My role in the London Olympics
July 31st, 2010 by Roger Darlington
This week marked the point at which we are exactly two years away from the holding of the Olympic Games in London in 2012.
Now I confess that, atypically for a man, I’m not very interested in sport. But I’m delighted that London will be hosting the Games in 2012 because I think it will be great for the city in which I’ve lived and worked for 40 years.
I’d like to play my small part in making the event a success and, since I’m now technically retired, I could make the time. I love meeting people from other countries and cultures and would like to connect with some of the people travelling to London for the Games.
So I’ve signed up to be a London Ambassador.
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (1)
“The Day Of Reckoning”
July 30th, 2010 by Roger Darlington
I’ve just put my latest short story on my web site. It’s entitled “The Day Of Reckoning” and you can read it here.
Please let me know what you think.
I’ve been writing short stories for a year now and this is my 23rd. You can check out the others here.
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (3)
World statistics updated in real time
July 29th, 2010 by Roger Darlington
You’ll find some fascinating statistics here.
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
The cull of UK quangos
July 27th, 2010 by Roger Darlington
The term ‘quango’ has come to be almost an insult, but it is simply an acronym – short for quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisation. Most of these organisations do really good work and give value for money, although there is always a case for looking at roles, rationalisation and savings.
Perhaps some of the functions could be carried out within Government Departments, but dedicated public bodies are usually more focused on the issues, more transparent in their work, and more consultative in their operations.
Furthermore particular care needs to be taken with reducing the role and resources of regulatory bodies. The failure of the regulatory process is behind such catastrophes as the collapse of the world banking system and the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
I declare an interest: as a semi-retired portfolio worker, most of what I do these days is working with two arm’s length public bodies, the Communications Consumer Panel and Consumer Focus.
Sadly, in the name of public expenditure cuts, the Coalition Government seems to have declared war on so-called quangos and is conducting a ’slash and burn’ approach to many of them, whether in health or education or elsewhere. It has just been announced that the UK Film Council is to go, but there was no notice and no consultation.
In the “Independent” newspaper today, there is the first full list that I have seen of bodies whose closure has been announced or specifically threatened.
Posted in British current affairs | Comments (1)
Defending “The Spirit Level” (1)
July 26th, 2010 by Roger Darlington
The authors of the book “The Spirit Level”, Richard Wilkinson & Kate Pickett, have now published detailed responses to all the criticisms made of their argument that societies with large levels if income inequality suffer many poor social outcomes. You can read the rebuttal here.
Just a reminder that you can read my review of the book here.
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
Defending “The Spirit Level” (2)
July 26th, 2010 by Roger Darlington
In an editorial today, the “Guardian” newspaper defends the work of Richard Wilkinson & Kate Pickett in their important work “The Spirit Level”:
“Perhaps some dark corners of the soul arrive with the human condition; many others emerge in lives that have little in societies where others have lots. After a budget that made the poor poorer, it should be no surprise that some want to see that insight buried. Yet to emerge from stricken times without breaking Britain, The Spirit Level’s inconvenient truths must be faced.”
Just a reminder that you can read my review of the book here.
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
The 20th century: the century of violent death
July 26th, 2010 by Roger Darlington
I’m in the process of writing my 23rd short story [you can access all the previous stories here]. As background research for this particular story, I wanted some estimate of the scale of violent death in the 20th century. We all know that it was an unprecedented period of human history in terms of wars and persecutions – but most us don’t know the headline total and the details are utterly chilling.
Obviously there are many estimates of the total death toll and there are many problems with the sources used, but one detailed estimate is a figure of some 188 million people. That’s more than three times the entire current population of the United Kingdom.
Matthew White, who compiled the relevant statistics, calls the 20th century experience “the Hemoclysm” which he defines as “that string of interconnected barbarities which have made the Twentieth Century so fascinating for historians and so miserable for real people”.
The statistics for the 30 events with the highest death tolls are listed here. The four biggest sources of deaths were the First World War and the Second World War plus the Russian Civil War & Stalin’s purges and the Chinese Civil War and Mao’s policies. You can see the statistics here.
Posted in History | Comments (0)
A stately home and a stately lord
July 25th, 2010 by Roger Darlington
It was an interesting day for Vee and me as we visited a new location and an old friend.
The new location was Osterley Park and House on the outskirts of west London. The park and the house are owned and managed by the National Trust and both are very well maintained. Osterley House is an original redbrick Tudor home, transformed and remodelled by Robert Adam between 1760-1780 for a wealthy banking family, the Childs. In each room, we found a volunteer with immense knowledge of the room’s contents and purpose and the whole history of the house.
The old friend was Tony Young aka Lord Young of Norwood Green. Tony has been a friend for over 30 years and he was my boss as General Secretary of the National Communications Union and the Joint General Secretary of the Communication Workers Union. Before the recent General Election, he was a Minister in the Department for Business, Innovation & Skills and he is now an Opposition spokesperson in the House of Lords.
So a day of history and politics.
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (0)
Word of the day: syncope
July 24th, 2010 by Roger Darlington
The word has two meanings:
1) It is a medical term for blacking out or fainting.
2) It is a linguistic term for the shortening of a word by removing letters or syllables from the middle such as fo’c’sle instead of forecastle.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
“The Spirit Level” debate
July 23rd, 2010 by Roger Darlington
I’ve already blogged several times about a fascinating book called “The Spirit Level” by Richard Wilkinson & Kate Pickett. In my review of the work, I commented: “This is one of the most important books that I have read in five decades of reading because its scope is so wide and its message so compelling and because it resonates powerfully with my own political principles and passion for social justice.”
The central proposition of the book is that, in the more developed countries of the world, the more unequal the income distribution the more that nation suffers from a range of poor social outcomes.
This week I attended a debate at the Royal Society of Arts in London in which the two authors of “The Spirit Level” were challenged by two critics of their work, Christopher Snowden, author of “The Spirit Level Delusion”, and Peter Saunders, author of “Beware False Prophets”. The whole thing will be podcast here.
The critics presented three main arguments.
1) The data used is selective in terms of countries and that a small number of outliers distorts the apparent correlation. RW & KP argued that they consistently used the same 23 nations for which robust data was available in order not to be accused of selectivity and that the predictive power of their thesis had been demonstrated by new data for additional countries fitting well the correlations.
2) That the thesis does not take proper account of cultural and historical factors which would better explain why the Scandinavian countries appear to do so well and the Anglo nations seem to do so badly. RW & KP pointed out that the same correlations are found in the 50 states of the USA which share a common culture and history.
3) That the influence of third variables has not be considered so that, for instance, for the US data ethnicity is a more powerful predictor of homicide rates that income distribution. This begs the question of whether in any given state there are more murders because there are more African-Americans or because there are more black people who happen to be poor.
Pickett was particularly confident and convincing in her presentation and answers and said that on Monday the web site of the Equality Trust would carry a detailed rebuttal of all the criticisms made of the book. She was the one of the four speakers who reminded the packed-out lecture theatre that we are dealing human issues: “We are talking about human suffering here”.
My overall conclusion was that Snowden & Saunders had raised sufficient methodical and computational issues to suggest that the original thesis may not be as simple or as powerful as the book asserts, but that the central proposition remains valid and strong. more research and debate would be valuable, and politicians and policymakers need to examine how best countries can reduce inequalities of income and wealth.
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)