- Bishop Hill blog

I was away from my desk yesterday, as I headed south for Owen Paterson's GWPF lecture (full text here). The cat was already out of the bag as far as what was going to be said, but it was an interesting trip nevertheless, with plenty of networking opportunities and the chance to renew some old acquaintances.

I was intrigued to learn that Brendan Montague was lurking outside the venue beforehand, taking photographs of those who were attending and handing out leaflets. I arrived so early that I didn't see this myself, but it did mean that everyone had an inkling of what Paterson was talking about when he referred to "bullying" by the green blob.

There were plenty of journalists in attendance and David Shukman did a piece on the BBC 10pm news (from 14:30 here, but only today). Needless to say, Twitter was on fire. The lecture therefore gets more play in the papers today (Telegraph, Mail) and I gather that Paterson was also on the Today programme this morning (here, but not available yet at time of writing).[Update: I've uploaded excerpts from Today below - there's an interview with Lord Turner followed by Paterson]

So while the greens are trying to portray Paterson's words as a last gasp, the fact that the lecture has enjoyed sustained media attention for several days suggests quite the opposite. It will be interesting to see where we go from here.

Update on Oct 16, 2014 by

Bishop Hill

There's an amusing piece here by Brunel University journalism lecturer Paul Lashmar. Mr Lashmar appears to combine an acquaintance with the English language that seems somewhat cursory, with considerable antipathy towards the ideal of free speech. This sentence rather sums his position up:

Owen Paterson reputation is poor – sacked by Cameron and the beholder of reactionary views.

I understand that people pay real money to be educated by Mr Lashmar.