Department dogs look like their jobs

It is often observed that dogs resemble their owners which, if true, would make me a handsome black chap, friendly to everyone he meets, always thinking the best of everyone and eager to please, absolutely none of which is true of me (nor, indeed, and perhaps fortunately, do I pee on every bush and rest my head on visitors’ knees under the table). Have you noticed, though, that public servants somehow acquire the characteristics which suit their jobs? Or perhaps people who look like that gravitate to jobs which suit them.

New Labour and BSI tree inspections

My post yesterday on the proposal by the British Standards Institute that there be compulsory examination of trees at three-yearly and five-yearly intervals (BSI urges new trough for tree inspectors) brings me a comment this morning:

BSI are running short of business at the moment, with many manufacturing companies going out of business. This is a bit of marketing for them. Like the article says, just to Labour’s taste

I thought it worth following up both strands raised here – the suggestion that this sort of nonsense benefits BSI directly and NuLabour’s view, if any, on it.

BSI urges new trough for tree inspectors

One of the most despised features of the Blair-Brown years is the number of busybodies who get their noses into the trough by inciting new inspection regimes in areas which pose no significant risk. The latest is trees which, the British Standards Institution urge, should be subject to checking by a “trained person” every three years and to a full “expert inspection” by an arboriculturalist every five years. There will, of course, be hefty fees payable for this.

Labour lies about rats in rubbish

One of the least appealing aspects of the Blair-Brown administrations – in a very long list of unappealing things – is the institutional dishonesty which these two men and their advisers have brought to government. The dishonesty comes with added hypocrisy since both Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, in their different ways, have expressly laid claim to a religious and moral basis to their lives.

This dishonesty is not just morally wrong. One is left gaping sometimes at the political stupidity of lying about subjects on which you are bound to be found out sooner or later, particularly things which, however important, are not matters on which governments fall. Governments are entitled to make some mistakes, to experiment, to assess the consequences, and to accept they got it wrong. What loses the votes is the persistent feeling that we are being lied to daily on every subject.

All announcements and no information at FGW

It would be useful (for the passengers at least) if the people who run First Great Western stations were to spend some time standing around on platforms, like the rest of us have to, totting up the ratio between the endless announcements thrown at us and the information actually conveyed by them.

They would find that, like the notices erected by the dumb animals who work in local authorities, and the stream of nannying advice poured over us by government and its many agencies, the value of the messages is in inverse proportion to their quantity.

Got nothing to say? Send for Harman

There was not much Labour could say as the extent of the overnight debacle in the local elections became clear. If there is not much to say, Harriet Harman is just the person you need to say it, and the mere fact that it was Harman who was sent out to speak on the Today programme this morning was evidence enough that Labour was lost for words.

She was eloquent and fluent as streams of nothing poured from her mouth. John Humprys was gentle with her in a way he would not have been with, say, Geoff Hoon or Hazel Blears or any of the others from the substitutes bench who might have been sent out on New Labour’s behalf. It would be like kicking a dandelion.

Decency all round as Boris wins London

Both Boris Johnson and, unlikely as it seems, Ken Livingstone, grew somewhat in stature in what was said after Johnson’s win tonight. The sheer unpleasantness of Gordon Brown, which has infected British politics for longer than he has been Prime Minister, makes magnaminity in victory and graciousness in defeat seem rather precious and rare.

Paul Schofield as Salieri

I only once saw the late Paul Schofield in the stage, but the memory is more potent than any other theatrical experience.

One Saturday in 1979 I got up early and drove to the National Theatre to queue for tickets for Amadeus, returning home proudly clutching a pair of front row stalls tickets. The main attraction of the front row, if I was honest, was probably the proximity to Felicity Kendal as Constanza, but I have little memory of her, still less of Simon Callow as Mozart. It was Schofield’s Salieri who stuck – and still sticks – in the mind.

I have not seen or read the play in the 26 years since then, but I recall it opening with Salieri in old age thinking back to the time when Mozart burst upon the scene. Paul Schofield stood a few feet away from me, an old man in a cloak. The scene moves  back in time and, before my eyes and without any external change beyond the removal of his cloak, Schofield became a younger man. It was all in his face and how he stood, but mainly in his face – a transformation which seemed miraculous yet cannot have involved any trickery. Just acting.

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