The passage of time in Wellington and elsewhere
Friday night football at ‘ new Griffin Park’. Not a great performance but periods of proper football and pressure. A win in the end with two late goals.
Against another potential relegation team the wind may turn out to be very important.
Finally back on display after being in a box for so long. It has not worked for about 10 years. We tried to have it repaired in New Zealand without success and I think with it nearly not returning from a trip to Christchurch. A slow process to have it fixed here too.
It makes a nice sound.
Conservative MPs react with fury at ‘own goal’ after PM ditches bid to shield former minister from lobbying claims
Owen Paterson, whose case led to an attempt to overhaul parliament’s anti-sleaze regime. Boris Johnson was engulfed in a sleaze crisis following a humiliating government U-turn that saw veteran Tory MP Owen Paterson resign from parliament after Downing Street ditched a bid to shield him from lobbying claims.
The appalling behaviour has been going on in one form or another for years but we seemed to have reached some sort of crescendo- or just a local peak of overpowering self-interest and abuse.
So Johnson rallies the MPs to vote down a punishment to meted out to his ‘friend ‘ or just Brexit comrade- possibly to weaken the system of accountability in preparation for his next investigation?
Hence the cartoon:
In less than 24 hours there was a U-turn and Patterson was cast off to the wilderness. No loss there as his behaviour of lobbying for money and using Parliamentary resources for that, was clearly corrupt, no matter what the Tory MPs, ministers, colleagues were saying.
Good turn of words to paint the picture:
“Downing Street has clearly treated parliament as a populist assembly, a lapdog to executive power. That 250 Tory MPs on Wednesday night, after damning dozens of ordinary MPs such as Keith Vaz and Ian Paisley for unethical behaviour, could obey Johnson’s orders to bail out his friend is, if anything, more awful than Johnson’s own decision.“
Buckingham Palace says Elizabeth II is now back in Windsor after doctors advised a few days’ rest
The 95-year-old had been due to take part in a two-day trip, but doctors told her that she should rest for a couple of days at Windsor Castle.
However she was then admitted to hospital for “preliminary investigations”.
That last bit is the usual cover for something big. She is 95 after all.
Much talk at the moment about the persistent and increasing level of cases in UK. So much higher than other western European countries.
However, from the government point of view this is not a problem. But to emphasise how serious this is they are apparently ‘checking the data hourly’- LOL.
So the message is that no action is needed and all is ok.
Until it is not presumably when the penny drops that the health service is dealing with so many Covid cases that the backlog of work from the last 2 years is not being dealt with or someone finally acknowledges that the deaths and ill health are not acceptable.
Then we will be told, in months to come, that all action was taken at the right time without delay, and that ‘ the science was followed’. Let’s hope the facts are clear when the questions are finally asked.
A Sunday afternoon visit for football rather than athletics and only 9 years late for the latter.
Brentford were playing West Ham and managed to pull out a last minute win when really a draw would have been reasonable.
I think this was the first away game I have been to since seeing them play Cheltenham Town when in League 1 about 20 years ago when I took Joseph. And then In was in the side stand with the home supporters.
The stadium was full which I think means 60,000 with about 5,000 of us. A strange experience. The stadium is clearly not designed for football with the pitch a long way from the fans. I was ‘on my own’ with 5,000 others, ie. no AP to discuss the finer points or moan to.
A positive write up:
Last weekend, Yoane Wissa emerged from the bench and equalised against Liverpool within four minutes. It took the man from the Democratic Republic of Congo double the length of time to hurt West Ham, but a winner with the game’s final action was a stunning outcome when his team appeared content with a point.
