The opposition parties have unveiled their basic platforms for the forthcoming election. First off the mark were the Liberal Democrats, who offered themselves as a clear opposition to Labour and the Conservatives. The Lib Dems are against the Iraq war, against student top-up fees, against identity cards, against council tax, and against the divisive regimes popular amongst the other parties.

Out will go Brown's baby bond, which will guarantee lower-class children £1000 when they're 18, and upper-class kids perhaps twenty times that amount thanks to tax breaks on parental contributions. Out will go the Eurofighter project, too.

But in comes an extra 10p marginal tax rate for those earning £100,000. According to the Lib Dems, this will ditch student fees, and will ditch charges for personal care for the elderly.

So tax rises and retargeted spending are the order of the day. Do the sums add up? The extra income will be of the order of £3 milliard, leaving Iraq will save that much each year, and ditching the ID database will save at least £10md over the next parliament. Baby bonds and Eurofighter might only save £1md. On the debit side, replacing council tax with a local income tax should be cost-neutral, but probably won't be. That leaves roughly £8md per year for student fees and elderly care, which is just about sustainable for the short-to-medium term. Will there be enough to pay back Brown's budget deficit? Depends on the economy, but there's not much room for error.

The Conservatives offered £35md of targetted savings, with £23md going back into "frontline" services, and £4md going into tax cuts. The remaining £8md will go into Brown's black hole, which seems a bit much.

Conservative cuts will be quite savage - almost a quarter of a million civil servants will go, along with 168 public bodies, including the English regional assemblies, the proposed supreme court, and the controversial New Deal "training" scheme.

£21md of the cuts are already planned by the government, ensuring that the vampires don't have to find as much as it might sound. Back of the envelope calculations confirm that the Tory sums just about add up, though we've not seen the details yet.

Underpinning to-day's electioneering is a set of assumptions. The Lib Dems are assuming that, though the Grate British Public is telling pollsters that they're over-taxed, there's appetite for a modest increase in taxes. The Tories, meanwhile, believe the GBP and the evidence of the 80s, that a low-tax policy will win. Does the GBP prefer low taxes, more services, or will they try to cut corners and take the worst of both worlds as has happened under Labour? We shall see.

And finally, Robert Kilroy-Shaft is to found his own party. He reckons it'll be called Veritas, we reckon it'll be called Mentior, so let's compromise and call it the Vote For Robert Kilroy-Shaft Party. The Torygraph cuts to the quick:

People who are quick to take refuge in classical languages for everyday purposes hope to give off all the right mood music about their erudition and sensitivity. Instead, they just come out as the sort of great, whacking bigheads who like to show off about their erudition and sensitivity.

It's absolutely no surprise, then, that Mr Kilroy-Silk, the bighead to end all bigheads, the man who had barely joined UKIP before he was trying to take it over, has decided to give his party a Latin name.

If you really wanted to get across the genuine Kilroy-Silk message, you could do worse than "Ego, ego, ego".

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posted 17 Jan 2005, 19.11 +0000

The People's Democratic Republic of United Provinces has failed. We will have to find a new name for the collection of ex-colonies between Mexico and Canada.

How do we know? They're badmouthing Europe for no reason at all. The EU will break up within fifteen years, claims a report published by the Comedy and Idiocy Agency. These people, lest we forget, said with a straight face that there really were chemical weapons in them thaar oil wells, gold in them thaar hills, and pigs in them thaar clouds.

The CIA's latest piece of ludicrous analysis claims "The current EU welfare state is unsustainable and the lack of any economic revitalisation could lead to the splintering or, at worst, disintegration of the EU, undermining its ambitions to play a heavyweight international role."

Where to start with this load of bollocks? First, it's obviously designed for domestic consumption. The voodoo economics practised by draft-dodger Richard Chainey and his henchmorons includes a spurious claim that the overall social security net for his nations will fail in about 30 years. This claim is based on inaccurate data and wholly impossible assumptions, so is about par for the course there.

And second, it's not actually based on any sort of assessment about the facts. It's true that there will be reforms of the EU's generous pension provision, caused as much as anything else by people wanting to carry on working after the traditional retirement ages.

Apparently, "the EU's economic growth rate is dragged down by Germany and its restrictive labour laws. Structural reforms there - and in France and Italy to lesser extents - remain key to whether the EU as a whole can break out of its slow-growth pattern." Germany, as anyone who has looked at recent history will know, is still experiencing the economic pain of a rushed re-unification back in 1990. The re-unification, lest we forget, was timetabled with the active support of that former power across the Atlantic. Germany is slowly getting back to her full potential, and actually has a better chance to zoom ahead over the next few years that the middle-northern part of the American continent.

Apparently, the failed state over the Atlantic will have a "dramatically altered" relationship with Europe over the next 15 years. NATO could disappear, and be replaced by increased EU action. And this would be a bad thing because..? Anyone? Anyone? One good thing to have come out of the colonials' continued occupation of Europe by proxy?

From the no, really department: the EU will retain her influence by appealing to those countries "searching for a western alternative to strong reliance on the failed republics". Of course the EU will gain, but this is more a move away from the failed American colonial experiment than a positive move towards Europe.

It's sad when a country can't come to terms with her newly diminished role in the world. We've heard of similar stamping of tiny little feet about a century ago, as first Belgium, then the Netherlands, and latterly France and Britain discovered that the world was prepared to move on without them. Why should the failed American republic colonial experiment be any different?

The long FARCE is over. Welcome to the new world order.

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posted 17 Jan 2005, 19.48 +0000

The fourth test in Johannesburg has been another absolute corker. Put into bat, England had a superlative first day; Strauss made 147, Key 83, and Vaughan settled in. Rain and bad light washed out much of the second day, during which time South Africa took four quick wickets, but Vaughan (82*) and Harmison (30*) had added 82 runs for the ninth wicket. With time no longer on their side, England declared at 411/8, but not before Vaughan had been fined his entire match fee after blasting the umpires' decision to remain off for "bad light" when the sun was shining before the close of play.

England needed early breakthroughs, but didn't get them. Gibbs was twice dropped en route to a six-hour 161, and he combined for a stand of 120 with Boucher in the final session on Saturday that dispirited England. South Africa were finally dismissed just after lunch for 419, a lead of 8.

Second time around, England needed runs. Strauss and Thorpe fell cheaply, but Trescothick made a superlative 180, and put on a crucial 122 with Vaughan (54) for the third wicket. If England could last the first session to-day, they should be in a winning position. Jones fell early, but Giles and Harmison provided solid support - Giles made 31 of a seventh-wicket stand of 50, while of 48 put on for the ninth, Harmison made exactly 3* and faced just 17 of 50 balls. England declared when Trescothick fell, at 332/9.

The run-chase was on, South Africa needed an improbable 325 in around 65 overs. Hoggard struck early, removing the top six in the batting order with just 118 on the board. Only Gibbs put up resistance, and he was cruelly dismissed for 98. Captain Smith, batting down the order after suffering concussion, made a fire-brand 67, but with Hoggard taking 7/61, he simply ran out of partners, and England had the series in the bag. Hoggard finished the game with 12/205, but both sides can take heart for the final test at Centurion on Friday.

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posted 17 Jan 2005, 21.33 +0000

From the department of really insanely stupidly daft things to do: Verizon -v- Europe. Falsely claiming to be blocking spam, North American ISP Verizon has configured its servers to reject all email connections from Europe.

Yep, an entire continent has been told to get stuffed by a puny little company based in the middle of Hicksville. And their country thinks it's not a FARCE?

Verizon has, of course, failed to respond to our requests for comment. That's because we sent them through email, which their misconfigured servers will have quietly dropped. Maybe we'll have to start using a neologism:

verizon v, trans To censor, block, esp. of technology. I can't get to this website, either it's down or the admin's verizoned it.

If you have a Verizon account, you may wish to seek an alternate supplier, one that does not impose completely ludicrous bans on its customers. Verizon, Comcast, and AOL are perhaps the world's biggest spammers, and this action smacks of cutting off an entire leg owing to a little mud on the shin.

In the meantime, turnabout is fair play. What IP addresses do Verizon hold? I feel a little block of my own coming on...

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posted 18 Jan 2005, 18.43 +0000

Airbus has officially launched its big new plane. The A-380 will carry more than 550 passengers on two levels, and there is space on board for things like a casino or a squash court. The 400 or so passengers on board will, doubtless, have approximately 0.24cm of leg room between their seats, so no change on the existing planes.

Airbus's business model is predicated on a continuation of the existing hub-and-spoke operations, where huge planes shift people between hubs, then smaller planes take them out to their final destinations. Their main rival, Boing, is going for smaller planes that can fly economically on a point-to-point basis. There's room in the market for both types of operation.

Is there room on the planet for them both? Airlines only turn very small profits, typically less than 1% of turnover, and can only make that money thanks to past subsidy from the taxpayer, and from current exemption on almost all taxes. Aircraft don't pay fuel tax, nor compensation for the huge amounts of pollution they emit. Even the A-380 is a net polluter, contributing to climate change. In a discussion on to-day's Mayo programme, former environment minister Michael Meacher said that climate change - flooding, landslides, and disruption to clean water - was killing around 150 million people per year.

What can we do to prevent a tsunami every year? The UN came up with ten points yesterday.

• Developing countries should adopt poverty-reduction policies by next year. Strategies need to be bold if the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are to be achieved by 2015.
• Strategies should promote human rights, support public investment, make governments more transparent and focus on women's health and education.
• Strategies must be inclusive, involving both civil society organisations and the private sector.
• Rich countries should choose at least six "fast-track" countries that deserve a massive boost in aid very soon as a reward for good governance. Mali, Burkino Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Mauritania and Yemen have been mentioned in this context.
• Rich and poor countries should club together this year to achieve "Quick Wins", including free malaria medicines, more school meals and abolition of school fees.
• National governments in developing countries should work with regional bodies to pool ideas and resources.
• High-income countries should raise official aid from 0.25 per cent of GDP to 0.44 in 2006 and 0.7 by 2015. Debt relief should be more generous.
• Rich countries should open markets to exports from developing countries. They should invest more in the very poorest countries through electricity supplies and roads.
• International donors should make sure scientific research prioritises the needs of the poor. An annual $7bn (€5.5 milliard) should be given for research by 2015.
• The United Nations should co-ordinate its agencies and programmes more effectively, ensuring that all levels in all countries are involved in supporting the MDGs.

This isn't going to be cheap; the total aid budget needs to increase almost ten-fold over the next ten years, and have most of that increase happen now. According to report author Jeffrey Sachs, the global aid budget needs to mushroom from €15 milliard to €100 milliard this year. The report, Investing in Development: A Practical Plan to Achieve the Millennium Development Goals follows the UN's Millennium Summit in September 2000. Over 180 countries have so far signed up to this plan. Success will lift 500 million people from extreme poverty. 300 million will no longer be hungry. Hundreds of millions will have an education, and those with an education can take care of themselves and are less likely to fall victim to the more foolish strictures of organised religion.

Other news in brief. Lockdown in Iraq. The country will be hermetically sealed during the elections in parts of the country at the end of the month. Sealed, that is, apart from the regular evacuation of dead occupiers. We don't expect that to stop.

The land of free speech. How television and radio in the FARCE is free to show anything it likes - so long as it supports the Republicans.

Still with the FARCE, it looks like they've blocked attempts to freeze the Iranian nuclear programme. As part of the efforts to bring peace to the middle east, the EU negotiated a trade-for-nukes deal with Tehran. The bigots in Columbia took umbridge at this, as it would rob them of a great excuse to continue their war against some terror, and proves that the EU can use its place in the world. Some of the trade requires the active co-operation of the FARCE junta, and that just ain't going to happen.

Vladimir Poutine's government is under threat from the elderly. Old people are revolting against plans to cut their benefits from 200 roubles a month to nothing.

Lloyd-Webber's a sell-out.. He's thinking about breaking up his Really Useful Group, and selling bits to a dumb Yank. Already under threat are his small theatres the Lyric, Duchess, Apollo, and Garrick, where some of the front-of-house staff are wonderful beyond words.

Still on the theme of revolting, Robert Kilroy-Shaft has announced that he's been "inundated" with letters asking him to set up a new political party. It comes from a Mrs Trellis of North Wales...

And finally. Peter Luff, MP for mid-Worcestershire, has criticised hit television show Dick and Dom in Da Bungalow as being a bit revolting, and "not the stuff of public service broadcasting." We have two words for you, sir: Bogies!

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posted 18 Jan 2005, 19.33 +0000

The arrogance of the FARCE knows no bounds, does it. Reuters reports:

A clutch of complaints by FARCE viewers that the Athens Olympics opening ceremony featured lewd nudity has incensed the Games chief, who warned Yankee regulators to bugger off from policing ancient Greek culture, as Greece has some, and they don't.

Gianna Angelopoulos warned the Federal Communications Commission watchdog, sensitive after a deluge of outrage when singer Janet Jackson's breast was exposed at a Super Bowl game, not to punish the obscure television channel that aired the Games. Male nudity, a woman's breast and simulated sex were the subjects of shrill complaints about the opening ceremony on August 13.

"Far from being indecent, the opening ceremonies were beautiful, enlightening, uplifting and enjoyable. Greece does not wish to be drawn into a failed country's culture war. Yet that is exactly what is happening," said Ms Angelopoulos in a piece for a local paper in the territory of California.

Complaints focused on a parade of actors portraying naked statues. Among them were the Satyr and the nude Kouros male statues, both emblems of ancient Greece's golden age. "We also showed a couple enjoying their love of the Greek sea and each other. And we told the history of Eros, the god of love. Turning love, yearning and desire into a deity is an important part of our contribution to civilisation."

"As these cretins should be aware, there is great hostility in the world to-day to cultural domination in which a single value system created elsewhere diminishes and degrades local cultures. In this context, it is astonishingly unwise for an organ of the illegitimate junta to engage in an investigation that could label a presentation of the Greek origins of civilisation as unfit for television viewing. We have civilisation, they don't."

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posted 19 Jan 2005, 18.32 +0000

Not content with the disaster area that is the Google-mail lack-of-privacy policy, or the completely useless usenet archive, Google has now decided to break its own core business.

The excuse is a pretty decent one, at least for five seconds or so. Google's promoting an additional attribute - rel=nofollow - to include in blog comments. This ensures that any useful links one happens to post in comments will be automatically ignored, just because some people are far too lazy to properly moderate their own comments pages.

Quite simply, this is going to shift the problem from those participating blogs to others. Google's also shifting the burden of comment spam from its own algorithms - which should be able to be trained to ignore comment spam - to the providers.

I project that there won't be any substantial reduction in comment spam, because the spammers still want actual people to look at and click on their links, which cost them nothing to propagate. Google's inability to program properly anymore has vastly diminished the chance of quality small blogs being noticed through comments.

In the final analysis: Google No Longer Gets It.

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posted 19 Jan 2005, 18.59 +0000

...Why a top lawyer told the government to bog off. Doesn't the treatment of Belmarsh detainees amount to psychological torture? I ask. He hesitates only slightly. "I ... I ... I would indeed accept that. If you suffer acute physical and mental suffering - and I underline mental in the context of the psychological effect of indefinite detention, and indeed the fact that at least two of them are in Broadmoor - then yes, I would agree with you. You may well have a very powerful argument that begins to look like a breach in itself of article 3. It's Britain's Guantanamo Bay."

... Government tries to confuse over the association between biometric passports and its proposed national identity database. We didn't follow this story until we drew a very large diagram, too large for this page.

...Peter Meddlesome heavily criticised, perhaps unfairly. He's encouraging bilateral deals between the global superpower and other nations; aid groups criticise because the EU can afford teams of lawyers, while poorer countries tend to have just a few people around. The charities risk confusing process with results.

... Robert Kilroy-Shaft quits charade party. People outside the party saw it as "a joke", he said, and it had no policies, no spokespeople, no energy, vision or idea of how Britain should be governed. He added that he would tell people not to vote for the party. So, that'll be his new Mentior party wound up before it's begun.

... National Express to allow coach travellers to book two seats, to ensure enough space to spread out a bit. Not that you get this sort of hassle on Chiltern trains...

... Train, tree meet. A tree fell onto a train near Four Three Oaks this morning. No-one's been hurt, but the line's been closed all day. Less seriously, an advertising hoarding broke loose of its moorings in the city centre to-day, and was last seen flying off towards Amsterdam. It was advertising a new low-fares airline.

Slightly less frivolously, there's to be a series of one-day strikes on Central Trains during Saturdays in February. Wankers. Both of them; the union for not selling their dispute to the public, and management for letting things break down so badly.

... Sport, and Greggles lost in four sets to world number two Andrew Roddick. He's the first of three British players to leave the Aussie open, as Yelena Baltacha (yes, she's a Brit, though of Ukranian extraction) has made the third round, the first woman to do so since Australia gained her dominion status.

And now, our main feature. Canada! Oh.

"It's a little early to say how many people have applied, but we do know there was a lot of interest in our internet site," says Maria Iadinardi of Canada's office of Citizenship and Immigration. "On 3 November, there were 115,628 visits from the US, and the day after there were half that number. We usually get 20,000 a day. It was three weeks before it went back down."

There is certainly a feeling - if only based on anecdotal evidence - that a considerable northward migration is under way. Newspaper columnists in Canada are beckoning to disgruntled Americans; websites have been set up to help people thinking of moving; law firms are holding "Move to Canada" seminars in big cities; and even the smallest, dot-on-the-map places north of the border are anticipating an influx of US citizens. An advert placed in alternative US weekly newspapers by a development group based in the South Kootenay region of British Columbia is typical of the mood. It says: "Escape the Madness. Visit. Relocate. Immigrate."

People are heading north for different, often specific reasons. The junta's opposition to gay marriage, and its support of a constitutional amendment to ban formal recognition of such relationships, have made some feel like "outcasts". Charles Key, a 56-year-old Vietnam veteran from Bellingham, whose ancestor Francis Scott Key wrote the words of the FARCE's national anthem "Bye-bye Baby", says he's leaving because his country is no longer tolerant. "The land of the free and the home of the brave always meant to me that America was supposed to stand for freedom and diversity and tolerance. I don't think it does that any more," he told a reporter.

Greg Pallas, 42, from Redwood City in California, has reasons other than politics to move north. His girlfriend Mariette is Canadian and the couple had always thought they would move to her home country. "It was 2 November that I decided," says Pallas, a financial analyst who has already sent off his paperwork to the Canadian authorities. "I can just see this country becoming more conservative. It's the religion thing. The country is moving to the right and becoming less tolerant."

All this talk of a new future in Canada, which recognised gay marriage in December, and where there is a healthy suspicion of the illegal junta, implies that the good folk there are ready to welcome a flood of disgruntled Yankees. That might not be true - at least, not everywhere.

In November, when the talk of a mass migration to the north was at its height, disaffected Democrats who had just seen their man lose were given plenty to think about by Ian Robinson, a columnist with the right-wing paper in a loony-right province Calgary Sun, who wrote: "I hope I'm not alone in gently suggesting to those considering coming to Canada: stay home, you pathetic whining maggots."

For the most part, however, the signs are more welcoming. Jason Mogus, director of a company called Communicopia, set up a website to help people considering the move and to point out that Canada has universal healthcare and no troops in Iraq, signed the Kyoto protocol on the environment and permits gay marriage - and that its senate recently recommended legalising cannabis.

The site, alternativecanada.com, adds: "We invite you to get to know Canada. Explore the richness and diversity of our regions. And find out why Canada is the perfect alternative for conscientious, forward-thinking Americans."

Most Americans who have already made the move to Canada - and there are up to one million now living there - appear to have only good things to say about their new home. The internet blogger Inspector Lohmann dedicates much of his website to details of his emigration from San Francisco to Toronto, a move he made last year. He has no regrets.

In one blog entry, he wrote: "When I crossed the border into Canada to begin a new life in a new country, I felt a tremendous weight lift from me. I felt free in a way I had never felt before. And I never looked back. I have not felt a single pang of regret, nor do I ever expect to. When I visit America now, I feel like a visitor in some alien land, and it's a great feeling."

Of course, the road north isn't entirely straightforward. On top of the headaches of paperwork, and finding new homes, jobs and friends and all the rest, there is the sniping from proud red-state US citizens who cannot believe that any true American could conceive of leaving.

The vociferous, increasingly intolerant right-wing commentator Ann Coulter said recently on Fox News: "It's always the worst Americans who end up going [to Canada] - the Tories after the Revolutionary War, the Vietnam draft-dodgers after Vietnam. And now, after this election, you have the blue-state people moving up there. They better hope the United States doesn't roll over one night and crush them. They are lucky we allow them to exist on the same continent."

To many people planning their move, such comments are merely another reason to get packing. As soon as they can.

... And finally. Beer fights cancer. To the pub it is!

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posted 20 Jan 2005, 19.39 +0000

Second of what I think will end up as nine newspaper reviews. This week: The Telegraph, 15 January 2005. £1.20 for a broadsheet enveloping three further broadsheet sections, one tabloid, and one magazine.

News and finance

38 pages. Front page: France 2005 plug. Headline: Prescott's housing plans repeat mistakes of past, says royal guru, with a picture of Charles Windsor looking old. Also above the fold: Prince is silent over Harry, and plugs for the magazine and sport. Below the fold: Pentagon planned love bomb, US fury at EU weapons for China; neither headline is bourne out in the story.
p2 - Blair panics over 24 hour pubs, and a plug for Sunday correspondent Terry Wogan.
p3 - Feature on Staffordshire bull terriers, better placed in the weekend section.
p4 - Urban planning spread, trailed on front page.
p5 - Saturn probe.
pp6-7 - Harry Windsor; picture of young toffs p7.
p9 - Euthenasia.
p10 - Sexist Conservatives. First proper political story.
pp16-17 - Tsunami, with eyewitness account from journalist covering the story. No report of Thailand's request for trade not aid the previous day.
pp21-2 - Extract from book about making one's mind up quickly.
p23 - Crashingly dull interview with yank hostess. Who does this interest?
pp24-5 - Diary columns.
pp26-7 - Op-eds, leader p27.
p28 - Social notices.
p29 - Obits of people we never knew were living in the first place.
p30 - Business starts, 3p news, 1p profile and diary, 4p tables.
p38 - Weather, map takes about a quarter of the page, comprehensive text summaries. Only downer is the Atlantic chart, where fronts are a couple of hundred miles wide.

Good for home news and tales from the US, very poor for Europe and the rest of the world.

Sport

10 pages broadsheet.
p1 - Cricket, picture of Michael Vaughan and umpires.
pp1-3 Football, brief team news and five-line previews of Div I matches.
p4 - Rugby
p7 - Good interview with Mark Butcher.
pp8-9 - Racing
p10 - Tennis

Very thin on the ground, though more comprehensive than last week's paper, and very well written.

Broadsheet bundle 1

Weekend 18 pages. Cover story - Perfect Me, the man who spent a month following the strictures of dieticians and fitness gurus and found physical perfection. Very readable. Also: pets, moths, fashion, cookers, make your own wine cellar, traditional education, country, restaurants. Games: gen knowledge crossword, scrabble, substitution crossword, bridge, chess. Worst: Schite's Miscellany, just dull. Everything else is a very good read, lightly aspirational but very accessible.

Property 12 pages. Got half a million to splash out on a house in the Gloucestershire countryside? This is for you. Not the rest of us plebs.

Gardening 8 pages. Gardening. What were you expecting?

Arts 20 pages tabloid. Cover: Victoria Wood's musical, plus defence of Jerry Springer, Slash, good column by Julian Lloyd Webber, 2p pop music, 1p classical, 3p film, London theatre listings, tv review. Contemporary - perhaps more clearly up to date than anything else in the paper - but very superficial.

Books 12 page tabloid, inside Arts. Dull reading - Belle du Jour is a hoax, and the Kenya books were more clearly done last week.

Broadsheet bundle 2

Travel 36 pages. Lots of plugs for the paper's travel show, plus ski insurance, 6p on learning holidays, New Forest, Aldeburgh, ski-ing, Barcelona, cider in Lewes, Ukraine, Brazil. Features are spread through the section, and lots for the UK traveller.

Your money 10 pages. Insurance, Brown's baby bribe, ethical funds, just ½ page of tables. Concise, but well-written.

Motoring 14 pages. Includes a good article on SABRE, the road fans' group.

France 2005

24 page tabloid advertorial, promoting show following week-end.

Magazine

96p, A4. Cover: Red China goes capitalist, plus Geo. Ribbisi, mobster's daughters, a sculptor, fashion, and the usual twittle at the beginning and end. This section stands or falls by its features, and this week's were very dull.

In summary: This is well-written stuff, and - apart from the property section - within the grasp of most potential readers.

Listings 32p, just under A4. 4p per day - terrestrials spread over 2p, with four highlights; cabsat has 16 channels (including History and Geo, but not Living) on a page with two or three picks; radio has a page for the national networks - details for R3 and selected R4, BBC7, Oneword, and full World Service listings, plus a couple of picks. A very good listings section, with everything in one place and not too much flicking around.

Overall: The Telegraph surprised me. The news section was perhaps the poorest part of the package, with very little challenging or unpredictable material. The weekend section was a particular gem, and the listings section has set the standard by which the others will be judged. Early doors, but this is a better buy than the Times.

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posted 21 Jan 2005, 22.10 +0000

* The new Blue Peter presenter has flown into a storm of controversy. A couple of weeks ago, Zoe Salmon, a law graduate from Queen's Belfast, suggested that the red hand of Ulster would make a good design for a plane. This week, she had the misfortune to hold up one viewer's design in which the whole of Ireland was painted in the Union Flag colours.

Viewers have complained that the red hand symbol is only recognised by unionist supporters, and some hotheads suspect the corporation is engaging in "deliberate provocation", after the head of Blue Peter, Anne Gilchrist, wrote back claiming that both unionists and republicans were "equally attached" to the symbol.

A sociology professor told A Demi Graudina: "Like the swastika the red hand is a symbol that has been misappropriated. It is the symbol of the unionists and is certainly not signed up to by the majority. Nobody seriously thinks that it is a symbol for Ulster or Northern Ireland."

Traditionally, the red hand is the symbol of Ulster and refers to an ancient Irish legend in which the king promised land to the warrior whose hand touched shore first.

* From the Indytab: "We'd like to publish our dossier on Iraq's weapons in full, but we're awaiting permission from the tutor of the student who wrote it."

* The Tories are introducing central selection of candidates for their shortlists. Constituencies will still get the final say, but they will be restricted to three approved candidates from the Central Office shortlist.

* Brad de Long writes: There is one force that could stop a neo-Baath coup, at least in the South of Iraq: Iran. And they have a strong incentive to do so, not just to improve the well-being of their coreligionists, but also Kuwaiti and Saudi policy changes when there is no longer a Saddam Hussein or an American army buffer between Iran and the south side of the Gulf. The major long-run effect of the junta's war on Iraq may turn out to be to greatly strengthen Iran's position in the Middle East.

* Blair’s old ward has gone Conservative. For the first time ever, Hackney : Queensbridge has elected a Conservative councillor. Blair had his first political office here, as Branch Secretary; he was turned down as a prospective candidate for the ward. Charles Clarke is also a former councillor here. The result was Conservative 696, Labour 595, Lib Dem 334, RESPECT 291. In May 2002, the Conservatives came fourth, behind the Greens. Full details in the Swingometer post to-morrow.

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posted 21 Jan 2005, 22.14 +0000

A French court has ruled that Google's keyword advertising service infringes on the trademark of Le Meridian Hotels (CAC: MERD), and has ordered the company to stop using the trademark to trigger advertisements for Le Meridian's competitors. The judge ordered Google to pay all court fees, and a €2000 fine.

The court in Nanterre said that Google must stop linking competitor ads to searches for Le Meridian trademark items and Le Meridian brands. If the company fails to remove offending ad links within three days of being notified of a listing, it will face a daily fine of €150.

Google says it will appeal the decision, saying: "We will continue to defend against this suit, which we believe is without merit." Google is, of course, a dab hand at things being without merit; Louis Vuitton has also successfully sued the search company for trademark infringement.

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posted 21 Jan 2005, 22.16 +0000

* From the letters page of to-day's Indytab: The picture on your front page of X's inauguration reminded me of the Soviet stage-managed displays of the Politburo in Moscow which, at the time, reminded me of the Nazi rallies at Nuremburg in the 1930s. As a statement of purpose it should make the world very nervous indeed. -- Bill Mason, Beckenham, Kent

* In the Times, Matthew Parris reckons the FARCE is nearing the end of its reign. As a time of day, I think it’s about half past four. For America-2005-Iraq, think of Britain-1899-Boer War. Ever-heavier burdens are being loaded upon a nation whose economic legs are growing shaky, whose hegemony is being taunted and whose sense of world mission may be faltering. Of course, if it's half past four, it's high time for someone to bring Countdown to those shores.

* Here's a curious thing. Nick Carter - the former Backstreet Boy - is now a colonel in the British army. And he was in charge of a series of raids in Basra that led to his troops abusing Iraqi prisoners. He faced a military court, but was told there's "no evidence to suggest that you ordered or encouraged those actions for which the individuals referred to above will stand trial." Mr Carter did order looters to work - and that's a blatant breach of the Geneva convention, but because he's famous and (apparently) cute, he won't face any charges. That's unlike three of his underlings, who are in a military court charged with beating prisoners and putting them in silly positions.

* Sport, and the Brits at the Aussie open lost on days 4, 5, and 6. Greggles went down to Andy Roddick, Yelena Baltacha to Silvina Farina Elia, and to-day Timbo was toppled by Nikolai Davydenko.

* Ents, and apparently video on demand is "not about offering people more TV, but giving them the freedom to watch exactly what they want, when they want." So claims Eric Tveter, head of British cable company Telewest. So, Eric, some of us would rather like to watch Nickelodeon. We hear they've a rather good morning show, and we've a whole month of Gilmore Girls episodes to catch up on. And a new episode of Mr Benn. Any chance of getting your head out of your arse and letting us watch what we want? Ever?

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posted 22 Jan 2005, 11.40 +0000

This article is available to those using standards-compliant browsers only.

Transfers
=========
Con - Lab + 7.37% (+ 7.03%)
Con - LD  - 3.84% (- 4.10%)
Lab - LD  -11.21% (-11.13%)

Seats
=====

Lab 315 (+ 0 -88 323)
Con 235 (+72 - 2 227)
LD   65 (+14 - 0  65)

-----------------------
Lab overall majority -11 (+1)

Targets
=======

Lab held
--------
Birmingham Yardley * LD GAIN by 8.63
Phil Woolas * LD GAIN by 8.70
Lorna Fitzsimmons * LD GAIN by 3.68
Broxtowe * CON GAIN by 0.82
Reading East (Lab maj: 0.52)
Stephen Twigg (0.45)
Ruth Kelly (0.58)
Copeland (1.14)
Denzil Davies (6.84)
Charles Clarke (7.41)
Barbara Follett (8.67) NEW
Shaun Woodward (9.73) NEW

Con held
--------
Oliver Letwin (1.12)
David Davies (2.36)
David Heathcoat-Amory (3.51)
Theresa May (5.67)
Michael Howaerd (10.39)

LD held
-------
No names at risk

Marginals
=========

1) Con-Lab
----------
Colne Valley          Lab 0.93 Con [1]
Falmouth & Cambourne  Lab 0.90 Con [2]
Staffordshire Moorlan Lab 0.87 Con
Battersea             Lab 0.80 Con
Blackpool North & Fyl Lab 0.63 Con
Bolton West           Lab 0.58 Con
Harlow                Lab 0.55 Con

Cleethorpes           Lab 0.49 Con
Batley & Spen         Lab 0.47 Con
Enfield Southgate     Lab 0.45 Con
Reading East          Lab 0.52 Con
Worcester             Lab 0.45 Con
Brighton Kemptown     Lab 0.37 Con
Harrow West           Lab 0.34 Con
Norwich North         Lab 0.32 Con

Gedling               Con 0.19 Lab *CON GAIN*
Wirral South          Con 0.16 Lab *CON GAIN*
Birmingham Edgbaston  Con 0.19 Lab *CON GAIN*
Pudsey                Con 0.18 Lab *CON GAIN*
Morecambe & Lunesdale Con 0.25 Lab *CON GAIN*
Rossendale & Darwen   Con 0.26 Lab *CON GAIN*
Watford               Con 0.32 Lab *CON GAIN*
Corby                 Con 0.43 Lab *CON GAIN*

Stafford              Con 0.79 Lab *CON GAIN*
Broxtowe              Con 0.82 Lab *CON GAIN*
Dover                 Con 0.95 Lab *CON GAIN*
Bradford West         Con 0.96 Lab *CON GAIN*
Pendle                Con 1.02 Lab *CON GAIN*
Tamworth              Con 1.17 Lab *CON GAIN*
Great Yarmouth        Con 1.28 Lab *CON GAIN*
Warwick & Leamington  Con 1.36 Lab *CON GAIN*
Gravesham             Con 1.41 Lab *CON GAIN*
Vale of Glamorgan     Con 1.41 Lab *CON GAIN*

2) Lab - LD
-----------
Leeds North West                        Lab 0.76 LD  [3]

3) Con - LD
-----------

Orpington                                LD 0.88 Con *LD  GAIN*
Dorset West                             Con 1.12 LD
Surrey South West                       Con 0.57 LD

4) Three-way
------------

Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale  LD 0.10 Lab *LD  GAIN* [4]

5) Others
---------
Comhairle nan Eilean Siar               SNP 1.17 Lab *SNP GAIN*

[1] Lab 1.85 LD
[2] Lab 1.68 LD
[3] Lab 3.05 Con
[4] LD  0.31 Con

Sunderland S
============
Lab 49.6%
Con 20.0%
LD  19.2%

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posted 22 Jan 2005, 16.11 +0000

Something unusual happened on Monday. Most of the UK's independent radio stations took the same programme, aiming to raise lots and lots of money for the tsunami appeal. The national programming was co-ordinated by Capital Radio, from their London studios. The 12-hour show was hosted by national personalities, most of whom had become famous through their work on television, proving once again that the magic box is better at uniting the nation than the radio. The show itself was very speech-heavy, with only four or five records played most hours. The last five minutes of each half-hour were available for local opt-outs - local news, travel, weather, fund-raising, and commercials.

Most independent stations took the format-breaking programme, but by no means all. With its emphasis on modern music, the Saga group stations - targetted at listeners 50 and over - remained with their own programming, but most links mentioned the appeal. Given that Saga is having a good go at Radio 2 in the English midlands, this is canny scheduling. Radio XL also remained with normal programming, in various Asian languages. And Talk Radio opted out of the networked show for about eight hours to provide live commentary on the cricket test - they've paid large amounts of money and upset the Beeb to cover the cricket, so that's what they jolly well will do.

On an unscientific survey, it appears that Classic FM will have been the major losers. The classical music station was a very long way off format. Even though their breakfast host Simon Bates hosted two of the broadcast hours, he shared the microphone with a Jady Goodie. Both Classic listeners we know retuned to the BBC rival Radio 3 on Monday, and at least one hadn't returned by the end of the week. Also not doing too well were the likes of "Mike in Uckfield" and "Andy in Goring," local radio DJs who hammed it up badly on national radio.

Other radio news in brief: changes at BBC WM will see Les Ross join the station on Sunday mornings from 6 Feb. He'll take the 9-noon slot currently occupied by Ed Doolan; in turn, Ed will host the godslot show between 7 and 9, and will continue his "Other Side Of..." interviews at noon. In 2½ years, Mr Ross will have presented on three major Birmingham stations; he left pop station BRMB for older station Saga in 2003.

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posted 23 Jan 2005, 09.59 +0000

We'll start with Michael Howaerd's vampires, who have taken out a full-page advert in to-day's Sunday Torygraph calling for immigration quotas. Contradiction to his assertion that the UK is "full" and the undertone that immigrants are a "burden" on society comes just five pages later, with an article explaining how eastern European builders have helped keep the quality of work up and prices down. Elsewhere, the Torygraph has a non-story about sexism in the Lib Dems that's built on a couple of anonymous quotes. Clearly the Tories are worried by the sunshine-yellow party, a topic the Obs treats more positively.

Further bad news for the blood-suckers comes with a poll in the Sunset Times, where we learn that the public doesn't actually believe the Torys' plans to cut taxes and increase public service. We also hear that - against Mr Tony Blair, Mr Gordon Brown, Mr Charles Kennedy, None Of The Above, and Don't Know - fewer people would like to have Mr Howaerd help them mend a puncture than any single person. Mr Kennedy topped the poll, a margin of error clear of Mr Brown.

(Full disclosure: we participated in this online poll, which confirms the split between Blair and Brown. We'd be interested to read the reasons why people don't trust Mr Blair, and whether the GBP believes there are "too many" Scots and Welsh in the cabinet. Though support for the Iraq war has dropped to 35%, a raft of questions on UK involvement in Iran also seems to have vanished into the ether.

More pro-Blair spinnery in the Murdoch press, though this time from the News of the Screws. Apparently, 130 is the magic number - if Labour secures an overall majority of that size, Mr Blair will feel secure enough to shuffle Mr Brown off to the back-benches. A smaller majority will ensure that Mr Blair can't risk splitting the party. Clearly Labour has grown fat and indolent on its two landslide majorities, so much so that its leader can't possibly think of governing on a majority as slim as Harold Wilson's 95, still less his 4 and 3.

All politics is local, and what could be more local than trouble at the 'bridge. Reports in to-day's Obs cast doubt on the future of Rover, if the last-ditch tie-up with a Shanghai-based car-maker falls apart. The deal, brokered by John Prescott, may be in jeopardy because of slowing demand for cars in Red China, and has this week been the subject of a personal letter from Tony Blair. The loss of the Longbridge car plant would turn its local seat, Birmingham Northfield, from one that would give the Tories an overall majority to one they could gain ahead of the national swing.

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posted 23 Jan 2005, 11.30 +0000

Remember The Coalition of the Willing, that list of 45 or so countries that were happy to break international law and invade Iraq? It's gone.

Lost.

Fallen behind the sofa somewhere, probably, that's what usually happens to this kind of thing.

March 2003, and 30 countries provide public assistance, and the FARCE's junta claims support from another fifteen countries, though those 15 ticked the "no publicity" box.

By last July, that list had shrunk by over a third, down to just 28. Where did the others go? Was their support conditional? Was it promised "if required", but never required? Was it all a figment of someone's over-active imagination, eh?

And that doesn't count the countries that were willing once, but now aren't. Such as Spain, Costa Rica, Ukraine, Poland...

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posted 23 Jan 2005, 12.05 +0000

The singles chart has only the second new number one in seven weeks. After the stasis of Band Aid Ill came the tedium of Steve Brookstein, then a desparate final royalty grab by RCA. Finally, Ciara (pronounced "Sierra", according to her appearance on to-day's Popworld) hits the top slot with Goodies. This is a tribute to Bill Oddie, Graeme Garden, and Tim Brook-Taylor, who recorded under the name of "The Goodies" almost 30 years ago. The Goodies never had a number one hit on their own, but did make the top five with the classic Funky gibbon in 1976. Quite why the comedy threesome should be huge on the dense side of the Atlantic remains to be explained.

All this ensures that the Presley Re-Issue Of The Week (A Fool such as I / I need your love to-night, the 85^th chart-topper, from May 1959) is stuck at number 2, in spite of RCA increasing their pressings from the original announcement of 25,000 to 30,000 and now to 35,000 copies per week. There are fourteen further records in this series, scheduled to be released one a week over the next three months, and in mid-week charts they were all occupying places between 41 and 75. On a request from RCA, the chart compilers have excluded these pre-release sales, as they're entitled to do.

What else? The Chemical Brothers are back with Galvanise, the lead single from their latest album. The group had a couple of number 1 singles during the second half of the Britpop era, and have since lifted a couple of top 10 singles from each album. Athlete had four singles out during 2002 and 03, never quite making the top 30. Hard plugging and careful release dates ensure Wires is new at number 4, one place ahead of Feeder's biannual top ten entry. Tumble and fall joins 2001's Buck Rogers and 2003's Just the way I'm feeling as their biggies. Lucie Silvas has her second straight top ten entry with Breathe in at 6, and Stonebridge's Take me away comes in at 9.

Other new entries of significance: Soulwax's E talking lists every known illegal drug, which makes 27. One place lower is Mercury Rev's comeback, In a funny way, and that's the best newie of the week. The pleasantly loud Mooney Suzuki's Alive and amplified comes in at 38.

But it's the fallers that make this week's headlines. From 10 to 50 goes Jailhouse rock, the fastest fall from the top 10 since the Wedding Present's Come play with me - another limited edition single - went 10-65 in May 1992. The biggest fall from the top 10 for a non-limited single is Iron Maiden's Man on the edge, which went 10-40 in 1995.
From 2 to 26 goes the Manic Street Preachers' Empty souls, the biggest fall from number 2 ever, breaking their own worst - The love of Richard Nixon fell 2-22 last autumn.
And, for almost fifty years, the record slump from the top slot has been Harry Belafonte's Mary's boy child, which slumped 1-12 in January 1958 when the festive season ran out. No longer. Last week's topper, One night / I got stung plunges 1-20. This year's Band Aid record makes the relatively modest slip from 31-43, while the Brighton record moves 45-47 and is already out-selling one Presley grab.

Phew. Here's The Good Stuff.

 7  3 Killers - Somebody told me
 8  9 Uniting Nations - Out of touch
10  5 Rooster - Staring at the sun
16 11 Dana Rayne - Object of my desire
19  7 Darius Danesh - Live twice
22  8 Iron Maiden - The number of the beast
25 14 Erasure - Breathe
32 16 Pop! - Serious
35 27 Kasabian - Cutt off
53 43 U2 - Vertigo
55 22 Client - Pornography
63 39 Interpol - Evil

Albums

Little change on the albums list - Killers, Green Day, Franz, Keane hold down the top four. Damien Rice (14-5) and Gwen Stefani (10-6) both make good climbs, as does Lucie Silvas (28-11). Thirteen Senses re-release their album The Invitation on the back of the single success, and it hits a new peak of 13. Ashley Simpson re-releases her album Autobiography on the back of a forthcoming single, and it lands at 21 before flouncing off because it's in the wrong sleeve, or something. Ashanti moves 23-17, the Slappers 15-23. Proper new stuff comes from KT Tunstall Eye to the telescope and Interpol Antics, down at 35 and 36. Shame.

20 re Zutons - Don't ever think
19 14 Garou & Michael Sardou - La riviere de notre enfance
18 16 Star Academy IV - Adieu M le professeur
17  5 Kylie Minouge - Am I really you?
16 NE Iron Maiden - The number of the beast
15 18 Papi Sanchez - Enamourame
14  6 Britney Spears - Toxic
13 10 Green Day - Boulevard of broken dreams
12 NE Darius Danesh - Live twice
11 11 Embrace - Ashes
10 13 Keane - Somewhere only we know
 9  12 Annie - Chewing gum
 8 NE Erasure - Breathe
 7  9 McFly - Obviously
 6 NE Rooster - Staring at the sun
 5  3 Eric Prydz - Call on me
 4  7 U2 - Vertigo
 3 re Killers - Somebody told me
 2  2 Uniting Nations - Out of touch
 1  1 Gwen Stefani - What you waiting for?

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posted 23 Jan 2005, 20.58 +0000

Another mixed week, with a warm front passing over on Wednesday night, followed by a cold front on Friday night. Thursday was another windy day, the fourth prolonged period of high winds already this year.

17 Mo Cloud drizzle 6/8
18 Tu Sunny spells, wintry showers 1/6
19 We Cloud drizzle 2/8
20 Th Wind, cloud 9/13
21 Fr Sun to cloud 5/7
22 Sa Cloud, snow later -1/3
23 Su Sunny 0/3

In spite of some hot days, 36 degree heating days required this week, taking the season's total to 305. The coldest week of the winter so far.

We're looking for a fairly cold week. However, a front in the Atlantc might bring warmer weather, or leave some snow if it stalls over the midlands. We just don't know.

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posted 23 Jan 2005, 21.18 +0000

older writing... write to