HomeBlogs & ViewsBirmingham Mail ColumnistsMaureen Messent

Wife Swap pairing inspired

THE pairing of the blowzy Vanessa Feltz with that desiccated little Paul Daniels in Channel Four's Wife Swap was brilliant. Read

School's no place for many 14-year-olds

THE notion of allowing some children to leave school at 14 is new but wise, given education's false notion that all kids are the same. Read

Apology would be a token because slavery still goes on

END OF slavery be damned. The great and the good, breast-beating with the Queen and Prince Philip in Westminster Abbey this week, were players in a hypocritical set piece. Read

Praise to dad who shopped his own son

WHAT was the last straw, I wonder, that broke a father's heart, forcing him to march his layabout 22-year-old son to a police station after the youth had threatened a shop-keeper with an eight-inch knife? Read

No harm in sex trade show

AS A thriving city keen to promote its verve and modernity, Birmingham can take kudos from hosting international trade fairs at the NEC and the NIA. Read

Why do we let Mugabe ruin Zimbabwe?

ZIMBABWE'S horrors are drip-fed us. Read

See how the money goes

THE plan to give NHS patients "virtual bills" that tells them how much their treatment costs seems a praiseworthy notion. Read

How PC speech brigade is damaging race cause

BRITISH freedom of speech? Don't make me laugh. Read

We're breeding a generation of benefit claimants

IT WAS a defining moment on the No 35 bus. Read

Ain't nobody's business if he do!

I WISH widowed pensioner John Harris well in his quest to marry and bring to Britain the paediatrician with whom he's fallen in love. Read

Wright's the wrong kind of role model

EX-ARSENAL star turned TV presenter Ian Wright has accused the BBC of ignoring black TV potential. Read

Just deserts for a chancer

EASTBOURNE antique dealer Yvonne Cole reckoned she'd make a good few bob by suing the British Legion who had put up a maypole. Read

Who'd dare be a good Samaritan in modern Britain?

LAND ROVER worker Daniel Woodward is unlikely to forget what appears to be an example of shocking callousness in Birmingham. Read

Rebel cleric's £1m appeal

WE HEARD this week another bewildering truth. That rabble-rousing Abu Qatada, dubbed Osama bin Laden's creature in Europe, has lost his appeal against his deportation to his native Jordan. Read

Mallon's hair today but Brady's got legs

WELL, it was St Valentine's night but none of the worthies assembled in the Council Chamber let sex cross their minds. Read

Time to quite moping and go get a job

MALE unemployment in times of economic depression is a heart-breaking blight. Read

Poor, dear old Naseem

I CAN'T have been alone in my laughter at seeing that young Muslim woman directing an obscene gesture at photographers during recent police action in our city. Read

When love's flame dies...

I HAD never heard of Olivier Martinez until he was photographed squiring Kylie Minogue the singer-come show girl. Read

Mad? They're livid!

THAT splendid pub, Mad O'Rourke's Pie Factory in Tipton, is in hot water for calling one of its dishes "Michael Barrymore Pie of faggots swimming in onion gravy". Read

Cameron's become a buffoon - just like that!

HIS Fairy Godmother clearly took a dislike to the infant David Cameron at his christening - he wanted to become a statesman-like figure but has evolved into a politicised Tommy Cooper whose tricks always go wrong. Read