It has been a ‘well-being’ week, personally, and domestically. On the general home front, we had a visit from our main electricity supplier, Scottish and Southern, who said they needed to come and do some work on our supply system. The man and the letter he left with us suggested it meant losing mains supply for a few hours, as a couple of guys in a couple of vans took down and replaced the transformer, which sits on a pole that supports the cabling from the grid to our house. In the event, it was about eight guys, five vans, a flat truck low loader, a cherry picker, a small crane and a small tractor unit on tracks!
As they set about their work, we talked to the foreman, who was charming and knowledgeable. He explained it was a routine check on the transformer, which ‘transforms several thousand volts of network electricity to 240 for domestic use’.
The oil in the old transformer had to be checked, he explained, for carcinogenicity tests. For that, it had to be taken to the laboratories at headquarters.
Among the work team were a number of younger men who were trainees and/or apprentices, whom we mentally applauded. One of them had the task of clambering up the pole like an indigenous rainforest dweller or coconut harvester. It was an impressive act of physical agility. The tractor brought the new transformer into position before it was raised into place and attached by the young, talented ‘clamberer’. They put boards and ramps all over the place, so there was little or no damage to the fields or steps into the fields.
Before the small crane lowered it safely to the ground, I noticed the new transformer was made by Toshiba and felt sure that there must be a UK manufacturer. If there isn’t, I’d bet there was in Arnold Wienstock’s days of GEC and English Electric. President Trump would understand my point, as it is in part what the tariff debacle is about.
If a product is needed in the USA, it should be made there, and not arrive as an import. This area, and other parts of Hampshire, used to be home to Plessey, Marconi, IBM and much more besides. I was the industrial correspondent at Southern ITV in those days, and despite my dementia, I remember it well, as I do the strikes in the 1970s across ITV. One of them meant I had to ask permission of the ACTT - the technicians’ union - to cross their picket line at ITN to attend a job interview. I suppose it was an ironically appropriate way to start the journey to being an ITV network industrial correspondent.
The ACTT pickets said I could only enter the ITN headquarters if the journalists' union, the NUJ, agreed. ‘Where will I find them?’ I asked the technician's shop steward, Duncan Jones. ‘In the Green Man pub’, he said, and it proved correct. The pub was around the corner from ITN’s then HQ on Wells Street, just off Oxford Street. I eventually got in, and I got the job, and Duncan became a career-long friend.
Alastair Stewart reflects on a busy week on the health front in this week's Living With Dementia
GB NEWSSally and I both worked at strike-bound Southern ITV, and with a mortgage, etc and no strike pay, we had to work elsewhere.
She worked at Mr Kipling cakes in Eastleigh, and I worked at Southampton Airport. One day, I recall there was a remarkable scene as a luxurious horse transporter drew up and grooms escorted two horses from the truck onto a Bristol transporter. I asked about the horses, and found one was Arnold Wienstock’s ‘Troy’ on his way to Longchamps for the Prix de L’arc de Triomphe. The other was the thoroughbred’s travelling companion, as I later learned from our own experiences. Sport horses can be a bit nervous.
On my own well-being, it has been a busy week with blood pressure crucial to the causes of dementia. Some mysteries about my kidneys remain, so I have had an ultrasound scan done, and next week I have a biopsy. It has involved me attending a private clinic in Basingstoke, although I no longer have private medical insurance and am firmly and happily an NHS patient. The private operator was called Circle, and while I am all in favour of the NHS using the private sector to cut waiting times and ease demand on NHS Facilities, the Circle Group lacks the touch and kindness of BUPA and the Old Nuffield hospitals. They are a business, pure and simple. When they asked who my insurer was, I said “I had none”, and they declared me a ‘self-funder’ and then asked how I would pay, offering a package. When we finally resolved my NHS status, things calmed down, but it was a disagreeable experience that they should avoid in the interests of their patients. It was a rich reminder of how lucky we are with much, albeit not all, of the NHS. Sal has been busy helping prepare for a dear friend’s surprise birthday party, doing much cooking.
The birthday girl is Lady April Chidgey, the widow of one of my favourite Parliamentarians, the late Lord David Chidgey, former LibDem MP for Eastleigh, a seat which became vacant in truly bizarre circumstances in 1994: worth looking up if you enjoy colourful politics. David was subsequently made a life peer. One of their children is taking April for a break at an Airbnb, which used to be the farm she grew up on - a brilliant plan. The party in Hampshire is being hosted by Lady Allison Wakeham, wife of another political pin-up and dear friend of mine, Lord John Wakeham, who served in all Margaret Thatcher’s Cabinets.
A great man and remains the ultimate Mr Fix-It. The children and grandchildren have all been busy, but keep us briefed via the family WhatsApp group. It is social media at its best. It keeps our spirits up and is the best media I have. Alex and Anna had a West Country break, sharing lots of lovely pictures of where they stayed and what they did. There are such great holidays to be had in the UK, as I always say, because it is true. My family is formidable and so very thoughtful. On the political front, I continue to despair.
Rachel Reeves is borrowing and taxing us to oblivion, and if trade talks with Vice President JD Vance are the answer, we are doomed. Donald Trump wanting to reward Russia with illegally conquered territory will make Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt turn in their graves, leaving Joseph Stalin chortling in his. Finally, our tortoise, Fredericka, is out of hibernation, which the grandchildren love. She is, to them, a mini dinosaur who loves strawberries, which they love feeding her. Until next week, the best to you all and my thanks to all at GBNews for the framed picture of me opening the studio named after me. It was such a kind and generous gesture.
