A government source insisted Little “did not sit on the information” but was involved in a complex process and was trying to establish the risks in sharing highly sensitive information, including with the prime minister. The source added that Little informed Romeo of her plan to establish those risks. Romeo, the government source said, was supportive of the plan.
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
It's about the Andy Malkinson case. He was the man wrongly convicted of rape who was eventually released. The man who did do the rape has now been convicted.
But it's what this case says about our institutions which is important. And about the CPS. Starmer was DPP at the time.
As Nelson says -
"Organisations supposed to protect us, keep us safe and ensure justice can fail, egregiously. Reports say so, then the pattern of failure continues with really quite severe circumstances. But the Malkinson case stands out, not least because Sir Keir Starmer was running the Crown Prosecution Service at the time - and not only has he said he didn’t know about the case (which has turned out to be a bit of a theme with him) but that he should not have been told. It’s this reaction, or lack thereof, that I find fascinating. You would think a lawyer committed to justice would be more shocked than anyone about the Malkinson case as a complete failure of the British state: an example of a system in possession of evidence that could have exonerated a man, which instead sat on that evidence while he spent another 11 years in jail."
He goes on - "There is, to be clear, no evidence that Sir Keir personally saw the Malkinson file. The CPS has said the decision was made by a reviewing lawyer. In that sense his case mirrors his defences on Savile, on the Rochdale grooming gangs, on the Post Office Horizon prosecutions - in each instance, the defence has been that the file did not cross his desk."
But when he was in charge the CPS did know - in 2009 - that there was forensic evidence exonerating Malkinson. It did nothing. Malkinson spent another 11 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. And Starmer has done nothing since.
"If anyone in public life should be able to explain what went wrong - institutionally, culturally, psychologically - between the 2009 CPS note and the 2020 release, it is the former DPP. The case is a gift to anyone who wants to argue that the British state systematically resists confronting its own errors.
And yet the Prime Minister’s line is not that he wants to confront it. His line is that he wasn’t told, and that he shouldn’t have been. That is not the reaction of a lawyer who thinks the Malkinson case is important. It is the reaction of a politician who thinks it is dangerous."
We are seeing the same behaviour now over Mandelson.
This is not the mark of a leader nor of someone who can even begin to repair the shredded competence and integrity of our institutions.
Yes. The defining feature of Starmer appears to be that he doesn't want to know.
How can you fix a problem if you don't know about it?
It's kinda staggering. I don't think Starmer is actively malign in the way that Trump is, but he's as damaging as it's possible to be without trying to wreck things.
I still think the theory that he never wanted to be an MP/the peak of his ambition was to be Lord Chancellor/Attorney General and events conspired against him explains a lot about him.
I don't but it. Maybe it wasn't an initial ambition but at a point you have to choose to lead.
I often think about Harry S Truman, how fate conspired against him.
He didn't even know about the Manhattan Project then three months later he was in discussions about where to drop them.
Truman was (strangely for a Prendergast machine politician) a scrounge of corruption and inefficiency.
He dived into his role of holding manufacturers to account during WWII. Opened all the cans of worms.
Everything crossed his desk.
When he came across the edges of the Manhattan Project it took the word of General Marshall himself to get him to back off investigating it. Marshall had to give his word of honour that it was OK, to stop Truman.
A government source insisted Little “did not sit on the information” but was involved in a complex process and was trying to establish the risks in sharing highly sensitive information, including with the prime minister. The source added that Little informed Romeo of her plan to establish those risks. Romeo, the government source said, was supportive of the plan.
Stolen Yes Minister storyline....
Better than that play version in theatres, whcih was just lame.
'Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar, on the campaign trail in Edinburgh, told journalists he stood by his call for Sir Keir to resign over the Mandelson scandal, saying there were questions for Downing Street and the UK Government to answer.
He said: "I stated my position, I stand by it, I don't recoil for it, the Mandelson scandal was the tipping point for me," adding he believed Lord Mandelson to be "a traitor to his party and country".
Saudia Arabia switches focus to cricket after doubts over LIV Golf funding
Global T20 competition, which would sit alongside existing franchise tournaments rather than compete with them, has been proposed new
Saudi Arabia is exploring ramping up its interest in cricket as doubts grow over the future of its LIV Golf project.
At the centre of the plans is a proposed global T20 competition as well as developing greater relationships with existing franchise leagues and continuing the development of its own domestic system, with an increasing number of people playing cricket in the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) recently approved a new five-year strategy focusing on projects that will bring significant economic impact.
To date the PIF has invested more than £3.7billion into LIV but the breakaway tour is yet to turn a profit, with LIV chief executive Scott O’Neil admitting recently that it was unlikely it would do so for at least five years and possibly ten. LIV players expect funding from the PIF to end after the 2026 season, but business insiders have said that cricket is increasingly attractive to the Saudis because it has a bigger commercial base and lower entry barriers.
The proposed global T20 competition is only in the early stages of discussion but the concept involves a series of events across multiple venues. It is understood that it would sit alongside existing franchise tournaments rather than compete with them.
Take a dying sport and ruin it, eh, Saudi Arabia? Leave poor cricket alone.
Cricket is certainly not “dying”. It has never been more popular, worldwide, and has never been richer
The trouble is all the money and much of the popularity is in South Asia and it is directed at a truncated version of the sport. But, still, it is not dying
It's still the most boring "sport" in the world. Sad.
If U.S. naval blockade persists, Tehran will consider it a violation of the ceasefire and will close the Strait of Hormuz, an Iranian official tells Fars News.
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
9 years ago one of my cousins was also diagnosed with breast cancer that was stage 4 at presentation. It was also not picked up on mammogram., so she was also unlucky.
I don't think it medical misogyny. If such tumours are undetectable by mammogram, ultrasound or self examination then how could they be screened for? In order to screen, we need a suitable test.
No screening programme picks up all lesions, there are always false positives and false negatives as well fresh lesions that pop up between screening events and progress quickly.
Have you had your screening mammograms reviewed? Was anything missed? If not, then it isn't the fault of the screening programme.
The information leaflet/weblink about breast screening is quite clear that mammography cannot find all breast cancers, so I do not think that the accusation of false reassurance is correct.
Why isn't there an effective test for the second most common type of breast cancer? Is one / can one be developed? I would hope that someone somewhere in the NHS or the cancer research bodies is asking these questions.
The breast consultant was pretty apologetic when she told me. She also said that they'd do an audit but the letter I received said that as it was a different health trust which did the screening they could not find out. Sigh! Silos.
I am not looking to blame anyone. Nor do I want to be thinking "if only". I live for now. The past cannot be changed. But maybe they could learn something because it seems extraordinary to me that one can go from nothing wrong to stage 4 cancer without anyone noticing anything - and for a pretty common type as well.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
it’s not much consolation, in fact it’s not any consolation, but I do admire your fierce and lucid bravery in the face of grisly news. Also, as a sort of religious person, I sometimes say prayers for you. Because: you never know?
I am right now in the hometown of St Patrick: Downpatrick (and very pretty and English it is too). His handsome cathedral, and supposed burial site, is just up the road. I will say a prayer for you there, too, tomorrow
Thank you. I appreciate it. Patrick is a family name so a prayer there would be ace.
What do I think really happened with Mandelson and vetting?
In October, November and December 2024, No10 indicated it wanted to appoint Peter Mandelson as Ambassador to Washington.
It was presented with an array of people telling them not to: Cabinet ministers, spooks, officials in a vetting report. All raised major red flags.
Starmer and McSweeny made clear they weren’t interested in any objection, and this must go ahead at all costs.
So Mandelson’s appointment was announced mid December 2024.
The vetting we are focussed on today came later, in January 2025. Vetting of ambassadors is the responsibility of the FCDO and Olly Robbins.
One bit of the system said no - the UKSV agency said don’t appoint Mandelson.
We don’t know on what grounds, but probably the grounds No10 had seen and rejected as a reason to block. Olly Robbins cleared Mandelson. Very quietly, Mandelson didn’t get the very highest level of clearance when he got the job, but he got the overall OK because of Robbins. Robbins did No10 a favour.
This is because Olly Robbbins knew that going to No10 post announcement, and saying the Mandelson appointment can’t happen, was politically impossible.
And civil servants want to deliver for their political masters. So Olly fixed it for Keir: and is now paying a price.
Olly Robbins has - incidentally - done No10 a second massive political favour. The really really toxic claim doing the rounds last night was that surely someone - anyone - in No10 DID know the UKSV agency turned down the vetting
Olly Robbins is making clear he didn’t tell people the UKSV verdict because that would be inappropriate as part of the process he followed. It’s not even clear he saw it.
No10 don’t seem to realise he’s done them a favour, and are releasing documents to challenge alternative versions of events. Let’s see how it plays out.
The bottom line is No10 wanted Mandelson come what may. They rammed it through.
One quango; post appointment announcement, was never realistically going to be allowed to stop Mandelson taking the job because the top of Government had publicly committed to it. They hadn’t wanted to heed the warnings earlier; and were in too deep
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
1964, 1966, and 1974 (twice) - Harold Wilson
Wilson was an Oxford don so a class apart from Rayner who didn't even get A levels let alone go to Oxbridge and even he lost to Heath in 1970 and in England Home and Heath beat Wilson in 1964 and Feb 1974 too
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
It's about the Andy Malkinson case. He was the man wrongly convicted of rape who was eventually released. The man who did do the rape has now been convicted.
But it's what this case says about our institutions which is important. And about the CPS. Starmer was DPP at the time.
As Nelson says -
"Organisations supposed to protect us, keep us safe and ensure justice can fail, egregiously. Reports say so, then the pattern of failure continues with really quite severe circumstances. But the Malkinson case stands out, not least because Sir Keir Starmer was running the Crown Prosecution Service at the time - and not only has he said he didn’t know about the case (which has turned out to be a bit of a theme with him) but that he should not have been told. It’s this reaction, or lack thereof, that I find fascinating. You would think a lawyer committed to justice would be more shocked than anyone about the Malkinson case as a complete failure of the British state: an example of a system in possession of evidence that could have exonerated a man, which instead sat on that evidence while he spent another 11 years in jail."
He goes on - "There is, to be clear, no evidence that Sir Keir personally saw the Malkinson file. The CPS has said the decision was made by a reviewing lawyer. In that sense his case mirrors his defences on Savile, on the Rochdale grooming gangs, on the Post Office Horizon prosecutions - in each instance, the defence has been that the file did not cross his desk."
But when he was in charge the CPS did know - in 2009 - that there was forensic evidence exonerating Malkinson. It did nothing. Malkinson spent another 11 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. And Starmer has done nothing since.
"If anyone in public life should be able to explain what went wrong - institutionally, culturally, psychologically - between the 2009 CPS note and the 2020 release, it is the former DPP. The case is a gift to anyone who wants to argue that the British state systematically resists confronting its own errors.
And yet the Prime Minister’s line is not that he wants to confront it. His line is that he wasn’t told, and that he shouldn’t have been. That is not the reaction of a lawyer who thinks the Malkinson case is important. It is the reaction of a politician who thinks it is dangerous."
We are seeing the same behaviour now over Mandelson.
This is not the mark of a leader nor of someone who can even begin to repair the shredded competence and integrity of our institutions.
Yes. The defining feature of Starmer appears to be that he doesn't want to know.
How can you fix a problem if you don't know about it?
It's kinda staggering. I don't think Starmer is actively malign in the way that Trump is, but he's as damaging as it's possible to be without trying to wreck things.
I still think the theory that he never wanted to be an MP/the peak of his ambition was to be Lord Chancellor/Attorney General and events conspired against him explains a lot about him.
I don't but it. Maybe it wasn't an initial ambition but at a point you have to choose to lead.
I often think about Harry S Truman, how fate conspired against him.
He didn't even know about the Manhattan Project then three months later he was in discussions about where to drop them.
Truman was (strangely for a Prendergast machine politician) a scrounge of corruption and inefficiency.
He dived into his role of holding manufacturers to account during WWII. Opened all the cans of worms.
Everything crossed his desk.
When he came across the edges of the Manhattan Project it took the word of General Marshall himself to get him to back off investigating it. Marshall had to give his word of honour that it was OK, to stop Truman.
A heartening story of gender equality in the civil service. TBH it's quite worrying, who was the last competent top civil servant? Or do we only hear about the incompetent ones?
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
1964, 1966, and 1974 (twice) - Harold Wilson
That would be the Oxford don, Harold Wilson, that bit of rough?
I'm imagining one of those situations where someone goes into a filing cabinet expecting to pull out a Mandelson folder and then realising the folder is the entire contents of the cabinet.
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
women outlive men
Nevertheless tasking the NHS to maintain the existing differential might bear interesting fruit. Annual reports to outline the progress being made to support the status quo would probably result in much closer inspection from the public than the NHS is accustomed to.
I know, bonkers, but it would drive investment in each.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
women outlive men
Nevertheless tasking the NHS to maintain the existing differential might bear interesting fruit. Annual reports to outline the progress being made to support the status quo would probably result in much closer inspection from the public than the NHS is accustomed to.
I know, bonkers, but it would drive investment in each.
This is the kind of suggestion that flabbergasts my fellow councillors.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Saudia Arabia switches focus to cricket after doubts over LIV Golf funding
Global T20 competition, which would sit alongside existing franchise tournaments rather than compete with them, has been proposed new
Saudi Arabia is exploring ramping up its interest in cricket as doubts grow over the future of its LIV Golf project.
At the centre of the plans is a proposed global T20 competition as well as developing greater relationships with existing franchise leagues and continuing the development of its own domestic system, with an increasing number of people playing cricket in the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) recently approved a new five-year strategy focusing on projects that will bring significant economic impact.
To date the PIF has invested more than £3.7billion into LIV but the breakaway tour is yet to turn a profit, with LIV chief executive Scott O’Neil admitting recently that it was unlikely it would do so for at least five years and possibly ten. LIV players expect funding from the PIF to end after the 2026 season, but business insiders have said that cricket is increasingly attractive to the Saudis because it has a bigger commercial base and lower entry barriers.
The proposed global T20 competition is only in the early stages of discussion but the concept involves a series of events across multiple venues. It is understood that it would sit alongside existing franchise tournaments rather than compete with them.
Take a dying sport and ruin it, eh, Saudi Arabia? Leave poor cricket alone.
Cricket is certainly not “dying”. It has never been more popular, worldwide, and has never been richer
The trouble is all the money and much of the popularity is in South Asia and it is directed at a truncated version of the sport. But, still, it is not dying
It's still the most boring "sport" in the world. Sad.
Of the major televised sports that's F1, all the more tedious because 15-20 years ago it could be exciting.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
Saudia Arabia switches focus to cricket after doubts over LIV Golf funding
Global T20 competition, which would sit alongside existing franchise tournaments rather than compete with them, has been proposed new
Saudi Arabia is exploring ramping up its interest in cricket as doubts grow over the future of its LIV Golf project.
At the centre of the plans is a proposed global T20 competition as well as developing greater relationships with existing franchise leagues and continuing the development of its own domestic system, with an increasing number of people playing cricket in the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) recently approved a new five-year strategy focusing on projects that will bring significant economic impact.
To date the PIF has invested more than £3.7billion into LIV but the breakaway tour is yet to turn a profit, with LIV chief executive Scott O’Neil admitting recently that it was unlikely it would do so for at least five years and possibly ten. LIV players expect funding from the PIF to end after the 2026 season, but business insiders have said that cricket is increasingly attractive to the Saudis because it has a bigger commercial base and lower entry barriers.
The proposed global T20 competition is only in the early stages of discussion but the concept involves a series of events across multiple venues. It is understood that it would sit alongside existing franchise tournaments rather than compete with them.
Take a dying sport and ruin it, eh, Saudi Arabia? Leave poor cricket alone.
Cricket is certainly not “dying”. It has never been more popular, worldwide, and has never been richer
The trouble is all the money and much of the popularity is in South Asia and it is directed at a truncated version of the sport. But, still, it is not dying
It's still the most boring "sport" in the world. Sad.
Of the major televised sports that's F1, all the more tedious because 15-20 years ago it could be exciting.
I must agree. I know loads here like it but, fuck me, it’s dull.
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
1964, 1966, and 1974 (twice) - Harold Wilson
That would be the Oxford don, Harold Wilson, that bit of rough?
The nearest we came to proper rough as PM was probably Jim Callaghan. Or, if you want an election winner, John Major.
That probably tells us something uncomfortable about the country we live in.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
Saudia Arabia switches focus to cricket after doubts over LIV Golf funding
Global T20 competition, which would sit alongside existing franchise tournaments rather than compete with them, has been proposed new
Saudi Arabia is exploring ramping up its interest in cricket as doubts grow over the future of its LIV Golf project.
At the centre of the plans is a proposed global T20 competition as well as developing greater relationships with existing franchise leagues and continuing the development of its own domestic system, with an increasing number of people playing cricket in the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) recently approved a new five-year strategy focusing on projects that will bring significant economic impact.
To date the PIF has invested more than £3.7billion into LIV but the breakaway tour is yet to turn a profit, with LIV chief executive Scott O’Neil admitting recently that it was unlikely it would do so for at least five years and possibly ten. LIV players expect funding from the PIF to end after the 2026 season, but business insiders have said that cricket is increasingly attractive to the Saudis because it has a bigger commercial base and lower entry barriers.
The proposed global T20 competition is only in the early stages of discussion but the concept involves a series of events across multiple venues. It is understood that it would sit alongside existing franchise tournaments rather than compete with them.
Take a dying sport and ruin it, eh, Saudi Arabia? Leave poor cricket alone.
Cricket is certainly not “dying”. It has never been more popular, worldwide, and has never been richer
The trouble is all the money and much of the popularity is in South Asia and it is directed at a truncated version of the sport. But, still, it is not dying
It's still the most boring "sport" in the world. Sad.
Of the major televised sports that's F1, all the more tedious because 15-20 years ago it could be exciting.
I must agree. I know loads here like it but, fuck me, it’s dull.
All polling has consistently shown that Rayner rates worse than Starmer.
Now we know party members love to vote for the person they love the most - but if Labour MPs are worried about losing their seats are they really going to let members choose the one person who will maximise their chances of losing?
If I was a Labour MP I would absolutely stick with Starmer for now - let Reform keep sliding, do nothing significant and aim to win by default.
And if a change becomes imperative, make it much nearer the GE.
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
1964, 1966, and 1974 (twice) - Harold Wilson
That would be the Oxford don, Harold Wilson, that bit of rough?
The nearest we came to proper rough as PM was probably Jim Callaghan. Or, if you want an election winner, John Major.
That probably tells us something uncomfortable about the country we live in.
Both very upwardly mobile, both grammar school educated and both held middle class civil service and banking jobs before election and a great office of state before becoming PM
Saudia Arabia switches focus to cricket after doubts over LIV Golf funding
Global T20 competition, which would sit alongside existing franchise tournaments rather than compete with them, has been proposed new
Saudi Arabia is exploring ramping up its interest in cricket as doubts grow over the future of its LIV Golf project.
At the centre of the plans is a proposed global T20 competition as well as developing greater relationships with existing franchise leagues and continuing the development of its own domestic system, with an increasing number of people playing cricket in the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) recently approved a new five-year strategy focusing on projects that will bring significant economic impact.
To date the PIF has invested more than £3.7billion into LIV but the breakaway tour is yet to turn a profit, with LIV chief executive Scott O’Neil admitting recently that it was unlikely it would do so for at least five years and possibly ten. LIV players expect funding from the PIF to end after the 2026 season, but business insiders have said that cricket is increasingly attractive to the Saudis because it has a bigger commercial base and lower entry barriers.
The proposed global T20 competition is only in the early stages of discussion but the concept involves a series of events across multiple venues. It is understood that it would sit alongside existing franchise tournaments rather than compete with them.
Take a dying sport and ruin it, eh, Saudi Arabia? Leave poor cricket alone.
Cricket is certainly not “dying”. It has never been more popular, worldwide, and has never been richer
The trouble is all the money and much of the popularity is in South Asia and it is directed at a truncated version of the sport. But, still, it is not dying
It's still the most boring "sport" in the world. Sad.
Of the major televised sports that's F1, all the more tedious because 15-20 years ago it could be exciting.
Formula 1 has always had the ability to be tedious, and I say that as a lifelong F1 fan since the late 90's.
Back then you had 16 races a season. One of them was brilliant, because it was wet. One, if you were lucky, was brilliant in the dry, because the tyres were weird that weekend or some freakish events happened. 7 of them were fairly ok, and 7 of them were tedious dullness. And those seasons were great.
The difference is in the past F1 had the ability to be tedious but pure, whereas now it is tedious but fake.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
When I was in Brittany I kept ordering Muscadet and I kept getting the cheap feeble shite and it was never good, only at best tolerable. Yuk
I stopped ordering Muscadet. Also, I hate to say this, but Chablis is not what it was, or maybe it never was
The best white wines are no longer French. Spain, Portugal, South Africa, the USA, Chile and especially Greece are making amazing and vastly superior whites. The only problem is that a lot of people have realized this and the best Greek whites are now properly expensive
English white is now pretty good, too. But not as good as English Fizz
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
I'm imagining one of those situations where someone goes into a filing cabinet expecting to pull out a Mandelson folder and then realising the folder is the entire contents of the cabinet.
The whole thing lives in a large crate in a secure warehouse in a secret location... just like the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark.
All polling has consistently shown that Rayner rates worse than Starmer.
Now we know party members love to vote for the person they love the most - but if Labour MPs are worried about losing their seats are they really going to let members choose the one person who will maximise their chances of losing?
The biggest winner from a Rayner Labour leadership would be the Tories, she would squeeze back some Green voters but shed middle class voters back to the Tories and set up a Tory v Reform general election with Labour third most likely
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
Bamboo is a nightmare. Should never be planted in anything other than a bucket. And preferably not at all. A horrible looking thing.
To create that bed I had to move hundreds of rocks. Then put down ca 800 litres of topsoil and compost and then plant each individual tulip, daffodil, narcissus and allium bulb. Plus then plant each of the daphnes, viburnums, salvia uliginosa and a rose. From the top you can see Coniston Old Man.
To the left there is a crag - it's beautiful but I have had to get rid of mounds and mounds of nettles and brambles - so now I have some beds for an alpine rockery and a herb garden (as the kitchen is nearby). It is a very sunny as well as windy spot. For anyone wanting really good herb plants by post Herbal Haven are the best.
It's a shame I am limited to only 1 photo per day. I've really only come back to share more photos. Next week raised beds in stone are being built opposite my new garden room.
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
1964, 1966, and 1974 (twice) - Harold Wilson
That would be the Oxford don, Harold Wilson, that bit of rough?
The nearest we came to proper rough as PM was probably Jim Callaghan. Or, if you want an election winner, John Major.
That probably tells us something uncomfortable about the country we live in.
Both better candidates than Harold, that's for sure. His pipe was an affectation. He was arguably the cleverest PM we have ever had.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
Yes Muscadet was big in the 70s and 80s. It’s a “coastal white” just like Picpoul, Assyrtiko, Vinho Verde, Xacoli.
Quality was shit back then. Spurred by their popularity, they over-produced and under-aged. Just like Beaujolais and Chianti and Rioja. Then the market crashed and they retrenched. There is still poor bulk Muscadet, but these days lots of very good small scale production and a big proportion of natural and esoteric wines.
English Muscadet is hard to judge. There is a sample size of one: me. Mine is nice.
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
Bamboo is a nightmare. Should never be planted in anything other than a bucket. And preferably not at all. A horrible looking thing.
To create that bed I had to move hundreds of rocks. Then put down ca 800 litres of topsoil and compost and then plant each individual tulip, daffodil, narcissus and allium bulb. Plus then plant each of the daphnes, viburnums, salvia uliginosa and a rose. From the top you can see Coniston Old Man.
To the left there is a crag - it's beautiful but I have had to get rid of mounds and mounds of nettles and brambles - so now I have some beds for an alpine rockery and a herb garden (as the kitchen is nearby). It is a very sunny as well as windy spot. For anyone wanting really good herb plants by post Herbal Haven are the best.
It's a shame I am limited to only 1 photo per day. I've really only come back to share more photos. Next week raised beds in stone are being built opposite my new garden room.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
Yes Muscadet was big in the 70s and 80s. It’s a “coastal white” just like Picpoul, Assyrtiko, Vinho Verde, Xacoli.
Quality was shit back then. Spotted by their popularity’, they over-produced and under-aged. Just like Beaujolais and Chianti and Rioja. Then the market crashed and they retrenched. There is still poor bulk Muscadet, but these days lots of very good small scale production and a big proportion of natural and esoteric wines.
English Muscadet is hard to judge. There is a sample size of one: me. Mine is nice.
Sweet. You should invite me down for a tasting and I can write about you in the Knappers Gazette. OK the “stone sex toy fans who also drink unusual wines” are not a huge market but it may spread. Drop me a DM if you want some modest publicity
Interestingly Labour still lead with the comfortably off and financially stable but Reform lead clearly with the just about coping and financially precarious with Ipsos (p22).
The Tories are second with the financially stable and financially precarious, Reform second with the comfortably off and the Greens second with the just about coping
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
Bamboo is a nightmare. Should never be planted in anything other than a bucket. And preferably not at all. A horrible looking thing.
To create that bed I had to move hundreds of rocks. Then put down ca 800 litres of topsoil and compost and then plant each individual tulip, daffodil, narcissus and allium bulb. Plus then plant each of the daphnes, viburnums, salvia uliginosa and a rose. From the top you can see Coniston Old Man.
To the left there is a crag - it's beautiful but I have had to get rid of mounds and mounds of nettles and brambles - so now I have some beds for an alpine rockery and a herb garden (as the kitchen is nearby). It is a very sunny as well as windy spot. For anyone wanting really good herb plants by post Herbal Haven are the best.
It's a shame I am limited to only 1 photo per day. I've really only come back to share more photos. Next week raised beds in stone are being built opposite my new garden room.
Because it is you, you can post more than 1.
i think we can all heartily agree on this, Ms @Cyclefree has a special license to post more lovely photos
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
Yes Muscadet was big in the 70s and 80s. It’s a “coastal white” just like Picpoul, Assyrtiko, Vinho Verde, Xacoli.
Quality was shit back then. Spotted by their popularity’, they over-produced and under-aged. Just like Beaujolais and Chianti and Rioja. Then the market crashed and they retrenched. There is still poor bulk Muscadet, but these days lots of very good small scale production and a big proportion of natural and esoteric wines.
English Muscadet is hard to judge. There is a sample size of one: me. Mine is nice.
Sweet. You should invite me down for a tasting and I can write about you in the Knappers Gazette. OK the “stone sex toy fans who also drink unusual wines” are not a huge market but it may spread. Drop me a DM if you want some modest publicity
When I have some decent volumes to sell I’ll do that. I’m still pre-commercial but won’t be long now.
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
1964, 1966, and 1974 (twice) - Harold Wilson
That would be the Oxford don, Harold Wilson, that bit of rough?
The nearest we came to proper rough as PM was probably Jim Callaghan. Or, if you want an election winner, John Major.
That probably tells us something uncomfortable about the country we live in.
Both better candidates than Harold, that's for sure. His pipe was an affectation. He was arguably the cleverest PM we have ever had.
Would any of them have made it to the top in contemporary politics? I fear not.
(In the case of Wilson, Callaghan and probably Heath, The War was surely a factor. Whatever its downsides, nothing like war for favouring ability over greasy-pole-climbing.)
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
9 years ago one of my cousins was also diagnosed with breast cancer that was stage 4 at presentation. It was also not picked up on mammogram., so she was also unlucky.
I don't think it medical misogyny. If such tumours are undetectable by mammogram, ultrasound or self examination then how could they be screened for? In order to screen, we need a suitable test.
No screening programme picks up all lesions, there are always false positives and false negatives as well fresh lesions that pop up between screening events and progress quickly.
Have you had your screening mammograms reviewed? Was anything missed? If not, then it isn't the fault of the screening programme.
The information leaflet/weblink about breast screening is quite clear that mammography cannot find all breast cancers, so I do not think that the accusation of false reassurance is correct.
Why isn't there an effective test for the second most common type of breast cancer? Is one / can one be developed? I would hope that someone somewhere in the NHS or the cancer research bodies is asking these questions.
The breast consultant was pretty apologetic when she told me. She also said that they'd do an audit but the letter I received said that as it was a different health trust which did the screening they could not find out. Sigh! Silos.
I am not looking to blame anyone. Nor do I want to be thinking "if only". I live for now. The past cannot be changed. But maybe they could learn something because it seems extraordinary to me that one can go from nothing wrong to stage 4 cancer without anyone noticing anything - and for a pretty common type as well.
It seems that ILBC can be picked up by an MRI scan but typically not by a mammogram: Sadly being first detected at stage 4 is very common, both here & in the USA.
My guess is that, if they looked at this, NICE would have concluded that MRI scanning the entire female population would be spectacularly expensive & would lead to so many false positives that it simply wouldn’t be worth the effort. There’s probably a report buried somewhere.
Hoping for the best possible outcome for you @Cyclefree .
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
1964, 1966, and 1974 (twice) - Harold Wilson
That would be the Oxford don, Harold Wilson, that bit of rough?
The nearest we came to proper rough as PM was probably Jim Callaghan. Or, if you want an election winner, John Major.
That probably tells us something uncomfortable about the country we live in.
Both better candidates than Harold, that's for sure. His pipe was an affectation. He was arguably the cleverest PM we have ever had.
Would any of them have made it to the top in contemporary politics? I fear not.
(In the case of Wilson, Callaghan and probably Heath, The War was surely a factor. Whatever its downsides, nothing like war for favouring ability over greasy-pole-climbing.)
More grammar schools, all 3 attended one and then two out of 3 Oxford
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
Bamboo is a nightmare. Should never be planted in anything other than a bucket. And preferably not at all. A horrible looking thing.
To create that bed I had to move hundreds of rocks. Then put down ca 800 litres of topsoil and compost and then plant each individual tulip, daffodil, narcissus and allium bulb. Plus then plant each of the daphnes, viburnums, salvia uliginosa and a rose. From the top you can see Coniston Old Man.
To the left there is a crag - it's beautiful but I have had to get rid of mounds and mounds of nettles and brambles - so now I have some beds for an alpine rockery and a herb garden (as the kitchen is nearby). It is a very sunny as well as windy spot. For anyone wanting really good herb plants by post Herbal Haven are the best.
It's a shame I am limited to only 1 photo per day. I've really only come back to share more photos. Next week raised beds in stone are being built opposite my new garden room.
Because it is you, you can post more than 1.
i think we can all heartily agree on this, Ms @Cyclefree has a special license to post more lovely photos
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
Bamboo is a nightmare. Should never be planted in anything other than a bucket. And preferably not at all. A horrible looking thing.
To create that bed I had to move hundreds of rocks. Then put down ca 800 litres of topsoil and compost and then plant each individual tulip, daffodil, narcissus and allium bulb. Plus then plant each of the daphnes, viburnums, salvia uliginosa and a rose. From the top you can see Coniston Old Man.
To the left there is a crag - it's beautiful but I have had to get rid of mounds and mounds of nettles and brambles - so now I have some beds for an alpine rockery and a herb garden (as the kitchen is nearby). It is a very sunny as well as windy spot. For anyone wanting really good herb plants by post Herbal Haven are the best.
It's a shame I am limited to only 1 photo per day. I've really only come back to share more photos. Next week raised beds in stone are being built opposite my new garden room.
Because it is you, you can post more than 1.
i think we can all heartily agree on this, Ms @Cyclefree has a special license to post more lovely photos
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
Bamboo is a nightmare. Should never be planted in anything other than a bucket. And preferably not at all. A horrible looking thing.
To create that bed I had to move hundreds of rocks. Then put down ca 800 litres of topsoil and compost and then plant each individual tulip, daffodil, narcissus and allium bulb. Plus then plant each of the daphnes, viburnums, salvia uliginosa and a rose. From the top you can see Coniston Old Man.
To the left there is a crag - it's beautiful but I have had to get rid of mounds and mounds of nettles and brambles - so now I have some beds for an alpine rockery and a herb garden (as the kitchen is nearby). It is a very sunny as well as windy spot. For anyone wanting really good herb plants by post Herbal Haven are the best.
It's a shame I am limited to only 1 photo per day. I've really only come back to share more photos. Next week raised beds in stone are being built opposite my new garden room.
Because it is you, you can post more than 1.
i think we can all heartily agree on this, Ms @Cyclefree has a special license to post more lovely photos
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
Bamboo is a nightmare. Should never be planted in anything other than a bucket. And preferably not at all. A horrible looking thing.
To create that bed I had to move hundreds of rocks. Then put down ca 800 litres of topsoil and compost and then plant each individual tulip, daffodil, narcissus and allium bulb. Plus then plant each of the daphnes, viburnums, salvia uliginosa and a rose. From the top you can see Coniston Old Man.
To the left there is a crag - it's beautiful but I have had to get rid of mounds and mounds of nettles and brambles - so now I have some beds for an alpine rockery and a herb garden (as the kitchen is nearby). It is a very sunny as well as windy spot. For anyone wanting really good herb plants by post Herbal Haven are the best.
It's a shame I am limited to only 1 photo per day. I've really only come back to share more photos. Next week raised beds in stone are being built opposite my new garden room.
Because it is you, you can post more than 1.
i think we can all heartily agree on this, Ms @Cyclefree has a special license to post more lovely photos
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
Yes Muscadet was big in the 70s and 80s. It’s a “coastal white” just like Picpoul, Assyrtiko, Vinho Verde, Xacoli.
Quality was shit back then. Spotted by their popularity’, they over-produced and under-aged. Just like Beaujolais and Chianti and Rioja. Then the market crashed and they retrenched. There is still poor bulk Muscadet, but these days lots of very good small scale production and a big proportion of natural and esoteric wines.
English Muscadet is hard to judge. There is a sample size of one: me. Mine is nice.
Sweet. You should invite me down for a tasting and I can write about you in the Knappers Gazette. OK the “stone sex toy fans who also drink unusual wines” are not a huge market but it may spread. Drop me a DM if you want some modest publicity
When I have some decent volumes to sell I’ll do that. I’m still pre-commercial but won’t be long now.
Please do, I’m serious, It would make a nice little article. In these dark times readers are longing for pleasurable positive diverting little stories, and “bold English winemaker reinvents 70s classic French grape” would be an easy sell to an editor
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
When I was in Brittany I kept ordering Muscadet and I kept getting the cheap feeble shite and it was never good, only at best tolerable. Yuk
I stopped ordering Muscadet. Also, I hate to say this, but Chablis is not what it was, or maybe it never was
The best white wines are no longer French. Spain, Portugal, South Africa, the USA, Chile and especially Greece are making amazing and vastly superior whites. The only problem is that a lot of people have realized this and the best Greek whites are now properly expensive
English white is now pretty good, too. But not as good as English Fizz
For the last three changes of PM (2002 twice and 2004) my wife has been visiting her mother in the States. She’s off again on 30 June for 2 weeks. I think he’ll be gone first two weeks of July.
Stone wall and lawn. And forsythia. Such a cheering sight. The raised beds will be in similar stonework on the other side of that wall - creating a parterre /potager view from the seats at the top of the crag.
I mean law and politics are all very well. But designing and making something creative and which outlives you is the real joy in life.
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
1964, 1966, and 1974 (twice) - Harold Wilson
That would be the Oxford don, Harold Wilson, that bit of rough?
The nearest we came to proper rough as PM was probably Jim Callaghan. Or, if you want an election winner, John Major.
That probably tells us something uncomfortable about the country we live in.
Both better candidates than Harold, that's for sure. His pipe was an affectation. He was arguably the cleverest PM we have ever had.
Would any of them have made it to the top in contemporary politics? I fear not.
(In the case of Wilson, Callaghan and probably Heath, The War was surely a factor. Whatever its downsides, nothing like war for favouring ability over greasy-pole-climbing.)
More grammar schools, all 3 attended one and then two out of 3 Oxford
From 1964 to 1997 we had 5 PMs all of whom educated at state grammars.
From 1997 to 2026 by contrast we have had 8 PMs, 5 of whom educated at private schools (Starmer's a grammar before going private) and 2 of whom went to Eton and one Winchester and one Fettes. We have had only 2 PMs in that time educated solely for secondary level at a comprehensive, Gordon Brown and Liz Truss but Brown was in an academic hothouse experiment taught in separate classes at his High School so basically it was a grammar in all but name.
May was educated at a Roman Catholic private school, then a grammar school which converted to a comprehensive when she was in the sixth form
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
Bamboo is a nightmare. Should never be planted in anything other than a bucket. And preferably not at all. A horrible looking thing.
To create that bed I had to move hundreds of rocks. Then put down ca 800 litres of topsoil and compost and then plant each individual tulip, daffodil, narcissus and allium bulb. Plus then plant each of the daphnes, viburnums, salvia uliginosa and a rose. From the top you can see Coniston Old Man.
To the left there is a crag - it's beautiful but I have had to get rid of mounds and mounds of nettles and brambles - so now I have some beds for an alpine rockery and a herb garden (as the kitchen is nearby). It is a very sunny as well as windy spot. For anyone wanting really good herb plants by post Herbal Haven are the best.
It's a shame I am limited to only 1 photo per day. I've really only come back to share more photos. Next week raised beds in stone are being built opposite my new garden room.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
When I was in Brittany I kept ordering Muscadet and I kept getting the cheap feeble shite and it was never good, only at best tolerable. Yuk
I stopped ordering Muscadet. Also, I hate to say this, but Chablis is not what it was, or maybe it never was
The best white wines are no longer French. Spain, Portugal, South Africa, the USA, Chile and especially Greece are making amazing and vastly superior whites. The only problem is that a lot of people have realized this and the best Greek whites are now properly expensive
English white is now pretty good, too. But not as good as English Fizz
Chablis has always been shit.
Yes. I do wonder if that is true. I’ve no idea why but I’m going through a white wine phase and buying lots of it, instead of red. From all over the world and quality stuff. Consistently the French wine disappoints, especially the big names - like Chablis. Premier fucking cru my fucking Cornish arse
Was it always mediocre and the French just gaslit us with their wine reputation?
South African whites are now often sensational, and pretty good value in the 15-30 quid sweet spot
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
I'm extremely sorry for your health situation and the prognosis and I know all of PB is rooting for you and hopes the headers keep coming despite things.
But on the screening thing I suspect an issue is that the powers-that-be (NICE etc) feel that if they let it be known that the screening doesn't cover all bases then they fear there will be a drop off in women coming forward to be screened.
Just a thought. Feel free to shoot me down.
Yes I am aware that it is a balancing exercise. And I can understand the concern about not putting women off. And I also take on board @bondegezou's comments that no screening will work 100% and they tell you that. But there were no other symptoms - other than 3 breast operations between the ages of 24 and 40 which showed repeated benign tumours - adenomas. There was nothing unusual after my last op. I come from a medical family. I have always taken my health seriously - not least because of all the other stuff I have endured. I made the screeners fully aware of my medical history. Despite it no-one ever said "hey maybe you should do a CT scan" which is what, by chance, eventually uncovered this. And at the last stage before it becomes terminal.
Is this just very bad luck for me? Or is there something more systemic which needs looking at? Were clues missed which shouldn't have been?
If this screening does not work for this particular type - not just that no screening is 100% effective - then this needs looking at and the message to women, especially to women like me needs to be a lot clearer. I did everything I was told to. But it was pure chance that I got this diagnosis. If a year ago I had just put my chest pain down to a bit of heavy gardening that morning and not gone to A&E I might still not know. Or worse.
Talking of which this is the result of my hard work last summer.
A very pleasing bed of flowers. I'm still at the very early stage of killing things to make way for what we want to grow, but I'm kinda enjoying the battle with the bamboo still.
Bamboo is a nightmare. Should never be planted in anything other than a bucket. And preferably not at all. A horrible looking thing.
To create that bed I had to move hundreds of rocks. Then put down ca 800 litres of topsoil and compost and then plant each individual tulip, daffodil, narcissus and allium bulb. Plus then plant each of the daphnes, viburnums, salvia uliginosa and a rose. From the top you can see Coniston Old Man.
To the left there is a crag - it's beautiful but I have had to get rid of mounds and mounds of nettles and brambles - so now I have some beds for an alpine rockery and a herb garden (as the kitchen is nearby). It is a very sunny as well as windy spot. For anyone wanting really good herb plants by post Herbal Haven are the best.
It's a shame I am limited to only 1 photo per day. I've really only come back to share more photos. Next week raised beds in stone are being built opposite my new garden room.
Because it is you, you can post more than 1.
i think we can all heartily agree on this, Ms @Cyclefree has a special license to post more lovely photos
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
1964, 1966, and 1974 (twice) - Harold Wilson
That would be the Oxford don, Harold Wilson, that bit of rough?
The nearest we came to proper rough as PM was probably Jim Callaghan. Or, if you want an election winner, John Major.
That probably tells us something uncomfortable about the country we live in.
Both better candidates than Harold, that's for sure. His pipe was an affectation. He was arguably the cleverest PM we have ever had.
Would any of them have made it to the top in contemporary politics? I fear not.
(In the case of Wilson, Callaghan and probably Heath, The War was surely a factor. Whatever its downsides, nothing like war for favouring ability over greasy-pole-climbing.)
More grammar schools, all 3 attended one and then two out of 3 Oxford
From 1964 to 1997 we had 5 PMs all of whom educated at state grammars.
From 1997 to 2026 by contrast we have had 8 PMs, 5 of whom educated at private schools (Starmer's a grammar before going private) and 2 of whom went to Eton and one Winchester and one Fettes. We have had only 2 PMs in that time educated solely for secondary level at a comprehensive, Gordon Brown and Liz Truss but Brown was in an academic hothouse experiment taught in separate classes at his High School so basically it was a grammar in all but name.
May was educated at a Roman Catholic private school, then a grammar school which converted to a comprehensive when she was in the sixth form
Most comprehensive's set classes by ability, it's not unusual or experimental.
Stone wall and lawn. And forsythia. Such a cheering sight. The raised beds will be in similar stonework on the other side of that wall - creating a parterre /potager view from the seats at the top of the crag.
I mean law and politics are all very well. But designing and making something creative and which outlives you is the real joy in life.
Heseltine agrees with you on politics I believe!! He's spent dozens of years of retirement creating an arboretum.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
When I was in Brittany I kept ordering Muscadet and I kept getting the cheap feeble shite and it was never good, only at best tolerable. Yuk
I stopped ordering Muscadet. Also, I hate to say this, but Chablis is not what it was, or maybe it never was
The best white wines are no longer French. Spain, Portugal, South Africa, the USA, Chile and especially Greece are making amazing and vastly superior whites. The only problem is that a lot of people have realized this and the best Greek whites are now properly expensive
English white is now pretty good, too. But not as good as English Fizz
Chablis has always been shit.
Merely overpriced. But, of course, that's sort of the same thing.
These people know what they're doing, despite the biodynamic scammery:
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
When I was in Brittany I kept ordering Muscadet and I kept getting the cheap feeble shite and it was never good, only at best tolerable. Yuk
I stopped ordering Muscadet. Also, I hate to say this, but Chablis is not what it was, or maybe it never was
The best white wines are no longer French. Spain, Portugal, South Africa, the USA, Chile and especially Greece are making amazing and vastly superior whites. The only problem is that a lot of people have realized this and the best Greek whites are now properly expensive
English white is now pretty good, too. But not as good as English Fizz
Chablis has always been shit.
Yes. I do wonder if that is true. I’ve no idea why but I’m going through a white wine phase and buying lots of it, instead of red. From all over the world and quality stuff. Consistently the French wine disappoints, especially the big names - like Chablis. Premier fucking cru my fucking Cornish arse
Was it always mediocre and the French just gaslit us with their wine reputation?
South African whites are now often sensational, and pretty good value in the 15-30 quid sweet spot
There is some decent white Burgandy out there. Chablis, though, is the nearest bit of Burgundy to Paris, and is on the river, so it was the white wine the Parisians drunk, and commanded a massive premium relative to quality.
For decent white Burgandy, you basically want Puligny-Montrachet, without the price tag: Saint Aubin and Rully would be my choices.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
Yes Muscadet was big in the 70s and 80s. It’s a “coastal white” just like Picpoul, Assyrtiko, Vinho Verde, Xacoli.
Quality was shit back then. Spurred by their popularity, they over-produced and under-aged. Just like Beaujolais and Chianti and Rioja. Then the market crashed and they retrenched. There is still poor bulk Muscadet, but these days lots of very good small scale production and a big proportion of natural and esoteric wines.
English Muscadet is hard to judge. There is a sample size of one: me. Mine is nice.
A while ago I volunteered for the Kensington and Chelsea Lib Dems and was given £50 to buy some wine for an event. I popped to Waitrose and found a good deal on Muscadet so bought that as the white wine. The squeals of delight from the middle aged party activists was something I remember to this day.
I love costal whites and would love to try yours some day.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
When I was in Brittany I kept ordering Muscadet and I kept getting the cheap feeble shite and it was never good, only at best tolerable. Yuk
I stopped ordering Muscadet. Also, I hate to say this, but Chablis is not what it was, or maybe it never was
The best white wines are no longer French. Spain, Portugal, South Africa, the USA, Chile and especially Greece are making amazing and vastly superior whites. The only problem is that a lot of people have realized this and the best Greek whites are now properly expensive
English white is now pretty good, too. But not as good as English Fizz
Chablis has always been shit.
Merely overpriced. But, of course, that's sort of the same thing.
These people know what they're doing, despite the biodynamic scammery:
I just don’t buy any of this growing mountain of total bullshit. It’s gaslighting. You have to believe the entire British civil service conspired to keep the prime minister in the dark that his personally chosen and controversial appointee for our most important diplomatic job failed the fundamental vetting test. And all of this at the same time that the prime minister KNEW that the same controversial man remained friends with a known pedophile and child sex offender after the pedo was convicted
Meanwhile the PM’s aide’s phone containing all the most important messages was miraculously stolen at the best possible moment to hide that evidence
It’s utterly ridiculous. Now they’re trying to muddy the water with endless long confusing emails they’ve made up and ridiculous screeds of boring verbiage in the hope we all get bored and confused and somehow Skyr survives
It might even work. But every day Skyr survives as the least popular premier in history, getting even less popular by the hour, damages the Labour Party, hampers the government, makes their re-election even less likely and is a sad state of affairs for the UK
Andy Burnham stands ready to serve.
As I posted late last night after drinks someone I trust implacably to have their finger on the pulse of deepest Labour says he's on his way.
Burnham grates on me and he isn’t even an MP yet. I’d rather Rayner took over .
Burnham is a legend (in his own mind).
My view is that Burnham would make a better PM but in the cage fight that the next election is going to be between Farage, Polanski and Labour then she is a better choice.
Agreed. Rayner has a genuinely tough backstory, and she is pukka working class. I suspect she is properly bright, you don’t get as far as she has - with her background, in the misogynistic Labour Party - without native cunning and wit
I abhor most of her politics but I admire her grit and sass. I don’t give a fuck about her taxes, tho her hypocrisy does grate
I reckon she’d be a better prime minister than Starmer and she’d be better electioneer than Starmer, Burnham or any of them. She could retrieve some working class Reformers and women who are drifting to Green
She would leak middle class voters from Labour to the Tories and LDs even if she won back some working class voters from Reform and she wouldn't have any more appeal to the Greens than Burnham does either.
Rayner would basically be a female Neil Kinnock
Have you never thought of some rough? Maybe not a Manc, but someone who speaks in Estuary English, drops her "h"s and operates a parallel foreign policy.
When have the British ever voted for someone a bit rough? Middle England prefers their leaders to be a bit more refined, even Hague's thick Yorkshire vowels and Kinnock's Welsh windbagism was too much for them
1964, 1966, and 1974 (twice) - Harold Wilson
That would be the Oxford don, Harold Wilson, that bit of rough?
The nearest we came to proper rough as PM was probably Jim Callaghan. Or, if you want an election winner, John Major.
That probably tells us something uncomfortable about the country we live in.
Both better candidates than Harold, that's for sure. His pipe was an affectation. He was arguably the cleverest PM we have ever had.
Would any of them have made it to the top in contemporary politics? I fear not.
(In the case of Wilson, Callaghan and probably Heath, The War was surely a factor. Whatever its downsides, nothing like war for favouring ability over greasy-pole-climbing.)
More grammar schools, all 3 attended one and then two out of 3 Oxford
From 1964 to 1997 we had 5 PMs all of whom educated at state grammars.
From 1997 to 2026 by contrast we have had 8 PMs, 5 of whom educated at private schools (Starmer's a grammar before going private) and 2 of whom went to Eton and one Winchester and one Fettes. We have had only 2 PMs in that time educated solely for secondary level at a comprehensive, Gordon Brown and Liz Truss but Brown was in an academic hothouse experiment taught in separate classes at his High School so basically it was a grammar in all but name.
May was educated at a Roman Catholic private school, then a grammar school which converted to a comprehensive when she was in the sixth form
'Most comprehensive's set classes by ability, it's not unusual or experimental.
'Liz Truss’s claim to be the first prime minister to have gone to a comprehensive school inadvertently thrust Kirkcaldy High School into the limelight.
The crisis-hit Conservative PM made the remark on Wednesday in her speech to the party conference in Birmingham.
And commentators were quick to ask: “What about Gordon Brown?”
Many – including her rivals – pointed to the 71-year-old Fifer’s education at a state school as proof Ms Truss was wrong.
But broadcaster Andrew Neil wrote: “Labour is wrong. Kirkcaldy High was not a comprehensive when Brown went to it.”
He added: “Entrance exams for Kirkcaldy High did not end until 1970 by which time he was at Edinburgh University...All publicly-funded secondary schools in Scotland are comprehensives – however this was not always the case.
Former Kirkcaldy High School rector Derek Allan confirmed the school WAS selective when Gordon Brown was a pupil in the 1960s.'
So there we have it, the only UK PM to have been fully educated at a comprehensive school from 11 to 18 was Liz Truss. Though Truss went to Oxford, we have never had a comprehensive school educated PM who did not go to Oxbridge though we have had non Oxbridge educated private and grammar school PMs
Stone wall and lawn. And forsythia. Such a cheering sight. The raised beds will be in similar stonework on the other side of that wall - creating a parterre /potager view from the seats at the top of the crag.
I mean law and politics are all very well. But designing and making something creative and which outlives you is the real joy in life.
Nice
And I know whereof you speak. I can’t believe I am saying this, but I have really enjoyed creating two balconies full of herbs, succulents, and little trees this last year. I have two south facing balconies. They are basically too small for chairs so never really did much until a friend firmly suggested: put some fucking greenery out there
Now I have done that and they are full of life. Bees and spiders and ants too, but hey ho. It’s all life. They demand attention and I actually worry about them when I go away, which is unusual for me - to put it mildly - but the reward is significant. Somehow the greenery outside the flat makes the whole flat seem much bigger and nicer, and I am not sure why. It’s just a lot of pot plants. But it works
And yes I get a buzz out of curating and creating something pretty and alive
For the last three changes of PM (2002 twice and 2004) my wife has been visiting her mother in the States. She’s off again on 30 June for 2 weeks. I think he’ll be gone first two weeks of July.
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
9 years ago one of my cousins was also diagnosed with breast cancer that was stage 4 at presentation. It was also not picked up on mammogram., so she was also unlucky.
I don't think it medical misogyny. If such tumours are undetectable by mammogram, ultrasound or self examination then how could they be screened for? In order to screen, we need a suitable test.
No screening programme picks up all lesions, there are always false positives and false negatives as well fresh lesions that pop up between screening events and progress quickly.
Have you had your screening mammograms reviewed? Was anything missed? If not, then it isn't the fault of the screening programme.
The information leaflet/weblink about breast screening is quite clear that mammography cannot find all breast cancers, so I do not think that the accusation of false reassurance is correct.
Why isn't there an effective test for the second most common type of breast cancer? Is one / can one be developed? I would hope that someone somewhere in the NHS or the cancer research bodies is asking these questions.
The breast consultant was pretty apologetic when she told me. She also said that they'd do an audit but the letter I received said that as it was a different health trust which did the screening they could not find out. Sigh! Silos.
I am not looking to blame anyone. Nor do I want to be thinking "if only". I live for now. The past cannot be changed. But maybe they could learn something because it seems extraordinary to me that one can go from nothing wrong to stage 4 cancer without anyone noticing anything - and for a pretty common type as well.
It seems that ILBC can be picked up by an MRI scan but typically not by a mammogram: Sadly being first detected at stage 4 is very common, both here & in the USA.
My guess is that, if they looked at this, NICE would have concluded that MRI scanning the entire female population would be spectacularly expensive & would lead to so many false positives that it simply wouldn’t be worth the effort. There’s probably a report buried somewhere.
Hoping for the best possible outcome for you @Cyclefree .
Thank you.
Stuff happens. I've made my peace with it not least because there is zero point worrying about something I can do nothing about it. It bothers my husband a lot though he does not show it. It has helped me to view it as I might one of my investigations into a cock up - helps me be detached, I guess. But the blunt truth is that I will never be cured or in remission; it could go horribly wrong and I will not make old bones. So best to concentrate on nice stuff from now on in as much as possible.
I have - rather pleasingly - lost lots of weight and have bought clothes from the hospice charity shop. I view this as an investment in my future. Plus people keep telling me how good I look and at this rate I shall be at my most beautiful just before I die. And with all my lovely new clothes will win the Best Dressed Corpse Competition. I certainly intend swanning down those steps in a ball gown this summer, a lovely drink in my hand. I may even post that photo!
For the last three changes of PM (2002 twice and 2004) my wife has been visiting her mother in the States. She’s off again on 30 June for 2 weeks. I think he’ll be gone first two weeks of July.
It's about the Andy Malkinson case. He was the man wrongly convicted of rape who was eventually released. The man who did do the rape has now been convicted.
But it's what this case says about our institutions which is important. And about the CPS. Starmer was DPP at the time.
As Nelson says -
"Organisations supposed to protect us, keep us safe and ensure justice can fail, egregiously. Reports say so, then the pattern of failure continues with really quite severe circumstances. But the Malkinson case stands out, not least because Sir Keir Starmer was running the Crown Prosecution Service at the time - and not only has he said he didn’t know about the case (which has turned out to be a bit of a theme with him) but that he should not have been told. It’s this reaction, or lack thereof, that I find fascinating. You would think a lawyer committed to justice would be more shocked than anyone about the Malkinson case as a complete failure of the British state: an example of a system in possession of evidence that could have exonerated a man, which instead sat on that evidence while he spent another 11 years in jail."
He goes on - "There is, to be clear, no evidence that Sir Keir personally saw the Malkinson file. The CPS has said the decision was made by a reviewing lawyer. In that sense his case mirrors his defences on Savile, on the Rochdale grooming gangs, on the Post Office Horizon prosecutions - in each instance, the defence has been that the file did not cross his desk."
But when he was in charge the CPS did know - in 2009 - that there was forensic evidence exonerating Malkinson. It did nothing. Malkinson spent another 11 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. And Starmer has done nothing since.
"If anyone in public life should be able to explain what went wrong - institutionally, culturally, psychologically - between the 2009 CPS note and the 2020 release, it is the former DPP. The case is a gift to anyone who wants to argue that the British state systematically resists confronting its own errors.
And yet the Prime Minister’s line is not that he wants to confront it. His line is that he wasn’t told, and that he shouldn’t have been. That is not the reaction of a lawyer who thinks the Malkinson case is important. It is the reaction of a politician who thinks it is dangerous."
We are seeing the same behaviour now over Mandelson.
This is not the mark of a leader nor of someone who can even begin to repair the shredded competence and integrity of our institutions.
As Nelson says, it is a theme with Starmer. He knows all the tricks in the book to weasel out of any mistake he makes, and he seems to make plenty. As insincere as it comes.
A vegetarian who eats chicken when he's a bit hungry A multi millionaire whose brother died in poverty
Yes. The more I think about Starmer, the more I think that cynical gaslighting is his predominant characteristic:
- he poses as an expert administrator, while presiding over a series of obvious administrative disasters, losing various chiefs of staff, Mandelson, somehow contriving not to know about Jimmy Saville in an office he ran, etc. - he tries to seem competent, while consistently displaying poor judgement, - he claims to preside over a pro-growth government, while consistently undertaking measures to screw the economy - he is always seen in photos with two Union Jacks in the background, while desperately trying to hand over British territory and making us pay for the privilege, cosying up to Brussels in the most abject way, failing to fund the armed forces properly ... - he holds everybody else to the ministerial code, while excusing his own repeated violations of it - he ran as Labour leader as an extreme lefty, then ditched it the moment he won, using an excuse so preposterous as to be insulting to everybody's intelligence (he'd love to stick to those vote-losing policies, but the pandemic made them unviable) - etc etc etc
I think he is the most unappealing character we've ever had in Number 10, certainly up there, and about the least competent, Truss, Ted Heath and maybe Brown perhaps excepted. He never deserved to be Prime Minister, and Labour certainly merit the epic destruction in their vote share since he won.
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
9 years ago one of my cousins was also diagnosed with breast cancer that was stage 4 at presentation. It was also not picked up on mammogram., so she was also unlucky.
I don't think it medical misogyny. If such tumours are undetectable by mammogram, ultrasound or self examination then how could they be screened for? In order to screen, we need a suitable test.
No screening programme picks up all lesions, there are always false positives and false negatives as well fresh lesions that pop up between screening events and progress quickly.
Have you had your screening mammograms reviewed? Was anything missed? If not, then it isn't the fault of the screening programme.
The information leaflet/weblink about breast screening is quite clear that mammography cannot find all breast cancers, so I do not think that the accusation of false reassurance is correct.
Why isn't there an effective test for the second most common type of breast cancer? Is one / can one be developed? I would hope that someone somewhere in the NHS or the cancer research bodies is asking these questions.
The breast consultant was pretty apologetic when she told me. She also said that they'd do an audit but the letter I received said that as it was a different health trust which did the screening they could not find out. Sigh! Silos.
I am not looking to blame anyone. Nor do I want to be thinking "if only". I live for now. The past cannot be changed. But maybe they could learn something because it seems extraordinary to me that one can go from nothing wrong to stage 4 cancer without anyone noticing anything - and for a pretty common type as well.
We have made huge advances in cancer detection and treatment in my lifetime, but there is more to do. Sadly, many people still don't receive a diagnosis until late. It's particularly a problem with certain types of cancer: pancreatic cancers, for example, are usually only diagnosed at stage 4, and it's also common with lung and ovarian. I have a student now who is working on the NHS's new liver cancer screening programme that shows promise, liver cancer being another type that is often only diagnosed late.
A lot of lobular cancers are detected on regular mammograms, but the way the tumours grow make them harder to detect by any method than ductal cancers. Instead of growing as a lump, they can be lines or sheets of cells, or aggregates of small numbers of cells. I used to do some research on AI tools in breast cancer screening, but I am out of date now. I understand the newer AI models are getting much better, which may help. I don't know the lobular cancer screening literature, but understand there's some research on using MRI for screening, but only for women identified as being at high risk. There are different X-ray techniques that also seem to be better able to detect lobular cancer, like digital breast tomosynthesis. Ultrasound can also detect some lobular cancers and there's research on when to best use ultrasound. There's a paper from a year ago that concludes we need better models to detect who is actually at high risk of lobular cancers.
In terms of treatment, hormonal treatments have made great strides in breast cancer (as my aunt, 8 years on from being diagnosed with stage 4 cancer, can thankfully attest). Hormonal treatments can be particularly useful in lobular cases. There is plenty of research in this area. Breast cancer research is generally well funded.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Huzzah!
I was somewhat assisted by the fact you said you were walking from somewhere in south Brittany (IIRC) and also the fact that I spent a chunky 6 weeks in Brittany last year - in various sessions - and basically went everywhere. I briskly walked past that exact cathedral
But still, yay me
Yes Vannes is gorgeous. It’s also lovely down by the water. The oysters are magnifique, even if the food otherwise often disappoints (in my experience)
Keep us posted with more photos! They are cheering
I really don't know why you need cheering.
The slow downfall of Starmer being served before us like a cruel force-fed foie gras is a delicious gourmet treat to rival any oysters.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
When I was in Brittany I kept ordering Muscadet and I kept getting the cheap feeble shite and it was never good, only at best tolerable. Yuk
I stopped ordering Muscadet. Also, I hate to say this, but Chablis is not what it was, or maybe it never was
The best white wines are no longer French. Spain, Portugal, South Africa, the USA, Chile and especially Greece are making amazing and vastly superior whites. The only problem is that a lot of people have realized this and the best Greek whites are now properly expensive
English white is now pretty good, too. But not as good as English Fizz
Chablis has always been shit.
Yes. I do wonder if that is true. I’ve no idea why but I’m going through a white wine phase and buying lots of it, instead of red. From all over the world and quality stuff. Consistently the French wine disappoints, especially the big names - like Chablis. Premier fucking cru my fucking Cornish arse
Was it always mediocre and the French just gaslit us with their wine reputation?
South African whites are now often sensational, and pretty good value in the 15-30 quid sweet spot
There is some decent white Burgandy out there. Chablis, though, is the nearest bit of Burgundy to Paris, and is on the river, so it was the white wine the Parisians drunk, and commanded a massive premium relative to quality.
For decent white Burgandy, you basically want Puligny-Montrachet, without the price tag: Saint Aubin and Rully would be my choices.
Interesting, thank you
Coincidentally in my latest haul I’ve bought both Saint Aubin and Rully (and not tried them yet) so I will be able to test your opinion shortly. I hope you’re right!
It's about the Andy Malkinson case. He was the man wrongly convicted of rape who was eventually released. The man who did do the rape has now been convicted.
But it's what this case says about our institutions which is important. And about the CPS. Starmer was DPP at the time.
As Nelson says -
"Organisations supposed to protect us, keep us safe and ensure justice can fail, egregiously. Reports say so, then the pattern of failure continues with really quite severe circumstances. But the Malkinson case stands out, not least because Sir Keir Starmer was running the Crown Prosecution Service at the time - and not only has he said he didn’t know about the case (which has turned out to be a bit of a theme with him) but that he should not have been told. It’s this reaction, or lack thereof, that I find fascinating. You would think a lawyer committed to justice would be more shocked than anyone about the Malkinson case as a complete failure of the British state: an example of a system in possession of evidence that could have exonerated a man, which instead sat on that evidence while he spent another 11 years in jail."
He goes on - "There is, to be clear, no evidence that Sir Keir personally saw the Malkinson file. The CPS has said the decision was made by a reviewing lawyer. In that sense his case mirrors his defences on Savile, on the Rochdale grooming gangs, on the Post Office Horizon prosecutions - in each instance, the defence has been that the file did not cross his desk."
But when he was in charge the CPS did know - in 2009 - that there was forensic evidence exonerating Malkinson. It did nothing. Malkinson spent another 11 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. And Starmer has done nothing since.
"If anyone in public life should be able to explain what went wrong - institutionally, culturally, psychologically - between the 2009 CPS note and the 2020 release, it is the former DPP. The case is a gift to anyone who wants to argue that the British state systematically resists confronting its own errors.
And yet the Prime Minister’s line is not that he wants to confront it. His line is that he wasn’t told, and that he shouldn’t have been. That is not the reaction of a lawyer who thinks the Malkinson case is important. It is the reaction of a politician who thinks it is dangerous."
We are seeing the same behaviour now over Mandelson.
This is not the mark of a leader nor of someone who can even begin to repair the shredded competence and integrity of our institutions.
As Nelson says, it is a theme with Starmer. He knows all the tricks in the book to weasel out of any mistake he makes, and he seems to make plenty. As insincere as it comes.
A vegetarian who eats chicken when he's a bit hungry A multi millionaire whose brother died in poverty
Yes. The more I think about Starmer, the more I think that cynical gaslighting is his predominant characteristic:
- he poses as an expert administrator, while presiding over a series of obvious administrative disasters, losing various chiefs of staff, Mandelson, somehow contriving not to know about Jimmy Saville in an office he ran, etc. - he tries to seem competent, while consistently displaying poor judgement, - he claims to preside over a pro-growth government, while consistently undertaking measures to screw the economy - he is always seen in photos with two Union Jacks in the background, while desperately trying to hand over British territory and making us pay for the privilege, cosying up to Brussels in the most abject way, failing to fund the armed forces properly ... - he holds everybody else to the ministerial code, while excusing his own repeated violations of it - he ran as Labour leader as an extreme lefty, then ditched it the moment he won, using an excuse so preposterous as to be insulting to everybody's intelligence (he'd love to stick to those vote-losing policies, but the pandemic made them unviable) - etc etc etc
I think he is the most unappealing character we've ever had in Number 10, certainly up there, and about the least competent, Truss, Ted Heath and maybe Brown perhaps excepted. He never deserved to be Prime Minister, and Labour certainly merit the epic destruction in their vote share since he won.
That is a superb summary of the man. Faultless and “forensic”. 10/10
For the last three changes of PM (2002 twice and 2004) my wife has been visiting her mother in the States. She’s off again on 30 June for 2 weeks. I think he’ll be gone first two weeks of July.
It does kind of feel like we’ve had 22 years of Starmer..
Stone wall and lawn. And forsythia. Such a cheering sight. The raised beds will be in similar stonework on the other side of that wall - creating a parterre /potager view from the seats at the top of the crag.
I mean law and politics are all very well. But designing and making something creative and which outlives you is the real joy in life.
Nice
And I know whereof you speak. I can’t believe I am saying this, but I have really enjoyed creating two balconies full of herbs, succulents, and little trees this last year. I have two south facing balconies. They are basically too small for chairs so never really did much until a friend firmly suggested: put some fucking greenery out there
Now I have done that and they are full of life. Bees and spiders and ants too, but hey ho. It’s all life. They demand attention and I actually worry about them when I go away, which is unusual for me - to put it mildly - but the reward is significant. Somehow the greenery outside the flat makes the whole flat seem much bigger and nicer, and I am not sure why. It’s just a lot of pot plants. But it works
And yes I get a buzz out of curating and creating something pretty and alive
I saw this in one of your flat photos and was going to tease you about it. A little bit of greenery is so cheering even in the smallest space.Get an automatic sprinkler if you can.
I got v excited about my new lawnmower which has - don't laugh - assisted power because the entire garden (half a hectare) is on a hill and the salesman thought that it would be helpful for me. Anyway, the scent of newly mown grass is childhood. And lying on a lawn in sunshine is just pure happiness.
That wall is one of the most beautiful things I've seen. The detail of the work is wonderful. The guy who made it is both a craftsman and an artist. Working with him to build this - and much else - was a real highlight of last year.
All polling has consistently shown that Rayner rates worse than Starmer.
Now we know party members love to vote for the person they love the most - but if Labour MPs are worried about losing their seats are they really going to let members choose the one person who will maximise their chances of losing?
The biggest winner from a Rayner Labour leadership would be the Tories, she would squeeze back some Green voters but shed middle class voters back to the Tories and set up a Tory v Reform general election with Labour third most likely
There can be no Tory v Reform with Farage in a skirt taking the Tories to the right of Reform.
The only Tory v Reform would be a one nation centre party led by Hunt or Cleverley that too Lab and LD tactical votes
Reform and Tories under current leadership would share at best 45% of votes, probably 26 to 19 split
55% on centre left with heavy tactical voting to stop Reform and Reform in a skirt.
Lab would form Government as largest Party with LD and Green support to ensure anti right coalition government.
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
When I was in Brittany I kept ordering Muscadet and I kept getting the cheap feeble shite and it was never good, only at best tolerable. Yuk
I stopped ordering Muscadet. Also, I hate to say this, but Chablis is not what it was, or maybe it never was
The best white wines are no longer French. Spain, Portugal, South Africa, the USA, Chile and especially Greece are making amazing and vastly superior whites. The only problem is that a lot of people have realized this and the best Greek whites are now properly expensive
English white is now pretty good, too. But not as good as English Fizz
Chablis has always been shit.
No no no no no.
A lot of the Chablis and petit Chablis we get in Britain is mediocre (not shit, I’ve never drunk a Chablis that I wanted to spit out), but they make some awesome wines.
Essentially Chablis in the 2020s is like Cote de Beaune in the 1990s. 30 years of climate change. It’s just we’ve had 30 years of ever-increasing ripeness in white burgundy that leaves Chablis seeming spare and thin. But it’s still cool climate Chardonnay at its best, and you should make the most of it because within 2 decades it’ll taste like Macon tastes now.
For the last three changes of PM (2002 twice and 2004) my wife has been visiting her mother in the States. She’s off again on 30 June for 2 weeks. I think he’ll be gone first two weeks of July.
It does kind of feel like we’ve had 22 years of Starmer..
Managed to get to the Cathedral just before it got dark
Lush
i do admire the way the French protect their ancient town centres. Proper attention is paid
I am trying to identify the place, without internet assistance. France has a LOT of cathedrals. The half timbered houses suggest Alsace, the Jura, eastern France. The cathedral is not perfect or huge so not a major city. Hmmm
But then I THINK I vaguely remember you saying you were walking from south Brittany, which confuses things. And western France does also have a lot of that half timbering
I am gonna say.. Vannes. But with about 6% confidence
It is indeed Vannes, and it is lush
I’m now sitting in a restaurant in the old ramparts of the city overlooking a beautiful garden
I’ve ordered black pasta with salmon, and I’m rather enjoying a half bottle of muscadet while enjoying the view
Muscadet is an excellent appetite-sharpener.
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
I am the only vigneron in Britain growing Melon de Bourgogne (MelonB), the Muscadet grape.
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Am I imagining it or was “muscadet” weirdly popular in Britain in the 70s? I seem to dimly recall, as a child, my parents saying “Muscadet” the same way people say “Picpoul” now - ie not hugely globally popular but with enough branding to create a trend \ In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
"Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis."
When I was in Brittany I kept ordering Muscadet and I kept getting the cheap feeble shite and it was never good, only at best tolerable. Yuk
I stopped ordering Muscadet. Also, I hate to say this, but Chablis is not what it was, or maybe it never was
The best white wines are no longer French. Spain, Portugal, South Africa, the USA, Chile and especially Greece are making amazing and vastly superior whites. The only problem is that a lot of people have realized this and the best Greek whites are now properly expensive
English white is now pretty good, too. But not as good as English Fizz
Chablis has always been shit.
You're drinking the wrong Chablis, then.
There's some mad prices for really inferior stuff out there.
This time last year I was in hospital. During my stay the Supreme Court judgment on the proper interpretation of the Equality Act came out - on 16 April 2025. A year later the government has yet to issue the guidance to help service providers. It has said it will do so in May which means that it may not come into force until September, a year and a half after the judgment of the UK's top court. This delay puts service providers at legal risk, though of course they should be taking legal advice on the law, and it has given those who don't want to comply an excuse for not doing so. Even the UN has stated that British women and girls have been "left exposed" by the government's failure.
This behaviour shows utter contempt for Britain's women, the Supreme Court and the rule of law itself. Remarkably, it is happening under a government led by a piously self-regarding human rights lawyer with an Attorney-General insistent on compliance with every dot and comma of international law but blithely unconcerned with the government's failure to comply with domestic law. Taking its cue from this, the civil service has refused to withdraw its current unlawful internal policies, presumably on the basis that if the government can't be arsed with paying attention to the law, why should they be.
So I may write to him and point out that - 1. Invasive lobular breast cancer, which I have, is the 2nd most common type of breast cancer. 2. The current screening programme is ineffective at detecting it - either with mammograms, ultrasound or physical examination. 3. Women are not told this when they go for screening. They are given false reassurance, as I was, for many years. So that barely a year after a screening which told me there was no problem, I was told that not only had I had it for some time but it had progressed to Stage 4 and was now in my spine, ribs and pelvis. It is incurable. This false reassurance - and dismal outcome - is probably happening to other women right now, some of whom will be your wives, daughters, sisters, mothers etc.,. 4. Is this an example of the medical misogyny he is talking about and, if so, what is he proposing to do about this?
I am very happy to raise my voice on this but given that I first raised this issue with my health trust last November and got a reply at the end of March, how serious is he. Because frankly whatever Ministers from the PM down say about women & girls strikes me as so much hot air with little action behind it.
9 years ago one of my cousins was also diagnosed with breast cancer that was stage 4 at presentation. It was also not picked up on mammogram., so she was also unlucky.
I don't think it medical misogyny. If such tumours are undetectable by mammogram, ultrasound or self examination then how could they be screened for? In order to screen, we need a suitable test.
No screening programme picks up all lesions, there are always false positives and false negatives as well fresh lesions that pop up between screening events and progress quickly.
Have you had your screening mammograms reviewed? Was anything missed? If not, then it isn't the fault of the screening programme.
The information leaflet/weblink about breast screening is quite clear that mammography cannot find all breast cancers, so I do not think that the accusation of false reassurance is correct.
Why isn't there an effective test for the second most common type of breast cancer? Is one / can one be developed? I would hope that someone somewhere in the NHS or the cancer research bodies is asking these questions.
The breast consultant was pretty apologetic when she told me. She also said that they'd do an audit but the letter I received said that as it was a different health trust which did the screening they could not find out. Sigh! Silos.
I am not looking to blame anyone. Nor do I want to be thinking "if only". I live for now. The past cannot be changed. But maybe they could learn something because it seems extraordinary to me that one can go from nothing wrong to stage 4 cancer without anyone noticing anything - and for a pretty common type as well.
It seems that ILBC can be picked up by an MRI scan but typically not by a mammogram: Sadly being first detected at stage 4 is very common, both here & in the USA.
My guess is that, if they looked at this, NICE would have concluded that MRI scanning the entire female population would be spectacularly expensive & would lead to so many false positives that it simply wouldn’t be worth the effort. There’s probably a report buried somewhere.
Hoping for the best possible outcome for you @Cyclefree .
Thank you.
Stuff happens. I've made my peace with it not least because there is zero point worrying about something I can do nothing about it. It bothers my husband a lot though he does not show it. It has helped me to view it as I might one of my investigations into a cock up - helps me be detached, I guess. But the blunt truth is that I will never be cured or in remission; it could go horribly wrong and I will not make old bones. So best to concentrate on nice stuff from now on in as much as possible.
I have - rather pleasingly - lost lots of weight and have bought clothes from the hospice charity shop. I view this as an investment in my future. Plus people keep telling me how good I look and at this rate I shall be at my most beautiful just before I die. And with all my lovely new clothes will win the Best Dressed Corpse Competition. I certainly intend swanning down those steps in a ball gown this summer, a lovely drink in my hand. I may even post that photo!
You cannot possibly know that you will never be in remission or cured. And a doctor cannot say so with any certainty - they can only surmise.
All polling has consistently shown that Rayner rates worse than Starmer.
Now we know party members love to vote for the person they love the most - but if Labour MPs are worried about losing their seats are they really going to let members choose the one person who will maximise their chances of losing?
The biggest winner from a Rayner Labour leadership would be the Tories, she would squeeze back some Green voters but shed middle class voters back to the Tories and set up a Tory v Reform general election with Labour third most likely
There can be no Tory v Reform with Farage in a skirt taking the Tories to the right of Reform.
The only Tory v Reform would be a one nation centre party led by Hunt or Cleverley that too Lab and LD tactical votes
Reform and Tories under current leadership would share at best 45% of votes, probably 26 to 19 split
55% on centre left with heavy tactical voting to stop Reform and Reform in a skirt.
Lab would form Government as largest Party with LD and Green support to ensure anti right coalition government.
Comments
Stolen Yes Minister storyline....
https://x.com/WhiteHouse/status/2045223977077907914
He said: "I stated my position, I stand by it, I don't recoil for it, the Mandelson scandal was the tipping point for me," adding he believed Lord Mandelson to be "a traitor to his party and country".
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c17v2452vglo
The breast consultant was pretty apologetic when she told me. She also said that they'd do an audit but the letter I received said that as it was a different health trust which did the screening they could not find out. Sigh! Silos.
I am not looking to blame anyone. Nor do I want to be thinking "if only". I live for now. The past cannot be changed. But maybe they could learn something because it seems extraordinary to me that one can go from nothing wrong to stage 4 cancer without anyone noticing anything - and for a pretty common type as well.
They are so much cuter than the greys. They are wisps of russet and aethereal mischief
Mind you, walking all day probably is too.
What do I think really happened with Mandelson and vetting?
In October, November and December 2024, No10 indicated it wanted to appoint Peter Mandelson as Ambassador to Washington.
It was presented with an array of people telling them not to: Cabinet ministers, spooks, officials in a vetting report. All raised major red flags.
Starmer and McSweeny made clear they weren’t interested in any objection, and this must go ahead at all costs.
So Mandelson’s appointment was announced mid December 2024.
The vetting we are focussed on today came later, in January 2025. Vetting of ambassadors is the responsibility of the FCDO and Olly Robbins.
One bit of the system said no - the UKSV agency said don’t appoint Mandelson.
We don’t know on what grounds, but probably the grounds No10 had seen and rejected as a reason to block. Olly Robbins cleared Mandelson. Very quietly, Mandelson didn’t get the very highest level of clearance when he got the job, but he got the overall OK because of Robbins. Robbins did No10 a favour.
This is because Olly Robbbins knew that going to No10 post announcement, and saying the Mandelson appointment can’t happen, was politically impossible.
And civil servants want to deliver for their political masters. So Olly fixed it for Keir: and is now paying a price.
Olly Robbins has - incidentally - done No10 a second massive political favour. The really really toxic claim doing the rounds last night was that surely someone - anyone - in No10
DID know the UKSV agency turned down the vetting
Olly Robbins is making clear he didn’t tell people the UKSV verdict because that would be inappropriate as part of the process he followed. It’s not even clear he saw it.
No10 don’t seem to realise he’s done them a favour, and are releasing documents to challenge alternative versions of events. Let’s see how it plays out.
The bottom line is No10 wanted Mandelson come what may. They rammed it through.
One quango; post appointment announcement, was never realistically going to be allowed to stop Mandelson taking the job because the top of Government had publicly committed to it. They hadn’t wanted to heed the warnings earlier; and were in too deep
That’s where I think we are
https://x.com/samcoatessky/status/2045218119568781493?s=46&t=CW4pL-mMpTqsJXCdjW0Z6Q
https://x.com/belfastdgm/status/2045102422196883559?s=46&t=CW4pL-mMpTqsJXCdjW0Z6Q
I made a small batch of still MelonB last year and yrs excellent.
Truman was nothing like that.
TBH it's quite worrying, who was the last competent top civil servant? Or do we only hear about the incompetent ones?
Reform 25% (-3)
Labour 19% (-2)
Conservative 19% (+2)
Greens 17% (No change)
Lib Dems 14% (+5)
Others 7% (-1)
https://x.com/keiranpedley/status/2045163656397078690?s=46&t=CW4pL-mMpTqsJXCdjW0Z6Q
Nevertheless tasking the NHS to maintain the existing differential might bear interesting fruit. Annual reports to outline the progress being made to support the status quo would probably result in much closer inspection from the public than the NHS is accustomed to.
I know, bonkers, but it would drive investment in each.
Wherefore art thou Romeo?
\
In my experience Muscadet in France is dismayingly bad. Cheap, thin, boring
I trust yours is much better
https://www.theguardian.com/food/2019/sep/17/muscadet-lambrusco-great-1970s-wine-revival
That probably tells us something uncomfortable about the country we live in.
Now we know party members love to vote for the person they love the most - but if Labour MPs are worried about losing their seats are they really going to let members choose the one person who will maximise their chances of losing?
If I was a Labour MP I would absolutely stick with Starmer for now - let Reform keep sliding, do nothing significant and aim to win by default.
And if a change becomes imperative, make it much nearer the GE.
Back then you had 16 races a season. One of them was brilliant, because it was wet. One, if you were lucky, was brilliant in the dry, because the tyres were weird that weekend or some freakish events happened. 7 of them were fairly ok, and 7 of them were tedious dullness. And those seasons were great.
The difference is in the past F1 had the ability to be tedious but pure, whereas now it is tedious but fake.
When I was in Brittany I kept ordering Muscadet and I kept getting the cheap feeble shite and it was never good, only at best tolerable. Yuk
I stopped ordering Muscadet. Also, I hate to say this, but Chablis is not what it was, or maybe it never was
The best white wines are no longer French. Spain, Portugal, South Africa, the USA, Chile and especially Greece are making amazing and vastly superior whites. The only problem is that a lot of people have realized this and the best Greek whites are now properly expensive
English white is now pretty good, too. But not as good as English Fizz
To create that bed I had to move hundreds of rocks. Then put down ca 800 litres of topsoil and compost and then plant each individual tulip, daffodil, narcissus and allium bulb. Plus then plant each of the daphnes, viburnums, salvia uliginosa and a rose. From the top you can see Coniston Old Man.
To the left there is a crag - it's beautiful but I have had to get rid of mounds and mounds of nettles and brambles - so now I have some beds for an alpine rockery and a herb garden (as the kitchen is nearby). It is a very sunny as well as windy spot. For anyone wanting really good herb plants by post Herbal Haven are the best.
It's a shame I am limited to only 1 photo per day. I've really only come back to share more photos. Next week raised beds in stone are being built opposite my new garden room.
Quality was shit back then. Spurred by their popularity, they over-produced and under-aged. Just like Beaujolais and Chianti and Rioja. Then the market crashed and they retrenched. There is still poor bulk Muscadet, but these days lots of very good small scale production and a big proportion of natural and esoteric wines.
English Muscadet is hard to judge. There is a sample size of one: me. Mine is nice.
The Tories are second with the financially stable and financially precarious, Reform second with the comfortably off and the Greens second with the just about coping
https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2026-04/Ipsos Apr 2026_Political Monitor charts_v1d5.pdf
Nicely done, @TSE
(In the case of Wilson, Callaghan and probably Heath, The War was surely a factor. Whatever its downsides, nothing like war for favouring ability over greasy-pole-climbing.)
There was a Parliamentary debate on it a couple of years ago: https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CDP-2024-0168/CDP-2024-0168.pdf
My guess is that, if they looked at this, NICE would have concluded that MRI scanning the entire female population would be spectacularly expensive & would lead to so many false positives that it simply wouldn’t be worth the effort. There’s probably a report buried somewhere.
Hoping for the best possible outcome for you @Cyclefree .
There should be an update on Vanilla soon that should allow unrestricted photos without shrinking them all.
First Trump starts a war…
I mean law and politics are all very well. But designing and making something creative and which outlives you is the real joy in life.
From 1997 to 2026 by contrast we have had 8 PMs, 5 of whom educated at private schools (Starmer's a grammar before going private) and 2 of whom went to Eton and one Winchester and one Fettes. We have had only 2 PMs in that time educated solely for secondary level at a comprehensive, Gordon Brown and Liz Truss but Brown was in an academic hothouse experiment taught in separate classes at his High School so basically it was a grammar in all but name.
May was educated at a Roman Catholic private school, then a grammar school which converted to a comprehensive when she was in the sixth form
I also like a good Touraine, which is less dry than Sancerre and more fruity but not as overpowering as New World Sauvignion Blanc.
Was it always mediocre and the French just gaslit us with their wine reputation?
South African whites are now often sensational, and pretty good value in the 15-30 quid sweet spot
These people know what they're doing, despite the biodynamic scammery:
https://brocard.fr/en/
For decent white Burgandy, you basically want Puligny-Montrachet, without the price tag: Saint Aubin and Rully would be my choices.
I love costal whites and would love to try yours some day.
The crisis-hit Conservative PM made the remark on Wednesday in her speech to the party conference in Birmingham.
And commentators were quick to ask: “What about Gordon Brown?”
Many – including her rivals – pointed to the 71-year-old Fifer’s education at a state school as proof Ms Truss was wrong.
But broadcaster Andrew Neil wrote: “Labour is wrong. Kirkcaldy High was not a comprehensive when Brown went to it.”
He added: “Entrance exams for Kirkcaldy High did not end until 1970 by which time he was at Edinburgh University...All publicly-funded secondary schools in Scotland are comprehensives – however this was not always the case.
Former Kirkcaldy High School rector Derek Allan confirmed the school WAS selective when Gordon Brown was a pupil in the 1960s.'
https://www.thecourier.co.uk/fp/education/schools/3758377/gordon-brown-kirkcaldy-high-school-comprehensive-liz-truss/
So there we have it, the only UK PM to have been fully educated at a comprehensive school from 11 to 18 was Liz Truss. Though Truss went to Oxford, we have never had a comprehensive school educated PM who did not go to Oxbridge though we have had non Oxbridge educated private and grammar school PMs
And I know whereof you speak. I can’t believe I am saying this, but I have really enjoyed creating two balconies full of herbs, succulents, and little trees this last year. I have two south facing balconies. They are basically too small for chairs so never really did much until a friend firmly suggested: put some fucking greenery out there
Now I have done that and they are full of life. Bees and spiders and ants too, but hey ho. It’s all life. They demand attention and I actually worry about them when I go away, which is unusual for me - to put it mildly - but the reward is significant. Somehow the greenery outside the flat makes the whole flat seem much bigger and nicer, and I am not sure why. It’s just a lot of pot plants. But it works
And yes I get a buzz out of curating and creating something pretty and alive
Stuff happens. I've made my peace with it not least because there is zero point worrying about something I can do nothing about it. It bothers my husband a lot though he does not show it. It has helped me to view it as I might one of my investigations into a cock up - helps me be detached, I guess. But the blunt truth is that I will never be cured or in remission; it could go horribly wrong and I will not make old bones. So best to concentrate on nice stuff from now on in as much as possible.
I have - rather pleasingly - lost lots of weight and have bought clothes from the hospice charity shop. I view this as an investment in my future. Plus people keep telling me how good I look and at this rate I shall be at my most beautiful just before I die. And with all my lovely new clothes will win the Best Dressed Corpse Competition. I certainly intend swanning down those steps in a ball gown this summer, a lovely drink in my hand. I may even post that photo!
- he poses as an expert administrator, while presiding over a series of obvious administrative disasters, losing various chiefs of staff, Mandelson, somehow contriving not to know about Jimmy Saville in an office he ran, etc.
- he tries to seem competent, while consistently displaying poor judgement,
- he claims to preside over a pro-growth government, while consistently undertaking measures to screw the economy
- he is always seen in photos with two Union Jacks in the background, while desperately trying to hand over British territory and making us pay for the privilege, cosying up to Brussels in the most abject way, failing to fund the armed forces properly ...
- he holds everybody else to the ministerial code, while excusing his own repeated violations of it
- he ran as Labour leader as an extreme lefty, then ditched it the moment he won, using an excuse so preposterous as to be insulting to everybody's intelligence (he'd love to stick to those vote-losing policies, but the pandemic made them unviable)
- etc etc etc
I think he is the most unappealing character we've ever had in Number 10, certainly up there, and about the least competent, Truss, Ted Heath and maybe Brown perhaps excepted. He never deserved to be Prime Minister, and Labour certainly merit the epic destruction in their vote share since he won.
A lot of lobular cancers are detected on regular mammograms, but the way the tumours grow make them harder to detect by any method than ductal cancers. Instead of growing as a lump, they can be lines or sheets of cells, or aggregates of small numbers of cells. I used to do some research on AI tools in breast cancer screening, but I am out of date now. I understand the newer AI models are getting much better, which may help. I don't know the lobular cancer screening literature, but understand there's some research on using MRI for screening, but only for women identified as being at high risk. There are different X-ray techniques that also seem to be better able to detect lobular cancer, like digital breast tomosynthesis. Ultrasound can also detect some lobular cancers and there's research on when to best use ultrasound. There's a paper from a year ago that concludes we need better models to detect who is actually at high risk of lobular cancers.
In terms of treatment, hormonal treatments have made great strides in breast cancer (as my aunt, 8 years on from being diagnosed with stage 4 cancer, can thankfully attest). Hormonal treatments can be particularly useful in lobular cases. There is plenty of research in this area. Breast cancer research is generally well funded.
The slow downfall of Starmer being served before us like a cruel force-fed foie gras is a delicious gourmet treat to rival any oysters.
Coincidentally in my latest haul I’ve bought both Saint Aubin and Rully (and not tried them yet) so I will be able to test your opinion shortly. I hope you’re right!
He was 64 but felt like 82.
I got v excited about my new lawnmower which has - don't laugh - assisted power because the entire garden (half a hectare) is on a hill and the salesman thought that it would be helpful for me. Anyway, the scent of newly mown grass is childhood. And lying on a lawn in sunshine is just pure happiness.
That wall is one of the most beautiful things I've seen. The detail of the work is wonderful. The guy who made it is both a craftsman and an artist. Working with him to build this - and much else - was a real highlight of last year.
The only Tory v Reform would be a one nation centre party led by Hunt or Cleverley that too Lab and LD tactical votes
Reform and Tories under current leadership would share at best 45% of votes, probably 26 to 19 split
55% on centre left with heavy tactical voting to stop Reform and Reform in a skirt.
Lab would form Government as largest Party with LD and Green support to ensure anti right coalition government.
A lot of the Chablis and petit Chablis we get in Britain is mediocre (not shit, I’ve never drunk a Chablis that I wanted to spit out), but they make some awesome wines.
Essentially Chablis in the 2020s is like Cote de Beaune in the 1990s. 30 years of climate change. It’s just we’ve had 30 years of ever-increasing ripeness in white burgundy that leaves Chablis seeming spare and thin. But it’s still cool climate Chardonnay at its best, and you should make the most of it because within 2 decades it’ll taste like Macon tastes now.
There's some mad prices for really inferior stuff out there.