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Top news from The Times, Daily Telegraph, The Indepedent and The Guardian newspapers

Auf Wiedersehen

”’IS this Lie-cester Square?” ”Where The Mousetrap?” ”Ya, Jan, zat plistic bobby’s helmit is really cool. I mist ‘ave one?”

”And how many palaces does the Royal Lego set come with?”

It’s the kind of language that hasn’t been heard in this country since Britain became as popular a tourist destination as a cold Sunday in Kabul.

So yesterday the same people who dream up National Sausage Week and National Walking Backwards Minute asked us to celebrate the inaugural National Tourism Day.

And that meant the Royal Family – ”one of Britain’s premier tourist attractions” (Independent) – were pressed into action.

What a fun day out was had by one and all. Mater and pater Windsor went to Legoland in, er, Windsor and looked at Lego models of things like Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle and life-sized Lego bust of their own heads.

The Telegraph looks on as the Legoland staff try to present Philip, who was 82 years old yesterday, with a ”Happy Birthday” badge.

The offer was waved away by a flunky, but the crowd could not be deterred from singing Happy Birthday as the couple boarded the ”kiddies’ train”.

Meanwhile, the Independent spots the Duke of York in the Drunken Duck Pub in the Lake District; the Princess Royal at the Royal Navy Submarine Museum, Hampshire; and Prince Charles pulling on a kilt and sampling Scotch malt in Edinburgh.

By now, you’re wondering like the rest of us what happened to the Wessexes. The Telegraph spots Sophie at Pennywell Farm, Devon, chatting to lambs.

But where is Eddie? Oh, the Independent’s caught sight of him taking in the delights of a caravan park in Brynich, Wales, and then disappearing down a hole at the National Caves Show at Brecon.

It’s just great to see them Royals doing their bit. And if their German and Greek kin can take a feather from their caps, the British tourist industry might yet be saved.

Posted: 11th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Quality Street

‘HEARING Prince Eddie call out from the deepest recesses of a Welsh cave that he won’t move until the tourists come back is one sign of our changing times.

Open-plan living area, with bedroom on mezzanine floor…

(It is also something of a deathknell to our benighted tourist industry.)

Another is that villages and towns are no longer older versions of Poundbury in Dorset, the site of Prince Charles’ vision of the ideal rural community.

They are thrusting, new-builds, with galley kitchens built on a mezzanine level.

It’s the style of housing that the Times says if set to replace the old Victorian back-to-back housing in Langworthy, Salford.

This means little to most readers until the paper reveals that the homes scheduled for development are seen four times a week in the opening credits to Coronation Street, TV’s longest-running soap opera.

While we can only thrill to a new-look Corrie, we wonder what such a redevelopment means for TV in general.

Is Terry Wogan to get a facelift? And who wants to underpin Vanessa Feltz? The diggers are looking nervous…

Posted: 11th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


A Bunch Of Blix

‘EVEN at the apogee of hostilities, George W Bush, a man with a loose, soapy grip on language, resisted the chance to call Saddam Hussein names.

Don’t let the bastards get you down, Hans

Sure he was evil, but, then, who isn’t compared to God-fearing George?

He never called Saddam a berk, a pratt or a dolt. He never shoved his tongue into the space between his bottom lip and chin and gurned.

But now Hans Blix has changed political protocol. In conversation with the Guardian, the UN chief weapons inspector has used the word ”bastard” to describe they ”who spread things around” and ”who planted nasty things in the media”.

Of course, had the unnamed ”they” planted a few weapons of mass destruction in the pages of the Beano, Hans would have achieved what many hawks in the US believed was his goal.

Instead Blix complains that he was smeared by the Bush administration and was wrongly branded a ”homosexual” in Baghdad.

But that’s nothing a bushy moustache can’t fix… ‘

Posted: 11th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Paying The Penalty

‘LIKE the results of a football penalty shoot-out, the Times lists with crosses and ticks the failure and success of each of Gordon Brown’s five economic tests for euro acceptance.

As Gordon drones on, Tony stares up at whence he came

The score is four to one in favour of the crosses, although the Independent puts the score much closer at 2-1 to the ”nos” and has referred two tests to the Russian linesman.

With the result in limbo, the Telegraph (”The euro tests”), Times (”euro verdict”), and Guardian (”Britain and the euro”) bombard us with separate pull-out reports on the match of the century.

Only the Telegraph bothers to punctuate the welter of words with a cartoon. With a nod to Waiting For Godot, Samuel Beckett’s play about the pointlessness of life, Gordon and Tony are located, appropriately enough, in the woods.

”That passed the time,” says Gordon. ”It would have passed in any case…” replies Tony.

At least the Independent keeps an eye out for what’s happening abroad, and as promised we bring you another story from life overseas.

A mosquito that can carry the lethal West Nile virus has been spotted living in an illegal colony close to the Scottish village of Menstrie, Clackmannanshire.

Already over 40 Brits have been bitten by the nasty wee beasties, which are believed to have arrived from Europe…”in a lorry”.

They are also believed to have arrived with no euros.

Posted: 10th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


What A Doughnut

‘SCHOOLED in EastEnders English, most of would rather not be called a ”doughnut”.

More of a Polo than a doughnut

But the Guardian says it’s the word on everyone’s lips ”in the land of spies”.

Famous for leaving briefcases full of documents at Paddington Station, doughnut might be an apt description for a member of our intelligence service personnel.

But it is the building rather than the person that has a hole in the centre. The Doughnut is the new multi-million pound headquarters of GCHQ, the Government’s electronic eavesdropping centre.

And being the secret institution that it is, the Guardian was invited to tour the premises before it is ”sealed” off to outsiders later this month.

And what a fine construction – acres of steel and glass, enclosing a large open space, ”the size of 17 football pitches”.

Workers within will be invited to kick ideas around, if not footballs, sharing a ”common desktop” and an open plan space ”designed to make staff talk to their colleagues”.

Which will mean that the chatter picked up by the men and women in shiny suits will entirely be of their own making.

Posted: 10th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Watch Wiv Muvver

‘GREAT news for those who think children should be seen and not heard.

Nick Cotton – a good role model for children?

The Times has noticed a survey by the Broadcasting Standards Commission and notes that children are watching up to two-and-a-half hours of television a day.

The even better news is that just 30 minutes of that is children’s programming, with the rest dedicated to shows intended for an adult audience.

Reading between the 650 lines, this means that children who would otherwise be getting pregnant, joyriding or smashing up the bus stops are choosing to burn their retinas instead.

But let’s not get the champagne corks out just yet, as the report also says that the most popular show among the ankle-biting fraternity is EastEnders.

Which means that although they’re indoors, the little loves are probably planning to sleep with their siblings or murder their parents. But, no matter, it’s only telly…

Posted: 10th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Five Go Mad

”’COME on in,” says the German. ”It’ll be all right. Pierre is already here.” But John Bull waits for the creepy music to end and the audience to tell him what to do.

Test 1: If it sounds like fudge, smells like fudge, it is probably fudge

”Don’t do it,” say most of the Tories from the right. ”Don’t follow the Germans and the French. Are you mad?!” ”Don’t be scared,” say the europhiles on the left. ”Go for it!”

So which way to jump? It’s a tough decision, but, thankfully, Gordon Brown and Tony Blair are there to cast the decisive votes.

”Yes,” says Gordon, ”but not yet.” And so John Bull waits. The Independent then hears Brown step up to the euro gates and address the French and Germans within. ”You go on ahead, we’ll catch up later – if we feel like it.”

The Independent, though, is struggling to believe its ears. The paper remembers on its front page how, in July 2000, the Prime Minister predicted the meeting of the famous five tests and the Government recommendation that we the people take up the euro.

But we all know that the driving forces behind the five tests have radically altered. For instance, there’s the one about the, er, you know thingamebob in Test 3: The Pepsi Daz Challenge. Or is that Test Four.

Whatever it is, the Tory leader, Iain Duncan Smith, tells the Times that the Chancellor’s five tests were one of the ”most elaborate, time-consuming smoke-screens in history”.

No chance, says a restive Chancellor Brown, the man who’s set to announce his ‘definitely maybe’ verdict to a packed Commons this afternoon.

Warming up for that, the Times hears him launch into a long speech about the importance of trust. ”Trust in Governments depends on you being able to make the right decision and to show people you are working in their interests,” he blusters.

Or making no decision at all, as is the case here.

Posted: 9th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Strike Bound

‘JUST by way of a memo about the probity of our European cousins, the Guardian says that the European Central Bank is thinking about tagging big euro notes with electronic chips to combat a six-fold increase in fraud.

”Was it not a Frenchman who said ‘All for one and one for out’?”

If you like that story, each day we’ll try to bring you another tale of life on the continental shelf.

But if you think the story of forged notes is a loaded story, weighted for the europhobes, we’ll even it up with the Times’ lead story on how Unison, the country’s biggest union, is thinking about adopting a typical French custom.

The union, it seems, it looking to the creation of a permanent ”strike fund”, taking up a ”continental tactic” intended to bypass laws which ban secondary action.

What this means is that the union can call on co-ordinated industrial action. If staff in one sector – say, teaching – want to walk out, then their brothers and sisters in local government and health care can come out in sympathy.

It’s what the French call Les Grandes Vacances. And with a bit of luck, it’ll be here soon. Roll on the endless summer…

Posted: 9th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


What’s Up, Doc?

‘PHYSICIANS are being urged to heal their English. The Times reports that the NHS is spending thousands of pounds each year instructing health workers to write better patient notes.

”I am sorry to tell you that you are dead”

The paper says that badly written notes are part of the growing problem of patient claims for compensation.

Over the past three years, claims have risen by £100 million, and many of them, according to NHS Trusts, would not have been successful had the doctors and nurses written proper notes.

For our knowledge, the paper lists a few of the choice mistakes that have been made.

”In one instance, a worker at an emergency ward told a woman’s children that their mother was dead.

”DOA” had been written on her notes. Dead on arrival? No. Date of admission. She was fine.

Another patient was incensed at being called a ”son of a bitch”. The SOB on her notes turned her red with rage.

Which was a shame since she suffered from Shortness Of Breath (see notes).

And so it goes on.

But the remedy is surely for all notes to be written by Gordon Brown and his team.

After a series of confusing tests, patients will be advised to sit tight, not to worry and to see what happens.

And then die.

Posted: 9th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


The Mish Mash Man

‘WHEN judge Mr Justice Lewison looked at the court list and saw his next case was The Ant’ill Mob v The Heartless Crew, he probably thought he was caught up in an episode of The Wacky Races.

The Heartless Crew lusted after Penelope Pitstop

That is, of course, if he knew what the Wacky Races was – which it’s a fair bet he didn’t.

But that would certainly have been preferable to the reality, which was a court case between two rival rap bands over whether a remix of an Ant’ill Mob song was derogatory.

Andrew Alcee, who wrote the song Burnin’ (which went on to top the garage charts in 2001), complained that lyrics laid over the top of his original tune by The Heartless Crew referred to drugs and violence.

And thus Mr Justice Lewison was called upon to judge the meaning of such phrases as ”shizzle my nizzle”, ”the mish mash man” and ”string dem up”.

It was, the judge admitted, a ”faintly surreal experience”, ruling that although the lyrics were written in a form of English, they were ”for practical purposes a foreign language”.

The Telegraph was in court to see the judge eventually rule in favour of The Heartless Crew.

He said there was no evidence that any of the phrases referred to drugs.

”Shizzle my nizzle” is, the paper helpfully points out, a bastardisation of ”sheezy mah neezy”, itself a bastardisation of ”for sure mah nigga”, a bastardisation of ”I concur with you wholeheartedly, my African-American brother”.

As for ”string dem up”, there was nothing unrespectable about expressing this as an opinion.

After all, it’s heard every morning at the breakfast table of Telegraph readers…

Posted: 6th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Muck And Brass

‘YOU sometimes wonder what doctors and dentists have to do to get themselves struck off.

Gareth failed to spot that we had switched cans

For instance, you would think taking out the wrong teeth would be a pretty serious mistake for a dentist, particularly when the schoolboy victim was a budding euphonium player.

The mistake ended Ben Oliver’s dream of becoming a professional musician because the resultant gaps in his mouth made it difficult for him to play the right notes.

He still plays in a brass band as a hobby, but works professionally as a mechanic (where, ironically, the gaps have helped him produce that whistling sound so beloved of his profession on first examination of a faulty car).

But according to the Telegraph, the dentist responsible for the mistake, Eugen Durr, received only an admonishment from the General Dental Council for his error.

Another musical career wrecked in the same paper, which reports on how auctioneer Andrew Grant was ordered to pay £24,000 compensation after a violinist lost part of his finger when an antique gun he was examining went off in his hand.

Bad things, they say, come in threes. Let’s hope we don’t read tomorrow that Gareth Gates’ singing career has been ruined after he drank a pint of bleach…

Posted: 6th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Old Bill Meets Uncle Sam

‘GIVEN the American police’s philosophy of ‘shoot first, don’t bother to ask questions later’, it was only a matter of time before we started recruiting from the other side of the Atlantic.

Rodney King was a great fan of US-style no tolerance policing

As part of David Blunkett’s plan to make himself the most unpopular Home Secretary since, er, Jack Straw, he is proposing that foreign police chiefs could be invited to become chief constables in Britain.

”Among the countries being looked at for recruitment,” says the Times, ”are the United States – reforms in New York, which led to better crime-fighting and management, have already been adopted in Britain – and Scandinavian nations.”

But the plan will meet with fierce opposition, says the paper.

Dr Ruth Henig, chairman of the Association Of Police Authorities, says that she would be surprised if someone from a Scandinavian country would have the experience to run a big rural force in Britain.

But what of the Yanks? Zero tolerance is likely to prove a two-way street…

Posted: 6th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Muddying The Water

‘JUDGING by the picture on the front page of the Times, it’s not only hotel guests who fill their suitcases with ”freebies”.

Saddam’s caber-tossing squad were ready to go at 45 minutes notice

President Bush sits in a garden in Jordan with the prime ministers of Israel and Palestine and a bottle of Evian on the table in front of him.

Is it a coincidence that this is the very same French spa town where he had attended the G8 conference earlier this week?

Possibly, but that doesn’t explain why Ariel Sharon and Mahmoud Abbas are drinking water from bottles with Arabic writing.

Nothing in the Middle East is simple and we can offer no answers – but closer to home we can tell you that Bush’s great chum, Tony Blair, is under fire for a lot more than raiding the hotel mini-bar.

Former deputy leader of the Labour Party, Lord Healey, tells the Independent that the Prime Minister should resign if no weapons of mass destruction are found in Iraq.

He also called for a full judicial inquiry into claims that Downing Street encouraged the intelligence agencies to exaggerate Iraq’s readiness to launch a chemical or biological attack.

But the current deputy leader of the Labour Party, John Prescott, angrily backed Blair.

”This is about the integrity of the party,” he told loyalists. ”The Prime Minister does not lie.”

Unsurprisingly, it is the anti-war papers which are leading the attack on the Government, with the Independent the most voluble critic.

The Guardian is again impressed by Blair’s performance under fire, making Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith look ”out of his league” and berating his critics ”almost Thatcher-style”.

But it says that should not detract from bigger issues.

”If intelligence was perverted to make the case for an otherwise illegal war, then we need to know about it,” it says.

Yes – but who do we trust to tell us about it?

Posted: 5th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Blow-By-Blow Account

‘TONY Blair obviously does not lie, but not all his friends are so poorly acquainted with noble and ancient art.

”Is that a cigar in your pocket, Mr President, or are you just pleased to see me?”

President Clinton was as likely to tell a porkie as he was to undo his zipper in front of one.

And who should know better than his wife Hilary, who describes what happened when her husband finally owned up about his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

”I could hardly breathe,” she says. ”Gulping for air, I started crying and yelling at him, ‘What do you mean? What are you saying? Why did you lie to me?”’

”I was furious and getting more so by the second. He just stood there saying over and over again, ‘I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I was trying to protect you and Chelsea’.”

Hilary’s account, which is contained in her forthcoming memoirs, Living History, is reproduced in this morning’s Telegraph after the Associated Press somehow got hold of a copy.

Given that the secrecy surrounding the book was almost on a par with the new Harry Potter adventure, there was amazement in media circles at the AP coup.

”The American news agency is not the obvious first port of call for an opportunistic printer wanting to make a fast buck from a stolen manuscript hot off the press,” says the Telegraph.

Publisher Simon & Schuster paid £5m for the rights to the book and ”the leak will certainly deflate the carefully orchestrated publicity campaign”.

Somehow, however, it seems fitting that there should be such a leak for a book by the wife of such an incontinent president.

Posted: 5th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Galloping Gourmet

‘IT does not take a huge leap of the imagination to get from President Clinton to salami, especially when we discover that the salami in question is not quite what it says it is.

”Last one there’s a salami”

The Times reports that the Food Standards Agency have discovered a secret ingredient in Safeway’s gourmet salami – horse meat.

The paper says traces of the meat were found in a 200g pack of L’Artibon Peppered Salami and a 250g pack of Cervelat Salami, as well as pre-packed Bernardi Gastone Italian wild boar.

”Samples of cold meat are now to be collected from supermarkets, delicatessens, catering companies and wholesalers nationwide to find out the scale of the problem,” it says.

Safeway insist that there were no traces of horse in a second test on the products, which are still on supermarket shelves.

But rather than curling our lips up and shying away from the supermarket cold meats section, we should be rushing to snap up the remaining packs.

Steve Bridgeman, a director of Alvini, which supplied the meat, said: ”Horse and donkey meat fetch premium prices and should not have got anywhere near this lower-value product.”

And they’re under starter’s orders…

Posted: 5th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Imaginary Enemies

‘THE best form of defence is attack and the best target for attack is one which can’t defend itself.

”I don’t even know a Mr Higgins”

Thus, Hilary Clinton blamed a shadowy right-wing conspiracy for the attacks on her husband while he was in the White House.

And this morning senior ministers are blaming ”rogue elements within the intelligence services” for using the row over weapons of mass destruction to undermine the Government.

The Times says the claims, which echo the allegations that MI5 tried to destabilise the Harold Wilson government in the 1960s and 1970s, are part of a concerted counter-attack against charges that Tony Blair exaggerated the threat posed by Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction.

Leader of the Commons John Reid said opponents of the Government had been receiving uncorroborated briefings by potentially rogue elements of the security services.

”I find it difficult to grasp why this should be believed against the word of the British Prime Minister and the head of the Joint Intelligence Committee,” he told the Times.

”This is getting ridiculous. We have not found WMD yet, but we have not found Saddam Hussein – and everyone knows he existed.”

Or do we? Consider – he is a nondescript Middle Eastern-looking man with a moustache.

He has several doubles to excuse the fact that his appearance seems to change from one day to the next.

He sleeps in different houses every day so no-one can ever find him.

And he appeared on the international scene just at the time Tom Selleck was looking for work after the final series of Magnum PI.

Makes you wonder…

Posted: 4th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


My Life As A Table

‘HOW ironic it is that Tony Blair cannot persuade us of the existence of weapons of mass destruction when scientists say we can be persuaded to feel like a table.

Fears were growing over Geri Halliwell’s weight

The Telegraph explains a bizarre experiment in which a person cannot see their own hand but can see a rubber hand placed next to them on a table.

When both hands are simultaneously tapped and stroked in sequence, the subject has the illusion that the sensation comes from the hand that it can see – i.e. the rubber hand.

Fair enough, but scientists in the US have gone further and simply tapped and stroked the table instead of the rubber hand.

”To our astonishment, subjects often reported sensations arising from the table surface, despite the fact that it bears no visual resemblance to a hand,” they said.

The Telegraph says scientists believe the findings will help shed light on body image disorders like anorexia nervosa.

The point presumably being that anorexics tend to feel like flat-pack tables…

Posted: 4th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


This Is God Calling

‘IF the evidence for Saddam Hussein’s existence is sketchy, what about the evidence for the existence of God?

”Yeah, I know you’re the way, the truth and the light, but how do I get to Camberwell?”

A burning bush a few thousand years ago and a flash of light on the road to Damascus would hardly stand up to much examination in court.

Small wonder, you might think, that fewer and fewer young people are going to church to worship a bearded man who none of them have ever seen.

But enough about Jeremy Beadle – a church in Wales has decided it’s not the message that’s wrong, but how the message is delivered.

And so, according to the Independent, it has launched a national text-message service that send words of Biblical wisdom to your mobile.

W2LB (or Words To Live By – for anyone over the age of 17) gives subscribers a thrice-weekly spiritual boost with a specially chosen verse from the Bible.

The word of the Lord costs 25p a pop (of which 4p goes to charity).

However, for our beloved Prime Minister, a keen Christian himself, we at Anorak are happy to provide this service gratis.

And today’s verse is… Jesus wept.

Posted: 4th, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


A Muck Sweat

‘WAS it just a coincidence that the air conditioning failed as Tony Blair was answering accusations that he fabricated evidence to strengthen the case for war against Iraq?

Is the writing on the wall for Tony?

Or could it be that his host and leader of the anti-war lobby, Jacques Chirac, had pulled the plug so he could watch his erstwhile friend sweat literally as well as metaphorically?

Certainly, the Prime Minister ”appeared uncomfortable in the extreme” – according to the Independent – as he issued his strongest denial yet that the threat posed by Saddam Hussein had been exaggerated.

And his frustration boiled over as he launched an unprecedented attack on Clare Short, whom he branded a liar, and rejected calls for an independent inquiry.

With a similar inquiry already under way in the US and one in the pipeline in Australia, the Guardian says Blair’s position is both wrong and foolish.

”The Blair government should not be out of step with its Iraq war allies,” it says, ”never mind out of step with its own supporters and backbenchers.”

Just how out of step it is with its own backbenchers is suggested by the comment from Malcolm Savidge, MP for Aberdeen North, who believes the issue ”is more serious than Watergate”.

Mr Blair has challenged his opponents to produce evidence of wrong-doing, just as they had challenged him to produce evidence of Saddam’s arsenal of weapons of mass destruction.

But his position has been undermined, says the Telegraph, by the US Senate’s decision to hold joint hearings in public into the intelligence warnings.

Senator John Warner, Republican chairman of the armed services committee, explained: ”People are challenging the credibility of the use of this intelligence, and its use by the President, the secretaries of state and defence, the CIA director and others.”

If that seems a good enough reason to hold a full inquiry in the United States, why is it not a good enough reason over here?

Because Tony has given us his word that he hasn’t done anything wrong – and, as we said yesterday, that’s good enough for us…

Posted: 3rd, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Get Well Soon

‘FOR a while now, we at Anorak have been advocating a new solution to the problems in the NHS – reducing the number of diseases.

Best get private health cover, Lisa

For instance, thousands of beds would be freed up every winter by the simple expedient of reclassifying ‘flu.

But we are pleased to see Labour have been even more innovative, with a report in today’s Times suggesting that patients will have to sign contracts with their doctors.

Initially, the paper says, these will apply to overweight people and to heavy smokers, who will have to promise to go on a diet or give up the cigarettes in return for treatment.

”Those who failed to keep their side of the bargain or kept missing appointments would be denied free care,” it says.

The Times suggests that the proposals come ”amid growing concern about the strain on the health service from avoidable illnesses”.

But it is surely only a matter of time before the arrangement is extended to other categories of people.

For instance, the lame will be forced to walk to see their GP, the blind will be forced to play a game of 501 (double in) and the deaf will be asked to guess the intro.

And very soon we will all have signed contracts with our doctors promising not to be ill.

A work of genius – Alan Milburn, we salute you…

Posted: 3rd, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


The Pub With No Beer

‘WITH hospitals full of the terminally healthy, we turn our attention to the British pub.

”Fuck me! This place is dead”

And we read this morning in the Telegraph that swearing is the latest thing to be banned from the boozer.

JD Wetherspoon, which operates 600 pubs, is considering printing a warning on menus and beer mats asking punters to keep their language clean.

It follows a complaint from two customers, who said they found swearing embarrassing when they visited their local in Ruislip with friends.

The Rev Ian Gregory, founder of the Campaign For Courtesy, said he welcomed such a move but thought it would be impossible to enforce.

He suggests a ban in certain pubs, similar to the partial no-smoking policy adopted in Wetherspoon pubs.

A good idea, but why stop there? Are we alone in finding the smell of beer on our breath after a night out in the pub slightly off-putting?

A ban on beer in pubs (or, at least, certain areas of pubs) would do the trick nicely…

Posted: 3rd, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Chemical Tony

‘SO far they have eluded teams of UN weapons inspectors and the might of the US military, but Tony Blair assures us that he has proof of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.

‘I’m Tony – fly me’

With 44% of the population believing they were misled about the threat and ex-ministers attacking the Prime Minister over the war, Tony is in no doubt.

‘We are going to assemble that evidence and present it properly to people,’ he tells the Telegraph.

As we speak, aides are scouring the Internet looking for decade-old GCSE essays from which to crib the ‘evidence’ required.

If Blair is only suggesting he has proof that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, then of course we all know that he did.

Whether he had them in the run-up to war – and whether they were therefore a justifiable casus belli – is another matter altogether.

Clare Short, the former international development secretary, claims not only that Tony Blair misled the country into war, but that he lied to the Cabinet.

The Guardian says that she is accusing the PM of making a secret pact with President George Bush to go to war.

Another former Cabinet minister, Robin Cook, said the Government had made ‘a monumental blunder’ and demanded an independent inquiry – a call echoed by the Tories.

But, the Guardian says, ‘an increasingly exasperated’ Blair has swept aside calls for an inquiry.

He categorically assures us that there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, even if we never find them.

And that should be good enough for all of us…

Posted: 2nd, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Heir Today, King Tomorrow?

‘WHAT is Prince Charles for? What does he do? Good questions and ones which Prince Charles is endeavouring to answer.

”Do one’s two shots carry?”

The Times says the heir to the throne is to write his own job description and publish a brochure on the role of the heir.

He will say, apparently, that his duty is to support the monarch, to act as an ambassador for the country and to do work for charity.

”The Prince, who has irritated ministers by writing to them about topical issues, may also state that it is his duty to tell the powerful what the ordinary person is thinking,” says the paper.

The Prince, by nature of his background and his lifestyle, is of course uniquely placed to represent the views of the ordinary person.

Their main worries in life are, it seems, being kinder to organic vegetables, being less kind to modern architecture…and trying to work out how to squeeze out their own toothpaste.

Posted: 2nd, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Slumming It

‘IF the heir to the throne cannot represent the sufferings of ordinary people to the Government, how else can it be done? Through a theme park, of course.

Queues for the rides were mercifully short

The Independent reports on a model shanty town being built in the US state of Georgia – based on some of the planet’s worst in Africa, Asia and Central America”.

But its job is not accommodate the poorest of the poor, but to educate the richest of the rich.

Habitat For Humanity, a non-profit group behind the idea, hopes that it will attract 70,000 visitors a year, despite having none of the rides of traditional theme parks.

Instead, children will get to make bricks and tiles in mock squalor and discover what it is like to live in a scorpion-infested shack.

And then go home and stuff their faces with McDonalds.

Posted: 2nd, June 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment


Into Africa

‘IF only Prince William had continued to study the module in Middle East studies, we would now surely be one giant step closer to achieving peace in that troubled region.

Wills – the epitome of cool

Sadly, he dropped it. But, as the Times reports, his degree in Art History has taught him plenty about social anthropology, moral philosophy and geography.He’s a well-rounded lad is Britain’s future king – he knows who is he, what he is and where he is.

And in an interview with the Press Association, reproduced in today’s papers, we get to hear that he’s now turning his flick-knife brain to learning Swahili, what the Times calls the lingua franca of East Africa.

”It’s an odd language to learn,” says Wills in the Telegraph, ”but I wanted to do something that was very specialised.” Although being a young Prince is far from routine.

But before he can be pressed further he’s off and running. Over three large photographs the Telegraph shows the man who will be king carrying a rugby ball, kicking a rugby ball and then putting his socks back on ”after a dash through the sea”.

Such is the praise helped upon him by the Telegraph that the paper’s writer must have been agog that the Prince even bothered to take his socks off and didn’t simple skip over the waves like a messianic pebble.

But if William is anything, he is grounded. We hear in the Guardian that the prince was a little homesick when he started life at St Andrew’s University, Edinburgh.

”I went home and talked to my father during the holidays,” he said, ”and throughout that time debated about whether to come back – not seriously debating it – but it did cross my mind.”

Of course, he was never really on his own, not with Uncle Eddie’s camera crew relaying his every movement back to the palace.

Posted: 30th, May 2003 | In: Broadsheets | Comment