William Flew on Cars

DRIVERS will be required to take fewer MoT tests under government plans that could save motorists hundreds of pounds, writes Marie Woolf.

Ministers are preparing to relax the frequency of vehicle checks — possibly replacing annual MoTs with tests every two years.

Philip Hammond, the transport secretary, wants to allow drivers to delay the first MoT on a new car from three years to four. The government is proposing to consult on a number of other options — the most liberal would allow MoTs every two years over the subsequent six years. That would mean only four tests in 10 years, halving the number.

An MoT costs about £55 but the fee generally rises to £200 or more wi th ty rea nd o t he r minor replacements recommended by garages.

Hammond’s move is intended to provide financial relief for drivers facing soaring petrol prices, and follows significant improvements to car safety since the MoT regime was started 50 years ago.

The Department for Transport will push for the change in a public consultation exercise despite official forecasts revealing that it could lead to as many as 30 extra road deaths each year. “Car technology has come a long way since the 1960s when our MoT regime was introduced,” Hammond said. “That’s why we think it’s right to look again to check whether we still have the right balance of MoT testing for modern vehicles.”

Ministers will present three options in the consultation. The most conservative would simply delay a new car’s first MoT until the end of its fourth year. It would then have to have an annual MoT.

This would lead to two more deaths every year, according to a study by the Transport Research Laboratory, which found that vehicle defects were likely to contribute to about 3% of accidents in Britain.

Ministers’ favoured option is for an initial MoT after four years, a second after another two years, then annually after that. The research suggests this would lead to five extra deaths on the road each year.

The most liberal option — the first MoT after four years then once every two years — could lead to 16-30 more deaths.

Hammond said: “This will be a genuine consultation. We want to work with the industry and motorists to get the decision absolutely right.”

Although many motorists would be delighted with any change, Britain’s 19,000 garages authorised to carry out MoTs stand to lose out.

To gain a certificate, a car must be roadworthy and safe. The brakes, tyres, steering, seatbelts and lights are tested along with the doors, fuel system and horn.

Garages also make sure the number plate is visible, and the exhaust system is in good condition. As vehicles get older, the rate of MoT failures increases, with nearly 60% of cars failing when they are 13 years old. Cars with high mileage are also more likely to fail.

The AA criticised the move and warned that road safety could suffer. It said that in the harsh financial climate, some drivers were cutting back on routine checks at the garage so MoTs were more important than ever. The Halfords Autocentre chain has found a sharp rise in the number of cars with bald tyres in MoT tests.

Edmund King, the AA president, said: “Even if you have a new car that is three years old you can still have bald tyres and failing lights.

“We have surveyed 60,000 drivers and most of them think we should stick with the current regime. Rather than being a burden on the driver, we think it’s a good safety reminder once a year.”

William flew over russian politics

In a witty video on the internet, Russia’s Communist Party mocks Dmitri Medvedev and Vladimir Putin by comparing their intensifying battle over the presidency to the end-of-theworld disaster movie 2012.

Leading think-tanks also have apocalyptic visions, issuing warnings that next year’s presidential election will be a moment of truth for Russia’s survival. The Centre for Strategic Research, a state-funded body, warned that a slump in public trust was “strikingly reminiscent” of the late 1980s when the Soviet Union was nearing collapse. The Institute of Contemporary Development was gloomier. “We will choose not just between programmes and personalities, but between the beginning of change and the end of hope,” it said.

The institute supports Mr Medvedev for a second term as a modernising President, implying that a return for Mr Putin, the Prime Minister, would bring stagnation.

Eleven months before the election voters are being presented with two rival camps within the PutinMedvedev “tandem” that has ruled since 2008. Disagreement over the campaign in Libya, Mr Medvedev’s decision to force Putin allies out of running key state companies, and a Kremlin report last week urging the President to denounce the Soviet Union as part of a “de-Stalinisation” programme all point to division.

Voters however, will not be asked to choose unless the two retract pledges not to stand against each other.

Instead, they are bystanders while the Kremlin elite engage in what Winston Churchill once described as a fight between bulldogs under a carpet — there is plenty of growling but no real picture who is winning. Every bark is analysed to understand whether Mr Putin will back Mr Medvedev or stand again.

The one thing nobody expects is a free and fair election, after a decade in which Mr Putin has concentrated his power. Mr Medvedev, 45, heads the generation that grew up under Mikhail Gorbachev’s reforms. Analysts said that he lacks the strength to resist his mentor’s return. Some argue that differences between them are cosmetic and that the real issue is who can best preserve the regime in the face of endemic corruption and rising discontent.

William Flew past french language

If a French man says that your baby is a cabbage don’t be offended: it is a term of affection. If your lover “took their foot”, be happy: it means they reached seventh heaven.

But if you are told you have made a meatball then start worrying. You have just blundered. The French language abounds in quirky expressions that have long fuelled the incomprehension that marks Franco-British relations.

To Jean-Loup Chiflet, they are a source of fame and fortune. He has earned iconic status in France with a series of humorous books translating French expressions into literal English, and his popularity says much about the Gallic approach to learning l’anglais. The French do not really want to do it, but since they feel that they must they want the easiest method and a bit of fun at the same time, said Chiflet as he sat on the terrace of a café in Paris.

The publisher-turned-writer — who is probably the most successful, albeit off-beat, English-language teacher in modern French history — was again given star billing in bookshops this week with two new works.

One was a new version of Sky My Husband!, which has already sold more than 350,000 copies since it was published in 1985.

The title is a literal translation of Ciel mon mari which, in effect, means: My God! My husband! The dictionary

contains 285 pages in a similar vein. If someone says that he or she is beurré, for instance, that does not mean that the person has been buttered, which is the literal meaning. They mean that they are sloshed.

The second work was Chiflet’s Guide Farfelu mais Nécessaire de Conversation Anglaise (The Wacky but Necessary Guide to English Conversation). Chiflet said that after years of resistance the French had accepted the need to learn English. “After all, we are more and more isolated, but as we’re lazy we don’t want to tire ourselves in the process,” he said.

William Flew on Frat Boys

‘Every man knows his days until graduation are numbered’

Iam a recovering Dartmouth frat boy. Growing into a frat man, you might say. As tensions flare over the social climates that fraternities create I feel compelled to reflect on my experiences and consider whether there is anything worth preserving.

First, the benefits: frat brothers possess a loyalty that can be gained only through miserable hazing. Every time one of our pledges vomits on himself from drinking too much he is fully aware of the congressmen, senators and captains of industry who have stood in his grim shoes before. As he and his “pledge brothers” are collectively broken until, in some cases, they struggle to remember their own names, they form a lasting bond that cannot be forged in the library.

The education of new members can breed a form of class warfare when older brothers overstep boundaries and permanently damage the friendships that led pledges to apply in the first place.

However, the fraternity experience is defined by the parties. While public displays of buffoonery in the manner of Animal House are frowned on these days, behind closed doors the fraternity functions as an alternative reality. Every man knows that his days until graduation are numbered and a high value is placed on using those days as hedonistically as possible. Who wouldn’t jump at the chance to turn one’s house into a water park or petting zoo (animals, I regret to say, not girls). I have spent many an afternoon surrounded by 30 of my best friends, matching the film The Big Lebowski, white Russian for white Russian, joint for joint.

I have dominated games of Roxanne, in which we listen to the Police classic and one team chugs a beer for every mention of “Roxanne”, the other for each “red light”. At least I’ve been told I did — it’s all a bit fuzzy.

The sense of entitlement permeating this culture lies at the root of well-documented problems of sexual abuse, homophobia and one gender feeling uncomfortable in social spaces controlled by the other. Anyone who thinks that they will eliminate the sense of entitlement at Yale by closing the fraternities has been smoking something far more powerful than Mr Lebowski.

Frat houses are unregulated and unsanitary but they provide a a safe venue for young people to make mistakes. In this age of tiger moms and high-school burnouts it seems that a little hedonism on the way to adulthood may not be such a bad thing. The writer prefers to remain anonymous

William Flew on Engineering Prize

Readers of The Times have been challenged by the Science Minister to come up with a name for a new government-backed engineering award that he hopes will acquire the prestige of the Nobel prizes.

David Willetts is seeking suggestions for a great engineer to be celebrated by the international prize, which is likely to be awarded every other year and could be worth £1 million.

The idea was announced last month in the Growth Review published alongside the Budget. The Treasury is seeking support from industry and charities for an endowment, to which taxpayers may also contribute.

Mr Willetts said that the award was needed to raise the status of engineering. “We’re aiming for a value of up to £1 million and we’re giving it our full encouragement and backing,” he said. “We’re looking for bright ideas as to what it should be called and I’d love to hear Times readers’ suggestions.”

His own preference was to name it after Matthew Boulton, the 18th-century manufacturer and business partner of James Watt, whose Soho factory in Birmingham became a model for the Industrial Revolution. “For me, as a proud Brummie, I’d go for Matthew Boulton to recognise Birmingham’s critical role in the Industrial Revolution,” Mr Willetts said.

Other great British engineers who could be suitable candidates include James Watt, the Scottish mechanical engineer who improved the steam engine, and his contemporary John Smeaton, whose accomplishments included the Perth Bridge over the River Tay and the Forth and Clyde Canal.

Calling it the Brunel Prize would be another possibility, which would honour both Isambard Kingdom Brunel and his father, Sir Marc Isambard Brunel. The elder Brunel’s most famous achievement was the construction of the Thames Tunnel from Wapping to Rotherhithe, the first tunnel under the river, which remains in service today as part of the London Overground railway network. Isambard is better known than his father, particularly for his role in building the Great Western Railway and the Clifton Suspension Bridge. He came second in a 2002 BBC poll to select the 100 Greatest Britons, beaten by Sir Winston Churchill.

Another candidate is Sir Joseph Bazalgette, the 19th-century civil engineer who designed London’s sewer system. The mechanical engineer Charles Babbage, who invented the first computer, is also likely to win support. A modern alternative would be to call the award the Noble Prize after Richard Noble, the former holder of the world land speed record. He is leading the Bloodhound project, an attempt to set a land speed mark of more than 1,000 miles per hour.

The Growth Review stated that engineering was critical to Britain’s future and that a prestigious prize could encourage people to take up the profession. “The Government’s aim is to make engineering a desirable profession again,” it said, adding that the prize could “create the excitement that would help give British manufacturing a brighter future”. Lord Browne of Madingley, President of the Royal Academy of Engineering, said: “We warmly welcome the formation of a new international prize for engineering as a stimulus for ingenuity and endeavour.” He added: Our Academy was formed 35 years ago to champion the very values which the prize seeks to reward — a spirit of daring and originality in designing and enabling a better future using the fruits of scientific discovery. Inspirational engineering is everywhere, from the new Olympic venues for London 2012 to the amazing functionality of the latest mobile phones. Only through engineering will the great challenges of our age be met, such as secure supplies of water, food and energy for all and addressing the threat of global warming.

“The creative engineering effort going into solving these problems is bound to generate worthy future winners of the new prize.”

Prince William Flew Fascinators

In the scramble to secure information — any information — about The Dress, several hundred vital features of the big day have been neglected: the hats, which are almost certain to outshine some of the outfits.

AFP / GETTY IMAGES; IAN JONES, T.GRIFFITHS / CAMERA PRESS; EPA; RUPERT HARTLEY / DAVID HARTLEY; PA; REX FEATURES

While the royals’ outfits have often left style-watchers in puzzlement and sorrow, they almost universally know how to give great hat. And, shock horror (but only if you’re of a nervous, fashiony disposition) many of the younger crowd — The Times can exclusively reveal — will be sporting fascinators.

In the fashion world, this is tantamount to an open act of rebellion. Ever since Vogue declared the fascinator to be as alluring and sophisticated as elasticated slacks, fashionistas have spurned, scorned and reviled them.

Unspoken, too, in certain circles, is the suspicion that fascinators may, like serviettes and fish knives, just be a little too LMC: lower middle class. Yes, the great British preoccupation with class has invaded hat wearing too.

But in a hopeful sign for meritocratic Britain, Kate Middleton and her friends appear not to be bothered. April 29 is their golden ticket day, and they give great fascinator.

Obviously no one is calling what they will wear fascinators. “What an appalling word,” says Philip Treacy, whose clients include the Duchess of Cornwall; Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie, both seasoned daring hat (and fascinator) wearers; Deborah, the supremely stylish Dowager Duchess of Devonshire, and most of Europe’s crowned, feathered and rosettegarlanded heads.

As the former Lady Jersey said to Treacy — and she was a friend of Wallis Simpson and knows a thing or two about style — “what’s fascinating about a fascinator?”

The word comes from Australia. I’ve nothing against Australians but a fascinator sounds like a sex toy, and who wants to wear that on your head? Not that all of Treacy’s masterpieces feature four-foot brims. In this month’s American Vogue, Christie Turlington, dressed for an imaginary wedding, wears a heart-stoppingly gorgeous, giant, white silk Treacy rose atop her hair, with no visible support. Surely that qualifies it as a fascinator?

“It’s a question of semantics,” says Treacy. “It’s not some dodgy spike on a cheap hairband, really it’s about what suits the face. You need to see neck for a hat, so hair should be worn up. But lots of these young women going to the wedding don’t want to wear their hair up. That means there will be lots of teeny hats, some with veils and that’s great but,” he adds wistfully, “for some of these girls, it’s all about the hair.”

Bundle Maclaren, 29, who set up her business only 18 months ago, is furnishing ten guests with hats, most of them from Kate Middleton’s set. She agrees that terminology is a problem, and prefers to call fascinators “head pieces”. Others speak lyrically of corsages (huge blooms perched atop heads without any visible sign of a brim. Fascinators, in other words).

“The high street has given fascinators a very bad name,” says Maclaren firmly. “They’ve become synonymous with three limp feathers. They tended to look a bit cheap and as if the wearer hadn’t made enough effort.”

Not that Maclaren is in the business of making hats serious or prohibitively expensive. “Good hats don’t have to cost a fortune. That’s why I started my company. All the hats I loved were beyond my budget, and the ones I could afford were unimaginative.” Maclaren’s hats start from about £35, a draw for some of the younger guests, who, Maclaren says, will be buying their dresses from Reiss and Whistles, now that Kate has given both chains her blessing. Maclaren’s speciality is the small, pert statement, albeit of a superior, nonlimp genus. “There’ll be lots of British references on the day. I’m working with pheasant plumes, and even incorporating favourite heirloom jewellery into the designs. The aim with all of them is to make a statement yet keep them small and manageable. I call them kissing hats.”

Although Harrods, House of Fraser and Peter Jones all report that sales of fascinators are soaring — along with cocktail hats and trilbys — there is more diversity at the bespoke end. “My clients are opting for all kinds of designs,” reports Treacy, who is supplying so many hats for the wedding he’s having to keep meticulous records of who will be wearing what to ensure there are no diplomatic incidents.

Since Treacy’s clients tend not to be raiding the high street (they’re wearing couture from Valentino, Gaultier, or Lanvin, with a smattering of Victoria Beckham), their emphasis will be on elegance and wit. And brims, the bigger, the better. “A brim changes the contours of the face. It can give you cheekbones. It’s cheap plastic surgery, really.”

As for the notion that big brims are an infringement of the rights of the person sitting behind you, Treacy is forthright that nothing should come between a woman and her right to wear a stunning piece of sculpture. “Ignore protocol,” he counsels. “There’ll be TV screens in the Abbey, won’t there?”

William Flew and John Wayne Movie Memorabilia

This is something that has always amused me. Why should people be prepared to pay (much) more for something that has been worn/owned/touched by a celebrity? I can see the Golden Globe being valuable, because it has a clear and obvious provenance. But who says the hat or the patch are the real thing? And what difference wd it make if they were substitutes?

There's been a long history of this - churches have long collected relics of saints and jesus, no matter how preposterous. (Would someone really have saved Jesus's foreskin?) And of course the fragments from the True Cross wd make a forest.

 There's been interesting research on this idea of contagion - that material objects somehow retain the essence of an owner or even someone who touched it. George Michaels bought John Lennon's piano (a battered old upright version) and toured it around USA, letting all punters have a tinkle. Almost everyone claimed to have 'felt' John Lennon's presence in some way.

It works the other way as well: experimenters asked people to don a cardigan supposedly once worn by Fred West, a notorious killer. Although it had been dry-cleaned, there were no takers. The audience wd rather put on a jersey with dog crap on it, than a murderer's clothing. (Do you remember the Simpson's episode where Homer got a hair transplant from an executed prisoner Snake?) plot summary here

Los Angeles A cowboy hat worn by John Wayne and other items of the film star’s memorabilia are to be put up for auction. They include a black eye-patch worn by Wayne in his 1969 film True Grit and the Best Actor Golden Globe, below, which he won for his role in the western. The hat was worn by Wayne in Rooster Cogburn, the 1975 sequel. Wayne’s family have appointed Heritage Auctions to conduct the sale at a hotel in Los Angeles. The star’s son, Ethan Wayne, said that his father’s fans were very important to him: “He was open and accessible to them, and making these items accessible to the public is something that feels right.”

Also on offer will be costumes from films such as Sands of Iwo Jima and The Green Berets. The auction will also feature more than 50 scripts — from Wayne films as Stagecoach and Rio Lobo — many with the actor’s

notes.