Finally, after Teresa May 2018 appointment of Brian Langstaff his report has landed in Parliament and is damming. Langstaff was not the protecting Safe Pair of Hands that May’s government had hoped. Hearing the testaments of patients and their

Eleanor Coppola

23 days ago

In 2008 Eleanor Coppola published her book ‘Notes on a Life’. It did well, though was received with mixed reviews; some people were curious about the life of a Coppola, others about art and relationships, while others understood that a woman’s

The Sky is Crying

30 days ago 9m 20s

The student protests with Pro-Palestinian sympathies about the bombing of Gaza are growing around the world, each country’s universities going about their demonstrations in their own cultural way. On the campuses here in England because so far

Fading Flags

Apr 27th, 2024 9m 3s

The weariness that is shown by the torn Ukrainian flags is but a reflection of the faces of both the Ukrainian and Russian soldiers. Satellite pictures of Russian graveyards show their expansion and a rough estimate is over 50,000 Russian and 3

Serving Safety

Apr 13th, 2024 9m 16s

Andrés’s stride across the world stage is large like the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who is also untrained in the school of politics. Andrés schooling in the kitchen as Zelenskyy’s on the stage has given both men the skills of hust

March Winds

Mar 30th, 2024 6m 1s

The farm calls for focus and sends the world of wars further into the outskirts of my mind. Though the horrors that are occurring all the time - everywhere - still return to my consciousness when I try to rest from the chores that face me here.

The Guilds

Mar 16th, 2024 10m 12s

But this last weekend I had to mange it - Hollywood - because it is ‘that time of year again’. Oscar was coming. But there is foreplay in the form of the British BAFTA awards appearing in London a month beforehand, like a butler announcing ‘Din

Navalny

Mar 7th, 2024 8m 36s

This single death takes over my consciousness as I think I can imagine it - while the multiple slaughters are that are occurring in Gaza and on the West Bank leaves me sifting through pictures of rubble, hospitals and carnage, not really knowin

Remembering Oscar

Jan 28th, 2024 8m 14s

Looking back on that year, and the politics that were uppermost in so many minds, it is hard to accept where we are now. Everything seems more - nothing seems less - and it is frighting for all of those paying attention. Vanessa, and others who

January – The New Year

Jan 14th, 2024 7m 40s

- but it is with the stories that hold the slimmest degrees of separation that I carry. We have friends who are housing Israeli refugees in Paris; another young woman who fled Russia now lives with her mother as refugees in Tel Aviv; a Palestin

A Dog’s Dinner

Nov 25th, 2023 10m 25s

It is the first time we have seen such an acknowledgment from a festival and it seems fitting that it should occur here where the emphasis has always been on the heavy lifting that it takes to be a cinematographer and to make movies. The yello

An Inquiry

Nov 12th, 2023 7m 57s

‘Yes Minister’ first aired on the BBC television in 1980 until it ended in 1988, possibly due to the fact that it was becoming harder to distinguish the comedy series from the nightly news casts that followed. Among the many quotes attributed t

The Rain in Spain

Oct 28th, 2023 8m 24s

While waiting and watching Walter sign a new edition of his old ‘Blink’ book I am gently surrounded by the young people who are there for us. They hover like bees finding a new flower but instead it is I who take from them, as each has a story,

Sunshine and Storms

Oct 19th, 2023 10m 9s

Coming home from the market, and thinking about what to write for this weekend letter - focusing on the Labour and Conservative Party Conferences that take place in September and October - but while I was plucking carrots, choosing cheese and w

Bobbies on the Beat

Sep 28th, 2023 8m 16s

Chris’s family along with the police are not alone in their mistrust of the government. This next weekend the Conservatives are holding their Annual Party Conference in Manchester. Which is a bit rude - to put it mildly - where the main item on

Summer’s End

Sep 17th, 2023 9m 22s

There were as many European Union flags and berets in the audience as their were Union Jacks. Members of the Government are asking for another investigation by the BBC but it could be - that just like the late Queen before them - with her clear

Poaching in the Park

Aug 25th, 2023 7m 53s

‘Ello darlin’” He calls to me, having long forgotten my name and it being too old a friendship to ask to be reminded. And we chat, about this, that, the other, and loneliness. A kiss is always welcome. The last time I saw Jim he was walking slo

On the Moor

Aug 11th, 2023 13m 30s

“It came to me last night, we are bit like ancient oak trees, a bit bent and gnarled, but the inner strength keeps us going. So from one Oak tree to another, take care of your roots and branches but wave your leaves merrily into the air wheneve

Divas and Dingies

Jul 27th, 2023 8m 2s

Salman Rushdie took a quote from ‘The Book of Laughter and Forgetting’ “The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.” And this is why there are novels, poems, songs and biographies of work and of people writt

We Seek him Here … and then There

Jul 17th, 2023 7m 57s

We seek him here we seek him there and the whereabouts of Yevgeny Prigozhin the Russian General who took a group of mercenary fighters towards Moscow and then back again, is reminiscent of Humpty Dumpty who took a big fall - as I remember - and

Old Music

Jun 30th, 2023 9m 13s

The Government party-gate reports are in, and the votes on ‘did Boris Johnson break the rules the government set for us all?’ were cast. 354 ministers said yes, 7 puffed no while a few slippery ones went missing. It is too much all too foolish

Below the Fold

Jun 16th, 2023 9m 22s

It came on Saturday - effectively immediately - Boris Johnson resigned from his parliamentary seat of Uxbridge and South Ruislip - a Greater London constituency inside of the M25 Motorway for those who need to know - It was on the front page of

Back to Work

May 29th, 2023 8m 35s

On Monday evening our plane touched down in Athens Airport 59 years after we left - not knowing if we would ever see each other again. The drive to the city dips in and out of old memories. Small towns and old olive groves spread out in age, sh

The King’s Coronation May 6 2023

May 11th, 2023 12m 26s

It was raining - of course it was - with the steadiness that puts up umbrellas and gives rise to the English complexion. It was not cold.

Truth Bombers

Apr 28th, 2023 8m 57s

Once again the Government’s knickers are in a twist - and all of a sudden it doesn’t seem so far a stretch between rapping Gary Lineker’s knuckles, clipping Sir David’s prime-time wings, and jailing Vladimir Kara-Murza.