I am not sure I first heard the above saying when I was in the cradle but I am sure I heard it very soon after.

It was one of those much used sayings in the more frugal times of my generation’s younger years.
It was in keeping with the real poverty of pre-war times, through the years of the Second World War, and the hard times which came after that war.

Our “make do and mend” habit and our of “keeping little bits of string” have provided much amusement to those born in more prosperous times.

Reluctantly at my age I am now having to admit to myself that those little bits of string, the boxes of screws, nails, nuts, washers and bolts, collected diligently by dismantling anything we did scrap, (but only after the items were no longer reparable), and sundry other artifacts kept in the loft because they could be used again, ‘in extremis’, will have to go before long.

I might manage to ensure that anything useful in any way will be so used. I doubt that the next generation will have the time or the inclination to do other than “take it to the tip”.

Over a lifetime our frugal ways will have provided us with much satisfaction and saved us more than a pound or two. I would still rather mend an old item than have a new one.

Clothes go only when they are worn out. None of this nonsense of ‘throwing out anything you have not worn for a year. As you age you can shrink into clothes you have not been able to wear for years.

I look on the profligate ways of the younger generations, when they are spending their own money, with pity and hope that they will not fall on hard times in the future.

I get thunderingly angry, or worse, when they waste my money.

My letters published in the Staines Guardian, over the last year or so, document how my money, and other council tax payers money, has been, and is, squandered by my local and county councils.

I put that down to a majority of councillors being well past their prime, and without the wit to realise it, or perhaps knowing they are past it but liking the money too much. If they are of my age, and many look as though they are, they either do not remember the hard times or had a more priveliged childhood than I did.

At a national government level, it is clear beyond question that our politicians take every penny they can get for themselves whilst failing completely and utterly to worry about others.

Completing my wife’s and my own annual tax forms has provided a classic example of the government failing to look after mine and your pennies.

All some elevated civil servant, well paid and pensioned,in the Revenue and Customs Department had to do was to get the design of the envelopes, in which completed forms were to be returned, correct.

It proved too much of a challenge for his intelligence.

The A5 size envelope for one of the forms had an address window which was too small so part of the address could not be seen.

An A4 size envelope was provided for a thin four page form weighing about 25 grams even with the envelope.

This was accompanied by a request that the form should be sent unfolded, because the form would be ‘machine read’.

Presumably another elevated civil servant, well paid and pensioned, in the Revenue and Customs Department, lacked the intelligence to ensure that the design of the form was such that the information to be so read would be located away from the fold line.

That would allow a smaller A5 envelope, hopefully one with a large enough window, to be used. In that way the millions of tax payers returning such forms could use Ordinary Letter Post at a cost of 36p First Class or 27p Second Class. Doing what the Revenue and Customs Department wanted would mean that it would have to go Large Letter Post at a cost of 52p First Class or 42p Second Class. Needless extra cost to the tax-payers,(16p if you use First Class or 15p if you use Second Class). The extra money going as a gift to Royal Mail or whatever it calls itself these days.

Needless to say I folded the edge of the A5 envelope and taped it down to keep the address visible.

I also folded the A4 envelope in half to A5 size, taped the edges, and sent it Ordinary Letter Post.

I had to re-write the address on that envelope correcting the address from ‘Liverpool, Great Britain’, to ‘Liverpool, England’.

My guess is that another, or maybe the same elevated civil servant, aiming to ingratiate himself with his masters, decided that, totally needlessly and after all these many years, that there should be a ‘country’ line in the address. Then he could use ‘Great Britain’ rather than ‘England’ and make his pathetic little contribution to the government's ‘Promote Britain‘ campaign, their feeble attempt to undo the damage done by their devolution policy.

The press again reports a story that should make every thinking adult's blood run cold and terrify every single child in the country.

A very young child has an accident in which his head strikes the ground.

The caring parents send for an ambulance.

The crew decide there is no need to take the child to hospital.

Later that night the child’s mother finds the child in bed clearly seriously ill.

Another ambulance is sent for. The child is taken to hospital. The medical staff’s efforts fail to save the child, who dies.

The report which I read said the parents have two other young children.

It did not say what the parents actions were when the child was taken into hospital.

It does not say who cared for the children if both accompanied the, by then, very ill child to hospital.

It does not say if one parent had to stay worrying at home while the other went to the hospital with the child.

It does not say if the other children were further traumatised by being taken into care.

After the young child’s tragic death the sinister servants of our “sick state” then immediately leap into action.

They exhibit a concern that would have been far better exhibited when the ambulance was first sent to see the child that died.

They accuse the parents of murdering their own child. The child’s grieving mother is taken into police custody, unbelievably “in hand-cuffs “.

The mother collapses and has to be taken into hospital, probably the one where her son has so recently died.

The wheels of our “sick state” roll slowly on. Eventually the parents are declared innocent and released from custody.

The Ambulance Authority belatedly announces an investigation.

The Police Force belatedly say the parents were arrested on suspicion of murder but any suspicion against them has been completely lifted.

The damage has been done.

Nothing that our “sick state’ can now do will right the wrong that has been done to this family.

Surely no civilised society should handle incidents such as this so brutally and so insensitively?

Be frightened, It could easily happen to your family!

As Pastor Niemöller might have written:-
When the "sick state" came for my first neighbour
I remained silent;
It was not for me.
When they locked up my second neighbour
I remained silent;
It was not me.
When they came for my third neighbour
I did not speak out;
It was not me.
When they came for the fourth neighbour
I remained silent;
It was not for me.
When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.

The time for all good people to speak out is now, before it is too late.

Yet again I am surprised that a news item which I thought would reverberate in the media died a sudden death.

This time it was the emergence of the fact that a British Prime Minister, an officer and a gentleman, I thought, and an old Etonian, I believe, supressed the news that a definite link had been established between cigarette smoking and lung cancer.

He apparently did this because he was more concerned about the tax revenue he could lose, if the news led to a fall in cigarette sales, than he was with the fact that some of his fellow men and women, those who might have given up smoking if they knew of the risk to their health, would die unpleasant and early deaths.

He would have known that families would often lose their only bread winner, as few married women worked in those days, and children would lose their fathers. It is hard if not impossible to think of a more despicable decision any man in such an elevated position in a nation's establishment could possibly make.

I saw no estimate of the number of unnecessary deaths which could have occurred as a result of that decision.

I would guess that it was many, many, times the number of deaths which have resulted, so far, from the decisions of later Prime Ministers to engage the country in military adventures.

I thought that those Prime Ministers would have difficulty in sleeping at night but the deaths resulting from their decisions are as nothing compared to the decision to supress the news of the establishment of the link between smoking and lung cancer.

Perhaps the news died it’s sudden death because most of those now working in the media are younger and were not themselves denied the information on the health risks of cigarette smoking and were therefore free to make their own decision.

My age group were those who were at the age when the sometimes fatal, often disabling, decision to become, or not to become, a smoker, was usually made. We were denied the facts at least for some time. Many of them may have suffered unnecessarily and many unnecessarily died early deaths. Perhaps that is why I feel so strongly on this issue.

Those older than I am who may have given up smoking if they had known the risks were also denied the facts for some time at least. Few of the smokers in that cohort will still be alive and those that are will be amongst the few who have the genes to protect them from tobacco smoke.

Most of the other few older survivors will be non-smokers. They will have been the few strong enough, or poor enough, to be able to resisted the exceedingly strong social pressures that existed, throughout all levels of society at that time, to be a smoker.

Offering around your packet of cigarettes, and accepting other’s offers, were daily social rituals and those who did not participate were made to feel uncomfortable outsiders.

The recent elections, in which Surrey Council residents had no part to play, set me contemplating what has changed in our lives, particularly during the last decade or so.

Just over a decade ago our Prime Minister could accuse a political opponent of being “frit". A dialect term, from her part of our country for being frightened.

These days I suggest "the state" has all of us “frit”.
I certainly am, even with the protection and freedom to speak one’s mind that no longer having to obtain and keep employment confers.

We are now frightened to express a view on a whole range of subjects because of the accusations, and worse, that will rain down on us.

We are frightened that even when we have said or done nothing a malicious accusation will have us treated like a convicted criminal, can destroy our family, cost us our job and future prospects of employment, even when eventually the accusation is proven to be an untrue malicious one.

We are frightened to teach our children and grandchildren many traditional nursery ryhmes and songs for fear they will cause offence.

We are frightened to tell the jokes that always started “ There was an Englishman, a Scotsman, an Irishman and a Welshman” and in which anyone of the nations could be the butt of the joke.

We are now frightened to play or sing the Flander’s and Swann song “The English the English" etc.(They will be banning the ‘Gasman Cometh’ next.)

We are now frightened to intrevene in any street incident. This is both because of the fear that knives will be produced and because of the way any such brave and foolish public spirited person will be treated by the police when they belated arrive on the scene.

We are frightened because if a gang of burglers, armed with an axe, break into our home the police will fail to respond to a 999 call.

We are frightened that, if we are in our sixties and have long been a primary school teacher,(a job almost every man is frightened to even consider these days), the discovery that we once let our fishing licence go out of date would end our career.

We are frightened that if we, and the bus driver, fails to realise our Oyster Card was a few pence short we will end up in court and get a criminal record.
We are frightened what the next stealth tax will be foisted upon us.

We are frightened just what the next hare-brained scheme will be dreamed up by our European, national or local politicians to waste our hard earned taxes and at the same time line their own pockets by way of unjustified, if legal , expense claims or by illegal but unregulated ways.

We are frightened of just what unrealistic military commitment our national Government, none of whom I understand has ever served in the armed forces, will undertake and of the young men’s lives that will be needlessly lost.

At another level we are frightened by the officious actions of local Government councillors and employees over rubbish and recycling collections. Have you tried reading, let alone decyphering, the recycling markings on many plastic items?

Even 20x20 vision and a powerful magnifying glass is not enough. We are frightened by the way in which the Government intrudes into every corner of our own life and our family life.

We are frightened on nothing more than a malicious accusation social workers and the secret Family Courts will take our children away and even rush them into adoption in order to defeat even that secretive legal system.

We are frightened that being on a DNA register could led to us being convicted and imprisoned by a technology stretched to its limits by its practitioners and understood by no one else.

(We have hung and imprisoned too many innocent men in my lifetime even with less involved technology and practices.) I am sure that the above is only part of the story.

On reflection, are you certain that you are not “frightened” in a way you never used to be?

I have been impatiently waiting for one of that large band of journalists, who air our prejudices day by day and reassure us that we have not yet flipped our lid, to comment on the recent NHS campaign. I am sure the revenue from the full page advertisements was welcomed by the newspaper proprietors but that is no excuse for letting such a misguided campaign pass without comment.
For those who have somehow missed the campaign I should explain it sets out to persuade us to use tissues when we cough or sneeze.
Obviously written and revued purely by females of our species, or by a male frightened into submission.
For centuries the civilised members of the human race have used handkerchiefs.
Smaller pretty handkerchiefs for the ladies.
Larger plain, or initialed, handkerchiefs for the men.
Years of development proved the right size for both and the right densely woven material, cotton of course.
Under pressure, when rapidly running through my stock of handkerchiefs during a heavy cold I have tried one of those pathetic tissues, even 3 ply ones, and received my just deserts, in my hand, to show just how stupid I had been.
No man I know would dream of using a tissue to blow his nose, one attempt shows they are no good for the job.
A tissue makes it more likely, probably certain, that one will get germs on one’s hands and hence spread them onto everything you touch, thus infecting others.
The advice given in the NHS campaign is clearly bad advice.
One question is how can such bad advice be passed for widespread publication.
Perhaps an even more important question is does the NHS really have the funds to waste on a campaign to tell us how to blow our noses even if they were promoting the centuries proven handkerchief ?.
Someone, somewhere in the NHS, and clearly not in front-line service, has clearly got nothing better to do with themselves than dream up tom-fool ways of squandering our taxes when there are a million and one ways that money could be far better spent within the NHS..

The other standard quotation is "Turkeys would not vote for Christmas".

I am beginning to wonder if that claim is still true.
Everyone seems to be in favour of a reduction in their tax bills.

However, it seems a very high proportion of our society are unable to see the simple connection between what they want or allow their politicians, local and national, to do and the size of their tax bill.

The question posed in the Local Guardian on-line edition a week or two ago was "Should public buildings fly the Union Flag?".

At my last look, of those who responded, 91.5% voted "Yes", 3.8% voted "No", 0.3% "Did Not Know" and 3.8% "Did Not Care".

How can this be? Flag flying, in line with traditional British reserve, is what was, until very recent years, regarded as something only to be done on very special occasions. Flag flying, domestically and on motor vehicles, is a relatively new practice in England.

It has been primarily associated with sporting activities. It has involved, in particular, the very late assertion of their nationality by English who had not seen the need until recently to follow the assertion of their nationality practiced by the other three home countries in flying their national flags.

I suggest that the majority of respondents could not have thought this issue through but have responded from their hearts and not their heads.

The population of Wales, who have no component of the Union Flag to represent their country, will not want to fly it.

They would prefer the Welsh Dragon Flag. The population of Scotland, who do have the Cross of St Andrew's in the Union Flag to represent them, will prefer to fly that flag alone.

In Northern Ireland, in their particular situation, flag
flying has for too many long sad years been controversial.

Encouraging flag flying at this time in our islands' history is most unwise to say the very least.

Being a tax payer of the older generation, who learned from hard experience "that money does not grow on trees", the last thing I would wish to do is to encourage our spendthrift national and local Government politicians to waste yet more money. There would be thousands, probably millions of pounds, of hard earned tax payers' money squandered on flags and flag-poles, overtime to public servants to raise the hundreds, probably thousands, of flags at dawn and lower them at sunset, frequent flag renewals, staff training in health and safety when flag raising and lowering, and lessons in which way up to fly the Union Flag.

Then there would be the cost of the very many hours our politicians would spend arguing whether they should fly the Union Flag or another national flag.

Added to that would be the cost of the time our public servants would spend deciding what size flag was appropriate for each and every building and where each and every batch of flags should be bought following an expensive tendering process.

From every viewpoint a totally hair-brained idea.

And yet the majority of Guardian readers who voted seem to want to have their hard earned money spent in such an unnecessary way.

They cannot all be public servants who might stand to gain, can they?