Gotta love a petrol crisis

 Last year it was toilet rolls, the flour...

Now the old favourite a good old scare about petrol and, err, boom. There is no petrol. 

Can confirm out of my window a 1 mile queue to the only petrol station with any left around here currently with a very happy franchise owner no doubt. 

These crises are such a good example of the downside of the risk-cost management approach of just in time delivery. Who wants expensive stock when you can rely on 99% delivery of enough product. Only the 1% of the time is rather painful.

As to the Government, nothing can be done. If petrol stations all get emptied, then indeed there is a crisis. Saying there is no crisis just makes it worse as people second guess. The crisis subsides in a few days when the cars are full and the stations can gradually re-stock. 

Perhaps the only lesson for now is that with a shortage of HGV drivers, perhaps there does need to be a hierarchy of need to allocate our resources - food, power, petrol, public transport, ambulances - these could have some priority to available resources, but all too complicated to figure out and implement before the crisis is over. Endure it we will!

Statuesque insanity

Apart from being very tempted to crowd fund for a statue to Farage holding hands with Genghis Khan, the whole charade being played out in the UK is very dispiriting.

We have enough to deal with in terms of a pandemic, with the need for race riots and civil disorder too.

No doubt many feel strongly but the Government has to get more of a grip - solutions to that are less clear though. A bit of leadership on some uncontroversial aspects - coming out strongly against defacing war memorials etc would go some way to starting the process.

Of course the constant defeat of the left at the ballot box both in the UK and US has bequeathed us a motivated group of whingy lefties with no prospect of power. Let us not forget, power moderates as the realities of the situation sink in. Lack of political power drives people to political extremes, eventually even terrorism as we know all too well in these isles.

So now, we are facing extremists on lots of fronts, climate change, racial tensions, unions, pandemic response Whilst there is an overlap of sorts, these are one issue brigades that have become a whack-a-mole for the Government to address. Each has a list of undeliverable nonsense to try and ignore.

Meanwhile, not enough vim is being shown to counter these protests and agitators. They have the bit between their teeth, a few arrests and court appearances would temper the tantrums. More worrying yesterday was even the Met Police union critcised Cressida Dick for acting to weakly in the face of the protestors.

And of all times, now is easy, there is a pandemic with social distancing, the Government can actually take the moral high ground for once. I have not understood why they are not taking this open goals to stuff the crazies

So how bad is it?

This is the biggest unknown question at the moment  - jut how bad is Covid-19 and how bad is the economy?

Boris is back at work today, but after the scare he had you can imaginehe will be very conservative on following the health guidance.

But the Government is rapidly getting into crazy amounts of debt and the economy is ruined for a generation already. People are talking about a recession worse than 2008 (supposedly a once in two generation event) but to me it seems not really dealing with what that means.

The comparison is now crucial because it will determine the next phase. At some point lockdown will be releaxed, but I fully expect a crash in the stock markets and property prices at that time, as the damage becomes more visible.

In parrallel we will know if the end of lockdown increases the virus spread once more and by how much. It could be we get back to the early March situation very quickly, or it could be that we stabilist with it in our society but at a lower level.

Closing our economy will kill tens of thousands of people, this will only exaccerbate the curretn situation. Already hospitals are empty as people stay away, many of the 'excess' deaths reported are likely to be not Covid but people dying of strokes and heart attacks at home. Missing cancer scanning and treatment is also lethal.

Such a hard balance to get right, but to my mind the Government should press on with ending lockdown at the beginning of May to begin an assessment of the situation, following the Red/Amber/Green type strategy recommended here and elsewhere a couple of weeks ago.

Should Boris quit?

On the one hand...


- He has been found to have acted unlawfully in advising the Queen, in normal circumstances definitely a resigning issue.
- He has a majority of -43 and so does not lead a working Government.
- He has been asked to go to Brussels to ask for an extension, which he will refuse to do, further breaking the law potentially.
- His performance yesterday was over the mark, as rude as the opposition were being, he just played into their hands with his over the top rhetoric.


On the other hand...


- He took advice from the Attorney General that what he was doing was legal, really the AG should resign not the PM. There is no evidence he willingly misled the Queen, but was following protocol that the Supreme Court has retrospectively changed.
- Parliament has refused to hold a vote of no confidence, therefore he has the confidence of the House to continue as Prime Minister.
- As long as he is in No 10 he has some power to try and resist the Remain coup, out of No 10 we may find revoke or a long extension (say 2 years) being agreed by whatever Quisling they put into place as PM.


Quite a hard one to call, I think after yesterday he should quit as it stands a good chance of forcing an election which we desperately need.

UK Economy shrinks by 0.2% in Q2 2019

Quite a surprise today that the ONS has the UK economy shrinking by 0.2% in the second quarter.


Just a couple of days ago the services PMI read came out as 54.5, well above fifty and as the largest part of the economy, normally enough to carry the overall GDP numbers up.


However, a further drop in construction and also a drop in manufacturing (where stockpiling for a March Brexit boosted Q1) has been enough to see the economy slide into negative territory.


There is no much good news to be had here, with another Brexit shock due to hit in Q4 there won't be any recovery in Construction or much in Manufacturing - which is hugely hurt by the disaster of diesel car sales which disproportionately UK factories were set up to produce.


Services can help to keep the UK out of outright recession, but it will be touch and go as Politics is set to head into meltdown in September and that itself will temper optimism and business investment, as well we job hiring.


The UK really needs to go sign a Brexit deal and move on. Hard Brexit, on the back of what will already be an ailing economy now, will push us into a nasty recession. Not 2008 levels, but certainly early 90's pain.


The FTSE100 will hold up due to dollar earnings, the 250 and AIM are going to fare less well.

Goodbye, Cruel World

Just back from several trips and I see the Government are going full on Middle East dictatorship back in Blighty.


Let's ignore Brexit for a bit, as there will be plenty on that this week.


Instead, the hand-wringers in chief have been getting upset about the internet and people saying stuff on it. 'Wont someone think of the children?" is the refrain and so of course now we have a new regulatory consultation. I can see some small merit in trying to stop social media from posting terrorist vids and livestreams - who wants that? However, state security and terrorism has been used by the Government since WWII to restrict freedom - who remembers not so long ago RIPA legislation being used by councils to spy on childrens' parents to see where they lived and if they could qualify for local schools.


So, of course, the Government instead have been taking their lines from their favourite companies, Google (who employ the ex-Conservative digital guru's, natch) and Facebook. Unsurprisingly as market leaders they are really keen on regulation to defend their dominant position. They are advocating lots of control that only they have the resources to police.


The form of this proposed regulation is fairly draconian covering:


"The plans cover a range of issues that are clearly defined in law such as spreading terrorist content, child sex abuse, so-called revenge pornography, hate crimes, harassment and the sale of illegal goods.
But it also covers harmful behaviour that has a less clear legal definition such as cyber-bullying, trolling and the spread of fake news and disinformation."


So, this website will be in real trouble, hate crimes are fast becoming the UK equivalent of the US wire fraud - basically, anything the Police or your enemies want to stitch you with is a hate crime. Trolling too covers anyone leaving a comment that is a little bit mean and Fake News, well what is one person's fake news is another's facts - it is the modern world (Let's think of an immediate example, crashing out of the EU will mean medicine supplies collapse in the UK - is publishing this fake news or denying it disinformation - who decides - the Government of course!).


So fun times ahead if this gets in. Maybe we can turn this into a Gardening Blog or some such, any ideas in the comments welcome.

Things can always get worse

Overall, I am quite an optimist in life, went through a bit of a downward spell as a teenager, but since then have been more one for the sunny uplands than the everything's-going-to-hell memes.

However, I am also a strong realist, with a firm grip of what is actually happening as opposed to just hoping things might turn out to my liking. Life has a firm hand for those who only want to wish.

As such, as bad as anything gets, short of death, situations can always deteriorate as well as improve - anyone who follows my share tipping advice will, sadly, know this in spades!

So here we are today, Brexit Day minus 15 with the Country in more of a state than it has managed to date. May clings on, against all reason, with a view to pushing her deal through. Labour are just about to split further today too as Corbyn dodges or maybe evens whips against a second referendum!


Just two weeks from a very messy Brexit day. Who would have thought? Even though our current Parliament is hopeless and full of venal fools, it is amazing we have ended up here....


and yet....


The pain might still be extended with some stupid 3 month article 50 extension


May might quit and instead of Brexit we get a General Election


Parliament somehow may usurp the Government and Revoke Article 50 (Hello Mr Bercow)


We might leave with no deal and all starve within minutes (copyright Remain)


So, enjoy the rain today, somehow things are going to get worse for a bit anyway!

Gatwick!

Really, what a mess and how interesting what a small and low cost mission this has been by the interlopers.


As said in the comments to the previous thread here, it is entirely possible that several drones were pre-programmed far in advance and left to do their thing, probably ending by crashing into one of the nearby lakes so as to make evidence harder to find.


As always, it is often the small things that make the difference. Overall though, a right pain for all involved but it is not like we have not all experienced before flights being cancelled due to bad weather, crappy airlines, insolvency of airlines etc. The media reaction in a 24/7 news cycle has amused me the most, trying to get frustrated people to get angry and upset when in the main they are in fact quite phlegmatic about the situation!


So who has done it, the money from the Police is on environmental campaigners and I can see this as a possibility, but it would be wrong to rule our state actors at this stage - likely not the usual terrorists as this is a disruption attack rather than one designed to inflict injury.


Anyway, happy holidays, blogging will be light next week! The annual prediction game awaits!

- - - - - - -
PS - this has the ring of plausibility about it ...  (h/t the whole interweb  - ND)

Crisis!

It is boring writing that these days.


But still, just today we have:


- Priti Patel resigning for a failure to understand the difference between work, fundraising and holidays.


- The EU making the usual threatening noises, now purely focused on saying the UK is not offering enough money. Really, these are a nasty bunch to negotiate with and we are well shot of them in due course.


- A railway strike over literally nothing at all. No real safety issues, no staff issues and only really a silly attempt to get more pay.


- More 'scandal' over the supposed sexual mores of politicians over the past 30 years.


It is amazing how quickly a Country can fall into a such a mess when leadership is so weak. However, there is no time for a change of PM at the moment.




It is hard to know what to do, perhaps a massive re-shuffle is on order after the budget? There seem to be a few people to promote and the current cabinet are not cutting it so best maybe to go for a big change. I guess the 'sex' scandal is making it hard to know who to pick at the moment....

The EU are going to dictate Hard Brexit, our hyperventilating politicians are myopic poseurs

The Fuss over Article 50 is something to behold really. How something so meaningless can come to dominate  the national psyche, even if only for a few days?


The 'Trigger' of Brexit was the referendum, from which there is no re-tying of that Gordian knot.


The Prime Minister will have an easy majority in Parliament to pass any Article 50 Enabling Bill, it is as though everyone has forgotten the large Labour Leave support and DUP support. It is really not in doubt. Plus, failure is a confidence matter for the start of a general election that the current Government would walk with current polling.


However, the real reason it is a nonsense is the posing of the likes of Jeremy Corbyn about Single Market access and such. None of this is in our gift. We voted to Leave the EU, that means the single market and all the other pieces. The only way to keep Single Market Access is to, err, not leave the EU but to stay in all but name.


There is no mandate for this and, moreover, that is a worse position to be in than either staying or leaving fully. With leaving we go gain control of the future, by staying we keep the status quo (for now), half leaving means we get all the bad stuff of EU bureaucracy and none of the political control


The EU nations are determined from everything they have said so far to make it either a stay or go negotiation. Perhaps hoping that stance will force a second referendum or that the punishment beating handed out will deter others from the same path.


What our red lines and negotiating positions are is being really over-analysed in the current febrile environment. Once Article 50 is enabled, it will be a full exit from the EU, bar minor stuff like police information sharing. The EU won't have it any other way.


As usual, our politicians are playing on their hopes about they think people voted for. Vox pops in the country show clearly whenever I see them that Brexit voting people knew what was coming; it is just the metropolitan elite who cling to the hope that somehow that is not so. Neither do these wets realise what having the EU on the otherside of the table means.  It means business, it means walking away.

More aggressive taxing of UK business

The UK Valuations Office has slipped out a corker during the quiet summer period with the Olympics on.

From January 2015 (yes, retrospective) occupants of any building that does not have direct access between floors will be separately rated rather than treated as one joint rental. This leads to a much larger tax bill. Even if you rent and office and use the common parts, stairs/lifts etc, it won't count.

And this is retrospective. Helpfully, businesses wont knowhow much they owe until the VAO gets around to telling them.

Honestly, what a shoddy way to approach tax collection. It is highly aggressive in the extreme.

The Squeaking of the Pips

Rather worrying for many people is this latest report into the ongoing heavy handedness of HMRC. They are increasingly picking on professionals, people living in the South East and the self-employed to investigate. It seems from the Telegraph's FOI request that they are looking at over 100,000 people extra per annum.

Mainly thanks to their fancy new computer system, Connect. My worry is that Connect actually allows the fishing expeditions that the Government and Revenue say are illegal. After all they get bank statements and Land Registry information, decide that a person cannot afford their house purchase and then begin an investigation.

How is that not a fishing expedition?

I am not sat here saying people should not pay tax; after all I personally handover eye-watering sums PAYE every month. Still once a year I get asked for more for some spurious reason post handing in a self-assessment form; it always feels like a stick-up as the process and reasoning are Byzantine but failure to comply ends in a court summons and CCJ in short order.

What to make of this in the medium term though, HMRC is desperate for revenues now, what is it going to be like in the UK after the next election? The Government will be very short of money and stuck with a massive structural deficit that will require big tax rises and a larger tax take from the taxpayers.

But I fear that as you try to make the pips squeak as Labour and Conservatives are want to do, you drive away the desire for wealth creation. After all, if you can't hold on to it what was the point? The situation, for doubters, is similar to pensions today - with the State pension much safer, albeit a lower level, than the Private sector pensions which have been taxed to death, people are saving LESS for their retirement and pushing the burden more onto the state - which can be seen in our deteriorating public finance and vast increases in pensions payments over the past 4 years.

I don't know where this ends, but the future is not rosy for taxpayers or the Government.

Will they, won't they split RBS?

Politics and Banking have has an interesting relationship this past 5 years or so. What with the small matter of the Financial Crisis and part-nationalisation of major banks and full nationalisation of some smaller ones. The Poltiicians have been firmly in control, of what they know not.

The latest project to come up is what to do with RBS. Lloyds has been set forth on the road to full privitisation with a sucessful sale of shares the other month. Next year will see the Government holding whittled down to next to nothing, in plenty of time for the election, natch.

RBS presents a more worrisome challenge. The banks historic incompetencie's are vast, with a huge array of mis-selling, rigging and general lending splurge having laid waste to both its management and balance sheet. Stephen Hester did a good job of steering the bank away from the brink and now new management has the job of building for the future. The bank though is still brought low by its bad debts - a sterling job has been done to sell its non-core assets down from £350 million to more like £80 million, but the buffer that was trading profit that allowed it to balance profits and losses (well, sort of, RBS has been the least profitable of the big banks by far since 2008) has been closed down. This leaves a steadier income stream from corporate and SME banking, but a less profitable future.

So clever Mergers and Acquisitions advisors at Blackrock have been telling the Government to split the bank to make the good part easier to put back into the private sector. meanwhile the bad part can sit on government books just like Northern Wreck and slowly lose taxpayers money into the distant future. The split and sale has a positive outcome for those wishing to see deal activity and also for a stock market which likes nice easy bets, like the Royal Mail.

Also a thorny issue for the Government though is that the most under-performing part of RBS is its Ulster Bank - a part of the UK which needs help and does not need a banking crisis of sudden call in of credit lines. This issue is the main one which has driven the Government side of the need to split the bank.

From the bank side a split would be disastrous, the need to split out employees, systems and balance sheet is a hard job. So hard that Santander got bored of waiting to acquire a mere 5% of the bank and walked away from its deal to buy Williams and Glynn after 18 months. To inflict another large change on the bank would surely cripple its market focus and suck in all resources for another 2 years.

So a lot depends on the results on Friday, which should be announced with the decision about whether to make a split into a bad bank. If things have continued to turn around, perhaps the Government will leave it be, with a fig leaf of a faster closure of the investment bank or an 'internal' split of the bank, pushing its restructuring and Non Core units together. if things have nor progressed, then the dealmakers will have their day and RBS will be consigned to the same bin as Northern Rock, having turned our only to have managed to have its suspended for 5 years and then imposed after all.

How government works -1. Making tough choices.

Just how did that 'Conservatories Tax' from the previous post suddenly become a live issue?

1. Did it come from blue skies, original thinking?
2. Pass through a think tank to check the idea for its pluses and minuses.
3. Pass through a working group to examine the implications of the plan and the impact it would have on existing and future legislation ?
4. Did the idea reach a costs and benefits stage?
5. Did a feasibility study show up the practical implications of the scheme?
6. Did the PR team focus group test the idea to check how it resonated with the voters?
7. Were all the current UK legal and EU laws checked to ensure that this idea was not contradicting previous legislation?
8. Was a trial run carried out to test the plans under battlefield conditions?
9. Was all the feedback gathered from each stage, analysed, altered, reworked, rethought and re-engineered to create a precise, proven, practical law that would achieve, or even surpass its stated aims, whilst enriching and improving the lives of ordinary citizens?

For the first time BQ mp can reveal a snapshot of how big, tough, important decisions are taken by this government.

John Prescott's top fifty. {2}

Some more reasons to be thankful..

11. 85,000 more nurses

{With 100,000 more administrators in the NHS than in 1997. No go }

12. 32,000 more doctors
{ £1bn was being spent by the NHS on management consultants each year "without any clear benefit".Nowt }

13. Brought back matrons to hospital wards

{ I make the first announcement of this 1 April 2001 and the first matron to appear on a ward in Scotland October 2008. Partial credit.}

14. Devolved power to the Scottish Parliament

{? but the English have no assembly of their own.Damaged relations with Scotland. Even Tony had second thoughts.What good is it anyway? Nil}

15. Devolved power to Welsh Assembly

{Where prescription charges, student fees, hospital parking charges..etc. Divide and rule eh JP. No ball!}

16. Dads now get paternity leave of 2 weeks for the first time

{OK. Its not as if you have to pay for it though. Employers cost and admin cost.The first Paternity scheme was really rubbish too. Partial credit.}

17. NHS Direct offering free convenient patient advice

{ But closed surgeries and GP's on reduced hours on more pay for one of the biggest contract bungles ever negotiated in the history of the NHS. Instead of a doctor, go on-line, or phone a friend. Not worth it, not good enough. Nil}

18. Gift aid was worth £625 million to charities last year

{ And a lovely bit of pointless paper pushing it has been too. Could you not find a simpler way?1/2 point}

19. Restored city-wide government to London

{OK. Needed it.Full credit }

20. Record number of students in higher education { Edukashen surely? Not too many engineers or chemists or even language students in there though. A bit of a numbers game. A good attempt that is going to take 20 years more to produce anything close to your intentions. Nope} + on general education a report today says

An "unacceptably" high number of people in England cannot read, write and count properly, MPs have warned.

30 to go.

Any good ones yet folks?

John Prescott's top fifty. {1}

John Prescott has been re running the Labour top 50 achievements on his blog. I vaguely remembered it, but its suddenly popping up all over the place. Iain Dale did a link for him too. So, lets have a look at New Labour's claim to fame.

Its a long job, so well break it into bitesize chunks.

First 10.

1. Longest period of sustained low inflation since the 60s

{If you manipulate the figures,use CPI instead of RPI etc.. Plus the emergence of the Asian markets that kept prices low for a decade didn't hurt either. Low energy prices too. Hard to credit the Blair/Brown team with this so..No credit}

2 Low mortgage rates

{Oh dear.. look out the window, see where its led us. You might as well say "enjoyed an unsustainable housing boom" Score zip}

3. Introduced the National Minimum Wage and raised it to £5.35

{Good for some but not the great leap forward that is claimed. The success is at cost in employment, somewhat masked by the switch to more part time hours. Not enough space here to explain that a NATIONAL minimum wage completely ignored areas of high and low employment, relative costs of living in different parts of the country,the effect on small businesses of a constantly rising wages regardless of trading conditions etc. It is fair to say that minimum wage benefited Labour areas more than Tory ones. Nil point}

4. Record police numbers in England, Scotland and Wales.

{record numbers sure..but not on the street. The target led policing policies has done much to undermine law and order in the country. Zero pints, possibly even a minus point}

5. Cut overall crime by 35 per cent

{ But only selectively. Serious crime has risen. Violence has risen. Knife crime has risen, Drunkenness has risen.Shoplifting isn't even seriously measured . Car crime and burglary are well down. Any link to the cheap Chinese DVD player being worth £15.00 new in a box, where the Tories VHS was several hundred pounds? Ditto car manufacturers anti theft and secure audio systems? Crime is one of the areas where this government is viewed as at its weakest. Nought points}

6. Record levels of literacy and numeracy in schools

{you cannot be serious? Up to a third of 11 year-olds cannot read, write and add up properly when they leave Junior school.. Education is going to be the biggest failure of Labour's tax and throw era. Zero points}

7. Best-ever primary school results.

{ unsure how they are measured and against what, but generally people are satisfied with primary schools as learning centers and daycare facilities. and that is the real measure. Chalk up a success.What children have learnt at school is very variable. But at least a genuine effort was made to improve primary schools. Call it a credit}

8. Funding for every pupil in England to double by 2008

{Funding is an achievement? There have to be results surely? If its just employment creating then pay people to stay home. Funded by what to achieve what? Nearly 23,000 children left school without a single GCSE. Careful John, moving into PFI territory here too. Nothing given}

9. Employment went to its highest level ever.

{Long term unemployed {5 years +..which is a hell of a long term definintion} only rose. Twenty times up from 1997 . 2.7 million on a conservative estimate claiming disabilty + the 1 miilion on job seekers etc.. Ten years of relatively good economic growth should have helped to reduce the state's bill's. Instead worker's were imported to fill the positions. And the unemployment figures for 3rd quarter 2009 will rival anything the Tories managed. No joy.}

10. Written off up to 100 per cent of debt owed by poorest countries

{Good news for them. We still lend to them though? So ..? Will we have to write it off again? UK government debt, before the credit crunch was high. National Debt as a % of GDP has increased from 30% in 2002 to 37 % in 2007. This was despite the long period of economic expansion. It is primarily due to the governments decision to increase spending on health and education. There has also been a marked rise in social security spending.. With the recession it will be astronomical.}

How are they doing so far? Getting your vote?

Tory Fuel Tax Plan

The new announcement by the Tories of a fuel tax plan is at least travel in the right direction. The Tories can see the madness of extra taxes at a time of crisis and of adding to the inflation level by making fuel even more expensive that it has to be.

However, there are 2 awkward holes in the pitch as I see it:

1 - In order for this to work, it means that the Tories will have to 'pick' a 'right' price for oil. As the price of oil has increased 9x over in 10 years, this is quite a feat - beyond the best market participants. How the government is meant to know this is quite hard.
If they get this wrong this policy will seal high prices for everyone - a 40% drop in oil price will not feed through to the paying public.

2- It is playing a game with the public finances, so Labour and the Lib Dems are right to point this out. To make this a safe play, £3 billion odd of savings should be outlined - thus making this a complete win win. With current government spending far out of control, finding £3 billion should be a doddle. Perhaps start by looking here.

Iain Dale thinks it is a great idea; well, at least it is populist and not haranguing us to eat less food by the Prime Minister...

UK Politics: Tory economic policies

Quick take on this today due to work interfering somewhat with blogging. Sadly I am no Dizzy, Croydonian or Iain able to swan off to the conference for a few days...

Five main ideas stick out:



Inheritance tax threshold to £1 million; a good idea and despite what the Labour party say, it is clear that many more people in the future will be hit by this. Particularly in the South East. I don't see how this helps win the midlands and Northern marginals, but than I am no political strategist.

Moving the Stamp duty threshold to £250,000 for first time buyers; This is also a good idea, a few months ago I would have been critical as it would over-heat the housing market further, whereas this idea may now stop a real property price crash in the current challenging circumstances.

Non-Domicile's to pay £25,000; Where do I sign up to only pay £25k a year in tax? It is a good one-off idea but this is one where no one can be sure of the real amount of money this will raise. It won't put the Non-Doms off living here (cough, tested this idea on one already today so I have clearly tested this as fully as the Tories or Labour have...).

Green tax on aircraft; This idea is just a pure revenue grab like Gordon Brown's APD tax rise. People might swallow this but I hate the concept of stealth taxes and it is disappointing to see it from the Conservatives.

Finally, George Osborne announced that Tory spending plans overall would remain the same as Labour plans for the first 3 years. Oh, yeah? The economy will slow down int he next three years and the Government will receive a lot less tax receipts - so on current spending we are heading for massive borrowing or service cuts. This announcement is a hostage to fortune. One radical way to combat the sow down would be huge tax cuts across the board in the manner of George Bush.

That would be a better and braver plan.

What do you think and what one policy would you have suggested

Emergency! Red Alert! Diversion!

John Reid has come out yesterday saying that the Home Office should be split into two groups, Security and Justice. Yet another crisis is looming from this minister of Public Woe. He certainly is not a good news man, is he?

Even toady Lord Falconer, not to be titled prospective minister for Justice, has defended this idea on Andrew Marr's show this morning.

Yet, I cannot understand it. Why do you need to break the Home Office up? After all the only real reform here it to add ministerial interference by increasing the numbers of politicians wading in.

If the organisation has poor chains of command and leadership then it should be re-organised internally with new reporting structures. This is what companies like GE, Hanson, TUI and other conglomerates manage all the time.

So the issue will not be resolved by a split, only by a change of management. This whole idea is then a red herring.

I wonder why? Perhaps Guido, Iain, Praguetory and others can help enlighten us as to why the government is currently engaged in such large smokescreen initiatives.

Gordon: New World Order

Broon is in the news today giving some sort of foreign policy speech. I say sort of because it is a mish mash of vague ideas rather than anything concrete in terms of realistic policy.

Talk of reforming major international institutions is in my view pushing it for a man not even yet elected leader of a mere 5% of the world's GDP and 1% of it population.

However, what really struck me as odd was that the speech seemed to be based on a classic H G Wells novel, also titled New World Order.

In this book (skim it, it is free, short and here), Wells speaks of the horror of the world being slowly ruined up by an expanding global bureaucratic government. He writes brilliantly of class hatred basis of socialism. He was referring in the aftermath of the 2nd World War to the UN, Bretton Woods agreement and so forth. He saw socialism and collectivism as the death of Britain and the world as we know it, at the hands of dangerous revolutionaries.

Yet this is what Brown, in his vague way, is also suggesting. Clearly he wants the end of Britain than even I had thought. I think he may even have read Wells and as a socialist drawn the opposite conclusions.

Except Brown thinks world government expansion is all a good thing. More EU interference and more UN action. He says:

"you cannot meet the challenges of the future by simply building the present in
the image of the past."

What about failure of the UN at Kyoto, over Iraq, during the cold war, in child abuse scandals, the list of goes on. As for the EU, what are its great successes? How are either of these institutions in any way democratic and able to represent the wishes of British people?


But these institutions are to be our future governors, not all this messy democracy and representation that he has to put up with now.

A dangerous man is Gordo; statist, anti-democratic and without positive vision for the world. How sad I will be when he becomes our Prime Minister.