Not Alexander

Alexander the Great, you will recall, wept because there were no new worlds to conquer. This is not so of the ..er.. less great Alexander 'Boris' Johnson. For Heaven's sake, John 'Vince' Cable, Gideon 'George' Osborne, why can't these people use their own names?

Anyway, Johnson wants to conquer No.10 Downing St, and he is, as the Americans say 'making his run'. He is looking for a safe seat for the 2015 election.

I don't like Johnson, and would never vote for him. Nor would I vote for any party which he led. He is a shallow self-publicist, albeit a good one. The speech in which he announced this was one where he declared that Britain would survive outside the European Union. Perhaps there should be joy in Heaven when any sinner repenteth but he has had ages to make this announcement (I have been saying it since 1991). I don't suppose he believes it - or indeed believes the contrary. He just saw which way the wind was blowing in the Tory Party.

He never seems to fail with his self-publicity, though. Even the occasion when he was stuck on a rope slide - something which would have been a disaster for, say, Harriet Harman, he managed to come out of it fairly well. The truth of the tale is that they ask you how much you weigh so they can adjust the pulley, and he refused to tell them and it went wrong. Like Winnie the Pooh, seeking the honey of publicity, he was stuck because he was too fat.

And I don't like his private life. For me anyone who could treat his marriage vows in such a shoddy way could equally forget a promise he made to the people who elected him. And here is an example, with this very speech. In 2012 he solemnly promised the electorate of London that he would not stand as an MP while he was mayor of London. Oooh! said the voters, that means he won't be standing in 2015. Wrong.

It is arrogance: promises don't apply to him, they only have to be kept by little people. We have seen this type of arrogance in some bank employees and in Andy Coulson, former editor of a newspaper. We really don't need it on the front line of politics.

Johnson is untrustworthy and a cheat. If the Tory Party take up with him he will let them down without a care in the world. For Alexander the Less they are the equivalent of Marx's useful idiots. It will be the biggest mistake they have ever made.

Pro Patria

The one hundredth anniversary of the start of the First World War. I have always thought I understood the Second World War, with its clear threat of invasion, but this previous one seems mysterious, even now, which is perhaps why it holds such fascination for the newspapers.

Commemoration began months ago, in an almost triumphal tone, as if the start of a war which killed millions were something to celebrate. Now it seems to be on a personal level, respecting 'our heroes' who died for our liberty.

Let me say I don't think the First World War was about our liberty and I think a hero risks his life knowing the risks. They volunteered, most of them - there was no conscription until 1916 - in utter ignorance.

They believed somehow that there was a glory which transcended dying. They must have been shocked at the lack of individualism engendered by so many troops and so much mechanisation. Agamemnon and Achilles were not mown down in their thousands, nameless, numberless corpses. It was no place for heroes. Were they naive, or were they duped?

If any of the Prime Ministers in my lifetime had asked me to go to war I should have looked very carefully, not just at the risks, but at the motive. Supposing Tony Blair had, from the safety of his bunker, asked for the ultimate sacrifice for what he perceived as the nation's duty!

Those were different, trusting times. No one supposed that Asquith or Grey had in fact no idea what a war would be like.

I can't help feeling that our present mood of scepticism and mistrust of politics, regretted by some, in fact makes our time far happier. Perhaps that is the lesson of the Great War.

As to the rest of it, we still seem keen to start a fight. We and the French bombed Libya to remove Kadafy without the slightest clue as to what would come after him. Our then Foreign Secretary, Hague, wanted to fight in Syria, in support of the very same Sunni Muslims who are now causing havoc in Iraq. And Iraq itself is a disaster, largely of our making. So is Afghanistan, which has lasted longer than the First and Second World wars together. Finally Hague (again) was down in Kiev supporting a mob which overthrew Ukraine's democratically elected government, ably supported by those great international statesmen Hermann van Rompuy and Catherine Ashton.

It seems the people have learned to say no, but the politicians have not. 

Against the rules

A British cricketer has caused outrage by wearing wristbands saying 'Defend Israel from terrorism' and 'Back the Israeli Defence Force'.

Nah. That really would have caused outrage. In fact Moeen Ali wore wristbands supporting Gaza and Hamas so it's all right. No one is going to complain, despite the fact that it is against the International Cricket Council's rules to wear any contentious or political clothing.

Unanimity

Mr Cameron has made another daft speech, this time on the Russia / Ukraine crisis.

He says there should be further sanctions on Russia, perhaps in the areas of defence and energy.

Of course Cameron knows that the French are selling warships to Russia and the Germans and Italians are buying their gas.

The EU started this crisis by destabilising Russia's borders but having successfully (in the British press at least) pinned the blame on Putin, cannot now agree on procedure.

You can't help feeling the world would be a better and safer place if the EU didn't get involved in foreign affairs at all, but there again that is also probably true of the British Foreign Office.

Beliefs

The fact that, after Mr Cameron's cabinet reshuffle, there are now - what? - five women in a cabinet of 22 does not seem to change much.

What is of most interest is that Cameron has done something cosmetic, at what, one would have thought, was an important juncture in the country's governance, the election being ten months away.

It's almost as if Cameron didn't actually believe anything (except that he'd like to be Prime Minister, he believes that all right) but just tinkers with things, irrespective of what they mean or how they function. Tony Blair was like this.

An extraordinary headline in the Telegraph says 'Eurosceptic cabinet will win back UKIP voters'. I presume this has been fed to the papers by Conservative HQ (the Telegraph has sacked most of its reporters and all its good writers).

At a pinch you might win back a UKIP voter (one who was going to vote UKIP in the General Election, not just the Euros) by setting out exactly how the UK's relationship with Europe needs to change. Here are some examples:

1. Leaving the Agricultural Policy which makes our food unnecessarily expensive so it can subsidise inefficient farming
2. Leaving the Fisheries Policy which makes our fish a 'common European resource' and thus eaten by the Spanish.
3. Abolishing the Working Time Directive which dictates how hard someone can work to support their family (and keeps it low so there is no pressure on the idle)
4.Changing the 'Single Market' so our exporters don't have to abide by the heavy burden of EU regulation when selling outside Europe, eg to the USA.
5. Stopping the prohibition of Britain from negotiating trade deals with other countries.
6. Stopping the regional policy whereby Britain subsidises Germany and vice versa but the money goes through the Eurocrats' hands. International subsidy only in cases of need, which does not include Britain.
7. Cancel all Health and Safety directives which cost jobs
8. Remove responsibility for regulating the City of London.

That would be a start. I would add kicking out Cyprus until it agreed the UN plan for resolving the border dispute with Turkey (which has agreed it).

But Cameron won't do any of this, because he doesn't really believe in anything. Come the referendum, the country will see him as so wishy washy it will vote to leave the EU.

But don't worry: if we do vote to leave Cameron will suddenly have been a eurosceptic all along. If we voted to become a circus he would volunteer to become a committed clown.

Perhpss we have.

Foreign lunches

The European Parliament is in the midst of making up its committees, a process involving arcane voting systems which is normally too soporific for this blog.

However I notice that the Foreign Affairs Committee, which allows members free travel at the taxpayer's expense, has no fewer than 71 members, 10% of the entire parliament!

Sports update

Just to keep you au courant, here is the state of our sporting performance:

Cricket: England whitewashed (5-0) in Australia then lose to Sri Lanka at home

Football: England out of the World Cup at an even earlier stage than usual

Rugby: England whitewashed (3-0) by New Zealand

Tennis: our boy (Scottish) out of Wimbledon

Cycling: Mark Cavendish crashes on first stage of the Tour de France (confusingly, in Yorkshire).

'Something,' I heard a commentator say, 'on which to build'.

Europe

Just what is going on about Britain and Europe? Anybody know?

David Cameron appears determined to accept the European Arrest Warrant. This means that a corrupt magistrate in a far away country can order your arrest, even for something which isn't a crime in Britain. The British police have to round you up and put you on a plane. Hardly any European countries have a habeas corpus law, under which you can only be held for a limited time without charge, and almost none of them have trial by jury. And yet our Prime Minister seems perfectly happy with this.

Now there are reports that he is giving away further policing powers to the EU, despite having said that he would call a referendum if that happened.

Why aren't his backbenchers in revolt? Why isn't the country in revolt? He is supposed to be clawing powers back from the EU, not giving more away.

Cheating

It seems - and correct me if I have got this wrong - that in the World Cup Holland beat Mexico by a single goal from a penalty at the end of the match.

The penalty was given because the referee thought that a Dutch player, Arwen Robben, was tripped. Mr Robben has since admitted that he 'dived' - that is to say threw himself on the ground pretending to have been tripped.

Mr Robben did not admit this at the time. He did not retire from the rest of the tournament in shame, and the Dutch team manager did not dismiss him. The penalty goal was not disallowed. The Dutch have not offered a replay. The football governing body will take no action.

So Mr Robben cheated, and felt so confident that nothing would happen to him that he even admitted it.

What a strange game football is, and what a strange world we live in. Bring back Luis Suarez, who at least bites his opponents openly and without subterfuge.

Grubby

At he time of the recent European lunch summit, as European leaders were queueing up to attack David Cameron, one said his proposal for the Heads of Government to decide the President of the European Commission was advocating a grubby backroom deal.

As a matter of fact on this, at least, Cameron was right. The Lisbon Treaty (bet he wishes he'd kept to his cast iron promise to hold a referendum, eh?) says that the Heads of Government will decide 'taking into account the results of the election'. Any idiot can see that the election showed an enormous rise in anti-EU voting, so they should have taken that into account.

But while we are on the subject of grubby deals, that is the way Europe operates and one of the best reasons Britain should have nothing to do with it.

Take Matteo Renzi. He at first cosied up to Cameron and said no, he thought a woman should have the job. He then went to Angela Merkel and said he would support Juncker if he achieved flexibility on Italy's debt. Renzi came away from the conference victorious. Here is what Mrs. Merkel said about it: 'flexibility on the fiscal pact does not mean member states get to rewrite the rules.' Only one of these can be right.

François Hollande, who achieved nothing at the summit, announced that he had been speaking for 'the concept of Europe'.

What the others couldn't understand about Cameron is that they expected him to ask (privately, nothing to be said to the press) for some little concession, say, on agriculture. They were astonished when he simply spoke his mind.

People who attack Cameron for not making friends and building coalitions should have been honest about this. The European way is to discover which way the wind is blowing, give in but obtain some minor concession. It is not the British way.

I presume Cameron now realises that there is no hope of reforming the EU. For him it will not be a question of recommending withdrawal: it will be a question of changing a word here, obtaining a trivial concession there and then pulling the wool over the eyes of the British Electorate. Betcha!

Witch Hunt

It seems that the Police's witch hunt of celebrities has turned to the late actor Leonard Rossiter, famous for Reginald Perrin.

Er....Hello? He's dead.

That means natural justice cannot be served here because he is unavailable to answer the charges and defend himself.

Why not drop it, eh?

EYNTKA...

Everything you need to know about Jean-Claude Juncker

First, the pronunciation: as everyone outside America knows, the first part is not pronounced Gene, but Zhon. Good. The more luxuriance and pursing of the lips, the more it sounds as if you don't approve of foreign names, even for foreigners.

It's the second part that seems to get people, particularly the BBC. They are giving us the anglicised Claud, whereas the approach ought to be coherent, Gene-Claud or Zhon-Clode.

Juncker, more commonly Junker, is an old Northern European honorific for landed gentry.

So J-C's name is roughly the same as J.C.Squire, the 20th century essayist and poet, who was a bit of a boozer.

J-C has been getting a bit of a rough time in the British Press recently. For myself I think Europe is safer in the hands of a man who likes a drop to drink, and I confess I couldn't come up with stuff like 'Europe is a modern, dynamic economy' without a couple of sharpeners after breakfast.

J-C is a fairly common stereotype on the mainland: cutting through all the debate about centralisation, they mistrust the nation state and feel that putting everyone together under the benign governance of people too important to be merely elected is the optimal political system. Of course J-C would be one of these Lords. Of course.

This view, and it is important to recognise that it is widespread, stems in part from World War II and in part from a recognition that the direction of travel (towards a united Europe) would be interrupted if the electorate got grumpy (as now).

Whatever its merits or demerits it is clear that this is not our system.

So rejecting Zhon-Clode was merely picking a fight. Merkel and the rest knew that they could, if necessary, pick someone else with the exact same mindset.

What this episode has shown is that the fundamental point, that Europe should be run by an unelected élite, and that national power should be kept to a minimum, is something they are not going to back down on.

Our choice is simple.

England expects

It turns out, and I have this on good authority, that England could stay in the World Cup under certain circumstances, which include Italy winning their next two matches.

Italy's hugely talented forward, Mario Balotelli, says that he can arrange this in return for a kiss from the Queen.

Balotelli does not detail the nature of the kiss, whether a peck on the cheek (Mwah! - ciao Mario) or something altogether more intimate, but surely now, as so often in the past, is the time for Her Majesty to put her country first.

Dulce et decorum

The Uruguayan football team, which England is due to meet on our next exciting attempt to return home, has complained that its poor performance against Costa Rica was caused by the Brazilian customs authorities' seizure of its stock of dulce de leche, the milky snack so popular in that part of the world.

The England camp will be hoping the supplies have not been released, confident in the knowledge that if the Brazilian hosts were to impound stocks of British food, our team's performance would likely improve.

The way to make dulce de leche is to put a tin of condensed milk into boiling water for three hours. When you get it out and open it, there will be the caramelised brown gloop these Uruguayans love.

Now, don't blame me if you burn yourself getting the tin out of the water, or if it explodes while boiling, or a stream of hot caramel spurts into your eye as you wield the tin opener. I am still in a body harness from my last kitchen accident.

Still, what would cooking be without a bit of risk?

An attack on freedom

In 1961, with the passing of the Suicide Act, it became no longer illegal to kill yourself.

Obviously, if you had succeeded, you would be judged by a higher court, but until then if you botched your attempt at doing yourself in you could be prosecuted.

Naturally you might even now be in breach of some by-law, like jumping off Beachy Head, but in broad terms I am allowed to buy a carving knife (if over 18) and slit my throat, hold a shotgun to my head (if I have a licence for the weapon) and pull the trigger, or jump off the roof of my house.

But I am not allowed to kill myself by going through the windscreen of my car (through not wearing a safety belt) or throwing myself off a motorbike without a helmet.

Why? Don't tell me it is because the NHS has to pay money to treat me if I fail: we don't make it illegal to live in a town (more likely to suffer from respiratory disease), or climb a mountain (risk of falling off) or to be a promiscuous homosexual (more likely to get AIDS). The NHS is an insurance scheme: if you are a cautious healthy individual you pay the same income tax as a heavy drinker or smoker. Why do we single out drivers and bikers?

The fine imposed by this supposedly Conservative vindictive nanny government for not wearing a crash helmet is £2,000. Some MP ought to have the balls to propose the abolition of these 'crimes'.

Albania

While we are on the subject of Mr. Cameron, it now appears that despite promising to do something about migration to the UK from poorer EU countries, he is going to support the application for membership of - and therefore unfettered immigration from - Albania.

The average wage in Albania is £300 a month, a third of the British minimum wage.

Magna Carta

David Cameron, laughably in my view, has said he wants children to learn about Magna Carta. They will learn that amongst its principles were to outlaw the arbitrary arrest of any British subject and the law of habeas corpus where a subject cannot be imprisoned without charge.

They will find in later life that Cameron was happy with the European Arrest Warrant, where a country - Romania for example - can order the arrest of a British subject for something which is not a crime in the UK. The British police have to arrest the suspect and send him to Romania where he will find there is no habeas corpus and they don't even have trial by jury.

This is only one example of Cameron's hypocrisy. It is not that he is deliberately trying to deceive us to pursue what he believes in, it's that he doesn't believe in anything.

I hope everyone remembers this at the next election.

Iraq - what to do

If you're not a Muslim, ask yourself this: which is better, Shia or Sunni?

The distinction between the two arose from a dispute as to who should succeed the prophet Muhammed after his Death in 632.

In Syria and Iraq, before Western intervention, there existed the strange state of affairs that Syria was a predominantly Sunni country with Shiite rulers (the Assad family) whilst Iraq was a predominantly Shia country with Sunni rulers (Saddam family). I have written before that a great deal of unpleasantness could have been avoided if they had simply swapped leaders.

But no, the West intervened and Iraq elected Mr Al Maliki who was going to be an inclusive figure for all Iraqis but turned out, as son as the troops left, to be simply pro Shia.

So the Sunnis rebelled and some of them crossed over from Syria where they had been fighting Assad.

And now some of our half-witted politicians, and the pseudo-statesman Tony Blair, are bleating that we should intervene. And this is where the question at the start of this post becomes important: on which side? Should we intervene in favour of the Shias, allied with Bashar al-Assad, Russia and Iran, or on the Sunni side alongside the ISIS militants, who were chucked out of Al Qaeda for being too brutal?

The answer is that this being a purely sectarian war we shouldn't intervene at all, but let them get on with it. Tony Blair says that we will suffer terrorism in the future, but we suffered a lot when we intervened in Iraq, because those Islamists who are looking to resurrect the Caliphate felt we had invaded their country. We are not going to get more terrorism by not taking sides.

They will not create a united Muslim caliphate in the middle east because they can't stand each other. Long may it continue.

Luxembourg

One of the happier tales surrounding the 70th anniversary of D-Day is that when Luxembourg was liberated the cheering people were astonished to see climbing out of the leading tank their own heir to the throne Crown Prince Jean. On escaping to Britain after the Nazi invasion he joined up and as a lieutenant in the Irish Guards had fought his way up from Normandy. He eventually became Colonel in Chief of the regiment.

Bethink you of that, Mr Juncker.

Our Shirl

Just check the date before you read this, from a speech by the Education Secretary. It is 2014.

'How can it be right that more than a fifth of children left primary school without having reached a basic level of literacy and numeracy?'

As the men were racing up the Normandy beaches seventy years ago, Parliament passed the 1944 Education Act, supposed to stop this. Seventy years ago. Now we are told we can sort it in another generation.

So, where are the apologies? What about from you, Shirley Williams, educated at elite St. Paul's Girls' School who moved house in order to get her daughter into elite Godolphin & Latymer, but who pushed through Comprehensive Schools and banned grammar schools?

Just a little apology for two generations of children whom we have failed due to your madness and hypocrisy?

Driverless

Speaking of driving, do you wonder what it's like in Google's new driverless car?

Two people sitting side by side talking, perhaps caressing, neither with hands on the steering wheel, while the car careers along?

Come to Italy and see.

Il telefono

I rarely criticise Italy, in part because I like it here and in part because I am a guest, but I have to mention one of the worst characteristics of Italians, worse than their crazy, corrupt political system or their inability to drive cars. It is their attitude to the telephone.

Last night a delivery van came up our drive and the driver got out and hammered on the window. When I opened the front door he was on the telephone. I asked what he wanted and he held up a hand for me to be silent.

I tried again and then shouted that either he could talk to me or the telephone but he carried on. As I was closing the door he said 'Hold on, Giorgio, I've got a problem with a foreigner'. He was carrying a courier's delivery instructions so I snatched them from him and shouted directions (he was still on the 'phone).

In Italy, the person you are talking to on the 'phone is more important than the one you are talking to face to face. I was once in a meeting with some minor government official - I had made an appointment - and his 'phone rang so often (he answered it each time) that I was beginning to forget why I had come. So I 'phoned him.

He was a bit confused hearing my voice so I said we'd leave the line open so we weren't disturbed any more. He looked at me incredulously but it worked.

Super Mario?

The European Central Bank's decision to adopt negative interest rates is not the first time this has

happened. In Switzerland in the 1980s it was fairly common in order to stop upward pressure on the Swiss Franc, and it is worth noting that it didn't help much. The markets decided Swiss Francs were the place to be and suffered the cost.

What ECB Governor Mario Draghi has done will have a short term effect of pushing the euro down, but it may be too little and it is quite likely to be too late.

Here is how it would work.

1. A bank, let's say French, keeps money on deposit at the ECB because it is safe there: safer than depositing it with another French bank and a lot safer than lending it to a French company.

2. It either keeps the money at the ECB, wearing the cost, or draws it out.

3. It decides whether to shrink its balance sheet, that is to say repay the corresponding creditor, or lend it to someone else. The other French banks are in the same position, as are most European banks, so it seeks out a company to lend to.

4. The company borrows for a new project, which it is cautious about because Europe is already depressed.

5. It slowly invests and takes on workers.

6. The workers, once they have been employed for a bit, feel confident and spend more.

7. That extra spending generates more investment and the eurozone recovers.

Apart from the fact that in those seven steps a lot can go wrong, it is easily seen that it takes time. The economist's rule of thumb is 6-9 months before industrial activity picks up and a further 6-9 months before prices improve.

Has Draghi left this too late?

El Rey

Despite a lot of sniping in the media, I believe Juan Carlos will be remembered fondly by history. He could have allowed military dictatorship to continue in Spain but stuck to his line and ushered the country into the modern era.

Handing over now, however, is something of a hospital pass. Felipe must deal with calls for a Republic and with Catalan (and other) attempts at secession, at a time the people are still suffering from austerity.

Good luck to him.

Crazy prices

The European Commission has warned that house price inflation will damage the UK economy.

They may be right - a broken clock is right twice a day - but it does seem impertinent that people who have made such a mess of the Eurozone economy (the ECB is about to take Emergency measures to avoid the spiral to deflation) should lecture us. The unfortunate folk in Europe would like a bit of house price inflation.

The facts, in case anybody is interested, are that if you bought a house in 2007 it is just now - this month - getting back to the level you paid for it. I don't call that crazy.

Source: Nationwide.co.uk

Bad exchange

'No soldier is left behind' intones President Obama as he buys the freedom of an American soldier with the release of Taliban prisoners from Guantanamo Bay.

Laudable, but the fact remains that America has paid, and every terrorist in the world now knows it will pay again. Every potential hostage in extremist areas must be trembling.

The fact also remains that the President can release prisoners, surely making the separation of Executive and Justice a laughing matter.

I congratulate the freed American sergeant and his family, but this is by no means good news.

The devil you know

Most people don't follow the rarified bits of European politics, feeling, correctly in my view, that it will go on in the direction chosen by unelected politicians, whatever the voters might think.

But if you have a modest concern about how your life is being managed by other people, consider this. The European Parliament is the institution which is put forward as being democratic, even though its little rules mean that anyone who is against the whole business is never allowed to speak for more than one minute (sometimes two). The Parliament decided that it wanted a bit of influence over the Head of the Commission, so it introduced the concept of favourites being recommended by the bogus political groupings. These are called Spitzencandidaten, and I hope you have noticed that the language for important things has changed from French to German, whilst everyone actually speaks English to each other.

Anyway, the two Spitzencandidaten put up by the main parties were Martin Schulz, currently leader of the Parliament and a leftish integrationist, and Jean-Claude Juncker, former Luxembourger Prime Minister and a rightish integrationist. No one, it appears, likes Schulz (Berlusconi once said he would be suitable in a film about Nazi Germany as a concentration camp guard) and Mrs Merkel favours Juncker.

To appreciate this you have to try to get into the mindset of these people. They believe in the 'European Project' absolutely and to the exclusion of all else. That is to say they believe that the nation state is an outdated institution and that government, to protect the Union against silliness by the electorate, should be by the people who know how to do it.

Cameron appears on the surface to be cutting up rough. He has said that Juncker is such a federalist that his appointment as Commission President could cause the bringing forward of the British Referendum and an early exit from the EU.

Two other pieces of information I should give you: one is that the Parliament reserved the right itself to elect the Commission President. The other is that Tony Blair said in an interview that he would like to 'help' Europe and is next week making a speech in Germany on how he would like to see Europe in the future. In William Hague's terms he is 'on manoeuvres'.



Is Cameron trying to push Blair into the job? Personally I view the possibility with horror: at least we know what Juncker is about; Blair might believe one thing or another or nothing and still say something different.

Better the devil you know....

See what it is yet?

I wonder if it was entirely appropriate for Rolf Harris to perform, at his trial, 'Jake the Peg (with the extra leg)'.

Elections

So,did the earth move for you? Earthquake is one of the commoner descriptions of the election results as Nigel Farage and Marine Le Pen sweep all before them, but....I'm not so sure. A Euro election is a good time for a protest but that doesn't mean the voter won't return to type, certainly in France. A few years ago the socialist vote collapsed but left-wingers were seen going into the poling booths holding their noses as they voted for Chirac in order to keep out Marine's father, Jean-Marie.

The British voter is a little different. I remember people saying to me that they wouldn't vote for me because I couldn't win. Farage's success this time will make more people think it is OK to vote for him.

But the mainstream politicians are wondering what they should do now. I think it is easy to guess what will happen in Europe: they will ignore the vote, as they always do. They will tell themselves that what the silly little people really meant was that they wanted more Europe.

In the UK there may be some small change. Ed Miliband might now endorse the idea of a referendum, although I think he was Always going to do that anyway. What would be a breakthrough is if Cameron announced that in the event of his renegotiations not working he would campaign to leave. We'll see.

I have a piece in the Commentator about the European results. Read it; it's free.

Still Life

I must say I find it strange that in the 21st century the cure for fractured vertebrae is to lie still in the hope that they heal up. There is apparently an alternative of injecting plastic into the broken bits but that seems unappealing.

Anyone who finds themselves dependent on rolling news broadcasts will immediately notice how they seize on a topic and won't let go, however uninteresting it becomes, like a puppy with an old shoe it has found. One of the worst of these was the Sky News coverage of the Oscar Pretorius trial, a minute-by-minute coverage of tedious legalisms and nothing serious (we know he shot her, the question is why).

Then we had the Ukraine, of course, and Prince Charles saying Putin was behaving like Hitler. Charles was wrong, of course: firstly he should have kept his mouth shut (he surely can't seriously have thought a woman he had just met would respect 'a private conversation'?). He was also wrong in that the crisis was caused by Hermann van Rompuy and Baroness Ashton's naive foreign policy, not by President Putin.

And there was Astra Zeneca. In the first place it would be hard to describe this as a British Company: the great majority of its employees work in other countries, the great majority of its shareholders are foreign institutions, its Chief Executive is French and its Chairman Swedish. Then there is the madness of the Government intervening. I own shares in Astra Zeneca and I don't want the likes of John 'Vince' Cable telling me who I can sell them to. Supposing a Russian oligarch offered you an excellent price for your house, and then this whining ballroom dancer appears and says you can't sell to him because he may be horrid. B****r off!, is what I say.

Then there were the elections....

High score

My latest kitchen accident was higher scoring than I thought: 2 fractured vertebrae and I must lie still for a bit.

I am resolving for a life on takeaways but the kitchen bug will probably get me again. Hey-ho

This time?

It is the Eurovision song contest again (Hurray!) and this year rather than offering a 1960s loser Britain's candidate will be Molly Smitten-Downes, who must have had a tough time at school with a name like that.

To save you having to watch the whole affair, here it is.



Still, I expect she's a nice girl underneath all that cliché

Our boys

There are outraged reports in today's press that British soldiers have been photographed next to dead Taliban in Afghanistan.

I don't know who the Left think we are sending out to Afghanistan - perhaps they imagine it was an army of Guardian reading social workers. In fact it was thousands of tough young lads, whom our schools system has largely neglected, who are trained for fighting and told that their job is to kill Her Majesty's enemies.

If we don't want this type of person representing Britain abroad, we shouldn't send them.

The r-word

One of the silliest pieces of news has been the story of Jeremy Clarkson and the n-word. Incidentally, don't you find this terminology daft? I first heard it from George H Bush (Bush père) referring to the F-word. It doesn't seem to convey meaning in a straightforward way.

Anyway, Clarkson previously had referred to an Asian gentleman as a 'slope' (the s-word, or perhaps one of the s-words, this is difficult). For myself I shouldn't have known this was slang for an Easterner had not some daft woman threatened to sue.

Now, apparently in an out-take, Clarkson recited the Eeny.meeny-miny-mo tag, mumbling the n-word, but this was not enough. So he's a racist.

Surely this is pretty low-level offensive, indeed not much more than silly. Why didn't the BBC edit it out?

Contrary to newspaper reports, the BBC will not fire Clarkson. The reason is that the licence fee goes towards making the programmes. There is some other income from sale of material, much of which is provided by Clarkson, and this pays for the chauffeur driven cars and decent lunches of the executives. There would be uproar, not just among the general public, if they got rid of him.

I am just wondering if our problem isn't over-use of the n-word, but of the r-word?

The Master

I generally regard myself as a modest type, but on one issue I will brook no dissent. When it comes to kitchen accidents no one comes close.

Over the years I have suffered sprains, bruises, dropped stuff on my feet, got hot oil, water or fat in most anatomical locations and of course got burns everywhere. My culinary career has been tantamount to self-harm.

My latest contribution was to put a pan of hot oil on the cooker such that it could not balance. As I noticed it falling towards me, with great presence of mind I leaped backwards. During this manoeuvre a shoe came off, I slipped and lost my footing and landed heavily on the terracotta floor on my backside, sliding along until my head struck a solid chestnut door.

Don't try this at home, children.

In over a week of enforced misery, lying on my front, under heavy medication, I have absorbed the news stories without being able to comment or even, as is my usual practice, throw things at the television.

I am now heading for the land of the living, if not for civility. 

The LoUC

Interesting news for fans of the Law of Unintended Consequences.

Europe doesn't allow the death penalty, but is good at making the drugs to execute criminals in America.

Europe banned the export of these drugs, because of the use the Americans were putting them to.

Since the Americans have had to find other drugs, the average execution has taken a lot longer, perhaps 20 minutes more, and, as we saw in Oklahoma the other day, the prisoner can die in pain.

What is the answer to this (other than the USA banning the Death penalty, which is unlikely)?

It is for an American company to buy the companies which make the drugs, then manufacture them in the USA. Obama should tell Pfizer to add them to its shopping list.

More racism

The media have not been shy of telling us that the UK Independence Party has had a bad week, being referred to everywhere now as 'racist'.

UKIP promptly went on to top the opinion polls, being now expected to come first in the European Elections.

They must be doing something right, mustn't they?

I sometimes wonder how it would be if the whole country, other than a few bien pensant lefties in London, turned out to be, in their terms, 'racist'. It reminds me of that East German politician who said 'the people have lost the trust of the state'. These people would be writing their bilious articles and displaying their high blood pressure on television while the rest of us ignored them and got on with being utterly horrid, in our own way.

There would be two separate realities, one for the media classes and one for the rest of us. Indeed, perhaps it is already like that.

Quite interesting.

The men in charge

I often think back to the time the Glazer family bought Manchester United. Hundreds of supporters paraded at the stadium with banners saying 'Manchester United is not for sale'.

But of course it was: it was quoted on the stock Exchange which is an invitation to buy or sell the shares.

Now they are getting a new manager. The media have been having earnest discussions with former players and heads of fan clubs 'So, Jim, the man the fans want is....'

Of course it is completely irrelevant who the fans want. Manchester wanted to hold on to the previous manager until they had confirmed a replacement but the Stock Exchange rules didn't allow this: if there are rumours circulating you have to deal with them publicly.

Equally, the reason the interim manager and former player, Ryan Giggs, won't get the job is that the investors probably haven't heard of him as a manager. They will require someone who has managed a team to win international tournaments.

All the fans are required to do is traipse through the gate every Saturday and buy the shirts.

Honour

Chung Hong-won, Prime Minister of S. Korea, has resigned over the ferry disaster.

He was not captain of the ship, he did not write the rules for conduct of a ship in open waters, it was not he who failed to give the order to abandon the vessel.

But it was indeed a disaster, he was the man at the top, and he has quit, like a gentleman. He bowed to the people he served.

I do hope some British and European politicians have been following this story.

Ukraine; the next step

I hesitate to re-enter the debate on the Ukraine. A dismal story in European statecraft has been mishandled at every step, such that it is hard to see an end to it.

Let me explain, however, how there could be an end.

As I have pointed out, Russian aggression was the likely outcome of Europe's wooing of Ukraine. A child could have seen that. Putin carefully cultivates his image as a tough guy, but it is not purely for his image. If the former Soviet states on the periphery of Russia know that he means business they won't step out of line. He has to be able to rattle his sabre at America and Europe.

So instead of more sanctions, which will not harm America but which will do lasting damage to Europe, let Putin win something. Back down a bit, concede a little so he has something to show for it all: not just the man who lost Western Ukraine but the man who stood up to the West.

That way there is a chance of peace.

Rome

Yesterday, had it not been Easter Monday, and had I not been out for a long lunch with friends, I should have been celebrating the 2,767th birthday of Italy's capital city, said by legend to have been founded on 21st April, 753BC.

Still a great place.

Right and Wrong

I have probably mentioned that I knew the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, in a previous life and think very highly of him.

I cannot, however, leave unchallenged the tripe he has spouted about homosexuality in the Daily Telegraph (is this the only newspaper which covers religious matters?). He says, and I paraphrase, that much as he would like to recognise gay marriage he can't because the Africans wouldn't like it.

Sorry, Justin, but we expect you to know. The reason people have been leaving the Church of England in hordes over the past few decades is that it doesn't appear to believe in anything. For those of us who drift in and out of religion, and it is most of us, it is like going for a swim from a ship with a loose anchor: you never know where it will be when you want to get back on.

The job of the Archbishop of Canterbury is to know whether, in the sight of God, gay marriage is acceptable or unacceptable. If acceptable it would be quite wrong to deny homosexuals marriage in Church, ie in the sight of God.

If he thinks homosexual marriage is the right thing then, it being an important topic, he should advise those who refuse it that they are leaving the Church.

If it is wrong, he should be prepared to upset the liberals and say it is wrong, or leave his job if he can't.

If he blubbers that he thinks it is OK but that some others don't, people will think him soaking wet and ignore everything else he says.

People are entitled to be told by the Church what is right and what is wrong, and entitled to a Church which commits itself to these principles.

Get a grip, Justin!

Christian?

It seems that fifty-five people have signed a letter to the Daily Telegraph complaining about David Cameron's statement that Britain is a Christian country.

They are incorrect.

Most countries - America and France are the best known for this - have in their constitution provision for the separation of Church and state. Nothing wrong with that, it's just that it isn't the case in Britain. The Head of State is head of the Church, Christian bishops, but no Buddhists, Muslims, Jews or Jainists, sit as of right in the upper house.

Unlike most countries but like, say, Pakistan or Israel, Britain has an established religion, and this is not dependent on the number of people in Church on  any given day.

Where we differ from so many other countries with established religions is that we welcome people of other faiths and protect their rights. This doesn't mean Britain has changed religion. It hasn't.

Unhelpful

This blog salutes Dr. Kari Poikolainen, an alcohol expert, formerly of the World Health Organisation, for his recent report on recommended drinking levels.

He says that drinking only becomes harmful at more than 13 units a day, equivalent to about a litre of wine.

The guidelines from the National Health Service are for 3-4 units for a man, so Dr. Poikolainen is coming in at three or four times the recommendation.

Naturally the busybodies are furious. Julia Manning, of the think tank 2020 Health describes it as 'an unhelpful contribution to the debate'.

Incidentally I love this use of the word 'unhelpful', meaning 'differing from what I say and therefore to be banned or ignored'.

2020 Health is funded by the Government, and Ms Manning is hardly likely to jeopardise her salary by saying 'Oh, sorry, I've been talking complete cock all along'.

I personally found Dr. Poikolainen's report very helpful.

Holy War

I think I have mentioned before in these pages that Iraq was a Shia Moslem country run by a cabal of Sunnis, whereas Syria is a Sunni Moslem country run by a cabal of Shias. A great deal of unpleasantness could have been avoided if they had simply swapped leaderships.

Of course the Syrian conflict is still going on, kept out of the press by Ukraine, a lost Malaysian Airlines flight and a sunk Korean Ferry. We learn of Abdullah Deghayes, 18, of Brighton, who went out to Syria and was killed.

Now, usually when we hear of British Moslems going to war it is against us: some sort of jihad they have got up, but this is a purely Islamic thing: one set of Moslems fighting another. Of course our rather gung-ho Foreign Secretary, William Hague, would have got us involved if he could have, but Parliament, for once, put a stop to it.

So it is no different, really, from our fathers and grandfathers going to fight in the Spanish civil war: if that is what they want to do, fine. Around 400 British nationals have gone to fight in Syria. Around 20 have died.

It's just a bit depressing that, despite being British, they see themselves primarily as foreign.

Mystery

I've been away on holiday to Sicily, a land of strange contrasts. I've written about it in The Commentator, an internet magazine you should read (it's free!).

As I write, a frantic search is still going on for the disappeared Malaysian Airlines jet in the Indian Ocean.

Why? There is no chance of finding anyone alive after all this time. We (and why does it include the British?) seem to be devoting far more resources to it than we did to the Air France flight which disappeared a few years ago.

There is a lot of speculation on the internet, as always, but even people like myself who reject conspiracy theories are beginning to feel that there is something we haven't been told.

Marvin

Incredible - well incredible for me anyway - but yesterday it was 30 years since Marvin Gaye died.

He was shot, aged 44, by his own father.

Gaye led a difficult life, but he could do this:

France

I don't follow football, but as an example of life management it repays inspection. When a team is doing badly, the trick is not to fire the players, but the manager, the guy responsible for the strategy.

In France, François Hollande, responsble for the strategy of injecting more socialism into the country (the State takes up 57% of the economy), and for borrowing more and more money, has been found out by the electorate. He is the most unpopular President ever and has taken the biggest drubbing ever seen in the Fifth Republic.

So what happened? He sacked the Prime Minister whom he had appointed.

It would be like the bottom ranking team sacking the ball boys.

Earth Hour

Bugger, I missed it. I was watching, on a device which used electricity, Jeremy Clarkson and his friends drive smoky diesel lorries through Burma.

Most entertaining it was, too. Better than turning the lights off, anyway.

I reported on this a few years back when the Environment Minister of British Colmbia lit candles all over his residence and set the cat on fire. That's a carbon pawprint, if you like.

Earth Hour is not for people who are worried about the planet but for people who want to look as if they are. Almost no electricity is saved and it may be that the sudden surge in use at the end of the hour means the event might cause more to be used.

If you think that not using electricity will save the planet, don't use any. You'll be happy. But don't tell us about it. Keep it to yourself.

Virtue is its own reward.

The clocks change

Don't get me started on this, it's bad for my blood pressure. I am remaining on GMT and suggest you do too.

Cock a snook at the State. Say 'I am a free person and know what the time is without being told, wrongly, by a bureaucrat I am paying to do so.'

Keep saying this until you are sane.

The Scottish Pound

We are still hearing a lot of nonsense about a possibly independent Scotland and its currency.

'Walking out of the UK means walking out of the UK pound' George Osborne is reported to have said. I haven't read what he actually said, because I can't be bothered, but he should take care that reportage of his speeches does not come out as utter drivel or loose thinking.

Of course Scotland can keep the pound: it just keeps printing out its Scottish pound notes and fixes their rate at 1:1 to the British £. At present the Bank of England holds £1 for every Scottish £ printed. Also it stands by Scottish Banks as lender of last resort. It is these two things which would change, unless we had a currency union.

As to allowing a currency union in return for Scotland permitting our nuclear weapons at Faslane, the suggestion is risible. Why would we want our nukes in a foreign country? Put them in Portsmouth which already has the skilled workforce and traditions to cope.

Scotland would be very unwise either to seek a currency union or simply to adopt the UK£ as its currency because it would result in it being overvalued and causing a recession, such as we see in Southern Europe today, which has had a vastly overvalued currency (the €) for years, caused by political will rather than economic sense. Thousands of Scottish jobs would be lost.

Let's adopt a simple policy. If they go, they go. They can adopt the Japanese yen as their currency for all I care but they get no help when the plan fails.

Cats

The news that cats may be giving TB to humans is disturbing.

When we thought that badgers were spreading TB - even if only to cattle - we had a cull.

The question is whether they should be shot, or gassed in their suburban homes.

The government must act swiftly.

The way we live now

I don't know what you made of the news that aborted embryos in NHS hospitals are thrust into the furnace in order to heat the hospital as part of an energy saving scheme. Perhaps you sighed and reflected that this is the sort of world we have created for ourselves.

For me, and perhaps for many, the idea that this is part of a waste to energy scheme lends it a particular horror, I don't know why.

I suppose there will have to be some enquiry, which won't change anything except in that it will make some people feel better about it.

What I can't listen to, however, is people saying that it shows lack of respect for human remains. These are unborn people whom we as a society have decided to kill because they are inconvenient.

Now that is lack of respect.

Europe

Tomorrow Nigel Farage, head of UKIP and Nick Clegg, head of the Liberal Democrats, will debate Europe. For myself, I don't believe it will be an earth shattering event: the parties are so far apart there can be no synthesis, only an individual restating of existing positions. I suppose the major outcome will be the damage it does to the Tories.

Anyhow, just in time for this event Business for Britain, a Group campaigning for European reform, has come up with some rather interesting research.

Since 1996 Britain has voted against proposals in the Council of Ministers 55 times, but on each occasion that proposal has gone on to become European Law. Our vote has counted for nothing, not even once.

The other shocking aspect to this is that we have only voted 'No' 55 times. There have been a damned sight more than 55 damaging proposals in the last 18 years.

Forward, Nigel.

Dealing with foreigners

It appears that Gennady Timchenko, a Russian oligarch, sold his share in the oil trading company Gunvor the day before the US put him on its blacklist. Naturally the list had been leaked.

The swine. The utter swine. This is the problem with blacklisting Johnny Foreigner, he just doesn't play by the rules. Timchenko should have left his billions where they were and taken it like a man.

But no. He weaselled out.

Shocking.

Ummmm....is there any chance of the West behaving sensibly on Ukraine, admitting we instigated the trouble by supporting a mob which staged an illegal coup against the country's properly elected government, and just letting it go before we suffer any further embarrassment?

Probably not.

St. Patrick's Day

The referendum

I smiled when I read that various Western leaders have described the referendum in the Crimea as 'illegal'.What does the properly elected Ukrainian Head of State say? Given the fact that he is currently in Russia I expect he says 'yes' to it, making it ....er....not illegal.

Of course Britain is allowing a referendum on whether Scotland should remain in the UK, even though the Scots are not ethnically different from their countrymen, do not speak a different language and have much deeper ties to the Union than Crimea has to Ukraine.

And I saw the European Union had condemned it, too. I think President Putin will be giggling here. He will remember that Ireland, having had a referendum, was sent back to the polls twice, because it got the wrong answer, and that when France and Holland voted in referenda against the new constitution, it was changed into a treaty, so there wouldn't be another vote.

Putin hasn't tried any of that in Crimea, he's too honest.

This has been hypocrisy taken to a shocking extent, and we're as bad as the rest of them.

Oxfam

I remember going on a sponsored walk for Oxfam - it must have been a good forty years ago - and I have donated modestly in the years since.

You feel safe giving to Oxfam: its proper name is or was the Oxford Campaign for Famine Relief and you know exactly what it does.

No you don't.

There was a recent case with an actress Scarlett Johanssen who as well as being an Ambassador for Oxfam was in an advert for Sodastream, which is made in ISRAEL. Oxfam had decided to enter the Arab / Israeli dispute on the side of the Palestinian Arabs (I don't know whether Hamas or Fatah) and in the ensuing row Ms Johanssen, to her credit, severed all ties with Oxfam.

Note that Oxfam's involvement in the West Bank was nothing to do with famine relief. It was purely political, the managers taking the money donated by honest folk for the relief of hunger and applying it towards their own political aims. It doesn't matter which side you take yourself, this diversion of funds should outrage you.

Now we read that Oxfam has decided to give its views on the gap between rich and poor - not in Africa, where it is extreme and identifiable as a cause of hunger, but in Britain. It has announced, pompously, that the five richest families in Britain have wealth equivalent to that of the poorest 20%. This is not a complaint that the poorest 20% are suffering from famine (they're not) just that they have perceived a sin (rich people tend to be rich and poor people tend to be poor). They have got involved, as in their Middle East caper, with politics, pure and simple, and using your money to do it.

Personally I shall never donate to Oxfam again.

Tony Benn

Tony Benn has died aged 88, denying a bed in an NHS hospital to someone, unlike him, who couldn't afford to go private.

You will find three sorts of obituaries of him: those from a dwindling few who think he was often right; some from the right of the political spectrum who think he was wrong about everything but one of those originals who spoke his mind which is a good thing (like Stalin, I suppose). The third, and there is a particularly ghastly version of this by Mary Wakefield in the Spectator, falls for his innate charm. Wakefield, whom he clearly twisted round his little finger, thought his philosophy was a belief in the inherent goodness of man.

There's clearly quite a lot that needs to be put right here.

In the '60s and '70s my father, the son of working class parents, was, like a lot of managers then, trying to understand what was going on with the working man, whom he had begun by regarding as his own type. In fact the British worker was the same, it was just that a new politics had entered the workplace and disruption, largely for disruption's sake, was its aim. It was the era of lightning strikes, intimidation and bullying, and Benn pushed this programme as hard as he could.

Benn, by contrast, the son of a cabinet minister, wealthy publisher and viscount, had never had any understanding of the working man and didn't until the day he died: there was a leitmotif of patronisation, which even came out in Mary Wakefield's panegyric where he described a couple of his visits to poor areas (Get me, I'm hanging out with the sans culottes). For Benn, the British workers were Karl Marx's useful idiots, catalysts he could put to use in his political melting pot. Most of them, those who weren't his acolytes, hated him.

And he uses in his act the familiar socialist props. He explained to Wakefield, as if to a child, that Hitler and Mussolini nationalised the banks. He doesn't say that he has been trying all these years to put into practice the policies of Hitler and Mussolini, or, of course, that his policies would leave the British Citizen with as much freedom as the Germans and Italians in the 1930s. He must have looked so cuddly as he was saying it.

Benn opposed the European Union, which you may think a good thing, but he did so because he thought it might stop him from imposing an even worse system on us.

Tony Benn was almost an exclusively bad thing for Britain, and worse because he dressed up his illiberal beliefs as daring candour.

De mortuis.... of the dead let us speak nothing but the truth.

I yield to no one....

It seems that the Boy Band One Direction are encouraging their fans - which consist largely of randy 14 year old girls - to write to the Chancellor of the Exchequer demanding he maintain foreign aid and and tighten up on tax avoidance.

Now, I am all in favour of getting kids involved in politics and naturally yield to no one in my admiration for One Direction's .... I think espièglerie is the word .... but this is a tricky one. Doubtless Harry Stiles and the other children have a firm grasp of macroeconomics but in Italy, for example, the new Prime Minister, a trendy leftie, has just realised that the way to get more jobs for people is to cut taxes. But if you publicly encourage tax cuts you lose that smug, one world fair trade image which is so important in the music business: look at Bono.

Probably best to stick to the day job, lads.

 

Francis's First

Tomorrow, 13th March, will be the first anniversary of the accession to the throne of St. Peter of
Francis I (although he doesn't much like thrones).

Will he be conservative or liberal, good or bad? Will he allow contraception, women priests?

Find out in my article in The Commentator. It's Free!

De mortuis....

It only happened this morning, but I am already heartily fed up with being told what a wonderful, warm
person the late trade union leader Bob Crow was.

He was, by contrast, an unpleasant, drunken shit who insisted on living in state-subsidised accommodation despite earning £140,000 a year, blocking other more needy people from getting a home.

He had no taste for democracy and was too extreme even for the Labour Party.

Nobody who couldn't get into work or visit their family because of some unnecessary strike he had called, nobody who paid extra for a train ticket because he insisted on overpaid and unnecessary staff on the trains, none of these people think he was a friendly, cuddly chap whose heart was in the right place.

Let us start speaking the truth about these people. His family might miss him but the rest of us don't.

How far we've come

Russia is a country run on different moral and philosophical lines to a western country. We knew that.

President Putin is a nasty piece of work and his tough guy image doesn't just extend to being photographed without his shirt. We knew that, too.

Even the British Foreign Office, which in my view should have been closed down years ago in the public interest, knew these things.

Then the West began to covet Ukraine.You may wonder why: it is an enormous country with some rustbucket industries, subsistence farming and a Russian pipeline running through it. The reasons are that America and NATO wanted to put one over on Putin, whilst the European Union wanted to see its bureaucratic kleptocracy extend eastwards. There would be Ukrainian ministries, with commissioners, under-commissioners, chefs de cabinet and largesse to be distributed to the grateful cossacks. That's the sort of stuff Eurocrats like.

John McCain, the failed presidential candidate who brought Sarah Palin to our TV screens, has been in Kiev stirring up trouble, as has John Kerry, Secretary of State and our own William Hague.

As the mob got violent the EU brokered a peace deal, which the mob ignored. Baroness Ashton completely misunderstood what was going on. They overthrew the Ukrainian President who asked Moscow to intervene. Moscow did not 'invade' - they didn't have to since they had thousands of troops and scores of planes already there, perfectly legally.

David Cameron and Others are now mouthing absurdities about sanctions, and not going to the paralympics, as if anyone cared.

It just goes to show how far we have descended, that senior political figures have connived in the overthrow of a democratically elected government and then tried to blame the outcome on someone else.

The winner is....

After the Oscars ceremony the Italian papers were ecstatic. 'The Oscar goes to Sorrentino', 'Italy wins!', such that you might have thought that Matthew McConaughy, Kate Blanchett and the rest didn't exist.

It was of course for best foreign picture but they were mevertheless delighted. All, except for the Berlusconi Family paper, Il Giornale, which led with 'The Oscar goes to Berlusconi' reminding us what none of the other papers had mentioned, that it was Silvio's production company which made the whole thing possible.

Poor Silvio! No one even wanted to mention him. It was the truth that dared not speak its name.

P.I.E. (2)

There has been an interesting and, for me, pleasing development in the case of the Paedophile Information Exchange and the National Council for Civil Liberties.

We have now settled down to the expectation of something new every day, which suggests seriously bad management by the Labour Party. Tony Blair's old supremos Peter Mandelson and Alistair Campbell would never have let it get this far.

There has been an interesting defence of the NCCL by Brendan O'Neill in the internet magazine spiked , which is written by what appears to be a group of left-wing libertarians, if such a thing can exist. O'Neill says that NCCL was right to affiliate with P.I.E. because people shouldn't be censored from expressing their views, whether one agrees with them or not.

To a large extent, as a Libertarian, I agree with this. I have had enough cases where my views have failed to see the light of day because they were 'inappropriate'. You may remember Rod Liddle being told, when he wanted to put a Eurosceptic on a panel show, 'You don't understand, Rod, these people are simply mad'.

But the NCCL appear to have gone further than merely allowing P.I.E. to spread its opinions. They seem to have actually campaigned for them, which is quite, quite different. The new development is Patricia Hewitt, former Labour cabinet minister and then head of NCCL, replying to a letter from a schoolmaster.

That schoolmaster was my old tutor at St Paul's, Philip McGuinness. Philip was fortunate to have gone through life with a strict set of values as to what was right and what was wrong. He wasn't everyone's cup of tea, and certainly not every schoolboy's, but in later life I rather envied him, as I envy those who have no doubts about religion, one way or the other. I have always been wracked with doubt, on almost every subject under the sun.

Philip wrote to Patricia Hewitt:
"I cannot help but think that you do not support civil liberties at all. Your aim is questionable in the extreme. Are you aiming for the destruction of society, for the enslavement of the individual, for the destruction of family life? Is your object to shatter prospective individual happiness at an early age?
....Your title is a shame and a masquerade. There must be some very twisted minds and pernicious malcontents behind your organisation if this is the sort of thing you advocate".

Hewitt had written in a press release

"NCCL proposes that the age of consent should be lowered to 14, with special provision for situations where the partners are close in age, or where consent of a child over ten can be proved."

Her reply to McGuinness suggests that the police should not get involved if there has been consent and the press release suggests that consent could be given at 10 years old..

She and the NCCL seem not just to be giving a platform to P.I.E. but campaigning for it.

P.I.E

I am quite enjoying the row about Harriet Harman and the Paedophiles, but only, I should stress, from the point of view of mischief. I don't believe for a moment that she, her husband Jack Dromey or her then boss Patricia Hewitt are paedophiles.

Perhaps I should start by declaring a possible connection: Ms Harman was at St Paul's Girls School at
around the time I was at the boys' school. Contact in those days was limited to a joint discotheque and it is possible that a shy, blushing Harriet allowed me to lead her to the floor to bust a few moves among the collected prefects and swots.

Under the circumstances I shall make no further comment on this matter.

I remember the Paedophile Information Exchange, though. They had a nice sounding chap as their spokesman who said that some people wanted relations with adults of the opposite sex, some with people of the same sex, some with all kinds of kinky stuff, whilst they simply wanted to be allowed sex with a consenting child. One's first thought was that this seemed perfectly reasonable. It certainly sounded reasonable. It was only one's second thought that was 'Wait a minute! This is not normal, this is a disgusting breach of trust with a minor whom we deem unable to give his or her consent.'

So I can quite understand the assorted loony lefties in the National Council for Civil Liberties (it's just called 'Liberty' these days) thinking 'Well, we believe in fighting against persecution on the grounds of sexual preference, so obviously we should support these people who are being banned by the Government.'

In other words they couldn't see beyond their narrow world view: they put the Liberty part before the Civil part. P.I.E. became affiliated to the NCCL and Ms Harman helped it campaign for lower sentences for people in possession of child pornography. The NCCL's evidence to Parliament in 1976 said that a sexual experience with an adult caused no lasting damage to a child.

Ms Harman ought to go a fair bit further with her explanation of all this, but in the end she just needs to say 'I was a barking mad leftie at the time but hope I am more sensible now.'

But I fear the public is unforgiving and perhaps she should consider spending more time with her family.

Ukraine

Stupidity, I fear: blinkered stupidity seems to be the cause of the Realpolitik game being played out in this benighted country.

The Ukraine did not make a success of its independence from the Soviet Union. By 1993 it had the world record inflation and whilst things have got better it is still a lot poorer than it should be. It has an aircraft plant, some light industry, incredibly a space programme and the rental income from a pipeline which supplies Russian gas to Europe. It is also heavily dependent on this pipeline for its own energy needs.

Because of its own incompetence and poor governance, Ukraine needs money.

The country is bordered by Moldova, Roumania, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, Belarus and Russia. Money could come either from the EU or from Russia.

Money has strings attached.

Now we come to internal Ukrainian politics. Because of the country's history, the west of the country, formerly part of the Habsburgs' Austria-Hungary, tends to be more European whilst the east, much of which is Russian speaking, tends to be more Russian. Underneath it all they are as corrupt and incompetent as each other.

In 2004 the presidential Election run-off was between two Viktors: Yushchenko (European) and Yanukovych (Russian). The result was declared in favour of the Russian but no one believed it and thus started the Orange Revolution which eventually got Yushchenko into power. Five years later he
was ousted (fairly, they say) by Yanukovych who managed to get Prime Minister and Abba lookalike Yulia Timoschenko thrown in prison for corruption.

The second Orange Revolution which unlike the first has not been bloodless has seen off Yanukovych again and what is tantamount to a mob has taken over. A peace deal had been brokered by Europe but the pro-Europe mob has gone miles further than what was agreed. One gets the strong impression that the European negotiators got taken for a ride. Most of the people killed have been police and legitimate government officials. Naturally Russia is fairly peeved.

Back to the money. The Russians over the years have kept Ukraine afloat (if poor) with billions in loans and subsidised energy. The EU hasn't offered much (less than €1 billion). The Russians insist on having a Russia-friendly administration and Ukraine belonging to a customs union with other former-Soviet satellites.

Europe insists on Ukraine joining the whole panoply of regulation, political integration and currency union, but not yet: Ukraine would have to go through a candidate phase.

When I say Europe has offered this: we haven't been consulted. This new status for Ukraine has been offered by unaccountable bureaucrats who, unlike President Putin have not been elected and would recoil with horror at having to be. In the end Ukraine cannot join the EU unless the 29 member countries agree and they would be wise not to agree. It is a bottomless pit for our money for very little in return except putting one over on Russia.

What will happen? Likely as not Putin will draw off the Eastern parts into new satellites while the western parts cosy up to Brussels. They will find it curiously similar to their previous masters the Austro-Hungarian Empire: inefficient, corrupt, undemocratic and bearing an inflated sense of its own importance.

You may think that a country has to be truly desperate to see its future in the EU. Ukraine is. Poor people.

The Campaign for Fair fines

'Abbey Clancy slapped with a parking ticket after blocking off pavement while running errands.'

What knowledge of gossip I have comes from the Daily Mail, which I find a mystical journey through the lives of people I have never heard of but whom the Mail seems to find important. It is a judgmental newspaper but getting a parking ticket is not nearly as bad in its eyes as wearing unsuitable lipstick (someone called Jessie J) or having cellulite (almost everyone from Kate Moss...er...down).

I can enlighten you here a little. Ms Clancy has recently won a reality TV show, which must be important, and she is married to a Premier League footballer, which is very important. And when it says she was 'slapped' with a parking ticket it does not mean that some concerned citizen, appalled by the triviality of her lifestyle, struck her in the mazzard with an Administrative Penalty Notice. It means she received such a ticket, probably in the usual way.

Phew! I bet you're breathless. But there's a point here.

As a TV star, married to a sportsman who is on tens of thousands of pounds a week, she can easily afford the fine. In fact she'll probably spend more on getting her staff to handle it and perhaps run it past a lawyer (a defence under the Persecution of Celebrities Act?).

So this young woman will effectively have broken the law for free, blocking a pavement, perhaps making disabled people step into the road, while she ran 'errands' (does she moonlight as a message boy?). A person on the average wage, by contrast, would have found the fine a huge encumbrance, possibly needing time to pay.

We desperately need a fairer system. If the fine is £150, that would represent perhaps half the weekly disposable income of a poor person after property costs, food etc.

Ms Clancy's husband makes £40,000 a week and if we add in her earnings and subtract tax and costs (she doesn't look as if she eats much) they must have at least £40,000 a week to spend.

So the fine should be £20,000.

That would be fair.

Global..er..change

I really am just a sceptic, not a disbeliever or apostate or whatever term is currently in use for those who don't toe the line on the climate, but I do think we should remember this.

It was not long ago, when the left of centre doom mongers were calling it global warming, that they - George Monbiot, Prince Charles and the rest - were saying that the rivers would run dry and that swathes of Britain and Europe would be desert. Even as recently as November 2013 the Met Office, which is stuffed with these fools, was predicting  a particularly dry winter.

Then they decided, in the face of evidence many of them still don't accept (are you listening, HRH?), that absent any global warming since 1998 they should call it climate change.

So now, when half of the country is submerged, they say 'See, proves what we were saying all along'.

I do not assert that everything is the diametric opposite to what Prince Charles says (although that would be a more accurate forecasting method), I am saying that anyone who uncritically believes what these people say needs his head examined.

The Commentator

See my thoughts on Italy in The Commentator.

The Commentator is great political journalism and it's free.

Tony Benn

On a personal level I wish Tony Benn well. He has brightened political life for 50 years, since the days when he tried, successfully, to renounce his viscountcy.

He has been wrong about almost everything he has ever uttered, and proven to be so (I exclude renouncing the peerage).

Now, aged 88, he is seriously ill in hospital. He could easily have afforded to go to a private hospital but instead has gone into an NHS one, blocking a bed which could be used by someone more needy.

Surplus to requirements

It appears that a giraffe in Denmark called Marius has been killed by his keepers. There are European laws about animal collections in individual countries, and Marius was deemed to be surplus to requirements.

This is something which should concern us all.

It has certainly put the wind up me. For years, because of my political views, the European Union has described me as 'mad', 'unhinged', a 'swivel eyed extremist' and someone displaying 'disturbing nationalism'.

It seems only a matter of time before Brussels decides, in the interests of the human race as a whole, that I, like Marius, am surplus to requirements, and that, given with the danger that I might breed, I should be put down humanely.

Too late for Marius of course, but my solution is to go into hiding. This post is being sent, not from my usual haunt in Rome, but from a secret location in the basement of the Berlaymont building in Brussels.

Just in case they decide to bomb.

I yield to no one

George Clooney, an American actor who serves as the Cary Grant de nos jours, has decided that Britain should give the Elgin Marbles, more correctly known as the Parthenon frieze, back to Greece. He came to this conclusion at the Berlin film festival.

Now, I yield to no one in my admiration for Mr Clooney as..er..an advertiser of coffee, but suggest that on subjects on which he is not qualified to speak, or indeed knows nothing, he might be better advised to remain silent.

Nor do I want to hear Miley Cyrus on stem cell therapy.

Just smile at the cameras and keep the lips zipped, George.

Nexit

Stop me if I've told you this before, but several years ago, around the time of the EU Constitution fiasco, I was lecturing on the EU to some Erasmus students in Rome (Erasmus is the system whereby students can pursue their studies in another European country).

One of them, a young Dutchman, said there was really no need to put the matter to a referendum in his country since everyone was in favour - no opposition whatsoever. A few weeks later the Dutch voted 'No' to the constitution and it had to be foisted on them by calling it a Constitutional Treaty, which didn't require a referendum.

Nevertheless, Holland is one of the founder members of the European project and has traditionally been seen as one of the keenest. Things are changing, however. Economic growth in the Netherlands is tiny, the country has lost its AAA rating and there is concern about immigration and unemployment.

Geert Wilders's right-wing Freedom Party is likely, according to the opinion polls, to be the largest party in the European elections in May. Wilders is anti-EU as well as anti-immigrant and this time will enter the elections armed with a study by Capital Economics to the effect that if Holland left the EU (a concept known as Nexit, but of course it would be Hexit if you call the country Holland and Dexit if you are referring to the Dutch) it would by 2035 have a national income 10% higher than if it stayed in.

Whilst in the past talk has been only of the British leaving the EU (Brexit) or the Danes (another Dexit) this time there are strong anti-EU voices from Marine LePen's Front National in France (Frexit), Greece (Grexit) and for all I know one of the countries beginning with S.

Of course victory in the European elections does not mean victory in the national ones as the British UKIP can attest. But one of the interesting things is the effect this is having on the more mainstream parties. In the Netherlands Prime Minister Rutter, in order to fend Wilders off, is making noises about repatriating powers from the EU. The comical figure of François Hollande was in England last week pleading with Mr Cameron not to go for a Treaty change since he knows he'd never get it past his own electorate. Mrs Merkel, who is on less shaky ground electorally, is inclined to bend a little with the Eurosceptic wind and not rule out repatriation of powers.

One of the winners of this new mood could be David Cameron, who is pressing, not for Brexit but for reform of the EU. Movements by governing parties to make concessions to Euroscepticism could play right into his hands.

My own guess is that Cameron won't succeed in reforming the EU, certainly by his 2017 deadline and that we are past the point of no return.

Still, everything to play for.

Scotland

The referendum on Scottish Independence is this year and the papers have got into several flaps about it. What astonishes me is that everyone seems to have made their mind up.

I confess that if I had a vote I should find it very difficult. Scotland has the critical mass to manage its own affairs, with a population around that of Denmark, which doesn't have any hydrocarbons, just a lot of contented pigs and sensible people, which latter resource the Scots may be lacking. But if I were voting principally with my heart I should vote for Independence: the Scots are different to the English, and whatever vicissitudes the new state might undergo, it would be something new, a concentration of Scottishness.

Against that I am quite sure that Scotland will not be able to manage its own affairs with the politicians it currently has. At a time when public expenditure needs to be tightly controlled, Scotland has a choice between the socialist spendthrift Scottish National Party and the socialist spendthrift Scottish Labour Party. Individually or collectively these two are capable of turning the new nation into a basket case. Still, cometh the hour, cometh the man (or woman) and it may well be a leader will emerge who has the courage and intellectual consistency to take the country forward. I see no such person at the moment.

So if I were voting principally with my head I should vote against independence. But of course I don't have a vote, and I don't really object to that. We didn't offer the Scots a vote on joining the UK.

What I do object to is the latest proposal that the Scots and the rest of the UK (RoUK) should have a currency union. I really ought to have a vote on this: after all Britain has kept out of currency union with the rest of the EU madhouse and is generally against the principle. It would carry constitutional implications, forcing RoUK, for example, to bail out Scottish banks if they got into trouble again.

I really think I would need a vote on this: we couldn't just let RoUK politicians give in and commit us to such dangerous uncertainty.

And it really wouldn't be good for Scotland, either. It would find itself, like Italy and Spain, with a grossly overvalued currency, damaging exports and jobs. Of course that would still be the case if it simply adopted sterling as its currency, without the formal currency union, although it wouldn't affect us too much.

The Scottish National Party celebrates its 80th anniversary this year, and you would have thought it would have given just a little consideration to this important point. Scotland needs its own currency, to float up or down according to the economic management of the country (likely to be disastrous, see above) and of course the oil price.

The opinion polls are still pointing towards a vote against independence, though the Nationalists seem to be gaining ground. If they have conducted this debate honestly, and discussed all relevant matters with the people, then good luck to them.

Website

I should have mentioned there is a new website. I hope to improve it as time goes on but it is the best I can do at the moment.

It is www.timhedges.eu and you can send messages to me at the address shown on the site.

Foxy Knoxy

I have written a very short piece in The Commentator about the Knox / Sollecito verdict and will be writing more when we receive the official reasoning from the judges.

I just thought I'd offer this interesting little quote from the President of the Court: 'There is no prevalent motive. Until 8.15 in the evening Amanda was supposed to go to work in Lumumba's pub and Raffaele was supposed to go to the station to collect a friend's suitcase. Then the situation changed. The episode was born in an evening when nobody had anything to do any longer ....if Amanda had gone to work probably the crime would never have happened.'

There seems to be a mindset that because these two people were young and modern that they would not act rationally: they took drugs, they had the sort of sex you don't have, so they would think nothing of killing her flatmate. I should have thought the prosecution were on dangerous ground reaching this conclusion without a motive. It would mean they were relying on circumstantial evidence.

But....as I say in the article, I rather want them not to be guilty. I don't know.