Looking back - to 2004. Have we moved?

Mr Brazier has a clear vision for his legislation. It is to make it easier for people to volunteer to help with activities such as school trips and sporting events. People are put off volunteering, he suggests, because of the increasing fear of litigation and frustration with the associated red tape.

Julian Brazier, briefly a shadow minister under Iain Duncan Smith, and Frank Dobson, equally briefly his party’s London mayoral candidate, came together to steer this Bill through to the next stage of its parliamentary process. The Promotion of Volunteering Bill has even gained the tacit support of the government.

Echoing the sentiments in Julian Brazier’s Bill he claimed that it has led to playgrounds being fenced off, hanging baskets being taken down as health hazards, and teachers being advised no longer to supervise school outings. Expanding his theme, he argued that money was being taken away from schools and hospitals to pay for lawyers and claims managers.  

Adventure is freedom in at least two ways,....

Firstly,  that to be adventurous one must be free to choose one's route to adventure (perhaps also one's destination - should the latter be important). Secondly, of course is the freedom to really be there - in the moment, at the place, doing what adventure wants done - through curiosity, performance, creativity, intellect. courage, wisdom, ethics, and so on - of course a mix is also often present.

Here we have BBC Radio 4 and Edinburgh Festival 2018 collaborating in Freedom. Five short programmes (in total an 68 minutes) on what freedom means in 2018 for ten writers and speakers. I have chosen to highlight Nichola Davies poem. 6 minutes to introduce her great friend of and for life: Freedom by Nichola Davies:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/play/b0bgpfw1

It is available on this link for 28 days from 26th August, 2018.

Ian Lewis