In order to stay in the war against Germany 1939-41 and then to go on and make a major contribution to victory alongside the USA the UK had to produce huge quantities of industrial and agricultural product in these islands.
Peak production of aircraft was over 25,000 in a year, 250 major naval ships in a year, with millions of tonnes of new merchant ships. UK yards built 58 aircraft carriers during the war. There were big technical breakthroughs including radar, jet engines, a wooden warplane, bouncing bombs, and mulberry harbours.
The country got by with rationing of food combined with a dig for victory policy and the women’s land army.
Today a government who says we need to mend our defences delights in driving farmers out of business and in subsidising other uses for land than food growing. It runs down our industries, driving orders abroad by insisting on high energy prices and carbon taxes.
Where we had more than 50 aircraft carriers today we have just two, albeit much bigger and more sophisticated than many of the WW2 models. Where we could make 25,000 aircraft in a year today we would be hard pressed to build 25, and then only by relying on substantial imported components and raw materials. Our farmland has contracted as we become ever more dependent on imported food.
Before promising to deploy troops we do not have and to buy weapons we need the UK government needs to change its energy , business and industrial policies so we can make much for ourselves. It needs to actively back and promote self sufficiency in energy and temperate foodstuffs.
January 11, 2026
Absolute yes to all you say.
Fast forward to Jeremy Clarkson and all he has created based on 1000 acres of Diddly Squat. Now reported as a 75 million business despite all the efforts of nimby local councils to stop it happening. It may not be the solution for all farms but it is inspiringly positive. I think the lesson for all farms is to take greater control of the whole process of getting food out of the ground and onto the table.
Supermarkets should be seen as predatory. Local government as negatively blimpish. Food education as none existent. Current national government as an occupational, traiterous, alien power of no use to UK man nor beast.
January 11, 2026
Well yes but the Clarkson business is not a farming business but one of making TV programmes which then also act as endless adverts for his pub, beer, farm shop, brands, books…
Good luck to him. Not easy to run anything when the government, employment laws, planning laws, energy rules, wars on car users, tax laws, pub banters… are so against him and everyone.
https://diddlysquatfarmshop.com/?srsltid=AfmBOoqAeQzGuaO8ojFGB1CT69u2vdqCeYqlIrzWEhuH6dUdzQjwOt7r
January 11, 2026
John Cleese criticises the the BBC over their lack of coverage of the events in Iran. Well said Joh the BBC get almost everything wrong Net Zero, Energy, Climate Alarmism, Iran, the EU, the size of the state, anti-semitism, two tier justice, free speech…essentially they are rather like the appalling Two Tier himself!
January 11, 2026
Clarkson’s profile as former presenter of Top Gear and his journalism/books bears no resemblance to the reality of farming for the vast majority of small family farmers.
He’s done a magnificent job but it’s been achieved via TV entertainment, not farming.
January 11, 2026
“The UK needs to rebuild its farming and industrial capacity”
True. However, as with previous daily suggestions, we all know it is not going to happen anytime soon.
Farming might be the easier task providing the land is not built over and disincentives are removed.
January 11, 2026
My Lord,
I completely agree with you and have advocated so to anyone who will listen.
The other problem I see is that, we have been losing the necessary skills over the last couple of decades. Where are our engineers now? Where are our power workers? Our ship builders? Our aero engineers? We no longer have the skilled people nor the facilities.
Even if we had the people and facilities, how on earth would we power these factories etc.?
The EU and Starmer are completely deluded if they think they are a major force in the world, more a major farce.
January 11, 2026
When I studied electronic engineering, there was a rigorous covering of circuit theory, mathematics, solid state physics and field theory. Such subjects are now considered too tough for today’s students so the material has to be simplified so they won’t be put off. The result is students graduate and present themselves to employers with a poor understanding of their subject. This has been going on for decades. Universities won’t fail poor students because they lose funding.
Going on to industrial training, large electronics companies used to have training schemes for undergraduates in conjunction with their academic studies. Employers used to see their trainees leave after a couple of years post-graduation, so became disillusioned about making the investment. Today any employer investing in training engineers is in a mug’s game, as all their hard work will be reaped by another employer that doesn’t make the investment.
The engineers that understood their subject are now approaching retirement if they haven’t already done so, and most of them have forgotten what they learnt.
January 11, 2026
Indeed but the subject has moved on so quickly other than the basic physics. After my maths & physics I did some solid state physics and electronics but even as they were teaching it the books and lecturers were often out of date. I remember 8K bytes of non volatile memory taking up about cubic inch of space and costing about £100 (prob about £300 in today’s money). No you can probably get 8 million trillion bytes in less space and prob. for less money, also using far less power and with far faster access speeds and far more reliable. Overall perhaps circa million, million, million, million times improvement in just 45 years. Alas over the same 45 years batteries only about 4 times better, cars perhaps 10 times better per £1 spent, government generally worse (and much of what they do is not even positive), Lawyers probable worse too in value for money!
They have often used more efficient IT and engineering to make things ever more complex and generally worse for the public and clients!
January 11, 2026
We have a generational gap (maybe two) in basic ‘practical’ skills. We needed those Polish plumbers and bullders, not just because of a manpower shortage but because of a serious skills shortage (coupled to an unwillingness to do physical work) in our own young. Blair’s half-brained idea that we could (needed to) educate half our youth to degree level standards has only worsened this situation. We’ve produced thousands of young people (up to their neck in debt) with no useful skills to show for their time & effort, who are effectively unemployable.
Meanwhile, Polytechnics shut down their basic skills and apprenticeship schemes and rebranded themselves as “Univerities” (Reading, Bath, Oxford, Southampton etc). It looked good on paper but it seemed completely unplanned, with no direction (as far as I can tell) from central Government. Another source of trained personnel used to be the armed forces. Ex-military technicians were highly prized by industry. They had both the skills and the work attitudes employers need. This is still true of course (as skilled men give up on the military and just leave for civilian life) but they are not being replaced. Another source of skilled personal gone.
This is a serious issue for the UK both in the short and longer term, when we need to rebuild our capabilities to exist as a functioning society. Degrees in Anthropology and Medieval Art are all very nice but don’t contribute anything to our economy. So why allow more than a handful of students to study them.
Start managing our education and training system to deliver the skills we actually need, in the quantities we need and stop relying on importing people to fill foreseeable gaps. Incentivise the young to study useful degrees and practical qualifications (such as abolishing student debt in key strategic areas). Stop subsidising any educational establishment that isn’t offering useful/practical skills. If people want a degree in Ancient Greek History, thrn fine but don’t susidise it. We don’t need hundreds of Historians when we don’t have enough Chemists, Engineers and Medics, not to mention heating engineers and EV technicians.
January 11, 2026
Stop subsidising any educational establishment that isn’t failing 35% of students by grading on the curve.
January 11, 2026
Pay rates do not reflect this lack of supply . My son, an NHS doctor in London, 6 years at UNI and slightly better A levels than his two flat mates (just 3 year degree) earns about half the pay for the other two in Law and Banking. Top Cambridge engineering in say Aero-Space certainly when up North can struggle to earn as much as £80,000 even when at the top of their careers!
The NHS is a virtual monopoly employers so can get away with poor pay and conditions. Engineers often have work outsourced to say India or China or import cheaper engineers. Also if you are specialist engineering (say a jet engine or aircraft wing designer) you might only have one employer in your area or even country! So again wages are suppressed.
January 11, 2026
Yes indeed but we can have no serious defence systems nor a sensible economy with the mad policies of Zealot Miliband and this government. Also who will want to defend a country that has two tier justice, open borders, DEI racist recruitment and wars on motorists, free speech, private school users, industry, the self employed, the rich and hardworking. They wants to bring in an evil law preventing all criticism of a religion and a banter law so business owners can be sued if a worker hears a customer saying thinks he does not agree with related to
Protected characteristics.
A protected characteristic is a personal trait legally safeguarded from discrimination, with the nine key ones in the UK (under the Equality Act 2010) being age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage/civil partnership, pregnancy/maternity, race, religion/belief, sex, and sexual orientation; employers and service providers must not treat someone less favourably because of these.
The statement being in jest or even being entirely true is no defence. How can a bus operator or pub owner control what their customers say that might be over heard by someone who takes offence. Do we really want our free speech to be controlled in this appalling way. Free speech is certainly not remotely safe under this truly appalling PM.
January 11, 2026
the uk has less than 80 artillery pieces now of which less than 10 are 155 mm guns. we couldn’t fight any other nation.
protected characteristics misses class, which is why discrimination against the white working class is routine. it should be replaced with a general requirement to be meritocratic. the human rights commission charged with prosecuting breaches needs much more equal representation in its own ranks, ie a lot more people from white working class backgrounds.
January 11, 2026
Good morning.
And for that you need cheap energy. And to have cheap energy you need to get rid of the Climate Change Act and a whole slew of other laws and agreements. President Trump has done that and it is said that they are heading for a growth rate of over 5%.
He seems to know what he is doing.
January 11, 2026
If we look at photos from the old days WW2 people looked so skinny compared to today and that in itself should tell us something – that if we are to survive in an emergency we need to grow enough of the essentials to get by – if you want to know what the essentials are just look at any corner shop from the early 1950’s. However what we can’t grow of course we have to import but then we need our own merchant ships so we don’t have to depend on others – just for a start.
January 11, 2026
Nobody would disagree with trying to rebuild the industrial base of the country. Unfortunately, we are more interested in shooting badgers and chasing foxes (accidentally) with hounds than farming.
I cannot remember the last time a Chancellor mentioned manufacturing, or exports, during their budget speech. The UK has recorded a deficit in its current account every year since 1984
So who is going to pay for it? Nobody wants to invest in our bankrupt, basket-case economy
January 11, 2026
Why would anyone want to invest in a bankrupt- basket-case economy which has been destroyed with the Net Zero Insanity when the people who are implementing the deliberate destruction are doubling-down on the lunacy, not scrapping it?
January 11, 2026
@Donna
Net zero is the British industrial opportunity of the 21st century. The sector is expanding strongly, with the 10% growth in 2024 following a 9% jump in 2023.
The Confederation of British Industry issued a report in 2024 strongly in favour of the net zero sector. Their detailed analysis showed unequivocally that the green sector is growing three times faster than the overall UK economy, providing high-wage jobs across the country, while cutting climate changing emissions and increasing the UK’s energy security
The CBI report showed that the net zero economy grew by 10% in 2024 and generated £83bn in added value. 22,000 net zero businesses now employ almost a million people in full-time jobs. The average annual wage in the businesses – £43,000 – was also £5,600 higher than the national average. The report analysed the growth attributable to businesses working in renewable energy, electric vehicles, heat pumps, energy storage, green finance and waste management and recycling.
Farage, Tice and their anti-swans Reform head bangers oppose net zero, apeing Trump’s pro-fossil fuel views. Their message is clear; vote Reform and destroy a million well paid green jobs and British leadership in the sector
January 11, 2026
All based on massive subsidies, transferring wealth from “the little people” to Corporations and vested interests.
January 11, 2026
The reason no one wants to invest in UK industry is because we have the world’s highest energy prices because of the Net Zero policies you support.
January 11, 2026
Once again gold is soaring to record highs. An ounce of the yellow metal could be sold on Friday for £3364
Now is an excellent time to buy a pre-owned Tesla. Due to Musk’s unpopular dalliance with Trump – which cost him a $200m contribution to his campaign funds – sales of new Tesla vehicles are slumping right across Europe and the world.
(Second hand 3 year old ones are cheap? )
Using an Ultra-Rapid 150kW public charger you could get a range of about 340 miles and an 80% charge in about half an hour. Time to get a coffee and a chat with other Tesla afficionados. What a bargain!!
Reply I do not publish adverts.How long would a battery last in a 3 year old battery car and what is the cost of replacement?
January 11, 2026
@ JR – reply
Tesla UK battery warranty lasts for 8 years, guaranteeing at least 70% battery capacity for 100,000 miles for the standard Model 3/Y or 120,000 miles for the long range Performance model 3/Y and an outstanding 150,00 – 240,000 miles for the new Model S/X. Depending on the agreement with the dealer at purchase
The warranty is transferable to a subsequent owner. You have to look after the battery, as you would for a mobile phone (20% to 80% charging unless for emergencies) Plus, to keep the warranty active a Tesla dealer needs to check the battery each year. Tesla have lots of Ultra Rapid charging points on all major UK routes
Not sure of replacement battery costs for a second hand one, but a new 75kWh battery for a Model 3 Long Range would be roughly £6500 if it failed after the 8 years/100,000 miles because it had not been properly looked after.
I’ve never heard of anyone having to replace a Tesla battery unless it was physically damaged by a crash.
January 11, 2026
Dream on a new 100% battery with new 8 year warranty will cost at least double that £6500 perhaps even triple! Even a small crash can write off an EV car see the insurance cost on them.
Finance and depreciation plus extra tyre wear, extra insurance likely to cost you £1 a mile on a medium size new EV. My old cars more like 25p and over that about 10p is fuel tax not paid. By the EV yet!
Plus they generally cause more CO2 not less if that bother you! And more tyre particulates too.
January 11, 2026
Have you not seen the man on YouTube who blew up his Tesla with dynamite because the cost of replacing the battery was 20,000 + euros?
January 11, 2026
The competitors are better deals…..first keep your ICE car for as long as it functions fully. Second look to Tesla competitors, the ground models merely paved the way.
January 11, 2026
The trouble that this Labour government is too stupid to understand any of this. They are totally superglued to their socialist dogma. Today, socialism is totally incompatible with Britain, or anywhere else for that matter.
January 11, 2026
I fully agree Sir John, although sending troops now is preferable to waiting for an enemy to reach our own back door.
January 11, 2026
Sending troops where? To do what?
Perhaps you mean send them where c. 40,000 undocumented males of fighting age per year are coming in through the front door.
January 11, 2026
I agree with your views. When asked if he supported Starmer’s commitment to send troops to Ukraine in the event of a peace deal, Nigel Farage replied “What troops? What kit?” The UK’s capacity to produce just about anything has been completely gutted over the past few decades,. Deliberate government policy, high taxes, unnecessary regulation have all contributed. There is no hope of it being recreated. It will take a generation for ths UK to reinvent itself as a technically advanced, prosperous country. And only then if it has a government that knows what it is about, has a clear objective to do so and can break through the entrenched opposition to change that it will face. There are opportunities out there. AI tools and agents will enable both dark factories and dark offices in the future for those that with the wit and knowhow to apply them. Whether the capital and appetite for risk exists to support it on a large scale in highly taxed UK must be a matter of doubt.
January 11, 2026
They had to get rid of all our troops to provide space in the barracks for all the illegals coming in.
January 11, 2026
We need to do so many things Sir John but we are not going to do so under these people – and (unfortunately) under many of the alternatives. It’s going to be a very long, frustrating wait for change I’m afraid and even then, very little certainty of practical improvement.
January 11, 2026
The benefits of being self sufficient in manufacturing and re establishing healthy key industries like Steel Cement Glass and and Energy is the additional advancements having such industries brings to society.
The opportunity to develop better everything only exists if core skills are in place to advance ideas. Our education systems also benefit because we develop teaching methods to convey new knowledge through out technical colleges and universities.
It is a no brainer to redevelop manufacturing and farming/fishing, both sectors where we have historically excelled . The benefits are not just seen directly in those areas themselves. Support activities like insurance, commerce and finance also advance.
Why is the drive for service industries among government influencers so blinkered? Why do policy makers fail to champion core industries, the benefits to the treasury are so obvious?
If Rachel had actual industries to tax she might leave our pubs and workers alone…….
January 11, 2026
governments of all the main parties have socially engineered a country which they hoped would pay its way in the world by selling financial services internationally, selling education to the rest of the world, and sold rock music to the rest of the world. that was their vision, that is what they have been aiming for, together with a massive indulgent inefficient public sector. and that is pretty much where we are. that and ultra premium, ultra specialised goods, like morgan cars, are all we have.
January 11, 2026
Government reminds me of a song from the 1950s “Why do fools fall in love? (with unobtainable objectives).
January 11, 2026
Starmer has really generated a lot of songs on YouTube.
Danny Finkelstein too. Moonlighting from ‘The Times’ with a catchy dance video. The man with the moustache throwing shapes is a modern day Fred Astaire
January 11, 2026
The country has watched as successive PMs and their divided parties have presided over the UK plunging down the league tables of abilities of most industries, and factors of modern life which added together make a country a place to be proud of and offering a pleasant standard of living. We no longer figure in importance in almost everything, bar our physical location separate from the European mainland and indeed Russia. That has always been an attraction to the ‘homeland defence’ mentality of USA and most Presidents.
We have created the strange idea that a fresh start can be made here by all the world’s refugees, or in truth those who will do almost anything to find an economic miracle for their future, yet being able to bring their culture and religious beliefs with them, ignoring and often protesting that absorption is their right.
We witness only encouragement in these aims expecting the earlier citizens to happily accept their position reduced to bit part players in the social change and upheaval for many.
January 11, 2026
The original aims of the EEC was to make European nations completely interdependent: it’s why the original Treaty focused on the production of Coal (ie energy); Steel (essential for munitions and a great deal else); Agriculture. The EU is creating a Socialist/Corporatist United States of Europe. Two-Tier supports the aims of the EU and is completely obsessed with implementing the original objectives. Watch what he’s done/is doing:
1. Gave away our fishing waters for 12 years for NOTHING in return (thereby destroying what remains of our fishing industry)
2. Fanatically implementing Net Zero, which is destroying our manufacturing capability and denying us our own secure/reliable sources of energy. Signed us up to the EU’s Emissions and Carbon trading CON
3. Is about to sign us up to automatic alignment with the EU’s Food and Agriculture Regulations, thereby making it impossible to agree/maintain deals with Nations outside the EU
4. Is promoting/participating in EU foreign policy objectives, to the detriment of our relationship with the USA
5. Is signalling our retrenchment from “the world” and future focus on Europe with the Chagos Treachery
He is deliberately making it impossible for us to defend these islands and he is deliberately choosing the EU over the USA …. ignoring the wise words of Churchill “If Britain must choose between Europe and the open sea, she must always choose the open sea,”
January 11, 2026
yep our own governments destroyed our own fishing industry, and are actively stopping its renewal. they should stop and impose our borders for the benefit of our own people. 15 quid for fish and chips is ridiculous, break down where that money is going and it is staggering.
January 11, 2026
The ‘Original Treaty’ of Rome is unchanged.
It envisioned a single country called Europe devoid of the English characteristics of Democracy and Capitalism.
We were warned. We were tricked. We wanted to believe that all the evil had been concentrated in a little corporal who was dead and that our neighbouring continent was peopled by ‘our friends and partners’.
Self delusion and wishful thinking has brought it’s just reward.
I don’t think Britain can recover. People of quality who remain are suppressed, silenced, sidelined and alienated.
We have lived through The Fall of Britain.
However our successor nation has a fighting chance of carrying our precious baton, the flame of all things the British historically cherished, fought and died to protect, successfully into the future.
It will provide a homeland for the genius of the future generations of those people who built the modern world. It needs to be secure and prosperous.
Trump is making a great start.
January 11, 2026
Agreed Donna.
He also has started making joint statements with the EUSSR over matters of a military nature for example, the latest idea of sending troops to Greenland. My question is to defend from whom? Russia? China? The United States? All the aforementioned?
January 11, 2026
You’d imagine that even a government with no experience and limited ability could work out that feeding our people, providing enough energy and keeping them safe from invasion would be the absolute priorities.
Yet, HMG is far more interested in getting boots into the Ukraine war than it is about safeguarding us. Clearly there is a hidden agenda at play here.
Net-0 rules when it comes down to converting farms to fields of so called renewable energy creators, while supermarket shelves start to go empty, noticeably.
So what are our prospects – I fear we will never have another GE if we do join the Ukraine war, while we at home will be ‘expected’ to ‘surrender’ more freedoms with no choice but survival rations and ever more pain, restrictions, starvation and lack of purpose.
January 11, 2026
I’m wondering if actually HMG just wants to send our troops anywhere, so long as they are out of the country.
Then the takeover can be ‘peaceful’.
That’s their best hope.
They hope to lose the country without much bloodshed.
January 11, 2026
Three comments:
i) if you can get your message woven into the messaging now coming from Kemi Badenoch, I am confident that the combination will be an election winner, particularly if the need for resilience is emphasised – the combined messaging will require examples of the UK landscape envisioned (see ii)).
Ii) technology has progressed hugely in 80 years, so there are benefits in the UK having to make a fresh start to manufacturing, farming etc. Examples include vertical farming, the emergence of new performance materials (eg graphene, composites etc – I have seen a shell case made of composite rather than metal) and the emergence of new approaches to long established production processes (eg foundries – see Foundry Lab (www.foundrylab.com)).
Iii) training up a suitable workforce is achievable by getting companies to work with schools. I know of a carbon ceramic business working with two local schools to introduce pupils to STEM – the engineers are enjoying the interaction with the pupils, and the flow of apprentices and graduates into the workforce has started.
The future can look bright!
January 11, 2026
Labour doesn’t understand farming at all. Labour is an urban/industrial party who have never really represented agricultural constituencies and so regard them as the enemy. I was brought up in a fairly impoverished farming area and we always had Conservative or Liberal MPs. Labour think all farmers are wealthy because they multiply the area of the land they own by a nominal price for that land so they are seen as fair game.
January 11, 2026
energy needs to be cheaper, anti pollution rules need to be in the top quartile of the world and not the most expensive one percent, safety rules need to be in the top ten percent of rules worldwide and not the most expensive one percent, tarrifs need to be applied to countries making stuff in more polluting and less safe ways than we do, the state needs to protect British intellectual property much more strongly, we need to stop outsourcing to cheaper cost base countries which dont follow our rules, we need to stop import of poor quality workforces. we need to protect this country, but stop all the state social engineering within it. we need a radical improvement in education systems. we need to cut the size of the state, and hand far more power and decision making over to individuals in all aspects of their lifes.
January 11, 2026
IT’s beginning to feel like I’m living in a third world country with all the stupidity enacted by Starmer and his rabble.
My mood has not been helped by waking this moning to discover we have no water…………………
January 11, 2026
John
Completely agree with your headline, it should be an absolute no brainer, but unfortunately our politicians of all colours, and our Education system, have done their best over the last 30 years to think the exactly the opposite.
January 11, 2026
From a senior military man “Oh, we can fight for about three weeks then we’ll have to go nuclear”. That was the plan in the ’80s and still is. Ladies making shells on capstan lathes whilst smoking a Woodbine is history.
The guided weapon and the nuclear bomb wiped away all that old fashioned 1000 bomber raid nonsense. Now 999 bombers would be shot down before they got near. Observe the Russia/Ukraine conflict. Even Mr Trump is scared of a nuclear bomb. Just one would destroy his voting prospects forever. Stick to non-nuclear foes.
WW2 absorbed all our coal mining, iron making and factory capacity. No new cars, no new radios or telly, no new frying pans or cooking pots, no new railway trains. OK if you have an active war on but you can’t run a civilian economy and a warmongering economy economy at the same time. So we threaten to go nuclear, with a quivering upper lip.
We are all accountants and lawyers and spreadsheet jockeys now. Can calculate how many bombs and how much in a trice – but making them is outsourced. Outsourcing has been the economic mantra for the last 50 years or more. The bottom line is we don’t and can’t do war any more. The nuke and the guided missile and the outsourcing consultant took that option away.
In 1939 we imported 70% of our food. Farming still used horses and was under-invested. Rationing helped (look at any supermarket trolley) but Dig For Victory did more for morale than bellies. Now we import rather less – about 50%, so if you want to start a war bring it on – we can take it. Anyway we can manufacture food pills from recycled waste.
Mr Miliband is doing his best with self sufficiency but as with my gardening efforts – it is hardly worthwhile.
January 11, 2026
Correct Sir John. But the current Net Zero policy is deliberately devised to de-industrialise, impoverish, destroy our national security and make us dependent upon both China (goods) and the EU (food). Socialism depends upon making and keeping people poor.
January 11, 2026
wonder how many days left before Elon offers cheap Starlink, with bundled VPN, for people in the UK to access twitter without having to go through the UK Telco hubs, so completely unstoppable by clueless politicians in the UK even if they wanted…
January 11, 2026
I would contend that the business plan for farming has not been very well thought out. Compare it with the motor industry that operates cradle(raw material) to grave(service life) of its product, choosing its profit centres as it sees fit.
Farming produces raw material, and with but a few exceptions, has no input on what happens after that material exits the farm gate. This leaves the farmer very vulnerable to those who profit in transit to the dining table.
A farmer producing potatoes only has a strong profitable position when the rest of the world’s potato industry suffers disaster, and the supermarkets can no longer dictate price. Much better if farmers or their cooperatives create an end product and market it. Crisps, Rosti, Chips, or Dauphinoise for instance , sold online. The whole process from farm to dining table needs restructuring.
Jeremy Clarkson is but one way this restructuring has come about in his specific circumstances. You use the tools in the box. I remember him questioning what had happened to his possible inheritance from his ancestral family the Kilners ( Of jar fame). Considering his achievements, I would contend were inherited in his genes.
Reply Some farmers add value before selling the product. Some join co-ops to coordinate sales
January 11, 2026
I understand that the mosque responsible for a lot of the violence in Birmingham had a representative on the panel which selected the west midlands police chief constable, why?
January 11, 2026
Every winter we get the usual scaremongering from the fossil fuel lobby about “blackouts” caused by our investment in renewables. In case anybody hasn’t noticed, we don’t get blackouts – unless the weather damages the pylons
However, in the south east/south west people do get drinking water blackouts. Lots of them, which last for weeks at a time. Following which the public has to boil their water, which is expensive, South East Water then pays their CEO a fortune to appear in front of the parliamentary committee and say its not his fault, despite his huge 2025 bonus
It seems inevitable that the privatised water industry is going to have to be re-nationalised. Unfortunately this will not happen until the inevitable outbreak of cholera, caused by sewage leaking into the potable water supply.
Re-nationalising the sewage dumping industry without compensation would be popular with Labour MPs. The private equity firms who bought the industry when Michael Howard sold it to them in 1986 have had their investment back in dividends several times over. They make at least 35% of the average water bill in profits. Time the customers got their asset back
Reply The old nationalised industry dumped more sewage and didnt even monitor it and tell us. Regular need for water rationing, hose pipe bans,stand pipes in streets etc. Nationalising without compensation is theft which would deter future inward investment. Returns much lower than you say as the industry has price controls.
January 11, 2026
Not just manufacturing capacity but reliant on others for technology. The 25,000 aircraft built during World War 2 and the ships weren’t controlled by other countries’ operating systems.
Aircraft and ships are much more sophisticated these days (as are nuclear plants) and we have fallen behind in all these areas.
Growth my @£$€