Longrider

The late summer bank holiday slips wearily into the past; a fading memory of a few warm days at the end of the summer that never was. The early anticipation of April and May and that glorious TT week on the Isle of Man was followed by rain, more rain and for dessert, torrential downpours leading to flooding in parts of the country.

Of course, it was blamed on global warming, but isn’t everything these days? The Atlantic is more salty; global warming, the Atlantic is less salty; global warming; it rains in the summer; global warming, it is hot in the summer; global warming. The reality is that washed-out summers are a fact of life on these temperate isles; it’s why our countryside is so verdant.

Each year for as long as I can recall I have looked forward in late April as the budding new leaves start to turn the trees green from their winter state with their naked branches stark against the sullen sky, to the warm, friendly foliage and heady scents of summer; clear blue skies punctured by vapour trails, and the sound of the honey bee working the nasturtium; a tantalising promise so often broken. It happens each year and each year is a gamble; will we, this year, just for once get a summer? All too often, the answer is months of disappointment as we note that the rain is warmer but otherwise the skies remain sullen, dark and leaden as summer slips by without fulfilling her destiny. On those spectacular and rare occasions – such as last year – when we get a warm spell that lasts more than a few fleeting days, the British moan in unison about it being “too hot” and they long for the weather to break – oh, and isn’t this another sign of global warming, so we had better do something about our carbon footprints? I refrain tactfully here from telling people what they can do with their carbon footprints.

So September waits in the wings, her entrance fore-shadowed by the languid warmth of late summer evenings with their smouldering charcoal perfume and the crisp, cool dew on the meadow grass in the mornings. There’s a low lying morning mist reminding us of the autumn to come, but before that we have September, mellow and sweet with late summer fruits, September, golden, russet and green, listless and warm. September; summer’s nemesis and winter’s portent. Perhaps, just perhaps, we will be treated to the consolation prize of an Indian summer?

An environmental group has decided that public transport is poorly linked:

Public transport has too many weak links making it difficult to switch from one mode to another, a report by an environmental group suggests.

Travellers polled for a Transport 2000 survey said buses did not connect with train times and stations had insecure cycle parking and poorly-lit footpaths.

I can’t help wondering just how much this survey of the bleedin’ obvious cost – or, that anyone was daft enough to think that it needed any research. Our trains do not provide a twenty-four hour service. This is because the overnight lull is useful for servicing the trains and maintaining the track. It is just unfortunate for the traveller if he has arrived at Stanstead on the Montpellier flight; just in time to catch the last train to Liverpool Street (you have to get your skates on, mind). Once there, the station is in the process of closing down and the underground has already closed – oh, yes, LUL doesn’t provide an overnight service either. So, it’s a taxi trip across the city to Paddington only to arrive long after the last train to the West Country has departed. Nothing is open; no cafés, no toilets and no waiting rooms; it’s a cold night on the platform ahead until the first train to Reading leaves at about four in the morning and you take it, because it is warmer than waiting another couple of hours on the platform. Damned right our system isn’t linked. Integrated transport is a pipe dream – you don’t need a survey to tell me that.

The interfering and draconian state is to seize a woman’s baby as soon as it is born, because the quacks believe that she “may” abuse it:

A pregnant woman has been told that her baby will be taken from her at birth because she is deemed capable of “emotional abuse”, even though psychiatrists treating her say there is no evidence to suggest that she will harm her child in any way.

That this is jaw dropping arrogance ceases to surprise me. The psychiatrists state that there is no evidence yet…

Social services’ recommendation that the baby should be taken from Fran Lyon, a 22-year-old charity worker who has five A-levels and a degree in neuroscience, was based in part on a letter from a paediatrician she has never met.

Astounding. Someone she has never met has assessed the level of risk and a conclusion has been determined. Hexham children’s services, based upon this hypothetical nonsense are going to take the child:

Hexham children’s services, part of Northumberland County Council, said the decision had been made because Miss Lyon was likely to suffer from Munchausen’s Syndrome by proxy, a condition unproven by science in which a mother will make up an illness in her child, or harm it, to draw attention to herself.

This, despite Munchausen’s by Proxy being an invented syndrome created by a discredited quack. It gets worse, the social services will truck no challenge to their totalitarian behaviour:

Under the plan, a doctor will hand the newborn to a social worker, provided there are no medical complications. Social services’ request for an emergency protection order - these are usually granted - will be heard in secret in the family court at Hexham magistrates on the same day.

From then on, anyone discussing the case, including Miss Lyon, will be deemed to be in contempt of the court.

These people are evil – and I don’t use that word lightly.

Miss Lyon, from Hexham, who is five months pregnant, is seeking a judicial review of the decision about Molly, as she calls her baby. She described it as “barbaric and draconian”, and said it was “scandalous” that social services had not accepted submissions supporting her case.

Yup, barbaric, scandalous and draconian are all valid descriptions and are all the consequence of ten years of New Labour; a party so wrapped up in its own stupendous arrogance that it thinks that it can dictate our lives for us and empowers the little Hitlers in the town halls and the social services, giving them carte blanche to bully, intimidate and in this case; steal from us. To make a decision based upon a letter written by a person who has never met the mother concerned and cannot therefore make an accurate assessment defies belief, yet believe it, I do.

John Hemming, the Liberal Democrat MP and chairman of the Justice for Families campaign group, said the case showed “exactly what is wrong with public family law”.

A classic example of understatement.

Miss Lyon’s best option is to flee the country. It’s what I would do.

By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes.

I’m in danger of becoming a Neil Watch if I’m not careful. Actually, as is often the case, I find myself in partial agreement with Neil; in this case on the general tendency of the media to distort facts for the sake of a headline. He refers to Simon Jenkins in the groan commenting on the news vacuum of the August break:

News editors abhor a vacuum. Half an hour of airtime and 10 pages of news must be filled each day, whatever the weather. If a story normally confined to the local press is given national prominence, so be it.

Indeed, I recall a Spitting Image spoof on this very issue many years back; there is projected news, actual news and the waffle that fills the gap between the two and all too often the actual news isn’t worth reporting.

If Neil confined himself to a non-partisan kicking of the press and their desire to distort fact and wallow in facile celebrity “news” then he would have a good post up. Unfortunately for Neil, what we get is the usual descent into partisan politics and a rant about the “right” and the “distorted” market.

The solution is simple…but it could mean a little more taxes to pay.

Groan… Here we go. A “problem” is perceived (you see, Neil is swallowing the very nonsense he derides, so just how big is this “problem” anyway?) and the solution is that the taxpayer is expected to dig yet deeper to fund another unnecessary project. In this case, keeping the yoof off the streets and gainfully employed. One problem here is that the people in question haven’t been asked what they want; which might just be a useful starting point, no?

Finally neither does the Right’s reliance on ‘the free market’ to magically solve everything, work. In fact ‘the free market’ is exactly the problem.

No one has claimed magical powers for the free market and it certainly isn’t the problem here. Indeed, it is less of an issue than it is being made out to be – remember; we don’t believe the “Tory” press with its “right wing agenda” do we?

There is no short-term economic incentive for the private sector to keep our youth - active, healthy, educationally and sportingly engaged in rewarding worthwhile pursuits, there is just not enough money to be made - which is why our youth are left to wander the streets aimlessly.

Now that is interesting. Why do large football clubs, private businesses, indeed, run youth schemes? Other sporting bodies do likewise. Why is this? Oh, that’s right, it is because they are long term planning, looking for tomorrow’s players; that is the short term incentive.

Businesses have proved they cannot think that far ahead,

Once we’ve completed the mental somersault, I think that we can deduce from this comment that Neil has never had to put together a business plan. I could also mention that he cites no evidence for this absurd assertion. Oh, sorry, I just did.

Like evolution - the ‘free market’ is a process that is nasty, brutish and wasteful.

Life is potentially nasty, brutish, wasteful and short. Get used to it. Utopia is a pipe dream. We are born, we struggle and we die. It is up to us as individuals to make the best of our lot. If we can help our fellows along the way, then well and good, but it changes not the basic facts of life.

Left to the distorted market (for that is the true picture without decent regulation to keep it in check) the majority have to suffer for the few to prosper.

Yet it is okay if the state makes the majority suffer for the behaviour of the few.