Diary 6/11/10

Massive congratulations to FC United of Manchester, who progressed to the second round of the FA Cup by beating Rochdale 3-2 away, courtesy of a controversial last-second winner. It’s the stuff cup dreams are made of; FC play in the Evostik Premier Division and none of the players are professional – one is a residential childcare worker, one makes PVC windows, another is a steel erector… Meanwhile, League One promotion contenders Rochdale featured Craig Dawson, who has already been sold to Premier League West Bromwich Albion for £500,000 and Chris O’Grady, who has often been linked with moves to Championship clubs.

The FC story is a wonderful one. Formed by Manchester United fans who could not accept the takeover of their club by the Glazers, FC have very quickly progressed through the tiers of English football and are now three levels below the Football League. Their fans used Friday night’s ESPN coverage as a showcase for their vociferous, boisterous and positive support – singing constantly, with songs by Slade (‘Cum On Feel The Noize’), Sam Cooke (‘Under The Boardwalk’) and The Beach Boys (‘Sloop John B’) all adapted for their needs. Unfortunately, this excitement spilled into a pitch invasion when Nicky Platt scored the opening goal and red flares were lit at certain points.

Behaviour is less closely monitored at lower levels of the game, so there is a fear that certain undesireable elements of the football fraternity might adopt FC United as ‘their’ club, but I applaud the desire to build a United for the community, not for corporate raiders and star players to make millions. FC United welcomes paying members, who have a say on club matters. It’s similar to the FC Barcelona model (‘mes que un club’), which protects the institution from the sort of share-hoovering sharks who have scented blood in the TV money-soaked waters of the Premier League.

On Bonfire Night, FC United fans waved a banner bearing the image of Alan Moore‘s V, from V for Vendetta.  In Moore’s nightmare vision of a near-future Britain taken over by fascists, it is V who revives the spirit of Guido Fawkes and blows up the Houses of Parliament. Doubtless, the Rebels’ fans see themselves in the same light – independent spirits, rising against the tyranny of oppression, greed and vested interests, reclaiming something they see as rightfully theirs – the spirit of Manchester United.

I hope that FC managed to raise the money they need to move into their proposed new 5,000-capacity stadium in Newton Heath – if they do, I will certainly go to see them. The atmosphere their fans generated at Rochdale’s Spotlands was fantastic, in what was essentially a home tie for FC.

Diary 3/11/10

My reply to John Leech MP on the Murdoch issue : -

Dear Mr Leech,

Many thanks for your response.

I share your concerns around Mr Murdoch’s continuing efforts to dominate the British media. I am glad that this issue is referred to in the Coalition Agreement, but am only too aware that your Conservative partners are far less worried than we are. I read with interest a Financial Times article, which stated that almost all the senior Tory cabinet ministers were present at Mr Murdoch’s recent Lady Thatcher lecture in London.

In that address, Mr Murdoch (an Australian) clearly sets out his vision for Britain – a neo-Thatcherite vision of small government with low public spending and certainly not a government that would seek to get in his way.  Clearly, a newspaper proprietor is entitled to direct his titles as he sees fit, but when his Conservative ‘fan club’ are then responsible for freezing the BBC’s licence fee for six years – a measure that can only benefit Mr Murdoch’s Sky TV and certainly not the British public – shouldn’t questions be asked?

Mr Murdoch did not quite get what he wanted from the British public at the last election, but he will continue to use his media to work towards this goal – a Conservative government – in the future. I hope that you and your Liberal Democrat colleagues will continue to promote your ideals of plurality and diversity by protecting the public from those like Mr Murdoch who would seek to dominate and distort the media with biased coverage, whatever their political leaning.

Yours sincerely,

Oliver Wright

If Mr Leech is your MP in Manchester Withington, you can email him yourself at LEECHJ@parliament.uk.

We watched an interesting documentary called Twitchers on BBC Four the other night. Principally because I’ve been known to go out birdwatching, I was fascinated to watch the men (and they are all men) who go out not just birdwatching, but actively ‘twitching’ around the UK and Ireland – attempting to build as big a list of ‘ticks’ as possible.  These are men who would drop anything to drive, fly or sail anywhere they had to go to spot a rarity, knowing that if they don’t go, they may never see that bird again.

It’s a hobby which, if taken to such extremes, demands total commitment – financial as well as in terms of time. I felt sad for Brett, the veteran twitcher on the verge of retirement, who had returned to birding after giving up drinking and has one of the longest ‘life lists’ in Britain.  Brett was trying to come to terms with the fact that once he retired, he wouldn’t have enough money to properly pursue his passion any more.

Another man, Garry, had a 7-year old daughter at home, but thought nothing of leaving her with his wife at the drop of a hat, whenever his pager bleeped with details of a fresh rarity, no matter how far-flung.

The strangest of the twitchers is undoubtedly Lee Evans, the self-proclaimed ‘George Michael of birding’.  “I live my life in a similar way; like him, I’m controversial”, he says, without a hint of irony.  Evans’ birding obsession has become his career and he is also the self-appointed ‘judge, jury and executioner’ of other British birders’ claims to have seen a rarity.  His motivation? He hates cheats. Plus, he likes to win the annual ‘yearlist’ competition that he runs – and he usually does win, by seeing more species of birds in Britain than anone else.

I love birds and I would love to see rare birds, but I also like to think that I would not become as obsessive as these gentlemen. I gues I can live without seeing the first ever Yellow-Browed Warbler to appear on these shores and would rather not drive fifteen hours on the off-chance of spotting a vagrant gull in the middle of a crowd of 2,000 of its commoner cousins – on a rubbish tip.

Diary 2/11/10

It’s raining pretty intensely in Manchester. I never can quite get used to it. Especially when cycling home leads to an absolute soaking.

Prompted by the campaigning organisation 38 Degrees, I emailed my local MP, the Liberal Democrat John Leech, about Rupert Murdoch‘s attempts to take 100% control of BSkyB. Mr Leech replied; here’s the full response:

Thank you for contacting me about News Corporation’s bid to take over BSkyB. May I apologise for the length of time it has taken me to reply to you.

I certainly would not be happy to see Rupert Murdoch further expand his media operations in the UK as I feel it would threaten diversity and plurality both of which are essential to a healthy and independent media. The Liberal Democrats have always been committed to a plural media combined with an independent BBC and indeed the Coalition Agreement specifically mentions these commitments.

On a personal level I do have great doubts about the amount of control and the possibility of undue influence that a single person can have when so many media outlets are controlled by one corporation and by one individual in particular. This would be true of any individual whether I agreed with their political point of you (sic) or not, although it is fair to say that I do not find myself in agreement with a lot of the news and opinion of much of the Murdoch controlled media.

I have passed on my own concerns to Vince Cable and will certainly forward your concerns as well.

It is perhaps worth noting that there is a clear legal framework set out within which Vince Cable will look at this decision. Firstly the European Commission’s competition directorate has to examine the proposals before the Secretary of State can intervene. Even then he must make his decision within the rules laid down by British legislation (the Enterprise Act 2002 and the Communications Act 2003) having taken all relevant information into account. This was laid out to ensure that there is not undue political interference in the media. It is for this reason that Vince Cable will not be making substantive comments at this stage as it would jeopardise any enquiries he will be making in the future.

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We shall see.

In other news, we took the recommendations of loads of friends and started watching Mad Men (I’m glad of the break from Damages).