Rising Dawn

  The chief executive at the prayer breakfast

I had breakfast with Bill McCarthy,  the Chief Exec of the City of York Council. I joined about 40 leaders from churches in the city for one of their occasional prayer breakfasts in The Spurriergate Centre organised by One Voice York. Key leaders from the city are invited to talk frankly about their expectations of the churches and we spend time praying in response.

This morning Bill McCarthy appealed to us to welcome the strangers and the disadvantaged into the city. While only four percent of York’s population is from outside the UK, it’s the fastest growing sector. He said it was important to integrate these new people into York and he asked for our help. There were leaders representing a broad range of churches from Independent Pentecostal to Roman Catholics, Mr McCarthy’s own persuasion.  There’s a longer report about the event on the One Voice site.

Ruth Gledhill - Times Online - WBLG: Zimbabwe: ‘The devil came late today.’
This might not look like the average Mothers’ Union meeting as we know them in Britain, but in terms of peacefulness, good works, child-centredness and Christian goodness, the Mothers’ Union branch in Harare is no different from its UK counterparts. Having known more hardship, its members are probably even more good than the unsung English stalwarts who keep the churches here upright in every sense. There can be no true explanation then for why, shortly after this photograph was taken, this meeting was broken up by Zimbabwe riot police.

Evidence of pointless intimidation in Zimbabwe, and the resilience of The Mothers Union!

Anglican Communion News Service: World Day of Prayer for Zimbabwe on Sunday 27 April 2008
A desperate cry from the hearts of Zimbabwe screams across the world

It calls upon all Christians of every denomination in every nation to focus their prayers, in churches, halls, homes or elsewhere, on Sunday 27th April, 2008 on the critical situation in Zimbabwe, a nation in dire distress and teetering on the brink of human disaster.

Let the cry for help touch your heart and mind. Let it move you to do what you can immediately to ensure this Day of Prayer takes place in your country and neighbourhood.

A plea for help from Bob Stumbles, Chancellor of The Anglican Diocese of Harare. If you pray make the people of this oppressed country the focus of your prayers on Sunday.

I am sick of hearing Labour Cabinet minister defending the abolition of the 10p tax band. It’s so pathetic they have lost all credibility. They have to hold their hands up and admit they’re robbing low paid single people of some of their income.

There’s no point in arguing how much better they all are since Labour came to power, or that they will sort it out sometime never. Just give them their money back. Take it out of my tax bill if it makes you feel better but stop being so stupid.

Just because people are single and low paid they aren’t stupid. Many of them are loving caring people like the staff who look after my son who has learning disabilities. They are low paid but they care. And at the moment Mr Darling, Ms Cooper, and the rest of you treasury wonks - you clearly don’t. 

The 10 deadly evils of life in Britain today | Society | The Observer

 ’The focus on greed as an issue reflects concern about the growing gulf between the rich and poor. Connected to all of these issues was the perception that we no longer share a set of common values and that we have lost our “moral compass”.’

As I wrote previously Joseph Rowntree’s legacy is still contributing valuable stuff to our national conscience.

Richard George: Plans ignore cyclists | Health and wellbeing | Life and Health
My local supermarket was designed by a driver, for drivers. This, despite the fact I live in Hackney, London, where less than half the population drives and 70% of shopping trips in the borough are made on foot. Nine buses stop outside the supermarket and most of the customers live in nearby flats, but my supermarket would rather everyone drove - and they have designed everything to try and ensure we do.

Richard George is right - planners are making it impossible to use a bike for shopping or commuting. It’s time they brought their green ambitions into line with their aspirations.

David Cameron’s first criticism of the budget speech was that it was delivered with all the enthusiasm of someone reading out the telephone directory. So I assume he thinks the job should be given to a presenter.

Chris Evans

I switched off - that’s the prerogative of a listener - assuming that, as the opposition leader’s prime criticism, there was little to follow.

Presentation over content is the scourge of the modern age. Make your talk glitzy enough and no one will notice you have nothing to say.

So if David Cameron is elected to power and you want to be Chancellor now would be a good time to put in some broadcasting hours to up your game. Or perhaps David Cameron himself should be given a radio show of his own. If he wants even more popularity he should be a gameshow host, “Vote or No Vote“, or “Who wants to be a Millionaire Tax Exile” with a “Giveaway Budget Jackpot“. The audience figures would be a painful gauge of his popularity.

This is not a defence of Alistair Darling’s budget, just another example of how easily David Cameron can get up ones nose, in the same league as Noel Edmunds and Chris Tarrant.

According to one caller to Victoria Derbyshire’s phone in on BBC 5 Live this morning, deaf people become so frustrated with their deafness that they may try to commit suicide. He was argueing against the campaign of a deaf couple featured in The Observer this Sunday. Garfield and Lichy say the Embryology and Human Fertilisation Bill would prevent them from having a deaf baby by IVF. Their first child, conceived naturally, was born without hearing.

This couple want a deaf child. Should we try to stop them? | Science | The Observer
We celebrated when we found out about Mollys deafness, says Lichy. Being deaf is not about being disabled, or medically incomplete - its about being part of a linguistic minority. Were proud, not of the medical aspect of deafness, but of the language we use and the community we live in.

The problem with the callers’ argument is that if we stop the birth of babies with any kind of disability we devalue all people with disabilities. Their frustration of course is often caused by those who don’t or can’t be bothered to understand how to communicate with them.

In many ways the the problem afflicts everyone. How many times have you been frustrated because someone else didn’t take the time to understand what you were trying to say. Deaf people simply help us realise how poor we are at communicating. Perhaps it’s a British thing and explains why we shout in English at people who don’t speak our language thinking that somehow it’s their problem and volume will penetrate their stupidity. It’s not communication, it’s ignorant and patronising. Perhaps a little like the fine detail of the bill currently going through parliament.

Can news be presented as drama? The editorial team at the BBC must have wrangled over this one. Newsnight is to stage a series of short dramas to raise issues about the decision to go to war against Iraq 5 years ago. This is how the Editor, Peter Barron explained it in his daily email.

Next week on Newsnight we’re making our first foray into drama with a series of films entitled 10 Days to War. This may prove controversial, but we hope it will also open up the debate about the war in Iraq in new and revealing ways. The issue our viewers most often ask us to revisit is - by some distance - the decision to go to war in Iraq.

Over the next two weeks, to mark the fifth anniversary of the invasion, we will look back and examine again the circumstances of the run-up to war: the WMD claims, the question of legality, the diplomatic wrangles and so on.

I’m pleased they’ve decided to present the films as a mini drama series that will screen before Newsnight starts. But it still raises difficulties. (more…)

BBC Radio 5 Live has a problem on Wednesday Lunchtimes - it’s two main presenters, Brown and Cameron, are becoming very predictable. Whatever the subject they both turn the conversation to competetence and exchange accusations about the others ability to lead.

So here we are again, Prime Ministers Questions; today mainly on Europe.

BBC NEWS | Politics | Leaders clash over EU referendumGordon Brown has clashed in the Commons with Tory leader David Cameron and Lib Dem Nick Clegg over an EU referendum. Mr Cameron said Mr Brown had lost his “courage” while the Lib Dem leader said the prime minister had “bottled it”. Mr Brown hit back by accusing Mr Cameron of “appeasing” his eurosceptics and putting British jobs at risk. He ridiculed Lib Dem plans to abstain.     

So should we have a referendum? It would be suicide for Brown because he knows he couldn’t win. The right wing press has lined up its tanks along the cliff tops of the channel coast with a firm “No”. There is a deep suspicion in Britain about what goes on in Brussels and Strasbourg and a perception that we give more than we get from the EU. But the risk is also high for Cameron because the process of disentangling the UK from Europe would be long and costly. Will he still be supporting a referendum if he becomes PM? (more…)