No ! Never !

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... dApp_Tweet

Think he is on holiday so can I just say on behalf of Bresslaw that they are all very kind people who just want our public services to run smoothly for the benefit of all. They are very welcoming and loved catholics, black people, women, and many oppressed groups for a long time before it became fashionable. They have no secrets and if you don't believe me just roll up a trouser leg and have a look in my shed. I'll even show you round myself.

I'd rather they found a hidden government at Westminster seeing as the alleged official one has gone missing.

I've never been a member of the funny handshake brigade but there have been a lot worse groups in Westminister. For example, the one that included Cyril Smith for example or the Labour Group that advocated the legalisation of PIE (Paedophile Information Exchange) in the seventies.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politic ... hange.html

Thanks for replying on my behalf tolouse, but in all honesty I wouldn’t have even bothered, it’s a non-story.

Cyril Smith was a disgrace, thank god he was a Liberal.

Same old Labour , trying to tackle problems, albeit in this case in a way that divided opinion. Can't ever remember the tories tackling paedophilia , shame that would of been a great job for Leon Brittain to have headed up.

I wasn't been party political Ron. If it had been a Tory group that defended PIE I would have been just as castigating. But it wasn't.

Fair enough !

Freemasonry is a self help organisation and should be denied charity status.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/ ... judge.html

Whoosh !! the blue touchpaper is lit. Expect a 10 page thread now

Another non story

But you would say that.

I expect that bresslaw was 'taught to be cautious'!

I did say that!

The 2nd article was published when Pools where 9th in League 2, a long long time ago.

The moment you put people into catagories it becomes personal.
They are just people, Irrespective of which party they belong to.
Irrespective of color creed Etc.

Thing is with freemasonary , some categories aren't allowed to participate.

You're welcome. Never know when I might want a banker killed so I try to keep well in with the Knights of the Occasional Table and all other secret societies.

Some categories ?

pidgeon hole
sterotype


Thinking about it how many pidgeon holes would you get in a carton.

I am a humanist on the fundamentalist wing of atheism. Any chance?

Dear Sir/Madam,

Complaint – Article published on Sunday 4 February

This is a complaint pursuant to your Editorial Code about an article published on Sunday 4 February on your website and in print on Monday 5 February. The article was headlined "Two Freemasons' Lodges Operating Secretly at Westminster" and Ian Cobain was credited with the byline. lt contained significant inaccuracies which created a substantially misleading article. The existence of the two lodges in question is not secret, they don't operate at Westminster and they don't have MPs or journalists in their respective memberships.

ln particular:

The article claimed that "Two Freemasons' lodges set up for members of parliament and political journalists are continuing to operate secretly at Westminster". This is inaccurate. The Lodges do not operate at Westminster and only meet in Camden at Freemasons' Hall.
The article stated "Exclusive: Lodges for MPs and journalists are so covert even lobby reporters do not know members". The Lodges in the article do not have any MPs or journalists as members.
The Lodges are not secret. Their meeting place is open to the public all year and their meeting dates are published in the United Grand Lodge of England directory of Lodges and Chapters available for the public to buy from most Masonic retailers. Details of the founding of the New Welcome Lodge were published in the press including in the Daily Telegraph. The New Welcome Lodge and Gallery Lodge are referred to in Hansard and have had Wikipedia pages for 12 years. Both Lodges feature in publicly available academic articles (on Researchgate, among other resources) and press. A detailed history of Gallery Lodge, together with its past and present members, was published in 1968. lt is wilfully misleading for the Guardian to state that the Lodges operate secretly or to imply that their existence is "secret" or "covert".
The article claimed that "The New Welcome Lodge has about 30 to 40 members ... only about four of the current members are MPs". This is fictitious, as anybody connected with the Lodge would know. New Welcome Lodge only has 22 members. There are no current MPs who are members of New Welcome Lodge.
We provided extensive information and quotes to Ian Cobain in answer to his questions about Freemasonry and he used this information in other contemporaneous articles about Freemasonry. He chose not to ask us about New Welcome Lodge and appears to have ignored all of the widely published and available information about it and Gallery Lodge. He did not provide us with any opportunity to correct the errors in his article. Instead, inaccurate information has been published to create a misleading impression of Freemasonry. The reader is deliberately left to infer that journalists and MPs meet in secret at Westminster as Freemasons, which is untrue and which the author must have known or suspected to be untrue. There is no evidence for, or truth in, these inferences in the article about Freemasonry.

By publishing inaccuracies which foster and promote popular prejudices against Freemasonry concerning corruption, power and control, the article damaged the reputation of the United Grand Lodge of England as a membership organisation and encouraged further discrimination against individual Freemasons.

We request that you publish a retraction of the article in an agreed form which confirms that journalists and MPs don't meet in secret at Westminster as Freemasons. We also request that you publish an apology to Freemasons for misleading the public about the nature of Freemasonry.

Yours faithfully,

Dr David Staples
CEO
For and on behalf of
The United Grand Lodge of England

Zzzzzzzz..........

As was the original link. A story !

End of thread

You cant win on here, thought you would know that by now.

Are you 'taught to be cautious' brigade objecting to the judge who ruled

The United Grand Lodge of England, which in 2010 donated more than £82 million to good causes, was told that its emphasis on caring for fellow masons meant its giving was not “wholly philanthropic”.
Judge Charles Hellier noted that only between 25 and 30 per cent of the Grand Lodge’s charity donations go to causes with no Masonic connections.
“To the extent that monies were paid with the hope or expectation of self-insurance, their payment does not seem to us to be an act of philanthropy,” he ruled.

Freemasons call for an end to `discrimination` of members

There was a freemason's representative on the news who explained everything but told us nothing.

What did you want to know.............?

We’ve been here before !

There's a conundrum. A bit like people who've never seen a tiger asking what a tiger is like of members of the Society of Tiger Protection( made up by the way). They'll tell you it's endangered, a beautiful creature with orange and black markings and invite you to watch a DVD of it in it's natural habitat. But did they tell you everything, like, it'll eat you....?

Risking derision again, just ask me !!

First time I've seen the Masons accused of cannibalism Snowy

Maybe that is what the aprons are for though...

The spokesman doing the rounds of the news channels apparently joined when he was 18......18?
He spoke a lot but avoided the awkward questions. Nothing learned.

University Lodges allow 18 yr old membership. It is also possible that he may be the son of a Freemason, in which case it is also possible.

I might be able to answer the awkward questions. What were they ?