<< May 2009 The Gurkhas - "The Liberal Democrats have won a vote in the House of Commons. This is not supposed to happen." Thursday, April 30th, 2009 - 3:02 pm
Nick Clegg raised the question of the Labour government's shameful treatment of the Gurkhas in parliament over a year ago. Thank goodness for the victory in parliament for the Gurkhas and all who have campaigned for them.
The historic victory for our motion in the House of Commons was a victory for justice.
Nick Clegg said, "This is an historic victory for the Gurkhas who have served our country so bravely.
"This Government has now lost its moral authority. From the first moment I challenged Gordon Brown on this over a year ago, he didn't understand that there was a simple moral principle at stake.
"People who are willing to die for our country, should be allowed to live in our country.
"The Government must listen to Parliament and scrap these shameful rules immediately and grant justice without conditions to all retired Gurkhas."
Read the full story on politics.co.uk (just one of several!) Second Stage of Playbuilder Application Tuesday, April 28th, 2009 - 11:03 am
Well, I've got through to the second stage of the Playbuilder application for funding for The Delph at Thwaites Brow. This is where the real work begins, consulting local people about it.
Er, apart from the original building of the playground. It was a community project by the then Village Society and I and my sons helped. I wheeled barrows of cement and stuff about whilst the boys helped with building the natural stone walling. The older one was fourteen at the time and when the cement mixer broke down he mended it, in spite of never having seen the inside of one before. Budget Basement Friday, April 24th, 2009 - 10:46 am
Well, we have the awaited budget. Will it really help the British economy? I am copying here an excellent blog posted yesterday on Cicero's Songs*:
"In a way it is tempting to discount the significance of the British Budget. The fantasy economic forecasts and unconvincing explanations that were offered yesterday are just not going to be relevant. Deep in our bones we know that the situation is not a shallow recession followed by an early recovery. The collapse of the financial system has taken away entirely a significant percentage of UK wealth creating capacity. Everything afterwards is set to be slower and smaller.
Perhaps it is appropriate that the rather sepulchral figure of Alistair Darling should have read the last rites over the coffin of new Labour - there is no doubt now that the Labour Party has comprehensively fallen into a massive trap. Abandoning any pretence to support middle class aspiration by imposing an absurd 50% marginal rate will not raise the money the Chancellor has said it will. It will, however, mark the beginning of an exodus of investment capital from London. The various funds that congregate in Mayfair and St James will now leave. Small numbers of institutions, but controlling a lot of money. In the face of the most serious economic crisis we have seen in a generation, the Chancellor has chosen to make one of the most political budgets. He response to the economic situation is to close his eyes, block his ears and simply deny what is actually happening. Instead of accepting the real position, the Chancellor is hiding behind absurd economic forecasts and the return of a policy of class antagonism.
It is, I think, not merely the end of New Labour, but the end of Labour.
Meanwhile what must we make of the Opposition?
I am extremely concerned about what David Cameron was signalling in his own, rather flimsy, contribution to the debate. Mr. Darling left him with an open goal, but Mr. Cameron did not have the political courage to offer us more than mere flim-flam. Where is the leadership in such cowardice? There is now every chance that he can lead a government, whether alone or on coalition, but he gives no sign of offering even the framework of ideas that would drive future Conservative policy. This is not the leadership of Margaret Thatcher, but the trimming of Edward Heath - a return to nuance perhaps, but a failure to articulate core values and principles would quickly drive an inexperienced government onto the rocks. Civil servants will fail to deliver "joined-up government" if they do not understand even the guiding principles that the administration should be following.
As Vince Cable and Nick Clegg articulate a clear economic policy framework, I don't think it is too much to ask the Conservatives to do the same. On the other hand in any future Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition it would mean that the Liberal Democrats would be taking the lead, so perhaps Mr. Cameron is merely preparing for a coalition, though I suspect not. It is a massive failure of the Conservative political imagination not to be pressing home what the practical differences between a Cameron and a Brown vision actually are.
Meanwhile the Liberal Democrats are slowly emerging as a credible force in the polls. As the curtain comes down on the last twelve years of New Labour, we face a whole new political world. If Clegg and Cable can continue to articulate their coherent Liberal vision, it may even be that they, rather than the ineffectual Conservatives can end up as the prime beneficiaries.
In the next twelve months there is more to play for in the British political world than at any time since the early 1980s. That - in the end - could be the true significance of this disastrous budget." If this had been The Apprentice the Finger would have been Pointed Friday, April 24th, 2009 - 10:15 am
Yesterday I found myself at a Keighley Street Drinkers Meeting! The group is endeavouring to cut down street drinking rather than join in, you understand. One of the ideas had been to supply beer mats to town centre pubs with a reminder that anti-social drinking can result in a fine of £500.
Good idea? Yes, possibly, but the anti-social drinkers may not be the ones to take in the message so a contact phone number might just have been a good thing. None given. Members of the group also pointed out that the picture of a couple of glasses of beer did not have a cross over them to indicate that the message was actually against drinking too much.
Worse still 500 of these somewhat mixed messages had already been printed - on completely the wrong kind of cardboard, shiny non-absorbent stuff!!
The lady in charge (an employee of Bradford Met) was trying to blame the printer. Er, no, it was her project and she should have overseen it properly. Any young hopeful on The Apprentice doing just that would be lucky not to have the famous finger of Sir Alan Sugar pointed at her.
I suggested that in future all printing should be brought to the group for proof reading before incurring printing costs. The young lady argued that she had been in too much of a hurry. (You can say that again!) I repeated my suggestion that there should be input from the group before printing takes place and asked how much the non- beer mats had cost.
About £150 apparently.
One or two of the group thought up ways of using the cards so that the money spent would not be completely wasted.
I feel that Bradford Council has a culture of throwing away other people's money (the council tax payers of the district) without shame. Saint George's Day Thursday, April 23rd, 2009 - 11:30 pm
It's St George's Day and also Shakespeare's birthday today. William was English but George wasn't.
The facts of St George's life are not certain but he was probably born in Cappadocia, which is in present day Turkey, to a Roman father and a Palestinian mother (both of whom were Christians) and he was probably martyred because of his protests against Rome's persecution of the Christians. He's the patron saint of several other places as well as England - including Palestine, Lithuania and Greece as well as Istanbul and Moscow. Busy chap!
Good story about the dragon but probably not true except in the metaphorical sense. Did the dragon represent the might of Rome? If so George could only be said to have overcome it by giving up his own life. Or did the dragon represent an inward struggle? Vera Smereka's book, The Girl from Ukraine,
ISBN 978-0-9560811-0-0 Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009 - 2:10 pm
I've finished reading The Girl from the Ukraine by Vera Smereka. It chronicles her life and shows how Ukrainians suffered in quick succession first the terrors of Holodomor (deliberate starvation of millions of people) under the regime of Stalin and then slavery under the Nazis during the Second World War.
Vera herself was one of the teenagers forcibly taken from the Ukraine and made to work in German factories as slave labour.
When the war ended the captive Ukrainians had the choice of going back to live in the Soviet bloc, where they had suffered so much during Holodomor, or going to live in the West with the possible result that they would never see their homeland or families again.
Many Ukrainians chose to come to Britain and we have quite a large community in Bradford and Keighley. Vera came to live in Bradford where she eventually became a nurse. Her brother and father died before she could see them again but after many years Communism became less totalitarian and she was able to go and see her mother, sister and aunt.
I recommend the book to anyone who wants to understand more about the background of the Ukrainians in Britain.
I have to declare an interest here: it's available from Reids Bookshop,87 Cavendish Street, Keighley. My Knight in Shining Armour Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009 - 1:55 pm
Well, actually he's part of a collection G E Pallant-Sidaway, my dad, made to illustrate the history of armour.
Some music from Steve George, my great nephew Tuesday, April 21st, 2009 - 2:20 pm
Here's some music for you while you read my blog. Music composed by my great nephew, Steve George, and played by his band, The Blue Screen of Death* with Steve on vocals/guitar. Delph Playground Tuesday, April 21st, 2009 - 1:49 pm
I've had a letter asking me for ideas for improving the Delph Playground on Thwaites Brow Road in order to get funding for it. I'd like to get ideas from people who live in Thwaites Brow. My email address is:
judith@brooksbank1.demon.co.uk
If you live in Thwaites Brow and would like to get in touch I'd love to hear from you. Clement Freud, April 1924 to April 2009 Thursday, April 16th, 2009 - 8:25 pm
I'm sad to hear of the death of Sir Clement Freud, a great Liberal and a great human being who has died just before his 85th birthday. One of a kind, life will be duller without him. Thirty two knights Wednesday, April 15th, 2009 - 11:22 pm
The man from Kirkleatham Museum has kindly sent me a CD of photos of my father's little knights when they were on display at Kendal's Abbott Hall Museum.
Must get some work done on that. The CD player on this computer is bust so I'll have to copy them from another computer on to a memory stick and then on to this one. Someone at the Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds is interested in the knights and wants me to email pictures of them. A job for tomorrow evening. I'll try to put a piccy on my blog too.
My father made a set of about 32 men (knights and bowmen) and eight horses to show the history of the development of armour. They're about two foot high and made by a method he invented himself. He did all the research for the models himself from brasses, effigies, written documents and his own vast knowledge of heraldry. Most of the models are of particular named people (he had to guess at what they looked like but some of them are right bruisers)!
My father's name was G E Pallant-Sidaway. What I'm reading Wednesday, April 15th, 2009 - 11:08 pm
I've just finished the latest in The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series by Alexander McCall Smith, The Good Husband of Zebra Drive. I love the series, Mma Ramotswe, Mma Makutsi and all of them. I think they are very positive books and I like the humour, but they are not completely light hearted. In their own gentle way they deal with some serious issues too, abuse of women, children being orphaned, the AIDS epidemic - but all as seen through the eyes of the essentially good Mma Ramotswe.
A friend of mine hates the books. Ah well, we're all different.
The next book I'm going to read is The Girl from the Ukraine, a complete contrast I expect. It's a privately published autobiography by Vera Smereka. She lived through Holodomor, the famine deliberately imposed on the people of the Ukraine by Stalin in the 1930s. The publisher is Contraflow Media and the ISBN (International Standard Book Number) is 978-0-9560811-0-0 What does Keighley do with politicians such as Alistair Campbell and Eric Pickles? Tuesday, April 14th, 2009 - 9:10 pm
Export them! Borneo's rain forest destoyed for palm oil Tuesday, April 14th, 2009 - 7:22 pm
I was asking my sister-in-law about the situation in Borneo where rain forests are being destroyed and plantations of palm trees are being planted instead.
She said that land is being given over to Chinese companies who are growing the palms for oil. I believe the oil is for so-called "green" petrol.
The government (that is, the Malay government) rents out the land to the Chinese companies although the land does not actually belong to the government. Local people whose families have owned the land for generations are being thrown off the land. They do not have title deeds as we know them because the land has been in their families since long before literacy was introduced, (with all the written documents that go with it). What's more one person may own small parcels of land in several different locations.
My brother and his wife have a friend who is a lawyer there who has told them that he had thought he was the only lawyer in the country dealing with these cases because he has hundreds of cases of people trying to get their land back. However when he compared notes with other lawyers he found they all had hundreds of cases.
The situation is dire. The Dyak people live off the land; their way of life is tuned to the forest; they only clear small patches of land at a time to farm, allowing the forest to grow back. Wild life cannot live off the palms that are being planted over huge areas of the land. A whole way of life and ecosystem are rapidly being destroyed - and the orangutans could become extinct. We had a lovely Easter Tuesday, April 14th, 2009 - 6:58 pm
Easter has been very enjoyable.
Easter Sunday started with singing in the church choir. I think our choir anthem went very well and we three sopranos all did a descant in another hymn too, which surprised us a bit as one of us had been having a voice problem, one didn't believe she could sing a top G and one (myself) had a sore throat for a couple of days beforehand.
Next our elder son took us and younger brother for a day out to Lake Windermere and provided a picnic. It was a special day and made poignant by a visit to my parents' grave at Staveley on the way to Windermere, where I practised my drawing. It really makes you observe in more intense way.
Back home I watched a programme about the "Messiah", featuring three choirs, one of which was the Keighley Vocal Union. Of course they were the best; I'm not biased at all.
On Easter Monday friends and their little girl, who is our goddaughter, came to lunch and after lunch we went to St Ives near Bingley. It's a country park with a playground. The playground has had some new play equipment put in recently. One of the slides was too steep and fast and my godddaughter and her mum were thrown off the end of the chute, which wasn't nice at all. However we found the play stuff for smaller children after that and that was really good fun.
I sat on the story chair and the others sat on the "mushrooms" and I told them a story about a little girl called Suzie who washed the potatoes in the washing machine. (The real Suzy reads my blog so I hope she thinks that's funny.) I think Jacqui deserved this blue plaque. Tuesday, April 14th, 2009 - 6:44 pm
Well deserved, Jacqui. See www.dontpaniconline.com* Happy Easter! Saturday, April 11th, 2009 - 9:56 pm
What the Keighley News says: Friday, April 10th, 2009 - 3:50 pm
Nader Fekri will stand for Keighley at the next General Election. I'm delighted that Nader has been chosen unanimously by our membership and look forward to working with him. Criminal Investigation into Ian Tomlinson's Death Thursday, April 9th, 2009 - 12:01 am
From BBC News:
'The IPCC said it would examine the footage from 1 April and discuss it with the Crown Prosecution Service.
Following Mr Tomlinson's death the IPCC had initially said it would oversee an investigation into the incident to be carried out by the City of London police.
Deborah Glass, of the IPCC, explained the decision to take over the investigation: "People are rightly concerned about this tragic death and this footage is clearly disturbing.
"In light of new information which we became aware of yesterday (Tuesday) evening, we have now taken the decision to independently investigate.
"People have been calling for a criminal investigation. I want to stress that, from the outset of all our investigations, we consider whether criminal offences have been committed.
"This is a criminal investigation and we will, of course, be discussing it with the Crown Prosecution Service.
"At the moment the investigation is focused on identifying the officers in the footage. Several have already come forward and all efforts are being made to trace those who haven't."'
As far as I can see Mr Ian Tomlinson was attacked whilst going about his lawful business. I just love MIDI files! Sunday, April 5th, 2009 - 3:23 pm
Having gone through The Crucifixion by Stainer this afternoon ready for a Come and Sing I've just realised I've missed out a couple of choruses. I've quickly found a MIDI file of it and I'm learning it even as I type. Thank goodnes for MIDI and thank goodness for multi-tasking. Whoops! I'm on now. Bye! Something Fishy about Grants to Parish Councils? Sunday, April 5th, 2009 - 2:35 pm
Recently Bradford Council (Conservative) has given out grants, supposedly to parish councils within its boundaries.
Bradford (Conservative controlled) handed out grants to Oxenhope Parish Council (part of Worth Valley Ward) and Haworth Parish Council (part of Worth Valley Ward).
So far so good BUT Bradford also gave out a grant to an Oakworth community association which had not even applied for one. It is not a parish council. Oakworth is part of Keighley town council.
Oakworth IS within the Worth Valley ward though.
Keighley Town Council (legally the same as a parish council) didn't get one of these grants.
Kris Hopkins, leader of Conservative controlled Bradford Metropolitan Council, just happens to be the councillor for the Worth Valley Ward.
Most of Keighley Town Council is not in the Worth Valley Ward. If we were nearer the sea I'd think it was fishy. Bradford Council with Kris Hopkins as Leader has only managed two stars. Sunday, April 5th, 2009 - 2:27 pm
From the Bradford Telegraph & Argus, 5 March 2009:
"Bradford Council has plunged to its lowest overall star rating ever and is now the worst performing authority in the county, according to Audit Commission results released today.
The Council has never held a lower score since the Comprehensive Performance Assessment was introduced in 2002 – with a “good” assessment from 2002 to 2004 and a three star rating from 2005 to 2007.
Liberal Democrat group leader, Councillor Jeanette Sunderland, has condemned the district’s education standards, blaming the “experiment” of having a private company, Education Bradford, running the district’s schools following Government intervention."
Bradford's leader is Kris Hopkins (Conservative)who hopes to be the next MP for Keighley. Mobile phone mast mystery Saturday, April 4th, 2009 - 12:47 pm
There seem to be a lot of applications for setting up mobile phone masts at present, some in Keighley.
Some Keighley town councillors have become aware of applications for masts in their own wards. On comparing notes they have found other aplications for masts in Keighley. It seems as though there is no overall pattern being openly declared, but lots of individual applications, all from the same company, some for small pieces of land right next to housing. I wonder what's going on. Take-aways causing global warming? Saturday, April 4th, 2009 - 12:25 pm
This week I was asked to complete a survey on behalf of a university student on the subject of personal responsibility for global warming.
I found myself writing that I believe that all schools should teach all pupils to cook and that all students should be able to cook.
Here's my reasoning:
People who cannot cook are the most likely to buy take away meals.
Take away meals involve a special journey JUST to get that one meal, either by the purchaser or by the delivery vehicle.
This adds to global warming and depletion of fuel resources (and expense).
Whilst occasional take-away meals in an emergency or for a special occasion may be justified they cannot be justified as a way of life.
When people shop for several meals at once they use one lot of fuel for several meals (bus or car).
Therefore the modern propensity towards take-away meals adds to global warming.
Many young people have never been taught to cook because of national education policy. They cannot be blamed for this lack on an individual basis.
However it's never too late to learn. (My dad learnt to cook in his 70s.)
The National Curriculum imposed on schools over the last decade or so has a lot to answer for.
So I really do think that everyone should learn to cook as a small step towards combatting global warming. Here's a novel idea! Saturday, April 4th, 2009 - 12:16 pm
Perhaps all councillors and MPs should be thinking of ways to save council tax payers money.
I don't mean by cutting services to the community but by how they personally, or as a group, could cut down on the amount of cash being paid out on their own behalf.
There have been several stories in the press recently about MPs who have been doing precisely the opposite. Someone called Jackie seems to have been feathering her own nest at our expense; though I did hear on Radio 4's The Now Show last night the view that the £10 or so of our money spent on questionable videos was well worth it because it had given us all such a good laugh. My proposal for us to pay for our own food failed.
(But here's another way of saving council tax payers' money.) Saturday, April 4th, 2009 - 11:59 am
Well, we've had the Keighley Town Council meeting when my proposal that councillors should pay for their own food at full town council meetings was discussed and voted on. Only two other councillors voted with me, David and Lionel. Lost heavily!
You'd have thought I'd suggested that councillors be starved to death! Lots of spurious arguments, including that Bradford District councillors get a three course meal at council tax payers' expense. True! But that doesn't make it right.
To be fair, Graham Mitchell has already brought in a measure to have Watch & Transport meeting minutes printed half size, but with a full sized version for anyone who asks for it (thus enabling anyone who can't cope with such small print to read a bigger print version). Copies of all minutes go to all members of council for approval, so this in itself will save some dosh. Paper is expensive stuff.
I have to hold up my hand and admit that I have been one of those maddening people who forget to bring all my papers with me to committee meetings sometimes and hope there's a spare copy available. One set of minutes and agenda each would also save expense so I am making a resolution to do better in future.
If all committee minutes were printed half size and we were all grown up about remembering to bring our papers to meetings it would save the council, and therefore the rate payers, quite a bit.
(Might have to invest in a magnifying glass.) Turkish Results Thursday, April 2nd, 2009 - 12:34 am
The right wing Turkish ruling AK Party has not done very well in the local elections on Sunday. Not sure how Anavatan has done yet. I'll try to find out. Turkish Elections Thursday, April 2nd, 2009 - 12:21 am
Have just been in Turkey during their Municipal Elections. Just can't seem to get away from campaigns.
I met a candidate for the Anavatan Party, which is about the most middle of the road of the Turkish parties, though I think they are more right wing than the UK Liberal Democrats. The candidate's name was Rashit Barut. He was a professional in the field of power generation and had good ideas about wind farms to produce power. There are some plans to create a coal fired power station at Focha and he's opposing that.
He was in the fishing village of Focha a few miles from Izmir. Focha has just been put in with the Izmir council and Anavatan is worried that it will eventually be swallowed up in the sprawling city of Izmir.
I offered to to go leafleting but Rashit said all the leaflets had been delivered.
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He was in the fishing village of Focha a few miles from Izmir. Focha has just been put in with the Izmir council and Anavatan is worried that it will eventually be swallowed up in the sprawling city of Izmir.
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