AN OUTSIDE VIEW

The referendum campaign was appalling on both sides. Speculations were presented as solid predictions by both sides. The race card was played by both sides. In the end, most of us, on both sides, had no option than to vote on gut feeling. The neglected working class in the neglected regions turned out in sufficient numbers to upset the prosperous metropolitan elite. Democracy produced the result that supporters of democracy did not want, thereby demonstrating, amongst other things, that democracy is not an ultimate value. The Bremainers have now cried foul and demand a re-run. There is no guarantee that it would produce a different result. The result has also given rise to racist and anti-foreigner feelings and verbal abuse. It will probably get worse. There is a nasty side to the English white working class which has always been an embarrassment to the left wing intellectuals who have patronised it and expected it to vote them into power. That it has come to surface is an ugly d...

A friend of mine is currently working temporarily at a home for elderly disabled people, run by a local authority near Gothenburg. Most of them have had strokes and are also suffering from dementia. Three times a week I get a telephone call about what a stressful day she has had. The home is understaffed, with six care staff for 35 residents. Her colleagues seem not to care. The patients' calls for help can go unheeded for an hour or more. Care is inadequate. They don't even get enough water. They are allowed to lie in their own excrement for hours before they are changed. It does not help that most of the residents almost never receive a visit from their children. Having to work in such an institution is stressful, especially if one cares about the patients, wants to do the best for them and is actively prevented from doing so. If dogs were kept in conditions like that, those responsible would be prosecuted for cruelty.

The advocates of democracy, not liking the result, are now petitioning for a new referendum. This is a game that could go on indefinitely.

The Bremain party are having a whinge today. The Brexiters, they claim, were stupid, xenophobes, racists, Little Englanders and old fogeys. Democracy is only good when the people vote the way you want them to.

SMILE at us, pay us, pass us; but do not quite forget. For we are the people of England, that never have spoken yet. There is many a fat farmer that drinks less cheerfully, There is many a free French peasant who is richer and sadder than we. There are no folk in the whole world so helpless or so wise. There is hunger in our bellies, there is laughter in our eyes; You laugh at us and love us, both mugs and eyes are wet: Only you do not know us. For we have not spoken yet. We hear men speaking for us of new laws strong and sweet, Yet is there no man speaketh as we speak in the street. It may be we shall rise the last as Frenchmen rose the first, It may be we are meant to mark with our riot and our rest God's scorn for all men governing. It may be beer is best. But we are the people of England; and we have not spoken yet. Smile at us, pay us, pass us. But do not quite forget. These are the first and last verses. The ones in the middle are rambling and frankly, rep...

Islands of yellow in a sea of blue. The metropolitan prosperous surrounded by the left-behind rest. Areas with good infrastructure embedded in tracts with poor roads and run-down railways. The yellows will benefit from HS2. Everyone else gets nothing. It is a map of the economic failure of the past seventy years. By removing some of the obstacles to the necessary reforms, Brexit might help to turn things round, but it will still take a lot of imagination, intelligence and hard work. Whether the British have what it takes is another question.

I am sure George Soros (or should it be Tsures - צאָרעס, the word means "misery") has everyone's interests at heart when he urges people to vote Remain, but how many other people appreciate that? Soros warns that " The Brexit crash will make you all poorer .". Wouldn't politicians and other commentators who are so widely mistrusted do better to keep quiet if they want people to do what they say? Or do they not even realise that they are not trusted. Anyway, here is the link to his piece , but you will not be allowed to comment. However, his reasoning is interesting, since by implication he suggests that Brexit would remedy some of the long standing weaknesses of the British economy. First, he predicts a fall in house prices, a bubble value if ever there was one. Second, he refers to the drying-up of capital inflows - which have been a major factor in the large-scale purchase of UK real estate by foreign "investors", particularly residential pro...

This famous signature tune tune was written twenty five years before it was chosen for the BBC's longest-running radio soap, The Archers. This is the story . The music was picked at random by the producer, whose budget would not stretch to paying a composer to write something specially. What would the programme be without it? A couple of weeks ago I wrote an blog piece about why the Introit should be sung . The Introit music is the signature tune for the Mass, and sets the theme for the day. Unlike the Archers' tune, the music was composed with the aim of setting precisely the right mood for the theme.

That is not exactly news but this time it is because of a "shameful silence". The author writes "The Orlando killings would have been a perfect opportunity for the church to condemn the deep-rooted prejudice in our midst" . Because of its timing, it is only today that the first opportunity would have arisen to pray for the victims at a Sunday Mass. I would be surprised if prayers were not offered at Masses on the following day. Only a couple of days before, I was at a Mass where the sermon was on just this point - it is a lie to accuse the Catholic church of being anti-gay.

Fifteen men have been jailed for 168 years for "systematically" grooming and sexually abusing teenage girls in Halifax - with one man getting 25yrs. There have been similar cases in other parts of the country. This seems to be a trend. What lies behind it?

It is good to see the Catholic community flourishing in what is said to be the most secular country in the world. Skövde in the west of Sweden has a small Catholic congregation using a church quite recently converted from a an old church hall. It really is quite an attractive building. There is a very small pipe organ which has a lovely tone. The work has been done to a high standard However, the building would benefit from a re-ordering, with the altar re-positioned against the wall and the tabernacle immediately behind. The lop-sided position of the tabernacle (to the right of the sanctuary) is ugly and confusing. The tabernacle should be in the same position as the Ark is in a synagogue, where the Scrolls of the Law are the focus and given pride of place. The position of the tabernacle - indeed, the entire architecture of a church, is a theological statement. It would also be helpful if the pot plants were removed from the altar step so that communion could be received kneelin...

Yesterday's Gospel reading was Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18 Beware of performing religious acts for people to see “Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven. “So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you. “And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will re...

It is amazing the lengths the Bremainers are going to. This Guardian journalist has recruited the eighteenth-century painter Hogarth in support. Hogarth was making the point that Britain was dependent on the international economy, which it does. And the international economy does not stop at the borders of the EU. Another own-goal from a Bremainer. You have to wonder why they do it, because there are perfectly good arguments for remaining, which make it very difficult to come down on either side.

Like a lot of people, I have found it very difficult to make up my mind which way to vote at the referendum. A Brexit vote aligns one with the forces of xenophobia, illiberalism and worse. These attitudes are summed up in the rantings of the Daily Mail. A united Europe is a fine concept which has brought real benefits. A Brexit vote will trigger uncertainty. It will probably lead to the break-up of the EU and a possibly chaotic future. On the other hand, the economics of EU membership work against the UK for geographical reasons which have not had much of an airing in the debate, but are a factor in the grotesque maldistribution of population and commerce in the UK, which are ever more sucked towards London and the South East. However, that is not a deciding factor. I do not like the Daily Mail's rhetoric. But what came to mind this morning was a poem by G K Chesterton called "The Secret People". It has the refrain "SMILE at us, pay us, pass us; but do not qu...

So said the man's father after Omar Mateen killed 50 people at an Orlando gay club. Although details are still emerging, his father told NBC News that his son may been motivated by witnessing two men kissing in Miami a couple of months ago. “This has nothing to do with religion,” he told NBC, adding that the family had been unaware of his plans. This in an article "Queer Muslims exist – and we are in mourning too", in today's Guardian , in another attempt to distance from Islam terrorist actions committed by Muslims. It convinces nobody. No comments are allowed, naturally, not on this or any of the several other articles on this incident. You begin to wonder what this newspaper's game is, so determined is it to shield Islam from criticism. The effect is to destroy what remains of the Guardian's credibility. The misdeeds committed in obedience to the teachings of Islam are getting all religion a bad name. Christianity and Judaism promote can intolerant at...

This subject came up in a discussion last night, as part of someone's anti-Catholic diatribe. We need to be clear about this. The Crusaders behaved abominably. They were, however, a necessary response to four centuries of aggression, at the request of the Byzantines who were in the front line and needed help. They ultimately failed. Or perhaps the Crusades have never really ended. The westward spread of Islam was not checked until 1683 when the Ottomans were defeated when they besieged Vienna. The Ottomans were slowly driven back from most of the Balkans and Greece. However, the Christians of Asia Minor - the ancient communities of Armenians and Greeks, paid a terrible price at the beginning of the twentieth century, when three million died in the two genocides of 1915 and 1923, at the break-up of the Ottoman Empire and the foundation of the state of Turkey. We should no more condemn the Crusades than we should condemn the Second World War on account of some of the acts of the ...

It seems that it is not just transport projects that get messed up by civil servants. Defence procurement is another field of failure. Defence chiefs have told a House of Commons committee that the new £1bn class 45 destroyers are likely to suffer engine failure in warm waters .

The Guardian has published a couple more articles against HS2, one by specialist rail commentator Christian Wolmar, and another today by journalist Simon Jenkins. The main arguments in favour will doubtless be wheeled out by the commentators: the need for capacity and the disruption caused by upgrading existing routes. HST itself will severely disrupt services to Euston during the construction period. Capacity can be increased at a fraction of the cost by a variety of measures, provided that it is accepted that the additional traffic will run at existing speeds. It is not generally known that the Midland main line is, or was, four track all the way from London to Trent Junction, between Nottingham and Derby. This is because the additional tracks are separate, having been added for coal trains which trundled down to Brent sidings, on the edge of London, from a collection point at Toton in Nottinghamshire, where the Midland Railway build a huge marshalling yard. Beyond Derby, the main l...

Dominus illuminatio mea. Today's introit, for the tenth Sunday of the year, was the first verse of Psalm 27, " The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? " It is also the motto of the University of Oxford and appears on the coat of arms. The Latin tune would take a couple of rehearsals to learn, but it is in mode 2, which is one of the easier psalm tones, which is an option if the choir does not have the time or skill to learn the music. It could even have been sung in the vernacular; this version of the psalm in Anglican chant would make a perfectly satisfactory start to the Mass. Unfortunately, it got replaced by a hymn on a different theme altogether. Does this matter? In the bigger scheme of things, possibly not, especially when there are parts of the world where it is not even safe to go to church. However, the General Instruction of the Roman Missal lays down guidelines on the subject. Replacing the Introit with a hymn is a last-choice op...

Last Wednesday afternoon, I spent a couple of hours working in a friend's garden. On Friday morning, ie about 36 hours later, I felt an itching sensation, scratched the area of skin and removed a particle which, on examination, turned out to be a tick. I noticed several other red inflamed areas nearby and took a shower. In the evening I felt the same thing in the groin area and removed another particle which was also a tick, and another again on my back which I never got to look at which might have been a tick, making between two and five tick bites in all. I went to the local emergency clinic this afternoon (Saturday) and asked the duty doctor for a prophylactic antibiotic. This is apparently against the guidelines which are to wait until a red patch is at least 5 cm across. The problem with this protocol is that in about 30% of borrelia infections (the tick-borne Lyme Disease) there is no characteristic red patch, so the most advantageous opportunity for treatment is then mi...

Ramadan starts next week. It occurs about eleven or twelve days earlier each year due to the lunar Islamic calendar. It is a peculiarly tough, indeed, cruel, fast, from dawn to sunset for a month. No water is allowed, so people get dehydrated. After sunset, the practice is to eat a very substantial meal, which means that they get a poor night's sleep as well. Many people will be fit for nothing next day, and certainly not for work. I would not want to be on a bus driven by someone who has been following this regime. This year it is particularly hard on Muslims in northern latitudes where the nights are short. There are divergent views on how this problem should be dealt with . If Islam was meant to be a religion for the whole of mankind as it claims to be, the curious thing is that this was not foreseen at the outset. Travellers in classical times had long visited the far northern latitudes and the greater seasonal variation in day length must have been well known even in Saudi A...