So, this last week was election week. For our lowly Parish Council, through our County Councillors for Buckinghamshire, to several metropolitan mayors in England and then the devolved assemblies in Scotland and Wales. The summary would be that the incumbent governments all did well – Labour in Wales, the nationalists in Scotland and “Boris” in England. This may be a mixture of vaccination approval and understanding of the difficult decisions made by governments over the COVID months. You all will see the impact of the SNP and Conservative positioning for or against a second independence referendum over the next, perhaps, three years.More of Mike's story - "Read More" below.
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Astonishingly COVID has been pushed from the front page and replaced by a French fishing dispute just off Jersey and Guernsey, a Queen’s Crown dependency, which have their foreign policies negotiated by the UK, so making them part of the trade settlement with the EU. Many of us older Rotarians will remember the cod wars with Iceland, which we lost, but so far, the media has resisted the use of “scallop wars” which apparently are the main fish in dispute. Jersey and Guernsey are all that remains of the Crown’s Normandy possessions going right back to William the Conqueror.
Parts of Scotland were covered in snow, making the election slightly more complicated, but a boon for late winter skiers. In Chalfont St Peter, the cold weather has pushed back the plants by 3 weeks or so – so I am told by my gardening neighbours.
In Misbourne Matins we continue to benefit from an international speaker programme with a talk last week on Zoom from our Rotary friends in Bali. Over the years we have helped them install water tanks for villagers in the drier parts of the island (which withstood the recent volcano eruption) and taught local children to swim. Rotary programmes around the world are hugely facilitated by clubs working together and perhaps this is something our two clubs might consider.
Do please join us at one of our breakfast meetings. Ken tells us outrageous stories about Australia, and we have no-one to give us the real truth.
Mike Leyland