David Oldroyd-Bolt

Caustic, eternal wisdom from Robert Blake.

Farewell to arms 🫡

Grateful to Times columnist Giles Coren for putting to the sword a local council pipsqueak for trying to put out of business a restaurant in the middle of nowhere where owner Ruth Hanson does all the kitchen prep herself, the washing up, the bookings, the till, payroll and then cooks it. The restaurant is called Hansom in Bedale, North Yorkshire. To give you an idea of its remoteness it’s 7 miles from Northallerton and 31 miles from York. So, on occasions, her husband Mark, who had a job of his own, gives up his evenings to chauffeur some guests to and from their homes. Coren points out when he reviewed the place last year ( he gave it a glowing recommendation) he had to hitchhike from Northallerton station. No Bedale train, no metro, no Uber hanging around at the corner. Enter Chris Doyle, licensing enforcement officer for N Yorkshire council, who has written to Ruth saying in his view Mark was operating a taxi service and that would require a raft of expensive and time consuming licences. Ruth responded that Mark was her husband, he was unpaid and there was no separate charge for the journey. Doyle said he didn’t care as there was deemed to be a commercial benefit and warned without a licence the council may take legal action. Coren has a great last paragraph; “ Yeah, you sue her, you absolute local heroes. “ You teach Ruth and Mark a lesson for being great at their jobs, for treasuring their customers, for trying to create a little joy and make ends meet in a collapsing world.” PS Thought you’d like to see what a Ruth menus looks like. This is called the Sunday Sharing Feast. Starters. Smoked Leek and Pickled Croque Monsieur Whitby Crab Crumpet Pickled cucumber, Garden herbs. Heritage beetroot, whipped goat’s Curd, Wild Garlic emulsion. Main Course Wensleydale chicken, Apricot and sage Wellington. Honey and mustard mash, buttered spring , cider sauce. Dessert Yorkshire rhubarb and ginger trifle. Cost; £55. With publicity thanks to Coren’s column and this tweet I suspect the queue will be out the door and Mark can have his evenings off again.

I have thirty pages of difficult to dicipher 'Turkic language' in a 'Perso-Arabic script' dating from the early 1920s I would like brought into English. If any of my followers know any relevant and talented translators who fancy a challenge, please let me know.

@RusGarbageHuman Most kind! Thank you.

Really fun speech regarding western politics and various related topics by @david_oldbolt Wetherspoons mentioned too, wooo! Great humour and insights.

Fascinating interview with Johan, whose book will be one of the autumn's essential reads.

Speech, Migration, Nation: NCF Beaconsfield Spring Conference This SATURDAY, 25 APRIL Our NCF Locals Conference brings together a stellar line-up of speakers from brilliant organizations Tickets: eventbrite.co.uk/e/ncf-beaconsf… With: @AlpMehm of @MigrationWatch @janmacvarish of Free @SpeechUnion @TimScottUK of @tfa4freedom @Sargon_of_Akkad of @lotuseaters_com @david_oldbolt of @InstituteDanube Cornelia Van Der Poll of @RestoreTrustNT and our very own Dr. @KiszelyPhilip

CHANNEL 4 NEWS has taken shocking testimonies from Nigerian Christians in a "village of widows" and who have been subjected to what victims describe as genocide . Africa Correspondent Jamal Osman reports from Plateau State, where survivors describe killings and mutilations which they say were carried out by Fulani militia groups. In this village of widows there are now 537 widows whose husbands were killed during wave of attacks. In this compelling and deeply distressing report Christians say they face deadly persecution, which the Nigerian and UK Governments primarily attribute to criminality and struggle over land rather than Jihadism and what Nigeria's village of widows describe as a 'Christian genocide' @YvetteCooperMP @JennyChapman @Coalition4GR @AyoAdedoyi9914 @ACNJohnPontifex @mervthomas @SamuelBrownback @USCIRF @NazilaGhanea @NDLawRLC @dsnorthnorth @APPGFoRB @HARTnews Watch youtube.com/watch?v=p2I9hy…

@johanwennstrom @Tonisenior @Roger_Moorhouse VE Day

@david_oldbolt @Tonisenior @Roger_Moorhouse When is the talk, David?

Had a fine lunch today at the Reform Club and sat in Guy Burgess’s favourite chair. Talked spies and the Cold War with @johanwennstrom whose very fine book about Swedish plans to defy an expansionist Soviet Union is out in September.

This is the reason why we can never reform healthcare in the UK — or even have a sensible debate about it. The moment anyone suggests alternative/additional ways of funding health Labour rushes out privatisation smears and claims US private health insurance is being proposed. Labour has been doing it for decades. It explains why the NHS is effectively beyond reform. The two worst health systems in the rich world are in America and the UK. It’s why nobody has ever copied them. It would be mad to go from ours to theirs (or vice versa). But Europe is awash with health systems that can call on several sources of funds, including many with compulsory public health insurance schemes. They have better health outcomes than the NHS. They are free at the point of use (like the NHS). Most of them are better funded. But Labour puts them out of bounds, refuses even to discuss or consider. So patient care suffers. NHS struggles on. Labour is always telling us we need to get closer to Europe. It’s where we belong. But not when it comes to health, where it insists no lessons can be learned. Pretty pathetic, really.

Arian Ahmed, 19, and Mujmain Uddin, 21, armed with a spanner and a crowbar, chased a man through Darlington and assaulted him in what Teesside Crown Court called a “racially motivated” attack targeting a “white British male”. They received just 10 months (juve) and 12 months, for 3 separate offences each. Later, a community fundraiser raised money for their families, on the grounds that “Our community, known for its diversity and unity, was threatened by Right wing activists… violent, racist and Islamophobic thugs.” More buried incidents from the Southport unrest @LD_Sceptics

Continuing his work as Professor of Theology, Imagination and the Arts @univofstandrews, James MacMillan contributes to a new video about the Master MLitt course in Sacred Music. Find out more about the course in this new video: bit.ly/4mzgDSe

Dynamic alignment with the EU is not good for Britain. It is bad and the Government is creating fake or misleading economic reasons to justify it. Ultimately, this is about taking Britain back into the EU step by step. There is no way in which a country of our size and wealth would benefit from following regulations designed and set by Brussels. Everything a Minister briefs about trade barriers and market access is a distraction. Britain has a free trade agreement with the EU, tariff-free and quota-free. We have market access and the latest trade figures show a healthy trading relationship between Britain and Europe, with British services exports performing very well. Dynamic alignment means the entire British economy must follow EU rules, whether British businesses trade with the EU or not. Once again, the EU will be able to dictate the terms on which a British business trades with a British consumer. When it comes to SPS rules, this means that the EU will be able to inspect British farms to see if they meet EU standards, even if those farms sell to the British market and not into Europe. This is a form of economic subjugation that should be beneath any sort of sovereign, democratic nation. The EU Reset is a dead end for Britain, a road to nowhere. prosperity.com/media-publicat…

An extremely rare case of someone dropping a fashionable opinion, and adopting an unfashionable one instead, because there's better evidence in favour of the latter. The world would be an infinitely better place if people did this more often.

Something similar happened to me recently, courtesy of @CityWestminster. I ended up being fined 8x more than a mags’ court would typically fine a thief because a small empty box with my address was found next to overflowing bins. There is no way to appeal, it’s deeply unfair

The people Waitrose should sack (I'm serious), are the people who fired this guy and the people that set the rules which got him fired. Chronic risk aversion is the cancer of the Western world. This fellow was a risk taker, seemingly motivated by an innate sense of duty, justice and honour. Small beer you may think, but such pebbles as these, in their millions, strengthen the cement of civilisations.

@murielzagha Happy Easter, dear Muriel.

@david_oldbolt Happy Easter!

Christ is risen: alleluia! Ten (liturgical) years a Catholic. Thanks be to God and to all the faithful who helped me.

Let us offer up prayer & petition for our persecuted brethren throughout the world - Easter is often the time when Christians are attacked in Church - in the ME, Africa, Asia - and ISIS has called for churches to be burned in the West🙏

Here is the US front cover & blurb of new new book, Napoleon & His Marshals: simonandschuster.com/books/Napoleon… I do hope you enjoy it #Napoleon