Friday Five News 15/7/16

Well a lot has happened in LOCAL news this week.  As the former Prime Minister (David Cameron) said in his final PM Questions said, "We've had resignation, nomination, competition and coronation, they (the Labour Party) haven't even decided what the rules are yet...If they ever got into power, it would take them about a year to decide who would sit where."

He was of course referring to Theresa May winning the nomination for Prime Minister following Andrea Leadsom dropping out of the race and the continuing debacle the Labour Party is undergoing.   

There was a great debate this week on whether Jeremy Corbyn can stand for re-election without gaining the support of 20% of the current Labour MPs, something he clearly doesn’t command at present.  The decision was that he can automatically be on the ballet paper as the current incumbent.  What will happen if he is relected remains to be seen.  If the Labour Party doesn’t get its act together  I fear they will split and there will not be a credible opposition to the current Government for years to come.

In the meantime Theresa May had a very busy first day in office hiring and firing and perhaps the biggest surprise was the appointment of Boris Johnson as Foreign Affairs Minister.  Much as I think he will fail it will be entertaining to watch him do so.

It seems you still can’t look at INTERNATIONAL news without finding doom and gloom.  I decided to steer clear of the recent incidents in the USA, but I couldn’t avoid the reports last night of the incident in Nice in France where a lorry crashed into a crowd of people celebrating Bastille Day.  Many were killed and injured and it was being reported as an attack rather than an accident causing widespread panic.  It was just breaking news when I started preparing this post and I hoped by this morning the situation would be clearer and under control.  Well it’s under control and it’s being treated as an act of terrorism.  The death toll has risen to 84.  The state of emergency was due to be lifted in France but it has has now been extended. Will this madness never end?

In SPORT I give you the story of how Chris Froome, the British cyclist had to run during part of yesterday’s stage of the Tour de France after his bike was broken during a collision caused by unruly spectators.  There has been various online comments and videos about this highlighting the ridiculous situation.  Having watched the video of the actual incident the spectators seemed much too close to the cyclists and their road seemed very narrow.   

Fortunately Froome has been re-instated as the leader of the race.  Hopefully lessons will be learned for the rest of this and future races.

Under ENTERTAINMENT I bring you details of the launch of the latest Pokemon Go app.  It was listed under technology but it’s a game so it should be entertaining.  However there have already been incidents of people being injured and concerns that people could be lured into dangerous locations by people looking to steal their phones or worse.  Doesn’t sound like much fun to me, but then I never was a Pokemon fan.

For MISCELLANEOUS  I’ve opted for this BBC Magazine article which details how a project in Ottawa, Canada is working with homeless alcoholics by providing them with regular drinks of wine.  Sounds crazy but giving them access to the wine stops them from trying to access alternative sources of alcohol and helps to regulate their lives so that they can address the issues that caused them to be homeless in the first place as well as dealing with medical and other problems.

 

The project faced a lot of opposition initially but it seems to be working. Good to find an uplifting story.

All links are courtesy of the BBC website. Opinions are my own.

Have a great weekend.