The aftermath of the Gray Report

At long last the Gray Report into the parties held at Downing Street has been published, or at least parts of it. There are three blank pages in the 12 page pdf and the body of the report itself is really only five and a half pages long, the rest is made up of factual and non-contentious annexes. It's not a big read, I've read it and it took me about 10 minutes. 

Sue Gray notes that her report does not provide a “meaningful” account of the goings-on at Downing Street because of the omissions requested by the Met Police. Nevertheless what has been published is a damning indictment of the culture of entitlement which pervades Johnson’s Downing Street, and if we were dealing with a functioning democracy and politicians who accepted responsibility for their failings, this report would immediately be followed by resignations. But, of course, we are really dealing with the shameless liar that is Boris Johnson and an equally corrupt and mendacious Conservative party.

The report does not criticise Johnson personally, but finds failures of leadership in No 10 and the Cabinet Office. Gray writes : “There were failures of leadership and judgment by different parts of No 10 and the Cabinet Office at different times.” And that is Johnson’s get out clause right there. He will blame the civil servants in the Cabinet Office and sack a few of them so that Conservative MPs can pretend to themselves that action has been taken and the problem has been dealt with. We saw some toady Tory MPs congratulating Johnson for promising to make changes to the work culture that he himself created. Others insisted that Parliament had spent too much time debating this and demanded that the government get back to “more important” issues, as though the fact that the Prime Minister of the UK is a corrupt liar was not important.

As he spoke to the Commons about the report, Johnson said that he understands the anger people feel. No. He doesn’t. If he had even the vaguest inkling of the anger people feel he’d resign immediately. Instead he sat on his bench in the Commons with a smug grin on his face, believing that he’d got away with it.

Theresa May, who herself was no slouch when it came to mendacity during her time as Prime Minister told Johnson: “Either he had not read the rules, or understood the rules, or thought they didn’t apply to him… which was it?”

Ian Blackford accused Johnson of lying and misleading the house. All those with half a brain cell know that Johnson did lie and mislead the House, yet it was Ian Blackford who was reprimanded by the Speaker and forced to leave the Chamber. That right there tells you all you need to know about what is wrong with Westminster. In Westminster it’s a greater sin to call a liar out for lying than it is for the liar to tell lies. Westminster is a ridiculous excuse for a parliament which is incapable of holding power to account. In the farce that is Westminster, Ian Blackford is told to leave for telling the truth, while Johnson gets to stay for lying. The fact that MPs can’t call a lie a lie in Parliament makes a mockery of the whole principle of accountability. Unparliamentary language, my arse. 

Johnson is now insisting that we must all wait for the police to complete their investigation and then he will decide what should be published. He repeatedly refused to answer a simple question about whether he was present at the party on 13th November, merely repeating that the police need to complete their investigation.  Surely you don’t need a police investigation to tell you whether or not you were at a party, unless you were so rat-arsed you can’t remember what happened that day, and that by itself is enough to tell you that you were at a party. We can infer from Johnson’s refusal to answer that he was indeed present and that there was indeed a party, which would prove that he had, in fact, lied to Parliament when he denied that any party took place. 

The Tories are desperate to move on from this and judging by today’s performance it is clear that Johnson will not go quietly and that it’s unlikely that back-bench Tories will find enough of a collective spine to unseat him. On Sunday, Michael Gove, the Secretary of State for Who Knows What said that Johnson has already apologised for any breach of the rules and that we all need to find some “Christian forgiveness” as though we are the ones at fault for wanting Johnson to be held to account and not Johnson for lying, cheating, and repeatedly breaking the rules. I’m not an expert on Christian morality but I always thought that Christian forgiveness depends upon genuine contrition, remorse, a willingness to make amends and a determination to change and not repeat the same offence. We have seen no evidence of any of that from Boris Johnson.

What will happen next is that we will have to wait weeks or months for the Met to conclude its investigation. The police will conclude that some civil servants breached the rules and should receive spot fines, and Johnson will announce that the police investigation has cleared him so there is no need to publish the Gray Report in full. Meanwhile the spineless Conservatives will not remove him from office. Johnson will get away to smile smugly another day on the front bench in the Commons and another bit of what is left of public trust in the institutions of the British state will wither and die. 

This time it's personal

 

This is written, in part, as a response to one of my trolls who asked why I seemed to be so personally incensed by Partygate. Perhaps this will explain why.

As we all know the Metropolitan Police have announced that they will after all investigate the numerous parties alleged to have taken place in Downing Street while the rest of us were in Lock down, bereaved families who had lost loved ones were unable to give them a proper farewell and people in hospital for months on end with life threatening or life changing conditions were not allowed the comforting presence of a visit from a partner or family.

On a personal level, I fall into the latter categories. Throughout the various Lock down periods, my sister Julie was going through some horrendous treatments for what turned out to a terminal condition. She had to face all of these almost entirely alone, without the reassuring presence of her husband or her closest closest family and friends. It must have been the hardest and most frightening experiences of her life. And throughout all this, we followed the Covid restrictions.

That was the reality and hardship of lock down, for my sister, her family and for many thousands of others. It was a time of fear, of grief, of extreme hardship and crushing isolation, it was far, far more than merely a tedious imposition and restriction on your right to party. Yet we all, at least most of us, tolerated lock down restrictions because we understood that it was necessary in order to protect people. 

We were constantly being told that we were all in this together, Covid was a threat to rich and to poor, it was no respecter of social position or standing, and that made the deprivations of lock down a little easier to bear. We were all suffering isolation for the greater good, in order to protect ourselves and our vulnerable friends and relatives.

So it came as a shocking slap in the teeth and the worst kind of betrayal to discover that, throughout that time, the man in charge of the UK, the man who had ultimate responsibility for depriving millions of people in England of the most fundamental liberties in order to protect the vulnerable, the chronically sick and the elderly, was himself ignoring the rules that the rest of us had to follow, often at immense personal cost.

It is now clear that throughout lock down, Johnson refused to accept that the restrictions which his government imposed on the public should in any shape or form hamper his ability to down a bottle of wine in the company of his sycophantic lackeys. His behaviour is a gross insult to those who endured lock down despite far greater hardships and deprivations than Bring Your Own Bottle Johnson ever had to face. When his supporters remarked on how tired and wiped out he looked during lock down as supposed evidence of how he was sharing our struggles. We now know that it was most likely that he was still hung over from last night’s party.

Johnson is not responsible for the terrible loss of my sister, a loss we are still struggling to comprehend, but the callous indifference and chaotic incompetence of him and his government is responsible for the fact that 150,000 families across the UK are grieving like we are grieving just now. My contempt for this entitled bag of selfish hypocrisy knows no bounds.

It is welcome news that there is now to be a police investigation into the parties in Downing Street but judging from the long and inglorious tradition of the British state failing to hold the rich and powerful to account it is highly unlikely that anything will ever come of it. Just as nothing ever came of Dominic Cummings’s lock down busting trip to Barnard Castle in order to give himself a vehicular eye test and not as a birthday outing for his wife, not at all, oh no. We have already seen, just in the past couple of years a number of instances of senior Conservatives being found by the courts to have acted unlawfully, Michael Gove, Priti Patel, and Matt Hancock have all been ruled to have acted unlawfully, and Johnson himself was ruled to have unlawfully prorogued Parliament in 2019 in order to evade parliamentary scrutiny of his Brexit deal. What all of them have in common is that every single one of them was able to break the law with impunity, not one of them suffered any negative consequences as a result of their law breaking, and the odds are very much in favour of Johnson doing exactly the same this time.

Johnson may or may not face a leadership challenge, in the absence of a clear successor and with his willingness to use blackmail and intimidation in order to bully supine Tory back benchers into line, it is by no means certain that he will be forced out of office. If he does survive a leadership challenge, the Tory party rules say that he cannot be challenged for another year. But even if the buffoon in Downing Street is forced out, he will merely be replaced by another Conservative who displays the same rank entitlement and contempt. What a prospect.

And that's why, Mr Troll, it's personal. And that's why you can take a running jump.

The Lizard Revisited 2022: Part 5

 Another fine day - two in a row - and another opportunity to walk a stretch of the Coastal Footpath.

Some walks are memorable for the views and others for the history. This one will be long remembered for its mud. 

According to the map, the linear distance of the walk was 5 miles but, because a lot of it was zig-zaggy as we negotiated stretches of mud and pools of water, it felt longer than that. It was quite hard going. The outward leg took us across Predannack Downs to Kynance Cove and then back along the coast.

Oooh look, a stretch of mud and water - again and again and again...

Kynance Cove, with Lizard Head in the background. The cove is probably the most visited place on The Lizard and is a place to be avoided on a fine Summer's day. Today? I counted two other couples.

Looking westwards over a cove called The Pound. A typical Cornish seascape.

Saint Wynwallow/Wynwalloe, Landewednack, just outside of Lizard Village. The most southerly church in mainland Britain, at the very tip of the Lizard peninsula. Established in the 6th Century by Gwenole, a monk from the Landevennac Abbey in Brittany, after which the village is named. Dedicated to St Winwalloe as is the church at Gunwalloe Church Cove. What we see today dates from the 15th Century. The tower is a delight of patchwork, featuring alternate blocks of granite and the local serpentine rock. So, this site has seen many changes over the years, ranging from pre-Christian times when Christianity was not the major religion, to Christian times when it was and now to, arguably, Post-Christian times when, again, Christianity is not the major religion. And that is the big challenge that the Church faces - what role does it have in Post-Christian times? I'm not sure that 'it' knows. And I certainly don't.

Every headstone in a graveyard tells a story, mostly only known to family members and then probably only remembered for a generation or two. Not so, those graves maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. There is always something of interest to discover - always tragic because of the context but some have an added dimension, just like this one for Radio Office Robert Frederick Hampshire of the Merchant Navy. He served on the SS Gairsoppa and was 18 when he died at some point between 16th February and 7th March 1941. What's the story hinted at by his inscription? Here it is:
At 00.08 hours on 17 Feb 1941 the unescorted Gairsoppa (Master Gerald Hyland) was hit on the starboard side just behind the bridge in #2 hold by one G7a torpedo from U-101 about 300 miles southwest of Galway Bay, Ireland. The ship had been in convoy SL-64 which was slowed down by bad weather and running low on coal, she was detached alone to Galway on 15 February. At 18.00 hours on 16 February, the U-boat spotted the ship but had troubles to hit the target due to heavy seas and missed with a spread of two torpedoes at 23.28 hours and one G7e torpedo at 23.32 hours. The Gairsoppa caught fire and settled slowly by the bow after being hit in the third attack, but Mengersen decided to give up further attacks when a coup de grâce missed at 00.20 hours, assuming correctly that the burning freighter will sink anyway in the heavy seas. The survivors managed to abandon ship in three lifeboats before she sank within 20 minutes. However, two of the boats were never seen again and its occupants presumably perished in the cold and bad weather. The boat in charge of the second officer set sail with eight Europeans and 23 Lascars aboard, but after seven days most had died of exposure and only four Europeans and two Lascars were still alive when the boat reached land on 1 March. Sadly, it capsized in the swell and surf of Caerthillian Cove on The Lizard, Cornwall and all occupants drowned except the second officer, who was rescued unconscious by a coastguard. The bodies of two Europeans and the two unidentified Lascars were recovered and buried in the Landewednack Churchyard. The master, 82 crew members and two gunners were lost.
The cargo being carried by the Gairsoppa comprised of 2600 tons of pig iron, 1765 tons of tea, 2369 tons of general cargo and 200 tons of silver ingots and coins. Some 50 tons of the silver bullion has been recovered in an operation claimed to be the heaviest and deepest recovery of precious metals from a shipwreck ever made.

An unknown sailor from the Gairsoppa. His CWGC entry says that he was of Indian nationality.

Nothing is known of these two sailors other than they were of Chinese nationality.

The oldest part of church is the twelfth century Norman doorway , decorated with typical Norman zig-zag carving. But it's a little more complicated than that as a 13th Century doorway has been set inside the earlier Norman opening. The perpendicular polished serpentine columns are 19th Century.

The Norman tympanum with the nicely decorated inner course. The  centre voussoir is missing and it is thought that there once was a figure that projected into the arch.

The font is 15th Century and is inscribed with 'Dn. Rich Bolham me fecit' which translates from Latin as ‘Master Richard Bolham had me made’. Richard Bolham served as rector of St Wynwallow’s from the early 15th Century. I'm not sure that the serpentine supports are contemporary with the bowl but they might be.

In 1549 the Act of Uniformity introduced the Book of Common Prayer in the English language during services, stirring the Prayer Book Rebellion. With the quick suppression of the uprising, the Cornish language fell into decline. In the latter 1670s, Reverend Francis Robinson preached: "Qy A Wra Aga Clewes Kewsel D’aga Tasow Agan Honen An Gwy Threson Mur A Dhew" (‘We do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God’). It would be the final sermon delivered in native Cornish and very fitting that it was about the power of speech.

Stained glass in North Aisle West dating from 1897: from left to right, St Peter, Christ and St John the Evangelist. I really am rubbish at taking photographs of stained glass. I know what I should be doing but never do it. One day, one day....

Stained glass in Chancel South dating from 1869: Christ raising the dead. It looks a lot brighter in situ and much more modern than the date suggests.

When we first visited St Wynwallow's some 6 or 7 years ago, I remember being impressed by the colourful kneelers on display. I am still impressed by the skills involved and the imagination of the designs. Far too good to kneel on!

Somewhere underneath all this lichen would be an inscription. But who would want to despoil this natural skin to get at it?

How many shades of Gray will we get?

 

A couple of weeks ago, as the allegations of numerous parties in Downing Street started to gain traction, I thought that if Johnson survived this self-inflicted crisis it would be the final proof that the Westminster system is irredeemably broken and utterly incapable of holding the powerful to account, even when they break the rules in the most brazen and egregious manner.

After a rocky week, and with the senior civil servant Sue Gray yet to deliver her report, it looks as though the Conservative rebellion against Johnson is losing steam. It may flare up again once the Gray report is published, even though that report will doubtless provide Johnson with sufficient wriggle room to allow him to get off the hook and once more escape the consequences of his actions, as he has done throughout his miserable entitled life. There are some Conservative MPs who claim that Johnson has been chastened by the experience and has learned his lesson. It’s hard to say whether they are stupid, lying, delusional, or simply trying to move the public narrative on, or possibly some combination of all of those, because surviving his recent difficulties with his job intact will only teach Johnson one thing - that he yet again has got away with it and that he will continue to get away with it in the future.

Johnson has certainly signalled to his critics that he’s not going to go easily, If they were hoping that the Gray report would make him hand in his resignation for the good of the party, they are in for a big disappointment. What’s for the good of the UK as a whole, what’s for the good of standards in public office or for British democracy does not register in the calculations of Conservative MPs. Johnson is a creature in their image, the only interests that any of them attach any importance to are their own. They want Johnson to go for their own self-interests, he’s equally determined to stay for his.

It was reported today that Gray has seen the email from a senior official to Johnson’s principal private secretary Martin Reynolds, warning him the 20th May party should not go ahead. This will make it harder for Johnson to maintain his obvious lie that he didn’t realise it was a party. But, of course, Johnson will say he never saw that email. Or that Reynolds never told him about it. And the report will merely repeat Johnson’s words since it’s not Gray’s job to draw conclusions.

Number 10 has mounted a ferocious campaign to keep Johnson in office. If the reports appearing in the press today are to be believed, the allegations are shocking but not surprising. This Conservative government is using the tactics of gangsters in order to keep Johnson in power. Tory whips are reportedly threatening and intimidating back bench Conservative MPs that if they do not get in line and support Johnson, then embarrassing and damaging stories about them will find their way to the press, which can only mean that there are plenty of damaging stories about the Conservatives which have not yet seen the light of day, and that this venal and corrupt party is even more venal and corrupt than we realise so far.

One senior Tory, and critic of Johnson, has even gone so far as to call on his colleagues to report instances of what he described as attempted blackmail to the Speaker’s office and to the police. William Wragg, the Conservative MP for Hazel Grove in Greater Manchester and the chair of the influential Commons public administration and constitutional affairs committee, claimed that Government whips were in breach of the ministerial code by threatening potential rebels by telling them that, unless they get behind Johnson, their constituencies would face the loss of hundreds of thousands of pounds of so-called levelling up funds.

If true this would be a criminal offence and rank and blatant corruption and signals the descent of the UK into the status of a kleptocratic gangster state. Levelling up funds are public money , they are supposed to be used for the public good, not to further the party political goals of powerful factions within the Conservative party. There have already been numerous reports that the Levelling up funds are being disproportionately spent in constituencies represented by influential Conservatives, this is the final proof that the Conservatives believe that the resources of the state and public monies are their private property, to be used to further their party political aims and to further entrench their rule. 

In his desire to save his own skin, Johnson is behaving like a mafia boss, threatening and intimidating his opponents, and misusing public funds in order to bribe back bench Tories to support him.

Yet in the broken and failed Westminster system, it is the same government against which the allegations are being made which is in charge of investigating the allegations and deciding whether the ministerial code has indeed been broken, and if so, what if any consequences there ought to be. Johnson has claimed that he has seen no evidence to support the allegations made by Wragg, allegations which were also made by Christian Wakeford, the former Tory MP for Bury South who yesterday defected to Labour. Surprise, surprise. And likewise it will be no surprise that if ever there is an investigation into these allegations of gangster criminality at the very heart of the British Government, it will find that no laws had been broken and that no one except possibly some lowly and inconsequential figure will be held to account, which in any case will amount to nothing more than a rap across the knuckles for what will be described as a minor infringement of the rules.

This government is not only corrupt, the UK is being governed by shameless gangsters and there is absolutely nothing in what passes for a British Constitution that allows anyone to hold them to account. 

I’m crying crocodile tears for the PM - not.

There is mounting speculation that Boris Johnson is to face a vote of confidence from Conservative MPs. This is not because they have suddenly discovered some moral outrage about a corrupt serial liar and man who didn’t know he was at a party even though he was warned not to go to the party. Those same Conservative MPs were quite happy to continue to support the corrupt liar even when his inaction and self-interest led to the UK suffering both the highest per capita death toll in Europe during the pandemic and the greatest economic damage.

They supported Johnson and the rest of his sociopathic cronies even after they reneged on their pre-referendum promises that a vote to leave the EU did not mean a vote to leave the Single Market and Customs Union yet after the vote was in they pursued the hardest Brexit possible purely in the party political interests of the Conservative party, no matter what havoc it wrought on Britain’s trade with the EU, and as we have seen, in some sectors, trade with Europe has fallen off a cliff.

They continued to support Johnson and his cronies even after a mountain of evidence came to light to prove that they unlawfully provided a so-called “VIP lane” giving preferential access to lucrative government contracts to the friends, family, and associates of senior figures in the government. In any other country, this would be called out for what it is – rank and rotten corruption.

They supported Johnson even after he and his government risked the fragile peace settlement in Northern Ireland, in the process trashing the reputation of the UK abroad and relegating the British Government to the ranks of untrustworthy bad faith bad actors who cannot be trusted to adhere to the terms of international treaty obligations which it had signed up to.

The UK is now a laughing stock abroad, a diminished and reduced joke, pathetically trading on nostalgia and fading memories of former power and influence while at home the government adopts increasingly authoritarian measures, cracking down on the right to protest and neutering any independent body such as the Electoral Commission, which might hold it to account. It is shamelessly seeking to by pass and undermine those alternative sources of democratic authority which exist in the UK, the devolved parliaments, despite not even possessing the pretence of any democratic mandate from the people of Scotland or Wales which legitimises it to do so.

All this has been just fine with Conservative MPs. They haven’t suddenly discovered a moral backbone, expecting the Conservatives to act morally is like expecting Sweeney Todd to offer a vegan pie. The only reason that the Tory back benches are now rumbling their disapproval and making anonymous briefings to the press that they might start to move against Johnson is because they are afraid for their own jobs, positions, and power. As always the only interest that motivates the Conservatives is self-interest.

Today one of the Brexit supporting new Conservative MPs from the so-called “red wall” seats in the north of England has left the Conservatives, citing the disgust of his constituents about the misdeeds of Johnson. Christian Wakeford the MP for Bury South has announced that he is joining the Labour party. This is a man who supports Brexit, who voted to cut Universal Credit, for the Nationality and Borders Bill which demonises migrants and asylum seekers and the Police and Crime Bill which places huge restrictions on the rights to peaceful protest in England and Wales. He is a man who signals with his Union flag face mask that he has fully signed up to the uber Anglo-British nationalism that remains the dominant force in British politics. Keir Starmer’s Labour party has welcomed him with open arms.

Those on the left have protested that such an individual is clearly no friend of the working class, the poor, and the marginalised. Others in Labour say that people like Wakeford are precisely what Labour needs if it is to have any chance of winning a majority at Westminster. And that right there is the nub of the problem with the Westminster system. Can we believe that the Labour party of Starmer will protect us from the Conservatives if the only way in which Labour can win a majority at Westminster is by transforming itself into a slightly more apologetic version of the Tories.

One Tory MP reportedly told the press that Johnson broke down in tears yesterday and certainly in some of his public appearances during the past day or so he has looked red eyed and close to tears. But when you watch Johnson seemingly close to tears,  just remember that this is the man who thought it was OK to “let the bodies pile high” in order to save his career. A narcissistic sociopath like Johnson can only cry for himself. He’s not crying because of any genuine contrition or remorse, that would entail caring about the impact that his selfishness has had on other people. He is crying because he has been found out, because he realises that he cannot any longer escape the consequences of his actions.

Johnson is likely to go sooner or later. He may hang on until after the May local elections as there is currently no obvious successor to him within the Tories and he or she will not want to carry the can for the drubbing that the Conservatives are likely to receive because of the widespread public anger about Johnson.

But whoever does succeed him is going to be just as bad. Deposing Johnson will certainly not mean that the Conservative party has changed. It will merely mean that it seeks a more efficient means of imposing its hardline Brexit agenda, its destruction of any checks and balances on its power. Even with a new leader the Conservatives will still be in thrall to the Brexit hardliners and Covid deniers on the back benches. There will still be platitudes but no meaningful action on climate change. There will still be the same aggressive Anglo-British nationalism, fetishising the royals and the armed forces and picking fights with Europe. There will still be the same attacks on any body or organisation that might hold the Conservatives to account.

Getting rid of Johnson won’t mean that the Conservatives have learned the error of their ways. As the economist Richard Murphy pointed out on Twitter, “He is being disposed of simply because he no longer meets the need of a party desperate for power in pursuit of the wanton destruction of all that is good.”

And a pox on all those who voted for him. You had no excuse for knowing what you were getting.

The Lizard Revisited 2022: Part 4

Shout it out loud! The sun shone today. Just proving that it isn't always raining in Cornwall. Time to hit the Coastal Footpath for the first time on this break.

A straightforward walk - out of the door onto the coastal footpath and head towards Mullion Cove. Then inland to Mullion and back via Poldhu Point. At just over 5 miles, it was good exercise.

We started off with a competition - how many dogs can you spot on the beach? I can see at least 10. More dogs than people, in fact.

Looking towards the Trewoon complex. We are staying in the cottage on the left. Very, very nice.

On the coastal footpath just below the Poldhu Nursing Home/Poldhu Hotel looking westwards towards Mount's Bay and Penzance. Actually with views like this, I think I'll put my name down on the waiting list for a bed in the home.

The visibility was not particularly good but St Michael's Mount is clear enough.

This lichen covered monument was erected in November 1937 by the Marconi Company , to recognise the pioneering work of Guglielmo Marconi and his research experts and radio engineers at the Poldhu Wireless Station between 1900 and 1935. In 1923 and 1924, Charles Samuel Franklin, inventor of the Franklin beam aerial, directed his short wave wireless beam transmissions to Guglielmo Marconi on his yacht 'Electra' cruising in the South Atlantic. This laid the foundation of modern high speed radiotelegraphy.

The swirling sea always accompanies a walk on the coastal footpath, which comes as no surprise as the clue is in the name. Pretty dumb thing to mention, really.

Poldhu Cove. Yet another beach that takes a lot of getting to so probably doesn't get too busy when the sun shines.

To the left, where we've come from. To the right, where we are going. In the middle, to parts not on our itinerary.

We come across many benches with memorial plaques on them. Some are more poignant than others, like this one just above Mullion Cove.
Lee Rendall, who came from Mullion, died after the moped he was riding collided with a single-decker bus. He suffered serious injuries and was taken to the Royal Cornwall Hospital at Treliske after the accident where he died. The accident happened close to the entrance to the Mullion Golf Club, just up the road from where we are staying. Lee left behind his pet boxer dog of 14 months, Amma.

A deserted Mullion Cove. Presumably the fishing boats were all at sea.

Mullion Church is dedicated to St Mellanus who was bishop at Rennes (Capital of Brittany) and died in the mid-sixth century. He is also honoured at St Mellion just down the road from where we live and St Mellons in Wales, just down from where Mrs P and I were in secondary school. The church is thought to be no older than the 13th century and this is the date of the font. The north and south aisles are later additions and the north door has a round arch, like a Norman arch, but in this case dating from the 16th century.

The three aisles of the church are rather dominated by the full width 20th Century rood screen. It is a masterpiece of wood carving (to my uneducated eyes) but it does seem to cut the three altars off from the congregation. But that was what the screen was intended to be - a barrier between the priest and the congregation.

Attractive though the rood screen is, I think the principal beauty of the church is the old oak seats. Dating from the 16th Century, they are traditionally supposed to have been carved from timber from the ancient forest, now Goonhilly Downs. On the front of the east-end pews of the nave there are the symbols of the Passion. Other pews include representations of the crucifixion, and Renaissance figures fancifully interpreted as Judas Iscariot, Pontius Pilate and many others. Well worth making a detour to see these.

The east window in the chancel - the Adoration of the Magi, dating from 1850. There is some evidence that 'ancient' stained glass was incorporated into the design. 

The stained glass in the North Chapel east window, showing Mathew, Mark, Luke and John. Dating from 1892, it is dedicated to one of the Robartes of Llanhydrock.

Fascinating to look at but not very comfortable to sit on. Good thing traditional services mean lots of bobbing up and down.

There must be an army of volunteers who spend time polishing all of the wood. An on-line guide to the church says "the moment the door is opened the sense of smell is pleasantly alerted; for Mullion smells of good polish, a mixture of beeswax and linseed which speaks of years of attention and affection". I think it still does.

In the South door there is a small hole at the bottom - the so called ‘Dog Door’ put there to allow farmers’ sheep dogs to leave when they had had enough of the service. 

I've already mentioned the connection of Marconi to Poldhu Cove and this information board says it all. Click on the image to enlarge it and read all about it.

Despite being the site of such pioneering work, the present day appearance of the 'radio' field belies its significance.

A Chough.

Not a Chough but a Jackdaw.

A rear view of a Kestrel. It refused to turn around and let me get a good look at it.

A Robin enjoying the sun.

The Lizard Revisited 2022: Part 3

A better day weatherwise with an even better day promised tomorrow. A very relaxed day with old friends (from 1970!), lunch at the Halzephron Inn at Gunwalloe and another visit to St Winwaloe's at Church Cove.

Just a nesting box but I like the contrasting textures of its treated wood against the natural bark of the tree.

St Winwaloe's is named after a 5th century Breton saint, who is said to have founded the first church on this site. It is the only church in Cornwall located on a beach. The earliest mention of a church at this site comes from 1332 when it was mentioned as a chapel connected with the church at Breage. It stood beside a holy well but not trace of that remains. Its exposed position has given it its popular nickname, The Church of the Storms.

The church is set in the dunes but is protected from the worst of the elements by a strip of rather weather beaten trees. The bell tower, probably 13th Century, on the left is physically separated from the main body of the church. 

There are two fonts in the church. This one was carved from granite in the 15th century to an octagonal design. It looks, to my eye, rather modern and has a pleasant symmetry.

The oldest font is Norman, made of Pentewan stone carved with a tree of life design. It was discovered in the churchyard, where it presumably was discarded after it was replaced by the more modern 15th Century one. 

The 15th Century gabled roof spanning the three aisles/halls. A tribute to the carpenters who made it.

An interesting feature in the church is a 15th Century screen, painted with a depiction of the Crucifixion. This screen originally spanned the entire width of the nave and aisles. It was later cut down and two bays were reused as the North and South church doors. These reused sections are painted with figures of the Apostles. A local tradition says that the screen was salvaged from the wreck of the Portuguese treasure ship The Saint Anthony, which ran aground at Gunwalloe on 19th January 1527. There is no evidence to confirm this and it is just as likely that wreck money was used to pay for the screen.

The south aisle or, more strictly, the south hall of the church.

The church has three rectangular halls joined by gabled roofs. The west end, where the 15th Century font is, of the central hall acts as nave, and in the east end can be found the chancel. It is thought that remains of that early church may have survived in the west end. On the lectern on the right is the sermon we sat through on Sunday. It read shorter than it sounded.

Looking out across Church Cove towards the Nursing Home on Poldhu Point. The Nursing Home was originally the Poldhu Hotel. The popularity of travel in the Victorian era saw a rapid increase in the number of visitors coming to Cornwall and with the introduction of the railways making travelling easier it was anticipated that the railway, which was operating in Helston, would be extended on to the Lizard. With this the construction of three large hotels began to meet the demand of the incoming tourists. The Poldhu Hotel was one of the first and was built in  1889. It was later announced that the railway wouldn’t be extended onto the Lizard but this did not halt the popularity of the hotels (Poldhu, Polurrian and Mullion Cove) to their Victorian visitors.

Who doesn't like to watch the sea? Ever changing, ever stimulating. I'd hate not to live within easy reach of the coast.

Quite a few Rock Pipits were scurrying on the shingle, poking about for food.

The late afternoon light was beginning to fade.

A great sunset in the West.