Way back in January, I totally missed the significance of Lib Dem Cllr Faraz Bhatti defecting to the Tories. I think the reason I missed the point was, I never even considered the Conservatives would seriously contest the seat.
Back in May 2007, Lib Dem Faraz Bhatti scored 2030 to Labour’s 1418, the Green’s 393 and the Tories pathetic 206.
And yet the election season opened with a flurry of never before seen blue and green Conservative Party posters. The only political posters for some weeks, although the Lib Dems have now hit back hard and easily outnumber them. Faraz Bhatti apparently added 872 votes to the Lib Dem total and if he took them all with him to the Tories… this time represented by his mate Fawad Hussain… well they’d only leapfrog the Green Party into a solid third place!
But more importantly, Labour would reclaim the seat… doh! So up the Tories in Whalley Range. They’re mostly harmless… unless you’re a Lib Dem.
If ever there was a must-do holiday excursion, the Grand Canyon, Arizona must be it. And there is no shortage of people aching to take you there be it to get married, drink champagne in a wigwam or whatever.
We opted to fly from Las Vegas on a small fixed wing plane, drop down to the canyon floor by helicopter, take a boat along the Colorado River, helicopter back up and then take a coach trip around the sites with All Las Vegas Tours. All incredible value at just $289.99 each (and they throw in lunch). Other options include driving off road in a Hummer through a 1,000 year old Joshua Tree forest, but that seemed a little excessive.
The Grand Canyon itself was snow capped when we turned up, which made it all the prettier and there are fly-bys of Boulder City and the Hoover Dam, which provides Las Vegas with its emission free electricity.
New Philanthropy Capital aims to make a living – albeit in a not-for-profit manner – helping us donate our money more sensibly. New Philanthropy Capital aims to professionalise charitable giving.
But it’s hard to see that this is such a good idea, especially as the handy Charity Selector reveals a very narrow definition of a worthy cause; something domestic that can be pigeon holed into community, education or health.
A point missed, surely, is that people make charitable donations from their personal resources – monies they might otherwise quite reasonably spend on trivial things – on causes that somehow touch them. And if that’s donkeys, fair enough.
Of course, there may well be a role for New Philanthropy Capital in the corporate world, but even here the promotion of charity as not-so-altruistic investment is not particularly attractive.
Democratic accountability becomes an issue as powerful private sector institutions become more professional about the way they give and seek to become ever more involved in what and how the voluntary sector delivers. We already have at least one creationist school thanks to this kind of philanthropy.
There are still some areas where the state should lead, like protecting the victims of domestic violence and helping them rebuild their lives. Tending retried donkeys, on the other hand, might more reasonably be left to charity.
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