How about extending some sympathy to us?

2020 was the year when the standards in public life were well and truly dragged into the gutter by ‘good old Boris’ and his fellow incompetents.

First was the covering up and condoning of the lockdown rule breaking by Dominic Cummings.

Next up was the peerages for Boris’ own brother, Jo, and his Russian oligarch chum who owns the London Evening Standard newspaper. What exactly had either of these done to deserve a peerage? As for Boris’ own dad, Stanley, I am beginning to lose count of the number of times he has broken the lockdown rules.

Then we had the Priti Patel bullying saga when Johnson overruled the advice of his own Standards Advisor to keep her in post.

And then to round the year off nicely, for the first time ever,the advice of the Lords Appointment Commission (LAC) was overruled by our learned Prime Minister, so that a peerage can be given to Peter Cruddas, a former Conservative Party treasurer who resigned in 2012 as a result of a ‘cash for access scandal.’

I wonder what it is about a man who has donated £3.5m to the Conservative Party and £50,000 to Johnson’s 2019 leadership campaign, that prompted Boris to overrule the LAC?

This all shows how Boris seems to think rules and laws do not apply to himself, his family and hi chums – these are instead only for us little people.

Lord (Roy) Hattersley (pictured), Labour politician, 87; Dame Maggie Smith (pictured), actress, 85; Denzel Washington, actor, 65; Nigel Kennedy, violinist, 63; Terry Butcher, manager and former footballer, 61; John Legend, musician, 41; Sienna Miller, actress, 38.

ON Sunday, December 20, 2020, I rang West Yorkshire Police to inform them that two youths from the travellers’ encampment in Ravensknowle Park were digging up lumps of turf with picks and throwing them onto the driveway. I was told that a police officer would contact me, but nothing happened.

On the Wednesday, December 23, 2020, my 77-year-old wife was savaged by what we think were two of the travellers’ terriers. She received two bleeding puncture wounds, grazes and severe bruising from one of these aggressive, feral creatures. One circled her as a distraction while the other approached from behind and bit into her leg.

She hurried home in pain and distress. I rang the doctor to arrange an anti-tetanus vaccination. I also called the police, as I had the first time. I did not expect any help or action and I wasn’t disappointed.

They would call back tomorrow, when the travellers’ encampment had moved on, and I was assured that the police had no idea where they had moved on to.

Since the police have a duty to protect the public, you would think it a priority to acquaint themselves with the kind of dangers that come onto their patch.

A priority of dereliction that is shared by our Labour Council, since it provides such illegal encampments with portable toilets (which the travellers treat with contempt) and the clear-up of rubbish and excrement at the expense of the ratepayer (of which travellers are not).

I know that Labour Party policy is to support minorities exclusively, but to encourage such a threat and hazard to the public is a step too far.

I recall Barry Sheerman saying we should be sympathetic to travellers. Wrong! We should be sympathetic to everyone else.

Poem: A Knock on the Door

A KNOCK on the door, I call out. “Who is it”?

Can I believe my eyes,

Two very good friends have paid us a visit

Oh, what a lovely surprise

How kind of them to come all this way To share with us their precious time I must try to say, to sort of convey

Our thanks with a short friendly rhyme. It feels quite a treat to actually meet Have a nice chat and some wine

I’m so out of date, I really do hate

This so called conversing online

I’ll now end this verse before it gets worse.

But let me just finally say,

We’ve enjoyed this so much please keep in touch.

Thank you for making our day.