Cultural architecture, so to speak

I came across this nonsensical piece of drivel in a school monitoring report

“Cultural architects are individuals or teams that have fully understood and subscribe to a leader’s aims and objectives for the organisation. They are the people who will influence others positively on behalf of the leader even when the leader is not present.”

They used to be called brown nosers, but that was before management-speak took over the world.

Freedom of Speech Just Got Silenced

The removal of placades from Parliament Square is another example of Government paranoia about protest. Brian Haw has been protesting agaisnt the Iraq war in Parliament Square for 5 years. After court action to try and remove him failed (why, what harm was he doing - embarrassing he might be, but a threat to national security?).

Politicians - on both sides of the Atlantic - like to portray themselves as champions of freedom and democracy, yet the right to protest has to be the best measure of the health of a democracy - and we've just failed it, miserably.

Labour Party blues

OK, so anyone can mislay around a thousand foreign ex convicts, maybe even accept that the NHS really is having its best ever year, but who in their right mind would think John Prescott could turn into a geriatric leg-over merchant?

Madness and the Special Relationship

Tony Blair's comments to the Australian Parliament about the "madness" of European anti-Americanism gives us an interesting insight into his thinking.

Is Blair really so frightened that the US will "walk away" that he wants his fellow European leaders and the media to back peddle on their criticisms of the Bush administration? If there's any "madness" here Prime Minister, it's surely in the fear that we shouldn't be too critical of the US, for fear of losing the Americans' support.

If the special relationship is worth having it has to be robust enough to withstand criticism where it's warranted - rolling over and letting Bush and Co. get away with anything they want is not being anti-American, rather it's about fighting our corner and defending our side of the relationship, which should be part and parcel of the free exchange of ideas Blair also mentioned in the same speech.

Blair does Parkie, with God in the audience...

Interesting to see that Tony Blair, Britain's Labour Prime Minister and, some say far too close friend of President Bush, fears divine judgement over his decision to go to war in Iraq.

While he seems happy to discuss this on a chatshow (far less confrontational than Parliament) he's strangely silent on the ongoing denial of justice at Guantanamo, which he only "hopes" the US will get round to closing "soon".

Quite how he'll answer for all this at the final judgement is anyone's guess, but given his much vaunted up-coming handover to Gordon Brown, one thing is for sure: he'll escape the judgement of the British electorate yet again.

Jingoism and the Cabinet Minister

Dr Reid, the UK Defence Minister, makes a spirited call for balance and for the media to be slow to criticise the military in Iraq. The danger here - given the traditional view that British soldiers can do no wrong - is obvious. Perhaps the media should lay off all but the most heinous abuses by troops on the ground and concentrate instead on the culpability of those who sent them there in the first place.

Nude cyclists have balance problems

A group of German naturalists found themselves on the wrong side of the law when they tried to celebrate World Nude Cycling Day in the only way they knew how. The judge in the Karsruhe Administrative Court rejected the group’s claim that it was only exercising its right to freedom of expression under Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights and found that the police could prevent the cycle ride because it was in the public interest to prohibit displays of nudity, and, presumably, the risk of exposure to involuntary yodelling when riding over cobbled or other uneven surfaces. In reaching its decision the court found it had to balance the rights of the cyclists to exercise their freedom of expression against the rights of the wider public, which could be offended by an unexpected display of mass nudity in a public place.

Sex and the Politician

News that Simon Hughes, Liberal Democrat Party President and leadership contender, has admitted to being bisexual makes you wonder whether he made the decision to announce it himself, rather than face yet another embarrassing press disclosure. Aside from accusations surrounding past denials about his sexuality, and the Bermondsey bye-election was way back in the far less enlightened 1980s, the danger is that this latest Lib Dem story will merely encourage the tabloids to keep on hunting for prurient Lib Dem stories to fill their pages. You can just see it now: "kinky candidate caught in polling booth".

Isn't rather time to grow up and accept that politicians have private lives and should be allowed to lead them.

Good news for those politicos feeling a bit stressed in case the News of Screws is on the snoop - they could always relieve the tension with a bit of "horizontal jogging", after all, the scientists reckon it's a great stress reliever for those in the public eye. Just so long as they don't get caught doing it public - or in view of a paparazzi's lens.

At last, some good news from Turkey

The decision to end the prosecution of Orhan Pamuk, Turkey's leading author, for insulting the secular republic is very good news, not just for Pamuk but for all progressive Turkish writers, academics and journalists; it is also a sign that freedom of expression is finally being taken seriously by the authorities in Ankara.

Accepting adverse criticism in no way undermines Turkish democracy, rather it strengthens it and should go some way to aleviating fears over Turkish membership of the EU.

It's to be hoped that the decision also means that a sensible debate will now be possible on the persecution of the Armenian and Kurdish people.

Edukashun, edukashun, edukashun.

It looks like the danger of too much rhetoric backed by too little substance has finally come home to roost in the shape of Labour's much trumpeted education reforms.

With commentators unable to give a proper explanation of the difference between current "foundation" schools and the much vaunted (but ill described) "trust" schools the National Governors' Council is now warning that the complex politicking is very confusing, and even off-putting for parents.

The DfES strategy of spinning even the most mundane of changes means that genuinely beneficial changes intended to raise standards and support schools in difficult areas risk being lost to view as Kelly and Adonis try to browbeat Labour backbench opponents.

Officially a Secret Joke

Has the Attorney General really threatened journalists with the Official Secrets Act just to stop George Bush looking either paranoid or stupid?

Is the "special relationship" (which in reality seems only to exist in the fevered imaginations of British politicians) so fragile that free speech - that great bastion of the US Constitution - can be swept aside in the media of the US's oldest ally?

This is not the first time that the criminal law has been deployed to stop anti US comment or protest in the UK. In December 2000, veteran peace campaigner Lindis Percy was fined £500 for writing on the Stars and Stripes and then trampling on it outside a US airbase in Norfolk, England.

We are living in strange times indeed when something that symbolises lawful dissent in the US is criminalised in the UK. But then again, perhaps that's what makes the relationship so special: the Americans know that Tony Blair will do anything for them - including denying the British their long cherished freedoms.

Anyone for a recycled slogan?

Leeds City Council has just discovered that the slogan 'Live it love it', which it commissioned from the imaginatively named PR agency An Agency Called England, is a direct lift from one used by the Hong Kong tourist board!

A snip at £150,000 for "research and launch costs" (which presumably didn't include a quick Google check, just to be on the safe side) the agency responsible for the slogan, Marketing Leeds, a joint venture between the council and the city's chamber of commerce, smartly sidesteps allegations of plagiarism by saying it hadn't cost anything to "develop" the new brand., whatever that means. An Agency Called England's head honcho, Tony Stanton, was, perhaps unsurprisingly, even more inventive with his response:

"The Hong Kong campaign targeted North American tourists on city breaks. We took the view we could use it as a brand as opposed to an ad campaign".

So there you have it - lifting the title of an ad campaign to use as a "brand" isn't plagiarism - more creative recycling - with the bill footed by the hapless council taxpayers.

Meanwhile, away from the self-serving frenzy and hype of the PR world, the BBC's website is currently featuring the 50th anniversary of the World Press Photo Foundation's annual photographic competition. The images are graphic and shocking, including a Turkish mother mourning her five dead children, victims of an earthquake; Chilean President, Salvador Allende, photographed moments before his death in the 1973 right wing coup; and the death mask image of a child victim of the Union Carbide gas leak. These are images that challenge our perceptions of the world - a far cry from the sanitised "news" increasingly served up for us by the major broadcasting channels.

Let me through officer, I'm a Proofreader

Police in New South Wales are embarrassed by a mis-spelling on new uniforms. Green vests to be worn by the force's ACLOs (that stands for Aboriginal Community Liaison Officers) were supplied with ALCO printed on them instead. Given the prevalence of alcohol related problems amongst certain sectors of Australia's indigenous population, the sight of officers trained to diffuse tense situations running around in vests bearing the word ALCO has prompted an apology by the force, as the Commissioner's spokesman said: "there was no intention to offend anybody. It was a simple printing error".

Preachers of Hate

Let's hope Charles Clarke's proposals include the Christians as well as the jihadis. Pat Robertson - 2 Commandments down, and counting (that's 6 and 9 for any atheists, agnostics or US televangelists who might be having difficulty keeping up).

For the rest of us, there's always Ship of Fools

I've never liked airline food

The Gate Gourment dispute has left an increasingly bitter taste. Not only has British Airways been landed with a £ 40 million pound bill, but the allegations of "union busting" and attempts to deny the workforce the protection available under UK law demand a proper enquiry.

Ownership of what was originally a Swiss owned in-flight caterer passed to US venture capitalist Texas Pacific in 2002. Since then, Gate Gourmet's losses have rocketed, so that today a £25 million loss is predicted for the current financial year. This is mainly due to cost cutting measures by its airline customers which have seen the in-flight catering market shrink by 30% (40% in the US) since 2001.

Just the incentive for a ruthless management to provoke industrial action to cut their losses and export the operation to countries offering cheaper, less protected workers?

Multiculturalism means what, exactly?

Strange, really. After spending the last 20-30 years telling to celebrate multiculturalism as a good thing, our politicians now either can't define it, or want to ditch it altogether.

A trite phrase capable of meaning all things to all people, is now blamed - post July 7 - for reducing community values to the point that they have become meaningless, alienating those it was intended to help adjust and find a common home in post colonial Britain.

Time now to do some real thinking about how we can live together - without using meaningless slogans to cover up the divisions?

Go Ruth, go

Only 24 hours after Ruth Lea, the economic diva, championed Anglo Saxon values and the victory of "new" Europe, she returned to have a go at the greatest threat to us all - that's right, children.

You see, Ruth has long been convinced that it's wrong to give incentives to parents and children - makes childless co-workers hopping mad and costs the economy millions.

Only a barking Thatcherite - wedded to the "no such thing as society" mantra could fail to notice that today's toddler is tomorrow's wage slave.

Time to get real, Ruth, take a look at the bigger picture. Even if you don't understand society values - you'd better make sure today's young are well-adjusted and educated, after all, some of them will be looking after you in your dotage. And you wouldn't want them to get the wrong idea about your views on their parents, would you?

"As ever I’m afraid the people are ahead of the politicians"

Nice quote, Mr Blair, but "as ever" we're just a little concerned that you're not listening.

Grandstanding, whether on Europe or anything else is a favourite hobby for Tony, but the sweeping statements always hide the reality.

While he says he wants Europe to have a social dimension, this will - if he follows his form on domestic policies - take a back seat to unfettered globalisation. The French "No" vote was largely a rejection of this kind of open market challenge to adopt US practices and it looks like Blair is going to have a very uncomfortable EU Presidency if he keeps trying to make deregulation palatable by sweet references to a social dimension we no longer recognise in the UK.

The Ruth Lea Appreciation Society

She's back - the right wing economist with a great line in revisionism.

From the Institute of Directors, the great thinker has now moved on to become the Director of the Centre for Policy Studies, espousing multi speed Europe, Britain and "new" Europe (that's right, Ruthie has picked up on Donald Rumsfeld's memorable dichotomy put-down for France and Germany - although he used it to castigate them for not joining the Coalition in Iraq, Ruthie has taken it up as a term of derision for the social democracy she so hates) as bastions of "Anglo Saxon" economic values. No, that's not pillaging monasteries, but rather "competing" with low-wage economies.

Watch out, folks - when she really gets going it'll be bye-bye minimum wage and parental rights: if they don't have it in Myanmar, why should we?

Times might change, but Ruth just goes on, and on and on...

Old economists never die, they just find another market.

Tony's latest Opsi

So the failed "rebranding" of the DTI cost £30,000 - but at least it gave us a laugh. The government has also renamed HMSO - that's the department that publishes legislation and official information - it's now called OPSI: The Office for Public Sector Information.
Where will it end- how about Off Tony?