Still a Christian country?...

An article in today’s Guardian reminds us of what we already know: that more people under 40 in England and Wales now declare “no religion” than profess to be Christian. The census findings also reveal that more than 50% of twentysomethings are not religious, compared with under 37% a decade ago. We are still nominally a ‘Christian country’, with schools obliged to provide “broadly Christian” daily worship, but for how much longer? I look forward to the day when the deliberations of the Archbishop of Canterbury receive no more attention than the drunken ramblings of some guy at the far end of the bar.

I kipped in the car, last Friday, next to Crowland Abbey...

Barrow-in-Furness...

Licensed today: Barrow-in-Furness in Cumbria, with the BAE submarine works in the background...

Kirk Yetholm...

Licensed today: the Border Hotel in the village of Kirk Yetholm, Roxburghshire... the finishing point of the Pennine Way…

Chippy...

I’m mildly intrigued by this article in the Guardian, featuring the “ten best blankets for the British chill”. I wonder who the article is aimed at, since the people who can afford a blanket – made from “responsible wool standard (RWS) certified wool”, and costing £499 – are unlikely to be too concerned by the size of their winter fuel bills.

The mobile fish 'n' chip van came this evening, as the fog lifted... 

Levelling up...

It only takes a brief promenade around Goole to realise that the “levelling up” promised by our political masters isn’t working yet. If we want to know why blighted northern towns like Goole are failing to get the investment they need, we may get some clues from a talk Rishi Sunak made last year to Tory leaders in Tumbridge Wells. He was filmed making this remark. “I managed to start changing the funding formulas to make sure areas like this are getting the funding they deserved. We inherited a bunch of formulas from Labour that shoved all the funding into deprived urban areas and that needed to be undone. I started the work of undoing that”…

Leighton Hall...

Licensed today: Leighton Hall, home of the Gillow family, near Carnforth, Lancashire… 

Serial rapist...

I’ve been reading about David Carrick, the met officer (now ex-met officer) who has pleaded guilty to multiple rapes, on many women, over twenty years. Now that a trial is not needed, some truly awful details are emerging. Apparently, in the wake of his many crimes, the met are now going to investigate 1,000 reported incidents, featuring 800 more serving officers. This raises the question of where these 1,000 reports have been until now. Locked in a filing cabinet and marked ‘No further action required’, or slid under the nearest rug?

Spotted in the Guardian today: a Royal Mail van parked in the village of Boxford, Berkshire…