English language quiz – I got 6 on the first round, 5 on the second and 4 on the third. What about you?

…human rights for all kinds of groups across Europe have been improved thanks to the work of the European Court of Human Rights. The question would better be “Do you want human rights cases to be judged only in the UK, knowing this would endanger the human rights of other Europeans – including gay rights, the rights of women, the rights of minorities – if all other countries did the same?”
Add into the mix a completely incoherent approach to sovereignty and international treaties fostered by this government and a Prime Minister ill at ease on these matters thanks to those on his back benches phobic of anything with Europe in its title, and you have a very messy and unpleasant situation indeed.

The ECHR is very far from perfect. But a country lucky enough to enjoy the rule of law, like Britain, should think long and hard before flouting international treaties which offer perhaps the only hope of legal recourse to people in much less lucky climes.
Above all (and with apologies for a very long posting) though prisons are full of nasty people, they are also full of adult citizens of this country. Declaring that such citizens have lost the moral authority to vote just because they are behind bars is an arbitrary decision, not a principle carved on the granite of the common law. Let them vote.

Because Anne asked.

On reading your ex's poems, written about you fifteen years ago.

My cousin Sarah in Africa's newest country.