The Parliament Oak.... What if...

On the Countrytracks programme last Sunday, (5 minute report, then and now 44:26 in) there was a feature on the Parliament Oak. Situated just outside Sherwood Forest, the tree, at over 1,200 years old, is an ancient and still alive noble oak - and has had an illustrious and specifically English history. It once spanned 8 metres, but now, as with most old oaks, the centre of the tree has gone leaving a few old knarly but still impressive stumps.

A few years ago, the tree was in danger of collapse and the surrounding site was being used as a giant fly-tip. Thankfully, the Woodland Trust have skipped all the rubbish, cleared away the brambles, stabilised the tree, provided information panels and car parking for visitors - and now its future is looking a lot more optimistic.

For hundreds of years, the tree been used as a meeting place. King John conducted a parliament underneath its boughs, as did Edward 1st on his way up to Scotland for a bit of hammering.. But looking at the tree five years ago, you'd hardly know of its importance in England's democratic process, neglected, abused, ignored - a sort of metaphor for our existing non-national democratic process?

That's the history - what about the 'what if?'..

So what if, someone proclaimed a reconvening of the English Parliament under these self same boughs, tomorrow, next week or next month?

What if an elected body - a coalition English Cabinet in waiting was formed - and a manifesto published with outline policies specifically for the benefit and well-being of the people of England?

What if, during that spontaneous English Parliament, it was proclaimed that we, the people of England demanded our God given right for national democratic self determination?

What if that English coalition cabinet applied for international recognition - and asked to join the United Nations?

What if all the media was invited, press releases were prepared and it was widely publicised - so that people in England at last began to wake up?

What if?.....

The Parliament Oak is easy to find and easy to get to, just off the B6035....

Nige calls it a day, (but will he take his desk with him when he goes?)....

Sex mad lothario and Scottish MP Nigel Griffiths is standing down at the general election. He told party members in his Edinburgh South constituency last night that he would not be standing for re-election and would instead take up a job with an "international educational institution".

Well, he had to go didn't he? Griffiths was caught bang to rights, in flagrante delicto with a nice young brunette lady amongst the staplers, tippex and post-it noted detritus of his Westminster desk..

So when he goes, who is going to inherit his government issue ash effect laminated desk - the one with the signed portrait of Gordon Brown and a couple of sweaty naked bum prints on?.....

Nige will not be sadly missed by anyone, least of all by his constituents, who probably didn't even know he was there in the first place. He didn't do much for them - but like virtually every other MP with a Scottish constituency, he claims credit for stuff which falls within the juristiction of his MSP counterpart.

On his website, Griffiths loves to big himself up. Throughout his site, Nige is portrayed as a sort of McRambo man of action for his constituents. It’s photos, photos, photos of Nigel as he gets to grips with the great issues concerning the folk on his patch. Got a problem? Call for Nige – if nothing else, he’ll give you a signed photo of himself to stick on your mantelpiece....

Nigel’s news section on his website is a joy to behold. Within are a series of photo opportunities in which Nigel manages to get himself associated with Al Gore (green issues), Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese Opposition leader(human rights issues), a couple of survivors from Nagasaki(nuclear arms race issues) and film star Jackie Chan. But as far as I know, none of these people actually live in his constituency of Edinburgh South..

My appraisal of this vacuous pillock can be found here

Nigel Griffiths with a couple of honeys...

Team Kernow disqualified?

Campaign Kernow (formally the Cornwall Commonwealth Games Association) has been told that it has no hope and Bob Hope of fielding a team in any Commonwealth Games gig in the future. That said, campaigners are hoping that Cornwall can be represented at the Games in Glasgow in 2014.

They are considering submitting a judicial review against the Commonwealth Games Federation. Games organisers called it a "frivolous" act and said they would oppose any legal action.

Graham Hart, CK head honcho, campaign leader, Cornish musician, sportsman and renowned Cornish campaigner (his words, not mine) says, "It is a sad day indeed when the so-called “ Friendly Games “ has forced us to take this action but we will not be denied our birthright, go away or take no for an answer. We are now at the point of taking what we hope will be the final step for acceptance into the Federation."

From the opening lines of the campaign website, Campaign Kernow is clearly a bit of divine cause for Mr Hart - "In October 2002, I was given the vision of taking a Cornish team to the Commonwealth Games. By December 2003 I had put together a quality executive committee, which include international and professional sportsman to form the CCGA. Exactly one year later we applied for membership of the CGF, who refused us ‘ out of hand ’. Since then further researches have strengthened our claim to bring us to where we are now."

Kirsty Winstanley - an English victim of an unequal union

Every now and then, you come across a story which sort of sums up this unequal union of equals and the appalling price that citizens in England are expected pay for New Labour's Grand Plan. When, because you are English, you just don't seem to qualify for stuff that is routine everywhere else in Britain.

Today, supporters of the late young mother Kirsty Winstanley, have been lobbying at Westminster to try and get cerival cancer screening down to the same age levels as the rest of the UK.

This from Sky.com -
"Kirsty Winstanley, 23, from St Helens, died ten months after being diagnosed with the disease.

She had been too young to be screened in England. If she had lived anywhere else in Britain, she would have qualified.

Kirsty had called for the cervical cancer screening age in England to be lowered to 20, in line with Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Currently, women in England are not invited for the test until they reach 25.

Kirsty's brother Ian Atherton said: "She felt bitter that she didn't have the chance to save her own life.

"If the Government hadn't raised the screening age from 20 to 25 in 2003, she could have had the opportunity to have the smear test, and could have caught it. She would have had two years from 20 to 22 to catch this disease, and actually be able to survive."

Dear Peter.......

To Peter Hain, Secretary of State for Wales

Mr Hain, whilst watching BBC's Questiontime on 14th January, I noticed that in reply to a question from the audience (34 minutes in), about David Miliband and his loyalty message, you said, (and I quote directly from BBC iPlayer), "And actually, when it comes down to it, my constituents say to me... They're not interested in all this nonsense and all this media Westminster bubble stuff,what they're interested in is who's going to take this country forward so that jobs are protected, so that schools are protected, so that the health service continues to be invested in and continues to perform....."

Well, that surprises me somewhat. I mean, seeing that Health and Education are now devolved issues, are the good people of Neath in Wales really that bothered about the English education system and the English health service? Surely, they will be thinking of their own health and education issues when they can actually vote for them - in the elections to the Welsh Assembly?

But maybe they are confused? If they are indeed raising such subjects to you, maybe you should be correcting them - and telling them that Welsh health and education has nothing to do with you. But as Secretary of State for Wales, you can vote on English Health and Education issues but not Welsh ones - and that all enquiries should be addressed to the Welsh AM for Neath?

As you are the Secretary of Wales - and so are presumably defacto aware of the devolution settlement, I am somewhat surprised that you should have made such an elementary error. I would be grateful if you could reply to this and let me know if what you said was, indeed a slip of the tongue - or an attempt to continue to confuse the people of England as to who is responsible for what..

Q & A with Nick Clegg.... (via some geezer called Duggie Dowell)..

Questions sent, September 21st:During yesterday's conference speech by Nick Clegg he talked about abandoning your no tuition fee policy because of hard financial times...

HOWEVER, he talked very generally about where the policy would impact. For example, he talked about the need to act responsibly for the sake of the British people etc...
Am I right in thinking that he was only talking about tutition fees in England? (As I understand it, education is entirely devolved, apart from in England, obviously).
So if it is only about England that he is talking why did he never once mention England by name?

As the LibDems were supposed to be the party of honesty - how can Clegg do exactly the same as Brown and Cameron when talking about devolved issues - ie give the impression that he is talking about a British-wide policy when in actual fact he is only referring to policy in England

Also, I notice you have official Scottish LibDems and Welsh LibDems websites and organisations - but where are the English LibDems?

Two questions - I would appreciate an honest and unspun reply to both.

Answer received November 25th: Many thanks for your email to Nick Clegg MP. Nick has asked me to contact you on his behalf and I apologise for the delay in responding. I hope you will understand that, due to the sheer volume of correspondence that Nick has been receiving, it can take some time for us to reply.

Liberal Democrats recognise that the advent of devolution to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland poses difficult questions for the governance of England within the Union. Solutions, however, are in many ways equally problematic. The ‘English votes for English laws’ solution is extremely complicated – partially because the Speaker would have to decide whether issues were England only; England and Wales; Great Britain; England, Wales and Northern Ireland; or UK-wide. Given the fact that changes in spending on English services which would be devolved in the rest of the UK directly affect the devolved administration’s budgets, this is by no means a simple question. More fundamentally, in situations where English MPs had a majority of one political colour and the House of Commons as a whole another, it would mean that the government’s writ would not run over most of its legislative programme. An English Parliament would address some of these points, and we would not necessarily rule it out. However, it does beg the question of why we should wish to create a new level of government covering nearly 85% of the population. This might be a logical response, but it does not meaningfully move power closer to the people, which is the ultimate point of devolution. Furthermore, given the different levels of powers allocated to the different devolved assemblies, inconsistencies would still remain. We believe this question should be a matter for our proposed Constitutional Convention.

Our own party structure has always had a high degree of autonomy for regional and local parties, before and after devolution. We believe issues should be decided at the most appropriate level close to our constituents. I hope you’ll understand that, due to the nature of the current devolution settlement, it can be a little difficult to avoid moving from a devolved issue (e.g. education) to a UK-wide one (e.g. taxation policy) at the moment – but Nick certainly didn’t intend to cause confusion and I do apologise if you were irritated by it.

Finally, with respect to finance – as the Scottish Parliament, Welsh Assembly and Northern Ireland have devolved bloc grants, I hope you’ll understand that Nick can’t generally lay down Lib Dem policy on matters like tuition fees in Scotland. However, it’s worth bearing in mind that the level of bloc grant in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland is automatically linked to total ‘English’ spending, so reductions in spending south of the border will translate into an equivalent reduction in the devolved nations.

Thank you once again for emailing. Once again, I’m very sorry for the delay in replying to you.

Best wishes,

Douglas Dowell
Office of Nick Clegg MP

Cross-dresser goes cross-country.... and gets cross!

On Wednesday, I almost took out one of the nation's favourite comedians.

Eddie Izzard, currently pounding the roads of Britain almost went the way of countless insects, a few birds and a cyclist (it was his fault, honest!) in disappearing under my bonnet. Thankfully, this time, I avoided adding to my bonnet fodder count by managing not to mount the pavement and flattening him.

Eddie Izzard, here in Nowheresville, West Lancashire, doing his bit for Comic Relief? I mean, what are the chances? At first I thought he was alone in a loneliness of the long distance runner kind of way ('cept for the flag of St George strapped to his arm). But then I noticed the S Type Jag', the 4x4 with countless bikes strapped to the back, the weird motorised trap thing being ridden by a few hippie types....

We went back to get the Nikon.

By the time we found him again, he was a few miles up the road and into countryside. I reckon a certain amount of rules interpretation had been explored by Team Izzard - Had the back seat of that Jag' suddenly become all sweaty?

But even though he was in the country, Eddie was hardly alone. A camera crew had suddenly materialised - which along with the team meant there was a bit of a bottleneck on one of the most dangerous stretches of the A59 - one of the most dangerous roads in the country. Still, there's a celeb at work so who cares?

We drove past a mile or two to turn round and drive back up towards the Izzard show. Camera primed, foot on the accelerator Eddie had broken away from the group and was running in a walking kind of way towards us. He looked a tad grumpy and no mistake....

I'm multi-tasking. One hand on the wheel, one hand holding the Nikon, we're doing about 40 mph as we draw near...

I try to get his attention.

"Hey, Eddie baby, I love ya!"

"Piss off" said Eddie...

Must be a showbizz greeting thing.

Mean, moody, magnificent. Eddie against the West Lancashire skyline.