The news that Pizza Hut is closing 68 sites with 1210 job losses is bad news for those impacted. Whether it is bad news for pizza lovers (other brands are available) is another matter. I note that one Pizza Hut near me opens until 3am so clearly there is a demand.
It raises the question of whether Tony Benn a well known pizza lover ever ate in a Pizza Hut. According to the AI tool that heads up any interweb search these days there is no evidence that he did, so that means he almost certainly did.
Benn was mostly a Pizza Express man, and his Diaries record several visits(none in Woking) However on 20th December 1992 Benn records that he took the ‘grandchildren to a pizza parlour in Chiswick’ which could have been a Pizza Hut, although it doesn’t currently have an outlet there.
Let there be no doubt of Benn’s love for pizza though. On 9th September 2003 he records ‘went out shopping, looking for my favourite triple cheese pizzas which have disappeared from the local supermarket.
The Royal Family: 1848-2026. Protest, but survival, so far
The arrest of Andrew Windsor on his 66th Birthday on 19th February 2026 occasioned the appearance in my in-box at around 11am of a special edition of the Daily Telegraph. It describes the arrest as ‘seismic’. Indeed so while the specific issue is now subject to contempt of court proceedings the wider issue about whether the Royal Family can survive when the King’s brother is arrested is an important one.
2026 is also the 178th anniversary of 1848 when monarchs feared for their crowns across Europe, even in Britain where on April 10th 1848 Queen Victoria retreated to the Isle of Wight as the Chartists marched for democracy in London
The left, being supporters of democracy and elections, have never been great enthusiasts for unelected rulers, particularly, as many have done historically, when they have claimed a ‘divine right’ to rule.
Yet in Britain republicanism, the idea that there should be an elected Head of State, has been a minority trend if one is to compare it for example to French Republicanism which had a revolution in 1789 to remove the King permanently.
It’s true of course that on 30th January 1649 King Charles 1st lost his head in Whitehall, and a Commonwealth was in place until 1660. At that date the monarchy was restored although the events of 1649 have a place in radical history and thought to this day.
Republicanism in Britain in addition has not always associated been with the left. One need only look at President Trump to understand why in the present moment this might be.
Rather the majority trend on the left has been to have a distaste for the patronage, privilege and forelock tugging that goes with Royalty, but to be clear that politically there are other priorities.
It is this anti-monarchism, identified by Antony Taylor, an academic who has provided perhaps the best modern template for the study of opposition to Royalty, that has been the dominant trend in British republicanism. The monarchy is not liked but it is specific instances of excess and extravagance that are the focus of protest.
Prince Harry is a child of the late Princess Diana whose life and particularly death, did much to highlight almost 30 years ago how out of touch with the modern world the Royal Family had become.
Blair tried to fashion Diana as the ‘People’s Princess’ but it is difficult to see any lasting impact of a campaign that made a considerable mark at the time.
A wider issue and one that was central nineteenth century are protests are Royal occasions.
These protests centred on what William Cobbett had called ‘Old Corruption’. That is a political culture of deference, patronage and forelock tugging where those who held ultimate power in society- Britain remains a constitutional monarchy not a Parliamentary democracy-do so by virtue of an accident birth rather than on merit or electoral choice.
Royal occasions in the second half of the nineteenth century, when Queen Victoria was on the throne, such as weddings and Jubilees, provoked significant protest.
There were a number of underlying motivations for such protests- not all progressive, there was an element of anti-German xenophobia- but a key one was the cost.
Expenditure on Royal pomp and ceremony was contrasted with the large numbers in society who lived in absolute poverty. The radical Reynolds’s Newspaper became the biggest selling Sunday paper of the time centrally based on virulently attacking the Royal Family and its aristocratic hangers on.
Expenditure on things like the Royal Yacht and the Royal train were particular targets outside of specific ceremonial occasions even at that time. The arrival of King Charles in 2022/3 has seen a continuing range of protests under the Not My King banner, questioning the validity of an inherited monarchy in 2026. The continuing and deepening issues around Andrew Windsor will surely reinforce the motivation to protest and perhaps at last to do something about the monarchy.
Reform led Kent Council launches Traitors spin off with a tweak
Celebrity Traitors currently airing on BBC1 has been a TV talking point of October. So much so it seems that Kent Council, led since May 2025 by Reform, has launched a spin off.
A video of a meeting of Reform Councillors in August 2025 has been leaked to the Guardian. In the video Council leader Linda Kemkaran can he heard shouting down critics and telling them that if they don’t like her decisions they will just have to f*cking suck it up.
Subsequently Kemkaran has sent a note claiming that she has ‘suspicions’ of who was responsible for the ‘treachery’ of leaking the video and Reform HQ have been informed.
Reform seem to have added a tweak to the BBC version of Traitors. While the BBC Roundtable must name Traitors, Reform has decided to ‘suspend’ four Councillors without directly naming them as Traitors. Whether this tweak adds or detracts from the dramatic impact will be debated
Kent is regarded as the flagship of the ten Councils Reform won in May possibly because it is in Farage’s backyard.
It will be interesting to see if Kemkaran does any better than the BBC’s version of Traitors in working out who are the Faithful and who are the Traitors. Either way it looks like some banishments are on the way, although hopefully no murders
Reform led Kent Council launches Traitors spin off
Celebrity Traitors currently airing on BBC1 has been a TV talking point of October. So much so it seems that Kent Council, led since May 2025 by Reform, has launched a spin off.
A video of a meeting of Reform Councillors in August 2025 has been leaked to the Guardian. In the video Council leader Linda Kemkaran can he heard shouting down critics and telling them that if they don’t like her decisions they will just have to f*cking suck it up.
Subsequently Kemkaran has sent a note claiming that she has ‘suspicions’ of who was responsible for the ‘treachery’ of leaking the video and Reform HQ have been informed.
Kent is regarded as the flagship of the ten Councils Reform won in May possibly because it is in Farage’s backyard.
It will be interesting to see if Kemkaran does any better than the BBC’s version of Traitors in working out who are the Faithful and who are the Traitors. Either way it looks like some banishments are on the way, although hopefully no murders
Funeral of Dickie Bird, Cricket Umpire ‘The son of a coal miner from Barnsley’
Dickie Bird who died in September aged 92 was as his Times Obituary notes the first celebrity cricket Umpire.
Born in Barnsley he played cricket for Yorkshire and Leicestershire but his true vocation was in Umpiring which he began doing in 1970.
His Times Obituary records ‘a devout Methodist he turned down lucrative offers to join Kerry Packer’s break away series and to officiate in during the rebel tours of South Africa in the apartheid era. He was no political firebrand but he regarded both enterprises as undermining the integrity of the game’
The BBC report of Dickie Bird’s funeral notes that he mostly made plans for the funeral before his death
The points that he wanted to bring was that he was very proud that he was the son of a coal miner from Barnsley and that he’s been able to take Barnsley out across the world,” Mr Maries tells the BBC.
After Andrew: A Renewed Game of Royal Titles & Dis-Inventing some Royal Traditions
Ahead of his Coronation in May 2023 King Charles re-arranged some Royal titles.
Harry and Meghan may be disenchanted with Royalty but their children became Prince Archie of Sussex and Princess Lilibet of Sussex
Meanwhile the King’s youngest brother Edward became the Duke of Edinburgh and his wife Sophie the Duchess of Edinburgh. It’s not clear how this has went down in Holyrood but the two Royals do actually work in ,er, promoting the Monarchy and its image. Not an easy job in 2025 but a very well paid one.
Their son James, Viscount Severn, aged 15 became Earl of Wessex and then Earl of Forfar. He will not be able to become Duke of Edinburgh in due course thanks to a tradition King Charles has just made up.
In the latest Royal Titles developments Andrew has voluntarily given up his Duke of York title and his membership of the Order of the Garter but his children with Sarah Ferguson will remain within the Royal fold.. He retains the title of ‘Prince’. Removing this is apparently a more complex matter
There may be a few more titles to come. The Royal Family is at least good at inventing and tweaking tradition. The Duke of Ediburgh title was invented by George 1st in 1726 but fell into disuse in 1760. Queen Victoria reinvented it in 1866.
In short Andrew’s various titles related largely to traditions that the Royals invented at some point but they were clearly very useful in gathering contacts and making lots of money
The 12th Earl of Portland calls & Mulligan is found dead
David Archer has form. It started with badger murder. Then Nigel Pargetter fell off the roof of Lower Loxley while Daveed was in attendance. No prosecution followed. This week Archer visited an adjacent farm of someone on his own admission he hardly knew, indeed he did not even know his first name, because he was according to the BBC dropping off a spare part that Mulligan had mentioned to him. It’s story line worthy of the Traitors, and the traitor in question is David Archer aka Tim Bentinck, the 12th Earl of Portland.
George is back. Demonisation of Grundys has also returned
George Grundy is back in the Ambridge flow, making several appearances at The Bull. He is cocky and arrogant, which, on the other side of the class divide also describes how Freddie Pargetter was and is. Pargetter does however have occasional moments of self-reflection. George not so much.
Lilian is determined to ban George from the Bull while Jolene thinks he deserves a chance at rehabilitation. It’s a classic debate and at its root is the long standing demonisation of the Grundys by both the BBC and the Ambridge ruling class
Esme Mulligan: will she stay or will she go?
Mulligan’s daughter Esme has made an appearance. Not a farmer but a web designer etc. Will she become an Ambridge regular. Time will tell as will her other commitments- currently in a touring version of Louise Alcott’s Little Women
He is the master of the double-double bluff. The man with the infallible strategy for winning at Traitors. Come the evening’s roundtable, vote for yourself to be banished. That’s the last thing anyone would expect a Traitor to do.
For whatever reason Dominic Cummings has been omnipresent in the media this week. There has been a Peston podcast and a lengthy Times interview where he discusses a lunch he had with Nigel Farage (but not how much they had to drink)
A lot of sound and fury signifying nothing as the bearded Bard had it, except Crace’s point about Cummings Traitors strategy of course.
