Triple whopper with lies

Today is the third anniversary of the 2010 General Election and, like any normal three-year-old, the present coalition government has learnt to walk, talk and destroy things.

Quite a lot can be achieved in three years. You could, if so inclined, complete a university degree course and saddle yourself with debt and no hope of gainful employment. You could, with tenacity and stamina, produce three children and therefore enjoy a life of luxury by scrounging state benefits. Given an advantageous launch window and a suitable propulsion unit, you could journey in a space craft to Jupiter. You could train to be a nurse and save people`s lives only to find that your hospital is closing because a lying minister unqualified in health has decided that you are “uncaring”. You could become a teacher and educate three cohorts in Key Stage One or Key Stage Two only to be described by a lying minister unqualified in education as a Marxist for wishing to nurture children with a balanced curriculum. You could develop a serious disability or terminal illness in order to adopt a lifestyle choice of state benefit dependency only to be told by a lying minister unqualified as a human being that you are a feckless, workshy scrounger and will receive no support during the time it takes you to die.

Out, damned spot

South Shields image via mirror.co.uk

Imagine those poor lost souls still claiming to be Liberal Democrats waking up with the realisation that they were beaten into seventh place by an orange woman representing the BNP and calling herself Lady Dorothy Macbeth Brooke.

If losing their deposit was bad, losing to a racist with a fake tan must be the most spectacular act of retribution since Birnam Wood came to Dunsinane. A lost deposit in South Shields is nothing compared to lost principles, lost liberalism, lost manifesto promises and lost political credibility. On the night that Shirley Williams claimed on BBC Question Time that the Liberal Democrats had saved the NHS by voting with their Tory masters to privatise it, electorates across the country were voting for an “anti-establishment” one trick pony led by a public school stockbroker and followed by a host of white, male, middle-aged golf club Napoleons and dodgy double glazing salesmen. When Shirley and the others in the Gang of Four broke the mould of British politics, I would wager that she never imagined that it would end in the destruction of liberalism at the hands of little England xenophobes. We should congratulate UKIP for a 23 per cent share of the vote even if this is not sustainable. However, the greatest achievement in their 15 minutes of notoriety is the fact that they have seen off the spineless sacks of bat guano formally known as the Liberal Democrat Party. Nice one, Nigel.

Last words

Image via anorak.co.uk

The poignant and rather touching tribute to the late Baroness Thatcher in this week`s Walsall Advertiser from, of all people, Councillor Pete Smith reminds me of my own encounter with the former Prime Minister.

The circumstances that led to me driving towards St James`s Park (the one in London, not the one on Tyneside) at six thirty on a spring morning in 1988 are too complex to describe in detail. Suffice to say that it involved a friend who worked for a television news company, a Ford Fiesta that refused to start, my reliable if battered Mini and a government photo opportunity. I pulled over at the end of The Mall near Admiralty Arch to let her out and find her camera crew then went on to find somewhere to park. By the time I joined her at the Horse Guards end of the park, a host of photographers and camera crews stood around looking bored and opening flasks of coffee. That was about to change.

From the direction of Whitehall, a group of six or seven young men in expensive suits approached and they seemed pleased at the number of cameras that had turned up so early in the morning. Presently, however, these “special advisors” detected a problem. Looking at a clipboard and the Rolex, one chinless wonder turned to another and said:
“Where`s the rubbish? Where`s the bloody rubbish? It was booked for seven. Find it Nigel, find it now.”
Nigel started looking in the bushes much to the amusement of the waiting photographers. Then, striding across the grass came the colossal figure of Nicholas Ridley, the then Secretary of State for the Environment. It could be that he was suffering from some illness or that he might not be a morning person, but given the ungodly hour, the minister appeared to be drunk. Surveying the scene, he lit a cigarette and turned the air blue with some very unparliamentary language. Spad panic ensued and two ran off in the direction of Great George Street and the others started screwing up papers from their clipboards and throwing them on the ground. The press, now openly guffawing, joined in by screwing up their briefing notes and throwing them at the Spads. Ridley contributed by flicking his cigarette end at the laughing snappers and sparking up another fag.

Q tips

The Bird is the word

After the playground custard pie fight in Walsall Council Chamber last Monday night, we are still none the wiser as to the identity of the mysterious Councillor Q.

It might be presumptuous to imagine that the representatives of local democracy would wish to explore the circumstances surrounding the recommendation from the Ombudsman that three of their number should have no further input into a suspicious planning application, but it seems that the matter has been noted and is now closed. The local press, including the Advertiser that initially broke the story, consider that there is nothing to see here and it`s time to move on. The increasingly ridiculous Express and Star offered a bizarre piece from a barely literate hack describing his attempt to survive on £53 a week, left-over turkey sandwiches, tea at his mother`s house and “down-sizing” to half pints of beer. Including an image of the woeful hack looking miserable in a pub was consistent with the editorial line of scrounger rhetoric but the E and S missed a trick by not bringing up the usual bilge about flat screen TV`s, computer games, booze, fags, class A narcotics, tattoos, piercings and horse meat to feed to the trophy attack dog. Earlier, the Express and Star nailed its colours to the mast with a laughable piece extolling UKIP`s barking mad Nigel Farage with a drooling dollop of nonsense under the headline “This charming man”. Standards are obviously slipping at the paper where a former editor wrote the “rivers of blood” speech for Enoch Powell. Surely clear evidence of impropriety would result in the press pursuing the story and stir councillors from their slumber to ask what the bloody hell is going on.

Walsall fantasy football

Image via walsallfcstore.co.uk

Today, Walsall Football Club celebrates 125 years of history, triumph, disaster and survival; year number 126 might just prove to be the best yet.

In 1888, when Walsall Town Football Club merged with Walsall Swifts Football Club to become, unsurprisingly, Walsall Town Swifts, Queen Victoria was on the throne and the Marquess of Salisbury was Prime Minister. The year brought to the world T.S. Eliot, John Logie Baird and T.E. Lawrence and witnessed the passing of Matthew Arnold, Edward Lear and Louisa May Alcott. The Financial Times was first published, Jack the Ripper was doing his worst in and around Whitechapel and Van Gogh cut off a piece of his own ear. More importantly, the Football League was founded. The first 12 clubs included Aston Villa, West Bromwich Albion and Wolverhampton Wanderers. Walsall Town Swifts would become founder members of the Football League Second Division in 1892 and would be renamed as Walsall Football Club in 1896.

The more recent and financially troubled past has been thoroughly documented elsewhere and given the current economic turmoil affecting Cyprus, it might be best