THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO

Furious Nigel Farage Loses His Temper

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Nigel Farage fought to restrain his annoyance on Good Morning Britain after host Charlotte Hawkins pointed out a problem with Brexit stats, as the Brexit Party emerged as a definite victor of the European elections with a third of the vote and Nigel Farage stating that he would end his sobriety with a beer to celebrate, quipping that the wheels would come off.

But Charlotte Hawkins, who was presenting the program with Richard Madeley, destroyed his mood by saying: “If you add up all the pro-remain parties they did get a bigger percentage – 35.8 per cent vs the Brexit party 31.6 per cent. So the pro-remain parties altogether did get a bigger percentage.”

But Nigel Farage was infuriated, saying: “This is absolute tosh! If you want to look at it that way…”

Charlotte Hawkins added: “Well it’s the facts.”

“It is not a fact, alright!” Nigel Farage asserted, outraged. “Add up the Brexit party vote, add up the UKIP vote. Let me finish! Add to that the Conservative vote, that’s still a party that says we’re going to leave, and you will find that leave beat remain.

“What you find is that overall, right now, our country is 52: 48 in favour of leaving! We’re supposed to be a democracy! We were promised that this would be implemented and I’m really tired of all these Remainers constantly moaning about every single election which they leave.”

And Nigel Farage stated he had gained the most seats in the European election because of his “simple message”, and he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “We set it up and of course we had no ground campaign, no branches, and yet with a big, simple message, which is we’ve been badly let down by two parties who have broken their promises, we have topped the poll in a fairly dramatic style…

“If you look across the country it’s about 52:48 – we’re pretty much where we were three years ago.

“Things haven’t changed, people haven’t changed their minds.”

Maybe we should get the thieving cheat back on again and question him about the anti-Brexidiocy Liberal Democrats topping the Yougov poll, it would probably give him a heart attack. After all, he knows full well that the people are better versed now, and many have realised just what nonsense the Brexidiots were glibly spewing.

Of course, the Remain voters who are continually sniping and whining, seeking to reverse the Brexit referendum or have Article 50 repealed, if they were to succeed, Britain would have the Brexit Party securely entrenched in the European Parliament for an additional five years until 2024. And when Nigel Farage gets a tad annoyed its headline news, but when Boris Johnson talks total rubbish, the British people don’t appear to mind.

The media made a huge fuss when Boris Johnson made a silly frivolous remark on a TV show but didn’t appear to mind when he said on the same show that there wasn’t a vote on the 2nd war against Iraq when more Tories had voted yes than other parties.

That indicates he had the position of Foreign Secretary without knowing any basic foreign policy. Perhaps he put on a clown routine to get away with telling fibs and the media is in with him, or are Boris Johnson and the media that stupid?

Yet it’s taken the EU to do something about his lying, while the British people respond like birdbrain nincompoops, believing that he wants to leave the EU for the good of the British people. Then our pitiful Tory propaganda news lets Jacob Rees-Mogg give the only opinion, stating that Boris Johnson and other anti-EU Tories that were plastering lies about the EU on buses was really about free speech.

And then there are all those people who are losing their jobs because our news didn’t give accurate information, so it isn’t about free speech at all, and I can’t believe that England has become so thoroughly dumbed down, and it has to take the EU to prove that the USA born Boris Johnson whose family changed their name from the foreign relative names to Johnson to sound more British, and he just talks rubbish, while our media simply keeps protecting the lies.

And our media hasn’t given any accurate information about the EU. Such as saying to look at the US section in supermarkets, and to look at EU compliant labels over original US labels, and that the US doesn’t have to label genetically modified ingredients, and that their food is more inclined to be that, so that food companies can make more profits.

But then Nigel Farage is just a self-serving opportunistic clod, and hopefully, shortly he will be an antiquity, and the media should stop giving him air time.

The same Idle Nigel whined because Andrew Marr challenged him, and he didn’t like it, what a pity Robin Day isn’t still around to put Nigel Farage’s feet to the fire, the masquerade would soon be removed from this second rate hatemonger and he’d be shown up for what he really is.

But then Robin Day would have put every politician through interrogation, and Nigel Farage would have been shown up big time because he’s a manchild who chucks his toys out of his pram when he can’t get his own way.

Nigel Farage is a snivelling baby who doesn’t like answering awkward questions or like facing awkward facts and then goes off bellowing if anyone attempts to dishevel his feathers. Do we seriously want such a person running the country?

The thing is Brexit will cause chaos in UK politics for years to come with both major parties announcing that they would support the outcome of the referendum and then do everything they can to thwart the will of the people, and now they’ve divided the people, and have caused intolerance amongst the people.

But the blame for the situation that this country is in, lays heavily at the feet of the Houses of Parliament, nowhere else. After all, at the end of the day, we all had a vote, we voted and the rest was up to them, all power and no progress because of their squabbling.

The gentry of this country emerges from a pretty small gene pool, based on people standing and not the natural evolution and development of the human race, that’s why most upper-class people look like unintelligent Hobbits.

Society, however, evolves and develops from a broad and diverse gene pool and will proceed to do so until we get to the point were we take hold of the upper-class imbeciles, and elbow them back in the lockers we shoved them when we knew them at school, and take back control of this country with the determination needed to run it. After all, this country has withstood wars for our freedom, our integrity and our sense of “do not mess with us”

So, Leave won, but it was apparently based on lies, but hallelujah, that’s okay, it doesn’t matter because they will tell Leavers anything, and the Leavers will believe it, but unfortunately lies were told on both sides, and sadly such is the true nature of politics.

But Nigel Farage is so convinced that a Leave campaign will win again, well, if he’s so convinced, then let’s have a second referendum. After all, if he’s so confident that he’ll have the people on his side, what’s he so frightened of?

Would I vote for Nigel Farage in a General Election, absolutely not, and when are politicians going to get their heads together for this country, instead of seeking to boost their self-esteem? The days of having great powerful leaders are gone, and we have no idea who these people are masquerading as Cabinet Ministers or Shadow Cabinet Ministers are.

And watch as the chumps that voted for the Idle Nigel realised he’d duped them again. Nigel Farage who’s all piehole and no knickers.

If we don’t come out of the European Union by the 31st October 2019, maybe we shouldn’t come out at all, and most of us should really be terrified of being impaled on an island with nincompoops that fall for every deception that our government come out with, or get caught out with, but are still dim-witted enough to vote for, and time and again Nigel Farage has shown he’s nasty tempered when asked perfectly relevant questions, which should demonstrate that he’s simply a typical opinionated leader.

Poor Nigel, the pressure has been showing for some time, and Farage lies like a moody kettle when he wails, and he should calm himself down, turn the lights out, lay down and croon a tune…

All manifestos are fairy stories because, at the end of the day, they’re simply seeking to sell themselves, there’s no validity to them, they can make up anything and people will believe it, and hopefully this braggart, the Poundland fuehrer won’t get to stand in the General Election.

The problem was that when we had the referendum, at the time most people voting were too busy running up and down the motorways pursuing an illusory Pokemon and weren’t actually thinking about what they were really voting for, and now they’re whining about it, and the problem with Nigel Farage is he doesn’t like the truth, but as long as people agree with him, then that’s alright, but if he’s challenged on anything, it’s like stand back and watch the fireworks.

A second referendum would be the best idea with two clear choices, either leave with a deal or cancel Article 50 and remain in the European Union.

Nigel Farage is now claiming he should get a seat at the table regarding negotiations with Brussels, I myself wouldn’t let him near my sprouts, and people will accept anything they’re told, and seem to be too dense or slothful to work out when they’re being lied to.

I’m gravely concerned about Brexit because nothing is getting done, and we appear to be more concerned about that than what’s going on in the real world, like knife crime, public services, housing, homelessness and hospital waiting times, when we should be building more housing and opening Youth Centres across England.

Bus Services Plunged Into Damaging Decline

Bus services have been plunged into damaging decline because of spending cuts, and Theresa May and Chris Grayling have been accused of refusing to recognise that there’s a problem.

The Daily Mirror’s Save Our Buses campaign stands up for local bus routes and defends them from crippling funding cuts leaving commuters annoyed and frustrated, and since 2010 passengers numbers have fallen by 10 per cent while bus services have been reduced and fares have risen by 32 per cent, well above the rate of inflation.

And despite buses being the most prevalent form of public transport, the report depicts a panorama of steady deterioration amid “uncoordinated, fragmented government policy and squeezed funding for local authorities,” with approximately three out of five journeys by public transport that are on buses, but passengers are getting a bad deal, as there are long-term funding projects for rail and roads, but not buses, but the House of Common’s Transport Committee is asking for a national strategy for buses to give passengers a better deal.

The strategy should make bus services more passenger-focused and provide value for money, and help bring more people, particularly young people, onboard.

The report says local authorities should be able to create new publicly-owned bus companies and encourage people to switch from cars to buses.

The Tories have neglected buses, along with the people and communities who rely on them, and the government has cut funding and denied local authorities powers over services, putting the profit of private bus companies before passengers, and communities have been damaged by cutting people off from work and recreation and worsening congestion and air pollution.

It’s ridiculous that local authorities are prevented from setting up new municipal bus companies.

Reading, Nottingham and Edinburgh all have award-winning publicly owned bus companies, and other municipalities should be able to follow their example. Right now, shareholders extract millions every year from our bus network, and public ownership would mean more money to reinvest in better buses, and that’s the standard in other European countries like Germany and Austria.

More than 3,000 bus routes in England have been reduced, altered or eliminated since 2010/11, and the numbers using bus services are declining, which has direct consequences on people’s lives, affecting journeys to work, education and social events.

It narrows our transport choices and drives us towards less environmentally-friendly choices, and yet, there was no physical indication that the Government was prepared to take action to prevent this.

Passengers want manageable and reliable information on ticketing and fares and dependable services that turn up on time and get them where they want to go, and local authorities and bus drivers want to work together, whether to understand local traffic to better use bus priority measures, enforce moving traffic infractions or plan for new housing developments.

The Government has strategies on rail investment and road development, so it’s now time to bring forward a strategy for bus services outside London.

The strategy should make bus services more passenger-focused and provide value for money, and help to bring more people, particularly young people, onboard. This will also bring benefits for air quality, cutting carbon emissions and diminish congestion.

In February it was announced that the Local Government Association warned that approximately half of the bus routes in England are in threat of being discarded due to a lack of funding, and Town Hall chiefs fear the 12,700 services which councils finance are in jeopardy because the money may have to be redirected to fill a £652 million funding shortfall to pay for the free bus scheme.

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Free bus passes for off-peak travel are a legal entitlement for people aged over 65, or those with a disability, but budget constraints mean councils are spending less on discretionary items such as free peak travel, post-school transport and supported rural services.

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But Jeremy Corbyn promised to reverse the Tory cuts to bus routes with new funding of £1.3 billion a year, which would restore many lost services.

The bus ‘revival’ will be financed by revenue from Vehicle Excise Duty, which was designated for new road building and was welcomed by campaigners and union leaders.

Delivering high-quality bus services is a shared obligation and a national strategy could provide a sound foundation for government, workers and local authorities to act together to make bus travel even more attractive to commuters, reduce congestion and better the environment.

Keeping Abreast Of Things!

The world of politics, diplomacy and celebrity has responded with a fusion of amusement and horror when it comes to Boris Johnson, and his track record when it comes to interacting with other cultures is patchy, to say the least, and politicians throughout the world will no doubt be fascinated by the possibility of working with a man who once wrote a poem about the Turkish president having sex with a goat.

And in the US, the official response was one of carefully suppressed hilarity, but then just looking at Boris Johnson you struggle to keep a straight face, with his Mr Bean parody that’s unquestionably put him on the map, and what are the facts behind this slapstick laden man?

Boris Johnson is sheer slapstick, and I’m sure a complete delight to many of his disciples, but not everybody takes this opinion of him with his clumsy antics. He not only expresses himself visually but verbally as well, and when I think of Boris Johnson’s character, the picture I always get is of Mr Bean, and it’s only a matter of time before the hapless Boris Johnson acts up once again.

Boris Johnson is a slow-witted, but generally amiable buffoon, and he often seems oblivious to the basic aspects of the way the world works which makes him funny and often ridiculous, with his complete disregard for others.

Boris Johnson is frequently depicted as a buffoon, offensive and sometimes pretty simple, and he doesn’t show much interest for his partners or spouses, and I could quite imagine him standing in front of the Queen and inadvertently headbutting her.

Boris Johnson is an irritation and a menace. He’s hopeless, awkward, poorly dressed, and a blathering nincompoop who appears to be totally unaware of anyone and everything around him, but he’s every clever man’s stupid invention, and he’s unmistakably British, and often others are enraged by his bizarre character, but he’s become a genuinely iconic figure.

Of course, we seem to have this British tradition of self-mockery, but today when our country is a declining power, we no longer laugh from a position of strength, but from one of cringing, cowering self-hatred.

Boris Johnson may appear to be a plonker but don’t disparage his intelligence, because he’s certainly making a clean breast of things…

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And under that Benny from Crossroads hat is a really intelligent person. Educated at Eton and Balliol College, Oxford, but as Boris Johnson as the favourite to be Prime Minister by the end of the summer, Boris Johnson has waited years to win the iron throne in our parliamentary version of Game of Thrones, but just as he appears poised to win the prize, there’s every possibility he will keep it for only a brief time.

To win the leadership of the Tory Party, Boris Johnson will seemingly make an assortment of promises that could leave him no option but to fall out of the EU with no deal, and he may allege that he can negotiate a better deal than Theresa May could, and he may argue that, if we take the EU to the brink, but it will crack.

He may promise there’s no way he’ll delay Brexit yet again except if it’s as part of a negotiated no deal. He may tell us there’s nothing to fear from a no deal, but it will just be a short sharp shock before we soar to our doom.

But the notion that he can negotiate a better deal is fantasy, and the only exit deal on offer is the one Theresa May agreed. The EU won’t crack because we need it more than it needs us, and the concept of a “negotiated” no deal is a unicorn.

The EU will only agree to ease our departure from the club if we adhere to the promises Theresa May made, including the notorious “backstop” intended to keep the Irish border open, and there’s a lot to fear from no deal.

Boris Johnson is not stupid. He knows this. But he may get fooled by his own discourse with the result that we crash out anyhow.

After all, if nothing improves by October 31, that’s precisely what will happen. And then what?

In the ensuing turmoil, the government, which doesn’t have a majority would fall and Jeremy Corbyn would probably enter Downing Street, at least if he comes off the fence and backs a People’s Vote unambiguously, but for Boris Johnson, that would be an embarrassing end to a premiership that was cruel, brutish and brief.

So how can he elude this outcome? Well, one possibility would be to call a general election before the end of October in the hope of thrashing Jeremy Corbyn’s backside and winning a majority which will be large enough to enable him to ride out the storm that will be unleashed if we crash out.

But this hope seems rather forlorn. Sure, Boris Johnson is an exceptional campaigner, but the Tories are tearing themselves to pieces over Brexit and Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party is rising in the polls.

Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage could split the Brexit vote and allow Jeremy Corbyn to seize the iron throne, but in the latest analysis published implies that the Tories would get fewer MPs and Boris Johnson himself would lose his seat.

He might be able to circumvent this fate by cutting a deal with Nigel Farage so they didn’t compete in an election, and such a fiendish pact might save his skin, but Nigel Farage would drive a hard bargain, and it might not even work.

Sensible Tories would leave the party, splitting it irretrievably, and even if the ploy worked, we would still crash out of the EU with no deal, something that Boris Johnson seemingly doesn’t want in his heart of hearts – remember how shell-shocked he looked on the morning after the referendum?

But there’s one more option, call a new referendum. The choice would probably be between leaving the EU with no deal and staying in. Boris Johnson would campaign to crash out, so would Nigel Farage.

But there wouldn’t be any need for an electoral pact between the Tories and the Brexit Party because there wouldn’t be an election.

Boris Johnson might believe he’d win such a vote and that if he did, he would have the people’s blessing for crashing out, and if he lost, he’d presumably have to give up the iron throne, but, hey ho, it would take six months to organise and hold a referendum so his reign wouldn’t be miserably brief.

What’s more, if he kicked the can, who knows what might happen? After all, Theresa May managed to cling onto power for longer than most people anticipated by endlessly playing for time, but as Boris Johnson considers his next moves, he might just decide that his least damaging option is the People’s Vote, and if he does, we’d have to beat him soundly because we need to gear up for that probability now.

Free Social Care For The Elderly

Mah Rana travels up to five hours a day across London to care for her 87-year-old mother. Since her mother was diagnosed with dementia it’s something she’s been doing nearly every day for four years.

She’s classed as an unpaid carer, and it’s taken over her life, and it’s all-absorbing because it’s a 24/7 job, and it affects her sleep and it increases her stress levels because she’s always worried about her mother when she’s away from her.

Her mother goes to a daycare centre in West London, an important facility to help her to a point of extreme need, but to be cared for there she has to pay just like all attendees who live with dementia, but this leaves her mother with no disposable income.

Her mother doesn’t have a vital income, so that impacts on her finances because in terms of social care she has to pay for everything, even though she has a disability, but now a new report from the UK’s leading progressive think tank maintains that social care for the over 65s who need it should cost them nothing, just like the health service, and in turn it could save billions of pounds.

Under the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) proposal, older people who can afford accommodation expenses will still have to pay for it, but they won’t have to fork out for personal care wherever they live across the country.

Approximately 1 in 10 people face catastrophic care costs of £100,000 or more, and at the moment they’re paying for that largely out of their own savings, or what we have is a huge number of people going without the care that they need.

The report suggests that the change would create parity between cancer patients whose care is all free from the NHS, and those with dementia, many of whom have to pay for all their care. It says it would raise the number of people with access to state-funded care to just under half a million, easing pressure to unpaid carers, and it would further help shift hospital patients back into the community and give a higher quality and integrated service resulting in possible savings to the National Health Service of 4.5 billion pounds.

But where will the money come from?

The think tank proposes raising taxes to make up the funds, and they say that a two per cent rise to income tax is required.

A more long term strategy needs to involve probably a kind of social assurance scheme, and there are some really great models in Europe, but particularly in Germany where they’ve thought out a way to have a sustainable funding model for social care, which means that the costs aren’t lumped onto families at the end of someone’s life.

Plus the Department of Health and Social Care say they’re dedicated to ensuring that everyone has access to the care and support that they need because then people like Mah Rana and her mother will benefit, not only financially but emotionally if this latest proposal comes into force.

Boris Johnson Plots Quickie Divorce

Boris Johnson wants a divorce inside six weeks as he ventures to be Prime Minister.

The bookies favourite has been negotiating with wife Marina so he can move on with girlfriend Carrie Symonds and even move her into Downing Street if he gains the leadership battle.

Ex-Tory spin doctor Carrie, 24 years younger than Boris Johnson, 54 lives in a £1million flat in South London where he spends a lot of his time, and as well as easing tensions with wife Marina Wheeler, 55, there have been many heartfelt discussions and collations with each of their four grown-up children, and he has allegedly told them that he wants to do the right thing.

Marina will stroll away with an attractive deal, and Boris Johnson is now expecting the divorce will go through in six weeks, and politically it will work out well, but also personally so he can push ahead with Carrie.

The Tory’s £3.75 million family home in London’s Islington is up for sale with Marina assumed to pocket the money following the quickie divorce.

She’s also expected to take 15 per cent of his future earnings, and a source stated that Marina would never ruin Boris’s chances of being Prime Minister.

The couple announced their parting in September as his romance with Carrie was made public, and in a statement he and Marina stated it was in their best interests, adding that the divorce process was underway.

The ex-Foreign Secretary has had at least four extra-marital romances and made at least two of his consorts pregnant.

He married his first wife, university sweetheart Allegra Mostyn-Owen, in 1987. They parted following an affair with Marina, whom he married in 1993, and in 2004, he confessed to having an affair with writer Petronella Wyatt, who had an abortion and a miscarriage, while both worked on magazine The Spectator, but she said that they still remain friends and that he would be a good Prime Minister.

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In 2009, Boris Johnson fathered a love child with art consultant Helen Macintyre, then 39, who did volunteer work for him, but there were reports that Marina, mother of their children Milo Arthur, Cassia Peaches, Lara and Theodore Apollo threw him out over it, then took him back.

It doesn’t seem like anyone is in a credible position to become Prime Minister, and with Boris as Prime Minister, Downing Street will look like a high-class brothel, and by the time Marina is finished with him, Carrie will only be left with a lying, thick-witted, racist buffoon.

But it’s the deception that runs through all his behaviours in every sphere of his professional and private life that makes him unfit for public office. He’s generously shown when given the opportunity to prove his performance as Foreign Secretary, that he’s hopeless, careless, apathetic and gaffe-prone, running around giving the very people who are paid to protect his wild life the slip so that he could meet someone young enough to be his daughter, and he definitely doesn’t have the maturity to become Prime Minister.

And God help us if he gets to become Prime Minister, although it won’t have been the first buffoon in parliament. Britain’s in a bad place, but with him, in charge, we will just sink further into the mud.

Boris Johnson has a habit of wanting to do everything too quickly, that will mean trouble for the United Kingdom if he becomes Prime Minister, as details can be lost and then come back to bite us on the bum, and this maniac should never become leader, he will be a disaster, not only for the Tory party but also for Britain, and Boris Johnson may well be the Tories coffin nail, well, one can only hope.

Boris Johnson was given a crack at being Mayor of London, and he was hopeless and wasted £97,000,000 on vanity projects London neither wanted or needed, although Boris’s bikes were a great idea, but most of it was sold off at a loss.

Then they gave him a crack at being Foreign Secretary which he was even more hopeless at. He didn’t read briefs properly and didn’t get it right for any of the foreign visits he undertook and insulted every country he visited.

Then he got himself distracted by yet another marital affair and ran away. He is idle and has no self-discipline, but prattles a lot in an effort to cover it up, and would someone who’s been fired three times for blatant lying to the boss then get a promotion in another department?

He’s a confessed liar and cheat, but doesn’t that make for a good portfolio for a Tory Prime Minister? With no scruples whatsoever.

It appears that his ex-wife Marina was the brains behind any success that Boris Johnson had, and it will be another huge blunder if Boris Johnson becomes Prime Minister. British politics is quick becoming a worldwide embarrassing laughing stock, but with Boris as Prime Minister, it will become a circus, and the next person to become Prime Minister should at least be human, not a Chimpanzee.

Young People Are Being Ignored Over Brexit

It’s horrifying that 70 per cent of our young people wants to stay in Europe, and they’re being disregarded by the 70 per cent of old people who want to leave.

The self-interest of this country self-evidently depends on our presence at the core of Europe, and all this stuff about sharing power and gaining power and sovereignty, it’s all slogans, it’s got no relation to the real world that we live in, and whilst there are some pretty brave Conservatives holding the fort and standing by their own convictions as to what our national interest is, there are too many who are in one of two camps.

Those who just it’s a quiet life, it’s all we can do, the people have spoken and all that, and those who are the Brexiteers, who are motivated by these delusions of yesteryear, by the misconceptions of the role of a medium-sized economy and nation-state in tomorrows world, unmindful of the wishes of the generations yet to come.

And it’s tragic that a generation has betrayed a younger generation. Sad that government denied Britain’s historical role at the centre of Europe. Sad that they stood down from their position as one of the leading countries of our sort in the world.

They gave up power.

Let’s be realistic here, Brexit was, is, and has been misrepresented, and the people of the United Kingdom didn’t really understand what they were voting for, but regrettably due to our democratic beliefs we have to accept the consequences, like it or not, and run with the new predicament we the people find ourselves in.

How strange this country will be when Brexit is proved to fail and the people who brought it to our door all leave to remain comfortable, whilst those of us who can’t leave strive to live through it.

There’s definitely no advantage to Brexit, nothing save ridiculous kindergarten jingoistic slogans, and leaving the European Union is simply an unattainable goal by the right win Euro haters who’s goal can never be realistically achieved in full.

At the end of the day, the Tory government should have had those Brexit negotiations well and truly sorted by now, but they were merely too far out of depth and incompetent to deliver Brexit for the people who voted for it, and the government needs to end any kind of Brexit urgently before they push this country off a cliff edge.

To be fair I’d prefer my food source to be from the EU. I don’t want GM food from the USA, and I’d like my food to be cancer free and relatively fresh, and we’re on a slippery slope to nowhere, and in the process of antagonising our closest allies and friends.

So, since the politicians can’t decide on what deal to go with, why don’t we simply send it to the people to decide? And since the Leavers are so happy with democracy and confident about their position, put Remain as an option, this would be the most democratic option because we shouldn’t be selective in our use of the democratic process, and we should be more comprehensive.

After all, democracy isn’t static, people are entitled to change their opinions, and just because you vote one party one year, doesn’t mean that you’ll vote for them in the next election. It’s never too late to end this economic madness, and there were countless people who voted for Brexit who had no idea of the consequences of this aberration.

I’m not really sure what we have to gain by coming out of the European Union, and I do appreciate everyone’s views! But by leaving the European Union the United Kingdom will have to give the EU £39 billion in order to break away, that’s a lot of money to be shelling out when we really don’t have to.

And even though a transition period has been granted to enable the United Kingdom time to adjust, which means that if the withdrawal agreement gets the green light, there will be no huge changes between the date of Brexit and 31 December 2020.

So, has our government supported the Withdrawal Agreement, well, no, they have voted against it three times.

If the Bill fails, then the way ahead is completely unclear, although senior politicians have warned it would lead to either leaving the EU without a deal, or Brexit being cancelled entirely. Of course, it’s still written into law that the United Kingdom will be leaving, even though the deadline has changed, three times, although the European Court of Justice has said that the UK could cancel Brexit altogether without the agreement of other nations, but politically, it’s not expected to happen.

The two-year period outlined by Article 50 came to an end on 29 March 2019, and unless all 28 EU countries agreed to prolong that period, the withdrawal agreement will have to be done and dusted well before then, and with no withdrawal agreement that would further mean there wouldn’t be any transition period following Brexit.

Instead, there would be a sudden break in UK/EU relationships, so a “no deal” needs to be taken extremely precariously, and there’s no point in looking tough under pressure regards these negotiations, it won’t get the government anywhere.

However, some advocates of Brexit say that it would mean that the United Kingdom wouldn’t have to pay the divorce bill to the EU, although that’s an argument that would presumably end up in court, and most definitely rile the other side.

There would be no specific arrangement on the future rights of EU citizens in the UK and UK citizens in the EU, and border checks would have to be re-imposed, and transport between the United Kingdom and the European Union would be seriously affected.

The UK would become a “third country” with considerably less access to the EU single market, and the UK’s involvement with the European Union would suddenly be ruled not by the common rule and regulations that have been built up over more than 40 years but by general international public law.

It’s worth highlighting that the UK government says it doesn’t “want or expect a no-deal scenario”, yet it’s stepping up contingency planning.

One major issue is timing, and if both sides decide reasonably quickly that negotiations will not succeed and that a “no deal” is extremely reasonable, they will at least have numerous months to prepare.

But if there is a last-minute glitch, that would prove very challenging. That’s when people talk of a cliff-edge Brexit, and there will be numerous priorities, and some of them are rather obvious, and that will be to guarantee the supply of essential services, and those highlighted were the need to protect supply chains for food and medicines under the almost unimaginable scenario of a cliff-edge departure, and the Department of Health has already stated that it would stockpile medicines.

And it was further mentioned that there would be a need to try to negotiate a range of bilateral agreements with individual countries to enable aircraft to fly if the UK left the European Aviation Safety Agency with no new arrangements in place.

Currently, 100,000 International Driving Permits are issued every day by 89 post offices around the country, but in the first year following a no-deal Brexit, those figures would increase to a predicted 4,500 post offices issuing up to seven million permits, to take into account journeys into the EU.

In other words, every area of the economy needs to be ready for no deal, just in case. In other words “It ain’t over till the fat lady sings”.

If Only She’d Shown Some Humanity!

So destroyed is Theresa May’s credibility that as she started to break, when she showed some emotions through her resignation speech, the trouble was, she cried the wrong tears, and if anything has changed throughout her time as Prime Minister is her waning of compassion.

And the millisecond in which one might feel for another person, even if they are different from you, is now merely political vulnerability, and the valley of tears is a mysterious place and Theresa May’s tears may only have been for herself, merely a single register of the shattering of her delusion, but there they were.

Make no mistake, she’s been an appalling Prime Minister, inaccessible to reality, profoundly indifferent, and entirely tone deaf. Avoiding any possibility to really compromise, and anyone who’s met her will tell you that she doesn’t actually do human, and a walk-in freezer has more warmth, and attractive accessories don’t make a personality.

More importantly, she doesn’t do conversation, she just repeats her lines and her mantras until people are so bored they perhaps agree with her, or she simply pretends that they did.

When she took up the poisoned chalice of delivering Brexit, we thought it was a duty thing, a Christian thing, a God thing, questioning how she got up every morning, walking into meeting after meeting where everyone in the room despised her and believed that she was not up to the job.

This has been called that dreadful catch-all word “resilience”. Actually, it appeared more delusional because Theresa May’s restricted emotional spectrum, disdain for Labour and a cheap knockoff of Thatcherite resoluteness amounted actually to a kind of absenteeism.

But was she ever there at all, this woman cleaning up mayhem, stooped with a burden of her own choice?

Margaret Thatcher wept, too, after being overthrown, but at least she believed things, but Theresa May has never seemed to have an ideology past insensitivity to immigrants, and her Home Office was inhumane, and the torture she caused is still being felt.

This is why her speech citing Nicholas Winton and speaking about injustice rubbed salt in the wound, and her policies were enacted when gay people faced deportation to countries where they faced persecution where people of colour are abused every day, and Grenfell and Windrush are her legacies, she should certainly cry for that.

David Cameron, of course, went out with nonchalant humming and was praised in the Commons for being a nice bloke. Yet all of this fine mess goes back to his decision to hold an election and not conjecture the consequences of the intentional torture his chum George Osborne had inflicted on the most defenceless people in the country, yet this pair’s extensive cruelty has been well compensated.

Never forget that disconnect.

Theresa May’s disconnect was between what she said she wanted to accomplish and how she behaved. She didn’t compromise, or ever show one bit of emotional intelligence. The job was beyond her, and it was also beyond the parochial narcissists who encircled her.

Theresa May was correct in saying that the Brexit vote was a vote for profound change, and it’s also self-evident that such a change couldn’t come from the Tory party, and the voice of healing comes too late.

This is a woman who choreographed an antagonistic environment for immigrants but whose own party became a hostile environment for her, and even now as a dead duck Prime Minister, she still has to endure a state dinner with Donald Trump when he and his entire family entourage arrive in Britain next month, this was yet another thick-witted thing Theresa May agreed to.

So, perhaps she was really crying mercenary tears for herself alone, and for the collapse of her own fantasy, for she has lost the power, to all those who care not for vulnerability, the perverse men, with their insane belligerent talk.

Her fall has been a long time coming but it’s real, and this isn’t about a woman blubbing, it’s much greater than that, she’s broken, because we’re broken, and whether people feel her pain or not, the pain for all of us is about to get worse.

And at the moment when Theresa May let her emotion to show while signing off her resignation speech, she did more for women that she has over her whole political career, and hearing her voice break when she announced that running the country she loves has been “the honour of my life”, it was very hard not to feel sad about the fact that another woman’s time at the helm of the country was over, not to mention the fact that her turbulent time in office will unavoidably be used against other women in politics in the future.

No, I don’t feel sad for Theresa May, she only wept for herself, not for Grenfell, Windrush or the homeless. She didn’t weep for the domestic violence shelters which were shut down on her watch, and the Northern Irish women who suffered because of the DUP’s draconian stand on abortion, or the immigrant women detained in Yarl’s Wood, and it will take decades to turn back the clock on that dismal record, no matter how hard she strives to push the “second-ever female PM” line.

But that moment at the conclusion of her resignation address it was like watching a woman shake off the patriarchal restraints she’d been chained to for more than two years and then finally exhaling.

It was a tad touching, maybe even relatable when you remember her humiliating herself with her dance routine of Abba’s ‘Dancing Queen’ trying so hard to be seen as just another human being, it couldn’t have been easy, but emotion has been weaponised against women since time immemorial, particularly in the political field.

As women our wombs make us irrational, our hormones make us delicate, so we’ve been told, and women supposedly shouldn’t work in these kinds of professions because when you criticise them, they cry, but it makes no difference whether we actually cry or whether we simply assert ourselves, studies have shown that men who respond to situations with anger are praised, and women who do the same are penalised.

Historically when women cry men become misogynistic and they try to demonstrate that women can’t hack it and that we’re too weak, but when women subscribe to do this as men do, it damages men just as much as women because masculinity is the norm.

Now men are frequently praised for crying or talking about their emotions but Theresa May has been torn apart for it, and she’s been mocked across the internet for those closing moments when she ultimately lost her composure.

Of course, Theresa May isn’t the first politician to show emotion, Barack Obama, Gordon Brown, David Cameron, and even Margaret Thatcher all had their moments, but these tears felt much more real than the politically expedient crocodile tears adopted in a timely moment.

Theresa May’s done fighting, and she simply abandoned her defence mechanisms, she really has nothing more to give. The only thing she did have to give was a moving statement that she’d ultimately failed in an office that she held in very high esteem, but then name one male Prime Minister that cried when they didn’t get what they wanted, and perhaps she has lived up to the stereotype that girls always cry when they lose.

Or perhaps she was merely crying because of all the lies she’s told during her career, or for the total destruction, she and her predecessors have subjected us to? Or perhaps she was just showing typically psychopathic behaviour, seeking to garner pity and followers, after all, she did get the job through the illusion of being human.

But then the people of this country have been crying ever since she was elected, now it’s her turn to cry.

I listened through the whole resignation address, odd how she was so composed during her entire address, and then she cracked during the last few words of her resignation, almost like it was scripted.

But her entire address was nonsense. Theresa May was divisive, offensive and arrogant. She didn’t listen to anyone, she took no accountability for her decisions, and she surrounded herself with bungling nincompoops. All in all, she was a thoroughly hopeless Prime Minister, and the only two people she seemingly helped was herself and her tax specialist hedge fund husband, she did nothing positive for anyone else.

Disabled Single Mum Is Left Trapped

Several years ago Julie McCaffrey, 36, was a young employed mum, balancing her position as an administrator with looking after her son, Lee. She enjoyed her position at the children’s centre she’d worked at since the age of 18 and had a comfortable life in the bungalow she shared with her partner and son.

All that changed however after she started experiencing inflammation and discomfort in her left arm following a flu vaccine. Her condition worsened until she was no longer able to use her arm at all and was in perpetual pain along the left side of her body.

Doctors diagnosed a neurological condition and eventually, unable to carry out simple duties, Julie, from County Fermanagh in Northern Ireland, was dismissed from employment.

She managed fine on benefits until recently when the amount she got was cut by over £700 a month. Her mobility car was also taken away leaving Julie, who also has a five-year-old daughter, Rachel, practically housebound.

Julie lives in a pretty isolated area and there isn’t even a shop nearby, she has to send her son to the supermarket to get food when he comes home from school, otherwise, they wouldn’t be able to eat, but at the moment they’re living hand to mouth because her disability benefits have also been discontinued.

Julie was in excellent health until October 2009, when she had a vaccine against Swine flu. There was an eruption of the potentially deadly virus at the time, and because she has asthma, she wanted to take precautions. She didn’t think she’d have any problems as nobody had discussed the possibility of serious side effects, she simply thought she’d have the shot and that would be it.

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But within moments of being given the vaccine, Julie experienced inflammation and redness in her left arm. The next day, when her arm was still swollen and red, she went to see her GP who told her it was just a local response to the shot and would improve in time.

But it didn’t and the swelling didn’t go down and the pain proceeded to get worse and worse, and Julie started experiencing shooting pains along her arm, spreading from her shoulder and struggled to use it properly, and it hurt when she attempted to hold anything or pick it up or even to drive.

Over the next few months, she kept going back to her GP who prescribed painkillers and sent her for physiotherapy, but it did little to help long term, and she kept telling her GP that it must have been the vaccine that had caused it, and that she’d never had any difficulties with her arm before, but he maintained it was a pinched nerve and nothing to do with the vaccine.

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Julie was sent to see a neurologist who diagnosed her with the pain condition Fibromyalgia and Functional Neurological Disorder (FND), which causes weakness and abnormal patterns of movement in limbs as well as postural and gait issues, seizures and sensory difficulties.

She carried on at work for as long as she could because she enjoyed her job, but after having her daughter Rachel five years ago the pain in her arm spread all along the left side of her body and became intolerable. She required help bathing and dressing her daughter and could no longer carry out her responsibilities properly at work.

Julie had also split from her partner so was now a single mum and aware that she needed to provide for her kids. But in October 2015, she was fired from work after being declared unfit to continue in her position, although they did try everything they could to help her stay in her job, making adjustments to her work station and getting occupational health in to keep an eye on her, but in the end, she just couldn’t physically do the work any more.

Julie was deemed qualified for Disability Living Allowance (DLA) with an enhanced rate of mobility, which meant she could get a Motability car, and Employment Support Allowance (ESA), and Julie managed fine on the £559 in DLA she got a month and the £382.00 ESA she got fortnightly after becoming unemployed.

It was just enough for bills, travel and food for the three of them, but when she was notified that she was being shifted over to the new Personal Independence Payment benefit in July last year, everything changed. She had to attend an assessment and was told afterwards that her payments would be lowered to £229 in PIP and £314 a fortnight in ESA, which was much less.

The enhanced mobility component was also eliminated which meant her Motability car was taken away. She couldn’t drive an ordinary vehicle any more and depended on it to take her daughter Rachel to school and back, go to the shops and to see her family. She also needed it to attend medical appointments and physio too so she was totally stuck without it.

Julie had been using some of the money to finance holistic physiotherapy too, which isn’t accessible on the NHS and which she says was helping a lot with the pain. So, she appealed against the ruling by the Department for Communities (DfC), Northern Ireland’s equivalent of the UK’s Department for Work and Pensions, and had to endure a second assessment in February this year.

While at the assessment, she was asked if she could walk three kilometres once every three or four weeks and she said that she could, even though it’s excruciating, it’s part of her rehab because it encourages her to swing her arm to keep it active, but because of this she wasn’t given enough points to qualify for any PIP at all, which is totally wrong.

This was despite her neurologist writing a letter outlining Julie’s disabilities and confirming that her condition had a major and widespread impact on her functional ability, and her PIP was removed altogether in March and her ESA was reduced to £187 a fortnight, leaving her with just over £13 a day.

Clearly, neurologists and doctors have no rank as far as PIP is concerned, it’s their way or no way. And apparently, they consider that they’re more qualified than anyone else. After all, as an example guide, it takes approximately 10 years to qualify as a GP, including medical school and it typically takes around 12 years to become a neurologist.

Four years are spent as an undergraduate working towards a bachelor’s degree, and another 4 years are spent in medical school, but following medical school, graduates will then begin a one-year internship, followed by a 3-year residency programme.

Umm, who’s more equipped to make these kinds of decisions over a person’s health and what they need and don’t need, well, it certainly isn’t PIP.

So, what’re the typical qualifications that a PIP assessor needs. Well, they usually look for nurses, occupational therapists, paramedics and physiotherapists with at least 2 years post registration experience to join their team who have great observational abilities, in this case, definitely not.

An assessors average day at work is that they get up super early, log into their computer for ten minutes, and then drive around the country to assess people. Their first assessment is either 8 am or 9 am, which involves approximately 60-90 minutes of listening to really sad, negative stories about how people are affected by health conditions which the assessor needs to record with thunderbolt typing speed.

They do this about 4 times a day so will have completed assessments by approximately 3 pm or 4 pm depending on when they started and then back home by 4 pm or 5 pm. Then it takes approximately 60-120 minutes to write up each one and send them in.

These are then arbitrarily checked by audit who will ask them to make absurd random changes, and if they can’t work out how to do that, these guys with their constant shifting goalposts and rules will have fired you within a few months with little come back or compensation.

Training goes on for weeks, the worst thing about it is that the person can fail, and people do fail, and when that person realises what the job involves, it can be a tad demoralising with management being the worst part of the job because they use banking and business models and their workers are just numbers to them, and a number that doesn’t perform precisely how they want WILL be culled.

They care little about the public and even less about their staff, and they have regular culls of staff when there isn’t enough work, and they will not compensate you well. They give lip service to be caring but care nothing about that person’s career or feelings, all they care about is profits and hitting targets.

Workplace culture is poor, it’s fake and corporate, and the hardest part of the job is working all day on the same thing over and over again, something that can’t be done in an 8 hour day, and I would guess the most fun part of the job is being off at the weekend, even though they would still need to spend one and a half of those days off, planning for the week ahead.

Most people don’t even last 6 months, and all applicants must be fully registered without restriction or conditions with the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) or The Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) and have a valid PIN, plus hold a full current driving licence with access to a vehicle.

They go on a 5-week intensive training course, fully paid, but following that, there’s an additional 6 weeks on the job training with close mentorship and development. They offer an opening salary of £34,000 per annum, increasing to £35,000 on DWP approved status and the potential to earn up to £3,000 per annum quality bonus.

And they call themselves an equal opportunities employer…

Julie was able to get a supplementary payment of £264.16 a month too, increasing her daily income to about £23, but that runs out shortly, and now she doesn’t know how she’s going to manage, and she’s extremely depressed because she can’t go anywhere and she’s not able to use public transportation due to her muscles spasms, plus the fact that she won’t have enough money to pay the bills.

Julie’s been using her credit cards to purchase food and she has to send her son Lee, who is now 17, to go and get it because she can’t carry any shopping even if she could get to the supermarket, and she’s isolated here as is her daughter Rachel, and it’s not fair on her daughter and it breaks Julie’s heart not being able to take her anywhere.

Julie has appealed once more to have her benefits restored and is waiting to hear back from the DfC.

A spokesperson for the DfC said: “The Department for Communities (DfC) is unable to comment on individual cases. Personal Independence Payment (PIP) entitlement depends on how a disability or long-term condition affects a person’s ability to carry out a range of everyday activities. It does not depend on any specific medical diagnosis. Each case is considered on an individual basis.

So, what they’re really saying is that you actually have to be brain dead and not be able to move an iota of your body to be able to get any money. No surprise people are committing suicide because they probably believe that they’d be better off dead.

But this is the tragic truth behind rising disabled employment cuts, deaths and zero-hour contracts.

Lawrence Bond suffered from a heart condition, shortness of breath and struggled with mobility. His GP had reportedly also made two referrals for mental health services. But, despite all that, the 56-year-old was declared “fit to work” at an assessment.

As a result, Lawrence Bond’s benefits were cut and he was told to get down to his local Jobcentre in Kentish Town to look for work. He started an appeal against the decision but had no other options while he waited, and his anxiety was getting worse because he couldn’t pay his bills and was too scared to leave home to go to the shops.

Then, in the January, as he walked back from the Jobcentre, he collapsed and died of a heart attack, and the case of Lawrence Bond is not unique because in 2016 figures revealed that more than half of disabled people who appealed their “fit to work” assessment eventually got the decision reversed but for some it was already too late, they were already dead.

There are many people out there that have various health issues, some physical and some mental health issues, and for those few that can manage to work there’s literally no support to help them stay in work, and it frightens the hell out of them because the system is broken, on purpose.

And Scope issued a survey that found that approximately 59 per cent of disabled people in work felt that their jobs were insecure because of their disability and around 53 per cent had encountered disability-related bullying or harassment at work, and some disabled people spend years battling to keep working while their employers make their life intolerable.

And until the Equality Act is actively implemented there will be no possibility of disabled people being safe in work, and the government need to ensure that small businesses are supported to make changes and employ disabled people and that disabled people are given educational opportunities to help create a portfolio of qualifications fitting for their circumstances and aspirations.

Sanctions and cutting money to people who have practically no possibility of getting work in this current climate is not going to support them, instead, it will just cause tremendous anxiety and worry to people who already have much higher costs than everyone else, and applying this to people who have serious health problems is just wicked.

The Equality Act was only framed to give the idea that we would be protected, instead, it’s got more holes in it than Swiss cheese, and you’ve got more chance of winning the lottery than the government giving a piffle about sick and disabled people.

And it appears odd that the government is supposedly trying to get disabled people into employment, and yet, by their own admission have cut funding for Motability, in fact they’ve cut the numbers available to the bone, resulting in many instances of disabled people to no longer be able to get to work, and have done absolutely nothing to help employers to take on disabled people, bar fiddling the figures on a scheme to confirm how many employers are “on board” with the governments drive to get the disabled working.

In fact, it’s just the reverse. It’s one of the many war and peace novels put out there by the government that disabled people are protected by Equal rights laws, they’re not, and as with every employment law, the only real way to implement it was until 2011, the free Employment Tribunal.

Now, it’s no longer free, and of course, applications have plummeted as the costs to someone now recently unemployed, or on minimum wage or on a zero contract, are prohibitive, but this isn’t the only problem, to make an Equal rights claim stick, you have to demonstrate you have been discriminated against.

But 90 per cent of the time that means your word against theirs, and it means you have to demonstrate they did make your life a misery, and here’s the cop-out for the employer, didn’t make change or adjustments that were reasonable for the business.

And if they do argue, they will just say that they didn’t hire you because the other applicant was better suited, so that’s the pre-employment case quashed, and if they claim you’re a poor performer, again, it’s just your word against theirs.

It’s they, not you, that have your performance markers, and they who determine if you’re meeting them, and goalposts can, and are constantly moved for disabled people, but try proving that to a tribunal.

Harassment is all too common, with disabled people seen as a pain, obstructive and too demanding, but then it shouldn’t need an Employment Tribunal to order a business to fit automatic opening doors for their disabled workers, but it does.

And the Tories are not actually interested in really helping anyone, bar themselves to taxpayers money. All they want is to get the disabled off the figures, off benefits, and if they die, as thousands have, oh dear, how sad, nevermind.

But of course, we shouldn’t condemn their ineptitude, although it’s a contemptible cop-out for them to salve their consciences in the evaluation to death, of course, the government aren’t making mistakes because they don’t put a value on people’s lives and certainly don’t put a value on their deaths.

School Dinner Lady Sacked

A dinner lady has reportedly been fired after she let a child have a lunch he didn’t have the money to pay for.

Bonnie Kimball said she didn’t believe it was a huge deal and had said to the pupil to pay the next day, convinced that he would, and sure enough, she said he gave her the $8 (£6.29) he owed the next day at the Mascoma Valley Regional High School in New Hampshire, US.

Bonnie states however that she was fired about a week later by the district manager of Café Services, the food services company that employed her.

The dinner lady, who had served at the school for four and a half years, maintains the food services company accused her of theft, and a spokesperson for the company stated that the pupil wouldn’t have gone without a meal as students who go to the lunch line without money can get a starter or sandwich plus side dishes or fresh fruit and milk.

But a letter seen by CNN told Bonnie that on March 28, a District Manager was on-site and saw a pupil coming through the line with various food items that she didn’t charge him for, but evidently this is a strict breach of their Cash Handling Procedures, the Schools Charge Policy and Federal Regulation governing free meals.

But a statement by Jaime Matheson of the Café Services states they would not let an employee go because they provided this lunch to a student.

A gofundme page titled ‘funds to help lunch lady’ has been set up, and according to reports, two other members of lunch staff have quit in protest.

This is shocking in Donald Trump’s America, perhaps they would have prefered that she be tasered, peppered and shot? This world gets sicker by the day with selfishness and greed that reign supreme. Well done to this lovely woman and shame on this company of leeches.

We should be sending this lady to the top of the class, and as for her employers, detention and they must write a million lines “I must not act like a sewer rat”. But then it’s profit before people and the United Kingdom is heading down the same road, and don’t get me wrong, the private sector has its strengths, however, it should never be allowed near health care, education or social housing because they have no compassion towards people.

Yes, let’s starve the children who have no money for food because I can remember when a school dinner was a good dinner. I can remember when dinner was at school with a plentiful meal, plus sponge pudding and custard, and a drink, definitely enough to satisfy a child’s belly for the rest of the day until they got home, now children scarcely have enough money for a sandwich and a drink.

What a savage nation we now live in, and the people who were in charge clearly didn’t have a clue, or simply didn’t care, they should have given her a warning, but to sack her was truly horrifying, and instead of dismissing this humble lady this could have had a surprisingly positive outcome, however, the parents and pupils should have protested themselves, and should have done all that they could to put this company under, and certainly not bought their food, but instead, they should have sent their children in with a packed lunch with a little extra for those other children that may not have had any, that’s how we all stand together to be strong and more professional and caring than this catering company.

School food should be free or at least subsidised because for some children it is their main meal of the day. These children are our future, and we should really be caring for our children, and if the student paid the next day there was no loss to the lady or the food service, and it appears like this company had a grudge against her and simply wanted to find some way of getting rid of her.

It’s not compulsory for your child to attend school, but it is compulsory to educate, this is why so many parents choose to educate their children at home now, but school meals should be free, and so should school uniform, and this company has fired this unfortunate lady for what? I would love to see how much food is wasted and thrown out at the end of the day, so one small dinner wouldn’t really make much of a difference.

However, this lady has since been given a job by celebrity chef and well-known foodie philanthropist Jose Andres which made headlines after he gave the recently fired lady a place at one of his businesses, and taking to Twitter, Jose Andres chose to draw attention to what many felt was a shocking miscarriage of justice, after Bonnie Kimball from New Hampshire was fired for providing a student with a free lunch.

Posting on the social media platform, Andres wrote, “New Hampshire school cafeteria worker fired for giving food to a student who couldn’t pay – WHBQ! The hero is Bonnie Kimball! If she needs a job we have openings at ⁦@thinkfoodgroup⁩ if you know her, let her know!” He also included a link to a website containing details of the original story.

And while it would be easy to dismiss the tweet as a chance to raise his public profile, there’s evidence that Andres was deadly earnest about the proposal, and in addition to reaching out over social media, it’s been alleged that Andres also got in touch with Bonnie Kimball by telephone.

Such an act of kindness would not be out of turn for the famously generous Andres. His non-profit organisation World Central Kitchen has been massively involved in a number of humanitarian endeavours around the world, including helping in the aftermath of the devastating hurricane in Puerto Rico, feeding Mexican migrants on the border with the United States and giving support to those affected by Californian wildfires in 2018, and given his track record, it’s unsurprising that the chef was tipped for a Nobel Peace Prize last year.

Bonnie Kimball’s story proved especially compelling as it seems to have come about as a consequence of her own small act of kindness, and if reports are to be believed, the lunch lady was discharged for letting a student skip out an $8 lunch fee, on the condition that he would give it back the next day, and even though the pupil did indeed pay for his meal in full less than 24 hours later, Bonnie Kimball was told that she would be dismissed from her position due to company policy.

Jose Andres is not alone in reaching out to the unfortunate lunch lady. In the aftermath of the incident, a GoFundMe was set up by concerned citizens and has received donations calculating $5,000, and even though the reality of being discharged from a job that she had held for over four and a half years was no doubt traumatic for Kimball, there can at least be some morsel of comfort that she has supporters in her corner.

New Law Could Mean Drivers Who Hit Cats Will Have To Report It To The Police

Under current legislation, felines are not covered by regulations which require motorists to report collisions with animals, but Rehman Chishti, MP for Gillingham and Rainham has begun a Private Member’s Bill to Parliament, with MPs scheduled to consider the bill in Parliament.

The Cats Bill summons for a modification to the Road Traffic Act (1988) making it a legal requirement that any motorist involved in an accident resulting in injury or death to a cat must stop and give information or report the accident to the police.

The Act currently pertains to dogs, horses, cattle, pigs, goats, sheep, donkeys and mules but cats, badgers, deer or foxes are not.

A description of the bill reads: “A Bill to require the driver of a mechanically propelled vehicle involved in an accident resulting in injury or death to a cat to stop and give information or report the accident to the police; to require the keepers of certain cats to ensure they are microchipped; and for connected purposes.”

And even Environment Secretary, Michael Gove, and Transport Secretary, Chris Grayling, are seriously considering the proposal.

The Labour Party are said to be supporting the plan and propose to incorporate the issue on their next manifesto.

The Cats Bill was scheduled in Parliament to be discussed in Parliament on Friday (March 22) but is currently on a lengthy listing of legislation to be heard in the House of Commons, and the push for a shift in the law is being driven by the campaign group Cats Matter, and their prime purpose is to make cat deaths on the road reportable, so the cat gets the chance for vet treatment as soon as possible.

Many pets that could have otherwise survived die “slowly and painfully” because no one stopped to help. Cats Matter further want local councils to scan animals discovered at the roadside for microchips so that the cat owners can be notified if their pet is hit by a vehicle.

Campaigners want owners to have their pets microchipped and for councils to routinely check any cats discovered at the roadside for identification because there is a predicted eight million pet cats in the United Kingdom and about 230,000 cats that are killed as a result of a road traffic accident each year.

There are about 11 million cats and they are part of people’s daily lives, and they bring tremendous happiness to many people, particularly the elderly, and if these felines tragically get killed on the road, their owners want closure, they want to know what’s happened to their loved one.

Drivers need to be made aware of their responsibilities and they should stop and report incidents, after all, it’s a perfectly reasonable thing to ask in a civilised and so-called animal-loving nation.

And usually, numerous cats are put down solely because there’s no way of contacting the owners, and as a nation of animal lovers, we should recognise the suffering that can be caused when a cat goes astray or becomes lost, which is why cats should be microchipped so that it gives the cat the best possibility of being reunited with their owner.

It would save an awful lot of heartache knowing what’s happened, if nothing else but to be kind, after all, an animal is an animal, whatever variety it is, and this is a law that not only protects the animal but further promotes civility.

Of course, cat owners should be allowed equal rights as dog owners, but they should also take the same legal responsibilities. However, there are numerous people out there that are really anti cats, but there are also numerous old people who live on their own who have a cat as a companion and friend, which makes them smile and not feel so alone, but yet there is very unyielding hatred of them.

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