Archive for February, 2013
Word of the day: meteorism
February 20th, 2013 by Roger Darlington
“Hitler suffered acutely from meteorism: perhaps he did not suffer so acutely as those around him, since meteorism is uncontrolled farting, a condition exacerbated by Hitler’s strictly vegetarian diet.” This is a quote from a book I’m currently reading: “Hitler: A Short Biography” by A N Wilson.
Posted in Cultural issues, History | Comments (0)
What’s HMRC doing about tax avoidance?
February 19th, 2013 by Roger Darlington
If you are a private citizen and you cheat on your benefit claim or tax return, you are liable to serious consequences – which is as it should be. But, if you a corporation pushing tax avoidance schemes as far as you can, you are likely to get away with it totally. As explained in […]
Posted in British current affairs | Comments (0)
The facts behind British and global obesity
February 18th, 2013 by Roger Darlington
The British media today covers a new report on obesity titled “Measuring Up” produced by the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges. The foreward to the report states: “The UK is the ‘fat man’ of Europe. Latest figures from the Health Survey for England 2009-11 shows that one quarter of men and women are obese (BMI over 30) […]
Posted in British current affairs, World current affairs | Comments (0)
How big is Australia?
February 18th, 2013 by Roger Darlington
I will shortly be visiting Australia for the first time. Since the country is on the other side of the globe to Europe, it is difficult to assess from an atlas what is the relative size of Australia – so I’ve checked. At 7,692,024 km2, Australia is the planet’s sixth largest country after Russia, Canada, China, […]
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (2)
How big is New Zealand?
February 18th, 2013 by Roger Darlington
I will shortly be visiting New Zealand for the first time. Since the country is on the other side of the globe to Britain, it is difficult to assess from an atlas what is the relative size of New Zealand – so I’ve checked. The two countries are very similar in size. The UK is […]
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
How the Japanese bombed Darwin in Australia
February 16th, 2013 by Roger Darlington
In a couple of weeks time, Vee and I will be visiting Australia (and New Zealand) with stops in Bangkok and San Francisco that will literally take us round the world. To put us even more in the mood, this weekend, we rented the Baz Luhrmann film “Australia” [my review here]. The movie features the […]
Posted in Cultural issues, History | Comments (2)
Our Valentine’s Day: something very new and something very, very old
February 14th, 2013 by Roger Darlington
Vee and I today celebrated our 31st Valentine’s Day as a couple and did a couple of special things. In the morning, we went to The View From The Shard. the top of the new building near London Bridge. The Shard – which has only recently been completed – is already an iconic building on the […]
Posted in Cultural issues, My life & thoughts | Comments (2)
How Britain (and others) are enabling multinational corporations to undermine the tax base of nation states
February 13th, 2013 by Roger Darlington
“Companies have a responsibility to pay corporation tax in the jurisdictions where they operate. Citizens are already losing faith in their banks and the financial system. If big corporations fail to pay tax and leave it to SMEs and middle income groups, it will undermine democracy. This is about the survival of democracy.” And who […]
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
The British lecturer and the Chinese students
February 12th, 2013 by Roger Darlington
Today I gave a lecture on broadband policy to postgraduate students at the London School of Economics. A third of the almost two dozen students were Chinese. This tells us how international is the student population of LSE and how much Chinese students are seeking British education. All the Chinese students sat together and they […]
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (0)
Prediction not an exact science
February 12th, 2013 by Roger Darlington
Forecasting technological change is not just about whether, but when and how, such change will happen. This is the headline message of my latest column for the trade union Prospect. You can read it here. I have been writing articles on information technology for the trade union movement since 1978 and all the ones written […]
Posted in Science & technology | Comments (0)