Blogs

The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who controls that chaos, both his own and the enemies’. If one were to publish a long list of ‘Things that we didn’t expect to hear’, I rather suspect that ‘Boris Johnson’s government didn’t have a …

You have shown me prejudice and greedAnd you’ve shown me howI must learn to deal with this disease There’s been a lot of talk in the last few days of 1997. Of the Labour landslide that swept a youthful Tony Blair into 10 Downing Street, on a wave of optimism …

If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us do we not die? There may be readers who believe I am writing out of turn here, who think I am virtue-signalling from the comfort of my study, cup of …

The world breaks everyone, and afterward, many are strong at the broken places. Just when you think it might be safe to start watching the news again, it all kicks off. It’s Party Conference Season, so that means there’s plenty of food for thought coming out of Bournemouth and Liverpool …

Thou callest me a dog before thou hast cause. But since I am a dog, beware my fangs. You can usually find a canine equivalent for the personalities of most people, and Prime Ministers are no exception. Take the three previous incumbents of Number 10 Downing Street, for example. Boris …

There is no square mile of earth’s inhabitable surface that is not beautiful in its own way, if we will only abstain from wilfully destroying that beauty. Having jumped, on several occasions, through the very, very many hoops that my local council requires me to before granting permission for things, …

If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold it would be a merrier world A couple of things happened this week to drive home to me, once again, just what a fabulous industry to work in this is. Last weekend my phone was pinging no-stop …

Schoolbag in hand, she leaves home in the early morning, Waving goodbye with an absent-minded smile I don’t really understand enough about the properties of concrete to really have much of an idea about the whys and wherefores of using RAAC in schools and public buildings, but I do know …

 We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give. We are at that time of year when school halls are filled with pupils opening envelopes to greater or lesser degrees of joy and relief, as they receive their A level and GCSE results. …

any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind. And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. I thought long and hard about whether to start this piece of writing, on this topic and in this way. First off, I want …