Tuesday 3 September: Conservatives choosing a new leader have a crucial lesson to learn

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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724 thoughts on “Tuesday 3 September: Conservatives choosing a new leader have a crucial lesson to learn”

    1. Thank you for posting that link to the quiet coconut. He skilfully navigated across some awkward territory.

  3. Good morning, chums. And thanks for today's NoTTLe page, Geoff.

    Wordle 1,172 4/6

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  4. Good morrow, Gentlefolk. Today’s (recycled) story

    Poor Fanny Green

    An Irish man went to confession in St. Patrick's Catholic Church.

    'Father', he confessed, 'it has been one month since my last confession.
    I had sex with Fanny Green twice last month.'

    The priest told the sinner, 'You are forgiven. Go out and say three Hail Mary's.’

    Soon thereafter, another Irish man entered the confessional.

    'Father, it has been two months since my last confession. I've had sex with Fanny Green twice a week for the past two months.'

    This time, the priest questioned, 'Who is this Fanny Green?'

    'A new woman in the neighbourhood,' the sinner replied
    .
    'Very well,' sighed the priest. Go and say ten Hail Mary’s.

    At mass the next morning, as the priest prepared to deliver the sermon, a tall, voluptuous, drop-dead gorgeous red headed woman entered the sanctuary.

    The eyes of every man in the church fell upon her as she slowly sashayed up the aisle and sat down right in front of the priest.

    Her dress was green and very short, and she wore matching, shiny emerald-green shoes.

    The priest and the altar boy gasped as the woman in the green dress and matching green shoes sat with her legs spread slightly apart, but just enough to realise she wasn't wearing any underwear.

    The priest turned to the altar boy and whispered, 'Is that Fanny Green?’

    The bug-eyed altar boy couldn't believe his ears but managed to calmly reply,

    'No Father, I think it's just a reflection from her shoes’

  6. Russia hits Kyiv with barrage of missiles as schools reopen. 3 September 2024.

    Across the war-torn country, the start of the school year had been celebrated and heralded as a moment for Ukrainians to attempt to continue with life as normal.

    Yevheniia’s six-year-old daughter, Margo, was due to start school for the first time on Monday.

    “Her hands were shaking, we woke up. Our apartment started to stink of smoke, but we still need to go to school, right? We are Ukrainians,” the 33-year-old mother told Reuters.

    I would suppose that this article is a reaction to the silence of the last three days. It doesn’t actually contain anything of any significance. It is simply a piece of rather twee propaganda. That the Russians would wait for the school year to launch an attack seems unlikely to say the least. Allied with some venomous personal abuse from the in house trolls, and a Guardian article about the “heroes” of Kursk it actually reinforces my suspicions that all is not going well at the Donbass front. Keep your eyes open my friends.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/09/02/russia-hits-kyiv-with-barrage-of-missiles-as-schools-reopen/

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/ukraine

    1. If there were real successes, the papers would be full of them. Since they aren't, you get this "Russian man bad" stuff, to remind folk that there's still a war and that the Ukies are poor, defenceless folk. Women & children especially.

      1. Is it the EdSec who gets preferential hospital treatment by chanting "From the River to the Sea" in the A&E waiting room?

        1. Thank you, unmarried mother with two children living over the brush with another left-wing politician. A perfect example of today's political elite.

  8. 398371+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    He is, plain as day, a davos, WEF / NWO twatologist as are those wanna be fully fledged twatologst supporters who use him as a role model.

    His political likes have been unfit to govern a nation, openly seen from the political knifing of Mrs Thatcher (RIP) but innocents MUST continue to suffer as grist on the altar via must vote tory
    ( ino) keep out lab (ino)party , family tree voters, the best of the worst party voters,and so it continues.

    This high tech tactical voting has in point of honest fact, seen our children raped & abused via MASS paedophilia , our elderly "put down "no other description fits more aptly", and the country flooded with a murderous foreign alien species,

    PLUS being given succour via the political overseers employees as in the rotherham sixteen plus year cover up.

    https://x.com/JamesMelville/status/1830606147113582774

    1. Tough choice my left buttock. It was the easy one – crap all over the pensioners (again), 'cos everyone no they will die soon and have unfair advantage of getting (bugger-all) money for no work.
      Man's and out & out bastard. It's shits like that that helped persuade us to leave the UK. Nearly as shitty are those who voted him in!

      1. Hear you…real problem as I see it are the ones who voted for him, in gazillions – mostly young, and most likely to continue voting for him next election too, infinity and beyond. In it for the long haul, and I likely won't be around to experience it, but my younger family will. Anyhow, CP leadership coming up, Badenoch for me. Must have some breakfast, hope to improve my mood…:-(

      2. I pray that I see Starmer burning to death on my side of the road.

        I would cross to the other pavement and pee onin a drain

      3. Just more standing proof that they are all habitual and pathological liars.
        Honest people do not go into politics. If they do they don't last long.
        Victory is not 30% of the vote.
        Our system needs a serious overhaul.

    3. It wasn't a tough choice. He did it to punish those he and his ilk hate to reward the incompetent, lazy paymasters who own his socialist backside.

      He's a liar.

    1. 'Morning Paul. We had the warnings yesterday, flooding didn't transpire. Could do that job standing on our 'eads couldn't we 🙂

    2. I slept through it with two windows open, but I've just been informed that the heaven's opened last night.

    2. I think it's the third time he's arrested, similar situation to the young woman arrested outside an abortion clinic. Free speech? don't make us larf.

    3. Two sides to this story. Mr Burke was arrested for repeatedly breaking an injunction to stay away from the school premises.

      1. a bit like the.. Two sides to the praying story. Isabel Vaughan-Spruce from Worcestershire was arrested by the SWAT team for repeatedly.. repeatedly I tell you.. for silently praying in a menacing way.

        She said to the arresting officer "this can't be right?".. He looked at her and said.. "You're faaar right. You're a gammon, you idealogue, you chauvinist. You Tory scum, you capitalist. You're a bigot. (that's enough..)"

  12. Good morning, all. 85 years ago today, the imperialist warmonger Chamberlain declared war on defenceless, unsuspecting Germany. Just remember all the years of misery he (and then the ghastly Churchill) forced on Britain…

    Rain in the night. Grey and miserable right now.

    2. Both wars 1&2 had a big effect on my family, all survived physically and grateful for that. I doubt mental scars ever really heal. Don't see too many leaders on the battle front.

    3. Good morning Mr T and everyone.
      A Dutch friend, now sadly deceased, once said to me "My boy, never, ever trust the Germans.".

        1. And my father-in law about Russians, and my mother-in-law about Serbs

          Edit: it was observing the hatred’s of eastern and south-eastern Europeans for their neighbours that (inter alia) made me realise that the EU was a doomed project.

        2. And my father-in law about Russians, and my mother-in-law about Serbs

          Edit: it was observing the hatred’s of eastern and south-eastern Europeans for their neighbours that (inter alia) made me realise that the EU was a doomed project.

        3. And my father-in law about Russians, and my mother-in-law about Serbs

          Edit: it was observing the hatred’s of eastern and south-eastern Europeans for their neighbours that (inter alia) made me realise that the EU was a doomed project.

        5. My dad said much the same about the Japs (after serving with the Royal Artillery alongside Indian regiments in Burma).

          He loved India and Indians his mother having been born in Cawnpore, the daughter of a Regimental Tailor.

    4. On 1st September 1939, BBC television was shut down completely and didn’t reopen until summer 1946. You see, even WWII had its compensations.

    5. Problem is, when the Nazis were defeated in 1945 the Left kept fighting the war. They changed the weapons – propaganda, economics – but they kept chipping away at freedom, decency and civil society. Hitler would be proud of what the sewage have done.

      Sad thing is, they think they're the good guys

  13. Good morning all.
    A dull, damp morning with steady rain and 9°C on the Yard Thermometer.

    A disappointing double washout with ERNIE this morning. Nothing for self nor the DT.

      1. We thought so too but were surprised to win £250 and £350 having fallen below the maximum holding(s) by recently withdrawing £15K to top up our ISAs.

    3. I can't remember ever winning anything on Ernie. I inherited bonds from my parents I have lost contact with the details. How can I find them ?
      Anyone know?

      2. Write to the Premium Bonds Office giving as much information as you can.
        Inherited bonds are only active for 1 year after the death of the holder, after that time they need to be cashed in and reinvested.

  15. Conservatives choosing a new leader have a crucial lesson to learn

    Pick one that isn't a Globalist Stooge

  16. and now for something completely different. Two births today.

    – Poppy Urielle Darnley Manning
    – to Rosie Kelly-Smith and Stephen White, Billie Kelly Smith-White

    I have typed the hyphens faithfully

    My children were both announced in the Terriblegraph (as, indeed, was my engagement) but my kids don’t have poncy names.

      1. Yes. My children have very old-fashioned, strong Anglo-Saxon names . Max 6 syllables for their entire names. And their initials don’t do anything strange either. I am not interested in “expressing my creativity” or how “interesting” i am through my offsprings’ names.

        1. The initials one can be good or bad. We consciously switched our preferred order of Christian names for the first-born to spare him having initials that could be the butt of teasing. But others have looked at me blankly when I suggest that kids can be spared needless pain by a bit of forethought.

        2. As a mark of respect to my Scottish father-in-law – who married an Essex girl and moved to her home territory – we gave both our sons Scottish christian names.
          We always regretted that he died before our oldest son was born; he was lovely gentle man who would have been an excellent grandfather.

    2. As we taught and lived in a boarding school at the time Caroline and I thought it best to keep our relationship secret until we were ready to announce it.

      When a boy in the school library was reading the day's Daily Telegraph he came across a small announcement in the Forthcoming Marriages section. He cut it out carefully and then went to the main school notice board, put all the other notices on it to one side and put this announcement in the very centre of board surrounded by brightly coloured arrows with the message: Congratulations – Well Done!

      Within minutes everybody knew.

  17. Putin’s silent killer is choking Ukraine’s regiments. Hamish de Crettin-Gordon. 3 September 2024.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/47fb8328660392bb5a4b85fba7b0b2588905c6b6095e092761a2461f27825790.png

    The grinding trench warfare across the Donbass in Ukraine is experiencing a new silent killer, which has allowed the Russian invaders to make gains around Chasiv Yar and Bakmut early in the year and in the Pokrovsk area today – gas.

    This is almost a carbon copy of an article written on May 7 though it has no more credibility. It even has the same picture. Things must be even worse than I suspect.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/03/putins-silent-killer-is-choking-ukraines-regiments/

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/05/07/chemical-weapons-putin-ukraine-gas-masks/

      1. Unfortunately it's the same lame old story everything the political classes come into contact with they eff it up. And in this case, big time.

      1. Morning Bleau. The article is just a filler. My comment pointing this out; though quite harmless in itself, has got me banned.

    3. Guy in the centre looks like he's about to sneeze as I did last night – enough force and spray to reach the TV screen.

  18. Good morning, all. The climate here in N Essex is changeable, a sunny day here, a cloudy day there, an odd chem trail on clear days and at this moment in time it's overcast and wet. The proverbial "a change is as good as a rest" works for many of us.

    Talking of THE climate, not Miliband minor's favourite topic; 'climate change' is what gets his juices flowing and sometimes an urge to pluck a guitar, or is it a ukulele? with a background of windmills for effect. What can one say about this juvenile behaviour from a government minister?

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/00a5398375cfb99f6e473165abc317707b60d5b05086ae3f093fa5dc5c692d7a.png

    Directly below is a selective representation of climate change, around 173 years of data if one comment is correct, with the present time indicated on the right. The representation shows warming, no doubt. (Reading University)

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ba9fa6b93400f8f32fe6f958feac919a2652559c2a6410d2607dc3b942ba77ff.png

    Now, a similar representation over a 2,000 years long period shows a much different picture: a pattern of cyclic warming and cooling. Science, that's real science, indicates that the Sun is entering one of its periods of minimum activity and subsequently the Earth should cool.

    If carbon dioxide, the warming gas of choice of the fatalists, is responsible for boiling the Earth then when the minimum ends the data should show that the cooling either didn't happen or wasn't as severe as previous data indicates. That will take decades (even a century or so?).

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/67602eb3fc1f91f49e96b466debe27c4cf9eb6d3a1e8d648b01c48f8dfadd474.png
    No source given for the above representation but comparing it with one of Dr Roy Spencer's (Climatologist, former NASA scientist) charts shows there is a correlation between the highs and lows e.g. the Medieval Warm Period and the later Little Ice Age.

    1. I subscribe to Climate Change Despatch, have been saying similar for some time. Locals I know a tad hysterical we're now going into the dark ages, makes a change from being boiled I suppose.

    2. And the 'experts' changed their tune from global warming to climate change because climate changes have been happening for thousands of years. So they must be right.

      1. The instrument has 6 strings, it's a guitar. But at least he's got the strings facing outwards.

        1. I love that picture.
          It's the simplicity that strikes you and stays in the memory.
          Very clever, in shades of predominantly grey and black, to convey an atmosphere of deep understated enjoyment.

    3. Note the boo word 'deniers' as if we're denying something heinous. No, we're just not accepting the lies the state pumps out.

  20. Morning all 🙂😊
    Rain overnight. Not a bright start.
    Conservatives have a lesson to learn.
    That will be a first, politicians learning lessons from their past mistakes.

    1. It'll go something like this: lots of waffle and puff. Eventually one berk will be selected, one comfortable with the powers that be. He'll spout a load of gibberish and promise many things. When – if – he gets into post he will abandon all those promises and revert to big state authoritarian socialism.

    2. They don’t consider it a mistake though, all part of their agenda.
      The Conservative Party is much like the abusive husband, promises to change but never will.
      No matter who they elect the parliamentary party will still be stuffed with one nation wets and will carry on as before, high tax, big state, net zero, ideologically wedded to the EU and ECHR just as soon as they return to power.

      1. 392971+ up ticks,

        Morning R,
        The way I see it is, support / vote lab/lib/con coalition party you are consenting, to wanting to activate the seven circles as is currently proving the case.

    2. This is what happens when the diversity are told they can have say and do anything they want with impunity.

    1. ….and yet the vast majority of voters showed that they wanted this by how they voted last election.

      1. 392971+ up ticks,

        Morning J JH,

        Many have been in collusion since the political demise of Mrs Thatcher,supporting / voting in
        total disregard of consequence.

      3. 40% of the electorate did not vote at the last election. More than those who voted for the party that won by a landslide. What was it they wanted?

    2. It's all part of the dismantling of identity and forcing people what to think. It's is nothing but using force to apply the sate line.

      In a democracy this wouldn't be possible. The majority would reject this nonsense. Yet we have the BMA – a union, not a medical association – fighting the Cass report. Why? Because if people have a rooted identity then you cannot disrupt it. If you are something, you can be that thing. If the state can take that from you, it is one less anchor to reality.

      “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”

  24. ….and yet the vast majority of voters showed that they wanted this by how they voted last election.

    2. As with all kings, the last thing he wishes is to bite off the hand that feeds him royally. He has a vested interest in the prosperity of the nation, and that it remains prosperous for his descendants.

    3. Anyone who believes the Guardian is a fool. The fact is we get far more from the Crown Estates worth £15.6 Billion and which are the monarchs private property given to the state, temporarily, at each accession of a new monarch and which the monarch doesn't have to fork over if he/she so wished. than we give to the monarchy for all it does. That money is not an income per se it is money for fixing buildings, state occasions and all other obligations incumbent on the ruling monarch. You might recall a ceremony that was televised where the king signed a document in the presence of all his ministers. That was him signing over the crown estate's in exchange for the royal grant, a deal made centuries ago between government and the Crown.

      1. The Crown Estate Commissioners administer the Crown Estates. The CEC are effectively an Agency of government.

        This dates back to Charles II from memory when the income from Crown lands (all land is Crown land such that if you die intestate your land reverts to the Crown) was exchanged for the Civil List.

    4. Anyone who believes the Guardian is a fool. The fact is we get far more from the Crown Estates worth £15.6 Billion and which are the monarchs private property given to the state, temporarily, at each accession of a new monarch and which the monarch doesn't have to fork over if he/she so wished. than we give to the monarchy for all it does. That money is not an income per se it is money for fixing buildings, state occasions and all other obligations incumbent on the ruling monarch. You might recall a ceremony that was televised where the king signed a document in the presence of all his ministers. That was him signing over the crown estate's in exchange for the royal grant, a deal made centuries ago between government and the Crown.

      1. 392971+ up ticks,

        Afternoon DB,
        Up until the Queen died I was a royalist, they stayed within the nation during the 1940s dark hours.
        Princess ANNE would be the perfect active figurehead.

        Charlie has, I believe, his heart in the right place but he is suffering from a WEF / NWO addled brain.

        1. Charlie has a burning desire to assist cruelly oppressed people everywhere. He was once told off by Prince Philip for sucking his thumb, even at the dinner table, and he has never forgotten the embarrassment and humiliation even to this day.

          1. 392971 + up ticks,

            Evening Ped

            A thumb sucker for king a multitude of treacherous feather pluckers as ruling overseers, and a consenting feeble minded electorate, whom 48% against 52% chose to be eu lapdogs.

            Have we any chance to rectify things, I STILL BELIEVE SO.

  26. The awful truth: Hamas’s hostage-taking works
    One does not have to be a fan of Mr Netanyahu to see how unfair it is to stigmatise him as the obstacle to peace in Gaza
    Charles Moore : https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/03/awful-truth-hamas-hostage-taking-works/

    Much of the MSM is in the pockets of Hamas who will probably get want it wants by continuing to practise terrorism and murder.

    In recent months I have feared that Charles Moore has gone sadly off the boil but his take on Islamic terrorism is still sound – he points out that Hamas always demands far more than it will every give:

    "In 2011, a single Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, was released by Hamas. In return, Mr Netanyahu (then, as now, prime minister) released 1,027 Palestinian prisoners, including the murderer Yahya Sinwar. Today, Sinwar is the leader of Hamas. Far from breaking the cycle of violence, hostage deals tend to perpetuate a cycle in which violence pays."

      1. Yes we know – but we need to be reminded lest we forget.

        But how will the Left ever be persuaded that surrender to terrorism will always make things worse?

    2. It is the old dilemma – is it better to sacrifice a few hostages in order to nip in the bud a lucrative industry in hostage taking? This horrible decision has to be taken with every kidnapping, regardless of the identity groups of the villains and the marks involved.

      If I recall, the SAS has special training in this, to minimise the risk to hostages whilst dealing with their captors and setting a deterrent to future crime. What astonishes me is that a force as militarily excellent as the IDF has to resort to mass bombardment of cities to winkle out a few hundred criminals, unless site clearance was their true objective.

      1. So be it. Palestine should be levelled. Force is all the muslim understands. If you carry a bigger stick and use it regularly they learn to behave. Odd, this approach doesn't work with any animal, but it does with savages. Is it because they're fanatics rather than rational creatures?

        1. Considering what they have had to put up with from their enemy, some Palestinians and their allies may well argue too that Israel should be levelled from the river to the sea. Sauce for the goose…

          A 'Might is Right' attitude towards bigger sticks worked for a while with the Thousand Year Reich, but in the end, its enemy found an even bigger stick, which ended with the realisation that humanity had developed a stick big enough to devastate all habitable land on the planet. What then?

          Fanatics can come from anywhere, and the moment one favours one tribe of fanatics over another, there is bound to be trouble.

    3. Good morning Rastus 🙂 following are just my thoughts, I know there are many many others who disagree with me. The Israel/Gaza conflict will end when the Lobby stop funding Israel (this is key and unlikely at present), following which Netanyahu defenstrated and standing trial there being a number of pending actions against him. A deal will be done between America and Iran, (who are by far the biggest players in the region, Iran reigning in Hamas/Hezbollah) and to hopefully stop nuclear proliferation. Similarly in Ukraine, that will end when Trump is re-elected and he does a deal with Russia incorporating the four oblasts, and American companies finally get the rebuilding contracts they've been seeking. I'll get me coat….sorry, folks….

  29. Modern Grand Solar Minimum will lead to terrestrial cooling
    Valentina Zharkova . . .

    "This discovery of double dynamo action in the Sun brought us a timely warning about the upcoming grand solar minimum 1, when solar magnetic field and its magnetic activity will be reduced by 70%. This period has started in the Sun in 2020 and will last until 2053. During this modern grand minimum, one would expect to see a reduction of the average terrestrial temperature by up to 1.0°C, especially, during the periods of solar minima between the cycles 25–26 and 26–27, e.g. in the decade 2031–2043."

      1. Oh well. It will buy my duty free cologne.

        Edit. I forgot. No duty free available though i can get it cheaper in their shops.

          1. I later found out it was from the Boss. As people arrived i didn’t take much notice of their gifts as it was a bit hectic. Remiss of me i know.

  31. Not necessarily a bad thing for business though.

    There would be a market for skillful metal bashers to fix up old cars, so that they are good for another ten or twenty years, rather than buying new and inferior battery models and scrapping the old ones. Fuzz Townshend shows on TV how it's done.

    Once economies of scale kick in, and parts can be made and sold for a reasonable price and their fitting streamlines, restored cars should be as affordable as new ones.

    2. Maintaining and repairing vehicles only works while there are spares. The state will, no doubt make those harder to get.

      It's the loss of jobs that's the big problem. Not just in the factories, but the entire supply chain. Once broken, there is no coming back. The state simply doesn't care. Tens of thousands of jobs directly, and hundreds of thousands peripherally, entire communities destroyed, completely in an act of Left wing stupidity, spite and malice. The green hoax must be stopped now.

      1. There are a number of Yorkshiremen and Dutchmen in my own car club. As parts become unavailable, pattern parts are taken are replicated, sometimes even better than the original.

        For example the SLC chassis, made in Yorkshire, for the 2CV is regarded as superior to the Citroen original. I got an exhaust clamp and that little catch that holds the window open re-engineered in the Netherlands by Burton, the clamp being diecast, rather than bending tin, and the catch has a screw rather than the push-in rod, which makes it much easier to get on and off and also lasts longer.

    4. Just another step on the road to becoming Cuba then??
      The NHS is already a long way down that road

      1. If M. Pélicot suddenly finds his inner Mozzie, the trial will come to a juddering halt.
        Or is it only stupid British governments that pander to such nonsense?

  34. They don’t consider it a mistake though, all part of their agenda.
    The Conservative Party is much like the abusive husband, promises to change but never will.
    No matter who they elect the parliamentary party will still be stuffed with one nation wets and will carry on as before, high tax, big state, net zero, ideologically wedded to the EU and ECHR just as soon as they return to power.

  35. I just wait to get an email and then, if lucky, a week or so to find out what hits the account. That way, one can fantasise a lot longer about getting the big one before finding a mere £25 (or it may have gone up again to £50) has been credited.

  36. Morning all. Article from todays Telegraph. It actually makes me angry because it is the result of deliberate subversion of our history and the truth.

    Why fewer people are proud of Britain’s history
    ‘Nation is redefining itself,’ say experts as Britons become more culturally-aware and the wartime generation dies out

    Tim Sigsworth
    3 September 2024 • 7:15am

    Pride in Britain’s history has plummeted to a record low as the wartime generation dwindles, a major survey has found.

    Just 64 per cent of the public said they were “proud” or “very proud” of Britain’s history in the British Social Attitudes Survey 2023, down from 86 per cent in 2013 and the lowest proportion since the question was first asked in 1995.

    Alex Scholes, the senior researcher at the National Centre for Social Research (NatCen), which conducted the survey, said there was a connection between changing attitudes and the fact that there are fewer people alive today who lived through or fought in the Second World War.

    “It definitely has an impact,” Mr Scholes said. “History is possibly the standout area because that’s where we’ve seen the greatest drop over the past decade.

    “It was consistently over 80 per cent between 1995 and 2013 and now it’s 64 per cent and that’s quite a sizeable drop in the last decade.”

    Even the youngest people who can remember living through the Second World War are now in their mid to late 80s.

    Polling has consistently shown that those who fought in or lived through the war, and their children, are more patriotic than younger generations.

    A YouGov poll of 4,611 people in April found that 81 per cent of those aged 65 or above were “very” or “fairly” patriotic, compared to just 39 per cent of 18 to 24-year-olds and 45 per cent of those aged between 25 and 49.

    Prof Robert Tombs, professor emeritus of French history at the University of Cambridge, said increasingly prominent criticism of slavery and the British Empire has also contributed to the decline in pride in our history.

    “I expect that not only the passing of the generation who lived through the war, but also of those who knew people who lived through the war is significant,” Prof Tombs said.

    “But the generally negative portrayal of British history in the media, fiction, TV, films and schools must surely have had an effect. This is true across the Anglophone world.”

    The past decade has seen growing scrutiny of Britain’s imperial past, the emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement and intense pressure on museums and galleries to repatriate artefacts to their countries of origin.

    Activists have also demanded the “decolonisation” of the country’s history and called for reparations to atone for the past.

    The pressure for changes has contributed to “culture wars” that have centred on universities, such as Rhodes Must Fall at the University of Oxford (regarding imperialist Cecil Rhodes), and statues, including that of Winston Churchill outside the House of Commons and slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol.

    Prof Lawrence Goldman, of St Peter’s College, Oxford, said: “Too much history teaching seems to start now from an assumption that the empire was inevitably malign.

    “I would suggest that it’s not just about the distance now between events in 1914 and 1939, and the death of all the combatants, though of course these are factors.

    “We are failing to explain why those wars had to be fought, what sacrifices they entailed and how everyone across the world, of all races and backgrounds, ultimately benefited from the defeat of militarism and dictatorship.

    “We have lost that sense of what was at stake, with a consequent decline of pride in the sacrifices endured.”

    The survey of around 1,600 people also revealed that national pride in Britain’s democracy and economic achievements has decreased since the turn of the millenium.

    In 2003, 62 per cent said they had pride in “the way democracy works” and the same proportion said they were proud or very proud of “Britain’s economic achievements”.

    But those figures now stand at 53 and 44 per cent respectively.

    Conversely, levels of pride in Britain’s sporting and cultural achievements have increased over the same period, rising from 63 and 67 per cent in 2003 to 77 and 79 per cent in 2023.

    Elsewhere, the proportion of the public who think it is important that someone describing themselves as “truly British” was born in Britain has fallen from 74 per cent in 2013 to 55 per cent in 2023.

    The proportion who believe it is important to have British ancestry has also dropped to 39 per cent from 51 per cent a decade ago.

    Gillian Prior, deputy chief executive of NatCen, said the survey shows Britain is a “nation redefining itself”.

    “These research findings show that while we are less likely to take pride in British history and more critical about its politics, there is still a great deal of national pride in the country’s cultural and sporting achievements,” she said.

    “This change in attitudes may have been influenced by the increased diversity and shared citizenship within Britain, presenting a portrait of a nation redefining itself.”

    1. Americans define "baby boomers" as those born between the end of the war and the 1960s. In Britain, there was a dip in the birthrate in the mid-1950s, when I was born, so here there are two baby boomer generations, who are quite different to one another. One grew up with the Beatles, flower power, free love and self-sufficiency, and the other with Thatcher, punk, yuppies, the dismemberment of British industrial heartlands and the casinofication of money.

      The professor may be well qualified enough to be used by the BBC to push their political agenda, but he falls into the fallacy of making generalisations based on American political thinking. Why must Black Lives Matter be the defining factor in modern British culture?

      When I had an argument with a supporter of Norman Tebbit in the 1980s about the evils of the 1960s, he saw it as the time when permissiveness and socialism ruined the nation, whereas I grew up with its liberalism being a breath of fresh air after the unthinking stifling conformity of "the done thing", and my biggest gripe against the 1960s was that everything from beloved city landmarks to personal relationships became disposable -, a throwaway culture that worshipped the consumer god of waste and that nothing in the future mattered, since everything was destined to be thrown away.

      1. The baby boomers were conceived – as I was – in 1945.

        We are the result of the celebration that the war was over.

        (This year I am calling myself and Nottlers of my age Shellacs because we are now 78 and the old gramophone records made of shellac rotated at 78 rpm)

      2. By today's reasoning he was extreme right.

        I am not sure that his experience as a policeman In Burma led him to the right conclusions about colonialism as far as Africa was concerned.

        I think I have read all his published novels and I have them on my library bookshelves along with a couple of collections of his essays. When I was in my late teens and early 20s once I found an author whom I found interesting I tried to read everything he or she had written and I am delighted that both my sons and my wife have done the same thing.

    3. One wonders why our parents and grandparents and their ancestors bothered.

      It is a great pity that everything created by the British could not just disappear overnight.
      It might be a wake up call to end all wake up calls to the world.

    4. When they are fed a continuous diet of how awful it is to be English, it's no wonder people are ashamed of their history. Nobody ever highlights the achievements, not even that we abolished slavery and policed it at great cost.

    3. Your selflessness must be costing you a fortune in travel , van repairs, time and mental energy .

      Good luck and take care of yourself.

      I hope the chap isn't violent and I hope he respects you .

  38. Nearly finished the Freddie Flintstone creekit progammes. I hadn't realised that the exercise had been going on (in dribs and drabs) for THREE years. I found it quite extraordinary that these lads were unable to keep to FF's request that they were up and at breakfast at 8 am. Also depressing that they all knew their "syndromes", "spectrums", alphabet names of heir "illnesses". What did we call youngsters in the 1940s/50s who had what is now called "autism" (or similar)?

    2. We didn’t see the youngsters who had autism as it was originally described ie a very severe condition, because they were taken to the equivalent of asylums. It was only when it became law that all are educable that the Health Service (by then the NHS which had appropriated the charitable institutions where they had lived) dropped them into the lap of local education authorities and their families that we started to see them, just as we started to see children with Down syndrome. Then the NHS dropped the adults they became into the lap of social services for ‘inclusive care in the community’ and we started to see them wandering the streets. No funds were transferred of course during this shift of responsibilities.
      For the less severely affected group – where to begin? They either managed to adjust and became rather unhappy but functioning adults or they perished (some by their own hand). The ready availability of repetitive jobs that didn’t call for great social interaction may have helped produce some reasonable outcomes.
      As for those whose ‘neurodiversity’ is purely performative – before the internet fed them that schtick, they either sought attention in whatever way was fashionable at the time or they were just forced by circumstance to get a job and grow up.

    4. I don't know if right or wrong, Bill but various commentators online incl RFKJr think it's partly the processed/ultra-processed diets introduced a few decades ago into children's diets. If so, it would surely tie in with libbers, more women in the workplace, less time to cook meals. More research required. (Note: RFKJr also an anti-vaxxer, related to autism etc).

    5. There be benefits in a good 'statement'. And of course the individual will need a carer, generating another benefit. What's not to like. There are many genuine cases, but…

  39. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7a3dd0aba60acb6a3fae9381b89b39e601581e595f633fdbf97af88f1128900f.png
    I would have thought that blue was to the right and red to the left so this must be an American Bell Curve!

    On this I am in the red right sector – would any Nottlers place themselves in the left or centre sections?

    (This reminds me that on the other side of the Atlantic the buoyage system is different – in European waters a red buoy or light should be left to the port or left side when going into harbour; on the other side of the pond it is the other way round – the mnemonic is Red Right Returning – i.e. leave the red light or buoy to starboard. This could have put me onto the rocks in the Caribbean!)

    1. On the political compass site I always come out as a free market libertarian. I tried answering contrary but I simply can't do it.

      I think the bigger problem is that hard Left nutters think they're in the centre. When you hear their attitudes and ideology, how they talk about things you ask them what boot size they'd like to start goose stepping.

  40. Good morning all ,

    Damp humid air 17c.

    Very strange thing has happened in the garden , lots of fine not lumps , piles of earth dotted ALL over the garden , front and back garden .. Investigated and no they are not mole hills starting off , because the earth is almost like finely sifted stuff.

    We think they are ant hills … We had swarms of flying ants in July, but this seems to be rather late in the year for swarming .

    1. Morning Belle. August 4 1914. Britain declares war on Germany. It must be something to do with the weather.

      1. It's to do with the farming cycle.
        Under an agrarian system, you start wars when the harvest is in and there is food and men to spare.

  44. Good Moaning.
    And, although grey and wet, it is a good moaning.
    Nice working temperature, bulbs being watered in and ground being softened the next planting session.

      1. Mixture.
        Some in pots and some between plants or where plants have died off.
        It helps that tulips need to go deeper than daffodils, so the same area can be used for both and you then have a longer lasting patch of spring colour.

        3. Agree Anne, they do ,beautiful plants always in excellent condition when they arrive. A little more expensive but well worth it.

    1. That's why I asked yesterday if there is a way other than a general election of removing them. I'm sure you and I are not the only one that would like an answer to that

        1. I'd prefer Cromwell. Or just the Kentish marches. They've simply got to be stopped. There is no alternative but to cut spending. I refuse to pay more money to see council waster salaries increase.

          1. You would prefer Cromwell! It strikes me that the humorless Herr Starmerfuhrer is the reincarnation of that misfortune. He'll be banning Christmas by the time he has finished.

          2. TBF: Cromwell himself was not as grim as he is painted.
            He did actually understand the country rather better than the Stuarts. He was also aware of the great changes and opportunities to break away from an exhausted mediaeval system that was taking place throughout Europe.
            During the 1650s, France underwent The Fronde, a revolt against an arrogant ruling class. Ironically, it was the cause of an even bloodier revolution some 130 years later.
            The young Louis XIV was so frightened by the uprising, that he instituted the stifling royal dictatorship that eventually burst like a boil. He kept his nobility trapped at court scrapping over piffling jobs (handing the king his right stocking, arranging the pillows on his bed etc …) that they lost contact with their lands and their people and became shallow functionaries.
            Louis' successors continued the practice with the results we all know.

          4. But he did get rid of parliament with a speech still apt.

            Starmer isn't a patch on Cromwell. He is the corruption, nepotism and deceit of the political class, the malice, spite and desperate double standards.

          5. From Coffee House, the Spectator

            A tribute to the glorious heyday of smoking
            Comments Share 3 September 2024, 6:00am
            When the revolting news broke that Keir Starmer – whingeing lovechild of Oliver Cromwell and Captain Mainwaring – could be about to ban smoking in parks, public restaurants and beer gardens, I couldn’t help but think elegiacally of my own lifelong love/hate-affair with the pernicious weed, and to nicotine glories past.

            I was 13 when I started smoking in earnest and had been impatient to develop the habit long before that. Back then everyone smoked, and they did it everywhere too – on buses, in trains, on the underground and at the cinema. We were a tobacco culture: chat show guests would puff away languidly, the former prime minister Harold Wilson had just stopped rebuffing Robin Day’s questions by firing up his pipe and some houses had tabletop lighters and cut-glass ashtrays to sanctify the habit for their guests.

            Back then, society was neatly divided into smokers and non-smokers
            Children would be sold candy-cigarettes in facsimiles of the adult packet – ‘Just like Dad’ said one advert – and most of us couldn’t wait to convert those sugary sticks into the real thing. Smoking was a rite of passage, a marker of maturity, with different cigarette-brands and their packet designs taking the place, as you hit your teen years, of childhood gobstoppers and Aero bars.

            The summer I started smoking I’d just left prep school, and the heady sense of freedom (we’d just bought our first video player too) was maximised by this new, joyful habit. We had a lodger at the time who worked on an American airbase and could get a carton of 200 Marlboro for exactly £3, the kind of sum you could (mea culpa) secretly ‘borrow’ from your parents without dropping yourself in it. I taught myself doggedly to enjoy tobacco and, by the time I did, it was too late to stop.

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            Not that I much wanted to. I loved everything about smoking and felt as though I’d discovered a vocation. There were the cigarette packets, all of them faintly iconic: the deep purple of the Silk Cut square (what a smoke for all seasons Silk Cut was!), the lavish gold (just the right side of vulgar) of Benson and Hedges, the baronial flat packet of Dunhill (favoured by gangsters, apparently, as it didn’t ruin the line of their suit). There were the three red K-shapes of the Marlboro packet, with the urban myth that they referenced the Ku Klux Klan.

            All the smoking paraphernalia was part of the fun too. Those spinning ashtrays that centrifugally flung the cigarette butt into an odorous hell beneath, or special cigarette dispensers (I remember a wooden donkey, bought from an Ipswich junk shop, which, at a lift of its tail, casually shat a Gauloise for you). Hotels and bars had matchbooks to filch, or – if you were flash – nestling in your pocket was a Zippo Lighter (edgy and American) or an effortlessly elegant Dunhill Rollagas, purchased in St. James’s with your Christmas money.

            Back then, society was neatly divided into smokers and non-smokers, and it appeared (in adolescence and beyond) to be a way of classifying people and quickly knowing something about them (I suppose, in these post-tobacco days, woke and non-woke has replaced it).

            To be a young person and not to smoke seemed to be missing out. All the idols you’d inherited – Lou Reed, Bob Dylan, even Jean Paul Belmondo – would have been diminished without a cigarette in their hands or gob, and you wanted to emulate them. There was the flirtatious move of lighting a cigarette for someone, of sparking up one cigarette from another, of learning to blow smoke-rings.

            Our breath, our clothes, our hair smelt, but we were tolerant enough with each other not to care. People who wouldn’t let you smoke in their houses seemed odd and finicky, and those who came out with things such as ‘Kissing a smoker is like licking an ashtray’ seemed sa-a-ad. Richard Burton spoke of ‘that killing cigarette between my lips, how I love its round cool comfort’. Dennis Potter, who smoked till the day of his death, called it ‘this lovely tube of delight’.

            Of course, all this had a hangover. In many ways, anyone born after 1970 was lucky – their habit has waned and grown threatening at the exact moment those exquisite packets have vanished to be replaced by dull cardboard and a picture of rotting lungs. This of course hasn’t put many off but has at least taken the Mayfair sheen off the practice. Reports in these pages that anyone who smokes past the age of 35 is doing serious damage to themselves ring horribly true (I myself had to give up tobacco completely this year following complications, putting the kibosh on my beloved new pipesmoking habit, and should surely have done it earlier).

            I’ve often questioned my smoking over the years – why was the one cigarette or pipe out of twenty that actually hit the spot enough to keep me hooked? Was smoking simply the softest possible way of beating myself up for imagined misdemeanours and subtly contributing to my own non-survival? Did I just enjoy addiction, that sense, 20 or 30 times a day, of coming home? Not even copious tobacco has helped me arrive at answers to these questions. The fact remains though that it’s almost impossible to imagine my teens without a fag in my hand and the pleasant feeling I was doing something naughty that had to be kept from the grown-ups.

            This feeling, of course, has made a comeback. That the 2007 smoking ban was grudgingly accepted is perhaps because we smokers, in our teen years, had been schooled in what it meant from the start. We were all now, once again, puffing away behind the bike sheds, forced into the open air to congregate with our own kind, away from the walls which had ears.

            Though smoking – in TV series and movies at least – had moved away from the realms of cool to become a signifier of human vulnerability, there was still a sense, in those huddles outside pubs or workplaces, of belonging. Portmanteau words like ‘smirting’ (smoking + flirting) sprang up, to describe what often went on outside a pub. Addicts, as they always do, found that no obstacle was enough to put them off.

            Starmer – who has the permanently hurt look of a schoolmaster after the choir have misbehaved on an outing – and his band of gurning non-smokers have declared war on the very remnants of this habit. This hints at something obsessive and vindictive in their nature and is a lousy augury for the next five years.

            The wide unpopularity our new PM has managed to secure himself in a matter of weeks (with his personal rating dropping 16 points) suggests that the British people, having wearied in the past few years of a government they despised, have instead opted for one they can actively hate. ‘Giving up smoking doesn’t make you live longer,’ went the old joke, ‘It just feels like it,’ and the same could surely be said of our new ‘changed Labour’ government.

            Chewing tobacco, anyone? Pinch of snuff? Nicorette throat spray? I fear we shall need all the stimulants we can legally lay our hands on, to make it through the fallout clouds to 2029.

    2. It should be made law that MP's cannot claim, on expenses, Council Tax Relief (CTR) on their home properties, when they are in their Second Homes in London, on which "they" should also personally pay the CTR.

        1. Maybe a number of them already are 'lets' to family, friends etc, wibbling. I have a friend moved out of London because of the freebies he felt obliged to offer.

      2. There should be a Government owned tower block in London that is simply divided up into 650 small flats. Maybe two bedroom but no larger.
        Each constituency is allocated a flat, and that is where the MP spends his or her time when they are on Parliamentary business. No allowances for second homes and all the additional bungs and scams that go with them.

        2. The tower should also have the same cladding that every other tower dweller has to put up with on their unsellable flats.

        5. And there could be xxxxxxxxxin the basement walls so, when we've had xxxxxx of the xxxxxxxx, they can all be xxxxx xx xxxxxxx.

        6. I've been suggesting 650 flats in Dolphin Square designated for all MPs for some time. If there are not as many as 650 flats available – simple: just reduce the number of MPs.

          For sheer grubbiness over housing expenses there was nothing grubbier that Ed and Yvette Balls.

          They both still think they are les testicules du chien

          2. Dolphin Square would suit MP's very well. It has a reputation for prostitute and paedophile parties.

      3. Don't they also get heating allowances? Over three thousand, I read. That has to be scrapped. Imagine, MiliMarx enforcing us to pay huge bills to fund his eco-insanity, whilst he gets his bills paid for.

  46. She must believe the majority of those households are socialists. Wonder if she's had research done to prove it…hmm..

  48. Not a subject to be amused by.
    Headline:

    Elle Macpherson, 60, reveals secret breast cancer battle and why she refused to have chemotherapy despite being advised by 32 doctors

    However, who wrote this blurb without thinking?

    Elle Macpherson has revealed her secret cancer struggle seven years after being diagnosed and why she refused to undergo chemotherapy. The Australian supermodel, 60, dedicated a chapter of her recently released titular memoir to her holistic approach during the the shocking illness. She said she went against the advice of 32 doctors and experts to treat her breast cancer without the usual medical methods, reported Women's Weekly on Monday.

  49. Not bad:
    Wordle 1,172 4/6

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

    1. I'll join you, Ped

      Wordle 1,172 4/6

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

  50. Precisely why Major and Blair effectively disarmed the GBP.
    Now only agents of the state and criminals have access to firearms.

  51. 'morning All
    Bloody grim out there so some on the lighter side
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a1b9ed76fe1f03b1c138b4541b42f4618a9902554e1a5061b3aaddbb875739ee.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8cb83635d79fb7bb22244f80859686e06f0cd75b2201e48449a0ad7ad256e600.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c51c80eb32e10a85930f02afe884cd400d34c2e5f8f8828ae75069143a78815e.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/fe603cee6f9c5d520a1f5d15e9b09c181a9d748c12466b57dc98f7eb8e192f3a.png
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/bfe072a39ace218bc73d13a37c2e39e0ce2dc21fa37497a603676746ed396efb.jpg
    Still want one!!
    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f30d1dc263e53b9c04f1a54dd50cac5be0c2136246620c36e12e1549a1aaa181.jpg

    1. That last one, with a swamp dragon [?], must be Her Grace, The Duchess of Ankh, Lady Sybil Deidre Olgivanna Vimes (née Ramkin)??

        1. But capable of at least Mach 2 with a biologically modified digestive system.
          That has GOT to be one of Terry Pratchett's funniest episodes!

  53. From a seaside village in Valencia,

    Rainfall Warning State Meteorological Agency 24°C
    Tuesday 11:36 Light thunderstorms and rain
    Torrential rain coming down.

  56. We are aware HM Govt can't really tell us what exactly a woman is.. so let's give em a go on Islamophobia, after all its gonna be a bit of key legislation and we could easily end up in jail… Over to you Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom the Rt Honourable Ginger Gobble Queen..

    "Well, umm a new definition must be given after careful consideration so that it comprehensively & comprehensibly reflects multiple perspectives and considers potential implications for different communities. So we're actively considering our approach with Islamophobia including definitions and will provide regular updates in due course."

    a lot of wordies to say.. "dunno".

    2. After consulting key elders..

      Allah cannot be captured in an image by human hand nor criticised by mere human minds, such is his beauty and grandeur. To attempt such a thing is seen as an insult to Allah. The same is believed to apply to Muhammad. And certainly will not be tolerated under the regime of the grand Leftie & Muslim Alliance.

    3. I love the use of 'comprehensively & comprehensibly' (long words) make it sound, well, an intelligent response…. and doing anything but.

      1. Just in Democrats have decided to replace Harris with the more coherent Joe Biden.
        So back up to 81 million votes?

  57. We are aware HM Govt can't really tell us what exactly a woman is.. so let's give em a go on Islamophobia, after all its gonna be a bit of key legislation and we could easily end up in jail… Over to you Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom the Rt Honourable Ginger Gobble Queen..

    "Well, umm a new definition must be given after careful consideration so that it comprehensively & comprehensibly reflects multiple perspectives and considers potential implications for different communities. So we're actively considering our approach with Islamophobia including definitions and will provide regular updates in due course."

    a lot of wordies to say.. "dunno".

  58. Just posted on Free Speech is a well research and shocking story of how the NHS responded to his FOI request by poster Graham Wood. Please, read and leave a comment.

    freespeechbacklash dot com.

    2. Yesterday, the DM had a story about Christmas tat being on sale already.

      I doubt that christmas cards and wrapping paper are hot sellers at the moment but there again what do I know!

      1. We used to send about 150 Christmas cards each year but the unreliability and cost of both La Poste the UK postage system means that we now send email cards.

      2. We used to send about 150 Christmas cards each year but the unreliability and cost of both La Poste the UK postage system means that we now send email cards.

  61. Yes, rather depressingly I can imagine they get together to claim each other's rent on expenses to pay their own mortgages.

    1. Always follow the money, wibbling….sometimes I dream about politicians such as Thatcher, Fielding, a few others……

      1. I don’t listen to the radio anymore Bill. I use to listen when Jimmy Young and El Tel use to be on there.

        1. Don't mention The Wogan is Bill's presence ! You'll give him conniptions.

          Ken Bruce is doing well on Greatest Hits Radio. He has stolen half the Radio 2 listeners !

          3. He met Pauli Walli aka Paul Walters, he was the producer of the Wogan Prog . I use to play a bit of golf with PW.
            I met El Tel and Ken Bruce at ‘the old Mid Herts’.

    2. The bbc is 'incredibly' problematic for me. And their wokeness, their anti-indigenous people agenda of these isles of ours.

      Edit: Every year, one of their ilk pops to exploit the Last Night to display and signal their virtue.

      1. From Coffee House, the Spectator

        Why is the BBC so positive about the Notting Hill Carnival?
        Comments Share 2 September 2024, 5:41pm
        The BBC’s coverage of the Notting Hill carnival has been almost relentlessly positive. But the rosy view of the festivities was finally shattered this weekend when the Metropolitan Police released a statement confirming the death of two people who were attacked at the event. The force said both killings were now being treated as murder investigations.

        Smiling photos of the victims – 32-year-old mother Cher Maximen and 41-year-old chef Mussie Imnetu, who was visiting London from Dubai – accompanied the reports, their carefree expressions underlining the senseless destruction of two lives.

        Why is the BBC so determined to give such favourable coverage to an event with a lamentable track record of violence and criminality?
        Pushing down feelings of horror and grief, I experienced momentary relief that the BBC was finally giving due prominence to such a serious story.

        But as I read the bleak details of the story I felt a growing sense of dismay that it had taken two murders for the BBC to steer away from its relentless propaganda for the carnival.

        Before the harrowing consequences of this year’s event became clear, the BBC News website published articles with headlines such as, ‘Global visitors join Notting Hill celebrations’, ‘Our Notting Hill love story’ and ‘Children’s joy at Notting Hill Carnival parade.’

        An article on the CBBC Newsround webpage told its young readers to expect ‘a loud, colourful and vibrant event’ with ‘plenty of dancing, singing and processions that take place through the streets’. There was no mention of crime.

        During the carnival itself, a special BBC News ‘Live Page’ was published online. The headline set the upbeat tone: ‘Fabulous costumes and a “feast for the senses” as thousands turn out for Notting Hill Carnival.’ One reporter, on the ground during day two of the carnival, gushed: ‘From what we found among the crowds, the celebrations are going off peacefully with an electric energy in the air.’

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        Yet a different picture emerged further down the page with a few paragraphs about a mother with her child who ‘narrowly avoided being killed after she was stabbed’. As it turned out, that line proved to be tragically mistaken.

        Cher Maximen was one of eight people who were stabbed during this year’s two-day jamboree. Her wounds proved fatal. In total, 349 arrests were made. Seventy-two people were detained for possession of an offensive weapon. One person was held for possession of a gun. More than 50 arrests were made for assaults on emergency workers. Thirteen people were detained on suspicion of carrying out sexual offences.

        Even before the costumed throngs hit the streets of west London, blood had been spilled. A 15-year-old boy, Rene Graham, was shot dead in July during a pre-carnival event in a west London park. His killer remains at large. Judging by a recent re-appeal for witnesses to come forward, a wall of silence appears to be hampering the police investigation.

        The violence is predictable and follows a steady pattern. Met data shows there were ten stabbings at the carnival in 2023, seven in 2022 (one fatal), 18 in 2019, seven in 2018 and 12 in 2017. Yet the street party goes on and the BBC coverage is stubbornly positive. Why is the BBC so determined to give such favourable coverage to an event with a lamentable track record of violence and criminality?

        As I have written here on previous occasions, the BBC tries its best to fulfil its mission to ‘provide duly accurate and impartial news’ but the editorial Overton window has moved significantly in recent years. There isn’t a ‘progressive’ value the BBC doesn’t seek to promote these days and identity politics has engulfed the Corporation.

        The BBC’s intentions are good: a fear of feeding the bigoted prejudices of the knuckle-dragging, lager-fuelled white-power mob. But we know what the road to Hell is paved with. I believe the BBC is actually letting BAME communities down by turning a blind eye to some of the major problems blighting their neighbourhoods.

        It is young people from BAME backgrounds who are predominantly victims and villains in this horror show. A 2022 report on the London Assembly website opened with this stark assessment: ‘Despite making up only 13 per cent of London’s total population, black Londoners account for 45 per cent of London’s knife murder victims, 61 per cent of knife murder perpetrators and 53 per cent of knife crime perpetrators.’

        Twenty-one teenagers were killed in London last year – 18 were stabbed, two were shot and one was killed after his moped was hit by a car. Vulnerable children, some already suffering trauma due to challenging family environments or experiences in their countries of origin, are being killed, injured or incarcerated on a disturbing scale.

        The result of this is ruined lives: dead kids and young gang members locked up for decades, their misplaced dreams of notoriety slowly fading as they are forgotten by their peers and swallowed up by our squalid and failing prison system.

        I recall during the pandemic that some of my virtue-signalling BBC colleagues would justify promoting daft and draconian measures designed to ‘stop the spread’ by shrugging and saying, ‘If it saves just one life it is surely worth it.’ Setting aside the intellectual bankruptcy of this myopic viewpoint, it is telling that this yardstick is not being applied to coverage of crime.

        If it was, the BBC would be giving more prominence to voices calling for the Notting Hill Carnival to be cancelled, or at least put on hiatus, and the eye-watering sums it costs to police the event channelled instead towards taking back control of London’s streets and protecting the communities terrorised by crime.

          1. Unless all or most of the stabbers come from the area, then probably "yes" the number of stabbings would be less.

        2. "It is young people from BAME backgrounds who are predominantly victims and villains in this horror show."
          No, it is the Taxpayer who will now be shaken down for the cost of the Police investigation, the trials and, if the accused are found guilty, the expense of keeping them alive behind bars etc.

          1. The taxpayer will certainly be the victim. The perpetrators, on the other hand, the villains, will not normally come from that class.

        3. 'The BBC’s intentions are good' No they are not. They endorse murder on an industrial scale. How can such a brutal fact have 'good' roots?

      4. Renamed the Black Broadcasting Corp!

        Moh and I feel so depressed .

        Did you watch University Challenge last night.. there was a neutral looking individual who only answered one question , kept tossing its hair and pursing its lips.

        Only Connect is no better , every time we turn the TV on there is an Islington leftie weirdo agenda .

        My poor stomach churns , all the broadcasting channels are appalling .

        Am I getting old?

        1. Don't judge yourself by TV standards. And certainly don't judge yourself by woke scum and their pretensions for modernity. Most young do not agree with them. Wokists just make out that most agree with them. Most live in Brighton, Oxford or London. Hardly representative. Those elsewhere only centre around academia.

      5. The real sickener is that we have to pay the TV licence if we watch anything on terrestrial TV, not just the blasted BBC…very happy to know it's going to pay people like Hew….not…

        2. I gave up my licence at the end of July. I haven't missed it. I can watch ITV X catch up if I want to, but I gave up even that after a while. I have given away my TV and freed up space. I do have some DVD box sets I can watch on the computer should I feel the need.

          1. There’d be trouble ahead if I gave ours away. Want to name your favourite box set? (I know it’s not Malcolm in the Middle…)

          4. I'd happily live without the telly – but OH does like to watch the sports. We do occasionally watch other things like wildlife programmes but can do that on recordings.

    3. The bbc is 'incredibly' problematic for me. And their wokeness, their anti-indigenous people agenda of these isles of ours.

      Edit: Every year, one of their ilk pops to exploit the Last Night to display and signal their virtue.

    4. Anyone know how you contact this person. I would like to know how many Brownie points on the Woke Scale she earns with this remark. Better job in a better pay category?

      2. She shouldn't be too hard to find given her job title but you will only get grief if you contact her.

  63. Why is this savage even in this country?

    Jihadi knifeman who went on rampage in Marks & Spencer and stabbed defenceless worker in the neck because he believed the retailer 'funded Israeli persecution' of Palestine' is given indefinite hospital order.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13805761/Jihadi-knifeman-went-rampage-Marks-Spencer-stabbed-defenceless-worker-neck-believed-retailer-funded-Israeli-persecution-Palestine-given-indefinite-hospital-order.html

    This is what you get when you make excuses and appease groups that support terrorism.

    3. Hospital? A life sentence for attempted murder !
      Thus the continuous anti white anti British attacks. Our government's have been particularly stupid recently.

    1. Figures for the last 7 days for irregular migrants attempting to cross the English Channel in small boats without permission to enter the UK.
      Mustn't call them illegal immigrants – that is hate speech. You vill go to jail you far-right bigot, you!

        1. The boat people are the most conspicuous but also the smallest problem. The main problem is the number of legal immigrants under ECHR, approx 90% of the figures, and the ones we can do more about if only we would leave the ECHR but it was embedded in the NIA thanks to Sunak and Von der Lyon. So we are between a rock and a hard place, 'mum. I really doubt it will ever be sorted. Australia looking pretty good….

          1. Australia seems to be in a similar position to ourselves. I realise that the dinghy people mask the reality of the situation. Are we really going to allow ourselves to be annihilated as a people? There is no way back from that. I know that traditionally we are so laid back that we leave things until the 59th minute of the eleventh hour but I am getting a tad nervous!

          2. I think they sorted the Vietnamese boat people out by processing offshore ‘mum? I have relatives out there, will check their views on the legal ones (I think they may be in the Care Sector, similarly to UK likely to fall over without migrants).

      2. Under English Common Law (does anyone under 60 remember that?), everything is legal until someone stops you. It is a presumption of freedom, and beholden on those who do not like it to stop the criminals or find a man that can.

        Picking them up and putting them up in hotels does not strike me as stopping them. Therefore they are legal.

        1. Erm I think that English Common Law is based on a premise that it is applied to people who are legally in this country. So, for example a German army during WWII would not qualify.

          1. I think it might. Germany occupied part of Britain during WW2, and there if we could not stop what the occupiers were doing, we had no effective jurisdiction over them.

    2. Figures for the last 7 days for irregular migrants attempting to cross the English Channel in small boats without permission to enter the UK.
      Mustn't call them illegal immigrants – that is hate speech. You vill go to jail you far-right bigot, you!

  66. The Taliban has silenced Afghanistan’s women – and the world watched it happen
    The nation’s ultra-conservative rulers have been showing us who they are since the mid-Nineties and somehow we still don’t quite believe it
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/03/afghanistan-women-silenced-by-taliban/

    BTL

    And meanwhile Labour government are worrying their little heads about how best to make a definition of Islamophobia which would make reporting this sort of story a hate crime!

    1. They can conjure up what ever they like, nobody with an ounce of common sense will be listening.

    2. The Taliban has silenced Afghanistan’s women …….

      Another very apposite BTL under this article:

      If you care about these issues in Afghanistan, you're a freedom fighter. If you care about these issues domestically, you're a racist. Strange how the leftist mind works.

      More of Two Tier Kier's philosophy.

  67. Good day all,

    Grey skies overhead McPhee Towers. Wind North-West, 17 to 19℃. Late here today because I went out into the garden straight after breakfast to mow, cut, trim and gather up to beat the forecast rain which hasn't arrived.

    A rare admisssion of truth from the Met Office…..

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/cb2c86bb4600c2328bdba55fa3c0de0a244272350d15e172c1c3b549817b60eb.png
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/03/uk-coolest-summer-in-nearly-a-decade/

    …but with a caveat about the overall trend still being for warmer temperatures.

    Oh no it isn't. They continue to ignore the Modern Grand Solar Minimum .

    2. Every single hour our country back slides deeper into their dung filled mire.
      I hope Israel step it up now.

    3. Even Jess Phillips who is in the thick of it when elected couldn't bring herself to say it was muslim male mysogyny even after canvassers were threatened by muslim men.

    1. I used to quite admire Andrew Neil – until he raged against the "anti-vaxxers". Now, I ignore him.

        1. I posted this a while ago.

          "You cannot hope to bribe or twist
          Thank God! the British journalist,
          But seeing what the man will do
          Unbribed, there's no occasion to".

      5. And me until I saw him crying on GBN when a studio lamp fell over. Cue Farage with a more even temper and steely resolve.

    4. Jean-Luc Melenchon is a has been and lost his position with his manoeuvrings in the French elections.

      The actual threat to the EU is a failing German economy now that its sources of cheap Russian gas have been cut off. Without a thriving German economy the entire EU House of Cards comes crashing down and not a moment too soon.

      The problem for Germany is that under Merkel its ability to make its own policy was given over to the unelected bureaucrats in Brussels so Germany is now trapped by its submission to the EU. Germans should exit the failing EU and unilaterally seek a raprochement with Putin to restore its energy supplies.

  74. Latest.
    Starmer has ordered no more Felix or Whiskas for Larry the Cat and his heating pad has been turned off. He either mouses or starves and sleeps by the boiler. The government can no longer afford him. His pension has also been withdrawn.

  75. Latest.
    Starmer has ordered no more Felix or Whiskas for Larry the Cat and his heating pad has been turned off. He either mouses or starves and sleeps by the boiler. The government can no longer afford him. His pension has also been withdrawn.

  76. Latest.
    Starmer has ordered no more Felix or Whiskas for Larry the Cat and his heating pad has been turned off. He either mouses or starves and sleeps by the boiler. The government can no longer afford him. His pension has also been withdrawn.

  77. What teed me off was his climate warming jag whilst flying around in his private plane. Man is an all round hypocrite.

      1. That is a gentle kind sentiment to declare ..

        Boats full of people who live far from the sea, who live in mountainous regions or desert lands , dry hot / cold or arid are gathering like ants or wildebeest or even a rush of sardines in an ocean current ..

        The draw is Europe , hang on , an island they have heard rumours about , of temperate climates and free handouts given by a Christian country and a large established Muslim population .

        Where do these illegals get their money from to pay for their sea travel.

          1. They allow their sons to be used in a similar fashion prior to puberty. Bacha Bazi.

            Is Bacha Bazi still happening?
            In 2022, after the Taliban's return to power following the United States' military disengagement from Afghanistan, it was reported that the abuse persisted in the reinstated Islamic Emirate, with Taliban officials broadly engaging in bacha bazi.

            They happily sell their children as sex slaves for favours.

            If anyone thinks it isn't happening here they are deluded.

          2. There are millions more on the way. My empathy is exhausted. I will save it for widows and pensioners i know who are about to suffer under this government.

        4. Money lenders quite often. Or borrow from those already in the UK. Or sell whatever they have. Why would they not come, it's our blasted government that doesn't have the will, desire, cojones to do what needs to be done. Leave the ECHR straightaway, no matter the NIA.

        7. Treasure Island, Maggie. No need to work, just pick up the jizya while they strive to make us submit.

      2. France is a safe country. No one forced them on those boats. They take their chances because here they get everything free and comments like yours make me sick.
        We are being over run and treated like second class citizens in our own country.

        1. Why wouldn't they take the chance? This is on us and our lousy government. Leave the ECHR, no benefits for 12 months minimum and then means tested. And the rest.

          1. The majority don't even bother making asylum claims in all the European countries they have passed through because they know we are a soft touch. Thanks to our Civil Service which happens to favour them.

          2. There you go, Phiz. We need a government of Crusties…first job kick out the CS/s whose jib we don’t like the cut of.

          4. There are so many things the PTB could have done but lacked the testicular strength to do them.

            But maybe it is not just weakness – maybe it is because the PTB actively want to destroy our country.

        2. Phil, this is a public forum.
          Those people who drowned or died of exposure in the English Channel were alive and well yesterday, and they all would have had families and friends back in their sh*th ole countries of origin. I do not and will not blame them for seeking a prosperous life, albeit mainly at our expense.
          Meanwhile LibLabCon politicians in the UK are more malevolent than gang of Remainer non ces.

          1. They were alive and well in FRANCE. They are seeking a life of ease to which they will not contribute and for which they will show no gratitude. Time it was put a stop to. Stop the boats, stop the drownings.

        3. Phil, this is a public forum.
          Those people who drowned or died of exposure in the English Channel were alive and well yesterday, and they all would have had families and friends back in their sh*th ole countries of origin. I do not and will not blame them for seeking a prosperous life, albeit mainly at our expense.
          Meanwhile LibLabCon politicians in the UK are more malevolent than gang of Remainer non ces.

      4. They could have stayed safe in France. Pardon me if I shed no tears over self-inflicted disaster.

    3. There's a joke on FB with a picture of an over filled boat and Chief Brody
      Saying. "You're gonna need a bigger shark!"

      1. That fact is irrelevant to the stasi. They want another tax. The intent is simply to stop people driving entirely.

    2. Righty. get the train. Junior's school is 5 miles away. We all pile in the motor (3 dogs, me and him) and we shuttle up the motorway. He piles out. I then go off to work.

      The train station is 8 miles away. It doens't go anywhere near Junior's school. The suggestion that we get a bus, then the train instead of a short car journey is moronic. It's the sort of idiocy that comes out of the minds of a child sat in an office in Whitehall.

      2. These policies are advocated by people who live in London. They have a regular bus service (miss one and there'll be another along in a few minutes), a regular tube service (ditto), a regular train service (same applies) and plentiful taxis. They have no idea about living somewhere where if the bus gets you where you need to go, it almost certainly won't get you back again. Not that it will always go where you want, when you want and a 10 mile journey can take you a couple of hours. If you miss a train, there could well not be one until the following day. No tubes and taxis are often fully booked (owing to the previous transport difficulties). They should be dropped in the middle of nowhere where their phones won't work – oh yes, we have lots of "not spots", too. That might concentrate their minds.

      1. We have, the Royal Marines.
        But nobody has the guts to clear them out of their cosy bolt hole.

        2. They shouldn’t be allowed to stay in govt for five years, once they have shown that their course is ruinous to the country.

      4. Has the person who is compiling a list of Starmer's lies and writing them down already run out of paper and does he need a new pen?

    2. Idiotic. Doubt any government can dictate to private companies what they should charge, or not. Perhaps in the case of illegal activities…oh wait..what's being doing about those 'businesses'…

  86. Back from seeing Stepson.
    Took him to Newcastle for an hour then back to the hospital. He's very much 2 steps forward, 3 steps back at the moment.
    Last Thursday he opened up five vape-oil capsules and swallowed the contents, putting himself in A&E for 5 hours and delaying his then immanent discharge.

    1. Bob

      How old is your stepson , and are you the only senior male role model in his life?

      You must be feeling shattered .

      I suspect you never guessed that after your previous active career , army and rail, that you would be running around ragged the way you are now?

    2. That's a heavy load for you and your family, Bob…sorry to read it. I believe some have success with clinics, others with hypnosis, not certain if any are permanent.

  88. Now on the news we are told that
    libraries are closing !
    Is that because too many books are in the English language?

      1. My good lady is a volunteer in our local library as are all the other people who help to run it on a daily basis.

        2. I think if the local town wants a library, that’s the way it’s going to have to go – but first they’ll have to find somewhere to house it or buy a library van.

      2. People no longer use Libraries as they once did. I more or less lived in our local Library when I was a young 'un (talking 7 decades ago). Now – people read online, or buy books from Amazon…should see my pile teetering away, top 2 Ballard/Millenium and The Enigma of Japanese Power/van Wolferen…I have a drawing to finish and another to start, yet here I am…….

        1. I am similar except I don’t buy from Amazon. I haunt charity shops for out of print books (or library booksales or church/village hall bookstalls). I too have paintings I ought to be doing, piles of books I ought to be reading, work to be doing in the garden, yet I’ve turned up here again like a bad penny.

  89. Oh what fun! Jessie brought in a very small, live mouse……..and let it run! OH tried unsuccessfully to catch it. Evicted Jessie, shut the door and locked the catflap – she gave me a very baleful stare….. At least it made me move stuff and clean up a bit in the conservatory – but we didn't catch the mouse.

    1. Gracie used to bring in mice – and then get bored when they disappeared under something and she couldn't get to them. I'm sure families of mouselets used to breed from mice brought in by her…

      1. My Mum always said that just the smell of a cat will keep mice away! I came down one morning, when we had 3 very lively cats to find them in the kitchen staring at a mouse which was nibbling at one of their bowls! So much for that theory… 🙄

          1. I just wish I’d had the wit to take a photo! The cats faces were a real treat, and I often considered what the speech bubble above their collective heads would have said!

    2. I have a small border terrier, once caught a baby badger who squealed so loudly the mum came barrelling out of the sett. Just got to the dog in time to lift up high, and the baby ran to its mother. Terrier will have a pop at any other living animal.

      1. It was lucky not to have been killed. Terriers are the worst things for hedgehogs as they will cause severe damage if they don’t kill them.

        This little mouse was only the second time Jessie has brought one in since we took the girls in last October. Ziggy is a little older and doesn’t seem at all interested in hunting. It’s one advantage of having older cats. It made us have a bit of a clean up but where it is now is anyone’s guess.

  90. Afternoon, all. Have a meeting tonight, so, after having done a bit in the garden, I am updating this old laptop and seeing if it's worthwhile taking it on holiday with me. It's been a pain so far, but I hope once it's warmed up it will be okay. Naturally, I thought I'd test it out on Nttl before I have to disappear.

    I think the Cons are beyond resurrection. They need to be disbanded and a new, genuinely conservative, party to be created in their place.

      1. I am not convinced by Reform, although I did vote for them as an alternative. I think we need something completely new, untainted by the past.

        1. I’m not convinced by any of ’em really, never used to vote when I was young (talking 50 odd years ago here), somehow can’t get out of the habit. Don’t know many young people who vote, they think all politicians are useless. When you say new, do you mean a new system? Or new candidates? Or both?

          2. I suspect it’s the system as much as anything. How about a benign dictatorship, Lee Kwan Yew style…remember no jay walking, and always flush the loo….

          3. The only two parties in the last election who wished to change things were the Greens and Reform.

            The Uniparty was quite content to keep to the old policies of the last thirty years.

            As Reform and the Greens only got 21% of the vote in our local area, one can assume that 79% of the voters

            wish to continue as usual.

            Very worrying Conway, but that's the truth!

    2. What many of us here have been saying for some time.

      As I posted here yesredy:

      "The selection of a new party leader for the Conservatives seems completely irrelevant to me.

      The Conservative Party is dead and needs to be replaced by a new conservative party with a conservative philosophy and with conservative principles. We shall see whether or not the Reform Party will be able to wear this mantel but one thing is certain the Conservative Party has betrayed the electorate and does not deserve to survive."

      Gracie could have sung about the Conservative Party

       https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzUR_Q0GCc0

    4. After a terrible election loss and split in the party, it took nine years for the Canadian conservatives to get their act together, merge with the right wing party and win an election.
      We were lucky that the liberals in the intervening years were not as bad as the scumbag pretendy PM that we have now. Can the UK afford an extended time in the wilderness?

      1. I am not sure. It could all go t1ts up and end up with blood on the streets (it might do that anyway) or the IMF will step in and say TINA you must rejoin the EU. Either way it will not be pleasant.

    2. The “chocs” were doing that on Brixton Underground station in the 70’s when we lived locally.

      Edit: The staff are from the same “communities”.

  92. Hello again! Back now on the usual laptop. The other one was such a pain I gave up. I think I shall have to ditch Firefox in favour of Startpage and see if that improves matters. Firefox wouldn't update and kept crashing. I'm sure you were all desperate to know that!

    1. Best pc I've ever had is current one, Conway…acer chromebook running google…(wouldn't have google for a long time after reading how it was acquired, wouldn't want to change now tho).

        1. 'Afternoon Mr T…I should probably do similar, like the idea of wider screen, have worked with PCs since 80s, used to build them one time that was fun…I recall seeing one of those ascent of man cartoons…we ended up looking like gollum but with enormous fingers from keyboard use…:-DD

        2. I do have a desktop, but it's so old and slow I fear it may soon give up the ghost, which will be a pity as it's the only machine which will drive the printer.

      2. Best PC I ever had is a Microsoft Surface.
        Keyboard, touch screen, can be operated as a PC or tablet, masses memory etc. Does everything I want in a PC.
        Good battery life, too. Slim and light, as well.

      3. Startpage do a browser and that doesn’t track your every move, unlike Google. I may be paranoid, but it doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get me! Thanks for the good wishes for the holiday, by the way.

        1. Will check it out. Agree our every move is monitored. Have a fab time, hope you do some sketching for painting ideas:-) guessing you may be an acrylic or oil fan?

          3. I did a kitten playing with a ball and a horse lying down. I also did some arty-farty pottery (weights and measures – a hand, a foot, a rod, pole perch etc). These were all kiln fired and glazed pottery.

          5. I have the horse and the weights and measures. I gave the kitten to my mother. No doubt she threw it out. It was nowhere to be seen when we cleared the house.

          6. That’s a shame. My dad did similar, after mum died he just got rid of all trace of her in the house. I just have a few things of hers she gave me earlier.

      4. I bought this new laptop last December and my son set it up for me while he was here at Christmas. Transferred everything over from the old one and I'm happy with it.

    3. I use Firefox on Linux and it's fine. Last week I had the devil of a job because we were promised a donation from Waitrose, but the wretched form would only use Chrome. In the end the John Lewis person at head office got it all sorted for me but it took an hour on the phone while I was trying to cook dinner.

      2. I think it was 17 July 2024 celebrating Ashura Day.
        They can be assuraed that they will always get a free pass.

        1. Thank you. One needs Stig – he always knows how to be accurate about “today@s” news…

    3. A blind eye comment sums it all up. This country is now in very, very serious trouble. It's F*cked.

  94. Rastus, they appear to think that if this country collapses economically with chaos in the streets then

    we will definitely rejoin the EU.

    Has anyone asked the EU if they will agree with this proposal?

    1. The EU is only interested in two things; getting us to pay for everything and as a place to dump their detritus. As long as they can ensure that, they'll be okay.

  95. I just wish I’d had the wit to take a photo! The cats faces were a real treat, and I often considered what the speech bubble above their collective heads would have said!

  97. Best PC I ever had is a Microsoft Surface.
    Keyboard, touch screen, can be operated as a PC or tablet, masses memory etc. Does everything I want in a PC.
    Good battery life, too. Slim and light, as well.

  99. I am gnashing my teeth as i have just read our draft annual report and accounts which has tons of climate and diversity bollocks (55 references to diversity!) including a chart of “nationality and ethnicity”. I am hopping mad because there are 6 employees down under the heading “no response” BUT i know for a fact i am one of those 6 and i have given them a response (too rude to write here).

    How dare they put it as “no response”? It needs to be “Prefer not to say”, not “No response”.grrrrrrr

      2. They could well link reporting into the fabled connected car idea not only will your car send mileage information over the internet, it will report speeding violations as well..

          1. Not sure. The car has satnav but that was only on the better trim levels.
            Most new cars here have satellite radio, I thought that it was one way but who can tell. They also seem to have a panic button feature that will call for help if the car us involved in a crash.

      3. You are (and have been for a long time) being watched by EU sattelites

        Pay as you go
        Parking
        Speed checks

        Galileo is Europe's own global "navigation" satellite system,

    2. Good evening,
      Drivers of petrol (and diesel) cars already pay per mile they drive. The more they drive, and the bigger the car's engine, the more fuel they buy and, therefore, tax (VAT & duty)

    2. The most important thing for Germany is to make a deal with Russia. This will involve apology for the Scholz government by its replacement and the eating of humble pie.

      That the EU cannot survive without a strong Germany is a given.

      Will someone explain the facts to Starmer who seems intent on tying the UK to the EU at the very point of its imminent collapse. Perhaps could be added the fact that Ukraine will shortly cease to exist as a sovereign country.

        1. They’ll certainly lose Donbass and can forget about Crimea. It’ll be interesting to see what happens to the Black Sea ports, which were built by Russia in the 18th century and remained Russian throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries. When the Soviet Union was dismantled, the borders should have returned to where they were before 1917 and sod the New World Order.

      2. If Cameron had had the testicular bravado to put his case as Alice Weidel is putting it we could have got a good deal from the EU and would not have had to leave it!

  104. A wobbly Par Four?

    Wordle 1,172 4/6
    🟨🟩⬜⬜⬜
    ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜
    🟩🟩🟩🟨⬜
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. Just started up the laptop at Christmas House.
      Almost an eagle.

      Wordle 1,172 3/6

      🟨⬜🟩⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟨⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

      2. Well done Mola, I've just done my fourth birdie on the bounce …. Aaaargh!!

        Wordle 1,172 3/6

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

    2. After a poor start, I recovered to par.

      Wordle 1,172 4/6

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

    3. Par for me too.

      Wordle 1,172 4/6

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

  106. Gentle reminder: White man shouts at police dog and is swiftly sent to prison.. two Pakistani muslims launch a ferocious assault on a policewoman and they are not even charged, and continue to freely walk the streets.

    It's only going to get worse.. and 2TK doesn't care what you say, think or do.

  107. Child murderers in Leicester.

    Children held over fatal attack on dog walker, 80

    "Due to prior police contact with the victim, the force will be making a voluntary referral to the Independent Office of Police Conduct (IOPC)…"

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1l5y5nge31o

    In other words, the victim had complained to the police and the children exacted their revenge.

        1. As Leicester is a majority "effnik" community, one can probably guess the shades of the assailants.

          3. I'll take a punt and say the suspects are more likely to be either white or black/mixed race. Leicester does have a high "effnik" count, but mostly Asian. Indians come in at 34% and this kind of behaviour isn't common in that population or even amongst Pakistanis and Bangladeshis (just 5%) – and the victim was a Hindu.

            White British are just 33%, other white 8%. Black (all groups and mixed-race) are about 8%.

          4. I'll take a punt and say the suspects are more likely to be either white or black/mixed race. Leicester does have a high "effnik" count, but mostly Asian. Indians come in at 34% and this kind of behaviour isn't common in that population or even amongst Pakistanis and Bangladeshis (just 5%) – and the victim was a Hindu.

            White British are just 33%, other white 8%. Black (all groups and mixed-race) are about 8%.

          5. I'll take a punt and say the suspects are more likely to be either white or black/mixed race. Leicester does have a high "effnik" count, but mostly Asian. Indians come in at 34% and this kind of behaviour isn't common in that population or even amongst Pakistanis and Bangladeshis (just 5%) – and the victim was a Hindu.

            White British are just 33%, other white 8%. Black (all groups and mixed-race) are about 8%.

          6. I'll take a punt and say the suspects are more likely to be either white or black/mixed race. Leicester does have a high "effnik" count, but mostly Asian. Indians come in at 34% and this kind of behaviour isn't common in that population or even amongst Pakistanis and Bangladeshis (just 5%) – and the victim was a Hindu.

            White British are just 33%, other white 8%. Black (all groups and mixed-race) are about 8%.

          10. We can join the dots, opopanax. May I ask please if you've seen PetaJ lately? I haven't, but she posted a little while ago she hadn't been well, just hoping she's doing OK.

        2. Yes it does matter.. a lot.. during the Starmergeddon era everything has context, everything is on a spectrum.

          For instance, an 80 yr old white male bludgeoned to death in W11 at the end of August is classified as an unfortunate incident with many contributing factors.
          Whereas a brave popular local Windrush veteran murdered in cold blood in deprived crime ridden Braunstone becomes a public inquiry of national importance..

          3. "….a brave popular local Windrush veteran…"

            You think Bhim Kohli came over on the Windrush?

          4. Did any of the so called “Windrush Generation”? A few hundred Jamaican men have morphed into a “generation”.

          7. This victim appears to be a Sikh. There was a battle between Sikhs and Bangladeshis not so long ago.

        3. Yes – because if they are white it fits the Ikea Slammer/Pencil monitor’s view that all BAD things are done by white people.

  108. That's me gone for today. Damp and dreary weather. A bit of rain but not enough to be useful.

    Have a jolly evening.

    A demain

    2. Labour has been looking for an excuse to "divest" Israel for years now. It's got a different voting bloc to attend to from the traditional one. What Lammy won't have reckoned on is the mysterious drying up of intelligence coming from Israel from now on. Israel isn't the UK's dupe no matter what this government thinks and I imagine will be fully aware that even if the country at large in the UK is on board with its struggle, the Labour Party itself is more on board with its newer allies. Passing of hard intel towards Britain could be a dangerous thing for Israel to do, in my opinion. I think they'll see this country as a two-faced unreliable back stabbing so-called ally, although won't say it openly. They do of course export more arms to Britain than go the other way, but I guess Israel will just shrug its shoulders over that one and carry on as normal.

      Meanwhile, Israel is making plans to remove Britain from the arms equation altogether: Israel investing in new munitions factory

        1. I can never decide if Labour is aware that we can see everything it does in plain sight KJ, also that we know the reasons why it does them but carries on regardless. Or if they really do think we're a bunch of retards.

          1. I don’t think they bother about us seeing everything they do James, because they believe they are the righteous (chosen) ones. Similar to a cult in that it’s a form of brainwashing, ‘labour good’ ‘tories bad’. There are some younger Conservatives coming along – possibly if Badenoch wins she could be good on that front (crossing fingers, have sent in my vote…) do you think I’m being too optimistic, bit of a character flaw…

          7. From George Whitebread aka Harry Enfield 😀 Leeds, as with so many other places, isn’t the place it once was.

          9. My mum once thought Dewsbury was the bees knees, she loved it there. Can’t imagine what she, my dad, grandparents would make of it now. Democracy? havin’ a larf, ‘mum.

          10. Awful place now. It’s years since I visited, I have one old schoolfriend remaining there oop north. I couldn’t believe Leeds when I was there 15 years ago and that was the posh part. My rellies had a house in the posh part (Roundhay) and lived on what was then the poshest road (Park Lane). We were the church mice from the socially unacceptable side of the river! It is a terrorist breeding ground these days.

          11. I’m a church mouse too. Many moved north some time ago, even to Sturgess-land – what a carry-on there…

          13. It always was. My mum had an aneurysm and was operated on in LGI (she saw Saville but luckily he didn’t see her) by Miles Gibson and his associate Carys Bannister.

    1. If the government had had the determination to stop the crossings by turning them back long ago, those twelve people would still be alive.

        1. I detest the change of my character from charitable to heartless caused by spineless and treacherous British governments.

          3. I know the feeling. If the me of 20 years ago could fast forward to today, he would be appalled at my current views.

          1. Well, we should be. To wish misfortune on others isn't nice, nor is it Christian.
            It may be human, though.

          2. It's not your fault, It's not my fault, it's not poppiesmum's fault…it's not any one of us' fault. It's government's fault, successive ones.

          3. I have compassion fatigue. These people will force us out of our homes eventually, its what invaders do and have done throughout history, they rape and kill without mercy. These will be no different when they feel their numbers are right. I fear for my grandchildren. I will not be ashamed about how I feel.

        1. I read that there were six children who died, KJ – just appalling……

          How many more kids will have to die before our spineless governments actually do something to stop this foul trafficking???

          1. It's a puzzle I can't figure…if we really had the cojones to say we're an independent nation, no more ECHR because it's not working for us, we're going to return every boat, every person, to French shores starting tomorrow…would we ever do it, I suspect not, the question I can't answer is 'why not'…if we need people to work here, that should be up to individual companies to advertise and recruit, proof of employment would be required, and benefits will be paid only to the needy including housing, and British nationals will come first. And why have we not seen the Trade Deals we were told would come our way once we left the EU. And why is Michael Gove still an MP. I could go on, bit of a tiring day. Sorry folks.

          3. Ah fell on his sword, think he’d just had enough. Sorry, memory bit cr*p since vaccine. Thanks for nudging me, Sue 🙂

    2. At least a couple to be earmarked by Mrs Balls for deportation after time served, or maybe 1/3 time served?
      Ms Popa appears to have received a conditional discharge. If she has any kind of passport that isn’t a UK one perhaps she could be taken straight to the airport.
      Just kidding.

  114. You know that, I know that and, I suspect, an awful lot of other people know that, too. The government doesn't care.

    1. Why am I not surprised.
      Question: Alexa, why do you spout lefty biased claptrap?
      Alexa: I cannot comment on that. I reflect the views of my programmers.

      2. OOPs, said that it out loud, the Bitch said she did not understand

        One night we were talking about Ad Blue, now used by cars, but not either of ours

        Went onto Amazon: First adverts were Adblue.

        You are being watched

      1. Actually, I think Amazon/Google listen…quite a few times been talking about something, and there it is, on my screen. Have heard others say similar.

          1. I haven't noticed it on WhatsApp. A lot of our village chit chat is about Evri parcels not being delivered, or dumped in other neighbours' garages.
            I think Google is watching.

  116. After my own heart. Exactly. Down to the last penny, bad or otherwise:-) (we sound like two sides of the same coin..)

  118. For the avoidance of doubt, m'lud, I mean sink them when the occupants have been safely returned to France.

  119. Five children have been arrested on suspicion of murder following the death of an 80-year-old man who was attacked in a park.
    Bhim Kohli died in hospital after being assaulted while walking his dog at Franklin Park, in Braunstone Town, Leicestershire, on Sunday evening.
    Leicestershire Police said a boy and a girl, both aged 14, and another boy and two girls aged 12, were in custody.
    Officers have appealed for witnesses to come forward.

  120. Just found this – it has a reflectiveness about it that I rather like.
    https://youtu.be/aRHBqQ4sxaQ?si=JVFPRNc4bLd4_nxc
    I also wish, yet again, that I had a musical bone in my body – just one would do, that allowed me to play either instrument here. Imagine (I must) what it must be like to be able to put your own emotion into music, your own emphasis… not just click the right-arrow. Or even be able to sing! One's own inbuilt music doesn't work, either.
    It's a pisser.
    Imagine, aged notmuchteen, being able to come with this for your girl:
    https://youtu.be/dDxav1FME4Y?si=lcn32QXL44UU0m-5
    And, yes, I've posted these before, but in my defence, they are really powerful and emotion-stirring – just frustrated that all I can do is play someone else's recording…

    1. Chas and Dave – against all the odds – produced one of the most poignant love songs i know. I was most moved when my lovely wife posted it for me on the Nottlers' Forum on my birthday a couple of years ago.

      1. Definitely a keeper, Rastus!
        SWMBO lacks the gene for romance, I’m afraid. Replaced by the gene for Viking!

    2. I was told by a music teacher when I was 8 that I'd never play a note of music, so there's hope for everyone

      1. You sat next to me?

        I got sent off for humming out of tune.

        On the plus side, music teachers cannot fix things, mechanically

    3. Thank you! It is only recently that I have begun to appreciate the extreme beauty of the trumpet

      1. I went into town the other day and there was a chap (black) playing the saxaphone in the High Street. He was quite good, too.

    1. TB, does this comment from Ms Reeves mean that she will ask MPs to give up their tax free heating allowance of £3700- pa?

      1. MPs continue to keep their entitled snouts in the money trough , Janet .

        The Labour party and their leader will end up being public enemy no 1, and there will be consequences.

      2. Of course not. I believe they can claim rental for accommodation near to the House, although they live not too distant, 10 minute taxi.

    2. Just another classic example of how totally out of touch our political idiots are with reality.

    1. Yes Eddy, but we can’t really compare this to heating as we don’t know which expenses she has honestly incurred in the course of her duties, but we DO know what the Government thinks

      is a fair price for an heating allowance.

      1. But they are basically dishonest and steal money from the kitty. The money is supplied by hard working British tax payer’s.
        Labour introduced Elizabeth Filkin years ago to monitor the expenses claims politicians make.
        She was too good at her job so they shoved her into the Lords.

  125. Four full on days split both sides of our 50th wedding aniversery. And we are home alone again. Phew, we loved every minute of it but.
    What a relief.
    Night all 😴

  126. Well, chums, it's almost 10 pm. So I will go to bed just a little early tonight. Good night, sleep well and I'll see you all in the morning.

  127. At least 12 people have died and two are missing after a boat carrying up to 70 migrants 'ripped open' and capsized in the English Channel.

    A major rescue operation is underway to rescue people from the water after the inflatable vessel got into difficulty off the coast of northern France, near Calais.

    The French coast guard initially reported 10 people were in critical condition following the sinking. French official revised this down to two by early evening.

    Children were reported to be among the victims of the tragedy.

    A local official said that the majority of those in the boat were from Eritrea and other parts of Africa, per Reuters.

    The scale of the tragedy prompted Darmanin to call for better relations with the UK to negotiate a 'migration treaty between the UK and the European Union'.

    He said: 'The people who go now [are] people from the core of Africa who want to go to the UK and they want to join their families and they actually work in conditions that would not be accepted [in] France.

    'And so we really do need to work together to stop these things happening.'

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13808083/Boat-migrants-capsizes-English-Channel-critical-condition.html

    Apparently all the men on board had taken all the life jackets and left the women and children without this is the kind of men that think women are beneath them that we are letting into OUR country

    Just to repeat..

    He said: 'The people who go now [are] people from the core of Africa who want to go to the UK and they want to join their families and they actually work in conditions that would not be accepted [in] France.

    'And so we really do need to work together to stop these things happening.

    Gawd , you just couldn't make that up!

    1. I’m sorry. I have no sympathy. And would add, the UK Govt and its charities are complicit in this.

      1. I'm sorry. I have loads of sympathy for the unborn child and the children. And would add, the UK Govt, and its predecessors are 100% complicit in this.

    3. It won't change, Belle, as far as I can make out, because we are committed to the ECHR which is embedded in the NI Agreement (remember von der Leyen coming over to sign with the King and Sunak?) That Agreement confirmed parity between NI and the Republic – the latter already being part of the EU and subject to ECHR, and at the signing NI became subject to ECHR and by extension rest of the UK. No wonder Ursula was grinning, no wonder Sunak beetled off. Further, the 'boat people' are around 10% of total immigration, 90% are here quite legally, and those numbers will only rise.

    4. Their families should go back to Africa to join them. We do not need any more savages, we've got (more than) enough.

  130. Allegedly, the Director-General of the World Health Organization. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) was involved in some rather nasty goings on in 1970s Ethiopia:-
    https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,911969,00.html
    If this is the case, why was he ever appointed as head of WHO and why is he still in the post??

    ETHIOPIA: A Despot at War On All Fronts
    Monday, May 23, 1977
    Curfew in Addis Ababa starts at midnight, but the shooting in Ethiopia's frightened capital (pop. 1 million) begins long before that. Shortly after sunset, armed members of the city's 291 kebeles (neighborhood associations) take to nearly deserted streets seeking "class enemies of the broad masses" —meaning opponents of the brutal Marxist regime of Lieut. Colonel Mengistu Haile Mariam and his military administrative council, known as the Dergue. Scouring slum areas of the capital, kebele patrols kick open doors of mud huts in search of objects that would prove subversive intent. Among them: typewriters and field glasses. Justice is often administered on the spot—with a bullet. Foreign diplomats estimate that perhaps 3,000 people have been murdered since January by kebele cadres in Addis Ababa, and at least that many elsewhere in the country

    1. Being damaged goods, to say the least, Tedros will obey his masters. They’re ideologically aligned anyway but the threat of being sent home to Ethiopia to face trial will keep him in line. I read that he’s charged with terrorism and attempted genocide.

  132. Cheers Ndovu. I think she may have made a comment on the Lynch yacht tragedy. She’ll likely post when she’s ready 🙂

      1. As I lay me down to sleep
        I pray the Lord my soul to keep
        if I die before I wake
        I pray the Lord my soul to take

          1. From ghoulies and ghosties
            And long-leggedy beasties
            And things that go bump in the night,
            Good Lord, deliver us!

  135. I have about 6 songs on some form of i-Tunes, including a few favourite Billy Ocean, a couple that i have no idea how they got in there in the first place but played consecutively back in 2017-ish when my daughter and I did a road trip round Spain (it was the week of las Ramblas attack – i have a true story to tell about that) and the following song by Lawrence Fox, the Distance, which is the only one I am aware of positively purchasing back in January 2020 while he was being cancelled and i was fairly new to NTTL. Anyway while running for my train home it popped up unexpectedly for some reason as i never listen to my music. Here are the lyrics;

    “
    They have put something in the water
    They seek a cure for the conversation
    They stole a march on your indecision
    And the first to fall is laughter
    Just to quell the long offended
    They seek to murder your opinion

    The light has been turned down on the age of reason
    Replaced by blinding fires that burn wild across the region
    For the wrong to rule
    The good must just stand idly by

    So I need you more than ever
    Need your hands in this resistance
    If we're going to go the distance
    And if I ever doubt it
    I think about my future
    And if i want to live there

    The world outside is wondrous wide for a reason
    And if you can't decide, you must blow your own mind for that reason
    For the wrong to rule
    The good must just stand idly by

    It can be hard to know what feeling
    What with all the lies that you're reading
    If it's hard to say, you may mean it

    Don't be lost thinking about tomorrow
    When today is what you are living
    Make today your new beginning

    The light has been turned down on the age of reason
    Replaced by blinding fires that burn wild across the region
    For the wrong to rule
    The good must just stand idly by

    So I need you more than ever
    Need your hands in this resistance
    If we're going to go the distance
    And if I ever doubt it
    I think about my future
    And if i want to live there”

    1. You forgot to include the cost of the concrete base for these monstrosities. Several hundred tons of concrete do not come carbon free.

      1. And the birds which get minced. To say nothing of the effect on marine life. Hurrah for “green” energy.

  142. 392971+ up ticks,

    I do consider this to be tremendously decent of them, 48% of Britain would have agreed with them.

    Dt,

    France wants migrants to be able to claim UK asylum from within EU

    Sort of legalise the invasion, protect france.

    Interior minister proposes safe legal routes after 12 die in the latest small boats Channel tragedy

    The real answer is genuine patriotic United Kingdom 24 / 7 English Channel patrols, we done it once upon a time to protect the COD why not try it with the indigenous English peoples in mind.

    1. Well haven't the French always gone their own way when it comes to following EU mandates? This is just more of the same.

      If migrants are in the EU, surely they do not need to claim asylum – or are the French saying that the EU is not a safe place?.

      We actually had the same in Canada with migrants from the US claiming asylum.

      1. It's a case of trying to bend the rules, aided and abetted by lawyers – I'm guessing they're either pro-bono, paid by charities or possibly even the UK gov't under ECHR rulings.

    2. Then why don't they seek asylum in France? After all, France is bound by the same conventions. I think we all know the answer.

    3. That could possibly mean an amendment needed to ECHR, or even an addition. UK should have ability to appeal, drag out the process for some time. As I said yesterday, seems UK can't leave ECHR because it's embedded in NI Agreement – perhaps another look at that whilst we're at it. Lawyers will be all over this, probably for some time. We know what will happen in the meantime.

  145. From the business section:
    ”The universal winter fuel allowance has already gone. Any savings anyone might have put aside for their retirement are likely to be a target in the Budget in October.
    No one has suggested a ballot to take 10pc of the over-70s off to a clinic in Switzerland every year to reduce pressure on the NHS, but no doubt one of the Labour think tanks is already working on yet another plan to preserve “generational fairness” should the “black hole” in the public finances get any bigger. For the Government’s war on the retired is becoming more vindictive with every week that passes. And now it looks as if the council tax discount available to bereaved widows may be the next benefit to be axed.
    Angela Rayner, the Deputy Prime Minister, managed to take some time out from partying in Ibiza this week to raise fears of yet another stealth tax raid. She refused to rule out allowing councils to remove the 25pc discount on council tax currently allowed for single occupancy homes.
    In effect, that will amount to a tax on widows and widowers who, through no fault of their own, suddenly find themselves living alone. Not only will they have to struggle with bereavement, they will face a stiff rise in their tax bill as well, despite the fact they will use fewer council services than larger households. It is hard to see anything very “compassionate” or “caring” about that. But why would anyone be surprised by the move?
    Only a couple of months after taking office, it is clear that the Labour Government regards Britain’s 13m retired people as fair game for raising whatever extra cash it decides it needs.
    We have already seen the universal winter fuel allowance axed, a move that Rachel Reeves seems to think pensioners can afford, even as the Government pushes up energy prices at an escalating rate.
    We already suspect that the forthcoming Budget will include some form of raid on pension funds. And now ministers seem to be looking around for every other way they can load yet more costs on to the retired.
    Add it all up, and one point is clear: the Labour establishment, in the words of one of its advisers, the former HMRC boss Sir Edward Troup, sees pensioners as old “codgers” who are “under-taxed”.
    Puffed up by a weird neo-marxist analysis that has substituted generational conflict for class conflict, with downtrodden millennials taking the place of the proletariat, they are determined to punish what they see as a privileged elite. The trouble is, that is completely unfair. To start with, while some pensioners are very well off, especially if they have worked in the public sector with its gold-plated final salary pension schemes, many are not. Almost 1.5m receive pension credit, meaning they barely have enough to live on, and many more are eligible for extra help but are too proud to ask for it.
    Even worse, with inflation, many are seeing their incomes fall in real terms. Sure, the cruise ships and golf courses may have some wealthy retirees. But they are a minority – and it is the poorest who get hit hardest by the constant tax raids.
    Next, they can’t earn their way out of trouble. If council tax or any other levy goes up, at least most of us have the option of working a bit harder. We can do an extra shift, take on another couple of clients or even look for a better paid job. It may be a struggle, especially with taxes so high, but for anyone in their 30s or 40s that is at least an option. Once you have retired, however, earning extra money is usually no longer possible. The taxes have to be taken out of a fixed income, and if that means you cannot heat your home or buy enough food then that is just tough.
    Finally, and perhaps most importantly, it is not the 70 and 80-somethings who are responsible for the mess we find ourselves in. There is a huge hole in government finances because we have a public sector with relentlessly declining productivity that demands higher wages for less output with every year that passes; because we have allowed millions of working-age people to stop working and live on benefits instead; and because the Government has decided to waste billions on projects such as GB Energy and a National Wealth Fund, along with rewarding the public sector trade unions with huge pay rises.
    And why are we punishing the old when huge numbers of millennials and Gen Z-ers refuse to go into the office, and spend much of their time when they do so focusing on social activism instead of delivering higher profits? It is hard to see how people who retired 10 or 20 years ago are to blame for that. Indeed, during their careers the economy grew far faster than it does today.
    Labour’s war on pensioners is turning into a vindictive assault on some of the most vulnerable members of society.
    A zero-growth economy stuck in a doom loop of rising taxes and declining living standards is tough for everyone, but it is toughest for retirees.
    A new government with a huge majority should be figuring out ways of accelerating growth so that there is more money to pay for everything. It might even take on some of the vested interests on its own side.
    Instead, Labour appears to have already given up on that agenda and is waging a war on the elderly.
    It is an unpleasant spectacle – and the backlash, when it comes, will be ferocious.”

    1. The council tax rise threat is the follow-up gambit, after the WFA cut, in this uncaring government's assault to get as many pensioners as possible to downsize and move out of their family homes and free up accommodation for the growing demographic. This government cares not a jot for all those treasured memories associated with people's homes: soulless bureaucrats, one and all.

      1. Interesting point. If, in the forthcoming budget, they offer a reduction in stamp duties for those downsizing it'll would be confirmation of such a policy!

      2. Mother has no home. She lives in a care home, waiting for God, whilst her savings and the money from her house sale drops by about £5 500 a month. She can't afford tax – when the money drops below a (low) threshold, the Council steps in and pays.

        1. Sounds similar to my dad's case. Very fortunate in that he needed 24/7 care (dementia) and at that time the gov't would cover the cost in that case – I didn't know until I went to see a solicitor about getting PoA for his affairs. Might it be worth taking legal advice (guessing you likely have already tho)..it's a worrying time, sorry to read, Paul..

    2. Yet another socialist government who thinks it can tax us into growth and prosperity.
      The ‘quality’ of politicians has dived from downright mediocrity into excruciatingly pathetic.

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