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

Monday

Good morning, my good friends, and it’s a lovely morning, warm and sunny. I was intrigued to read that the Tories put in a Freedom of Information request to find out the actual cost of the Chagos sell-out, as Legohead had refused to tell the House of Commons, having indicated that it was in the region of £3.4 billion. The FoI was revealing in that it showed the Snivel Serpents’ first estimate was around £10 billion, but the government told them this was too much, so it was artificially reduced to £3.4 billion. But this wasn’t the final cost. The FoI reveals this as a whopping £35 billion. Now divide that by the 32,200,000 taxpayers in the UK, and it means it will cost every single taxpayer £1,086.96.

A couple of other immigration stories emerged this weekend. Apparently, the Home Office has lost track of 150,000 who came here on care work visas and has no idea if they are in the country still working at their original jobs, have moved to another job, aren’t working, or have gone home. The Home Office is not fit for purpose. Local government is trying to buy up whole streets and new housing estates to house the illegal immigrants displaced from hotels. I really don’t want them in private housing instead of hotels, I just don’t want them at all.

There was a big demonstration in Parliament Square on Sunday in favour of the proscribed group Palestine Action. They are proscribed as a terrorist organisation, so anyone who turned out to support them was committing a terrorism act and likely to be arrested. So, it came as no surprise to me that 532 were arrested. The protestors’ aim was to flood the 500 police cells in London, but it didn’t work, as the Met bailed everyone who could prove their ID. I wonder how many of the 532 will get a terrorism conviction and not be able to find employment because of it.

I hear there is a new island in the River Thames near Hammersmith Bridge. The island is composed almost completely of congealed solid waste. It mainly comprises the likes of wet wipes and is estimated to contain around 180 tonnes of waste. The Port of London Authority and Thames Water are to remove the island, which is the size of two tennis courts and over a metre above the high tide level, over the next month. I wonder where it will be taken.

It seems that a Chinese Coast Guard vessel was in collision with a Chinese Navy vessel earlier this morning. The vessels were involved in a dispute with Philippine fishermen, and the Chinese were trying to chase them away from the fishing grounds around the Scarborough Shoals that China seized in 2012. China has acknowledged the clash, but not that two of their ships were in a collision. Manila has not been so reticent. It has aired a video showing the Chinese Coast Guard vessel firing water hoses at the fishing boats before turning sharply into the bigger Chinese warship, creating heavy damage.

A couple of weeks ago, I told you about the month-long hunt for Burmese pythons in the Florida Everglades. The hunt was a competition, with the person who trapped the most snakes winning $1,000. I hear the winner caught a staggering 87 snakes in the month. Registered python hunters normally get paid $50 for every snake they catch up to 4 feet long. In addition, they get another $25 for each additional foot in length. If one man captured that many, there must be thousands still out there.

Do you remember the recent hullabaloo over the government’s announcement that there was to be a return of the EV grant, with two levels set at £3,750 and £1,500? Well, I can report that at the time of writing, with the scheme up and running for a couple of weeks, not a single car has been placed in the higher tier. It has been announced that some EVs have been placed in the lower tier, but not many. The first four were all Citroëns, but they have been joined this week by 13 more from Renault, Nissan and Vauxhall. But every single one is in the lower £1,500 tier. I think it’s all a government con.

Tuesday

Good morning, everyone. It’s a beautiful morning, even if it was a touch warm overnight. It is a little uncomfortable on a hot night when you are covered in fur. Sometimes I go and sleep on the lino, as it’s a bit cooler. Yesterday, another 430 illegal immigrants crossed the Channel in small boats, taking the total number of people arriving in this way to over 50,000 since Legohead came to Number 10. It also took the number of illegal immigrants who have crossed this year to over 27 thousand. Legohead has no idea how to deal with this invasion.

Today I read that 1 million immigrants have an NHS certificate (HC2), which entitles them to priority NHS treatment. This doesn’t just mean they jump to the front of the queue for GP appointments, they do the same for dentists and for hospitals. Not only that, but it also allows them to recover the cost of travel to the appointment from the government. I wonder how much a card like that would cost if available to ordinary NHS users? But I forgot, it’s only available if you come over on a small boat, the back of a lorry, or overstay your visa, so you will never qualify for one.

Merton Council in south London guidance has been issued to employees to tell them they must not call the parents of children Mummy and Daddy, as they could be drawing assumptions. It could be Mummy and Mummy or Daddy and Daddy, and they might cause offence. What woke rubbish.

Amazon launched another two dozen of its Kuiper satellites yesterday. What is a little strange is that they were aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9. The odd thing about that is that SpaceX is an Elon Musk company, while Amazon is owned by Musk’s great rival Jeff Bezos. But Bezos also owns a space launch company, Blue Origin. The interesting thing is that SpaceX has developed a system where a stage of the rocket is recovered and reused. This makes it a cheap system specifically designed to launch satellites into space for anyone, even rivals.

I see that on Saturday there was an emergency at the Mayflower Terminal in Southampton, where the P&O cruise ship Ventura was boarding passengers for a cruise to the Canary Islands. It seems a man checking in had claimed he had a bomb. The passenger boarding process was halted and armed police pounced on the man. Those already on board were called to their muster stations until it was found that it was all a hoax. A 63-year-old man was arrested for a bomb hoax. This is the same fortnightly cruise that my scribe went on and wrote all about. Nothing so exciting happened on his cruise.

I see there are demands that the Government’s Trade Envoy to Turkey be sacked. Reports say that he has made a visit to Northern Cyprus, a regime not recognised by the UK and most other countries. A report in a local newspaper says he attended several ‘official’ events. The envoy, Afzal Khan MP, seems to have been moonlighting, as we have no official trade with the nation. What a surprise, another Liebore MP in trouble.

Has our Mastermind-contesting Foreign Secretary, David Lammy, placed the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office in an illegal position? I see that he has received a letter prior to legal action over his scheme to embed FCDO officials in big business. But at the moment, the plan seems to be working in reverse, as people from Shell and BAE Systems are instead working in the FCDO. This has raised a few eyebrows, as both companies have raised concerns about alleged issues of compliance with human rights and other legal obligations. There are worries about the companies’ influence on FCDO policies, potential for conflict of interest, and the transparency of the scheme. The expression ‘thick as mince’ comes to mind.

Wednesday

Hi folks. Unlike yesterday, it is very dull and grey and looks like rain, so why is the BBC saying warm and sunny? I heard a Liebore minister on the radio this morning talking about the number of illegal immigrants officially going over 50,000 since the election last June. Apparently, it is all the fault of the evil Tories. They have not been in power for the last 13 months, so I can’t see this myself, especially as the number coming across on small boats is up 48% on the previous year.

Today I heard that the latest advice on saving water is to delete your stored emails. Apparently, it works like this. Most people don’t delete their old emails, and many millions sit on servers in vast data farms, stored just in case you should ever want to access that invite to go for a drink with a pal seven years ago. But these servers burn electricity, and as you no doubt know, using electricity produces heat, and the data centres use millions of gallons of water keeping them cool. So, there we have it. If we were all to erase all our old emails, we would save a lot of water, and you could avoid a hosepipe ban.

Down on the south coast at Worthing, the council seafront multi-storey car park is still closed because its concrete structure has been deemed unsafe, and a report says it will cost millions to repair. The Liebore council says they don’t have the money to repair it and have put it and other attached buildings up for sale to a developer. In the meantime, they are spending millions to install a local heating scheme for public buildings, including the Town Hall, Library and Hospital. The heat will come from several industrial air source heat pumps, which are being installed in a new building in front of the other multi-storey car park, closing it for days on end. The pipes to deliver the hot water are being installed under town streets, causing road closures. Unsurprisingly, the town centre traders are complaining this is all affecting footfall. Well, the council has a cunning plan to bring visitors back to the town centre and is to spend £3.1 million to change a small street off the main shopping street into a ‘Community Space’, and another £150,000 on the refurbishment of some seafront shelters and the repainting of benches, railings and bins. Surely the council would do better to increase the parking spaces.

What is going on with Eastleigh Borough Council? Two weeks ago, they announced the scrapping of the 53 CCTV cameras in the town centre to save money. This was mainly because several of the cameras need to be replaced, and they can’t afford the £50,000 it will cost. This morning, I learn that the council has applied for a £50,000 CCTV grant from the local Police and Crime Commissioner. Could the two things be related?

I see the North Wales Police have had to back down in the case of the Wrexham shop owner who put up a notice in his shop window describing shoplifters as ‘Scum Bags’. The local police had arrived in his shop to ask him to take the notice down, as someone had complained it had upset them. The shopkeeper told the police the notice was staying there, as the only person it might upset was a shoplifter. The Chief Constable has now confirmed that the notice was perfectly legal and can stay. However, a spokesman for Legohead says he would never call anyone a ‘Scum Bag’. Somehow, I suspect the Ginger Growler might.

Three South African Rugby Union players who ply their trade in the UK are about to qualify to play for England. The three, Benhard Janse van Rensburg, Hanro Liebenberg and Jacques Vermeulen, were called up to play for the South African under-20s team in 2015, but in 2017 the South African rugby authorities designated the under-20s their second team, making the three players registered as South African players. However, these players have never been called up for the first team. So, the three have decided to invoke the five-year residency rule and become eligible to play for England. The International Rugby Board changed the rules in 2018, and so it is not possible to capture players in this way anymore, but the rule change was not retrospective.

The former head office of De Beers, the diamond dealers at Farringdon on the edge of London’s Hatton Garden diamond district, is to be redeveloped. The current owners of the empty building have got planning permission to completely change the look of the building, adding a double-storey colonnade and four additional floors on the top of the building. The windows are all to be changed, giving the building a modern look. The result will be 85,000 sq. ft of Grade A office space and a further 8,500 sq. ft of retail space under the colonnade. No mention of the cost, but I bet it’s not cheap.

Thursday

Hello folks. Well, it is back to nice again this morning, unlike yesterday. The Member of the Welsh Senedd for Caerphilly has been found dead. Hefin David, who has died suddenly, was aged 47, a member of Welsh Labour, and the police say the death was not suspicious. Could this be a big chance for Reform, who only have one MS who defected? Liebore are in power with 30 of the sixty seats, and a win for Reform or any opposition party could make things difficult for Liebore.

I hear that Randy Andy has got the hump. He is reported to have been moaning about a sleeping policeman that has been installed on a road on the Windsor estate where he lives. The story is that he can often be found driving around the private estate, as he doesn’t fancy appearing in public, and the speed bump has been installed on one of the roads he regularly uses. Poor chap, he has to be pampered.

The latest illegal immigrant in court story is about a Nigerian who visited Bournemouth back in 2022 and groped a 19-year-old’s bum. Three years later, he is up in court, where the girl tells the judge she has been traumatised and is scared to go out on her own. The judge said the Nigerian had suffered a troubled upbringing and sentenced him to an 18-month community order and ordered him to do 150 hours of unpaid work, as it was deemed that a custodial sentence would be too severe. Rather than throwing him out of the country, he has been granted leave to remain.

I saw the clip on the internet where a man on a District Line train in East London dropped his trousers and pants in the middle of the carriage. Several men on the train told him to pull his pants up, but the man told them to ‘F… off’. The men then took it on themselves to get him off at the next stop and sat on him until the British Transport Police arrived. The man is said to be suffering from a mental problem, but the BTP is considering charging the men who chucked him off the train for using too much violence. I would give them a medal.

The numbers released for the last year show that there are now 8 million people on Universal Credit. Now, I know that UC is both an in-work and out-of-work benefit, and a lot of those people are working and claiming top-up benefits. But I learn that numbers are up by 1 million since Legohead came to power last July. One other little bit of interest is that 800,000 of that 8 million are in a category that do not have to look for work for life. I can understand this if they are not physically fit and never will be. This is a huge number of people.

The police have been carrying out a trial of face recognition software and have had 11 vans in London. We are told that the CCTV compares the pictures of people passing the van with the pictures of wanted criminals in a fraction of a second, and if a match is not found, the picture is destroyed. But I learn that the police want free access to the driving licence photos held by the DVLC and passport photos for ‘face recognition purposes’. Why do they want this access? Is it to run against CCTV pictures of burglars and shoplifters? Oh, I nearly forgot. It looks like the Home Office is going to buy 10 more vans for other police forces.

Yet more bad news for Legohead in a new opinion poll. Only 13% of those polled approved of the government, while 68% disapproved (the remainder were don’t knows). I want to know who this 13% that approved were. Did they poll the local lunatic asylum?

Friday

Hi everyone, it’s back to a sunny morning. Every day, I seem to be reporting another problem for Legohead. Today it’s that the growth in GDP slowed again. The numbers for the second quarter of the year have fallen to 0.3%, down sharply from the previous quarter and making Legohead’s aim of growing the economy look almost impossible.

In yet more bad news for Legohead, a record number of illegal immigrants have come across the Channel in a single RIB. The record has now jumped to 107 in one boat. Now I hear that each illegal costs us £40,000 a year, so that one boatload is going to cost the taxpayers £4,280,000 for one year. These numbers are becoming crazy and Legohead is doing naff all about it.

Word reaches me that in an attempt to reinvigorate his northern backbenchers, Legohead is considering revising Northern Powerhouse Rail, the improved route between Liverpool and Hull. Its development collapsed when the HS2 extension from Crewe to Manchester was pulled because it used some of the same new track from Manchester Airport to Manchester. People who know about railways are saying the NPR revival could also mean the revival of HS2 to Manchester. HS2 was, after all, a Liebore project in the first place. I wonder where he plans to get the money from.

The recent use of the Falcon 9 by SpaceX to put the latest 24 Project Kuiper satellites in orbit was rather interesting, as it wasn’t really a Falcon 9 rocket. It was actually the main body of a Falcon Heavy in single rocket mode. The original idea of the Falcon Heavy was to strap together 3 x Falcon 9s to make a heavy launcher. However, the stresses imposed on the central rocket by the other two being used as boosters meant that the central rocket of the three had to be made with a thicker body wall. The big thing about the Falcon 9 is that this first stage lands back on the launch pad and can be reused. So far, SpaceX has managed to recover Falcon 9s but never the central rocket on a Falcon Heavy. But this time it worked. Will it be recorded as a Falcon 9 or the first Falcon Heavy recovery?

I had to laugh when I read that the Environment Agency has been on to Mastermind Lammy about his fishing and to see if he and his fishing partner JD Vance had a licence. It seems that Mastermind didn’t, claiming an oversight and making him liable for a fine, on conviction, of up to £2,500. The EA boasts that they always prosecute, so I will be interested to see if Mastermind is prosecuted, or will it be another case of two-tier policing?

If what the Indian military is claiming for its BrahMos 2 missile is true, then I would expect to see it selling to other nations in large numbers. BrahMos comes in several versions: air-to-air, air-to-ground, ground-to-ground, ship-to-ship and submarine-launched. It is a two-stage stand-off supersonic missile with a long range, which the makers say has a 250-plus kilometre range. In the recent war with Pakistan (Operation Sindoor), the Indians say their satellites watched a Pakistani AWACS aircraft land and taxi into a hangar before the target information was sent to an Indian fighter aircraft in Indian airspace. It launched a BrahMos missile from over 300 kilometres away. The missile went through the hangar roof and exploded inside, destroying the plane and its crew. But perhaps the more unbelievable story is that the missile took out a hardened Pakistani nuclear bunker from over 350 kilometres away. They say the missile entered the bunker via a 45 cm x 45 cm air vent. If true, that is pretty good accuracy.

The Virgin bid to run trains through the Channel Tunnel has progressed a bit farther, with Virgin signing a binding agreement with Alstom to purchase 12 trains. Virgin’s latest application to the Office of Rail Regulation reveals that Virgin has ordered 12 x Avelia Stream model trains, the latest generation of the Pendolino tilting trains. These are single-deck trains, and not the double-deck that there was speculation would be ordered. However, the gauge of the HS1 track through Kent would need to be modified to accommodate double-deck trains in line with the continental gauge, something the government is reluctant to spend money on. The Virgin plan is to have a service up and running by 2030, with trains initially serving Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam, with longer-term ambitions to extend further into France, Germany and Switzerland.

Saturday

Good morning, people. It’s a lovely morning this morning, made better by Trump and Putin having a meeting later. Legohead was moaning that he should have been invited, but apparently, he is not as important as he thinks he is.

A report from the Nuffield Trust has revealed that the NHS is removing 248,000 appointments from the waiting lists every month. They say these appointments are removed because the person doesn’t respond to a request to confirm they still require an appointment. They assume that the person has died, had private treatment or moved abroad. I wonder if they are sure the patient has ever received such a request. I keep hearing about how the NHS appointment system is such a mess, with people constantly getting appointments cancelled, then a new one made, only for that to be cancelled. This seems to happen four or five times before someone gets seen.

Two new immigration stories for you today. A resident of the Epping Hotel, where a lot of this kicked off, has been arrested over five cases of assault and one of sexual assault on a male in the hotel. Over to the Britannia International in Canary Wharf, where a resident was found in the home of an 82-year-old blind woman. The man was not charged by the police because they said nothing had been stolen. That’s not the point. The woman clearly couldn’t have seen him and had no idea if he had pocketed anything. Surely he could be accused of something, if only trespass.

The news outlet City AM reports that in the second quarter of the year, in the whole of London, under 1,000 homes were built. It comes up with an interesting suggestion as to where the authorities in London could find the space to build a mere 250,000 homes. It points out that the London Underground has a dozen or so huge train depots where it stables its 1,000+ trains overnight. All but one of these depots is above ground and occupies acres of prime real estate. The single below-ground depot is at White City, below the Westfield shopping centre. In 2007, when it was built, it cost £80 million. That’s £135 million at today’s costs. Now let’s look at TfL’s Neasden Train Depot. It occupies 65 acres on its own, and the other dozen or so depots are roughly equal in size. City AM calculated that using the White City costs, escalated to present-day costs, would cost in the region of £8 to £10 billion to bury all the depots. On the land released, you could build 250,000 houses, which would sell for at least £50 billion, solving all TfL’s money problems. I wonder if housing the Tube trains underground would stop the bloody awful graffiti they get covered in when parked above ground. That’s another saving.

It seems that in many parts of the U.K., we are running out of burial space, so the councils are responding by not just putting up costs but also introducing extra-wide graves for fat people. A few years ago, councils increased the standard width of a grave from four feet to five feet, but some have now introduced six-foot-wide graves as people are getting bigger. Of course, the extra width costs more, and in truth, the councils would probably prefer if fat people were cremated.

The London ‘Congestion Charge’ is scheduled to increase from £13 to £15 on Boxing Day. At the same time, TfL will be including EVs in the charge. One of the big benefits of buying an EV was that it was free of congestion charges and road tax (or whatever it’s called today). But it was never going to stay a cheap option to operate an EV. The government relies too heavily on the tax it gets from petrol and diesel cars and must replace it. I learn that the new Congestion Charge is predicted to raise £455 million for TfL next year.

I see that if you are under investigation by HMRC for tax evasion, they plan to use AI to scour the likes of Facebook, Instagram, X and Reddit to see if you are spending more money than they think you should be. So, if you are on social media boasting about your wonderful holiday in Bali, but are officially on Universal Credit, you’d better watch out. HMRC says this is all for the benefit of its ‘customers’ as it will release staff to deal with enquiries, while AI carries out the background admin. And if you believe that, you will believe anything.

Well, that’s me done for the week and it’s another windowsill nap for me this afternoon. Today it’s rather nice out there. I do enjoy my afternoon snooze in the sun. It’s nearly the Summer Bank Holiday and that’s the end of summer. Chat to you all next week.
 

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