Mass Debate

I eschewed an episode of Top Gear on Monday night in favour of the “Chancellors’ Debate”, a televised argument between the current holder of the public purse and his two would-be successors. Well, I say two, actually there is only one.

Vince Cable, the self-titled Financial Genius, is alleged to have won the battle of the bean counters by virtue of his insightful commentary on the hindsight that he possesses. Cable produced applause from the audience every time he stated the obvious about house price inflation and easy credit. Unfortunately Vince, elections are not decided by clapometer, unless I missed a meeting. My former neighbour and I use to have conversations over the garden hedge about how unsustainable the economy was. But we were in no position to do anything about it. The Lib Dem treasury spokesman proved last night that his party has as much power as a flat double-A battery.

George Osborne, on the other hand, had Old Caterpillar Eyebrows on the ropes on a couple of occasions, eliciting such eloquent responses as “Er”, “Um” and the classics “the economy needs to be managed by people with experience” and “our economy is best placed to weather the financial crisis”, whilst glossing over the not insignificant matter of how he and his boss got us into the crisis in the first place through their inexperience and mismanagement.

Osborne is also the only one to have actually produced a concrete policy ahead of the election, which is the reversal of Darling’s planned National Insurance increase, a rise that will cost employees between £150 and £750 per year. Labour and the Lib-Dems say that the increase is needed – to fund Darling and Brown’s £178bn of debt, remember – and is not costed. Osborne retorts that the reverse will be funded from savings. I think that when the Tories finally get to see the books and the state of government on May 7th, they will find that they can fund this tax cut and many more from efficiency savings and cuts.

And not that Darling or Brown has ever worried about where their spending will be funded from. Billions thrown at failed banks, who have then rewarded themselves with 7-figure bonuses; billions thrown at two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but still not enough to fight the wars effectively; £12 billion on a failed IT system for the NHS; £10 billion on a vanity Olympics project. Who are Labour to preach on prudent economics?

What's Up Doc?

MPs are supposed to have learned their lessons from the expenses scandal, or so Gordon Brown keeps saying. But Stephen Byers and other MPs proved this weekend that they haven’t, as the stories surrounding the latest trousering scam highlight.

Not only are they constantly using inventive ways to fill their nose bags, but when they get caught, the excuse is always "but it's within the rules and I have done nothing wrong".

Don't they know the meaning of propriety?

Watch your back, Darling

Rumours abound that miniature maniac Kim Jong Il has had his finance minister jailed and subsequently executed. This is because the unfortunate holder of the treasury office in North Korea could not implement the crazy currency plans of his boss, resulting in spiralling inflation. Sounds spookily familiar: out of leader dreams up an economic strategy that results in hardship and mountainous debt for his citizens.

All I can say is, if only we could adopt the same job recognition scheme in the UK…

Three – a magic number

The Red Rag today reported that government has spent nearly three-quarters of a billion pounds on internal re-organisations and renaming of departments. Which is £780 million pounds that wasn’t spent on defence capabilities in Iraq or Afghanistan, or new schools, or employing doctors and nurses, or keeping the streets safe.

But as we know from a couple of weeks ago, what can we expect from a former Chancellor and now Prime Minister who lied to the Chilcott enquiry about the level of funding to the military - he hasn't a clue how much money is being spent, or what on.

Now Brown says that maybe in 1 or 2 years after 2003, spending on defence was lower than he originally stated. In fact it was lower in three years, Gordon. Not only did he lie to Chilcott, but he can't even make a factually correct statement in his retraction of evidence.

And we wonder why the economy is up a certain creek without a certain implement when the man in charge can't even count up to 3?

How do you know the government is lying?

There were a couple of contradictory news items today that demonstrate the mendacity with which Labour will fight the election.

First, The Standard reported that Gordon Brown warned that the Conservative Party “could” cut funding to Sure Start centres to the tune of £200m, resulting in a 20% reduction in services. As with the greens and their passive conditionals, Labour thinks nothing of using conjecture to create a negative yarn. The Tories have said no such thing, but why let that get in the way of a good scare story.

And then in The Times, there is a commentary piece on how citizens are being means-tested at one Sure Start centre and rejected on the basis of perceived class. Families who are deemed middle class do not meet the “reach” of Sure Start in Hackney and are being turned away. So we have a situation where taxpayers who fund this scheme are not allowed to make use of it.

To use a conditional of my own, what if we did away with all the outreach officers who make up these nonsensical rules and reduced the astronomic £183k salary of the Learning Trust’s chief executive? Maybe that would allow a fair system for all and not just Labour’s chosen few.

Cutting costs in public services does not have to mean reducing the quality, level or “reach” of the services; but it can remove unnecessary staff, red tape and bureaucracy from the equation. Who knows, it “could” even mean that 20% more Sure Start centres can open.

Laugh and a half

Spot the difference:


And also:

Give me a break

Actors in the “webuyanycar” and “gocompare” adverts – you need to take a long, hard look at yourselves in the mirror. You are at the bottom rung of the thespian ladder. And the foot of that ladder is just below the deepest part of the London Underground.

Mr. Brown goes to war

So now we know that Gordon Brown thinks it was right for the UK to help the US to invade Iraq. Whilst I could wobble on about how us standing shoulder to shoulder with the Americans has not been reciprocated over The Falkland Islands, I won’t, as that is not the subject of this rant.

What miffed me about Brown’s appearance at the Chilcott enquiry – apart from the fact that the whole process is a waste of taxpayers’ money – is that the PM kept going on about how much extra money he had given the armed forces. At no point did any of the lame ducks who ask the questions think to ask if it was actually enough. Brown, as Chancellor, may well have given the armed forces more cash each year, but this in no way took account of the fact that the military was involved in two wars more than they had been since 2003. Even before Bliar made his pact with that old devil George Dubya Bush, the generals, air vice marshals and sea lords were struggling to finance the operations they were already involved in.

But the most astounding revelation – and which has not been commented on anywhere in the media – is that Brown handed over billions to the chiefs in charge of the war, and then blamed these same people for not procuring equipment quickly enough or in sufficient quantities. Brown doled out a staggering amount of money but did not bother to ask what it was going to be spent on. And this is the financial genius that is running the country.

That just about sums up Labour’s approach to economics: screw as much money out of the taxpayer as possible; then throw the money at every available cause without bothering to check that the money is going to be spent sensibly, or whether the outlay is required in the first place.

For “Snatch” Land Rovers, also read the £12.7bn NHS computer system, the Olympics, £178bn on bank bailouts and quantitative easing, high-speed rail, Trident 2 and anything else that Labour can financially mismanage.

Because we're worth it

MPs are to get a 1.5% pay rise, taking their salaries to just shy of £65,000. To predictable outcry from some sectors of the civil service, the increase has been denounced, on the basis that if the average government worker is receiving nothing extra, why should MPs. Which is fair enough, until you realise that the 1.5% is based on an average of 15 other public sector groups’ increase.

But why should anyone in government, MPs or otherwise, be getting any pay rise? When most private sector workers are receiving nothing extra, or in some cases taking pay cuts or enforced reductions in hours, the government sector should move away from their position of having an automatic right to annual salary uplifts.

The next government needs to break this cycle of yearly rises without any associated improvement in productivity. But this is not helped when the MPs themselves feel that they are also justified in getting a raise, and the case is also subverted when party leaders try to water down proposals to reform changes to politicians’ expenses.

Bad Broadcasting Continues

News today that the BBC is going to cease most of its “yoof” TV and radio broadcasting. All the programmes that have had millions spent on them in the past 5-10 years are deemed to have failed and will be closed. No news on whether the execs that green-lighted these doomed experiments will also be axed, but knowing government departments, of which the Beeb is one, they will be moved onto different projects where they can continue to waste our money.

How about trimming fat from BBC1 and 2, by reducing the reliance on "reality" TV and cookery programmes? How about rationalising the ridiculous amount of news broadcasting that happens simultaneously across TV and radio channels, but with different presenters, crew and studios?

The report also states that the BBC will spend only a fixed percentage of the licence fee on sports programmes. This is a coded message to say that they Beeb won’t be bidding to broadcast popular sports any time soon, but will continue to waste money on non-sports, such as darts and snooker, which are pastimes you partake in whilst supping beer, not athletic spectacles.

More importantly, can the licence fee be reduced in line with the reduction in services?

The changing face of Climate Change

The backlash against the Great Global Warming Swindle grows with the news that the data that underpins the warmists’ theories is to be independently reviewed.

Whilst this is good news, I seriously doubt that the review will be very independent, and will probably follow the same line that has been previously adopted whereby someone else from the inner circle of the ecomentalists is wheeled in to “review” the data and draw the same conclusion.

The review is not due to be released until 2013 or 2014. In the meantime, can all the policies and taxes that have been dreamed up in the name of “fighting climate change” be put on the scrapheap? The EU’s Emissions Trading Scam, sorry, Scheme, springs to mind. As does the Labour government’s obsession with raising fuel and motoring duties in line with CO2 emissions. The UK should also stop subsidising alternative energy supplies until they are proven to produce electricity at the same rate and for the same cost as traditional energy sources.

None of this will happen of course: even though the game is up for the climate change proponents, politicians at all levels and in all territories are in such thrall to their nonsense non-science that nothing will be done to reduce the tax-raising opportunities presented by CO2 emissions.

Once, twice, three times a bailout

The Tories’ latest attempt at making them the least popular government in waiting is to sell us back shares in the banks that were bailed out in 2008 and 2009.

We saved and invested in these banks all our lives; through Brown and Darling’s largesse and our tax, these same banks have been given billions to keep the banking system afloat; and now George Osborne would like to offer us shares in the identical institutions that we already own via Labour’s desperate attempt to resuscitate the economy.

Whilst ducking a mobile phone slung by his grumpy boss, Lord Mandlespin predictably announced that the Tory plan was “incoherent”. I wouldn’t call it that, but if Osborne does manage to persuade anyone to take up his offer, he should get himself a job as Director of Sand Sales, Middle East division.

Gordon – get a grip

Another government minister has weighed into the row over John Terry, England’s former Wendyball captain and alleged philanderer. This time, Mike O’Brien, taking time out from wasting £20bn of our tax on the 2012 Olympics, has called on the England Wendyball manager, Fabio Madeupnamio, to rethink his “crass” decision to sack the skipper.

Labour is totally split over this issue: first we have Gerry "Expenses" Sutcliffe calling for Terry's head; now the Sports minister is demanding the opposite.

Gordon Brown needs to show some leadership in the Commons to correctly communicate the government's policy on footballers' private lives. Forget the Tories’ indecision over tax breaks for married couples or whether to cut public services this year or next. The UK is rudderless on this crucial subject and needs direction.

The PM must do this as a matter of urgency, as it is obviously a much bigger issue than £178bn of public debt, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, a creaking transport system, inadequate health and education systems and 4m unemployed citizens.

Cash for snow

My favourite raiser of blood pressure, the London Evening Standard, today carries the news that £20m of damage has been caused to the roads by the recent cold snap. I wondered how soon it would be before the taxpayer was landed for the bill for the snow.

We have been paying billions in fuel duty and carbon taxes for the past 20 years. This was all done in the name of saving the planet from CO2 emissions. Since this myth has now been dispelled, there should be plenty of money in the coffers to deal with a real climate threat, rather than one inferred from a dodgy computer simulation.

Except there isn't. Because it's all been spent on subsidising wind farms, paying carbon credits to the EU and employing thousands of civil servants to “manage” government’s fight against “climate change”.

Well, here you go: the climate has changed. It’s got nothing to do with CO2, and the predicted rise in temperature has actually seen a gradual drop over the past twelve years. Spend what we've already given you in green taxes on a genuine weather threat. Any attempt by politicians to strong-arm more money out of us to pay for the weather should be met with appropriate resistance.

Stop pulling our leg(g)s

Sir Thomas Legg’s review of the MPs expenses system was unleashed on a mostly disinterested world this morning. This is the 3rd review into MPs expenses, after the ineffective one by the former disgraced speaker and the expensive KPMG one.

Between them, some MPs are being asked to repay just over a £1m in wrongly-claimed expenses. But I still don't see any MPs being charged for fraud, for that is what they are guilty of in a lot of cases. And I also don't see any change of the rules that will prevent them from nosebagging their way through the next parliament.

I also spend 4 or 5 days away from home, which is my choice. I get back in expenses only what I spend. I do not get a flat at my employer's expense; I do not get a free plasma telly; I do not get my garden at home tended to while I am away; and I don't get free porn, unlike Jacqui Smith's husband.

The whole system needs to be brought up to date and come under the scrutiny of the taxman, who would not tolerate any of the exaggerated claims we have seen in the past 18 months.
Despite what the denizens of SW1 think, MPs are not special. They have proven that consistently during this episode.

iSore

Ok, so now we know what Apple has been doing in its labs for the last twelve months. Whereas the trend in technology since about 1950 has been towards miniaturisation, Apple has gone the other way and taken its svelte Touch product and grown it by about 600%. Step forward the “iPad”. Very original name, guys. Dom Jolly and his comedy mobile obviously had a huge influence on the design.

Re-launching a product that his company already produces for a cheaper price and in a much handier size, Apple supremo Steve Jobs claims his new toy is the third way between a mobile phone and a laptop. Which it certainly is for Apple, as it will cost a third more than any comparable device on the market.

Jobs described netbook PCs as “cheap laptops”, unlike the iPad which is a “very expensive iPod”. Just goes to show, if you put a fruit-based logo on a product and prefix its name with an “i” you can convince the world to open its wallet faster than a sprinter on steroids. Or in other words, put two things together that no-one has ever done before, and some schmuck is sure to buy it, in this case "i" and a tablet computer.

Wish I’d bought Apple shares in 1993…

Recession is in recession

So, it’s over. The recession that has officially lasted 18 months (but has in reality been around for about 3 years) is now at an end. Last quarter saw a 0.1% growth in the UK economy.

0.1% growth? The only things I see growing are my council tax bill, utilities bills, fuel bills and shopping bills. So yes, some corporations are raking it in and "growing".

But me? My salary is unchanged. I still have to pay ever increasing bills. On top of that, the government keeps coming up with ever more inventive ways of increasing taxes and duties to pay back the £178bn of debt it has created and to fund £900bn of civil service pensions, not to mention Jacqui Smith's husband's porn habit.

Doubtless Brown and Darling will wobble on about how they have successfully steered us through the murky financial waters and that the Promised Land is now on the horizon. The fact that we shouldn’t have gone through the waters in the first place and shouldn’t have stayed in them for so long will soon be forgotten in a blizzard of good news spun out by this discredited government.

A statistical growth means nothing, especially an insignificant one of a tenth of a single percentage point. The country will not start to feel more confident until there is a change of Prime Minister, either from the incumbent party or preferably from a different one.

Good Service

“There is a good service operating on all London Underground lines”. This is an announcement I hear about ten times a day on the tube.

No there isn’t. There is a normal service operating. What LU means is that there aren’t any leaves on the line, snow or striking tube drivers. No trains have hit scaffolding at Aldgate. No-one has pulled a passenger emergency alarm at Baker Street. None of the customers have decided to use a Circle Line train as a one-way ticket to heaven (or hell).

A good service would be one where trains arrive every minute, there is always a free seat, there are no rabid, ranting lunatics in the same carriage and where there isn’t a chav playing crap music through the tinny speaker of their mobile phone.

Rubbish

I was under the impression that the colossal amount of money that I pay in council tax was used in part to pay for streets to be cleaned. Apparently not. As this government dreams up ever more fanciful ways to extract tax, MPs are now proposing that chewing gum, sweets and fast food be levied with additional duty in order to fund the cleaning up of the resultant litter.

This is typical New Labour thinking: rather than tackle the underlying problem, which is that there are elements of society who think that it is acceptable to drop litter on the street, let’s slap a tax on the affected products and dress it up as a solution. This also means that the Neanderthals who are prone to throwing rubbish onto the streets will have even less of a worry, because some government-employed minion will come along and clean up the mess.

Flippin’ Marvellous

News just in that after several inquiries and the expenditure of a few million pounds on reports, the proposals to revamp the MPs expenses system will be watered down to the point where almost no changes will be made whatsoever.

This includes the practice of being able to “flip” between their main constituency home and their rented accommodation in London, which means that duck houses and expensive plasma tellies will still be paid for at our expense. Also, MPs will be able to keep any profits from selling a taxpayer-funded second home. And Jacqui Smith’s husband will be able to pull his plonker to his heart’s content, safe in the knowledge that it won’t be costing him a penny.

So much for MPs listening to the electorate’s concerns. Their day of reckoning is coming soon.