I have written before about the 'Ealing Apocrypha' - the comic films the studio produced that have been forgotten, like The Magnet and Barnacle Bill. The best of these is Alexander Mackendrick's The Maggie from 1954, which is like a less sentimental version of Local Hero. An American businessman makes the mistake of entrusting his furniture to the skipper of an ageing steam vessel for delivery to his holiday home in the Hebrides and never looks like getting it back. Among the crew was Dougie, a boy, played by Tommy Kearins. Here he gives his memories of the making of ...
Britain is becoming a rogue state. In fact, it may already be one. The Johnson government's threat to jettison the EU Withdrawal Bill negotiated last year and an alarming philosophy of "creative destruction" threatens to leave the UK dangerously isolated on the world stage. This is bad for Britain and bad for the world. The UK is one of the chief pillars of the post-war rule of international law which has underwritten the world's longest period of relative peace and prosperity. Without these legal structures dictators are emboldened to embark without fear of serious reprisal on genocide, murder of political ...
We saw in the new year multinationally, with Belgian friends coming for dinner and cooking a raclette for us (very nice) and then the brother-in-law and his Eastern European fiancée showing up in time for the fireworks. One of F's Christmas presents was a meccano-style Shark Run roller-coaster, which he set up pretty much single-handed. A modest start to the year with eleven books. Non-fiction 2 Endgame in Ireland, by Eamonn Mallie and David McKittrick Seven Pillars of Wisdom, by T.E. Lawrence Non-genre 1 An Instance of the Fingerpost, by Iain Pears SF 5 The Last Hero: A Discworld Fable, ...
Over the past few weeks, I have been getting a number of emails and tweets from people who feel that as the Opposition Leader in Liverpool I am not doing enough. Perhaps I'm not. People will have the opportunity to ... Continue reading →
"I will never forget the relentless anxiety of living hand to mouth. When you're in that position, you go through every possible emotion. Shame. Panic. Fear. Ultimately everything becomes about survival." Liz Jarvis makes the case for a basic income. David Henig explains the fundamental problem with Brexit now: "The problem is not the UK, whether Labour or Conservative, wanting a deal. It is that the deal that the UK seems to want, of privileged non-membership access without cost, it not available, has not been available since 2016, and that neither Labour or Conservative Party is prepared to admit this." ...
Fri 11th
15:57
Cricketer Usman Khawaja's brother apologises for making false terror claims against love rival
The Guardian goes down under to claim our Headline of the Day Award.
Events of the last 12 months (think unlawful prorogation of Parliament, Covid-19 mismanagement, stalled Brexit talks, exams fiasco, threats to abolish the Electoral Commission and breaking International Law) demonstrate beyond all reasonable doubt that the Johnson-Cummings administration is surely the most inept, incompetent and fundamentally dishonest in living memory. But should we be surprised? I would say no, as this government is only in place as a result of the First Past The Post (FPTP) electoral system which is itself fundamentally dishonest. How can it be right that one party gains 43.6% of the vote, but wins 56% of the ...
Responding to news that the UK has signed a new trade deal with Japan, Liberal Democrat Trade Spokesperson Christine Jardine said: "The Government's deal with Japan appears to be little more than a less ambitious version of the trade agreement between Japan and the EU. The Conservatives cannot be allowed to present it as a Brexit victory."The agreement's economic contribution will be a drop in the ocean. Government has failed to leverage any meaningful benefit from its independent trade policy, whilst a deal protecting our EU trade is nowhere in sight. There couldn't be a more reckless approach to international ...
Some Libertarians in the US and elsewhere certainly seem to think so, and refuse to wear them. But we are not Libertarians, and as Liberals it is easy enough for us to justify asking others to wear masks by drawing on two principles described by John Stuart Mill. In On Liberty Mill explores his political philosophy and expounds on the Harm Principle: That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. In other words, the potential for harm can outweigh the loss ...
I started writing seriously in 2016 when I lost my job and decided to semi-retire, It took about six months to get a first draft and I subsequently started to hawk it around agents, with absolutely no success whatsoever. In the end I decided to shelve it and come back to redraft it at a later date. Then I saw this article in the Guardian and I started to think how I could adapt the bare bones of these real life events into a fictionalised version set in a more familiar environment. The actual events saw the most powerful politician ...
Thu, 12:56: How wealthy lobby groups benefit from a silent media https://t.co/B04ZSM5j1U Interesting. "Media attention and public scrutiny of policy issues can counterbalance the role of economic resources for political influence" Thu, 15:15: RT @alexstubb: 1. Today we are celebrating 20 years of @cmioffice. In the words of our founder, President Martti Ahtisaari, we believe that... Thu, 15:51: RT @APCOBXLInsider: 🇩🇪 The latest issue of our German EU Council Presidency newsletter is out now, with insights from APCO's @adam_c_waters... Thu, 16:02: RT @bbcdoctorwho: We're sad to report the death of Dame Diana Rigg, who starred in 'The Crimson Horror' https://t.co/taiEq2OaNx ...
This is a follow-on post to the one published yesterday. The real issue with UBI is not economic; it has been shown to provide no disincentive to work and most people are just paying in cash via taxes and getting that cash straight back. It doesn't really affect most household finances to any significant degree. Instead the problem with UBI is political. How do we make it popular and keep it simple? That's what my proposal is about. The elevator pitch is this: "Voters are clear that they want tax dodgers to pay their fair share. That's why the Liberal ...
At last, the UK has been able to negotiate a free trade agreement with a major economy. The government had previously clocked up agreements with the Faroe Islands and Papua New Guinea but anything large seemed to elude them. Now however, Japan can be added to the list of countries which will be free trading with the UK. A big achievement? Well, no actually. Membership of the EU gave us a free
Just in case all this fuss about a no deal Brexit is proving to be a bit esoteric, here is Morrison's supermarket with a more down-to-earth interpretation. The Guardian reports that the boss of Morrisons, Britain's fourth-largest grocery chain, has warned supermarket prices will go up unless the UK government negotiates a tariff-free Brexit deal with Europe: "From our point of view representing British consumers we would like the government and the leaders of the country to negotiate a deal that includes no tariffs UK to Europe or Europe to the UK because tariffs do drive inflation," said David Potts, ...
i) births and deaths 11 September 1921: birth of Edwin Richfield, who played Captain John Hart in The Sea Devils (Third Doctor, 1972) - not the Captain John Hart of later Torchwood! - and also Mestor in The Twin Dilemma (Sixth Doctor, 1984). I think it's reasonably clear which part required more make-up... 11 September 1981: birth of Lachlan Niebohr, who played Jack's brother Gray in the second season of Torchwood (2008). (So what happened to him after the Hub was blown up?) 11 September 1987: death of Hugh David, who directed The Highlanders (Second Doctor, 1966-67) and Fury from ...
A resident recently contacted me as follows : 'I was wondering if it's possible to get the drains cleared the around Ancrum Road school. There was a river running past the crossing lights and lots of standing water at school pick up ... Is it also possible to ask for the area to be gritted in winter?' I contacted the City Council's Roads Maintenance Partnership about this and have received this helpful feedback : "An order has been raised for the gully machine to attend the gullies opposite Ancrum Road School. Ancrum Road footways are included in a priority gritting ...
Time for a walk with the daddy of London psychogeographers, Iain Sinclair. His 2017 book The Last London was reviewed in the Guardian: The Last London is an elegy for a London that is now over. The artists, the homeless, the eccentrics - the people Sinclair has always been on the side of - are moving out, or being moved out. The city seems to want him out too. He receives cards from estate agents urging him to "sell up, cash in, get out". His children and grandchildren have been forced out by rising rents, part of the great London ...
