I like a good knife. One cannnot underestimate their importantance in the succesful function of everyday life, just imagine how you would struggle to cope without being able to cut, slice, gouge or carve at will. From buttering toast to conducting violent bus stop muggings, knives are crucial to keeping Tony Blairs' Britain great and I for one salute them.
It's as fundamental as this - could you eat your daily requirement of food without a knife?
The answer is of course yes, you'd probably get away with a spoon, but you see my point. What galls me is that the importance of the knife has not been formally acknowledged by our so-called Prime Minister. Oh sure, we'll welcome convicted terrorist Nelson Mandela into the country with open arms but we have nothing, not even a crumbling statue of a letter opener, to show the part knives have played in our development of our society.
And, as proved by a press release I received today, we're not just bringing up the Euro-rear in public transport, medical provision and voter apathy, no, we're also lagging behind in the knife stakes too. This is completely genuine.
INVITATION FOR INTERNATIONAL PRESS
The mayors of the knife-making cities of Albacete (Spain), Thiers (France) and Solingen (Germany) and the directors of the Knife Museums in these cities invite you to the presentation of the "Declaration of Albacete" in defence of the European knife-making industry, which will take place during the Ambiente trade fair in Frankfurt, on Saturday 12 February at 4pm in the Facette Hall in pavilion 3 of the exhibition site.
Mr Manuel Perez Castell, Mayor of Albacete; Mr Theirry Deglon, Mayor of Thiers; Mr Franz Haug, Mayor of Solingen; Mr Heinrich Beelan, President of the German Knife Museum Board; Mr Amos Nunez Juan, Executive Coordinator of the Municipal Knife Museum in Albacete and Mr Pierre Therias, President of the French Federation of Knife Making would be honoured by your presence at the above event.
It appears Spain, France and Germany (all of whom we've beaten in several wars, if only their backbones were as strong as their knives) have entire cities utterly dedicated to making knives. Metropolis' so fanatical about knife-making that they want to preseve it's future as well as acknowledge its past. I hope the Declaration of Albacete is heard by those in power in Brussels, the European knife-making industry is obviously struggling and yet I think a representative from the Belgian knife-making fraternity is conspicuous by his absence here. Perhaps the Belgian fork-making industry is having a resurgence and making headway into traditional knife-only markets like the vikings and gypsies. Or, more likely, the threat of chopsticks from the far east are making knives redundant and the Eurocrats are lining their fat cat pockets with Yen.
Who knows, but whatever happens to the European knife market, at least some countries are devoted to preserving its historic traditions which, while putting the UK to shame, at least means we can tour the German Knife Museum, the Spanish Municipal Knife Museum and perhaps drop in at the French Federation of Knife Making on the way home.
It is time this country followed suit and finally opened its own knife museum, I'm sure the Millennium Dome is still free.
