Apostrophe Update

You may recall an earlier posting on this blog and the widespread media interest in England and to some extent in the United States about the use, or rather the impending official non-use, of possessive apostrophes on road and place nameplates in Birmingham and indeed other cities and towns.
This pedantic seeming issue rumbles on and so, not sparing myself in the relentless pursuit of wisdom and truth, I wondered lonely down to St. Paul’s Square, Birmingham, which had featured prominently in press comment.
The walk was well worth it, since it turns out that there are not two but three different renderings of this auspicious name on the signs. But at least there’s no doubting where you are, since in an attractive yet relatively modest sized square, there are no fewer than sixteen nameplates! Fortunately, the regrettable tinny modern ones (which are easily bent and which rapidly fade) are not to be found amongst them - at least not yet.
The first of the three ways of rendering the name is in what I will call (for want of deeper knowledge) the classical style with apostrophe and ‘Saint’ rendered as a capital S followed by a superscript lower case ‘t’ underlined and with two commas beneath - as shown in our first photograph. There were eight signs in this style.

There were three with apostrophes only (an example of which is shown in our second photograph) and five sans both apostrophes and punctuation for ‘Saint’.
Elsewhere in the city, such as in my own ward of Hall Green, we can also find the 'St.' rendering for saint and a longstanding absence of possessive apostrophes. While some may argue for this rich diversity, it is unclear which of the versions would get the nod in a tick-box examination!

As for me, my vote definitely goes to leaving it simple in the future!

A Question of Principle

The vexed question of whether cities in England should have elected executive Mayors has once again been brought to the fore. Personally I am very much opposed to such a concentration of power. I see that the Conservative Party nationally has now stated that it will conduct referenda in the main cities of the country including Birmingham. The question of referenda is an interesting one - particularly for Liberal Democrats such as myself. The principle is fine and commendable, but the value and validity depend on the way that a referendum is carried out.
If the intention is genuinely to establish the true wishes of the people and it is framed and conducted in that spirit, then none can reasonably object. If however the intention is to achieve a result that fulfils the policies or ideology of those who happen to be in power, then both process and outcome are likely to be flawed.
I see three main considerations. First consider the choices put to the electorate. In my opinion these should include a representative range of the reasonable options. For example, one of the options presented to the people should be that of the committee system which was abolished by the Labour Government under Mr Blair. There is reason to believe that many people would like to see this tried and tested form of local governance restored in preference to its polar opposite, an elected executive mayor. My understanding is that this choice will not be made available. Perhaps I could be forgiven for suspecting that an incoming government has a desired outcome in mind - rather like the existing Government in fact? However it is clearly true that if options are significantly restricted then the result may not accord with the wishes of the people. The questions and options must be fairly expressed. Practice elsewhere closely involves the proponents and opponents of a proposal in the framing of questions. I wonder to what extent we will see balanced engagement here.
The second consideration is the information provided to the electorate. It will no doubt be claimed that there will be a ‘debate’ preceding the ballot. To the extent that there is any informed discussion at all, some such public ‘debates’ have been a travesty - lacking any discernible structure with politicians trotting out party ‘messages’ and newspapers parading the biases of their owners. There has, for example, been no ‘debate’ to speak of on the important question of enforced mass medication through the water supply (for example, population dosing with fluoride). If our political masters wish to copy American systems - as Mr Blair undoubtedly did and Mr Cameron seems similarly inclined to do - let us at least make this a fair copy. When there are referenda in US states, an information pack is provided to all electors with simple statements made in a uniform format for and against the propositions or alternatives to be decided. These are prepared through involvement of the proposers and opposers. As an example, here is a link to the information provided by the State of Massachusetts in the November general election:

http://www.sec.state.ma.us/Ele/elepdf/IFV_2008.pdf

Highly commendable in my view, and the results of the referenda were undoubtedly valid and thus fully accepted by the public. But will we see the same here on the important question of the form that our local government takes? I doubt it, but I would be delighted to be proved wrong.
Thirdly there is the method of voting. You will no doubt not be surprised when I take the view as a Liberal Democrat that preferences should be ranked - 1, 2, 3, etc and counted by transferable vote. This rather than electors being allowed only to state a view about one option - that which they most prefer (perhaps not by much) and with no ability to indicate the option that they least want. Before the cries of protest go up from supporters of other political parties (on the unlikely assumption that they have read this far!) let me point out that if this system had been adopted for the first elected mayor referendum in Birmingham they would most likely have got their way. I say this since two broadly similar variants of the concentration-of-power-in-the-hands-of-a-single-individual model were presented alongside the ‘Cabinet’ model that emerged as the ‘winner’ as judged by the primitive first-past-the-post method of voting. Needless to say, the Government restricted the choices that were put in front of the electorate.
So there you have it - or more likely you don’t have it - some of the factors involved in doing referenda properly. Perhaps if the Conservatives gain power, Baron Heseltine - the single individual who, apparently, will determine the question to be put - will have a Road to Damascus conversion and engage Electoral Reform Services to advise!

http://www.erbs.co.uk/

Ho hum. About as likely, I would say, as having an outcome that we could be confident reflected the true wishes of the English people. We shall no doubt see - under this Government or the next.

Britain's Loss

Quite recently there was a furore that spread throughout England, the rest of Britain and way beyond about the creeping removal of the possessive apostrophe from road nameplates in Birmingham being made official. Many signs in Birmingham and many other towns and cities have lacked the apostrophe for years. One example is St Peter’s Close in my own Hall Green Ward. Other streets have kept their apostrophe while some locations such as St Paul’s Square in the City Centre have both. I will say nothing about the lack of a full stop after the abbreviation for Saint.
In other cases you need to know a bit of the history to be sure where the apostrophe should go. For example it is King’s Heath rather than Kings’ Heath but nearly everyone I know has always written Kings Heath. In my view preferred usage should accord with the wishes of local people but otherwise I cannot claim to be greatly exercised about the issue. But there is something else that is being lost that does concern me greatly. That is the loss of Britannia from our national coinage.
Britannia has been a symbol of Britain since Roman times and is strongly identified with and related to by most people. She is represented as a woman seated on a rock, carrying spear and shield and wearing a centurion’s helmet. Her image first appeared on the farthing coin in 1672, but is perhaps most fondly remembered from the old one penny until 1969. But after 336 years, people who no doubt regard themselves as modernisers and looking for something to do, have put an end to Britannia.
Would the French so disrespect Marianne - the national emblem of the French Republic? Of course not - just as they hang on to more of their manufacturing industry and in French ownership too.
What worries me is not simply the setting aside of history but the creeping loss of identity and indeed regard for national myth that has beset Britain (and England in particular) these many years. Another instance is the disregard for the statue of Boudicca (English tribal Queen of the Iceni who almost drove out the Romans). There is a cheap knick-knack stall directly beneath her statue by the Thames. Your history is a major part of your identity as an individual as well as a nation. I believe that a appreciation of History (from whence did I come?) Geography (what place is this?) and the Physical Sciences (what is the nature of my world?) are almost as important to the sense of self as one’s personal background.
Last year, existing designs were scrapped and with them Britannia from the 50p coin and replaced with part of a coat of arms with the symbols of the nations of the UK. Only if the coins were placed alongside each other would the full coat of arms be evident. Also ditched with Britannia are the lion on the 10p coin and the portcullis on the penny. How can our tradition be trashed so casually? Probably by the same mindset that ditched so much of our industry, exported so many of our jobs and paid themselves bonuses for doing so.
So I was very pleased when Birmingham Liberal Democrat MP John Hemming began a campaign among MPs to bring back Britannia. This has received support from members in all parties. The ideal candidate would be the £2 coin that presently carries an Olympic symbol that will disappear after the games in 2012 and so could be replaced by Britannia - who should never have been removed from our coins in the first place. Perhaps if we do regain that which was lost by that time we may also reclaimed some of the other national assets that have been so carelessly discarded - but probably not the nameplate apostrophes!

Words across Europe

If you are tired of domestic television or sixty second clips of trifles on YouTube (or are possibly experiencing sleep problems) you can always watch the European Parliament live (sic) - and thankfully free of charge - in plenary session, or in committees at:
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/wps-europarl-internet/faces/live/live-video.jsp
There is likely to be a more than usually interesting session in a couple of months time since the chances are growing that United States President Barack Obama will accept the invitation to speak in the European Parliament.

The President's address is likely during his visit to Europe for the G20 and NATO Summits that are scheduled for 1 - 4 April, with the most probable date for the speech being Friday April 3rd. The above link would allow you to view his speech as it is delivered to the parliament.
Of course, events could still disrupt the best-laid plans. In an unlikely to be repeated episode, George Bush accepted an invitation to speak in March 2004, but his visit fell through because of one important detail - his insistence that he must receive a standing ovation (otherwise he thought that he risked looking bad on American television).
On a lighter and much more politically astute note, back in the 1980s Ronald Reagan addressed the European Parliament. In the middle of his speech Labour MEPs and some Socialists (distinction noted) walked out of the chamber waving banners. President Reagan, adept as ever at the telling one-liner, patiently watched them leave then commented to the members that remained: "Gee, if only I could get rid of my opponents in Congress as easily as that" - and received a deserved ovation!
Times, of course, are much changed, and given the extensive ramifications of the deep and international economic recession and the ever-present international peace and security concerns, President Obama’s address is keenly anticipated in Europe and beyond.

Words across the World

What a deeply impressive occasion President Obama’s inauguration was. The very sight of the million plus people gathered for the historic day set the inspirational scene and that picture will endure in memory and record. So also will the President Obama’s speech endure. Some commentators, no doubt seeking highbrow entertainment, have complained that it was not drenched in soaring phrases. There was poetry there aplenty but it seemed clear to me that this was a speech of great substance setting out the character of the new United States administration, its broad intentions, some clear imperatives and struck notes of genuine change and what I would characterise as ‘ambitious realism’.
As with all the limited selection of Obama material that I have heard, including the half-hour ‘infomercial’, not a word was wasted. It was laden with significance and for that reason will outlast speeches remembered mostly for their memorable phrases (‘ask not...’, ‘land a man on the moon...’, ‘nothing to fear but fear itself...’) from Kennedy or Franklin Roosevelt. And, I will wager, we will see more of President Obama’s speech implemented - that was the clear intention. And such are Obama’s gifts of organisation, the structure of decision making, confidence and sheer ability - clearly comfortable with power from the outset - that he will do this himself.
Franklin Roosevelt, in my view the greatest US president to date, had major achievements both at home and abroad but could have pulled the United States out of the Great Depression sooner had he not been somewhat hamstrung both by institutions and the thinking of the times. It was President Johnson of course who carried forward much of the Kennedy programme and, despite his less attractive qualities, began material delivery on civil rights with considerable political skill.
President Obama has got down to work immediately - and so should national leaders elsewhere. In this connection, one less commented upon point of Obama’s speech is how the powerful and poetic phrases are deployable to other contexts. Before illustrating this in an English context, could I point towards a completely unrelated source that is richly usable in the same way.

This is Ecclesiasticus from the Biblical Apocrypha, which will reward a reflective browse. I once gave a speech at a cricket dinner reviewing the season my club had had, illuminated by phrases from this both multi-levelled and profound source. It would probably work for other sports too, should you want to try something a bit different. No doubt your ‘delivery’ would be a distinct improvement on mine - no wonder half the members seemed to be nodding off!
So, as a few examples of the relevance of the Obama phrases and the lamentable English economic condition:
‘An economic crisis caused by greed and irresponsibility...’ Applies here too - unchanged and, alas, probably with even greater force, now amplified for England by having to pick up another huge chunk of losses from the Royal Bank of Scotland.
‘Our collective failure to make hard choices...’ In my book principally the choice to live within our means, abandoning the ‘have it all’, ‘must have’ and ‘generation now’ advertising mentalities as well as unmade selections of options in political economy.
‘The challenges we face are real...’ All too true of the real economy skewered by the avaricious and incompetent bankers and the glut of globalisation thrust upon us in a cruel kind of industrial pate de foie gras.
‘Clinging to power through corruption and deceit...’ Today’s (or yesterday’s) possessors of economic power, corrupted by bonuses and deceiving themselves as well as both citizens and leaders here. In my view we must do something about the culture of customer deceit on which so much of our economy became based.
‘Bold and swift action...’ on the economy - not so swift and only retrospectively emboldened by discoveries of the emerging scale of the debt the banks have saddled us with.
There are many more widely adaptable phrases in an eloquent speech, the relevance of which extends to large parts of the Western World.

An Effective Keynesian Stimulus

Contrary to the repeated assertions made by the Government, there is no doubt that the British economy was particularly badly placed to withstand the crises in the financial sector and, even more importantly, in the productive sectors. Badly placed indeed, due an unbalanced economy that had become far too reliant on casino capitalism, to imprudence in government management of finances, mismanaged contracts and misdirected spend over very many years. And of course, on a truly epic scale, due to the abandonment of prudence, wisdom, diligence and even plain common sense in the banking and financial sector and the absence of effective financial regulation.
Added to this have been the ravages of the globalisation bandwagon on domestic industry, manufacturing in particular, with much of it closed down and many jobs already exported. The evisceration of our industries of substance rather than froth leaves the country less able to benefit from the lower value of the pound by producing for export - where the demand is there. The commercial banks have added further to this problem by effectively forcing viable producers out of business with severely tightened conditions or recalled loans. I sometimes think that banks, in their behaviour towards industry and individuals alike, are little better than a fifth column. As a result, there is still a real and present danger of approaching a 1930s situation.
How is this dire predicament to be remedied? Certainly not without a cost. Folly always has its price. We will do well to escape with 5% reduction in Gross Domestic Product. But how do we ensure that such a deep recession, where output recedes and where spending and income are well below normal, does not worsen further into depression where there are disastrous falls and the loss of GDP approaches double digits? And how do we ensure that a sustainable economic recovery begins as soon as possible?
Those in power, or aspiring to power, must have a clearly thought through and effective recovery strategy. It is not clear that this exists in government and certainly not in the principal opposition. In these circumstances, does it sound like good sense to start cutting back? Most certainly not. If output and income are to go up, then there must be extra spending from some quarter. The rational debate - and there is plenty of scope for discussion of which measures will prove to be most effective - is about how a Keynesian solution that would achieve this is to be implemented, and which quarters can be persuaded and enabled to spend more.
A certain amount of benefit, but probably not all that much in the shorter term, may come from exports (not evident as yet) and visitors from overseas (some evidence of this). If the death grip of the banks can be loosened, and companies can be enabled at least to retain what they already have, and to increase their investment spending, then that would indeed be ideal. But, in order to justify investment, companies need to see demand for their products, which of course is precisely what isn’t there. So, once again, it makes no sense to cut back.
In terms of expanding aggregate demand, you can try to create that extra consumption with tax cuts. In this connection, income tax cuts would have been better than the VAT reduction, which clearly isn’t working. And transmitted interest rate reductions will also cause borrowers to have more at their disposal.
But interest rates are a double-edged sword whereby those who rely on savings for income are made worse off and so spend less. We know only too well that, courtesy of the banks, savers are hit early and in full and borrowers benefit later and less, if at all. Additionally, Experience in Japan in the 1990s found that in the face of interest rate cuts people saved harder to preserve their future security and incomes. We may see something of that effect here.
Important though they are, in my opinion there has been too much concentration on interest rates and taxation (though not enough about helping those who save) and now talk of increasingly imaginative and risky monetary policies too. Though all these policies have a role, there has in my view been not nearly enough of a focus on public works projects and support for manufacturing industry.
With infrastructure work - and goodness knows that after decades of under-investment we need it in energy, transport and right across the board - we generate business to firms and encourage them to invest, create or save jobs, keep more of the money at home and provide a better quality infrastructure and the much needed energy security and stable prices in the future. To my mind that’s a whole lot better and wiser than, in effect, saying: ‘Here’s £100, dash down the shopping centre and spend it on imports’.
What about Government waste? All too much of this is gone for good, but no-one in their senses would object to cutting current waste and improving efficiency - it’s important to do this. But in my view it is also important to divert the bulk of such savings to public works projects - and then to add to this total. It is imperative that the total be increased. Also in my view, if too much of the savings from waste reduction are passed on in the form of tax cuts then, entirely rationally in individual terms, people will probably use most of it to repair their domestic balance sheets - rather like the banks and with the same lack of benefit to the economy as a whole.
Economic recessions are about a serious shortage of aggregate demand. And in my view it also matters what makes up that demand. The less expenditure that is frittered away on bric-a-brac and which leaks out on imports, and the more of it that is invested in improvements in the nation’s infrastructure and the environment, securing productive jobs and supporting manufacturing, the better. And in the longer term, a restored and re-balanced economy, achieved by these Keynesian means described, will provide the firmest foundation for the restoration of future public finances and the resumption of prudent and sustainable ways of living.

Gaza

The relentless bombardment of Gaza must stop, as must random rocket attacks on Israeli people. Israel has no right to make the whole Palestinian people, least of all children, culpable for the actions of Hamas and those who arm it. Hamas has no licence to act in ways that it knows will bring suffering and death to innocent people - not least to the afflicted, powerless people that it claims to represent. There must be an immediate, durable and fully respected ceasefire to ensure that there is no further loss of life in and around Gaza. International peacekeepers and experts should be deployed in key positions and arms exports should cease. There should be credible and independent investigations into any violations of international humanitarian law.
The Israeli government and those who support it must realise that the problems of the Middle East cannot be solved by armed and disproportionate force and that the Palestinian people have rights to homeland, peace and prosperity. Hamas and its backers must realise that the welfare and interests of the Palestinian people are undermined by acts of violence and vengeance, and that Israel is an established fact. The world must realise and base its actions upon the strength of the convictions of the two peoples about their rights to live in the same area of land.
If Israel’s aim is to destroy Hamas (as if something worse would not spring up in its place) then it must rapidly reconsider. If eradication is not its aim, the attack upon Gaza is senseless as well as barbaric. If the objective of Hamas is to destroy Israel (as if the roles would not then be reversed) it too must reassess and relate to reality. If not, the siting of rocket launchers in populated and vulnerable areas is also senseless as well as abusive and dishonourable. A cycle of merciless violence, fuelled by hatred, loathing and disregard for individual life, will be victory for no-one and defeat for humanity.
Yet there are people of pragmatism - and indeed good will - in both causes. By means that cannot yet be set out in full, their hands must be strengthened and those of the ideologues diminished. Some leaders who show insight in calmer times should promote their own level-headed counsel in ending this conflict. For example: "Israel will never turn armed might into strategic security. If need be it could win a war against all its enemies combined. But if it wants peace it must face the decision it has avoided for forty years: withdrawal from the occupied Palestinian territories. Military victories and land grabs are futile. Security will only come with political resolution." So reflected Ehud Olmert last September.
For ill or for good, and certainly forever, the destinies of the Palestinian and Israeli peoples are bound together, obliging them to live side by side. In the interests of ordinary people, those who command or govern must come to the conclusion, however reluctantly, that this is to be constructive rather than cursed, developmental rather than desolate and act accordingly. Through continued diplomatic pressure from the United Nations, the United States (now, we cannot wait for the new leadership), through the EU with a serious mandate, through our own Government and through the actions of other nation states - and thousands of organisations within them - the world must put its weight behind a massive effort to bring an end to the humanitarian disaster in Gaza and work with unprecedented commitment to achieve a just and lasting political resolution in the Middle East.