THE PARENTS OF MISSING “MADDY’ McCANN have understandably come in for much condemnation for leaving their young children unattended in their holiday apartment. With the benefit of hindsight, no-one will be feeling this more than the McCann’s themselves and they are going to have to live with this for the rest of their lives. Most of us cannot even begin to imagine their guilt and grief and the strength required just to wake up and face another nightmare day of not knowing what has happened to their lovely little girl. So I would say to all those loudmouth critics just shut up and think how fortunate you are not to be suffering like the McCann’s.
They have been vilified for no other reason than they are articulate and have managed to hide their true inner emotions from the public gaze. It has to be said that the public has a voracious appetite for the sensational even when mixed with a deep pity for the victims. And this appetite is fuelled by parts of the press who have a constant need to outsell their rivals in the highly competitive world of news media. We are all guilty by association, even if we are unaware of it at the time.
The fact that Kate and Gerry are both doctors appears to have created some kind of resentment among some which may come from a curious envy of their intellect. But this cannot in any way reduce their burden of grief and helplessness that any of us would feel in such circumstances. Whatever their professional status, they are flesh and blood human beings facing every day problems that all parents of young children experience, but theirs are far greater and more terrible than most will ever know. Only parents who have experienced the loss of a child can possibly have any idea of what the McCann’s are going through. Everyone else should just keep their thoughts to themselves and pray for a happy outcome.
IT IS REVEALED THAT police officers are required to fill-in up to 33 forms for a straightforward crime like a mugging. They collectively spend more than 56,000 hours a year inside stations dealing with mountains of paperwork. And ironically, their place on the beat has been taken over by inexperienced poorly-trained civilians in uniform who have no more power to apprehend criminals than the ordinary citizen.
So isn’t the solution staring us in the face? Put the real police officers back on the streets and move the “pretend’ ones into the office to deal with all the paper work. Or better still, cut the amount of paper work and get rid of the “pretend’ police officers. Why is it always left to me to point out the simple solutions to our major problems?
‘In 2006 life was flowing along lovely then bang, your life is turned upside down’ [Linda Norton widow of murdered Erith man, Ernie Norton].
‘I must have your welfare in mind’
[The judge sentencing the five local thugs to a pathetic two years detention for Mr. Norton’s murder]
I don’t wish to bore you with my usual axiom on the return of corporal punishment, capital punishment and proper life sentences but what do YOU think?
WHAT A REFRESHING CONTRAST the England rugby team supporters are, compared with the drunken, tattoo-covered, shaven-headed, bare-chested, obese soccer yobs making obscene gestures to cameras.
Rugby is a tough game played by gentlemen but is no place for wimps marketing kaftans, male deodorants and pansy hairstyles. Every tackle results in a sickening bone-crushing crunch, yet the players come back in defence and attack again and again, after a dab from a wet sponge or a squirt of aerosol analgesic. Not for them the dramatic “dive’ of their soccer counterparts, or being stretchered away after an elbow in the ribs. Yes rugby is a physical game and requires constant concentration and stamina, which is why you won’t find players in nightclubs until the early hours before an important match. There is the occasional punch-up inside the scrum and fists and boots are known to fly in the heat of the moment. But the referee and his decision is respected as final and the game continues without rancour.
And the female partners of soccer players, those over-indulged, model-like, dim-witted WAGS, cannot compare with the homely, intelligent Scrummy Mummies who partner the rugby players. It saddens me that rugby is not seen as our national game, but I suppose the greed and selfishness endemic in soccer is just a sad reflection of what our country has now become and we deserve all we get.
DAVID CAMERON was applauded for making his conference speech entirely without an autocue. Stage actors are doing this six nights a week, which just confirms that our leading politicians are no more than glorified performers. Lord Olivier would have made an excellent Prime Minister.
I AM NOT by nature anti-royalist, but any mention of Prince Edward could easily change my mind. He is an idle waster who serves absolutely no useful purpose whatsoever, whilst enjoying all the trappings of wealth and privilege. My opinion of him however turned to anger, when he had the effrontery to attend the ceremony at the Cenotaph wearing the uniform of a colonel in the Royal Wessex Regiment. This is a solemn occasion to remember and pay tribute to all those brave souls who laid down their lives for their country and his presence was an insult.
This was the wimp who failed the Marine’s induction course and made a hasty retreat before he could embarrass his family further. Maybe we could have forgiven him this, had he not been strutting about publicly and falsely masquerading as a warrior himself. In my day, impersonating an officer was a very serious offence, punishable by Court Martial and a spell in Colchester military prison.
ONCE UPON A TIME when Liverpool was mentioned, one immediately thought of its great comedians, the Beatles, the Mersey Ferry, Ken Dodd and two great football clubs. Alas, the first thing that comes to mind today is gang warfare and killings.
This once great city that was the gateway for imported goods from all over the world, has descended into a depth of crime and depravity that brings shame and fear to its citizens. It is difficult to see how it is going to climb back to its former glory and how this scourge can be eliminated, all the time the police are hampered by political correctness, human rights and the requirement for cast-iron one hundred per cent evidence before they can take positive action. In many cases they know who the criminals are, but are unable to proceed because a climate of fear prevents witnesses from coming forward. It’s a terrible situation and we must all feel some empathy with the plight of decent Liverpudlians who are living through this hell.
We can only helplessly look on and consider how fortunate we are not to be caught up in their nightmare. But I like to believe the strong resolve of its people will restore Liverpool to being the capital of humour and music it once was and deserving of its title “Liverpool City of Culture 2008.
JUST TO PROVE there’s no justice in this world, the recently resigned spending watchdog Sir John Bourn is as thin as a beanpole despite spending £27,000 of taxpayers money over the past three years, eating out in the finest restaurants. That’s one hell of a lot of meals to put away. Imagine, if he had to pay for them out of his own pocket he’d be almost a skeleton by now!
DID YOU SEE the latest fat-cats to have their snouts in the Olympic trough? The Princess Royal draws £400 an HOUR for attending meetings of the London Organising Committee, as an adviser. This should buy quite a lot of hay for her horses. She’s not the only one of course to make hay whilst the sun shines, because there are a number of other competitors in the race to become multi-millionaires by 2012.
Lord Coe is paid £285,000 a year as chairman, in addition to his substantial earnings from outside interests. Organising chief Paul Deighton is reputed to have received a £100,000 bonus last year, presumably for “organising’ and this was on top of his £436,000 fee. It’s not that he needs the money of course, having amassed a personal fortune of more than £100 million as a city financier. Accountant David Leather received £2,440 a DAY for 19 weeks work, which overtook Princess Anne’s mere £4,000 for ten hours attendance. She must be champing at the bit to pass him at the next hurdle, so we have a race on our hands long before the track is built. We must be careful though in case she tells us all to “naff off.’ Jonathan Edwards, former Olympic triple jumper has certainly tripled his income, with £101,500 as the athletes’ representative and for consultancy services. The chairman of the Muslim Council of Great Britain drew £5,000 as a non-executive director and the other board members received £1,000 for each meeting, averaging just two-and-a-half-hours.
It doesn’t take much computation on the calculator to see how the cost of the Olympics has escalated to a massive £9.3 billion and still counting. At this rate, there won’t be enough left in the kitty to build the track and the athletes will have to be satisfied with a run around the Serpentine. But they will all have a job to beat the members of the LOC and we London Council Tax payers will of course come a poor last.
THOSE CALLING FOR the head of Sir Ian Blair and his removal from office, are overlooking one important thing. Accepting that he played no personal part in the shooting of the innocent victim at Stockwell station, the officers who actually bungled this operation will still remain in their posts to do so again.
Sir Ian is not the most popular Commissioner the Metropolitan Police have had and comes over as condescending when addressing the media and his obsession with political correctness and diversity has not endeared him to many of his colleagues. He is not what’s known as a “copper’s copper’, having been fast-tracked through the ranks from university, rather than the traditional route. It is of course not unusual for people in any organisation to dislike their boss because of his management style, but this in itself doesn’t equate to failure.
I say again, when he has gone, those who made the serious errors of judgement will still be there.
I’VE ALWAYS FOUND Jehova’s Witnesses an odd bunch. They parade in pairs along my road about once a month, ringing the doorbells of unsuspecting householders who are unlucky enough to be caught at home and treated to a relentless diatribe of biblical anecdotes and myths.
My personal approach is to humour them on the basis of live and let live and to courteously send them away without offending them and their religion. After all, they’re quite harmless or are they? The recent death of a young mother during childbirth, because she was denied a life-saving blood transfusion by her Jehova’s family, makes them murderers in my book and they should be charged with manslaughter. What kind of God is it that can leave two newborn babies facing life without their mother?
The next time Jehova’s disciples come to my door, they will wish they hadn’t.
THE KNIVES ARE OUT again and I’m not just referring to the McCann’s, Heather Mills, Sir Ian Blair, or leaders of the Liberal Party. It is that time of year when our beloved Father Christmas comes under attack from the multiculturalists who are determined to banish everything that is traditional in our country. Empire Day, St. Georges Day, the Union Flag, children’s nursery rhymes, burnt cork make-up in the theatre, Land of Hope and Glory at the Proms, religious education in state schools all these and more have become targets for the apologists, such as the Institute for Public Policy Research, Labour’s favourite “think tank.’
We no longer have to worry about attacks from outside enemies, whilst these crackpots are allowed to dwell in our midst. I do hope your own store, school and church continues to celebrate with the traditional crib, nativity play and Santa Claus and that you and the children enjoy A Happy and Peaceful Christmas, free from political-correctness and State interference.