Scarlet Pimple

Apparently others as well. So I will just say this: that if you can remember listening to Lord Haw Haw then are you sure you are younger than me? 'Cos at that age I didn't know about him. Was your mother making sure that you knew yer onions before you grew up? And I never heard an air raid siren ever. Apparently my generation must have led a charmed existence completely unaware of a war going on and it started one year after I was born. My Dad did remark that a German plane flew over Inverness once.

Get it, M'em Sahib. Ah So! Still, a ridiculous amount of money. That's just reflective of the huge amounts of money in sport these days.

Good Lord-What have I started? Bughtmaster your slip(age) is showing. I can barely remember PC49. Can you remember Childrens' hour on the Home service from Glesca with Kathleen Garscadden? Can you remember Spread Eagle on Children's Hour? How about Tommy Handley ? And/or Wilfred Pickles? Or even Alvar Ladell the BBC announcer with the posh and melifluent tones? Can you remember Victory Day in the second World war? --I do since I fell off my bike onto my nose in the rain whilst celebrating?

Jock..why? Don't you want to stir the pot?

Gotta come out of the gates with all guns blazing and unsettle the opposition they can implement their game plan . Secondly, we have been coshed by Partick more than once in the past and in important games--Scottish cup etc. So, either we don't take them seriously enough or they have really smart coaches/managers who really give our team's performance the once over prior to game time and let us have it during the game before we can settle. They are a team to be reckoned with and I said that right at the start of the season. After this victory they could start climbing the league. Don't they have quite a few youngsters in their team ?

Brora is at the back of beyond methinks. And such a small town isn't it. ...too far north for any of the bigger boys to want to travel there?

D.D I read he is getting 400,000 pounds per annum . You say millions?

If the team has started passing back to the goalie as has been reported then I am now concerned. I thought we had got over that affliction.

Absolutely spot on , Scotty. He was so upfront and honest. J.H. is a real man!

If the temperature is too low it saps the energy of the players on the park and it doesn't help to make a very good match day experience for the customers if you are frozen stiff. It was a low turnout again today. Mostly the diehards I assume. If the league cannot be persuaded to change over to summer football, which makes perfect sense,even for one season to try it out, then does anyone feel that there is anything but a challenging future ahead for Scottish clubs? There are too many other attractions nowadays for fans to put up with this when they could be sitting in comfort indoors watching the telly? Comments?

Danger here that confidence will be sapped ?

Gentlemen of the Jury When will the rules change to allow for handbags at dawn instead of the ruthless pain attendant upon plain old rolled cold steel?

I think you are right in your post #60, Alex --this is likely to be a temporary blip. High time that Canada switches over to windmills and wave-driven hydro operations. Currently we have five foot waves on top of five foot swells in the storms coming in off the Pacific. And flooding overnight is now an option. Global warming is alive and well.

Oddquine, I am always very impressed by the amount of effort you put into your research and the way in which you seem to come up with accurate facts obtained from Statistics or Government papers or sources. In other words, logical figures - with those relating to frozen pensions being supportive of my previous claims and other statements, many of which have also simply been a reporting by me on here of facts obtained from similar sources. The Government-sponsored White Paper you found for me in April 2014, which traced the origins and subsequent developments in the Government theories and excuses for non-uprating pensions, was sent on by me to the Head office of our organization, The Canadian Alliance of Britsih pensioners, who blithely told me that they had it on file already and it had been in the hands of their solicitors for some time. Meaning that they and their hired legal help were on the ball and knew the facts intimately. So, when they quote figures in their newsletter, that goes out to at least 10,000 ex pats, then you can be assured that they have done their research very thoroughly on this and their facts in print are very accurate. And you are absolutely correct about the fact that because we live outside the U K and don't consume their resources then we are also saving them bundles of money. This has been a new and recent argument, backed up by figures, that the CABP has been putting to the Government which, from all accounts, has stirred the pot quite a bit and they seem to be intrigued enough to agree to at least consider the figures submitted to them by us. Alex, I must confess I had some head scratching to do to understand some of your statements.: Opening paragraph:- I was not aware that the British Government had set aside any funds for frozen pensions or for the benefit of frozen pensioners. Being as cash strapped as we all know they have been, and still are, this would surely never have entered their minds since they obviously feel that their "no upratings for these guys EVER " policy will always stand the test of time and also be in place for EVER. The argument you put forward about the funds put aside to meet their obligations to pay future pensions as people retire is stretching incredulity to the limit. Frankly they will never be persuaded to use any part of any such slush fund to help any pensioner that emigrates overseas to an ex-Commonwealth country. Like all Governments, including Canadian, their first priority is to use the available funds to make their Balance Sheet look good, then become re-elected next time around and not to think of the people who put them in power to enjoy their high salaries and privileged life-style etc. It is also well-known, thanks to Oddquine, that they move funds between funds of different names to suit their purposes. That's an old banking con-game that is also very dangerous. Robbing Peter to pay Paul can only be sustained for short periods of time before the whole house of cards falls down. I also paid-in at the then current rates for contributions but if I ever earned an "ENTITLEMENT" for my future retirement, as you put it, then where is that getting me now? The pensions of ex pat U.S citizens or those in Germany or Swahili land are regularly uprated thus proving that THEy got what they are entitled to as ex Pats but they did not pay-in to the fund any greater contribution amounts than we did. Nor do they contribute anything to the British economy which is one of the planks of some folks who seem to resent ex pats crying out for parity., conveniently forgetting that the only reason we in ex Commonwealth countries don't get uprated is simply because there are more of us domiciled in the latter areas than in the former--meaning more funds left in the pockets of your U K Governments than if they uprated the pensions of all ex pats instead of the greeater number living in these Ex-Commonwelath countries. Neat trick eh....... ''We do it because we can, old boy" type of thing . Whatever the Government does with that money internally in Britain is entirely up to them , and over which we ex-pats have little control . They are going to do it anyway regardless of how people squeal at the unfairness so your point is what? That's just the way Governments operate in order to get themselves out of the hole of irresponsible spending, ballooning deficits and looming crises. And you are probably right about the "NO POT" claim. Why? Because what has happened is that the control and expenditure of Government finances have just GONE TO POT. As for your last paragraph, er.. Alex.. are you still unaware that there is not just one fund but many, many others. I saw a list recently but don't have it to hand. And, as stated above, all interchangeable depending on the current needs of the reigning Federal Government.

76,000 for attendance at the game yesterday in which Lionel Messi scores and scores... Here: http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/football/30333988

Is it my imagination but was the pace of this one a bit slow today?

Why Chas?............ Does he get up your nose?

Yes, it depends on whether or not he decides to move and the integrity of purpose used at that time by all parties as to how it unfolds.

At that time this topic was explored in considerable detail under the thread started about the Referendum campaign recently by Oddquine. At that time I explained the reasons for the freezing of pensions of overseas ex pats who now live in ex-commonwealth countries and the lack of response from the British Government. The figures I quoted were challenged by some members , one stating that no such National Insurance Fund existed in Britain containing any kind of large monetary sum that could have been used to redress the frozen pension issue. There was also a challenge made to the effect that the reason for the non-uprating must be because there is a reciprocal agreement in place between these ex pat countries and the British Treasury. My explanation was that this did not exist at all and any Agreement reached in the past between respective Governments was, in any case, a taxation one only. e.g I do not pay tax in Britain on my pension but I pay tax in Canada upon it when I receive it. The following Article in the most recent newsletter received from the Canadian Alliance of British Pensioners refers to this National Insurance fund and the accumulated sum of 19 BILLION pounds currently resting in there. It also explains that the amount required to redress this situation is only 599 MILLION pounds. So, I hope that this satisfies the sceptics that there is indeed: 1. An enormous sum resting in this National Insurance Fund. 2. That there is no Reciprocal Agreement by the U.K. with any Ex Commonwealth country relating to this. Here is the small article in full copied from the newsletter : Ever-vigilant POP protesters The Parity or Poverty (POP) Group continues to live up to its commitment to being a ‘rapid response team’ on behalf of frozen pensioners, speedily correcting any inaccurate comments on pension freezing by politicians, the media or bureaucrats. When it recently received a letter from a British MP that contained all-too-familiar inaccurate information – a rehash of disingenuous statements that the Department for Work and Pensions has been churning out for years – the group’s members found themselves having to yet again remind a parliamentarian of the following facts, facts which all of us may find helpful to keep in mind as we write to UK MPs in the prelude to the 2015 election: • Reciprocal agreements are irrelevant to discussions on frozen pensions, as the UK Government has the authority to implement uprating unilaterally any time it wants. • The cost of uprating pensions today (£590 million) is affordable, given the £19 billion-plus surplus in the National Insurance Fund. • There is an appetite for change among politicians, as evidenced by the setting up of the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Frozen British Pensions and the support given to various Early Day Motions. • The European Court of Human Rights’ far-from-unanimous ruling proclaimed state pension uprating to be a domestic political decision. It passed no judgment on the morality of the policy, however even ministers of the crown have acknowledged that it is illogical and an anomaly. Our gratitude goes out to the POP Group, which certainly packs a punch well beyond its size. Its seven tireless members (ranging in age from 66 to 89) in Canada and Turkey* steadfastly refuse to let anyone get away with issuing statements that are not factual, lucid and principled. * The member in Turkey is unfrozen personally, but still campaigns!

Charlie--out of the 4 brothers my mother had when she was alive there is only one left, Duncan, the youngest, was killed in France in the First World war at the age of 19. Two others survived that miserable maelstrom of misery but were seriously wounded which plagued them physically for the rest of their life. I think all three were in the Cameron Highlanders.....Ladies from Hell as the Germans described them. I will try to find out more next time I am in Inverness. I am going to ask my sister who is 79 and still lives in Inverness. I was darned lucky I wasn't born 18 years earlier otherwise I would have been in it as well. I've bee looking at T V documentaries recently all about these two conflicts, WW1 and WW2. Shocking madness and pain can't even begin to describe the insanity ......

There you go. ! Now I am completely bamboozled........

Charles you are really smart at times. I thought of that after I had posted it. You are very probably right since what would a General Infantry man be doing as far up as Inverness? Truthfully, I only heard snippets from my family. Until I read about the ships being berthed in Inverness I thought that Inverness may have been a rest and relaxation area for the Americans or for wounded ?

Sneckboy--yes I noticed that about the many managers at our game. Eyeing up our boys eh? Smile In a way it's encouraging and complimentary. Hope they went away nervous after watching that display. I wonder if the Partick manager was also there? This one makes me a wee bittie nervous. They have beaten us in the past when it was assumed that we had a more than reasonable chance of winning and Firhill will be full of screaming Glaswegians.

Tob There they are.the Highlights. BUT this video is not available for viewing in Canada --or Overseas=- so can anyone send me the link to an opened file so that I can enjoy it as well. Also for all overseas lads and lasses in a similar position. Many thanks S.P.

You've got that right. They fear all overseas viewers so much that they seem to go out of their way to forbid our simple little pleasures, such as ICT footie, which for us old, decrepit, aching seniors, is up there with the Meerschaum pipe and slippers.