Thursday 4 August: Another gimmick from Sunak in a contest of loose pledges and U-turns

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

464 thoughts on “Thursday 4 August: Another gimmick from Sunak in a contest of loose pledges and U-turns

  1. Good Moaning.
    Apologies for bad taste this early in the day, but I couldn’t resist this snippet from a DT investment article:
    “Around 200,000 people who had bought a funeral plan in the belief it would give them a trouble free send off when they die, woke up last weekend to find that the firm that had taken thousands of pounds off them has been banned from the business.”
    On the plus side, they woke up.

  2. Blast that killed Ukraine PoWs was Kremlin operation, Kyiv claims. 4 August 2022.

    The Ukrainian prisoners of war killed last week in an explosion at their barracks were the victims of a Kremlin special operation plotted in advance and approved at the highest levels, senior government officials in Kyiv have claimed.

    Citing intelligence, satellite data and phone intercepts, the officials said the inmates were killed in a callous and premeditated war crime. They suggested it was carried out by Russian mercenaries from the Wagner Group, working closely with Vladimir Putin’s FSB spy agency.

    The dead Ukrainians were members of the Azov battalion, who defended the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol until their capture in May. They were being held at a prison in Olenivka, close to the frontline and about 10 miles south of occupied Donetsk.

    There’s no way of proving anything either way but I’m pretty sure that the attack itself is a Ukrainian cock-up! Their record since the beginning of this war has been one of exaggeration and fabrication and the article is by Luke Harding who was responsible for much of the Sergei Skripal propaganda prior to the war.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/03/blast-that-killed-ukraine-pows-was-kremlin-operation-kyiv-claims

    1. The dead Ukrainians were members of the Azov battalion…

      In peacetime, the Guardian would not be ruing the deaths of members of the Azov Brigade.

  3. ‘Morning, Peeps.

    Of all the ‘leadership’ letters this one struck me as by far the most realistic:

    SIR – I have a feeling that whoever loses the leadership contest will look back on it in the middle of winter and breathe a massive sigh of relief.

    Simon Morpuss
    Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire

    This will be possibly the most difficult winter in decades, even for those of us who have been round the block a few times. Any PM who can survive it will be extremely lucky!

    1. The first things that need doing – immediately – are things big fat Whitehall will refuse outright. Scrapping of all green taxes. Immediate scrapping of corporation tax. Scrapping of the NI hike – while leaving the rise in place. A rise in the tax allowance and, frankly, scrapping of the upper and higher rates.

      Then we must dig reservoirs and build power stations. The savings will come from closing the department of lies and deceit – climate change. On top of that close any quango within six degrees of Shambolic Charkaabalti. Have the Home office officials sacked for every boat that gets over here until they stop. Then immediately start deporting – back to france – the ones here.

      The state will fight all of these, but it needs to learn it’s place, and get a bloody nose for the effort. However, Truss nor Breadstick have the slightest interest in making any changes. They’re both wasters wedded to a failed, corrupt, toxic system.

  4. 354852+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,
    Thursday 4 August: Another gimmick from Sunak in a contest of loose pledges and U-turns

    For the electoral majority voting many, it is just a rerun of vows,promises & pledges with the tag, no action needed attached.

    These pair are only figureheads as was major, the wretch cameron, treacherous treasa, & the turkish delight, a continuation of reset / replace
    political drivers, and with the peoples help via the polling booth are making successful headway.

    As the Dover / Dungeness invasion beaches are clearly pointing out the United Kingdom is on course to hit the bottom of the Tommy Crapper.

      1. 354852+ u[p ticks,

        Morning W,
        And if they ( political class ) so ordered
        as a lesson regarding disobedience “heads must be put in gas ovens ” it would follow
        so ?

  5. Good morning, all. Same old, same old…

    108 years ago today, there started the “War to end all Wars”. Looking back – that went well, n’est-ce pas?

      1. Even fewer than that, if you count such things as civil wars or Japanese incursions into China, etc..

    1. Good morning, Bill. And a very “Happy Birthday” to you – I had no idea that you were 108. Lol.

  6. SIR – The Government must stop dealing with the current energy crisis as a failure of the markets and start dealing with it as a consequence of war – albeit a proxy one.

    There is perfectly sufficient capacity in gas production in this country to supply the population with more affordable energy and retain the profit incentive. However, because of Vladimir Putin’s weaponisation of gas supplies, we now export record amounts to Europe, where the markets support an inflated price.

    This is not the fault of our energy producers: they will secure the best price for their product. But where it causes the industrial chaos and social instability that are now inevitable, the Government must act, if necessary directing supplies and determining price, not as a market intervention but in recognition of a war.

    Mr Putin is using energy to strangle resistance in Europe just as Hitler used the U-boat to starve Britain during the Second World War.

    David Lane
    Orleton, Herefordshire

    “…the Government must act, if necessary directing supplies and determining price…” Is it really that simple??

    1. Directing supplies – it is, windmills. It is deliberately rationing energy to make it expensive.
      Determining price – it is, through crippling taxation.

      All thes fools demanding government control energy need to be shot. The reason energy is expensive is *because* of government meddling.

      1. 354852+ up ticks,

        Morning SiadC,

        You dare try you will be, courtesy of the lab/lib/con coalition party / supporter /
        voters Tommy Robinsoned only faster.

    1. We’re trying to move – the costs of that will be borne entire by us. As will the offensive stamp duty. Then along comes an illegal gimmigrant, with no skills, who’s contributed nothing and we’re forced to pay for him – after having fought against him in Afghan.

      The enemy within is not some nebulous fifth column, it’s not Lefties – it’s the sodding state machine.

    2. Not to mention that the Afghans who worked for us were traitors to their own country. They deserve the same reward as Tarpeia. However our politicians are strangers to honour and truth.

  7. SIR – Much hot air has been released by the media and the Labour Party over BP’s profits (report, August 3).

    They fail to understand that BP and other oil companies do not set oil prices – the market does. I am fairly certain that Mr Putin didn’t consult them before invading Ukraine either.

    Their detractors also conveniently forget that oil companies are paying huge amounts of tax on these profits. Household bills are inflated by tax and green levies. If the Government wants to help the public, it should reduce these duties and suspend green levies.

    Charles Penfold
    Ulverston, Cumbria

    Nice idea, Mr Penfold, but why do I see in my mind an entire squadron of pigs on their take-off run?

    1. Why should the Government suspend green levies? Surely they should cancel them in perpetuity.

      1. You’re right Elsie, it should but people have become used to government getting it’s taxes as if they’re necessary. Of course, the right approach over energy is to scrap the standing charge, bin all subsidy – if a wind mill can’t make a profit on it’s own, it should never be built. Equally the grid upgrades forced on us – all because of unreliable, intermittent wind should be paid for by the windmill owners. Their costs should not be socialised.

        With no taxes and people only paying for what they use, energy suppliers can compete on service, reliability, diversity – and if they want to build windmills and sell that to greeniacs, fine, great – but those customers must pay the costs. It is so simple but government insists on forcing conventional fuels to be expensive while giving money to windmills, then forcing ‘grid upgrades’ on the tax payer. Socialised costs, private profits.

    2. Why should the Government suspend green levies? Surely they should cancel them in perpetuity.

  8. Morning, all. Overcast in N Essex this morning. Lack of precipitation remains evident.

    When the going gets tough… Old Blackface, aka Trudeau, does a runner, again. This time to Costa Rica for some ‘Me Time’ at a cost of around 190,000 Canadian taxpayers’ dollars. The tough bit is the fact that documents released by a court expose Trudeau’s ban on non-inoculated people travelling as having no scientific basis to support the ban. It was purely a political move. In addition his popularity appears to be in the toilet, if not the sewer.

    https://twitter.com/MattersNot7/status/1554583939565506560
    https://twitter.com/Kellyblooming/status/1554301279949623296

  9. 354852+ up ticks,

    Gerard Batten
    @gjb2021
    ·
    20h
    Cultural enrichment comes in many forms.

    The rapists will be unlucky to serve half the time of the sentences handed down.
    DaveAtherton
    @DaveAtherton
    ·
    22h
    Seven men have been jailed for the rape of 3 girls aged 13-15 in Burton.

    David Korosi -14 years
    Adrian Demeter-7.5 years

    https://gettr.com/post/p1kwx2g3dc5

  10. SIR – Mike Warburton (Business, August 1) invites Nadhim Zahawi, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, to scrap IR35, the tax law that effectively bans freelances from working for one company.

    The effect of this regulation was reinforced during the pandemic by transferring the onus on to employers to determine if a worker was self-employed or an employee. Penalties were introduced in order to force the cautious employer to make the “right” decision.

    This drove many self-employed and habitual contractors, such as lorry drivers and skilled tradespeople, into early retirement. They were simply not prepared to lose the right to deduct their expenses from their earnings before tax and see a significant proportion of their net income disappear along with their hard-fought independence.

    This has been repeated in many sectors, from construction to finance, pushing up supply-side costs and fuelling wage inflation by removing skilled workers from the market and thereby significantly raising gross pay rates.

    It should remain a matter of contractual agreement between an employer and a worker as to whether that worker is employed (with all the attendant benefits such as paid leave, pension contributions, employees’ rights and other perks) or, rather, self-employed, with none of the above and little job security.

    It should not be for HM Revenue and Customs to determine a worker’s status arbitrarily and impose penalties where it likes.

    Unless the Government changes this damaging law, many will be unwilling to deliver their full potential to the economy.

    Will Curtis
    Raydon, Suffolk

    This government is no stranger to the ‘law of diminishing returns’ so I wouldn’t hold your breath, Mr Curtis.
    It always always manages to miss the obvious consequences of its ban-everything crusade – and personal prosperity seems to be at the top of its list.

    1. The intent of IR35 was to soak tax. Government likes tax. It didn’t understand the non-compliance, nor the jobs that would be lost. As soon as a chum working in the Treasury was slapped with IR35 he added 50% to his day rate. When asked why, he said ‘IR35!’ His hiring manager didn’t understand why.

      The tax take is so cripplingly high, so utterly egregious, so appalling the spent that government as an entity should be forced to provide on a tenth of what it currently takes and told to shove it. High taxes create oppressive societies, they remove choice, freedom, economic flexibility, create monopolies, inconsistencies. Like degrading rubber, eventually the car goes off the road.

      1. If – IF – the house deal goes through, we will be giving the government £16,500 stamp duty to pi$$ up the wall.

    2. The intent of IR35 was to soak tax. Government likes tax. It didn’t understand the non-compliance, nor the jobs that would be lost. As soon as a chum working in the Treasury was slapped with IR35 he added 50% to his day rate. When asked why, he said ‘IR35!’ His hiring manager didn’t understand why.

      The tax take is so cripplingly high, so utterly egregious, so appalling the spent that government as an entity should be forced to provide on a tenth of what it currently takes and told to shove it. High taxes create oppressive societies, they remove choice, freedom, economic flexibility, create monopolies, inconsistencies. Like degrading rubber, eventually the car goes off the road.

  11. There was a ‘thing’ going round the t’internet some months back asking whether there were more bees in the world or stars in the universe. I don’t know if anyone has discussed it on here already. I ignored it because I thought it a stupid question but on the weekend my sister brought it up and we argued for ages. I couldn’t believe how she could try to justify her answer, it was so blatantly wrong!

    I won’t say which I think atm – will wait to hear what Nottlers think and I’ll post my answer later.

    So, bees or stars? Post your answers below 🙂

    1. Morning Stormy. I know that it sounds impossible but there are more stars in the Universe than there are grains of sand on the worlds beaches!

      1. MGM used to claim that there were more stars in their studios than in the heavens above.

    2. 354852+ up ticks,

      Morning Siad,

      Must surely bee that no one is shooting stars in a fatalistic manner, whereas bees are being bumped off wholesale.

      That’s the buzz word on the street anyway

    3. As far as is known right now, stars outnumber bees by billions of billions; however, how and why should anyone ever know?

      One thing that mankind will never completely be able to get his head around is an appreciation of scale and size: whether that be massive (as in the universe) or microscopic (as in the world of quantum physics). Making such fatuous comparisons by guessing is, quite simply, utterly pointless.

      1. ‘Morning, Grizz. One only has to look up to the night sky to realise that our significance in the great scheme of things is routinely over-estimated!

          1. Morning Grizz.

            From your previous comments, I believe you are of the view that an inordinate number of humans have minds like bogs……

          2. Morning, Stephen.

            Notwithstanding your funny pun, all I do is peruse the newspapers each day and I am left in no doubt whatsoever about the atrophied nature of the modern human brain. The accelerating descent into decline is glaringly apparent, anywhere you may care to look. Conclusive proof is everywhere, clearly showing that the human species is in terminal decline and is getting more and more stupid by the second.

      2. Yet it is wondering that creates poetry, and the most advanced sciences are often so abstract as to be almost art.

      3. Q – where is the universe? What is it expanding into? and where is that ‘into’ ? ad infinitum
        Even the most advanced human brain is incapable of grasping this

    4. I’ve heard scientists proclaim that more stars exist in the ‘known’ Universe than there are grains of sand on all the beaches on the Earth. More bees than that number seems improbable. Mind you, I’ve seen more bees on my lavender, marjoram, raspberries etc. this year than for a few years.

    5. Ooh, so you have a sister!
      I am going to guess that she is fully vaccinated if she really bee-lieves that them little honeymakers outnumber stars.

      The usual illustration for children is that stars outnumber the total grains of sand on Earth. However, some years ago a young scientist did the arithmetic and discovered that the comparison works if you only include beaches, but not when you include the land (eg sandstone) as well. A joyride on the web will produce conflicting reports.

    6. We will never know how many stars are in the universe because it’s expanding

    7. We may never know. The stars we can see may have died already. The bees certainly will. Both are beautiful.

      Although not wasps. Wasps are nature’s gits.

    8. A more pertinent question

      Which is the highest Number
      Stars in the firmanent
      Bees
      Illegal immigrants in UK, ie Boat People

  12. Good morning, everyone. I hope you all had a good day yesterday and slept well last night. For some strange reason I could not access the NoTTL site yesterday last night.

    1. I had the same problem. I got round it by accessing through nttl.blog instead of my ‘earmarked’ page.

      1. I have a load of Kosher and Halal pork in my kitchen. Every time I make a bacon sandwich I bless it before I eat it!🐖

    1. I think you’ll have to go wee, wee, wee all the way home with your little toe intact but without the little pig.

  13. Good morning all.
    11½C outside and it’s a fine morning.

    A quick scan through the BTL comments gives this one:-

    Edwin Pugh
    1 HR AGO
    And now for something completely different. Late last evening a few of us old codgers were commenting on the fact that modern ads on tv were incomprehensible. So, just to remind you what the old ones were like, here is a short selection –
    nescafe gold blend – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsN4YwbM9kw
    cinzano – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk31k2BIFR0
    vw gt-i – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyYV6HkmYPs
    Dubonnet – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vQA_8Yee9c
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmoxFSbbtm4
    Campari – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ydVbn0gMk4
    The old Dubonnet ad reminds me that Fernandel played Don Camillo in the tv series ‘The Little World of Don Camillo’ – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwA3u941trA
    Am surprised that AmF hasn’t yet found time to appear as the author of the books as the stories were all about the battles between the priest and the mayor.

    The Don Camilo clip is excellent.

    1. Good morning Digger of Bonsall, and everyone.

      Somehow I recall reading that Edwin Pugh worked in education as an examiner or inspector.

    2. In retrospect, I’m amazed how much I learnt from reading fiction. Most of my historical and social knowledge came from fiction and it triggered my desire to learn more.
      I was in my teens when I read the Don Camillo books; but for them I wouldn’t have known that the Communists were so powerful in post-war Italy.

        1. No. I never heard them; I tend to be a book person. Often adaptations ruin my imaginings.

    3. Ah, Leonard Rossiter. Heck, I can remember the ‘cigar called Hamlet’ adverts. My much younger self didn’t get ‘Papa? Nicole?’ until much later on.

    1. Interesting. But the article about Russia and the Ukraine is really tosh. The Russians have made heavy weather of achieving their limited aims: to control the Donbas and reduce Ukrainian capability to carry out military operations in the Donbas. It ought to be clear to Russia that an armed attack on the rest of Europe is a pipe dream . The only possibility of success would be because we* in the UK have given all our weapons to the Ukraine. Anyway, what would be the point? Russia will have noted that we are for sale, businesses, houses, football clubs etc, and that an unarmed invasion has provoked no opposition but only the generous welcoming arms of the UK taxpayer

      *Was this ever debated in Parliament? should our members of Parliament not be held personally responsible for the cost?

  14. A DT BTL from a poster who calls himself Cobalt Blue

    I am sure there are many more things one could add to the list such as the rape of young white girls and a system that looks the other way. Mark Steyn bangs on about this disgrace each night on GB News but nothing is done. Why not?

    Police that don’t police.
    An expensive health service you can’t access.
    Councils that exist to infuriate whilst cutting services.
    An army cut to the bone.
    Ditto the Royal Navy.
    Ditto the RAF.
    Borders that aren’t secure.
    Civil service that stays at home.
    Energy companies run by scrooge.
    Water companies unable to deliver free stuff that falls from the sky.
    All of them costing a packet, please sir, can I stop paying tax because I’m not getting anything for it !

    1. 354+ up ticks,

      Morning R,

      To repeat myself once more that is what the polling booth
      shows is needed, as before and prior to that, again & again.

      Democracy takes no prisoners
      you get what you, knowing the party’s history these past near four decades, vote for
      I was accursed on here tother day of being obsessed with
      paedophilia actions, that tells me that the eyes tight shut option is acceptable by this accuser.

    2. Doubleplus agree. The state uses our money to waste it on things *it* wants. No longer does it provide services, but thinks itself our master. Worse, it is using our money to actively, deliberately make our lives more difficult, more dangerous and poorer.

    3. I think the Police and others involved in protecting the public are scared of the retribution that would follow if they prosecuted the rapists. Sharia should be banned in the UK and not allowed as an excuse for raping and Halal slaughter etc. However I think the politicians are scared as well.

      1. There must be a showdown and the matter resolved or else Britain is finished and the rapists will have won and will continue to rape.

        Shouldn’t that pathetic man, Welby, be taking a stand against what is happening or is he even more cowardly than the politicians, the police and the MSM?

        1. When the going got tough during the scamdemic, Welby disappeared on a ‘sabbatical’, rather than give spiritual support to his diminishing flock.

          1. Has there ever been an Archbishop of Canterbury who is so despised and held in such complete contempt? I cannot remember anyone ever expressing respect, affection or admiration of this piece of human filth. A member of my family had a job at Lambeth Palace. Apparently Rowan Williams was much liked but Justin Welby was was much disliked by virtually everyone working there.

          2. Having made sure the churches were locked and denied to those who needed spiritual comfort.

      2. The Danes have banned halal and kosher slaughter.
        What was necessary amongst Bronze Age tribes wandering in a parched desert, is not necessary in a world of refrigeration.
        I wonder if the adherents to these forms of slaughter are also using Bronze Age medicine and technology?

        1. “The Danes have banned halal and kosher slaughter.”

          Except for Slammers, of course…(sarc)

          1. Slammers probably import frozen from other countries, but at least the Jarlsvikings are making an effort to stand up for their own culture.

      3. How long before this comes here?

        Ambush of French Firemen, Police with Firebombs and Fireworks Lasted Four Hours

        https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2022/08/03/ambush-of-french-firemen-police-with-firebombs-and-fireworks-lasted-four-hours/

        A BTL comment:-

        Police and firefighters in the French city of Limoges were subjected to attacks by Molotov cocktails and mortar fireworks for at least four hours this week after being lured to a “sensitive” area of the city.

        So the arms throwing those Molotovs are unlikely to have been white as your picture depicts.

        1. a “sensitive” area of the city. Code for a slammer ghetto. They should have responded with live rounds.

  15. Hugh J posts a letter below from a DT reader who thinks that who ever wins the leadership of the Conservative Party election will very much wish that he or she had not done so.

    One of the best things that ever happened to me and Caroline was when we did not get a prep school headship for which we had applied and been interviewed because, amongst my many other doubtless defects, I was too old at 42!

    We decided that we would throw caution to the winds, give up our secure jobs, move to France and set up our own business. This was the best thing we could have done as it has enabled us to have had far more interesting lives.

    Have any other Nottlers been very happy to have not been given a job for which they had applied?

    1. Mmm I’ve never not got a job I applied for , other than joining the RAF I’ve only applied for 2 jobs, the other 2 I had they asked me.

    2. No, but then my career meant applying for so many, I learned to stop fantasising about particular possibilities early on. Audition then forget about it. I was then pleasantly surprised whenever I did get a job 🙂

    3. Being laid off by the Consumers’ Association in 1975 – their membership had fallen and, thus, their income, and last in first out applied. I had four months redundancy pay – and “put up my plate”. Within a year, I was earning twice as much as when employed; worked from home and was as happy as larry. And so I remained until I finally stopped in 2009. I was extremely fortunate – and had a much more varied and interesting life.

      1. If we had not been running our courses but had been in normal employment we could not have bought Mianda, set off for the Mediterranean, educated our boys ourselves and popped back to France during school holidays to run our courses leaving Mianda berthed wherever we happened to be and returning to her again after the courses.

        We are still running our courses but have reduced our group size to a maximum of five students at a time. As I write this Caroline is explaining the intricacies of French grammar to four boys from Winchester and a girl from St Mary’s, Ascot. The little boy on the left in the photo has just got married and is an aerospace engineer and the one on the right is an expert on computers. Both fully employed since leaving university debt free but let us hope they have as much fun as their parents have had!

        https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ee4c747e48c39a4ef17302fc22426c7229044ca276b9a04ebf14cb57a6167b1b.jpg

    4. I applied for a job at the local private university as a writing tutor. I didn’t get it- too elderly and it went to someone whose husband was in the military.
      However it turned out to be a good thing because that department is where my now daughter in law works. We get on wonderfully but that might not have been the case had we been working together first off.
      Edit- this was in NC.

    5. I failed to get the grades for my first degree course, and have had a much more VC varied and interesting career as a result!

  16. Good morning all,

    I didn’t see the notification for a new page this morning , I had to follow BT’s trail.. he was off to market !

    My SA sister has been here a week and is off to London later , then going to Norfolk then back to N Yorks ..

    We have had an enjoyable time , also celebrated b/day of younger son .

    Feeling quite tired now .

    My poor garden looks as if it could do with a proper drink .. several days worth.

          1. Actually i don’t. I have a 42 inch plasma for when i want to watch big sci-fi movies but it is dumb like me.

            Had the full Sky package once. What a load of crap.

            Thanks anyhoo…

    1. But oggs, us nottlers don’t! Thanks for the link. Was out yesterday evening so missed him.

      1. 354852+ up ticks,

        Morning SE,
        “us nottlers don’t! ”
        May I be so bold as to rephrase slightly
        ” Many” of us nottlers don’t.

        As in know our own fathers.

    2. As you know many of us agree with you on many points – but you do not give the ordinary person many options as to what to do other than not to vote at all and what will that achieve until NOTA (None Of The Above) votes are counted?

      1. 354852+ up ticks,

        Afternoon R,

        I tell you what, IMO one option that should never again be pursued is supporting and
        voting in a political shite grading manner
        as in the best of the worst.

        NOTA is marking time until death, shuffling the same political shit and suffering ALL the way.

        YOU BUILD EN MASSE ON AN EXISTING FRINGE PARTY, FOX OR KURTEN,ERC,ETC.

        ALL the time spent regarding NOTA would surely be better spent building a patriotic party, we in the genuine UKIP were partially successful and gave the Country the referendum, the treachery since then
        via lab/lib/con is quite clear to see.

        Each person is responsible for their own
        voting selection the evidence for condemning & change is in your face daily.

  17. Good Morning. Dull, windy and cold yesterday. Rained last night. Raining now. But looking on the bright side… …still looking.

  18. Should we be worried about Rishi ?

    Who are the wealthy Gupta brothers, people of Indian-origin arrested for graft in UAE
    The Guptas fled to South Africa and built a sprawling business empire in mining, computer technology & also media. Today, they are ranked among Top 10 richest persons in South Africa.

    The Gupta brothers, hailing from Uttar Pradesh moved to South Africa in 1993. Currently at the centre of corruption & scam in South Africa, they have no good record in India. Cases of money laundering are lodged against them here and raids were also conducted at their properties in 2018.

    New Delhi: Indian-origin Gupta brothers, who once held sway in South Africa with their enormous economic clout, were arrested by the law enforcement agencies in the UAE on Tuesday. The Gupta clan includes Rajesh Gupta, Atul Gupta. However, the third brother Ajay Gupta remains off the hook.

    The Gupta brothers have been accused of manipulating & influencing the government machinery in South Africa by exploiting their close links with former President Jacob Zumba. The brothers have been accused of bribing the government officials to win lucrative contracts and also influencing appointment of senior govt officers for facilitating their business dealings.

    https://newsroompost.com/india/who-are-the-wealthy-gupta-brothers-people-of-indian-origin-arrested-for-graft-in-uae/5112543.html

  19. Back from market. No pigs – even for ready cash. Good wine offers in Morrissons. 25% off….

    Now coffee and the newspaper.

      1. Oh my goodness me. I could not watch more than a few seconds of that. It’s heartbreaking. I hope whoever filmed it showed it to the police.

        1. And if the police are anything like the police in places like Bradford and Oldham that Mark Steyn describes then they will say that the poor old woman was asking for it.

          The profound depravity of people like this so-called carer defies belief.

          1. Do you know what annoys me most? It’s not that it’s a care home. It’s not even the person in position of power and authority creating the conflict. It’s the simple lack of respect for another human being.

            I’ve wanted to punch many people in my time but only ever done it once. You don’t treat people like this – hell, even if someone is a threat to themselves, you get support.

          2. You do in some countries. Like rounding up slaves – even nowadays. Get real. Deport these people, we do NOT need them. And if they’re born here, it just shows what their offspring can be like. How many white carers/nurses behave like that? Not nearly as many – it’s not in our blood.

      2. But we NEED immigrants for our care and health services. ALL the people that walked by were also POC-marked. Deport them.

  20. 354852+ up ticks,

    https://media.gettr.com/group23/getter/2022/08/04/07/956cdd0d-1d7c-dbc4-04e5-832d8667df31/315a4b46e6cd1488d6998ef6f0e13fcc.png
    Gerard Batten,

    2h

    2h
    Wow, that will be a big job!

    It will include the BBC, C4 & all the MSM, academia & education, most of the Civil Service, most of the political class, most of the legal profession, the Church of England, & God only knows how many more.

    Plus in Ogga’s view the lab/lib/con current voting membership.

    1. Once he does that the legislation will be perverted to include anyone who vilified Her Magesty’s Government.
      It’ll just be another tool to quel dissent.

    2. I love Britain. It’s a beautiful country. Some of the people in it are very pleasant, decent sorts – evidenced by this forum. However some places are not. Dirty, nasty, overrun toilets.

      The people I hate – overwhelmingly – are officialdom. I hate the state machine. I hate it for creating a problem, then pretending to solve it. I hate it for it’s waste, inefficiency, obtuseness, arrogance, ego, laziness, self importance. I hate that it sends soldiers to fight an enemy overseas while another bit of it brings those soldiers in en masse. I hate that those combat soldiers liein the streets, suffering while the foreigners fought against are given homes and cash.

      I hate that it punishes work and rewards laziness. I hate that the striver who falls on hard times is hammered into a system that doens’t give a stuff about him. I despise the political class and their infighting, back stabbing as if this is normal or acceptable. I hate mandarins who fight democratic expectations at every step.

      I hate how every single thing they can see is regulated and controlled – until their mate wants something, and then it’s suddenly ignored. I hate the injustice, the deceit, the treachery, the corruption, the fraud the abuse of power. I hate the people who seek such office solely to obtain that power over others for their own aggrandisement.

      So go ahead Sunak. You’ll find my extreme hatred is something you can do nothing about because you’re the epitome of the damned problem.

      1. I hate those seedy get-rich-quick types who provide lamentable service and execrable food at the small cafés and restaurants they run, whilst charging a fortune for the ‘privilege’ of you eating there.

          1. I choose not to eat there if I can; however, sometimes you don’t find out how crap these places are until you have ordered their shit food.

          2. That’s why i use tripadvisor. A favourite Italian of mine can’t cope well in the evenings and people have long waiting times. I go at lunchtimes and have no problems.

      2. 354852+ up ticks,

        Afternoon W,
        I am in complete agreement only more so,
        I go deeper as in, knowingly, who puts these treacherous ,odious political cretins into power NOT once, NOT twice NOR thrice, but continually, ALL still .supporting a Conservative party that was murdered some near forty years ago.

        To combat what lies in the near future
        children should be, by rote / mantra in school taught ” The Beginnings”and over every entry to a polling station.

        “The Beginnings” is a 1917 poem by the English writer Rudyard Kipling. The poem is about how the English people, although naturally peaceful, slowly become filled with a hate which will lead to the advent of a new epoch.

      3. I loathe the BBC, a mere organ of government disinformation reinforced by an army of ‘fact checkers’ so dishonest as to still claim that Biden won the last US election or that Zelensky is legitimate and that Ukraine is no longer the most corrupt country in Europe.

        I despise the Welfare State, its encouragement of dependency and obstruction of human endeavour.

        Politicians have almost all proven to be self interested charlatans who would collectively sell granny for a few coins.

      4. I loathe the BBC, a mere organ of government disinformation reinforced by an army of ‘fact checkers’ so dishonest as to still claim that Biden won the last US election or that Zelensky is legitimate and that Ukraine is no longer the most corrupt country in Europe.

        I despise the Welfare State, its encouragement of dependency and obstruction of human endeavour.

        Politicians have almost all proven to be self interested charlatans who would collectively sell granny for a few coins.

        1. She’d not read it, or would dismiss it as the ravings of a mad man. The exist in a bubble of their own peculiar idiocy. I just wish they’d stay in it.

      5. You have to convince the 80% thats the problem. Those that stand outside their home and clap the NHS. those that took a so called vaccine that does not work without question. those thart could have refused to wear a mask but failed to do so. Its a much longer list than you think. I just get on with my life as best i can and have nothing to do with the 80%.

        1. People were frightened. They didn’t know what to do and looked to authority to tell them. Sadly humans are weak. They like abrogating responsibility to others.

          1. The increasing stupidity of humans is not just genetic in provenance. It is also due to the programme introduced by successive governments under the auspices of the global corporations. They want a completely compliant population.

            Their first move was to employ stupid teachers who possess no general knowledge. Those clueless teachers were then further conditioned at teacher ‘training’ facilities before being let loose on an ingenuous generation. Thick adults will produce even thicker children, who will be made even more stupid by their schooling, as well as what passes for entertainment these days.

            The move towards a world of automatons is well under way and when our generation is gone, what used to be an ‘intelligent’ being (the most resourceful and clever ever to have evolved) will possess the IQ of an amœba.

            The future is grim. In 2022 I’d much rather be 71 than 17.

          2. No one will look after you only yourself. People have so much to learn.if ever.

        2. Every time I’m asked if I can be given a mask, I reply, “no because I’m exempt”. Stops them in their tracks.

  21. Mahnin ahl as they say in Banham.
    A much more balmy day in Conques today… a mere 31°.
    A bit of a mystery for which some explanation would be appreciated.
    A couple of years ago I went tobthis Lake in the hills above Conques. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f9f022a97e0de9113245da10ba9e63fceef860f25305469d69587636a4000c61.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/dc299e27ac1953010e957db781eba2ae578a6ec1b07ba6258905680b34b15acf.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/aa0c6933506ea44e95acd46ac3cf6a074984e3ef2490b4191077ae190cdf9d11.jpg
    Beautiful and isolated so that psychotic Star carn run about with killing things.
    But the place was infested with thousands of these things.
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/620f49bd4f3bfc8c0a41ed2053b70a1e9b60f8c8aaeea3f70f9e7402decef54b.jpg
    American crayfish, I am told. A voracious pest.
    So this year I went back with a view to poaching. But they were all gone!
    I have no idea how or why. I am told they are indestructible.
    And as I puzzled and looked at the lake I observed two large turtles looking back. Turtles, nom de Dieu!
    Utterly non native.
    Do turtles eat crayfish??

    1. That is beautiful and I’m jealous.

      However, I see a dog – a beautiful dog – and water. I do not see the dog *in* the water. This is unusual, as I thought all dogs as soon as scenting water pulled their hoomahn over in their bid to get to it.

      1. She took a dip this morning. It is very deep where the picture is taken and very muddy at the other end.
        Guess which end she likes.

        1. Well, Mongo’d just go for both sides. Roll around inn the mud, splash about in the water. Mud, water for about 5 hours or so. We’ve a tiny pond near us (it’s barely 20ft around) and he loves it in there. Belts off the pier, leaps in, slash, paddle paddle paddle.

        2. My red setter plonked himself down in the muddy edge of a Moss – when he got up he was no longer red and stank to high heaven!

      2. Dolly dog won’t go near water. She gave me a very doleful look when i sprayed her during the hot weather.

        1. Dogs are all so different. I have had 3 Golden Retrievers; the first one Lenny liked the water, the second, Fred adored it and it was hard to get him out. The third one, Henry, was terrified of it. He fell in the pool once in NC and had to be rescued although he did swim with me up the pool. Used to take Fred down the trails in the forest in CT and there was a wide stream with a beaver dam- wonderful swimming hole. He’d leap straight in and swim around, climb out, shake all over you and jump in again. I miss that boy so much.

          1. There’s a ratty little thing that goes to the same day care. He’s terrified of water too. On a beach walk once where the great floof was basically swimming alongside ratty got caught in the tide going out and panicked horribly, and lo, Mongo swims over and tugs him out.

            Then went belting back in.

          2. Cheers to Mongo. If Fred had still been with us in NC we’d never have got him out the pool.

          3. Mongo The Brave.

            Dolly’s nickname now is BingBong Woof Woof. Can you guess what my doorbell sounds like? :@)

      1. Revenez donc!
        Though I love our house in Auvergne and London is amazing and even Peckham has its moments, this is where my family is from and when I see the Pic de Nore from the motorway between Toulouse and Carcassonne, I know I’m home.
        It’s in my bones.

        1. That must be the “lac de pêche” on the Ceize – and that “wall” is vestiges d’un pont romain.

          Not many people know that!!

          1. Au contraire – very few people know that the wall is Roman. Well, Gallo-Roman = 4th century AD. It just looks like a wall.

            Laure has at least five Gallo-Roman vestiges. Most locals know nothing about them – except for the Roman tomb.

            So there!

    2. In the second picture of that weir/wall…do you have a picture of the other side? I think i went there once when staying in Montpellier. I remember we drove up in the hills to swim in a river. I suppose in those hills most weirs look similar.

      We have signal red crayfish in the UK. They burrow into banks and undermine them. They will eat absolutely everything and our perverse enviroment agency has banned people from trapping them.

      1. I’ll send you a picture.
        Someone has done something to get rid of them. I didn’t think I was possible.

        1. Thanks.
          If they have got rid of them they have done all the other things that live in the river a favour.

      2. Some pictures of both sides with the link. We’re over two hours from Montpellier

        1. Thanks. No it’s not the same place. Nice though. The drive took us about 90 minutes. Just wanted to get out the swamp for the day.

      3. I believe you can get a licence to trap the signal red crayfish as the native ones are a protected species. A couple of weeks ago a 6:00 am start on the River Wey caught two blokes wearing yellow waders hauling crayfish traps onto a small boat. I had to toot them as they were athwart the River!

        1. Yes, a licence is available to a few, but given it is a destructive invasive species we should be able to trap the buggers and throw the locals back in !
          Apparently they taste really good too. In Rick Stein tastes the Blues prog they were boiling them up in pots the size of dustbins and then just piling them on the table.

    3. Tasty they say? Did any travellers park their caravans there for a few days?
      Are crayfish helal?

      1. I think they are halal but not kosher.
        Travellers here tend to be Romany Gypsies and I don’t believe they have stopped here.

    4. If you are still in Conques and want a good day out – try Laure Minervois. Very good Cave Coopé (mention my name!!). Excellent caff in the centre of the village: https://lelauranais.business.site/?utm_source=gmb&utm_medium=referral

      Very good rapport qualité-prix. Good chance you’ll eat off one of our plates while looking at some of our furniture. When we left, Sophie and Sabrina were just starting up – and the plague struck. And we gave them tons of stuff. Despite that, they have soldiered on and are doing a great job in the village.

      Very good plan d’eau with NEW digue (since our time). Roman stuff. Church with largest unsupported roof in the Midi.

      Also ACE butcher…..

      Enjoy!

  22. https://12ft.io/proxy?ref=&q=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2022/08/03/sir-nick-cleggs-silicon-valley-adventure-has-lucrative-failure/

    For goodness sake. Clegg was brought in to get the EU to make farceook a special case with regards to data processing by the EU. That’s it. The man is bent. We knew it at the time. That suddenly, as if by magic certain specific sections of gdpr no longer applied to farcebook a few months after Clegg’s appointment was staggering and surprised everyone. Not.

  23. Millions dying through heatwave didn’t work – so now we are all going to die of starvation because of inflation and problems caused by Brexit and failure to follow EUssr diktats. It must be true because I just heard it on BBC Radio 4. We are all doomed!

        1. It’s been tedious from the get-go and don’t forget monkey pox…they won’t let that one go!

          1. Monkey pox is just eye-rolling stuff, I couldn’t believe they were giving it another airing, they must be desperate.

          2. The “facts” keep getting changed….one day it’s homosexual men who have been intimate with others; the next day, something else is added to the mix. I believe nothing anymore. The government and media can chase themselves up a greasy rope!

          3. Don’t forget ebola.
            All we need is a do-gooder Scottish nurse to rock up in darkest Effrika; worse still return to Blighty.

          4. A whole segment on our news last night about this latest pox. Questions from
            low IQ viewers answered by condescending medical experts.

          5. They may as well have been but to be honest, I really tune that stuff out and have no idea of what they are saying most of the time.

          6. The original story states that monkeypox is difficult to catch and pass on: men having sex with men, usually multiple times, or touching an infected person’s leaking pustules. Refraining from these particular actions should render the chance of catching the disease as extremely remote. Now, if it has been ‘engineered’ that could be a very different proposition: put nothing past the psychopaths.
            The other explanation is that monkeypox is being used as a cover for the destruction of the immune system in those that have been inoculated for CV-19 and the subsequent rise in shingles (Herpes zoster) in some of those people.

          7. There was an advert about shingles on Classic FM last night. “”Ask your doctor about it”.
            I can’t do that as I gave up golf years ago.

    1. If brexit shenanigans doesn’t get you the green idiocy around reducing fertilizer usage most certainly will.

      Our village idiot is helping this food shortage along with the same restrictions as the Dutch greenies are. They positively hate us.

  24. My mate fell into a vat of jelly and custard and then they dumped a huge sponge in to soak it up before he drowned.

    He survived ok, just a trifle deaf.

    Coat etc…

      1. If you were littered under Mercury, would you be a snapper-up of unconsidered trifles?

  25. ‘…A soldier was stationed overseas and received a Dear John letter
    from his girlfriend back home.

    It read: Dear Harry, I can no longer continue our relationship. The distance
    between us is just too great. I must admit that I have cheated twice
    since you’ve been gone and it’s not fair to either of us. I’m sorry.
    Please return the picture of me that I sent you. Love, Kim.”

    The soldier, with hurt feelings, asked his fellow soldiers for any
    snapshots they could spare of their girlfriends, sisters,
    ex-girlfriends, aunts, cousins, etc.

    In addition to the picture of Kim, Harry included all the other pictures
    of pretty girls he had collected.
    There were 43 photos in the envelope along with a note that read: Dear Kim, I’m so sorry, but I can’t remember who you are. Please take
    your picture from the pile and send the rest back to me.

    Take care, Harry.

    No, you get your coat…

  26. Nancy Pelosi visits Taiwan.
    Her visit sparks sabre-rattling from China; naval manoeuvres, fighter
    jet deployments, economic sanctions, military experts fear invasion and
    world leaders plead with China for restraint. There are very real fears
    of nuclear conflict. Biden states he was opposed to the Pelosi visit.

    Meanwhile, back in a rural backwater of California, (almost un-noticed),
    a certain Mr Pelosi pleads not guilty to drunk driving. The same Mr
    Pelosi who killed his teenage brother in a car crash in the 1950s.

    Now THAT’S how you bury bad news!

  27. brain.dead,heart.beating bodies are a candidate for organ transplants.
    Archie’s case presents an unusual cause of ‘highly likely’ brain.death.
    It appears from this Japanese article:

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5667297/#:~:text=They%20stated%20that%20both%20pupils,light%20reflexes%20must%20be%20absent.

    that there are international differences in a diagnosis of brain.death and there could be factors that have not yet been discussed in relation to Archie’s treatment.

    As I understand it, a judge has pronounced that Archie died in May 2022.
    The hospital however continues his care and refrains from allowing his body to moved due to a ‘considerable risk’.

    However, Archie is in such an unstable condition that there is considerable risk attached even to turning him within the confines of the hospital bed, as must be done as part of his continuing care.

    https://www.bartshealth.nhs.uk/news/media-statement-regarding-our-care-of-archie-battersbee-13736

    1. Afternoon Angie. I haven’t commented on this because almost anything that might be said would look pointless and tasteless against a Mother’s love for her son!

      1. Quite. I fear the distraught lady is being used by a group of “do-gooders” who do not care about her one jot.

      2. A Mother’s love for her son, which has has no limits, has however been subsumed by the state.

      3. What can you say? If that were Junior I’d be pumping the bellows myself. How.. how do you countenance the death of your little boy?

        1. Archie’s case raises some contentious and serious issues surrounding a judge’s pronouncement of death by virtue of the doctors inability to apply the diagnostic test for brain stem death.

          This is enough to convince his mother that he is still worth fighting for.
          Even brain stem death alone is not considered to diagnose brain death in some countries so it is reasonable to think that Archie’s higher level brain functions like hearing are still active. It is a horrifying prospect to think that Archie may be, at some level of consciousness, to be aware of his impending fate.

          The difficulty in Archie Battersbee’s case is that, for various reasons, they couldn’t apply the diagnostic test for brain stem death. Mrs Justice Arbuthnot decided that notwithstanding the inability to apply that test, nevertheless, the preponderance of medical evidence suggested to a preponderant degree of likelihood that he was probably, in fact, brain stem dead,” Bratton added.

          https://www.euronews.com/next/2022/08/03/archie-battersbee-12-year-old-on-life-support-raises-questions-about-who-decides-life-and-

    2. The agony of his parents must be unbearable; and all, it would seem, because of some evil TikTok ‘challenge’.
      By this stage, I feel it would be kinder to move him to a hospice. If he doesn’t make it, everyone has done their best; if he reaches the hospice, he will get specialised care that allows him to finally die with dignity.

  28. A wee bit of good news to counter all the misery purveyed by the MSM.

    Our youngest daughter went home this afternoon with her newborn twins. I’m looking forward to meeting them soon.

        1. When I moved in with my husband- he wasn’t all that keen on meeting his grandchildren. He said a couple of days ago that he hoped we see them soon as he misses them.
          His little grand daughter adores him and laughs at everything he says. She’s seven. Makes my eyes mist to see them together.
          You have years of fun ahead.

      1. Talking of Poles. There are current four plus an Englishman fixing 30 oak sleepers in the gently sloping front garden They are hard workers but talk abut herding cats to get the sleepers into the configuration management (who’s currently in Oberamagau) wants!

          1. Two of ours are in mid-teen waiting-for-exam mode; currently they are bit wearing and we have to remind ourselves that we do love them – honestly.

    1. Grandchildren are not in our future, all we have are the children of nieces and nephews.

      I still feed them chocolate and send them home.

    2. Lucky man, we haven’t seen ours, except via facetime, for over 3 years.

      Make the most of them.

      1. Paul in all probability one day your prince /ss will come and then you too will become a Granddad!

          1. It will happen- my son and his now wife had been together for a while, were living together and her parents came over from California for Thanksgiving. OK, this it I thought; put a bottle of fizz in the fridge. They were all coming for T/giving dinner. Not a sausage.
            Next day we went to their house for dinner and they announced their engagement.
            They don’t want kids which is up to them…but I have the Grand Monsters here.

          2. No Mr Cup since the ex Mr Cup and I went our separate ways three years ago 🙁

      1. Too late – according to the name tags put on at birth they came already named…..

        1. Oh King Stephen! You do remember that one of our twins is called Stefan! I think of you often!

          1. Enjoy every moment! I hesitate to say that twins are unique…but they really are!!
            Oops! Not tins….obvs!
            That would be the rattles!

          2. Made Birds custard once. No instructions about powder vs water. Blasted stuff set like araldite, had to get a screwdriver to lever it out of the pan… 🙁

          3. It tells you clearly on the side of the drum: 35g custard powder, 35g sugar, 1 pint of milk (never water).

            Proper custard uses eggs, sugar, milk and a vanilla pod.

          4. Birds custard and real custard are two entirely different things.
            And – there were no instructions, ‘cos I looked. This was back in 1986 or so.

          5. I know they’re different but they are both nice when properly made. When I make a crème patissière (confectioner’s custard) I use eggs but also some Bird’s custard powder (some use just cornflour or even wheat flour) to thicken it up. [This was a tip from Michael Nadel, London confectioner].

          6. Not only that, it is hardly any more difficult to make. You can also adjust the amount of sugar to reduce or increase the sweetness, depending whether it is going to be served with Spotted Dick or cod.

          7. And don’t put the sugar in until it has thickened, otherwise you can get a burnt flavour.

          8. Disagree. You need to whip the eggs with the sugar, to make a sabayon first, then add the milk. I’ve never had a burnt sugar flavour in my crème anglaise.

          9. No. I saw a travel film some years ago. Apparently cod with custard is eaten in Iceland. I cannot bring myself to use the word “delicacy”.

          10. Enjoy every moment! I hesitate to say that twins are unique…but they really are!!
            Oops! Not tins….obvs!
            That would be the rattles!

        2. Our granddaughters were never as cuddly as our grandson but that came to a fairly abrupt end at about 10 when he started training as a teenager and conversations were replaced with grunts.
          He was 19 on Monday and is now a lovely young man and we see him quite regularly when he’s not a university where he’s studying for a Masters in Pharmacy.
          Cuddle them as often and as much as you can because you really miss it when it comes to an end.

          Edited to correct mistakes. Must proofread before posting.

        3. Our granddaughters were never as cuddly as our grandson but that came to a fairly abrupt end at about 10 when he started training as a teenager and conversations were replaced with grunts.
          He was 19 on Monday and is now a lovely young man and we see him quite regularly when he’s not a university where he’s studying for a Masters in Pharmacy.
          Cuddle them as often and as much as you can because you really miss it when it comes to an end.

          Edited to correct mistakes. Must proofread before posting.

    1. I think the 2 candidates know exactly what we think, Mr Farage. They just don’t give a toss about what we think.

      1. I wonder if I’ve become cynical or if this is just a pointless, farcical exercise of two liars doing so very publicly for their own aggrandisement.

    2. Tie over the seatbelt? Very unusual.

      Look, we all know it’s statist revenge. We all know as soon as the state gets it’s way the tide will stop. Until then we need to get a drone ahead of the statists and turn machine guns on them. Keep doing this until they stop. Do the same with the ones that are here.

        1. I wore a tie once. By the end of the day it was around my head.

          Never again. Blasted noose.

          1. I never learned! My work ties were all clip-ons (to avoid being throttled by prisoners).
            I invariably tied my dress ties with a half-Windsor. Smarter and less cumbersome than a full-Windsor and much neater that a simple hand-over.

          2. I used the same knot, I never liked the full, but sometimes a shirt collar is too wide.
            And on the rare occasions I wear them, I tie my own bow ties, either single or double depending on what’s available.

      1. Use them both on france . Sort out an age old problem and remind the cheese eating surrender monkeys who’s boss.

  29. I have received this e-mail from the Immigration Advice Service:

    Record Number of Migrants Crossing Channel to UK

    According to data released by the Ministry of Defence, a record 696 migrants crossed the English Channel to the UK on Monday, with 460 being recorded on Saturday and 247 on Friday.

    The figures on Monday represent a new recorded high in terms of crossings made in small boats on a single day.

    Below is and advert:

    Need to book your English Language Test?

    If so we recommend Trinity College London. For more information click here or the button below

    Book Online

    That and several more adverts for help in circumventing immigration problems and legal aid, They got my details because I was looking for a new passport. I thought it was a government service. Barstewards!

    1. The scum should be immediately deported to France.
      This nonsense has got to end and the dross removed.

      1. Short of sitting on a raft in the Channel with a machine gun – not sure what else an individual can do…

  30. Nottlers Beware

    Police Tasered 93-year-old disabled care home resident

    Donald Burgess, who had dementia and only one leg, died three weeks after the incident in which he reportedly threatened staff with a knife

    Two police officers are under criminal investigation on suspicion of manslaughter after a 93-year-old disabled man with dementia died after
    being tasered in a care home.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/08/04/police-tasered-93-year-old-disabled-care-home-resident/

    1. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8f2db64a382eedffdcb039f9e61f44181dc44a0ed70a2cb6a79007965a9673fe.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2c81207b08f165788523c14bc9f2546ba7dfb9435e43fb5216103cfecce1ee7a.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/52b3fd0e152eeef0ba9bc668bc11274bc35b29eb992958480cd32b0662ac61c6.jpg THIS is the way to deal with someone who is mentally disturbed and making threats with a large sharp knife.

      I apologise for the quality of the report (which has faded somewhat) but the gist is this. I was called by social services to a house where an emotionally disturbed young woman was threatening to kill herself with a knife. She steadfastly refused to open the door to anyone. At the scene I quickly sent everyone away (including social services and my supervisory staff) despite their protests (I even told one inspector, over the radio, to fuck off for interfering!) I then spent considerable time gaining the woman’s confidence by speaking to her, calmly, through the letter box. Eventually she calmed down sufficiently to open the door to me. I then spend more time gently speaking to her and eventually she put the knife down. I then arranged for her to be taken in an ambulance to hospital. No one hurt, job done. I was fully prepared to be disciplined for being discourteous to a senior officer, but he sheepishly thanked me afterwards and nothing more was said.

      1. Good one, Grizz! Wouldn’t make exciting telly, which seems to be the way things are done these days – screeching tyres and flashing lights. Cool & calm is too dull!

    2. Thank goodness he wasn’t black. Then his death would have to be taken seriously.

    1. Just remember
      The Chancellor you have is not what you want
      The Chancellor you want is not what you need.
      The Chancellor you need can’t be obtained….

  31. Currently trending in Canada. How soon will we see Truss’s or Sunak’s picture on a similar comment?
    Trudeau and Rutte (Netherlands) have gone in hard; here, over the last year or so, we’ve had big hints regarding cattle flatulence and its impact on global climate change and an advert asking farmers to consider retiring early. Different approaches with the same result, less meat, less dairy and less arable crop output. Result will be less food available and higher prices leading to a more bland and probably unhealthy diet. A secondary impact will be on the hospitality industry, something Johnson & Co went after in the lockdowns. Anything and everything enjoyed by the people is under attack, a miserable existence for the masses is the aim of these self-proclaimed elites.

    https://twitter.com/JulieMCTaylor/status/1554669498090885123

    1. Chemical companies are suing the village idiot over the proposed cuts in fertilizers.

      Trudeau the hypocrit took so many flights last month that they reckon that his flights used more fuel than was used by all of the truckers in the freedom convoy.

      The environment minister is believed to be lost on his cross country trip to discuss environmental issues. A great idea to go by train, he just overlooked that trains Don go to five if the provincial capitals.

      It’s a minority government for God’s sake, he is being supported by the further left party.

      1. As I’ve said before I thought Canadians were sensible – Clearly they aren’t….

        1. Only about 35% of those that voted did vote liberal.
          Thanks to nicely drawn riding boundaries, the eastern suburban ridings get many more seats than the rural and western areas. Guess where the liberals gather.

    2. The same applies here. People keep wailing that government must do something, but the only thing government must do is to scrap all taxes and bugger the feck off.

      1. It is time for the people to stop wailing and take matters into their own hands, it is the only avenue open.

  32. The great Greenscam revealed a little more…….

    REGO’s the fraudulent way to claim you supply “100% renewable energy”

    “REGOs do not guarantee the energy you are buying as a customer comes directly from renewable sources.

    An energy supplier (such as British Gas or Gazprom etc.) can buy REGO

    certificates from a wind farm or solar farm at around 15p per

    certificate. They do not have to also buy renewable energy from wind or

    solar farms at the same time.

    The supplier could simply buy the certificate and then source energy

    from a separate source all together. This could be from a coal power

    station.

    Consequently, the energy that is being supplied to you as a customer

    from these big companies could be derived from fossil fuels and not from

    renewable sources, even though your supplier has marketed your energy

    supply as ‘green.’

    Yes, they are giving 15p per megawatt hour to a sustainable renewable

    energy generator, but this 15p is minimal in the grand scheme of things

    and is futile if the energy you are using is still sourced from fossil

    fuels.

    This is what Shell have done. They have sold misleading 100%

    renewable energy tariffs to their customers by buying surplus REGO

    certificates.”

    https://www.greenelement.co.uk/blog/renewable-energy-guarantees-of-origin/
    Just like “Carbon Trading” and “Carbon Capture” all a huge con that enriches the big boys as they laugh at the young zealots they use as foot soldiers see Al Gore etc for more details
    Edit
    Like most of you I suspect I had no idea what a “REGO” certificate was,there must have been some complaints about the “100% renewable” ads on tv as in the small print they now mention REGOs, a little checking and voila the scam is revealed

      1. Renewable Energy Guarantees of Origin (REGO) (Just google it – and be depressed).

      2. The Renewable Energy Guarantees of Origin (REGO) scheme provides transparency to consumers about the proportion of electricity that suppliers source from renewable generation . All EU Member States are required to have such a scheme.

        1. Domestic/ Retail suppliers of electricity and gas have no control over the origin of/ the content they sell to consumers, srb.

          REGO appears to be an EU Compulsory Fraud Scam … !

          Quelle surprise!

          1. Like so many other moronic nonsense that stupid organisation pumps out in the pretence of it’s demented ideology.

        2. What a shame we are no longer a member of the EU and have no need to follow this nonsense…..

    1. Scottish Power ranted about how great they were for having rela wind mills. I said I really don’t care if there’s a blasted windmill, the whole green scam is a con at the bill payers expense.

  33. That’s me for yet another dreary, sultry, unpleasant day. The market was good – we were early. Sardines for supper, I believe!

    Have a brilliant evening planning how to eat 30% less food.

    A demain – prolly.

        1. Women footballers don’t routinely go to ground when tackled, screaming and clutching their legs! They simply get back up and get on with it. Just like Stanley Matthews, and his generation, did way back in the mists of time.

    1. Not many players today
      Mine’s a Par Four!

      Wordle 411 4/6
      ⬜⬜⬜🟨🟩
      ⬜🟨⬜⬜🟩
      🟩⬜⬜⬜🟩
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  34. Hey Hey we’re the Monkees…:

    The Biden administration has officially declared monkeypox a public health emergency.

    “I want to make an announcement today that I will be declaring a public health emergency,” HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said during a Thursday call with reporters.

    “We’re prepared to take our response to the next level in addressing this virus.”

    “We urge every American to kick monkey pox seriously and to take responsibility and help us tackle this virus,” he continued.

      1. A bloke called the clinic yesterday asking for the MPV vaccine. We have only about sixty doses every couple of weeks so have to limit to high risk pts.
        This bloke qualified – he had slept with 300+ men in the past three months, in ‘saunas’ and other on-premises sex establishments.
        Another bloke (76yo) ran a close second with 168 (v. precise – he must keep a diary) male partners so far this year.

          1. Yo Stormy

            3×30 = 90

            300 Divided by 90 = Three and a third a day.

            Whether it is better to give than receive, I think this was more tha a hobby

    1. “The Monkeys have officially declared the Biden administration to be a health emergency …”

  35. The BBC clearly can’t stand the ‘imperialist’ Commonwealth

    Black Commonwealth citizens used to be patronised and told off by white fascists. Now, they get patronised and told off by white liberals

    ALLISON PEARSON

    Why is the BBC broadcasting the Commonwealth Games? The corporation is clearly deeply ill at ease with what its staff would regard as a “problematic”, “imperialist” (racist) institution. Coverage of the opening ceremony, which should have been a fantastic, uplifting celebration of sport, was barely watchable, I found. It was like being forced, in the middle of a birthday party, to attend a lecture on diversity and LGBTQ rights. A bard from Birmingham called Casey Bailey intoned a dire bit of doggerel which instructed us to “check the galleries and palaces for the evidence of wrongdoing”. [Be thankful it wasn’t Benjamin Zepheniah or Linton Kwesi Johnson.] I’m sure that Adam Peaty and our gold-winning swimmers in the 4 x 100-metre relay think of little else.

    As Casey fretted about millions of people “held under” by the Commonwealth’s banner, the Beeb helpfully added footage of the National Front (from 50 years ago) just to remind viewers what a horrible, racist country we live in. “What does the Commonwealth mean in modern society?” a frowningly earnest Clare Balding asked her studio panel. “The history of the Commonwealth isn’t the best,” said Ama Agbeze, who strangely seems to have done quite well under that dreadful organisation, captaining England in 2018 to a Gold medal in hideously white netball no less.

    Gymnast Max Whitlock told Clare he was excited about the “diverse and inclusive” opening ceremony, saying it would be “a statement about the need for many Commonwealth countries to change laws, change attitudes”. That turned out to mean Tom Daley carrying the Pride flag into the stadium with six other standard-bearers who represented the 35 Commonwealth countries where homosexuality is still a crime. Black members of the Commonwealth used to be patronised and told off by white fascists. Now, they get patronised and told off by white liberals. And they call this progress.

    Ironically, the colonisers of today are the Wokeists who want to infiltrate every aspect of life – sport, culture, politics – and bend it to their righteous, hectoring creed. The BBC could have acknowledged that some Christian Commonwealth countries have a moral objection to the philosophy of Pride. That would have shown the “cultural sensitivity” which they aggressively demand of others. But, no. Its attitude is that such people should be “educating” themselves in inclusion instead of training 12 hours a day to run faster than any human before them. Sounds a teeny bit racist, don’t you think?

    Why must everything be about “Diversity” instead of Diversity’s sweet, magnanimous sibling, Unity? No occasion is just allowed to be fun any more. Enough people are sick of it now, I think, for the fightback to begin, starting with the highest offices in the land. On LBC this week, Jacob Rees-Mogg spoke with his customary lethal courtesy about civil servants in the Cabinet Office who had done a “Check Yo Privilege” course. The idea of all those Oxbridge-educated mandarins excusing that appalling grammar – Yo must be joking, Humphrey! – and reflecting on how their sociocultural identities had shaped their ascent from Winchester to Whitehall would be hilarious were it not for the scandalous amount of public money wasted on what Mr Rees-Mogg correctly called “woke rubbish”.

    Suella Braverman also lent her mighty mind to the battle against what she called a “new religion with a new priestly caste”. The Attorney General said she was “horrified to discover that hundreds of government lawyers spent nearly 2,000 hours of taxpayer-funded time last year attending lectures on “micro-incivilities”, different “lived experiences” and “how to be a straight ally”, courtesy of Stonewall. Incredibly, the lawyers are told that if a black person says something is offensive then it is offensive, and they don’t have a right to question it. So much for due process and Magna Carta, eh?

    Guilt-ridden, self-loathing elite groups seem particularly prone to drinking in this kind of Left-wing indoctrination. Normal people are more bothered about the macro-incivilities of their forthcoming gas bill. Liz Truss has pledged to scrap diversity jobs in Whitehall. Good. A pernicious identity politics which claims to enlarge tolerance only sows division, fear and, ultimately, racism. We need a counter-Reformation to purge the heretic-hunting Stonewall Inquisition from our schools and institutions.

    Funnily enough, despite the BBC’s tedious obsession with inclusion, I have really enjoyed watching the sport from Birmingham, especially the gymnastics of Jake Jarman. Peterborough-born Jake’s double-back somersault with a triple twist defied gravity just as it defied belief. When he stood on the podium to collect his fourth gold medal, with the strains of Jerusalem swelling around him, did that mixed-race athlete think the Commonwealth event he bestrode like a god was about examining the past for evidence of wrongdoing? Or did his heart swell with pride, as he made our hearts swell with pride, and did he give that adorable shy smile of his and think, “Hooray! I won it for England”? [Don’t bet on it?] That’s unity.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/08/04/bbc-clearly-cant-stand-commonwealth/

  36. The BBC clearly can’t stand the ‘imperialist’ Commonwealth

    Black Commonwealth citizens used to be patronised and told off by white fascists. Now, they get patronised and told off by white liberals

    ALLISON PEARSON

    Why is the BBC broadcasting the Commonwealth Games? The corporation is clearly deeply ill at ease with what its staff would regard as a “problematic”, “imperialist” (racist) institution. Coverage of the opening ceremony, which should have been a fantastic, uplifting celebration of sport, was barely watchable, I found. It was like being forced, in the middle of a birthday party, to attend a lecture on diversity and LGBTQ rights. A bard from Birmingham called Casey Bailey intoned a dire bit of doggerel which instructed us to “check the galleries and palaces for the evidence of wrongdoing”. [Be thankful it wasn’t Benjamin Zepheniah or Linton Kwesi Johnson.] I’m sure that Adam Peaty and our gold-winning swimmers in the 4 x 100-metre relay think of little else.

    As Casey fretted about millions of people “held under” by the Commonwealth’s banner, the Beeb helpfully added footage of the National Front (from 50 years ago) just to remind viewers what a horrible, racist country we live in. “What does the Commonwealth mean in modern society?” a frowningly earnest Clare Balding asked her studio panel. “The history of the Commonwealth isn’t the best,” said Ama Agbeze, who strangely seems to have done quite well under that dreadful organisation, captaining England in 2018 to a Gold medal in hideously white netball no less.

    Gymnast Max Whitlock told Clare he was excited about the “diverse and inclusive” opening ceremony, saying it would be “a statement about the need for many Commonwealth countries to change laws, change attitudes”. That turned out to mean Tom Daley carrying the Pride flag into the stadium with six other standard-bearers who represented the 35 Commonwealth countries where homosexuality is still a crime. Black members of the Commonwealth used to be patronised and told off by white fascists. Now, they get patronised and told off by white liberals. And they call this progress.

    Ironically, the colonisers of today are the Wokeists who want to infiltrate every aspect of life – sport, culture, politics – and bend it to their righteous, hectoring creed. The BBC could have acknowledged that some Christian Commonwealth countries have a moral objection to the philosophy of Pride. That would have shown the “cultural sensitivity” which they aggressively demand of others. But, no. Its attitude is that such people should be “educating” themselves in inclusion instead of training 12 hours a day to run faster than any human before them. Sounds a teeny bit racist, don’t you think?

    Why must everything be about “Diversity” instead of Diversity’s sweet, magnanimous sibling, Unity? No occasion is just allowed to be fun any more. Enough people are sick of it now, I think, for the fightback to begin, starting with the highest offices in the land. On LBC this week, Jacob Rees-Mogg spoke with his customary lethal courtesy about civil servants in the Cabinet Office who had done a “Check Yo Privilege” course. The idea of all those Oxbridge-educated mandarins excusing that appalling grammar – Yo must be joking, Humphrey! – and reflecting on how their sociocultural identities had shaped their ascent from Winchester to Whitehall would be hilarious were it not for the scandalous amount of public money wasted on what Mr Rees-Mogg correctly called “woke rubbish”.

    Suella Braverman also lent her mighty mind to the battle against what she called a “new religion with a new priestly caste”. The Attorney General said she was “horrified to discover that hundreds of government lawyers spent nearly 2,000 hours of taxpayer-funded time last year attending lectures on “micro-incivilities”, different “lived experiences” and “how to be a straight ally”, courtesy of Stonewall. Incredibly, the lawyers are told that if a black person says something is offensive then it is offensive, and they don’t have a right to question it. So much for due process and Magna Carta, eh?

    Guilt-ridden, self-loathing elite groups seem particularly prone to drinking in this kind of Left-wing indoctrination. Normal people are more bothered about the macro-incivilities of their forthcoming gas bill. Liz Truss has pledged to scrap diversity jobs in Whitehall. Good. A pernicious identity politics which claims to enlarge tolerance only sows division, fear and, ultimately, racism. We need a counter-Reformation to purge the heretic-hunting Stonewall Inquisition from our schools and institutions.

    Funnily enough, despite the BBC’s tedious obsession with inclusion, I have really enjoyed watching the sport from Birmingham, especially the gymnastics of Jake Jarman. Peterborough-born Jake’s double-back somersault with a triple twist defied gravity just as it defied belief. When he stood on the podium to collect his fourth gold medal, with the strains of Jerusalem swelling around him, did that mixed-race athlete think the Commonwealth event he bestrode like a god was about examining the past for evidence of wrongdoing? Or did his heart swell with pride, as he made our hearts swell with pride, and did he give that adorable shy smile of his and think, “Hooray! I won it for England”? [Don’t bet on it?] That’s unity.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/08/04/bbc-clearly-cant-stand-commonwealth/

  37. Isn’t today the anniversary of the outbreak of WW I ? Not one mention of it in the media today; history doesn’t matter anymore.

      1. Not while I has breff in me body;-) History is SO important. Forget the past and you are destined to repeat it….I think Churchill said summat like it.

          1. Bill isn’t here- I could start with Richard III- only kidding, folks. No, seriously, it is all so important.

      2. Present day Media and politicians make me mad, about all the MAD years I spent, ensuring their safety freedom of speech

      1. Gawd, your name is mentioned and you appear out of a trap door. I also do not read through all the early am comments.

      2. Gawd, your name is mentioned and you appear out of a trap door. I also do not read through all the early am comments.

      3. Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie were shot to death by a Bosnian Serb nationalist during an official visit to the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo on June 28, 1914.

        I wasn’t there, Guv, honest …

Comments are closed.