Nether Hambelton emerges from beneath Rutland Water

The remains of a lost Rutland village can currently be seen because of the drought, reports ITV News:

Low water levels at Rutland Water reservoir in the East Midlands have uncovered the remains of the buildings which were once part of the village of Nether Hambleton.

Residents in the hamlet, along with other small villages including Middle Hambleton, were relocated to other areas before the buildings were demolished and the area flooded in the 1970s to create the reservoir.

Lord Bonkers has been known to give those who believe the reservoir dates from the 1970s the disparaging label "Rutland Water truthers".

Northwood Lane, Bewdley: The Elan Valley Aqueduct, The Singing Detective and Jonathan Meades

Fire broke out beside the Severn Valley Railway (SVR) bear Bewdley yesterday, reports the Shropshire Star. I don't know if it was caused by a spark from a train, but many preserved lines have gone over to diesel-only operation because of the tinder-dry state of lineside vegetation this summer.

This fire took place near Northwood Lane, which is a long road that runs beside the River Severn north of Bewdley. And this post  is about three things you can see along its course.

The first is an aqueduct that carries drinking water from the Elan Valley reservoir in Mid Wales over the River Severn on its way to the Frankley Reservoir in  Birmingham. This 73-mile pipeline, which opened in 1906, was a wonder of its day. 

You'll find it marked on the endpaper maps of many books about the Welsh Border, and I suspect it was the inspiration for the plot about a Shropshire reservoir being blown up by German spies in the first of Malcolm Saville's Lone Pine books, Mystery at Witchend.

You can see the Aqueduct over the Severn and the rails of the SVR in the photograph above. Now on to two television connections...

There is a station beside Northwood Lane, and it was used as a location for Dennis Potter's The Singing Detective. It's in the scene where the young Philip Marlowe returns to the Forest of Dean after his mother's death in London and is met by his father, who is played by Jim Carter. You can see a photo of them above along with photos photos of the station and level crossing.

And then there's Jonathan Meades...

You may remember his film Severn Heaven, which visited the Bewdley plotlands. This is an interwar community of some 160 self-built properties, which appears to be under threat at the moment. 

I had a wander round it some years ago myself, getting off the train at Northwood Halt.

My Liberator article on the Yorkists' New Deal

This article appears in the new Liberator – you can download the whole issue from the magazine's website. Following the best traditions of academic reviewing, I spend a lot of time stating my own views before I get on to the publication I'm meant to be writing about.

You can find The New Deal online.

Lib Dem Narrative – The Search Goes On

The 2024 general election saw 72 Liberal Democrat MPs elected, the most for a third party since the Liberals’ brief revival in 1923. It was a result that exceeded all expectations, yet, two years on, there is a feeling of deflation among many Lib Dems. May’s local elections, whose outcome was in some ways very good for the party, were followed by a series of posts on Lib Dem Voice expressing dissatisfaction with the party’s direction or at least arguing that its current approach had been exhausted and a new one was needed.

This dissatisfaction arises from a sense of disappointment. If we have so many MPs, why aren’t we more central to the political debate? You can blame the media all you like, and they certainly do us no favours, but maybe the problem lies deeper than that. If we were allowed to write out own newspaper headlines, do we know what they would be? The approach with which we fought the last election – three bullet points and a reminder that Labour can’t win here – and its continuation after that election have left us with a limited number of headline policies.

Massive failures

Where we do have them, they aren’t necessarily as strong as we try to make them sound. We won support at the last election by campaigning on the massive failures of the water companies, but what would we do about them? The answer is that we would appoint a new, tougher regulator. The trouble with this is that the model promised at privatisation – businesses that displayed market-driven efficiency and went in fear of powerful regulators – has never looked like working. There are two reasons for this, the first of which is that the water industry is a natural monopoly. The second is regulatory capture, the process by which public institutions that are set up to keep an industry in check are subverted so they come to act in its interests. Nothing about the Lib Dems’ proposals for the water industry suggests they have found the answer to either of these problems.

Then there is the party’s performance in opinion polls and local elections. When it comes to the polls, despite the collapse of the Labour vote, we are happy if we see one where we match the 12 per cent of the vote we achieved at the last general election. We may remember Zack Polanski as an ambitious Liberal Democrat who was keener on austerity than most of us, but as James Butler wrote in the London Review of Books: 

Polanski’s political journey … is sometimes framed as opportunism but in fact reflects the often radicalising economic experience of millennials now approaching middle age.

We need to have more to offer such voters than we do at present.

Our vote is now heavily concentrated in the parliamentary constituencies that we won in 2024. We gained dozens upon dozens of councillors there in May, but I saw debate as to whether we had gained or lost councillors across all the other constituencies. What is certain is that our vote in seats where we have not been active in recent years is as low as one or two per cent, as is demonstrated weekly in local by-elections. And while we are being worried, the party’s membership is generally estimated to be 60,000, which is barely half what it was in 2022.

Many of the areas we now represent are prosperous, which means we must beware of simply representing their interests. Our opposition to inheritance tax on land, for instance, is hard to defend. As far as farmers have a grievance, it’s that the price of land has lost its relationship with the income that can be derived from farming it. But if you allow land to be used as a tax shelter, that problem will not be solved, it will get worse.

In the end, the Liberal Democrat hold on the seats they gained in 2024 may be out of their hands. In order for disillusioned Conservatives to come over to the Lib Dems, it is necessary for them not to be too scared by the possibility of a Labour government. If Andy Burnham turns out to be more Socialist than anyone expects, or at least if the press succeeds in getting the public to see him that way, then there is a danger that those voters will flock back to the Tories, however sensible or moderate we have been.

Against the background of this complicated political landscape comes The New Deal: How the Liberal Democrats Should Go into the 2029 General Election. It’s billed as “a pre-manifesto strategy document from the Yorkist group of Liberal Democrat activists” and, in his foreword, William Wallace explains its purpose:

This paper aims to start a conversation within the party on the narrative we need to construct. We have at most three years until the next election. Too many voters have come to despair of any political party’s ability to overcome the country’s economic stagnation and social divides. Liberal Democrats must find a way to offer them hope that national renewal – economic, social and political – is possible and attainable.”

To that end, The New Deal offers an analysis of the electoral position of the Liberal Democrats, a narrative they should develop before the next election and the policies it says flow from that narrative.

When The New Deal was published in May, it seemed that both the Greens and Reform UK were in line to make sweeping gains at the next election and that the Liberal Democrats would have to change their strategy to take account of this. Since then, both parties have faltered. The Greens appear to have hit their ceiling in the opinion polls and the media have at last started to ask hard questions about how Reform and its leader are funded. This position may change again, of course, but at the moment it seems the 2029 election may be more like the 2024 election than we expected.

Usefully, The New Deal considers the parties along two axes. There is the conventional one of Progressive/Centre Left vs Authoritarian/Orthodox, which sees the Liberal Democrats lined up with Labour, the Nationalists and the Greens against the Conservatives and Reform. From their history, their members and their voters, the Liberal Democrats are inescapably an anti-Conservative party, though that doesn’t mean that, deep down, we are the same as Labour or that ‘Progressive’ is a meaningful political identity rather than just a more impressive way of saying you are against the Tories.

The second axis is System vs Anti System, which sees the Lib Dems (and we still just about deserve this) placed in the Anti-System camp along with the Greens, the Nationalists and Reform, while Labour and the Tories share the System end. 

Anti-system

This ‘anti-system’ concept is a useful one and helps explain why, to the bafflement of the simplicities of social media, there are many voters who choose between Reform and the Liberal Democrats. It’s an identity that I suspect has something to do with being a long way from the centres of power, as voters are in Cornwall or Lincolnshire, and perhaps with the area being a historical stronghold of religious Nonconformity. As academics always say, more research is needed.

The New Deal emphasises the importance of developing a narrative, identifying Keir Starmer’s failure to do this as a key reason for his premiership foundering, but I’m not sure that what they’ve come up with quite fits the bill:

We are a better country than this! We are a kind, welcoming people, proud of our traditions, keen not to be taken for fools, but happy to be a modern, compassionate civic nation. We believe in a helping-hand role for a benign state, but one that doesn’t encroach any more into private lives than is strictly necessary. We believe in giving power back to the people, and in making all votes of equal value. 

This is a collection of four sentences, two of which are immediately qualified with a “but…”, that fails to tell a story. Stories involve movement through time or space, but these words just sit there. And they are statements about the Liberal Democrats when what is needed is a story about Britain today that will make voters nod in assent.

So an effective Liberal Democrat narrative might look more like:

In recent years politicians have looked to party interest rather than what’s good for Britain, the gap between rich and poor has grown too wide, and young people are finding it too hard to get a start in life. We need to rebuild our democracy, make it easier for people from all homes to make the most of their talents, and revive social housing.

That’s what’s on the back of my envelope, anyway.

When it comes to the paper’s policy offer, the cover leads you to expect great things because it has a mock-up of FDR wearing a Lib Dem rosette. In fact, it’s not always clear how different this New Deal would be. There are places where it talks about “success and progress being about more than GDP, including measures of social wellbeing and the environment” and “markets working for society rather than society being there to support markets”, but it’s not clear what these encouraging sentiments would mean in practice. Nor is it clear what the “unashamedly Keynesian” policy it wants to see at the next election would be. It seems to envisage more government intervention in the economy, which is welcome, but Keynes’s great theoretical innovation was the idea of demand management to avoid the cycle of economic booms and slumps. I’m not sure that’s on offer here.

But there are some very good ideas in The New Deal, and not only rejoining the European Union either. There’s a welcome emphasis on localism, and the inevitable support for electoral reform is strengthened by a call for it to be “linked to some form of bottom-up democracy to allow citizens to generate legislation, and to take more control over their local affairs”. There’s a call for the provision of rented accommodation (though it doesn’t say in which sector) and for an emphasis on “doing up the housing at the bottom of the ladder which is a health hazard for many of those living in it”. Education is there too, with a thoroughly Liberal emphasis on the importance of teaching critical thinking.

Above all, it’s great to see Liberal Democrat members publishing their ideas in a long form. Since the demise of Lib Dem News and then political blogging, communication within the party has tended to be very short (hello social media) or very top down. I hope The New Deal will be the first of many such publications.

The Joy of Six 1538

Kevin Collins asks how modern Britain would cope with a drought on the scale we experienced in 1976: "The public of 1976 learned to cope with these unusual weather conditions, and per-person use of water dropped from an estimated 190 litres per day in 1972 to 95 litres in 1976. This was a generation with direct or family experience of the hardships of the second world war – including following government restrictions on food, clothing and fuel rationing, which finally ended in 1954."

Roger Mosey finds the latest BBC cuts mystifying: "As misinformation and disinformation swirl around the globe, audiences will want to know what is true – and the BBC can provide a place where our querulous nation can share its views. The onslaught of YouTube, Netflix, Disney and the rest means that we risk having most of our viewing choices made by giant American companies, with algorithms devised in Palo Alto replacing editorial choices made in Britain."

From hedgehogs to buzzards, Britain's wildlife is being quietly killed by rodenticide poisons, report Eliza Egret and Tom Anderson.

National politicians should keep their noses out of the decision-making processes of local councillors, argues Richard Kemp.

Ruby Hamilton analyses the appeal of screwball comedies: "Some Like It Hot (1959) doesn’t work just because Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon are men pretending to be women (though they’re always funny about it) but because nobody notices or cares. Lies and truth have indistinguishable effects, so what’s the fuss? Screwballs aren’t miserabilist-humanist comedies about learning to revel in imperfection; they’re comedies of fantasy and will."

A soft pop op-art space rock opera from 1970 starring Olivia Newton-John? Yes please, says Discontinued Notes.

The Joy of Six 1530

"The big red 'stop nudes' button is appealing because it’s a lot easier than investing in proper services to protect children and in the kind of education that will help them grow up in the world as it exists rather than the sterile bubble of Starmer's imagination. Bad actors will circumvent these measures while ordinary people's privacy is undermined, and health information and even art is censored. The design choices that have led to this environment are the same choices that the government courts when it tries to partner with these tech companies." Mic Wright looks at the media's uncritical coverage of government plans to prevent children viewing or sharing nude images online.

Claire Jones analyses the creeping misogyny of Reform's agenda: "To enshrine women’s demotion to second class citizens, Reform has pledged to drop the 2010 Equalities Act which provides legal recourse for maternity leave, sexual assault, domestic abuse and employment discrimination. Reform also plans to ditch the ECHR thus thwarting it’s use by women as another court of appeal. You can hear the sound of doors closing."

David Eddy asks who is protecting our drinking water as an energy company seeks permission to drill through the chalk aquifer beneath the Yorkshire Wolds in search of gas.

"You may heard that if you’re under 25, your brain isn’t fully developed yet. It's an adage supposing that individuals under 25 can’t think things through or make rational decisions, and so are less responsible than older folk. This logic has now formed the basis of official government advice, sentencing, and more. The only problem with this fact is... it’s not a fact. Never has been. No matter how many TikTokers insist otherwise." Dean Burnett takes aim at a scientific myth.

Oliver Bray has been to an exhibition at the Dickens Museum in London: "It reframes Dickens not only through the women he knew, but through the theatrical culture they collectively inhabited. Stepping outside, I felt his familiar voice linger, now joined by the sense that the women behind the scenes were finally stepping into the light – something the dramatist in Dickens might have appreciated." 

"On one level, this is a song about a man who, losing his mother, seeks to make his lover a surrogate maternal figure. On a larger level, it is about the need to find an escape, a haven, from the brutal realities of life. But it must be mentioned that this is a song about the power and necessity of movies... that was written for a movie." Another Paul on That's Why God Made the Movies, one of my favourite Paul Simon songs.

The Joy of Six 1522

"Why, if the homes are unregistered and therefore illegal, are English councils still placing children in them? And how can the system be reformed so this doesn't continue to happen?" Noel Titheradge investigates a continuing scandal.

James Meek looked at housing in Andy Burnham's Manchester om the eve of the last general election: "Burnham presides over a scale model of a future Starmer Britain, one where a social democratic leader full of genuine desire to mend the broken, over-marketised public realm is hamstrung by lack of resources and constrained by fear of frightening away the wealth-holders. Like England, Greater Manchester has its richer south, the Cheshire fringes where the golfing set and superstar footballers live, its great main city of hedonism and cranes and sky-high rents, and its decapitalised, struggling northern towns."

Rachel Dixon on the revival of the River Mease (rises in Leicestershire, flows through Derbyshire and joins the Trent in Staffordshire) by the communities on its banks.

"Old buildings give places a uniqueness that cannot be imported, exported, or copied. They contain distinctive details and period-specific materials that carry forward long-standing building traditions and preserve something intangible at first glance – the touch of time." Anita Straub makes the case for conserving historic buildings.

Daniel A. Kaufman distinguishes the 13 different social media personalities.

"The falling-off of the last few chapters is due to the need to fill the three-decker’s third volume, but that must surely be forgiven when Bevis and Mark and Frances make their winter ride through the ice-floes of The New Sea in the final stunning paragraphs." Brian Alderson pays tribute to Bevis: The Story of a Boy by Richard Jefferies.

More improvements planned for the River Welland through Welland Park, Market Harborough

The East Mercia Rivers Trust (EMRT) is to carry out improvement work on the River Welland where it flows through Welland Park in Market Harborough.

HFM News reports that the EMRT will increase water flow during the summer by clearing weeds and adding gravel and small structures to the river. It will also create better access points for education and community use and install new interpretation boards.

The report quotes the EMRT as describing the Welland through the park as "a heavily modified urban watercourse, with weed growth restricting flow and causing both visual and ecological concerns".

So I went to the park today to take some pictures of the unimproved river in the sun. Rewilding work on the Welland through Market Harborough previously took place in 2014.

The Joy of Six 1507

"These settings are not registered – as they should be by law – with Ofsted. They are meant to be temporary, but a recent report by the children’s commissioner found the average placement lasted six months – one child had been in a 'holiday camp/activity centre' for almost nine months." Alexandra Topping explains why social workers are forced to place children in unregistered homes.

Heather Stewart analyses Labour's crabwise approach to closer economic ties with the EU.

Richard Kemp condemns the snobbery behind the use of classical music to disperse groups of young people: "I have instead asked the Council and Police to support the 'In Harmony' programme of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic which is taking music playing into some of the most deprived areas of Liverpool both during the day and evening. During the day they ensure that every child in three schools gets to play a musical instrument for an hour a week for three years."

"I hope what comes across at the end is an invitation for people to consider the aspects of British culture that they want to celebrate. Albion can't be determined by me; this is a personal quest and a personal vision of the aspects of Britishness that I feel need to be celebrated. It's an invitation for people to say: "I have a stake here, and what do I want to champion?" Zakia Sewell talks to Michaela Makusha about her first book, Finding Albion.

Rob Hakimian reports on a scheme to use the Grand Union Canal to transfer water from the Midlands to London and the South East.

"I have a soft spot for Waddon (1937). Beneath garish commercial signage is a striking Modernist building which can hold its own against any inter-war Tube station." Daniel Wright takes us on a tour of the South London railway stations built between the wars to rival the striking architecture of those on the Underground.

The Joy of Six 1498

Peter Juul argues that Donald Trump sees America not as the leader of a global posse bringing international gangsters to heel, but as a mob boss threatening America’s allies and neighbours while carving up the world with other gangster powers.

"The government’s plans will patch up the water system, particularly with the boost in revenue from bill payers. But the private sector has found unanticipated ways to maximise profits in the past and may well do so again. Rather than continually tweaking the failed private model, the only real route to operating water in the public interest is for it to be in public ownership." Kate Bayliss and Frances Cleaver say is treating the symptoms of the water industry but not their ultimate cause.

Britain’s swift population fell by two-thirds between 1995 and 2023. Emma Beddington lists 10 ways we can provide these beautiful birds with the help they need.

Josh Taylor asks how Australia can sell its social media ban for young people to the world when the evidence suggests it is not working: "When the age assurance technology trial released its final report before Australia’s under-16s social media ban came into effect last year, its first finding was: age assurance can be done privately, efficiently and effectively. Four months since the ban came into effect, we can say that was – to paraphrase Yes Minister – a courageous statement."

Richard Norton-Taylor reviews Antonia Senior's Stalin’s Apostles: The Cambridge Five and the Making of the Soviet Empire: "Stalin’s task in building what Senior calls his 'Red Empire' was made so much easier, and so much more brutal, by the intelligence the Cambridge spies passed to Moscow. This included information about partisans and individuals hostile to the Soviet Union, and about how much support they would get from the Western allies."

"Not long after, in 1845, inventor Charles Wheatstone attended a demonstration in London. Chess legend Howard Staunton played against his rival George Walker over the South Western Railway line between Portsmouth and London. Müller-Pohl describes how witnesses found the match “rather tedious,” but it received a lot of press." (Roughly) Daily on Victorian e-sports.

GUEST POST The Red Lion, Evesham, and the Warwickshire Avon

River Avon and Workman Gardens, Evesham

Peter Chambers voyages along the Severn and Shakespeare's Avon, visits an Evesham pub and consults the accounts of the Avon Navigation Trust.

For the English boater who has completed the delights of the Trent and its disappearing power stations and riverside pubs other venues await. One such is a trip down the Severn and up the Warwickshire Avon, with a stay at the tourist trap of Stratford when leaving the river.

It is worth a stay at Evesham on the way. We had embarked a local guide with knowledge of both volunteer water pollution activism and the best drinking places. Before we were done I could identify a CSO (combined sewer overflow) and an Environment Agency solar panel, which indicates a remote monitoring system nearby. If I had watched the documentary Dirty Business before the trip, I might have understood better why they are located where they are.

After a thirsty tour of the Lower Avon we moored at Workman Gardens at Evesham. There is plentiful mooring there although it is not technically flood safe (for example, using tall poles to moor on). However, the weather forecast said we would be safe that week.

And so up hill to the Red Lion for drinks before dinner. This is an unusual pub, aiming not so much for real ale as real everything. Real cider, real music, real atmosphere. It has a shop front exterior rather than a faux olde worlde tourist appearance. The guest ales appear on a hand written list and the tables are small and mismatched. You can even have tea. Well behaved dogs welcome. 

This was a great place to spend an hour before going on to dinner at the River Avon Restaurant. Happily, being up the hill from Workman Gardens, it is not going to flood.

Evesham was a nice break between the Lower Avon starting with Tewksbury on the Severn and the Upper Avon ending near Stratford. A chance to pick up on some local knowledge.

It was also interesting to come across the Charity Commission filings from the Avon Navigation Trust (ANT) that document the state of the trust in 2020 and 2024. In 2020, ANT turned in £959,995 (larger than a parish council but smaller than a principal council) and had a single employee earning a reportable remuneration between £80,0001 and £90,000 (about 8.9 per cent).

By 2024, ANT had an income of £1,058,900 and reportable (individuals on £60+k) of one between £60,001 to £70,000 and one between £100,001 and £110,000 (about 16 per cent). The cost of governance seems to have nearly doubled. Happily there is a lot more detail on file to dig into.

Peter Chambers is a Liberal Democrat member from Hampshire.

Will Neolithic stones in garden of James Corden's former £8.5 million mansion be returned to Jersey?

Embed from Getty Images

It's the question everyone's asking and it's our Headline of the Day too. Well done ITV News.

Because they were in a good mood (they're allowed an extra bottle of port on Fridays), the judges also named two highly commended entries.

The Guardian for:

‘Bigger and lower’: bull in Dutch painting once had much larger testicles

Cambridgeshire Live for:

Next stage of Fens Reservoir project delayed as questions remain over how to fill it with water

Thames Water tries to force Lib Dem MP to pay ruinous legal costs

The supreme court this week rejected Thames Water’s arguments that Charlie Maynard, the Liberal Democrat MP for Witney, should pay its legal costs after representing the interests of the British public in court.

The Guardian reports:

Maynard was granted unusual permission to represent the public interest in a court battle over an investor bailout for Thames Water. The bailout was approved, but Maynard appealed, arguing that the company, which serves 16 million customers in London and south-east England, should be taken into temporary government control. 

Thames Water’s barristers argued that he should be made personally liable for its expensive legal fees to "deter" future appeals to the supreme court.

It would be interesting to know what the supreme court and parliament think of this argument.

Maynard, says the Guardian, described Thames Water's actions as "retaliation" for pushing for government control of the crisis-hit utility

"I find it completely extraordinary,” he said. "What is the largest water company in the country doing trying to run an MP off the road, and saying they want to deter me and others from taking such actions?

"What is the government doing letting a bunch of people run the largest water utility in the country and behave this way?"

A good question. Labour's refusal to life a finger against Thames Water is starting to invite discreditable explanations.

The Joy of Six 1435

"The real scandal here is the behaviour of the board. As Patrick Barwise and Peter York detailed in their 2020 book The War on the BBC, the British right has been trying to cow and weaken the BBC for decades, for both political and commercial reasons. But this time is different because the chief saboteurs were board members, chiefly Sir Robbie Gibb. On the Today programme, former Sun editor David Yelland justifiably described this week’s events as 'nothing short of a coup'. The call is coming from inside the house." Dorian Lynskey says the BBC is the biggest prize in the information war and the right may be about to destroy it.

Stacy Patton shows that Donald Trump is not the first US president to be accused of paedophilia.

"In 2024, Pershore and Thrapston became the first towns in the UK to twin their rivers, the Avon and the Nene, creating the Sister Rivers partnership. The idea is simple and scalable. Each town takes guardianship of its stretch of river, monitors it, and shares results, data, and strategies with its twin. Two councils, two communities, one purpose: to restore what regulation has failed to defend." Michael Chapman Pincher on a new initiative to protect our rivers.

Gordon McKelvie finds that historians must be alert to the dangers of AI and its potential to simplify, and ultimately impoverish, the study of the past.

"At one point the White Lady apparently benevolently watches over the father’s daughters as they sleep but she is revealed to be a form of predatory grim reaper when suddenly the silhouetted arc of a scythe she holds appears over their heads." Stephen Prince revisits White Lady, a lesser-known television play by David Rudkin that was broadcast in 1987

The Crow Inn has a guide to some of the best pubs in Derby.

The Joy of Six 1429

"The academics from three UK universities who wrote the report said their analysis had found that 21 of 24 objective performance indicators – key council services or functions – were stable or improved." Jessica Murray says the benefits of a four-day week are becoming ever clearer, despite Steve Reed’s condemnation of Liberal Democrat run South Cambridgeshire for implementing the policy.

Joe Hanley has read Nick Gibb's book Reforming Lessons: "The educational establishment becomes particularly pernicious in that it continues to be Gibb’s obsessive bogeyman, despite him unavoidably being the most consistent person at the heart of policymaking in schools over the past 15 years. He also boasts throughout the book about all the great people he has put into positions of power and influence in education during his time as minister (and, perhaps more notably, those he has actively excluded)."

Ebony Rainford‑Brent talks to Andy Bull about her work to broaden the cultural and class base of cricket: "The two biggest steps she wants English cricket to take are to bring in more means testing so the cost of entry drops for people who are being priced out of playing, and changing the structure of the talent ID system so that opportunities are distributed evenly around the country rather than focused on, say, a handful of private schools."

"On November 2 1925, the dam at Llyn Eigiau burst. A torrent of water and boulders thundered down the valley, sweeping through the northern part of Dolgarrog and destroying the small settlement of Porth Llŵyd. Sixteen people were killed." Lynda Yorke and Giuseppe Forino on a forgotten disaster that that reshaped a Welsh community and the UK’s safety laws.

"The reality is that 92 per cent of wine sold in the UK is consumed with 48 hours of purchase. Maybe we should stop pretending that every bottle is potentially going to mature in a cellar for 10 years, when the majority are going to be opened with a takeaway pizza or ready meal." Andy Neather suggests it may be time for the wine industry to move away from glass bottles and reduce its carbon footprint.

Grace Benfell asks why adaptations of The Lord of the Rings shy away from what is arguably its crucial chapter: "The Scouring of the Shire reflects multiple thematic cores of The Lord Of The Rings, echoing meaning across the novel’s entirety. The book’s environmentalism is threaded throughout. Saruman already represented an industrial threat. Some hobbits’ lack of care and vigilance to their environment, a relentless pursuit of profit, leads to the destruction of their home."

Reform UK Leicestershire councillor blames immigration for low water level at county reservoir

If you're short of a blog story, Reform UK in the East Midlands will always come through for you.

Sure enough, Michael Squires, a Leicestershire county councillor, has blamed "mass immigration" for the low water level at Cropston Reservoir.

He made the claim on X after visiting the nearby beauty spot Bradgate Park on Sunday, reports Leicester Gazette.

A glance at Squires' account, particularly the Replies tab, reveals him to be very online.

Derwent village is emerging from beneath Ladybower Reservoir

The current drought is having a striking effect in Derbyshire, where the village of Derwent is emerging as the waters of Ladybower Reservoir recede. This video from Trekking Exploration (like and subscribe) shows us what can be seen this week. There will be more to come if the drought continues.

Derwent was drowned by the reservoir, which was constructed between 1935 and 1943.

The spire of the village church was originally left standing above the water and people tried to swim out to it. This was deemed too dangerous, so the church was dynamited.

We see what remains of the church today in the video, and the photo below - which I've always found deeply sinister - shows the reservoir when the church could still be seen.

GUEST POST What is the technical debt of Thames Water?

Peter Chambers introduces us to the concept of "technical debt" and asks why no one talks about it when it comes to Thames Water.

The term "technical debt" was applied to an effect in software engineering identified in the 1970s by Professor Manny Lehman. Lehman was trying to identify how the new field of software was similar to previous fields of engineering such as civil engineering, which deals with infrastructure and other hardware. 

It was intended to appeal, as a metaphor, to indicate future costs to rectify present-day design choices and externalities. Manny’s work was intended to help estimate the cost of large software projects in a better way than looking out of the window and saying something like, “I think it will be a million and a half”.

What seemed odd with technical debt during my years engineering was that technical people and their managers always seemed to state in the fashion of, “you will need new tyres and an oil change”.

This persists in news stories of the perfidy of Thames Water. Financial debt can be stated in legally definite ways in loan paperwork, including tax liabilities. Indeed, fiscal matters are often described as “ironclad”, or “rules”, and debated in sacred terms. They pertain to the rights of rich and powerful people. By contrast matters of the commons pertain to the rights of the people. Tragic.

Technical debt is mentioned in statements of the form, “It would take many years of work, skilled staff, new pumps, new pipes, a reservoir and a clean up plant to make the tree-huggers happy”.

This is odd for two reasons. First, the informal estimate of hardware and labour effort could be turned into a project plan and cost estimate fairly easily by qualified engineers. This would be done by a water company, by a third-party consultant, by the Environment Agency or by civil servants working for the Environment Secretary. 

Second, the regulatory theory used for water companies in the UK is termed "regulated asset base". If the assets to be regulated are subject to any technical debt, then why is this not explicitly accounted for to the regulators.

You might think that this financial translation of raw technical debt is very complicated. Yet it need not be. The example of doing car maintenance annually is understood by millions. 

The financial statement is often a 12-month Road Fund Licence, an annual MOT, a major or minor service and possibly some exceptional items. Depreciation and replacement can be calculated using accounting conventions used by millions of people. The detail of pumping stations etc. is greater, but is finite and can be handled by contract consulting firms who would have engineers and accountants on staff.

So, Ofwat, what is the Technical Debt of Thames Water? And why do you not know? Or tell us?

Peter Chambers is a Liberal Democrat member from Hampshire.

Leicester Line of the Grand Union to close because of the drought

The Leicester Line of the Grand Union Canal – from Watford in Northamptonshire to Leicester – will be closed next week to conserve water, reports HFM News. This length includes the famous Foxton Locks near Market Harborough.

The Canal and River Trust has taken the decision because the reservoirs that feed the canal, including Saddington Reservoir, are unusually low because of the drought.

While drought will always be a problem for the canals, I get the impression that a backlog of maintenance, caused by the trust's financial position, was already leading to more closures than in a usual summer.

Anyway, you can see Foxton Locks above and Saddington Reservoir below.

One piece of good news for the canals is that the Welsh government has earmarked £5m to upgrade an emergency pumping station and keep the Monmouthshire and Brecon Canal in water.

The canal's future was threatened by new laws that limit how much water it can take from the River Usk, though it's not clear from the Nation Cymru report that a long-term solution to the problem has been found.

Richard Foord helps launch campaign to revive the River Otter

Richard Foord, the Liberal Democrat MP for Honiton and Sidmouth, has joined forces with the Otter Valley Association in a new campaign - #ReviveTheRiverOtter - to restore the health of the River Otter.

The middle and lower reaches of the Otter are now so contaminated with sewage-related pollutants that it's classed in the bottom 20 per cent of rivers in England for water quality.

For the last four months, the Otter Valley Association has mobilised 48 volunteers, who have been monitoring the river’s health every two weeks. In the latest round of testing, phosphate levels were found to be over four times the upper safe limit, peaking at six times just downstream of the major sewage works.

Richard says:

“The river Otter should be crystal clear and teeming with fish and invertebrates, but instead, the middle and lower sections are murky, slimy and sick. This is largely due to untreated or inadequately treated sewage being endlessly discharged in the river, by South West Water.

“We felt we had no option to but to launch #ReviveTheRiverOtter to stop SWWs appalling use of the River Otter as a free extension of their sewage infrastructure. This is just the start. We’ll keep going until we succeed in getting the investment the River Otter desperately needs to thrive once again.

High Court overturns approval of 200,000-bird intensive poultry unit in River Severn catchment area near Shrewsbury

River Action is hailing a "turning point" for the movement against polluting factory farming. The High Court has overturned the planning permission Shropshire Council granted for a 200,000-bird intensive poultry unit near Shrewsbury in the River Severn catchment area,

The campaign group says:

The case was brought by local campaigner and River Action board member Dr Alison Caffyn, supported by River Action. The judgment quashes Shropshire Council’s planning decision and marks a major turning point in the fight against the irresponsible and harmful spread of factory farms and the protection of the UK’s iconic rivers.

This victory sends a clear message that planning authorities must:

• Assess the cumulative impacts of having multiple intensive agricultural developments in one river catchment before granting permission for another. 

• Consider how livestock production units dispose of the waste from treatment facilities downstream, including from anaerobic digestion plants.

You can read the full High Court judgment online. Shropshire Council, which has been run by the Liberal Democrats since last month's local elections, has announced that it will not appeal against it.