I couldn’t supress a small giggle at this.
Speeding British muppet foils German speed cam
All posts by Monnow Man
View from the Kymin
This was the view this morning from the Kymin, the big hill behind Monmouth, looking towards Abergavenny, the Blorange and the Skirrid. I’ve never seen it so clear.
An exasperating battle for our children’s rights
Every year many parents of children with disabilities in the UK have to play an absurd game with their local education authority. In principle, it is a process to define the special educational needs for their child that puts in a legally binding statement the steps which the authority will take to make provision for those needs.
Providing those services, such as speech and language therapy, is sometimes expensive and the authority will try to avoid providing it, by, for example, not making mention that it is, in theory available. What should be an exercise in providing exactly what the child needs becomes a battle of wits, with parents having to find legal precedents for provision of a particular service and authorities using evasive language to shirk their responsibility to provide for the specific needs of the child. The stress this creates for both parents and children is appalling.
Parents have paid for these services through their council tax. Imagine the uproar if your council used your money to provide some sort of service such as an after school club, say, but then tried to prevent you finding out about it. And not only that, but once you have found out, the council put forward spurious arguments (sometimes involving surreal bureaucratic jargon) to prevent you using it. You then resort to legal advice or expert opinion (for which you have to pay) to establish that the council has to give you access to it, which they ultimately concede. They know that they have to provide the service but hope that you won’t have the tenacity, wits, money (sometimes) and letter-writing skills to go all the way. You are obliged fight an expensive, stressful and needless battle with council officials whose salaries are paid for by your taxes to get something you are entitled to anyway.
The result is that disabled kids whose parents don’t have the means, financial or otherwise – whom the present government euphemistically refers to as “hard working families”- are deprived of the opportunities that society supposedly affords them as a right.
This is a scandal that needs exposing and which makes a mockery of the present government’s aspirations to build a more caring and inclusive society.
So this report is very welcome.
Special needs battle highlighted
Telegraph – 140 years of UFO pictures
The Daily Telegraph has an interesting retrospective of photos of UFOs going back to 1870. This one was seen over New York in 1950. Looks like a brandy snap to me.
Irony of Ironies
This document on the Department for Children, Schools and families website has a very embarrassing mistake, made all the more ironic because it is about standards in English.
Black triangle UFOs over Monmouth
The 10th October edition of the Forest & Wye Valley Review, a local free newspaper, has an article reporting triangular black craft seen by anonymous witness over the A40 dual carriageway next to Chippenham Mead at 10 PM on Friday 26th September.
The witness describes the two objects as “low enough to hit with a stone… There were several lights on them, arranged symmetrically on the underside and there were white lights on the three points of each triangle.”
Moving “slower than 5 mph” they took at least 15 seconds to pass over the dual carriageway. They were “absolutely silent and there were no other cars on the road at the time”.
The witness provides a sketch showing craft very similar to the ominous black triangles that have featured in so many UFO sightings in recent years.
The article appears to have flushed out others who have seen similar craft. The 17th October edition has a front page article reporting similar sightings in Westbury last winter and Whitchurch in 1994.
Perhaps it was all a big fib.
Perhaps it looked a bit like this triangle filmed over Florida in March:
England or Britain? A guide for Americans and too many English people
“We call our islands by no less than six different names, England, Britain, Great Britain, the British Isles, the United Kingdom and, in very exalted moments, Albion. How can one make a pattern out of this muddle?”
George Orwell, The Lion and the Unicorn
This BBC News article, combined with a recent visit to the USA reminded me of the misunderstanding that exists in the minds of not just Americans and others but – embarrassingly – English people about when to use the word words England and English. I should stress that I don’t believe it’s malicious; more a bad habit whose avoidance can prevent giving offence to those born in the constituent countries of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland outside England. I also stress that I’m no constitutional expert: my own qualifications are merely having been born in England and living in Wales.
In short England is used wrongly to refer to the sovereign state whose formal name is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. This misuse went on in political circles until relatively recently, with Winston Churchill speaking during World War Two of ‘England’ when he was referring to the aformentioned sovereign state. Or was he? There’s an essay for a first year PPE student.
Recent devolution of some government powers away from the United Kingdom government and parliament in Westminster to Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland have served to make this issue more important to handle sensitively.
My guide for the uncertain:
- Only use England when referring to the constituent country called England. Don’t use England if you mean the United Kingdom. If you are talking about someone or something from Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland and the constituent country is relevant, don’t say ‘English’. Say Welsh, Scottish or Northern Irish. If you’re not sure, see below.
- Use ‘Britain’ or ‘The United Kingdom’, or ‘The UK’ when referring to the United Kingdom or if you’re not sure – or it’s not relevant – to which constituent country you are referring. The same goes for the adjective British.
Downtown Seattle
I spotted this angle on some skyscrapers while being jostled by Seattlite commuters during the evening rush hour.
Seattle Skyline
A photo taken from the Bainbridge Island Ferry.
Bainbridge Island and civil liberties
On holiday in the Seattle area, I spent yesterday walking around the centre of the city and, after a lunch of clams and fish and chips, took a ferry across Puget Sound to Bainbridge Island.
After a visit to a bookshop, I was stopped by a member of the American Civil Liberties Union. He was looking for support for among other things, their campaign to close the POW camp at Guantanamo Bay. I explained that I was a foreign tourist, but he said that he had signed up someone from Australia recently. While I, in broad terms, agreed with the ACLU’s stance, I couldn’t bring myself to contribute to an organisation involved in political struggles in a country that is not my own. I meekly offered a link to the ACLU on my blog as a sort of substitute.
Before I went on my way, he offered me an apology on behalf of his country for its foreign policy mistakes in recent years.
Monnow Man 