Andy Burnham, the Minister for Identity, said, "The manifesto says very clearly that we would seek to introduce ID cards incrementally as people renew their passports. It couldn't really have been clearer." Or, in other words, e + π ≅ 6

"There will be no compulsion initially for people to have an ID card." Or e + π ≈ 5⅞

"There is a good reason for doing it as we are, which is that the passport is changing." The UK and other countries must introduce biometric passports by October to remain part of the US visa waiver scheme, which makes travel to America easier. Or, where C = the number of people in the cabinet, ∑ arrogance_1..i → ℵ as i → C.

Mercifully, the Lords are the guardians of our democratic liberty, and have thrown this nonsense back to the Commons.

Like his predecessor, Charles In Charge is incapable of seeing the writing on the wall. How else to explain his incoherent response to the defeat in the Lords' last night. "When it comes back to the Commons, I will be urging my colleagues in parliament to roll over the Lords' decision," said the interior minister.

Well, if that's your position, that's your position. BUt there's no need to resort to downright lying to explain it. "I hope the Lords will recognise that this manifesto commitment, voted through by the elected chamber, should be respected." Sorry, Charlie, you're on no grounds at all there. The manifesto commitment was to a voluntary identity register. What you're proposing is a compulsary identity register. By no stretch of the imagination can the scheme currently proposed by the interior ministry be deemed voluntary.

Even Patricia Scotland, your spokestwit in the Lords', is singing off a different hymnsheet. "We went to the electorate and said, we want identity cards and it will be a compulsory scheme in the long term," she said. That's in the long term. Not from the start.

And actually, Patricia, if you're playing the democratic card, you went to the country and two people in three who expressed an opinion said, "No, we don't want to support a party that will bring in compulsary identity cards." And the consultations run by the interior ministry, they said exactly the same thing.

In other politics news, Ming the Merciful has unveiled his flash new shadow cabinet. Dr Chris Who, the runner up in the leadership contest, will go to Environment. Nick Clegg will be the new Home Affairs critic, a decently cushy number given he's up against Charlie the Elephant. Vince Cable continues at the Treasury, with the very young Julia Goldsworthy his deputy.

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posted 07 Mar 2006, 18.18 +0000

Muse of the moment, Lucy Cat., asks:

does one need to be full of angst, despair and heartache to truly create art? is one's best work done when one is miserable?

It is true that many people have done good work when they are depressed, when they are able to see the world through certain eyes. I'm far from convinced that it is necessary to feel even slightly under the weather in order to do well. To pick an example within our own remit, Jasper FForde seems to be someone who writes best when he's happy. Indeed, in my own work, I'm happiest with the work that was done when I was in a good mood, when I was able to let the sun shine through and not be consumed by a dark cloud. That is when I feel the creative juices flowing with an intoxicating energy of their own.

1. who was your favorite all time teacher(s)?
2. what did they teach?
3. what is your best memory from that class?

In the sense of formal education, it's got to be Mr Chadwick, my economics teacher. Here was a man who knew his onions, knew that sixth-formers need a little sugar to sweeten the pill of two-hour lessons, and was never afraid to give us something to think about. One time, when discussing the methods the former Warsaw Pact countries might adopt to become market economies, he suggested the "cold turkey" method (sudden market liberalisation, as adopted in Russia); the "warm frog" policy (more gradual opening up, as followed almost everywhere else); and the "hot dog" method (in which the currency was replaced by sausages and buns, as used in Frankfurt.)

4. did you ever have a crush on a teacher and if so who?

In the sense of informal education, it is fair to say that I've learned a heck of a lot from my friends and acquaintances. Some of the people I've learned the most from appealed on that level, too.

5. what is the craziest/wildest/weirdest thing you (or someone you know) ever did at school?

The unofficial general election took over conversation for a week and a half. It resulted in a victory for the charismatic candidate of the right-wing Liberty And Justice party over the Plant Liberation Party. Whose supporters had turned up with branches growing out of their hats.

1* you have three of your closest friends over for a television stay-in/sleepover, what shows do you think each would pick? what would you pick? what would you all mutually decide on?

Well, if we're talking pure hypothetica, then I'm inviting Jae over, I'm asking my offline chum Caz to drop round, and I reckon The Good Doc would enjoy the outing. What would we watch? Classic Gilmore Girls is a given, but nothing after the Chilton years, for that would be a spoiler. We'll probably see one episode (but no more) of Interceptor at my insistence, there would be some L-word tomfoolery, probably an episode from My So-Called Life, and there would almost certainly be some Des Chiffres et Des Lettres et Des Lynam brainwork in there.

2* what is your favourite box-watching snack?

You mean we're not going to get drunker than your average Chicagois? A good show will keep enough attention to stop the viewer from feeling bored and wanting to nibble...

3* what are five shows you own as part of your personal collection?

Every episode of MSCL, every episode of Interceptor, every episode of Bagpuss, the last six runnings of the Eurovision Song Contest, and most of the Election Night programmes since 1955.

4* do you plan on watching the awards? do you have a favourite nominee(s) that you are rooting for?

Well, it's certainly a big week-end, for Saturday night saw the nominations flood in for this year's Eurovision. I was hoping for the UK to send Teenage Life and for someone to send Welcome to Lithuania, so that we'd be guaranteed some entertainment in both shows.

5* what do you like on a pizza?

Mushroom, sweetcorn, red pepper, lashings of cheese, tomatoes. And yes, Brig, pineapple.

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posted 07 Mar 2006, 18.34 +0000

More from m'learned friend Lucy Cat., who asks

what actually defines travel? is it the actual vacation type of escape where you plot and plan, have a ticket to leave by plane, bus or train? fill the gas tank and cross a state line? or is travel simply the act of movement into something new? taking a different turn at the corner? trying a new restaurant, or route to work, or getting off at a stop you've never seen and discovering a part of the city you live in that is yet unknown to you? or could it be a dream you had? the experience of the world a book creates in your imagination as you read? the way you can get lost, and transported somewhere else, in a song?

For my fourpence, travel requires a physical movement. You can't travel if you're just sat in your familiar four walls. I find that travel is a process, a means of getting from A to B.

What Lucy Cat. seems to be describing here is a journey. It isn't so much the final destination that's important so much as the getting there. And, yes, one can embark on a journey by delving into a good book, by visiting an unfamiliar part of town, or by going to the other side of the world.

Going to work on your first day, that's a journey. Going to work on your thousandth day, that's travel.

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posted 08 Mar 2006, 19.08 +0000

"A tyrant must put on the appearance of uncommon devotion to religion. Subjects are less apprehensive of illegal treatment from a ruler whom they consider god-fearing and pious. On the other hand, they do less easily move against him, believing that he has the gods on his side." - Aristotle 384-322 BC.

A slightly more modern commentator, Terry Jones, has also been in correspondence with The GOD Organisation regarding Mister Tony Blair's spiritual claims. Mr Jones states,

Sources close to the archangel Gabriel report him as describing the Almighty as "hopping mad ... with sanctimonious yet unscrupulous politicians claiming He would condone their bestial activities when He has no way of going public Himself, owing to the [Moves in Mysterious Ways] agreement"

"Oh us, not again," said The GOD Organisation's spokesdeity, the impishly fun Loki. "Gabriel is known in these parts as a bit of a loose cannon, not someone to be trusted with anything important. We remember the April Fool's joke he played on a young lady in Nazareth a millennium or two ago, something about bearing the son of a god. Got us into terrible trouble that did, and Mithras has never forgiven him for stealing all his followers. And you don't want to go around offending gods, do you.

"I mean, Gabriel gives a good quote, don't get me wrong. But he does tend to misrepresent people. Stuff like If he'd done it on Richard and Judy I could have forgiven a lot. That's just bunk; everyone knows that Christian-deity always watches Blue Peter. Never bothered to get the badge, though...

"No, don't trust anything that Gabriel says. Not without a second source. Quite frankly, the only time we like to see him up here is when he's drunk as a skunk and doing that funky little dance on the head of a pin. He's really cute when he does that."

While I've got you on the line, what about this quote attributed to Mister Blair?

If you have faith about these things, then you realise that judgment is made by other people. If you believe in God, it's made by God as well.

"As I know you know, The GOD Organisation is not in the business of judging people. We welcome all sorts of thinking organisms, and organisms that try to think, and politicians as well. We don't do the judgement, we just provide the tools for people to review their own actions and complete a feedback loop so that objectives can be quantified, then prioritised for future incarnations."

You're beginning to sound like a character from Dilbert there.

"Rumbled! Heck, a deity's got to do something to pass the time. It's not all smiting and throwing thunderbolts, you know..."

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posted 08 Mar 2006, 19.53 +0000

A special edition of Panorama last night investigated the killing of Sr Jean Charles de Menezes at Stockwell on 22 July last year. It became clear that this was both a failure of intelligence, and a failure of planning.

To put it bluntly, the intelligence available on the day was hopeless. Sr de Menezes was coming out of a block of flats. The policeman outside the house was taking a leak, and hadn't left his video camera running. No-one bothered to challenge Sr de Menezes during his journey, even when he got off and back on a bus at Brixton. And it's still unclear why he was shot in public rather than restrained in a more sane fashion.

It's worth noting that the Israeli police, from whom London's police are presumed to have learned lessons, will not even think about shooting anyone until they see the bomb. This did not happen at Stockwell.

But this was also a failure of planning. London police had only considered a surprise action, spotting a suicide bomber in the process of carrying out the attack. They hadn't seriously given weight to a pursuit, or any intelligence matters.

The Association of Chief Police Officers, quite bizarrely, have said that shoot-to-kill remains the right policy. That may be the case, but it is predicated on a perfectly functioning police force. The experience of last July shows that the police are perfectly capable of botching the operation, for they assume too much.

They *assumed* that Sr de Menezes was one of the suspects from the previous day's woeful attempts to send a second bombing wave. They *assumed* that a potential bomber would be carrying another bomb about his person. They *assumed* that the bomb supposedly carried was effective. They *assumed* that it would be better to kill - sorry, "shoot to incapacitate" - than to risk setting off a bomb.

Hindsight is perfect vision, but I can't share any of these postulates. Not leaving the video camera running just in case was a foolish thing to do, but I cannot pin the entire blame on someone answering the call of nature.

Sr de Menezes was carrying no bag, which instantly meant he wasn't following the modus operandi of the eight previous bomb attempts. Not getting close enough to see - or even to suspect - the presence of a bomb worn around the waist was another failure.

The previous day's attacks had been complete failures, the bombs hadn't gone off. While this doesn't entirely rule out the prospect of a successful bomb, the notion that this device might be less useful than a chocolate teapot never entered the police's minds.

It's clear that someone, somewhere, has committed a gross error of judgement. The question that needs to be answered: who took the decision to open fire. If it was Cressida Dick, the designated officer in charge, then she must be tried for her actions. If it was someone lower down the chain, then they must also have their day in court. To have no prosecution in this case would damage public confidence. If there's no prosecution and no public inquiry into the shoot-to-kill policy, then it'll be compounding tragedy upon tragedy.

Let us mention, but not dwell upon, the police's attempts to cover their tracks by altering the official record. The person responsible has lost any level of trust and needs to be fired, no further questions.

Earlier this week, I was listening to an old Random Edition, where Peter Snow reads an old newspaper and explores the society of the time. This one was from 1875, and talked about a snowball fight between the students at St-bartholomew's Hospital and the police. One commentator suggested that this was a social war by proxy; the students at Bart's would have been upper-class, the police were lower-class, and there was some resentment about the aristocracy being bossed about by common oiks.

How times have changed. Now it's the police that are the untouchable, self-accountable people, sucked up to by every politician going, put on a pedestal as if they can do no wrong.

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posted 09 Mar 2006, 19.36 +0000

The death of John Profumo, MP and charity worker, aged 93. Somewhat unfairly, he's best known for the manner of his resignation in 1963, following revelations that he had used the services of a prostitute.

He was the penultimate surviving member of the 37th (1935-45) Parliament, having entered at a by-election for Kettering in 1940. The remaining member is Wing-Commander Ernest Rogers Millington, the Commonwealth (later Labour) MP for Chelmsford from January 1945 until the 1950 election.

Of the 1945 intake, only Michael Foot (Lab, Plymouth Devonport), Maj. John Freeman (Lab, Watford, subsequently to host Face to Face), David Renton (Nat Lib, Huntingdonshire), and Col. Douglas Dodds-Parker (C, Banbury), are known to survive. Lt. Edward Carson (C, Isle of Thanet) and Francis Noel-Baker (Lab, Brentford and Chiswick) may also still be amongst us.

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posted 10 Mar 2006, 18.41 +0000

A couple of follow-ups from the de Menezes documentary earlier in the week. Canadian media commentator Antonia Zerbas reports that ITN's reporters are under criminal investigation about the leak of the report. Meanwhile, ITN head honcho Deborah Turness speaks about British media censorship, and reveals how the UK government handles things these days. The D-notice - under which the UK government officially asked the media not to report something - has become history, replaced by unofficial words in ears.

It's not all bad news from Zerbas-blog: the odious Turn it in software has been turned off in Nova Scotia. "If we can't spot plagarism ourselves, that's our problem," is the thesis. And Mark Steyn is now unemployed. Neither the Telegraph's new owners, nor the Spectator's new editor, have no space for his dribblings.

Mr Steyn was one of the last remnants of the Americano-centric editorial policy run by disgraced former owner Conrad Black of Cross-shareholder. Now, the Torygraph has a policy that might be described as insularly English. The paper has been criticising the UK government over the bungled sell-off of Quinetiq, and has been criticising the unequal extradition treaty with the colonials.

They're also criticising the lack of an English parliament, pointing out the current answer to the West Lothian Question (Scottish and Welsh votes count for more than English.) And they're asking where is the money from the Phoenix Four and other tricky questions about the collapse of Rover...

Last week's report from the National Audit Office makes it clear that "a senior official" at the DTI told Rover that a government loan would be "a non-starter" if there was any doubt that the Chinese deal would come through. Not only was there doubt, Rothschild, SAIC's financial advisers, had informed the DTI that the Chinese were pulling out on April 5, five days before the loan was agreed. Furthermore, says the report, officials told ministers that they should tell the Opposition about the loan. But, we are led to believe, Patricia Hewitt was the only person in Britain who could not find Tory leader Michael Howard during the election campaign and she "tried unsuccessfully to contact HM Opposition".

Behind the scenes, Sarah Sands has been relieved of her command at the helm of the Sunday Torygraph. Her nine-month reign saw a depressingly rubbish relaunch under the odd thoughtline, "like an iPod - full of your favourite things." It felt like the paper was guided by a focus group of one person, Mrs Sands - this is perhaps why the publication feels a bit like Stuart Murphy's play-channel, BBC-3.

Mrs Sands will be replaced by Patience Wheatcroft, the city editor of the Universal Daily Registertab for the last nine years. She's adopted a preference for free-market solutions, so will fit in well with the paper's owners, the Barclay brothers. I'm not yet convinced that she's got the experience to handle the more arts-based Sundays. Still, very good luck to her.

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posted 12 Mar 2006, 13.38 +0000

Art for art's sakes

Changes are afoot at Oneword Radio. From next week-end, the Channel 4-owned books channel will air ... a chart show.

For those of you who thought the announcement looked a bit wrong, here it is again. From next week-end, the Channel 4-owned books channel will air ... a chart show. Frank Stirling is the Mark Goodiebags of the literary world, giving details of what's hot, what's not, what's flying off the shelves, and what's gathering dust. That's at 9am and 5pm each Saturday; highlights at 1pm and 9pm Sunday.

But wait, there's more! Sunday morning sees a sensible competitor to Broadcasting House, in the shape of the imaginatively-titled The Week's News. It'll be ... oh, what do you expect?! Sunday at 9am and 5pm. Finally, The Distillery will be a lifestyle programme, something for all the sybarites out there. Sundays at 10am and 6pm, repeated at the same time on Monday and Tuesday.

Because of these changes, arts review show The Gallery will now be airing a mere six times over the week-end: Friday and Sunday at 8.30am and 4.30, Saturday at 12.30 and 8.30pm. It's already available as an MP3 download thingummy. It wouldn't surprise me to find some or all of the other shows will join it.

More literary stuff: Het Grauniad's guide to great bookshops of the UK.

Get free stuff

Microsoft wants to give you a Flash drive. (For values of "you" that are resident in the FARCE.) (With thanks to Dave Farquhar.)

If that's not to your taste, The 37 Dollar Experiment (€15.22)

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posted 12 Mar 2006, 13.51 +0000

In France, novelty record Le papa pingouin is new at number 3, and you *really* don't need to hear it to imagine what it's like. Trust me on this, you *really* don't need to hear it. Bob Sinclar's back at the top in Germany, where a cover of Alexia's Ooh la la la is also in the top 20. Da Buzz are the new list-leaders in Sweden, Last goodbye overcomes all the Melodifestival entries to take the top spot.

 20 19 Amine - J'voulais
*19 NE Diams - La boulette
*18 20 Najoya Bejel - Gabriel
 17 15 Bob Sinclar - Love generation
 16 18 Natasha St-Pier - Un ange frappe a ma porte
 15 11 Mattafix - Big city life
*14 NE Orson - No tomorrow
*13 NE Zucchero - Baila marena
 12  8 Tina Arena - Aimer jusqu'a l'impossible
 11  6 Eros Ramazzotti / Anastacia - I belong to you
 10 13 Coldplay - Talk
* 9 16 Fall Out Boy - Sugar we're going down
* 8 12 Shakira - Don't bother
* 7  7 Depeche Mode - A pain that I'm used to
* 6 14 Corinne Bailey Rae - Put your records on
  5  4 Sugababes - Push the button
* 4 17 Juanes - La camisa negra
  3  1 Kelly Clarkson - Because of you
* 2  2 Madonna - Sorry
* 1  3 Sugababes - Ugly

For the first time ever, ROPRA has allowed singles to chart based only on download sales. The allowance is available only to those records that will be in the stores to-morrow, mind. The Royal Pop and Rock Association has also excluded records that have been physically deleted from its listings, as well as anything more than a year old.

Not that any of this has much effect on the charts - the Sugababes' latest single Red dress is in at number 4, the third top five release from their album, a remarkable result. Almost as remarkable is Orson's climb from 5 to 2, and Placebo's entry at number 13. We were briefly excited by Kayne West's entry, Touch the sky, until we found that it wasn't a cover of Wonderwall's smash from a few years back. Shame. Not such good news for David Craig, barely making number 18. Fightstar deserved better than 29. On the albums side, David Gilmour (who he?) is straight in at the top with On an island; Andrea Botticelli and Van Morrison also enter the top ten, which seems to have an average age of a million or so. Shakira, the Delays, and Morning Runner just miss the top 20, with Mogwai and the Mystery Jets missing the 30.

Here's the good stuff on the singles listing:

 2  5 Orson - No tomorrow
 4 NE Sugababes - Red dress
 5  3 Corinne Bailey Rae - Put your records on
13 NE Placebo - Because I want you
15 12 Source - You got the love
19  9 Shakira - Don't bother
20 14 Charlotte Church - Moodswings
22 16 Fall Out Boy - Sugar we're going down
26 NE Rifles - Repeated offender
29 NE Fightstar - Waste a moment
34 24 Dead or Alive - You spin me round
35 34 Kelly Clarkson - Because of you
36 37 Arctic Monkeys - When the sun goes down
40 53 Jose Gonzalez - Heartbeats
44 NE Avenged Sevenfold - Beast and the harlot
45 NE Hundred Reasons - Kill your own
48 20 Graham Coxon - Standing on my own again
50 51 Arctic Monkeys
- I bet you look good on the dancefloor
56 NE Yellowcard - Lights and sounds
57 46 Jesse McCartney - Beautiful soul
60 NE Gemma Hayes - Undercover
62 23 Mystery Jets - The boy who ran away
63 59 Sugababes - Ugly
64 22 Rakes - All too human
68 71 Kelly Clarkson - Since you've been gone
73 61 K T Tunstall - Suddenly I see
74 56 Ashley Simpson - Boyfriend

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posted 12 Mar 2006, 19.53 +0000

Winter went, in the first week to deliver an inch of rain since November, but now it's back for another blast.

06 Mo sun to cloud         1/ 8
07 Tu rain                 2/ 5, 9.5
08 We rain                 7/11, 7.5
09 Th cloud, showers       7/10, 2.5
10 Fr showers              3/ 6, 3.0
11 Sa cloud, showers       3/ 7, 1.5
12 Su snow o/n, cloud     -2/ 4

A full 34 degree heating days this week, the winter's total goes to 685½, and it's official. This winter is now colder than last.

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posted 12 Mar 2006, 19.59 +0000

older writing... write to