Reeves’s Plan To Cut Welfare Triggers A Labour Revolt

Keir Starmer is facing a rebellion over plans to axe £5 billion from welfare as the government scrambles to balance the books.

Labour MPs have been warned of ‘deep concern’ over ‘draconian’ curbs, and details are expected to be announced as soon as tomorrow.

Liz Kendall is set to declare that workers who lose their jobs should receive more than long-term claimants. Check-ups on sickness payment recipients are also expected to be bolstered.

While disability subsidies could be frozen in cash terms, most of the savings are probably going to come from making it more difficult to receive personal independence payments.

Ministers have been making the ‘moral’ case for reforming welfare, with Rachel Reeves pointing to the near-million young people not in education, employment or training. 

The Chancellor is fighting to sidestep the need for more tax rises at the Spring Statement later this month, after delaying economic growth and increasing debt costs wreaked havoc with her Budget plans.

She is also under immense pressure to ramp up defence spending amid increasing alarm at the US withdrawing support from Europe and doing deals with Russia. 

Health and disability benefits in sicknote Britain are expected to cost more than £100 billion a year by the end of the decade – which would be more than the defence budget even after Keir Starmer’s recent boost.

The  Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) estimated in October that the cost of long-term sickness handouts will increase from £64.7 billion in the 2023-24 financial year to £100.7 billion in 2029-30.

That would be about 3 percent of GDP, while Labour has committed to spending 2.5 percent by 2027 and looking towards 3 percent after the next election.

Speaking to the BBC’s Westminster Hour on Sunday, Labour MP Rachel Maskell said colleagues were ‘deeply concerned’ about the prospect of changes to the system.

She told the programme: ‘We recognise the economic circumstances that we’re in and the hand that we were given and of course it is right that the Chancellor has oversight over all those budgets but not at the expense of pushing disabled people into poverty.’

She added: ‘There’s got to be a carrot approach, not a stick approach.

‘We’ve got to make the right interventions and that doesn’t start with the stick.’

Ms Maskell said that she had ‘picked up […] deep deep concern’ from colleagues and called for a ‘compassionate system and not taking just draconian cuts’.

There are assertions that up to 80 MPs are prepared to fight the reforms. 

The government wants to create a new, time-limited benefit for those who find themselves out of work after paying into the system, dubbed ‘unemployment insurance’.

It will have a lower age limit – probably about 22 years – with different support set to be announced for out-of-work youngsters.

The goal is for people who have contributed to the system to benefit from it more than those who have not.

Nonetheless, there will be exceptions for people with serious disabilities that prevent them from working.

After World War II, the welfare system had a far greater contributory component, but governments of all stripes have been progressively reducing it.

Liz Kendall, the secretary for work and pensions, is expected to announce to the Commons later this week, possibly tomorrow.

She is aiming to save roughly £5 billion from the welfare bill, with the majority of the cuts expected to come from changes to Personal Independence Payments (PIP).

A crackdown on personal independence payments is expected to tighten rules, potentially affecting those with conditions like anxiety and depression.

The rate of PIP will also be frozen in cash terms, rather than going up 1.7 percent like other benefits.

A Work Capability Assessment is administered to new sick benefit applicants and is intended to be repeated periodically.

That gap is meant to range from six months to three years, depending on the severity of the illness. Some 607,000 repeat assessments were carried out in 2019, but that nosedived during COVID and last year is believed to have been about a third of that level.

According to the OBR, the decline in checks is the primary cause of the increase in claims; Ms Kendall’s aides told the Telegraph that she is investigating measures to increase checks.

Cabinet Office Minister Pat McFadden said yesterday that without action four million people would be on long-term sickness benefits.

‘There are 2.8 million people on long-term sickness benefits,’ he told the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg.

‘We are an outlier in the UK and not in a good way. We’re the only G7 country that hasn’t recovered its pre-pandemic rate of employment and we’re the Labour Party.

‘We believe in work. We believe in the good that a good job can do for people. We don’t believe it is good that if somebody could work with a bit of support that they’re left to live a life on benefits.

‘200,000 of those 2.8million have told us they would work tomorrow with the right support. So, we’ve got to reform the system, because if we don’t, the trajectory of standing back and doing nothing is that it won’t be 2.8 million in a few years, it will be over 4 million people. We can’t allow that to happen.’

A government source said: ‘The challenge we inherited and the case for change is stark.

‘When this Government took office last July, more than 9.3 million working-age people were out of work and not looking for employment – that’s more than the entire population of London. 2.8 million of those were out of work due to long-term sickness – the highest in the G7.’

The UK will run out of money unless it begins to repatriate illegal immigrants.

Given that housing and caring for migrants costs billions of pounds and that many of them are economic migrants who have no desire to contribute to our nation or community, Rachel Reeves ought to reduce the budget for migrants.

I simply don’t see why our own citizens are homeless but migrants get all they want. What’s the point of repeatedly giving to them? This merely invites them over, and when they get what they want, who can blame them?

I observe people fighting and disputing with one another in the interim, while the elite is getting away with anything they want while we are fighting. It’s a tried-and-true method of inciting conflict among us.

Instead of targeting people with lifelong disabilities and health conditions, Rachel Reeves would do better to stop paying for migrants in hotels. That would plug the supposed hole. They should start addressing the elephant in the room!

People who are ill or disabled are being targeted, particularly those who are seriously disabled and simply cannot work. Every disabled person I know—and I know a good many of them—would trade their PIP for the ability to be physically healthy and lead a “normal life” without hesitation.

There must be protests at Westminster, Downing Street, and the doorsteps of lawmakers.

There are many people, however, who hate British retirees, the sick, and the disabled, and they are quite pleased that we spend £5.5 million per day on hotels for all of the economic migrants who live in our nation and receive everything for free, including our NHS care.

Put an end to this Net Zero craziness. Put an end to unauthorised immigration. Turn the budget around.

Meanwhile, people have been paying their National Insurance to get their pension for 45 years or more but will never get a penny from it – of course, our government need to hold on to that money (our money) so that they can give it to the 1600 boat people that have arrived this week!

Why should a family or individual who has never made contributions to the social system be granted benefits upon arrival in the UK?

Many migrants are not able to speak any English, and many do not work or intend to work.

Although they will never make any contributions to the UK economy, the state will provide them with welfare payments, housing, healthcare, and other benefits at no cost.

The UK cannot afford to maintain this kind of generous giving.

And why does every photo of a Labour minister show them with a smug grin on their faces? Let’s be real, they have nothing to be smug about.

Millions Of Pounds Are Spent Every Day On Foreign Prisoners

Foreign prisoners are now costing British taxpayers more than £1 million per day, official figures have revealed.

New data by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) has revealed around 10,500 foreign prisoners are being held in prisons across England and Wales, each costing more than £50,000 a year.

Around 12 percent of all inmates in the UK are foreign nationals.

Among the nationalities with the most inmates in the UK, Albanians lead the unwanted league table with more than 1,200 prisoners. Poles are in second with 911, followed by Romanians (729), Irish (634) and Jamaicans (370).

About half of those inmates have been convicted while the other 50 percent are being held on remand either because they are considered to be too dangerous to release or because they are deemed a flight risk.

A Freedom of Information request seen by The Telegraph revealed violent crime was most common among prisoners from Poland, with 215. While Romanians were most likely to be involved with sex crimes, with 88 prisoners.

Ireland topped the table for robbery (80) and theft (11) while Albanians were most likely to be incarcerated for drug crimes, with 439 held on these charges, four times more than any other nationality.

The MoJ has committed to spending £5 million on new frontline immigration staff to accelerate the removal of foreign prisoners.

They plan to work across 80 prisons to remove some foreign offenders, to lower the elevated costs and free up spaces in Britain’s already overcrowded prisons.

This new unit will be operating by April 1 and will also help the Home Office to identify and handle those going through the immigration process, deporting prisoners up to 18 months before the end of their custodial sentence.

Labour says it has removed more than 2,500 foreign criminals since last July.

Prisons minister Lord James Timpson said: ‘It cannot be right for British taxpayers to foot the bill for jailing foreign criminals who have brought misery to our communities.

‘Under this Government, removals are up by nearly 20 percent. We’re now taking action to ensure this is done swifter, easing pressure on overcrowded prisons and on the public purse.

‘This is part of our Plan for Change – fixing the broken prison system we inherited and keeping our streets safe.’

Shadow Justice Secretary Robert Jenrick said removing foreign criminals from prisons should be a priority and argued that countries who refuse to take them back should be blacklisted for migrants wishing to enter the UK from that country. 

Mr Jenrick said: ‘That is the number one thing we can do to free up prison capacity. And how do you do that? Use every lever of the British state to put pressure on those other countries to take back their own criminals.

‘Do things like stopping issuing visas, don’t give foreign aid to those countries. If they won’t take back their criminals, we shouldn’t be supporting them.’

As previously reported, foreign nationals are up to three times more likely to be arrested than Brits in regions of the country, according to data by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

In Cambridgeshire, of the more than 21,200 arrests made between 2021 and 2023, almost 8,800 (41.5 percent) were not UK citizens. This is despite them comprising just 15 percent of the local population. 

Foreign nationals living in the UK are three times more likely than British citizens to be arrested on suspicion of a crime, according to statistics from Cambridgeshire Police, which serves places including Cambridge and Peterborough.

In the county, the average annual arrest rate for foreign nationals between 2021 and 2023 was 21.5 per 1,000 population. In comparison, MailOnline analysis suggests the equivalent rate for Brits was 6.5 per 1,000.

Last year, surprising data from MoJ revealed that foreign criminals who evaded deportation carried out more than 10,000 offences in a year.

According to the data, about 25 percent of foreign offenders committed another crime after being released from prison or receiving a court order.

The 3,235 criminals who were released from prison without being deported were behind 10,012 crimes in the year to March 2022 – a rise of 25 percent on the last annual total of 8,021.

Over the last four years of data – released by officials in a parliamentary question – foreign criminals were guilty of 40,000 offences ranging from robbery and drug dealing to murder.

As well as criminals who were released from prison and evaded deportation, the MOJ data also includes people who were previously deported before returning to Britain illegally.

All of them ought to be sent back to their own countries to fulfil their sentences. They are not helping our nation and are cluttering up prisons, costing us a fortune.

Since the human rights of law-abiding, innocent people should come before those of criminals, our government should take away their opportunity to appeal deportation.

Unfortunately, we are no longer the UK; instead, we are a hub for criminals from other countries.

If these foreign nationals have committed a crime and should be expelled, no excuses.

I have had enough of paying taxes to all the jerks from every other nation. Our government needs to take care of its own citizens, but it’s so easy to waste other people’s money, isn’t it?

All our politicians need to be locked up because they’re all traitors to this country!

The English City Where A Staggeringly High Percentage Of Women Are Married To Their Cousins

Sir Keir Starmer has signalled that he would block any attempt to ban first-cousin marriage, a practice which remains prevalent in some UK communities – despite the genetic damage it can potentially do to offspring.

 

In Bradford, one of northern England’s largest cities, almost half (46 percent) of the female Pakistani community were in a ‘consanguineous relationship’ meaning they have a common ancestor, a 2024 study found.

In December of last year, independent MP Iqbal Mohamed faced a great deal of criticism for opposing former Conservative Minister Richard Holden’s bill to outlaw the marriage of first cousins.

A senior Tory said it was ‘shocking’ that an MP would ‘defend this revolting practice’.

Mr Holden’s Marriage (Prohibited Degrees of Relationship) Bill is due to return before the House of Commons on Friday and, ahead of its planned second reading, Mr Holden pushed for government support.

However, Sir Keir, yesterday signalled that Labour would stop any such endeavour to introduce a legal prohibition on first cousins being able to marry in England and Wales. 

Speaking during Prime Minister’s Questions, Mr Holden urged Sir Keir to ‘think again’ after Downing Street previously indicated it had no plans to change the law.

‘A marriage between first cousins carries significant health issues, many of which aren’t even knowable until post-birth,’ he told the PM.

‘When practised generation after generation, there is a significant multiplier effect.’

Mr Holden added: ‘In addition, the real impact for the openness of our society and women’s rights in our country are also significant.

‘After all, there are significant dynamics in having and sharing the same set of grandparents.

‘On Friday, this Government has a choice to let my Bill to ban first cousin marriage go through to committee stage.

‘Will the PM think again before instructing his whips to block this legislation?’

But Sir Keir signalled the Government would not be throwing its support behind Mr Holden’s Bill, with the PM replying: ‘We’ve taken our position on that Bill, thank you.’

While the genetic risks of first cousin marriage are hotly contested, they relate to a process called ‘unmasking’. 

Each individual receives two versions of each gene – known as ‘alleles’ – from our parents, one from the mother and one from the father.

One gene can be dominant and one can be recessive, so for a recessive gene to become active and manifest in a certain individual then both copies of the gene must be the recessive. If you only receive one recessive gene then you are just a ‘carrier’.

Since cousins share grandparents, it becomes risky in first-cousin marriages because there is a greater chance that a child would receive two copies of the same harmful gene.

Experts say that children of first-cousin marriages have an approximately double chance of having a child with an autosomal recessive genetic disorder, with the danger increasing to 6 percent from about 3 percent in the general population. 

However, not all members of the medical community believe that is a basis to prohibit the practice, as one doctor put it in a 2005 paper by Owen Dyer: ‘We know that the risk of Down’s syndrome increases with advancing maternal age, but we don’t see public education films urging mothers to have children younger.’

Experts started tracking the prevalence of consanguinity in Bradford – home to one of the UK’s largest Pakistani communities – in the late noughties.

Nearly 12,500 pregnant women were questioned about their relationship status with the father of their child.

The Born in Bradford study was later repeated with another cohort of 2,400 women between 2016 and 2019.

Last month, Wellcome Open Research, a platform operated by the esteemed Wellcome Trust, released the final results.

The study discovered that cousin relationships are no longer a ‘majority’ in Bradford’s female Pakistani community amid growing awareness of the birth defect risks.

A decade ago, a Government-funded surveillance project discovered that 62 per cent of Pakistani heritage women were in consanguineous relationships.  This figure has since declined to 46 percent, researchers say. 

He described cousin marriage as having gone from a ‘majority activity to now being just about a minority activity’.

Dr Wright added: ‘The effect will be fewer children with congenital anomalies.’

The Born in Bradford figures, it was said, may indicate that the number of Pakistani people marrying cousins across the UK as a whole is also falling.

It is believed that changes in family relations, higher educational attainment, and more stringent immigration laws are the causes of the decline.

Writing in their study, the team said: ‘It may be we are seeing generational changes and newly evolving societal norms. 

‘But these changes need to be monitored to see if they are indications of a lasting change and they need to be considered in other settings where consanguinity is common to see how widespread these reductions in consanguinity are.’

Pakistanis make up more than half of the population of the Bradford West seat, which is represented by Labour MP Naz Shah.

The figure is 36 percent in Bradford East and nearly 17 percent in Bradford South – the city’s two other constituencies.

Birmingham also has an extensive Pakistani community, with up to 40 percent of people being of that ethnicity in regions of the city.

In the past, the highest classes of Britain frequently married cousins.

In the past, it was seen to be a means of strengthening ties and preserving family money and land.

In certain communities, like travellers, the practice is still prevalent even though it has become less popular.

Prince Albert and Queen Victoria shared grandparents and were first cousins.

The existence of ‘extreme’ inbreeding in the UK was exposed pre-COVID.

Scientists studying the genes of 450,000 Brits believed 125 had parents who were either first- or second-degree relatives. This correlated to a rate of one in 3,600.

When extrapolated to the wider population, the 2019 study, published in the journal Nature Communications, was reported as meaning that 13,000 Brits were conceived through extreme inbreeding.

First-degree relations include those between parent and child, while second-degree includes more distant, but still genetic close relatives, such as half-siblings.

The University of Queensland authors noted, given the nature of the subject and the limited variety of Brits included in the sample, actual rates could be significantly higher or lower.

Incest—sexual intercourse between immediate relatives—is prohibited in the UK even if consensual.

Marriages between certain blood relatives—as well as some step relationships—are also illegal. However, it is legal to marry your cousin in the UK.

Richard Holden, a former Conservative minister, recently introduced a bill to completely ban the practice.

Saying now was a ‘sensible time’ to look at the problem, Mr Holden said: ‘People already think it is illegal and then are surprised when you mention it isn’t.’

He pointed to evidence showing it heightens the risk of birth defects and claimed that it can ‘reinforce negative structures and control women’.

Mr Mohamed, representing Dewsbury and Batley, suggested that MPs should avoid ‘stigmatising’ the issue, which is seen as ‘very positive’ in some communities.

Instead of banning it outright, he said a ‘more positive approach’ involving advanced genetic tests for prospective married cousins would be more effective in addressing issues around it.

Mr Mohamed, who is part of the Independent Alliance of MPs – including ex-Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, encountered objection from senior Tories for defending the practice.

Tory justice spokesman Robert Jenrick said: ‘It’s shocking that an MP would defend this revolting practice which is linked to birth defects and abusive relationships. 

‘We know this is causing immense harm. This practice has no place in the UK.’

Labour declined to support proposals to outlaw marriages between first cousins.

Worldwide, one in 10 people is thought to be a result of a consanguineous union.

The prevalence of consanguineous marriage is estimated to vary globally.

Studies have put Pakistan as having one of the most elevated rates globally at 65 percent of unions.

This is followed by India (55 percent), Saudi Arabia (50 percent), Afghanistan (40 percent), Iran (30 percent) and Egypt and Turkey (20 percent each).

Data suggests the chance of a child of first cousins developing a genetic condition is up to 6 percent, double that of children from unrelated parents.

Although this implies that most children delivered in these situations will be healthy, there is no denying the elevated risk.

Children of first cousins may be more susceptible to developmental delays and chronic genetic problems in addition to birth abnormalities.

These can include diseases including cystic fibrosis, low IQ, cleft palate, blindness, heart issues, and even a higher chance of newborn death.

They were adamant about outlawing first-cousin marriages back when I was a child, but nothing changed.

For generations, people have been marrying their first cousins.

While many people have had children with anomalies, my grandfather’s sister married her first cousin and they produced children without any.

Prince Leopold was born with haemophilia B, a form of haemophilia, and died of a haemorrhage at the age of thirty. Prince Leopold was the son of Queen Victoria.

To avoid upsetting the Labour voters, Keir Starmer will not forbid these unions because that would mean having a backbone and the leaders of the UK seem to be devoid of one.

This man is so anti-British that it’s unreal.

This is huge and will be a lifelong burden on the UK, and this includes those who have come from elsewhere, and who have been fully assimilated into our society.

Resistance is Futile!

An Elderly Woman With Dementia Was Convicted For Not Insuring Her Car

An elderly woman with dementia has been convicted of failing to insure her car – despite her living in a nursing home and no longer having a driving licence. 

The pensioner, 93, from Dudley in the West Midlands, was prosecuted by DVLA in September last year when they discovered that the insurance on her Ford had expired.

In a handwritten letter, the woman explained that due to her diagnosis, she had not driven since November 10, 2023, but the car had been ‘kept on the drive’ during this time, the Evening Standard reports.

She confessed to having ‘overlooked’ making a Statutory Off Road Notification (SORN) for the motor but said her disease had caused her to hide mail – leaving her family unable to access her letters.

The woman also disclosed that she had spent November in a care facility recuperating from a stroke.

Because it wasn’t in the public interest, the prosecutor, DVLA, had the option to drop the case.

However, this was overlooked because of the Single Justice Procedure’s expedited nature.

The pensioner was convicted on a guilty plea at Taunton magistrates court last month. 

She was given a six-month conditional discharge, meaning no financial penalty, but still has a criminal conviction.

On Thursday, the administration opened a consultation to change the SJP system.

Proposed changes include making it an obligation for prosecutors to read mitigation letters and making it compulsory for agencies like DVLA to engage with potentially vulnerable defendants.

The consultation is expected to conclude on May 8, but the SJP system will continue to operate until then.

A DVLA spokesperson said: ‘We urge anyone who receives a letter about potential enforcement action to get in touch with us if there are mitigating circumstances we need to know about.

‘A Single Justice Procedure notice will only be issued when we have exhausted all other enforcement routes, including issuing multiple items of correspondence, to which the customer can respond to DVLA with their mitigation.

‘Once progressed to SJP, any defendant can request a hearing in open court, but for those pleading guilty via SJP, including those with mitigating action, are considered by a magistrate. These can be referred back to DVLA but whether or not to do so is a decision taken by the magistrate.’

Picking on the weak and defenceless while others get away with everything has become the standard in the UK.

This goes to show that the UK has gone off the rails. There is literally no hope if we are prosecuting a 93-year-old with dementia for not registering her car.

Does our government really hate pensioners that much, or are they just a soft target? This was an utterly meaningless conviction and a waste of time, money and resources.

Authorities want quick wins to maintain high conviction rates when drug traffickers, murderers, and worse are free to roam the streets, and what moron told her to plead guilty? The violation was driving without insurance, yet she didn’t even drive the car. This is a total disgrace.

Is this country devoid of common sense?

This is a despicable way to treat our elderly, but then, we no longer matter!

Meanwhile, several million migrants come to the UK and commit any crime they like.

They probably don’t look at the insurance records and driver’s licenses of Uber drivers and others, particularly those who park outside fast food restaurants. Many of those guys shouldn’t even be driving on our roads, and I doubt that many of them don’t even know the highway code or speak English.

Zelensky’s Comment Pushed Trump Over The Edge

Volodymyr Zelensky’s prediction that the end of the war in Ukraine was ‘very, very far away’ was branded ‘evil’ by Donald Trump’s inner circle and enraged the president before he chose to pull military aid to the beleaguered nation.

In response to the remarks, Trump promptly scheduled a meeting on Monday with National Security Adviser Mike Waltz, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth to consider a course of action.

Zelensky had spoken after a summit in London on Sunday, with 18 allies joining to offer Ukraine security guarantees and reify their support.

British PM Keir Starmer said a ‘coalition of the willing’ would come together to present a viable peace plan.

‘The Ukrainians didn’t think we were serious. We had to make a demonstration,’ one official told The Wall Street Journal as Trump confirmed he was cutting aid to Ukraine. 

The extreme move comes just days after Trump and Vice President JD Vance berated Zelensky in the Oval Office for failing to show gratitude for the $180 billion in US military aid sent to Kyiv since Russia invaded three years ago. 

The aid pause – which the Department of Defense confirmed to DailyMail.com Monday night – could leave Ukraine without air defence systems, surface-to-surface ballistic missiles and long-range rocket artillery.

The Ukrainian leader had already flown to Europe, desperately seeking support from NATO allies following a catastrophic Oval Office meeting. The war-torn country could collapse within months without US assistance.

In the leadup to the 2024 election, Trump promised a swift end to the war in Ukraine, even boasting he could end the fighting in one day and questioning whether Zelensky wanted peace.

Trump was apoplectic following both White House fracas and the statement from the Ukraine leader claiming the end of the war with Russia was ‘still very, very far away.’

He also laid into Europe’s effort to fill the void where the U.S. said it would remove aid for Ukraine. 

Trump accused the UK-led ‘coalition of the willing’ of being weak for relying on an American backstop for peace – after his administration applauded the UK for pledging to lift its defence spending. 

Trump said following the summit: ‘It is what I was saying, this guy doesn’t want there to be peace as long as he has America’s backing and, Europe, in the meeting they had with Zelensky, stated flatly that they cannot do the job without the U.S.’

In an interview with Fox News, JD Vance also appeared to target America’s allies in Britain and France as he urged Ukraine to sign the minerals deal.

Vance said giving Americans ‘economic upside in the future of Ukraine’ was a ‘way better security guarantee than 20,000 troops from some random country that hasn’t fought a war in 30 or 40 years’.

British troops supported both the American-led invasions of Afghanistan (2001) and Iraq (2003) following the September 11 attacks. The attacks prompted the first and only time NATO invoked Article 5, calling on allies for military support.

With the U.S. increasingly turning away from Europe, the EU’s Ursula von der Leyen said today that Europe was ready to massively boost its defence spending, unveiling a €150 Billion Defense Loan Plan for Pan-European Security and presenting a plan to mobilise €800 billion for European defence.

The EU will propose to give member states more fiscal room for defence investments, as well as 150 billion euros in loans for those investments, and will strive to muster private capital as well, von der Leyen said.

Trump acknowledges that without American assistance, Europe will find it difficult to survive on its own.

He said following the London summit: ‘It is what I was saying, this guy doesn’t want there to be peace as long as he has America’s backing and, Europe, in the meeting they had with Zelensky, stated flatly that they cannot do the job without the U.S.’ 

White House DOGE leader Elon Musk branded Zelensky ‘evil’ for continuing to pursue war after the president made clear he wants to bargain with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

‘Zelensky wants a forever war, a never-ending graft meat grinder. This is evil,’ Musk wrote on X. ‘Stop sending men to die for nothing. ENOUGH!!’

Earlier Monday night, the State Department said Secretary Marco Rubio insisted a diplomatic end to the war was imperative.

‘We want to get the Russians to a negotiating table. We want to explore whether peace is possible,’ Rubio said.

‘President Trump is the only leader in the world right now who even has a chance at bringing an enduring and lasting end to the war in Ukraine.’

For several reasons, it might constitute a crippling blow to Ukraine’s anti-Russian operations.

In an interview last month, Zelensky said that the United States supplied Ukraine with over one-third of its war equipment.

‘The contribution from the United States to Ukraine’s defensive capability and security is now around 30 percent,’ Zelensky said. ‘You can imagine what would happen to us without this crucial 30 percent.’ 

Furthermore, as Ukraine enters spring, Russia will use the warmer weather to renew its push to take more territory in the weakened nation, The Telegraph reported.

The war continued to rage overnight, with Russia again striking civilian infrastructure – with a drone hitting a children’s clinic in the Sumy region, and another attack damaging two kindergartens in Odesa, where energy infrastructure was targeted.

Ukrainian military drones destroyed a vital pipeline in the Rostov region and a Russian oil refinery in the Syzran and Samara regions.

The strong-arm move from Trump to ‘pause’ US military supplies to Ukraine leaves Zelensky’s defences facing danger because it will prevent vital arms such as Patriot air defence missiles.

Ukraine was severely hurt by Congressional Republicans withholding aid for several months last year. Families were forced to take refuge in train stations in Kyiv while Russia hit the country’s energy infrastructure. 

However, Ukraine has become less dependent on the US, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace senior fellow Michael Kofman told the New York Times, ‘than it was a year ago.’ 

Dr Kenton White, politics and international relations expert at the University of Reading told MailOnline yesterday, ahead of the shock announcement, that Ukraine was still reliant on America’s scale and efficiency of production.

‘Ukraine would struggle without US support as the US has the greater capacity for the manufacture and supply of weapons, ammunition and all of the supporting military equipment and infrastructure required to prosecute a modern war,’ he said.

‘A US backstop is urgent because Western Europe has been complacent about its own defence, and its ability to produce the military infrastructure necessary for fighting a war.

‘Even within NATO, there is no flexibility for anything other than short-term, low-intensity conflicts. NATO is not ‘war-ready’ at all.’

In the United States, reactions to the news mostly followed party lines, with some Republicans in swing seats voicing opposition.

Without mentioning Trump, Republican Mike Lawler, who won his seat in New York in a district where Kamala Harris defeated him by a slim margin in November, blasted the action.

‘Stopping support for Ukraine would jeopardize the stability of Europe and the free world,’ Lawler said. 

‘There are strong opinions on both sides of this issue, and I respect that. However, we must be pragmatic about the bigger picture and protect America’s interests abroad,’ he said on social media.

Don Bacon, who won his seat in Nebraska by less than half a point, also criticised the move but didn’t mention Trump, stating that Russia’s supporters were not pausing aid. 

‘There is an invader and a victim, there is a democracy and a dictatorship, there is a country who wants to be part of the West and one who hates the West. We should be unambiguously for the good side,’ he said.

New York Democrat Dan Goldman said that Trump was attempting ‘extortion’ on Zelensky.

‘Basically, he wants Ukraine to cave. That’s the only thing that I can tell,’ he told CNN Monday.

Mary Miller, an Illinois Republican, represented much of the caucus in backing Trump: ‘If Zelensky wants to continue fighting an endless war, let him do it himself. The U.S. will no longer participate in this conflict that has led to the death of thousands. It’s time for peace!’

Even while European nations are debating how to strengthen their support for Ukraine, Trump met with senior advisors on Monday to debate the future of the aid, which led to the order.

Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly executed the pause.

Over $1 billion in arms and ammunition will be hindered, as well as hundreds of millions in support, leaving Ukraine to negotiate with private contractors, the New York Times reported. 

The Biden administration provided Kyiv with more than $66.5 billion in military aid and weapons since the war started.

It had left unspent roughly $3.85 billion in congressionally approved funding to dispatch more weapons to Ukraine from existing U.S. stockpiles – a totality that had not been impacted by the foreign aid freeze that Trump put in place when he first took office.

Although President Biden stopped deliveries of 2,000-pound bombs to Israel amid humanitarian concerns in Gaza, Trump’s move against Ukraine essentially serves as a final ultimatum to Zelensky.

Either the Ukrainian leader concedes to Trump’s demands or faces devastating losses on the battlefield. 

A White House official said Trump is focused on reaching a peace deal to end the more than three-year war sparked by Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine and wants Zelensky ‘committed’ to that goal.

The official added that the U.S. was ‘pausing and reviewing’ its aid to ‘ensure that it is contributing to a solution.’ The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the assistance.

A second official told Fox News that ‘this is not permanent termination of aid, it’s a pause’. 

All of the US’ NATO brethren have vowed to boost assistance to Ukraine since the disaster meeting, though they are nowhere near as heavily armed as America.

During a news conference on Monday, Trump alluded to the possibility that Zelenksy’s tenure as Ukrainian president would be short-lived if he persisted in making demands before a peace agreement was reached.

‘It should not be that hard a deal to make,’ Trump told reporters at the White House. 

‘It could be made very fast. Now, maybe somebody doesn’t want to make a deal, and if somebody doesn’t want to make a deal, I think that person won’t be around very long. That person will not be listened to very long.’

In response to a post on X claiming that ‘Zelensky knows if the war ends, his power ends’ and branding him a ‘dictator’, Musk said: ‘True. As distasteful as it is, Zelensky should be offered some kind of amnesty in a neutral country in exchange for a peaceful transition back to democracy in Ukraine.’

This echoes a statement by Trump, who also called Zelensky a ‘dictator’ for not holding elections in Ukraine, where Martial Law has been declared since the beginning of Russia’s attack in 2022. 

On Monday, Trump was asked what Zelensky needed to do to resume talks with Washington.

‘Well, I just think you should be more appreciative because this country has stuck with them through thick and thin,’ he said, before repeating a falsehood about levels of American support.

He added: ‘We’ve given them much more than Europe, and Europe should have given more than us.’

Trump has been pushing for a quick deal to end the war in Ukraine ever since he returned to office in January. 

His administration has held discussions with Kyiv on a rare earth minerals agreement that would permit Washington to recoup some of its expenses. 

The disruptive ending of Zelensky’s meeting at the White House on Friday with President Trump and Vice President JD Vance has flung all prospective support to Ukraine into question after the Ukrainian president was asked to leave the White House after the meeting.

Following a weekend of media backlash over his handling of Zelensky, Trump reaffirmed his stance on Ukraine.

‘The only President who gave none of Ukraine’s land to Putin’s Russia is President Donald J. Trump,’ the president wrote on Truth Social. ‘Remember that when the weak and ineffective Democrats criticize, and the Fake News gladly puts out anything they say!’

Trump’s National Security Advisor Mike Waltz warned in an interview on FOX News Channel’s America’s Newsroom Monday morning that the days of unlimited support from America to Ukraine were over.

‘The American people’s patience is not unlimited, their wallets are not unlimited and our stockpiles and munitions are not unlimited,’ he said. ‘The time to talk is now.’ 

Zelensky, according to Waltz, did not show that he was prepared to cooperate with Russia and the United States to reach a peace agreement to stop the conflict.

‘Success looks like President Zelensky sitting down and talking the terms of peace…what became so evident to us in that session is he’s not ready to talk peace at all but here’s the problem: Time is not on his side,’ he said.

Waltz said it was ‘really confounding’ that Zelensky blew up the meeting and lost an opportunity to work with the American people for the future of his country. 

‘I think that President Zelensky truly did his country a real disservice by not having a positive outcome on Friday and we’ll see where things are going forward,’ he concluded.

During the Oval Office discussion, Zelensky became irritated when Vance discussed how crucial it is to permit President Trump to negotiate with Russia.

‘What kind of diplomacy, JD, you are speaking about? What do you mean?’ he asked, after listing all of the ways that Putin had broken prior agreements with Ukraine. 

‘I’m talking about the kind of diplomacy that’s going to end the destruction of your country. Mr. President,’ Vance replied, before accusing Zelensky of being rude to President Trump by attempting to express his opposition to a peace deal in front of the American media. 

After the controversial Oval Office meeting, Trump told Zelensky to leave, cancelling the scheduled lunch, and a meeting to sign a mineral deal agreement followed by a press conference to celebrate.

‘I’m talking about the kind of diplomacy that’s going to end the destruction of your country. Mr. President,’ Vance replied, before accusing Zelensky of being discourteous to President Trump by attempting to express his opposition to a peace deal in front of the American media.

Trump said the Ukrainian president did not seem to be interested in reaching a peace agreement and chastised Zelensky for demeaning the United States while in the White House.

‘He can come back when he is ready for Peace,’ Trump wrote on social media. 

After the catastrophic meeting with Trump, Zelensky made an emergency trip to London where he met with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and European leaders who emphasized their support for Ukraine.

‘The U.K. is prepared to back this with boots on the ground and planes in the air, together with others,’ Starmer said. ‘Europe must do the heavy lifting, but to support peace in our continent and to succeed, this effort must have strong U.S. backing.’ 

But NATO members seemed to be divided following the meeting, while Trump accused the UK-led ‘coalition of the willing’ of being weak for relying on an American backstop for peace.

French President Emmanuel Macron proposed a 30-day end to the fighting – but without any security guarantees for Kyiv.

Britain and other allies gave the plan the cold shoulder, as the UK supports the Ukrainian situation which is that any end to the war must be secured by an agreement which Russia will be too afraid to break.

European leaders were hoping a common policy on Ukraine would materialise following Sunday’s meeting, with reports of the French diplomatic effort emerging. 

None of the leaders who attended the meeting on Sunday offered their support for the plan.  However, no one voiced opposition to it either, out of respect for Macron.

Concerns remain among allies over the number of troops countries can deliver as part of a post-settlement stabilisation force as Trump rejects using the US as a ‘backstop’ to prevent Russia from striking again. 

Trump said following the summit: ‘It is what I was saying, this guy doesn’t want there to be Peace as long as he has America’s backing and, Europe, in the meeting they had with Zelensky, stated flatly that they cannot do the job without the US.’

He added in what appeared to be an attack on what he appeared to perceive as a weakness of European leaders: ‘Probably not a great statement to have been made in terms of a show of strength against Russia. What are they thinking?’

Putin’s lapdog appears to be preventing Ukraine from receiving weaponry to help his best friend win the war.

If Trump truly wants peace above all else, why does he feel the necessity to put a ‘mineral resources’ price on it? That’s not looking for peace, it’s trying to screw someone over.

Why should the US keep footing the bill for something they don’t want if Zelensky and the EU want war to continue and the US wants peace?

And let’s face it, Zelensky does want a continuance of the war, he said it himself, ‘The end of the war is very, very far away.’ You wouldn’t say that if you had any interest in negotiating.

The definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing and expect a different outcome.

I’m amazed at how many idiots are supporting this war—or any war. What’s the matter with this world?

There seems to be enough of money for war, but not for its people, which is wrong, thus the UK shouldn’t have been involved and that has to end now.

Leak: Phones Listen To Conversations

Although it has long been assumed by millions, a recent leak indicates that our phones are listening to us. A purported presentation deck from one of Facebook’s purported marketing partners describes how the company listens to user interactions to provide customised advertisements.

In a slideshow, Cox Media Group (CMG) claims that its ‘Active-Listening’ software uses AI to collect and study ‘real-time intent data’ by listening to what you say through your phone, laptop or home assistant microphone.

‘Advertisers can pair this voice data with behavioural data to target in-market consumers,’ the deck states. 

The pitch deck goes on to tout Facebook, Google and Amazon as clients of CMG, suggesting they could be using its Active-Listening service to target users.

The pitch deck was leaked to reporters at 404 Media that showcases the abilities of Active-Listening software to prospective customers.

Since the story broke, Google removed the media group from their ‘Partners Program’ website. 

In an email statement to DailyMail.com, a Meta spokesperson said, ‘Meta does not use your phone’s microphone for ads, and we’ve been public about this for years. We are reaching out to CMG to get them to clarify that their program is not based on Metadata.’

Amazon responded to 404 Media by saying that its ads arm ‘has never worked with CMG on this program and has no plans to do so.’

However, the spokesperson added that the company will take action if one of its marketing partners violates its rules, leaving the status of Amazon’s relationship with CMG somewhat unclear.

The presentation explains the six steps that CMG’s Active-Listening software takes to gather speech data from customers using any gadget that has a microphone, such as a laptop, smartphone, or home assistant.

The presentation does not make it obvious if the Active-Listening software is listening all the time or only when the phone microphone is turned on, such as during a call.

Advertisers then use these insights to target ‘in-market consumers,’ which are people actively thinking about buying a certain product or service. 

If your voice or behavioural data suggests you are contemplating purchasing something, they will serve you advertisements for that item.

For instance, discussing or looking for Toyota vehicles may cause you to see advertisements for their most recent models.

‘Once launched, the technology automatically analyzes your site traffic and customers to fuel audience targeting on an ongoing basis,’ the deck states.

Therefore, this might be the case if you believe that you encounter more advertisements for a certain product after discussing it with a friend or looking it up online.

For years, smart-device users have suspected that their phones or tablets are listening to what they say. But most tech firms have flat-out repudiated these claims.

For example, Meta’s online privacy centre states, ‘We understand that sometimes ads can be so specific, it seems like we must be listening to your conversations through your microphone, but we’re not.’ 

However, this breach is only the most recent in a string of reports that your phone is listening to you and that websites like Facebook could be profiting off your words.

404 Media first announced the presence of CMG’s active listening service in December 2023.

A day later, they exposed a small AI marketing company called MindSift for bragging on a podcast about using smart device speakers to target ads.

Although it may seem incredible, Active Listening is completely legal, CMG claimed in a since-deleted blog post from November 2023.

‘We know what you’re thinking. Is this even legal? The short answer is: yes. It is legal for phones and devices to listen to you,’ the post reads.

‘When a new app download or update prompts consumers with multi-page terms of use agreement somewhere in the fine print, Active Listening is often included.’

This may be the reason why CMG can get away with it in places like California where wiretapping laws forbid recording someone without their consent.

CMG did not immediately respond to DailyMail.com’s request for comment and has not yet responded to similar queries from other news sites, including Futurism and Gizmodo.

CMG is a an American media empire based in Atlanta, Georgia. The company provides broadcast media, digital media, advertising and marketing services, and it yielded $22.1 billion in revenue in 2022.

Throughout the years, I have had conversations with people about fairly specific topics, and even though I may not have previously Googled or searched for them, by the time I check Facebook, an advertisement appears that it deems pertinent and related to the topic I was discussing, making it impossible for them to claim they are not paying attention.

This has to be prohibited right away since it is a flagrant invasion of privacy with a great deal of room for misuse.

Anybody with a brain larger than a walnut is aware that smart devices listen in on conversations.

Smart metres track when you get up and go to bed. Supermarkets monitor what you buy, and banks track more or less every transaction – pretty soon cars will be tracking the places you visit if they don’t already.

More and more facial recognition will be tracking you, and AI will predict where you will be and when, under the disguise of, ‘If you’ve got nothing to hide,’ ‘Or it’s for your protection.’ The future is going to be very bleak indeed.

George Orwell wrote the novel ‘1984’, perhaps this was his instruction manual for us all.

Mixing Ethnic Colleagues’ Names Can Constitute Race Discrimination

According to a tribunal, it constitutes racial discrimination to mix up the names of coworkers from ethnic minorities.

Employment judge Garry Smart said those from minority backgrounds are often ‘confused’ with others from the same heritage, which can make them feel hurt and offended and ‘lumped together as a group’ rather than being treated individually.

Judge Smart added that the ‘adverse inference’ of confusing the names of non-white employees is due to race and can therefore be seen as discriminatory.

His decision was in the case of Abhinav Sharma, an engineer at Jaguar Land Rover, who claimed that his coworker Magdelena Badescu had discriminated against him by calling him by the name of another Indian employee.

Mr Sharma said he looked and sounded ‘very different’ from co-worker Bhuvnesh Bhardwaj – who was of a larger build, wore glasses, had a beard and spoke with a British accent.

The Birmingham tribunal commented that in comparison, Mr Sharma was slimmer, spoke with an ‘obvious Indian accent’, and was clean-shaven or had ‘nothing more than stubble’.

In the engines team, Mr Sharma and Ms Badescu, who is white, were believed to get along well.

However, she called him Bhuv, which was an abbreviated form of Mr Bhardwaj’s initial name, at a team meeting in 2022.

Mr. Sharma submitted his notice and a grievance document in September of that year.

His line manager said Ms Badescu was ‘one of the kindest people he knew’ and would have got the names wrong as an ‘accident’.

But the tribunal found there ‘could be no mistaken identity based on looks and voices’ and concluded the error occurred ‘because of his race’.

The amount of compensation will be determined later.

For goodness sake we have at all one time or another called somebody by another name by accident – these things happen, but most of us have a chuckle about it and move on, but sadly that doesn’t seem possible anymore.

As a mother, I would frequently go through the names of my kids until I got the right one, even the dog! We all laughed a lot about it, and it wasn’t a huge problem.

When I was at school, kids couldn’t pronounce my surname correctly. It annoyed me slightly but it didn’t actually upset me that much, and now I’m old enough to know what a thick skin is.

I will just say that some people are not good at remembering names, but they get there eventually. Sometimes people’s brains wane, so it’s not always deliberate.

Whenever I did the yo-yo-ing with my children’s name I was never criticised for it, nor did they demand recompense, but in this issue it’s about the money, it’s always about the money.

‘Appalling’ Food Served To Troops As Army Chefs Are Axed

Napoleon and Frederick the Great are both credited with the saying ‘an army marches on its stomach’, knowing that troops need adequate nourishment to fight effectively on the battlefield.

However, one of their golden rules for military success appears to have been ignored by British defence chiefs after the number of Army chefs was slashed by almost two-thirds in the last 15 years.

Rather than employing chefs with military training to prepare healthy, wholesome meals for soldiers, the Ministry of Defence now mostly uses commercial contractors to deliver cuisine that many Army members find offensive.

A soldier posted startling images on social media of food served to troops training on a shooting range at Longmoor in Hampshire, calling it ‘the worst I’ve seen in 12 years of service’.

It included a bowl of raw chicken in soup and a meal merely comprising ‘meat water and a potato’.

Another warrant officer said he was ‘appalled’ after getting just a ham and cheese toastie as a meal.

Figures released by the MoD have shown that the number of chefs has plummeted from 2,547 in 2010 to 868 today, a drop of more than 65 percent.

In 2010, the Army comprised some 114,000 full-time personnel. But by last year, this number had dropped to about 75,000.

One former commander said the reduction in the number of Army chefs would ‘seriously damage morale’ and was ‘terribly short-sighted’ of the MoD.

Because they prepared meals for hundreds of soldiers every day in sweltering field kitchens during the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, Army cooks became unsung heroes.

Fresh, hot food prepared by trained chefs was considered essential to morale.

In addition to offering top-brass fine dining, army chefs are highly skilled soldiers who are trained to prepare meals for troops in harsh field kitchens.

With Pay As You Dine, things took a turn for the worse. Contract chefs and cooks, who were chosen based on their lowest offer, took the place of the camp chefs.

The service chefs were then pooled for exercises and operations, before this, they were posted to units that became part of the fabric. They knew who they were cooking for and had rapport with them. All that was lost in a pen stroke, and now this is the outcome.

And all the time migrants are treated with kid gloves and this is how our lads and lasses are looked after – no wonder our youngsters are not interested in a military career anymore.

The migrants would likely be able to provide far nicer cuisine, to be fair. Maybe we ought to hire them? Or perhaps they should serve this rubbish up in Whitehall and Parliament, and see how they like it.

Labour Councillor Gives Nazi Salute Before Shouting He’s Fascist

A Labour councillor has provoked anger after he was apparently filmed doing a Nazi salute before shouting that he is a ‘fascist’ during a council meeting.

The bizarre moment occurred when Cllr Alan Gardiner, speaking at a meeting, told a Liberal Democrat member to ‘shut up’.

Then, with background applause and laughter, the Labour politician appears to do the Nazi Sieg Heil gesture.

To make matters even worse Mr Gardiner then recited ‘I’m a fascist’ several times.

He has since apologised saying he was being ironic.

However, the move was described as ‘deeply disturbing’ by councillor Sarita Robinson who spoke to the Express.

She said the Labour Party needed to act ‘clearly and swiftly’ about this after saying they would get ‘serious about tackling antisemitism at every level’.

She added: ‘Hull is a proud and welcoming city and this action does not speak for us. 

‘As a Jewish person and minority in the city, it was horrific to see this display of ambient antisemitism.’

Since this, the councillor has now apologised for his comments, saying in a statement: ‘I wholeheartedly apologise for my comments made in the chamber earlier today’.

‘After a heated debate, I made comments in irony which upon reflection I know are highly inappropriate.’

Mr Gardiner was contacted by MailOnline for comment.

This comes after tech billionaire Elon Musk was embroiled in a scandal after claims he seemingly made the same salutation at Trump’s Inauguration.

Following this, he responded to this by posting a string of offensive puns to his X account.

His post made light of the names of Adolf Hitler’s Deputy Fuhrer Rudolf Hess; Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels; Reichstag President Hermann Göring; and Schutzstaffel (SS) Commander Heinrich Himmler.

Conservatives rushed to Musk’s defence after a liberal meltdown over the gesticulation where he put his hand over his heart, then shot his hand out to wave to the crowd in Capital One Arena.

Even Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu weighed in, writing in an X post on Thursday that Musk ‘is being falsely smeared.’

A few weeks later, a former Trump aide was also attacked for doing a similar hand signal at a Conservative convention in the US.

Steve Bannon yelled ‘fight, fight, fight’ before extending his right arm, fingers pointed and palm down, during his speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference (Cpac) near Washington DC.

This led to the French far-right leader Jordan Bardella cancelling his planned address at the same event and calling Mr Bannon’s action a ‘gesture referring to Nazi ideology’.

Bannon denied the Nazi comparison and called the gesture a ‘wave’, saying it was the ‘exact same wave’ he did on stage at a speech seven years ago in France to Bardella’s party. 

‘If he cancelled [the speech] over what the mainstream media said about the speech, he didn’t listen to the speech. If that’s true, he’s unworthy to lead France. He’s a boy, not a man,’ he told the French news magazine Le Point. 

These are the sought of people running our country. Our country is under communist rule and comrade Starmer is simply loving the power. He will fall back to earth when he’s ousted – hopefully from a significant height.

It appears every day we get a Labour politician ‘wholeheartedly’ apologising, the fact that they need to apologise demonstrates the calibre of those who are supposed to be representing us.

Notwithstanding their claim to socialism, the present Labour Party is unquestionably crypto-fascist. Without a doubt, it possesses all the characteristics of political authoritarianism, including the propensity to impose limits and bans on our society based on ideology and to tolerate no criticism or debate.

It’s that fantasy world that our friends on the left live in, that’s the reason, and Labour are out of control, but then, when have they ever been in control?

The NHS Refused To Cover Weight Loss Injections

A man reduced to “crying on his knees” after being refused NHS access to weight loss injections has lost nine stone and saved thousands by going private.

Grandfather of two, Mark Spurr, 53, has dropped from 30 stone to 21 stone and shaved eight inches off his waist after starting weekly Mounjaro injections eight months ago.

The security officer had pleaded with his GP in June for NHS treatment upon discovering that he couldn’t fit into the needed stab-proof vest for work at a Leeds immigration centre and struggled to walk from the car park.

With a body-mass index (BMI) score of 57, flying off the chart, he still didn’t meet the NHS criteria, which necessitate a BMI over 35 with at least one weight-related illness for those with “the highest clinical needs”.

Determined to save both his job and his life, Mark turned to Cloud Pharmacy, embarking on private treatment starting from £100 a month.

Now, not only has he shed pounds but he’s also benefited financially – claiming to have kept £2,000 in his pocket by foregoing the £400 monthly spend on snacks and takeaways, all courtesy of the medication that tricks the brain into feeling full.

“Mounjaro’s changed my life and it might have even saved my life,” Mark told PA Real Life. “I couldn’t walk across the car park in June and last weekend, I hiked Whernside mountain in the Yorkshire Dales.

“When I went to the GP, I was basically on my hands and knees crying my eyes out and pleading with them to prescribe it to me, I was in so much pain.

“I might as well have been smashing my head against a brick wall as I was told I didn’t fit the criteria. But they recommended that I take it privately and now I feel fantastic.”

Mark, from Morley, West Yorkshire, started to gain weight when he left school aged 15 and took a job as a joiner for Leeds City Council. Ten years ago, his weight spiralled after the death of his mum Susan Spurr, in her 60s.

“Food was a coping mechanism,” said Mark. He joined a Slimming World group but his weight kept yo-yoing.

On a typical day, he would consume a sausage, spam, and egg sandwich for breakfast, followed by a bacon roll, a pastry, and a coffee. For lunch, he would have a sandwich, pasty, bun, and cake, while for dinner, he would have takeaway fish and chips, with snacks of multipack crisps and chocolate in between.

Things came to a head last year when Mark could no longer fit into the stab-proof vest he was required to wear for work and feared he would lose his job. “I felt depressed, tired all the time but unable to sleep, and full of anxiety like I was struggling in an 85-year-old’s body,” he said.

“I was wearing shorts and T-shirts in winter because I was sweating by the time I’d walked from the car door to the office.

“A report by occupational health said I’d have to lose six stone to do my job safely and I took some time off. I have to thank my work for giving me the opportunity to lose weight.”

Mark said he visited his GP every few months at Robin Lane Health and Wellbeing Centre in Pudsey where he “begged and begged for help but got nowhere whatsoever”.

He added: “I asked if I qualified for a gastric band but there was a two-year waiting list.

“Then I did a blood test for Mounjaro but I didn’t fit the criteria, even when the results showed I was in the lower end of type two diabetes.”

The final straw came during a trip to Crete in June when he could not walk from the hotel to the beach and had to resort to taxis. “When I came home, I said to my dad, ‘That’s it, I don’t care if I can afford it or not, I’m doing it’, and I ordered my first pen,” he said.

Mark immediately began taking weekly Mounjaro injections, starting with a dose of 2.5mg, costing £100 per month. “I was really shocked because it works and it worked virtually within four hours,” he said.

“For somebody in my situation, we get food noise, where you’ll be eating breakfast and you’re already thinking about what’s for dinner, but taking Mounjaro, that food noise just disappeared.”

After a week on the treatment, Mark had lost 9lb and had switched junk food for meal replacement shakes and high-protein meals like chicken and rice and egg salad. He is now losing a steady 2lb to 3lb per week, is approaching his ideal weight of 16 stone, and has resumed mountain biking with his son Joshua, 28.

He’s also enjoying more walks with his 54-year-old partner and playful times in the park with his six-year-old granddaughter Hailey. “So far, I’ve gone from a 6XL to a 3XL – now the goal is to be able to nip into Primark rather than travelling to specialist clothes shops for plus sizes,” he said.

Mark has upped his amount of Mounjaro, which now costs him £150 a month, and he notes that the price will increase to £180 at the end of the treatment. “It may not seem like a lot but as a civil servant on minimum wage for my level, I thought I couldn’t afford it,” Mark said.

“But once the effects kicked in and I was eating less, I realised I’m actually saving £250 per month.”

The doting grandfather, who also has a one-year-old grandson named Arthur, thinks the medication’s benefits overshadow its side effects, which have included constipation and diarrhoea. “If that’s what I have to do to prolong my life and stay healthy, that’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make,” he said.

“People say it’s not a quick fix and it’s not – I am putting in the hard work at the gym three to four times per week – but the medication controls my appetite.

“Rather than food being my life, I now eat to live rather than live to eat.”

Mark’s weight loss journey is being chronicled on his TikTok account, Mark on Fitness @spurry05tiktok, where he has accumulated 3,500 followers and his videos have garnered up to 80,000 views.

Since weight reduction injections are just for diabetics, many people who sought them out from their doctor were flatly denied access.

Those who can afford it pay for it themselves, while those who cannot afford it suffer in silence and do not receive the injection.

In the long run, administering injections would undoubtedly save the NHS a significant amount of money.

The cause of a person’s weight growth is unknown. Medication, decreased mobility, genetic sickness, etc., could all be contributing factors. It has nothing to do with not taking care of oneself. It’s about receiving the necessary support, and those who are overweight aren’t receiving any.

Why not aid those who are overweight? The NHS helps those who smoke and those who are addicted to drugs and alcohol.

Unfortunately, we live in a day and age where our food supply is endless. Go to the supermarket and there it is in abundance, and foods that are high in refined carbohydrates, sugar, or fat can make you feel more hungry more often.

The purpose of these foods is to trick your brain into believing that you need or desire more food.

Like alcohol, food is addictive, although it’s not entirely as black and white as that, but well done to this man. What an outstanding accomplishment which has probably saved his life.

Food addiction is no different to alcohol, drugs, smoking, shopping, gambling and even sex addiction, it’s all the same substance and all are classed like any other illness and should be covered by the NHS for help and support, and it should be helped with prevention medication as any other illness.

Before passing judgment on others, those who think that being overweight is a self-inflicted condition should examine themselves.

What about individuals who train out at the gym or go running so much that they develop an addiction to it and subsequently have an injury that requires a fractured bone, a knee replacement or both?

Shall we tell all those people that it was self-inflicted because they were addicted to exercise? Where does this argument end? The fact is, none of us are perfect and we all have things that we are addicted to, whatever it might be.

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