Blog

What I place here is part of a personal e-mail from a Dutch friend. It is un-edited, just as I received it, and I post it instead of what I originally intended for the sake of us Brits who, like me, have been appalled at what is happening to and within our country, only because the EU forced us, and I include Holland, to do away with our borders..

My friend wrote ‘One more advantage of living in an apartment we no longer have to fear for burglars. The criminality increases very fast and becomes  rougher by the day. They don’t hesitate to ram the door or break the window panes to enter and treat the people very rough and only for a few euros or a laptop. I think that soon the windows and doors will be equipped with bars.

These criminals are working most of the time in small groups and have an East European nationality. I think those people prefer the western countries because of the very soft treatment when they are caught. They stay in comfortable cells with TV, good food and books in their own language and after a couple of days they will be sent home by plane. Some days later they return and start again their crimes. Luckily, on the third floor of this building we don’t need bars!

I love reading your interesting blogs, in which I recognise all the problems and injustice we have in Holland. It seems to me that you want to carry all the problem of the world with you. But I think it is a relief for you to write it down and the fact that it will be read by others is not so important. So carry on with writing and don’t worry about the statistics.

Please revise your ideas of the discrimination of a high proportion of the people shopping with you. We’re not all mindless sheep, or obsessed with the cheap and cheerful. A lot of us were once good cooks, who are now reduced to being on our own, or just two of us, whereby cooking meals is no longer as viable or as economical as it was. There seems to be a policy whereby you introduce a new product on the food shelves, that has been carefully designed, tested, its packaging made as attractive as possible and the price is generally reduced as an introduction. We buy it, we try it, and we’re sold; it is all that it says on the tin, and so it becomes a staple, something we propose to eat, maybe once every three weeks. The honeymoon generally lasts about three months, then the price rises, but we don’t mind because we think we are still getting value for money, but then subsequently the quantity and quality starts to decline but not the price. This has happened with a number of products, staples and prepared food. For a year or so you are buying a particular article, say corned beef, Pacific salmon, tinned ravioli or maybe a Chinese meal. Then one day, the label changes, the price may stay the same or go up, but the contents of the tin or container, has definitely gone down. Ultimately not only has the quality and much of the flavour gone down, but the quantity has also gone down.There is more liquid in the tin than heretofore, if liquid is usual, the salmon looks as though it could be farmed, not wild, because of the increase in fat, and also made of the tail because of the size of the pieces and the amount of the skin. What is really aggravating is that you the purchaser have to start searching all over again, even elsewhere, to find another product of the same type to replace what you are now rejecting, and of course there is disappointment.

In the prepared meals department, almost invariably the size of the packaging and the printed picture cause one to expect more than is realised, in quantity, quality and taste, often by a big margin.I have found old-fashioned English dishes like steak and kidney with so much chilli in it, it killed the taste of the kidney, and indeed chilli seems to be a staple ingredient in a good deal of these prepared dishes. There is a marketing ploy in television, whereby the people determining the programmes operate on the principle that if you don’t like it, you can switch off. In the case of supermarkets, I suppose we can vote with our feet. Finally what really drives me crazy is this policy of changing the positions of the items, even scattering some of one kind in different parts of the supermarket, thus making them still more difficult to find. I know the principle is that it encourages you to see things that you didn’t anticipate, because you have been hunting for the last 20 minutes for something you normally found in a minute and a half, having fruitlessly looked along a few hundred yards of shelving. When so many articles of different brands are on offer, and there are so many miles of shelving, it can take a lot of time, better spent on happier things, than looking for articles on the shelves, or someone to find them for you.

I have already referred to the fact that we are paying 31 billion, in interest on our National Debt, not internal debt. For years I lived with the national debt after the last war, when we owed the Americans and others for helping us. I vaguely remember that in or around about the 70 and 80s the National Debt was either non existent or low. When I find that we are paying more in interest from money borrowed than we are for some of our essential services, I begin to wonder if they’re using the same system in government, that the government expects us to use at home.

Every time the government changes its systems, especially if it’s on a national scale, the costs are incredible in management skills, history, refurbishment and changes in the clerical sphere – furniture, printing, decoration, – just equate it to moving house many times.. This government is constantly changing the deployments of services, the form of the services, for little improvement, if any in the end result. I believe waste, which was very low when there was stability in education, health, social services and infrastructure, is now at a very high level, I have seen it in a big way when I myself was taken over from local to national government. So many of the changes since the 70s, have been both costly and unnecessary. Indeed almost monthly we find that old traditions which were overturned on a whim, are been reinstated – one glaring example is the hospital Matron. If you go to the previous article, Part 1, and look at the list of budgets you will find that the ones that we worry about most, housing and the environment, agriculture and employment, public order and safety, and transport, aggregate to only 55% of that paid for Social Protection. As I don’t really understand all the relevant requirements for social protection, and the interpretation doesn’t help, I feel that this discrepancy between some of our greatest needs, and what I assume are the greatest needs of the world in general, should at least be explained to us simply, and in more detail, and be justified in the light of our national debt, and also if it comes to that, our internal debt.

On the 13th or February the Daily Telegraph had a list of how taxpayers money is spent. The total came to 589 billion, and they were as follows, Social Protection at 159bn, Health 105bn, Education 78bn, Other Expenditure unspecified 62bn, Public Order And Safety 33bn, Defence 32bn, National Debt Interest 31bn, Personal Social Services 26bn, Housing And Environment 22bn, Industry, Agriculture, Employment And Training, 21bn, Transport 20bn.

I was surprised that Social Protection, which I then assumed meant the police, CCTV, and presumably the prisons, until I found that we were spending 33bn on public order and safety. As defence gets 32bn, I couldn’t interpret what this large sum, more than a quarter of the total budget is being spent on as well as 62bn unspecified. When you see the health service which is only receiving 105bn and consider the size of it, the number of people working in it, and the complexity and technicality of what they do, it can give one pause for thought. When I went to the Internet and looked for the interpretation of Social Protection, the information that was available stretched to almost 300,000 items, but when I looked at Social Protection per se, my personal interpretation was that it is basically overseas aid. I was never aware that our overseas responsibilities extended to a quarter of our budget, especially when transport only receives the smallest amount, 20bn.

I took exception to the paucity of funding for transport, at a time when the government is telling us to turn off neon power indicators to save the world. The lamentable lack of public transport, and the lower portion of our national funding devoted to it, shows an illogicality in the approach to global warming, when so many cars are daily used along suitable public transport routes. I have firmly believed for years that the general public would not object to funding a cheap and efficient public transport system. The reduction in traffic at peak periods, and stress to the individual not worrying about parking, or driving in heavy traffic, would not only help the global warming problem, it would reduce stress in us all, young and old. There will of course be a reduction in the taxation which is gathered from personal transport.

I have not done sufficient research to comment on whether this vast sum for overseas aid is warranted as our responsibility, or if it is common in other countries to the same degree, and indeed if it is solely for overseas aid and the care of migrants. To my untutored eye, 159bn or 27% of our income, our largest expense, set against the other causes seems excessive, especially when you consider that we are paying 31bn to cover the interest on our national debt, (not our internal debt). The National Debt could currently be building, even now and even more, in the light of all the new demands on our Exchequer which are put forward daily.

On the BBC Political Show today, there was an item about the controversy between the government, and the bus companies concerning the supply of bus passes to everyone who is 60 or over years of age. The government has set aside money to cover the cost, while the bus companies can see problems of inequality between those who service highly attractive holiday sites, and the rest, with respect to reimbursement. It is easy to realise that this complaint is totally valid, but the government spokeswoman seemed adamant that not only had they supplied enough money but the bus companies had no argument. I have a few though.

I didn’t retire until I was 70, by which time I had bought a motor home and travelled over a lot of Europe in periods of six weeks at a time, and parts of Britain more often. I played golf, I walked for miles, and was a keen and strong swimmer, also I was not on the breadline. It wasn’t until I was in my mid-80s that I applied for one of those blue cards to allow special parking for the disabled. Others are not as fortunate as I, and their problems should be catered for as far as is sensible, and equable. I have had a bus pass since I was 65, but as there are very few suitable bus routes, I have used it rarely. The ability to take public transport for a change of scene, if one has no car, and thus change one’s perspective from time to time, is essential for both physical and psychological reasons, and should be encouraged at all levels and particularly in the aged. Those pensioners with low incomes should be assisted by being given a number of free passes, to travel to places of their choice. On the other hand, if the travel is free, a trip round Britain, which with the government system would appear to be valid, is the opposite to this, it is abusing the privilege.

It would seem more logical, and reasonable that some travel, is provided free on the same principle as parking for the disabled, to provide for a proven need. On the basis that the elderly require to be encouraged to get out, shop, see new sites, a limited system could be provided with a more general bus pass for those over 70. Those between 60 and 70 whose income is too low, or are handicapped, could apply over and above a free pass for the local area, for a limited amount of free extended travel, which they would obtain in the form of vouchers they could use to pay for the extended journeys they propose to take. This will enable them to visit relatives who live some distance away, in this society of ours that is so scattered. Those over 70 would also be able to apply for the vouchers which would provide a limited amount of free extended travel per annum.

From my own experience I know that no matter how healthy you are at 60, you rogressively wear out with time, your need to travel and see new places diminishes exponentially, because it becomes repetitive with those within easy reach, and too exhausting for those far off. Setting up the system will be expensive initially, and will take some organisation on the lines of the blue badge. There will be teething troubles, quite a bit of discussion as to who is entitled to get what, but with time, after a period of experimentation by the recipients of the free travel, the system will bed down at a lower level than is anticipated, will be more equable for both the public and for the transport authorities, and one might be able with this voucher system, coupled with a limit of only travelling at off-peak, to actually apply the system also to the railways.

When I heard what was said on the television, the total take-it-or-leave-it attitude of the spokeswoman gave the impression that she considered what was on offer was a charity, if it didn’t suit everybody, hard luck!

Sophie and I have subscribed to some charities over many years long-term and also one off. Now we are on a mailing list which is passed from charity to charity and we are receiving junk mail and presents for which we have no use, but overall costing a fortune to purchase, wrap and post, so that the small sum we sent has long been used by this process alone. I repeated this statement because I am convinced that the maintenance of charities is now a marketing industry, supporting not only the charity’s staffs, but a number of marketing specialists. The nightly advertising on TV, and the vast quantity of paper that comes through the door justifies this statement. The whole charity industry needs a close examination. What amounts to blackmail of the conscience should be outlawed, especially as it must by its very nature, waste charity funds, and annoys the likes of me, and causes generous hearted people, often poor themselves, to part with money that may never reach the intended destination, either because of waste, or through diversion at the other end.

I know what I’m about to write is simplistic, might even be incorrect, but I have found in many circumstances that stresses build up over time, until that moment when the stress is greater than the resistance and the system snaps. The life of man on earth is miniscule to that of the Earth, and the damage being done to the Earth has taken place in a very short time of even man’s occupation. I find that the sudden climate change is so widespread, that perhaps the accumulation of stresses from the cooling of the Earth, from deforestation, plate tectonics, and the greenhouse effect etc. has all combined with some other changes to bring about this sudden vast change. Around the world, changes are taking place, both political and geographical, which are almost unique in the widespread seriousness of their effect. In consequence the level of demand for charitable help throughout the world has risen to an unanticipated level, and can no longer be accommodated by subscriptions from individuals. It is now a worldwide problem to be countered by a worldwide charitable organisation encompassing more than the UN is currently capable of.

Homeland. In the last piece I wrote I mentioned the portcullis psychology. Today as always, the Englishman’s home is his castle, but I see the UK, my homeland, in the same terms as I see my home. I am therefore cautious of strangers, welcoming to friends, and object to being taken for granted by those who wish to profit from any generosity I might show. I therefore fail to understand why we have foreigners sitting on our pavements begging, sleeping rough, all without invitation. I would have thought it was logical that if we needed special skills, and were unable for some reason to train them up at home, we should be adopting the same policy of advertising, seeking references, having interviews and selecting by a face-to-face meeting, those we wish to invite into our homeland. It is totally beyond me how Europe has permitted this increasing rush by immigrants, unchecked, who wish to improve their lifestyle at the expense in every sense, of the established nations of the EU. Surely it is time that we reinstated, right across Europe, a border system that was convenient for free trade, but reduced the movement of drugs, criminals, and immigrants with no visa to justify their entry, or for crossing state borders. I can see a loophole whereby, I suspect, it would be easy for Eastern Europeans with passports, to arrive in Eire ostensibly on holiday, and merely walk into the United Kingdom via Northern Ireland.

If you read the Government current and proposed control systems, here and abroad, and one assumes it is replicated by other countries, it would be more logical and more secure to just shut the borders. While I read what is said, I believe it is too fragmented to be secure. It proposes introducing ID cards for foreign nationals in 2008, people who stay in the UK longer than they should will not be able to access benefits. My two objections to blankets ID cards are that they were going to cost us £60 plus, and from the way the credit cards and other identity cards can be forged today, I always felt that they served little purpose in the long-run, as the honest didn’t need them, and the criminal could get them for a small sum.

My experience stretches for nearly 90 years, and I see those past times as individual periods. From the end of the First World War until the middle of the 30s, was a time of overcoming the horrors, and retrenchment of the values we had had before. From the mid-30s until WW2, there was a new peace, it was a time of tranquillity, when people were reasonably happy with their lot, and we as a nation felt secure. Then came World War II, and all of that was wiped away and we didn’t really recover until the 1950s, and then again the feeling, as far as I was concerned, was that level of calm and tranquillity that we had had in the mid-30s. This was thrown over almost totally in the 60s by the flower people, who had none of the charm or the beauty of those plants, but introduced us as a nation, to the horrors of drugs, and the relinquishing of the chains which had previously held our society together. The religious ties were no more, and to some extent the social mores were frowned upon as being old hat. After 69, I couldn’t really tell what the atmosphere was in the UK, outside Northern Ireland, as we were too concerned with our own problems.

But what we have today is an underlying, unnoticed fear, which affects our lives from almost birth to old age. We don’t trust people as much as we did, and some of us take extreme security measures to ensure our own safety. We fear new diseases with good reason. Streams of cars, nose to tail, are taking children to school because the parents are afraid. The elderly have special locks on their doors, and to a great extent, batten down the hatches as soon as the sky darkens. Youngsters are carrying knives either from aggression or because of fear, and parents often keep the children within the house at nights, staring at a screen because they’re too afraid to allow them to stroll the streets. Over this 90-year period our standard of living, our comfort, and possibly a large proportion of our incomes have risen, but there is not the relaxed atmosphere that those of us who were lucky to be in the right place at the right time, enjoyed. What concerns me most, is that I cannot foresee the outcome, with our society being fragmented the way it is, being also subjected to considerable psychological adjustments, having our way of life controlled to an unreasonable extent by a new form of government in a foreign country, as all this can overburden many to the point of a high level of frustration, and discontent.

I am probably too old, and too set in my ways to see the future clearly, but that doesn’t stop me expressing my views. Increasing the population, having more large towns and cities, is only aggravating the situation on such a small island. Instead of bringing immigrants in to perform jobs our people seem reluctant to do, it seems to me that as the indigenous population is waning, the jobs are being manufactured to feed technical advancement, such as call centres, the mobile phone, as the need created by advertising, rather than the stable requirements of a contented society.

Speaking personally
My regular readers will have found that my output has dropped considerably over the last six weeks. This was for a number of reasons. Firstly, I have to use a magnifying glass for reading print on paper and on the screen, secondly I have had to be careful of my eyes, and thirdly and more importantly, I believe that I have arrived at a point where I am beginning to repeat myself. As my grandmother used to say,’ I am boiling my cabbage twice!’ As I have written something like 500 articles, it will be too tedious to go through them to see if I’ve already made the same comment before, so I rely on my creaking memory, and your forgiveness. The condition of the eyes will not be complete until May or June, when the other eye has been done, and at that time, because I shall have little of my own experience to offer, I will only be writing what I feel is important, and worth the reading. I still have other interests such as painting, writing, illustrating personalised books for my great-grand-children and of course the inevitable gardening, although each year I find I can only do successively less. I just hope you will understand. John

When a boy throws himself off a bridge to fall 20 feet, because he is being attacked; when we hear daily of murder, stabbing, and children with machetes, and other children stoning ambulances, it is time to take stock. Before World War II one rarely saw an article in a newspaper about murder, to the extent that if written, it was emblazoned. Now all news is daily peppered with accounts of murder, so what is the real cause for this terrible breakdown in our society, and what needs to be done to remedy it? Our way of life is totally different to what it was in the 50s, but are we so totally different? I am not aware if a nationwide survey of the type that I’m proposing has ever been carried out to assess if there are actually any patterns in the causes of crime, which are influenced by age, the environment in which people live, and their financial situation, to highlight just a few of the variables. The only way that we can find this out is to examine possible changes in each decade since the 50s and relate them to the rise of violence and criminality that is prevalent today. I did think of an incredibly complicated analysis of the records of all those who have committed crime over the decades, and discovered that it was a monumental task. Then I thought of a marketing research tool that I had used in the past, the Observation Panel. One invited a number of like minded individuals, to a hotel room, showed them a product, asked them for their views on it, and from the information gained, having done this several times, a decision was made on whether the product should be promoted and to what extent. I think graphs should be used once the information is correlated to enable changes to be seen in different categories over the decades. It has been my experience that graphs are far superior to unvarnished statistics, for a quick understanding of any marked variation.

Today’s security, and peoples’ personal records, have to be protected, so a scheme must be designed which will provide analysis, and ultimately promulgation and examination, without access to the names and addresses of the individuals who have been questioned. I therefore propose the following system of analysis by sample, to see if it was possible to find trends over the decades which have led us to where we are today. Firstly we would need to question people who in the past or currently committed one of a number of crimes which we will have under review. To do this we would have to give an incentive to people who agree to be questioned. For their own security they will be required to provide a number of their choice between a 100 and 1000 which would be their personal reference, retained by a collator, who will be the only person to have this information. The environments, the areas that people came from, the types of crime, plus the social and financial background of the individual, would all be estimated in categories, while other information like the reasons for the crime can be explained in more detail.

I am proposing a system which has the same basic philosophy as market research, but instead of being done in groups, is a verbal question and answer session, conducted by a psychologist, but not taped. Veracity would have to be tested. It would be up to the interviewer, or a scribe, to fill in sheets with the categories that they assess the individual’s answer to be. Subsequently after about five people in each of all seven decades have been questioned, and the information converted into graphs, it will be then to decide whether the scheme has any validity, shows any patterns of behaviour, or is a complete waste of time. It’s the old adage of if you want to know what it tastes like, you have to suck it and see.

I don’t anticipate that this idea will be taken up, but if I have at least caused some people in authority to think again, with fresh eyes, on the behavioural problems of today in all ages and specifically the young and relatively young, your time will not have been wasted in reading this and mine in writing it.

If I were a schoolteacher I think I would pack it in, buy a rucksack and go walkabout. It is incredible that we have two members of Parliament, called secretaries, to deliver one message from the Cabinet, the culture Secretary, Andy Burnham, and the school’s secretary, Ed Balls, telling schoolteachers and the parents that the children today are insufficiently cultured and need the equivalent of more than one days teaching added to the curriculum per week for the appreciation of the arts, sport and suchlike. A quotation from the New Testament, ‘ God, forgive them for they know not what they do.’ do they really believe that teachers, without going on another course, spending hours mugging up, can deliver an interesting, light-hearted exposition on the merits of a collection of pictures in a local museum or art gallery that is going to teach young children anything about Art? In the list that was featured by the MP when he gave his explanation. It is no wonder the educational system is in the chaos it is.? Think of the time that will be wasted on gathering the children together, taking them to an art gallery, or whatever, and returning

Our schools are struggling, structurally falling apart, through lack of funds, they have sold off the playing fields, for the same reason. They have added additional classes for those not reaching the standards in the three Rs, and I recently discovered that my great-grandchildren, aged eight and 10, had to sit three hour entrance examinations, to obtain a place in the school of their choice. Neither the parents nor the children in this case,are moaners, all their lives they have knuckled down, to do the best they can, and have as wide a range of interests as possible. However, having to sit these incredible exams at that age, and having tuition in order to be sure of passing, says something about the educational system.

In the 30s, in elementary school, we had, I think, two periods a week devoted to painting and messing about with plasticine, we did physical jerks, and we went swimming, and nobody grumbled about the quality of the education, and most of us were reasonably well educated, enough to hold down a job at 14, pass an entrance exam at 11 to get into a secondary school, and while there was an element among the parents of being selective in the choice of the school, the weight of it didn’t fall on the shoulders of the children. Coming up to the 11 plus, there were certainly tantrums and weeping, when it came to mathematical problems in homework, but nothing like the pressures of today, nor the constant tinkering with the system. We did music, three or four classes coupled together, singing traditional songs, and I remember at least two Christmases where I acted in plays which we put on for the parents. This was an ordinary LCC primary school, open to everyone and approved of by everyone. We had a couple of pretty desperate teachers, but the majority were interesting and interested.

Some will say I am an old idiot living in the past, but the old saying ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it’ should have been drilled into the politicians many years ago, and the kids coming up now would have the same qualities of education that we had, instead of this repetitious mishmash that clearly doesn’t work, is making the better teachers leave the profession and go and do something else, or never join it in the first place, and I believe money by the shed full is being thrown down the drain for no valid return.

Curry Concerns I couldn’t believe my eyes when I read that 9000 Curry houses were short of staff, and the staff that was needed had to come from Bangladesh. Sophie and my daughter have both taught themselves to make various, incredibly nice curry dishes, using a spice recipe that they got from a restaurant in Cyprus a long time ago. Surely, we don’t want even more immigrants, what we want is a short course which includes hygiene, commercial acumen and curry making, and then the jobs will be filled from within the UK, helping to take some people off the unemployment list and not having to find upwards of 9000 more homes for people to live. I can understand the proposition put by the Bangladeshi curry house owners, and there’s no way that I would think it was a ploy to bring relatives in from Bangladesh, it is just that they don’t want their secrets discovered, so I recommend that the teachers in the commercial Colleges go to Cyprus, instead of Bangladesh, to see how it’s done.

An Annoying New Industry.
Is it avarice, or incompetence? I don’t know whether you are having a problem with updates, I certainly am. I have, on recommendation, AVG anti-virus. They update daily, but that’s understandable. Microsoft has started sending almost daily updates, which I believe slowed down my computer, certainly annoy me and I see no reason whatsoever for them as I was happy with the way my computer operated anyway, but the latest one that has taken me to the fair, has been Nuance. About a week ago I bought a brand new copy of their NaturallySpeaking 9 voice transference, which I’m using at the moment to write this, because of my eyes still needing rest, this has been a great advantage, but I discovered today, only a week later, that they want to update this new version. I am assuming that any communication from a company on the Internet must cost somebody something. It costs me my monthly broadband charge, but is part of that paying Microsoft and all the others to update me? I can’t see them doing it to the extent that they are for free. In the case of Nuance, it is either that, or total incompetence in sending out a product which is still wet behind the ears and yet Nuance chooses to tinker with, this smacks of incompetence. Actually I have an axe to grind with Nuance, I bought version 8, it developed a fault, and I was instructed by the software to uninstall and reinstall. Unfortunately I had forgotten to record the registration number of the disc, I could only half uninstall, and what was left nearly wrecked my computer. I telephoned, I sent e-mails and I wrote, asking to be sent the number, because Nuance knew it, because I was registered, and they were busy sending me ads for new products. They never replied. It was against my better judgement to buy the new version, but due to my eye problems I had no choice. Now they are busy sending the updates I’m scared that I’ll go through the whole thing again with my computer damaged again. Incidentally, even when you register and they send updates or ads, they tell you to up date- that is incompetence, it has happened in both cases.