So long, farewell, auf weidersehen, goodbye

It's been ever such a long time since I've put anything on this blog.  Mostly because I've been so busy getting 'outputs'. [Outputs are a fancy way of saying 'the things that you are supposed to do for the money you've been given'].  So for the past few months I've been in schools and Sixth Forms assemblies and classes to make sure I've reached enough people to show I've earned my wage.

But there are two reasons why I've decided to write a blog post today: one, it's my last day in post.   After today I am no longer the Youth Regeneration and Development Officer for Copeland Borough Council, no more forum meetings, no more regeneration projects; and I wanted to say goodbye, and make it official.  My out of office reply is set to say:

Hello,

As we have reached the end of the three year period for this project, I am no longer working as Copeland Borough Council's Youth Regeneration and Development Officer.
If you have anything you wish to discuss regarding community regeneration or economic development, you might like to contact Sarah Mitchell, Economic Development Manager s_________@_______.gov.uk
If you wish to contact me personally, I am available at g._________@_______.com

Thank you,   

My desk is cleared, and I have a box of tea bags and pens and a potted plant to take home.

(This isn't me by the way, it's a stock picture to make a point).

The other reason that I wanted to do one last post is because the world seems to be going Pete Tong at the moment, and if I don't comment on this I think I'll explode.

If you look at all the stuff that I've written about over the last couple of years, quite a bit of it is pointless or frivolous or just plain rubbish. If there's been a slow news week I've tried to squeeze a story from something totally irrelevant (remember the story of the Lynx being released into the Lake District? I got two weeks out of that).

Now we have the biggest political event since the Second World War, and that's no exaggeration: the economy is all over the place, the Prime Minister is resigning, the Labour Party is tearing itself apart, Scotland is threatening to leave the United Kingdom, one MP has been killed, others threatened, incidents of racist abuse have increased, and no-one, and I mean NO-ONE, knows what to do next.

This is big, this is huge! 

In fact, in order of hugest things we have this hat

then this dog,

this fish,

this pizza,

Donald Trump's ego,

and then Brexit.

   

Just to let you know, I voted to remain in the European Union, because I believe we are better together.  In this age of world travel, and the internet, it's not possible to be separate as though we still lived in the days before aeroplanes.  It feels a bit like the guy at a party who refuses to have fun, thinking everyone else will stop enjoying themselves to notice him.

 ain't gonna happen...

  That said, the majority of voters want to leave the Union, and being the champion of democracy that I am, I have to respect that decision.  What we need now is stability, good planning, and a clear idea of what we have to do next.

But we haven't got that: the government are split over who will replace David Cameron as Prime Minister, the MPs of the main opposition party (Labour) are trying to replace their leader, but the ordinary members don't seem to want that.  The Scottish National Party (who you'll remember are talking about trying to leave the UK again) now argue that they should be the main opposition party.

Know what that sounds like?

If it wasn't so crazy, this would be funny.

So, there we have it, everything's going crazy and I'm going home.

Laters. 

Mobile phone films

Newsflash: we're living the 21st Century. This is the future.
    Which is great for many of us.

It means that we have lots of advantages. Mobile phones and the internet make world-wide communication almost instant, and give us access to information on a scale that we've never seen before.

But if I've learnt nothing else from Spiderman, I know this: with great power comes great responsibility.

[Actually, I also learnt that Tobey Maguire went crazy, fast]

Having a mobile phone means that you can find stuff out really easily, and you can take pictures and videos and record your life as it happens.  But that's not always a good thing.  Here's a couple of examples of what I mean.

A hotel in Dubai caught fire on New Year's Eve last year, leaving many people distressed (though fortunately no-one was hurt).  Two people nearby decided it was a good opportunity for a selfie

Now, most people agreed that it was pretty insensitive and disrespectful to use other people's misfortune for a photo opportunity, and after getting a roasting on social media, the couple removed the picture.

But it's not just insensitivity that we're talking about.  There's also the safety aspect.

This picture is of a lorry crash that happened on the M40 last week. Again, no-one was seriously hurt, but one half of the motorway was closed, and the other half was reduced to one lane.  This caused huge delays (of up to seven hours for some people).

The issue here though was that people in that one working lane were slowing down to take pictures and videos of the crash, which is insensitive, but it also added to the delays and, even at those low speeds, involved drivers controlling their cars while using mobile phones.

Up to eighty motorists were identified as using their phones while driving and they are all being issued with fines for breaking the law.

So the warning here is: think before you take pictures or videos, it might land you in the middle of a Twitter storm, or even in court.

Labour win Oldham West and Royton election: why it matters

There is a general election every four years, when the public gets to choose who will represent them in Parliament. But what happens if you need a new MP between times? This might happen if the previous MP dies, resigns, or is sacked (which doesn't happen very often).

Obviously, the people in a constituency don't want to have to wait until the next general election, it might be years until then and their opinions would be unrepresented until then.

So we have by-elections.

They don't get as much national news coverage as the general elections, and to many people they don't seem very important.  But actually, a by-election can tell us a lot.

This week, there was a by-election in the constituency of Oldham West and Royton. Which, for those who are interested, is somewhere around here:























The MP there was a member of the Labour Party called Michael Meacher, and he died in October. So this election was to look for his successor.





Now, as we all know, Labour didn't win the last general election, because they were nationally less popular than the Conservatives, but there are some places where there are many more Labour voters than Conservative ones. These are sometimes called safe seats.

At the general election Michael Meacher won this safe seat with almost 59% of all the votes.  If at this by-election the new MP got fewer votes, or if another party won the seat, it would tell us that maybe the Labour Party was even less popular than their opponents (don't forget, they have a new leader now -- Jeremy Corbyn).

But Labour did win, and the new guy Jim McMahon, won over 62% of the votes, which suggests that Labour isn't unpopular with the voters (at least in Oldham West).





The other thing to take notice of is how many people vote.
    In general elections there's usually a good turnout, but in by-elections less so (like I said before, some people see them as less important).

At the last general election (in May) 43,137 people voted, in this election 27,706 people voted.  That's a lot less obviously, but it's still about 40% of all the people who can vote.

Over the last 18 years there have been 59 by-elections and the average turnout is... about 41%.

That suggests that people are about as engaged in politics and democracy now as they have been for the past two decades -- so people aren't totally put off, which is good.

Local News

I reckon the majority of people in West Cumbria are aware of the rain last night, and the flooding.

My wife was supposed to be singing in a concert in Keswick, but most of the choir were unable to get there without a boat...

This was in Seaton last night

 
With more rain forecast for this week, it doesn't take a genius to realise that we all need to take care. So keep your water wings handy.

Seeing Things Differently

I love this picture. Timing is everything.

And finally

As it's nearly Christmas, here's an early Christmas present.

Your welcome

New Zealand, New Flag?

Okay, so New Zealand are considering changing their country's flag, which looks like this

The reasons for the change are numerous and complicated, but here's the main ones:

1. The flag is out of date: the existing flag still has the Union Flag of Great Britain on it, and New Zealand hasn't been a British colony for many years (just how many years is still argued)
2. The design is confusing: the NZ flag looks very much like the Australian flag, which looks like this

 New Zealand's Prime Minister is tired of being sat under the wrong flag apparently.

What's most interesting about all this is the way that the decision will be made: by two referenda.

Stage 1: five new designs have been chosen and people can vote for their favourite. Here are the five:

Stage 2: once the winner of this referendum is chosen, it will go head to head against the existing flag.

This is interesting because another way to do this would be to ask people to choose from all six flags in one vote.  But the winner of a one-in-six vote is almost certainly going to be the old flag, because more people will choose that than any of the new designs.

Doing this as a two stage process means that the second referendum is really clear: new flag or old flag, and that gives the new flag (whichever design it happens to be) a much better chance of being adopted.

That's the science of voting...

Local News

You might have already seen that a group of young singers made the front page of the Whitehaven News this week.

The group were due to sing at Disneyland Paris, but were prevented by the theme park's first ever closure following the Paris terrorist attacks. Not to be outdone, they chose to entertain people waiting at Charles De Gaulle airport by singing their chosen songs. Their performance is likely to be remembered for a very long time, not least because they showed that even in the middle of tragedy, there can be room for joy.

I think, at times like this, it's worth remembering the words of Martin Luther King. 

Movember

Okay, so it's November again, which means Bonfire night comes and goes, supermarkets' Christmas adverts start seven, eight and even nine weeks early, and huge numbers of men once again try to grow a moustache to raise awareness of prostate and testicular cancer.

I'm still trying to work out what growing hair on your face has to do with anything, but that's my problem.

Many of you will remember that I grew a 'mo' last year, and it was hardly a challenge: not shaving my top lip is something I'm pretty good having had the 'evil-twin' goatee beard for more years than I care to think about.

But the truth is that Movember isn't about hard work, it's not some kind of endurance test, it's about raising awareness in a simple and sometimes funny way.  Don't believe me?  Check out these moustaches.

In fairness, I don't think any of these were actually grown for Movember, but they still show that facial hair can be funny.










For more information, check out https://uk.movember.com/ 

Local news

A devolution deal giving more power to Cumbria continues to move forward.

Devolution basically means that a lot of the decisions affecting Cumbrian people will be made in Cumbria, rather than decisions being made in London by people who don't know what life is like up here in the frozen north.

The deal could boost our economy by as much as £1.3billion, which is quite a lot of money I'm sure you'll agree.

Note: this is $1billion not £1billion