PERSON WITH ...

A recent news article that appeared on the BBC website regarding ‘disabled people’ caught my eye the other day giving rise to a lot of head nodding and feelings of empathy for those folks who like me are labelled ‘disabled’ by society. I think the correct term now is ‘person with’ ….

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gz9njvj43o

As a person with a mechanical condition (dodgy neck) that is classed as a disability under the Disability Discrimination Act, I am well familiar with the search for non-existent part time jobs that might fit around my physical limitations.

It’s unbelievable that neither Government (nor Job Centre) had not foreseen that a lack of suitable situations was always going to be a major stumbling block to whittling down disability benefits by getting people with physical limitations back into the workplace.

Employers shell out almost as much in taxes/on costs for a part timer as they do for a full-time member of staff so naturally, they’re not going to want to take on anyone that’s not providing value for money.  That's why many are so keen on robots.

Ask your boss for time off to attend medical appointments then step back to observe their body language. Whilst sympathy might ooze out verbally, facial expressions tell otherwise. You can almost hear their thoughts – not another visit to the … (insert relevant medical department). God that’s the third one this month!

Being a person with physical limitations then I’m obliged to disclose all my ills on every application form/medical questionnaire during the recruitment process for fear of leading prospective employers up the garden path. What I’d really love to say in support of my case is that I’m keen, hard-working, rarely take time off sick in relation to my dodgy neck or hands but I just can’t sit and type for 7 hours a day like other people can. All I need is a chance to prove myself. Of course, having done the decent up-front disclosure thingy I suspect my application form just ends up in the circular file (bin).

If the NHS found ways of fixing all of us mechanically maligned peeps then we’d be more than fit for duty but musculoskeletal disorders are way down their list of priorities even though they are probably the most common reason for people with physical limitations not taking up employment opportunities.

Employers might be more inclined to take us on if they were offered a financial incentive rather like an apprenticeship levy to make up for lost productivity due to medical appointments or flare ups. Since the Government have blown their budget then I can’t see there being a disability premium given to businesses so they can take on less-than-perfect workers.

I’d even go as far as saying that there is likely to be a statistical correlation between money spent on fixing sick people and unemployment. The less you spend on repairing the workforce, the greater the incapacity of workers resulting in higher benefit expenditure.

Rather than berating employers for not taking on people with physical limitations or suggesting that we’re all work dodgers, it would be better to get all those AI super computers to analyse the underlying health causes of benefit claimants then task them to come up with more effective ways of sorting out those problems. Once you’ve crunched the data, you might then begin to put together an effective plan to boost employment amongst the disabled community.

Otherwise, I can't see it getting any better.  Can you?

CRUMBLE-GATE

Definitely not cut out for a career in care work.  The other half will affirm that I'm more Attila the Hun than Florence Nightingale.  The word 'sympathy' didn't make this years personal dictionary.

This remarkable discovery is the result of aged mother’s desire to join the travelling circus by taking up tumbling in the back garden. The silly old dear could easily have died of hypothermia had my sister not arrived on the scene in the nick of time. After a long, stressful night of rushed conversations on the family jungle grapevine, mother is now under 24/7 surveillance.

Instant promotion for yours truly to personal shopper, batch cooker, bin emptier, patio sweeper and fitness instructor. Early morning wake up calls my speciality. Tea and chat on the hour every hour. Apples to be cleared off the lawn to stop the neighbourhood rat taking a nibble out of each one. The list of chores grows daily.

Think this is easy? Let’s throw in working from home between the hours of 7 am and 10 am too just to keep you on your toes. I’m sure the district nursing team who turn up on the doorstep each morning around 9.00 am are used to me opening the front door in a set of mismatched PJs, with hair that makes Beetlejuice look well groomed.

After two weeks of waiting hand and foot on dearest mama, I’m exhausted. She’s spent a fortnight in business class whilst I’ve been stuck in the worst kind of economy seat. Hats off to those folks who do this for a living. Give me a spreadsheet any time!

Things I’ve learnt in my new career as Help the Aged:

Old people are insanely stubborn. There are more compliant mules out there and in fact, I reckon it would be a lot easier to persuade mules to take up underwater knitting than to encourage elderly peeps to make changes for the better like using the expensive walking equipment I’ve just shelled out for.

Elderly logic is like a complicated algebraic equation – almost impossible to get your head round.

Crumble-Gate is just one example of this. Let me give you a taster of this by recalling an episode that took place as I was peeling an industrial quantity of apples harvested from the lawn to prepare a scrummy batch of mini apple crumbles to store in the freezer.

Mum - ‘What’s that you’re cooking?’

Me - ‘Well, I thought I’d make some lovely apple crumbles for dad’

Mum - ‘Your dad doesn’t eat crumble.’

Me - ‘Really? But you’ve always made him crumbles in the past.’

Mum - ‘He won’t eat them because he’s on a diet.’

Me - ‘Ok. If he’s on a diet then why does he scoff a whole large bar of chocolate every night? Surely that’s fattening?’

Mum - ‘He only eats chocolate because there wasn’t any after the Spanish civil war.’

Me - ‘Right so he’s not on a diet then.’

Mum – ‘Your dad doesn’t want to get fat. He just likes chocolate.’


I continue my one-woman British bake off determined my crumbles should qualify for a Hollywood Handshake. I know dad is going to love tucking into these since I have fond recollections of him nicking all our sweets in years gone by. He’s always had a sweet tooth.

Half an hour later, the delicious smell of cinnamon apples fills the kitchen. Mum has long forgotten our Crumble-Gate conversation as we’ve now entered into a geriatric ground-hog day parallel universe where the same sentence has been on a continual repeat loop for the past 15 minutes. Honest, it’s hard not to say ‘yes, you’ve just said that’ but I bite my tongue and just um and ah in the right places.

I’ve also discovered that oldies are devious masters in the art of procrastination. As mum’s newly designated fitness instructor it’s been impossible to find the right way of actually getting her to do the small daily exercise regime prescribed by the Physiotherapy Team. I’m amazed at the lengths she’ll go to in order not to do them including appearing completely starkers one morning claiming she couldn’t do her fitness because she wasn’t properly dressed. Head slap. I’ve seen it all now! Muuuuummmmm!

Patience is a virtue. Mine is now in short supply. Anyone for crumble?

STANDING CHARGES, SITTING DUCKS

It’s been a while since I had a little rantette about one of my favourite soap box topics – energy.  Whilst there’s no DIY to do then here goes…

Martin Lewis is disappointed. Poor bloke. Tries his hardest to convince Ofgem or the Government to make things fairer for us all on the energy front but his efforts just fall on deaf ears. What’s getting his goat this time? Standing Charges.

You can take a regulator to water but you can’t make it drink. And in the case of Ofgem, I wouldn’t have even bothered. Or I’d have pee’d in the trough beforehand!

The difficulty Ofgem face is that they are desperately trying to serve 3 masters: The Government, Energy Suppliers and the Consumer in that order. We’re at the very bottom of the pecking order and likely to remain thus until the end of time.

As Martin clearly points out in his latest newsletter, having consulted endlessly on energy and asking us all what we want done to make standing charges fairer, Ofgem is getting ready to press the feather pillow down firmly over our energy consuming faces to smother any possibility of changes benefitting consumers particularly the vulnerable.

I feel for the bloke as he's one of my heroes but ever the cynic and having bombarded Ofgem with emails myself as part of public consultations then I always felt these exercises were no more than lip service. A sop to the public. It’s that kind of ‘look we’re trying to do something about all this energy nonsense’ but with no actual intention of doing anything that might rock the boat with their other two paymasters.

And as I’ve blogged ‘til I’m blue in the face (channelling my inner smurf) on things like standing charges – the biggest stumbling block Ofgem face to reducing these is Government policy itself. Stealth green levies and all those other things snuck into our bills. Therein lies the problem.

Granted the cost of running the National Grid and infrastructure to supply energy has to be paid for by every consumer. I’m more than happy for that to be kept in as a ‘standing charge’ on energy bills it’s the other crap that gets lumped into this category that needs to be sorted.

Martin’s diagram showing a breakdown of what typically makes up your standing charges explains it rather clearly:

Breakdown of a typical standing charge

If you were to deduct those amounts from bills that make up what I deem to be items that shouldn’t form part of a standing charge such as:

Policy costs - £22.10

Adjustment Allowance – 90p

Payment Method Uplift - £9.80

Headroom Allowance - £2.80


That would knock at least £35 off your standing charge straight away.

Policy costs ie the stealth green levies, propping up the elderly or keeping work dodgers warm should be paid for out of general taxation or met from any energy windfall taxes levied by the Government.

Consumers should not be responsible for debts or provision for the unexpected as suppliers should be setting monies aside from the Profit segment to cover these things.

And as for the Payment Method Uplift. That’s a bit of a hefty chunk isn’t it and should already form part of the Operating Costs segment. As long as customers pay their bills, do we really need a surcharge for the different methods of paying it?

In reality, too much is woven into the existing standing charge that perhaps should not be in there in the first place and that’s what makes it a minefield to unravel.

No mention of Social Tariffs for the vulnerable coming out of any of the consultations. Of course not; that would be too logical and not make anyone any money would it?

Standing charges, sitting ducks. Whatever way you slice it or dice it, the money’s got to come from somewhere for someone. The Government would prefer all of us to foot the bill for the vulnerable which is why those that can pay their bills are subsiding those that can’t. This is again hidden in that Policy Costs segment. How else can they offer winter fuel payments or warmer homes discounts to those on benefits without hiking up taxes?

I may as well give 90 yr old Doris fifty quid every month just so she can toast her teacakes on the gas fire to have with her Horlicks every afternoon whilst I shiver in my shreddies unable to switch the boiler on. This is basically what standing charges amount to.

Good luck Martin in trying to convince Ofgem to change things for the better. We’re all grateful that someone’s got the energy to fight this battle because my candle’s burnt out at both ends!  Quack!  Quack!

WRITTEN IN THE STARS

Not that long ago, I splashed out on a cheapie tabloid to see what populist rubbish was being spoon fed to the masses and was amazed to read in that days’ horoscope that I was about to receive a large sum of money.

How large?

Woo hoo! In almost 5 minutes flat, I’d mentally spent every penny of it in a flurry of online purchases, extravagant gestures and bunging a few quid to my favourite relatives, charities, street beggars or anyone else I felt to be deserving of my financial largesse.

No matter that this horoscope applied to every other sea goat reading this paper or that a specific amount hadn’t been foretold. It could be a tenner or ten million for all I cared, the fact is that just reading about it in a horoscope made it seem all the more certain.

Could such an event truly be written in the stars? I mean we all know deep down that horoscopes aren’t really true, are they? Let’s face it, you could probably fit any set of circumstances into a Mystic Meg prediction because our minds are simply programmed into solving puzzles or looking for connections however tenuous.

Let’s apply some ‘scientific’ reasoning to this potentially wondrous piece of good fortune, dissecting it line by line to test the theory:

The receipt of a large sum of money will allow you to pay off loans and debts that have been a burden for far too long.

My first thought in analysing this sentence is where or whom will the cash come from? There are no bank errors likely to be in my favour, the tax man only rings once and that’s to collect and I don’t believe in pots of gold at the end of the rainbow. My parents are older than Methuselah but tighter than a jar of pesto sauce so I can’t imagine there’d be any pre-IHT gifting coming from that quarter. Maybe I’ll just stumble across a fiver on the pavement or under a sofa cushion.

Perhaps the ’loans and debts’ could be referring to the credit agreement that’s still outstanding on the new upstairs carpets. I don’t consider it a burden since it was only to borrow a small sum and as we only re-carpeted last year then that can hardly be considered ‘far too long’ can it?

Going forward, you need to make it a priority to live within your means.

Really sound advice given that we’re all in the midst of this never-ending cost of living crisis but hardly an astrological revelation. When those email alerts drop into Outlook announcing another legendary tour of some band you’ve always wanted to see or have already seen a zillion times (Depeche Mode) then delete, delete, delete. Nobody really lives within their means all the while there is credit to be had.


Do this and you will avoid accumulating more debt.


Well, it stands to reason doesn’t it that if you don’t overspend then you won’t be racking up any tabs anywhere that’ll need paying back. You don’t need Nostradamus to point that one out, it should be as plain as the nose on your face. Unless you’re someone or something that doesn’t have a nose. A potato for instance or a walnut whip. Only then could you be excused for buying a gold-plated toilet on tick.

It’s been several months since my astrological chart predicted I might be richer than Rockefeller yet I’m still waiting for this monetary miracle to occur. 

Written in the stars my arse!

ID? I DO

Smash the gangs! Sink the boats! Stone the crows!

The populist battle cries echoing throughout modern Britain in 2025. Everywhere you look there’s nothing but wars, riots, outrage or hatred. I’ve not seen this level of civil discontent since the 1970s. When will it all end? More importantly, where will it all end?

Digital ID cards for all workers – apparently. This is the newest answer to whatever the problem is much to the consternation of the purse-lipped, finger wagging, bleeding-heart do-gooding fraternity. Even before the ink of their latest civil liberties infringement petition has barely dried, the nutter lobby is already proclaiming an Orwellian Big Brother state.

Pause to think a mo before you jump on a soapbox screaming that your personal freedom is being eroded faster than a stick of seaside rock being sucked away by a trout-pout teenager. How can these people even suggest such a thing when every one of us has a birth certificate registering our existence lodged in some super computer/ledger/filing cabinet somewhere.

So, you don’t mind carrying a smartphone with you every minute of the day (ie a personal GPS tracker by any other name) but there’s no way you’d carry an ID card. Oh the delicious irony of it all!

NI number, NHS number, phone number, driving licence, passport, store or bank cards, etc, etc – mate it’s too late to start moaning that you’re just a number and not a free man because whether you like it or not society is built on numerical parameters. For law. For order. For the means of locating anyone or anything. It’s just the way it is.

Still Here Keir is desperately trying to shut the stable door albeit all the donkeys have bolted. Let’s at least give the man a fighting chance. If you’ve got nothing to hide then what’s the problem? Although according to my paranoid family they’ve already arrived at the conclusion that these ID cards (likely to be renewable) may be something else we will all have to pay for in future thus creating a lucrative money spinner for the Treasury.

As I see it, if you want to know exactly WHO is in your country then rather than digital ID cards for all workers perhaps the Government should consider the following:

Digital or plastic ID cards for all persons arriving illegally in the UK that include a unique identifying number, photo and finger-print. Even whilst they wait for their asylum claims to be processed, they could still be made identifiable particularly as I suspect that any relevant documents pertaining to new arrivals are likely to be nothing more than a soggy mass floating in the English Channel. Come on – they don’t really want us to properly identify them because that makes it easier to slip into the murky black market economy like thieves in the night.

Ellis Island in the US was historically an immigration inspection and processing station and I can’t understand why Britain has not set up an equivalent to deal with the process of documenting all those who have arrived illegally on our shores. This would at least provide much needed jobs and tax revenues for the nation.

Re-introduce the requirement that all those with one of the above ID cards report to their local Police Station every six months. Back in the 1960s this is exactly what LEGAL migrants like my parents had to do in order to maintain their right to stay and work in the UK.

Legislate accordingly. Establish a Right to Work in the UK Act then roll out a system to every employer in the land whereby they have to list all new recruits and affirm they’ve carried out all necessary checks under this new UK legislation. Non-compliance to be punishable with a hefty fine used to offset the costs of migrant processing or issuing ID cards.

Abolish ‘cash in hand’ jobs or cash only establishments by including this requirement in any current employment or tax legislation. Spot check those industries where this type of employment is rife. If employers (including small businesses) cannot produce a payroll substantiating who is on their books then close them down.

Scrap NI numbers and instead introduce individually numbered mini birth certificates so that everyone born on this turf is registered from day 1. These could act as ID cards and the unique number could then supersede the existing system of NI numbers once you begin earning. You will become a number not a name but at least this system would allow all relevant agencies to keep consistent standardised records along your lifetime.

I do think national ID cards are a good idea and long overdue. I’m all for it. Happy to be a number since I’m already a number to just about every important establishment in my life – employer, doctor, tax man, bank etc. Other countries have been using national ID cards for decades with no major insurrections or qualms about civil liberties being infringed so why is it only the UK that gets so uppity about this issue?

Honestly, I do believe there are some people whose sole purpose in life is to continually throw spanners in the works. In my experience problems only get solved with a straight forward common-sense approach that allows no room for loop-holes or errors.

Perhaps all those who sign civil liberties petitions could be asked to provide their suggestions for how the documentation/identification of illegals should be dealt with or maybe they’ve just got too much to hide. When push comes to shove, it’s always 'cat got your tongue' for the previously most vocal.

POINT BRAKE

I was driving down to Bournemouth through the New Forest yesterday. It’s a gloriously sunny September day. For once there’s little traffic. On the hilly bits I can actually see the empty road stretch on for miles to the horizon. A rarity.

In front of me there’s one of those cumbersome ‘hippo’ cars pootling along well under the speed limit. All is good with the world – the sun’s shining, the tunes are banging, my karma chameleon is chilling then wham! They slam on the brakes. Another hundred yards up the empty road and bam! Another jab on the brakes.

WTF!!!! I’ve gone to Defcon 1 in the blink of an eye. Why is this numpty braking when there’s nothing or no-one else on the road in front of them? Are there ants on the tarmac they don’t want to squash or some other invisible hazard that only they can see?

And so it continues for miles – empty road, brake. A few more yards of empty road, brake. Brake. Brake! BRAKE!!!

AAAHHH! After 10 minutes of these driving antics, my brain is fit to explode and I’ve had to wind down the window to let all the hot air out generated from a few choice words. Please – no more!

I can’t for the life of me understand why this driver is continually braking. They’ve over-used that pedal almost as much as the Labour party have blamed the Tories for every mess in this country. It gives me a mini heart attack every time they brake because when I see those red lights swimming before my eyes my own right foot automatically applies my brakes in response no doubt sending anyone driving behind me into an equally apoplectic fit.

Is it just me or has anyone else experienced this strange motoring behaviour? If you have then I’d love to hear your thoughts on why it is some people drive in this manner.  Why do people do this?  Don't they realise their actions could cause accidents?

Eventually when I can take no more of it, I flick on the warp factor switch to leave them miles behind in a cloud of dust; pootling and braking continually all the way to Dorset and beyond.

POWER SLAVE

When Gary Numan sang about friends electric he wasn’t joking as in the futuristic world we’re galloping towards, 21st century friends are likely to be an AI robotic entity rather than some goofy numpty you went to school with.

Over the decades I’ve seen how our lives have slowly become more and more electrified. Air fryers, smartphones, electric vehicles – every new gadget invented needs electricity to charge it, power it or update it. We’ve become an energy dependent generation. Power slaves!

And Hazel O’Connor also hit the nail on the head with her catchy 80s anthem Eighth Day whose lyrics are sounding more and more remarkably like a self-fulfilling prophecy:

On the sixth, man prepares his final dream
In our image, let's make robots for our slaves
Imagine all the time that we can save
Computers, machines, the silicon dream
Seventh, he retired from the scene

The sixth day has been coming about for the last 10 or so years but the AI revolution likely to eradicate jobs through automation will propel us rapidly towards day 7. We’ll be the ones ‘retired’ from the scene, unemployed, despondent, with even more mental health issues than we currently have. Unable to read maps, tie shoelaces or execute the most basic computations because our under-used brains will have turned to mush.

And he said, "Behold what I have done
I've made a better world for everyone
Nobody laugh, nobody cry
A world without end, forever and ever"
Amen (amen), amen (amen), amen (amen)

Yep, we’ll then seek to justify all the issues we’ve created by claiming that the world is indeed a ‘better’ place. Maybe for those raking in all the wonga at the expense of everyone else who’ll be sat around in their (taxed) underpants, stuffing their faces with over-salted, ultra processed snacks, goggled eyed and drooling over the latest episode of Strictly or growing petunias.

It’ll all end in tears. AI data centres will blight our once green and pleasant land like leprous vampires, sucking up water, electricity and other resources. Promises of billions in investment or jobs likely to be short-lived as they’ll be done by sentient systems and as we all know, once these companies get a toe-hold then magically all the ‘investment’ in local communities fails to materialise.

And after a few years of AI revolutionising our lives, we’ll arrive at the eighth day or as I like to call it the Terminator Scenario.

On the eighth day, machine just got upset
A problem man had never seen as yet
No time for flight, a blinding light
And nothing but a void, forever night

In our arrogance at playing God and inventing all these marvellous mechanical monstrosities, we’ll have overlooked the consequences of allowing AI to invade every aspect of our lives. Dare to contradict the omnipotent sentient machine and all hell will be unleashed. I only hope whoever is programming these new super computers has included an OFF switch which can manually override everything once we’ve had enough.

Billions in investment but what cost to our lives? Prepare to be a Power Slave. Data Centres need a lot of energy and if the grid isn’t producing enough then I suspect our own power supplies will be sacrificed to the great God of AI including that generated by solar systems on our very rooftops.

The question I’d like to ask these technological titans is this - ‘why build giant data centres in the UK and not in your own country?’ Don't your people need jobs?  Don't you need to promote self sufficiency?  Aren't you all about keeping America big, bold and beautiful?

I’m guessing that aside from the use of resources, it’s because they then can’t be blamed for increased greenhouse gas emissions. When the statistics are collated, people will forget these are American companies and just blame the UK instead.

Or is it because data centres push up energy bills?  You consider it OK to make us poor British power slaves foot the AI bill but not your own people, is that it?

And finally, if you think I’m just a cynically crazy old cat lady with a head stuffed full of conspiracy theories (yep that's me!) then just type ‘data centres and the environment’ into your Google search facility. Even its own AI overview brings back the following result:

Data centers impact the environment through high energy and water consumption, leading to increased greenhouse gas emissions and stress on resources, as well as contributing to electronic waste.

Hazel was right in thinking that mankind will eventually be the author of its own destruction. Way to go Haze, I'm right behind you on that one.

Meanwhile, I’m gifting you all some interesting bedtime reading:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyr9nx0jrzo

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/impact-of-growth-of-data-centres-on-energy-consumption

MAKING A TORTIE TABLE

One down, three across. Begins with M and ends in E (mouse). Nope, I just can’t think what it might be. Purrrrr!

cats and crosswords just don't mix

As Bertie grapples with the complexities of this week’s Times crossword, I’m putting the finishing touches to the new tortoise enclosure.

Shelby's new home

And about time too says Shelby who has been living in the narrow confines of her old holiday home since we moved to Chichester almost 6 years ago. She deserves a nice, roomy abode especially now the cold winter months are approaching so using all our leftover DIY materials, here’s how our tortoise acquired a cosy new crib.

Building a tortoise table is not overly difficult since most are just glorified rectangular boxes on legs. The most important considerations are dampness and whether or not the enclosure is escape-proof. Tortoise are break-out masters, somehow finding a way to get out of what you might think is a secure environment. Shelby is no exception.

Start by deciding how big you want your tortoise table to be. Your tortie home should be large enough to accommodate food & drink bowls, a sleeping compartment, a basking spot plus leave sufficient room to roam around. Our enclosure measures 1.15m long x 60 cm wide. Quite sizeable but not so big that we’re tripping over it every 5 minutes. Good that we have a big lounge.

Begin with the base. Grab a sturdy piece of wood such as OSB3 timber and some 20 cm wide pineboard planks for the sides.

Cut your OSB3 sheet into a rectangular shape sized to your finished dimensions. Cut your pineboard planks to fit each side of the rectangle. We found it easiest to screw the longest planks to the OSB from the bottom first then slot in the shorter lengths between them before joining together from the bottom and sides with long woodscrews.

Adding pineboard sides to OSB bottom

Once you have a completed rectangular box add legs to lift the structure off the ground. These lovely round furniture legs scrounged from my son’s new gaff are being repurposed for this. 

Old furniture legs being re-purposed

Screw down into each corner position from the inside of the box. You should now have a box on legs.

Rectangular box on legs

Shelby has always had the freedom to roam round the house by means of a small ramp allowing her to exit her enclosure without having to scale the walls. A gap in one side the width of the ramp has been cut out to enable it to be slotted in. Don’t make your tortoise table too high or you’ll create an almost vertical slope on the ramp which Tortie Tenzing might struggle to climb.

Cut out gap for ramp

Naturally there may be times when you just don’t want a tortie roaming wild so to this end, small plastic channels have been fitted to the gap’s sides to allow a door to slot in. Make the door high enough then it can’t be climbed over.

Make a ramp to slot into gap

Close the drawbridge

A lighting rig is vitally important for keeping reptiles since they need both heat and UV daylight in their enclosures. We fashioned a light holder out of 3 cm wide timber batten by cutting two pieces then joining together to create a tall right angled L shape. The timber pieces have been screwed together at the outside corner angle but also secured in place with a heavy-duty metal bracket on the inside for extra stability. Cut out a notch at the end of the L wide enough to accommodate the cable of your light fitting.

Make your own lighting rig

Decorate your tortoise enclose. I’ve primed then painted the OSB bottom and legs with black furniture paint and done the same with the sides/lighting rig using leftover Milltown furniture paint. For extra durability and waterproofing, everything has been finished with two coats of satin varnish.

Prime all surfaces

Painting the bottom black

Sides painted in Milltown jade green furniture paint

Your tortie table is now starting to slowly take shape but there are still a few things left to sort out before its ready for its new occupant.

Painted and varnished

Screw the lighting rig into position along one of the wooden sides. For safety, metal bolts have been used to prevent any sharp points poking out the other side.

Use metal bolts to secure lighting rig to side

Position your heat lamp holder under the notched end of the lighting rig. Feed the cable through the notch then secure neatly with cable pins down the batten.

Fit lamp holder keeping wires tidy with cable pins

Fit your UV daylight tube on one of the longer sides using a couple of metal spring clips screwed to the plank. Again, keep cables tidy using cable pins to hold into position.

Metal spring clips used to hold UV daylight tube

The UV daylight tube is attached to a black transformer unit which in the past has just been plonked on the ground behind Shelby’s enclosure creating a trip hazard. To keep things tidy, the other half has used black PVC guttering brackets to secure the transformer unit to the back of the tortie table. When screwing into position, ensure you use short screws so they don’t stick through and create danger for your reptile.

Keeping the transformer in place

Using black PVC guttering brackets

As the enclosure is now quite heavy then to make moving it easier, we’ve fitted a couple of black metal D handles to each end to facilitate lifting. I got these from Robert Dyas as they worked out cheaper than Ebay plus I could try them out for size in store to make sure fingers could fit through the D gap.

D metal handles to aid lifting

Now for the fun part, adding all the bits and bobs. First cover the bottom with beech chippings suitable for tortoises then add accessories. I find using chippings makes it easier to pick out dried poop and sweep when the table needs cleaning out. Less damp than sandy substrates which I wouldn’t recommend for several reasons: Sand gets everywhere, is a bugger to hoover out of carpets and dampness can lead to tortie health issues. Beech chippings are practical, easy to sweep and lighter than sand which means you don’t need to ring Arnie every time you want to lift the enclosure out of the way.

Add bowls and other accessories

Lastly, add tortoise. As you can see, there’s plenty of space for Shelby to mooch about.

Shelby's tour of inspection

Having given her new abode the royal seal of approval, she’s off for forty winks in her hay filled wooden bedroom where she’ll probably remain for the next few months. Tortoises are champion sleepers. If only I could crawl into my bed and stay there all winter!

See you next spring

ODE TO TAX

• How do I tax thee? Let me count the ways.
• I tax thee on your cars, homes and all I might
• Grab with my hands when not in sight
• For saving, working or owning a place
• I tax thee to the hilt almost every day
• In life or death, you’ll have to pay
• I tax thee freely as you strive for right
• I tax thee purely sometimes out of spite
• I tax thee with a passion so there’s no use
• Of non-dom statuses or off-shore trusts
• Your global wealth it is a must
• Crocodile tears but with my last breath
• I shall tax thee better after death.

Thank you Elizabeth Barrett Browning for poetical inspiration on this subject.

Saddo that I am, I sat down yesterday to list all the ways in which we’re taxed in the UK and within minutes almost filled a sheet of A4 paper. When you look at just how much is put away either directly or indirectly into the gaping Government maw, it’s enough to give you the heebie-jeebies! Don’t try this exercise at home without first downing a large glass of Southern Comfort, the list is scary.

Before putting pen to paper, I asked myself if it would be easier to just list all the duties, levies or taxes either alphabetically or in size/priority order but in the end I felt it would make more sense to lump them under a few broad categories as follows:

Work – From the moment you set foot in a workplace until retirement, the tax clock swings merrily back and forth, tick-tocking away in the background like an invisible money metronome. Income tax, national insurance contributions, online selling taxes, corporation tax, taxes on property/room rental, etc. Whether you own or run your own business, have a side hustle or simply work for someone, there’s no escaping taxes. I’ve been working almost continually since I left college – that’s 44 years of paying employment related taxes.

Spending – Not content with picking your wage pocket, what’s left to spend is then subject to a whole host of other insidious unseen levies or duties such as VAT which is applied like thickly spread butter to almost every product or service you acquire, be it essentials or sin taxes such as duty payable on booze, fags or gambling.  

Vehicles – Having squirrelled away a few pennies, the first thing most young people do after getting a job is to buy a car. What you don’t realise as you screech away from the forecourt leaving a trail of rubber on the tarmac, is that at the same time you’ve also signed up to a lifetime subscription to HMRC. Vehicle excise duty (road tax), fuel duty and insurance premium tax continue to erode your earnings until you can’t read the small print or realise that wasn’t the brake pedal. (Bang!) I passed my driving test at the age of 23, that’s 40 years of paying vehicle related taxes.

Property – After a car, comes a house although these days the chances of getting onto the property ladder before you’re 50 are pretty slim. When you buy or sell property, the Chancellor does a little rain dance. Whoop! Whoop! Another one bites the dust. Yeah baby! Rubbing their hands with glee at the thought of all that filthy lucre - stamp duty, council tax, capital gains tax (second homes) green energy levies (added to bills) flowing into the coffers. Honestly, young people are probably better off never leaving home and just living at their parent’s expense. Eventually, Britain will become like other countries where you have three or four generations living in their own familial commune to cut down on property or social care expenses. I stepped onto the housing ladder at the age of 20, buying a small flat jointly with my ex-husband so I’ve been paying property related taxes for over 42 years.

Savings/Pensions – So you’ve come to the end of your working life. In addition to shelling out a chunk of your hard-earned dosh in the previous four broad tax categories, you’ve somehow had a little left over to put away either into a pension or savings account for that retirement rainy day. Wake up and smell the coffee as your nice little nest egg is being eyed up by the tax magpie perched in the branches above. Yep, nothing’s sacred to these scavengers! There are taxes to be paid on share dividends, savings accounts (if interest is over £1,000 or not in an ISA) and every time you draw down on your pension pot, 20% is handed over to the Revenue. As I’ve said before, there’s little incentive to save for your old age – may as well have the best life you can whilst you’re young then live off the state.

Death – And the above last statement is vitally important if you want to limit the very, very, very last tax bill you and your loved ones may need to pay once you finally kick the bucket. When you die you transition from being an earthly taxpayer to being a heavenly one. Nothing is certain in life but death and taxes. Especially the Inheritance Taxes. 

It really takes the biscuit and smacks of double taxation thinking that you've paid taxes all your life out of your earnings or as a consumer then you have to pay AGAIN when you die.   You may be a 20% taxpayer in life but when you die, magically you move into a higher tax bracket (40%) if the grand total of all your worldly wealth exceeds a certain threshold.

The trick here is to ensure it doesn’t but even that is about to become harder if current revenue raising rumours are to be believed. How to limit your IHT bill? Here’s a few suggestions: Ensure you spend, spend, spend before dying. Buy nice clothes, splash out on expensive useless anti-ageing treatments, eat at the finest restaurants. Go to theatre, concerts, festivals. Don’t worry about dynamic ticket pricing as it’s doing you a favour by mitigating your IHT.

Employ gardeners, cleaners, chauffeurs, to help with daily chores. Pay them cash in hand. Give generously to charities – money or assets. Charities will take that old stamp or coin collection that’s been gathering dust for years off your hands. Financially help your children while you can. If you have grandchildren, pay for their university fees, driving lessons or house deposit. Take family holidays together in your old age with you footing the bill. There’s no tax law against that is there?

Your golden years are effectively a last chance saloon – make memories not money! Memories can’t be taxed. Your kids, grand kids, relatives will thank you for all those fun times had together and you can finally give a two fingered salute to the Tax Man with your dying breath safe in the knowledge your worldly wealth is less than the IHT threshold.

SHOESTRING FESTIVALS

Recently I stumbled across an online post on our neighbourhood website written by pensioners bemoaning the extortionate costs of going to festivals. There are still ‘silver’ revellers out there like me secretly pining for their misspent youth who’d like to keep on rocking but can’t afford to do so because cash is generally being saved for heating/food or carer costs. It really got me thinking that life’s far too short to spend all your time hoarding money for those sensible things. Occasionally, you just have to throw caution to the wind and go splurge on some fun.

This post is dedicated to all those oldies who’d love to go to a festival but think it costs way too much. Here’s how super-scrimpers like us did a day out at this year’s Victorious Festival on a shoestring budget:

EARLY BIRDS – Leaving it to the last minute to decide to buy tickets for most festivals is going to cost you more money plus there’s always the risk that any day tickets may quickly sell out. The majority of festivals start selling tickets almost a year in advance which enables punters to get entry at a discounted cost.

These days many people at festivals are not there specifically for the bands, they go along either as part of a holiday break or just for a cracking day out. Music just becomes an incidental background soundtrack to whatever else you want to do so unless you definitely want to go along to see a particular artist then just pick a day to suit and buy your ticket in advance.

Saturday's Line Up - Aug 25

CREDIT – Being a super scrimper I’m not one to advocate people getting into debt but there are ways to spread the costs of buying tickets. If shelling out a large chunk of dosh isn’t for you, see if there are instalment options you can take advantage of. A lot of festivals offer payment plans or failing that there’s always your flexible plastic friend. Buy tickets on a credit card then set up your own monthly direct debit to pay it off in chunks before the festival date.

TRAVEL – Aside from the entry ticket, the cost of getting there is likely to be your next biggest expense. Portsmouth is not a city that welcomes motorists. There are few free on-street parking spots, the car parks cost a small fortune for a day’s parking and even the festival’s own park & ride scheme is enough to make your wallet shrivel like an over-cooked roast potato.

Public transport usually derided for being costly or unreliable can actually work out fairly economical if you are retired. Senior railcards or National Express coachcards available for anyone aged 60 or over will get you a third off the price of a train/coach ticket plus let’s not forget free bus passes that allow travellers to travel off peak for nothing (or very little). The Government has capped bus fares at £3 each way and this too can be advantageous if you don’t live too far from the festival site.

Coming from Chichester, we drove to a location closer to Portsmouth with cheaper all-day parking then took the bus into the city. £12 for four single bus tickets (2 adults) plus £2.50 to park for 24 hours. Although it has a really good bus station, Chichester does not appear to have a night bus to Portsmouth or anywhere. More’s the pity really because night buses are a great way to cut congestion and allow motorists a night off. Perhaps Stagecoach should take a leaf out of Nottingham’s book and put on special festival buses during the Victorious weekend. They have special buses to Goodwood events from the train station so why not to the annual Victorious festival?

FOOD & DRINK – Yep, a festival pint and some nosh are going to make a large dent in your bank balance. Price for a pint at Victorious around £7.50 and food prices somewhere between £11 and £18. As you can’t bring in any food or drink then a couple of tips to keep the grub bill down. Firstly, the most obvious one is to have a hearty carb heavy breakfast before leaving home or get down to Portsmouth early and visit the local ‘Spoons’. Having fuelled up in advance that leaves a smaller hunger window to satisfy later on in the day.

Sharing is caring at festivals especially when it comes to meal times. We normally do a reconnaissance lap of all the food stalls on arrival, mentally noting prices and seeing if what’s on offer could be shared. Meals such as pizzas, fish n chips or pots of pasta are good for this. Cheaper to go halves than fork out a small fortune for fatty unhealthy foods, the sort that would be on the Obesity Police’s most wanted list.

Festival site map

On the other hand, water is FREE as you can bring in empty drinks bottles then refill from the numerous drinking fountains dotted around the festival site. As most of us oldies are on medication then alcohol tends to be a thing of the past. Plus, when it’s mega hot also leaves you feeling dehydrated. We limit festival pints to a maximum of two which we also share.

BUDGET BEFOREHAND – If the thought of all this scrimping does your head in then setting up a kitty at home so that you can set aside a few quid every month may be a better idea. Putting a fiver a month into an old jam jar for a year should give you enough cash (£60) to cover a meal plus a couple of pints.

GETTING HOME – I know I’ve already mentioned travel but if you are using public transport then best to check before going to the festival if there are any changes to normal services. The last train or bus home may depart well before the headline act finishes and is likely to be rammed with booze fuelled revellers so bear this in mind. If you are using the no 23 bus service back towards Havant then head down to Southsea Parade Pier so you can catch the bus at the start of its route. This bus makes it way from Southsea through Portsmouth then onto Hilsea and Havant, a very popular route with festival goers. Older revellers or those with kids tend to leave the festival site around 9pm which makes catching the bus a most interesting bun fight.

Just totting up what was spent for our Saturday at the Victorious Festival. This list should give you an idea of what it might cost one person for a fun day out:

• Saturday advance day ticket - £70
• All day parking - £2.50
• Bus to & from car park - £6
• Pot of crumble & ice cream - £8.50
• Pint and a half of cider - £12
• Large fish and chips - £10.50
• Coffee and slice of cake - £8
• Total cost of day out £117.50

Works out at approximately £10 per month over 12 months if you are going to budget across the year which is really not unachievable for most people even those on a pension.  I know £118 is still a lot of dosh for many but as mentioned before on this blog, if you really want something that badly then it's all a case of trade-offs or sacrifices.  Just making a small change in your daily spending habits could enable you to have festival fun.

We could have slimmed down our bill by leaving out the crumble, coffee and cake but hey, even super scrimpers have got to have some small indulgences in life.

Neighbours – get that old pickle jar out now and start putting away your spare change then you too can go to next year’s Victorious Festival. Yep, the super early bird tickets are already on sale. Hurrah!!

Next year's date - hurry super early bird tickets now on sale

UNDERPANTS TAX

The minute she walked in the joint. Pah Pah!

I could see she was a gal of distinction, a real big spender.

Tax raising? No not mine.

She hasn’t got a clue what’s going on in our minds.

So let us get off to Dubai. Pah Pah!

I don’t pop my purse for every migrant in the sea.

Hey big spender,

Spend a little less on these.

Duh, duh, dee dum dah dah!!



I see the date for this year’s budget has finally been confirmed as the 26 November 2025, just a month before Christmas. Oh joy. Time to batten down the purse hatches for the next few months in case of any nasty surprises.

Desperate to raise revenue to plug an ever-increasing black hole (around 50 billion at the last guess), a black hole of such enormity that even Professor Brian Cox fell off his chair, the tabloid rumour mill has been working overtime spreading wild speculation as to where the tax axe will fall. Possible targets include pensions relief, ISA limits, inheritances and property taxes to name but a few.

All of these are fair game but I can foresee that increasing the tax take on any of these areas is likely to drive the nails further into the UK coffin to the extent they’ll be poking out the other side before long.

Reducing pension tax relief will discourage people from saving into pensions. Reducing ISA limits will discourage people from saving for their retirement. Tinkering with inheritance tax rules, gifts and limits will reduce wealth from being passed down to younger generations because us oldies will just blow all our savings on haircuts and holidays.

Property taxes – now there’s a can of worms you don’t want to open. Just ask Three Homes Rayner what happens when you try to get round things like paying stamp duty.

A Dr Tim Leunig has written a report suggesting that the Government might consider scrapping the current system of Stamp Duty and instead consider replacing this with a National Property Tax levied on a home’s value between £500,000 and £1 million.

Yeah, Tim great idea except did you stop to consider typical human behaviour if such a thing came about? Well, I can hazard a guess as to what might happen to the housing market if this did go ahead. To get round this tax no-one would be buying any high value properties so there’d be a glut of expensive housing stock that no-one would touch with a barge pole.

In contrast, the other end of the housing market would go into meltdown as buyers scramble to snap up all smaller less expensive homes making it harder for older folks to downsize or young people to get on the housing ladder. Increased demand for smaller properties would then push up prices. Eventually we’d go back to those days when people bought homes then lived in them all their lives becoming the asset rich, cash poor pensioners frequently mentioned in the tabloids.

If Council Tax went the same way ie based on any accrued equity in the value of property rather than on an ancient rateable value this too would have repercussions. For starters no-one would be incentivised to carry out home improvements for fear of increasing the value of their house. No DIY, no trade for builder’s merchants or jobs for tradespeople. No changing boilers, fitting solar panels or heat pumps as no doubt these too add value to properties by making them more eco-attractive so causing impact to energy industry and climate change. Housing stock would all go to the dogs.

Agreed that perhaps Council Tax bands could be reviewed with a few more added to cover more expensive properties (Mansion Tax) but anything else would be over-complicating matters. Who would be working out how much value has been accrued from one year to the next? How would postcode variations in property values be accounted for? Just makes my brain hurt thinking about it.

To add to all these wild rumours, I’d like to propose a potential new area for revenue generation – an Underpants Tax. Everyone wears pants so why not tax them? The more pants you own, the higher the rate of tax levied. You could even charge more for luxury designer pants.

The Biased Broadcasting Craporation sent out roving reporters into the community to garner feedback from locals regarding this newly proposed Underpants Tax.

Posh middle-class bird, Miss Portia Ofchips from West Sussex said ‘Dahling, lingerie is so last year. I like to think of myself as an AbsTena lady, not wearing knickers thus saving myself the bother of having to fill out all those tiresome tax returns. Ciao dahling (air kiss). I’m late for pilates.’

Sir Rich Gitsorwatt from Higher Nether Regions expressed outrage at the proposed Underpants Tax. ‘Preposterous! A tax on under garments, whatever next. No-one wants their low hanging fruit clacking about unfettered like a pair of thigh castanets. Y-fronts are a fundamental human right that should not be exploited for cash.’

Looks like my suggested Underpants Tax is likely to be just as unpopular as raiding pensions, property or anything else. Best to just let Reevonomics take their natural course. Bring on the budget!

CORNER BOOKCASE - PART III

Tractor! Generally shouted out loud in a Wurzely accent every time we see one busily trundling down narrow country lanes carrying loads of hay large enough to feed the bovine population of West Sussex. Our tractor tally was significantly boosted this weekend as we slowly wound our way past field and hill bearing painted shelf unit to its final resting place in Somerset.

Tractor!

Getting a long bookcase into a car proved challenging. Wood is not like a sponge ball that can be squeezed into tight gaps, there’s no give whatsoever so trying to shoehorn it across the front and back seats of a Ford Focus is a feat worthy of Houdini himself. It reminded me of the last time I bought a smaller sized pair of stretch jeggings, wondering why my face had turned purple as I attempted to squeeze my thunder thighs into a fabric tube only wide enough to accommodate an octopus tentacle. Size matters.

And this is particularly important when you arrive at the other end of your journey if what you’ve carefully carted across at least 4 counties then has to travel up a set of stairs. Stairs that might be narrow. Stairs that have twisty landings or low ceilings or newel posts with knobbly bits that stick out. Yes, that kind of stairs.

After a great deal of huffing, puffing, to me, to you and almost blowing the house down, the bookcase finally reached the home office, cheerily greeting its other half already being put to good use by my son.

Assembly of the corner unit couldn’t have been easier. Firstly, put ready-made plinth into position along the front of the existing skirting board at right angles to the first unit. The plinth has not been secured in any way because the weight of books plus it being butted up tightly to the other plinth should keep it from moving.

Hello old friend

Next step – carefully lift bookcase onto plinth taking care to push it back fully so that it minimises any gaps between wood and wall.

To secure this bookcase to the wall, six small right-angled brackets painted blue are being used. Use two brackets underneath each end of top, middle and bottom shelves. Screw one side of the bracket into the wooden shelf using screws small enough not to pierce through. Screw the other side of the bracket into the wall using long masonry screws.

Small metal brackets to hold unit against wall

Now the other half, bless him, is not the JR Ewing of the DIY world as he hates drilling into anything harder than a jam doughnut and as we’ve discovered – there’s bricks and there’s bricks. In this instance he can be forgiven for splashing out on yet another power tool – a meaty SDS drill. SDS drills with SDS drill bits can apparently slice through the hardest masonry like a hot knife through butter so well worth the money particularly if you’ve got a number of projects likely to need this level of hammer action.

SDS drill for those tougher than usual bricks

Using your brackets to help mark up hole positions, lift the bookcase unit off the plinth to drill holes and fit raw plugs ready for securing.

Once wall holes drilled, replace bookcase and secure in place with long masonry screws. There! That’s never going to fall down even with a few weighty tomes on it.

Secured to the brick wall

Having secured the bookcase, time to turn thoughts to the plinths. I’ve designed the corner unit so that the plinths themselves are slightly smaller than the bottom shelves with a view to fitting a front fascia that matches the existing skirting boards. Visually, this will look like the skirting runs continuously round the room below the corner unit.

Making the plinths look like skirting

Luckily, a close match was found in Wickes to the existing skirting board which has a profile called ‘Torus’ and is approximately 12 cm high. One 2.4 metre length is enough to cover the front of both units but you can work out how much you’ll need by adding all the linear measurements of each section together.

Double sided skirting - Torus & Ogee profiles

Of course, it’s never just going to be a case of chopping up a bit of skirting then sticking it onto a plinth because there’s the corners to be accounted for. In this case both an internal and external corner. Give the other half a gold star for making his own mitre box out of two pieces of scrappy timber because his plastic box wasn’t as tall as the skirting. Genius!

Home made mitre box same height as skirting

Working out how to mitre the corners of the skirting

With skirting pieces cut to size and corners mitred, it’s simply a case of a couple of coats of primer followed by white gloss then sticking them onto the plinths but that’s a job for another day.

Skirting fascia ready to prime then paint