Anyone would think it was election season. Labour is concentrating its fire to-day on immigration, with plans to introduce a points system for new economic migrants. The prize, of course, is permanent residence, but they'll need to be young and "economically useful." The Conservatives have called it a "chaotic, headline-grabbing" initiative, which rather shoots the fox on their other argument, "we had these ideas two weeks ago, what's keeping you, Tone?" Here's what: giving refugees an initial five-year residence, in case the situation in their home-land stabilises. And, apparently, "Britain's hospitality is under threat." Indeed, from the likes of racist scum like Charles In Charge and his crony Tony.

ITV had an interview with their political correspondent bod, and ran it alongside pictures of people being turfed off lorries at ports. The tabloid channel is quite deliberately confusing refugees with illegal immigrants. Very poor, and my complaint's already with OFCOM.

A Fistful of Euro has this compelling analysis:

• For the European market to work effectively, the unimpeded transfer of goods and people is vital.
• The unimpeded transfer of people necessitates looser border controls within the EU - fewer passport checks etc.
• Looser border controls within the EU can be exploited.
• Therefore, outward-facing borders need to be tightened to prevent misuse of internal harmonisation.
• Additionally, individual member states need to harmonise immigration and - especially - naturalisation policies (to prevent one state's soft attitude being exploited by immigrants from outside the EU who can become EU citizens easily in one part of the Union and then migrate freely to another).
• If Spain offers amnesty to its illegal immigrants the risk comes that they can then travel freely to any other part of the EU - including countries which would not have allowed them entry of choice.
• This can then undermine national anti-immigration policies - such as those being proposed by Labour, the Conservatives and others in an attempt to win popular xenophobic support in the upcoming elections.

Clearly, Europe needs a coherent strategy for immigration. And - look! - article 3 of the constitution offers harmonisation of proceedures governing entry, residence, the granting of long term visas and residence permits, and "illegal immigration and unauthorised residence, including removal and repatriation of persons residing without authorisation", and regulation of the EU's external borders.

Rest of the news...

Meanwhile, the Conservatives are heading towards prison. Not because they're being locked up for crimes against taste, but because they're planning to build 20,000 new places. According to our back-of-the-napkin maths, that'll cost the thick end of £1 milliard just to build, and a further £100 million per year to run.

The Tories' strategy (if they have one) is predicated on the myth that prison cures crime. As anyone who actually thinks about it will tell you, prison encourages more and better crime. One of the proposals is to stop the home detention orders, even though they have a 90% success rate (measured by people completing their orders without a breach or re-offending.) Not only is this more effective than prison, it's a hell of a lot cheaper!

The Lib Dems' spokey made the telling point that the easy option is to lock people up in prison. The difficult and challenging option is to educate them, to encourage basic literacy skills, to provide vocational training, and let the prisoner become more useful to society.

Airport security is a FARCE. ... Terror laws will fall in Strasbourg, says lawyer for the Belmarsh Dozen ... Paige Turner signs for the BBC and will co-host a weekly book club series with Jeremy Vine ... we recognise about four of the original 24 authors, but we'll tune in for at least one show ... Quality of pot rises ...

And the return of Letter Of The Day; to-day, from the Indytab.

Sir: Tony Blair says it is a "fact" that the IRA carried out the Northern Bank robbery. He was also certain that it was "beyond doubt" that Saddam had WMD stockpiles ready to fire at British targets within 45 minutes. Does the PM know something we don't, or is he just stating, in good faith, what he believes to be true at this moment in time? - RICHARD NEWSON, Whitton, Middlesex

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posted 07 Feb 2005, 22.01 +0000

From the growing file labelled "Google Has Jumped The Shark (Evidence, For)," comes cette actuelle. In short: a French handbag maker has slapped Google's arms for allowing its competitors to buy adverts that use their name. Google's been fined €200,000 (€200,000.) (Is that the most redundant currency conversion ever?)

Quite simply, one is not allowed to use someone else's trademark in advertising in Europe. It's a cultural thing, and we don't look kindly on colonials imposing *their* culture on *us*. This is where Google stomped its big feet and trod on a landmine.

It can be argued that Google was only the messenger, but this is bunk, as they made money from selling the trademarked adwords. This is where they got hit, since they made a profit from the dealing. If they didn't charge for keywords, they probably would have avoided the fine. Perhaps if they change their adwords to kill trademarked names and separate the first and last names as different words, instead of the phrase "Louis V..." use "Louis" "Vuitton" "handbag", they could get away with it, but with this on the books I'd be extra cautious. Hiring a lawyer and remaining on the right side of the law will cost far less than the €200,000 they were fined.

It's been standard French law for over 100 years that it is a civil wrong for a company to use the efforts made by another firm to promote its trademarks. For instance: A has a trademark 'a' ; B pays a store so that whenever a consumer wants product 'a', to give him a discount on product 'b', or advertise 'b'.

This is wrong. Company B is in fact capitalizing on the money A spent to have trademark 'a' known to the public, without paying back A for this effort, thus 'stealing' it from A. The store is also making a wrongful profit, and can be sued for that.

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posted 08 Feb 2005, 19.22 +0000

We'll believe it if it sticks. Israel and the Palestinian government have agreed a cease-fire. It's the first meeting since the current outbreak of guerilla warfare began in September 2000. Under the agreement, Israel will release 500 prisoners and hand over five West Bank towns. Future negotiations would be under the framework of the 2002 Road Map, which had been residing in the glove compartment. Separatist Palestinian group Hamas said that it would not be bound by the cease-fire, which doesn't bode at all well.

UK television regulator OFSWITCH has allowed ITV to halve its regional output. The national broadcaster will be obliged to maintain its current hour-a-day of local news, but need only give 90 minutes per week to locally-produced programming. This is a reduction from 3 hours at present, and almost 20 hours in the 1960s. Cuh.

Iraq's been robbed of USD 8.8 billion (€6.8 milliard), claims George Monbiot.

The Lib Dems have launched their campaign of the week, to protect civil liberties. Leader Chatshow Charlie said, "We have to address the fundamental issues of the day that concern people, but underpinning all those fundamental issues is surely the most fundamental of all, which is that we can't take for granted in a liberal democracy our citizens' rights. If we as a party are not out there, making that case, then our politics are poorer as a result."

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posted 08 Feb 2005, 19.59 +0000

Denmark's centre-right Prime Minister has won a second term. Anders Fogh Rasmussen's Liberal-Conservative coalition won around 53% of the votes. His victory was widely predicted after a crackdown on asylum-seekers and popular tax cuts. Addressing jubilant supporters, Rasmussen said it was an historic occasion, as it is the first time a Liberal leader has been re-elected. The Liberals lost four seats in parliament but remained the biggest party.

The opposition enjoyed a last-minute surge of support, and won around 46% of votes. The leader of the Social Democrats, Mogens Lykketoft, conceded defeat before the final results were announced. He said he was sad that Danes would now have to live with a government propped by the Danish People's Party, the coalition's anti-immigration allies.

The result is a small cheer for those who backed the illegal war in Iraq; we believe the Danish government is only the second member of the "coalition of the easily bribed" to secure undisputed re-election, following Australia. Although most Danes initially backed the war and the opposition fell into line, six out of 10 now favour withdrawing troops - five of whom have been charged with abusing Iraqi prisoners. However, Iraq has featured little in an election campaign dominated by welfare benefits and immigration.

Immigration dominated the brief campaign. Laws passed in 2002 have made it harder to bring foreign spouses into Denmark, and to qualify for asylum. In July 2002, Denmark tightened its laws and decided only to accept refugees as defined by the Geneva Conventions, meaning those who have been or have concrete fears of being persecuted because of their race, religion or political beliefs. Denmark has also made it harder for foreigners to get residence permits and bring in spouses born outside the EU, and closed a host of asylum reception centres. The combined measures led to a dramatic drop in the number of asylum-seekers, from 12,512 in 2001 to 3,222 last year.

Mr Rasmussen left his Social Democrat opponents little room for manoeuvre by proclaiming his commitment to Denmark's popular welfare state. Despite promising tax cuts, he persuaded many that these can be achieved without eating into their prized social security benefits, which include high quality health care and education, generous unemployment benefits and guaranteed childcare.

Other politics news

From the "They're all stupid in Virginia" department: The Virginia state house has voted to outlaw the trend of wearing trousers so low that underwear hangs over the top. Youngsters in Virginia showing too much of their boxer shorts or G-strings could be fined USD 50 (32 euro cents.)

Tony Blair has apologised to the surviving members of the Guilford Four and the Maguire Seven. These Irish families were wrongly convicted of pub bombings in the 1970s, and served around fifteen years in jail before the completely fictitious nature of their convictions was confirmed.

This move will bring pressure on the soon to be former prime minister to apologise to the Birmingham Six, falsely convicted under similar circumstances. We're also wondering how this is compatible with Tony's plans to lock up people purely on the interior minister's say-so, a recipe for wrongful detentions if ever we heard it.

The cost of leaving the ERM has been confirmed by the UK's finance ministry. £3.3 milliard was lost in a failed effort to keep sterling within its ERM boundaries in September 1992, far lower than the ludicrous claims of anything from 15 to 30 milliard that have been common currency since the date. Given that the forced devaluation helped to kick-start the Clarke-Brown growth cycle, maybe history is showing us that £3.3 milliard was cheap at the price.

Hasn't he resigned yet? My hon. fiend goes inside the mind of Charles In Charge.

Q: Is there, in truth, actually an international terrorist organisation called Al-Qaeda?

A: No. And Fiend has very strong suspicions that if the Home Office and its subsidiaries were to tread a less illegal path with respect to anti-terrorism activities, that inconvenient fact might become slightly more apparent to the voters. And that would never do.

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posted 10 Feb 2005, 18.31 +0000

A wildcat strike by employees of host broadcaster RAI has blacked out the world championships of the International Ski Federation (FIS) currently taking place in Bormio, Italy. The men's giant slalom took place a day late following what FIS president Gianfranco Kasper called an illegal strike by a section of the domestic network's workers over contract issues. M Kasper said steps had been taken to make sure the race will be held with "90 percent certainty".

"We have been in discussions with the EBU and other networks from Switzerland, Germany and Austria and if we have to we will hold the races independently of RAI," Kasper told a press conference. Kasper admitted he was concerned about the possibility of strikes affecting the 2006 Olympics in Turin. "Are strikes possible at Torino? Of course they are. The right to strike exists in every civilised country. As a member of the IOC, I've tried to raise concern about this possibility next year and I've even pushed for a special dispensation in the law which means it will not happen. But to my knowledge, nothing has been done."

Arthur Hachler of the EBU was quick to quash the possibility that the Olympics could be held hostage. "In Torino it will be a different host broadcaster, and there will be several production teams including some from Sweden and Canada," he said. "And when they sign the contract they will also sign a disclaimer ruling out the possibility of strike action."

Wednesday's race was called off only a half hour before the first of the racers were due to start the first leg. Angry fans at the finish area had to be pulled away by police as they attacked a RAI TV outside broadcasting unit truck.

(From the Media Network interweb thingummy.)

UK media regulator Ofswitch has confirmed the analogue television switch-off schedule. When the changeover begins - currently scheduled for early 2008, but not to go ahead until 90% of households has at least one digital set - Border will go first, followed by Westward, and Harlech (Wales). 2009 should see Granadaland, Harlech (West), Grampian and Scottish. 2010 sees the switch pulled in ATV-land, Yorkshire, and Anglia, while Southern, Thames, Tyne Tees and Ulster follow in 2011. Channel will remain on analogue until 2012, pending negotiations with the French.

Ashley Simpson po'ed off. The famous Teletubby fan was boo-ed off a shop floor while attempting to spend money. According to reports, she'd just entered a boutique when four late-teen girls spotted her, let out a whoop and ran inside! One shrieked, "You're a FAKER!", another hollered, "You have NO talent. And you're not as pretty as your sister!" Exit stage right.

No doubt she'll bump into some of the out cartoon characters

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posted 10 Feb 2005, 18.34 +0000

Police have been to the new Swedish furniture store in Edmonton, London. They weren't looking for a self-assembly jail made out of pre-fabricated confessions, but for the source of the biggest riot in Ikea's European history. When the store opened at midnight, there was a lot of crushing, pushing, shoving, and at least one stabbing. People abandoned their cars on the North Circular Road, all in search of a £45 (€ 65) sofa. The store is notoriously inflexible. Susie Steiner writes:

You can look on Ikea's website, but you cannot purchase anything on it. You cannot purchase over the telephone either. You cannot ring up and add to your existing order, you must visit the store again. If you go to an Ikea store by car, you must resign yourself to a couple of hours in a tailback. If you go to an Ikea store by public transport, you must resign yourself to being stung by the store's furniture delivery service.

When you're inside an Ikea store, you must come to terms with a near permanent state of bewilderment: shelves stacked with flat brown boxes labelled with random codes and names; a yellow road which takes you inexplicably through bedrooms when all you wanted was some kitchen handles. And then, then, when your emotional temperature is rising and you can feel a panicky hotness around your ears, you will be faced with Ikea's version of customer care - an underpaid teenager, trained in psychic disengagement who'll tell you they're out of stock. The next delivery won't be for two weeks. No, you can't place an order, you'll have to return to the store. That other query? You'll have to ask someone in bathrooms ... that's five yards down the yellow road and the queue's on your left.

Ikea is disingenuous when it takes corporate decency or responsibility out of the equation. Improving the experience of its customers doesn't inevitably mean a stark rise in prices - that's a management choice, which relates directly to profit margins. It could change the way it runs its business - spend a few million less on marketing, and a few million more on staff - and begin to take some responsibility for the people having nervous breakdowns in its car parks.

They got off lightly with a riot, when you think about it.

She doesn't note that the quality of the furniture is poor. We've had a sofa and bed from the store for four years, and both are becoming quite uncomfortable. They don't have the durability of other furniture products, and that's very bad. Especially in a bed.

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posted 10 Feb 2005, 19.18 +0000

Following a thirty-five-year courtship, wealthy landowner Charles Windsor will marry his paramour Camilla Parker-Horse in a private ceremony in April. So spake Mr Windsor's PR office at 9.10 this morning. At 10.30, we heard that the divorcee will take the courtesy title "Duchess of Cornwall," and will not generally be referred to as "Princess of Wails." By 11, they'd let slip that no-one will ever refer to her as "Queen Camilla," but as the "Princess Consort."

Bollocks to all that. The far more important thing is that the wedding will close the Commons on Friday 8 April. If, as we all expect, the general election is to take place on 5 May, the writ must be issued on Monday 11 April. Labour's just lost another day to force through one of its more unpopular bills through parliament.

Those who want discussion on their home seat could do worse than to head for Vote-2005. All 659 646 seats are under discussion. Hope they get some good moderators soon... Not so required on Backing Blair, the site for people who are backing Mr Mister Tony Blair.

Honestly, the things fans of good music will do to knock the shine off the most depressing BPI awards ever. The low point came when Joss Stone won "Best urban act", when she doesn't even win "Best countryside act". The Sizza Sistas won everything they were up for, in spite of having less talent between them than Joss Stone has in her little fingernail. Keane droned their way to an award or three, Mike Skinner won best male, Kate Bush best female, Willy Oung won best single with a record we won't remember in twenty-five weeks, never mind twenty-five years. Even worse, Franz Ferdinand won the kiss of death that is the Best Newcomer. On the upside, McFly won everything they were up for; on the downside, that was only Pop.

No surprises to find that the Times' pisspoor Caitlin Moran saw this apology for a show as a bright new future. She is, after all, the one person who actually thinks Joss Stone really does sing the blues, and isn't a chancer from Devon who will be overshadowed by Alex Parks within months.

Another nail in the coffin of the planet; the EU will not set any greenhouse gas reduction targets for after 2012, preferring the impossible task of forcing regime change in the PDRUP to a less selfish form of government.

And another: North Korea has the bomb. First target: Japan, following the 2:1 defeat in yesterday's football match.

Curio of the day: front page features in Het Grauniad and the Indytab on the blackcurrant, an insanely popular mobile phone / slash / personal organiser.

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posted 10 Feb 2005, 19.45 +0000

That Labour pledge card in full:

1. Your family better off
2. Your family better and faster treatment
3. Your child more achievement
4. Your country's borders protection
5. Your community safer
6. Your children best start
7. Your verbs worthless
8. Your sentences fragmentary punctuationfree
9. Your ears in empty promises
10. Your voting for us

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posted 11 Feb 2005, 19.29 +0000

Picking up on the newspaper reviews, we turn to last Saturday's Independent. £1.10 to Mr Newsagent.

The main paper is 84 pages tabloid. Strapline on the front: Six Nations 2005 - Free rugby magazine. Also plugs for Two Great Travel Magazines, and 50 Great Beauty Products. Grate.
Headline: Rice talks language of diplomacy - but it has alarming echoes. Then, in much larger print, Target Iraq, only with the Q crossed out and replaced by an N. There's a picture of some woman snarling, with thinly-veiled threats in pullquotes to each side.
p2 continuation of FP story, plus Freedom of Information.
p3 organic eggs (a typical non-story)
p4-5 school standards, slightly critical of government.
p7 motherbloggers
p9 Pete Doherty - the Indytab reckons its readers will know who he is; also a piece on Betjamen's church bells, something Indytab readers will also know in the same way.
p10 Pain for victim of friendly fire's mother - there's a clear criticism of the Iraq war here.
p13 abysmal column by Deborah Orr.
p15 map of London's criminals.
p16-17 light-hearted spread on air rage.
p19 Bath Spa is a failure (see Eyes passim.)
p20 Anti-Brown politics column
p22 more on FoI
p24-5 Feature on the Eiger
p28 Europe section - preview of the Swedish election, then 2p on wine.
p32 World section, including the first telephones in Louisiana and a page on Nepal.
p36 Opinion begins, with leaders on a full page. Columnists on p37 are readable and entertaining, not didactic. Cartoon p38, letters p39, arts columns p40-1. More on Nepal p42-3; obits, religion, birthdays p44-5.
p47 Weather, UK map ¼ page, Atlantic chart large and clearly printed, Europe has temperatures and conditions. No attempt to look past the next two days.
p48 Business starts - 5p news, 1p profile, 2p tables. Well-written, but a little brief.
p56 Sport starts with columnists. 4p racing, 2p NFL, 1p cricket, 2p shorts, 5p on rugby (of which 4p is England and Wales - the others matches get half a page each) 12p on football, with a good article on the plight of Cambridge, 3p on the lower leagues, 2p Div I previews, and 2p of top-flight news, plus a readable interview with Ashley Cole. Column on the inside-back page rips into the earnestly dull US sports journos, and rugby on the back page.

Overall, this is a quality news and comment package - perhaps a little more actual news from Europe would be welcome, and a little more detail on the business, but these are minor tinkerings.

Save and Spend 20p, inside the main tabloid. Good comments on pensions and cash machines, plus a gratuitous pic of Clitring Aguilera. Negative view on equity release will piss off the advertisers. 2p on spending, and about 10p on investments, including a great cover story about the supplement's competition, in which day-trading beat long-term holdings. 3p of tables are through the section, which isn't as readable as the Telegraph's, but is still good.

Traveller 28p slightly subtab. Courcheval cover story, plus Lybia, boutique hotels, Algarve, Soho London, 10p classifieds. Soho article's the only one we rate, and the supplement's uninspiring.

In a polybag comes American Adventures - 52p slightly glossy A6 supplement. Includes articles on Highway 61, Chicago, Albuquerque, Dallas - not a mention of Deep Ellum's counterculture - Route 66, music, New Orleans, 4p events. As tepid as the main mag.

6 Nations 48p. Cover: are England ready to win again? Even before the matches, we knew that wasn't the question so much as can Ireland do the slam? England, Wales, Ireland get two articles each, France one, nothing for Italy, and - surprisingly - nothing for Scotland. Unbalanced.

Magazine 64p A4, stapled. Quixotic column from The Weasel, Will Self is dull, Beadle sets a good quiz, and that's yer lot: three ultra-dull articles, uninspiring columns on the usual subjects. Games: 1p on backgammon, chess, bridge, impossible crossword-with-bars, plus 1p on picture rebuses. Very poor.

The Information 68p sub-A4, stapled. The beauty products promo takes 8p, then it's 35 pages of national listings for the coming week. Wide ranging stuff - the usual cinema and music, plus art, book readings, children, comedy, events, and theatre includes capsule reviews. Television is 2p/day, with terrestrial and two highlights taking 1.2 pages, and 16 cable channels (4 movies, two KY sports but no Eurosport, two ITV, two BBC, four big ents, Artsworld, and Fox Kids - the last two very odd selections indeed.) The terrestrial listings aren't impossible to use, but the cable listings are cursory. Radio is 2p for the week, tucked away at the back, and is BBC1-5 plus World Service overnight, with no detail. The arts listings are good, the broadcast ones aren't.

Overall, the Indy is great for news and current affairs, not so good at anything else.

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posted 11 Feb 2005, 21.48 +0000

Maths in crisis as Hull University withdraws from mathematical university challenge. The London Mathematical Society said, "The effect is creating mathematical wastelands in parts of the country at a time when the government is saying we need more students to study maths and that we need to encourage people into maths teaching."

Official NHS waiting lists rose last month, rather undermining Labour pledge 2 (below.) These lists do not include people who are waiting to be formally assessed for an operation; the real figure is somewhat higher, but no-one knows how much greater.

Konstantin Kosachyov, the chairman of the Moscow state duma foreign affairs committee, confirmed that the British Prime Minister's office had cited the election on 5 May as the reason Mr Blair could not attend a ceremony in Moscow on 9 May to mark the 60th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. "British Prime Minister Tony Blair said there will be elections in his country on May 5 [so his inability to attend] is understandable," he said. Number Ten have said that Mr Blair will confirm his attendance at a later date, though this rather presumes that he'll be re-elected. B'caa b'caa.

Joined-up thinking from the Conservatives, as John Major calls for a moratorium on releasing past government papers under the official secrets act, and Michael Howaerd calls for the release of all papers pertaining to his time as interior minister.

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posted 12 Feb 2005, 10.07 +0000

Finance minister Gordon Brown delivered a keynote speech at the Labour party's spring conference to-day. Spring in the middle of February? That'll be global warming for you. Anyway, Mr Brown delivered his speech between 10 and 11 on a Saturday morning, so his pledges had to compete for our attention with the goings-on in Dick and Dom's Bungalow. We may have one or two slight inaccuracies in this report.

Speaking at the conference in the fenland town of Chatteris, Mr Brown told the prospective nominees that "if we were going to win the seat, you wouldn't be the candidates." Mr Brown then brought his youngster to compete in The Baby Race, in which we heard that his child loves all food except milk, which is good, because milk is not a food. Mr Brown's message was clear: if you want to get from here to there faster than anyone else, you've got to crawl.

Pre-empting the budget speech next month, Mr Brown announced that, under Labour, there would be more opportunities to affix stickers to unsuspecting members of the public. Under the Conservatives, claimed Mr Brown, stickage players would be unable to read "Traffic Warden", and that the incidence of lay-on-lay trouser stickage has increased by 550% under his government.

"Inflation has become a thing of the past," claimed Mr Brown, oblivious to the fact that everyone is scoring something around 300 points per head per hour. This isn't low growth at all, it's runaway, rampant inflation in the economy; even under the worst excesses of the Lawson boom, scores rarely grew by much more than 25 points per head per hour.

He pledged to ask the Conservatives which babies they would sacrifice, which stickers they would cut, and which goats they would make heads into masks. "I'm the only person who can run the economy while dancing in my pants," claimed Mr Brown, before giving a brief demonstration.

"Here in Chatteris, we can make many words. Cat, there's one. Chat, there's another. Eris, er, that's not a word," said Mr Brown. As usual, he was talking out of his tush: Eris is the Greek goddess of chaos and disorder, so quite appropriate for this event.

His claim that every GP, every teacher, and every nurse would be out of a job was immediately ridiculed by every thinking commentator, and by the Conservative party, who reported that the use of creamy muck-muck has been slashed under Labour, and that Mr Brown was no good at the Two Word Tango, preferring to use the now discredited One Hundred And Ninety Seven Word Waltz inspired by former Labour leader Neil Pillock.

"We'll be tough on terrorists," said Mr Brown. This is rather ruined by a report in to-day's Telegraph, which says that new interior minister Charles In Charge will shelve plans to keep suspected terrorists under house arrest. "We'll also make sure that there are more world record attempts for drinking fizzy pop than ever before," but his shot at drinking two litres of dandelion and burdock in five minutes failed rather dismally.

Mr Brown concluded his short speech with a pledge for party unity, and saying that "Labour is the party of opportunities," before picking up his saxaphone and dancing with a pantomime cow. That's why Gordon Brown is backing Blair.

Manual intervention required

In good news, failing cable company Telepest has caved in, and has started showing the Nickelodeon bouquet of channels again. Even better, it's free to all viewers until the end of March, giving new viewers plenty of time to catch up on the second series of Gilmore Girls and any episodes of Fairly Odd Parents they've not seen a gazillion times. The deal seems to be a quid-pro-quo - Telewest's unilateral plug-pulling has caused Nick to be off screens for just over eight weeks, and giving access to the quarter of customers who don't normally get the channels will roughly equalise the situation.

Some things we have seen more often than that episode of Sabrina where she, you know, does that thing with her finger and the cat: The Revision Thing, all lies, all the time. And Everything we heard about Iraq was true.

Oh, and that Ali Campbell was behind that "flying pigs" poster a couple of weeks ago, proving that Labour's commitment to equal opps is only skin-deep, at best.

And hang on, wasn't climate change at the top of Tony Blair's agenda as recently as - oh, last week? In that case, how come it doesn't appear in his party's Top Ten pledges? Is he changing his views with the wind?

And the reason we're launching emails to Tone? Obvious, really...

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posted 12 Feb 2005, 11.44 +0000

Not a huge amount to report from this week's two local by-elections: most of the movement comes from the slew of voting on 25 Nov falling out of the eight-voting-weeks average. That was a very good week for Labour, the last time they picked up a significant transfer from either Tories or Lib Dems. Here's the scores on the doors:

Transfers
=========

Con - Lab + 9.08% (+ 7.81%)
Con - LD  - 3.85% (- 4.01%)
Lab - LD  -12.93% (-11.82%)

Seats
=====

Lab 281 (+  0 -120 303)
Con 272 (+108 -  1 246)
LD   63 (+ 12 -  0  66)

Lab 42 (20) seats short of an OM
Con 51 seats short

Six seats vote on Thursday, and a great week for the Lib Dems drops out of the rolling average.

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posted 13 Feb 2005, 12.13 +0000

This week, the regulator OFCOM will give its verdict on the new local license for Kidderminster town. One of the three bidders will take the opportunity to broadcast to the area for the next eight years. The last license awarded in this area by OFCOM's predecessor, The Radio Authority, went to Kerrang radio. After eight months on air It's been an unmitigated disaster - an audience share of barely 2%, complete listener indifference, and just this week a desperate publicity stunt that's led to the apparent suspension of two on-air talents. Can the new authority do any better? We're not confident.

Wyre FM is headed by Muff Murfin. His CV is impressive - the first person to try and make a success of Wyvern across Hereford and Worcester; a year minding the fort at Buzz in Birmingham; a hugely successful re-launch of KIX in Coventry; founder of The Bear in Stratford; a friendly take-over of Sunshine in Ludlow and Maldwyn in mid-Wales; and he has Wyvern's old AM licenses. Wyre will replicate the sound of Murfin's other stations - blending tunes from the last 40 years with clearly local news and other speech. All the output would be local, with strong interaction with Kidderminster College. The weak point: they've set an ambitious target of 29% share and 200,000 listening hours within three years, from a population of 80,000, though these guys have experience of the adjacent areas. Strong point: all local, and only automating output at night. Wild card: the transmitter uses a different location from the other applicants, reducing spill into Bromsgrove but increasing power in the direction of Bridgnorth.

Kidderminster FM is put forward by The Wireless Group, who own Signal (Stoke-on-Trent), The Wolf (Wolverhampton), and Talk Shite (national). Their proposal feels very cookie-cutter - a male-female breakfast pairing is common to almost every other station on the dial, mystery years during the day, requests and love songs through the evening ditto. Strong point: The Wireless group is financially secure. Weak point: it's strange how every independent survey always produces the same results. Wild card 1: the playlist of "just under 1000 songs" actually contains just 845; Wyre has 1320, Ace 1000. Wild card 2: they're not at all ambitious, going for 19% share and 220,000 hours on a population of 130,000.

Ace is backed by Wolverhampton's Express and Star newspaper group, and already runs Telford FM (er, Telford). If KFM is a cookie-cutter proposal, then this is a carbon-copy of the group's existing station, right down to the hours each show will run. They're going for 29% share and 200,000 hours on a population of 90,000, using the same transmission site and power as KFM. Weak point: automation from 7pm - 6am overnight pushes the regulations to their absolute limit, and pre-recorded output from 2pm on summer Saturdays gives the lie to claims about local sport. Strong point: lots of local support from successful 28-day trial licenses. Wild card: One of the Ace employees jumped ship to work on the Wyre bid.

There are good and bad things from each proposal. Ace has local support, Wyre the knowledge, KFM the financial muscle. Given the input, we would back Wyre, mainly because we know what the other Murfin stations have done, and we like what they've done far more than the other applicants. We're particularly worried lest Ace get the license and turn the station into one as dull and insipid as Telford.

We will know on Thursday.

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posted 13 Feb 2005, 13.37 +0000

For the first time in almost three months, Britain has two new number ones in as many weeks. The 995th chart topper is U2's Sometimes you can't make it on your own. Uniquely, it's the second number one single from a U2 album, and the first to come after the album's release. All their previous chart-toppers - 1988's Desire, 1991's The Fly, Discotheque in 1997, and Beautiful day in 2000 - were the single before the album.

This week's Elvish release is Wooden heart, originally a chart-topper in April 1961. It's a Bert Kaempfert re-working of a German folk song that just so happened to be out of copyright by the time he wrote it. Second time around, it's not quite so successful.

Back into the top ten come Sheffield band the Doves. Their biggest hit under that name was 2002's epic There goes the fear, though the band had reached the same height in 1993 when recording as Subsub. Black and white town picks up where their Last Broadcast album left off, all driving beats and an air of almost resigned melancholy.

Also new in the top ten come Destiny's Child and Raghav, the latter with a bizarre cover of ABBA's Angel eyes that sounds almost completely unlike the original. No such confusion for pop triplets The Noise Next Door - their second single is Calendar girl, and comes with an almost too cliched video featuring lots of buxom and leggy blondes. It lands at 11. We're quietly warming to this band, they're not a-list material, and their image is atrocious, but the tunes are good for a laugh.

The other big story this week is the revenge of the Alistair Griffin fan club. They grind slowly, but they do wear people down. In 2003, Daniel B'dingplant appeared on the Star Academy final, and told people to vote for Alex Parks. To any neutral observer, this was the right thing to do, but you can't influence the vote in such an unsubtle way and expect to get away with it. Eighteen months later, and following a creepy appearance at this week's BPI awards with his sister Natasha, Dan has the smallest hit of his flagging career, barely scraping the top 20. Revenge is a dish best served cold, though Bedders is no dish...

Very pleased to hear Kills in at 23 with The good ones. They're a male-female pair, the record company's promoting them like the White Stripes. This'll be a big error, the sound is a lot closer to the scrunge rock of Luscious Jackson. Also impressed with Duke Spirit's Lion rip at 25, a veritable slab of feedback (as in, they played slightly less than two minutes on the chart show, and it sounded noisy but nice.) And hurrah to the Beautiful South, This will be our year lands at 36.

Question marks abound: U2 has a second - presumably unofficial - release, All because of you appears at 51, and this has passed us by. Fierce Girl have been promoting themselves on everything from Popworld to Buzzcocks; the laddish single What makes a girl fierce? is a pile of poop, and should thus have made the top two without thinking. It's 52, one place ahead of Adam Green's Emily.

Long runner watch: Uniting Nations move 10-13 in week 12; Jay-Z and Linkin Park go 18-14 also in week 12 - it's the third time this record has been to 14 without ever climbing higher; Green Day go 21-18 in week 11; and Elvish Records of Previous Weeks are at 20, 27, 31, 32, and 37. Other plunges include Tepid Tracey (9-21), the One World Project (8-26), Duran Duran (11-33), and Gwen Stefani (45-66). The big ones!

 1 NE U2 - Sometimes you can't make it on your own
 6 NE Doves - Black and white town
 9  7 Chemical Brothers - Galvanise
11 NE Noise Next Door - Calendar girl
13 10 Uniting Nations - Out of touch
19  5 Bloc Party - So here we are
22 17 Freefallers - Do this do that
23 NE Kills - The good ones
25 NE Duke Spirit - Lion rip
29 19 Hanson - Penny and me
34 23 Rooster - Staring at the sun
39 35 Dana Rayne - Object of my desire
46 32 Milo - Destroy rock 'n' roll
50 39 Killers - Somebody told me
53 NE Adam Green - Emily
54 43 Darius - Live twice
62 54 Iron Maiden - The number of the beast
65 29 22-20s - Such a fool
68 34 Wedding Present - I'm from further north than you
70 51 Erasure - Breathe
71 48 Phixx - Strange love

The annual BPI awards this week. It's always an excuse to sell more albums, and this year is no exception. Keane move back up three places to top the chart, with Franz Ferdinand climbing six places to number 2. Joss Stone - rural Devon's best soul singer this week - climbed from 25 to 6, but that's as far as the post-awards bounce goes. U2 moves back up two to 8, Daniel Bedingfield 18-14, and Destiny's Child 23-22 - all three have singles out this week. Highest new entry is Michael McDonald's Motown 2 album at 15, ahead of Hanson's Underneath at 25, and Willy Mason's Where the humans eat at 37. Other good climbs include Lemar 22-16, Katie Melua 31-19, the Slappers 30-23, and KT Tunstall 38-31, a new peak.

 20 15 McFly - Room on the third floor
 19 re Soulcentral - Strings of life
 18 re Kimberley Locke - Eighth world wonder
 17 20 McFly - Obviously
*16 NE Krypteria - Liberatio
 15 14 Ludovico Einaudi - Luce dei mei occhi
 14  9 Annie - Chewing gum
*13 18 Schnappi - Schnappi
 12 12 U2 - Vertigo
 11 16 Embrace - Ashes
 10  2 Gwen Stefani - What you waiting for?
  9  7 Hanson - Penny and me
  8  4 Killers - Somebody told me
  7  8 Green Day - Boulevard of broken dreams
* 6  6 Jay-Z & Linkin Park - Numb / encore
* 5 10 Eminem - Like "Toy soldiers"
* 4 11 Rooster - Staring at the sun
* 3  3 Chemical Brothers - Galvanise
* 2  5 U2 - Sometimes you can't make it on your own
* 1  1 Uniting Nations - Out of touch

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posted 13 Feb 2005, 20.32 +0000

There's been a bit of a spat between various television weatherpeople this week, the radio folk say that the telly folk are rubbish; the telly folk say that the radio folk are ugly. Are these positions really going to help us decide whether it will rain to-morrow or not? Er, no. Here's the week this week.

07 Mo Fog 1/5
08 Tu Cloud, bright later 4/9
09 We Sunny spells 5/9
10 Th Cloud, brief showers 7/10
11 Fr Cloud, drizzle 4/8
12 Sa Heavy showers, sunny spells 3/6
13 Su Snow showers, strong sun 3/9

Yep, the first lying snow of the year was on the ground this morning. Only a crunch deep, and it had all gone by lunchtime, thanks to some strong sun. 28½ degree heating days this week, the winter's total is now 398.

Next week will, according to the forecasters, see the cold snap continue for a day or two more, but it'll slowly die away to be replaced by south-westerlies. There was heat behind the sun to-day, and that will continue to warm the land over the coming week.

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posted 13 Feb 2005, 20.33 +0000

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