IS SECONDARY EDUCATION RELEVANT to TODAY?

Introduction

I blogged weekly during my time as Groups Cordinator of Swansea U3A 2008-2011 to promote new groups, but rarely since. This posting follows my thoughts after reflecting on the discussion led on Education by Martin Cole, a relative newcomer to the Politics and Citizen Group. Intriguingly he has prepared another presentation for the group on the topic of 'Growing Pains'.

Martin started by introducing himself as a winner in the stakes of Eleven Plus, grammar school plus university, the same scenario as my own. I suspect a sizable proportion of the audience were educated at grammar school - though we might disagree on its merit in today's world.

He spent a life in education in a variety of positions, initially as a graduate in the discipline, then as a teacher, then charged with training teachers and finally with Ofsted. He was happy with the current form of Primary education and its aim to equip everyone with unchanging essential basic skills, so was I. 

But said that Secondary Education largely reflected a Public School curriculum designed for a very small privileged section of society essentially aimed at largely non scientific entry to Oxford or Cambridge. Now aimed at getting university education for half of society. Leaving the other half to face feelings of failure, pointlessness with consequent lack of enthusiasm and disinterest. 

He pointed to the enormous changes in lifestyle, wealth and technology since our own schooldays and contrasted it with the almost complete lack of lack of change in educational aims or syllabus. Clearly he thought changes were needed but reasonably enough expected his audience to provide their suggestions 

In response to my questions he obviously thought different abilities needed to be recognised and indicated there should be 'choice'. My immediate response was of great interest in this idea but little coherence on its application except to recognise the problems it would set teachers and my conclusion that some topics need not be subject to passing exams.

I hope I have summarised with reasonable accuracy. This blog posting is thus to give time for thought to examine these issues further. 

My Own Schooling
I took the very first Eleven Plus examination in 1946 and got a place in the 'A' stream at Warwick School which was partially boarding at the time, only those boarders passing the exam were allowed to continue. I remember little pertinent to that period except the long hilly cycle ride to school up to Westgate and down to the Castle over the river Avon.

Two years later we moved to Rugby and I transfered to the Lawrence Sheriff school, founded by the same founder as Rugby School when he realised that it was no longer satisfying his intention of providing education for locals.  

Had I to 'chose' my subjects first choices would undoubtedly have been Physics and Mathematics followed by Chemistry the three subjects I later followed at 'A' level (not every-bodies choice). I recognised the vital importance of English language, liked English Literature and Geography. These six subjects I studied with great enthusiasm for 'O' levels. I think the exam system is vital for those proceeding to further education.

I was less enthusiastic about Art, Latin, 'Ancient' History, French (my only poor teacher - who ruled by fear), and Biology which in the 1950's didn't even feel like a science - were it not for the recent extension of Mendel, the father of modern genetics. I passed 'O' levels in Biology and French though failed Art. This was before the advent of Grades, you either passed or failed 'O' and 'A' levels.

But great though my enthusiasm for the sciences none of them could match my enthusiasm for competitive team sports, in my case Rugby and Cricket in which I harboured dreams of playing County cricket as a professional. Enthusiasm born from listening to the commentary of the 1946/7 Ashes in Australia hiding under the sheets with my crystal set.

CHOICE, SUGGESTED ADDITIONS for a SYLLABUS
Team sport was an enthusiasm shared with some pupils across A, B and C streams. We all tried our best all the time without the need for exams, we wanted to get better and better with no other than the personal satisfaction of winning as a team. A sizable proportion of the population has similar enthusiasm today.

Others would have similar enthusiasm feeling for art, acting, singing, music and cookery for example. A boy at our school loved collecting fossils, unfortunately he died exploring a local quarry alone.

Leading to the conclusion that Choices could produce high attainment without the need for exams given enthusiasm from staff and pupils. The pressure and challenge of Exams worked for me in all subjects, but I suspect that is not true of less academic students. But motivation for the subject being learned is vital. And motivation doesn't need to be curbed by exam pressure.

I recently reread an article by George Monbiot, far from my favorite Guardian journalist, entitled 'In an age of robots schools are teaching our children how to be redundant'
'In the future if you want a job you must be as unlike a machine as possible: creative, critical and socially skilled.'
'Children learn best when teaching aligns with their natural exhuberance, energy and curiosity.'  

My thoughts about syllabus

RECENT HISTORY,  Living through the second of two world wars in Europe, watching the bombing of Coventry and not a word about either! Too frightened to talk of politics? Start with the History of yesterday and work back - to the stone age!!

CITIZENSHIP is vital and should never be the forgotten option. Personal relations, collaboration and empathy are core. The subject links naturally to DEMOCRATIC POLITICS and ITS AIMS
Encourage thinking about the future. I am one of those who would gives votes to sixteen year olds, it's their future not mine.

NUMERACY, an end in itself to arithmetic, should be taught separately from a never ending study of MATHS. Everyone needs to understand context and relevance of numbers. (Only since writing this have I become aware this has already been started in Wales - though I would sympathise with those universities who regard it as a less challenging subject).

Why not teach basic budgeting for ordinary life?
The difference between Average and Mean (median).
Grasp the Magnitude of income inequality in Britain today. 

CODING
Above all in this day starting with binary coding as distinct from Maths and Numbers. Computers work on it and so do genetics. Such coding implies deep training via abstract logic. Many might be enthused by creating computer games - my eldest son did with an early Sinclair ZX computer.

Training is the sole point because only a minute proportion of the population will ever code computers for a living. Many of those who do will make computer software products for appropriate use by the rest of us. Today those programming use far more sophisticated tools than binary. 

It is well worth noting that the amazing steps forward in computing have been made by intelligent coders devoid of the need for most school subjects beyond English and Maths.

DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY the outline principles are worth teaching. Digital computers, digital instrumentation, digital controllers, PLCs. Everyone will soon be involved in The Automation of Things. 
Social Media is one of the big issues of the day for good - but also unfortunately twisted simply by thoughtless copying, or by targeting for advertising or political aims. Spread sheets like Excel  and Power Point are very useful tools far beyond typing.

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NOTES ON MY CAREER IN AUTOMATION
When I was at university a research student showed me our latest analogue computer, boasting it was very good at modelling dynamic (time changing) equations and how superior it was to digital computers, then the pride only of Manchester and Cambridge Universities.

My first job, a year of widespread post-graduate training apprenticeship in Canada. A year in three monthly rotation through various departments, sales, testing, electronics etc. Before finding my role in Application Engineering the design and the commissioning of major industrial projects.  

The Canadian head of that design engineering department (full of brits) told me how much he valued British engineers trained via HNC+ (Higher National Certificate+). Learning engineering the hard way by part time day plus evening study combined with 5 year apprenticeships, often living at home in my day. But, as my wife keeps pointing out there are no longer the local industries to employ young people let alone the incentive to train them.  

Returning to the UK and working at English Electric in 1961. I designed simple circuits using a few of the first Silicon transistors, they were £5 each to buy. Until then transistors had been based on overly heat sensitive Germanium. Silicon was the great breakthrough. Those transistors were used as analog amplifiers - the then modern replacement of valves in radio and TV.

Now each laptop computer or modern phone has transistors numbered in millions yet they do not cost £5 millions.  Today transistors are 'wasted' as two state binary switches OFF or full ON, nought or one. 

I moved to Steel Company of Wales at Port Talbot in 1966, attracted by the challenge of a new Automation Development Department. I was sent on a two week course on computer programming and first realised there were really only two numbers which mattered 0 and 1. (Strange that until then I thought of numbers as being 1-9, zero played little part except in carries) 

But computers use them in wholly different ways.

1) As binary numbers to use in calculations.

2) As individual bits of 0 or 1 to use in logic, eg as On or Off

3) As addresses pointing to where in memory the numbers in question could be found or returned.

4) As the instruction code defining how these two numbers should be used, eg added, subtracted, multiplied, divided, simply compared for size or manipulated.

I remember struggling to conceive of what looked like binary numbers being used in four such different fashions. At that time software writing was limited to using Machine Code and octal notation 0-7 easier to remember and think about than pure binary. (leading to IBM's promotion of hexadecimal notation in which the single digit forms of A,B,C,D,E and F stood for the numbers 10,11,12,13,14 and 15) .

SUPERVISORY CONTROL and  DATA ACQUISITION
From the mid 70's until I retired in 1996 I ran a small team of talented enthusiastic individuals who produced and maintained the entire software including the operating system and all in so called 'naked' computers,ie ones devoid of software. Eventually our now called SCADA  system was installed on nine of the twelve process units in Port Talbot. (The remaining three units needed specialised computer systems involving complex calculation and/or mathematical models, the major plants, steel making, hot rolling and cold rolling).

Each system handled the data collected by analog (later digital) instrumentation, limit switches, integrated and coordinated multiple digital sub controllers. (So called three term process controllers for the automatic control of temperature, pressure, plus the PLC's (programmable logic controllers) used for sequencing operations.

SCADA systems are themselves programmable in the same fashion as the sub controllers, all deliberately designed to be configured, tuned and put to end uses by conventional engineers like me. (Very different live data functions but to some extent analogous to static spread sheets for use by accountants.) They display details of the current state of the process live on VDUs (Visual Display Units) to many manager's desks and vitally provide for intervention by operators in VDU control rooms.

The purpose of this article is not just to blow my team's trumpet but to highlight the unprecedented changes in my working life and draw conclusions about Educational needs. 

The special to purpose operating system was designed a few years before my involvement by two software engineers, the leader was a maths graduate from Swansea University, his assistant an ex-apprentice technician. Both left steel at the height of de-manning in the 80's to work on Games production in Cardiff. 

SCADA DEVELOPMENT TEAM 
The two most fundamental roles in my team were filled by:- A second maths graduate from Swansea University who designed, commissioned and maintained the programmable VDU  side of the system
AND
An apprenticed 'tool maker', who seized a chance to enter software when working with Marconi. His task was to design, commission and maintain the multiple communication links between instruments, controllers, programmable logic controllers and other computers.

The software team was completed by two metallurgy graduates and by an electrical technician who gained a HNC+ during his period as apprentice at the steel company. His skills were unique for he alone of the software team understood the electronic hardware as well. 

On the engineering side there were normally three electrical engineering graduates including myself.

I count myself very lucky to have been at the helm in such a fast moving period of technological progress. It was very hard at its zenith due to the immense increase in demand for automation as Port Talbot modernised and cut staffing levels to the bone. In such ways we became the victims of our own success. We were very lucky to keep a stable software team throughout, but were helped by the paucity of alternative employment opportunities in rapidly de-industrialising South Wales.

Port Talbot when I joined in 1966 employed 17,000, almost all men. On leaving thirty years later a quarter of that number were making more and far higher quality strip steel. There was some original over manning but most of the reduction was due to improvements in process technology, only part the result of automation. 

The speed of computers when I retired in 1996 were a few thousand times slower than today's laptops and even less powerful when comparing by memory size. 

The frightening speed of technological revolution continues to beneficially affect all forms of developments in engineering, research and medicine.

But it is harder to see employment of whole population as in the past except as carers of the elderly like us. Education needs to prepare the young for an uncertain future or I fear mass frustration will follow. Building on the young's natural enthusiasm for learning, basic thought is key so is collaboration - rote learning just to pass exams is not.

  

  

REFERENDUM, WHAT NOW?

For those wishing to Remain in Europe there are three encouraging well argued articles in today's Guardian, the leader, those by Nick Clegg and Zoe Williams.

The Leading article is asking for patience from our friends in Europe and not to write us off for at least 48% of us wish to retain the closest of links with Europe. Asking forgiveness, for sending huge destabilising shock waves all over Europe, 'not contempt for a nation that backed Brexit on a series of fantasies and lies'. Not to press 'too hard for the invocation of article 50' (the starting gun) until our political disarray has had time to recover or we may be rushed 'into choices that you may regret'.

Nick Clegg argues that Britain importantly deserves a new election before activating article 50. Writing that 'The government not only finds itself without leader-ship, it has no plan, no consensus and no clue about what it wants to do in the future' . It agrees only ' that the UK should leave the EU.'  

'The new prime minister ... should immediately publish a white paper setting out a full plan ... and must seek a democratic mandate for their plan in an early general election.' Crucially article 50 should be triggered only after that plan is scrutinised in parliament followed by a vote of consent from MPs.

He like me fears moves 'to turn the city into a low - regulation Dubai'. The intention recently expressed by George Osborne of a big reduction in Corporation Tax from 20% to 15% (under half that of the major countries of Europe) indicates that he like Ireland will be attempting to attract companies keen to reduce their taxation in a race to beggar our neighbours in a race to the bottom. What price British Values then?

Ireland did it to escape from severe financial trouble but Osborne claimed our economy was the best performing around.

Zoe Williams and Paul Mason of the Guardian have recently revealed that they, like me, voted in favour of the Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn. Zoe worries that a snap General Election could be called before Labour have corrected their current disarray. She writes that he won by a landslide 'that leadership election against three politicians who had forgotten how to make the core arguments in favour of social democracy'. 

Remember Andy Burnham, Yvette Cooper and Liz Kendall - were all established figures. He alone represented a long lost case for integrity, straight speaking, and demanding social values which spoke to people far outside Labour's ranks.  Perhaps it was the enormity of his success appeal to the masses which caused the regrettable cold shoulders he received from Labour MPs. 

Zoe argues that the Labour Party is tearing itself apart when they agree fundamentally with his views 'over privatising the NHS; over the importance of a social safety net; over the role of taxation; over appropriate regulation in markets, over energy and climate change'.

Even though I believe that replacing Trident is a huge waste of money as well as a danger to a world that says it believes in nuclear disarmament we could merely continue with the current government's policy of kicking the issue into the long grass.  

Just some thoughts of my own. Contrast all this idle talk about the saving of weekly costs of being a member of Europe with the costs and waste of highly skilled manpower which will be needed to unravel ourselves and replace forty years of agreements with Europe. A process which could all to easily leave us with less rights as individuals, in or out of work. No doubt there is some unnecessary complication but the major thrust surely were to improve our standard of life.

Above all what has happened to the promise of eliminating unwanted immigration from European nationals whilst retaining our trade agreements? Let's face it, we were conned!

To finish on a lighter note congratulations to Wales and their place in the semi-finals of the European Cup. As an English immigrant  of exactly 50 years standing perhaps I can now claim to be fully integrated. However last night saw the end of Iceland's dream and my wish to see Wales and Iceland meet in the final. 

IMMEDIATE REFLECTION ON REFERENDUM CAMPAIGN

I am deliberately writing down my thoughts after only a thirty second discussion with my wife on waking from a well earned sleep following the pressures of campaigning on the streets for the Stronger IN Campaign. She told me we had lost 52/48%, that the Northern Ireland and Scottish populations and Londoners voted IN but Wales and England held the opposing and dominant view. That there was talk of a United Ireland.

MY POSITIVE HOPE the unification of Ireland. If ever there was a case for open borders this is it. If this really happens I would be delighted for the many good Irish friends I made in my youth in Canada, mostly but not all from the then economically depressed South. Hopefully this marks the end of Christian bigotry. I hope this does not result in their small population being overwhelmed by European migration

One day we will see the end of similar division in the Muslim communities of the world. If our (Joan and I) all but 25 years of independent global travel, as a lone couple using slow local scheduled transport (bus and train) without pre-booking or fixed itineraries, taught us anything it was the welcome and friendliness  of such people across Turkey and Asia of Malaysia, Indonesia, India and the huge Xin Jang province of Western China. Until then we had known practically nothing of Islam except their rejection of alcohol.

I hope to see Port Talbot, where I worked for 30 years, retained fully as both an Iron and a Steelmaker. The government can't any longer argue they are ham strung by EU rules.

WHAT DO I FEAR MOST a dramatic knock on increase in fragmentation of the Western World in terms of polarised political division within countries and the political elite of each country thinking only of its own self interest, never of the common good. That is not my kind of World.

OBSERVATIONS from my first involvement in political campaigning on the streets. 
1  The polite good nature of all our population
2  IN and OUT were clearer alternatives than REMAIN/ LEAVE
3  The high proportion during working hours at least in Swansea Uplands clearly not of Celtic or Anglo Saxon stock.
4  The high proportion of people who had exercised Postal Votes
5  I talked to several Poles who arrived here 10 years ago all of whom were in work or running businesses, proud to be paying taxes and obviously well integrated.
6  Several, often irate, convinced we should not be working with the Germany after what they did to us in past world wars, and more worrying to me what they were doing to Greece today.
7  Immigration was less often raised than I thought, strangely more often by thinking people like my own wife Joan who had voted IN but reluctantly for this very reason
8  One who told me in a voice that 'I should be ashamed of myself' for supporting Germany'
9  Another hurt more - 'Tony Benn (one of my political heroes) would be ashamed of you' adding - ordinary working people are taking the brunt' - no doubt thinking of the dangers of over rapid immigration from Europe. 
10 Several voiced the view that we elect politicians to govern not  shirk responsibility - My view entirely.
11  I went to my first street session concerned that the Labour backed STRONGER IN EUROPE campaign might be represented by Trade unionists wondering how they would react to a university educated comfortable middle class citizen like me. Only to be met  by a really well organised group largely of university graduates including no less than four  doctors, one a consultant another expecting to become a Registrar next year, one of whom born in the UK of Pakistani parents was a committed socialist and a member of the Labour party. My first thought being of empathy with the group, today's reflection being maybe that's part of the problem the EU is seen as being for the rich and the privileged not the ordinary man. 

12  The presence of so many doctors was a reflection of the damage caused by Jeremy Hunt's campaign to a hardworking profession. My memory was of a profession almost entirely Conservative but now antagonised and  increasingly politically active.


MY HOPE AN END TO LEADERS WITHOUT SINCERE POLITICAL PRINCIPALS.

David Cameron being the current example who clearly damaged the IN vote from traditional Labour voters making them reluctant to vote with him. they certainly did not realise OUT would increase the power of the Tory Right Wing and encourage the less sincere and less principled Boris Johnson. He flitted from his Green, Big Society, Hug a Hoodie policies as he moved right to get elected. He choose to call this disastrous referendum to fight off UKIP.

Tony Blair was another a plausible master of the media adept at riding the political whims of the day. I joined a joyous, hopeful, Labour Party on retirement 20 years ago with time to spare for politics. But left them disillusioned within his first 100 days, long before talk of Iraq. He did however do a great deal of good via a substantial increase in investment in the NHS - attempting to bring the funding up to Western European standards. Also by highlighting the importance of quality Education for the masses, and then by funding it.
Nigel Farage is another chancer who can't be trusted with the truth.

That leaves JEREMY CORBYN,  Labour MP should build on his his unerring socialist principles. He was pro Europe throughout this campaign but too honest to ignore the need for structural reform of the EU.
Currently he lacks the support of Labours MPs. 

'Shame on them'

I hope Scotland does not vote for independence. 

Why did the Labour Party let Gordon Brown take the blame for a world financial crisis? He was world statesman in coordinating the solution (saving the banks) to the immediate crisis and in my eyes is still easily the best political heavy weight and speaker we have. Why he performed so poorly as Prime Minister I will never understand, was it the simply stress?



Here's hoping the repercussions on the EU and their Prime Ministers will result in a fitter EU, rapidly enough to prevent its breakup. They have been served a strong rejection by the British people. 






 





    

EU REFERENDUM, blogging again

INTRODUCTION
Only a few weeks ago I doubted I would ever see Britain Trump the level of hyperbole, dishonesty and hate in USA politics but it seems all too obvious we have. Deliberate creation of Fear or Greed on both sides of the argument via threats and promises. Most projecting forecasts as facts when no-on can ever predict the future with certainty. Promises and threats from those without the political power to deliver - for not even ministers in a sorely divided Government can do that. 

Since writing this section I have to include the tragic news of the killing by stabbing and shooting of the young, highly principled MP, Jo Cox, quite possibly resulting from hate stirred by this campaign in a mentally unstable person.

More of the big issues of the current campaign which I deem to be related to TRADE and ECONOMICS, MIGRATION, POLITICS and the prospects of REFORM of the EU.

TRADE and ECONOMICS

What will happen to trade with Europe? For me the one undeniable certainty is there will be substantial risk and a period of uncertainty if we vote to leave. Trade with Europe may recover but seems unlikely to be fully restored given the increased degree of hostility from many of our jilted European partners and manufactures like the Japanese car makers who came here for easy access to European markets.

Trade with the rest of the world may improve. It has to for any net gains to the UK exports will have to come from this area. These days with little manufacturing industry left we have nothing to offer bar the financial clout of the City of London. A British Isles full of tax havens and a world leading expertise of accountants skilled in imparting methods of avoiding tax.

The vast majority of experts seem to be convinced that it would be a financial tragedy to leave, but then they would be in favour of the sitting Prime Minister wouldn't they? That however doesn't mean they are wrong, although very anti both sides of Project Fear I think they are probably right. There is a though a plausible alternative view though it may well take time to establish.

For all the who-ha this issue, dominated by FEAR, is not the vital one for me.

MIGRATION

Adds YOUTH,  DYNAMISM and BREADTH to a Society. It is Good and NEEDS a POSITIVE RESPONSE.

This item will not go away whether we are in the EU or not. We now live in a rapidly expanding very unequal world already of 7 Billion people of which the UK form less than one percent. Many will want understandably to move country or continents for financial gain. Add to that the huge outflow escaping the major war zone that is today's Middle East, for which region's current instability the USA, UK, France and Russia arguably own much of the blame.

Just turned 21 in 1956 I emigrated to Canada because I was offered over three times the starting salary on offer to a newly qualified graduate engineer in the UK. No doubt Canada was as pleased to see me as we have been to accept expensively trained doctors or trained nurses from  India the Philippines or Europe. In all cases, including my own, it denudes the country of origin of the benefits of educating their populations.The much vaunted Points System of Australia and Canada is designed with that prime aim.

Salaries are a major factor especially for the young, but those who choose to emigrate in a fresh start are characterized by courage and healthy ambition. In my case I initially faced loneliness for a few months without a close friend for the first and only time in my life, the loss of family and a lifestyle dominated by playing Rugby and Cricket (captain of university and school respectively).

Of a TOTALLY DIFFERENT NATURE to economic migration are the REFUGEES fleeing war and wholesale destruction of the fabric of their lives in the Middle East. Our national response, government and populace, to this tragedy is to wash our hands of our responsibility to help refugees. A response of which I am ashamed. I applaud the generous welcome given by Angela Merkel, and deplore the lack of support from other EU leaders for which  she is now paying a party political price in her own country.

Elimination of borders worked extremely well in Europe for years until strained to breaking point by the uncontrollable influx of refugees from the Middle East. Followed it must be said by economic migrants from Africa jumping on the bandwagon once it became apparent to all that such determined mass flows could not be stopped.

Equally freedom of movement across the borders went well, our eldest son moved to France over twenty years ago and his family though nominally British from their dad's side are French speaking, though bilingual. Freedom of Movement was then a two way process in reasonable balance. The problems of Economic Migration were not highlighted until the over rapid expansion of the EU to include the much poorer countries of Eastern Europe. That expansion was driven by the markedly different prosperity of the two regions, financial and political. Britain was the first to suffer the strain, though I have encountered little but praise of the Poles who opened the flood gates here. In time such flows will reduce naturally as lifestyles across Europe become more alike. But for the moment the unmanaged surge is causing huge problems.
 
POLITICS

Freedom of movement like the elimination of borders and the single currency and the inclusion of other countries were all laudable essential aims in trying to achieve a cohesive continent. But for different reasons each has come under huge pressure from events, none more so than freedom of movement combined with the over rapid expansion of nation states within the EU. We should be glad that Gordon Brown kept us out of the Euro, for he alone in Blair's pro-Europe Labour government saw the deficiencies in the lack of the structure needed to encompass countries with fluctuating widely differing economies.

Thus today we have Greece still being offered bail outs which increase debts they will never be able to repay with ever heightened austerity, when what is needed is a debt write off, a helping hand to give them a chance. Portugal, Spain, Ireland and Italy have suffered too. Youth unemployment is huge across the continent, and that includes France. There are huge real problems to sort but this does not rule out a highly satisfactory outcome to vital aims with huge potential benefits. 

Dangerous political instability, almost hysteria, is visible in America, Europe and the Middle East. Some extreme right wing others left wing, far to few politicians arguing rationally and calmly. This is not the right time fragment Europe with too many countries seeking the best for its own people, and damn the rest. 

Surely few would argue with the value coming out of the 1939-45 war of France and Germany determined to work together to create a united Europe. That was an era of politicians deserving of great credit and a heart felt vote of thanks.

But Britain was very late to join in and has always tried to minimise our political involvement.  Europe needs us, I believe we have far more to gain by being IN than a strong Britain can achieve on its own. Lets vote IN and work to improve our continent not just ourselves. Undoubtedly Britain looks back on its glorious past but the world is moving on at an ever increasing pace. NOW IS NOT THE TIME TO JUMP OFF. 

Greece, Italy in the days of the Romans, many European countries have since dominated the world with colonies. The British Empire might have been the most successful but Spain and Portugal challenge particularly in South America, the Dutch discovered New York (once New Amsterdam) then ruled Indonesia, the Portuguese Goa in India, France vied with us of in the plunder of India, Belgium had the Congo, Germany was at the game too.

Columbus discovered America. Was Greece the originator of great written literature? Copernicus was Polish he saw that the Sun was the hub of our world. Is Europe not still the site of Learning prized by China. Much of modern science began in Europe. Did Europe not give the world it's greatest music?

We have given the the world its most universally revered language English, the language of the educated in India, currently challenged by Spanish but in the future perhaps by Mandarin using our alphabet. 

Britain and Europe have great histories. The future belongs to huge populations of China and India with their massive populations, should we lie back isolated or join forces with the rest of Europe and compete?

DEVELOP EUROPE or sink

The political turmoil around the continent tells me that discontent with the EU is wide spread. 

The EU desperate to become more accountable without which it will never gain public support. Many of the annoying directives are aimed at improving and unifying standards across the continent. Resentment is not limited to Britain where we recently learned, in a chance meeting, of zero help towards the cost of meeting new EU standards on hygiene from a couple starting a new butchers business, Jim in France talked recently of local farmers complaining about the cost of complying with European regulations on the handling of animal waste. Neither is the wish for democratic control of only local concern, the EU seems like a civil service unconstrained by democracy.

We as individuals need to be informed about current EU proposals to the same degree that we are of the activities in our own parliament via the very same mechanisms via Radio, TV and Internet. Is it my fault that I do not even know the name of my representative MEP or have little understanding of the complex structure of the EU? 

You may judge for yourselves if I am similarly ignorant of British parliamentary matters. HUMAN RIGHTS is one of Europe's biggest achievements, I for one am completely relaxed over European law in this area.

Yet from the current discussion you would think we had already lost our democracy, or by voting IN we will lose sovereignty to the EU.

I am convinced we should work wholeheartedly in positive negotiation with other nation states to produce the stable, successful, EU all the nations of Europe need.

STRONGER IN EUROPE   

     

EU REFERENDUM, blogging again

INTRODUCTION
Only a few weeks ago I doubted I would ever see Britain Trump the level of hyperbole, dishonesty and hate in USA politics but it seems all too obvious we have. Deliberate creation of Fear or Greed on both sides of the argument via threats and promises. Most projecting forecasts as facts when no-on can ever predict the future with certainty. Promises and threats from those without the political power to deliver - for not even ministers in a sorely divided Government can do that. 

Since writing this section I have to include the tragic news of the killing by stabbing and shooting of the young, highly principled MP, Jo Cox, quite possibly resulting from hate stirred by this campaign in a mentally unstable person.

More of the big issues of the current campaign which I deem to be related to TRADE and ECONOMICS, MIGRATION, POLITICS and the prospects of REFORM of the EU.

TRADE and ECONOMICS

What will happen to trade with Europe? For me the one undeniable certainty is there will be substantial risk and a period of uncertainty if we vote to leave. Trade with Europe may recover but seems unlikely to be fully restored given the increased degree of hostility from many of our jilted European partners and manufactures like the Japanese car makers who came here for easy access to European markets.

Trade with the rest of the world may improve. It has to for any net gains to the UK exports will have to come from this area. These days with little manufacturing industry left we have nothing to offer bar the financial clout of the City of London. A British Isles full of tax havens and a world leading expertise of accountants skilled in imparting methods of avoiding tax.

The vast majority of experts seem to be convinced that it would be a financial tragedy to leave, but then they would be in favour of the sitting Prime Minister wouldn't they? That however doesn't mean they are wrong, although very anti both sides of Project Fear I think they are probably right. There is a though a plausible alternative view though it may well take time to establish.

For all the who-ha this issue, dominated by FEAR, is not the vital one for me.

MIGRATION

Adds YOUTH,  DYNAMISM and BREADTH to a Society. It is Good and NEEDS a POSITIVE RESPONSE.

This item will not go away whether we are in the EU or not. We now live in a rapidly expanding very unequal world already of 7 Billion people of which the UK form less than one percent. Many will want understandably to move country or continents for financial gain. Add to that the huge outflow escaping the major war zone that is today's Middle East, for which region's current instability the USA, UK, France and Russia arguably own much of the blame.

Just turned 21 in 1956 I emigrated to Canada because I was offered over three times the starting salary on offer to a newly qualified graduate engineer in the UK. No doubt Canada was as pleased to see me as we have been to accept expensively trained doctors or trained nurses from  India the Philippines or Europe. In all cases, including my own, it denudes the country of origin of the benefits of education in their populations.The much vaunted Points System of Australia and Canada is designed with that prime aim.

Salaries are a major factor especially for the young, but those who choose to emigrate in a fresh start are characterized by courage and healthy ambition. In my case I initially faced loneliness for a few months without a close friend for the first and only time in my life, the loss of family and a lifestyle dominated by playing Rugby and Cricket (captain of university and school respectively).

Of a TOTALLY DIFFERENT NATURE to economic migration are the REFUGEES fleeing war and wholesale destruction of the fabric of their lives in the Middle East. Our national response, government and populace, to this tragedy is to wash our hands of our responsibility to help refugees. A response of which I am ashamed. I applaud the generous welcome given by Angela Merkel, and deplore the lack of support from other leaders for which  she is now paying a party political price in her own country.

Elimination of borders worked extremely well in Europe for years until strained to breaking point by the uncontrollable influx of refugees from the Middle East. Followed it must be said by economic migrants from Africa jumping on the bandwagon once it became apparent to all that such determined mass flows could not be stopped.

Equally freedom of movement across the borders went well, our eldest son moved to France over twenty years ago and his family though nominally British from their dad's side are French speaking, though bilingual. Freedom of Movement was a two way process in reasonable balance. The problems of Economic Migration were not highlighted until the over rapid expansion of the EU into the much poorer countries of Eastern Europe. The expansion was driven by the markedly different prosperity of the two regions, financial and political. Britain was the first to suffer the strain, though I have encountered little but praise of the Poles who opened the flood gates. In time such flows will reduce naturally as lifestyles across Europe become more alike. But for the moment the unmanaged surge is causing huge problems.
 
POLITICS

Freedom of movement like the elimination of borders and the single currency and the inclusion of other countries were all laudable essential aims in trying to achieve a cohesive continent. But for different reasons each has come under huge pressure from events, none more so than freedom of movement combined with the over rapid expansion of nation states within the EU. We should be glad that Gordon Brown kept us out of the Euro, for he alone in Blair's pro-Europe Labour government saw the deficiencies in the lack of the structure needed to encompass countries with widely differing economies.

Thus today we have Greece still being offered bail outs which increase debts they will never be able to repay, when what is needed is a debt write off, a helping hand to give them a chance. Portugal, Spain, Ireland and Italy have suffered too. Youth unemployment is huge across the continent, and that includes France. There are huge real problems to sort but this does not rule out a highly satisfactory outcome to vital aims with huge potential benefits. 

Dangerous political instability, almost hysteria is visible in America, Europe and the Middle East. Some extreme right wing others left wing, far to few politicians arguing rationally and calmly. This is not the right time fragment Europe with too many countries seeking the best for its own people, and damn the rest. 

Surely few would argue with the value coming out of the 1939-45 war of France and Germany determined to work together to create a united Europe. That was an era of politicians deserving of great credit and a heart felt vote of thanks.

But Britain was very late to join in and has always tried to minimise our political involvement.  Europe needs us, I believe we have far more to gain by being IN than a strong Britain can achieve on its own. Lets vote IN and work to improve our continent not just ourselves. Undoubtedly Britain looks back on its glorious past but the world is moving on at an ever increasing pace. NOW IS NOT THE TIME TO JUMP OFF. 

Greece, Italy in the days of the Romans, many European countries have since dominated the world with colonies. The British Empire might have been the most successful but Spain and Portugal challenge particularly in South America, the Dutch discovered New York (once New Amsterdam) then ruled Indonesia and Goa in India, France vied with us of in the plunder of India, Belgium had the Congo, Germany was at the game too.

Columbus discovered America. Was Greece the originator of great written literature? Copernicus was Polish he saw that the Sun was the hub of our world. Is Europe not still the site of Learning prized by China. Much of modern science began in Europe. Did Europe not give the world it's greatest music?

We have given the the world its most universally revered language English, currently challenged by Spanish but in the future perhaps by Mandarin using our alphabet. 

Britain and Europe have great histories. The future belongs to huge populations of China and India with their massive populations, should we lie back isolated or join forces with the rest of Europe and compete?

DEVELOP EUROPE or sink

The political turmoil around the continent tells me that discontent with the EU is wide spread. 

The EU desperately to become more accountable without which it will never gain public support. Many of the annoying directives are aimed at improving and unifying standards across the continent. Resentment is not limited to Britain where we recently learned, in a chance meeting, of zero help towards the cost of meeting new EU standards hygiene from a couple starting a new butchers business, Jim in France talked recently of local farmers complaining about the cost of complying with European regulations on the handling of animal waste. Neither is the wish for democratic control of only local concern, the EU seems like a civil service unconstrained by democracy.

We as individuals need to be informed about current EU proposals to the same degree that we are of the activities in our own parliament via the very same mechanisms via Radio, TV and Internet. Is it my fault that I do not even know the name of my representative MEP or have little understanding of the complex structure of the EU? 

You may judge for yourselves if I am similarly ignorant of British parliamentary matters. HUMAN RIGHTS is one of Europe's biggest achievements, I for one am completely relaxed over European law in this area.

Yet from the current discussion you would think we had already lost our democracy, or by voting IN we will lose sovereignty to the EU.
I am convinced we should work whole heartedly in positive negotiation with other nation states to produce the stable, successful, EU all the nations of Europe need.

STRONGER IN EUROPE   




















 

  









     

Ebooks, U3A Chronicle, Travel and Jazz, Margaret Thatcher, China's Cultural Revolution,

   eBOOKS
Having left the discussion after stressing the anti-competitive nature of Amazon's Kindle saying it needed further investigation to identify the alternatives. It turns out that Amazon use the MOBI text format as developed for the original handheld Palm computer, which Amazon call AZW.

John Buckman came back with the Kobo ereader as sold for instance by WH Smith which he and his wife use either to buy ebooks to keep from various suppliers or to get free temporary downloads (lasting three weeks) from a Library. An ebook alternative to borrowing a physical copy, subject to similar availability rules, probably to harmonise with the libraries lending licence.

Kobo and the ereaders made by Sony and also Barnes and Noble (Nook) use OPEN free text formats of ePUB and PDF (the free Adobe Reader commonly used on PCs as mentioned before).

It is possible to convert these formats to the Kindle format on a computer and then download them onto a Kindle, but there may well be a further hurdle caused by proprietary Digital Rights Management or DRM which is used to prevent copying. A few years ago DRM was used to stop copying CDs, though later deemed illegal since it also prevented CD copying to make a back-up. Amongst the users of this technique are Amazon, Apple, Sony and the BBC, though the later does it to directly protect copyright of its own material and not just to gain a commercial advantage. 

Interestingly note that Kobo is owned by Rakuten of Japan who also run the <play.com> site selling ebooks as recommended to me by Marilyn Croft. Does it pay tax for business done in the UK? I have a gut feeling there is a huge problem with international Internet sellers.

U3A ACTIVITIES
CHRONICLE When I enquired recently there was still a shortage of entries of articles for the next edition which are required in two weeks. Please send them to derrick.jenkins@ntlworld.com
It does not take so long to write and its a sad reflection that copy seemingly dries up as our membership increases. Meanwhile I have sent one in for consideration.

ARMCHAIR TRAVEL
Next Meeting at Hazel Court 2pm Friday 3 May

Joan and I will be doing half the session on our trip a couple of years ago to Turkey, politically perhaps one of the key states in Europe, secular politics but a largely Muslim population, a long border with Syria and a beautiful friendly country to boot

Tony and Esther Searle will do the other half with an account of a trip to Canada.

JAZZ 
John Buckman is trying to start a new group both to increase the attendance at local events and to encourage visits to Jazz Festivals. Joan and I will attend the Titley jazz festival (hospital operations allowing) at The Rodd estate in Presteigne the Friday 26 July to Sunday 28 July, which features nearly all the best known names of British Jazz from Stan Tracey down, in an interesting mix of combinations from Django Rheinhart style through vocals from the Great American Song Book to Bop. Featuring the likes of  Professor Steve Waterman on trumpet and Britain's now mellowed original hard man Alan Barnes, who made his name as a young alto-saxophonist with drummer Tommy Chase's bop band.

Liverpool fan John Buckman can be contacted on 
johnkop.135@btinternet.com

TRAVEL
Owen Lewis is trying to get support for a Group to actually Travel together in groups. Far wider appeal I would think than Jazz. Recent week ends away organised by DJ Thomas onto which the Jive Group independently book have sold me on this sort of cooperation of like minded U3A groups. We go our separate ways during the day but meet up in the hotel for an evening meal and particularly to dance during the evenings prearranged entertainment.


MARGARET THATCHER
I have no doubt whatsoever that in 1979 the UK urgently needed reform, for the unions not management were effectively in control of major industries including Steel and Coal whereas the professions were under control of 'old boy' networks free to restrict entry and competition, not least in the City of London. It is to her credit that she saw both these wrongs and was determined that her government would stand up to these vested interests, which they undoubtedly did with great success.

Another observation is that UK industry in general had lost out to engineers in the USA, Japan and Europe. Even tiny Canada was outstripping us in the development of Nuclear Energy, and with British trained scientists. We could not even mass produce cars of sufficient quality to stand the rigours of long journeys on high speed highways in north America or the cold and salt of Canadian winters. In the 50's our lead as inventors of computers, once parallel with those in the USA, were being rapidly lost for the want of industrial understanding of technology's importance.

Or, and I would say this wouldn't I, the recognition of the increasingly vital importance of well trained young Engineers. It was not just a reflection in pay/living standards that I was offered 3.5 times more by Canada Westinghouse than I could have secured in the UK to follow a Graduate Apprenticeship. In my experience the quality of British engineer training was recognised there, both in terms of university degrees and Higher National Diplomas (HNDs). No wonder that a decade later we had the Brain Drain from this country, chiefly of scientists and engineers.

But when the Thatcher government in the so called Big Bang opened the City to vigorous competition including for the first time foreign ownership of banks, it did nothing to check the feeding frenzy which led to the our current banking problems. 

Although it had to be strong to face down the Unions it was a dreadful error to close down overnight heavy manufacturing in Britain displaying particular viciousness to the coalminers and their one industry communities. How much better it would have been to show a little forward thinking and opened discussion on union participation in management - but I guess that was just too European to contemplate

Sure change was needed but the emphasis had to shift to the development of competitive modern industries. The unexpected wealth from the discovery of North Sea Oil and Gas should have funded such a strategy. Only 8 years previously Rolls Royce was nationalised to rescue it from the short term costs of developing the RB211 engine which proved the key to their future prosperity. Thanks to that forethought Rolls Royce is now world class and our most important integrated design and manufacturing firm.

The British pharmaceutical industry thrived because the high cost of product development could be borne, the advantage of a having a large dependable unified market in the NHS. 

Meanwhile the north sea boom was wasted on tax reductions and benefits. Benefits which given the appalling level of unemployment amongst working men was hidden by falsely assigned incapacity benefits.

So when my eldest son left university with a degree in Chemical Engineering in 1983 there were insufficient jobs for his year and so a third went on to study accountancy whilst he qualified again in Informatique. ICI (Imperial Chemical Industries) had just announced redundancy of 800 Chemical engineers. ICI was once the giant of British industry. 

The remainder of the once great Electrical Manufacturing industry was continually amalgamated and downsized, the remainder is now in French hands and German Siemens marches on, so does Swedish ASEA and Swiss Brown Boveri albeit as ABB. For cars now we have only of the US Ford and Vauxhall and the major Japanese brands, all mainly as manufacturers only. For computers practically no firms are left. But micro computer on a chip designer ARM is a world leader, its designs being now used in most of the world's mobile phones, though it sensibly leaves manufacture to its customers discretion.

Where did our once great designing and manufacturing industries go? The French and the Germans still have theirs so do the USA and Japan. No wonder we have such problems nationally after placing total reliance on the financial industry which collapsed across the globe. Now we have a continual stream of evidence of corruption in the British financial industry.

The Thatcher era started us down these routes but Tony Blair's government followed with glee along the road to financial disaster. Greed and selfishness led to the ever growing disparity between top income and average wages, to such an extent that many senior employees now earn more in a year than the average person can hope for in a lifetime (read two lifetimes for a minimum wage earner). Some of these top people are now exposed as rogues, but still no official action is taken. 

Perhaps we should choose a leaf out of Mao's book and have a Cultural Revolution of our own and clear out the greedy self seeking types at the head of our society. It doesn't seem to have done China any harm! These people weren't irreplaceable here either. 

CHINA'S CULTURAL REVOLUTION 
Once one starts to think in depth about something then it is remarkable how further information seems to flit into place. I hope previous paragraphs have emphasised the harshness of suffering by the powerful and the intelligentsia. But what I perhaps forgot was Mao's political opponents. 

Zhang Hongbing's mother Fang suffered two years of investigation and detention but was eventually shot as a counter-revolutionary, aged 44, after he at 16 and his father denounced her, that's an indication of the fervour behind Mao's communism last revolution even from educated people, or maybe it was just the hope of personal survival. Many children turned against their parents in this way. His mother's father had been shot earlier as a suspected Nationalist, perhaps it was that which sealed her fate.

Zhang is now a lawyer and lives in the USA. He wishes to atone for his action. He seeks above all to turn her grave into a shrine dedicated to telling her story, hoping to ensure the lessons of that terrible era are never forgotten. He claims that 36 million people were hounded and perhaps 1 million were killed. His father too was attacked as a 'capitalist roader' and suffered at least 18 'struggle sessions' of verbal and physical abuse. 

Almost in passing it was recorded in he article that the father of China's new leader Xi Jinping was sent to labour in the countryside. 

Zhang's mother Fang was cleared in 1980 and they erected a headstone not far from the place she was shot in Anhui province, it is this he would like to become a centre for remembrance.

Petition NHS and Tax Avoidance, Performances, Kindle, Rapidly Changing Life in China

PETITION to SAVE the NHS from PRIVATISATION
If you feel strongly about this, even though with the Welsh Assembly there is no immediate danger, then add your name to the petition against the UK government legislation at

https://secure.38degrees.org.uk/nhs-section75

38 degrees present many important petitions which do seem to apply significant pressure to government, for instance they claim to be a major influence in quashing plans to privatise of our forest land. Other petitions include requesting action to curb Tax Avoidance by individuals and companies.


TAX AVOIDANCE - IT'S HUGE
High Profile Companies Avoiding Tax
Barclays
Amazon
Starbucks
Google
COUNTRIES
Barbados, Bermuda and British Virgin received more foreign direct investment than Germany or France
Channel Islands
British Virgin islands source of 14% of outside investments in China
Cyprus 25% of outside investments in Russia
Mauritius 25% of outside investments in India

PERFORMANCE ARTS
RICHARD 3 at the TOBACCO FACTORY IN BRISTOL
Richard 3rd the ultimate example of ruthless evil murder in search of the crown. His skeleton was recently dug up from a car park in Leicester, thus proving one more hitherto doubted part of Shakespeare's character, for he was indeed a hunch-back. The Independent nick-named it a Pay and Decay car park which was once the site of the Abbey where he was buried. How better to remember the end of the Plantagenet dynasty the War of the Roses and the Middle Ages and usher in Henry 7th at the start of the Tudor dynasty.

Joan and I went to the Tobacco Factory in Bristol to see Shakespeare's Richard 3rd (earlier in life just Duke of Gloucester), in its first week of a 6 week season. We would strongly recommend the experience. The day before it had received a 4 star rating from Lyn Gardner of the Guardian. The lead role of Richard is played by John Mackay who is on the stage virtually throughout.was in our opinion the strongest of many great performances in this theatre-in the-round since Hamlet played by Jamie Ballard and directed by Jonathan Miller in 2008.

In addition there are three wonderful performances from the suffering women in Act 4, Dorothea Myer-Bennett who played Lady Anne daughter-in-law of Henry 6th who he had just murdered, she agrees to be his wife in a wonderfully dramatic scene in Act 1. Lisa Kay playing the Duchess of York mother of Richard, had seen off his two older brothers to clear his way to the crown, Edward 4 of ill health and the Duke of Clarence in the Tower. Finally Nicky Goldie playing the old Queen Elizabeth (married to Edward 4th) was the mother of the two young princes Richard had had murdered in the Tower) whose daughter Princess Elizabeth he intended to marry so as to unify his House of York and her house of Lancaster to gain complete control of England. In practise he had just time to cry out 'A horse!, A horse! My kingdom for a horse'. Before being was killed down in a personal battle with Henry 7th at Bosworth Field near Leicester. Thus ended the last battle in the War of the Roses.

CITY MAYORS
The Tobacco Factory is an excellent example of Urban Renewal now in its tenth year since its rescue from destruction by the foresight of visionary architect George Ferguson which building now houses the theatre of which I write, a performing arts school (a ballet lesson was taking place when we were there last Saturday) a pub and excellent restaurant restaurant usually selling one course meals (I had an excellent Moroccan fish stew Joan a mixed plate mezze of bread, meats cheeses and stuffed vine leaves for under £20, a shop and apparently some appartments.

I have just realised that George Ferguson was elected Mayor of Bristol (without I think being supported by a political party) in the November 2012 election and he has many ideas to revamp the city centre to inject vibrancy and visual form. His aim "Making Bristol known across the world so we don't have to say it's a port somewhere near Bath which I have found myself saying in China America and India".

My own vision of city mayors was previously one of respect for the achievements of Ken Livingstone and Boris Johnson in London, but the Bristol experiment would seem to be even more exciting, I can think of no-one I would rather have as mayor.

FLUELLEN THEATRE IN SWANSEA
In Swansea Fluellen theatre gave an excellent one act performance of a play by J M Barrie (of Peter Pan fame) in their Theatre in Focus monthly series 1pm Saturdays in the Dylan Thomas Centre. There were quite a few U3A members in the audience but for the first time Patricia Morgan was one of four old 'cronies' discussing their soldier sons away in the war. I owe Patricia a special debt because it was her work as Convenor which rescued Carolina Jones Italian Group from a prolonged a difficult start, Carolina expresses delight with her class nearly every time I see her.

Fluellen are on the main stage at the Grand Theatre with my wife's favourite play Hobson's Choice. We will be there. It runs at 7.30pm from Thurs 7 March till Saturday 9 March, with a 12.30 matinee as well on Friday.

MODERN DANCE
I have enjoyed the few classical Ballets I have seen but am really enthused by modern dance of which there was a particularly fine example recently in the Taliesin recently by the 10 dancer Richard Alston Dance Company in front of an reasonably full audience. They started to Ragtime tunes played live on piano which made a fine start but it was completely a outshone by the two the very different music and dance routines of Buzzing Round the Hunnisuccle and then the startling Madcap with music and choreography from New York. 

SWANSEA JAZZLAND
I often talk of Swansea Jazzland and comment on the quality but never before has it been in the same breath as Ronnie Scott's club in London. American saxophonists Vincent Herring on alto and Eric Alexander on tenor played three dates on short UK tour, the first two nights at Ronnie Scott's the third at Swansea Jazzland.
It was a superb gig especially for lovers of hard bop, like me, entitled 'In the Spirit of Coltrane and Cannonball', all very fresh and very musical, all originals though the chords of Coltrane's most famous recording Giant Steps were often heard, and incredibly three of the compositions were written by the drummerJoris Dudli. Giant Harold Mabern owner of the largest hands I have ever seen on a piano, but they didn't stop him twinkling and when needed they gave plenty of power. Milan Nikolic completed the quintet on string bass. John Fordham gave him a three star Guardian revue for the London  Concerts, he should have come to Swansea, ours was worth four stars.

U3A ACTIVITIES
ARMCHAIR TRAVEL
Tomorrow Friday 1 March at 2pm at Hazel Court
Polly Davies will talk on Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee
It should be good, she gave a Wednesday Lecture recently for us in the University

JIVE
Going strong as usual including a large proportion of the beginners taught in the Autumn Term
Photo taken by me this week there will be more on the website from our forthcoming weekend dancing and holidaying in Tenby.

PHOTOS
There are photos sets of many of the Activity Groups on the website including records from me of Jive's previous weekend in Torquay and of the Politics and Citizenship visit to the Lifeguard Station at Mumbles
Anyone who has photos to post should send them by email attachments to our webmaster Adrian Crowley at   webmaster@u3aswansea.org.uk

WHAT'S NOT TO LIKE ABOUT KINDLE?
In many respects it represents an important breakthrough, some very good books which are out of copyright are actually free, others considerably cheaper than their paperback equivalent and all somewhat cheaper. The print is very easy on the eye, as pleasant to read as a conventional book because unlike say a computer monitor or a TV there is no constant refresh of the display, typically 50 or 100 times a second, and therefore non of the flicker which causes eye strain. A Kindle display only alters when you change page. 

The other big virtue is reduced space and weight which makes it especially attractive for holidays. My Kindle is two years old one of the first to include a wi-fi interface which allows one to buy new books rapidly across the world of wi-fi, which today is very widespread, and they then download automatically also to other wi-fi devices with a Kindle App. But the book seller can only be Amazon.

The more modern versions might include features I am not aware of. The main drawbacks of mine are the lack of colour, a downside of the display technology, the lack of a zoom-in feature so useful to pick up details on maps or other diagrams full of minute detailed information, and the paucity of the navigation make it ideal only for linear reading, ie from cover to cover without flicking pages. These downsides, except colour disappear when used in conjunction with say an iPad, a virtually indispensable facility in other respects particularly if like me you want to blow up detailed street maps of the kind which identify the location of chosen hotels and restaurants from a travel guide of the Lonely Planet, Footprints or Rough Guide type.

So what's not to like? Well it all comes down to Amazon. It is widely known that they do not pay UK taxes on their sales in the UK, for that reason alone, without cutting off my nose to spite my face, I intend to stop trading with Amazon and would urge others to do likewise, and today they are not just a bookshop but sell over the Internet an evermore increasing range of products.

The other quibble is just as serious for with no good reason apart from profit they have chosen to use a proprietary printing protocol for Kindle when a perfectly good and better protocol is freely available all over the world from Adobe.

The real problem is with Amazon itself is TAX EVASION. It does not paying taxes in the countries it makes its profits , for example the UK. For this reason alone I personally boycot them and have signed 38 Degrees petitions against tax evasion.

That issue becomes even more pointed in the case of Kindle which is totally uncompetitive. Ebooks to play on Kindle have to be bought from a single supplier Amazon, usually at prices just below the purchase of a new paperback from them. There are many other forms of ebooks available, but they can not be loaded to Kindle.

UK Corporation tax on profits has had to be lowered by this government and still stands at 20%. Given the huge benefits of closed markets and tax avoidance it is no wonder that Amazon can provide the good web sites and good service that make them otherwise a very attractive supplier. John Lewis arguably our favourite store and owned by its staff was recently warning that its own future was at risk from unfair competition from international firms avoiding tax.

There are alternatives to buying books via email, our local bookshops which are under fierce competition from Internet Sales. Waterstones can offer either, so do charities like Oxfam with their wide supply of donated second hand books. I have currently written to Oxfam to enquire why they sell books via Amazon for just 1p. From a quick recent comparison Oxfam sell direct at approximately twice the price of their supply via Amazon. In both cases they supply, package and post the books. I will keep you informed of their reply

Other alternatives for Internet include

Book Depository
Play.com  - owned by Rakutan, Japan's biggest Internet Shopping site (probably also a tax avoider)

A decade or so ago when I working on the design of computer systems for the highly specialised field of Industrial Automation, the rage in the software industry was Open Source (code) and the governments of the day spent a lot of time and effort promoting this path to open competition for their own purchases in finance education and healthcare. If source code is published and freely available then the computer programs can be understood, copied and modified by any adequately skilled programmer.

I guess the venture failed because restricting competition is in the nature of private industry. From what I saw of attempts like MAP and FIELDBUS, both excellent aims associated with creating a universal communication protocol for 'plugging in' the various parts of factory automation systems (eg instruments, automatic controllers). In my view it was sabotaged by commercial firms who saw their best chances in getting on board the various committees and stringing the arguments out so they never reached conclusion.

I had started to investigate the alternatives for competitive ebooks when I had my eyes opened by a recent Satellite series on BBC 4 and especially the program on Google with its Google Books venture starting with capturing their own digitised versions of entire of libraries of invaluable books held in some of the worlds most famous libraries. They were invited to copy the Bodleian in Oxford, one of America's top university libraries, if I remember correctly Harvard, Michigan University and a French National library before being stopped over a Copyright Lawsuit, mainly on the need for agreement books still under copyright but no longer in publication. It seems to me, since all copyright is time limited, that the greater concern is over the ownership of books out of copyright. 

Googles ultimate target was to produce a digital copy of all the books in the world. The idea of a complete global library is a noble one, but it needs to be jointly owned and available to the citizens of the world. The potential value of such information to Google for a proprietary strangle hold is uncalculable.

A similar grab by Google to that made in the captures for the creation of Google Earth in which they listened in to personal wi-fi systems unprotected by password entry and extracted a great deal of personal private information including passwords.

I am sure I will return to this theme of ebooks, but it is clear far more research is needed. The Internet was conceived as a wonderfully free way for university academics and research scientists to share information across the globe. But it is now, as feared, radically changing aims with commerce as a major user, which I have seen it argued will ultimately challenge governments and democracy itself.

INTERMITTENT FASTING
I had thought I would leave this issue until I noticed that the best selling book for the last two weeks, outselling its nearest rivals by a factor of two had been 'The Fast Diet' by M Spencer and M Mosley. I assume this is the Michael Mosely who presented the Horizon program which interested Joan and I immediately. We both followed the recommended principle of partial fasting on two days each week by eating a single meal of 500-600 kcalories. We are still following the regime some 7 months later. My weight stabilised just before Christmas and today was 81.0kg, exactly my weight at 20 so were I twenty again I would be sweating a bit wondering if I could meet 81kg (12stone10lbs) Light Heavyweight boxing weigh-in! A loss of well over one stone from a highpoint a year ago of 89kg. Joan has lost two stones but her weight is now too showing signs of stabilisation.

I have long been tolerant of the fasting regime, though it was difficult at first. Joan has had to struggle harder to master headaches, in part related to over low fluid intake, and irritability. There is no doubt that we would advise someone interested in fasting to eliminate first having a third meal in the day, as a means of an easier entry to the self control demanded by a regime of Fast Days. As a warning note that Fasting is dangerous to those with Diabetes.

I also received a cutting from the New Scientist 17 November 2012 from friends of Bill and Margaret Massey from Carmarthen U3A. The article discusses its authenticity as a means of improving Health and Brain function; avoiding Cancer, Alzheimers and  Parkinson's; lowering 'bad' Cholesterol; developing resistance in those overweight to getting Diabetes, Cardiac problems and reduction of problems from Asthma; increased alertness with just possibly an increase in lifespan as well.

It did this mainly by a review of published papers. Amongst the advice found is to make an early start on such a regime in middle age (say at 50), that it is more effective than calorie restriction alone (which has its own dangers). A fast is not considered to have started until  about 10-12 hours after the last meal and it is more effective in those already overweight. It popularity on this blog was almost entirely as a way of dieting, it could be much much more.

Conscious of passing on Joan's cooking advice second hand I took over our twice weekly Indian style vegetarian meals and am now able to improve more than somewhat on the cooking details I gave in earlier blogs. Revised advice which I emailed privately to people I knew had a direct interest. I therefore update the blogged meal advice. In good faith I used the calorie figures in a tiny booklet Joan had bought years ago. Recently I found a table for bulk foods in reducing order of calories. In the case of several vegetables it gives higher values, even doubled for some low calorie vegetables, which does not alter the concentration needed on high calorie foods, for instance, cooking oils, oil based Pataks paste, and supermarket tinned spice red beans in sauce.

 http://www.bodyfatguide.com/foodcalorie100gms

INDIAN VEGETARIAN RECIPE

Today I have almost no essential foods it is all a case of seeing what vegetables are available in the house.
So I start by piling 1.2kg (nearly 3lb) of vegetables on the kitchen scales in roughly 200gm portions.
                                                                         Calories/100gm
Onions        200 gm                                           36/23
then about 200 gm of the following five from the following list of possibilities with US/UK calorific values
                                                                         
Leeks with extensive greenery                          52/24
Swede                                                                   /18
Carrot                                                                    /20
Potato                                                                76/80
Cauliflower especially leaves and heavy stalk  ?  /13
Parsnip                                                               76/86
Butternut squash                                                  50/?
Peppers, red, green, yellow                                 22/15
Mushrooms especially needing prompt use         ? /13
Courgettes                                                            ? /25
Broccoli                                                              32/18
Celeriac                                                              40/14
Celery                                                                    /10                                                              Nowadays I rarely use                                          
Aubergine, no longer cheap                                25/15 
Tins or packets of chopped Tomato                    22
Tinned Red Beans in Hot Sauce            around 220                           
Tinned Lentils or Beans                         around   85


Last meal
20ml oil, 20ml aubergine pickle, 20ml Tikka paste = 320 kcal for 2
Onion, leek, carrot, cauliflower, squash, peppers    = 330 kcal for 2
Fruit                                                                          = 320 kcal for 2
Milk semi skimmed about 200ml 100 kcal for         =  22 kcal for 2
Total for two big meals                                             = 1080 kcal

PREPARATION AND COOKING
Nowadays takes just one hour in total

SOFTEN
Hard vegetables by pre-boiling unsalted for up to 15 minutes in a single saucepan

First  I peel and chop into sort of 2cm cubes the vegetables needing to most needing time to soften

The full 15 minutes for Swede, Carrot and the Hard Stalk of Cauliflower

Less for Squash or Potatoes or Greenery (from cauliflower or leaks

Less again for parsnip

FRY

Once this underway I put the 200ml of cooking oil in a casserole pan and heat then first fry a teaspoonful of Cumin Seeds, then add the Onions and fry the onions till translucent

Then mix in the curry pastes I still like 20ml a heaped teaspoonful of Pataks Aubergine Pickle with another teaspoonful of medium hot Pataks curry paste, often their Tikka paste.

Then add the chopped white of leeks

BOIL

By this time the 'hard' vegetables will have finished their pre-cook so they are added to the casserole pan and by using our smallest saucepan for this task I can add all of the vegetable water.

Stir and boil for another 15 minutes.

Take the lid off if needed to reduce the soup. We eat it from shallow bowls so quite like a little broth but Indian vegetable dishes are usually served virtually dry with rice

SALT to taste and add any Ground Spices, I normally add a teaspoonful of Garam Marsala (mixed Indian spices without chilli)

That provides a tasty large meal for two, though by 5pm (23 hours from our last meal) Joan in particular is more than ready to eat.

First thing in the morning we usually drink two mugs of tea with semi- skimmed milk as usual, but drink mostly black coffee, green tea or Tinnies during the day. I have a half stock cube in boiling water before going to bed. We usually eat a piece of fruit, say 80kcal for desert and often a second later in the evening.

CHINA'S RAPID CHANGES, RURAL and URBAN LIFE in MORE DETAIL
A few days after writing but before publishing the section on China in the last blog Joy Gillard lent me 'Country Driving' by Peter Hessler, published in 2010 but mainly about experiences before 2008. He was born in 1969 and graduated from Princeton in 1992 in English and Creative Writing and won a Rhodes scholarship to Oxford. In 1996 he went to China in with the Peace Corps (the US equivalent of Voluntary Service Overseas - incidentally Bob Hughes revealed at the last Armchair Travel meeting he had taught with the VSO in Nigeria). Peter Hessler taught English to the Chinese in Chan province at the age 27 and obviously took the opportunity to learn Mandarin. A tremendous boost helping him question and learn about the Chinese both rural and in the new factory towns and to understand the mechanisms behind that countries unprecedented rate of growth. Already a fluent Mandarin speaker he started work as Foreign Correspondent to the NewYorker from 2002 to 2007, also publishing books and writing articles for The National Geographic. Indeed these articles obviously made this book possible. In 2011 he and his wife moved to Cairo where he intends to learn Arabic as no doubt a precursor to studying and writing in English about the Arab Spring.

Remember in 1976 China was on its knees 25+ years of after the Communist Party (founded in 1921) took control of government in 1949. Following the disaster of the Great Leap Forward (58-61) of nationalisation and collectivisation by farming communes, and the  setting up DIY communes to manufacture steel and to the unattainable targets set by government which were met only by false recording of achievements and by melting farm implements. It
led to the great famine in which tens of millions perished.

The final straw was Mao's Cultural Revolution 1966-1976 in which he used gangs of Red Guards to terrorise the whole country including forcing middle, upper and academic classes to earn a harsh living from manual labour, often degrading them and separating them from their family. The Red Guards unthinkingly also destroyed much of the diverse heritage of the country as we heard during our trip along the Silk Road in 2006. Destruction that included the main temple in the Buddhist Yellow Hat monastery at Xiahe, near Tibet (a Chinese Autonomous Region) and used ancient caves full of valuable statues or paintings as living quarters. Xiahe was the closest foreign journalists could get to Tibet to report the most recent uprising there. The importance of those, now restored caves, has been recognised in recent years and they are now one of the chief tourist attractions in China.

The recovery since 1978 followed to the ideas of Deng Xiaoping, merging their Communist System with a Market Economy, he is famous for saying "It doesn't matter whether a cat is white or black, as long as it catches mice".

China will shortly have a GDP larger than the USA. Deng bowed out as an old man around 1992. The golden temple at Xiahe had been completely rebuilt (financed I think by the Chinese authorities) when we were there in 2006. There was considerable evidence of a change of heart leading to a revaluation of the value of their heritage, an exception being the family dwellings (hutongs) in Beijing. Farmers can no longer own land but they can rent plots from the state for an agreed rate of money or produce keeping as profit any excess and thus operating largely as owners before communism, though it is likely farming will develop into much larger units.

The of the book Joy sent me was in three separate sections. The first concerned Peter's experiences as one of the very first licenced drivers in the China. I think Joy's intention was to sow in me the seeds of exploring China along secondary roads, which scarcely exist in a form we would recognise, and in any case would demand far more than my limited understanding of Mandarin. This first section is often humorously written about and encounters with the police and escapades in rented cars, which were not authorised to go outside Beijing. But he used hired cars to explore the length of the Great Wall of China.

He obtained his driving licence in 2001 at the very start of personal car ownership in China, before usable road maps existed. The Chinese manufactured their first 12ft, 0.8 litre, sub compact car - the Chery - in 2003. It was a copy of the one General Motors intended to release later that year!

But I was really interested by the other two sections which were written in a much simpler journalistic style with the seeming intent to record, analyse and understand information rather than to entertain. It seemed to me that Peter Hessler has given an honest and correct picture which tallies easily with what I had seen in 2006 and that reported since by the BBC and the Guardian. 

The second section 'The Village' describes his experiences about being the first to rent a cottage in a small remote hamlet near Beijing to use as a weekend retreat. Here he learned much about rapid rural depopulation as the young left their homes in search of a better future in the fast expanding factory towns, about the education which was voluntary and not free as I had imagined, about health care, and, about the continuing hold on the population by local members of the Communist Party. It was a hilly area and their main crop was walnuts.

His 'landlord' Wei Ziqi  applied for party membership, he was vetted by the current members and six months later became a party member in 2004. He was their first entrepreneur having seen the future for his depopulated, depressed, area in becoming a tourist attraction for the rapidly emerging numbers of car owners in Beijing.

Following disquiet about the approval of certain local development schemes he was one of five candidates to challenge the long standing woman party secretary of Sancha district. Such elections are only open to members of the Communist Party. Wei Ziqi came fourth, which initially upset Peter, but he finally accepted they had reached the right solution. She, the incumbent chairman, and the Vice Chairman retained their positions.

Only about 5% of the population are members of the Party (in 2004 there were only 14 members in Sancha). New members are are chosen (elected) by the current members and on the basis of this district would seem to be well led. Members gain free tuition to equip them better for future roles in the party hierarchy. On the evidence in this book it does appear that the best rise in the party, and in an uneducated rural area that meant those showing innate ability. 

In our journey following the Silk Road route in 2006 we saw virtually no private cars and almost no traffic whilst travelling for hours, often on the only local bus scheduled that day, along newly built highways in order to cross the western half of the country. The big towns like Kashgar, Hotan and doubtless Urumqi, by far the biggest city in Xijiang state, had taxis, that was all we saw of cars until we reached X'ian well into the eastern tourist half of the country.

The third section 'The Factory' was most fascinating of all for someone interested in understanding the mechanisms behind China's remarkable rate of growth.The area he writes about is southern Zhejiang, the province south of Shanghai, a fast developing area around Wenzhou where 1/4 of the shoes sold in China are made (just like Northampton years ago in our industrial revolution, says Joan, but their potential home market is well over a million Chinese, or more than twenty times the population of the UK!). Wenzhou also made 70% of the world production of cigarette lighters. Over 90% of Wenzhou industry is private, quite the reverse of the state directed expansion I had imagined from a communist country. The title Wenzhou Model was earned for showing the way to rapid rural development.

The author set out to investigate in depth the progress in nearby emerging towns. He found that they were essentially one product towns with several factories mass-producing the same article. In particular he got in at the very early development of Lishui, a completely rural city 75 miles from Wenzhou. When first visited, July 2005, it had poor road connections so it took 3 hours to reach Wenzhou, and, Lishui had the lowest per capita income of any city in the province of Zhejiang. But the government was building a brand new expressway, which would reduce the travel time between them to one hour, and building industrial infrastructure - the Lishui Economic Development Zone.

Three months later he met 33 year old well dressed businessman Gao Xiaomeng usually known as Boss Gao, an already successful entrepreneur in the manufacture of clothing accessories. He was joined by Boss Wang and a building contractor and in a one and a half hour meeting they had sketch-designed the 21,000 sq ft factory building and asked for the contractor for the final price, not an estimate for competitive tender.

When he returned in January 2006 they were testing three big punch presses and learned they would be making two products, both parts for a woman's brassiere the smallest thin steel ring coated with nylon in fact the most technically complicated part of a brassiere. Back in the 80's manufacture of these parts had been dominated by France and Germany, and a far off Taiwanese owned factory had started earlier by importing a German machinery, but a 'tricky' technician with little formal education but exceptional visual memory had become very familiar with servicing the machine. He claimed to have 'created' a detailed blueprint from memory by 2006 twenty factories existed in China using replicas. Hence Bao had a working machine and to beat the competition his maxim was "It's not the product that counts. It is the volume".

The Wenzhou development strategy was explained as
1) Prepare the Infrastructure (expressways and development zones), a task shared by central and provincial government.
2) Sell land use rights at cut rates to Factory Owners
3) Grant tax breaks for the initial years of production
4) Then unleash human energy, let highly competitive, private entrepreneurs and their workforce do the rest

From 2000 to 2005 Lishui spent $8.8 billion in infrastructure and the rate of spending increased by over 30% in 2006. So where did all the money come from?

All land in the countryside is owned by the state so farmers like Wei Ziqi in Sancha have no right to sell their plots and homes on the open market. But the village controlled by its Party Chairman can sell, so there is a mechanism for sale 'the right of use' at low prices set by the government to a city. Next the city government borrows huge loans from state owned banks to build the infrastructure and reclassify the land as urban.

Urban landrights can be auctioned off  by city government to entrepreneurs at prices far higher than the village was paid, thus arbitrage of land values is the means of funding the city (robbing - if you like - the poor farmers by selling their right to use to industrial entrepreneurs. Above all the population of the city skyrockets by attracting workers to its factories and so the tax receipts rise sharply and hence the payback to governments.

Communist because village, city and state politics are controlled by Communist Party Members, but the implementation is by private profit driven Market Forces.

We hear a lot about corruption in China but Peter calls it guanxi or 'pulling' a basic technique in China, also a term in common use here amongst the young in sexual relations. A technique familiar to every western engineering or arms salesman, particularly extreme when selling into the Middle East or less principled regimes. But how to pull and how much to bribe, 'even a schoolchild can figure it out', he is told, in other words listen and all will be revealed. Boss Wang talked of the necessity of dining and bribing local officials and bankers when buying the land rights, wooing customer buyers with gifts, but being especially respectful of government tax officials.

Peter Hessler was present when three government tax officials called asking the Boss Wang, a university trained economist, why the factory wasn't yet registered for production. During the conversation following registration, so henceforth they would be taxed on output, he was advised by a local official to get a particular accountant, and correctly answered by asking the price thus indicating he was prepared to pay the 'bribe'.

China's response to the Global Banking Crisis was informative not because of their own 'credit crunch' which didn't exist but because the loss of western markets resulted in a mass closure of factories. The workers went back to their rural villages and await better times. The Chinese Government's Stimulus Plan in 2008 was to spend an additional $586 billion, of which half went to develop roads, railways and airports, but not he implies to education.

By amazing coincidence the day after I wrote this preceding paragraph there was a letter to the Guardian on Alternatives to Austerity confirming the figure and 2008 date but saying that beside infrastructure there was a 45% increase in state funding of education and increased spending on health also stating that the implementation was 2009/10 which coincided with a big recovery in GDP by China. You have to be careful of raw percentages 45% of zero is not a great deal!! The letter concluded critically by noting that "The Chinese government reacted to the crisis , by building thing, not by giving money to the banks".

Another short newsclip in the same issue confirmed the strategy used by workers changing jobs, to make the change directly following a Chinese New Year Holiday in their home town. To give notice beforehand would simply result in the employer holding back payment of wages so as to provide a cash incentive to return instead. So those who have negotiated another job just don't return. The piece headed "Apple's partner Foxconn [who make their iPhone] stops hiring workers in China" confirmed that an unexpectedly high 97% percent of their employees returned from their New Year trip home to explain why Foxconn had ceased hiring new workers. Thus denying there was a freeze in the production of Apple's latest smartphone. Either Foxconn are a very good employer or jobs market is getting tough in China as well or just maybe Apple have problems.

Another report that day said that Chancellor Osborne ruled out full nationalisation of RBS. But nationalised banks is the way China triggers its growth. Funding the infrastructure development is the key to their approach. This kind of financing well before 2008 was the way China drove its economy. I accept the UK and China are in very different stages of rise/decline different, but the comparison illustrates their extra control over outcomes.