A visit to Sherwood.

No, not Sherwood Nottinghamshire, but Sherwood Tunbridge Wells.  A very warm day, unfortunately rather windy. Never mind, a call on the way at the Robin Hood public house put me in the right frame of mind to enjoy the Sherwood Carnival.

The highlight of the event was the procession.  The Tunbridge Wells town crier led the way, closely followed by a band of drummers which drowned out the crier's bell. Sandwiched between the two was the Deputy Mayor of Tunbridge Wells, John Smith and the Deputy Mayoress.  The Deputy Mayor wore his chain of office, but I did note that his jacket came off as the unremitting heat from the sun beat down on him and the rest of the procession.

Congratulations to John Smith for marching in the procession.  Just the thing I would expect of a man who was deselected by the Conservatives, stood as an Independent and beat comprehensively the Conservative candidate.

Apart from meeting long standing friends, my reason for the visit was to sniff the Sherwood air for signs of the racial tension which the local newspaper claims has risen following articles the paper published alleging that a couple of Sherwood residents were racists.  People of ethnic minority groups were circulating at the carnival and didn't give the impression of being tense, indeed everyone was very relaxed.  Now the paper would not claim that racial tensions were rising without any evidence would it?  Doubtless the evidence will be published, or won't it?

I commend the article that can be read by clicking on this link:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jun/03/poor-white-britons-discrimination-not-racial

When I commented on the local newspaper's first article I wrote:

The real issues relate to deprivation, not race, and unless tackled minority groups will continue to be the scapegoats. It is the message we should be concerned about, not vilifying one of the messengers.

Sherwood has serious problems of deprivation and in my experience residents have not scapegoated minority groups.