In which my second crack at a Dickens joke comes on live radio

Back in the early Nineties, which was the era when I was doing a part-time MA in Victorian Studies at Leicester, I turned up at a pub in the city to play a county league chess game for Market Harborough. Naturally, I had a copy of Great Expectations in my jacket pocket.

A member of the home team saw this and suggested it meant I was feeling confident about the coming game. Just when it was too late, I realsied that I should have replied with a self-deprecating "It's more likely to be a case of Hard Times, I'm afraid." L'esprit de l'escalier is a bitch.

And I was expecting hard times, because we were playing a team called Marten Inn and it included some of the best players in the city. They had presumably started off at the Marten Inn in Martin Street, but were now playing at the Town Arms in Pocklington's Walk. The Town Arms, which is now called Duffy's Bar, used to be a significant Leicester music venue.

As it turned out, I wasn't in for hard times at all as I won rather a good game. I don't recall seeing the scoresheet in the folder of them I still have, but I remember I played aggressively as Black, won the exchange and eventually returned it to transpose into a won king and pawn ending.

Fast forward to 2007, when I was still hosting the BritBlog Roundup. This was a weekly digest of British blog posts, compiled (at least when I hosted it) largely from the nominations made by its regular readers.

For a short while – I think I only appeared a couple of times – the Roundup host for that week would be interviewed live on a BBC Radio Five Live programme called Outriders. And I didn't dream this as it's still mentioned on the BBC website.

I went on air, I think that evening, to talk about the Roundup for 25 November 2007. One of the blog posts included was a football team chosen from Dickens characters. The link no longer works, but I discussed a few of the selections.

At the end, quite unbidden by me, the presenter said: "I suppose you could say this team has Great Expectations.

And I was able to give the instant reply: "Yes, but I'm afraid it might turn out to be a case of Hard Times."

Procol Harum: Pandora's Box

Though it was included on the band's 1975 album Procol's Ninth and released as a single the same year, this song was written by Gary Brooker and Keith Reid back in the psychedelic Sixties.

Caroline Voaden on what Shovegate tells us about Nigel Farage

Writing in the Guardian, Caroline Voaden tells us what really happened in the Commons altercation that Nigel Farage later used as his excuse for missing the John Healey's Budget speech:

On the day of the king's speech, MPs process through to the House of Lords to listen to it. Leaders of all parties, including smaller ones, lead the procession, but on this occasion Farage didn’t seem to get into place in time. So he was stuck behind a load of MPs also trying to join the procession.

I was on a flight of stairs and he demanded to get past. I told him to wait his turn like everyone else and he clearly didn’t like that, so he grabbed me by the arm and I ended up shoved to one side so he could push through. 

My colleague thought I was going to fall down the stairs, so he grabbed Farage and had a word with him about his behaviour. I reported it to the parliamentary authorities and they asked him to apologise in writing. That never happened – of course – and I chose not to say anything about it publicly.

So, yes, there was an altercation. Was it caused by "aggressive" Lib Dem MPs, as a Reform UK source later claimed? Hardly.

And she goes on to offer some penetrating observations on what the affair, and in particular on the way he dredged it up as an excuse, tells us about Farage and his approach to parliamentary politics:

I think it's a perfect reflection of the type of politics that typifies Reform UK. The politics of grievance, the repetitive mantra that the "establishment are out to get us", but, more importantly, the disdain for parliament and its traditions.

For a man who claims he wants to become prime minister, Farage's aversion to spending time in parliament means that he will go into the next election with very little knowledge about how the place works, how to leverage its power and what lies behind its traditions. 

He has spoken less in parliament than any other comparable party leader and voted about half as much as the average MP. He is a stranger in the place he aims to command.

The ghosts of Naseby Battlefield

This is a short video from the Cromwell Museum that catalogues the many places where the ghost of Oliver Cromwell is said to walk.

I have selected the section on Naseby Battlefield and the ghosts, Cromwell included, who are seen there. It lies seven miles south of Market Harborough,

The 2008 photograph said to show a Civil War soldier has managed to walk through the Telegraph paywall.

The old Pontesbury magistrates court and police house are for sale

For two days in February 1945 the eyes of the nation were on the little magistrates court at Pontesbury in Shropshire. It was here that the committal proceedings against the farmer Reginald Gough and his wife Esther on charges of the manslaughter of their 12-year-old foster child Dennis O'Neill were held.

At the full trial, held at Stafford the following month because feeling was running so high in Shropshire, Gough was convicted of manslaughter and his wife of the lesser charge of neglect.

As I have shown here, news from Pontesbury shared the front pages with news of the Allied advance on Berlin. That shows how the boy's death scandalised the country, even if many newspapers had only four pages because of wartime paper shortages.

The reason for this post is that the magistrates court, which closed long ago and was for many years home to an insurance company, and the old police house next door are up for sale. The old court is on the left in the photograph above and the police house on the right.

From the internal photographs on the properties' rightmove listing, you can see that the courtroom was on the first floor, with cells and other appurtenances beneath. 

This is certainly a project for someone – the listing suggests it would be ideal for mixed commercial and domestic use.

Let's end with a glimpse of what happened in that courtroom in 1945. This is from the Newcastle Journal for 15 February:

Mr. H.H. Maddocks, prosecuting, said that he could not possibly consent to bail for either. "There is another matter to be taken into consideration. A tremendous amount of indignation has been aroused, and it might be for their own safety if they were not allowed bail." 

An outburst of laughter among people at the back of the court followed this remark.

For more on the death of Dennis O'Neill, see my article for Central Bylines: The forgotten Shropshire tragedy that inspired The Mousetrap. 

The courtroom at Pontesbury (photo: rightmove)

The Joy of Six 1601

"This low-cost strategy of largely relying on conditionality and sanctions to get unemployed claimants into work has clearly failed, as numbers have gone up since 2016, and the binary nature of our welfare system pushes our ageing and increasingly impaired population to claim incapacity benefits over limited working with in-work financial top-ups." Paul Gregg introduces the new Resolution Foundation report What's Gone Wrong With Welfare?

Flynn Devine and Hannah Perry, meanwhile, introduce a Demos report on how the lack of impartial local news sources fuels asylum housing clashes and what can be done about it.

"But what a diagnostic label cannot do is tell a teacher how a child learns. Those of us who have taught in classrooms know that two autistic children may need very different support." Mark Mon-Williams and Karen Guldberg call for a shift from a "diagnosis-dependent" system of helping children with special educational needs and disabilities, to a "needs-led plus diagnosis" one, where support is not withheld while waiting for a diagnosis.

Francisco Garcia on the Student List's victory in Serbia: "From the start, the student movement was determinedly horizontal. There were no leaders and decisions were taken collectively at assemblies. Over time, the movement agreed on a few key demands, with elections chief among them."

Stephanie Seul introduces us to Avis Waterman, the woman who covered the First World War on the Italian Front for The Times.

"Pawlikowski does not make arty films in which the imagery stops the story to admire itself. But he depends on the force and the simultaneous distancing of black and white, the way it tells us we are seeing something that has been chosen." David Thomson praises Paweł Pawlikowski's Fatherland (2026).

Reform leader of Leicestershire County Council resigns

Dan Harrison has resigned as leader of Leicestershire County Council's minority Reform UK administration, reports BBC News:

It comes after Harrison had apologised after being recorded saying 76 council solicitors would be made redundant, branding them "incompetent", before saying "what I want to look at now is the women", in remarks which were then released on social media.

Harrison has said that his deputy Kevin Crook will become the council's acting leader.

The Reform Party UK Exposed Bluesky has talked of rumours that several Reform councillors are in talks with Restore Britain or considering going independent. See last week's Harborough Mail report for some background on that.

All this has rather squeezed out news of the censure of the first deputy leader that Harrison appointed, Joseph Boam (the Private Pike of the Reform group).

John Rogers walks from Herne Bay and Reculver to Margate

John Rogers writes on YouTube:

This picturesque walk takes us across the vanished landscape of the Wantsum Channel which once separated the Isle of Thanet from the mainland. 

We start at Herne Bay Pier and talk about the great French artist Marcel Duchamp's relationship with the town. At Reculver we explore the ruins of the medieval church and monastery and the Roman fort. 

Then we walk across the windswept land that once lie under the sea before strolling in the sunset through Birchington-on-sea, Westgate-on-sea and arriving in Margate in the dark. A truly memorable walk.

I have been to Herne Bay and Reculver myself. Sad to say, John does not comes across an establishment that Lord Bonkers occasionally mentions: the Home for Distressed Canvassers, Herne Bay. But he does mention Tarkovsky and Marcel Duchamp.

John Rogers has a Patreon account to support his videos and blogs at The Lost Byway.

Fortean Times nods on yoghurt and the Stiperstones

I went into Leicester today to see Pawel Pawlowski's new film Fatherland and also to buy the new issue of Fortean Times at the T.G. Jones on Leicester station.

Fatherland is well worth seeing, but here are a couple of minor quibbles occasioned by my flick through the magazine on the bus home.

David Hambling writes in his regular science column about some regions' claims to have lots of inhabitants who have lived well past the age of 100 – and about how they generally prove to be unfounded upon investigation.

One region that made such a claim was Abkhazia in the Caucasus, which used to be part of the Soviet Union. Today it is recognised by most countries as part of Georgia, but it is occupied by, or at least economically dominated by, by Russia.

Hambling says of Abkhazia:

A 1970 census showed that 40 per cent of the population claim to be over 90, but were remarkably youthful looking. This was partly attributed to yoghurt, a novelty in the West at the time, and Danone used the claims in a successful yoghurt advertising campaign.

But yoghurt was not a novelty in the England by 1970. I can remember regularly choosing a pot for breakfast from the milkman's float as a small boy several years before that.

A BBC News story confirms my memory:

In 1963, Swiss-invented Ski was launched in the UK. With added sugar and real fruit it was an instant hit and launched a yoghurt revolution on our supermarket shelves.

And the Ski television commercial above dates from 1967.

Danone, I suspect, were behind the Chambourcy brand, which I also remember from childhood. Maybe they were launching it in 1970?

And then Alan Murdie's Ghostwatch column refers to:

Wild Edric, an Anglo-Saxon noble who resisted the Normans between 1067-70, appearing on the jagged Stiper Stones, Shropshire, on the longest night.

"Stiperstones" as two words? The term describes a five-mile ridge, not just the outcrops at its highest point.

Still, I am happily reminded of the young son of a fellow Liberator collective member who was delighted that we had found "the stiper stones" when we reached those outcrops in the rain, much as Christopher Robin was convinced Pooh had found the North Pole.

Anna Sabine on losing and partially regaining her voice

Anna Sabine MP (photo: Frome & East Somerset
Lib Dems)

Anna Sabine, the Liberal Democrat MP for Frome and East Somerset, has spoken about her experience of losing and then partly regaining her voice.

She lost her voice after a thyroid operation in June and used a microphone to speak in the House of Commons, but woke one morning a few weeks ago to find it had regained some of its natural strength.

LBC reports what she has told the Press Association about this experience:

"When I came back to work in September I really wanted to hide, I did not want to speak in the chamber with my voice, because it actually, at that point, when you stood up to speak, you weren’t really sure what was going to come out.

"But over that summer, I had heard from so many people because I’d done various radio and TV about it, and people had emailed me.

"I felt like there’s all these people that are genuinely finding it inspiring that I’m on the radio or on TV.

"I can’t now hide away, so I kind of felt inspired by them really to stand up in the chamber, which I did feel really embarrassed about. Even though no-one made me feel embarrassed, it felt extremely exposing.

"I’m glad I did it because I kind of then felt if I can do that, I shouldn’t be scared of being in the chamber any more. Because if I can do it with a very squeaky voice, I can do it in any way."

She also said that groups like the British Voice Association and the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists can provide support, and that she would be campaigning to get more therapy for adults with voice problems like hers.

From The Mere back to Ellesmere canal basin

I walked from Ellesmere canal basin to The Mere through the centre of the town, which made them seem further apart than they are. So I took the direct route on the way back, which took me up Church Hill.

When I reached a sign indicating there was a bowling green on top of an overgrown mound, I remembered Clun and Bishop's Castle, which both have greens among the remains of their old castles, and reasoned that the mound was probably once the motte of a castle. I was right - there's a brief entry on Ellesmere Castle on Wikipedia.

So this must be the oldest part of Ellesmere and, despite some interesting houses, it's a part most visitors don't get to see. I climbed Church Hill. went down the other side and, after I had crossed a main road, I was the parched cricket ground again and knew I was almost back at the canal basin.

The Joy of Six 1600

"In a sacred ceremony dating back to time immemorial, a researcher from a poverty charity or housing campaign group raises their mournful head from the Budget small print and confirms to their line manager that no, there is no money assigned to raising Local Housing Allowance in line with rents and yes, that means housing benefit for private sector tenants in all but the cheapest homes is being cut. Again." Chaminda Jayanetti says John Healey's "breathing space" Budget has ensured the noose around the neck of the poorest private renters gets ever tighter.

Daniella Shreir reports on the unrest in France: "Despite three weeks of blockades and protests that had already led to more than six thousand arrests (most of them of minors), Macron claimed to have been surprised by the scale of the protests on 17 October."

Shem Law argues that the BBC's decision to close Radio 4 Extra is a terrible mistake.

"Illich’s censure of industrialized society originated in his criticisms of the Catholic Church. As a young priest of formidable intellect, Illich was known in the Vatican and seemed clearly destined to become a prince of the church. But his experience of missionary attitudes, first in Puerto Rico and then in Brazil and Mexico, turned him into a vociferous critic of what he saw as a corporate-religious developmentalism that paved over Indigenous customs and encouraged dependency." Justin McGuirk looks at the ideas of Ivan Illich in his centenary year.

Malin Hay visits the Inside Aardman: Wallace & Gromit and Friends exhibition at the Young V&A: "Of late, a note of techno-optimism has crept into the Aardman canon. The most recent Wallace and Gromit film, Vengeance Most Fowl, feints towards a Luddite message, as Wallace’s obsession with gadgets threatens Gromit’s peace and the simplicity of their lives."

"The history of an organisation's change programmes can tell you a lot about what is behind its current initiatives. Sometimes they are a reaction to what went before, other times they are an attempt to do the same again, only with different language. Often, there is little understanding of why the last change attempt failed. People want to bury the embarrassment of previous projects and move on." Flip Chart Fairy Tales undertakes some workplace archaeology among the ruins of past change programmes.

The Ethiopians: Everything Crash

A site devoted to the band says:

The Ethiopians (originally The Ethiopian Children) were one of Jamaica’s most influential vocal groups during their heyday. Not only did the original quartet (Leonard Dillon, Wally Booker, Harold Bishop & Neville Duncan) spearhead the transition between Ska and Rocksteady, Dillon’s heavily Rastafarian lyrics also paved the way for the socially conscious roots reggae era that was to come.

The Reggae Museum adds that they were among the first Jamaican groups to tour widely in Britain.

This single from 1969 records a wave of public-sector strikes – a sort of Jamaican winter of discontent.