Larry’s Diary, Week Two Hundred And Seventy-Three

Monday

Good morning, folks, and it’s not as nice as yesterday here in London. The last two days have been beautiful here in Westminster, warm and sunny, real windowsill weather. It’s still warm here this morning, but the sun has gone. The woman presenting on the TV says cold weather is back in Scotland this morning and heading south. So, I’d better get on with my cat tales so I can make the most of things while it is still pleasant outside.

If I ever go to Brighton, I shall not be eating in the Blossom Café Bar near the station. They have just had a food and hygiene inspection and were rated zero on a zero to six scale. The inspection checks on things like hygienic handling of food, cleanliness and condition of facilities, and management of food safety. What I don’t understand is why a café with such a poor report is allowed to stay open while it ‘makes improvements’. Surely, a place that rates zero should be closed down until it cleans up its act.

A woman called Melanie Lukasiewicz took her 80-year-old father shopping at Marks & Spencer’s Wolstanton Retail Park and ended up with a £60 parking ticket for exceeding the 4-hour parking limit. However, they had completed their shopping well before the parking time limit expired but were unable to leave the retail park because of an accident on the main road outside. The retail park has four big stores but only a single access road into and out of the car park, meaning that the accident completely blocked off the entrance and exit and no one could move. The woman successfully appealed against the fine, but I wonder just how many others were fined.

Mark Carney, the ex-Head of the Bank of England, has been elected leader of the Canadian Liberal Party, which means he is the next Canadian Prime Minister designate. I remember him visiting No. 10 several times, and he was quite a nice man, but he was an arch Remainer, full of all the disasters that were going to happen if you humans dared to vote Leave in the referendum. He was also appointed a UN Special Envoy for Climate Action and worked for financial institutions to invest in net zero. It looks to me that Canada has got itself another Trudeau.

While in Canada, they have placed an order with Irving Shipbuilding Inc. to construct three new destroyers at a cost of CAN$22.2 billion. The ships are to be named after major Canadian rivers and will be based on the BAE Type 26 Global Combat Ship, so I assume that they are to be built under licence with money coming BAE’s way. But it all sounds a little odd to me because the BAE Type 26 is an anti-submarine frigate according to the Royal Navy, but the Canadians are calling it a destroyer.

King Big Ears has just spent £3 million buying the house that shares a private lane with the Queen’s private retreat in Gloucestershire. The Camel bought Ray Mill House back in 1995 for £850,000 after her divorce from Andrew Parker Bowles and has kept it as a quiet retreat where she can spend time with her family away from the public eye. The owner of the nearby house, the Old Mill, has had it up for sale for a while, and there were fears that it was to be sold as a wedding venue, ruining the Camel’s peace and quiet. It’s okay if you are wealthy enough to spend £3 million on a house just to stop someone else from buying it.

Last week, I told you about the H&S Wisdom getting stuck in the mud in the Humber Estuary. Now I hear there are six crew members stuck on board. Over the weekend, Humber Rescue were out there to take them fresh supplies and water. I doubt this will be the last time they are resupplied as it is unlikely the tide will be big enough to lift them off the mud before the end of the month. I do hear that local people are collecting treats for the crew, particularly crisps and sweets.

Tuesday

Good morning, everyone. Well, the rain hasn’t got here yet, but it is definitely colder. Legohead said in a speech last night that the benefits system was getting big and bloated and needs to be trimmed. This is something we all know, but can you imagine what Liebore would have said if this had been a Tory proposal? I am interested to hear what Liebore is going to do about the problem.

Some time ago, I told you about the problems that were happening in Turkey, where the Russian builders of the country’s first nuclear power station, the Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant, were unable to get important parts for the reactors from Germany due to sanctions, and had turned to China instead. Now I hear that Turkey is not at all happy with progress on the project and is considering taking over the company building the four-reactor power plant. It seems that the company doing the building is currently 100% Russian-owned and consists of five Russian state-owned companies. The Turks say that the agreement to build the plant allows them to take full control of the project. I see an almighty row on the horizon.

Following my report that Ukraine was using French Mirage 2000-F5 in combat, I now hear that France is to supply additional AASM Hammer units for bombs to be used with them. They are currently supplying 600 of these kits made up of old units while France is replacing its stocks with 1,200 new weapons, some of which are earmarked for Ukraine. The AASM is a kit that converts conventional gravity bombs into a standoff weapon by adding a nose cone, including guidance equipment, wings, and a steerable tail with a rocket motor. This will give Ukraine a similar weapon to that already used by the Russians, with the ability to hit a target with a bomb launched from high altitude some 70 km away. The French say Hammer-equipped bombs can also be launched from the F16s already operated by the Ukraine Air Force and are capable of hitting within a metre of their aiming point at 70 km. Apparently, the Mirage has been tested carrying six 250-kilogram weapons at one time. I wonder where they will be aiming first.

A nasty collision at sea yesterday off Withernsea on the coast of East Yorkshire. The tanker Stena Immaculate was at anchor waiting for a berth to become available. The Stena Immaculate was full of Jet A1 fuel for the US Forces and was hit by the MV Solong, a container ship on its way from Grangemouth in Scotland to Rotterdam when it ploughed into the tanker. The jet fuel has caught light and spilled into the sea, where it is burning. A Mayday was put out just before 10 am this morning, and it seems that at least 36 have been rescued, including all the crew of the tanker, but some from the Solong are still unaccounted for as I write this. At least I suspect I will hear more by tomorrow.

How do you know if a chicken will lay white or brown eggs? Well, apparently, it is all down to the colour of their earlobes. I didn’t even know that chickens had earlobes, but I read that if the earlobes are white, then you will get white eggs. But if the earlobes are brown or red, you will get brown eggs. Even better, Araucana chickens have pale green or blue earlobes and lay eggs of the corresponding colour. Oh, and one odd one: Silkies have turquoise earlobes and lay white, cream, light tan, or sometimes pink-tinted eggs. I don’t think I have only ever seen brown or white chicken eggs on the breakfast table here in Number 10. But if we ever have a green Prime Minister, perhaps they will be buying green eggs.

Late yesterday afternoon, Mike Amesbury, the punchy MP, announced that he is stepping down as the MP as soon as possible. So, we are to get the first by-election of the Government in the seat of Runcorn and Helsby. It should be considered a safe Labour seat, as they had an 18,000+ majority at the General Election back in July. But it looks like it’s going to be a straight fight between Labour and Reform, and last time I looked, Reform were odds-on favourites to take the seat. I understand that Reform have been campaigning in the constituency every weekend for months. I think that Labour will throw everything at trying to hold this seat. If they lose it, I can see a big split coming in the party.

So, Red Ed Miliband has come up with another brainwave. This time, it is an offer of up to £250 a year for ten years to anyone living near a new grid line. Firstly, I don’t think it is very much. Secondly, I look at it as an attempt to bribe people to accept pylons in their backyard. And thirdly, it was a carefully worded ‘up to £250’. But with this government so short of money, where do they propose getting the money from to pay for this bribe? Well, as usual, it’s coming from you, the billpayer, as it will be yet another levy on the electricity bills.

Wednesday

Hi, folks, well, it’s an odd morning. It is a lot colder, but very pleasant in the sun. Legohead is advertising for a ‘Deputy Director – Migration, (No10 Policy Unit)’. Among their duties will be ‘Developing new and innovative policies.’ It sounds like Legohead is privately admitting that he is not ‘smashing the gangs’ and is looking for new ideas. As the numbers show what a complete disaster ‘smashing the gangs’ is, I guess looking for new ideas is not a bad idea. 1,497 illegals have arrived in small boats in the last 7 days, that’s over 200 a day. It brings the total arriving so far this year to 4,131, the highest ever.

The Sentencing Committee has told the Justice Secretary that they are not going to change their latest recommendations that ethnic minorities, women, gays, etc., should be treated differently to white males. This is pure racism, and I can’t see how the committee can justify it. Now it’s time for Labour to use their huge majority and pass a one-line bill to throw out this racist rubbish. I suspect the Tories, Lib Dems, and SNP will vote with them.

Statistics show that nearly a quarter of sex crimes are committed by foreigners, but foreigners represent only 9.8% of people in Britain. But it’s not just sex crimes; immigrants top the tables for rape, violence, and theft. The government has been very reluctant to release these numbers because they go against their “all immigration is good” mantra, and it has taken a Freedom of Information request to force them to reveal the information. But it is interesting to see where the worst foreign criminals are coming from. Well, in the case of sex crimes, it is Afghanistan. What I do find interesting is that nowhere in those tables are Australia, New Zealand, America, Canada, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, or even the West Indies. But it is Africa and third-world nations that seem to top the list. Isn’t that a surprise!

Good news for the people of Northern Ireland: the aircraft parts manufacturer Spirit Aerospace has reactivated its old plans to increase the production of Airbus A220 wings. Spirit was an independent company, spun off from Boeing, to build and supply aircraft fuselages, mainly for the 737. As an independent company, Spirit took on work from other companies, including Airbus. But Spirit struggled financially, and with Boeing’s recent manufacturing quality problems, they decided to buy them back. This gave them a problem, as they would be making wings for Airbus. So, they are selling the Belfast operation to Airbus, who would love to increase the number of A220s it can make, and one of the stumbling blocks has been the rate of wing production. I hear that the plan is to increase wing production to 160 pairs a year.

The Ginger Growler has come up with another way to bankrupt British farmers. She has decided to use the Planning & Infrastructure Bill to allow councils to buy farmers’ fields by issuing compulsory purchase orders to build housing. But there is another twist in the tale: the price paid will not be that for building land but for agricultural land. I’m not sure what the idea is; all I can think is that Labour wants to force all our farmers off the land and to import all our food.

Today’s news on the two ships involved in a collision off the coast of Yorkshire yesterday is both good and bad. First, the good: all but one of the two crews have been found, with only one being taken to hospital. It seems that a crew tender was alongside the tanker when the container ship ploughed into it, which facilitated getting all its crew off safely. One of the tanks of the jet fuel cargo on the tanker was punctured, and fuel spilled out and caught fire. The container ship was carrying 15 containers filled with highly toxic sodium cyanide, and others filled with alcohol. No wonder it too is on fire.

I find it astounding that a gun-waving Palestinian migrant can get out of Gaza, document his journey across Europe on FaceAche, publish that he wants to kill all Jews, tell everyone on the internet he was coming to Britain, cross the channel in a small boat, then be able to land and not be recognised by Border Farce, and be released to be housed in a hotel at our expense. Why did it take 3 days to arrest Abu Wadee, only then to arrest him and charge him with entering the country without leave? What is the sentence for this heinous crime—extradition back to their home nation? Well, we all know this is not going to happen because the woke judges have ruled that Gaza is not safe. I thought the war there was on hold, so surely he can go. Otherwise, Wadee will get to stay here forever and kill people just as he wants.

Thursday

Hi everyone, I woke up extra early this morning, and it was chilly for my trip down the garden. Jonathan Reynolds admitted in Parliament yesterday that he had called himself a solicitor in the Commons when he was only a trainee solicitor and asked for the record in Hansard to be changed. Is this rewriting of history supposed to get him off from all the other times he called himself ‘a solicitor’, which is a criminal offence if you are not a real one? It’s nice to see him squirming.

My cat story this week is a bit different because it is about big cats, in particular lions. You might remember that last summer I told you about Yana, a lioness from Ukraine who was taken in by the Big Cat Sanctuary in Smarden, Kent. The lion was apparently suffering from shell shock after a Russian missile landed very close to her enclosure. Now I hear that the sanctuary has raised more than £500,000 to bring four more of her colleagues in from Belgium. The money is being used to cover transport, veterinary treatments, and the construction of the lion rescue centre. From what I have been hearing, Rori, Amani, Lira, and Vanda will be setting off on their journey to Kent today. As an aside, I wonder who the bright spark was who called a lion Rori.

This morning’s update on the ship’s collision off the Humber has brought out a few interesting points. The fires on the tanker are all out, and many of the tanks of jet fuel are secure. The container ship is still burning in a few spots, but tugs have got lines on board, and it is no longer adrift. The reports that the container ship was carrying sodium cyanide have been denied, as it was apparently only carrying empty containers that had been used to transport sodium cyanide. The captain of the container ship has been arrested on suspicion of manslaughter by negligence. Intriguingly, the captain is a Russian national. I am waiting for the howls from the conspiracy theorists.

Another problem for Labour, as a senior aide, Wes Streeting, has been charged with flashing at a 13-year-old girl and a 25-year-old woman. He has pleaded guilty and will be sentenced later. Labour has sacked him from his position and cancelled his party membership. However, Sam Gould is still a councillor on Redbridge Council, and it appears that the only way to get rid of him at the moment is for him to resign.

I see that on Monday, Manchester United justified numerous cuts in things like meals for staff and redundancies by saying that without the cuts, ‘they would be bankrupt by Christmas’, as they are £1 billion in debt. Then, yesterday, they announced plans for a new 100,000-seat stadium on a site next to their Old Trafford stadium. The cost of the project: only £2 billion. However, I am a little bothered by the design of this new stadium. It looks like a circus tent has been slung over it. I suppose that is appropriate, as Manure often play like clowns.

This week is the last one for P&O Cruises Australia, as its parent Carnival closes them down after 93 years since its first cruise. The Australian company was originally a subsidiary of the British P&O Cruises and became part of Carnival when they took over P&O Cruises, Cunard, and Princess Cruises. Australia and Princess became divisions of Carnival, while P&O Cruises and Cunard operate as British divisions. Now, Australia is being closed, with one of its ships being sold off and two merged into the Carnival fleet. I understand that they will now operate as Carnival Australia.

How many things in the Labour election manifesto has Labour done the complete opposite of? They promised to smash the ‘smuggling guns’, and we now have record numbers coming in on small boats. They promised to keep the winter fuel allowance and didn’t. They promised not to put up taxes and did. They promised to bring down the cost of electricity and gas, but it has gone up on three occasions. But one of the best is the promise to cut the quangos. Have they managed to do that? Not in the slightest. In fact, they have set up an extra 27 since coming to government. Can you believe a word they say?

Friday

Good morning my happy readers, it’s lovely and sunny this morning but still chilly. However, the national economy is not sunny. Once again, the ONS report that it shrank 0.1% in January, wiping out the 0.1% it grew in December when everyone was shopping for Christmas. So, effectively, the economy is flatlining, not growing as we have been promised, which is the number one aim of this useless government. How can Robber Reeves not see that her policies are a complete failure?

Yesterday, Legohead announced he intends to scrap NHS England. I have always wondered why we need both the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS England. The DHSC gets the money from the government and passes it on to 23 different agencies and public bodies, one of which is NHS England. What do NHS England do? Well, they pass the money on to the next level, like hospital trusts, and write standards. They also employ 14,500 people. So, it looks like 9,500 people will be redundant, and the rest will move from NHS England to the DHSC and carry on in just the same way. If we can just get rid of that many people from the NHS at the stroke of a pen, how many more are there?

It’s beginning to look like the U.K., Italy, and Japan have found another partner to join their sixth-generation fighter aircraft project. The Saudi Arabians have been evaluating fifth-generation planes for some time and have been looking at the American F-35 and the Chinese J-35. Apparently, the Saudis liked the F-35 but not its price, so they had a good look at the J-35, which the Chinese say is the equivalent of the F-35. However, it seems that it might have been much cheaper but was also inferior. So, the Saudis have been looking for an alternative, and the GCAP (Tempest) seems to be the winner. The Saudis want to develop their aerospace industry, and joining this project is seen as a way forward. The word I hear is that Saudi Arabia will join the consortium before the end of this year.

I have been reading that the Women’s Super League has been considering a new league format, expanding the current format from 12 teams in the WSL and the Championship to 16 in both. The current proposal is to stop relegation but continue with promotion. This would mean adding extra promotion to the Championship to grow its numbers when its top team is promoted to the WSL. But I hear there is a big snag in the new TV broadcasting contract that kicks in next season. The £65 million Sky and BBC joint contract stipulates a 12-match competition with promotion and relegation and needs the agreement of both sides to change. Under the new contract, Sky will be able to broadcast 118 matches and the BBC 21. I wonder if they will agree to the changes.

Over the past five years, 943 people have attempted to sue Transport for London over accidents at train stations, including one person who won £2.3 million in compensation. However, the average compensation payout was only about £14,000. In the four years to March 2024, there were 14,000 injuries in TfL stations. Unsurprisingly, the most accidents occurred at the busiest stations: 46 at Kings Cross, 40 at Stratford, and 27 at both London Bridge and Waterloo.

A man who has been in prison for 37 years for beating his wife to death had his appeal case heard as new evidence has been found. New DNA testing techniques have revealed that semen found on the wife’s dead body has now been shown to be that of an unknown person. The authorities have a month to try and identify whose DNA it is, but it is definitely not the husband who is in prison for killing her but has always denied being guilty.

I see that the Donald is upping his trade war with the EU. In retaliation for tariffs on EU iron and steel going to the US, the EU has announced a 50% tariff on US whisky. This has rather upset the Donald, who has said that unless it is immediately removed, he will slap a 200% tariff on all wine, champagne, and alcohol products emanating from the EU. This is all getting very silly and is rapidly escalating out of hand. All I can say is thank goodness we are out of the EU.

Saturday

Good morning everyone, it was lovely and sunny when I first woke up and wandered down the garden. But it clouded up and it’s cold in the wind now. Red Ed Miliband has flown off to China to try to get them to stop building coal-fired power stations. If he thinks the Chinese are going to take the slightest bit of notice, then he is even more stupid than I think he is.

The sale of Typhoon fighter jets to Turkey has just moved a step closer. Some months ago, the Turks sent an enquiry document to the Ministry of Defence and the manufacturer, laying out exactly what they wanted by way of 40 aircraft and their operational requirements. This week, the MoD has been in Ankara to present a formal offer. I understand that it is now being evaluated.

It has taken a bit of a long time, but the Canadian Transport Safety Board has just released a report into a 2022 accident at Kitchener Airport. A plane from Canadian airline Flair ran off the end of the runway and nobody was hurt. The report says the basic cause of the accident was pilot fatigue, with the accident coming at the end of an 18-hour working day when the pilot had just worked a particularly busy week where the airline had scheduled him to work the maximum number of legal hours. It seems that as the plane came into land, the pilot disengaged the autopilot but failed to disconnect the auto-throttle. Consequently, the auto-throttle went into ‘go around’ mode while the pilots were distracted handling the landing, and instead of slowing down, the plane sped up without the instruments making it clear what was happening. So, the accident was one of those things that occurred because a number of things went wrong all at the same time, which no one had foreseen ever happening together.

I hear that the Russian energy company Gazprom is being sued for €18 billion for not supplying contracted gas. It comes from a time before the Russian invasion of Ukraine when PooTin demanded payments for Russian gas had to be made in roubles. When many companies refused, as their contracts were for payment in euros and dollars, Gazprom turned down supplies. Interestingly, this is not just European companies who are suing, but also Turkey, China, and Central Asia, as well as countries from the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Gazprom is now going to court in Russia to try to prevent them from being sued by anyone outside of Russia. I can’t see Western courts accepting this as a ruling if it happens.

The industrial action on the West Coast Railway has been settled, with Avanti West Coast agreeing to pay ever-increasing amounts to train crews. Those scheduled to work on Saturday will be paid time and a quarter, and Sunday’s time and a half. In addition, minimum shift payment goes up from six hours to seven and a half hours. All this is backdated to the 10th of February. All this comes after the big increases which Labour gave back when they came to power in the summer.

Interesting picture on the internet of passengers leaving a burning American Airlines plane at Denver Airport. The plane was flying from Colorado Springs to Dallas Fort Worth when the pilot heard a funny noise coming from an engine, causing a diversion to Denver on landing. On landing, there was a delay in opening the doors, and smoke filled the cabin, leading to an emergency evacuation. Numerous people went down escape slides and out of the over-wing doors. But those going out the over-wing doors ended up standing on the wing. Now, even my little cat brain knows that the wings are full of jet fuel, so is this safe? I always thought that there were L-shaped slides at those doors to get passengers to the ground. I think this needs looking into.

The first opinion poll for the Runcorn by-election since Mike Amesbury announced his resignation is out, and it is spectacular news for Reform. At the general election, Labour got 53% of the vote, with Reform coming second on 18%. But in the new Lord Ashcroft poll, Labour is down to 35% and Reform up to 40%. Which is very good for Reform, but it gets even better when you look at only those who say they are certain to vote. Then it’s 33% Labour, 42% Reform, and 11% Tory. The poll was taken very recently in the middle of the row between Farage and Lowe.

I’m done. It’s very chilly out there in the street, so there is no windowsill for me today. Instead, it’s back to the comfy chair in the Thatcher room where it is a bit warmer. Legohead is trying to boost his reputation by hosting a virtual summit this morning. I bet he had no idea how to even turn on the equipment and had one technician do it! Chat to you all next week!
 

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