Nobbut Laiking, by Ross Brewster
When I came across the sad story of four-year-old Rosie-May I was finally convinced that it’s time to ban the open sale of fireworks.
Rosie-May was enjoying a bonfire night party until a stray firework struck her in the neck. She spent five weeks in hospital being treated for severe burns, with skin grafts, and bears the scar for life.
Her mum, Eleanor Mason, is now an Ambassador for the Children’s Burns Trust. She says it’s important for people to know what she went through that night and raise awareness of firework safety.
Look, I’m in danger of being branded a hypocrite here. I loved fireworks as a child. Even as an alleged grown-up, I used to get together with a chum from work for a few fireworks on 5th November. No bangers mind. Both of us were too cowardly to go in for whizz bangs. We’d light a Golden Rain or a Snowflake and run for cover.
Harmless fun? It probably was for us. But fireworks seem to have got bigger or louder. Take the idiot who let off a banger in the Warwick Road End at a Carlisle United football match. It produced a huge bang that had fans jumping nervously at the other end of the ground.
Fortunately no-one was hurt. But it could cost the club a few hard-earned pounds in fines.
In 2022, when the last serious study was held, some disturbing evidence came to light about injuries to children as a result of firework accidents. Victims aged from 15-19 had the highest rate of emergency treatment while children 10-14 had the second highest.
There is an average of more than 100 hospital admissions a year relating to firework injuries, some of these involving children aged from one to four. The percentage of injuries may not appear particularly high, but as in Rosie-May’s case, when they do occur they tend to be life-changing.
I can’t think of a more tragic case than that of a friend’s brother-in-law who was killed in an explosion at a fireworks factory while simply calling in to collect some items for a community display.
Lots of people will hold perfectly safe displays this bonfire night and I don’t enjoy spoiling anyone’s fun. I am pretty liberal when it comes to freedom of choice in life.
But it’s not always the organised shows that are the problem. I saw a report just last weekend of youngsters in a Cumbrian town throwing fireworks at passing cars.
One slip and people could lose fingers, hands, even eyes, as a consequence of an out-of-control firework. The loudest on public sale these days top 120 decibels. One of those could damage your hearing.
I imagine some will say I’m being a killjoy. But the story of little Rosie-May is part of the evidence that, in 2023, it’s time the availability of fireworks, which are after all explosive devices, was more severely restricted and over the counter sales banned altogether. Surely it makes sense.
How many of us put our cross on the voting paper at an election, choosing one candidate but not really supporting any of the names on the sheet?
I think it would give a more realistic view of the public’s perception of politics if there was a further box they could tick — one marked “none of these.”
We keep hearing that people have lost faith in politicians. Well here is a chance to tell it like it is. It might be revealing and give our main parties a rocket.
In the 2019 general election the turnout was 67 per cent, a 1.5 drop compared to the previous election. The numbers of people voting has significantly dropped since a high in 1950 of over 83 per cent. I can only think that the British public was grateful for democracy soon after the war and expressed that feeling at the ballot box.
Between 1922 and 1997 voter turnout never fell below 70 per cent. By 2001 it had dropped to 59 per cent. Is it apathy, or a reflection of people’s disillusion with politics?
I have an inkling that turnout figures might increase again if we gave electors the opportunity to vote honestly — for nobody.
I wonder how many dedicated Conservative voters hid under the bedsheets when they read last Friday’s newspaper heading “Penrith tipped for Labour win”.
Penrith and the Border has never been won by Labour. But it’s a re-drawn constituency, Penrith and Solway, for the next general election. Once the heartland of Willie Whitelaw and enormous majorities, it will now encompass a large chunk of the Workington constituency which turned away from its Labour roots in 2019, but if predictions are correct, will switch back in 2024.
Whither Workington Man? Remember him? White, middle class, rugby league loving Brexiter and jaded Labour supporter. A stereotype insulting to many locals, but a pollster’s red wall dream. Where Workington voted the nation would follow. And to an extent it was true.
Will those same pollsters identify a typical Penrith and Solway swing voter now Workington Man has disappeared into electoral history?
