I did an BC Advanced White Water Coach Training with Matt Haydock overseen by Ken Hughes.

We started with Ken doing a session on paddling in a ~10m wide circle using constrains based coaching to limit the possible options of the person being coaching until they got the right answer. Turns out that when turning in a circle you use your inside stroke much more than the outside stroke.

We did a varied practice session on eskimo rolling with Matt. Go and roll. Go and roll after paddling about. Go and roll without any setup. Go and roll in the moving water by the fall. Roll and do Bren’s helicopter under the water then roll up. The point is that we rarely practice rolling in the river but on a not-too-cold day it’s fine to do if you have a drysuit and it doesn’t ruin the rest of the day and it’s well worth doing rather than just a roll at the end of the day when you are cold and tired.

We did some sessions on the first two drops of tripple step at the Ettive looking at attentional focus to get a clean line through the section. It does help a lot to look ahead of you where you’re going.

We practiced some boofs off the last drop.

The next day we had three students come and we coached them in the pool at the bottom, the bottom drop and then I did the top two drops. Using video to review and watching each performance to review who got the slickest. The aim is to do it, do it cleanly then do it so it looks good on Instagram.

It’s election time in Scotland and one aspect of recent elections from the populist parties such as the Johnson Tory party is to use emotive social media to create Fear Unnerving and Doubt (FUD) around cultural issues. I took a quick look at the two main ones which people bring up, knowing that I write from a position of privilage as a white straight middle aged well off landed voter.

The Hate Crime and Public Order bill was recently passed by parliament and supported by all the non-Tory parties.

https://www.parliament.scot/-/media/files/legislation/bills/current-bills/hate-crime-and-public-order-scotland-bill/stage-3/bill-as-amended-at-stage-3.pdf

This creates the idea of aggravated offences where if you’ve broken the law it’s even more broken if you do it based on the victim’s membership of a group:

And it create a new offence for threatening or abusing someone or communication threatening of abusive material to someone to stir up hatred against a group.

All of this seems very sensible, it doesn’t crimialise people for making flippant remarks, doesn’t criminalise anything except what a reasonable person would consider to be abusive, the next parts of the legislation set a high standard of proof, and it’s followed by a load of defenses around human rights and of freedom of speech and religion.

In normal leadership the Tories would want to be seen as the party of law and order and fully support this, but under Johnson they just want to support threatening and abusive behaviour.

The other issue is the Gender Recognition Reform proposed bill which never did make it through parliament, but may come back in the next session. I’ve never seen anyone explain this properly, not even SNP ministers, but it’s all set out in the government notes.

https://www.gov.scot/publications/gender-recognition-reform-scotland-bill-consultation-scottish-government/pages/11/

It de-medicalises legal gender recognition for transgender people. This is the same as being gay has been de-medicalised for many years, being gay isn’t a psychological problem that should be dealt with by doctors and it was degrading back when it was treated as such. The current law is degrading by forcing transgender people to be medicalised when there’s no need and should be tidied up.

But nothing in the proposed law affects equal rights, nor could it. Those are governed by the Equalities Act 2010 and reserved to the UK government. Single sex services such as toilets or refuges against domestic abuse can exclude trans people as needed in line with a risk assessment. This has worked well for over a decade and it’s very puzzling that the SNP leadership don’t just point that out.

Instead we have an essay by Joanna Cherry (https://www.thenational.scot/news/19101924.joanna-cherry-possible-support-rights-trans-people-women) which starts with unrelated lies: “Lesbians are same-sex attracted. We are attracted to women’s bodies not to male bodies. To say we must be attracted to male bodies is homophobic” nobody has ever suggested this but this is writing which is clearly designed to put fear into people worried about the unrelated issue of Gender Recognition.

There’s also an article by Joanne Rowling (https://www.jkrowling.com/opinions/j-k-rowling-writes-about-her-reasons-for-speaking-out-on-sex-and-gender-issues/) where she similarly wrongly conflates gender recognition with the unrelated, reserved and decade old Equalities Act “When you throw open the doors of bathrooms and changing rooms to any man who believes or feels he’s a woman – and, as I’ve said, gender confirmation certificates may now be granted without any need for surgery or hormones – then you open the door to any and all men who wish to come inside. That is the simple truth.” This is a lie, as the Equalities Act doesn’t require surgery or hormones for transgender inclusion. Rather the Equalities Act has a much wider definition of transgender protection which doesn’t involve the Recognition which the SNP are proposing to de-medicalise:

“ A person has the protected characteristic of gender reassignment if the person is proposing to undergo, is undergoing or has undergone a process (or part of a process) for the purpose of reassigning the person's sex by changing physiological or other attributes of sex.” Equalities Act 2010.

It’s easy to blame this on social media, it is perfectly made for incomplete arguments to be thrown around and raise emotions rather than truth, but I guess it was no better back in the section 28/clause 2a days when equally the media seemed incapable of reporting normally on the topic and politicians were scared to defend it properly. It’s creating quite the toxic politics, I had to remove a trans-phobic sticker from a lamp post recently. There are real issues around that need dealt with in this election: why is England the worst country in the world for Covid deaths, with Scotland not far behind? why is the UK government taking away freedoms and breaking international agreements? would a goods border with England be worth the gains of independence?

In summary: Hate Crime Bill limits abusive behaviour but only when unreasonable and does not affect free speech or religion. Gender Recognition Reform de-medicalises being trans gender but does not affect Equalities legislation which is reserved to Westminster and a decade old.

Edinburgh tenements have stair lighting which used to be provided by the council but a few years ago they stopped doing replacements on it and now owners need to replace broken bulbs and lights themselves. Of course most landlords are self entitled people who couldn’t change a light bulb if it was their job (which it is) so chances are they won’t know how.

You need a 2 prong coughtrie screwdriver for the “security” screws (that’s security through obscurity).

https://www.thetoolboxscotland.co.uk/2-prong-stair-lighting-screwdriver-117667-p.asp

And Crompton Stair Replacement Tube

https://www.thetoolboxscotland.co.uk/crompton-stair-replacement-tube-113439-p.asp

The bulbs are: Edf8/35 Fusion 8W T5 300mm Miniature Fluorescent Tube 3500K

https://www.cef.co.uk/catalogue/products/904483-8w-t5-miniature-fluorescent-tube-white

Then you send the bill split between all the owners.

Good luck.

Four years after the referendum and with only five months to go until Brexit takes effect we are finally starting to see what the UK government is proposing that to mean.

The UK gov wrote a post about it today with the petty line

“That is why we continue to look for a deal with, at its core, a free trade agreement similar to the one the EU already has with Canada – that is, an agreement based on existing precedents. We remain unclear why this is so difficult for the EU, but we will continue to negotiate with this in mind.”

So gone is the talk of a custom “red white and blue” Brexit and in is the talk of copying CETA.  This means vast new bureaucracy and taking away our freedoms, something the UK gov is openly paying money and boasting about.

CETA is the EU and Canada trade deal.  It has quotss on how much goods can be traded, tariffs on many of the goods and does sod all for services.  It’s more generous than basic WTO rules but it’s no single market.  It’s not what the political declaration says which as agreed by the UK gov along with the transition withdrawal agreement last year.

Our media (either from London or Scotland) doesn’t usually cover the EU side when politicians put out statements, but the EU one is here and of course it lists the problems which the UK one dismisses.

On two important subjects, transport and energy, we had intense and useful discussions. However, the UK continued to request single market-like benefits.

In addition, there is still no progress on two essential topics of our economic partnership.

• First, there must be robust guarantees for a level playing field – including on State aid and standards – to ensure open and fair competition among our businesses, also over time. This is a core interest for all 27 Member States – and in my view also for the UK.
• Second, we have to agree on a balanced, sustainable and long-term solution for fisheries, with the interests of all Member States concerned in mind, and not least the many men and women whose livelihoods depend on it on both sides.

So it’s a lie to say they want the same as CETA, they want single market style access despite having left the single market.

None of this was ever mentioned during the EU referendum by the leave campaigns who just lied when is was suggested there would be massive bureaucratic lorry parks costing billions.

The only change is that the UK gov says they won’t impose any import taxes for the first six months.  This going against WTO agreements but they are slow to pick up so will allowed to be waved for six months.  Presumably the EU will impose taxes on imports of course, putting UK business at a massive disadvantage.  But at least we shouldn’t be short of food or medicine or other stuff we need to import for six months, it’ll just cost more.

Join Yes for EU to help the campaign to support an independent Scotland rejoining the EU to be a normal international country without bureaucracy.