Back In The Working World

Week Thirty – two: Sunday 6 – Saturday 12 May

Took my wife and daughter up to Edinburgh for a week; I had a week of freelance work, and we three had a chance to catch up with family and friends. You know your place when you contact people to say you are coming up and they all immediately ask, “Are Toni and Kumali coming too?”

So while I jumped back into the working world Toni and Kumali spent their days meeting up with various people. A constant stream of tea and cake, lunch, then more tea and cake, and my beautiful daughter being fussed over and complimented on her beauty, grace and abilities.

It wasn’t so bad being back at work; I guess I have worked enough over the last twenty-five or so years for it not to be so much of a shock to the system. It has been a pleasure and a treat to be a full-time student again, and the nine to five routine does easily drop away; but work is not so strange as to be unmanageable.

The work involved managing the media campaign for a national event to encourage adults who are not normally associated with learning to return to learning. It is a worthwhile event to be involved with; the opportunity to effect real, positive change in people’s lives is high and that makes it great to be involved with.

I have also been doing this work every year for the last nine years; I normally fit back into the rhythm of the work easily enough.

What was most interesting about being back in Scotland was the fact that the elections had just taken place and the Scottish voting public made it clear they have had enough of New Labour. With proportional representation at local level Labour lost control of several local authorities; nationally the Scottish Nationalist Party won most seats, leaving them as the party to form the new government.

It is clear that the Scottish media are not keen on an SNP government; the fourth estate fearing the break-up of the union. There is no sense in any of that, in my humble opinion. Great Britain is a misnomer; it is not a country, it is four countries. Surely a nation state is entitled to run its own affairs? An independent Scotland doesn’t have to mean anything negative in relation to the historical links with England, and/or Wales and Ireland for that matter.

How much difference does any mainstream political party actually make? I read a quote from green campaigner Jonathan Porritt over twenty years ago. He said, “Political parties are like cars on a motorway; they might all be going at different speeds, but they are all going in the same direction.”

Say no more!