You’re Through!

That’s what the telephone operator would say, having connected you to the number you had requested.  Too soon those words will be pronounced in a different manner – confirming that you’re through using your telephone. Well, the telephone which has served you so well and so long. That is, if  like me, you have managed to cling on to a landline.

I recently mentioned telephone books, the sort strong men and women relished tearing in half to demonstrate their strength. I remember the set of London phone books in the office: A-D, E-K, L- R, S-Z, they had a whole shelf to themselves.

The local phone book was sizeable too. I could boast that I was mentioned in the same book as the Duchess of York’s father: the Guildford area telephone book that is.

Now I have received the phone book for Guildford and West Surrey. It is, indeed, a slim volume and, sadly, it bears the  message “Final edition hold on to it forever”. And so I shall.

Inside is the statement “We’ve been delivering the phone book to you from 1880 to 2024. Thank you from the phone book team”.

In Iceland the number for the Icelandic Prime Minister is in the phone book.  Many years ago, well before Mr Google and his lot, the author Ernest Gann asked me to find the name of the regiment on duty at Buckingham Palace on a specific date. Out with the A-D and there was Buckingham Palace and the answer to Ernie's query: I wonder if that would have been so simple these days. 

Evidently the first phone book issued in 1880 contained 248 London personal and business names. By 1914 1.5 million phone books were printed: the largest single printing contract in the UK.

In 2005 it became accessible through a website. It was re-sized in 2010 to fit through letter boxes and save 2,000 tonnes of paper a year.

And so to 2024 and the last telephone book. There are still some useful advertisements in it and emergency telephone numbers which include coastguard and cave rescue – 999 – but it no longer gives advice as to what you should have to hand in case of emergency. Nor instructions in the event of an earthquake or tsunami.

We must, therefore, rely on various leaflets and pamphlets outlining a household emergency plan. Some suggestions are obvious: torch with spare batteries or a wind-up torch.

That's all very well but the wind-up torches I have come across require a bit of priming by winding them at various times because they can go flat – the one I keep in my car for emergencies tends to quaver unless wound from time to time.

Traffic jams make the right length of time to do some winding – just make sure not to appear that you are using a mobile phone in your car.

Of course, smart phones have their own torches but they too, will fail when the phone fails.  Telephones: mobile, remember the charger. Yes, but if the emergency includes lack of electricity how long will that phone last with or without a charger?

One of those pamphlets I have states “It's useful to have an 'old-fashioned' analogue (non-electric) phone as it will still work if the power goes off”. But not if BT switch it off.

I have an “old-fashioned” analogue phone on my desk, next to an electric version. What I like is that if the phone(s) ring I can pick up my old phone and speak. With the electric phone I have to pick it up and press the green button to hear who is there.

And in bad light – an electricity cut for instance – that green button is not always easy to find. The numbers on my old phone are larger and clearer – again don't put that down to my age but remember if there is a cut in electricity, can you find all the right buttons to press? Wasn't that why, on the old dial phones, you could find 999 in the dark because of its closeness to the thingy which halted the dial?

That is no longer the case, even on my old phone. You must remember that 9 is bottom right – but not extreme bottom right for that is the hash key. Just think, before almost everyone had a telephone – there are still many who do not – you would have to venture out in case of emergency and go to a Police Box. And how annoying if a bumbling Dr Who answered the door, but was unable to answer your emergency problem.

Neighbourhood Watch (NhW) brings news of telephone networks improving our phone lines. I distrust the word “improving” in this case and suspect it is another example of mending something which was not broken, and doing it not for the customer but for the board of directors.

Of course, I may be totally out of line with those thoughts and in danger of seriously impeding the march of progress, but I would have thought tinkering with our phones before everyone in the country has a phone which works in every room of the house and they do not have to climb a handy mountain to get a signal is a case of putting the cart before the horse.

Openreach and other telecom companies are rewiring the telephone network to do away with copper wire – the analogue – and replace it with fibre (digital). I understand copper fetches a good price these days...

“They” say they are finding it difficult to source the parts required to maintain or repair connections as suppliers are no longer manufacturing them. What happened to supply and demand? Surely if the telecoms companies demand, manufacturers will find a way to supply – therein lies the making of money, does it not?

We are told of the delights which the new wiring will bring us. Faster broadband. Clearer and better quality phone calls. Features such as anonymous caller rejection. Three-way calling which would enable me to speak to one daughter in Goldsworth Park whilst chatting to another in the Netherlands .

There is a downside, of course. Digital landlines cannot carry a power connection, which means handsets and routers must be powered from your home power supply, and they will not function in a power cut unless you have a back-up power system such as a battery or generator. This means elderly and infirm people with care-lines may not be able contact their care provider via their special adaptor during a power cut.

Neighbourhood Watch say they “would expect that local ‘care-line’ services would already be checking their clients, but many people use private care-line companies. The solution in most cases is a modern SIM-based ‘box’ which uses mobile phone technology. Also be aware that your burglar alarm company may still use this old landline technology and so that link will also fail during a power cut. We would suggest you contact your burglar alarm company to check.”

Martin Stilwell of NhW continues “it will be clear that our elderly/infirm family and neighbours are the ones likely to have issues. BT are being very good about providing solutions, but I cannot see any other telephone service provider doing anything.

“If you or a neighbour/family member use care-line services please contact the service provider if there is a concern. If you or they are not sure who provides it, and the current service uses the landline, trigger the alarm and see who answers!

“BT are running events across Surrey in September and Neighbourhood Watch is supporting this initiative. Watch out for notifications of these events from NhW and BT. The digital switchover is happening now and will be completed by end of 2025. Please don’t blame the government – this is not their doing, for once.”

Change of Place

Next week, although my byline will remain unchanged, I shall once more be reporting from St Peter's Hospital. This time I shall go in prepared and take my daughter's laptop. They will not have had time to smooth out those terrible bumps in the long link corridor and I expect that I shall find some more things to write about: such places are always anxious for feedback from users. At least that is what they say.

People have been most kind since they read of my last stay at St Peter's: I've had messages, and flowers, and visits and even a tea break: a bag containing a couple of tea bags and a couple of naughty cookies. Clever idea.

My daughter nags me into taking exercise and a favourite walk is around the Rive Ponds. I am disappointed at the lack of obvious growth among some of the thousands of young whips and saplings but the rowans are looking healthy and a group of guilder rose is looking lovely, their leaves showing copper markings as though preparing for autumn. Patches of long grass blow in the breeze. The reed beds in the ponds are a delight for the ducks and other creatures.

I am surprised there is not more bracken. All sorts of plants are cropping up which never grew there in the past including some beautiful water lilies. Every time I walk there others are doing likewise: dog walking, family walking, groups of runners doing what runners do, lone health enthusiasts jogging. It is a very well-used place and beautiful all year round.

It is so different from when I walked there with my father 80 or so years ago – beautiful in a very different way. I pointed out to my daughter the first ditch I jumped – I was so proud. Now the ditch joins a pond and has been broadened and is more like a stream and full of interesting things.

Our Kiwi friends, who stayed with us for over a month, have now returned to NZ. We never did manage to get them to the sandpits – which they remembered from their childhood – but they were impressed by the Rive Ponds.

Football

I feel obliged to make some mention of that match: England against the Netherlands.

I chatted to my Wolvega-based daughter the day after. She and her Dutch husband are not huge fans but watched some of the match, feeling it would be rude not to. She had hung a large England flag outside the house – with a small “hand waving” Dutch flag tucked into it.

Her husband did the opposite with a large Dutch flag in another window.

A few doors along the road from their home a neighbour had gone orange all over. Finding some England bunting “my lot” went to this garden and quietly decorated it with said red-crossed bunting.

When the neighbour saw it he shook his fist in mock anger at my daughter. She pointed out that the position of the high bunting was proof that she was not the culprit: her husband is 6' 6”. She is not.  By the way, Dutch men are the tallest in the world – so useful when it comes to home decorating!

Some of her neighbours were also somewhat puzzled at the England flag, saying they thought our flag was red, white, and blue and formed of several crosses. The late Horsell Explorer Leader gave the Dutch locals a brief lesson on English and the Union flags.