Comments on: Gareth Young

By: Anthony Bye

Anthony Bye — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 20:22:38 +0000

Gareth
I thoroughly concur with your sentiments. I fear that the current proposal to reduce the legal drink/drive limit will, if passed by Parliament, see the fulfilment of Hillaire Belloc’s prophecy in that we will, indeed, lose the last of our Inns - especially in Rural areas.

By: Dr Mike

Dr Mike — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 16:11:38 +0000

More thoughts.
Gareth cariad, To leave Canada and go back to the UK- INSANITY. After my first ten years in vancouver, Montreal and Ottawa, I went back to the UK for funerals and reunions only. Now not at all.

I loved the gentle, polite, well behaved country that I left in the 60s but that has been replaced by an angry, discontented loutish drunked country that is a sad echo of its former self.
When i first went to Canada in 1966 i thought it a rather rough and ready ,crud place. now I think it is a mecca of sophistication and good manners compared to the UK.
And to sit on an outdoor terrace of a pub in Toronto, Vancouver or Ottawa on a warm summer evening, or in cottage country north of To or in the Gatineau —thats just as great as an english pub.

By: Dr Mike

Dr Mike — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 15:52:22 +0000

Having lived most of my life in Canada and the last 13 years in Asia, I am fascinated on how poeple try to re-create the English pub abroad. Occasionally they get it nearly right but its never quite there. The architecture, the decor, the food, the beer all very close I guess its the customers, even if they are Brits, they are ex-pat Brits, a sub-species.
Irish bars are everywhere, There is one Irish bar opening every day somewhere in the world which is the same as the number of Irish bars closing in Ireland.

The Royal Oak, Bank St in Ottawa–very close.
Robin Hood on Sukhumvit in Bangkok–very close.
Several in HK and S;pore.

By: Bart Hulley

Bart Hulley — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 09:51:06 +0000

If you read Private Eye - they have an interesting piece this week ‘in the back’ on the state of Pubs in the UK. In short it lays the blame squarely at the door of the money-men and Thatcher’s Conservative government of 1989 for introducing a ruling that effectively turned pubs into cash-cow real-estate.

It’s funny, but the root cause of many of our present woes seems to be Mrs Thatcher!

The day we sold out to free enterprise - is the day we sold our souls.

By: fillets

fillets — Sat, 23 May 2009 08:26:30 +0000

quote: …there is the Nationalist’s England of Imperial institutions… /quote

Oh dear, bit confused aren’t we Gareth? Diametric opposites, nationalists and imperialists are. And today’s Monarchy, Parliament, Civil Service, and Military are united in their hostility to English nationalism and their support for the colonisation of England by aliens.

quote: … Frenchman turned English poet Hilaire Belloc… /quote

The magnificent HB was never a Frenchman. He was mixed-race, half-English and half-French, but lived permanently in England from toddler days on.

It’s interesting to speculate on how much the war on pubs is an unconscious attack on a source of English solidarity, so a part of the war on the English.