Seen in the News

[Stanley]

That's shocking David....
HERE'S something I saw in the news that makes me feel better about the lousy weather we have had over the holiday.
For Sanaa Shah's family, summer in Australia is worlds apart from the carefree coastal lifestyle depicted in travel brochures. "We don't have a close-by beach to go to," the 20-year-old says. "We can't escape the heat here." Instead, sweltering days often leave her "locked indoors" with a crippling migraine and trigger heavy nosebleeds for her younger sister. Her home is in an inland area of Sydney where temperatures can climb 10C higher than seaside suburbs - a result of its geography, lack of green spaces and abundance of heat-trapping surfaces. That region - western Sydney - has one of the fastest-growing urban populations in the country, as well as rising poverty rates. And weather data shows that one in every 10 summer days there already surpasses 35C. Heat is known as Australia's "silent killer" because it's deadlier than all other natural disasters combined yet leaves behind no visual clues as to the scale of its devastation. But its impacts aren't being felt equally, with more than 60% of such deaths occurring in underprivileged communities like Ms Shah's, according to a climate modelling firm.

[Stanley]

THIS is the headline news yesterday and this morning.
Eurostar has said it will run all services to London, Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam on Sunday following a day of major disruption. New Year plans for thousands were in ruins after flooding in a tunnel under the River Thames led to the cancellation of all Eurostar services between London and Paris on Saturday.
At the moment it looks as though the flooding is due to a major leak in pipework and Thames Water is involved but nobody is coming clean of course.
I suppose it may become clearer later.

[Stanley]

See THIS for reassurance that the days of gunboat diplomacy are not entirely gone!
Defence Secretary Grant Shapps has said British forces are ready to act against Houthi rebels that target cargo ships in the Red Sea. In a newspaper article, he said the UK was "willing to take direct action" to protect the key shipping lane. Highlighting how a British warship shot down a suspected attack drone in the Red Sea in December, Mr Shapps said "we won't hesitate to take further action". The Houthis have targeted foreign ships since the Israel-Hamas war started.
Note how policy is announced through the editorial pages of friendly newspapers.....

[Stanley]

See THIS BBC report of a stabbing in London.
A 16-year-old boy stabbed to death in north London on New Year's Eve has been named by police as Harry Pitman. Officers were called to the stabbing in Primrose Hill, Camden, at about 23:40 GMT on Sunday. Metropolitan Police said first aid was given to Mr Pitman but he was pronounced dead shortly before midnight. A 16-year-old boy was arrested at the scene on suspicion of murder and taken into custody.
My thoughts go out to his parents and I have a suspicion that this is yet another example of a stabbing by someone who would have been picked up by the police before he did this if the former system of local intelligence gathering had been in operation with more police and PSOs on the ground. We are told by the politicians that this isn't the case. Sorry, I am not convinced. (And neither are police officers I have heard saying the same thing.....)

[Stanley]

I SEE that while we were inconvenienced by a windy wet day the rest o0f the Isles was being battered by Storm Henk. (Where do the names originate?
Storm Henk has lashed large parts of England and Wales with heavy rain and strong winds, causing power outages, transport disruption and flooding. The biggest gust of 81mph was recorded at Exeter Airport in Devon. Several rail firms warned people not to travel as blocked trees or power failures affected the network. In Orpington, south-east London, a woman was taken to hospital after being struck by a falling tree. Her injuries are not thought to be life-threatening. Moving from west to east, the storm brought significant disruption to large sections of Wales and England. Rough seas lashed coastal areas, especially in southern England, and road users faced downed trees and treacherous conditions. The Energy Networks Association (ENA), which collates data from all energy providers, estimated that 38,000 customers were without power as of 19:00 GMT on Tuesday due to damage from the storm.
Notice that Scotland isn't being reported on, they of course had much higher winds and lower temperatures.
See THIS for more pleasant news.
Luke Littler's sensational run at the PDC World Darts Championship continued as the 16-year-old beat Rob Cross to storm into the final. Littler, playing in his first world tournament, won 6-2 and will face Luke Humphries, who beat Scott Williams 6-0. Littler, who has now earned £200,000, is the youngest person to reach the final, overtaking Kirk Shepherd who was 21 years and 88 days old in 2008. "It is crazy to even think I am in the final on my debut," he said. Littler told Sky Sports: "I was happy to win one game and now I can go all the way. It's not easy. You are playing Rob, he is a world champion who won on debut. I've got no words." Asked about his preparation for Wednesday's final, Littler added: "I'll be doing what I've been doing. In the morning I'll go for my ham and cheese omelette and then come here, have a pizza and then prep on the board. That is what I've done every day." Humphries became the new world number one after reaching the final for the first time and will represent Littler's toughest test.

[Tizer]

Have a look at the photo of flooded holiday homes in this BBC article - eeek!! LINK

[Cathy]

Some of those pics look like our east coast floods.
Hope Tripps is OK.

[Tripps]

Hope Tripps is OK.

Aww that's nice - thanks for caring . . . .

I'm fine - here in Midsummer Mel, and the chalk stream is behaving itself. Waterlight

The drive however is looking a bit ragged - never seen such a big pool. . .

[Cathy]

Good. Hopefully Plaques will let us know how his area is faring .

[Stanley]

I can't speak for Ken Cathy but here in Barlick we are not flooded. But of course we have the benefit of living on the watershed and so we don't get anyone else's floodwater coming down on us. Peter is right, others have not been so lucky but looking at the pictures, particularly the aerial ones of the park home sight at the water centre they seem to all be on either flood plains or next to major rivers.
UK news this morning is focussed on the fact that Prince Andrew has been named in court papers associated with the convicted Epstein and THIS report of the fate of young Littler in the world darts championship final. i]England's Luke Humphries defeated teenager Luke Littler 7-4 in a gripping final at Alexandra Palace to win his first PDC World Championship title. Littler, 16, was aiming to become darts' youngest ever world champion after a remarkable run to the final. But Humphries, the pre-event favourite who became world number one on Tuesday, saw off his challenge to claim the £500,000 first prize. Trailing 4-2, the 28-year-old won five consecutive sets to close out victory.[/i]
He has no need to be ashamed, to get to the final was a great achievement, he's young and there will be other chances.....

[Tizer]

The two local streams here have been raging torrents - and I'm not exaggerating, they're narrow but with high banks and sharp bends. After heavy rain they're always brown and muddy, full of silt and I wish farmers would get their heads around the fact they are losing good soil and polluting the rivers at the same time by not making changes to their land so that rain doesn't immediately wash out everything but instead pools in ponds and marshy areas, slowing down the flow of the streams.

Locally we've also lost a lot of very old, big trees from the 60-70mph wind gusts. One them was shown on BBC news. Taunton Vale runs between Exmoor and the Quantock Hills from Bristol to Taunton and has always been a way for mild air from the channel to create a locally warm environment - now it's become a wind tunnel!

[PanBiker]

He has no need to be ashamed, to get to the final was a great achievement, he's young and there will be other chances.....

Indeed, the record is held by a 21 year old so he has another five years to better that.

[Stanley]

I can well believe it Peter.... We are, as I say, lucky here. All we have to worry about is events on the moor, that was what caused our 1932 flood. You might well ask how long before we have another one? That's why, in my newspaper column I regularly had a subject, 'Watery Matters' and reminded everyone of the dangers posed by clogged trash screens on culverts and the culverts themselves, many of which are well over a century old.

[Tizer]

Another example of Musk's motors not being properly set up before sale...
`Tesla recalls more than 1.6 million cars in China over steering software issues' LINK

[Big Kev]

Another example of Musk's motors not being properly set up before sale...
`Tesla recalls more than 1.6 million cars in China over steering software issues' LINK

Not really a recall though, it's an over the air software update.

[Stanley]

Peter's point is still valid though. Musk's Motors appears to have more than a hint of Twitter Management about it.
I realise I am not Mr Average Customer but I wouldn't touch one of them with a barge pole! If I was buying a car I would be looking for the best secondhand one I could find and let others be the avant garde in these matters!
THIS news about the Boeing 737 Max caught my attention. The report has a scary video. Bit like Tesla Cars, I seem to hear nothing but bad news about this piece of 'advanced ' technology!
Bad news also for Royal Watchers. Have a look at THIS BBC report on the position of Prince Andrew after a bad start to 2024.
For Prince Andrew, it's been a terrible 2024 so far. Awful headlines, being reported to the police, demands for him to lose his Windsor home. That's just this week. At Christmas he was basking in the glow of the Royal Family, appearing before the public after a Sandringham church service. Back in the fold. But a few days later he was appearing in the much harsher light of US court documents about sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Much of the information in the unsealed court papers was already known - but once again it raises the long, embarrassing shadow of his involvement in the circle of the disgraced financier. What was he doing with these people?
A very pertinent question.... Was nobody advising him? Or, as I think is very likely, was he warned off but refused to take the advice?
Later.... Early news that the government is looking as simplifying the appeals procedure for postmasters affected by the Horizon scandal. At the moment due to the way the cases were originally structured the Post Office has a role in deciding if the appeal can go forward. This role is what is being looked at as in some cases the Post Office has blocked appeals.

[Stanley]

See THIS for news about the expected tube strikes in London.
Strikes by London Underground workers which would have crippled Tube services this week have been suspended, the RMT union has announced. Little or no service was expected across the capital's entire network from Sunday evening to Friday morning. Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union had previously voted to take industrial action over a below-inflation pay increase of 5%. The union said "positive discussions" meant further talks could take place. The 5% offer was described by Transport for London (TfL) as "the most we can afford". But it said an "intervention" by London's mayor had allowed pay talks to be reopened. Some disruption on the Tube is still expected though due to the strikes being called off late on, TfL said.
Why am I interested in this news when I live in the North? Because there may be a lesson embedded in this negotiation which could be usefully taken on board by the government in dealing with the NHS doctors. SIT DOWN AND TALK!
See THIS report on public confidence.
Public trust in the police has fallen to the lowest level ever - and time is running out to restore it, the policing watchdog has warned. Chief constables are being urged to concentrate on crimes that matter most to people, get the basics right in investigations and restore the abandoned policy of neighbourhood policing. His Majesty's Chief Inspector of Constabulary Andy Cooke says they should be forced to do all of this by law - and he is demanding new legal powers to make chiefs follow his rules. He also wants a role in their appointment. Mr Cooke said: "There are clear and systemic failings throughout the police service in England and Wales and, thanks to a series of dreadful scandals, public trust in the police is hanging by a thread. We have a small window of opportunity to repair it."

[Tizer]

I didn't believe this at first but now find that it's genuine..
`Touching Another World' Luna Moon Burial Service
Inaugurated in 1998 by NASA’s selection of Celestis to assist in honoring legendary scientist Dr. Eugene Shoemaker aboard the Lunar Prospector spacecraft, the Luna Service sends Flight Capsules of cremated remains or DNA samples to Earth’s moon.
What could be more compelling than looking up in the night sky at our glowing neighbor, knowing your loved one has completed a journey accomplished by so few? The Celestis spacecraft is a permanent lunar memorial for adventurous souls.
Celestis Luna missions also permit – for the first time in human history – off Earth storage for DNA and digital data archives. All missions are conducted in strict adherence to international and national law, are easy to arrange, and provide a performance guarantee.
Reservations are open for the Celestis Destiny Flight.

And it was followed by this - the Navajo Nation people have more sense than NASA...
`NASA won’t scrap launch sending cremated remains to the moon, despite Navajo complaints' NASA

I have to admit I'm gobsmacked - the world really is going mad!

[Tizer]

Rather than edit my previous post I'll put more here - Wikipedia links to two `space memorial' projects...
1. Celestis 2. Elysium

What I find so shocking is that these projects are going to put human remains and human DNA on the Moon (and probably on Mars later). This kind of contamination wouldn't be allowed in Antarctica, so should why it be allowed on moons or other planets?

Here's a better use of the money. This news page is from last September but it's been in the newspapers last week...
`Step forward for DEEP underwater research site'
DEEP Project

[Stanley]

I agree totally about deep sea research Peter. It's been a truism for years that we know more about deep space than the deep oceans. And further it looks as though we may be about to permit destructive deep ocean mining to get the metals and minerals our modern society is addicted to.
HERE'S another disturbing matter.
Years of headlines about it. More than two decades of injustice. But it is a Christmas holiday TV drama that has catapulted the plight of hundreds of sub postmasters to the top of the political agenda. More than that, it has accelerated the likely timeline for significant change. The government is now saying publicly it hopes that as soon as later this week it can bring forward a plan.
What bothers me about this is that it would appear that our government is more concerned by bad TV coverage than real life matters. I believe this is connected to the current trend to announce policies and actions via the editorial columns of sympathetic national newspapers. What happened to democratic rule by parliamentary politics and Cabinet government?
Another thing that occurs to me, Vennels would be well advised to voluntarily hand her CBE back rather than carry the weight of the attention which is going to fall on her and her executive colleagues.
I have a question as well, how come when something like this happens the lawyers have a field day? It is the Justice System that sets all these legal convolutions in place and then uses them for its own profit. Jarndyce v Jarndyce is alive and well in the 21st century. I can't help thinking this is perhaps the biggest con-trick of them all.
(PS. All this criticism applies equally to the Contaminated Blood scandal and the Grenfell Tower disaster.)

[Tizer]

It's looks like the payload of cremation remains and DNA on the rocket will now not get to the Moon (good!) but will become just one more load of `space junk' after the glitch yesterday.

As for the Navajo people...
The lunar memorials weren't sanctioned by NASA, as it lacks oversight on payloads that are included in commercial flights as part of the agency's Commercial Lunar Payload Services program.
The tribe's concerns were dismissed by Celestis CEO and co-founder Charles M. Chafer, who told USA Today that no individual religion should be able to influence whether space missions go forward. Axios

Then on that site I see...
Meanwhile, Celestis has another mission aboard the rocket, though not included in Peregrine and not destined for the moon. Called the Enterprise Flight, it contains capsules containing human remains as well as DNA samples from over 200 people, including the DNA of former presidents such as George Washington, John F. Kennedy and Dwight D. Eisenhower. The remains from the creator and several cast members of the original Star Trek television series were also included on Enterprise, which is set for interplanetary deep space. Celestis says the purpose of Enterprise is in part to establish "the world's first true outpost of humanity in the cosmos." The details of Elysium Space's payload were not released.

On that same web site I now learn: The human remains aboard the lander won't be the first on the moon, as ashes of Gene Shoemaker, the founder of astrogeology, were buried on the moon in the late 1990s by the Lunar Prospector.

An important rule for scientists and archaeologists whatever you are studying is don't contaminate it with material derived from humans or any other living organism. I'm surprised that NASA is letting itself break that rule.

[Tripps]

Better late than never, and why not. I'm surprised no one has attempted it before.

Not sure what this means though. " “The Pendle witch trials were the most prolific in England"

Pardon Pendle Witches

[Stanley]

Sorry but being an old cynic I have a sneaking suspicion this is more about attracting publicity for Wicca and Emma Swinton's film. And why not? But I wish they'd be more open about that and not try to assume the mantle of justice seekers....
On the subject of Paula Vennels and her CBE, I think I heard news that she has volunteered to hand it back but can find no mention of it.
However, see THIS BBC report which is mainly about the disturbing allegation that racism may have played a part in their prosecution.
Seven Post Office workers of South Asian heritage have told the BBC they believe racism affected the way people were treated in the Horizon scandal. One of the workers who spoke to BBC Newsnight said: "It felt like they thought that you were a foreigner and you'd robbed them. The seven people spoken to by BBC Newsnight worked as sub-postmasters during the scandal and say they were accused of false accounting, theft, or fraud due to data from the faulty Horizon IT system. One man from an Indian background said a member of Post Office staff told him: "All the Indians are doing it. They have relatives so they take the money and send it to them abroad". Another person of South Asian descent said: "It was like we were dumb because English wasn't our first language, that we struggled to make sense of basic accounting". Another said of the Post Office staff he dealt with: "It felt like they thought that you were a foreigner and you'd robbed them". Balvinder Gill told Newsnight his life was destroyed after he was wrongly accused of stealing £108,000 from the Post Office in 2004. The 45-year-old had a mental breakdown afterwards and was sectioned three times. In a double blow for his family, in 2009, his mother Kashmir, now a postmistress, was found guilty of stealing £57,000 from the same Oxford branch. Her conviction was overturned by the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) in 2021. "
If these allegations are true it makes it even more imperative that sanctions should be levied against the Post Office executives who were the root of these prosecutions.
But then, embedded in this report I found THIS.
Former Post Office boss Paula Vennells is handing back her CBE after facing mounting pressure over the Horizon IT scandal.
But if you read further there is no explicit offer to surrender the honour, or if there is, I have missed it.

[PanBiker]

they were accused of false accounting, theft, or fraud due to data from the faulty Horizon IT system.

I have to reiterate this, the system was not faulty. The errors were brought about by programmed back doors into the operating system controlled and abused by Fujitsu technical support staff. They and the Post Office constantly lied to cover up the fact that the system could be interfered with in this way. Post Office were the operators and should bear the brunt of compensation claims although that will have to come from government coffers, (tax payers). That should not stop the government from claiming back all costs plus damages from Fujitsu via the courts. Should be a straightforward breach of contract, as Fujitsu maintained there was no dodgy dealings and no back door entry to the system. Clearly a lie known about by the company and present since the original roll out.

[Tripps]

I have to reiterate this, the system was not faulty

From what I saw of the original TV proramme and what has followed I'm not sure that is true? What would be the motivation of the people concerned? They would have nothing to gain. My impression was that the intervention by Fujitsu employees, was an attempt to conceal the fact that their software was at fault. That said - I'm not sure why, if the software was fundamentally unsafe - it did not affect every single post office, and not just those that were prosecuted. Many operated throught the period without problems.

The issue of the P.O. doing their own prosecutions without the CPS must be addressed. I believe a similar situation exists within the RSPCA. I also think the race angle, which has just appeared yesterday, and seems to originate with the BBC, is a red herring.

Since like everyone else, I don't really have enough knowledge of the affair, I will say no more than that on the subject.

PS except this brief addition.
Simon Webb has just put some numbers to the situation.
He says 35% of those prosecuted were minority ethnic, whilst overall 45 % of employed postmasters were such. That means that they are in fact statistically under represented in the totals.