This began as an update to the piece I put out a few days ago. But it grew too big. So I had to admit that the only way to do it properly was as a follow-up, a second part. Which explains what you’re about to read.
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LEO FROM THE OLD SCHOOL
A source, someone who’s given me some good stuff in the past, tells me a name to watch for in relation to the Tramshed and other matters is Leonora ‘Leo’ Thomson. She already plays a big role, and may have an even bigger role in future.
Leonora Thomson was educated at Oakham School, and then Leeds University, where she did philosophy. Yet another product of a public school helping to fill the thinning ranks of Labour in Wales.
One day I might put aside some time and see just how many of them there are. For now, I’ll just remind you of two.
There’s Senedd Member Jenny Rathbone of the uber wealthy Rathbone dynasty, who goes big on the environment, and whose partner, John Uden, was given a sinecure by Bute Energy, which wants to cover Wales in wind turbines and pylons.
And of course, there’s the Green Goddess herself, Jane Davidson, who wrote the Well-being of Future Generations legislation that dictates so many of the restrictions on our personal freedoms, and also the damage being done to our economy.
What was once the party of the Welsh working class has to keep applying an increasingly unconvincing Welsh veneer as it falls further under the control of pressure groups, fanatics, sexual deviants, and career politicians.
Among them we find the privately-educated, conflicted between guilt at their privileged upbringing and the old impulse to shout at the natives.
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WHAT LEO DID NEXT
To help you start, here’s Leo’s Linkedin profile. It’s all media, arts, PR. Also a brief stint with the Metropolitan Police, plus 8 years as a Labour councillor in Ealing. All in London until she arrived in Cardiff, December 2015, to become managing director of the Welsh National Opera Company (WNO).
If you go to the About panel on Linkedin, and click on ‘see more’, you bring up what you see below. I’ve highlighted parts that I’ll be referring to as you read on.
There’s nothing listed after she ended her stint with the WNO in August 2019. What followed is partly explained in the image above, with the rest filled in as we go along. But now, let’s turn to another line of enquiry.
Here’s the relevant page from Companies House. There are some interesting entries there. Let’s go through them.
The oldest active directorship is with English Touring Opera Ltd. She joined 7 June, 2021. Less than two years after leaving the WNO.
On 18 November, 2021 Leo became a director of the Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales Ltd. Well, when I read that you could have knocked me down with an illegally-released-into-the-wild beaver!
Yet nothing I see in her background suggests an interest in flora and fauna. Truth is, this was a political appointment to an organisation the ‘Welsh Government’ wishes to use in its war on livestock farming.
In November 2021, with another woman, Thomson set up Studland Hill Ltd. This is a property management company in West Ealing, London. The other director gives as her address a house being renovated according to this Google map for January 2021.
On 23 March 2023 Thomson and three others set up Omidaze Productions Ltd in Penarth. Here’s the glossy website.
Once you read, “fairer and more equal society” you know it’s about leftist propaganda rather than theatre. More ‘Waiting for Gramsci’ than anything Beckett wrote.
Can’t help wondering where the money comes from, cos I’m damn sure Omidaze don’t pay for itself.
Monk Racing Ltd is an odd one. Formed in 2000 it’s always filed as dormant. The key to Thomson’s involvement is probably Anthony Kenneth Lewis, who was a founding director, and is the joint owner with her of a house on the Taff Embankment.
Lewis resigned from Monk Racing 9 April, 2023. Thomson joined 27 June, 2023.
There have been two stints where Leo served as a Labour councillor. The first you’ve already read about, from 1998 to 2006 in the London Borough of Ealing; and now, from May 2022 for the Riverside ward in Cardiff.
Given the Philistines in Labour’s ranks, both on Cardiff council and in the Senedd, I’m sure the comrades have deferred more than once to Thomson’s knowledge of the finer things in life.
‘How do ew spell opera, love?’
Though I’m beginning to wonder if Leonora Thomson is bad luck. Let me explain.
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HARD TIMES, FOR SOME
Towards the end of September last year, it was announced that the ‘Welsh Government’-controlled Arts Council was pulling the plug on the National Theatre of Wales (NTW).
In March we learnt that Thomson was joining as interim CEO. Having already served as Interim Joint Chief Executive from October 2019 to June 2021. And now NTW has moved to the Tramshed, a nest of Labour cronies and insiders.
Another body to lose funding recently was the WNO. Where Thomson was managing director for almost 4 years until August 2019. (Though I believe she returned in some kind of temporary capacity.)
Which means the WNO lost funding after Leonora Thomson had been involved, and while she was Chair at English Touring Opera. Seeing as the WNO performs at English venues some might see the WNO and the English company as competitors.
Though it’s difficult to explain these cuts to two such important cultural bodies as the WNO and NTW when one of their main funders, the Arts Council of Wales, saw its income increase by more than 50% in just 4 years.
Where did the extra money go? Surely it didn’t all go to Theatr Clwyd?
A third organisation to lose funding following an association with Leo Thomson is the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama and Creative Lives (RWCMD). She was working there in some unspecified ‘freelance’ role.
One organisation linked to Leonora Thomson suffering a funding cut, I could dismiss; two, I might, just, accept as coincidence; but three, and in such a short space of time? Do me a favour!
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UNDERMINE, TAKE CONTROL
What we’ve just looked at is a phenomenon I’ve seen regularly in recent years. I wrote about it a year ago in Taking Control, Of Everything. I focused then on the Welsh Rugby Union (WRU) and the Football Association of Wales (FAW).
It’s the ‘Welsh Government’s method for taking control of an organisation.
The first stage is to discredit and undermine the target organisation, maybe also those running it. (Sometimes with inside help.) Stage Two is the reduction or withdrawal of funding. Stage Three, the takeover; done through a combination of restored / increased funding and the appointment of politically loyal or malleable individuals to the organisation.
A bit like the CIA handbook for regime change.
What we’ve seen done to the WNO, NTW and RWCMD could only have been achieved with the assistance of the Arts Council of Wales; which had already undergone the same treatment.
I wrote about it back to August 2021.
First in Corruption Bay and a tale of Cymrophobia (23.08.2021). In which I reported that the Arts Council and the National Museum commissioned three reports in June 2020 to look into ‘widening engagement’.
To make sense of it, remember that George Floyd died the previous month and there was fierce competition as people fought to honour his memory capitalise on his death.
The three groups commissioned were:
An unregistered entity run by Labour insiders Lu Thomas and Jon Luxton.
Richie Turner Associates. Here’s the image then being used on his Linkedin page.
(Though the company of that name wasn’t formed until February 1, 2022.)
The third outfit commissioned was The Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union (WAARU). Which had no presence anywhere – yet its anonymously submitted report was accepted!
And remember! 31 other applicants were rejected in favour of these three.
The piece in which you’ll find these joys unalloyed was followed with Arts Council of Wales and Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union, an update (31.08.2021).
And then (06.09.2021) Welsh Arts Anti-Racist Union unmasked, in which I identified those behind WAARU. The usual mix of chip-on-shoulder race grifters and middle class leftists trying to live out their slogans.
Woke employees of Welsh national institutions collaborating with their Woke allies outside to discredit and undermine the organisations they worked for.
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FINALE: FITTING LEO INTO THE BIGGER PICTURE
The evidence might suggest that Leonora Hope Thomson has been employed by the ‘Welsh Government’ as some kind of hatchet woman; sent in to various bodies and asked to recommend ‘economies’ and ‘restructuring’.
Part of a pattern that sees ‘Welsh Government’ / ‘Welsh’ Labour, take control of our public, artistic, and sporting life. Done at the behest of the shrieky and the unhinged to promote the Woke agenda.
Which explains how we see Leo, and National Theatre Wales, of which she’s interim CEO, joining the migration to the Tramshed. Which is of course good news for the owner, Cardiff council (Labour); and the lessee, the Count of Abbasock (also Labour).
And it contributes to the circular economy of which I wrote in the previous piece.
Welcome to socialist Wales 2024. The circular economy, benefitting those lucky enough to be in the ‘circle’. Where there’s no private investment, and everything is state funded, but only those close to the ruling party can benefit.
And having mentioned Cardiff council, it’s worth adding that even though she was only elected in May 2022, Thomson, who hardly knows Cardiff, is now Chair of the council’s Labour group.
I wonder who decided to give her such rapid promotion?
I suggest we watch Leonora Hope Thomson, and the Tramshed with which she’s now linked. Both might have roles in the political and public life of Wales.
In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Leo’s name isn’t already pencilled in on one of the closed lists for the 2026 Senedd elections.
Finally, what I found perhaps most disturbing when writing this was that I had difficulty telling the Labour party and the ‘Welsh Government’ apart. They should be two clearly separate entities.
That they’ve effectively merged is, for me, confirmation that Wales is a one-party state.
♦ end ♦
© Royston Jones 2024
So we learn that Leo Thompson is someone we need to watch carefully. Well she hails from Oakham and Rutland is as Conservative as any place in the UK. So are Deep State
Freemasons disguised as Labour followers infiltrating the Welsh Labour ranks? It sure isn’t beyond the realms of likelihood bearing in mind how the Police Forces have been massively subverted to the cultists cause.
And when we read of the slightly obscured CV of Alex Barros-Curtis, new candidate for Cardiff West it is not difficult to understand that the obscurity is designed because people are beginning to realise that 95% of solicitors are Freemasons!! So when Plaid Cymru’s Sionid Williams states that Welsh Labour voters have a right to transparency what a complete change would have to be wrought in the Brotherhoods ranks to bring that to fruition. Secrecy is their watchword, their absolute key to success in gaining the occult governance they have attained particular over the last thirty or forty years. I wonder if Torsten Bell is a cultist. Good job there are people like you keeping an eye Jac.
When the Assembly was first set up there was a promise made that membership of the Freemasons would have to be declared along with other interests. It was soon dropped.
Which opened the door more widely to cronyism and nepotism, In my booklet Fight The Darkness I recently named three Labour Councillors in my Ward who never even answered my request for help in getting it published. Bring back true transparency and let us see who really governs us
Well I didn’t see BBC Wales on Monday 3rd June but if it was anything like the programme I saw years ago on Freemasonry then it would have been ultra insipid. Maybe that’s because the cult is so powerful in the media these days and so stifling of criticism of itself that democracy in the UK has now become truly bent. Even the Guardian fails democracy when it refuses to reflect real in depth criticism of The Brotherhood. And Murdoch has stitched up the rest. See my Blog WordPress.com antifreemasonry.blog. PERFECT CULTISTS.
On a similar tack but closer to home I was naive enough to think that Labour Councillors in Swansea would be motivated along similar lines to Aneuryn Bevan and Ernie Bevin but I find I am way out of touch. Being born in 1930 has many disadvantages.
In an ideal world these chumocratic organisations would be banned. The Masons, Orange Order, the Bullingdon Club. Any public servant’s involvement in them is a flagrant conflict of interest, much like how the twats are allowed to own stock portfolios. A five year old could grasp the concept that having a hand in policy and lawmaking concurrently is tantamount to insider trading.
I absolutely agree with you David. It takes me back to Ernie Marples, one time transport minister who introduced parking meters and made a packet from being well invested in the production of same. His punishment was a beating from one of the Profumo prostitutes which presumably made life even more enjoyable.
The proletariat are disadvantaged from birth and the elite parasite from them without conscience.
Marples was the real villain of the Beeching Axe too, the utter bastard. Shares held in a road company so he signs off on wholesale vandalism of Britain’s railways, to the scale of which many places never recovered from, and further entrenching Londoncentrism. I can only hope Beelzebub is sodomising him personally for all eternity.
Wow! I had no idea and of course it would have greatly increased the number of parking meters. Reminds one of the picture of Goering rubbing his hands every time Hitler invaded another country with the ensuing plundering adding to his personal wealth
I take some solace in that while these fucks almost never get a proper comeuppance, they all care about their legacies such is their ego, so die knowing their reputation is in the toilet.
Just so sir. Now, who you gonna vote for David? Jac must be in real distress. For a Welsh patriot to even consider voting Conservative I think he needs some feminine brow stroking. Either that or some intravenous Jack Daniel’s by the pint.
I hesitate to state that I’m English in his blog but transparency above all, as the vicar said as he removed his silk neglige.
Im gonna upset him further by yearning for the good old pre-Brexit days when Farage was a mere irritation, the pound had some value and we had some standing in Europe and the world. Look at us now. Broke. Scared stiff that NATO will fall apart if Trump does the unthinkable and now introducing a kind of ersatz Boy Scout National Service.
Over to your explosion Jac!
At the moment, I’m thinking of holding my nose and voting Reform.
Well at least Farage admits the error of his Brexit influencing. If only he would stop giving the impression of suffering from galloping Narcissism and flirting with weirdo Trump, people have more respect
Living on Anglesey, and having had an attack of the pragmatistics, I may, having thought a bit about it, vote for Virginia Crosbie, the English (gasp!) Conservative (gasp!) incumbent. The one thing she has in her favour is she at least makes the right noises as regards inward investment and growing the local economy, and she seems to be very much in touch with her constituents, holding surgeries and delivering news pamplets through the letterbox regularly, which I cannot recall any previous post holders ever bothering to do.
Perhaps also the appeal of doing so is it being another way to confound expectations of what a Welsh Republican should be like. Anglophone, living in a port town, spent most of my working years in England, and given how barmy left-wing politics has become these days, most probably objectively a small-c conservative; and now, actually voting for the big ‘C’s themselves!
It does make me laugh though, given that modern day Conservatives are sons of Thatcher and not of the older One Nation sort, their creed being limited government, personal liberty and individualism, they see fit to basically have the state steal one of your best years in service to it. That is one hell of a circle to square in my reckoning, as unlike other Ayd Rand turning-in-grave events like Robin Hood taxes and capital flight which are reversible, time is the only commodity in this life you cannot buy, sell or replenish.
Ah, now you’re talking! Republic of Britain and a separate Rep. of a United Ireland. That would put a smile on my face before the clogs are made redundant. As to local politics I wrote to Councillors Fiona Gordon, Hanna Lawson and Patience Bentu for a bit of advice and have never heard from one of them.
They are all too well dressed not to be Freemasons or affiliates of same. So vote for altruists by all means, the Mammon worshippers sicken me.
Incidentally I was at the Loggerheads near Mold with a David Pritchard from Anglesey in 1941. We were evacuees. He was very pleasant lad. Like me he’d be about ninety four if still quick.
By Welsh Republican I actually mean the full breakup of the UK into four closely-cooperating states. Ideally all republics and the monarchy binned for good where it belongs but independence is the priority rather than a United Republic. Interesting that they’d evacuate a lad from relatively sparsely populated Anglesey to Mold with all industry and largeish towns nearby, and over the border plenty more large towns and a few fair sized cities, all within a 50-60 mile radius.
Not sure where Pritchard was evacuated from . His mother was nursing in London during the blitz so maybe he had been living there. I was evacuated from Liverpool during some pretty intensive unloading from the Hun. The Loggerheads was a converted holiday camp. It was a beautiful place
My preference will always be a full united Republican Britain with no semblance of a modern if invisible Offa’s Dyke or Hadrian’s wall.
Look how authoritarian Orban in a country of only 10,000,000 people thwarted for a year the desires of the EU in respect of NATO membership for Sweden and wants to see Ukraine subjugated by tyrant Putin.
Real unity is real strength and Putins specious reason for his war, of the threat of NATO , is as false as Judas. NATO is a defence organisation and has never been an aggressor so I think the Federalists have a point.
As for Ireland, time to right the wrongs of our forefathers
The problem is that England is 18 times our size. We do not have democracy in Wales, which is an affront to our nationhood. The sheer arithmetic dictates that England will always get its way, Tryweryn being a pertinent example. How about them pissing in our pocket and telling us it’s raining with HS2 being deemed an EnglandAndWales project funding-wise, but curiously not an All-Great Britain (or UK) one?
The Union is a busted flush. I want to remake Great Britain as a house with three adults living in it. We will always be a family of nations, and shared history and ties do not disappear upon mutual statehood. I’d probably favour a breakup into a mini-EU type arrangement with open borders and cooperation on matters of shared interest. The idea is the good bits of our relationships are retained, and the bad bits binned. A good analogy would be how an unhappy marriage can be ended to blossom into a beautiul friendship.
To dually address your point about strength in unity and your reference to the Ukraine war: perhaps Ukraine should rejoin Russia in a USSR sequel, as that would demonstrate this apparent unifiying strength and deliver peace, surely? Perhaps though, things ain’t that simple. I didn’t catch what you meant by ‘federalists’ either.
Yes the Mini EU is Ok. The difference with a federation would be that Orban or any other individual state would not have a veto that scuppers the main interest.
I think you would have to discuss with Zelensky the remerging of Ukraine and Russia. That is pretty alien to me.
The flip side to that argument is illustrated by the EU referendum, as we all know done on an all-UK basis, and in which the wills of Scotland and Northern Ireland were effectively silenced by the heft of the English vote.
Not to say the British expats who had no vote at all.
But us humans are a complex lot, the herd instinct pulls us one way then the tribalism takes over. Would the Gauleiters still be strutting the streets of Britain if Scotland or Wales or even both as real independents had favoured fascism back in ‘39?
Starmer commits to recognising a Palestinian State. Perhaps he can offer advice to their leadership about containing and eliminating criminal pseudo political enterprises who prefer the “freedoms” offered by international terrorism.
P.S Plaid got its knickers in a knot, again, by selecting a supporter of Hamas’ indiscriminate violence as candidate for the GE. Don’t they undertake any kind of check on prospective candidates’ declared sympathies ? Or are they just worried about too many native blokes who don’t wear frocks applying?
Plaid’s been here before with Leanne Wood’s friend Sahar Al-Faifi. No political party in a secular Western country, preaching democracy and openness, should even consider having a candidate – even a member – who chooses to dress like that. It betrays that person’s outlook, that person’s attitudes towards Western liberal democracy, as clearly as someone in a fetching brown ensemble with a swastika armband.
Especially when dressed up in black from top to toe and strutting his/her stuff carrying an AK47. The more clinically insane topup the ensemble with a tailored waistcoat with all sorts of “fireworks” attached !
This congnitively dissonant cunts no doubt spout off about feminism, yet will also defend the ‘rights’ of that daft bint (Arabic for daughter) to dress like a bank robber for backward reasons of ‘modesty’.
On other stylistic fronts there’s a whinge afoot in the States to do with black people wanting to wear dreadlocks, cornrows and other such ‘culturally expressive’ hairdos in formal work environments. Personally I’d avoid representation by a lawyer with a Snoop Dogg Barnet, just as much as I would by one sporting any other hairstyles of ‘cultural significance’ such as a rats’ tail, mullet, or for the ladies, multicoloured and partially shorn.
..like Busy Lizzie a.k.a LSR who seems to have gone for a variety of “cultural expressions” of late.
You’d have thought the associations her middle name evoke would have her dropping it from her official moniker.
Llol..
Duw, duw, there’s a bit of a noise over on N.C just cos the infamous agitator Farage has opted to stand at a constituency over in the Far East of Southern Engerland. Can hear voices howling “we’re doomed, we’re doomed” when in reality I don’t think the bloke will have half the effect that these pillocks fear. He may be good at stirring up a single issue but he’s now proved that he can’t be asked to follow through on anything. If Welsh people want to poke the Establishment in the eye then find candidates that are standing for Gwlad or Propel and let the Faragists do their utmost to create their vision of a New Order beyond Y Clawdd.
Gwlad don’t stand for Westminster elections
Can’t blame them. Focussing on cleaning out that gutter down the Bay and the trash in it is a big enough challenge. Looks like there’s nobody worth the bother in the UK GE.
I shall be casting a spoilt ballot. Perhaps with a naughty word written. I’ll never vote for a Unionist party ever again. That is my expression as a voter.
Another excellent article Jac following on from the last one…
I was wondering looking at BBC programme…
How a Welsh senior Labour party is wealthy enough to repay & lend the £200,000 to pay back the donation….
Where did his/her ill gotten gains come from & what favours could they expect in return….
Vaughan Gething: Firm linked to criminal probe donated to first minister – BBC News
BBC Wales Investigates: A Big Stink is available on iPlayer and BBC One Wales at 20:00 BST on Monday 3 June
I shall watch it
Amazed that BBC went anywhere near lifting the lid on this crock of smelly gunk. Must have been frightened by prospect of ITV getting ahead of them.
On the theme of Big Stinks I think you are on to something when restating the links between the witch Rathbone, her bed warmer ( tough job that!) and the carpetbagging neo colonialist Bute outfit. Rathbone giving Gething comfort with the offer of a cool 200k is plumbing new depths of scheming, plotting and generally corrupt behaviours. I can imagine her saying to the embattled boyo “Here’s a bundle of notes, butty, let’s make it all go away and we can get back to making the real money making scam work for us” !
The thing with Rathbone is that she, and her clan, are loaded. There’d be no need for brown envelopes from Bute. The connection between her, Uden, and Bute, lies more in her ability to get political decisions made in Bute’s favour. But of course, our media will never look into that.
The big question is: Who the fuck is John Uden? Supplementary question: Why was he taken on by Bute? It’s the same answer to both questions.
And why were the other three taken on?
In the case of John Cwmbetws it was his influence within the RWAS, and therefore with landowners.
Vaughan was a former MEP and Labour big shot. Another favour for Labour.
Though I’m not entirely sure about Debra Williams. Keep thinking I’m missing something there..
Why does this blow-in get thrust right into lofty positions? Are they in thrall to her having read philosophy at a prestigious university after being privately educated just like the Great and Good of Westminster?
Among the equality-loving comrades there is a deep-seated regard for the memsahib. They may not be aware of it, and they would never admit it, but it’s there. A posh English accept, even Estuary English, gets them all of a tizzy.
Your recent article describes yet another case of Labour Party infiltration of any body that makes any kind of input to public administration and life in Wales. Evidence if needed that politics is corrupt. O.K , Labour is the primary player in corrupt Welsh life having secured an embedded dominant place, aided in recent years by a compliant Plaid who show an occasional flash of dissent to keep suckers believing they offer “something different”. I would argue that the Tories are the party of “dominance” in England with pockets of Labour supremacy that for most times fit neatly into the Tory pattern with very few instances of real dissent. SNP came close to tearing up the whole thing in Scotland but stumbled over ishoos that were cunningly exploited by their enemies and opponents (Labour and Tories!).
How do we get rid of this blight ? I haven’t a clue short of having a total revolution but that sounds a touch too “People’s Liberation” to my liking. Not that there’s much wrong with PL in theory but in practice the same old blight described above reappears rather quickly. Such is the nature of politics and its bad actors.
The political system in the West is largely fucked. Useless placemen obeying people and agendas we aren’t supposed to know about. And protected by a media that is so obviously biased that few trust it anymore. Even those who support the official line don’t believe it. We’re at an intermediate stage where more and more people know they’re being lied to, but many still don’t understand why.
But most people are endowed with some common sense. They can see that there is no climate catastrophe. Cow farts are not destroying the planet. Women do not have penises. White people alive today have no responsibility for a small number of slave-owners centuries ago. Thousands upon thousands of fit and healthy young men invading Western countries are not refugees.
And it’s made easier for the common herd to identify the problem thanks to ‘intersectionality’. We see that those who tell one lie, also tell the other lies. And when you realise that the official narrative is just a sick-bag of lies and propaganda, then you really start wondering what it’s all about. And who’s behind it. And where does it lead?
That’s where we are now. More and people waking up, and those who lie to us on a daily basis getting a wee bit desperate. (Trumped-up charges being one example.)
But replacing one gang of useless bastards with another gang of useless bastard – which we’re being asked to do on July 4 – is not the answer. Something revolutionary is needed, but not necessarily involving barricades and guillotines. (However attractive you might find the prospect.)
I’m not quite the psychopath that you might have been led to believe although taking the heads off some of the deviants that occupy our contemporary “political space” might be an enjoyable diversion. (see, I’m using their kind of gibberish in my comments. Alarming, innit). The uniformity of the “alternatives is alarming. Look at the Unionist parties and the “rebels” of Plaid and SNP and most of what you see are groups of grey men and women in dark or grey suits with the odd exception who dresses differently just for the sake of doing it. More to the point they all spout variations of the same crap, not just downright lies but also evidence of their inability to understand much of what they jabber on about.
The breakup of the UK, the end of the class system and the creation of a federal English state will be three voluminous pails to the good of emptying the cesspool that is British politics. Nothing political will ever be perfect of course, it inherently attracts spivvy, self-serving, silver tongued twats much as say, the sciences or computing attract those on the spectrum (as I can attest!)
I’ve probably made the case here, but somewhat counter-intuitively, the imbecilic policies of the Scottish and Welsh governments of late I believe make the case for independence. 20MPH has angered and mobilised the Welsh body politic like no other Senedd policy I can think of. The Welsh people are making their voice heard and accountability is being felt. Contrast this with Tryweryn, where as we all know, through official and legal routes at least, the square root of fuck all could have been done about it.
Welsh and UK politics is in something of a rut, same old, same old. In contrast with what’s happening around us. We see establishment parties coming under pressure from new, nationalist parties (Spain, Ireland, Netherlands), or parties that have been around for a while enjoying a surge in support (France, Germany). While across the Pond the neo-con establishment is dreading a return of The Trump.
All we have here would appear to be Reform. And despite its many shortcomings it will probably get my vote.
It’s interesting you make reference to the Neo-con establishment in contrast to Trump. Now he’s obviously a conservative, but he strikes as a social one as opposed to the more ‘modern’ neoliberal, free trade, open borders, globalist sort. See for example his protectionist approach to trade and in policies aimed at revival of heavy domestic industries like coal and oil. Am I on the money there do you think?
Trump is certainly a social conservative. And when it comes to coal, oil and other industries we saw an approach that’s being appreciated more and more as the realities of Net Zero start to bite. National security isn’t just about armed forces and weapons, it also embraces the things needed for a decent life, and being as self-sufficient as possible.
Jac your second paragraph where you state that there is no climate catastrophe is correct but only at the moment. It is a veritable Sword of Damocles hanging over us with Biblical catastrophes likely to be made miniscule by what is forthcoming. Our petty politics and Putins land grabbing forays will be truly insignificant in the not too distant future.
Cow farts are as nothing to the current annual grape harvesting and ensuing distilling – in Cognac they actually have metering of the methane/ethanol air pollution in the main car park. I never did enquire the reason but it maybe that a certain density would make it dangerous to turn the ignition key. Not to mention of course the invitations to invest in masses of barrels of whisky, the increased storage of which may well haunt those investors as we take to the hills to breath cooler air and avoid rising sea levels.
So the Brexiteers who followed Trump’s ostrich advice vastly increased the carbon footprint on the new trade routes as our politicians and influencers boast about our improved exports standing in world trade tables. I was eating spring onions imported from Egypt last week!
My son fishes off Portland and the mackerel, once seasonal, can now be caught all year round as they seek cooler waters. And unbelievably tuna are now being sighted there. So climate change holds primacy in my concerns and thinking.
My view is that ‘the climate’ has always changed, and there’s bugger all we can do about it. And the records bear me out.
What I will not accept is the scam of anthropogenic climate change, dreamed up a gang of very powerful and dangerous people hoping to use the scam to control and dictate human behaviour to their advantage.
You are right Jac but man with industry have had a massive impact and those genuine people who are trying to mitigate it meet with some success. Take the slow healing of the ozone hole in Antarctica. The revolution in fridge design and pop cans must have had a bearing.
So keeping Wales beautiful is a balancing act in which I admire your views in particular to the corruption that inevitably results from the power fraternity.
Loved your recent sentence to Dr Ball “ the finest councillors that money can buy”. !!!!
“Taking control of everything.” Flaming ‘ell Jac you brought back a memory – and one that shows nothing has changed, except perhaps the actors.
Do you remember the infamous BBC Man Alive programme “Something in the air” that reveled dodgy dealing by Swansea Labour in the seventies?
I was interviewed in the programme and remember being asked how the things could have got so bad. I remember my response clearly – “they control everything there is to control” I said.
Nothing changes….
Labour is and always has been a control-freak party. It betrays the totalitarian streak that’s always there. The dangerous belief that they have the answer to every problem – so why not control everything?
Swansea back then, the best councillors money could buy. But it wasn’t confined to Labour. After Gerald Murphy got sent down, Labour lost control of the council to the Ratepayers. Then their leader, Syd Jenkins, got hauled before the beak for accepting ‘favours’.
If it had been left to the media they’d have got away with it. It was Alarm, published by a bunch of anarchists that included Ian Bone (aka Ieuan ap Asgwrn). Printed on some primitive Xerox machine and hand delivered at night around town. Real grassroots politics!
I remember one Friday night in the old Queens on Oxford Street. I was with Phil Henry. Ian Bone was there flogging ‘Paul Ringer is Innocent’ badges and doing very well. He’d bought the badge-printing machine with the compensation after a Labour stalwart had welted him with an iron bar.
Happy days!
Dr John Ball let’s have some detailed comments from you to cheer us up when Labour reveals its candidate for Swansea West in a few days time.
It was announced yesterday.
What is there to say???
This is just the latest in a long line.
What’s really sad is there is no opposition, there might have been in the past from Plaid Cymru but that’s a lost cause; just a few half awake careerists.
Plus ça (ne) change (pas).
Absolutely, but now I’m going hijack the script to open your eyes to my main concern which, although aired on my blog, seems to get very little reaction which puzzles and frustrates me. I’m determined that Freemasonry’s corrupt practices will be publicised.
The following is my very recent email to Nick Emmerson, President of the Law Society – it is near verbatim and reflects the substance exactly.
Dear Sir, In 2009/2010 I reported Christopher Berry of Pengillys, Weymouth to the Law Society for the conveyancing of a valuable parcel of land by acting for vendors and buyer. I was told to initially take my complaint to the manager Pengillys. This was done and I was forcefully,by that manager,
told that there was no conflict of interest!! That was utterly untrue but massive domestic pressures forced me to abandon my complaint.
Since that time, over the past fourteen years or so, I’ve been subjected to punitive measures exacted against me by the Probus/Freemasonry community instigated and perpetuated by Berry, a ranking Freemason, by dint of his influence in that corrupted arena.
It has been costly, time wasting and detrimental to me in ways that could only be attributed to the Business/Freemasonry community and I am currently seeking redress on the most recent amercement against a solicitor through the Legal Ombudsman. (Theres a ten week waiting list and I am ninety four years old in ten days time !!!)
I don’t know if the Statute of Limitations applies to my original complaint but my main grievance is against Berry, as one of your members, and his dishonourable and malicious conduct in perpetuating the illegal punishments to which I’ve been subjected.
This has been actively enabled vis the internet grapevine by his Masonic membership. The cultists have violated my Personal Privacy and my Human Rights but when I complained to the CEO, UGLE re the circulation of my photo with slanderous dossier in the lodges of Weymouth, Melton Mowbray and Swansea, my complaint and a SECOND query as to whether my amercement was a life sentence were ignored. Weeks ago!
I continue to distribute my more explicit booklet available free of charge and postage – just give me a Uk address and I will send it on.
Finally, what I found perhaps most disturbing when writing this was that I had difficulty telling the Labour party and the ‘Welsh Government’ apart. They should be two clearly separate entities.As I said…last chapter of Animal farm….
You’re right, but that was not in my mind when I wrote it.
Well, for what its worth and I am sure you know this…a motion of no confidence in the Gethling is to be put before the Senedd on the 5th JUNE…The money he received is from a convicted criminal and the person who ownes the Stinking Heap of Toxic waste at Withyhedge, Haverfordwest which again is being legally investigated by Pembs CC. But all of the above is nothing new. These people hide in the back ground hidden accounts within the Development Bank of Wales or whatever its called these days based in Blessed Wrexham.Its all companies within companies and as you said follow the money or have the time to peruse Company House and who is who etc etc…and on and on it goes…Johnathn Dimpleby, lol…had an interesting point which he said publically on Sky this morning, that there is no money and yet politicians keep promising and promising what people want to hear as its all about keeping themselves in power. Well we know that, but some dont and its the some that dont that keep Welsh Labour in the manner to which they intend to become accustomed to…So I dont know how you change this as unless people want to learn about this then its just going to carry on…I appreciate the amount of effort you put into this but…its like the last lines of Animal Farm where the animals starring into the Farmhouse could no longer distinguish the pigs from the farmer…and so it goes…arent I cheerful..lol…