Ahoy Landlubbers - It's Doctor Death !!!!!

In the past, in deference to his sailing exploits, I've called Councillor Matthew Offord Captain Useless. His latest sailing blog on the Hendon Times website was charting a course towards another entry in the chronicles of Captain Useless, when half way through the wind chaged. What was a rather dull blog about the effects of seasickness, actually became quite interesting half way through.

As those of you who follow this blog may have realised, it seems to me that Matthew isn't really cut out for this sailing lark. The first six paragraphs are dedicated to Matthew talking about the cause and effects of sea-sickness. To be fair, he throws in a witty anecdote about Isaac Asimov, worth reading the blog for. As I've said before, he should throw in a few personal experiences. As it is he just waffles. My favourite story was coming home from Cherbourg on a rather rough crossing. A colleague, who was rather prone to "Mal De Mer", but would never admit it, spent about six hours throwing up. As we approached The river Hamble & calmer waters, he announced "That Boullabaise last night really didn't agree with me, I think I just brought the last of it up". At this, everyone fell about laughing. After that, any subsequent trip to the side of the boat on future journeys elicited a comment of "The wife been cooking Boullabaise again". Other comments would follow as we entered various eating establishments.

Anyway, the 7th paragraph of Matthews blog suddenly lurched onto the subject of what the Council does with it's "unclaimed dead". This is the people who die, where there are no contactable relatives or friends. It seems that the council organise burials for those poor people. Matthew suggests that he'll be looking at ways to mark their passing. Given that they no longer have a vote, there is no one to know they existed and there is no one to mourn them, there isn't any political capital to be had. As such I applaud Matthew for raising the subject. I doubt that any suggestions from me will have much of a hearing from Barnet Council right now, but I do have a genuine one, which is constructive (hopefully).

I'd like to suggest that all such corporate burial be recorded on a Barnet Council website. Any known details could be left. That way, should relatives or friends ever wish to find out what happened, they could. Presumably some of these people have assetts. A percentage of these could be used to fund the running of the site. It seems to me unlikely that all of the people who died lead a completely solitary life. Giving long lost relatives an easy way to check what happened, may be a way to mark their passing.

As I read the entry I also wondered whether maybe Barnet should organise some sort of annual multi faith commemoration, where the names could be read out. Whilst many will be of no faith or at least no known affiliation, I'd like to think that a non denominational service, where anyone could say a simple private prayer for them, would be fitting. For once Matthew has raised a good point.