One transport oddity applicable to Wimbledon residents who wish to commute early into London using a freedom pass, is that you have to take a District Line train in the morning although you can take a SWTrain to return home in the evening.
The District Line train to Victoria is rather more idiosyncratic than the usually efficient SWTrain to Vauxhall. EG this morning the District Line train driver announced that the bad news was that there was a signal problem on the Southfields
section of the line. The good news he said was that he would after undertaking a planned emergency stop for which passengers had to brace themselves, be able to proceed with the journey without further delay.
The train duly braked sharply, jolted and stopped. There was then a long pause before the driver announced that just as he/we had thought that things could not get any worse, they had, as he could not re-start the train. He then apologised profusely but some minutes later after further presumably frantic tinkering with the electrics etc. the train resumed its hilarious journey, arriving at Victoria 35 minutes late on a journey which is supposed to take only about 35 minutes anyway.
The good natured commentary by the driver, his explanations of what was occurring and profuse apologies, meant that what could have been a poor start to the day was instead quite different.
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Employment Tribunal - Christmas Conundrum
Day job took me to the seaside last week to a tiny Employment Tribunal in a city (it has a lovely cathedral) not much larger than Wimbledon Village. The fascinating and Christmas seasonal question for the Tribunal was one which has vexed secular courts before, namely whether a minister of religion should be treated mainly as a servant of man, in which case he or she should be subject to the full rigours of the British employment laws or mainly a servant of God, in which case Divine Love, Providence and if needs be Retribution, should apply in due course. In the event the tribunal members decided that they would need private time to decide on how to answer the question so wait and see applies if not 'God only knows'.
A thought which has remained with me ever since is that the State in the UK at least is interfering more and more in matters religious. The Tribunal case did not concern the Catholic church whose Bishops are currently understandably in my view, anxious about the Gordon Brown government's proposed new Equalities Bill, which if it becomes law may circumscribe some of the important beliefs customs and practices of the Catholic Church in this country. However a trend is appearing these days for such questions tobe answered in ways which are unhelpful to religious believers of most faiths.
A few years ago, many perhaps most UK citizens and political parties, would have been wary of the Chinese government's intereference in matters of religion; for example the Roman Catholic Church was essentially outlawed; only the Chinese state approved Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association was approved.
We may smugly have felt that such intereference in matters of religion "couldn't happen here". Sadly unless the people and hierachy remain vigilent it may well happen here and may already be happening, albeit in a different guise from that of the Chinese state.
A thought which has remained with me ever since is that the State in the UK at least is interfering more and more in matters religious. The Tribunal case did not concern the Catholic church whose Bishops are currently understandably in my view, anxious about the Gordon Brown government's proposed new Equalities Bill, which if it becomes law may circumscribe some of the important beliefs customs and practices of the Catholic Church in this country. However a trend is appearing these days for such questions tobe answered in ways which are unhelpful to religious believers of most faiths.
A few years ago, many perhaps most UK citizens and political parties, would have been wary of the Chinese government's intereference in matters of religion; for example the Roman Catholic Church was essentially outlawed; only the Chinese state approved Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association was approved.
We may smugly have felt that such intereference in matters of religion "couldn't happen here". Sadly unless the people and hierachy remain vigilent it may well happen here and may already be happening, albeit in a different guise from that of the Chinese state.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Politicians and People
Once more many thanks to Barnaby Capel Dunn whose comment on my last blogpost warrants a fuller response than a comment in reply hence this seperate blog post. Barnaby you said:
In Britain today I am not sure that you are right (Iraq war apart where I believe the people were lied to anyway). We have I think at last begun to appreciate that the nation is so heavily indebted that national payback time now looms large. Many were expecting details of how the pain of payback is to be shared between us, to be set out in the Chancellor's recent pre-budget statement. Had he done so and added some real painful specifics like VAT being increased food and children's clothing apart, to 20% he would have improved the present governments prospects of doing well in the 2010 elections. Instead we/they were disappointed as he and his colleagues played politics by announcing taxes on banker's bonuses etc. which will hardly even make a dent in the nation's debt mountains and then throwing in some decrying of the Leader of the Opposition's Eton education - which will make not one iota of difference to the nation's debt pile.
This feebleness may ironically have done the nation some favours as the voters being more sophisticated than the present government likes to think, may well choose to govern us from 2010, people from an other party which transparently promises pain and realism rather than those from the party which tries play politics. 'Fiddling whilst Rome Burns' is the saying which comes to mind.
However there are limits on what politicians can do anyway and as you suggest individuals' actions count for more than politcians' words. The Times newspaper, which I do not usually read, was delivered to the maytrees' household this morning instead of the Indy. It contains an interesting article on life in Malawi Africa some 50 years ago under British rule and life there today under local politicians' rule. The main thrust of the article was to suggest that almost literally, nothing has changed there over that time span and that all the politicians do then and now is little more than scratch the surface of people's lives there. A bit of flag waving, some policing, meagre primary education, no jobs and a few roads. Malawi according to the reporter is full of friendly non-violent people so why the lack of 'progress' one may ask? Possibly an answer is to be found in how we choose to define progress. Maybe the pereceived definition will have to be re-visited in the UK as well as elesewhere when the repayment of the debt mountain begins to make us rein in or excessive consumerism.
Maybe also the words emanating from Copenhagen will be appreciated as being mere weasel words, only when harsh realities and nations-wide lack of cash compel individuals and their politicians to reduce the methods and volumes of production and personal consumption that are endangering life as we know it on this planet.
...I would like to take up one point in your latest post, when you decry: "... politicians' feebleness in responding to the overborrowed state of the economy, ...". In my view, this is a Catch 22 situation. If a party in Britain, France or anywhere else were to run on a platform of fiscal (or for that matter ecological) rigour, and if that party were to spell out what such a programme would entail for each and every one of us, said party WOULD NEVER GET ELECTED! Will things ever change? Yes, either, and most probably, the economy collapses completely and some sort of semi-democratic government takes over, or, less likely but far more positive, the electorate at long last shows the necessary intelligence to vote in a party prepared to tell the truth and to promise to do something about it.
I truly believe that our present predicament is not, as so often asserted, an indictment of our politicians, but much more a condemnation of us, the electorate. When we criticize successive governments, we are in effect criticizing ourselves. With so much knowledge and information freely available nowadays, we can no longer plausibly say that we have been hoodwinked by our politicians. We know perfectly well what we are doing when we vote in a government dedicated to NOT confronting the problems facing us.
As someone who has very often been proved long in the course of my life, I do believe it really is up to us show the way forward. We almost did this in the case of the Iraq War (not me personally, I'm ashamed to say) but we show little sign in pushing politicians a little nearer in the direction of financial and economic reality...
In Britain today I am not sure that you are right (Iraq war apart where I believe the people were lied to anyway). We have I think at last begun to appreciate that the nation is so heavily indebted that national payback time now looms large. Many were expecting details of how the pain of payback is to be shared between us, to be set out in the Chancellor's recent pre-budget statement. Had he done so and added some real painful specifics like VAT being increased food and children's clothing apart, to 20% he would have improved the present governments prospects of doing well in the 2010 elections. Instead we/they were disappointed as he and his colleagues played politics by announcing taxes on banker's bonuses etc. which will hardly even make a dent in the nation's debt mountains and then throwing in some decrying of the Leader of the Opposition's Eton education - which will make not one iota of difference to the nation's debt pile.
This feebleness may ironically have done the nation some favours as the voters being more sophisticated than the present government likes to think, may well choose to govern us from 2010, people from an other party which transparently promises pain and realism rather than those from the party which tries play politics. 'Fiddling whilst Rome Burns' is the saying which comes to mind.
However there are limits on what politicians can do anyway and as you suggest individuals' actions count for more than politcians' words. The Times newspaper, which I do not usually read, was delivered to the maytrees' household this morning instead of the Indy. It contains an interesting article on life in Malawi Africa some 50 years ago under British rule and life there today under local politicians' rule. The main thrust of the article was to suggest that almost literally, nothing has changed there over that time span and that all the politicians do then and now is little more than scratch the surface of people's lives there. A bit of flag waving, some policing, meagre primary education, no jobs and a few roads. Malawi according to the reporter is full of friendly non-violent people so why the lack of 'progress' one may ask? Possibly an answer is to be found in how we choose to define progress. Maybe the pereceived definition will have to be re-visited in the UK as well as elesewhere when the repayment of the debt mountain begins to make us rein in or excessive consumerism.
Maybe also the words emanating from Copenhagen will be appreciated as being mere weasel words, only when harsh realities and nations-wide lack of cash compel individuals and their politicians to reduce the methods and volumes of production and personal consumption that are endangering life as we know it on this planet.
Saturday, December 12, 2009
Silver Linings in the Dark Midwinter?
The gathering gloom reported in the media recently over a very wide spectrum of human life on the planet, is mirrored in SW London at least by winter darkness still prevailing at breakfast time and again by teatime making the daily commute a grey cold and usually wet experience.
The media reports about politicians' and others' wise and sometimes not so wise, words at Copenhagen, the continuing grave news out of Dublin about priests' malfeasance, the ongoing recession and politicians' feebleness in responding to the overborrowed state of the economy, the plight of those living under intolerant secular or supposedly religious regimes and those oppressed by war famine or pestilence, make for pessimistic reflection, especially when also taking into account, one's personal actions which might be said not to be adding to the Common Good.
Yet...and yet, the sun is shining now as always it does somewhere. Countless individual human acts of kindness go unreported. Collectively many individuals seek to improve the human condition. Thus outside the offices of Lockheed engineering co's UK subsidiary in SW1 earlier this week, were singers dressed as Santa Clauses singing in the tunes of carols, songs beseeching workers and politicians not to replace the UK's Trident nuclear missile arsenal. That they were able to sing and protest freely barely a stones throw from the Houses of Parliament is itself positive but their viewpoint I thought about by Westminster Cathedral and concluded was entirely correct so signed their petition in support.
Had I been alive for WWII and had the prospect of dropping an atom bomb or two on Japan been up for discussion, doubtless the likelihood of shortening the war by a year or more would have been hugely enticing, yet the price to be paid of killing and maiming millions of non-combatants would I hope, I would have seen, as being contaminated blood money of the kind, that should never ever be paid.
If during the cold war Cuba missile crisis - and I recall us teenage pupils saying the deeply moving and consoling De Profundis prayer with the Jesuits at Beaumont on Black Saturday night - the West had fired its/our nuclear bombs at theUSSR, the human race, even had any humans survived, would have been immeasureably poorer for it, far poorer in fact than if we had simply run up the white flag and joined the USSR (rather than as it subsequently turned out the EU). The salutory lesson to be learned from the demolition of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the USSR empire years later, is that good will out - eventually - which is really a gold rather than silver lining thought for the dark mid-winter or to put that another way, the thought of Christmas to come.
The media reports about politicians' and others' wise and sometimes not so wise, words at Copenhagen, the continuing grave news out of Dublin about priests' malfeasance, the ongoing recession and politicians' feebleness in responding to the overborrowed state of the economy, the plight of those living under intolerant secular or supposedly religious regimes and those oppressed by war famine or pestilence, make for pessimistic reflection, especially when also taking into account, one's personal actions which might be said not to be adding to the Common Good.
Yet...and yet, the sun is shining now as always it does somewhere. Countless individual human acts of kindness go unreported. Collectively many individuals seek to improve the human condition. Thus outside the offices of Lockheed engineering co's UK subsidiary in SW1 earlier this week, were singers dressed as Santa Clauses singing in the tunes of carols, songs beseeching workers and politicians not to replace the UK's Trident nuclear missile arsenal. That they were able to sing and protest freely barely a stones throw from the Houses of Parliament is itself positive but their viewpoint I thought about by Westminster Cathedral and concluded was entirely correct so signed their petition in support.
Had I been alive for WWII and had the prospect of dropping an atom bomb or two on Japan been up for discussion, doubtless the likelihood of shortening the war by a year or more would have been hugely enticing, yet the price to be paid of killing and maiming millions of non-combatants would I hope, I would have seen, as being contaminated blood money of the kind, that should never ever be paid.
If during the cold war Cuba missile crisis - and I recall us teenage pupils saying the deeply moving and consoling De Profundis prayer with the Jesuits at Beaumont on Black Saturday night - the West had fired its/our nuclear bombs at theUSSR, the human race, even had any humans survived, would have been immeasureably poorer for it, far poorer in fact than if we had simply run up the white flag and joined the USSR (rather than as it subsequently turned out the EU). The salutory lesson to be learned from the demolition of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the USSR empire years later, is that good will out - eventually - which is really a gold rather than silver lining thought for the dark mid-winter or to put that another way, the thought of Christmas to come.
Saturday, December 05, 2009
Crime Punishment - Compassion Treatment
The trial in the Italian courts following the tragic murder in Perugia of the British exchange student Meredith Kercher and the verdicts and sentencing announced yesterday, bring to the fore how uninspired, uncivilised and primitive even, man's official treatment of his fellow man and woman remains quite apart from individuals' personal treatment of their neighbours. The State should lead its citizens in answering fundamental questions that arise from our all sharing this planet with our fellows and not necessarily simply follow individuals' basic if not base, feelings.
Undoubtedly Meredith was killed in the prime of her life and her relatives and friends will be grieving profoundly for her loss, for the whole of the remainder of their lives. Amanda knox was sentenced to serve 26 years in jail. Irrespective of the issue of 'guilt' at least that sentence is not as primitive as that of answering killing with death, still practised in some American and Arabian states.
Relevant extracts from the Independent newspaper today read:
These illustrate 'the eye for an eye' Old Testament approach still generally followed by legal systems just as in anarcichal states, the world over. Surely we can and must do better than that? Even those who do not espouse Christian values - and Italy is the historic second cradle of Christianity - must see the wisdom of looking beyond the starkness of the effects of actions which in this case included the horrible death, to the reasons for them and the state of mind health and circumstances of all those said to be involved? What good is going to be done by locking up a girl for all that time even assuming guilt? Where are the sentencing reports? What is her mental state? Rehabilitation issues?
The victims relatives' grief and their reported concerns for retribution are really understandable but should such subjective even so profound emotions and feelings determine the outcomes of criminal sentencing?
More dispassionate decision taking as regards sentencing especially, should be made when the hue and cry of the verdict has abated. Is the jury system really still adequate for C21? I think not.
I would like to see sentencing reports include input from theologians and others, weighing the factors such as deterence, retribution and punishment, with those of the benefits to society and individuals of attempts at forgiveness reconciliation health and healing.
Undoubtedly Meredith was killed in the prime of her life and her relatives and friends will be grieving profoundly for her loss, for the whole of the remainder of their lives. Amanda knox was sentenced to serve 26 years in jail. Irrespective of the issue of 'guilt' at least that sentence is not as primitive as that of answering killing with death, still practised in some American and Arabian states.
Relevant extracts from the Independent newspaper today read:
Knox, distraught and sobbing, was led out of the courtroom by a prison guard on each arm as her family watched, stunned. Her sister Deanna's cries echoed in the courtroom, where two of the women jurors and a number of family friends also wept.AND
The Kercher family, accompanied by the attaché to the British embassy in Rome and aided by an interpreter, also comforted one another and wiped their eyes. John Kercher, Meredith's father, hugged prosecutor Giuliano Mignini... Arline Kercher looked directly at Sollecito and Knox as they were led in and out of the courtroom. The police officers who investigated Kercher's death also shook hands with family members after the announcement. The Kerchers will be holding a press conference today to make an official comment.
These illustrate 'the eye for an eye' Old Testament approach still generally followed by legal systems just as in anarcichal states, the world over. Surely we can and must do better than that? Even those who do not espouse Christian values - and Italy is the historic second cradle of Christianity - must see the wisdom of looking beyond the starkness of the effects of actions which in this case included the horrible death, to the reasons for them and the state of mind health and circumstances of all those said to be involved? What good is going to be done by locking up a girl for all that time even assuming guilt? Where are the sentencing reports? What is her mental state? Rehabilitation issues?
The victims relatives' grief and their reported concerns for retribution are really understandable but should such subjective even so profound emotions and feelings determine the outcomes of criminal sentencing?
More dispassionate decision taking as regards sentencing especially, should be made when the hue and cry of the verdict has abated. Is the jury system really still adequate for C21? I think not.
I would like to see sentencing reports include input from theologians and others, weighing the factors such as deterence, retribution and punishment, with those of the benefits to society and individuals of attempts at forgiveness reconciliation health and healing.
Wednesday, December 02, 2009
Harare Zimbabwe/Wimbledon London - Better Bridged By Boys
To be a governor of a school in England (state or fee paying) can be perceived as a thankless task. No pay, some hard work and potential responsibility when things go wrong, are enough to deter many volunteers. Yet the deterred volunteers risk losing as much as the school govering bodies they have shied away from.
Being a school governor this week proved a fulfilling experience. Boys from a Jesuit junior school in Harare were to spend some ten days with their counterparts in Wimbledon. A supper of welcome was laid on for them, the Wimbledon staff and host families, and the head teachers from couple of other Harare schools who travelled over too.
One of the other Harare schools was fee paying but at $4 a term I doubt that any British political points about fee paying schools could be taken.
At the eleventh hour His Excellency the Ambassador
of Zimbabwe in London decided to drop his normal duties and join his compatriots young and not so young at the welcome supper. Welcome speech was required - from a governor - but what to say? protocol? Ignore domestic politics or add some 'King of Denmark'?
The 8 to 11 year olds set the scene and the protocol with fun friendship, banter and exchanging ideas based on things and interests in common as well as exploring each others different backgrounds and influences.
Governor's and Ambassador's speeches flowed from atmosphere created by the youngest generation present.
A fascinating evening and unusual meal.
Being a school governor this week proved a fulfilling experience. Boys from a Jesuit junior school in Harare were to spend some ten days with their counterparts in Wimbledon. A supper of welcome was laid on for them, the Wimbledon staff and host families, and the head teachers from couple of other Harare schools who travelled over too.
One of the other Harare schools was fee paying but at $4 a term I doubt that any British political points about fee paying schools could be taken.
At the eleventh hour His Excellency the Ambassador
of Zimbabwe in London decided to drop his normal duties and join his compatriots young and not so young at the welcome supper. Welcome speech was required - from a governor - but what to say? protocol? Ignore domestic politics or add some 'King of Denmark'?
The 8 to 11 year olds set the scene and the protocol with fun friendship, banter and exchanging ideas based on things and interests in common as well as exploring each others different backgrounds and influences.
Governor's and Ambassador's speeches flowed from atmosphere created by the youngest generation present.
A fascinating evening and unusual meal.
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