Where on earth are we with global warming? Just as I was about to abandon my long-standing scepticism on the issue and grudgingly accept that ‘no right-thinking person could oppose the scientific consensus’, along comes a TV documentary - The Great Climate Change Swindle – which parades a constellation of luminaries to tell us it’s got nothing to do with carbon dioxide but is caused by solar activity. Which pleased me for a couple of days. But now, this morning, I read that the evidence supporting the program's central thesis was possibly wrong and may even have been faked. What is the stance equivalent to Deist in this new religion, I ask myself. And what is Biopolitical’s informed view?

A teacher somewhere in Madrid wore a T-shirt to class which was not very complimentary to President Zapatero. Astonishingly, this led to demands from senior government officials that she be summarily sacked. I assume this is because - like all state school teachers here – she’s a civil servant and is expected to be loyal and polite to her employers. Molehills and mountains.

By some odd coincidence, Mother’s Day in the UK coincides with Father’s Day here in Spain. Not that either of my daughters appears to be aware of the latter. Even the one who lives here. And despite my posting reminders on the wall of her flat last weekend. No wonder I am curmudgeonly.

I go on a bit about Spanish web sites but, as cases in point . . . Last night I 1. failed to get details from RENFE of any journeys which involved a change of train, and 2. failed to get reservation data from the Paradors’ site because it firstly refused to respond unless I registered and then wouldn’t budge unless I gave it the second surname I don’t have. Actually, I did get the info but only because I made one up and am now known to them as Señor Curmudgeon. Which could be a problem when I try to check in. The Parador organisation has been in business since, I think, the 1920s. You’d have thought that by now it’d know that, outside the Hispanosphere, no one has two surnames. By the way, in the fine tradition of Spanish customer service, both RENFE and the Paradors organisation offer you the chance to phone for information – via a premium rate number.

In another of those eye-rubbing cases, an appeal court in Burgos has quashed the conviction for dangerous driving of a man who was clocked doing 260kph[163mph]. The judge opined he was not guilty of causing any ‘concrete danger’ as neither he, his passenger, the pursuing police or anyone else on the road had had to execute any perilous manoeuvre to avoid him. It was admittedly reckless driving, the judge said, but not dangerous. The driver was a politician, by the way.

En passant, someone has pointed out that the decision to do nothing about prostitution is the only thing Spain’s government and opposition have agreed on in living memory. Which must say something.

Galicia Facts and Perspectives

The Xunta says it’s the first local government in Spain to introduce gender equality provisions. In future, it says, only 60% of company directors can be male.

And, in another bit of good news, the Xunta says it will review the employment of 365 applicants for fireman positions who were rejected because, although they could speak Gallego, they didn’t have a certificate to prove it. With luck, the process will have been completed in time for our traditional August conflagrations.