This is a question many people in the National Health Service (NHS) must be asking themselves after a leaked document revealed that staff in the south-west of England will have to work more, get less, whilst still adhering to those strict targets set up for trusts all over the country.
I believe everybody understands that there will be pay cuts/freezes for people in all sectors, but those in the NHS are seemingly being hit over and over and over again. The latest comes from a leaked document which reveals the following. Staff will have to deal with:
Salary reductions across the board.
Even more cuts to their allowances.
Considerably more hours.
The amount of leave they have per year reduced.
Mass changes to their sickness benefits.
And to put the flies on the pile of faeces, they will all be dismissed and will have to reapply for their own jobs.
And this is ignoring absolutely everything to do with NHS pensions. So if they are earning less after these changes whilst still having to pay more then what’s left? Why would anybody want to work for the public healthcare system in this country? Let’s get one thing straight. The health system is one of the toughest to work in as hours are long, targets are strict, and it gets battered by disgruntled members of the public and the media on a consistent basis. It’s like they are trying to destroy the whole thing and turn us into an Americanised copy.
Let’s look at one area of the health system that’s tiny these days. The dentists. Now, have you ever tried getting an appointment with a dentist in this country outside of the private sector? If you haven’t then I assure you that you certainly won’t find it easy as there are so few dentists. Yes, it’s true that all dentists in this country have to go through a few years of training in the public system before going into private practice, but how many of them are going to stay? You get less than private practice and you are under the control of somebody else, what’s the point?
All these changes are going to do is continue to push the brightest and the best out of this country and into the waiting arms of another country. Alternatively, if they decide to stay then they are probably either going to create or join a private practice instead. So tell me one thing, exactly how does the government hope to keep a fresh and competitive health system when they are constantly throwing people out of it with their ludicrous changes? I hope for the future of the NHS that their answer is a pretty damn good one.
It’s been two weeks since we were able to see the final Planet Earth Live on our television screens. We had Top Gear legend Richard Hammond presenting live from Kenya throughout the programme with updates from Julia Bradbury based in North America. It was billed as a truly epic piece of television, and one that would be talked about for years and years as a pioneer of wildlife television. I found it fascinating. It was truly a beautiful series, but it wasn’t all that innovative.In fact, the only live parts of it were from Hammond and Bradbury during their pieces to camera. The rest? Well, that was all pre-recorded.
The most important aspect of a series like this is the animals. Wild animals in their surroundings, allowing us to see just how stunning animals across the globe really are. Whilst we were able to witness said animals in their natural environment, it wasn’t live, as many people thought it would and should have been. In fact, we saw the animals throughout various clips that had been edited for time purposes and to show only the best parts – some may argue this is good as it cuts out the boring parts, while others, myself included, think that is what makes it so unique. Seeing the animals interacting in such a way, during a live piece of television really would have captivated my imagination and made me want to see more.
Instead, what we got was two presenters, simply interjecting between some stunning videography. To be fair, the presenters were there to stitch the story together, and I understand that. But to have the best part of the programme pre-recorded, and the less important part filmed live seems to really baffle me – the animals should have been the stars, not the presenters.
I’m not stupid, and I do understand that to perhaps capture the important moments in the world of these animals is time-consuming and the camera operators would need to be extremely patient. This goes some way to explaining lack of live action we got to see as viewers. Many viewers took to social networking site Twitter to air their disappointment with Planet Earth Live. A selection of these tweets can be found below:
Lauren Grandidge @LaurenisGrand – ‘Really trying to give #planetearthlive a second go but find it less informative and more patronising. And wish RH would stop with the hands!’
Danny Brooke @DaRkDaN89 – ‘This PlanetEarthLive is pointless. It’s not ‘live’ it’s presented ‘live’ the content is all pre-recorded :/’
Jordan Harkness @_jordanharkness – ‘That PlanetEarthLive is a farce. 70% of it is in fact, not live.’
Simon @MrFlibble81 – ‘This PlanetEarthLive show is not very “live” is it, I’ve seen about 30 seconds of live footage so far, & that’s all been Hammond talking!!’
Twitter is an important tool for media, and this shows why. Producers can really sense audience reaction to their products. In this case, I think it’s important to note that if Planet Earth Live is commissioned for a second series, then it needs to really live up to its tag of being ‘live’; featuring more animals in their environment during live shots, and capturing some truly stunning aspects on live television. That way, viewers could really enjoy the programme a lot more, and really become immersed in the magic of the beautiful environments featured throughout.
It’s important to flip this argument though; does it really matter that it isn’t live? Surely, if we have access to the stunning footage we do, then why should it matter? Some users on Twitter also tweeted their reactions to the show.
Khalid A Shah @KShah_K – ‘BBC’s #PlanetEarthLive is truly a great show. Don’t know why the presenters try dramatise it, the animals manage that all on their own.’
Hadleigh @hadleigh_x – ‘Despite 95% of the programme not actually being live, Planet Earth Live is rather entertaining’
Dave Peat @davepeat86 – ‘PlanetEarthLive is not a bad watch, seriously lacking David Attenborough though! #legend‘
It’s obvious to see that some viewers feel that the sheer beauty of the animals, surroundings and the unprecedented access to such beautiful animals around the world is all that matters, not whether it is live or not. I just wonder why the BBC pushed for the live aspect so much, if they weren’t truly going to honour what viewers would have wanted.
Seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twel…damn there’s a lot of boats on the River Thames today. I hope one of them doesn’t sink, although I admit that I do have my fingers crossed. Still, it’s better than listening to more garbage from a banker/politician/some random civilian. I just wish that the BBC would reveal to me the news for today.
Political Oops of the Week
This is going to sound awful, but I laughed at the Syria massacre this week. Now, I know what you’re thinking, but you are wrong. I wasn’t laughing at the fact that many people were slaughtered by armed terrorists, or as the rest of the world call it: the Syrian Government. I was laughing at the fact that the UN is so inept and is so useless that it’s laughable.
Instead of actually taking action this week all they did was repeatedly condemn it with meaningless words on the news channel, as well as promising action that will never come. But it’s not just because what happened this time, it’s because it happens all the time. If you are really so “outraged” then surely you should be doing something about it?
You know I consider this a political oops because it shadows the failed League of Nations from the early 20th century. And we all know what happened when the failure of that organisation grew and grew. We ended up dealing with the single biggest conflict in human history. I’m not saying that the Syria massacre is going to cause that, but it really does highlight the failures of the organisation when it comes to actually enforcing its will across the globe.
This will be your fault, UN. Condemn that!
The Painful…
The fact that Piers Morgan hasn’t been assassinated yet, the unfortunate truth that people are starving all over the world, but nothing was more painful than what I had to witness on Saturday night. Yes, England v Belgium. That was perhaps the single most painful thing I’ve had to watch in very recent memory. If England honestly believe that they stand a chance against any relevant teams then they are sadly mistaken.
What the game last night showed was that sometimes football can be the most mind numbing experience on the planet. England simple held their shape and waited for Belgium to give them the ball, and when they had the ball they just passed it around without making many incisive movements. The only good part was the end as that’s when they actually decided to play football.
That about sums up England's authenticity.
All England v Belgium showed was that the team is still weak. It’s still a team of individuals playing for themselves. And they are still inferior to many other countries on the planet. The English league might be the best league in the world, but that’s certainly not because of the English players.
…And the Pointless
We’ve all seen the story about the British woman who was caught smuggling cocaine in Indonesia; the Bali area to be exact. Rachel Dougall was the woman involved in this. She was arrested at the airport with over 4kg of cocaine in blocks, and that’s about £1.56m in street value. And all she could do was try to defend herself by saying that she did it for her sons who were under threat from bad people in Britain. Well boo hoo!
The fact is that you are guilty. You have been caught smuggling cocaine into Indonesia. The authorities were right when in similar terms they expressed that they couldn’t care less and it makes absolutely no difference. She did it. End of story.
What irritates me is that the BBC is acting as if she is the victim here though. She is not the victim. She is a felon and Britain can’t help her as she has broken the laws of that country. And now we are listening to stories about how she’s losing her mind in the police holding cells. Good! That’s how it’s supposed to work, it’s called prison. Just because our prisons are softer than a caramel-covered marshmallow doesn’t mean everybody else’s is. You are guilty. You are going to die. And you have nobody to blame but yourself. Now please just end the almost-daily coverage of her, please.
The So Outrageous that it’s Borderline Hilarious
Do you know when some lard-packing doughnut master walks down the street and you just think to yourself: “What a fat bastard.”? Well if you act on it in the future then that could be a hate crime. Unbelievably, MPs were actually debating the idea on making calling someone fat a hate crime. What an absolute joke this country really is sometimes. If you’re fat, you’re fat. It’s not a hate crime, it’s the truth. If you can’t fit through the doors at your local fast food restaurant then you are fat; or you’re wearing a large costume.
If this went through then it would be on par with racism and being homophobic. So if you’re a fat bastard and somebody refers to you as such then you could get them arrested. But in reality there’s not even any reasoning behind this. With racism you are born the colour you are so you can’t change a thing. With homophobic remarks you have the tastes you do and you can’t change that. If you’re fat then you can probably change that. The problem is that you are too busy sitting down eating an extra-large curry and threatening to blow a hole in the sofa with a mini nuclear warhead coming out of your rectal launch sites.
I’m quite frankly tired of this idea that we have to make everybody feel great about themselves. Why a disgusting, overweight tub of goo should be made to feel great about themselves when what they are doing is on the level of self-harm is beyond rational thought. We seem to think slicing your wrists open in a dark corner of your black-painted bedroom is a problem, so why not binge eating and making yourself into the second coming of Godzilla?
So maybe next week won’t be so bleak and irritating after all…
If there’s anything that’s truly a fixture of the world we live in then it certainly has to be the fact that we always have to think that every child is depressed because they’re not happy. A recent BBC article really highlighted the whole depressed people thing today as it reported that 1,000 under 18s had been referred to mental health teams in Sussex.
We’ve actually had this turn up quite a few times now as a few years ago there was a big media storm over the subscribing of antidepressants to young people. Now, depression is a strange beast. It’s not something that’s imaginary, like certain people would have you believe. It doesn’t necessarily mean that the person is weak either. What it means is that when depression is genuine something needs to be done. The problem is that you can be diagnosed with depression at the slightest thing these days.
Obviously, the number of children who are depressed is going to be higher due to the fact that this isn’t something that was taken seriously; mental health problems as a whole weren’t taken seriously. We also have to acknowledge that our population has increased significantly over the years so the number of depressed people will naturally increase.
What people have to acknowledge is that being sad once in a while does not equal depression. Depression can come in many forms, but it isn’t occasional. Some depressed people may switch between happy and sad every few hours, or it may even be prolonged periods of happy and sad over months. This is depression and these people need help, they are the genuine ones, and many of the ones who claim to have depression today won’t fall into these groups.
What would make a child fall into depression, though?
I’m not going to go into the blatantly obvious things like an abusive household because that’s plain obvious and it would be an insult to dedicate half of a page to it. Some people believe that the accessibility of the world’s events is to blame. There’s no doubt that the world is a depressing place to be in, and this worry and anxiety that’s always permeated the mass media will naturally fall on the heads of children. And children will have access to all of this stuff because they are usually more technology orientated than most adults.
Another reason? Well there’s the argument that the stress of school is a major factor, but I completely disagree with this for the most part as that’s always been present and we are seeing a spike in the number of depressed children in recent years. I would agree that those who are bullied on a regular basis may garner some depression as being bullied is a traumatic experience. I, myself, was bullied and I had a horrible time for years, but luckily for me the chav bastard died at the age of 18 from an ‘unlucky’ brain aneurysm. I’m very happy about what happened and it did lift a weight off my shoulders as I did believe that justice was done, but such karmic justice isn’t present for many people. I understand that many children who don’t have their bullying issues resolved will feel cheated, and that will certainly contribute to depression.
An over exaggerated representation of karmic justice.
However, what I believe the main reason is is the lack of parental love in the world these days. There’s no getting away from the fact that many depressed people don’t have the support or regular companionship of their parents. And this can be attributed to many things. Some may argue that it’s declining family values. Some may argue that it’s because most families tend to have both parents who work for long periods these days. I believe that it’s due to the fact that many parents don’t realise what they are doing. If a parent decides to forgo spending time with their child for an hour or two then what happens? Usually, absolutely nothing so they believe that everything is ok when really it’s not.
This is usually when we start seeing the spoiled brat who has all of these presents and gifts and yet they are still upset. Many people can’t fathom why someone with everything could be so upset. But what they don’t take into account is that material goods can’t substitute long-term love and affection. It just doesn’t work. There’s absolutely no correlation between amount of material goods and long-term happiness. In fact, that’s how those with everything can still become depressed. This is due to a psychological incident known as hedonic adaptation (or the hedonic treadmill), which is where humans become happy when they receive material goods and revert back to emotional stability after the initial period of euphoria is over.
Materials are temporary. Love is forever. That’s why your kids are supposedly depressed.
I’m even more excited than usual to be writing a review of this British-made Second World War drama because not only does it tell an incredible story based on actual wartime events but also because it follows on rather satisfyingly from an earlier article I scribbled entitled ‘Podcasts – an alternative to bad TV’. For it was while listening to a podcast from the unfailingly listenable Sarah and Deblina from ‘Stuff You Missed In History Class’ that I learned all about “Operation Mincemeat” – a highly devious and clandestine plan British Intelligence cooked up in 1943 to deceive the Nazis into thinking a planned Allied invasion of Sicily would take place elsewhere.
The Man Who Never Was was made in 1956 and, directed by that stalwart of British cinema Ronald Neame, it tells how that deception was accomplished. Neame produced such celebrated pictures as Brief Encounter, Great Expectations and Oliver Twist in the 1940s before turning director in ’47 and delivering such cinematic gold as Tunes of Glory, The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie and The Poseidon Adventure. His career, from humble assistant cameraman on the first ever “talkie” made in England went on to span six decades and he was awarded the CBE in the 1996 Queen’s Birthday Honours List for his services to the film industry.
The film is based on the book of the same name by Ewen Montagu who, while serving as a Lt. Cmdr. in Naval intelligence during WWII was responsible for conceiving “Operation Mincemeat”. Clifton Webb portrays him in the picture. The premise of the story is that in order to attempt to divert German forces away from Sicily, an invasion of which the Allies have planned in order to open up the Mediterranean to Allied shipping, a deception is needed to convince the Germans that the Allied objective is really Greece and Sardinia.
“Operation Mincemeat” came into being when an idea was suggested to Montagu early in 1943 that if a dead man carrying top-secret documents which contained intelligence about a fake invasion was to fall into enemy hands and that if those documents were convincing enough to be believed, the Germans might move part of their forces from Sicily to Greece and Sardinia, thereby sparing the lives of countless Allied troops during the real invasion. Of course, even if the plan was given the green light by his superiors, where would Montagu get a dead body and if he did, what of the moral dilemma? After all, “Every body belongs to somebody and it isn’t a thing people want messed about” runs a line in the film. Also how would Montagu convince the Germans that the dead body was the sort of person who would be carrying such sensitive documents and equally, how would he convince them that the documents themselves are genuine etc etc? It’s almost guaranteed that the German High Command would investigate the man and the documents for authenticity.
It’s an absolutely fascinating story and the film does a great job of re-telling it. The lengths that Montagu and his small team go to to create a fictitious “life” for the corpse that they acquire is extraordinary – the dead body belonged to a Welsh man named Glyndwr Michael in life but then became Captain William Martin of the Royal Marines in death. Even though the film adds just a little fictitious sparkle to proceedings, the level of detail written into the screenplay lends the film a great sense of realism. The pace throughout the hundred or so minutes of the movie is steady rather than spectacular but it promotes genuine intrigue and it builds to a wonderfully tense conclusion thanks to the introduction of an Irish spy played by Stephen Boyd. Although this latter character was a complete fabrication, Montagu later said he was happy with it because despite the fact that there wasn’t a spy involved, there may well have been.
“A dead man goes to war!” cried one of the taglines that went with the film upon its release and with that, I’ll reveal no more as to how exactly that happens – it’s definitely worth checking out. But I will say that the cast is top notch – lots of familiar faces from a golden age of British cinema including Laurence Naismith, Geoffrey Keen and Michael Hordern while Ewan Montagu himself has a cameo role of an Air-Vice Marshal. There’s even a romance entwined within the plot which, as you will see, becomes a crucial subplot to maintaining the deception’s secrecy.
All in all, it’s a terrific film telling a fantastic and extraordinary true story. I shall end by simply saying you never what you can learn from podcasts. I knew nothing about this covert operation until a few days ago but now I’m all the more educated for learning about it and to see it told well in a film is a satisfying bonus. Thanks Sarah and Deblina from ‘Stuff You Missed In History Class’. I eagerly await your next episode.
