Generation next?

• Tags:
• shipping

Posted by Tom Dodds on July 18, 2008 12:41 PM

The transport industry, already reeling from increasing fuel prices, faces a further crisis - there's a tremendous shortage of qualified staff looming on the horizon.

Let's start with shipping. Despite the credit crunch, there's still a boom in shipbuilding, with analysts reckoning there'll be something like 10,000 new ships launched in the next few years - and they'll need somewhere in the region of 400,000 new crew members to operate them.

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I'm the backbone of democracy (apparently)

Posted by Graeme on July 17, 2008 3:46 PM

Two differing views of the press came out in Parliament this week.

Speaking after he announced that newspapers would be given access to court documents for free, Justice Secretary Jack Straw said that "local and regional newspapers are indeed the backbone of our democracy."

How nice of Mr Straw. His Labour colleague Jim Sheridan seems less enamoured with us, however, saying: "A high proportion of people living in the UK have some difficulty in even believing the racing results printed by some of our newspapers".

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It's not big and it's not clever...

Posted by Graeme on July 15, 2008 12:12 PM

It's not big and it's not clever, but the fact is that journalists do tend to swear a lot.

Most of the myths about journos - that we all wear trilbies with cards in the brims and are drunk by lunchtime - are no longer true, I'm afraid, but the idea that we're all pretty foul-mouthed cynics is a bit nearer the mark.

I don't know why swearing is so much of the journalistic culture, but it most definitely is. My dear old ma, having brought me up right and proper, would be distraught if she could hear the way I go on this office, I'd have to say. And the sweariness that abounds in The Journal newsroom does occasionally get us in trouble.

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Two wheels good...

• Tags:
• cycling

Posted by Tom Dodds on July 15, 2008 10:30 AM

There was a poll running on a website recently. It asked if, in response to the soaring cost of fuel, people were being forced to leave the car at home and walk or use public transport instead.

I didn't vote, because the poll overlooked another mode of transport - cycling.

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If patience is a virtue...

Posted by Write Said Fred on July 14, 2008 11:01 AM

... then I'm changin my name by deed poll to Fred 'the virtuous' Telfer.

It was December 24, 2007 when I put in my order for two front teeth... and I'm only just seeing the whites of my top two gnashers breaking through the vast sea of gums responsible for a 1,018 gummy smiles to date.

Santa better be quicker about this year's list or someone's gonna have to have a word.

(I would write more but I'm sunny myself in Provence... I'll send a blog card when I've perfected by backstroke and picked a bunch of lavender for mum)

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"I couldn't help but wonder..."

Posted by Rebecca Young on July 13, 2008 8:39 PM

I finally went to see Sex and the City: The Movie the other week. I may have been a little "fashionably late" but it was definitely worth the wait. To me, though, the storyline came in a close second to the fashion. And boy, did I LOVE the fashion!

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Fare's fair

• Tags:
• tickets

Posted by Tom Dodds on July 11, 2008 11:40 AM

I usually use www.thetrainline.com to buy my train tickets, despite the fact that they charge a pound for postage and 50p for paying by plastic - it's still more convenient than popping into a station and, for main line travel, you get a reserved seat. But beware - these systems don't always give you the cheapest options.

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I don't want to look like a hippy!

Posted by Anna Heywood on July 10, 2008 10:42 PM

One reader, off to Venice, wants to know if she can be green and still look and smell sophisticated and refined.

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Still waiting...

• Tags:
• A1
• East Coast Main Line
• PD Ports

Posted by Tom Dodds on July 10, 2008 11:10 AM

I had really, really wanted my first blog entry to start on a positive note.

However, the local media this morning is rather preoccupied with the news that roads minister Tom Harris has told the Commons that the A1 through Northumberland does not meet the government's criteria for upgrading.

And on a similar theme, over lunch with friends last Saturday I was reminded that Northumberland is the only county in England not to have a single mile of motorway somewhere. And the only three-lane motorway in our area is the two-mile stretch from Chester le Street past Washington services.

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Watch your dinner grow

Posted by Anna Heywood on July 8, 2008 4:28 PM

When Bob Fountain, owner of the Black horse pub in Beamish, asked me to come and check out his vegetable patch, I had no idea he meant all 33 acres of it!

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