This is Northumberland Calling 19.1.24

The icy cold grip of the electorate having its say looms for UK politicians edition

Hello America (especially Central Ohio) is a frozen Northumberland calling

Winter well and truly has Britain in its grip this week – schools closed and people wrapped up warmly. Most people in the Midwest would not break their stride at the cold but it is all in what you are used to and what the houses are built for or indeed if the councils can be bothered to grit the roads (or have the capacity to). First floods, now freeze.

The Great Post Office Scandal continues to reveal its sordid secrets. This week, Fujitsu bosses and employees took the stand to give jaw dropping accounts of extensive cover ups in order to protect the brand name. Fujitsu has now formally apologised and will be contributing to the compensation fund. They are also not going to be bidding for UK government contracts while the Inquiry is ongoing, a voluntary decision apparently. Fujitsu shares have declined considerably in the last week. In the meantime, the innocent sub-postmasters still wait for a pay out. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/fujitsu-director-post-office-scandal-inquiry-horizon-hwjxd9d96 or https://archive.is/WyEyM

The Tory party fortunes seem to be sinking fast. Not even ditching Liz Truss last year appears to have saved them. The prediction is now for a near complete wipeout. There are even predictions that my MP, Guy Opperman will not be re-elected. The thought is Labour will get in. Labour is running a climate change person who is about 30 and has held a variety of Westminster jobs within Labour. He does hail from Hexham.  The Reform party (the populist party on the right, originally called Brexit) has yet to declare a candidate. The election is unlikely to be before the Autumn as the current MPs do like getting their paycheques. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/01/18/rishi-sunak-latest-news-rwanda-bill-philp/ or https://archive.is/7MiMV 

Labour however continues to  silence women, the latest being Laura Pascal, a candidate for a by-election. Her ‘apology for wrong-thinking’ read like a hostage message. Starmer does have a woman problem and women do vote. Will they vote for a party which takes punitive action against women (or men) who say biology is real and it matters?   https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/01/17/labours-trans-witch-hunt-will-be-the-end-of-keir-starmer/ or https://archive.is/VJYBK

The Civil Service continue to have training sessions about DEI which go beyond what is permitted under the Equality Act 2010.For example the Information Commission had a training session which said that it was not enough just to use preferred pronouns, the employees actually had to think that the trans-person in question was the gender they desired to be. It is a wonder that they have not heard of the Forstater judgement or the Fahmy one or indeed the very recent Rachel Meade one. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12957867/Civil-Service-woke-madness-Pronouns-arent-THINK-trans-colleagues-women-now.html

The High Court however decided that the Gender Reassignment Act only offers a binary solution. As currently written, it does not offer non binary as an option and therefore people can not change their legal sex to non binary in the UK (unlike California). What precisely is the DNA of a non binary person and how do the component parts differ from that of a person who believes in biology? What is the difference in the sex chromosome markers? Enquiring minds want to know because DNA analysis is used more  and more in detecting crime and indeed identifying badly decomposed bodies. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/01/17/non-binary-us-citizen-loses-attempt-gender-recognised-uk/ or https://archive.is/IlL6y

Britian’s strictest head teacher, the inspiration Katharine Birabalsingh has been taken to court because the school has a ban on prayer rituals. Her view is that in multicultural society, prayer rituals have no place in school. A Muslim pupil has taken her to court saying that she is directly discrimination against Muslims. Birabalsingh said that she enacted the ban because it was divisive, and her teachers were getting racially abused. In her school the food is all vegetarian so that everyone can eat together. She has refused to make concessions to Jehovah Witnesses and to Hindu parents in the past. The board of  governors backed Birabalsingh. It remains to be seen what the courts do. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/01/17/katharine-birbalsingh-stop-muslim-prayers-racial-harassment/ or https://archive.is/STgYX

Ireland continues to have problems with housing its immigrants in hotels as they don’t have the social housing for them. There were protests in front of the only hotel in a small town which will now house asylum seekers and their families. Of course, it means all the small businesses which were dependant on custom from visitors to that hotel will have to find some other means of drumming up a living. Labelling the protestors as racists as the Taoiseach has done is unlikely to win over the protestors or calm them down. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/01/18/ireland-revolt-asylum-seekers-leo-varadkar-riot-police/ or https://archive.is/YoeJo

The King’s new nickname is C-Rex. He wore a dinosaur tie in honour of it. Queen Camilla is called Lorraine (a pun on the La Reine). There is a new book about the king and apparently it is more a historic document than tittle-tattle. There was a very good excerpt from it about the man who organized the funerals  and what went into it. A review of the book https://www.telegraph.co.uk/books/non-fiction/review-robert-hardman-charles-iii/ or https://archive.is/596tI   The excerpt for Channa (and others) https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2024/01/17/robert-hardman-charles-iii-extract-queen-funeral-norfolk/  or https://archive.is/aMCKm

C-Rex has allowed it to be known that he is suffering from an enlarged prostate in hopes that other men might get checked out for the same condition. The news came on the same day that it was revealed the Princess of Wales has had abdominal surgery for an unspecified condition. The Princess is expected to remain in hospital for up to 2 weeks. This points to full surgery rather than laparoscopic  surgery which is less invasion and can be done as day surgery. It was apparently planned but no details on how long it was planned for. They do try to do laparoscopy if at all possible. Latest news is that she is doing well.  (No word on her nickname)  https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2024/01/18/king-charles-prostate-campaign-signs-men/ or https://archive.is/JTdI5

Pompeii yielded up more treasures as the  far reaching dig continues. This time they are focussing on the apartment blocks. They found magnificent frescoes for a formal villa for an aspiring politician  and in the next room, the dark secret to his wealth -- an area where slaves toiled, complete with grooves in the floor where the slaves should stop and wait. The slaves might have come from as far away as Gaul or Britain. Their lives were wretched. Before mechanisation, slavery propelled civilisation. There is no such thing as good slavery imho. I am very grateful to the Industrial Revolution which allowed slavery to be exposed for the evil that it is and enabling the world to have machines instead. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/pompeii-discovery-uncovers-dark-truth-behind-aspiring-politician-280rjdt7j or https://archive.is/wD7zK

Here, I am currently reading the spytainment novel  Damascus Station by David McCloskey. Having started it, I can see why my husband devoured it and why the times rated it so highly. His new book Moscow X has just been released in the UK. McCloskey was a former CIA analyst and the CIA has vetted his work (they do this for everyone who works for them – part of the condition of employment apparently).

I signed my deal memo and am now under an official but self-imposed deadline on my latest Viking. Thus far, it is going well, but who knows as I am a master at the dark arts of procrastination and time wasting.

The cats staged a protest and asked why it always has to be a photo of a soppy spaniel. They are sisters and nearly identical. Hercules and Persephone because we originally got Hercules sex wrong and figured that she wouldn’t know the difference in any case because well, she is a cat. In this household cats rule, and dogs (and humans) are subservient.