Striking the Balance

[Ian G Batten]

On Wed, 30 Oct 2002, David Hansen wrote:

> Holyrood parliament works fine (after a few alleged teething 
> troubles) and allows votes to take place in minutes. That's in the 
> UK, so the excuse that it may work in the EU parliament but it will 
> never work in the UK does not apply.

Mother of parliaments, long traditions, Lord Palmerston, dramatic votes,
Chips Channon, digestive biscuits, where are my tablets?  Austin
Mitchell on Today this morning couldn't speak a sentence without
boasting how much MPs used to drink and how often they votes while
paralytic.  My, Austin, what big men that must make you.

> What I find fascinating is the complete failure of joined up 
> thinking, or whatever it's called this week. One bit of government is 
> busy re-instating the removed bits from OS maps at places like 
> Aldermaston. Instead of bland conturs (and railway lines that stop 

I have the front gate at RAF Fylingdale on my GPS box for no particular
reason, the top carpark at GCHQ from when I parked there to do some
consulting, a site a mile or so from Aldermaston (Auspex's offices),
most of the London mainline stations, quite a few international
airports, a random spot over Canada which I waymarked as a spectacular
view out of the window of a plane and have never got around to looking
up on a map, quite a few spots in Lisbon so I can get around there when
I'm out on business, ditto Belfast, ditto San Francisco, ditto New York,
random points all over northern France from various holidays, ditto
Cornwall, all the junctions on the M42 between the M5 and the M6.

Job for the week: download the waymarks, plot a map, pop it on my
website.

> the same time another bit of government is busy making it illegal to 
> have an OS map which contains these buildings. You couldn't make it 
> up.

To be fair, and every word I type pains me grievously, the
interpretation of ``useful to a terrorist'' will have to await a case.
I presume there would be, and the pain in my chest is building, some
sort of sliding scale from ``information you bought in a shop which they
could buy in a shop as well'' to ``information loveingly collected over
the course of many years which renders a terrorist task practical''.
The stabbing sensation is still there, you understand.  Yes, it's
egregiouis nonsense, but the example you quote is, I think, unlikely to
be valid.  A better example would be a trainspotter whose notebook
collects the numbers and locations of the white trains.

ian