Now that the Party (Conference) is over…

Did you comb the speeches of the Party leaders, at their Party Conferences, for mentions of the environment? Nick Clegg did best – he said that it was the Liberal Democrats who were keeping the Government ‘green’ and had ‘saved’ Natural England from the axe. Nick Clegg didn’t mention ‘wildlife’ or ‘nature’ but he did…

Badgers, Syria and democracy

I read an interesting blog last week by Matthew Taylor about whether ‘doing something’ is seen as better or worse than ‘not doing anything’. I am emotionally a ‘let’s do something’ type of person.  If I see a mess I’d rather be doing something about it than not doing something – sometimes, even if I’m…

Bovine TB

I heard this suggestion several years ago from a clever colleague.  I haven’t heard it since but I bet he’s right – although it’s a bit late in the day now. Is there any genetic basis for immunity to bovine TB in cattle? If so, why aren’t we using the more immune breeds of cattle? …

Should we be grateful?

Sometimes governments say they are going to do 20 daft things (they never put it quite like that) and then only do 10 daft things and they expect us all to be grateful.  There ought to be a word for it  – a Greek word – maybe there is – for a victory which you…