An Olympic Joke

Patrick Collins in today's Mail on Sunday tells us that he is confident that next year we will all agree what a wonderful thing it will be to have the Olympic Games in London and we will all rejoice. No we will not. I may be in a minority — although I know that former editor of The Times, Simon Jenkins is with me — but I still think that these games are a waste of money. So far the powers that be have accepted that they will cost £9,500,000.000, although there are suggestions that there are various extras — like transport links, etc — which may push the cost to £12,000,000,000. Astonishing, sport at almost £1 billion PER DAY. But its the legacy that will count; all the extra sports and regeneration of the east end. You can get a lot of serious regeneration for a lot less than £10 billion. David Cameron says its the most important thing happening next year. No, it's not! The most important thing that should be happening next year is that the bloody government gets its act together and makes real progress in re-building our country, sorting out the banks, moving us away from Europe, making the NHS more efficient, ending our involvement in Afghanistan and Libya, sorting out our ridiculous defence mess, putting aeroplanes on aircraft carriers and so on.

Now we are putting on shows for the count-down — just 363 days to go — and Sebastian Coe is becoming more annoying than ever. But this week's monstrous absurdity is the saga of the mascots. These ridiculous things — I refuse to give them a connection with humanity — designed by a completely inebriated, mad cartoonist, one of the last employees of a now defunct company dedicated to marketing the absurd and bent on one last act of revenge, designed these mascots, to look like Mr Blobby with a George Foreman griller for a head. What are they supposed to represent? Perhaps some one-eyed psychodelic Cyclops intended to make us lose all contact with reality. I suppose that when we think of the bill, we have already done that! Now the mascots are available to tour the country — are there just two of them or have LOCOG got several pairs. They can visit your school on payment of a simple fee of £850 [for the two]. These things have names, Wenlock and Mandeville and were, we are told, created to "connect young people with sport."" ?????? If any school or charity is mad enough to oblige by paying this exorbitant fee, they can be assured that these creatures will appear and the actors that fill the suits will "behave in character" — but they are not allowed to speak to the children. Perhaps they think that any child suddenly being addressed by a mouthless, one-eyed thing may have hysterics. The fee includes for assistance in helping the pair to "manoeuvre" in their silly suits as well as the cost of transport and public liability insurance. It is rather odd that a pair of mascots intended to make young [very young] people connect with sport are, apparently, incapable of movement without assistance.

Oh, by-the-way, schools or charities in Scotland and Ireland will have to pay extra. For visiting such remote locations the cost rises to £2,450. A wag — who clearly does not understand these things — has suggested that they just hire out the costumes to the schools and let some local amateurs put on the costumes and parade around the schools. Not acceptable, the LOCOG say because "Mandeville and Wenlock have whole characters, so it is important that we use professional actors so they follow through with these characters at appearances." How can a plastic and fibre blob thing with a griller for a head, one eye and no mouth have a"character"? And which professional actor is going to put playing Mandeville or Wenlock on his [or her, I suppose, who knows] CV.

These Olympics are already beyond the joke. What will happen next?

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Death in Norway

Well, we now have, sadly, a new name to add to the rather limited list of famous Norwegians. Perhaps, I should say infamous Norwegians; but there is no doubt that Anders Behring Breivik's name will go into the record books for the fulfilment of a deed that will live with other horrors in the annals of infamy. He killed about 70 people last Friday with a bomb and a gun. There are many questions being asked about why it happened and politicians across Europe and the rest of the world have expressed their deep sympathy for the friends and families of those killed. Also, they have announced their intentions of looking at security in their own countries. But in condemning Breivik and expressing sympathy — no doubt honestly intended — they are just going through the motions. They say what they have to say and then they carry on as before. They do this through a mixture of arrogance, complacency, ignorance, incompetence and through a complete inability of politicians across Europe to understand the concerns of ordinary people. Anders Breivik cannot be considered as an ordinary person. Ordinary persons do not decide that they have to execute large numbers of other people but the concerns expressed in Breivik's manefesto should not just be dismissed. Anders Breivik is clearly, an intelligent man and he has produced a 1500 page manifesto that sets out his beliefs "2083 A European Declaration of Independence". It is a rambling document — at 1500 pages this could hardly be avoided — that has obviously taken some considerable time to compile. He has been nurturing his grievances for at least 10 years until finally he snapped and in his disturbed mind he concluded that he had to act. But why kill so many innocent young people? It seems to be just that to him they were representative of the political classes of the future who would follow the unacceptable pathways that were destroying his country's character. It is easy to dismiss him as just another nutter — albeit a nutter with a gun. But that would be dangerous complacency. The fact is that there are men like Anders Breivik in every country in Europe — and in the USA — and we should be shocked not only by what he has done but by the fact that it has nor happened somewhere before. Clearly, the extreme demonstration of his feelings must be condemned; no political creed can demand and justify such slaughter. But, perhaps such things have happened before. Several members of extremist organisations have gone on the rampage in the past; but here the difference is that the perpetrator has set out his political creed for all to judge before he went out to put his tortured beliefs into operation. Like Adolph Hitler sitting in prison composing Mein Kampf, Anders Breivik has spent years collecting evidence and writing down the basis for his beliefs, prime among which is a conviction that Islam is a pernicious evil that must be destroyed. In many ways this manifesto is like Mein Kampf. Hitler wanted initially to call his book "Four & A Half Years of Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice" but he was persuaded that Mein Kampf was rather more memorable. Hitler's lies, stupidity and cowardice are a denunciation of the failings of politicians after World War I and his belief that many of the problems of Germany were caused by Jews. In the same way, Breivik believes that governments - as well as others - have failed in Europe in the years since World War II. They have collectively operated a creed of political correctness, of Marxist ideology, of spineless liberalism, of multiculturalism, have abandoned Christianity and have failed to control the immigration that has led to the Islamification of society - not just in Norway but across Europe. Whether the politicians like it or not, I believe that many people in Europe hold similar views.

Britain has suffered from mass immigration particularly since 1997. Many of these immigrants have religious beliefs that are alien to us and nothing has been done to integrate them into our society. This immigration continues, even after our Prime Minister has promised change and has said publicly that multiculturalism has failed. We have laws that make racial discrimination an offence but the laws are applied entirely for the benefit of minorities. We have Muslim youths so alienated against our society that even as they are British citizens they demonstrate on the streets against our soldiers returning from doing their duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. We know already that some of these alienated youths even go on to carry out bombings, having been trained to kill in camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan. They are watched by security services but still more Muslims are allowed into the country — some with extremist anti-Western views that are already known. We have particular problems because we had an Empire and many citizens of former colonies wish to come to England. Norway had no such empire and Anders Brievik considers this an added reason why Norway should not have to suffer Islamification. He is concerned also at the decline in moral standards over the last 50 or 60 years; the increases in muggings and robberies; the increased use of drugs; the acceptance of homosexuality; the acceptance of easy access to pornography.

Anders Brievik is a Christian with beliefs close to fundamentalists and this inevitably confuses his arguments. He has ideas that can be argued but his rambling exposition of his manifesto suggests the tortured mind that has probably resulted from years of feeling impotent, unable to halt what he sees as the destruction of Nordic society.

I have little time for any organised religions. Everywhere they are like cancers in society. Christians and Muslims have argued and fought for a thousand years and the medieval nonsense of their religious dogmas ignites conflict. They can't even agree amongst themselves. Catholics and Protestants have justified slaughter in the name of their brand of Christianity. Even now there are walls still dividing Protestant from Catholic in Northern Ireland and people are killed in the name of religion. Is there any sense in perpetuating a friction that dates back to William of Orange who died more than 300 years ago? The Church of England seems to be run from another planet as they argue about women bishops and gay priests while the structure collapses around them and the Archbishop of Canterbury becomes more and more like a retired old social worker.

Like everyone, I express my sympathy for all who have lost family and friends last Friday in Norway. I cannot support the conclusions and consequences of Anders Brievik but I understand the frustrations. I am proud to be British but also I am ashamed at the way that our country has been allowed to decline. Our industries are almost all dead; bankers rob the people of their hard earned cash while they wallow in obscene wealth; the government wants a resurrection of our manufacturing base but does little to support manufacturers and un-regulated immigration gives three out of every four new jobs to foreigners.

Anders Breivik may be declared insane but it is easy to understand what drove him to that state.

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Mark Cavendish

While I am still getting over the enjoyment of this year's Tour de France, there are one or two things that are worthy of more comment.
Some of the newspapers this week-end have been coming to realise just what fantastic athletes the road racing bikers are. Patrick Collins in the Mail on Sunday recalled labouring up into the Alps some years ago, in a Volvo in steaming heat with the car struggling to keep going as it got hotter and hotter and the atmosphere got thinner and thinner, in order to cover a stage of the Tour de France. When he got to site and sat and watched he saw these bike men coming up the side of the mountain with what he thought was comparative ease. I think he may have over-egged it a bit here. Mark Cavendish after the two Alpine stages where he lost points said, "Man, that was really hard." And if Cav' says that, I am prepared to believe him. This year the Tour de France followed roads through the Alps — goat tracks Andy Schleck called them — to a height of 2,700 metres — in old British money that is 8,910 feet — or an altitude of double the height of Britain's highest mountain. That is some climb and no one who is not an awesome athlete could do it.
It is interesting to read some of the reports of the amateur riders who try one of the stages each year. The organisers of the Tour de France set up, each year, a single stage event that is open to all amateurs. Anything up to 2,000 trained loonies have a go. Since there are so many, they are sent off in groups well spread out and they race against the clock. Many do not finish the course but also, many do. One writer wrote his report in one of the national newspapers last year. He was a keen amateur cyclist and he trained for this special one day for more than six months putting in lots of miles and gym workouts. He completed the course. When he got off his bike, he was on the verge of total collapse, totally exhausted. He told us that he had taken twice as long as the riders would do in the race and the idea that he would get out of bed the following morning and do it all again was pure fantasy. He held the riders in awe ever after.
David Millar, the British rider who completed this year's Tour in 76th place [out of 168 finishers] said yesterday that we do not appreciate just how good is Mark Cavendish. He is, said Millar, "the greatest sprinter in cycling history." And for such an achievement he may get a mention in a small column a few pages away from the back of a national newspaper. He is fantastic. There is no doubt about that and in the last 2 years he has matured immensely. No longer does he behave like the truculent teenager and, always, he gives enormous credit to his team of lead-out men who get him to the right place to rocket him towards the finishing line. To see him take off in a bunch sprint shows just how great he is. The best cyclists in the world are left standing. So far he has 20 stage wins to his credit and experts are predicting that he will one day exceed the 34 stage wins of Eddie Merckx - the greatest bike rider of all time. I look in the sports pages of newspapers and see acres of rubbish about footballers being transferred from here to there, about the sex lives of footballers, about the ridiculous wages of footballers, etc, etc. And this happens even during that brief respite of no football in July. But mention of a great performer like Cavendish is scant. Perhaps after his green jersey win he will get more attention. But, I suppose it will be mostly about wags!
What will happen to Cavendish and his team next year is unknown. He is out of contract and HTC Highroad have not yet committed to sponsoring the team in the future. Cavendish has indicated that he wants the team to stay together. That may not be easy if HTC cannot collect the resources to allow them to continue this sponsorship. It may be, of course, that the problem is agreeing contracts with a team of riders who have now become very valuable in world cycling.
Luckily, there are many young men [and women] who are being inspired by the likes of Mark Cavendish, Bradley Wiggins, David Millar and, on the track, Chris Hoyle, Graeme Obree, and Victoria Pendleton. bike riding in all its forms is becoming more and more popular, encouragingly, as a break from the brutal corruption seen in football.
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Tour de France 2011 - Part 2

One of the joys of watching the Tour de France on TV is the sight of the French countryside viewed from camera carrying motor-bikes as they follow the riders and also the panoramic views from the helicopters. Added to that is the sheer enthusiasm of the vast crowds. How many people watch the Tour as it wends its way up hill and down dale fro 3,500 kms? In the high mountains there are continuous rows of camper vans alongside the roads for mile after mile, campers owned and occupied by enthusiasts who are sometimes in the one place for several days enjoying a social occasion with other fans. In some places there are organised groups of spectators from particular areas of the country or from particular countries. The French have had one of the their best years for some time with Thomas Voeckler finishing 4th and holding the yellow jersey for 10 days as the Tour laboured through the Alps and Pierre Rolland winning the White Jersey after a stunning stage victory on stage 19. Perhaps they will have another overall Tour win soon — the last time was in 1996. But the French supported this year's race enthusiastically in every city, town and village in France. Everyone turns out to see the Tour through and everywhere there is a festive atmosphere. With so many foreign bike riders in the race every year now, there is immense overseas support with groups of Spaniards, Luxembourgers — are there so many of them — Italians, British, Dutch, Americans, Australians and so on. Little Norway had lots of supporters for the only two Norwegians in the race, Thor Hushovd and Edvald Boasson-Hagen. They each won two stages and Hushovd held the yellow jersey for a week. Considering the mass murders that took place in Norway on Friday with 100 people dead, the country needed something to raise their spirits.
As the Tour goes up into the high Alps and Pyrenees, the roads are narrow and made narrower still by the enthusiastic supporters in fancy dress running alongside the road and ready to cheer on their favourites. Everywhere the atmosphere is terrific. And the whole of this spectacle is free. It brings lots of spending and investments into France, of course, but it is the greatest sporting event in Europe and it is free. In this day and age, that is something that is all too rare.
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Tour de France 2011

Today the 2011 Tour de France bike race came to an end. This was a memorable year and some of the most fantastic racing in the total history of the Tour. Certainly it seemed so for me and it was the opinion of many of the aficionados who have been watching the races for many years. Cadel Evans became the first Australian to win the Tour in the whole of the race's history. He was also — at 34 —the oldest rider to win a tour at any time since World War II. And he deserved it. He is a wonderful champion. This is his 9th Tour and many thought that after poor placings in 2009 and 2010 after placings 2nd in 2007 and 2008 he was past his best and he could never win the Tour. But his was an example of dogged determination and persistence; he was totally committed and he was never going to give up. He has been a professional bike rider for 20 years and this is the peak of everything that he has done. Cadel Evans has been a morose man over many a year; a man who looks about to burst into tears or have a nervous breakdown. When he wins there are tears. He is a man who cannot hide his emotions and it is clear that what he wanted more than anything in this life was to win the Tour de France. He showed this many times in this year's race but never more so than when he set off in pursuit of Andy Schleck up the mountain from Briancon to Col de Galibier. Un-assisted he went after the Luxembourg rider with Thomas Voeckler on his back wheel. Cadel's face was an image of concentration and the subjugation of pain as he forced himself upwards. And Voeckler hung on to keep the yellow jersey for another day. On Stage 19 Andy Schleck took the yellow with Frank Schleck 2nd 57 secs behind and Cadel Evans 59 seconds behind. Thus it all came down to the individual time trial on Saturday. Here Cadel Evans not only made up the 59 seconds he went a furthier 1min35 secs ahead to win convincingly. He was imperious, all powerful, the not-to-be-beaten man.

At the end Cadel Evans was all smiles — at last — and there were tears. There is no doubt about the power of his emotions but he is a man with a big heart and the dogged persistence that will always win through in the end. His wife is not very interested in bike racing but she will appreciate the magnitude of what he has achieved. He will go down in the record books as one of the all-time greats. Perhaps not blessed with the natural talents of a Lance Armstrong but no less a rider. He is going to get some welcome when he goes back to Australia.

In writing about Cadel Evans I cannot miss recording the massive achievement of Mark Cavendish, the "Manx Missile" who today won the final stage sprint on the Champs Elysee and took the green jersey for the best sprinter. Today was his third consecutive win on the Champs Elysee and he is the first Briton to win the green jersey, ever. In fact the only other British rider to be wearing a Tour jersey in Paris was Robert Millar, crowned king of the Mountains in 1984. Mark Cavendish now has 20 stage wins to his credit. Only Eddie Merckx [Belgium] [34], Bernard Hinault [France] [28], Lance Armstrong [USA] [25], Andre Leducq [France] [ 25], Andre Darrigade [France] [22] and Nicolas Frantz [Luxembourg] [20] have equalled or exceeded Mark Cavendish's total and none has achieved 20 stage wins in less than five years. However, Andre Darrigade is the only one on that list who has not achieved at least one overall win of the Tour. Can Mark Cavendish go on to do that as well? He is not a man for the mountains but who knows. Like Cadel Evans, he is a great bike rider but when it comes to the sprint he is the best in the world. Also he is very emotional and he feels failure. If he does not win in a sprint he believes that he has let down the other members of his team who look after him and get him into the right position for those awesome sprint finishes. This keeps him awake at nights. He still has much to give and he can only get better.
British riders did themselves proud in this Tour and I think British riders are going to be serious contenders in the next few years. Remember Bradley Wiggins [eliminated by a bad accident], Geraint Thomas, Ben Swift, Peter Kennaugh, David Millar and others all of whom are exciting prospects.

I have said many times that these bike riders are the greatest athletes on the planet. I believe that even more after this year's fabulous Tour. Congratulations to all 168 riders who covered the full 3,500 kms and made it onto the Champs Elysee. You deserve our applause and respect.

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Long Operas

I commented a couple of days ago on the glorious production of Rossini's William Tell at the BBC Proms in the Royal Albert Hall on 16th July. It seems to have been well received by critics almost all of whom were surprised by the sheer quality of the music. But what surprised me was that there were, apparently, many empty seats. The Proms attracts good audiences for a many an obscure work listening to some of which can take away the will to live. So why not a full house for this huge masterpiece? Was it condemned by its obscurity? In this age of instant gratifications does no one want to endure 4½ hours of anything? I have sat through 4½ hours of Wagner and I can remember every dreadful minute of it. I saw Lohengrin and Das Rheingold in the 1970s and I can remember that each opera seemed to go on not for hours and hours but for months. One of the problems I have with Wagner is the ridiculous plots — which make Rossini comic operas seem positively sane and commonplace — but also they are performed by singers who cannot sing. I know this is a sweeping condemnation. There are some good singers in Wagner operas. But they are singers who sing Italian and French opera for the most part. The real horrors are the specialist Wagner singers. They sing nothing else because they can drone on in Wagner without anyone getting excited one way or the other. Rossini is not like that. His William Tell buzzes along with it huge choruses and arias that make great demands of proper singers. It has been suggested that in many ways the work does better as an oratorio rather than an opera. If that is enough to guarantee its more frequent performance, I have no problem with that. It avoids the theatrical production problems and allows a big chorus to be used. But maybe people did not turn up because they will not sit through 4½ hours of anybody's opera.

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The Stink of Corruption

This last week has produced one scandal after another in the matter of News International's involvement in phone hacking, interference in government, bribery, police payments and corruption. It can be argued that every bit of the whole story is one of corruption but the overwhelming impression made in my mind is that the whole sordid mess was a direct result of unrestrained nepotism. The start of the story was a matter of phone hacking that seems to have started a good few years back. For a long time it seemed that the phones being hacked were those owned by people in the public eye — show-biz personalities, politicians, sportsmen and those famous for being famous. Back in 2006 when the first leaks became an issue, the police needed all their resources to tackle matters of terrorism and they did not take very much action on the matter of the hackings. It was put on the back burner. No one seemed to care very much. All that seemed to result from the hackings was that stories of the more insalubrious activities of people in the limelight made their way into red top Sunday papers. More recently, there have been reports of many whose phones were hacked being paid off and the tales of hacking spread to the general public. But worst of all, they hacked the phones of the relatives of men killed in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as murder victims and their relatives. The big out-cry came when it was revealed that the phone of murdered teenager Milly Dowler had been hacked and messages deleted which gave the parents hope that the girl was still alive when she was in fact already dead. Such a sordid story brought the phone hacking onto the front pages.

Phone hacking has gone on for years and I find it difficult to get too worked up about it. It was quite wrong to hack into the phones of the dead and their relatives and action should be taken against those responsible.

What I find more disturbing is the cosy relationship between senior politicians, rich fixers and the media. I have complained that this country is in a serious mess that has got worse and worse year after year. The country has always been ruled by the rich and it still is ruled by the rich. We read over this week-end of a party thrown on the 2nd July at the home of Matthew & Elisabeth Freud at their home Burford Priory. Everyone whose name I will mention — all of this guest list was set out in The Mail on Sunday [17 July 2011] — can be considered exceedingly rich. Matthew Freud is the son of the late Clement Freud. He was educated at Westminster School and is head of Freud Communications, the seventh largest public relations company in the UK and the ultimate networker and fixer. Elisabeth Freud is the daughter of Rupert Murdoch. Present at this gathering which lasted for some guests until mid-day on Sunday were : Michael Gove - Education Secretary; Ed Vaizey - Culture Minister; Peter Mandelson; David Miliband - former Foreign Secretary; James Purnell - former Cabinet Minister; Douglas Alexander - another former Cabinet Minister; Steve Hilton - David Cameron's Policy Adviser; Mrs Hilton [Rachel Whetstone] - Google Director of Communications; James Murdoch - son of Rupert and Deputy Chief Operating Officer of News Corporation; Rebekah Brookes - Chief Executive of News International [resigned on 15th July; arrested on 17th July]; Robert Peston - BBC Business Editor; Will Lewis - Group General Manager of News International; Mark Thompson - BBC Director General; Alan Yentob - long-term BBC employee now an Executive; Charlie Brooks - husband of Rebekah and former race horse trainer; Jeremy Clarkson - BBC Top Gear man; Jon Snow - Channel 4 News Presenter; Piers Morgan - former Editor of Daily Mirror; now TV host; Tessa Jowell - former Cabinet Minister; David Mills - allegedly estranged husband of Tessa Jowell. Add to all these a list of various show-biz stars and sportsmen and you have the Establishment at play. The only people missing were all members of the Royal Family. It is a closed shop of the very rich, many from outside government but who, via these get togethers are able to exert a far from benign influence on all aspects of government.

David Cameron lives nearby and he and his wife are regular visitors to Burford Priory as well as the home of Charlie & Rebekah Brooks in Chipping Norton.

It is revealed today that in 2007, David Cameron was minded to appoint BBC man Guto Harri as his PR man when, allegedly, Rebekah Brooks intervened and requested that he appoint Andy Coulson instead. This would help his relations with News International and it would compensate Mr Coulson for falling on his sword and resigning as editor of the News of the World. Eventually as more sludge floated to the surface, Andy Coulson had to go. David Cameron was warned about the risks of this appointment long ago but he did not take the advice. But what is worse, Andy Coulson stayed at David Cameron's home after he had been forced to resign.

Everything about all this stinks. We have a closed circle of rich men and women from politics, the media and show-biz who think they know how to run the country in this secretive manner. It is a Mafia that works away fixing things for the select few who are very rich. It did not start with Cameron. Tony Blair was just as bad — if not worse. There are to be enquiries but such enquiries with senior judges appointed as chairman do not have a good reputation for changing things. All too often the terms of reference are limited so that nothing much will be revealed by an expensive and long-winded exercise in sophism. But how has to be the time to stop.

Today the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, Sir Paul Stephenson, resigned. He was responsible for hiring former News of the World Deputy Editor Neil Wallis as a PR consultant for the Met. Now he also is embroiled in the News International hacking scandal.

Yesterday in the Daily Mail, Max Hastings — a highly respected former newspaper editor, journalist and historian — deplored the fact that the great institutions of state are becoming tainted by venality and incompetence. He also attacked the cosy relationship between politicians and the media but also he directed his attack at the police, politicians, civil service, bankers, royalty and the Church. Everywhere there is an obsession with wealth but the whole is steeped in incompetence.

The country has major economic problems and the government has decided that a course of cuts is the solution. Cutting expenditure and improving efficiency in government is important but if we are to recover there has to be a programme that sets out how that recovery is to be achieved. I see no sign of that programme. The Establishment meets for parties and talks amongst itself but bankers continue to pay themselves vast amount of money for doing things that serve no purpose and many in the public services are paid obscene salaries for doing less than they did in the same jobs 10 or 20 years ago - and I am not thinking about inflation.

Max Hastings mourned the failings of so many departments of state, the failures in education, the irrelevance of the Church and the total lack of any leader that could take us out of the abyss.

Is there any reason to hope?

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William Tell

Poster Advertising the Premier of Rossini's Opera in 1829

I have just come into my office after listening tonight's Henry Wood Promenade Concert from the Royal Albert Hall. It was a concert performance of Rossini's last opera William Tell. This last great effort of Rossini produced a masterpiece which over the years has been hacked around, performed in bits, adapted and finally neglected almost into oblivion. I don't know when the opera was last performed in Britain. Covent Garden mounted a production in 1990, resurrected it once and then forgot about it. Previous to that they performed it in 1889. Has it been performed anywhere else? I suspect not.

I have loved the music of Rossini since I was a teenager. In those days — the early 1950s — the only Rossini opera that was performed regularly was The Barber of Seville. Occasionally someone had a go at La Cenerentola but there was not much else. There may have been performances in Italy at Rossini festivals but the musical establishment had little time for Rossini operas. They condemned Rossini as no more than a tune-smith and a writer of trivila operas. There are many wonderful overtures — some used several times by Rossini as introductions to various operas but the operas that followed these overtures were utterly ignored. In about 1955 I bought — or, more accurately, my father bought for me — a 3-LP set of the complete Barber of Seville with Victoria de los Angeles, Nicolai Monti, Gino Bechi and a splendid Nicola Rossi-Lemeni as Don Basilio. The Orchestra was made up of musicians mainly from La Scala conducted by Tullio Serafin — who definitely knew Verdi, personally, and probably Rossini as well. I enjoyed these records immensely and played the discs over and over again — learning the Italian words of many of the arias. Then, I thought, it seems odd that a composer could produce a masterwork like The Barber, lots of great overtures — including the great tone poem of William Tell — yet all the other operas — nearly 40 of them — were all rubbish. It did not make sense. So I searched for recordings of other operas. I have to say that I did not get very far. I did dig out Philips discs of extracts from Mosé and William Tell. Nicola Rossi-Lemeni was the Mosé and again there was much marvelous music. There were severe practical reasons for not performing this opera. Moses leads the Israelites out of Egypt and the waters of the Red Sea part to let them pass and then engulf the pursuing Egyptians. This is not easy to do on a stage.

But apart from these two discs there seemed little available until the early 1980s, when, suddenly, there was a great revival of interest in Rossini operas — stimulated by such performers as Joan Sutherland, Marilyn Horne and Samuel Ramey. Now, almost every Rossini opera is available complete on cd. I have quite a few including the William Tell, recorded in 1980 with Sherrill Milnes, Luciano Pavarotti, Mirella Freni and Nicolai Ghiaurov. but still live performances of this opera are few. Again there are technical reasons — like shooting an arrow through an apple and arranging for Tell to row out into a stormy Lake Lucerne. But above all is the problem of finding tenors who will tackle the part of Arnolde with its strings of high volume top notes.

Tonight's performance at the RAH appeared to be a complete revelation to all the supporting BBC staff and the musical experts. It was very much a display of absolute astonishment that Rossini — Senior Crescendo and the composer of a string of comic operas — could write grand opera on this scale and of this quality and then find it neglected for the best part of 200 years. Tonight's performance was rapturously received and so it deserved. This production was put together for Rome last year with the Orchestra del Accamaedia Santa Cecilia and conducted by Antonio Pappano. The conductor was thunderstruck when he worked on this last year and realised just what a great work this was. Is this Rossini really the same man who wrote The Barber of Seville? Has it taken nearly 200 years for the quality of this work to be appreciated? I think the answer is. unfortunately, a guarded yes! I hope now that it does not again become neglected. It was Rossini's last opera even though he lived for another 38 years after its composition. Did he pour everything into this and then realise that he had nothing left to give? I think, also, that as he got older, Rossini became more unsure of himself. As a young man he would dash off operas in a few weeks and never worry what others thought about his works — as long as he got paid. But later, I think he did worry. Consider his hesitations and doubts when he was composing his Petite Messe Solennelle towards the end of his life.

I don't know if the spirit of Rossini was anywhere near the RAH this evening. I hope that it was and if so, I am sure that the old maestro would have been pleased.

The opera William Tell sets the story of Tell and the Swiss resistance to Austrian rule. Today Otto von Hapsburg, until last week when he died at the age of 94, the last member of the Hapsburg dynasty that had oppressed Switzerland was buried in Vienna. Very fitting is it not?

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Guided Traffic Jams

As we grow older many of us tend to become clones of Victor Meldrew and prone to moaning about anything and everything but every day I do see and hear things which make me feel that this country is run by lunatics. Today I was caught up in considerable traffic jams in Crawley partly caused by the police closing the A23 during the rush hour in order to deal with an accident. The jam was exacerbated by the ridiculous guided bus system that still blights the town. This guided bus system was never more than a gimmick but a gimmick that cost £35,000.000 to install and much disruption over a period of about 18 months. Does it make a profit? It is subsidised but to what extent is not clear. Today as I sat in queues of traffic, an occasional guided bus came along, remotely operated the traffic lights and increased the delays. As I traversed the total length of Southgate Avenue I saw three guided buses and two conventional buses — which were not allowed to use the guided bus ways — and one of the guided buses was almost empty. While 50% of the available road space was made available to three buses the other 50% was being used by hundreds [thousands?] of cars, vans, trucks, taxis, ordinary buses, etc. The system is absurd. I told West Sussex County Council before they embarked on the project that guided buses was a daft idea and an utter waste of tax payers money. I have not changed that view. I am not opposed to all buses, guided buses just cost too much and get much more than their fair share of scarce road space. But all the arguments made in favour of buses in general seem to assume that a handful of buses with infinitely variable capacity can provide a service to all at all times which replace all the cars on the road, cut pollution, abolish parking problems, cut world fuel consumption and save the planet. None of this is true. Buses are environmentally friendly because there are not many of them.

In addition to my opposition to buses that have priority on the road in spite of the fact that they only account for about 5% to 10% of all passenger journeys there is the matter of traffic lights in general. The bureaucrats regard traffic lights as devices for stopping traffic from moving. In many countries in Europe traffic lights are used for the opposite purpose — to keep traffic moving. That is anathema for our traffic managers. In these days of computers, it should be possible to manage traffic lights in such a way that they maximise traffic flows and make 100 % use of the road space available. That does not happen here. Day after day I see traffic lights displaying green but no traffic; the traffic is held up by another set of lights which, when they change to green give the signal to the first set of lights to change to red and thus stop the traffic flow again. I have sat, impotent, eunuch like looking at acres of empty road waiting at a red light and then, as I see a green light and I move off another traffic light changes, triumphantly to red and I stop again. There is a large roundabout in Crawley that is controlled by traffic lights — lots of them — God knows what it all cost — and it is possible to see this wondrous scheme operating with queues of traffic on every road leading into the roundabout, all held up by traffic lights and to see the roundabout and its multiplicity of traffic lanes completely denuded of all motor vehicles. How can this be, I ask myself? But. so far, I have been unable to offer any possible explanation other than, as I said, this country is run by lunatics.

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Something Rotten in Deepest Wapping

I have had another couple of weeks of silence, mainly because of jobs going on in my home and doing a bit of extra time in the gym. During this time, I have been reading in the newspapers the daily goings-on in the saga of the phone hacking, etc in News International. Today, Sunday will see the last edition of the News of the World, a newspaper that has existed for 168 years and is now brought down by the criminal activities of a sanctimonious group of very rich people. As those of you who have been keeping your eyes on this story will know, it all started with the alleged tapping of the phones of various politicians and show-biz personalities. But it has moved on from that and now it seems that thousands of people have had their phones tapped, including murdered girl Millie Dowler, the two girls Jessica Chapmen and Holly Wells murdered in Sohom in 2003 and the relatives of servicemen killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Added to this sick tale, it is alleged that various police officers have been bribed to provide information. James Murdoch has tried to hush up the story by handing out compensation. Former editor Andy Coulson was involved at some stage and he became David Cameron's press officer, in spite of several prominent people warning him that Coulson was toxic. Also toxic is Rebekah Brooks the Chief Executive who was editor of the News of the World when the worst abuses occurred. It seems that she and James Murdoch will keep their jobs while the uninvolved present staff of The News of the World will all lose their jobs. The story has further to go and there seems little doubt that eventually Rebekah Brooks will have to go.

The worst part of this tale of slime is the deep involvement of various politicians and the super-rich. The Chipping Norton set they are being called. David Cameron is a close friend of Rebekah Brooks and her husband Charlie Brooks. David Cameron and his wife were guests over Christmas at their house in Chipping Norton — located, ironically, in Hackers Lane — with James Murdoch present as well. Also in the Chipping Norton set is Matthew Freud, PR fixer and married to Rupert Murdoch's daughter Elisabeth. In 2008, the Camerons were flown in Freud's private jet to see Murdoch on his yacht off the coast of Greece. George Osborne is part of the crowd as is Nat Rothschild — tax exile and billionaire financier — and Peter Mandelson. Blair was part of this during his days in No 10 and it now seems that he tried to get Gordon Brown to try to shut down any investigation into phone hacking. He refused. Most of us have believed that politics in this country has been relatively non-corrupt but these revelations indicate that not to be true. It is totally unacceptable to have a media baron like Murdoch controlling government in this country, popping in and out of Downing Street by the back door, as he has done for many a year. In addition it is clear that News International has played fast and loose with the law and there was much corruption in what they did. The full story must now be unravelled. Murdoch must never again be allowed to control government in this way. Nor must he be allowed to get his hands on any more of BSkyB. He certainly is not a fit and proper person to control a huge media empire almost without control.

Rebekah Brooks has been revealed as a totally self-centred career woman who had not the slightest interest in the News of the World or its history or its staff. All that mattered was that it be used to promoted her career.

Last week, James Murdoch put out a statement about why they were closing the News of the World and what struck me was that he spoke of the paper as though it were some remote entity over which he had neither control nor knowledge. It is a consistent streak through all this story that everyone in charge tells us that they did not know what was happening. If this is true they should have and they are surely responsible. When the first stories of hacking came out they should have investigated thoroughly to ensure that anything rotten was rooted out. They did not because they knew it was rotten and they were complicit in the cancer.

To lose any newspaper is a great loss. The News of the World is gone not because of its own failings but because of its super-rich owners and managers and their arrogant contempt for their staff and their readers. Many times in its history, the paper made mistakes but it was responsible for digging up some stories of corruption and wrong-doing that needed to be revealed.

Goodbye NotW. Good Luck to all who sailed in her.

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