Alastair Stewart: Those of us living with dementia are not celebrating the winter fuel cut U-turn just yet

I remember another year we were in the hospitality tent and a fellow guest leant over to me and asked: "Who is that extraordinary man in boots and a full-length leather coat?”

I looked over with as much subtlety as I could muster, took a peek, and observed it was global rockstar Bruce Springsteen! His daughter Jessica, who rides in the US national team, was competing, and he often turned up to see her.

After the London Olympics, Bruce had phoned our friend Peter Charles MBE, who, with Ben Mayer, Scott Brash and Nick Skelton, won gold for Team GB in the Team Show-Jumping event. Bruce wanted to buy Peter’s horse, on which he’d won Gold - the deal was done.

Also at this year's show was Peter’s son Harry, whom our son Fred grew up with on the show-jumping circuit. Harry’s sister Sienna, also an accomplished rider, was also there. Talking like mother like son, the King’s attendance was hugely welcome. The equestrian community knew he was a keen flat-racer but hadn’t much form in supporting show-jumping.

The late Queen was very keen on rare breeds like her beloved highland ponies. She also enjoyed watching the ‘driving four in hand’ events, which her late husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, loved and mastered as a global competitor.

I was delighted to learn His Royal Highness Edward Duke of Edinburgh, had become Patron of the Royal Windsor Show. His daughter, Lady Louise, is a keen competitor in driving four in hand and was bequeathed her late grandfather’s carriage and Fell ponies. I remember so clearly the top shot of the carriage at Philip’s funeral that showed he had also left his gloves and a jar of boiled sweets for the horses. It was deeply moving

Another great event this week was the Royal Horticultural Society’s flower show at Chelsea. Everyone knows His Majesty the King’s passion for gardening and the environment. He and the Queen turned up and appeared to greatly enjoy it.

The BBC coverage was extensive and much of it good. But, like Japanese Knotweed, there were too many. Presenters that is! Sophie Raworth and the professional gardeners were good; others less so.

The fixation of TV with celebrities has infected the coverage and presentation, but we enjoyed it and learned a lot. It is great that the show gardens are again being transferred to good causes like hospitals, hospices and so on, where they will be enjoyed and do much good. Those of us with dementia benefit enormously from nature.

It was great this week to see and hear Sir Keir Starmer pressed on dementia at Prime Minister’s Question Time. The dementia and Alzheimer’s charities do a great job in lobbying the Government and politicians.

I had an email from one asking me to press our local MP on the subject.

I happily obliged, and I am delighted to say he has a good track record on the subject. We would all be in a worse place post diagnosis were it not for the voluntary sector, who take the baton over to a great extent.

I like and enjoy the BBC’s “Scam Interceptors” show, especially co-presenter Nick Stapleton, who is the son of the late great Lynn Faulds Wood, who died of a stroke, having been cured of bowel cancer many years previously.

In her last months and years, she was a brilliant campaigner on this tricky and deadly disease. Nick’s dad, and Lyn’s husband, the superb John Stapleton, is struggling with Parkinson’s. John, among many things, used to present The Time, The Place, of which ITV’s The Assembly is a thin echo.

I got a Facebook message from a claims team saying they’d discovered I was owed thousands of pounds over car finance and exhaust emissions from previous car purchases I had made.

So I messaged Nick to ask if it was a ‘scam’ and he said some are bona fide, others are fishing expeditions for your personal details. “Best left,” he said, so I have. For those with dementia, this is a minefield.

ITV took a knife to its daytime schedule. I will lose no sleep over cuts in airtime for any of the shows, few of which I ever watch. But I do feel sorry for the backroom teams, some of whom I have worked with. It really isn’t their fault that it has become so poor, but as Sally observed, the vibrant independent sector will pick up some of the good ones. I hope so.

I had my regular lunch with friends Bob and Khalid. I posted a picture of the three of us on social media, which yielded several lovely responses with many friends observing I looked well, which included Clive Jones and Mick Desmond, who helped run ITV in its better days. Mick was Head of Sales.

Khalid is a former ITV and BBC presenter, and Bob is a former investor in TV production and radio. Both said ITV looked like a basket case these days. I agreed.

Bob was just back from a regular trip to Argentina, where he shoots and fishes with friends, several from the USA. Among them are many Republicans who tried to convince him that Trump's odd policies on trade and foreign affairs were all part of a plan. We had an interesting debate.

These two friends keep me mentally on my toes, and their kindness in giving me their time and company means I always leave feeling on top of this odd world I now occupy. As for US politics, while Roosevelt had a plan, the jury remains out on Trump in my view.

Back in the UK political scene, some pensioners may get the winter fuel allowance back. Those of us with dementia aren’t celebrating yet.

Especially if the new system is based on complex application forms, our most effective postwar PM, Thatcher, was a ‘lady not for turning’.

Starmer should read her diaries - as you can easily skid off the road doing U-turns.