Name Bono As The Father

News today - which sadly should have been from the Daily Mash, but was actually real - that women who receive IVF treatment will be able to name ANYONE as the father of their child. Sorry for the Daily Mail link, but it's their kind of story.

Can't see that going horribly wrong, can you? No malicious scrotes naming someone who they want to get back at? No? Or completely innocent people being pursued through the courts for maintenance payments they don't owe?

I have a solution. Name Bono as the father. He's rich enough.

Interestingly, this is in direct contradiction to a law enabled late last year that forces single mothers (presumably not receiving IVF) to give the father's name so that they can be pursued for child maintenance money. This link is from the Telegraph so your eyes won't be quite as sore as earlier.

Nice to see some joined up Government there lads. You incompetent cunts.

Stop Having Children

Following on from my many posts advocating not having children, the BBC have a nice piece about the benefits of having children and then ask the question "why don't people who don't have children receive the same?"

The comments at the bottom reveal the depth of feelings on this subject very nicely indeed.

Getting Them One Way Or Another

Following on from yesterday's post - about ACPO distancing itself from collecting DNA from children deemed most likely to offend in the future - the Government are pressing ahead with their "baby ASBO" plan.

Trouble makers as young as 10 years old are to be asked to sign a good behaviour contract to stop them going off the rails. About 1,000 of the "most challenging" children will be expected to stick to the order, or risk a criminal record. Of course once they've been questioned or charged their DNA will be taken anyway.

Children's Minister Beverley Hughes said that "the best form of prevention is cure... We can spot early warning signs in young people and families where things are going wrong - poor parenting, lessons skipped and complaints about behaviour... To change, rather than just contain, we need tough action on the underlying problems." She denied the measures would replicate work already being done.

And that is something I have levelled at the Government before and I shall level it here again.

There are already provisions in place for truancy officers to stop children who are not in school and to return them. There are already provisions in place for parents of regular truant children to be fined and in extreme cases imprisoned unless the child's attendance improves. There are many, many provisions for Social Workers to step in if they feel that a parent is not bringing a child up properly.

Just because the Government isn't allocating sufficient resources - or setting quantitive rather than qualitative targets - to the right people doesn't mean that we need another whole raft of legislation put in place at a cost of £218million. The only purpose of which seems to be to get more people onto the DNA database at an earlier stage in their lives.

Making children feel like criminals will, in my opinion, only speed up their progression to becoming actual criminals in later life.

I do, however, agree with the sentiments of youth worker Shaun Bailey (who is also Conservative prospective parliamentary candidate for Hammersmith) who said "We need to change the notion around parenting. So many parents up and down the country believe it is their divine right not to parent their children properly and there is absolutely no come-back."

As I have said previously, are you sure you need a child?

Congratulations Nat & Ryan!

Yesterday morning (4th December) at 10.25am, Nat & Ryan's first child (a boy) was born. Mother and child doing well, father doing cartwheels.

I'm On The Register

And funnily enough, not the Sex Offenders Register, but The Register.

Yep that Silas, on the picture showing what Windows Live Messenger looks like on a Nokia, is me! Go Bill! And also slightly belated congratulations to him on the birth of his third child, Zachary.

Lacking Sleep?

Following up nicely from yesterday's news for the Enions, a report covered by the BBC says that having a baby can cost you two MONTHS worth of sleep in the first year alone.

Which is something worth considering.

For the record, I'm not planning on children.

Isabella Yasmin Enion

Congratulations to Sophia and Giles Enion on the birth of their first child, a girl named Isabella Yasmin Enion. She was born at 11.20 this morning, weighing 8lb 11oz. Both mother and baby are doing well, despite a difficult birth.

Pictures and (I'm guessing) a huge amount of drinking will follow.

A quick check of who else was born today reveals that she will share a birthday with Neil Kinnock. The poor girl.

Congratulations!



To my dear friend Jules (who put up with me for far too long while I was out in California in the late 80s) who gave birth to her first child, Mackenzie (6lbs something & 20" long!) very recently. And further congratulations to her & Eric for their fifth wedding anniversary on September 30th.

I've known that poor girl for 20 years now, yet she still seems relatively normal.