PHYSICIANS HEAL THYSELVES !

Having been quite unwell over the Summer myself - with an illness for which Swine Flu seems to have been in part the catalyst - I have some rare sympathy for Gordon Brown, if reports of his need for pain killers and anti-depressants are true, and, indeed, it they are not. For I also happen to disapprove of the over-prescribing of legal drugs, of which the recent sad death of Michael Jackson is a cautionary tale.

Therefore, notwithstanding my considerable discomfort, I was actually glad to have a taste of my own medicine when refused drugs on the grounds that these might make the condition worse. I am now largely recovered, and, I have to say, the Pantomime of the New Labour Conference seems to be just what the doctor should have ordered to cheer me up !

Enter the gloriously camp Peter Mandelson with his description of Conservative Party Leader David Cameron as a "flibbertigibbet" ("A silly, scatterbrained, or garrulous person" for those of you who didn't know). What a wonderfully appropriate term for the Pantomime Dame himself : aka former Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott. Might I suggest that "Flibbertigibbet" would be an excellent name for Mr Prescott's much-hailed blog !

Returning to serious matters, I strongly suspect that 12 years of New Labour Misrule has also been a contributory factor in my own recent disposition. Therefore, I'm going to suggest to Mr Brown and his colleagues that the well-being of us all - socially inclusive, that is - should improve once they leave office. Physicians Heal Thyselves & Things Can Only Get Better !

SOME RAIL GOOD NEWS FROM WOOLWICH

Those of us who attended the Thames Gateway Bridge Planning Inquiry between 2005-6 will remember that the London Borough of Greenwich, who had been a leading opponent of an earlier version of this project, made much of its importance to the regeneration of Woolwich.

Incidentally, if this long running inquiry of nearly a year's duration had taken place in Woolwich, rather than Charlton Athletic Football Club, the economy of that town, and birthplace of the famous Arsenal FC, might well have benefited.

However, the Planning Inspector recommended against the Thames Gateway Bridge in 2007, and the new Chairman of Transport for London Mayor Boris Johnson scrapped the scheme last year, notwithstanding continuing efforts by the likes of Greenwich Council to revive it.

Now it has been announced that TfL has a joint venture partner for two rail transport related commercial development projects in Woolwich, and that planning applications for these are anticipated next year.

My view has always been that the regeneration benefits of rail investment for Woolwich town centre and the Royal Arsenal areas are much more significant than any potential contribution of a road-based river crossing which has the major environmental objections of the TGB.

TAKING US ALL TO THE CLEANERS

Jonathon Porrit's departure from Chair of the Government's Sustainable Development Commission has generated a good deal of green rancour on the part of the great man. Newspapers report a fall-out with the prime mover in green slime himself, Lord Mandelson.

However, the fact that this Government prefers the nuclear option to renewables should surely come as no surprise to someone as intelligent as Sir Jonathon. After all, the Prime Minister's own expenses showed he shared a cleaner with his brother, who he is top PR man for the industry.

The Problem of Resource Misallocation

Since the publication of my previous post, there has been an ongoing argument amongst British Government ministers, politicians of other parties and senior figures in the Armed Services about whether this country's front line soldiers in Afghanistan are adequately resourced. In fact, the problem is more likely to be one of misallocated resources : for as Deputy Leader of the Labour Party Harriet Harman - and someone with whom I rarely agree - has pointed out, Britain's "defence" expenditure is the second largest in the world, presumably after the United States, in real terms.

This problem of resource misallocation is , I would suggest, as much a contemporary "British Disease" as lack of productivity was in earlier times, and, indeed, it may be argued that the two are closely allied. Take, for instance, "a little local difficulty", to quote former British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, with which I have been wrestling in recent monthss.

I have been concerned for some time about the state of Worcester's iconic Foregate Street Railway bridge , which passes above a busy thoroughfare. It has been pointed out to me that basic lack of maintenance of this heritage-listed Victorian iron bridge is causing structural damage. As a consequence, I often visually inspect said structure when passing underneath. Last week, I noticed that a bracket attached to a horizontal metal beam was broken and the beam had started to sag. I drew this problem to the attention of staff at the adjoining railway station; and bracket and beam have since been secured with a (very high tech !) piece of wire. This is just as well because a bus stop is located immediately below.

Needless to say there are various stakeholders involved in the future of Foregate Street Railway Bridge : namely Network Rail (who own the structure) together with Worcestershire County Council, who have responsibility for sub-regional integrated transport planning. The lesser players are train operating company London Midland, who run Foregate Street Station, and the City Council, who are the local planning authority and responsible for heritage conservation. I think it's fair to say that these secondary stakeholders, who are most directly affected by the state of the bridge, would very much like to see this structure and the station regenerated.

By contrast, the main obstacles to such regeneration appear to be the infrastructure owner, Network Rail, and, in particular, Worcestershire County Council. The latter has for some years run a concerted campaign to have a strategic rail parkway station constructed to the south east of the current Worcester boundary, and takes little interest interest in the City's two existing railway stations, of which Foregate Street is one. The other, Shrub Hill, was placed on the English Heritage At Risk Register last year, but subsequent investment by the Railway Heritage Trust (part of Network Rail) has brought some respite for that station.

So what is Network Rail doing about Foregate Street Railway Bridge and Station ? I think it's a testimony to the apparent disinterest hitherto of this organisation that a sign on the wall immediately below the structure informs passers-by to contact - in the event of a problem -RailTrack, the deceased private sector company from which Network Rail took over ownership and operation of Britain's railway infrastructure in 2002. As far as I can make out, Network Rail is a sort of quango which means that it operates much of the time along mysterious lines. As regular media coverage also testifies, the company appears to have a strong preference - shared, incidentally, by Worcestershire County Council - for grand prestige projects which distract it from smaller, but nevertheless essential, resource allocations.

An all-too-familiar story, I suspect !

British Foreign Policy

Having been personally grounded for some time - an experience I highly recommend to jet setters and other high fliers - I'm conscious that the downside of this may be a point of view which is insufficiently internationalist, so today I want to reflect on Britain's foreign policy.

The death of British Armed Service Men and Women in Afghanistan is a tragedy. Leaving aside the rationale for their presence in the country, Britain must recompense and resource them adequately whilst they are there. This is not presently the case.

However, the experience of other military campaigns in that country - and notably of the former Soviet Union in the 1980s - suggests that the situation in Afghanistan will continue to be extremely difficult for NATO forces.

A basic issue, which seems to un/under-recognised by Western Governments is the sheer numbers of young men willing to fight for the Taliban and similar tribal/religious causes. In short, this is a war involving "the many" on "the other side".

Therefore, it is only when the citizens of conflict zones themselves take up arms against the perpetrators of tribal and religious violence - as happened recently in Pakistan - that there is any real prospect of "winning the war".

For most Western leaders and technocrats - military and civilian - old-fashioned and prolonged conflict "on foreign ground" - and very difficult ground in the case of Afghanistan - is, I suspect, still alien territory.

The challenge for British Foreign Policy on this, and other issues, is, I would suggest, to find its feet again. Understanding the demographics of conflict zones, including the role of very large, and increasing, numbers of un/under-employed young men is an area worthy of greater policy research.

However, please do not pretend that the so-called "Beautiful Game (ie football) can solve the problems of those countries where former Western foreign policy (notably of Britain and Russia during earlier colonial regimes) was known as the "Great Game".

A New Breed of Climate Change Protester ?

Whilst the President is Away
The Turtles will Delay....

With the G8's latest pronouncements on climate change just made, has a new breed of protester revealed their dissatisfaction with the latest proposals ?

From pa.press.net : Turtle invasion delays flights

A runway at New York's Kennedy Airport had to be shut down after 78 turtles emerged from a nearby bay and crawled onto the tarmac.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey said ground crews rounded up the wayward reptiles in about 35 minutes and deposited them back in the water, farther from airport property.

The shutdown disrupted flight schedules, with delays climbing to more than an hour.

My Search for Enlightenment is Well Rewarded

Whilst separately researching sustainable construction and earth-based spirituality (as reflected in the historic environment), I came upon a fusion of the two subjects in The Arch Druid Report http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com/ @ Energy Bulletin http://www.energybulletin.net/

My researches thus rewarded in this Zen-like enlightenment, I can heartily recommend both these sites.

Need "To Shrink" the State of Britain.

On 26 June, I reflected on the United States government policy of "City Shrinking" and noted that our former Deputy Prime Minister was something of a convert to this way of thinking, in the context of some old Northern industrial areas over here. I also noted that Mr Prescott acknowledged the need for a "Shrink" (ie psychological counsellor) himself with respect to an eating disorder.

Today, I want to reflect again on these two meanings of "shrink" (verb and noun), this time with regard to the state of Britain.

Yesterday, Deborah Orr, writing in The Independent newspaper, recommended that the state needed to be significantly, but also selectively, reduced in size, a view with which I concur.

However, I would also suggest that our "State", like Mr Prescott, also needs a Shrink. The lengthy reading lists for the public British Broadcasting Corporation's "Headroom Campaign", intended to help people deal with "depression" and make them happier are a case in point : for amongst these lists, I would suggest, are a number of volumes likely to have precisely the opposite effect on most people. But perhaps "misery" is essential to state/media control.

RE-BUILDING BRITAIN'S FUTURE

An article in today's Financial Times refers to "...corporate oligarchies, poor governance and a lack of focus on productivity, innovation and global competitiveness".

The article was not, however, referring to major parts of the British economy and public services - although it might have been - but to "countries in Latin America and elsewhere" unable to rise "to the ranks of the developed nations" due to the above problems. However, we in the UK should pay heed to these and related issues.

Thus whilst some of measures announced by the British Government under the umbrella of "Building Britain's Future", including a re-allocation of funds withing the Homes and Communities Agency to enable the construction of more "social" housing, are to be welcomed, present and future administrations must fully acknowledge underlying structural problems.

The founding Chairman of the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment, Sir Stuart Lipton - himself a highly successful property developer - has been one of the most perceptive observers of the strengths and, equally important, structural weaknesses of the British house-building and construction sectors.

These structural weaknesses have been thrown into relief by the current economic cycle and need to be rectified as a matter of urgency in the interests of "Building Britain's Future". However, there is little indication as yet that either the present Government or the leadership of the other main political parties is up to this task.

Problem of House-building Advocacy Gravy Train

In my post of 4 June on the need for some new enlightenment on housing issues, I referred to the ineffectiveness of the government-funded house-building advocacy sector and the need for this particular gravy train to be shunted into the sidings.

News that former housing minister Nick Raynsford MP earns a comfortable £148 000 on top of his parliamentary salary (and expenses) "from six private sector posts - mostly connected to housing" in today's Metro newspaper is the other side of this particular coin, of course.

THE TRAIN TO STOKE-ON-TRENT.....

In the light of recent posts (see below), this is the real and metaphorical journey that I would recommend to British planning policy makers, and, for that matter, cultural commentators.

Please see also :
http://janetmackinnon.wordpress.com & http://witchofworcester.wordpress.com on related themes.

America's Shrinking Cities & Unsustainable Settlements

The United States, following in the tradition of Britain, has been a globaliser of the dubious enterprise, long before the latest sub-prime mortgage fiasco wreaked havoc on the world's financial markets and plunged international economies into a truly global recession.

Thus I listened with some alarm to an item on BBC Radio 4 this morning about "Shrinking America's Cities", a "plan", I fear, which will find new enthusiasts in this country and elsewhere.

It is well known that many older industrial cities in the United States have experienced a massive flight of people both to suburban areas, and to other parts of the country. This flight, incidentally, has been largely, but by no means exclusively, of white middle class people to more desirable neighbourhoods and states, or so they thought.

In fact, the flight has brought unsustainable population growth to precisely those parts of the United States most vulnerable to natural disasters and, therefore, climate change, such as California and Florida. Moreover, the State of California now has its own economic woes comparable to those of the so-called "Rust Belt".

It is the cities of this "Rust Belt", mainly to the north and east of the country, which are the main targets for the latest "Shrinking Plan", notwithstanding that many are well-situated and have good basic infrastructure : unlike many of the apparently desirable suburbs and new settlements of Florida, for instance.

So what does shrinking actually entail ?: essentially knocking down abandoned homes, retail centres and former employment areas and not replacing these with new development; or "rationalising the physical layout of the city", according to one exponent of the plan.

It should come as no surprise, of course, that an earlier recruit to the "Shrinking City Plan" - and who has himself subsequently revealed a need for the services of a "Shrink" (ie psychological counsellor) with regard to a personal eating disorder - was none other than former Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott*.

This brings me in turn to the subject of food, and why urban abandonment** should not be encouraged by policy makers, particularly in our rather smaller country than the United States : excessive suburbanisation and new settlement growth generally consume agricultural land, if not natural areas, which may well be required to sustain future populations.

* Some readers may feel that I've been unfair in highlighting Mr Prescott's condition. However, I would suggest that daft ideas are always waiting to seed themselves in the political psyche, and this should serve as warning to the next generation of politicians Over Here and, indeed, Over There.

Moreover, the spatial distribution of populations within countries and internationally, along with food production and consumption, will be amongst the most important issues facing nation states and the global community in the present century.

** Except where environmental factors make this necessary.

The New Road to Milton Keynes.....

I returned again yesterday to my reading of John Brannigan's* excellent book on "Literature in England, 1945-2000", sub-titled "Orwell to the Present" (well not quite the present, the book was published in 2003).

Nevertheless, Brannigan's choice of post-war English literary subjects is remarkably prescient. By way of illustration, early on he quotes from Richard Goodwin's poem "Return to England" which refers to none other than :

"the headline bankers, the spinners of captions,
the millionaires -"

This sounds rather familiar ! However, it is on the opening of the later chapter entitled "English Journeys" that I want to focus today.

In this, Brannigan returns to "the summer of 1983" when the novelist "Beryl Bainbridge joined a BBC television crew in a journey around England" :

"Bainbridge retraced the journey undertaken by J B Priestley fifty years earlier....'English Journey, or The Road to Milton Keynes' pays homage to Priestley, and, as its sub-title suggests, also to Orwell's 'The Road to Wigan Pier' (1937)".

Eventually arriving at Milton Keynes, Bainbridge finds :

"....'a cathedral dedicated to the worship of the credit card, a place where people could come and pay their respects to the consumer society'"

She also finds : "...it's housing estates empty, its shopping arcades derelict, and an architectural planner who tells her that 'no one had foreseen a recession and unemployment.'"

Once again, this sounds all too familiar : please see below my post of yesterday.


* I have also referred to this work @ http://witchofworcester.wordpress.com/ in a post of 3 June 2009.

Housing : From Growth Hotspot to Negative Equity

Yesterday's report in the Financial Times based on data released by credit agency FitchRatings made interesting reading. The top 10 cities and postcodes with the highest proportion of loans in negative equity (by % number of borrowers) was something of a revelation. As the article pointed out :

"The range of locations showing either a high percentage of borrowers in negative equity or a high proportion of loans under water is striking. In central Birmingham, 31.2% of borrowers, representing 37.4 % of loans by value, are in negative equity, while the countryside around Cambridge, where house prices rose sharply in recent years, has also suffered badly".

However, whilst house price falls in major cities such as Birmingham and Manchester - Salford Quays also has a high proportion of loans in negative equity - significantly reflect unsustainable levels of apartment-building, the situation in the East of England's "growth triangle" of Cambridge, Peterborough and Northampton is more surprising.

For it is in fact Northampton which is currently the UK's epicentre of negative equity, according to FitchRatings. All the more important, therefore, for housing policy-makers and planners to remind themselves - as memories are surprisingly short - that this part of England has been the focus for the development of "affordable housing" for so-called "Sustainable Communities".

SPECULATION, SPECULATION, SPECULATION

Although it started out with the mantra "Education, Education, Education", and now offers the prospect of "Regulation, Regulation, Regulation", it is "Speculation, Speculation, Speculation" which has defined not only New Labour's time in government, but leadership of the Party itself.

Thus New Labour has presided over a period of unparalleled speculation in the UK economy, notably in the property and financial sectors, to the extent that even leading speculators such as hedge fund managers have suggested the country needs to refocus it's economy back to "making things" : to which advice should be added, "that employ British labour". It is precisely these real needs that should determine the future leadership of the Labour Party.

The question is who could fulfil this role : not, in my view - and present incumbent aside - Alan Johnson (or "Corporal Johnson" as a Staffordshire Labour Councillor recently called him), David Milliband, Ed Balls (Mr & Mrs) or Harriet Harman. That leaves some space for speculation.

UK Euro Elections - A Failure of Regional Policy

Having declared my vote as "Green" in both the County Council and European Parliament Elections, I shall now reflect upon the outcome of the latter.

First of all, though, I have to confess that whilst I voted "Green" pretty much without hesitation in the local elections, and will probably do so again in the general, the long ballot paper for the Euro elections caught me contemplating other parties. Yes, I too considered the option of voting for UKIP, the English Democrats, and another party represented by Dave Nellist (See - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Nellist)

Why ? Because, like many people, I view the European Union - notwithstanding the fact that it does some excellent work, on the environment and planning, for instance - and its over-expensed politicians and bloated bureaucrats, with some suspicion. Yes, I too, like the Labour Party, have to confess to something of a political split-personality.

Returning to "That Party", for whom I have not only voted but also been a member (until the election of Tony Blair as leader, that is), and for whom the outcome of the Euro Elections is an unmitigated disaster, I have to say that "We were Warned !", but the election of 2 British National Party MEPS still came as something of a shock !

A shock but not a surprise ! For the fact is that there are significant parts of the Nation (England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland), and sections of their populations, who are, in effect, in a "State" of managed decline. For sadly, much of UK regional policy - most particularly in England - is, to use the words of former Europe Minister Caroline Flint, a "window dressing".

Thus whilst it is the "Greens" who have displaced Labour in the "Growth" areas of the Southern England, it is the BNP who have done the same in areas of "Decline", typically the old industrial heartlands of the North of England. The result is that both parties now have two English MEPS.

In Scotland, for whom ownership of "The Land" (see below) has always been a key (perhaps "the key") issue, the Scottish National Party has fared rather better....than its banking sector

Euro-Election Results also @ http://janetmackinnon.wordpress.com/

THE PROBLEM OF LAND BANKING

Whilst the problems of Iceland's Landesbanki* are in the news once again, it is the problem of land banking - see en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_Banking - which I want to focus on here.

Land speculation is as much a challenge for regulators - if not more so - than other forms of financial speculation.

It is time for regulatory authorities in the UK, and elsewhere, to get to grips with the negative contribution of speculative land banking to dysfunctional property markets.

Until there is a proper understanding of this, housing issues of the kind referred to in my previous post cannot be resolved.

At the present time, UK government policies continue to encourage excessive speculation, and, therefore, exacerbate the very problems they seek to tackle.

See also my blog @ http://smartlimits2growth.wordpress.com/

* Landesbanki now own West Ham Football Club

Housing - Some New Elightenment Needed

The New Labour Government - and I blame the centralists and the localists equally for this - has created an enormous house-building advocacy sector, which has achieved remarkably little "on the ground" as the following article illustrates :

"Millennium Communities scheme set to fall far short of goals
Jamie Carpenter, Regen.net, 2 June 2009

A government programme to construct 6,000 environmentally-friendly homes in seven new communities between 1997 and 2010 has so far succeeded in building fewer than 2,000 homes, ministers have admitted.

Figures published in a written parliamentary answer by housing minister Margaret Beckett show that the Millennium Communities initiative has delivered 1,626 new homes.

The Greenwich Millennium Village in London was the first development to be announced under the scheme in 1997. The figures show that nearly 1,100 homes have been built on the site.

But only 14 homes have been completed at the Oakgrove Millennium Village at Milton Keynes and no homes have been constructed at the Hastings Millennium Community, spanning an area of 72ha across three sites in East Sussex, Beckett said.

In New Islington in Manchester, 179 homes have been constructed under the scheme, while 172 homes have been constructed at the Allerton Bywater Millennium Village near Leeds, the figures show.

At the South Lynn Millennium Community in King’s Lynn, Norfolk, 109 homes have been built.

In 2007, the then housing minister Yvette Cooper revealed that public expenditure related to the Millennium Communities programme amounted to £131.6 million."

I have to say that all this comes as no surprise to me at all. The state-funded house-building advocacy sector is, I would suggest, a gravy train which has plunged well off the rails of common sense and the sooner someone shunts it into the sidings, the better !

On Re-Naming the She-Shanty

Travelling back to Worcester from Birmingham on the train the other week, I fell into a conversation with two gentlemen, who reminded me a little of a couple of Bird and Fortune characters. After discussing the "Enlightenment Enterprise" of Matthew Boulton*, also called "The Father of Birmingham", our talk turned to contemporary politics.

One of the gentlemen was a lawyer, with an obviously keen interest in politics. He suggested to me that that New Labour has a "split-personality", with the key ideological fight taking place between the "Centralists", led by Ed Balls, and the "Localists", led by Hazel Blears.

Returning to events of this week, and my post of yesterday, I wonder whether the "Nancy Lee" (see below) should be re-named the "Hazel Blears" or

On reflection, perhaps the ship,
After She who steers,
Should be re-named,
the "Hazel Blears",
"Rocking the Boat"**
With Her own waves :
"YouTube if you want to....***
....The Lady's not for turning"****
But then it all ends in tears !*****

* There is an excellent programme of events in Birmingham over the Summer to commemorate the bi-centenary of Boulton's death
* Hazel wore a brooch emblazoned with these words after her resignation from government
*** As Hazel said of Gordon and his gang : those of us who hail from the North West of England, never under-estimate the power of the Manchester Mafia to influence national events
**** As Margaret Thatcher told the men of her day
***** Hazel's subsequent recantation to the Manchester Evening News

Please see also http://limits-2-growth.blogspot.com/ - Gender Politics & New Labour's Undressing

"The Capting" faces his "Ukulele Music"

Last October, in a post entitled "Deconstructing "Captain" Gordon Brown's Rhetoric", I quoted some lines from the sea shanty "Nancy Lee" :

"I sing you a tale of the Nancy Lee
A ship that got shipwrecked at sea
The bravest man was Captain Brown
Who played his ukulele as the ship went down

........All the crew were in despair
Some rushed here and others rushed there
But the Captain sat in the captain's chair
And he played the ukulele as the ship went down."

Today's national newspapers all suggest that it is time for the Prime Minister to face the music.

However, I want to reflect once again on the subject of my blog of yesterday, Tom Paulin's book "Minotaur : Poetry and the Nation State".

The concluding chapter of this book focuses on the work of the contemporary British poet, Peter Reading, and, in particular, his poem "Ukulele Music" and the figure of "The Capting". The poem poses the following question :

And shall it, now, be counted
as ye dignified defiance
in us towards our fateful
merciless element,
or gull naivete,
cousin to recklessness,
that, e'en in pitching Gulpward,
our salt kind brings forth chanteys ?

Paulin, in turn, offers the following reflection on this passage :

".... these lines carry a patriotic impulse as well as performing a kind of ritual absolution. In them we witness the the isolated, scarred and diminished soul of a great seafaring nation asking forgiveness after centuries of reckless imperialism. It's a hard request to answer and it perhaps betrays a sentimental softness for the imperial past*. We may be grateful, though, that the nation has found such a prolific laureate in Peter Reading. The imaginative risks he takes in confronting the state have a witty desperation and a strange but essentially confident poignancy that speaks in that phrase "our salt kind". It reminds me of Churchill's remark in May 1940 that the nation was as " sound as salt in the sea"".**

* A past unfortunately re-kindled in the imperialist foreign policy of the Blair Government and a UK banking system which swelled to leviathan proportions under "Capting" Brown's watch.

** The subjects of "soundness" (legal) and "SEA" (in this case "strategic environmental assessment") are tackled at my other blog : http://janetmackinnon.wordpress.com/