After so many years, Jane and I are experts in our style of walking. We know all there is to know, and I say this without conceit. After nigh on 3000 miles, we just know, and if we didn’t by this time, we would be really very stupid! First, we know the limits of how far we can safely travel in a day’s walk. It may sound obvious, but it really isn’t: we know how far to walk in an hour and when to stop and drink (often!). How to handle traffic (with great care), what sort of pubs to avoid, which to patronise, how to use our excellent “LEKI” sticks. What socks to wear, the best boots and so on.

It all comes naturally now. But everything has a season, and we are well aware that, in the end, everything – the good and not-so-good, as well as the ghastly – passes. We are aware that at our respective ages, we are outliers and supremely fortunate we remain fit enough to be able to walk such distances as we do, day after day
or at all. It would be really very foolish to take all this for granted. None of us, not even our wonderful ZANE supporters – will get out of this life alive!

Praise the Lord! Praise His Holy name.

Keep Buggering On

On 30 April 2020, Sir Keir Starmer was secretly filmed by a student. He was in Durham Miners’ Hall with May Foy MP and Labour’s deputy leader, Angela Rayner, eating takeaway curry and drinking beer.

In a BBC interview with Sophie Raworth, Starmer was repeatedly asked about “Beergate”. In a rictus of anxiety, he denied there could be any comparison whatsoever between this incident and Boris’ “Partygate”. 

For the record, I’m sure Starmer was telling the truth. But that’s not the point.

On My Mother’s Life!

Soon, other people starting sharing evidence of Downing Street booze-ups and helped to bring down a prime minister. Smart phones have changed the world and that’s the thing.  

Fifty years ago, even 20, voters would never have known about Starmer’s curry and beer, nor would they have known for sure about Partygate. Vague rumours may have circulated, but in those innocent, smartphone-free days, they were often limited to games of “He said, she said” with the truth a case of, “Who do you believe?” Secrets were usually exploited by breaches of faith, and they went like this:

“I’m going to tell you a hugely important secret… but, please, please, promise you’ll never tell a soul!”

“Oooh, of course… tell me. I’ll not tell anyone. I promise on my mother’s life!”

Of course, by the end of a week most people would have forgotten any mention of their mother and exactly how very secret the secret was. By the end of two weeks, they’d have forgotten the secret was a secret; and by week three, they wouldn’t even be able to recall who spilled the secret in the first place!

But that was then and this is now, for the world’s a changed place. Today cameras and social media rule, and nothing in public life remains behind closed doors for long. Politicians realise that everything they do and everything they say – all their mistakes, outbursts of anger, follies, boozing, betrayals, hands on the knee and other infidelities – may be recorded on camera, or by other means, and paraded to a world that’s gagging for scandal.

Now, most people (except ZANE supporters, of course) have probably done something at some time or other which brings a degree of shame. Just imagine if your worst disgrace had been recorded and was about to be broadcast on social media in the most hostile way imaginable?   

Sozzled Saviour

Peer back in time to 1943 when Churchill was our wartime prime minister. He ended up as a saviour. But would he have survived if the loans from chums, his incontinent casino gambling, his egregious tax-avoidance, his drinking and his serious ill temper towards staff had been recorded on camera and paraded on social media? Would he have survived when, for example, everyone was on strict rations and pictures of him, a bit sozzled and singing music hall ditties while scoffing smoked salmon, grouse and rich puddings – all washed down with vast quantities of champagne and claret – had been shared with the nation?

Of, course, in those dark days there were no smartphones to cause mayhem and it was, thankfully, a different world. So, today – thanks to Churchill – we can speak in English, not German, and we can KBO (“keep buggering on”, which was a favourite sign-off of his) in freedom. 

The late Julian Critchley, former MP for Aldershot, was right when he said that the only thing people in public life can safely do is to suck boiled sweets.

And not even that’s safe nowadays.    

Tennessee Williams coined the phrase “The kindness of strangers,” and never was it more appropriate than in our Norfolk walk. We never use the names of those who offer us hospitality, for few want that sort of publicity and anyway, by the time we have stated that X and Y are wonderful, what on earth do we say about A and B.

Norfolk is fortunate not to be able to boast of a motorway so that it retains its independence and charm. We were even spared the wind that is said to roar over straight from the Urals: “The Beast from the East”.

Kangaroo Court

What is “Confirmation Bias” (CB) and why does it matter? It’s the tendency to process new information as confirmation of our existing beliefs. And it’s often the result of our desire to establish we are right.

Perhaps you think you have an open mind and are willing to change long-held views if you receive new information? Are you sure about that?

Trial By Mob

Allow me to give you an example of extreme CB. Long before Rev Nigel Biggar, Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology, wrote his excellent book Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning, he announced he was setting up a group at Christ Church Oxford to research the pluses and minuses of colonialism and empire. To his astonishment, he attracted abuse on an industrial scale from Professor Priyamvada Gopal at the University of Cambridge: “We must stop this shit!” Then followed a condemnatory letter from 59 Oxford academics, backed up by another 200 from around the world, which was publicly circulated. It came from intelligent people who decided to put the boot in on a project well before any of them could possibly have known what it entailed.

How did this come about? Easy! One person decided on the cancellation initiative. A letter was written, and colleagues persuaded to sign it on the proposition that Biggar was a misguided simpleton and that anything from his pen had to be condemned.

So, one by one, these people put the boot in – just as in Alice in Wonderland:

“Let the jury consider their verdict,” the King said, for about the twentieth time that day.

“No, no!”, said the Queen. “Sentence first, verdict afterwards.”  

Then publisher Bloomsbury – who had commissioned Biggar – got cold feet and decided that they couldn’t go ahead with the book after all. Rumour had it that young employees decided they were far too delicate to have anything to do with the “colonialism” in the book’s title, and so that was that.

Fortunately, William Collins was brave enough to publish, and the book has been a great success.

What Nigel Bigger suffered is an extreme example of confirmation bias, all from professors and publishers with brains the size of Basingstoke. Being intelligent didn’t not stop them from acting like hens. They judged before they knew the facts – and none has apologised!

So, what hope have we got to avoid the CB trap?

This is how it works. Let’s assume you supported the Remain camp back in 2016, and you loathe Boris Johnson, whom you regard as largely responsible for Brexit. Each time you hear of one of his achievements – such as the vaccine rollout ahead of all other countries or support for Ukraine – you simply close your ears. Meanwhile, his many disasters are like catnip to you.

Just listen to people parading they are “left wing” – whatever “left wing” is meant to mean? They are virtue-signalling they are not “right wing”, like that ghastly Nigel Farage and Boris.

Some claim to be so delicate they cannot bring themselves to read the Daily Mail or even have it in their house, as if merely touching the paper would taint them with some exotic right-wing disease. When I point out that it’s the most popular newspaper in the UK with wonderful sports and women’s pages, an informative financial section, first-rate quizzes and simply stated opinions by top-class writers – so what on earth are they talking about – they grow mute. CB sufferers are never happy to be challenged.  

Trigger Warning

I submit we are all tainted by CB to some degree, welcoming views that support our prejudices whilst rejecting others that do not. Let’s run a simple test. To what extent do the names or words Jeremy Corbyn, Boris Johnson, Angela Raynor, Nicola Sturgeon, Nigel Farage, Meghan Markle, Brexit, Rupert Murdoch, Dominic Cummings, Dianne Abbott, Richard Dawkins, the Guardian, the Daily Mail, Israel and Palestine, and the words “colonial” and “empire” trigger an attack of “CB” in you?

Now we know the moral quality of figures from some leading universities and publishers, it makes it easier to understand the dynamics of Paris’s revolutionary mob, the Salem witch hunt and why in America’s deep south, individuals were so easily persuaded to lynch black people.

Roughly halfway house, and we’ve burned a few pounds from our easy living! The faint muscle stiffness has abated and we are swinging along with renewed confidence as each mile passes us by.

About a year ago, I had an operation on my left foot, and I worried whether the foot would survive the inevitable battering, for if the feet pack up, then it’s goodbye sweet Prince to the walks. For some weeks it was a bit stiff, so with some trepidation, I launched the foot on my second last walk. My old theory holds good: if you simply ignore pain, it often goes away. It did. Now it’s all fine.

Heaven on Earth

“If there is heaven on earth, it is here, it is here, it is here.”

So said the fourth Mughal emperor, Jahangir, while visiting Kashmir in the seventeenth century – and those words might aptly be applied to the UK today.

Anyone who discusses immigration runs the risk of being called “racist” and as there is no agreed definition of the word, it can be launched as a general insult to smear anyone you dislike. Nevertheless, ever since Tony Blair threw open Britain’s borders and rebuilt the economy around cheap migrant labour, immigration has remained a contentious issue.

Once the genie had flown from the bottle, that was it. Cameron proved this in 2010 when he promised voters to reduce net migration from hundreds of thousands to tens of thousands – instead, he ended up presiding over the highest levels of immigration ever seen. His inability to honour that pledge reinforced the growing sense amongst voters that no one was in control. Of course, this was one of the factors behind Brexit and it will be an important determinant at the next election.    

Land of Milk and Honey

Voters aren’t stupid. According to YouGov, uncontrolled immigration – particularly illegal immigration – remains among the electorate’s top three concerns. Across the Third World, millions of people, mainly young and unemployed, are determined to make the UK their home. Many of them live in countries where life is often cruel and short, where corruption is endemic, where there is no chance to alter society for the better, and where thinkers and critics often rot in jail. Meanwhile, their mobile phone screens tell them that the UK is a land of milk and honey – a country that promises free healthcare, free education, generous social services, religious freedom, democracy, and the rule of law handed down from incorrupt courts. A land where – so the people smugglers tell them – lawyers will (for free!) do all they can to prevent new arrivals from being deported.

In short, the UK is to the Third World Emperor Jahangir’s “heaven”. Who can blame young hopefuls for their iron determination to reach our shores? And who can be surprised that there is a booming business to facilitate their passage, run by corrupt people smugglers?   

What can we do about this? First, truth must be separated from garbage. We are told that these non-European migrants are an economic benefit to the UK. If this is true, please will someone tell me why Belarus and Turkey use immigrants as weapons? Why isn’t France campaigning to get its valuable migrants back from Britain? Why aren’t countries everywhere competing eagerly for more incomers, perhaps incentivising them with bribes and goodie bags?

There is no such thing as a bargain! The reality is that migrants cost a great deal of money and the numbers are staggering. Net immigration – people allowed to come here – soared last year to about half a million. That represents the population of a city half the size of Newcastle each year and it costs north of £15bn.

So, although estimates differ wildly, illegal immigration is an economic drain – at least in the short term – which is why the countries the immigrants pass through play pass the parcel and hope they land up in the lap of the UK.

The 100,000 illegal migrants are, in the main, unskilled, poorly educated and heavily dependent on the public purse. Their accommodation in south-coast hotels costs UK taxpayers £5.6m per day – and this pays no heed to the numbers in the black economy, into which many foreigners disappear.  

Self-Interest

UK residents already face an acute housing crisis, schools are overcrowded, and the NHS has a waiting list of seven million patients. We have escalating welfare bills and there is a growing reluctance by the country’s increasingly elderly citizens to pay the necessary higher taxes to fund the welfare services they have grown to expect as their right. So, what is the government to do? Of course, no one wants immigrants attempting dangerous boat crossings to drown. But we must stop our laws from being flouted by people smugglers.

And why is HMG embarrassed by critics focusing on self-interest on behalf of UK voters? Dare we discuss the level of immigration that suits the UK, however contentious that calculation may prove to be? We must not heed the siren voices that tell us we must be “kind and nice” and try to improve the lives of immigrants everywhere, for this will lead to national bankruptcy. There are 89 million displaced people in the world, 27 million are refugees, 40 million live in modern slavery and up to 780 million can claim fear of persecution on grounds of race, nationality or religion. The solution cannot be to bring even a small minority to the UK. Similarly, the popular “safe and legal routes” cannot stop the crossings unless they apply to everybody prepared to travel here illegally.

Surely, we must concentrate on the interests of the people who already live in the UK? Our government should decide what number of immigrants best benefits our resident population and elevate the interests of voters who already live here above the interests of people who don’t. What’s wrong with that? After all, HMG owes its first allegiance not to suffering humanity, but to the UK taxpayers who live in the country it was elected to protect.

Voters are merciless! Unless our relatively liberal government does something about uncontrolled immigration, voters will shrug and back far-right leaders who will. That’s what’s happening In Sweden, Italy and Germany. Our present leaders should take note. 

Overarching mist the colour of a tramp’s vest. At my minute, I expected Magwitch to spring out at Pip from behind an ancient tombstone. Miles of glorious galloping beach and I thought of our horse Prince Panache, born in our old stables a generation ago. For ZANE donors interested in this sort of thing, prepare for a boast! Our horse, Prince Panache, sleek as a seal, 17 hands, and like riding a Maserati, won the world championship three-day eventing (show jumping, cross country and dressage) in Lexington, USA, in the nineties (rider Karen O Connor. Fantastic achievement. Big obituary in Horse and Hound.

On we plod…

The Empire Fights Back

The accusation by Meghan Markle that she and Harry were driven from the UK to the US – that haven of racial harmony – because of racism is a wicked nonsense. Why on earth did the media allow her and Harry Markle to get away with such a disgraceful slur?

Why do lefty media pundits accuse the UK of entrenched racism just because we once had an empire? Why was “Black Lives Matter” allowed to flourish in the UK, with leaders and sports people taking the knee?

A Matter of Pride

Pundits speak of our involvement in slavery as if the UK had invented it. But they must know the reality – slavery was endemic in all societies throughout history. And although, of course, we have our share of bigots, we should be proud of the fact we are a remarkably tolerant society.

Why aren’t children in schools and universities taught that the abolition of slavery in the late 1700s was brought about because of our Christian conviction in the basic equality of all human beings, regardless of race? And why aren’t they taught that Britain was the first state in the world to abolish slavery within its own territories in the early 1800s? 

Britain’s imperial power was devoted – at vast cost – to the global suppression of slavery for the next century and a half. The campaign attracted widespread support, with an estimated one third of the male population in the UK signing abolitionist petitions. What other country has such a record?

American historian John Stauffer has written: “Almost every United States black who travelled in the British Isles acknowledged the comparative dearth of racism there. Frederick Douglass [the famous black abolitionist] noted after arriving in England in 1845:

“I saw in every man a recognition of my manhood, and an absence, a perfect absence, of everything like that disgusting hate with which we are pursued in [the United States]”.

The fact that Rishi Sunak is now prime minister of the UK, and that the country has more ethnic minorities in the cabinet than all EU member countries combined, is the fulfilment of our liberal, imperial vision. It should be a matter of great pride and not shame.

All these things should be taught to our young.

What’s in a Name?

When I started ZANE, I held a meeting for veterans in Bulawayo. I said that because of their loyalty, ZANE would look after their needs.

One very old but sprightly man called from the front row, “Even me?” 

“Why not you?”

“My name is Hauptmann Smidt. I fought in Hitler’s army!”

The room froze. Then laughter. I muttered that grass grows on all battlefields, and why not?

And so we did!

Here we are two old gits, not two pounds of us hanging straight, minute figures wandering along the Norfolk coast under a vast pale blue canopy of sky. What a wonderful world and what a privilege to be alive at this hour.

God Save the King!

It’s inevitable in our free society that republicans are bound to make a fuss about the cost of monarchy, and some would even glue themselves to the roads to make nuisances of themselves. But what they’ll find is that it’s far easier to moan than establish a decent alternative.

Okay, republicans don’t like the class divisions that the monarchy is said to generate, and they disapprove of non-elected people exercising even modest influence in our democracy. Yet the vital quality of the monarchy and the stability it brings were tested when, between 2016 and 2022, the revolving doors of 10 Downing Street saw five prime ministers taking office across a period of just over six years. While our democracy bent (though failed to break), our magnificent queen ruled calm and serene above the fray bringing a non-political stability to our affairs.

We pray it will be the same under King Charles III.   

Rites and Rituals

The monarchy may look strange in our modern democracy – rather like the bumble bee, it shouldn’t fly but it does.

We will never know the value of ancient ceremony, ritual and traditions until they’ve been destroyed. Imagine, if you will, that the monarchy was swept aside, and we faced our first presidential campaign. The candidates would all proclaim to be “non-political”, but we all know that is simply impossible.

It’s a racing certainty the redoubtable Diane Abbott would appear as the first woman candidate of colour – any accusation that she’s far too stupid to be seriously considered would generate shrieks of “racism”. Her candidacy would be contested by Nigel Farage, furry collar, fag and pint at the ready. Then Peter Tatchell might be paraded by Stonewall as LGBAEM (Lesbian, Gay, Black, Asian, Ethnic Minority), as the first LGBTQ+ president, and Blair would face Corbyn.

You think I am wrong? Want to take a bet? But sanity will prevail, and I can’t see republicanism being introduced here. 

Britain’s Greatest Brand

Most people realise that the UK’s monarchy is one of the biggest brands in the world. It’s the thing we do best that no other country can match. The brand beats Facebook, Virgin, X (Twitter), Rolex, Trump, Amazon and Chanel into cocked hats. The cost is small, but the value in terms of soft power and influence is beyond price.

Twenty million people in the UK watched the coronation on television and many hundreds of millions more looked on from around the world. From Tasmania to Toronto, from St Petersburg to Nairn, and from Newfoundland to Perth, viewers watched in awe as the best of British pomp and pageantry went on display. I bet many of them would love to have taken part and wished their country had even a fraction of our style and chutzpah. 

What other world event could generate such favourable publicity? Not even the Olympics pulls that number of viewers. What monetary value can you attach to it? It’s priceless. What positive effect do these figures have on our tourist industry? How much benefit do these viewing figures bring to our worldwide businesses, the financial arena, and our goods and services?       

God Save King Charles III!

O, to be in England

Here’s a definition of what it is to be English – and one that will not find its way into newspapers:

“Basking in our garden over the weekend, celebrating our temperate climate, a passive spirit, cricket at Lords, tennis at Wimbledon, sports day and the egg and spoon race, the village fete, a car boot sale and real ale. These things are in the English DNA and are a way of life. Those who wish to destroy it cannot understand it, and yet it is the very essence of why they will fail.”

Walking on the beach at Hunstanton, we found ourselves compelled to look at naked UK swimmers. One tanned man in a thong – Jane, avert your eyes! – and, flexing his muscles, looked rather like a condom stuffed with conkers. Then I saw myself in a window, my hat askew, a blob of ice cream on my nose, flies undone, so who on earth am I to judge?

As so often on our walks, we are overwhelmed by the kindness of strangers, the generosity of supporters who take us in, usually sight unseen. One startled lady told me she was actually expecting someone else, “but perhaps you’ll do!” I think I passed muster!

Wolf In Sheep’s Clothing

You may have watched TV’s The Sixth Commandment recently? It detailed the ghastly experience of Peter Farquhar, who was sexually exploited and then murdered by the vicious Ben Field.

I knew Peter in the early 1990s when he was the Benyon daughters’ English teacher at Stowe School. Our relationship was more than casual – I tried to help him, wholly unsuccessfully, to get his books published. He was an excellent writer but publishing novels is a cruel game and he fell into the Clement Freud category: “Any fool can write a book, but it takes a genius to sell one!”   

Peter was a gentle and very shy man. He was gay but as a deeply committed Christian, he had remained celibate. His unhappiness and desperate loneliness were brilliantly drawn by actor Timothy Spall.

In Cold Blood

Years ago, US author Scott Peck wrote a couple of brilliant books. The Road Less Travelled won worldwide acclaim but the less well-known The People of the Lie was equally insightful. In brief, Peck claimed that real wickedness is not just straightforward violence and crookery, which is bad enough. Real evil has yet another dimension, where the cold-blooded perpetrator cloaks his or her wickedness behind a mask of false kindness and virtue. For example, I wasn’t surprised when a large army of priests were discovered hiding behind holy office whilst sexually abusing the children they had caught in their claws.     

Ben Field pretended to love poor Peter. He then “married” him and persuaded him to change his will. Then he drugged Peter to make him feel like he was going crazy before finally strangling him.

Believe this: I attended the funeral service for Peter where Field – who had, of course, callously murdered him – gave the oration in his memory.

Field was caught after trying the same routine on a retired headmistress who lived a few doors away from Peter’s old house in Maids Moreton, Buckingham. Luckily, when Field came to change her will, he tried to employ the services of the same solicitor he had used for Peter. The solicitor smelled a rat – and what a rat he turned out to be! Fortunately, Field was jailed for life and will serve at least 38 years. Good!   

Butter Wouldn’t Melt

Recently, another example of supreme evil dominated news headlines. Smiling, blue-eyed Lucy Letby, hiding behind the mask of the perceived virtue of her profession, murdered at least seven infants. No one could believe that such a gentle, innocent-looking woman, marinated in infant care, would stoop to such evil acts. Now we know.

There are, of course, cries in the Telegraph that we should debate the return of the death penalty. Probably, in the event of a referendum on the subject, its promoters would effortlessly win.

I remember 19 July 1979 well. Parliament debated whether capital punishment should, once again, be available as a penalty in the courts. I was the MP who succeeded Airey Neave (following his assassination by the IRA in the Commons car park). To the consternation of many constituents, I voted against the motion. First, there had been several well publicised miscarriages of justice. Second, experienced lawyers warned me that if a jury knew that a defendant found guilty faced possible execution, the law of unintended consequences could bite. The jury might be afraid to convict, and guilty people might escape justice.

Last, in a debate in 1974, Lord Hailsham told the House of Lords that the death penalty is “a horrible and degrading thing”. He was as right then as he is now.        

In last year’s commentary, I listed the five regrets of the dying. The one that generated the most reader comments was, “When you wake do you think it just another boring day or are you full of wonder that we are still alive in this wondrous world?” Here I am on a beautiful day, contemplating that a man needs three things to bless his life: a battle to fight, a maiden to woo and a cause bigger than himself to live for. I can by the grace of God tick all three boxes.

We read that Fayed is dead. Will anyone mourn him? he had much in common with Trump and Maxwell. All allegedly self-important bullies to whom truth and honesty are moving targets, all living out the insight of author Henry James: “Behind every great fortune is always a great crime.” They blighted everyone they met. The first two are facing their maker… I suspect and hope that sometime soon the Donald will reap his nemesis and spend richly deserved  time in an orange jump suit.

We are walking down Peddars  Way, a 2000 year old track whose surface is hatched into grooves  by bikes; the going  is hazardous in that it’s dead easy to twist your ankle.

Putin’s Divide

Of course, we all know that Putin is a dangerous and corrupt thug. However, he has a worrying point when it comes to his judgement of the west.  

In the New York Times, I read that the Russian president is selling his disastrous war to citizens by proclaiming a “High Noon” battle between a noble, family-orientated and disciplined Russia and the spiritually collapsed and morally dysfunctional west. 

He starts by drawing attention to the US – presently an easy target – where, in 2024, the astonished electorate must decide which geriatric candidate is the least disastrous choice to run the country.   

Putin then proclaims that the west has degenerated from being the home of ruthless capitalism to a “nest of sex changes, the rampages of drag queens, barbaric gender debates and an LGBTQ takeover.” He goes on to claim that today the west is “a hotbed of selfishness, permissiveness and immorality, and in denial of the ideals of patriotism”, and that it is “busy with the destruction of the traditional family through the promotion of non-traditional sexual relations”. 

Parade

To what degree are Putin’s claims true? We can surely agree that his vicious campaign against the gay community is monstrous and cruel. But what about his assertion that here in the UK, there used to be a divide between simply letting people get on with their sexual preferences (within the law) and promoting and celebrating LGBTQ+ issues in the way that happens now? Worried critics remain silent for fear of being labelled homophobic, a career-ending insult. The “Pride” campaign has expanded from one day a month to a whole month, and parades a rainbow of sexual preferences, however bizarre they may be – other, of course, than the one that reproduces our species. Sexual aberration appears to be the new normal. 

Why is it appropriate for “pride” to be involved with any sort of sexual activity? Why don’t we just get on with what we like doing in our own bedrooms, and shut up and try not to frighten the horses? And whilst I think about it, why are we passively conceding there is no such thing as “normal” sexual conduct, even the one that brought all of us into the world? Surely this is anti-family and manifestly not in the public interest.  

Why do we allow bias in the selection of CEOs, leading politicians, military leaders and law officers, instead of just choosing the best candidate – whether straight, gay, white, black, Latino or Asian? If you want proof this happens, just study the circumstances in which Kamala Harris was chosen as vice president of the US.  

And surely Putin is right about our lack of patriotism. Any teacher or professor who dares mention the “ideals of patriotism” to their charges, or who demonstrates affection for our homeland, is considered not just absurd but malign. Teachers at schools and universities persuade the young to be ashamed of our country while cleansing the curricula of our cultures’ classics. Yes, Putin has plenty of ammunition to feed his vicious campaign – all he need do is read our newspapers.   

On the Road

I bought a new car in May. To be accurate, it’s a very old car but new to us.

Anyway, I transferred my insurance cover, and to cut a tedious tale to its barest shreds, the insurance company managed to get a single letter wrong in the new registration. Did you know that the traffic police now have a gadget that automatically reads registration plates and highlights the uninsured? 

Well, they do! Within a week, I was stopped by a cop who politely told me I was uninsured. Of course, I had no paperwork with me, and he was adamant that I couldn’t drive another yard further without proof of cover. 

“Officer, I’m not so stupid as to drive a car whilst uninsured.” 

No joy! 

“Officer, please believe me, I used to be a politician”. 

He began to laugh. I could see it coming. 

“All the more reason not to believe you, Sir!”

He let me go in the end.

Nearly all telly programmes start – ludicrously in my view – warning viewers that watching, for example, Putin’s war in ghastly detail involving bombing, death, and rape “might be offensive to some viewers”. What do they expect? Do they think viewers live in a perpetual world of Little Bo Peep and The Sound of Music?

Anyway, following the nannying trend perpetrated everywhere, my walk commentary may be offensive to some readers. If it is, stop reading and get a life!

Over the years, I am sure I’ve started many walk commentaries with “ Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun,” and so we do today.

Miles of sandy paths cut through the beautiful county on the “Peddars Way”. Kind and generous hosts to see us on our way. Heroes Charles and Angela walk with us often as pathfinders.

Baby Wants Cake! 

Why do people accuse politicians of being liars?

The answer is easy – if politicians told voters the unvarnished truth, they’d never get elected in the first place!

Do people realise how darn difficult it is to run a country effectively when the electorate act like babies who refuse to recognise the inconsistences of their demands? People cry for better healthcare, “free” social care, better paid teachers, more money for defence spending and roads without potholes. Then they simultaneously squeal for lower taxes – while failing to notice the impossibility of having all these things at the same time. Voters want their cake, but they won’t pay for it by voting for the bills.

No, Nein and Non

Of course, it’s not just British citizens who practice such willful blindness. In the US, people want to see an end to gun crime and mass shootings but steadfastly refuse to ban guns. They complain about eye-watering debt but decline to vote for candidates who pledge to do something about it. Remember Ronnie Reagan who quipped, “Our debt’s big enough to look after itself!” – and so he let it balloon. Of course, when the debt parcel finally reaches the end of the line and bursts – as it surely must – the poor sods holding it will face a world-shattering debt crisis, and everyone will blame them for being lying, useless hounds.    

In Germany, voters want energy security but said nein when asked to buy the nuclear reactors that would have delivered what they needed. That’s why they were in hock to Putin’s oil. It’s much easier now for voters to lazily blame poor Angela Merkel and Gerhard Schröder for incompetence than accept responsibility for their own fecklessness. 

In France, poor Macron is trying to deliver vital pension reform – an essential matter that has been ducked by previous presidents who saw that the issue is electoral dynamite. Macron can only deliver it in his last term of presidential office when finally freed from democratic constraints. 

We live like babies, voting for politicians who tell us what we want to hear and then accusing them of being liars when things go wrong – as they usually do in the end.   

DH Lawrence’s poem “We Can’t Be Too Careful” sums things up. Here’s an extract:

“We can’t be too careful
about the British Public.
It gets bigger and bigger
And its perambulator has to get bigger and bigger
And its dummy-teat has to be made bigger and bigger and bigger
And the job of changing its nappies gets bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger
And the sound of its howling gets bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger…
And soon even God won’t be big enough to handle that infant.”

Lawrence died in 1930. The baby’s got a bit bigger since then, hasn’t it?

There’s an election in just over a year’s time – another mouthful of cake, Baby Dear?

Time Waits for No Man

Now, something to cheer you up. As you get older, you of course have less time left but it seems to flick by much faster than when you were a babe.

For a 10-year-old, a year seems an eternity, while for a 79-year-old, that same year passes by in a flash. A paradox of course, but the mathematics tell us this. For a 10-year-old, a year adds 10 per cent to their life, a huge amount. For a 50-year-old, a year adds 2 per cent, a tiny amount. And that percentage diminishes each year that passes! 

The sun is like a bishop’s bottom: large, shiny and hot, the first continual sun we have seen for months. Lunch in Castle Acre, a gem of a town with a priory, a castle and a grand house lurking somewhere.

I see the news is dull, which is good when you think of the miseries we have endured these past years. Perhaps our politicians might be persuaded to go on holiday more often! Give me dull at any time! I am reminded of the newspaper competition for the dullest headline ever. The winner was “earthquake in Chile, only a few dead!” ( Sorry to Chilean donors, but I thought it was funny! it shows how tasteless I can be!)

An Unholy Mess

“They were careless people, Tom and Daisy,” recalled Nick Carraway in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. “They smashed up things… and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”

Readers of my last commentary will recall the case of the great Post Office mess whereby this old British institution prosecuted around 900 sub-postmasters for theft, false accounting and fraud. After a lengthy court case, it was found that 99 per cent of them were wholly innocent and that many had been maliciously prosecuted. Many lives were destroyed. 

Oh yes, I nearly forgot to remind you – the Post Office CEO at the time, the Rev Paula Vennells, is a former Anglican priest. At first, she said she was misled by computer experts – but when she was told the full extent of her mess, she said she was “sorry”. That’s nice, isn’t it? Bound to reassure those whose lives have been wholly destroyed. Pity about those who took their own lives before she issued her apology.

You think the Post Office scandal was a one-off? Think again.

Dirty Money

If any ZANE donor was found to have assisted drug smuggling by laundering money, he or she could rightly expect up to 20 years in the slammer. But not so if you’re too big to jail. The world’s biggest bank is HSBC. During its recent drug-running days, the CEO of HSBC UK was the Rev Stephen Green – yes, these Anglican priests pop up everywhere.

Between 2006 and 2009, the bank – under Green’s watch – allowed a breakdown in money laundering controls in its Mexican subsidiary with the result that at least $881 million of drug trafficking cash flowed through its US accounts. The bank was so blatant in its enthusiasm to assist the drug cartels and enhance profits that bank cashiers’ windows were specially adapted to allow large bungs of dirty drug money to be posted easily. When HSBC was warned – several times – that the practice was illegal, it turned a blind eye. There can be no argument about guilt. There is even a recording of a Mexican drug lord saying that HSBC Mexico is “the place to launder money”.

When finally confronted with HSBC’s crime of profiting from drug running on an industrial scale, Green expressed his “regret”. That’s it. No explanation as to how the bank landed a fine of $91m, the largest penalty ever recorded. Amazingly, when the US authorities decided to prosecute HSBC, it was the UK’s chancellor, George Osborne, who defended the bank’s executives and pleaded that the economic fallout would be so great that prosecution had to be avoided.

Of course, Osborne was right. To bring criminal charges against nice, non-violent people like us, who hail from similar backgrounds and circles, and send us to jail and thereby ruin us and our families is quite another.

I bet you’ll never guess the next bit. Partly thanks to Osborne’s intervention, HSBC survived. And once Osborne had moved on from his chancellor role, he made two speeches for HSBC, one in Davos for which he was paid £51,000, and another for which he received £68,000 (he was obliged to register these fees in the Commons file of financial interests).     

A Blooming Shame

This all makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? You see, the authorities view non-violent criminals differently from violent criminals. They don’t regard them as, well, quite so criminal. Remember the old song “It’s the Same the Whole World Over”?

“It’s the same the whole world over,
It’s the poor what get the blame,
It’s the rich what get the pleasure,
Isn’t it a blooming shame?”

So, what happened next? The key drug runner in Mexico, “El Chapo”, is incarcerated for life in one of America’s most secure prisons, the US Penitentiary Florence Administrative Maximum in Colorado (its nickname is “The Alcatraz of the Rockies”). He’s locked up for 23 hours each day. A former warden claims, “The jail is not fit for humanity… I think being there day by day is worse than death.” 

Meanwhile, Rev Green (Cameron elevated him to Lord Green) “regrets” what happened. So, that’s all right then.  

Just like Rev Paula Vennells, today the Rev Lord Green is rich, retired and free – he’s a member of the House of Lords and he continues his ministry as an Anglican priest.

Careless people these vicars. Smashing things up… and then retreating back into their money or their vast carelessness and letting other people clean up the mess they’ve made.

A Wonderful Beginning

Zimbabwe can be summed up in the words that Bill Clinton’s secretary of state, the late Madeleine Albright, once quoted:

“God made a wonderful beginning,
But man spoiled it all by sinning.
We hope that the story will end in God’s glory,
But, at the moment, the other side’s winning!”

And how! A once wonderful country has been reduced to a comprehensive ruin!

So, Jane and I – along with Moses, the dog – walk to draw attention to the plight of those in Zimbabwe who are trapped in penury and destitution. All too many of them look to ZANE as their only lifeline.

As Stiff as Stoats

The setting for our fourteenth walk is Norfolk – and to be honest, it’s getting harder to find locations we haven’t already covered! This time, I demanded our walk planner look for a route that didn’t involve major roads – in the past, we’ve nearly been mown down by lunatics. Then we proscribed major hills for we’re running out of puff, and told him no plough, for it clogs up our boots. And then last – and pleeease – no minor, overgrown paths that make the job of getting lost all too easy!

Someone asked me why the walks continue to be popular. I reckon loyal supporters assume that after all these years Tom and Jane must be as stiff as stoats – so they back us “one last time”. And then, guess what? The following year, we pop up again like a jack in the box with, “Hello! Here we go again!” And so, our supporters think, “Gosh, one more time it is, where’s the cheque book?” And the process repeats itself!

So, it’s the same old boots, the same old sticks, the same old trousers and the same old dog – and off we go!

Postcard from Paris

I saw a postcard that made me smile. An elderly couple are eating breakfast and she says, “Darling… when one of us dies, I’m going to live in Paris!”

A couple of our closest friends are celebrating 45 years of a wonderful marriage. They told me that before they had even decided on a date for their wedding, James suggested to Mary, “Let’s anticipate the marriage. Come and live with me now?”

“Oh, no,” she replied. “I’m far too fond of you to do that.”  

I suggest that this story would be incomprehensible to today’s young.