Madeleine Bunting not so bad after all.

If like me you have tended to dismiss Madeleine Bunting as the Guardian's hag god-botherer you will understand the misgivings that I had about turning up at the RSA for her talk (to coincide with the publication of her book of the same name) on  'Place, Identity and Community'. Regardless of any disagreements I might have with her about a lot of other things I think that she is pretty much on the money when it comes to the importance of 'place'. If we run away from talking about this we leave the field wide open to all those loony nationalists who are only to happy too talk about it. Never thought I'd  say it but, "nice one Madeleine".