Lavengro in Spain

British moral hypocrisy

What strikes me amid all this fuss about the unlovable Jonathan Ross and the puerile Russell Brand is that it is ultimately about a male claim of sexual achievement: ‘You fucked his granddaughter,’ Ross said to Brand. There was a time when gentlemen were not supposed to brag about their amorous activities – let alone those of their friends. It may be that Ross and Brand do not consider themselves, and are not considered by their friends, to be gentlemen but even so the question of privacy will – fortunately I am pleased to say – not go away.

I had not heard of Georgina Baillie before all this started, and a lot of people’s lives would have been all the better if that state of affairs and been maintained. She is a young woman with a rather extravagant style of presenting herself and a taste for black underwear; curiously, a Google search for pictures of her leads exclusively to the Daily Mail, for ones of her in mild S&M gear. She also, it seems, enjoys the kind of varied and experimental sex life that is by no means unknown to many young people of that age. But her private life is her business and no-one else’s.

What I find quite disgusting is the way in which her style of life has been presented. We read in the Independent about

witless references to the ravishing of [Andrew Sachs’s] granddaughter by Mr Brand. … As for Georgina Baillie, it has become trickier to empathise with the shock to which she lays claim since learning that she’s an erstwhile “glamour model” who thrice enjoyed coitus with Mr Brand … Georgina will make a great deal of money from this, and so she should. For playing even an unwitting part in the provision of such mirth …

and in a letter in the same paper the same day:

It would be disgraceful to censor [Brand & Ross] indefinitely because of an unfunny routine left on Sachs's answer-phone about his 23-year-old granddaughter who, being in a band called The Satanic Sluts and describing her marital status as a "swinger", seems not to be lacking a sense of humour.

So there we are. A woman who says that she loves her grandfather – and why shouldn’t she? – is written off in a way that my Victorian great-aunts would have been proud of. I can hear them now: a woman like that … she can’t have any human feelings … no better than she ought to be … she can’t expect people to respect her … she’s forfeited all right to respect … women who display themselves in public … A suggestion that her right to privacy should be respected is branded as censorship.

British Puritanism and its associated hypocrisy – in the sense of allowing bullies to be rude about other people’s intimate affairs while keeping their own lives private – is every bit as alive and well as it ever was.

I recommend a reading of The Scarlet Letter.

Something to look forward to

When I go to Britain at Christmas, I won’t see Jonathan Ross or Russell Brand on television. Things are looking up. Maybe there's hope for the country yet.

Spain is different

In the town of San Fulgencio recently Manuel Barrera, a councillor from a local independent party, was caught on a DVD accepting 5,000 euros as an advance on a bribe for giving planning permission to a builder ‘It’s best in big notes,’ he said. ‘They take up less space.’ He was duly arrested and charged with corruption. Nothing very strange there – it’s far from being the first such case of corruption, and as long as allocation and classification of land is done at municipal level it is unlikely to be the last. San Fulgencio has a population of 10,583 (2007).

But what makes this story wonderfully Spanish is that the Socialist mayor of the town, Trinidad Martínez, has now been arrested, along with other councillors and the municipal lawyer. It seems that they set the whole thing up using a firm of private detectives from Barcelona to act as the speculators who bribed the councillor. Presumably, the operation was paid for with public money. The lawyers are now busy trying to work out who to charge with what.

The BBC report that the acting mayor is a British expat who barely speaks the language and, presumably, understands little of Spanish culture or governmental procedures has turned out to be a false rumour. San Fulgencio’s web site  has nothing in its news section.Funny that!

As for the big notes, about 30% of all €500 notes in circulation are in Spain. They are known as bin Ladens because everyone has heard of them and no-one has seen them. The banks are trying to control them, and many shops won’t accept them, but they are legal tender and they are widely used by corrupt politicians, mafia organisations and so on because of their convenience. It is also worth remembering that, despite what some people think, these large denomination notes were introduced against the wishes of the Spanish and other governments, who could see precisely what problems they would cause. It was the Germans with their DM1000 note and their preference for cash rather than banks or credit who wanted, and insisted on having, a euro equivalent for it.

Bureaucracy gone mad

Every Thursday the Guardian sends me its Northerner round-up of news from the north of England. Today there is this classic from the Manchester Evening News (my emphasis).

A ghost bus stop in the foothills of the Pennines has this week been described as the stop that time forgot - a ghostly bus shelter, illuminated at night by solar lighting but devoid of passengers.

The shelter was put up two years ago to serve passengers in the village of Diggle, on the outskirts of Oldham. But the same week work finished, bus services were changed by transport officials and diverted on to another road.

The Diggle bus stop was unused and unloved. No number 184 buses passed by.

Every night the solar-powered lights flicker on automatically to light up the shelter. Two years on, no passengers have ever used it.

A sign on the shelter helpfully instructs passing travellers that there are no services on a weekday, Saturday, Sunday or public holidays.

A Saddleworth councilor, Ken Hulme, said: "It's in excellent condition and comes fully equipped with lights that come on every night despite its redundant nature. It's not perhaps the best way to help the environment. I spoke to Greater Manchester passenger transport executive and they told me they have a policy of not closing any bus stops. I couldn't believe that. It's bureaucracy gone mad."

Hulme believes the shelter should be shifted down the road. "It's in fine condition," he said. "In fact I'm amazed it's never been vandalised."

Michael Renshaw, of the Greater Manchester passenger transport executive, said there were no plans to move the stop in case a new route is introduced in future which would run past it. "The lights are solar-powered and they reduce antisocial behaviour so we keep them on."

British airport ‘security’

As British freedoms are abolished in the Labour Party’s police state (which the Conservatives will be more than happy to maintain when they get back), the airports are already staffed by fascist jobsworths who could have walked straight out of Franco’s (or anyone else’s) dictatorship.

BBC

'Thumbed' passport grounds family

The bottom left corner of Kevin Higgins' passport was "too damaged"

A Dorset family was not allowed on a Ryanair flight [to Barcelona] because one of them had a "well thumbed" passport which check-in staff claimed was a security risk.

…

Mrs Higgins said … "I have spoken with the passport office and they claim a damaged passport is one which is illegible, has obviously been defaced and written over or water damaged or cannot be read electronically. My husband's passport is none of these.

"It is not defaced in any way, no water damage and is perfectly legible."

She said Mr Higgins had travelled four times already this year, once to the US, using his passport without any problems.

A spokesman for Servisair said: "Having examined [the photographs] and talked to our supervisor, Servisair is sorry that the passport was too damaged to allow Mr Higgins to travel.

"As the handling agent for the airline we have to stick to their regulations and so our supervisor had to refuse travel because the passport lamination had started to come away, which allowed possible tampering with the photograph and was clearly a security risk and against those regulations.

"As we always advise, people should put their passport in a passport holder for protection against damage and we are very sorry that the passport was damaged and therefore travel was refused."

Once, back in the seventies, I left the UK through Dover. After checking the photo and other details on my brand new passport, the immigration officer suggested that I really ought to sign it as soon as I got on the boat. Those were the days! They were also the days when you could travel around much of western Europe with only a cursory passport check at the borders if that. The Nordic countries and Benelux already had their passport-free agreements, and checks on the West German and French borders were hardly rigorous.

Things you should NEVER do

Give your phone number to someone at the BBC.

[Andrew] Sachs is upset after [Russell] Brand and [Jonathan] Ross left a series of lewd messages on his voicemail, including obscene comments about his 23-year-old granddaughter Georgina Baillie.

Crossing the pond

Typepad, who host this blog, have sent me a newsletter with this in it. The motive is worthy no doubt, but the slogan in the image reads oddly to British eyes!

If you’ve ever wanted to contribute to classrooms in need, now is your chance. Donors Choose is an organization that matches teachers' wish lists with people who want to donate, and they’ve invited bloggers to participate.Several TypePad bloggers, including Six Apart co-founder Mena Trott and Alice of Finslippy have joined the effort to help fund important classroom projects. You can help, too: Get details on how to participate in the Blogger Challenge.

Joining the euro

Today’s Independent says:

At this rate, it won't be long before we're joining the euro

What it means of course is that it won’t be long before the UK applies to the EU with a view to opening negotiations on the possibility of the country’s joining the euro. As I have said on more than one occasion, the days when the UK could announce what it wanted and expect the foreigners to fall into line have long gone. Sadly, the Independent still seems to believe this piece of nationalist mythology.

Countries that join the euro are expected to meet certain criteria. I do not know whether the UK’s economy is in a good enough state to join, but I do know that there is no obvious reason why the EU’s most stroppy and objectionable member state should expect to be welcomed into the euro as a haven when its own financial system collapses. The new member countries have to adopt the euro as soon as their economies meet the criteria, and they are gradually doing so; that is a condition of their joining the EU. After standing disdainfully aloof from the European project for so long the UK can expect no special favours when it tries to run inside for cover.

The euro is a part of the EU, and it is not the only part. There is the Schengen agreement too. If the UK wants to join the euro at last, why should it not also join the Schengen common passport area? If anyone in the UK ever thought about the EU properly, that question would immediately spring to mind. It will certainly be a European reaction to any UK attempt to seek refuge from its mistakes of the past by seizing hold of the euro.

Foreign muck

From the BBC

Cooks complain about foreign food

School cooks in north Wales have complained about being forced into serving up foreign meat to pupils.

Anglesey council has received complaints from 11 primary schools whose kitchens are unhappy at being supplied with Belgian beef.

They said suppliers Eden Foodservice said they would provide only UK-sourced meat to local schools.

 

 

The UK is, of course, the only country in the world where British is regarded as a good word to associate with beef. Perhaps the Belgian beef smelt foreign – of garlic perhaps – or indeed of the very foreigners themselves.

My baggage claim against easyJet

I have described the problems that I have had with my claim against easyJet for damaged luggage (here) and the delaying tactics that they have used. On 31 July they asked me for my postal address so that they could settle the claim:

So that we might finalise your claim could you please forward to me your full postal address, as we do not appear to have this on file.

I replied the following day giving them my address. The next thing was that I received this form from them. It is surely unnecessary to go to such legal lengths for a payment of sixty euros, and it is utterly absurd for them to ask for a witness to my signature when there is no way at all of confirming that the witness is genuine.

What is more, I did not at all like the bit about me indemnifying them against any other claim that might be made, so I deleted that bit before I sent it to them – by registered post of course. There is the further point that in Spain getting anyone other than a notary to witness a signature is quite rightly regarded as pointlessly stupid, so the chances of any of my Spanish friends and acquaintances putting their name to a legal document in English were pretty low. In the end I had it signed by a bemused British friend when I was in Cambridge last month.

I have a letter from Barcelona city council’s consumer protection office. It gives easyJet two months before they take the matter up directly. It is dated 19 September. easyJet are aware of this letter. I wonder what easyJet’s next move will be.