Renaud

I enjoy reading political blogs - they often give inside stories that often don’t make it to the BBCs newsroom. My favourite is by a friend Tim Pendry. (http://asithappens.tppr.info) A second one that is worth reading is by John Redwood (http://www.johnredwoodsdiary.com). This is a recent blog by John Redwood The disappearance of England England is the country that is not allowed to speak its name. It is the country that has to be wiped from maps of the EU. The UK government was at it again this week in the Commons. I need to tell you as it was little reported, because the Labour spin doctors did not recommend it for news exposure for obvious reasons. The House was invited to approve members of Regional Committees for England, as part of Labour’s lopsided devolution to Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and “the regions”. Once again England was to be balkanised and obliterated. This is not an official Conservative site, and I do not seek to use it to retail official Conservative soundbites. Perhaps I may this morning say, however, that I was proud of the Conservative party on this occasion. They have refused to put any member onto these new regional committees, and have confirmed they will cease to exist after the next election if Conservatives have the majority. They are all part of Labour’s attempt to cover over the chasms in their devolution policy. The decisive rejection of elected regional government in the North East meant the rest of England was never given the chance to tell the government how much we hate the attempts to split England into artificial regions and then to charge us for ever bigger bureaucracies to govern us in this sad condition. Labour thought that maybe setting up regional committees in the Commons would overcome the “democratic deficit”, the lop sided devolution. No chance. One newspaper did invite me to give a quote they had already made up, to define English nationalism by being anti Scottish. I declined, for that is to misunderstand the nature of the English. Most of us have no wish to define our belief in our country by being unpleasant about the neighbours. For almost two hundred years the English were happy to wave the Union flag rather their own and to sing the UK national anthem when supporting their teams. Labour and the EU have awakened English consciousness to the point where we wave our flag and recognise St George’s day. We still wish to understate, and reject the notion that we must fashion our pride in country out of denigrating others. Lop sided devolution is unfair and is creating ill will within the Union. Regional committees make it worse.

Steve - I take it that you stay in Dubai and drive down the road into (dry) Fujeirah just to work?

Only surprised that Carolyn missed out - driving through Paris in an open top sports car with the wind blowing through her hair, as Dr Hook sang about Sylvia's mother. Bye the bye, exactly what kind of doctor was Dr Hook?

Pernod makes a very acceptable substitute for ouzo.

Respect!

The original posting reminds me of a letter to Design Week several years ago by the serial winner of various design awards. She moaned that they were all different sizes and shapes which made it hard to display them nicely.

News item yesterday said that RBS was halving its sports sponsorships. So the likes of Greg Norman and Andy Murray will be getting less dosh. Why does the RBS still sponsor any sports? Greg Norman hardly needs more cash. Is Sir Humphrey going to get the seats at Ascot, Wimbledon, Brands Hatch, Twickenham etc?

Music is spiritual, the music business is not - Van Morrison. Quality is never an accident - it is the result of intelligent application - Ruskin.

I don't see the euro surviving as it is now much longer. I think that by Christmas the weaker currencies will split into a mark 2 version and a stronger euro (representing the founder common market countries) will soar against the other currencies.

How does the RyanAir policy of closing the flight 40 minutes before take-off work if they don't have and ticket desks to turn away those arriving late? Will late comers get turned away from the boarding gate, leaving them airside?

A summer drink only. Never had the experience of a bottle of Pastis having the chance to go off.

Option 1 - Talk to your boyfriend about it. Option 2 - Get a British boyfriend then after an evening in the pub discussing how rubbish Liverpool / Man U / Chelsea are, you will long to be back listening to your French boyfriend's cronies rabbitting away in French. Option 3 - (this is the one I am trying) have a set of Michel Thomas's CDs somewhere in the car and really mean to listen to them sometime or other.

Teapot advises "Or fitting Volvo bumpers to our subs" Far better to fit them to all cars that enter a supermarket carpark.

I agree at home if possible will be less stressful for your dog. Best wishes for you at this sad time.

Article in this evening's Evening Standard (Pravda Lite) saying that the price that houses are selling at in London is 25% less than the peak price last summer. However something I read elsewhere said that around West London property has risen 5% this year due to the fact that there is so little on the market that sellers are getting this premium. Mind you prices rising 5% from what they might have been thought to be worth might not be much. If you are in a position to buy I am sure it is worth waiting. Friends of ours near Falmouth sold their lovely converted Victorian house (to a Londoner) and moved into rented accommodation waiting for house prices to drop or repossessions to start.

I agree with the above consensus. I guess the point of a mortgage to buy a gite is that in the end you have an asset. The gambol is that the value of the property will appreciate, whilst the traffic through the gite will pay the cost of the mortgage. A feasable way to acquire what might become a nest-egg but not a way to earn a living. We have a 5 bedroom house nearish enough to the coast for bucket and spade holidays and this year are fortunate enough to be booked-up over the summer school holidays. However it is very hard to get bookings at other times. So the economics mean that we have a 'harvest' season and that makes the house pay for itself. The economics of having a one or two bedroom gite (in a good location) with bookings through the year means that there might be a reasonable stream of income.

I am only a holiday home owner in France - so we don't have the same year round presure of trying to live economically in France. However when we bought our house, we thought that we should try and support local shops and businesses as much as possible. But it is very hard as most of the foodstuff sold at our local Super U one cannot buy in local family-run shops.

As ever I am with Cathy and Sweets.

What were Nogbad the Bad's parents thinking of at his christening?

I don't think that the Union is part of any chain. I think the Logis hotel is the Cheval Gris which has a depressing dining room. In summer you eat in the garden which indeed is lovely but last time we went they had an unpleasant attitude towards our veggie daughter so we avoid it now. We have never tried to eat at the Chateau Hotel we wanted to stay there for the time we finally bought our house but they tried to bump us up to one of their most expensive suites even though the hotel was mainly empty so we went to what is now our first choice for a seriously posh (and expensive) meal: The Moulin Val De Seugne (try saying that after a few drinks) at Mosnac. Great food and wine but prices to match. Across the small river from the restaurant there is an island with an entertaining menagerie of animals - exotic birds, goats, miniture ponies, and rabbits that appear at different times as an impromptu sort of cabaret. Try to eat on the balcony so that you can watch them. The restaurant is located north of Mirambeau - follow the signs from St.Genis de Saintonge. www.valdeseugne.com Look forward to trying the Chateau des Salles.

JR and Maricopa, I am with you.

A Charente Maritime place for PeterCD: The Union Hotel’s restaurant in Mirambeau has authentic French charm and good food. Not grande cuisine but good value. Slightly ‘Allo ‘Allo. The large dog that is not allowed to enter the restaurant is called Rex.

UnderwearCops2.wmv

It comes to something when the grunidad reading youngsters at the BBC collude in being unkind to Gordon.

I missed Clarkson's unkind comment (I don't get to many Australian news events) but the BBC helpfully have repeated it on radio and TV news several times. If it was unkind to Mr Brown why have they done this? PS Good for Sarko.