The ‘lost boy’, a briefcase of secrets – and Pauline’s body parts forgotten about by police and a university

The legacies of Ian Brady and his monstrous lover Myra Hindley horrify the world.

And still today the families of victims are haunted by the secrets the evil pair of child killers have left behind.

At least two of the secrets are twisted games played from beyond the grave by psychopath Brady.

Not least of course is the continuing search for Keith Bennett’s body on the bleak moors above Manchester, almost 60 years after he vanished.

Surely, this must be Brady and Hindley’s most prolonged and agonising legacy?

But we must not forget the agonies of the family of Pauline Reade who was 16 when she disappeared on her way to a disco.

Think of it, she disappeared on July 12, 1963. And only now her family might be finding some kind of peace.

Let’s be honest, the true horror of having parts of your daughter’s body found in a dusty storage room at a university more than half a century after her murder is unimaginable.

Alan Bennett had this to say about Pauline. In so many ways it is a message of positivity.

I have been in contact with Alan a handful of times, so I do not know him well. But I have no doubt Alan is a good and caring man despite the traumas the evil monsters left behind for him.

Alan wrote: “On this day ( July 1st ) in 1987 the body of Pauline Reade was discovered and brought off Saddleworth Moor, 24 years after Pauline had been murdered and buried on the moor by Brady and Hindley.

After being returned to her family Pauline’s mum, Joan, told us that ‘It was like a big dark cloud had been lifted off my shoulders.’ Joan found some small peace of mind eventually and the change in her life after Pauline was found was so very good to see.

I met Pauline’s immediate family and I can honestly say that Pauline’s mum, Joan, who I met and got hugs from on quite a few occasions, was one of the nicest, gentle and sincere people I have ever met.

Thinking of and remembering Pauline and her family today.”

https://leighgbankspreservationsociety.blog/bradys-killing-streets-what-it-was-like-growing-up-in-shadows-of-evil/

And we should not forget that 12-year-old John Kilbride was snatched in November the same year. He would have been 70 now but died after being sexually abused and strangled.

Hindley and Brady buried beneath the howling winds and curtains of rain which dominate Saddleworth Moor, on the outskirts of Greater Manchester.

Pauline was the first to die.

And decades later it was the emergence from the moorlands peat of a once-white stiletto shoe that finally brought her home. As the shoe was found Greater Manchester Police knew they had found her shallow grave.

But the legacy of Brady’s cruelty continued because of the bureaucracy of investigation.

More than 30 years after Pauline’s remains were uncovered, the shoes she was wearing and her broken necklace were returned to her family. Police also had her metal chain belt, a piece of material from her dress, a safety pin, a number of buttons and a press stud.

The return of these small and cheap personal items was the second shock in months for her relatives …

Parts of Pauline had been kept by police without her family’s knowledge. After decades an audit had taken place and her jawbone and some of her hair. were found at Leeds University.

This legacy meant planning a second funeral for the teenager at Gorton cemetery.

Greater Manchester Police apologised and said at the time: “Pauline and the other Moors Murders victims are ever present in our minds and Greater Manchester Police will always do everything we can to support their relatives and honour their memory.”

Martin Bottomley, head of GMP’s Cold Case Unit also said: “This is a deeply sensitive matter and understandably it has caused some upset with the family however, we felt contacting them was the right thing to do and we have given them a number of options, all of which GMP will pay for.”

Meanwhile, we wait for Priti Patel’s new access to justice Bill to finally arrive. It could finally force Liverpool solicitor Robin Makin to open two briefcases entrusted to him by Brady just before he died.

It is possible the briefcases, kept securely in storage, could contain clues to where the body of Keith is buried.

John Ainley, senior partner at North Ainley solicitors, in Oldham who is working with Alan Bennett to reveal the secrets of Brady’s suitcases, said: “We have been hoping for a change in the law so police have wider powers to obtain documents that belonged to Ian Brady and may contain information to help find the whereabouts of Keith’s body.

https://leighgbankspreservationsociety.blog/as-new-crime-bill-lumbers-on-keith-bennetts-brother-asks-how-police-can-be-denied-access-to-murder-clues/

“There are two briefcases of particular interest containing papers which belonging to Ian Brady and now held by his executors but despite several requests to view the contents, access has not been granted.”

We should never forget these names, names forever linked with true horror:

Pauline Reade

John Kilbride

Keith Bennett

Lesley Ann Downey

Edward Evans

#Pauline Reade #John Kilbride #Keith Bennett #Lesley Ann Downey #Edward Evans #ianbrady #myrahindley #moorsmurders #saddleworth

Two years ago I was asked to write something about Slovakia’s dream machine .. a prototype flying car.

I loved it, but worried I was being a bit of an Icarus about it all. I waxed lyrical anyway!

And now it has just completed a 35-minute 80K flight between airports in Nitra and Bratislava.

The hybrid car-aircraft, AirCar, has a BMW petrol engine which you can fill up at the pumps.

Its creator, Prof Stefan Klein, who I interviewed in 2019, said it could fly about 1,000km (600 miles), at a height of 8,200ft (2,500m), and has completed 40 hours in the air so far.

And it only takes two minutes and 15 seconds to transform it from car into a plane!

Its wings fold down along the sides of the car.

Prof Klein said the vehicle reached a cruising speed of 170km/h and carry two people. At the moment it requires a runway though.

Flying cars are finally the way forward – or the way up in reality.

In 2019, consultant company Morgan Stanley predicted the sector could be worth $1.5trillion (£1tn) by 2040.

However, AirCar, Klein Vision, says the prototype has cost “less than 2m euros” (£1.7m).

Dr Stephen Wright, senior research fellow in avionics and aircraft, at the University of the West of England, described the AirCar as “the lovechild of a Bugatti Veyron and a Cesna 172”.

And he did not think the vehicle would be particularly loud or uneconomical in terms of fuel costs, compared with other aircraft.

And he revealed how 40 people from eight countries, including the UK, had worked hard on it, making it another international project emanating from the Little Big Country. 

But Aeromobil are not alone and at least 20 companies are on working flying machines.

Uber for instance is working to create an aerial taxi service in Dallas, Fort Worth, Los Angeles, and Dubai. Uber wants a plane-helicopter hybrid with fixed wings and tilt prop-rotors. The vehicles will take passengers from rooftop to rooftop.

Terrafugia Inc. in the US, also has a prototype flying and it has completed its first flight,

And Dr Paul Moller, of Davis, California, has spent 40 years developing a flying car that can be mass produced. He built his first one in 1967 in his garage.

#slovakia #flyingcar #klein #bratislava #nitra #flyingcarflies #icarus

Fifty three years ago Scott released Scott: Scott Walker Sings Songs from his TV Series. It got to No 7 in the UK.

Despite its good chart rating, Scott thought it was a ‘wilderness years’ album and ultimately it was deleted for decades.

That’s sad because it contained some powerful big band-driven performances of songs like I Have Dreamed, The Impossible Dream and Lost in the Stars. (it was re-released in 2020 by Pleasure for Music).

After this album Scott’s wilderness years cast a dimming light on his shining career … many say his material was wrong, the time was wrong for one of the greatest singers of all time. Certainly, the charts were being raided by the likes of Simon and Garfunkel, the Carpenters and the Jackson 5.

They were good acts … but not for me.

The enigma of this thin man with a hip haircut and equally hip(ster) jeans, eyes as sad as dreams, a vulnerability and gentleness … and the voice that in so many ways out-classed Elvis and Sinatra and thundered through – or played with – your soul.

Scott was true romance.

I met him once, in a dark room the size of a cupboard behind a stage in Manchester. We got a bit drunk together.

I’d like to share a song and two stories about Scott with you (some of you may have read them before):

https://leighgbankspreservationsociety.blog/remembering-mr-invisible/

https://leighgbankspreservationsociety.blog/how-a-slur-by-proby-led-me-full-tilt-into-scotts-world-of-gothic-genius/

#scott #scottwalker #70s #manchester #rafters #simonandgarfunkel #jackson5

People in an old Texas railway town claim their local ‘dollar’ store manager – a hurricane hero – has lost his job because of a candy bar competition.

Affable Joe Dore, a diminutive man in his early 60s, who spends his free time rescuing animals from the side of the old state Highway 24, lives with his pet cat, Dash, 30 miles away.

But has worked at what used to be described as the old ‘five and dime’ for more than three decades.

And the store is still a five and dime in everything but name, selling just about anything you might need at a knock-down price.

Despite being bisexual – a life-style many of the Trump voters in the Lone Star State disagree with – Joe has won massive respect from them and other residents of Winnie.

Winne is a small township which had high hopes when it was created by the railways way back in 1895.

Sadly it failed as a railway town and fell victim for decades to floods and hurricanes. And alligators in the marshes.

And it was here in this woebegone by-water that Joe took on the mantel of a super-hero.

Hurricane Joe.

It was well-deserved … for decades, come hell and high water, as the winds howled and the rains whipped, homes were trashed and crops decimated, Joe often single-handedly kept the dollar store open day and night.

People in boats and canoes trusted he would be there so they could collect everything from bottled water to life-saving equipment while hurricanes like Imelda and Ike ripped through the township.

Alligator farms suffered too. Marshes that held tens of thousands of alligators have at times been left all but devoid of them.

Hurricane Ike, for instance, pushed a 20 feet deep wall of saltwater 15 miles inland killing thousands of alligators that lived there.

Despite all this elemental horror though, Winnie still today keeps a semblance of small town dignity, hosting the Texas Rice Festival every first weekend in October. And there is a local beauty pageant too.

And the Dollar stores had retained their own quaint ways. One of them still is the Candy Bar Competition, a store-to-store ‘war’ to see who can sell most candy bars. Joe’s store had won the promotion a number of times over the years.

But it is claimed by locals there was some misunderstanding about it a few weeks ago and ultimately that’s why Joe no longer works in the job he loved.

Dollartree bosses have refused to comment on the situation, saying they are protecting Joe’s privacy.

But the story is anything but private. Locals say they are boycotting the store until Joe gets his job back.

And with that same true grit that keeps them living in this alligator-ridden area they have been getting together to hold regular protests outside the ‘dollar’ store in the horse-shoe like commercial centre of town.

The protests continued even after Joe got offered a new post at a large store in the next big town.

His old five and dime was taken over by Dollartree some months ago.

Now local writer SC Bryson has written about what she believes has happened exclusively for The Society.

We also have recordings of Joe telling his own story which we hope to publish next week…

Sue tells the story: “The sixth day of June is a significant World War 11 anniversary. This significant day reminds us of once-in-a-lifetime sacrifice!

Southeast Texas seems to have no connection to that era, those brave people on their noble yet doomed missions. But there certainly is a vital connection…

Service and Sacrifice.

Joe Doré received a termination notice after a stellar career with this retail establishment. Many days have passed since this unexpected and unwelcome event. Winnie, Texas, was the location of this unfathomable occurrence for Joe Doré was, is, and always will be a real hero of this little town. 

This is Hurricane Joe’s heroic tale. 

Joe Doré was born in August, 1957. He looks like an ordinary discount store manager but no one can see his invisible Superman attire beneath his work clothes. His apartment is his sanctuary from the hard work that occurs everyday at Family Dollar/Dollar Tree.

He is modest, intelligent, hard-working, compassionate, knowledgeable, honest and friendly. He knows every local customer’s name, and often, those of their family members. He has worked for this company for nearly thirty years.

The store is a success because of him, and the employees that he trained, guided and nurtured. He created a loyal base of dedicated customers too.

We all love him.

His customers call him Mr. Joe or Uncle Joe. People could buy necessary items from other establishments, and from online stores, but they would not receive genuine Texas hospitality and concern.

Joe also rescues turtles and wild birds from impending death, and he would do so much more.

But he is totally dedicated to the Winnie and Stowell customers who regularly shop at his store.

He continued serving these small communities while he battled cancer and diabetes.

Hurricanes are devastating natural disasters. Residents stay glued to their television sets, computer screens and smartphones as they try to forecast which direction, and what dot on the map, the swirling white mass, on millions of screens around Southeast Texas, has decided to plunder.

Mandatory evacuations are issued after the professional prognosticators have all come to agreement. People hastily gather necessary provisions and lots of money, and then they flee.

But some brave souls steadfastly guard their plots of Texas soil, and everything on it. Joe Doré is one of those individuals who choose to face Death, without blinking. And he has done it many times in recent years.

He smiles as he provides the local citizenry with bottled water, canned goods, cleaning supplies and other commodities that are crucial hurricane survival tools. His heroic presence is quite calming. This store manager is not a newbie. He has been an outstanding leader for nearly thirty years.

This remarkable manager guided his store through very unsettling times. Family Dollar was open during multiple hurricanes and tropical storms that caused as much devastation as a hurricane would have meted out. This venerable store manager carried on with routine business, in the dark, while the store utilized generators. The competitors were closed up, and their employees had evacuated.

Mr. Joe did not leave his customers in dire straits. Autumn of 2019 brought national attention to Winnie, Texas. 80% of this town flooded, but people could still purchase their necessary supplies although their means of transportation changed from cars and trucks to boats and speed boats.

Joe Doré won two very significant awards during his long tenure. He received the Store Manager of the Year award for Region One which represents approximately 800 stores. He also received The Chairman’s Award from Mr. Howard Levine, the owner of the Family Dollar stores.

He spent nearly every waking moment…building this Family Dollar store into a genuine small town success story.

Why did he have to move on?

This Hurricane Hero now needs his own hero!! Well, lots of them.”

Thank you Sue and also Gracie who helped us research some of the issues in the story.

https://www.change.org/p/dollar-tree-dollar-tree-family-dollar-bringjoeback?redirect=false&use_react=false

#lonestar #midnightfiveanddime #joedore #dollartree #dollarstore #fiveanddime #candycompetition #alligators #winne #texas #petition

Concert of horror: 22 murdered and 22 harrowing sketches by artist Elton

Twenty-two men, women and children died in the suicide bombing at the Ariana Grande concert in the Manchester Arena on May 2017.

Bomber Salman Abedi’s device ripped through the lives of hundreds more.

The inquiry into the terror attack says that all these people – and their families and friends – were “failed on every level” by security organisations including the police.

Salman Abedi should have been identified as a threat by security, the inquiry chairman said.

Sir John Saunders found there were missed opportunities to avert or minimise the “devastating impact”.

Manchester ‘Biro’ artist Elton Darlo spent 18 days sketching a startling eye-witness account of the grief and tributes around the scene of the terror attack.

Elton said: “I was in Manchester as normal and when it all happened I just did what I felt I had to do – capture this awful tragedy and the outpourings of grief in my sketches.”

#mountainside #bombs #manchester #ArianaGrande #manchesterarena #arena #22dead #Salman Abedi #elton #sketches

Moston writer Dorrie Jane Bridge wrote this piece for us the day after the bombing

It is the fifth anniversary of the Manchester Arena terror attack.

Twenty-two people died when a suicide bomber blew himself up at an Ariana Grande concert on 22 May 2017.

Among the tributes, a minute’s applause will be held at the start of each wave of runners taking part in the annual Great Manchester Run.

DORRIE BRIDGE WRITES: I live about three or four miles from the Manchester Arena which is virtually built on top of Victoria Railway Station.   On my way to bed at about 10.45 last night I heard a noise.  It could have been a car backfiring or several car doors being slammed hard. I switched on my local radio as I usually do and within minutes the presenter interrupted his phone-in programme to report ‘a bang’ in Manchester Arena, no more was then known. This then built up little by little as Alan Beswick reported every additional item of news as it came in.

Yes, I lived through World War 11, and after all these years I remember the warm, loving neighbours who came together like one big family.   Day and night our parents came together in the air raid shelters, in the queues for food, on the streets as Air Raid Wardens or ‘Dad’s Army’ and comforting those whose sons and daughters died fighting for their country. 

When the IRA planted a bomb in the middle of Manchester I heard the blast here, saw the helicopters warning us to stay away from the city centre.

My granddaughter who was studying for a degree was working at Marks and Spencer and was due to go on shift at the almost precise time of the explosion.  I managed to stop her with frantic phone calls. Whether I heard the explosion last night I can’t be sure.   The IRA didn’t daunt Manchester; it was re-built with pride – and nobody was badly injured miraculously.

Today we hear that 22 people, some children are dead and many more injured, some seriously.  Nobody at this point has claimed responsibility but reports say this was a suicide bomber.

It doesn’t matter whether it was a terrorist attack organized by extremists, or a ‘lone wolf’, an individual with mental illness, or a person full of evil.  It doesn’t matter if it was a person who was a mixture of all those motivations.  What matters is that innocent people have once again lost their life.

What matters is, that once again Manchester has come together in a spirit of caring and love.   Whilst people all over the world have this total resolve that they will not be overcome by evil, there is hope for us all.

#manchester #areana #bombings #concert #22dead

A Mancunian rant!

As Hough Hall crumbles into oblivion, British Heritage – one of the organisation that could have helped us Mostonians save it – are ‘weeping’ over another vanished listed building 40 miles up the road.

We probably all know Hurst Green, Longridge, in Preston, that scruffy little industrial town up the A6 (I think) that made North Manchester look posh … b

But who recalls the haunted, historic Grade 11 listed Punch Bowl Inn?

I do! A good few country miles travelled for a few pints of real ale and a micro-waved meat and potato pie with soggy chips.

Brilliant! That’s what us Northerners thrive on!

Anyway, the Punch Bowl Inn just disappeared a few days ago, leaving people upset and the indignant council saying they are ‘looking into it’.

Into what? It’s been empty for almost 15 years – and they didn’t care then did they?

Here’s part of the problem … the Heritage Statement from English Heritage, submitted to the council about the pub in 2012, said: “Owing to the building’s designated heritage status care is needed to avoid harming the significance of the building in line with the requirements of planning law and policy.”

At least English Heritage recognised the status of the pub, which is said to be haunted by the ghost of Dick Turpin, the grandad of Coronation Street’s hotpot queen Betty Turpin.

This is what they had to say about the pub another time: “As heritage assets are irreplaceable, any harm or loss should require clear and convincing justification.

“Substantial harm or loss to a Grade II listed building should be exceptional.”

The Heritage statement also said that where a development proposal would lead to less than substantial harm to the significance of the heritage building, the harm should be weighed against the public benefits; and rather than harm the building, any changes should enhance its significance and give it a new lease of life.

Well, that’s not what they said about Hough Hall is it?

Hough Hall was 200 years older, in a better position, more attractive, part of Moston’s rural history, had a beautiful artistic and heart-breaking love story attached to it… and nobody in power cared.

The responsibility for the future of this beautiful and evocative 17th century farmhouse also lies with two organisations who should right now hang their heads in shame.

The first one is of course Manchester City Council … you see, despite what they say,  local authorities can take action to ‘secure repair when it becomes evident that a building is being allowed to deteriorate’.

But MCC nailed their colours to the mast when they told the preservation society’s chief researcher Andrea Martin-Banks there was nothing they would do to protect the near-derelict hall.

History in a hole.

The next port of call then is Historic England, the Siamese Twin of English Heritage.

They say on their website: “Historic England have produced guidance to help owners and purchasers of vacant buildings to reduce risks by undertaking an ‘active management approach’ that can prevent unnecessary damage, dereliction and loss of historic fabric.”

But when approached by Andrea, Historic England simply referred her back to Manchester City Council.

And that was it!

Ultimately nobody saved the Punch Bowl and nobody saved Hough Hall. But what a difference 40 Northern miles makes … they might be crocodile tears in Preston, but at least somebody is shedding some kind of a tear.

What’s happening in Moston, only dry eyes in the house.

The people to contact at Manchester City Council and Historic Britain are:

Sir Richard Leese, Leader of Manchester City Council T

Telephone: 0161 234 3004

Email: [email protected]

Duncan Wilson OBE is the chief executive of Historic England

Telephone: 020 7973 3250

#PUNCHBOWLINN #houghhall #preston #moston

Manchester artist Elton, has two new books full of fabulous drawings. Enjoy this interview with him as we explore part of Manchester and it’s history in words and pictures.

Elton Darlo and me walked the same moribund Victorian streets of 1970s and 1980s rainy Manchester.

I was a young writer making my way in the metal clatter of the city’s Fleet Street of the North and Elton was a skinny pub bouncer at places like the Thompson Arms, a glass and panel halfway house under the bus station near Canal Street.

People like us were the young dudes then, dressed in Stacks and flares, roll top jumpers or tank tops. Hair bouffanted like Steve Marriott.

We smoked Bensons and Capstan Full Strength and swigged warm Watney’s with abandon to impress the girls.

Yep, people like us were slick as switch-blades. And as hard as nails.

We knew people too… both Elton and me were friends with George Best and Hurricane Higgins, the inarticulate drunken faces of Manchester’s sporting life.

We knew Quality guys like Dougie Flood, Jimmy Swords and Peter Tut Tut.

Drank with them in the Circus Tavern, the smallest and tightest-knit pub in Britain at the time. Deals were done there, people were set and ripped off there, threats and kickings were arranged in the fug of the back room.

I went to the Circus for the stories. And so did Elton.

Me, I was brought up in the woebegone ways of Moston, in a house near the Ten Ten Hell’s Angels HQ – Brown’s Dance hall was just around the corner too.

The Ten Tenners used to like to smash up Brown’s every other weekend or so because it was a honey-pot for squares and Mods on the pull.

Elton, was brought up near Belle Vue and eventually on the rough and rowdy shadow streets of Tower-block Alley, Longsight.

We were the tough-guy artists, one from the wrong side of Oldham Road, the other from the wrong side of Rochdale Road.

Dougie Flood lived near Rochdale Road in arrogant splendour in the mansion behind the trees.

Jimmy Swords lorded it in a Longsight tower block next to Oldham Road.

As the 80s headed for the 90s Elton and me both hit the road. I had the time of my life becoming an alcoholic journalist, travel writer and broadcaster.

Elton spun around the world going to LA, becoming a wrestling coach. But life got him too. He ended up homeless and with mental health issues.

Funnily enough we never crossed paths until a few days ago. And then it was on Zoom. I am in lockdown in Slovakia and he is back on the streets in our City of Tall Towers.

Elton is 72 now. I’m not quite as old as him!

I’m looking for a publisher for my book Ravine and Elton has just self-published another one of his own, this one about lockdown in Manchester in 2020. It’s a captivating collection of sketches in Biro and washes, Lowery-eaque in some ways but in others almost Scarfe-ian.

They can be brutal too, scratched in to the page with an earnest desire to capture a moment in pen and ink, an old and unusual medium to be working in nowadays. But it works.

Elton said to me: “It’s been a funny old life really… until my books started to come out my only claim to fame was really being an Elton John impersonator for a laugh. That’s why I’m called Elton … the Real Elton apparently got to hear about me and mentioned me once on telly, in the US. But that was it – oh, except when I was a sort of roady for Springstein… but that’s another tale.

“It’s strange really when you think, it took me until I was in my 70s and something like Covid to come along to get me noticed!”

Yep, Elton, after all these years I noticed you and your artwork.

Cheers

Leigh

#MANCHESTER #ART #MANC #COVID #BIRO #CIRCUSTAVERN

Prince Philip died aged 99, nine weeks before his centenary.

To mark his birthday the Queen was presented with a new rose named after the Duke of Edinburgh. The pink rose was bred by the Royal Horticultural Society and planted in the gardens at Windsor Castle last week.

This week also marked the Queen’s official birthday…

Poprad-based writer, journalist and AirTV International broadcaster Leigh G Banks remembers a charming and amusing few minutes with Philip in town.

Leigh writes:

“In 2006 the Queen and Prince Philip paid a whistle-stop tour to Central Europe and stopped off in Poprad. I was lucky enough to spend a short time with him and we chatted about many things – not least the health-giving powers of the small mountainside city which stands over an ancient thermal lake.

As the Royal Consort and I walked around a top hotel charged by the harnessed thermal qualities of the lake, he asked many questions and was impressed by the clean air, the bright ‘shark teeth’ of the looming High Tatras mountains. Finally, he looked me directly in the eye and said: “Do you think I could come and live here?”

It was obviously a gentle joke – but something about Poprad had caught his imagination.

Many people, particularly, in the UK have derided the Prince for his sometimes abrupt manner and his ribald sense of humour. Others have attacked him with unproven conspiracy theories.

These are not things to discuss now. All I can say is for those few minutes, I found him engaging, friendly, charming and funny.

Thank you Prince Philip.

#princephilip #thequeen #royalfamily #windsorcastle “

By Moston writer, Dorrie Jane Bridge

Here I endeavour to represent Josephine Bloggs who is trapped on a planet of disease.

I want to get out of my prison, and to have people come in and transform it to a home.  I want to wander around the shops, handle the goods, eat in the carvery, sharing the serving utensils without a second thought. 

I want to debate in ‘live’ meetings and to go on holiday and enjoy trying to speak other languages – to dance with strangers.   I want to leave behind all things ‘virtual’.

I want my grandchildren to be safely placed in school without feeling they are being left in a battlefield.

I want to go out to work and socialize with colleagues who are working for the same cause.

I want to practise my chosen faith in my place of worship knowing that all other faiths are doing the same freely.

I want to get in the builders or the decorators, the electricians – to spend money or save money.

I want to save my business, be it big or small, by surviving and thriving.

To go to the cinema and be annoyed by the popcorn eaters or the theatres and stand on my feet clapping for encores.   Cheer and sing at a football match.

Do crafts or draw a paint, or play bingo in silence – study in college or join groups. Make music.

I even want to see my GP  come out of the inner sanctum, and to have the benefit of hands on diagnoses.

To somehow jump from a bemasked state of nervous optimism to some kind of normality.

I even want all of this here in the UK on June 21st. 

SO what do I NOT want

I don’t want our leaders, of whatever political colour, to take us, like lambs to the slaughter, into another cesspit of disease and struggle. I am sensitive to their dilemma and to the needs of our economy and our jobs and businesses.

I don’t want to follow gently nor to fight vocally, with innocence and ignorance as our guide with false optimism taking us down familiar pathways.

When the final easing of restrictions comes – be it June 21st or a year hence, it should not be ratified until it is recognised that though the plague may have waned it is threatening to surge once again.

By moving with greater caution and continuing vaccination, until the great majority are covered, we may avoid a coming winter of isolation and all its evils.

To quote Emperor Augustus …  Hasten Slowly.

#covid #holidays #uk #indian #bolton #manchester #plague

Dorrie Jane Bridge