Thursday 5 August: The American bid for Morrisons is bad for staff, customers and Britain

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its comments facility (now reinstated, but not as good as ours),
Intelligent, polite, good-humoured debate is welcome, whether on or off topic. Differing opinions are encouraged, but rudeness or personal attacks on other posters will not be tolerated. Posts which – in the opinion of the moderators – make this a less than cordial environment, are likely to be removed, without prior warning.  Persistent offenders will be banned.

Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2021/08/04/letters-american-bid-morrisons-bad-staff-customers-britain/

814 thoughts on “Thursday 5 August: The American bid for Morrisons is bad for staff, customers and Britain”

  3. “The public policy response to this illness has caused more harm than the illness itself”. 5 August 2021.

    “Very often with an illness, the body’s response to the illness causes more harm than the illness itself. And I think in this case, the public policy response to this illness has caused more harm than the illness itself.”

    Morning everyone. The whole thing has been a Criminal Fiasco from beginning to end. The Government used methods and took measures for which there was no justification whatsoever! The Spreading of Fear alone was a device worthy of an enemy attack, the killing of thousands of the elderly in Care Homes, a crime of Manslaughter if not actual Mass Murder. What should have been an epidemic of a mild illness was transformed by the State into a Pandemic that killed and is killing tens of thousands of people through serious but unrelated conditions!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/08/05/public-policy-response-illness-has-caused-harm-illness/

    2. “Very often with an illness, the body’s response to the illness causes more harm than the illness itself.
      Utter effing rowlocks. Who wrote that shit?
      The body is fighting off illnesses pretty well all the time, whether they be a cold, other virus or something bacterial, and since we don’t all drop dead within a moment of being born, seems pretty effective. Occasionally, the cure turns out to be damaging, but in relation to people getting an infection that needs combatted several times a year, seems pretty unlikely (a few in 84 000 000 000 probability (1 infection each a month).

      1. It’s not entirely wrong. The so-called cytokine storm, effectively an overreaction of the immune system, especially to viral RTIs, is one instance. Hay fever is another; the immune system cannot make a specific response to pollen and so instructs cells in the nasal lining to produce histamine to flush it out, the effect of which is worse than that of the irritant.

      2. Not always effing rowlocks, Paul. E.g. a wasp or bee sting in the throat can cause a swelling, which on the exterior would be harmless or uncomfortable, but which can block the airway lead to asphyxiation.

  5. I was istening to Times radio while in the bath earlier, they announced that 16-18 years olds will be ‘allowed’ the vaccine in the next few weeks, and 12 years olds will be ‘invited’ to have the jab in the Autumn.
    Then the bombshell, vaccinators are being hired to go into schools to administer the jab, the word ‘invited’ suggests that people will have a choice, I don’t think they will get a choice unless they want to live in the equivalent of a leper colony.
    Language is now being weaponised by the authoritarians, almost to the point where it looks like they are extracting the urine., they are getting that confident.

    1. Morning Bob, they are that confident because there is no effective opposition to their plans, those that oppose what is happening are very much in the minority.
      Conversations with friends and family only confirm to me that most people accept or give no thought to what is underway.
      I shed no tears for myself at my time of life, I fear for my children and grandchildren.

    2. Just legalise intravenous cannabinoids, add a shot of Pfizer and the kids can do it themselves.😳

    3. ‘Morning, Bob.

      I’m pro voluntary vaccination for adults, but somehow I feel uneasy about the ‘coercion’ around teenagers.

      1. And even more uneasy about vaccinating children for something which rarely affects them more than a common cold.

    4. 336307+ up ticks,
      Morning B3,
      They are confident & why would they not be, that the herd will STILL support them WHATEVER the consequence.

    5. Morning, Bob3.

      The decision to “vaccinate” young children in schools horrifies me. The JCVI’s sudden about face on the use of this potion on children, bearing in mind the adverse effect reports from the USA, is disturbing. Clearly the decision was political and not medical.

      I do not wish to appear crass but the inevitable** adverse effects may, just may be the wake-up call the slumbering and unthinking population needs. Schools are small communities and hiding any side effects, let alone those of a serious nature, will be impossible. An ambulance rushing through the school gates and a pupil being carted away will open eyes and minds. Facebook pages etc will be spreading the news like wildfire. Likewise with effects that occur days later: the PTB will not be able to censor the news as they are doing with the MSM. However…

      …**The evil-doers may be ahead of the game and have decided that children will only receive a placebo (we know now that there exists an adult placebo group, we do not know how large that group is) and hence no side effects will occur. This action will reinforce their erroneous claims that the “vaccine” is safe and at the same time “educate” the children into accepting regular inoculations to keep them safe. As it is recognised that young people shrug off the “virus” with few serious symptoms this scenario would be a win-win for the “vaccinators”. The annual “boosters” will be the genuine article.
      I never used to be a conspiracy theorist but…

      1. Good morning, Korky. With regard to your final sentence: one million upvotes.

    6. Strangely, hospitals are now apparently filled with young people with cv. Odd, that when the lurgy was coursing through the country, they were unaffected in general. One might conclude that there an agenda to push.

    7. Language has always been weaponised by those in power; he who controls the language, controls the narrative.

  6. I was istening to Times radio while in the bath earlier, they announced that 16-18 years olds will be ‘allowed’ the vaccine in the next few weeks, and 12 years olds will be ‘invited’ to have the jab in the Autumn.
    Then the bombshell, vaccinators are being hired to go into schools to administer the jab, the word ‘invited’ suggests that people will have a choice, I don’t think they will get a choice unless they want to live in the equivalent of a leper colony.
    Language is now being weaponised by the authoritarians, almost to the point where it looks like they are extracting the urine., they are getting that confident.

        1. Sunny & chilly here. Now the sun is on the hives, bees are out ‘n about. It’s good to see the buzzy little things going about their business.
          Got to go and herd them today, to be sure they are feeding properly and have increasing larders for overwintering.

  8. ‘Women are being excluded from their own sports’. Spiked. 5 August 2021.

    Sport is about bodies. It’s about physical performance. So the physical reality of someone’s sex really matters. There’s a very good reason why we separate out male and female athletes. A male body goes through male puberty and develops on testosterone. That gives it an advantage that female bodies just don’t have. On average, male bodies are bigger, stronger and faster than female bodies. That’s why the female sports category was invented. It gives women a chance to compete on a level playing field, against people with the same body type. Is it fair to allow people who were born male to be in the female sports category? The answer is no.

    You have to laugh. Feminism has argued the exact opposite for the last thirty years.

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/08/04/women-are-being-excluded-from-their-own-sports/

    1. 336307+ up ticks
      AS,
      Seemingly only one answered the
      question when asked was it wrong
      appertaining to the weight lifting only one answered yes the rest stayed mum.
      To me the team was a cross section of society and what is occurring politically.

      1. weightlifter was following orders from Jacinta Arden to get the issue covered, not to compete and now has deemed it’s time to retire. MSM is now in their own preferred corner airing whatever suits them

        1. I did wonder that. The dreaded JA was part of the Blair entourage and knows all about political manipulation.

      2. weightlifter was following orders from Jacinta Arden to get the issue covered, not to compete and now has deemed it’s time to retire. MSM is now in their own preferred corner airing whatever suits them

    2. mng araminta. Usual tried and tested and proven model “Fail to Prepare, Prepare to Fail”, then pull the “victimhood” card under mental illness etc. [it’s good for TV coverage]

    3. mng araminta. Usual tried and tested and proven model “Fail to Prepare, Prepare to Fail”, then pull the “victomhood” card under mental illness etc. [it’s good for TV coverage]

    4. Morning all.

      I take issue with your last sentence. As far as I am aware the argument was that women should have the same opportunities work wise i.e., salary wise for doing the same job, obviously. However, as in women’s tennis, I do not believe there should be parity regarding payment as there is obviously a difference in the minimum number of sets played.

      Unfortunately, as with all activists, there are those who push things too far. And as usual they then become strident and unreasonable in their demands.

      ETA: Sorry about all the italics – something went wrong.

      1. Morning vw. Ahh! The Pursuit of Equality. This Equality was only sought if it brought about an improvement in Women’s position, particularly if it was financial. No Feminist ever called for a reduction in Reward or Position to match their Male counterparts. Though they demanded access to all Male Activities they blocked the opposite! The whole thing was prompted by Greed and Envy. They are hoist by their own petard here and well deserved it is too!

        1. This is the problem with labelling people “feminist”. I am feminine but I have given an example of an instance where I think women are paid more than they should be (I am not actually aware of any others).

          And why shouldn’t women be paid the same for doing the same job? When you say “the whole thing was prompted by greed and envy” – I repeat, why shouldn’t they be paid the same for doing the same job? This obviously depends on the physicality of the job but life is too short to argue the ins and outs of every single job.

          1. Same job, same pay.
            Problem comes when we start talking unfairness, and quotas.
            Norway is pretty equal, and the girls have got their way and are now required to do military service, as are the men. Seems they are pretty good at it, too. However, we see quotas that force company boards to be at least 40% female, for example, but no quotas that require bin collection to be 40% female… I listen to SWMBO (a wise course of action!), and she is one capable woman – but she isn’t interested in all this top management crap, directorships and the like – in fact, she got so peed off with being department manager that she reverted to being a technical specialist. She doesn’t want top management positions, and I suspect there are a lot of women who think the same way. Men, typically, want it because it shows them to be successfully competing, and that’s mostly a guy thing. So, just maybe, the lack of women at director level isn’t to do with unfair, just a lack of desire to be at that level?

    5. Morning all.

      I take issue with your last sentence. As far as I am aware the argument was that women should have the same opportunities work wise i.e., salary wise for doing the same job, obviously. However, as in women’s tennis, I do not believe there should be parity regarding payment as there is obviously a difference in the minimum number of sets played.

      Unfortunately, as with all activists, there are those who push things too far. And as usual they then become strident and unreasonable in their demands.

      ETA: Sorry about all the italics – something went wrong.

    6. Our two youngest grandchildren are 15 and 17.
      The 17 girl has a tongue on her and can be sharp. Her 15 year old brother is now the same height and is all muscle.
      Their father has warned his daughter that she could push too far and a combination of male hormones and physical strength could – could – make her regret her bossiness. He has also warned his son to be aware of his superior strength and not abuse it and learn to control his temper.
      This may upset the feminists who have taken logic into the realms of madness, but this is a situation in which both sexes have to learn to curb their natural instincts. In other words, what human beings have been doing for millennia.

      1. All part of growing up – learning that, whilst you can, it may be unwise/unwelcome/downright unpleasant to actually do.

  10. 336307+ up ticks,
    Morning AS,
    It has been openly in the making for at least three decades, the construct of repress, reset, replace that is.

    The beauty of replace is the overseers do NOT have to replace the whole population, a short term impossibility
    only major players, and that is a highly successful probability in play, take council / mayors members for instance…..

    1. ogga mng. “Overseers” ie; corporates plan to remove the “nigger in the woodpile” elements of population / rights. ie indigenous population who fully understand their rights within a Sovereign nation, remove the political matrix with a version compatible to corporates and replace them with illegal economic migrants who will follow the proposed new “rules of the road” in return for being “relocated”. This is what needs to be confronted full on, as the rule book’s thrown out with the bath water when it goes against corporates

      1. 336307+ up ticks,
        Morning AWK,
        They only have to replace peoples in power take khan for instance what damage could he do if he so wished,
        replicate that via councils nationwide and these Isles
        could go into steep decline, what was that?

        1. destroy existing model and replace it. Councils won’t exist, it’ll be corporately paid “Regional Commissar” aka the test model being run via Khan as it’s closer to central power and easier to “manage / tweak”

  11. mng all, another cold start here again. Usual witterings from the Islington Wine Cellar:

    SIR – We are all for inward investment. Aren’t we? It can certainly bring advantages, but there is something disturbing about the bid by American vulture funds for our much-loved Morrisons supermarket.

    The City, always ready to sell its grandmother for a quick turn, is due to pick up an outrageous £300 million in fees, so is unlikely to object. Institutional shareholders, desperate to show how clever they are at stock picking, will welcome it. Only the investor Silchester has shown a sign of pro bono by voting against it.

    But the staff at Morrisons, who have helped make the business a national success story – along with the millions of customers who like its consumer-friendly attitude – have ample reason to be worried.

    There can be only one purpose for this takeover – and that is to strip its assets, enabling those behind it to walk away with a billion pounds. Any national benefit would appear to be non-existent: it is difficult even to begin to make a convincing case that this deal is in the national interest. In the past, Morrisons has been good to its customers, good to its farm suppliers and good to its staff. It was able to build its reputation as a sensible, well-run British company because it was well funded and consequently didn’t have to pinch and scrape to cover costs.

    I wonder what the loyal staff, some of whom have worked for Morrisons for 20 years, feel about having the business sold over their heads. Shouldn’t the management, now with its nose in the trough, at least have considered giving the staff a bonus?

    This would have rewarded them for their part in creating a successful and well-regarded business. It might also serve to compensate employees for rougher waters ahead and help create a better relationship with the new owners. (When I floated my company, I gave 10 per cent of the equity to the workforce.)

    The bid is doubly unattractive to those affected, as it is headed up by an ex-head of Tesco, a business that has been criticised for its treatment of its suppliers and being careless over its stock-taking.

    Profit-seeking in a competitive environment has played a huge role in raising living standards around the world. Food now only accounts for 10 per cent of the family budget. But the circumstances of the Morrisons deal will no doubt strengthen the hand of capitalism’s many critics.

    Even if it will not act now, I hope the Government should at least learn the lessons of unbridled inward investment. It should refer takeovers above a certain size to a beefed-up Competition and Markets Authority.

    It is promising that it has already indicated that it wishes to do this: the national interest, however difficult to define, must be a factor. Allowing billionaire asset strippers to walk away with another billion, leaving this country poorer, while contributing nothing in return, should be a thing of the past.

    Lord Vinson (Con)
    London SW1

    Olympic trans rules

    SIR – A problem with “trans” Olympic competitors is that men still dominate the world and think that a woman is merely a man with reduced testosterone.

    Could I remind them that a woman is not a man at all? She is a woman.

    Taking drugs to reduce testosterone does not a woman make.

    Annabel Burton
    Winchcombe, Gloucestershire

    SIR – I agree with Sally Jones (Comment, August 3) that sharing medals is a cop-out.

    Shouldn’t the men’s high-jumpers have shared a silver, as neither had won?

    Graham Smelt
    Huddersfield, West Yorkshire

    SIR – Julian Mogford (Letters, August 3) wonders why the International Olympic Committee has not devised 
a better fastening for competitors’ badges than safety-pins.

    I, like many other riders to hounds, fasten our expensive hunting ties to our shirts using even more expensive gold pins, as do Olympic equestrians, and find that it works.

    Nicky Samengo-Turner
    Gloucester

    Chocolate Mozart

    SIR – Ivan Hewett (Arts, August 3) questions the wisdom of Mozart’s last three symphonies being performed in a row during Sunday evening’s Prom concert.

    I, too, found this puzzling. While there was superb playing and musicianship from the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and its conductor Maxim Emelyanychev, 
by the time we reached the opening bars of Mozart’s symphony No 41 
(The Jupiter) I felt like Bruce Bogtrotter in Roald Dahl’s Matilda being forced 
to eat the last slice of Miss Trunchbull’s chocolate cake.

    Jean Clark
    Eastbourne, East Sussex

    Rhythm and googe

    SIR – As an orchestral string player, I read with interest M T Austin’s account of an oboist providing an A with very wide tremolo (Letters, August 3).

    This was described as “almost a googe”. It was not a term with which I was familiar, but you can imagine the response when I typed “googe” into 
a well-known search engine.

    So I am none the wiser.

    Kate Pycock
    Ipswich, Suffolk

    Freedom to travel

    SIR – The Prime Minister asked, on 
the subject of lifting Covid restrictions, “If not now, when?”

    Regarding travel restrictions, if we don’t open up overseas travel this 
 year, why should travel be opened up next year?

    Anthony Booty
    Angmering, West Sussex

    SIR – I and thousands like me were volunteers in Covid vaccination clinical trials. We now find ourselves unable to obtain “vaccine passports” despite GPs having records of the vaccination details.

    The NHS vaccination app and the paper-based passport do not include data from clinical trials. The app was supposed to be amended by the beginning of July; this was delayed until the end of July. Now, in August, there is still no progress. Thus, no volunteers are able to travel overseas.

    For many like me who were part of the Novavax trial the situation is worse. I was led to believe that Novavax was submitting its dossier to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency in the spring of this year. To date no submission has taken place.

    As I have been vaccinated with an unlicensed product there seems little hope that I will receive a vaccination passport in the near future. At present I cannot, for health and safety reasons, be vaccinated with one of the approved vaccines.

    Am I, and thousands like me, to be condemned to a life of not being allowed to travel overseas because we did the “right thing” by volunteering?

    Joan Meakin
    Milnthorpe, Cumbria

    Nuisance callers fined

    SIR – Paul Arnold, the deputy CEO of the UK Information Commissioner’s Office, defends the commitment of the ICO by saying it has levied more than £13.5 million in fines to nuisance call and spam text operators since 2015 (Letters, August 2).

    We all know the stress and financial damage these operators can create, 
 so one might wonder whether a punishment of barely £2.5 million 
per year constitutes anything more than the most token of efforts.

    Can the Government really not do better?

    Mark Lewis
    Aboyne, Aberdeenshire

    SIR – May we ask how many of these fines have been paid?

    Michael Towers
    Sherborne, Dorset

    Insect killers

    SIR – My modern Skoda windscreen is rarely splattered with insects (Letters, August 4), but my 1952 Jowett Javelin murders them with silent aplomb.

    Aerodynamics at play, perhaps?

    Geoff McAuley
    York

    SIR – Graham Lang observes (Letters, August 3) that he gardens unhindered by insects and that there has been a huge reduction in wild birds.

    I don’t doubt his experience, but wonder why in my garden I am putting elastic bands around my trouser legs to prevent widespread insect bites. And where have all my redcurrants gone?

    Robert Curl
    East Raynham, Norfolk

    SIR – There is a lot of talk of bugs on the windscreen: surely in British English the word bug is usually used for biting insects, such as bedbugs.

    Apparently, all insects are bugs now and we are all Americans.

    Joseph Kerrigan
    London W13

    A fairer deal for full-time residents in Cornwall

    SIR – David Nunn (Letters, July 31), writing about holiday homes in Cornwall, claims that he rescued a derelict hovel, bestowing work upon otherwise idle local tradespeople.

    Those people might have restored that hovel for themselves or their children, had they not been priced out of the market. Has Mr Nunn thought about where they will live, and who will take over their businesses, in years to come?

    Holiday and second homes are refurbished once over many years. They do not put patients on to local GP lists, nor children into the village school. They do not support the local economy all year round. Visitors do support the seasonal hospitality businesses to some extent – yet all too often we see the supermarket delivery van arrive shortly after they do, so village shops do not benefit.

    Visitors are of course welcome, and are an essential part of rural and coastal economies, but there needs to be a sustainable future for local communities, so that they can maintain the scenery and services that people expect. The first step should be to ensure that every new-build home is designated for permanent residence only.

    Honor Byford
    Middleham, North Yorkshire

    SIR – David Nunn makes valid points about holiday homes in Cornwall. The same is true in Devon.

    However, he misses the point that, while local people may complain about outsiders making prices unaffordable, they are the ones who sell properties as holiday homes.

    The fairest way to stabilise prices may be to introduce capital gains tax on the increase in value of primary properties.

    Kate Graeme-Cook
    Brixham, Devon

    The risk of electric car batteries catching fire

    SIR – Your article about electric car batteries catching fire (Business, August 3) was well-informed, but I would add several points.

    A runaway lithium fire, which may be unlikely and tolerable in a mobile phone, becomes a more serious risk in a car – and, in a large energy storage battery, very much more so.

    Recent reports of fire and explosion in Liverpool, Beijing and Chicago show that accidents are far from rare.

    In Britain, it seems, the ambition to achieve net zero has led to such incidents being dismissed and has discouraged the authorities from classifying these energy stores as dangerous.

    Emeritus Professor Wade Allison
    Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire

    1. I’m surprised that Graham S. of Huddersfield hasn’t suggested smelting the gold medal in two, so that it could be shared.

    3. Dammitall!!! Lord Vinson! How many times to I have to explain that the UK is “open for business”! Come one, Come all. All welcome. Russian gangsters, Czech fraudsters, Indian embezzlers, Saudi crooks, Texan wanglers. No barriers, no visas, no limits. Do as you please and pocket the dough (and take it back home with you).

    4. Nicky Samengo-Turner, while I fasten my expensive hunting tie with a gold pin, I secure the loose ends to my shirt with safety pins.

    1. mng bob. Another one who’s swallowed a fridge and wishes she had a figure of an IDP. It even gives propaganda a bad name, then again it is CNN

    2. They have lost the plot.
      What’s next? A my little pony in the shape of Hancock?

  13. How the Iran tanker hijacking unfolded. 5 August 2021.

    It was late afternoon in the Gulf of Oman when the speedboat came alongside the red and blue painted hull of the MV Asphalt Princess.

    Seven heavily armed individuals clambered up the side and ordered the crew to sail for Iranian waters.

    Just exactly how did they do this? Boarding a ship at sea while it is underway is frankly impossible without the active assistance of its crew. The rest also reads like something from Fred Karno’s False Flag Circus. If the crew really did disable the engine why didn’t the boarders simply shoot one of them? This would have soon brought about repairs. This is just more fakery to provide an excuse to attack Iran!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2021/08/04/quick-subterfuge-panicked-late-night-phonecalls-iran-tanker/

    1. On the plus side, there are no reports of any crew member being reduced to tears by the loss of his i-Pod.

    2. I thought that big ships had steam hoses. No one could climb a ladder on the vertical side of a moving ship with a steam hose playing on them.

      Mind you, “Asphalt Princess”? Surely ” Norrie McNoriega” would be more euphonius?

  14. Letter below sent to my MP (Andrew Rossindell), together with his reply. Although Rossindell is far more active on the matter of illegal immigration than many, his response is, I fear, largely too generalised.

    Dear Mr Rossindell,

    Illegal Migrants

    Suspect I am far from alone in contacting you regarding fears and concerns over illegal
    migrants crossing the channel (and using other means) to get into this country. It seems that once they are here it is all but impossible to remove them. I have heard calculations that each person will cost the country at least £1 million in benefits of all types until their eventual death of old age.

    I appreciate Priti Patel has made efforts, and the French are being paid extra for supposed extra security, but the situation worsens each day. I hardly need repeat the oft-used arguments about these people not being genuine refugees as they are coming from a safe
    country.

    Can you, in your response, please address these specific points:

    1. What measures are in place to identify these incomers? I have heard rumours
    that some countries are emptying their prisons and issuing one-way tickets to
    Calais, with a view to them eventually making their way to this country as very
    unwelcome additions. There is also the matter of the criminals we do eventually manage to deport, after lengthy, tortuous and costly legal procedures, potentially making their way back the following week by what is being called the ‘Calais Taxi Service’.

    2. Is use being made of drones to patrol the French coastline? If not, why not? My view is that these, coupled with fast-response units, could stop most attempts before they start. This should be followed by destruction (rather than confiscation) of inflatables involved.

    3. The craft being used are inevitably not seaworthy for the journey and we are repeatedly told this is the reason their occupants are being rescued and brought to this country.
    However, it does not explain the attitude of the French who are happy enough to escort these unsafe vessels to the mid-point of the channel, rather than carrying out a rescue and returning them to France. Why is this?

    4. Is it true these illegals are given free accommodation – sometimes to a standard well above that most of the indigenous population could afford – together with free food, priority health provision (particularly galling when NHS is so far behind treating the general population), £38 a week ‘pocket money’, free water, power, Wifi and television? In other words, all their needs are taken care of free to them, but paid for by the tax payer. The point regarding television is particularly annoying given recent ending of grace period offered to over 75s who are now required to buy a licence. Despite having paid into the system their entire working lives they are now at risk of £1,000 fine or imprisonment if they don’t pay. It is hugely frustrating that those who have never paid a penny into the system – and quite probably never will – are being given things free that the general tax-paying public risk imprisonment for should they not pay for them.

    5. What is your view on the fact that the vast majority of these ‘illegals’ are ‘fighting age’ young men? What are their intentions? We have already endured a number of atrocities at the hands of those we have helped and have ‘repaid’ us in the most dreadful way imaginable. In addition, their numbers are such that they will eventually be greater than our
    (diminishing) regular army. Is that intentional?

    6. Do you consider it acceptable that we have heard reports that RNLI are prioritising ‘rescue’ of illegals above that of other seafarers in distress?

    7. Do you consider the Australian approach by Tony Abbot should be given serious consideration? This is where illegals are intercepted and put on unsinkable craft with just enough fuel to get them back to where they came from. It worked very well in
    Australia.

    You must surely be aware that, according to polls, immigration in general – and illegal immigration in particular – is the greatest concern of Conservative voters. Unless more than
    lip-service is given and real practical action is taken to produce a huge reduction in illegal migration, then support (mine included) will evaporate.

    I look forward to your response

    Yours sincerely
    ———————————————————————————————————————–

    Wednesday 4th August 2021

    Thank you very much for contacting me, regarding illegal immigration across the English Channel.

    I completely agree the illegal channel crossings are totally unacceptable and more needs to be done to make the route unviable.

    You may be aware that I have written to the Home Secretary on several occasions about this issue over the past year, urging her to take further action to deter crossings from France by economic migrants.

    Unfortunately, international treaties are complex and this does restrict what action the Home Secretary is allowed to take.

    However I know she is working tirelessly to find solutions, as she feels as passionately about this subject as you and I do.

    For example, the New Plan for Immigration was recently announced, which intends to tackle these illegal crossings across the English Channel by outlining a new system
    which will stop abuse of the asylum system and expedite the removal of those who have no legitimate claim for protection.

    For the first time, whether an individual has entered the U.K. legally or illegally will have an
    impact on how their asylum claim progresses, and on their status in the U.K. if that claim is successful.

    Additionally, a new agreement has been reached between the U.K. and France to tackle this issue which I hope will address some of the current issues being experienced,
    including the unacceptable reports of the French authorities helping boats reach English waters.

    However, I understand that for these to be effective they need to be properly enforced, and I will be raising the possible of use of drones if they are not already being used.

    As you say, these people should be returned to the first safe country they came to in order to claim asylum, including France, rather than choose to come to the U.K. illegally.

    I assure you I will continue to raise this issue with the Home Secretary, to ensure this remains her top priority for the months ahead.

    With every good wish.

    Yours sincerely

    1. Best of luck with that.

      While his reply shows that he has actually read your letter (unlike my waste of space who ignores any letter and sends Central Office tripe out) I doubt that one MP can have any influence over Priti Awful – whose one aim seems to be to get as many of these ghastly leeches into the country come what may.

    2. agree with Bill’s opening point below on that. His coded response merely confirms he’ll not pursue it as he’s got zero interest unless it confronts him in his face. He confirms in writing it IS illegal immigration [line 1]. What he doesn’t state is why he’s indirectly supporting it

    3. Unfortunately, international treaties are complex and this does restrict what action the Home Secretary is allowed to take.

      No International Treaty is violated by the UK protecting its own borders!

      1. Yup. It is guff. Worse than that, it is rude and condescending. (Treaties did not stop the Soviets building the Berlin Wall, or President Trump initiating a wall on the Mexican border.

    4. Never mind making the route unviable (although turning the boats back and sinking them would be a good start), preventing access to any benefits once here would be a big incentive not to try. Put them in camps (preferably in an inhospitable part of the country) until their identity and origin can be established (DNA?) then send them back to their place of origin asap. No messing. Appeals only allowed from their home country (and no legal aid).

  15. 336307+ up ticks,
    Migrants in taxpayer-funded hotels not having quarantine enforced
    Asylum seekers tell The Telegraph they are allowed to leave their hotels and go shopping, all while supposedly confined to rooms

    The illegals are an already bought & payed for commodity, ( taxpayers) many of the indigenous, not ALL, have to be coerced via fear, blackmail, bribery to accepted being moulded and made fit subjects to grace the coming reset world.

    Your lab/lib/con vote is still necessary to iron out any protesting wrinkles and achieve a smooth running reset.

  16. Good morning to all NoTTLers. As a Woke Woman, I am most impressed by The Duchess of Sussex’s 40th birthday message, urging every woman to spend 40 minutes mentoring the younger female generation. So today I am offering to show any female on this site how to make a good rhubarb crumble and/or some home-made marmalade. Any takers? I have a very busy schedule today, but I am sure that I can fit in 40 minutes somewhere or other.

    :-))

    1. ‘Morning, Elsie.

      Is your ‘office’ like Meghan’s ‘office’? Or do you demonstrate in your kitchen?

      2. Congrats, PA, on getting a letter published in the Tellygraff.
        What with you and that ex-pat in Sweden, NOTTLers can be proud of themselves.

        1. Why, thank’ee very kindly, Ma’am, but it wasn’t a letter; it was a comment.

      3. And does she wear 6” high heels at home alone like Hapless’s wife (well, with Hapless juggling outside)?

  17. Another example of the repercussions when the government trash the economy in the name of saving the NHS and dealing with Covid.
    Nottlers foresaw this sort of thing 18 months ago, you don’t have to be a genius to see it, only it appears to stay out of politics.

    John Lewis gives lorry drivers a £5,000 pay rise
    Employee-owned partnership is the latest retailer to offer lorry drivers a £1,000 sign-on bonus amid chronic shortages
    By Laura Onita

    John Lewis is the latest retailer to offer lorry drivers a £1,000 sign-on bonus and higher salaries as the industry grapples with a chronic shortage of HGV drivers.
    The partnership, which owns the Waitrose and John Lewis chains, said it will increase wages by up to £5,000 a year from Sunday.
    The incentives are designed to ensure the retailer can continue to recruit drivers at “market competitive rates”.
    The move comes days after similar decisions from Tesco, Marks & Spencer and Aldi.
    Tesco has offered drivers a £1,000 joining bonus for those who join before 30 September, while Aldi is understood to have increased wages to maintain its position as the industry’s highest payer. Meanwhile, Marks & Spencer offered a £2,000 joining bonus this week.

    The Road Haulage Association has estimated there is a shortage of 100,000 HGV drivers mainly because EU workers have left the UK and the suspension of driver training and testing during the pandemic. Fewer people are taking it up as a profession, further exacerbating the problem.
    The lack of drivers has caused disruption and delays across food supply chains, leading to product shortages in some cases.
    It has also disrupted waste management services in some areas, forcing councils to pause or cancel rubbish collection.
    The Government recently granted a temporary extension of lorry drivers’ working hours to help tackle the crisis.
    Mark Robinson, director of supply chain at the John Lewis Partnership, said: “We’re responding quickly to the national driver shortage by ensuring our drivers are paid competitively and by investing in training for the future.
    “These changes will mean that we can continue to serve our customers well and get them the products they need.”

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/08/04/john-lewis-gives-lorry-drivers-5000-pay-rise/

    2. On a good day being an HGV driver is a good job. However traffic congestion across the UK has reduced it to a frustrating slog in which it becomes increasingly difficult to meet delivery time “windows”. In my experience the likes of Sainsbury’s would refuse a lorry that was in sight of the unloading bay if it was a couple of minutes late.

      1. Went shopping in Sainsbury’s today, talking to a staff member he told me they are using a different warehouse and all is well now.
        I said we will wait and see, but as I only go in the place once in a blue moon I probably will not know.

        1. I’m not gonna lie to you, I mean, I can’t remember when I last entered a Sainsbury’s.

        2. We were there a few days ago. I hadn’t been there for months. There appear to be stock problems, particularly in the frozen food department.

      2. Yes, i remember that from my business days. Whole lorry loads of frozen goods turned away.
        Tesco hubs were shockers for that.

    1. Organisations which have behaved and behave like this should be named, shamed and punished. We are in grave danger of losing our freedom of speech.

      1. mng Rastus. Agree BUT who’ll punish them, they’re protected by “the system” when issues are challenged. Re above, what repurcussions for “Andy Noble”?

  19. Take What You’re Offered
    The pope is on his way to Las Vegas. While boarding the plane, a stewardess says: “Hello Mr. Presley, it is a pleasure to see you!”

    The pope replies: “Sorry my child, but I’m not Elvis!”

    Later, as the Pope arrives and gets into his limousine, the driver says: “Good evening Mr. Presley!”

    The pope replies: “My son, I am not Elvis!”

    So even later, as he’s checking into the hotel, the clerk says: “Good evening Mr. Presley! We have your suite all ready for you, and the usual – 2 beautiful women – are waiting for you!”

    To which the Pope replies: “Thank you… thank you very much.”

        1. My imperfect grasp of history tells me NOBODY has coped with the place. Neither the British, Soviets, nor USA/NATO.
          Whoever thought that going there armed was a good idea is clearly the stupidest person that ever existed, and ever will exist.

          1. Well, I can’t agree completely. I think that going there unarmed might be even stupider?

        2. Was it John Reid, who suggested that (I paraphrase), it unlikely a shot will be fired?

      2. Syria would be a far happier place if the West had not got involved with helping the terrorists who wanted to overthrow Bashar al-Assad.

        Indeed, the West’s politicians’ political vision would have been much improved had they visited a good ophthalmologist – as Bashar-al-Assad used to be before the death of his older brother eventually led him reluctantly to become Syria’s leader.

        1. …and has since then, Richard, been democratically (a la Middle East) re-elected as President.

          But let’s not let a little thing like that deter us from constantly bashing Bashar.

      3. Syria would be a far happier place if the West had not got involved with helping the terrorists who wanted to overthrow Bashar al-Assad.

        Indeed, the West’s politicians’ political vision would have been much improved had they visited a good ophthalmologist – as Bashar-al-Assad used to be before the death of his older brother eventually led him reluctantly to become Syria’s leader.

    2. Yes, our interference in Afghanistan and Iraq have been unmitigated disasters. But carrying on will be even bigger unmitigated disasters. It’s time to lick our wounds and cut our losses – if we can’t sort it in 20 years with all the blood and treasure spent, how can we ever sort it?

      Let those who want to force Western peace, love and understanding on to people that don’t want them do so with their children and money, not mine.

    3. Yes, our interference in Afghanistan and Iraq have been unmitigated disasters. But carrying on will be even bigger unmitigated disasters. It’s time to lick our wounds and cut our losses – if we can’t sort it in 20 years with all the blood and treasure spent, how can we ever sort it?

      Let those who want to force Western peace, love and understanding on to people that don’t want them do so with their children and money, not mine.

  21. Another bright start up here is Derbyshire. 10°C in the yard.
    Most of the building sand, probably a decent 8½ cwt, carted up to the garden worksite yesterday.
    That was after I’d finished spreading the last coupe of cwt of topsoil I got from t’Lads last week.

    Blood test this morning, then another mortar mix to do. I’ve 14 blocks to use and probably will need a few extra.

    1. 8½ cwt?

      My goodness Bob, that is 34 quarters; or 243,712 drams! I’ll wager that the modern generation are confused by all that avoirdupois stuff! :•)

          1. As is a bushel, but converts to weight knowing the substance measured and the water content. There are conversion tables.
            So, farmers sell grain by the bushel, get paid depending on the moisture content. Seems a tad complex to me.

          2. I was born on the Derbyshire/Yorkshire coalfield and we always got concessionary coal since my dad was a coal miner. There were, however, a number of independent coal merchants who would rip off their customers by leaving the coal and sacks outside to get saturated before “filling” those drenched sacks with wet coal before weighing them. Many private customers were short-changed by this Spanish practice.

      2. I fill the bags to about 4 stone which = about ½cwt and I shifted 17 of the buggers!
        And I’ve just done the last 13 bags, but threatening rain has stopped play regarding the mortar mix & laying the blocks.

  23. Biden’s woke, Left-wing America is no longer a model for the world. 5 August 2021.

    A quarter of a century later, I still love America but the tragic reality is that today’s United States is no longer Ronald Reagan’s shining city on a hill. It is, instead, a Republic in decline, plunged into a moral, economic, philosophical and existential crisis that may yet destroy it. Joe Biden’s useless presidency will merely intensify the forces driving the nihilism that is eating away at America’s soul.

    The West in the sense that Nottler’s and most sensible people would understand it is finished. The very things that made it what it was, Freedom, the right to Worship or say anything you please; Democracy itself, are all being expunged from its members. The UK itself is simply a camouflaged Police State; Scotland, actually has a Law prohibiting Free Speech while the Internet is being censored out of existence!

    One would wish that there was another America as in the Sixteenth Century where we could flee to escape the coming Horrors!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/08/04/bidens-woke-left-wing-america-no-longer-model-world/

    1. An obvious BTL Comment:-

      Robert Spowart
      5 Aug 2021 8:56AM
      “Biden’s woke, Left-wing America is no longer a model for the world”

      Was Biden’s woke, Left-wing America EVER a model for the world?

    2. And a 2nd BTL Comment:-

      Robert Spowart
      5 Aug 2021 9:02AM
      “Many Republican voters still believe, against all facts and evidence, that the election was rigged;…”

      Against ALL facts and evidence?
      Someone’s still got their head buried in the sand I see.

  24. Biden’s woke, Left-wing America is no longer a model for the world. 5 August 2021.

    A quarter of a century later, I still love America but the tragic reality is that today’s United States is no longer Ronald Reagan’s shining city on a hill. It is, instead, a Republic in decline, plunged into a moral, economic, philosophical and existential crisis that may yet destroy it. Joe Biden’s useless presidency will merely intensify the forces driving the nihilism that is eating away at America’s soul.

    The West in the sense that Nottler’s and most sensible people would understand it is finished. The very things that made it what it was, Freedom, the right to Worship or say anything you please; Democracy itself, are all being expunged from its members. The UK itself is simply a camouflaged Police State; Scotland, actually has a Law prohibiting Free Speech while the Internet is being censored out of existence!

    One would wish that there was another America as in the Sixteenth Century where we could flee to escape the coming Horrors!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/08/04/bidens-woke-left-wing-america-no-longer-model-world/

          4. They put them all up in nice hotels at our expense – meanwhile if I were to go on my long-booked trip to Kenya I would have to fork out more than £2 grand for an enforced stay in a grotty prison hotel.

          5. his own twitter feed!

            49 min ago “The Home Office says the French authorities intercepted eight crossings, preventing 246 people from reaching the UK ”

            53 min ago “482 migrants reached the UK yesterday on 21 boats – a record number for a single day”

          6. At a reported £5k EACH asylum uttering – £2.4 million they instantly cost us. Just for one word each.

            Meanwhile the local beeb radio has the absolutely bland presenter – talking on – “Which condiment do you like?”

    2. It’s weird how we never get any footage of them setting off from France, they must keep everyone away somehow.

          1. 336307+ up,
            N,
            I do believe that johnson would agree to that as a cosmetic input, but NO film.

    1. Puzzling that a few weeks ago the population of India was being wiped from the Earth by cv, but from Sunday, they are reduced to the Amber list. No pressure from our home-growns, of course, certainly not.

      2. Not puzzling at all. Sensibly they started issuing hydroxychloroquine. Result, given the population of India, the percentage of people that have died from Covid is no greater than the UK or any other part of the developed world.

    1. Is that the Tay Bridge?

      “Beautiful Railway Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay!

      Alas! I am very sorry to say

      That ninety lives have been taken away

      On the last Sabbath day of 1879,

      Which will be remember’d for a very long time.

      ‘Twas about seven o’clock at night,

      And the wind it blew with all its might,

      And the rain came pouring down,

      And the dark clouds seem’d to frown,

      And the Demon of the air seem’d to say-

      “I’ll blow down the Bridge of Tay.”

      When the train left Edinburgh

      The passengers’ hearts were light and felt no sorrow,

      But Boreas blew a terrific gale,

      Which made their hearts for to quail,

      And many of the passengers with fear did say-

      “I hope God will send us safe across the Bridge of Tay.”

      But when the train came near to Wormit Bay,

      Boreas he did loud and angry bray,

      And shook the central girders of the Bridge of Tay

      On the last Sabbath day of 1879,

      Which will be remember’d for a very long time.

      So the train sped on with all its might,

      And Bonnie Dundee soon hove in sight,

      And the passengers’ hearts felt light,

      Thinking they would enjoy themselves on the New Year,

      With their friends at home they lov’d most dear,

      And wish them all a happy New Year.

      So the train mov’d slowly along the Bridge of Tay,

      Until it was about midway,

      Then the central girders with a crash gave way,

      And down went the train and passengers into the Tay!

      The Storm Fiend did loudly bray,

      Because ninety lives had been taken away,

      On the last Sabbath day of 1879,

      Which will be remember’d for a very long time.

      As soon as the catastrophe came to be known

      The alarm from mouth to mouth was blown,

      And the cry rang out all o’er the town,

      Good Heavens! the Tay Bridge is blown down,

      And a passenger train from Edinburgh,

      Which fill’d all the peoples hearts with sorrow,

      And made them for to turn pale,

      Because none of the passengers were sav’d to tell the tale

      How the disaster happen’d on the last Sabbath day of 1879,

      Which will be remember’d for a very long time.

      It must have been an awful sight,

      To witness in the dusky moonlight,

      While the Storm Fiend did laugh, and angry did bray,

      Along the Railway Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay,

      Oh! ill-fated Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay,

      I must now conclude my lay

      By telling the world fearlessly without the least dismay,

      That your central girders would not have given way,

      At least many sensible men do say,

      Had they been supported on each side with buttresses,

      At least many sensible men confesses,

      For the stronger we our houses do build,

      The less chance we have of being killed.”

      1. As I think I have mentioned before, my Dad’s favouritest poem. Without anyone asking (and they never did), after a couple of pints he (6′ 6″) would stand up and recite it from heart in a faux Scots accent complete with hand gestures and worse to to illustrate the drama. There were always three or four people in the audience who didn’t realise that he was taking the piss out of Scotland’s finest poet and were moved to tears. {:^))

    1. maybe of interest – post copy / pasted from @triggerprod not what the woke entities like to read when dots are joined which collapse any “traditional voting pattern”:

      You’re struggling to understand why some people are vaccine hesitant. The “let me help you” megathread:

      Imagine you’re a normal person. The year is 2016. Rightly or wrongly, you believe most of what you see in the media.

      You believe polls are broadly reflective of public opinion. You believe doctors and scientists are trustworthy and independent. You’re a decent, reasonable person who follows the rules and trusts authority.

      Imagine your shock then, when Brexit, which you were assured won’t happen because it’s a fringe movement led by racists for racists, happens. The polls, which widely predicted it wouldn’t happen were completely wrong.

      The experts and media pundits who told you it wouldn’t happen day after day are also wrong. “Oh well” you say, “these things happen”.

      Imagine that soon after Donald Trump is running for President. You are told by your favourite media publications that he is going to lose.

      And now, the racist monster they told you would never get near the White House is the leader of the free world.

      “How did this happen?” you ask yourself? How could all the people in charge of informing me be so wrong? “It was the Russians,” they tell you.

      “The Russians did Brexit and they got Trump elected too”.

      Imagine that for the next 3.5 years you watch as the media and the political class run with the Russia collusion narrative. They tell you the how, when and where.

      The dossiers, the whistle-blowers, the peeing prostitutes. Imagine your desperation for things to make sense again. The Muller Report is coming and it will set your world straight.

      Evidence of foreign meddling in the 2016 election and Brexit is coming to save your unsettled mind.
      Imagine your shock then, when you discover that Brexit and Trump had little to do with foreign meddling. The screaming about Russians and Brexit dies down as well.

      Imagine that bit by bit, you discover that events which the media and political class told you would not and could not happen not only happened, but happened without some sort of evil interference. Instead, millions of your fellow citizens voted for them.

      Again, you ask “How could this happen?” and again the media has the answer: racism. “Your country is racist”, they tell you. If you’re white, this seems strange to you. Other than a handful of idiots, you’ve never met a racist.

      If you’re an ethnic minority immigrant like me, this seems even stranger. Why would people in one of the most welcoming, tolerant countries in the world want to convince themselves their country is racist when it’s so obviously not?

      But the evidence is right there on your TV screen. Imagine your horror as a gay black actor is assaulted by MAGA hat-wearing thugs who racially abuse him and put a noose around his neck. He cries while talking about it:

      Imagine your outrage as you see news reports of a bunch of MAGA hat-wearing kids from a religious school contemptuously confront a native America elder. Reza Aslan tells you the kid has a “punchable face” and while you abhor violence, it’s hard to disagree.

      Imagine that for days you watch coverage of these events, with expert after expert, pundit after pundit, sharing and fuelling your outrage about them. With every word, your belief that you are a good person and that your country is a good country wavers.

      Imagine that soon after, however, the Jussie Smollett story turns out to be an attention-seeking hoax. Imagine that you quickly discover that the native American elder was the one who confronted the kids and not the other way around.

      “If this is such a racist country,” you ask yourself… “why would they need to make up stories of racism?” As you ponder this, you remember that for years now, you’ve been expected to go along with other make-believe.

      You’re expected to believe that whether you’re male or female is not as simple as you once thought. Whatever you learned about biology at school is wrong. You no longer know how many genders there are and it seems dangerous to try to find out.

      Imagine reading that the experts at the American Psychological Association say that traditional masculinity is “pathological and harmful”. https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/01/traditional-masculinity-american-psychological-association/580006/

      Imagine that you still want to believe the media and their experts, but now that requires you to think your country is racist, men are bad and gender is a social construct, whatever that means.

      It is at this point that a pandemic emerges on the other side of the world.

      You are initially unconcerned, but as scenes emerge from Italy and other countries, it is clear that something big is happening.

      You watch nervously as politicians give press conference after press conference, flanked by experts, to explain the situation.

      The racist Donald Trump shuts down travel from China. In response, the mayor of Florence advises citizens to fight racism by “hugging a Chinese person”.

      Shortly after, Nancy Pelosi, a respected Democrat visits Chinatown in San Francisco to explain “there’s no reason tourists or locals should be staying away from the area because of coronavirus concerns.”

      “Thank God there are some sensible non-racist people who aren’t overreacting,” you say to yourself. https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/nancy-pelosi-visits-san-franciscos-chinatown/2240247/

      Imagine watching as Trump doubles down on his racism by claiming the virus may have come from a lab in Wuhan.

      “Nonsense,” you think to yourself as you wonder how best to protect yourself and your family from this deadly disease.

      You consider getting masks – you’ve seen visitors from Asian countries wear them.

      But the UK’s Chief Medical Officer tells you not to wear a mask and wash your hands instead.
      https://independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/coronavirus-uk-news-professor-chris-whitty-no-masks-advice-a9374086.html

      As lockdowns are introduced around the world, you diligently follow all the rules. You stay at home, only go out once and live off savings or government grants.

      You are proud to be doing your part. Thanks to you and millions of your fellow citizens the first wave of the pandemic does not overwhelm the healthcare system. While thousands sadly die, you’ve helped to protect the NHS.

      Imagine your confusion as the same people who have spent 3 months telling you masks don’t work and you shouldn’t wear them introduce mask mandates. We’re “following the science” they tell you. This makes little sense but a pandemic is no time for questions.

      As you cautiously go to the supermarket, you notice that masks have made people far less likely to socially distance.

      You remember reading somewhere that bicycle helmets work similarly: they give the wearer more confidence and the result is more accidents and injuries, not fewer. “Silly people,” you say to yourself. “If only they would follow government advice”.

      You turn on your TV to learn that shoppers at your local supermarket aren’t the only ones who have been ignoring the rules.

      Neil Ferguson, the man whose projections were used as the basis for lockdowns, appears to have broken his own rules to get some action with his married lover.

      Boris Johnson’s chief advisor, Dominic Cummings, drove half way across the country to ensure he had a better place to isolate. The journalists who berate him for this are later found to have attended a birthday party in breach of the rules. https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/kay-burley-and-beth-rigby-among-four-sky-news-over-60th-birthday-bash/ar-BB1bLEZd

      The lockdown continues. However, a man is killed in Minneapolis while being arrested for a petty crime. The man is black. The officer is white. The arrest is captured on video and quickly goes viral around the world.

      Imagine your horror as you watch an officer of the law kneel on another man’s neck until he passes out and later dies. “This is disgusting,” you say to yourself. “I hope they throw the book at him”. Overnight, a huge campaign for racial justice springs up around the world.

      No one explains what racism had to do with the incident but they don’t need to. As you know by now, the West is racist and therefore any time a white person does anything bad to a black person, there can only be one explanation.

      The fact that an identical incident happened to a white man called Tony Timpa is never mentioned for context.

      While the lockdown rules remain in place, the protests against injustice spill out onto the streets. Tens of thousands of people crowd into major cities.

      Few wear masks and social distancing is non-existent. Clashes with police ensue, and in America protestors loot stores, attack residents and start fires. A retired black police officer called David Dorn is among dozens of people who are murdered in the chaos.

      The media describe these events as “mostly peaceful protests” as their reporters stand in front of burning buildings. After months of harsh restrictions, the media and political class offer no criticism of protests which violate every element of lockdown.

      After months of telling you to stay at home to avoid spreading COVID, doctors explain that rather than being a mass COVID spreading event, “protest is a profound public health intervention” https://time.com/5848212/doctors-supporting-protests/

      Big Tech companies go into overdrive to stop the spread of disinformation. All discussions of alternative points of view regarding the efficacy of masks and lockdowns, as well as the origins of the virus are censored.

      Attempts to discuss the negative impact of lockdown on health and mental well-being are suppressed.
      As the year runs on, with a pivotal American election looming, President Trump promises a huge push to develop a vaccine.

      Kamala Harris, who is later elected Vice President, says that she would not take the vaccine if Trump told her to: https://twitter.com/i/status/1314019361859014656

      On the eve of the election, a publication in America releases a damaging report about Hunter Biden, son of presidential candidate Joe Biden. The story alleges corruption which may involve his father, as well as drug taking, use of prostitutes and more.

      Twitter and other social media companies prevent the story from being shared. The media lines up commentators to claim the story was “Russian disinformation”.

      Once his father wins the election, it becomes clear that several key elements of the story are likely accurate and the laptop from which the information was recovered is in fact Hunter Biden’s laptop

      Meanwhile, the numbers of COVID patients and deaths turn out to have been wrong. For some time, anyone who died at any point after a positive COVID test was counted as dying of COVID, even if they were killed by a drunk driver. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-53722711

      This figure is later revised again. The number of people who are in hospital because of COVID also turns out to be incorrect. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/07/29/hospital-figures-covid-cases-misleading/

      Now that racist Donald Trump is no longer President, closing borders is no longer considered xenophobic and is widely advocated for in the media.

      The racist conspiracy theory that the virus came from a lab is now also allowed to be discussed and appears likely to be the most credible explanation of the origins of the virus.

      Imagine your horror as you learn that the reason thousands of people died in the first wave of the pandemic was that elderly patients with COVID were allowed to be released back into care homes.

      This is especially true in the UK and in New York, run by Governor Andrew Cuomo, brother of CNN anchor Chris Cuomo. Governor Cuomo’s publisher suspends promotion of his book about leadership during the pandemic amid the enquiry into nursing home deaths

      Meanwhile, Texas and Florida which remained open continue to thrive. https://nytimes.com/2021/03/08/nyregion/cuomo-book.html

      In the UK, the Health Secretary, the person responsible for saving lives, is found to be cheating on his wife with a married aide in breach of social distancing rules.

      The man making the rules for you does not follow them. It is at this point that the vaccine, which you were initially told would need to be given to the vulnerable before restrictions are lifted, becomes the main drive of Government policy and media commentary.

      The same people who told you Brexit would never happen, Trump would never win, that when he did win it was because of Russian collusion, then because of racism, that you must follow lockdowns while they don’t, that masks don’t work and then that they do work, that protests……during lockdowns are a “health intervention”, that ransacking black communities in the name of fighting racism are “mostly peaceful”, that Jussie Smollett was a victim of a hate crime, that men are toxic, that there is an infinite number of genders, that COVID didn’t come……from a lab and then that it probably did, that closing borders is racist and then that it’s the most important thing to do, that the Hunter Biden story is Russian disinformation and then that it’s not, that they would not take Trump’s vaccine and then that you must take the……vaccine, that Governor Cuomo is a great COVID leader and then that he is a granny killer, that the number of COVID deaths is one thing and then another, that hospitals are filled with COVID patients and then that many of them caught COVID in hospital.

      These same people are now telling you the vaccine is safe, you must take it and if you don’t you will be a second class citizen. Understand vaccine hesitancy now?

      1. 336307+ up ticks,
        AWK,
        I do agree wholeheartedly with your post as a now ex long term member of UKIP prior to the treachery striking.

        As soon as I heard “we” have won, leave it to the tories I
        knew a second front was opening regarding the eu Allies
        the lab/lib/con political fraternity, as in the UK political
        fraternity filling up brussels submarines at DOVER.

        A flash of honest brilliance only visits the electorate every 1000 years the 24/6/2016 was the time.

        Sad to say in a lot less than a 1000 years with the same voting pattern we will be witnessing decapitations, stonings, etc,etc, in between your 5 a day, mosque visits
        that is, and you will find a list of these reset events in your local mosque, next door.

          1. 336307+ up ticks,
            Afternoon N,
            I hope I am wrong in thinking that the rest of the time we have got will be spent under the same type treacherous overseers.

            Surely only on the grounds of mass insanity will this be able to continue, there must be enough decent peoples to combat the lab/lib/con current membership / voter.

    3. Was he one of the “We’ll take a family of refugees/asylum seekers/whatever title today is into our house” lot?

      1. 336307+ up ticks,
        Morning W,
        He was allegedly taking one , maybe, only he / she/it
        must survive on a staple diet of crisps.

  30. BTL:

    Why can’t the RNLI perform its main purpose of saving lives at sea at the same time as helping stop illegal immigration by taking the people it rescues back to France?

    If the French are prepared to accept a multi-million pound bribe to help Britain stop cross channel illegal immigration then surely they accept that these people should not be leaving France in the first place?

    This being the case why does the RNLI not rescue the potential illegal immigrants but then drop them back in France? The French, who say they want to help and accept the Johnson bribe, could even use some of the multi-million pounds they have been given to pay the RNLI for the fuel they use?

    Certain metropolitan liberals have used my observations about the RNLI for their own ends
    I have concluded that this RNLI clash isn’t really about the RNLI at all. It’s about immigration.
     DT Nigel Farage

    Not for the first time, comments made by me have been twisted by those with an opposing point of view, confecting an argument that I never wanted to have and did not provoke in the first place. Yet the row in question – which concerns the RNLI – has caused me to look more deeply at this noble organisation. I’m worried about the ultra-woke path that it has begun to go down.

    First, let me deal with the trumped up dispute. Last month I wrote a piece for the Telegraph about the Channel immigration crisis. I mentioned that the RNLI is being used to prop up a system which has enabled thousands of people to enter Britain illegally. I explained how the French navy escorts vessels into UK waters and essentially dumps the problem on the British and, by extension, the RNLI.

    In the article, I stated: “Regrettably, in the county of Kent, the RNLI, which has done such wonderful work since first being formed under a different name in 1824, has been reduced to little more than a taxi service. The morale of the volunteer crews has never been lower and many RNLI donors are wondering whether they will continue to support this charity.” I published a tweet to this effect as well.

    When I discussed the same issue on my GB News show a few weeks later, again calling the RNLI a “taxi service”, my observation was seized on by certain newspapers and commentators. They portrayed me as some kind of villain merely for having raised concerns about the institution. These concerns are genuine. Some 95% of the RNLI comprises volunteers. Many of these volunteers face a dilemma. The Channel crisis has caused them an excess workload and subsequent loss of earnings. At no stage have I criticised RNLI crews, however. Far from it.

    My central point is that I believe it is the job of the UK Border Force to stop this criminal activity in the first place and then, if necessary, to intercept illegal immigrants. This is not a job that the RNLI should be expected to do as a matter of routine. It relies almost exclusively on donations and its resources are precious. (Incidentally, on the topic of money, much has been made of the fact that about £200,000 has been raised online since this “row” took off, as though this is proof that I was in the wrong. It’s an impressive sum, but given it costs more than £400,000 every day to run the RNLI, or £148 million per year, it will cover barely 12 hours of its funding).

    I have concluded that this RNLI clash isn’t really about the RNLI at all. It’s about immigration. The people now laying into me have no problem with illegal immigration. Indeed, many of them positively welcome it, as far as I can tell. They appear not to care that 20,000 or even 30,000 people turning up in Britain in the space of a few months represents a series of major practical problems for Britain and its taxpayers. It may carry major security risks, too. I find this so concerning that I will highlight it until it is dealt with properly.

    Since the RNLI has now become a talking point, however, I have taken a closer look at it and I’ve been startled by what I’ve found. Chief executive, Mark Dowie, is currently paid a salary of £160,000 a year (though he has agreed to a 50% pay cut), the same as Boris Johnson is paid for running the country. The comparison is relevant because under Dowie’s stewardship, the RNLI has become increasingly politically active. It has chosen to focus some of its energies – and funding – on matters which have nothing to do with the core aim of its founder, Sir William Hillary, who called for volunteers to rescue those in peril on the sea.

    Dowie, who has held this post since 2019, is continuing an ideology that has taken root very quickly. For example, in 2018, two lifeboatmen in North Yorkshire were sacked after they were found to have mugs on RNLI premises featuring naked women. The rainbow flag has flown from lifeboat stations. And recently a programme called Our Watch was launched. It’s described as the RNLI’s “strategic intent” for 2020–2024. Through this scheme it aims to attract more diverse volunteers and staff.

    All this reeks of a virtue-signalling corporate outlook and I find it very surprising that the RNLI has time to spend on this sort of activity.

    The charity has also ploughed millions of pounds into water-safety campaigns in countries such as Bangladesh, Ghana and Greece. I would question why a charity that has operated for most of its 200 years in Britain and Ireland has taken on an international dimension at the expense of its domestic work if it does not have the means to do so. I also wonder how many of those who help to fund its £148 million annual budget realise it is doing this.

    Since the RNLI has chosen to go ‘woke’, I would like to warn Mark Dowie that he is entering a highly toxic area. It is important he thinks about this because some of those who helped to create the RNLI had links to the slave trade.

    Founder Sir William Hillary himself inherited a share in a plantation with slaves in the early 1800s and the RNLI has admitted that “it’s likely that some of the first lifeboats were partly funded by those profiting from slavery.” Mr Dowie should know that those same people who have falsely suggested that I was criticising the RNLI for the way in which it is increasingly being used by those involved in illegal immigration may start to attack the RNLI itself for its links to slavery. People in glass houses should not throw stones.

  31. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9e86c272fd65fdbccf781c7e4a13cb00e710d5159bb9261b60fc65d93ed031b3.png It would appear that yer muzzies are not the only gang of religious zealots who think that raping (and, ergo, destroying the lives of) young children is a de rigueur rite of passage for their zealotry.

    A Hindu priest is involved in this abomination. He probably thinks it will assist in his country’s unstoppable surge (urge) to be the most populous on the planet.

    Rather than inject the population with an untested serum to ‘protect’ everyone against a putative ‘pandemic’; methinks the time is rapidly approaching where it would be more productive to introduce an effective chemical castration agent into water supplies. It would certainly do more good for the planet than the addition of chlorine!

      1. It might well be but, in any case, it was too late to stop this gang of utter scum.

  32. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9e86c272fd65fdbccf781c7e4a13cb00e710d5159bb9261b60fc65d93ed031b3.png It would appear that yer muzzies are not the only gang of religious zealots who think that raping (and, ergo, destroying the lives of) young children is a de rigueur rite of passage for their zealotry.

    A Hindu priest is involved in this abomination. He probably thinks it will assist in his country’s unstoppable surge (urge) to be the most populous on the planet.

    Rather than inject the population with an untested serum to ‘protect’ everyone against a putative ‘pandemic’; methinks the time is rapidly approaching where it would be more productive to introduce an effective chemical castration agent into water supplies. It would certainly do more good for the planet than the addition of chlorine!

  33. A good while ago ( pre this site? ) 3 or 4 new posters ( female logon IDs ?) if remembered correctly, suddenly appeared together. Not too long after, all of them vanished together as well – – and 2/3 week later a tv prog came on about people on the internet sites making comments that were anti – immigration etc – – Is this new group the same ones that have suddenly appeared together recently? Another tv program on the way?

    1. No idea – Geoff’s been running this site now since 2019 when we were forced to move from the Disqus channels. The mods are the same team we’ve had since 2016. The spammers are stopped in their tracks and removed.

      1. The ones from back then were clearly just trying to get more info on people – not making nasty stirring comments about the site. It was the fact they all appeared together – and left together – that made it suspicious. Followed by the prog. Something was DEFINITELY wrong then – and I think there is now.

        And oddly enough, late news last night on the radio – load of people arrested all over UK for nasty comments on internet.

        1. It’s possible we are monitored here for nasty comments – but as far as i know nobody has ended up arrested for them.

        2. Is there anyone in particular you are suspicious of now? Elf and Safety does have some lady followers who visit here occasionally.

          1. No one’s name I can pick out at the moment – but am getting old – with health probs.

        3. Don’t worry about your local programs, the blessed Canadian government now have laws against hateful internet postings (not in favour of the liberals).

          I don’t know how the idiots expect to police sites that have no physical presence in Canada but maybe Geoff will be getting some cease and desist correspondence if I dare to read some of the comments made here.

  34. According to the results of some opinion polls the lumpen proletariat are suffering from collective Stockholm Syndrome in that they are more than happy to do what their captors tell them to do and welcome the loss of their liberty.

      1. I hope he doesn’t use any off shore companies to keep his reported multiple millions in. Could be embarrassing if he did. Keep spending the poorer people’s cash – – and leave the struggling multi-millionaires alone !!!!!

  36. Just back from the market. Very busy – very few maskees. Morrisons, virtually everyone masked.

    Filled up with petrol for the first time in two months. Gosh – it has got dearer. Thank goodness I don’t go anywhere!

    1. It’s all I can do to stop myself saying to them, “Why are you still wearing a mask?”

      2. Every so often – if I can be bothered – I give them a puzzled stare and a pitying smile hovers on my lips.

      3. Every so often – if I can be bothered – I give them a puzzled stare and a pitying smile hovers on my lips.

      4. They’ve been conditioned. My French friend (who rang me last night to ask how Oscar was doing) is still clinging on to wearing a mask (although admitting to using a one-time mask multiple times). I didn’t mention that masks were completely useless because it’s clearly a psychological prop.

    3. Hello Bill

      I remember you telling us all you had changed your car , and bought a Yeti .. How are you getting on with it ?

      I like the look of them, but there are very few of them on the road around here to examine . They look like a great all purpose motor .

      Is yours a deisel , and what is the engine size.

      My Peugeot SW is still wonderful, but have had to spend out lots for bits and pieces that need repairing , it has a 06 plate, but still has a powerful 1.6 engine , suspension is giving a few problems , pot holes etc

      Breezy day here , sunshine , and perhaps showers later .

      Moh is playing golf again, and has his fourth game tomorrow … another competition …in aid of the RNLI charity match .

      He was furious when I suggested to him that he was aiding and abetting people smugglers

    4. The oil price fell last year due to lack of demand. Now that everyone is on the move again it has shot up. I will need to fill up again soon.

        2. Ouch! I just filled up and it was 130.9ppl – up 1p from a few weeks ago. Diesel is 1p cheaper; I filled up the camper @ 128.9ppl when I got back from Lincolnshire.

      1. My feline is a bit rough around the edges and will eat only Aldi’s best, a bit like me! We should be safe…

          1. I know someone who spoon feeds his dog best chicken pieces. Nothing wrong with the dog.

          2. None of that nonsense with Oscar; place bowl on floor and stand well back or you get knocked over in the rush (and that’s since I’ve tried to instil some manners into him)!

          4. We will be back to dishwashers and dogs licking plates next. We could continue into other savings made by having a large dog, well, you wouldn’t need a bidet for a start.

      2. Thanks, Phil. My indoor staff ensure that the cats eat nothing but the best. None of the suspect brands ever cross our threshhold.

      3. Thanks for that, Phil. I’ve checked the FSA site and we don’t use any of the affected brands.

    6. In Waitrose yesterday everyone was still masked up (except me) although I did see two others without masks. That would be 100% increase from my last visit.

  37. The new NHS – yesterday I arranged a telephone appointment with a doctor – – for the 16th – what time I asked the receptionist – anytime between 2 and 6. – so an appointment can be “up to 4 hours” – He won’t be able to see me, so can’t make any assessment on that – the race to the bottom of the 3rd world continues.

      1. Probably the first – I am losing any will to live – with what the govt are doing to this country. BJ’s Great Reset – – I hope they all burn in eternal hell, never getting away from the suffering. And they haven’t even got the guts to be honest about it.

        1. I’m lucky enough to enjoy good health, so haven’t had to bother my doctor for some time. Oh has had some problems but we have no cpmplaints regarding the service he’s received this year.

    2. Well, small consolation, Walter, at least it’s on the telephone and not the drums or the Witch-doctor’s ‘telling bone’.

  38. Sorry, never shopped at Morrisons. What’s so important about them that they can’t be flogged to the Americans?

    1. Apart from being my local supermarket so the one I use, they do support British farmers by only selling British meat. There are probably other reasons….. one of them I think is that they must be a reasonable company to work for as the staff at my local branch have all been there for many years.

          1. Con permiso…

            You mean the sort who waddle by half-dressed in their night-clothes?

          3. Neither, because they usually wear a thong which ends up cutting them in half vertically.

          6. I have one of those who lives three houses down from me. I call her ‘The Elephantine Sow’. I kid you not, when she gets into her SUV it visibly tilts until she has hefted herself in. The mystery to me is where do such people get their clothes?

      1. Not being able to read the Telegraph the obvious question is, are the potential buyers in the profession of asset stripping or are they just another business doing a bid?

        1. Private equity firms tend not to be interested in running businesses – well, except into the ground so they can asset-strip.

          1. Especially American ones. Perhaps they’re looking for an entry into British markets for American produce.

          5. Which, buy the way, is perfectly good, despite the propaganda to the contrary.

          8. I wouldn’t know as I don’t buy it, but I don’t fancy food stuffed with high fructose corn syrup or beef full of growth hormones.

          9. Well, I lived off it 40 years in perfect health. I started to become ill when I returned to the UK. Make of that what you will.

          12. Very much agree with the thrust of your comment, AA, but may I be picky, picky about some of the terminology.

            Private Equity Firms and Venture Capital Firms and Funds tend to be interested in the running of businesses. The knack is to remain close and available to the entrepreneur(s) without interfering too much and bu88ering everything up by being overbearing.

            Hedge Funds of all shapes and sizes (many of which masquerade as Private Equity Funds because the term sounds more respectable and less predatory) frequently behave exactly as you suggest.

            I spent many years as a Director of Chase Manhattan’s two Private Equity/Venture Capital subsidiaries and, as sure as nuts were nuts, every November the Main Board Directors would slither into our meetings and try to duff us up and force us to sell/asset strip/abuse two or three of the portfolio investments because December’s prospective earnings for the overall bank were looking a bit thin and iffy. We always resisted but didn’t always win.

          14. Private equity firms should be very regulated, if not disallowed. They have been causing damage for decades.

          15. Private equity firms should be very regulated, if not disallowed. They have been causing damage for decades.

  39. An email from daughters’ friend who was our neighbour in Short Hills, NJ. She was at Billy Joel in concert last night at Fenway Park (Boston Red Sox’s baseball stadium), Boston, MA. We are all envious.

    https://scontent-cdg2-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.6435-9/c0.27.2048.1069a/s843x403/82778166_10158241589523641_6899412885651324928_n.jpg?_nc_cat=111&ccb=1-3&_nc_sid=340051&_nc_ohc=mEYwYczWaM4AX94TLTh&_nc_oc=AQm3qXWYo_Ll4XsIhQCuKh8tV9P-3_HjKQB28Zj_yEn2Wb47EazlJzqhbSi5NcznnTw&_nc_ht=scontent-cdg2-1.xx&oh=d9dee447df2933ea8db3bba29bb7cf54&oe=6132E26B

    1. Wouldn’t have recognised him. Mind you, last time I saw him was when he was singing ‘Uptown Girl’!

    2. Morning! That’s nice. Did they have to enjoy a little oxygen deprivation and show evidence of shooting up drugs to gain entry? I’m upsetting some friends by determinedly ignoring The Proms due to that regime being in place at the RAH.

      1. But…but…but I thought that oxygen-deprived drug-shooting people weren’t interested in The Proms (unless in some High School with kiddies to…get to know).

        1. Proof of “Covid Certification Status” or a “negative test result” plus a face nappy now required for entry to the RAH for The Proms. I could download the app, order a lateral flow test kit, spit on it and enter the result but I won’t, on principle! As far as I can tell, from double jabbee frends, on the day ticket sales are not going well.

      1. Denmark were completely out of order. But they get away with it because they are not GB.

  41. I see the DT has removed all comments on the article about the rising crime rates in Britain – you know the one that avoids mentioning the ‘B’ word.

    2. Guy Verhofstadt is, no doubt, the biggest wanker who ever lived.

      Bigger, even, than Gary Lineker.

      1. No doubt he is a “plucky little Belgian” (see above). It’s always the little who yap the loudest. (No offence to dogs.)

          1. I DID say no offence to Dollys! As for us humans, I’m the shortarse around here!

    4. Many of the EU’s medal winners would not have been competing under a single banner so his figure is artificially inflated. For example, EU nations won many team cycling medals in the same discipline.

    5. Well Guy, how does the “British” Commonwealth do on that score?

      Or NAFTA, or the African Union or any other conglomeration of arbitrary but linked nations?

    6. He has always reminded me of a Nazi Prison Camp sentry and about as decent.
      .

      3. Considering that he is Belgian, and “plucky little Belgium” wouldn’t even exist if it wasn’t for Queen Victoria’s family feelings overcoming her sense, it wouldn’t even be in existence. Plus if it wasn’t for the British and Allies in WWII, everyone there would be speaking German.

    1. That would be the variant for which the symptoms are reported to be a headache, sore throat, sneezing and a runny nose. So China hasn’t beaten the common cold and also still has pneumonic plague but doesn’t seem overly worried about that. The farce rolls on.

    2. They are NOT “rescued” Lyndsey – total now over 10000 so far this year – multiply by 10 for the rest of the family arriving – all on benefits, all virtually unemployable. Uncheckable history. All wanting a fully furnished house, water, sewage system, heating, healthcare, schooling for their multiple kids by multiple wives etc etc, in their multiple new 5 bed housing on the new estates.ALL contributing NOTHING positive. And some idiots here can’t see a problem ??? What will those idiots do when THEY get turned on by the ones they welcomed?

    1. 336307+ up ticks,
      O2O,
      Heavens forbid that a bearded child
      tranny with paedo tendencies is put in the children’s ward.

    2. He’s not stupid. For similar offences women are far less likely to be sent to prison than men and their sentences are, on average, less than half those for men.

    3. Of course it is not the judge ‘taking a chance’ (his own words) in releasing this person. Those exposed to risk are young people living close to where he chooses to reside.

      1. Just like the judges who rule that immigrants who murder/rape here cannot be deported – no risk to the judges.

    4. Well, with her hairy armpits she’d have been mistaken for a German.
      My dear, the shame; the ignominy.

    1. Men have been “opening up” for years now, and look at what a mess society has become.

      1. I’ve noticed signs locally for Men’s clubs – where men go to talk with each other about their problems – just surprised they haven’t been made illegal and they must admit women.

          3. You can’t help asking for it, can you, sweetie xxx

            And we all know that it’s deliberate – you naughty Pip, you!

    2. So they haven’t yet found a pair of fully-jabbed two-headed, three-legged black trans-lesbian Marxists?

    5. We all know what they open up and we’ll leave at that but – don’t force it upon us, we don’t wan’t to know – keep quiet and you won’t be victimised

        2. That was the question that was asked , back in the late 60’s (I was in RN then), when it ceased to be illegal

        1. Isn’t there a wide difference between knitting and crocheting? You may have kicked a hornets’ nest at the local WI.

        2. When I was just a little more than a toddler, I had a green woollen swimsuit. I hated it.

      1. Why don’t they have 4 Strictlys? One for straights, another for gay males, another for gay females and a fourth for all TGs. then the beeb can look at viewing figures to see how successful each is. – instead of forcing stuff on us we don’t want.

        1. Strictly come dancing, strictly bum prancing, snatch clean and twerk, pushmepullyu

        2. “… forcing stuff on us we don’t want”, but for which we are forced to pay on pain of a prison sentence.

          1. So true. Local beeb radio is way beyond a joke, but only one to get decent? reception. Articles discussed today – mass migration? NO – – what condiment do you like? – yes. Yesterday the topic was – anything happened to you on a bus or tram???
            Tunes – -god knows how many times daily -Diana Ross – Rag and Bone man – and Pink. and many many many repeats of clips from other beeb radio progs.
            There is one night time presenter I listen to – Russel Walker – a great laugh – and another who does part time – an incredibly full of life Becky Measures who is usually on weekend dinnertimes. She has a fantastic natural laugh and a great load of fans round here. So genuine, so natural, loved by so many who’ve never met her.

    8. I thought all the coupling preamble was done on Grinder and the likes these days and dancing is so last century.

    9. I thought all the coupling preamble was done on Grinder and the likes these days and dancing is so last century.

    2. No wonder they are pushing for every market town a CITY.. yep, how sill, some idiot has suggested Dorchester should become a city … Grrrrrrrr

      1. Nice to know, Maggie that we shall be living in the City of Flowton (pop 117 at 2011 census).

        I wonder if that will make our little 12th Century church of St Mary, a cathedral?

        1. It’s more likely to be closed as ancient and irrelevant and too expensive to have a vicar because the surfeit of bishops has taken all the funds.

          1. I’m all in favour of our withholding our ‘Parish Share’ which amounts to some £5,000 p.a.

        2. Some cheeky wretch on Twitter told me if I didn’t like what was happening in the UK, I had to clear off some where else .

          It seems perfectly clear to me now , that not only are we in the middle of the Great Reset , but we are nw living in the New NEW.. and we are being pushed aside.

          We used to be great warriors once upon a time , and our ilk protected King and country from invaders .. what have we become .. an arty farty rainbow country governed by idiots .

          I looked up JINGOISM… and felt really shocked by this :

          Jingoists really dislike people from outside their own borders. Jingoism is an extreme form of patriotism that often calls for violence towards foreigners and foreign countries. Patriotism — a love for one’s country — can, in certain cases, turn nasty and go beyond wishing for the welfare of one’s own homeland.

          2. Those wretches ought to go and live in the 3rd world – because they’ll be living in one VERY shortly.

          3. “We don’t want to fight, but by jingo if we do, We’ve got the ships, we’ve got the men, we’ve got the money too!”

            1878 Music-hall song, inspired by Disraeli’s speech of 9 Nov1876 threatening Russia with war if it sent volunteers into Serbia and Montenegro. This is the origin of ‘jingoism’.

          4. Thank you, Anne, I only knew of the first part but whoever defined Jingoism, as Maggie puts it, is just displaying their own racism and ignorance.

          5. Shortly followed by the cynical version, “We don’t want to fight, but by jingo if we do, We haven’t got the ships, haven’t got the men, we haven’t got the money too!”

          7. As far as I know, Maggie, Jingoism was a term applied to those before the 2nd, 3rd or 4th Boer War (I lost count) who are reputed to say, “We don’t want to fight but by jingo, if we do…”

        1. 336307+ up ticks,
          Afternoon Anne,
          It is in every MPs briefcase Make every
          hamlet a city, open up more DOVERS.

  48. ‘Afternoon All
    Absolutely Fuming.envy of the world my arse,rushed my sister to A&E this morning she needed an urgent referral to the eye clinic at the same hospital 3 hours in an empty A&E being bossed around by little tin god nurses and finally an actual doctor descends from Mount Olympus and after a 2 minute consultation provides the referral so she can start waiting again at the right dept
    My BiL having completed his hospital app now turns up to release me from the expensive car park and take over
    Why A&E you say?? because her GP Surgery WON’T ANSWER THE BLOODY PHONE!!!!!!
    Edit
    Sister back from eye clinic,an ulcer not glaucoma treatment ongoing

    2. Why have GP’s gone to ground, are they afraid someone will ask them if the Vaxx is worth having?

      1. Precisely. GPs have a lot of explaining to do.

        Particularly as they are paid by patient registration number, not work done. Our surgery has 35,000+ patients on its register. With fewer than 3 full-time GPs and about 4-5 part-time GPs.

        It’s pure greed on their part.

        1. That would bring in a gross income of around £3m per annum on per capita payments alone?

      2. Precisely. GPs have a lot of explaining to do.

        Particularly as they are paid by patient registration number, not work done. Our surgery has 35,000+ patients on its register. With fewer than 3 full-time GPs and about 4-5 part-time GPs.

        It’s pure greed on their part.

      3. Precisely. GPs have a lot of explaining to do.

        Particularly as they are paid by patient registration number, not work done. Our surgery has 35,000+ patients on its register. With fewer than 3 full-time GPs and about 4-5 part-time GPs.

        It’s pure greed on their part.

    3. I can feel your frustration and anger .

      Hope she is sorted quickly , was it a detached retina .. I had one , I dashed to Poole Specsavers … their bod looked at me , and rang up B/mouth hospital eye unit , and I was seen in a matter of a couple of hours and then they gave me an appt for the next day for a minor op .. done and dusted .

      I hope your sister’s problem is resolved quickly .

      GP practises are a nightmare ..

      1. How things change.
        Around the 1960 mark, a work colleague had a detached retina. We had never heard of such a thing.
        He had what I suspect was one of the first operations for the condition. He had to go to London (Moorfields, I think), have the operation which entailed stitching the retina back into position and then spent 3 weeks on the eye ward, lying very still on his back until it healed.
        Certainly it was no minor procedure at the time.

        1. It seems that some treatments for a detached retina are now classified as out patient surgery.

          I had laser surgery for another eye problem, it was anything but comfortable but very effective.

          1. Mate at work had that too. Also, they drained and refilled his eyeball, then added an air bubble to provide some tension and hold things in place.
            Apart from having amazingly clear vision, the bubbles were visible, but of course on the “opposite” side of the eye – so, at the bottom. After a couple of weeks, the bubbles had been absorbed. He said – don’t shake your head, the bubble turns to foam and confuses the vision amazingly.

          2. Alf had a torn/detaching retina 8 weeks ago. Was referred to st. Thomas’s in the morning, surgery pm and home later in the afternoon. Great treatment and outcome.

        2. Nowadays , the retina is lasered, takes probably less than an hour .

          I can remember those early days when patients had to lie still for 3 weeks .. Injuries like that were usually sustained playing squash !

          1. This chap had very short sight; real bottle end glasses. Maybe there was a weakness.

          5. I sent it to the only one I have – Pipex.

            Why don’t you e-mail me on MY gmail – and then I can re-send.

        3. It’s laser surgery now to fix them. Brother-in-Law’s had it done and Dr. Daughter is in the Eye Department of the Newcastle RVI when the technique was developed.

    4. I trust you clapped on your way out.

      I hope she is sorted out promptly and successfully.

    5. That is appalling – but what we have come to expect.

      Wishing your sister full recovery.

  49. Well done, the Mercury Theatre. Their production ‘Baskerville’ is a normal theatre seating experience. They are putting on 3 ‘social distancing’ performances for Colchester’s Neurotic Nellies, but otherwise back to normal.
    Judging by my visit to Fenwick today, the audience for those evenings will mostly be Fenwick customers.

  50. BG News had an MP on at lunchtime who is trying to stop the ban on Petrol and Diesel cars. The MP has other MPs who agree with him. Perhaps they will stop the removal of gas supplies to our homes. At least there appears to be a glimmer of hope that our PM will be challenged on these issues.

    1. About time too.

      It is slowly beginning to dawn on people that a lot of the green nonsense is no more that manipulative nonsense which will overturn the lives of ordinary people far more than it interferes with the lives of the PTB and the lives of those with money.

      Boris Johnson has also banked on the fact that the excrement will not meet the mangling force of the ventilator until he is safely out of office. Let us hope that he cannot escape the inevitable flak that will come.

  51. G’day Nottlers. Well, we know why. What are we going to do about it?

    YOUR DAILY BETRAYAL – Thursday 5th August 2021 – One rule for them, one for us
    Posted by Vivian Evans | Aug 5, 2021

    When Security Guards aren’t enforcing our covid rules …

    This morning I’m again bouncing off the walls in anger, thanks to ‘immigrant news’. t’s not only because of the blatant institutionalised racism in the Border Farce and Home Office – it’s also because of the unbelievably submissive behaviour of native Brits. Add to this the latest ‘news’ from the covid government and my outrage knows no bounds.

    Starting with the ‘covid’ news: kids down to the age of 12 are now being offered “Teh Vaccine”. 16-year old youths won’t even need the agreement of their parents should they want ‘Teh Jab’. Last month the JCVI was against giving the jab to the over-12 age cohort. Why did they change their advice? Has the biology of teenagers changed so much during that time that suddenly they can be given the jab?

    In their report The Times bewails the fact that there was no explanation forthcoming. Prof Van-Tam ‘dodged the question’ and simply ‘spoke from authority’ when asked to explain this U-Turn. The author of that piece observes:

    “Yesterday’s inadequate explanations will give more space for conspiracy theories to flourish. Although ministers have always been keen to vaccinate children, it is unlikely that the committee will have been swayed by such pressure. It is more plausible that the decision was closer than it was made to appear last month and a couple of swing members have changed their minds.” (link, paywalled)

    Cynical old me thinks, conspiratorially, that some arm-twisting went on en coulisse, to make these ‘swing members’ change their minds. Very scientific, that! How proper reasoning has gone out of the windows of the JCVI and the newsrooms of The Times is documented perfectly in this sentence:

    “To maintain faith in the vaccination programme that is on the verge of taming Covid in Britain, […]” (link, paywalled)

    Crikey – “we” must have faith in the jabbings which are ‘taming the virus’? Is that why booster jabs will be rolled out next month? Meanwhile, there are stories that the 16+ youths are happy to get the jab even if their ‘naive’ parents don’t agree (link). Taking ‘Teh Jab’ as act of teenage rebellion? Now I’ve heard everything!

    But that’s not the only reason for my fury. You’ve heard of illegal migrants flooding into this country, haven’t you. Yesterday, a further 300 have arrived. The Home Office coyly didn’t confirm that number, but estimates are that we’ve ‘received’ 10,000 illegals by now (link, paywalled).

    The next quote shows that Nigel Farage was not outrageously off the mark when he predicted that there would be 20,000 ‘new arrivals’ this year. He must’ve been speaking to The Home Office or The Times because it was them who came up with that number, or so they say:

    “The Times revealed last month that Border Force believes 22,000 will have arrived by the end of this year — almost triple the 8,420 recorded last year.” (link, paywalled)

    Now we know why the MSM didn’t attack Nigel for being a horrible racist when he made that prediction! But there’s more – and this is where ‘institutional racism’ comes in. The DT has an ‘exclusive’ – duly copied later by the Times. Here’s what they found out;

    “Migrants in hotels paid for by the taxpayer are not having their quarantine enforced, it has emerged. Ministers have been urged to investigate allegations that Channel migrants from France are escaping quarantine, even though returning holidaymakers are having to self-isolate for 10 days, enforced by daily calls and police checks.” (paywalled link)

    Yes indeed – “we” would love to know why returning Brits must quarantine themselves but those illegals don’t really need to! That’s not all – see this next:

    “Migrants told The Telegraph that they had been allowed to leave their hotels and could even go shopping while they were supposed to be confined to quarantine in their rooms. Security guards posted outside the hotels to supervise migrants’ movements in and out of the buildings admitted they were unable to police quarantine because they did not know who was self-isolating and who was not.” (paywalled link)

    That’s ‘institutionalised racism’ because ‘covid rules’ to which we all must adhere are disregarded when it comes to those illegals. The feeble excuse that the security guards are ignorant of who must quarantine and who mustn’t doesn’t hold water. It’s simply the latest version of ‘not our fault, guv’. The sheer numbers of illegals can no longer be hidden, but the supine acceptance of the authorities and the MSM make my blood boil:

    “Up to 10,000 asylum seekers are housed in hotels because of an increase in claims fuelled by migrant Channel crossings. Some new arrivals are now quarantining because of the travel traffic light system.” (paywalled link)

    How does the Border Farce know where ‘some new arrivals’ are coming from? Don’t they always arrive without documents? Never mind – here’s one other outrageous news item – the headline for the DM’s article says it all:

    “Quarantine hotel bills rocket to £200 a night: Cost of isolation on returning to UK is set to soar after ministers agreed to hike prices to ‘reflect increased costs involved’ (link)

    There were distressing reports last month in Lockdowns Sceptics, now ‘The Daily Sceptic’, describing the situation in those quarantine hotels where people were allocated one hour of ‘fresh air’ in an adjoining car park. They were kept strictly inside – unlike ‘Our New Arrivals’ who apparently can come and go just as they please.

    I want to know if those criminals – ‘illegal’ means they’ve committed a crime – are being jabbed. I want to know if these criminals who are going out ‘to do some shopping’ – the money for that of course coming out of our wallets – are suitably muzzled up.

    I wonder why it is that Brits returning from ‘red’ countries are sheepishly accepting quarantine for themselves – for which they themselves pay £2,000! – while criminals are disregarding these covid rules, aided and abetted by guards who have no compunction when it’s about enforcing those ‘rules’ on ‘legal Brits’ but turn a blind eye when illegals walk in and out. Are those criminals immune? Do they have vaccine passports?

    It’s one covid rule for those criminals and one for the rest of us. Why? Is it because insisting that our rules be followed by all would be … racist? Have the security guards been told to be lenient because the Home Office doesn’t want ‘incidents’ should those criminals go on the rampage because they’re not let out to go shopping?

    What does this attitude, what do these ‘orders’ tell us about the future – a future where illegals are permitted to do as they like because ‘we aren’t racist’? Meanwhile our youth blithely disregards reports on devastating side effects of the jab’ because they’re happy to rebel against their ‘naive’ parents by taking ‘teh jab’ because that is now deemed to be ‘cool’, thanks to covid government propaganda.

    Why do the Whitehall mandarins, why do the metropolitan MSM, why does our own government hate us so much?

    KBO!

    https://independencedaily.co.uk/your-daily-betrayal-thursday-5th-august-2021-one-rule-for-them-one-for-us/?utm_source=mailpoet&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=INDEPENDENCE+Daily+Newsletter1

    1. 336307+ up ticks,
      Afternoon HL,
      It is NOT hatred so much as despise is more apt.
      They, if asked would NOT support / vote
      for the likes of themselves,and if they did once they would never,ever again.

      So in regards to the herd doing so again & again brings on feelings of utter contempt.

  52. Female friend – single mother NEVER been on benefits – told me one of her lads recently became offensive, turned vegan and told her she needed “educating”. They agreed a deal where he paid no board, but he had to get and prepare his own food. No board – but still ate what she prepared, still got electricity, water. tv, washing etc etc. Even complained when she hadn’t done him any food??? – today, unknown to him, she is looking at a flat for him. Let him be grown up. Let him get his own council tax, tv, tv licence, his own electric bill, own water , his own shopping, coming home to no prepared food, no clean washing, etc etc.

    I await her phone call later.

    She did similar with her eldest a few years ago – who thought it was going to be great – then within weeks was pleading to come back once a week for a properly cooked meal, not burger after burger after burger.

    1. Did she not teach them how to cook or are they just lazy and expect her to do everything?

    2. A true story

      We had a student on one of our courses a few years ago who said: “I am really looking forward to next year because I shall have left Cheltenham Ladies’ College and shall be independent.”

      “What will you be doing and where will you be living?” another student asked.

      “I shall be doing a part-time Prue Leith cooking course and living in a flat in Chelsea, just off the King’s Road. The year after that I shall be going to Oxford.”

      “A flat in Chelsea? Gosh, that will cost a bomb in rent!”

      “Oh, that doesn’t matter. My father will be paying the rent and giving me an allowance!”

      “Remind me again why are you so looking forward to leaving school?”

      “Because I shall be completely independent.”

      2. Yes I have NO doubt it is true.
        I daren’t even think how much the allowance would be Richard. Enough to stop her worrying about little things like bills, bills and more bills?

        1. As I’m sure you know, Walter, Tiffany’s on Bond Street is frightfully expensive these days

      3. Reminds me of an as yet un-potty-trained former poster here who, when her (pedal) car was in a crash simply said, “Daddy will pay for it all.”

          1. Each to their own. She has been very rude to me in the past. Ignorant teenager.

        1. Sorry HL – that description made me laugh out loud. Is she little and a bully – or does she bully little people? – as for driving busses after going there – – speechless.

          1. She was small of stature and a bully – certainly to me when I was sent round to play with her when we were small. I can’t imagine that she changed – in fact when I mer her at her mother’s funeral (her mother had always been very kind to me) she didn’t seem to have changed. And she stank.

          2. A man at work smoked virtually non stop – yet he couldn’t smell anything. Amazingly he actually reached retirement – then went to the doctor – immediately sent to hospital and scanned, Exploratory. Sew him back up came the order. Buried within 14 days. Full of cancer – and all his cash he’d worked for went to the pubs, cig makers and the bookies.

          3. And the government. He’d paid for his treatment several times over.
            And missed most of his pension.

          4. I sometimes wondered if smokers should be denied treatment by the NHS but that all the money raised from tobacco taxes should be used to provide medical facilities exclusively for smokers. Would the smokers be better or worse off under such a deal?

          5. To be fair the great majority of our our students are delightful young people who keep in touch with us. Indeed, when our boys were little many girls came to stay with us during the summer vacs when they were at university to keep up with their French and help us look after Christo and Henry.

          6. To be fair the great majority of our our students are delightful young people who keep in touch with us. Indeed, when our boys were little many girls came to stay with us during the summer vacs when they were at university to keep up with their French and help us look after Christo and Henry.

        2. Another true story

          We had a rebel girl from CLC on another one of our courses – quite the opposite of the one in the story above – who shocked all the locals in the restaurants we visited by wearing black fishnet stockings and the miniest of miniskirts. She had been predicted a E grade in French in her mocks at school and did not much like her teachers who, she said, hated her. But she adored Caroline and was determined to prove that in a week on one of our courses she could learn more French than in two years at school. I managed to find and play this song on Youtube for her and she was thrilled because she had never heard it before.

          When the “A” level results came out she wrote to Caroline in triumphant glee: “I got an A in French – all down to you!”

      5. Name and address, please Rastus. Nagsman and I are not being kept in the manner to which we wish to become accustomed and need help with our independence.

          2. When you realise the molotov cocktail in a teenager’s brain it’s surprising they can make it through the day.

        2. That’s appalling. He should have grown out of it by that age, but I would imagine that if you’re coping with grown males on your own, you try to avoid trouble for as long as possible.

        3. He will no doubt expect his mother to pay for the flat, plus living expenses…

          It’s a hard one.

          1. When I was an RAF Apprentice my mother expected me to pay for my board and lodgings when I was on leave FFS and I was on 30/- a week. Later, in my 40’s I only had digs for 4 nights a week (before I bought a house) the other 3 were at hers for which she charged me
            FTAG

    4. Our elder son went through a bumptious period where we dreaded his presence in the house.
      Finally, MB told him that, if we were so ghastly and inferior, he could find himself somewhere else to live.
      Fair do’s to the Bumptious One; he realised he had overdone it, and returned to his normal self.
      At the time, he had an unpleasant clever dick friend who we think brought out the worst side in him.

    5. Daughter at Uni. came home and informed us she was now a vegetarian except for lamb chops. We took no notice and carried on as normal asking her to leave anything she did not want to eat at the side of her plate. Guess what clean plates.

        3. Nor did we, so ignored it and it worked. She is now cured of being a veggie.

      2. One of our friends went through a veggie stage back in the 60’s when it was unusual.
        He had a couple of exceptions; pork sausages and steak.

    1. Did you chop it right down? We have hydrangeas, but the blooms are looking rather small.

      1. If you call 9 inch blooms small – then it is small!! We just do the normal, annual dead heading when frosts are past.

        We have about 50 different Hydrangeas – all of which are doing very well, this year. They thrived on the rain in June.

          1. He does it on purpose. How on earth the MR puts up with it, we’ll never know. {:^))

          2. Oh I SEE. I read the second sentence to mean:

            We have hydrangeas, but the your blooms are looking rather small.

            Do try to be more precise…{:¬))

          3. Answer the bl**dy question. Do you chop your hydrangeas to the ground each autumn/or whenever? Does this account for your blooming … ch … success?

          4. Language.. Tut, tut.

            No.

            Just dead head and each stem by about a foot or so down to a pair of nice young shoots at a node. NEVER cut back to ground.

            See you on Saturday in the rain and I’ll show you the grounds…. 2/6d a head.

      1. That’s usually how it works, Wm. Or were you told that all babies are to be found underneath gooseberry bushes?
        *
        *
        *
        Oh silly me. Have just realised that you were talking about vaccinations.

  56. Yes folks its true Wimmins have saved the world once again !

    An undated handout image of a Barbie doll made in the likeness of Sarah Gilbert (3d R), the Oxford University professor who co-designed the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine, among a global lineup of women of healthcare sector honoured with a one-of-a-kind doll. (photo credit: UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD/VIA REUTERS)
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/63691eba7853b72ef1213c65b2c36ccd0ab379c2581636a7c274ab42aa3b1e56.jpg

      1. One rolls onto the cul de sac around 2.30 am – and never turns the spotlight that shines backwards – off. I know its illegal but the police never seem to bother him.

    2. My ex used to leave for work about 4am – he drove a milk tanker. He was regularly stopped by police on his way to work.

    4. An attempted break-in was reported at 2.30am. The police stopped a vehicle driving past the property 2½ hours later…

      1. A mate reported an early morning disturbance/argument outside his house – about 3am – a woman was shoved into a car which screeched off. He even gave the make, model, colour and partial reg of the car. 4 days later a female PCSO knocked on his door asking if there was any more details. I cannot post his reply on here.

        1. It’s not the late response that is so risible but that they thought that the suspect, 2½ hours after failing to break in, might still be driving around in a distinctive and highly conspicuous van.

        2. I was run off the A68 road by an HGV. I phoned the police and gave all the details, colour, condition etc (I was too busy keeping out out of a hedge to notice the reg. The lorry was in dreadful state, dirty, broken bits, assorted paint, mostly green.)
          Any patrol car on the A68 should have been easily able to identify and pick it up, by dilapidated appearance alone. Some hours later I received call from the police and they read back the details as taken by them – no resemblance to what I actually said.

          2. Who knows? One may guess, recording not working, sloppy shorthand, lack of understanding, couldn’t care less…

    5. “He was released under investigation in relation to the arrest for obstructing a police officer“- a face saving exercise so they can nick him for something?

    7. Effin’ stupid plod. I hope they feel hurt being referred to as either, or both, the Police Farce, or The Keystone Kops.

      At least the latter seemed funny, at times.

  58. And why not..bodybags are plentiful.
    Until last month, most of the Taliban*-occupied territories were located in rural parts of Afghanistan. However, with the foreign troop withdrawal deadline nearing, the Islamist insurgent group is now threatening major provincial cities. Clashes between the Taliban and the Afghan forces have been reported from three major towns this week.

    Two of the United Kingdom’s (UK) former defence ministers, chairman of the House of Commons’ Defence Committee, Tobias Ellwood, and Johnny Mercer, have called on Boris Johnson’s government to “show international leadership” and return British troops to Afghanistan. The demand came as the Taliban set its sights on the country’s urban centres ahead of the troop withdrawal deadline.

    “We are capable of acting without the Americans and it’s time to prove it,” Ellwood, a Tory politician and a former commando was quoted as saying by the Daily Mail.
    He has also expressed fears that the “horrific local, regional and international consequence” of US troop withdrawal are just starting to unfold, in a reference to escalating violence by the Taliban.

    “History will show that our failure in Afghanistan, culminating in our abrupt retreat, will be the biggest own goal made by the West so far this century,” Ellwood tweeted.
    ​The conservative MP called for the 31 August troop withdrawal order by the Joe Biden administration to be revoked, warning that if the UK didn’t “step up” and convene a conference of “like-minded partners”, the sacrifice of British troops over the past 20 years would be in vain.
    The call by the UK MP comes as the Taliban militants threaten to overtake three provincial capitals — Herat (Herat Province), Lashkar Gah (Helmand) and Kandahar (Kandahar Province).

    During their offensive in these Afghan cities, the Taliban are reportedly singling out Afghan interpreters who have helped the US-led foreign coalition forces since 2001.

    Nearly 450 British troops have been killed in combat across the insurgency-ravaged nation since 2001, most of the casualties having taken place in Helmand.

    Fellow conservative MP Johnny Mercer backed Ellwood’s calls, accusing the US of “losing its moral compass” and “leaving Afghanistan to its fate”.

    1. We should have learned by now to keep our noses (and troops) out of the Middle east – let them carry on killing eachother and if they run out of targets we have plenty here we can export to them

      1. Britain will never learn.They go in gung-ho on the US coat tails but never consider that the enemy will target Britain (the US is over a wide ocean so not the same risk).
        Maybe one day they will realise that if you attack their people,they will attack yours.

        1. Not Britain – British politicians. And they don’t care – so long as their promises of money for themselves (often from us) come in – stuff what happens to the population of this country.

          1. Doesn’t wash…unfortunately,middle east countries don’t discriminate between government and citizens.
            The soldier at the back of a gun isn’t a politician.

        2. Some ideologies don’t need outside interference to provoke mayhem (and a lot of it is already over here).

          1. So the obvious answer is…stay out.
            Its not rocket science.
            How many attacks happened BEFORE the Iraq war`?

          2. I don’t have an argument with that; it’s what I’ve always advocated. You can’t take European values to (still less impose them on) non-European cultures. We’ve had plenty of bad experiences in Afghanistan dating to the 19th century at least for us to have learned something, if only politicians were willing to be receptive.

    2. In which case, send Mercer and Ellwood and their families in as the advance party without security and a fully published itinerary so that the Taliban can plan for an appropriate meetings to discover what the plans are for those British troops.

    4. Why waste more British soldiers’ lives on this lost cause? They should have been withdrawn years ago.

    5. Perhaps Mr Ellwood could go himself to Afghanistan. He could talk directly to the Taliban and convince them to mend their ways?
      Is it me? We have no business there. We have repeatedly lost, and lost badly. Of course, any talks might have more traction if we offered to buy their opiate crop…

      1. The Chinese have the right idea.Instead of going in mob-handed they invited the Taliban leaders to China to discuss helping to rebuild the country.
        Let’s see who’s approach bears fruit.

        1. Let’s leave it all to China then. They’ve already bought up the whole of Africa and a large part of the UK.

  59. Steerpike
    Guy Verhofstadt claims Olympic gold for the EU
    5 August 2021, 12:14pm

    Who is on top of the gold medal table at the Tokyo Olympics? China? The United States?

    According to former European parliament Brexit chief Guy Verhofstadt, it is, in fact, the European Union that is triumphing at the games.

    While you have to go down to seventh place in the Olympics leader board to find an EU country (Germany), Verhofstadt appears to have his own scoreboard:

    ‘Fun fact,’ he wrote on Twitter: ‘EU combined has more gold medals than US or China’.

    Verhofstadt went on to say that he would ‘love to see the EU flag next to the national on athletes’ clothes’.

    Mr S wonders whether this is all just a ploy to ensure that Verhofstadt’s Belgium – which has so far won just a single gold at the games – stands a chance of beating Great Britain, which has 16.

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

    Anglomicronesian • 2 hours ago
    Fun fact: if you combine all of the Commonwealth nations’ medals together, the British Empire is winning.

    https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/guy-verhofstadt-claims-olympic-gold-for-the-eu#

    2. Another fun fact – Imelda Staunton has actually appeared in a Steven Seagal film!

    3. The EUrgh tried that at the last Olympics. It didn’t impress anyone then, either! What a bunch of losers!

      1. What a waste of money that is … Marble A mound … what happens if there is a landslip , you know just like the cliff landslips around our coastline ?

        1. Everything they do is a waste of money now – HS2 – mass immigration – Foreign Aid – what is ANY of it doing ANY good for us?? – We are being driven into the ground, our culture and country deliberately destroyed – and I can’t put what I want to put or else i’ll be banned!!!!!

  61. Afternoon, all. Wet here, so I’ve given up in the garden after weeding and installing the new Watchman on the oil tank. Come to plague you lot instead.

      2. Thank you, Sue. The feeling is mutual. It’s nice not to have a load of chores to complete.

    1. There’s no word for pré-commander in French just like there isn’t one for entrepreneur in English! 😉

    2. There’s no word for pré-commander in French just like there isn’t one for entrepreneur in English! 😉

    1. This is why I started my own company. I’ll never own a Lambo though. Far too expensive. Much prefer my 80’s V8 Vantage.

          2. Very few Muslims in the UK in the 50s. Muslim population 1961 50,000. Muslim population 2017 3,372,996.

          3. And the number is rising ..

            If they can’t get on with each other in the land of their grandparents , how on earth d they expect to get on here, hang on a second , yes , Christian countries are the magnet , the people they pathologically despise and want to hurt , torture and betray and con.

          9. Perhaps the Brits should have stayed out of their countries?
            Just an observation.

          11. As you alluded to earlier…they’re not Christian.
            Should have stayed at home.What exactly have the West gained by rampaging through the Middle East?

          12. What did the Turks want when they rampaged through Europe ..

            Why did the Barbary pirates raid our coastlines and take our people as slaves ?

          13. Why did the Romans invade Btitannia?
            These and many other questions need answering.
            As things stand,we’re dealing with “the here and now”

          14. Because they could, in essence. More territory – minerals – potential slaves. Bit like the UK today – with its new invaders.

          15. Maybe they’ll start fracking for the oil and gas.
            Now that would be a turnaround!…people from the Middle East coming to steal Britain’s mineral wealth!

          20. Thanks Bill, I have scribbled a little gmail to you.

            I saved lots of email addresses, thank goodness.
            Nuisance , really annoying that my Pipex is messing me around .

          21. “Perhaps the Brits should have stayed out of their countries?”

            Trouble-making again, I see.

            Islam had conquered a quarter of the known world before England was England.

          22. You can’t live life in the past…it doesn’t work.
            You have to deal with the present.

          23. Bullshit.

            You’re saying we’re the bad guys for invading Islamic countries [sic] but Islam gets a let-off for invading other peoples’ lands – and earlier.

          25. Bullshit.

            You’re saying we’re the bad guys for invading Islamic countries [sic] but Islam gets a let-off for invading other peoples’ lands – and earlier.

          26. I think you are suffering from cognitive dissonance, you’re questioning old actions in the ME by the West yet refusing to accept that perhaps people in the ME are equally culpable.

          27. Perhaps a true British government should sit in parliament…Too many foreigners on the front bench.

          1. I really have no idea why Jews have always been the target of hatred. Was it something to do with the Crucifixion? Or maybe because they were good at making money?

          2. You say “hatred” but if some looney paints a swastika on a wall…that’s anti-semitism!

          5. These few words have often been the Christian excuse for the persecution. One man’s account long after the event.
            “In Matthew, the Roman governor washes his hands of Jesus’ blood while the Jews proclaim, “His blood be on us and on our children!” (Matt 27:25)”

    2. Good one. I’ll pinch it to send to my brother. It’s heavy going but I am teaching him how to forward emails to exclude the originator’s name/ email address. Not sure I’ve explained that too well. He sometimes forwards an email from one of his friends – I can see every email address his friend has sent it too.

      1. If I forward something to OH, he very often replies just to me, instead of the originator.

  68. 336307+ up ticks,
    Could it be in ALL reality that if this whole JABOREE
    political campaign, heavens forbid went tits up leaving the unjabbed nursing a mounting number of double jabbed.

    Or would a third jab be the political answer, would
    the double jabbed being administered the third political stabbing continued to abuse the unjabbed that was nursing them ?

    https://twitter.com/BernieSpofforth/status/1423290371077906434

      1. I think a lot of the hard research into alternative technologies and alternative energy sources as well as improvements in existing technologies may have been accelerated, resulting in improvements, but other than that? Pass.

          1. Who knows? I don’t think they have, but perhaps it would have been worse. Damned hard to prove either way.
            My own view is that the main culprit is changes happening on that big orange thing we sometimes see in the sky.

          3. And use the rich men’s toys to do so. Branson, Musk and Bezos can pilot the the arks.

          4. 336307+ up ticks,
            N,
            They have elected a new capo dei capi I believe.

            The last one choked on lies.

      3. Enormous amount of air travel, posh hotels, posh restaurants – securiddy etc etc etc

  70. HAPPY HOUR
    Shopping in town earlier it was great to see street musicians returning. I listened to a rendition of ‘Losing my Religion’ a couple of quid lighter,by a talented artist who engaged a large crowd.
    The street was filled with music….and I felt a sense of nostalgia for the good old days.

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

  71. Just had a couple of days boating with two granddaughters (5 & 8 years old). They asked for a couple of shrimping nets which I was happy to provide. Led by the eldest as we cruised the canal they proceeded to scoop out of the water bits of plastic, bottles and cans which they placed in sack for proper disposal…

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c1188a1d07b51e3e6731cb50cbde1eedab7ed1c074397c55521e98102d3a9ffe.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/fb7f71e6ca6fd23d6673c2d30131dd7f4d747679381bed243b54830292ad73f3.jpg

    1. Grandchildren are God’s blessing, aren’t they? Even if one doesn’t believe in God…!

          1. I was invited there last night when my French friend telephoned, BUT masks are compulsory in the town along with a vax pass to visit anywhere (selon mon amie) and then there is the quarantine/testing malarchy here. I would love to go and spend a couple of weeks down there again (especially since, apart from Oscar, I have no ties at the moment), but it frankly isn’t worth the hassle.

          2. My view exactly. We have a flat available in Cap d’Ail (next to Monaco) mid-Sept – the MR is very keen to go. I am NOT – because of tests, masks, inability to go to Ventimiglia to shop, then all the compulsory tests, locator forms etc etc etc. I’d rather stay at home and do the garden and be amused by the cats.

    1. Me, I’m afraid. I just can’t help myself! I have been having a bit of a clear out recently, though (to make room for other stuff).

      1. Did you have a look at those slide across pics? I thought I was a hoarder, but I’m not quite that bad!

        1. No, I didn’t read the article, but I know I’m nowhere near as bad as some hoarders, who have piles of old newspapers stacked up the stairs, for instance. The only reason you can barely move around in one of my rooms is because I’m clearing out the conservatory before it’s replaced and all the stuff from there has been boxed up and has to be stored elsewhere.

          1. It never ceases to amaze me; we clear a room for, say decorating, and the stuff in it not only hogs other rooms it also blocks corridors. How on earth did we get it in one room in the first place?
            Incidentally, I’ve got rid of books and all sorts of extraneous home and office stuff by sticking them out by the gate. Even on a quiet suburban road, it’s amazing what goes.

          2. When I went to church yesterday for the BCP service I noticed they’d got the book stall back (it disappeared, as did so much else, during Covid). Memo to self; take some books you want to get rid of next time you go. I was pleased with myself; I saw a book I fancied but didn’t buy it, which is a minor miracle 🙂

          3. I left a large bag of hardy geraniums by the roadside when I went to buy my newspaper.After 30 mins I returned ..the plants had gone….

          7. Our neighbours do that. Annoyingly, they put them on OUR gate post, as none of them have gates fronting on the road. So we look like Steptoe and Son, and people think they can come into our garden and help themselves.

        1. Signal crayfish. Delicious. Though they are an invading species which eat absolutely everything you are not allowed to trap them without a license.

          Bye bye all native species in rivers and canals.

          1. A chap in our village trapped the ‘American’ crayfish by the local lock on the River Stour.

            The river was polluted and he was poisoned and after having bits of his digestive tract removed sadly died.

          2. Very unfortunate but i don’t think that was down to the crayfish. They are usually edible.

            I thought river and canal water quality was tested quite regularly.

          3. I believe the village sewage ‘holding tank’ overflowed into a field ditch and polluted a stretch of the river which is quite narrow upstream in Stoke by Clare.

            The rivers are not managed particularly well. This is because the flora and fauna receive more attention than is given to keeping the rivers free flowing. We regularly have floods on the stretch between Wixoe and New England.

            There are some black mayflies which are found only on our stretch of the Stour.

    3. I see Essex scores well – they must know Mrs Allan….!!

      Incidentally, without my reading glasses, I read the first three words as “England’s biggest WHORES…”

  75. I must love you and leave you. I haven’t read the morning paper yet. Busy all morning with market and then painting bodged woodshed. I found a tin of Cuprinol last used in 2006 when my late son and I first constructed the shed. Enough there to cover the re-hash. Very satisfying. Then this arvo, after lunch in the garden – stacking logs. All is now safely gathered in – with Pickles being very useful in walking over the logs as I stacked them….

    I am now thinking about a glass of medicine as the rain is about to start.

    A demain – more rain.

    PS For anyone in yer Norfolk – this Saturday we are holding (mask free) “Coffee at the Crossroads” in Fulmodeston in aid of the Church. All welcome.

    1. Is that because those wearing masks at the crossroads in your part of the world are highwaymen?

    2. Been raining gently all afternoon here – at least not a monsoon type rain.

      Enjoy the medicine.

    3. Careful, Bill I might yet convince Best Beloved we should be there. Is the venue Christ Church?

  76. 336307+ up ticks,
    The establishment are at it again, surely the mid 70s was a warning about these types with two MPs conversing with PIE also being suggested that the age of consent goes down to 12 if not, lower.

    The BBC’s Woman’s Hour programme has seemingly attempted to normalise the question of providing pornography to children, asking the public whether they believe “age-appropriate pornography” should be made for them.

    1. My mantra to my children when they complained.

      “Life’s not fair, I’m not fair, and who told you it would be?”

    2. No, I’m not going to spend 36+ minutes to find out why I’m disillusioned.

      I already know why and the list is far too long to enumerate here.

  78. Sod it!
    Working my way through a 200+ catch up of today’s posts, made the mistake of trying to upvote someone and got “disqussed” to a white screen.

    1. It’s been a bit shaky today – a lot of shooting about when I try to post a comment. Could be just my laptop I suppose.

  79. VR46 (Valentino Rossi) has decided to (at last) hang up his leathers at the end of this season.
    He is a “one-off” and his exploits will live long.
    I suppose at the ripe old age of 42 he deserves a rest.
    However he won’t be going far as he already runs his VR46 teams in both lower classes and next year his team will start in MotoGP.
    If ever anyone gave back to the sport its Valentino.
    Enjoy your retirement Vale but you’ll be back in a rally car or a Le Mans car very soon…

    1. Not exactly a leading example of how we – in the UK – get over our current problems.

      Sorry, Harry, but with regard to (Rudolph) Valentino, I find it hard to give a minuscule flying fart, let alone a f**k.

  80. ITV News at 6:30 pm this evening – item on the record number of illegal immigrants arriving in Kent yesterday. Much was made of the ‘migrants’ (not immigrants) ‘risking their lives’ in the crossing. Not one word about the fact that they are all breaking the law.

    1. Not one word about the cost either I assume. Millions must be being spent on them – for WHAT contribution??? NOTHING AT ALL. . With all they need provided free – why work and pay taxes? They will keep coming – and the bill keeps rising – – the govt can’t just keep accepting without something giving.

        1. You missed several extra “muches” – there isn’t an endless number of hotels – so where do they go? Nor an endless supply of taxpayer funded housing, nor the money to pay for them, nor the people, nor what they expect to get for purely arriving. There has to be a crisis point – then the idiots who want them all here – I hope – become their first victims.

          1. I heard something on the radio that said that Millenials are not having children, the day of the single young mother is over , and more older women in their late thirties over forties are having children , so I guess they meant that the indigenous bithrateois going down so these illegals are here to take up the slack !

          2. But how many of those who didn’t have children didn’t because it was so expensive to have a roof over their heads and both partners had to have a wage coming in? This lot are of the culture where the women don’t work anyway – and now we are having to pay for them as well.

          3. Concentration camps on remote Scottish island.

            Retained until deportation. – That’ll STOP the gimmegrunts once they know what their fate is.

            Strewth – I should be Home Secretary!

          4. Gruinard, perhaps!

            Gruinard Island, off the coast of Scotland, was contaminated in 1942 by a test use of anthrax spores by the United Kingdom and the United States; the island remained uninhabitable for decades.

          6. Its been clean for some years – no longer uninhabitable …

            195 Hectares – .75 Square Miles.

            A I Km – 5/8 Mile swim to shore.

            Perfect!

          8. It will be billeting with the indigenous population next. It’s what communists force on their populations. ‘Property is theft’. That should wake them all up.

      2. The entire state machine is dedicated to promoting massive uncontrolled gimmigration.

        We must remove these dross – both the media AND the gimmigrants.

      3. “Something Giving” you say??
        That’ll be the ever increasing age it takes to claim a pension you’ve paid taxes for 50+ years to qualify for……*
        *

        Unless you’re in Public Service in which case your vast index linked pension can be probably be claimed at 60 or earlier!!

        1. As a former public servant – may I just say that my index linked pension (for which I am very grateful) is not vast.

          1. All things are relative.
            My wife’s and my total pensions combined would put us well below average weekly earnings for an individual.
            We think we are extremely well off.

            I recognise that we’ve paid off all debt but we still have to be careful how we live.
            My M-i-L has a much, much higher income off her husband’s public sector pension.

    3. More than a passing resemblance to actor Neil Stuke who has played plenty of slippery characters.

  83. A cracker from John Ward:

    Britain is hopelessly infected by the pclgbtqtrans virus, for which there in no known cure.

  84. It would appear that Lionel and Barca have parted company.
    I’ll believe it when he pens a contract with another club.

    1. Messi is 34, he wants a 5 year contract. Liga rules suggest he can’t have it.

      Even at reduced wages, he’s past it.

      Time to head for America, land of the living dead in footballing terms.

      2. Tottenham Hotspur is a possible gateway to the States. The alternative is Man City now managed by his former Barca manager when they won stuff.

        1. Possible, but FFP rules must kick in, Hell’s teeth MC are buying and paying from a bottomless pit of money

      3. Oh, my God, Wendyball, overpaid ball kickers strike again – who cares. Go woke, go broke.

      3. We had endured the three day week under Heath.

        Thatcher was influenced by American advisors on her election and did two very damaging things viz. first, turned the UK from a manufacturing economy into a service economy and secondly shut down the coal mines under the pretext that the workings were running out of coal which could be imported from South America instead.

        1. She closed about as many mines as did the previous Labour government. Don’t hear the same about Callahan.

          1. “By 2025 it is planned there will be no coal fired power stations left in the UK.”

            And then the lights go out!

          5. You’re right. It’s late and I’ve had a couple of glasses of wine 🙂 Mind you, given the state of California, the lights are probably going out in San Francisco (be sure to wear some flowers in your hair) as well 🙂

          6. I cannot wait to see the San Andreas fault slide the whole kit and caboodle into the Pacific.

          7. I agree the Wilson government did a lot of damage by closing down smaller mines. Thatcher followed suit but principally for political reasons causing immense societal damage to communities. Scargill was a stupid power crazed union nut job man and never posed the perceived threat.

            British mines were a source of high quality anthracite. By contrast the German’s have been building new coal fired stations burning lignite or brown coal. Those lignite mines were purloined from the Jewish industrialists before WWII.

            I do not believe that shutting our superior coal stocks and moving to solar and wind power will ever replace our former capacity. The Germans worked this out some time ago and ceased the building of offshore wind generation.

            As for the Chinese, they simply laugh inscrutably at our every folly.

        4. I cannot agree, Corri, Maggie was trying to straighten out British society and reduce its dependence upon state and socialist benefits.

          1. I agree that something had to be done about the incessant strikes and disruption.

            I was taken to task by my resident site engineer, a great bloke from Middlesbrough, for tossing a pound coin into the miner relief fund bucket on Pimlico station. He explained that the children of miners were better off than other children. They had new clothes and shoes and were measurably better off than their neighbours.

            I knew then that the debate about the merits of coal mine closures was both heated and an intractable problem. I take no side.

    3. Margaret Thatcher was 100% against the Trades Union power in dictating Government Policy. She set herself up to curb that power and the greatest threat was the Miners’ Union who would deny coal to the power stations – we were not bluddy ‘green’ in the 1980s.

      So she set out to smash that power – and succeeded, because the whole militant Trades Union Congress came to realise that if they didn’t toe the line, they would be next to suffer the fate of the NUM.

      More power to her elbow – that is the sort of strong leadership we need today, rather than this wishy-washy ‘green’ shite that we see today from Boris and his Carrion harpy aficionado.

      1. Margaret Thatcher who, as education secretary in the early 1970s, agreed to the closure of most grammar schools.

        1. I think it would be more accurate to say that she didn’t stop the closure that Labour (Anthony Crosland, anyone?) had put in hand. Either way, it did irreparable damage to the prospects of bright, working class children.

        2. Possibly, Plum, she had more pressing problems, vis-a-vis NUM et al to occupy her mind and the drive forward to liberate the country from the grip of the left.

          Hell’s bells, would that we had such a focused leader today.

      1. Good idea, I can give you 650 plus another 8 – 900 tossers in Westminster. Will that do for starters?

    3. In the panoply of useless Politicians this character has achieved Superstar status….

    5. Yet another lying globalist monster lying bastard. Holidaying in the Bahamas I assume whilst the rest of us remain under the tyrannical medico cosh.

    3. Poor old Michael P.

      Last year the TV legend opened up on his battle with prostate cancer. After an early diagnosis he was given an operation and radiotherapy. He said: “It leaves you with problems because it’s so near the bowels and bladder.”

      Double incontinence must be one of life’s worst horrors.

  88. Vaccines, vaccines, vaccines.
    Who are by far and away the main recipients overall?
    The White Western population.
    And if….

      1. and in the words to Melting Pot by Blue Mink – coffee coloured people by the score – why all the ads show mixed race couples with dark skinned kids – – just like Agenda 21 wants.

    3. Dolly Partons latest song? – Vack – seen vack-seen vack-seen vack – seeeeeeen.

    4. My African friend is in her country at the moment – I will ask her whether there is a vaxx program there, and what the pressure is if so.

  89. A good one here! https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/milkman-arrested-burglar-police-milk-pints-b949364.html
    Plod had nothin on him, so he’s under investigation for obstruction – ie, being irritated at the fuckwits arresting him for delivering milk”
    Milkman arrested after being mistaken for burglar despite showing police pints of milk
    A milkman was stopped on his round after he became a burglary suspect. / PA Archive
    By John Dunne@jhdunne 5 hours ago
    A milkman was arrested on suspicion of being a burglar despite showing police pints of milk and empties.
    The delivery man was stopped by officers in Newton Aycliffe, County Durham, in the early hours of Wednesday, just after delivery to a customer, according to his boss Russ Gibson.
    Police were hunting for a suspect after an incident at a convenience store.
    The suspect was said to be a man in a van.
    The milkman first rang Mr Gibson at around 2.45am to say there was police activity in the area.
    Mr Gibson said the driver then rang again to say he had been followed by police, stopped and asked what he was doing at that early hour, despite them seeing him make a delivery to a doorstep.
    The officers seemed unconvinced so the driver showed them the milk and empties in the back of the unmarked white van, and he was allowed to continue on his way.
    However, 15 minutes later the driver had stopped for a coffee break and was met by officers from three patrol cars who said they were arresting him on suspicion of burglary.
    The driver then rang his boss again, this time from Darlington police station, and Mr Gibson thought he was being pranked.
    He spoke directly to police at the station, telling them they had got the wrong man, and a tracker would show them the van had not been near the convenience store.
    Mr Gibson located the van and tried to stop hundreds of pounds worth of product – which should have been delivered to customers – from being wasted.
    But he was told it could not be removed as it was evidence.
    Mr Gibson then went to the police station in Newton Aycliffe where he got officers’ attention by banging on a window, and was helped by two officers.
    He said they helped him stop his van from being impounded and he had it back by 7am, but by this stage the milk in the back was too warm to be sold and had to be replaced.
    The driver was de-arrested for the burglary charge but is under investigation for obstructing a police officer.
    Mr Gibson, owner of Aycliffe Dairies, said: “It was a right farce.
    “We have been stopped by the police all the time and normally it is easily resolved.
    “But regardless of what he said, they weren’t interested, they just saw a white van and a guy with a beard.
    “It’s one of those stories where you don’t know whether to laugh or be angry.”
    Durham Police said officers were responding to reports of an attempted break-in at a shop, and CCTV showed a van and someone acting suspiciously.
    A spokeswoman said: “Officers attended the scene and stopped a van nearby.
    “After refusing to provide his details, the driver of the van was arrested on suspicion of attempted burglary and obstructing a police officer.”
    He has been released without charge for the attempted burglary and released under investigation for obstructing a police officer

    3. Someone commented that the man was driving a plain white van, which is why he was stopped. That he had dozens of milk bottles in it is another matter.

      1. And it was covered with pictures of Cows – not quite so plain. Keystone Kops strike again – TWATS!

        2. No need. It is obvious and frankly I for one welcome his return. This place needs its linguists and food aficionados. It is only on losing them that you appreciate the loss.

        3. No need. It is obvious and frankly I for one welcome his return. This place needs its linguists and food aficionados. It is only on losing them that you appreciate the loss.

  92. just had a premonition

    “Strictly 2031”: BBC declares that the final couple to be selected for this years show will be Heterosexual,
    for the younger viewers, that is a Man and Woman

    2. Both have of course transitioned…one of them has transitioned twice, the other one three times.

  93. Goodnight and may God bless you during your sleeping hours.

    I’ll catch up with you all in tomorrow’s morning light.

  94. Universities set own entrance exams amid A-level chaos
    Chancellors say they cannot rely on grades handed out by teachers during the pandemic as objective

    Camilla Turner and Lois Turner DT https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/08/05/universities-set-entrance-exams-amid-a-level-chaos/ ,

    In government the executive, the legislature and the judiciary must be independent of each other to avoid conflict of interest. By the same token teachers should not be asked to assess the work of their own pupils for public exams.

    A BTL comment

    As a teacher my job was to do the best to ensure that my pupils achieved the best grades they could in public examinations; as an examiner my job was to be objective and impartial.

    My wife and I left teaching in schools when GGSE with coursework presented us with a conflict in interest. When we were asked to assess our own pupils for examination grades how could we achieve the best possible grades for our own pupils while being objective and fair. Also we knew that some teachers would be far too generous in their assessments while others would be far too strict putting some pupils at an advantage and others at a disadvantage.

    We now run our own residential courses for students of French in France. Our job is to try and see that our students do as well as they possibly can; assessing the grades which they are given is up to an independent examiner.

    1. I recall that everyone in my class failed the German O-Level. This was because we had no continuity with teachers coming and going on a regular routine basis.

      Our German teacher (Mr Gadd) took it upon himself to allow his two favourite pupils (Hauser and Millward) to retake the oral part of the examination and loaded the result to allow them to be awarded a pass mark.

      The fact is that some teachers have favourites and all are not impartial. I write as one who was yearly a prize winner but this was always for effort.

      1. When I passed the eleven plus, the headmaster called my parents into the school where he asked them to decline the grammar school place that I had been offered. Apparently he wanted my place to go to the daughter of a local doctor.

        I suppose that with the teachers assigning grades I would have been sent round to the local secondary modern.

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