Overrun by the nanny state

A welcome guest at Boisdale on Tuesday was Simon Hills, associate editor of The Times Magazine. Simon has been a friend of Forest for many years and is enthusiastic about our embryonic Free Society campaign. Last year he wrote a thoughtful yet entertaining book called Strictly No!: How We're Being Overrun by the Nanny State. Unfortunately bookshops saw fit to file it under 'Humour' rather than 'Politics' where it really belonged.

Simon now has his own blog which features articles he has written for publications such as The Oldie, Compass and Esquire magazines. Exasperated by what he calls "a world gone mad", he asks:

Did you know? Blackpool Council have given donkeys Fridays off and a guaranteed lunchbreak • Britain’s prettiest village pub in Somerset was ordered to take down its hanging baskets because the council deemed them too dangerous. • In Norwich the City Council decided to fell a row of horse chestnut trees because of the dangers posed by falling conkers • And to play conkers, school children are now being forced to wear goggles • Yet 200,000 seven-year-olds cannot read • 90 per cent of crimes go unsolved • More motorists than burglars are jailed • You work 170 days of the year just paying tax • A quarter of the quarter of the population is employed by the state • In 2004 alone 260,000 people were hired in newly created state jobs? And they all want to boss you around!

Simon Hills' blog is HERE.

Tonight's the night

Tonight we celebrate the publication of an important new book by Christopher Booker and Richard North. To quote the blurb, "Scared to Death examines the role played by scientists who have consistently misread or manipulated the evidence; by the media and lobbyists who eagerly promote the scare without regard to the facts; and by the politicians and officials who come up with an absurdly disproportionate response, leaving us all to pay a colossal price through the financial cost of misplaced and often completely ill-conceived legislation."

At risk of repeating myself, there are chapters on BSE, the Millennium Bug, bird flu, salmonella in eggs, global warming and passive smoking, to name a few. The book complements perfectly Forest's new Free Society campaign, which is why we decided to organise tonight's party at Boisdale in Belgravia. The event is now fully booked - but check back here tomorrow for a full report.

National treasures

Reviewing Scared To Death - the book we are celebrating with a special Forest event in London next week - Mail on Sunday columnist Peter Hitchens yesterday paid a remarkable tribute to the authors. Describing Christopher Booker and his colleague, Richard North, as "courageous opponents of scares", Hitchens added:

They ought to be national treasures ...  they are relentlessly unfashionable. Their unwillingness to run with the pack makes them sceptical of conventional wisdom and sets them apart from mainstream journalism, which is unsettled by their diligence and their originality.

And then - like all sceptics - they are sometimes embarrassing even to their friends. They will insist on checking the facts of the matter ... Every politician, every journalist, every consumer of journalism should read, mark, learn and inwardly digest it.

See also the Daily Telegraph's review HERE.

Scary monsters and super creeps

The Sunday Telegraph today published THIS article by Christopher Booker and Richard North. It's a chapter from their new book, Scared To Death: From BSE to Global Warming - How Scares Are Costing Us The Earth (Continuum, £16.99), published on November 8.

There's also a must read chapter on passive smoking (Smoke and Mirrors: How They Turned ‘Passive Smoking’ Into A Killer) - one of many reasons why Forest has agreed to organise a special event to celebrate the publication of what we think is one of the more important books of the year.

Scared To Death (the party) will take place in London later this month. Details to follow. Watch this space.

Top of the blogs

Writing a blog is not unlike keeping a diary. To the best of my knowledge, however, only one blog has, to date, made it into print. Out Of The Tunnel by Rachel North is based on a blog that was written in the aftermath of the London terrorist bombs of July 2005. (A second blog, Wife In The North by Judith O'Reilly, was reported to be the subject of a £70k publisher's advance - see HERE - but I have yet to see it in print.)

Anyway, buy Iain Dale's Guide to Political Blogging in the UK (as I did last week) and you will find that Rachel from North London is listed at number 49 in the UK's top 100 political blogs. Top dogs (in the political blogging world) are currently:

1. Iain Dale's Diary
2. Guido Fawkes
3. Dizzy Thinks
4. Conservative Home
5. Political Betting

My favourites are:

1. Iain Dale's Diary

Er, that's it.

I have nothing against the other blogs - I just haven't got time to read them, religiously, every day. A year ago, according to Iain, there were around 500 political blogs in the UK. Today there are 1200 and ID's Guide to Political Blogging lists all of them, including this one.

Blogging is a growth industry, but whether it can ever influence government policy remains to be seen.

Adventures of Mr Benn

I succumbed to a fleeting (?) sense of vanity the other day. Browsing around Waterstones in Cambridge, I spied the latest volume of Tony Benn's diaries (More Time For Politics: 2001-2007). Having met - and interviewed - Benn in Edinburgh in 2002, I couldn't resist a quick peek to see if our brief encounter was mentioned, in passing. The answer (a quick search of the index revealed) was 'no'. But I bought it anyway.

You see, much as I abhor his politics (naive at best, downright dangerous at worst), Tony Benn struck me as one of the most charming men I have ever met - generous with his time and genuinely interested in other people. (I have interviewed quite a few famous people and this is unusual, believe me.) We enjoyed a pot of tea together and I went away favourably impressed - albeit hugely relieved that the man never got to lead his party or (horror of horrors) the country itself.

Smoking, sin and science

Forest is about to re-enter the book publishing business. Some years ago we produced what - in publicity if not commercial terms - were two highly successful titles: The Forest Guide to Smoking in London and The Forest Guide to Smoking in Scotland. The former even featured an introduction by the late, great Auberon Waugh and a preface by the late, great Jeffrey Bernard. (Do you spot a trend here?) Sadly, if either volume were published today, I fancy they would be somewhat slimmer.

Neither title was cheap to produce so our first foray into book publishing proved to be our last. Until now. Earlier this year I received a 40,000-word manuscript from journalist and author Mat Coward. Mat's books include crime novels, science fiction, children’s fiction, a history of radio comedy, and the "notorious" Success And How To Avoid It. He has also written for radio, television, and innumerable magazines and newspapers.

The manuscript lived up to Mat's impressive CV. He describes it as "a short book (or long pamphlet) which I’ve been writing, on and off, for over 20 years. It’s a polemic in which I consider the anti-smoking movement as a religion and explain why I think it’s so dangerous."

Forty Lashes: Smoking, Sin and Science is an engaging and substantial piece of work. I loved it. Mat wants it to be read by as many people as possible so the plan is to print a few thousand copies for those who want to buy a hard copy, and also make it available, free of charge, as a pdf, from the Forest website. Watch this space.

The Routemaster: London's symbol of liberty

I was asked last week why a Routemaster bus is included in the Taking Liberties masthead. My family moved to Scotland when I was ten but before that I grew up in Maidenhead, Berkshire, and from time to time I would spend weekends and holidays in London with my aunt. I must have been five or six when these visits began and everywhere we went we travelled by bus. (I don't recall ever going on the Tube at that time.) My love of London - and the Routemaster - dates back to those exciting, liberating days.

Years later, when I moved to London, I travelled to work on the No 6, never tiring of the freedom to jump on and off that unique open platform without waiting for permission from driver or conductor. Like millions of people, I cannot begin to count the number of times I ran to catch the bus as it pulled away, leaping on to the platform and grabbing the pole to stop myself falling off. Elation tinged with relief!

A favourite memory is hanging off the platform one day as the bus sped off down Whitehall while a friend on a bike pedalled furiously, inches from the tailgate. Today, health & safety would frown on such behaviour - but in 50 years how many people were killed or seriously hurt jumping on or off a Routemaster bus?

By coincidence, another guest at the ICA on Friday night was Travis Elborough (left), author of The Bus We Loved: London's affair with the Routemaster (Granta, 2005). If anyone doubts the liberating qualities of this special vehicle I urge you to read the book. Or read THIS interview in which he says: "That bell, with its school orchestra triangle 'ding-ding', such a comic, comforting sound, will be hard to forget ... And lastly, of course, the open platform at the rear for that liberty to hop on and off, in a way that seemed somehow to acknowledge all the spontaneity of life in the capital."

Needless to say it was an interfering politician, Ken Livingstone, who abolished the Routemaster and replaced it with the notorious 'bendy bus' that Travis correctly describes as having "all the aesthetics of a Hoover attachment". Thanks to Ken we have lost a little bit of freedom. It's not much but all these things add up. Without the Routemaster our lives are a little less spontaneous and a little less fun.

Financial freedom: money talks

I am currently reading Piers Morgan's new book, Don't You Know Who I Am?. I enjoyed his previous diary, The Insider, and I very nearly named this blog The Outsider as a sort of tongue-in-cheek homage. There is something about Morgan I rather like. He may be a (self-confessed) prat at times but I admire his energy, his cheek and his effervescent style of writing. I even have a sneaking regard for his apparent shallowness and persistent name-dropping.

Early in the book he recalls an interview, in June 2005, with Simon Cowell. Describing a moment in his life, ten years earlier, when a record company he had invested in went bust and he found himself completely broke, Cowell said:

"There was a weird sense of freedom at having absolutely zilch but still having the energy and desire to change my life for the better. I got rid of my house and swapped my Porsche for a £7,000 car I'd paid cash for, but that didn't embarrass me. It was just the way it was ... I vowed then never to borrow money again. If I could afford something, I would pay cash for it; if I couldn't, I would wait. In an odd way, it was a very good thing for me."

The book doesn't explore this issue further (nor should it) but perhaps we can. In a week when it has been revealed that in order to get on the property ladder some people are having to borrow up to six times their annual salary, future generations could find themselves in a financial straitjacket that may have serious repercussions for individual freedom. On the other hand (thanks in no small part to our ability to borrow surprisingly large sums of money), those of us who are not cash rich have the freedom to buy a new car, enjoy expensive holidays or indulge in home improvements that may have been denied to previous generations.

BTW, Simon Cowell is another man I admire. Neither he nor Morgan is a saint, nor do they pretend to be. Morgan likes a drink, Cowell likes a smoke. Together they would make excellent patrons of The Free Society. Watch this space.