Saturday 24 December 2016

Happy Christmas!

Image result for smiths crisps
As you all know by now, this blog doesn't carry advertising, but if it did, these are probably some of the products and services I'd endorse. Have fun and enjoy the break. 
Image result for lucky numbers chocolatesImage result for lucky numbers chocolatesImage result for Woolworths UK imagesImage result for Party sevenImage result for zebo black grate polish imagesImage result for Witney Blankets imagesImage result for Cecil Gee imagesImage result for Tandy imagesImage result for Chelsea Girl imagesImage result for Hornby Dublo imagesRelated imageImage result for Bloater paste imagesImage result for Henekeys imagesRelated imageImage result for frog kits imagesImage result for Kwik Save imagesImage result for Freeman hardy willis imagesImage result for trust house forte images

63 comments:

  1. Thank you JB for YET another year of unstinting, steadfast and ever hopeful compassion for a much loved Service and for sustaining another year of Light on the impact of TR as we now move towards a Probation Review I hope you are able to have some rest and have a wonderful Xmas and New Year Wishing you good health and best wishes in ALL your endeavours during 2017 Take Care JB

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    1. Ian your posts to yourself are actually disturbing. Please stop!

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    2. Doesn't he just go on . Prayers and all that goodwill. It wont stop what has happened but lets enjoy the next few days and goldy keep your comments to the point.

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    3. Ignore them Ian.

      It's amazing that on the internet you can be anyone you want to be....but soooo many people choose to be c***s!

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  2. Thank you Jim.

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    1. I agree. Don't know what we would do without you! It helps to know what's going on. Thank you Jim!

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  3. Thank you for keeping the spotlight on the continuing injustice and incompetence of TR - 'trashing rehabilitation'

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  4. Thank you Jim. I have only just begun to join in this year, and it has been a comfort and an encouragement to hear truth spoken when we are lied to so much every day

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  5. Thank you, this blog helps us to stay informed.

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  6. Merry Christmas Jim!

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  7. This blog rocks, TR sucks, what on earth is Shippams Bloater Paste? and a Merry Christmas Jim and all.

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    1. Shipphams bloater paste was a wonderful thing. Made from fish, you could make sandwiches from it, but it was also great for keeping the leather on your football boots soft.
      It's a product that if you fed it to your kids today, they'd probably report you to social services for cruelty.
      I think they'd be justified too. It was horrid stuff.

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    2. "© Copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited 2016

      HOME»COMMENT»LETTERS
      The boat comes in for the last of the bloater paste
      A sad day for connoisseurs of a great-smelling spread.

      7:00AM BST 25 Aug 2010
      SIR – I have learned this week of the sad demise of bloater paste. The last supplier, Shippam's, now owned by Princes, has informed me that its production has been discontinued.
      It is a sad day for connoisseurs of this great-smelling little spread, with a special taste that I grew up with.
      I have one small jar left. Should I eat it, sell it on eBay or donate it to a museum?
      B. J. Simmons
      Birchington, Kent"

      http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/letters/7962341/The-boat-comes-in-for-the-last-of-the-bloater-paste.html

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  8. Probation Officer24 December 2016 at 10:28

    Probation Officers won't remember Cecil Gee, it was far too expensive. But then we did have decent expense claims and other payments in the past which buffered the poor pay. Merry Christmas Comrade Jim and keep up the good work in 2017.

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    1. Dad bought me my first suit from Cecil Gee in Golders Green when I was 18...

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  9. Happy Christmas Jim... personally, I preferred sardine and tomato paste although my Dad did the bloater one; that and the anchovy one! Spangles :) and Party Seven aka "automatic entry to a 1970s party"!

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    1. Absolutely true about the Party Seven - trouble is, once you'd lugged it under your arm for any length of time, it tended to spray the ceiling upon opening...

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    2. Use to hammer a screwdriver in on one edge then quite often forgot to put another breather hole in,messy.

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  10. Smiths Crisps - with a little paper twist of salt inside. The North remembers. Best wishes Jim.

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    1. A little paper twist of salt inside? Yep! But sometimes you could get a dozen of the little blue bags inside. More salt then crisps!

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  11. Great nostalgic blog post today. It makes me want Green Shield Stamps back.
    Glad chest hair and bell bottoms are a thing of the past though.

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    1. Really?

      Why didn't anyone tell me :(

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    2. Chest hair reminds me of some great advice I was once given on entering prison.
      I was cheerfully informed that if I shaved one leg, I wouldn't feel like I was sleeping on my own.
      Best advice I ever had.

      'Getafix'

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    3. I am gonna give that shaving one leg lark a go. Merry Christmas.

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    4. Velvet two tone split knee loons. Must be due for a revival in 2017. Available only through the small ads section of the broadsheet New Musical Express. Fashionistas - you read it here first

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  12. Hi Christmas Jim
    thanks for all your hard work
    your are a star
    best wishes

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  13. Fry's 5 centres - loved them! Have a wonderful break one and all!

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  14. Merry Xmas Jim, one & all; and here's to what I hope will be a 2017 so very different to 2016.

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  15. Merry Xmas Jim, I can't express how valuable this blog has been for me. I learn more from the blog than the CRC to which I got shafted. Thank you.

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  16. Happy Christmas Jim. Thanks for the blog, go-to place for my morning cuppa, keeping me sane and informed. Have a good one x

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  17. Merry Christmas Jim and all you non forward thinking socialists. May the new year bring more business development opportunities in the criminal justice system. Let's agree to disagree today on the way forward in criminal justice. Merry CHRISmas.

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    1. Merry Xmas 10.07. Let's hope not to 2017 but your kind do make this blog interesting. Keep on contributing.

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    2. We do believe in a free market economy as our data shows TR to be making steady progress. The same can be said for prison and other subsidiary contracts offered. Let's hope youth services, police and social services open up the books.

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    3. But when you treat people as wigits, you get the chaos that is errupting in the prisons! I am especially thinking of all those not with their loved ones today!

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    4. Merry Christmas and a prosperous new year to all CRCS. Let the cash flow and people be treated right.

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    5. Wind up 10.48

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  18. And what about the victims. You're unbelievable!!!!!

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  19. This is an interesting article from the Guardian. The UK's poor productivity compared to other Western countries is due to a lack of investment in technology, money going to zombie companies and reliance on unskilled cheap labour.

    Remind anyone of probation with its ancient IT (NPS) and poor performing private sector companies ready to be bailed out by taxpayers. The downgrading of qualifications (15 months to train now) and the reduction in the minimum level of skills needed to manage most cases - PSOs managing most offenders? As well as an influx of cheaper, inexperienced staff.

    https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/dec/25/what-is-productivity-why-uk-poor

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  20. I love the fact this blog rattles the arses of the establishment and senior management. The truth always prevails, and its trickling out slowly but surely ��

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    1. Believe me, this blog rattles no assess. Maybe when we were Trusts, but not anymore. I've heard senior management mock thr blog on a regular basis and openly too at all staff events!

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    2. So why does it matter enough for you to read it Anon at 14:54?

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    3. Anonymous 14:54 is talking utter rubbish. Senior Management in MTCNOVO London loathe Jim Brown yes they joke about us and it behind closed doors but that is to try and belittle and distract us from the blog. Helga has mentioned Jims blog several times.

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    4. The last thing these mickey mouse companies want is staff across the country communicating. The universal consensus seems to be that privatisation has been one expensive disaster. Will anyone be held accountable ? Keep on blogging Jim.

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    5. Is that Nigel Bennett at 14:54?

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    6. NB loves the blog!

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    7. NB loves himself. End of.

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    8. Why do you say that 20.01? What evidence do you have...

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  21. Just noticed this. It may provide a trip down memory lane, or maybe an informative look at probation roots.
    May not be worth £30, (maybe cheaper on other websites), but some might like to watch it.

    http://www.atvtoday.co.uk/88586-atv/


    'Getafix'

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    1. Well spotted!

      ATV drama Probation Officer comes to DVD

      The saga is described as an ‘absorbing, rigorously researched drama’ which centres on the work of a team of probation officers based in London, and the lives of the men and women of all ages and backgrounds who come under their care.

      Probation Officer sadly, like so many ATV programmes of the era, does not exist complete in the archive – this volume contains the twelve earliest surviving episodes from series one which was produced in the last year of the 1950s.

      Drawing on the documentary skills of creator Julian Bond and produced by Emergency – Ward 10’s Antony Kearey, Probation Officer was broadcast at a time when the service was increasingly coming into focus as a progressive response to rising crime.

      Guests include Alfred Burke of Public Eye fame, Susan Hampshire from Monarch of the Glen, Strange Report’s Charles Lloyd Pack, Richard Vernon as seen in Goldfinger and Peter Vaughan of Porridge fame.

      Also in this first volume Earl Cameron and Lloyd Reckord star in a blistering tale of racism and intolerance which features one of the earliest interracial kisses ever broadcast on British television.

      Probation Officer – Volume One (12) is released on the 30th of January 2017 with a RRP: £29.99. The three disc set has been complied from the ITV Studios archives by Network Releasing.

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    2. There's actually a full episode available on YouTube. Link here.

      https://youtu.be/C2QgKEb9B9E

      'Getafix'

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  22. 2016, the Tories & TR can go fuck themselves. Max, our best friend & partner-in-crime for the last 13 years died today. She was just incredible. More than that, she was LOYAL, COMMITTED & utterly TRUSTWORTHY.

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  23. Although there arent many recruits or new employees here in London I am noticing that the new staff are white young females is this an American thing I wonder

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    1. Really? Or perhaps they are being very pro colour to notice and point it out. I feel sure your average racist wouldn't notice; just have the vague feeling that everything was fine by them and what's all the fuss about?

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    2. Don't write daft stuff how is it at all wrong to make an accurate observation.

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    3. Accurate observation based on what data. It's racist and sexist as there is no substance to the claim other than the authors incorrect observation.

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  24. Funny how people say 20.29 is racist but not sexist or ageist. BTW here in London nps is becoming more and more white in the offices. Not racism just my observation.

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    1. Same with the CRC in Manchester, hardly any black staff.

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    2. Perhaps ABPO could offer a view to assist?

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  25. Can I ask 14.28 , what has happened to them? They gone to NPS?

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  26. Does ABPO exist. NAPO might be better

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    1. Since leaving the service and related professional organisations I lost track of ABPO. Being inquisitive I find they seem to have morphed into ABPONOMS, where membership is only open to employees of noms or moj. Perhaps this is the unspoken but preferred route for Napo?

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    2. If ABPO or NAPO were worth their salt they would know about CRC issues....

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  27. Those in recent & current government, the civil service & the organisations involved in TR might like to look to this as a definition & act of integrity-:

    Prof Scraton, who worked on the exposure of the Hillsboro disaster as an avoidable unlawful killing, in refusing an OBE: "I could not receive an honour on the recommendation of those who remained unresponsive to the determined efforts of bereaved families and survivors to secure truth and justice.... Finally, I could not accept an honour tied in name to the 'British Empire'. In my scholarship and teaching I remain a strong critic of the historical, cultural and political contexts of imperialism and their international legacy."

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