The end of the Welfare State as we know it?

President Macron can't hide from his troubles (WSJ)

The end of the welfare state as we know it?

Having just spent time in France, it seems to me that the French state's financial problems are even worse than the UK's. 

According to Françoise Fressoz of Le Monde newspaper, "We have all become totally addicted to public spending. It's been the method used by every government for half a century – of left and right – to put out the fires of discontent and buy social peace."

"Everyone can sense now that this system has run its course. We're at the end of the old welfare state. But no one wants to pay the price or face up to the reforms which need to be made."

I think that sums up very neatly the near impossible challenge faced by France, UK and most well established democratic countries. 

Working People Pay Pensioners More

"French pensioners are making more than the average wage. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development puts France as the only developed country where average incomes for the over-65s are higher than for working-age citizens.

The average income for over-65s in France is about 1 per cent higher than it is for workers, after taking into account taxes and other social contributions, according to analysis by the Financial Times of figures from the OECD group of advanced economies and the Luxembourg Income Study, a not-for-profit group.

The state pension can pay as much as €23,184 (£20,135) a year in France, while in the UK the full new state pension pays £11,973 a year, going up 4.7 per cent to £12,535 next year, in line with average wage growth."

"France’s pension spending accounts for nearly 14 per cent of its GDP, compared with 5 per cent in Britain. France spends more than €400 billion (£347 billion) a year on pensions."

The Times September 17th 2025

How incompetent are our governments when they changed the pension source from each individual creating a future funding pot to to a system where today's workers fund today's pensioners. That released that valuable future pot which got spent and left us in an unenviable situation where today's workers can't afford to fund today's pensioners! Another example of short term-ism to win the next election regardless of the consequences.

So we know that the big problem in the UK, France and many other countries is that we can no longer afford to fund state services. The state is living beyond its means and it literally cannot continue. The two big ones are welfare and pensions, both far far more generous than our states can afford. As Margaret Thatcher once said "The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of somebody else's money". And the failure of successive governments to act means we are reaching that point. The economy is not growing fast enough to make up for all the extra spending.

So what is the answer?

The solutions are: reducing expenditure, increasing taxation and growing the economy. We will need to do all three. In spades. We will have no choice. But any government that really goes to town on this will be voted out. That's the dichotomy!

Quote of the Month

"Almost everything that I dislike about the right in America, and here and in Europe, I can say is probably the fault of the left..... The left's greatest sin - and I say this as a sort of leftist - is that it would rather be right than effective."

Stephen Fry at an interview on Triggernometry, December 2024.

The Oleander, David Hockney, Jobless Benefits, Quote from C.S. Lewis

The Oleander

The Oleander or Laurier Rose, is one of my favourite plants. It loves the Mediterranean climate and can grow into a tree with beautiful green leaves and stunning flowers, usually pink, red or white. I associate it with warm sunshine and it is a symbol of everlasting love.

In Greek mythology, Hero is a priestess of Aphrodite (the goddess of love). She lived in a tower in Sestos and fell in love with Leander who was from Abydos on the opposite side of the Hellespont (the Dardenelles today). Hero would light a torch on the top of her tower and Leander would swim across to see her. One stormy winter's night, she lit the torch and Leander got lost as he swam across and the torch was blown out. Hero found his body washed up on the beach and she jumped off the tower to join him in death. It is said that she found him surrounded by the flowers and she screamed 'O Leander, O Leander' and this is how the Oleander got its name. 

It's more likely that the plant's name comes from the Latin word for olive 'Olea' and the Greek word for tree 'Dendron'. It was thought that the leaves were very similar to olive trees.

David Hockey at the Fondation Louis Vuitton

My children gave me tickets to go to Paris to visit the David Hockney exhibition at the Fondation Louis Vuitton. I have never been a Hockney fan prior to this but I am now. The 88 year artist's latest works are absolutely extraordinary and I love them!  His landscapes techniques combined with his vivid use of colour make for remarkable pictures that are both realistic and imaginative at the same time. He now uses an iPad in some of his art and the impact is magnified as the pictures in front of you transform. A few of my favourites are below. 

Finally I should say that the newish Fondation Louis Vuitton and the surrounding attractions in the Bois de Boulogne are worth a visit in their own right. Spectacular!

Jobless benefits reach record high

By Ross Clark in The Spectator 26/08/2025

"Quietly, without even a press release, let alone a fanfare, Britain over the past 12 months has just passed a grim milestone. The number of people on out of work benefits has surpassed the peak reached in the early 1990s. It is higher now than it was at the peak of Covid-19 in 2020.

Remember when unemployment of three million used to generate headlines every week, in the early 1980s and then again a decade later? Well, there are now 6.5 million people living on out of work benefits. Yet it hardly causes a ripple in the political pond because most of them are not officially ‘unemployed’ – they are either on disability benefits or on Universal Credit, many of them without any requirement to look for work.

Official unemployment figures – which since the 1990s have been based on a questionnaire called the Labour Force Survey rather than on the number of claimants – have become a scam. They enable the government to boast of apparently low unemployment while the real picture is one of mass worklessness.

There is a terrible price to pay for this sleight of hand. While the unemployed used to be highly visible, the growing millions who have been signed off as unfit for work are not. They don’t necessarily have to visit Job Centres or unemployment offices in order to sign on every other week, as claimants had to do in the 1980s. Since the pandemic, many claimants do not even have to present themselves for a face-to-face assessment; rather, they are carried out over the telephone. It has become laughably easy to play the system, with numerous TikTok accounts even providing coaching on how to get signed off, in many cases by claiming mental ill-health.

Keir Starmer came to power a year ago promising to get people back to work, but then cowered at the first hurdle when his own backbenchers revolted at the very principle of trimming the benefits. There is now zero hope of reform during the current Parliament. The economy is being compromised by having to lug along an ever-heavier deadweight of the economically inactive. And all the government will do is try to cover up the scale of the disaster."

C.S. Lewis Quote from 'Learning in Wartime, his 1939 sermon at St Mary the Virgin in Oxford

"If men had postponed the search for knowledge and beauty until they were secure the search would never have begun. We are mistaken when we compare war with 'normal life'. Life has never been normal. Even those periods which we think most tranquil... turn out, on closer inspection, to be full of cries, alarms, difficulties, emergencies".

The Unsustainable Welfare Bill, UK Financial Services, Joke for the Month

The Welfare Bill keeps rising

I struggle to understand why the forecasts for the Welfare Bill show that it is ballooning to astronomical sums of money that we clearly can't afford, despite the House just voting not to make many cuts. Then I saw this graph in the Spectator.  It explains the numbers but not Why.

It shows the increase in the number of claimants over the last 3 years. By far the largest category, 'CTA' or Common Travel Area, is basically regular UK citizens (and Irish people who live here). According to data released by the Department for Work and Pensions on July 15, 2025, households with a single person and no children received the lowest average monthly payment of £740. At the other end of the scale, couples with children received the highest average payment of £1,290 per month. So let's say it's around £1,000 per claimant per month to make the maths easier. The increase in the last years for the largest category, CTA, is 2 million people. That means an extra £24 billion pounds is now being paid out just in that category! To give some context, the annual budget for working age benefits is £117.6bn and disability benefits are £90.4bn.

So the question is not whether this is sustainable (it most clearly is NOT) but more about why on earth on the numbers shooting up like this? Why do more than 1 in 5 people between the ages of 16 and 64 claim some from of benefit? By July 2022, there were 30,000 new claimants a month, double that of the previous year. That's 1,000 new recipients of benefits EVERY SINGLE DAY!  We are heading in a very dangerous direction very rapidly and the House just voted to reduce by not very much following a rebellion of Labour MPs who don;t want any cuts to benefits.

People are very upset by the number of immigrants coming to 'sponge off our benefits system' but the stark reality is that 95% of NEW claimants are regular Brits who have full citizens' rights. 

The UK Stock Market may become irrelevant

The decline in the value of the UK Stock Market as a percentage of global markets is probably inevitable as the emerging markets develop and is not necessarily a bad thing. BUT, UK government policy has allowed the UK to decline at a faster rate than necessary. 

Graphic from Visual Capitalise showing the value of global markets

In 2023, financial services contributed £208.2 billion to the UK economy, which accounted for 8.8% of the total economic output. 

In the first quarter of 2024, there were 1.17 million jobs in the financial services sector, representing 3.1% of all jobs in the UK.  When related professional services such as legal and accounting are included, this figure rises to over 2.4 million people. 

The total tax contribution of the financial and related professional services industry reached a record £110.2 billion, equating to 12.3% of total UK tax receipts. That equates to over 60% of the total NHS budget. [data gathered by Gemini].

So that's 7% of all jobs creating over 12% of our tax receipts. More of that please!

The UK is the world's largest net exporter of financial services, making it absolutely critical to the UK's economic success.

Yet, we have allowed it to whither. Look at these statistics gathered by David Kempton using Chat GPT:

• In the UK 26% of the adult population invests in quoted companies; in the US 62% invest directly or through their retirement accounts
• Foreign investors own 57% of UK shares, pension funds 6%, funds and institutions 26%, and individuals 11%
• Since 2013 the number of listed companies on all UK markets has decreased from 2,448 to 1,836 – a decline of 25%. The AIM market is down from 1,700 in 2007 to 700 today
• In 2024, 88 companies left the market with only 18 new IPOs (initial public offerings)
• In 2000, UK pension funds had 48% of their £3trn of assets in UK equities – now only 6%
• BP and Shell are on price-to-earnings (PE) ratios of 8.5 times, compared to Exxon Mobil and Chevron on more like 13 times. This 50% variation is typical of the increased valuation of US over UK stocks across the respective equity sectors

What is the government waiting for? Why do financial services often still have a poor reputation? 

The London Stock Exchange Group has its HQ in Paternoster Square, St Pauls.

Individuals should be encouraged to invest sensibly. AIM type companies should be celebrated and encouraged (the government removed half of the IHT tax break on AIM companies last year!). Investing should be taught in schools! We should aim to match the USA where 62% of adults invest in stocks and shares.

The City of London is known globally and needs to be promoted. Red tape needs to be reduced, costs of trading and doing business needs to be slashed and there needs to be a huge PR and marketing campaign to put British Financial Services firmly back on the map. Let's expand please!

Joke for the Month

Do you think humans eat more bananas than monkeys?

Don't know?

Well generally humans don't eat monkeys.

A Very Eventful Month, What has Iran Ever Done to Us? and 50 equals 34 million.

A very eventful month:

Israel attacks Iran.

Air India crash in Ahmedabad with 1 lone survivor walking away unaided

America bombs Iran's nuclear plants

Donald Trump talking about Iran and Israel as their bombs continue to fall after the start of his ceasefire: "They don't know what the f**k they're doing"

This has all been extensively covered in the press. What I am going to look at this month is what the Iranian regime has been doing to the West since it took power in 1979. I am just going to report FACTS and I will make some comments at the end.

What has Iran done to us in the last 50 years?

The Iranian regime and its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) have been accused by numerous Western governments and intelligence agencies of sponsoring terrorism globally for decades. This is primarily carried out through funding, training, and directing proxy groups—most notably Hezbollah—as well as deploying its own intelligence operatives to conduct attacks and assassinations.

Ali Hosseini Khamenei - Supreme Leader & President of Iran since 1989

While Iran denies involvement, a significant body of evidence from official investigations, court rulings, and intelligence reports links the regime to numerous attacks on Western targets or interests. Here are some of the most prominent examples.

Major Attacks Attributed to Iran and its Proxies:

1983 Beirut Barracks and Embassy Bombings (Lebanon): In April 1983, a suicide bombing at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut killed 63 people, including 17 Americans. Six months later, in October 1983, massive, coordinated suicide truck bombs struck the barracks of U.S. and French members of a multinational peacekeeping force. The attacks killed 241 U.S. service personnel and 58 French paratroopers. A U.S. federal court and declassified intelligence found that Iran's leadership authorised the attacks, which were carried out by its then-nascent proxy, Hezbollah. 

1994 AMIA Jewish Centre Bombing (Argentina): A car bomb destroyed the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA) building in Buenos Aires, killing 85 people and injuring hundreds. In 2024, Argentina's highest criminal court formally ruled that the attack was masterminded by Iran and executed by Hezbollah. The court identified the attack as a "crime against humanity" and named senior Iranian officials of the time as responsible.

1996 Khobar Towers Bombing (Saudi Arabia): A truck bomb targeted a housing complex for U.S. Air Force personnel in Khobar, killing 19 U.S. service members and injuring approximately 500 people. A U.S. federal grand jury indictment in 2001 stated that members of the Iranian-backed Saudi Hezbollah al-Hejaz carried out the attack and that they were "inspired, supported, and supervised" by senior officials in the Iranian government.

2012 Burgas Bus Bombing (Bulgaria): A suicide bomber attacked a bus carrying Israeli tourists at the airport in Burgas, Bulgaria, killing five Israelis and the Bulgarian bus driver, and injuring over 30 others. Bulgarian authorities, with support from international partners, concluded that Hezbollah was responsible for the attack, leading the European Union to designate Hezbollah's military wing as a terrorist organisation.

Foiled Plots and Recent Activity in Europe:

In addition to these major historical attacks, Western intelligence agencies have uncovered numerous more recent plots on European soil attributed to Iranian intelligence services and the IRGC. These often target Iranian dissidents, as well as Israeli and Jewish interests.

France (2018): European authorities thwarted a plot to bomb a large rally of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), an opposition group, near Paris. An Iranian diplomat, Assadollah Assadi, was later convicted in a Belgian court and sentenced to 20 years in prison for his role in masterminding the plot. 

United Kingdom (2022-Present): The head of MI5 has publicly stated that UK authorities have uncovered and disrupted at least 20 Iran-backed plots since 2022, including assassination and kidnapping attempts against individuals on British soil deemed to be enemies of the regime. 

Germany and Sweden: Security services have exposed networks and plots linked to Iran, sometimes involving the recruitment of local criminal gangs to carry out surveillance or attacks on Israeli and Jewish targets, including the Israeli Embassy in Stockholm.

My Thoughts

These incidents highlight a consistent strategy by the Iranian regime to use terrorism and covert operations as a tool of state policy against Western, Israeli, and dissident targets. The Iranian regime provides training, weapons and money to Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza and Houthis in Yemen in order that they can attack Israel and the West. In Palestine Square in Tehran, there is a 'countdown clock' which counts the days until the destruction of Israel.

Iranian countdown clock to the destruction of Israel

I have not listed the Iranian attacks on Israel, whether direct or via their terrorist proxies. There are far too many to list - they are frequently daily events.

These people are wicked beyond belief and in a way that it is hard for the Western mind to understand. We should all be grateful to Israel and the USA for having destroyed and damaged much of Iran's military and nuclear capabilities. We should also be thinking of the people of Iran who are suppressed by this evil regime. 

The Fordow nuclear enrichment site in Iran before/after US attack

U.S. Air Force B-2 Spirit stealth bombers dropped GBU-57A/B Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) 30,000-pound "bunker buster" bombs on the Fordow nuclear enrichment site on 22nd June 2025

I fail to understand why there appears to be so much support for Iran's death proxies in the West. We see regular demonstrations and vandalism by so-called Palestine freedom groups against Israel and either covertly or overtly in favour of the terrorist groups with chants such as 'From the river to the sea' which calls for the destruction of Israel. 

Billions of dollars of Western aid money have been stolen by Hamas and Hezbollah to supply their arms, build their tunnel networks and their luxury houses. These terrorists groups use their own people as part of their weaponry and openly celebrate every time there are civilian deaths as it helps their cause to turn more people against Israel. They use children an elderly people in their war effort as they know the IDF is less likely to attack them.

It is utterly repugnant and the West needs to wake up to their sheer evil. The only way to help the civilians is to rid them of their terrorist rulers. I utterly condemn the Israeli settlers in Palestine who are stealing other people's land and I condemn the Israeli' government's heavy handed approach to the conflict in Gaza. However this in no way justifies the Hamas attacks of the 7th of October which were unimaginably repugnant beyond belief. No sane person can support Hamas, Hezbollah, Houthis and Iranian Regime. They are a great danger to our world and our values.

 50 equals 34 million

The 50 wealthiest families in the UK own the same value of assets as the poorest half of the population. That's 34 million people. Sounds right? Absolutely not. 

"The top 50 richest families in the UK now hold more wealth than the poorest half of the population, comprising more than 34 million people. In 2024, the two richest UK billionaires held more wealth between them than all the billionaires in the 1990 rich list combined.

“Our analysis also shows the vampiric nature of extreme wealth, which is completely incompatible with the health and wellbeing of the nation,” said Priya Sahni-Nicholas, co-executive director of the Equality Trust. “Property, inheritance and finance account for over half of total billionaire current wealth: sources of wealth creation that are responsible for large-scale planetary and community destruction." 

The Guardian May 19th 2025

You can read the full research report here:

https://equalitytrust.org.uk/evidence-base/billionaire-britain-2025/

I remember when I used to buy the Sunday Times every week from my local Newsagent in the 1980s. The annual Rich List was a big deal and the Top 10 had people like the Queen and Lord Sainsbury but as far as I can recall no billionaires. This year the 350th person on the list is worth £350 million. And that's more than most of the Top 10 used to have. 

So what you may say. Let them be. Well the problem is that many of the bottom 34 million people receive money from the state and the Top 50 don't pay much tax. This partially explains why our government is short of money and struggles to provide basic services that we used to take for granted. 

Quote for the Month

The following quote is frequently attributed to Winston Churchill:

“An empty taxi drew up outside Number Ten, Downing Street, and when the door opened, Attlee got out.”

Churchill categorically denied saying this. When challenged, his response was:

“Mr. Attlee,” he said, “is an honourable and gallant gentleman, and a faithful colleague who served his country well at the time of her greatest need. I should be obliged if you would make it clear whenever an occasion arises that I would never make such a remark about him, and that I strongly disapprove of anybody who does.”

A Chaotic World in May 2025, My Retinal Tear

May 2025 was another fast-paced ever changing month on planet earth. From Trump's tariff swings and the ensuing chaos, through more failed peace talks on the Russian invasion of Ukraine to multiple new trade deals closer to home, it feels like a new unexpected event is lurking around every corner. And regular talk of a new Hamas-Israel ceasefire while the carnage continues.

My blog this month covers a few comments that caught my eye away from the mainstream global chaos.

The Surge of The Reform Party in the local elections

"Reform UK's voter base is characterized by older, male voters, residing outside major urban centers, with a history of Conservative voting and strong views on immigration and national identity."

Gemini AI, 11th May 2025

New Labour Government EU-UK post Brexit deal

Boris Tax: cost to UK taxpayer:

The British Ports Association (BPA), which represents ports that facilitate 86 per cent of the UK’s trade, including the overwhelming majority that handle EU traffic, estimated the total cost to the industry at over £120 million. 

The National Audit Office estimated last year that the government had spent more than £4.7 billion on implementing post-Brexit border arrangements. At the same time, it repeatedly postponed imposing full controls on EU imports.

With the new UK-EU agreement, it seems that these preparatory measures are now largely redundant resulting in more waste of taxpayer resources.

UK Trade Deals in May

India, USA, EU. Three new trade deals. None is particularly great, but each lays the groundwork for expansion over time. Better UK-EU relations and freer two way trade is almost certainly the most significant.

My Retinal Tear

I made an appointment to see my local optician as I felt that my left eye was not right (!). Using his advanced retinal imaging equipment, Rashpal Sidhu discovered a tear in my retina and referred me immediately to the John Radcliffe Eye Hospital where I was seen immediately. Laser Photocoagulation surgery was performed on my eye to create scarring which will hopefully contain the tear and prevent any further damage.

I would like to thank Rashpal and all of the NHS doctors and nurses who looked after me at the JR. They almost certainly saved my eye and they were all extremely professional and courteous, despite that day being one of the busiest ever experienced.

Quotes for the Month

"Resentment is like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies."

Nelson Mandela

"Holding a grudge is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die" 

Buddha 

“Macron, Merz, Starmer, and Tusk were supposed to discuss peace in Kiev (sic). Instead, they are blurting out threats against Russia … You think that’s smart, eh? Shove these peace plans up your pangender arses.”
9th May 2025, Dmitry Medvedev, former President of Russia, responded on X to Western ceasefire proposals.

2 Presidents and 2 Egos, Lisbon Rich and Poor, Argos Cookworks Kettle, White Lotus Quotes

2 Presidents, 2 Egos

Presidents Trump and Xi are engaged in a battle of the ego and their countries come second. 

I understand why Trump is imposing tariffs to try to address the massive US trade imbalance and unfair taxes placed on US imports. However, I fundamentally disagree with his approach to fixing it: create as much chaos and disruption as possible even if you screw the poorest countries who can't afford US goods.

So then he temporarily suspended tariffs above 10%, presumably to allow time to negotiate proper trade deals with dozens of countries, except for China.

As at mid April 2025

There has been a tit for tat set of retaliatory increases leading to the current situation of tariffs of over 100%. Many Chinese companies have suspended exports to the USA and are looking for alternative markets. It has become a battle of the egos - who will cede first - rather than a policy decision designed to promote the local economy.

Trump and team must know that a lack of Chinese imports will drive up inflation at home, so I imagine this is just a short term negotiating game. But they are playing with fire and wreaking havoc on the global economy and on many US and Chinese businesses. Real people are getting hurt in their game.

Lisbon, Europe's Poorest and Richest City

We recently went on a short break to Lisbon to discover a beautiful city that exceeded our expectations. The 'Age of Discoveries' in the 15th and 16th centuries was Lisbon's golden age. Portugal, with Lisbon at its heart, was a major global power due to its pioneering maritime explorations. The city became a central hub for the lucrative spice trade, gold, and other valuable goods flowing in from its vast overseas empire in Africa, Asia, and South America (especially Brazil). From 1808 to 1821, Rio was Portugal's capital!

The iconic Lisbon Trams

A massive earthquake registering 9.1 on the Richter scale struck the city on All Saints Day, 1st November 1755. One third of the city's population perished and most of the buildings were destroyed. We visited the only church that remains from before this period along with the world's oldest working bookshop.  On that morning, the pious and the wealthy were at the early morning church service, alongside vast amounts of gold which was stored in the churches. Most of these people died. Only one part of the city, the Alfama district, survived largely unscathed; it was the poor, red light district. The religious scholars debated the meaning of God's intervention long and hard. 

See the earthquake damage on the ONLY surviving church

The elegant Praça do Commercio

We stayed in a quiet hotel, just a few minutes from the main sights using the efficient and spotless metro. We also tried to use the trams and buses but they don't appear to run to  timetable - or at all - when we wanted them. The one Uber we used was very slow to arrive and got stuck in very bad traffic. There were plenty of places serving high quality gluten free food, even amazing ice cream with cones!

Praça das Armoreiras (Mulberry Trees)

We were most impressed with the quality of the city's architecture, the beautiful squares (Praças), the location where the river Tagus meets the Atlantic ocean, the hilly setting and the people! We plan to return and visit more of Portugal.

Argos Cockworks Kettle

We use our kettle a lot. Several times every day. Over the years I have bought some expensive ones such as Bosch, which typically break after a couple of years so I decided to buy a cheap one. I bought an Argos own brand Cockworks kettle about 3 years ago and it was well made and remarkably good value at £10. 

I wasn't surprised when the thermostat stopped working as it had outlasted the more expensive brands. So being a loyal customer, I decided to replace it with the same model, which had gone up by just £1 to £11.

All good? Well, no, unfortunately not. In order to keep the price rise modest, the kettle quality had been downgraded substantially:

1. It feels much more flimsy, rattling on its base

2. To fill it with water you need 3 hands: one to hold the lid (which flops down otherwise), one to hold the kettle (you don't want to put it down in a wet sink) and one to turn the tap on and off

3. When you pour the boiling water out, if you tip the kettle a little too far, the boiling water pours out all over you

So I suspect the excellent reviews on the Argos website refer to the former model. I took it back and they refunded me when I explained how dangerous it is. And I bought a Russell Hobbs Kettle for £25 on Amazon which seems to be very good quality and comes with a 3 year guarantee. Let's see how long it lasts.

Quotes from White Lotus

"These Gays, They’re Trying To Murder Me"

Tanya McQuoid S2

Tanya on the luxury boat in Taormina with her 'High End Gay' acquaintances

"The least we can do is enjoy it. If we don't it's offensive."  

Victoria Ratilff S2. She is explaining that the poor aspire to be like them, the ultra wealthy, and they need to enjoy their wealth so as not to disappoint the poor.

"Guesss who I am? Peppa Pig?" 

(Monica Viti actually) Valentina S2
https://www.tiktok.com/@warnerbrosirl/video/7295701727683071265?lang=fr

https://www.tiktok.com/@accesshollywood/video/7175361938463952171?lang=fr

Valentina is more abrasive than the other obsequious Hotel Managers in White Lotus

"We’re Living In The Best Time In The History Of The World, On The Best F---ing Planet. If You Can’t Be Satisfied Living Now, Here, You’re Never Gonna Be Satisfied."

Jack talking to Portia S2

I Was Almost Scammed, HSBC are So Irritating, Quote for the Month

I Was Almost Scammed

I look after my mother's phone and broadband account with BT. We have been having regular problems, with the service going down for hours and also intermittently. Last week, following a 25 minute 'chat' on their website, BT sent out a technician to check the setup. He rang me whilst on site to say it needed an engineer to have a look externally at the service going into the house. I am not happy that my mother has no phone and broadband as without these services she can't contact her doctor or the emergency services and is unable to watch TV.

A few days later we were visiting my mother and the landline rang and as it was BT, I was asked to take the call. The lady explained that as we were experiencing issues with the service they wanted to conduct further tests. She asked me some questions (e.g. how many connected devices, etc.) and then passed me over to her 'technical' department. He asked  me to run a speed test (and explained how) which confirmed that it was running slowly. He also asked me more questions and then explained I would need to download the 'BT Anydesk Remote Desktop' app on my phone. I said to him I was uncomfortable doing this and he then re-assured me and explained I would be able to see the BT server name I was connected to. He then proceeded to show me how our IP address was public and anyone could have access. He asked me to write down a code number. All this sounded pretty much like nonsense to me so I hung up. I then rang BT and they confirmed that this was a scam. They never ask customers to download anything and they never call customers unless it's a pre-arranged call or a sales call. They always send you text messages to confirm security.

This left me somewhat shocked as I can see how easily anyone with even less technical knowledge than me would fall for this. If I had downloaded the software he would have had full access to everything on my phone.

Fraud, and in particular these types of scams are now the biggest global form of robbery, having overtaken the drugs trade. In countries such as Laos and Vietnam, there are huge call centre operations dedicated to scamming people all over the world out of their life savings. They also target business and some have lost millions to these people.

My advice: only trust people you already know. Assume every call from a stranger is a scam. This is the only way you can protect yourself. And believe me, they are extremely professional and proficient at what they do. They take their time, they guide you through, they try to be ever so helpful, pleasant. BEWARE.

HSBC are so irritating

Last month we had two problems with everyday banking with HSBC. 

First paying in a cheque. How hard can that be? How many hours can that take?

Well I tried to pay in a cheque using the app as I have many times before, but now it doesn't work! I must have tried dozens of times and each time it fails. So eventually I went to their only remaining bank branch in the area and tried to pay it in using their cheque paying-in machine. It rejected it. So I queued to see a member of staff. He tried and of course it worked.

I think they do it on purpose to dissuade people from using cheques as they are so expensive to process.

Then my wife attempted to transfer some money to another account she has. She does this on an infrequent but regular basis. This time they decided to decline the transfer as it was 'potentially fraudulent' and asked her to ring them on a number they provided. So she rang and they were closed! She rang back later and was put through a 20 minute inquisition before they agreed to release her money.

I understand the need for organisations to protect their customers (see my BT scam above) but when you are making a transfer from one bank account to another on a regular basis, both accounts in your name, is this really sensible? Maybe it is! I don't know what the fraudsters are up to. I'm thinking that if this sort of transfer is at risk of fraud, then pretty much anything and everything we do must also be at risk. Any transfer to anyone.

I think the message to myself this month is assume everyone is a fraudster unless you are CERTAIN that it not the case.

Quote for the Month

"God gives us the nuts but he does not crack them"

Franz Kafka, born in Prague in 1883.

Government Efficiency, My Taxes, Quote for the month

DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency)

What Elon Musk appears to be doing to government in the USA is quite extraordinarily and probably illegal. Just as he did when he bought Twitter, he is sending small teams of trusted employees from his firms in to hijack the software and data which they will use to decide which 80% of employees they are going to fire. 

It's hard to imagine where or how this is going but I surprise myself by agreeing that radical change is long overdue. My own personal experiences dealing with administration relating to the recent deaths of my father, father-in-law and mother-in-law require extensive use of government services in 3 countries: UK, France and USA. All three have provided the most abominable levels of service so far. It feels as if old systems and practices have had decades of changes layered on top of each other until you get to a service today that scarcely functions, even with the manual intervention of armies of paid administrators. Let me give some examples:

1. USA

My father was in receipt of a US pension. Within days of his passing, I emailed the US Federal Benefits Office in London (who handle people based in the UK) to advise them. I sent them the required documents including his death certificate. No response other than an automated acknowledgement. I sent a couple more emails but still no response within their stated delay (2 weeks I think it was). So I tried to telephone them during the small window they are open for calls (I think it was certain Tuesday or Wednesday mornings only each month). I was put on hold, told to ring another number, put on hold and then cut off with a message telling me to email them.

After about 4 months I received a response from the federal agency advising me that the contents of my email had been noted and they would be in touch.

This is the envelope they provided to send a cheque to the USA

A month later, they sent a letter to my mother demanding re-rembursement of the pension money that they had continued to pay after I had first told them my father had passed away. They require us to send a cheque in US dollars in an envelope they have provided that does not have an address on it. There is a note to say it should be posted to the address as instructed on page 1 of form SSA-1372-BK-FC. I googled this form and it is entitled 'Advanced Notice of Termination of Child's Benefits' with a US address. Of course I am not going to post a cheque for $8000 there. I don't know what to do next but I guess they will be after us for the money!

These appear to be the instructions for posting a cheque to them

The thing is, that had they acted rapidly - perhaps asking me to fill in a few questions and upload a form or two to their online portal - not only would they have saved us all a lot of time, energy, frustration and hassle, but they would have saved the US taxpayer thousands of dollars in actual cash and in admin staff costs!!

2. UK

Working with our solicitors, we completed the government's 75 page from to apply for probate. All of my father's assets are frozen until this process is completed and any taxes due are paid. The solicitors sent the form by special delivery to HMRC and advised me that a code would be sent within 20 days. The code is then used to access the online account and proceed with the next steps.

From www.gov.uk

After the 20 days deadline has passed, our solicitors contacted HMRC. They said they had lost the document that was sent to them by special delivery (with proof of delivery of course). So the form now has to be sent again and we start again.

This reminds me of a very similar incident when I last renewed my UK passport a couple of years ago. I had to send both of my passports (the expiring UK one and my valid French one) in for the application which I did using special delivery with signature on arrival and they lost both of my passports.

3. France

Goodness where do I start? 

Well let's say that you have to inform dozens of organisations individually of a death, some in writing, some will accept electronic documents. The notaire has to produce an 'acte de notoriété' without which no assets can be released. This document is official confirmation of who the heirs are. We have been waiting over 6 months for this document so nothing much has happened yet. The only payment that is authorised is payment for the funeral up to a maximum of about €5800. 

So despite the fact we have posted about 25 letters and sent various organisations all sorts of emails, nothing has happened yet. We have been able to close some accounts and mobile phone contracts but it's not easy. I get the distinct impression that some organisations make it as hard as possible. Or maybe it's just the old fashioned bureacracy led approach in a digital world that makes it feel that way.

There is without doubt a very strong case for tearing up the old system (lots of paper) and designing a streamlined digital process for the 21st century. I sometimes wonder if I am going to need to get out my quill pen ink and seal to proceed.

"It became apparent that what we have here is not an apple with a worm in it, what we have actually, just a ball of worms, ... You've got to basically get rid of the whole thing ... It's beyond repair. ... We're shutting it down."

Musk talking about USAID 3rd February 2025

He is taking this approach at DOGE (the Department of Government Efficiency) and applying it more broadly.

My Taxes

I have to pay my taxes at the end of January each year. Soon after the government kindly sends me an email advising what my money is being spent on. Unfortunately, it doesn't itemise out all the money wasted on inefficient archaic bureaucracy, the type of which I have written about above. However, what it does illustrate very clearly is the vast amount of your money that is wasted on paying back all the money that our governments have borrowed to fulfil their ill advised and wasteful policies. Just think what we could do with all that money if we used if to benefit the people rather than to pay back loans. It's truly shocking, it's so much money!!! It's 11% of our state expenditure!! And then there's welfare but best not to go there!

How shocking that we spend more on our debt interest repayments that on educating our children! And on our country's defense! Something is seriously wrong!!!

Quote for the month

"It became apparent that what we have here is not an apple with a worm in it, what we have actually, just a ball of worms, ... You've got to basically get rid of the whole thing ... It's beyond repair. ... We're shutting it down."

Elon Musk talking about USAID 

3rd February 2025

What do these people all have in common?

André Breton, André Masson, Peggy Guggenheim, Max Ernst, Franz Werfel, Alma Mahler, Marc Chagall, Marcel Duchamp, Victor Serge, Heinrich Mann, Claude Levi Strauss?

These people plus about 2,000 others, had their lives saved by Varian Fry and his team (which included Mary Jayne Gold, Miriam Davenport and others) , who smuggled them out of Vichy France in 1940 via Marseille, Spain and Portugal.

The Agentic Era, My worries about AI, Quote for the Month

The Agentic Era

We are in the Agentic Era. We use agents, such as Google's AI agent Gemini, for more and more tasks.  There are more and more of them and the months go by. Big names such as OpenAI's Chat GPT was given a run for its money with the launch of the latest from the Chinese AI, Deepseek which caused a minor market correction.  Last month, Google produced a short video to show where this is going for the general public. What I like about it is that it demonstrates the use of AI in everyday tasks that most people will be able to relate to. Watch this four minute video which I think is informative:

My worries about AI

I have been reading a book called The Coming Wave by Mustafa Suleyman, the co-founder of Deepmind and one of today's most experienced AI experts. He is worried that AI could end up destroying civilisation as we know it. I have summarised some of my main concerns below.

Deepfakes everywhere - how will we know what's genuine? From fake news to fake videos, I think we are going to have to rely more on the 'established' press if we want to believe most of what we read. When we have Trump and his admirers already re-writing facts, AI's is able to do this far more powerfully than any human. Services such as the BBC's 'Verify' will become more and more vital for our understanding of the new (and our sanity).

How do you spot a deepfake?

I worry about the ability for criminals to get their hands on advanced AI that will shut down our technology and mean we can't access our money, our data, our lives. An example of this was in 2017, when the WannaCry attack shut down the NHS by exploiting a weakness in old Microsoft software. It caused absolute chaos. However, in the future, AI will make it far easier to identify weaknesses in almost any software. This worries me far more than the possibility that AI will take over people's jobs and start running the world. It won't. It will help people be far more productive in their work and will change the nature of work. Some jobs will go, others will be created. It will make us richer. Unless someone comes along and destroys all of our institutions and great companies by undermining the very software we use to exist.

This ransomware caused absolute chaos across the NHS

At the end of the last century we worried about the Millennium Bug. Now we should worry more about how criminals and evils states (like Putin) will attempt to destroy our civilisations by using AI to identify and exploit weaknesses in the systems we rely on every moment of the day. I hope that every government department and every private company takes this extremely seriously. It will take some serious international co-operation to control and regulate rogue AI. The chances are that the COVID-19 pandemic started from a Chinese lab leak. This is another area of concern where AI will boost our ability to produce new life-saving medicines. But with that comes the challenge of establishing very high lab standards to reduce the risk of accidental or intentional leaks.

Technology growth - We ain't seen nothing yet!!

It looks as if the speed with which AI transforms our world is going to surprise most people and it's likely that we won't be ready for it. Chinese AI seems to be open source which means anyone can copy it and modify it. Again I think we should be rapidly putting international measures in place to control its use and regulate for its mis-use. The key to success in this area is to work with our friends and not so friendly states to establish protocols that will protect us all.

Quote for the Month

In 2005, Vladimir Putin visited the 60th anniversary commemoration at Auschwitz, giving a speech in which he said it was “inconceivable to think that people are capable of such barbarity”

Hypocrite of the Century award goes to the evil Vladimir Putin.

Last Monday was the 80th anniversary ceremony of the liberation of Auschwitz on Holocaust Memorial Day. Putin was not invited.

Happy 2025, Generation Game Changers, British Cheese, France Falls, Brown's Bottom.

Happy New Year 2025!

Happy New Year! (Image created by Gemini)

Well 2024 was a terrible year for me and in my opinion for the world. I lost my father and my mother-in-law and the world suffered from wars in Ukraine and the Middle East (not to mention the humanitarian crisis in Sudan and the recent overthrowing of Assad in Syria). And politically we have seen more extremism in democratic countries than ever before in my lifetime.

Foe 2025, my wish is that we see peace in Ukraine (Putin has to be made to stop his madness) and a more peaceful Middle East where an evil Iranian regime is supporting several terrorist groups with arms and money.

I also hope that 2025 will be the year the world gets serious about regulating Social Media given the havoc it is wreaking on society and the damage it's doing to our young people.

Generation Game Changers

As we start 2025, I thought it would be interesting to list some of the new inventions that had a profound effect upon recent generations.

Prior to the 20th Century  we had Stone Tools, Fire, The Wheel and The Industrial Revolution.

My Grandparents (born early 20th Century)

The Telephone

My Parents (born just before WW2)

Penicillin and free healthcare

The affordable Motor Car

International Flights 

The Television

My Generation (born 1950s and 60s)

The Mobile phone

The Internet

Cheap Computers

Cheap overseas travel

Cheap Chinese imports

My Children (born 1990s) 

Smart phone and internet (next generation applications)

Working From Home

The start of Artificial Intelligence

Electric Vehicles

My Grandchildren (born 2020s)

Perhaps new medicines curing everything for dementia to cancers and AI powered robots helping in ways almost unimaginable yesterday! Hydrogen powered cars to replace EVs.

Cheese becomes a metaphor for Brexit

"British cheese is now considered some of the best in the world.

After a boom in artisan cheesemaking, Britain produces 1,100 varieties, double the total in France, and many connoisseurs argue it is now superior in quality too.

Which meant there were high hopes for British entries at the recent World Cheese Awards, which took place in Portugal.

But as the judging began, the British contingent noticed something untoward. Many of Britain’s cheeses, it emerged, had failed to pass customs, and were deprived of the chance to compete.

As a metaphor for Brexit, it couldn’t have been more succinct. Some had fun pointing out that one of Brexit’s architects, former Prime Minister Liz Truss, famously made a passionate speech about international cheese markets."

City AM December 3rd 2024

France Falls

In early December, the extreme left and right joined forces to bring down Prime Minster Michel Barnier's government, following his forcing through of a huge debt reduction budget designed to start to re-balance France's bloated state. President Macron took to prime TV to state that he would name a new PM in the coming days and would serve the remainder of his term (another 30 months).

"The underlying problem is that most French voters are unwilling to face economic reality. It is hard to see how this can be resolved. Until voters rediscover the merits of frugality, they will go on voting for the fantasies peddled by the extremes. 

Northern Europeans used to mock the PIGS —Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain—for their profligate ways. France has now turned porcine, while the PIGS have largely reformed."

This text is from The Economist 4th December 2024. Macron has named François Bayrou as the new PM.  I wish them luck.

Brown's Bottom

The UK eventually sold about 395 tonnes (12,700,000 ozt) of gold over 17 auctions from July 1999 to March 2002, at an average price of about US$275 per ounce, raising approximately US$3.5 billion.

This equated to about half of the UK's gold reserves and were sold at a time that gold was very lowly priced. Today's it is over US$2600 per ounce. Today the bank of England holds about 310 tonnes in reserve for the UK in addition to all the gold held for other owners.

This ill timed sale of British assets is now referred to as Brown's Bottom.

We are in the Agentic Era

More on that next month. Perhaps! 

Quote for the Month

"Rien n'est mort que ce qui n'existe pas encore 

Près du passé luisant demain est incolore"

"Nothing is dead except what does not yet exist 

Next to the shining past, tomorrow is colorless"

Guillaume Apollinaire in Alcools 1913

Image created by Gemini

Image created by Gemini