William Ellis - The Movie

Who's been a bad lad, then? I think we'd better confiscate
his Travel Pass...."

Please humour me for a minute or so. Later you'll see why. Stand in front of your mirror, imagine you're a policeman and say, in the most menacing tone you can manage, "I'll confiscate your Travel Pass." Give it some real film noir, hard copper/villain darkness and depth. Think John Thaw in The Sweeney, Vinnie Jones in Lock, Stock or Arnold Schwarzenneger in Terminator. It doesn't work, does it? "I'll confiscate your Travel Pass..." is simply not an utterance likely to awaken any serious level of respect in the miscreant to whom it is addressed.  No doubt John, Vinnie or Arnie could make a much better job of it than you or me, but the end result would probably be comical. I've kicked off on a cinematic note because fur and feathers are flying as a result of a report in the Ham & High about my intention to film the bad behaviour of secondary school pupils at William Ellis, Parliament Hill and La Sainte Union schools (see last week's blog post below). Starting this term, I propose to film instances of littering, swearing, drunkeness, intimidation and violence by local pupils. When the footage is in the can, I intend to post it on the internet in a bid to highlight and thereby, eventually, eliminate the problem. My hope is that others throughout the UK will follow my example, since anti-social bahaviour in secondary schools is a nationwide problem and one which, it seems, is very nearly beyond the power of the appropriate authorities to address, albeit through no fault of their own. My "Film-a-Thug" project may or may not take off. Let's see. Send your footage to robin@robinsaikia.com.

In the meantime Fiona Millar, Chair of Governors at William Ellis School and wife of spin-guru Alastair Campbell, was less than pleased by my proposal to film her unruly pupils. She said (Ham & High, 28/4/2011): "It is completely inappropriate for any member of the public to film pupils under the age of 16 without their or their parents' consent  We believe most of our parents would be very concerned by this type of behaviour."

My behaviour?!

What about the behaviour of her pupils? And what about the fact that many local residents, among them the elderly and vulnerable, are, to borrow her words, "very concerned" and, in some cases, downright terrified by it?  And what are school governors, teachers, parents - and now the police  - going to do about it?

Well, there's not a lot that can be done. I have received a pleasant letter from Sgt Jeff Williams of the Metropolitan Police who is on the Highgate Safer Neighbourhoods Panel. In my view, Jeff and his colleagues have a near-impossible job, given the extent to which the fashion for political correctness, committee work and community liason impedes or prevents any truly effective attempts to restore law and order. He pointed out that while I am free to film in a public place, it might upset the children and provoke a "negative reaction". He also said that there were a number of initiatives in place to combat anti-social behaviour. For example, pupils on buses who terrorise their fellow passengers run the risk of having their Free Travel Passes confiscated. As to the litter, the wasteland of beer bottles and pizza cartons, I heard from Richard Gentry of the Hampstead Heath Constabulary, another outfit burdened, in my view, with a near-impossible job. Richard acknowledged the problem, reminding me that prominent, bright-yellow bins have been introduced in an attempt to minimise littering. 

So that's it. In a heroic and endearingly British attempt at compromise and fair play, we punish hooligans by confiscating their bus passes. We pander to the brain-dead morons who litter our parks and open spaces by supplying them with strident eyesores in the form of bright-yellow dustbins. We set up committees, we draft policies, we continually strive to appease and protect the very people who are making our lives a living hell. And now a seasoned and normally ultra-tolerant old Leftie like me, who should be able to enjoy a nice middle-aged stroll on a peaceful Hampstead Heath, is reduced to dusting off the Super 8 and making grainy cinéma vérité in a bid to curb the antics of gangs of naughty children. These children - in a just world - should be disciplined by their teachers and parents, not allowed to become yet another drain on an already overburdened and underesourced police force. Jill Hislop, head teacher of William Ellis, and Fiona Millar, the Chair of Governors have both criticised me and my partner Vicki Carpenter for making "unsubstantiated" and "general" claims to the press. General? Unsubstantiated? There is nothing more specific and verifiable than the behaviour of these children on and around the Heath after school. Go and see for yourself how unsubstantiated my claims are.

William Ellis - one of the worst schools in London?

The litter-strewn wasteland to your right is a section of Hampstead Heath in London that is repeatedly abused by pupils of William Ellis, a comic-book comprehensive school notorious as much for its lack of discipline as for the bright and ludicrously unrealistic picture it paints of itself on its website. Below is a letter of complaint, very moderate in my view, written to the head teacher Jill Hislop by my partner Vicki Carpenter. I am the friend to whom Vicki refers and the world-weary seven-year-old is one of my sons. It is certainly true that the unlovely Ellis louts routinely terrorize each other and the residents of Hampstead and Highgate. My children and those of many others in the area are frightened of these yobs. Elderly people, too, are at risk, not to mention the shopkeepers and restaurateurs to whom Vicki refers. It's about time something was done about this and that the head teacher and governors stop fobbing people off with anodyne excuses. And if Jill Hislop proves incapable of controlling her louts, it might be time for her to give up teaching. If her upbeat introductory letter on the Ellis website is anything to go by, she could always get a job writing spin for Alastair Campbell, whose partner Fiona Millar is Chair of Governors.

Letter to Jill Hislop from Vicki Carpenter

Dear Jill Hislop,

Your introductory letter on the William Ellis website paints an inspiring picture of the ethos of the school and the conduct of your pupils. Sadly this is far from reflected in the behaviour of William Ellis pupils on and around Hampstead Heath.

Recently I accompanied a friend and his two young children on a walk across Hampstead Heath. Unfortunately our outing coincided with the letting out time of your pupils and any hopes of a peaceful stroll were completely squashed. The large grassy area near the tennis courts had been monopolized by your pupils, who were shouting obscenities and behaving in an intimidating manner to each other and to passers-by. The open area near the tennis courts resembled a rubbish dump, littered with beer bottles (many of the pupils were clearly drunk) and pizza cartons. When I remarked on this, my friend’s youngest child (aged 7) shook his head wearily and told me that the Ellis pupils left it like it this every day. Over the road, near Café Mozart and the other restaurants and shops, your pupils were clustered on the pavement shouting and swearing. People trying to relax and enjoy a drink in the sunshine were visibly wincing and shrinking in fear. A local shopkeeper told me that he dreads it when your pupils are on the loose – in the mornings, at lunchtime and at home time – and is seriously considering closing his shop for good. Later, from the window of the C11 bus, I caught sight of an Ellis boy swinging a bicycle chain, surrounded by a gang of admiring younger children.

I suggest that you, as head teacher, are responsible for the behaviour of your charges and that you should put your house in order without further delay. Until you do, the bright and upbeat text on your website will continue to be greeted with skepticism and derision by long-suffering Hampstead and Highgate residents.

Yours sincerely

Vicki Carpenter

Out Soon - The Venice Lido

This book is an unashamedly personal view of the Lido, coloured by my prejudices and enthusiasms. These were kindled when I first came here nearly thirty-five years ago, at the end of a school trip to Venice. We were staying at the Pensione Seguso on Zattere, then a fairly reserved establishment, a favoured retreat of James Lees-Milne. The trip was led by the genial and worldly Drawing Master at Winchester, Grahame Drew. Everyone was to fly back to London except two of us, me and a friend, Oleg de Baikoff, I destined for Athens, he for Vienna. Grahame’s kindly but firm parting shot was memorable. “You’ve one more night at the Seguso. You’ll be absolutely fine so long as you don’t do three things. Avoid them with the ends of several barge poles. Don’t go to Harry’s Bar, don’t drink Grappa – and do not go to the Lido.” Later that night, after martinis at Harry’s, we rolled along the Riva degli Schiavoni and caught the vaporetto to the Lido, clutching our bottles of Grappa. We ended up in the brightest looking bar on the Gran Viale with a gang of friendly young Italians who invited us to a party. We crammed ourselves into their dangerous Fiat and tore off towards the pine forest and beach at Alberoni. There we roasted fish on hot stones and drank wine until dawn, finally falling asleep amid the trees and dunes. I awoke in the blaze and breeze of mid morning, stripped and flung myself into the warm shallows of the Adriatic where, in a specifically spiritual sense, I have remained ever since. This book is an attempt to communicate my boundless love for the Lido and to encourage all its readers to head for its warm and glamorous shores.

The Lido isn’t just about a glamorous past, though this is what I’ve tried to recreate in the book. Go there today and you’ll find it no less colourful and alluring, in or out of season, than it was in Byron’s day. Carpets of shells crunch underfoot; tractors arrive on the beach at dawn to clear away the seaweed, dead fish and crabs; rollers follow them, smoothing the tousled coverlet of sand. Here are the boys who rent out pedalos and sailboards; there go the Dravidian kite-sellers and Nigerian handbag-merchants, patrolling hungrily back and forth along the beach. There are the bronzed lifeguards, the children leaping from piers and pontoons, the artists who colonise the murazzi with their ramshackle driftwood shelters. Away from the beach, along the Gran Viale and in the surrounding streets, there are the Liberty villas, their gates and facades alive with wrought-iron, stone or ceramic lions, lilies, nymphs, tritons, butterflies, dragonflies and spiders, their pilasters, ogee arches, gardens and statuary shaded by palms and cypresses. The capanne, the beach cabins of the Excelsior and the Hotel des Bains, are rented by Italian families who save up for this summer treat, for either the timber cabins favoured at the Excelsior or the straw-topped variety known at the Hotel des Bains as tuculs. There, glamorous old ladies, grandmothers the rest of the year but now self-appointed countesses or film stars for a week, play cards and drink prosecco under the candy-striped awnings. Out of season the hotels remove the straw tops from the tuculs, revealing the naked, skeletal frames beneath. Then, the beach at low tide, strewn with driftwood, is combed by families collecting vongole for lunch, clutching the distinctive bright-yellow plastic bags of the local Billa supermarket. Flocks of goats invade the murazzi; baby flounders are stranded in the shallows; dogs of all shapes and sizes leap and bark for joy along the endless, endless strand in the glassy February sunshine. This is the Lido I love and that I invite the reader to share.

Close Encounters

Corbett: the embodiment of charm

How many chance encounters have you had with famous people? Genuinely chance encounters? I mean bumping into them in supermarkets, pubs or railway stations rather than meeting them at controlled, carefully-planned events such as openings, prizegivings, fetes? What are the odds against bumping into first Ronnie Corbett and then, years later, Robert Morley, outside the very same Duke Street St James's entrance of Fortnum & Mason in Piccadilly, London? Massive I'd have thought, but this is exactly what happened to me. The two men's reactions were markedly different. Corbett was the embodiment of charm, even though the collision was entirely my fault for not looking where I was going. "My dear fellow," he said, clasping both my hands in his. "I'm so terribly sorry!" Morley was a different proposition, very sour about the whole thing, even though it was he not I who had barged carelessly out of F&M. "Whill you look where you're going?" he testily cried (note the 'h'), before pulling a sort of horrified Frankie Howerd-type face at a group of mystified Japanese passers-by. And then there are pubs. Once, some fifteen years ago on a Sunday evening, I called in at The Hour Glass, on the corner of Walton Street and Brompton Road in Knightsbridge. Very quiet, no music, open fire, clock ticking, dusk. That dates it. At a table in the corner near the fire sat a man entirely hidden behind a copy of the Sunday Times. I ordered a whisky and soda and, barbarically, a packet of crisps which I began to try to open, noisily and ineptly. Down came the newspaper - and there, animated by the flickering chiaroscuro of the fire, was the expressionless but terrifying face of Donald Pleasance. I've never to this day messed around with crisps in a quiet pub. Returning to collisions, my son Sebastian (10) is showing some promise, as witnessed by an episode in Tesco in Hampstead a few years ago. He was - I should never have allowed this - tearing around the aisles on a scooter. He ran headlong into a tall, strapping, Teutonic-looking figure who had been carrying (and had now dropped) a case of Evian water. "My dear fellow," I said. "I'm so terribly sorry!"  "No worries! No worries at all!" beamed the big-hearted Arsenal goalkeeper (and now also, I see, film actor), Jens Lehmann. That's about it. "I bet there are some famous people we could bump into in the London Library, dad." says Sebastian, helpfully and hopefully intending to engineer a few memorable collisions. I know what he has in mind. Didier Drogba and John Terry poring over Illustrated London News match reports featuring Stanley Matthews. Cheryl Cole mugging up on the social history of Vaudeville. Lady Gaga feeding her an insistent inner craving for Cicero. We live in hope, but our stack-prowling to date has been to no avail.

Walkopedia - the world's best walks

An excellent and well-named site, Walkopedia, an online encyclopedia of the world's best walks. Here is a very wholesome and confidence-inspiring photograph of the founder, William Mackesy, who has tried out upwards of 70 of the 100 world's best (according to Walkopedia) walks. You can tell the weatherbeaten hero really has walked to summit of this mountain or whatever it is, not just been plastered with orange make-up and airlifted in by a 50-strong television crew. The core treks are intrepid GAP year or mid-life crisis stuff: Ayer's Rock; the Drakensberg Escarpment; Leaping Tiger Gorge in China; the Shikoku Pilgrimage; the Diamond Mountains in North Korea. But site followers are encourged to feed in their personal odysseys, so there is a growing number of less ambitious but no less uplifting walks to be discovered. They haven't got as far as mapping some of my personal favourites yet, St James's Square to Queen Anne's Gate, or the first nine holes of the Alberoni golf club on the Venice Lido. But that will come. Meanwhile, an important point. However long or short, easy or arduous a walk might be, it should surely be undertaken for pleasure and not, as it were, at gunpoint. Is this scenario familiar? It certainly is to me. You come to the end of an agreeable Sunday lunch at a friend's place in the country. You postpone the trip back to town until Monday morning. Your fifth glass of claret sparkles like a rare Burmese temple ruby in the late afternoon sunlight, stealing flecks of viridian, blue and gold from Turkey carpets and Brabazon water-colours. Humphrey, the family's amiable golden retriever, rests his lustrous, doting head on your knee. "Whassup, Humphrey? There's a good chap... There's a good chap... You're my besht friend, aren't you?" A gentlemanly longcase clock, the dial alive with sporting Keatsian nymphs, measures away these long, precious, pleasure-loaded minutes. Then suddenly your host brightly announces that everyone is to go for a 'walk' - and he's drawn the map of hell well in advance. "We'll go as far as Madman's Folly then cut off down into Plague Field... Follow the Flooze back as far as Temple Priesthole... We'll have an hour or so to spare before the pub opens so we'll scamper up Wild Sally's Fell and take a look at the Devil's Ring"... and so on. Four hours later you're back, out of the chill, drizzling twilight, drenched, aching, miserable. I say all this not because I dislike walking - I don't - but because walking is one of life's greatest pleasures. It's like opera. Break in the virgin with tender loving care rather than attempt to relive the retreat from Moscow. Send your favourite walks to walkopedia.

The Rabbit Hell of Keifer Gray

I wonder if pet shops sell thousands of rabbits in the run-up to Easter. I suppose they do. I've just come across an enthralling article by Thomas 'Keifer' Gray, an engineer from Houston, Texas. In it he demythologizes the long-eared layabouts once and for all: "Although some people and organizations, such as the House Rabbit Society, might like you to believe that rabbits make great companions, I have determined that, while bunnies might look cute and cuddly, in reality they are ill-tempered, destructive, boring, unrewarding animals which, in my opinion, make poor pets." The article, well worth reading (see below) if you're thinking of keeping a rabbit, triggered a fair amount of hate mail, some of it, according to Gray, "undecipherable". But whatever Gray's detractors might say, there is no denying the suffering the Gray family endured at the hands of these creatures - and for so little reward. Caveat emptor, some would say; but it takes a brave man to challenge a mindset so widely held as to be nearly sacred, and this is what Gray has done in the case of unquestioning knee-jerk bunny-love. As for me, we never had rabbits when I was a child - cats, dogs, a chameleon, parrots, but never a rabbit. I quite enjoyed Enid Blyton's version of Brer Rabbit, but I loathed Peter Rabbit. And I successfully resisted Watership Down. Read Thomas Gray's article here. And here's a selection of 25 rabbit recipes for every occasion, supplied by Sheila Crompton of the Bolton Ferret Welfare Society. It's a brutal world, isn't it.

Stan...

Preparing to give a talk on English comedy (they're not laughing now...) End up watching a South Bank Special in honour of Stan Laurel. I'd forgotten how funny he was - when I was six I'd howl and roll about. Later in life you respond to rather more than the slapstick - one of the funniest scenes is in Beau Hunks when they've joined the French Foreign Legion. Stan asks the commandant if he and Ollie may be excused and "go home". They've had enough. But this clip is the very best. It overturns all that nonsense about not acting with animals - if you're good enough, then you can.