The less than super highway

Two stories of national importance landed on the Westmorland Gazette cartoon desk last week.

Local hotels are up in arms and down in the dumps because BT broadband failed, losing them millions of pounds of business (hyperbole added for optional excitement).

And after months of campaigning, the much-loathed on-street parking plan from Cumbria County Council has been buried due to a legal problem.

Here are the six ideas I submitted to my steamed editor. The winning entry is at the end, complete with crop marks (which the sub-editor always ignores). Which would you have chosen? Place your carefully-considered vote in the comments box below.

Banks bunking off

Banks are disappearing from rural communities. Like post offices, the village bobby, pubs, telephone kiosks and flashers, what was once part of the fabric of rural life is now going the way of the dodo. (They're disappearing, not being hunted and eaten by sailors.)

The assumption is that these days everyone can do internet banking. Country residents still struggling on internet dial-up, slow broadband speed or frequent breaks in service may care to disagree. And many of them won't relish the prospect of a long bus journey to their nearest high street bank.

The closure of more branches in South Lakes is one of the main stories in this week's Westmorland Gazette. It seemed a good target for the front page cartoon. 

Below are four ideas I submitted to my steamed editor. His choice is shown at the end. But which one would you have chosen? Make your vote in the comments below.

A Bit of a Royal Do

Excitement gripped the area this week. Could it be the return of Eric Robson and Gardener’s Question Time? No, someone even more august, despite the fact that it’s July. The Queen and Princess Royal were visiting.

It’s been many decades since the Queen visited South Cumbria, possibly put off by the weather. I can’t speak for the Princess Royal, partly because it took me a while to work out which one that was. (Not Edward, apparently.)

The Royal Visit began in Kendal, progressed to Windermere and then set sail on the lake for Brockhole, where the Royal Party enjoyed half-an-hour on the Treetop Trek aerial playground.

The last time the Queen visited, social media consisted of the Court Circular. Today it is slightly different. By following #royalvisit on Twitter, anyone could be kept informed, read live updates and see photographs tweeted from the scene by citizen journalists (this is one of the best). As one wag pointed out, it is Royal protocol to curtsey before snapping her Majesty with a smartphone.

The sun shone, the whole area was a-buzzing (not just with bees) and there was a general good feeling in the air. 

And it was press day at The Westmorland Gazette, so how could a cartoonist for Her Majesty’s Press spoil it all by being customarily cynical and embittered? Besides, he might end up in the Tower.

Below is a selection of cartoon drawn for the Royal Visit, with a wider selection of captions. There were also a couple of other stories which I sketched, but don’t let them trouble you.

So, you ask, which Royal Cartoon made it into the newspaper? Well, I don’t know. Apparently at Gazette HQ everyone picked a different one. Press day during a Royal Visit is an exciting affair and as the paper was being assembled in all directions, I drew up the final art and left the captions with them. In an hour or so, I’ll pop out and buy the paper. I’ll know which cartoon they chose, just as soon as the readers.

Loyal readers in far-flung places can see the chosen cartoon by visiting my website, sometime on Friday.

Nice place to live

The sun is out

The grass is riz

I want to live

Where Wordsworth is.

So said viewers of Channel 4’s Location, Location, Location (prop. Kirstie Allsopp and Phil Spencer). South Lakeland topped the pops in an online poll to find viewers’ preferred place to live. Of course, if they al buy second homes here then those of us who are here already may have to go live somewhere else.

This was one story in this week’s sun-soaked, soaraway Westmorland Gazette. The other concerned unused space at the Westmorland General hospital. Have closed bits down, administrators are surprised to discover they’ve got rather a lot of room and are wondering what to do with it. Rent it out to Channel 4 viewers?

These were the topics for this week’s cartoon. You can see my sketches below. For the editor’s final choice, wander lonely as a cloud to my website.

Wild Things

Cumbria is full of strange and exotic creatures.

Red deer, ospreys, char, golden eagles, Bownessie, ostritches, tigers, giraffes, even the occasional cartoonist. Many of these exotic animals (not the cartoonist) live at South Lakes Wild Animal Park, which has plans to expand to include even more exotic animls (still no cartoonists).

Local councillors have other ideas, however, and there is something of a stand-off occurring at present. Two sides to a conflict, each with a voluble spokesperson - an ideal lead for any newspaper.

The other story which whiffled past the cartoonist this week, is one which is bound to create controversy. Emma Thompson, actress and daughter of the narrator of Magic Roundabout, is writing a sequel to Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit, set in Scotland.

I had a few ideas what this might be like, most of which were judged unsuitable for a family newspaper. Fortunately we’re made of more robust stuff here, so you can see the ideas sketched out below. To discover which cartoon is on the front of this week’s Westmorland Gazette, buy the paper or waft over to my website from Thursday morning. In case you were hoping, it isn’t number one …