Did you know that every year 300 of us will die due to a fatal accident in the work place? How about that 400 of us die every year from domestic house fires, over half of which could have been prevented through use of a smoke alarm? What about the fact that almost 3,000 people die as a result of car accidents that at least a third could have been prevented by simply abiding by the law?

Perhaps most shocking of all, and I come to this subject cautiously given media (tabloid) involvement in it in the past, is that over 2,700 children under the age of 13 are raped every year and this figure is rising. Whether it's rising because (thankfully) reporting these crimes is becoming more common or because it's happening more is fairly inconsequential to the fact the problem is becoming more apparent.

This post is just a bit of filler while I attend the Liberal Conspiracy / Guardian event in London today, but is to highlight two stories that have some serious relevance to homosexual rights in this country. The first is regarding the Heinz advert that has been pulled by the company following 200 homophobic complaints about the innocuous contents. The second is the much more dangerous statement by Jacqui Smith that has the audacity to try and tell homosexuals to tone down their behaviour so as to not get caught by the homophobic Iranian officials.

To the "hard working" yet easily frustrated representative of my constituency,

I would, in turn, like to thank you for representing your constituency in parliament, but have yet to see the evidence. Apparently my taxes go towards paying for you to groan and shout in the house of commons, to feed the prime minister an easy question to boost his performance at PMQ's or playing the partisan blame game. When you debate it is not to get to the best solution but to deride it for not being your party's solution, and when you vote it's because of what a handful of politicians think rather than what thousands of your constituents think.

I personally think that the BBC is spot on for saying that they want to do more to promote politics and trust in the political system of the UK in the future, but also that in turn it make themselves look stupid for having not done more in the past on the subject. There have also been comments around saying that the move was a bribe, effectively, and this is an interesting if not slightly irrelevant angle.

From this has arisen some discussion about why the BBC need to do this, questioning just why people are disengaged with politics. Some say that it's because there is no mystery any more, and that it's too open, too ugly. Other's say that the media's closeness just shows up how clandestine politics can still be. Personally I have to say let's face it, it's not the openness or mystery of politics that stops people from engaging. I doubt the people sitting around post war were going and voting still because of the allure of the mystery behind Westminster, and I severely doubt people aren't getting involved now because things are seemingly more transparent.