\t\tCommon ground<\/p>\n
The Commonwealth Games began as the British Empire Games in 1930, yet they did not originate in Britain. The event was instigated by a Bobby Robinson, a sports reporter on a local newspaper in Hamilton, Ontario, who also acted as manager for the Canadian track and field team at the 1928 Olympics in Amsterdam. The games were held in his home town, Hamilton, and 11 countries participated: Canada, England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland (which meant the Irish Free State as well as Northern Ireland), Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, British Guiana, Newfoundland and Bermuda. The only women\u2019s events were in swimming. In spite of its small size, the games did inspire one innovation which continues to be used in the Olympics: putting winning medallists on pedestals for the medal ceremony.<\/p>\n
Who cares?<\/p>\n
Andy Burnham proposed a National Care Service. How many people receive care?<\/p>\n
\u2013 On 31 December 2025, 685,000 people in England received some sort of adult social care.<\/p>\n
\u2013 490,000 of these received care in a community setting, including their homes.<\/p>\n
\u2013 140,000 lived in residential care homes.<\/p>\n
\u2013 55,000 lived in nursing homes.<\/p>\n
\u2013 250 were in prison.<\/p>\n
Source: Department of Health and Social Care<\/p>\n
Drowning deaths<\/p>\n
How many people drown in Britain?<\/p>\n
\u2013 In 2024 there were 193 confirmed accidental water fatalities, a 51% fall on the average between 2010 and 2013.<\/p>\n
\u2013 61% were on inland waterways.<\/p>\n
\u2013 84% were men.<\/p>\n
\u2013 37% of those who died were not intending to enter the water, but slipped and fell while doing something else.<\/p>\n
\u2013 The worst month was May (28 deaths), followed by August (25) and July (21).<\/p>\n
Source: National Water Safety Forum<\/p>\n
Adapt and die<\/p>\n
Emily Wilson, whose translation of The Odyssey was cited as an influence by Christopher Nolan, said his adaptation was \u2018abysmal\u2019. Which authors have disliked adaptations of their works?<\/p>\n
\u2013 Truman Capote said Breakfast at Tiffany\u2019s \u2018was the most miscast film I\u2019ve ever seen. It made me want to throw up.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u2013 P.L. Travers cried through Mary Poppins and asked: \u2018Why was Mary Poppins\u2026 transmogrified into a soubrette?\u2019<\/p>\n
\u2013 Stephen King said The Shining was \u2018like a big, beautiful Cadillac with no engine inside it\u2019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Common ground The Commonwealth Games began as the British Empire Games in 1930, yet they did not originate…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":93804,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2],"tags":[13,34660,39852,39853,34623],"class_list":["post-93803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-britain","tag-britain","tag-christopher-nolan","tag-commonwealth-games","tag-drowning","tag-the-odyssey"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/117008778226591425","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93803\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}