Peter Rhodes on parking wars, nasty stuff in old cars and promises, promises on the trains

NEWS priorities. No, I can't explain why five deaths in a California wildfire are deemed more important to the news channels than 60 deaths in flooding in India.

BREXIT may be tangled but it is happening. I passed a delivery lorry piled high with new cars and not one of those cars had a number plate with the EU symbol.

ACCORDING to HS2 Ltd, the new high-speed railway from Birmingham to London will have an average delay target of just 30 seconds. This is because the operator, not having to share lines with other companies, will be in "full control" and able to set "a new standard in reliability." Really? How very easy it is to make pledges for the future. Back in the present, problems with the air-conditioning caused "diabolical" queues and delays for thousands of travellers on that other space-age service, Eurostar, a few days ago. That shouldn't happen, should it? Promises, promises . . .

YOU may have noticed a new crop of stickers appearing in the rear windows of cars. The message goes something like: "No, I don't look disabled - but then you don't look pig-ignorant." These waspish little banners mark the opening salvo in a new phase of Britain's worsening car-parking war. It began some years ago when the suspicion grew that blue badges, supposedly issued only to people with real mobility problems, were being used dishonestly by some able-bodied drivers to use disabled parking places. If you can barely walk, it must be galling to find "your" space taken by someone who leaps out of the car and briskly strides away, apparently in robust health. From next year, expect more friction as people with "hidden disabilities" such as autism and mental-health issues are granted blue badges, increasing the number from about 2.4 million to four million.

I CANNOT be the only one puzzled as to why someone with autism - which covers a wide spectrum of problems - deserves a reserved place. If I were on crutches or used a wheelchair, my puzzlement might just boil over. And if some of those newly entitled to blue badges are already attacking anyone who questions them as "pig-ignorant," the future does not look happy.

I HAVE done the deed and bought another old banger, ending a long line of diesels and returning to the petrol fold. And I can think of no better example of the term "sod's law" than buying a second-hand vehicle on the very same day that Jeremy Clarkson wrote a column about testing the interiors of used cars.

ACCORDING to Clarkson, the experts examining the old cars found "a thin veneer of mucus, significant traces of faecal matter and enough dried blood to suggest someone had been beheaded in there" Plus other stuff unsuitable for a family newspaper. Having read Clarkson's piece, I gave my new pride and joy another good scrub. Yeah, I'm sure it's just mud . . . .