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Mark Steel: Do the elderly need a £14m bonus as well as pudding?

Almost everyone connected to the elderly or care homes has insisted the Government addresses the issue of the lack of care homes. So the Government has agreed to look into it. One possible cause they might find, if they investigate thoroughly and consult enough people, analysing everything with great care, is that they've cut the number of care homes.

Mark Steel: Just because you're an atheist doesn't make you rational

Once you make it your primary aim to refute the existence of God, you miss what's really fundamental

Mark Steel: I'd like to be taken for lunch by the taxman

You have to congratulate these companies for managing to pull this trick off

Mark Steel: Hands off our greedy bankers

It's the right of every Englishman to have his country robbed blind by the banks

Mark Steel: Let's ask florists for a credit rating

Governments should be made to recite their policies in front of a panel on TV every Saturday

Mark Steel: Unions just want the mums to pay

Michael Gove believes the strikers want 'mothers to give up a day's work or pay for childcare'

Mark Steel: Don't let's forget the rich are different

You almost have to admire the front when people can't stop swiping billions

Mark Steel: Oh, no! How can I pay the school fees?

Ignoring your children is really the only loving thing a good parent can do

Mark Steel: How to be a giant and still second best

Joe Frazier's problem was that his most celebrated opponent was much more than a boxer

Mark Steel: Seven billion? That's not a problem

The mistake that the pessimists make is in seeing each of us solely as consumers

Mark Steel: The price is always right (whatever it is)

If prices go up, demand goes down. But not with university courses apparently

Mark Steel: If only we'd shopped around more

Huhne will deal with electricity prices by saying he's hoping for a mild winter

Mark Steel: Stop the NHS prioritising parakeets

The Housing Minister will say a local council built a town hall out of Wedgwood china

Mark Steel: Will we ever be rid of Tony Blair?

Tony Blair keeps popping back to annoy us, doesn't he? Every few months, just as you think he's slid into history, he emerges getting paid a million pounds for something, like brokering an arms deal with Josef Fritzl and you realise we'll never be rid of him. At least in the past, leaders did their damage, then disappeared, but he'll never go. It's like finding out the next leader of the UN will be General Franco or that Emperor Hirohito is to be a judge on X Factor.

Mark Steel: Lost in the car insurance labyrinth

To sense the irrational terrifying chaos that drives the modern economy you should get someone to drive into your parked car in the middle of the night. I went on this course yesterday and it's a splendid education. It begins with the relative calm of answering the door to see the police stood before you, an image that makes anyone decent think, "Bollocks, I must have been on CCTV", or "They can't STILL be after me for the poll tax".

Day In a Page

Independent Appeal: A lesson in understanding: the former runaway bringing two worlds together

Independent Christmas Appeal

A lesson in understanding - the former runaway bringing two worlds together
The lawyer taking on Guatemala's criminal gangs

The lawyer taking on Guatemala's criminal gangs

Death threats are part of the job for the UN investigator scoring victories in a drug war – and setting precedents for battles elsewhere
Master of St Trinian's: The death of Ronald Searle

Master of St Trinian's

Ronald Searle, the cartoonist who parodied British life from scurrilous schoolgirls to curmudgeonly colonels, has died aged 91
Soprano finds her voice – as a teen-lit novelist

Soprano finds her voice – as a teen-lit novelist

'Outstanding' dystopian tale wins debut writer the children's prize in Costa book awards
Senegal's soul king sets sights on the presidency

Senegal's soul king sets sights on the presidency

Grammy-winner Youssou N'Dour says it is his 'patriotic duty' to challenge incumbent
Zooey Deschanel: 'I do try really hard to be normal'

Zooey Deschanel

'I do try really hard to be normal'
Family safaris: Look children, a zebra crossing

Family safaris

Look children, a zebra crossing
The Ten Best: Thermals

The Ten Best: Thermals

From tights for men to beanie hats
Military fitness: sun, sea and sweat

Military fitness

A new military-style fitness break in Fuerteventura is no boot camp
James Lawton: Liverpool do not retreat with honour but self-serving scorn

James Lawton

Liverpool do not retreat with honour but self-serving scorn
Plotting a route to London 2012

Plotting a route to London 2012

What lies between Team GB's athletes and a place on the podium six months from now?
When the drugs deny real winners their golden moment

When the drugs deny real winners

Asbel Kiprop runs in Edinburgh on Saturday having only just received his rightful 2008 Olympic medal. The fight goes on to avoid similar travesties in 2012
Vinyl destination

Vinyl destination

A new generation of buyers and sellers is dealing in ultra-rare collectables
Independent Appeal: 'Doing this job makes you realise how much we all take for granted'

'Doing this job makes you realise how much we all take for granted'

Independent Appeal: Ben Fewtrell's working week is filled with the kind of emotional stress many of us do our best to avoid
Dieting: Battle of the bulge

Battle of the bulge

A look at 20 centuries of bingeing, purging, snake oil and strange dieting fads