“... problems in humans, and bizarre deformities in fish. Among those promoting the deregulation was Andrew Wheeler, for many years a lobbyist for Murray Energy, the US’s largest coal-mining company. He is now the head of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). In his first speech in his new position, Wheeler said: ‘I get frustrated with the media when ...”

“... It would be like Fire Island without the gays.’ 13 November. A propos the Queen’s Speech Andrew Marr on The World at One talks of the future saying, ‘If the war with Iraq goes well . . .’’ the conditional not to do with the likelihood of war but only with its conduct. No one demurs. But Bush is extraordinary. Seldom can there have been a leader ...”

“... were on him, the breakfast shows seeing him as a symbol of desperation as the inferno raged. Neil Thompson, the editor of ITV’s Good Morning Britain, ordered that the cameras be kept on him. ‘At the point at which Elpie started to cry,’ he said later, ‘there was smoke billowing out from behind him, and I told them to cut off him. Anybody watching ...”

“... are you still here?’It’s not that they don’t still fish out of Grimsby. One morning I met Andrew Allard, who runs a ten-vessel outfit called Jubilee Fishing from an office in the docks. When he showed me on a map on the wall where his boats were at that moment I got a sense of the big world of the Grimsby fishermen, how unprovincial it had been to ...”