Rudinblog

The Berlin Wall – my part in its downfall!

I've been doing quite a lot of thinking and writing recently about how our personal and collective memories are forged. Anniversaries – always a good stimulus or excuse for these memories - seem to have come thick and fast this year: the 90^th anniversary of the first Armistice commemorations and the death of the last UK participant in World War 1; 70th anniversary of the start of World War II (at least for Britain!); the 40th anniversary of the first moon landing, and the 30th anniversary of the first election of Margaret Thatcher and the end of the post-war Keynesian consensus. But the one which most exactly unites personal and world events for me is the fall of the Berlin Wall. What followed was a glorious period in which it really did seem for a while that, as a result of true 'people power', freedom and democracy would take hold throughout Europe and beyond, and furthermore with very few casualties.

 

In my early teens I had a fascination with Berlin. My mum remembers discussing it with me, saying how she thought it was an awful place but I, apparently, had disagreed with this and said I would very much like to go there. At that stage, of course, I had no idea that I would end up with the British forces broadcasting (BFBS) and would be posted there. That is indeed what happened in February 1982.

Until I went out to Germany I thought, in common perhaps with millions of others, that the 'Berlin Wall' described a neat partition of Europe between East and West, which somehow ran down the centre of Berlin. What I hadn't realised was in fact there were two walls; the first dividing West and East Germany, with the second some 80 miles inside East Germany and encircling the Western sector of Berlin, with the World War II victorious allies of France, the UK and the USA controlling one side; and fellow former ally, now enemy, the Soviet Union, the eastern sector. So, getting into West Berlin meant travelling deep inside Soviet controlled territory and a bizarre observation of the niceties of respecting the post-war partition of Europe and agreements with the Soviet Union. Furthermore, the other three Allies refused to recognise the right of the so-called German Democratic Republic to determine who should or shouldn't be able to enter the Western sector of Berlin.

There were three routes, or corridors into the western section; by road, rail and air. I experienced all of these but it was via the first that I first experienced Berlin, setting off with my then girlfriend (later to become the first Mrs Rudin!) in my car from Köln in north-west Germany, which was then home to by far the largest BFBS radio station. One of the things that was impressed on me before we embarked on this journey was that you had to be very careful not to miss the exit from the East German autobahn into Berlin, because your mileage was clocked at either end of the journey and that if you strayed along or past the exit you would be in serious trouble – indeed, would quite likely spark a major international incident! As it happened, the day that we set out was foggy and so I was fearful we would miss this turning.

Before we hit the autobahn, though, we had to go through both the Allied and Soviet checkpoints on the western side. This involved, firstly, having your documents checked by the British forces and then going through the Soviet checkpoint. The Soviets could, and often did, make you wait for a long time, especially if you were American and volubly made comments about "those commie bastards", etc.

At the Soviet checkpoint I had to get out of the car, leaving my then girlfriend inside, salute the Soviet soldiers on duty and then go into a hut, where you would submit your documents, a hand (no other part of the body was visible) snatched them, the hatch snapped shut and you just had to wait for as long as it took. Although I could hear a few voices behind this hatch and a television blaring, I couldn't see the car and so had no idea what was going on outside. This was very unnerving and intimidating - as of course it was intended to be. After a few minutes or so the hatch was raised and a hand maybe the same one – maybe not!) pushed the documents back at me; I stepped outside the hut, saluted the soldiers again, got into the car with some relief and off we went.

Naturally, I was peering anxiously through the windscreen as the mileage indicated that we were near the exit and fortunately I did manage to take it and was very relieved indeed to get to the Allied checkpoint under the arc lights and then be waved through into West Berlin where I was greeted by my new boss at the Berlin station, Alan Clough.

Alan and his wife Janet made a great fuss of us over that weekend, taking us to the French sector and the French equivalent of the NAAFI, the Economat, where we stocked up on fabulous cheeses and wines (naturally!) and I think that first weekend we also went to the American sector, to their equivalent, the PX. The US sector was, as might be expected, a fully created version of smalltown America, complete with its movie houses, bowling alleys and hamburger joints. They even imported Cadillacs and the like and all the street furniture you would associate with the USA.

The British sector wasn't quite like that and seemed to be much more integrated into the life of West Berlin. Before we got married the following year, and had our own quarter -- a fabulous house by the Grunewald (green forest), which would apparently have fetched around half a million pounds in the early 1980s -- I lived in a civilian mess on one of the city's great thoroughfares. It was also next to the British Military Hospital and the first day I was there I was having the evening meal when there was a commotion outside, with armed police, dogs, sirens, etc. Clearly, something more than a squaddie going to the outpatients' department following a rugby accident was going on!

"What's happening?" I asked my fellow diners. "Oh, that'll be Hess arriving" said one. "What, Hess as in Rudolf Hess, Hitler's former deputy?" I asked as I dropped my fork. It was indeed. Hess was by then the sole prisoner in Spandau jail, which was in the British sector, and who was guarded in turn by the four wartime allies but as the British hospital was the nearest he was always treated there and had a whole floor devoted to him. On a later tour of the hospital I was allowed into the room where he was treated: he wasn't there at the time I hasten to add! – but one of my great claims that I've sat on Rudolf Hess's bed! It was just one of many extraordinary things about that city. But, this is supposed to be about the Berlin Wall…

It would be wrong to say that, unless you happened to live and work in its sight, that it was constantly at the front of your mind, but it was certainly never far from your thoughts. Of course, you were most conscious of it as you travelled, as we Allies were allowed to, from West Berlin via Checkpoint Charlie into the East. Mostly, these would be on official tours organised by the respective military powers and was certainly a 'must do' whenever you had any visitors, so my mum, stepfather, and brother, as well as numerous friends, all 'did the East tour'. After showing your passports in the coach, or sometimes pressed against the window for inspection, you would be allowed through the checkpoint and taken to certain approved sites and displays. However, there were also unofficial tours that I did, once with my by then fiancée, was led by a British spy, although of course he did not have that job title emblazoned about him!

He took us to a few places that weren't available to the normal tourists, including some interesting historic sites. You were always followed, of course, and when we stopped off at the dreary Russian equivalent of the NAAFI, the car was broken into and thoroughly searched by East German agents and our friendly spy announced at one point that we were being followed by the, 'People's Police' and he was going to "lose them", so we had a very exciting fast journey around that part of East Germany!

At other times, though, as you would wake up to the news that somebody else had been shot and either killed or injured as they tried to make good their escape over the Wall, you realised this was a deadly game. On other occasions you'd be going out about your business as usual and suddenly find yourself confronted by a section of the Wall, perhaps at the end of an innocent looking street. I remember one occasion when I was doing some work -- actually very lucrative work! -- at a little recording studio, just about 50 yards from where the wall ran. After I finished the recordings, I climbed the steps of the Wall to peer over and, just beyond the 'death strip', some kids were playing football, just as they will in any street in any part of the world. But in this case, their presence and mine was being observed by armed soldiers with binoculars in the watchtowers, and had the ball gone over into the death strip it would not be possible to knock on the door and ask for it back!

There were almost constant visits of major politicians, including President Reagan - whose speech I attended - Margaret Thatcher, Michael Heseltine (then Defence Secretary) and former Prime Minister Jim Callaghan, who granted an extended one-to-one interview with me at the BFBS studios. We were very spoilt as broadcasters, as virtually every major star who passed through would agree to interviews and I've lost count of the number of concerts I went to. I also have great memories of terrific, *interesting* nightclubs and restaurants, as well as walks in the glorious green spaces and trips on the River Havel.

Unlike the Allies' presence in other parts of Germany, the British and Americans seemed genuinely popular in West Berlin, not least because we had sacrificed many lives and resources in the Berlin blockade of 1948 - 49, when the Soviets had attempted to establish their right to govern the whole of Berlin by blocking off outside access to the Western sectors. There had been various attempts and threats since then, not least of course in the construction of the Wall in August 1961 (the only wall in the history of the world designed to keep people in rather than the enemy out), but the airlift had shown that the Americans, in particular, were serious about halting any further march westwards of the Soviet Union and were prepared to engage in a third world war if necessary to defend the west. At any stage between 1949 and 1989 a wrong move could have unleashed a nuclear holocaust. So Berlin was, indeed, the frontline of the Cold War and you were certainly very conscious of that.

To help giving a breathing space in any further attempts to seal off the city, about six months of food supplies were constantly available in the western part and as of course meat and dairy products go off after a while, these were then sold to the personnel, including civilians, of the Allied powers every few weeks at knockdown prices. There was a deep underground nuclear bunker in the centre of Berlin but that was never openly revealed until the 1990s. I visited it and many other sites with the family in 2003. It was very emotional to freely walk through the Brandenburg Gate.

But to 1989 and the year everything changed. I was married, with a baby on the way, and working for the BBC in Leeds. We had not yet moved into our new home there, so my wife was back in the north-west, in our lovely stone cottage a mile or two from where I live now. My temporary accommodation for four days of the week was then a small hotel and so when the pictures came up of the crowd surging through the Wall on the night of November 9 we were apart but watching the same TV news broadcasts, and then excitedly and tearfully discussing them over the 'phone. The next day, of course, the coverage continued on the breakfast-time news, which they had on in the hotel restaurant. I was so excited and so happy that I had a bout of 'emotional incontinence' over my corn flakes, prompting the waitress to ask if I was all right. Back at the BBC studios they were desperate to find someone who knew something about Berlin to add commentary to the events, so I was whisked through to give my thoughts. I made a prediction that although what was happening was unprecedented and wonderful, it would not mean that Germany will become united - at least not for many years! Oh well, I wasn't alone in thinking that.

 

What I do remember is that for the next few months the world seemed an extraordinarily hopeful place and it really did seem that we would move on to new, peaceful era and that perhaps, at least in the northern hemisphere, war and conflict would be at an end. My two and a half years in Berlin were certainly the most exciting, and in some ways the most significant, part of my life. Tomorrow, 9 November, I shall be thinking of all those who dreamed, for all those who died, and for all those who were left behind in those terrible 40 years of division.

Freedom of speech wins the day

This is a great day for everyone who believes that freedom of speech is not only a fundamental, democratic right but that it tends to illuminate and expose those with bad intentions and divisive policies.

Last night's controversial appearance by Nick Griffin, the leader of the British National Party (BNP) on the BBC's weekly television discussion programme, Question Time, exposed his ignorance, bigotry and, perhaps most surprising in Cambridge - educated man, lack of, erm, intellectual consistency.

Many had opposed his appearance -- justified by the BBC on the reasonable basis that the party had broken out from its few local strongholds to a national presence to gaining nearly a million votes in June's elections to the European Parliament and gaining two MEPs under the Proportional Representation system. The opponents' case, which in some areas was a strong one in my view, was that providing Griffin with a platform on national television and sitting alongside what are usually described as 'mainstream politicians' and other commentators, normalised a party which stands for Britain being peopled exclusively by what it terms the indigenous population of these isles - by which it means (despite some waffle from Griffin) white.

So, if you have a different coloured skin or ethnicity you, even if you are born and raised in the UK contributed to the society, you can never be truly thought of as British.

The second objection to his appearance was that by this normalisation such views were legitimised and this resulted in increased verbal and physical attacks on ethnic minorities. Ken Livingstone, the former Mayor of London, was adamant on this point when he appeared on the Today programme on Thursday. When the BNP's predecessor, the National Front, had been prominent in the 1970s, attacks always increased following media exposure, claimed Livingstone. He went further and said that the BBC would be "morally responsible" if there were such attacks following the broadcast. My former boss, Mark Byford, now deputy Director - General of the BBC, who followed Livingstone on that programme, was clearly uncomfortable about the situation but pointed out that under its Royal Charter, the Corporation had to observe 'due impartiality' and once a political party - which was legal and had passed a certain threshold in national support - the Corporation was in no position to pick and choose whom it invited onto such a programme.

The final objection was that, although it was all right for Griffin and others of his ilk to be interviewed by rigorous inquisitors such as John Humphrys and Jeremy Paxman, the format and style of Question Time meant that he would not necessarily be put under pressure to explain his views and that he would be "allowed" to get away with sounding all sweet and reasonable, especially when discussing topics other than race and ethnicity.

 

Although, inevitably, reaction has been mixed and varied, my assessment is that such fears were groundless: Griffin was indeed put under the spotlight and under pressure and looked sweaty, defensive and lacked any credibility as a serious politician. It is also rather patronising to assume that only professional and experienced broadcasters and journalists can make the best job of rigorously examining the views and policies of politicians. In fact, all professional politicians most fear questions from the general public. It was an "ordinary person" who caused Margaret Thatcher the most difficulty when she appeared in an election phone in 1983 when she was pushed about the direction of the Argentine warship the General Belgrano at the time that it was sunk by the British Navy in the previous year's Falklands War. It was the partner of a cancer sufferer who, full of righteous anger, ambushed Tony Blair during an election campaign and accused him of not caring about the fate of such sufferers that caused him one of his most uncomfortable moments.

You see, politicians fear the electorate and know they have to be pleasant and reasonable to the voters. The best arguments against Griffin's odious policies were from members of the audience, especially those from an ethnic minority background who declared themselves proud to be British and who'd lived here all their lives and I especially liked the Jewish teenage boy who was enraged about the invocation of the Holocaust-denying BNP of World War II, when it was the Brits who had saved his grandparents from the gas chambers.

As was pointed out during the panel, the availability of Griffin's previous on and off the record statements on social and media sharing sites such as YouTube mean that it is very difficult for him to claim that he will have been misquoted about his more ludicrous and revolting statements, such as that the Holocaust had merely been 'a Jewish folk tale'. Confronted with his past statements he could only say that he didn't know why he had held these views, or why he had changed his mind. The claim that the reason he couldn't do so was because of an unspecified "European law" was undermined immediately by a fellow panellist, Justice Secretary, Jack Straw, who gave his permission for Griffin to explain about his past statements! That was a great moment.

On the whole, though, I thought the panel was fairly feeble and Chris Huhne, the Liberal Democrat spokesman, was typically shameless and outrageous when the discussion turned to immigration from EU countries, which his party has fully supported. He now says that his party supported the potential unrestricted access from up to 500 million people in the EU to Britain, without the ten-year phased - in transition arrangements which most countries adopted, because he had relied on government projections that said that fewer than 100,000 people from the rest of the EU would choose to live and work in Britain when the true figure had turned out to be more than three quarters of a million.

The way that the Liberal Democrats twist and turn on this issue is a real lesson in the utter shamelessness and hypocrisy of certain politicians. But at least Huhne had agreed to appear on the programme and had supported Griffin's right to be heard. The same was not true for the rent-a-mob outside Television Centre who physically tried to prevent Griffin from entering the building and, when they found that he had sneaked in by a back door, attempted to storm the building itself and, naturally, were arrested. One such protester, who was dragged away by police chanting: "shame on you! This is how fascism started!" No, fascism was started by people like you who attempted to use mob rule; intimidation; burning effigies; chanting that they would like to burn certain people, etc. For such people, free speech is only allowed if it conforms within their own self-righteous limitations of what is acceptable. The whole point of free speech is that it will be offensive to some people some time. If you don't have that right you don't in fact have free speech. This works, of course, as it were the other way. When there was the brouhaha over the publication of the cartoons of The Prophet, our currently leader, Gordon Brown, said that free speech did not include the right to be offensive to people. We really are in trouble when Her Majesty's Chief Minister says, and presumably believes, in such views and it does explain a lot of the repression and anti-democratic, anti-libertarian measures of this government.

 

Nor does it help to shout down people who are not racist but have turned to the BNP out of despair and disillusionment with the current mainstream parties, especially Labour in its traditional working-class base. Immigration is a legitimate topic of public discussion, as is multiculturalism versus integration, and a requirement/ expectation of all people, whatever their background, to support the basic values of a country such as, indeed, free speech, equality under the law, tolerance, rights for women and for those of different sexual orientations, etc.

It is all very well for there to have a relaxed attitude to all this from the white, middle-class 'trustafarians', who do not see their livelihoods and their culture threatened by those with different culture. The white, educated middle classes such as myself get all the benefits from immigration and none of the downside and it behoves us to have a little humility about those who are at the bottom of the economic scale, with very little or any job security -- or any job at all -- who see the latest wave of immigrants as destroying what little prospects they have for building a decent life and which puts additional pressure on very scarce resources, such as housing.

A lot of this comes down to a sense of place. I'm a typical, peripatetic member of the professional white middle classes in that, although I've lived my current home for 16 years, I have no particular affection or sense of belonging to where I live. My social networks, virtual and real, are mostly not geographically centred and I haven't had generations of my family living and working here - working for and building communities, constructing schools, hospitals and even more fundamental aspects of civilisation such as sewage systems and street lighting (don't laugh -- these innovations are historically very recent in many parts of Britain). I haven't seen streets where generations of my family lived, transformed by new arrivals with a very different and sometimes hostile culture and set of beliefs.

Any democratic politician, or anyone has any experience of life and knowledge of humans, has to realise that when such transformations take place in less than a generation there is bound to be trouble and that people on the sharp end of this policy -- -- over which they have never been consulted and for which they have certainly never voted -- have legitimate grievances that have to be addressed. Some in the Labour Party 'get this' but others are still in denial.

There is another uncomfortable fact the white liberals such as myself in that many people who support directly or indirectly the BNP are - not to put too fine a point on it - not very bright. There was a piece on Channel 4 News a couple of days ago in which a 'social cohesion unit' from Leicester Council was going around putting leaflets through households in a deprived area, suggesting ways in which people can work together more and understand each other better. They then looked at figures on educational levels and found that the average reading age on this particular council estate was seven. They'd been wasting their time leafleting, because most people simply couldn't understand the words. So they then went round door-to-door, explaining what they were trying to do.

When people are under pressure it is the easiest thing in the world for them to the tribute all their woes and problems to a minority who are physically different, or wear different clothes, or insist on, say, going to a mosque where, for generations, a chapel once stood. Shouting down such people or calling anyone who doesn't happen to hold liberal views and thinks that mass immigration is a wonderful idea and that multiculturalism enriches lives etc., etc. is a racist, is doomed to failure and is bound to feed the very parties who move into the political vacuum left by what can justly be regarded as the political elites.

But let's end on an optimistic note -- surely know one who saw Griffin on Question Time programme could find his arguments or approach at all persuasive and it's a reasonable bet that many are tacitly or explicitly supported the BNP are now having a rethink. Last night, in my view, public service broadcasting in the shape of the BBC really did provide a public service.

When Irish hands are voting…

As I write this the Irish are voting for the second time on the Lisbon Treaty. You see, they got the 'wrong' answer the first time round and the EU never takes no for an answer when it comes to a new treaty; they regard it as a blip and an unfortunate consequence of democracy in a particular member state. Funnily enough, when the vote is tight the other way - for a 'yes', as happened for example in Malta in 2004 and even closer for the French vote on the Maastricht Treaty (which only gained a very bare majority because of voters from the outlying remnants of the French Empire) - they never go back to the electorate and check that that is really what they wanted and voted for the 'right' reasons. In Britain, of course, no one under the age of 52 has ever had a direct vote on any particular treaty, let alone our overall membership.

 

When the people are allowed a vote, they do tend to vote against what is on offer. The only member state – Denmark - to have a direct vote on the final stage of European Monetary Union -- "the euro" -- voted against it; the only countries to be allowed a vote on the original Constitution, France and the Netherlands, voted against it; the only country to be allowed a vote on the Lisbon Treaty, Ireland, rejected it the first time. I think we can discern a pattern here. But the institutions and instincts of the European Union (including of course many of the politico's of the member states) are so profoundly undemocratic that they regard the electorates as mere ill informed inconveniences who just have to be goaded, bullied and propagandised until they get it 'right'. Ideally, of course, the electorate will never be given a say and that is indeed what will happen after the Lisbon Treaty is finally ratified by all the member states, because all future treaties will be "self approved", so this really is the very last chance for the peoples of Europe will ever have of rejecting anything that comes out of Brussels. After that, it's all down to what the political class decides, and they of course will sign up to the European project.

 

But first, I think a little explanation is needed as to why I'm so hostile. It is an attitude which has caused me a great deal of difficulty and upset with friends, relations and colleagues, because most of these associate even mild Euroscepticism with those who are xenophobic or closet racist and have various and associated other nasty right wing frames of mind. I can understand this myself because, dear reader, I too, had that approach to those who are anti-the (formerly known as) EEC. To explain my change of heart -- actually two changes of heart – I need to briefly to go back to where I was a schoolboy, when the Heath government put the European Communities Bill to parliament to pave the way for Britain's entry into the 'Common Market'. In 1971 to '72 this was a very major topic. Some sections of the Conservative party were, as now, against, but the main opposition came from the Labour Party, which has always had some "pro-Europeans" such as Roy Jenkins and Shirley Williams in its ranks (they of course were to form part of that great quartet 'the gang of four' in 1981) but the majority of the party was definitely against. Fortunately, during the period of the 1960s Labour government, France under de Gaulle was also against Britain's membership, so it didn't become an issue for the Wilson government of 1964-70. If it had, the government would probably have split over it. However, back to the early' 70s and one of my brain waves was to have an unofficial school magazine and for the leader column in the first issue we decided to tackle the European question. One of my co-conspirators, with whom I now have a great renewed friendship after a gap of well over 30 years, went down to London - I think for a gig - and on his way to or from it encountered a very big demonstration in Trafalgar Square to protest against the EEC Bill and brought back some of the literature. This discussed Britain's loss of sovereignty, how the EEC was profoundly undemocratic and was in the clutches and the interests of big business, etc. Using the leaflets as a basis we wrote this editorial column.

When the magazine came out, my history teacher, whom I liked, pull me aside after class and said he was deeply sorry I held these opinions because he was a passionate pro-European and began to explain why. This made me rethink my attitude and from there on I became pro-European. This wasn't a hard switch of approach because being pro-European then, as now, is seen as the progressive, youthful way of looking at international relations. After all, I was the first in three generations of my family not to be forced to put on a uniform and go off to fight other Europeans. Now we only went to Europe to enjoy our summer holidays. I began to associate anti-Europeanism with narrow-mindedness, old-fashioned, reactionary attitudes and that is not what you want to feel when you are, say, 16 years old (or indeed, in my case at least, at any stage in your life!).

Then of course in early 1974 the Labour party limped back into government, first with minority support and then with a tiny majority and Wilson, once more Prime Minister, had to face the problem that, although by then the country was a member of the EEC, at least half of his Cabinet and certainly well over half his Parliamentary party and the party beyond it in the constituencies was deeply opposed to membership. (The party was to have a policy of pulling out of the EEC without a referendum in its only truly left-wing period of domination from the early to late '80s). To avoid his government splitting over the issue, Wilson offered a referendum in which, for the first and only time in Britain's history, the principle of "collective responsibility" was lifted and pro-and anti-EEC members of the Cabinet were given permission to join the cross party platforms and campaigns on both sides of the referendum issue. So, in June 1975, when I just reached 18 years of age, we had what is still the only UK wide referendum ever to be held. In one of those rites of passage, I went to the polling booth with my mum and dad, proudly displaying my "vote yes to Europe" badge. As it happened, public opinion had been turned round from being about 60/40 against, to a 'yes' referendum win of about two thirds in favour. This change in attitude in only a couple of years can partly be explained by the fact it's a more difficult proposition to say we should leave something once you're in, as opposed to if we should join in the first place, and also because nearly all the newspapers were in favour. Furthermore, as the BBC itself in a Radio 4 documentary ('Document', BBC Radio 4, 3 February 2000) and former BBC journalist Robin Aitken has described in a brilliant book, the Corporation was in cahoots with the pro-Europeans from the start and held secret meetings on ways in which the BBC could propagandise on their behalf and marginalise the contrary opinion, including the exclusion of broadcasters and producers who were of the opposing view. It helped that the then Director-General was a close personal friend of Conservative Prime Minister and fervent pro-European Conservative leader Edward Heath. So much for BBC impartiality!

 

Throughout the rest of the '70s and the whole of the '80s I held onto my pro-European views, despite the fact that one of my housemates when I was a senior newspaper journalist was profoundly against, as were some other friends and associates. I guess my attitude throughout this roughly 20 year period was pretty close to the mainstream view now: that there were many silly aspects but overall it was a good thing and it was better to be in it than not.

So what changed my attitude? Well, Britain's ignominious exit from the Exchange Rate Mechanism in 1992 was the trigger. This policy of pegging the exchange rate of the pound within a band of the mighty German Deutschmark had been forced on a reluctant and politically weakened Margaret Thatcher by her then Chancellor and Foreign Secretary and was supported by pretty well the entire British political establishment -- the TUC, the CBI, the Labour opposition, many Conservatives and certainly all the Liberal Democrats. And guess what? They were all wrong.

Britain's already fragile economy was tipped over the edge by its membership of the ERM, which was a major factor in thousands of people losing their homes, businesses going bust and the economy generally on the slide, as well as costing us at least £4 billion of our reserves. Britain began its longest period of economic growth virtually the moment we left the ERM. This was not a coincidence. So if all the pro-European lobby were for the ERM and were proved to be completely and hopelessly wrong, perhaps they were also wrong about other aspects of this idea of 'ever closer union'? Especially on us joining full European and Monetary Union ('the Euro') which would be 'ERM without the fire exits' and mean a common interest rate which would almost certainly be 'wrong' for us (as it's been wrong for Germany, Ireland, Greece, etc.).

Then, immediately on top of this debacle, we had the Maastricht Treaty. Every treaty in the past had been accompanied by sound and fury by opponents of the hen EEC and I had dismissed them as the usual ravings of reactionary nutters, etc. Now, however, I began to take notice. When I looked into what the Maastricht Treaty actually said (and few of our parliamentarians it seems even bothered to read it - in fact the then Chancellor of the Exchequer urged people not to read it!), I began to see what all the fuss was about.. This did indeed signify a significant transfer of the rights of our national parliament to the (newly re-named) European Union and the people were not to be allowed a say in it. The reason they were not to be allowed to say is, of course, because they would have rejected it.

Whatever the arguments for and against developments in the European Union this is the one overwhelming issue that I keep coming back to: the people whom we elect to a parliament do not have the right to give away the power that is entrusted to them, because that power in fact belongs to the citizens in a democracy and is only loaned to parliamentarians in the period in which the parliament sits and for which they are elected. If they wish to give away that power, then they must at least come back to the people for permission which, I believe, should require a two thirds positive majority of the electorate as a whole, because these are not small issues. If your national parliament is no longer supreme, then that means that your individual and collective liberty is also now compromised and in the hands of people whom we largely do not elect. Those whom we do elect only constitute currently 10% of the European parliament (which is in any case not the supreme body of the EU). If you cannot elect, remove, or petition those who govern your life and make laws, then you do not live in a democracy. You might argue that this is a historical, necessary movement away from national parliaments to "pooling sovereignty" with other nations. But if you believe that, you should put the case to the people and allow them to have their say. All the other arguments pale into insignificance against this one factor in my view.

And of course, once one's mind is turned against the project, you do begin to look at the practicalities of what the European Union actually does, or doesn't do. What it has done for example with its ludicrous and obscenely wasteful fish quotas, which assumes that certain types of fish or swim meeting together, so fishermen can be prevented from exceeding their quotas of the particular fish stock, is just one example. Of course, different types of fish swim together, so if the fishing boats have in fact exceeded their quota catch on that particular fish they have to throw it back in the ocean, dead, or face a fine and criminal prosecutions of various kinds. This has literally led to our fishermen having to burn their boats. Of course, it was Britain's fishing grounds that eventually persuaded the French and the others that Britain should become part of the EC, as 80% of this now "common resource", lies within British territorial limits.

Then you look at the Common Agricultural Policy and you see how this not only artificially inflates prices for the consumer but also results in the excess produce being dumped on poor countries. As these products often form part of their limited indigenous produce, the local farmers then have their prices undercut and so are further impoverished. I doubt that is an exaggeration to say that tens of thousands of people have starved to death and millions of others plunged into a necessary continued poverty as a direct result of the EU. It also gives millions of pounds to rich farmers/landowners NOT to produce anything on their land! (Lewis Carroll could not have contrived anything as ludicrous in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland).

You would not know all of this is of course from the propaganda that comes out of the EU -- and they take propaganda extremely seriously (not least in Ireland for the second referendum), spending millions on it every year, including the neo-Stalinist type of approach and content to schoolchildren, because like all great dictators and authoritarians they believe that if you 'catch them young you've got them for life'. When it is propaganda in favour of the EU of course it is always simply "information". When it is arguments the other way round it is shrill propaganda from those nasty reactionary types, etc.

Of course, this idea that opponents to the European Union are all right wing is complete rubbish but it suits the EU propaganda perfectly to promote that 'link'. In fact, most of the best material I've seen about the EU, particularly its role in the disastrous privatisation of the railways, the closure of Post offices, unnecessary and destructive competition in the Royal Mail, etc., has come from left-wing sources, including the Socialist Worker and the Morning Star. True left-wing radicals certainly oppose the EU and see it for what it is -- a cartel of rich nations who are determined to get richer at the expense of the workers, and other poorer nations, although of course they were always trumpet ideals and ideas of equality, diversity and inclusion. All authoritarian regimes do this; certainly the constitution of the old Soviet Union was a model of this doublethink. And it still amazes me that those who think of themselves as left-wing and radical support the EU. Thoughtful and intelligent left-wingers Tony Benn and his ilk see if for what it is. The propaganda machine has in fact worked supremely well, so that in fact what are really extremist positions -- outlined above- are seen as a moderate point of view, whereas those that oppose them are seen as extremists.

 

But surely there are benefits from being members of the European Union? What about the ability to live and work wherever we want within the 27 countries? What about all those projects and schemes which proudly display the EU logo? This really makes me really laugh. As we pay far more than we get out of the EU it is rather like depositing some money with a bank – say, for the sake of argument, a modest £100. Then you go to the bank one day and say you'd like to get some of the money out. "Well", says the friendly bank manager, "unfortunately we lost about £20 of your money due to fraud, corruption and waste. We might be able to let you have some of the other £80 back but you'll have to put forward your spending proposals to us for approval, and then when you do spend it you must put the logo of our bank to show people where the money has come from".

 

So, OK, it costs…but what about all the investment we get as being part of the European Union – would t go elsewhere if we withdrew? And in this globalised world and inter- dependency, isn't it better to be part of a power bloc that can rival both the old centres of power, chiefly the USA, and the new emerging ones, such as China and India? These are powerful arguments and deserve to be taken seriously but the fact is that at least in in Britain's case, with its almost unrivalled positive attributes of language, culture; being a permanent member of the UN Security Council, and still one of the leading industrialised countries with membership of the G8, its Commonwealth, it's close (I don't say 'special') relationship with the USA, membership of NATO, the World Trade Organisation (which in fact sets most of the rules on trade anyway), plus the fact that citizens of countries which are not part of the EU but are part of the European Free Trade Association also have free movement of goods and people within the rest of Europe and trade perfectly happily with the EU -- you do have to question whether Britain needs to be part of this, given all the negatives I've outlined above. And, incidentally, we were told during the major push to sign up to the Euro in the late '90s that if we did not do so we would lose trade and investment from international companies, who would choose to invest in the 'Eurozone.' I will happily hear of evidence for this but I do not know of a single confirmed case where we have lost investment, etc. through not being in the 'Euro.'

 

As the UK imports far more from the EU than it sells, I think it unlikely that even the EU Commissioners and judges would stop the UK trading with it if we were to pull out altogether or have 'associate status.' All the scare stories that Norwegian citizens were given, for example, if they (twice) refused to vote become part of the EU -- that they would be marginalised, would lose trade, etc have been proved to be wrong; it has all the advantages of EU membership and none of the disadvantages -- e.g. it holds on to its fishing grounds, controls its own laws and so on. In fact, the legal argument is the final clincher for me. The European Arrest Warrant, which is being trumpeted by many, including last week by Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg, as being responsible for preventing terrorism and paedophile networks, also has the capacity, and indeed has already resulted in, the arrest of British citizens who are then being forcibly removed from the country and spend many months in foreign jails in legal and justice systems are quite different from ours and without the rights and liberties which British citizens have taken for granted so long. The fact that the European Union takes such a robust approach to critics of itself -- for example when there are whistleblowers over its finances, they react by bullying, marginalising, demoting, and eventually removing such people – is deeply troubling, to say the least. As numerous accounts have shown, journalists who attempt to expose the lies and corruption within the EU are treated to neo-fascist treatment, have their files raided, are intimidated and have their professional reputations and private lives traduced with lies and smears.

 

I am now well over 3000 words, so all I can say to finish is that I have no hope or expectation is that the situation will change. I do think that the British people, like the Irish, are too frightened to push to come out and that we are on a one-way track. I predict that in a few years blog posts such as this will probably lead to prosecution for anti-European sentiment, racism or some-such and that having views like mine will be regarded as incompatible with any public service. Sounds crazy and paranoid? Well, so did most of the powers of Europe now has some years ago. Every time the EU acquires new powers, it has been preceded by some years of denial that such powers are proposed, then when they are proposed were told not to worry about them - it won't really affect us – then, when they are finally put into motion and are shown they do impact on us after all, we're told that it's all for our good. This is the policy and mindset of authoritarian regimes and I do find it truly frightening.

Hang on a mo’, Baron Heseltine

I always enjoy the BBC's weekly discussion programme Question Time, which returned for a new series last night and which is just celebrating its 30th anniversary. It's a vital part of British democracy, particularly important in a country without a guarantee of free speech but, ironically, it's been argued could never happen in the country best known for its Constitutional safeguard for open debate and argument in the media. The first programme is being repeated in full tonight (September 26^th) on the BBC Parliamentary Channel, which, sad though it may seem, I am greatly looking forward to. I remember watching the first edition. I was a late newscaster at Beacon Radio in the English Midlands (see previous Blogs of mine which have discussed this great station) that night, so was trying to view it whilst pulling together the bulletins, which ran in those days up until 1 AM. How quaint that all seems now! Although video recorders had by then come on the market I certainly didn't possess one and of course there was no streaming or opportunities to play again via the Internet, so you either saw it as it was transmitted or not at all.

 

Last night's panel looks promising and although I wouldn't say it was a vintage programme it certainly had its lively moments. What really wound me up though was the discussion on their destruction of the so-called Camp Jungle on the northern French coast. Hundreds had set up makeshift shelters, having travelled from various parts of the globe in the hope of a better life in Europe, many of them setting their sights on Britain. The French police stormed into the camp on Tuesday in a most brutal way – indeed, "liquidating" was a term used. I mean, why not go all the way and lob Zyklon B into their tents? (The current refugee issue has been compared to Europe's response to the Jewish refugee crisis of the late 1930s).

Some of the reporting of the reasons and motivations of the asylum seekers in the UK press, and even on TV, was irresponsible and vile. The idea that these refugees are targeting Britain because it is a "soft touch" in giving welfare benefits to anyone who arrives on its shores is just so off the mark it would be laughable if it didn't have the most pernicious effects on public attitudes toward such people, both general and specific. Refugees, or asylum seekers, do not get welfare benefits if and until they have gone through strenuous, often highly stressful and hostile interviewing process, with a huge amount of bureaucracy in which the slightest error -- even if it is the fault of the bureaucrats -- can result in them being denied even basic subsistence and having to rely on charities to save them from complete destitution and homelessness. Even when successful, they are not initially given any money but rather vouchers and they do not 'jump the housing queue'. They're lucky if they get any accommodation at all and if they do it will be in the worst areas which have been deemed unfit for the resident population, or put in with assorted crack addicts and violent psychotics. This often even applies to those under 18.

So why do 'they' do it? Because in the most part they have witnessed the most horrendous repression and atrocities against their families, friends and other members of their 'tribe', that their homeland gives them no hope of anything approaching what we would regard as a decent life and that they would literally rather die than go back there. They target the UK not because of its lavish welfare benefits, but because – due to a variety of historical factors - there are often others from their region or even from their wider family settled here, that if they do speak a second language it is most likely to be English, plus -- and I regard this is something of which should be proud -- despite the hostility alluded to above, it is a more tolerant society on the whole than many others in Europe. I know all this because of my direct experience with Somali refugees in Liverpool back in the 1990s and because of my more recent second-hand contacts with refugees in the Midlands, and because I try to read behind the nasty headlines and 'framing' of this story in much of the media. .

 

There was another factor in the waiting of nationalities in the Camp Jungle. There were disproportionate numbers of Afghanis and Iraqis. It will not have escaped your attention that these two countries have been in the news over the last few years. The arguments/justification is for our military interventions in the two countries will have to be explored on another Blog but whatever the motivations for our involvement and whatever the pros and cons of our current strategy in Afghanistan, the effect has been to make many hundreds of thousands homeless and result in much of the infrastructure and even basic means of survival being destroyed. This does give the UK, in particular then, a moral obligation to considering refugees from those two countries with particular sympathy.

 

So back then to Michael (Baron) Heseltine, the great Thatcher ouster, former 'Minister for Liverpool' (when the city was beset by rioting and in pre-Revolutionary mode' under its Trotskyist Council in the 1980s), former deputy prime minister, Privy Counsellor and millionaire publisher. When the question over the closure of Camp Jungle came up on the programme he claimed that all those seeking entry into the UK were economic migrants rather than refugees. When challenged by fellow panellist - the Liberal Democrat David Laws - how he could possibly know this was the case amongst all the varied stories and lives of those hundreds of people, he blustered and said: "well, if they were from Afghanistan, and they were seeking asylum they could go to the British Consulate in Kabul and put in an application there." Sorted!

The reality of a perhaps partially literate, traumatised Afghani, maybe living many miles from Kabul, having to travel over hostile territory and with the risk of being murdered by Taliban or killed by bombings and shootings from the Americans, British or other partners in the Alliance, getting through the military guard (wearing those same sort of uniforms) outside the consulate and then just simply filling out a few forms, having a nice chat and then being granted entry into the UK if their story stands up, is so fantastical and so at odds with any reality it beggars belief it could have been trotted out by someone of Heseltine's standing. I've always had a fear of being in some sort of trouble abroad and having to rely on the help or mercy of the British Consulate because I've heard so many horrendous stories about their incompetence, indifference and even hostility even to British citizens; I shudder to think how they would deal with a foreign national.

What was even more disturbing was the reaction of some of the audience to Heseltine's outburst. He got a lot of support and there was a lot of grinning and applause of his ludicrous and dangerous claims. It was the same sort of smug, bullying satisfaction I saw on the overfed faces of the suited and well groomed French ministers as they toured the destruction of Camp Jungle, oblivious or perhaps gaining a perverse satisfaction from, the wailing and distress of those hadn't yet been rounded up by the police, and the scattered, pathetic belongings of those who had.

What is it with people? Why do they gain such satisfaction from the misery of others? We know this is a difficult problem and there are no glib and easy solutions to it. We know that the UK or any other country cannot take all those who would wish to settle here but could we not start with a modicum of compassion and at least acknowledge that the vast majority of those who are seeking asylum are in a desperate state and deserving of at least a hearing and, even if we cannot grant them their wish to permanently live in the UK, a least a helping hand. It is appalling that many of those who are so callous to the feelings and of such people regard themselves as Christians. If they know anything of the Bible they know that Christ had a lot to say about our joint and individual responsibility to the stateless, the dispossessed, the hungry and the friendless. But whether you're signed up to any faith or not, these are flesh and blood human beings we're talking about, who differ from us only due to a chance of fate.

 

President Kennedy said this on June 10^th, 1963, in a speech on a different issue – the banning of above ground nuclear tests - but it does for pretty well every issue facing mankind:

For, in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal.

The Maltese Factor

I am very glad to see sunshine again here in Northwest England, after what seemed interminably grey skies and rain since we returned from a very hot, sun-drenched Malta just over a week ago. It was our first visit to the island, although I kind of felt I knew it because of the number of people I've known who have been there - not only as tourists but also those who served there with the British forces until we were kicked off the garrisons and base at the end of the '70s -- more on which below.

Vestiges of the British - the most recent and last ruler of the Maltese islands - are everywhere. The thing that first strikes you most as you leave the airport by road is that driving is on the left, which does seem very odd in a Mediterranean country! Then there is the fact that English is still an official language and that nearly all signs and advertisements are in English, plus the red post boxes and telephone kiosks.

It certainly has the most astonishing and varied history -- in fact I can't think of any place in the world which could rival it. There are temples a thousand years older than Stonehenge and some of the earliest remnants of homo sapiens, including what is alleged to be the first ever sculpture by man of man.

We couldn't afford to stay in the upmarket end (we did see the bay and the penthouse suites -- from the outside - where the Beckhams, Julia Roberts and many other 'celebs' have apartments) and had to be content with a reasonable standard hotel, with a rather varied levels of service and pretty poor food in a very touristy area, albeit where St. Paul had been shipwrecked and, as the legend says, received a very warm welcome from the islanders, and blessed them and their locale. Which was nice! The hotel did have its very own, genuine, temple. The area around that was used on several evenings for private parties, including a wedding party on our last day, and a reception and dinner for one of the island's MEPs – which, as might be imagined, did not go down terribly well with me!

The island - or rather islands - state only became part of the EU in 2004, and that after a hard-fought referendum which produced a narrow majority in favour of entering and has only been part of the Euro zone since January 1, 2008. It was a long haul for them to get into the EU and the application was suspended in the mid-1990s when the Labour party -- which was against entry -- briefly resumed power. However, it had a majority of only one and Dom Mintoff, the Prime Minister who chucked the Brits off the bases in 1979, crossed the floor of the House to vote with the hitherto deadly rivals so that the application continued. Now the island is in the EU it is benefiting greatly from the various subsidies and schemes (it was good to see how our taxes are being spent!) but it is still relatively poor and is being hit by a decline in tourism due to cheaper and "sexier" resorts in Turkey and parts of North Africa. The decline in the value of the pound versus the Euro has clearly affected tourism from Britain. The entry into the Euro zone was blamed by several locals who I talked to for massive inflation; one even said it resulted in a 100% increase in the price of basic foodstuffs, which seems a bit over the top, but there you are.

Mintoff certainly had some rather bizarre policies. Britain had ceded independence to the islands in 1964 on the same constitutional terms as other parts of the Commonwealth, e.g. Canada and New Zealand, with the Queen still nominally Head of State and who appointed a Governor- General. This was not enough for Mintoff, and his Labour-dominated Parliament declared a Republic a decade later, and five years after that the British were told to leave the bases. Fair enough: Britain is a fairly militaristic nation with a colonial history, but Mintoff rather compromised the so-called independence and neutrality of the islands by then making pacts with the Soviet Union, North Korea and, of course, Libya. History does not suggest that, if push had come to shove during the Cold War, the Soviets would not have respected the neutrality of such a strategic island and no doubt warships and missiles would have been stationed there as fast as you could say "Warsaw Pact". It is interesting that there are statues to most of the Prime Ministers and presidents over the last 40 years or so, but none to him- none I saw, anyway. The island is in fact very divided politically and political debate is very heated. Last year's general election produced a majority for the Conservative/Nationalist party - which has been in power for most of the last 22 years - by just 1500 votes.

The Brits had been there for 150 years and, uniquely, the islands as a whole were awarded the George Cross -- the country's highest civilian honour - during World War II for the few truly heroic and astonishing resistance to the most almighty pounding via Sicily, just 60 miles away (the day after Mussolini joined the Nazi side he ordered planes to bomb the islands and they suffered a Blitz, equivalent to that experienced by London and for twice as long). People were living in caves, caverns, and various makeshift underground shelters and were nearly starved out until a couple of supply ships, flanked by destroyers, several of which were bombed, limped into harbour. These are tough people for sure and although tourism is the most important part of the island's economy you don't get the same "you want it, it we provide it" approach of the Spanish; however, neither do you get the "come if you want to but don't expect this to make any concessions because we have the best culture, language, food, etc. in the world" of the French!

The French had conquered the islands and governed them a short period before the Brits but were very unpopular as they ransacked the churches and other sites of 300 years of accumulated treasures, and the locals rebelled. Prior to that it was the Knights of St. John who ruled the place and we toured, in the relative cool of the evening, a number of sites which positively oozed history; in fact it was hard to believe they were for real and not some part of the giant movie set. Quite extraordinary. The Knights had prevented the encroachment of the Islamic world and survived a siege by the Ottoman Empire. In fact, the history books talk about the two sieges of the islands -- the 1530s and the early 1940s. The strategic importance, both militarily and in religious terms, of Malta can hardly be overestimated. One guide said that it was Malta above all else that was vital in securing Christianity in Europe; a thousand other islands could be lost but, if Malta had gone, Southern Europe (and maybe further north and west) would have become Islamic in that period.

We went on an escorted trip, via ferry, to Gozo, which is supposed to be more fertile and is certainly much less affected by tourism. It has some beautiful villages and coastline, and crystal clear waters. Our guide was a local and gloriously camp. I have a fascination with tour guides as they are invariably highly idiosyncratic and with their own obsessions. This one's favourite phrase, used at least three times, was that: "Gozo is rich -- rich in standard of living and rich in history." No argument about the latter. I wondered though what it was like being a gay man in such a highly conservative island where, as he admitted, rather than six degrees of separation from knowing anyone else, you are down to two and everybody knows everybody else's business. The Catholic Church dominates culture and politics on Malta itself and the smaller islands -- there being 500 priests in Malta and only some 60 parliamentarians which, as another guide said, tells you all you need to know! Divorce and abortion are illegal and a suggestion by a priest that divorce should be permitted in certain, limited circumstances, met with the most astonishing, vitriolic attacks in the letters column of one of the newspapers. Another letter- which provoked similar opprobrium - suggested that, at last, condom machines should be installed at the University. It did make me laugh: in Britain and in many other places, we are constantly trying to get 'the kids' to use condoms, accepting the most if not all will be having various sexual adventures. All the society's ills are blamed on those women who (gasp!) go out to work - when, obviously, they should be at home looking after the house and tending to the children.

Another indication of the difference in mores between Maltese and UK society was a poster which declared: "whatever your wife says, size does matter". Underneath was a picture of Sumo wrestlers- it was advertising a local bout of that extraordinary sport. Now, full marks for the cheekiness and in probably getting the attention of most men, but it struck me that in Britain the slogan would have been: "whatever your girlfriend says…". Of course it would be unacceptable in Malta to suggest that any woman other than your wife would have any knowledge of the size of your manhood.

The churches, it has to be said, really are magnificent, even in small villages. Normally, this would be a major problem for me as it seems all wrong that poor, unsophisticated areas should put whatever resources, human and material, they have into a church. I would rather they spend such resources as they have life on this earth, and have a small, simple shrine as a place of worship, this being more in keeping with my view of what Christianity should be about. But it is clearly a focus for local life and who am I to say they are wrong?

The Festas are fantastic: we went to one just ten minutes or so from the hotel in a small village which, because of its location, was mercifully undamaged by bombing in World War II. On the week leading up to the Sunday it is very much a communal, non-church event. A local committee raises the funds and the villagers spend all year preparing for the week to commemorate whichever Saint is "allocated" to them, festooning the streets with lights, banners and wooden sculptures and statues. On the Saturday nights there are superb firework shows: the usual aerial type from a nearby field and then a series of Catherine wheels mounted on large poles in the village, which tend to have bits breaking off, sending alarming and surely dangerous pyrotechnic parts into the crowd and causing huge explosions (another source of controversy in the local 'papers) by what they call petards…as in 'hoisted by…'. These are all put together by the locals, often in their homes! Anyway, "elfnsafety" is not a phrase that seems to be particularly well-known. A fire engine was parked in a side street and there were police sauntering around, but that was about it. There was also a brass band -- another remnant, I guess, of British rule and culture.

It's become an unspoken understanding, or even tradition, that at least on one day of a family holiday I will take off on my own to do some exploring. This is partly because, unlike the rest of the family, I'm good at getting up early and being out the door within, say, twenty minutes of waking and can therefore get to places before the crowds and the heat and partly because when I am on my own I can observe more and listen more. So it was that about three days before our return I headed off on an early bus to the Maltese capital, Valletta. Ah yes, those buses! You see them everywhere and they provide a very comprehensive and very cheap mode of public transport. They are part of the idiosyncratic, British-styley nature of Malta, mostly dating from the 1960s, certainly of that type, and owned by their individual drivers, who festoon them internally and externally with unique and often quirky signs and decorations.

On this early, effectively commuter, bus to the capital, my fellow travellers at first were just two women, who did not talk to each other. One was in her early 20s I would say and immediately started playing her iPod and stared straight ahead; the other, in her mid-30s dozed off quite quickly. The happy chatter of Liverpool buses and trains of that type in the morning seemed a long way away, although things livened up when two African men joined us, who chatted and laughed in heavily accented English. There is some racial tension and even violence between the 'host' Maltese and the newly arrived immigrants.

I got off the bus at Floriana, a suburb of the capital. At first I thought I'd blown it by getting off too early and would have to take another bus or taxi into the centre but in fact it is only fairly short walk and although Floriana has a proud and distinctive individuality it is quite hard to see where it ends and the capital begins. I stopped by a statue commemorating 25 years of independence from Britain, then strolled into the centre of Valetta, which was gloriously calm and tourist - free.

I noticed a sign to the Royal British Legion and followed the side road from the main square and there, indeed, it was; in appearance just like any branch in Britain. I entered a very dark bar type area which had glass cases with many pictures, newspaper articles of Royal visits and various commemorations, paintings and other manifestations of British, along with a few models of various naval vessels and the like. A woman was rooting around in the bar area and asked if I could take some pictures. She shrugged her shoulders and didn't attempt to engage in conversation. However, after a couple of minutes the atmosphere thawed and she asked if I wanted to look into an adjacent room where there was more memorabilia and which was used for film shows and presentations of various types by a number of societies, including National Geographic. After I went back into the main area she said: "Sorry, I'm not having a good week. I didn't mean to be rude." "That's okay, I know the feeling" I said. I explained it was my first time on the island but had friends and former colleagues had been stationed there in 1979 when Mintoff kicked us off.

"You know that people think that was a terrible mistake?" she said, "they really regret that now." Had I been in the forces? This question always makes me smile because I can't imagine ever putting on a uniform unless the enemy was literally at the gate. We started chatting about people who came there -- mostly of course ex-servicemen, who naturally are getting fewer with every year. Business is bad all over, she said. She had never known anything like it in over 30 years. I asked for some bottled water which was 50 cents and gave her a €10 bill. "That's okay" I said. Keep the rest as a donation". She beamed "well, you've made my day, in fact you've changed my whole attitude" she said. Result!

I asked for her views about various local sites worth exploring, took my leave and headed off to vantage points around the city looking over the spectacular Grand Harbour, and climbing the ramparts whenever I could. The heat was already beginning to build by mid-morning, so I was glad then to have an hour or so inside an air-conditioned theatre to watch the highly commended Malta Experience multimedia show. Most of the rest of the audience were in one of several organised parties and included quite a few children. The commentary is in one of 16 languages and you pick up a headset in your seat and click the dial to the appropriate number shown on the screen. Before the show begins, you hear sweeping, majestic music and then to confirm you have selected the right language, you hear "English" or whatever. This produced giggling fits from the children who then mimicked it and then of course wanted to try the other languages. I don't know why this was funny but it made me laugh too - I suppose it was the contrast between the rather grand music and the prosaic and terse announcement made over the top. Anyway, it was a very interesting show and compressed 3 1/2 thousand years of history in about 50 minutes. I thought that one of my lectures, which covers 350 years of journalism history into the same time period, was quite ambitious, so this was quite impressive!

Well, I'm heading towards 3,000 words already and so much more I'd like to say but I must mention the newspapers and media, which were excellent. The papers are very politically biased and most of the ones I saw were very critical of the present Nationalist government. Better than that though, they were full of real, investigative reporting; including stories about police beating up a woman detainee, corruption allegations of various kinds and the treatment of immigrants/asylum seekers, with a huge row over Italy over who is responsible for those who are apprehended drifting around in all kinds of makeshift boats - from Libya amongst other places – inbetween Sicily and Malta. On radio, as well as a number of various music channels with English presentation, there is the University station, which puts out out a combination of BBC World Service and the U.K.'s Classic FM, which is a pretty good combination I think. This may of course change during semester time. Anyway, I was very impressed at an island this size could produce such strong local media.

So, an interesting place or sure but if I went again it would have to be in spring or autumn, as the mid-summer temperatures are too hot for an Englishman.

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They don't make 'em like Macklin any more

I'm beginning to get slightly anxious about summer holidays, as bad things seem to happen while I'm away. Of course, I realise it just seems that way; that "things" are happening all the time but they register more when you are not at home and able to deal with them first hand. One of my very best friends died while I was on holiday one August and I arrived home to hear a tearful series of ‘phone messages from his widow -- one of them just a few hours after he had died -- telling me the bad news and then later the details of the funeral, which I had by then missed. That was a few years ago, before mobile phones, e-mail and Facebook were so ubiquitous.

 

Despite all these modern tools of communication and social networking I did not discover that my former colleague, the excellent and much loved all-round journalist and broadcaster Keith Macklin had died until after my return from France. I was there this time back just in time for the funeral, which was held at Blackburn Cathedral on Tuesday. Quite rightly, whose passing was noted by several of the national newspapers in their obituary pages, as well as on the local radio stations which he served so well over so many years.

 

I knew him when I joined Red Rose Radio in Preston in 1986, where he was the initial Programme Controller (PC), as well as presenter of a daily programme, Midday with Macklin -- alliteration always too good to miss in local radio schedules! By his own cheerful admission though, neither the attention to detail and administrative chores associated with being a PC, nor the styles and conventions of modern music-led local radio presentation were his forte and I think he'd quite willingly stepped back from both. By the time I joined the station he was well and truly back on his comfort zone of reporting, commentating and interviewing in the sports area, although also presenting a weekly classical music programme and fronting various ‘specials’; one I remember was on the cellist Jacqueline du Pre – commercial local radio did that kinda thing in them days! Keith had varied interests and a well stocked mind and followed the great journalism advice of “knowing something about everything and everything about something” – the second ‘something’ in his case undoubtedly being Rugby League, on which he also wrote for The Times for so many years.  

 

Although I knew the name, having been brought up in the Midlands and immediately before being in the north-east of England and before that in Germany, I was not overly familiar with his work, but my in-laws certainly were and they were very impressed that I would be working alongside this great man! In fact, my desk was immediately behind his in the newsroom and so I had the opportunity of a lot of banter with him. He was something of a father - or perhaps uncle - figure to us young, always exclusively male, broadcasters and journalists. He was, in the best sense, a solid and reassuring presence and someone who although didn't offer unsolicited advice, was certainly willing to impart it if requested and I'm sure that if any of us had any difficulties in the marital, financial or professional stakes he would be an excellent sounding board. Perhaps even more importantly, although it was a very happy station in my time there, he acted as a sort of break on any bitchy conversations.

 

I sometimes presented the daily half hour Red Rose Reports – a fiendishly complex feat of presentation and technical dexterity for the person ‘fronting’ the programme in those analogue days, when every audio insert, commercial, jingle, etc., was on a separate ‘cart’; I would always end that half hour with what became knows as the ‘Red Rose Flush’. Keith of course, sitting opposite me, was unperturbed and unflappable throughout.  I swear he was sometimes humming a piece of classical music when the mic’s were closed…perhaps even when they were open!!

 

He was sitting in the same place when I went back to do some freelance work in the mid-‘90s and, trooper that he is, some 10 years after THAT he even agreed to do sports’ coverage for a short-term station in Liverpool, that was put on air to support a licence application for a full-time station, which was headed by ex-Red Rose management and for which I presented the breakfast show. He was still exactly the same: “Hel-LO Richard, how marvellous to see you/hear from you”, etc, in that fabulous, mellifluous voice of his. And although he was equally charming with everyone else, you certainly felt as if he was genuinely pleased to work with you again.  I never heard him say anything bad about anyone or anyone say anything bad about him and although the radio industry is probably not quite as nasty as many people believe, that is still quite a rare thing. More than that, he was genuinely liked by all. Certainly, everyone has their favourite, fond, Keith Macklin anecdote or two!

 

The funeral itself was as good as these things can be, with a friend from his days at Prescot Grammar School, Alan Jones, delivering one of the eulogies and, in reflection of his candour "career" as they Methodist lay preacher, there was also one from Canon Chris Chivers.

 

Considering it was the middle of August it was an excellent turnout, with many of his former colleagues in the broadcasting and journalism worlds, alongside rugby league and footie players, and of course his extended family.

 

Funerals are inevitably also a reunion and although it seems in poor taste to gain pleasure from seeing people in such circumstances, once the formalities over I feel less inhibited and we had some great conversations in the crypt of the cathedral, where refreshments had been laid on, and in the tour of the BBC Radio Lancashire Studios, which are just over the road. It was from the ‘radio theatre’ there that John Gillmore -- who put together an audio montage of Keith’s work for the funeral -- presented an hour-long tribute special. I was delighted to make a small contribution at the end of this, alongside my former Red Rose Radio colleagues Dave Shearer and Rod Hardisty. The ‘edited highlights’ of the programme are on my Podcast page.

 

Anyway, it was as they say a good send-off. And given that he was 78 not so sad, of course, as for the premature deaths of younger broadcasters but I was sorry to read and to hear that the last 18 months of his life had been so difficult medically and also that he seemed to have so many regrets about his life. Given the obvious and clearly sincere affection so many had for him it is hard to understand this, but perhaps his physical condition also affected his mental state and certainly there was tragedy in the family, as one of his daughters predeceased in him. Who knows? We all have to come to terms with what we do and what we have done but in Keith's case I should've thought there was room for few regrets and few of us can hope to be as well remembered as him. I am certainly very, very glad to have known him.

I must also say that I found Lancashire folk, especially in the Preston and Blackburn areas, as friendly as I remember them from my time at the station. I was advised by the Cathedral authorities that parking was very limited and difficult in the area, so I went on public transport from home all the way there and back and it was a pleasure to see so many people -- including those who were obviously strangers until then  -- chatting to each other and helping each other out. A good feeling and a real antidote to all the depressing news and the zeitgeist there seems to be about our supposed ‘broken society’, etc. It just ain’t so, you know…

 

 

 

Pretty vacances

Isn't the Internet great? In the past you could really only bore friends, family and colleagues with your holiday snaps and Journal but now some 2 billion people have the potential to be bored by them!

 

I recently returned from holiday in Evian in the Haute Savoie region of France – on Lac Leman, or Lake Geneva, as the French definitely don't like to call it. Yes, the place where the spring water comes from and, yes, we did fill our bottles form a free source, straight off the mountain and delicious it was. To place it further: about halfway down the eastern side of France, near the border of Switzerland . Just up from the lake and you are in the foothills of the the Les Memises section of the Alps, so if you lakes and mountains as I do then it's a pretty good spot. Just up from the main town of Evian in the wooded hillsides are the very posh hotels where world leaders tend to stay and are helicoptered into and out of during summits such as the G8, or more recently the EU summit. We've been to the area several times before, winter for the skiing and summer and my mum had a very small studio flat – well, as she's trying to sell it, I should say "compact and surprisingly spacious apartment" - in Thollon les Memises. That's about 1000 feet above the lake and then you get a Telecabin -- or walk if you're feeling especially energetic – for another 1000 feet or so to get into the mountains. Before we mostly stayed in Thollon, although once we also had a couple of days in a hotel at Evian. The apartment we stayed in there this time belongs to friends of my mum and is right in the town centre.

 

As per usual, we picked up a hire car at Geneva airport and this time also delivered it back to the Swiss side. It's a right performance otherwise going round Geneva and so we had to keep going in and out of different countries! My wife generally drives and I navigate, which a lot of people think is a bit odd. Even in these supposedly no - sexist times I get some funny looks from men in particular when they realise I 'allow' my wife to drive out of choice rather than necessity (i.e. even when I haven't had a skinful and I certainly have been banned from driving) as if my wife must have my balls, instead of a pair of furry dice, hanging from the rear-view mirror! But the fact is she is a very good driver and tends to get less stressed in strange places! Anyhow, she is a terrible passenger, certainly with me in the driving seat, claiming that I drive too fast and aggressively. I reject this view but it is true that I don't especially enjoy driving and she does and I quite enjoy navigating and she doesn't, so there we are. This is how a partnership should work! The only thing I would say I was better at than her in the driving stakes is reverse parallel parking, but this seems to be very common: clearly a guy thing!

So anyway my mum is waiting for us when we arrive -- she got there a day or two ahead of us -- and the apartment owners had also kindly arranged for us to have a pass for the conveniently located underground car park. However, there was a bit of a kafuffle over this as the scanning device didn't seem to want to recognise the card. A trip to the town hall which issued the card brought further instructions and reassurance and we got it right by the second or third day!

There is plenty of opportunity though for other forms of transport more to my liking: a funicular, revived just a few years ago, which takes you from the low to the high town and those posh hotels I mentioned; the aforementioned Telecabin to take you to 'the tops' and of course various forms of transport on the Lac, various boat trips, excursions and self hire boats of various descriptions. We took advantage of most of these during our stay and I also braved the waters of the lake which is, as they say, "nice once you're in". Unfortunately, though, the official Lido insists on you wearing Speedos, rather than the usual bathing shorts which most favour today. As none of the males in our party possess such items, and frankly, only my son would get away with wearing them and he's too embarrassed to do so, we had to give that a miss. Apparently, this rule is for hygiene reasons, which I must say is a bit rich from what it is –FACT!-the nation with the worst personal hygiene and cleanliness record!

We did have a road trip out to see friends at their magnificent chalet in Le Gets. It's in a glorious spot what feels like the top of the world and I am so impressed with the work they have done on the chalets themselves. He is a builder and is obviously naturally gifted in these areas where as I am to DIY what Abu Hamza is to touch typing.

We have interesting conversations about academic life -- his wife and mine are both teachers -- and he is quite the windup merchant to them but very supportive of me. When I marvel at his practical abilities he says I could do it all – there are books these days, etc. That is kind of him but the fact is that since I tend to woodwork were ridiculed by my woodwork teacher at school – hilariously, called Mr Wood -- at the age of 11 I decided that this was not going to be one of my strong points. I think we should stick to what we do best and I'm quite happy to pay people to do a professional job which they will do so much better than I could and in about a tenth of the time. On the same basis, I trust they will not come to the University and offer to do lectures for free!

The view from our friends' chalet at Les Gets

 

On Sunday I accompany mum to the chapel in the local church, pretty well next to the apartment, which has an Anglican service in English. I explained to the Minister on arrival that I'm a Methodist, nonconformist, and don't go in for this high church, communion business but he welcomes me anyway and very nicely pointers to the order of service and says he will follow it very strictly. I take to him very much and the little chapel is packed -- about 30, literally standing room only by the end. The Minister uses his sermon to deliver an impassioned attack on the wealthy, explicitly well-to-do middle classes who formed his congregation, even mentioning one by name! It must be wonderful to be a minister; in any other social sphere those sorts of comments would surely provoke a fight at the very least!

Afterwards, as the main, Catholic church fills up, we repaired to a local cafe. Extra seats are dragged from the waiters from the other areas and I have some interesting conversations with some of my fellow churchgoers. They are quite a mixed bunch with varied backgrounds and several nationalities, including an American who is returning home to Ohio after 18 years in that part of Europe. Opposite me is a guy who used to be head of the education authority in our major English town and his daughter works as a kind of police/social service liaison officer in said town. I start to talk about the excellent series on the BBC about crime in Britain today and on the causes and possible remedies of the appalling and senseless violence in pretty well every town and city in Britain, particularly the weekend. One of the things the programme showed was that women are becoming as bad as the men and indeed are the protaganists in a fair number of domestic violence incidents. My conversationalist agrees the female of the species is more deadly than the male and it's not unknown for them to smash a bottle and sever their (by then presumably ex) boyfriend's penis, laughing all the while. Can this be true? Is this otherwise blameless town and many others full of young men with severed members? I think we should be told! Then the Minister sat by me and we had a very long conversation about the politics of France, the history between the church and state, the attitudes and future of Anglicanism, and much more. Just a few nuggets from this conversation: apparently the mountain village at the top where my mom had her place had the highest percentage of votes for be National Front in the whole of France. Rural areas, he says, are very right wing. Apparently the full separation between church and state only happened in France in 1905 and has a long and very unfortunate history of collaboration between the Catholic Church and right-wing elements, of course we know from the Nazi period, but interesting all the same.

 

Despite the above critical remarks about the French I must say that the locals and tourists -- the vast majority of whom were French and very few of whom spoke in English, or cracked on they didn't anyway! -- were absolutely charming. The children, in particular were a delight. The apartment though was right in the town centre and therefore we got a lot of noise from the bars late night and youths returning 'home' at say two or three in the morning shouting obscenities (I think that even obscenities sound charming in French!) and kicking and jumping on the rubbish recycling containers outside. Then early morning we get said rubbish recycling bins emptied, things start to be set up, the streets are cleaned, even the church roof has weed-killers type stuff on it to stop the moss growing, and twice a week there is a market right outside. This turned out to be a real joy and, inevitably, including a number of excellent cheese stalls! But you can't get away from Liverpool: two boys are busking, they are very surely far too young to be doing this legally, say around about nine and seven, and: what was top of their repertoire, accompanied by piano accordion and cymbals? Liverpool Lou!

 

And, my, it is so expensive there I thought of doing a bit of busking myself -- it's always been price, being so close to Switzerland I suppose, and with the fall in the value of the pound is now eye-wateringly so. In my view though it is no going on holiday and worryingly about the money, so what the heck! Plus we did have our wedding anniversary while we are out there -- our 26th, which means I've now been married exactly half of my life. It would mortify and embarrass my wife to say this but I feel so lucky that she has put up with me for all this time, and when I wake and look at her (she is usually still sleeping!) I think how gorgeous she is and wonder what she saw in me. I know, I know….

 

 

 

 

A Class Act?

The least surprising yet most revealing survey and report of recent times was the Alan Milburn led study into class and mobility. It was published the same day as the graduation ceremony for the Class of '09 journalism students at 'my' university. For my thoughts on all this, including the significance of the impact of feminisation of newsrooms, you will 'have' to download or at least listen to my Podcast which if you are listening some time after July '09 has the same title as this Blog. Sorry, but there it is!

A Night to Remember

I've been trying very hard to concentrate on urgent tasks and meeting urgent deadlines today but the anniversary of the first moon landing has been just a trifle distracting. I've just finished watching a replay of a BBC-4 (TV) special programme broadcast five years ago, which put together archive footage of the BBC's coverage, with other bits and pieces. The reason for the 'bits and pieces' is that, amazingly, the BBC did not archive a complete recording of its coverage and has had to rely to some extent on viewers' home recordings of the output. Outrageous! Those spools of two inch wide video tape were very expensive, and bulky to store (I know, I used to lug them around as part of my duties d with BFBS Television years later) but still..! The BBC did archive all its election night coverage and replays these from time to time on the Parliamentary Channel – absolute gold-dust for media historians and political anoraks like me!! - but I guess they thought that people would only want to see the footage of the landing and moonwalk, not all the rest of the stuff. How wrong they were! Even worse was the archiving of rival ITN's coverage. Their pride and joy was a then new 'caption generator' which could put up details of what was going on at the bottom of the screen without blabbing all over the radio communications to and from Mission Control. However, when the Eagle landed ("…there's a bunch of guys about to turn blue we're breathing again, thanks a lot...") it actually read 'Ouchdown' – the 'T' had failed to materialise! In the later Apollo missions, and when we had colour transmissions (colour TV was introduced on the main UK TV channels in November 1969) both channels had this device and the caption "Live From The Moon" must go down as the most remarkable of all time

 

But back to the achievement itself…the more distance there is from the event the more remarkable it seems. The on-board computer (which was the smallest of the time, leading the way to personal home computers) has just thousandths of the power as the one I am using to compose and send this. The determination – and finance- for such a risky operation was brought about of course because of the Cold War and the fear that the Soviet Union ( which had put the first man in space and whose exploits I eagerly followed as a very young child of four or five) would be seen to be scientifically and militarily superior to the United States. And standing at the back of the Control Room in Houston during Apollo 11 was Werner von Braun, the Nazi rocket scientist, who had used slave labour to build the V2 rockets which landed in the south-east of Britain with such devastating effect in the last year of World War 11 (indeed, my Mum was in London during this period and remembers them VERY well!) Von Braun, along with others, had been given immunity from prosecution as a Nazi war criminal so long as he helped the United States with its military "hardware". But then, the most significant inventions and achievements have mostly been driven by the desire for military superiority, or the fear that the enemy, or potential enemy, might be about to launch a surprise attack. Certainly, radio was given a huge boost before and during World War One because of this and the Internet was developed because the Americans were terrified that the Soviets would explode a nuclear bomb over the country, not to devastate cities but to send an enormous Electric Magnetic Pulse, which would destroy its communications systems. So there was a need for thousands of alternative ways of transmitting messages and codes. Sorry for the history lesson but I thought it worth pointing out at this juncture!

 

Anyway, it was an astonishing achievement and certainly captured the world's imagination, and the ability to witness it simultaneously with millions of others around the globe through television made it all the more amazing. It's also worth pointing out that the first communications' satellite, allowing live television pictures between the United States and Europe, had only been in position for seven years, and now we were seeing pictures from the moon! It was of course vital for public relations terms that the American public could see how their $1.4 million of taxes in today's prices was being spent and indeed this was why the actual moonwalk took place earlier than scheduled. The reproduction of the special edition of The Times today quotes Neal Armstrong suggesting that the new time would be 8 PM in Houston. "That's peak viewing time, isn't it?" he said.

I was captivated by the Apollo programme and cut out all the newspaper articles and fact today I was just looking at the special flight plan which has survived in my grandly titled "Man on the Moon" folders which have travelled with me over the years. I guess at 12 years old I was about the perfect age for it; old enough to understand what was going on and to follow the detail of the missions but not too old to be cynical or to try and be "cool" about it. Needless to say, I was there recording the landing and moonwalk with my still relatively new and still very modern cassette tape recorder, sticking the microphone in front of the TV speaker (and so picking up some of the conversation of the family around me) both for the Lunar Module landing on the Sunday night and then for the first moonwalk in the early hours of the following morning.

It was very hard to go to sleep that night; the TV channels had been given special permission -- yes permission was needed! -- to stay on overnight (the first time that happened) and, after sneaking out to look at the moon with wonder, I reluctantly went to bed and set my alarm for very early the next morning. I remember tuning through the radio dial under the covers, listening to the various broadcasts from Europe, including the Voice of America, the American Forces Network and, for an alternative take on the news, Radio Moscow. I think it came third or fourth in the news bulletin there, after the usual boasts of increasing tractor production in the Ukraine or whatever! Anyway, I did doze off and awoke with a start at around 3.30 a.m., switched on the radio and heard that the hatch door was open! I scrambled downstairs and, as quietly as I could, put the TV on in time to see Armstrong step down from the craft and utter those immortal, if slightly disputed, lines.

I think my dad was a bit disappointed when he came in an hour and a half or so later. "Oh, they've already stepped out already have they?" he said. But, of course, it was an ordinary working day, indeed an ordinary school day. That really annoyed me -- surely we could have had the day off? I know now of course it would have been difficult to arrange; the local education authority would have had to make special arrangements, what if they project had been delayed or abandoned? Etc., etc. However, also that month there was to me utterly pointless and meaningless investiture of the Prince of Wales, for which we were given the day off, due to the fact that the Acting Headmaster was Welsh! This seemed to me a ludicrous way of prioritising these events and I don't think I ever quite got over that in terms of my attitude towards school!

Of course there had been a lead-up to the moon landing and to some extent at the time I think it just seemed like the logical next stage. And we just assumed that these remarkable things that were happening in the '60s -- England being world championships at football (sorry to rub it in but it just seemed quite natural at the time!), this most amazing music that was happening and now the moon shots – would just keep occurring. It seemed that my childhood and early adolescence was just one amazing thrill after another. I'm sure many would not have believed in 1972, when the last Apollo mission took place, that in all these years since we would never have gone back to the moon. Seeing the earth from the moon – this tiny, gorgeous blob hanging by invisible forces in space, lonely and fragile - also had an effect on me, as it did to many others.

I still become very emotional watching the TV coverage replays and indeed I get choked when I hear the audio of the landing and have it on my iPod for inspiration. It is the combination of the calm, matter - of - fact manner in the communications (e.g. the remark "picking up some dust" was MOON dust!), with the knowledge that something absolutely astonishing that had never been done before in the 100,000 years or so of man's existence was happening and we were all there witnessing it: right there, right then. We now know how close they were to disaster; that the "30 seconds" warning from Mission Control was that there was only that amount of fuel left; that Armstrong was guiding the craft manually and only just missed a very deep crater which could have been fatal (his heart-rate was 156 bpm at that stage); that President Nixon had prepared a broadcast to the nation in the event of the astronauts dying either on the moon or at some stage on the return journey - which seemed quite likely - and that Buzz Aldrin was terrified of shutting the Lunar Module door on his way out as there were handles only on the inside! That would have been a DOH! moment for sure.

 

And finally, so I can post this message at the exact time that the Eagle landed, I will conclude with the lyrics from Monty Python's The Galaxy Song, which I also find inspirational, as well as very funny. And you can't ask for more than that! Thanks, as ever, taking the time to read my witterings.

 

Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving
And revolving at nine hundred miles an hour,
That's orbiting at nineteen miles a second, so it's reckoned,
A sun that is the source of all our power.
The sun and you and me and all the stars that we can see
Are moving at a million miles a day
In an outer spiral arm, at forty thousand miles an hour,
Of the galaxy we call the 'Milky Way'.
Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars.
It's a hundred thousand light years side to side.
It bulges in the middle, sixteen thousand light years thick,
But out by us, it's just three thousand light years wide.
We're thirty thousand light years from galactic central point.
We go 'round every two hundred million years,
And our galaxy is only one of millions of billions
In this amazing and expanding universe.

The universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding
In all of the directions it can whizz
As fast as it can go, at the speed of light, you know,
Twelve million miles a minute, and that's the fastest speed there is.
So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,
How amazingly unlikely is your birth,
And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space,
'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth.