CHRISTMAS TV PROGRAMMES usually come in for much criticism - and this year is no exception. So what do YOU remember most of the seasonal offerings coming from the box in the corner? Perennial favourites perhaps, like The Sound Of Music, Gone With The Wind, Meet Me In St. Louis and The Muppets continue to be repeated, like a bad bout of indigestion. Or perhaps the foul-mouthed Catherine Tate, or the ubiquitous James Bond was more to your taste? My own preferences were the several ballet programmes and the excellent documentary on the life of Andrea Bocelli, the blind Italian opera singer. And best of all, the splendid Arena documentary on Ken Dodd, reminding us of a time when variety was king and real humour could be enjoyed by everyone.
But what has most stuck in my mind was not a programme at all. It has to be those interminable, dreadfully pushy adverts promoting half-price leather sofas, with a free armchair thrown in, no deposit, interest-free credit and nothing to pay until the year dot. And there was no escape by switching on the radio - because they were also there to assault the eardrums at all points on the dial, as well as every other page of every newspaper. There was absolutely no escaping this torture.
All credit to the advertising agencies handling these accounts, for successfully getting their message across to the great British public, by constantly pounding the senses into submission. Adolf Hitler employed a similar mesmerising tactic at his pre-war rallies and had he been advocating furniture instead of war, history would have taken a much different course. It occurs to me that there must now be a massive sofa mountain somewhere on a disused airfield, where the discarded old ones are laid to rest. Frankly, I don’t care if I never hear about or see another sofa as long as I live. Except of course the one I’m sitting on, which unfortunately didn’t come with a free armchair.
THE NEW YEAR’S HONOURS LIST always manages to include a name that gets my hackles up. My nomination this year has to be Michael Parkinson, whose only visible talent is to be a good listener.
For the last four decades he has interviewed most of the world’s leading actors and celebrities and has carried out this task reasonably efficiently from his comfortable chair. But in no way can this be described as onerous, as all the hard work is done by the backroom team of researchers. As a journalist, he is quite at home posing inane questions to the interviewees sitting opposite and massaging their already over-polished egos. He has obviously enjoyed being paid very good money for doing what he likes best and must have been as surprised as I am that this should be rewarded with a knighthood.
Personally I found him smugly self-satisfied, keenly aware of his contrived public persona and utterly vain. These unattractive traits though did not deter viewers from switching on to his show, but I would suggest this had more to do with the celebrities, than the great show-off himself, although I doubt he would agree.
Arise Sir Michael, you have epitomised the vacuous state of British TV, where real talent continues to go unrewarded.
MURDER RETURNS ONCE MORE to the borough. And again, this has taken place in Erith, which is fast becoming a notorious ‘no go’ area after dark. It is now time for some positive and decisive action by the police and the housing associations.
They must carry out a root and branch investigation into anyone suspected of making life unbearable for the decent residents in these tower blocks and evict them immediately, although there is evidence that outsiders have also infiltrated the area. Security must therefore be stepped up, with personal entry codes for residents and routine dog patrols around the buildings. Magistrates must also get tough with those offenders appearing before them on drugs charges and show that this kind of behaviour will not be tolerated in the London Borough of Bexley.
THE SCHOOLBOY GANG whose violent behaviour led to the death of Erith man Ernest Norton have had their convictions for manslaughter quashed and replaced by twelve month Suspension Orders, which means they are required to occasionally report to youth team officers. In other words they have escaped punishment, with no more than a legal slap on the wrists and are free to roam the streets of the borough again, seeking out victims on whom to unleash their vile behaviour.
This will be of little comfort to Mrs. Norton and her family and certainly not to the residents of Erith and surrounding areas. If the law is unwilling to protect us - who will?
WHY THE HELL are we sending a team of our best Scotland Yard bobbies to Pakistan to investigate the death of maverick politician Benazir Bhutto? She was not a British subject and Britain has no jurisdiction in Pakistan. This is probably a welcome break away from the nick and not having to investigate daily stabbings and shootings on London’s streets. But these officers, who’s wages are paid by us taxpayers, are badly needed here where they belong and not among a bunch of hot-heads in a far away land.
YOU HAVE TO FEEL SORRY for the patients evacuated from their burning wards at the Royal Marsden Hospital. No sooner were they found a warm and safe haven - then Gordon Brown turned up to shake their hands with his own stubby nail-bitten fingers. They could be forgiven for wishing they had stayed behind and taken their chances among the smoke and debris. It might have been worse though. Imagine if Tony and Cherie had still been in Number Ten!
APPOINTING THE LATEST in a long line of recent England soccer coaches, has been on a par with the election of a Pope. We haven’t seen puffs of white smoke emerging from the roof of Wembley Stadium announcing the result, but there has been plenty of hot air in the media as the usual band of pundits treated us to their expert opinions.
The new man appears to be something of a disciplinarian, which I have long advocated on this page. Let’s hope he can keep our over-indulged players away from the nightclub scene where they usually spend most of their non-playing time; often getting into trouble as they struggle to offload their riches on strong drink and scheming females. I’m particularly impressed that he has already banned mobile telephones from the dressing room. Let’s hope Italian, Fabio Capello signals the turning point in our national team’s fortune and we can again hold our heads high with the pride we once had when soccer skills were more important than fashion displays and celebrity.
There has been criticism that he speaks very little English. So what - neither can most of the players!
A RECENT SURVEY (yes another) has revealed that bishops are in the same earnings bracket as pole dancers. This may come as a surprise to many, but whichever way you look at it, both are performing a service to society and have something in common. They spend much of their time up the pole!
THE EDUCATION MINISTER says that parents should read fairy tales to their children. Who could be better qualified on this subject than a politician? Do you remember boys and girls, when they told us the story about wicked Uncle Saddam,
scheming in his desert lair to point his nasty rockets at us? Then our very best friends, the Americans, found him hiding in a hole in the ground and took him away to be hung up by his neck, so that all of us boys and girls could once again sleep safely in our beds.
What is different about this fairy tale is that no-one lived happily ever after - except that biggest storyteller of them all - Anthony Blair.
DAVID EVENNETT MP presented a petition to the House of Commons on behalf of Bexley’s pensioners protesting against the Olympic Games Council Tax Levy. I have covered this many times in my column and the fact that it is quite unfair that residents in the London Boroughs are forced to pay this iniquitous tax when the rest of the country doesn’t.
Full marks to David Evennett for his support, but certainly not to council leader Ian Clement, whose only contribution was a dire threat to remind us that anyone withholding part of their council tax payments will have legal action taken against them. He is right of course to point this out. But wouldn’t it have been more commendable if he, and the leaders of all the other London Boroughs, were on the side of the people who elected them and ganged up on City Hall to protest on our behalf?
PLANS ARE AFOOT to reorganise Bexley’s three police stations to make them ‘Fit For Purpose’. A new separate custody centre is proposed, to free-up more office space at Bexleyheath. MORE OFFICE SPACE!! This presumably means even more officers occupying even more desks instead of out patrolling the area. We can’t blame the police for this state of affairs; they are at saturation point with the amount of admin and paperwork the Home Office has thrust upon them.
I don’t think deskbound bobbies was what Robert Peel had in mind!
‘TILL NUMBER FOUR PLEASE’. We’ve all obeyed this distinctive female voice instructing us to go forward to the next vacant position, in the bank, Post Office, Woolworths, Argos and other high street establishments. What intrigues me is that I’m convinced this is always the same woman and by the time I have walked from the bank to the Post Office, she has beaten me to it and is in position, ready to welcome me to ‘TILL NUMBER ONE PLEASE’.
Try explaining this to the kids?
WHO IN THEIR RIGHT MIND would have bet on Evel Knievel dying in his bed? This was the greatest daredevil of all time who had broken more than 400 bones during a career, that often featured a dozen or more buses, or a yawning chasm that he attempted to traverse on his motorbike. More often than not he would crash and end up again and again on the operating table. His philosophy was ‘you can fail many times, but you’re never a failure until you refuse to get up’. That’s not a bad thought - and one that we could all learn from.
AFTER THE DEBACLE of illegal immigrants being found employed at the Home Office, I have become immune to what happens at the centre of government any more. That is until the missing computer discs saga, where the confidential records of some 25 million families were ‘mislaid’ by the Benefits Agency. Yet even this serious lapse of security didn’t have the impact on me that it once might.
No - what shocked me to the core was to learn that staff in these offices wear baseball caps! And there I was thinking that civil servants wore smart pinstripe suits and carried tightly-rolled umbrellas to the office.
HIS NAME IS SYNONYMOUS WITH A DOG BISCUIT. He never appears in public without his trademark wrap-around dark glasses and diamond earring. He is often to be found close to the seat of power, having had his feet under the table at Number Ten, becoming an unofficial adviser to the PM on such weighty matters as world poverty and climate change. He has pleaded with the masses to give all they can to such worthy causes, whilst protecting his own personal fortune in an overseas bank.
What he’s done to have amassed this fortune is a mystery to me, but for some reason I find him an intolerable bore, whose main claim to fame is to be seen with the makers and shakers at the top of the pack. His ridiculous name to his fans is BONO, but then who would have taken any notice of him if he called himself Paul Hewson, the name on his passport?