Ed Vaizey

Britain is enjoying its best Olympics for a generation.  And I’m glad to see at least one paper (The Telegraph) gave credit where it is due - John Major.  There’s an apocraphyl story that Jim Callagham was asked what the best thing about his premiership was, and he replied “cat’s eyes”, the reflectors that illuminate the middle of the road at night.  His point was (if indeed he said it) that these would endure far longer than any other achievement (not hard in the case with his premiership).  So it is with the Lottery, where John Major (and Ken Baker) can reflect on the dozens of new art buildings, the hundreds of heritage sites, and now the dozens of athletes who have all been given a chance because of the Lottery.  Typical that new Labour is raiding it for its own pet causes.

While on the Olympics, it does show the powerful effect of sport.  Credit crunch and all, there is no doubt it feels better to be British today, with us lying third in the table, than it did a week ago.  if only our footballers could perform on a similar level of investment!

Final thought - am I the only person in the country who cannot stand the phrase “Team GB”.  What is wrong with “Great Britain” or “The British Team?”

Like many people who have commented, I have not read the Policy Exchange report which is supposed to say that northern cities are finished and people should migrate south. I am sure the report is more nuanced than that, but if its main thrust is what has been reported it is indeed absurd. It is of course nonsense to say that northern cities have lost their economic purpose. To be sure, their traditional industries have disappeared, but many new ones have replaced them.

One important “industry” that northern cities have taken advantage of is culture. I’m in Newcastle at the moment, on holiday. It’s a brilliant place to come to (apart from the rain!). We went to Alnwick Castle today, which was packed. Yesterday was Hadrian’s Wall. Tomorrow will be Gateshead (the Sage and Baltic) and the Bowes Museum. And that is just the tip of the iceberg.

The report does pose some questions for Labour, however. While northern Labour MPs fulminate against the report, have they asked why their Government is planning 3 million new homes for the south east, and why John Prescott bulldozed homes in the north? HAve they asked why, after eleven years, nothing has been done to improve rail links. Billions have been spent to link the south to France via the channel tunnel rail link, but it still takes three and a half hours to get to Newcastle by train. A TGV would do the same distance in just over two.

I spent yesterday evening with an amazing group of people.  About 20 young men and women, aged between 18 and 29, are taking part in the third annual Young Muslim Leadership Programme.  Community workers, teachers, councillors, doctors, students, television producers, the first muslim woman to address the Welsh Conservative COnference, they were all there, and they were all fantastic and very interesting, giving their perspective on what it is to be a young Muslim in Britain today.  If someone made a documentary just featuring these people talking, we would overcome a lot of anti-muslim prejudice in this country overnight.

The programme is organised by the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, set up in 1985, and championed by the Prince of Wales. They are moving to a new and impressive building near Magdalen, and it complements the Oxford skyline wonderfully.  The Prince of Wales is designing the garden, and it is another example of the quiet work he does to help projects that make a great difference, in subtle ways, to the country.  The Centre hosts speeches from world leaders, such as Mandela and Sonia Gandhi, and contributes to a better understanding of the muslim world in Britain.

I went to a lovely reception at the County Council’s offices in oxford, to say farwell to Sir Hugo Brunner who is retiring after a dozen years as the Lord Lieutenant of Oxfordshire.  This ancient office of the Crown, the original requirement of which was to raise an army, has adapted to the 21st century.  You would be forgiven for thinking that it is a pointless throwback to a bygone age, honorific and pointless.  Not a bit of it, at least under Sir Hugo.  As Reg Little wrote in the Oxford Times, Sir Hugo has been the glue that has held the County together.  He and his wife Mary Rose have turned out tirelessly for events all over the county.  They embody all those cliched English qualities that we worry are falling into abeyance - good humour, hard work, an overwhelming sense of duty, self-effacement, loyalty to county, country and crown.  The 200 people who made it to the event - and remember this is August - was just a small testament to the high regard in which Sir Hugo is held, and the huge amount of organisations that he has helped.  He is immortalised in a gargoyle on the side of Dorchester Abbey, just one of the projects where he made a huge difference.