Demo one

A few days ago, I reported at reference 1 the successful outcome of the Commons debate on assisted dying.

Some days before that I attended a demo on Parliament Square to mark the first of two days of debate which had been allocated to this matter. Possibly my first demo since the time of the Vietnam war, more than fifty years ago. Noting, as an aside, it is odd how things turn out, with the long re-united Vietnam doing very good business selling us all manner of manufactured goods. Odd, that is, considering how much damage we did there and how many of their people we killed.

I decided that standing in the sun for a long time was unlikely to be a good plan and so took my Stockholm folding chair. As with sunshades in Epsom over the past few days, odd how few people bother to take such elementary precautions. Packed my Shan bag with various other necessities like sun hat and bottle of water, then managed to leave it on the kitchen table. It was very early in the morning, perhaps around 06:30, which is early for me to be up and about these days and I was too far down the road by the time that I noticed to go back.

It was not possible to capture the trolley on the Eclipse car park as the Ashley Centre would not have been open and proper return would not have been possible. Plus I did not have the time. Sadly, it had gone by the next time I went by.

But I did notice what was once the door to my hairdresser of many years, with what is left of his sign visible behind the pole. Very good hairdresser he was too. Building now slated for demolition.

Caught the 07:08 from Epsom, having been taken aback by the price of a Travelcard which was neither off-peak nor supported by a senior person's railcard.

But, rather to my surprise, I discovered that there was an upstairs clothes part of the M&S snack food hall at Waterloo, where there were plenty of sales assistants available to help me find the sun hats. A good cheaper I might say than the one I bought from JD Sports and subsequently managed to leave on the trolley stack at the Epsom food hall.

Took the tube from Westminster. Thought about walking but decided that it might be a long hot day and I needed to conserve energy. So I arrived at Parliament Square in good time for the official kick-off at 08:30. Surprised and pleased to find that the grass was in good condition and that we were allowed to be on it. Something which I believe needs to be negotiated with the appropriate authorities beforehand.

There was also a rather ugly statue of Lloyd George, which I do not remember from my years in GOGGS adjacent - not that I made much use of Parliament Square at that time. I associate to the splendid idea, in 'Erewhon', that you only lease spots for memorials of this sort. When the lease is up, if you can't raise the cash for renewal, or if you don't make the cut on the vote, the memorial goes. See chapter 13 of the book, which is noticed at reference 3.

[On Friday, as British lawmakers engaged in an emotional debate over a proposal to legalize assisted death for some people with terminally illnesses, supporters of the bill rallied in Parliament Square in London. Credit...Neil Hall/EPA, via Shutterstock. 5th December 2024]

Maybe between a hundred and two hundred of us, with the opposition mustering rather less. They managed to look decidedly cranky and odd, so maybe they helped rather than hindered the cause. While we were mainly women, and mainly young women at that, which I found surprising. I did not talk to many young people, but most of the old people I talked to were there because someone close had had a messy, painful and undignified death. And some of their stories were really pretty grim. While I was there for myself and because this is a long overdue reform.

The main idea was to be there and to be visible in the pink shirts and hats provided, waving the placards provided. On this first occasion, I did the placard but not the shirt or hat. Every half hour or so we had two or three short speeches, either from campaigners or from people with stories to tell. Which served well to keep us motivated.

I took a comfort break in Central Hall where they had an educational networking outfit called PixL upstairs.

I left around lunchtime, heading off to Clapham Junction for an overcomplicated sandwich from  Prezzemolo & Vitale. But it was very pleasant, sitting outside in the shade, watching the world go by. With a curious drink which may have been a blend of tea and peaches.

What do they do with the upstairs at the Falcon. There is an awful lot of it - the bar downstairs used to be the longest continuous bar in the land - and I don't suppose the demand for meeting rooms - for masons, railway enthusiasts and the like - is that strong these days. Let it out as bedsits?

Steady stream of ones up on the platform, ones which would have been converted to twos had I cared to sit in the noonday sun.

Having dealt with the trolley at reference 5, home to eat properly, eating which included our last bottle of 'Terre d'Obus' from Alexandre Bain. Rather good, and on this occasion it did not last long enough to cloud over, in the way of cider of old. But I have still to think of a better translation than 'land torn up by shell fire' - not least because I don't think that there has been much of that at Tracy-sur-Loire. See reference 6.

Eating may also have included roast turkey leg, a very economical and satisfactory roast, which we take from time to time. But I need to check up on that.

Blood pressure contraption visible right. From which we have learned that if we were to average our scores, we would be doing alright.

PS: I subsequently learned that our shiny new LibDem MP having voted initially for assisted dying, ended up abstaining, possibly by being absent. And I had assumed that as a young woman who had done time in the Military Police, she would have seen quite enough unnecessary suffering to have stayed onside. 'The following Surrey MPs voted for the Bill at Third Reading: Will Forster, Zoe Franklin, Chris Coghlan and Jeremy Hunt. Helen Maguire did not vote, despite having supported the Bill throughout - we were expecting her to attend, so if anyone knows why she did not, please let me know. The rest voted against, despite our best efforts with Al Pinkerton'. Digging indicated. Maybe even an email.

PS 2: the definition of idiot referred to at reference 3 is 'someone who thinks for himself'. Which is more interesting in context that its bald statement might suggest.

PS 3: on a quite different tack, Tories used to boast about the UK punching above its weight in world affairs. I wonder this evening, having just taken delivery of a copy of reference 8, the cover of which is snapped above, whether this is more a matter of publishing above our weight. Glossy books we can do; tanks (or battalions as one Stalin used to think in terms of) maybe not. Perhaps the rather crumpled flag will turn out to be appropriate. I associate to being told that we no longer had the factories needed to make the explosives which would be needed in the event of a serious war. Never mind the blast furnaces to make the steel to make the battleships. Or the coke to drive them. While reading somewhere or other that the Serbs are quite good at all this sort of thing. But do we want to have to rely on them?

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/06/progress.html.

Reference 2: https://www.dignityindying.org.uk/.

Reference 3: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/12/erewhon.html.

Reference 4: The U.K. Voted to Legalize Assisted Dying. Which Other Countries Allow It: Assisted dying is legal or partly legal in about a dozen countries, and more are considering allowing it - Lynsey Chutel, New York Times - 2024. I learn that the Columbians have gone rather further than we are likely to any time soon. Also the source of the demo snap above: not the same, but much the same sort of thing as mine.

Reference 5: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/06/trolley-877.html.

Reference 6: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/09/toad.html.

Reference 7: https://www.neilhallphoto.com/index. Possibly the photographer of the old demo.

Reference 8: National Security Strategy 2025: Security for the British people in a dangerous world - HM Government - 2025. CP 1338.