I have recently finished Ben Elton’s autobiography and enjoyed it very much – he is at the very least always easy to read. He was at Manchester University not long before me and as students we adored The Young Ones. He has of course been extraordinarily prolific and I read several of his many novels years ago. They show remarkable prescience. In Stark he depicts a world where simply falling into the sea and consuming a small amount of it makes you seriously ill (heavy metal and other poisoning) and the corrupt mega-rich few are devising ways to get off the planet which they have done so much to help destroy. So it could have been written now as a contemporary account, but Stark was published in 1989. Litle did we imagine then how unfettered capitalism and greed would leave our rivers and seas in such a dreadfully polluted state. The showbiz stories are often great fun, with some coming out of it less well than others. Egos abound but I suppose you have to have one of a certain size to go into the performing arts in the first place. Alexi Sayle, Rik Mayall, Ronnie Barker, A.N. Wilson (no surprise there), Paul Merton and Jonathan Ross (who has always made my skin crawl) all seem rather or even highly unpleasant. The good guys include Harry Enfield, David and Victoria Coren-Mitchell, Lenny Henry, French and Saunders, Lisa Tarbuck (an underrated talent in my opinion) and her father Jimmy. I remember seeing a talk show years ago where Jimmy Tarbuck and Cilla Black have each other in fits of uncontrollable, infectious laughter, the memory of which still gives me a warm glow.
Elton is very good on the media’s love of setting people up only to knock them down and it is hard not to agree that much of the vitriol aimed his way was the result of jealousy, anti- Semitism and class prejudice. He found himself often described as “uppity”, the word Eammon Holmes notoriously used to describe Meghan Markle. It’s a real giveaway word. I have tried Upstart Crow, the Shakespeare based sitcom, a number of times but it hasn’t raised even a hint of a smile from me. I love Blackadder (apart from the first one which Elton was not a part of and especially the third and fourth), and the much slated The Thin Blue Line and The Wright Way.
The book does contain some formulaic ruses, such as postulating what should have happened as though it has, then revealing that it didn’t, which is fine once but here is overused, like some of the tropes even in Blackadder.
Stewart Lee’s seemingly cruel criticisms of Elton come in for some flak too, but I suspect that that stellar comedian was as likely satirising himself and those who took against Elton’s ‘uppitiness’.
The ex-prince and the royal art collection.
Just one observation on Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor (the rest really goes without saying) regarding that choice of surname, hyphenated or not. I don’t think they really thought it through. Both names are inventions as I never tire of saying. The family’s real surname is Saxe-Coburg-Gotha (or … and Gotha), changed to Windsor by George V in 1917 in the face of wartime anti-German sentiment. Mountbatten is an Anglicisation of Battenberg. But Lord Louis Mountbatten is not a name with which I would wish to be associated. He seems to have been an incompetent, reckless and pompous buffoon, forever failing upwards and known in the navy as “the master of disaster”. He played a huge part in the partitioning of India in spite of Gandhi’s opposition. There are also unproven allegations that he was a predatory paedophile, possibly even linked to the Kincora Scandal. They have never been properly investigated. He was a very close friend of Jimmy Savile, as was our current king, upon whom Mounbatten was a huge influence and the king was an apologist for and defender of the paedophile bishop Peter Ball. There can be smoke without fire but … At least now the ‘firm’, the royal family, has implicitly acknowledged by its recent decisions Andrew’s guilt. Neither Charles’ nor Andrew’s financial shenanigans seem to have been properly investigated either. Whether one is a royalist or an anti-monarchist, this lot are worse, much worse, than not fit for purpose. Enough, surely, is enough.
I have written about the royal art collection before but The Times yields up some facts and figures to make the blood boil. How much of it was acquired and even what it actually contains is shrouded in secrecy. Which is outrageous since in my mind it undeniably belongs to all of us. What we do know is that there are more than a million objects, including some 7,000 paintings and 30,000 watercolours and drawings, of which 550 by Leonardo da Vinci were valued at £3.22 bn in 2002. The Great Star of Africa in the royal sceptre might be worth £1.5 bn. The best guess is that the whole caboodle is probably worth £10bn. As is pointed out in the newspaper article, it is all supposed to be held “in trust by the sovereign for his successors and the nation” – but which? If the latter how can the trust refuse to publish an inventory? Or even if just the former. And should the public not be able to have access to it?
Good and bad news for nature
We have been repeatedly lied to by governments about the badger cull and so that it seems finally to be coming to an end is a cause for cautious celebration. Only one new licence will be issued for now and it has been acknowledged that it simply hasn’t worked as so many have been saying for so long, being based on bad science as it always was. Why that one licence, who knows? A sop for dairy farmers presumably. Badgers have been here for literally hundred of thousands of years. I take my hat off to the relentless campaigners and even to the small ways in which friends and I have tried to win people over to the truth.
So many should be hanging their heads in shame now. Surely unable to sleep at night. The blood of a quarter of a million badgers on their hands, all those souls on their conscience. It can no longer be denied that politicians and farmers can’t be trusted, at all, with wildlife and the environment.
Tom Longton makes it even clearer here: Cattle tuberculosis; badgers finally in the clear – British Wildlife
“Collectively all the evidence suggests that intensive and supplementary culling of badgers has been a distraction, contributing to a waste of over £1 billion of public funds since 2013.
The current strategic direction to replace badger culling with badger vaccination is, like culling, also a distraction.”
Whilst the Planning and Infrastructure Bill is an unmitigated disaster waiting to happen and a breach of manifesto promises, the government has guaranteed not to issue any more gas and oil exploration licences which also seems a huge step in the right direction. As is the retention of the windfall tax on polluting companies. Talking of breaches of promise, the budget is spectacularly awful in that regard for a second time – a stealth tax is still a tax. I am no fan of Kemi Badenoch but she has probably come out of this budget best. Her blistering attack on it and Rachel Reeves in parliament was devastating, leaving Reeves looking shell-shocked whilst Starmer stared in another direction, blank-faced as usual.
I wrote about the Guga hunt here: They steal baby Gannets and eat them, don’t they? – Animal Wild. There’s a passionate call for a ban by Rachel Bigsby which I feel I should quote in full:
“I have devoted my life to Scotland’s seabirds; photographing for National Geographic as avian influenza devastated colonies, winning Wildlife Photographer of the Year (Natural Artistry) and Bird Photographer of the Year (Portfolio). I have spent years volunteering on seabird islands across Scotland, including with the Scottish Seabird Centre, working hands-on to protect these birds I love so dearly. The annual Guga Hunt is no longer tradition — it is blood sport. This abhorrent cruelty dates back centuries, when island communities relied on seabirds for food, but today it is not a necessity. Despite catastrophic losses from avian influenza and unimaginable daily threats, the hunt continues.
After surviving a winter at sea, Gannets return to our shores to raise one precious chick with a lifelong partner. After months of devotion, that chick is snatched, clubbed, and strangled in its prime.
I beg the Scottish Government: end this cruelty, protect Gannets, and let them recover.”
The petition has already mustered over 14,000 signatures.
PETA reports that the consumption of cruelty-free food is soaring and that more coffee companies have been persuaded to abolish the price hikes for non-dairy milk. It really isn’t all bad news. Gwyneth Paltrow has removed angora wool from her website as well.
Protect the Wild allow themselves some quiet celebration too: Norwich City Council has refused to let Barclays install bird netting on its building (petitions work) and donations have been made to several animal sanctuaries, including The Retreat which I visited, loved and wrote about in Animal Wild.
Elsewhere, We May Soon Be Able to Eat Bacon Without Killing Pigs – well worth a look.
This is a beautifully written, heartfelt and wise piece from a blog to which I subscribe:
A Turning Point for the Environment – Wild Island
Chris Philpott writes of an all too familiar feeling: “a mix of cautious hope, exhaustion, and that familiar weight in the chest that comes whenever politics finally intersects with the natural world.” In Australia the protections offered to the logging of native forests are shifting. There will be a too long transition period (as per usual) and the change will not be enough on its own, but it is progress, it just might make a difference, although it is impossible not to mourn the damage already done. Chris by no means ignores those whose livelihoods depend on the logging industry. I hope he won’t mind my quoting him at some length:
“If the government is serious about supporting forestry workers through this change (and not leaving them stranded) then this can be a moment where both people and wildlife benefit. A moment where economic transition is paired with ecological recovery. A moment where we finally start thinking in terms of generations instead of elections. But for me, personally, the heart of this story is the wildlife. It’s always the wildlife. The creatures who are pushed to the edge every time we cut corners or make decisions that value money over living things. The animals whose lives hang in the balance between what governments say they’ll do and what actually happens.
I want to believe this deal will help them. I really do. I want to believe it will mean fewer habitats destroyed, fewer species declined, fewer rescue calls from places that should have been protected in the first place. And maybe, just maybe, this is the start of a shift where the environment is no longer the thing we sacrifice, but the thing we safeguard. For now, I’m choosing to hold onto the hope that this is more than political theatre. That it’s a real turning point. That the days of waving through native forest logging under exemptions are coming to an end. That the forests of Tasmania might receive a level of protection they’ve long deserved.
If today is the start of a better future for our forests and the creatures who call them home, then I’m grateful. Not relieved (not yet), but grateful. And I hope, truly hope, that in the years to come, we’ll look back on this moment as the day things finally started turning in the right direction.”
The first of the wonderful quotes below I caught at the beginning of Buddy Guy and Playing for Change’s wonderful video for the song ‘Skin Deep’. I love the Playing for Change videos and music, which bring together musicians of exceptional calibre from round the world. There’s a moment in ‘Redemption Song’ which cuts to Bob Marley himself which always moves me to tears. Perhaps my definition of great music is that which makes me cry, fills me with joy, sends shivers through me or all three.
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