A family chorus for children to adapt, The Twelve Weeks of Lockdown is now available on the Medium platform.
Altogether now ….
Owning The Future
25 AprThe Centre for Local Economic Strategies (CLES) has just produced a brilliant 2-part paper on future options for central and local government. Here’s my review/summary published on the Medium platform.
https://medium.com/@groupeintellex/owning-the-future-1ed0bb80d5e4?source=friends_link&sk=785da6a59c7c8f57c3f7053ec805120f
FTTH Council Europe releases 2020 edition of pan-Europe Full Fibre league
23 AprThe new FTTH/B ‘panorama’ is based on September 2019 data collected via network providers and regulators in each country.
Our full report – including a graphic of the table – can be found via ‘Plodding Partners Leave Basecamp’ on the Medium platform.
Community Leadership and an Easter message
12 AprOur latest Action Pointer – the 6th in the series considers the prospects for community leadership when the covid-19 pandemic has passed.
Also published this weekend is an Easter message – We rise to play a greater part – an appreciation of FR Scott’s villanelle as sung by Leonard Cohen on his 2004 album Dear Heather.
To all our readers we wish the very best possible Easter and hopes for a better year to come.
Passing Thoughts – a year in review
2 AprIn the near-monastic silence of locked-down isolation, capacity for contemplation is no longer a luxury. Now I come to think about it, this past year was remarkably productive – not that any reader of this blog would know. Since March 2019 nearly all of my writing has appeared exclusively on theMedium platform.
It may seem odd to be reviewing a financial, rather than calendar, year but, as my last post hinted, April 2019 marked a new beginning and a new regard for the brilliance of the UK’s National Health Service medics.
After an enforced 2-year break it was a joy to once again sail offshore in Tessera even if it would be my last voyage. By October the decision was made to sell our quarter share of this fine yacht and by March the deed was done – a quite fortuitous outcome given the timing of the pandemic.
From a writing perspective, almost every month Medium carried some interesting pieces culminating in the current series headlined ‘The post-Pathogen Reset Button’. These Action Pointers are, much like their 1970/80’s forerunners, ‘totally uncalled for’ papers. They are not concerned so much with the current tribulations but with the emergence of new priorities for future governance. Action Pointer #5 is scheduled to cover Arts & Ethics and #6 will turn a spotlight on the leadership requirements for community subsidiarity. Readers can track back through the series so far via the footnotes of Action Pointer #4, ‘mending our ways’.
Diligent readers of Groupe Intellex via Medium.com may notice an upturn in political awareness – partly because I now also write for our local Libdems site. The local Libdem gang are a vitally important irritant in an area dominated by long-serving (and often self-serving) Conservative councillors. The suspension of the May local elections places an even greater burden on our small band.
Future postings on Medium will, once again, be mirrored on this site. I pray, that all our friends come through this challenge with renewed enthusiasm for action on priority issues such as the Climate Crisis.
Best Wishes – Stay Home – Stay Safe.
That Was The Week That Was
31 Mar
It may be over, but I have no intention of letting it go. It was far too good a week to forget. Indeed this week will linger long – not just in my memory but in the renewed public spirit that has been engendered.
I’m not, of course, claiming to have been the first to notice.
To be honest I doubted my sanity in a week when the weirdness of Westminster gripped the nation. But I wrote my thoughts on Tuesday March 26th and then promptly placed them on ice. I was more than cautious – this was my first day of release from medical mayhem. It was highly likely that the new medication was warping my wishful thinking mind.
But the words could not be constrained and I published them the following day. Even then I hedged my bets for fear of immediate castigation. But I dared not hesitate – I sensed a great change was underway and, although the body politic, the media, the entrenched combatants, were all running on the same old tracks, I found it undeniable that relief was at hand.
Maybe it was the weather. Maybe it was the sheer relief from months of pain. Maybe it was a hymn of praise to the brilliant talents of our NHS. Maybe it was my odd early-morning choice of Leonard Cohen’s “You got me singing’. Whatever. This spirit of joy was unquenchable. ‘Everyone Suddenly Burst Out Singing’ captured exactly how I felt – and amazingly my little inconsequential networked world agreed!
By the end of the week even dedicated politicians were tentatively, cautiously, quietly suggesting a ‘change of tone’. They were pushing this forward even in the midst of outraged screams of betrayal by ardent Brexiteers.
But this is no time to stand down – the struggle is not yet done. In Tolkien’s The Hobbit (There and Back Again) Bilbo Baggins utters what would later became one of his favourite sayings. Bilbo had narrowly escaped from a very angry encounter with the dragon. “Never”, he said to himself, “Never poke fun at live dragons – you’re not halfway through this adventure yet.”
And that was a very timely thought. It would have been too easy to ridicule. Too easy to pour scorn on those in pain. Too easy to not understand the deep roots of their desperate delusions. Too easy to crow. Far too easy to seek vengeance. Even slightly (or grossly) demented dragons need and deserve our help.
All at sea?
We are, still, only halfway though this adventure. The tone has changed, the tide is turning but renewed purpose has not yet been confirmed. I’ve been sailing offshore when a storm has devastated the plan. The ship is damaged, the crew scared witless. There is no going back. This is the time for renewed purpose – a new destination. Only a few alternatives come easily to mind – but my crew need, more than anything, clear intent to deliver us safely home.
The hand on the helm may be uncertain but the crew can pull together. Time now to steady the ship and seek that new unifying purpose. Let the restoration of sanity and purposeful survival now flow through the life-blood of our nations.
(and here endeth the lesson for Mothering Sunday!)
Wake Up – the new series
26 SepHibernation normally occurs in winter.
Activity is minimised. Survival burns through reserves. The frenetic return is driven by a new hunger.
This year the seasonal cycle was flipped – must have been the heat, or just a weak spring
But – ‘Hej, we’re back now’, and the return is celebrated by Wake Up – a new series of reflections on the scramble to understand what exactly is going on.
Part 1, ‘So You Did?‘, kicked off with a curious blend of a World War 1 recruitment poster and Archbishop Welby’s speech to the TUC conference.
Slightly more awake, Part 2, ‘What Happened’ is out later today. and Part 3 will follow in a week’s time.
Waking Up to the realities of the wider world – new perspectives or just the old ones seen in a new light – dances around the dawn.
We might, of course, hit snooze and slip back into deep slumber – but the alarm is sounding.
Only when properly awake might we realise that we are letting go of something we’ve not fully grasped.
Welcome back.
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UPDATE 01/Oct/2018: Part 3 ‘Contra Dictions’ – the battles between Facts and Fictions.
UPDATE 09/Oct/2018: Part 4, the series final, sets the Brexit agonies in context – a blip that now seems insignificant against global imperatives. It questions the quality of leadership and has a former Dean of St Pauls turning in his grave.
Double Positive V Single Negative
12 JulThe project – the reason I was spending so much time on the Island of Ireland – was extraordinary. Breathing new life into an economy wrecked by decades of disregard and battling legions of diehard naysayers was invigorating and challenging. But more than the project itself, I found myself immersed in, mesmerised by, the local way of words – not just the accents but word choices and less inhibited conversational patterns.
Beyond marvelling at the quality of conversations – the highly-valued, hugely entertaining, fast-flowing and oft-surreal ‘craic’ – it was the contrast between Irish English and English English that hit hard between the ears.
Nowhere was this contrast more evident than in the matter of post-qualifiers – verbal reinforcements that bolster or modify statements. To some it was a mild embarrassment but to my ears entirely natural that ‘to be sure’or ‘so it is’ could be twice repeated to hammer home the positive intent. Not so at home in England where negativity was the norm with a single ‘don’t y’know’,‘innit’or in strangled parliamentary speak, ‘is it not’.
That contrast between the double positive and single negative post-qualifiers seemed to speak volumes of cultural variance and, in the context of the project, was a huge contribution to the success of the project and its call for imaginative/brave/fresh thinking.
I was reminded of this when writing ‘Word of the Week: Sophistry’– letting off steam as Westminster wrestles with the consequences of addiction to right-headed (AKA wrong-headed) ideology. A colleague working on the Irish project often complained that if stated three times, falsehoods became normalised and regarded as truth.
Taking a principled stand against sophistry is always a test of leadership – and in its absence huge damage can be incurred. We’ve witnessed that in the promotion of Brexit but that is only the tip of the iceberg. For the moment, in its 70thyear, the NHS has a temporary reprieve but do not doubt that the destroyers have gone away. Meanwhile the BBC remains a popular target and silence fogs the failures of rail privatisations. In that era of post-privatisations, it was, apparently, entirely ideologically sound to silence any criticism of the lack of full fibre until now when the consequences of underinvestment are becoming apparent.
The destruction of decades of public investment on the altar of avarice is rooted in the narrow negativity that prevails over the more forward-looking positivity that we all need to make a difference. To be sure. To be sure.
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Roadside Radiators
26 JunIn ‘Feeling the Heat’ I describe the green boxes that deliver an apology for broadband as ‘pavement heaters’ – not least because Roadside Radiators might seem just a little harsh.
At the same time it seemed worthwhile explaining why they appear always to be warm, even before they are baked in the sun.
But, however described, these green boxes qualify as rather poor ‘installation art’ – self-demonstrative (and, frankly, boring) monuments that disqualify their owners from any future role as a contributor to economic and social sustainability – or, as Greg Mesch (CEO of CityFibre) would say, lacking ‘the vision, passion and determination to succeed’.
Aided by the Advertising Standards (?) Authority – the folks who misheard ‘Full Fibre’ to be Fool Fibre or Faux Fibre – and Local Authorities for whom the digital dawn has yet to outshine the telephonic twilight – the once vital incumbent has lost the plot.
But, at least homeless souls will have warmth next winter as they shelter next to those green boxes.
The Intelligent Community
31 MayThe Intelligent Community
Kate Raworth, the ‘renegade’ economist and author of Doughnut Economics, knows only too well that ideas are born when and where they are needed most. Fresh thinking takes time to be accepted. Darwin’s evolutionary insights are still resisted. Climate Change science still denied. Flat Earth advocates still cling to the edges of their world.
It is not enough to gather evidence. Mass acceptance of fresh thinking oft requires a crisis of sufficient scale to overcome complacency. Sufficient scale? Massive impacts for a few may be discounted by those looking at bigger pictures. Responses reflect agency – the ability to make that difference. And therein lies the power of localism – the strength of the place, the community, the neighbourhood. That ability to JFDI.
The emergence of Intelligent Communities – places that are not resigned to some externally-imposed fate – reflects locally perceived priorities. These are communities that really do ‘know their place’ and know it in colours, details, depths of complexity – ‘nuanced knowhow’ that often eludes the averaged ‘higher’ authority.
BUT (and that’s a big but) the vital essence of such communities is difficult to measure and analyse. Qualitative research methods do not easily answer the question: Why do some places succeed whilst others decline? We can, however, spot the signs – the indicators of prosperity, confidence, wellbeing and community spirit. That is why, over two decades of research, the Intelligent Community Forum has assessed hundreds of places and selected a few as exemplars – communities that may serve as beacons for others.
Every year ICF has brought these communities together to share their learning. Until now that global gathering has always been held in North America. 2018 is different. For three days of next week the ICF Global Summit will be held in London. In preparation for that event (and for the benefit of those new to the notion of Intelligent Communities) we started publishing a weekly series of notes covering several of the primary indicators – the signs of local activity that ICF’s researchers have, over the years, seen time and again in the most successful places.
The series was first announced in a brief note ‘Looking Sideways at that Place We call Home’,and closely followed by ‘Local Fabrics?’ to set a framework for the rest of the series. Subsequent episodes were:
- Connected With Success? – the local impacts of broadband
- Where Have all our Flowers Gone?– creating a local Knowledge Workforce
- Altogether Now? – Community Inclusivity and equity in a digitalised world
- Who Do We Think We Are? – advocacy and representation of local values
- AI – Authentic Intelligence in City Infrastructures – Humanising Data for citizens
- Pacemakers for Place-Makers – the local value of Innovation Hubs
- Keep on Running – in circles – local respect for ecological boundaries
- What If? – the local value of investment in Resilience
All of these themes and their local action programmes (calibrated to match local economic and social priorities) are common indicators of Intelligent Communities.
Next week, ICF’s Top7 communities from around the world, together with an array of top flight speakers, will share their experiences with delegates from near and far.
The full 3-day programme includes details of evening receptions and, on June 6th, at the Summit Dinner, Melbourne Australia will hand over the accolade of Intelligent Community of the Year to one of ICF’s 2018 Top7 Communities.
Groupe Intellex 