World’s End Estate

A video shows children’s toys and family possessions have been discovered untouched and rotting on an abandoned housing estate by an urban explorer.

Sean Piper, from Kent, England, stunned TikTok users after he found the Mayron Grove estate in Woolwich, London, and posted the footage to the social media site saying it looked like ‘the end of the world’.

The video, which has over 20,000 views, shows the exploration of the housing estate which has 172 dwellings spread across 16 blocks of flats.

On the estate, old children’s toys like stuffed rabbits, play cars and rocking horses can be seen rotting and collecting dust.

He told NeedToKnow.co.uk that wandering around the estate was a very eerie experience. It reminded him of scary movies like 28 days later or even video games like The Last of Us or Resident Evil.

The estate has been abandoned since 2010 and it took Greenwich Council a year to move everyone out, so obviously they do have housing reserves.

They slowly began offering one-off payments to residents, as well as reduced rent rated in new build apartments.

The plan was to demolish the buildings and build new luxury apartments, 165 in total to be built, to be a mixture of private and council flats.

However, plans hit a gridlock, and following a fire in one of the flats in March 2023, the buildings have since been fenced off and set for demolition.

The flats have been sat empty and open to the elements, for people to explore, and many residents took the moving opportunity to have a clear out of their possessions, so many things were left inside, like kids’ toys, televisions, shoes and clothes and even a couple that were completely furnished still.

Upon visiting the area, Sean felt as though he’d gone back in time, and got a eerie feeling from the start.

He said that it wasn’t fenced off when he went and even the car parks were very derelict looking. The lamp posts had broken lights, it was a ghost town, and he said the properties were almost all open, either by a door or window. They were metal sheeted so extremely dark inside, and wandering around inside with a torch provided a creepy atmosphere.

He said that some of the flats were fire damaged and had signs of squatters inside with soiled mattresses on the floor, bags full of old beer bottles and cigarette butts and needles on the floor.

What a waste. The council should be really ashamed and they should be fined every day until they either demolish the flats or renovate them if they can. After all, this could be supplying housing for so many desperate people, and yet the councils keep bleating on that they don’t have any housing stock, well this is probably why – disgraceful.

And you can guarantee that if they do knock it down and rebuild, it certainly won’t go for our own homeless.

This was likely a perfectly good council estate that probably wasn’t up to code, which could have been brought up to code, but instead, councils insist they build on every scrap of green land that we have.

This is a disgraceful waste of once decent social housing left to rot for the pursuit of profit and greed, and this happens a lot because councils are creating social cleansing whereby they uproot people on these estates that have likely lived there all their lives so that they’re disjoined from a community, friends and family.

They tell us that they have a housing shortage, they don’t have a housing shortage, just an out-of-control immigration policy.

Midge Ure, 71, Claims Bob Geldof Described His Iconic Band-Aid Song As Junk When He First Heard It

It’s an iconic song that’s graced the world’s airwaves for nearly 40 years, and now Midge Ure has revealed Bob Geldof’s first response on hearing the song to Band-Aid’s Do They Know It’s Christmas? was less than flattering.

Midge Ure, who co-wrote the charity single, said the singer claimed that it was rubbish but that it would do when he played him the tune on a toy keyboard.

The Boomtown Rats frontman, now 71, also told Midge Ure he thought it sounded like the theme tune to the 1960s British police TV drama Z-Cars.

Midge Ure, 69, said the pair then went to work on the track that has gone on to raise more than £200 million to help fight starvation in Africa since its release in 1984.

The Ultravox singer, originally of Cambuslang, near Glasgow, told the How to Be 60 podcast they’d thought of absurd ways to come up with money but settled on making music.

He added that they spent two hours trying to think of ridiculous ways of trying to raise some money then finally succumbing to the fact that they were rubbish at everything except maybe writing a song.

He said that they thought that if they wrote a Christmas song and got all of their friends involved, they could raise £100,000.

He said that luckily he’d just finished building his studio and sent Bob a cassette of this little thing he did on a toy keyboard. He said it was rubbish and that it sounded like Z-Cars, but that it would do. Then he came over with a right-handed guitar upside down because he’s left-handed, with barely any strings on it and started singing.

He told Bob to leave him and then he recorded them on a cassette and spent four days playing all the instruments and doing the arrangement for the song while Bob bludgeoned all their friends to come along and had a strength in name and fan base which was extremely important. Then, of course, the entire thing went mad, but whether he liked the song or not, Bob has been dining out on it.

However, you have to admit the Band-Aid concert would have been forgotten long ago if it hadn’t been for Freddie Mercury.

Bob Geldof did a good thing at the time – he wanted to do something to help. How much he helped is another thing, but his heart was in the right place, although he’s presumably profited a lot off the back of it, and I’m sure there were loads that wanted to climb aboard his bandwagon. He’s an extremely impressive man that didn’t have the best life growing up but has always been there for his own family.

Yes, of course, he wanted the notoriety, who wouldn’t?

NOT Lovin’ It!

McDonald’s has quietly hiked the price of a Big Mac by nearly £1 and has also made chicken nuggets, burgers, fries, and milkshakes more costly.

Last year the fast food giant declared it could no longer shield customers from the soaring costs caused by rising inflation hitting the cost of produce, energy, fuel and wages.

Yet in April McDonald’s announced sales in the first quarter were boosted by four per cent to $5.9 billion (£4.57 billion), compared to this time last year.

Now the fast food store has bumped up prices across its menu in the United Kingdom without announcing it to customers.

This time last year the company said it was increasing the price of a cheeseburger for the first time in 14 years from 99p to £1.19.

Although a cheeseburger still costs £1.19 in June, this month the price has bounced to £1.29, while a Big Mac is £4.59, up from £3.69, and fan favourite 20 Chicken McNuggets is at £5.79, up from £4.99.

Milkshakes have been raised by 50p from £1.29 to £1.79, an increase of nearly 40 per cent.

Even vegan dishes have been hit by the hike, with the Vegetable Deluxe rising from £3.59 to £4.19 and the McPlant jumping from £3.69 to £4.29.

It comes as it was revealed the Consumer Prices Index rate was running at 7.9 per cent in June, falling from 8.7 per cent the previous month and significantly below expectations.

Crucially the core measure of prices, excluding more volatile elements such as fuel, also declined.

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt hailed CPI as being at its lowest level for 15 months in the official figures but also warned the fight to suppress prices had not yet been won.

He said that they weren’t complacent and knew that high prices were still a huge worry for families and businesses and that the best way they could ease this pressure and get the economy growing again was by sticking to the plan to halve inflation this year.

Rishi Sunak said he was sticking to the plan of trying to halve inflation to around 5 per cent by the end of the year.

The fast-food colossus has been slammed with allegations of sexual wrongdoing this week after young female staff at McDonald’s declared they were groped, given nicknames like ‘McBike’, and were rated on their appearance at work on scoreboards.

Alistair Macrow, McDonald’s boss in the United Kingdom, issued an apology after the BBC discovered that more than 100 existing and former staff at the fast food chain alleged they’d been harassed.

From now on the staff will ask, ‘Do you want fries with that?’ And they’ll be saying no because they just can’t afford them.

I must admit McDonald’s has done well at attempting to keep their prices down, but of course, everything has gone up, the price of food, utilities, fuel, rents, rates, probably uniforms and wages. They all add up, and McDonald’s isn’t a charity, they’re a business and they have to make money, condemn the Government, not McDonald’s.

The short and tall of it is, if people can’t afford to eat out anymore, then eat at home. Soon, there will be no McDonald’s, Burger King et cetera. In fact, there won’t be much of anything beyond your front door, it will all be gone, but of course, that’s what the Government want so that they can keep an eye on you and control your every move.

Also, have you noticed, McDonald’s burgers have become smaller? I can remember a Big Mac back in the 1970s being much bigger, like double the size. In fact, I used to have trouble eating them because when you bit into them the sauce would seep out the sides and normally I would wear it instead of eating it. Now, two bites and it’s gone!

Of course, we’re all acquainted with our favourite chocolate bars, crisps and household essentials falling prey to shrinkflation. A sly method in which brands quietly push through price hikes by reducing the size of their packaging, therefore giving customers less bang for their money.

And now hungry McDonald’s customers are now questioning whether the food chain has shrunk its burgers, but McDonald’s denied these claims.

McDonald’s burgers look more like a kid-size portion, rather than an adult size. If it’s kid-size then we should pay for a kid’s portions, not adult portions. So, not only have they become smaller, but they’ve become more costly as well!

It’s not the first time McDonald’s has been accused of shrinkflation. In 2020, one Reddit user compared their cheeseburger to the size of a cookie, with numerous commenters flocking to the comments in agreement.

Caravan Smashed By Nightmare Holidaymaker

A nightmare holidaymaker who realised she could have paid £200 less, unleashed carnage in retaliation, ripping her hired caravan to shreds and destroying its contents.

Rob Smith, director of holiday caravan rental company Jars Holidays, rented the vehicle at Lyons Robin Hood Holiday Park in Rhyl, Wales, out to a woman and her partner between July 14 and 21.

However, the 38-year-old claims the holidaymakers were a nightmare from the start, calling for the boiler to be fixed at 1 am in the morning and badgering for money off despite being in the caravan already.

When Mr Smith pointed out that it was all already paid and refused any reimbursement, the renter turned hostile and trashed the caravan and fled in the night, just four days into their holiday.

The company director was shocked when he stepped inside the abandoned van the next morning to discover that it had been torn to shreds by the guests.

Shocking images shared on Facebook reveal the state of the two-bedroom caravan, with torn-up bedding, curtains and a smart flatscreen TV.

The whole home appeared to be clad in dog food, rubbish and what seemed to be flour emptied all over the stove, whilst uprooted sofa cushions and broken kitchen utensils covered the floors.

Mr Smith claims that the destructive tenant had even left the shower on full blast, with the head dangling out the bathroom window.

Mr Smith, who rents out privately owned caravans to backpackers looking for seaside town getaways, claims that it took the Jar Holiday team six hours to clean up the carnage.

The caravan rental company had to replace everything in sight, including forking out about £1,000 for a replacement flatscreen TV.

Mr Smith, from Toxteth, Liverpool, said that obviously, they’d rented out to somebody who hadn’t been a good renter.

He said that security had walked past the caravan between one and three o’clock in the morning and it was all smashed up, but that they only got the call in the morning.

He said that it was disgusting and that in all the years they’d been there, they’d never seen this happen before, and that she was a nightmare during the stay and after.

He added that she booked through a third-party company and that she privately messaged them halfway through the holiday saying she could have paid £200 less elsewhere through a different third-party company for the holiday and that she wanted her money back.

This is criminal damage and the person that caused this trashing should be taken to court.

Unfortunately, things like this occur and Mr Smith should have been insured for this kind of thing, and he will more than likely get his money back for the destruction of the caravan, and if he was not insured, then he should have been.

The police probably won’t pursue this as they’re out pursuing ‘woke’ issues, but Mr Smith would have been given an incident number for his insurance company to investigate and eventually pay out.

This woman should be made to pay every penny for the damages, but you’ve got to find her first, and taking her to small claims court would likely end up costing Mr Smith more money in the long run, and no doubt the woman is on benefits or a meagre income and would only be ordered to pay back a small amount at a time. There’s a vast difference between winning in court and actually getting the money.

This is why there needs to be a register of bad tenants so that they won’t do it to others in the future.

Sadiq Khan Now Threatens To Use Hidden Mobile Cameras In ULEZ Zones

Sadiq Khan could be set to ramp up efforts to enforce his ULEZ scheme with the use of mobile cameras after at least 200 cameras have been vandalised by Londoners so far.

The move has sparked concern amongst sceptics over whether Transport for London (TfL) will be able to implement the mayor’s clean air directive.

Sadiq Khan said that TfL will no longer provide details on just how many cameras were being vandalised, as there’s the danger of inadvertently giving vandals the oxygen of publicity.

London’s mayor, whose position is up for re-election next year, attempted to de-emphasise concerns that the capital’s drivers could avoid the £12.50 levy by working out ways where they won’t be picked up by the cameras.

On TfL’s use of mobile cameras to implement the congestion charge scheme, Sadiq Khan told Mayor’s Question Time that in previous schemes, with the C-charge and the Ulez, there was the possibility for there to be mobile cameras as well.

Conservative member of the London Assembly, Peter Fortune asked the mayor for an update on the topic of Ulez camera vandalism so far and whether it would be feasible for London’s transport body to enforce the Ulez rules across all 33 boroughs.

Sadiq Khan said TfL had good confidence it would be able to enforce the ruling across the Greater London expansion from August 29.

He told Mr Fortune that was his concern in relation to loopholes or routes, it’s not their first rodeo and that they’ve done this before.

Sadiq Khan revealed that a slim number of people had been vandalising the cameras and that two had been charged with vandalism offences and were facing court hearings.

He said that having taken advice from policing partners and others, TfL had taken the position that it wouldn’t be releasing details about the number of cameras that had been subjected to criminal damage.

As a way of attempting to circumvent vandals, TfL has been using ‘cherry picker’ lorries to position cameras out of reach of civilians.

This came after a number of cameras pitched on top of traffic signs were vandalised or removed by furious Londoners.

Sadiq Khan said that the number of cameras that TfL originally planned to have by the day of ‘go live’, they’re still confident they will have by the date of ‘go live’. They’re confident they will get to the number they need to get by August 29.

It’s evidently clear by the amount of vandals that people don’t want the ULEZ charge, and why would they, it’s costing them a fortune. Come to that they don’t want Sadiq Khan either, but the majority of people are irrelevant to Sadiq Khan and the government’s opinion.

Sadiq Khan really isn’t endearing himself, is he? But then this is what you get when you give someone with a brain some authority.

Doesn’t he realise that fighting the people is a sure way not to get re-elected? Unless the voting is rigged. I used to believe that this country was honest but I now believe it’s corrupt to the core.

Hidden cameras, is this not against the law and wouldn’t this be classed as covert recording?

It appears that the government will tax you on whatever they like, what will it be next, fresh air? No doubt, they will come up with a strategy for that, if they haven’t already done so.

It’s all about dictatorship and going against what the people really want, and then attempting to conceal the reality that it’s a dictatorship, this must stop or society will fail.

Sadiq Khan Is To Be Exposed For Who He Really Is, According To Susan Hall

Susan Hall vowed to expose Sadiq Khan for who he really is after she was chosen as the Tory candidate for London mayor to take on the Labour incumbent.

The London Assembly member and local councillor will endeavour to stop Sadiq Khan from winning a third term as the capital’s mayor in next May’s election.

She defeated rival Tory candidate Moz Hossain to win the Conservative nomination for London mayor, with Ms Hall securing 57 per cent of the vote compared to Moz Hossain’s 43 per cent.

Ms Hall, 68, was announced as the Tory choice for London mayor at an event at the Battle of Britain Bunker at RAF Uxbridge.

Conservative members in London had been voting over the past two weeks for their preferred candidates.

She vowed to work tirelessly over the next 10 months to defeat Sadiq Khan, who she claimed only cared about himself, and to expose the London mayor for who he actually is.

Speaking after the outcome of the Tory contest was announced, Ms Hall said that it was a huge honour to be everyone’s candidate to be the mayor of London.

She said that it left her with an important responsibility and that she would work tirelessly to defeat Sadiq Khan and offer Londoners the change they desperately need, and that we need a safer city where women and girls don’t have to fear walking down the street at night.

She said that we need an inclusive city where one can afford to buy a home and raise a family and that we needed a kinder city where we can celebrate our cultural diversity and focus on what unites us and not what divides us.

She added that we needed a cleaner city that’s serious about tackling climate change and air pollution but without taxing the poorest.

Ms Hall claimed Sadiq Khan had no interest in helping others and only cared about himself, and that was why he was failing Londoners, and that he goes on trips to cannabis factories while young people are getting stabbed on the streets.

She said that when things go wrong, he hires an army of spin doctors to convince everyone that it’s actually not his fault, but that Londoners deserved so much better.

Ms Hall promised to use the next 10 months to expose Sadiq Khan for who he really is.

What we actually need is someone who is passionate about London, that’s not too much to ask, or are we overlooking something here? Could Susan Hall be that person?

Susan Hall is from Harrow, London, where she worked as a mechanic in her father’s garage and owned a hair salon.

But does she have hope against Sadiq Khan, yes I think that she does.

She’s obviously passionate about London, but the problem is, there are not enough people living in London who are passionate about it.

Sadiq Khan is a lousy mayor and really doesn’t have a vested interest in the people who live in London, the trouble is, the Tories are so poisonous that London will vote him back regardless.

Perhaps the most money-saving thing would be to abolish all mayors because they’re a waste of space and money.

Look at the state of the country, and the voters have been voting stupidly at the polling booth for the last thirteen years. Anyone voting Tory would have to be deranged, but those types that do vote for them would no doubt lick the trotters of a pig.

Court Of Appeal Rules

A mother of three imprisoned for illegally obtaining her own abortion tablets to end her pregnancy is to be released from jail after the Court of Appeal ruled it was a case that called for compassion, not punishment.

Carla Foster was jailed in June for more than two years after taking pills which claimed the life of stillborn Lily, in a matter that sparked widespread debate.

Anti-abortion campaigners, enraged at the 44-year-old’s jailing, orchestrated demonstrations outside the Royal Courts of Justice in Westminster, as they called for her release over the extremely concerning decision to confine her behind bars.

But now, following weeks of legal wrangling, an appeal judge has insisted there was exceptionally strong mitigation in her case and that the imprisoned mother should be freed from jail immediately.

Carla Foster, who lived in the Staffordshire village of Barlaston, lied about how advanced her pregnancy in order to obtain the abortion-causing drugs.

She was between 32 and 34 weeks pregnant when she obtained the medication from the British Pregnancy Advisory Service under the ‘pills by post’ scheme.

Carla Foster was initially charged with child destruction and pleaded not guilty, before pleaded guilty to an alternative charge of administering drugs or using instruments to procure abortion. She was ultimately sentenced to 28 months in jail.

Last month, Mr Justice Pepperall said that Carla Foster would serve 14 months in custody and then the rest on licence after her release, but at the Court of Appeal in London, three judges took the decision to cut her prison sentence.

Dame Victoria Sharp, sitting with Lord Justice Holroyde and Mrs Justice Lambert, said Carla Foster’s sentence would be lowered to 14 months and that it should be suspended.

She said that this was a very sad case, not least because of the length of the gestation when the offence was committed.

She added that it was a case that called for compassion, not punishment, and there was no useful purpose served by detaining Ms Foster in custody.

Dame Victoria said there was ‘exceptionally strong migitation’ in Foster’s case and that she should be released from prison ‘immediately’.

Carla Foster emerged for the hearing via video link from Foston Hall Prison, sporting glasses and a dark blue top with flowers on the shoulders.

Her barrister, Barry White, said there was a lack of ‘vital’ reports into Carla Foster’s mental health at the time of the offence and that ‘the obvious impact of the pandemic added to Ms Foster’s already anxious state of mind’.

The Court of Appeal was told the prison in which Carla Foster had spent 35 days had refused to allow her any form of contact with her three children, one of whom is autistic.

Mr White also said Carla Foster had voluntarily brought her actions to the attention of the police, adding that had she not done that, it’s highly unlikely that she would have ever been prosecuted.

Of course, this is an extremely sad case, and some might say that she could have carried the child to full term and either given it up for adoption, but unfortunately many of these babies end up in the system, and there’s no telling what kind of life this child might have had in the system, and this poor woman didn’t take this decision lightly.

This has now set a precedent that will be referred to in similar cases in the future. You can’t force somebody to have a baby, and people’s opinions are not a matter of law. It’s their body and their choice.

And remember this was during lockdown, remember that. We couldn’t go anywhere, or see anyone, and I don’t suppose giving birth during lockdown is something that people wish to remember, and I can’t imagine what this woman went through.

But COVID or not, shouldn’t there have been a medical check-up, of course not, nobody wanted to work, not even doctors. I’m guessing that the procedures have been investigated and why wasn’t the person that mailed the pills out questioned about it? After all, had they not sent them to her, it would never have happened, so shouldn’t the British Pregnancy Advisory Service have been culpable of a crime as well because it’s shocking that this was even a scenario in the first place?

House Of Lords Should Be Abolished, According To Most Voters 

A survey discovered that most voters don’t trust the House of Lords and want it abolished in its present form.

The poll found that barely a fifth of voters (21 per cent) believe the Lords acts in the public’s best interest, with 70 per cent believing it doesn’t.

The study by Opinium, for the think tank Labour Together, found that two-thirds of those questioned would like to see the Lords replaced by a directly elected second chamber.

Almost half (49 per cent) want the upper house abolished completely.

When voters were asked to describe it in a single word, they said it was outdated, old, corrupt, privileged and a waste.

A thorough study by the House of Lords authorities this year demonstrated that the upper chamber had become increasingly assertive since Britain voted to exit the EU, a decision opposed by most peers.

In a Parliamentary session from 2019-2021, when legislation to take Britain out of the EU was being considered, peers imposed 114 defeats on the Government, equivalent to more than two-thirds of all votes held.

The House of Lords has a turn-up sign, then they have a gourmet lunch with a lovely bottle of wine, coffee, and Connoisseur Brandy, then they have a nap out sign, collect their 300 plus expenses – they’re making a fool of us and it needs to be ditched.

Visualize how much we would save if we got rid of these hangers-on who bleed the pot dry for doing very little.

The House of Lords is a place where favours, under-the-table handshakes and generous donations are repaid and then it’s a life of generous expenses and when the time comes it’s a free daycare centre where everything’s for free with no expectations of them doing anything in return, and most of them sleep through their attendance anyhow.

It’s outdated and of very little value these days, and only serves to delay the introduction of necessary lawmaking. Moreover, it’s an excessive cost to the taxpayers, and the sooner it’s rescinded the better.

We are a democracy, which means we elect people (MPs) to represent us and run the country for the benefit of all. However, if we don’t like or agree with their running of the country we should get the opportunity to remove them through a General Election when we want, not when they want.

Why should an unelected body of people only be there because of birthright, unelected political appointments, or leaders of the church et cetera have a voice in how the country is run?

Perhaps we do need a second house, purely as a failsafe to hopefully make the Government think twice about their flawed decisions, but this second house should also be an elected house as well.

Politicians often tell you what they believe you want to hear when trying to get elected, but at least you get to vote them out in the next General Election. However, the length before a General Election is far too long for them to do tremendous damage to our country.

Of course, we could still have a scrutinising body for new laws to curb Parliament, but it should be elected and somehow adopted by ordinary working people.

There are presently approximately 800 of them and that is far too many for my liking, it’s like freeloaders central.

To Pick Up Their NHS Heroin, Drug Addicts Are Given Free Taxis

More than £80,000 of taxpayer’s money has been spent on hiring taxis to take drug addicts to an NHS clinic to be injected with ‘free heroin’.

Addicts with ‘chaotic’ lifestyles are picked up and transported to the £4 million clinic, where they’re given the Class A drug.

Earlier this year, a newspaper outlet revealed that the heroin-assisted treatment facility had cost taxpayers more than £165,000 per patient, and had logged 26 overdoses.

The latest figures, which came amid a row over Scotland’s drug death rate, the highest in Europe, sparked outrage at a time when the NHS was in crisis as waiting lists spiralled.

Anti-drugs campaigner Annemarie Ward, of human rights advocacy service FAVOR UK, said that this was basically the state acting as an enabler for addicts and encouraging them not to take responsibility for their own lives.

She said that there was a difference between rights and responsibility and that of course, people have a right to treatment for addiction but people also had to take responsibility for themselves.

She added that this took them into the territory of sick co-dependence, with millions spent on giving patients heroin when a place in rehab was proportionately much more cost-effective.

A newspaper outlet told that some patients had been selected from pubs and other locations rather than their own homes to be taken to the heroin clinic in Glasgow.

Ms Ward, a vocal critic of the SNP Government’s drug strategy, said the centre was aimed at tackling the chaotic lifestyles of drug addicts, but the fact that patients rely on taxis to get to the appointment suggests it is failing to restore stability to patients’ lives.

The purpose is to support those whose addictions are so far advanced that methadone has proved ineffective, so the NHS gives them heroin.

In March, it emerged that only 24 people had participated in the Enhanced Drug Treatment Service (EDTS).

There have been 26 overdoses since 2019, while 12 patients had been moved to other support services.

Now NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde (NHSGGC), which runs the EDTS, has disclosed that £80,027 of taxpayers’ money has been spent on taxis for EDTS patients since 2019.

It said taxi journeys were planned and agreed on an individual basis for a brief period in order to help people to engage with services.

Pharmaceutical-grade heroin is given to addicts at the EDTS under medical supervision in a bid to stop them from using lethal street heroin.

Of course, no one forces these people to take these drugs, so why should the taxpayer have to pay for their lifestyle? On the other hand, no one forces people to drink alcohol, yet it costs the NHS 3.5 billion and a million beds yearly, so we shouldn’t have to pay for their lifestyle choices either.

What the NHS should be doing is treating cancer, dementia and all other serious long-term illnesses, but yet again they’re wasting NHS money on these taxes, and just when you thought you’d heard it all, you hear about the NHS squandering money, so next time your appointment is cancelled, or your procedure is postponed, remember this!

Then you have the elderly who are as old as their 90s being denied patient transportation to the hospital for appointments.

However, we mustn’t overlook the ex-servicemen that have been suffering from PTSD, and who have been ditched and left to suffer from addiction and extreme mental health problems.

If you spoke to each of these people with a history of dependence, most would have a painful story that would warrant help and support, so we need to have a heart.

The Exile Of ‘Backstairs Billy’ Tallon, Who Reigned Supreme While Queen Mother Lived And Queen Elizabeth’s Dresser Angela Kelly Illustrates How Ruthless Courtiers Can Be

Loyal but louche, diligent but drunk, discreet in word but indiscreet in life, the Royal Family’s most notable servant, ‘Backstairs Billy’ Tallon is to be honoured in a play in London’s West End in the autumn, given equal billing with the woman he devotedly served for 50 years, the Queen Mother.

From the death of her husband, George VI, in 1952, until her own death in 2002, this dapper, bouffant-haired flunkey never left the former Queen Elizabeth’s side. He poured her drinks, organised her parties and listened to her secrets. And he was the only person permitted to enter her rooms without knocking.

While the Queen Mother lived, Billy Tallon reigned supreme at Clarence House, but tragically, he ended up in the gutter, literally.

In one respect, his fate had been mirrored by Angela Kelly, the late Queen Elizabeth II’s dresser and confident. When his royal employer died, Billy, son of a Coventry shopkeeper, was sacked and then ejected from his grace and favour home in the shadow of Clarence House.

Angela Kelly, daughter of a Liverpool docker, and in effect, the late sovereign’s gatekeeper, suffered a similar flight from grace at the hands of jealous courtiers.

Though adored by the late Queen, she ruffled feathers among other royals and recently had to leave her rent-free home on the Windsor estate to move to the Peak District.

Billy’s rise and fall will be portrayed in a comedy called ‘Backstairs Billy’, starring Downton Abbey actress Penelope Wilton as the Queen Mother, with Welsh performer and singer Luke Evans playing the title role. It’s a story worth telling.

When George VI died, the Queen Mother was only 51 and far from ready to be put out to pasture, but with her daughter firmly on the throne, the old Elizabeth had to find a new life for herself and a way to pass her time.

Enter, below stairs, William John Stephenson Tallon, a 15-year-old who’d written to Buckingham Palace begging for a job.

He started out by walking Elizabeth’s corgis, a position he was to continue doing for the next half-century, but soon his talent to entertain was spotted, and he started a long climb up the stairs, into the Queen Mother’s heart.

Shaking off the shadows of grief, Clarence House became what one courtier described as ‘a glorious gin palace’, with Billy, more usually known as William, the man to pour the Queen size drinks.

‘When the lights go on in Clarence House, it’s showtime’, he said theatrically, and so began a lifetime of drinking and partying, well-behaved, but turbo-charged by Billy’s dynamite cocktails, which kept the Queen Mum content for the rest of her days.

William Tallon succeeded Walter Taylor as Steward and Page of the Backstairs, this is how he earned the tabloid moniker ‘Backstairs Billy’.

William Tallon was on duty from early in the morning until the Queen Mother went to bed, and he was allowed to enter her private rooms without knocking and purchased the Christmas presents that she gave to others.

William Tallon had a partner of over 30 years, his name was Reginald Wilcock who became a footman at Buckingham Palace in 1954.

Reginald Wilcock was also a valet to the Duke of Windsor in Paris from 1957 to 1959, before joining the Queen Mother’s entourage at Clarence House in 1960 as a footman.

He’d been the House Deputy Steward and the Queen Mother’s Page of the Presence since 1978. On 4 August 2000, Reginald Wilcock served the Queen Mother her 100th birthday morning tea in her room. That night, whilst at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden with the Queen Mother, William Tallon learnt that Reginal Wilcock was dying. A week later, on 11 August, Reginald Wilcock died, aged 66. William Tallon arranged a magnificent funeral for him at the Queen’s Chapel in Marlborough House.

After Reginald Wilcock’s demise, William Tallon reportedly suffered from depression, and he reportedly felt sidelined when the Queen Mother turned to a younger team of attendants for her nursing care.

However, when she passed away in 2002, at the age of 101, William Tallon was said to be heartbroken.

Following this William Tallon left Clarence House, where he lived in the Lodge House. He settled in a ground-floor flat with a garden in Kennington, southeast London, where he was discovered dead on 23 November 2007, aged 72, as a result of liver failure.

William Tallon’s funeral took place at the Queen’s Chapel in St James Palace, with readings from Sir Derek Jacobi and Patricia Routledge. The funeral was attended by more than 200 people, including the Earl of Snowdon, Lady Sarah Chatto, June Brown, Paul O’Grady, Phyllida Law, Sir Roy Strong, Roy Petley and Keith Barron.

A bio that was written by Tom Quinn was called ‘Royal Life of William Tallon’. It said that the Queen Mother was often drunk and dotty for the final 20 years of her life. Whether true or not ‘hats off to the Queen Mother’, although Buckingham Palace responded angrily to these suggestions.

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