Good Morning Scotland spent quite a lot of time covering the latest firefighters' dispute. It is of course November 5th but the BBC tells us that:
... bonfire night crews have stressed that emergency call-outs will not be affected.Let's hope that's the case.
An editorial in The Scotsman considers the wider matter of the availability and use of fireworks:
For some time now, the use of fireworks has become detached from 5 November. Instead, it has degenerated into a common nuisance spread over the weeks before (and after) the annual celebration of the Gunpowder Plot.The paper welcomes the forthcoming Fireworks Act and links Britain's freedom to legislate with the failure of the Gunpowder Plot.
Some of us believe that our liberties are again under threat. A really excellent analysis of Britain's current position has been written by Sean Gabb of the Libertarian Alliance.
Dr Gabb writes:
The real area of conflict is cultural. That is where the engines of destruction are now most concentrated. And this is a conflict in which there is no overall strategy of defence. There are local defences, and these sometimes succeed. But there is no strategy, nor even the realisation that one might be needed. The engines of destruction may be ranged against fox hunting, or unfashionable humour, or Remembrance Day commemorations, or the Churches, or the nuclear family, or received opinions about the past, or national independence, or the Monarchy, or standard English, or private motoring, or whatever else - but the object is always to delegitimise dissent where it cannot be made impossible.Read the whole of Dr Gabb's article. As he says, the threat to our country is primarily cultural. It's time for a successful plot - this time in favour of liberty.