The Magnificent Severn (Barrage) rides again ...
IT should be coming along about (checks watch) … now! Yep! There it is! Right on time. On the front page of the Post a week ago today there was a story about the Severn Barrage.
Longstanding BT readers will have read numerous articles about the Barrage down the years. The last time we dusted it off was the November 24 2020 edition when we marked 100 years of the idea of putting a massive dam across the river to generate electricity.
This time round, the story is that the Western Gateway (a “panregional partnership for South Wales and Western England” comprising local councils, city regions and Local Enterprise Partnerships and the Welsh and Westminster governments) is to assess potential tidal energy projects in the Severn Estuary, including a barrage.
As we know, the barrage comes back onto the agenda every time there’s an energy crisis. So now not only do we have the government’s commitment to Net Zero, but we also have the mother of all fossil fuel supply crises thanks to the antics of that child-murdering bastard in the Kremlin.
Personally I’m a huge fan of the barrage. It’s grotesquely expensive, but it’s visionary and bold. It would inspire a generation of new young engineers, and it would create many much-needed jobs. It would leave a priceless legacy of experience and knowledge which could be used profitably elsewhere.
And unlike that monstrous white elephant at Hinkley Point, which costs (very roughly) the same, we can be (almost!) certain it would work, generating 5% or even more of the UK’s electricity needs.
Between the lines, though, the Western Partnership looks an awful lot like a talking-shop for politicians and bureaucrats, and a blank cheque for consultants and lawyers. Just imagine the planning battle it would entail; there’d be years of hearings on the environmental impact alone.
So no. It ain’t going to happen, in my lifetime. What we’ll end up with eventually will be one or more much smaller, less expensive, and frankly less interesting tidal schemes, and probably on the Welsh side first.
Even if I say it myself, I am one of the country’s leading experts on the Severn Barrage Not Getting Built.
Someone should award me an honorary doctorate.
If anyone needs me, I’ll be in the lounge bar, holding forth grumpily about pusillanimous politicians, arse-covering bureaucrats, parasitical consultants and how the city that produced Brunel and Concorde should be ashamed of itself.
Western Front footsteps
Book now if you fancy a four-day trip to the WW1 battlefields of France and Flanders following in the footsteps of soldiers and units from the West Country.
Historians Clive Burlton and Jeremy Banning have been running these for a few years now (barring interruptions in recent years), but this year’s is on for October 7-10.
The organisers say that they will try, if possible, to trace individual stories if one of your forebears fought in the war. This year they’ll also be looking at how Bristol helped rebuild the destroyed French town of Béthune in the 1920s.
Find out more at www.westernfrontfootsteps.com
Free events!
Show of Strength Theatre Co have added another string to their already-stringy bow. Now, as well as guided theatre walks around Clifton, Bedminster and other occasional forays, you can sample Saints and Sinners in St George, a brand new walking tour taking in 800 years of St George history from collieries and factories to Queen Elizabeth I and one of the most notorious serial killers ever.
And the best news is that you might still be able to go on it for free if you get in there soon enough, as tours – two each day – on Fri 18, Sat 19 and Sun 20 March are free thanks to the Welcome Back Fund.
Details at showofstrength.org.uk – but get in there soon!
Meanwhile, the University of the West of England Regional History Centre in partnership with M Shed is back again with an online lecture for this month. In a talk titled Beyond the ballot: Girls’ education, women’s welfare and the Bristol suffragists, UWE historian Alison McClean looks at the work of the less-militant wing of the women’s suffrage movement in the late 1800s and early 1900s.
While “suffragettes” captured headlines with their direct action and even arson, McClean’s claim is that the “suffragists” – the more moderate members of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS) - who had a greater impact in improving the lives of women and girls in Bristol in providing access to education and better housing and working conditions.
The lecture is this Thursday, March 17, from 6pm to 7.30pm, To book a place (free, but donations welcome), register by 2pm on Thursday at https://tinyurl. com/3tym4fx8
Paddy’s revenge
As it’s St Patrick’s Day this week, and as I’ve had to listen to my fair share of Thick Paddy jokes down the years, here’s one for ye’s:
A conceited Englishman, a banker or estate agent or the like, finds himself sat next to Paddy from Kerry on a long-haul flight.
Thinking his companion is probably as dim as they make out in the jokes, he thinks to have himself some patronising fun, even though Paddy has made it clear he’d prefer to get some sleep.
Yer man asks Paddy if he’d like to play a little game to pass the time.
Though he’d rather snooze, Paddy asks “What kind of a game?”
Says the Englishman: “I ask you a question, and if you don’t know the answer, you pay me €5. Then you ask me one, and if I don’t know the answer, I will pay you €500.” “Right so.”
The Englishman asks: “How far is it from the Earth to the Moon?”
Paddy pulls five Euro from his pocket and hands it over.
“Now it’s your turn,” says the Englishman.
Paddy thinks for a bit, then, says he: “What goes up a hill with three legs, and comes down with four?”
He then turns and goes to sleep, leaving the Englishman perplexed. He fires up his laptop and Googles. Finds nothing. Over the next hour he emails several friends, but they don’t know either.
Finally, he nudges Paddy awake, concedes defeat, and hands him €500. Paddy pockets the money and goes back to sleep.
The plane lands. Paddy wakes up and stretches. The Englishmen says, “One more go before we get off. So tell me the answer. What is it that goes up a hill with three legs and comes down with four?”
The Irishman reaches in his pocket, and hands over €5.