Trains are out of steam

IF, as a newspaper editor (which I'm not), I was told that 80per cent of readers liked my paper, my reaction would be: Well how come the other 20per cent don't.

After all, if they don't like my paper, why are they still reading it? Perhaps it's because it's the only paper left at the shops when they get there, or maybe it's because it's the only newspaper the shop stocks.

So I think that if I was running Britain's railways, and a survey came back which said that four out of five people travelling were 'satisfied' with the experience they got, I'd like to think I'd set about finding why the other one in five didn't.

But I'm obviously wrong, because when greeted with this statistic, them what run the railways decided what it meant was: "Let's stick up rail fares!"

Because that's exactly what the Association of Train Operating Companies (ie those who wish to make a profit on the railways) are doing. And not just by inflation either.

What else to expect from the organisation who felt that the National Rail Enquiries phoneline would be more customer-friendly operated from India than Tyneside. No racism intended here, just fact: I don't know how to spell any train station names in India, so it's fair to expect Indians won't know how to spell 'Morpeth' or 'Euxton Balshaw Lane' without having to spelt out.

But back to ATOC. Their director general George Muir said: "While no-one likes to pay more for their travel, we need the revenue to pay for the ongoing improvements to the railways that passengers expect - and overall satisfaction levels are now at an all time high of 80%."

So, randomly, it is now cheaper to fly return to Prague from Manchester than it is to travel by train to London. Mad, isn't it?

What the 80% stat doesn't reveal is a) how they got to the figure, b) whether it is 80per cent of passenger journeys and c) why they think it is a figure to be proud of.

If I am a passenger on one of the new Virgin trains, and my train runs on time most of the time, I probably am happy. Especially because I know my train, if running late, will make the slower, localised services wait at stations so I can overtake to make up time.

But if I travel five times a week, does that mean I am unsatisfied at least once a week?

And what does it mean to be satisfied by a train journey? Am I satisfied just to get from a to b close to on time or do I expect some level of comfort? If that's in the North West, I'm out of luck.

Across the North of England, there are to be no new trains. Just the rattling old ones which leak when it rains. I'm not joking. And if you catch one late at night, you share the train with a day's worth of rubbish. On a Virgin train, they are cleaned at the start of each journey. Not so on Northern.

Many of the trains Northern uses date back to before privatisation. Where's the investment there? And there's none to come in the future. Ultimately, we still pay for the railways - through the massive subsidies the Government gives the franchise firms.

Imagine going into a hospital, paid for by your taxes, and being told: we're charging you for this service because four out of five people rate us. You'd wonder where your money had gone, wouldn't you?

If the Government is determined to get us on public transport, lets go for something bold. Free trains. First class costs extra. Like hospitals.

Going down the canal

It's just a thought, but aren't so-called 'direct action' events supposed to actually cause hardship to someone else in an attempt to make something change?

When teachers go on strike, it's the kids who suffer until the Government/LEA/headteacher backs down and gives in.

When lorry drivers blockade fuel depots, isn't it meant to affect people other than the drivers themselves?

When one million walked through London against the war in Iraq, wasn't it meant to shame the Government into realising that a lot of people didn't support the hunt for pretend weapons?

When Passport Agency workers work to rule (ha - done that one before, and we didn't notice the difference). But you get my drift.

So which bright spark dreamt up the narrow boat blockades of canals up and down the land today in protest at cuts to the budget of British Waterways?

Don't get me wrong, I love canals, particularly the Leeds-Liverpool. And I love the fact Birmingham has more canals than Venice.

But who exactly is going to suffer when the narrowboaters blockade the canals. After all, who else uses the water other than them? Up next: Fishermen protesting at the cuts by staging sit ins next to the water?

Talking balls

IT'S the little things that annoy me. Like the fact Shayne Ward has an autobiography out.

I can just about handle the fact that Charlotte Church has published one - after all, she was a child star. It just about gets through why Jordan/Kate Price has now published two - she basically set out to live her life for the second book as soon as the first one topped the charts.

But Shayne Ward? In the words of Ricky Gervais's funny character in Extras: "Are you having a laugh?"

Do you actually remember Shayne? I do, just. He's the shaven-haired chappie who won X-Factor last year, turned on Manchester's Christmas lights, got a festive number one and subsequently dropped of the face of the planet.

If you do remember him, here's another question to illustrate the point I'm trying to make (and this one isn't open to anyone in Shayne's fan club): Can you remember how any of his songs went?

On second thoughts, I'd best exclude South Africans from taking part in that second question, because according to Louis Walsh (appearing on Graham Norton's wickedly funny programme last week) 'Shayne's big in South Africa at the moment.'

It's not a year since Shayne won X-Factor - in fact, his successor winner (bound to be those MacDonald Brothers as Scotland rallies round and votes for it's musical Braveheart in the face of Simon Cowell's Longshanks assault from the judges' table.

Yet Shayne has written a whole book about what has happened since then. And because not a lot has - interesting to him, I'm sure - he's even charted his childhood.

Summed up like this: "His autobiography also reveals what life was like growing up as the youngest son in a large family in Clayton."

Are you going to want to read it? Am I? No more than I'd take advice on testicular cancer from him.

But then again, I've already had that, thanks to ITV2's incredibly bizarre 'Me and my Balls' talking heads programme, where Shayne - along with every other I'm-a-celebrity-future-contestant - talked openly about their privates in the mistaken belief they were raising awareness about testicular cancer.

Shayne's advice, by the way, was to tell all men they should regularly check for lumps. Because he's the man we all look up to, isn't he? Shayne Ward, the only man with a more effeminate voice than David Beckham, a voice so girly it makes you wonder whether he has any at all!

And I'll wager you this - that won't be in the book.

Bobbins!

I've never understood why grown men adore Lord Of The Rings. Maybe it's some regressional thing, reminding them of their first 'big book.'

And never in all my life have I heard such bobbins spouted about a film - or three films, in this case.

I sat through the first one at the cinema, but rain-checked on the second and third ones, figuring that perhaps one day I'd catch them on TV.

And when they duely appeared on my Sky viewer schedule on Channel Four over the last two Sundays, I stayed well clear.

But I did see the end of the third one. The bit where the ginger one arrives back at his house with-the-door-the-looks-like-the-end-of-a-sewer-pipe, and hugs his wife and says the Middle Earth equivilent of 'Hi honey, I'm home.'

And that was it. It all turned out well. What a relief.

But only then did I read about the rift between Peter Jackson - the director who brought Tolkein's 'masterpiece' to our screens - and New Line, the company which made the films.

Apparently, he'd been expecting to make The Hobbit and another, yet-to-be-concocted prequel to the Rings trilogy (here's a mad crazy thought for Hollywood: Trying making a series of films in the right order! If it's not Star Wars Part I coming after III, IV and V, it's the new James Bond telling the story of how he got to the point where the other films could happen).

But now he's been told he's no longer needed. They're getting someone else. Perhaps they want someone to give it a darker edge. It worked with Batman.

Or maybe it's more to do with the fact that Jackson, who made £200m out of directing the three films, was threatening legal action because he didn't think he had a large enough cut. Well, £200m doesn't stretch far these days. And, after all, Frodo Baggins fought tooth and nail to get the ring back, so it's almost natural Jackson hunts his treasure.

New Line turned round and apparently said 'Drop the lawsuit, and we'll give you the last two films.'

Jackson has said no, because: "Deciding to make a movie should come from the heart and not be a matter of business convience."

Which kind of makes you wonder why he was so worried about getting that third £100million, doesn't it.

As for me, I'll wait for these two prequels (apparently New Line will have to pay more to go back to New Zeland to film it if they don't use Kiwi Jackson) to turn up on the telly. And then I'll just hope a repeat of Hollyoaks is on elsewhere.

Hobbit? Bobbins

Moaning about the moaners

BBC Breakfast was on the box in my bedroom on Thursday morning, and guesswhat they were talking about? The new series of Planet Earth, the BBC documentary series which is simply stunning in terms of the images it hascome up with.

OK, so it's not the most heavyweight of subjects for the BBC to be chewing over, but this certainly wasn't some annoying plug for a programme which happens to be on the same channel.

No, the producer of the programme was on to answer criticism about the programme. Specifically about one bit where one of the two-man crew which had spent eight months in Antartica filming penguins, actually helping one out.

In a nutshell, one baby penguin had fallen into a hole in the ice. Itcouldn't get out and its mother couldn't get it. So this camerawoman got out a knife, cut through the ice and the baby penguin escaped.

Back to its mum,who had sat by placidly as the camerwoman had done her work. There were cheers in our house when we saw that. But it appears some people- presumably sad, lonely people who like to make the lives of others as misearble as their own - decided to complain.

On what grounds? The general thrust appeared to be that they should have let nature take its course - ie letting the penguin chick perish. I know the argument about birds goes that you should never interfere with a chick because its mother will disown it, but that obviously wasn't the case here.

Then there's the one about not interfering with wildlife because it will lose its fear of humans - and that obviously can be bad news because it can make them easy prey. Highly unlikely, in the Antartic, wouldn't you say?

And as for not interfering with nature - you try living in the frozen wilds for eight months without building up some sort of relationship with a colony of birds who have watched you with bemused interest.

It was interesting to see there weren't any complaints about the crew at the Artic using a gun to scare off a polar bear who had become very interested in the crew's lodgings.

Presumably the survival of the fittest argument wouldmean a giant bear should have eaten them alive. I think not. But there's no reckoning with TV complainers. I get the feeling that, for many of them, Points of View is the reason they keep going.

It's true, theprogramme's still on - tucked away on Sunday afternoons (no doubt a source of complaint too).

It has its own website too. Within minutes of Friday's Have I Got NewsFor You, while perhaps the rest of us went for a beer or flicked channels, our TV complainers were on there discussing whether it was a vintage episode or not. Another thread complains about a voice used in a documentary being 'insulting.'

And not surprisngly, when asked about what people thought ofthe new Points of View messageboard, the first reply the BBC got was: Rubbish. What else did they expect from the sort of people who complained intheir droves about Jonathon Ross's quizzing of David Cameron on Wossie's late-night chat show?

If you remember, he asked if you used to 'pleasure' himself over pictures of Margaret Thatcher. Cameron dodged the question - presumably there's a focusgroup working on the policy behind the idea now - but 250 complained.

Why? Because it offended them! Surely the easily offended know not to watch Jonathon Ross? His act is hardly new! He's made millions with the same act, and it was shown at 11.30pm! So the complaints pored into Ofcom, which decided the BBC had done nothing wrong - and pointed out Margaret Thatcher hadn't complained about it. Why not? Perhaps because, even in her limiting state, she knows better than to watch programmes which she knows she wouldn't enjoy.

Say what you like about her, but she's obviously still got more of a life than the offence-hunters who probe around the channels looking for things to be affronted about. Now if anyone ever comes across one of them in need of help, just remind them about survival of the fittest.

Playing a dangerous word game

SOMEHOW, the British justice system today managed to hand the British National Party good publicity on a plate.

Why? Because Nick Griffin today was found not guilty of inciting racial hatred at a retrial in Leeds.

Earlier in the week, his barrister had argued that he hadn't incited racial hatred because Muslims - the subject of what I consider to be a vile speech made in Yorkshire and filmed covertly by the BBC - are not a race. And there is no crime of inciting religious hatred.

To quote the BBC's website: "During the trial, the jury heard extracts from a speech Mr Griffin made in the Reservoir Tavern in Keighley, on 19 January 2004, in which he described Islam as a "wicked, vicious faith" and said Muslims were turning Britain into a "multi-racial hell hole".
At the same event, Mr Collett addressed the audience by saying: "Let's show these ethnics the door in 2004."

In my mind, had there been such a crime of inciting religious hatred, then the Crown Prosecution Service would have been home and dry. But for now, we will have to tolerate Mr Griffin and co carping on about a victory for silent public, the ordinary man in the street etc, etc.

Gordon Brown has already intimated such a law should come in. It doesn't need a lengthy government review, it just needs action now.

But why can Griffin do this in the first place? Because he's in Britain, where we have free speech and a democracy. I'm all for anyone who wants to standing for election. If they want to believe they will actually make real progress rather than justing winning odd seats with clusters of protest votes in areas which the mainstream parties often appear to have abandoned, then so be it. Who are we to stop them getting a metaphorical bloody nose at the elections?

It was rather amusing to hear Nick Griffin talk about Tony Blair 'never being able to take our freedom' because a) Griffin looks nothing like Mel Gibson in Braveheart and b) Tony Blair has never tried to do that.

Much as you or I may oppose what we did in Iraq, the PM has never avoided a talk about the issue when confronted.

Ask the BNP a serious question such as 'Are you racist' or 'why didn't you win' and from the organisers of the party you are likely to get a round-the-houses argument which never attempts to answer the question but tends to end up with a phrase like 'When we're in power, you journalists will know about it.'

And that's the truth. On the ground, many of their activists are pleasent chaps and lasses. Many more aren't, but those that are appear not to be reading the same literature we read from the BNP. And that's where the truth can get muddled.

The BNP is a big fan of the word 'truth.' Here's it's take on why the BBC went undercover to expose the party:

The publicly funded broadcaster was, at the time, colluding with Tony Blair’s close colleagues in the Labour Party hierarchy and a criminal outfit called Searchlight which was co-founded by a convicted but now deceased, and unlamented, homosexual predatory paedophile.These are the kind of people; liars, crooks, war-mongers and close intimates of vile perverts who exist on one side of the fault lines of the British political scene. On the other side stand the heroic men and women who are prepared to stop the moral rot, end the inevitable slide into an EU controlled totalitarian police state and who will do their utmost to prevent this green and pleasant Christian land becoming an Islamic State.

Now ask yourself why the BBC felt the need to go undercover. Having worked in several areas where the BNP has made attempts - mainly unsuccessful - to get into elected office, I know the answer. They won't let you in to hear what they what they are saying because what they are saying is much more extreme than the leaflets they put out.

As for the BBC colluding with Searchlight? And where do vile perverts fit into this? The BNP is a secret world where, from the outside, answers are hard to come by, and playing with words has become an art form.

The leaflets they put out, by the way, seek to blame all of the nation's problems on one section of society. It used to be illegal immigrants, not it's Muslims. Not so long ago, someone else had a similar idea of scapegoating to get into power. We now have an international Holocaust Day to mark the terrible crimes which followed once that man, a certain Adolf Hitler, got into power.

It may sound extreme to compare the two - but that is what they are. Extreme, with little notion of what the truth is. And that's why we all have a duty to do all we can to stop them getting in.

I personally believe their successes at the polls will remain at a local level. Constituencies up and down the country are too diverse, and in the main voters too intelligent, to fall for the BNP spin and fingerpointing. A one-off local issue (their 2001 success in a council by-election in Blackburn was based on the possiblity a derelict OAP home could be turned into flats for asylum seekers. It never happened) won't win a general election.

But we need to make sure it doesn't happen.

How do we do that? Simple. We vote. And when we do, we make sure our 'x' isn't next to the BNP candidate. Mr Griffin and co won't be smiling then. Not matter what words he chooses to use.

I told you I was sick

My Grandma died last week. She was 85. No doubt about it, she's had a good innings. She was fit and well (though she wouldn't admit it) until the end - and passed away peacefully.

But what an absolute eye-opener the week since has been - not least of all discovering about the incredible industry which has built up around death.

I doubt there is a reporter - or at least a reporter with more than a couple of years experience under their belt - who hasn't either written about or come across a family who've been told they they have to alter a funeral service/grave because it doesn't fit with regulations.

Sometimes it is simply having a picture on the headstone and understandably it causes uproar. The one I remember most is the mother who was in tears because the local council had asked her to remove the singing Santa from her dead daughter's gravestone. She couldn't understand why people had complained about a motion-activated Father Christmas singing 'Jingle Bells' going off every time they passed to go to their memorial of choice.

And, at the time, I couldn't understand why she had put it on there in the first place. Just like I couldn't understand why people in Newcastle are now having special black-and-white-striped headstones in the shapes of football shirts being placed on the graves of Newcastle United fans. Surely they'd suffered enough during their lives?

Then there's the incredible floral tributes you see at funerals now. One funeral I went to - for work - was to mark the passing of a two-year-old killed by his childminder. I was a bit taken aback at first to see a floral 'Henry Hoover' next to the coffin, but all became clear in church. It had been the thing he liked playing with most, his mum's hoover.

I remember leaving the church thinking what a thoughtful touch that was, obviously thought up by the family and made as a special request. As opposed to the two-foot high 'GRANDMA' 'DAD' ''UNCLE" or (if the florist is really lucky) "STEP MOTHER IN LAW" that appear to be bought for many funerals these days.

Go into florists and say its a funeral and its only a matter of time before they're suggesting a generic 'empty chair' or 'pearly gates' to show how much you cared.

My question is this: When did a funeral become the chance to show you cared more about someone than the next mourner by spending the most on the tribute?

My answer is this: When florists realised there was as much money to be made from dying as there is from getting married - in fact more, because we all HAVE to die. Marriage is merely voluntary pain.

And it's not just florists. How many times have you seen horse-drawn carriages taking coffins to church? I know parts of Lancashire are backward, but not so much so that they haven't heard of a motor-powered hearse.

Then you get to the upkeep of the grave. My Nan and Grandad have a simply memorial stone near to the crematorium where they moved on to the next world. I put flowers in it when I visit, as do the rest of my family. The graveyard section, at times, looks like something Willy Wonka could have created - bright colours, strange objects, interesting sounds. And where exactly do people by those glittery windmills from which are normally on sale at the seaside.

This particular cemetery is near Birmingham - about as landlocked as you can get. But guess what, the florist has them in stock!

I don't mean to pick on florists - there are others out there at it too. Getting people at their most vulnerable, making people feel not splashing out shows a lack of respect.

And while I don't doubt that a lot of people get fleeced into having the best wedding ever, can we really be proud of a country which encourages us to keep up with the Joneses when dispatching of a loved one?

You can't take it with you, after all.


NEXT: Who complains about TV?