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Reply | Earl Spencer
at 14:02 19 Sep 2026
I’ve no idea what happened following Diana’s death, but Earl Spencer’s account is based on his perceptions after his sister’s death. He may be right, he may be wrong - sounds harsh but tbh I’m not really bothered about the royals as they don’t effect my day to day life.
What I will say, is there have been many men and women who’ve been caught up in very acrimonious divorces and weren’t unhappy to see their ex pass on as it saved them a fortune in alimony etc. |
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Reply | Here we go again
at 18:23 18 Sep 2026
Commercial trackers and shipping companies estimate the flow through the straights of Hormuz is 2m bpd, industry analysts say the August average was around 7.6m bpd while the US government estimates the figure is 18-20mn bpd. Most of the flow through the straights of Hormuz goes east to Asia with China, India, South Korea, Japan the bid consumers. With the Houthi’s kicking off and potentially closing part of the Red Sea access supply will only get tighter.
President Trump has linked Ukrainian activities against Russian refineries for the rise in the price of diesel, while there will be some substance to that the conflict with Iran is also a major contributory factor. |
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Reply | Reform - surely this has to be the end?
at 17:56 18 Sep 2026
It looks like Nigel Farage is referencing an article in the Daily Express which was referring to a story about a 27 year old British guy (Joel) who wanted to do a level 2 and 3 in plumbing on top of the level 1 he already has so he that he can go on and become a plumber.
Firstly, good on this guy for wanting to continue his education and improve his prospects, he’s in already work and making a contribution so he’s unlikely to be just a lazy oil bumping his gums off, that said but there’s a lot going on here that needs to be considered to get to the bottom of things.
Whilst Farage is only making reference to the immigration side of things, access and payment for the training and educational courses and i think access to and funding for education is a much bigger issue.
The criteria for accessing the funding is …. “Anyone who is legally residing in the UK and earning below £26,800 a year can access full funding for skills training through the Adult Skills Fund.”
Based on that criteria, an asylum seeker would have to have been granted the right to remain in the U.K. to access the funding. Given the back log of cases, I suspect it’s very unlikely many if any asylum seekers would be able to access the funding after 6 months.
If there is to be funding for asylum seekers at some point after they’ve obtained legal status, then it should be linked to having already made contributions to society in the form of paying taxes etc from other roles and jobs.
In this particular case, Joel is probably ineligible for funding because he likely earns over £26,800pa. Should he be eligible for funding? Under the current framework I don’t think he should be, he’s earning money and why should he be subsidised and treated any differently to the thousands of kids who go to Uni and have to pay they’re way through Uni (incurring a load of debt on the way). He’s likely to be earning good coin in a few years so I’d imagine the funding could be repaid pretty quickly. That’s said, do I think the current funding system is right? No I don’t.
The big question for me is what should education cost? We need to have a society where education is accessible and affordable, if we want to have a highly skilled workforce and a society where people can go out become the best that they can then things need to change and affordability is part of that.
[Post edited 18 Sep 18:02]
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Reply | MPs investigating poor UK eurovision results
at 16:54 18 Sep 2026
It’s not the government per se, it’s a committee of 11 MP’s drawn from all the parties under the chair of Dame Caroline Dinenage who is a Conservative MP. |
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Reply | Assisted Dying Bill
at 22:51 16 Sep 2026
I’m also disappointed that it didn’t pass. We’re living in the 21st century and if people who have a terminal diagnosis and are likely to pass in a pre determined period - say 12 or 6 months are of sound mind, are not subject to any external pressure and can demonstrate that to a panel of suitably qualified people, I’m thinking judge, medical practitioner, advocate, and a psychiatrist then they should be allowed to pass as they wish.
It should be a matter of individual choice, who am I to tell someone who is terminally ill what they can or can’t do. In my opinion, assisted dying is preferable to forcing people to suffer or suicide. |
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Reply | Know them by their friends
at 13:01 14 Sep 2026
I’ve no issue with the 3 leaders meeting and discussing options to work together to improve things or identify common problems that need addressing in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, but they can shout or proclaim as much as they want but there’s no prospect of independence in any of the 3 countries at the moment. |
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Reply | Election
at 12:22 14 Sep 2026
It’s a very poor article from the Telegraph as it lacks context and detail.
I’m completely against the 20mph limit in its current guise and would revert to the 30mph limit in most areas except where it’s justified, for example busy town centres, outside schools (but only during certain hours ( for example 07.30 to maybe 7 or 8 or 9pm when activities have finished - lots of schools are now used by community groups etc in the evenings) etc.
What this article doesn’t say is where the collisions are taking place. It may be there have been no fatalities in 20mph zones which would mean the policy had been a success, or it may be those collisions in a 20mph zone which resulted in a fatality were attributable to drivers doing 70 in a 20 or drivers high on drugs or intoxicated or drivers texting which is increasing significantly. It may be that collisions in 20mph zones have increased, but just don’t know because there’s no info there. [Post edited 14 Sep 12:33]
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Reply | Reform - surely this has to be the end?
at 23:38 12 Sep 2026
Your figures are correct according to the Electoral Commission, Labour probably get a lot more in GE years, but it’s nowhere near what Whiterockin has claimed in normal years.
Both of these donators are crypto billionaires. Delo was convicted in the US four years ago over failings in an anti-money laundering programme in his business and subsequently pardoned by Trump.
Many Governments are wary of cryptocurrency because of the risks and challenges it poses to state monetary control, it enables financial evasion, tax evasion, money laundering, makes it difficult to track organised crime and drug dealing, terrorism etc etc and introduces systemic risk. |
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Reply | Reform - surely this has to be the end?
at 23:22 12 Sep 2026
That’s nonsense.
Depending on what metric is used, in 2025 official oversight tracking for total cash donations accepted by the Labour central party in 2025 sits at £8.2 million.
Reform UK raised roughly £18.6m–£19.8m in 2025, and the Conservative Party raised roughly £13.4m in cash donations.
These are the official figures as reported to/by the Electoral Commission. Given the on going investigations in to Reform, they may have received more than has been declared. |
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Reply | Secretary Shabana Mahmood
at 22:32 11 Sep 2026
You make a good point about some of the work Shabana Mahmood has done, it’s a lot more than most of her predecessors did in their tenures.
The numbers are down significantly and legislative changes have made it more difficult. There’s still some way to go, but all in all she’s made some d3cent progress. |
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Reply | Trump’s $5000 voting dividend
at 23:32 10 Sep 2026
According to the old saying, When America sneezes the world catches a cold.
You’re absolutely right about being concerned, we all need to be, but we do have a massive exposure to things that happen across the pond. We need to focus on getting our house in order pdq. |
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Reply | Welsh Education Performance
at 23:25 10 Sep 2026
I think there are a number of reasons for the situation we find ourselves in now.
Firstly, I think parents need to shoulder a significant proportion of the blame. A lot of parents don’t spend time doing the basics with their kids, times tables, reading, writing, homework etc etc etc. too many parents these days are only interested in what’s appearing in the social media feeds, they don’t spend time doing the basics with their kids and half the time they have no idea what’s going on. When the kids come up short, they blame the teachers. Absenteeism is an issue, If kids are succeed they need to be in school.
Budgets, these have been cut and don’t help, councils top slicing funds etc makes things worse. For a number of years I was a governor at a local school and balancing the budget was a nightmare.
Catchment area and poverty are big factors, the school I was a governor at achieved excellent academic results, the school where my wife worked was in a very poor deprived area and their results were much much lower despite the fact they had a driven and inspirational headteacher.
Governments have to take responsibility too, they’ve allowed standards to slide, budgets to shrink and councils are top slicing funding.
There are a lot of good teachers out there who are inspirational and driven, but there are also teachers out there who just don’t give a ****. Whatever people think, it’s clear that until we can recruit top talent in to teaching we are going to struggle. I saw stats yesterday about the difficulty we’re having recruiting teachers in to the sciences and maths.
My aunt was a driven old style teacher and she became head teacher of an inner city comprehensive school which was doing ok, not bad but not brilliant. Under her direction, the school improved significantly and featured amongst the top state schools in the country. She found money to pay for student teachers to come in a deliver extra lessons to the middle band pupils who wanted them during the weekends and school holidays running up to the GCSE exams. As a result, the kids who could have failed passed and the schools overall performance levels went through the roof. Underperforming teachers were identified and confronted.
I understand why Blair wanted more kids to have the opportunity to go to university, the concept was sound but like so many other things it’s not delivered what it should have. There are too many poor degrees which are worthless and costs have become prohibitive for many and a millstone around young people’s necks. I’m not saying education should be free, but it should be affordable and people should be able to continuously improve themselves.
Apprenticeships are excellent, but a lot of smaller companies no longer recruit apprentices because of the red tape and expense. My brother in law is a plumber, he won’t have an apprentice and a lot of the compiles he deals with are pulling up the drawbridge on their schemes.
Ive got 2 kids, one has a very good degree from a very good uni ( and a load of debt to boot) but he’s decided he no long wants to pursue a career in that field. He’s looking to start a new job next month which is completely unrelated to his degree, I can’t say going to Uni was a waste because I don’t know if he’d have got that job without going to uni and the skills and knowledge he acquired there. My youngest joined the NHS on an apprentice nurse scheme and is about to graduate after 7 years of part time study, they have a job, a house, a car, some cash in the bank and no debt. It’s been hard graft though, working, uni, placements, self directed study etc, but it’ll pay off. [Post edited 11 Sep 1:24]
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Reply | Reform - surely this has to be the end?
at 22:47 9 Sep 2026
We’ll have to wait and see what happens and what the police and CPS interpretation of the legislation is. It’s appears they were looking to accept a £500k donation from an ineligible donor who was submitting it via cover. If they hav exploited a “gap” in the legislation, the law needs to be tightened up.
There needs to be total transparency around donations to political parties and politicians. They should be working tor us, not a foreign state (Gill) or a billionaire or accepting cash for asking questions. |
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Reply | Reform - surely this has to be the end?
at 20:58 9 Sep 2026
Yes, 100% illegal.
The Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 specifically outlaws knowingly taking steps to disguise or conceal that a donation has come from an impermissible source. Under electoral law, you must be a UK registered voter or a company registered in the UK to be a "permissable" donor to a UK political party. In this instance, the son would be a permissible donor, but his father would not be.
Any donation of more than £500 from an impermissible source must be declared to the Electoral Commission and returned within 30 days.
Any legitimate donations from permissible donors worth more than £11,180 in a calendar year must, by law, be declared to the Electoral Commission. The £32,500 polling payment does not appear to have been declared.
Farage is claiming he didn’t hear the conversation !!! Someone rocks up, offers you a shed load of cash and you didn’t speak to them or hear the conversation - more front than Bournemouth !! |
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Reply | De-industrialisation of the UK
at 12:39 7 Sep 2026
It’s not just this government, there’s been a lack of foresight, investment etc for 20 odd years. It doesn’t help that the price for all our electric is based on the most expensive source used that particular day which invariably is gas.
I dare say the system is being rigged and gamed and wind turbines are being turned off at various points so that gas generated electricity has to be drawn on and then the owners of the wind turbines get gas rates for the leccy they’ve produced.
If we had cheap electric along with incentives to invest it would make industrialisation and wealth creation much easier. |
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Reply | Burnham and Macron
at 22:05 5 Sep 2026
According to the official updated Home Office statistics in September 2026, small boat crossings have fallen to a six-to-seven-year low.
The total number of people detected crossing from January 1 through September 1, 2026, stood at 16,513, representing a sharp 43% drop compared to the exact same period in 2025.
During Summer 2026 (June–August) there were 7,371 arrivals, the lowest summer total since 2020. June, July, and August recorded the lowest overall crossings in 7 years. |
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Reply | Reform - surely this has to be the end?
at 23:06 4 Sep 2026
It’s being reported that Farage has said if he were to win the general election, to eliminate "obstacles" to his plans, Farage said he would declare a "national emergency" and threatened to overhaul the House of Lords and how judges are appointed if they stood in the way.
Sounds very much like what happening over the pond. I’ve no issue with sensible reforming of the House of Lords, but the judiciary must be completely independent and merit based. Judges mustn’t become beholden to politicians and the latter must not be allowed to become above the law. |
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Reply | Reform - surely this has to be the end?
at 22:42 4 Sep 2026
Have an up arrow! Totally agree with much that you’ve said.
Politicians should be there to serve the public good, sadly, all too often many are in it for all the wrong reasons. If we are to have good governance, then there needs to be absolute transparency in relation to every financial transaction a politician or political party are involved in and if the law is broken those responsible need to be held to account. People who transgress and fail to comply with the law must be face serious consequences and I don’t mean a slap on the wrists or a telling off I mean jail.
We need to be sure politicians are acting in the national interest and aren’t taking backhanders, bribes or whatever people want to call it for malignant motives, for example Nathan Gill who took money from Putin’s Russia. There’s serious questions now being asked in Hungary post Orban about corruption and his stance on Russia.
Farage is getting a lot of attention and scrutiny, but that’s because there’s a lot of unanswered questions and from where I’m sitting he’s got a lot of explaining to do. He’s been gifted £5m quid, that’s a lot of money and I just wonder what, if anything is expected in return? The alarm bells should be ringing.
If he’s done nowt wrong, great, he’ll be able to stand up at the end of the enquiry and say I told you so, but in the mean time we need to have a no stone unturned investigation. [Post edited 4 Sep 22:44]
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