So how many delegates will be at the COP29 climate conference this week? 5,000? 25,000? Keep going…50,000? The answer is….67,000 - plus thousands of journalists etc. Presumably very few arriving on a bicycle, or in an electric car. Seems an odd signal for ‘saving the planet’.

Labour’s long held perception is that ‘bosses’, farmers and school fee paying parents are ‘rich’ and thus should be targeted with high taxes i.e. ‘made to pay’. Clearly a % of the above are very ‘rich’, but many most certainly are not. The politics of envy trumps economic sense.

Labour’s plans to phase out new petrol/diesel cars by 2030, with financial penalties for producers not meeting annual targets, is totally unrealistic. EV demand is stalling: why make cars you can’t sell?! ‘Green’ ideology over rides a basic understanding of business principles.

Watching Spurs v Chelsea on Sky. At a corner kick Cucurella is grabbed round the neck by a Spurs defender- ref warns the defender, who instantly repeats the arm wrestling! Ref has another word. On behalf of ALL football fans… award a PENALTY! One weekend of this and it’s sorted.

Interesting to note the minimal TV coverage by the BBC of the farmers’ protest yesterday in London. A massive event largely ignored. So sad to see what was once regarded as the world’s ultimate newscaster - in terms of impartiality - morph quietly into what it has become today.

Thirty new Labour peerages in the House of Lords. The deal? £361 daily attendance (even for a few minutes) allowance (tax free, so effectively £400+) plus travel expenses. ‘Attention please - the gravy train leaves Platform 3 shortly, calling at Westminster….’

‘UK’s stalling economy is disappointing’ says Labour Minister. GCSE Economics question: ‘If employers face a rise in NMW and additional employee pension costs, will they (a) offer more jobs, or (b) release staff and offer remaining employees lower future pay rises?’ I’ll wait…

Presenter to Roy Keane: ‘How do you think the great United team you played for would fare against the current team?’ Keane: ‘We’d have beaten them at least 1 - 0’ Presenter: ‘Really?! ..only by that small a margin..?!’ Keane: ‘Yeh…in fairness most of us are nearer 50 years old’

Gary Neville: ‘Man Utd currently are £ for £ the worst team in the Premier league’ - factoring in the many £ millions paid in transfer fees for such mediocre players. Appalling previous recruitment in terms of quality and price is the millstone that Amorim has to work with.

For those who can recall the disastrous impact that Liz Truss’s crazy budget policy had on bond markets and interest rate rises, we have now topped those rates! Investors are dumping gilts, showing a similar lack of confidence in Rachel Reeves first budget. Not very encouraging.

Whichever Government is in power, UK’s stalling economy should surprise no one. The ‘productive’ population relative to the ‘unproductive’ shrinks year on year - disability benefits explode, an ageing population needs pensions and NHS support, unemployment falters. Do the Maths.

A classic case of greed (vast dividends) and incompetence in equal measure: in 1989 investors buy a local monopoly with zero debt and zero competitors. 35 years later they announce £2bn annual losses, £16bn debt and issue cries for help. Welcome to the world of Thames Water.

In the Times Mike Atherton comments wisely (as ever) that the many £ms heading towards non Hundred host counties from franchise sales ‘will repair their balance sheets, if not their business models’ - a short term fix for several whom regrettably at present are not sustainable.

The latest Bank of England forecast is 0.75% GDP growth for the next year. Given that the UK population is rising by a similar amount, the GDP per capita - often used as a measure of living standards, productivity etc. - will be static. Could be a difficult year.

Drove for 40 minutes along town and country roads in Somerset and Devon. Most road surfaces at roundabouts have so many deep holes, it amounts to ‘off road’ driving, which thankfully my Land Rover could cope with. Elsewhere en route I dodged another 25 potholes. Why is this?!

So an increasingly deranged and unpredictable US President claims that ‘Ukraine started the war’ with Russia, conveniently ignoring an unprovoked invasion of a sovereign state. The political gap between Europe and USA gets wider by the day. Is this what the USA people voted for?

Difficult to understand those who criticise Starmer for switching funds from Overseas Aid to Defence. Yes, there’s awful poverty globally, but UK can’t afford to significantly solve the problem, given (a) hardship and priorities at home and (b) dubious overseas project auditing.

I’ve just been watching an extraordinary and awful conversation between Zelensky and USA’s Trump/ Vance: the latter two bullying and interrupting the Ukraine leader whenever he attempted to present the case - of his compatriots defending their territory from a Russian invasion.

Something tells me this guy lies about how good a golfer he is too.