The
Spanish legal system 2: I mentioned denuncias the other
day. A prominent one has just been through the courts, in which a
woman accused her piano-playing neighbour of destroying her
tranquility and mental health by practising 8 hours a day, 5 days a
week. Sometimes into the hours when the community rules forbade
noise. Again, the prosecution demanded a lengthy jail sentence of 7 years but
the judge turfed out the complaint, saying - in echo of my question
about weak/frivolous cases - that this one should never have got so
far, that the jail demands were out of all proportion and that he could
find no evidence of a link between the piano-playing and the
psychological complaints of the neighbour. In brief, the court said
the allegations were "absolutely devoid of a basis." Which
rather endorses the questions of why the proceedings were ever
started and who was in a position to stop them.
The latest
UK-Spain Gibraltar spat is over the opening of a British diplomatic
bag at the border. The British government claims to be furious (but
probably isn't) and the Spanish response has been a classic:- The was
no offence because:-
1. The bag
wasn't properly marked.
2. Even if
it had been, it was OK to open it (to search for cigarettes) because
it was only from the Governor of Gibraltar to the UK government and
he doesn't constitute a diplomatic mission.
3.
Therefore, technically it wasn't a diplomatic bag as far as Spain is
concerned, regardless of what the UK thinks.
This
brilliant argument is on a par with that given whenever Spanish
crowds make monkey chants at black players in visiting English teams
- "They were noises of encouragement and so technically weren't
monkey chants. And, anyway, no one intended to upset anyone. So they
couldn't have been." The British response to this nonsense was:- "We
disagree with the Spanish position and we are puzzled and saddened
that Spain should now question whether the bags were diplomatic when
they have been treated by the Spanish authorities as such for many
years". That old British mistake vis-a-vis Spain - expecting logic and
consistency. These count for nothing when you have a neo-fascist
right wing to appease. So, onwards and upwards to the next cavalier
and pathetic Spanish flea-bite. And subsequent denial.
Sr Fabra -
the PP politician who's just been convicted of defrauding the Tax
Office of €500,000 - has resigned from the party but not from 2
senior jobs in the Castellón municipality. He doesn't appear to see
any incongruence between his conviction and keeping these positions. So,
it'll be interesting to see whether he's pushed out.
I took my
watch to a jewellers yesterday, to ask them to fix the bracelet. When
I returned, they asked me for the grand total of 2 euros. And
my ID. This left me with 2 questions:- 1. Wouldn't it have been
better to charge me either nothing or something sensible like 5 or 10
euros?, and 2. Am I now going to be reported to the Tax Office for
possessing an Omega watch, bought when I was 19, after months of
saving from my income?
Finally . .
. Years ago, I read a book by a (female) feminist whose message to her
readers was "Yes, ladies, you can indeed have everything - a
wonderful husband, a great career and well-balanced kids. But not all
at the same time." I thought of this when reading an Alison
Pearson article on Nigella Lawson, the discredited 'Domestic Goddess'
who is/was "the most admired and envied woman of my generation."
Another victim, perhaps, of those who gave women understandable but
unrealistic goals. And I say this as the father of two women who were
brought up to believe they're as capable as any man. Which they
certainly are. With hormones.
I will now stand back.
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