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NEWCASTLE JOURNAL 4.11.04

There are two little questions that have been niggling away at the back of my mind – a cluttered attic of a place. Question One was – ‘Why does Mr Blair cling so tightly to Mr Bush’s coat tails, when it is doing him so much political damage?’ – actually my version is phrased rather differently, but this is a family newspaper. Question two is – ‘Where has John Major disappeared to; after comprehensively screwing up the Conservative Party?’ An old friend - a man who gave me my first broadsheet column, which is probably why he is famous, has now answered both questions. The answer lies in the Bush, or in the two Bushes, father and son. For the avoidance of doubt we will refer to them as 41 and 43, those being their numerical positions in the list of American Presidents. The Bush family may have its faults, but it sticks like glue to those it considers to be loyal and rewards them substantially. The answer to Question Two, is that Major is now deeply involved in the USA, where 41 is making sure that he is stuffing in his back pocket the sort of wedge that the likes of you and I can only dream about. There are two answers to Question One. The first is that Mr Blair is suffering from the sort of infatuation that weak men have for someone tougher and more macho. The second answer is that 43 has made it plain that if Blair stands by his man, he will not be eking out his declining years on the sort of miserly pittance that will be left for the rest of us - more especially after Chancellor Brown has finished filching from the till. The expensive and ghastly house, beside the old Tyburn gallows, that the Blairs have bought for ‘after the Fall’ will be as a drop in the ocean compared with what he can expect with his ‘Loyalty Card’. Such expectations must surely be worth sacrificing the lives of a few British squaddies for. Think, as they say, on.

‘Murder most foul’ is in the news. The question is - does shooting a burglar constitute a criminal offence? Or should we be allowed to protect our lives and our property with all the means at our disposal. I look at it this way. Our bodies are the temples of our souls. The rape of our bodies is certainly a criminal offence and the repulse of the rapist, even with ‘extreme prejudice’ should be our legal right. The family home is the temple of our bodies and nobody should be able to rape it and get away with a slapped wrist and a community service order. It is totally wrong that those who try to protect themselves should find themselves ‘criminalised’ (dreadful word) as a result. An old friend of mine retired from the ‘twilight zone’ of the Armed Forces and got a job delivering legal, but dangerous, drugs for the manufacturers. One dark evening he was in charge of van load of Methadone. Two toe-rags thought that they would relieve him of his responsibility. They made a mistake. He laid one out cold and broke the other’s jaw. This did not surprise me, when I heard, as this man once trained me. The two maxims that he drummed (a very good description) into me were – “Give him some pain!” and – “Get him down and keep him down; whatever it takes!” fair enough, I reckon. What did surprise me was that he told me that after he had prevented a serious robbery, the local constabulary arrested and charged HIM. The charges were dropped, but in every sense of the word JUSTICE, they should never even have been considered in the first place.

I am reminded of a lonely rural bar that I used to frequent in Alabama (USA). It was kept by a frail looking little old lady called Miz Gracie. I asked her politely if she ever had any trouble? The next moment I found myself looking down the business ends of a pair of .44 Magnum pistols – enormous in her tiny hands:

“I don’t have no trouble, but my son, the State Trooper, he says to me – ‘Maw, you shoot an a****le, you just make sure you shoot him daid, otherwise that a****le might sue you. Nossir! I don’t have no trouble with a****les.” No I don’t suppose she does. I see that one man who recently shot a burglar was, like Miz Gracie, of advancing years. Here is a new initiative for Mr Blair – let every Senior Citizen be issued, along with their pension, a chit for the shooter of their choice – ‘An Uzi for Great Aunt Susie!’ So ‘lock and load’ you oldies and see the a****les run.

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NEWCASTLE JOURNAL 11.11.04

Crotties – that is what we will talk about today. Crotties, in case you are not familiar with the rural demotic, is the term generally used for the pellet like droppings of sheep, deer, goats and rabbits. An old friend of mine served his time at an Agricultural College. When he had qualified and was preparing to face the cold blast of life, he could find no suitable employment. Then the Principal, suggested that he could find the lad temporary employment as a ‘Fieldsman’. His job would be ‘to roam the fields for health unbought’ and whilst he was there being healthy, he was collect the crotties of sheep, but them in a box and take them into the MAFF (remember it?) laboratory to be analysed for a worm count. Although this was obviously a job of great responsibility and importance, my friend was the sole applicant for the job. Even so he had to attend upon a Selection Panel of the Great and the Good. The G&G was made up of 3 men – a very old and important local politician (Chairman – ‘Chairs’ had not then been invented), a MAFF official and some local bureaucrat. My friend, at that time a pink and shiny eighteen year old into whose soul the iron had not yet entered, was suitably nervous. It was the Chairman who took it upon himself to question the nervous youth. You my make up your own mind as to the relevance of the questions:

1) “Ist thoo a member of a Trade Union?”

“Nossir”

2) “Ist thoo a Mason?” Well my friend had learned a lot about stone dyking from his Grandad, but somehow thought that that was not what was required, so he did not mention it

3) “Ist thoo a member of the Labour Party?” a tricky one this as my friend came from a clan of long horned Tories, so once again he gave a negative answer.

The old man leaned back in his chair and said that he could find nothing in the applicant’s answers that indicated that he might be suitable for the important position in question.

The MAFF man scratched his head a suggested that it was only a question of collecting a few crotties and did not seem to have any great political significance.

The bureaucrat came instantly to the nub of the question and pointed out that the lad was, in fact, the only applicant.

The Chairman mumbled and grumbled to himself for a long time over this dilemma, before reluctantly agreeing that – ‘aye, the lad had better get on with it then’

So for six glorious months, the lad collected crotties without benefit of backing from the Trade Unions, the Masons, or the Labour Party.

The point of this story, if there is one, is that ignorant political interference in rural affairs is not a new phenomenon – it has just got worse.

The ‘getting worse’ bit may be observed at any English border livestock Mart. I am told that DEFRA officials prowl the transport lines to ensure that all livestock transporters from England are pressure-hosed clean. A few crotties left lying on a tailboard and they will beat the offender about the head with a clipboard. At the same time and place, transporters from Scotland can arrive and leave, hanging in filth without so much as a hard stare. The official reason for this craze of cleanliness is ‘precautions against Foot and Mouth disease’. This supposes that washing out lorries will prevent F&M disease. This idea appears to be scientifically unproven. The other supposition is that the Scotch Fence and the Carter Bar are so impenetrable that no disease can pass these barriers, even by air. The real reason seems to be that the writ of English DEFRA does not run in Scotland (which I did not know). All this running around with clipboards is merely a method of increasing the Government Payroll Vote and that the real purpose of DEFRA is to oppress the English farmer to the extent that he will take the money and run. This will help to decrease rural antagonism to this blighted government.

I was discussing Wind Turbines the other day with an eminent engineer. I said that whilst I had no aesthetic objections to the Turbines, I just wondered how efficient they were. The Prof told me that the turbine towers are made out of some special material, which is expensive to produce and that in the working life span of these turbines, they would never produce enough electricity to cover the cost of manufacturing the material that goes into them. There is no such thing as a free lunch. However I have heard of a man who bought an old water mill. He restored the wheel and connected it to a generator. This supplies his own electricity and the surplus is fed back into the National Grid. At times he can sit and watch his meter running backwards.

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NEWCASTLE JOURNAL 18.11.04

Clause 22 worries me. As the old saying goes the Devil is always in the detail and he is lurking in Clause 22. Clause 22 of what, I hear you cry? The Answer is the innocuously named ‘Civil Contingencies Bill’. It has probably passed you by, as the Government meant it to and it is probable that you do not even know what stage it is at in the parliamentary process. In this matter, I am as ignorant as many of you. Some of you may remember that during the Fuel Protest the Government was very keen to bring in the MOD Police (please do not call them the ‘Mod Plods’ – it upsets them) and use it as a private security force. It was discovered that this would have been illegal. The Government tried a sneaky on this one by inserting a clause (31) in some Defence Bill which would have given them the right to use the Mod Plods as it thought fit – it only needed authorisation by a Minister. This dastardly plot was foiled because someone (who shall be nameless) wrote about it somewhere and brought it to the attention of a friend in the Upper House. As a result the Lords refused to pass Clause 31 and threatened to wreck the whole Bill if the offending clause was not removed. It was.

Now the Government is at it again. The CCB is supposed to be used against threats by terrorists. It gives Ministers powers to act above the law - almost unlimited powers, in fact. They can order the police to break up meetings, seize persons and property and to put roadblocks on the Queen’s various highways. I suppose that some people might shrug at this and say that if it is used to stop us being blown to smithereens by the Bushmeat Liberation Front or other terrorists, let it be so. Right, so now read Clause 22. All the powers of the Act can also be used against those who attempt the:

“ Disruption or destruction of plant life or animal life”. Now do we really suppose that al-Qu’aeda agents are going to come here to dig up a few primroses or nuke a couple of bunnies? I think not. I think that this is a weasel of a clause designed to sneak in a ban on all Country Sports by the side entrance. By using Clause 22 the Government can class all or any country people as Terrorists. Even the urban hiker walking along the Pennine Way could be said to be disrupting and destroying plant life, although the Government will hardly want to annoy urban hikers. This Clause is a bit of malice cunningly aforethought to shaft all Country Sports and to make all country people potential terrorists. Cut a new hazel shank for your stick and you are a terrorist. Your cottage will be turned over, your pocketknife and your pushbike will be seized and it will be you for the slammer. As to leaving hoof marks in a pasture and killing a fox, or a pheasant…well! (Sharp intake of breath) you’ll be looking at 30 years in maximum security. Come on, some of you, are saying, you surely don’t think that this government is going to use its powers in such a ridiculous fashion? All right then, let me pose you a question:

This country is fighting a war in Iraq, children are leaving school unable to read or write, the NHS is a shambles, political corruption is running loose and what is this wonderful government spending most of its time and energy and a considerable wedge of taxpayers’ money on – Foxhunting. Now you look me in the eye and tell me that that is not ridiculous. Now you see why Clause 22 is so sinister. Confound their knavish tricks.

Since I started writing this last Sunday, the Lords have cottoned on to the iniquities of the CCB. They are agin it. Mind you they are more concerned with minor points of interest that would come under threat - things like Habeas Corpus, the Bill of Rights, the Act of Settlement and Human Rights. That is kindergarten stuff. We all know that NuLab is against all those things in its determination to establish a One Party State and the National Socialist Republic that all right thinking people in this country (in Islington, anyway) want. In spite of the wishes of these worthy people, the Tory spokesman in the Lords is wittering on about ‘ attempting to safeguard the foundations of our democracy, our civil rights and ensuring the supremacy and independence of Parliament…’ Any good Islingtonian would recognise that as dangerous and reactionary claptrap.

However a committee of MPs and Peers has proclaimed that the proposed Bill contains – ‘potentially dangerous flaws’. I suspect that ‘flaws’ is a misprint for ‘flowers’ and refers to the primroses that I mentioned earlier.

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NEWCASTLE JOURNAL 25.11.04

I suppose that you will expect me to comment on the little Parliamentary spat over hunting. As I see it there are two dimensions to it. One is to do with wildlife and conservation and the other is political, which we will deal with first. I want to look at this from a sidewise angle. You may be surprised to hear that I blame Mrs Thatcher for this mess. I do not think that Mrs Thatcher had any strong views about Hunting, but she did have a deep rooted dislike of country people. I have always understood that this was something to do with having a brother-in-law, who was a Suffolk Barley Baron. None of us are forced to like our In-laws, but she took it to an extreme, in as much as she laid down a policy for prospective Conservative Party parliamentary candidates that pretty well excluded a great wedge of traditional Tories. This meant that the quality of the candidates declined. Out went the ‘Knights of the Shire’ and in came the spivs and the snake oil salesmen. It was hardly surprising that the party became unimpressive and lost membership and support. No one with half a brain could have imagined a feeble creature like John Major achieving even junior cabinet rank under a traditional Tory administration. As to him become Prime Minister – it would have been unthinkable, but it happened and this set off a chain reaction of political disasters that ended in a landslide of NuLab with Mr Blair grinning toothily on top of the rubble. Now Mr Blair has got himself into a deep kett hole and over hunting of all unlikely and unimportant things.

As far as I understand Mr Blair he has no principles except the one of his own political self preservation. We know that he has no strong feelings about hunting because he had avoided the issue until in a moment of verbal incontinence on television, he blurted out a promise to ban it. This promise he then filed in his ‘Too Difficult’ tray. He rediscovered it at a convenient moment, when he needed a gobbet to throw to his revolting back benchers, who were threatening to rebel over the war in Iraq. You may wonder why the Labour Rumpers were revolting? The answer is quite simple. Many Labour MPs still nurse their Old Labour principles. They are nursing them because these principles have been gravely wounded and mauled by NuLab and by a PM whose own political inclinations lie deep in the bowels of Conservatism. You may want to ask another question and I will pose it for you – why if most of what NuLab has done is so deeply offensive to the principles of so many MPs, have they not had the guts to stand up and say so? I can answer that question in one word – Mammon. A salary of £57, 485.00, a golden handshake and a pension, not too mention expenses of (last year’s figure) of £78 million can soothe an awful lot of stricken conscience – but not all. An awful lot of these MPs still treasure the ashes of their political principles, even if they are in an old jam jar beside the clock on the mantelpiece. Every time they look at the jar, they get a twinge of old Socialism. They do not like themselves very much, they feel dirty and leprous. They desperately needed something to restore their sullied pride and self esteem. So when Mr Blair threw them Hunting they leaped on it with a collective whoop of glee. Here at last was a piece of red meat that any good Socialist (if that is not a contradiction in terms) could be proud to sink his dentures into. It was, as the egregious Mr Banks said – ‘a totemic issue’. And the wonderful thing about it was that banning hunting would not lose them many votes. Hunting was a ‘country thing’ and the ‘Natural Fascists’, which is what all country people are known to be, would be unlikely to vote for them anyway, I mean all those Toffs in red coats… All the spite and malice that had become pent up under the de-socialisation pf the Labour Party could now be released on a non PC minority:

‘To the barricades, Brothers and Sisters!’ they cried – ‘No surrender! No compromise! We’ll teach Blair a lesson for singing the rude words to the Red Flag!’ and that was what they done.

But what have they done, apart from banning Hunting that is? The answer to that one is that no one rightly knows. What we do know is that Mr Blair is in the kett hole, a constitutional, political and legal kett hole. No one knows how deep it is, what we do know is that it smells ‘awfy bad’.

I will deal with ‘wildlife and conservation’ next week.

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