Another long gap between entries but the cuts agenda has prompted a post.

The cuts to library services that Alan Gibbons and others have been valiantly fighting in England for so long have arrived with a vengeance in Wales.

Councils are under the cosh so where do they look for huge savings....library services. Everywhere I go from Port Talbot to Penrhiwceiber libraries are exposed as outdated, dusty, silent spaces that can face the axe because, let's face it, nobody's going to speak out in libraries are they?

Silence please.

But it is time to make some noise. Dylan Thomas once said:

'My education was the ability I had to read indiscriminately and all the time, with my eyes hanging out'

They also say a child that grows up in an environment where there are 500 books will grow up reading for pleasure. Not all homes have 500 books......but libraries provide that environment. Recent research demonstrated that children who read for pleasure outstrip others in Maths....the benefits of reading for pleasure are not just arts based.

The country that tops the much maligned PISA rankings (world league tables for a nation's educational performance) is South Korea which has a programme to build 180 new libraries. Finland also features strongly and has worked hard to build reading performance in youngsters during the 1990's with library services as a vital component.

Nobody is saying libraries should not evolve and change, embracing new technologies, becoming cultural community hubs, performance spaces,coffee shops and debating points but if we allow them to disappear they may never return.

We're all struggling with the cuts and austerity measures and, it seems, we have to rely on Russell Brand to make bold, radical suggestions to the shake up the Newsnight consensus. But I'll have a go too: 

The total personal wealth of the UK is £9000 billion a sum that dwarves the National Debt and the richest 10% own £4000 billion with an average per household of £4 million.
The bottom half of our society own just 9% of the wealth.
A one off tax of just 20% on the wealth of the richest group would pay off the National Debt.

The importance of libraries............it's not rocket science
Paying off the National Debt...........it's not rocket science

Is it? 

It's my birthday today...and a good while since I wrote anything...see I told you I was no good at social media....I'm actually no good at birthdays either which is why I'm sat here writing this.

The book launches went very well and thank you to everyone who attended and bought books. We sold out at Waterstones in Cardiff and pretty much did the same by performing poetry on the streets in Penarth (and got invited to perform at an International School in Kuwait...if you're out there please get in touch...you know who you are!).

Swansea was a bit tougher and the Oxfam Bookshop seemed a little off the beaten track for shoppers on a very hot day. I did have a very interesting discussion there though about queuing being a perfect form of anarchy. Most people associate anarchy with the Sex Pistols and raucousness but this is not the case. Queuing is people choosing to take turns, working co-operatively and being responsible for their own behaviour in getting what they want.

This started me thinking.

I've always liked the traffic parting for the emergency services. It's when people behave in an intrinsically altruistic fashion.
Recent research with rats found that they can behave in an instinctively altruistic fashion.

Apparently researchers put rats in a situation where they got food by opening doors but they heard another rat behind a door in distress (without the accompanying signal to tell them there was food there and they had to go back rather than forward away from the food triggers). A very high percentage of rats opened the door for the other distressed rat even when they were able to leave towards another food source.
Heart warming isn't it?

You see we really are all in it together

Right here we go let's blog n tweet n facebook n canvas n trumpet n tell everyone when I'm eating apples or sleeping, shopping or spinning plates.

Ok sorry... I'm not good with the whole social media thing but thought now I've got a website I ought to update at times to inform of news and events that might interest those of you still reading this far....

Let's start with the book... there are a few events planned to launch 'A Wee Bit Of Trouble'

Saturday 13th July 2013 at the Windsor Bookshop in Penarth at 11 am
Saturday 20th July 2013 at the Oxfam Bookshop in Swansea at 11 am
Saturday 3rd August 2013 at Waterstones in Cardiff at 11 am

Be great to see you there...