Mark Andrews on Saturday: Plant-based proms, a tearful weather presenter, and how Warden Hodges could save the planet
Breakfast television weather presenter Laura Tobin broke down in tears while presenting a broadcast live from the North Pole, saying she was overcome with emotion at the damage being caused by global warming.
Her daughter had drawn her a picture of a polar bear before the trip, prompting the weathergirl to blub: "If Charlotte comes here when she's my age, there potentially won't be polar bears."
Very touching. But it is reasonable to ask how she managed to travel 1,900 miles to film the broadcast. I do hope she rowed and cycled her way there, without burning any of those ghastly fossil fuels. Because that would be no good for the polar bears at all.
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Still, the great news for Laura and the polar bears is that John Gummer has stepped in to save the day.
Remember him? The former environment secretary who tried to play down mad-cow disease by making his four-year-old daughter eat a beefburger for the television cameras?
Anyway, he's back, now as chairman of the independent climate change committee and luxuriating in the title Lord Deben. His big concern is street-lighting in rural villages, which he says is contributing to global warming.
He suggests that rural dwellers should carry torches instead, but I'm not sure that battery-operated devices will really cut it with today's eco-extremists. Oil lamps sound more Luddite-friendly, but they rely on fossil fuels. Maybe the answer is people walking around the countryside with candles, providing they are made from sustainable vegetable wax, of course.
Maybe Lord Deben should become a 21st century Warden Hodges out of Dad's Army. Put that light out!
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Was this year's Last Night of the Proms the worst of all time?
I tuned in just before half time, and a bloke who looked like Christopher Biggins was singing about plants. Tried again about half an hour later, when a man in drainpipes and no socks was talking to newsreader Katie Derham about slavery and diversity. Oh, and he said the highlight of the night was going to be the Argentinian music. Never mind Land of Hope and Glory, let's hear it for General Galtieri!
Tried a third time about 20 minutes later, and this time Biggins was doing some weird chanting.
The organisers would do well to remember that when Henry Wood launched the Proms in 1895, it was all about making music open and accessible to everyone. You know, a bit of fun and populism, rounded off with some good-natured flag-waving and patriotism. I don't think plant-based lyrics were what he had in mind. And let's have some British patriotism, not Argentinian.
