And where is the accountability?

It was always obvious to anyone with a grain of sense and half a brain cell that Boris Johnson was shockingly unfit to serve as Prime Minister (especially after his shambolic stint as Foreign Secretary). His appearance at the Covid Inquiry this week has done nothing to dispel that view and has merely underlined his unfitness once again. As satisfying as it was to see him grilled over his half-arsed and incompetent handling of the pandemic, it was still profoundly frustrating for several reasons. Not least of which is the suspicion that this inquiry will, instead of holding politicians to account for woeful decision making, turn out to be yet another example of establishment immunity.

Despite the Tory care home scandal, the billions of pounds lost in corrupt "VIP lane" covid contracts for Tory cronies, Rishi Sunak's insane "Eat Out To Help Out" scheme, and billions more squandered on covid support loans to fake companies and fraudsters, a light grilling by their establishment peers is as bad as it's ever going to get for the likes of Johnson and Hancock.

You'd have to ignore so much in the past to believe that this time it will be any different. That this time, their feet will be held to the fire. That this time, the precedents will be proven wrong. Here are some examples of what I have in mind

Tony Blair's actions lead to countless thousands being killed in Iraq and created the world's largest terrorism breeding ground, and the worst he faced was the Chilcot Inquiry exposing his lies. And then what?

Cameron and Osborne caused the premature deaths of innumerous people via their austerity agenda, and they haven't even been told off. They've got off scot-free because the establishment elitists are still as addicted to economically illiterate austerity ruination as they ever were.

Theresa May completely got away with introducing the unlawfully racist "Hostile Environment" which destroyed the lives of countless Commonwealth Brits and their families, to the extent of deporting British citizens who actually died in exile overseas.

It's sickening that the worst Johnson and his ilk are going to face is a bit of a telling off, rather than the jail time they deserve, but that's just how the British establishment order operates.

Another profoundly frustrating aspect is the faux shock and outrage from Labour politicians and their liberal-capitalist media outriders. They knew exactly how bad Johnson was all along, but that didn't stop them sabotaging the Labour Party from within. These people worked tirelessly to hand power to Johnson and his Tory rabble, because they saw it as a price worth paying to achieve their primary objective of taking control of the party for themselves.

Their outrage is doubly fake because they don't want to set the precedent of jailing political leaders for crimes of governance (why isn't there a crime of 'Government Manslaughter?) and corruption, because they want to retain the same establishment immunity for themselves when they get into power.

Without serious consequences for the profoundly corrupt architects of bad governance, the Covid Inquiry is destined to be just an empty performance. And we all deserve better than that. Or am I jumping to a premature conclusion?

Princetown in the snow

Things can only get better? Under Starmer?

 

Last week, as thousands demonstrated in the street outside his constituency office in protest against his refusal to call for a ceasefire in Gaza, Keir Starmer unapologetically tweeted: “I've changed the Labour Party and if I’m given the opportunity, I’ll change the country too.” Yes, indeed. Keir Starmer has changed the Labour party, he has changed it into the Conservatives.

His Labour party occupies approximately the same political space as that which was occupied by the Tories a few years ago. Labour is now an overtly Anglo-British nationalist party which wraps itself in the British flag, opposes rejoining the EU, supports privatisation in the NHS, and heaps more misery on the poor and the marginalised.

During a recent episode of the i newspaper podcast, Labour’s Plan For Power, Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary said that, far from protecting the NHS in England from the creeping privatisation it has endured under the Conservatives, he wants to speed the process up and increase private sector involvement in the provision of healthcare on the NHS. Streeting said he would “hold the door wide open” to the NHS for the private sector if the Labour party was to win the general election. He said that NHS England had “started to move in the right direction” by increasing the amount of private sector involvement in healthcare delivery, but he wanted to see a Labour government “put our foot on the accelerator”.

We always knew that the NHS was not safe in the Conservatives’ hands. Now we know it’s not safe in the hands of Keir Starmer’s Labour party either. Labour will speed up the erosion in England of the core ethos of the founders of the NHS. 

Last week, the Tories announced that they are going to make the already difficult lives of those struggling to survive on benefits even more difficult in order to find extra cash which they plan to use for tax cuts for those who are already comfortably off. The plan is not to raise benefits by the rate of inflation, which is an effective cut in the already inadequate money that claimants have to subsist on. However, to heap on the cruelty even further, it was also reported that the government plans to stop the current entitlement of means tested benefits claimants in England, to free prescriptions and dental treatment. The chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, said the move is necessary to stop “anyone choosing to coast on the hard work of taxpayers.”

This is an unspeakably vile and nasty move. Even former Tory Deputy PM Michael Heseltine has accused the Conservative government of fuelling ‘hate politics’ over its plan to strip the jobless of their entitlement to free prescriptions. It’s a measure which holds people’s health to ransom. Heseltine said ministers should not “use the health service as a sanction.” Former Conservative health secretary Stephen Dorrell also spoke out against the plan, saying that all governments face the difficult question of who should receive benefits, “but making a virtue of withdrawing healthcare support from people who, by implication need it, is deliberately unpleasant”.

Poverty has a major impact on health. People struggling to survive on destitution levels typically have worse health and suffer higher levels of illness than those living more comfortable lives. The Conservatives propose to deal with this by denying the unemployed access to vital medications and leaving them to suffer the agonies of toothache.

You might think that the Labour party would be loudly condemning this egregious cruelty that even former Conservative Ministers under Thatcher and John Major think is a hateful and unacceptable exercise in nastiness for the sake of nastiness, designed to pander to the basest prejudices of the far right media. Sadly, but unsurprisingly, you would be wrong. Not only has the Labour party said that it will not oppose this offence against humanity and common decency and will not reverse it when in power, but Labour’s shadow work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall reportedly told The Times newspaper that in her view the Conservative plans did not go far enough.

Labour’s move to the right is a consequence of the broken system of British politics and the first past the post system for Westminster elections so beloved of both the Labour and Conservative parties. It’s a system which repeatedly forces voters to choose the least worst option, as the Conservatives move to the right, Labour moves rightwards in order to appeal to the former Tory voters, whose support it needs to win the election. This, in turn, nudges the Conservatives to shift even further to the right, and with every election the depressing cycle repeats itself. We get the toryfication of Labour and the Conservatives slide into extreme right wing authoritarian populism.

Labour is now where the Tories were under John Major, while the Conservatives are now an extreme right party advocating policies which were beyond the pale of political acceptability only a few decades ago. Now many Tories advocate leaving the European Convention on Human Rights, something which not even UKIP dared to push for prior to the Brexit referendum. Meanwhile the Conservative assault on civil liberties continues.

The Tories have now normalised extremism, aided and abetted by a British media which is now presenting Nigel Farage as a colourful character on a reality TV show and not for what he is, a dangerous fascist. Labour refuses to undo Tory policies once it gets into power and the rightward decline of British politics continues unabated. Not in my name, not in my name.

You couldn't make it up.

Rishi Sunak’s big revelation was that he was the ‘change’ candidate. Remember, just a few short weeks ago he was telling the Tory party conference that British politics have been locked into a cosy and damaging short termist consensus for the past thirty years and that he was the guy who was going to change all that and shake things up. It was never a convincing claim at the best of times, relying as it did on us all collectively forgetting that the Tories have been in power since 2010 and that Sunak himself has been either Prime Minister, Chancellor of the Exchequer or a government minister since 2018. But then patronising the public and demanding that we ignore the evidence of our own eyes and ears has very much been the stock in trade of the Conservative party for many years now. That much at least did not come under the umbrella of those things about British politics that Sunak was determined needed to change.

However, Sunak can no longer pretend that he’s the ‘change’ candidate, as he has brought back David Cameron into a senior role in Government. Cameron, a man best known for being the architect of austerity, allegedly sexually molesting a dead pig’s head (I know he’s repeatedly denied this but…..), and holding the disastrous Brexit referendum in order to get himself out of some internal party difficulties with the spittle-flecked, Brexit-loving, frothing right wing extremist end of the Conservative party. As we all know he lost that referendum, and immediately ran away from the consequences of his failure, leaving the rest of the UK at the mercy of a Conservative party which had been fully taken over by the spittle-flecked, Brexit-loving, frothing right wing extremists. All of Britain is still paying the price for that, and by sacking the dangerously incendiary Suella Braverman from her post as Home Secretary, Sunak has given the spittle-flecked, Brexit-loving, frothing right wing extremists a new reason to feel aggrieved.

Braverman will now return to the back benches from where she will continue her manoeuvring for the party leadership after Sunak takes the Tories to inevitable defeat at the next general election. Now free from the constraints and discipline of the doctrine of collective cabinet responsibility, Braverman is likely to become even more extreme in her attention seeking pronouncements as a back bencher. Should the UK Supreme Court rule later this week that her plan to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda is unlawful, she will be leading the Conservative calls for the UK to leave the European Convention on Human Rights, which if successful would amongst other things allow for the restoration of the death penalty.

In Braverman’s eyes, if her plan is deemed to be cruel and inhumane and in breach of an international treaty on human rights which a previous British government was instrumental in designing and implementing, the problem lies with the legal guarantee of human rights, not with her performative cruelty. Braverman might have gone, but the constitutional and political vandalism she represents remain very much at the heart of the Conservative party.

Sunak had no choice but to sack her. But it wasn’t her calling homelessness a lifestyle choice favoured by people with foreign accents that did it for her. It certainly wasn’t describing asylum seekers as an invasion. It wasn’t calling pro Palestinian demonstrations “hate marches”. And it wasn’t even claiming that the police favour left wing protestors over those on the right and making the violence seen from fascists over the weekend more likely. No, what really signalled the end of her tenure as Home Secretary were the reports that she had, as protocol demands, submitted a draft version of her incendiary article in The Times to Downing Street for approval and had then refused to make the changes to it which the Prime Minister’s office had asked of her. It showed that Sunak was unable to control his own cabinet, reinforcing the already widespread impression of a weak Prime Minister who is being led by his party rather than leading it.

Braverman’s comments led to right-wing demonstrators going on a rampage in London on Saturday, but the BBC focused on the placards and chants of those protesting against Israel’s collective punishment of the people of Gaza. Now the Tories are once again talking about cracking down on the right to protest.

By bringing David Cameron back as Foreign Secretary, Sunak is making a desperate gamble. He is trying, rather desperately, to shift the political dial in his favour, given that his conference speech and the King’s Speech were miserable flops. He is almost certainly about to reignite calls from the far right of the party for his resignation. And while appointing Cameron as Foreign Secretary, via his hastily contrived elevation to the House of Lords, is certainly attention grabbing, ensuring that on the day of the reshuffle press attention was mainly on Cameron and less so on the sacking of Braverman, it’s a move which comes with many risks. The appointment comes just two years after a parliamentary inquiry found that the former prime minister had shown a “significant lack of judgment”over a lobbying campaign for a financial services company in which he held a personal economic interest, Greensill Capital, which collapsed in 2021. But not until after then Chancellor Rishi Sunak had pumped £5 billion in public money into the company as a result of Cameron’s lobbying. But never mind any of that, it's in the past and Cameron is a good chap. An old Etonian, don't you know?

The inquiry found that Cameron had not broken any rules in this sordid and grubby episode, but it was clear that the rules were woefully inadequate. Of course nothing has changed, and now the lobbyee has brought the lobbyer back into the heart of government, in a manner which ensures that Cameron will never have to face any democratic scrutiny or accountability. It’s all within the rules, and it’s the epitome of all that is wrong with Westminster, rules which Starmer’s Labour party has no intention of changing. But Sunak is gambling that this sleazy deal won’t come back to haunt him. Let's hope it will. What's that saying? "What goes around, comes around".

Now the man who gave us austerity and whose vanity gave us the Brexit referendum is back in the heart of government, still smug, still glib, still having learned nothing or having suffered any consequences for the havoc and chaos that are the lasting legacy of his term in Downing Street. That’s the real message of this reshuffle.

Just as Sunak’s claim to be the real candidate of change is a bad joke, fingers crossed that Starmer’s promise to be the ‘change Britain needs’ will be not revealed to be equally hollow.

National Trust standards are slipping

As a long time member of the National Trust, I take enormous pleasure in visiting their properties around the country and admiring the traditional craftsmanship on display. Naturally, as somewhat of an obsessive nerd,  I am always reassured to see their craftsmen using only old-fashioned slotted screws in all locations. Imagine my horror then when I visited one property recently (I won’t embarrass them by saying where but it’s not far from our home in South East Cornwall and it begins with C) and, while taking a comfort break, I noticed that the exposed pipework in the Gents had been fitted with cross-head screws. Naturally this completely spoilt my visit, not to mention my aim.

Which leaves me in a quandary. In order to prevent further trauma, should I (a) carry a screwdriver and a selection of slotted screws with me on visits in order to replace offending fixings, (b) cancel my National Trust membership in protest forthwith, or (c) get out less? Answers on a postcard, please.

Things can only get better?

 

Keir Starmer has high hopes of becoming the next Prime Minister, unless he blows it between now and the next General Election or the Tory media attack-dogs really start to bite. However, his claim to deserve the office rests not upon any positive offer of real and meaningful change from a Labour party which he has taken so far to the right that a conservative American Republican senator has hailed the British Labour party as ‘reaganesque’ in its taxation policies. But rather in the moral, intellectual, and political bankruptcy of a Conservative party whose policies and style, Starmer seems to be eagerly adopting. Ronald Reagan, for those too young to remember, was the American president who ushered in an era of tax cuts for the better off, combined with the decimation of government programmes to assist the poor and the low paid. It should be obvious to everyone by now that so-called trickle-down economics have been a historic failure, but it lives on in the guise of ‘growing the economy’. It is beloved by its adherents on the right because it provides a fig leaf of intellectual cover for the greed and selfishness of the wealthy.

Reagan campaigned on the racist trope of the ‘welfare queen,’ blaming America’s economic woes not on the rich who refused to pay their fair share of taxes, but on poor, often African-American single mothers, who relied on government assistance to feed their families. Then, as now, many of those who were so demonised were, in fact, in low paid employment, but the poor were blamed for their poverty, not the employers who did not pay a living wage. The result was a widening of the gap between rich and poor and the mushrooming of shanty towns in American cities as homelessness exploded and the closure of facilities for people with mental health problems saw mentally ill people dumped on the streets with no support. Reagan’s economic policies were copied by Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative party, with similar results. The Tories have sought to change the language so that the poor receive ‘welfare’ or ‘benefits’ – a handout graciously doled out by taxpayers - rather than ‘social security’ - a safety net to which all contribute and upon which all can rely in time of need.

The Conservatives have not only changed the language of social security, they have destroyed the concept of social security itself. Over the past couple of decades, we have witnessed the normalisation of food banks and the normalisation of homeless people begging in the streets of our towns and cities. Neither of these things is ‘normal’. A supposedly rich and developed economy in which citizens are routinely forced to beg on the streets or to turn to charitable handouts in order to put food on the table, is a society which has failed. There is nothing inevitable about homelessness or food and fuel poverty. They are the direct consequence of decisions made by successive Westminster governments. Our politicians have let us down.

Traditionally, after a bruising and brutal period of Conservative misrule, Labour has laid claim to the Buggin’s turn chance of taking over the reins of power by claiming that it will reduce and adjust the size and weight of the boot which the Conservatives have stamped down upon the neck of the poor and the low paid. But no one now seriously expects that a Labour government is going to get rid of the boot entirely. The Labour party, like the Tories, has a vested interest in the continuation of the dysfunctional Westminster system and the inequalities which it produces.

We have a Labour party which insists that it will not raise taxes on the wealthiest. Starmer has categorically ruled out any tax increases on the wealthiest and will not raise income tax on the highest earners or introduce a one off wealth tax of 5% on all individual wealth above £500,000, which would only be levied after mortgages and other debt had been taken into account and which could be paid off in installments over five years. This one off tax which could raise an estimated £260 billion which, at a stroke, would solve the funding issues blighting education and the NHS. But Labour is not going to do anything like this. 

Labour’s claim that it’s not going to raise taxes on the rich but rather will focus on ‘growing the economy’ is simply code for the same discredited trickle-down economics which have caused such societal blight for decades. Labour is no longer promising to adjust the weight and size of the Tory boot on the necks of the poor. Instead, Starmer’s Labour party is saying: “Nah, the boot is just fine.” 

The distortion of democracy created by Westminster’s first-past-the-post system – which neither Labour nor the Conservatives are willing to change – means that we are all held ransom by a minority of voters in Conservative-Labour swing seats. This in turn means that even policies which enjoy the widespread support of a clear majority of people across the UK have no chance at all of ever being adopted. For example, most people in the UK believe that Brexit was a mistake, but neither Labour nor the Conservatives will seek to minimise the damage and restore British membership of the European Single Market or Customs Union. 

A major opinion poll published last week found that a clear majority of voters, even Conservative voters, would like to see the renationalisation of the gas, electricity, water and rail companies. The poll, carried out by Tory donor Lord Ashcroft, found that 60% of respondents across the UK backed these companies being brought back into public ownership. A majority of both Labour and Conservative voters supported public ownership. However, both Labour and the Conservatives are opposed to the move, so even though it enjoys clear majority support, it’s not going to happen. When neither of the two big Westminster parties feels the need to respond to majority opinion, it is a clear sign that the Westminster system has irretrievably failed. 

And, you know what, there's absolutely sod all that you and I can do about it. But that shouldn’t stop us from trying.

A political wish-list - so much to do

I'm not a great user of Twitter/X but I dip in every now and again to test the political waters. Today, I came across this quote: Much of the UK looks and feels like a poor country. We visit from NL, and it's  shocking at times. Everything's tatty. Dysfunctional, high streets boarded up, trains and buses no shows, broken machines, signs of decay and poverty everywhere. It doesn't have to be like that.

I agree - it doesn't have to be like this. It shouldn't be like this. But is it any surprise in a country without a plan and a government that has run out of ideas. Mr Sunak once appeared to offer, at best, the prospect of managed decline, but, as the country crumbles around him, even this is a forlorn hope. He seems to have neither the will nor the ability to lead competently. The question facing Keir Starmer’s Labour Party is whether it will fare any better – and end this age of private affluence and public squalor.

And it's one hell of a mountain they've got to climb. Just take a look at all the issues that need attention. Add your own to the list. What a s**tshow.

Sewers
Water
Sewage in water
Energy security
De-carbonising said energy
Raac in schools
Raac in prison
Raac in hospitals
Raac in courts
Raac in flats
NHS waiting times
NHS recruitment
NHS funding
NHS fraud
Military funding
Military recruitment
Military retention
Military skills gap
Poverty
Child poverty
Mental health crisis 
Child mental health crisis
Suicide figures
Declining birth rate
Poor housing
Lack of housing
Lack of house building
Lack of affordable housing
North-South divide
Transportation 
Trains
Potholes
Electric car infrastructure
Industrial strategy
Investment strategy
Funding for local government
Social services within local government
Old age care
Supported accommodation
Support for learning disabilities
Education funding
Books
School libraries
Extracurricular activities
Pre-school support
Paternity leave
Statutory maternity leave
Statutory sick pay
In work benefits
National living wage

Northern Ireland

Power-sharing
The DUP
Money laundering
HMRC
Fraud
Computer fraud
The LSE
Social mobility
Institutional racism
Boys
Gender recogniition
Girls
Cyber-bullying
Sports
Public green spaces
Homelessness
Drug addiction
Access to nuclear fuels
Acceptance of UK qualifications abroad
Musician touring
Open skies

Skills shortage

Unskilled labour shortage
Higher education
Further education

Economic inequality

Immigration

The triple pension lock
Adult education
University fees
Access to the arts
Restriction of arts degrees to the wealthy
Museums
Labour relations
Strikes
Press ownership
Freedom of speech
Right to protest
Diminishing freedoms
SLAAP
Brexit
More Brexit
Planning reform
Scotland
Wales
Federalism
House of lords
Quangos
Sparks
The houses of parliament itself
The royal list
Transparency

Digital equality

Republicanism

Disestablishment
Data protection and ownership
Electricity pricing
Water pricing
The whole area of local taxation
Wealth taxes
The Irish problem

Summer Holiday 2023: Swaledale Part 2

 Our second walk along the Swale. A day that promised more rain than we actually got.

A circular walk from Muker - up one side of the Swale to Keld and down the other side on our way back. It came in at just under 7 miles and I'd rate it as moderate as it had a few 'moments'.

Looking upriver from the Muker bridge. Our footpath was to the right.

More Oystercatchers. Still can't get over seeing them up here.

Swaledale ewe next to the Swale.

Coming up to the footbridge over the Swinner Gill. The other walkers are sitting in the crumbling ruins of the Swinner Gill lead mines.

Looking back from whence we came. It was not a sunny, clear day. The walled fields we'll be walking through on our return leg are over the river on the right.

I guess this Uber driver got fed up waiting for his next fare.

Looking down on the Kidson Gorge where, although we did not venture down, can be found the Kidson Falls.

Just to record that we did walk a stretch of the Penine Way and the Swale Trail. At this point we were heading to Keld to route out the Keld Green Cafe, which we did and very good it was too.

Looking up the Swale again from the Keld footbridge.

A bull mask in the Keld Local Museum. A quite brutal design with the hole in the front - read the label for a description.

An abandoned farmstead overlooking the river. I couldn't be bothered to walk up to take a more panoramic shot of it.

Looking across to Swinner Gill. It's quite a cleft in the hillside. Some of this would have undoubtedly have been shaped by the activities of centuries of mining but not all.

And here we are almost back at the start, quite near the Muker bridge but on the other side of the river. A good walk.

Summer Holiday 2023: Swaledale Part 1

Summer holidays are here and we are spending two weeks in Swaledale, in the North Yorkshire National Park. After a pretty horrendous journey up on the M6, we were looking forward to getting some fresh air and we did just that on our first day after travelling.

Our first walk was from the door of our barn and followed the Swale up to Mucker (pronounced Mooker) and back. It came in at 6.9 miles, but we'll call it 7. The half way refreshment break was at the tea shop in Mucker (pronounced tee shop). Nothing too energetic but looks to see along the way.

Our residence for the next two weeks - Millbridge Barn. Look! No neighbours.

The single span bridge over the Swale at Ivelet - more of this later.

The landscape in Swale is characterised by buildings like this one. I call them 'field barns' but the locals call them Cow’us  or Cowuss  (pl  Cow’uses) - cow houses. These cow'uses are all over the place, not quite one for every field but, in some parts, not far off that ratio.

We went into one of them being used as an example and it was quite simple and functional. They were used to house cows mainly - sheep were hardy and kept outside - over the winter months. There was room for stalls in which the animals were tethered and plenty of room for hay, straw and other food.

Lots and lots of fields and miles and miles of dry stone walls criss crossing the landscape. In this part of the world, although there are what I would regards as conventional stiles, there are breaks or 'squeezes' in the stone walls, created by vertical stones, which you can just about manage to squeeze through. More often than not, there will be a small gate on one side kept in place by a rather strong spring. This is not the place for weight-challenged people or pregnant women.

The Ramps Holme bridge over the Swale.

Looking back towards the Ramps Holme bridge. It is a long, narrow single span wooden bridge, supported in the centre by a conical stone tower, and at each end by a raised stone platform. The design raises it high above the river and well above any flood water, a regular occurrence with the Swale.

The Muker area is one of the best places to see upland hay meadows from public footpaths in the Yorkshire Dales. Some of the meadows at Muker are protected as part of the Muker Meadows Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) and the Northern Pennine Dales Meadows Special Area of Conservation (SAC). They are species-rich with a very wide range of wildflowers and grasses including Wood Crane’s-bill, Melancholy Thistle, Yellow Rattle, Pignut, Lady’s Mantles, Rough Hawkbit, Cat’s-ear and Sweet Vernal Grass. Easy access is provided via flagged footpaths.

Nah, it couldn't be. An Oystercatcher up here, so far from the sea? But, yes, they do come to this part of the world to breed. They are ground nesting birds and here's as good a place as any. Instead of their normal maritime diet of shellfish etc, they pick away at insects in the meadows..

The Muker Literary Institute was built in the 1860s by public subscription at a cost of £257 2s 7d, to provide a venue for residents (in practice men – though the constitution did not exclude women) to read and meet. Many Swaledale villages had such institutes originally built to provide adult self-education opportunities. It resonates with me as it reminds me of the Bedwas Workingmen's Hall that featured prominently in my early years.

What a lovely title - Muker Literary Institute and Mutual Improvement Society.

I find this catalogue of books in the library in September 1864 intriguing. Who decided that heavyweight tomes like Macaulay's History of England and Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress were just what was needed to get the good people of Muker reading? Or perhaps I've got it wrong. Maybe the locals demanded that these books be included. Why do I think this was somebody's idea of what should be read rather than what was wanted to read?

St Mary’s the Virgin at Muker blends in with its surroundings. It is one of the few churches to be built in the reign of Elizabeth I and was consecrated in 1580. It was originally built as a chapel of ease for St Andrew’s in Grinton, lower down the valley. It had a thatched roof and no tower. The thatch was replaced by stone slates in 1761 when pews were installed in the church. The tall narrow tower dates from 1793. The clock was paid for by public subscription to commemorate the wedding of King George V and Queen Mary. 

Colourful stained glass window above the altar depicting Christ the Shepherd.

All you need to know about hiring a hearse in Muker. By hearse, I think that it would be more like a cart than anything else.

Private Thomas Clarkson.
325648, 1st/9th Battalion Durham Light Infantry, formerly 30597, Yorkshire Regiment. Son of John and Ann Clarkson, of Richmond. Died at home of wounds on 30th April 1917. Aged 27.
"GREATER LOVE
HATH NO MAN THAN THIS
THAT A MAN LAY DOWN HIS LIFE
FOR HIS FRIENDS"

Looking back towards Mucker (pronounced Mooker) on our return leg. The clouds look more threatening than they were. We just had a few scattered showers.

And that's our residence in the mid-ground.

Look carefully and you'll be able to count three cow’uses. These date back to the late 18th and 19th century when there were more cattle kept and farms were much smaller, quite often with only one field. All of which fits with the somewhat random patchwork of fields and walls. Another factor which might have lead to the small units was the custom of 'partible' where the inheritance of farms were divided equally amongst all surviving heirs. I'm not sure how this worked out over the generations as dividing an increasingly small 'pot' seems to be counterproductive.

The Swaledale sheep are the typical breed in these parts (the clue is in the name). They are noted for their hardiness, off-white wool, curled horns and white around their nose and eyes. They taste pretty nice as well.

I presume that the house-owner has an interest in fishing?

And at the end of the walk, we are back to the bridge at Ivelet. As bridges go, I think it’s just about perfect. Form and function combine effortlessly to make something both beautiful and practical. It’s stood the test of time and survived the worst that the Swale, in full spate, can unleash. There’s no doubt whatsoever that its builders, in the late 17th century, knew exactly how to build a bridge!