Hardly a week goes by without a business magnate or government minister moaning about how the planning system is exploited and clogged up by those opposing development. Here is a story of how it works the other way round – of how big business can exploit the system to bully local communities and councils into… Continue reading What do wind developers do when they lose the planning argument? Get nasty…
Read moreIt is the time of the year when the great divide between the salaried and the self-employed is at its widest. For one group, there will be the usual pay-slip at the end of the month, while the other faces that painful moment of reckoning which is the tax deadline. At these moments, it is… Continue reading In an age of team-building, we all need more solitude
Read moreIn these prim and disapproving times, the breaking news that men become stupider in the presence of women is unlikely to win much sympathy. There will be knowing, irritating female chuckles over breakfast tables across the country at the revelation that male cognitive resources are “depleted” by the exhausting business of trying to impress a… Continue reading Sex and the absurdity of male optimism
Read moreMost of the time, those of us who happen to live in the country are happy to ignore the casual urban prejudice which characterises British politics and the media. Now and then, though, the level of metropolitan silliness reaches a level which is impossible to ignore. Those occasions tend to occur when big decisions affecting… Continue reading Enough of the townie prejudice against the countryside
Read moreSHARE  +MORE Ads by Google Static Caravans For Sale Static Caravans at 39 Coastal Parks From £9,995 With 2013 Pitch Fees! www.park-resorts.com/caravan-sales Still a Girl Hunter? Date with Chinese beauty, To Love & be loved in Chnlove! www.ChnLove.asia 9 Best Stocks to Own Now Here’s a list of recommendations that several top analysts agree… Continue reading Don’t sneer if a Big Mac helps your children to read
Read moreThe Danes, as they never tire of telling us, are famously happy. Whenever there’s a global wellbeing survey, Denmark sits smugly at its summit while Britain skulks in the gloomy foothills between Estonia and South Korea. There is, though, one area of human behaviour in which we are considerably more evolved than the cheerful Danes,… Continue reading We’re not world class at many things, but looking after animals is one
Read moreWith perfect timing, the image-builders who play such an important part in marketing the Royal Family have chosen the first days of the new year to launch phase two of “Project Queen of Hearts”. The charities who have found favour in the eyes of the country’s new princess – Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge –… Continue reading Things go better with Kate
Read moreOne of the enduring wonders of modern life is the inability of policymakers to understand that actions tend to have obvious consequences. Allow bars and pubs to open longer and alcoholism will increase. Encourage supermarkets to expand and local high streets will soon become dead zones. Anyone with half a brain could anticipate these consequences,… Continue reading Match-fixing is a curse the UK invited in
Read moreThe end of 2011 brings a moment of small satisfaction to some of us in the prediction business. Many of the past year’s major events – Jeremy Clarkson making a fool of himself, Nick Clegg looking more miserable every month, the embarrassments of Silvio Berlusconi – were exclusively predicted in these pages. What does 2012… Continue reading Predictions for 2012
Read moreThere was a time when one knew where one was with Christmas cards. It was a matter of counting, or perhaps weighing, what the postman had delivered. If, by a rough and ready calculation, the incoming was about the same as the outgoing, it meant that, socially, professionally, you were still more or less afloat.… Continue reading Home-made or just very small? The truth about your Christmas cards
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