Horse-Racing on Good Friday and the Christian Churches.

I'm not a Christian, nor am I a particular fan of horse-racing but I am a fan of quirky traditions. It is, therefore, with some regret that I heard on the radio today that the powers that be are to consider having horse-racing on Good Friday.

Good Friday has always been a no racing date in the racing calendar.  This was out of respect for the Christians and was intended to commemorate the soldiers gambling for the clothes of Christ at the foot of the cross.

I think this proposal should be resisted (even by us old atheists).  I know it's a bit quaint in today's climate of profit maximisation but there's nothing much wrong with being a bit quaint and quirky now and then.

Syria and the Crown Prerogative

It seems I was wrong in my last musings and we are not to go to war in Syria, a bloody good thing if you ask me. But there are other really beneficial outcomes from Big Dave Cameron's major parliamentary blunder. The power of the Prime Minister now and in the future has been seriously undermined, as has the power of the Crown prerogative, because unless I'm seriously mistaken, (which has been known to happen), it will be virtually impossible now for the Government to exercise the Crown prerogative to take us unwilling into a foreign war without the consent of Parliament.

I'm very happy that, at long last, the back benches have found a bit of backbone and that they are starting, in some small way, to represent the views of the people who elected them to do just that.  Long may it continue.