Health, safety and pubs: there's a reason why cliches are cliches

And that reason is: because they're true. The cliche I'm thinking about is the one that runs something like "it's health and safety gone mad". The trouble with this and other such things is that they become cliches and are dismissed as such when actually the reverse is the correct response: don't dismiss them, embrace them! Cliches are true! That's why they're cliches, you dolt!

We all know that when a pub closes, an angel dies. As a result, heaven currently looks like the Somme on the morning after. I'm not sure what happens when a pub is desecrated; perhaps an angel loses the use of their wings for a period, or something. Anyway, it's bound to be something pretty nasty.

That being the case, there's one less angel flying around now following the horrific treatment suffered by a pub in Plymouth called the Minerva, this treatment meted out in the name of the dead hand of Health and Safety.

 

 

 

 

The ceiling of the Minerva, Plymouth: you won't see that again

 

 

The Minerva is more than 500 years old and was apparently the local of Sir Francis Drake. Many of its beams, and notably its staircase, are thought to have been taken from ships of the Spanish Armada. Its ceiling was covered with the scribbled messages of sailors about to set sail to do battle. Sounds like an important bit of history doesn't it, and one probably subject to all sorts of preservation orders, yes? No.

All this history has now been covered by several coats of paint. The reason? Apparently it was a fire risk. No matter that the place has stood for hundreds of years, unscathed by fire, despite for most of its life being full of smokers, inevitably often the worse for wear, warmed by open fires spitting sparks all over the place. 

How do we let this sort of thing happen and what can we do about it? A lot of these regulations stem from our membership of the EU so we could tell them to go to hell but I'm not sure that would make much difference. What I'm wondering is, if it was OK for Nelson Mandela to be involved in killing people in the interests of ending the evil of racial discrimination, maybe it's OK to be involved in killing H&S busy-bodies so as to protect our heritage. Just a thought...

 

And yes it most definitely is health and saftey gone mad. But not just health and safety - our society as a whole for allowing this to happen.

 

Raise a glass and toast the Minerva and its sailors. You won't be able to read their messages again.

How democracy works...or doesn't...part 2

What's the point of an MP then? All they do is fiddle their expenses, open a few village fetes and vote how their party tells them to. That's the received wisdom isn't it? The less cynical response is that they hold the executive to account, ask awkward question and scrutinise legislation. Plus they might occasionally do something to help their constituency.

 

And so it comes to pass that one way MPs can make themselves useful is by sitting on parliamentary committees. But then how useful is that? This blog has already had a go at the Public Accounts Committee for its dumb approach to the tax affairs of the likes of Google, Starbucks, etc., etc. Now this bunch of financial wizards has been lambasted by BT for a similarly idiotic approach to Internet infrastructure upgrades. The BT head honcho accused them of rudely interrupting answers and being far more interested in generating headlines for themselves than getting at the facts. One reason for this is that, just as with the tax business, they're too thick to understand the facts. Another reason is that these things are often televised these days so playing to the gallery ensues.

 

So what's to be done? God only knows but it's clear that many of our MPs are just not up to the job. Perhaps there should be rigorous testing of prospective candidates rather than just some local big mouth or whoever's flavour of the month with the party and is parachuted in.

 

You get who you vote for but you can only vote for who you get given. IQ tests for prospective MPs now! And less of this stuff on TV.

How democracy works...or not...the pub quiz angle...

Do you go in for pub quizzes? We do, quite a bit as it happens. I'm not sure it's because we're quiz fanatics or whether it's just a good excuse to go to the pub, as if one were needed. But the dynamics of your average pub quiz team are often fascinating and can teach us a lot about the democratic process and especially the failings thereof.

 

The weaknesses of our old friend democracy have been something of a theme on this blog. We've seen how the poor souls in Greece, who gave us the word democracy for goodness' sake, have been sold up the river as a consequence, not to mention the general economic mess that much of the so-called developed world continues to thrash around in. But nothing demonstrates so clearly how democracy can lead to sub-optimal outcomes like a pub quiz team.

 

"Come on - you're the bloody geography teacher - what's the capital of Bhutan?"

Anyone who's been in a pub quiz team knows how it works. You get half a dozen or so "friends" together, some of whom are dead keen and some of whom have been dragged along under protest by their other halves. The problem is that some of the dead keen ones may also be dead thick and some of the reluctants may know a lot of stuff but are probably staring into space or acting the shrinking violet and not speaking up. So you get situations where one of the keanos loudly asserts "I'm 100% sure Everton won the cup in 1961...I remember my old dad telling me and he was there" whereas a shrinking violet is pretty sure the answer's Tottenham but is unwilling to contradict Mr 100% Certain. All the while the bloke with the pen in his hand is wavering, pen poised; he knows nothing about football but experience tells him that when Mr 100% Certain is in uber assertive mode, he's very often wrong. Finally, with the question master now spouting forth with the next question, Mrs S. Violet mutters almost inaudibly into her pinot grigio something about thinking it might be Tottenham but it's too late - the man-with-the-pen has to write something and with Mr Certain now almost purple with rage that his answer's still not been taken as gospel, he scribbles down Everton. The correct answer, inevitably, is Tottenham. The team lose by one point and several of them never speak again.

 

Our recent equivalent of this scenario concerned the number of motorways in the UK. Someone (OK, it was me) surmised that there's bound to be more than you think...ooh, say around 50? Everybody else thought it was a lot less. A minute or two of canvassing ensued with yours truly on the hustings, trying to convince the team of the infallibility of my logic while some team members (teachers of course) tried to do a list. In the end we went for the usual British compromise and stuck down a figure of about 35. Now this was actually quite an important question as there was a round of drinks on it. In due course, with the tension rising to fever pitch the question master gave us the answer: 50. Not about 50 but exactly 50. One round of drinks evaporated.

 

Luckily, being mature adults, this failure did not result in blood on the carpet, noisy exits with the words "you never listen to me you bastard!" hanging in the air or the end of friendships; only a deeper hole in someone's wallet (probably mine, just to rub it in.)

 

So what does it tell us about democracy? That the majority view is often the wrong one. It also tells us that squeaky wheels get the most oil, i.e. those who make the most noise get the most attention. Neither of these things is ideal and leads to career politicians often cocking things up, where our beloved but elusive benign dictator might make a much better job of it. Whatever, one can conclude that just because a decision's been reached democratically, this does not necessarily make it better than one which hasn't.

 

Anyway, there's a music quiz at our local tonight so let me leave you with a little musical teaser. This one I think is obscure enough that even Google won't help you (and I knew you were going to cheat). The teaser is: Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love", aside from being a rip off from some old bluesman, is very heavily based on a version (recorded in about 1965) of the old blues song in question by which British recording artist?

 

Get those answers flooding in!