MODERN TIMES: the Dinosaur Column

Preparing for the “Sicko” society?

I don’t know how many folk out there actually watch the adverts on TV. Maybe they prefer just to blank them out, treat them as rather annoying moving wallpaper, or go off to make a cup of tea during the commercial breaks.

But those who have been paying attention may well have noticed the sudden increase in the number of adverts for private health insurance. I’m aware that for some time we’ve had to put up with those smugly cosy plugs for BUPA, but now a range of insurance companies are getting in on the act.

After the National Health Service came into being, back in 1948, private health insurance seemed to sink without trace. After all, we all paid national insurance as a matter of course, so why pay twice for our health treatment? So is this sudden resurrection of private health insurance a sign of the times? Getting ready for when the Health and Social Care legislation comes into effect? It’s a chilling thought, isn’t it?

Those who’ve watched Michael Moore’s film Sicko will have seen what happens in the USA where folk rely on private insurance to see them through bouts of ill health and sickness. Me, I’m one of the NHS generation of dinosaurs – and I’ve no intention of surrendering to the blandishments of the private health care industry.

branching out:

Since Group 4 merged with Securicor it has attempted to re-brand itself. It now calls itself G4S, and in recent years it has been busy bidding for any Government contracts that come its way – including Ofsted, for goodness sake.

But one contract that it gained didn’t work out quite so well. It was some time ago that it was signed on to provide the security at Halifax Airport, Nova Scotia, Canada.

As readers may have noticed, this Dinosaur is partial to the odd visit to Canada – and Nova Scotia in particular. On one such visit we flew in – only to discover that Group 4 were now in charge of airport security. It was like stepping into a Marx Brothers’ comedy film.

The security guards were all dressed in what looked like ill fitting Ruritanian uniforms, and they charged around in a state of disorganised chaos. Queues at the checkout lengthened, with passengers reduced to a state of bemused uncertainty. There was no panic, but, hey, this was Canada, after all..

The next time we flew in to Halifax, the Group 4 guards had vanished, and it was all back to normal.

The nature of capitalism – in Canada

Whilst we’re talking Canadian, I came across one news item about a stand-off between the US company Caterpillar and its workforce at the company’s plant in London, Ontario.

Caterpillar makes those giant earth moving machines, as well as a range of mining and construction machinery. They’re big, in more ways than one. In 2010, It took over the local firm EMD, and moved into Ontario.

At the time, Canada’s Tory Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, praised the takeover as an example of how his government was attracting foreign investment into the country. But now Caterpillar has sacked the entire workforce at its Canadian plant – after they refused to take a 50 per cent pay cut. Yes, 50 per cent – I kid you not! Not only that, but workers would lose their pension rights.

On New Year’s day, the workers were locked out, and then in February the company announced that it was closing the factory and moving to a non-union plant back in the USA.

The union involved. is the Canadian Auto Workers Union. Its members put up a brave fight to save their jobs and the factory – but faced with unacceptable demands from a predatory company, their jobs have gone, and the whole local economy will suffer as a result.

Incidentally, on an ironic note, it was in London, Ontario, that the Tolpuddle Martyrs chose to settle after they returned from their long years doing penal servitude in Australia. And they are remembered by the town that they chose to settle in. There is a monument there to their memory, as well as a co-op housing development and a trade union complex in the town, both named after them. Despite the machinations of US asset stripping companies like Caterpillar, this is the true face of trade unionism in Canada.

Dinosaur

MODERN TIMES: the Dinosaur Column

A bad case of rhyming slang:

What is it about bankers? Why do they seem to have the arrogance to assume that they’re indispensable – and that this gives What is it about bankers? Why do they have the arrogance to assume that they’re indispensable – and that this gives them the right to siphon off as much of our money as they like?

Bankers have never been popular – particularly those of the “merchant” variety. It’s no wonder that in the world of rhyming slang, the word “banker” became synonymous with another word beginning with “w”.

Since the markets crashed some three years ago (thanks to the greed of the aforementioned bankers), it’s been a case of “here’s mud in your eye”. They managed to lose thousands and thousands of their customers’ money, they’ve been bailed out, humbled – and still they give themselves pay rises and award themselves massive bonuses. You’d think a certain humility would be in order, wouldn’t you? The odd hair shirt or two, or some ditch-water instead of bubbly?

One recent pay-out came from Goldman Sachs, the banking giant operating out of the City and from Wall Street. Despite a sharp fall in overall revenue and profits, it has managed to find £7.9 billion to share out amongst its top wheelers and dealers. The money is being paid out in pay and in bonuses. We’ve also had RBS and Lloyds going over the top with pay-outs from the money that we gave them to bail them out.

Whilst I think the whole notion of bonuses is suspect, I fondly imagined that it was tied in with performance. If you did well, you got a bit extra to encourage you to do even better. Now it seems that the fat cats think that it’s their due regardless of anything.

Goldman Sachs, incidentally, reported that its revenues had fallen by 26 per cent last year, and profits were down by 47 per cent. Whilst it appears there’s still plenty left in the kitty it hardly seems to me to be the time to be dishing out bonuses on a grand scale.

for the last time, say cheese

I must confess to a pang or two of regret when those household names that we all took for granted over the years give up the ghost. Once they were part of our everyday landscape – and that of our parents..

I felt the shock waves when Woolworths disappeared from our high streets. Now HMV (short for “His Master’s Voice”) have had  a temporary reprieve from imminent collapse. But a bigger shock for me was the news that Kodak (the US company that pioneered the roll film – and even developed the first digital camera, even if it was the size of a biscuit tin) had gone bankrupt.

I remember clicking away with my old Kodak “Box Brownie” when I was just a young dinosaur, and waiting impatiently for the results to be developed and printed. in the local chemists All right, the snaps weren’t all that special, but in this case you have to blame the photographer. And many of them became treasured memories. But nowadays it seems as though fewer folk feel the need to treasure those “caught in time” moments. They’re more into instant gratification – a quick snap on the mobile phone to be shared briefly and then forgotten.

When I was young, though, the world of popular photography in the UK seemed to be shared between Kodak (who had the lion’s share) and Ilford. Ilford are still in business, but have retreated into a niche market selling black ‘n’ white film and accessories.

Meanwhile, the camera market went on to be dominated by the Japanese – and latterly by the Chinese. And now it seems the once mighty Kodak has sunk beneath the waves.

the rate for the job?

We’ve all seen the blurb when one of the big supermarket chains wants to set up shop somewhere There’s always the promise of more “choice” for the customer, and more jobs for the community.

Many of these jobs, though, are highly suspect. Often they’re part time – or imported from elsewhere. And now a report from the Fair Pay Network accuses the four largest supermarket chains of paying staff “poverty” wages whilst make huge profits.

The report says that hundreds of thousands of those working for Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury’s and Morrisons are not being paid a “living wage”. And the Network’s director, Mark Donne, says it couldn’t be acceptable that profits and executive pay were soaring whilst employees were sinking further into debt. Indeed, more than half of them say that they don’t earn enough to live on. That, it seems, is one cost of our cheap food.

Dinosaur

MODERN TIMES: The Dinosaur Column

That borders bust-up

I presume that we’ve all been paying attention to that recent bust-up between Home Secretary Teresa May and her former head of the “border force”, Brodie Clarke.

Personally I’m not really bothered about who did what to whom, and who gave the orders. And I doubt that our security was really jeopardised one jot by it all.

But as a reasonably law abiding Dinosaur, born in primeval Britain with a UK passport tucked away somewhere, I’ve long objected to the hoops we have to go through to leave or re-enter this country. Personally I neither have the predilection or the ability to commit “terrorist acts”. But whoever we are, we all have to put up with the nightmare of what’s known as UK “airport controls” – tediously lengthy check-in times, searches and scans, and invariably hostile looking officials who seem to assume that potentially we’re all up to no good.

Getting back into the UK is almost as bad. It usually involves long shuffling queues that snake around a bleak entry hall the size of an aircraft hanger. And that’s just trying to get back into one’s own country!

Incidentally, for those who come in to Britain by car or coach, have you noticed that Britain’s border controls are now actually just outside Calais? It’s here that you’re expected to rummage for your passports and face the steely-eyed “border force”.

Of course the experience varies. Arriving in Canada, for example, is usually quite welcoming. But my worst encounter to date was on a flight to New Zealand involving a stop for refuelling in Los Angeles, USA. We were all taken off the plane, made to wait in a  corridor for an hour, before being herded into a “transit lounge”: an interior room with no natural light and with armed guards posted around the walls. We had our passports examined and stamped, were subjected to an “iris test”, and made to sit until we were allowed to re-board our Air New Zealand plane.

I wouldn’t imagine that Teresa May, or any member of her Government, has to go through that kind of ordeal. They’re probably given the red carpet treatment.

Come fly with me?

Darting off at a tangent slightly, I’ve recently been to see the film, The Age of Stupid, a production with a powerful green message, looking at how our own stupidity and greed led to global warming, and (in the film) the final destruction of human civilisation.

One of the many points hammered home in the film is the environmental damage caused by the increasing number of aeroplanes in our skies. The implicit message is “don’t fly” – Airlines are bad for us all.

I don’t have any argument against the message. But the only problem is that if we want or need to visit those faraway places across the Atlantic or Pacific, how do we do it without taking to the air? The era of ocean liners is now over, and no genius has yet come up with an environmentally friendly alternative for global travel. So, do we merely stay put in our own land-locked continents, never having any physical contact with those across the seas?

Or could we merely accept the “virtual reality” offered via the computer and the world wide web? Or those travelogues on the telly showing us life in faraway places? Or do we just wait for the oil that powers the aircraft to run out?

For this particular Dinosaur it’s a dilemma. If anyone has the answer, let’s have it!

The Olympic ideal…

Whatever happened to the Olympic ideal? That ideal of friendly sporting competition between the nations has long since been sullied by interests that believe that winning at all costs is what counts. That of course all began at the Berlin games mounted as a showcase for Aryan supremacy back in the 1930s.

Now on top of that, we’re told that the London Olympics will take place in an atmosphere of tight security. Demonstrations will be banned anywhere near the site, homes may be searched at will and any political material confiscated – and there’s even been talk of missiles being alerted in case of “terrorist attacks”.

Is all this worth all the money, the dislocation and the razzmatazz?  Let’s scroll back to the first post-war Olympics held in London. That was a cut-price affair held in a bomb-damaged city. We didn’t win much on that occasion – but didn’t we all enjoy it! And that’s what it should be all about.

MODERN TIMES: The Dinosaur Column

So, who’s in charge of the NHS?

…and will he turn the lights off when he leaves the room, please?

I must confess that I blinked – twice – when I heard that Andrew Lansley had claimed that he never had a legal duty to provide a comprehensive Health Service – merely to promote it.

Oh, really? So what does that mean? We’re talking about a man who’s the Health Minister in this government for goodness sake. So why has he decided to shift himself on to the sidelines?

Does he see his new role merely as telling us: “I say, chaps, I think we should all go and see a doctor from time to time. I’m sure you’ll find details in Yellow Pages. And I’m told that hospitals are a damned good thing to have around. I believe that there’s plenty of private companies running them if you want to try one for yourself. I really do recommend regular health care. If you want more details, I’m sure we can let you have a leaflet.”

As far as I know, no other Health Minister has made this mind-boggling claim – and we’ve had quite a few since the halcyon days of Nye Bevan. Some have been good, others not so good – and some downright abominable. But they all knew that they were meant to be in charge when it came to providing for our health care.

There’s a pawnshop on the corner…

One sure sign of the slump years in the 1930s was the proliferation of pawnshops. They sprang up like mushrooms in depression-hit towns across Britain, as desperate families pawned their belongings just to make ends meet.

This was Love on the Dole Britain. But in the years after the war, many pawnshops closed their doors. There was no longer any need for them in a welfare state with full employment. But more recently they’ve been making a comeback.

They don’t call them pawnshops any more, of course. And they don’t display the three golden balls outside their premises, to remind folk of the poverty and degradation of past times. Now they’ve been re-branded as “cash converters” – but they became quite popular amongst consumer-driven folk who’d extended their credit and wanted to download their impulse buys. But now, in Cameron’s Britain, they may be reverting to their original role.

I see one has even opened its doors in Lydney. On the sign over the shop it urges folk to “recycle your jewellery and goods for cash.” The message is clear. If you need the money, that’s the place to hock your family jewels, your telly or even the kids’ play station. These are hard times for many folk.

A boundary too far:

Proposals for re-drawing our constituency boundaries have brought some raising of eyebrows.

In particular plans for the Forest of Dean. It seems that our constituency could end up joined to the Westgate ward of Gloucester. We’d find ourselves sharing an MP with those good people living in the shadow of Gloucester cathedral, the city’s docks – and of course the Guildhall.

To say that this notion of constituency representation has led to controversy would be an understatement. The Tory MP for Gloucester is livid. Foresters are highly indignant at losing their electoral identity, and folk in the affected areas of Gloucester have made it quite clear that they want to keep the Forest at arm’s length, thanks very much.

Now, I’m told that the general idea behind the proposals is to reduce the number of MPs by fifty, whilst trying to make all constituencies roughly equal in terms of their electorate.

The only trouble is that you end up undermining the one saving grace of our present electoral system – that of representation.. How can an MP be seen to represent a large sprawling area whose voters have been unwillingly yoked together and have no sense of common interest?

So, guess who’s the Government Minister responsible for the Boundary Commission’s proposals? Why, it’s our own Mark Harper of course. Oh, dear. He’s not going to win any popularity contest at this rate, is he?

Dinosaur

MODERN TIMES: The Dinosaur Column

News of whose World?

So the News of the World is no more. Whether there were many mourners, at the funeral I don’t know. As far as I’m concerned, it died many years ago – in 1969 to be exact, when it was bought by Rupert Murdoch.

The original News of the World, the one I remember as a naive young dinosaur, was born in very different times. It first appeared in 1843, when Queen Victoria was on the throne, and the face of journalism was very different. Oh, yes, reporters and readers liked their scandal even then, but there were no phones then to be hacked in to; and obscenity laws restricted how the news was presented.

The News of the World then was a large broadsheet style newspaper, with pages of closely-packed columns. By the time I got to know it, it seemed to have changed very little in its layout and type-style. Archaic in appearance might be a way to describe it. One speciality was its coverage of the law courts, reporting particularly the more salacious offences – some of which, of course, are no longer illegal in our more enlightened days. And as a young innocent, I found much of the reporting a bit obscure. Statements like, “an act of intimacy took place in the back of a motor car” meant little to me at the time.  But the paper enjoyed mass sales throughout the country.

When Murdoch bought it, there was instant shock and horror. “The News of the World is an institution, as British as roast beef”, snorted one commentator. A brash Aussie incomer was no fit custodian of its heritage. But Murdoch wanted to expand his Australian press empire and gain entry to the British market -  and what Murdoch wanted, he got. The News of the World as I’d known it as a young dinosaur, faded into memory. And, as they say, the rest is history.

By the way, it may be worth noting that the Sun (which was next on his list of acquisitions) was the successor to a very different newspaper – the Daily Herald, once owned jointly by Odhams Press and the trade unions. It was effectively the paper of the Labour Party, enjoying a mass, working class readership, and once boasting George Lansbury as its editor. But finally its owners decided to change the title, and re-brand it to try to tune in to the new consumer-based lifestyles of the 1960s. It was a flop. Circulation declined to below the million mark, and by the time Murdoch bought the title, it was on its last legs.

The days before mobile phones:

I can remember the days when the only people authorised to listen in to our phone calls were those employed by such bodies as the Special Branch or Military Intelligence. As far as I know, that’s still officially the case.

Back then it was called “telephone tapping”, and members of such sinister subversive bodies as CND or the Committee of 100 would take great delight in trying to spot the tell-tale signs that their phone had been tapped. I was told that there was often a tell-tale click when the tapping took place. Some more imaginative folk swore they heard heavy breathing from a third party whilst they were chatting away quite innocently. Sometimes fake demos would be arranged over the phone, just to see if the police would turn up (and often they did until they got wise to what was going on).

Now it seems that with all this modern electronic, digital gadgetry, anyone can get in on the act. All you need is the right equipment and the know-how – plus, presumably, some way of identifying your target. All right, I admit it. I don’t really know how telephone hackers carry out their business. But as a method of doing the dirty on some unsuspecting victim, it’s a technological breakthrough compared to raking through their dustbins.

Sell off? No thanks!

According to a recent poll involving 7,007 folk in the Dean, only seven raised their heads above the parapet to declare their support for the Government’s plans to privatise the Forest.

That amounts to just about half a percent. On the face of it, it’s hardly a percentage at all – more of a slight blip. But Forest Research, the body given the task of analysing the results, expressed a degree of caution. Because of the conditions under which the poll was taken it might not be totally “representative of wider public opinion” they said.

But be that as it may, it did show the way that the wind was blowing as far as forest folk are concerned. And it’ll do for me.

Dinosaur

MODERN TIMES: The Dinosaur Column

“Beautiful Game?” or just a cash trough?

I can’t say I take a great deal of interest in football – and have no interest whatsoever in the antics of prima donna football stars or the multi-millionaire owners of Premier Division clubs. Any fleeting attention I pay to the game is in the lower ranks of the league. For example, I’ve long kept abreast of the precarious progress of Bristol Rovers – don’t ask, it’s something that dates back to when I was a young dinosaur – and keep an eye on clubs as diverse as Forest Green Rovers and, because I have a soft spot for the underdog, Accrington Stanley (I like the name, and the fact that the club fought back from bankruptcy to gain re-admittance to the league a few seasons ago).
 
And, of course, we should all applaud those who formed FC United – the former fans of Manchester United who broke away in protest against the autocratic rule of the American Glazier Brothers, to form their own club. Supporters have a vision – it’s run as a co-operative and is making steady progress through the non-league divisions of the game.
 
So all the allegations of bribery and corruption at FIFA came as no surprise to me. At this kind of level, football, the so-called “beautiful game”, is about two things: money and prestige. And the same seems to apply throughout much of the Premier Division.

The NHS – as seen through “Casualty”

Mrs Thatcher never liked the NHS. But her strategy for cutting it down to size was somewhat different from that of the present Government. It was based on encouraging the private health care sector whilst starving the NHS of funds, with the long term aim of reducing it to a second rate”safety net” service for those who couldn’t afford to go private.
 
Recently I’ve been spending some time glued to the box, watching DVDs of early instalments of the BBC hospital drama, Casualty. This popular series first saw the light of day in 1986, at the height of the Thatcherite attack on the NHS. And it pulled no punches.
 
What was portrayed was the night shift at the tightly stretched casualty department, fighting for funds and equipment against a management only concerned with reducing budgets. Dramas are set against the crumbling infrastructure of the city descending into nightly chaos – leaving the night staff at Holby City Hospital to try to mop up the casualties.
 
The St. Pauls’ riots are anonymously re-captured in one dramatic episode, when police swoop and seal off an entire black community in “drugs bust” which becomes a grotesque piece of over-kill. And when the night shift at the casualty department is threatened with closure, the campaign to save it is dramatically portrayed.
 
Thatcher’s attack on the NHS was, of course, fairly blatant. She knew what she was doing, and so did everyone else. The NHS survived – but at a cost. The attack now being mounted by Cameron and his cohort Andrew Lansley has been rather more subtle – but it’s just as dangerous for those of us who care, and don’t want to see our health service in the hands of money-grabbing, privateering health companies (many of them based in the USA).

Buying in private education:

Another nasty sign of the times came my way, courtesy of a piece in the Guardian. It seems that many schools have been sending letters to parents, inviting them to buy in private tuition for their children.
 
This tuition is provided by a course of DVDs supplied by a private company called the Student Support Centre. Parents who go along with the scheme, under the illusion that their children’s school is recommending it, may find themselves paying out thousands of pounds for a scheme that turns out to have little or no value. One such letter from a school told parents that the Student Support Centre’s programme “may be of interest to you and of benefit to your children”.
 
The scheme, it seems, costs parents £65.50 a month – and those who commit themselves to the entire programme could find themselves paying out over three thousand pounds. And other private companies are also getting in on the act. – aided and abetted by letters from head teachers written on school headed notepaper! And to soften them up, those schools that get involved receive donations on the basis of the number of parents who sign up for the scheme.

Not the time to go nuclear !

Do you sometimes suffer from one of those days when somehow your timing seems all wrong? When the odd remark that could have been perfectly innocent in a different context goes down like a lead balloon? Or worse?

So, what about this one for bad timing. On March 12, the Citizen came out with a front page headline, “Nuclear Hope for Thousands”. Jobs could be secured for generations to come, it declared.

The nub of the news item was that Gloucestershire could become a major centre for the nuclear industry, with thousands of “high quality” jobs being created. “If there is a certainty for the nuclear industry then there will be people needed to work in this sector,” the Tory MP for Stroud, Neil Carmichael, was quoted as saying.

Good news perhaps for those who liked that kind of thing! Of course, it goes without saying that we don’t. But on the same day, the news broke of the tragic earthquake and consequent tsunami in Japan. And, to make things worse, a few days later we heard that a nuclear power complex had been destabilised and was in danger of going critical. With radiation levels rising, the battle commenced to prevent the Fukushima plant from becoming another Chernobyl.

Now we on the Clarion have never believed that we should go down the nuclear road – and we’ve printed numerous articles pointing to the dangers and difficulties involved. Now surely is the time to stop flannelling and think again?

{click here for the Forest-side anti-nuclear presence on Facebook}

Making the most of our post…

There’s probably not many folk around these days who can remember the halcyon days when a letter cost a few pence (in old money) to post – let alone the time when if you popped it in the pillar box early enough it would be delivered the same day.

Back then the GPO was a government department, headed by a Minister called the Postmaster General. Not only did it handle the mail, but also pioneered the telephone system, routing our calls through a network of telephone exchanges who could connect you with places throughout the world. And you could have telegrams delivered, if you lacked a phone and had urgent news to send. And it was never afraid to embrace the latest technology when it came along.

Ah, those were the days! The rot set in, when MacMillan’s Government first allowed the GPO to distribute “junk mail” with our post. Later, the whole system was hived off, to become a public corporation.

Since then it’s been a sitting target for the circling vultures. It’s already faced the debilitating impact of “competition” – and now the Government wants to sell it off to the highest bidder – as the Tories under Thatcher did with the telephone system.

It’s no wonder that postal workers are campaigning to save the service and keep it in public hands. If we value our post, we should give them our backing.

Time for some cautious celebration?

Since our last issue, folk in the Dean have been celebrating victory in the campaign to save the Forest from the Government’s plans to snatch it from us – and then sell it back again. And we’ve every right to make a bit of whoopee.

But of course it ain’t necessarily over yet – and Jan Royall who led the campaign from the front was right to suggest we should stay vigilant. Whilst the Government has scrapped its plans for a wholesale sell off, they’ve appointing a panel to look at future plans and report back. I’m sure many folk will be waiting for its conclusions with bated breath.

Of course, this didn’t stop campaigners throughout the country from taking to the woods for a day of celebration on Sunday, March 20. Here in the Dean it was held at Wenchford. It was good to see so many people around the barbecues, strolling amongst the trees, and generally relaxing. One campaigner said to me, “it’s so good to be able to celebrate a victory, for a change!”

I agree. But there are so many more battles to be fought – and, who knows, there may be more victories to come, and times for more celebration!

MODERN TIMES: THE DINOSAUR COLUMN

Someone there to take care of us:

It seems like the National Health Service has always been there for us. Some of us may feel we don’t need it – well, not just yet, anyway – but are glad we have it , just in case we do. It deals with our illnesses, with accidents, and with a host of bodily problems that often happen when we least expect them.

As I grow older, I find I’ve become a more frequent visitor to our local health centre – for check-ups, or occasional treatment when I find something isn’t functioning as well as it used to. In a way, we’ve come to take it for granted. We pity those poor Americans who have for so long been denied a proper health service, and where the system’s all about profit. And we’ve come to respect those who work in the NHS – the nurses, doctors, and all the rest who do their best to patch us up or keep us ticking over.

So, perhaps, Cameron’s “shake up” of the system should be a wakeup call for all of us. Our health is important to us all – and so is the NHS. We don’t want it handed over to the private sector. We shouldn’t allow ourselves to sleep walk into a situation where we suddenly discover that American rules apply, and everything we valued about our health service has faded away.

* * * * * * *

Whilst I’m sort of on the subject, I wonder how those TV hospital soaps we love to watch will tackle Cameron’s plans for health care? In particular I’ve been thinking about the BBC’s stablemates, Casualty and Holby City.

I still watch Casualty, and admire the dedication of those who work in the A & E department – and I appreciate the various shenanigans that take place each week. Though with all that blood around, I’d rather not have to be admitted!

Casualty has in the past touched on changes in the NHS structure – such as the conflicts caused by the imposition of new management structures. But if, heaven forbid, Cameron’s new deal for the health service is implemented, surely Holby will never be the same again. I wonder how that veteran, Charlie Fairhead, who’s been in more instalments of Casualty than some of us have had hot dinners, would react?

Regrets? What me?

Well, the bankers’ bonus culture is still with us, it seems. Any notion that they may have learned their lesson must by now have dissipated like dew in the morning. They still believe they can give themselves fat pay-outs from our money which they have wantonly gambled with.

All this became clear when Bob Diamond, the new boss at Barclays, appeared before MPs on the Treasury Select Committee. It seems he’s likely to receive £8.5 million for his services this year – and when asked by MPs whether David Cameron or George Osborne had asked him to show restraint over any bonus he may get, he said “no”.

The time for remorse is now over, said Mr Diamond. Now, by implication, it’s back to the old “loadsa money” world for bankers. It’s almost as though the crash of 2008 never happened for them. Never mind the toxic debts – that’s all in the past. Let’s get back to the party.

But times have changed. Under our Con-Dem government we’re all going to have to pay for the bankers’ extravagance. Meanwhile, I wonder what top bankers do with all those millions that they receive each year? What can they spend it on? And with that sort of money, why on earth should they want so much more?

Recalling Harper?

An interesting notion was put forward in a recent issue of Private Eye. In a column devoted to the Government’s plans to sell off our forests, the magazine turned its attention to the “HOOF”campaign in the Dean.

It noted that Mark Harper believes that the forest sale is “an example of Dave’s Big Society in action as it would allow local people to buy and manage things as they see fit.” But as has been pointed out, folk in the Dean see the forest as theirs anyway. Why should we buy it if we see it as ours already?

The article concludes: “If Harper disappoints his constituents, he could become the first victim of another coalition brainwave: the “right of recall” which enables voters to recall an MP if they lose faith in him or her. This would be ironic. When Harper isn’t calling for the sale of his constituents’ natural environment, he is the minister for constitutional reform responsible for… the right-to recall policy!”

Dinosaur

Modern Times- the Dinosaur column

Woodman, spare that tree!

I almost feel sorry for Mark Harper. Almost, but not quite. Here he is, caught on the horns of a dilemma. He’s a junior minister in a government that’s decided to cut the Forestry Commission down to size, and force it to sell off half its estate. And here’s our Mark, representing a Forest constituency in which the vast majority of voters are up in arms against the threat to their woodlands.

What can our MP do about it? As part of the Government he can’t speak out or vote against its proposals. He could of course resign his position – but can we really see our Mark letting go of the greasy pole that he’s clinging to? I don’t think so!

So all he can do is try to justify the Government’s plans for the Forest. It won’t mean cutting down thousands of trees, he assures us. Neither will it involve making vast swathes of our woodland reserves into “no go” areas for Forest folk. Indeed, he tries to tell us, it will open up new opportunities, in which we can all participate. So far he’s been a bit vague about the details. he prefers to talk of “a number of new ownership options and the means to secure public benefits.” Oh, yeah? Maybe we could all “adopt a tree”, and go out to give it a big hug when we feel the need.

The other week, I took a Dinosaur-style amble up into the Forest, to enjoy the last of the Autumn colours. Up at Mallards Pike there were families, with dogs and children, doing much the same – though most of them were moving rather more quickly than I was. The banks of mature trees and the hidden paths that led into the quiet places in the depths of the Forest, are there for all of us to enjoy, young and old. Courting couples gained their “fern licence” out there in the woodland undergrowth. Age-old traditions linger on in the Dean – and the Government interferes with them at its peril.

Creaming off the charities:

With Cameron’s “big society” kicking in, how do our charities fit in to the general scheme of things? They don’t seem to be doing too well, I’m afraid. I’ve had a number of phone calls recently from charitable bodies, asking for donations. But with money in short supply, there’s only so much one can do.

All these cold callers are glib and persuasive – and I suspect from private telemarketing companies hired by charities to raise money for their good causes. The fly in the ointment is, of course, that much of what we donate doesn’t go to the cause we support, but into the pockets of these fund-raising companies.

A recent survey conducted by CBC in Canada found that the marketing companies were creaming off 70 to 75 per cent of the money raised through telephone canvassing. Indeed, one charity (helping those suffering from alzheimers) actually made a loss as a result.

Now I don’t know how far these kind of figures are reflected over on this side of the pond. And neither am I suggesting that we shouldn’t donate to causes that desperately need our money. But perhaps some questions should be asked about where our money actually goes.

Zombies against the cuts?

A correspondent recently sent us a short item from Brighton. It seems that organisers of a march and rally against the cuts at the end of October found that their protest was likely to clash with the town’s annual “Zombie parade”.

This little local difficulty was soon resolved by making sure that the two events took place at different times – allowing those Zombies who were against the cuts to go on both! As our correspondent said – “only in Brighton…!”

Quote, unquote…

Under the headline, “A royal wedding – it’s exactly what we need”, a Citizen reporter gushed:

“Royal fever is gripping Gloucestershire with the news Prince William will wed long-term love Kate Middleton.”

“Thoughts of the gloomy economic climate disappeared as spirits across the county soared at the prospect of a royal wedding.”

(page 2 of the Citizen, November 17th).

Gosh! I’m feeling better already!

Modern Times- the Dinosaur column

Back from the land of the maple leaf

I’ve just returned from taking time out in the land of the beaver and maple leaf. Yes, Canada’s been calling me across the pond yet again.

For those who’re interested in the political set-up of this vast and sprawling country, Canada also has a Tory Prime Minister – and, like in the UK, he heads a minority government. But unlike here, he hasn’t formed a coalition. Instead he relies on the divisions between the opposition parties to remain in power.

The opposition consists of the Canadian Liberal Party, the left-wing New Democrats (the NDP) – and the Bloc Quebecois, who naturally enough represent the separatist elements in the province of Quebec, and thus have their own particular agenda.

Canada’s Prime Minister is one Stephen Harper – and as far as I know he’s no relation to Mark, our own MP here in the Forest. Indeed, the Canadian PM rose through the ranks of the redneck right in the province of Alberta – though I’m sure that he likes to think that he’s matured somewhat since those days.

Whilst I was there, the main political debate seemed to be centred on whether to scrap the “long gun register”. Harper and his party were keen to get rid of the legal requirement for folk to register any rifle or shotgun in their possession. When it came to the vote, he was narrowly defeated.

Somehow I couldn’t quite grasp what all the fuss was about. I don’t own a gun of any sort – and neither does any one else I know. I thought that was just for the gun-happy lobby in the USA. And anyway in Canada, anyone who really really wants a gun has to get a certificate, covering such points as why they want a firearm and whether they’re capable of using it without endangering anyone (apart, perhaps, from some hapless moose). No, I think it’s just the inner redneck emerging in Harper and his supporters.

Stimulating?

I was however interested to note that rather than tackling the recession through cutting everything that’s not nailed to the ground, the Canadian Conservatives launched what they call a stimulus package of public spending to try to re-energize the economy. Canada hasn’t suffered quite as much as some countries from the recession – though it’s all relative, I suppose.

But Harper has now announced that his stimulus package will end next year. It’s done its job, he says, and from 2011 the Canadian economy will have to stand on its own feet. The opposition, of course, aren’t happy. They think it will expose the country to the danger of a “double dip” recession – particularly as it’s so reliant on trade with its neighbour the USA these days. Me, I’m no economist, but I think they may be right.

Oil for the taking?

The debate over the havoc caused by the exploitation of Alberta’s oil tar sands has been covered several times in the Clarion. And whilst I was in Canada CBC television also gave it major coverage. The Canadian born film director, James Cameron, had, it seemed, decided to travel to the site to see for himself.

Cameron likes to see himself as an environmentalist, and he concluded that the oil companies really needed to clean up their act before any further exploitation could be regarded as acceptable. He also denounced the way in which the rights of First Nation people living in the area had been brushed aside in the scramble to exploit the oil tar reserves.

I was also interested to see some prominence given to the decision by the Co-operative Bank here in Britain to give backing to those First Nation tribal chiefs who are trying to sue the oil industry and the province over the conditions under which their people are now forced to live.

Incidentally, the USA oil industry is strongly represented amongst those exploiting the tar sands – and America now gets over half its oil from Canada. Its representatives strongly resent anyone who tries to interfere with their “right” to get its oil from Canada. After all, declared one Republican senator, its only wilderness territory up there, so who cares?