The Leisure Review: World of Leisure

Thursday 1 May
The International Rugby Board meets in Dublin to discuss the experimental law variations (ELV) tested in the southern hemisphere and so beloved by TLR’s letters page correspondents. Famed makers of model trains, Hornby, have bought Corgi, the model car brand, to add to Airfix, which it bought a couple of years ago. A TripAdvisor poll puts only five UK venues in the top one hundred travel destinations. BBC radio achieved record listening figures in March, with 34,219,000 people listening to all its stations during the month. It seems that plans to build a sports stadium on the site of the Maze prison in Northern Ireland are to be abandoned after opposition from unionists. Sven has apparently talked his Manchester City squad out of going on strike to support him in his hour of well-paid need. Sports minister Gerry Sutcliffe is to seek talks with the FA to find out what they want the government to do with regard to the bid for the 2018 world cup.

Friday 2 May
Boris looks like he’s won the title of mayor of London. Pictures of him jogging makes it look more like he’s on the run than going for a run; subtle but important difference. Broadcast companies are using satnav technology to deliver geographically relevant information, including drama, to motorists. Phantom of the Opera in London is to close for a couple of weeks to install a new sound system. The musical celebrates its nine thousandth performance at the end of this month.

Saturday 3 May
Former PM of this parish, Mr Tony, has bought a very nice heritage property, the South Pavilion near Aylesbury, which used to be owned by Sir John Geilgud. It may well qualify him for inclusion in Olympic Price Watch as it is reputed to have cost him some £4m. It goes with his two properties in London’s Connaught Square, which cost around £4.5m, a couple of flats in Bristol and a house in his constituency.

Sunday 4 May
In end-of-season shake up in the original second division, Stoke and West Brom are up, Leicester down. Usain Bolt runs the second-fastest 100m sprint in history, clocking 9.76 at a meet in Jamaica. Australian swimming legend Grant Hackett comes fifteenth in a qualifying competition for the Olympic 10km open water event and his less-than-cut figure provokes criticism from some that he is out of shape.

Monday 5 May
The sun comes out on a bank holiday Monday and the British leisure industry smiles. Olympic Price Watch on film: Inspector Knacker says that even though the UK has spent billions of pounds making us one of the most spied-upon nations on earth CCTV hasn’t really done much stop crime. Forty years after Cliff Richard came second in the European song contest it seems a recount might be in order; evidence from Spain suggests that General Franco fixed the competition. Russia have waived visa requirements for anyone going to Moscow for the Champions League final, solving their administration problems at a stroke. Cycling England says that parents who cycled in their youth are not letting their own children use their bikes as much as they did. Their survey shows 81% of parents restricting their children’s bike use but a Sustrans survey suggests that half of school children would like to cycle to school. That bastion of good sense, the US Pentagon, has drawn up plans for a $5bn project to develop Baghdad’s Green Zone into a leisure and tourism destination.

Tuesday 6 May
The BBC and ITV announce the launch of a free-to-view digital satellite service. A senior officer from the Metropolitan police reveals that China had threatened not to bring the Olympic torch to London if the Chinese “torch attendants” had been banned. They also admit that the Met had not expected the torch to come under such intensive attack during its 31-mile journey through the capital. Paul Evans, master chief executive of the Royal Armouries, has been suspended as part of an investigation into activities across the three Royal Armouries sites. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra has appointed Ricardo Muti as its musical director, the tenth appointment in the orchestra’s 117-year history. The MCC is looking to stage neutral test matches at Lord’s after its £200m refit. Fabio Capello has been told that he must take England to the semi-finals of a major competition to be judged a success and the FA review following the team’s exit from the European Championships has put the Burton national football centre back on the agenda. Liverpool FC has had its latest plans for a new stadium in Stanley Park approved by the city council. Dwain Chambers has been released by Castleford after his trial, meaning he may again look to a legal challenge to be admitted to the British Olympic team.

Wednesday 7 May
Stephen Fry tells the culture, media and sport select committee not to top-slice the BBC budget and offers a stern warning against the BBC giving away its programming free online. Defending the BBC’s budget, he says, “We can afford what we decide we can afford.” Five proposals for Britain’s biggest piece of public art are unveiled, with Mark Wallinger’s 50m-high white horse listed as early favourite to appear on the chosen site near Ebbsfleet in Kent. A company developing water-soluble chewing gum has received a £10m cash injection from investors; the boffins think it could save local authorities millions in pavement cleaning costs. Mr Flintoff’s plans to return to the England cricket team take a knock as he’s out first ball for Lancashire against Durham. More problems for Fabio Capello as Italian authorities put him under formal investigation of charges of withholding evidence from court. This charge relates to the Italian match-fixing scandal that saw the Juventus team he was managing relegated and comes on top of an existing tax fraud investigation. Sven’s looking for a job, you know.

Thursday 8 May
ITV chooses the day it is fined a record £5,675,000 by Ofcom for “seriously and repeatedly misleading its audience” on 86 separate occasions over four years to reveal that it also rigged the 2005 British Comedy Awards. It seems Ant and Dec were given an award they hadn’t won because Robbie Williams fancied giving them an award for something. The British Beekeepers’ Association says that one in five bee colonies in the UK have been killed over the winter by a mixture of weather, stress and disease. The Heritage Lottery Fund announces a £4m grant to create a new home for the Black Cultural Archives at Raleigh Hall, Windrush Square in South London. Sam Harris, who suffered brain injury after an accident on a bouncy castle at a birthday party, wins a claim for damages against the parents who hired the inflatable. The Olympic torch is reported to have reached the summit of Everest. Conservation groups and a property developer reach an agreement over 240,000 acres of Californian wilderness, allowing 30,000 acres to be opened for development and the remaining area to be protected. Unaware of the all-seeing eye of The Leisure Review’s Olympic Price Watch, it seems the government is about to award a contract worth £5bn – that’s five billion pounds – to two former shareholders in Metronet, the company that collapsed under the pressure of delivering on the London Underground refurbishment and had to be bailed out by the government to the tune of £2bn – that’s two billion pounds.

Friday 9 May
With summer coming in, police and coastguards issue a warning of the dangers of tombstoning. Clam Bridge on Dartmoor, a centuries-old crossing the River Bovey, will be accessible this weekend for the last time after health and safety officials suggested that it was too dangerous for public use. Not to be outdone by ITV, the BBC apologises for keeping £106,000 from premium-rate phone lines that should have gone to charity; the money plus interest has now gone to the charities for whom the money was originally intended. The Olympic torch is delayed again, this time by the huge enthusiasm of the crowd gathered in Shenzen in China.

Saturday 10 May
An Arts Council exhibition titled Unpopular Culture and curated by Grayson Perry opens at the De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill. Perry has trawled the Arts Council’s collection for the show and created a skull from tourist tat into the bargain. There is a suggestion in one of the broadsheets that there is a growing campaign to persuade Her Majesty to open up the grounds of Buckingham Palace, one of London’s largest and most private green spaces, to the public. Nuala O’Faolain, celebrated Irish author and broadcaster, dies at the age of 68 after a long illness.

Sunday 11 May
The Fabian Society is suggesting that the next Labour manifesto includes free bicycles for children, a limit on fast-food premises and a ban on alcohol advertising in sport. Research from Bath University finds that government binge drinking warnings are not working, undermined by the fact that people just like getting plastered every so often. Berlin hosts the 13th Carnival of Cultures, celebrating difference of all kinds. The Spanish industry ministry publishes a report showing that fewer than half of the nation’s 1,268 bull breeders made a profit last year; rising costs of foodstuffs and stiffer competition (for the breeders rather than for the bull: there’s little chance of victory for them) are blamed. Manchester United win the Premier League title and in the Championship some particularly delicate club chairmen are shocked by fans being rude to them.

Monday 12 May
The public are to be asked to vote on the best Booker Prize novel after a judging panel narrowed the short list down to six: The Ghost Road by Pat Barker, Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey, Disgrace by JM Coetzee, The Conservationist by Nadine Gordimer, the Siege of Krishnapur by JG Farrell and Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie. The winner will be announced in July. SATC fever (that’s Sex and the City, gentlemen) hits London as the red carpet is rolled out for the international premier of the film incarnation of the TV series that launched a thousand Manolos. Arts Council England reveal a report by Sir Brian McMaster which talks of a new approach to evaluating the success of arts organisations; self-assessment seems to be the way forward. Radio 4 is named station of the year at the Sony radio awards. The National Trust announces plans for the UK’s biggest ever plant count across eighty of the Trust’s properties over the next three years. Meanwhile in New York, ex-Talking Heads front man, David Byrne, is to turn the Great Hall of the Battery Maritime Building into a musical instrument at the end of the month. The Treasury announces that should Wembley host the 2011 Champions League final players and teams would be tax-exempt, a situation at odds with other sports and one which, according to said other sports, puts them at a significant disadvantage when trying to lure events and players to the UK.

Tuesday 13 May
Chairman of the BBC, Sir Michael Lyons, uses a speech at the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA) that the licence fee is not a handy pocket of cash to be raided by the government to support other broadcasting ideas. The Sun recognises the cultural drift by considering a series of Polish-language editions in the UK over the summer to coincide with Euro 2008. Lucian Freud’s portrait of Sue Tilley goes on sale in New York and at £17.2m becomes the most expensive painting by a living artist ever sold. The Turner Prize short list is revealed: Runal Islam, Goshka Macuga, Cathy Wilkes and Mark Leckey are the artists. The original Von Trapp villa near Saltzburg will open as a hotel in July. Mark Bullock, BAA’s MD of Terminal Five, resigns. Decathlete Dean Macey says that he will be doing his utmost to be on the start line in Beijing despite two years of injury, illness and everything in between. West Indies cricketer Marlon Samuels is banned for two years following conversations with bookmakers in contradiction of the ICC code of conduct. Mark Cavendish wins the fourth stage of the Giro d’Italia, arguably. the biggest win of his professional career to date.

Wednesday 14 May
A Honda-designed robot conducts the Detroit Symphony Orchestra to less than rousing critical reviews. An estimated 200,000 Glasgow Rangers supporters arrive in Manchester for the UEFA Cup final with no clear idea of how they got there and not the faintest clue of how they are going to get back. The Cannes film festival opens with not much to see from the British film industry. While English cricket ties itself in knots regarding its response to the Indian Premier League, UK broadcaster of the latest version of the pyjama game, Sentanta, reveal declining viewing figures for the competition. Ian McGeechan is named as coach to the British Lions tour of South Africa.

Thursday 15 May
The Treasury admits to the Commons public accounts committee that some £2.8bn a year lost as a result of tax errors is written off as uneconomic to pursue. Sandy Nairne, director of the National Portrait Gallery, writes of his hopes for the 2012 Cultural Olympiad as an opportunity to explore the links between sport and the arts. David Gibbons, head of conservation science for the RSPB, writes in answer to an article claiming that the successful reintroduction of birds of prey, such as sparrowhawks and red kites, and comes up with quote of the week: “In a properly functioning eco-system it is possible to have your blue tit and eat it.” Something for us all to remember. Still mayor of London, Boris Johnson turns his attention to the 2012 Olympics and promises to keep his eye on costs. Facebook or no Facebook, Inspector Knacker warns that the force will take a dim view of public pillow fights should they appear on the mean streets of Leeds. A swift review of handling techniques at the National Gallery as a Renaissance painting by Domenico Beccafumi breaks in two while being moved. Olympic Price Watch on the wards finds that the NHS IT system upgrade costing £12.7bn will not be ready for a further six years, four years behind schedule. New computers or an Olympic Games: your choice.

Friday 16 May
Dwain Chambers talks to UK Sport about drugs with press reports showing he knows of what he speaks, particularly in light of the allegations from Victor Conte that he was taking “the full enchilada”, which translates to a truly staggering programme of long-term, regular pharmaceutical abuse. He then officially indicates that he will be making another comeback to the sport, with his eye firmly on Beijing by way of the High Court if necessary. And talking of abuse, the DCMS admits that it knew that the budget for the Olympic pool was over budget three years before the overspend was revealed. A survey of best value cultural destinations undertaken by the Post Office puts Warsaw at the top of the list with London at number ten; no news of why the Post Office should be interested. Oscar Pistorius, the South African sprinter who uses prosthetics on both legs, is cleared to run in this year’s Olympics.

Saturday 17 May
Public tours of the government art collection for the first time. Portsmouth wins the FA Cup. It seems that the Francis Bacon triptych, sold this week in New York for $86.3m to become the most expensive post-war work ever sold, and Lucian Freud’s Benefits Supervisor Sleeping, sold by the same auction house the previous night for $33.6m, becoming the most expensive work by a living artist ever sold, were bought by Roman Abramovich. They’ll look nice next to Andrei Shevchenko.

Sunday 18 May
With celebrated athletics coach Trevor Graham set to go on trial in the USA over his involvement in widespread doping of athletes, Seb Coe hopes that all the names will come out “so we can move on”. The Albert Hall in London launches a new scheme to offer affordable venue hire to up-and-coming bands attracting a more youthful audience than the home of the Proms usually welcomes through the doors. Dr Jeffrey Sherwin, a Leeds GP, prepares to put his collection of British surrealism on display for the first time. His 200-piece collection includes numerous masterpieces and will be shown at the Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art. Rugby union’s latest wunderkind Danny Cipriani ends his season for Wasps with a fractured dislocation of his right ankle

Monday 19 May
Keith McNiffe, former mayor of Pembroke and football referee extraordinaire, is in court following allegations that he falsely claimed disability and care benefits between 2005 and 2007, a period during which he officiated at 67 football matches. Reliance Big Entertainment, one of India’s biggest film studios announces that it will be making ten Hollywood movies and spending around one billion dollars in the process. Chelsea Flower Show opens its doors to a fully suspecting public. Ever the contrarian, former Beach Boy Brian Wilson rejoins EMI via its Capital label. Academics write an open letter condemning the decision of Manchester University to retire Terry Eagleton, feminist historian and literary theorist respectively, as an attack on the knowledge and cultural economy. Forty-five professional tennis matches should be investigated as having suspect links to betting patterns, according to a report. Meanwhile Chelsea and Manchester United owe £1.5bn between them. It seems that the 2012 organisers will be seeking IOC approval to abandon plans to construct a purpose-built fencing arena; the competition will be moved to the ExCel Arena.

Tuesday 20 May
Mr J Barton, recently of Newcastle United, is sentenced to six months. Boris Johnson meets IOC officials and promises to rein in spending on the London Games. “My approach will be ‘citius, altius, fortius sed non carius’, which translates as ‘faster, higher, stronger but not more expensive’,” said the classically educated Old Etonian. Olympic Price Watch goes afloat with the announcement that the government is pressing ahead with spending £3.9bn on two aircraft carriers despite misgivings among military top brass. Prince Albert of Monaco explains that an extension to his home (also knows as Monaco) will be a boon for wildlife. Building a new district out to sea will create new reefs for wildlife, he says, as well as more space for tax exiles and billionaires; a museum could be a centrepiece of the development. Fire breaks out at the home of the Berlin Philharmonic, sending musicians fleeing into the street with as many instruments as they could carry to save them from the flames.

Wednesday 21 May
With a carefully crafted story written and all but completed in Moscow, John Terry fluffs his lines before Nicholas Anelka (aka Le Sulk) brings down the curtain. Adrian Flanagan arrives into the Solent having become the first yachtsman ever to circumnavigate the globe through the Arctic. Dylan Hammond unveils his portrait of Margaret Thatcher, which stands alongside a portrait of Aneurin Bevan at the Welsh Assembly. A report commissioned by Transport for London advises that the proposed new Thames crossing in East London should be a pedestrian cable car and certainly not a road traffic bridge.

Thursday 22 May
Paula Radcliffe’s hopes of appearing in Beijing seem to have been scuppered by a stress fracture of her hip. Last year’s very wet summer is blamed for fewer British beaches reaching minimum water quality standards. The Lightbox in Working wins the Art Fund museum of the year prize. Kew Gardens opens a new tree-top walkway for visitors. Work begins on the London Olympic stadium and the IOC assessment team congratulates the 2012 organising committee for its unprecedented preparedness, awarding 9.75 out of ten. The Singapore arts festival opens.

Friday 23 May
The Dalai Lama claims that the Beijing Olympics will be followed by the settlement of one million ethnic Chinese in Tibet in an effort to end Tibetan culture and identity. Mark Cavendish wins his second stage of the Giro d’Italia.

Saturday 24 May
British adventurer and vertigo sufferer Sir Ranulph Fiennes ends his quest to climb Everest, having raised £3m for charity in the process. Having come within an inch and a half of winning the Champions League, Avram Grant is escorted from Stamford Bridge and the continuous search for a new manager of Chelski continues. With the investigation into illegal drug taking among American athletes continuing to spew names onto the laboratory floor, a number of British athletes could be in line for retrospective medals. Neils De Vos, chief executive of UK Athletics, notes that US drug testing was less than robust. “Frankly, the American system was set up to help them to avoid testing but post-2001 it is a lot, lot tougher,” he said.

Sunday 25 May
Some consolation for the Buckinghamshire town still mourning the Wanderers’ play-off failings: the latest literary sensation to appear in Berlin, Charlotte Roche, grew up in High Wycombe. Over the Atlantic there is a literary buzz surrounding a novel, Netherland, by Joseph O’Neill set around the attack on the World Trade Center (sic) with cricket at the heart of the story. And speaking of serious matters, LibDem MP Richard Younger-Ross is moved to table a Commons motion condemning the voting arrangements for the Eurovision song contest, won last night by Russia. Beavers are to be reintroduced to the UK after a four-hundred-year absence; Scotland first and four further locations. Kotooshu becomes the first European ever to win the Emperor’s Cup, Japan’s most important sumo competition. Former soldier Min Bahadur Sherchan becomes the oldest person to summit Everest at the age of 76. Lewis Hamilton wins in Monaco.

Monday 26 May
London 2012 could be passing on a large chunk of the Olympic Stadium to Chicago, were the latter to win the bidding for the next Games; plans for 55,000 seats to be dismantled and shipped from London to a new venue are under discussion. Judging by his call for the gardeners of the world to unite and subvert the system, the Soil Association’s new president, Monty Don, is on the road to recovery from his recent stroke. Hanif Kureishi, novelist and curmudgeon, condemns university creative writing courses as “the new mental hospitals”. Butch Harmon, the golf world’s most famous coach, says that it is naïve to think that his sport is drug-free. In Manchester England win a test match that they should have lost. Film director, producer and actor Sydney Pollack dies. Stockport County reach the heights of the proper third division.

Tuesday 27 May
Glasto organisers let it be known that they are laying in arrangements to cope with sultry conditions during this year’s event but it seems plenty of people are waiting to see if it actually stops raining before they sign up for the musical re-enactment of the Somme. Sports minister Gerry Sutcliffe says that top-flight football is becoming too expensive for ordinary people. Predictable feigned outrage from a small number of intellectual snobs when Cambridge University puts an Amy Winehouse lyric on an English literature question paper. It seems that the USA may be preparing a bid to host the 2018 FIFA world cup, competing with the English FA’s bid. What could possibly go wrong? Meanwhile it seems that the proposal for Liverpool FC and Everton to share a stadium has been resurrected by Liverpool City Council. David Brailsford’s plans to establish a British Cycling road team have been advanced by two years as a result of emerging talent; the ultimate aim is “to win the Tour de France with a clean British rider within five to ten years,” he says. Meanwhile, Shanaze Reade is pleased that her new BMX coach has taken her out of her comfort zone. “I was getting by winning world titles but not how I’d like to,” she says.

Wednesday 28 May
A new James Bond novel, titled Devil May Care and written by “Sebastian Faulks writing as Ian Fleming”, is published. The first comprehensive exhibition of the work of Gustav Klimt opens in Europe’s capital of culture, Liverpool. Consumer experts Which? find that sneaky extra charges can add 30% to the cost of tickets for music events. Artist Beryl Cook dies at the age of 81. Italian experts have given the tower at Pisa the all clear following some eight hundred years of being on the tilt; see it while you can. Bill Henson’s photographic portraits of adolescents create a storm of protest in Australia owing to the nudity in the images; Cate Blanchett among others comes out to support his freedom of expession. The European Commission says that any plans to restrict the members of any football team on the grounds of nationality would be illegal and discrimatory under EU law. The Deloitte review of football finance shows Premier League revenues passing £1.5bn for the first time. Some semblance of etiquette is alive and well in the peloton as Mark Cavendish finishes second in today’s stage of the Giro d’Italia, having permitted his team mate, Andre Greipel, to take the victory.

Thursday 29 May
The Royal Institute of British Architects announces its prize-winning buildings; the list of 92 includes plenty of leisure-related buildings, not least of which are Wembley Stadium, Nottingham Old Market Square and St Pancras International Station. In news to scare the accounts department at TLR Towers, it seems that the BBC website has run slightly over budget to the tune of £36m or about 48%. Jake and Dinos Chapman unveil their latest work, including reworkings of Adolf Hitler’s artistic achievements and a reworking of Hell, lost in the art warehouse fire, now called Fucking Hell; the exhibition, If Hitler Had Been a Hippy How Happy We Would Be is at the White Cube, Mason’s Yard in London. Mayor Boris’s first U-turn: contemporary art will continue on the Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square. It seems that a number of MPs are lobbying the DCMS to return Test cricket to terrestrial TV as part of the sporting ‘crown jewels’.

Friday 30 May
Prince tells YouTube to take down his version of Radiohead’s Creep and Thom Yorke, who wrote the song, says they should leave it up. “It’s hilarious,” says Thom, puncturing the notorious self-importance of the Little Purple Genius. Amnesty International urges athletes at the Beijing Olympics to speak out on human rights. Andy Murray sets hearts a-quiver by suggesting that he can win Wimbledon this year “if I play my best tennis”.

Saturday 31 May
In a classic example of chaos-where-once-was-harmony politics, thousands mark the ban on alcohol consumption on public transport in London by taking to the Circle Line for a party. Fourteen million people watch a fourteen-year-old dancing to victory in a television talent competition. The first Indian Premier League cricket competition reaches its climax with tens of millions watching on television and Shane Warne at the crease when victory is secured. Usain Bolt runs 9.72 for the 100m in New York, upsetting the form book for the Olympics. Mixed messages for the UK’s potential medal haul in Beijing with Shanaze Reade winning another BMX world championship and the rowing squad not meeting their own high standards at the Lucerne regatta; heptathlete Jessic Ennis also retires from an event with an ankle injury.