We have not been through this before

Awake at 4 in the morning, and there being no prospect of sleeping, I realised that there is a reason for disturbed sleep, in that our lives are disturbed and we are all probably anxious, even the children, because we haven't been this way before, and this is very serious.

I worry about the economy at the best of times, and now I can see only too clearly that business cannot easily recover from this awful stagnation, and that firms are going to have to downsize. My brother was on the phone and told me that when firms need to economize they fire managers - expensive people who add nothing to the bottom line. They don't tend to sack the people who bring in the revenue - those providing the service or making the product unless demand falls. But when the economy really shrinks there is less money and demand falls. And that's where we're headed. So I am having a big worry about that.

More acutely because closer at hand, I am worried about the compound to the allotment shop, because there is not much security and if you are quite nimble you can climb over the gate and help yourself to the items in the compound. These are large items - manure, compost, strulch. You would have to be quite strong to haul them over the gate but it wouldn't be impossible. Anyway, I think that's what's happening. I think about 15 bags of compost have gone missing. I imagine the culprit is one or two of the newer plot-holders, and they raid at night. We do have CCTV but we don't do anything with it. It's a deterrent only. We have always said that when we have a problem we shall review getting a monitor and making it work. Maybe it doesn't work at all?

I calculate a profit margin of about 30% on the goods we sell because there's a lot of wastage on time-limited items and some goods have to make up for those losses.  The price for this kind of compost has gone up, and at present there is practically no profit on it at all! 15 bags is a lot of profit to throw away.

Another worry is Mr M Law, who has written to the Trustees of the Charity protesting about the terms of the Lease, and you feel that he wouldn't do this unless he hated the allotments and everyone there. Although the Trustees have been very reasonable and accommodating to us, someone like ML can really turn things around, as he did before in a way that benefited the allotment association, now he is trying it the other way around. I can only assume he is the sort of person who likes poking sticks in ants' nests.

All this and COVID-19 too. The Prime Minister has got it now. There is no reason to suppose he will have it badly. But perhaps the news made me think of him and his pregnant girlfriend in Number Ten, and that's unprecedented too. He doesn't behave like a respectable man. I didn't trust him on the economy (because leaving the EU doesn't make economic sense) and now the economy will probably tank anyway, as the world economy will be so damaged. The kind of things that will damage us include that there won't be jobs for our young people, and unlike the Poles and Hungarians I used to teach, our young people tend not to be the kind that just go abroad, learn the language and make a new life. They tend to be weak and lazy and terribly dependent on their Mums and Dads.

Oh dear, I am feeling low. Maybe this is all because of ML being such a sod, and those 15 bags of compost!

Bethnal Green

Yesterday I went to another comedy recording; and although it will be broadcast on Radio 4 I think it was not an "in house" production because it was recorded in a comedy club in Bethnal Green. Bethnal Green is in the East End of London, at one time it was a Jewish area and as I have never been there I though I would go early and see what it is like.

I think I was expecting towering council flats, and I didn't see them although they may be there. I saw streets of shops and small businesses, some buildings and pubs unimproved since Victorian times. I saw a high street of betting shops and pawn shops and the shops that unlock mobile phones and sell the accessories for them, and I went to Macdonald's. In Macdonald's I saw black schoolboys and girls in their early teens hanging out after school, dressed in blazers and school uniforms, speaking in English. Their parents may have come from many different places (Bangladesh and Somalia, among the mix) and English may be their second language, but altogether they speak English and they are not unmannerly. Seeing me waiting for the counter they moved out of my way, and I am sure if I had asked any of them for help with the self-service screen they would have helped. There were also mums of small children in MacD's; their toddlers in push-chairs and their older ones tearing around banging on the seats. Probably this is somewhere cheap where they can come and be warm and safe and well-lit for the price of a cup of tea. I imagine that most of these families are in pretty poor housing. There were also grandparents (white) minding grandchildren with a bit of "effing and blinding". There were also students coming in - very obviously students and not just people of the area. They were white, mainly, long-haired, in pairs. I found a few agencies for student rooms and a block of bedsits purpose-built for students. It reminded me of Selly Oak when I was a student. The trouble is that there is money in building student rooms and none in building good housing for immigrant families. But the immigrant families want to be there. A bad area of London is full of possibility for new immigrants to find work. Historically, this is the place. These children in their school uniforms and hefty shoes are the reason that the parents came to this country. I give credit to the teachers of Bethnal Green - they are doing a hard job, and not badly, I think. I also thought it was good for the students to live there amongst the poor. They need to know.

At my comedy show the audience was largely middle-aged, middle class and white, but not entirely. There were some quite eccentric looking people and some who looked as though they didn't get out much, as well as some worldly types showing off a bit. We enjoyed the show with John Finnemore's Teenage Diary although the humour felt a bit "bolted on" (a spy theme) which might be straightened out in the editing. He talked about going to work in Krakow as a teacher of English before he had even been to university - in short, he had nothing except intelligence on his side, and lacked a lot of training and subject knowledge.  But hey! this doesn't always hamper progress! It felt right to give John Finnemore a good big round of applause because his writing has given me so much delight and is always fun and good-humoured.

And look, he's got excellent teeth, too!