Mancunian Blues: 10 miles
Created | Updated Nov 29, 2009
10 miles
Ten miles. That distance sneaked into the UK news this last week. It sneaked unexpectedly into my legs the week before. As is typical of my narrative style, I shall start the story a month ago with a steam train.
I was planning a trip into the Greater Manchester countryside with my girlfriend. To be more specific, we were heading to the Peel Monument just north of Bury. Arranging to meet at the Bury tram station, I had got there a few hours early. This was planned, and I went exploring the town centre. By exploring, I mean I took a few pictures of churches before finding what I was looking for, The East Lancashire Railway. I nipped over to check out the transport museum, which according to the surrounding signs was due to have opened in September. Obviously nobody told the diggers still working outside. Unable to get onto the East Lancs platform without paying, I instead sat myself in their cafe / bar and drank lemonade, read the paper and watched a variety of steam engines chug in and out of the station. A lot of sips and a fair few photos later, I walked off to find my girlfriend and get a bus to the marvellously named Ramsbottom.
Foresight on my part meant that I had a combined tram and bus pass, as it turned out paying to go by an ex-LNER K4 class Mogul may well have worked out cheaper than using the bus. Anyway, we got the bus, walked up the hill, saw a sign for a road with a 25% gradient. Having reached the monument, we trekked across the boggy West Pennine Moors until we located a good echo then ruined out voices by yelling silly words at the stone tower. Slartibartfast’s name rang out across the Irwell valley. To mark the first day of trams running across the city centre in 6 months (no passengers on them, just testing), we got stuck in Bury tram station for an hour as the system shut down, with no explanation given.
Two weeks later, we took to the next hill along. This time we trained up to Blackrod, past Bolton, to attempt Winter Hill. Now, many readers may have been aware that the North West of England has been under severe weather warnings for the last week or two. This Saturday was the first of those days. Previously it had been raining on and off for a week. Having trekked from Blackrod station into Horwich we got to admire a field of llamas. Technically, it was a field of sheep with only two llamas. And one of the llamas was rather shabby and not that admirable. It got drizzly, then rainy, then very rainy as we headed up towards Rivington Pike. It was just us and teams of dog walkers by the time we reached the oriental water gardens (more water than gardens). At this point we wondered if it would not just be better to head back to the pub at the bottom of the hill.
No, we went onwards, and we reached the summit of Rivington Pike, a lump that sits across the moor from Winter Hill. It is crowned with a square stone tower (seems to be a theme here with these formerly Lancastrian hills). Sheltering from the wind, we admired the calligraphy of the people who had come up to scratch their name in the stonework. We pondered who would live in the house just down the hill that was tall, black and narrow and seemed to suggest to me that it'd be home to a reclusive wizard from a Harry Potter book.
Instead of taking the slippery stone steps down the pike, we used the path that rounds the hill. Near the bottom we saw what looked like a path across the moor to Winter Hill, the radio masts gleaming in the sun. We looked at the watches, it was still early, we decided to see how far we get in half an hour, and then maybe turn back. The path turned out to be just the muddier bit of the peat bog. We trekked on. The mud turned into standing water. We trekked on. The 'path' led us over a river and up a ridge, we trekked on. We both sunk into water well over the tops of our boots. We trekked on.
Now, the sun was lower in the sky. The clouds, which recently had vanished, were now closing in. The 100 meter high mast on winter hill vanished in the clouds. It was obvious now how this hill had lured many planes to a sad end, especially in the nights of the wartime black out.
We couldn't see where we had come from. We couldn't see where we were going. Clouds drifted across the wet bog land, the light seemed to be fading. It was one of those times where you knew that you'd have to bother the mountain rescue mob. I had a hope though. I knew that the mast on Winter Hill was part of a broadcasting station, and while my photocopied map didn't show one, there must be a road to it. I was confident I knew where I was, however, the radio masts were not there. Then suddenly the clouds cleared slightly. We were standing just a few meters from one of the support bases. A quick nip though some roped off areas and we were on the road. I had no idea where it went, but it was a road, it must go somewhere. Even if we could only see a stone's throw away into the grey bank of cloud.
The summit of Winter Hill is one of the few places in England were you can see four national parks. You can see the Peak District, you can see the Yorkshire Dales, you can see the Lake District and you can see Snowdonia. Supposedly you can see the Isle of Man too. Here's a computer generated view of a sunny day. This day, briefly we could see the Peaks, and maybe a Dale appeared for a moment. Certainly Cumbrian Death Mountain was hiding from me, behind its own bank of cloud.
We walked on in silence, listening to the sounds of the bleak landscape, watching brief flights of birds, raging at the person who managed to dump both a Burger King bag and a McDonalds Fries pouch at the same spot. The clouds lifted slightly, the sun was still out until we reached the first sign of houses a maybe an hour later. We passed more llamas. We tried to follow the signed footpaths, which in Bolton never say where they are going and sometimes just stop in the middle of a field. A pub visit later and a detour through a retail park, we ended up at Horwich Parkway station having just missed the train. To mirror our previous trip, the train back was delayed and we spend an hour on a platform with a bunch of drunk pre-revellers.
A conservative estimate (a ruler and a map book combined with guesswork at the bit not on the map) put that walk at 10 miles.
Now, for the other ten miles, we have to go into politics. Sorry. Well, strictly it is not about political views; it is about MPs and their expenses. Sorry again.
I will first off say this. I believe that the majority of MPs have done nothing wrong and are being tarred with a brush that makes them all out to be as bad as serial killers or bank executives. I also like my local MP. I voted for him. Thanks to me and many others, he overturned a massive majority in a formerly safe seat. He now has a razor thin margin to hold on to so answers every letter sent to him. He has to do this, in part, because the local South Manchester free paper used to have a picture of the woman who is standing against him in every issue. I've never seen her around in the area, then again, I've not seen that paper for a year, so who knows if either are still in circulation.
I also dislike some MPs. The MP of the area where I went to school in Essex is one example. He has the second safest seat in the country and is a leading figure in the Conservative Party. In 2001, the newsreader turned corruption fighting MP, Martin Bell, was invited by former members of the local Conservative Party to stand against him. They claimed that the local party was being run by members of a shady Pentecostal church. There were threats, accusations, and dirty tactics in the campaign. Unlike in Tatton, where Bell stood before, the other two parties put forward candidates in an election they couldn't win, so the sitting MP stayed in.
Just before the scandal about expenses and second homes really took off, there were some murmurings about people with two homes who didn't really need one. This MP had an infamous appearance on Question Time when in a patronising manner he said that it was vital that he had a flat in London because he needed to be in Westminster by 8.30 because MPs have to be at parliament at a certain time. "Like a job, in other words?" David Dimbleby asked. He claimed he needed to leave his house at 5.30 to parliament on time. He represents a town on the edge of the M25. There is a train that takes 23 minutes from that town to central London. I'd be disappointed if I left that town at 5.30 and wasn’t in the office an hour later. Heck, if I left Manchester, 200 miles away, at 5am, I'd make it to Parliament in time.
This week however, there was a man who took the biscuit. He probably took two. He is on the parliamentary standards committee. He is MP for Hendon. Hendon is about seven miles away from Westminster, in North West London. He has a property there. He was in the news because he 'flipped' what he termed as his first home and his second home. Second home you say? Yes. Despite London’s 24 hour transport system, he felt the need to get a second home, nearer the office. If I couldn't face a seven mile commute, then I'd assume my second home must be a crash pad yards from Big Ben. No, he lives in Notting Hill. For the Brits reading this, Notting Hill is that bit of West London famous for the carnival led by its Caribbean population. For the rest of you, Notting Hill is that bit of West London from the Hugh Grant film where there are no black people at all! It is about three miles from Westminster. The combined distance from Notting Hill and Hendon to Westminster is about ten miles. I don't really care about flipping or whatnot. I can't see how somebody in all honesty can justify having two homes, one of which is paid for from the public purse, because they can't face a trip on the Northern Line.
It is this kind of thing that leads to people not trusting MPs of the main parties and going towards the extremist parties thinking they are better. Perhaps the press should have made more of the expenses fraud committed by the UKIP MEP. Perhaps the media should highlight the assault and offensive weapon convictions, tax avoidance, support of fascist terrorists and appearances at European Nazi conventions of BNP councillors and agents. Perhaps they should highlight the lack of meetings that many of these councillors attend. Many have less than 50% attendance. Despite this, some claim a full allowance, costing over £1000 a meeting. They make MPs seem good value.
These are all perhaps and whatevers, but surely we have to expect and demand a greater sense of responsibility and accountability from all our representatives. This has to start from the MPs being the most visible. As long as my adopted city and the soggy peat moors of Winter Hill are being represented in Europe by Nick Griffin, no MP should ever use 'I was within the rules' as an excuse.
Mancunian Blues wishes to express its support to the residents of Cumbria, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland who were affected by the recent floods.
Until the next time
Love, Peace and the Blues.
