Larry’s Diary, Week Two Hundred And Fifty-Seven

Monday

Good morning from a grey and not very nice morning in Westminster, where at least it is dry. Legohead was up early this morning as he is off to Birmingham to give a “pre-Budget” speech. It is only a few years ago that nobody had any real idea what was in the Budget before it was made. These days it seems that half the Budget is leaked before it happens and the PM wouldn’t dream of making a pre-Budget speech warning how tough it was going to be, or at least that is what has been leaked about the leak speech!

I was amazed to learn about the illiterate Iraqi goatherd who has just been sentenced to four years for being a member of a drugs gang selling cocaine and cannabis on the streets of Aberystwyth. Thirty-five-year-old Hawre Ahmed is said to have his name tattooed on his arm so that he could show it to anyone needing to know how to spell his name. Now how does an Iraqi goatherd come to have the money to get to the U.K. and claim asylum? Was he sponsored by the drugs gang who knew that once in the U.K. he would be unemployable (there is not much call for illiterate goatherds in the UK) and would be easy meat for them as a small dispensable cog in their organisation? So, the British taxpayer is now going to have to support this useless person in prison. He should be deported today.

The press has had it right for ages, they said it was going to happen and finally this morning Manchester United have at last sacked their manager Eric ten Hag who has been very poor this season. Ten Hag was sacked at 11 am and by 2:15 pm he was on a private jet back to the Netherlands with a £14 million payoff in his pocket. The club had brought in ex-player Ruud Van Nistelrooy earlier this year as his assistant manager and he is taking over as temporary manager until a permanent replacement can be found. I hear that the new manager could well be Gareth Southgate, good luck with that.

British Airways seem to have problems as made clear by a couple of announcements over the weekend. Firstly, they have cancelled all flights between Gatwick and New York until next March because of problems with deliveries of Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines which the Boeing 787s on this route used. The second announcement was that they are going to stop serving three-course meals to Business Class passengers. Instead, they will get a choice of four main courses and desserts. I am amazed that two of the main courses on offer will be a bowl of soup and cheese and biscuits. I can see businessmen switching to rival airlines en mass.

Over the weekend both the Donald and the Camel held huge rallies. Apparently, the queue for the Camel’s rally was enormous with hundreds of people queuing from mid-afternoon in the Texas sun to get into the arena. Many were excited because Beyoncé was going to appear. However, it was all a come-on, she spent five minutes introducing the Camel then buggered off. At that point thousands of the 30,000 audience streamed out disappointed that there was no free Beyoncé performance. Contrast that to the Trump rally at Maddison Square Gardens, New York, where there were also 30,000 people in the arena who stayed until the end and 70,000 outside who couldn’t get in!

Last week I told you about the two blue-throated Macaws that escaped from London Zoo. Well, I can now tell you that Lily and Margot were spotted high in a tree in Cambridge at the weekend and keepers from the zoo rushed off to try to recapture them. However, by the time they got there the birds had flown. But reports said they were in a local field. When the keepers got to the field the birds were in a tree but on seeing familiar faces they came down and landed on the keepers’ arms. They were given some of their favourite foods – pumpkin seeds, pecans and walnuts. They were put in a transport cage and travelled back to the zoo where they are in quarantine prior to being reunited with their parents, Popeye and Ollie.

It’s the Budget on Wednesday and one of the rumours is that in a Budget, that according to Legohead is going to be harsh, one of the few winners is going to be the NHS, who will get as much as £35 billion on top of the £176 billion they already get. But I also hear that the government is likely to increase employer’s NI payments. It has struck me that the NHS, being the UK’s biggest employers with 1.6 million employees, will be paying a lot of that £20 billion straight back to the government. Then they have the massive pay increases granted to doctors and consultants to be found. It all seems a bit pointless.

Tuesday

Hi folks, it’s a dry morning out there for a change. There’s a cabinet meeting this morning and I’m going to pop out into Downing Street and watch the shower arrive. I think I might wander over to the other side of the street and watch from between the reporters and photographers. I hate most of the reporters who just shout inane comments and questions that never get an answer. But some of the reporters are nice and I even let my favourites pet me. In return I pose for photos and get the occasional cat treat.

Back on the 17th of October the Cuban Government sent all non-essential workers home from work in an attempt to save power consumption and to prevent the electricity grid from collapsing. It was the shutdown of a major power station that triggered the grid to collapse anyway. Power has now been restored, but due to Cuba’s dire financial position, most places are suffering 20 hours a day blackouts. Many government departments are shut and the government is struggling against total collapse. The Antonio Guiteras power station that caused the problem was built in 1989 and is on its last legs. But there is no money to repair it, let alone replace it. The shortage of power has led to another problem, a shortage of water, caused by pumps not being able to work. I don’t think I fancy Cuba for a sunshine holiday.

Before the Budget Legohead has announced that the cap on bus fares is going up by ‘only’ £1 a ride from £2 to £3 at the end of the year. This is actually a huge 50% increase but think about someone going to work on a bus five days a week. That’s an extra £10 a week they must find. Take away five weeks annual holidays and eight bank holidays and a ‘working person’ will have to find more than an extra £450 a year. This is another announcement by Liebore which hasn’t been thought through properly.

This year the Royal British Legion is selling a poppy with a multicoloured gay pride flag beside it. I fail to see why anyone should wear a ‘gay’ poppy, surely the popper emblem is for everyone, black, white, gay, straight, or any religion. Will we be seeing a poppy for all the Hindus and Muslims killed in Wars? This is an awful woke idea and the sooner it is discontinued the better.

It’s 2:30 in the morning and a Liebore MP, who appears to be drunk, has a row at a Runcorn taxi queue about the withdrawal of the Winter Fuel Allowance. The MP suddenly swings one haymaker at the man who appears to have his hands in his pockets and knocks him to the ground. He then jumps on the man punching and kicking him until dragged off by bystanders. He then continues to rant at the man on the floor before walking away. I see that Mike Amesbury has been suspended by the Parliamentary Liebore Party and had the whip withdrawn, but as I write this he has not been charged by the police. Why not, they were quick enough to charge Southport rioters? I wonder if he will be charged with bringing Parliament into disrepute and subject to a recall petition?

I see a £550,000 electric bin lorry spontaneously burst into flames in Westminster yesterday. The blame is being put on lithium batteries. The public has been disposing of old lithium batteries in general waste and when the waste is compacted in the back of the lorry, batteries often burst open. They then self-ignite, set the rubbish alight and that ignites the truck’s batteries. If lithium is exposed to water or air it combusts, and trying to put it out with water makes it worse, it is said to be better just to let it burn itself out. I just don’t see the economics of buying electric bin lorries. They cost twice the price of a diesel one and attract a £25,000 subsidy from the government. I also hear that bin lorry fires have gone up 71% in the last year.

I read that Jeremy Clarkson has plans to expand this pub, “The Farmer’s Dog”, into an ‘experience’. He has sought to trademark the name Hawkstone Filling Station with the UK’s Intellectual Property Office, and has said that the Farmer’s Dog is the first in a chain of Hawkstone Filling Station pubs. But it is the plans that go alongside the trade market that are interesting. The application says, “services for providing food and drink; temporary accommodation; bar services; bars; pubs; public house services; hospitality services; information, advisory and consultancy services in relation to all of the aforesaid”. Is he trying to take on Spoons?

Wednesday

Good morning everyone it looks like it’s not going to rain today, that is two dry days running. Today is a big day in Westminster, it is Budget Day and the day we learn what Robber Reeves has planned for you rather than what the media says she has planned for you. As a Government employee, I am a working cat, and I don’t have a lot to worry about things as my accommodation and food come from the state. I will give you my opinions on the Budget tomorrow, I’ll have gone for my afternoon nap before she is finished speaking.

Legohead has made a lot of Red Ed Millipede’s new baby GB Energy being headquartered in Aberdeen, with satellite offices planned for Glasgow and Edinburgh. This is to help give Scottishland some jobs to replace all those he has killed in Scottishland by banning North Sea oil. But I read that the GB Energy chairman, Juergen Maier, will remain based in Manchester. He was brought in from Siemens last July where he was based in Manchester and is reluctant to move. I really can’t believe that Keir Starmer thinks that the person running one of his flagship policies shouldn’t be on the ground in Aberdeen with the workers.

Air India is merging with another Indian airline, Vistara, next month. Consequently, they have introduced a new money-saving policy by making long-haul air crew share rooms on layovers. This has caused enormous upset among aircrew, who claim things like they may be forced to share with someone who snores or has BO and their legal rest periods could be interrupted. The airline has rowed back a little saying that there will be some exceptions for crew on ultra-long-haul flights (over 16 hours), such as Southern India to the West Coast of America and cabin executives who have worked for the airline for more than eight years. Now I hear 10 cabin crew have been suspended for, according to the airline, encouraging other aircrew to complain about the new policy.

Sometimes I read an interesting story and tell you, my happy readers, about it only to read the next day another story saying the complete opposite. Well, today I have read three stories about the American B-21 Stealth Bomber. The first story was saying that the aircraft’s manufacturer was on the verge of stepping up the production rate because of fears with war with China over Taiwan. Then I read that the USAF is about to dump the B-21 over costs. Then I read that the USAF might dump the NGAD project for a next-generation fighter in favour of funding more B-21 bombers. I suppose you take your choice and believe whichever story you like best.

A few weeks ago, I told you that the Czech electricity producer CEZ had decided that the way forward is Rolls-Royce mini nuclear reactors and had applied to the Czech Government for permission to build 3 Gigawatts of the RR 460 Mw reactors. Now I hear that CEZ has come to an agreement with RR to buy 20% of their Small Modular Rector business when the Czech Government gives them the go-ahead. CEZ is also building two new full-size PWRs of South Korean design.

The Lords have been discussing the UK-US Mutual Defence Agreement and have suggested that it should be rolled into the AUKUS agreement. But not the existing agreement but an enlarged one that also includes Canada, Japan and New Zealand. I wonder what the new grouping would be called if such an agreement was to go ahead. Would they stick with the AUKUS name or try to make up a new name to include CJNZ? I can’t come up with anything sensible. I have come to the conclusion that the J is the problem, perhaps Japan should be excluded on the grounds that the letter J is too hard to make a new word?

I hear that the Dogger Bank wind farm, which will be the world’s biggest at 3.6 Gw if it is finished, has hit a problem. Back on 22nd August a turbine blade suffered a catastrophic failure. The manufacturer of the turbines, GE Vernova, say it wasn’t a design, manufacturing or installation problem but failure happened during commissioning when the turbine was hit by a powerful storm. But it is the fact that the failure of this one turbine has stressed several of the surrounding turbines that is worrying, asking the question: could a single failure take down a whole massive wind farm? It has emerged that a very similar failure occurred to a GE Vernova turbine in the USA. The suggested solution is to make individual turbines stronger but that will cost more money and upset Red Ed Millipede.

Thursday

Hello friends, it’s another dry, dull morning, but still, it’s not too cold. I don’t know what’s going on with my Felix, it was beef again this morning. It seems ages since I had chicken. I must say I like the Donald, he has a great sense of humour. I loved him dressing as a bin man and arriving at yesterday’s rally in a bin lorry to take the p*ss out of Biden.

I hate to say it, but the Rich Boy was 100% right, Liebore always intended to increase the tax take. The fully costed, fully funded Liebore manifesto was all a lie (like any sensible person knew) and they have just revealed a £40 billion increase in taxes, with more than half coming from employer National Insurance. I am a little bothered that employers will find it necessary to not take on new employees or maybe even lose some employees to balance their books. I can’t see how this is going to bring growth.

One tiny bit of good news was that fuel tax was not increased in line with inflation, a move that would have put 7p on a litre of fuel. I had to laugh when I heard that Robber Reeves said that ordinary taxpayers will benefit from about £460 per annum. I really don’t know how she worked that out when just about every tax and duty was either going up or staying the same. The only thing that came down was tax on draught beer, and that was only by 1p a pint. You will have to drink an awful lot of draft beer to benefit by £460.

Another Liebore lie that seems to have been sunk is the £22 billion “black hole”. We were told it was going to be proved by an OFR report that was published today. Unfortunately for Legohead and Robber Reeves, the OFR report did not support them. They said that at the time their report was written, there was a missing £9.5 billion, but that had not existed when the previous forecast had been done in February and that could well have been found from savings. So, it once again appears to have been something made up by Liebore to try to justify their tax plans.

Another thing I can’t understand is the £1 million cap on farms for Inheritance Tax. This is a real death knell for family farms. If a family farmer leaves their farm to their family they will be paying 50% on everything over that £1 million limit, be it land, equipment or even the family business. This is more than likely going to mean either part or all of the farms being sold. Of course, farming companies are not affected as there is no Inheritance Tax on companies, only on individuals. I think if I was a family farmer I would be selling it to a corporation tomorrow on the basis that I am employed by them to continue farming it. I would then give the money to my family in the hope I lived long enough, seven years, for them not to pay Inheritance Tax.

One other thing I’d like to comment on is the difference in the presentation of the Budget by Robber ‘and finally’ Reeves and the response by the Rich Boy. Reeves had months to prepare, had all the details in the speech in front of her and the presentation was awful. I lost count of the number of times she said, “and finally,” only to carry on. In response, the Rich Boy was busy scribbling notes as the Robber spoke, as he had no pre-knowledge of what the Robber was going to say. But I thought his speech was pretty hard-hitting considering it was off the cuff and at least he wasn’t as boring. Mind you, Legohead seemed to find it funny, he sat there smirking, giggling and cracking jokes to the Robber. It made me wonder if the story I have heard that he hates the job as PM, and is on the verge of resigning, is true.

More information is emerging on the Israeli attack on Iran last weekend. Sky Australia tell me that despite Israel warning Iran, via a third party, that they were coming, they didn’t lose a single aircraft. In fact, they seem to have been able to fly F-35s without even being detected by the Russian-supplied air defence systems. The rumours I hear are that Israel took out every single one of Iran’s S300 and S400 antiaircraft missile systems and the country is now wide open to any new Israeli attack.

In the States, McDonald’s is suffering on two fronts. In several outlets they have been hit by an E-Coli outbreak that has been associated with people consuming the chain’s quarter pounders. It seems that around 75 people have been treated so far in the outbreak. This comes on top of McDonald’s sales falling in both of the last two quarters of the year. In the first quarter sales were down 1% and in the second quarter this accelerated to 1.5%. With the E-Coli outbreak, I wonder if the next quarter will be even worse?

Friday

White rabbits, it’s the first of the month. It seems to be dry for a third day in a row, but it’s grey and dull again. I see the Ginger Growler has taken the opportunity offered by the row over the Budget to switch yet another £3,550 ‘donation’ from Lord Back Alli Cat, from office support to clothing. Garmentgate, the gifts that keeps on giving.

Something I haven’t had space for before today is an incident that happened in Moscow on Monday and although reported on Telegram doesn’t seem to have made it into the British media. Probably too much domestic news with the Budget, the fighting Liebore MP, the US election and speculation on government cover-ups, to pick up this story. It seems that some kind of failure happened in the Moscow sewage system and a plume of sh*t the height of a skyscraper shot in the air and covered the surrounding area in the brown stuff. It is not yet clear if it was a failure of a creaking system, sabotage, or planned maintenance gone wrong. I did read that back in April, Ukrainian hackers attacked the Moscow sewage system by wiping servers and cross-wiring the system. But it is just as likely that it is a failure of a pipe in a pumped system, in a 50-year-old system that there is no money to maintain it.

On Wednesday the bosses at Northern Rail were called into a meeting with Transport for the North to discuss their abysmal performance. The company is supposed to run 2,500 services a day connecting cities across the North of England including Manchester, Leeds, Hull, Sheffield and Newcastle but has been failing badly. Four years ago, Northern Rail services were so bad they were forcibly acquired by the Operator of Last Resort, effectively nationalising them, and ever since they have been cancelling even more services. Normally a rail operator who isn’t performing would be threatened with the OLR, like Avanti West Coast were, but what do you do when the operator is already in the clutches of the OLR? One interesting thing that emerged from the meeting was that Northern Rail still must use fax machines for communications because the union refuses to modernise.

In Islington there are plans to repurpose a derelict hospital tower block that has been empty for 10 years into 87 homes. These homes will either be affordable homes for people to buy or low-rent properties. You might think this a good idea making use of an old property, but I hear the local MP is leading the objections on the grounds that it might spoil the view. Surely repurposing an existing derelict building would improve the view. Oh, I nearly forgot to tell you the identity of the MP, it’s none other than Jeremy Corbyn.

What an amazing bit of video on the internet this morning showing just how badly Sniffer Joe has declined. First he is shown walking (well shuffling like he has filled his nappy), hand in hand with someone in a rabbit suit into a room full of mothers and babies. Well, at least this time he didn’t sniff them, instead he bit them on the leg. Can you imagine what another four years of Sniffer Joe have been like.

Over on the Emerald Isle, Tuesday was the first day of the new timetable for the Enterprise train service between Belfast and Dublin. The opening of the new Belfast terminal Grand Central Station, with its additional platforms, has enabled extra services to be introduced by increasing trains to one an hour. The Enterprise trains have been running for many years, so it was not exactly difficult to virtually double the service, but I hear that on Tuesday there was a major problem at the Dublin end of the service and trains were running two hours late.

I read that Sergei Skripal may have been saved from dying by an accident. The former Russian spy, who was poisoned with the nerve agent novichok, was found sitting rigid on a city bench vomiting heavily and sweating profusely with mucus secreting from his nose when the paramedics arrived. The first thought of the paramedic was a drug overdose and as Skripal was being prepared to be carried to an ambulance the paramedics intended to inject Skripal and his daughter with naloxone, a drug used to treat opioid overdoses. But Skripal started to vomit again, and the paramedic rushed to clear his airway and knocked over his bag. When he did administer the drug, he accidentally picked up and administered vials containing atropine an anti-nerve agent drug. It was only later when he was replenishing his bag that he realised the mistake. It looks like it just might have been Skripal’s lucky day.

Saturday

Good Morning my happy readers, it is a little moist this morning, just a tiny bit of drizzle. The row over the increase in farmer Inheritance Tax rumbles on. There has been talk of strikes, but I suspect it is more likely we’ll see tractor protests gumming up the big cities. I wonder if they will dump manure in Whitehall and if they do, will it be noticed with all the crap that is already there? It’s amazing how quickly Liebore and Legohead have gone from hero to zero. I see that in a new opinion poll in the “i” this morning, the Tories have a one percent lead over Liebore.

If you are a cruise lover, like my scribe, I see that Royal Caribbean is having a switch around of its ships and for the summer season 2026 they will be sailing Liberty of the Seas from Southampton. It will replace 4,906-passenger Anthem of the Seas, which has been based in Southampton for the past four summers. I’m not quite sure why they have done the swap, as Liberty is only fractionally bigger than Anthem at 4,960 passengers. I understand that my scribe was not impressed when he went on a couple of Royal Caribbean cruises. Meanwhile, over at P&O, I see that Britannia and Arvia both sailed from Southampton to the Caribbean for their winter season based in Bridgetown, Barbados. If you ever want to experience a trip to the sun, these positioning cruises are usually pretty cheap. OK, I know it’s too late for this year now, but you can always do the reverse in March when the ships come back, flying to Barbados and sailing the Caribbean islands before sailing home.

The Government has a plan to get the country to net zero by 2030 by building 60% of the demand by offshore wind farms, 20% by Solar and a further 20% from onshore wind farms. Now, to supply that much power from wind farms we need to build the equivalent of the Hornsea 2 wind farm (165 x 8 Mw turbines) every five weeks from now to then. Hornsea 2 occupies 178 sq miles of the North Sea and took nine years to build. Even my poor little cat brain can calculate that this is just not possible.

After last weekend’s search for flyaway macaws, this weekend it’s runaway Raccoons. The Amazon World Zoo Park on the Isle of Wight has lost them and started a bit of hue and cry to try and find them. The authorities say the animals are not dangerous but if spotted you should call the zoo as the raccoons are likely to be scared. That’s hardly surprising as they are reported to be searching for them with dogs and drones just like they would for an escapee from Parkhurst Prison.

If you are interested in Formula 1 I have a little snippet of news for you about the Junior Red Bull team’s name. For many years they raced as Torro Rosso, but they switched to AlphaTauri ahead of the 2020 season to promote the team’s fashion label. For this season the team took on the convoluted name of Visa Cash App RB, or VCARB for short, but most commentators have been calling them the simpler RB. Now I learn that next season they propose being called Racing Bull. I have one question – why?

One little bit of news that crept out yesterday but doesn’t seem to have been widely reported because of the Budget and the US election is that the case of the fighting MP, Mike Amesbury, has been passed to the prosecutors. I can hardly think that he will not now be prosecuted and that would almost certainly lead to a recall petition. I suspect that is the last thing that Liebore want, but the Tories, Reform, Limp Dumps and Greens will love it.

I see that Israel has placed orders for ‘Iron Beam’ lasers to supplement its ‘Iron Dome’ missile defence system. The last Iran missile attack used swarms of missiles and drones to try to swamp the iron dome with too many concurrent targets for it to handle, allowing some missiles and drones to get through. The Iron Beam laser has been undergoing testing and is now, I hear, deemed to be ready to go into service. However, it will take time for it to be manufactured in sufficient quantities to be considered effective and officers say that it may be a year from now before it can be considered fully operational and integrated into the Iron Dome system. It is my understanding that it is effective against all types of airborne threats; missiles, drones, aircraft, bombs in flight, and even mortar bombs. It is designed to be another layer of defence after the long and medium-range rockets already in use, but it also has the advantage of each shot only costing pence as compared to thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of pounds, for missiles.

Well, I’m done for another week and it is now dry out there but rather grey. It’s not cold out there so I’m off for my afternoon windowsill snooze. The forecast for tomorrow is similar, grey but dry, no doubt I will be able to snooze on the windowsill again. Chat to you next week.
 

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