In brief

Once upon a time our railways were operated as separate undertakings (LNER, GWR etc) which through the process of transition became known as British Rail and then Network Rail. A further transition has occured whereby it is now known as "the rail system within the Community (now the EU). (Explanatory Notes)  Now you can see why HS2 is being imposed, that it is not a Government initiative but one that originates from Brussels and TEN-T.

David Cameron - aka Dear Leader Dav il Cam - has vowed to rein in executive pay. It is a great pity he does not vow to rein in executive power - which is why talkconstitution.net has been created. The fact that this ''news" report carries little detail or substance is not surprising - it may well be a precis of an information sheet put out by CCHQ - leads on to an aspect of journalism that I have previously covered.

Autonomous Mind posts on the reported, alleged attack by a 10-year-old boy on his teachers, the actual details of which were not covered by reports in the MSM. As AM states, this is due to (his words) a media that is "lazy, derivative and unfit for purpose , therefore ill-serving the public audience. No doubt it will fall to blogs to tell the story the media is incapable or unwilling to research and publish, and serve the public interest". That well-deserved statement can be applied to almost anything that the media reports, especially where matters EU are concerned. Apropos that last point, Richard North EU Referendum has yet another example of lax media 'reporting'.

Charles Moore, in his usual op-ed article in today's Daily Telegraph, poses the question of why have a House of Lords if there's not a single Lord left in it? He opens his article thus:

"Last year, Mr Clegg failed to persuade the British people, in a referendum, that the Alternative Vote system was the answer to their political ills. This year, he hopes to persuade both Houses of Parliament to invent a new House of Lords. He thinks the present House is an affront to the principles of openness which underpin a modern democracy."

Is not the present state of politics in this country an affront to the principles of democracy? Is not the media, with their servility to the political class, an affront to the principles of democracy?

Just asking......................