Excerpts from Life: Meltdown/Absconding

NOT AS FINELY CRAFTED AS MOST POSTS. JUST NOTES I'VE MADE OF WHAT WENT ON THIS AFTERNOON, SO I CAN REMEMBER IT WHEN SOMEONE ASKS, "ANY IDEA WHAT CAUSED IT?"

Insisted on being taken to Hobbycraft to buy Modroc

Bought that and 3 sheets of Xmas felt

Once through the door, insisted sewing machine be set up

Local authority called. M shouted, slammed doors, throughout call

I went to eat lunch. Complained she couldn't find the scissors. Left lunch to look for them

Abandoned sewing as machine not working well

Started making another plaster cast of hand using sock

Didn't work, so suggested she used clingfilm instead

Shouted because clingfilm wasn't in drawer. Left lunch again to find it (on worktop in plain sight)

Made plaster cast too tight. Told her it would need ot be cut off before it set. Came downstairs to do it. Complained I was cutting her (don't think so) slammed cellar door. Broke panel.

Eventually cut cast off herself

Now demanding I pay her back the £1.59 she spent on it as “my fault” it hasn't worked

Short break:

“Can you top my phone up?” Point out she's just caused xx amount of damage to a Victorian door and thrown wet plaster all over the kitchen.

“Fine. I'll just bugger off.”

Log on to Orange website to top up phone. Then see her leave the house with suitcase

[Phone call from her sister asking for lift, as she'd just been sick. Told her she'd have to walk]

Went to look for her. Checked railway station. Managed to call her. Said I was “behind her”. Phone OH who confirmed he'd spoken to her and she was OK. Went home again.

She came back, dumped bags in hall. Fair amount of verbal abuse. Demanded sewing machine be threaded again.

Didn't work. Demanded toy sewing machine be threaded instead.

Now sewing.

[I'm now hiding in box room with computer.]

#asdmornings: When a Tweet's not long enough....

We had anticipated some problems this morning. We knew that she was not happy about doing Food Tech because she hadn't done last week's class and had therefore not made the puff pastry. The suggestion that she could take in some ready made stuff went down badly. Similarly, she's narky about not being "allowed" to do PE, despite several weeks where despite the best efforts of all concerned she has either refused to take part or has refused to leave the PE building afterwards, to a point where they have arranged alternative provision for this lesson while the school is still a building site (the logistics of getting the girls to PE currently involves leaving the premises by the front gate and walking around 2 sides of the perimeter to get to the PE Dept.).

Still, I heard her alarm go off at 6.45am and when I went in at 7am, she was awake and cheerful. "5 minutes" I said and went off to try and encourage her younger sister to engage with "morning."

By 7.30am, her mood had changed and she was refusing to get up. I warned her sister that she might have to walk up to school (it's cold but dry and not the end of the world not to have a lift), and that she'd need to be ready to leave by 8.00am.

At 7.57am, M complained that she also wanted to walk to school with her sister (despite still being in bed). Younger sister (and this is where it starts kicking off) complains that she didn't know she'd got to walk. This appears to trigger something and M then chases her down the stairs and we end up with YS locking herself in the downstairs toilet for protection, with M barring any exit therefrom. Eventually, YS ventures out and puts her blazer and winter coat on, but realises she can't put her shoes on as they're in the kitchen where M is hovering....

I try to encourage M away from her sister, but as she storms past (throwing stuff on the kitchen floor in the process) she pushes her, full strength, into the coat pegs in the hall. and heads back to her room, slamming the door and knocking more paint off the door frame as she does so.

Tears (YS's and mine) and a hug, and I bundle YS out of the house, and go into the living room to phone school to warn them that M is in meltdown and to request that they don't give YS a late mark, as she has been physically unable to leave the house before 8.15am. As I'm on the phone, I hear the merry ratchet-ing sound of the Chubb key on the outside of the living room door being locked behind me (a security measure we put in years ago when we had four break-ins in as many years, coincidentally the last time the Tories were in charge of law and order).  Can hear the sound of things being thrown around, but no idea what. At this point, YS appears at the living room window. In her earlier panic, she has accidentally picked up her sister's blazer rather than her own. I negotiate, through a locked door, for M to let her sister in and exchange it for the right blazer without causing her sister any physical pain. I think I can gauge her mood from peering through the small crack in the woodwork (this one not of her creation!), but have to hope that I've called it right.

Blazer-exchange seems to go off without major injury and YS scuttles off to school.  I then phone OH who, very sensibly, had left the house for work at 7.10am so he at least knows there is a problem. Offers to come home and let me out, but this seems unwise - the last thing a public sector worker needs at the moment is to be perceived as not being 100% productive. Also phone school, and we agree that it's unlikely I'll get her in, but that I will keep them posted

During the course of these conversations, M disappears upstairs, returning fully dressed for school and announces she's going to go in on foot. She then opens the front door, realises it's only just above freezing and asks for a lift. I try to phone school to warn them of this unexpected development, but can't get through, so I drive her there and phone them from the car park. I walk her to Reception, but her route to her classroom is blocked by a class of girls assembled to make the trek over to the PE building, so we lurk in the foyer until the way is clear. She then goes down to her classroom without a further murmur and appears in a perfectly good mood.

I am acutely aware, as I talk to members of staff and her support team, that I haven't yet had a chance to wash or clean my teeth and my hair is in need of a wash. Still, living with autism means that your sense of social embarrassment diminishes as you do what it takes to get by, and at least I'm not still in pyjamas!

Today was a fairly major version of the pre-school meltdown, but they're far from uncommon. I can never be sure what reception I will get when I go in at 7am, and it can often take 50 minutes to persuade her to get up (while trying to get the 11 year old sorted at the same time), to not wear the same shirt 3 days in a row, to have to judge how serious she is when she says, "if you make me go in I'll misbehave." Mixed in with the autism are the teenage hormones which would make life difficult anyway, but unlike the teenage hormones, there is every likelihood that a measure of this behaviour will remain into adulthood. Part of it is pure manipulation (she behaved better yesterday and was rewarded by being allowed to make peppermint creams and coconut ice for the end of term party), but once the manipulation has started, she doesn't always have the ability to stop it.

Autism is an unfairly invisible disability. Those who know her slightly, and have never encountered her in full meltdown see - quite rightly - what a lovely child she can be, but have no concept of what it's like trying to cope with the mercurial changes in temperament. They see that she is resourceful and resilient, but not that she can only do it sometimes - and there'e no predicting when she won't be able to.

Her sister, as many 11 year olds do, tends to overreact to perceived slights and unfairness. She hasn't yet learned the coping strategy of quietly ignoring the extreme provocation in the interests of self-preservation. That will come with maturity, but it's a lot to ask of her.

It's days like this where I wonder how I am ever going to find work that will enable me to combine caring with gainful employment. I'm reasonably intelligent, a good administrator, even ran a team of 30+ people at one time. At the moment, though, there is no prospect of me being able to go out to work on a full time basis. Childcare for secondary-aged children is patchy, so realistically, I'd be looking at term time only and, with the issues we face on a regular basis, it could really do with being something home-based and flexible.  You're no use to an employer if you are constantly having to rush off and sort out a crisis (with my former management hat on, I know that's the case) and with employee's rights being stripped away, I don't think I'd last long in the conventional work environment, do you?

Which is why, on days like these, I so appreciate politicians and unelected 'representatives' voting to reduce the support I receive through tax credits by 50%. Makes me feel truly valued.

We'll Miss it When it's Gone....

After a text book pregnancy, I went into labour at 1am on Thursday 12 February 1998. Our birth plan had been for labour to start at home and for me to transfer to hospital for the birth. Our midwife was called out and did an examination, at which point it was discovered that the baby's umbilical cord was lodged round her neck, so as a precaution I was taken straight in to the hospital. After an uncomfortable night on the ward, I was taken to the birthing room in the morning and my partner and I spent the day waiting for the labour to progress. Not much happened over the course of the day, so on the Friday morning  they decided to induce.


When at midnight I still wasn't in established labour, they decided that if no progress had been made by morning, an emergency C-section would be needed. 


And so, at lunchtime on Saturday 14 February, our daughter finally arrived, looking pink and beautiful. Actually, a little pinker than we were expecting, due to a sizeable birth mark which covered most of the left half of her face and skull. She was a good weight, though, and all the necessary checks were done to pronounce her fit and healthy. My exhausted partner, who'd stayed with me throughout and who only had my old pullover to wear (it had been unseasonably warm, and he'd come into the hospital wearing only a T shirt and jeans), went home to get some well-earned rest.


The next day, she appeared a little jaundiced, so we were moved to a side room with a light-box and she 'sun-bathed' to reduce the jaundice. Staff came and went, pronounced her beautiful and assured us that the birth mark would fade in time. On her second night on the planet, a junior doctor came to visit me late at night to say that he had been doing some research and thought it possible that the birth mark was indicative of a rare but serious neurological condition called Sturge Weber Syndrome. After the trauma of a 3 day labour, this was not what I wanted to hear (especially in a lonely hospital room, on my own, late at night). 


The next day, she underwent X rays, and we were visited by the Chief Consultant to explain the condition, which could present as anything from - well, very little to very severe developmental problems, epilepsy, glaucoma, hemiplaegia (weakness on one side of the body), learning difficulties, etc.  Diagnosis couldn't be confirmed fully without further investigation and we were assured that she would be monitored closely.


After a week of sun treatment, we took her home and started life as a family. She had a CAT scan at two months, and was seen quarterly by a consultant at the Eye Hospital to make sure that the glaucoma would be spotted if it arose. Developmentally, she was fine, hitting the milestones on target and doing pretty well. Of course, we jumped at the slightest twitch, in  case it was the epilepsy kicking in, but she was fine and we made arrangements for me to go back to work, and arranging for a place for her at our local children's (later SureStart) centre.


A week before she was due to start nursery at 6 months old, I visited my sister in Shropshire. On the way back in the baby seat, my daughter seemed distressed, but I put it down to her picking up on my stress levels navigating the M6 in rush hour.


The next morning she was clearly unwell; listless, unfocused. We called our GP, who told us to bring her in. As we arrived, he ushered us in past a queue of waiting patients, examined her and said that she appeared to be post-ictal and suggested we took her in to the hospital. She was admitted as an in-patient and during the course of the day had more seizures. It took us a week to get her stabilised on phenobarbitone and carbamazapene, but she made a good recovery and started nursery only a week behind schedule. She also sat up for the first time while in the hospital, so clearly the seizures where not affecting her development.


And so it went on for a couple of years. Her seizures, usually partial, came in clusters, usually towards the end of the week when she was tired or when she was unwell and running a temperature. At 3, while on holiday with my parents, she had a major seizure, and her medication was raised in line with her increased body weight.


Shortly afterwards, she embarked on a course of laser treatment to reduce the appearance of her birthmark (see my previous post 10th Anniversary for the background on that), and a year ago decided to discharge herself. The birthmark has not gone completely (and probably would never have done), but is considerably reduced. More importantly, she is confident enough to face the world with it on display.


A few weeks into her school career, it was noticed that she was failing to settle and that her  behaviour could be very erratic. By Year 1 she had a statement of special educational needs and 1:1 support in class. Although she did not appear to have learning difficulties, her learning was being severely impaired by her behaviour, and so the NHS Child Psychology Service was brought in, and we attended parenting courses to help us understand and manage her behaviour. In Year 3, after a particularly severe meltdown, we were referred to a new psychologist who decided to investigate whether, apart from the Sturge Weber diagnosis, there might not be something else going on. After an intensive round of sessions with our daughter and us, looking at every aspect of her life to date, we were given the diagnosis of Autistic Spectrum Disorder. 


I know you are supposed to be devastated when you get this diagnosis and mourn for the child you thought you had. We were just relieved that finally we had an explanation and - if you like - a label (Me, I don't mind labels if it gets us the help she needs). This enabled us to work with the medical and educational authorities to later manage her transition to a mainstream high school.


She had a good start to year 6 and then, on a routine visit to the Eye Hospital, they discovered that she had a choroidal haemangioma, leading to a detached retina. Not the normal, torn retina, but a bleed behind it which had been leaking fluid so that, in the words of the specialist, it was like wallpaper peeling of a damp wall. She was referred to another hospital, and an emergency operation to reattach the retina, with a silicone splint inserted to hold it in place, followed by a course of photodynamic therapy. This failed to reduce the tumour, so she was then referred to another hospital for radiotherapy. This appeared to be successful and on a subsequent visit, it was decided to remove the silicone splint. We had been told that it was likely that little, if any, sight would return, but my feeling was that with the eye still in place (instead of removing it - pretty traumatic for an 11 year old), it was at least possible that there might be some possible treatment in the future which might restore some sight. Unfortunately, the retina detached again and rubeosis developed so her eye is now effectively dead; we still have quarterly check ups to monitor it, in the hope that it can stay in place for as long as possible.


She still sees the psychology service on a regular basis - the problems of being a partially-sighted, autistic  teenager are many and varied - but fortunately, she has been seizure-free since 2001 and has recently been weaned off the medication, so far with no ill effects. She is currently undergoing orthodontic treatment to reduce the uneven appearance of her teeth (also an SWS manifestation). It's a struggle keeping her in mainstream school, but with the input of the medical professionals, we are getting there - just.


The point of this very long piece is to highlight how much interaction she has had with the National Health Service in her short life. She has had world-class treatment from many professionals - treatment that we, on modest public sector salaries, could never have afforded to pay for. I have said many times since she was born, "Thank goodness she wasn't born in America."


Which is why it both breaks my heart to see the NHS being sold off to the medi-vultures by Lansley and his pals, and scares me, too.


What will happen to her in later life, if her eye deteriorates? If her autism prevents her from meaningful (if any) employment and makes her behaviour more challenging as she ages? At the moment, her father and I can fight her corner, but what happens when we're no longer around? 


And make no mistake - if the Health Bill goes through, as it looks like it will - all this superlative care, free at the point of delivery, will go, and people like my daughter face a miserable future.


And that's not even starting in the issue of disability benefits and work.............


NHS Roll of Honour 1998-2011


St Mary's Hospital for Women and Children, Manchester - Neonatal and Neurological Depts
Manchester Royal Eye Hospital
Manchester Children's Hospital
Manchester Dental Hospital
Manchester Community Paediatric Service
West Point Medical Centre, Levenshulme, Manchester
West Point Dental Centre, Levenshulme, Manchester
Leeds General Infirmary, Dermatology Dept
Child/Adolescent Psychology Service, Winnicott Centre, Manchester
Royal Liverpool University Hospital, St Paul's Eye Centre
Clatterbridge Centre for Oncology, Wirrall


[I'm sure there are others I've forgotten about, too]

Update:

I wrote this some years ago. Sadly, the NHS has been decimated since then, just as we feared. My daughter's physical health is pretty stable these days, but the psychological support she got from CAMHS has, of course, ground to a halt now that she's an adult. So the next time she has extreme anxiety and lands in hospital after taking a potential overdose of over the counter medication, there is likely to be no follow-up. 

My late parents spent their last few days in NHS care - superlative care. Lifelong Tories, they didn't live to see the absolute mess their party has made of what my mother described as "the best thing this country has ever done." I'm so glad they were spared that. As for the rest of us? The more people keep voting for Conservative governments, the quicker we will descend into the barbaric US-style system where one piece of bad luck can land you with bankrupting medical bills. If you value the NHS, you need to vote Labour (and yes, I know New Labour allowed the first fault-line of marketisation to creep in). For your sake and your loved ones. Bugger Brexit - this stuff's more important.

Incandescent

I don't know where to start, really.


Woke this morning to the news headline that Manchester City Council is having to lose 2000 jobs this year, due to the additional £60m savings it has to find thanks to the coalition government's disproportionately swingeing, "that'll teach you to elect a Labour council", cuts to government grants.


Therefore sent my other half off to work in the knowledge that our single household income could be about to disappear just as the last of my severance money runs out.


We are (or were) both career public servants. We're not motivated by high salaries, have no interest in being entrepreneurs and are profoundly disinterested in profit. Both of us, though, are committed to giving something back to the community and our adopted city. At some point in our local government careers, have been responsible for monitoring income and expenditure and ensuring that council tax payers were getting value for money. And we were both good at it.


I got clobbered by New Labour's ill-conceived adoption of the Tory, free-market mantra that the private sector can always provide "it" cheaper and better. My entire team was TUPE'd out to a private BPO on a multi-million pound contract which had previously been delivered (under contract) by Manchester City Council. The council lost 200+ years' accumulated experience, and we (despite the 'protection' of TUPE) lost our local government pension rights and our careers.


We were told that our experience and knowledge of the schemes we had run (at cost) under local authority control were invaluable to the success of the contract and yet less than 3 years later, we had pretty much all been paid off. It seems that the private sector couldn't provide, as first one contractor was ditched and the second realised the job was effectively un-deliverable. I was one of the first out, and had thought that I would be something of an exception. One by one, the more senior staff were offered packages to go away and shortly thereafter an announcement was made that the Manchester operation was being closed down. A few doughty souls decided to relocate, only to have the Coalition ditch the biggest component of the contract, having assured the electorate that they would not do so, putting their jobs at risk.


So far, so similar to a great many other conscientious and hard-working local authority workers who don't (contrary to propaganda from the media) earn vast salaries, retire at 60, get 'free' pensions (we pay into them, just as private sector employees do), sit around town halls drinking tea, etc, etc. (Even last night's 'Midsomer Murders' had the Planning Chief as the murderer!)


In our case, there are additional issues, though. Our eldest daughter has a rare neurological condition and is on the autistic spectrum. During her years at primary school, we somehow managed to maintain both of us working full time, although this was frequently disrupted by emergency calls to school to deal with a behavioural problem which could erupt at a moment's notice. She's high-functioning, though, and has no learning difficulties, so we were keen that she remain in mainstream schooling. My severence co-incided with her transition to high school and allowed us to manage that transition in a positive way. And it's been great being merely a phone call away in a crisis and not having to go cap in hand to an employer to beg for time off to deal with it.


We've also been able to economise on childcare as well, as I've had the luxury of being able to spend the holidays with the girls. Instead of having to rush out of the house (earlier than in term time, as most holiday playschemes start early and finish earlier than term-time provision), they get a chance to re-charge their batteries and lie-in if they need to. 


But here's the catch. As they get older, the options for childcare diminish. It's either not available or if it's there at all, they don't want to go to it, seeing it as 'little kid's stuff'. It's also tricky with a teenager with ASD. Normal expectations on behaviour mean that outbursts which might have been tolerated when she was 5, would now find her thrown out of a scheme. Yes, there are holiday playschemes for disabled children and their siblings, but I'm wary of that 'culture of disability' which means she doesn't mix with mainstream society. It's a tricky one, but in the main, I would prefer to be at home to manage the school holidays myself. 


So, in order to provide the best for the family in terms of meeting the needs of my daughter and the mental health of the rest of the family, I would be far better served staying at home (just what the Tories want women to do!). However, even before the threat of partner's possible redundancy, this was never realistic, so I'm having to look for work which is term-time only, where the hours enable me to meet childcare needs and where the employer would be happy for me to be called away at short notice and to take time off for the multiple medical appointments she has. Well, that's looking promising!


We have never claimed any benefits on behalf of our daughter, either. Although many people told us to apply for DLA, we didn't feel that we incurred any additional expense in terms of support or mobility than any other child of her age and as were on good 'moderate' incomes (let's be clear, though, we were in no danger of losing our Child Benefit) we felt it would be wrong to put in a claim. She walks a mile to school, goes into town unaccompanied (albeit closely monitored by us on her mobile), and can cook her own meal if necessary, so we really didn't feel that we were justified in claiming for her. Hers is an unfairly 'invisible' disability - she is capable of managing with most things, and is an intelligent child. 


We're hoping that she will be obtain qualifications (although this is getting less likely by the day, thanks to Michael Gove's obsession with making all pupils something out of Mallory Towers) and will be able to live independently. At the same time, she is subject to the funny looks when her behaviour seems strange and we need always to be 'on alert' for potential flashpoints. She doesn't need full time care in the usual sense, but we are never off duty - no-one in the current climate of "benefits scroungers", though, is going to accept that my time would be better used waiting at home for the times when there's a problem. In small, intangible ways, her ASD fundamentally alters they way we can live our lives and that's not something the state is willing to pick up the bill for. Profound physical disabilities are easier for the legislators (and electorate) to get their heads around - "poor little mite" syndrome, as I call it - but there are thousands of people for whom a disability is a lifelong impediment to success. How, in this new, "small-state" world where we are all expected to be entrepreneurial, will she manage to maintain a work record?


I've read a lot of people who expected that David Cameron, as the parent of a disabled child, would be sympathetic to (or at least appreciate) the difficulties that this can present to family life, and are dismayed that he appears sanguine about the cuts to disability benefits and local authority support. Now, I'm not callous enough to deny him the grief he felt when they lost their son simply because I disagree profoundly with his politics and world-view; no amount of wealth can compensate for the myriad ways in which living with (and losing) a disabled child affects you. To those expecting empathy, though, consider this. He has never been in a position of having to choose a course of action for economic reasons. For most of us, though, such a choice has to be made. I would love to be in a position where the next 5 years were devoted to my children as they move towards adulthood, but it simply isn't practical. Nor do I expect to sit at home letting the state support me. But the sad reality at the moment is that it is becoming more difficult to get a work-life balance. There were improvements to family-friendly employment of the last 13 years, but most of these gains are being undermined. The attack on existing terms and conditions, threats of further legislation to 'curb the power of trades unions' (Hang on, I thought the Tories had done that? That's what they tell us!), mean that working life, for those of us fortunate to have a job, will be meaner, longer and less-family friendly. For a much more erudite discussion of this particular topic, see this:


http://www.labourlist.org/say-goodbye-to-good-work


I know this post will do nothing concrete to change the situation we find ourselves in (and my partner will almost certainly tell me my time would have been better spent looking for jobs), but it has at least cleared my head of the rage I felt this morning when the radio came on....




UPDATE: Have now applied for DLA, despite partner's misgivings. The irony is that the more we try to help her be independent, the more we have to "hover" to keep her safe. We'll just have to see if she is "disabled enough"...

Blog Mission Statement

This post is a re-edited version of a note I put on Facebook within days of the General Election. It pretty much sums up how I feel about most things....


Within days of the Labour victory in 1997, we won a cricket match, we won the Eurovision Song Contest and my first child was conceived.

When she was born, and was almost immediately diagnosed with Sturge Weber Syndrome, we realised we would be facing the prospect of a lot of interaction with the National Health Service. When, at 6 months, she suffered her first seizure, we were ushered straight in to our GP's surgery and within minutes we had been sent direct to Acorn Ward the old Manchester Royal Infirmary, where we remained for a week while the medics tried to stabilise her.

Over the years she has been treated by a paediatric neo-natal specialist, neurologists, psychologists, Manchester dental hospital, Manchester Royal Eye Hospital; she has had 9 years' laser surgery to reduce her birthmark, an operation on a detached retina which saved her from having an eye removed, radiotherapy and cataract surgery. She has seldom had to wait very long for appointments and has had exemplary service from the medical professionals she's been involved with.

It's been the same with Education. She attended an excellent local authority-run nursery and then a very good barrier-free primary school where she received 1:1 in-class support from a number of excellent Teaching Assistants. At nine, she was additionally diagnosed as being on the autistic spectrum; her ASD diagnosis came in time for us to be able to plan her secondary education carefully and she has made a successful transition to a mainstream secondary school, still with support, but with a level of independence she would not have in a special school. At her first Parents Evening we received comments such as "a pleasure to have in my class". Anyone who knew us when she was in Reception/Year 1, would appreciate how much that means to us!

That's why I voted Labour on 6 May - I'm proud to have done so make no apologies for it. As a family, we've had a far better life under Labour than we had under the Tories, but it's not just about us - millions of other ordinary families did, too. 13 years in which legislation gave protection from discrimination, lower crime rates (we were burgled 4 times between 1993-97; 0 times 1997-2010), where a less antagonistic attitude to Europe gave us greater credibility and influence, and where the concept of "society" was reintroduced. I have to say I never liked or trusted Tony Blair (even when everyone else seemed to), but was prepared to put up with him because - and here's a thing - I was more concerned with party's policies than the personality of the leader. Some of the trashing of Brown has been, frankly, disgraceful and I think it shows the mettle of the man that he's put up with it. In time, I think his reputation may recover - after all, John Major is now seen as a genial elder statesman!

I fear for the next five years - the proposed removal of a right of appeal in school expulsions (you get a right of appeal if you're convicted of murder for god's sake!); the very real possibility that 'stopping the closure of special schools' has a corollary of 'let's get these pesky SEN kids out of mainstream'; the concept of paying to see your GP; the re-demonisation of those who are 'different', be it gay, unmarried, disabled, etc. It was quite nice to have 13 years where I wasn't constantly told I was a second class citizen.

That's not to say there weren't times when I despaired of some of the things that were happening. The decimation of the social housing stock was not reversed, the ridiculous relaxation of the licensing laws which could only have been thought up by people who spend far too long in Tuscany, getting sucked in to the Bush War on Terror, some frankly unacceptable assaults on civil liberties and, on a personal level, the mania for outsourcing government projects to BPOs (at vast expense) which ends up costing far more and delivers a poorer service for the 'customer' than local authority provision did.

That aside, the overall movement of the country since 1997 has been towards a more tolerant, inclusive nation. Of course it's possible that the sainted Nick Clegg will be able to show the Tories the error of their inward-looking, exclusive ways, but I wouldn't hold your breath.


Seven months on, I can't say that I'm reassured....