I was impressed by Jack Wilshere last Saturday.

I was impressed by Jack Wilshere playing for England v Wales last Saturday. Perhaps it represents a change of policy for his Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger to try and develop local talent. I read in the Sunday Times that Arsenal is the team, which has employed the most foreigners in the last few years and Arsene always complains about the alleged rough-house tactics of lesser teams such as Stoke, something never stated by Man Utd's Fergie, who usually treats the opposition with
respect. However, Arsenal have a good chance of winning the league this year and it will be interesting to see if they take it.

It must be hard for Wilshere playing with the least-talented Brazilian (Denilson) in the Premier League, although there are reports that a host of Brazilian youngsters will be joining Man Utd soon like Fabio and Rafael with the scam of getting Portuguese passports. Personally, I don't think Fabio and Rafael will make it as full backs since they are too small and you just lob the ball over their heads. Denilson is apparently a home-grown player but if that is true I am a banana.

Dave looks a bit weak about the Big Society

British prime minister David Cameron did not look too convincing about his promotion of the "Big Society" yesterday. Anyway that is my view. In most areas the local council is the main player because it holds the purse strings and thereby has the resources to carry out projects.
Although councils can be much maligned in many locations they do have the expertise to help run schools and look after the elderly. Perhaps these activities can be outsourced to private providers to save money but look at the problems of the private care home operator Southern Cross loaded up with debt by private equity
purchasers.

In addition, it is a sad state of affairs that most English people do not want to volunteer for anything. Most don't want to know their neighbours and perhaps we have a duplication of charities (too many of them). Existing volunteers are perhaps dismayed by the lack of a new generation of people coming through.

Also, the British government has no shown no sign of working with civil institutions such as trade unions, churches, mosques, temples etc, which already do their best in helping people participate in society.

It looks like Dave and Gideon are feeling the heat.

Dear Reader, it looks like the Old Etonian mafia are feeling the heat. The Royal British Legion has accused the government of breaking the military covenant while increased job losses in the pipeline are not going to help stimulate economic confidence. Some public sector workers (and I say this with a heavy heart) will not find private sector conditions very conducive. Lower holidays, can't go on sickies and no pension plan (although we will have this stuff and nonsense called NEST coming your way soon)are not particularly attractive to some people in the UK public sector (especially amongst Catholic public sector people in Northern Ireland, I suppose it is part of a Gandhi-style disobedience campaign).

I am sure disaffected public sector voters will vote for Labour at the next election but if this is four years away then it would be simply too late for them. New Labour had already initiated cutbacks in the National Health Service (NHS)such as the planned closure of A&E departments like Enfield Chase Farm. (See Note***)

Changing the subject it is a shame NEST was not up and running a few years ago and we would still have some more British companies, which have been since swallowed up by foreigners, to invest in. The roll-call includes Cadburys, Smith & Nephew, Wellstream and British Oxygen (BOC). Here, everything is up for sale. The City is like Wimbledon. We host the tournament but don't win it. Even the Spanish bought up Bristol Water, Luton Aiport, BAA and O2. While our major investment was the massive amount of money wasted on the Vodafone acquisition of the German company Mannesmann Telecom.
Makes you glad to be English!!

Gawd knows why the London Stock Exchange (LSE) wants to merge with Toronto Stock Exchange. I suppose it is to get rid of the threats from the French and Germans.


Note*** Chase Farm was originally a profitable hospital then it was shunted into a joint operation with Barnet General. Now it is threatened with closure because greedy w***ers see a nice little earner selling off the site for houses

Are we going for the double dip recession?

I don't think David Cameron and George Osborne will be happy bunnies with today's
disappointing quarterly GDP's figures. I suppose blaming the bad weather is a pretty lame excuse. With a limited manufacturing sector it would always be a big ask. The 0.5 pct fall in GDP joins the shocking inflation figures with economic commentators saying the Bank of England has lost the plot. The British central bank is certainly behind the curve and can only keep its fingers crossed.

Sorry for the long New Year/Xmas break!!

Dear Readers, sorry for the long New Year/Xmas break!! I have been having problems with things such as the black dog and with how many promises the Coalition government can break. Today's unemployment figures are disappointing and it was naive of the Cameron-Clegg administration to think that the private sector in the UK would take up the jobs lost in the public sector.

Over the Xmas period I was in Spain and we share similar problems such as very high youth unemployment. Our relatively flexible labour market has not been able to sort out this problem either.

Apparently, the Spanish economy is so troubled that the number of non-European Union workers has actually gone down. On the Easyjet plane back it was 95 pct full of Spanish passengers, who looked like they were coming back to study or to work. It is going to be tough going for our own youngsters (English ones), who are discriminated against in terms of university fees and job opportunities.

Well are we on home strait for World Cup bid?

Whenever I read about our World Cup bid (a bit of a misnomer because we are not prepared to pay the commissions required) I am always amazed about the news management we put up with in the UK. Last night both the ITV and the BBC interviewed David Beckham, who was upbeat about the bid, without mentioning the fact that the Russians were favourites with the Spanish/Portuguese. Although there would be different time zones, which would probably affect television coverage, I am quite happy for the competition to go to Russia. We have already got the white elephant of the 2012 Olympics, where I suppose there will be the benefits of opening up a part of East London and of West Ham moving to a new ground.

The main advantage for our World Cup bid is that we have the stadia in place such as
Wembley, Old Trafford and the Emirates. There would not be major distances for fans to travel and there would be the added bonus of our football yobs not having to travel abroad. I suppose this will all be irrelevant after the BBC's Panorama programme on FIFA.

If we did not get the 2018 competition, at least we would avoid the embarrassment of England being knocked out in the qualifying round. With the Premier League you could not set up a more inimical structure to the interests of the national team. How many
domestic players get picked for Arsenal?

David Cameron and his vanity staff!!

There are claims that British Prime Minister David Cameron used the announcement of the royal wedding to bury the "bad news" that his personal photographer and his wife's stylist would not be going on the government payroll after all. I don't believe these claims at all but the proposed appointments did show an unhealthy interest in media management. Well, at least we have got the new term "vanity staff" in the UK political language.

What is perhaps more worrying is the pressure on the BBC to delay a Panorama programme on the World Cup bidding process because it would annoy FIFA. I think the
BBC's independence should be cherished more than winning the right to host the
World Cup.