{"id":3033,"date":"2014-04-01T03:11:22","date_gmt":"2014-04-01T03:11:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/?p=3033"},"modified":"2014-04-04T15:41:07","modified_gmt":"2014-04-04T15:41:07","slug":"horsington-to-declare-war-on-milborne-port-in-twinning-row","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/?p=3033","title":{"rendered":"Horsington to declare war on Milborne Port in Twinning row?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Twin2\"<\/a>An ugly spat has broken out between two Somerset villages over a controversial \u201cTwinning\u201d arrangement.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It was all the rage in the 1980\u2019s to \u201ctwin\u201d with a similar town in France or Germany, so all the bigwigs could go on expenses-paid \u201cfact finding tours\u201d and come back with loads of cheap (or even free) booze.<\/p>\n

Milborne Port, famous for its, award-winning opera company, has gone one better and is twinned with Utopia, an island in the centre of the Pacific Ocean.<\/p>\n

Now they are up in arms because Horsington wants to get in on the act.\"Twin3\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It all started when the EU\u2019s External Action Service (equivalent to the UK\u2019s Foreign Office\/Overseas Aid department) began throwing money at Utopia for wind farm development. Then, before you could say \u201cGeoffrey Boycott\u201d, they were giving grants to Utopia\u2019s cricket school, and finally their tourism website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Before long it was rumoured that leading citizens from Milborne Port were flying off to the Pacific and indulging in so-called \u201ccultural exchanges\u201d, the considerable cost of which was being borne by the EU. (And therefore YOU, the British Taxpayer \u2013Ed)<\/i><\/p>\n

\"This<\/a>
This Utopia tourism website picture shows the kind of people visitors on twinning trips might meet during “cultural exchanges”.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Sure enough, Milborne Port\u00a0 then announced that it was to stage a lavish production of Gilbert & Sullivan\u2019s rarely-performed comic opera “Utopia Limited\u201d in the village hall, a clear case of bribery,\u00a0 favouritism, nepotism and patronage (Steady \u2013Ed)<\/i>. The Opera is about what happens on a Pacific island when British management consultants get involved.<\/p>\n

Horsington\u2019s gripe is that a number of Milborne Port performers live, or have lived, in Horsington and believe that it\u00a0 is deeply unfair that Horsington should miss out on a potential investment\u00a0 and cultural bonanza. Chris Bailward, a longtime resident of Horsington and<\/em> member of the MPO\u00a0told the blog \u201cIf anyone who should go on all-expenses paid trips to the South Pacific during the wettest winter on record, it is us. It can be very damp on the Marsh.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neil Edwards, spokesperson for the Milborne Port Twinning Association responded angrily:” I cannot believe the cheek of Horsington to even attempt something like this. They\u2019ve overstepped the mark. Milborne Port has a long standing tradition of twinning, already sharing links with\u00a0 the town of Rederring which is on the border between Denmark and the UK and of course, Titipu, Japan. The Utopia Chamber of Commerce<\/a>\u00a0left me in no doubt that\u00a0any approach from Horsington would be met with stern opposition there. If you ask me, Horsington should twin themselves with Brigadoon and disappear for a century”.<\/p>\n

\"Utopia's<\/a>
Utopia’s celebrity magazine seems familiar – and so do its celebrities!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The blog has looked at the Utopia website and admits that Utopia is a fascinating place, well worth a visit<\/p>\n

It even has its own celebrity magazine.<\/p>\n

Several of the\u00a0members of the ruling clique look strangely familiar. Click on the image on the left to enter the website.<\/p>\n

1 April 2014<\/p>\n

\"Click<\/a>
Click on image to see MPO’s web magazine<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An ugly spat has broken out between two Somerset villages over a controversial \u201cTwinning\u201d arrangement. It was all the rage in the 1980\u2019s to \u201ctwin\u201d with a similar town in France or Germany, so all the bigwigs could go on expenses-paid \u201cfact finding tours\u201d and come back with loads of cheap (or even free) booze. … Continue reading “Horsington to declare war on Milborne Port in Twinning row?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[794],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-humour"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6glYD-MV","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3033"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3033\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3168,"href":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3033\/revisions\/3168"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/horsington.blog2.idnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}