Sergei Gotsmanov

The fact that our monarchy is still working makes it living history that is the pull for tourists. All those republicans are just chippy people; I mean do you really feel 'ruled over'?. The Queen brings in more revenue than she spends and I enjoy the odd Jubiliee celebration. I like all the pomp and ceremony; it makes us stand out from all those bland European parliaments. Ask yourself the question do you really think you will wake up feeling any happier or better if we get rid of the Queen? Get passionate about things that will make a diffrenece to your lives.

It is a fair point and that is why you are not in the forces.

I think you will find the senior staff were probably the first to be given the boot; that is how the private sector works.

I am not sure that people like that bother to create deflections from their own did performance. What did amuse me was his statement from is Air Lingus pilot days that 'A reasonable man gets nowhere in negotiations'.

I would suggest this was BA smears.

I am not aquainted with the full facts of the BA dispute but the way it looks to me is that a company is losing staggering sums of money and is rightly trying to do something about it. I do not doubt that BA have used some unsavoury tactics but all in all I think you demean the memory of the Tolpuddle Martyrs by comparing the two.

The explosion in badgers has contributed to the decline of bees. They are also doing a pretty good job at wiping out the hedgehog (when did you last see one run over?) the English partridge. It was a lovely site to see a badger 20 years ago now they are vermin.

I must have picked the the thread half way through BTF so I apologise if I caused offence.

By repeating the question you were indeed asking it to be answered. I think you should be apologising to DD. As I am sure you are aware the way the military works is you cannot question orders other wise the whole system breaksdown. You should be supportive of the people who put their lives on the line but ask your questions of those that make the decisions.

[quote Somebody asked you why you didn't resign from your career on principle if you thought the war was so wrong. Have to say BTF I think that is an outrageous thing to say; especially to somebody who ultimately would put their life on the line on behalf of your nation.

BTF - they were not outspoken because they probably felt their careers would be harmed. I hate career politicians of all colours. Robin Cook was one of the good guys.

Get a beekeeper. We are running out of bees - do not kill them

Robin Cook understood how it works

Well James obviously is not a shrewd tactician then.

That was criminal of Maggie to decimate all of those mining communities. Scargill was to blame as well for creating such a them and us scenario.

Hursley and Hambledon I think.

Proper country types are dieing out especially where we are in the south as houses in villages get bought up by commuter types and villages are no longer working villages. It is a great tragedy. We are losing the people that really know about the countryside; I can never claim to know as much as they do but I will try to make sure my children do. Part of it is just being out. To be honest I love stalking but not that fussed about pulling the trigger. I like just being on the hill or in a wood. What people do not understand is that today stalking is all about taking out the old stag, the smaller nobber or the scruffy hind to make sure that the stock is healthy.

243 but to be honest normally out to get on top of the rabbits. You must be quite confident of a fox arriving to where you are waiting because whenever I have been lamping you are mobile. To be fair if you are waiting then a .22 would do the job but I would be amazed if you never wounded one - should you be training for 2012?

It is far more complex than that. My assumptions are based on watching people like Simon King and Bill Oddie who often show a naivety in their subject. If you commute to the countryside to look at widlife you will know less than people who live and work in the countryside. Those people are actually quite rare. A lot of the people who hunt are pretty awful but in the main they are not. These are tight knit communities and have rights as well, you have to understand it is a way of life. It is part of your identity and probably why so many turned up to protest in the big CA marches. Whay upsets me is that they are portrayed as not being compassionate.

Well I go lamping twenty or thirty times a year and would never use a .22 for foxes. I can only base this on my own experience. Your motor must have a very quiet engine to get that close to a fox.

Then that really is barbaric. You are not going to kill a fox with a .22 unless you are within twenty-thirty yards. Ask yourself why it is illigal to shoot a deer with a .22?

Do you think BTF that if you grew up with a family that hunted and all the people around you hunted and much of your everyday life revolved around hunting you would feel that people who are totally disconnected from the hunting scene have the right to tell you that you and your community they are barbaric? Speaking personally, although I have hunted since childhood I have more knowledge, understanding and respect for the natural world around me than any of you lot. Death in this world is a daily experience and so inevitably I have a different attitude to it.

awful. Looks like a lottery ball.

Very sad. Puts things into perspective.

It is not about what you think it is about whether people should enforce their moral believesonto other people. I say no and no again. One day somebody will decide they do not like something that you do. It is about the right to choose to live your life how you like.