Charlie, you have seven and no passes

LAST WORD ON THE WEEK: YOU have to hand it to Charlie Parker (and I don’t mean a wheelbarrow to carry home is wages) he is a sophisticated human equivalent of the answering machine in that he always knows what to say and never ever fluffs his lines.

His three-day grilling in the Chronicle this week was a Mastermind-winning performance with no wrong answers and no passes. Interrogator supreme John Humphrys would have been lost for words. And even Jeremy Paxman would have had the perma-sneer wiped from his jowls.

Asked for his list of achievements since becoming chief exec, Charlie came up with seven that was just enough to sound impressive without appearing too cocky. A sort of modest preen.

The key, of course, is putting together a winning team and Charlie has certainly done that, evidenced, as Charlie points out, by favourable national media headlines and a place on the shortlist for the most improved council of the year.

Council leader Howard Sykes has his team given to him by a combination of party activists and the electorate. How he probably envies Charlie.

I like Howard (kiss of death, Howard, I know — sorry) he is a say-it-as-it-is pragmatist who only joins in the cross-party, primary-school name-calling nonsense when he is drawn into it.

Howard was at his best in the Radio 4 programme on Oldham this week.

He was brief and honest about the problems the borough faces but even he probably couldn’t answer the real question: why did Radio 4 do the programme, what was it for apart from filling air time?

Perhaps we should ask Charlie.


PERHAPS we should feel sorry for Asian men who, according to Muslim peer Lord Ahmed, are forced to use drugs and alcohol to groom young white girls — some as young as 12 and some in care — into sexual activity because their arranged marriages with relatives from overseas are not happy.
Or, then again, perhaps not.

If an unhappy marriage was justification for what is, after all, criminal activity of the worst sort in that it corrupts and damages the lives of vulnerable young people, then we should desist from deeming ourselves a civilised society.

Surely there are enough young Asian women living in the UK at the moment to provide the young single men with a splendid choice of life partner.

The problem is an extended family structure that encourages marriage to a relative who moves to the UK, knowing nothing about its mores and lifestyle and especially its liberated attitude to matters sexual.

It is a problem that damages the reputation of Asian communities in many of our towns and cities even though it involves only a tiny minority of men.

Only the communities themselves can heal this festering sore in their midst.


FINAL WORD: If you go down to the woods today you’re sure of a big surprise: There’ll be “Keep out” gates and fences as another freedom dies.