Nadine Dorries - Right Honorable Lady?

Nadine Dorries has been Conservative MP for Mid Bedfordshire since 2005. In June she said she would quit as an MP, but still hasn't formally resigned. So no by election can take place, which is a shame for her constituents who have been effectively without a functioning MP for a very long time.

 

According to locals she has been barely visible in the constituency. She hasn't held a Surgery since 2020. There is no listing for a Constituency office address. The last one in Shefford closed ages ago. She lives in the Cotswolds, not in her constituency.

Her Parliamentary voting record makes interesting reading - https://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/11397/nadine_dorries/mid_bedfordshire/votes  She hasn't been in the Commons since 2022 & has only voted 6 times in 2023. 

Actually the fact that she does very little to earn her Parliamentary salary isn't surprising given how busy she is with her media career. She has written 16 books & is about to publish a new one about the political assassination of Boris Johnson. She is a columnist in the Daily Mail & a Talk TV host. She has also apperared on reality TV shows.

She's a busy lady - just not doing the job we pay her for. Honorable simply isn't a word I would apply to Ms Dorries. Unfortunately, although she may be an extreme example of an MP pursuing their own self serving agenda, she isn't alone. (Partygate report 2023)

The problem is we are in desperate need of really good political representation & leadership. We just aren't getting it. 

Justice & Andrew Malkinson?

I listened to Andrew Malkinson on the radio after his conviction for rape in 2004 was quashed yesterday. It is hard to imagine how he felt during his years in prison & on being finally exonerated. The injustice of his case seems obvious, once again, largely due to the failures of the police. I imagine that the impact of what has happened to him for so long will be difficult, if not impossible to erase.

You would think that the State would compensate him fully for everything he has suffered. "Compensation - typically money, awarded to someone in recognition of loss, suffering, or injury". You would think that over 20 years of his life taken away would merit quite a lot of money, even if his life can never be replaced or compensated for. Between June 2019 and March 2020, there were 1,336 successful appeals against both decisions of Magistrates’ courts and the Court of Appeal Criminal Division. But Malkinsons case is much more serious than most.

However, compensation is the exception rather than the rule in the UK. The statutory scheme gives the Justice Secretary discretion to pay compensation to a wrongly convicted person “when his conviction has been reversed or he has been pardoned on the grounds that a new or newly discovered fact shows beyond reasonable doubt that there has been a miscarriage of justice”. How much should be awarded is determined by an independent assessor, who can make deductions for any conduct of the applicant that contributed to the conviction, for his criminal record and for “saved living expenses”. So the applicant has to pay back to the Prison Estate the costs of his imprisonment! The maximum amount of compensation payable is £1 million in cases where the applicant has been imprisoned for at least 10 years, or £500,000 in all other cases.

I was completely shocked when I heard that. It seems utterly heartless & unjustifiable. We imprison someone for something they didn't do, because of the incompetence or even negligence in the system. In 2021/22, the average cost of a prison place in England and Wales was £46,696 a year. So presumably Malkinson will have to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds out of his "compensation". Whatever pittance he gets will take years to come through. In Scandinavia & Germany the compensation schemes are far more generous.

Trust me, because I worked for the IMB in Gloucester prison for years, imprisonment is a punishment no one would want. It bears no resemblance whatsoever to living a normal, free, life outside. To be expected to pay for the privilege of wrongful incarceration seems the height of injustice to me. How dare they? How on earth is Malkinson expected to re-integrate into society having been excluded from it for so long without a reasonable & just sum of money to help him - immediately?

 

I'm pleased for him that he has had support & that Buddhism & meditation helped him get through the ordeal. Hopefully that support will continue. But I have to ask, how can we call ourselves a civilised society if this is how we treat people in Malkinsons situation?

 

 

Fire, Flood & Drought

In 1996 we went to Madeira for the first time on a walking holiday. One of the walks was the well known Valley of the Nuns walk from Eira do Serrado. However my intrepid husband wanted to do it in reverse for some reason I can't remember. This meant climbing up out of the Valley of the Nuns rather than descending into it, which would have been much easier. 

It's very steep. Every time you think you can see the summit disappointment follows when you get there. At some point I realised there was quite a bit of smoke to our left, blown towards us by the wind, which was gusty. I became more & more concerned. We had reached the point of no return & started to walk through recently burnt undergrowth. My husband insisted we were fine. I believed him. So we continued upwards.

We did reach the top having walked for hours meeting no one. When we got there it was like Offa's Dyke. Loads of Germans there to see the views & people picking chestnuts. 

My point is that it was probably really foolish. Instead of blindly following my husband I should possibly have done what instinct told me to & returned to some semblance of civilisation. But I trusted him. We had been in dodgy situations before on our travels & always survived. Often having had amazing experinces that holidaymakers don't have. I always believed I could achieve anything so long as we were together. He was unflappable.

Nearly 30 years on the world has changed. Wildfires now are affecting every region of the world because of complex socio economic factors. Records are being broken all the time for area burned, numbers of fires & fire intensity. 

https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/global-maps/MOD14A1_M_FIRE/MOD_LSTD_M

In January 2009, the second time we went to Madeira, my house was flooded by a water escape from the loft while we were away, which devastated two thirds of my house. It took months to dry out & a full year to rebuild. That was clean water. 

Now the world is suffering from flooding on a scale unimaginable a decade or so ago. We are getting used to torrential rain even in the UK. Flooding, landslides, crop failure, death & disaster result.

https://floodlist.com/

Drought impacts food, fuel, and freshwater. Droughts result in significant, long-term economic losses  &  can cause major human health impacts. https://www.drought.gov/international

https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/5dceec104a384df094e65af12a274959/

The point is it isn't that we don't know what is happening. We live in an age of instant communication & reliable scientific research. But we are human. We all have this capacity to ignore our better instincts & put uncomfortable truths into boxes in our brains. We believe that things will sort themselves out. We resist real change & want to maintain the status quo. 

It won't work this time. We do have the capacity to solve this existential climate emergency. But we have to make difficult decisions & make difficult changes. Time is running out. We just need to all face up to it. 

Or my 18 year old grandsons don't have a future anything like my past. 

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The Climate of Life & Death

When it rains I wear a Gortex coat or carry an umbrella. When it's frosty or snows I wrap up warm & wear boots with a good tread. When it's very windy I find it difficult to walk against the wind. When it's very hot & sunny I tend to try to stay in the shade & cool. In other words, sensible people adapt to weather conditions. 

The world is now experiencing more & more extreme weather events. Changing our clothing is not going to protect us from floods, droughts, heatwaves & forest fires. According to the European Environment Agency "Extreme weather events pose an increased risk to nature, buildings, infrastructure, and human health. These events, expected to increase in frequency and intensity because of climate change, are already causing substantial damage and loss. We must adapt and prepare for life in a changing climate". https://www.eea.europa.eu/en/topics/in-depth/extreme-weather-floods-droughts-and-heatwaves

People are being injured & are dying due to extreme weather events. Last year more than 61,000 people died from the heatwave in Europe. This year it is set to be worse. 

According to ReliefWeb in 2022 "The Pakistan June-September floods affected 33 million people, causing 1,739 deaths and economic damage costing US$ 15 billion. Monsoon floods also struck India (2,035 deaths, US$ 4.2 B), Bangladesh (7.2 M people affected), and China (US$ 5 B)" https://reliefweb.int/report/world/2022-disasters-numbers

According to the EU Science hub the EU 2022 wildfire season was the second worst on record. Wildfires in 45 observed countries burnt an area about the size of Montenegro, hitting Natura 2000 protected sites hard. This year, France has already surpassed its annual average of fire-ravaged area. https://joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu/jrc-news-and-updates/eu-2022-wildfire-season-was-second-worst-record-2023-05-02_en

Extreme weather costs lives, impacts health, costs huge amounts of money & causes immense human suffering. Extreme weather is a reality now & scientific research shows that events are increasing exponentially. The UN Climate Change report 2023 by the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) found that "the world is likely to surpass its most ambitious climate target — limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial temperatures — by the early 2030s. Beyond that threshold, scientists have found, climate disasters will become so extreme that people will not be able to adapt. Basic components of the Earth system will be fundamentally, irrevocably altered. Heat waves, famines and infectious diseases could claim millions of additional lives by century’s end".

 

Time is running out to actually take action. We are asleep at the wheel & continuing on putting a sticking plaster on a real existential threat. There have been 5 great Mass Extinctions in earth's history. This could be the 6th.

Sporting Gladiators

I have watched Wimbledon for decades, particularly mens singles. I love tennis, it's a combination of  physical & mental prowess. It has changed a lot over the years - Everything from the sports gear to the way the game is played. Not to mention the amount of money involved.

I am fascinated to watch the behaviour of the crowd & the response from the players. It is so gladiatorial. The racquets replace the swords, the balls are the missiles travelling at speeds over 100 mph. The players are the hero's, or villains. The entourages urge their player on to victory at any cost. The wives & partners are the damsels offering favours to their man. The arena is focussed on the battle taking place. The umpire is the emperor giving the thumbs up or down to the protagonists.

The crowd is the crowd, individuals forming a powerful vocal mass, just as in Roman times, but maybe a bit more civilised. It is like a single entity, either supporting or not. Emotions are high & people are vociferous. It must have a huge impact on the players. If they are being supported it's positive. But if not it must be very hard to deal with. To be fair to the Wimbledon crowd, they mostly know their tennis & they do support the underdog. 

What I understand less is the way the players behave. There was a time when the entourages were not allowed to communicate in any way with the player - on court coaching was not done. The player had to fight his own battles. Now there seems to be a constant dialogue between the player & the box. I find the actions of some players inexplicable. They seem to need constant verification of their own skill from their team. They look to their box all the time, they need the clapping, the standing & shouting, the punching the air when something goes well, the encouragement. It seems surprisingly co-dependent to me.

One exception is Ivan Lendl who coaches Murray. He is "old school". He has always been very unemotional, in contrast to Murray who constantly talks to himself & his team & is obviously sometimes very frustrated. 

I've been to Queens & to Wimbledon. I understand how involved one gets with the game & the favoured player. What I find unacceptable is the way crowds at sports events sometimes behave, booing & shouting abuse. The extreme is at football matches, both from the crowd & the trainers. I really don't want to see that in tennis. 

Sport is in danger of becoming too money focussed & too divisive. It is in danger of becoming so gladiatorial that it looses everything that made it "sporting". Sportsmanship is an aspiration or ethos that a sport or activity will be enjoyed for its own sake, with proper consideration for fairness, ethics, respect, and a sense of fellowship with one's competitors. I think that most sports people do have that & they work extremely hard to achieve excellence.

Audiences want to see the personality of the player. We admire the work, the skill & dedication. We don't empathise with automatons. We also don't empathise with players who bend the rules & use unfair mind games. Tantrums are not pleasant to see & are disruptive to other players. There have been tennis matches that are very difficult to watch because a player cannot or does not control their emotions, deliberately or otherwise. McEnroe & Kyrgios are prime examples in different generations.

What concerns me is the increasing atmosphere around some sporting events. Wimbledon, fortunately is still the exception. I hope it remains so.

 

Death and Widowhood

Space isn't the final frontier, death is. Life is just the antichamber. Our individual lives are rarely very important, but how we live the lives we have is.

Today is the 14th anniversary of the death of my husband David. It would also have been our 57th wedding anniversary. He didn't "pass". I didn't "lose" him. He isn't "resting" in peace or otherwise. He died, very unexpectedly & pointlessly because he was up a ladder which slipped & he fell onto concrete. I knew he wouldn't survive from the minute I found him. But he was helicoptered to hospital & in intensive care for almost 2 weeks before he actually died. 

My life continued. There was no option.

One point in writing this is that death is normal. Everyone probably experiences the death of someone close to them. We should all be more open in discussing death & preparing for it. I've just re-written my will & a Letter of Wishes. My executors will have to impliment the will, I hope they will do the same with the letter. I try to be organised & not leave a messy life behind for someone else to sort out. I've done that, David wasn't hot on paperwork. Nor was my father or mother in law. It isn't fun.

The second point is that being widowed doesn't just mean an ending. It is also a beginning. My 14 years of widowhood has given me opportunities I would not have had while married. I have worked for charities in Nepal & Malawi. I have moved house 4 times & renovated my current house. I have made new friends & managed to keep most of my lovely old ones. I have become very political & lobby a lot, often working with charities I support. Finally, I'm living my own life.

For the first time, I am myself. I'm no longer someones child or wife. I am someones parent & grandparent, but they all lead  their own busy lives. I make my own choices & decisions, I don't have to compromise with someone else. More & more I try not to do things I don't want to do in order to please someone else. Increasingly I am not prepared to ignore negative or uncalled for comments from others, or poor service or behaviour.

Women are raised to care, to be co-dependent, to please other people, not to put themselves first. Despite Womens Lib, equality & the sexual revolution, that is still the case. It's taken me 78, often very difficult years, to try to break the habit. Oddly, being widowed has helped.

There are downsides. There always are in life. Living alone 24 / 7, especially if you are ill or incapacitated. However there is a difference between being lonely & being solitary. Being responsible for everything that keeps a modern life going. Not having someone to share the good & the bad days. Meals & experiences are more fun if shared....

But on the whole, I think that if you are open to change, you can learn a lot about yourself through experiencing everything life has to offer. 

Reasons to be Concerned

Conversations with friends centre around the current situation in the UK & Worldwide. We are all of an age group 60's -70's.- 80's. There are individual differences on certain topics, but we are able to argue without harming friendships. We actually listen to eachothers views. My friends are all reasonably intelligent & try to be well informed. On the whole we are a fortunate generation, well educated, ex professionals & financially secure.

We have lived through the 60's with the Vietnam War, Civil Rights & the Cuban Missile crisis. The 70's brought Stagflation, Watergate, an oil crisis & the Iran hostage crisis. The 80's brought disasters like Chernobyl & Challenger, the AIDS virus, Reaganomics & Thatcherism & the fall of the Berlin Wall, plus the rise of computer technology. In the 90's we had global economic & political crises & Recession, Poll Tax riots & IRA bombings. The 20th century brought the Global Financial Crisis, the War on Terror, real concern about the Climate Crisis & the rise of the Internet. We have experienced everything that life can throw at us & we have survived.

Change is inevitable, sometimes beneficial, sometimes not. Now we are all deeply concerned. We know we have survived really disruptive & difficult events, but this feels different. The World order is in a state of flux. It is highly unstable. Just at the moment when the need is for leaders who put the needs of humanity & the planet first, rather than their own wealth & power, there is a general complete lack of trust in politics.

Even if you aren't political, you should be concerned about that.

If, like me, you live in a supposed democracy, it is important that you can believe what your politicians say. It is important that you are confident that they are on top of their Brief, have accurate & informed advice from reputable people. There has to be short, medium & long term planning to solve the very serious & complex issues facing not just the UK, but the World. My concern is that I simply don't have that confidence in today's leaders. And I know I am not alone. Trust has evaporated.

It is also important that you understand the complexity of the issues & are willing to lobby to let the politicians know what you think. There is a debate about political protest & the disruption it causes. I'm just relieved that some people feel strongly enough about the issues to put themselves at risk. Even if you don't actively protest you have the mechanism to make yourself heard. Social Media gives everyone a voice. I accept that some of those voices would be better not heard. However what is at stake here is vital to our world as we know it. It is an existential threat.

A lifetime lived through all the exttremes makes me acutely concerned about just how different & dangerous the 21st century is. https://21stcenturylab.lincoln.ac.uk/ten-grand-challenges/ We are a free nation. many are not. https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2018/democracy-crisis

Reasons to be Cheerful

Life is full of ups & downs. The important thing is how we deal with everything, the good & the bad, the wonderful & the dreadful. Our responses to situations depend on our thoughts, attitude & emotional involvement. Nothing good is gained from a negative reaction like jumping to conclusions. Being proactive not reactive in dealing with adverse circumstances helps.

In a world of problems, personal & universal, I think it helps to focus on the postitive, however difficult that is. So, in the words of the song, "Always look on the Bright Side of Life"  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJUhlRoBL8M  Our thoughts control our actions, so we need to try to be "glass half full" rather than "glass half empty". Optimists rather than Pessimists.

Optimists find solutions. Pessimists don't think there is one.

We can all find reasons to be cheerful in our lives. I could list mine, but they would be very individual. Everyone should be able to find some, they are mostly very simple & probably cost nothing. There are always people who are better off than you, but there are also always people who are much worse off. It's so easy not to recognise what you have & take it for granted. It's also easy to get bogged down in the problems life presents you with & lose touch with the blessings.

Life is a journey. Every experience teaches us something. We just aren't very good at learning the lessons. Ego & self interest gets in the way sometimes. No one is perfect, but we can always be better human beings.

Buddhist teachings pursue happiness, equanimity, or peace of mind. We achieve happiness by not craving things we don't have. https://www.pursuit-of-happiness.org/history-of-happiness/buddha/