela Rayner and Ed Miliband. The Parliamentary party is now little more than a mismatched coalition at war with itself; factionalism rules, guaranteeing stasis and drift.

    It has taken just a year for this farce of a Government to run out of other people’s money, as all Left-wing administrations eventually do, yet it is now unclear who has the authority to grasp a situation that threatens to spiral out of control.

    Britain in 2025 feels ominously like a gigantic ponzi scheme on the brink of exposure, taking down everything and everybody with it: no wonder many young, ambitious people are dashing for the exits while they still can.

    Starmer will eventually sack Reeves, or she will quit in disgust, but whoever replaces her will either be a creature of the party’s tax-loving, anti-capitalist, spendthrift Left, or suffer her sorry fate. Her successor won’t be allowed to make any cuts, just hike taxes on the rich and successful, further crippling the economy.

    The next Chancellor will be under immense pressure to loosen the fiscal rules, and borrow with even more abandon. Labour’s experiment with technocratic social-democracy lasted exactly one year: whatever comes next will be much more explicitly socialist and destructive.

    Yet this is not merely the latest instalment in a Parliamentary theatre of the absurd, or even the human tragedy of a hubristic, over-promoted politician stabbed in the back by her party and cut adrift by her honourless leader. This is real life, and the situation is grave.

    Britain is nearing a point of maximal danger. The budget deficit is too high, and gilt yields have been rising. The economy is barely growing. Tax increases aren’t yielding much.

    This is the moment when political crises typically metastasise into financial meltdowns, when the markets begin to treat us like a failed state, sell the currency and push up interest rates.

    Britain is one political blunder away from a run on the pound, an emergency Budget and a bailout by the IMF. It was striking how sterling slumped when it looked as if Reeves was about to be axed during PMQs: the markets don’t love her, but they are terrified that her successor could be even worse.

    The tragedy of Reeves is that she has no friends, no defenders, but she actually understands the need to speak the language of business and to give the impression that she is trying to balance the books. I will never forgive her for slapping VAT on school fees, for lying about the Tory black hole, for attacking farmers so pitilessly, for wasting billions on useless pay rises for the public sector, for breaking her manifesto promise on National Insurance, for destroying the economy. But in a desperate world of least-awful options, she was nevertheless the last bulwark against neo-Corbynite madness.

    She was right to seek to cut welfare spending.

    The obscene increase in the number of people receiving the mobility section of enhanced personal independence payments (PIPs) is laid bare in a TaxPayers’ Alliance analysis of the official statistics. The numbers exploded from 734,136 in January 2019 to 1,754,739 in April 2025, a 139 per cent increase driven by widespread, officially sanctioned abuse of our welfare state.

    The number of recipients claiming because of autism surged from 26,256 to 114,211, for anxiety and depression from 23,647 to 110,075; for ADHD from 4,233 to 37,339. Successful claims for acne, obesity, drug and alcohol misuse and even writers’ cramp all jumped. Some thirteen people receive enhanced PIPs for “factitious disorders” with deliberately falsified symptoms, including munchausen syndrome.

    The Left have no interest in tackling this. They are much more interested in what they see as the obvious solution: higher taxes. When not toasting Reeves’s imminent political demise, they have been excitedly sharing “Just raise tax”, the cover article in the New Statesman magazine, in their WhatsApp groups.

    The piece argues that Starmer’s “tax lock” – a pledge not to raise National Insurance, income tax and VAT – was an “act of cowardice”. The magazine’s thesis is that Britain’s “malaise” is caused by a state that is too small. It posits that “middle earners are not being taxed enough for the kind of state we want”. It argues that “the basic rate of income tax has not risen – not once, not by a penny – for more than 50 years”. It wants to replace employee National Insurance with a 5p hike in income tax designed to hammer savers and pensioners. It calls for a “land value tax”.

    Some of the suggestions to simplify tax on labour income make sense, but the Left will ignore those and simply see a new opportunity: massive rises in income tax at every level, and the confiscation of as much “unearned” wealth (to use the despicable Marxist term) as possible. They have spent years dreaming of a crippling wealth tax on property, targeting especially Tories in London or the Home Counties; with the Starmer-Reeves project in tatters, now is their opportunity.

    Owners of large gardens would be ruined, pensioners would have to sell, the rich would flee and the housing market would crash. If homeowners were levied even one per cent of the value of their home, they would need to pay £5,000 a year for a modest flat in London, and £10,000, £15,000 or much more for a house.

    Starmer has behaved disgracefully, and failed to stand up for Reeves. If she really believes in fiscal probity, and realises that full-on socialism isn’t the answer, she should stop covering for a Prime Minister who doesn’t deserve it. She should resign, and let somebody else clean up his mess.

    *********************************
    Helen Duckett
    22 hrs ago
    pinned
    The only people responsible for the utter mess are those that voted for Labour. The chickens are coming home to roost. It’s an utter shambles.

    Cunning Linguist
    22 hrs ago
    pinned
    Though I'm working class, albeit in a well paid role, I've never voted Labour nor for any of it affiliates. This is why. They do not govern for the betterment of the majority but for minorities and the workshy.

    Shame on those that voted for what, unfortunately, is rapidly becoming the worst UK Government in living memory.

    Socialism IsEvil
    22 hrs ago
    No foresight, no skills, no experience of anything significant and here she is, in charge of the 5th largest economy in the world, destroying all that she touches out of spite, envy and intellectual inadequacies. Stupidity alive and thriving in the Cabinet.

    1. one blunder away from an IMF bailout..
      Anyone that writes this about the UK is an idiot.

      IMF! On its last legs, and should have been disbanded when Bretton Woods collapsed.
      And before you ask.. but why did Jim Callaghan call in the IMF in 1976? Because he was an idiot that thought we still had fixed exchange rates.

      1. If we do go to the IMF – and it's increasingly likely – then I bet they'll put in that we must rechain to the hated EU.

        I can almost guarantee it. Then the entire civil service will say 'see, we told you so' and at that point unravel the entirely intentional destructive nonsense they've foisted on us.

        Recovering the economy is not economically difficult. It could be done overnight. The problem Labour have is they don't want to. They don't see a problem with spending, to them, the problem is revenue, having more to waste.

        This is a bunch of playground wasters who've never worked, never built anything, never grown anything, who've never run a company. They're children playing with toys they don't understand, egged on by a bunch of moronic thugs who think the state is the centre of the economy – because they profit from that ideology. The simplest solution is radical, significant tax cuts, real welfare cuts, scrapping welfare for gimmigrants for at least 10 years, the closure of multiple departments and hundreds of quangos.

        Does that sound like something the hard, socialist statist Left would ever want to consider?

  92. Bully-girl Red Rayner & her team circling the PM & Chancellor moving in for the kill.

  93. That's me for today. A curious, sultry day with a chill edge to the wind. Hoping for better tomorrow.

    Have a spiffing evening.

    A demain.

  94. Tommy Robinson denies harassing two MailOnline journalists.
    OMG he may even get a trail with a jury.

    Soooooooo MailOnline journalists give whereabouts, images, location and intel on Tommy's wife & kids to five Islamic groups so they can finish the job. And he says how would you like it if I turned up at your doorstep?

    1. It's odd – why would he say that then deliberately, spitefully make everyone poorer?

  97. Where is she now that we need her?
    Only a woman could have kicked arse like she did…

        1. Heath was the main problem back then he led us into the EU trap.
          Telling us that we were joining the ‘common market’.

  98. Babylon Bee strikes again!

    https://babylonbee.com/news/uk-police-release-updated-chart-showing-who-youre-allowed-to-be-racist-against

    “LONDON — In a move intended to help citizens direct their hatred toward the appropriate parties, UK police released an updated chart showing who you're currently allowed to be racist against.

    With residents unsure about which people groups they are allowed to hate, authorities said the updated chart should provide a useful road map to make sure everyone discriminates against the designated parties.

    "Here we are with your government-endorsed Hate Chart," said Constable Wellington Chestershire. "As you can see ‘ere, large groups of individuals from Africa and the Middle East who go ‘round rapin' and pillagin' is totally acceptable, while a poor, English grandmum prayin' on a street corner is a proper target for hate. She's got white skin, see? That's what you're to be lookin' for when you need to do some racism. Simple, innit?"

    Citizens expressed gratitude for the clarification provided by the new chart. "This helps a lot, for sure," said London resident Bertrom Kensingtonworth. "Here I was with all this racism welling up in me heart and needin' to know where I should put it. Now, I know to only point my anger toward native British white folks, preferably Christians. Thanks, police!"

    At publishing time, British authorities emphasized that caucasians born in the UK remained the top government-sanctioned group for racism, provided they were heterosexual and against having their country invaded by radical foreign-born Muslims.”

  100. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/6d6b397577d6bb10af52a6b900c82748927ba6f999373876471c8f354a74fb2c.jpg

    Is this true?

    "This is Princess Sophie Charlotte, born in 1744. She was the second Black Queen of England, married to King George III."
    She reigned during the American revolution and was Queen of the 13 original colonies before they won independence.
    "In fact Charlotte, North Carolina is named in her honor."
    BTW, Queen Charlotte is the great great grandmother of Elizabeth II and the great, great, great grandmother of Prince William’s (next to be King) young daughter, Charlotte.
    "Yes, there is African blood in the British Royal family!".

  101. and now from Guido:

    https://order-order.com/page/2/

    “There has been much wailing and gnashing of teeth in leftist circles at the decision by asset manager Aberdeen Group plc to kick out the group of tax hike enthusiasts running its charitable arm, “the abrdn financial fairness trust,” who since 2019 had turned it into a cashpoint for myriad organisations promoting tax increases and campaigning against spending cuts. Oh no!

    Since 2018 the Trust has been led by leftist activist Mubin Haq, who has been campaigning against the Labour Government’s now stymied welfare cuts and for assorted tax hikes. The trust’s highest paid employee was raking in between £110,000 and £120,000 according to public documents…

    Organisations who have over the years been in receipt of the trust’s circa £2 million per annum largesse are a roll call of the tax-raising blob, including:

    The Institute for Public Policy Research.
    IPPR Scotland. Even more radically left…
    New Economics Foundation. Corbynite…
    The Resolution Foundation.
    The Child Poverty Action Group.
    The IFS.
    Demos.
    The Fabian Society.
    The High Pay Centre.
    Poverty Alliance.
    TUC.

    Critically the abrdn trust provided £660,000 of seed funding to establish CenTax, the ‘tax the rich’ research group that was successful in persuading Labour to introduce its disastrous policies of attacking non-doms and imposing a death tax on family firms and farms. The Resolution Foundation has also cashed in to the amount of £367,000. The loss of this annual infusion of millions is a severe blow to leftist lobby groups but the real surprise is how long it took Aberdeen plc to stop its own charitable arm from promoting anti-capitalist policies that hurt savers…”

    1. I’m very pleased I sold my shares when they were at a reasonable level! My dear husband didn’t!

  102. Good Evening.
    Hurrah; fence panels painted. They are replacements, finished in a coloured preservative I can only describe as Romford Tan.
    At least they are now toned down and don't catch the eye.

      1. The fencing is rough wood and that, combined with a dry day meant the brush needed frequent reloading.

          4. Back in the day of pre teenagerism all of my friends had roller skates. We use to skate for miles.

  103. The lack of a washing machine for three days has seen the back of the kitchen turn into a very large washing pile. There's his, hers, Junior's, sorted into underwear, t shirts/tops and trousers. Not to mention towels, sundries and so on. It'd be quite neat if it were not 1. In the way. 2. Revolting.

    Junior is on his last school uniform. He has 6 – every day +1. We went shopping earlier for a couple more. The Warqueen regularly tells me she is not wearing any knickers. I said 'Good girl, we'll get two sets of coloureds in rather than 3.

    Apparently that wasn't the response she expected.

      1. Not really, no. New machine arrives tomorrow. Hoping it'll be early than can make a start on the piles.

    3. Well done, I'm impressed. I've never used a washing machine/drier in my life – I segued seamlessly from Mother to Wife (with one particularly impressive girlfriend in between, but dont tell anybody!). Women just seem so much better at that sort of shite (and I mean that most respectfully!!)……

      1. Let's hope, in that case, that you go first! You'll have a learning curve if you're left on your own.

        1. I get your point and I think I understand your own position (and I sincerely hope that I do go first) – however, if I didnt, I reckon I would just outsource all those types of tasks to some gorgeous Amazon who I would recruit from on-line (possibly Amazon!)

          1. I've been on my own for four years, but before that I had to do everything (MOH had dementia). I learned skills I never knew I had.

  104. Just now the bbc news were making a big deal about seemingly invented mass islamaphobia. Surprisingly the stand against has been backed by the mayor. Who pays the ferry man ?
    But never an investigation of why this might be taking place. As usual it's every one else's fault,
    but of their own self importance and there own version of intolerance in another country.

  105. muslim has slaughtered thousands in the UK alone. They're vicious thugs who pedal drugs and sit on welfare. They're parasites, vile, nasty, evil creatures who have no place in our society.

  106. Scientists have discovered something that goes on even longer than eternity.
    They have named it U-turnity
    As in life under Starmer

  107. There's been a lot of fuss about the Windrush folk "building the UK" after the war, but we don't hear anything about the Brits building nations such as Rhodesia, South Africa or the location of my early childhood, Nigeria.
    I asked Chat GPT about my Father, whose 99th birthday it would have been tomorrow, and amongst other stuff, I got this:

    "Oberstleutnant's Father was the founding Head of the Chemistry Department from its inception in 1962 until 1977
    http://physicalsciences.abu.edu.ng
    During his tenure, he steered the department’s transformation from offering combined honours degrees (Chemistry with Physics, Biology, or Math) to launching a stand-alone B.Sc. (Hons) in Chemistry by 1964, with the pioneering graduates completing their studies in 1967.
    His oversight was critical in training chemists suited for academia, research, industry, and public service—roles essential to Nigeria’s developmental goals at the time.
    While Oberstleutnant's Father's personal research publications remain elusive online, his leadership laid the foundation for what is today a vibrant Chemistry Department—actively contributing to fields like environmental chemistry, medicinal chemistry, food and pharmaceutical analysis, computational chemistry, and beyond.
    Much of the current department’s reputation for research excellence can be traced back to the institutional groundwork that he helped establish.
    Oberstleutnant's Father's groundwork positioned ABU’s Chemistry program as one of Nigeria’s first robust chemistry education hubs.

    Subsequent Nigerian scientists and educators, including locals like Prof. J. O. Amupitan (who joined later), built upon the structure he established.

    ABU is Ahmadu Bello University, Nigeria.

    So, Whitey also helped build these Black countries, and put a lot of effort into it. Don't forget that.

    Edit: Quote marks, for clarity

    1. It's just another loada bolero Obs.
      They've never stopped moaning since they arrived in the UK.
      Has there been a mention of Idi Amin his horrific murders and the many other dreadful Africans including the twenty thousand plus of his own people Mugabe killed. Because he knew that they wouldn't vote for him.

    2. Brits went to Africa and taught them how to build mud huts. Prior to the British invasion and colonisation, Africans had all been living in nice three-bedroom semi-detached houses with driveways and neatly-clipped hedges.

    3. When did the Windrush lot come over? What about the thousands of years of literature, culture, buildings, inventions and achievements that took place before their arrival? I am beyond cross.

      1. Makes you feel like that. After all, they don't want white help (now at any rate).

        1. They’ve got all the benefits – now they are trashing their own countries. If we hadn’t introduced civilisation, they wouldn’t be able to come over here…

  108. I'm not liking this ten year NHS health plan
    What happens to you after 11 years?

    4. I imagine, much like the national food strategy which doesn't discuss growing food, the energy strategy that has us shred our energy production that this NHS strategy is about killing people off.

  109. Oh I know it's early but I've had a busy day watching Wimbledon between my Hospital and surgery appointments. Even a nice long chat with an old friend I haven't seen for nearly a year. He only lives in Mill Hill Meeting soon for a boozey lunch.
    I was told that even though our car is an automatic I might have to clear it with my insurance company before I can drive again.
    I can't stop yawning, so I'm orff, goodnight all Nottlers😉 😴

  110. Zarah Sultana Quits Labour to Start New Party With Corbyn

    Zarah Sultana has just announced she has quit Labour to start and lead a new party with Jeremy Corbyn. She says:

    “Today, after 14 years, I’m resigning from the Labour Party.

    Jeremy Corbyn and I will co-lead the founding of a new party, with other Independent MPs, campaigners and activists across the country.

    Westminster is broken but the real crisis is deeper. Just 50 families now own more wealth than half the UK population. Poverty is growing, inequality is obscene and the two-party system offers nothing but managed decline and broken promises.

    A year ago, I was suspended by the Labour Party for voting to abolish the two-child benefit cap and lift 400,000 children out of poverty. I’d do it again. I voted against scrapping winter fuel payments for pensioners. I’d do it again.

    Now, the government wants to make disabled people suffer; they just can’t decide how much.

    Meanwhile, a billionaire-backed grifter is leading the polls, because Labour has completely failed to improve people’s lives. And across the political establishment, from Farage to Starmer, they smear people of conscience trying to stop a genocide in Gaza as terrorists.

    But the truth is clear: this government is an active participant in genocide. And the British people oppose it.

    We are not going to take this anymore.

    We’re not an island of strangers; we’re an island that’s suffering. We need homes and lives we can actually afford, not rip-off bills we pay every month to a tiny elite bathing in cash. We need our money spent on public services, not forever wars.

    In 2029, the choice will be stark: socialism or barbarism.

    Billionaires already have three parties fighting for them. It’s time the rest of us had one

    Join us. The time is now.”

    Corbo nudge-winked on the prospect of a new party last night on Peston. Sweat on brows in Downing Street and Labour HQ…

    July 3 2025 @ 20:25

    Captain Sensible
    19m
    Zarah should feel right at home with Magic Grandpa. They share a common interest.
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ec3a2675f424c0669d86a1965b27ba652da994e4ec0b77c9cfa900435cf942b6.png

    2. We're an island that's suffering because of the Labour Party mainly (Zanulabour under Blair and now Starmer) and other parties who had the chance to change direction but didn't and kept on following Labour's lead. The reason we can't afford homes is because the government keeps importing more and more people who need to be housed. We have rip-off bills because of government imposed taxes. Joining up with Corbyn is only going to make matters worse.

    3. Corbyn's mental. Anyone starting a new party should trigger a by election so their employers – the public – can get rid of the useless dross.

    4. Wow! That’s some hate-filled, virtue-signalling, kind and caring Lefty rant! I’d be surprised if her halo didn’t slip and choke her!

    5. She was suspended from the Labour Party for voting against the 'Two Child Benefit Cap'….

      Now I wonder why she might have done that…… beats me, any ideas? (anybody saying population replacement will get barred, Ok?)

        1. That's near enough Macfarlane – You're Barred!!

          Now get your cards and your comic and eff off down the road….

    6. Like all Lefties, she confuses the wrong decisions with not having achieved the outcomes she wants.

      Let's dismantle her stupidity.

      Inequality is high because when taxes are high rich people don't risk getting poorer. If taxes are lower, they stand more chance of getting richer, so spend their money on factories.

      Equally when legislation is crippling, you can't set up a rival company as you stand to lose more than you'd gain. This enforces unemployment.

      Paying feckless wasters to breed and then giving them more of other people's money is utterly, completely wrong. It is not 'good'. It's spite. You're stealing from the productive and giving it to dossers. There's a reason there's so much crime amongst the black and lower chav classes: poor parenting, discipline and endemic reward for failure.

      The winter fuel allowance was a response to high energy bills created by socialists to control the public. The simple solution would be to scrap the WFA and stop forcing the communist tax scam of 'climate change'.

      Bills are high because of 'climate change'. Water is expensive because the regulator is inept. The biggest bill we have is council tax – because the pointless non-jobbers in local government want big pensions.

      House pricews are high because of massive uncontrolled gimmigration – something you've forced and are the product of, Raisinhead. Same for every other cost, all passed on in useless legislation from the hated EU.

      Yes, we're suffering – we've 80+ million people consuming resources and only 20 million putting anything back – the few you hate so much.

      Every single problem is caused by the state, by Lefties, by soshulists. Of course, as usual, you Lefties simply cannot understand that you're the problem. You keep – insanely – thinking that more of the cause will solve the problems, where evidentially, it just makes everything worse.

      Sod off and resign. Get a real job mopping floors, although you'd screw that up.

      1. But, but, but this country was built on the back of immigrants. Immigrants rebuilt this country after the War. We owe them…

        Who really built this country?
        Douglas Murray

        Anyone who has visited Canada or Australia in recent years might have noticed an interesting new tradition. This is the trend for issuing a ‘land acknowledgement’ at the start of any public event. Before discussion gets under way, some bureaucrat or other will get up and note that we are all fortunate enough to be on the land of X, and then garble the name of some not-especially-ancient tribe. The moment gives everyone a feeling of deep meaning and naturally achieves nothing.

        Even our King indulged in some of this in May when he opened the latest session of the Canadian parliament. Before getting down to the meat of his speech, Charles said: ‘I would like to acknowledge that we are gathered on the unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabeg people.’ You would have thought that by dint of his being King and addressing a parliament the land had been very much ceded.

        In any case this is the modern routine. Everybody pays tribute to an extinct or almost extinct tribe, giving the sense that anyone other than the members of the said tribe is an interloper and that indigenous peoples are everywhere and always to be revered. Their ways are forever understood to be the ways of peace. Their customs, habits, crafts and learnings are to be discussed as having a connection to some ancient wisdom, long lost to our own wretched materialistic societies.

        One interesting thing is that concern for indigenous rights has exceptionally firm borders. The delineation of those borders are clear. All indigenous peoples must be allowed to have rights, just so long as the people in question are not white and do not originate from our own continent.

        The brouhaha over last weekend’s Glastonbury festival nicely clarified some of this. Pascal Robinson-Foster, singer of the rap group Bob Vylan, has been much commented upon because of his ‘death to the IDF’ chant. But another of his charming ditties got far less attention. This one consisted of him jumping around screaming: ‘Heard you want your country back. Ha. Shut the fuck up.’ As he repeated this, things like ‘This country was built on the backs of immigrants’ flashed up on a screen at the back of the stage. I’m not sure that anyone could come up with a more irksome and divisive message if they tried. The taunt is clear: ‘If you are English and think this is your country then I have news for you. Nope. It’s ours now.’

        The suggestion is that the British were an essentially bad people until the noble migrants came to rescue us

        Others have been ratcheting up a similar message. At last year’s general election, a man called Shakeel Afsar ran as an Independent in Birmingham Hall Green and Moseley, and was only a few thousand votes away from becoming the area’s MP. He is the sort of person who is usually described by local media as a ‘firebrand’. I’m not sure that does him justice. His public life has mainly consisted of insisting that Birmingham will not allow the inventor of Islam – Mohammed – to be in any way criticised or ridiculed. Afsar is also not a fan of Prime Minister Modi of India, for obvious sectarian reasons. In a recent interview, he was asked about the line that a few brave souls have had the temerity to utter in recent years: that if you want to bring your Third World beliefs to our country and replay the same failed playbook here, then perhaps there are other countries – including your family’s country of origin – in which it might be better for you to live.

        This was how Afsar responded: ‘Our forefathers were instrumental in rebuilding this country after the second world war. It was our grandfathers who worked in the factories 20 hours. It was our grandfathers who came here and ran the infrastructure. It was our grandfathers who brought you the lovely curry which is your national dish. So how can you tell us to go? We’re not going nowhere. We’re here to stay. We’re not here to take part. We’re here to take over.’

        That would seem to me to be almost the definition of a threatening statement, and one almost perfectly designed to stir up the worst sentiments of the human heart. Personally I feel these sentiments throbbing through me when I hear statements like this, or those Mr Robinson-Foster decided to project from the stage at Glastonbury.

        Keir Starmer, Danny Boyle (who directed the 2012 Olympics opening ceremony) and others have long insisted that this country was effectively built by the Windrush generation. If they had pitched this ball a little shorter they might have been on to something. If they had said that our country had a rich and distinct history and that we owe ‘something’ to those who came after the last war then they might have brought more people along with them. But the suggestion that the British were an essentially uninteresting and bad people until the noble migrants came to rescue us is a story that is not only false but insulting.

        So back to the retort that this new type of anti-British demagogue inevitably wishes to provoke. They want a backlash along the lines of: ‘Actually this is not your country. It’s mine. Your grandfathers may have done something, but mine did far more for a lot longer and to much greater effect. The benefits of the recipe for curry we might litigate another time. But I prefer everything that was already ours.’

        And so the language of indigenous rights that has been pushed on our friends in Australia and North America finally comes back around to the people it was never meant to assist. Yes – many feel they would like their country back. Many do not wish their country to be taken over. We were here first, they’ll think. That’s how it works, right?

        https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/who-really-built-this-country/?status=Non-subs&utm_medium=email&utm_source=CampaignMonitor_Editorial&utm_campaign=BLND%20FO%20%2020250703%20%20HOUSE%20ADS%20%20MG+CID_2a6f31a65ca79c193915a2c8def85799#comments-container

      2. But, but, but this country was built on the back of immigrants. Immigrants rebuilt this country after the War. We owe them…

        Who really built this country?
        Douglas Murray

        Anyone who has visited Canada or Australia in recent years might have noticed an interesting new tradition. This is the trend for issuing a ‘land acknowledgement’ at the start of any public event. Before discussion gets under way, some bureaucrat or other will get up and note that we are all fortunate enough to be on the land of X, and then garble the name of some not-especially-ancient tribe. The moment gives everyone a feeling of deep meaning and naturally achieves nothing.

        Even our King indulged in some of this in May when he opened the latest session of the Canadian parliament. Before getting down to the meat of his speech, Charles said: ‘I would like to acknowledge that we are gathered on the unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabeg people.’ You would have thought that by dint of his being King and addressing a parliament the land had been very much ceded.

        In any case this is the modern routine. Everybody pays tribute to an extinct or almost extinct tribe, giving the sense that anyone other than the members of the said tribe is an interloper and that indigenous peoples are everywhere and always to be revered. Their ways are forever understood to be the ways of peace. Their customs, habits, crafts and learnings are to be discussed as having a connection to some ancient wisdom, long lost to our own wretched materialistic societies.

        One interesting thing is that concern for indigenous rights has exceptionally firm borders. The delineation of those borders are clear. All indigenous peoples must be allowed to have rights, just so long as the people in question are not white and do not originate from our own continent.

        The brouhaha over last weekend’s Glastonbury festival nicely clarified some of this. Pascal Robinson-Foster, singer of the rap group Bob Vylan, has been much commented upon because of his ‘death to the IDF’ chant. But another of his charming ditties got far less attention. This one consisted of him jumping around screaming: ‘Heard you want your country back. Ha. Shut the fuck up.’ As he repeated this, things like ‘This country was built on the backs of immigrants’ flashed up on a screen at the back of the stage. I’m not sure that anyone could come up with a more irksome and divisive message if they tried. The taunt is clear: ‘If you are English and think this is your country then I have news for you. Nope. It’s ours now.’

        The suggestion is that the British were an essentially bad people until the noble migrants came to rescue us

        Others have been ratcheting up a similar message. At last year’s general election, a man called Shakeel Afsar ran as an Independent in Birmingham Hall Green and Moseley, and was only a few thousand votes away from becoming the area’s MP. He is the sort of person who is usually described by local media as a ‘firebrand’. I’m not sure that does him justice. His public life has mainly consisted of insisting that Birmingham will not allow the inventor of Islam – Mohammed – to be in any way criticised or ridiculed. Afsar is also not a fan of Prime Minister Modi of India, for obvious sectarian reasons. In a recent interview, he was asked about the line that a few brave souls have had the temerity to utter in recent years: that if you want to bring your Third World beliefs to our country and replay the same failed playbook here, then perhaps there are other countries – including your family’s country of origin – in which it might be better for you to live.

        This was how Afsar responded: ‘Our forefathers were instrumental in rebuilding this country after the second world war. It was our grandfathers who worked in the factories 20 hours. It was our grandfathers who came here and ran the infrastructure. It was our grandfathers who brought you the lovely curry which is your national dish. So how can you tell us to go? We’re not going nowhere. We’re here to stay. We’re not here to take part. We’re here to take over.’

        That would seem to me to be almost the definition of a threatening statement, and one almost perfectly designed to stir up the worst sentiments of the human heart. Personally I feel these sentiments throbbing through me when I hear statements like this, or those Mr Robinson-Foster decided to project from the stage at Glastonbury.

        Keir Starmer, Danny Boyle (who directed the 2012 Olympics opening ceremony) and others have long insisted that this country was effectively built by the Windrush generation. If they had pitched this ball a little shorter they might have been on to something. If they had said that our country had a rich and distinct history and that we owe ‘something’ to those who came after the last war then they might have brought more people along with them. But the suggestion that the British were an essentially uninteresting and bad people until the noble migrants came to rescue us is a story that is not only false but insulting.

        So back to the retort that this new type of anti-British demagogue inevitably wishes to provoke. They want a backlash along the lines of: ‘Actually this is not your country. It’s mine. Your grandfathers may have done something, but mine did far more for a lot longer and to much greater effect. The benefits of the recipe for curry we might litigate another time. But I prefer everything that was already ours.’

        And so the language of indigenous rights that has been pushed on our friends in Australia and North America finally comes back around to the people it was never meant to assist. Yes – many feel they would like their country back. Many do not wish their country to be taken over. We were here first, they’ll think. That’s how it works, right?

        https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/who-really-built-this-country/?status=Non-subs&utm_medium=email&utm_source=CampaignMonitor_Editorial&utm_campaign=BLND%20FO%20%2020250703%20%20HOUSE%20ADS%20%20MG+CID_2a6f31a65ca79c193915a2c8def85799#comments-container

    8. I wonder if she will escape extradition to Pakistan for her alleged blatant corruption and grifting? It will be interesting to see. Meanwhile, we have a new party! Present but not involved. Just like Starmer – and Clinton, who neither inhaled nor had sex with that woman. Yet another party for people with desks that were never crossed by inconvenient facts.

    3. And if they want to reduce the welfare bill how about stopping payments to the illegal scum invading us in the boats

    4. That's no worse than Trudeau banning oil and gas exploration in Canada then importing oil from Saudi Arabia. We bet Carney will be no worse.

      Where do these idiots come from?

    1. vw and I met playing table tennis at a school in Highbury New Park in April (?) 1962. That’s 63 years ago. Our first date was October 64, married March 68 and still going strong.

      1. Well done you two!!

        I met my ex in 1966, married him in 1969, divorced him in 1992.

        Met my now husband at a German class in 1986. Married him in 1997. Still together………

  114. The current wife is out whooping it up with 3 or 4 other loose women and it's getting dark. Had to put Tufty, our sole surviving Indian runner duck, to bed. She's 15, stroppy ,and has a bad leg. Walking back to the house I was honoured by a screeching flypast of a dozen swifts. Saw half a dozen comma butterflies this morning along the river, as well as lots of more common species. I'm reading Stephen Ambrose's book on the Lewis and Clark Expedition. It's superb, and I've learned more about the US's history c 1800 than I ever knew before. Lotl would be proud of me.

    1. We've had some amazing fly-pasts from our nesting swifts this year – swooping round very close to the house. We have 14 chicks this year, some look as though they will fledge soon.

      1. We have two Common Wood Pigeon nests, a Collared Dove nest, a Robin’s nest, several Sparrow nests and nesting Blackbirds and Thrushes. We have Blue Tits nesting under the window sills at the front of the house which is thatched.

        The Pigeons and Collared Doves nest in the trellis roses and somehow manage to negotiate the thorns.

        I might post photos if able to do so without causing alarm.

      2. We have two Common Wood Pigeon nests, a Collared Dove nest, a Robin’s nest, several Sparrow nests and nesting Blackbirds and Thrushes. We have Blue Tits nesting under the window sills at the front of the house which is thatched.

        The Pigeons and Collared Doves nest in the trellis roses and somehow manage to negotiate the thorns.

        I might post photos if able to do so without causing alarm.

    2. I had a peacock butterfly in the kitchen this morning and yesterday a tortoiseshell alighted on my leg. We get cabbage whites as well, although I don't grow cabbages.

    3. "Lewis And Clark" rings a bell. They were the names of Walter Matthau and George Burns characters in the lovely film "The Sunshine Boys". Highly recommended!

  116. Well, chums, my bedtime is rapidly approaching. So I shall wish you all a Good Night. Sleep well, and I hope to see you all early tomorrow morning.

  117. Why is the Met Office adopting the language of climate alarmism?

    The forecaster exists to predict the weather, but our national service seems to have been embarrassingly duped by activists

    Matt Ridley
    3rd July 2025. 5:15pm BST

    I gather it's been hot down south. My sympathies. As Londoners were sweltering, we had a chilly breeze off the North Sea in Northumberland. The UK Met Office says it is "virtually certain" that June (the hottest in England since 1884, second hottest in the UK) was made hotter by human activity.

    Duh! Even if temperatures were not affected by greenhouse gases, which they are, the 34.7C (94.5F) recorded in St James's Park on Tuesday might have something to do with that weather station being a low-reliability "class 5" site with an error rating of "up to 5C". It's next to a very busy tarmac path. Plus, it is in the middle of a city and therefore subject to a more general "urban heat island" effect. Research by Arup reckons London's heat island is worth 4.5C extra warmth on average. So yes, the heat is indeed partly man-made – but not necessarily in the way the Met Office means.

    Besides, it's not exactly unusual to have hot days in summer: it reached 36.7C (98.1F) in Northamptonshire in 1911. As the world gets slowly warmer, we will see more hot summer days, though not as much as we will see more mild winter nights: winter nighttime temperatures have risen faster than summer daytime ones, as predicted by the greenhouse effect, just as Arctic temperatures have risen faster than tropical ones.

    The Met Office exists to forecast the weather. But increasingly it seems bored by the day job so it likes to lecture us about climate change. And here it seems to have been embarrassingly duped by activists. Go on its climate pages and you find a forecast for the year 2070, that summers will be between one and six degrees warmer and "up to" 60 per cent drier, depending on the region. A lot of wriggle room in those caveats, note.

    Then it admits: "We base these changes on the RCP8.5 high emissions scenario." Aha! Unbelievably, shockingly, this national forecasting body has chosen as its base case for the future of weather a debunked, highly implausible set of assumptions about the world economy that was never intended to be used this way.

    RCP8.5 is one of five projected futures for the world economy this century, dreamt up by economists. Here is what it assumes. First, the world becomes addicted to coal, burning 10 times – yes, 10 times! – as much coal in 2100 as we did in 2000 and even using coal to make fuel for aircraft and cars. Yes: that is really what it says. It projects that fully half of all the world's energy will be supplied by coal in 2100.

    Second, it assumes that the world population will have swelled to 12 billion people by 2100, way more than any demographer thinks is likely. Third, it assumes that innovation will somehow dry up so there's hardly any new technology to make our lives more fuel-efficient – and we won't even try to cut emissions. In short, this scenario is barking mad.

    Don't take my word for it. Here's what Carbon Brief, an activist website, has to say: "The creators of RCP8.5 had not intended it to represent the most likely 'business as usual' outcome… Its subsequent use as such represents something of a breakdown in communication between energy systems modellers and the climate modelling community."

    Even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that RCP8.5 should not be used as a forecast. And here's its chief creator, Keywan Riahi: "I wished I would have been clearer with what I meant by 'business as usual'."

    In 2020, even the ultra-alarmist BBC said RCP8.5 was "exceedingly unlikely". Yet here, five years later, we have the Met Office itself still basing its forecasts for 2070 on ludicrous assumptions. And no, this is no "breakdown in communications": this is deliberately seeking extreme predictions to scare people and so get media attention. If they used more realistic assumptions, they fear, the future would sound less terrifying.

    Come on, Met Office, do the decent thing and ditch the climate apocalypticism. If you must try to forecast the weather in 2070 – and for all your supercomputers, you generally admit you cannot reliably forecast the weather more than a week or two ahead – then use realistic assumptions. Even if it makes the future sound less scary.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/07/03/met-office-language-climate-alarmism

    I thought at first that this was an odd piece by Matt Ridley, that he must have missed out on a few gigs lately and so tossed this one in the direction of the DT in order to pay his wine bill. However, that was before I reached RCP8.5. We knew the Met Office had been hijacked by catastrophists long ago but it comes to something when even the BBC says "Er, no, that's too nutty even for us".

    Perhaps it went mad when it relocated from sensible suburban Bracknell to wild west Exeter…

  118. Watching the replays I have to say that the reason Reeves was quick to tears was most likely Starmer’s reluctance to endorse her as his chancellor during PMQs.

    Other explanations do not synchronise with the progress of her facial expressions from quivering lips to hunched shoulders, obvious mental and physical discomfort and ultimately tears.

    1. She already looked as if she hadn't slept or had been crying long before Starmer didn't endorse her, with big bags under her eyes.

  119. Goodnight, all. Have been planning my last holiday for 2025 (in September). I may be taking another one before then.

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