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"The government continues to frame the cost-of-living crisis as a problem that can be solved largely through domestic policy choices. Announcements focus on price caps, fare freezes and measures like free school meals and breakfast clubs to ease pressure on family budgets. But these treat the symptoms, not causes." We need to recognise that geopolitics is driving the cost-of-living crisis, argues Anna McShane.

Harriet Walter on the effect of the government's misbegotten treatment of Palestine Action: "By accusing them of being part of a terrorist organisation rather than a protest movement, the government ensures that these people who broke machinery in factories or sprayed paint on aeroplanes or helped to plan these actions can be seen not as ordinary people who are innocent until found guilty of ordinary crimes such as criminal damage or violent disorder, but as outside forces that are deeply threatening to social order and our ways of life."

Chaminda Jayanetti says falling school rolls are not just a problem for London.

"His fabulously wry first wife, Eileen, described his landmark 1941 essay ‘The Lion and the Unicorn’ as ‘a little book explaining how to be a Socialist, though Tory’. Even in his most revolutionary moods, Orwell was very specific about what should stay and what should go. Small wonder that he found fault with every version of socialism except his own." Dorian Lynskey reviews two recent books on George Orwell.

"She became a byword for the brutal and controlling ways of the ‘Hollywood factory’ and its tendency to swallow up child stars. You’ve probably heard that MGM encouraged Garland’s use of drugs – ‘pep pills’ to get her to work and suppress her appetite, downers to help her sleep – only to criticise her for being unreliable when she became an addict who sometimes couldn’t show up for work. Eventually, the studio dropped her. She wasn’t yet thirty." Bee Wilson on Judy Garland.

Peter Adams has good news. The Devon Heritage Orchard at RHS Garden Rosemoor is preserving traditional apple varieties, some of which were on the point of disappearing.

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Peter Jukes argues that Peter Thiel’s name "now sits at the centre of a transatlantic web stretching from Epstein to Boris Johnson’s Downing Street, through the NHS’s largest ever data contract, and into Labour leader Keir Starmer’s recent trip to Washington".

"Federal Council turned out to be the worst committee that I've ever served on. And remember, I've been doing this for the best part of forty years." Mark Valladares has found the first three years of the Liberal Democrats' Federal Council to be an exercise in futility.

"It's easy to condemn anti-migrant protests on moral grounds. What such condemnation misses, however, is that there's also an intellectual error here – an excessive focus on individuals and insufficient attention to structural societal problems." Chris Dillow says we should spend less time looking for scapegoats and more time thinking about socio-economic failure.

Danny Chambers discusses how his varied veterinary career now shapes his work in politics: "I’ve learned the hard way that you can’t look after animals – or other people – unless you look after yourself first. Whether you’re a vet or an MP, it’s incredibly easy to let your own wellbeing slide, to say yes to everything, and to push yourself to the point of burnout."

"'If you love cider, this is cider to the power of 10,' says Barny Butterfield, speaking about the flavours packed by some of this year’s 'special' apples. Indeed Butterfield, the owner of Sandford Orchards, near Exeter, is buying extra tanks to increase cider production after the UK’s hottest summer on record resulted in an abundance of fruit." Zoe Wood reports on the prospects of a vintage year for English cider.

Andrew Hickey celebrates Jethro Tull and Living in the Past.

The Bailey Head, Oswestry, is CAMRA's Pub of the Year

Congratulations to Grace Goodlad and Duncan Borrowman whose Oswestry pub The Bailey Head has been named Pub of the Year by the Campaign for Real Ale .

Grace and Duncan were both Liberal Democrat councillors in Bromley. Duncan is also a former Lib Dem parliamentary candidate and was a member of party staff at Cowley Street for many years.  I visited their pub last summer.

Grace told the Mirror today:

"We are thrilled, we hope we can live up to the award. In our wildest dreams we never thought we would win CAMRA Pub of the Year. From small beginnings nine years ago, we have taken everything one step at a time, through COVID, slowly improving to the point where we now have twelve handpulls serving six cask beers and six ciders and perries, plus sixteen other draught lines.

"When we bought the pub nine years ago it was failing and had been listed as an Asset of Community Value by the local CAMRA branch. That listing made it possible for us to save it from potentially becoming housing and turn it into the pub it is today."

The Bailey Head, Oswestry: One of the 17 best pubs in Britain

I have been to one of the best 17 pubs in Britain.

Remembering a post from July about Grace Goodlad and Duncan Borrowman's pub in Oswestry, the day after showing the philosophers around Malcolm Saville Country I broke all my rules and customs and headed for the north of Shropshire.

The Bailey Head occupies a great position in the centre of town, and the orange umbrellas outside display a Liberal Democrat's knowledge of which colour stands out best from a distance.

I found Grace and Duncan behind the bar. We talked Shropshire politics, I sampled their beers and the regulars were friendly.

One of the best 17 pubs in Britain? When I blogged about the pub in July, it was to say that it had just been named as the CAMRA's West Midlands Cider Pub of the Year.

Now, reports Shropshire Live:

The Bailey Head in Oswestry has been named as one of the top 17 pubs in the UK as part of the Campaign for Real Ale’s (CAMRA) prestigious Pub of the Year competition.

The pub has one of the largest beer ranges of any in Shropshire, claiming to have sold over 3,400 different draught beers since March 2016.

Six constantly changing cask beers, always including one dark beer, are supplemented by eleven other draught beers, plus four ciders and a perry. The pub also has a substantial range of canned and bottled beers from across the UK and overseas.

The Society of Independent Brewers (SIBA) named the pub the UK’s Best Rural Independent Craft Beer Pub or Bar in 2020 and has been a finalist many times since. Regular tap take overs and meet the brewer events, among other activities are organised for the local community. The Bailey Head is very dog friendly, being voted Most Dog Friendly Pub in the West Midlands in 2017 by DogBuddy.

17 fantastic pubs have battled it out with thousands of pubs across the UK to be crowned the winner in their area. Pubs in the competition are scored on their atmosphere, decor, welcome, service, inclusivity, overall impression, but most importantly – the quality of live beer, real cider and perry.

The regional and national finalists will now compete for the UK National Pub of the Year award, with judges whittling the 17 pubs down to just four in late September. CAMRA’s esteemed National Pub of the Year title is the topmost accolade the campaigning group can bestow upon a pub. The overall winner will be announced in January 2025.

Good luck to The Bailey Head!

An early Lib Dem victory in North Shropshire

The Bailey Head in Oswestry is the new Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) West Midlands Regional Cider Pub of the Year, says a press release from the British Guild of Beer Writers.

Well done to the pub's owners Grace Goodlad and Duncan Borrowman, who will be known to many readers of this blog. 

Grace and Duncan were both Liberal Democrat councillors in Bromley. Duncan is also a former Lib Dem parliamentary candidate and was a member of party staff at Cowley Street for many years.

The Bailey Head is also the reigning CAMRA Shropshire County Pub of the Year and Shropshire County Cider Pub of the Year.

Sarah Dyke and Ed Davey say Save Our Cider

Embed from Getty Images

During the Somerton and Frome by-election campaign Sarah Dyke and Ed Davey visited Burrow Hill Cider Farm and listened to the concerns of its owners.

It must have been a memorable visit because the two have written to Jeremy Hunt calling on him to cancel a planned tax increase on cider.

Somerset Live explains:

Somerset cider farmers are facing a crisis following the introduction of a tax hike on their products which could wipe out thousands of jobs and acres of orchards. ...

From August 1, the cider industry is facing a hammer blow tax hike, the Lib Dems say, due to the government’s reform of alcohol duty. It means an 11p hike on alcohol duty for a 500ml bottle of traditional cider with a typical 6.5% ABV.

And quotes Sarah Dyke:

"I will make it my mission to stand up for the rural communities in the West Country and give them the voice that so many of this region's Conservative MPs have completely failed to do. That starts by telling the Chancellor that if he cares about the cider industry here in the West of England, he must get rid of this damaging levy."

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Peter Oborne reminds us that British Muslims were the first to suffer from bank account closures, but nobody protested.

The Pipeline looks at the decision by Shropshire Council to grant planning consent to a local housing development in the near setting of the nationally important Old Oswestry hillfort.  It fears that by raising the bar on what constitutes “harm” to the setting of a heritage site, the decision puts every such site in England at risk from insensitive developers.

"Why should Dartmoor remain the only place in England where wild camping is (lawfully) possible? If we accept that being able to rest in modest comfort is an essential feature of open-air recreation, then that implies that this right should apply to all our national parks (whose statutory purpose is partly to provide exactly that) – at bare minimum." Jon Moses says we need a national right to roam.

The late Dorothy Rowe chooses five books on lying and dispenses much wisdom in the process: "If you understand that all you ever see or know is the constructions of your brain and that everything is a guess, then you can’t escape uncertainty. You could be wrong and that is frightening."

Simon Perks has finished c

"It wasn’t just about the liquid itself, but the experience. The feeling of being in the presence of someone who really cared about the heritage, the orchards, the fruit and the story the drink told. It was utterly magical." Gabe Cook celebrates role in the revival of traditional cider and perry.