Always struck me as a strange sort of guy. There was a documentary about him maybe five years ago and he seemed rather an odd chap. Not specifically in the way that would make you think he was capable of sexual assault, just odd in general. Seemed to have a fixation on his mother if I remember rightly.

I’m sitting on the fence as far as his accusers go. We know nothing about the background and trial by forum shouldn’t really be a part of this. He did some great things, doesn’t mean he didn’t have a dark side, most famous people do.

Jim, if Jeffrey Archer, a convicted criminal and liar can keep his seat in the Lords then it makes a mockery of the whole honours system anyway. Knighthoods are fairly meaningless these days.

I wouldn’t use Norton either. It can take over you computer and really slow things to a crawl.

I was an anti Norton guy too until I saw the latest version running on my friend’s machine. It was so good I bought it. All of the ‘Norton slows you down’ is a thing of the past now.

Incredible shots, I wish I could shoot pics like that.

Anyone else remember him as psychiatrist Dr Roger Corder from the series ‘The Human Jungle’? Probably early to mid sixties. Great actor and lived to a good old age.

Crikey, always sad to see a bent jet but one of the few occasions I imagine that you would be glad that the fuel tank is in front of the pilot. That could have turned very nasty.

Jim, most of them are ex convicts (usually drug trade) or illegals who run a good chance of absconding. http://www.justice.gov.uk/contacts/prison-finder/morton-hall.

I’ve no idea why some fancy coming here instead of Germany/France. Maybe it’s historical, the Poles especially seem to not want to go to Germany. I do know that some are starting to return home as the recession bites here.

I lived in Germany some years ago and even then they had problems with the ‘Gastarbeiters’, mostly Greeks and Turks, even to the point of paying them to return to their country of origin; reasoning that it was cheaper to send them home with some cash than it was to pay them unenployment benefit. The problem (if you see it as a problem) being that it is EU law now to allow free movement of labour amongst the EU nations, which on the face of it is a good thing; whereas the Gastarbeiter system was a bilateral agreement between Germany and the seperate countries involved.

Don’t forget also that there are about 1 million Brits living and working abroad in Europe, cf around 1.6 million EU nationals living and working in UK, it’s not all a one way street.

As far as Oz goes, I’m certainly not aware of any more stringent entrance tests for persons ‘of colour’, I would imagine that to be highly illegal. They are quite sensitive now about their past treatment of Aboriginals and as far as I’m aware if you can do the job they couldn’t care less whether you are Black or Sky Blue. I find (surprisingly, as I was as guilty of stereotyping them as anyone else before I actually visited the place) Oz to be far more culturally integrated than the UK. Of course there are areas where if you went to the right bars and pubs where you will find the same arguments against ‘foreigners’ that you find here, but if you go anywhere in the world you will find the same thing.

Speaking personally, I find that the oft bandied phrase ‘Multicultural Britain’ is far off the mark. We do have many cultures but sadly they aren’t multi, more seperate entities making a token effort to co exist. I know many decent people of a certain age who continue to surprise me with their views on immigration, this country was founded on invasion and immigration, without it we wouldn’t be the nation we are now. There’s a lot of fear mongering going on and has been for years about immigration/emigration when in my opinion it’s what makes this and many other countries what they are.

Just as a last line, one of my son’s friends in Oz is an expat Brit. He left ‘because the country was becoming full of foreigners’. So….he became a foreigner in someone elses country, the beauty of which is totally lost on him…:)

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