Horses for courses

Recent news item - offering long-term contraceptive injections to women rather than have them rely on other ad-hoc methods "could cut the number of unplanned pregnancies by 70,000 a year". The report went on to say that objectors rejected such an idea as it "could help fuel promiscuity". Question - is this a proper and relevant objection? Of course, not all unplanned pregnancies prove to be a problem, but to the extent that they are, the problem is a social one, whereas promiscuity, if indeed you see it as a problem, is a moral one. Here we are concerned with the treatment which doctors - i.e. the NHS, which in turn means the Government - should offer, and that is a decision which should be driven solely by what is best for society. Purely moral questions are by no means unimportant, but they are for parents, teachers, church leaders, philosophers and the like. Government is there to make decisions in the best interests of us all, and not to promote a particular attitude to the way we should live our lives.

Tick tock - aargh!

At an interview I once attended, one of the questions was - If you had the power to get one law passed, what would it be? I'm still not sure just what the interviewer hoped to find out about me by asking such a question, but my answer was immediate - I would abolish Summer Time. Actually, in retrospect that wasn't exactly what I meant. What I would really like to do away with is the necessity of changing the clocks twice a year - I'm not that bothered about which particular time-zone we ally ourselves with. I live in a fairly standard three-bedroomed semi, so I would imagine that my experience is pretty typical, and last night I once again had to change the time on no less than eleven clocks. And the major problem is that only about half of them are real clocks - the others are digital displays on various pieces of equipment, and because I only have to deal with this twice a year, that means that I can't remember how to do it (they all work differently of course) and that involves getting out the various instruction books (first remembering where you put them last time!) and trying to make sense of the strange English these things tend to be written in. And as for the central heating clock, that involves half emptying the boxroom and then scrobbling on the floor with a torch! Plenty of suggestions in the papers today that we should go on to Central European Time, but that wouldn't solve the problem because they change the clocks as well. I'm sure they hadn't used to - does anyone else remember Two Way Family Favourites where the intro used to change in the summer to reflect the fact that our Summer Time now coincided with their clocks. So here's my suggestion - we (England and Wales) adopt a Standard Time which is half an hour ahead of GMT, and stick with it throughout the year. If the Scots want to do their own thing, let them, and the other European countries of course can decide for themselves. Please???!!

Tiptoe through the......

Spent the last week picking my way through mud and various sorts of animal poo on a semi-working farm in Devon. The grandchildren loved it despite the somewhat inclement weather, and I can thoroughly recommend the place to anyone with small children - the people who run it put themselves out to entertain them, and they have a wonderful time running wild in complete safety. I've no hesitation in giving them a well deserved plug - the website is http://www.northhaynefarmcottages.co.uk/.

Learning from history - again!!

So the candidates for the leadership of the Conservative Party are now down to two, and they are both, apparently but not surprisingly in view of the clout of the "little Britain" wing of the party, eager to present themselves as eurosceptic. And yet, once again, look at the past. If there's one thing that two world wars have taught us (or should have) it is that, however much we may want to, we cannot be self-sufficient - at least if we wish to maintain anything like the lifestyle we aspire to. This was why the Battle of the Atlantic was second only to the Battle of Britain in importance to the eventual outcome of the last war. So, it's clear that we need to have an trading/economic alliance with someone - the only question is, who? There are only three reasonable options - (a) the USA, (b) the Commonwealth, or (c) Europe. The problem with the USA - apart from the fact that many people, myself included, would baulk at any possibility of becoming the de facto 51st state - is distance. Goods from the USA will have to travel around 3,000 miles or more, with all the cost and other implications involved. The same problems arise with the Commonwealth, quite apart from the fact that the Commonwealth is basically an artificial grouping of countries that don't always get on that well with each other, so long-term stability cannot be taken for granted. And that leaves Europe. We may wish that Europe worked better, but the question of whether we should be in or not is really a no-brainer, isn't it?

A bumpy playing-field

Did anybody spot the case of Campbell v MGN before the House of Lords the other day? Did you realise that if you are successfully sued by someone who has a Conditional Fee Agreement with their solicitor (commonly referred to as "no win, no fee") you may end up paying up to twice as much in costs as you otherwise would have done? I didn't, and I can't help but feel somehow that it ain't right.

P.S. Mea culpa - I had assumed (see post dated 10th October) that an insurgent was someone who came in from outside to create trouble, but apparently it is anybody who rises up against authority. Must consult dictionary more.

Lies, damn lies and statistics.

Another set of crime figures - what, if anything, do they mean? Let's face it - nobody knows how much crime there is, only how much crime is reported. So that's what these figures represent, and the extent to which crimes are reported depends on many changing factors. When the police started to take domestic violence seriously, the incidence of domestic violence appeared to increase - but this was simply because more people felt it was worthwhile reporting such behaviour. Recently, a local police authority who decided to put more bobbies on the beat reported a marked increase in crime - but again this was because you're far more likely to report a crime if you see a policeman just down the street than if you have to go down the local (and it's probably not that local) cop-shop to do it. So let's be clear - these new figures which show overall crime falling may represent a genuine decrease, or equally may simply be an indication that people, for whatever reason, are somewhat less likely to report crime. Equally, the reported increase in violent crime may be nothing more than the public's reaction to their perception that these crimes are being taken more seriously. The reality may be that nothing much has changed.

Book prices

With the possibility of Waterstones taking over Ottakers, there has been much whinging about the power the booksellers wield over the publishers. Should we feel sorry for the publishers? Consider this - I have several paperbacks which I purchased in the mid to late 1950s. Price, 1/6 and 2/6 (and for those who don't go back that far, that's 7½p and 12½p respectively). Taking account of inflation, that equates to around £1.25 and £2 in today's money. And the price of a paperback today? At least £6.99!! Even if it's a best-seller and you're able to take advantage of the supermarkets' discount prices you're still going to have to pay around £3.50 or more. Like the man in the bank advert says - someone's having a laugh!

The future's red - the future's Labour

So Ken Clarke's out. I can't help but feel that the Conservatives have just ditched what miniscule chance they might have had of winning the next election. David Cameron might be the man to lead them back into power eventually, although I'm not sure about the wisdom of going for a Blair-alike, but in any event, even if he can fight off being taken over by the right-wing, as William Hague was, I can see it taking him a good few years to do the business. As for David Davis and Liam Fox - permanent opposition, I'm afraid.

A sp(l)iffing idea.

The question of drug-taking is in the news again, thanks to one of the proposed Conservative leadership candidates not being prepared to come clean on whether he had or hadn't. I find our attitude to drugs most confusing. My understanding is that the number of crimes committed specifically as a result of someone being under the influence of drugs is - if we exclude alcohol (which most strangely doesn't count as a drug) - very small. What tends to be referred to as "drug-related crime" refers almost entirely to crimes committed by people after money to feed their habit, and turf-wars between drug-dealing gangs. In other words, the main problem as far as society is concerned is not to do with people taking drugs, but with the practicalities involved in them getting those drugs, and yet all our laws seem designed to make the problem worse by making the supply more restrictive. If our laws were based on logic rather than on hypocritical bigotry we would, as a first step, make drugs readily and cheaply available thus virtually eliminating drug-related crime as defined above, and then, but only then, if thought appropriate, we could embark on an education programme designed to try and make drug-taking socially unacceptable - though why we should when we place no restrictions on the consumption of alcohol, escapes me. And let me make clear that I have no axe to grind - like Bridget Jones I regularly exceed my daily alcohol unit intake - v.v. bad.

Another poke in the eye for poor old Magna.

Just the other day I was musing on how easily one could fall foul of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, and in the papers today is a report of a young lady who was arrested and held for several hours under said Act for - wait for it - walking in an area designated for cyclists only. Yes, really - it is not April 1st! What makes matters worse are the quotes from the various authorities involved trying to justify their actions, and each blaming somebody else. I reckon Franz Kafka and George Orwell are up there having a really good laugh. By the way, for anyone not aware of the fact, George Orwell was a nom-de-plume - his real surname was Blair. Now how spooky is that!

You've got an ocracy?? (Part II)

So just how democratic is our Parliamentary system? Well, if we go back to the basic ideal that democracy means that each person has an equal right to have their voice heard, the answer has to be "not very". At present we have a government with a very comfortable majority for which only just over one person in three voted. And that's not a snipe at this particular government. I think I'm right in saying that every post-war government has been elected on less (and in most cases, considerably less) than 50% of the votes cast. This wouldn't matter so much if MPs did what they ought to do, which is represent their constituents, but with a very few honourable exceptions, they don't - they do what their party tells them to, irrespective of the wishes or best interests of those they are supposed to be representing. Indeed, what we like to think of as our "democracy" is much closer to what Lord Hailsham referred to in 1976 as an "elective dictatorship". If you voted for Party A, but Party B got in, you're going to have no say in what goes on, at least until the next election. Does this all really matter? After all, it's a system which has developed over centuries, and although we may slam a few doors and kick the cat when election results go against us, for the most part we are content with it. Well, it does to the extent that when we talk about "bringing democracy" to Iraq or Afganistan or wherever, this is what we are talking about - not democracy as such but Western parliamentary democracy, and what I'm not at all sure anybody has really thought through is whether that model, which serves us well enough for all its faults, is really suitable for others.
P.S. I see that Condoleezza Rice is over here to talk to Tony Blair about "Iran's nuclear programme" - why do I get this feeling of "Oh, God, here we go again"?

You've got an ocracy??

I keep hearing the word "democracy" being used in connection with what's going on in Afganistan and Iraq, and this has led me on to some thoughts about that word and what it imports. Let's start with basics - all the "ocracy" words derive from the Greek "kratos" meaning power or strength, and thereby the right to rule. So we have "autocracy" meaning power in the hands of one person (autos = self), "theocracy" meaning government according to the rules of some religion or other (theos = god), "meritocracy" meaning rule by those who have proved their ability (from the Latin this time - merere, to deserve), and of course "democracy" meaning rule by the people (demos = the ordinary people). So in a true democracy everybody has a right to their say, and everybody's say carries equal weight. The closest mankind ever got to this was in ancient Athens, where all citizens could go to the Assembly (which by all accounts was just an open hilltop) and speak their piece and vote on what laws should or shouldn't be made - at least in theory. In fact this wasn't as open as might first appear. For starters, you had to be a citizen, which ruled out slaves and women, for instance. Then if you weren't a good orator, or didn't have a particularly powerful voice, your chance of being heard (or more to the point, of being taken any notice of) was slim. In any event, such a system could only work where you had a small population, and so it was quickly taken over by the concept of "representative democracy", where people elected representatives to speak and vote for them. And that is essentially the system which has developed here in the UK, where Parliament is the modern equivalent of the Assembly. But just how democratic a system is this? More later.

Joined-up government?

Two recent headlines -
26th September - Sylvia Hardy jailed for seven days for failing to pay £53.71 of her council tax.
13th October - Thousands of prisoners could be released early because of chronic overcrowding in jails.
'Nuff said!

Poor old Magna

Another of my gran's sayings was "You can't have the penny and the bun", by which she meant, make your mind up - you can't have it both ways. But have you noticed how this doesn't seem to apply to politicians? Consider two quotes from Tony Blair:-
1. "...when they [terrorists] seek to change our country, our way of life by these methods, we will not be changed."
2. "Let there be no mistake. The rules of the game are changing."
Excuse me? If the rules of the game, that is the way we live our lives, are changing, then the terrorists have already achieved their objective surely? And boy, are they changing! Not long ago, if the police wished to arrest me, they had to have a reasonable suspicion that I had committed, was in the process of committing, or was about to commit one of the more serious crimes ("an arrestable offence"). They then had 48 hours to charge me or release me, and if charged, bring me before a magistrate "at the earliest opportunity". In theory at least, this is still the case, but the reality is that, if I am arrested under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (which may be for doing something completely innocent but which arouses someone's suspicion, for saying something that someone takes exception to or for simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time), I can be held without charge for at least a week and probably considerably longer. And proposals are currently under consideration for this to be extended to three months! The justification for this seems to be that the police need this sort of time-frame to investigate your computer, mobile phone records etc. But hang on a minute - surely this is putting the cart before the horse. What happened to the presumption of innocence? If they've no evidence, what are they doing arresting you? This idea of "we'll arrest you now, and hope to find the evidence after we've been through all your stuff" goes against all the principles of basic justice. To quote Tony Hancock (of beloved memory) "Does Magna Carta mean nothing to you? Did she die in vain?".

Bad, worse, worst

Poll carried out by local news programme the other night - should we withdraw our troops from Iraq? Result - 90% yes. Why does this worry me? My position on Iraq is quite clear - we should never have got involved in the first place, but we did and must now deal with the situation as it is, however much we may wish it were different. If there's one thing nearly 70 years in this world has taught me, it is that life rarely presents you with clear and easy choices. For the most part, you find yourself making choices you would rather not have to make, and choosing between options which all have a downside. So how do we deal with this? There are two strategies which have helped me over the years. The first is the seat-belt approach. Every year several people are killed or seriously injured as a direct result of wearing seatbelts, so how can the government possibly justify passing a law requiring us to wear one? The answer, of course is that many, many, many more people are saved from death or serious injury as a result of wearing seatbelts - in other words the advantages far, far outweigh the disadvantages. So, list the pluses and minuses of your various options and you might find the answer becomes obvious, or at least easier. But what happens if there are no pluses? Then you fall back on the "least-worst" approach. Which option produces the least worst result? Which brings me back to that poll. I can't help but feel that many of those 90% have not considered the matter any further than to see the obvious bad things which will flow from our troops remaining there. But what is likely to happen if we withdraw? Will that lead to even worse things? I don't claim to have the answer, but I'm certain it's not so clear-cut as that poll would suggest.

The sound of silence

My gran, who was mainly responsible for my upbringing, had a fund of maxims, one of which was "if you've got nothing worth saying, say nothing". As this is a blog about current affairs here in the UK, I feel I really should say something about the terrible stories and pictures coming out of Pakistan - particularly as where I come from (West Midlands) there are many people with friends and family in that area. But, however much I may wish it were different, nothing I can say will affect things, or make things better, so......

...a rose by any other name....

So we now have a new candidate as the "true" author of the works of William Shakespeare. But does it matter? Surely the value of the works of Shakespeare lies in the works themselves, irrespective of who wrote them. Similarly, I recently read an article in a music magazine suggesting that the music of Richard Strauss should not be played because he was a Nazi. Well, I'm not sure that in fact he was in the sense in which the writer meant it, but even if he was, what relevance has that got to the worth - or otherwise - of his music? Does a great painting or a wonderful poem become any less great or wonderful if we learn that the painter or poet was a mass murderer or a paedophile or whatever? If your inclination is to answer "yes" to that then consider the opposite - does a crap painting or a terrible poem become any less crap or terrible if painted by the Dalai Lama or written by Mother Theresa? Works of art have - or don't have - an intrinsic value irrespective of who creates them. So, speaking for myself, I couldn't give two hoots about who actually wrote "Romeo and Juliet", "Julius Caesar", "Othello" et al., I am simply content to accept them as the works of genius they are.

Musical pockets

So Network Rail have been fined £3.5m for their culpability in the Hatfield rail crash. But wait a minute - aren't Network Rail a nationalised concern (or whatever the current expression is), meaning that Network Rail's money is government money? And where does the fine go? Well presumably, either directly or indirectly, to the Treasury. So if I'm right, the effect will be that the government will take £3.5m out of one pocket, marked "Network Rail" and transfer it to another pocket labelled "Treasury". As Jimmy Greaves used to say (and probably still does) "It's a funny old game"!

Learning from history - part the twoth

The government keep trying to excuse the mess they have helped create in Iraq by maintaining that they couldn't possibly have foreseen what was going to happen. And yet.... It's not that long ago that we watched what happened in Yugoslavia, a recent artificially created country only held together by a strong repressive government, when that government collapsed. So now we have Iraq - a recent artificially created country only held together by a strong repressive government, and we go in and deliberately remove that government, and...... well, goodness gracious me, I didn't see that coming! Of course, as we all know, it's really down to the insurgents. This word "insurgents" keeps cropping up in official pronouncements, rather like a comfort blanket - it's all down to these wicked people coming in from outside, and the Iraqis themselves, left alone, would live a Utopian existence in peace and harmony. Really? My understanding is that in those (admittedly few) cases where the perpetrators of terror attacks have been able to be identified, the overwhelming majority have been native Iraqis. Ah yes, then goes the argument, the insurgents are using Iraqis to do the dirty work, but they are behind it. Comfort blanket again. I'm sure there are people who have been drawn to Iraq to help in what they see as a struggle of principle - exactly as many British and Americans were drawn to Spain's civil war in the 1930's (learning from history - part the third!), but I think this insistence that it's all down to these insurgents owes more to wishful thinking than reality. I guess that my use of words like "Iraq" and "insurgents" probably means that this post will have been flagged by the intelligence services - so hello, lads, and have a nice day.

It's round and it rolls, stupid!

When I went to school - more years ago than I care to remember - I recall our history teacher explaining to us what the purpose was of studying history. "It is" he said "to prevent each generation having to re-invent the wheel". In other words, you build on what others have done, and avoid the mistakes others have made. And yet it's amazing how often this lesson is ignored. I was reminded of this the other day when listening to the speech of one of the candidates for the leadership of the Conservative party. Essentially his message was "I want us to stop apologising for being Conservatives" which to me, at least, appeared to be a coded way of saying "Vote for me for more of the same". The fact that "the same" had resulted in three straight big election defeats just didn't seem to register. The most cursory examination of elections since the war demonstrates that they are won from the centre ground. I am no fan of Tony Blair, but give him credit for understanding that the Labour party would never win an election from way out on the left, and for dragging them kicking and screaming into the centre. Of course the Conservatives then made their fundamental mistake. Instead of fighting for the centre ground, they adopted the "clear blue water" policy which resulted in them moving further and further to the right and becoming, in their turn, unelectable. So they now face the same problem that Labour did in the 80's - stay where they are and become the "sadly-misunderstood party" permanently in opposition, or move back into the centre. I've seen governments come and go over many years and developed a somewhat cynical attitude to politics and politicians, but it is important for the political process to have a strong opposition - something we haven't had for the last eight years - so the outcome of the Conservative leadership contest does concern me, and the fact that the party are even willing to listen to candidates who simply promise "more of the same" worries me.

...and possibly goodbye from them

Top story today is of the danger of species becoming extinct due to global warming. Am I alone in wondering just what it is we are getting our knickers in a twist about? After all, environmental factors have been killing off species throughout history - anybody seen a dinosaur lately? I see a certain similarity here with the arguments over fox-hunting. As far as I could see (and I am a townie who knows nothing of country life) it had little or nothing to do with foxes or dogs or one creature tearing another to pieces - after all, this is the natural order of things. No, what was at issue was human behaviour - it was OK for a pack of dogs to chase and kill a fox, but not OK for people to specifically organise such an event, and then to watch and get enjoyment from it. The same people who were so vociferously anti-fox-hunting would probably see nothing wrong in a TV program showing a lion hunting down and killing a gazelle. In the same way, the problem with the possible extinction of species due to global warming is not that this sort of thing doesn't happen naturally, and that these species may well become extinct in due course anyway, but that what is happening is the result of human behaviour. I'm not arguing for or against, but it seems to me that we should be clear in our minds about just what the argument is. There may be good reasons for trying to stem the tide of global warming, but I'm not sure that the possible extinction of species is one of them.

Goodbye from him.........

The news yesterday and the papers today are dominated by the death of Ronnie Barker. Certainly the most accomplished comedy character actor of the television era, his portrayals of Norman Stanley Fletcher in "Porridge" and Arkwright in "Open All Hours" will ensure that his memory will live on. I, like I suspect many others, feel that I have lost a personal friend. Four candles, anyone...........?