Archive | April, 2020

Owning The Future

25 Apr

The 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 Apr

The 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 Apr

Our 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 Apr

In 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.