Wednesday 30 December: The Covid response is being stifled by an unimaginative bureaucracy

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its comments facility (now reinstated, but not as good as ours),
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Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2020/12/30/letters-covid-response-stifled-unimaginative-bureaucracy/

680 thoughts on “Wednesday 30 December: The Covid response is being stifled by an unimaginative bureaucracy”

  1. Black Testicles

    A male patient is lying in bed in the hospital, wearing an oxygen mask over his mouth and nose, still heavily sedated from a difficult 4 hour surgical procedure.

    A young student nurse appears to give him a partial sponge bath.

    Nurse,’ he mumbles, from behind the mask ‘Are my testicles black?’

    Embarrassed, the young nurse replies ‘I don’t know, Sir. I’m only here to wash your upper body.’

    He struggles to ask again, ‘Nurse…’

    Concerned that he may elevate his vitals from worry about his testicles, she overcomes her embarrassment and sheepishly pulls back the covers. She raises his gown, holds his penis in one hand and his testicles in the other, lifting and moving them around and around gently.

    Then, she takes a close look and says, ‘No sir, they aren’t and I assure you, there’s nothing wrong with them, Sir !!’

    The man pulls off his oxygen mask, smiles at her and says very slowly,

    ‘Thank you very much. That was wonderful, but listen very, very closely…

    ‘ A r e – m y – t e s t – r e s u l t s – back? ‘

      1. A bit like needing a bottle after my stent was fitted and the nurse commenting, very matter of factly, “I’ll just pop it in for you!”

  2. John Major said it wouldn’t be cricket to let Robert Mugabe join MCC. 30 december 2020.

    In a handwritten note on a Downing Street briefing paper outlining why “it would be a nice gesture” for the then Zimbabwe president to join the Marylebone Cricket Club the Prime Minister warned how it could set a “dodgy precedent”.

    Files released by the National Archives in Kew, South West London, show the Foreign Office wrote to Sir John, as he is now, shortly before Robert Mugabe’s state visit in May 1994 asking him to bestow a gift on the Marxist president.

    Morning everyone. When one thinks that this murderous thug had already been in office for 14 years and carried out the ZAPU massacres when this request was made one has to wonder what the Foreign Office has for brains?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/12/30/john-major-said-wouldnt-cricket-let-robert-mugabe-join-mcc/

    2. Whatever one may feel about the individual, a state visit honours the country and the head of state. Look at the disgraceful way Trump was treated.

      I would not have offered Mugabe’s Zimbabwe a state visit, but offering him such a gift, which would be completely and utterly useless to him, seems quite a good compromise, although he would probably not have seen it as such.

    2. And in the background ( apologies to Pink Floyd ) is music playing
      ” We don’t need no Vaccination
      ” We don’t need no thought control”

    1. The PTB fear a contagion of truth. Currently, there is no vaccine for that but they’re working on it.

  5. Brendan O’Neill
    The school closures debate exposes Britain’s class divide
    29 December 2020, 1:56pm

    There have been many shocking sights in this cursed year. For me, one of the most shocking has been the sight of comfortably off, Oxbridge-educated experts and journalists agitating for the closure of schools even though they know this will hit poor kids hardest.
    This alarmingly cavalier attitude towards the education of the less well-off has exposed the class tensions that lurk behind the lockdown.

    Once again, depressingly, school closures are back on the agenda. SAGE says the only way we can get the current wave of Covid infections under control is by enforcing a proper lockdown, including the closure of schools and universities. Many in the media, long smitten with SAGE, agree. Teaching unions, who have perversely spent much of 2020 arguing for schools to be shut and kids to be kept at home, also want face-to-face learning to be put on hold. Patrick Roach of the NASUWT says we should revert to remote learning in January.

    The government is erming and ahhing. It has decided to stagger the return of kids to classrooms in England. It seems that exam-year pupils — Year 11 and Year 13 — will return, but other secondary-school pupils will have to learn from home. Wales and Scotland have both delayed the start of the January term. Westminster might yet buckle and force more English schoolkids into the dreaded Zoom classroom — a ridiculous parody of pedagogy.

    In 2020 we have witnessed something deeply disturbing: the suspension of education for millions of children. This is the true consequence of so-called ‘remote learning’ — many, many children do not learn. In cramped homes, with very few resources, overseen by stressed, busy parents, kids have not received anything like a proper education. Their learning has been put on hold. And, disgracefully, this has been cheered on by teaching unions and public-sector leftists. They want more of it, in fact. Their cry of ‘Close schools in January!’ signals how little they care about the education of working-class and poor children.

    For make no mistake — it is those children who suffer most when schools are shut. Children who attend private schools did pretty well during lockdown. Research by University College London, published in June, following the closure of schools during the first lockdown, found that 71 per cent of state-school pupils had between none and one online lessons a day, while many private schools were providing four or more online lessons a day.

    The National Foundation for Educational Research found that 42 per cent of state-school children were not completing their work, and that ‘pupils in the most disadvantaged schools were the least likely to be engaged with remote learning’.

    There were big divides even among comprehensively educated students. The Sutton Trust found that kids in middle-class homes were twice as likely to take part in online lessons as kids in working-class homes. Forty-four per cent of middle-class children had spent four hours or more on schoolwork each day when schools were closed, compared with just 33 per cent of working-class children.

    It isn’t hard to see why. The less well-off a child’s family is, the less likely that child is to have a computer, a quiet room to learn in, parents who have the time to assist with learning. When you push education out of the classroom and into the home, it is inevitable that social inequality will rear its ugly head.
    Classrooms are a great equaliser; children from all sorts of backgrounds enter them as equals with a right to a decent education. Home life, of course, is not equal: some children live in big, spacious houses and have books and dictionaries and every gadget going; others do not.

    I often think about what would have happened to my education if my school had been shut. There were six children in my family, all boys, all rowdy, and conditions were cramped. Our young parents were always busy, earning a living. We had one ZX Spectrum back then (which we fought over constantly); these days we’d probably have a laptop or two. There is just no way we would have learned. Our right to gain knowledge and expand our minds would have been halted. That is happening to millions of kids right now.

    Those demanding the closure of schools have got to be honest with themselves, and with us. They have got to admit that they think it is not a particularly big deal to suspend education for working-class children. They at least have to admit that this will be the consequence of their demand being enacted — that the educational rights they enjoyed, very often in good schools and well-resourced middle-class homes, will be denied to children whose only crime is to come from less well-off families.

    Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised. No one wants to admit it, but the lockdown is riddled with class tensions. This bizarre social experiment in authoritarianism has been fine for many middle- and upper-class people, who could work from their nice homes and have a wander in their gardens. But it has been a disaster for the less well-off, stuck in small apartments, shamed by wealthy journalists if they dared to take a walk in a crowded park. Millions will lose their jobs, poverty will worsen.
    There is something genuinely nauseating about well-remunerated members of the media and expert classes demanding harder, longer lockdowns without giving a second thought to the impact lockdowns have on working-class families. Lockdown often feels like an unspoken class war.

    Yes, this new spike in infections is a genuine challenge. Yes, measures will have to be taken. However, a society that is indifferent to the education of the next generation is a society that has seriously lost its way. Education cannot stop. It must not stop. Even in the face of a health crisis like the one we are living through, we must find a way to keep kids in schools, accessing knowledge, sharpening their minds, enjoying their right to understand the world. I predict that future generations will look back on 2020, and possibly on early 2021, and be horrified that we stopped educating poor children.

    https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/what-the-well-off-won-t-admit-about-school-closures

    1. This is a good article, but ….
      “It isn’t hard to see why. The less well-off a child’s family is, the less likely that child is to have a computer, a quiet room to learn in, parents who have the time to assist with learning.”
      This is NOT the whole story! Be realistic and admit that many parents who are not well off are not well off because they don’t care about studying, and don’t bother to try and make sure that their children complete the work.
      It’s not down to income, it’s down to parental attitude.
      A friend of mine has a textbook working class situation – social housing flat with no garden, working single mother, immigrant and non-native speaker, hard up – but she is middle class and aspirational, and her children stuck at the lessons during school closures!

      1. It’s tough to bugger up the child’s life because the parent doesn’t give a shit.
        Education is probably the most important thing that people can get, more important even than good heath care – from there stem informed decisions and the ability to operate in modern society, and where do the health care professionals come from if nobody is properly educated?

        1. I completely agree that schools should stay open, but my point is that “the poorest in society” are always excused from having to exercise the same responsibilities as everyone else on account of their poverty, and this is a very bad thing for them and for society.

          1. I agree. Some neighbours of mine (professional people, Lib Dems, living in a nice, detached house) were vehemently anti-grammar school education, claiming that their children had prospered at the local comp. Not all parents, I apprised them, were down at the school regularly complaining if they thought the teaching wasn’t up to scratch (as they were), nor did all children have access to books and technology. They just couldn’t see it.

          2. Getting rid of grammar schools was one of the worse mistakes born out of post-war idealism. But wait until the row kicks off about a smaller percentage of black pupils at the remaining grammars than other ethnic groups. Or perhaps they have anticipated that and are taking pupils based on skin colour.

    2. When one thinks of all previous crises in the UK, the governments of the day made the most strenuous efforts to retain normality in every sphere. Now the intention is to add to the problems and spread panic at every opportunity1

      3. Whatever happened to keep calm and carry on? It seems to be a case of panic and hide behind the sofa!

    3. Thank you for posting Michael. A very thoughtful article. Given the known incidence of serious Covid infection in the various age groups – apart from those teachers nearing or over retirement age the risks to teachers appear to be minimal. Shop workers have worked throughout and ought to serve as a role model for teachers (I bet they all go shopping).

      For what it’s worth the teachers at my grand daughters’ primary school appear relaxed to be working and interacting with parents on a daily basis (sans PPE!)

      1. Dorset-dwelling teacher friend (aged 55) is shitting herself about return to school, wants next term stopped, otherwise they’ll all die. Although she teaches all forms of science, she’s unable to understand the infection and death statistics… That was a very depressing Christmas call, I can tell you.

        1. Tell her to take early retirement, lock herself away from anyone else, get a load of feline companions and then she can catch Catvid.

  6. ‘Morning, Peeps. I would like to think we will get through the pandemic despite the inaction of those charged with its defeat. Having been one of the many who volunteered in March but who subsequently heard nothing, I have some idea of their frustration:

    SIR – I was furious when I read the letter (December 28) from Dr Claire Barker, who attempted to volunteer as a Covid-19 vaccinator but was unable to supply the 21 documents demanded during the registration process.

    I was further dismayed by your report yesterday that Nightingale hospitals are empty because, according to Saffron Cordery, the deputy chief executive of NHS Providers, “we can’t conjure staff out of thin air”.

    It seems that, in the battle against Covid-19, we are witnessing the triumph of bureaucracy over desperately needed creativity.

    Alun Hicks
    Wokingham, Berkshire

    SIR – In April the General Medical Council emailed me to tell me that it had restored my licence to practise.

    I completed all the application procedures, including a video call to show someone my passport and medical degree from 1972 (though if I had got away with it for 50 years, you would have thought I could manage a Photoshopped document). I then spoke to a doctor on the phone and was told I could be a medical support worker. Since then – nothing.

    In May I completed the training course to join the Test and Trace programme, but was not sent a password to log on to the booking site. After numerous emails and telephone calls – nothing.

    Earlier this month I applied to help with vaccinations. I filled in the form and contacted my local GP practice. Guess what? Nothing.

    Talk about being a nowhere man.

    Dr Michael Paul
    Barnoldswick, Lancashire

    SIR – Like Graham Odd (Letters, December 29), I am a recently retired oral surgeon, and so by definition an expert at injecting both into the mouth and into peripheral veins in order to administer sedative drugs.

    Compared with these sites, the upper arm is entirely safe and accessible. Why, then, does the NHS require people like me to undertake e-training? After an early application, 
I too have heard nothing.

    There have been dire warnings of a third Covid wave. After years of incompetent bureaucracy – which does not include the doctors and nurses – the country is now being brought to its knees in order to maintain this dysfunctional system. Surely it is time to bring in the Army to organise the vaccination programme.

    S J Garner FDS RCS
    Bollington, Cheshire

    SIR – An eminent, recently retired surgeon friend of mine volunteered to help with the vaccination programme at our excellent local hospital.

    He received a prompt reply, reassuring him that they were covered at the moment but might need some help with the car park in the future. I was one of the first in, and the arrangements were most efficient. He is, however, keeping his hi-vis jacket and ping-pong bats at the ready.

    Paddy Shillington
    Louth, Lincolnshire

    1. I too was never asked to do anything despite spending hours at the ready. These letters make my blood boil.

  8. SIR – You report (December 21) that City of London politicians have approved a proposal to consider taking down some of London’s great statues because of fears there will be a “political outcry” if they refuse.

    This is rather cowardly. In Black Lives Matter, the City of London is faced by a highly vocal, single-issue movement using moral blackmail to get its way. The City’s duty is to stand up for what most people feel. We do not like to see Winston Churchill’s stature daubed in paint. Nor do we judge historical figures for having attitudes or connections which were of their time but are no longer respectable.

    There will always be angry movements demanding our attention because of some ancient wrong, but the history of mankind is full of savagery and oppression. It is misguided to ascribe particular significance to a single element of it, such as the Atlantic slave trade. It was, anyway, our Royal Navy that swept this trade from the seas. Queen Anne saw off Louis XIV, while Charles II brilliantly reunited a divided nation after our only civil war. Those are the things the statues commemorate.

    The City must not bend its knee to the aggressive, Marxist, anti-capitalist agenda of Black Lives Matter and the violence of too many of its supporters.

    Gregory Shenkman
    London W8

    Well said, Gregory Shrnkman, but I fear that this insanity has some way to run.

    1. The real damage is not done by BLM, it is done by the government and the police that don’t enforce law and order because they are black.

    2. What about the enslavement of black children forced to work by black people in cobalt mines in Central Africa?

      Has any woke person or person sympathetic to BLM addressed this question? And has anyone in the BBC or MSM ever even dared to put this question to them?

      1. No, and the BBC have ignored the worrying situation in Cabo Delgado, and the many black refugees from there.

  9. First chink of light in the wall of misinformation from the MSM? Daily Fail with a series of stats, and charts – still some doubt over the big figures re real infections and having a positive PCR test – it’s a start but will it be allowed to last? Reading the tweet replies it’s obvious that paid trolls are rife as they try to either discredit or otherwise misdirect the respondents.

    https://twitter.com/ClarkeMicah/status/1343852813047230465

  10. Following on from the letters from frustrated former medics:

    Bureaucracy stopping retired medics from returning to NHS front line to fight Covid

    Only one in eight who originally applied to return have been able to work, NHS boss overseeing recruitment reveals

    By
    Lizzie Roberts
    and
    Hayley Dixon
    29 December 2020 • 9:30pm

    Retired medics have been prevented from returning to the NHS front line to help battle the coronavirus pandemic by bureaucracy including a requirement to provide 21 pieces of evidence, The Telegraph can reveal.

    Claire Barker, a retired GP, said it was “impossible” for her to apply because she did not have the required proof, which includes evidence of Prevent Radicalisation training.

    It comes as the NHS boss overseeing recruitment revealed that only one in eight retired medics who had applied to return to the front line have been able to work.

    Andrew Foster told The Telegraph that of the 40,000 doctors and nurses who applied to return in March, 30,000 were eligible but only 5,000 had been given jobs by July, with officials ignoring his plea to create a bank of volunteers.

    He said “everybody could see that there was going to be a second wave and a need for vaccinations” and the team “tried very hard to create something a bit like the military reserve” and encourage volunteers to join.

    Mr Foster, a former hospital chief executive who co-ordinated workforce supply and deployment in the NHS Bringing Back Staff programme until July, said he believed the plan was ignored because it came with a £30 million price tag.

    It comes as hospitals warn that they are at risk of being overwhelmed by the second Covid wave, with one trust sending a plea on social media for volunteers to help in its intensive care unit.

    Despite widespread warnings of staff shortages, retired doctors who volunteered to return to work said they were being ignored by the NHS or tied up in bureaucracy.

    Dr Barker, who retired in 2017 after running her own practice for 30 years, said it was “absolutely impossible” for her to provide all the documents requested and was doubtful that a current GP would be able to.

    She added: “I am not proud – if they just want me to point people in the right direction I am happy to do that. But I have spent my life doing jabs like this. It is very frustrating.”

    Dr Brian Cooper, a retired consultant physician who has been trying to volunteer to get back on the front line since April but has been ignored said those in his position felt “frustration, disillusion and sadness that we feel we can’t help”.

    An NHS spokesman was unable to provide details of how many staff had returned to the front line.

    The spokesman said the health service was “delighted that former members of NHS staff have applied to become vaccinators and have completed their online training, and we continue to process these as fast as we possibly can” but that checks and training are required “regardless of a person’s background”.

    It is understood that the standards for vaccinators are set by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency.

    A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said “thousands” of former medics had come forward to offer support and that NHS England was “working to increase the employment rate of these professionals”. The spokesman said the “concept of a permanent NHS reserve” was being piloted.

    * * * *

    And some of the BTL comments:

    Jimbo Jones
    29 Dec 2020 10:19PM
    What a pathetic and useless organisation. They have had 9 months and countless £billions and still haven’t got themselves sorted.

    Supermarkets and other businesses had a wobbly fortnight but then had adjustments in place and were ready to operate.

    Karen Stuart-Smith
    29 Dec 2020 9:59PM
    The red tape is the mandatory training required of all NHS employees. It is very wide-ranging and time-consuming and has spawned a whole private industry of companies charging a fortune to provide this training, which consists of a large number of online learning topics. It contains many elements which are not required to give a vaccination in an open, supervised environment and in an emergency situation such as this should be waived.

    Grey Owl
    29 Dec 2020 10:18PM
    So, if I was a recently retired doctor, I could not give an injection unless I had been on diversity course etc.

    THE NHS rulebook should be torn up as long as there is a need for “volunteers” for this crisis.

    I am afraid this is further justification for overhauling the NHS completely.

    A very small task force should look at the current requirements, and produce a very very minimal set. This project should take about 3 days max, and be implemented immediately i.e. “action this day” springs to mind,

    Tomas NiFiach
    29 Dec 2020 10:25PM
    Well then the head of the NHS needs to face criminal charges for negligence. The moron has had 9 months to prepare, the army provided thousands of beds and he had a bottomless pit of money. What does he do to prepare for the bloody obvious yearly strain? F all. Absolute moron

    John Heppell
    29 Dec 2020 10:17PM
    Boris kindly overrule the bureaucrats and get the doctors and nurses back. All that is needed is that they retired in good standing.

    1. ” An NHS spokesman was unable to provide details of how many staff had returned to the front line. ” – – -rather strange they don’t know that – but can tell you EXACTLY how many people have “tested positive” EVERY DAY ????

      Anyone would think they are making the numbers up.

      1. What an appalling suggesting. The government and its agencies would NEVER lie to us….(sarc)

    1. Much sympathy! I’m dreading going back on Monday, having had a glimpse of how beautiful life could be as a stay at home mother!

  13. Is the Brexit vote in Parliament happening today, I can only here talk about a game changing injection that nobody in their right mind will take.

    1. 327927+ up ticks,
      Morning B3,
      As far as I know yes,the DNA tamperer IS to divert the mind from today’s dose of treachery.

  14. I wouldn’t like to have either of these characters standing behind me

    National Archives
    How Edward Heath taking a bath exposed Chequers’ lax security
    Adviser felt compelled to complain about security at PM’s country residence after incident, files reveal

    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/8025119a778028f26e3b13eda30044ad30f695ba/0_33_2793_1676/master/2793.jpg?width=620&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=a3bfe234818edace825dec941a0e8cba
    Edward Heath, left, and the then Canadian prime minister, Pierre Trudeau, at Chequers in 1972

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/dec/30/how-edward-heath-taking-bath-exposed-la

      1. It would have been better for Canada if the latter had stuck to that sort of thing and not procreated.

        1. According to rumours, the current Canadian PM was conceived during a trip to Cuba, and not by his mother’s then husband.

      1. Your powers of observation have spoiled my breakfast. Would you please keep such things to yourself until later in the day?

      2. Caroline has made special bibs for me and our regular dinner guest, 86 year old Jim. Indeed, if you eat seafood in a good restaurant in Brittany the management will offer you a bib. After a couple of meals using the bib if one regards the stains upon it one realises how much would have accumulated on one’s clothes without it.

        Rupert Brooke is best known for his poem ‘The Soldier‘ but he also wrote some other very interesting poems. In Jealousy he conveys an incredible amount of vituperative hatred for his lover and the man for whom she has left him. The image of senile decomposition and senile love making he conjures up are very powerful and repellent. The reference to lips being no longer able to ‘hold slobber’ should encourage us all to wear bibs when we get old!

        Here is the full poem:

        Jealousy: by Rupert Brooke

        When I see you, who were so wise and cool,
        Gazing with silly sickness on that fool
        You’ve given your love to, your adoring hands
        Touch his so intimately that each understands,
        I know, most hidden things; and when I know
        Your holiest dreams yield to the stupid bow
        Of his red lips, and that the empty grace
        Of those strong legs and arms, that rosy face,
        Has beaten your heart to such a flame of love,
        That you have given him every touch and move,
        Wrinkle and secret of you, all your life,
        —Oh! then I know I’m waiting, lover-wife,
        For the great time when love is at a close,
        And all its fruit’s to watch the thickening nose
        And sweaty neck and dulling face and eye,
        That are yours, and you, most surely, till you die!
        Day after day you’ll sit with him and note
        The greasier tie, the dingy wrinkling coat;
        As prettiness turns to pomp, and strength to fat,
        And love, love, love to habit!

        And after that,
        When all that’s fine in man is at an end,
        And you, that loved young life and clean, must tend
        A foul sick fumbling dribbling body and old,
        When his rare lips hang flabby and can’t hold
        Slobber, and you’re enduring that worst thing,
        Senility’s queasy furtive love-making,
        And searching those dear eyes for human meaning,
        Propping the bald and helpless head, and cleaning
        A scrap that life’s flung by, and love’s forgotten,—
        Then you’ll be tired; and passion dead and rotten;
        And he’ll be dirty, dirty!

        O lithe and free
        And lightfoot, that the poor heart cries to see,
        That’s how I’ll see your man and you!—

        But you
        —Oh, when that time comes, you’ll be dirty too!

        1. The great tragedy of Brooke is that unlike many of his contemporaries, who suffered the shelling and gassing of that dreadful conflict, he survived all that but developed pneumococcal sepsis from an infected mosquito bite, which took him away from us far too early.

        2. Although my own poor effort, I can sympathise having to tell my youngest that although I had treated her like my own daughter, I was not her father:

          Your Mother Lies

          In your year of thirty one
          I passed a poison chalice.
          It wasn’t done with spite or hate
          But for truth and not for malice.

          I hoped with time
          To ope your eyes
          And slowly let you realise
          That even Mother lies

          Even Mother lies – in another’s bed
          And whilst creating life,
          She hurts the one she wed;
          Sowing seeds of strife

  15. Daylight has joined us. No frost on this part of North Narfurk.

    Must away to loaf. Make one, that is.

  16. Don’t understand why the much vaunted “management” of the NHS cannot recruit recently retired medical people to lend a hand.

    The Army can call up reservists or retired personnel very quickly. Perhaps the MoD could offer Halfcock some advice…

    2. In the 1960s, when my age group were giving birth, the young mothers would plump for the Military Hospital; the maternity home was the place for disorganised losers.
      Guess which facility was closed.

      1. I gave birth to my elder son at Tidworth Military Hospital – not something I’d want to repeat, though the cleanliness at Gloucester Maternity left something to be desired.

        1. I produced at home; our GP specialised in G&O and, in those days, was allowed to make his own decisions.

    3. There are still lots of military doctors and nurses at some hospitals, perhaps a medical military coup would be in order.

    4. This is not a new type of absurdity. The administrative structure of politics and management was damaged beyond repair some time ago.

    5. They have called up retired volunteers. But in the spring, when they called my n-d-n, a retired nurse, they wanted her to go back on the register, which, at 70, she was not prepared to do (and pay for).

  17. The outside temperature is 1.7ºC – the same as it was during the night. Chilly but not frosty.

    1. It was -1.7 C here when I got up half an hour ago. Calm skies and frost over the green and roof tops.

      Edit: oops – good morning, Bill.

      1. Bit chilly here but no snow, yet within 5 miles in all directions there’s deep snow and terrible driving conditions……I’m staying in…. well the law says I have to anyway as all mainland Scotland is tier 4 now
        Morning PM

        2. Me and my big gob – I was called out to recover a car involved in an RTC in the thick snow this afternoon. Brass monkey weather in spite of cold weather clothing

    2. Heyup Bill!
      Got up to do a tea for the DT & self at 04:30 this morning and it was -2½°C on the yard thermometer.
      There’s a decent frost this morning too.

  20. I see from the front page of today’s Telegaffe that “Professor Neil Fergusson, a member of Nervtag, said … “clearly no one wants to keep schools shut. But if that’s the only alternative to having exponentially growing numbers of hospitalisations ..”

    Why, in the name of all that’s holy, is anyone listening to this cretin and his predictions – I can’t remember him ever being correct!

  21. SIR — I cannot agree with David Penprase (Letters, December 22) that Cornwall has been turned into a circus.

    The county’s coastline, estuaries, moors and rivers are as beautiful as they always were, and can be quiet too. What has changed are the towns. When we first took the children to Cornwall 50 years ago, Helston, for instance, was a thriving market town with butchers, bakeries, greengrocers and delicatessens. It is now a shadow of its former self.

    This change is, in part, down to the three supermarkets outside town, serving just 11,000 residents. Their emergence cannot be blamed on tourists. For the culprits, look no further than the local councils, whose lack of foresight is mind-boggling.

    Tim Lee
    Kenilworth, Warwickshire

    Well, that comes as no surprise to me, Timothy lad. Councils are the lowest echelon of government and, as such, are composed of the same brand of scum, villainy and corruption as you find at Westminster: i.e. politicians. Politicians only exist—despite their mealy-mouthed pleas that they are altruistic and only working for the good of mankind and the ‘community’—to feed their own desire for lucre and power: nothing else. Parish councils are made up of the lowest form of this type of life, county councils are just above them.

    The only reason why the once-thriving centres of most towns in the UK are no longer viable is directly due to the uncountable back-handers given to councillors by big business (e.g. supermarket chains). Nothing more.

    1. While councillors were certainly behind the horrors of comprehensive redevelopment of the 1960s and 1970s (the town Dorking, where I grew up, was only spared this in the nick of time), I blame the demise of the High Street on the National Business Rate, introduced by the Thatcher Government in 1990, and imposed on the councils.

      This was compounded by a decision by a Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer in 2014 to cut the grant to council to pay for statutory services to zero by 2020. This was never reversed by his three Conservative successors. Meanwhile their online global competitors go practically untaxed.

      I cannot blame councillors for national tax policy, set in Whitehall.

      Since we joined the EEC (now the EU) in 1973, business and trade policy has been set by global corporate lobbyists with the ear of the Commission, who set the agenda and enforce policy directives in favour of the lobbyists’ clients and against SMEs who cannot afford such things and are often driven out of business. I hope that Brexit would at least correct this, but it’s too soon to tell yet.

        1. The attitude of local shopkeepers is also significant. Those who have made the effort to meet the changing demands of their customers have done far better than those who thought that their customers owed them a living.

          1. Saw the same here in lockdown, for restaurants.
            One just shut up & died, didn’t make an effort to adapt.
            Our local curry house adapted so well, you now have to book when you didn’t used to. They advertised take-away or collect (from the car-park), expanded their client base (in the spring) and eat-in is fully restrictions compliant and never been so busy. The expected death of restaurants now all alcohol serving is banned hasn’t dented numbers, but since beer & wine are marked-up by about x3, obviously represents a dent in takings.

          2. “They advertised take-away or collect (from the car-park), expanded their client base (in the spring) and eat-in is fully restrictions compliant and never been so busy.”

            That’s called entrepreneurship.

          3. Yup.
            Took advantage of the crisis. Excellent move, and really good food, too.
            We’re there every two weeks or so.

          4. Yes, I can remember some shockers from my youth.
            The shops no longer exist and their owners’ attitudes probably added to the other problems.
            Why spend a fortune on parking charges to experience service with a snarl?

          5. Worse… to experience grossly over-priced service with a snarl.

            We have a thriving village shop with Post Office and filling station, the PO is so busy they have recently been given a second terminal. Prices are, understandably, a margin above the supermarkets, but not a massive margin. The have modernised over the years and the shop is clean, well lit and well run. The regular staff (including the family), are local, friendly, and helpful. The evening/weekend youngsters (they are open from 07:00 to 21:00 – 20:00 on Sundays – so there has been a regular turnover of school/college lads and lasses doing the evening and weekend shifts in the 25 or so years that I’ve been calling in there) are well trained and if they are shy when the start they soon get to know people. They have recently changed the fuel contract for the filling station so that prices there are more competitive. Only when I call in at ten minutes to nine in the evening do I find myself the only customer. They’ve worked hard at being what their customers need and want, and they have a busy and thriving business as a result.

        2. As well as pedestrianised high streets.. where people cannot shop in bulk , try carting a couple of duvet covers , or a couple of bags of groceries back to a carpark nearly half a mile away .

      2. When I lived just outside Worksop, in Notts, during the 1990s, an entrepreneur bought an old disused (and decrepit) watermill, just off the town centre and reached by a narrow un-tarmacked side road. He spent a fortune renovating the place and turned it into an exceptionally well-appointed restaurant and public bar.

        Because of its location he lobbied the local council to have a sign placed near the entrance to the side road so that customers would easily find the place. The council refused his application stating that the presence of such a sign would be ‘detrimental’ to a residential area. All attempts at an appeal also failed. Not long afterwards the same council granted permission to the multi-national corporation known as McDonald’s to erect an enormous illuminated sign advertising their recently-built fast-food emporium in the same residential neigbourhood.

        It was clearly apparent that the local businessman didn’t have an unlimited coffer of lucre with which to grease the already-greasy palms of the local council.

        He erected a small discreet sign on a lamp standard near to his restaurant but the council ordered its removal.

        The words ‘corruption’ and ‘politics’ are synonyms.

        1. You do make an excellent point about the rotten state of the planning system.
          Last year, I had a planning application for an extension to my cottage turned down. It seems that its design was incongruous to the street scene and that it was not consistent with the local vernacular. It was in violation to the rules laid out in the South Worcestershire Development Plan, which the Council had to adopt to avoid all planning decisions being handed over to the developers who ran the Whitehall Department, which actually had its policies set by a former Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne.

          The problem I had with the reasons for refusal were that:
          1. Since the nearest public highway is 150 yards away across a field, there is no street where I live to have a scene over.
          2. It is impossible to define “the local vernacular” in my neighbourhood and village, which has a eclectic mix of pretty well everything from ramshackle modern converted Atcost barn to Grade 1 listed monument and all styles and periods in between, including 1960s council houses. What gives my village its charm is the variety of its buildings, not conformity to something that would appeal to Persimmon.

          My objections were over-ruled of course, because I do not have the necessary qualifications or professional remuneration package. I was not alone – one of my neighbours, who wanted an outside toilet for staff caring for her horses was told this was “overdevelopment”. Another, a farming family, wanted to convert a Dutch barn as a home for one of the sons to raise a family, which is in view of my home. The logical cladding was agricultural corrugated sheet – the building would have disappeared, but the planning expert insisted it had to be clad in timber weatherboard, which makes it look silly.

          At precisely the same time my application was refused, there was an application to build a glass and concrete foyer facing the street with new rehearsal rooms and offices for the theatre complex in town. This was the “Winter Gardens” extensively rebuilt in the 1930s and again in 2000, but care was taken to preserve the view from the street. The old Victorian façade was to be demolished. This was in the centre of Great Malvern, opposite Great Malvern Priory, which is in a Conservation Area famed for its Victorian buildings and pretty well intact from modern development. They could not have chosen a more sensitive site, or a worse place to put a glass and concrete carbuncle. This application was approved.

    2. Yo Mr Grizzle

      Back in the day, when the Floral Dance happened, the Mayor of Helston approached the Commanding Officer
      of RNAS Culdrose and said that he did not object to the Officers taking part in the Dance, but would he not
      give the ‘normal’ days leave to the rest of the ‘ship’s company on Dance Day

      The CO replied, of course I will and then put on RN buses for the rest of the year to take their dependents in Falmouth to do their
      Shopping. This was back in the 1960’s when not so many cars were about

    3. Yo Mr Grizzle

      Back in the day, when the Floral Dance happened, the Mayor of Helston approached the Commanding Officer
      of RNAS Culdrose and said that he did not object to the Officers taking part in the Dance, but would he not
      give the ‘normal’ days leave to the rest of the ‘ship’s company on Dance Day

      The CO replied, of course I will and then put on RN buses for the rest of the year to take their dependents in Falmouth to do their
      Shopping. This was back in the 1960’s when not so many cars were about

    4. When our boys Christo and Henry were respectively aged 7 and 5 they were having a heated argument. As we tried to avoid ever using bad language in their hearing they had to use more imaginative terms of abuse or criticism which they had gleaned from their parents’ conversation about current affairs. When Christopher had made a particularly cutting remark Henry was almost apoplectic with rage and he had to think on his feet for the most devastating insult he could muster: “Y-y-y-you politician!” he said triumphantly.

      (This puts in the shade the effectiveness of those who seem to trade insults and downvotes with each other on this site in the evenings!)

      1. “This puts in the shade the effectiveness of those who seem to trade insults and downvotes with each other on this site in the evenings!”

        I think it is quite apparent to those of us on here, Rastus, who actually possess a brain—and know how to use it—that your sons are light years ahead in intelligence over those tedious miscreants whom you’ve just mentioned.

  22. 327927+ up ticks,
    Morning Each,
    Face facts,
    Wednesday 30 December: The Covid response is being stifled by an unimaginative.

    My take on it is far from being unimaginative these governance party’s led by the one that gave us major, the wretch cameron, mayday now johnson have been highly,
    treacherously, imaginative.

    In point of fact especially the last three decades they have,
    openly gone into political Aztec mode, they have, I truthfully believe, ripped the living beating heart out of England and to
    show their arrogance they oversee the Dover invasion force.

    You bring in the retired volunteers then that would give the
    existing team a seemingly much needed boost, but could also bring about a situation where you have MORE cowboys,( in the nicest possible way, medical staff) than redskins, and that would put a rather large spanner in the fear campaign.

    For this current society situation to continue keep in mind these party’s NEED your continuing support / vote.

    1. The Oslo chief medic has 3 reasons why there is a rise in virus cases here:
      – We spend more time indoors, so it’s easier to spread the virus
      – It’s cold outside, and the virus prefers that
      – The new English strain is more infectious
      His remedy? More lock-down (ie, staying indoors). See the top reason…

        1. Typical Socialist response: If socialism isn’t working, then they are not being socialist enough! Same with lockdown – it barely works, so more lockdown is required (even though it assists the infection…)!

        2. Morning Anne

          Cynical me asks I wonder what percentage of deaths are really due to DVT/ Pulmonary Embolism.. Keeping people confined to their homes , no exercise,and bad diagnosis ..

          Poor late Ma in law had a pulmonary embolism at home , we were visiting her at the time , she was still in bed and she had difficulty breathing , blue around the lips , very confused ( dementia ) I summoned paramedics ASAP,they administered clot busting stuff and oxygen and rushed her into hospital .. Oxygen treatment and clot busting drugs plus more treatment , because of her age , she was in hospital for about a month, then discharged back home then promptly had a very bad fall.

          We had to make some very grown up decisions 8 years ago . She died aged 91 , four years ago .

          1. When we finally get the public enquiry into this fiasco and the handling thereof, there are some questions to be answered.

            I know I’m spending far too much time sitting here, and not getting enough exercise, though we did go for a couple of walks when it was fine.

          2. Ditto, the same as me .

            Here in the village we are all being cautious , dog walks, few bods out on their horses , not much socialising .

            I will be doing some shopping late morning . Moh playing golf whilst the weather holds .

          3. Never been so unsocial at any time. Just the family (4 of us + 2 cats and, we think, a free-range mouse) rather limits the conversation. Mother is doolally and not a pleasure to talk to – when she answers the phone, that is – as she keeps on about wondering when dead relatives will be home. In-laws on Zoom was carp, as BiLs family only used the opportunity to tell the dog off some more (on Zoom? Seriously? Arsehole). Else, nobody visiting locally to anybody, nobody shopping (disaster for the shopowners), massive queues at the wine monopoly – gotta go later, out of wine. Sod-all to do outside other than dance in the dark & rain – so my arse has rooted itself to the sofa. Still, plenty time to catch up on zeds, and Firstborn got himself a wine fridge to mature his cheeses in – should have been £50, but was given it free of charge.
            Weird Christmas all over.

          4. Try a 1000 piece jigsaw, matey. Hours of harmless pleasure. The cats like it, too.

            We are half way through one we started ten days ago….

          6. I have two wine fridges. One sits atop the other. Got the first one for a £100 and the second from British Heart Foundation shop for £40. One is full of fizz and the other white wine and beer.

            When my Stinking Bishop cheese arrived i made room for it in the wine fridge so the smell didn’t contaminate everything in the other fridges.

            Sensible lad, your boy.

          7. I acknowledged this afternoon that I am totally unfit now; I had to push the Connemara to extend his slower paces (walk and trot) and it was seriously hard work. I was puffing like a grampus.

    2. I posted that yesterday, Belle. But you have missed the last line.

      “Hopefully I will be able to lick my own bollocks by the time this is over as well.” 🙁

  25. I suppose – looking on the bright side – that Tier 5 is just round the corner.

    When we will not be allowed to leave the house at all – and will all die from starvation.

    Millions of Covid dead…a prophecy come true.

    1. I think maybe, just possibly, that may well be the moment that people start getting a teensy bit annoyed about all of this. Perhaps.

      1. I should bluddy cocoa, Mum, we are far too passive and, when demonstrating, should include something to dispatch the police thugs.

    2. Tier 6 – the Police come round and shoot dead anyone stepping outside. Everyone else dies of starvation. But the NHS is saved!!! Yea! 🙂 No more waiting lists!

      Tier 7 – nuke ’em!

  26. 327927+ up ticks,
    Well that is very reassuring to all the pretendee tory’s, mayday is behind johnsons deal as she was when I likened it to a semi re-entry missile with mayday the intermediate section, behind johnson the nose cone.

  28. 327927+ up ticks,
    Surely these must be added to the mythical creatures list.

    Tory Brexiteers to back deal after ERG’s ‘Star Chamber’ says it passes the ‘acid test’ seemingly mayday inclusive.

  29. Boris the Wonder Dealer is live on TV, telling us how good it all is. He is quoting figures on fishing that have already been contradicted by the analysis of the fishermen’s associations. He has paid tribute to Ursula Von Der Leyen and his other friends in the EU…
    All we can hope for is that the next five years are used to prepare for a complete rupture with the EU.

    1. 327927+ up ticks,
      Morning HP,
      I believe an islamic ideology hand over will come about before an eu breakup.
      This via the lab/lib/con coalition party, it is on the parliamentary canteen menu.

      1. Bear in mind that the demographics show that France will be the first EU country where the majority are Muslim.

    2. Is the way that Boris Johnson speaks a sign that he has a speech impediment which is not his fault and with which we should sympathise – or is it indicative that he is just plain stupid and cannot cope with joined-up thinking?

      1. Hard to tell. He seems to have difficulty making a sensible, and comprehensible, speech. I wonder if he has had any training in addressing audiences?

      1. 327907+ up ticks,
        Afternoon NtN,
        The only topping I would accept is on cakes, but exceptions will, in future be made regarding politico’s, rope material.

  31. 327927+ up ticks,
    There are strong similarities between the vaccine and the deal,both rushed into far to fast with potential dire consequences in the near future.

    These pricks definitely need to be put under close scrutiny
    before irreversible damage is done.

    1. This is interesting on the subject of a possible Irish exit from the EU. If, as the EU feared, Brexit leads to other countries leaving the block then at what point will any of the restrictions which still remain after the ‘Boris deal’ be lifted.

      Remember the Dutch and the French both voted in referendums against the European constitution (aka The Lisbon Treaty). If these two countries leave then what about fishing in British waters – will it end completely and immediately? And how long before Germany is the only country left remaining in the EU!

      2. 327927+ up ticks,
        Morning R,
        If the eu disintegrated an hour after the deal was signed & found to be as many suspected treacherous, then it would at least show up the lab/lib/con coalition in it’s true colours.

      3. Former Taoiseach Leo Varadkar played hard ball for Brussels against Britain and Brexit. Now that game is over/ lost, it would take only a modest imposition of EU ‘harmonisation of taxes’ to destroy the main arrow in the Irish economic quiver – very low corporation tax – to severely damage Ireland’s exceptional economic growth.

        The Irish Finance Minister must toy with the idea of ‘Irexit’ from time to time …

  33. OT. We have been watching a quite good series of documentaries by ITV called “Great Art”.

    The last one was about Matisse (quite why cutting out paper shapes and sticking them on a wall is “great art” is beyond me, but that’s another isshoo).

    The art gallery luvvies made a great song and dance about how it had taken them 2½ years to “curate” the exhibition. As they preened themselves and made infinitesimal adjustments with rulers and looked ardently at the pictures, I recalled that they had taken longer to hang 25 pictures than the whole of the time it took to conceive, plan, mobilise, build, and put into action the Normandy Landings……

    Isn’t modern life just so thrilling…? And rewarding….

    1. Hello Bill,

      I saw some of that as well. I felt offended to think that these luvvy types could fool themselves as well as us!

      Bit like the Emperor’s new clothes really.

    2. ‘Morning, Bill. I am more than happy for the arty lot to organise whatever they like and to take as long as they like – provided it does not involve long and vigorous sucking on the public teat. We are technically broke, which should by now have greatly restricted the flow of public money onto their coffers.

    3. Think these sort of time comparisons can be useful in shaming organisations. Some years back the London Evening Standard published a letter of mine where I mentioned that TFLs refurbishment of tiny Elephant & Castle ticket office, the closure of which had caused considerable inconvenience because of having to exit from different station, had taken longer than construction of the Empire State Building.

  34. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3f4637f6fc74c89d6edf65ee04f40d6fc9ade117872737d3c081cc31678ec75c.png https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f73d0b4a529cf3c7a374c4f86002f95dcb6ad9e65896dea9ca67b01fabb2423d.png
    Strange, don’t you think, how the massed ranks of women luvvies and their Pinko cohorts (Greta, where are you?) are not taking to the streets of the world’s capitals and rioting to complain about the outrageous treatment of women in these countries?

        1. …and just the one jab (unless I have misunderstood) but only 70% effective. In comparison, I wonder how effective the annual ‘flu jab has been – not counting the occasion a few years ago when the wrong strains were selected by the manufacturer and Mrs HJ and I took to our beds on Christmas Eve with a memorable dose. That was not a happy Christmas, but at least we were around to celebrate it – and our survival – a couple of weeks later.

          ‘Morning, Clyde.

          1. Morning Hugh – it is still 2 jabs at the full strength dose but the first jab apparently gives sufficient immunity to allow more time between jabs – up to 2-3 months as I understood the BBC report. I will go for this vaccine when it is offered.
            The people who have had Covid-19 and survived must have immunity as not many , if any, have had a second attack of the virus. Herd immunity in the UK must be well established already yet Hancock will proudly impose more restrictions on us this afternoon.

          2. Same here, Clyde. Yes, the 2nd jab has been confirmed on the lunchtime news. As it happens I caught the virus at the end of Feb, it hung around for 3-4 days and displayed most of the now-familiar symptoms. I felt pretty ropey at the time but it soon cleared up, and with no after effects. Perhaps the winter dose of Vit D I have been taking for the past 5-6 years assisted? Who knows.

            I can’t see any easing for now, even though the figures here – if we trust them – have turned down nicely over the past week or so, and had started to do so before we were ‘promoted’ to T4. However, I can see no prospect of any reduction anywhere with new year’s eve almost upon us.

          3. I had the ‘flu jab last year (I “declined” this year); it made me feel ill and I had ordinary ‘flu in January, followed by Covid in February. I reckon my T cells should be good to fight off infection for a while.

        1. Our son has discovered that one. His usual group of chums is somewhat depleted when they go out.
          TBF, some are under the thumb of bed wetting wives.

  38. The BBC cut from Mrs May live in Parliament, having a go at Starmer, to Downing Street where some previously unknown “scientists”were presenting the Oxford-Astra-Zeneca vaccine. Dr June Raine, head of the Medicines and Healthcare Regulatory Agency (MHRA) gave a lengthy spiel.
    She was flanked by a couple of others. I did not catch both their names. One was Chinese. He is Prof Wei Shen Lim, chair of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation. He seems to be hugely influential as regards vaccination in the UK.
    Internet searches reveal nothing of his history, and nothing of where he came from, although he apparently is associated with Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust. A search of their website does not find him, perhaps he is based in the Chinese campus, although that cannot be accessed. He is The Man From Nowhere.
    Colour me paranoid but we are now going full steam ahead with a vaccine helped on its way by someone associated with the country that created the virus bioweapon and unleashed it on the world?
    This vaccine was apparently tested on over 20,000 people at some point and so that’s all OK. Unless you are old enough to remember Thalidomide, or aware enough to know of the vaccination disasters in India.

      1. Phew! Good job that AstraZeneca, Pfizer et al got that sorted out in advance. As these vaccines apparently will make women infertile, it could have cost them quite a bit.

        1. If the bit about making them infertile is true then it fits in with the Agenda 21 and the “removal” of whitey.

          1. It was mentioned on this blog in the last few days. Something about how the mechanics of the vaccine performs in a similar way to the processes which lead to pregnancy. It acts as an inhibitor. The little mushroom blobs on the virus, or something. This is not a simple vaccine like smallpox, but something more fundamental as it alters RNA supposedly permanently.

    2. 327927+ up ticks,
      Afternoon HP,
      It must have had despicable content the jennifer has upticked it in her usual down tick fashion.

      1. It is a very effective drug in a variety of circumstances. Like quite a few other drugs it is not suitable for use in the early stages of pregnancy, but it has few other drawbacks.

      2. 6,000 living victims? That seems low; I’ve come across a few, so the 6,000 total spread across Europe (?) seems on the low side.

        1. Estimates of 10 – 20,000 affected in total. Quite a large number died at, or shortly after, birth and the youngest will now be almost 60 so it might well be the case that a number of those who survived birth and early childhood have died in the intervening years.

          My mother was offered the drug when she was carrying me….

          1. That was a narrow squeak.
            The sad thing was, those effects only occurred during 2 weeks out the entire 40.

          2. Developmental disasters (large or small) generally occur between weeks 5 and 13, with 7 to 11 the period of greatest risk. After the end of the first trimester, for good or ill, most of it is unchangeable. Slightly scary.

            Mother decided that she wasn’t sick enough to need pills… or I might not be able to type this. And yes, it does give me pause from time to time.

      1. Jolly Good! I’ve already been there. Where was he born? Where was he educated? Well, nothing like that, is there?
        Do you really not detect any resonance between the sudden appearance of some people and the selection of George Blake for our security services?

        1. Well a quick look at the oldest of his publications shows that he was working at Nottingham Hospital back in 1997, so clever chaps these Chinese if they planted a sleeper in the UK at some point more than 23 years ago,

          1. Since, from his pictures, he doesn’t look more than 50 or so, it is quite likely that he trained at Nottingham. The possession of an oriental name does not preclude his being British by birth. But if he is an immigrant who has worked as a clinician and academic here for over 20 years that is no reason to deride him or his work.

          2. Possibly HK Chinese origin, but whatever his origin, I would have thought he’s the type of immigrant/ son of immigrants, some people posting here keep claiming to want.

          3. Agreed, but it’s indicative of the distrust of China that has grown up over the past couple of years that people are querying his origins and theorising as to where his loyalties lie.

            The chances are that he is part of the Hong Kong Chinese diaspora and glad not to be under the heel of the CCP.

          4. I found a reference to Singapore in his history too, I’m afraid I thoroughly dislike the scare-mongering that is taking over here. It’s not so much indicative of the distrust of China, as it is indicative of a general inability to understand science – of any sort.

          5. It goes further than that Jennifer, in my view. Take last night’s ‘to do’ I had with Sos; it’s a nasty tactic employed by some who can’t refute an argument, so they attack the person. So this professor is attacked because he appears to be of Chinese origin..

          6. Despite accusations I try very hard, within the confines of supporting fact as opposed to drivel, not to stir the pot or name names. I disapprove of those who write nasty things about others – so I don’t join in any nastiness or even justifiable accusations.

          7. You do realise that the Chinese authorities keep tabs on most of their citizens abroad, and likely actual operatives ‘pay them a visit’ when needed? I can’t remember the article, but I did read this quite recently.

            The operatives often threaten the citizen into doing things for them, ranging from keeping them abreast of developments in their field or company, to actively stealing secrets and proprietary information/technology, to saying things to nudge others into decisions favourable to the CCP.

            There are several instances in the US of long-term ‘operatives’, plus all those recently outed on that wikileaks type list that dissidents in China managed to smuggle out.

            People don’t have to BE a paid-up spy to do the dirty work of an oppressive regime. They just have to be threatened (personally, professionall or family/friends back home) enough to do their bidding.

      2. Working and publishing in the UK for well over a decade, given an award by the British Thoracic Society a few years ago for his work on pneumonia.

        For people who moan relentlessly about the cult of the personality to be so unpleasant about someone who wants to keep private life private seems, to say the least, ironic.

  39. Good News! Flu has been abolished!:
    “One of the most bizarre features of the alleged COVID-19 ‘global pandemic’ has been the mysterious disappearance of the seasonal flu in medical and public health record keeping. It’s as if the Flu just vanished into thin air after being the most common perennial seasonal respiratory virus.
    As it turns out, recorded seasonal influenza cases have literally nosedived by 98% across the globe.
    “The disappearing act began as Covid-19 rolled in towards the end of our flu season in March. And just how swiftly rates have plummeted can be observed in ‘surveillance’ data collected by the World Health Organisation (WHO),” reported the Daily Mail.

    WHO spokesperson, Dr Sylvie Briand, recently claimed during a press briefing that “literally there was nearly no flu in the Southern hemisphere” of the planet Earth in 2020, but gave no real explanation as to why. She then went on to extend this magical thinking saying that, “We hope that the situation will be the same in the Northern Hemisphere.”

    Truly extraordinary science by the health experts at the WHO.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/22a6ed874c640e262e398581e08f4683b793cd48878de9315c6943aec7ecf721.png

    As one BTL comment notes:

    “We are being forced to worship at the Altar of the Bill Gates of Hell”

    1. One Flu over the Cuckoo’s nest….their fictional storytelling is catching up with them….disappearing faster than the Oozlum bird.

      1. It’s rather hard to push the narrative of the NHS being overwhelmed by the Plague when they’ve just closed the Nightingale hospitals.

        1. The Nightingales are surge capacity and as things stand, the NHS doesn’t need surge capacity. That could change and the Nightingales could be re-opened with a few days notice.

          1. Really? there was a photo in the Mail of the empty building, suggesting that it can’t be brought back at a moment’s notice.
            Also they were saying that patients will have to be moved outside London due to being overwhelmed by THE PLAGUE, which I assume is what you mean by surge capacity.

            I’m quite prepared to believe that the Mail is lying…

          2. It took 8 days for the London Nightingale to be set-up from scratch, so to do the same again given the equipment is all in storage, would be less.

          3. Well I am not going to panic until the dead are stacked in the corridors of the Nightingale hospitals, and we are clearly nowhere near that situation now.

    2. Stephenroi, you could look back to yesterday’s comments from one of the less popular Nttlers and be enlightened. He/She uses the line I’ve seen elsewhere on this issue viz. “The flu figures are way down due to the measures taken to control Covid.” What is missing from that argument is, why then aren’t those measures also reducing Covid? That is of course if one believes the government figures on Covid.

      1. The answer is of course the increase in Covid cases is because folk aren’t wearing masks, washing their hands and social distancing….Oh hang on a minute…

      2. I suppose the official answer will be that covid is so much more huge, terrifying and dangerous than flu, that the heroic lockdowns are all that has brought it down to its current level…which funnily enough is somewhere around a bad flu year!

      3. ” What is missing from that argument is, why then aren’t those measures also reducing Covid?”

        Precisely. My thoughts exactly when I read the original comment.

    3. Funny that isn’t it? I suspect that the vast majority of the million or so people who have died of (or perhaps ‘with’) Covid would have died this year anyway, but we would have called it flu, or ‘natural causes.’ In 2020, every death is a Covid death!

  40. Is it a record? Within one minute of posting below I have no upvotes (not that unusual) but I do have one downvote. Woo-Hoo! I wonder who downvoted me?

    2. Having checked and it is of course the anti-anti-vaccinator with no argument of her own (or one she dare not voice).

      1. Indeed. A somewhat rhetorical question, just for fun. I seem to be on the farm book-keeper’s hit list.

      1. After some of the agro seen towards Jennifer in the evenings, a simple downvote can hardly be called intolerant. Time to practice what is preached here.

        Now about the “my ego doesn’t suffer from a downvote” assertions made by some yesterday.

    1. The sooner they all disappear up their ain folk, the better for the world of rational thinkers – like us?

    3. That is a very sobering article Anne. It’s like watching children in a playground – the relationships, the “she said this”, the whispering behind the back and the desire to be part of the “gang”. Really quite terrifying how easily it flows over people.

        1. The bigger problem is their addiction to “soshul meeja” which is neither sociable nor mediate!

          1. I don’t think that there has ever been a generation which hasn’t been written off by those who came before them… but here we still are. I’m inclined to think that the pattern is likely to continue for a few more centuries at least.

        2. This generation differs from those before as many of them do not interact other than over the meeja. Many will lack interpersonal skills and not be able to sense basic human nuances. This is not rebelling like other youth generations, it is a descent to stupidity.

  43. Early on during the great panic, some media commentators made much of OFCOM’s statement about how the media should behave, considering it to be restrictive and likely to inhibit criticism of policy. All I can find is this:

    We recognise that licensees will want to broadcast content relating to the Coronavirus and that dissemination of accurate and up-to-date information to audiences will be essential during the current situation. However, we remind all broadcasters of the significant potential harm that can be caused by material relating to the Coronavirus. This could include:
    • Health claims related to the virus which may be harmful.
    • Medical advice which may be harmful.
    • Accuracy or material misleadingness in programmes in relation to the virus or public policy regarding it.

    We will be prioritising our enforcement of broadcast standards in relation to the above issues. In these cases, it may be necessary for Ofcom to act quickly to determine the outcome in a proportionate and transparent manner, and broadcasters should be prepared to engage with Ofcom on short timescales.

    Ofcom will consider any breach arising from harmful Coronavirus-related programming to be potentially serious and will consider taking appropriate regulatory action, which could include the imposition of a statutory sanction.

    Source: https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0025/193075/Note-to-broadcasters-Coronavirus.pdf
    Repeated in modified form: https://www.ofcom.org.uk/tv-radio-and-on-demand/information-for-industry/guidance/broadcast-standards-and-coronavirus

    Was this all there was? I don’t think it’s particularly intimidating.

    1. Surely the thing is that never before has there been such a statement from Ofcom. aren’t we supposed to live in a democratic free-speech country? I don’t recall there ever being warnings like this before. Why do they deem it necessary to release a statement like this?

      1. Indeed, but I had a vague memory that there was a warning about ‘undermining public health messages’ which has slightly sinister overtones. Perhaps it was journalistic comment on the statement that I saw.

    2. All it says is that we will shut you up if we don’t like what you say. Just Like Facebook.

        1. Depends on the wording. However, if a couple of very big blokes turned up at the front door and said those words to me, I’d be a tad worried.

  44. Schools should start planning for double class sizes in the first forms across the country next year and allow all pupils to retake this year.

    1. On the face of it a helpful suggestion, but how do you separate the two year groups after the first year?
      I would consider doing amalgamations, but only for those who are most behind.

      One might combine that with allowing the most capable to move up a group.

      1. You’d have to have a double year for the rest of their school careers. It might make sense to allow parents to make the decision about whether they think their child should repeat or not.
        The government would NEVER allow parents to make any kind of decision though!
        In Germany, if your child is born on the border of the year group you can decide whether you think they should start school or delay a year.

        1. That was my point regarding separation of the two year groups after year 1. It could go right through to school-leaving.

          For me, the big problem is the haves and have nots. Those in need of the greatest support are likely to be the poorest and most disadvantaged children and the cycle will continue.

          The Government’s panic and the unions intransigence has created a real problem that could take years to resolve.

          I believe that many countries adopt similar approaches for those on the cusp of a year and some even start much later/older than the UK.

        2. My eldest son (December b’day) started school at four and moved up a year. He spent his entire schooldays in the year above his age-group, but it caught up with him at university – he did an extra year.

          1. Christo and Henry both skipped a year at school because they were both fluent readers at the age of 4. We home schooled them up to the age of 15 and brought them up to be bi-lingual. They then went to boarding schools in England so they got their IB or “A” levels at 17 and started university at that age. They were disappointed to get 2.1s rather than Firsts but Christo is now a design engineer in the aviation industry while Henry works with computers and is studying for an external M.Sc. in Computer Science. I think that the fact that they did much of their schooling while living on a boat helped them develop into very ardent readers. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/3351975/One-hull-of-a-school.html

      2. How do you seperate them? simple. Anything that didn’t put a certain skin colour first would cause another load of protests about “discrimination”.

    2. That would require organisation. I don’t think anyone apart from private industry and the Army is capable of that any more in the UK.

    3. Good morning Stormy

      The country should not worry about closing schools for a month or two, as school time could be increased by using Saturday as a schoolday , and school hours increased by one hour , and by reducing major holidays by a week or more .

      Within a few months , lost school time will be equalised.

    1. I can only get the headline, but

      Updated advice from the JCVI following the authorisation of the
      Oxford/AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine has said that pregnant women should
      be considered for vaccination if they are at high risk of exposure to
      COVID-19 or at risk of serious complications.

      That rather suggests that if they are not at high risk or are not at risk of serious complications, then they should avoid it. Lesser of two evils.

      It also suggests that the O/AZ vaccine might be OK but fails to mention others.

      1. Update from https://www.gov.uk/government/news/statement-from-the-uk-chief-medical-officers-on-the-prioritisation-of-first-doses-of-covid-19-vaccines
        “The JCVI has also amended its previous highly precautionary advice on COVID-19 vaccines and pregnancy or breastfeeding. Vaccination with either vaccine in pregnancy should be considered where the risk of exposure SARS-CoV2 infection is high and cannot be avoided, or where the woman has underlying conditions that place her at very high risk of serious complications of COVID-19, and the risks and benefits of vaccination should be discussed. Those who are trying to become pregnant do not need to avoid pregnancy after vaccination, and breastfeeding women may be offered vaccination with either vaccine following consideration of the woman’s clinical need for immunisation against COVID-19. The UK Chief Medical Officers agree with this advice.”

      1. Ahh, ‘my bad’ to use that horrid phrase.

        Updated advice from the JCVI following the authorisation of the Oxford/AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccination has said that pregnant women should be considered for vaccination if they are at high risk of exposure to COVID-19 or at risk of serious complications.

        The new guidance has not changed the list of priority groups for vaccination (see below). However, as reported earlier on Wednesday, the committee is now recommending that as many people in the high risk groups as possible be vaccinated with a first dose of either the Oxford/AstraZenca or Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.

        The JCVI has also updated its advice for breastfeeding women, saying that they should also now be offered the vaccine.

        The JCVI said that while there was no known risks associated with pregnant or breast feeding women receiving non-live vaccines there was ‘insufficient evidence to recommend routine use of COVID-19 vaccines during pregnancy’.

        However, it said it was now advising that vaccination should be considered for pregnant women where the risk of exposure to SARS-CoV2 infection is high and cannot be avoided, or where the woman has underlying conditions that put them at very high risk of serious complications of COVID-19.’

        ‘In these circumstances, clinicians should discuss the risks and benefits of vaccination with the woman, who should be told about the absence of safety data for the vaccine in pregnant women,’ the guidance added.

        For breastfeeding women the guidance says that ‘the developmental and health benefits of breastfeeding should be considered along with the woman’s clinical need for immunisation against COVID-19, and the woman should be informed about the absence of safety data for the vaccine in breastfeeding women.’

        Either of the two approved vaccines can be considered for use in pregnant or breastfeeding women.

        The guidance has also been updated to say that women do not need to avoid pregnancy after vaccination – previous guidance had suggested women should try to avoid conceiving for three months after receiving the vaccine.

  47. 327927+ up ticks,
    Live Coronavirus latest news: Longer interval between jabs key to Oxford vaccine success, regulators say,

    Ogga would say if that be the case then let the interval be
    10/15 years.

  48. I see from the front page of today’s Telegaffe that “Professor Neil Ferguson, a member of Nervtag, said … “clearly no one wants to keep schools shut. But if that’s the only alternative to having exponentially growing numbers of hospitalisations ..”

    Why, in the name of all that’s holy, is anyone listening to this cretin and his predictions – I can’t remember him ever being correct!

    2. Agreed, especially now that’s he’s part of a ridiculously named organisation that sounds like something Ian Fleming would have dreamt up!

  49. Gove thanking Barnier, live in Parliament. Also thanking the “the thousands of civil servants” who got us here.

    Sometimes I believe that I’ve flipped into an alternate Universe.

    2. He probably thinks it better to not rub peoples noses in it. Personally i would have given them a good spanking.

    3. He’s joking. He’s got a great sense of the ridiculous.

      He made a similarly humorous speech when Bercow was ejected.

  50. Now that we have (hopefully) ‘got Brexit done’ our next task as a nation must be to ‘Get Covid Done.’ My opinion has always been that we should have shielded the vulnerable (if they wished to be shielded) and let the rest of us get on with our lives. With vaccines being rolled-out as we speak, what exactly is the justification for continuing to restrict the lives of millions of healthy people? Or for preventing children from going back to school?

    Many people have lived in a happy little bubble this year, where that nice ‘Dishy Rishi’ will pay for everything. We need to wake up, realise that there is more to life than the bloody R number, un-shutter our businesses and get back to living life again.

    1. 327927+ up ticks,
      Morning JK,
      The polling booth says NO.

      If any consolation I am in complete agreement with you.

  51. MPs have overwhelmingly approved the Brexit trade deal to pave the way
    for the UK-EU agreement to come into force at 11pm tomorrow.

      1. Doubt it. Ministers are renowned for only reading four bullet points on one side of A4. More and their heads explode.

        1. Poor dears, they’ve really had to work hard, haven’t they.

          Wonder how they’ll get on making decisions on things like legislation? No more rubber stamping for them. Do we think they have the wherewithal to consider the pros and cons? No we don’t, they haven’t had to for a long long time.

          Maybe they will concentrate on getting rid of the stupid tiers and encourage/send people back to work? No, silly thought. Still squabbling over “they’re in tier 2 while we’re in tier 3, it’s not fair” stupidity. Get rid of all tiers.

      1. Ho ho – the motorway was closed.

        I have walked dozens of times along that road – the building to the rear is the Monaco FC stadium.

  55. 327927+ up ticks,
    I do honestly believe the decent peoples of these Isles have been struck a political blow from this make believe, pretendee tory party & helpers from which their kids kids will find in very hard to live under and recover from.

    1. 327927+ up ticks,
      O2O,
      These houses of parliament are proving to be the biggest dunny on the planet, with at least 521 political @rseholes active at any one time.

  56. In 4 days Cornwall’s gone from Tier 1 to Tier 2 to Tier3. Soon, to bypass Tier 4 and go directly to 24/7 Curfew.

        1. She – who moved from London to Cornwall – wrote an article complaining bitterly – and very rudely – about people who, er, moved from London to Cornwall

          1. Look peasants (not you and MR of course) the Rules are

            You Do as I Say, Not as I DO

            Gorrit, good, now back to London you cretins

          2. What’s the chances she breaks the rules and then justifies them for her ‘special circumstances’? Journos have surpassed themselves this year to actually be less well regarded than politicians, lawyers and celebs.

          5. This one. Remember, she is a London journalist who is one of the very people who have pushed up house prices to unaffordable levels.

            “Here in Tier 1 Cornwall we’re already angry about Christmas guests

            Outsider greed deprived locals of affordable housing here, so forgive us if we’re more than a little tetchy about Tier 3 visitors

            Tanya Gold15 December 2020 • 7:00pm

            Londoners are now in Tier 3 and a long Christmas break in Cornwall (still Tier 1) must be cancelled, though people are, for now, permitted here from December 23 to 27. My extended family won’t be coming though. They can’t face the roads and the Christmas lapse in rules is looking increasingly like a poisoned chalice. Who will feast before a wave of sickness, a Masque of the Red Death?

            But we needn’t wait for Christmas. Visitors from Tier 3 lands are here already, camping in Tier 1 Cornish holiday cottages, shopping and eating, sometimes even boasting that they “got through” before the rules changed.

            There is much local anger. Most of it is due to the pandemic and the obvious impact an outbreak would have on Cornwall. We have an ageing and sometimes infirm population of 500,000 – retirees flock to Cornwall – and only one major hospital, at Treliske.

            It is true visitors brought no outbreak with them in summer, but that is probably because people stayed outside, and locals avoided the places where tourists eat and shop – the lovely and expensive seafood shacks and artisanal shops.

            This brings me to the major point: the pandemic exposed something about Cornwall, and why the anger against outsiders is fierce here. Tourism – the wrong kind of tourism – does not benefit the Cornish at all. It is simply all the duchy has – so do you take a little, or do you take nothing?

            Behind the myths that people make about Cornwall – written by affluent incoming novelists, for whom the duchy means freedom – is a reality that is as hard as granite: this is one of the poorest regions in Europe, and tourism, as it is, makes it worse for some. You won’t see it on the harbourside in St Ives but look up the hill (which you probably won’t do for staring at Virginia Woolf’s lighthouse) and you will find a housing estate in which the child poverty rate is over 35 per cent.

            One third of Cornish children under five live in insecure and often very poor rented housing, from which it is impossible to form a stable and thriving economic unit – when all your money goes on rent, how do you save for a house? The answer is: you don’t.

            Why is this happening? There are three elements.

            Work in tourism is seasonal and ill-paid; the average Cornish salary is £10,000 below the national average.

            Tourism pushes up prices so locals cannot afford to eat in local restaurants and shop in local shops. They cannot park in local car parks which are, in the glut of summer, necessary and extortionate.

            And, finally, and most grievously: the housing market. It used to be that if you loved a place you came on holiday and you stayed in a hotel. For me it was Treyarnon Bay Hotel near Padstow, where I spent my childhood summers in what seemed like a faded palace of dreams.

            Cornwall is full of budget hotels and holiday parks. But, people thought, why do that when you can buy a charming house that will only go up in value? Why pay for your holiday at all, when you can fund it with investment?

            Now the average price of a property here is almost £300,000. Greed destroyed the Cornish housing market – for the price of a hotel room those native to a duchy outsiders say they love were sold out.

            You might say: but you can do that, so why not? Of course, you can do that: but should you? That will be your decision, but you cannot then blame the Cornish locals for losing their customary grace, just a little, when those who have deprived locals of secure housing now threaten to bring a pandemic to their doors.”

          6. She seems to have rehashed some of that in an Unherd article I read from the grdening one – she was mainly on about food poverty and sharing left-overs.

          10. Look peasants (not you and MR of course) the Rules are

            You Do as I Say, Not as I DO

            Gorrit, good, now back to London you cretins

    2. Does that ‘Tier 4’ also apply to a fishing boat, anchored in the Western Approaches and fully stocked with food and boozy stuff?

      1. To be honest, booze and fishing (at the same time at least) aren’t a good mixture. In early June when we had our 1st charter trip with our regular skipper, I smuggled onboard 5 cold bottles of Corona beer and produced them after we’d finished cleaning the catch. It was a very pleasant end to a lovely day. 4 happy anglers and a great skipper.

    3. Seems Derbyshire has just jumped into Tier 4, like so many other areas – this lunacy needs to stop!

    1. Ah ha!! So we’re going to be used as guinea pigs to make sure that the rhesus monkeys to be used in the testing will not be at risk. Ingenious!

  60. It’s a great pity that those who are so enthusiastic to have lockdowns, and MPs and government advisors in particular, don’t find their salaries slashed at every level of tiering. Tier 2 -20%, tier 3 -40% tier 4 -60%.

    It might concentrate their minds and allow them to see just what it is really like for the people at the sharp end that they are supposedly protecting for their own good.

    1. Agreed. I said right at the beginning that people would stop clapping us (ennaitchess) when they realised we were the only people getting paid. Indeed paid more for many who are working overtime.

        1. Call out the instigators
          Because there’s Covid in the air
          We’ve got to get it sooner or later
          Because the Vaccination’s here, and you know it’s not right
          And you know that it’s not right
          We are gonna get it together
          We are gonna to get it together now
          Lock up the streets and houses
          Because there’s Covid in the air
          We’ve gonna get it sooner or later
          Because the Vaccination’s here, and you know it’s not right
          And you know that it’s not right

      2. Those on the front line, be they NHS workers, shop workers, delivery people etc., deserve the praise they get.

        I don’t like the back-room people, who have virtually no chance of catching it because of their jobs, riding on the back of them.

  61. 327927+ up ticks,
    Cannot verify if fact or not that the johnson chap has been made , on account of the deal dealings,
    CinC of the 77th Bengal Lancers, if fact I do believe it to be well deserved.

      2. I’ve been a certified fan of the exemplary products of Fuller, Smith & Turner for decades. I do fear for the future of their brews now that they’ve been taken over by Japs.

          2. Come now, I’m sure a trencherman like yourself will need a generous helping of neeps and tatties 😉

          3. Ex-trencherman, please! I’m back on starvation rations, one-meal-a-day from Jan 1.

            I have to confess though that if I could source a haggis here, even a half-decent one, I’d have the whole hog: haggis, neeps, tatties and a wee dram. I might even combine the neeps and tatties into a clapshot.

          4. http://www.cockburns-haggis.co.uk/

            Someone was praising these very highly a day or two ago. I don’t know if they deliver overseas and their website is currently down but it would be worth taking a look in a day or two. You’ve got 26 days to source one after all.

      1. 327927+ up ticks,
        Evening M,
        Himself the Cin C would be following in camerons
        footsteps & pig husbandry, when approaching a pigs head on a platter.

        What I cannot understand is how do these types
        one after tother get to run a nation ?

          1. 327827+ up ticks,
            M,
            Well appreciated I bet, but I don’t know what the wretch C mindset was on his toolkit approach to the porker on the platters head.

          2. Mine likes those, but I couldn’t find any in the shops when I tried to buy him some. Not halal, I presume 🙂

  62. MPs vote to support Brexit deal by 521 to 73.
    I expect remainers will claim this is too small a margin

    1. You mean the regain British sovereignty ”Brexit deal” which gives up British sovereignty for crumbs from the EU’s table.. ?

      That crumby ”Brexit deal” ?

        1. Holy Smoke. I’ve just nipped over to the DM and discovered that’s Paul McCartney.
          I thought it was the Spiderwoman succumbing to dementia.
          That is just plain tragic – especially to us girlies who thought Paul was the dishy one.

          1. Scary isn’t it? We should be grateful he is no longer sporting the Cherry Blossom Ox Blood hair dye!

          2. Twenty odd years ago as I was driving to Colchester when Paul McCartney pulled out of Nayland Golf Club and followed me for several miles.

            He was driving a Burgundy coloured Bentley. It struck me at the time that his hair was the same colour as the bodywork.

          5. That’s who they say it is but are we sure?

            Surely the media are quite capable of using a photo of some old dear instead of McCartney, after all it is the DM.

    1. I found this quite interesting. He works as a gardener to supplement his writing and sees the liberal lefties comfortably ensconced “working from home”, shielded from unemployment, nice guaranteed pensions, “worried” about climate change, able to afford private education for their children and many of the things lefties seem to go for, private education being possibly the greatest hypocrisy of the left. I’m pretty sure these people do not live in the real world or, at least, the world that the majority of Brits inhabit. So many Labournpoliticians send their children to private school and yet couldn’t wait to demolish grammar schools.

    2. I got as far as “exit the kitchen” and stopped. Anyone who is crass enough to say that is not worth reading. Pah!

  65. That’s me for this cool day. Got to 7ºC – but riding the bike for three miles was hard going. Tomorrow is going to be much colder. So we hope to finish the jigsaw.

    Have a jolly evening. There is a version of “Uncle Vanya” on BBC4 tonight – black woman playing the main female part, of course. Frankly, I was surprised it hadn’t been renamed “Aunt Vanya”….. The MR has set the recorder….

    A demain.

        1. I did Monet’s waterlilies earlier this year. It was a good exercise in studying the painting but the hardest jigsaw I’ve ever done.

          1. I think it must be the lighting. In this modern era of led lights, the pieces all appear to be flat single coloured pieces.

            Maybe in the days of a nice warming incandescent light, the pieces had texture and tone.

    1. The whole Covid saga and the collusion of our politicians with Soros, Gates and Co stinks to high heaven. The way in which billions have been thrown at Pharma companies, dodgy PPE suppliers, never used Nightingale centres, SAGE advisers with share interests in Pharma companies, Imperial College with its embedded Chinese and the discredited Ferguson, Rishi Sunak whose venture capitalist company is heavily invested in Pharma, the shambolic ‘world beating’ Test and Trace run by Dido Harding (a woman famed for one of the largest security breaches when CEO of Talk Talk), lockdown measures which will have killed ten times more than those its measures are supposed to have saved.

    2. Damned if they do damned if they don’t.

      Our “experts” are ravaging the man in charge of vaccine distribution for wondering about the value of just giving a single jab to twice as many people.

      Not that it matters if .1 or .2 percent get vaccinated.

      Not exactly just following the science are they?

  67. Here’s a new game –
    Things not to buy after having the vaccination

    Long playing records,
    Copy of War & Peace,
    Easter presents.

    2. I read War & Peace aged 24 when in hospital with meningococcal septicaemia. I was isolated, not expected to recover, in pain and bored. Matron took pity and let me have her b/w portable tv in my room but Tolstoy was better.

        1. Christmas 1979. The ambulance came in the early hours of Boxing Day morning. No, not much fun. One memory of it is one of my nieces, just a wee girl then, standing at the foot of the bed saying, “Is that OUR Sue”?

    1. “The planet is fragile”, seems to be the tell tale phrase repeated a number of times in that piece.

      2. The planet ain’t fragile, it’s us. If we were wiped out tomorrow by a plague, a proper plague, the planet, and all the plants and animals, would be laughing. The planet has survived many mass extinctions, and will survive many more.

    3. Curiously Bill and Melinda were predicting just that, each with a snide grin on their ugly mugs. They added that the world would have to get used to vaccinations after the ‘next one’.

      Two more odious creatures never walked the Earth.

      1. Don’t forget Mr Blair – I’m sure he will be disappointed not to be in the same company….

  70. 327927+ up ticks,
    The johnson bloke could not be clearer, build.build,build, the lab/lib/con voting members are so tunneled visioned they do NOT believe their own leaders.
    The wretch cameron telling them the politico’s were ALL in it together, & he was Thomas Peppers role model, no members believed him.

    In the eyes of the lab/lib/con coalition party top man of this moment, johnson, re-set = resettlement of as many potential
    troops as can get into a landing craft, destination DOVER.

    The build,build,build program, immigrants building for immigrants is gaining strength daily 9000 plus from Dover alone.

    ENGLAND WILL NEED TO BUILD OVER 100K HOUSES PER YEAR TO KEEP UP WITH MASS MIGRATION.

    3. Are they displaying menus showing fish is definitely still on the menu for the foreseeable future?

  72. Latest Breaking News – Sturgeon announces that everyone in Scotland to be cryogenically frozen until all signs of the virus have disappeared.

          4. Hoots mon, see you Jimmy, it’s a braw bricht moonlit nicht the nicht.

            As you can see, I’m a plastic Jock.

  74. The Speaker just told Jeremy Hunt off for not adhering to the HoC dress code when on Zoom – priceless!

    3. I prefer MS Teams – you can insert the background of your choice. So, one meeting you can be in the desert, the next, the jungle, the next the arctic… keeps me happy, anyhow, and I hate video meetings.

      1. My nephew called me up on Skype yesterday with his little ones… not nearly as good as being there, but much better than not seeing them at all.

        I’ve got Skype, Zoom, Teams and GotoMeeting on this machine via various organisations. I’m not very keen on video meetings either, but needs must when the devil drives.

        1. These days I spend about 4 hours a day or more in video meetings. Hate it, so not motivating.

          1. No, I don’t have to do that. I use Skype to communicate with mother as she finds it easier to hear when she can also see – and it was lovely to see the small people (6 and 2¾) even if it would have been better to be able to cuddle them. But other video meetings are “now and again” rather than all day every day. I can imagine that it gets very wearing.

          3. They are OK for information exchange, but as far as team-building or creative work goes, they are not much good.
            Even scribbling on the whiteboard is compex on TEAMS – I can do it using my MS Surface home pc, but not the work PCs, as they don’t have a touch screen. My oppo & I worked very creatively in business development around our office taht seems to be built of whiteboards!
            There’s also the lack of social contact, and just walking to & from the station to commute that I miss.

    1. It is difficult not to conclude that these draconian measures are more to stop Brexiteers celebrating and Remainers protesting on 31st December / 1st January.

  76. Evening, all. The only people now in Tier 1 are on the Isles of Scilly. We’ve been shoved into Tier 3 and there is no way I’ll be going to Wolverhampton to see my horse run next week as that’s in Tier 4. Everything is shut (except the borders, almost certainly). They need their heads examined and a short, sharp shock.

  77. ALMOST 300 new homes will need to be built every single day to cope with current levels of immigration, new research has found.

    Over half of the extra homes needed in England until the early 2040s would be the result of immigration, according to findings by Migration Watch UK.

    The think tank, which campaigns for lower levels of immigration, says this would be the equivalent of 107,400 new homes per year – or one every five minutes.

    It has warned that after the Covid crisis, net migration is likely to return to the hundreds of thousands witnessed over the past five years despite the end of EU freedom of movement.

    Migration Watch UK says numbers are unlikely to significantly reduce given the range of various uncapped migration routes being opened up under the UK’s new Australian-style points-based immigration system, which comes into effect on January 1.

    It has complained that the government’s serious weakening of work visa rules for citizens in four-fifths of all countries across the world, alongside decaying enforcement and the introduction of yet more uncapped avenues into the UK will fail to reduce net migration, which is the difference between the number of people coming to the UK and those leaving.

    Its analysis of Office for National Statistics data found the impact of the current arrival numbers alone would drive the need for nearly 2.7 million extra homes between 2018 and 2043.

    This is equal to about nine cities the size of Glasgow.

    BULLDOZE COUNTRYSIDE
    Even if immigration fell to 2013 levels of around 190,000 per year, the impact of immigration alone would still account for 46 per cent – 1.7 million of the total 3.7 million homes estimated to be needed under that scenario by the early 2040s.

    This is 67,800 per year, or 165 homes every day.

    But if net migration levels reverted to last year’s level of 263,000 then it would drive the need for 294 more homes per day.

    This is over half of the 519 daily homes required – a total of 4.7 million by 2043 that are projected to be needed to accommodate soaring housing demand.

    Migration Watch UK warned that the equivalent arrival of a new city from overseas every year will add huge pressure on communities up and down the UK to bulldoze countryside – even in “protected” greenbelt land – in order to make way for housing.

    Alp Mehmet of Migration Watch UK, said the alarming scale of the figures showed the need for tighter immigration control to tackle the housing crisis facing the UK

    https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/13602832/homes-built-300-immigration-levels/?utm_term=Autofeed&utm_campaign=sunpoliticstwitter&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1609291416

    Of course , as we all know, when you crowd people in so tightly , and introduce thousands of foreigners, what else can you expect , a blooming plague.

    1. 327927+ up ticks,
      Evening TB,
      what was that party,the far right,racist, knuckle dragging , skinhead,
      fruitcakes called, flippers,slippers, something like that, they were the only ones I can think of who kept calling for “controlled immigration” all in vain.

    2. An obvious question would be to ask how long until all of the existing agricultural land is used up if you go ahead and build everyone a house.

      It will take a lot of windmills to power that lot

      1. By the time they have finished planting the wrong sort of trees in the most unsuitable places and re-wilding the grade 1 cereal land, there won’t be any agricultural land left to build houses on. The beavers and lynx and wolves that they want to turn loose won’t need windmills.

        1. If only you were joking but rewilding is big business now.

          And I thought that I was being cynical.

          1. Don’t get me wrong, there are places where more trees would be an asset to everyone – but they have to be the kind right trees, planted in the right way, in the right places – and, frankly, they would be better without beavers except in a very limited number of places – beavers in Scotland are already creating far more problems than they solve. The vast block planting of the 1950s and 60s was disastrous and the timber it has produced is worth less than the price of felling it in most places. We need native trees, intermingled with grazing land – and for that we need to be able to make some money out of the grazing animals.

            As for re-wilding. I can’t speak for Canada, I know some Canadian history but not nearly enough to start laying down the law; but I do know that in the UK nothing has been “wild” for centuries. We have a man made, industrial landscape (farming, after all, is an industry despite all the people who would like it to be twee and useless) and we have had it for at least a thousand years. The idiots who want to “re-wild” it, don’t even have a clue what it was like when it was wild before (despite the number who will tell you that they do). It certainly wasn’t anything like what they envisage. The great “Caledonian Forest” was mostly scrub pine about 6 – 8 feet high and there was heather growing all through it, so the trees were anything but dense.

            Re-wilding, in places like mid-Wales, would mean driving most of the people out. It is agriculture which creates the landscape that people want to visit, we are never going to be able to offer the spectacular eco-tourism they predict and even the hardiest hill-walker hardly wants to have to use a machete to get through the brambles at every step, or to wade through head-high bracken being devoured by starving ticks. Most of the wildlife won’t thrive either, bracken is virtually the equivalent of a desert. Without farming and without tourists there will be nothing to live on at all so there will be no people – so where will they all go?

            Frankly the political ideas currently prevailing about countryside management terrify me far more than the threat of “climate change” – albeit the climate is changing.

    3. With all the business failures and people now working from home, they will be able to convert the office blocks to flats for the incomers.

    4. Clearly MW don’t think the Covid Grim Reaper is going to thin the population to any degree….

  80. Good night all.

    Went to make my usual G&T only to discover I’d run out of lemons (or they’re hiding). Rescued the situation with slices of dried clementine which turned it into a fantastic variation.

    3. Ah ha

      I have a Christmas wreath on the wall next to the front door , it has dried orange slices amongst the greenery , have you got the same type of wreath , Peddy?

    5. If only I’d known, Peddy. I bought some lemons recently for use with pancakes. There are still a couple of shrivelled specimens (lemons, that is) in my fridge. You could have come over to my place and taken those two. :-))

      Good night, sleep well, btw.

    2. “I want to see us fashion grant and loan schemes for our farmers to grow more food, revolutionising the vegetable and salad counters with more local produce from extended growing seasons with glasshouse and polytunnel capacity.”

      Cover the countryside in them…great.

    1. 327927+ up ticks,
      Evening PP,
      Re-set = resettling 9000 plus via Dover
      potential troops WILL be expanded on from the 1/1/2021.

  85. 327927+ up ticks,
    Three-Quarters of England Under Top Restrictions Tier by New Year’s Eve.

    By consent surely via the polling booth.

        1. I have about 3 small rubber-covered binoculars, ranging from 8x to 12x that travel with me almost everywhere. Same with the monocular – at least it’ll be with you when you want it.

          1. I have a pair of Leitz 10 x 40 BAN Trinovid binoculars (from 1988); a pair of Leica 10 x 42 Ultravid HD binoculars (from 2009); an Opticron 60mm telescope with 30x eyepiece; and a Questar 3½” catadioptric (mirror) telescope with 50mm (extendable to 80mm) and 80mm (extendable to 130mm) eyepieces.

            “Leica” (Leitz Camera) is the brand name of Ernst Leitz, Wetzlar.

    2. That product keeps popping up on numerous websites, BB for instance. If you search for “Is this $47 monocular a scam?” you get loads of entries saying it isn’t, all of which link to the site selling the darned thing! I once managed to find a reputable US photography site which reviewed it. It was extremely unfavourable. For example, the vignetting (darkening towards the edges) is very noticeable and worse than a cheap telescope. Even the claimed magnification (10x) according to the advertisement is lower than the accompanying photographs would suggest (50x?). Basically, it’s a case of ‘you get what you pay for’. Not exactly a scam, but pretty close.

      1. I would love to show you one taken through mine but I’ve had constant cloudy weather for the past three weeks! :•(

      1. Just take a simple perusal of any American internet site. Hysteria and hyperbole have taken over.

          1. It is most of the time (I use Adblock Plus); however, there are a growing number of sites that ‘detect’ its use and will not permit you in until you disable it on their sites.

          2. #metoo
            Most of the time I don’t go there if they won’t allow it. Just occasionally, I do, if they provide me with something that is otherwise “free”.

          4. I’ve never heard of that one but, looking it up, it apparently doesn’t work on Apple Macs, which is the only computer system I am familiar with.

    1. Waddesdon Manor, one of several mansions built in a French style. Others are Wrest Park in Silsoe Bedfordshire and Bowes Museum in County Durham.

      The old guy will be a Rothschild.

      1. “I care not what puppet is placed upon the throne of England to rule the Empire on which the sun never sets. The man who controls the British money supply controls the British Empire, and I control the British money supply.”

      2. That is so French style that it could be a chateau in the Loire.

        Certainly a lot more attractive than the large chateau style monstrosities that we see built over here

          2. That example is a bit ‘busy’ for my taste.

            Waddesdon is an eclectic assemblage of features derived from the great Chateaux of the Loire, Chenonceau, Chambord, Chaumont, Villandry, D’Ambois and Fortress Royale de Chinon in particular.

        2. Yup. Some of the Waddesdon interiors are imported from French chateaux.

          The gardens and Aviary are particularly impressive. The last time I was there Parrots were free to fly and perch on the park trees.

    2. Waddesdon Manor; that’s Jacob, fourth Baron Rothschild (84) with Boris …

      Neither Eton – nor the girl friend – have taught Boris to keep his hands out of his pockets …

  88. How did we all get here as refugees from the DT when they closed their comments column , to being supporters of Farage in the early days to then being Brexiteers , then voting out of the EU, then waiting patiently, discussing , campaigning , putting the government right , chopping Cameron into little political pieces , then rolling on the floor with pain and anxiety watching the Maybot fluff and stumble over our vote to leave …

    All those frustrations and anger .. remember… but now this .. watching the economy crumble .. after Pandora’s box of Chinese delicacies let loose the most ferocious challenge to health since the great polio outbreak 70 years ago .

    What next ..

    Why has life become grimmer than grim..We should be laughing and smiling , we should be feeling triumphant , celebrating ..

    We have listened to each other , discussed, argued a bit , laughed , supported, sympathised and influenced , some of you have endured HUGE health problems and won, some of you have lost and grieved , and we have grieved with you.

    It feels now as if we are sliding around , hanging onto each other, yet there is more wisdom amongst all of you than this shoddy Parliament and House of Lords .

    Even if we are saying goodbye to the EU, their legacy will still linger and influence , and it will be decades before we are free from their influence , and many of us won’t reap the benefit .

    Sadly the UK spirit will be watered down and strongly coloured , and many of you will have observed huge changes to your own particular landscapes in the past 20 years .

    What are they ?

    Sorry I have dribbled on a bit … I was trying to find a suitable piece of music or a song to match this misery

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5myGRYm_2pg

    1. If you are talking literally about landscapes, T_B, then I have seen virtually all the green spaces built on in my local town and there is more housing planned for the couple that remain.

      2. 327927+ up ticks,
        Evening C,
        But we have had decades of the same via GE after GE so agreement must be a controlling element among the electorate.

      3. In Braintree District we have averted developments in my small village. The chap next door was a Braintree District councillor and wished to build several ‘executive’ residences on the site of some old chicken sheds behind my mediaeval listed property, outwith the village development boundary and outwith the tightly drawn conservation area.

        The bastard had got his mates on the Braintree District council to agree to move the village development boundary unknown to the Parish Council on which he sat.

        I fought the shit over a five year period and eventually Historic England highlighted the site as completely inappropriate for any development whatsoever. Even then his Masonic mates regrouped and forced a vote to endorse his proposals, a vote denied by the Planning committee chairman.

        I recommend that everyone attends council planning meetings to see for themselves the slick developer suits sucking up to the corrupt local politicians. This is a blight on our country.

      4. In Braintree District we have averted developments in my small village. The chap next door was a Braintree District councillor and wished to build several ‘executive’ residences on the site of some old chicken sheds behind my mediaeval listed property, outwith the village development boundary and outwith the tightly drawn conservation area.

        The bastard had got his mates on the Braintree District council to agree to move the village development boundary unknown to the Parish Council on which he sat.

        I fought the shit over a five year period and eventually Historic England highlighted the site as completely inappropriate for any development whatsoever. Even then his Masonic mates regrouped and forced a vote to endorse his proposals, a vote denied solely by the casting vote of the Planning committee chairman.

        I recommend that everyone attends council planning meetings to see for themselves the slick developer suits sucking up to the corrupt local politicians. This is a blight on our country.

      5. Same here. What used to be a charming old market town, with gardens in the centre, has now become a pink-paved, concreted, over-developed mess with a big supermarket sucking the life out of the high street.

    2. Cheer up.

      We the English are indomitable. The fools trying to deceive us will come to a sticky end. I have an unshakeable belief in natural justice. I also have a reserve supply of doll fetishes and a large pin cushion for emergencies. I will be working on Hancock next week so he should meet an unfortunate accident and be dead by the first of April.

    3. What next?
      I would like to suggest that a personable conservative leader comes to power somewhere and leads a worldwide anti Davos rebirth of sensible values. That is too much to dream of so surely we are about to see the green new future delivered by the “science is settled” experts who will ignore the disintegrating economy.

      Other plus side, you will be able to watch Trudeau dragging canada down this woke hell hole well before Carrie persuades boris to do it.

      1. The US election has just shown what will happen should any such leader look like getting into power.

        1. Personable? Trump continues to alienate other conservative leaders in his own country, let alone worldwide.

          Look at the latest attack on the Georgia Secretary of State. Trump accused him of being controlled by the Chinese because his brother Bob works for a Chinese company. Really? Never mind that he doesn’t have a brother Bob.

          All the US election showed was that many voters were not impressed by an ego driven salesman.

          1. I know you don’t like him, but he is not as bad as you think. If you understand how he ticks, he’s OK.

    4. So sorry to read that you are so sad and miserable, Maggie. I hope that a good night’s sleep will restore your spirits. The darkest night is followed by the dawn.

    5. 327927+up ticks,
      TB,
      We could Never have got to our present position without the continuing input of the lab/lib/con coalition & their dedicated member / voters over the decades.

    6. They only let us out of the EU because they knew they had us tied up in other spiders’ webs.
      I said right from the start that Brexit was only the first battle we would have to fight.
      We’ve had a long, long run of the left being culturally dominant – Margaret Thatcher made a good attempt to hold back the flood, but they made huge gains even during the eighties.
      That won’t be healed by one battle.

    1. One has to be very careful with such videos.

      Certainly in France, hospitals would appear to clear non-essential areas when there’s a major problem.
      When I was recovering in the French hospital earlier this year, one could easily find empty corridors and vacant beds in side wards.

      The main critical areas were heaving with people at the same time.

      Nobody was allowed visitors, nobody was permitted to leave their location and every time I went for tests, scans and x-rays it appeared like a ghost town in the “machine areas”, that was because they were keeping patients apart and cleaning up as if their lives depended on it. I was very impressed.

      I can’t comment on the period when I was considered to be seriously ill, because I wasn’t remotely aware what was going on, apart from being stabbed, jabbed, pumped and puffed at regular intervals.

      1. Agreed it was a walk through the out-patients area. Time of day not clear. On a normal working day one would expect it to be fairly busy but between Christmas and New Year a lot of staff and patients alike will be on leave….

        1. Yep, unless the hospital was completely overwhelmed you’re not likely to come across Covid patients in the corridors or outpatient zones. It’s also worth noting that the filming was at the main hospital in Gloucester which is in the NHS region with the lowest number of Covid patients. The NHS trust in question runs two hospitals which between then currently have 184 inpatients with Covid which represents barely 1% of the total for England. This was all reported in the local press (very much the MSM). But this nonsense still gets spread.

          1. But equally, your figures suggest that the whole NHS is not being overwhelmed as the politicians and SAGE would have us believe.

          2. I agree, currently the NHS is not overwhelmed with 18,000 Covid inpatients which equals about 20% of beds, but there are worrying signs that infections are increasing rapidly and there’s normally a lag until that increase fees through to admissions. But, I do believe there’s scaremongering going on and I think the way the gov’t has presented stats is very misleading. However, equally there are stupid conspiracy theories being promoted by the likes of the video above.

      2. We do, but in this case, it was major departments that were empty, as well as the shop areas. After all, the lady was arrested – if it was all fake, the authorities would easily debunk it with footage of their own.

        1. Again, I would ask the question, exactly when was this shot?
          Timing is all in a propaganda film.

          Hell’s teeth, I’m quite possibly the most cynical, sceptical s-o-a-b who posts on Nottle, but even I would be wary of trusting such as this one.

          1. I’d give you two upticks if I could. One for asking the question and the second for being the preeminent s-o-a-b…..

    2. It looks like outpatient departments, which is why there are chairs in the corridors. If it was filmed on a weekend or a bank holiday it’s not surprising there is no-one there. Context is everything.

      1. There were at least two signs in the clip with “outpatients” written on them, but the camera was moved away again very hastily.

          1. 327927+ up ticks,
            Evening AA,
            Not good news though because these medical echo chambers means peoples are going without
            medical attention which in time can prove life threatening.
            It seems highly unlikely to have a medical barren waste while around the corner you have a raging plague does it not ?

  93. You can always rely on Wiki for unbiased view of the world:

    The declaration makes no mention of physical distancing and masks, nor of testing and tracing, nor of Long Covid, which has left many fit and young people suffering from debilitating symptoms months after a mild infection.

    The World Health Organization and numerous academic and public-health bodies have stated that the proposed strategy is dangerous, unethical, and lacks a sound scientific basis.

    The American Public Health Association and 13 other public-health groups in the United States warned in a joint open letter that the Great Barrington Declaration “is not a strategy, it is a political statement. It ignores sound public health expertise. It preys on a frustrated populace. Instead of selling false hope that will predictably backfire, we must focus on how to manage this pandemic in a safe, responsible, and equitable way.”

    It was sponsored by the American Institute for Economic Research, a libertarian think tank that is part of a Koch-funded network of organizations associated with climate change denial.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Barrington_Declaration

    Yep, a declaration signed by 52,000 fully certified covidiots, deniers and conspiracy theorists.

    https://gbdeclaration.org/

    1. Apparently I have already signed it. I do not remember.
      Wikipedia entry is totally opposed to it.
      Interestingly, a counter to it, the John Snow Memorandum, “published in The Lancet, is a response by 80 researchers (a “who’s who of the epidemiological, infectious disease and vaccinology world”) denouncing the herd immunity approach of the Great Barrington Declaration. Taking its name from John Snow, the epidemiologist who worked on the 1854 Broad Street cholera outbreak,nit states that the herd immunity idea is “a dangerous fallacy unsupported by the scientific evidence”.

      If herd immunity is a fallacy, and masks, distancing and lockdowns have not worked, and the vaccines have yet to be shown to make any permanent difference, where are we?

    2. Charles Koch is one of the wealthiest men in the world. He was highly critical of Obama policies and believes in small government and encouragement of business and trade. Koch Industries is one of the foremost industrial complexes in the USA. Koch is a Libertarian.

      Koch Foundation policies are a necessary counterweight to the Soros Gates Schwab policies of centralised control by a special untouchable elite.

    3. Charles Koch is one of the wealthiest men in the world. He was highly critical of Obama policies and believes in small government and encouragement of business and trade. Koch Industries is one of the foremost industrial complexes in the USA. Koch is a Libertarian.

      Koch Foundation policies are a necessary counterweight to the Soros Gates Schwab policies of centralised control by a special untouchable elite.

    1. If that were really the case, other countries would be waiting two or three years to see the possible effects. No-one has that courage.

      1. Why wait two or three years?

        Give it to the expendable.

        They can be the benchmark.

        UK, already ill, already 80+…

  96. 327927+ up ticks,
    I have a feeling this pretendee tory party has for three decades only been operating on one barrel and we are going to shortly witness both barrels coming into play, and it won’t be pretty.

  97. If life wasn’t already bad enough, its just been confirmed that Hammy is to become a sir. Will he raise a fist when down on a knee? Gawd help us…

    1. 327927+ up ticks

      Evening K,
      I think you will find that God only helps them that help themselves if that be the case we as the nations peoples sure have a strange way of showing it, being in a sod the nation we don’t give a toss mode.

    2. Apparently Boris intervened. The man is a prat, sorry but both men are prats.

      Edit: As with the Nobel Peace Prize, these awards are now utterly meaningless. They are rushed out to professional sports people who are very well remunerated in their chosen ‘sport’, actors and actresses who play themselves on stage and film (yup you Judi Dench), and effing Lib Dem’s who are overly represented in the Lords considering that their party is to all intents and purposes defunct.

      I could go on about pen pushing civil servants, Party donors and assorted criminal scum but am in need of a stiff Cognac.

      1. I agree. Knighthoods were originally for rewarding loyalty to the monarch. Hamilton has conspicuously shown no loyalty either to the monarch or the country she symbolises. It’s just a pathetic PR exercise. All worthless titles should now be abolished.

  98. Sovereignty will be a hollow victory if we let its symbol go up in flames

    The Palace of Westminister was built to be a defiant masterpiece but they couldn’t have made a more effective fire hazard if they’d tried

    TANYA GOLD

    British sovereignty will be a curiously empty phrase if its symbol burns and the remnants sink into the River Thames.

    The Palace of Westminster is in a terrible state of repair. It is crumbling, unsafe and in grave danger of destruction by fire, but British people aren’t worried, even though Notre Dame was almost lost in 2019.

    I am worried because I have toured the palace. I have smelled the basement, poked in the peeling archives and stood inside the clock tower. Its walls have partially exploded: water ingress.

    It happened before. We lost most of the old palace to fire in 1834 after workmen burnt tally sticks used for record keeping in the basement.

    Westminster Hall, which is Norman, was saved because it was surrounded by scaffolding, from which water could be thrown on to the flames, alongside the Jewel Tower, the cloisters and St Stephen’s chapter house and undercroft. The rest was lost.

    The new palace was a defiant masterpiece by Charles Barry and Augustus Pugin. It is unique, a physical embodiment of our place, even then, at the edge of Europe. (Like St Paul’s Cathedral, it is both classical and Gothic).

    But Barry and Pugin couldn’t have designed a more effective fire hazard if it had been their sole intention. Pugin’s fabulous neo-Gothic interiors are made of flammable materials and the building is filled with voids – part of an early experiment in air conditioning. Voids enjoy fires.

    As modern inventions came – electricity and communications – they were stuffed into the fabric of a palace that increasingly resembled Gormenghast. To view the basement is to be terrified. Steam pipes run alongside electrical cables. 40,000 problems have been noted in the last three years. By 2025 half of the systems will be at risk of failure.

    The nightmare is that flooding knocks out the fire alarm, and a fire is undetected. There are about 10 fires a year.

    It is made of Anston limestone, which was cheap and good for ornamental carving. But it is rotting, due to pollution and neglect. An angel fell off the Victoria Tower in 2018 into Black Rod’s garden. The scaffolding wrapped around the palace is not for repairs. It is to protect those below from death by angel.

    The windows don’t keep heat in or water out. The roof is leaking. There is asbestos. The sewage system is Victorian. The disabled access is almost non-existent.

    The archive in the Victoria Tower – the most important partial archive in Britain (most of the Commons’ records were lost in the 1834 fire) would take a year to remove even in normal circumstances, and it has none of the protections of other, less important archives.

    This is all madness, but there is a curious paralysis around the palace, which I struggle to understand because it is so heavy with metaphor.

    Perhaps Barry and Pugin did their job too well and we cannot untangle the building from the state, and our confused relationship to it?

    Why would we risk our most important public building? Thomas Carlyle saw the 1834 fire and wrote: “The crowd was quiet, rather pleased than otherwise; whew’d and whistled when the breeze came as if to encourage it, ‘There’s a flare-up (what we call shine) for the House o’ Lords.’ – ‘A judgment for the Poor Law Bill!’ – ‘There go their hacts (acts)!’ Such exclamations seemed to be the prevailing ones. A man sorry I did not anywhere see.”

    Would that happen now? I can’t imagine it. France is a secular state and it wept for Notre Dame.

    The superficial reason for the paralysis is money. In 2014 Deloitte drew up three separate estimates for restoration and renewal: moving out completely for six years for £3.9 billion; partially moving out for 11 years for £4.4 billion; not moving out at all for 32 years, for£5.7 billion.

    Six years on, and these estimates are low to meaningless. In four years, maintenance has almost doubled to £127million a year. No government wants to take responsibility for the most expensive renovation ever.

    I find it almost touching that MPs are willing to work inside a building that smells of damp – and sometimes sewage – and is in danger of bursting into flames. They kick the decision on into the future, while the palace is subject to a completely inadequate “patch and mend” policy. An original plan of works was sent for review in the spring amid concerns around asking the public to foot the bill. The revised plan, due out early next year, is rumoured to suggest the House of Commons and the House of Lords share the nearby Richmond House. There are rumours that they will put off a decision on how to proceed until after the next election – and with a majority of 80!

    This is not an untravelled path. Barry’s palace cost three times its original estimate and over-ran by 24 years.

    Neither he nor Pugin lived to see it finished, but that is normal. How much do we value the seat of our democracy? Should we renew it, symbolically and actually, as we walk away from Europe? Or watch it burn, and ask ourselves then – did we value it enough?

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/politics/sovereignty-will-hollow-victory-let-symbol-go-flames/

    BTL
    Jacqui Guild 30 Dec 2020 6:07PM
    Come on you politicians you are the custodians of our magnificent history. Renovate our Palace of Westminster regardless of the cost.

    Get rid of the HOL it is a bloated pointless second chamber with outdated titles.

    We need a Senate with no more than 250 as a revising chamber. Use the money saved to save the precious symbol of our democracy.

    Blocky Bloke 30 Dec 2020 7:28PM
    The Palace of Westminster is replaceable and can be recovered. Sovereignty is not.

    1. A resourceful architect would have little difficulty in evaluating the condition of the Palace of Westminster and formulating a strategy for a repair programme. I could do it and I am sure several others of my profession with the same good intentions could too.

      As an architect you have to understand the history of the development, examine all extant drawings and records, examine contracts for the works from historical records, forensically, and develop a sensible strategy for a restoration programme based on needs must.

      The appointment of a Manchester based commercial firm to oversee specialist work is a bad sign. I hope that I am proved wrong but have grave reservations.

      Edit: I said Manchester based but BDP was actually founded in Preston by Sir George Grenfell Baines. He was the professor of architecture at the University of Sheffield in my final year and the reason that I left for London.

      1. Although very recognisable and symbolic, it isn’t actually a very old building. I would knock it down and build a modern one with roughly the same shape, but modern materials. Probably also cost a fortune. Doing nothing (until the inevitable fire, when Jacob Rees-Mogg will assure the nation that it really was an accident) would appear to be the worst possible option.

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