Julia Hailes MBE

Sustainability Pioneer

Pen Hadow’s Arctic adventure (Dec07)

We missed seeing Pen Hadow and his team mates plunge into the chilly depths of the Serpentine on a rainy day in London. Apart from a few damp spots on Pen’s trousers, they didn’t look any worse for wear. This is hardly surprising because, by all accounts they were wearing the full garb for immersing […]

See Telegraph Blogs (Sept07)

September 2007 to October 2008 My Blogs are being posted on Telegraph Blogs. Please look there for the most recent editions! September 2007 onwards are exclusively on the Telegraph Blogs site.   Blogs from this time have been transferred to my website.  

Gay Times – I interviewed Kristin Digby (Sep07)

One of three interviews I did for the Gay Times – Kristin Digby . See also Peter Tatchell and Paul O-Grady “I don’t even know how to read a f***ing fuel bill”, Kristian admitted when I asked him to tell me how much electricity and gas he was using.   I arrived at his house somewhere […]

Gay Times – Peter Tatchell (Sep07)

One of three interviews I did for the Gay Times – Peter Tatchell. See also Paul O-Grady and Kristin Digby  With piles of paper balanced precariously almost to the ceiling (it reminded me of Dr Seuss’s Cat in the Hat), Peter’s flat is not only his home but his campaign headquarters too.  Animal rights, human rights, […]

Gay Times – I interviewed Paul O-Grady and Peter Tatchell (Sep07)

I interviewed three prominent Gay men for the Gay Times Eco Issue in September 2007 –  Peter Tatchell (campaigner), Paul O’Grady (comedian) a.k.a as Lily Savage and Kristin Digby (TV presenter), who sadly died a couple of years later.  Peter Tatchell was very green, but Paul O-Grady wasn’t ashamed of his super-size aga and TV.  His best […]

Gay Times – I interviewed Paul O’Grady – aka Lily Savage (Sep07)

“I’ve never known anyone make so much fuss about three light bulbs” Paul said as we laughed uproariously in his kitchen.  I’d pointed out that there were more lights in just half his kitchen than Peter Tatchell had in his whole flat.  Then I saw more lighting above the aga.  “Only one” Paul says.  So I peered underneath the mantel and discovered there were three!

Is flooding a sign of global warming? (Jul07)

Rushed back from London for a BBQ on the beach at Eype in Dorset. Like almost every other outside event since the beginning of June it was rained off. Actually, it was moved. We had a party in a friend’s artist studio. The rain or more accurately the flooding was supposed to be the main […]

Prince Charles talking to trees (Jul07)

I was sitting just behind Prince Charles and Al Gore at the Business in the Community Awards dinner and wondered whether my image would be appearing in newspapers as a hazy blur over their shoulders. But I had a clear view of how Prince Charles reacted to Rory Bremner’s impersonations. The one that particularly amused […]

Hay on Wye Festival – China & droughts (Jun07)

The China Question When I wrote the original Green Consumer Guide there was one question I was unfailingly asked by journalists. It was ‘if there’s one thing that you can do to save the world what would it be?’ Answer that in a sound bite without sounding trivial… Of course there isn’t just one thing […]

Bath & West – going green… (Jun07)

The Bath & West show was a bit of a wash out for its first 2 days. Luckily I wasn’t there but I did have someone who was supposed to be running my ‘stand’ selling The New Green Consumer Guide. Actually there was no ‘stand’ as such and they couldn’t sell books in the rain […]