Hull Primary “Care” Trust overturned the original decision to deny me life changing treatment, and now we can look forward rather than back, and with some hope rather than fear.

But even then actually getting the information was like pulling teeth.

The original appeal was to be heard last Friday. They cancelled it and didn’t bother telling me.

Then the tapes weren’t given to the typist until Thursday. I asked to be informed by phone. No can do. Email ditto. Eventually I found someone in the PCT Management Team with a functional beating heart, and she emailed me the good news.

Reading this makes you immediately think; “Who on Earth do these people think they are”, talking about something of which they have no professional competence on which to comment? My GP says the stuff he gets may as well be in Chinese, but he does what GG says with no question because the man is literally the top man in this area in the country, if not beyond.

So how DARE lay people, let alone Doctors who are bureaucrats and not practising clinicians write the following. My emphasis added.

A pretty model is abducted by a crazed obsessive. But is she held captive alone…..? (One spoiler in paragraph six.)

I was quite surprised at the end of the picture to see that is was directed by Roland Joffe, a stalwart of the political movie scene through his ’Eighties films with David Puttnam of The Killing Fields and The Mission, as this was simply one of the bloodiest gore fests I have seen, and I have severe doubts about the portrayal of the female character, especially the sexual stuff.

The film’s first half is extremely strong, torture, mind bending deprivation and the like and I admit that I was starting to get a bit uninspired as one relentless scene followed another.

But… the second part of the film lifts it into the psychological thriller genre and you were kept of the edge of your seat until the denouement and it put some of the gore into context.

It was an enjoyable film and worth seeing, but….

There is a trend in some films to have base and negative portrayals of women in a violent and often sexual context with the excuse of post modernism being trotted out, but in this film the girl is repeatedly tortured and severely traumatised and yet ***spoiler finds time to have a sexual encounter****.

I can fully understand if people would interpret this film as misogynistic. Tarantino’s latest Hostel offering is also criticised on the same charge of Torture Porn. I will see it and make my own mind up, which is what a free society is all about. BUT I do feel some confusion on the whole issue surrounding how women are shown in this genre of film and given how Society is geared against women, I don’t think this film is going to help.

Nevertheless I did enjoy the taught nature of the second half, and as a thriller with a great deal of horror, it worked well.

It is 1987 and a Glaswegian bus driver’s life is changed for ever by a chance meeting with a refugee from Nicaragua in Ken Loach’s first film with screen writer Paul Laverty, a partnership that would culminate in the Great Man of Film’s piece de resistance on the Irish War of Independence; “The Wind That Shakes the Barley”.

Nicaragua was a cause celebre for the Left in the ‘Eighties as a democratically elected Government which was an alliance between Socialists and the Catholic Church, attempted to better the lives of it’s poorest citizens through Land Reform, and spending money on health and education. This despite a cruel and inhumane economic blockade by the US, and condemnation from the Vatican which took the side of the rich and powerful against the very people the Gospel decrees should be raised up. No change there then.

To cap it all the Americans were then caught selling arms to their sworn enemies in Tehran and spending the readies on funding one of the most brutal of terrorist Death Squads ever to operate in the region.

The Contras aimed to destroy the Sandanista Government through a relentless campaign of targeted assassination and razing of villages loyal to a Government who had given land and freedom to the peasant classes for the first time.

I first learnt of all this when attending SWP meetings with a friend of a friend, but baulked at joining them when they described the IRA in the same terms as the ANC, the Palestinians and the Sandanistas which I found ludicrous and totally offensive. Thus I continued in the Labour Party and became an activist with Militant for a few years. I don’t regret it for a minute but we were deluded.

All this talk of Nicaragua reminds me of a very weird experience in January of 1988 and looking back I’m not sure it was even real.

1987 was a totally screwed up affair for me and I arrived in Dublin on my way back to the North from Limerick for a few days with my cousin who lived in Glasnevin.

It was an all too rare event. Going to a Labour Party meeting and actually discussing policy, and feeling that through the drafting of a Resolution for Conference, that we were actually having some input into what goes on.

I can only imagine the fear in the hearts of the organisers of the meeting, as I remember all too well that horrible feeling when as a CLP Secretary, I had roped in an MP or God forbid a Front Bencher to speak at an event and it ends in an embarrassing fiasco when hardly anyone turns up.

I suffered a total humiliation of this kind in 1993 when Phil Woolas came down and it was me, him, the local branch nutter (it wouldn’t be the Labour Party without one) and three others. Woolas was fine about it, but I felt like a total knob.

Our biggest triumph came in 1994 when we had 200 people at an event in Farnham to mobilise against rail privatisation, the Unions did their bit, plus us leafleting the station before work. But this was in the Major Govt. dog days, and on a hot issue.

Saturday’s Forum on Climate Change produced a healthy attendance complete with stimulating debate.

Colin Challen M.P. is Chair of the Cross Party Committee on this issue and spoke to us about some of the facts and myths surrounding Global Warming.

Firstly he debunked the nay sayers and faux science which is doing the rounds. Every UN study since 1971 has reported that we are heating up, and that our activity is a MAJOR factor. Not the only one, but in combination with cyclical change, sun spots and the like our actions are a vast accelerant.

Air travel. It’s not ideal but take this for a stat. ONE day of logging in say Indonesia or Brazil is the equivalent to 4 MILLION passengers going from New York to London in the same 24 hour period.

Car usage and 4X4’s. Ditto as in minimal impact. But tax the bastards any way as they are tossers who don’t vote for us! And Daily Mail readers. Cause enough for me.

Seriously, air travel and the car issue are just excuses to tax in the name of being green. It’s a con. Michael O’Leary was right. God that hurt!

The main cause of Global Warming in the West is our old friend, energy production.

Nuclear? Forget it. The energy expended on getting the darn things up and running would negate any benefit for TEN YEARS. By then it would be too late.

Then there’s how to get rid of the waste, accidents and saying to Tehran and the such; “It’s OK for us, but you lot ain’t to be trusted”. Plus France had to shut 40% of capacity in 2003 as the drought meant they couldn’t get enough water to run the reactors safely.

Next to speak was Dave Bowe, a former MEP who served from 1986 till 2004 on the Environment Committee in Strasbourg.

His solution, backed up by science? Open the mines. Yorkshire has high yield clean stuff and we nearly cracked the carbon waste issue in 1984 until Her Who Shall Remain Nameless pulled the plug on the labs doing the work. Wonder why?

The technology is now available (he explained, but I’m too thick to understand this stuff) to remove the CO2 and pump it into the North Sea beds from whence oil and gas had previously come. All the infrastructure is there and would mean we could cut emissions by a massive amount. Up to 60% if it works out.

What’s needed, and thus why it won’t happen, is a complete U turn in policy allied to initial heavy expenditure to set it up. The Labour Government won’t commit because of the financial commitment which the Tories would argue  is Big Government (always Bad) and mean they couldn’t offer tax cuts.

Another way forward is to INCREASE bin collection, so that organic waste is picked up more rapidly, put into landfill and the resulting methane gas pumped into clean power stations. They’ve done this on a local basis in Germany and it works.

The US pollutes at 20 tonnes per person per year, we are at 10 tonnes and Kenya at 0.5. Thus we should aim to converge at 5 tones which means we do our bit whilst allowing developing nations to well, err develop.

Not hard? But as with Global Poverty, it involves redistribution of resources and wealth, and as we all know Capitalism simply won’t play ball, unless absolutley made to by the market. 

Nevertheless we have to keep going, not give up and hope for a sea change in attitudes on the scale of the Slave Trade.

I’ve got no time for all that hand wringing pony such as Live Earth. We know what needs to be done. Better to get out on the Streets and make ’em do it through direct campaigning, especially of MPs in marginal seats where the Tories pose a real threat.

May 29^th Despair. The Primary “Care” Trust pulled the plug on my treatment for Cerebella Ataxia which was due to begin on 4^th June at the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel.

What followed defies belief as I had a round of just surreal conversations where I am basically begging them to give me a chance to save, and hopefully improve my quality of life.

This should not happen. Period. By last night I was I the darkest of dark places. No word on an appeal from Prof GG in London. A frankly distressing discussion of the consequences with my GP, and to cap it all a shambolic appointment at the Eye Hospital where they had failed to send out the appropriate paperwork for my being registered as fully blind, as a pose to chronically visually impaired.

Mr. Stewart was away, and his stand in could barely speak English. What are you meant to do?

Me:

It was typed OVER A WEEK AGO, but he can’t sign it as he’s at a Conference.

Ding dang dong! His Secretary reminds me of “Computer Says No” in Little Britain.

Race and culture are minefields in the UK, and two Labour Ministers and a wanabee contestant on the lamentable gawpfest that is Big Brother have re ignited the debate in recent days and that can be no bad thing.

Industry Minister Margaret Hodge represents a Constituency which has seen tremendous demographic upheaval in the last twenty years.

Barking has traditionally been a blue collar area providing labour for the Ford motor plant and it’s subsidiaries in Dagenham, but recent developments have seen the numbers employed slashed and the local economy is now a low wage, low skill affair based on service industry.

Allied to this, the Borough has the cheapest private housing in London, thus attracting those at the bottom end of the socio economic scale who in this case are predominantly Bengali.

Therefore affordable housing, as in most parts of the UK is at a premium and because of the demographics this makes Barking fertile ground in the imagination of the BNP who have gained a foothold in the Council.

Hazel Blears has encountered similar problems in Salford, and whilst acknowledging the fears of her local community, she has quite rightly pointed the finger at those Rackmanite Landlords that illegally pack people into substandard accommodation that would be recognisable in The Road to Wigan Pier.

In addition Blears attacks unscrupulous employers who, whilst paying the minimum wage “On the Book”, exploit their workforce by making them work extremely long hours, often in additional employment which is hidden, building, catering and farm work being the main areas.

So although it appears that everything is above board regarding hours worked on one job, the unfortunate immigrant is often pressed into service “Off the Book” which drives down wages for the indigenous population.

This in undeniable and I feel that Blears was right to grasp the nettle and chose the right targets; Rackmanisim and employer exploitation and any discussion on this within the Trade Union movement will reach similar conclusions.

Hodge, however did not and has been quite rightly condemned from the Front Bench with Alan Johnson accusing her of employing the sentiments of the Far Right for saying that indigenous British people should receive priority for Social Housing.

An admirable, and pragmatic idea it would seem?

Yes. But a few slight problems and Hodge should know this from her time as Council Leader in Hackney.

Firstly only 1%, yes that’s right 1%, of occupants of Social Housing are non British people, and secondly their ain’t much in the way of this type of accommodation available in the first place.

So it’s a non issue. She only said it to appear “tough” and stand up for her white constituents, thus giving the false premise that white people live in rubbish houses because of the influx of people from outside the Borough, which simply isn’t true.

As a Minister in the Labour Government her first priority should be to campaign for mass build new Social Housing to right the cause of this mess which was the flogging off of well maintained Council stock by the Thatcher Government, which was then sold on by the occupants (no blame attached. You’d have to have been one sandwich short of the proverbial picnic not to take advantage) for vast profit and is now in the private rented sector with all the problems that this causes with poor maintenance, overcrowding and resulting anti social behaviour.

Major reform of the tax breaks on land, second houses and the ownership of acreage by the Crown and the Church of England should be the way forward to address the issue, not the demonisation of one section of Society, and I bet if we weren’t in this weird interregnum period, Hodge would have lost her Front Bench job.

In the wake of Emily Parr’s eviction from the Big Brother House John Humphreys conducted a discussion on Radio 4’s Today Programme. Whilst lots of people throw their hands up in horror and proclaim loudly that they never watch it, you’d have to be like the Judge who had never heard of Gazza, especially if you are under 45. It’s there and (rightly or wrongly) part of modern Popular Culture.

What annoyed me was that Humphreys kept repeating THAT word. Not just once, but ad nauseum. If it had been the F or C word would he have done so?

The N word is just far, far beyond the pale, and everyone knows it. In 15 years as a teacher all the kids new that so there is really no excuse. I’m not stupid to believe it never went on, but people just instinctively know. All I can think is that Parr, a self confessed Tory, and her friends used it as routine amongst themselves.

As for the argument that black people call each other it…. I remember a fantastic Chris Rock routine on this and he pointed out that is always used insultingly, and never as a positive re enforcement of colour.

“Black people love reading. But if you want to keep money safe, hide it in a book. Books are like kryptonite to +++++++!”

And as for the Gangsta Rap argument. The vast majority of these acts work for white owned labels aimed at a white audience who want to titillated by this incredibly narrow and un representative strand of Black Culture in order to appear cool and street.

The Indy analysed ticket and record sales for Snoop, Jay Zee and 50 Cent. The results show that 75% of the audience is white so proving that mainstream black youth aren’t that interested, and it sells as a form of cultural porn to a certain market.

Hopefully the good to come out of this sorry affair will to re enforce the taboo of this hideous throwback to the Slave Trade and all that went with this evil practice.

Now we need to address the issue of misogynistic language and it causes and affects. Would this be a cause for eviction? Of course not…

Guardian cricket writer Mike Selvey should hang his head in shame. If I wanted nasty vitriol posing as “humour” I would buy the Torygraph and read the lamentable ramblings of Michael Henderson.

No one is disputing that summat ails Steve Harmison, and that since the brainless decision not to offer bowling coach Troy Cooley a contract the Durham man has been misfiring.

But to describe Harmison’s efforts as “so pathetic as to become laughable” and to make that ever so lame joke about monkeys, typewriters and Shakespeare to describe how Harmison would find his next scalp is just plain puerile.

He bowled a corker to dismiss Ganga trapped leg before to a pacy ball having been pushed back into his crease but Selvey’s analysis of this is risible.

Until Simon Jones comes back, or we uncover another shock and awe bowler, then we are left with no alternative. Hoggard, Sidebottom, Plunkett, Mahmood and Anderson are all game lads, the former arguably the best swing bowler since Fred Truman but they can only take you so far up the rankings.

Harmison has the ability to destroy world class batting line ups so my advice to the media is to can it.

We all get frustrated with the Big Man but I would like to ask Mr. Selvey just how his contribution is going to help, especially given Harmison’s well documented mental vulnerability?

PARENTS WHO CALL EACH OTHER MUMMMY AND DADDY.

Don’t. It’s up there with “Baby on Board” which roughly translates as; “I’m so wonderful I just HAD to reproduce”, or “I’M A PARENT!!! THIS MEANS I CAN DO WHAT I LIKE AND JUSTIFY ALL” especially driving 4X4 and having no manners or consideration for others.

Which brings me to the continued frothing at the mouth and hyping by the Rothermere Press of the Madeline McCann case.

People come up with this “if you haven’t got kids you don’t understand” garbage. You’d have to be some piece of work if you couldn’t empathise with the McCann’s plight. As it happens I too have a four year old but I keep returning to the point raised by Simon Schama on Question Time last week; “If the family had been single parents from a Council Estate and from an ethnic minority and holidaying at Butlin’s, would the response have been the same?”

A sixteen year old is shipwrecked in the middle of the Indian Ocean and is forced to share his life boat with amongst other things a Bengal Tiger.

The Life of Pi starts well, has an interesting plot turn in the middle, but runs out of steam about two thirds of the way through, and if I’m honest I skimmed the last fifty pages just to see what happened in the end.

Why this won the Man Booker Prize of 2002 I can’t explain. The plot dies a death and the prose is nothing special but I imagine as with most awards, politics of a sort comes into play.

I enjoyed the first part of the book before Pi, the main protagonist, takes to the waves as it explored the social make up of ‘Seventies India as it emerged from the Raj Era, and the adolescent musings of Pi as he explores the many faiths of the Sub Continent is fascinating, echoing the open minded views of Gandhi who revered and took inspiration from a wide variety of faiths and practices.

The book itself came under severe attack due to plagiarism allegations, not proven but not wholly refuted either.

It had promise but just failed to deliver, in my opinion.

NOTES ON A SCANDAL BY ZOE HELLER,

A serial killer casts a shadow over late ‘Sixties California with a series of seemingly random, blood thirsty murders which are chillingly followed up with taunting letters to the Police.

This is a true story and all the more shocking for it, based on the books surrounding the case by nerdy newspaper cartoonist turned sleuth Robert Graysmith.

The case gripped America as the self styled Zodiac Killer claimed seven verifiable victims in a three year period between 1966/69. In addition five further murders were possibly committed by this individual, but it was the weird coded letters that enthralled the public, later having echoes in the Yorkshire Ripper case where Police erroneously attributed the “I’m Jack” letters and tapes to the killer, when it was all a cruel hoax.

Graysmith was involved on the periphery of the case through being on the staff of a big San Francisco Daily who were the recipients of the coded scripts, and took over the investigation from alcoholic drop out Paul Avery (Robert Downey Junior), pestering the Police and trying to fit all the evidence together using his rather odd problem solving powers.

As a picture I would have liked a bit more action as we only see three of the murders. That’s not a blood thirsty request, it was just a very long film that could have done with a hike to up the pace about three quarters through.

A passable film but perhaps a case for DVD viewing due to it‘s rather bland flavour.

Note to CineWorld: The heating has been on the blink in Screen Six since at least December. Last night it wasn’t just a bit chilly, it was bloody freezing. Gerrit sorted!