There was much wringing of hands this week over a UNESCO report on education which placed Spain 26^th in the world, at the same level as Hungary and Trinidad & Tobago. The point was stressed that only a couple of other countries in Europe were lower in the rankings. Maybe so but, after several readings, I couldn’t find either France or Germany in the list of the top 30 reproduced in El Mundo. The UK was 13^th, by the way. From memory, the top three were Norway, Denmark and South Korea. And Holland was up there with them.

The Language Wars: The government of Catalunia has published a bill under which people in Catalunia would have a ‘right’ to speak Catalan and a ‘duty’ to understand both Spanish and Catalan. This is rather like the Welsh parliament demanding that everyone in Wales learn Welsh. Rather disingenuously, they say that no one will be compelled to actually speak Catalan. Maybe not but non-Catalan Spaniards already complain that the locals refuse to talk to them in Spanish and this development will undoubtedly help to justify such bloody-mindedness. And the example will surely be followed – in the fullness of time - in both the Basque country and Galicia

I wrote yesterday that my favourite café had a ‘non-smoking zone’. As you will all have appreciated, this should have been ‘no-smoking’. Zones, by and large, neither smoke nor refrain from it. Which reminds me, the government here has today announced an intention to ban smoking in ‘closed places’. This should be interesting.