The Government announced £1 billion funds to support the work schools would need to do to enable many children to “catch-up” after Covid: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/catch-up-premium-coronavirus-covid-19/catch-up-premium It is clear that the Covid lockdowns have had a serious impact on many children- not only through “falling behind” in education, but also in mental health. The Maudsley…
Category: First Thursday Archive
December 3rd 2020 First Thursday
Summary of the discussion We noted the practice of “Imprisonment for Public Protection” (IPP), in the news recently. IPP was created by the 2003 Criminal Justice Act, implemented since 2005, and used for crimes which do not merit a life sentence, but where the offender is considered to pose a danger to others. After 10…
November First Thursday
November 12th summary of the discussion. Covid was still top of the news “agenda” with the promise of vaccines soon to be available. The costs of some (eg Pfizer) are likely to be high (Astra Zeneca is likely to be cheaper and does not need minus 80 degrees Celsius for storage). Drug companies may reap…
October 2020 First Thursday
Summary of our discussion: We noted that the “R” (reproduction) rate for Covid had recently fallen from 1.7 down to 1.1 [how long ago does that month seem now!!] The UK Agriculture Bill is going through Parliament at the moment (with a debate today). This has resulted from the UK leaving the EU, and therefore…
First Thursday, September 2020
Summary of the discussion: The election campaigning of US President Donald Trump appears to promote division, rather than healing. Law and Order is his message, rather than any attempt to deal with the issues that have caused anger and the protests. In some ways, this is similar to Richard Nixon’s campaign in 1968, which stressed…
First Thursday, August 2020
The Beirut explosion happened two days before- a shipload of ammonium nitrate en route in 2013 from Georgia for fertilizer in Mozambique, and abandoned after the Russian cargo ship developed mechanical problems near Cyprus, appears to have been triggered by a nearby fire. If stored for long periods ammonium nitrate solidifies and becomes dangerous. Poor…
July 2020 First Thursday
Two matters in the news occupied most of our discussion: The impact of the Beijing Government’s actions on Hong Kong. Is it that Beijing is determined to subvert the 1997 One Country, Two Systems agreement with Britain and control Hong Kong- or is it a difference of interpretation of what that agreement meant? Since Deng…
First Thursdays
Summary of First Thursday discussions Nov. 7th 2019 and Jan. 2nd 2020 The story of a 10-yr old boy who claimed that his ambition was to become a drug lord https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-50317250 https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7656687/Boy-aged-TEN-dreams-County-Lines-drug-dealer.html provoked a discussion about the ideals offered to young people and the pressures put on them in society today. In the not too…
First Thursday, October 2019
Summary of the discussion October 3rd 2019: Zechariah talks about false prophets (13:4 to 6), people who wear hair shirts and beat themselves up to pretend they have a message from God. Our media and politics today are flooded with accusations of “Fake News”. In 1920s and 1930s Germany Joseph Goebbels knew the power of…
Summary First Thursday 5th September 2019
Micah chapter 4 (one of the readings for the morning prayers on September 5th) speaks of a time when nations “beat their swords into ploughshares, their spears into pruning-hooks” and do not “learn war and more”. In his book “Beyond Brexit” Vernon Bogdanor points out that the wars of the first half of the twentieth…