Well, really!

Bookham Busybody

Don't you just hate it when people poke their noses in where they don't belong? Miss Josephine Rooney was sent to prison for three months on Monday for refusing to pay her council tax since November 2004, in protest at the problems of prostitution, drug use, litter and graffiti where she lives in Hartington Street, Derby. She has been paying into a savings account instead.

Miss Rooney is a good woman, a pensioner and devout Catholic, who has spent much time helping and feeding the homeless and the drug users in the street (and receiving a Taking a Stand award from Blair's government for doing so). Inviting her prison sentence is part of her protest, to publicise the problems and force the council into doing what it's paid to do.

And now some prat comes along and pays her tax, forcing her to be released from jail. Miss Rooney is very annoyed. "The person who did this obviously had no respect for me or my campaign," she said. Well quite. That person is one Ed McGrath, 68, a retired insurance broker, from Little Bookham, Surrey. A long way from Derby, and Miss Rooney, and her campaign to make things better.

Good comment in the Telegraph here and here.

Targeting Honours

I suppose it depends how you look at it. The Telegraph reports this morning that "High-profile but uncontroversial figures... receive awards today in a deliberately low-key Queen's Birthday Honours list." Almost as an afterthought, the final paragraph of their piece adds that "The country's most senior anti-terrorist police officer, the Metropolitan Police assistant commissioner, Andy Hayman, 46, receives a CBE."

The Times front page headline, on the other hand, shouts "Honours row over shooting blunder policeman", which seems closer to the mark, if you'll pardon the pun. This recipient of the Government's largesse is "facing a disciplinary investigation over his involvement in the aftermath of the shooting dead of an innocent man after the July 7 bombings... [He] was also in command of a disastrous raid in East London two weeks ago in which a man was shot and injured, but later released without charge."

Whether or not Hayman deserves the honour for services to the police is not at question. What is doubtful is this Government's outrageously insensitive timing of the award, close to the anniversary of the shooting of Menezes last year, and only days after the trauma of the upheaval of the community in Forest Gate. It's typical of NuLab's indifference to anyone's feelings but their own and their cronies'.

Women Train for 2012 Olympics

Women are to be trained as builders in preparation for the 2012 London Olympics, at a cost of £20 million, according to the Beeb. This is an excellent idea – one of the Government's better policies – as it will allow the blokes to sit and watch the sport while the women finish the stadium. Afterwards the women will take part in weightlifting and hammer throwing.

Lesson 1: The Fork

There's a wonderful book called 'The House on Beartown Road', by Elizabeth Cohen. Moving, funny, well observed, it describes a year in which Ms Cohen is bringing up her baby daughter Ava while also looking after her 80-year-old father, who has Alzheimer’s. Anyone who's been close to someone with a declining memory will especially appreciate it.

She realizes the symmetry of the situation: that Ava is learning about the world as her grandfather forgets. The two of them make a great team.

"Now he can't remember the name of a fork. Yet here is the thing: he knows the difference between a good fork and a bad one. Once I remind him that a fork is a fork, he wants me to know right away that he doesn't find the fork I have handed him a very nice fork. He is right. The forks we use have plastic handles. They are cheap.

"This is important to him, that I recognise his good taste. Once I remind him how to use a fork, a spoon, a napkin, the location of the arms in his jacket, he is instantly an expert. He decides that he will pass on the knowledge, as well as the power of discriminating. The person he has decided to pass these on to is Ava. He will demonstrate good fork manners to a baby who is still struggling with fork usage. He will teach her. So every day now he sits beside her; she shows him which utensil is the fork, and then he shows her the right way to use it."

All of which is by way of introduction to a story in the Daily Mail [actually a couple of weeks ago] that children in at least one school are to attend lessons in how to use a fork.

"A primary school is employing a member of staff solely to teach pupils how to use a knife and fork. Teachers have noticed many children having trouble using cutlery at school mealtimes. They believe someone needs to teach them the skills they may be missing out on at home. Children aged four to 11 will also be shown how to socialise with other pupils while sitting at the table and to choose healthy foods at Burrowmoor School in March, Cambridgeshire."

Well, really!