Going local

The Conservative Party has recently discovered to its dismay that it is unpopular. This is despite having a leader who seems fluent and intelligent, and who actively promotes ideas about society and politics that deserve some respect. These ideas (summarised as ‘localism’ and the ‘big society’) echo some fundamental themes in British conservatism, dating from Edmund Burke or before. In particular, conservatives propose that society is not a structure that can be demolished and rebuilt at will, but an organic whole, in which each citizen has a wide range of personal affiliations which involve mutual interdependence, guidance, and support. The term ‘big society’ has presumably been coined by David Cameron’s advisors to contrast with ‘big government’, which, according to conservatives, involves the replacement of these relationships by the impersonal imposition of centrally-determined rules, and the creation of subordination to the state in place of the mutual interdependence of free people. Localism is the logical consequence of this central idea. Conservatives see an efficient government as an essential requirement for a civilised society, but wherever possible it should be organised as part of that society, being delivered locally by people who know each other’s needs, rather than imposed centrally.  

Conservatives do not of course believe in equality as a virtue. Indeed, many conservative theorists celebrate inequality - a feature that makes conservatism particularly attractive for those with great wealth or high social status. Yet conservatives are usually reluctant to recognise that the extreme inequalities in this country undermine their very aspirations for both the big society and localism. Wealthy corporations and individuals make decisions with little regard for the day-to-day lives of their workers or the people who live down the road from their offices and factories. They prefer to build houses where they like and erect large standardised supermarkets to replace the distinctive local shops in our traditional high streets. Local control of planning would inevitably obstruct such developments.

These conflicts can be seen in the government’s Localism Act and its proposals for neighbourhood planning. One element of the Act is the ‘community right to challenge’. This involves parish and town councils taking over the running of services previously provided by city, county or district councils. But once a case is made by the parish or town council, then the service is open to tender. This means that the likes of Serco and Capita, which excel at winning contracts but not at providing decent services, will move in and expand their empires.

Another conflict, particularly relevant to my own village, is over new housing. The Localism Act has introduced ‘neighbourhood planning’, which is intended to give individual parishes, towns and neighbourhood of cities the right to develop their own plan for the development of their locality. ‘Town planning’, however, no longer involves the sort of vision that gave the world Bath or even Welwyn Garden City. Instead, it now means little more than the allocation of land for housing and commercial development, and ensuring that the necessary services are in place to support them. Nevertheless, devolving the right to determine land use is potentially important. The English countryside with its scattered communities is precious and vulnerable. But developers prefer greenfield sites (which are cheaper) in country villages (which are more attractive for prosperous commuters). Local control over development sites would enable towns and villages to block the speculative housebuilding which has covered so much of the countryside with breeze block and stud walls.

However, localism and neighbourhood planning contradicts the general  operating principles  of national and local government in England, which are based on centralisation, secretiveness, and subservience to the powerful rather than respect for the views of the ordinary citizenry. In my part of England, three district councils have come together to develop the South Worcestershire Development Plan (SWDP). If it had followed the principles of localism, it would have identified future needs for employment, housing, transport and other public services in the South of the County, and then set some general targets to be discussed and implemented locally. Instead, the SWDP not only specifies individual development sites in each town and village, but also the precise number of houses to be built on each site. The total number of houses for South Worcestershire has been based on national targets (no doubt set after a cosy discussion between senior civil servants and the building industry), and the allocation of housing numbers to individual towns and villages has been based on sites already identified by developers. A ‘consultation’ by the District Council’s planning department consisted of a planner visiting the village hall and telling us what was going to happen. 

And so Malvern Hills District Council, which only six years ago fought against an appeal by a developer to despoil a local view in my village, now supports the SWDP which schedules the very same site for 62 houses. At the same time, it is organising workshops to explain its commitment to localism. Perhaps they should listening to people as a first step.

The man in the iron knee

The photograph above was taken four years ago, on a trip with my son along the road on the South East side of Loch Ness. Note the bent right knee. This appears in many of the pictures taken at this time - in others I am sitting down, sometimes also with a grimace of pain. The cause of this distress was psoriatic arthritis, which affected my right knee and developed from an irritating pain to crippling agony over a period of two years. Standing with my leg straight became impossible. Walking became an ordeal. I changed in two years from a man who ran up stairs to one who took the lift whenever he could. Even the shortest journeys required careful planning and the use of a car whenever possible. Even so, a trip of a quarter of a mile would leave me in severe pain and sweating with exhaustion.

Pain also crippled the soul. I was less able than I had been to stand up to the usual bullies and egoists that are found in most organisations (and certainly in universities). My sense of personal effectiveness declined, and the avoidance of pain occupied an increasing part of my waking thoughts. Psychologically, I became a painful knee with a man attached.

My return to health required surgery, which replaced my right knee with one made from titanium. This only took place after the NHS tried and failed with the various non-surgical alternatives, from steroid injections to physiotherapy and orthotics. Eventually, my wife and children urged me to request a knee replacement. I went to my GP, and a referral to an orthopaedic surgeon followed almost immediately. The surgeon explained in great detail the operation, the risks involved, and the probable outcome. There was no waiting time for the operation in the local NHS unit, where I spent four nights in a private room with en-suite facilities. After discharge, I received aftercare from physiotherapists and various home adaptations from occupational therapists. None of this of course required any negotiation with an insurance company or personal payments for treatment.

I spent an elated three months living without knee pain, until the back pain began. It seems that adapting to prolonged pain when walking had twisted my back. This was followed by further physiotherapy advice and some adaptations at my workplace. But by then, I had become tired of the long journey to work and took early retirement. Now I have lost weight, walk good distances, and live without pain. I still have the yellow car though.

How to teach skills

There is a crisis at the heart of British education - not university fees, academy schools, or the declining standards of A levels, but the inability of our education system to produce sufficient people with the right kinds of skills needed by employers. How could this happen after two decades in which there has been a massive increase in university admissions? The answer is that universities are good at teaching knowledge and the skills needed to generate and analyse knowledge, but not very good at teaching the skills needed in other workplaces. Expanding the number of people who go to university therefore diminishes the proportion of new entrants to the labour force who have appropriate skills when they begin work.

What is the best way to teach skills? There is a useful example from history. In the middle of the Battle of Britain in the summer of 1940, the RAF upgraded 1050 of its fighter aircraft by installing new constant-speed props. These added 7000 feet to each plane’s altitude and significantly reduced wear and tear on aircraft engines. The way this was done is a model for how to promote innovation and how to teach skills. The new props were developed by de Havilland, who formed a team of expert fitters to tour each airfield. Each squadron was told to select its best fitters, who were trained by the expert team. Training involved three stages: the expert team would first demonstrate one installation; then supervise the squadron’s fitters as they carried out another installation; and finally assess the squadron’s team when they carried out an installation without supervision. If all went well, the expert team would move to the next squadron.

This three stage model of demonstrate-supervise-assess is the basis for all successful programmes for teaching skills. Of course, the de Havilland team was teaching one skill to people who already had many skills in this field. Most occupations require hundreds, if not thousands, of individual skills, and this means that training people to become skilled doctors, plumbers, or lawyers takes years rather than days. Most skills training also involves starting with newcomers who, unlike the fitters in RAF squadrons, initially lack relevant background skills. Some skills can be assessed quickly, but others (particularly those involving an ability to respond to emergencies or to deal with difficult or distressed people) require observation over a long period of time.

The example from the Battle of Britain also shows another essential feature of skills training: it should be done by the most skilled practitioners. These are the best people to judge what counts as skilled practice, and therefore also the best people to supervise trainees and assess whether they are sufficiently skilled to be counted as a competent practitioner.  This model of training, supervision and assessment by the most skilled practitioners has been a key principle in all trades and professions since they existed. Of course, skilled practitioners also need to be knowledgeable practitioners, and so training in professions and trades has traditionally involved more formal classroom teaching, often on a day-release basis.

And that was how almost all professions and trades were trained until recently. Most lawyers, nurses, professions allied to medicine, and librarians did not go to university, but gained their professional qualifications while working in a junior capacity in their chosen occupation. Most craftsmen became apprentices, and attended colleges of further education on day-release. The exceptions to this model, in Britain at least, were divinity and medicine. These were taught at university, although a university degree was not a pre-requisite for a medical career until well into the 19th Century. Teaching medicine at university had the advantage of making it easier to standardise the curriculum and the way it was taught. There remained an emphasis on acquiring skills because students spent much of their time in practice settings under the supervision of medical professors, who were chosen as being the most eminent practitioners in their specialty.

All this changed during the last 30 or so years. Virtually all professions are now taught either as a university degree or following a university degree. This has enhanced the status of these professions, but it has come at a cost. Universities have become vast institutions competing for funds from the state and research funding bodies. Competition for funds has meant a greater emphasis by the universities on their research output, often at the expense of the quality of teaching. This affects the recruitment of senior academic staff, including those who are responsible for teaching skills. As an example, medical professors are now appointed not primarily for their skills as practitioners, but for their research record, even where this exclusively involves experiments with mice and rats in laboratories.

As universities have sucked up educational funds and ever more students, the teaching of skills for the rest of the population has been allowed to atrophy. In Germany, over half of all young people complete an apprenticeship, taught in companies and vocational colleges. Indeed, as many as 40% of all employees in Germany have completed an apprenticeship. The proportion is similar in Australia. In England, it is 11%. Apprenticeships in most countries take three or more years to complete. In England, the equivalent figure is between one and two years.

It is hardly surprising, therefore, that Britain has needed to import trained people from the rest of the EU at the same time that it has record numbers of young people out of work. The failure to train all our young people in vocational skills not only harms the British economy, it also demonstrates a cruel neglect of the young people themselves.

The discovered country

The best part of a touring holiday is arriving at a place not in the guide books, and finding it to be beautiful and unique. I have had many such experiences. I remember a holiday in Brittany with my wife when my son Andrew was young enough to be in a pushchair. We passed through the small market town of Quintin on the way back from somewhere else, and stopped. We found streets of fine old houses and a chateau. At the chateau café, looking out on the gardens and the river, a well-dressed lady took a liking to Andrew, and fed him Madeleine cakes.

Many years later, now with an adult Andrew and an adult daughter Rosemarie, my wife and I travelled Eastwards from Vancouver. This was a quiet winding route with scenery of staggering beauty. Travel meant crossing a sequence of wooded ridges, each running North-South, with long narrow lakes in the valley floors. We travelled through EC Manning Provincial Park, Penticton, Kelowna (where we ate at an Indian restaurant whose owner was nostalgic for Birmingham), Upper Arrow Lake, and then, on the third day of travel, arrived at Nakusp. This was the perfect British Columbia village, arranged on a small grid plan, with a high street of buildings lined with the kind of wooden facades seen in wild west films.

Nakusp had once been an industrial community, but the lake had been raised and the lakeside industry had been flooded. There were now gardens and a lakeside footpath. The old Leland Hotel (built shortly after the village was established) survived, although rather closer to the lake than it once was. Built in 1892, it is ancient by BC standards. We stayed there and had a view from our bedroom window that people in Switzerland would pay thousands to see.

I wonder if the European Union has any funds for village twinning, so that people from Quintin and my own village of Martley could get to know each other? Nakusp is rather far from Martley, but I intend to visit again as a one-man twinning association.

Graduating joy

University students invest several years of their lives and thousands of pounds of their money in their education. When their course of study is complete, they feel a great sense of achievement accompanied by a desire to celebrate. How well do universities help them in this task. From my experience in England and Scotland, hardly at all. I have attended three graduations as a student, half a dozen as a member of academic staff, and three as a proud parent. I found that these graduations fell into three types:

1.    Stuffy and self-congratulatory. This was my dominant experience of graduation ceremonies, from when I graduated with my masters degree from the University of Strathclyde, my social work qualification from the University of Stirling, and my PhD from the University of London (I didn’t attend the ceremony for my first degree). Also stuffy and self-congratulatory were the degree award ceremonies I attended as a member of staff at the University of Birmingham. All of these events shared a familiar British obsession with meaningless procedures (usually ‘traditions’ of recent invention), wearing funny hats, and a complete lack of fun. In each case, large numbers of students were processed at high speed, with no recognition of their individual talents, the promise they held for the future, or the fact that all the professors, vice-chancellors, administrators and so on depended for their income on the money these students brought into the university. The most memorable of these events was at the University of London. This took place in the splendid setting of the Albert Hall, and was chaired by Princess Anne, as Chancellor of the University. Graduands were supposed to bow to her when they paraded on the stage to receive their degree. Some churlishly refused, and in each case an amused smile appeared on her face. The dullest graduation ceremonies of all were at the University of Birmingham, but the Medical School did make up for this afterwards by holding a slightly more informal reception for graduands and their parents. One irritating feature of Birmingham’s ceremonies was the refusal to honour students who graduated with diplomas and certificates rather than degrees. The University of Stirling could do this, but Birmingham preferred to exclude this group of students (but take their money of course). 

2.    Utterly commercial. All of these graduations, however, were infinitely preferable to Nottingham Trent University (NTU), where my daughter graduated with a BA in Textile Design. The University imposed charges above her fees for all the materials she used in her degree, and then charged parents for attending the graduation ceremony. In other respects, the ceremony was exactly like the others, with a large hall, boring speeches, and an endless parade of graduands. There was a meagre reception afterwards. I suggest NTU’s administration have a chat with its academic staff teaching the degree in management and marketing to learn the concept of customer care.

3.    Small and respectful. The best ceremony I attended was at Leeds University, where my son graduated with a BA in Politics. This was a small affair, limited to students in the same subject, and followed by a very friendly reception afterwards where staff, graduands and parents could meet over a buffet meal. I was pleased to find that the academic staff in the Department of Politics knew their undergraduate students well. The academic speeches were witty, and the several of the students cheered each other when they received their degree. My son went on later to the University of Leiden in the Netherlands, from where he graduated with an MSc in International Public Administration in 2011. I did not attend this ceremony, but I did see a video. This took place in the oldest building in the University, and, after the ceremony, graduands signed their name on its walls, next to centuries of previous graduates and honorary graduates. It must be nice to write your signature next to that of Albert Einstein. But what was particularly good about this ceremony was that each student’s academic supervisor made a speech outlining the subject of their dissertation and its contribution to knowledge.

I have seen pictures of graduations in other countries, which include parades of students through the local town, concerts, gigs, dances and general fun. This could happen here too, but it would need universities to recognise that their primary purpose is the dissemination of knowledge, and that they collaborate with students to achieve this, and that success in this task is grounds for real celebration. Of course, it also requires that the British middle class lose some of its dreary stuffiness and learn how to have fun.

A few words about snow

The Eskimoes, it is reported in urban myth, have lots of words for snow. But English is sparse indeed when it comes to describing the white stuff. The media usually only distinguishes between a ‘blanket’ of snow and a ‘light dusting’. Both of these terms are ‘dead metaphors’, which must at one time have required some imagination to devise. A similar dead metaphor is used to describe ice, which is always referred to as ‘treacherous’. To the literally-minded, this would suggests that journalists believe that ice is sentient, that it aims to falsely reassure us of its safety, and then without warning and with devious malevolence becomes cold and slippy just as we choose to walk or drive on it.

The main consequence of snow, according to the media is ‘chaos’. This term, originally meaning a chasm in Greek, was later adapted by philosophers to designate the formless void that they believe preceded the act of creation (now renamed the ‘big bang’ by scientists). However, when used in the media, ‘chaos’ simply means any disruption, large or small, to transport timetables. Cars and trains are then said the ‘grind to a halt’. Of course, lines of cars lined up motionless on motorways are the very opposite of a formless void, but they still represent ‘chaos’ to journalists and the general public.

In Britain, transport disruption at the first heavy snowfall of the winter is regarded as a uniquely British phenomenon, not found in more organised countries. It thus becomes an opportunity for an intensive episode of national self-denigration. Yet, at the time of writing, cold weather and snow in much of Europe has disrupted transport and caused many deaths from accidents and exposure. This is true even in Germany (the most efficient country in the World as far as the British media are concerned). Still, it would be a pity to inject some evidence and fresh thinking into the accustomed narratives and dead metaphors. Otherwise, the pages of our newspapers would be empty and newsreaders on television would stand mute before us.

Driving and the English brain

Rudyard Kipling did not quite say “Who knows England who only England knows?”, but the meaning is clear: no-one can hope to understand their own country until they have become familiar with other places. Only then, can they understand what makes their own land different and special. However, there is an alternative to prolonged travel abroad, and that is to learn from foreigners who have become familiar with our own land. There are of course reports and books by foreign journalists based in London, but the most interesting source of information comes from the blogs written mainly by expats about their daily lives in many different parts of England. These are conveniently gathered in the website Blog England, Expat England. Most are written by women, and include family photographs, recipes, and reports on family holidays and outings. But they also compare England with their country of origin and reflect on the differences.

The bloggers have chosen to live in this country, and are passionate about the beauty of its countryside, and the way in which ancient sites and history are packed into a small area. Those in London are fascinated by the mix of nationalities in the city, and the experience of living in what is probably the biggest collection of theatres in the world. American bloggers are puzzled by the different names for food in England, the small size of domestic appliances, and the problems navigating in a land where street names change at each junction and where city grids are almost entirely absent. But the particular, and almost insoluble, problem for many Americans is having to drive in a car with a steering wheel on the right and with manual gears.

Why should this prove so difficult? After all, a third of the world’s population live in countries which drive on the left, and most us in England adapt easily to driving in the other two-thirds. I think the reason for the particular problems experienced by Americans  lies in how our brains adapts to daily mental exercises. There has been little research on how driving affects the brain, but a study over ten years ago found that London taxi drivers have a larger hippocampus (the part  of the brain associated with navigation) than other people. Indeed, part of the hippocampus grew larger as the taxi drivers spent more time in the job. It is also possible that the layout of the car we drive may also affects how our brain operates.

Driving in the USA and Canada is a right-handed affair. The gear lever is hardly used in the automatic cars that are almost universal in these countries, and it is, in any case, to the right of the driver. There is no clutch for the left foot to use. North America is overwhelmingly right-handed when it comes to eating as well. Diners hold the food to the plate with the fork, and then cut a single bite-sized piece with the knife. The knife is then placed on the plate, the fork transferred from the left hand to the right hand, and used to bring the food to the mouth. The fork is then transferred back to the left hand and the knife is picked up with the right. This elaborate procedure seems to exist to ensure the main tasks in eating are performed only with the right hand, and to avoid the co-ordinated movement of knife and fork required by the usual European style of eating.

Even more left-right co-ordination is required in driving in Britain, Ireland and other places which drive on the left and use cars with manual gears. The left hand is frequently used to change gear and the left foot to press down on the clutch, while at the same time the right hand is used for steering and the right foot for the accelerator and brake. How does this affect our brains? Our brains are divided into two distinct hemispheres by a longitudinal fissure. The limbs on each side of our body are controlled by the opposite hemisphere. Driving (and eating) in left-hand drive countries requires a constant exchange of information and adjustment between both hemispheres. It has been found that the part of the brain connecting the two hemispheres (the corpus callosum) differs in shape between men and women, and is larger among occupational groups such as musicians. My hypothesis is that it will also differ between typical drivers in England and those in the USA. If so, it would explain why people from North America find it so hard to adjust to driving in England.

This could of course all be tested by neuroscience researchers, aided by large sums of research council funding. At least it would get them out of their labs and on to the road.

Expat blog England