Robert Hampton

Ben Bradshaw MP has got it badly wrong by mocking the Government’s same-sex marriage plans.

“This is pure politics on their part. This isn’t a priority for the gay community, which already won equal rights with civil partnerships. We’ve never needed the word ‘marriage’, and all it’s done now is get a bunch of bishops hot under the collar. We’ve been pragmatic, not making the mistake they have in the US, where the gay lobby has banged on about marriage.”

One part of what he says is true – I think this is a political move on David Cameron’s part. However, while he’s entitled to his view I wish Bradshaw would have thought a little bit before speaking out and making comments that anti-marriage campaigners would jump all over. Like other prominent gay people who have opposed marriage equality – Christopher Biggins, Brian Sewell et al – he seems to have looked at his own life position, where he’s happy and settled and doesn’t want or need to get married, and concluded from that that no other same-sex couple anywhere could possibly want or need it.

It’s also worth pointing out the civil partnerships do not confer exactly the same rights and responsibilities as marriage – there are several important differences, mostly in the areas of inheritance and pension rights.

Oh, and you have signed the petition and submitted a response to the Government consultation, haven’t you?

Alan Davies is in trouble after making comments about the Hillsborough disaster on a podcast. He criticised Liverpool for refusing to play matches on the anniversary of the tragedy. A clip is on YouTube here, if you want to judge his choice of words.

I don’t for a second think that Alan Davies is an offensive person. But get a man to talk about football, and for some reason common sense goes out the window and angry nonsense seems to be the default level of conversation (check out the comments on the YouTube video I linked to, which make normal YouTube comments look like the Frost/Nixon interview).

I kind of get the nation’s obsession with football, but there are lots of things I don’t get. For example, I don’t understand why rivalries get so nasty and personal. I don’t understand why Liverpool and Everton fans are such a volatile mix that police feel it necessary to enforce segregated pubs in London for the FA Cup semi-final on Saturday.

I don’t understand how a stall in Clayton Square Shopping Centre thinks it’s amusing to sell baby-grows that say (paraphrased) “I’ve only just been born but I hate the red shite”.

I blame Sky Sports for hyping up every match they show as being the most important event in the world ever (clip below is a David Mitchell spoof, but scarily close to the real thing).

I don’t understand. Someone explain it to me.

Last month, when the Government launched its consultation on equal(ish) marriage, I predicted “three more years of unpleasant rhetoric from opponents of equality until the law is passed.”

I’ve been proved right, but I didn’t expect it to get this unpleasant this quickly. I’ve previously mentioned Cardinal O’Brien calling gay relationships “grotesque”. We’ve also had a Kent MP claiming that Shakespeare’s plays will have to be rewritten, and the Daily Mail screaming that terms like “mother” and “father” will be replaced by “progenitor”(?!).

The campaign took a new twist on 3rd April, when gay rights group Stonewall relaunched their “some people are gay, get over it!” ad campaign on the back of the current push for equal(ish) marriage rights. The advert is on 1,000 of the capital’s buses, ensuring that the equality message is brought to every community of London.

A response came today from the misleadingly-titled Anglican Mainstream, a Christian organisation which claims to support “traditional” teaching on the family (and you know what that usually means). They booked a smaller ad campaign on 26 London buses, claiming that sexual orientation can be changed with therapy. The ads, which were due to appear from next week, were a spoof of Stonewall’s design and slogan: “NOT GAY! EX-GAY, POST-GAY, AND PROUD. GET OVER IT!”

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When I first read of the plans for the Sea Odyssey Giant Spectacular, I was sceptical. These big set-piece events cost a lot of money and effort, but do they have any lasting impact?

My cynicism was increased further when Merseytravel published a list of bus diversions which ran to 12 pages, but could have been succinctly summarised as, “if you use a bus, you’re in trouble”. Was it worth causing this level of disruption to the normal life of the city?

As it turned out, yes it was.

For the uninitiated, The Sea Odyssey is a show based on the story of three giants: a little girl, her dog, and her uncle (a diver) who end up roaming the city in search of each other before finally being reunited. The giants are extremely sophisticated marionettes, animated by a squad of talented French performance artists who operate numerous ropes and pulleys to make the giants move. The show has been developed and designed specifically for Liverpool’s streets, and is a one-time-only event.

What set Sea Odyssey aside was the sheer scale of it. The Guardian previewed the event and noted that “Sea Odyssey will be – the Olympics aside – the largest outdoor event staged in the country this year.”

It started on Friday with events centred around Stanley Park in the north of the city, but I was in work so missed out. I took advantage of my lunch break, however, to stroll down to the Albert Dock, where one of the giants – the Diver Uncle – sat in the water, waiting…

He was due to wake up at 2pm, but I was expected back at the office by then, and to miss even a second at my desk would violate my strong work ethic (stop laughing, you).

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Since moving to Aigburth, with its attendant Merseyrail station, in 2003, I’ve become quite accustomed to being whisked off into the centre of town in just 9 minutes. A total of 15 minutes door-to-door commute time? That’ll do nicely.

I think it’s the hallmark of a good service that you only notice when its not there. Over the nine years that I’ve been using the service, the problems have been rare but disruptive: a strike, a blizzard, a misbehaving sewer and, most significantly, a six week shutdown to work on the tunnel. By and large however, Merseyrail get on with it with quiet efficiency, taking me to work, the shops, days and nights out, or just delivering me to Lime Street to start a longer journey.

It’s fair to say that Merseyrail is almost as essential to me as oxygen or photos of Gareth Bale with no shirt. Now Liverpool Central has closed for six months, I feel like one of my legs has been chopped off – sure, I can still get about, but it’s not as easy as it was. I mean, come on: Moorfields is at least a five minute walk from Liverpool ONE!

At least Central went out in a blaze of glory at the weekend, with more people passing through its doors than it has ever had to cope with at any time in its existence.

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Once more I have stared awkwardly at the camera while talking.