health

there i was in the library. i was reading a trade paperback (x-men legacy: aftermath by mike carey if you must know). my read was interrupted by a bloke who wanted to know if i was white and over not over 50. i am. did i want a free health check? oh ok if you must. well it was free and it would have been rude to refuse.

it was to see about what my risks of a cardiovascular event (not a good thing) are.

as i was filling out the papers they handed me i started to have second thoughts. why? when it comes to my health i can be incredibly pessimistic. i quite like blissful ignorance as opposed to bad news. however i overcame my nerves and went in for the tests.

first up was height, weight and waist measurement. height was a revelation i seem to have grown two inches. weight – still a fat bastard. waist – bigger than it should be.

then it was the blood sample. just a little prick. now i have spent a whole bunch of hours being tattooed, an electric needle inking designs into my skin – no problem. a needle to take my blood and i come over all shivery and filled with the heebie jeebies: so i am a wuss. while the sucked up blood was being tested i was asked the questions – do i exercise enough? no. do i eat well? no. do i have regular check-up? no. the only place i seemed to be virtuous was in not drinking or smoking. yay me.

then i get the results. blood sugar, ok. not diabetic. cholesterol within limits, though i need to be careful. blood pressure within limits, fine and dandy. body mass index – oh deary deary me – well outside the limits. i was told that i needed to lose weight and that i needed to get down to my target weight range – which even at the highest part of it is still 30kgs lighter than i am. no chance. it did make me smile though.

in short i was told i wasn’t that bad and that a some exercise and better diet and my risks would be reduced further.

nice.

later that day i was walking (hey it’s exercise) when i thought ‘hold on’ wasn’t my risk 48%? that’s not good, this is pretty shit – it’s a one in two chance. panic.

turns out that the 48% was actually 4.8% and that was the average risk for someone of my height and age. my risk was 8.7% not quite twice the risk for my age and height, still much much better than 48%.

from this i learnt that i am shit at numbers and i could risk a pack of doughnuts.

They were yummy (if you must know).

bolted

leave it to football to take a bad situation and make it worse. i wasn’t really following the john terry racism case, mostly because i can’t abide the man. turns out that while anton ferdinand found terry’s comments ‘hurtful’ he hadn’t been shy in dishing out the insults and barbs himself – though his was nothing more than banter, or so the footballing defence goes. 

can’t say i would want to spend any time with either john terry or anton ferdinand.

one of the things that came out of the court case is that footballers like to swear at each. they like to do it a lot. what was surprising is this seems to have come as a shock to many people: footballers swear? say it ain’t so.

even the professional footballers association (pfa) appear shocked. pfa chairman, clarke carlisle, is calling for a clampdown on swearing and foul language. the pfa is the footballer’s trade union and it has a number of current players on its committees. from the evidence it seems as if the pfa have never watched a game while the players who advise them have never heard a naughty word uttered. the rest of us know that swearing and football go together like chalk and cheese.

the terry/ ferdinand court case has done much to bring swearing front and centre, in doing so has smeared the good name of football, or more importantly has tarnished the brand of football and the potential earning power of footballers. not many sponsors want to be associated with sweary marys.

mr. carlisle has said that players who swear should be sent off and banned he believes that will get the clubs clamping down on the problem. one wonders what the pfa would do if its members started being punished this way. given the success of the respect campaign there is little chance that any attempt to stop swearing is going to work.

the only way swearing is going to affected is if the player’s lose money over it because they have lost out on a sponsorship deal. other than that it is going to be business as normal.

of course the question is: does it matter if footballers swear? as someone with a potty mouth i am not in a position to throw stones. football’s issue isn’t with swearing per se, it appears to be more to do with the lack of respect that players have for each other – the cussing of each other is a symptom of that.

john terry may well be innocent of being a racist, but i would wager that he hasn’t been slow to call a number of players a number of things he wouldn’t want repeated in polite company. the clubs, the agents and the pfa have all watched this get worse. have they left it too late to change it?

(as if things couldn’t get worse we now have rio ferdinand stumbling into a race row – except in his case he is claiming the twin defence of ‘being misunderstood’ and ‘people not understanding sarcasm’. looks to me like rio has scored an own goal. football – it’s a funny old game.) 

security

have i told you that i have a licence to be a cctv operator? well i have. i am one of the, very, many who have a licence from the security industry authority (sia). the sia are the professional body that sets and maintains the codes of practice that security guards should follow. did you know that there are several types of security guard roles – and in order to do those roles you have different licences. with my cctv licence i can’t do door supervision, and those who have the door licence can’t do cash and valuables in transit work. it’s a nice earner for the sia. 

in most cases you can’t work security unless you have a licence from the sia.

i only mention this because of the hoo hah over the inability of g4s to make good on their contract to supply a lot of security guards for the olympics.

for the next couple of months there is a going to be a shortage of security guards in the london area.

for the last couple of months jobcentres have been doing their best to get the unemployed a temporary gig working security at the olympics, the key part of their pitch was that you didn’t need to have a licence from the sia, you just had to be willing, fill out their application forms and pass some checks. i failed because i don’t have a 5-year checkable work history.

this didn’t apply to just g4s, but the other private security firms involved with the olympics.

the employment drive was still going on a few weeks ago. now the jobcentres are asking if you want to be in the reserve squad in order to be called up if someone doesn’t make it in for work.  (the loss of ‘staff’ had been planned for which is why more people were being sought than were needed).

according to reports g4s only realised that there was going to be a shortfall in numbers 8 days ago. i suspect that part of the problem has been that in order to keep costs down they started recruiting very late in order to make sure that they were not paying staff for too long a period, after all why pay them in june if they are not going to be working until late july? also if you recruit someone close to the time of the games, there is less chance that they are going to find a job in the meantime.

the daily mail has made a big play g4s employing cheap labour because they are paying security £8.50 an hour during the olympic games. obviously daily mail reporters are not keen on checking facts or having basic knowledge. most security jobs are going to be at minimum wage or close to it and that means £6.08 an hour. so £8.50 is pretty good considering. it isn’t that the labour is cheap, it is that the g4s seems to have tried to save costs by operating on a just in time schedule and this bad planning has, in the end, wiped out their profit.

it is not like g4s are alone in not doing a good job, you only have to think about companies such as ‘close protection uk’ or a4e to see that there are some issues with private security providers and trainers.

remember these are the people who the con/dems are keen on taking over aspects of policing the nation. as i mentioned before i am a security professional – my training was 3 weeks long and the bulk of that was to do with customer services. people like me are not the sort of people you want to entrust with the policing of the nation and companies who would use people like me, and on rates of pay that will be less than the olympic rates of pay, are not the sort of companies that you should be entrusting these duties to. they are not interested in order in the streets; they are just interested in their order books. some things should not be about the bottom line – policing is one of them.

in reality security at the london olympics is mostly going to be about deterrence – the thousands of bodies on the ground functioning as a warning against someone trying something. mostly the security guards will be searching spectators not to see if they weapons but if they are bringing in water bottles that are too big, or are bring in too much food (have to make sure the concession stands make their money), that is where most of the problems are going to be and where most of the flashpoints will be. the rest of the time security guards will be there to point people in the right direction.

ironically for a lot of people, me included, the idea of getting a job at the olympics was a potential foot in the door with a security company with the possibility of it leading elsewhere. most of the people i did the course with were looking at the possibility of getting a job there and were keen to work (one chap did and because of his previous experience could possibility turn it into a long term job there as he could end up working for the london legacy development corporation, the people who are going to take over once the games have gone).

from what i have read the public servants, police and military, who are stepping in to save the day are working out to be cheaper than those who would have been supplied by g4s, which begs the question: just how were they saving us money?

somehow the lack of planning on g4s’ part has been built up into a series of ‘aren’t the olympics a farce’ stories. how the london organising committee of the olympic games (locog) were supposed to know that their partner in this, g4s, was going to be unable to provide the staff it had been contracted to is never explained, especially as g4s themselves only seem to have realised there was a problem very recently.

what seems to be missed is that while the whole thing looks like a monumental cock-up it in fact shows that someone at locog was quick to realise that an alternative had to be found. it was and it has been deployed. crisis management that worked:  amazing. as with much to do with the olympics the positive isn’t highlighted – instead the negative aspects are the story the media wants to go with.

shit

people keep telling me that i shouldn't use microsoft programmes. they are evil i am told. they are full of bugs i am told. they are not reliable i am told.
so i listened.
i started using firefox.
it looks nice.
it updates regularly.

it crashes every day. not once or twice, but several times.

i think i will stick with microsoft and internet explorer - it may mean i can't claim to be computer cool, but it works and that is all i want from my computer.

(and tomorrow i will bring you the blog i was doing tonight before firefox crashed like a richard littlejohn joke).

meddle

"it would be utterly extraordinary if we didn't take a look at the games. i don't see that this compromises the committee at all."

said  john whittingdale, conservative mp and chair of the culture media and sport committee, to the daily mail.



he was commenting on the fact that he will be attending an olympic event as a guest of bt, an olympic sponsor. bt will be giving a briefing on its role in delivering the games and once this has been completed the guests will be able to enjoy an olympic event care of bt.

nice.



many many years ago when i was a medium sized fish in a small pond there were occasions when i would be treated to a slap up meal and a movie by some of my clients. it was nice. made me feel important (even if i would have swapped the slap up meal for a decent large pizza from pizza hut). made me feel appreciated and meant i would do that little bit extra for the client the next time.



i guess that members of parliament are no different. they like to feel the love as well.



there are some crucial differences. i was never paid as much an mp, the relationship between me and the client was always a business one: we both wanted to gain from it and in all the cases i probably paid to see the movie again at a later date (ok maybe not spider-man 3 - but it was pants). nor was i ever invited to go to something that was high profile once in a lifetime event - just a preview screening of a movie that everyone could see in a week or two.

not that it matters as it was all about the love.

i am sure that is what the members of the culture media and sport committee are all about: it's the love.



bt's briefing is sure to be edifying albeit one that will amount to little more than 'didn't we do well' and even if there are criticisms it is not like they can ever be acted upon. in fact if one were not charitable one would say that such a briefing is pretty pointless. 

why pointless? because by the time they are delivering it, in the middle of the olympics, it is pretty much too late to change anything or to pass on wisdom to others who are helping to deliver the olympics. not to mention it is not like we are going to host the olympics again for a loooong time, or for that matter the only other global event that matches it: the world cup.

the time for the briefing should have been moths before the olympics, and i am sure the committee has had many with bt before now, so that lesson could be learnt, advice given, blah blah. the time for briefings would have been around the times that members of the select committee jetted off to previous olympic cities to see how they had done it and what had happened after the games had gone. (it’s all work on this select committee).

so let’s call this what it really is: a lovely jolly.

how can i say that about our hard working mps. surely after sitting on a committee for five years dealing with the olympics they deserve a chance to go to the games? no. not at all. the committee is their job, and just doing your job isn’t enough to entitle you to go to the games, just ask some of the athletes who have worked hard for the last several years who have missed out on selection to the great britain team.

oh now you are being harsh – surely they should be allowed to go to the games, have a heart. if they were that keen on seeing the olympics they could have done what the rest of us did and applied for tickets (it would be interesting to know just how many of the committee actually have tickets they have paid for), if all they wanted to know about was how the olympics were going to be delivered (by bt or any of the parties involved in the games they could have gone to any of the test events – at least then their input might have been useful).

instead a few of the committee, not all, are guests of bt at the olympic games. the event they will be seeing is the men’s 100 metres final, only the hottest ticket of the games. nice work if you can get it.

i’ll put my hand up here and say that if i were on the select committee there is a good chance that i would have said yes to a freebie as well. this means i am practicing a nice bit of hypocrisy here. not can i really blame them for doing it when the international olympic committee is pretty much guilty of doing it themselves as they have reserved a large number of seats for key events for their dignitaries, because as part of the olympic family they want to show their support. they just don’t want to show their support to the wrestling, weightlifting, archery or any of those other events that are not glamorous.

everyone wants to support the popular stuff – none of them want to go see some nobody in a sport that will never be covered in the media (another part of the committee’s remit) until the next olympics. nope everyone wants to be seen.

the funny thing is they probably would have learnt more at the smaller events that would have actually benefitted the committee and sports. that’s just not as much fun.

what stands out here is that one of the major complaints about the london olympics has been the whole ticketing process and the lack of tickets available for the big events to the ordinary fee paying public. the culture media and sport committee would have been aware of it (if not because they are interested in sport then because they are interested in the media and it has been one of those stories that has been carried and covered everywhere) so at the time they were offered these tickets from bt a warning signal should have come on indicating that perhaps this wasn’t the most sensible thing in the world to be doing. once again showing that politicians tend not to see (care?) how things are going to look to the general public.

john whittingdale is probably a nice bloke, aside from a short period he has worked in politics all his adult life. while he is patron of the local cricket and rugby clubs he lists his interests as music (classic rock – good for him) and movies (no genre given), so sport doesn’t seem to play a big part of his private life. no worries he will be going to the olympics in his official capacity, that’s alright then.

perhaps he can suggest that bt give one of their spare tickets to zaha hadid, she also seems to think she is entitled to a freebie because she worked on the olympics – at least they will have something to talk about when the sport is on.

blame

we all like to play the blame game. it really is quite fun. we stand and point our fingers and say ‘your fault’. assigning blame from the trivial to the most important of things is the name of the game. yet there are times when we are (shock! horror!) are wrong (though this was never the case when my mum used to blame the dog for her farts, if only because we didn’t have one).

george osborne is not one to admit his mistakes or apologise – especially when it concerns ed balls.

i get that george osborne hates ed balls (i am sure the feeling is mutual), i get that david cameron hates ed balls (i am sure the feeling is mutual), in fact i am sure most members of parliament don’t like ed balls and i am sure he doesn’t care.

i can understand how ed balls must infuriate and annoy the con/dems sitting opposite him when he does his impression of john mccririck with his little fluttering flouncy hand gestures.

so i can see why they want to get one over him.

when the barclays libor scandal broke the conservatives were very keen to apportion blame to the previous labour government. it was their fault that there were not enough regulations in place – even though the conservatives agreed with the deregulation and wanted it to go further. still here was a chance to slap (metaphorically) that nasty mr. balls in the face.

so that is what george osborne, the chancellor, did. he took his chance and said that mr. balls had some questions to answer over the barclays rate rigging scandal.

oh what glee for the conservatives: two for the price of one. double bubble.

in the real world most of us would have shrugged our shoulders and gone: ‘nope – nothing to do with me mate’, question asked and answered.  in the world of politics it doesn’t quite work that way as the implication of mr. osborne’s assertion was that ed balls was hip deep and mired in the scandal.

so far the evidence seems to prove that mr. balls wasn’t involved and hadn’t pressurised the banks to mess with their rates.

ooops.

will george osborne apologise?

doesn’t look like it. what’s more david cameron is supporting his lack of apology.

a treasury spokesman gives a reason why there is no need for an apology by explaining “labour protests too much. can they say that no labour figure was aware of libor low-balling? can they say no labour figure implicitly or explicitly condoned it in conversations with the banks? they haven’t been able to so far.”

so much for innocent until proven guilty: labour are guilty because they have not professed their innocence. a very odd stance to take.

even so it is even odder when you consider that the claim was made against mr. balls and that seems to have been refuted. so instead of doing the decent thing the goal posts have been moved.

the thing is very few people are going to shed a tear or be concerned for mr. balls, he is more than capable of looking after himself, yet spitefulness on the part of mr. osborne and his advisors have made mr. balls look like a victim and mr. osborne a posh boy bully. if he had apologised mr. osborne not only would he have appeared to have a modicum of humility (something lacking among the senior tories who all give off that to the manor born air) he  would also have the moral high ground the next time ed. balls made like bobby crush while others were talking at the despatch box.

looks like ed balls wins.

also looks as if elton was right – sorry seems to be the hardest word.

consistency

life is full of shades of grey (way more than 50, i just thought i would get a topical literary and cultural talking point in as normally i am so low brow), which is why we value consistency. we like to know that there are some things that will remain the same – it explains why places like starbucks and pizza hut (other restaurants and coffee shops are available) are so popular: not because they serve the best coffee or pizza, but because we know what we will be getting. 

it is also important in people - we want to know that when someone says something they mean it and believe it. it isn’t that people can’t change their minds it is just that they can’t keep flitting from idea to idea every time the wind changes. we hate it when politicians just change their stance for no real reason (it is different if they explain why they have moved their stance).

yes given the current political and economic situation you are probably expecting me to wax lyrical and polemically about the state of the nation.

well dear reader i am about to disappoint you for you see the consistency that is exercising me right now is the consistency of my poo.

yes my poo.

see most of the time i do nice solid logs. i sit on the bog, have a read and let loose the crap torpedo, read some more and depart. big job done.

most of the time.

not sure what has changed in my diet but at the moment i am going through a period of changeable poo. sometimes it is little hard pellets, almost dainty. sometimes it is soft and gooey: oozing out. neither provides the satisfaction of a good solid job well done. there have been false alarms where i have felt the need for speed only to be sitting on the throne several chapters later with nothing but dead legs to show for it. or the occasions when it felt like i was passing barbed wire (and that brought tears to the eyes), or the times i have had to squeeze out what felt like it was a bowling ball, the effort bringing out a sweat and bring a red mist down on me.

fear not dear friend. all seems back to normal. and i have a modicum of consistency in my poo again. rejoice.

i started off with 50 shades of grey and i end on 50 shades of brown – one is interesting the other has sold (ahem) shit loads. 

bankers

amidst all the hoohah about the current crisis at barclays bank there have been a few lone voices crying out for the attacks on the banking institution to stop. they are a faint echo of the please that bob diamond made at the time of the last crisis in confidence in the banks and bankers.

one of those voices is boris johnson, the mayor of london (and probably never going to be prime minister - because his next gig will pay him too much to contemplate the prime ministerial job). boris has a vested interest in curtailing the bank bashing - he sees london as being a thriving financial hub, maintaining itself as the main place to do business.

what boris seems to be forgetting is that people are not bashing the banks because it is fun (even though it is), they are able to have a long and constant pop at the banks because they don't seem to be able to do their jobs very well.
if it is not misselling of financial products to clients, then it is fixing the inter bank lending rate. if it is not that then it is about the bonuses, and the weak justification for them, or it is about the fact that they are not lending to the very people that david cameron has said that the uk economic recovery is dependent on: small and medium sized businesses.

from what boris is saying it doesn't matter that they are doing some dodgy thngs, we should forgive and forget, turn a blind eye and move along all because the banks generate a lot of tax income in the country (a large percentage of that being taxes paid by the bulk of their staff unable to afford a fancy dan lawyer) and this should give them a pass when it comes to these recent scandals.
could that be how this privileged tory sees the world - the rich (and supposed wealth creators) should be allowed to get away with anything scot-free because they are rich? the flip side of this view is that the only criminals are poor.
oh hold on that is just how the tories think.

seems to me that the banks are all too happy to provide a rod for their own backs, because they know that they have friends in high places who might talk tough but will always avoid doing something that might upset the banks and financial institutions of the financial world.

wrong

as an armchair socialist i should be in favour of getting rid of the house of lords, well the unelected aspect of it. i am not.
nor am i in favour of reducing the number of members of parliament - though not for the reason that it is a tory ploy to make sure they gain more seats.

the boundary changes have come about partly because of the expenses scandal - the argument goes that parliament must be leaner meaner and more efficient. naturally the easiest way of doing this is by cutting the number of parliamentarians. the method of doing this is to 'even' out the sizes of constituencies so that each mp gets to represent the same(ish) number of people.

parliament is about representation (which is part of the argument for house of lords reform), so it strikes me as odd that the way to foster better representation they are cutting the number of members of parliament.
i would argue that they need to create more seats - and have our politicians represent smaller constituencies, so that they really have to work to keep people happy. smaller constituencies means that people can see that their votes count and that they can vote for a smaller party and make a difference that way. oh hold on there is the flaw in my plan - it might mean other parties getting into parliament.
can't have that.
instead let's cut the number of seats (increase the chances of the conservatives always getting in) and let's reduce the number of people who are prepared to vote.
seems to be a winning plan to me.
not.


on the house of lords i have yet to be convinced that change is a good thing or a needed thing.
more often than not the lords seem to be the people who are prepared to hold up government legislation to scrutiny.
so what if some of the people there are there just because of who they are (and who they paid party contributions to), because of this we know that the house of lords is the lesser of the two houses.

the notion of electing long term senators calls into question the primacy of the house of commons - which vote is more important? on the face of it giving the vote to someone who gets to stay in power for 15 years seems to be more important than someone who only gets 5 years in the job.
as constituents who do we take our issues to?
the 'senators' are only going to be getting a daily allowance and not a salary, and from that they will have to fund a constituency office. which means either there won't be a constituency office or the people who run for election to the second house will be independently wealthy to start with.
the system will be promoting the primacy of the house of commons - which also brings into question the quality of the people who are going to run for the second house. sure they will get a long period of office but they won't be able to make any real changes because they don't have the power. will that mean that it will just be people who are interested in the glory and the pomp? will it be those who don't want to actually deal with the hard cut and thrust of daily politics but just want to be in sniffing distance of power? will it be a place to shunt those nice chaps who have done some good work for the party but are just not good enough to win enough votes to get into the house of commons?
not to mention the other big problem - confusion in the electorate. we have a declining vote, for some odd reason people choose not to vote. imagine how much harder it is going to be when you are trying to persuade them to elect two people - who will be representing you but not in the same way or for the same period of time, or on the same platforms.
yeah i can see it working.

my solution is: keep the house of lords as is  and have more members of parliament and not fewer.
sorted.


i know the current system isn't perfect, and all that privilege is bad - yet at the same time i have little confidence in what is being offered to replace it. (and yes a lot of that lack of confidence is that it is being championed by nick clegg, a man who gave up pretty much all his principles just to get his feet under the top table).

that said - if i am still unemployed when (if) an elected second house is being chosen i guess i could apply - after all i can't be any worse than some of the people who are going to get elected.

attack

another day another story about how vile benefit cheats are.
no one likes those who are leeching off the state, no one likes cheats. the problem is the way these things are reported is that everyone who is on benefits (except pensioners - who make up the largest percentage of benefits claimants) is tarred with the 'cheats' tag.

terry moran, director general at the department of work and pensions wants to name and shame bogus benefit claimants by posting their photos in the streets that they live in. why stop there? let's start branding claimants as well, or make them wear special coloured armbands so we can easily spot them. 


maybe it is time for each town and city to bring back the stocks? 


before we get around to naming and shaming those who cheat the benefit system perhaps we should start by having all those members of parliament who have benefited from the expenses system do a regular walk of shame through trafalgar square? 
we could also have anyone claiming to be non-dom in order to reduce the money they pay in taxes forced to do community service - i am sure there are a number of park toilets that need cleaning out. 
then there are the corporations who do their level best not to pay their fair share of tax - now would be a good time to have each and every member of their boards stand up in a school that has a leaking roof to explain just why they are not paying tax (and they might mention how their little angel is doing ok in the independent sector at a school that is no doubt claiming charitable status). 


do you know what i think terry moran has a great idea - now let's see it being applied to all who may not be paying their full share and who is cheating. 


don't hold your breath though as the only 'bad' people in the world are those who are unemployed and can't find work - they are just rogues, cads and bounders. 
the rest of the people who bend the rules and stretch a point are all entrepreneurs so they can do what they like because it benefits us all. apparently.

seeya

can't say i really understand the libor thing.
looks like bob diamond is in the same boat as me.

remember when at the height the banking crisis (no not this one the last one) bob diamond told us it was time to move on.
now that barclays bank has been found to be doing a range of dodgy deals big bad bob is taking his own advice and is moving on.

i am sure his pockets will be well lined as he walks out the door and into another well paying job - to which we all ask: how?

reading

books are important to me. i have loved books for as long as i can remember and i can’t imagine being without them. 

reading was encouraged at school and we kept records of the books we read and progress that was made. while that might be seen as making reading a chore it also made it something i learnt to do on a regular basis. so the reading primers of school turned into adventures by enid blyton. then i discovered thrillers and science fiction – ian fleming’s james bond, ed mcbain’s 87^th precinct stories, robert heinlein’s starship troopers, frank herbert’s dune. words on the page transported me to fantastic, dangerous and thrilling places.

somewhere around this time i also began reading comics.

the love affair with reading has never stopped.

school may have started me off, but my dad gets the credit for making sure my love of books was able to grow (ironically years later my mum became a voracious reader of crime and horror books).

reading is one of the great pleasures of life. i even enjoyed reading to the kid when i was doing my step-dad duties – even though i didn’t share the same enjoyment of asterix as the kid did. mind you i am not a deep reader, none of that delving into themes and ideas i am more of a flash bang wallop kind of guy who just wants thrilling entertainment. it is why i never managed to continue with english literature, i wanted to read for fun, i didn’t want to be hard work.

so to this day i am still a reader of genre fiction, with the occasional political or historical text thrown in for fun.

over the weekend it was reported that there is a gender gap between the boys and girls when it comes to reading; the girls are leaving the boys behind.

apparently boys think it is nerdy and or girly to read books. it is not that the boys can’t read it is more that they don’t read. some of this is explained away by the fact that there are not many male role models in primary and junior schools to encourage boys to read. family life also carries its share of the blame – partly in the form that some parents do not take an active interest in their kid's education and when they do it seems they offer more encouragement to girls to read than to boys.

admittedly things have changed drastically since i was a kid. my entertainment choices were: tv (three channels and in black and white), the radio, books and comics. today’s generation of kids is confronted with much more choice including: more tv channels, dvds, computers, mobile phones, console games, tablets and more. (and to think they are always using the ‘we haven’t anything to do’ mantra for when they needs to excuse their poor behaviour). given all that there is little wonder that there are reluctant readers out there!

yet why aren’t girls so hindered? they have exactly the same choices for time wasting as boys, but they keep reading. is it because they are encouraged to do so? is it because there are more books out there that appeal to girls? (where is the equivalent to katie price for the boys market – i am sure a ghost written wayne rooney novel would go down a storm). is it that the girls have more patience than boys (a study from 2011 claimed that most boys are bored of a book by the time they get to page 100). 

even though i would never go near a harry potter book (with or without ‘adult’ covers), it was amazing to see the interest in reading that they generated (and bookshops loved the sounds of cash registers ringing), somehow though this hasn’t translated into getting boys to read books.

maybe it is time to move the focus from books – but on other things such as magazines, newspapers (sports pages, reviews pages – the bits that might interest them (ok maybe not the bit where the page 3 girl tells you what they like to do with the sunday roast), short story collections, comics. nor does it have to be just on the printed page as so many kids seem to be welded to their phones why not use that as a way of getting them to read – short adventure stories: snippets that they read and respond to in order to get the next bit. (and these sorts of strategies are going to be even more important thanks to the con/dems decision to close libraries across the country even though nick gibbs, schools minister, has said "reading for pleasure is key to boosting a young person's life chances. as a government, improving reading standards in schools is central to all our education reforms.”

reading should be fun, and people should do it for pleasure as well as for learning. reading develops imagination; it allows people to glimpse other cultures, places and worlds. reading is important because it is a source of information and information is, as we all know, power. more importantly for kids reading for pleasure, according to unesco, is an indicator of their future success at school.

for me the recipe to becoming a reader was simple in addition to the obvious ingredients add in a regular serving of comics (habit forming) and novels that were not too long (pleasure of finishing a book in a short period of time) – they added up to a lifelong habit.

it’s a habit more people should have.

problems

is it me or are the conservatives getting very nervous about their grip on power.
look there they are attacking the poor and the weak.
look there they are covering themselves in anti-european sentiment.

crikey argentina - you had better watch out! (oh sorry with the defence cuts that cameron and osborne have brought in that will have to change). so watch yourself the isle of man.