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Rotherham proves we are all to blame.

Telford, Derby, Oxford, Rochdale and now Rotherham with revelations and courtcases of underage girls abused and raped by men. Shocking. Or is it?

In the last two years we have been faced by the realities of child abuse and our collective failures to recognise it, confront it or deal with it. We are all to blame for Savile, Hall, Harris and the young girls and boys who have been abused, raped and abandoned by society in Telford, Derby, Oxford, Rochdale and Rotherham. These are just the towns and cities we know about. There are others. So why are we all to blame? Simply we created the culture that made it impossible for the victims to come forward and be believed.

The scale of Rotherham exposes the failure of social services, the police, local government, central government, socialism, political correctness, a conservative elite, the media and so-called policy of ‘social mobility’. It would be simple to put all this down to race and a few ‘incompetent’ social workers and their managers. That would make us all feel better.

The media narrative implies that Asian men are to blame, that it’s their culture, it’s their fault. So arrest them, convict them, send them home ‘back to their own country’ will be the clarion call of the Right. If we do this and fire a few social workers, force more to quit, plaster the faces of those in charge on TV and in the papers, stick a microphone to their mouth and a camera in their face, ask ‘why’ and ‘how’ for a couple of days this will help too. Then lets hold an enquiry where questions will be asked. Then a report can be published complete with a commitment that this must never happen again. Reporters will be live outside the Town Hall. And NOTHING will change unless you will it to change.

First off let’s be clear about one very important issue. If you think Rotherham or any of the locations so far is just about race you are an idiot. None of the cases or those yet to come out are just about race. We don’t get off the hook that easy.

The story of child abuse in Rotherham and other towns is about those who are at the very base of our society. The abuse victims are those who have, yet again, be failed by those who claim they were there to protect them and look after them. The victims have been abused by those who felt they had the power to do it and get way with it. Those who did the abusing used all the power they could to claim power over their victims bodies and playing any race card was just a part of that.

So what of Social Services, the council and the police? Well, despite their ‘do good’ intentions and, in some cases election promises, they have all failed to do anything to protect the children in their care properly. When the victims of abuse come forward to try to tell those in authority what is being done to them, they were not believed. The culture created by government and political correctness meant and still means that thousands of underaged girls who were being raped knew they would not be believed. The perpetrators knew this too. This culture HAS to change as a priority. The victim’s allegation must trump the accused presumed innocence.

Rotherham is nothing special. It’s just another example of our collective failure to face up to and deal with the abuse of children. Rotherham has proved one thing though; the media’s obsessions with getting a scalp to make us all feel better. The whole council, the MP and entire police force could have all quit along with the PCC Shaun Wright and still over 1400 girls have been failed. The entire Rotherham elite could have been sacked and over 1400 girls have been abused. These girls will never have the life they should have had. So what if Shaun Wright quits? Over a one thousand girls have been raped in one council borough. This hardly seems a result for the victims that BBC and others were so keen to report. Those who were responsible need to be held to account and not allowed to slip away by being sacked or resigning.

The reality is that our political classes has and continues to appeal to the middle, telling it that everything is being done to protect and enhance the lives of those who are ‘less fortunate then you’, yet they have spectacularly failed the very people they claim they are championing. Child abuse proves this.

From Tony Blair to Rotherham’s former Labour MP Dennis MacShane to now EX-Labour Police and Crime Commissioner Shaun Wright to every social worker and every council tax payer in the borough pf Rotherham, you are all to blame. You are all to blame as we are all to blame for Savile, Hall, Harris and strange ‘Uncle Fred’ who you wouldn’t leave your own children alone with but ‘what can you do?’. If we don’t actually report what we see and feel thus forcing those in authority to do something about it and hold them to account until they do, the abuse of children in care or in family homes will not stop. Rotherham is just another town and another failure in our collective inability to face and deal with child abuse. There are many more towns and cities like Rotherham.

Child abuse is too important to be left to the council, the government, the police or the media. It is down to you and me to stop it.

Child abuse is not about race, class, celebrity, family, politics, social services failures or the media congratulating it’s self for exposing it and reporting on it. Child abuse is about you and me protecting those who can’t protect themselves from those who want to do harm to them. Nothing is more important than protecting a young life from abuse. If you suspect anything you must report it and make sure they follow it up, no matter how trivial, no matter the consequences.

I will, and I have in the last month.

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August 23, 2014

Islamic State and the state of social media

A British born jihadist beheads an American journalist in a self-declared Islamic State to affirm a caliphate by posting it on social media.

Those who use social media, and include myself in this, are wondering what these platforms are all about this week. The use of social media by Islamic State, IS as they are now called, is quite brilliant. Many companies and celebrities would love the attention and ‘penetration’ that IS are achieving in getting their message and methods out to the world. This is a world IS want to destroy or at the very least return to their 14th Century version of Islam. The juxtaposition of using the very apex of the 21st century communication to tell the world they are wrong and IS is right cannot be lost on them, or us.

This is the biggest issue with social media and, as has already been proven by the internet, social media is fast becoming out of control as it is being used for purposes unimagined and is now beyond the control of its creators. As fast as IS have an account closed they open another; its like a cyber version of wack-a-mole. Advocates of Twitter and Facebook, who are public companies with shareholders and business models and bottom lines to achieve, have been and are being duped. I include the BBC in this.

It would seem implausible that any BBC presenter, paid from the public purse on a network that does not advertise at all, would be allowed to say ”call me on your Blackberry or Apple mobile ‘phone, using your Vodafone provider or you can use your BT landline and your Currys ‘phone to make that call, or you can even use Royal Mail to write to me using your Parker pen and Basildon Bond paper”? They are all businesses looking for custom and profit, just like Facebook and Twitter yet social media is exempt.

Television viewers and radio listeners are regularly invited to tweet, post or like on Twitter and Facebook. It seems okay for everyone in the media to freely advertise social media providers, encourage their use, to create and enhance the platform of millions of connected users and, by endorsement, imply it’s a good thing.

Here is the reality from this weeks shocking news. A simple click of a link on social media can take you to a video of a kitten in an oversized wine glass looking cute, a drunk Russian trying to stand up in the snow or an innocent man, a son, a journalist being murdered by someone whose twisted view of his faith makes him ‘believe’ his actions are just. You are a click away from the worst of humanity, faith, belief, and what you may know or feel is right or wrong. You have no control over this unless you opt out completely. Social Media has no control either and IS know this.

Sharing views, keeping followers or friends informed is one thing but social media is fast becoming something more and it has now contributed to the murder of James Foley. Social Media gives IS a platform and that platform allows them to ‘share’ their message, ‘post’ their actions, their followers to ‘retweet’ it and there is nothing we can do about it. There is nothing social media providers, these listed companies with shareholders and profits to make can do about it.

So the question is ‘would James Foley still be alive if social media didn’t exist?’. If the act of his brutal murder couldn’t be ‘shared’ or ‘tweeted’ or ‘retweeted’ would IS have done it?

The conclusion could be to beware the advocates of social media, those who claim it is the future and we must embrace it, do more on it, make it part of our every day lives, plead for tweets or posts. Most of all beware of those who have the need for ‘followers’ and ‘friends’. These are some of the many lessons of this week.

One last thing. The bravery of James Foley shown in his face against the masked face of ‘Jihadi John’ who was unwilling to show the world his face by hiding in the cowardice of non identity and clearly lacking in any confidence that his ‘god’ believes in him tells us much about this version of Islam and IS.

N.B

I am aware I have used Social Media to publish this blog. That irony is not lost too.

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August 16, 2014

Fear; it’s a cover up and it’s wrapped up.

Fear; it's a cover up and it's wrapped up..

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Fear; it’s a cover up and it’s wrapped up.

Be safe, feel safe. This is the mantra of Avon and Somerset Police, it’s part of the nine crime plans across the West of England and the Police and Crime Commissioner believes the phrase encapsulates all she is trying to achieve. The reality is that overall crime rates are falling by every measure and, despite less police officers being on the streets, you are safer now than you have ever been. Yes, certain crimes are on the rise, cyber crime seeing the biggest increase of all, but you are safer than you have been for many years. Yes you really are. You don’t feel it though do you? The fear of crime is significantly greater than the reality of crime.

There is a whole industry out there playing to your fears and hoping to make you feel safer. It preys on your fears, creates and magnifies your fears and uses the odd incident or accident to make you more fearful it could happen to you too. Nothing makes this more clear than the industry that makes covers for mobile phones. Every phone designed is made as a complete object. It’s not made to fail, to fall apart or not to withstand the odd accidental drop so why would you buy a cover for a phone? Fear. You buy the mobile phone cover fearful that if you don’t have one you might damage your phone. Do you honestly think that the brains at Apple or Samsung created their cutting edge technology, starting selling it and then thought ‘bugger, I wish we’d made a cover for it.’

Other examples of fear being turned into a business include wrapping your suitcase in cling wrap to protect it. Think about this. Shrink wrapping your suitcase; that’s putting a cover on a case, which is already a cover. If your suitcase needs to be wrapped in cling film buy a better case.

The cycle helmet is another product of fear. July this year saw all children who ride a bike aged under 14 on the Channel Island of Jersey without a helmet risk a £50 fine for their parents. The debate rages in the UK over the compulsory wearing of cycle helmets but I’ve yet to find any empirical evidence that they work. Maybe you can point me to it? I’ve heard of accidents that might have been different if a cycle helmet was worn but the key word there is ‘might’. There may be lots of reasons to wear a cycle helmet, feeling safer being one of them but there is little real evidence or research to prove you ARE safer wearing a cycle helmet. And where wearing cycle helmets has become compulsory, like Australia, rates of cycling have fallen. The reality seems to be that a bit of polystyrene perched on your head makes you feel safe with out a doubt, but will it make you be safe?

Some media and certainly some newspapers trade on your fears and who is to blame for it. The more fears they create the better and, as we get older, we become more fearful. My own recent experiences of cycling to work and riding water slides on holiday have proved this to me, until I found my inner ‘child’ again.

So the next time some tries to sell you a cover for a phone, wrap your case in cling film or make you wear a protective anything please, at the very least, question it and don’t be afraid to do so.

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August 10, 2014

Oh, those Russians…

Summer holidays are about the sun, the sea, getting away from it all or, in the case of Russians, getting away with it. This year I have spent two weeks with my family in the hot African sun, surrounded by Russians both big and small, but very Russian. The following became quite clear from being with them, closely watching them and talking with them.

1. They are locked into the 1980s like a Hazel Dean Greatest Hits collection. (There would be only five songs on that album and if you can name two you win a prize.)

2. They really can drink a lot.

3. They like to take pictures and pose in those pictures, a lot. The sort of poses that would grace the catalogues of the very companies that would sell you the clothes you used to buy in the 1980s.

4. They have money. A lot of money.

The Russians I shared the sun with were not oligarchs who were handed a state-run monopolies by a pissed president to do with what they willed. These are Russians who work for these oligarchs. They are middle class Russians mainly and they are happy, not just because they were on holiday.

When you probed a little deeper, they were happy because they love and are proud of their country and their leader, one V Putin.

The world, geopolitics and the media love a bogie man. Nothing sells a news bulletin or a newspaper more than a bad guy to point at and say ‘it’s his fault’, or ‘her fault’ for that matter. Think of the names that have been used for that very purpose over the last few years; Saddam Hussein, Col Gaddafi, Mohammed Morsi, Jimmy Saville, Sharon Mathews, Maxine Carr, Angela Merkel. The media love the binary world of the old Hollywood Western where the good guys wear the white hats and support their gun slinger against the black hats and their gun slinger.

Vladimir Putin has a very big black hat. He would not be out-of-place in a hollowed out volcano lair, sitting in a high back, black swivel chair. You can picture Putin stroking a white cat while surrounded by Ninjas in orange boiler suits turning nobs and flicking switches, tapping on computers and watching security screens. But it’s not as simple as this Bond image and the media in general is doing a disservice for making it so, much like the coverage of Gaza and the continuing ripples and waves of Sykes-Picot a century on from the fall of the Ottoman Empire.

Take Crimea. Putin has. Bad joke. But Crimea is more Russian that Ukrainian, indeed if you look at the history of the region Crimea is more Russian than Moscow. Is it wrong to cede to the will of the people and take control of what actually wants to be yours? Putin did not seek a war, conflicts or even a spat with the west, but it has done him no harm. Quite the contrary. Putin needs us to be his black hats and we need him and his people to be ours. Putin also needs the west to be strong too in turn make him look and be stronger and he needs the West, especially the EU to buy Russian gas, oil, coal, wheat.

History is replete with lines drawn on a map as a result of war, dividing lands and people. The effects of this from the First World War are still being felt today thanks to the afore-mentioned Sykes-Picot plan for the Middle East.

Putin is a leader, not a manager and the world needs leaders as it does have too many managers. Look at Barrack Obama. The world thought they were getting a leader but they got a manager. Margret Thatcher was a leader, John Major was a manager. Tony Blair was a leader, Gordon Brown was an unmitigated disaster. The jury is out on David Cameron but I think we all know what Ed Miliband will be, and so do his party.

So what has this all go to do with my holiday in the company of Russians? Well they are happy, they have a sense of nation and purpose and, even with their economy going into recession, they are bound together and even if they struggle they will struggle together and be stronger for it. History should teach us that a strong leader, who knows the people and their history needs watching very closely. That leader also needs our respect, our admiration and our caution.

One last thing. Can you think of any other flag of the world that could be turned into a bikini without it causing offence? Well the Union flag and the Stars and Stripes makes an excellent two piece swim wear ensemble. Maybe the flag of Saudi Arabia could be next? Maybe not.

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July 9, 2014

Cut the efficiency crap.

All local councils and unitary authorities are about half way through their cuts, austerity programmes or whatever you choose to call them. Bristol City Council have implemented just shy of a 150m of cuts by slashing grants to service providers and charities, cutting services and making efficiency savings. There will be more to come. Bath and North East Somerset have cut, so have North Somerset and South Gloucestershire. Have you noticed the cuts so far? Have you? Really? Probably not as the cuts so far have mostly been ‘efficiency savings’, changing what councils do and how they do it so the cuts actually doesn’t bother you. They should.
You will soon begin to actually feel the Council cuts too, and there will be little you can do about it. Or can you?
Take BANES. One of their cuts, proposed last year, was to close public toilets. ‘No’ said the residents, one of whom ended up sleeping in one the toilets slated for closure in centre of Bath. The Council decided to not go ahead with the cut. In Bristol, the council have 19 members of their Parks, Crematorium and Cemetery tending these council grounds and gardens. They were late in recruiting them, maybe as a result of wage saving or a wage bill cut. On my radio programme we heard that Bristol City Council were not looking after these parks, that cemeteries were over grown and one widow told me she fell into an over grown grave trying while trying visit her husbands grave because the grass was so tall. Two weeks later these cemeteries have now been tended, of sorts, and the grass has been strimed. Why? Simply because pressure was brought to bare on Bristol City Council.
Is this the answer? Shout on local radio and council will do it? Maybe, but it is a little more complicated than that.
The liberal democracy argument is that you vote for your councillor (or Mayor), the one with the most votes gets in, they act in the interests of all the electorate and then, in due time, you vote for them again (or not) depending on how they have done. The reality of our actual relationship with our council is that they don’t really effect most of us beyond paying out council tax and them collecting our rubbish and filling in the pot holes on the roads we drive.  It all seems very simple. But it isn’t.
Local Government effects you more than you realise and to not get involved, to just do your recycling and drive repeatedly over a pothole riddled road without reporting it is NOT good enough. You need to get involved. The money you pay every year is enough for a good family holiday or a better pension when you retire.  You need to hold your councillor and your council to account. If you don’t the leaders of each council or the elected Mayor of Bristol will end up being responsible for managing the waste management contract and adult social care and they will be unable to do anything for you or your neighbours. They will do what they have to do and not what you want them to do, with your money.
So what has happened to your money so far? Here is a clue. Most of the cuts so far have been achieved through ‘efficiency savings’. Bristol achieved 50m through ‘efficiency savings’. Why was any council allowed to ever be inefficient with your money. Every penny you pay should go towards what you want it to, for the benefit of you and your neighbours. Any council inefficiency is not acceptable. It’s your money, it’s your vote and between you voting it is your right to hold your councillor and council to account.
To put this another way, would you give someone you know a £150 a month, every month and not ask questions about what they were doing with it? It is your democratic right to make sure that your council do what you want or, at the very least, you know what they are doing even if you don’t like it. Never again should we allow any council to say they are making ‘efficiency savings’, and if they do you must ask why. And then ask why again.
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March 26, 2014

Are we really all in this together?

The Budget is done. The annual state of the union (more on that story in September) is complete and with all the rabbits running fast from the Chancellors speech on Wednesday there was a lot to digest or even dream about.

One of the biggest questions yet to be fully answered for the 21st century just got a little harder. The question is how are we going to pay for our increasing years of old age and potential poor heath in our later years? The Government now says that you and me can now be trusted with our pension pots.  We can invest it, spend it, by a Lamborghini, put it all on red or black or even take it racing and bet it on the 3.40 at Kempton Park. Oh what fun. The reality is very different. Your pension pot, should you have one, has to pay the bills you pay now, but without a monthly income from the work you do. If not there is a state pension of £145 to come and, err, that’s it.

Here is the reality. The number of people living in the UK aged 100 increased by 73% in the decade to 2012. The Office for National Statistics say that in 2012 there were 13,350 centenarians living in Britain, up from 7,740 in 2002. Life expectancy in Britain has reached its highest level on record for both males and females and a newborn boy could live 78.7 years, a girl for 82.6 years, if mortality rates stay the same. They won’t. They will get better.

It gets worse. A man aged 65 in the UK now could expect to live for a further 18.2 years, a 40% increase on the 30 years ago while a 65-year-old woman could carry on for 20.7 years. Many years to pay for and will that be living or just existing? Who is going to pay for these years? You? The state? Your children? The tooth fairy? Probably it’s a combination of all of the above and more.

One reality is that we are all in this together and we all need to plan how we are going to pay for it. Working longer is one certainty and this already happening with over one million over the age of 65 now in full-time employment and 300,000 over 70 still working. Those numbers will grow and, in reality, it’s the way it was generations back. You worked, you retired, you had a few years of retirement, then you died. 20 plus years of doing nothing is, frankly, just not possible and we all need to grasp this and plan accordingly.

While on the subject of ‘all in this together’ one other thing sticks out from this years budget and the Her Majesty’s Oppositions response. By 2015 over 3 million will pay no income tax at all yet the bankers bonus could pay for everything if it were taxed more. This seems so simple; to tax the rich more so that those who don’t have the earnings don’t have to pay anything.

Here are my two questions. If the top 1% of earners pay one-third of all the income tax taken in the UK how much more should they pay? And with 3.2 million paying no income tax from 2015, just how many bankers and their big bonuses are there? The Pensions Minister couldn’t answer that question from me this week. Can anyone?

If we really are all in this together and we all use the NHS free at the point of delivery, education free to all and a vast range of public services freely shouldn’t we all pay for it and not just rely on the middle or top earners to pay the majority?

Maybe we are just all in it, but not together.

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February 3, 2014

I’m not being racist but…

Immigration. It’s a complex word that strikes a deep chord, gets the media in a tangle and makes politicians worry about what they can say, or don’t say.

At the last general election in 2010 it was the third rail of British politics. Touch it and you will die. Bigotgate anyone? Ask Gordon Brown about immigration and see his jaw lock, as only it can. This year and the next general election this will and must change.

It is a painful reality that, as part of he EU, we have freedom of movement around the 27 member states and they do here. So we can no more pull up the UK PLC drawbridge and lock the doors with a sign on saying ‘No Vacancies’ than Spain can do the same to us. Maybe Spain, Greece, France, Portugal would like to send back all those British expats living in those warmer European climbs? Freedom of movement is a central plank of the EU and, without it, the whole project will fail. So for the UK not to be part of this fundamental part of the EU means we are out, even before you get be asked if you want to be in or out in 2017. It is a shame that the bill that would have made that law has now died a painful death at the hands of our noble lords. That is politics for you.

This last week has seen the Prime Minister commit again to ‘tens of thousands’ of net immigration just as parliament got itself into a total tis over the Immigration Bill. The sight of our Home Secretary having to sit on her hands and abstain on an illegal amendment to the bill shows how difficult this whole issue is, even for our law makers and party leaders.

So is it racist to debate immigration? The BBC gets itself in knots over the issue, as do most national newspapers and politicians. Is it racist to want border controls? If it is then most countries outside the EU are guilty as charged. ‘I’m not being racist but … can I see your visa?’ Is it racist to expect those who choose to the UK to pay taxes, to be part of the wider community, to speak the common language and respect the laws and traditions of the UK? Is it racist to ask those who come her to be part of our culture, life, and principles? Is it racist to send home those who threaten lives or incite hatred against the wider society?

Last year the retiring Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks suggested multiculturalism creates a society where “everyone is a guest”, and went on to call for a “multi-ethnic” society not multi-cultured. In essence multicultural means many cultures rubbing along together, all trying to understand and respect each other. But what happens when things rub? Friction, heat and then worse. Lord Sacks went on to say multiculturalism in Britain has “had its day” having led to “segregation and inward looking communities”. Is he a racist for say that? Am I a racist for expanding on it?

We must stop being afraid of a debate on immigration and the many unique cultures that live in the UK. We must control our boarders, know who is coming in and out and we must stop saying ‘I’m not being racist but’ every time we dare to express a view that might offend someone. Free speech is just one of the many reasons why we are all here and free speech might just achieve a multi ethnic, broad, mono cultured society that we can all live in, happily.

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January 26, 2014

Who is squeezing you then?

This year will be dominated by three main arguments in the national news. Europe and being in or out of it, energy costs and can you afford them and your income; are you earning enough of it?

Lets ponder the last one. When have you ever earned enough? Isn’t there always someone earning more than you, maybe even doing the very same job as you, probably working less hard than you, not as deserving as you of the money they earn. Twas ever thus but now this has become political.

Labour has given this earning paradox a name and it’s called a ‘cost of living crisis’. You might call it ‘life’ because the age-old reality is that no matter how much money you have, chances are you live to your means. The painful reality for many is that this shifted in the last four decades to living beyond your means. Life has been fuelled by easy credit and the simple, now misplaced belief that property prices are another household income steam. They were always going to rise and rise and rise and even after they crashed, property prices would rise again. All political parties are guilty of instilling this belief. Many bought in to it, literally. The reality is that, for some, there is a genuine ‘cost of living crisis’ but for most this is just life, boom or bust, feast or famine and the answer is not as simple as more income. That would be like starving yourself thin.

January has given us a slew of statistics and predictions for the coming year. The trouble is that statistics are losing their power. Just look at the lack of belief in crime numbers or NHS waiting times. The IMF (not to be confused with the much missed MFI … OPEN BABK HOLIDAY MONDAAAAAAY) say the UK economy will become one of the fastest growing in the world this year and ONS say our unemployment rate has dropped to 7.1% of the workforce, with the highest number employed workers ever. So it’s basically all good, but do you ‘feel’ good? This is politically important. You have to feel good because if you don’t you must find someone to blame for feeling bad.

The chances are you don’t feel good at all. In part this is the human condition. In reality this maybe because you might be doing one of the newly created jobs that are poorly paid. Or it maybe because you have not had a pay rise in the last few years. Or it maybe because you took a pay cut to save your job or the job of the colleague. Also there is no doubt that prices have gone up on most of the things you buy. So if someone tells you you’re having cost of living crisis it does tend to make you question if you are. Yet what is Labour’s answer to this soundbite and label? Freeze UK energy prices in a global energy market, raise the tax rate to 50p in the Pound for those earning over £150,000 and borrow more to build stuff. The Coalition say things will start to get better for you soon. Are you smiling now?

Politics isn’t working. We know this. I’ve blogged about this before (see earlier posts) and it’s set to get worse. The Hansard Society suggest that less than 13% of young people have any intention of voting at all in the next General Election. Turn out at the forthcoming local council elections, European elections and the Scottish independence referendum may be so poor that the actual mandate of these elections may come into question.

Why? Maybe it is as simple as the failure of modern politics and politicians to engage with you other than the tried and tested way of ‘why you should be afraid of it and who is to blame for it’. They are all at it. And Labours ‘cost of living crisis’ is a prime example of this. Who isn’t having one of those? And what is the answer? A pay rise of course. But by how much? Who is going to pay for it and where will the money come from?

The answer to the last question is you. One thing that is for certain is that the current UK economic recovery has been driven by the consumer. All political parties agree on that. The reality is that you will have to pay for your own pay rise because inflation will increase, prices will go up all because the bosses will have to put their prices up to pay for the rise they have given you.

There are no easy answers to this but labels and soundbites are as much use as statistics now. We don’t believe them and we are tired of hearing them. All we want something to believe in and to feel good about.

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December 22, 2013

The perils of Father Christmas on the radio

It’s almost here or it is as simple as there are just three more sleeps. Noddy Holder has made his pension shouting about it. Will your Christmas be like it is on the telly? Chances are you don’t even have an open fireplace in your living room. It’s a difficult time of year to be a journalist when the world is point east, toward a bright star or Cribbs Causeway as its better known while you are pointing west, toward a news story.

It is even harder if you do a daily topical phone in on the radio. Getting a listener to talk about something other than Christmas, even if they don’t actually give a monkeys about it, is quite difficult. One could start to discuss the truth and realities of Christmas but this is VERY dangerous ground.

On BBC Radio Bristol this week I ran a series looking at how other faiths and religions mark, celebrate or avoid this time of year. Very illuminating it was too. We had a lot of praise from listeners and some critique too, which I always welcome. As ever in these matters, if your faith does not chime with another there is a conflict of the heart, soul or body. ‘Twas ever thus.

One thing you can never EVER discuss is that Santa Claus or Father Christmas does or does not exist. You can’t even challenge the notion of his existence, his origins or meaning. It’s the law. Whether he is or was a saint, a sinner, German, a construct of the coca cola company or just a retail catalyst to get you shopping for one day of consumer excess I will let you decide.

Here are a few thoughts on this. Parents must maintain the magic of Father Christmas for as long as possible so children believe in him, but at who’s cost? The parents, maybe. As soon as the Santa secret is out, the Christmas stocking stops and the christmas spend decreases significantly. You might say that this is a retail conspiracy. You might very well think that, I couldn’t possible comment, to quote a former fictional Conservative Chief Whip and PM.

Here is another thought. This time of year and the use of Father Christmas is a useful juvenile binary judicial system. Any potential crime or disciplinary infraction committed from early October means you are either ‘naughty or nice’, you are listed accordingly and duly punished on the big day. You can even commute your crime and get a lighter sanction for good behaviour.

One last thought on Father Christmas. He is the ONLY exception to the rule of ‘don’t talk to strangers, don’t engage with them’. Indeed it’s okay for Santa thought to break into your home, steal food, creep up to your child’s bedroom and leave toys.

In short if you even dare to say you don’t believe in Father Christmas it is career suicide and likely to get the local paper on your back with a campaign to have you taken off the air, taken to the local park and force-fed carrots while listening to Shakin’ Stevens Merry Christmas Everyone over and over and over again.

So without actual commitment on Father Christmas/Santa/Ole Nick’s existence I leave you with this final festive thought. The are four stages of Santa. You believe in Father Christmas, then you don’t, then you become Father Christmas then you look like him.

Merry Christmas and a safe 2014.

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