The Thimble

David Cameron's flood barrage...

2007-07-24T11:32:00.000+01:00

From today's Daily Mail:

David Cameron Pissed On My Cornflakes

David Cameron's rich, white constituents voiced their anger last night that he was spending time with poor, black people in Rwanda while they battled with floods, floods which Cameron could have stopped single-handedly with the use of his bike pump if only he'd bothered to stay at home. Cameron's constituents were reported to be astonished that the Leader of the Opposition was moved to give up the chance of photo opportunity in a dinghy in Witney to take up the chance of a photo opportunity with some Africans in Kigali.

Cameron damning political error, to spend some time honouring 259,000 victims of the 1994 Rwanda genocide, was compounded by his weekend in Witney when he only visited the scene of the flood rather than donning his scuba-gear and helping grannies get their meals-on-wheels.

Stephen Smith, 37, whose house was under 2ft of water at the weekend, said: "He came to visit but he just walked past me. He didn't even pick up a mop and a bucket. He was just walking showing his face, talking to people, trying to establish what's been happening, talking to the authorities, expressing sympathy, promising to take up the issue in Parliament, raising it with his Shadow Cabinet... and that was it. Now he's off in Africa. The bastard."

Shop manager Gary Cooper, 46, warned of a potential major problem over debris from the flooding. He said: "If there are no bin collections what are we supposed to do with all the rubbish? It's all right for David Cameron - he goes off on a jolly to Rwanda, visiting scenes of mass genocide - but what about the rubbish? As my elected MP, the least he could have done was pick up a bin bag rather than get involved in sterile issues like international development and conflict prevention. Did I mention the rubbish could be a problem and that it is all David Cameron's fault?"

Cameron who spent the weekend in Witney, was said to be in close phone contact with the local authorities, and got his wife to bake a cake for the local flood fund, was also criticised in Tory quarters for his decision to go to Rwanda. Kelly Grant, deputy chairman and treasurer of the Ealing Southall Tory association, where the party came a humiliating third in last week's by- election, attacked the 'unfortunate' timing of the visit. She said: "I think his interest in worldwide aid, yada, yada, yada is good but he needs to concentrate on the real issues, like making sure his backbenchers don't stab him in the back".

Read the original Daily Mail article here (That's the last time that phrase will be heard on this blog).

(Left: Not content with ignoring the plight of his constituents, David Cameron decides to strangle a puppy for charity).

Le Tour

2007-07-09T16:37:00.000+01:00

Twas a great weekend! Thank you Ken for getting the Tour to London and let's hope it comes to England again sometime (and that we don't have to wait 104 years for it to come back to London).

(Pics: from top to bottom - more will be available on my flickr stream in due course).

1. Axel Merckx

2. Cadel Evans

3. The Crowd (a true KoM...he climbed to the top of that lampost without the assistance of any banned substances).

Question Time, Interns and Being Nasty

2007-07-06T11:11:00.000+01:00

This week I finally succumbed to the dawning realisation that I am not a very nice person. Many have known this for a long time but I'd been blissfully unaware of this until now. A few episodes in the last few days have confirmed this unpleasant discovery....[Warning! This is a long post. After weeks of non-posting I now have blog-post diarrhea]

The Intern

We have an intern in our office. They are usually hard-working, enthusiastic and American. These three characteristics usually give me very little difficulty in establishing a fruitful working relationship with them. It is the norm for them to get diligently down to work and for me to bore them with my theories on the development of the British Parliamentary system. They come out of the whole experience with half the knowledge they entered it and we get a lot of envelopes stuffed.

This time, however, the experience has been different. The intern is American but he is a bit lazy and a bit annoying. Admittedly my tolerance levels may be lower than normal but he is, on reflection, not a bit annoying but very annoying. He spends his day on the PC, alternating between facebook and websites advertising accommodation in the areas around his college back home. He also appears to be in the grip of a hitherto undiagnosed condition whereby whatever is showing on his PC screen is transmitted through his vocal cords to the greater public...'ha', 'oh man', 'no waay', 'that's funny' are the most common utterances when's he surfing the web [which is all the time] and, at a rate of 15 ignorant comments per minute, they can get fucking irritating.

Yesterday he asked me, in all sincerity, if the email he's received from someone he doesn't know, asking for all his personal and bank details, might be a scam. You think?! FFS.

I did tell him the email was a scam but this whole experience has brought home to me the inescapable fact that I am not a very nice person. I could try and make out that he's bringing out the worst in me but the truth is that I must have a deep reservoir of nastiness within my soul in order for me to draw upon it so easily... For example, this week I taunted him about what a boring sport basketball is (hardly an original line-of-attack) and then suggested, on American Independence Day, that the US would be better off returning to British rule and having Gordon Brown as their Emperor, with Blair as Viceroy, based in Washington. It says much for my addled thinking (brought about by my irritation at said intern) that I actually thought this was both a searing political critique and devastatingly funny.

My transformation into a nasty, glib, unfunny, boor (well, I hope its a transformation) was confirmed by my reaction to the intern's morning greeting as he walked into the office one day this week. The first thing he said, commenting on the police around Westminster and the security checks in Parliament, was 'You guys and your civil liberties. You're giving them up m'aan. As Thomas Jefferson said,“He who trades liberty for security deserves neither and will lose both.”

Unfortunately I was having a Richard Littlejohn moment and, recognising the quote before he finished it, only allowed him to utter 'He who trades security..." before replying, pithily,'Well, Jefferson didn't have to deal with fucking Al Qaeda did he...".

My face then took up a suitably sheepish expression before I meekly asked the intern to open the post.

I am a nasty person. I'm hoping that the Summer Recess might alleviate my condition.

Question Time

A deepening of my conviction that I am indeed nasty came about from watching Question Time last night. You can tell that my condition had become more advanced because I was positively revelling in being nasty - it seemed the only sane position to adopt when your upper cortex is being bombarded by idiotic statements from apparently well-meaning people.

Last night's edition of QT was one of such high-octane stupidity that it made your teeth bleed. Last night QT was down-wit-da-kidz. Not that they wanted to patronise or anything, but, because they had a yoof audience (between 14 and 22, their age range rather than their IQ score parameters apparently), QT had Davina McCall on the panel. Davina-Fucking-McCall. They also had some numpty called Charlie Bell, who was 18 and planning to go to uni. Another example of a higher-education policy gone wrong. Again, my nastiness glands kicking in, I yearned to see him adopt a nervous blink, a la Ben Swain in the Thick of It, but sadly this never happened. Which was a shame as it if did have a mad blink it might have done something to take your mind off the fact that he spoke utter horse-shit.

The first question brought about an orgy of wrong-headedness. The question was 'Has the UK become a terrorist target because of its culture or because of the actions of its Government abroad?" (Cue audience applause)

Douglas Murray, a neo-Con possessing all the genuine charm-skills of a Foxton's estate agent, rightly spoke of Islamic fundamentalism and refused to countenance foreign policy being a major motivating factor in terrorist attempts at mass-slaughter. Of course, in front of an audience immersed in 'root causes' muddle-headedness, this didn't go down as well as when Davina responded by saying Murray's arguments were 'all twaddle'....(cue audience whopping and cheering). Davina, Professor of Politics at Kings College, then wisely characterised the multi-faceted nature of international terror by saying that 'hate breeds hate' and that everyone should sit down and chat about it.

I can see it now...Big Brother 8: [adopts Geordie accent] 'Ismail Haniya walks into the diary room. He's disillusioned by Israel's existence on the sofa and is fed up that Fatah keep nicking the milk'.

Someone from the audience then declared that the suffragettes were terrorists. I then declared that the nation's youth were all idiots. In comparison, my reasoning stands up better to closer examination.

I know that QT isn't representative of the population but, on this evidence, let's forget about lowering the voting age, let's raise it. On a rolling basis. Then the generation on QT will never have to face the horrible indignity of having to compromise by voting in an election.

Why, you might ask, if QT was that bad, didn't I turn it off? Because my lady was on press-duty and we had to have all the news bulletins and QT on telly just in case she got calls about it...I suffer for her art. At one point I seemed to be having convulsions as my brain struggled to absorb the colossal ignorance of the audience's responses. I even rushed upstairs to grab a hoodie to wear just so I could pull it over my face at the most agony-inducing moments.

This is a desperate, desperate situation. Not only am I nasty but I am actually searching for the next 'hit' of idiocy just so I can vent my spleen. I'm watching the Tour de France at the weekend - maybe a weekend of cheering on athletic endeavour will help me get over my misanthropy. But I wouldn't count on it.

Change of blog ownership

2007-06-22T13:19:00.000+01:00

Following recent developments on the London Stock Exchange, this blog has been taken over by a private equity firm and will be subject to new management shortly. Regular underperfomance made the blog vulnerable to take-over and this site will now undergo a brief period of internal review before a dazzling re-launch featuring a host of celebrity contributions (for more see below).

Blog-staff have been sacked, the pension-fund has been plundered, and golden-handshakes have been swiftly agreed. A new blog will begin soon with lower standards of public transparency and more intense worker exploitation. Watch this space.

So this is the last post under the old regime. Morale is low, inspiration is woefully lacking. This last post has been handed to our guest writer, Jim Smith, part-time cabbie and pub philosopher:

Last night's Question Time: Actually a decent edition of QT last night but proof again that there's rarely anything 'liberal' about the Liberal Democrats. Shirley Williams' woeful failure to defend freedom of speech, the freedom to cause offence, was staggering when discussing the Rushdie Knighthood award. Williams, you're supposed to be a fecking liberal! Stand up for the right to piss people off and don't say it was a 'mistake', blah, blah...Well done McNulty, good performance, and well done the "Hitch"(the Chris version).

Honours: So a guy who designs knickers gets offered a gong and doesn't want it cos' Blair is 'morally corrupt'. And guess what...the Independent put this as it's front-page. Jeez.
Joseph Corre said he was: "Most proud of my daughter, Cora, and least proud of Tony Blair and the Labour party." This is a man whose fine reasoning led him to name his child Cora Corre...I think we need to take his moral judgements about as seriously as his daughter's name.

Nick Ross: Auntie Beeb don't owe you a living mate. It ain't ageism, they've just woken up to how dispensible you are.

Blog developments - Coming Soon

Beppe from Eastenders has already pledged to blog on his experiences of auditioning for the understudy part in the new musical "Lord of the Chastity Rings", a mediocre tale about one girl's crusade to wear the ring of virginity and which ends in moderate tragedy when she realises no one fancied her anyway.

I believe I can fly

2007-06-01T15:39:00.000+01:00

Anyone who's ever heard Adam & Joe's dissection of the R-Kelly Trapped in the Closet dvd will know that Robert Kelly is a man who waxes in almost Dickensian scope about his, erm, dick (or at least about what he's going to do with it).

Alexis Petridis reviews R Kelly's new album, available in all good petrol stations, in today's Guardian. Read it all but this pretty much sums it up Mr Kelly:

"...a hapless slave to his libido, a man whose brain exists merely as a life-support system for his testicles".

Nothing more to see here folks. Have a good weekend.

Deputy Leadership Hustings

2007-05-17T11:01:00.001+01:00

So to the Institute of Education for the Deputy Leadership Hustings last night and here's my rundown, FWIW, of the performances of the runners and riders....

Hazel Blears: She generally performed the best and consistently got the biggest applause. As someone immune to the charms of Hazel Blears (I don't think that's a minority pursuit), I found this a little perplexing at times but she successfully promoted herself as the candidate with the strongest talent for campaigning. She demonstrated the 'right, I'm working class, me' routine enough times for a bourgeois dilettante like myself to find it grating. There's no way I'm voting for her but on that performance I can see why people would. Her answer on climate change was fatuous and pretty irritating though(see below).

For me Jonathan Freedland got it right though when he wrote (of Blears):

"Her manner is a tad too grating: she's that character you find in every office,
falsely chirpy, constantly demanding people cheer up and with a sign above
her computer declaring, "You don't have to be mad to work here, but it
helps".

Hazel Blears USP: Vote for me, I'm a feisty, Northern, working class lass. Did I mention I was working class?

Hilary Benn: Popular and charming as he is, Benn really struggled to say anything beyond banalities when responding to audience questions. He did well in his set-piece opening speech and also in his closing speech but otherwise was unconvincing.

Hilary Benn USP: Vote for me and elect me to a position in which I can do nothing about the global poverty I talk so eloquently about.

Peter Hain: Managed to tick the boxes but still seemed to struggle to pass the test. He spoke of a 'Red-Green agenda', pointed to his record of banning the 11-plus whilst Norn Iiseland Secretary and generally gave soft-Left responses to each question but still failed to fully convince. Hain reminded me of a candidate going for a job interview ('Remember, back up everything you say with an example from your career'), as he proceeded to preface his every response with 'As Northern Ireland Secretary'...this got a tad irritating.

Peter Hain USP: I'm the only candidate to build a Red-Green & Orange Coalition.

Harriet Harman: Harriet Harman asked if, with Gordon as leader, "we wanted two men in the team? Do we want another man?" Yes, Harriet we do if it means you don't get the job.

Beyond arguing that she was Radio 2 (in comparison with Brown as Radio 4), Harman's monomania about the importance of electing a woman (or to be precise, Harriet Harman) to be deputy leader meant that I can't remember anything else she said.

Harriet Harman USP: I'm a woman. From the South. And I'm a woman.

Alan Johnson: Didn't play to the audience which was actually to his credit. Seemed laid-back, perhaps too much so at times, which meant that Blears stole the show with her more aggressive approach.

Alan Johnson USP: I'm yer real-politiking trade union ex-postie.

Jon Cruddas: Having heard about Jon's desire to re-engage the core vote and the party , I was keen to hear what he had to say on this. I wanted to like him. Unfortunately I came away disappointed as he didn't really say much about what he would do to reach core voters. He also actually looked disinterested on the stage and failed to exude (deputy) leadership quality.

Jon Cruddas USP: Bring me your tired and huddled working class masses and I'll, erm...

Climate change

One of the questions from the floor was 'what have you done personally and professionally to tackle climate change?'. The answers on this were, for the most part, either instantly forgettable or totally depressing.

Hain has a strong record on this (from his time as Northern Ireland Secretary...) but Harman's felt it worthy to mention in her response that she stops her husband from running the tap while he's cleaning his teeth. Cruddas rambled, saying he was initially reluctant but now he does stuff 'cos of his kids. Blears' response was absolutely awful. She offered a fatuous reply which was probably aimed at getting a laugh but was actually risible (yeah, I didn't like it). Blears said she'd heard that beacause of climate change, Manchester was going to get warmer and have the climate of Portugal. She spoke in a manner which suggested she was all for this (what a card!). She then said she'd done her bit for the environment by downsizing to a smaller engine sized motorbike....

I hate the 'hair-shirt' strain of environmentalism but I would have expected a better answer from Blears especially. The other candidates answers (Hain's apart) were also disappointing. Surprising too given that the environment is so high on the political agenda now and that politicians need to pay at least effective lip-service to it if nothing else...

Torywatch - Brave Tory Speaks Out

2007-05-14T18:01:00.001+01:00

In the deep, dark depths of Surrey, one man is fighting a lone battle for truth. Cllr David Pickles, Tory Councillor for Belmont (in Sutton Council), waged his honourable fight in a letter to the local Guardian newspaper last week on the issue of housing. Making a heart-felt appeal to reasoned argument and calm reflection, Cllr Pickles said:

It takes a local politician of guts and honesty to put the finger on the correct cause of the housing shortage and I'm about to reveal what everybody knows but not many have the courage to say.Lack of border controls, record immigration and a continual flood of asylum seekers.

There - now it's been said and before the lefty loonies come out of the closet, no I'm not racist and nor is that statement.

Let's be clear here. He's not a racist. He's just said so. And that local politician of 'guts and honesty'? That's him, just in case you were wondering.

He concludes his paean to prejudice with the following policy recommendation.

London (and the UK) is bursting at the seams with respective populations of 8million and 60million and it's high time politicians of all persuasions closed the doors once and for all. Coun [Darren] Johnson's green credentials also lack credibility. After all it's hardly green to continually rape what's left of our countryside to build houses for what is a falling indiginous* population.

'Closed the doors once and for all'? What an enlightened policy! Who's going to close the doors for him? Possibly the Polish au-pair he's hired to polish his jack-boots...

His inflammatory language is hardly the cool appeal to facts you would hope for in a local representative. He's supposed, at least nominally, to provide leadership for the local community, examine the issues and try and find a way to contribute to a solution. He's failing his local community if he'd rather spout such shite and pander to prejudice.

The Cameron mask of respectability has clearly slipped from this ugly Tory's face....I wonder what's the Leader of Sutton's Tories or even Cameron has to say about it?

*The online version had indigenous spelt this way - "indiginous". Clearly Cllr Pickles needs a spell-check as well as a lobotomy.

p.s. Interestingly, when I went to copy his picture from the Sutton Council website, the default file name was 'Small Mug' ....

While stocks last....£1.38 a pint

2007-04-30T11:04:00.000+01:00

Beer on wine, feel fine. Wine on beer, feel queer.

Whichever order you imbibe them in, it is cheap to drink alcoholic drinks in Parliament's bars. No news in that statement but the House of Commons Commission has just published figures detailing the number of litres of alcohol consumed over the 11 months from April 2006-February 2007.

In the bars and restaurants, 34,377 litres of beers and ciders were consumed at a cost of £52,260. I'm assuming the 'cost of consumption' is the price the punters pay for it, which works out at around £1.52 a litre and around £1.38 a pint...which is'nae bad value at all.

Any Dream Will Do

2007-04-26T15:24:00.000+01:00

In my MPs postbag today....

An invite to my MP to attend the Credit Today Awards Dinner in May. Who says MPs don't live a life of pampered privilege and high-octane entertainment?

The awards, as if you didn't know, are 'the most prestigious in the credit industry' and they are to be hosted by that king of financial expertise...Graham Norton! What a great night will be had by all as they rejoice at the winner of the 'Best Supporting Credit Controller in a Data Protection Act' while hackneyed double-entendres bounce off the walls (that will be Norton rather than the finance delegates).

Also in my MP's postbag today is a nicely presented pamphlet from Saga fashion model, Michael Meacher MP(the soft-focus photo on the front of his leadership manifesto initially led me to think MM was doing a 2-for-1 promotion on bi-focals). No doubt we'll be inspired by the Meacher message and place it in the recycling bin. It's what he would have wanted.

Friday frippery

2007-04-20T14:16:00.000+01:00

Down with the yoof on You-tube

Pip Scroobius offers a list of useful commandements to live by ('Thou shall not quote me happy").Check it (but don't wreck it...) here.

Entertaining Lyrical genius or naff novelty act? You decide! (text in to 0800lobotomy)

Footballer in inane comment shocka

Ian Nolan is always brillant value. Displaying the entertaining virtuosity which make Bolton Wanderers such a prize draw for football neutrals, Nolan peppers his BBC column with a wealth of penetrating insights. This week he describes, in excruciating detail, how he came to chose Paul Scholes for PFA Footballer of the Year, "I picked up a pen. Then I moved my hand in a forward, sideways and then backward motion to establish an imprint on the nomination form. This inscription marked the letters P-A-U-L..."

But it gets better. He is posed the following question by an interested member of the public:

Kevin,
Which actor would you have in a film about your life, and why?
Des O Gorman, UK

Kevin ruminates for a moment and then [Eureka!] he answers:

Al Pacino - no question. I think he is absolute class as an actor. I have seen a
lot of his films and think that he's so talented he would be able to do a pretty
decent Scouse accent.

Al Pacino. A predictable choice Kev. I'd thought Paddy Considine would have been more appropriate but its your movie.

Infrequent posting

2007-04-04T17:09:00.000+01:00

I'm usually crap at updating my blog anyhow but I'll be away for a week now. I'm repeating my journey of last year and off to Nooorn Iiseland for the week.

Have a good Easter (uprising)!

On the slide

2007-04-04T16:47:00.000+01:00

Abusing the freedom of the Easter Recess (and the absence from Westminster of my MP), I got myself down to the Tate Modern before work this morning and had a go on Carsten Holler's slides.

Skillfully employing the talent developed through years of supermarket shopping, I managed to position myself so I evaded the associated groups of overseas students and nabbed the second ticket of the day for the Level 5 slide. The slide was excellent, although the whole experience was over just as I started to enjoy it (....), and it really is a great way to start the day. As Mr Holler himself has said:

They’re also a device for experiencing an emotional state that is a unique condition somewhere between delight and madness. It was described in the fifties by the French writer Roger Caillois as ‘a kind of voluptuous panic upon an otherwise lucid mind’.

And who am I to disagree.

From a paen to slides to a nation on the slide (see what I did there...). Iain Dale's linked to an article by Tim Montgomerie which helpfully explains why Britain's influence is on the wane. You can read the 10 key factors on Dale's blog but here's the next ten 'key' factors, narrowly missing out on the list, that have contributed to Britain’s vulnerability in 2007:

1. Female suffrage.
2. Indian independence
3. The National Minimum Wage
4. Channel 4
5. The Human Rights Act.
6. Political correctness.
7. The Guardian
8. John Prescott
9. The scrapping of Clause 28.
10. The demise of the old-style Kit Kats with their silver foil and separate red wrapper.

These aren't mine by the way, but I do rue the passing of No.10 (or have these come back now? I get my butler to go to the newsagents these days).

(Pic: Tate Modern, Tate website)

Hug a Tree not a Human

2007-03-26T14:09:00.000+01:00

Juliette Jowitt's Observer article on population growth (and its linkage to climate change) got a reassuringly humanitarian response on the Observer's letters page yesterday. Colin Wells from Leicestershire submitted this cherry missive:

An article in the New Scientist has recently examined what would happen if all human life disappeared from Earth. It concluded that recovery of threatened
habitats and species would occur quite quickly. This is actually happening
in the area contaminated by the nuclear reactor meltdown at Chernobyl in
1986.

My guess is that people won't opt for the logical solution to the climate change threat, so it's roll on the bird flu pandemic - that'll sort it out!

Great! Mr Wells sounds positively gladdened by such a prospect. Forget fining people for failure to recycle their rubbish, just threaten them with a deadly virus...that will convince them of the righteousness of our cause!

Paul Butler from Gwynedd is not so fond of the Green Lobby and begins his letter:

Many thanks for allowing Juliette Jowitt to highlight the true environmental
cost of having children. I find it particularly annoying when people such as
myself are criticised because they live in single accommodation.

Mr Butler argues that his carbon footprint is lower because of his choice to remain childless and concludes:

It seems very strange to me that my attempt to help save resources by not
bringing any more people into the world has become a stick for the green lobby
to beat me with.

Aaah, the old romantic, you can just imagine the scene..."listen daaahling, I ain't getting shacked up with you cos' that will lead to an extra burden on the world's dwindling resources and that just ain't fly..."

I'm no climate change denier (I recycle my beer cans) but if the sentiments of Mr Bell and Mr Butler are the way in which the environment debate is going to be couched then Cristina Odone might be right in surmising that the world we can look forward to living in will be 'a green and unpleasant land'.

Cheers Blears

2007-03-23T17:03:00.001Z

"We must build on our successes and make politics matter" says the Hazel for deputy (dawg) letter sent to our office today.

The letter's addressed to the unsung heroes of the movement (that's us bag carriers) and acknowledges the valuable contribution we make (i.e. snide blog posts and insular gossip). It is such a good letter that we must have received about six copies of it, one for each intern who's worked in our office over the last couple of years...I'm all for solidarity with our international brethren but appealing for votes to Democrats from South Carolina is getting a bit desperate (in other words, "Oi Blears, sort your mailing list out!").

SERA have pulled off quite a coup and managed to get all the deputy leadership candidates to take part in their Red Green Agenda lectures. Hain and Benn have already fulfilled their slots but SERA are still touting tickets for Hazel's one...maybe it was that picture of Hazel on that gas-guzzling bike that's stopped a sell-out so far...

I don't think I'll be supporting the Ginger Tiger for the deputy leadership but she's promised that if she's elected she'll visit 50 marginal seats, 50 heartland seats and 50 seats with no Labour MPs which sounds like something the others should sign up to too.

What is the French for "leaves on the line"?

2007-03-23T15:25:00.000Z

"Madames et monsieurs, la prochaine gare est London Victoria..."

Nigel Farage (that's the only time I'll be linking to the UKIP site) would be disgusted, no doubt, but on the Southern train service this morning commuters heard their public announcements in French as well as in English. This was a novelty so I thought I should bring this news to you...

These Franco-utterings caused something of a stir in my carriage. Well, as much of a 'stir' as you are going to get on a train of commuters that is. "This isn't Eurostar" responded one switched-on commuter. Others harrumphed, one tutted and another looked confused. For my part I offered the wry smile of a knowing, cultured European-type. It might have looked like the grimace of a constipation sufferer but I tried my best.

The Gallic announcement was a little out-of-the-ordinary but the clear annunication of the announcer was possibly even more suprising. The guy spoke in such clear tones that I thought I'd woken up in a private school foreign language class rather than the train service to London Victoria. The contrast between this and the usual inaudible mumbling was stark.

Maybe this development is part of the celebrations for the 50th anniversary of the European Union? In which case I looked forward to getting in a black cab sometime soon and being greeted with the words "J'ai eu ce Nadine Dorries dans le dos de mon taxi l'autre jour. Son blog n'est-il pas grand?"*

*"I had that Nadine Dorries in the back of my cab the other day. Isn't her blog great?"

The state of political journalism

2007-03-20T16:48:00.000Z

Iain Dale draws attention to the Today programme and this morning's piece on the current state of political journalism. Peter Oborne and Steve Richards were on to debate the issue (for all of 4 minutes). It started at 8.55am and you can listen again to it here.

Oborne suggests that political coverage is reverential to politicians, citing biogs of Tony Blair (by Rentoul, Sopel, Riddell etc) and others as examples of this reverence. Meanwhile, Richards argues that daily political coverage is extremely critical of politicians to the point of cynicism. This approach debases politics, Richards argues.

Oborne might have a point about reverential political biographies - isn't that a common flaw of many biographies, not just political ones? - but Richards is surely closer to the truth in characterising the current state of journalism as debasing politics.

Oborne's view - at least as it was expressed on the Today programme - might be more popular, appealing as it does to the lazy cynicism which it helps to foster, but the daily media coverage of politics does debase politics, portraying it as an obstacle to governing the affairs of the country rather than as process by which complex societies make decisions.

Politicians themselves should not be absolved of blame but the media coverage of politics is damaging and unhelpful. The coverage, for the most part, does not attempt to be balanced, does not attempt to hint at the complexity of decision making, and almost never gives the impression that politicians just might be making decisions with the best of intentions.

Newspapers too often adopt the default message when discussing politics of 'a plague on all your houses'. Oborne tagged Richards as an apologist for the political classes for his view but it is this misguided notion that brave political reporting means giving politicians a kicking which is damaging to our politics and our political coverage. Political reporting might well mean giving politicians a kicking at times but if it is not to have a poisonous effect on our politics then it needs to be constructive rather than cynical (or indeed deferential).

Westminster reporting often suffers too from its descent into Kreminology (micro-analysing comments from a Minister for signs of a split with another Minister, for example). Oborne may have a point about the embedded status of Lobby journalists here and the insider Westminster Village gossip stuff can be a switch off but Parliament actually deserves a lot better coverage than it often gets. The press need to act more responsibly, acknowledging that politics is often about messy compromise and that policies will inevitably bring winners as as losers. Covering the Westminster scene, politicians who vote with their party are, for example, routinely dismissed as as 'supine' or 'lobby fodder' - even though they were chosen by their electorate to enact that very policy - and those that don't are regarded as 'rebels', even if they may have some more nuanced criticism of the policy in question than just being oppositionist (yes, I know there is only an 'Aye' and a 'No' lobby and not a 'Nuanced' one).

I've taken far too many words to state the bleedin' obvious here but the political coverage of much of the media is damaging to our politics. Of course, politicians themselves have their own responsibilities in promoting politics as a positive process - and they might often fail in this - but that doesn't excuse the media from its role in feeding cynicism of our political process.

Avoiding this journalistic impulse to view politics with cynicism doesn't mean that political corruption, hypocrisy or incompetence should be glazed over in our political coverage. Rather it means that the media should try and illuminate what the political process is about, what powers Parliament has to effect change, and what the limits are to political action (i.e. in terms of what can be done in the short-term, the power of corporations etc). It should give an idea of some of the competing interests that are in play and do so in a way which is not simply diametrically opposed lobby groups voicing off at each other, suggesting that the issue is 'black and white' rather than the shade of grey that it probably is in reality.

Battling for market share might make it problematic for newspapers and TV news to fight the impulse to pander to cynicism but it is important that they do. Politics is how complex societies organise their affairs and, for all its faults, there is much to be celebrated in the way we in the UK organise our political affairs. But if our institutions are going to retain their political legitimacy there needs to be a cultural change (aahh, the cop-out, non-concrete propsal...) in the way politics is viewed in the UK. Journalists and the media are an important component to this change and they need to act with the responsibility which comes from being unelected members of the Fourth Estate.

Green Eyed Monsters

2007-03-20T11:10:00.000Z

News today of a genetically modified strain of malaria-resistant mosquito which offers the possibility that one of the world's deadliest diseases could be eradicated.

But what is the possibility of saving millions of lives when you can focus on the flippant....the real story here is that scientists have made the mosquito's eyes fluorescent green (to differentiate them from the non GM mozzies).

This is surely the route to future GM success; encouraging people to cast off their scepticism of the benefits of GM procedures by turning the creatures of the world into funny colours. Not sure about milk from GM cows? Be amazed by the cow's new blue skin with its luminous yellow spots. Wary of GM chickens? Check out their new go-faster stripes.

Vegetables could get a boost too. Apparently Brussels sprouts have fallen out of favour with the British public. What better way to boost their image and credibility with the nation's yoof than to modify them by equipping them with fancy graphix and a ring-tone?

This is the future, ladies and gents, and you read it here first.

(Picture credit: BBC Website, Image from PNAS)

Turkeys decide not to vote for Christmas

2007-03-15T11:01:00.000Z

The House of Lords debated the subject of its own reform over the last two days and gave a pretty good indication of where the current House of Lords stands - somewhere in the 19th century.

Leigitimate concerns exist, of course, as to the future composition of the Upper House and about how it is to be elected (among other issues) - and I don't dismiss these concerns - but the current Peers didn't do themselves any favours yesterday when they voted against all elected options (326-122 against a fully elected chamber and even bigger majorities against the smaller elected proportion).

This was to be expected but it amused me to read Lord Howe say that the government had to show 'sincerity' in its public promise to take account of the Lords vote, when the House of Lords appears to have taken no account at all of the elected chamber's decision last week.

Interesting to note too that Lord Irvine spoke in favour of an all-appointed chamber. 'Interesting' less for the content and rather more for the fact this was his first speech since his sacking as Lord Chancellor in 2003.

The Government's White Paper has been dubbed a fudge and also criticised for leaving issues unresolved. This might be true but the White Paper was really a starter for discussion and perhaps necessarily a fudge for this reason. The tide has now turned in this debate - towards a significantly elected element in our Upper Chamber - and the Peers don't gain much credit by blocking the path to reform.

Tory Furniture Row - MP says "I am not a chair"

2007-03-09T10:57:00.000Z

Talking the plain sense for which she is reknown, The Rt Hon Member for Maidstone & The Weald yesterday:

A chair is a piece of furnitiure. It is not a person. I am not a chair, because no one has ever sat on me.

I think we should all rejoice at this fact.

Claire Curtis-Thomas

2007-03-05T12:40:00.000Z

Spotted on recent correspondence from the Member for Crosby:

Claire Curtis-Thomas MP Ph.D BSc MBA CEng FIMechE FCGI FIEE

Typing that lot out on a regular basis would wear me out...

The lost Rory Bremner transcripts

2007-03-02T14:42:00.000Z

Found in a bin by the Channel 4 HQ, the remaining pages of the transcript of Rory Bremner impersonating Gordon Brown in his telephone conversation with Margaret Beckett when she was Environment Minister in May 2006.

MB: Did you see the news at lunchtime?

RB: A bit, yeah.

MB: So you saw the item on Darfur then? And the car bombings in Baghdad?

RB: No, I didn’t actually, no. I was working on a script, erm, sorry, I mean, a budget projection.

MB: It’s terrible, what’s going on, you know. And that’s not even accounting for the lazy cynicism of the culturati in this country. I mean, apart from anything else, there’s some people going on about Bush being the world’s No.1 terrorist. It is such lazy thinking, don’t you think?

RB: Well, quite. Erm. What did you think of Blair at PMQs the other day? Struggled a bit, didn’t he?

MB: Well, its panto isn’t it? There’s more heat than light really. Mind you, that Jon Culshaw did a great impression of Tony on Channel 4 the other night. Got him down to a tee.

RB: Jon Culshaw? I thought it was Rory-

[interruption]

MB: Oh yes, that’s right. The impression was good but the material was weak.

RB: Really?

MB: Yeah. I tell you who I do like though…that Alistair McGowan. He is good.

RB: Can’t say I’ve seen him.

MB: Oh you should do. His stuff is a bit lightweight. Entertaining though. Just what you need after a day spent scanning building regulations. Infinitely more bearable than the guy who always ‘does’ Richie Benaud.

RB: [puts on Benaud accent] That’s a nasty delivery.

MB: Hey! That’s good! Does Sarah know you can do that?

RB: Sarah? Oh…yes.

MB: The public should see a bit more of that from you. A bit of humour.

RB: Not too much though eh?

MB: Well, quite. People might mistake you for a comedian!

RB: ……

MB: I liked your speech at Chatham House the other day. Good to hear you move away from the Treasury brief a bit.

RB: Erm, thank you.

MB: It’s not easy. Trying to find an original voice.

RB: Nope.

MB: Trying to talk about issues without falling foul of cliché – its difficult. Challenging populist opinion rather than pandering to it. Trying not to be smug. Being brave in what we say. Taking uncomfortable decisions and confronting the glib and the ignorant. It’s difficult. Mind you, if we don’t do it, who will?

RB: Comedians?

MB: [Laughs] You are hilarious Gordon!

RB: Erm, thanks.

Dress down (a Tory) Friday

2007-03-01T15:41:00.000Z

I am desperately trying to summon the intellect and patience to write something on the launch this week of the Hansard Society's 'Democracy and Political Parties' pamphlet but, until then, I shall resort to petty insults and points scoring. Its What I Do.

That's not much of a defence but this is levelled at a Tory (which surely makes it alright).

Apparently Nadine Dorries, Tory MP for Befordshire, is less than happy that Jack Straw has been quoting from her blog. The Leader of the House name-checked her blog last week and repeated the trick again this week. Of course she ought to be glad of the attention but apparently she isn't. Strange when she's the one that's been putting her musings into the public arena by putting it on her blog.

A cursory look at the blog of 'Mad Nad', as she's know locally, reveals though that that she, like this blog, likes to talk about the big issues.

A snippet from the entry of Feb 18:

Suddenly an angel walked in through the front door, carrying a bottle of Rioja,two wine glasses, and a big bag of crisps.

We couldn’t find the cork screw. We did find a screwdriver and dug out the top of the cork and then pushed the remainder in and held it in the bottle as we poured out
the wine! We sat on the two remaining un-wrapped comfy chairs and laughed, in my
case the semi hysterical laughter of exhaustion, and drank beautiful red winefull of cork droppings – it was bliss.

Cameron's Conservatives - Making The Tough Decisions On Wine Corkage.

But there is substance to this sparky girl from Liverpool. On communities and the need for social boundaries:

My mother couldn’t knit, but I spent many a happy hour in Aunty Olives house learning how to. My mother couldn’t bake, but Mrs Dever could, and she taught me how to make a Victoria Jam sponge!

Aunty Peggy taught me how to look after a dog properly and Mrs Townley taught me how to clean. Each and every one of them would have had no hesitation in giving me a slap on the leg if they had seen me misbehave in the street.

Camerons's Conservatives - Stopping Gun Crime With Aunty Peggy and Mrs Dever.

Of course, what Nad didn't say was that Aunty Peggy's husband was made redundant during the mass unemployment of the early 80s, that Mrs Townley lost her house in the wave of repossessions in the 90s, and that Aunty Olive's been forced to sell crack to kids because of Tory pensions mis-selling.

The Crusade Against Big Business Begins...

2007-02-23T17:37:00.000Z

I have just received a text. From my gym. It reads:

“Hi, only 6 days left to get a FREE MONTHS [sic] membership if you refer a friend to cannons. Call now…”

Lovefilm.com regularly sends me correspondence along the lines of:

“Recommend a friend and get 3 months rental free”

My mobile phone company can’t stop itself from exhorting me to:

“Persuade your mates and family to join us and you'll get £10 worth of airtime for every friend you connect”

While I get several text messages a month from Nike:

“Thanks for buying those pink lycra leggings. Snag another pair by exporting your brother to work in one of our sweatshops for six months. Reply Now!”

It appears that it is increasingly difficult these days to buy a product or service without being prompted to dob your family or mates in for financial gain. While I’m all for exploiting friends and family for monetary reward, I do take exception to Big Business removing the personal initiative from the whole enterprise. Where’s the fun in getting something for nothing when you’ve got some corporate sponsor telling you to do it? When did all this ‘refer a friend’ tyranny begin?

I object to these Faustian corporate urgings on a number of levels. Firstly, the ‘refer a friend’ tactic carries with it the assumption that its target actually has friends. This could well be an erroneous hypothesis and one which runs the risk of inducing additional trauma in the subject who may already be rueing his or her lonely existence and now finds this compounded by the fact that he or she finds themselves unable to pass on this wonderful retail opportunity (to their non-existent friends).

The second assumption made by these preachers of corporate conversion is that the subject’s friends will be of the unlikely disposition that they take any notice of the promptings or suggestions of said friend. These ‘trick your mate, get a quid’ messages also make the category mistake of believing that the subject’s friends are likely to listen favourably to the proposal when its proposer stands to benefit financially. If you doubt this, try asking your mates to go for a particular phone network, i.e. your one, when they next upgrade their phone. When you outline the benefits of the free off-peak minutes and the good coverage, their eyes will light up…when you finish your pitch with the words, “This is really good. You should go for it…and mention my number when you buy it and I get £10” you will get a less sympathetic response and you'll find they’d rather place their trust in the wisdom of the spotty seventeen year old in the Carphone Warehouse.

This being the case, surely these corporate urgings are doomed to failure? Surely very few people manage to exercise the nefarious means to bend the will of their mates to achieve their own financial reward? I’d be intrigued to know how many people managed to get their friends to sign up for any of these deals.

But I’m not only intrigued…I’m outraged. I mean, what are they trying to do? Turn us all into automatrons, feeding instructions into our ears & eyes so as to propagate their dirty commercial message? I might be getting this out of proportion but I’m declaring the foundation of a campaign against corporate snitching. Text your mates and get them to join.

Auden Remembered

2007-02-21T13:35:00.001Z

Being the culture-vulture that I am (it impresses the chicks, see), I went along to the 'Celebration of Auden' poetry reading at Westminster Abbey last night.

Today sees the centenary of Auden's birth and last night the actor Sam Dastor read 21 of Auden's poems, including Night Mail and Funeral Blues. Funnily enough, the spiel on the event leaflet mentioned Sam's roles in I, Claudius and Julius Caesar (and his one man show Shakespeare's Sonnnets) but callously omitted mention of his appearances in Blake's 7 and Space 1999. Such modesty in an actor is quite refreshing...

As in other areas of life, I was generally ignorant of much of Auden's work but I did appreciate the timing of the centenary, and the setting of the poetry reading, given the poet's homosexuality and the current discussions of Anglican leaders in Tanzania. I also spotted Lord Hurd at the poetry reading. Given his political career, I'd thought this part-time poet would have been more up Lord Hurd's alley.

Back to the poetry, I liked Roman Wall Blues (1937), which I hadn't heard before:

Over the heather the wet wind blows,
I've lice in my tunic and a cold in my nose.
The rain comes pattering out of the sky,
I'm a Wall soldier, I don't know why.
The mist creeps over the hard grey stone,
My girl's in Tungria; I sleep alone.
Aulus goes hanging around her place,
I don't like his manners, I don't like his face.
Piso's a Christian, he worships a fish;
There'd be no kissing if he had his wish.
She gave me a ring but I diced it away;
I want my girl and I want my pay.
When I'm a veteran with only one eye
I shall do nothing but look at the sky.

Iran, Omaar and troublesome stonings

2007-02-15T15:02:00.001Z

In G2 today, Hannah Pool talks to Rageh Omaar about his new film 'Inside Iran'. Hannah notes that in the film Rageh is moved to describe Iran as Wonderland.

Hannah Pool: "What about the more troublesome parts of Iranian society?"

Rageh: "Yes, there is oppression, people being stoned and hanged and all
that"

Ah yes, how 'troublesome' it is to be stoned. Like that itch that you can't quite reach, like that stain that just won't come out of the carpet, it can be a little irritating to have a baying crowd chuck rocks at you for, erm, getting your rocks off.

Mercifully, the stones in Iran aren't too large. Or at least they shouldn't be. Article 104 of the Iranian penal code states, with reference to the penalty for adultery: "...the stones should not be too large so that the person dies on being hit by one or two of them; they should not be so small either that they could not be defined as stones." Amnesty argues that this is clear evidence that "the punishment of stoning is designed to cause the victim grievous pain before death" (source: Wikipedia).

So far, so troublesome. But if stoning is one of life's little irritations, then hanging, by this benign interpretation, must be the community justice equivalent of finding chewing gum on your shoe. Annoying, yes, but not likely to prevent you from getting to work.

Of course, it is Hannah Pool who uses the remarkably benign word 'troublesome' to allude to the existences of such cruelty and barbarism in Iran. Omaar's lack of interest, in this film at least, in 'oppression, people being stoned and hanged all that' is he says because:

"there surely is an argument and a need to present the other side of Iranian society where changes are being made."

I'm not sure why this means the existence of cruelty in Iran have to be ignored but let's hope that the film shows there are enough reasons to be found in the developments of Iranian society to believe that such cruelty might become a thing of the past.

Party Animals

2007-02-05T12:41:00.000Z

Forget House of Cards, this is Maison de Merde. The first episode of Party Animals, broadcast on Wednesday but caught fashionably late by myself due to cocaine-snorting-off-the-backs-of-female-lobbyist commitments, is truly dreadful.

Tibor Fischer famously wrote of Amis' Yellow Dog: "It's like your favourite uncle being caught in a school playground, masturbating." Party Animals, on the other hand, is like your errant brother being caught defecating on the London Underground. You didn't have high expectations in the first place but the idea that people might associate such embarrassing behaviour with your own way of life is strangely unsettling...

The highlight of the first episode must surely have been when Posh Blonde Journo (PBJ) engages in shengagians with Gormless Lobbyist. As they get down to business, PBJ, in a manner which should be breathless but instead oozes all the sexuality of a train platform announcement, utters a line claiming how great it is to shag someone "below's one's social class!"

Such searing indictment of the Westminster Village aside, Party Animals really doesn't have anything to recommend it. Will I be watching the second episode? Of course I will! Then I can sit there wallowing in Parliamentary anorakism, shouting at the screen "That's ridiculous! Don't they know OPQs have to be tabled two days advance.."

Overheard at the National Gallery...

2007-01-18T14:24:00.000Z

What follows are comments overheard at the Velázquez exhibition last night:

"This is a all a bit Spanish innit"
"That King Philip - definitely a nonce"
"You look a lot like Philip - you have the same bad hair parting"
"That dog looks very sinister"

Amis in the Independent

2007-01-15T11:25:00.000Z

In today's Indy, Martin Amis has the dubious honour of dealing with questions from Indy readers. Some choice responses include:

The phrase "horrorism", which you invented to describe 9/11, is unintentionally hilarious. Have you got any more? JONATHAN BROOKS, by email
Yes, I have. Here's a good one (though I can hardly claim it as my own): the phrase is "fuck off".

He does expand on this answer a little. Also...

Which is your favourite of your own novels and why? RICHARD LONG, by email
Your novels are like your children, and you try not to have favourites. But you tend to favour the one that has had the hardest time of it, so I will go for Yellow Dog (and, to repeat, Tibor Fischer [the reviewer who wrote "Yellow Dog isn't bad as in not very good or slightly disappointing. It's not-knowing-where-to-look bad. I was reading my copy on the tube and I was terrified someone would look over my shoulder ... It's like your favourite uncle being caught in a school playground, masturbating] is a creep and a wretch. Oh yeah: and a fat-arse). I had a soft spot for it anyway, but when I saw it being scragged in the playground ...

And:

Whats the worst thing that's ever happened to you? NESA GARDEZI, by email
One day I returned home from a book tour in the US, and I noticed that the leading edge of the toilet roll in the bathroom wasn't folded into an inviting V - as it was in all those American hotels.Not only that. I then had a tedious five minutes issuing instructions about the new arrangement to my wife.

And finally this:

What is the most depressing thing about Britain you have observed since your return? And the best? GRANT MULLIN, Surrey
The most depressing thing was the sight of middle-class white demonstrators, last August, waddling around under placards saying, We Are All Hizbollah Now. Well, make the most of being Hizbollah while you can. As its leader, Hasan Nasrallah, famously advised the West: "We don't want anything from you. We just want to eliminate you." Similarly, when I went on Question Time the other week, a woman in the audience, her voice quavering with self-righteousness, presented the following argument: since it was America that supported Osama bin Laden when he was fighting the Russians, the US armed forces, in response to September 11, "should be dropping bombs on themselves!" And the audience applauded. It is quite an achievement. People of liberal sympathies, stupefied by relativism, have become the apologists for a creedal wave that is racist, misogynist, homophobic, imperialist, and genocidal. To put it another way, they are up the arse of those that want them dead.
The best thing has been to find myself living in what, despite its faults (despite a million ills), is an extraordinarily successful multi-racial society. This is a beautiful idea, with a good chance of becoming a beautiful reality, too.

Fingerprints and frippery

2007-01-08T15:11:00.001Z

The Observer's front page yesterday warned that British visitors to the US would have their fingerprints stored 'on an FBI database alongside those of criminals'. The article outlined alleged plans to move from the taking of two fingerprints to the scanning of all ten fingers. A Homeland Security spokeswoman explained that, "The reason for 10-digit fingerprints is that it is more secure than the two-digit system, and the 10-digit system is becoming the international standard".

Liberty and other civil rights groups raised concerns over the proposals, while Simon Davies, head of Privacy International, sounded like he was auditioning for a voice-over role on American movie trailers by saying:

Be warned. A San Francisco Bay family holiday may easily become a nightmare.

What concerned me most, when civil rights organisations often employ the 'slippery slope' argument to criticise policy, was the question of what system would supercede the 10-digit regime when it was no longer sufficient to nail potential suspects?

Could there be a move to take impressions of male genitalia - I've had the odd girlfriend refer disparagingly to my own 'impression' of male genitalia - where casts or moulds would be taken to prove identity? Vast warehouses would need to be erected (sorry...) across America to store this new 'membership' and the queues at airports would add significantly to overall journey times. Such a policy could also be seen to be discriminatory, however, as female passengers would not be subject to such a scan.

Enlightened thinking is necessary here then. The recent passing of the office Christmas party season may provide a few pointers. Given how keen far too many people are to photocopy their own derriere, perhaps US Homeland Security could introduce a 'photocopier and Cava' procedure where Brits grab a glass of cheap fizz before jumping on the nearest Xerox machine to have images of their buttocks recorded for identification purposes? For some people's it might even improve upon the existing photo they have in their passports....

Unstoppable sex drive and charity shops

2006-12-20T14:25:00.001Z

It is, of course, a serious story. An article in today's Guardian on a man (Mr Stephen Tame) whose life has been made a misery after injuries sustained when he fell from a gantry while working in a warehouse. Apparently his sex drive has become unstoppable (titter ye not) since the injury and he's been awarded £3.166m in damages for the damage the accident has done to his life. So far, so tabloid-y but, at the end of the article, it reports that Mr Tame still suffers from a range of disabilities:

...including tunnel vision, a difficulty in tolerating noise, weakness on his left side, slurred speech, fatigue and poor concentration and memory.

The next and concluding sentence of the article then says:

He helps at a charity shop three days a week.

For some reason I found this funny....thoughts which may be attributable to the wicked impulse which left me to consider the tough recruitment policy which must be in place for Mr Tame to be an asset to the charity organisation in question.

Hey Porter

2006-12-18T00:18:00.000Z

In the Observer yesterday, Henry Porter outlined his 'radical manifesto to revitalise Britain'.

Porter is prompted to pen his manifesto by a body politic in which, "our political parties are ineffectual, boring us all by pointlessly fighting it out on the dull morass that is the middle ground." Porter says "It's time for some new ideas ..." and then proceeds, disappointingly, to offer very little in the way of fresh thinking.

He talks about offering sabbaticals to those who have worked 15 years or more, and discusses reform of the NHS, prisons, and media ownership law. On Parliament though his 'radical manifesto' is thin and unpersuasive, resting as it does on the idea that a reduction in the number of MPs will, by itself, radically improve Parliament and its scrutiny of the executive.

There may be an argument for reducing the number of MPs but Porter's case appears to rest on the fatuous point that at present that there is not enough room for all MPs to sit in the Chamber at once. This is a bogus reason to justify reform but it also fails to acknowledge that the Chamber was purposefully designed to be small to create a better atmosphere for discussions than would be possible in a larger chamber. To suggest that "Vanuatu is better organised" than the UK system because the House of Commons chamber is small is akin to suggesting that Busted are superior to Schubert because they at least managed to finish recording their album.

(Personally I am more likely to listen to Busted than Schubert but you know what I mean...)

Porter says that he wants more MPs to, "defy the party whipping system that is crushing the life out of Parliament and the spirit of MPs". There are good grounds for the reform of the whipping system but Porter parrots the lazy assumption that the Commons is currently inhabited by 'lobby fodder'. Porter fails to acknowledge that there has actually been an increase in the number of MPs defying the Whip. Phillip Cowley and Mark Stuart at Revolts published a paper recently for the 2005-6 Session of Parliament which recounted that, of Labour MPs, there had been 95 rebellions in total, involving 114 Labour MPs, in the last session and that there were more rebellions as a percentage of votes than in any other first session since the war. This suggests that more MPs are independently minded than they might be given the credit for by conventional wisdom.

Porter mentions that enhancing the power of Parliamentary committees might be one way to more effectively scrutinise the actions of 'an ambitious executive' but fails to expand on this point, believing that the reduction in MPs is the main reform to secure the goal of improved scrutiny. Porter offers his manifesto as a basis for further discussion rather than as a fully formed wish-list but his section on Parliament reads like it was written on the back of a cigarette packet - or the kind of thing you get on one of those god-awful blogs.

I'll try and spark up a nicotine habit at lunchtime so I can pen my own cigarette packet manifesto but the Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons has recently embarked on an enquiry into 'strengthening the role of the backbencher' which might provide some suggestions for Porter to include in his next manifesto piece.

Political discussion in the 21st century

2006-12-15T16:21:00.000Z

I thought I'd go for a weighty title to this post to cover the banality of the insight which follows....

Over at the BBF, Hamer outlines his take on the conduct of political discussion in the UK. Hamer refers to mass postcard campaigns and the tendency to characterise much of current political engagement (or not) as 'issue politics'. I wanted to leave a comment on his blog - but for some reason Blogger wasn't letting me log in and post one - so I thought I'd do a post of my own.

Hamer accurately describes what happens when a mass postcard campaign is launched and targeted at MPs. Constituents fill in their name and address on a pre-printed card (sometimes not even managing this onerous task) and then MPs respond with a letter which might include one or two original sentences of their own but usually tends to include the bulk of a PLP Resource Centre standard response.

As a fellow Labour bag-carrier this all rings true but I wanted to add a few remarks of my own on this.

Mass campaigns do often suggest that an easy fix is available. Campaigns can, by implying there is a simple 'yes/no' response to an issue, contribute to a what might be described as a 'binary' opinion of the politician (i.e. good/bad, usually depending on the MP's response to the campaign in question) rather than acknowledging that the issue may be complex and that any response may need to be equally complex.

Postcard campaigns and similar may hint that a simple solution is all that is required rather than impress that any progress probably requires messy compromise and dull negotiation. However, it has to be acknowledged that a mass campaign needs to have a simple message to be successful. It would hardly empower people to action if the campaign was "SAY 'NO TO POVERTY; ONCE WE SUCCESSFULLY NEGOTIATE WITH THE WTO, EU, US AND EMERGING ECONOMIES, AND DEVELOP A HIGHER STAGE OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT BEYOND CAPITALISM".

I would imagine that many people who send in these postcards do realise the limits of these campaigns but know that MPs might be inclined to take notice of at least the subject area - if not necessarily agreeing with the thrust of the whole campaign - if they get a heavy mailbag or two on it. For example, the reason Cameron got interested in green politics is that there is some political capital to be made out of appealing to environmental concerns. This suggests that campaigns, such as Big Ask, might be effective in prompting a debate on what is to be done in a particular policy area. Of course, the charities/NGOs will have their own agenda to peddle but the campaign could serve to open up a wider debate on policy options rather than just being a narrow monologue between Government and the NGO/charity in question.

While the campaigns may be simplistic, FoE and Greenpeace policy bods, for example, wouldn't claim there were simple solutions to, for example, climate change no matter what their broader campaigning indicates. I would imagine that they see their campaigns as useful in trying to shift the terms of debate and giving them the political weight to go to elected representatives with some mandate to speak on the issue.

Also, these campaigns do get people interested (beyond just copying a standard letter) in policy areas which might be a good starting point for further discussion and engagement with the political process. Characterising this 'issue politics' as mass political engagement might be wide-of-the-mark. However, and Hamer didn't argue contrary to this, in an age when there is less to separate the political parties than in earlier times, it is understandable that issue politics might have a greater attraction than traditional political channels.

But, at the end of all that, I do agree with Hamer's fundamental point which appears to be that politics is complex and that there needs to be an acknowledgement that there are no simple answers, that we need to engage on this basis, and that we should not berate politicians for trying to find an answer to these questions.

Not a controversial thesis but one which could definitely improve our political discourse and not just Question Time.

Windy stories

2006-12-07T14:53:00.000Z

...are dominating the news agenda today.

First up is the Kensal Rise tornado story (with rolling coverage ad nauseum on BBC News 24).

And then there's the 'Flatulence leads US jet to divert' story where a woman apparently lit matches to conceal the odour of her flatulence.

Surprised that they allow matches on the plane?

The article says that the TSA - Transport Security Authority- allows matches in carry-on luggage. It then helpfully adds that "The matches are not allowed to be struck, however".

NYC

2006-12-07T13:22:00.000Z

Got back from NYC on Monday night.

What a city! Fantastic.

Did the usual tourist spots; 5th Avenue, Central Park, Greenwich Village, Brooklyn Bridge, Empire State Building, Staten Island ferry (and Statute of Liberty), Wall St, SoHo et al. A truly amazing city and some great places to eat in the Village.

Looking for sterotypes to be confirmed as only the tourist does, I yearned to hear a New Yorker utter the words 'furga-geddit-abaht-it', 'courrfeee', or 'whacked' - possibly in the same sentence - and was a little disappointed that my dreams were not realised. There is a Starbucks on every corner - and a Japanese film crew - but even when asking for a coffee New Yorkers refused to do so in the exaggerated way of my imagination. The killjoys. (We did overhear someone say 'douchebag', which amused me far more than it should, but that was pretty much the limit of it).

So farewell then New York, but not goodbye. We're going to go back and stay in Brooklyn next time. Until then I'm going to get my fill at the ICA...Manhattan is on there until December 30.

Unveiling the Grauniad's new columnist...Jacques Chirac

2006-11-28T17:08:00.000Z

As the paper that printed an opinion piece by Osama Bin Laden, its nice to see the Guardian again give an up-and-coming young journo a chance by commissioning Jacques Chirac - the President of France according to the blurb at the end of the article - to write a piece in today's paper.

The article is worth reading, though. Entitled "Zidane, Gitane and Champagne", the Prez reveals what was actually said on that night in Berlin ('you'll never advertise 'Just for Men'" was apparently the damning final remark from the Italian centre-back), that big Jacques' only ever smoked a Gitane once and that was to celebrate an oil deal with Saddam Hussein, and that Chirac still has about 400 bottles of champagne stashed away in his cellar from the time when he was Mayor of Paris*.

Whatever else he is though, Chirac is brave...he's had his article posted on CiF, exposing himself to the kind of people who have programmed themselves a keyboard short-cut for 'Zionist-Imperialism' and who think that "Blair+Bush=Hitler" constitutes a reasoned argument. This being the case, I do hope the NUJ Chapel at the Elysee Palace is making sure Chirac's getting his proper rates...

*As Mayor of Paris Chirac and his wife, Bernadette, spent roughly £300 per day on their personal food and drink alone.

Bag-carrier news...

2006-11-28T10:39:00.000Z

Forget terror threats or Fathers4Justice campaigners spreading purple powder, the way to bring Parliament to a stand-still is to ensure the division bell keeps ringing all-the-bloody-feckin'-time...

The division bell started going at 10.30am and is still on...this is like some sort of torture technique. In our humble office in Norman Shaw South we are starting to see stars and uttering all kind of idle threats to the Serjeants staff who are probably responsible for this farrago.

The New Collective Noun Campaign!

2006-11-20T15:32:00.000Z

There's a sexy blog post title. It was going to be entitled 'Lazy post to remind occasional readers that I do still have access to a keyboard' but I omitted that in the interests of brevity.

Last week I was standing outside the Holland & Barratt on Villiers Street - it is the place to be - when a young girl came up to me and asked 'Do you want to end world poverty?'

Fearing that this may involve several years of diplomacy, a Phd. in economics, reform of the EU, an overhaul of the UN, and the establishment of participatory democracies in countries currently subject to tyrannical regimes, I politely replied 'No...not at the moment'*. While this encounter failed to illicit an appropriate level of charity in me it did make me think that our society is in desperate need of some new collective nouns....Here's a few half-arsed suggestions of my own but I'd be grateful to hear your contributions:

A nuisance of chuggers
An obesity of teenagers
A Hello of celebrities
An audit of accountants
A monotony of home-improvement programmes
A draught of real-ale campaigners
A clutch of Kwik-Fit fitters
A mute of chat-show hosts
A shower of meteorologists
A shoal of anglers
A blog of self-publicists

All other suggestions will be gratefully received...

*Jimmy Carr: A lady with a clipboard stopped me in the street the other day. She said, “Can you spare a few minutes for cancer research?” I said, “All right, but we’re not going to get much done.”

Interns of the world, unite!

2006-11-09T01:48:00.000Z

In an expose of the Dickensian poor-house working conditions prevalent in the Mother of Parliaments, the TUC has demanded that the Low Pay Commission investigate the employment of young people on unpaid internships - especially in Parliament and in the media.

The TUC argues that MPs who employ interns on no pay could be breaching employment laws,
and fear that the system could lead to exploitation rather than opportunity.

This follows the Danny Dewsbury story and an article in the Guardian in September which 'investigated' - i.e. they searched the w4MP website - the use of interns by MPs and found that the adverts placed by MPs required candidates to be available five days a week, to have good office skills but offered no pay.

So what to do then? Well, its true that interns are exploited. I've one of our interns running across London at this very moment to pick up some truffles and a copy of Horse and Hound. But the truth is that they love it. They demand to be exploited. The poor darlings labour in the mistaken belief that the three months of stuffing envelopes and faking the MP's signature will result in the offer of a junior position in the next government. It would, in my view, be unkind to threaten the purity of this dream by introducing the distasteful concept of monetary reward, thereby reducing this noble pursuit to the equivalence of other wage-earners such as lawyers, courtesans and bankers.

It is true also that the current set-up favours the middle-class kids who can afford to work for free, handing them the opportunities for advancement denied to their less well-off counterparts. But surely it is better that it is the snotty-nosed bourgeoisie who are engaged in these menial tasks rather than the salt-of-the-earth proletarian who would do better to dedicate himself to a life of plumbing a sink or wiring a fuse?

As a Socialist, I feel these sentiments are in line with my egalitarian beliefs (...) but what would be the solution if one should want to find one?

Well, you could pay them a living wage for a start...but where would that money come from? The press coverage of MPs allowances was wont to describe the cost of running an office as 'expenses', as if MPs were raiding the account to pay for weekends at the Savoy rather than paying the staff in their offices to deal with all the correspondence and case-work that goes with being an MP. This being the case it is hard to believe that Parliament would stomach raising the office cost allowance to pay for intern staff...and the parties certainly don't appear to have the money to pay staff either.

If the rules were tightened up to make it more difficult for MPs to hire interns then it is probable that they would increasingly use overseas students (such as the Hansard Society scholars) who would presumably be exempt.

So what's the solution then? Just as this blog's old friend Martin Horwood MP suggested sticking a laundrette and a dry-cleaners in Parliament, it is the commercial option that must be considered here. Indeed, a problem has yet to be invented to which advertising cannot provide the answer. This being the case I humbly suggest that interns should wear a sandwich board - funded by a private company - while going about their duties. Sure, it will make getting through those turnstiles at Portcullis House that bit more difficult but at least they would be able to afford to buy their own tea once they get in the building...

The Speaker has a mare

2006-11-01T13:11:00.000Z

Michael Martin made a bit of an arse of himself at PMQs today.

While the likes of Quentin Letts have always had it in for the Speaker (or 'Gorbals Mick' as they are wont to dub him), the Thimble, sadly without a newspaper column to vent his opinion, has always felt a bit more protective towards the MP for Glasgow North East. Maybe it was those mince pies we shared at a Christmas Reception in the Speaker's Apartments which bred such goodwill....

Today the Speaker mucked up though. He told Cameron he couldn't ask the PM who he wanted to succeed him as Labour leader as this was a matter for the Labour party.* Cameron could only ask the PM about Government business, the Speaker ruled (cue a chorus of disapproving howls from the Tory benches).

The distinction might be true but it is meddling in semantics given that Labour are the party in power. The Speaker really didn't need to wade in on this occasion and the ridiculousness of his intervention was highlighted by the fact that Cameron was then able to ask the PM who he wanted to be the next Prime Minister. This, at least, suggests that the Speaker's ruling might be as ineffective as it was ill-judged.

All in all it was a pretty crap PMQs and one the Speaker will presumably want to forget.

*Added. I should say that Cameron didn't actually mention the Labour Party (see here) which makes the intervention even more weird.

Pointless Lib Dem makes pointless remark

2006-10-25T17:18:00.000+01:00

Seemingly desperate to be offended, Lib Dem MP Bob Russell is in shock at the behaviour of the Prime Minister's Official Spokesman. But what, prey tell, could the PMOS have done to have had such a malicious effect on poor, sensitive Bob Russell?

Having eaten babies for breakfast and then dissembled to assembled journos at lunchtime, the PMOS then, at the PM lobby, proceeded to refer to the 'black economy'.

Bob Russell spoke to Gallery News, " I am shocked that Downing Street uses the reference 'black economy' - this term was dropped years ago, certainly by state organisations like Customs and Excise, to the more sensitively acceptable term 'grey economy' or 'shadow economy'.

Bob said" The term 'black economy' has racial overtones. Downing Street is thus politically incorrect to use this term."

Words can, of course, injure and outdated terms can prove insensitive but surely Bob Russell is the only one to be 'shocked' by the PMOS' reference?

Of course, if he is shocked by such careless language then he dare not look at some Lib Dem material from, erm, yesterday. Responding to John Reid’s announcement of limits on Bulgarians’ and Romanians’ right to work in the UK, Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Nick Clegg MP said:

"First, the danger of discriminating against all non-EU low skilled
migrants is that they will be simply driven underground into the black economy and the hands of exploitative gangmasters".

Bob had also better have a lay-down just in case he chances upon the following from other Lib Dem sources...

Liz Lynne, Lib Dem MEP and Employment Spokesperson in the European Parliament, said in her press release of 2 June 2006, "We must clamp down on the black economy, not encourage it."

Enfield Lib Dems, meanwhile, reporting on the Lib Dem stall at the Autumn fair, said on September 13 2006: "We discussed a range of issues with local residents....concerns regarding people avoiding income tax through off-shore payments and the thriving local black economy were but a few."

So it appears that if its the political incorrect you're after, it might be best to check out those Lib Dems after all.

Putin his foot in it

2006-10-19T15:07:00.000+01:00

Russian President Putin has met with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and seen fit to express his sympathy for Israeli President Moshe Katsav, who faces charges of serial rape.

After a meeting between Israeli and Russian delegations, the following occurred (according to Kommersant):

After that, the press was ushered out, and the president apparently thought the microphones had been turned off. “Say hi to your president,” Putin said. “He turned out to be quite a powerful person! Raped ten women! We're all amazed. We all envy him"

If true, it rather puts the Bush/Blair's off-mike comments into perspective...

The article is a little surreal, given it comes with the title "Israel Refuses to Recognize Roman Abramovich", which sounds like something straight out of the Onion, but someone forwarded me this from a messageboard so it must be true.

(Hat tip:MR)

Madonna, Guy and David...

2006-10-17T14:30:00.000+01:00

THE SCENE: Ashcombe House, a country estate on the Wiltshire/Devon borders. GUY RITCHIE is sprawled out on the chaise-lounge. He is alone and watching Animal Hospital. The TV shows a dog on the inspection table in a veterinary surgery. The dog is barking aggressively.

GUY RITCHIE: Just shoot the bitch! Geez, five-hundred nicker just for an examination and now that slag wants it to go in kennels. Un-fucking-believable.

The door opens. Richie’s spouse, Madonna, walks in. She is carrying a child.

MADONNA: Cooommme on Guy, what have I told you about watching Animal Hospital with the curtains closed? Open the drapes, will ya? Let a Ray of Light through, for chrissakes.

GUY: Sorry, dahlin. Won’t ‘appen again. Whatchya carrying there then? Its not another bleedin’ book on Kabbalah is it?

MADONNA: It’s a baby, Guy.

GUY: A baby? Blimey. Let's have a butcher's, then…

GUY rises from the chaise-lounge, takes the child in his arms and tenderly unwraps the shawl from around the baby. MADONNA beams with pride.

GUY: Where do you get it from then?

MADONNA: Malawi.

GUY: Malawi? Is that north or south of the river?

MADONNA: Its in Africa…It’s a democratic, densely populated country located in southeastern Africa. It has Zambia to the north-west, Tanzania to the north, and Mozambique surrounding it on the east, south, and west. And…

GUY [interrupts]: You got that off wikipedia didnchya? You know fuck-all about Malawi.

MADONNA: Give us a break, Guy, will ya? Open Your Heart. This child’s been through a lot. This is it’s a chance for a better life. It will get an education, a decent house, a chance to achieve something…maybe a No.1 album or…

GUY: Is it kosher?

MADONNA: No. I’ve told you Guy, I’ve given up on Kabbalah.

GUY: No, you silly slag, I mean did it fall off a back of a lorry?

MADONNA: No, of course not. Like any other prospective adoptive parent there’s a whole vetting process to go through…

GUY [interrupts]: A vetting process? I’ve just been watching that on Animal Hospital. It’s a fucking scam…

MADONNA: No, not vets…vetting! Checks on the parents, how they live, what they can offer the child…that kinda thing.

GUY Oh. Yeah, right, sorry. But we can bypass all that, right?

MADONNA: Yeah, yeah, of course. It’s Borderline but my publicist reckons that a few photo ops with the kid at the zoo should do it.

GUY and MADONNA look into each other’s eyes and then at the baby. They then hear the smashing of glass. VINNIE JONES enters the room by breaking through the window. He is carrying a pack of disposable nappies and holding a shotgun.

VINNIE: I've got some bad news for you two.

MADONNA: It’s alright. We know. Guy’s been turned down for the Animal Hospital Movie.

VINNIE: Its worse than that.

GUY: Fuck, no.

VINNIE kicks GUY in the crotch and takes the child, putting the baby under his arm.

VINNIE: Mind your language in front of the boy!

GUY: Jesus Christ!

VINNIE kicks GUY in the crotch again

VINNIE: That includes blasphemy as well!

GUY: What do you want?

VINNIE: I’m from Wiltshire child services. I’m taking the kid in.

[VINNIE turns to Madonna and stares before striding back out the window he entered from].

GUY & MADONNA: Shit!

Satire is dead

2006-10-13T00:49:00.000+01:00

When Henry Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1973, the distinguished musical satirist Tom Lehrer declared "It was at that moment that satire died".

When Sion Simon does a video* 'satirising' WebCameron then satire hasn't just died but been dug up again, had stakes driven through its mutilated corpse and then been reburied in concrete.

The Birmingham Erdington MP has said that "Nobody in the Labour party has said anything to me other than, 'Well done, good effort, very funny.'" Hmmm. Really? If that's the case then our party might be in more trouble than we thought.

Should an MP be going to the effort of making such a video? It hardly brings dignity to the office of MP does it?

But if he is going to do it then at least make it good. And it really isn't. The Sky News interview adds to the crowning shiteness of it all with Simon coming across like a stroppy adolescent. When he tries to make out the video is a searing indictment of Cameron's egregious politics and shallow media engagement he sounds like the teenager making out that stealing that CD from HMV was to strike a blow against the capitalist system.

We're having a difficult time landing a glove on Cameron at the moment. He's vacuous and cynical, its true, but having an irritating little prick make a half-arsed attempt at satire - and one that dies on its arse - doesn't seem the best way to highlight the egregious ways of the Tories.

Novel ways to attack Cameron and the Tories might be necessary but let's make sure these tactics are effective...and don't involve Sion Simon.

*The video now seems to have been removed....

Zizou

2006-10-03T13:12:00.000+01:00

I saw Zidane at the Curzon Soho on Friday. He was doing keepy-uppys in the cafe, with a gauloise in one hand and a copy of Camus' L'Etranger in the other...

Nah, silly. I mean Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait. Less a film and more an art installation, it was hypnotic and mesmerising in parts but, devoid of plot, it was, for long periods, a tad dull.

Zidane's may not have been in the best of form at the time of the game featured - although there are occasional flashes of his sublime skills - but what is striking about the film is how little he is involved in the game. Much of the game passes without his influence and you realise what a lonely existence it can be; out-there, on the pitch, even in the midst of a team game and surrounded by 80,000 supporters. Only viewing the overall context, i.e. the game and the other 21 players, for very brief spells serves to highlight the partial existence of the individual player.

I've seen it printed that you should see this only if you are a football fan and/or a Zidane fan. That's possibly true as otherwise you may think it pretentious twaddle, but for a football fan it is also a curious watch. As a fan you inevitably long to see more footballing action, to witness another example of Zidane's genius, and to watch the game in its wider context. But the film's purpose is not to provide an orthodox review of Zidane's finest moments - it wouldn't be any different from a Sky-Sports style feature if it did - so the film does become a bit frustrating for your average football fan. Having said that, most football fans know all about frustration so they might find the film a cathartic experience.

So I'm not sure I can give a thumbs-up to Zidane but its certainly better than this guy's efforts...

Brown just doesn't do it for me

2006-09-28T16:29:00.000+01:00

"They taught me that most of politics isn't about politics, in the sense of meetings, resolutions, speeches or even Parties. It starts with people.

It's about friendship, art, culture, sport. It's about being a fully paid up member of the human race before being a fully paid up member of the Labour Party."
Tony Blair, Labour Party Conference 2006.

"If I thought the future of politics was just about celebrity and not about something more substantial, I wouldn't be in politics.

If being in public life becomes about image above all else then I don't believe politics would be serving the public."
Gordon Brown, Labour Party Conference 2006

Unfortunately for Gordon, celebrity and image do matter in modern politics. Perception is important. If unemployment is at 3 million, a smile and a good bedside manner won't win the incumbent party an election but a Prime Minister must show personal authority and be able to transmit this authority to the nation. Blair's personal charm and ability to communicate may have lifted the bar in this respect - we didn't expect any of this from John Major in 92' - but Brown's failure to come close should raise alarm bells within the Labour Party membership.

In a public contest about being a 'fully paid up member of the human race' Brown stands to lose out. He might be the best Chancellor since the Crusades. He might be humorous and charming in private. He might be a pinball-wizard in his spare-time. But none of this matters because he is unable to communicate his genuine passion for politics in a manner which convinces the general public that they want to be a part of his project.

Writing after the Chancellor’s own conference speech, Polly Toynbee’s article was entitled “There is no longer any doubt: Brown will be the next PM”. Wishful thinking on Polly’s part, me thinks. There are plenty of doubts and not just those aired by disgruntled Cabinet colleagues. Real concerns must remain about whether Gordon can lead us in the Labour Party to victory in the next election. The polished performance of Blair's speech this week not only showed the Labour Party what it would be missing but it also served to highlight Brown's own deficiencies in this area.

Witness Brown's reaction to the tribute paid by Blair. Upon hearing these words Brown appeared to suffer a malfunction - 'Praise...cannot compute'. And it wasn't just when Blair spoke that Brown's body language was all wrong. When Clinton spoke of the Chancellor's achievements, a chip in Brown's CPU said 'smile'. Unfortunately Brown's team hadn't yet downloaded the necessary patch so after a quick flash of teeth the system error of the previous day was replicated and Brown's face reverted to a blank screen...

It might seem harsh to focus on every reaction and every word. It might appear to trivalise politics to focus on presentation in this way. But it is important that a leader is able to present the ideas of the party to the nation and Brown looks as if he will struggle to do this effectively. It might be nice to think that electing Brown as leader would show that we in the Labour Party are serious about the politics rather than the froth. But the fact is that we would be choosing someone who will not have the benefit of being a new face to the public and who lacks the skills to communicate a fresh message to voters.

So, unlike Kerron, I don't think I want Gordon to be our next leader. But whatever happens there must be a proper contest. Just don't let John Reid win it...

Reflections on the Blair speech

2006-09-28T12:13:00.000+01:00

The Messiah complex

The Rev Rt Hon Tony Blair (Tuesday 26 September 2006, Manchester): “in the years to come, wherever I am, whatever I do. I'm with you”.

Rt Hon Mr Jesus Christ (23 July 30AD, Judea) word: 'Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." (Gospel of St Matthew)

(Hat tip: RW)

West Wing

Season 6: Approaching his last year in office, President Bartlett attempts to bring peace to the Middle East.

Year 10: In his last year in office, Prime Minister Blair announces that he attempts to bring peace to the Middle East.

Blair's last conference speech...but the world goes on for the Express and the Mail

2006-09-27T11:22:00.000+01:00

Front pages from the nationals:

'And now the end is near … I did it my way’ The Sun

‘Blairwell’ The Mirror

'Tony Blair's last hurrah’ The Times

'The long good-bye' The Independent

'Going, going, not quite gone’ The Guardian

The Express and the Mail cover the news in their own inimitable style....by focusing on the twin-dangers of food and foreigners. Their front pages....

Dangers lurking in fruit and veg Daily Express
Thousands queue for a life in Britain Daily Mail

Man Bites Panda

2006-09-21T15:07:00.000+01:00

"If a dog bites a man then that's not a story...but if a man bites a dog...THAT'S A STORY"

The course director at our journalism school was seldom happier than when trotting out this dog-eared piece of journalistic wisdom...which might explain why journalists would have been barking mad not to pick up the dog-and-bone and follow up this lead, erm, story:

Man bites panda after zoo attack

A drunken Chinese tourist says he bit a panda who attacked him after he jumped into a zoo enclosure to "hug" the bear. Zhang Xinyan, 35, had drunk four draught beers before deciding to enter the Beijing Zoo pen belonging to six-year-old male panda Gu Gu.
The startled Gu Gu bit both legs of his intruder, who responded by biting the panda on its back", Mr Zhang was quoted by state media as saying. Mr Zhang said he had not realised pandas could be violent.

More here.

Surprise birth ends Labour succession crisis

2006-09-07T14:29:00.000+01:00

Blairite loyalists were celebrating today after Victoria HQ, the central office of the Labour Party, gave birth to a baby boy who will one day become the 52nd Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

While scientists and medical experts raised questions concerning the child’s genealogy, the rest of the country greeted the arrival with relief that a boy had been born into the governing party for the first time. Relief was expressed at averting a succession crisis that had not only threatened to bring one of the world's oldest democracies to the brink of extinction but also the very real prospect of a wave of mass destruction as the nation’s citizens kicked in their televisions at the umpteenth annunciation of the phrase “stable and orderly transition”.

The baby's arrival is expected to put on hold talk of a timetable for a Brownite succession which would have allowed the Chancellor to take the premiership. The new arrival, who will be named in a ceremony in a week's time, is the first child to be born into the governing party and will, owing to a little known rule in the party’s constitution (clause 7, subsection 5), become the new leader of the party when current leader, Anthony Charles Lynton Blair, decides to step down.

The 2.55kg (5lb 10oz) baby, conceived by artificial insemination using the revolutionary Byers-Milburn procedure, was said to be doing well after the delivery, by Mandelsonean section, at a private hospital in Pimlico. Following the ground-breaking techniques utilised in the baby’s conception, and repeated exposure during pregnancy to recordings of the current PM’s speeches, it is expected that the new arrival’s first words will include a pledge to continue the Blair legacy. A stinking nappy policy statement to feed into the Chancellor’s Comprehensive Spending Review plans is also anticipated sometime in the New Year.

Current PM Tony Blair, 53, was seen doing cartwheels in the garden of No.10 and has yet to speak publicly about the birth, although he was quoted as thanking his party for "a job well done". The Chancellor was unavailable for comment. Treasury sources indicated, however, that while the Chancellor had thrown his toys out of the pram at news of the birth, it was likely that a complicated PFI deal would be struck to ensure these assets would not be passed on to the new arrival.

Now the identity of the next Prime Minister has become clear, a cabinet reshuffle is likely with current Home Secretary John Reid expected to be named Godfather. Current Chancellor Gordon Brown can, however, look forward to spending some time on the naughty step.

Rigorous journalism

2006-09-05T13:16:00.000+01:00

In yesterday's Guardian Media, from the Media Monkey Diary:

When the BBC said it wanted more rigorous journalism in its sports coverage, Monkey's not sure this is what it meant. In the interests of investigative journalism, Match of the Day 2 reported that Everton FC charges people pounds 3,000 to be a matchday mascot at Goodison Park. After "numerous complaints" from fans and the club itself, the BBC will exclusively reveal in Sunday's programme that, er, Everton has never charged for the privilege of being a matchday mascot, the journalistic equivalent of a 10-0 home defeat.

The Guardian's sister paper, the Observer, in its 'For the Record' section on August 27 :

In 'Premiership club charges £3,500 to be a mascot' (News, last week), we said that Everton FC requires payment from the families of young supporters who want to be mascots. This is inaccurate.
In fact, the club has two quite different schemes: a traditional match-day
mascot scheme and a corporate mascot scheme. The match-day mascot is, and always has been, free; those selected are drawn from the club's supporters' section or are nominated by local charities and children's hospitals. These match-day mascots also get free tickets for the whole family and a tour of the stadium. The corporate mascot is nominated by a sponsor as part of a luxury package which includes executive seating and hospitality. We are happy to clarify this and offer our apologies for any embarrassment caused. In the same article, we neglected to say that Tottenham Hotspur offers some free mascot places and mistakenly said that Manchester City charges on some occasions. It does not.

That will be the journalistic equivalent of two 10-0 home defeats then...

Dere's more to Oireland dan dis....

2006-08-07T13:51:00.000+01:00

Just returned from a trip to Northern Ireland (hence the obligatory picture of the Giants Causeway). Had a jolly good time there. Stayed in Carnlough on the Antrim coast (not too far from 'Welcome to Loyalist' Larne), and got round the coast to Portrush and Portstewart, as well as making it to Derry and Belfast (see my photostream).

What follows are my own reliable observations of the country, its people, its food, its history and its culture. These were formed in six whole days on the island and, as such, provide a thorough and comprehensive guide to Ulster.

Stepping off the plane for one's first steps in Ulster, one was quickly reminded of the island's bloody history of violence and division. Walking into the main airport building brought this narrative into sharp relief. Separate toilets indicated 'male' and 'female', highlighting the bitter gender divide which dominates this country's political discourse and which underscores again the intense battle of the sexes for which this dark corner of the world has become infamous.

The newspapers are also dominated by the old divisions. Getting a copy of the Belfast Telegraph we read, with much trepidation and not a little concern, that the average cost of a fish supper in the province could top £5 by the year's end. The National Federation of Fish Friers (NFFF) - formed when a former UVF commander got a chip on his shoulder due to the carelessness of an overenthusiastic deep-fat fryer named Sean - expressed its concern that people were increasingly switching to cheaper, less nutritional alternatives such as McDonald's and Catholicism.

Ernest Bustard , NFFF spokesman, did little to quell the rising sectarian tensions arising from such a price hike by pointing out that "If you compare what you get in fast food outlets, a fish supper is far better value for money" ('and far cheaper than a trip to Rome to see the Pope' he didn't add).

Turning to the letters page, one felt depressed to find that even seven years after the Good Friday Agreement the correspondence still dripped with the prejudices of old. One bigot from Lurgan, under the inflammatory sobriquet 'Birdwatcher', wrote of the 'wildlife fascists' who sought to marginalise the poor magpie, sparrowhawk and kestrel by forgetting their vital role in the ecosystem. Another armchair paramilitary, Matthew Tennis from Bangor, poured further fuel on old hatreds by arguing that bus passengers deserve a better outlook on journeys and that Ulsterbus and Metro should seriously consider retro-fitting upper deck windscreen wipers on all double deck vehicles.

Given these suffocating references to the past, you can understand why we decided to get away from it all on a Belfast black taxi tour to look at the murals and the peace-line. Our driver, Martin, was a great guide even if he did put paid to my hitherto secret career plan - to become a bastion of the British political establishment - by photographing us in front of the Bobby Sands mural (on the wall of the Sinn Fein HQ on the Falls Road). Having a sense of the tragic history of the city, I stood and reminded myself of the The Day Today sketch where the Sinn Fein spokesmen is required by law to inhale helium to make his statements sound ridiculous. Of course, this tradition is proudly continued into real-life contemporary politics by the Rev Ian Paisley who manages to sound ridiculous even without the assistance of helium. Ho, ho...

I shall draw this post to a close now but you will be glad to know that this may be the first of an occasional series of reports, as I plan to return to the territory next year when I hope to find a country at peace with itself. And with unisex lavatories, obviously...

Hip hooray for Floyd

2006-07-24T14:20:00.000+01:00

Forget those walk spoilers dressed as pimps for a moment, and spare a thought for the special guys in lycra who have flogged their bodies for the last 3 weeks as they have travelled around France (haven't they heard of a one zone interrail ticket?).

Well done to Floyd Landis, the guy with the dodgy hip, who won La Grande Boucle and who can now at least look forward to recuperating from his hip operation with the maillot jaune to keep him warm.

Well done too to Viatcheslav Ekimov who completed his fifteenth Tour de France. In a nice touch, Ekimov was allowed to lead the bunch across the line during its first passage on the Champs-Élysées...presumably because having ridden the race so many times the peloton were sure he knew the way.

The first TDF of the post-Armstrong era was the most exciting race for years and let's hope the Praying Landis will be back to defend his title next year.

Westminster survelliance

2006-07-04T11:28:00.000+01:00

England may be out of the World Cup ('really, I hadn't noticed...') but the proud yeoman spirit lives on.

Boris Johnson, conforming to his media image, was spotted today walking towards Portcullis House and singing 'Three Lions on a shirt...'.

Reports that David Cameron was heard on his way to a Shadow Cabinet meeting singing 'Vindaloo' have yet to be confirmed.

Mixing pop and politics

2006-06-23T16:44:00.000+01:00

"...he asks me what the use is
I offer him embarrassment and my usual excuses".

(Great Leap Forwards, Billy Bragg)

With no excuses and an apparent lack of embarassment, Theresa "Russell & Bromley" May decided yesterday to tread the 'pop & politics' tightrope. At Business Questions DJ T- May bemoaned the demise of 'Top of the Pops' and then, in a move as stealthy as an Indian elephant in yellow pyjamas, slipped a series of pop references into her searing indictment of Government failure...

Hansard 22 June 2006 c1467

For example, given the Home Secretary’s recent problems, I wonder whether he should listen to the U2 track “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For”. Perhaps we could have a touch of Dire Straits for the Deputy Prime Minister with the track “Money for Nothing”. I suppose that the Chancellor might look to Diana Ross with “You Keep Me Hangin’ On”. Perhaps the Prime Minister would like the Clash’s “Should I Stay or Should I Go”. Talking of clashes, perhaps the Chancellor would describe his relationship with the Prime Minister with the White Stripes track “Every Day I Love You Less and Less”. Or, given the Chancellor’s commitment to new Labour, maybe his track for him and the Prime Minister should be Elton John’s “Friends Never Say Goodbye”:

“There isn’t much I haven’t shared
With you
along the road...
Who’s to say who’s right or
wrong
Whose course is braver run
Still we are, have always been
Will ever be as one”.

Yep, politicans are a funny bunch, and, where one ventures, others inevitably follow.

Iain Wright, MP for Hartlepool, aged 15, pointed out that "Every Day I Love You Less and Less” was sung by the Kaiser Chiefs rather than the White Stripes. With an eye on the crucial Artic Monkey-supporting demographic, he then said he was tempted to call Mrs May “Mardy bum”, but, being more gracious, he should say “I bet you look good on the dance floor”.

The Westminster law of diminshing comedy returns was proved once again when David Hamilton (MP for Cajun Jazz, Labour) ventured that 'Keep on running' by Spencer Davies might have be an appropriate response to Mrs May's pop promptings.

The popular music interjections got weaker and made you wish for an unusual scenario. If only the leader of the Opposition - and self-confessed fan of the Smiths - turned up, one thought, to step up to the Despatch Box and tell his fellows MPs "That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore".

(hat-tip: RW)

World Cup Fever

2006-06-15T13:10:00.000+01:00

A severe bout of World Cup fever, which was proceeded by an equally serious infection of laziness, has rendered me somewhat incapacitated on the blogging front recently.

Normal service (i.e. a blog post a week...) will be resumed soon.

General Well-Being and Captain Bull-Shit

2006-05-23T15:17:00.000+01:00

As pointed out at Harry's Place yesterday, the Chinless Wonder's latest contribution to the intellectual and political life of the nation is to say that Britain could be made a better place if only we asked businessmen to be nicer to their workers instead of imposing nasty regulations on companies.

Cameron's 'grand vision' here, suggesting the world would be a better place if people were nicer to one another, is predictably anodyne. Its banality, however, shouldn't disguise its true character as a restatement of the anti-regulation view, traditional in Tory circles. This view holds that business would operate far more smoothly if only they didn't have to worry about those pesky health, safety and employment laws.

It does seem a shame for Cameron's to adopt this approach especially when the Onion reports that even China is getting in on the regulation act...

Given an easy ride by the media on this issue, Cameron was able to portray this speech as a contribution to the work-life balance debate. Labour were right then to point out that, keen as Cameron was to take-up his own paternity leave, he had twice voted against the Employment Act 2002. This extended paid maternity leave, introduced paid paternity leave and allowed parents of young children to request flexible working.

Today's Guardian reports that Cameron also used the Google conference (...) to argue that:

"It's time we admitted that there's more to life than money, and it's time we focused not just on GDP but on GWB - General Wellbeing."

GWB, eh? Why come up with serious policies when you can have a silly acronym? Seriously though, it is nice to hear an Old Etonian being so magnanimous about the fundamentally unrewarding nature of wealth.

Job Centre Plus Staff Member: "I'm afraid there are no job vacancies this week"
Unemployed person: "That's okay. I've been elevated to the post of General Wellbeing."

Despite some critics levelling the charge that the Tories lack substance, Cameron's trade in vacuous bullshit is now expected to make way for a rash of policy statements. In a speech next week to the ippr, Cameron is likely outline his vision for a confident and vibrant Britain in the 21st century. The Conservative leader will argue that the key to personal well-being is to brush your teeth twice a day. In a startlingly innovative proposal to cut crime, Cameron will also recommend that householders deter potential burglars by leaving the hall lights on when they go out.

The new Conservative Party - modern, compassionate and full of shit.

(Pic: Twat on bike)

The New Statesman: Heroes of our time

2006-05-19T12:03:00.000+01:00

The New Statesman invited readers to write in with their suggestions for 'heroes of our time' and they've now published the top 50.

Showing a shameful lack of imagination they've gone for Aung Sang Suu Kyi and Nelson Mandela as their top 2. No sign of Jade Goody or Vernon Kay. Most disappointing.

No.3 is Bob Geldof. Bono is on the list too, but only at No.30. Goes to show that editing the Indy isn't good for one's popularity. John 'rapacious Western Governments' Pilger got in at No.4. Mag Thatch at No.5 (clearly benefitting from the large ex-miner readership of the NS), is in at No.5

Andrew Roberts, in his paean to Thatch, says "The 1992 election victory was largely down to her legacy rather than the non-leadership of her absurd successor, John Major. " That's funny. I thought it was precisely because the Tories dumped the old witch that they scraped a win in 1992.

No.7 in the NS poll is Noam Chomsky, who is to academic rigour what Dan Brown is to literary fiction. Tony Benn, Hugo Chavez and George Galloway fill spots in the top-50 too which indicates the Euston Manifesto may have a point about the moral bankruptcy of sections of the Left. With heroes like these who needs bogey-men.

Brian Haw makes it in at No.31 and shows how 'egalitarian' the NS survey is...apparently we ask little more of our heroes than that they squat at a roundabout for five years.

Prince Charles is in at No.46. Next to his name the NS has helpfully printed 'Eldest son of the Queen'. Charlie will be disappointed that his ma finishes higher up the poll, in at No.33, yet pleased that his subscription to NS has at last paid dividends.

In his intro to the poll, Jason Cowley says that 'although we asked you to consider the living, Winston Churchill was among several of the great dead to receive multiple nominations, as were Jesus Christ and Marie Curie. Some heroes, it seems, never die'. Or, rather, some NS readers never read the small print.

Elsewhere in the NS, Robert Calderisi speculates that the worst man in the world is Paul Wolfowitz. Not Robert Mugabe. Not Osama Bin Laden. But, possibly, Paul Wolfowitz.

Campbell pays tribute to Forth

2006-05-19T11:10:00.000+01:00

Campbell pays tribute

Liberal Democrat Leader, Sir Menzies Campbell said, "Eric Forth was a fine and independent spirit who valued Parliament and recognised its obligation to hold Government to account."

" His quick-wittedness made him a formidable opponent in debate. He will be missed on all sides. Our thoughts are with his family and friends at this time."
(Press Gallery News)

Quick-wittedness. A few weeks ago at PMQs when Ming asked what the PM was going to do about pensions. Forth, from a sedentary position, shouted [in Ming's direction] "Declare your interest..."

Given the flood of tributes that have been paid to him from politicians of all sides perhaps the House should consider holding a Private Members' Bill Friday in his memory. This would provide a perfect opportunity to celebrate the man and allow all the Bills he single-handedly blocked over the last few years to get another chance of becoming law.

Nick Robinson on Eric Forth here.

Hard-fi

2006-05-17T17:56:00.000+01:00

Saw Hard-fi at Brixton Academy last night.

Very disappointing.

Richard Archer, the lead singer who happily told the Guardian last week that he wants Hard-fi to be the biggest band in the world, was shockingly poor. His voice wasn't up to the job at all. He sounded like a cross between Eartha Kitt and Gonzo...and that wasn't on the promotional posters.

Be interested to hear from anyone else who goes to see them on one of their five Brixton nights..what do you think?

Holding the executive to account...

2006-05-17T10:42:00.000+01:00

Being the laughing boys they are, the Tories are asking some searching questions about staffing arrangements in the Deputy Prime Minister's office. Staffing arrangements being one of the few areas where Prescott may be able to answer questions given that he is now responsible for very little else.

If the Prime Minister arrives a few minutes early for PMQs today he might hear this question tabled to his valued lieutenant...

14 Hugh Robertson (Faversham & Mid Kent): To ask the Deputy Prime Minister, whether his new office will have a diary secretary.

Your summer movie preview

2006-05-05T12:37:00.000+01:00

May 5 Mission: Impossible 3 M:I: 3

In the third film of the series, Tom Cruise plays a man mocked by society for his deeply held religious beliefs. Frustrated by the way society views him, Cruise, playing a down-and-out Hollywood multi-millionaire, fights a desperate battle to prove his sanity and the enlightened appeal of his faith.

The movie, which again sees Cruise doing his own stunts, features a series of daring action sequences. Witness Cruise acrobatically jump on a sofa during a chat show appearance and then, without fear for his personal safety, urge his pregnant girlfriend to remain silent during the baby’s delivery.

The set-piece of the movie is, though, the CGI-enhanced finale sequence, dubbed ‘The Fight for the Placenta’, where our hero clashes with a mid-wife and team of medical staff to do battle for the umbilical cord, a prize which he plans to eat for brunch.

Phillip Seymour Hoffman plays Oprah Winfrey. Kate Bush plays Katie Holmes.

May 19 The Da Vinci Code

An intriguing split-narrative film which plays out in two parts, each lasting 3 months.

In the first piece Tom Hanks plays Leonardo Da Vinci, a little known Italian artist who suddenly realises he is the subject of a best-selling novel. Giving up the painting and decorating job which has hitherto been his life, Leonardo discovers that all those years at art school were a waste of time. Hanks, aiming for a third Academy award, delivers a powerful performance of a man facing existential crisis but finally finding meaning when he dedicates his life to writing airport fiction. Julian Clarey stars as Pope Pius II.

In the second narrative, Tom Hanks plays Tom Walker, a man driven to solve the riddle of Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code. Tom forms a crack unit of ace book-hunters, recruited for their specialist skills (hearing, power of speech, map reading), dedicated to uncovering the real reason for the mass appeal of Dan Brown’s best-seller.

After an exhaustive trek across four travelcard zones Tom finally confronts the fate he was desperate to avoid - he must read the Da Vinci Code. Sipping on a mochaccino in a local Starbucks, Tom realises he has lived his life as a cultural snob, always ready to dismiss a film or a book on the basis of its widespread popularity. Armed with this fresh insight, Tom discovers the Da Vinci Code is actually a very good read and vows never again to be so damning of something he hasn’t read before.

The viewer then realises the awful truth – Tom has had a lobotomy.

May 26 X-Men: The Last Stand – The Euston Manifesto

The soul-searching, angst ridden X-men have always regarded themselves as a cut above your average superhero. This time, however, they venture away from the world of tight costumes and superhuman powers and into the world of leftist politics.

The X-Men franchise closes with a full-scale stand-off where the mutants must choose between clinging to their beliefs in freedom, solidarity and democracy (the ‘Euston Manifesto’ of the title) or giving up on these ideals and throwing their lot in with the ‘anti-imperalist’ reactionary Socialist orthodoxy, led by George ‘Corrupto’ Galloway.

Sir Ian McKellen plays Professor Emeritus Norm Geras.Tom Cruise, who lost height but gained obnoxious opinions and toxic cigars for the role, plays George Galloway.

June 9 Omen 1966

In this innovative take on the 1976 horror flick, England fans are forced to suffer the ignominy of yet another glorious defeat at a major football finals. The ghost of 66’ leaves the fans with unrealistic pre-tournament expectations, quickly turning to fatalism and then anger as the recurring nightmare of disallowed goals and penalty misses raises its ugly head for another instalment in the series. The film features Antonio Banderas as Sven-Goran Erikkson and Timothy Spall as David Beckham.

August 4 Miami Vice

Michael Mann’s screen overhaul of the 1980s TV thriller sees the action transferred to Westminster. Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx play cops Crockett and Tubbs who are on a special mission to investigate the cash-for-peerages scandal. Al Pacino is Tony Blair. Ving Rhames plays John Reid.

Save Our Estate Agents

2006-04-28T15:29:00.000+01:00

Asda are planning on moving into the estate agency business.

Peter Bolton-King, chief executive of the National Association of Estate Agents, said he doubted whether Asda could offer a professional estate agency service.

A professional estate agency service? Hmmm.

Nick Goulding of the Forum of Private Business said: "Do they really expect to replace the service and expertise that your local estate agent supplies?"

Expertise like this?

Reverse pickpocketing?

2006-04-28T11:16:00.000+01:00

David Copperfield pulls magic trick during mugging

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — David Copperfield has magically escaped getting robbed.
The 49-year-old illusionist was walking with two female assistants to their tour bus after his show Sunday at a performing arts center when four teens pulled up in a black car, a police report said.

Two armed robbers allegedly got out of the car and demanded the group's belongings. One woman handed over $400 from her pockets and the other gave up her purse with 200 euros, $100, her passport, plane tickets and a cell phone. Copperfield refused to empty his pockets, the report said.

Copperfield says he turned his pockets inside out to reveal nothing in them, even though he was carrying his passport, wallet and cell phone. "Call it reverse pickpocketing," Copperfield told The Palm Beach Post for Wednesday's editions.

Copperfield read the license plate number of the car to an assistant while she called 911, the report said. Four teenagers were arrested and charged with armed robbery. They were held without bond, police said. The women's property was recovered.

'Reverse pickpocketing'? Wouldn't 'reverse pickpocketing' mean putting something into a pocket that wasn't there in the first place? Shouldn't 'DC' have magically made rabbits appear from the assailants pockets rather than lamely hiding his own valuables?

In fact, DC comes across a bit badly here. Note how he allows his female assistants get robbed and then reserves the magic to save his own possessions. Paul Daniels would not have been so lacking in chivalry. Paul would have distracted the muggers with the 'sawing a woman in half' trick and then, while dialling 911 and waiting for the police to arrive, wowed the dastardly criminals with a flashy card trick. By the time the prospective felons had realised their card was indeed the 9 of Hearts the local police would have the perps safely in their clutches.

The Home Office could do with an eye-catching initiative right now though. Why not train community police officers to pass on to the public the skills of David Coppefield's 'reverse pickpocketing'? Of course, putting all those released prisoners back in a box might be a bit more difficult but, who knows, maybe David could help out with that too?

Laws are like sausages

2006-04-25T09:59:00.000+01:00

Iran. Pensions. UK energy policy. Faster coffee services for MPs. All pressing issues needing firm and decisive action from our nation’s legislators. Credit is due then to the Mother of Parliaments for the enquiry into the House of Commons Refreshment Department.

Contrary to media perception, the daily Commons menu does not consist of foie gras, truffles and Chateau Lafite. This is only available on the first Monday of every month. The modest fare on show is not the end of the story, however, as the humble researcher, if not the MP, is required to not only queue for their food but, horror of horrors, pay for it as well. A most disgraceful state-of-affairs and worthy of a thorough investigation.

While not quite Watergate, the Select Committee on Administration’s report does unveil a few tasty titbits, most notably in the written evidence submitted by MPs.

For Ming Campbell, leadership of the Lib Dems and searing critiques of British misadventure in Iraq are not enough. Ming is driven by a higher calling. He longs for a day when we can sip our House of Commons coffee in peace and prosperity:

RT HON SIR MENZIES CAMPBELL
The coffee arrangements in the Debate in Portcullis House are inconvenient and dangerous.

Dangerous? Really? Najaf? Yes. The Debate cafeteria. Possibly not.

Nia Griffith, the MP for Llanelli, comes to Ming's aid, however, when she outlines the nature of the Debate cafe threat:

NIA GRIFFITH
One small point, please ask them to reconsider the layout of the take away hot drinks as this currently involves dancing around each other with hot water ie step to the left to pick up paper cup, step to the right to put in tea bag, step to the left to put in hot water, step to the right to add milk, step to the left to get cover to put on cup. This should flow in one straight sequence.

The Rt Hon John ‘Marie Antoinette’ Redwood then chips in with a nod to populist politics. In what may be the Cameroonian Tories first policy decision Redwood suggests:

I think it would also be popular to offer cake more often at tea time.

Perhaps the finest contribution, however, is reserved for Andrew Turner, MP for the Isle of Wight, who submitted the following comments to the Committee:

One member of my staff comments that there is too much emphasis on "ethnic" meals and not enough choice of traditional English dishes (very simple items like cheese on toast would be welcome).

Ah, the old ‘member of my staff’ ruse. Just like the ‘friend with a personal problem’ one suspects. Come on Andrew. Have the courage of your convictions. Say it like it is. It's foreign muck and you don't like it.

(Hat-tip: MR)

This is a modern world...

2006-04-21T14:00:00.000+01:00

Or maybe not.

See here, here and here.

14.00 Update

And this too...

Bullshit by any other name

2006-04-10T15:51:00.000+01:00

Fed up with murder, terrorist atrocity and killer viruses? Well, it could be worse. You could read a 'lifestyle' piece in the Sunday newspapers. Feelings of revulsion, disgust and misery might be expected when reading of the genocide of a whole people but it's something of a shock to find these feelings replicated when you stumble across a seemingly trivial article in your Sunday paper.

Yesterday the Observer spread word of a revolutionary new social phenomenon. The article told us that Britons now spend a lot of time with their friends and that Britons may be closer to friends than some of their family.

Well, thank you Observer! What an amazing revelation. My whole world's been turned upside-down. I am going to quit my job and join a circus.

The article in question even told us that this radical social transformation had heralded the invention of a new social group - the 'framily'.

Oh, purleaze. FFS!

If you were at a pub when a mate embarked on this little discourse you'd rightly denounce the validity of their opinion, question their parentage, and order them to get the next couple of rounds in as penance. Instead, you have to resort to clubbing yourself about the head with the paper and telling yourself that you'll never buy it again. Until next week that is when that film you never wanted to see is given away free on DVD.

This outstanding work of social history is clearly written from a corporate press release ; Dolmio, the widely respected international think-tank, commissioned the 'research' for this one. It also panders to the assumption common in these pieces that all Britons are in their 20s/early 30s, and live in a flat-share in Clapham with Courtney Cox and Jennifer Aniston.

So, please, please, no more of this rubbish. Give me tales of Amazonian rain forests the size of Wales being destroyed by a cabal of flu-stricken swans and evil Western corporations and I'll be happy....

(Pic left: The Last Supper - the first recorded 'framily dinner')

Feng shui consultant confirms Blair-Brown rift

2006-04-05T13:21:00.000+01:00

BBC News 24 today covered the launch of Labour's local election campaign in England with the serious tone befitting of a channel dedicated to in-depth reportage and informed comment.

With both Tony Blair and Gordon Brown taking the opportunity to speak at the same event, studio analysts played their part in connecting the watching public with their organs of local democracy. The news anchors discussed the role of local government, the relationship between local councils and central government, the worrying trends in low voter turnout, and then mused upon some of the issues which candidates at the upcoming election would be pledging to tackle.

Sorry, that was my belated April Fools item...what really happened was that the BBC News 24 hired a 'body language specialist' to commentate on the footage of Blair and Brown at the conference. In dark political times such as these there seems only one thing left for news programmes to do...call the body language specialist. The last thing, that is, if the tarot card reader is double-booked on the Today programme discussing the legal status of extraordinary rendition.

The body language specialist (from California...) studied the footage of Brown and Blair getting out of the ministerial car. He noted - with the seriousness of a man whose career relies on interpreting a man picking their nose as revolutionary act -that Blair walked over to Brown and placed 'two touches on the sleeve' of the Chancellor. From the tone of the body language specialist it was clear that this seemingly trivial gesture was, in fact, a momentous event akin to the signing of the Magna Carta and the passage of the Great Reform Act of 1832.

'Would they do that if they hated each other?' asked the news-anchor, breathlessly, indicating that as BBC News 24 was taking this charlatan seriously then we should all be obliged to do the same.

"Of course they would, they're duplicitous shits who'd sooner spit at each other than endure a moment in each other's company" the body language specialist didn't reply, before going on to say that Brown wearing a suit and tie gave an impression of 'gravy-toss'. Was this an insult or a term specific to the lexicon of the body language expert? No, it was apparently the word 'gravitas' spoken by a Californian.

Once Brown and Blair had exited stage left, Prescott arrived to rouse the party activists with a display of oratory not heard since Kelly Brook left the Big Breakfast. The sight of Prescott in full flow seem to hinder the body language expert's powers of analysis and he was put of his misery by the news anchor's 'okay...we'll leave that there for now...'. It was an ignominious end to a thoroughly enlightening piece of political commentary.

What's next then? A feng-shui consultant parading around No.10 suggesting the two vases facing each other across the mantelpiece represent Brown and Blair's ongoing struggle for power? We can only hope.

A Lib Dem MP writes...

2006-03-30T17:15:00.000+01:00

When I started this blog I looked forward to a time when it would become the source of reference for the country's elite. The rich and the powerful, the movers and the shakers, the power-brokers and the plutocrats...all would flock to the latest Thimble post about, erm, MPs post. Imagine my disappointment then when this rather vainglorious and desperate fantasy appears already to have been dealt a fatal blow at its very outset.

This blog, ladies and gentlemen, has been read by a Lib Dem MP. It seems that since I was a small boy, merrily hopping on the bus to school with joy in my heart and a Snoopy flask in my satchel, I have always attracted the social outcast - the drunk at the bus stop, the market researcher in the high street, the accountant at dinner parties - but this is the limit....a Lib Dem MP, come on! Grateful for the attention as I am, the Lib Dem constituency is not really the demographic I want to attract I'm afraid.

The Lib Dem MP in question is Martin Horwood, Member of Parliament for Cheltenham, who, in all fairness, left an amiable, if a little preachy, response to a blog-post I did on his parliamentary questions some time ago. Well, it was polite apart from the threat of legal action but I won't dwell on that. Apparently Mr Horwood thinks both a music and a video store in Parliament would be a good idea. He doesn't say whether MPs should be required to put in shifts at either establishment - "Will the Rt Hon Member please pass me the latest Black-Eyed Peas single?" "I refer you to an answer I gave some time ago...i.e. that Black Eyed Peas are a threat to the nation and are, as such, on our proscribed list of banned organisations" - but it's nice to hear some 'out of the box' thinking on these issues. After all, who wants to improve legislative scrutiny when you can open a Virgin Megastore in Central Lobby? They'll be flogging off peerages next.

Perhaps I'm being a tad uncharitable. Just as we were told to love the bomb perhaps we should learn to, erm, tolerate the Lib Dems. A message to Mr Horwood then: if you can forgive me for my lack of human kindness, then maybe I can forgive you for being a Lib Dem. Buy me a pint and we'll say no more about it...

Two Rotherham lads stick together

2006-03-29T21:03:00.000+01:00

PMQs were a day for the deputies today. With Blair in a NZ departure lounge ready to jet off to Indonesia, Prescott and Hague stepped up to the despatch box. David Heath – who bears a passing resemblance to Brian Blessed – did the honours for the Lib Dems too but we don’t really need to hear about him…

Prescottian PMQs may hold a macabre fascination for the Westminster anorak but a large groan – one not even muffled by the engine noise of two Jags - must surely emanate from the assembled throng of visitors when they realise their cherished public gallery tickets aren’t going to get them access to the headline act but rather to the teenage garage band who just turned up to play on the undercard…it would be like paying to see the Rolling Stones and getting the Flaming Furnaces…

PMQs with Prescott usually promises a rather different kind of political event to that provided by the usual question time with Blair. The anticipation of the usual ‘punch and judy’ routine is replaced by a different expectation, one of an altogether bloodier spectacle – Prescott single-handedly murdering the English language. It is ‘car-crash’ telly…it may be too awful to watch but, at the same time, you can’t bring yourself to turn away. Prescott’s jarring sentences sometimes feel a little like watching a learner driver crunch through the gears but he gets there in the end. Sometimes. Of course, this has now become something of a Westminster tradition, one eagerly anticipated by the Parliamentary sketchwriters, but today's proceedings did actually deviate a little from the usual script.

Prescott stumbled a little at the start of PMQs but he still felt confident enough to affect a spirit of solidarity with his opposite number. “Us Rotherham lads must stick together” said the Member for Hull East. This apparent bonhomie quickly disappeared, however, when Hague baited Prescott about his one-time failure to pay council tax on a grace-and-favour property. Hague linked this in with an attack on the Government for dropping the £200 council tax rebate for pensioners. Prescott struggling to reply as only he can gave a typically garbled answer, putting words together in a manner suggesting a rather avant-garde approach to both sentence construction and intelligibility.

Hague moved in for the kill at this point and, with a line likely to have been rehearsed for several days beforehand, said (of Prescott's reply) that there was, "so little English in that answer, President Chirac would have been proud of it".

Cue hoots of laughter from the Tory benches. But this was the red-rag to the proverbial bull and, aside from a temporary recurrence of verbal wrestling, this sent Prescott into what turned out to be a pretty effective attack-mode. From this point he largely got the better of Hague. Prescott struck back by saying that while he took the blame for getting his grammar wrong, he would sooner get his words wrong than get his judgement wrong, reminding Mr Hague that he had once described Tory peer Lord Archer as a man of "integrity".

While fired up and clearly riled by Hague’s comments, Prescott also, paradoxically, seemed to relax into the role of PM for the day. When being faced by a closed question – a question tabled in advance on a specific issue – he looked around for the civil servant prepared brief in his folder and said, “closed questions…oh yeah”, mocking his own apparent lack of a quick-fire response on the question. Prescott even managed to reply playfully to Hague’s reference of his 2001 jab, “I thought we had finished with Punch and Judy politics. I know I'll be called Mr Punch, but where do you think that leaves you?"

JP wasn’t finished either, he mentioned about how well everyone had done under a Labour government, including the Honourable Member (Mr. Hague), whose speaking fees somewhat outstrip Prescott’s, and then completed his recovery by telling Hague “Have I got news for you”…another reference to Hague’s outside interests.

All in all, Prescott seemed to come out pretty well for what must be a tough gig for him. What the great British public made of it remains to be seen but John, at least, should sleep well tonight.

Inside an MP's postbag...

2006-03-16T16:40:00.000Z

The four-hundreth postcard about tail-docking. Occasional rants about youths cycling on the pavement. Pornography.Well-produced corporate fabrication from the likes of BP and Shell telling us how corporately responsible they are ('for every Nigerian villager shot by our petro-dollar militias we plant two fridges in a landfill in Dungeness'). Such is the lot of the average MP's mailbag on an average day.

But today was different. For today we received correspondence from the British Precast Concrete Federation (Ltd). Oh yes. You can imagine my joy. Inside the envelope, along with registration forms for precast concrete events ('Concrete and Chico from Pop Idol - a match made in heaven?'), was a book...the 'little book of concrete'. Inside are 100 ways to maintain calmness through concrete, including the valuable information that precast concrete has the advantage of 'Rapid erection on site'. Ahem.

'Pornography' and 'erection' in the same post. I am desperate to increase my traffic...

For those of you not working in an MP's office, and who would like a copy, may I suggest you contact them at info@britishprecast.org They also hold out the attractive prospect of a follow-up by asking you to email them more suggestions of the advantages of precast. Don't let them down. Be creative. We could have a best-seller on our hands here.

Musical meme

2006-03-14T13:04:00.000Z

Picked this up from Bloggers4Labour....Pick a band/artist. Then answer these questions using only titles from the band/artist's songs.

(I'll pass this on to Steve-o at hyperrealandsupercool.com...maybe this one will be more to his taste than the last one he didn't do...)

1. Name of band/artist: The Pixies
2. Are you male or female?: Here Comes Your Man
3. Describe yourself: Fat Boy from a Lonely Planet
4. How do you feel about yourself? I Bleed
5. Describe your ex girlfriend/boyfriend: Is She Weird
6. Describe current girlfriend/boyfriend: I'm Amazed
7. Describe where you want to be: The Holiday Song (or Riding The Wild Surf)
8. Describe how you live: Tame
9. Describe how you love: Stormy Weather (or, if I'm to be rude, Bone Machine)
10. What would you ask for if you had just one wish?:[A] Naked Spanish Lady Rock 'N' Roll
11. Share a few words of wisdom: Distance Equals Rate Times Time
12. Now say goodbye: Vamos

Get smarter...don't read Sunday paper lifestyle pieces

2006-03-06T17:23:00.000Z

(Picture left - brushing your teeth while winking increases IQ by up to 7.2 per cent)

An upcoming BBC programme Get Smarter in a Week was trailed in the Observer yesterday. The scientific thinking behind the programme is that simple changes to our lifestyle - combined with physical exercise - can lead to significant improvements in how well our brains function.

The contestants on the show spend a week following a 50-page Get Smarter Guide and the Observer printed a selection of get smarter tips (possible outcomes provided by the Thimble):

THE GET SMARTER GUIDE

Saturday
Brush your teeth with your 'wrong' hand and take a shower with your eyes closed.

Possible outcome: Toothpaste stains on your 'Saturday night going-out' shirt from inaccurate brushing prompt failure at evening's social event. Your date, taking the view that a man lacking the coordination to brush his teeth properly may not be the man to guide her through the intricacies of the waltz, goes off with your best friend, Dan, who doesn't even brush his teeth.

Go home. Have shower with eyes closed. Fall over, break ankle. Cue six hours in casualty spent with drunks and victims of violent assault. Forced to wait even longer due to a large group of people with severe eye injuries. Doctors conclude injuries consistent with being stabbed in the eye by a toothbrush.

Sunday
Do the crossword or Sudoku puzzle in your Sunday paper and take a brisk walk.

Possible outcome: Go to parents for Sunday dinner. Mum and Dad, learning of your new regime, suggest you are only allowed dinner if you have successfully completed the day's cryptic crossword and Sudoku puzzle. Thankfully you manage to download the day's solutions off the internet and can safely tuck into meat and two veg. Your Nan, unfamiliar with the internet as she is, fails to complete the task and is sent home without any dinner.

Monday
Have oily fish for dinner, and either cycle, walk or take the bus into work.

Possible outcome: Signed off from work with broken ankle. Against medical advice cycle to fishmongers to buy oily fish. Disappointed to find fishmongers has been turned into a trendy theme bar named 'The Cod and Chips'. Drink expensive Czech lager and pay ten quid for a selection of 'crustacean crudites' (crab sticks) before slouching in a corner with a copy of the Ancient Mariner.

Tuesday
Select unfamiliar words from the dictionary and work them into conversations.

Possible outcome: Decide to use the words 'feculance', 'micturate' and 'discombobulate' without bothering to look up their meaning in the dictionary. Cause medium to serious offence at the local swimming pool by outlining your plan to "swim with considerable feculance and grace" for the next hour and puzzle staff by declaring that you plan to 'micturate for some time before deciding to join up on direct debit'.

Popping into the local Starbucks to grab a cappuccino with double discombobulate doesn't seem to cause too much trouble. You still feel cheated, however, when you find you have paid three pound more for a coffee that tastes exactly the same as the un-discombobulated version.

Wednesday
Go to yoga, Pilates or a meditation class, and talk to someone you don't know.

Possible outcome: Going to yoga has an unexpectedly positive effect on your sense of well-being. Feeling upbeat and positive you decide to stop and talk to a stranger. Stranger turns around from the urinal and pisses on your shoes. No amount of meditation is going to get those stains out of your trousers.

Thursday
Take a different route to work; watch Countdown or Brainteaser.

Possible outcome: Decide to skip the tube and take the river bus to work only to find a whale has ventured down the Thames. The London Transport River Boat you are travelling on is commandered for the whale rescue. and you are forced to wade into the water, wearing your best Savile Row suit, to aid the effort to keep the mammal from dehdyration. After five hours of alternatively filling buckets and taking pictures with your camera-phone, you realise your suit is ruined and that Thursday is, after all, a 'home-working' day.

You return home in time for Countdown.

Friday
Avoid caffeine or alcohol; memorise your shopping list

Possible outcome: Learn a mnemonic ('DON'T FORGET') to remember the shoppping. However, things go amiss when you return not with the duck, onion, nectarines, tomatoes, oranges, foie gras (FG...) and thyme as planned, but a dog, an orangutan, Nescafe, the Times, 'Fools Gold' by the Stone Roses and a bottle of tequila. Realising this is not the menu you had in mind for the evening's dinner party you drink yourself silly on Nescafe and Cuervo Gold tequila and pass out around 7pm.

Gordon Brown - pink shirts but where are the green credentials?

2006-03-03T16:28:00.000Z

I attended the "Sustainable Energy Policy for the UK" conference at Congress House this week. Trade and Industry Sec. of State Alan Johnson almost managed to get through his speech without mentioning the nuclear option but, as you would expect given the Energy Review is still open, he didn't really say anything new.

Dieter Helm spoke of the need for Government to set a framework for energy markets to work effectively in terms of improving the energy supply infrastructure and in terms of reducing carbon emissions. He said a lot more than this but I won't expand on this here. Sir David King, Chief Scientific Adviser to the Government, outlined the scientific evidence for global warming and offered dire predictions for the planet's future but mixed this with a degree of optimism at what might be possible through technological advances and international politicial agreement.

Attending the conference made me think about the future direction that Labour might take on issues such as the environment and climate change. While some may question the pace of progress under Labour in terms of the UK's own efforts to tackle climate change, Tony Blair has shown a great deal of commitment in raising the issue of climate change on a national and international level (it was one of the two main priorities of the UK's G8 presidency last year). This is in stark contrast to the record of the Chancellor who rarely (I would venture it is never but it is said that you should never say never) spoken with any enthusiasm on issues concerning the environment.

Okay, Gordon Brown is Chancellor and green issues might (wrongly) be thought of as being out of bounds for the man holding the purse strings. But given that Brown, in moves to prove he can talk about more than pounds, shillings and prudence, has been coming out with his thoughts on issues of Britishness and constitutional reform there shouldn't be any excuse for him not now to talk about the environment.

Of course, the excuse could be that he is not actually that interested in climate change. His commitment to world poverty issues is genuine and long-held but climate change probably doesn't register with Brown in the same way and for Brown these considerations may conflict with his belief in enterprise. But Brown needs to be interested in environmental issues and possibly not 'just' for the sake of the planet. David Cameron's opportunistic conversion to all things green is political shorthand for 'we've changed, we're now young and fresh and interested in the same single issue politics as you are...'.

Polls might be unreliable but a recent Guardian/ICM poll showed that Cameron was more convincing to the public on green issues than both Blair and Brown (who lagged even further behind in the poll). This poll might not tell us much but for me it reinforces the idea that Gordon Brown and Labour should come out all guns blazin' on the environment. There are environmental achievements under Labour that we can be proud of and we should say so while putting down a marker for further action too. This would call Cameron's bluff, provide an opportunity to show Brown is in tune with climate change issues, and hopefully lead to some bold Government action to help the UK meets its own carbon emissions commitments in 2020.

Winter Olympics 2012

2006-02-14T17:53:00.000Z

Watching the half-pipe snowboarding event on the Beeb's Winter Olympics coverage last night was surprisingly entertaining. It may be predictable to mock the names of the half-pipe manoeuvres involved but is that any reason not to do so? I think not.

I'm almost certain I heard the commentator describe one of Gretchen Blelier's moves as a Double McFlurry and the 'triple Black and Decker, toll-booth, $5 shake with extra Cheese manoeuvre' may not have been the product of my limited imagination but rather a hitherto un-executable trick worth 10 points with the judges.

In 'trendy' new sports such as this, the uninitiated (i.e. the overwhelming majority) really are at the mercy of the commentator to tell us what's good and what's not. Okay, I can tell that falling over and smashing your face on the pipe wall is bad but beyond that the commentator can pretty much make it up as they go along. Of course we have experience of commentators spouting nonsense - masquerading as expertise - on football commentary but at least then we have the knowledge to expose them for the charlatans they are. But in sports such as the half-pipe we might mistakenly cling to the insight of the Commentator more than we would normally do. That is my rather long-winded point, ladies and gents.

The usual Beeb authority on such matters seemed a little undermined on this occasion by the consciously 'trendy' commentary of the half-pipe event. Gone were the patronising, relaxed tones of Barry Davies ('aaaah, the Russian athlete reaaally was quite amazing. Lovely') and were replaced with something like 'rad man. She's nailed that and she'll be rocking all night once she watches that on the VT...'.

But trendy commentary delivery and different terminologies cannot hide the results of a commentator prepared to talk bollocks. As Hannah Teter prepared for her second run knowing she had already won gold, the Beeb commentator described her ability as an Olympic athelete in the following manner...."Hannah Teter is tiramisu. She's got the sponge fingers...and the hint of whiskey...'.

Winter Olympics 2012: The Trifle Games

Socialist

2006-02-08T11:33:00.000Z

Hearing John Reid's words on the Today programme this morning gave a wee tug on my ole heart strings. He was talking about Iraq and, when questioned about the security situation there, Dr Reid spoke of a "pessimism of the intellect and an optimism of the will"...echoing Gramsci's phrase. I know he's an old Communist but Dr Reid's turn-of-phrase raised a smile in the Thimble house. Well, it did raised a smile on my face anyway. The Princess couldn't actually hear Dr Reid cos she was in the kitchen making the sandwiches...

A demonstration of division of labour in practice ladies and gentlemen.

Despite occasionally shopping at Waitrose and actually enjoying the odd edition of 'Grand Designs' ..the Thimble is delighted to tell the world he is still a socialist. Of course the fact that I get misty-eyed at the mention of an Italian Marxist should be some indication but the Politics Test declares me to be a Socliast too. I was referred to it by the Bloggers4Labour site and here's the results.

You are a
Social Liberal
(70% permissive)

and an...
Economic Liberal
(18% permissive)

You are best described as a:

Socialist

Link: The Politics Test on OkCupid Free Online Dating
Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

Sick boy...

2006-01-21T11:04:00.000Z

The Thimble has been a rather sick boy of late. 'Sick' in the traditional sense of the word, as in ill, rather than harbouring perverted thoughts about cuddly toys that is.

I'll try and post again soon, but being off work I inevitably ended up watching DVDs. Given the whale story at the moment it seems apt that, before the first blowhole was even spotted in Westminster, I watched the 'Marine Biologist' episode of Seinfeld...

"In one episode, Jerry told a girl George wanted to impress that George was a marine biologist. The plan backfired when George was called upon to save a beached whale with a golf ball in its blowhole; he saved the whale, but the woman rejected him when he confessed that he was not, in fact, a marine biologist."

Trouble at Mill?

2006-01-11T14:55:00.000Z

Yvette Cooper and Ed Balls make a lovely couple.

Yvette, youthful, intelligent and able to talk of 'market renewal pathfinders' and 'intra-regional growth strategies' without blushing, is the MP for Pontefract and Castleford. Her husband, Ed Balls, former right-hand man to Gordon Brown, is the MP for Normanton and was, several moons ago, responsible for making post neo-classical endogenous growth theory a hip subject (okay, maybe not).

Storms, however, may be brewing in the Cooper-Balls household. The Boundary Commission confirmed today that the number of MPs for Wakefield District is to be reduced from 4 to 3. With Ed and Yvette's seats both in the Wakefield District this could be the beginning of unhappy breakfast times at the Cooper-Balls residence. Icy stares over the kitchen table and grudging moves to pass the milk may result from the decision which leaves the couple to fight it out with the other two MPs in the district to see who stays in Parliament (as long as the Great British public votes them in of course).*

Ed Balls was understandably unhappy with the decision,"Today’s decision would mean not only great disruption and the breaking of local community ties. If the plans go ahead unchanged, this will mean there are fewer people in Westminster standing up for our area."

"But, on the other hand," he continued, "er' indoors would have that much more time to finish the ironing, darn the socks and cook the dinner, so its not all bad."

*Fear not faint-hearted readers. Balls and Cooper probably will stay in Parliament in the next session. A they are both friendly with the Labour hierarchy I'm sure that even if the boundary changes are made they will find a way to remain 'local'. Mary Creagh and John Trickett, the other MPs in the area, could be in for a trip to the other place though....

Siggi Freud and the SUV

2005-12-21T14:41:00.000Z

Yesterday, in the Guardian, George Monbiot discussed what he believes to be trend towards extreme libertarianism in the UK. Monbiot exemplified this narrow individualism by referring to the antics of the automobile lobby and by quoting from Jeremy Clarkson.

Whatever the merits of Monbiot's argument the worth of his piece was the response it received from Guardian readers.

While Monbiot was happy to call anti-speed camera nuts and militant motorists as 'anti-social bastards', Liz Lloyd from Brighton had a better analysis...

"Good for George Monbiot on the devastating political impact of private car use. One other reason why the car is having such a corrosive effect on society is that, in psychoanalytic terms, the car driver is able to indulge the universal infantile fantasy of being centre of the universe - Freud's "His majesty the baby" - without the necessary disillusion of accepting the existence of others as people with their own needs and feelings. This self-centredness is evident in the car driver's "you can't mean me" response when faced with anything outside his own bubble.

Car driving, with its selfishness and aggressiveness is a terrible legacy of Margaret Thatcher's - on the analytic couch the car driver is a pathological narcissist who has not had to come to terms with the Oedipal "other".

Well, exactly....

[Pic above: Sigmund Freud sizing up whether he should go for the 5.2 litre V8 Humvee or the 5.0 litre Cherokee....]

McDonald's and BK chase franchise at House of Commons

2005-12-14T17:45:00.000Z

(Pic left: McDonald's - Coming to a Legislature Near You).

Martin Horwood, Lib Dem MP for Cheltenham, has a dream - he wants to see the Mother of Parliaments become a UNESCO World Hypermarket site. Mr Horwood, elected in May this year, clearly wants to make an impression and has tabled a written question asking the House of Commons to expand its commercial ventures....

Appearing in today’s Hansard – get them while they’re hot – he asks “…if the House of Commons Commission will expand the number of commercial ventures in the House of Commons part of the Parliamentary Estate to include (a) a newsagent, (b) a bookshop, (c) a bank, (d) a laundrette and dry cleaners, (e) a pharmacy, (f) a stationers and (g) an Indian restaurant; and if the Commission will make an assessment of the contribution to public funds such services might make.”

Unfortunately, h) an undertakers i) a Volvo dealership j) a Blockbuster video store and k) a Virgin Megastore were left off the question paper so we are left to wonder what might have been.

Disappointingly, Nick Harvey MP, answering for the House of Commons Commission, and lacking the Orange Book credentials of some his crypto-Thatcherite Lib Dem colleagues, responds by saying there are no current plans to extend the House's commercial activities. Ah well, never mind…we can but dream of a Krispy Kreme doughnuts outlet in Big Ben and an Anne Summers in Central Lobby. Today it may be the stuff of dreams but tomorrow, let's hope and prey, it could be a reality.

(Hat tip: MR)

I'm mad I am...

2005-12-05T17:10:00.000Z

This is Mark Davies, from Pontypool. He's a crazy kind of guy and has, as you can see, had a mini fir tree woven into his hair.

What a funny chap.

Surpassing the novelty tie (listed by the UN as an 'affront to human dignity') Mark, father-of-two (those poor, poor children), likes to go that one step further. In the past his head has displayed a dartboard design, a Playboy bunny, and a Welsh dragon. He was due to have a braided representation of the Cenotaph on his bonce to commerate our war dead in November but his stylist was on holiday in Dubai so Mark chose to wear a poppy instead.

Of his classy new style, Mark said "I've had a few wacky hairdos before, but this one is head and shoulders above the rest." A remarkably tabloid friendly quote that and the use of the word 'wacky' indicates Mr Davies might be a 'crazy' guy of the Colin Hunt variety.

Apologies folks. Christmas should be a time of goodwill and here I am slagging off my fellow man for attempting to have some fun. Shame on me. No novelty socks for me this year.

Saddam's trial will not be fair, says United Nations...

2005-12-05T11:16:00.000Z

"...because he knows he's guilty, the Iraqis know he's guilty and all those mass graves show he's guilty" a UN spokesman didn't say yesterday.

What kind of humanist are you?

2005-11-30T11:19:00.000Z

Haymaker

I took the New Humanist survey and this is what it says about me..."You are one of life’s enjoyers, determined to get the most you can out of your brief spell on Earth. Probably what first attracted you to atheism was the prospect of liberation from the Ten Commandments, few of which are compatible with a life of pleasure. You play hard and work quite hard, have a strong sense of loyalty and a relaxed but consistent approach to your philosophy.

You can’t see the point of abstract principles and probably wouldn’t lay down your life for a concept though you might for a friend. Something of a champagne humanist, you admire George Bernard Shaw for his cheerful agnosticism and pursuit of sensual rewards and your Hollywood hero is Marlon Brando, who was beautiful, irascible and aimed for goodness in his own tortured way.

Sometimes you might be tempted to allow your own pleasures to take precedence over your ethics. But everyone is striving for that elusive balance between the good and the happy life. You’d probably open another bottle and say there’s no contest. "

Of course, this is all guff really. I can see the point in abstract principles (I've always thought that Newton had a point with his gravity idea) and I've never been into GB Shaw. I do have my ethics too and only a very good bottle of Chateauneuf de Papes would convince me there's no contest...

What kind of humanist are you? Click here to find out.

Wax on, wax off....

2005-11-28T15:19:00.000Z

Having my finger firmly on the pulse of yoof culture, and not having a word to say about the important issues in the world today, I'd like to draw your attention to the recent death of Noriyuki "Pat" Morita.

Morita played Kesuke Miyagi in Karate Kid movies and became an almost iconic figure (I exaggerate in the manner standard in these profiles...) as the character who sagely guided the Kid in question, developing the Kid's martial arts skills while getting him to valet his car at the same time.

Mr Miyagi also played an important role in pioneering an environmentally friendly insect repellant. In the photo you see him demonstrating this invention, catching flies with his chopsticks.

Reading his obit, it says he started off as stand-up comic. As someone who was interned in America during WWII, his first big gig was, perhaps, particularly tough. At a 2,000 seat hall in Hawaii he unexpectedly found himself facing a huge crowd of World War II veterans, many of them disabled. They were there to observe the 25th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

He began by telling them that he wanted to apologise, on behalf of his people, for screwing up their harbor. The vets roared at this and he went on to play clubs for another 2o years...

Larceny and masturbation

2005-11-25T15:52:00.000Z

My subject header doesn't, you will be pleased to know, refer to a new late-night programme on Channel Five (probably one where Quentin Wilson commentates on grainy CC-TV footage of our feral youth stealing socks from TK-Maxx before going on to detail their solo night time habits) but a couple of items which have gained my attention this week.

Of course, working for an MP and being affiliated to Bloggers4Labour should, perhaps, lead me to a discussion of topical political matters like the pensions issue or the case for nuclear power. But, of course, I'd rather stick to topics I know something about. Like stealing and wanking.

As many of you will know, in WHSmiths they often have a money bin to drop your change into if you want to grab a newspaper rather than queuing up and paying for it. For many this is a convenient invention, saving as it does the important commodity of time while also negating the need for human interaction. But this invention is, inevitably, open to abuse. I am a bit shaky on my contract philosophy but it seems apparent that, with the provision of the money bin, some form of contract is established between the proprietor and the consumer (i.e. they do expect you to cough up if you take one of their products - ground-breaking philosophy this). Now, as a fire-brand radical I believe such bourgeois constructs deserve to be defied, but I did nevertheless feel a pang of guilt this morning when I found myself short of change and paid only 45p for my Guardian rather than the 60p cover charge.

Part of me expected the bin to be equipped with some kind of coin recognition system which would then activate a high-pitched alarm followed by an electronic voice which would bark, "Halt! You have paid only 45p for your Berliner format publication. Please insert the remaining 15p or report yourself to the nearest police officer." But, of course, it didn't happen and I was left with a tiny soupcon of guilt at short-changing a 3ft high plastic receptacle.

In my defence, your Honour, I should say also that the Guardian's recent performance (Bunting and the dreadful Simon Jenkins esp.) don't really deserve to be rewarded by a full-price monetary reward. Taken this way my 45p contribution was probably 50p too much. This act could also, perhaps, be the stimulus to a bigger movement where we pay for our papers on the basis of how much we think they are worth rather than the antiquated system currently in place where the vested interests of the newspaper industry decide what we should and shouldn’t pay.

As I'm on this topic I should also draw readers to the regional variations of the money-bin phenomenon. In London the money bins have grey/black coin lids but, in Leeds, the lids to insert your coins are transparent so everybody can see just how much you've paid for your paper. Are people in Leeds deemed more untrustworthy than those in London? Surely not....

Anyway, enough of that. Now to the masturbation. I spotted a quaint little article in the Guardian Education supplement this week about a scientific study into masturbation. The University of California’s research found that men get distracted when they masturbate. Really? That’s quite a finding. Click the title of this post to read on…and wait for the next piece of research from California University which finds that boys are sometimes attracted to association football and automobiles.

A tinge of regret sweeps across me now. I can’t help feel that I’ve sullied the previously unimpeachable integrity of this blog by making lewd references. Sorry guys, it won't happen again. I’ll pay 75p for my Guardian next week as penance.

For the love of the game

2005-11-07T16:31:00.000Z

'His head is never in the clouds, his words are always moderate, he has strong moral values'.

Words spoken of a top-flight footballer, but whom? Well, it's not Wayne Rooney...it's Damiano Tommasi. He's the AS Roma midfielder who has asked his team to pay him only the minimum wage. Apparently he simply wanted to return to playing football at the highest level and economic considerations were low on his list of priorities...he signed on because he 'loves football'.

Of course, its far too easy in circumstances like this to point to comparisons but some might call it 'refreshing' to hear of a top-level footballer driven by motives other than financial renumeration. I don't believe footballers are only driven by money but I wonder whether this guy might consider going down the Tomassi route?

Don't have a cow, man

2005-10-25T15:15:00.000+01:00

An interesting piece on Newsnight last night. About cows. Dead cows, to be specific, and their role in powering trains, buses and cars in Sweden in an environmentally friendly way.

And here's how it works....

The dead spirits of the cows return to haunt the evil murderers who put them to death - something akin to Marley's ghost in a Christmas Carol - and tell the wicked men that they must stop killing animals and protect the environment by developing 'greener' sources of fuel. The wicked men, chastened by this experience, then go on to find a way of running Saabs off carrot juice and Volvos off lavender oil.

In reality, of course, the item didn't quite say this. What it did say was that the Swedes are using the organs, fat and guts from dead cows to produce the biogas to drive trains, taxis, rubbish trucks and private vehicles in the towns of Linkoping and Vastervik. I'm assuming here that there are zero (or at least very low) carbon emissions using this form of fuel but does appear to show what can be done when the political will is there.

An encouraging development then and one that could have implications beyond the arena of environmental and transport policy. It could affect our wider politics too. Take this man, ('take him please'...), his life could change overnight if we were all to depend on ex-vaches rather than oil for running our motors....I can see the headlines now, "Gorgeous George in dead cow-for-food scandal".

p.s. Watch the Newsnight video item.

Anarchy in the Mother of Parliaments

2005-10-11T18:11:00.000+01:00

Confusion and mayhem hit the House of Commons today when the division bell , which alerts MPs to vote, developed a fault which caused it to ring even when a division (vote) had not been called. MPs - merrily watching childrens' telly in their Westminster pied-a-terres, enjoying a quiet pint or two in the local hostelry or devouring a filet mignon in a neighbouring bistro - were turned into gibbering wrecks as they felt obliged to rush out of their respective comfort zones to turn up for a three-line Commons vote.

Some left their pints immediately to make it to the lobbies, while others desperately snatched one last lingering look at Pingu or a forkful of foie gras, but for some it was all too much. The Honourable Nicholas Soames (Con, Mid Sussex), exercising the good grace of which his grandfather would have been proud, threw his pig's head in pigs trotters casserole at passers-by to express his profound indignation at being deprived of his third lunch of the day.

Fortunately, reader, this didn't happen at all. Fat Nick didn't miss out on his dinner. They’ve all got pagers now (“Will MP x please proceed to the lobby to vote on the Hedgehogs and Furry Animals Bill and remember to pick up some milk on the way back") so a catastrophe would have, in any case, been averted.

But we should be grateful too for the swift and decisive action of the Commons authorities. They acted with the efficiency and ingenuity for which they are renowned (how unkind of you to bring up the purple flour incident and that Otis Ferry business). The Serjeant at Arms (Peter Grant Peterkin) emailed all the users of the Parliamentary Network to trumpet his high tech solution to the division bell problem - flash the word DIVISION on the annunciator screen when there was a genuine division.

Genius.

With simple and effective solutions like these it can only be a matter of time before Peter Grant Peterkin is moving on to bigger and better things. Forget securing peace in the Middle East (oh, sorry, you had), surely the odds must be shortening on PGP (Peter Grant Peterkin) to take over from SGE (Sven Goran Erikkson) before the World Cup next year?

Where art thou Thimble?

2005-10-05T16:37:00.000+01:00

The Thimble has, of late, been less than prolific. Tackling global poverty takes time - so it would have been nice if I had that as an excuse for my non-posting - but alas my absence is due to rather less noble reasons. I am just very lazy and lacking in inspiration.

'Very lazy and lacking in inspiration' - sounds like a commentary on David Davis.*

It is not like anything has happened while I've been away....the tragedy of the London bombings (no, it wasn't our fault), the unbridled joy of an Ashes victory (thank you Freddie at al) and the shock of Kate Moss taking drugs (zzzz....) to take just a few examples of blog-worthy events.

Arguably more momentous than any of these, though, was the launch of the Guardian in its Ich Bin Eine Berliner format. Indeed, as a homage to this ground-breaking innovation I have revised the format of this blog. It now comes in an easy-to-read on the tube format and can fit handily into your, erm, hand-bag. Watch out on Saturday too for the free dvd 'The Importance of Being Egregious' starring Madeline Bunting and Gary Younge.

Anyway, enough of this floatsam. This is just a wee message to say 'I am still here' and I shall be posting again soon. Thanks for your continued interest.

The Thimble

p.s. I went to France and took far too many pictures of harbours...see my photos at the flickr link below.

p.p.s. I've noticed the Guardian G2 columnists doing a "This week X is reading....an Ikea catalogue" so, following on in this vein, I am reading Albert Camus' The Rebel . Having read Paul Berman's Terror and Liberalism (see here and here) - which is definitely worth reading - I thought I would give Camus a try.

*For the uninitiated, David Davis is a Conserative MP, brought up in a council house don't you know, who is running for the leadership of a political party called the Conservative and Unionist Party. They used to be big in the 80s.

Olympics 2012...even the website's against the French

2005-07-06T16:56:00.000+01:00

In his press conference, TB spoke of being magnanimous in victory. He judged the mood well for, as London won the bid, everyone around the country paused for a moment and thought "yep we've won but spare a thought for the French".

Of course that might change when everyone remembers why they didn't want it here in the first place but, even in this time of triumph, you would think the London Olympic web-site would be able to demonstrate some of the magnanimity the PM was referring to...but you'd be wrong.

When I tried earlier to click on the 'francais' link it didn't link to a page of French but the same page reloaded in English.

I tried it again later and it said "Service Unavailable".

Honestly, it would be enough to drive some people to misery

Pinter…beyond parody

2005-07-01T14:44:00.000+01:00

The latest from everyone's favourite Companion of Honour. From the Times today:

“AT THE National Portrait Gallery party in honour of Lord Weidenfeld on Wednesday.

Harold Pinter: “Hello.”

People: “Hello. How are you?”

Pinter: “I didn’t say ‘how are you’, I said ‘hello’.”

People: “Well, how are you anyway?”

Pinter: “That is the ******* disease of modern society. Everyone wants to know how you are. I just say I’m ******* awful. ******* AWFUL.”

People: “Can we talk about your film script for Sir Michael Caine and Jude Law, then?”

Pinter: “No. Goodbye.”

It can’t have taken long to write those plays.”

(Hat-tip RW)

Better late than never...book meme

2005-07-01T13:35:00.000+01:00

I have a very important job and my social life is a whirl (luvvie, darrling). These must be the main reasons why it has taken me so long to do the book meme thing. Thanks to "Bloggers4Labour" for including me in this...(they were running out of people to tag).

1) Total number of books I've owned

Don’t really know. A good few hundred but not more than 500. I’m only 30, I’ve got time to buy a few more…

2) The last book I bought

"The Making of Henry" Howard Jacobson

3) The last book I read

"New York Trilogy" Paul Auster

NY Trilogy is an investigation into the art of storytelling, notions of identity and the very essence of language. Ok, I read that off the back cover. It is an interesting read though. Highly recommended.

4) Five books that mean a lot to me

1. "Human Stain" Phillip Roth

Superb. Its variety, insight and wit make it a compelling read. I’ve gone on to read Portnoy’s Complaint, Sabbath Theater, Our Gang and Plot Against America since but this is the one that started me off. I can’t do it justice by describing it in this plodding fashion…so I won’t!

2. "Marxism and Politics" Ralph Miliband

I am not sure where academia would rank it but I read this book when I was 17 and it shaped the way I thought about politics. I’d only read the Communist Manifesto and Marxism and Politics gave me an introduction to Marx’s (and Marxian) politics which made me want to found out more. Marx has been the biggest influence on my political thinking and this book is pretty much where that all began.

I do remember reading somewhere in Marxism and Politics that the following of a football team, while not inimical to the chances of Socialist revolution, did not help in the realisation of Socialism! I may have paraphrased slightly here (!) but I did think at the time....“I do want to see a Socialist society but I do like football as well”.

3. "Muhammed Ali" David Remnick

Ali is often described as a living icon, transcending the world of sport to become a political and cultural icon as well as a boxing genius. This book matches the breadth of Ali’s influence by examining the political and sporting world prior to the emergence of Ali – touching on the lives of Floyd Patterson (‘the good black heavyweight’) and Sonny Liston (‘the bad black heavyweight’) – and charts Ali’s career up to 1967, looking at the politics of the fight game and of the wider world.

4. "Crime and Punishment" Fyodor Dostoevsky

It’s a classic for a reason. Brilliant.

5. "Atonement" Ian McEwan

Beautifully written. It has its flaws but as this is a ‘books that mean a lot to me’ list I couldn’t leave it out.

So, who to tag now? 5 people…hmm. I have no friends, and everyone seems to have done it already...so at Mr W at Hyperrealandsupercool will have to do. He has the personality of five people (I mean that he's a nice guy not a schizophrenic...).

Snail mail...

2005-06-17T14:21:00.000+01:00

I was impressed to find these stamps on some post we received last week. I think my MP was a bit bemused I'd scanned them in but an envelope with stamps on from 1977 and 1986 surely deserves some attention.

Is this a record? (No, its a blog post...)

Chris Eubank had never seemed so appealing...

2005-06-08T19:50:00.000+01:00

Today South Shields, tomorrow Jerusalem.

Egregious George is doing an "event" at the Customs House in South Shields, South Tyneside, on June 23. Apparently its the beginning of the MP for Baathnel Green & Bow's "The Mother of All One-Man Shows" tour. Sounds great.

Tickets are priced at One Oil Barrel each and are available from all good jihadists. Tour merchandise - including car stickers proclaiming 'My other car runs on the oil-for-food programme', and 'Tariq Aziz went to Iraq and all he brought me back was this lousy Mercedes' - will also be sold at the event.

We all know how difficult GG finds it to get his point across, starved as he is of publicity, so it is good to see him given the opportunity to take his case to the people. Thank goodness we live in a democracy, huh?

The man himself says he's "looking forward to a lively Q&A session with theatregoers - who are free to ask me anything". "And I'll answer by calling them wolves, donkeys or drink-soaked popinjays" he didn't add.

Let's hope the "Hitch" can make it to South Shields - perhaps we should start a Mariam Appeal style-campaign to raise the air fare cash? - and make it a truly lively Q&A session. Of course, all this wouldn't have been possible if Chris Eubank hadn't cancelled his show planned for the same night. Its one of those rare occasions when the cancellation of a Chris Eubank gig should be met with mass disappointment.

Without wanting to be a one-trick pony (oh how I dream of attaining such sophistication), I include GG's latest brush with authority. Taken from the Guardian's "backbencher" bulletin:

George Galloway's brotherly charm failed to move one of Labour's more assertive members during the GLA's questioning of the Respect MP this morning. The London assembly member Jennette Arnold, who is black, was pressing George rather hard about his claims of electoral fraud in Bethnal Green and Bow: "Full respect, sister!" he said.
"I am not your sister," she replied.

George was unabashed. "I'm sorry if what I'm saying is making you uncomfortable," he added a few minutes later, after laying into New Labour. "You could never make me uncomfortable," said Jennette.

Cool

2005-06-01T15:15:00.000+01:00

From Pootergeek

who got it via the Motley Fool. These are cool! (Note added, for the 'gifted' among you.You will need to click on the bullet pointed titles e.g. "Blair on top".)

2-d chalk, 3-d illusion. I might commission this guy to chalk a big hole with sharks in it for our pathway when the landlady visits to collect the rent...

Ever the charmer...

2005-06-01T12:00:00.000+01:00

Fresh from being labelled a "drink-sodden ex-Trotskyist popinjay" the Hitch pitched up at the Hay festival to "discuss sibling rivalry, politics and reconciliation" with his brother Peter (courtesy of the Guardian).

Those of you partial to jokes about the Red Army should enjoy it but its well worth its worth a read. Go to:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,1495857,00.html

Would have been good to have been there, with CH sounding as entertaining as usual, but may not be a good idea to question the expression of his nictotine habit...

Female audience member Excuse me. I'm not usually awkward at all but I'm sitting here and we're asked not to smoke. And I don't like being in a room where smoking is going on.
CH (smoking heavily): Well you don't have to stay darling, do you? I'm working here and I'm your guest, OK? And this is what I'm like; nobody has to like it.
IK Would you just stub that one out?
CH No. I cleared it with the festival a long time ago. They let me do it.
FAM We should all be allowed to smoke then.
CH Fair enough. I wouldn't object. It might get pretty nasty though. I have a privileged position here, I'm not just one of the audience, so it would be horrible if everyone was like me. This is my last of five gigs, I've worked very hard for the festival. I'm going from here to Heathrow airport. If anyone doesn't like it they can kiss my ass.
IK Would anyone like to take up that challenge?
(Laughter. Woman walks out)

As Oona said to George...

2005-05-27T12:59:00.000+01:00

Oona and George
Originally uploaded by the thimble.

Spotted in this week's House magazine.

Oona saying to Egregious George "Sir, I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability..."

Thanks to the House Magazine for their lack of permission for the use of this photo.

Apologies Australian style

2005-05-25T12:06:00.000+01:00

Scott Johnson, the Wales' assistant coach who will take up an observational role on the Lions tour to New Zealand, became embroiled in controversy when he referred to New Zealand as a "poxy island in the Pacific" before Wales' November clash with the All Blacks.

He then said he wished to make an apology as the conversation was a private one and he was overheard. This was his apology:

"I wasn't misquoted. I just got it slightly wrong. I actually said in the quote, 'it's a poxy little island in the Pacific'. I do apologise to all New Zealanders when in fact, it's two islands."

As apologies go that's one Blair might like to mimic when 'apologising' to his Iraq critics for getting rid of Saddam Hussein..

Here we go...

2005-05-17T14:10:00.000+01:00

Nia Griffin
Originally uploaded by the thimble.

And here is Nia Griffin...

A cheap shot I know but my team's weekend relegation has unleashed a whole new wave of bitterness...

Compare and contrast

2005-05-17T14:08:00.000+01:00

Cathy Carter Smith
Originally uploaded by the thimble.

this League of Gentlemen character with the new Member of Parliament for Llanelli...picture coming up...

Climbed Everest wearing only a tea towel

2005-05-17T10:37:00.000+01:00

That's one thing I've never done.

Normblog's picked up the baton of the '10 things I've never done' game - http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2005/05/10_things_ive_n.html - and I'm going to do the same.

I've never...

- got a parking ticket.
- read a Dan Brown book.
- taken class-A drugs.
- played a round of golf.
- worn a hoodie and committed an act of violence at the same time.
- been to Australia (although I've got a work permit for 2003-4 in my passport...)
- watched a whole episode of Star Trek.
- read anything by JK Rowling.
- eaten oysters.
- killed a man.

That was a pretty sober 10 things wasn't it...pay-per-view subscribers get the X-rated "10 things I haven't done"...

Anyone else wanna play the game...? I'd be intrigued to read your comments...