parmesan

"MOST ACADEMIC RESEARCH A WASTE OF TIME" CLAIM

A LEADING SOCIOLOGIST has sparked controversy after claiming that the majority of research carried out in the UK contributes little to our knowledge base.

Italian-born Professor Buitoni Parmesan told The Cynon Valley Beacon: "Every month or so the newspapers publish 'shocking new evidence' about something or other, which only confirms what everybody knew all along."

Horrified university chiefs throughout the country rushed to condemn Prof Parmesan's outburst.

One Oxford don said: "It's an outrage. Some of us earn a very comfortable living from stating the blindingly obvious, and this is going to do our standing in the no end of damage."

In an exclusive interview with The Cynon Valley Beacon, Prof Parmesan listed a number of reports which, he claims, simply duplicate earlier research. These include:

A Conservative Party education spokesman told The Cynon Valley Beacon: "This report comes as no surprise to us. Anyone who picks up a newspaper will read the same old data, dressed up in fashionable jargon, but telling us nothing."

The Government sought to distance itself from Prof Parmesan's report. A Downing Street source told us: "Prof Parmesan's work is interesting, but a great deal more work needs to done in this field before we can arrive at any definite conclusions."

The Department for Education confirmed that it has referred Prof Parmesan's data to a panel of experts for independent scrutiny. Their report is due in 18 months' time.

23 investigations which prove a clear link between poverty and ill-health;

17 reports indicating a definite connection between social exclusion and criminal behaviour;

14 surveys which draw parallels between levels of school truancy and lack of basic skills in adults;

5 studies into the relative motion of the heavenly bodies which appear to indicate that, on average, the Sun will rise in the east once a day.

JUSTICE DUNN

OUTSPOKEN OUTRAGEOUS OUT TO LUNCH

It seemed that an inexorable change was in the air. All over Europe, workers marched, struck and rioted against their governments, only to be stamped down by brutal police tactics or the mighty military machine. In the United States, thousands of young people fought for an end to racial segregation, equality for women, gay liberation, and of course against the war in Indochina. Like the young Wordsworth before me, I burned with the revolutionary fire that had fuelled the birth of America and the overthrow of the Ancien Regime. I knew that working people were sick of their oppression, and I was behind them all the way.

Father drained his glass and peered at me through his monocle, a fierce Churchillian bulldog scowl on his face.

"You're a bigger fool than I gave you credit for," he snarled. "Left to his own devices, the average man in this country couldn't organise a drunken orgy in a fully-licensed brothel, let alone the sort of society you dream about."

I was reminded of this exchange over the Bank Holiday weekend. Having watched Spartacus on the television I found my zeal for change reignited. After half a bottle of brandy I felt rather peckish. As I had generously given my servants the weekend off, I was obliged to visit my local town centre. The taxi driver was a pleasant young fellow of Asian origin, fleeing oppression at home and struggling to bring up his young family in an unfamiliar land.

He remarked that he didn't normally carry such distinguished passengers. I explained that my chauffeur had taken advantage of the long weekend and had taken his family to Porthcawl for a good working-class holiday.

"I hope you're getting paid overtime," I commented as I lavished a tip on my driver and bade him farewell. Picking my way through the hoodie-clad youths jeering at my Paul Smith suit, I found that the only eaterie open was a pizza restaurant. Nursing fond memories of my Tuscan holidays with high-raning politicians I perused the menu with interest. A bored woman behind the counter seemed rather upset at being dragged away from the television, where some preening queen was advising a couple on how to decrease the value of their home.

Ten minutes later the same woman presented me with what was described as "the best pizza in town," and I left the restaurant with a small cardboard box. Upon opening it, it was as though I could hear Father's voice ringing in my ears - "If you only wanted a badly-burnt piece of cheese on toast, you'd have been better off finishing the bottle and cooking it yourself!"

Father, I fear you were right.

My father once told me that things were better when he was a boy. I didn't believe him. We were sitting in the study, poring over the globe in the corner. The British Empire (for Father would never have called it the Commonwealth) spread pink and lovely over the Earth's surface.

"That," said Father, stroking Australia lovingly between sips of his Southampton Red Rum, "is the product of correct breeding, a fine education, hard work, devotion to God, Monarch and Country, a sense of duty, and sheer bloody-minded genocide."

"Surely not, Father, " I objected. "The days of your beloved class structure are at an end, and our great socialist utopia is just around the corner."

My time at Oxford had altered my political views. Rubbing shoulders with college scouts, cooks, cleaners, mechanics, tradesmen, barmaids and grammar school boys had given me a great insight into how the lower classes lived.

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