More Very Expensive Free Schools

So there are to be more free schools – free, that is, of local authority control, which is touted by Education Secretary Michael “Oiky” Gove as A Very Wonderful Thing, although the idea is not universally popular. Some are almost rapturously in favour of the concept, not least the loathsome Toby Young, who is more than happy to impose Proper Uniforms and Latin upon the offspring of suitably pushy parents.

And why is Latin taken as some kind of yardstick of how good a school is? This is, and I do have some experience of Latin lessons, thanks, one of those great mysteries. So Latin influenced many other languages? That’s a pretty thin excuse, unless all those other languages are similarly structured, which they are not. It would be good to see whether learning Latin has any effect on learning other languages.

My feeling is that it would make next to no difference. In any case, what is nowadays taught as Latin is some idealised language which may bear some relation to what was spoken in part of the Roman world at some point in its history – but equally may be a poor stab in the dark. What is not in doubt is that the language is not spoken in any part of the world, bar that of those who wish to perpetuate its teaching.

If, therefore, free schools, like Tobes’ West London Free School, claim Latin as some kind of foundation stone of their learning edifice, then I have to conclude that the whole shebang will have as much integrity as a dodgy Bangladeshi factory. And the cost of all these free schools also concerns me, if only because it is plainly obvious that the money being spent on them has to come from somewhere.

In these straitened times, if the education budget is not expanding, but free schools are being bunged a nine figure sum to get more of them up and running, it is rather obvious that existing schools are going to get less. This is manifesting itself in a number of ways: expanding class sizes, more pressures on staff, and having to resort to accommodating classes in portakabins.

But Tobes is more than equal to such criticisms: he just repeats his mantra that Free Schools are Very Wonderful, then tells readers to “look over there” as he sneers at Christine Blower of the NUT for not using a form of words that meets with his approval (she called 45% a “majority”, which she clearly intends to be interpreted as “largest number”, rather than “absolute majority”).

It is instructive that, as the education debate continues to rage, Gove’s biggest fans are reduced to picking at grammar and interpretation, rather than being bothered to engage with their critics (Young has previously called people “illiterate” because he does not approve of the number of commas they use, for instance). What would be more useful is to know whether this exercise really is worth the candle.

By the time we find that out, of course, Gove and Tobes will be away with the loot.

Healing Economy Meets IMF Reality

Much copy has been generated in the past month from the assertion by the Rt Hon Gideon George Oliver Osborne, heir to the seventeenth Baronet, that the avoidance by the UK of a “triple dip” recession means that the economy is “healing”. This has then been talked up by a succession of right-leaning pundits into some kind of success story, meaning the Tories will romp home in 2015.

That many households are seeing budgets progressively squeezed, with rising prices not balanced by equivalent rises in incomes, does not seem to bother the punditerati, probably because their number does not contain anyone who is having to think twice before splashing on weekend breaks or longer holidays, and certainly not any restraint on numbers of nights out.

So it was no surprise to see City AM reporting the good news, along with the encouragement from editor Allister Heath, the well known stooge of the so-called Taxpayers’ Alliance, that we should “allow people to build more homes and airports” [my emphasis]. Yeah, it’s all the fault of regulation – if only folks could just go ahead and plonk airports anywhere, the problem would be solved.

Sadly, this is total crap: Heath would be the first one protesting if the approach or departure path of an airport came anywhere near his back yard. And the deeply subversive Guardian noted that this very wonderful news had not stopped yet another credit agency stripping the UK of its Triple-A credit rating, or indeed that the man from IPPR described the economy as “stuck in a rut”.

That, though, did not stop the Mail presenting Osborne with a soapbox from which he proclaimed “Yes, Britain IS on the move again - all because we didn't take the coward's way out”. Really? “The economy is healing slowly, the tough decisions we have taken together as a country are beginning to pay off – and in me, you have a Chancellor who is going to stick to the course we have set out”.

But the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is not so easily impressed, noting that the UK was “still a long way from a strong and sustained recovery”. Crucially, “Of particular concern is that capital investment (as a share of GDP) is at a postwar low, and that youth unemployment is high”. The report continued “The prospect remains for weak growth ... risks remain tilted to the downside”.

The Fund also points out that “banks are not restored to healthy functionality”, that some interest rates remain higher than before the crisis, and that public debt is rising. For some reason, although these are not difficult subjects to present to their audience, the press has, generally, not given them the same stress as the Chancellor’s propaganda piece. Figure that one out for yourselves.

So, despite all the hot air, we are indeed stuck in a rut. Thought you’d like to know.

Nicholson Retires – Mail Attack Continues

There has been no sterner critic of David Nicholson, who is to retire from his post as CEO of NHS England, than the legendarily foul mouthed Paul Dacre and his rabble of attack doggies at the Daily Mail. So when Nicholson announced his forthcoming departure yesterday, it might have been thought that Dacre would order his troops over the top in one last orgy of crowing.

After all, their assault on Nicholson has been incessant this year, and for one main reason, the fall-out from the poor standards of care on some wards at Stafford Hospital. That there were many incidences of sub-standard care, which caused distress to many patients, is not in doubt. What is also not in doubt is that Stafford Hospital has now turned the situation around completely.

But that is not enough for the Mail, which has also incessantly pushed the idea that “up to 1,200” patients “died needlessly” at Stafford Hospital. This figure has been comprehensively debunked, and anyone needing the background, and detail, should look no further than Steve Walker’s excellent blog on the affair, where he reveals that the number of actual unnecessary deaths was “maybe one”.

Moreover, when Roger Taylor, of DFI, the company that supplies the data for Hospital Standardised Mortality Ratios (HSMRs), the source of the “1,200 deaths” claim, was asked “Where does Dr Foster stand on the portrayal of the figures about Mid Staffordshire as indicating or showing that there were 400 to 1,200 unnecessary deaths?” he replied “that is a misuse of these data”.

Yes, there was unnecessary suffering by many patients, which was inexcusable, but the constant repetition of “1,200 deaths” – which is then personalised to cause readers to believe that Nicholson was personally and directly involved – is equally inexcusable. But, now that Nicholson has signalled his departure, the Mail, although it devotes one article to the event, is surprisingly low key on the matter.

Why should this be? Ah well. Now that Dacre and his attack doggies have got the result they want, they are now shifting their attack on the NHS elsewhere: today has brought an assault on GPs, who are asserted not to be doing their jobs properly and therefore overloading hospital A&E departments. This attack will, it is also asserted, be joined later by Jeremy Hunt, no longer the Culture Secretary.

So those in Northcliffe House are maintaining their campaign to demonise the NHS, which they can do from a position of some comfort, as most of them go private and resent having to chip in for the great unwashed to access health care without being forced to open their wallets first (Paul Dacre is a fan of doing things the way they do them in the USA). Nothing has changed with Nicholson’s retirement.

The sad thing is that some believe the Mail is on their side. How wrong can you get?

TPA – No Traffic Congestion Answers

Those of us who have lived and worked in the city of Bristol know all about traffic congestion: my apartment was in Clifton, around a mile and a half away from the office, but even when the rain fell and through the winter, the quickest and easiest way to get between the two was to walk. Bristol’s congestion is the stuff of grim legend. And then there is the problem of parking.

Parking a car in the central area is eye-wateringly expensive: there are three P+R schemes, which help to keep some of the car traffic out of the city, and a number of bus schemes including priority traffic lights and bus lanes, but the problem remains that the area was not designed to take the volumes of traffic that are shoehorned into its narrow streets every working day.

The Mayor and Council are working to extend residents’ parking schemes and parking permits, and here they have encountered the routine intolerance of Tim Newark, of the so-called Taxpayers’ Alliance (TPA), who has taken grave exception to the idea of paying for parking permits. This, he has proclaimed, is an additional tax, and will surely drive business out of the city.

What Newark does not seem to understand is that, without some measure of control, the situation would already have been far worse, and that, unless more measures are taken to move people away from car dependence and towards solutions that use less road space – or perhaps none at all – then everyone will suffer, and that includes Himself Personally Now.

Newark has compiled every negative quote and opinion about the situation that he can find, and regurgitated it in a characteristically negative, whining post which has one major flaw: he cannot say what he would do about it. Some of us have worked enough in Bristol over the years to remember that the snarl was even worse in the late 1990s. It was still grim six or seven years ago.

Sadly, the local rail network can only offer so much relief, and having Temple Meads station on the fringe of the centre does not help. I notice that Newark is not joining those campaigning for a restoration of rail services to Portishead: the weekday commuter run from there into central Bristol is legendarily bad. All the TPA is offering is whining and “I want to drive everywhere for nothing”.

And that’s not good enough. Public transport in Bristol is not good, but it is improving. Moreover, if the TPA really gives a damn about business, it might desist from advocating the kind of behaviour that puts many punters off bothering with visits to the city. The problem is that the TPA does not care about any of those people: their agenda is just to kick Government and thereby weaken it.

Tim Newark and his pals have no solution to offer. So no change there, then.

Boris Fights Paper With Deeper Pockets

He should have realised from his affair with Petronella Wyatt: London’s occasional Mayor Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson is never going to have enough financial, and therefore legal, clout to hold the press at bay for long. This is especially important for any politician unable to keep his trousers firmly zipped up, and today it has once again been Bozza’s undoing.

We knew about his affair with Ms Wyatt, mainly because of Bozza’s ridiculous protestations of innocence, including the “inverted pyramid of piffle” remark, and his subsequent sacking by Michael Howard for lying about it. What was also known was that he had a later affair with Helen Macintyre, which resulted in Bozza’s long-suffering wife Marina throwing him out of the marital home.

What caused Bozza to be ejected was the thought that Ms Macintyre’s newly born daughter was the result of the affair. So it might be thought that this news would just filter out and be reported, but that thought would have been misplaced. There was even the obligatory source close to Bozza (ie himself) waffling “Is Boris the father of this child? It’s quite likely he hasn’t the faintest idea”.

Like heck he didn’t: his wife didn’t chuck him out of the house on a mere whim. This was not helped by Ms Macintyre not exactly keeping her own counsel on the identity of the father. That was most unwise, because the next thing was that the Daily Mail came sniffing after the story. And the paper has the very deepest pockets when it comes to fighting its legal disputes.

So the Mail was not put off, even when Ms Macintyre and her backers took their privacy case to appeal before Master of the Rolls Lord Justice Dyson. They had been instructed to pay damages for publishing a photograph of the child, and did not contest the ruling. But in the case that led to the appeal, the Mail had prevailed in the matter of reporting the affair and its consequences.

The appeal upheld that judgment. And what Bozza and Ms Macintyre did not want to hear was this comment: “The core information in this story, namely that the father had an adulterous affair with the mother, deceiving both his wife and the mother's partner and that the claimant, born about 9 months later, was likely to be the father's child, was a public interest matter which the electorate was entitled to know when considering his fitness for high public office”.

Thus the Mail is now crowing “Boris's secret lovechild and a victory for the public's right to know: Judge rejects lover's attempts to keep daughter's birth quiet”, and whoever is backing Ms Macintyre is rather worse off. The moral of the story is not only to keep schtum, but not to get into a legal war with the Daily Mail.

Especially if Bozza is involved. Cripes, readers! Oo-er!! Yikes chaps!!!

Tories Press Self Destruct

Those of us of A Certain Age can recall so many jaw-dropping moments from politics past that we become immune to surprise or shock: there is inevitably a precedent case to every twist or turn. But a majority Tory Government having to plead with its Labour opposition for help with passing legislation, because of the behaviour of its own backbenchers, is unusual in the extreme.

And that is what happened yesterday: George Young, who, before Andrew Mitchell became embroiled in Plebgate, might have expected a quiet last few years in the Commons, faced the unenviable task of begging Mil The Younger for support to see off an amendment to same-sex marriage proposals which was intended to do one thing, and one alone – derail the whole process.

This is despite a majority among voters in favour of same-sex marriage, a trend which is likely to continue, opposed as it is by a coalition of older voters and religious groups. Yet many Tories remain convinced that this measure will lose them votes, which is another way of saying that they are appealing to a gradually diminishing part of the electorate, and that’s not exactly a winning strategy.

So why the dysfunctional behaviour, coming as it does on the back of all the bickering over Europe? Simples. The Tories are being panicked by UKIP, despite Nigel “Thirsty” Farage’s party being home to a number of deeply unsavoury characters (see HERE from last Friday, or HERE for a round-up by Political Scrapbook), as opinion polls continue to bring grim news.

Indeed, a new poll from Survation has the Tories down to a miserable 24%, with UKIP posting 22%. And here’s the thing: in that same poll, the Labour vote share is more or less unchanged, at 35%. Miliband is in the box seat just by ordering more popcorn and watching the Tories self-destruct. There are, of course, other factors at work in the Tory decline, one of these being Loongate.

But, again, what Andrew Feldman is alleged to have said is all too true: activists who think that same-sex marriage has to be resisted at all costs, that the electorate constantly obsesses about the EU (as they do), and that it would be a wonderful idea to ditch a party leader (Cameron) who consistently polls ahead of his party, cannot object to being characterised as “Mad, swivel-eyed loons”.

Once again, Michael Ashcroft’s warning should be noted: he has said that the Tories could be plunged into a “spiral of irrelevance”. Rather than stand well away from UKIP, they are allowing themselves to scrap over who can be the most xenophobic, authoritarian and intolerant. Whoever is in charge ought to consider the wise and forthright words attributed to Lyndon Johnson.

Never get into a pissing competition with a skunk.

One Of Our Polecats Is Mad

With his resident polecats at the @toryeducation Twitter feed only venturing into print occasionally, and stand-ins such as the loathsome Toby Young proving easy to ridicule, Education Secretary Michael “Oiky” Gove needs all the help he can get from the like-minded part of the media, especially after his less than rapturous reception from one Trades Union at the weekend.

Becoming unfair and unbalanced

“Oiky” had attended the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) conference for a Q&A session on Saturday. He appeared not to be expecting the heckling and jeers, although had he bothered to do his homework, he would have known that the gathering had already passed a motion of no confidence in his policies. And from that point, everything went downhill in short order.

Gove repeated that he wanted to raise standards. The thought that his actions might have exactly the opposite effect was not allowed to enter. Nor was the thought that he conspicuously failed to engage with his audience. But instead of showing concern that a key relationship – between Government and head teachers – was fracturing, one of “Oiky’s” biggest fans could not stop herself applauding his every move.

To no surprise at all, that fan is Melanie “not just Barking but halfway to Upminster” Phillips, who asserts at the outset “The more abuse Mr Gove gets from the teachers, the more you know he's right”. That’s right, sheer frustration that someone is hell-bent on not listening to you is abuse. But “Oiky”, she asserts, is “a person of the highest quality ... he is bang on target”.

Children should, she claims, “start learning algebra and geometry by the time they leave primary school”. A word in your shell-like, O mad one: children needed neither algebra nor geometry to pass the eleven plus. I can still remember my maths paper, thank you. So that’s another example of how those wanting to return to some past golden age can’t even remember what it actually involved.

From that point, Mel rapidly descends into ranting incoherence, telling of “Britain’s truly dire and terrifying educational decline ... no one must be seen to fail and that all must have prizes ... ruthlessly enforced orthodoxy could hardly be bettered as a system of keeping children at the bottom of the heap, trapped in ignorance, illiteracy and disadvantage”. And she gets the “Mr Men” story totally wrong.

Then we get EU frighteners, the idea that human rights are A Very Bad Thing, and the flagrantly dishonest “high levels of illiteracy and innumeracy among school leavers”. And, would you know it, the whole of the “educational establishment” now “dances to the ... anti-education tune”. Belief is a wonderful thing to behold. But that does not make it right, whether expressed by “Oiky”, or by his most zealous fans.

And nor does a wilful determination not to listen to inconvenient fact make you right.

Leveson Gagged – Usual Suspects Silent

Whenever the Fourth Estate talks of the Leveson Inquiry, the line so often taken is that it has been the very presence of its hearings and report that somehow constrains, “chills”, or gags the press. So to see the Evening Standard bravely splash the news that, on one significant occasion, the Leveson Inquiry was itself gagged, by the order of the Metropolitan Police, should cause concern.

Moreover, the news that the Met applied for a “public interest immunity certificate”, to stop Leveson considering the case of a very senior officer in the force, is worrying. What is yet worse is that this officer was close to then Commissioner Ian Blair, and apparently passed information to the now defunct Murdoch Screws in exchange for money. And the force stopped Leveson from considering the case.

The thought then occurs that not only do we not get to know who this is, but also that we also don’t find out how much money changed hands, the identities of the Screws hacks involved, and who else in Rupe’s empire might have had their fingers in this singularly unsavoury pie. Did, for instance, this affair have any bearing on Murdoch’s decision to close the Screws?

Meanwhile, Labour MP Tom Watson has ensured that he continues to be persona non grata with Rupe and his troops by noting “I’m sure the current Commissioner would wish to urgently review what happened and I will be writing to the Home Secretary Theresa May to ask that she satisfies herself that all seemingly vital documents from the Yard were not withheld from Lord Justice Leveson”.

He might get further that way than the Standard did when contacting Leveson’s senior counsel Robert Jay, who asserted that he and Leveson were not shown the information until well after it could have been useful to the Inquiry, adding “The Met is claiming public interest immunity in relation to any police intelligence report, the contents of which are neither confirmed nor denied”.

So where are the usual Leveson bashing suspects right now? As has been pointed out to Zelo Street, Reading East MP Rob Wilson, usually so eager to wind up Leveson, has thus far been silent. And so have the usual suspects in the press. Why so coy? We’re talking about a senior Police officer flogging stories to the Screws here. This is about the basics of public trust – and very basic corruption.

As with the Daniel Morgan case – which was also about very basic corruption, and abuse of public trust – the supposed champions of press freedom seem unable, or unwilling, to report. Could this be because their view of press freedom is the freedom not only to be highly selective in what they tell their readers, but also because there is the possibility they have been doing something similar?

Come on, press freedom campaigners, don’t be shy. We’re listening. And waiting.

Guido Fawked – Bozier Not Charged

Despite the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines telling recently how his gofers routinely obtain information from those they “sleep with”, the Guido Fawkes blog has a fascination with others’ sexual preferences and habits that would not come amiss in a Viz Finbarr Saunders strip. One can almost hear the “fnarr fnarr”, “kersnick kersnick” and “yik yik” from behind the keyboard on occasion.

In happier times: Luke Bozier with Louise Mensch

So it was with the story of Luke Bozier: the former advisor to Tone, who left Labour early in 2012, had set up Menshn with former Tory MP Louise Mensch. He was opinionated, determined, and apparently successful. He therefore made enemies, if only from the generation of sour jealousy. When Bozier appeared to have been looking for sex with underage girls last December, that sourness erupted.

First out of the blocks was the deeply unsavoury Milo Yiannopoulos at the thankfully now defunct Kernel Mag (note that, when splashing the original story, Yiannopoulos put his name to the post, but when it came to retracting part of it later, he demonstrated that no man is of perfect courage). Then came the “spab spab” brigade of The Great Guido.

After all, anyone making the journey from the Blair to Cameron camps was not to be trusted by the supposedly libertarian and ideologically pure Staines circle. So out came the “One almighty cock-up” jokes (Geddit?!?). After Bozier was arrested, we got “it’s being handled by the Police” (Geddit?!?), with the later bonus of “Luke says he is innocent, but then he also said he had a nine inch”. Fnarr overload!

Quite how the characteristics of someone’s manhood can make the difference between innocence and guilt is not made clear. But it was very clear to anyone seeking out the wisdom of The Great Guido that Bozier had done something wrong, so much so that the Fawkes rabble returned to the subject with a post entitled “Fifty Shades of Bozier” (Geddit?!?) in late March.

And then the Fawkes blog went quiet, and had remained so, on the subject of Luke Bozier. But Bozier himself has broken his silence: yesterday he posted “My legal situation. Not guilty. The end”. He went on “The worst of the content applied to my name was untrue. I am not and never have been a paedophile”. The matter has been concluded with Bozier accepting a Police caution.

Of course, that is not all: Bozier has had his life well and truly trashed by what turned out to be mostly down to malicious hacking of an email account. Who was behind this act is not known. But The Great Guido is not done crowing yet, posting a typically sneering suggestion regarding the sex offenders’ register. It’s strange how the worldly Staines and his pals have a problem with this sort of thing.

And the Fawkes rabble does enjoy a bit of innuendo. K-wooo k-wooo! Yik yik!!

Eurovision – The Good Old Days

Every year since 1997, the UK has turned up at the Eurovision Song Contest, participated, expected to do half decently, and most of the time come away with zilch, with pundits asking if we should bother. I mean, this time we sent Bonnie Tyler, and she’s been Number One more than once. But Ms Tyler is not someone at the peak of her career, and thus our problem with the event.

Singers and songwriters who can make a decent crust elsewhere are not going to trouble themselves with a one-off competition that might look bad on their CV if they don’t walk away with it. So the singers are either unknowns or have already made their pile of dosh. It was not always thus: the problem used to be that we regularly came second, and by heck, did we complain about it.

Also causing grumbles – this before we joined the then EEC – was that we ended up hosting Eurovision when others pleaded poverty. London had staged the contest twice before the UK’s first win, with Edinburgh and then Brighton stepping in in the early 70s (the former was after Monaco had bodyswerved hosting after winning in 1971. Yeah, Monaco couldn’t find a suitable venue. Like hell it couldn’t).

But we were better than those dastardly foreigners, even when they won. When Cliff Richard was beaten by the Spanish in 1968, there were mutterings of fixes. He couldn’t possibly have lost in a fair fight to a girl singing “La, La La La, La La La, La La La”, could he? Er, yes he could. Cliff got another chance in 1973. This time he came third. You guessed it, Spain were second.

And we kept getting suckered into more: Mary Hopkin was going to win, until the pesky Irish in the shape of Dana came along. The re-formed Shadows (the NME rather cruelly headlined the event “Ex-Group Exhumed Shock”) lost to a really crap song from the Netherlands. And The New Seekers did their polished best, only to be ambushed by Vicky Leandros, an expat Greek singing for Luxembourg.

Those artists were chart-toppers at the time, though, and that’s the difference, as well as there being so many more countries taking part. When the UK first took part – 1958, the second year of the contest – there were ten entries. Now, there have to be semi-finals to get the overall number down from the high 30s to 26. There is so much to sit through. Yet still the punters tune in.

Eurovision is also ridicule proof: when the Pythons depicted a fictional contest in 1972, won by “Bing Tiddle Tiddle Bong” (the UK’s joint winning 1969 entry might just have been in their thoughts), with another of the songs called “Ding Ding A Dong”, three years later, the winning song was called ... Ding Ding A Dong. Yes, it’s so daft, it’s impossible to ridicule it. But we still want to win it.

Sadly, we don’t look like adding to the five wins or fifteen second places right now.

The Desperation Of Liz Jones

There comes a time when pundits cross over from being credible voices to mere hit-bait. For some, like the ridiculous Samantha Brick, they were never even intended to be credible. Others have seen their credibility slowly decay, but have kept churning out the copy, possibly because they need the money, and to cling to the last vestiges of status. Today, another of their number has gone further.

What do you think of it so far?

The Mail’s Liz Jones is that pundit. In the past, there had been some point to her witterings, but today’s pathetic snark at older women – that would be older women like herself – reveals that she, too, has joined Ms Brick and all the other objects of derision whose articles are read primarily by those who want to ridicule them, or are just in need of a good laugh.

“Old women are great with cakes - but far too prickly for TV news” declares the headline. What on earth is she going on about? “Do we really want more ancient women on TV? And if so, perhaps we should examine why exactly? My feeling is that people of both sexes over the age of 60 should be doing different things”. Speak for yourself Liz, you’re not so far away from the mark.

And Liz will not take the hint: “with their loud cries for comebacks, Angela Rippon, Joan Bakewell and Selina Scott, who surely landed their TV careers due to their good looks (and, in the case of Rippon, great legs), remind me why this particular sort of older woman is a turn-off”. Marvellous. La Ripoff (for it is she) did not become a newsreader on account of her legs. But, as the man said, there’s more.

She now homes in on Joan Bakewell: “women such as Bakewell want to continue asking probing, important questions, which, once you are post-menopausal, turns you into a mad, impatient and slightly batty combatant”. Speak for yourself kid, I quite admire Joan, who continues to be sharp, witty, and well-informed. In any case, how do you come to this conclusion?

“I know this because this is what I'm like: I fly off the handle, I moan, I have no patience with men or with younger women, and I am intolerant to the point of wanting to punch staff in Sainsbury's who ask me if I have a Nectar card”. Terrible, eh? All those people who either don’t know who you are, or don’t care if they do. That ain’t anyone else’s problem, Liz, bar yours and yours alone.

So save us the catty remark about the highly sound Germaine Greer (“I would listen far more closely to what [she] has to say if only she could find her comb”), and the swipes at Mary Portas and Jenni Murray, and look to yourself. So Liz Jones gets uptight easily. What the heck does that have to do with older people appearing on the TV or being heard on radio?

All this tells us is that Liz Jones was credible once, and now she’s not. At all.

Loongate – Paranoid Tories Blame BBC

The reports of someone close to Young Dave calling Tory Party activists “swivel-eyed loons” were first carried by the Murdoch Times and Barclay Brothers’ Maily Telegraph. The corresponding Sunday titles have continued to run the story. The Tories have since gone on the offensive, suggesting a connection between the way that “Loongate” was building, and the Alistair McAlpine saga.

So it should be pretty clear to anyone who is bothered that it is the papers that are normally the Tories’ natural supporters which have been majoring on this issue. From this, it follows that if the party wants to get a grip of the problem, it needs to address these reports, and maybe take a long and hard look at its relationships with journalists, as well as at its own behaviour.

As I noted yesterday, Andrew Feldman, who has spent most of the weekend flatly denying that he was the one close to Cameron, has already been responsible for his fair share of howlers. The impression is given that he became Tory co-chair – and a life peer – not on merit, but partly because of his contacts book, and more significantly because he is one of Cameron’s jolly good pals from University.

David Aaronovitch, who is prone to speaking direct common sense on occasion, put it very well on The Andy Marr Show (tm) this morning: there were three possible responses for the Tories to take. One was to take it on the chin, the second was to ask why anyone would think that of their activists, and the third – which is what they’re doing – is to demand “who says our branch chairs are loons”?

In other words, the Tories are instantly turning defensive. What came after Aaronovitch had had his say on the Marr paper review was that other prominent party members then appeared on the same show to add insult to injury. Moreover, the same tactic was deployed – to demand that viewers “look over there”. And where they wanted viewers to look was at the BBC.

John Redwood, the humourless Europhobe who is still MP for Wokingham, and who failed in his attempt to dislodge “Shagger” Major in 1995, was first. The Tories were not split, he asserted, and any suggestion in that direction was because the BBC wanted to present it as such. The thought that he was in favour of exiting the EU (full stop), and that many of his colleagues were not, was not allowed to enter.

Then came Jeremy Hunt, no longer the Culture Secretary to the relief of Spoonerism sufferers throughout the media, to peddle exactly the same line. The Tories were united, and it was the BBC who were saying otherwise. The thought now entered that this is an agreed and prepared line to take. But another thought also enters: it’s a pretty lame one. What happens when it’s Channel 4, or Sky News?

Or perhaps there ‘s a broadcasters’ conspiracy. Back to the drawing board, chaps.

Top Six – May 19

So what’s hot, and what’s not, in the past week’s blogging? Here are the six most popular posts on Zelo Street for the past seven days, counting down in reverse order, because, well, I’ve got washing to put out later. So there.

6 The Anti-EU Propaganda Isn’t Working Despite the avalanche of knocking copy, a new poll showed the percentage of voters wanting out of the EU falling significantly.

5 Mel Gets Her Sex Education Wrong Melanie “not just Barking but halfway to Upminster” Phillips blamed sex education for young people’s behaviour. But she had it the wrong way round – more teenage pregnancies came from ignorance.

4 Daniel Morgan Inquiry – Partly Reported Second week in the Top Six for this post. The Inquiry into the still unsolved killing of Daniel Morgan was announced, but not reported by many of the papers. No surprise there.

3 Telegraph Tolerates Anti-Semitism The bear pit that is Telegraph blogs attracted a number of blatantly anti-Semitic comments which were only removed after I prodded Damian Thompson into action.

2 Crossrail 2 Hijacked By Evening Boris This post from February returned to the Top Six after the Andrew Adonis backed variation on Crossrail 2 went out to consultation. As three months ago, Boris was not leading, but obediently toddling along behind.

1 UKIP – Another Bigot Surfaces Ron Northcott, a UKIP candidate and secondary school teacher from Plymouth, was caught using his Twitter feed to indulge in some particularly nasty remarks about Scots after Nigel “Thirsty” Farage was heckled in Edinburgh. He has now resigned from the party.

And that’s the end of another blogtastic week, blog pickers. Not ‘arf!

Loongate – Feldman In Denial

The sound of frantic backpedalling can be heard among Westminster Tories as the Maily Telegraph has broken ranks with those keeping schtum and pitched the name of Andrew Feldman as the likely source of the observation “The MPs just have to do it because the associations tell them to, and the associations are all mad swivel-eyed loons” when talking about opposition to Europe and same sex marriage.

Patrick Hennessy, the Sunday Telegraph’s Political Editor, has his name on the by-line, and so the likelihood is that this story will not only be on the front page of tomorrow’s print edition, but most likely will lead it. Feldman is telling anyone who is brave enough to make enquiries as to his connection to the remark that he is in the process of taking legal advice.

This is a not at all subtle way of suggesting that the Fourth Estate backs off, unless it wants everything to get eye-wateringly expensive in short order. However, and in these cases there is inevitably a however, Isabel Oakeshott of the Sunday Times has now taken to Twitter to tell “I now have a full account of what happened re Loongate ... I think No 10 should tread very carefully ... this could get very messy”.

Hennessy notes that “Sources close to him said he was at a dinner on Wednesday night for the Conservative Friends of Pakistan at the InterContinental Hotel at Westminster and had spoken to journalists - but denied using the words attributed to the unnamed senior figure” but also points out that “Today a spokesman for The Daily Telegraph said the newspaper stood by its original story”.

Why this matters to the Tory Party is that Feldman is not an MP, but he is one of Young Dave’s jolly good pals, the two of them having been at Oxford’s Brasenose College together. Feldman had a financial role in the Cameron leadership campaign, became party CEO in 2008, and after the 2010 General Election became co-chair of the party, along with Sayeeda Warsi.

He is still co-chair, albeit now alongside Grant “Spiv” Shapps, but has retained his position despite two high profile lapses: Feldman chose David Rowland as party treasurer, only for him to be forced to step down after revelations about his past. Then Peter Cruddas was brought in as co-treasurer, only to fall victim to a Sunday Times sting regarding “cash for access”.

If Feldman were to get into yet more hot water, papers like the Mail, which has already run stories such as “How PM gave his Oxford chum top job (and a peerage)” would be all over No 10 like a rash. Cameron is now, however inadvertently, involved in yet another credibility battle with the media, and if the dam bursts, no amount of legal threats will hold back the wall of water.

Tomorrow’s front pages may make for difficult reading in Downing Street.

Polecat Breeder Compassionate Shock

During times of difficulty for party leaders, there are inevitably those who position themselves as potential successors, and here, access to the print media can prove useful. But it can also cruelly expose the plotter’s lack of credibility, and equally the presence of social media enables some of the most egregious dishonesty to be called out and those leadership claims debunked.

So it has been with Education Secretary Michael “Oiky” Gove, whose leadership ambition is well known. “Oiky” has now gone on the record, using the annual Keith Joseph memorial lecture, hosted by the Centre for Policy Studies, to position himself as some kind of successor to the man who was nicknamed “The Mad Monk” and “Sir Sheath Joseph”, and who bodyswerved the chance to lead the Tories.

As the deeply subversive Guardian pointed out, Joseph’s leadership chances were badly dented when he made one of those remarks that Tories have been so prone to over the years – in his case telling in a pre-prepared speech that “our human stock is threatened” by single mothers on low incomes. This less than august tradition was continued recently by Howard Flight, with his remarks on “breeding”.

But Gove’s USP is that he is compassionate. He talked of “the spirit of Sir Keith's great work – consciously in the tradition of compassionate conservatism he incarnated ... That is why I believe the best memorial we can erect to him is a society in which opportunity is more equal, the needs of the most vulnerable are our first priority and the greatest fulfilment any of us can have is in service to others”.

While “Oiky” considers his new and formidable erection, though, it is rather more obvious to those who have observed the behaviour of the Department for Education (DfE) recently that any idea of his being “compassionate” is weapons grade bullshit. Anyone who lets Dominic Cummings and Henry de Zoete loose to terrorise his staff has, by definition, approximately zero compassion.

The behaviour of Gove’s retinue of polecats has been well documented on Zelo Street, from February’s initial coverage (HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE), to their online meltdown in late March, their subsequent silence, and the informal co-opting of the loathsome Toby Young more recently (Tobes has been on grammar pedantry duty yet again – see HERE – to no discernible effect).

Moreover, anyone seeking to lead his party is not going to improve their chances by trotting out a litany of slanted and occasionally downright untrue stories, underpinned with an inability to be open and transparent about his department and the way it disburses taxpayers’ money. And on top of all that, he remains far too close to the Murdoch empire for his party to be comfortable with him as leader.

The Tories could be desperate enough to choose Gove, but that’s their problem.

The Daily Maddie Is Back!

[Update at end of post]

Today, for the tabloid part of the Fourth Estate, is a slow news day. We know this because four papers have revisited the case of Madeleine McCann for the umpteenth time: the possibility that parents Kate and Gerry were asked about yet more wall-to-wall coverage beforehand is not unadjacent to zero. So what has caused the Mail, Express, Mirror and Daily Star to act in concert?

Simples. A review into the disappearance of the then three-year-old has been concluded by the Metropolitan Police, and has identified a number of “persons of interest” (or “suspects”, depending on which account you read). This number varies between “a handful” in the Express to “more than 20” in the Mail. Moreover, someone has once again said Madeleine could still be alive.

And that is all that is needed for the headline writers: from “Scotland Yard breakthrough ... Police Identify Maddie Suspects” in the Express, to “Maddie: Cops Hunt NEW Suspects” in the Daily Star, to “Maddie: 20 New Suspects” in the Mail, and “Brit Cops Bombshell ... She May Be Alive” in the Mirror, the screaming headlines have poured out.

But there is also a further agenda to pursue, and that is kicking anyone who talks foreign (plus, of course, this is the EU we’re talking about, so it must by definition be A Very Bad Thing). The Mirror tells how “detectives ... urge Portuguese Police to reopen the case” and the Mail is at its most judgmental: “Yard identifies fresh names ... but Portuguese won’t act”. Curses! Foiled by those dastardly foreigners!

As with so many of the stories that papers like the Mail report in that selective style intended to lead readers to the desired conclusion, the small print gives the game away. When Paul Dacre’s finest tell “behind the scenes, a major diplomatic row is brewing because the Portuguese authorities are adamant they will not reopen the inquiry” they are not telling the whole story.

Because there is a very good reason for that action: “Officials in Lisbon have told their British counterparts that under Portuguese laws, they can reopen the case only if there is new evidence”. Moreover, as the Mirror has mentioned, a case review has been carried out by the authorities in Portugal. A team working in the city of Porto has not yet concluded its investigations.

But all of this gets lost in the frothing and ranting directed at those rotten foreigners, without whom the search would continue, Madeleine would be found, and all would be well. Every time hacks from British tabloids get on their case, it is not hard to understand that the Portuguese authorities get heartily sick of all their prodding. While they too want a happy ending, they do not possess a magic wand.

It’s so much easier when your only interest is selling a few more papers.

[UPDATE 20 May 1640 hours: And today we learn that the supposed bombshell is just an old one re-heated. Although the Express talks of a couple perhaps visiting the McCanns' apartment the night before the abduction, their account is notable only for its contradiction of the Mail's insistence that the Police forces in the UK and Portugal are not co-operating.

The more concrete and focused assertion comes from the Mail, and it is the old one about a group of cleaners in a white van. But this was aired in the Sun two months ago, and in the Mail later the same day. One might have expected someone at Northcliffe House to check first. And the white van story has its genesis in reports three years ago.

One fortunate aspect of all this for the McCanns is that it is the Metropolitan Police and the PJ who are dealing with the investigation - not the self-appointed Sherlocks of the press]

Why It’s Called Global Warming

We get the same kind of response from the climate change denial lobby, whichever side of the North Atlantic they operate on: Sean Hannity of Fox News Channel (fair and balanced my arse) telling “It snowed in Houston ... there’s no global warming”, or Christopher Booker telling his faithful Telegraph readers “I woke yesterday to find six inches of global warming on my lawn”.

Laugh? I thought I’d never start. But that misses the point, as does this week’s sudden shock horror to find that it’s possible to see snow in May (clearly there are a lot of folks too young to remember 1979). It may have been much cooler than usual for mid-May this week, but global temperature averages are exactly what it says on the tin: it isn’t just about one location in the UK or USA.

To illustrate this point in as straightforward a way as possible, let’s look at current temperatures for London: these are lower than average for mid-May, with a high today of just 13 Celsius and a low tonight of 9. This compares with the average high of 17.7, and low of 8.4 degrees. But, as I’ve already told, it is not just about one location, and to show this, let’s look further east.

I’ve taken three examples, the first being the Polish capital of Warsaw. Average high and low temperatures for mid-May are 19.4 and 8.6 degrees. Now look at today’s forecast from the BBC: this shows an expected high of 26 degrees, and a low of 17. That’s significantly above the average, and a rather larger positive variation than the negative one for London.

Let’s take another example from eastern Europe, the Ukranian capital city of Kiev, which lies on approximately the same latitude as Plymouth, although its winters are far more harsh. Average high and low temperatures for mid-May are 20.7 and 10.8 degrees. Moving right along to today’s forecast, this shows rather different high and low of 28 and 16 degrees respectively.

Again, the variation is significant, and the higher than average temperatures extend over a wide area: consider the Russian capital of Moscow. Average high and low temperatures for mid-May are 18.6 and 10.7 degrees respectively. The forecast for today predicts rather higher values of 29 and 16. It looks hot and probably humid, with the odd shower, for Muscovites today.

Yes, temperatures may be lower than average across the UK, but that does not give the global picture. The problem with taking average temperatures for one location is that global temperature only averages out across the whole of the globe, and so that kind of approach is meaningless – unless everywhere else is showing a similar effect or trend. And that ends today’s meteorology lesson.

What you will not read in far too many papers over the next few days.

Telegraph Tolerates Anti-Semitism

[Update at end of post]

Once again, the bear pit that is Telegraph blogs has outdone itself regarding the depths to which those floating around the comments sewer are prepared to sink. And it had all started as would be expected, with a suitably frothing rant by the appalling Janet Daley directed at the hated BBC, with a side order of Guardian bashing, at the appointment of Ian Katz as editor of Newsnight.

Listen up you two, this is being done in your names

The post covers the usual ground, right down to the reference to “the country’s most blatantly Left-wing newspaper”. Strange, I didn’t think that Katz worked for the Morning Star. Maybe she was meaning a more mass-market title? Nope, he doesn’t work for the Mirror, either. It’s pretty lame stuff, which is par for the course where Ms Daley is concerned. But the comments bring the main event.

So what d’you think was the principal concern of commenters on Ms Daley’s post? Perhaps it was riffing on the idea that the BBC is populated by rotten lefties? Sadly, this only made it into the secondary issues. How about the licence fee? Also not the first concern of those leaping to comment. No, right there under the post was a straightforward display of anti-Semitism.

One commenter – note that the remark was recommended by nine others – recalled Greg Dyke calling the Beeb “hideously white” and then declared “I say the BBC is hideously Jewish”. This prompted another commenter to say “Ian Katz is apparently Jewish, which does raise the issue of institutional racism at the BBC, as they do seem to have a disproportionate number of Jewish people in senior roles”.

The commenter suggested that Katz should look into this supposed “issue”, and the remarks were recommended by eight others. A third commenter did not think that a deputy editor of a newspaper going to edit Newsnight was such a big deal, before continuing the theme: “Sure you’re right though. They just picked out Katz in the synagogue one day”. At least nobody recommended that one.

This prompted the second commenter to respond that the Times was “another good example of institutional racism. Their comment pieces are hugely disproportionately written by Jewish people (David Aaronovitch, Daniel Finkelstein, and I think Giles Coren are regulars ... not surprising as it is owned by Murdoch, a fanatical Zionist Neo-Con”. This was recommended by six others.

One can only wonder where Damian Thompson and his team were when all of that was contributed, especially as all those comments had been there since before 1800 hours yesterday. The post itself is trivial enough – Tel kicks both Beeb and Guardian no shock horror – but those comments are totally out of order. Is anyone on the bridge of the good ship Telegraph, or do they consider this acceptable?

Because a lot of people will not. Get a grip Mr T., this isn’t good enough.

[UPDATE 1730 hours: Damian Thompson has been in touch to express his displeasure at those comments, which he has described as "truly appalling". He is in the process of removing them as I type.

Fair play to him. Hopefully those who made the remarks will take the hint]

UKIP – Another Bigot Surfaces

[Updates, two so far, at end of post]

St Boniface’s Catholic College in Plymouth has had its fair share of problems recently: after the discovery of a “black hole” in its finances – the amount being pitched is over £1 million – the head teacher, Peter Eccles, was suspended at the end of March after a complaint about his private life. And now one of its teachers has been caught making a spectacle of himself on Twitter.

Step forward Ron Northcott, who has been a supply teacher at St Boniface’s for around 16 months. His Twitter bio has been hastily cleansed of detail, but Google’s cache clearly identifies him as “Married, Father of 4, B. Ed. Hons. Secondary School Teacher. UKIP candidate in Plymouth”. His LinkedIn profile states that his latest berth is at St Boniface’s college.

Northcott may have escaped attention, had he not referred on one Tweet to “some of my Y11 students”. That was the Tweet after the one where he suggested that his beloved Nigel “Thirsty” Farage was “the democrat”, and that Young Dave, Corporal Clegg and Mil The Elder were not. Yes, Ron Northcott is not only a UKIP candidate, but also not backward at coming forward with his views.

And when it comes to Scots, he is virulently intolerant, routinely referring to them as “Jocks”, and calling Andrew “Brillo Pad” Neil “that doughnut on the settee”. Then he sneered “Amazed that fifty jocks could get out of bed that early. It’s not signing on day. Is it or is the chemist open?” which he then topped by telling another Tweeter “Go home you tartan turd. We don’t trust a ‘man’ who wears skirts”.

It got worse: he then observed “Just saw a clip of jocks haranguing Nigel Farage. Unbelievably, one strung a whole sentence together – ‘Scum’ – and was sober”. This Tweet was bookended with abusive remarks about a number of politicians who hail from north of the border, together with allegations about how prescriptions, tuition fees and care for the elderly was funded there.

All of this would not have been out of place in the saloon bars of 30 or 40 years ago, but the world has moved on – at least, most of it apart from the likes of Ron Northcott has. His bigotry suggests that UKIP is still a long way from a mature political party, and I can imagine some of the St Boniface’s parents may be uneasy about his presence on the staff after reading his Twitter feed.

And I didn’t screenshot Northcott’s mentions of Muslims, a subject which one might think the party’s candidates would avoid in the week after Eric Kitson, newly elected on their ticket to Worcestershire County Council, was forced to resign after “sharing offensive material about Muslims on Facebook”. At this rate, getting jostled by a group of angry Scots will be the least of Farage’s problems.

He needs to look long and hard at some of those who aspire to represent his party.

[UPDATE1 1340 hours: since this post was first published, Ron Northcott has - surprise, surprise - deleted all those Scots-bashing Tweets. Now there is nothing there dated later than 14 May. So good to see you're looking in, Ron.

What I didn't say earlier was that I also took screenshots of a several more potentially embarrassing Tweets, including some less than fraternal quotes about the Spanish, and a particularly nasty remark about Kirsty Wark. These may, at my discretion, form part of a follow-up post.

In the meantime, I'm sure Ron will have his excuses ready for St Boniface's acting head and all those parents, plus the local UKIP party leadership. Never mind, eh?]

[UPDATE2 18 May 1415 hours: the Plymouth Herald has today brought the news that Ron Northcott has resigned from UKIP. The party's chairman in the city told that "Ron is not talking to any member of the press ... he has stepped down and will be leaving UKIP ... I spoke to him by phone. He realised what he had done and apologised. He said he would have to fall on his sword".

Northcott has removed the party logo from his Twitter feed. So there will be no need for a follow-up post. Thus another success for Zelo Street, but wouldn't it have been better for all concerned if UKIP had bothered to do their homework properly in the first place?]

Dorries And The Election Endgame

That went well, then: hardly had George Young caved in and given the Tory whip back to (yes, it’s her again) Mid Bedfordshire MP Nadine Dorries, than she was displaying the kind of awkward squad behaviour – some might call it flagrant disloyalty – for which she is rightly, as Russell Harty might have put it, “famous, nay, notorious”. Yes, the fragrant Nadine is now courting UKIP.

That is, she is courting UKIP as well as remaining the Tories’ official candidate for the next General Election. Confused? Well, the thought did enter that she might be, but as Clive James may have said, I digress. Ms Dorries is suggesting that she should be permitted to run in 2015 and be endorsed by UKIP as well as her own party. Why this should be is not immediately apparent, but stay with me here.

Although she is sitting on an apparently comfortable majority of over 15,000, achieved last time with securing over 50% of the popular vote, as Unity at Ministry of Truth has pointed out, Tories recently polled were split on whether she should have been allowed back into the party. Moreover, most UKIP supporters prepared to venture an opinion backed the idea that she would make their party less credible.

Someone's starting to flap ... yes, it's her again

All of which suggests it would be possible for that Tory vote to become split, given a suitable inducement. So what might cause Mid Bedfordshire’s Tories to look elsewhere? Simples. A credible UKIP candidate would doubtless build on the mere 5.1% of their 2010 vote. And a single mainstream alternative to lever away less happy but more centrist supporters could do the trick.

That single mainstream alternative is already in place: step forward Lib Dem candidate Linda Jack, who took second place in 2010. Whatever populist credentials Ms Dorries puts forward, the Lib Dem matches them: former serving member of the armed forces, experienced former teacher and youth worker, trade unionist, and adviser to the Financial Services Authority.

Linda Jack: Popular and agreeable

If there was a serious chance of getting Dorries out, Labour might be persuaded to give Mid Bedfordshire a miss next time. None of this, though, seems to have permeated the fan club at places like the Spectator, where Isabel Hardman describes her as “probably the most interesting and warm politician I’ve ever interviewed ... in person she’s normal and friendly and funny”.

Of course, Isabel, because right now you are useful to her. Those who pick apart the routine Dorries dishonesty, call out her logic fails, and otherwise criticise her see a rather different picture: a manipulative, greedy, viciously vindictive player of the victimhood card who is in politics for one thing, and one alone: the continuing success of Herself Personally Now.

And UKIP are most unlikely to accommodate her wishes. Roll on 2015, then.