Chris Whiteside's Blog

“He that can have patience can have what he will.”   (  Benjamin Franklin  )

“There is something about losing your mother that is permanent and inexpressable - a wound that will never quite heal.” ( Susan Wiggs , ) "when you look at your mother, you are looking at the purest love you will ever know.”   ( Mitch Albom  ) "The natural state of motherhood is unselfishmess. When you become a mother you are no longer at the entre of yor own universe. YOu relinquih that position to your children." (Jessica Lange)

"What the First Minister is saying is he wants a divorce but to keep the joint bank account." (Scottish Labour leader Johann Lamont, referring to the SNP wanting Scotland to seek "Independence" from the rest of the UK but to keep the pound.)

Both Nick Clegg and Nigel Farage made some good points in the debate but both of them also rolled out a few ancient and discredited sayings which they should have known, and intelligent and open-minded observers do  know, to be at best highly misleading and at worst very unlikely. E.g. to argue that 3 million jobs would go if Britain left the EU you have to assume no trade with the remaining EU after we left, which seems most unlikely, while the "75% of our laws are made in Brussels" claim by Viviane Reding is not taken seriously by anyone except UKIP, although the House of Commons Library's briefing which gives that figure as 7%, quoted by Nick Clegg in the debate this week, only counts primary legislation and is therefore not the full picture. The truth is somewhere in the huge area between those two numbers. There is a good fact-check on the Open Europe blog, which pours highly-appropriate cold water on some of the wilder claims by both men, her...

Hanlon's razor, attributed in this form to Robert J Hanlon but similar to sayings attributed to many others including Napoleon, Jane West, Goethe, and Robert Henlein, is "Never   attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity" A slightly more nuanced version from Robert Henlein, sometimes known as Henlein's razor, is   "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity, but don't rule out malice" Another similar comment, which is a comibation of the above and Clarke's law about technology and magic, is known as Gray's law: "Any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishalble from malice."

There were some interesting comments made by both leaders in the Clegg vs. Farage debate about whether Britain should be in the EU. The point howeer, where I thought Nigel Farage completely lost it was his preposterous attempt to blame the EU for what is happening in the Ukraine. The European Union gets many things wrong but the idea that the EU is in any meaningful sense responsible for the change in government in the Ukraine or for Russia's subsequent actions only makes sense in the looking-glass world of Russian propaganda - and now apparently also of UKIP propaganda. The EU tried to negotiate a trade agreement with the previous Ukranian government. Signing trade agreements is what the EU does and it's one of the things they are actually fairly good at, though I have some sympathy for those who urge counting your fingers after shaking hands on such negotiations. Such trade deals do not have to involve detatching the countries with which we agree to tr...

"Nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool" (Anon, sometimes attributed to Robert Frost or Winston Churchill) Similarly Douglas Adams wrote in Mostly Harmless , "A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools."

I believe that the result of the 2015 General election is wide open and there is still everythimg to play for. The result could be a Labur government, a Conservative government, or a hung parliament. I was interested to read in the press the other day an opinion by one journalist, John Rentoul of the Independent, that shortly after the budget MPs from both sides told him they thought their party would lose the next election. The Labour MPs were depressed with Ed Miliband's, quote "disastrously bad" response to the budget (e.g. the fact that he failed to mention anything in it). The Conservative MPs were afraid they still had too much ground to make up. Meanwhile the front page of The Times this morning is dominated by an opinion survey suggesting that a big majority of all voters, and even a slim majority of LABOUR voters, do not see Ed Miliband as a potential Prime Minister. Mike Smithson at political betting reminds us that Margaret Thatcher's Conservatives...

This comment by John McTernan may be a "gaffe" in the sense of a politico accidentally saying what he actually thinks but it is also very revealing. I didn't make it quote of the day, because it should be a quote for the week, month, year and century. This is an perfect summary of what is wrong with the socialist mindset.

"Change is inevitable, except from a vending machine" (Anon)

The response of the Labour party, and some of Britain's establishment, to Gerge Osborne's pension reforms was incredibly revealing. There are two reasons why I think he was absolutely right to say that nobody should be forced to buy an annuity. The first is that, as the saying goes, one size does not fit all, and the fact that an annuity may well be the right choice for many people does not mean it should be imposed on everyone. The second is that denying people a choice was a guaranteed recipe for more bad deals being provided. If people have more choices to go elsewhere, there will be more incentive for those who provide annuities to offer a good deal or risk seeing their customers go elsewhere. Pensioners tend to be extremely careful with the money they have spent years saving. Comments from one or two Labour MPs and from some other "talking heads" about whether people could be trusted with their own money woud have been insulting and patronising even if they...

UK Inflation as measured by the Consumer Prices Index has fallen to 1.7% last month, which is a new four-year low, the fifth consecutive month that the rate of increase in prices had fallen, and the second consecutive month that inflation in Britain has been below the Bank of England's target that the CPI should not rise by more than 2% per annum.. Inflation as measured by the Retail Prices Index which used to be the main measure until the previous government switched to CPI a few years ago, also dropped, from 2.8% to 2.7%. This is further evidence that,although there is still a long way to go, the government's Long Term Economic Plan is starting to put Britain's economy and the country on the right track. To replace those policies in favour of those who would stop trying to reduce the deficit, spend more, and borrow more, would be an act of insanity and would betray the future

"A day without sunshine is like, well night." (Anon)

A very big thank-you to all those who have already sponsored me, or my son John, or both, in the 2014 Swimathon which was part of the Sport Relief weekend. I completed my 5,000 metre challenge (200 lengths of Copeland Swimming Pool in Hensingham) in one hour 55 minutes and forty seconds yesterday: my son John completed his 1,500 metre challenge (60 lengths) in exactly 55 minutes. The Swimathon Foundation selects a National Charity Partner to promote itself and its charitable activities in association with the Swimathon and to receive funds from members of the public, including those participating in the Swimathon, in support of its activities. The Swimathon has raised funds for a variety of nominated charities including Macmillan Cancer Support, NSPCC, The British Heart Foundation, The Prince’s Trust, and Marie Curie Cancer Care. For Swimathon 2014 the selected charity has been Comic Relief, raising funds through the Sport Relief campaign.   Comic Relief is spending t...

"You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say will be misquoted, then used against you." (Anon)

"I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear." (Nelson Mandela)

This weekend is Sport Relief weekend, and tomorrow (Sunday 23rd March) I shall be taking part in the Swimathon in aid of Sport Relief. I first took part in the Swimathon twenty years ago in 1994 so this will be the 21 st consecutive year I have swum the 5,000 metre challenge. My twelve-year old son John is joining me and taking part in the Swimathon for the second year: he will be swimming the 1,500 metre challenge.   The Swimathon is Britain’s largest charity swim, and gives people of very varied swimming abilities an opportunity to raise money for charity by swimming distances of up to 5,000 metres.  This year's Swimathon event is part of Sport Relief.   Swimathon and Sport relief will be raising funds to help vulnerable people both in Britain and in many other countries of the world who are particularly in need of help, from elderly people to children, from helping people to find jobs or cope with disabilities to medicines and other means of p...

"Some Labour MPs are rightly concerned that Mr Miliband slips to easily into class war rhetoric that blongs to another era and will leaave many aspirational voters thinking that Labour is not for them. "When responding to the budget Mr Miliband made his default "Tory Toff" speech. He had expected a "rabbit" on the cost of living or the 40p tax band and was unsure how to respond o the pensions revolution. "Mr Miliband shouldn't make a habit of trying to revive the class war. It is over."  (Andrew Grice, writing in the "i" and Independent today)

"Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts." (Winston Churchill)

Three quotes from yesterday in response to the budget: "The Budget will put wind in the sails of business investment, especially for manufacturers. This was a make-or-break budget, coming at a critical time in the recovery, and the chancellor has focused his firepower on areas that have the potential to lock in growth." (John Cridland, Director-General of the CBI) "There are a number of announcements in today's budget that will be music to the ears of the over-50s. Many older savers want to be able to save the whole ISA allowance in cash, and the reduced tax on savings income will be a huge boost to those who have saved and done the right thing. Trusting people with their money must be the right approach, but with greater longevity the biggest challenge is to make people's savings last a lifetime. Those saving for retirement and the financial services industry need to step up to the challenge to enable savers to achieve their retirement dreams....

I received 95 almost identical emails today from supporters of the Trade Justice Movement, each with the same 380Kilobyte attachment urging me to sign a pledge to support their agenda. I agree with some but not all their aims, of which more anon. I am quite sure that this was intended to show me how strongly they felt about the issue and not as a DOS attack. However, lobby groups need to think about the possible consequence of this kind of campaigning. My present email account can handle that amount of traffic. Not all that long ago getting 35 megs of email in a day would have crashed the typical email account. If the trend where lobby groups encourage their members and supporters to send hundreds of emails with big attachments to political candidates goes much further, it will start to have DOS effects even if that is not the intention. What will happen then is that instead of being able to publicise a personal email account, as we can do now, candidates will have to ...

When all the political heat and light over the budget has died down there are two things it is likely to be remembered for. The first is the increase of the personal allowance to £10,500 which lifts the threshold at which people start paying income tax and will thus free many low paid workers from having to pay income tax at all. This tax cut for the poor, and previous such increases in the threshold, demolishes the ridiculous Labour propaganda that only the rich have had tax cuts from the present government. But possibly even more significant in the long run are the measures to protect savers and especially those saving for their retirement. I'm already older than my father was when he retired, but still hope and expect that I won't be retiring for more than a decade providing I still have a job and my health. Admittedly, my father took early retirement on ill health grounds, although an awful lot of his contemporaries and near contemporaries also retired in the 19...

The Chancellor of the Exchequer writes ...   Wed, 19 Mar 2014 at 5:46 5:46 Message starred Link Removal Request FROM info@epharmacies.com TO You Show Details From info@epharmacies.com   To chris4copeland@btinternet.com   Hello Webmaster, Hope you are doing well! I am trying to remove some backlinks pointing to my website, http://www.epharmacies.com . I would really appreciate your help in removing this link. Here is the info… My website is linked on your website here: http://chris4copeland.blogspot.com/2007/12/chemists-rota-in-copeland-over-holiday.html It points to this URL on my website: http://www.epharmacies.com And it uses this anchor text: discount pharmacy, online pharmacy If you could please send a confirmation note letting me know that the link has been removed, I would really appreciate it. Thanks in advance! I hope to hear from you soon. Tue, 18 Mar 2014 at 22:53...

"I can't budge it" - Denis Healey (while chancellor, on a BBC "Nationwide" humorous sketch) "I never could make out what those damn dots meant." - Randolph Churchill, while chancellor, referring to decimal points) "An economy hampered by restrictive tax rates will never produce enough revenue to balance our budget, just as it will never produce enough jobs or enough profits." - President John F Kennedy  

Godwin's law states that as a debate continues the probability of someone making a comparison with Hitler and the Nazis approaches unity. But in the case of what Russia is trying to do in the Crimea, I'm going to make that comparison right at the start. Of course, Putin's agents in Ukraine have already been justifying Russia's actions and condemning the interim Ukranian government by accusing them of being Nazis or Fascists and threatening Russian speaking residents of Ukraine, so I am not the first person to do so. Basically, Russia'a actions in using armed men to cut off part of the Ukraine, and then holding a referendum which did not offer a real choice to justify annexation, is straight out of the Nazi playbook as used when taking the Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia and later when claiming the Polish corridor. It is entirely possible that if the Ukraine had decided in a democratic manner to give the people of the Crimea a choice between the status quo, gre...

“To be trusted is a greater compliment than being loved.”   ( George MacDonald  )

Happy St Patrick's day to anyone reading this.

"In Ireland the inevitable never happens and the unexpected constantly occurs." (John Pentland Mahaffey) "The Irish gave the bagpipes to the Scots as a joke, but the Scots haven't seen the joke yet." (Oliver Herford) "The shamrock is a religious symbol. St. Patrick said the leaves represented the trinity: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. That's why four leaf clovers are so lucky, you get a bonus Jesus." (Stephen Colbery)

"It's not so unusual to run out of someone else's currency." (Jeffrey Sachs)

"The value of a currency is ultimately what someone will give you for it: whether in food, juel, assets or labour" (James Surowiecki)

I utterly disagreed with Tony Benn, who has died today, on so many, many things. And yet he was an exceptionally remarkable human being. He was possibly the greatest orator of his generation. He was certainly one of the most charming men I ever met. And he was one of the greatest parliamentarians of the 20th century. Rest in Peace.

"Some of the jam we thought was for tomorrow, we've already eaten" (Tony Benn 1969 - but very relevant in this decade, although he and I might disagree about who is to blame for this.)

Earlier this week one of my work colleagues asked what I think of Prime Ministers' Question Time,  how MPs sometimes behave at it, and particularly the "Not invented here" syndrome which causes many parliamentarians to attack things which they would certainly do were they in government - or in many cases had done when they were. I replied that I realise many of the public find some of the point scoring very childish, and the bad impression of politics thus created is unfortunate and off-putting. However, it is not an accident that all Prime Ministers hate PMQs - it is because it does genuinely hold them to account. The fact that every PM knows he or she can be asked about anything the government is doing, and will have to answer in front of both a large round the world viewing audience and their own MPs forces them to keep on top of what their ministers are doing and think about how they might have to defend the governments' conduct of affairs. For th...

One of the more extraordinary exchanges at Prime Minister's Questions yesterday was when Labour MP John Woodcock, who voted for the Labour amendement in the debate on Syria, suggested as you can read here that "Britain's failure to intervene-in Syria is shameful." In text language, WTF? I can respect those who look at a situation and say consistently all along that there is no possibility of military intervention being anything other than a disaster. That is my position on Ukraine now. I have less time for those who appeared to be more interested in tripping up their opponents than on adopting the right policy. Labour have been arguing that they "stopped the rush to war." I don't know if it is true that they stopped it - because alternative diplomatic avenues to respond to the chemical weapons attack opened up a few days later and I suspect the US and British governments would have taken those options in preference to a military strike anyway - bu...

The interim Crimean government and their puppet master in the Kremlin are insulting the intelligence of the world, and more importantly the people of the Crimea, with their bogus referendum on the future of the area. Bad enough that it is taking place in a rush and under Russian guns. Worse, there is no option on the ballot paper for those who want neither to become part of Russia nor for a big increase in Russian power to say so. There is a limit to the options the West has to make this point - military intervention is certainly not one - but we must certainly use diplomatic means to express our opposition to what Russia is doing in the Ukraine. The people of the area should be allowed to choose their own destiny freely. If that means joining Russia, so be it. But I see no evidence at all that President Putin is willing to give them that free choice.

"One man with courage is a majority" (Thomas Jefferson)

Labour leader Ed Miliband announced his position today on whether the public should have a vote on Britain's EU membership. He will not guarantee any such vote. However, he might hold one if the EU wanted significantly more powers, which he thinks is "unlikely." Hmmm. But when you look at the detail of what he is promising it is interesting to say the least. The current coalition government has already passed a law putting on a referendum lock which means that power cannot be passed from Westminster to the EU without a referendum on those proposals. Miliband appears to want to replace this with a different type of referendum lock whereby you have to have an in-out referendum if the EU wants more powers. This appears to be a replay of a trick Tony Blair and Nick Clegg tried nearly a decade ago, particularly at the time of what was called the constitutional treaty (later known as the Lisbon Treaty). They know they could not win a vote on the treaty, despite...

Earlier this week this blog had it's 175,000th pageview. This is the 3000th post.

"We are products of our past, but we don't have to be prisoners of it." (Rick Warren)

Fools say that they learn by experience. I prefer to profit by others' experience.”   ( Otto von Bismarck  )

I was horrified to read today that there were more than 330 apparently false or malicious 999 calls to Cumbria's Fire and Rescue services in 2013. In the majority of cases the fact that there was not a genuine emergency quickly became apparent, but on more than 50 occasions firefighters were called out to deal with what proved to be a hoax. As Bob Nixon, head of operational support at the fire service, said: “Hoax calls put lives at risk by potentially diverting fire engines that could be needed at real emergencies.” “People might think making these kind of calls is a harmless bit of fun, but it’s a highly reckless criminal offence that can easily have fatal consequences.” He added: “We work closely with the police to catch those responsible and, where we can prove the identity of a hoax caller, we’ll initiate a prosecution that the police can then follow up. “The penalty for making hoax calls can be a £5,000 fine or up to six months’ imprisonment. We also have...

Many years ago a radical Britisn politician pointed out that Crimea is an anagram of "A Crime." Notwithstanding the cover of the current Private Eye, which refers to the Olympics and has Vladimir Putin with a speech bubble saying "I think Russia will win the shooting," a military conflict over Ukraine is in nobody's interest least of all those of the peoples of the Ukraine, who should be left to settle their own destiny freely at the ballot box without intervention by West or East. Military intervention by the West should not happen and is not going to happen, but we have had a wake-up call about appearing weak and must exert maximum diplomatic pressure in support of genuine self-determination for the peoples of Ukraine. The best solution for Russia would have been for Ukraine to be a bridge between East and West but Putin's own actions are making that increasingly impossible. It will be nobody's fault more than that of Vladimir Putin if the peopl...

Having been on the receiving end of OFSTED inspections as a school governor I know just how thoroughly they put a school under the microscope. It has been my experience that if there is anything in a school which needs improvement, they will find it. So all the more impressive that Keswick School has just chalked up, for the second time, an inspection in which Ofsted awarded straight 1 grades (e.g. outstanding in all categories.) You can read the inspection report on the school website here .

“Keep your fears to yourself, but share your courage with others.” (Robert Louis Stevenson)

Prime Minister David Camern has beeen writing about the importance of voting in the European elections in two and a half months' time. The European Parliament now has a lot more power than many people realise - for example, when David Cameron and Angela Merkel negotiated the first ever cut in the EU budget ceiling, the cut could not come into effect until it was ratified by the European Parliament, which took two attempts (partly because UKIP's MEPs initially failed to support the cut.) David Cameron suggests that those who do not already have a postal vote and might find it easier to vote with one can apply online at the About My Vote website. He writes as follows: "This year's European election is the most important in a generation. For the first time since the Eurozone crisis, the British people get to have their say on our country's relationship with the EU. Make sure you have your say by registering for a postal vote on the About My Vote website. ...

This morning this weblog passed the milestone of 175,000 separate pageviews since the traffic counters started about seven years ago. The blog has been running continuously since February 2005, just under nine years and one month ago, which makes it one of the longest running blogs of any kind. Thanks to everyone who has visited in that time.

"There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure." (General Colin Powell)

When I was a boy I thought we could take for granted that our police were almost incorruptible and the envy of the world. I have known a large number of police officers and in most cases it has been a privilege to know them. I remain convinced that most police officers in this country are dedicated and honest public servants, doing a difficult, sometimes unpleasant and sometimes dangerous job on behalf of the community. Unfortunately, there are some people in every walk of life who fall short of the standards society has the right to expect of them. And after what has now come out about * the Hillsborough disaster * the death of Ian Tomlinson following an unprovoked attack by a police officer * the involvement of some police officers in the phone hacking scandal, * the sackings of two police officers for gross misconduct after an inquiry found that they had lied about former chief whip Andrew Mitchell (one of whom was also given a prison sentence after pl...

"This was a devastating report for the Met and one of the worst days that I have seen as a police officer" (Sir Bernard Hogan-howe, Met Police Commissioner, on the most recent Lawrence report.) "What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come about." (Lord Melbourne)

"Time is everything: Five minutes makes the difference between victory and defeat" (Admiral Lord Nelson)

I have just had a letter from St Albans City & District Council advising me of the death on Tuesday of Councillor Gordon Myland, with whom my experience of working together on that council goes back more than 25 years. I had my agreements and disagreements with "The Gnome" as he was sometimes nicknamed - boy, did I have my disagreements with him at times - but he worked extremely hard for the people of first Clarence ward and then Bricket Wood and Chiswell Green. He was an effective and very loud voice for the people of Clarence and then St Stephens. He also worked hard for the district as a whole, particularly as Mayor of the City and District in 2004/5, and took an active role in several other parts of the district's life besides that of the council - for example, he was involved with the local Morris Men. I won't say St Albans could ever really be a boring place, but St Albans Council will certainly be more boring without Gordon. Rest in Peace.

"The biggest danger to the European Union comes not from those who advocate change, but from those who denounce new thinking as heresy. In its' long history Europe has experience of heretics who turned out to have a point." (David Cameron)

"It is not enough to win a war: it is necessary to organise the peace" (Aristotle)

Rory Stewart, MP for Penrith and the Borders, has written and circulated a piece on preserving the Union. Here is an extract from what he had to say. "On 19 September we could wake up and find that Scotland has separated. That the United Kingdom as we have known it for four hundred years, has vanished. That a third of the land mass of Britain has broken apart. That anyone going to Scotland – on holiday or to see a relative – will be entering a separate country. Officials will be racing north and south to negotiate the terms of the separation: working out what to do with the Nuclear Submarines in Scotland, with the national electric grid, with currency and passports. Anyone with mixed English or Scottish blood will have to choose a single new identity, and reject a part of their previous identity. Scots in England will have to decide either to return “home”, to try to engage in the very difficult and uncertain task of launching a new much smaller, country; or to make a new life i...

The people of Ukrainse should be allowed to settle their own destiny at the ballot box without military intervention from any quarter. I don't believe it would do any good for the people of Ukraine if the West were to attempt to intervene militarily, and I don't believe that any reasonable person could take anything the West has said as a threat to do so. The EU has many faults which urgently need reform, but do I not believe any intelligent person who studies the situation for more than five minutes could take seriously the idea that the EU caused the present crisis in the Ukraine. Neither did Britain. Only people who have an axe to grind against the EU are blaming Europe for this, and only people with an axe to grind against David Cameron or William Hague are blaming the UK government. But the fact that starting World War Three is not a sensible response does not mean that we should not even express disapproval. The delegation of Conservative MPs to the Council of Eu...