June 28th
3.05pm. We all have feelings and act accordingly when situations present themselves. If it’s a pressing problem you think a little harder, then sometimes circumstances or events push you into doing what feel you should do. If I use this analogy of what happened on April 28th, 1789, in a few moments, I will write my thoughts of what pushed me to say what I feel should be now said. In 1787 as I’ve just mentioned a British ship called the Bounty was sailing to Tahiti to collect what was called breadfruit trees, as it was a high energy nutritious food source for British slaves. Their Captain did not know how to treat his crew correctly, which eventually forced one of his leading young officers named Fletcher Christian to mutiny and take control of their ship. The date of the mutiny being the above April 28th, 1789 on their return journey home.
Anyone following the latest news about the Coronavirus in the U.K. and hearing and seeing the state of our metaphorical British ship would follow me in saying Captain Boris Johnson has to go, just like the infamous Captain Bligh of the Bounty. Anyone following my journey with my message blogs has clearly seen me castigating the poor and diabolical leadership of our present Prime Minister since the Coronavirus began. You have read I predict he will not fulfil his term in office due to his inability to lead our country in the right direction. His health has already fallen to this virus. No, I’m not one of those who would abandon our democracy as so many M.Ps did, in not going with the people’s majority vote. So I am not in that particular box of thinking. I will start on Monday of this week when I spoke to my son who lives in Brighton. He said he had slept for 14 hrs then felt lethargically unable to work from home the following day. He is a digital director for a company in Europe and travels regularly abroad on business but with his skills online he could not get a test kit to see if he had the virus. They have a drive-in test centre in Brighton but he does not drive as his job takes him by plane and train, so that was an avenue he could not go down for help. Eventually now by Friday, he got a test kit after saying an untruth that he had lost his smell. The question he now posed was, How do people get a test kit if they are not familiar with laptops or more? Thousands must be going without help as our track, test, and trace service cannot provide a better word than poor.
Our world-beating virus app, described by Boris got lost metaphorically in the sea off the Isle of White, described as a dud costing over 12 million pounds. This morning it announced on the TV news, there was a serious outbreak of 600 people contacting coronavirus in Leicestershire, and the Mayor said for the last ten days they had been unable to get a proper analysis or data from the government to put an action plan in place.The Mayor was asked, Was he going to enforce lockdown in the area in question? He had not been given any such authority or reply from the government and he was at a loss with what to do.What does this say? We are a ship without a Captain, who hasn’t even got a cigarette packet to write on, where he might think we are going. This Captain said only a week ago those who return from holiday will have to quarantine for two weeks, of course, he had forgotten the 80 million who had flown in the country through March, April, May, and June all coming from around the world. It’s now announced you can travel to a number of countries, but what does this say, as Boris yet again makes countless U-turns. Imagine on our ship today, everyone is feeling dizzy and sick as we are being navigated to somewhere that doesn’t exist other than seeing bankruptcy on the horizon.
This morning on TV, another ex-government minister under the girl guide leadership of Theresa May, spoke of the Bournemouth beach incident last Thursday. He was saying, photographs showing such large crowds were deceptive and were probably standing in groups like families. These politicians take people to be as naive as them, as one town councillor had said, she had never seen so many people on Bournemouth beach in twenty-five years. Bournemouth in Dorset, it was said, with the hot weather they had received, over half a million people descended on the many attractive sites on that particular day. When you see some of these ministers, you can only say, you could recruit ten good men and women off the high street to run the country far better than those in power now. Captain Bligh was given a boat with 18 men who believed in him and set sail 3,000 miles to Timur which was then known as the Dutch East Indies. It was a remarkable achievement he made by following the stars, as I believe Boris should now be set adrift in a boat with those who want to follow him.
Throughout my life, I believe, we have not had the leadership we deserve, only with Winston Churchill through the war years. We now don’t have daily TV briefings, where hard-nosed journalists could put awkward questions to the scientists and ministers. This closure of information was because these scientists were taking questions they were not used to answer, and the government has now closed down this news sector because it was becoming an embarrassment for them to say the truth. This sent out a message that there is a controversy between many of the scientists with varying opinions. Anyone reading my thoughts and views would be wrong to say, well this is just my view because the following comments are widespread throughout the country. This is part of an article from a well-known journalist saying, “Supposedly crucial advances in the battle with Coronavirus are greeted with fanfare, only for those advances to evaporate mysteriously or be downplayed as marginal a few weeks later. Along with the grotesquely long list of unforced errors, these “duds“ feed the sense that Boris Johnson’s government has no real strategy for dealing with the virus. It’s hard to do justice to this leaderless, directionless shambles.“
Another journalist went on to say, “Johnson has been painfully slow to react throughout. We were late to restrict entry to the U.K., late with testing, late to provide front-line workers the proper protection, late to impose lockdown, late to cancel big sporting fixtures. We discharged infected patients into care homes.“ The article then went on to say, Could the staunchest of Tory supporters argue that Boris has handled it well?” Many M.Ps now feel he has lost his grip and the government has lost its way. Many say both he and his Svengali advisor Cummings lack a basic level of competence. The voices are now growing that he has to be replaced as they are rubbish at governing. While our government is crazily telling everyone to go abroad we are still having a thousand infections a day and that’s just a tip of a very big iceberg.
Across the world, this pandemic is still gathering pace with 183,000 new infections each day. In the U.K. we are increasingly ignoring the rules of distancing, again reflecting on the mixed messages where one metre apart should have been introduced far earlier on. Many of the situations I’ve described in previous message blogs are now frontline news, as publicans say, they will not be able to be profitable. Some are saying, Who wants to sit outside being apart from your friends with a mask on and queuing to get a drink? Another question has been thrown at fashion shops, like the big ones such as Primark, as it´s being said, Why would anyone want to buy clothes when for the last four months simple casual wear as being the norm? Also, Who would want to push and walk with crowds in a store where the greater possibility there is of catching the virus? The expectations are wishful thinking of the government who live in their own bubble. The big questions are now being asked, I’ve raised before. What happens to rent evictions and those losing their homes with none payment of mortgages? To put a family into a hotel costs the local authority £600 a week, and doesn’t provide the answer to this problem, which is beginning to surface. Imagination and creation of work for those being made redundant is a must in every area as there are tasks and needs required in every social area. If we had a government run on the national house building programme we could train young people in all building skills from plumbing, electricians, every skill needed. We could give special tax rates for those companies who exported. We could have an action plan in how money could be invested with a share in a company that had good prospects from innovative ideas. We as a country have excelled before through the war years when we have pulled together. There is a book of ideas if we have the will and leadership.
This government has announced July 4th a Saturday which is being called Independence Day, when pubs are opened for the first time. How will the police cope? They won’t. They will need the army out if drunkenness and violence occur with the prospect of mass looting. We are a rudderless ship, not knowing of the real storm that is approaching. These are not messages I like giving, but a day doesn’t pass when my predictions don’t go away. I’m speaking of the U.K. and it angers me when such people in power are clueless to the real world, and the real consequences, these short-sighted policies have now left this country of ours in. We reap what we sow, and it appears before the change can come, we have to witness hardship, unrest, social fear of the consequence if we cannot control thuggery and violence taking hold. History has shown many great empires have fallen from within, not outside of the enemy wall.
I’ve mentioned in my previous blog about Prime Minister Boris standing by a minister who went against advice and letting a property billionaire get away from paying 50 million to one of the poorest hamlets in London. This story is still running and growing, and we have a prime minister who endorses these immoral transactions. How long before he is asked to leave as he has become a liability and has stamped on him out of date, and not fit for Office?
The young have their energy on focusing to keep their families afloat, and few know of the true reality they live in. Each generation has had it better in many ways than their parents or grandparents and now I believe this present generation will find it very difficult. My experiences with the gifts I’ve been given cannot hide away and just think about myself as I feel that would be immoral. Many people don’t get heard and do not fit into a celebrity culture where you are judged by the wealth and material items you possess. I spoke in a previous blog of a young man I met in Banska Bystrica, who was training to be a physicist. He had no support from his university as he was creating a project on magnetism, no support from anyone. He had several part-time jobs to fund his project. He came to me for mental support as I told him, one day you will one of the new heroes for your country. Sport will not be the only spot of acclaim in the future. He did in that short time of knowing him to become the only student in Europe to gain the prize of being invited to America to show his magnetic theory. This is the future where I see all children, disadvantaged, and unloved being encouraged to succeed in their dreams. Are such thoughts just dreams? Not in the world I live in.