Close and be Damned

Cumbria County Council are starting a consultation process about the closure of rural libraries and the junking of the mobile library service. This is all part of Cameron’s Bold New Big Society, in which those who are big enough to go to posh schools survive and to hell with the rest.

The Westmorland Gazette is a family newspaper so, sadly, I can’t say what I really think about this idea for fear of putting people off their cornflakes. It rhymes with duck-knitted.

Anyway, here are the options I did submit. 


As usual, the chosen cartoon will be on the front of tomorrow’s paper and adorning my website.

Buy the paper on the way to your local library. You are using it, aren’t you …?

An App Too Far

Today’s venture into the world of local news brought me into familiar territory. The mountain rescue services are once again complaining about unprepared walkers.

This time, it seems, people are happily skipping up the Lakeland Fells, armed only with a bar of Kendal Mint Cake and a smartphone. They’re depending on Google maps to navigate them to the top and using the smartphone’s flashlight app if they get benighted on the way down. Clearly these people are deluded and should invest in a decent Lakeland walking book or map.

But it’s a good story and one I have tackled before. A few years ago, I was commissioned by Cicerone to produce Take A Hike, a book of cartoons based around walking and the outdoors. Inspiration came in the form of the various equipment walkers were starting to use - from high tech waterproofs to trekking poles and GPS thingies.

Since then, technology has moved onto the humble mobile and inexperienced walkers are beginning to rely on it. Which is good as it gives me more material.

Below are the sketches for this week’s cartoon. You can see which was chosen by my esteemed editor by purchasing a copy of the Westmorland Gazette, or by firing up your smartphone and navigating to your way to my website on Thursday morning.

Going Gaga

Last week’s Westmorland Gazette uncovered a hitherto unsuspected undercurrent in South Lakeland society; royal apathy. Apparently in the whole area, there have been only two applications for street parties to celebrate the forthcoming wedding of Prince …um… you know, the oldest one and Kate …er something.

Locals are much more thrilled at the prospect of Lady Gaga arriving in Carlisle for this year’s Radio One Roadshow (I’m given to understand that this it’s something to do with popular beat music enjoyed by young persons).

These were the topics of the front page cartoon. Below you can see the scruffy pencil sketches which were presented to the editor. In fact, this was one of those occasions when I presented four and was cruelly sent away to think of some more. This is usually a guarantee that I will deliberately think of some bad taste alternatives. This time, however, I was being polite.

You can see the cartoon which battled its way to the front page by popping over to my website.

Budget Blues

Excitement, thrills, tension, drama … all these things and more were absent from the UK Budget on Wednesday. Following it live from the Commons via streaming video, it was one of those events where the commentary was more interesting than the event itself.

Local MP Tim Farron was tweeting live from the Commons, highlighting aspects which had repercussions for the Cumbria economy. Money expert Jasmine Birtles was giving point by point analysis. It was all far more entertaining than watching Burlington Bertie’s performance at the despatch box. The only thing which caught my attention was the increased tax on private jets. Now how am I supposed to get about? At this rate, it will soon be cheaper to take the train.

I was watching all this whilst working on this week’s Westmorland Gazette cartoon. You can see the effect it was having by casting your eye over this week’s contenders. (I could have done one drawing and four captions this week. But - in answer to the question: which comes first? - doing the drawing usually helps me get the caption straight in my mind.)

In the end, the sketches weren’t all about the budget, although I was amused that one budget story I picked out hadn’t actually got as far as the paper yet. (Proving my claim that it would be much easier if I submitted cartoons and the reporters then wrote stories to fit.) 

The other stories included BBC plans to reduce local radio output, a bizarre re-definition of 'affordable housing' based on local house prices, not income and a European ruling that Cumberland Sausage can only be called Cumberland Sausage if it is actually made in Cumberland (which no longer exists).

To see which cartoon has leapt onto the front page, pop over to my website where you can see it in full technicolor.

Family Guy

International news featured in the award-winning Westmorland Gazette this week. The leader of the Free World (as opposed to the Paid-For World) is visiting the UK in May and the campaign is on to get him to visit the North West.

More specifically, Warton. This unassuming village (which is neither sleepy nor nestling anywhere, despite being outside the London media circus) has connections with George Washington. Specifically, his ancestors lived there and one of them helped build St Oswald’s Church. The stained glass window has the family coat of arms which, legend has it, inspired the design of the US flag. The villagers still run the US flag up the village flag pole every 4^th July.

I’m not sure why Barak Obama should feel particularly impelled to visit someone else’s ancestral home, just because they once held the same job as him. But any excuse to get a state visit.

On the other hand, if the President would like to venture a few miles north, an even more epoch-making connection may be established.

Here are the cartoons I pitched for the paper this week. One of them was clearly doomed not to get in. To find out which of the other three hit the editorial bullseye, pop over to my website at once or rush out and buy the paper.

Monster Mash

This week’s Westmorland Gazette provided a range of stories for cartoonist examination. Cumbria County Council are making cutbacks to rural bus services, street lights in Windermere have been lit continuously for several months due to an electrical fault, local school children have been consuming vast quantities of alcohol …

Oh, and Bownessie the lake monster has been popping up again. In fact, there were two stories about everyone’s favourite lake monster. 

The first of these disputes that it is everyone’s favourite monster. The people at Loch Nessie are getting a tad techy and have issued a statement pointing out that they’ve been faking monsters far longer than we have. And Nessie contributes far more to the economy than Bownessie ever will. And he eats porridge, so there. 

In response, the Gazette have compiled a Top Trumps game in which they point out that Bownessie swims faster than Nessie, has been seen more often in recent years, has its own Facebook page and has got four humps not three. 

Which leads us to the second Bownessie story in which someone has found an old tyre which, when cut up and thrown in the lake, looks like a four-humped mythical lake creature.

It’s all very exciting and I can’t wait for the next instalment.

Meanwhile, cast your gaze downwards and you can see my sketches on these vital subjects. As usual, the editor’s final choice will appear in the Gazette and on my website on Thursday morning.

Somewhere to go

The news over the last two weeks have shown that we all have an appetite for certain basic human rights. These include the right to freedom, the right to democratically elect our leaders and the right not to get shot at by leathery-faced lunatics in dark glasses.

Another right, often overlooked by short-sighted local councils, is the right to go.

Given that we elect and pay for these councils, one would imagine they have our best interests at heart. Sometimes, it seems, they forget our most basic needs in the desire to cut costs. Yes, I’m talking about toilets. Or rather, the Westmorland Gazette has been talking about them.

Kendal has followed the rest of South Lakeland in closing down public loos. This is particularly cruel in Kendal where, thanks to the splendid traffic system, you may have spent several hours cooped up in a car, looking for somewhere to park. And it’s one more thing to help deter anyone from visiting the town.

Fortunately, in a move worryingly close to the Big Society waffle from David Cameron, local organisations have come to the rescue. Some of the shops, pubs and attractions in town have offered to make their loos available to the public.

So this was the main subject of the cartoon ideas, submitted on Wednesday afternoon to the Gazette’s news desk. The other was the intriguing news that 1980s post-punk bombshell Blondie is going to be headlining this year’s Kendal Calling music festival. Something of a coup. But given her age, I hope the toilets will be open.

As usual, you can find out which of the sketches made it’s way onto the front page by buying the newspaper or popping over to my website.