CRIMINALITY AND IMMORALITY BY OUR SIDE

32 members of NATO, having taken over all of Russia's Warsaw Pact members, are now discussing a plan to attack military targets in Russia on behalf of a non-member.

Since 7 October 2023, NATO members are also in unity over arming a non-member's war on Gaza and the Palestinians when such a tactic will only fuel the hatred of any Gazan or Palestinian who may survive Israel's onslaught - when it does finally end.

7 W Midlands councils are fully supporting the immorality of spending £15 BILLION (2020 figure) to wreck a second mainline railway.  This one between London and Edinburgh through the Black Country.

Our politicians and senior officers are planning to spend billions on trams while 1,000s of taxpayers in the W Midlands use food banks and have help in paying their energy bills, in often the most inadequate and disgraceful housing.

THIS IS A SCANDAL

19 July discussion on ...

I would like to have, please, one hour to chat over and, hear your views, over these varied matters:

1. What is the health job that you do, Pete?
2. Why were you not selected to be the Labour candidate for Stourbridge?  Or, are you standing elsewhere?
3. Out of our national Labour Party leaders, since and including Tony Blair, which one was nearest to your own views and convictions?
4. What are your views on how to deal with small boat immigrants?
5. How would you deal with the growth of net, legal, authorised migration into Britain?
6. Do you want more pedestrianisation in Stourbridge to make it more like my home town of Halesowen?
7. Would you support a BID for Stourbridge?
8. What do make of the Black Country Cycle-Walk Mudway from Merry Hill to NW Wolverhampton?
9. What would you do to protect nature and increase its cover at Merry Hill?
10. How can you put a non-violent bomb under the authorities to put housing at Merry Hill for the most badly housed in Dudley?
11. Will you do all you can to protect and enhance the public open space at Merry Hill?
12. Do you support incentives to boost the growth of farming in tune with nature in our countryside surrounding Dudley Borough?
13. Do you agree with the four new Trident nuclear submarines being built?
14. Does Israel's War of Self-Defence have your full support?
15. Are you concerned about the council's self-declared Climate Emergency?

I can make any day except Tuesdays when I'm on grandad duties with my wife.

Many thanks, Pete.

Aug 2022 TfWM plans for WBHE aka the Dudley Tram

 Conclusions of

 Dudley - Brierley Hill Transport Scrutiny Note - Aug 2022 - Reply to Mr Weller.pdf

1. While the option presented by Tim Weller could lower costs for the WBH extension, it would not directly stop at Merry Hill and The Waterfront, For the Waterfront, I am suggesting a tram stop at the Blue Brick pub (closed).  This is the same configuration as the new Kings Heath railway station, now being built two of the line’s main attractors. This would impact patronage and thus the overall viability of the scheme.
2. From 2021 assessments, the most promising option to link Brierley Hill and Stourbridge Junction is to share the live rail freight line from Stourbridge Junction to Round Oak terminal with a tram-train and then proceed to join the Metro line to provide direct services without interchange to Merry Hill and The Waterfront.  YES!  Just call it a commuter, regional and intercity service with trams or trains to suit. This enables higher service frequencies to attract significant patronage. Light rail and Very Light Rail services would require a separate single line which would only give low frequency services, attracting less patronage. This suggests that the feasibility of tram-train, from Stourbridge to Brierley Hill, and then onto Dudley, Wednesbury and Walsall needs to be explored further.  Don't complicate things and add even more expense with tram-train or train-tram.  Go for one or the other.  Possibly, tram only now you have trams between Dudley and Wednesbury AND, the railway lines are now taken for the BCIMO HQ at the former Dudley mainline railway station.

Stop the rest of the line, from Walsall to Lichfield being turned into a cycle-walkway!!

Best wishes

An attempt at summarising or highlighting what's gone wrong

The Joke Over Our London to Edinburgh Railway Broken Up into a multi mix up, a mish mash of slow changes between Heavy Rail trains, Light Rail trams, Very Light Rail trams, tram-trains - and even cycle hire between Walsall and Lichfield on the forgotten Two Capitals Railway!!  Soon, cycles, walkers and horse riders, but not trains, will be seen on the 21st century railway bridge (photo below) over the M6 Toll on our London to Edinburgh Railway:

 M6 Toll banner 01.jpg

Looking towards Lichfield.  One track nicked by metal thieves over the 21 years since the opening of the motorway:

 M6 Toll 03.jpg

BACKGROUND

One third of the railway network was very properly closed as loss making.

Because we gave up train travel and took to driving cars - a lot.

The closed railway lines were turned into roads, and used for every kind of building imaginable. 

In about 1980, Manchester led the way in turning many of its remaining railway lines and some bus routes into tramways. 

This was to give people the choice of either bus, tram or train - multi-modal transport - to solve all our road congestion/pollution problems.

No wonder lack of funding (having gone to trams) means Manchester - Leeds - Hull is one of the worst cross country railways in the world!

More public transport of different kinds (modes) was bound to reduce road congestion - but ...

IT WAS A LIE!

Roads have become full as railways have been destroyed and the first tram network also destroyed.

HISTORY

200 Kms of the new tram network was expected by the year 2000.  However, only 20 Kms were open on the first mainline railway by 1999 when commuter trains would have been much cheaper, more responsible and easier to achieve.

23 Kms of tramway have been achieved by 2024.

That has taken 43 years - a world record, costing £100s million of public money!!

No wonder the nation is so heavily in debt and there is so much poverty.

But never fear!  150 miles of underground and overground tramways in the W Midlands will be in place by 2040.

The experts have been slaving away on it, with new enthusiasm, since 2020 when the cost was £15 billion!

THE DUDLEY TRAM, of all things, IS ON THE TWO CAPITALS RAILWAY!

But, there is much confusion over how to get the tram or tram-train or train on the railway

 "of national strategic significance".pdf

from Flood Street, Dudley to Stourbridge Jct station on our Two Capitals Railway.

INSTEAD, SENSIBLE ACTION:

Keep it simple and cheaper and use all our remaining railway lines for railway trains NOT trams!

Stop repeating the lie that "bus on rails" trams (UK Tram promotion group) of all kinds are the best way to reduce road congestion and pollution.

Make more road space by giving car commuters regional Fare-Free Public Transport for all but, penalties for car commuters who defy accepting that reward and carry on driving.

This map, from 2003, shows what must be done, especially where I have written, in pen on the London to Edinburgh Railway through the heart of the Black Country:

 Railfuture's full map.pdf

 

75 years of NATO

Always fear, paranoia and thinking the worst of the other drives alliances and re-armament.  Friendship and tolerance for different cultures goes out of the window.

When Russia tried friendship and rapprochment, from the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 to the disbandment of the Warsaw Pact, the West took advantage of their mighty victory, as they saw it.  The West rubbed the Russian noses in the dirt and quickly expanded east to welcome in the former Warsaw Pact countries into NATO.  What a cheek!  What lack of empathy!  What pig-headedness!

Alliances and imperialism drove the European empires into the disastrous World War in two halves that led to the Cold War between NATO and the Warsaw Pact. The Pact being formed in a response to NATO.  Mutually Assured Destruction and the balance between those two alliances were blown out of the water when the Warsaw Pact was disbanded.  The world became top-heavy and out of balance when we took advantage of further, E European countries being welcomed into NATO.

Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.  Gorbachev led to Putrid and a turning away from the West to the East under Putrid.  Perhaps Putrid thought we were getting too big for our boots.

Our side even failed to see that world domination by America and our side was bound, sooner or later, to upset the Kremlin.

We even failed to stop our military exercises in the former Warsaw Pact countries; or to withdraw our nukes from E Europe and to stop NATO expansion, as Russia insisted.

We couldn’t wait for an election to get rid of pro-Russian Yanukovych, but our hot heads saw about 100 killed in a revolution to get rid of the man who had been fairly and properly elected in Ukraine.

We simply went on being greedy and now want Taiwan, too! 

Corbyn - a hero of mine

 Peace and Justice Project

  · 

This election was never about me. It has always been about our community and the values we share. And it’s about our undying belief that there is an alternative to inequality, poverty and war.

Tonight’s result in Islington North gives us a glimpse of a different future, which puts the interests of the many ahead of those of the few. It is also a warning - a warning to the incoming government that dissent cannot be crushed without consequences. That ideas of equality, justice and peace are eternal. That hope for a better world can never be extinguished.

Tonight, we celebrate. Tomorrow, we organise. The energy we have unleashed will not go to waste. We are a movement made up of all ages, backgrounds and faiths. A movement which can win with and for people all over the country.

Thank you to everybody who built this campaign, making it the most inclusive I have ever been a part of.

Thank you to every single person who exercised their democratic right to vote. It has been the honour of my life to represent you, the people of Islington North. I will continue to learn from you, be accountable to you, and draw inspiration from you.

The future we speak of is no pipedream - our community is proof that a kinder, fairer world is possible.

JC of Islington N and JC of Nazareth - HEROES, OUTSTANDING MEN OF REAL STATURE

FROM:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cv2g4x97jpwo

by Harry Low on 5 July 2024

Jeremy Corbyn very nearly scooped up half of the vote in Islington North to win this seat for the 11th time - but it's his first victory as an independent candidate rather than Labour, the party he once led.

Labour’s Praful Nargund finished second, more than 7,000 votes behind the man who has held the constituency since 1983.

The former Labour leader is now London's longest-serving MP - and most of the people I speak to outside Finsbury Park Tube station have positive views on his victory.

Now the capital's only independent member of Parliament, Mr Corbyn was suspended as a Labour MP in 2020 for his response to a report into anti-Semitism in the party.

In his victory speech, Mr Corybn said his victory showed what "kinder, gentler and more sensible, more inclusive politics, can bring about".

Robbie Taylorhunt said Mr Corbyn's 49% vote share was an impressive feat.

He said: "It's great to see an independent get a vote and it be about the person supporting the area rather than necessarily being about party politics.

"It's been seen a lot of times that someone loses their party seat and goes as an independent and it doesn't work.

"It's pretty remarkable that it has been successful for him and shows that he has a huge groundswell of support, in this area at least."

Merry Hill map of slow progress to destruction

Merry Hill map of slow progress to destruction

At the top of the map, where it says 'Canal St', look for where the blue tram line comes south off the black railway line.  The tram must stay on the black railway line all the way to Stourbridge Jct station to connect with the national railway network.

WHAT WMCA MUST DO - urgently

Fighting the Climate Emergency after 5 years of business as usual must be WMCA's top priority. DONE by diverting the £1.3 billion going into tram extensions into putting 1/2 bedroom apartments in 3-storey blocks for the most badly housed WITHOUT cars at 22,000 sq m High Plateau, between Merry Hill shops and Brierley High St shops.  Highly energy efficient, properly insulated and solar powered homes.  We cannot afford to lose ANY of this 30 year old housing land to trams which are grossly and irresponsibly expensive both to construct and subsidise.  Therefore, accelerating Climate catastrophe.

NEXT, bring in regional Fare-Free Public Transport for all and not just old crocks like me.  BUT, there must be the stick of stiff penalties for those who refuse to leave their cars at home on Hagley Road to free up the roads for those who have registered to avoid the charge because they are authenticated ESSENTIAL VEHICLE USERS.

THIRDLY, tram money in the WMCA must be transferred to urgently insulate and solar power the homes of the poorest - those on Universal Credit.

Zaccheus and the big people running slavery!

David, in telling us stuff with a new and interesting approach.  But voting for Jesus, in my book, means today's descendants (us) of the imperialists, slave traders/owners and, everyone else connected with Empire and slavery, need to repent and make reparations after the fashion of Zaccheus.  And this time, NOT to the big people running slavery!!

BECAUSE:

I've just read a brilliant children's book of 190 pages, large print, drawings, very quick and easy to read, that is also suitable for adults - especially of my age - for all of us to be put right!

I told Caleb in Tim's hearing that it was less than 100 pages this morning.  Could Tim tell Caleb it's longer than I thought, please?

A Puffin paperback, 'STOLEN HISTORY' by Sathnam Sanghera in Dudley Children's Library.  £8.99 but I asked the librarian to get it for free.  I'll return it in the morning.  I'll buy my own copy, now.

Kingswinford Academy, Water Street for Mudway help

26 June 2023

Dear Ian Moreton - Head Teacher, Kingswinford Academy  Water Street

I was the old guy who turned up for last Friday's Any Questions discussion on a bike from Halesowen.  It was a lovely ride through Saltwells National Nature Reserve and Pensnett SSSI (for Great Crested Newts).  You kindly let me use the Gents toilet.

Out of sheer self interest, I'm trying to get your nearby cycle-walkway upgraded and more popular for cyclists who share with care to avoid upsetting walkers.  I'm wanting it to be like the wide, hard surfaced one in Woodgate Valley Country Park that I use when cycling into Brum from home.  That council upgraded it last decade and it is now more popular with walkers and cyclists.  We, in the Black Country, get left out over railway reopenings and old railways like the Kingswinford Railway Walk being transformed from what I call the Russells Hall Hospital and Black Country Cycle-Walk Mudway (especially in its Dudley section).  It is convenient for hospital staff and visitors to encourage them to leave their cars at home.

I wonder if you have a member of staff who might like to do a project with pupils on the history, geography, nature conservation and potential for the Kingswinford Railway Walk to be similarly upgraded, like the Brum ones, for active travel.  It runs from Fens Pool Avenue in Brierley Hill to NW Wolverhampton and far beyond, via Wombourne.  I call it the UK's longest and only urban-rural-urban cycle-walkway and the most important for its potential to help cycle commuters and all active travellers to leave their cars at home.  And, therefore, upgrading would reduce the twice daily crawl of car commuters and the cocktail of poisonous gases from our cars with their greenhouse gas emissions to worsen climate breakdown and, all too soon, bring oil reserve shortages.

The cycle-walkway goes through three nature reserves, has two old stations as cafes and one Woodland Trust property.

To explain my own lifestyle choice: I gave up my essential car user status to take to the food fueled bike for nearly all social work visits in the mid 90s!  I did have to use the car, at times.  My reward was 15p/mile on official council business.  It went up to 20p/ml before I retired as a working cyclist and commuter at 65.5 years, ten years ago.

Do let me know if you think this is a suitable matter for a group of your youngsters to work on in school.

Many thanks and best wishes

The Dudley Group NHS Foundation Trust

Dear Helen and friends

Twelve months ago Helen Attwood wrote, "to ensure our sites, service users and staff have the best access to sustainable and active travel."  (my emphasis).  I am your service user and, from my experience, it is all wishful, fine intentions but undelivered.  To be honest, it is cloud cuckoo land!

It cannot be true, after all this time, when there is not even ONE Sheffield cycle stand on the E side of the main entrance where there is room, as I wrote yesterday.

This cannot possibly be true when I have no proof that you have actually written to each of TfWM, WMCA, Active Travel England to insist that what they have built as the 22 Kms Black Country Cycle-Walk Mudway, the UK's most important urban-rural-urban cycle-walkway, MUST be finished with a wide, all weather surface that we can use as a business, leisure and commuter route for the increasing numbers who would use it as such, if it is made fit for purpose.  Remember, that it is a little over half a kilometre from the Trust's front door!

Even all you good people who are wedded and welded to your cars, can reduce road traffic congestion by insisting that the UK's most important, forgotten, fully built but without trains, 120 Kms railway, MUST be finished for us to use.  We could all get about in our cars more easily if the destruction and waste of the West Midlands railway lines was stopped.  This is because, although you may feel you have to use your cars, plenty of others, like me, will use trains, as well as cycles.

Could I please have a one hour meeting with you to discuss your doubts and to answer your questions and scepticism over my facts and figures regarding tragic transport in the borough of Dudley?  This is one map, from 2003 to show what STILL must be done, simply to address congestion and air pollution, quite apart from the five years climate emergency that is being ignored as we carry on with business as usual:

 Railfuture's full map.pdf

With best wishes

THE MIDLANDS MOST URGENT ACTIVE TRAVEL PROJECT FOR FUNDING

 17 July 2023

Adam told me last week that funding from HMG was not forthcoming.  You all need to persist, please.  I would love to know why Cycling UK is remaining steadfastly indifferent and failing to help.

I think Dudley's premier and nearby hospital also needs to help out of sheer self-interest in getting their staff, patients (like me) and visitors into the fresh air to cut back on the obesity epidemic and greenhouse gases over warming the planet to threaten extinction.

I cycled (or had to carry the bike on the most impassable, shameful sections) most of the 22 Kms Black Country Cycle-Walk Mudway last week when cycling back from Wolverhampton.  It is, I believe, the UK's longest and most important, urban-rural-urban commuter and leisure cycle-walkway.  I noticed that sections in all three councils (Dudley, S Staffs and Wolverhampton) remain muddy and waterlogged.  This was particularly disappointing because over the last two or three years, I have received emails from officers of Dudley MBC that they were going to be cutting back the overgrowing vegetation and putting a temporary surface down on the muddy and waterlogged parts in our borough.  This has certainly not been done.  Why is this?

Many thanks for an explanation, please.

Tim Weller   0791 380 4363

2 quizzes to inform and amuse

 Multi-choice answers for this fun quiz

continued on

 QUIZ: Select 5 given answers to 5 questions

as 5 top priorities for regional politicians and officers

Jewish/Israeli history - a fair and accurate resume?

Israel's first manifestation in the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures shows that Israel and the Arabs (leading, eventually to Islam) were born out of sexual immorality and was soon followed by cheating, dishonesty and deception.

I'm thinking of Abraham who had sex with a slave girl to give Ishmael who was not considered a member of the people of Israel.  Abraham's other son was Isaac who was.  With Rebekah, came Esau and Jacob.  Next, Jacob deceived Isaac, his dad, to take Esau's birthright to inherit and gave it to himself, instead!  Jacob was then 'honoured' by being renamed Israel.  This behaviour is obviously unethical but was given by Yawheh.

MODERN PARALLEL

Last century, with Christian faith embedded in the Western European nations, we saw centuries of Jewish persecution which culminated in six million Jews being killed by one of the Christian nations.  Some of the surviving Jews than used terrorism to force Britain which had the UN Mandate, to flee Palestine.  In 1948, the State of Israel was born out of force, coercion and violence and some of the inhabitants of the land fled to neighbouring countries, while those who stayed were subsumed into the State of Israel.

Not sexual immorality, dishonesty and deception this time but intimidation, terrorism and violence from the Children of Abraham who were and are to this day, still at it, especially in Gaza.  This, even after nine months of the slaughter of the 95% who are innocent in not taking to killing Israelis.

Over the recent centuries of the biggest and most powerful empire (Christian) in history, with its theft of land, property and people, it does have to be acknowledged that it is the Bible and its adherents who are responsible.

What is wrong with them and, in particular, the moral teaching of the Bible?

Questions for Lunar Society hustings

Should our candidates now be speaking out against West Midlands armaments industry fueling the slaughter of wholly innocent Gazans (and West Bank Palestinians) who simply wish to LIVE and to live in peaceful co-existence with Israel?

Should our candidates be resisting the hundreds of millions going into multi-modal public transport that actually means regular trains and buses being swapped with the roll out of Metro trams and Sprint buses?

Should the candidates be acquainted with the uncomfortable fact that these kinds of extremely expensive expenditure (armaments and multi-modal public transport) simply accelerate the climate emergency and divert private and public funds from helping low incomes with, for example, regional Fare-Free Public Transport for every citizen?

Do you accept the scandal of £15 billion (2020 figure) for 150 miles, 8 lines and 380 tram stops of Metro tramway expansion in the West Midlands?

Do you accept that, as with High Scam 2 billions being transferred to other transport and non-transport schemes, this £15 billion must go to insulate the homes of the poorest in the W Mids?

Do you accept that Metro expansion will accelerate the climate emergency and worsen the plight of the poorest in our region?
 
Do you accept that social and climate justice to benefit low incomes, at the expense of the rich and totally unnecessary flash, posh, plush, wealth flaunting schemes must be our top priority?

Over the centuries, Christian culture and practice involved imperialism and slavery

6 May 2024

Will Hutton's piece prompted this:

Over the centuries, Christian culture and practice involved imperialism and slavery - twin evils that anyone of integrity should have kept well away from regardless of the age in which they lived.  Some truths, like the Ten Commandments from 2,500 years ago never change over time.  I think, Christ's teaching too is applicable for all of the 2,000 years since His teaching and for the 2,000 years before Christ.

Yet, at a time when church attendance was at its high point, so was empire-building and slavery.

So entrenched were these practices, it would have been difficult to avoid them completely, I know.  However, the very minimum that I would have expected was the blindingly obvious fact from Christ's life and teaching, that you have nothing to do with warfare and you profit as little as possible from it.  And, of course, from the equally iniquitous cotton, tobacco and sugar plantations.  But much more difficult, of course, to exist without those products.  Violence was an integral part of slavery and colonialism.  Another reason for the Church to distance itself from as much imperialism and slavery as possible.

Still today, the state Church is so bound up with the State. Hopeless!  But wonderful for tradition, ceremony and pomp!

We need to buck our ideas up!

WHY the gross extravagance and idiocy of replacing and duplicating buses and trains with trams instead of spending the money on regional Fare-Free Public Transport for all and returning the commuter and regional trains to our urban railway lines not yet destroyed?

WHY, for 80 years, has every political party failed to strongly oppose Jewish terrorism and, then failed to oppose the State of Israel profiting from their land grabs from every war of aggression (under the guise of self-defence)?

For 400 years, Britain and other W European nations have strongly pursued the evil of domineering, undemocratic imperialism around the world that brought the racism, the barbarity and the horrors of slavery that killed or caused intense suffering and abuse for millions of black/brown people.

WHY, only reparations for the guilty people who did it.  How perverse!

W European empires followed by the world-domineering American Empire have all brought wars, coups, famines and death to many countries in the Global South and, in recent decades to countries in the Middle East.

Not one political party is opposing the victimisation of former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn who is barred from standing for Labour to continue his 41 years as an upright, left-wing dissident as the MP for Islington North.

WHY so little support over my insistence that Christians 'Voting for Jesus' means denouncing aggression and, the never-ending Israeli War of Self-Defence that has brought death and injury to tens of thousands of Gazans and Palestinians who knew nothing about what was to happen on 7.10.23.  No church-goer seems to want even the morally and blindingly obvious ban on UK/US arms sales around the world!

WHY so little support over my opposition to the four new Trident nuclear submarines where the old ones failed to stop Russia's invasion of Ukraine or Hamas attacking our friends?  Trident is a useless status symbol.

ALL THESE YEARS OF WRONG SPENDING for them has given me this!:-

2nd ANNUAL CYCLE OR WALK THE MUDWAY to get it transformed - on Sat 3 Aug 24 and Sat 10 Aug 24

Dear friends - please do join us for active travel under our own steam

Saturday 3 August and Sat 10 Aug.  I'll do both.  You choose either Saturday - for the weather you want!  Anyone and everyone is welcome.  We return when we reach the 'end' (20 Kms?) or whenever you have had enough.  The Dudley section is the worst, so choose the driest Saturday!  Bring lunch if you want to do the lot, as far as Shropshire Union Canal Mainline.

You cycle as much or as little as you want.  You cycle as fast or as slow as you want.  You are responsible for your own safety.  You can't get lost!  ALL TRAFFIC FREE.  Use a robust bike (or boots).  It's not that bad, honest!

10 am start at Fens Pool Avenue, Brierley Hill at Stourbridge Rd end on both Saturdays.  Maps:

 Disgraceful Dudley BC Cycle-Walk Mudway 01.pdf

 Disgraceful Dudley BC Cycle-Walk Mudway 02.pdf

HIGHLIGHTS to enjoy - the mud should be dry by now!!:

3 nature reserves - Fens Pools SSSI, Barrow Hill, Smestow Valley Local Nature Reserve.

2 disused railway lines

2 refreshment stops at two Victorian railway stations in Wolverhampton

1 Woodland Trust property - Himley Plantation

1 Monarch's Way

1 S Staffs Railway Walk

Our ideal mini power station of a home

The inclusion, below, of what I've written about 28 Hunnington Cres is so important to me and why, ideally, I would like it to remain within the Weller/Willson family - for one of the grandchildren, perhaps.  But whoever does live in it, I don't want the next occupants, after mum and I, to revert back to how the house was.  Jonathan has said, and I agree, that gas has to go for everyone one day.  Therefore, the two gas heaters must eventually be taken out.  They have served us well, are still working but both are now inefficient.  It is even much more comfortable to have the infra-red heaters in front of you or even on the settee, as I like to have.  They are slower at heating the room, so you do have to dress accordingly but, that has never been a problem for those of us who so love the outdoors!  We all have to tread more lightly on the planet.  Upstairs living during the daytime is very important for maximum warmth, minimum bills and lowest impact.

ON LIVING SIMPLY TO SIMPLY LIVE!

We two frugal fossil fueled OAPs finished our transition to low impact living on the 30 November 2023 when the gas meter was removed for free by our energy provider, Octopus.  From then on monthly bills inclu VAT were:- Dec £50, Jan £42, Feb £22, March £28, April £23, May £24 and, £21 on 21 June.  Averages out at £20/mth when 50% of that is standing charge (61p/day).  But that includes FIT/SEG payments.

July 24: £21    Aug: £21    Sept: £22    Oct: £25   Nov: £49    Dec: £49

Jan 25: £64  Feb: £74  Mar: £29  Apr: £29  May: £23  June: £23.67  July: £22.10   Aug: £23.65  Sept: £24.57  Oct: £30.15  Nov: £35.35  Dec: £51.12

Jan 26: £68.25  Feb: £56.37  Mar: £31.79  Apr: £26.52  May: £25.98

OUR MINI POWER STATION of a home in Halesowen:

1967/68 three storey, 3 bedroom, mid-terrace, townhouse.

6.24 kWp east/west, solar array fitted Nov 2013 (difficult to keep clean, however on high roof!)

14.40 kWh batteries in garage

Infra-red portable heater panels that are so flexible and are slim and white, that we love.  You sit in front of them.

Induction electric cooker

10/12 kWh instant electric water heater behind shower on top floor does all hot taps, too.

3 kWh unit for hand washing in downstairs toilet.

Sleep on the ground floor (not needed for us) because you don't need any room heat when in bed.

Live above bedrooms (not us), where it is naturally warmer.

Go for a smart meter and batteries BEFORE solar panels to then go on a tariff that uses cheaper night-time electricity stored in the battery.  You then use the elecy from the battery during the coming day.

Solar is very necessary, however, to go off grid as much as you possibly can.  Saves on big power stations and pylons!

Has anyone tried a domestic wind turbine on the roof?  Or, seen one?

These texts to a friend summarise longer pieces on my blog

We Brits (and France) are to blame for the Middle East today, especially from 1917 to 1948. "Perfidious Albany", duplicitous Britain all helped the 1948 catastrophe for both Israel and Palestine continuing to this day. 

I am horrified by Labour's unprincipled, 100% support for the most ever, extreme right-wing, ultra-nationalist, Israeli government committing acts leading to genocide, under the guise of a righteous War of Self Defence that never ends.  With Labour supporting arms and ammunition to Iniquitous Israel and, fully supporting the American weapons going to Israel, still.  I cannot bring myself to vote for any of the parties.

I want a unity, Coalition government to urgently address the climate and resource shortages and other multi-crises.

My first action would be to stop all arms and ammunition going from our shores.

LEGACY OF OUR NOT-SO-GLORIOUS EMPIRE

It is unheard of for ordinary Christian believers to condemn militarism, imperialism, displacement of peoples and to condemn aggression rewarded by the keeping of land as we have allowed the State of Israel to do for 76 years.  We don't allow other countries to be rewarded for land grabs but it's fine for our side to do it!

British Thuggery Around the World!:-
The Brits were responsible for the Palestine catastrophe in 1948, Kashmir impasse, the opium wars on China, South Africa war, Bengal famine, Amritsar massacre, solid support for numerous coups and SE Asian wars from our best mate USA, theft of the Chagos Archipelago that is part of the British Indian Ocean Territory and forced displacement of their people, Bloody Sunday in 1972, the 1840s Irish famine ...

The Great Bengal famine of 1770 struck Bengal and Bihar between 1769 and 1770 and affected some 30 million people.

FROM:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengal_famine_of_1943

The Bengal famine of 1943 was a famine in the Bengal province of British India (present-day Bangladesh, West Bengal and eastern India) during World War II. An estimated 0.8–3.8 million people died.

FROM: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/29/winston-churchill-policies-contributed-to-1943-bengal-famine-study

More recent studies, including those by the journalist Madhushree Mukerjee, have argued the famine was exacerbated by the decisions of Winston Churchill’s wartime cabinet in London.

Mukerjee has presented evidence the cabinet was warned repeatedly that the exhaustive use of Indian resources for the war effort could result in famine, but it opted to continue exporting rice from India to elsewhere in the empire.

Rice stocks continued to leave India even as London was denying urgent requests from India’s viceroy for more than 1m tonnes of emergency wheat supplies in 1942-43. Churchill has been quoted as blaming the famine on the fact Indians were “breeding like rabbits”, and asking how, if the shortages were so bad, Mahatma Gandhi was still alive.

Mukerjee and others also point to Britain’s “denial policy” in the region, in which huge supplies of rice and thousands of boats were confiscated from coastal areas of Bengal in order to deny resources to the Japanese army in case of a future invasion.

Repentance and reparations should "begin in the House of the Lord" (even the House of Lords where all the Top Bishops sit and ponder!)