“ # Made You Think ”

Really? Yeah, but did you, though? For almost a year, the Daily Mirror and its empire of subjugated, crushed takeover victims masquerading as “local” newspapers ran this irritating series of full page self-congratulatory adverts. Featuring this single hook line, attached to a series of stupid photographs. And yes, it certainly did that. But possibly not quite as the manicured darlings and pencil-chewers at the Advertising Agency responsible intended me to. It made me think how much real news could have been concentrated into a page like that. It made me think, “what a waste of ink!” especially in the ironic context of Trinity Mirror continuing to abuse my local newspaper by introducing a Putsch of local and volunteer journalists and their columns. It made me think, “ Perhaps, after 50 years as a subscriber and contributor, I need to read a different newspaper?”

     Independence, Free Thinking, left of centre Liberalism and equality of opportunity are all Big Thoughts which the campaigning Mirror likes to espouse. But by operating Regional Apartheid they are stifling creativity and repressing freedom of access. Further, they are attempting to control peoples' minds and behaviour. How? By denying local people access to local events. By refusing to promote, advertise or describe any of them (without payment) they are espousing only the causes of 1984 and Putinism. This is not any benign form of Socialism: it is Mind Control: the onset of the Thought Police.

     Quite why The Mirror Group is pursuing this irrational and pernicious purge of local news coverage is unclear. It certainly sits uneasily with the image TM likes to project nationally. That of being “The People's Newspaper.” In the Midlands, the populations of many provincial towns cities and villages are actually being increasingly disenfranchised by having news, coverage of local events and sports reporting curtailed or discontinued altogether. The “Coventry” Telegraph and its regional variations are now nothing of the sort. Since Trinity Mirror took over this and other provincial newspapers, an iron grip of rationalisation has steadily been applied. The net result is to the detriment of any “service” supposedly offered to the readership. Local advance coverage (“news”) of local events has largely been eradicated. Feature articles are now mostly syndicated, regurgitated work, recycled from previous items in TM Group papers, so that you can conveniently read it twice. For our entertainment nowadays, the Peasants of Coventry, Warwickshire and South Leicestershire are directed imperiously only towards The Mothership. Birmingham. Which continues to embrace its satellite towns like some giant amoeba. Coventry is it latest target. The prize it has been after for decades.

    I like Brum. I use its airport regularly. I gained my B.Phil (Hons) there, amidst the Campaniles, towers and leafy campuses of Edgbaston. I often visit its excellent pubs, and enjoy shopping there. I've played many gigs in the centre and in its suburbs. Audiences there are friendly, good natured and knowledgeable. I even have roots in West Bromwich, where one of my impoverished nineteenth century ancestors once puddled molten nails in a foundry. But this does not make me blind to its weaknesses nor does it make me want to forsake all the other wonderful towns and cities of the East and West Midlands to seek the Holy Grail there, and there only.

     But Trinity Mirror, like Coventry's ruling Labour council, have decided that Godiva's town, which once hosted Parliaments, (when the NEC and Snow Hill were just swamps), is now ripe for re-merger with Brumagem under the aegis of “Greater Birmingham.” Previously, as the erstwhile “West Midlands,” this kind of malarkey had brought expansion investment, prosperity ( and a Metro). But only to Black Country towns and cities, and not to Coventry. Yet, Birmingham is again to become the new hub of the Universe. With its hideous subterranean railway stations, its permanently dug-up streets, its traffic congestion and restricted parking. Strangled and throttled by motorways, and Ring Roads that aren't fit for purpose.

  And of course, there is HS2. That Great Midlands White Elephant. The Trent Valley By-Pass. Destined (and intended) to divide Counties and to reduce the West Coast Main Line to a pre-Beeching Branch. Existing rail services are by no means perfect already, from any of the Telegraph circulation area's stations. In every case, though you can travel outwards to Birmingham by public transport, return services cease unreasonably early. Late nights are OUT. Unless you drive, and enjoy sitting on the M6 for hours.

    I started up a monthly Folk Club in Nuneaton in October 2014. I'd run such ventures before, but Nuneaton and Bedworth, with a combined population of 80,000+ was the largest Midlands Town not to have one. From the onset, it has been very successful. Audiences have averaged about 70+ and have occasionally topped three figures. Local and National publications have taken a regular interest. Local radio have been very supportive-I've done three “live” interviews already with them. But the “Coventry” and “Nuneaton” Telegraphs, despite me sending them regular Press Releases, have given it sparse coverage and have recently refused to promote, publicise or advertise not just ours, but ANY Arts Event within (or beyond) the circulation area. Except those with massive franchising behind them. Or those occurring in Birmingham and beyond.

  Either TM or the current Editorial Team or both, seem to have issued a diktat that Fringe Arts events (as they see them) are to be curtailed. They don't like Folk Music. They see it as the reserve only of weirdo sandal-wearing Octogenarians, unless it is mainstream pap promulgated by Ed Sheeran or Mumford and Sons. So in last Friday night's edition, (29th May) under snappy strap lines like “ The Listings” or in Supplements like “What's On ” the coverage of local events amounted to..... nothing. No Jazz, no Pop, no Dance, no Folk, no Country, no Blues, no Classical. No exhibitions at galleries or studios. No amateur dramatics, no Comedy clubs, Concerts, Oratorios or recitals. Nothing at all going on in the area except Maroon V at the NEC or Heaven 17 at Warwick University.

 

    Quite apart from the opposite being the truth, this makes us all out to look like Philistines.    Coventry is a University Town. Both Universities recently headed off all of Birmingham's, in a Top 20 voted for by the nation's students. Warwick was in 5^th place, and Coventry, the highest placed ex-Polytechnic was in 14^th. Students like to come here and live in our region. Many stay on. Yet, opening the pages of their “local” paper on a Friday Night, they could be forgiven for wondering what the hell is going on. Other than nothing.

    It isn't as if all the theatres, clubs, pubs, colleges, churches etc have vanished overnight, just because TM has decided to “disappear” them. They are all still out there and many (like ours) are still flourishing, despite the news blackout. After all, newspapers like these are crumbling, anachronistic dinosaurs Dumbing them down and refusing to cover anything other than a Dancing Dog or overpaid footballers annually disgracing themselves abroad, cannot disguise their growing obsolescence. Their function is being replaced by Social Media Networks, Blogs, Podcasts and the return of (genuinely) independent self-financed publications. TM et al cannot suppress or censor The Arts, Amateur Theatre, Fringe Festivals, Stand-Up Comedy or any local culture simply by ignoring it. Nor can they drive what is already an overt movement Underground. There is no Underground any more. Except at New Street.