wrighty

Don't listen to the naysayers. Nothing wrong with laminate flooring - it's reasonably priced, hard-wearing, warmer than lino and better looking, and far more cleanable than carpet. Buy the right composite material and it's also water resistant. It's pretty easy to lay yourself, especially the glueless clip together stuff that seems to be prevalent these days. If for whatever reason you're not able to do it yourself, I reckon that anyone that advertises themselves as a general handyman would be more than competent at doing it.

New Statesman on 10.30pm ITV tonight

Really sad news. I've only just bought the young ones on DVD to watch with the kids. His finest work however for me was The New Statesman.

I've always thought that running water and sewage removal are basic household needs, and should probably be provided, free (i.e. out of general taxation) for all - within reason. I'd install water meters. Water being free up to a certain amount (per capita) and then charged for by usage. Therefore, if you're reasonably careful you pay nothing, but if you own a swimming pool and re-fill it every so often you get hit big time. As for sewage - why not a flat rate for every toilet in the house, first one free. Live in a big mansion with 5 en-suite bedrooms, you pay more. Those with septic tanks pay to get them emptied, with one free emptying per year. Simple.

I'd vote for bacon and bread. Perhaps some cheese.

Perhaps because it's possible to do without a replacement TV for a week if the boat doesn't go, and carry on using your current outfits. My understanding is that we've got about a week's food on the shelves, and if we had 7 days without a sailing the UN would have to start dropping food parcels.

Someone recommended these guys to me - pretty impressive.

The point is that staff are very worried about accusations of racism/classism/any other sort of discrimination. If you have a blanket policy of enquiry it is less likely things will get missed. Abuse may not present as abuse. I'd rather a few middle class parents were upset by polite enquiry than some poor kid be sent home to more abuse because everything looked alright. Child protection is an absolute nightmare and I'm glad I'm not really involved in it. Several high profile paediatricians have had ruined careers over entirely spurious allegations made by affronted parents - look up David Southall for an example. Policies and 'tick sheet' approaches have to be in place to protect both children and involved professionals.

When I worked at Alder Hey, every child under 3 admitted with a fracture was seen by the paediatricians to consider the possibility of non-accidental injury. It was standard policy. Some parents didn't like it, as of course 'they' weren't child abusers, and ones (like me and everyone reading this!) that clearly weren't abusers were very quickly reassured that all was fine. The odd one where there was suspicion was fully investigated. Nanny state, some may say. Pity the hospital that dealt with Baby P didn't have the same level of surveillance a few years ago.