Gay Marraige - Gay Divorce

So a milestone has been reached - and now past - Gay marriage is now legal.  Now for the next milestone - the first Gay Divorce!  For it was not only in the pubs and clubs frequented by the Gay community that this historic event was greeted with celebration - it was also in the hallowed halls and lodgings of Inns of Court where dwell that most despicable breed of lawyers - divorce barristers and their jackals -divorce solicitors.

I suppose it will be at least a decade or so before we can honestly say whether gay marriages are more lasting than straight ones. Currently some 42% of heterosexual marriages end up in the divorce court and it will be interesting to see if gays do any better but, even if they do, homosexual divorce will be a feature of our law courts in the future.

The good news for the vultures of the legal profession is that gays tend to be richer as they have no children to spend money on (normally anyway) - at the same time - when it comes to dividing up the assets of the gay couple- there will also be no children complicating matters and demanding that part of the proceeds should be reserved for them. 

Now, being the cynic that I am, I cannot help thinking that rich gays may be, even as I write, having their arms twisted by penniless partners into proposing marriage which -years later -they will sorely regret as they see themselves effectively robbed by, not only their ex partner but by a phalanx of greedy lawyers.

   

the Badger cull

Last week the BBC - who else - broadcast a claim that an independent report into the recent trial Badger cull found that it was 'ineffective and inhumane.'  Why the cull in the first place? Well badgers carry - and suffer from - TB (tuberculosis) .  If a dairy cow gets TB and you drink it's milk you are in danger of yourself getting TB. So all cattle in the UK are routinely tested for TB and any found infected -or suspected of having it (the tests are not 100% effective) are slaughtered.  In 2010 over 28,000 cattle where killed as a result.  It has long been suspected that the prime reason for the spread of TB among cattle is the expansion of the badger population as infected badgers forage and dig in pasture and thus spread TB to cattle.

Enough about the background - what interests me is why people are so angry about the culling of badgers. I mean most of the population seem quite relaxed about the need to cull and control deer, foxes, rabbits, grey squirrels not to mention rats so why is Mr Badger singled out for special protection? The answer is I don't know. All I do know is that in 1992 an Act was passed making it an offence to kill badgers and that since then the badger population has exploded.

Let's tackle the 'inhumane' accusation first.  Apparently - according to the leak - up to 5% of the badgers killed (by 'expert' marksmen) took more than 5 minutes to die. Now I find that statistic not only strange but frankly unbelievable.  If you shoot any animal and you wound it you do not just hang about and wait for it to die you put another bullet in it at once. Also badgers are not exactly difficult targets, with modern night viewing devices shooting, killing a badger cleanly should be a doddle and how-incidentally - did this '5 minutes' statistic come about. Was there an independent inspector at the elbow of the marksman - and did that independent inspector refuse to allow the marksman to give the badger a second 'coup de grace shot?  Frankly it all seems very suspect to me.  As for the 'ineffective' charge.  It is a little early in the day to call a cull designed to reduce the incidence of TB in cattle 'ineffective' 

What the badger cull row highlights is the fascist tendency of  animal rights groups - and bird rights groups for that matter. By fascist tendency I mean the belief that some animals or birds are superior to others - Eugenics in wildlife. So the RSPB believes that other birds are inferior to raptors -i.e. hawks, and is prepared to see any number of song birds sacrificed rather than approve the culling of a single Sparrow Hawk. Likewise the badger lobby cares nothing for cows needlessly slaughtered but sees badgers as some sort of 'master race' of the animal kingdom whose numbers must be allowed to increase regardless of the numbers of ground nesting birds whose nest it destroys or of the cattle it infects who must be killed





     

Edinburgh - a potential Financial Capital City

The great and good of the financial world have been threatening financial Armageddon on the Scots if they vote to leave the UK but I wonder if that is right.  Savills kindly sent me a copy of their recent catalogue of properties for sale and I noticed;

'An elegant 5 bedroom townhouse on a charming listed crescent in Edinburgh's New Town conservation area. It has wonderful proportions, a superb roof terrace with outstanding views and delightful central gardens.'   Yours for £795,000 - yes only £795,000 in London the equivalent in the West End would set you back in excess of £10 million!

Not only can you buy a lovely family house for almost an affordable amount  but in Edinburgh there are virtually no Russians, no Arabs, no Chinese'investors' and - most important of all -perhaps - no French. Wow what a city? There is also a well educated and financially astute and able population. Add these factors together sprinkle on top the plethora of world class golf courses and grouse moors within easy driving distance, not to mention art galleries and oodles of culture and you have a potential cocktail which ought to prove almost too tempting for any financial company. The only blot on the horizon -of course -is Mr Salmond and his continual desire to show his economic illiteracy by opening his mouth and saying stupid things.  Remember though - the first Prime minister of Singapore -Lee Quan Yew - was a socialist and then - strangely- metamorphosed into the most capitalist of all post colonial leaders and built Singapore up into the financial power house it is today. Could the same happen to Mr Salmond if he ever gains the independent Scotland he craves?     

THE HERON - Penthouse or Shithouse?

I spotted this advert in the property section of the Sunday Times:  -

 LIVE WITHOUT COMPROMISE  -
The opportunity to live in an exceptional space. Expansive residences
above the 30th floor with unparallelled views over London.
An outstanding specification and first class amenities throughout
Prices from £3.6 million   

This 'opportunity' is brought to you by 'the Penthouse Collection' at THE HERON EC2. The ad featured a  photograph taken from the inside of one of these Penthouses which, incidentally, featured a large pair of super sized binoculars pointing straight at The Shard -suggesting that one of the attractions of the Heron is that you can play 'Peeping Tom' on the equally mentally sub normal cretins who purchased similar 'penthouses' in that idiotic aberration of a building.

Actually I think that they shouldn't be called 'Penthoses' but - 'Shithouses' - because -if there is one thing which is absolutely certain -the sort of people who are going to buy into the Heron 'penthouse culture' are going to be absolutely top of the Premier League international shits.

The Somerset Levels

I am a bit fed up with all the whining and whinging from the inhabitants of the Somerset Levels . Frankly it is  time they did some lateral thinking. For a start if you want to live in a house which is virtually at sea level why not build your house on stilts? It is not rocket science is it? Secondly let's be honest. The Somerset levels are just that - level - they are not -in short - a thing of great beauty or interest-  nor is the farmland of much value except, in the main, as grazing.

No the answer to the problems of the Somerset levels is not more dredging, drainage, pumping, and dykes but the opposite- flood it and keep it flooded. Imagine 30,000 acres of inland water. Forget the Norfolk Broads the Somerset levels could become a great holiday destination and revitalise the dormant economy of these parts. As for all those complaining house owners who whine about the fact that they are cut off - get a life and get a boat - and remember that waterside homes the World over always fetch a large premium. Make the levels into an inland sea and just watch property prices soar.

As for the cost it would - assuming compensation to farmers of around £5,000 per acre - be around about £150 million, chicken feed for an Agency which spent £31 million on establishing a bird sanctuary last year!

I have got a new hero - now that -in this modern world which is virtually devoid of heroes - is quite something. His name is Paul Sykes and he is the very rich Yorkshire businessman who has pledged his fortune to making sure that every one in this country understands exactly why we -in the UK - must leave the European Union.  Now according to the CBI, the club of 'big business' he shouldn't do this as they are fanatical in their desire to keep Britain in Europe. But you know there is a great big difference between the likes of Paul Sykes and the over promoted, over paid bunch of has beens in the ranks of the CBI - the difference -Paul Sykes built his company and his fortune from scratch - most CBI members got to the top of companies by climbing a greasy pole.

Paul Sykes is doing what he is doing because he is a patriot who loves his country and he is sick of seeing it give up its historic Independence and freedoms for the proverbial forty pieces of silver.  Unfortunately Nick Clegg - the moronic deputy Prime Minister- doesn't understand the meaning of the word patriotism (and people thing that Westminster was a good school!) . Apparently Nick Clegg thinks that wanting Britain to leave the EU cannot be patriotic because ; 'it would leave many people poorer, it would leave us weaker as a country etc.'  Well - actually - Mr Clegg -using your criteria - we would definitely not have gone to war in 1939 - nor gone to war in 1914 - as both those conflicts caused us no end of economic grief. But we did so as we honoured treaty obligations and to fight tyranny. Now a different sort of tyranny is abroad. It is the tyranny of unelected judges, the tyranny of unelected and unaccountable officials, the tyranny of the urban political elite intent on foisting there ideas and 'vision' on everyone in this land.  The destruction of these tyrannies is surely worth fighting for and that is why Mr Sykes (someday I hope him to become Lord Sykes or even Paul Sykes Duke of....) is my new hero.    

Great Fulford Restoration - An Award

Yes - contrary to much belief we do actually have a restoration programme on the house - it is just that it goes in stops and starts and only happens when funds are available.  One of the most depressing things about owning a large house  is that you can spend large sums on vital 'infrastructure' such as the roof and the wiring but there are hardly any visible evidence that you have done anything! So the casual observer will still think the house is crumbling into the ground blissfully unaware that the lead work on the roof has been renewed - so no longer leaks - that the wiring has all be updated - so there is no longer a risk of the whole house going up in flames due to an electrical fault.

Finally though we have done something really visible and the effect is stunning. Our big Double Cube ballroom -or great Drawing Room (42 ft l x 21 ft x21) fell into total disrepair in 1810 when the ceiling collapsed. It had been constructed within the Tudor walls of the house and - to get the height-  my ancestor had removed a floor -cutting through tie beams etc. and fatally weakening the building - the result -disaster a hundred odd years later.

In 1960 my father carried out vital structural repairs to stop the whole of that side of the house collapsing but had little money left to spend on interior decoration and installed a temporary ceiling. Now at last I have got rid of it and realised a long held dream by replacing it with a truly 'shock and awe' baroque plaster ceiling created for me by probably the greatest exponent of the almost lost art of stucco and plaster work - one Geoffrey Preston - who I found - by a fluke - living and working down the road in Exeter! 


So for the last eight months we have all laboured to finish this great work  Geoffrey has created a ceiling to gasp at - pictures have been rehung where they last hung over two hundred years ago and my wife and I -with some occasional desultory help from our children have personally applied no less than four coats of paint to the walls - which has been very good for our figures and entirely satisfying. 

The end result was that we entered the finsihed room for the Georgian Group Architectural Awards - the Oscars of architecture - in the 'restoration of a Georgian interior' category and being on the short list hoofed it up to London to attend the awards ceremony at Chrisites.  Sadly we came second - beaten by a short head by Andrew Lloyd Webber's restoration of the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane.  Still -as they say - I think - better to have tried and lost than never to have tried at all.