The Eight Irresistible Principles of Fun

Found via dvorak.org/blog

Found via Tom Coates.

Technorati Tags: uk, postcodes, geo-location

The main thing has been that I’ve been working very hard on a new project…to get a new job! I’m pleased to say it has now been completed and I’m now into my third month with Mobeon, a Swedish company that produce voice and video mail systems for the telecommunications industry.

There are several benefits for me in this change:

1. I’m working with software.
2. I’m working with messaging software, i.e. e-mail servers and the like.
3. I get to work from home.
4. I get to travel around the world.
5. I get paid a bit more!

It’s not all roses though, the travel is quite extensive and can be at very short notice. So far, I’ve been to Sundsvall in Sweden (twice) and Jakarta, Indonesia. This can cause some problems with child care for Euan on the mornings when Louise works, but we’ve managed to work it out so far.

Working from home is cool, but I do have to be careful about not spending all my time working. It will be much better when I get a dedicated home office in which to work. At the moment I’m having to sit at the dining room table, so end up spending almost my entire day there!

Another reason why I’ve not had too much time for blogging is that I’ve been working quite a bit on the websites that I manage for various organisations. In particular, I’ve been working on one for the band I now play in, Northwood Volunteer Band. I’m particularly pleased with this one as it’s my first foray into content management systems, and it seems to work quite well with Joomla. However, now that I’ve been asked to do Euan’s school website I’ve discovered there some reasonably fundamental issues with both Joomla and Drupal. Joomla doesn’t have great frontend support for editors and both Drupal (at least the beta version of 5.0) and Joomla don’t have great permission/role frameworks, at least not natively. I’ll have to try the non-beta version of drupal plus extensions.

I’ve not posted here for a while as there have been a few changes of late, more on that later.

Hilary spoke for perhaps about 15-20 minutes and then took a few questions. He began by reminding us that the UK had once been a developing nation until the invention of the steam generator that fuelled the Industrial Revolution and that there challenges to being a small planet brought ever closer by technology; immigration, refugees, climate change.

It was clear in Hilary’s mind that there were two essentials required for a developing nation:

1. Clean water
2. Education

Clean directly affects the rate of infant mortality, as it did when it was discovered that it was contaminated water that caused the Cholera outbreak in London in 1854. In some parts of Africa 20% (1 child in 5) of children will not live to see their 5th birthdays due to contaminated water supplies. 6000 children die every day purely from water-bourne diseases.

Of course once infant mortality is reduced it then becomes important that these children are then able to receive a good, affordable education so that they in turn can raise children successfully. In many countries this is not possible either because the children die or are forced to work alongside their parents (or in place of their parents) so that the family can put some food on the table.

Hilary told us that thanks to the effective lobbying of MPs by people such as ourselves and through the campaigns organised by Make Poverty History and many others we can and do make progress. In fact, we can begin to make real difference today through buying Fairtrade goods without having to wait for the World Trade Organisation to make changes. Too often, campaigns such as these are met with cynicism and it was clear to Hilary that there was no room for cynicism in tackling these problems, we can all do something effective today.

He ended his talk by asking if we would have believed that the changes and commitments that were made in 2005 ($50bn in development aid; 19 countries relieved of debt; a reduction in the prevalence of AIDS in Africa) would have been possible if we’d been asked about them 12 months ago. He conceded that there was still much to be done in particular with lobbying the EU to make significant changes in terms of agricultural subsidies to enable more just trade.

A quote that stands out and picked out by my friend, and fellow Methodist, David Faires, from Hilary was: “We are a generation who know about this world’s condition and we can make a difference“.

Hilary then took questions from the audience. The first of which was also the top of my questions, which was to do with conditions imposed on debt relief that forces countries to privatise water supplies or reduce spending in other key areas such as education. Hilary addressed this by stating categorically that the UK does not impose conditions on the debt relief it gives other than to ensure that the money is not used inappropriately. He said that if countries asked the UK to provide support in establishing water supplies they would give it.

Hilary noted that needs of each developing country differs in their needs and priorities so each country’s relief and support is developed on a case by case basis.

A question was raised on the illegal logging going on in Indonesia to make way for Palm Oil plantations (demand for which, ironically, stems from environmental concerns on fuel emissions). Hilary acknowledged that this was a big concern but there is not an easy solution to the problem. Hilary believes that the best way forward was for a certification system to be introduced in the countries of origin that states that the timber was legally logged. However, this requires the originating countries to bring this in to effect and to strongly enforce it. Corruption at local, regional and national level appears to be preventing such systems being put in place.

The next question covered the apparent inconsistencies of policy in different departments of government. In particular between the Department for International Development and the Department of Trade and Industry in respect of arms trade. Surely all goverment departments should look towards taking a holistic approach to helping developing countries. Hilary addressed this by stating that the UK has the toughest arms export rules in the world but that countries, developing or otherwise, have a right to buy arms to defend themselves. He also pointed at that other departments within government are taking the issues of poverty seriously in the policies that they are adopting.

One member of the audience stated that his school had raised a significant sum of money to purchase a vehicle for a clinic in Africa and asked whether small-scale fundraising for specific projects was a worthwhile acitivity. A follow up question asked whether this approach could be scaled up to a national level, with, for example, the UK providing funding for health care and Germany providing funding for education.

The answer Hilary gave was that all fundraising is good but it must be done in conjunction with organisations and/or government in the receiving country to ensure that the aid is joined up. He gave an example of a new theatre had been built at a hospital using funds donated directly but this theatre was only ever being used for lancing boils because there was no funding or training to supply the doctors and nurses needed to staff it.

There were other questions that I cannot remember, but hopefully I’ll get additional information from others who were there which I can use to update this post.

Following the session with Hilary Benn, Claire Ward conducted us on a tour of the House of Commons and then some of us took the opportunity to sit in the Strangers Gallery of the House of Lords to listen to some of the debate still going on there.

My overall impression was that Hilary Benn is very passionate about the work he is doing and cares deeply. He struck me as someone who is working very hard for change, that he does listen to what the country is asking him to do. I suspect he gets frustrated with cynicism and intransigence, particularly perhaps at the EU level. For him 2005 was very definitely a watershed in terms of public perception of and willingness to do something about global poverty.

The problem is what questions should I ask in what is likely to be a brief encounter? So I turn to the collective wisdom of the blogosphere for advice and will select maybe one or two questions to take with me.

My invitation has come about through responding to the campaign action of the Make Poverty History campaign, but Hilary also deals with international environmental policy too.

I would urge you to read a speech that Hilary made to the Overseas Development Institute and the all party parliamentary group on overseas development entitled: An international development system fit for the 21st century.

The reception is to be held on the 19th of April so I’ll need questions by then. I’ll post his comments on this blog (if he lets me!)

It’s looking increasingly likely that I won’t be needing an office application suite installed on my PC at all. Though there is something to be said for having your data and apps close at hand for those occassions when your broadband link goes down.

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