a grand afternoon out....

Take us to 'Another Place' they said. So I did.
I went to.
Liverpool , or just outside. A town called Crosby.
There's a fine sandy beach, which has been invaded, albeit temporarily by....

http://hometown.aol.co.uk/alandmarker/crosby.html

This is not just cricket!

No mistake with the thread title, the quaint old expression 'this is just not cricket' almost applies to this alleged Pakistani ball tampering fiasco but not quite.

What I'm trying to say is the ramifications will almost certainly go way beyond the sport and will suit the 'martyr mentality' of a minority of muslims - a minority which seems to get bigger every time someone does a poll of opinion.

Will this be seen as the west having another go at an Islamic nation? The Pakistani's are fanatical about cricket & already we are hearing that the players, as a group, see this accusation as a 'slur on them and their nation' Oh very dear. I can sense riots in Rawalpindi and indignation in Islamabad.

This will prove to be another source of division. I heard a caller to BBC 5 today saying 'if this had happened in Pakistan the Umpire would have been shot'! As though that were something to be proud of! A matter of 'honour' you see. A much mis-used concept is 'honour'
I hope I'm wrong, I often am. We shall see.

This will run and run - pun intended.

History in the re-making....

.....Between the years 1914 & 1918 approximately FIVE MILLION MEN served in the British Army. I respect the memory of every single one of them. They helped to preserve a way of life we have been lucky to maintain. Their sacrifice helped safeguard our country and we owe them all an immense debt.

I have sometimes wondered how I would react under fire. Continuous bombardment would be too terrifying for my limited imagination to cope with. A living hell. An ear piercing cacophony of inbound and out bound ordnance targeted to kill and maim. The ground beneath my feet shaking and exploding, throwing up tonnes of earth. The end of the world? For many it was.

I am a child of welfare state Britain. The state nurtured me from the cradle - hopefully the grave is someway off yet and I’m not sure the process will endure- but I digress. The state provided a decent home for my parents to rent. Warm and dry. The state educated me roundly and well. As the nineteen -sixties swung by. I was eighteen years old as that decade came to an end, although the swinging continued for a couple more years yet.
Many of the young men called to arms in Flanders in the ‘Great War’ were aged eighteen, and some were even younger. This generation had few of the comforts I enjoyed. These were the Sons of a Britain which still held a mighty empire. A Britain which assumed superiority over all, and there were few to argue. Deference was almost inborn. Forelock tugging to the higher classes was commonplace and most folk knew their station. Social mobility had not been invented. Even successful businessmen were frowned upon in some quarters and tradesmen regarded as quite ‘low‘. The hoi-polloi, a bracket I’d have fallen into, well for some in the higher echelons they were beneath contempt.

The marbled corridors of power were the province of Royalty, and the landed gentry. It was here where wars were conceived and plotted, the politicians did their bidding - they knew their place too - and many politicians liked to flex their military muscle, so long as others did the flexing on their behalf of course.
So, as the cream of Britain’s youthful manhood spilled from the boats in French and Belgian ports in 1914 it may have been seen as an adventure to most. ‘ All Over by Christmas’ was the clarion call as the pals marched wide eyed and cheerful into a living nightmare. Naïve no doubt to the horrors of war.
Some of these men distinguished themselves, some of them survived intact with stories to tell, or more likely keep to themselves. For everyone of those there were men who returned home minus a sense, blinded maybe or deafened by the roar of warfare. Or many were invalided by gas like my the Grandfather I never knew, who survived but was never the same man I’m told . Others may have sacrificed a limb or suffered some dreadful injury which would change their lives forever. But they had survived ! The only common injury were the mental scars of a war so dreadful it was expected to end all wars.
There were also those who ran away. Who defied orders to fight. A tiny, tiny minority. Around three hundred of these soldiers were shot , charged with cowardice or some similar offence.

Let me say here that I have the utmost respect for soldiers old and new. I was a member of the Royal Air Force for a very short time myself. This was at a time c.1970 when the military was a comparatively risk free career choice. As I signed up I likened the outlook of those times to a map of Britain. With conflict as my coastline back then joining the R.A.F. was the equivalent of a cosy cottage in deepest Leicestershire, or some other land locked county.

The Army of 1914 - 18 was a huge military machine. A giant undertaking . Held together by unblinking discipline and order which kept the whole thing cohesive. Armies the world over are dependant on such methods. To differ would result in disintegration during adversity.
The mindset of many men reduced them to little more than cannon fodder & so in their tens of thousands, no! their hundreds of thousands they fell. Cut down by the rat-tat-tat of German machine guns, or were torn asunder in their filthy , squalid trenches by deadly artillery .
These conditions are frankly beyond my comprehension. These were simply, different times. Hardship and deprivation endurable only by means of comradeship, incredible stoicism and a black sense of humour. For even in those dark , bleak years trench humour was alive and well.

Ninety years later we learn that the 300 soldiers who were executed as ‘cowards’ are to be ‘officially pardoned’

How do you react to this news? The first, perhaps knee jerk response is to say ‘of course, why not?’
I do not criticise anyone who responds this way.
However, in my opinion deeper consideration is needed here.
We cannot bestow the enlightened times we live in retrospectively to earlier days. Our standards are of our age. The very term ‘coward’ is highly emotive and is seldom used today. The concept of cowardice, in these touchy-feely days of the Counsellor, and Post Traumatic stress disorder is itself a misnomer. It can be said to be an outdated, outmoded concept. We encourage our children, rightly, to walk away from trouble.
Things were very different in 1914. There was , as ever a thin line between bravery and foolishness. Survival was the order of the day, yet not at any cost. The command ‘over the top’ was a signal to abandon common sense and self-preservation. Keep your head down Tommy and you might just get through, against the odds. God is with you after all.

Some, inevitably could not cope. I do not judge these men. I am not fit to. Every story is different. How ‘cowardly’ were the ones who refused to fight on? When they knew a firing squad was the only other option? I feel humbled in writing of them, they were probably braver men than I.
Who would deny a descendant of such a soldier the chance to clear a stain on their Father or Grand-father’s name? Certainly not I. For undoubtedly in the fog of war mistakes were made and miscarriages of justice took place. Where evidence still exists & individual wrongs can be righted then so be it.

I cannot however support a blanket pardon for all those executed for ‘cowardice‘ and related offences.
This , I realise might be an unpopular opinion, but let me attempt to explain why.
We can only change our view of history. We can never change history itself. This practice is for totalitarian states who might wish to blot an unpopular or shameful era from the public domain.
The imposition of almost a centuries worth of enlightenment, evolution & mental health advances is as unfair to those who dispensed the punishment as it is the those who did not yield, and did not run.
Is their sense of duty , perhaps viewed today as blind allegiance and obedience diminished by a mass pardon of their less committed comrades?

No U.K. Government could today rely on an entire generation to volunteer to fight for any dubious cause. If such a folly could be seen likely to end in mass slaughter and annihilation then the very suggestion is laughable. The genie of mass subservience and unquestioned patriotism is, thankfully out of the bottle. One hundred years ago the opposite applied. The cork was hammered in tight and the bounds of duty entwined a generation to the bidding of their nation’s leaders.

What we have today is an unpopular government looking for certain easy causes. Gesture politics which are both lazy, and cheap. A blanket pardon by a Government anxious to right selective wrongs with a broad brush approach. Anxious to restore a tarnished reputation. This is, on the surface an easy, superficially sweet, victim-free decision. Scratch the surface and it is just plain wrong.
and further reduces the credibility of this tacky regime.

If we are to learn anything from history it must be viewed in context. Above all it must not be tampered with.
I do not expect my opinion on this to be popular, but it is carefully considered & sincerely expressed.

Rosy glow from a blue lamp...

Rosy glow from a blue lamp !


Landmarker Londoner
photo: courtesy of BBC

I listened to a profile of the late Jack Warner the other week on Radio 4. It was good. He was born over a hundred years ago now, maybe more. I didn't realise he was the brother of Elsie & Doris Waters, and changed his name by deed poll to escape any accusation he was riding on their reputation.
I don’t remember Elsie & Doris, (or even ‘Gert & Daisy’ whom they immortalised) they were 'before my time' but I do remember Jack. After music hall and stage success the war interrupted his career, although he found outlets for his talents in entertaining our troops. Film roles followed.

I wasn’t quite born when 'The Blue Lamp' was made. It caused quite a stir back then. The shooting of a Policeman was both big and bad news, and the guilty would surely swing from the gallows courtesy of Mr. Albert Pierrpoint, the Governments executioner -in-chief.
The movie, also starred a handsome Dirk Bogarde, and the amiable Jimmy Hanley. With perhaps a first recognition of undisciplined, rebellious and dangerous youth the film struck gold at the box office and enthralled the British public, who saw cinema as a blessed & affordable relief from the austere post-war years of rationing and lingering hardship.

Soon afterwards, on commissioning a new television Police series a decision was made to resurrect Jack Warner's copper. George ' Dixon of Dock Green' was born. Ted Willis wrote the scripts and wanted only Warner for the role.

As a young child this series brought a cosy, rosy glow to Saturday evenings .The fire was stoked, and I’d be warming up nicely after seeing Manchester City beaten again.
Mum & Dad would be there , before the auld incorrigible took off to the pub on his moped - where he played 'the Joanna' * - for complimentary pints of ale and a couple of quid every Friday and Saturday night. Not that ’Dad’ was auld back then, he just seemed older than today’s thirty somethings, much older in fact. Yet he was still in the mid-summer of his life.

Dixon meanwhile, in rose tinted retrospect seemed always a winter programme, maybe that's just the way I remember it. As the familiar Harmonica theme tune faded away Warner’s pre-amble to camera always started with his famed ‘evening’ all’ and the nation gave way to fifty minutes of entertainment…usually.
1967 Ford Anglia ‘panda’ car
The show was archetypal east end copper versus honourable villainy. ‘It's a fair cop, guv,’ with Morris Minors and Ford Anglias in lukewarm pursuit get-away cars. I can't remember any squealing of tyres and brakes, maybe those anti-diluvian brake shoes were not up to the task. !
Andy Crawford, the fresh faced plain clothes detective, conveniently George' s live in Son-in-Law always willing to take the odd bit of guidance across the the table from the older man, whilst staking his own C.I.D. authority as the need arose. And we mustn't forget his sidekick, the laudable Lauderdale. bedecked his quaint handlebar moustache which made him look forty-odd, rather than twenty-five! He ‘lost it’ on gaining promotion to Detective Constable, in a single act shaking off fifteen years from his boat race. I use rhyming slang intentionally because all the villains were cockneys. Mobility then was not as it is now. I mean, would Sergeant Dixon recognise today’s east-end ?

Yes the weekend bulletin from Dixon's 'manor' was always moral, and always cosy. The bad men were caught, usually anyway. The summing up, usually in the dark, outside the station I recall , standing underneath that re-assuring blue lamp our avuncular Sergeant dispensing pearls of worldly wisdom to millions. Many of them took it to heart and as he walked away
to the whistled strains of ’Maybe it’s because I’m a Londoner.’ George Dixon was a national icon, only we didn't know it back then, not enough people had done media-studies at University & we didn’t have icons we just liked him, a lot.

How things moved on. Old George continued in uniform until Jack Warner was well into his seventies ! No early retirement for him. He loved his job, and even as late as 1978 the manor had not changed that much since the war. I do not recall any drugs problem in Dock Green, or any mention of prostitutes, although the show was screened around 7pm, would that preclude today’s telly people from broaching the subject of the oldest profession? I doubt it. Though there may have been the odd reference to 'ladies of the night' my, my how anodyne that sounds today.
There were no terrorists either of course , I can’t recall an I.R.A. storyline. Fundamentalists were probably some kind of supportive undergarment back then, in those halcyon , British days, but time, as it does, moved on.


Dixon competed latterly with more gritty Police series like Z-cars, which began to shake off the cosy image. A decade later shows like 'The Sweeney' were hard hitting and fast. With drink sodden heroes, fighting men with wide lapels, flared kecks and sideburns, handy with their fists .Still almost scrupulously moral, yet not above bending the rules. Jaguars and Ford Capri’s were the props as the car chase became des-rigeur.
Who can forget Inspector Jack Regan’s immortal line 'you're nicked' delivered with a satisfied sneer to many a handcuffed hard man who had just received more than a cursory clip around the ear.
It is hard to believe that 'The Sweeney' first saw the light of day over thirty years ago. It soon became a 'must see' Monday night institution, not least, in our house . It’s arrival coincided with a colour telly! from Radio Rentals at about three quid a month - the height of sophistication and a real advance for our happy little family, in our two up, two down terraced home.

Since then of course TV. police series have moved on apace, and imports from the U.S.A. have more than matched our home-grown shows for viewing figures. I seldom tune in to these programmes now but when I do I'm often disappointed. More my fault I suppose than the actors or producers .I just haven’t kept up !
I'm need a measure of re-assurance you see. Moral victories. A world where good prevails. That's not always 'cool ' today. The crimes get nastier, the detail ever more graphic.
Do we need it,? emphatically, No ! Close up corpses and blood soaked crime scenes turn me off, and not just for obvious reasons. They are not necessary. All they serve to do is to de-sensitise a public which is already reeling from real life events. Gratuitous violence has permeated our living rooms and it’s no coincidence that society has followed suit.

Dixon is not coming back from the grave, neither can those far off Dock Green days be exhumed. However, the people who claim to know what the viewing public wants might take heed and sit up to notice that many of us are sick to the back teeth of nastiness and gore. We might even want a return to good , simple storylines which do not always involve murder, and which are well told and well acted. Where snarling yobs and bad-tempered women are not pushed into our living rooms nightly to spew forth their foul-mouthed venom and bile. Reality television Dock Green wasn’t, yet it involved escapism before any ’escape’ were really needed. George hung up his helmet for the last time in 1976, after 367 episodes. Coincidentally the same year Manchester City last won a major trophy ! Jack Warner died, five years later, in 1981
Come back elderly George Dixon with your blue lamp and your moral tales, you'd be welcomed in our house anytime.

The modern bunch just ain’t Jack !


*’joanna’ is a piano by the way, more rhyming slang.

Thatcher - her legacy & her funeral...

There is talk of a state funeral for Margaret Thatcher, this may seem insensitive given that she is very much alive but it's surely worthy of an opinion....

....I used to detest Thatcher with a passion. Given the benefit of hindsight, and the last two incumbents of No.10 who have both been utterly shambolic - who could believe Blair would lead the country to greater disasters than even the hapless John Major -I have revised my opinion of Mrs.T slightly.
She laid the foundations for a revised Britain. A Britain which shed off some of the post war ideas of itself. A Britain where many of the workers thought the country owed us a living. Me included. although I've always been a worker since the age of 16, I never really thought about market conditions and supply and demand etc. I turned up, worked fairly hard, without busting a gut though if the need arose etc...got my weeks pay, or monthly or whatever and so it went on.I'd willingly shift up another gear in terms of effort if my employer - and there were many - required it.

In the seventies though , under Labour, when someone asked a worker if they 'were busy' a postitive answer might be delivered in grudging terms. The idea of being 'busy' was , frankly a bit of a nuisance. Post Maggie, and her first recession c.1980/2 the whole climate changed, and after those incredibly lean times the thought of being 'busy' was just what the Doctor ordered. The whole mood was transformed. At this time she was the most hated P.M. in history. Remember those awful lapel badges saying 'ditch the bitch' or those car stickers which proclaimed 'don't blame me , I voted Labour' I had one of those on my Marina ! Hard times forced me to park it up in the garage and I bought a new 'Honda 50' for two wheeled commuting. (150mpg as fuel went past a quid a gallon)
Then of course the Falklands 'happened' and the resultant jingo-ism save Maggie's skin. She emerged as 'the iron lady' and happily for her this coincided with an economic upturn and the birth of the loadsamoney culture, where any notion of community, or society was flushed down the toilet pan.

Thus being 'busy' at work had now become a thing to celebrate. Those whose industries had survived the recession intact would by now be eternally grateful for the capacity to still earn a wage, however miserly a wage it may have been. Meanwhile the lucky ones prospered. Thatcher called the 'winners' she didn't much care for the rest. A new term arrived in the dictionary - underclass. The defeated ones, the abject poor. Although of course poverty is relative.

The good times for many - certainly enough to keep returning her to power - continued but her Chancellor Lawson, went too far with the tax cuts and the rest is history. The parlamentary mauling from 'sheep' Geoffrey Howe was the final dagger that finished Maggie off and away she shuffled omoist eyed. I rejoiced at that news! (to quote MT herself)

However. Since those times things have got steadily worse in unimaginable ways.. I am now twice as propserous yet twice as frustrated and exasperated at the parlous state of this country . With the benefit of aforementioned hindsight old Maggie was not quite so bad.

I would not support a state funeral, though I bet she would! I cannot see it happening. Most of the Parliamentary Labour party despise her still, and the Tories are almost too frightened to mention her name. How they have changed. A bunch of chameleon, logo changing backstabbing chancers. What limited choices we have as voters? The paucity of British politics is staggering, and dangerous for democracy.

in my element - a holiday in Scotland

Another week in the north of Scotland was on the agenda and an early start required for Satuday the first day of the seventh month of 2006. The alarm clock's clarion call at three-thirty am was dutifully heeded, for once with relish.
Thermos filled with coffee & bacon butties on board espresso dash for our destination saw Inverness reached in six motion blurred hours.Forty five quid replenished the Audi's fuel tank to the brim and from here on in the motoring became more demanding. Eighty or so miles on single track road. Yes, there are numerous passing places but as ones speed inevitably builds & concentration momentarily lapses the chances of a head on collision are at least worth factoring in to ones safety equation. The key is to always imagine a Land Rover, or some other tank like vehicle is about to loom ominously ahead of you around the next, fast approaching bend.
As landscapes turned more barren and the north coast beckoned, scenic appreciation halts increased & the travel clock neared nine hours. All gryst to the mill of seasoned Scottish travellers. I suppose if we'd headed off by air a similar time span could have us comfortably esconced on almost any tourist beach you could mention - perish the thought. Having 'been there, done that' several times over. I would not rule it out in the future, at all, but we still have a lot of Scotland to see.
I mused inwardly how more redolent of pit winding gear and brass bands the name 'Skinnet' was. Our objective, stands on the Kyle of Tongue, almost at the edge of the Britain's mainland Perhaps my current read: Orwell's 'Road to Wigan Pier' had inspired such reverie.
The cottage when we found it was surprisingly large and delightfully situated. Sea views from the garden and windows, and lot of space inside and out. A 'pub' less than seventy yards away added to our euphoric first impressions.
We soon set to exploring and a walk down to the aptly named 'Skinnet Beach' provided our first scenic feast. Filling the senses just like John Denver's missus in the forest we breathed it all in and slaked our burning thirst for Sutherland, her isolation and her beauty.
No one was around. The beach must have stretched a mile and a half, made up of pristine virgin sand and only we two walking upon this expanse. At a time of heatwave down south I pondered the sardine like crushing at places of traditional seaside fun and games, at the same time giving myself a notional pat on the back.
The 'Kyle' itself beguiled me from the start. Although, we had first clapped eyes on it briefly, only last October, we both knew we would be back before long. I sometimes try to analyse what holds such fascination for me in the furthest flung corners of these great British Isles. Why a damp , often dark land draws me, and luckily Sue too, like moths to a flame. Undoubtedly with me, my 'go against the grain' mentality has something to do with matters. I have become more cussed as I age and buck trends generally, seeing through many of them as panaceas for a breed of sheep known latterly as chavs. Perhaps also, like the celts in the mists of time, escape to the very periphery of the lands brings peace of mind, albeit temporary. As urban England changes so dramatically in its' ethnic make up, and the countryside ever more becomes a weekend refuge for hooray Henry's & Henriettas in green wellies and matching Range Rovers. Combine these motives with jawdropping beauty , ever changing light, a wind that can sing a lullaby , a lament or a vicious howl and where a glimpse of sun means so much more for its' unpredictable shyness.
Time after time we go, and always come back. Who knows what the future will bring?

one I prepared earlier......

....I wrote this er....polemic I called it just after the 7/7 bombings in London last yar. At this time of heightened tension I thought it worth a second look. You of course may think otherwise...

In these troubled times I often take a second or two to contemplate what has happened to my country.
I was born in the austerity years. 1951. Bursting forth into the world in the bedroom of a council house on one of the largest estates in western Europe.
My mother and father were decent, hard working folk, who met because of the war. They died in middle age and did not live long enough to enjoy the properous years of so many of their contemporaries. However, they managed to imbue me with common sense work ethics and instilled Chrisitian values, even though the Church did not loom large in our lives.
Childhood gave way to adolescence, and the swinging sixties. Not what they are so often cracked up to be, at least in working class Wythenshawe. No 'free love' there. I never had a sniff of any illicit drug, and even left it until I was seventeen for my first pub pale ale, my maiden kiss was also delayed until this late age. How different things seems in 2005. Back then, the Beatles, motorbikes and dear old Manchester City F.C,. held me in deep thrall. I didn't seem to need much else.
In 1970 I married the woman who is still my wife. Our children are grown and well adjusted, hard workers. I have a Grandaughter who is just two. I fear rather for her future. Why? Let me explain...
...I remember spending so much of my time at work when my own kids were little. Striving for square meals and a rounded upbringing for them both. My wife spent about thirteen years at home as a full time mother. Money was very tight. We wouldn't have had it any other way.
The eighties brought increased earnings and with Maggies 'right to buy' our nearly new council house. Things were looking up. Despite her largesse, I didn't really like Thatcher. I saw her as divisive to the community. I felt she was eroding the rights of working people, built up over decades and cemented by Wilson's 'old 'Labour. Under the Conservatives manufacturing Britain seem to wilt in the face of her remorseless ideology. The few good things and essential services were being hived off . The family silver was hawked here, there and everywhere.
When Tony Blair appeared on the scene I was weary and almost cowed, but then along with 'new Labour came new hope.
Things can 'only get better' they sang. I fell for it, and so did millions of others.
I was in my lorry cab that night in May 1997. On a 'night out' like thousands of other unsung truckers.
I stayed up until about four am. watching the landslide roll in on my little black and white telly. Once smug Tory faces like Portillo, and others reduced to humility in the face of the onslaught. I felt like dancing in the street, but refrained as I was in a quiet south Devon village.


Sadly for us all , after a bright and promising dawn, the clouds soon rolled in. Yes, the minimum wage was a good idea, and trades union rights were restored at G.C.H.Q. A start was made, and in fairness has been maintained on the re-distribution of wealth.
Then, slowly at first and then gathering momentum I began to realise that there was a reverse exodus taking place in my very midst. Television news carried reports of illegal immigrants, swarming onto freight trains and clambering into the backs of lorries, desperate to get into England. Added to the new phenomenon of the 'asylum seeker' this began to concern me a little, though I though the the Government would get to grips with it.
I was wrong.

On the contrary Blair seemed to leave the nations front door off the latch, while leaving the back door wide open. E.U. enlargement meant anothe rinflux, this time of legal migrants anxious to undermine British people on low pay, by snapping up minimum wage jobs, thinking each pay cheque was the equivalent to a small pools win back home. We already had a healthy proportion of immigrants from former colonies. Arriving steadily since the end of the war. This acceleration must have worried even those fairly recent incomers.


Disasters, like foot & mouth, Princess Diana's death , and the mis-adventure into Iraq has brought the best out of thespian Blair. His contorted, agonised facial expressions straight out of drama school . The pregnant pauses, timed for maximum effect. Does he realise so many of us see right through this faux facade?
The immigration problem did not seem to worry him. Even though his Home Secretary, not as blind to the situation as his boss was, openly admitted on t.v. that he had 'no idea how many illegal immigrants'were in Britain'
Distracted then by his folly in Iraq. The Prime Minister fooled Britain into backing his war.
This mis-adventure has been a complete disaster. Baghdad bleeds, civil war looms and Tony rings his hands, and pulls a hams face of denial.
The sorry chapter will evolve into a book and if there is a happy ending then pigs might one day fly.
Blair struts the world stage with a call to help Africa. A messiahnic clarion to world leaders. This man is a champion of lost causes.
However, I digress.
Blair only began to pay lip service to the public's chagrin over immigration after the election this year. The Conservatives despite nonsensical media attacks of using 'racism' as a campaign tool began to connect with an increasingly alarmed electorate. The British National Party amassed five per cent of the vote in the constituencies they stood in.
Suddenly, with victory, amazingly in his pocket Blair looked contrite. He pledged to build on the success of reduced 'asylum' claims.
Not before time.
Now, sadly, we find that of our new countrymen, many of whom actually quite like us and wish to settle here in peace and harmony, there exists another breed. A breed of malcontents who wish us harm. Using religion and imported howlers of hate, disguised as perverted Islamic Imams they encourage, quite openly, impressionable young men to take up the struggle and to suicide bomb us out of existence.
No other country would tolerate this.
The capital is wounded. Fifty people and more lie dead, many more are maimed.
Two weeks later, another, seemingly copy-cat but failed attack leaves many of our people fearful and some near terrified. The terrorists have short term success.
Blaire now knee-jerks into promising deportation for the pot-stirrers. What a shame so many have to die before common sense dawns upon our Premier and his acolytes.
The national broadcaster bends over backwards to appease the ' muslim community' Many followers of Islam condemn the atrocities. A few more are not so unequivocal. It is apparent that there is an undercurrent of resentment, A less than total sense of outrage at what has happened in the name of 'allah' Eveyrday, the 'overwhelming' majority of decent muslims sounds slightly less overwhelming.
The airwaves of 'radio mate' (fivelive) are awash with folk with foreign names and accents discussing our laws. Human rights, have become the sacred cow of the educated Asian who should count themselves fortunate to be in a land where they are afforded any rights at all. I have been tuning into this station for ten years on a daily basis. The vast bulk of debate centres around race and racism. The tone of which is rising to a wailing crescendo. We have representatives of 'black Policemen' the' Muslim Council of Britain' the Muslim Human Rights Association' et al.

Now, the death of an innocent illegal immigrant, shot dead, some even say 'murdered' by Police officers who are trying to protect the public at large is even more gryst to the mill for these one sided talking shops. The poor man was most definitely in the wrong place. The time and choice of top coat did not help either, much less the vaulting of barriers. We should lament his death. There will be an enquiry. Less cursory than those in his homeland of Brazil.
Meanwhile, we learn the suicide bombers were 'British'. The failed bombers it emerges are dependants of asylum seekers who have been given a home, and benefits. We are repayed with hatred and loathing.

Britain is in a sorry mess.
I am fifty four years of age. I have worked all my life and paid taxes uncomplainingly on modest wages.
I never asked for, or sought to live in a multi-cultural society. Much less one in which diversity is more important than equality, where 'communities' of this and that rub along ploughing disparate paths. Even many of those who claim to want to be British cling on to alien ways and the remnants of the culture that could not give them a life worth living. Religion, for so many a prop, but not a cornerstone of their lives has made a resurgent return in the shape of Islam. The faithful take instructions from an eleven hundred year old book. The post-religious British, with their Booze and their Beckham look on bewildered as Mosques rival only MacDonalds in their quest for brown field sites.
Multi-culturalism, even in the opinion of the head of the race relations 'industry' is a failed concept.
The result is a dilution of any culture at all and a society on the road to nowhere.

All this is happening during economic good times. The sustained and really rather unusual prosperity of recent times cannot go on for ever. My worry is what will happen when the downturn comes as it inevitably will one day.
Will disparate communites rally together and face out hard times? I recall black and white photogrpahs from the nineteen thirties of sad, bedraggled groups of men on street corners with no money, and no hope.
On the next street corner would be another clearly empathetic. A single culture assaulted by the forces of capital. No clearly identifiable scapegoats back then. Not in the same town, the same streets.
I wonder how the nineteen- thirties would have coped with todays ethnic mix.
Not very well I fear. Perhaps we shall see for ourselves when the Blair-Brown bubble finally bursts.
Burnley, Brixton, Oldham & Bradford suggests my fears are not fanciful.
For those who will view me as 'racist' (surely the most overworked word of the age) I shall crawl back underneath my stone. It is dark there, but surprisingly crowded. Shove up a bit.

(with the benefit of a relatively open society, and twelve months worth of hindsight the Menezez death was not what it seemed, but you'll have realised that I'm sure)

how many 'communities' does it take to make a society?

One, I'd say.

I am , in all truth, sick to the back teeth of hearing about this community, and that community. This is all going to end in tears. We have to accept that Britain is now multi-ethnic. I'm not overly happy to take that on board but the alternative is to bury my head in the sand. I'm no ostrich. However, MULTI-CULTURALISM and it's attendant system of umpteen different 'communities' all living parallel lives without common goals and aspirations is doomed to failure.

I read, and heard yesterday that Police informed 'community leaders' of impending dawn raids in connection with the airline terror alerts. Who are these people? These leaders? Are they elected? Almost certainly not. Are they 'Imams'? Possibly. Yet would your local Vicar or Parish Priest or even your local councillor be informed if the drugs squad were to launch a raid on local scumbag crack houses or narcotics dealers? The answer is an emphatic NO.

Britain, for reasons which might escape any other nation is bending over backwards to accommodate recent immigrants, and the offspring of post World War Two immigrants, especially Muslims, seemingly on their terms.

These people need to remember the old saying and adage 'When in Rome, do as the Romans do'. Even the Koran, the Islamic 'bible' says that host nations laws and customs must be respected.


They are free to worship in their mosques and free to wear their own particular garb.
This is as much as we can realistically offer. They are not free to never be offended. They
cannot be tiptoed around when militants and terrorists are amongst them and need to be weeded out.

So many now take a default postion on our Police and Security forces - they disbelieve them. I'm a cynical man myself , and admittedly there have been some high profile balls ups, not least the shooting of the illegal overstayer Menezez, although pointedly, he was NOT a muslim. The Forest Gate raid and subsequent 'accidental' shooting was another sorry episode, but the men concerned have been put up in expensive hotels ever since and will, in time be handsomely rewarded in terms of compensation.

We hear frightening figures in response to opinion polls. Apparently 30% of young Muslims think the 7/7 bombings were 'justified' and so many are now becoming radicalised that we are in danger of growing our very own fifth column within our midst. Indeed, it is already here.

What is to be done? Undoubtedly British foreign policy, and Tony Blair's slavish devotion to George Bush has alienated many, and not just Muslims, there are many white British people who have real roots here stretching back centuries are unhappy with Britain's mis-adventure in Iraq. I include myself in this. However, no amount of alienation can, or should lead people to commit, or support those who would conspire to commit mass murder of innocents.

There are of course the terminal cynics, and conspiracy theorsts who insist that the events of yesterday were just a smokescreen to take the Israel - Hezbollah conflict off the front pages. These idiots need to get a grip on reality. They are of the same ilk as those who think the FBI/CIA was behind 9/11 and carried out the attacks on the twin towers with the aid of Mossad. Nutters, all of them.
To get back to my main thrust here there can only ever be ONE community. Within this entity there will always be different faiths, different classes and different socio-economic groupings which are slowly replacing 'class' anyway. Sociologists who persist in trying to pigeon-hole and make a science of such matters will one day realise that 'class' is dead. There must only ever be though - ONE community !

Community can not be diluted into sub-divisions, not in a healthy nation. To divide is to weaken. The tail cannot be allowed to wag the dog. British values , British hospitality and tolerance must not be abused and taken advantage of by strident groups who are not happy with the way we live. If they do not like us, and eschew all that is British then let them leave and make their own way in lands more to their liking.
We need politicians of sterner stuff to deliver this message in a forceful way. We do not need mealymouthed apologists who talk of 'communities' and 'cultures'

Given a few generations , if theinflux of immigrants continues apace and they change this democratic society by the legitmate route of the ballot box then that is a different matter altogether. By then we will be dust , or at least well on the way. Before this happens there will be the death throes of what was once a community. A nation relatively at peace with itself.....

....One community , or NO community. The choice facing us is stark and simple.

landmarker