Freeze on Recruitment

It’s funny when you consider that in the run up to the EU Referendum certain sections of the media were claiming that big business supported the “leave” campaign. It’s funny because of this story, now that we apparently are leaving.

“We can’t sugar-coat this – many of our members are feeling anxious,” said Simon Walker, director-general of the IoD.

“A majority of business leaders think the vote for Brexit is bad for them, and as a result plans for investment and hiring are being put on hold or scaled back.”

According to “Leave”, the parallel universe which Britain was going to exist in – on it’s own – was going to be a much brighter place. The dickhead companies who supported leaving the EU were therefore signalling their belief in this deluded idea. And yet we now find that many of them are going to put a freeze on recruitment, with many more likely to follow, as a result of the unimagined financial uncertainty that has descended on our new parallel dimension.

A freeze on recruitment means that unemployment will not fall – in fact, with new people leaving school and university (it’s that time of year, too) it is likely to rise. Furthermore, such a freeze is often a precursor to redundancies, which are all the more likely with the fall in the value of the pound and company stock prices.

Any sort of security seems to rest with the EU granting the UK privileges which it has no right to if it is not a member- the “single market” being a prime example. HSBC is planning to move 1,000 jobs from the London to Paris if the single market is lost. Likewise, Morgan Stanley will move 2,000 jobs to Dublin or Frankfurt, and others could follow suit.

I’d love some of the cretins who voted to leave to explain to me how this is good – indeed, how anything that has happened, or is likely to happen as a result of that – is good. The problem is, their concern was only ever about those nasty immigrants with non-white skin and funny accents. They wouldn’t understand. And they wouldn’t care.

What is becoming very, very clear is that everyone is starting to realise the vote to leave was totally and utterly wrong. It was decided by idiots whose only skill appears to have been that they know how to erect a flagpole and nail posters to the sides of their houses. And it is being rued by those who should have made the decision to stay instead of giving these morons the vote in the first place.

Britain should be a part of Europe. Walking away, waving flags, and standing with your chest out chanting “we can make Britain great again” won’t f___king work. Ever. Not unless there’s a big market for flagpoles and posters these days.

Ritchie Blackmore @ Birmingham Genting Arena

Tickets for this sold out in about five seconds, so I had to use my ticket guy to get me in. He came up trumps, with a second-row VIP ticket (free parking and free meal thrown in).Mostly Autumn - support act

The last time Ritchie Blackmore played rock was almost 20 years ago, but up till then he made his reputation as the main man in Deep Purple and Rainbow (they were his bands at the time). Since then, he’s pursued his love of folk and mediaeval type music with his band, Blackmore’s Night.

No one imagined he’d come back to rock – always aloof, with a reputation of being difficult to work with, he had always said he never would. Then, last year, he suddenly announced three one-off gigs around Europe (don’t get me started on Europe), one of which was in the UK, nice and central in Birmingham.Ritchie Blackmore - Birmingham 2016

You have to put this into perspective. Ritchie Blackmore doing this show was pretty much equivalent to Led Zeppelin’s one-off gig in 2007. Perhaps not exactly the same, but definitely up there. The cosmopolitan nature of the crowd showed this, if nothing else: there were Americans, Japanese, and many Europeans present. Deep Purple and Rainbow were that big in the 70s and 80s, and Ritchie Blackmore is considered a guitar-god in the rock world.

The support band was Mostly Autumn (well, mostly – four of the six-strong line up). I’ve seen them before, at the Rescue Rooms in Nottingham, but this was a huge step up from the couple of hundred capacity there to a sold-out 15,500+ arena. They did bloody well, too.Ronnie Romero

Ritchie had caused not a little consternation in the music world by refusing to use any of the people who’d been in either Deep Purple or Rainbow in the past in this new incarnation of Rainbow. Some quarters of the music press were suggesting he’d go down like a lead balloon as a result. Ever outspoken – but logical with it – Blackmore had explained his reasons, which were sound if you looked at them objectively, objectionable if you hankered after the past. I initially had an open mind on the subject, but sided with Ritchie when I read that he doesn’t like hip hop music (well, not in 1995 he didn’t).Ritchie Blackmore

It should come as no surprise to learn that the media were wrong. As the band came on stage to the strains of Over the Rainbow, and to rapturous applause and cheers, they burst into Highway Star. In vocalist, Ronnie Romero, there is someone who could match Ian Gillan, David Coverdale, Graham Bonnet,  Joe Lynn Turner, or anyone else, note for note. And it quickly became clear that keyboardist, Jens Johansson, they have a player who could definitely do justice to the late, great Jon Lord’s legendary finger work.Ritchie and the band

Over the years, I’ve read a lot about Ritchie Blackmore, and something which always intrigued me was how many previous band members (Deep Purple) have said that Ritchie would go off on lengthy improvised solos, and it became a skill to work out when he had finished and they should come back in. A lot of years have passed since those days, but obviously – in order to duplicate classic songs – there had to be some showboating. You could see Ritchie keeping an eye on his band, and then giving them the nod when he was coming to a point where they should continue with the song.The lights

The full set list was as follows:

  • Over the Rainbow (intro)
  • Highway Star
  • Spotlight Kid
  • Mistreated
  • Since You Been Gone
  • Man on the Silver Mountain
  • Soldier of Fortune
  • Difficult to Cure
  • Catch the Rainbow
  • Perfect Strangers
  • Long Live Rock ‘n’ Roll
  • Child in Time
  • Stargazer
  • Black Night

Encore:

  • Burn
  • Smoke on the Water

The light show was also quite spectacular. And one of the backing singers was Ritchie’s wife, Candice, with whom he works in Blackmore’s Night. You can hear a bit of the show here – this is Since You Been Gone/Man on the Silver Mountain:

I got my usual collection of great pictures, and I’ll always be able to say “I was there”.The end?

Ritchie had originally said these gigs were “just for fun” and not to be repeated. More recently he’s been quoted as saying he wanted to see if he could “still do it” (after his reception at one of the Euro gigs). It appears that he isn’t now against doing a full tour.

Here’s hoping.

Petition for 2nd Referendum

If you’ve got any sense at all, sign it. And then pray that we get it.

Parliamentary petition for 2nd referendum

It’s a petition asking for a 2nd EU referendum. It already has nearly 2 3 (it’s increasing by about 1,000 a minute) million signatures.

Ignore reports of signatures being fraudulent. The vast majority come from UK citizens. I believe they have removed 77,000 fake signatures – that’s 77,000 out of 3.5 million and counting. Although it has little chance of succeeding, claims that it is fraudulent are coming from people who are worried that it might – the same people who effectively voted for this phenomenal screw-up in the first place.

Google Searches Prove People ARE Idiots

Following the EU Referendum, Google has revealed some interesting post-result searches.

There has been a 250% increase in searches on “what happens if we leave the EU”. I stress that this occurred AFTER the comedians doing the searching had voted.

It also appears that further searches after the polls closed included “what is the EU” and “which countries are in the EU”. Also trending was “what is brexit” and “are we european”.

Londoners have shown an increased interest in moving to Gibraltar, whilst there has been an increase in those seeking to obtain an Irish passport.

The guy from the first link has the same opinion as me – that there should never have been a referendum in the first place because understanding the issues and implications was beyond the wit of 95% of the electorate.

Arguably too complex for the average citizen. Referendums are a brute-force political engine, a numbers game designed to spit out a yes or no answer on a simple question. Something as complicated and multi-faceted as Britain’s membership of the EU, on the other hand, should not have been decided by referendum, instead weighed up by independent experts versed in the thousands of ways the UK interacts with the biggest economic power on Earth.

Absolutely spot on.

BoJo Can’t Help Himself

It was funny hearing Boris Johnson trying to be gracious in victory by declaring that David Cameron will go down as “one of the great prime ministers”.The UK is now broken

Sorry, Boris, but if you were wrong about Brexit not being damaging to the UK, you’re a hundred times more wrong over that.

Cameron has become the man who has broken up the Union. The man who handed Scotland independence on a plate, even after they had voted narrowly against it. The man who has sown the seeds for Northern Ireland and Wales to go the same way. The man who has resurrected Spain’s geographically legitimate claim on Gibraltar (which will almost certainly set the Argentinians off on one again). The man who called a referendum that should never have been called for the purposes of winning a general election. The man who then had that referendum turn on him and disembowel him. And the man who has ensured austerity for at least a generation to come – right after we’d dug ourselves out of a recession. God knows what else will appear on the list, but you can be sure it won’t be good.

There’s a certain irony in all this, since Cameron is also a man who has spent the better part of a decade blaming everything from the recession to outbreaks of scrofula on Gordon Brown and the last Labour government, when in fact Brown (and Labour) had nothing to do with any of that. Gordon Brown was actually a half decent (or half indifferent, depending on how you look at it) prime minister.

In Cameron’s case, on the other hand, all the accusations will almost certainly turn out to be demonstrably true. I have to admit though that – as a person – I feel quite sorry for him. I bet he didn’t see this coming.

Now, what odds can I get on BoJo being in the running as his replacement?


See how quickly things change? BoJo was right up there, favourite to become PM. Then he was stabbed in the back by Gove.

Brexit Vultures

Not surprisingly, the tragic result of the EU Referendum early this morning has been a topic of discussion with my pupils today. As I mentioned recently, none of those I had spoken with on the run up to voting had been in favour of leaving the EU.

Before I continue, an observation from yesterday evening. After my last lesson I went into Asda to do some shopping. Now, the West Bridgford store has a Bureau de Change, and in all the years I have been shopping there I don’t think I have ever seen anyone use it – probably because I shop so late. However, last night there was a queue (all idiots, since they were queuing across the entrance doorways). I wondered vaguely for a moment what was happening as I passed between them, assumed it must just be down to the holiday season, and then promptly forgot about it.

When my first pupil got into the car this morning, we exchanged the usual pleasantries, and when she asked how I was I replied: “Fine thanks – apart from that result last night.” She, too, was unhappy with the result, and in the subsequent discussion she mentioned a friend of hers who had voted to leave, but who was already regretting it because she was going on holiday next week and the sudden decimation of GBP (£) versus USD ($) and EURO (€) meant she would get a lot less spending money.

That was when it hit me about the queue in Asda last night. You see, I stayed up late watching the first results coming in, and watching the markets. Before the polls closed at 10pm there was speculation that there would be a narrow “remain” outcome, and as a result the value of GBP went up.

And THAT’S why they were queuing in Asda!

Although my local Asda is in Rushcliffe – and Rushcliffe was one of the few areas in England to vote “remain” – these vultures, many of whom probably voted to leave anyway, were cashing in on the early financial turmoil.


Something else that just caught my eye was on Sky News just now. They noted that of all the English wards to vote “remain”, the vast majority represented communities where at least 1 person in 3 had a degree or other higher qualification.

This confirms my own belief that you needed to have the IQ of fungus to want to vote “leave” – as evidenced by that filthy house on Wigman Road, which still has a huge poster nailed to the wall outside, and which has now added a number of England flags. Indeed, I pointed out to a pupil this morning that the number of English flags now draped outside of houses in Bilborough is dramatically higher than it was yesterday.

Idiots!

Oh my God! The UK is now doomed. We have voted to leave the EU.The day the UK shot itself in the foot

Well, almost exactly half has voted to leave. Because almost exactly half has voted to remain. Worse still, ALL of Scotland voted to stay, whereas virtually ALL of England voted to leave. The pound has fallen to its lowest level against the dollar since 1985.

Let’s just look at that again: the pound is at its lowest value since 1985. It has seen it’s biggest one-day fall. Ever. It is at a 30-year low – thanks in large part to people who weren’t born that long ago. The stock exchange is currently on its way down in sympathy. So well done, Brexiters, this is what the future will be like – and it is all your fault.

David Cameron must step down as a result of the unmitigated disaster he has caused. Indeed, he has announced he will do so in October. Quite frankly, you have to wonder if the Queen is considering a charge of treason against him – the skewed result will inevitably lead to Scotland demanding another vote on independence. Mind you, if the right-wing propaganda machine is even half right, she was a Brexiter and deserves as much credit as Cameron for this catastrophe.

This has been a perfect example of democracy at work. It has also been a perfect example of why democracy doesn’t work. A result this close could have been decided by the toss of a coin, yet the extreme skew between England and Scotland is about as anti-Scottish as you can get.The day Cameron gave Scotland its independence

But we’d better get used to skews, because our lives will be full of them now that the lunatics have taken over the asylum.

The referendum should never have been held. The only purpose of having it was to get Cameron into No. 10. Ironically, it has now got him out. The simple fact is that the choice should never have been given to a people too stupid to put away their flags and make the right choice.

Pray That We Stay

So voting is underway in the EU Referendum.Vote Remain

This is the promised referendum that ensured David Cameron won the last election – a promise which appealed to the type of person who probably shouldn’t have been allowed to vote in the first place. It is a referendum which should not be taking place – you simply should not be allowing stupid people to become involved in decisions of this importance. The Boaty McBoatface debacle, though far less important, illustrates the point perfectly.

Something I’ve observed is that not one pupil I have asked has said that they would vote to leave. All of them except one (and he was undecided, but very confused, as he was picking up information from Facebook) has stated outright that they thought we should remain EU members.

This contrasts oddly with the number of “Leave” posters. I note that the size of these posters appears to be inversely proportional to the IQ of the homeowner who is displaying it. The largest ones frequently appear in rough areas on the sides of council houses with filthy curtains and unkempt gardens (there’s one on Wigman Road in Bilborough).

Brexiters don’t like being labelled as racists. Well, they might not be overt racists, but they are definitely cast-iron nationalists – and unless you’re one yourself, you will know precisely what that means concerning their likely opinions regarding those of non-UK lineage. A prime example is on Bunny Lane in Nottinghamshire, outside a large house right next to the Commando Paintball centre. The nationalist who lives there has erected a crude wooden hoarding outside his gates which has had a different crudely painted message every few days. I suspect that he has been spoken to about the racist overtones, since the earlier bad prose about Albania has more recently confined itself to single words about Turkey, Serbia, and other countries.

I’ve concluded that there are more “Leave” posters simply due to the fact that Brexiters have the biggest mouths. Indeed, this morning I saw that they have effectively vandalised bridges and railings with their posters overnight. I guess it sums up their intelligence if they think that some inkjet-printed A4 signs are likely to change the outcome of the vote this late in the day.

I hope to God that we vote to remain.

All That Matters is London

The BBC website is full of stories today about how poor Londoners and Home Counties residents had some heavy thunderstorms yesterday. Apparently, “one month’s worth of rain fell on London is less than 24 hours.” A prominent table shows how Reading had 20mm of rain, Hampton 41mm, and Farnborough 46mm.

Mmmm. Just in case they missed it, Nottingham had a recorded total of 55mm of rain over three days between 14-16 June (20mm was recorded on 15 June). There is only one Met Office station up here, at Watnall, and the heaviest localised rainfall was definitely not there, and actual rainfall at such locations was certainly much higher. Many homes and businesses were flooded. But that never got into the news headlines. And all this applied to areas of Leicestershire, Derbyshire, and South Yorkshire.

There are a couple of dozen Met Office stations in and around London – or what is considered to be “London” when the media is reporting things. The rainfall figures from yesterday are much less likely to have missed any extreme localised events.

As the title says, all that matters is London. No one else exists on the front pages.

Extremes of Hatred

Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you cannot be unaware of the terrible events of last week, where Thomas Mair “allegedly” (you have to say that until he is convicted) shot and stabbed MP Jo Cox in Birstall, West Yorkshire. She died shortly afterwards.Hatchet and Mair - book ends

Jo Cox believed that the UK should remain a member of the EU. She had worked for various humanitarian charities and pro-EU pressure groups. She was opposed to strikes against IS in Syria because of the effects on the civilian population. She wasn’t pro-IS – she was pro-civilian. EU Referendum campaigning was suspended over the weekend, and pleas were made to avoid politicising Ms Cox’s murder by either side.

There is absolutely no evidence that Thomas Mair murdered Ms Cox because she was a woman. You’d need to be almost as insane as Mair apparently is to believe that (at his initial hearing, he gave his name as “Death to traitors, freedom for Britain”).

With that in mind, take a look at Jean Hatchet’s blog. All she is interested in is that a man killed a woman. She repeats this at least six times, almost like a Tibetan mantra.

It appears that Thomas Mair was already partially on the radar because of his mental state. His words at his first hearing tell you what his political views were. Quite simply, you can only gauge someone’s mental state based on what they say and – if you don’t catch it early enough – on what they subsequently do.

So you have to wonder at Jean Hatchet’s words. This is one seriously mixed up woman.