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Yearly Archives: 2023

Proms

Last night at the Proms

I was delighted to give my last performance at The Last Night of the Proms last Saturday for the EU Flag Mafia. The organiser of the event had his car broken into after the event and his laptop stolen. I myself had a laptop stolen by Vote Leave after a march a few years back. It is utterly sickening. Sadly the Met Police could not be bothered to investigate, which, of course, is typical. I’m even slightly prepared to believe that it may have been an ‘inside job’, given the Met’s credentials.

Met Police response
The Police response to the crime was typically poor.

To help him recover his losses, I am selling this multi guitar rack and a PA system plus two Peavey speakers. Sensible offers please. I will also be making a donation. If you wish to do so, please e-mail me reboot@brexitrage.com and I will give you his direct details for cheques and direct transfers. The Flag Mafia leader wishes to remain anonymous as he fears media attention which could jeopardise his employment.

Please support this cause. Every year, the Flag Mafia organise this monumental project. I stepped in at short notice after all the classical musicians cancelled at less than 24 hour’s notice, gaining social disapproval from a couple of Prosecco swilling Brexiteers and some of “Steve Bray’s angels” who attempted to stop politically motivated musical protest.

Last Night at the Proms. Click image to hear the music.

Join us in Mid Bedfordshire to support Gina Miller

Read Brexit has failed

Brexit has failed

News from the Brexit Bunker

Don Adamson reports the news that the Brexit media refuse to print from his Brexit bunker in Barnsley.

This week’s homework

One Tories have decided to rejoin the Horizon project – an EU wide scheme to fund scientific research all over Europe. Does this mean that the Tories are waking up to reality about the absurdity of Brexit before Keith Starmer and his Labour Party? 

Read Horizon

Two Discuss the following statement – When Richy Scumbag and Keith Starmer talk about their fancy ideas ‘to make Brexit work’ they most closely resemble two mutineers discussing how to blow a hole in the hull of a ship that is already sinking.

This week’s quotes

Hospitality is worth £93Bn to the UK economy, employs 3.5M people

… pays £54Bn in tax … until recently Tory party was considered to be the party of business … ties companies in red tape then lectures companies in not taking advantage of the opportunities offered … real people lose jobs, money, their businesses … Brexit has put a huge spanner in the works …. Massive hurdles for the industry…. government is hoist by its own petard … margins are squeezed … profits are down…

Brexit and rail fails have made Britain a laughing stock  

… Madras Courier … with Brexit Britain has closed its doors on global trade and commerce … rationale for divorcing a free trade bloc is baffling in an age of globalisation … India is interested in trading with the rest of the world … why would it want to forge links with a country that has turned its back on global trade … UK figures show that the mooted trade deal with India could boost UK GDP by 0.12% compared to the loss of around 5% which is the cost of Brexit … the contrast between the view of the Daily Express and the Madras Courier could not be more pronounced … the latter view is now prevailing internationally … other countries, both in and out of the EU do things better that UK … UK has become poorer as other nations have thrived … skilled workers can choose where they want to go … foreign skilled workers are not only needed but really welcome …

How paranoid nationalism corrupts it makes governments not just nastier but more corrupt

… dismantling checks and bank balances that promote good, clean governance … abuses are easier when institutions are weak … men in power have invented or exaggerated threats to the nation … paranoid nationalism is a backlash against good governance …leaders create acclimate where loyalty comes before truth … there is nothing racist or disloyal about wishing for a better life … unscrupulous leaders vow to defend people against confected threats … politics based on bigotry open the door to misrule and corruption … nationalism can foster the abuse of power … politicians grant their cronies influence … if leaders use nationalism to erode checks and balances it becomes easier for his cronies to plunder … 

GB News is a threat to its rivals and a trap for the Tories 

… offers plenty to mock … adverts filled with promotions for gold dealers and erectile dysfunction drugs … cast includes several fruitcakes … opinion driven coverage … Fox News is a clear inspiration … modest audience 600,000 a day … its loyal core is just 10% of the audience for the hours viewed … will have a greater impact on the Tory party if, as seems likely … the Tories lose the next election…. will proselytise in the struggle for control of the rump party … greatest threat to opposition parties is when they make themselves irrelevant 

Nadine Dorries has a notoriously elastic relationship with the truth …

Squabbling over spoils from Covid pandemic contracts has reached the rats in a sack stage … Medicaid owned by a Gloucester based Tory  accumulated profits of more than £12M.

Support our campaign for the True and Fair Party in Mid Beds

What is the difference between RAAC and RAAB  

… one is dense, full of hot air, dangerous and past its sell by date. The other is a type of concrete…

Sarah Vain putting the me in mediocre

… ‘government has been in office 13 years and has run the country into the ground; possibly because it contains my useless ex husband …;’

London once had a claim to be at the heart of musical Europe…

No peerage for Paul Dacre 

… state looks after Daily Mail grandee in other ways … his estate (Ullapool) granted £240,000 in rural subsidies…

Richy Scumbag’s approval rate sinks to minus 25%

… everyone around Scumbag, maybe even Scumbag himself is in a post Scumbag mode… Britain feels like an absolute shambles….  almost nothing works…. social and physical infrastructure is collapsing around us…. this is exactly the kind of epic unpatriotic Remoaning that Sarah Vine the Daily Mail’s High Priestess of Brexit used to decry as ‘unpatriotic’ … these are Vine’s own words … can hardly have endeared her to Rothermere who wants his paper to ‘accentuate the positive ahead of the election’ … 

A crumbling land of perpetual slums and a moribund PM with no plan 

… political panic, headless chickens … and an already acrimonious blame game … RAAC is also likely to expose dangerous asbestos … Johnson’s promises seek a distant memory and a sick joke … a government beset by fiasco and scandal … as despairing Tory MP put it ‘an in your face scandal’ … Gillian Keegan, Education Secretary, is writing cheques that she cannot possibly cash….  Scumbag is presiding over turmoil that inescapably triggers memories of Covid and school closures … hard to speak with a straight face of a government that delivers ‘value for money’ … tax burden at its highest for 70 years … Treasury says that ‘the money to pay for repairs and timetable disruption will have to be found from existing budget. Not a serious way to govern …  a deeply embedded rottenness in public life…. Brexit is the archetype of this tendency … sporadic warnings about time bomb of RAAC…. this is much more than an educational scandal … buckling and groaning of the social contract … what sort of country do we want to live in? …. How run down, decrepit jerry rigged and dilapidated are we ready for our post Brexit country to be? …. wretchedly buried under cheap concrete rubble …everything this gover4nment touches turns to rot … former Tory leader Ian Duncan Snot says he is happy for his constituents to damang3 measures in London without a squeak of outrage … 

RAAC and Roll
RAAC and Roll

Men with no shame

… their Brexit is a disaster … now fighting to stop the rest of us from putting it right … want to defend Brexit at any cost … according to Nigel Garb age ‘sell-out of Brexit is under way … Tories never believed in it … regardless of all the warnings in the economic data the Brexiters last argument is that the revolution would surely succeed if it was pursued more zealously … seven years after Brexit there is a haziness about what Brexit benefits might be … the numbers are not encouraging … Brexiters continue to promise a crock of gold … Brexit delivered a 10% hit to the economy … UK opinion shifted 60-40 in favour of Rejoin … 

Brexit is dead
Brexit is dead

Latest polls put Rejoining the EU at 63% …

It is immoral to force the insufferable consequences of Brexit on voters who were lied to.

Brexicide a neologism that aptly captures the toxicity of the event… 

Over 80% of under 25s and over 60% of the country want to Rejoin the EU. 

Read Helpful Facts

As the worm of public opinion turns there should be less reason for Keith Starmer to maintain a deathly hush over Brexit

… Red Wall manufacturing heartlands face the biggest downsides from Brexit … it is time to think again about Brexit by taking an approach based on facts and not fallacy and fantasy … both Labour and Tories airily promise that Brexit disadvantages will be massaged away … UK diplomatic and trading relationships will not survive another seven years of disengagement. The time for a Brexit reboot is now….

The negative impact of Brexit … The fact that no political party will speak the truth about this…

Don Adamson Pip Pip             Medway Delta (Retired)          Brexorcist and Saboteur First Class

Reform

Reformation shuffle

Do we need to reform the civil service? By Paul Higgins.

We have heard quite often lately that the civil service needs to be reformed. Whilst this is true, the reform needed should go in the opposite direction to the one we so often hear about. Most problems in the civil service come from contagion from politicians, especially ministers and secretaries of state.

If we look at current ministers and compare them with those 30 or 40 years ago, we see that today ministers in any department have little or no expertise or knowledge of their areas. 40 years ago, the Secretary of, say, Defence, used to be a military or an expert with an idea of where he wanted our armed forces to be in 10 years and what steps were needed for that journey to happen. Similarly, the Secretary of Agriculture was a farmer, an academic, a veterinarian or someone with experience or expertise in farming. Because of this expertise they tended to stay longer in the post, which enabled them to build a strong corporate memory to address the various issues affecting the department or the field, to see future problems and to prevent them before they happened.

Things have changed dramatically. Ministers now move fast from one department to another and they rarely have any knowledge of the areas they manage, whether it is farming, defence or international relations. Because of this, politics are now quite shortsighted. Nothing after the next general election matters and public services show a sharp decline in efficiency and quality. This is because the building stones for this quality will deliver tangible results only after some decades after being laid instead of some months. Another factor behind the increasingly poorer quality of public decisions is its politicisation. It is quite common to see a minister arguing with the engineers about whether a road should be built passing through this or that constituency, and, as you can imagine, the arguments rest on how voters in the constituency would react to a new road instead of on how to make the road safe, cheaper, environmentally friendly or how it will improve the capacity and time of journeys.

The civil service is suffering a similar trend. This is very clear when we look at recruitment or promotions where technical expertise has disappeared and instead the so-called behaviours are now the only criteria. These behaviours are valid everywhere, in every post, but leadership, influence or communicating will not make you capable of designing the best road but to argue in a powerpoint that it wasn’t your fault that the road was of a substandard quality. Putting even more effort in promoting these behaviours will improve relations between ministers and civil servants in the short term but will result in even worse and more expensive public services. As problems and tensions accumulate the blame game will intensify and we will see even more and louder calls to reform the civil service and get rid of unelected bureaucrats and experts. Since civil servants are not allowed to respond and publish their side of the story, this trend is quite difficult to reverse.

Finally, it is worth noticing that while most governments in western democracies suffer this problem, it is the UK Government where it is most exacerbated and, hence, more difficult to reverse.

Paul Higgins

Books
Reform, Renew, Reboot Britain
Brexit bunker

Don’s musings

This week’s homework

The BBC motto is ‘Nation shall speak peace unto Nation.’ Would it be appropriate for Fox News to adopt the motto: ‘Idiots shall speak balderdash unto idiots?’

This week’s quotes 

Putain/Ptomaine will carry on spying 

… troll campaigns, democratic interference … all of these deployed in Brexit … successive UK governments welcomed vast amounts of dubious Russian money … bought a degree of Russian accesses that the KGB could only dream of … Russian money bought access to the top of British political power … state backed inciters of chaos …

Brexit and Russia
Brexit and Russia.

Lee Anderson ignorant and proud of it

… represents everything most of the world despises UK for 

Brexit is killing off the school trip 

… costing millions and hurting children … youngsters are being denied opportunities … they did not vote for Brexit but are paying the price in many ways…. effects entirely predictable and immediately apparent … harming UK interests … time to think again … damage goes beyond detriment to education … financial costs top £3B … seaside towns that had English teaching businesses … decimated … ludicrous … if the economy can benefit while the children have fun so much the better …

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Baroness, dodgy PPE, slow death of trust 

… Michelle Mone’s companies received more than £200M for defective equipment … Mone made a vast profit … legitimacy is frayed significantly …  no offer of clarity, no explanation, no accountability … grubby profiteering … insincerity running through politics from all factions … utterly corrosive to the trust on which politics is based … ministers line their own pockets …  this government has truly failed…

Sad Times for Britain’s most ridiculous person

… Mad Halfcock … eight complaints he made against Daily and Sunday Mirrors rejected by press watchdog … shameful record of blunders … guilty of breaching ministerial code about financial interests …. corrupt, lying, incompetent, philandering, disgraced ex minister … ‘Britain has the chance to lead the world’ enthused Mad Halfcock five years ago … soon Halfcock’s techno-fetish was looking less sexy as complaints grew … Halfcock admitted his department was badly prepared for the pandemic … perhaps if he had not been seduced by overhyped tech, things might have been slightly different … 

People think leaving has been bad for the economy, exacerbating cost of living crisis … the evidence is on their side … post financial crisis recovery in business investment snuffed out by the referendumb … hut exporters … Brexit divisive, had a disastrous effect on politics, trust in ministers and competence in government … 

Startling resemblance between Nigel Garbage and Jar Jar Binks 

… one is a hapless, risible figure and the other is a character from Star Wars…

*ucker Carlson … absolutely bananas

… a real bullshitter … not combined with trenchant insight … opinionated, cocky, loud and ill informed … genuinely does not care what other people think … if you start off with a conspiratorial, paranoid outlook there is only one way to go; down … ever more delusional rants … a sense of gaping emptiness … never really had anything of substance to say … 

The UK government wants to maintain the doctor’s strike as an excuse for missing its promises and does not mind consequences

… (widespread avoidable harm to patients)…  as of June 7.6 ‘patient referrals’ in England still awaiting treatment in England up 100,000 from May … last year more than 23,000 excess deaths were associated with long waits in emergency departments .. A lack of available hospital beds a contributing cause… 

Non payment of tax on egregious profits made by pandemic profiteers 

… Excalibur Healthcare  … £135M contract to provide 2,700 ventilators… company made multi million pound profits … a financial ruse to extract profits ‘tax-efficiently’ … company has gone bust owing £3.3M … including £2.1 M corporation tax … Evans was said to be worth around £200M – hundred times the unpaid bill.

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Choking off immigration to make low-wage sectors more productive was never going to work

Johnson as PM described a future that was ‘high wage, high skill, high productivity’ … since 2010 Britain has suffered a dramatic slowdown in productivity … Brexiter argued that Britain had become a laggard in using technology … most economists disputed Brexiter promises … Brexit experiment has not worked … real output fallen … little sign of more investment or raising wages to attract domestic workers … Brexit politicians were not serious …  firms have struggled … Brexiters wanted fewer but more high skilled immigrants. The opposite happened … Lack of commitment was not the only reason the Brexiter experiment failed. The thinking behind it was always faulty … significant factor is the poor quality of British managers … weak investment is also to blame … workers with technical skills are hard to find … firms cannot plan … deterring investment … Britain timed its Brexit experiment very badly… 

Brits are not all in it together … taxation share of GDP highest since the 1940s … disposable incomes will not recover before 2028 …  nightmare mortgage stories … people are surviving but not thriving … cost of living crisis has a radically different effect on, say, a family with £600,000 mortgage on a house in Battersea compared with a family on benefits in Wigan … both families have reason not to vote Tory in the next election … the promise was that things would improve … people are worse off than they thought they would be … Britain was becoming poorer before prices spiralled … the political consequences have just begun … 

The horrible irony of this is that Don the Con has no time for either working class white, Southerners, or people of colour

… people down south ‘Hicks’ and crackers’ … his casino, the one that went bust, ‘how can you lose money on a casino?’) Left a lot of white working men stiffed – like the ones who built the place. 

Howard Barclay 

… Telegraph media owner … admits the publishing empire is a ‘distressed asset that will not be easy to sell’ … Lloyd’s Bank reluctant owner since a £1B loan to the Barclay group went bad … not worth anything near the  £660M price tag originally placed on it … Barclay family trying to regain control … with backing from unidentified investors based in Dubai … Rothermere meanwhile mulling over closing … Mail on Sunday … does not see a future for print journalism … 

Telegraph
Click to read Private Eyelines.

Theresa May accuses John Bercow of thwarting her Brexit deal 

… she is living in Walter Mitty land… 

Debate whether Johnson’s Daily Mail column is more boring than Anne Widdecombe’s in the Daily Express 

… Widdecombe’s lame anecdotes about difficult parking … Johnson gives his best stories to other papers… 

Brexit is not working 

… it is doing long term damage … Brexit benefits do not exist … government resorts to subterfuge … in the three years to March 2023, 13,793 hospitality venues have shut down … double the number of closures in the previous three years … a succession of polls show that British people think Brexit was a mistake. This is now turning into a willingness to Rejoin the EU … Keith Starmer will turn somersaults to avoid any discussion of Brexit … any suggestion of Rejoin has on him the same effect as garlic on a vampire … conflict between Keith Starmer’s position and his determination to look economically responsible … Brexit was economically illiterate and reversing it would have obvious benefits for the economy … Brexit hit to GDP is around 5.5%. Trade figures constantly demonstrate that putting up trade barriers with your biggest market is a sure way to lower exports…. International Monetary Fund  predicts that the UK will be the only major economy to shrink this year … we are in the most prolonged period of lost economic growth since the financial crisis of 2008 … government understands the problem but no minister will acknowledge it … quietly pushback deadline for erecting more barriers … government tries to put off the worst of Brexit … Labour fail to call out the hypocrisy by stating the obvious: UK would be better off in the EU … UK tarnished its credentials … UK behaviour over Horizon project has been crass as well as self defeating … UK scientists are desperate … if ‘sovereignty’ has been regained there is little to show for it … UK is poorer … All politicians seem to believe that Sue Ellen Braverman’s rhetoric about ‘securing borders’ is what voters want to hear … research tells a different story … empty gesture of throwing money at Rwanda… any sensible politician would be campaigning for re-entry as quickly as possible … Brexit is not working . Government must undo the harm Brexit has done.

Read Pay as EU go Rejoin

If MPs do not act swiftly they could lose voters’ trust forever 

… 15 MPs have lost their party whip for misconduct … five MPs stood down after being named in scandal or criminality … Tory MP accuses of rape who still has the whip … worst scandals disgust the public … voters bemused and outraged by partisan reaction by MPs when wrongdoing clearly proven … flagrant abuses … Parliament has a particularly unhealthy mix of people … parliament just does not seem to be doing its job very well … 

Don Adamson Pip Pip             Medway Delta (Retired)    Brexorcist and Saboteur First Class

Brexit Broke Britain

Britons

Paolo Bolzoni, an Italian in The Netherlands, set this poem to music to explain the condition of Brexitosis which still infects some Britons. We are gradually awakening from our slumbers and will soon get to a point of Rejoining the EU.

Please subscribe to Paolo’s You Tube channel.

BRITONS


Transposition of “Italiani”, by Cochi e Renato, 2007
Cochi e Renato are a legend of Milanese cabaret.
© Paolo Bolzoni, 3 September 2023

Ce n’est qu’un début, continuons le combat!
Nous voulons réintégrer l’Union Européenne!

There is a window to Britain
Where you can listen to gossips
Where you can watch the tears
Where you can hear the curses

There is a window to Britain
And if you open it
You’ll see the despair
Can’t you understand why?

It’s the Britons who shout
It’s the Britons who cry
It’s the Britons who curse
This Cabinet of Fools

It’s the Britons who leave
And who’ll never come back
It’s the Britons who are angry
Don’t you get it?

They have a Cabinet who lie
And people who listen to them
While they laugh at the poor chaps
Who believe in their crap

It’s the Britons who suffer
It’s the Britons who fight
To rejoin the EU
And they’ll never give up

Oh, Jesus, look down here
Bless whoever you want
But, we’re all Britons
Don’t bless only the Conservatives
Oh Jesus, oh Jesus
Forgive me if I call for you
Oh, Jesus, come down here
We can’t take it any more

It’s the Britons who boo
It’s the Britons who sink
Their trials and tribulations
In a bitter pool of ale

It’s the Britons who watch
The small boats sinking in the Channel
It’s the Cabinet who know 
And still don’t give a damn

It’s Rishi who loves
Talking cricket with Modi
It’s Cruella who hates
And has one obsession

It’s the Britons who are sick
It’s the Britons who are disabled
It’s the nurses who strike
It’s the teachers who are lost

It’s the Britons who watch
The news that report all this
And those who present it
And those who comment on it

Those who can’t stand it
Those who fall asleep
And those who get angry
And smash the TV

“Excuse me, Sir Larry, please?”
“What’s up?”
“Is Rishi there?”
“No, he’s in a meeting”
“Meeting with whom?”
“Alone, in the toilette”
“Will he have it for long?”
“Eh … he is on a conference call”
“Um… I’ll be back later”
“No! Rishi has two more meetings later
And two more conference calls”
“Excuse me, but… does Rishi …. all day?”

It’s the Britons who cherish
The good times long gone
Those who get married
To get a cheap council flat

Those who have nothing
And who lost their job
Those who can’t understand
When they see Londongrad

“Look, Rishi, excuse me…”
“Stop bothering me! Stop!
Go to hell, commoner!”

DEDICATED TO BRITAIN
III – IX – MMXXIII

Brighton

Brighton Rock

I am speaking at a panel event with the BBC’s Jonty Bloom on September 7th in Brighton from 7 – 9.30 pm with a cast of star people. We will be discussing the impact of Brexit on musicians. Organised by Helen Gibbons, Chair of European Movement Sussex. We will also be making stops with the Bollocks to Brexit Mini Cooper en route at the Millennium Clocktower and Seaford (venue tbc) 2 – 4 pm with our UK Brexorcism Tour. See Facebook for up to date details of the tour schedule.

UNLOCK THE MUSIC
Click to reserve your place.
UNLOCK THE MUAIC
Click to reserve your place.

Unlock the Music

The careers and livelihoods of UK musicians are being damaged by the loss of the right to work across borders in Europe. European Movement Sussex presents Unlock the Music, a panel event focused on the impact of Brexit on the music industry.

Experienced industry professionals and working musicians will each present their evidence and tell of the issues that have damaged the careers and prospects of many of those involved in music in the UK. They will also offer achievable solutions that the UK government should pursue.

Panel members include:

Dave Webster – Head of International at the Musicians’ Union

Will Page – Author, podcaster and former Chief Economist at Spotify

Tom Kiehl – Deputy CEO and Director of Public Affairs at UK Music

Heather Bird – Double bassist and founder of Classical Evolution

Peter Cook – Author of three books on Brexit and six albums of protest songs

Hanna Madalska-Gayer – Head of Policy & Communications, Association of British Orchestras

Jonty Bloom  – Freelance journalist ex BBC and New European contributor (Moderator)

Date: Thursday, 7 September. Time: 7pm – 9.30pm

Venue: Brighton Unitarian Church, New Road, Brighton, BN1 1UG.

Tickets from TicketSource.

This is the first of a series of three Rebuild with Europe events addressing Brexit impacts on specific sectors. Future events will focus on agriculture and education.

Read our article on musicians and Brexit at The Federal Trust.

Musicians and Brexit
Musicians and Brexit.

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Join us in Swindon Wed 30 August

Brexit bunker

Concrete and May

Don Adamson is s stalwart campaigner for better government and a better Britain free of Brexit BS. He reports on the week’s news from his Brexit bunker in Barnsley. In a bumper week of Tory chaos, now we face the collapse of concrete schools, the release of Theresa May’s book, Suella Braverman’s war on lefty policemen and the selling of £2500 NHS Nightingale Beds on ebay for £6.00 a go. Concrete and May indeed!!

This week’s homework 

One – List in order of importance the following reasons to detest Gammons and Flagshaggers. Give reasons for your answers: a) Gammons and Flagshaggers are despicable, lying scoundrels of the worst description; b) Brexit has done a FUBAR on Britain beyond the wildest dreams of Stalin, Hitler, Kaiser Bill and Napoleon combined c) Brexit has unleashed English nationalism which means that the English forfeit the right to despise nationalists of other descriptions

Two – Wetherspoon’s pubs cannot make a profit and the company is selling off premises for conversion to apartments. Are these economic problems attributable to Dim Tim Martin’s support for Brexit? 

Three – Gammons and Flagshaggers have a lot to say about their heroism in wars that ended before they were born. Television broadcasts a lot of material to encourage them in that belief: both documentaries and feature films. You sometimes see images of refugees in that period being shelled by badly aimed artillery and being bombed by air forces that define accuracy as hitting the right county. What do Gammons and Flagshaggers see when they view images of refugees; do they see ordinary people fleeing to avoid horrors that never needed to happen in the first place; or do Gammons and Flagshaggers see a sinister Woke Libtard conspiracy to betray the Brexit earthly paradise? 

Four – Discuss the following statement. Prince Andrew demands that his team of Scotland Yard bullet catchers should be re-instated. He has nothing to fear from our enemies but what about our friends (if we have any left)? 

Please support our campaign in Mid Beds

This week’s quotes 

Litigation case against immigration lawyer Jacqueline McKenzie 

… stupid that the party that sent out this dossier by email and unbelievably stupid that two journalists took it upon themselves to send the dossier to the person it was attacking … a shocking hit job laced with untruths … any case McKenzie brings is likely  to result in heads rolling at Tory HQ … 

Lloyds naturally want shot of Telegraph papers 

…  noticeable shift in tone … extraordinary piece saying tens of thousands of Tories want to leave the party … papers are not worth anything near the £600M that Lloyds had originally been hoping for …paper is pleading for a buyer … Rothermere has been courting financial investors in the Middle East to support a bid … 

Organisers of the Rejoin March in London may well have performed a public service 

… a poll of Lib Dem members showed only 3% would not be attending the march as it clashed with their conference … 32% say they will definitely be marching and another 58% say they may march …will at least force the party to confront the disaster of Brexit …

Brexit has dragged Britain back by 70 years 

… Dean Acheson (1962) ‘Britain has lost an empire but not found a role … that role was found and it worked … UK became a useful partner to the USA, an important part of NATO, and, most importantly, an influential leader within the EU …. First EU talks 1955 … we suffered 20 years of angst  … it became increasingly that Britain had missed the bus … no choice but to get on board … benefits of EU membership were almost immediate. Forget the miracle of Thatcherism; the single market was a huge boost for the UK after it began to catch up after 30 years of decline…. We threw it all away in a spasm of nostalgia and stupidity … small band of ultras who dream of a return to empire … think we are a superpower … dragged us back to the 1950s … ‘Anyone stupid enough to want to go back to the 1950s did not live through the 1950s’ … pretensions of grandeur that stifled any appreciation of Britain’s rightful place in the world … once gifted with political giants … Attlee, Churchill, Bevan, Bevin, Macmillan, Heath, Healey, Wilson and a dozen others  – we now have political minnows in charge … no serious people with real experience … mainstream media is now owned and run by self-aggrandising tycoons who only care about how much power they have over the government … post Brexit decline of UK becomes clearer … Why are the French wealthier? Why are the poorest 20% of the British population poorer than the poorest Poles? Where has our trade gone? Why does USA think we are unimportant? Why is the NHS on its knees? … Small minded, insular, climate change denying little Englanders … the road back to common sense will be long and hard … but the tide is turning against the Gammons and Flagshaggers and their media friends …  economic damage is too large, pettiness too blatant, the economy in permanent doldrums, tax burden rising for no apparent reason, the lies ever more pathetic … those who are trying to drag us back to the past must be defeated… 

Tory MP Tobias Ellwood says both Tories and Labour are being dishonest over the disaster of Brexit 

… Europe is stronger with Britain – a huge economy, fifth largest in the world being part of it. There is huge regret from the EU side that we have gone … there is an omerta about Brexit, even more so about mitigating its damage … experience proves that UK needs to be back inside the Single Market … ineptness of the referendum … construction was so poor … if something has been bodged so badly then it should be reconsidered entirely … Brexit is not worth the candle … we would be a richer country if we Rejoined the single market that Thatcher created … internationally people are baffled that we left the EU …  this artificial world of both parties  avoiding the subject because it so toxic and not working … damaging the UK economy … 

Read Michel Barnier

Britain is a rickety union blown apart by the rancour that followed Brexit  

…  Brexit has triggered disputes over devolution…. 

What happens to British comedy when British politics becomes a joke….?

It is hard to say anything funny about Thick Lizzie’s 49 days in office …  politics often trumps sound policy … nation state is seen as inadequate in the face of global challenges that only a united continent can tackle.

Read Private Eyelines

Theresa May is making Tory whips perspire 

… publication of her book ‘Abuse of power’ … describes how trust in politicians and public institutions has been eroded … government hardly in strongest position … eruption from May is last thing her party needs…. the whole issue of Russian interference in our politics … Johnson’s relationship with Lebedev …. May criticising Johnson, Thick Lizzie and Richy Scumbag … she chose Headline, a publisher not within the Murdoch stable … with a reputation for holding the powerful to account … 

Theresa May Cat
The stench of Brexit is unbearable – Theresa May

The only purpose in inviting Thick Lizzie to speak at public events is to laugh at her expense

… images of a lettuce in a blonde wig …

Martin Ivens, editor of Sunday Times in 2016

… assured executives that paper would be on the side of common sense in EU referendum … something happened … Ivens informed same executives that paper would back Brexit … last weekend David Smith … economic outlook, chose not to mention he worked for a pro Brexit paper … described the decision to leave as ‘daft’ … long depressing review of what happened … 60% of population believe to leave was daft … Brexit has had a disastrous effect on politics, trust in politicians … competence in government … 

Difference between a nationalist and a patriot 

… a nationalist wastes a week of government time obsessing on small boats … and on transferring refugees to a barge infected with Legionella … national pride has been horribly poisoned by Brexit … this nation is held hostage by a gang of liars, cheats and has beens 

Much of the best journalism nowadays is done by non journalists 

… several of our newspapers do not do journalism they do Tory propaganda … chaotic incompetence of the last few years … print whatever is served up by Tory spin machine … Tory Peer picked up £200M … for providing 25 million medical gowns  that did not meet the required standard … National Crime agency is taking an absolute age investigating potential fraud … sums of money involved are mind blowing … a disgrace … a country run by and for the Tories … any decent lawyer attached to the government should be ashamed (COMMENT: does he mean Dominic Raas?) … shows how far we have fallen as a country … under this populist rabble …. Something you would expect in Russia or Zimbabwe… 

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EU benefits

The Future Is Yours

The Future Is Yours. Don’t Let Them Take It From You by Simon Stiel.

I am 36 years old and you may think I have not been around long enough to have a view about Britain and Europe. I will do what I can here.

As a child, I was privileged in that Europe seemed local to me. 80% of the world’s population has never been aboard a plane. With family members on the continent, flights during the summer or Christmas holidays were run of the mill. So were day trips going on either cross-channel ferries, hovercrafts, catamarans or later the Eurostar.

When the single currency was introduced, I was in Year 10 at school. I first heard the opinion that Britain should leave the European Union and I was sympathetic to that view. I held beliefs then that I now find ridiculous. One was the introduction of the Euro was a sign of the Third Reich being reborn. Europe being dominated by a malevolent power. Britain had things that were special like Parliament, the common law etc. The European Union threatened that or so I thought.

For my A Levels, I studied Government and Politics. I learned how the European Union worked and that Britain, far from being dominated by the European Union had been a key member and had secured opt-outs from moves promoting integration. We succeeded in getting opt-outs like keeping the British pound and the rebate during the Eighties.

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In June 2005 and on the then 30th anniversary of holding of the 1975 referendum and while sitting my exams, I watched the documentary How We Fell for Europe. Made by Michael Cockerell, I found it excellent and it challenged my views. It showed that contrary to the belief that Britain was deceived into joining the European Community, it showed that advocates for membership were open that sovereignty was being sacrificed. One poster from the Keep in Britain in Europe campaign had the slogan: “Forty million people died in two European wars this century. Better to lose a little national sovereignty than a son or daughter.”

It was also in 2005 that I went to Berlin and Krakow for a school history trip. It was sobering seeing where the Berlin Wall used to divide the city. It was a wonderful experience visiting Krakow too. and it was just a year after Poland became a member of the EU. A year later I found my late Polish grandfather Erwin’s family in the town of Radlin, Poland after writing a letter to an address. In 2008 for the European Universities Debating Championships, I travelled to Tallinn, Estonia as part of Queen Mary, University of London’s team.

If you are given a crummy product, you return it, get your money back and get compensation from those who mis-sold it to you.

Germany had been divided by over forty years. Poland and Estonia had been dominated by another power. They were EU member states. They valued their freedoms, parliaments, identities and languages intensely. So why did many see the EU as a threat to British identity and freedom?

Margaret Thatcher made that point herself in 1975 as Leader of the Opposition and as part of the Keep Britain in Europe campaign: “It is a myth that our membership of the Community will suffocate national tradition and culture. Are the Germans any less German for being in the Community, or the French any less French? Of course they are not!”

The Keep Britain in Europe campaign was well-run in 1975. They had the facts ready to show to voters how being in the European Community benefited local areas throughout Britain. They took their opponents seriously.

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It would be a different matter in 2016. The Remain campaign was complacent and the Leave side won.

When the result was announced, I felt sick. I graduated from university in 2008 just as the recession hit and I had struggled to find paid work. The struggles led to a nervous breakdown in 2013. It took me a year to recover and in December 2014, I was confirmed autistic by the NHS. It did not come as a surprise to those who really knew me. It was a relief to me. After another year of trying to find paid work, I had got a job through a programme offered by Buckinghamshire Council at the time. As many others did, I had struggled. Why would we want to add to those difficulties by leaving the European Union and face great uncertainties?

I thought the referendum would be a close result and in favour of Remain. We are still living with the hurt and bitterness seven years later. I want to make clear I have no ill-will in any shape or form to anyone who voted Leave. I respect the secret ballot and I do not ask people how they voted on 23 June 2016.

Brexit is going to do nothing to help us address those problems. The Office of Budget Responsibility has pointed out that the Brexit has caused a 4% loss to the British economy. Many now face carnets, paperwork and regulations to play music and do business on the continent that took decades to remove. Many have been hurt in the process of Brexit and will continue to be under the present arrangements. What we have now is far worse than what we could have had and definitely worse than what we did have. Far from taking back control, we are not in control and we have to pay to access European Union bodies with no say now in how they are run.

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I have thought about leaving Britain. I certainly see myself feeling at home in France, Germany or Poland. Perhaps even further afield like Canada, South Korea or Japan. However, there is much of Britain I have not visited. I love Britain while hating what is being done to it. Leaving it would be too painful as I would miss so much: family, friends and places.

The debate about Europe is not about young v old, rural v urban, regions/nations or about party allegiance. It is about how we can find solutions to address the problems facing British society today and properly reboot Britain: how to create wealth; provide educational opportunities; tackle structural inequalities; address health inequalities; promote and further arts and culture; safeguard the environment; recover from the COVID-19 pandemic and come up with solutions to have more sustainable transport and ways of living.

Read Pay as EU go

Repairing our relationships with our closest neighbours will be tough. I would like to make the following suggestion. I hope that alliances are formed between voters, incumbent MPs and parliamentary candidates cross-party on one policy: rejoin the EU. Editor’s note : Join GIna Miller’s True and Fair party.

That way, it could become possible we could start to heal ourselves by asking ourselves difficult questions and to dispel the misperceptions about the European Union that persisted for decades and that the Leave side could exploit in 2016. We could have a dialogue with the 27 member-states and gain the benefits of club membership once again.

Take on the Brexit machine with arguments and evidence. Do not give up. After all, if losing meant you give up your cause, the Leave side would have given up and shut up decades ago. They were beaten comprehensively in the 1975 referendum: they didn’t give up. The Labour manifesto in the 1983 General Election called for Britain to leave the European Community. Labour was beaten comprehensively in that election: leavers didn’t give up.

Read Were you played?

It would be a start and it would also offer hope to many voters; particularly those born in 2004-05 who will be voting for the first time in the next General Election. I implore people to use their vote in whatever way they see fit whether it’s queuing at a polling station, voting by post or by proxy. If a Conservative ultra-safe seat like Chesham and Amersham can change hands, so could anywhere else in Britain.

There is much to criticise about Edward Heath’s conduct as Prime Minister and after he left office. However, what he said during the 1975 European Community referendum has resonated with me.

“The future is yours. Don’t let them take it from you.”

Farming

Countryside Matters

True & Fair is a minor party, passionate about local issues affecting our rural countryside communities. The countryside is the backbone of our economy and we recognise it has been left out in the cold after Brexit with no deal and no way forward, the True & Fair Party plans to change that.

You are invited to join our Parliamentary Candidate for East Wiltshire, Pete Force-Jones and True & Fair Party Leader, Gina Miller on Wednesday, the 30th of August, at 10 am where we will announce the beginning of our journey to improve the countryside, and get a better deal after years of inaction and being let down by the major parties. 

This is your opportunity to let us know how we can best represent you and your businesses; we are here to listen. We will be announcing our countryside policy at the town hall event. Join the True and Fair party – we deserve better, not more of the same.

When

August 30, 2023 at 10:00 am – 12.00 noon

Where

Marlborough Town Hall
The Court House 5 High Street
Wiltshire, England SN8 1AA
United Kingdom

Join the True and Fair party

Join us afterwards for a musical protest as well

The Disney Longstocking prison ship

The Don

Don Adamson writes from his hollow in Barnsley where he contemplates everything from the Disney Longstocking prison ship to Boris Johnson’s sacking from journalism and beyond.

This week’s homework: 

One – Some people would say that Chris Mullins was an under rated minister. He felt strongly about efficiency and economy. He would never make a decision until he was satisfied that the proposal was a) effective and b) economical. His staff officers complained that he sometimes took this to the point of diminishing returns. Sooner or later you come to the point where the cheapest thing you can do is sign the cheque and get on with it. Are there any ministers in this government who can be criticised for being over economical and over efficient? 

Two – Trump faces 91 indictments. a) Will he score a century? b) Trump calls this a Which Hunt. Is that because he does not know which indictment is which? 

Three – I looked in at the Iceland supermarket to buy provisions. The young lady at the checkout said she like my Bulwarks to Brexit cap; for which I thanked her. With the benefit of hindsight perhaps I should have told her that the people in charge of Iceland used to be ardent supporters of Brexit. We hear less of that nowadays. Do I understand that even the people who own Iceland have noticed that Brexit has not turned out to be the earthly paradise we used to hear so much about? Have even the people who own Iceland noticed that Brexit is doing a FUBAR on the British economy? 

This week’s quotes: 

Rupert Murdoch

… used to grant more audiences to Richy Scumbag than even his arch toady Johnson … passion appears to have cooled… 

JCB Chairman Lord Bamford 

… said in 2016 that UK was the fifth biggest economy in the world  … last year UK dropped to 6th largest … Bamford in no way apologetic for his position on Brexit but wails ‘Isn’t our country in a mess now?’ 

Read Changing Minds on Brexit

Immigration no immigration dream of Brexiters lies in tatters

… no public acceptance of this by the government … compared with what we had before Brexit the system is costly, time consuming, badly run, wrapped in miles of red tape and is nothing more than a huge anchor holding the economy back … Brexiters are in full retreat. While publicly lecturing business on the need to conjure up new British employees out of thin air … privately lowering the thresholds under which foreign workers can come to Britain … quite a turnaround … foreign workers can come to Britain at great expense and bother to themselves … makes sectors of the economy look aghast at the government making their lives more difficult … hospitality…. government has come up with what in Blackadder would be described as a ‘cunning plan’ … a pathetic ruse to claim that immigration is not happening  when in reality it is … an arrogant, ignorant fantasy … desperation leads the government to propose ridiculous policies like these … Scumbag’s team is torn between populist rhetoric it spews out and reality .. a moribund economy where growth is non existent … a disaster happening before our eyes … latest ruses make it harder for universities to recruit foreign students, even though they are the only thing keeping the further education sector afloat … At least in Italy the far right has woken up to reality … in our surreal politics government promises cuts to immigration knowing full well that it is neither in the national interest or possible…

Number Crunching

7.47M is the number of people on National Health Service waiting lists (up since Richy Scumbag pledged to reduce them). – 8% proportion of NHS budget spent transferring patients to private care … £318M cost of housing 500 refugees in cramped Bibby Stockholm barge for a year … £15.25M Cost of sending 500 refugees on a Disney cruise for a year.

Disney Boat
Live scenes from the Disney Longstocking.

Hack watch

Nick Timothy, Telegraph correspondent … Britain faces multiple, complex crises … everything seems frozen by uncertainty, ignorance and fear. The understanding is not there, the ideas are not there … The challenges we face are truly enormous, yet our politics has never seemed smaller … Capitalism as we know it has failed. Not even the Tories can defend it…

Michael Gove told last month’s conference of Local Government Associations 

… financially struggling councils were a handful of cases, the exception …  six councils have declared themselves bankrupt since 2020 … several others could join them … Kensington and Chelsea (Conservative) …deficit of £47M by 2027 … Kent County Council (Conservative) … faces a deficit of £86M this year … Hartlepool (Conservative since 2019) …even with a 5% increase in council tax deficits could increase to 8M … Warwickshire (Conservative) … worst cases scenario of £106M deficit by 2028 … Guildford (Lib Dem since May previously Conservative) … £300M debts … 

Coutts furore with Nigel Garbage 

Coutts indicated the decision was not about politics but corporate image… Mad Nad Dorries is taking a break from her little watched show on Talk TV … less than 3,000 views on YouTube … has not spoke in Commons for a year … her constituency want her to resign for her lack of work … most MPs don’t give a toss about the public …

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Horizon Europe 

Richy Scumbag’s stance continues to baffle EU officials, UK universities and research community … haggling over pennies … Brexit Britain procrastinates while other countries  queue to join, New Zealand is latest non EU country to apply for associate membership … Scumbag is determined to de-Europeanise education and research … Scumbag is committed to government’s own half baked Pioneer scheme … 

Immigration legal aid lawyers in South West England have zero capacity to take on asylum seekers housed on Bibby Stockholm

… makes a nonsense of Deputy PM’s claims that the barge will make processing easier … Dowden also complained he did not hear howls of outrage of use of floating accommodation in other countries … Silya Europa in Netherlands has been controversial for the last year… 

Lobbying by MPs government promised reform

… not much has changed … income from outside jobs up to £4.75M from £4M … Tory MPs … make multiples of their salaries … standards committee concluded that placing limits on outside work was too difficult … plenty of room at the trough …

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Horizon 

Britain should rejoin … without further delay … British sciences face major obstacles …  British scientists are clamouring to get back into Horizon … Richy Scumbag sees three arguments against … none stand up to scrutiny … Tories trumpeting planned Britain only project Pioneer … cannot match … Horizon … hard-line Gammons argued Britain could keep benefits of membership … difficult to find a better example than Horizon …  Researchers and universities say delay over Horizon has cost the country … If Scumbag is serious about supporting British science he should stop dithering and sign up without delay ..

Brexit has failed  

… London Stock Exchange looks increasingly moribund … Brexit has not made it easier to manufacture in UK … exporting has become more complicated … Britain is a diminished actor in export markets … failed to bring in investment … shrank by nearly half in 2022 … Britain is going backwards … Britain’s finance sector battered by Tories … workers have fared no better … raw sewage pumped into English waterways … failing health service… Brexit is a catastrophe for the country which those who campaigned for it claimed to love … Nigel Garbage now barely mentions the B-word … Johnson’s weekly Daily Mail column is largely a B-word free zone … no wonder Mail executives are ever more loudly asking each other ‘whose f*****g idea was this?’ … meanwhile true believer Richy Scumbag quietly drops, yet again, plans for new checks on imports from EU of farm produce … Who would have thought it, apart from those people who warned it would happen? … If Brexit was going well we would never hear the end of it… 

48 52 Brexit
Brexit has failed. Click to read our article from 2021.

Eurosceptics are Ecosceptics

This time they will wreck the plant … When you have done all you can to wreck the nation what is next? Answer: wreck the planet … two projects are two sides of the same ugly coin … striking membership overlap between the European (not much) Research Group and the Net Zero scrutiny Group … Lord Frost, former chief Brexit negotiator, claimed, extraordinarily that ‘rising global temperatures are likely to be beneficial’ … both ideologies involve a shocking indifference to evidence and data … distaste for ‘experts’ … same paranoid suspicion of ‘global elites and conspiracies’ … Nigel Garbage is the key figure moving further and faster than most Tory MPs are prepared to go … all horribly familiar … classic disruptive playbook, first devised by the tobacco industry and now the basis of most populist politics … put the frighteners on Keith Starmer … you might think that Brexit did more than enough damage …

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Johnson is a person who rarely stays the course 

… his Daily Mail gig likely to be no exception … Rothermere, mindful that Keith Starmer has promised to end non dom tax status, is less concerned that the column is desperately boring as its ceaseless digs at Richy Scumbag…

Don Adamson Pip Pip             Medway Delta (Retired)                       Brexorcist and Saboteur First Class

Don Adamson
Don Adamson and family.