Author: Brian

More media horrors from 2007

Literature is alright, still — Heading of Guardian column by Maya Jaggi, one of the judges of the 2007 Orange prize for Fiction, Guardian, 13 Dec 07.  But the booby prize no doubt goes...

Barry Sheerman on faith: OK in moderation

At least six cheers for Barry Sheerman, Labour MP for Huddersfield, with his splendidly English reaction to reports that Roman Catholic bishops in England are trying to insist that state-funded Catholic schools should teach...

Deporting foreigners: making the punishment fit the crime?

All the leading political parties are competing with each other for the title of the harshest advocate of deporting all foreigners who have committed any offence, however minor and regardless of personal and family circumstances. Time for the courts to rule whether in many cases this is in breach of the Human Rights Act [More >>>]

The British Diplomatic Oral History programme

The British Diplomatic Oral History Programme based in the Churchill Archive of Churchill College, Cambridge, provides on its website transcripts of numerous interviews with retired British diplomats about their experiences of great and small events and their views on the conduct of British foreign policy [More >>>]

Yes, it’s Kosovo again: a modest proposal

My letter in Saturday’s Guardian points out the fatal flaw in the solution for Kosovo proposed by Mr Garton Ash. I suggest outlines of a better settlement, least bad for everyone including the Kosovo Albanians, and achievable [More >>>]

‘Hitler’s Favourite Royal’: getting it right (not)

A historical consultant to the TV programme ‘Hitler’s Favourite Royal’ confirms that it contained some errors in describing the Duke of Albany’s royal relationships, here corrected [More >>>]

Party funding: pick the true statement

If only one of ten fashionable propositions listed is true, it follows that the gravity of the current row over donations to the Labour party through intermediaries is grossly exaggerated [More >>>]