Higher Education - For Everyone?

So, Lord Mandelson, Prince of Darkness, Secretary for Business, and now, apparently all round “good guy” unveiled his higher education policy at the beginning of this month. 

Entitled ‘Higher Ambitions’ , the framework set out a more science and technology based system, where the aforementioned sectors would be given priority with regards to funding and access.

It’s here when my position as a left leaning liberal is called into question. Mandelson’s idea is to brand universities with the same kind of traffic light system that you find on ready meals, defining their calorific content and fat etc. He wants to further expand the idea of universities as a brand. While there’s no getting away from it, universities are a business (Trinity College Cambridge recently bought the O2, no doubt), I think that this is a step too far. I find myself more in tune with the Conservative Policy than Labour on this one.

On the party website, Labour declare that “more young people are attending university than ever before”. That may be so, but does that take into account whether these extra people should be at university at all? ‘Going to Uni’ is the cool thing to do right now, and has become less a thing to aspire to, than part of the status quo. What this leads to is a huge amount of university students who really shouldn’t be there at all. Their skills are far more suited to apprenticeships, which have died out in current years, and which the Conservatives pledge to bring back. 

University is a place for someone to learn, grow in knowledge, and then hopefully apply the skills learnt into an increasingly competitive job market. What Labour has done, is create an entire new class of university student. That is, who floats through their degree course, not really paying much attention, graduates, and then is suddenly lumped with thousands of pounds of debt, but crucially, without having benefited from the university system. On the whole these people would be better suited to learning practical skills. The whole reason why Polish plumbers have become an in-joke is because there are no native plumbers to fill the ranks. We now expect people to go to university, when in fact we should be taking individual cases into consideration. A huge amount of self-made entrepreneurs never went to university, and I doubt any of them regret it. We need to see what suits the individual, rather than applying generalised conventional wisdom to everyone.

That said, I still believe university in this country offers a good service for the fees paid. Tuition fees, although obviously higher than in years past, are still cheaper than the cost for one term attending some private secondary schools. A lot of it is down to how you use it. Use the facilities, books and lecturers that are on hand to offer support. More and more, it’s becoming clear that it’s what you do outside of compulsory work that counts, rather than within it. 

Era of mass miscommunication

So, we're nearing the end of 2009. By the end of 2010 it'll be 10 years since all the hassle about the Y2K virus, remember all that? The terror that threatened to bring civilisation to a standstill because the ticking clock wouldn't be able to handle the date ending with "00".

Computers and technology back then were a contradiction. On the one hand, they were innocent compared to todays powerful behemoths. Slow chugging processors powered us through cyberspace, and hard drives were filled up by the presence of one or two games. Dial up internet gave particularly sinister access to the internet, I always thought it sounded like a character from Doctor Who being murdered in an air shaft. However, on the other hand, computers were endlessly more frustrating and jargon based than they are now. To us "normal" people, techies like to make computers deliberately complicated, in order to keep their kudos, and moreover, their jobs. Web 2.0 has democratised and de-cluttered the internet, to the extent that even an idiot like me can make an online magazine: http://thefzine.com

Of course, "social networking" "micro-blogging" and the rest of the idiot terms applied to Web 2.0 do come at a price. That is, it's a lot like a lifetime membership. Once you've signed up, it's very difficult to get away.

Take this example: I must be one of the only people in my age group to not watch The X Factor, judging by the endless Facebook updates. Opting out of watching the program isn't enough anymore. One has to turn off all radios, computers, phones, and just about any other piece of technology that looks shiny enough to pick up a signal to get away from it all. Instead, idly minding my own business, I cheerfully click the "refresh" button on my browser. Suddenly I'm hit with a torrent of updates:


"can't actually believe that jedward are still in xfactor!!!!!"


"JEDWARD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! whhayyyyyyy" 


"hope lloyd goes!"


I remember fondly when my dad would coincide his bike rides with England's efforts to progress through the World Cup. Time after time, the streets would be deserted as he joyfully cycled around in peace for 90 minutes. Whenever there was a penalty shoot out he got an added bonus. A few years ago, I could've been him. I could've turned off the television when Simon Cowell and his Will Smith circa '91 haircut hove into view, and that would've been that. Now because I've signed up to a whole range of mailing lists, networks and websites, I have to turn all of those off aswell. "But that's your fault!" you're screaming at the screen. Yes, of course it is, but do people really have to tweet and exchange such bland information? If the technology is there for Alan Rusbridger to tweet about Trafigura and overturn an injunction, it's a massive waste of resources if we're using this to talk about deluded fools singing their hearts out with all the melody of an irate chimp.

Essentially the banter which was previously only privy to the seats at the back of the bus have been brought forward onto the internet. Meaningless chat and general idiocy dominate the feeds. I'd love it if people thought before typing a bit more, but what can I do about it? Simply watch the conversations unfold, and subscribe to the X Factor Twitter page...

Red Hill, the border of England

To visit Penrith, Cumbria, is to visit one of the loveliest market towns in the UK. The town centre is based around the market square and shops are housed in hardy Georgian buildings, similar to Lancaster.

Checking through a newsagent, I was taken aback by the amount of local media. Granted, there were a lot of Have I Got New For You-worthy publications like Farmers Guardian but so too were there multiple local newspapers, including the Cumberland and Westmoreland Herald which unusually, came in a broadsheet format.


Leafing through these publications, one article kept popping up, the mass opposition to a huge Sainsburys superstore. The proposed development is due to take place in the southern part of Penrith, but there is massive local opposition. Talking to a salesman in the excellent Gents Outfitters, Arrnisons, it became clear that Penrith is proud of its stoicism in the face of chain stores and the endeavours to keep independent shops viable. Admittedly, Penrith has a branch of Morrisons, but it is outside the town centre, and small compared to the 98,000 square feet store proposed by Sainsburys. He went so far as to say that the new development would "kill the town centre" and that the sense of community created by close knit shops would be lost. Unfortunately the council seem to be in favour of this new development, but there is an open meeting at the Town Hall on 12th November where locals can voice their opinions.


Enough of the doom and gloom, as Penrith has so much to keep you occupied. The aforementioned outfitters is magnificent. Don't come here looking for the new deconstructed avant-garde jacket by Junya Watanabe, because you won't find it. What you will find is traditional high quality men's formalwear, excellent service, and a brilliant selection of shoes. All the "classics" boxes were ticked, with chelsea boots, brogues, desert boots and oxfords, on sale in a variety of styles and colours. Hats were available in a range of measurements which were all catered for.  No wonder the men of the town dress so sharply when such an excellent shop is on their doorstep. The service is helpful, knowledgeable, and crucially, unintimidating, which will allay most men's fears about clothes shopping.


Pop across the square from here and you find the excellent delicatessen, J&J Graham. I wish I'd managed to stay longer but they were shutting by the time I arrived. What I did garner is that it had a mouthwatering range of cheeses, meats and freshly ground coffee on sale, as well as a vast selection of preserves and wine. It was impressive to find a shop like this so busy just before closing time, especially with the supermarket on the outskirts of town. A revisit is surely in order to pick up some treats for Christmas.


My final pick of the town is the Lonsdale Cinema, a two screen cinema built in 1910 in the city centre, adjoining a bingo hall. While it showed the typical multiplex fare of mainstream films, it was lovely to see the original building had been kept whilst having a modern interior. Sunday afternoons are host to the "Alternative" showing, which this week was Pedro Almodovar's Broken Embraces.


Penrith is only 20 miles from Carlisle. A quick google shows that it takes next to no time to come south from Scotland down to Penrith, nor does it take long if you live in any other part of the north west. It deserves a visit, and any money that can be put in the pockets of local retailers rather than money hungry supermarkets is much appreciated. The people of Penrith deserve better.

"I'm trying real hard to be the shepherd"

So, I think this could prove to be controversial. At least, to the one internet drifter who happens to stumble across my small hut in cyberspace. Quentin Tarantino has lost it. There, I said it. While film critics have largely been saying this for the last six or seven years, it seems that I'm very much in the minority with this view when it comes to people in their twenties.

This is not an all out attack on QT, this is a study of a man who had something special, and then squandered it. There is no doubt in my mind that he has made three excellent films. Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown all stand out as triumphs in modern cinema. Whether you like his referential style, copious violence and wisecracking script or not, these films can't help but be appreciated as brilliant works. So how did he so spectacularly lose the ability to make such defining films? I think the answer is, the river of ideas drying up, as well as becoming a figure of self parody.

In Inglorious Basterds, his latest flick, there's a close-up of a bowl of cream while a conversation is taking place over a dinner table. The close up used in this style has become one of the Tarantino trademarks along with the trunk shot, and long, lingering takes. However, the difference is that before, Tarantino was using these embellishments to drive the story forward, to provide a different take on familiar situations and to render anticipation in the viewer's mind. Now he seems to include these begrudgingly in order to make the film seem his. Quentin Tarantino is trying too hard to make a Quentin Tarantino film. One doesn't feel that he creates films by an organic process anymore, but that he sits at his desks discussing scripts thus: "Ah yes, we'll have a trunk shot there....then in the next scene, that'll have a femme fatale in...oh and throw in a mexican standoff"

Tarantino's dedication to homages and tributes has, as above, turned from witty referencing to cloying and tiresome. In "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" each major character is accompanied by a little vignette, and a freeze frame outlines their respective characters as "The Good" "The Bad" and "The Ugly". Tarantino creates an obvious tribute to this in Inglorious Basterds, outlining the various Basterds in these small onscreen character profiles. Whereas in Sergio Leone's western, these depictions are used to good effect, to set up the story, under Tarantino's clumsy direction, they become tiresome. Eli Roth's character is introduced as "The Bear Jew". I was expecting a monster colossus of a man. Instead we get Roth, hardly well built,  wielding a baseball bat. Are we expected to find this clever, amusing or fearsome? It ends up being none of these.

In the aforementioned first three films by Tarantino, he used his knowledge of trashy cinema, integrated with snappy dialogue and cartoonish violence to create films which were exciting, humourous and unpredictable. He has failed to achieve this in any of his films since Kill Bill Vol. 1.

I put forward the argument that a blockbuster like Transformers can be considered superior to Tarantino's  efforts this millennium. It is easy to see the motives of the likes of Transformers, Hancock, Independence Day, et al. Their chief goal is a money spinning enterprise, providing big, dumb entertainment "for all the family". It's an effort to pack as many people into multiplex cinemas as possible to reap the biggest financial award. But, and here's the clincher, have they ever purported to be anything but that? Tarantino's slew of latest films are junk masquerading as high art, and he has struck back at critics deeming them "unworthy" saying they don't understand him. Doesn't that sound a bit like the hormonal teenager whose parents have been honest about their son's "eclectic" musical taste?

The horrible thing is that besides reasoned film critics, his army of devoted fans and sycophantic chat show hosts like Jonathan Ross manage to keep the idea going that he is still the prodigal enfant terrible of American cinema. When you find yourself yawning halfway through a Tarantino film, you have to ask yourself, if he based his early triumphs on keeping the viewer locked in with intrigue and expectancy, once these facets have faded, what does he have left?

Tarantino has run out of ideas. He should take a leaf from the Coen Brothers' book, who manage to create films with their signature stamp on, but can never be said to have created identikit films.

Lancaster bomber

I'd never been to Lancaster until yesterday. In tremendous contrast to my previous post, it seems like a town which ideally, all Northern towns would seek to replicate in terms of atmosphere, beauty and entertainment.

Late Georgian architecture adorns the high street, crowds make their way up and down the tiled pedestrianised area that makes up the town centre. It's refreshing to see so many independent shops on the high street, somehow Lancaster has not yet succumbed to the homogenisation that afflicts other British towns. It has found a way to accommodate high street institutions (Topshop, M&S, HMV) as well as provide an outlet for small business owners. Furthermore it was inspiring to see such niche interests represented; sauntering down the high street I saw advertisements for a Joe Meek themed clubnight and a French film society. I challenge anyone to find similar pastimes catered for in another town of similar size.

I think the secret to Lancaster's beauty is it's ability to effortlessly combine elements of the past with the modern. This collocation never seems contrived, and while the aforementioned shops are prevalent on the high street, they are housed in original shop fronts, their letters embossed in the old stonework. Lancaster's bygone years as a market town means that it has a long history in trade and commerce on a public level. Perhaps this means that it has adapted more readily and comfortably than some of the worn out mill towns in this part of the UK. Despite the architectural eyesore that is Lancaster University (very good academically, but I'm not sure the architect would top many "best in show" lists) it is truly a lovely town to look at. Open country is but a bus ride away, and there seems plenty of cultural investment in the form of the Lancaster Grand Theatre and Lancaster Castle.

While the current levels of poverty would betray the portrait I'm painting (second in Lancashire with regard to "Households accepted as homeless") I still think that Lancaster has a lot more going for it than other places in the region. All it needs is some investment, as currently it lives very much in the shadow of it's noxious Lancastrian neighbouring cities.

Go on, pay it a visit.