Man the barricades. Halt the trains. Stop the busses. Hold the trains. Close the airports. Seal the Channel Tunnel. Clear the streets. Declare an emergency. Mobilise the Civil Contingencies Unit. Cancel all police leave. Hold a COBRA meeting. Pull the TV schedules for rolling news coverage. Bring Kate Adie out of retirement. Close the schools […]
Author: GavinDrake
Game over for Julian Assange’s sexual offence charges? Perhaps not!
UPDATE (9 September 2015): the Crown Prosecution Service and the Ministry of Justice have been in contact with me to say that the provisions of Section 72 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 only apply to crimes committed against people aged under 18. This means that the entire premise of this blog post is wrong. […]
Can we PLEASE have some honesty from our politicians?
One of the things that you become aware of as a writer on religion is how much religious illiteracy there is in the country. But over the past few months, as my writing has veered more towards politics rather than religion, I have noticed that there is a far greater political illiteracy – particularly so when […]
The week that Walsall beat England
Well, not quite! But I was slightly amused yesterday, when it dawned on me that in the space of seven days I was on the pitch at Wembley addressing more than 72,000 football fans for a Saddlers match on the Sunday; and then the following Saturday I was on the pitch at Walsall addressing less than […]
I’m really not convinced the Wemley Stadium station announcer needs to be this loud
This is what the announcer at Wembley Stadium Station sounds like… …From the 10th floor of the nearby Holiday Inn. I really do not think that he really needs to be anywhere near this loud! VID-20150322-00000.MP4
You may not have heard, but there was an eclipse of the sun today…
…and this was the scene from Salford Quays in Manchester – taken from the car park at the rear of the Ramada Hotel.
The General Election televised Leaders Debates fiasco
Late last night, the Prime Minister’s director of communications, Craig Oliver, delivered what appears to be a devastating blow to the broadcasters’ plans for a series of leaders debates I’m the run up to the General Election. In his letter, the PM’s spin doctor says that David Cameron is prepared to appear in just one […]
The Bishop of Lichfield’s police incident
My old boss, Jonathan Gledhill, yesterday announced that he will retire from his post as the 98th bishop of Lichfield later this year after 40 years in ordained ministry. So I thought it may be an appropriate time to shed some light on a certain police incident! Before I returned to the purer (or darker, […]
Big Centre TV – Television as it should be
Last night, local commercial television returned to the Midlands. Big Centre TV is the new local channel for Birmingham, the Black Country and Solihull; and is available on Freeview channel 8 (you may need to retune your sets). London Live, the local TV service for London has hit a problem and has twice asked Ofcom to […]
The Grammys: Gospel and contemporary Christian music winners
Way way back, many centuries ago (okay, the early 1990s, actually), I cut my journalistic teeth on the UK’s contemporary Christian music magazine Cross Rhythms. In recent years I’ve been privately lamenting the loss of Britain’s Christian music scene. There just doesn’t seem to be the same market, scene or buzz around Christian music. There […]