Phew! Thank goodness for that; but what sort of puppy should Obama pick?

I woke early and the Today programme on my bedside radio seemed particularly gloomy. No cheering crowds, no excited presenters. Half asleep, I thought McCain had won, and dozed for half an hour worrying about the future for global environmental politics (not to mention everything else). What a relief when the headlines came on at 7am.

My favourite line from Obama's victory speech:

"Even as we celebrate tonight, we know the challenges that tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime - two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century." (my emphasis)

But that aside, the most pressing decision Obama now faces is what sort of dog he should get for his daughters!

"Sasha and Malia, I love you both more than you can imagine, and you have earned the new puppy that's coming with us to the White House."

Much as I love my English Springer Spaniel, and he's great with people (especially kids), I don't think that would be an appropriate choice. A hound of traditional US pedigree might be advisable, but a rescue mut might be more politically sensitive. Who'd have thought that picking a puppy could be such a political decision?

And then there's the question of a name…

Waiting, waiting, waiting, for the party to begin…

Turning on the Large Hadron Collider didn’t end the world, as some people had feared. But here we are, less than two months later, poised on the brink of another potentially world-changing event. Not sure I can take the strain of “Waiting, waiting, waiting…”*

Hot news is that Barack Obama has already won one race: in Dixville Notch, New Hampshire, a town of only 21 voters. Turning the town Democrat for the first time since 1968, the electorate chose Obama by 15 votes to 6.

I’m surprised to see that some fellow UK-based bloggers/editors say they’re not interested in the election. Whichever way the voting goes, it’s unavoidable that the US presidential election will have a knock-on effect – for better or worse – on global politics and economics, not to mentioned environmental issues.

So I’m keeping my fingers (and everything else) crossed for a high turn-out and the right decision…

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* First poem we had to learn in “Elocution” lessons, 30 years ago. (They really should have filled our growing minds with something more useful!)

Don’t mention the R—; it’s just a BAGEL

Clearly there’s no escaping the economic downturn. Most people are now convinced we’re facing a slowdown, and first the Today programme (Radio4), then the mighty GB himself, used the R-word yesterday. These people ought to be more careful with their terminology.

Today, in fact, specifically said “… the R-word …”, which caught my ear over the cornflakes (well, porridge, actually). There must be a West Wing fan in the Today editorial team; for all WW fans know that it’s not an *R—, it’s just a ‘bagel’.

Shame on me for not knowing off the top of my head which particular episode this is from (I DO have all of them on DVD), but through the wonder of t’internet I can tell you that it’s from Season 5, Episode 1, first screened in 2003.

The context is that Pres. Bartlett (Democrat) has had to hand over the presidency to the Speaker of the House, Walken (Republican), because Bartlett’s daughter Zoey has been kidnapped. Meanwhile there’re various other crises rumbling along, not least the impending Bagel.

Josh Lyman (played by Bradley Whitford) can’t bear the idea of mentioning the R-word, and quite right too! I’m sure there’s a saying (but can’t bring it to mind) about naming a thing bringing it into existence. If there isn’t, there should be – especially in the field of economics.

I do accept that current circumstances are, to say the least, exceptional. Nevertheless, the more the media harp on about the Bagel, the worse it is likely to get.

Funny thing is, I barely remember the Bagel last time around, even though it landed me and Mr Ms_well in negative equity territory. Back then, I’d just finished a stint writing for an electronics magazine (that industry was going great guns); and I'd moved to work for one of the UK’s largest trade unions.

The economy was certainly high on our list of priority issues, but the focus was much more on the loss of manufacturing jobs in the midlands and the north. So despite the (moderate) fall in house prices in the South East, the City carried on regardless and as I recall there was less hype about the Bagel, and more concern about the ‘balance of trade’ deficit. On top of that, with high inflation, those of us who didn’t lose our jobs were getting decent pay rises – my salary increased by £15k in the five years after I graduated in 1988 (though, admittedly part of that was linked to rising up the career ladder).

Things certainly don’t seem the same this time around. For one thing, I now listen to Today – guaranteed hype-on-toast Monday to Friday – and for another, as a freelance, I’m potentially more likely to feel the effects of organisational purse-string-tightening.

No sign of that yet, so far, for me (but I’m keeping everything crossed), but just this morning I bumped into a neighbour who’s a freelance PR, off on her way to an interview for a secretarial job at our local school. She says she’s sick of working at home, but I can’t help wondering whether the downturn is making her (and others) worry unduly about their employment prospects.

C’mon folks, I agree that we’re living in uncertain times (no change there then?), but life WILL go on. The only thing that IS certain, is that panic and media hype won’t help anyone. Sorry to quote Michael Winner, but “Calm down, dears” is the only advice I’m currently willing to take.

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* R—, of course, stands for recession. Nice to be able to use an em-rule once in a while!

Is DECC good news for us greenies?

Aha! Today I have a new acronym to add to my editor's checklist: DECC, the Department for Energy and Climate Change. Announced yesterday as part of the cabinet reshuffle, this new department will be led by Ed Miliband and has been welcomed by Greenpeace. Indeed, they’re so pleased about it that they’ve sent me a letter* (well, they issued a round robin to all their members, but I flatter myself they wanted to let me know personally!)

What a shame, though, that Gordon Brown didn’t bother to mention it in his round robin to Labour Party members – he was too busy justifying the resurrection of Peter Mandelson. What does that say about his underlying concerns? Is DECC a token effort? Oh boy, I hope not.

I am a tad suspicious of the motives behind this new department, though. The person who told me about the announcement mentioned the n-word (nuclear) in the very same breath…

I’m a definite fence-sitter when it comes to nuclear power.

It’s not a ‘sustainable’ option in any sense of the word, and in any case leaves us with the same problem as on-going oil usage – namely that we can easily be held to ransom by hostile countries who are sitting on the fuel sources. Wind, wave and solar we have aplenty, so let’s hunker down and develop these cleaner, safer and home-grown technologies.

On the other hand, from the politicians’ viewpoint, telling people to cut energy usage is not a vote-winner (as we’ve already begun to see with the low-cost insulation announcement); the prospect of power cuts, or worse, rationing, is even less enticing. But if people don’t get a grip on their energy usage the politicians have to come up with something, and nuclear is a low-carbon-emissions alternative.

So I’ll give two cheers to Ed Miliband and his new department; and with my editor’s hat on, let’s hope to goodness that Mr M lets his civil servants give it a proper logo and sensible acronym – unlike the powers that be who insisted on dropping the ‘department’ from Communities and Local Government.

Talking of which, I’d like to add three cheers for the appointment of Margaret Beckett as minister for Housing. Only yesterday I was reading of the woeful lack of heavyweights in government [Tribal gatherings by Decca Aitkenhead], and Mrs Beckett (I am told that’s her moniker of preference!) brings a wealth of experience to this portfolio, which is set to be one of the highest profile issues for many months to come. If the house builders cause her any trouble, she can always call in the caravan manufacturers!

* Send Mr M a letter via Greenpeace’s campaign to encourage ‘green collar’ jobs and stop the development of the Kingsnorth coal-fired power station. See also an informative take on the news on the Greenpeace blog.

Police, politicians and paintings

Sometimes the juxtaposition of news items simply can't be ignored.

A snippet on Today (Radio 4) this morning caught my attention: A couple in Cambridgeshire were being burgled, and phoned 999, only to get a text message from the local police instead of an actual Bobby.

Next item up was Nicholas Penny, director of the National Gallery, asking the nation to stump up £100 million to buy a couple of paintings. Well, they're Titians, and I'm sure they're fabulous. But they're owned by the Duke of Sutherland and they've been on loan from the Duke of Sutherland's estate since 1945. Is the guy really so hard up that he needs to cash in his family heirlooms? I doubt it.

Normally I wouldn't join the chorus who cry for 'money for nurses/schools' [insert pet issue of your choice], mainly because the sums involved in such cases tend to be trifles in the overall scheme of government spending (and as a former civil servant I know that a million quid doesn't go very far).

Nicholas Penny said that buying the pix would "end decades of anxiety about them being sold overseas". Doesn't the man realise that one of the many things people do when they holiday abroad is visit famous galleries to see famous painting? I could take him a tiny bit more seriously if he was wanting to save something from destruction, but overseas? What's the big deal?

Sometimes public spending is a case of 'what goes around comes' - e.g. give civil servants a 4% pay rise and they'll have a tiny bit more spending power in the high street and the VAT will dribble into the Treasury's coffers. In this case, though, I can't see it happening. Do we really think the Duke will stump up the Capital Gains from his 'car boot sale'?

On the other hand, £100 million (or even half of that - which is what he's likely to get) would buy quite a few bicycles for the Bobbies of Cambridgeshire, and if it's a choice between fighting off burglars rummaging through my drawers and keep a couple of paintings on home turf, I think I know which I'd choose.

[Sorry; links are to Daily Telegraph (top when I Googled), as BBC website has gone temporarily awol.]

It's not Frankenstein we should fear, but big pharma

Last week Prince Charles spoke out against genetically modified crops (aka "Frankenstein foods", if you read the tabloids).

It's about time people stopped focusing on the science (which may or may not be an issue) and thought long and hard about the economics of GM. What a pity Phil Woolas (Defra minister) continues to miss this key point. So I decided to set him straight:

Dear Mr Woolas

In the wake of Prince Charles's interview about genetically modified crops, you have been setting out the Government's policy towards GM. As a Labour Party member (who hasn't yet completely chucked in the towel), I'm writing to draw your attention to my concerns about GM, and to explain why I would like the Labour Party to re-think its attitude to GM.

For me, the issue is not about the science - it's the economic/political risks that concern me, principally the need to ensure "sustainability" of food supplies.

Do you really think it's a good idea to let the future of world food supplies lie in the hands of a small number of international chemicals companies? Letting the "market" control life's essentials is already leading us into trouble:

* We are already suffering the consequences of energy being controlled by hostile regimes and/or greedy international businesses. (Hence I'm all in favour of increasing home-grown energy from wind farms, wave power, PV, and micro-renewables.)
* Meanwhile, thousands die every day in developing countries because they can't afford to buy medicines from the pharmaceuticals giants; and back home in the UK some drugs have to be "rationed" because they are too expensive (i.e. shareholders in Glaxo et al don't want to see their profits shrink).

I don't object in principle to on-going scientific trials of GM crops, but they should be conducted by government scientists, and the results should be widely published. Any patents that result should be made "open source" so that farmers around the world can benefit from technological developments - instead of the technology being controlled by a handful of extremely powerful and secretive organisations (Monsanto, inevitably, springs to mind).

Of course, Mr Woolas is far too busy to reply in person, but the Labour Party's communications department assures me they'll pass on my comments to the appropriate department. Yeh, right. Well, I won't hold my breath…

The price of spin

Writing in the current issue of the Journalist (house magazine of the NUJ), Paul Ilett warns the wider media of the dangers of criticising public spending on "press officers" ['Don't bite the hand"; p31; Journalist, August 2008].

Ilett is a press officer with the NHS and is worried about a recent Freedom of Information (FOI) request by his local paper, which wants to know how much of the local NHS budget is spent on 'spin'.

He rightly points out to the NUJ audience (many of them, local hacks) that local newspapers would struggle to fill their pages without the work of his team.

"I spent six years as Head of Comms at MORI. MORI's local government research showed that councils that invest in good communications have much better approval ratings than those that do not. The truth is that people like to know what is going on," writes Ilett.

Quite right; and that goes for national politics too. Party political spin doctors have given government communications officers a bad name they don't deserve. The Opposition might think they can add information officers to their hit list for 'cost cutting' measures, but who'll be left to publicise the (pifling) amount of public money they saved along the way?

Of politicians and proofreaders

The Tories are criticising the government's Youth Crime Action Plan on the grounds that it was thrown together at the last minute.

At Question Time in the House of Commons yesterday, Nick Herbert, shadow justice minister, accused the government of " …still cobbling it [the document] together yesterday".

"Can the Justice Secretary confirm that the government was still amending the Youth Crime Action Plan yesterday?" he cried.

Apparently, Jack Straw looked down at the printed and bound document in his hands and said: "This was printed yesterday …"

Perish the thought that Nick Herbert ever comes out of his "shadow", but if he does, maybe he'll find out why the government employs a small army of Information Officers - who work behind the scenes to edit and proofread all government publications.

It's not all "spin" at the GCN, Nick!

Don't be 'discontented' this summer

Oh no! You and Yours (Radio 4's flagship moaners-and-groaners lunchtime slot) is today running a package on the "rise of the trade unions", and wondering (in its trailer) "Are we facing a summer of discontent?".

My answer: "Yes! ... I'm discontented with lazy journalism that always portrays trade unions as a 'bad thing'."

Trade unions are not 'the enemy' - they're just groups of people who realise their voices are more likely to be heard if they all speak together.

You and Yours is quite happy to give airtime to all sorts of unreconstructed individual opinions, but can't stomach the idea that when an elected trade union official speaks on the news, they're speaking on behalf of tens of thousands of individual members.

Note to self: take the dog out between 12 and 1 today!

Maternity benefits should pay attention to biology

Last week poor Zoe Williams lost her mojo amid a post-natal hormonal fug (see Guardian G2, Friday 11 July); this week Sarah Veal (TUC) and Sylvia Tidy-Harris (www.womenspeakers.co.uk) have ferociously debated the merits (or otherwise) of employing women of child-bearing age - not once, but twice… in one morning (on Woman's Hour, then on the Jeremy Vine show).

Yes, motherhood is top of the news agenda … again.

Ms T-H is an employer who says she won't employ women of child-bearing* age…
Hmm … I wonder how she'd react if an employee of hers discovered they were ill? What if (heaven forbid) they contracted cancer and had to take 6 months off to undergo surgery and recover from chemotherapy?

Those who complain about new legal provisions to protect their employees might do better to go back to their offices and do a bit of 'forward planning'. Employees are not bound to stick with an employer for ever - women of child-bearing age are just as likely to go out and find a new job (with better terms and conditions!), as they are to get pregnant. Nothing in life is predictable...

Sensible employers do understand that having a baby is a life-changing experience, and offer as much support as possible. But for all the maternity leave, childcare vouchers, and flexible working hours, the one thing that's not often on offer to new mothers is a 'good ear' to help returners talk through their problems.

I was lucky to work for an employer who offered excellent support for its female employees - including an on-site crêche. Nevertheless, three of us who worked in one division - and who all became pregnant with our first babies within a short 'window' (arousing comments like "There must be something in the water round here...") - all left once we had served enough time to avoid having to pay back our maternity pay.

Why?

In my own case, I'm pretty certain it was a question of hormones.

I took the full amount of maternity leave, going back to work when my baby was seven months old. In that short time my life had changed completely - not just a new baby, but a new (and as we later discovered, unsuitable) home as well. (Oh, and I almost forgot - recovering from emergency surgery!) Plunging back into the office, even on reduced hours, was another massive upheaval.

Even just the simple change of routine to get to work took some coping with. Where once I could have woken up, dress, breakfasted and been on the road to work in around 60 minutes, now I had a whole new list of things to do before I could step out of the house - wake, feed, dress baby; pack bag for nursery; mop up sick; change baby's nappy (again), change me (smudges on suit). [No need to explain further - this is a common scenario for all mothers, whether they're going out to work or just a basic shopping trip or school run.]

I was very lucky that my baby thrived at nursery, though quickly picked up the usual assortment of childhood bugs, which meant time off work. Despite my employer's flexible attitude I didn't feel that I was doing either job (employee; mum) justice.

I didn't sit around staring at my PC wondering what my baby was doing, but my brain definitely wasn't in gear either at home or at work.

The idea of working at home was therefore appealing; crucially, I wouldn't have to be at a certain place at a certain time. And as I had always had the idea of working for myself in the back of my mind, it seemed - at the time - like a logical thing to do.

What I hadn't thought through, though, was the the many benefits I have lost by taking this route: job security, career progression, and the biggie - a decent pension. And my employer lost a member of staff with more than five years' service, who they'd only recently sponsored through a post-graduate diploma.

When I handed in my notice, with baby's first birthday approaching, no one questioned my decision; not family, not friends, not my employer. Everyone just assumed I was a grown up and I'd made a grown-up decision.

What no one had factored into the equation was that I was still breastfeeding (just) and even if I hadn't been, I would still have been, like Zoe Williams, in the post-natal hormone fug. A few more months and I might have made a totally different decision.

So I applaud any efforts to extend the maternity leave period. Surely it's better for employers to mark a little more time waiting for their familiar, trained and refreshed female employees to return to work, than to hurry them back when they're still struggling to get a grip on their new life status, and their biology is working against them?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that all new mothers should be forced to stay at home, but I do think there should be greater consideration given not just for the obvious outward signs of new-motherdom, but for what's happening on the inside.

Interestingly, a quick Internet search for scientific studies of female hormones after birth draws lots of articles about post-natal depression, but nothing at all on general issues of hormonal changes. [Not surprising, as a lot of medical research is geared up to developing drugs to cure 'illness', rather than understanding perfectly natural phenomenon.] Wikipedia says that in some East Asian countries: "... confinement traditionally lasts 30 days, although regional variants may last 40, 60 or as many as 100 days".
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* She's currently 'representing' one Katie Hopkins, the scourge of last year's Apprentice who kept her own maternal status a secret until she reached the show's finale. Nuff said?

Pride and Prejudice - you couldn't make it up…

Did anyone else spot the irony* of the Daily Mail giving away copies of Pride and Prejudice on DVD today?

I know that a free dose of Colin Firth is very tempting, but do try to resist this "offer". You can pick up a low-cost second-hand DVD on eBay instead.

[*or has the DM's editor just decided on a new strap line for the paper?]

Marcus gets serious

Did Marcus Brigstocke know what was coming next?

Was it just an incredibly serendipitous piece of scheduling that resulted in his sketch featuring the:

"open[ing of] the crypt [and releasing] the Tory undead ... the restless, vicious lost souls of nasty judgemental Conservatism ..."

on Radio 4's The Now Show (Friday 11 July 2008; 17:40 mins into show) being followed by ...

... Norman Tebbitt on Any Questions?

Fantastic stuff, Marcus.

People have frighteningly short political memories, and don't forget that there's a whole generation of young voters who don't know anything about the divisive politics of the 1980s and early 1990s, so it's about time someone somewhere jogged our memories.

And while I'm at it, well done to MB for his blistering attack on the car-tax whiners. As MB put it so succinctly:

"Shut up! You myopic doughnuts!"