I woke up yesterday morning knowing that the result of the Gorton and Denton by-election in Manchester would not be declared until 4.00am in the morning. The result was predicted to be very close but in the event was a run away victory for the Greens who won with 41% of the vote, Reform securing 29% and the Labour Party pushed to a humiliating third place with 25% The winning candidate and now the first Green MP to be elected in a by-election was a (female) Manchester plumber and turned out to be an excellent choice. In her post victory speeches she sounded every inch what ‘traditional’ Labour wanted to hear, and it was no surprise that she was successful. This result once it is well and truly analysed and digested will no doubt add yet another nail to the coffin of Keir Starmer. I suspect that the answer to this will come after the May elections when the Labour party will receive yet another drubbing so the question about Keir Starmer’s leadership becomes a case of ‘not if, but when?’ The difficulty is that there is no evident and outstanding candidate who could unify the party. Probably one of the best candidates is Andy Burnham, the mayor of Manchester but he has yet to secure a parliamentary seat and the parliamentary Labour party, under the leadership pf Keir Starmer are not willing to see him as a potential rival return soon to Westminster. Yesterday was a day long pencilled into our diaries because it is a day when my son are going to travel to Worcester by train to undertake a financial transaction (repayment of my remaining stub of a mortgage) after which my son has promised that he would treat me to a meal. Actually there is a little  cafe just around the corner from the train station and not of our way which serves delicious but simple home-made type food so we will probably eat there. I spent some time the evening before last making sure that I had some of the software in place which takes a series of photos and then turns them into a rolling display  with whatever interval (in seconds) the user chooses to have. I am going to offer this to my University of Hampshire friend who will then have a choice whether to have a really excellent and professional service provided on the web and used by professional photographers (but at a price) or my own little system which is free and I can even host for him as well. I think another telephone call is needed to discuss the various alternatives. One of the advantages of using a professional website is that all of the resizing necessary is done for you whereas in the more home-made solutions it is often advantageous to have all of the photos calibrated to the same set of dimensions so that the software can deal with it more easily. I know that a lot of people will have their photographic collections stored on their phones but there are occasions when on family occasions one wants to have a selection of photos have a much wider availability and so do a more dedicated display on a website is indicated.

My son had called around as arranged and we made our way to the railway station, arriving in plenty of time and caught the train to Worcester where there was a gentle drizzle as we arrived. We had an appointment at the bank and were seen promptly and a redemption amount was put into effect to allow us to pay off the remainder of the mortgage. Then we trundled off round the corner to my own personal bank where we did not have an appointment but were seen by a very helpful assistant. We had to go through a series of checks including a call to their own control centre but this all worked very smoothly and by the time we got home, the funds had been taken out of my account and the mortgage redeemed. My son had promised to treat me to a celebratory meal so we patronised a cafe we know near to the station who do a good line in home cooking so we enjoyed a meal there. Then we caught the train back to Bromsgrove, everything having worked out smoothly. I spent the whole afternoon rearranging the series of photos that document Meg’s life and although we have these on a professional website, the originals were scattered all over the place. So I downloaded the files from the website and then to sort them in the right kind of order, made the simple expedient of just renaming them from 001 onwards. I only intended to make a start on this process but as I got half way through I thought I might as well get through to the bitter end. All I have to do now is to enter the files into my own software which provides a rolling display and then I can utilise some of my own webspace to post the files back again. The point of doing this is to demonstrate to my University of Winchester friend that he can either utilise a professional photo display package (at a cost) or I could utilise my own home-made solution and even post things into my own website for him which would cost him nothing at all.

This weekend is a ‘rugby less’ weekend as a fortnight’s break has been built into the schedule and the Winter Olympics have now concluded. If the weather is fine, there are a host of outside jobs to occupy m ranging from car washing to gardening, whereas if rain confines me to the house, I have a mountain of recently unearthed photos to be examined to determine if they are to be saved or jettisoned. Meanwhile, I am contemplating now that I do not have a mortgage to service whether to spend the newly released fund on a brief holiday, perhaps going up to Yorkshire, or to replace my ageing MAC desktop computer. It is now 10 years old and slowing considerably and my web searches indicate that Macs generally last 6 to 10 years, with intensive users seeing peak performance for about 6 years before battery decline, while light users can get 10+ years, though performance slows and support ends eventually. Key factors are usage (heavy vs. light), care, and Apple’s software support, which usually stops around 7 years after release, leaving devices vulnerable to security risks.

The night before last, I indulged myself and really enjoyed watching the last pf the mini-series of 3 docudramas entitled ‘Dirty Water’ showing, in great and graphic detail how the privatised, and not particularly well regulated, water industry has made vast profits but regularly polluted our rivers and coastal areas. What was so shocking was the revelation that in a desire to cut ‘red tape’ successive governments had rolled back their regulatory functions and had had asked the water industry to regulate itself, which it had manifestly failed to do. Channel 4 are very good at producing these docudramas and I wonder what impact the programmes will actually have. Just before I was getting ready for bed, I read my texts and my good University of Winchester friend whose wife is in a similar situation to Meg had sent me a text where it felt as though he needed some support. So I phoned him and we had  a good long chat on the phone and I hoped that I could be of some help to him as all of the things he is currently experiencing as his wife drifts away I have experienced with Meg about a year ago. I got up pretty early in the morning  having had a sleepless patch during the night and made the suggestion to my friend that he assemble together a series of photographs that will document his wife’s life. I have done this for Meg and every so often I look at the website I created for Meg which contains my funeral eulogy but also links to a slideshow of most of the photographs that my son and I could find which we assembled in a roughly chronological order. Without  wishing to sound in any sense macabre,  I am hoping that my friend takes up my suggestion but it will help to alleviate the inevitable rushing around that inevitable occupies one between the death of a loved one and the consequent funeral service. I must say that when I visit Meg’s website, I enjoy some bitter-sweet moments when I survey the photographs from the earliest to the latest which chronicle her life and I am still pleased with the efforts that I made at the time- there is a collection of 59 photos in the collection and more will be added as they come to light, no doubt. We are holding ourselves in readiness for the results of the Manchester by election which will be announced in the small hours of tomorrow morning, and the Labour party seemed to be set up for a good kicking by the electorate. The really interesting question is whether the Labour party will be defeated from the right (the Reform party) or the left (the Greens) As things stand on polling day itself, the election is too close to call between Labour, Reform and Green but a major upset may well be on the cards. There are some slight straws in the wind that the Greens might actually be a whisker ahead. A recent poll suggests Nigel Farage’s Reform UK could be narrowly defeated by either of the other two parties. And the new poll suggests that, among those people most likely to turn out to vote, the Greens are ahead on 30 per cent with the other two parties each on 28 per cent. However, tactical voting is bound to play a part as well in this Denton and Gorton election.

Yesterday proved to be quite an interesting day. I attended my Tai Ch class as I normally do each Thursday  morning after which I had coffee with a couple of my class mates and then carried on chatting with others at the ‘chatty table’ in the Methodist centre. Then I got home and cooked myself a normal ‘meat and two veg’ meal and after I had completed  the washing up, my son and daughter-in-law turned up to help me clear out the last of the ‘hobbit holes’ This particular storage area was devoted to some rolls of Christmas paper, and a very large but old suitcase. which we had stored some quite high quality floral curtains. These we are going to offer to our domestic help in the first instance but otherwise they will be charity shop bound. But the most important stored items were several large boxes stuffed full of travel guides from past holidays all of which were junked  but more importantly family photographs going back over the decades. The very earliest of these we must have been given by Meg’s parents as there were several of these taken when Meg was very young and the most charming of these was taken when Meg was being taught how to play the piano. There are several photographs of the generation before Meg so I am going to hang onto some of these so that we next are in contact with Meg’s cousins. There are a huge number of the kinds of folders that the chemists used to give you when photographs were handed  for developing – some of these will be seaside shots whilst yet others will be photographs taken of us holidaying in the Lake District. At the moment, we just have a huge pile of these on our landing and evidently, a job each day for the next weeks and months ahead is to devote a certain amount of time each day to go through them all and working out what to retain (and label if I can) and others to throw away. But we are taking about six decades of photos here so there is a lot of material to assess and process. Whilst this particular hobbit hole was ended, we have discovered a point at which there may have been a leaking valve or junction in some of the central heating pipes which are located in the eaves so we may have to ask the very good person who services our central heating boiler to have a look at this for us and see if a repair needs to be effected. We not appear to have see evidence of a leak in the house but there are suspicious water stains on the block flooring but if we had not cleared out the hobbit hole, then this would never have been discovered at all. Later on in the evening, I will get myself into bed to watch ‘Question Time’ on BBC1 which can sometimes, via audience reaction, give us an indication of the public sentiment over particular issues and, in this respect, the whole ‘Andrew’ affair will probably draw the wrath of both panel members and audience alike.

We awoke yesterday morning to some expected good news which is that the price cap on energy prices is expected to fall by about 7% in April. Chancellor Rachel Reeves said in November that £150 would be cut from the average household bill from April by scrapping the Energy Company Obligation scheme. The reduction is expected to be primarily applied through a lower price per unit of electricity used, with households advised to look out for information from their supplier explaining this after the price cap announcement. That having been said, UK energy prices have been some of the highest in Europe. UK electricity prices for households and businesses are among the highest in Europe and the world, frequently ranking alongside Germany and Ireland as the most expensive in the region. While domestic gas prices are lower than the EU average, high electricity prices are driven by heavy reliance on natural gas for power generation, creating a significantly high electricity-to-gas price The commercial sector have often complained to government that high energy costs are one of the most significant burdens which they have to bear, particularly when they are in competition with other European countries. The reason for high electricity prices is due to the way in which the energy market works. Electricity markets work by selecting the cheapest sources first (renewables, nuclear). When demand is high, or renewables are low (e.g., no wind), gas power plants are turned on to fill the gap. Because they are the most expensive, they set the price for the entire market to ensure all providers are compensated. Despite the growth of renewables, natural gas is still a major component of the energy mix, meaning price spikes in the gas market immediately impact electricity generation costs. What I am unsure about is whether the whole of the European market works in this way. But one point of comparison is the fact that the UK as a much lower storage capacity than Germany which has significantly higher natural gas storage capacity than the UK, with roughly 89 days of supply compared to the UK’s 12 days. Germany possesses the largest storage in the EU (around 220–260 TWh), while the UK’s capacity is roughly 90–96% lower, having lost 70% of its capacity with the 2017 closure of the Rough facility. This means that at critical points in the winter (i.e. when the weather is at its coldest and energy costs are at their highest) that the UK has to energy the ‘spot’ market to buy extra increments of energy and these prices are always much higher. The UK does have the possibility of using depleted gas and oil fields as long term storage but here I suspect that under short term pressures the UK has sold off some of the ‘family silver’ leaving long term supplies to us more vulnerable than in the case of Germany. In any event, now that we are nearly into March, and we are enjoying a spell of milder weather due to a ‘wiggle’ in the jet stream, thee is a feeling that the worst of the winter is behind us and we have both lower energy prices and the uprating of pensions to which to look forward in early April.

The principal event of today was a social engagement with an old school friend who is now living in the Birmingham area and who has made contact. We decided to meet in Webbs in Droitwich in a home and garden centre with a huge cafeteria in which it is easy to find a quiet corner in which to have an extended chat. We met at 11.00am and carried on chatting for over three hours as we had a lot of history between us to catch up on. We have had this meeting arranged for several weeks now and it was a relief that nothing had happened to get in the way of it happening. So having brought each other op-to-date over what had been happening in our respective lives, we will probably meet again in a month or so. We have learnt today that fairly draconian new rules are being applied to British dual nationals.  Those who do not have a British passport could be stopped from entering the UK under new government rules coming into force from today. They will no longer be able to enter the UK using only a foreign passport, as the government starts enforcing its Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) scheme. ETAs are part of what the government says will be a ‘more streamlined, digital immigration system’ that it hopes will mean quicker entry into the UK, reducing queues at the border. It also says the system will be more secure, and prevent people who shouldn’t be entering the UK from doing so. To board a flight, they must present a valid British passport or a Certificate of Entitlement – which costs £589 – or risk being denied boarding. Whether all of this is a hangover from Brexit or something else is hard to say. It is the case that the new Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) scheme is being rolled across Europe and I have a feeling that it may disproportionately hit visitors to the UK as meany people have family members working or living outside the UK. The UK’s Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) scheme, becoming mandatory for all non-visa nationals by April 2025, applies to visitors from over 85 countries, including the EU, US, and Australia, to enhance border security. While not solely targeting the UK, it creates a new administrative burden, £10 fee, and potential travel disruption for millions of visitors. I suspect that the days of fairly unrestricted travel across national borders is coming to an abrupt end as there are moves to tighten up on borders in which ever direction one looks.

I still follow the liberal American news media on podcasts that are shown on YouTube. Some of the latest videos of the activities of the American’s ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) are shocking in the extreme. Masked and heavily armed agents without any warrants or legal justification are breaking down doors and arresting people completely at will. They have been accurately described as a de facto private military force and the methods deployed are completely reminiscent of fascist regimes across the globe. Congressional hearings have revealed that ICE agents have been specifically instructed to ignore provisions of the American constitution against arbitrary arrest and imprisonment and it appears that this para-military force is now running amok through many American  cities. It is no wonder that Presidents Trump’s ratings have hit an all-time low but how many of these evident transgressions of American law and constitution are brought to the attention of the American public in the light of a subdued Main Street Media is an interesting question.

We are starting to enter a period of very mild weather but it might only be with us for a day or so. I spent a certain amount of time browsing the U3A (University of the Third Age) groups in which I may well have an interest. There is one group which I hope to join which visits all of the local churches in the area and have the history of the building explained in a guided tour. However, this group is so popular it as already been divided into two to make everything more manageable and the next few visits are already fully subscribed. Nonetheless, I have put my name forward in the hope that I might be capable of being squeezed into either group, but I think we are looking forward to April or even May before I could actively join the group. Meanwhile there is a ‘Curry Club’ which I have asked to join and there are more general meeting groups for coffee that tend to meet in a local garden centre about once a month. To manage all of these many activities, I have decided to press a spare calendar that I have into service so that I can plan out activities for the weeks and months ahead. As it is, I am looking forward very much (and have got my name down in time) to visit the telescope in Jodrell Bank, Cheshire, at the end of the month. I get the feeling tat some groups run by U3A are tremendously popular and you have to get your name down in plenty of time.  This week s going to be slightly less busy that initially thought because  a routine hospital check up has been postponed (due to staff illness) and a new appointment made for a month’s time.  As you may have gathered, I am following the Epstein files release (or non-release) with a great deal of interest and we now know that the latest attempt on Trump’s life was made by a disillusioned Trump supporter, dismayed by Trump’s involvement in the Epstein affair. It is of no surprise that the White House and the MAGA crowd are not broadcasting the fact that the would-be assassin was a Trump supporter but I am somewhat surprised that this story has not been picked up by any of the Main Street Media. Is this, I ask myself, due to the fact that the Trump domination of much of the media is successfully being deployed to minimise the impact of the fact that some of his most loyal erstwhile supporters are now trying to kill him? Austin Tucker Martin, the 21 year old shot dead by secret service agents,  was deeply disturbed by what he felt was a government cover-up over Epstein and had repeatedly talked about powerful people getting away with it. Meanwhile, little details seem to keep leaking out in the whole Epstein affair. I even saw an email sent from one prosecutor to another in New York that spoke of the ‘murder’ of Epstein but not his ‘suicide’, the circumstances of which look highly  suspicious.

Our domestic help called around today but a little distraught because the traffic had been horrendous and it had taken her over 20 minutes to undertake a 2 mile journey. This is quite a usual story these days because the lethal combination of new building all over the town allied to various road closures and temporary  traffic lights are making travel in the town at rush hour periods increasingly problematic. My son called around today and we had a good chat about things not least some of the logistics that may be affecting him in about a fortnight’s time. He and his wife are having a new kitchen installed and as well as having nowhere to eat or prepare food and with the hot water system out of action until re-plumbing takes place, it is probable that they are coming to reoccupy this house for a period of time  until the work is completed. Actually, under the circumstances, this is an ideal solution. I thought I might look  on the net to see how long an average installation should  take.  I  discovered that  standard kitchen installation typically takes 1 to 3 weeks (5 to 15 working days) from start to finish. While cabinet fitting itself may take only 3-4 days, the full process—including removal, plumbing, electrics, plastering, and countertops—usually extends over a few weeks. A full, complex renovation can last up to 4–5 weeks or longer. So having the ‘family home’ to which my son and daughter-in-law can retreat seems an ideal solution  under the circumstances. Earlier in the day I had attended my normal Pilates class and then come home to have a meal of mackerel and easily microwaved vegetables.

The first part of an amazing ‘docudrama’ was transmitted last night with further episodes to follow today and tomorrow. The three-part docudrama, Dirty Business, on Channel 4 exposes the harrowing impact of sewage pollution. Central to the programme is Julie Maughan, mother of Heather Preen, who died in 1999, aged eight, two weeks after contracting E. coli on a family holiday in Devon. Maughan, along with other victims of the sewage crisis, and grassroots campaign groups like Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) are calling for the government to end the current privatised water industry. To mark the series launch, Channel 4 installed ‘The Fountain of Filth’ on London’s South Bank, with statues of the men, women and children vomiting brown water. As Dirty Business airs, the water crisis it depicts is still unfolding. SAS has released new data that reveals over 124,000 hours of sewage poured into England’s bathing waters in 2025. 1,236 people also reported getting sick across England after using the water and nearly three out of four (74%) cases were recorded at bathing waters classified by the Environment Agency as ‘good’ or ‘excellent.’ Among them is seven-year-old Willow Clarke who contracted the parasite cryptosporidium after swimming on a holiday in Cornwall last August and was severely unwell for 12 days, narrowly avoiding hospitalisation. So far in 2026, SAS data shows that sewage has been dumped into England’s bathing waters for over 46,141 hours. The government set out in its Vision for Water White Paper this January, but campaigners have said the proposed legislation would entrench the failing privatised system rather than end it. Surfers against sewage are urging the Government to take control of water companies and restructure them to remove the profit motive and ensure they operate in the interests of people and the environment.  Julie Maughan said: ‘My daughter Heather was eight years old when dirty water killed her. She was a fun-loving little girl who knew only love, happiness and friendship. That summer we went on holiday as a family of four and came home as a family of three. Water companies tried to deflect blame for the death of Heather and twenty-seven years later they are still pumping sewage into our water ways. They cannot be trusted to protect our health.’ she added. It could well be that this programme will have the same impact as one of a similar genre which first exposed the Post Office scandal in which sub postmasters were the victims of a faulty computer system and wrongly accused of defrauding the Post Office.

I woke up yesterday morning with a fairly mild day in prospect but quite a busy week ahead of me. No one has yet used the term ‘Andrewgate’ but this story will rumble on for weeks and perhaps even months now that the police are investigating Andrew’s affairs in his role as a Trade Commissioner. The police are already investigating those police officers who served as Andrews’s personal bodyguards and they evidently wish to know the events that they witnessed. In addition, the net is being cast a little wider because  civil servants with something to say are now coming forward. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor charged taxpayers for massages and excessive travel costs while working as the UK’s trade envoy, whistleblowing retired civil servants have claimed. One former civil servant, who worked in the UK’s trade department in the early 2000s, had been so annoyed by Andrew’s request to cover the cost of ‘massage services’ that he’d refused to pay it, but says he was overruled by senior staff. The Department for Business and Trade has not challenged the claim about Andrew’s time as envoy, between 2001 and 2011, but has referred to the ongoing police investigation into the former prince. The revelations are multiplying but some are particularly concerning as it appears that Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor might have given young women access to Buckingham Palace without any security clearance. An ex-royal protection officer insists he was ordered to ‘keep quiet’ by the Met Police after making claims that Andrew Mountbatten–Windsor smuggled women into Buckingham Palace ‘multiple times a week’. Paul Page, 54, who helped guard the royal family from 1998 to 2004, says he has now approached Thames Valley Police to assist with their ongoing investigation.He described the former prince, who was arrested by Thames Valley Police on Thursday, as an ‘a*‘ to staff working under him, adding that protection officers weren’t allowed to ask the names of women being snuck into the palace. It follows bold claims made elsewhere that one woman was given the codename ‘Mrs Windsor’ when she was flown to the UK on Jeffrey Epstein’s ‘Lolita Express’ to meet the former prince. Mr Page, who has a fraud conviction after running a £3 million scam from a locker room in Buckingham Palace, first began talking about Andrew to the press in 2008. After Mr Page publicly spoke out again last year that the former prince allegedly smuggled unidentified women into his Buckingham Palace apartment, he says he received a letter from Jon Savill, deputy assistant commissioner of the Met Police. The letter reminded him of his duties to protect the ‘confidentiality and respect for the privacy of those who are protected’, as reported in ‘The Times’. The implications of tis are actually enormous as it implies that there are whole swathes of public officials who were aware of Andrews activities but whose attempts to raise the issues with their superiors were thwarted. Not for the first time, the Metropolitan police themselves are coming under the spotlight. In Parliament, there are calls for an official enquiry, possibly led by a senior High Court judge, with the power to compel witnesses to give evidence and the calls for this are getting louder and louder as more murky revelations are being uncovered.

In the morning, I walked down the hill into town and picked up a copy of my newspaper before settling down for a drink of coffee. There I was to read the headlines  that much of the airline data that could be used to throw light upon Andrew Mountbatten-Windsors illegal trafficking of girls may already have been destroyed.  I learnt that RAF records (and Andrew often made use of these) are destroyed after three months whereas aircraft movements (call signs and numbers, arrivals and departures) are generally only held for two years and the manifests of commercial airlines for six to seven years. This means that much pf the incriminating evidence may already have been destroyed (to which my response is ‘Quel surprise!’) We have witnessed a whole series of incidents in which once the rich and powerful are eventually held to account (Orgreave incident, Hillsborough, Tainted blood  enquiry, Windrush scandal, Post Office enquiry to name but a few) the evidence trail is missing, destroyed or unavailable. Meanwhile, news is emerging in the American liberal media that Austin Tucker Martin, the would be assassin of Donald Trump was a MAGA supporter who had been appalled by the Trump inspired cover-up of the Epstein files. At the time of the last election, the MAGA action had convinced themselves of their own propaganda that the major miscreants were all Democrats. As information has leaked out, it is evident that many sectors of the commercial, political and financial elite were drawn into the Epstein net and the majority of these were probably Republican and Trump supporters  and so to the MAGA purists, Donald Trump’s attempts to delay and redact incriminating files is seem as the ultimate betrayal. It will be interesting to see whether this story ‘has legs’ as it were and whether other media outlets will have the opportunity to do a little more digging to verify the provenance of the accounts.

The day yesterday had proved to be quite mild but the weather forecasters are predicting that in a couple  day’s time we could have temperatures that rise as high as 18° and so there will be a burst of spring. I must admit that as I walked up the hill this morning, I was on the lookout for an emerging spring flower, preferable something like a red caelia, that I could put in the little vase which I have  put in front of the little display that I have made of Meg’s ashes. I have taken pains not to make this ostentatious or vulgar in any way but the box is which Meg’s ashes were returned to me have been covered in red velvet and then I have a couple of tea light holders to be lit as the occasion demands, a tiny little  vase to contain a single bloom and surmounted by a favourite photograph of Meg. I have tried to make this unostentatious and not particularly funerial as might be the case if I had purchased a specialist urn. Although I try to occupy my thoughts with pleasant memories there are days of which yseterday happens to be one) where I happen to be a little overwhelmed with grief but this is only to be expected – and bad days always eventually pass.

The evening before last, I devoted my attention to two offerings on TV. The first of these was to observe the progress of the men’s curling team in their pursuit of Olympic Gold. When half way through the match it looked as though the Canadians had the edge over the GB team, I stopped watching and indeed the GB team, although World Champions, had to settle for silver as they were coming off second best. The other bit of TV is that on my son’s recommendation I have started watching the series entitled ‘Small Phrophets’ which is one of the wry, fairly slow paced English comedies brought to us by the writer of ‘The Detectorists’ which set the terms of the genre. Whilst the humour is gentle and understated, there is some genuine pathos in the scenes and Michael Palin was persuaded to play the part of the father with dementia in a residential home. To be honest, the whole series has not absorbed my attention as much as the ‘The Detectorists’ (series on the antics of a group of English metal detectorists) but perhaps it will grow on me. In the afternoon, there was an exceptionally exciting Six nations rugby match in the contest between Wales and Scotland. The Welsh got off to a good start and played rather like the Scots did last week against England and had established a good lead by half time. But the Scots gradually overwhelmed the Welsh team but only late on in the second half so it just seemed possible that Wales could end their terrible run of bad form in recent matches. But certainly the Welsh could take plenty of pride in their performance and almost succeeded in taking the match. The England team seemed lethargic in their match against Ireland and we now have the situation in which England have lost two matches against two of our Celtic neighbours, Scotland last weekend and now Ireland this weekend. I cannot remember a period when there were two England defeats like this and we now have a break of two weeks before the final set of matches. On Sundays, I now have a new pattern where  attend the 8.30 service at church instead of the 6.00 service on the Saturday night beforehand and one of the undoubted attractions is the tea-and-biscuits in the parish hall adjacent to the church at the conclusion of the service when I have the chance to socialise and reconnect again with members of the parish community. This I did for the early Sunday service and was greeted by a small band of two of the regular parishioners and two teenage children who were going to provide  accompaniment by guitar to the hymns that had been selected for the day. Afterwards I went for my tea-and-biscuits but not many  were in the parish hall this morning – nonetheless, I engaged in a half serious theological discussion with the member of the parish community who is responsible for offering instruction to new converts to the Catholic faith. Later in the day, they were to be formally received  by the bishop in a special service which  was to take place in St. Chad’s cathedral in central Birmingham. Last week, I thought I had lost my little black purse in the parish hall so when I went back for a second time to see if any of the tea ladies who dispense refreshments at this time had found it but no such luck. But I had another round of tea and biscuits with another parishioner with whom I chatted for half an hour before I returned home to prepare a lunch of ham, roast potatoes and broccoli.

My son and daughter-in-law came around in the afternoon and we watched rugby together. This was Italy – the weakest team in the Six Nations – pitted against France who are the strongest. Nonetheless, Italy put on a good show and although overwhelmed by the superiority of the French team, nonetheless provided a very entertaining match for us to enjoy. Meanwhile on the other side of the Atlantic, it looks as though a lone gunman was about to attempt an assassination attempt on the life of Donald Trump. As soon as the gunman raised his rifle to a ‘shooting position’ he was immediately shot dead so his actual motives will probably never be known. Trump’s behaviour continues to be bizarre. In his latest adventure, Trump has claimed he is sending a boat to ‘take care of the many people who are sick’ in Greenland, which has a universal public healthcare system. He announced the plan at a dinner for Republican governors at the White House. Trump posted on Truth Social: ‘Working with ‌the fantastic Governor of Louisiana, Jeff Landry, we are going to send a ​great hospital boat to Greenland to take care of the many people who are sick, and not being taken care ​of there. It iss on the way!!!’ Whether this is actually a military operation clumsily disguised as a modern day Trojan horse, it is really too early to tell but no doubt more news will emerge later.

After a quiet week, next week promises to be quite a busy one as I have a hospital appointment in Redditch and other appointments in both Droitwich and Worcester later on in the week. But the weather seems to have turned a little less cold than of late and I am looking to next weekend when we can actually celebrate the new month of March.  I have been discussing with family whether or not to have a short term break over the Easter period but my son and daughter-in-law are due to have a short break in Spain in the week after Easter and Easter week itself is problematic for a variety of reasons. Later on in the week, my son and daughter-in-law will be helping me to clear out the last of our ‘hobbit holes’ which is the family name for the small doors giving access to the eaves of the house that we use for storage. The things that I know for certain are lots of boxes of photographs, all unlabelled as well as spare duvets and Christmas wrapping paper. No doubt, a lot of the contents will be junked on this occasion, I will ensure that the duvets get given to the Salvation Army who will both launder them and either sell them on or more likely use them in their charitable work with the homeless on some of the streets of our large cities.

The ‘Andrew’ affair rumbles on in the media after the extraordinary event of the last few days but now a more sober analysis is awaiting the nation. It is becoming painfully clear that the examination of Andrew’s affairs may take weeks or even months, not least because  some records will have to be requested from the FBI in America and they are having enough troubles of their own. Even after evidence has been collected, there is still the difficult decision for the Crown Prosecution Service whether this will stand up in a court case which itself may be months away. I would not be surprised if despite the one email that indicates that Andrew shared information with Epstein whether this meets the bar for ‘Misconduct in Public Office’. The one development overnight is that the Government has let it be known that as soon as the police have done their work that they are considering legislation to remove Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor from his position as ninth in succession to the throne. Such a move would meet with a lot of public support with a recent opinion poll indicating that some 80% of the public would agree to such a move – of course, it is highly symbolic rather than practical but expresses the feelings of outrage in the population as a whole. On the subject of investigations taking a long time, it is now evident that the FBI are sitting on a mountain of evidence and it will require a gargantuan amount of effort to sift through it all. Recent investigations and the release of documents from the Jeffrey Epstein files have confirmed that the convicted sex offender utilised a widespread, discreet, and often hidden, network of recording devices to monitor his properties, with evidence suggesting he recorded himself with victims. Analysis by Channel 4 News has identified emails within the latest Epstein files that suggest that the mountain of information released by the US Department of Justice could amount to just a fraction of the total – potentially just 2% of the information that the FBI retrieved from Epstein’s homes. We have multiple examples of hard drives and computers stuffed full of images as it appeared that Epstein secretly recorded many of the perpetrators of the sex crimes, no doubt as an instrument of blackmail and, perversely, often included himself in such footage. Of course, all Epstein would have to do is to  let it be known to the rich and powerful to whom he provided under-age girls for sex that he had records of their encounters and the mere threat of exposure might be sufficient for many to cough up millions of dollars in Epstein’s direction. Only after the Congressional elections will there be the political will to devote the massive amount of resources needed to sift and evaluate all of this evidence and, at some point, even after a change in government even the Democrats may say that ‘enough is enough’ several years down the line.  Meanwhile, Donald Trump has reacted with fury to the fact that the Supreme Court voted 6:3 that his tariffs were unconstitutional and is fulminating to the effect that he is going to find other ways of imposing a 15% tariff on almost everybody. Also, the question arises as to how the American consumers who have had to pay higher  prices since the imposition of tariffs can be compensated (and the answer, knowing the Trump regime, is that they will not be) As a diversionary tactic, Trump is threatening military action against the Iranians but the UK government  is so far resisting the call to assist the US military in their efforts although I would not be surprising if refuelling facilities were not offered to the Americans. 

Yesterday morning was somewhat out of the ordinary as well. The last time I was in the Methodist Centre, I noticed amongst the various leaflets on display one headed ‘Bereaved’ and inviting people along to a meeting on the first and the third Saturday of each month. So I decided to give this a go imagining that might be half a dozen attendees but instead found myself in a large group of about sixty people (nearly all elderly female) An illustrated talk was to be given  by a local historian on the subject of ‘Plague, Pestilence and Pox’ and evidently this is why the audience was so large. When I first arrived, I chatted with someone I knew who used to attend my local church but who helps out with dispensing tea and coffee one day a week in the Methodist Centre. So, this talk took the best part of an hour and I new realise is one of a series of events that are organised on alternate Saturday mornings, The next one in a fortnight’s time is just labelled ‘DVD’ so this could be anything really. When I got home, I reheated something prepared a week or so ago and popped into the freezer and then settled down to watch the England vs. Ireland 6 Nations rugby match. I thought that the outcome of this match might be a little difficult to call and that England might want to prove a point after their defeat at the hands of the Scots last week. But the Irish comprehensively defeated England in every single department of the game and the final score of 42:21 indicated the highest number of points that Ireland had every scored at Twickenham as well as the largest margin of victory. The match that follows this is Scotland vs. Wales and I dare say that my sympathies  will be with the Welsh as they are so much the underdogs and are in danger of losing every one of their matches in this season’s competition. 

After his defeat in the US Supreme Court yesterday, Trump has responded with a show of petulant fury slapping a 15% tariff on every nation (i.e. the rest of the world) trading with America. This is almost certainly illegal but Trump has scant respect for any legal niceties that he seems to brush away as through they were irritating cobwebs.  It is probably the case that this action of tariffs will slow World Trade and will only invite reciprocal tariffs all round but Trump is convinced that only by imposing tariffs can he ‘save’ America. Trump is renowned for his economic illiteracy in any case and a general imposition of tariffs all around benefits none of us in the long term.

As might be expected, the media is still completely dominated, if not obsessed, by the arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor as we are painfully being called to address him. Andrew was released the evening before but he will have had to ignore the normal indignities of being locked in a police cell for hours, given tea out of a polystyrene cup (a pottery one could have sharp edges if smashed and could be used to self-harm) and even one’s shoe laces removed for a similar reason. The graphic designers have been busily at work on social media and two were particularly apposite. On showed Andrew advertising jewelry but his hands manacled in handcuffs (incidentally, the Spanish with a certain black humour called handcuffs ‘esposas’ which translates as ‘spouses’). The second image showed a portrait of the old Queen as depicted on a 50p coin but with her head in her hands in a gesture of grief or despair. There has been an enormous amount of discussion of the future role of the monarchy with some saying that this crisis is even worse for the Royal Family than the abdication crisis of the 1936- the monarchy will certainly survive but living with completely new parameters and with a lot of the mystique associated with it stripped away. Actually, I felt a certain degree of pride in UK institutions because, even without a formally written constitution, it has been demonstrated that no one is above the law and the police have gone about their business carefully and methodically. This is sharp contrast to what is (not) happening in the USA at the moment where only victims seem to have their identities revealed whilst the rich and powerful perpetrators of the sexual abuse of underage girls have remained hidden and almost certainly un-investigated. One almost feels like shouting to the Americans ‘this is the way to do it’ and certainly some of this feeling is already being manifest in the USA. I think there is a growing realisation that we faced with weeks or months of this story dragging on and the Royal Family are having to live life ‘as normal’ despite it all. Evidence gathering may take quite some time but I suspect that a lot of it will be email trails. After the evidence gathering trail, the Crown Prosecution Service (what an ironic title!) will have to take time to decide whether the evidence is strong enough to mount a prosecution but this Common Law piece of legislation (‘Malfeasance in Public Office’) is rarely used and there are all kinds of technicalities ‘en route.’ For example, given the way that Andrew was appointed a Trade Commissioner was he given a formal contract, any kind of induction and/or training and was he clear what was or was not expected and permissible in such a new role? I suspect that these procedures were done in the most cursory of fashions if done at all and this gives scope for defence lawyers to mount a defence on the grounds of ignorance as to what was expected of a ‘Trade Envoy’?

Yesterday morning, I made a journey into town by car, calling first to pick up a copy of the newspaper and then called at the branch of my bank to see if I could alert them to the fact that I was due to pay off the mortgage next Friday and wondered if they required prior intimation of the transfer of large amounts of money. The branch were singularly unhelpful so I went on my way to pay my usual visit to the ‘Gifts of Love’ charity shop cum coffee bar for my regular end of week drink. There one of the assistants who I know well by sight and another regular customer popped by so we had a conversation mainly centred around pets (particularly dogs) that we had known. I then popped into a cosmetics store to buy some cosmetic and cleaning products whilst I was in that part of town and then finally made it home, fairly late and cooked myself a risotto, utilising some mackerel I already had in the freezer. I then made a couple of telephone calls to my bank and also my mortgage provider to make sure that all runs smoothly whilst my son and I make a trip into Worcester next Friday in order to redeem the small stub of a mortgage with which we are left. One would have thought this would be straightforward and it may well prove to be if I transfer money using the app on my phone in the presence of the mortgage adviser but nothing appears to be unproblematic these days and I am loathe to do things entirely in case the wrong key gets pressed and large amounts of money disappear. But redeeming a mortgage is not something that is done on a daily basis – it practice, only once or twice on a lifetime so I want to ensure that there are no hitches.

There is a wonderful German word, not directly translatable into English which is ‘schadenfreude’ generally rendered as ‘malicious delight in someone’s misfortune’ Now I have experiences a little of that emotion yesterday when I heard the latest news from the USA. The US Supreme Court rules on the legality of the sweeping tariffs imposed by Donald Trump on the world last year. The case centred on whether the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which allows a president to regulate imports during a national emergency, authorises Trump to impose tariffs without clear limits on their scope or duration. The US Constitution grants Congress the power to set tariffs, and challengers argue Trump exceeded his authority. The Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, heard nearly three hours of oral arguments in November and gave few indications of how it might rule. But the court has now struck down the tariffs, meaning the administration could face huge financial consequences. Trump had warned the US will need to ‘unwind’ trade deals if it loses the case and warned of a ‘complete mess’. This could potentially cost the American economy some $175bn (about $150bn) which is a lot of money to reimburse American tax payers and one wonders how far Trump will comply. Given the Trump conservative majority in the Supreme Court, a ruling of 6:3 against Trump is quite surprising and, perhaps, having  defied presidential wishes on this occasion, they may feel emboldened to do so again in the future  when Trump seems to massively exceed the authority normally accorded to an American president.

Two particular issues have arisen yesterday morning as a by-product of the release of the Epstein files by the FBI in America and they both throw the spotlight on British institutions. The first of these issues are an examination of the role of Private Protection Officers whilst Andrew Windsor-Mountbatten was away, paying visits to Epstein on his private island.  At least nine police forces in the UK are examining their records to ascertain what these protection officers either knew or recorded of Andrew’s comings and goings. According to a Newsnight interviews, detailed logs should and probably  have been kept of Andrews’s peregrinations including the night when he was said to have assaulted Virginia Guiffre but do these records still exist and are they accessible? My guess would be that these records have been lost, mislaid or destroyed and with the passage of time, yet another of the rich and powerful have ‘got away with it’ Of course, I may be mistaken but I would imagine that the police investigations into their own records will reveal practically nothing and the British authorities may have to rely upon the memories of past protection officers which evidence will not stand up in court. Speaking to LBC a former Met protection officer claimed Andrew’s protection team travelled with him to the private island on at least two occasions, including travelling on Epstein’s private jet on one of those occasions.  The unnamed former officer said there were real concerns in the late 1990s and early 2000s that the royal protection team became too close to their principals, and staff were terrified of being demoted. Under the rules governing how police forces are held to account, the Independent Office of Police Conduct (IOPC) would carry out any further investigation should the initial Met assessment identify concerns. In the next few days, we may know the answer to some of these questions but I would be amazed if usable records still exist. The second issue concerns the young women allegedly trafficked into the UK to be abused by part of the Epstein empire. Even private jets have to go through immigration and customs clearance but this is often cut to a minimum of about 15 minutes and is not the long and drawn out process to which the rest of us mere mortals is subject. Now the interesting question arises as to whether any of the details of the trafficked young women and girls is retained by the British authorities – did they all have passports for example? This is yet another murky area in which the police are examining their own records but given the way in which the state has cut back on its monitoring of passengers entering and leaving the UK in recent years and the special privileges accorded to those who utilise private jets, I have a shrewd suspicion that these visits of young women to the UK was either not recorded or the records have long since vanished. As in the USA, there is a lot more yet to be revealed as journalists trawl through  the 3 million documents/files that have been released so far and, quite apart from the Epstein case, there is also some indirect evidence that the former Prince Andrew was abusing his position as a ‘Trade Envoy’ and releasing confidential information to their parties, probably for his own private gain (rather like Mandelson) but this is yet another twist to the emerging story.

In the morning, I had the most entertaining time. Firstly I attended my Tai Chi class as I do each week and afterwards had a coffee with my friendly bank manager with whom I often ‘chew the fat’ as it were. When he left, I joined the couple I had met last week who had been married for well over fifty years and who was always entertaining, and another of the regulars. They were joined by a friend with whom they had been to a talk the night before and then it emerged that at least three of us had all left school at the age of 15-16, largely for economic reasons. It transpired that the elderly  friend had actually trained as a nurse in Pendlebury Childrens Hospital. Pendlebury Children’s Hospital was a pioneering paediatric facility in Pendlebury, Salford, England, with roots dating back to 1829. Known as the Manchester Children’s Hospital from 1873, it was a major institution for sick children before eventually merging and relocating to the Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital on Oxford Road.  I enquired of the old lady what dates she had actually been in Manchester but she predated my stay there by about 5-6 years but we knew some of the same institutions. We were discussing the first wages we were paid but back in those days nurses lived in an adjacent home at a reasonable rent. In the 1950s, nurses’ homes (residences for nurses attached to hospitals) generally provided food as part of the board and lodging arrangement. Nurses often ‘lived-in’ with meals provided, and their wages often included a deduction for this accommodation and food. So therefore, the amounts we were paid each week were not really comparable with each other, but I also wondered why the nurses’ homes had to be abolished when they were because there was already a pool of adjacent labour upon which to draw in times of emergency. So after an entertaining morning, I returned home and cooked myself a curry. For the rest of the day, there was an absolute feeding frenzy in the press as we all digested the news that Andrew Windsor-Mountbatten had actually been arrested by Norfolk police earlier in the day. As this is the first time a member of the Royal Family has been arrested since the days of Charles I some 400 years ago, one can imagine the outpourings of the press. There are some suggestions from the liberal British media podcasts that find their way onto YouTube that this might have ramifications as far as the White House itself. It seems the ultimate irony that the ‘wash’ from the Epstein files should engulf first Mandelson and then Andrew but their transgressions are miniscule compared with the revelations of the transgressions of the rich and powerful on the US, not one of whom has actually been investgated let alone charged. The cover-up of incriminating material is off the scale – according to some FBI figures who had to give an estimate of the total volume of Epstein material in the possession of the FBI, it could be that the 3000 files so far released are only about 2% of the actual material collected.

I have not been an avid follower of the Winter Olympics and, perhaps, for good reason. Every time I have tuned in to watch the curling matches in progress, the GB team seem to be in the process of being beaten – as they were last night by Norway, So last night, I watched a biopic on the life of Kenneth Williams, the amazing comic, who turned out to be a very tortured soul. He is probably best known these days for the many times that he appeared in the ‘Carry On’ films but although he appeared in practically one of them and they thus provided him with a regular source of income, he was nonetheless filled with a degree of self-loathing for the part of himself which is displayed in them. Williams was actually a self taught and very erudite man and desperately wanted to be known as a serious actor in which he was successful on only a few occasions. He died on April 15, 1988, at age 62 from an overdose of barbiturates, with the coroner recording an open verdict rather than suicide. While his final journal entry, ‘- oh – what is the bloody point?’, suggested despair, his death followed chronic health issues and dread of impending surgery. I flitted in my TV watching between watching this and the curling which was rather an exercise in masochism. The day today may turn out to be a fuller one than usual as I shall venture out to the Methodist Centre to show if there is anyone interesting with whom to chat on the ‘chatty table’ and then this afternoon here is a dentist’s hygienist appointment to be attended and the weekly shopping to be done.  Although the weather threatens to be quite cold and chilly for the next day or so, some milder weather will follow on all as a result of the jet stream being pushed a little way northwards and of course, March is not too distant now. We were greeted yesterday morning with the welcome news that inflation had recorded quite a sharp fall down to 3% mainly as a result of lower petrol prices, cheaper air fares and food prices drifting a little lower.  The one thing that lightens my gloom a little in the months of February and March is that it the months in which the monthly payments of rates to the local authority have ceased until the new rates kick in in April. But at that time we are in for a severe shock as Worcestershire County Council has been given government permission to raise council tax by 9% for the 2026/27 financial year, one of the largest increases in the council’s history. Facing an unprecedented budget crisis, the Reform-led authority is expected to finalise this rise, which adds roughly £145 a year to Band D bills, on February 26. The ‘cap’ on rate increases is generally 5% but Worcestershire have been given 9% to help the (Reform led) council tackle an enormous projected budget deficit, nearly all of it attributed to the enormous cost of social care to which it is committed by statute. In fact, it seems that Reform-led local authorities  are increasing the rates at the same rate as other authorities and if they do not, it is only because they have raided the reserve funds held by all local authorities.

Later in the morning, I popped into town by car, picking up my daily newspaper and then making my way to the Methodist Coffee Shop near the centre of town. Here  had a brief coffee with one of my ex-Waitrose crowd but after she left, I was left on my own outnumbered by females in the ratio of 8:1 but the other two males were here with their wives, so it was one of those unfortunate days  which occur from time to time when social contact was minimal.  I decided to visit the nearby store which sells toiletries and household goods of every description. Here I had in mind about five items which I wished to purchase when I was next in the store but found that not one of them was in stock. Stores like this are full of the stuff where manufacturers have evidently excess production and have off-loaded them to the discount stores but if you are looking for specific items, you are destined for disappointment (as I was this morning).

One would have thought that making a journey from the outskirts of Bromsgrove to a neighbouring village where my dentist is located would have been straightforward. But the lane onto which my road opens is cut off half way down where, no doubt, utilities are being installed for the masses of new building going all around us. Soo I had to go through town in a really massive diversion only to discover that the road leading to the dentists was itself completely closed. A diversion was in place for about three miles and it was a minor miracle that I arrived at the dentist only about one minute late. I was due to see the dental hygienist who I would normally see once every six months but who I had not seen for about a year and a half during Meg’s final illness. I was relieved that my teeth and gums seemed to be in pretty good condition despite this year and a half without a hygienist’s attention but I asked for and received some very good advice about a routine of regular flossing. After this I went to my regular supermarket for a weekly shop and it was so quiet that no manned ills were in operation but only self-service tills, which I tend to avoid. So I had to wait until they could find one member of staff to provide a normal service through a manned till. Although it is a bit of a gloomy day and very cold, at least I managed to get home, the shopping unpacked and the wheelie bins located by the kerbside whilst it was still fairly light. 

In an important case currently through a court in the USA,  Mark Zuckerberg is to appear before jury for first time where he is scheduled to give evidence in a watershed trial. The CEO of Meta, which owns Instagram, WhatsApp and Facebook, is expected to answer tough questions from lawyers representing 20-year-old plaintiff KGM. Zuckerberg previously tried to argue that an in-person appearance at the trial was unnecessary but Judge Carolyn Kuhl ruled in October that he must testify, saying his evidence is ‘uniquely relevant’ to the case.