Barometer

Plagued by stigma The World Health Organisation told doctors to stop naming diseases after people, places and animals so as not to stigmatise them. But are diseases even really associated with things that gave them their name? — Spanish flu. First identified in an army hospital in Kansas in March 1918. It gained its name because Spain was a neutral country, and uncensored newspaper reports made it appear uniquely affected. Subsequent theories have had it originating in China or at an army camp in France. — Legionnaires’ disease. First identified after an outbreak at a convention of the American Legion at the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel, Philadelphia, in July 1976. — Ebola.

One-way stretch A study at Louisville University in Kentucky concluded that collisions are twice as likely in one-way streets as in similar streets with two-way traffic. — The one-way street is an older concept than many might imagine. Pudding Lane, where the Great Fire of London began in 1666, was one of the world’s first one-way streets. An order restricting cart traffic to one-way travel on that and 16 other lanes around Thames Street was issued in 1617. — Data on traffic flow at the time is hard to come by, but the idea was not copied for over 300 years, until Mare Street, Hackney, became a one-way street in 1924. Blavatnik’s billions Ukrainian-born businessman Len Blavatnik was named by the Sunday Times as Britain’s richest man, worth £13.2bn.

The Scottish way of death Nicola Sturgeon said the SNP would block a rise in the state pension age on the grounds that it would be unfair to Scots, who don’t live as long as the English. — The idea that the Scots die early was fuelled by a study by the Glasgow Centre for Population Health in 2006, which found male life expectancy in the Calton area of Glasgow to be 54: less than in many developing countries. — The figure, derived from statistics collected between 1998 and 2002, was exaggerated by the presence of a large number of hostels in the Calton taking in drug addicts from other areas. Life expectancy in Glasgow as whole last year was 73 for men and 78.5 for women, the lowest for any council area in Britain but not by much. In Blackpool it is 74.3 for males.

Royally paid Staff at Windsor Castle were balloted in strike action over pay. What can you earn in the royal household, according to adverts on the British Monarchy website? — Housekeeping assistant: £14,500 pa. Duties include ‘preparing rooms and cleaning upholstery’. Meals are provided, as is accommodation ‘for which there is a straight salary adjustment’. — Telephone operator in Privy Purse and Treasurer’s Office: £20,500. 38 hours per week. Includes some bank holiday and weekend working. — Ticket sales and information assistant for the summer opening of the Royal Collection: £8.80 per hour. Contract includes a minimum of 300 hours between June and September.

Service record The government is to form a design panel to improve motorway services stations. These have not always charmed the British public, not least the very first: Watford Gap services, which opened in 1959 on the same day as the first stretch of the M1. — It quickly became a night-time haunt of rock stars travelling between gigs, but not all were impressed by the food. In 1977 the folk singer Roy Harper recorded a track on his Bullinamingvase album called ‘Watford Gap’ and containing the lyrics: ‘…And the people came to worship on their death-defying wheels,/ fancy-dressed as shovels for their death-defying meals…Watford Gap, Watford Gap, a plate of grease and a load of crap.

A dangerous hobby Three men from Greater Manchester were arrested and held in the UAE after being seen writing down the numbers of aircraft. — Plane-spotting can be risky. In 2001 14 Britons were arrested in Greece after allegedly taking photos at an air base in Kalamata. Eight were sentenced to three years; imprisonment for spying and the other six were given suspended sentences. (All were overturned on appeal.) — In 2010 two British men were arrested at Delhi airport after being seen taking photos of planes from a hotel room. — Trainspotters have had problems too. In 2008 a 15-year-old boy was held under terror legislation after taking photographs of Wimbledon station for a school project.

Poor data Oxfam complained of an ‘inequality explosion’, citing an estimate that by next year 1 per cent of the world’s population will own half the wealth, but little other evidence. Is global inequality really growing, and does it matter? — There have been few estimates of global inequality in income and wealth, but one recent one was contained in a Unicef report in 2011 which revealed that on some measures global inequality is falling. In 1990, it claimed that the wealthiest 20% of people on the planet received 87% of global income. By 2007 that had fallen to 83%. Over the same period the poorest fifth of the population saw their share of wealth increase from 0.8% to 1%.

Not Charlie Some cases which make Britain a pretty poor champion of free speech: — In 2005 Bristol pub landlord Leroy Trought was given an Asbo and told to remove a sign for his car park, calling it ‘the porking yard’, after complaints to police that it was ‘racially and sexually offensive’. — In 2006, Angie Sayer, landlady of the New Inn, Wedmore, Somerset, was questioned by police for using a Welsh flag in a St George’s Day darts match and inviting participants to ‘slay the dragon’. — In 2010 street-preacher Dale McAlpine was arrested, locked in a cell for seven hours and had his DNA and fingerprints taken after telling a passer-by that he thought homosexuality was sinful.

Teen queens The Duke of York denied allegations in court papers that he had had sexual relations with a girl in Florida aged 17, below the age of consent there. Some of his ancestors who might now be in trouble: — King John, who married Isabella of Angoulême in 1200 when she was 12. — Henry VI, who married Margaret of Anjou in 1445 when she was 15. — James I, who married Anne of Denmark in 1589 when she was 14. — Charles I, who married Henrietta Maria of France in 1624 when she was 15. — William III, who married his cousin Mary in 1677 when she was 15.   Crude estimates The price of oil fell below $60 a barrel. There is nothing new about volatile oil prices.