August 2008 - Posts
With so much sniping recently about portly people , it is
easy to forget those whose weight barely registers on the scales. Read More...
It's definitely catching. Last month Call-me-Dave Cameron
launched a verbal blitz on overweight people. Now his health spokesman Andrew
Lansley is at it . Read More...
Tony Blair started it. We thought he was only
half-joking when in 2001 he proposed that drunken young men who engaged in
antisocial behaviour should be frogmarched to the nearest cash machine to atone
for their misdemeanours by way of an on-the-spot fine...
Seldom do I sing from Westminster Council's hymn sheet but I
do find myself in harmony with the authority's clampdown on the gobby charity
fundraisers who harass shoppers on its streets. Read More...
In social care circles, Scandinavia, particularly the
Swedish bit, is often cited as the holy grail for professional practice. Few
would dispute that social care is well funded and well run in the Nordic
countries. Read More...
Anyone who views our sporting stars as pampered should read the story of cricketer Marcus Trescothick, the exquisitely talented Somerset and former England Test batsman. Read More...
Few will be welcoming the homecoming of child sex offender
Paul Gadd, alias former glam rock star Gary Glitter, should he decide not to
disembark at Bangkok on his flight from Vietnam to the UK today . Read More...
The dangers of exposing social care to the whim of market forces were underlined when the High Court ordered a Southern Cross Healthcare subsidiary to relinquish control of a care home in Northamptonshire. Read More...
No wonder David Cameron has distanced himself from the report that more effort should be spent on cajoling people from northern
England to move south, presumably to London, such is the enviable standard of
living on offer in the capital. "Barmy"...
The UK's war on drugs is costing nearly as much as the
war in Iraq. And like the war in that far-distant land of which we think we
know so much, the one on our doorsteps has similarly little to show for the
billions poured into it. Read More...
Another wretched story about getting older has emerged with the news that the NHS is denying up to two million over-65s treatment for
depression . Read More...
The three-year gap allowed between inspections of care homes
rated as "good" by the Commission for Social Care Inspection is generous
indeed. It is also risky. Read More...
The possible closure of two support groups for victims of
sexual violence should be a cause of concern to a government that purports to
take a tough line on crime. Read More...
BBC journalist Kate Adie once described her style of
reporting as "telling it like it is". The maxim is not one recognised by the
Department of Health in its fight-the-flab campaign (my description, not the
DH's). Read More...
When scientists calculate as early as July that the
following winter is likely to be colder than the ones we have been used to ,
news of soaring gas and electricity costs merely heightens the sense of
foreboding. Read More...
You have to hand it to them; the Tories are in rampant mood as they make inroads into traditional Labour territory. Whether it concerns the emergence of an underclass (credit, Iain Duncan Smith ), families and inequality (credit, Michael Gove ) and our...
Does this post? Read More...