Right it's gone too far now. Just stop, Michael Ball.

[PineappleDanish]

The old boy doing laps of his garden and raising millions for the NHS charities - great effort and to be applauded.

Michael Ball warbling his way through a cringeworthy version of You'll Never Walk Alone - not fine.

Please make it stop.

Where is Cliff. He's got a nice tan.
Didn't realise Gary Barlow was tone deaf.

randomer - thanks - hope you are feeling a bit better now. I think we are all inclined to react more strongly than we might in normal times, me included.

@Frangipanini it's the embalming fluid

The song is by Rogers and Hammerstein from the musical Carousel.In the context of the show its about coming through tough times and facing adversity for someone who was bereaved.Only saying. Obviously now synonymous with Liverpool FC. I'd forgotten that, I cried like a baby when I saw it as a teenager.

We react when we see a little box and we can type nonsense!

I'm not keen on the way this guys thing has been hijacked but good for him.

I cried like a baby when I saw it as a teenager

I cried like a baby when I watched it on TV the other night. It’s a shockingly bad film.

Its an appalling film! Agreed

It might well be a shocking film but when they are singing that song she is walking along with her dead father. My father died when I was 13 so if it is OK with you as a 14 or 15 year old I was touched by it.

What started off as rather a sweet story and lots of generosity has been tainted and become tawdry with the over-egging by the media. Including - and horribly so! - the BEEB looking for the dollop of good news at the end of gut-wrenching reality news stories.
Emphatically, please know that the NHS itself is not a charity to be paid into. How awful that Joe Public is being brainwashed into thinking it is. The government has hung the NHS out to dry, in particular finally with the refusal to pay nurses and doctors any higher, with a walloping vote in 2017 against any improvements in pay. My own MP was one of the hordes who voted against any pay rise and acknowledgement of the importance of our brilliant NHS service . The chances are high that YOURS did, too.
And now the two-faced antics of politicians, media luvvies and celebrities (Michael Ball, you idiot! The “song” is dreadful, do you think the nation is tone-dead as well as gas-lighted?)
Poor brave and charming Captain Tom and his family (a nice enough middle-class family, surely) have been made monkies of. I hope that the huge, huge monies are spread far and wide to deserving medical charity outreach contingent on the NHS, including Cancer relief charities, Parkinson’s UK, Stroke and Heart Disease outreach etc etc, all of whom will be suffering short shrift because of this past week’s shuffle, song and dance.

Have you completely missed the point about the money going to NHS charities rather than the NHS?

People have raised money for the NHS to buy extras for ever: sofa in Calendar girls, I myself bought a DVD player and children's DVD's for the children's ward that treated DS.

The bit that's annoying me about this is the bloody weird nostalgia for World War 2. I think people should remember what happened in the east, in Yugoslavia and the holocaust and drop the bloody Vera Lynn stuff.

Anyway, im sure Tom Moore can have a laugh and isn't taking criticism of the song to heart.

#tone-deaf...... but in this case, maybe “tone-dead” is even more accurate. The so-called “song” has eclipsed all previous lovely renditions, turning it into a mind-numbing joke of a version. No wonder King Lear took pity on ‘Poor Tom’....

'he is a frail old man who needs to slow down and rest'

Can we not bring Cliff into this again.

People have raised money for the NHS to buy extras for ever

PPE to protect staff from dying and psychological services for staff that are inevitably going to be suffering from PTSD should never be ‘extras’ or Have to be funded by charitable contributions.

One more time, it isn't for buying PPE. Can you at least read the details on the Just Giving page.

No it's not for PPE and core NHS services.

But I said upthread that the reporting has been ambiguous in this respect. Reporters saying "it's for the NHS". So people draw their own conclusions.

Frangipanini - Barbados apparently.

@user1471, notbody is remotely interested in the truth are they?

The most potent thing Tom said was that he likes people. Sonething I'm not sure a lot on mn do. Agree with this. MB is cheese personified but I do believe he's a decent person.

The Vera Lynn thing makes me smile. My mum always said she had a good war, well paid job in a factory, a handsome boyfriend from the USA army base. A big change from her small town with no opportunities. Her worst memory from the war was, "Bloody Vera Lynn." It always made me laugh, she was not very PC and quite open that she thoroughly enjoyed herself.

Agree with this. MB is cheese personified but I do believe he's a decent person. I've never got the vitriol about him, I think I'm tone deaf as music does nothing for me so I have no opinion on his singing but he always seems pleasant, I've never heard him say anything nasty, never read anything about him doing evil stuff.

I’m drawing conclusions. I know for a fact that some charity funds are having to be used for PPE.

Unless they actually details where this particular money is going to go, you have no idea. Not only that, I used the example of PPE as a general one to highlight my point about the NHS not being Live Aid. MB et al are just one group of a very many ‘slebs raising money ‘for the NHS’.

What on earth was that about! I've enjoyed some of Gary Barlows crooner sessions but that was just all kinds of wrong

I agree that this unexpectedly huge amount of money must be used wisely. It has always been said that it is for NHS support charities rather than the NHS itself but it would be such a shame if it didn't go where it's most needed with that. Supporting those workers on the frontline of Covid wards and people who are being rehabilitated after leaving hospital is what has been talked about and that sounds good but there should be some checks to make sure it's doing the most good possible.