When someone holds a different view, you can still agree to disagree and remain in a state of antagonistic harmony.

This is the resolution often taken by powerful opponents who each perceive there to be more to lose than gain from continuing the disagreement.

This approach tends to produce temporary holding positions that set the disagreement aside for a period before it re-emerges later when the balance of power changes.

If the argument continues, there are only two ways you can win it.

Either you must force your way, riding rough shod over your opponent, or you must invest the time to convince the other side that they are misguided, which in my experience takes a very long time, a lot of effort and works much less often than it fails, which is why so many give up.

This is the Putin strategy in Crimea.

HS2 is another case needing a sensible debate about efficacy, connectivity with other transport systems, return on investment etc but where one side of the argument has pushed ahead regardless of the a bad taste in the mouth and will eat away at the relationship and drive deep seated ingrained resentment.

To convince someone of your viewpoint or at least allow sufficient time for a full debate takes time and the deployment of one of two approaches. You must either present or heighten a fear in the minds of others, spotlight a belief and the attainment of a passion, or both.

Both approaches were evident in the Clegg and Farage debates last week but they came out in the exact opposite way to what you might have expected. Nick Clegg in speaking for the Grand Projet of the European Union was all about threats and fears rather than the realisation of the ideal of interdependent States working together for mutual benefit.

He stressed the 3-4m jobs that would be threatened, the economic dis-benefits of leaving, and the fear of crime and climate change not handled in unison.

Nigel Farage on the other hand, tarred with the brush of a Xenophobic Little Englander, spoke with absolute passion and energy about the Britain we could be, our role in the world and about how it made absolute commercial and social sense to control our borders rather close them.

Not a word to induce fear in the minds of the audience.

He was all about what we could once again be in the world.

A student from Aylesbury has won a national poster competition and will have his creation exhibited at London’s Royal Opera House.

Jonny Graham, who studies graphic design at Amersham & Wycombe College, entered the Royal Opera House Design Challenge.

And among more than 400 entrants, Jonny won the new Director’s Choice Award for his poster (pictured), decided by stage director David Stevenson.

Jonny,of Tring Road, will also get the chance to work for a day at the Royal Opera House.

The competition is open to students from the Skills Academy College network, of which Amersham & Wycombe College is a founder member, and this year’s challenge was based on Tchaikovsky’s The Sleeping Beauty.

Joint chief executive of creative and cultural skills Pauline Tambling said: “We’re delighted with the success of the design challenge which is giving students the opportunity to learn and work within one of our most prestigious cultural venues.”

A council’s plans to mark the 100th anniversary of the start of the First World War later this year are ‘insensitive,’ according to a doctor.

Dr Eric Rose, who has lived in Watermead for over 40 years, is urging Watermead Parish Council to ‘think again’ after hearing of the plans.

He said: “Watermead Parish Council intends to mark the occasion with a day including ‘fairground amusements, stalls, some vintage aspects and an evening of entertainment.”

Dr Rose said he felt that ‘to mark the start of this horrific war with a village fete and entertainment seems misguided at best and many might see it as grossly insensitive.’

Dr Rose, who worked as a GP at the Walton Grove surgery in Aylesbury between 1973 and 1992 added: “I am not sure if many younger people realise how terrible the First World War was.

“I have read a lot about the war and in my early days as a GP I talked to people who survived it.

“It was basically wholesale slaughter which went on for four years.

“To use a more recent comparison nobody in their right mind would hold a fete with entertainment to commemorate the 9/11 attacks in New York.

“However the death toll in the Great War was many thousands that of 9/11.”

Councillor Sue Severn, chairman of Watermead Parish Council said: “We have only just started making plans for how we are going to mark this event and while the plans are still at this early stage I don’t wish to comment any further.”

“It’s the quiet ones you have to watch out for…”

Do you believe if ghosts? Well, The Quiet Ones – from the producer who brought you The Woman In Black and Let Me In – is the slightly unnerving tale based on actual events of how a team of Oxford university students led by their professor conducted an ‘experiment’ to try and prove that spooks were simply a condition of the mind.

The experiment’s subject was one Jane Harper (Olivia ‘Bates Motel’ Cooke), a young girl full of unspeakable secrets, but are these secrets dark supernatural forces or rather more explainable homicidal issues?

So we join unorthodox Professor Coupland (Jared ‘Mad Men‘ Harris) as he recruits Brian McNeil (Sam ‘The Hunger Games’ Claflin) to film the experiment while goofy student Harry (Rory Fleck-Byrne) and sexy Krissi Dalton (Erin ‘soon to be in Gotham’ Richards), who insists on wearing hot pants which I’m not convinced are suitable scientific garb, tag along for the chilling ride.

Professor Coupland is obsessed with trying to prove his odd theory that evil spooks are not entities back from the afterlife but rather projections manifested by traumatized minds.

So his ‘experiment’ seeks to use fragile Jane and drive her to project negative energy and then ‘cure’ her. He does this by playing Quiet Riot’s ‘Come On Feel The Noise’ very loudly all night, which is probably enough to drive anyone insane.

Things invariably go ‘bump’ in the night and Jane somehow gets a scar in the shape of an occult symbol.

Turns out that this scar is that of an ancient goddess venerated by a cult, which believed that the soul of this goddess possessed a little girl called Evey. Hang on, isn’t that the name of the doll Jane carries?

Oh, and didn’t the members of the cult kill themselves in a big fire? The indications are that it will all end in tears.

Director John Pogue does an adequate job with the uneven screenplay by Craig Rosenberg and Oren Moverman. The Quiet Ones starts well and builds up a decent eerie premise in the first hour but when the ghostly hokum kicks off it all gets more silly than scary. Yes there are plenty of ‘false’ scares in the form of sudden jump moments – these are effective though – so much so that the woman behind me in the cinema screamed very loudly, very often!

One for hardcore ghostbusters only.

A man had to be rescued from the first floor window of his flat after being trapped by a fire started by arsonists.

The blaze, which police are treating as ‘arson with intent to endanger life’ took hold just before 4.30am on Sunday in Gainsborough Road, Aylesbury.

The man was taken to hospital suffering from the effects of breathing in smoke.

Watch manager Steve Cook said: “When we arrived, the man was calling from a window on the upper floor.

“Thick smoke was blocking his only means of escape and the front door was on fire.”

The man was helped down a ladder from a first floor window by firefighters, who also rescued a cat from inside the flat.

The flat suffered severe damage from smoke and minor damage from fire, while neighbouring properties also suffered some smoke damage.

The son of Aylesbury MP David Lidington is among those on a panel of youngsters grilling prospective youth workers at their job interviews.

The Bucks County Council scheme recruits young people aged between 13 and 19 who then interview staff for the potential posts.

Teenagers are paid £25 in vouchers for half a day’s work during which they sit on a three person panel and grill the candidates.

The same process happens with a more traditional panel of experienced council interviewers however it is often the input of the young people which becomes the crucial factor.

James Lidington, 16, from Princes Risborough and the son of Europe Minister David Lidington, said: “It’s a great way for us to gain skills for interviewers in the future.”

The council has now launched a drive to recruit more youngsters onto the panel.

Simon Billeness, senior practitioner for the council’s youth service said: “Ultimately, we don’t want to employ a youth worker who is academically brilliant but is then unable to engage young people.

“This is a very real way of young people influencing the services delivered for them.”

Mike Appleyard, the council’s cabinet member for education and skills, said: “This is a fantastically effective project for us.

“We all accept that anyone working with young people must have their qualifications and suitability thoroughly checked out.

“So it’s only right that part of this process involves the young people themselves.

“After all, what good is a youth worker who can’t in reality work with the youths themselves?”

Young people are recruited for the panels from schools, colleges and voluntary organisations, but anyone else aged between 13-19 who is interested in taking part should send an email to yourvoicecounts@buckscc.gov.uk or contact 01296 382448.

A top kitchen design firm is offering a full bursary to one lucky student who enrols on the Bucks New University’s new foundation degree in kitchen design this autumn.

Kitchen brand Hettich UK will cover the full cost of the course fees over three years for one student and now Miele are on board following their agreement to provide bursary support.

Students will work on modules including aspects of materials, technology, sustainability, culture and design in order to develop critical and imaginative responses to kitchen design. They will also learn technical contexts of kitchen design and will be supported by industry partners within a challenging learning environment.

Hettich UK’s managing director Tim Leedham said: “We’re delighted to support the university in this professional qualification, which will undoubtedly attract fresh talent to the industry as well as boost skills of those already part of it.”

The bespoke course has been created to meet demand from the industry for qualified kitchen designers and has been developed with a panel of industry experts primarily for those currently working in the industry.

The university’s head of design, crafts and visual arts Alison Shreeve said: “The great news that Hettich UK is endorsing our foundation degree in this way is a fabulous achievement for the university, not to mention extremely good for the lucky student who will be the recipient of a fully funded place on what we are sure will prove a very popular course.

“Employability and opportunities for progression in kitchen design are certainly strong in a buoyant market which only shows signs of growing still further.”

The course is offered part-time over three years and details on the selection process will be announced soon. Visit www.bucks.ac.uk for more.

Police are hunting thieves who are using gardening equipment to break into homes.

The police issued the appeal today in connection with a series of incidents in Aylesbury on Wednesday March 19 and Thursday March 20.

In the first incident on March 19, thieves used gardening tools to break into a house on Nelson Terrace at around 4pm before taking electrical items.

In the second incident, between 9.30pm on March 19 and 9am on March 20, the rear window of a house on Ripon Street was damaged before electrical items and jewellery were stolen.

The third incident took place between 7.30am and 11.36pm on March 20, when thieves used a garden ornament and gardening tools to gain access to a house on Rickfords Hill before stealing electrical items and jewellery.

Similar incidents have also taken place in Great Brickhill and Stoke Hammond and police believe they are linked.

Anyone with information on any of these burglaries is asked to contact DS Jim Forrest from Aylesbury Local CID through the Thames Valley Police enquiry centre on 101.

Alternatively, you can contact Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.

What? More bank holidays? Oh, please – do we have to?

Now I can put my feet up and enjoy a day of elegant idleness with the best of them, but I’ve never been a fan of the whole bank holiday set-up and it’s about time someone had the sense to sort it all out.

We call them bank holidays, of course, but mostly they’re dropped into the calendar for religious reasons which for most people are lost in the mists of time.

Easter, which is just around the corner, merits two days off, and so does Christmas.

We get a day at the start of the year which just encourages the entire nation to shut down for a fortnight, and a couple more in May.

The ‘early May’ day off – nothing to do with international workers’ rights, let’s not go there – has only been on the books since 1978 and there’s also the ‘spring bank holiday’ one at the end of the month. No need to refer to Whitsun, it’s not really to do with religion any more, is it?

Then there’s nothing until late August, and that’s your lot.

Now the whole idea of a bank holiday, or a religious holiday, was to release the hard-pressed populace from whatever yoke they were forced to wear to make ends meet and concentrate on their inner souls, or just have a breather. Everything shut down, everyone was in the same boat.

That’s not the case today. If you’re lucky enough to be in a secure corporate or public sector slot, if such things can still be said to exist, you might get your full whack but for most of us bank holidays are nothing but days in the diary reserved for despair and disappointment.

We’re either expected to work to keep the machine running – whether that’s in a coffee bar or a casualty ward – or we’re stuck in traffic jams wondering why we thought getting away for a couple of days at the same time as everyone else would be a good idea.

The ranks of the self-employed, which we are told continue to grow, pay little or no attention to statutory days off and those who don’t follow the Christian religion have to juggle other holiday due if they want to mark their special days, while being forced to stand idle at times of the year that mean nothing to them.

There’s a simple solution – give everyone their own allowance so that they can take another eight days holiday throughout the year, whenever it suits them. No more than two days at a time, mind, and if you really want to be out of the office on Good Friday off knock yourself out. I think it’s a winner, and once we get the long weekend out of the way I’m going to get right on it.

With the upcoming Easter weekend, many of us will be planning outdoor activities, to which the weather could play an important role.

This weekend’s forecast in Aylesbury Vale is to come, but first, what about past years and what we can expect, on average, weather-wise over Easter?

Easter Sunday always falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon following the Spring Equinox (March 21) and so can be anywhere in a 35 day period from March 22 to April 25.

The climatological average maximum temperature in Bucks rises by nearly 4C in this period, from around 10C to 14C. Combine this with the large variability in the day to day and week to week weather in a typical British spring, it means that the Easter weather can be as warm as an average day in mid-summer or as cold as in the depths of winter.

The warmest Easter in recent history was actually only three years ago in 2011, when much of south-east England and East Anglia basked in temperatures of 25-27C, values that would be impressive in mid-summer, let alone April. Wisley in Surrey was the hot-spot, reaching 28C.

There have been some notable cold and snowy Easters too though.

In fact, snow is more likely to fall at Easter than Christmas in the UK, albeit often in the form of short-lived showers.

Easter 1983 was a particularly snowy one across the UK, with up to 10cm falling over large parts of Scotland, the Midlands and eastern counties of England.

Most of the snow was associated with a polar disturbance which moved southwards across the UK on Easter Sunday, bringing travel disruption as far south as Kent. Several Easters in the 1970s also experienced widespread snow.

Easter 1998 will live long in the memories of many thanks to the persistent rainfall and consequent flooding which affected a large area from Wales in the west, across the Midlands and into East Anglia. A slow-moving frontal system brought up to 48 hours of near continuous rain in these areas on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, the rain turning to sleet and snow at times too over higher ground in north Wales and the Pennines. Over 4000 homes and businesses were flooded across England and Wales, 2000 in Northampton alone. The cost of the flooding has been estimated at £350 million.

So what about this Easter? Well, nothing as exceptional as the Easters mentioned above, with temperatures close to average, but it will be rather changeable. Some sunny spells are expected tomorrow and Good Friday, with some brighter spells on Saturday too, although there will be a scattering of showers around. A spell of heavier rain is possible on Sunday, before a return to brighter skies and the odd shower on Monday.

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Kids off school? Check. Sun beginning to show itself a bit? Fingers crossed. Sounds about time for the first of the summer blockbusters...

There are two important things to know about The Amazing Spider-Man 2 – one is that it’s exactly what you would expect it to be, and the other is that it’s even more overblown than you might have feared.

The regrettable tendency for all superhero sequels is to just chuck in more, and more, and more of the same until the audience is battered into submission.

So as well as Andrew Garfield in the central role and Emma Stone as his love interest, there are a whole range of new foes led by Jamie Foxx, a complicated plot about corporate connivance and Russian gangsters and a running time that heads ominously towards the 2.5 hour benchmark that seems to be de rigueur these days.

Foxx probably didn’t have to ask too many questions about internal character motivation when he checked out that his Electro alter ego is a wage slave transformed into a fearsome monster after an unfortunate mishap involving a tank of genetically-modified electric eels. I hope the proper health and safety investigation was carried out...

Meanwhile there is an option for those who don’t have kids in tow – Pierce Brosnan is continuing to impress in his post-Bond career, and Emma Thompson is on a roll after Saving Mr Banks.

Put them both together as a separated couple teaming up to rescue their threatened pension, add in Timothy Spall and Celia Imrie and some lush Riviera locations and you’ve got The Love Punch, a bright and breezy jewel heist caper that stands or falls on the cast – who are more than capable of standing, thank you very much. Not a stunner, but a charmer.

Former BBC radio DJ Dave Lee Travis, who lives in Buckland, has been charged with a further count of indecent assault.

The 68 year old is alleged to have assaulted a woman in January 1995.

The Crown Prosecution Service said they had authorised police to charge him with the alleged offence last month.

The new charge comes after Travis was cleared of 12 counts of indecent assault in February.

He faces a retrial on two outstanding charges.

The jury at Southwark Crown Court had been unable to reach verdicts on the charges of indecent and sexual assault.

They relate to an allegation of indecent assault against a woman in the early 1990s along with an alleged sexual assault on a journalist in 2008.

Travis, who moved to a bungalow in the village near Aston Clinton earlier this year, was forced to sell the mansion in Mentmore where he lived for over a decade in order to pay his legal costs.

He is due to appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on April 24.

A person has been airlifted to hospital after a car crashed with a van on the A413 this morning.

Police and ambulance services were called to the Deep Mill Lane junction near Great Missenden just after 8am following the accident between a Citroen car and a Vauxhall van.

One patient was taken to the John Radcliffe Hospital by air ambulance.

The incident caused traffic congestion in the area.

More on this as we get it.

A schoolgirl whose first aid skills have been put to the test looking after her ill mother has been named as the South-East’s top St John’s Ambulance cadet.

Shannon Dean, 15, was given the honour after triumphing at the national selection event at Sedgely Park Police Training Centre near Manchester.

The two-day competition saw 30 cadets from across the country take part in some tough tasks to win one of just eight regional roles.

Shannon, from Princes Risborough, who only joined as a cadet 18 months ago, will now represent St John Ambulance cadets in the region over the coming year.

Shannon, who attends Princes Risborough School said: “I’m shocked to have won the Regional Cadet of the Year as I’ve been surrounded this weekend by some truly inspirational young people.

“I’m so proud to have been chosen to represent my region.”

Shannon’s mother Julie suffers from multiple sclerosis, and Shannon’s first aid skills have been put to use a number of times when she has fallen.

She said: “The best thing about being a part of the cadets is being able to go out in the uniform with a huge feeling of pride.

“Not only can you say you were there to help those around you in many ways, but you also have a reassurance that you would be able to do everything you could if someone who was close to you was ever in a situation when they needed emergency first aid.”

Wendy Human, director of charitable initiatives and training for St John Ambulance said: ‘First aid is an important skill for people of all ages to learn.

“Young people like Shannon are great advocates of this message.

“St John Ambulance also provides young people with tremendous opportunities to develop a wide range of knowledge and skills in other areas and to be part of their local community.

“Shannon demonstrated tremendous dedication and enthusiasm over the course of the selection weekend and we are delighted that she is representing young people who learn first aid in the South East.”

St John Ambulance cadets are aged 10 to 17 and besides first aid they learn a range of other life skills as they work towards their Grand Prior award – the highest a cadet can achieve.

Subjects range from cookery and animal welfare to sports and photography.

Older cadets can put their first aid and other communication skills into practice by providing first aid to the public at events or teaching first aid to other young people and adults.

Designed to stretch the cadets abilities, the Cadet of the Year competition includes a wide range of subjects such as communication, team work, presentation, the media and social skills.

The next phase of work on a roundabout which is part of the new access road to a 300,000 tonne per year waste incinerator in Calvert is due to get underway next week.

The latest work will allow the roundabout on the A41 at Woodham to be completed.

As part of the work, 24-hour temporary traffic signals will be used at the site from 22 April for 10-15 weeks.

Work is nearly complete on the Quainton to Edgcott road, where a new bridge deck has been constructed to carry the new access road.

It is hoped that the road underneath the bridge will be surfaced on either April 24 or 25 to allow the road to be re-opened to traffic on Monday April 28.

Bucks County Council officials have been praised for the way in which they have trained staff to deal with people who have hearing loss.

The council sent 72 contact centre and business support workers on a half day course last year in an effort to improve the techniques they use in responding to callers with hearing problems.

The training, and subsequent follow-up actions, were declared such a success that the council’s contact centre has recently been awarded the “Louder than Words” charter mark from the charity Action on Hearing Loss.

Now Steve Bignell, operations manager for customer contact at Bucks County Council, is calling on other local authorities to follow suit.

He said: “Staff felt very engaged.

“The feedback I received from them was probably the best I have ever had after any outsourced training.

“It opened people’s eyes and they felt empowered and better equipped.

“The process gave a real insight into the difficulties and challenges that people with hearing loss experience.”

The centre, based at County Hall in Aylesbury, handles 350,000 calls and emails from the public a year relating to a wide variety of council services, including social care.

Mr Bignell said: “Some time back, we identified a need for us to be better at handling queries from people who are hard of hearing.

“There are several techniques we can use to handle these calls, and we decided there was a need to train staff, so we arranged the course through Action on Hearing Loss.”

The course centred on identifying causes and types of deafness, and identifying ways to improve access for people who are deaf or hard of hearing.

The contact centre was then given a set of actions to follow by a consultant sent in by the charity.

Actions included buying a portable hearing loop and using alternative forms of communication such as text messaging.

Katie Richardson, a customer services adviser, said the skills she learnt have assisted her hugely in her work.

She said: “I really enjoyed this session and due to working in an adult social care role within the contact centre and being interested in learning some more hands-on skills, this course led to me enrolling on a sign language course through Adult Learning.”

David Sloan, head of sales and business development at Action on Hearing Loss, said: “A staggering one in six people across the UK are affected by hearing loss, so businesses and organisations have a duty to ensure that they communicate appropriately and effectively with each and every one of their customers in order to best meet their needs.

“Thanks to the commitment of Bucks County Council’s staff, our consultants returned for audit within a matter of months.

“We are delighted to confirm that their hard work has paid off, and award them our ‘Louder than Words’ charter mark and a place on Action on Hearing Loss’ ‘Roll of Honour’.”

Martin Phillips, county council cabinet member for community engagement, said: “According to Action on Hearing Loss, one in six people in the UK experience hearing difficulties.

“That is likely to mean that many thousands of the people calling our council contact centre will benefit from this initiative, and I congratulate staff for arranging this and carrying it through so well.”

A man has been charged in connection with a spate of burglaries across the Vale.

John McDonagh, 30, of Brideale Close in London, was charged with conspiracy to commit dwelling burglaries between November 1 2012 and September 20 2013 and two counts of burglary dwelling.

Homes in Ludgershall, Kingswood and Fleet Marston were targeted.

Other burglaries took place in Essex, Kent, Surrey Wiltshire and West Sussex.

He has been remanded to appear at Folkestone Magistrates’ Court tomorrow (Thursday).

A 42-year-old woman was sexually assaulted in the early hours of Monday morning.

The woman was walking down the path between Bell Street and Gatensbury Place in Princes Risborough at around midnight on Monday, April 14, when she was approached by a man and assaulted.

Investigating officer Det Con Suzie Price said: “This was obviously a distressing incident for the woman involved, who was left shaken by what had happened to her.

“I want to reassure the public that we have officers patrolling Princes Risborough and are doing everything to catch this offender.”

Anyone with information is asked to contact Det Con Price via the 24-hour non-emergency number 101, or contact Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.

Nearly 1,000 children in Bucks have missed out on their first choice of primary school.

A quarter (24.8%) of youngsters failed to get into their first preference, 2% higher than last year.

Bucks County Council had to find places for an extra 316 pupils, taking the total number of applications to 6,160.

A further 616 applicants were offered a place at either their second, third or fourth choice of preferred primary schools.

Of those, 270 children did not receive any of their preferences at all.

For the first time primary school places were all allocated on the same day nationally.

The Department for Education says primary school populations are increasing with an extra 200,000 enrolling in 2013.

It seems Easter is nearly upon us and the supermarket shelves are stacked with chocolate bunnies and eggs galore.

Since this is also the time of year when teenagers have their heads buried in their books and laptops revising for important exams, it led me to wonder if there is any research to suggest that students who munch on chocolate when revising for exams gain any benefit from doing so.

As luck would have it, for the chocoholics amongst us, it seems there is!

Chocolate contains around 380 different chemicals.

Some are believed to have positive benefits to brainpower.

For example, found in quite high levels in dark chocolate, antioxidants such as flavonoids increase the flow of blood to the brain and heart, in some cases heightening cognitive function through greater oxygen levels.

They also lower blood pressure.

Chemical compounds such as phenylethylamine (PEA) can have a positive effect on our mood by encouraging the brain to release endorphins.

This has potential to decrease stress and raise feelings of motivation and enthusiasm.

Low levels of caffeine in chocolate act as a mild stimulant, although levels are considerably lower than those found in coffee.

Sadly, the effects of eating chocolate are not all positive.

Remember chocolate is high in fat and the more processed it is, the less likely it is have retained any health benefit.

I believe the saying goes ‘everything in moderation.’

Other brain boosting super-foods to include in the diet while studying include walnuts, olive oil, berries, oily fish like sardines and salmon, avocado, garlic, spinach, beetroot and most importantly water.

Remaining hydrated while studying is a key factor for concentration.

Dehydration causes the brain tissue to shrink impairing short-term memory, focus and decision making.

Happy Easter.