Sir Simon Wessely is President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists. Together with Greg Smith, who works for the College, he wrote this excellent article about proposals to eliminate the payment of welfare benefits to fat people and people with alcohol problems. It is suggested that they will have their benefits withdrawn if they don’t […]
Memory of a free festival
The counter culture is extinct. Festivals are no longer unruly affairs featuring the Edgar Broughton Band on the back of a truck performing Out Demons Out. They are organised by the local council to encourage recycling or they’re sponsored by the National Licensed Victuallers Association to support lager consumption. Drugs went mainstream in the 1980s […]
In Athens and Detroit, there’s revolution in the air
Almost 20 years ago, I attended a meeting at the Department of Health in London and found that I was seated next to the late Professor Robert Kendall, at that time President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists. I didn’t really know him. He cut a rather austere, cerebral figure. He was friendly, but not […]
Several interesting things to do in Birmingham on a Wednesday
I go to a lot of conferences these days, most often as a speaker. This is a function of age and job description. It is unfortunate that I hate travelling. It might have been wise to take this into account before I changed from a relatively static NHS role to more mobile academic one, about […]
No College for Social Workers
Parenthood is an unending succession of anxiety provoking situations. Once, one of my offspring expressed an interest in becoming a social worker. I immediately had a pang of apprehension. Don’t get me wrong. Some of my best friends are social workers. I don’t mean that figuratively, they really are. I have social work colleagues who […]
It’s enough to make you cry
The hapless Sir Tim Hunt FRS, Nobel laureate and important scientific dude, is currently attracting support from a range of senior scientists. They feel that he has been victimised by a baying Twitter mob following some crass comments about female scientists. No one likes to see somebody hounded, but the fact is that his comments […]
Charles Kennedy is dead
Charles Kennedy’s funeral has passed and so has the intensive press coverage. The sheer volume of comment about him was astonishing. Much of it was repetitive, and it has left me feeling uncomfortable. Even for those of us who didn’t like Charles Kennedy’s politics, he always seemed personable and decent. He was once the youngest […]
Life
When I was young, old people had a certain mature dignity. They had been through the Second World War. They didn’t talk about it or, if they did, they construed it as one huge apocalyptic party and sing-song. Women still wore the fashions of the 1940s. Men had oiled short back and sides, topped off […]