Travel Costs

The Government are working hard to get everyone out of their cars and onto public transportation. They have raised the road tax on most family cars, based on carbon emissions. When it was announced in the Budget, it was made to sound like it was prospective – applying to cars manufactured from now on and encouraging new car buyers to choose more enviro-friendly models. Instead it has been made retrospective – it applies to all cars from 2001. That means anyone who bought the “wrong” car in the last seven years will now be penalised by about £245 ($500) a year.

But if you want to save money by getting out of your car, you will have to pay for the train. Of course unless your train starts at your station, you may very well have to stand for the entire journey. After all, a train ticket does not guarantee a seat, but only agrees to carriage – that the train will be going to the destination.

You also have to be careful where you stand on the train. Nichola Myhill found out that even if every breathable standing space is taken in the second class carriages, and next to the toilets between the carriages, do not stand in the luggage area just inside first class. There is no excuse for first class passengers to be soiled by the relative proximity of the cattle class. They shouldn’t have to bear with the commoners standing next to their first class luggage.

Nicola may pay £4,000 per year for a season ticket, but that doesn’t give her the right or priviledge of standing inside first class, next to rows of empty seats. She was duly fined £69 ($140) on the spot for such outrageous behaviour. (The fine is calculated as twice the cost of the first class ticket.) If she can’t squeeze into the toilet area, she just has to miss work.

This story was carried in several national newspapers. In the comments section to one, a reader proposed a logical solution: “Perhaps we should open up the roof like they do in other third-world countries?”

Crime and Crime Prevention

Today’s pustules on the butt of society are Adrian Hutchinson and Keith Buckley.

They got 26- and 28-year tariffs with their life sentences for the murder of a 62-year-old man who refused to hand over his mobile phone during their fifth robbery of the evening in Oldham town centre. As reported in the Daily Mail,

After Mr Smith refused their request for a cigarette, Buckley punched him in the face before the pair dragged him to a darkened yard, threatened him with a knife and demanded his property.

The 62-year-old had only bought the phone a week earlier and refused to give it up, but was put in a headlock and hit and kicked repeatedly, causing fractures of the skull, cheek, jaw and larynx.

Taking his phone – which was later sold for just £20 – the pair left Mr Smith dying where he lay, and his body was not found until 17 days later.

Hutchinson and Buckley aren’t teenagers – they are 25 and 22 – but their prior convictions go back before that. Hutchinson was first convicted at 11and before he was 16 he had nine convictions for arson, assault, and burglary, but never received any time behind bars. It was 29 further convictions later that he was finally jailed in 2004. He got four years for burglary, robbery and assault.

But never fear, the Government is here with a new solution for the growing crime problem. It now wants to hold schools responsible for curbing crime, as well as teen pregnancy and all other lifestyle issues. How well they meet 18 new targets for improving and policing pupils’ lifestyles and well-being will be included in their Ofstead (school inspection) reports.

Surely once schools are encumbered with even more non-teaching responsibility, the next generation of Hutchinsons and Buckleys will be redeemed. Our hope is the the expansion of bureaucracy and the micro-management of everyone’s lives.

Bannaghtyn

I was reading the Manx Independent newspaper online this evening and looked at the regular Manx language feature. This led me to the Ynsee Gaelg website. Ynsee Gaelg means “learn Manx”.

From the first lesson, the long history of Christianity in the Isle of Man is evident in the idiom of greeting. One of the simple greetings in Manx is “Bannaghtyn”, which means “blessings”. What a nice way to greet someone.

Being a Celtic language (more specifically a Goidelic Celtic language, related to Scots Gaelic and Irish), it’s not easy to learn. It takes eleven lesson before it is time to talk about pets. Apparently an essential sentence is “Ta kayt aym as t’eh breimeragh” – I have a cat and he farts.

The website doesn’t make it clear, but I’m guessing this isn’t a nice way to greet someone.

The Evil Continues

Ryan Herbert and Brendan Harris were sentenced today for the murder of Sophie Lancaster. With their so-called life sentences Herbert got a 16-year tariff and Harris got 18 years.

Ryan and Brendan got much less than what they deserved, but that penalty isn’t available in this country. As I mentioned to one of Ryan’s supporters, who left a comment here today, the judge said, “This was a terrible case which has shocked and outraged all who have heard about it. At least wild animals, when they hunt in packs, have a legitimate reason for so doing, to obtain food. You have none and your behaviour on that night degrades humanity itself.”

The sentencing of these thugs should not lull us into thinking that Britain is a safer place. Without even leaving the Northwest of England, the Daily Mail today has the case of Julie Pickford. She was asked a boy to stop throwing popcorn at other passengers on a tram. “Without warning, one girl stood up and punched her in the face and then a mob of up to 30 teenagers joined in, punching her and stamping on her. . . With blood streaming from her injuries and £50 stolen from her handbag, she was thrown off the tram at the next stop in Sale, Greater Manchester.”

The Price of Honour

This is the face of Islam. She’s dead. Daddy did it.

Rand Abdel-Qader was 17. She had a crush on a British soldier. She met him when she was a volunteer on a project. There was no actual relationship between the two of them. She hadn’t even seen him since January, but her dad found out in mid-March that she had been seen talking to him. One of her friends told him.

No doubt feeling fatherly concern, he asked her if it was true that she had met the soldier. Then, as fathers do (at least in certain cultures that are, of course, equal to all other cultures) he began to beat her savagely. But sometimes a good beating just isn’t enough.

With the help of her brothers (like father, like sons) he held her down with his foot on her throat until she stopped breathing. What a nice daddy. He didn’t want her to feel the pain as he then began to cut at her body with a knife. It’s hard to say what actually killed her – whether it was being stamped on, suffocated, or stabbed repeatedly all over her body.

And it’s not like there was a post-mortem. She was wrapped up and tossed in a grave without any mourning, because she had brought shame on the family. It was a family funeral. Her uncles showed up to spit on her body before it was covered with dirt.

Daddy was arrested. He was released after two hours because it was an honour killing. Sgt Ali Jabbar of Basra police said: “Not much can be done when we have an ‘honour killing’. You are in a Muslim society and women should live under religious laws.”

It would be terrible enough if this were an exceptional story. The only reason it is news is because it is the first case known to involve a British soldier in Iraq (if “involve” is even the right word). There were 47 honour killings just in Basra last year. That’s 47 other girls, just like Rand, just in one city, just in one year.

Court of Appeal Rules Man Can Carry a Stick

It is a stark contrast between the right-to-carry laws in the US and the stripping of weapons in the UK and at the same time a demonstration of taxpayer money wasted in the pursuit of a political agenda.

Stuart Kennedy is a stripper who uses a police uniform as the set up for his act. He was stopped out the Paramount Bar by two real cops. They weren’t so worried about the uniform – though they did follow him to the pub to make sure he was telling the truth. There’s no indication as to whether either constables Amanda Lawson and Fiona Duncan enjoyed the show. Of course they needed to watch the whole thing to be sure. That’s right, two police women watched him on taxpayer time, just to be sure he was a real stripper. PC Lawson told the trial court, “We had never been in a situation like that before. We needed proof he was a stripper.”

But that wasn’t the issue. No, it was his truncheon that bothered them. Stuart used a real police truncheon, not a floppy imitation. The policewomen arrested him after the show. He was charged with carrying of an offensive weapon. There is an provision in the law for a “reasonable excuse” but neither the police nor the Crown Office (the prosecutor in Scotland) thought Stuart had a reasonable excuse. The sheriff (trial judge) disagreed and threw the case out of court. Both he and the general public thought it was a waste of time and money.

Not to be put off by a judge or the overwhelming common sense of the Scottish people, the Crown appealed. This time three judges told them the same thing. The full written opinion will be released at a later date, but the Court of Appeal decided not to waste anyone’s time and let it be known that the Crown’s case had failed.

There is probably no way to tally the total costs of this overblown exercise in comic jurisprudence. All of this over who can carry a stick with a handle.

Christ is Risen!

I may be one of the first in the Ortho-blogosphere to say it, being on the eastern side of the Atlantic and missing the Vigil. Everyone else will just be transitioning from Matins to Liturgy about now.

I wanted to go tonight, but I was afraid I would fall asleep at the wheel on the way, not to mention on the way back. With the Unnamed Woman needing to stay home with the Unnamed Children, I would be on my own. After pulling an all-nighter marking pupil folders on Thursday/Friday, I still have not fully recovered. I’m not sure and hour and a half starting at 3:00 am on a winding two-lane A-road already known for fatal accidents is a place to be.

But I’m sure if I wanted to go bad enough, I would have made it happen. I suppose I could have pulled off the road if necessary.

Lent has been a washout, really. My usual lack of fasting after the first week and spiritual uselessness. I had the chance to attend Liturgy twice locally and managed to oversleep both times. The only significant reading I’ve done, other than in my new Orthodox Study Bible, is a book on St Columba.

But Christ is Risen. Whether or not I’m a spiritual washout, Christ is Risen.

Christ is Risen, and life reigns.

Backlash

When I wrote about the abolition of the 10% tax band, I thought there would be a bit of a kerfuffle and it would be another opportunity for those who are already opposed to the Labour Party, like me, to wag a finger at their dishonesty and destructive policies.

I figured some of the usual complainers on the Labour back benches would fuss and the Tories would try to make some hay. I didn’t realise that it would become a constant national news story, with a huge rebellion on the back benches and ministerial consternation. Some have suggested that this to Gordon Brown what the poll tax was to Margaret Thatcher. Some have even suggested that while Thatcher survived the poll tax, Brown might not survive killing off the 10% tax band.

Hopefully this will finally demonstrate that Labour has passed its sell-by date. After all, the Tories promised to be at least as liberal on social issues, so there’s no chance of a threat to ungodliness in the UK. The Revelation 21:8 crowd will make sure Britain is still comfortably post-Christian. Perhaps this will persuade Middle England to ditch Labour.

We are probably stuck with Gordon until at least 2009, since General Election usually happen about every four years (out of a possible five-year Parliament), but the local elections next Thursday will probably let the Government know just how unhappy the electorate is. That the way politics works. Local councillors, who have nothing whatsoever to do with central Government policy, will pay the price for Brown’s bad decisions.

Be Kind, Not Condescending

If you have gathered nothing in your youth,
How can you find anything in your old age?
Judgment is like the beauty in gray hair,
And in elders it is to know counsel.
Wisdom of Sirach 25:3-4

This is just a meta-blog. Go read “The day I became my grandmother: Our writer dons a mask to find out what it’s like to be 90 in modern Britain” by Tanya Gold from today’s Daily Mail. It will take you a few minutes. Spend them.

Another Country Queen

Being on the wrong side of the ocean for any radio exposure to country music, it takes a while for me to pick up on what’s hot. First I discovered Carrie Underwood,  and more recently Taylor Swift. Now with Kellie Pickler, I have completed my collection of the current triumvirate Queens of Nashville.

Once again, I have found an album that knocks my socks off. What distinguishes Kellie and her songs are the reality of them. Country music tends to have a real-life feel about it generally, but Carrie and Taylor have fairly conventional happy family backgrounds. Nothing wrong with that and I’m not denying that conventional or happy is just as real-life as any other. Kellie was deserted by her mother at age two. Her father has been in and out of prison and she was raised by her grandparents, until her grandmother died when Kellie was in high school. Not surprisingly, there’s a little more pain in Kellie’s songwriting.

I’m sure that there are male country artists who are worth a listen. It’s just a matter of finding a way to squeeze them into my playlist amongst the three beautiful blondes.

Council-sponsored Muslim-only No-go Area

And they said there were no no-go areas.

In January, when Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali suggested in The Sunday Telegraph that some areas had become no-go zones for non-Muslims, he was excoriated on all sides. His fellow Anglican bishops distanced themselves from him. From Muslims he received death threats.

Clissold Leisure Centre in Stoke Newington has Muslim-only swimming on Sunday mornings. Actually, it is Muslim males-only swimming. I don’t have any problem with separate sessions for men. After all, leisure pools have long had some of their facilities set apart at times for women. And as long as there is equal access, I got no problem with that.

But Clissold Leisure Centre owned by Hackney Borough Council in north London doesn’t have a Christians-only swimming session.

So have Muslims created this no-go area? No. The Muslims don’t mind swimming with Christians. It’s the leisure centre employees who have done it. After David Toube and his son we refused admission, even by a manager, they went back several days later to speak to another leisure centre employee, who confirmed the Muslims-only policy.

Since this hit the news, the leisure centre’s tune has changed. Seems they don’t want to openly discriminate in the face of media exposure. The sessions may still be for Muslim men, but they now say that staff cannot ask about someone’s religion or refuse them entry if they don’t appear to be Muslim.

Prayer Wars

The older unnamed child may be getting jealous of his sister doing the prayers at bedtime. There has been friction as to how the Trisagion prayers would be divvied up each night.

The older child has gotten one up on the younger. Except for singing “O Heavenly King” as the introduction to the prayers, they have otherwise heretofore been spoken. Well, the younger child may be able to do subtraction and multiplication at the age of three, but she’s never tried plain chant. The older child started chanting “Most Holy Trinity. . .” and didn’t stop until “O come let us worship and bow down. . .” He turfed his sister out.  She was not well pleased.

Crunch Time

I haven’t been blogging much in the last few days.

It’s getting down to crunch time with the Year 11s. They will be leaving in less than a month and their exam in my subject is the first day of their study leave.

I’m still trying to put finishing touches to the revision pack. I looked at the commercially available resources for my syllabus and they are useless. The official publisher has an A5-size book for £5.95 out of which they could have possibly used about 10 pages. I’m giving them about 40 pages of A4 for £1. I’m much better value for money. (Don’t worry – I’m not pocketing the cash. It’s going back into my budget to offset the photocopying costs.)

The pack is by no means entirely my work – in fact, it’s not even mostly my work. I have a very generous former head of department. I have adapted the pack I used in my last post with a different syllabus. I have changed the emphasis and imformation on a few sheets. I have added sheets for topics that weren’t covered in the other syllabus.

I have one more to finish tonight before getting the whole pack copied in the morning.

You’ve Been Warned

The Unnamed Woman opened a carton of eggs tonight. (My apologies to the scandalised Orthodox.) Inside the lid, next to the nutritional advice (why does a dozen eggs need nutritional advice?) there was the statement, “Allergy warning: contains egg”.

Discoveries

I’ve written a few bad songs I’d like to forget. Yesterday I discovered that I had written some bad songs that I had forgotten.

The last time I was at my parents’ house I was rummaging through some boxes of my old cassettes. I found some of my old music and brought it back to the UK. Even though it has been over a year, I hadn’t listened to some of it.

I pulled out what sounds like a tape for recording snippets of ideas and new songs. There was some real crap on it. Then at the end there is a zippy little worship chorus that I had forgotten.

Oh Lord you are my God
I wil exalt and praise Your name (x2)

For in perfect faithfulness He has done great things
We waited on the Lord, and He saved
Let us rejoice and be glad, and be glad.

It’s taken from Isaiah 25:1,9. I’m pretty sure I wrote it – the music, I mean. I can’t think of any other reason it would be on the tape. I remember playing it frequently for a time in church.

Last night I was looking for the Texas tapes and found another on the CD rack. Many boyfriends used to make compliation tapes of various artists for their girlfriend. Instead, many years ago I sent the Unnamed Woman a compilation of my music. I don’t know whether she ever really listened to it. Fortunately, she didn’t record over it.

The little felt pad under the middle of the cassette track where the head reads the tape is broken. The tape player kept wanting to shut it off, but I held down the play button until it stayed down. I discovered the best archive of my acoustic music in existence. I also discovered that I had completely forgotten a really good song. In fact, I was surprised how good it is.

Because the tape is so fragile, I’m not listening to it again until I transfer it to CD on Wednesday or Thursday.

Basketball Shoes

We went shopping today in the city by the bay – Cardiff Bay – an it is clear that the genetic differences in children are not limited to boy with trucks and girls with dolls.

The older unnamed child, being of the male of the species, wanted some new trainers. Specifically, he wanted basketball shoes. Not a brand name – just canvas basketball shoes. The younger unnamed child, a female of the species, needed “summer clothes”. Actually, she didn’t know she needed summer clothes – she was told this by the Unnamed Woman.

So we go into a large clothing retailer. The male child goes to the shoes, finds his size, tries them on, and is ready to go. All he wants to do is go outside and change into his new shoes. But insead he gets a lesson in shopping with females. They graze amongst the rows of dresses and skirts.

We were sent to find him some clothes. Clothes that would require an additional dresser to store them. He didn’t need any clothes. He didn’t want any clothes. He only wanted basketball shoes. He’d found basketball shoes. He wanted to go. He had places to go, people to see, basketball shoes to wear.

After a while, the rows of merchandise gleaned, the females had all the dresses and skirts and shoes the younger child “needed” out of that store and we went to the tills. I joked about the where we were going to fit the additional wardrobe in the younger child’s bedroom.

Apparently this wasn’t funny. Clothes are not a laughing matter.

Labour Attacks Jews

When Ed Balls isn’t having a punch up with Jack Straw in Cabinet meetings, he’s attacking Jewish schools.

He was admittedly on a witch hunt against all faith schools. He accused them of being covertly selective by charging admission fees. As it turns out the only schools he could find were five Jewish schools. They have a voluntary fee to cover religious education and security costs. Apparently in Londonstan it helps to have extra security if you are Jewish. More than half of the parents do not pay the fee.

Faith school are not in favour with Labour. LIke it or not, faith schools produce better results over all than their more secular counterparts. For a party that represents the increasing anti-religious bent of this island, this is not good news. They tend to have a more middle class demographic, perhaps because religion is a predominantly middle class phenomenon in this country. Chavs who don’t care about their children’s education don’t tend to care about God either, but they tend to vote Labour.

Of course the Labour elite who hate faith schools aren’t chavs. They come from the other end of things. They are too smart to believe in God.

The Board of Deputies of British Jews was demanding an apology from Ed Balls. I’m not saying he didn’t have the balls to show up, but he did send his deputy, schools minister Jim Knight to face the backlash, while he was away on holiday.

Press reports say Balls accepts Jewish schools have the right to charge voluntary contributions. He also admits that publishing details of spot checks by his department had been stressful for the schools involved. He claims it was in the public interest, but hasn’t explained how this could be the case.

Heston’s Challenge

I’ve heard it rumoured now that Charlton Heston has passed away, Al Gore has decided to accept his challenge to come over and take the rifle from his cold dead hands.

I also have to give a H/T to Matt for the link to speech Heston gave at Harvard in 1999. It really is worth reading or hearing.

The Qualifications Racket

One of the first vocabulary words I had to learn when I moved to this county was “qualifications”. They are a British obsession. If you were going for a job in the States and someone asked you about your qualifications, you would describe your work history

This is a country obsessed with qualifications. They are little pieces of paper that say you have completed some sort of course. Some of the most important qualifications are General Certificates of Secondary Education (GCSEs).

In the UK there is no such thing as a high school diploma. Instead, you receive a certificate for each subject you take. You don’t have a Grade Point Average. You get a string of grades, e.g., 5 A*’s (called “A stars”), 2 A’s, a B and a C, (if you are brainy), or a D, three E’s, two F’s, and a G (if you’re not or can’t be bothered). A*-C grades are considered good GCSEs. D-G grade aren’t. To actually fail, you have to get a “U”. In my subject, that would mean getting below 14%. In some subjects 16% will get you a C.

All of the exams are administered by national exam boards that have contracts with the Government. After all, schools can’t be trusted with so great a responsibility as examining their own students. Government always knows best.

Each department in each school chooses which exam board it will use and which syllabus within the options offered by the board. The thing about externally administered and marked exams is that they cost money. They cost so much money that more is being spent on exam fees than on textbooks and resources.

Let me put this in real terms. I misquoted a syllabus code to the exams officers at my school and she sent in the wrong number. Until she convinced them that it was because neither I or the school had ever done that exam before, so therefore they should waive the fee for the wrong entries, it was going to cost the equivalent of two years of my entire departmental budget.

No money had been spent by the exam board – no extra exam papers printed or anything. That was just the cost to go into the computer and change a 9 to a 0 in a course number for less than 100 exams.  Not that each entry would have to be changed manually – that could have taken as long as three minutes of a data processor’s time. It could have been done with a couple of key strokes.

This is because cost of the 100 exams is already the equivalent of two years of my departmental budget. In other words, we would have had to have paid double. No doubt some schools had to do just that. There’s no point in the exam board having the policy if they don’t plan on making some money from it.

As reported today in the Daily Telegraph, “One head teacher said that his exam costs had risen from £30,000 to £100,000 over five years for the same number of pupils.” So how much are these exam boards making each year? About £700 million in tax money. It’s a nice racket.

Fostering: Christians Need Not Apply

Some of you may remember the story of Pauline and Vincent Matherick, the Somerset couple who had fostered 28 children and were being pushed into promoting homosexuality. The foster son they had at the time was removed from them when they refused. After a national uproar, they were able to come to an agreement with Somerset County Council officials and were able to register again as foster carers.

It’s not like Somerset doesn’t need foster parents. As reported in the Daily Mail, the Council’s website says “that foster parents can be gay, disabled, on benefits, have a criminal record, be of any age, religion and gender, and be married or single”. This is true. I checked the website for myself. They keep the criminal record bit in the FAQs.

The thing they don’t need is people who ever spank their children for any reason. David and Heather Bowen don’t fit many of Somerset’s usual criteria. They are married, heterosexual, physically fit, and make their own living. He’s a chartered surveyor who volunteers as a school governor. She’s a special needs adviser. But, oops, they’re Christians. Go to church every Sunday and all that. Both involved in the children’s ministry. They admit that their beliefs mean that they occasionally spank their daughter as a last resort.

They never suggested they would spank children who belong to the State. They wouldn’t take the idea of being a foster parents that literally. But never mind. Clearly they are not the sort of people who support the ethos of the Somerset County Council and failed liberal parenting ideas rooted in an atheistic anthropology.

It would seem that Somerset doesn’t have enough listless hoodlums and slappers roaming its streets and schools. Given that they subscribe to a philosophy of mollycoddling children, that’s what they must be wanting. Of course this only results in more children that must be taken in by the State to prevent them from serious harm, and a need for more foster parents. Sounds like a downward spiral that, despite how bad things already are, is only just getting started.

Teetoddler

The Younger Unnamed Child is learning all of the Trisagion prayers, which form the basis of the bedtime prayers. Having not yet arrived at four years of age, she is learning them mostly by rote and doesn’t really understand fully when I have explained them to her and the Older Unnamed Child.

Not surprisingly, this leads to some misunderstanding of the words. After all, they are not in our three-year-old’s usual six-year-old vocabulary. We all laughed when she was learning “Most Holy Trinity . . .” and prayed, “Mister, pardon our inninnities,” instead of “Master, pardon our iniquities”.

It wasn’t until last night that I realised that she’s had an interesting take on the Lord’s Prayer. After all, she never missed a syllable of “Forgive us our tresspassess as we forgive those who tresspass against us.” Perhaps because, “And lead us not into temptation” was enunciated with perfection, I never realised she was praying, “And deliver us from the Evil Wine”.

Stealing From the Poor

You would think that a socialist Labour government would stick it to the rich and go easy on the poor. After all, that’s the point of socialism , isn’t it? Yeah, but Gordon Brown isn’t your dad’s socialist. This is New Labour, remember?

Gordon tried to impress everyone by lowering the main rate of income tax from 22% to 20%. Somebody has to pay for this, though. Gordon’s chosen the poor. The UK doesn’t have as many tax brackets as the US. In the US there are six brackets, ranging from 10% to 35%. Before April 1, the UK had three: 10%, 22%, and 40%. Now it has two. The 10% bracket has been taken away. Tax is payable at 20% from the first pound. At £36,000 ($72,000) it jumps to 40%. By contrast, an American at that income is still at 25%, $5,000 away from paying 28% on anything else he makes.

The 10% only covered the first £2,230 ($4,460). That is admittedly less than the $7,825 covered by the same bracket in the US, though as the Unnamed Women pointed out to me, it will still hit women working part time or students working their way through university the hardest. Obviously the lower the income, the greater the proportion of tax increase.

The Government are planning on a £6 to £8 billion increase in revenue from the change. To raise that money, it is estimated that 5 million households will be worse off. That would be the 5 million poorest households.

Just to re-emphasise the point I have made in the past about an elective dictatorship . . . After the Commons Treasury Committee condemns the changes tomorrow, they will be debated in the House of Commons in two weeks. It doesn’t really matter. They have already gone into effect. Despite the opposition from large numbers of his own party, the Prime Minister said there is no plan to change the policy. Not much point in having a Parliament, is there?

Notes from Hell

My most read post of the last month (and the third most read this year) was about Susan Pope, the school nurse at Malvern St James who was sacked for smacking her son once on the bottom for repeatedly swearing at her.

Today Mrs Pope has her own say, in a article she wrote for the Mail on Sunday. If you want an inside story on dealing with bureaucrats and police in the face of often bizarre accusations, you must read this. It has been nearly a year since her ordeal began and it is not over yet. Social Services are still infesting the lives of Mrs Pope and her husband, because the Popes won’t back down. Social Services have acted illegally repeatedly and gotten away with it. It is a story of abuse: a harrowing tale of governmental abuse of innocent people.

Social Services are helping to spread the cancer of family breakdown identified by Sir Paul Coleridge, the senior family court judge, as I mentioned yesterday. Sir Paul was not just concerned about marriages falling apart, but about the meltdown of parent-child relationships. Sir Paul’s views made not just the front page headline of the Daily Mail, but also the Daily Telegraph and the The Times. The case of the Popes just hightlights how Social Services can apply the blowtorch of aggressive incompetence to these relationships. Not all families are made of the same mettle. (As a side note, Al Gore will not be happy to know that Sir Paul thinks the breakdown of the family is worse than global warming.)

Mrs Pope mentions the subject of another popular post, former school bursar Denis Smith. It appears he was more involved in Mrs Smith’s sacking than previously suggested, whilst at the same time his own departure from the school was less honourable than reported.

The Doctor is in the House

Dr Who is back on British television screens for a fourth series under the guiding hand of Russell Davies, the third with David Tennant as the Doctor. Sadly for American fans, it will be available sometime in the future. Despite my best efforts, I cannot find out when this might be, or if it will be available for viewing on the BBC iPlayer.

With a new series will also come a new line of toys. After tonight’s episode I can expect that we will have at least one Adipose in the house. If we don’t buy it, I’m sure a well-meaning close relative will. As anyone who has seen the first episode with know, these new creatures will be the cheapest to manufacture in everything from hard plastic to soft stuffed toys. I could pretty much make one.

The Wrong Favourite

We picked the wrong favourite.

Today was the Grand National, the most valuable and biggest betting horse race in the world. Like many other people in this country, we never bet on the horses except the Grand National. Normally we put anything from £4 to £10 on the race.

This year we staked £25. We put £13 on the joint favourite Cloudy Lane and £12 on Hedgehunter, the 2005 winner. Unfortunately the other joint favourite, Comply or Die, won the race. Cloudy Lane finished 6th and Hedgehunter back in 13th.  The only good thing is that it didn’t cost us anything. The Unnamed Woman found a free £25 bet on the Internet. We also found a free £5 bet in the Daily Mirror that had to be placed by mobile phone text, but it didn’t take. I never got the text reply with the information to place the bet.

So we didn’t win anything this year, but at least we didn’t lose anything either.