Weekend Yarn: An Almighty Fail

Yesterday I poked fun at the non-existent proof-reading skills of my roofer.  But it isn't only humble tradesmen that can come unstuck: it can happen to exalted professionals as well.  Harken to one of Old Drew's war-stories  - and mark well ... 

 *  *  *  *  *

Twenty-five years ago during the first 'Dash for Gas', a sellers' market prevailed for a while in natural gas.  One of the very largest oil-and-gas producers who shall remain nameless, let's call it *xx**,  interpreted this cyclical state of affairs as a licence for unbridled commercial arrogance, and had a juicy chunk of gas for sale.  They put it out to market, telling prospective buyers that the sale would be under the terms of a long-term contract they'd drafted themselves, and the only matter for negotiation was the price:  all other contractual aspects would be per the *xx** diktat.  

This was not the norm: such contracts are very long and generally bespoke, and the details would ordinarily be up for genuine bilateral negotiation.  Several potential buyers read the uncompromising *xx** document and politely observed that the text wasn't beyond improvement, for the benefit of all parties.  They were shown the door.  The winning bidder accordingly sent its negotiators and lawyers simply to check the agreed price had been correctly entered in the space provided, and to conduct the usual round-table proof-reading of the 250-page document.  (Half a dozen people sit there reading one page each in turn, out loud, and it is hoped that typos and other cock-ups will thereby be nailed.)

At one point during proof-reading, progress was momentarily halted when the reader of the page in question read out the phrase "... the either Party ...".  Hoho!, everyone said - that's not English, it's a cock-up!  So they solemnly eradicated the otiose "the" and completed their monotonous task.

A few years later the inevitable happened: the sellers' market became a buyers' market and this particular gas contract became horribly out-of-the-money for the buyer - so much so, the buyer got into financial difficulties and was taken over.  The acquirer of said company set the lawyers to work on the dire contract ... and what did they find?

"Change of Control:  In the event of a change of control of a Party, either Party may terminate this Agreement."

Gotcha!  And the acquirer solemnly served a termination notice.  

Of course, *xx** rushed to the courts claiming Manifest Error: obviously it should have read "the other Party".  Well, usually it would.  But, consistent with the glories of the Common Law, since both buyer and seller were big companies well able to look after themselves, the words of the contract said what they said and the court rightly threw out their case.

And indeed, that was that: with one bound, the acquirer was free of the burdensome deal.  Back at *xx** - a firm well-known for control-freakery - the very senior head of the gas division was rather publicly moved to post that (how shall we put it?) didn't represent a promotion.

There but for the Grace of God ..?  Hard to suppress a chuckle, though, in the circumstances.  Read the bloody small print!  Carefully!!

ND

Always Read The Small Print

One day when I was newly-minted one-pip in the army, one of my soldiers came to me with a form that needed initialling by an officer.  Since this happened at least twenty times a day, it was no big deal.  I could see it wasn't the usual permit for a military vehicle journey or weekend out of barracks - it was something to do with an application for a car loan - but I signed it anyway, without reading the finer details.

It came back to bite me on the bum in less than 48 hours.  I'd inadventently claimed to be "assistant paymaster or equivalent" and was in for a bollocking at Regimental HQ.  Needless to say I made a vow ... 

When, many years later, I found myself dealing ginormous energy contracts, I carried this resolution through by being the annoying negotiator who'd actually read the two-thirds of the 250-page contract that is 'legal boilerplate'.  There'd always be something being passed across in there.  It always makes me snort when advertisers and salespeople people wave airily at the "T's & C's" as if they are some quaint and meaningless decorative runes that appear by convention on ceremonial bits of paper that are scattered around like confetti to celebrate the closing of the deal.  FFS - the "T's & C's" are the deal ! 

Anyhow, to get to the point:  we are having some roofing works done at Schloss Drew, and our shortlisted contractor handed over the usual duplicating-paper sheet with illegible small-print in 6-point (grey) on the back.   Fortunately, my scanner and OCR software are up to the job, and this is just one example of what I found.

Sic !  Suffice to say, the works will be carried out under a contract of my own devising.   I imagine the said contractor (who self-evidently has no more read his own documents than any of his previous clients) will be using my version in the future - and he'll not suffer too much in the event of dispute, since I am nothing if not a reasonable person ...

ND

No change in Ireland for Brexit - or is there?

In a week where some demented person having a breakdown is merrily providing the press with all sorts of nonsense stories, reality is slow to creep back to the table.


Just as James Chapman accuses David Davis of being a part-time layabout, he comes forward with all the proposals the EU has been asking for.


Interestingly, the UK Government has chosen the strategy that I find works really well. Admit defeat, agree to the enemy demands and then see what they do. On Ireland, the proposal is that nothing much changes with the exception of some agri-tariffs.


This meets perfectly what the EU wanted; but its a nightmare for Ireland - effectively it means in theory they could end up the "The Jungle" in Ireland, either at the NI border or in NI itself.


To me this is super idea - no immigrant is going to want to hang around forever in the hideous physical and social climate of Northern Ireland - it is like our own version of the successful, but much maligned, Australian strategy of holding immigrants in an off-shore processing centre. 


So we push most of the problems back to the EU by being broadly compliant with their demands. I like this strategy, there are many ways for it to fail - basically, the EU can always be unreasonable whatever we decide to do, given we are leaving and Article 50 is triggered, but this is nice approach.


Shame everyone is too busy slagging off the entire Government to notice or to give it any credit when it does get things right.

Power Play or Shell Game?

Eyebrows should be raised as Shell moves into the power market.  Why?  Because oil companies have been proven to be crap at electricity.  That includes Shell itself first time around when they - and BP, and Total, and Statoil, and Conoco, and Amerada Hess ... - tried, and screwed it up (this was in the '90s and early 00's).

It looked so logical, so easy.  They were (and are) big, big companies - energy specialists, no less, who had done OK in the gas markets when they got started around the globe in the 80's and 90's; they knew about trading and risk-management and marketing; they had ultra-credible brand names for the sector.

At least, that's what they thought.   But, to make a long story short, similarities notwithstanding it turns out trading electricity is an order of magnitude more difficult than gas.   There have only been two non-electricity companies to make a serious fist of the power market via organic development: Centrica / British Gas and the mighty Enron, both originally gas players.  (If someone points to Gaz de France - now 'Engie' - or Gazprom's European trading vehicle GM&T, the response is that neither of these moves into power were organic.  GdF simply bought Electrabel; and GM&T hired big teams of existing power specialists (and in any event haven't made waves in the power sector).)

So now Shell are trying again.  They are sticking to the easy segment of the market - sales to industrial customers - and can probably make a go of it if they hire enough of the right people (including at the top: will they make the mistake of assuming one of the old senior oil hands can manage this electricity stuff?).  They have certainly let fly with the PR: see that mighty FT puff-piece linked above, and this gullible nonsense:

"Shell becomes latest energy disruptor: the UK’s energy industry is braced for change as the world’s second-largest oil and gas company is to supply electricity"

The FT piece (Nick Butler, natch: they obviously gave him one of those really nice lunches) is just as sycophantic: 

"Shell’s decision to sell electricity direct to industrial customers is an intelligent and creative one ... Shell has been developing an extensive range of gas assets, with more to come. In what has become a buyer’s market it is logical to get closer to the customer — establishing long-term deals that can soak up the supply ... Shell is likely to be a supplier of choice for industrial and commercial consumers and potentially capable of shaping prices"

Ho hum, let's see how they do.  "Soaking up supply" is a crass business concept in a commodity market.  "Supplier of choice"?  In yer dreams, Shell.  "Shaping prices"?  Nope, just selling on price to buy market share, like any other new entrant in a commodity sector.  When Gazprom entered the industrial market they needed to take a massive haircut as buyers simply laughed and pocketed the windfall while it lasted - which in their case was several years.  Butler actually admits as much: "prices presumably set at a discount to the market". 

Yup. A short-lived price war.  Not so much a disruption as a harmless diversion.   

ND

Those Oh-So-Rational Germans

A primary go-to website for energy buffs is the excellent Energy Matters blog run by Euan Mearns and Roger Andrews, two first-rate analysts who somehow find time to keep their tremendous material pumping out for free.  Go and have a poke around, if you haven't been there before.  One of their regular features is a handy news round-up each week, from which we obtain this neat evidence of collective madness in Germany.

Yes, (a) the Germans are big fans of their ridiculous 'energy policy' (which sees them paying extravagant electricity prices), and at the same time (b) German CO2 emissions continue to rise.  Expensive and futile virtue-signalling by anyone's standards.

I am sure Greek citizens are equally delighted that their economy is in thrall to German bankers. 

(Meanwhile, in other news Cuadrilla et al are on the march and the shale drilling is underway in N.England ...)

ND

Buzzfeed Brexit review

Normally a vocal part of the daily remain, Buzzfeed has hot off the press a new, large-scale, study into peoples views on Brexit.


It makes poor reading for remainers - after filtering out the mostly contradictory statements which people want as their preferred Brexit, it finds that UKIP and Tories are for a 'Hard Brexit', whilst the Labour and others are split 60/40 in favour of a 'Soft Brexit.'


So this means that the majority prefer a Hard Brexit option in the Country over a soft one and there is really very little appetite for re-running the whole thing as the London Media and Chatterati are endlessly suggesting should happen.


It just goes to show, it really is hard to make people change their minds and that in addition, taking the side of the Elite and Entitled just won't work. For these reasons, Brexit is happening - this is the realisation that keeps both May and Corbyn ignoring the media chatterati; because at the end of the day they have to face the people again one day and need to be seen to be on the side of the people.


So what is the current view, what Brexit are we going to get?

Nuclear War - the world should make this avoidable

It is really quite worrying that this is being discussed.


What lesson should we really learn, to me the obvious one is that we desperately need the UN Security Council to have more muscle.


North Korea should have been stopped from getting hold of Nuclear Weapons, history has shown us that they are very safe in a MAD environment when controlled by sane Governments. North Korea is not sane, never has been - not an adult country that can be trusted with Nukes.


The list of countries like this is quite long, but not overly so. Few societies manage to fail so spectacularly over such a long-period of time, although being communist tends to be a strong marker for this.


The next on my list is Pakistan, utterly corrupt country and culture with religious extremism thrown in too and an existential fear of India. Only then would we get to the likes of Iran.


However, surely North Korea shows that the sanctions process is very key over the longer term - Iraq, with hindsight, even proves that.


I do wonder now that the hell China is going to do in the current circumstances - after all without Chinese help North Korea would still be a peasant state instead of nuclear armed terror threat. It is hard to know as I guess there is potential for China to like the idea of the North eliminating its rivals in South Korea and Japan - equally though, in statecraft the Chinese operate effectively over decades and are useless when things have to be done over days or weeks. A tricky situation indeed, the US is out of the game now, as any sate is when threatened with MAD.

Rights and respobsibilites - online fraud and the security war

Quite interesting, and I dare say, courageous, for the CEO of RBS to come out today and complain about his own customers.


I may be being a little partial, but he basically says they are stupid, fall for obvious scams and as such should not be recompensed.


It is very hard to have much sympathy for RBS  - after all, they managed to blow, er, £48 billion on stupid scams and lending which then then asked the taxpayer to bail out with no hope of ever seeing the money again.


So RBS do not start from a good place to preach. However, it is a growing scandal as to how much banks spend on compensating customers for online fraud, well over £1 billion a year in the UK.


There is a balance to be struck, no one wants to have to remember several passwords and use two or three key input devices in order to access their online accounts; on the other hand, the light touch access is easily hacked.


Online crime must surely be the fastest growing type of crime in the world alongside people trafficking in 2017.


So where does the line lie? It can't be right that people hand over their details to strangers or transfer money to strangers and the bank picks up the tab every time. There is a level of responsibility. On the other hand, people get conned, part the job of the bank is to stop this happening to their valued customers.


It is hard, just last week I was called by a guy who was referencing people I knew, telling me about his company and project and then subtlety asking for some key details from myself. It was a very high level scam (called Spear Phishing apparently) where quite some effort had gone into researching my background and contacts ( I would guess through linked-in). Only some tough questioning on my part made them hang-up the phone. The scammers are getting better and better and the Banks must be really worried about how they can keep up in the security war.


I am still not convinced blaming the customers is the answer, but it shows how worried the Banks are.

The Impact of 'Police Cuts' Down My Way

A peaceful Saturday morning in the suburbs - but what's this?  Three squad cars turn up, one after another - has a fight broken out in the florists?  Terror in the trattoria?

Details obscured to protect the, ahem, innocent ...

The clue lies above the shopfront with the red awning.  Yes, it's a(nother) coffee morning for the boys and girls in blue.  Like every other morning of the week around here, save the Lord's Day.  And tea in the afternoons.

The percentage of the total patrolling force in this neck of the woods represented by 3 cars-worth at this time of day must be pretty high.  But I'm sure the local commander has bemoaned the impact of budget cuts upon his ability to patrol the streets as he'd like.  

So here's a suggestion ...

ND

BBC Online - Part 2

 

  As we saw here, the BBC IS a world leader in news reporting. BBC Worldwide is watched in hotels worldwide. 350 million people a week are reportedly watching some content from the various BBC world channels and programmes made.
Its very, very worthy. Equally as worthy and dull as CNN worldwide. The bland leading the bland.

Closer to home BBc News has dropped huge market share since the digital revolution and the rise of workable, readable smart phones. 3-4% year on year decline since 2012. Predicted 25-30% decline in viewers watching any TV news by 2022. And those that are watching are averaging 61 years of age. 

So to retain market share, online focus must be the future. The man or woman sitting behind a desk format is coming to an end. Which is just as well as TV channels have exhausted the ways of showing the same thing.
 Person behind desk. Phone on desk. No phone. Laptop on desk. Spindly glass desk showing persons legs. Person in front of desk. Balanced on a high stool with no desk. Filmed side on, instead of to camera.. Sitting on a low comfy sofa facing a digital screen. Desk in the middle of a glass box 360* panoramic swiveling. There's really only under the desk and lying flat on the sofa with a bowl of nachos left.

Back to the BBC.

This self censorship is seriously damaging their brand. Because of the politically correct attempts to avoid mention of race or religion in any way, means some news items make no sense at all when read on the BBC website.

During the French election there was a story about riots by French schoolchildren. Secondary school age kids were blockading and threatening to burn down schools. Bizarre. 
The piece suggested this would help Le Pen. 

There was no indication of why this would help Le Pen. No clue at all.
 On further investigation elsewhere the story was about a black boy, who claimed he was caught and raped by the French police with a police baton  This led to the rioting in the black areas of Paris. With a few kids on social media calling for protest and the barricading of streets and schools. 

Essentially, this was a race story. Disaffected banileue youth. Policing, tensions and immigration.
And that's why it would it was thought to favour Le Pen.
Later on the BBc expanded the story and it was reported with context. And made much more sense. But it was a few days on.

A more recent story was the GTA gang in Moscow. 3 defendants killed in courtroom escape bid.
In the BBC piece it emerged that the gang were suspected of killing 17, unrelated, motorists on the roads outside Moscow. For no reason. Over a long period of time. 
Cars had their tires blown with homemade traps. And the occupants murdered. No robbery took place.

What the ..? What's going on here?

The very last sentence of the piece gives a clue. 

One of them had fought for so-called Islamic State in Syria before returning to Russia, Russian television reported.

And going anywhere else reveals this is not a bandit gang story at all. Its a terrorist story. An Islamic state terror group are committing the killings. That's the motive. Killing unbelievers.




On other news sites this is immediately apparent. So why was it not made clear? 
This strange decision to hide facts. Race and religion should not be mentioned. 
Even if it is extremely important to the story.

This is without all the other odd, impersonal noun, choices the wider media have been making recently. 

Truck kills ten on London Bridge.

Women wounded by knife in German supermarket.

Strange choice to make.

 And another reason not to ever bother sitting down to the main news at ten. 
With the solemn woman sat behind/in/on/adjacent to/under/suspended above/ or just flopped on a beanbag beside the desk.

***

All the news that's fit to print. 

New York Times masthead.

All the news deemed fit to print 

Updated millennial masthead ?

Is BBC online Pravda ? Or the Sunday Times Style Magazine

My real issue with the very extensive and incredibly wide ranging BBC Online, Your BBC website of news and sport, is that it isn't very good at informing.
Its pretty good at reporting the news. But just reporting it. Not explaining it. Or contextualizing it. Or investigating it.

Sure, its a supremely slick web page. The latest news is analytically promoted to appear as the top item in search browsers. There is news. Weather. Sport. Politics. Human Interest. Charity. A bit of Religion. A lot of Royal.
World news. Arts. Business. Science. Popular culture. Newspaper headlines. Tech stories. Schools, education and children's news. 

{which is a very good service. Costly for the Beeb to produce. But kids do have a grasp of news they would not otherwise have because of Newsbeat and Newsround.}

Plenty of minority content. UK regional content picked up at great expense and available to view. 
Individual, devolved home nation news, produced  in languages people don't even speak. 
Endless BBC self promotion stories and plugs and the whole webpage, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news links together BBC television, radio and iplayer content.

But, my complaint has long been, although the BBC has the width of a lake, it has the depth of a puddle.

  That is not say BBCOnline isn't quality. A visit to CNN or Fox or Russia Today shows a much inferior content and  navigation web page.
But they don't have the licence fee cash cow. Not the £-billions that the BBC pours into its online and worldwide content. So the BBC should be the best.

The BBc is a great stater page. But it isn't a newspaper. Its not even an informed blog. Its more a colour magazine. Flip through and look at the pictures. A taster for news and issues. A news precis. A guide to whether its worth seeking out further information.

An example would be the current EU airport security checks: Holidaymakers 'face long delays'
Reading the story informs the reader about long delays. Explains that it is new passport readers adding to the time to check. Tells the tale of EU increasing regualtion at borders, to combat terrorism.
Has plenty of comment from airline chiefs and the tourist board. And delayed passengers.
And concludes at the very end that the delays seem to have vanished. So its already a non-story.
A perfect, quick and simple, modern newspaper clickbait online type story. Snips and quote cuts and a modicum of redrafting. With a banner headline and a sad picture. 
Its only lacking - 
'10 incredible things holiday makers packed in their suitcases. You won't believe number 6 !"

There is no mention of why the process takes longer. Of the fact the hugely expensive new scanning machines don't tell the passenger which way up to place the passport. So failing to work. 
No mention of perhaps the customs should have had more staff for a new process at the start of the holiday season. Or why the EU, with its no compromise ever - no way- no deals on no-borders, or freedom of movement, suddenly felt the need to strengthen border controls.

Its just a collection of statements from interested parties. And that is fine. The BBC prides itself on holding no opinions. And its why if you want to know more, you have to go elsewhere.


It reminds me of watching Tomorrow's World with my best friend's dad. He was a nuclear physicist. 

He once told us kids, sat on the floor in front of the small, fat, telly, that if you had no idea of the subject it all seemed plausible and informative. But if the Tomorrow team strayed into his field, it was clear their discussion and explanations were laughably simple.

"Its quite easy to forget they are just actors. If you don't have any knowledge of what they are talking about."

Compo Results: & a Brief Summer Book Review

(1) Brief Book Review

The Turing Guide  - 33 contributing authors (Oxford, 546 pp)

Alan Turing was one of the foremost geniuses of the 20th C.  Many will know something, if only vaguely, of his mighty contributions to maths, computing and AI, and to codebreaking during WW2.  This book details all of that and a great deal more, in as much technical / mathematical detail as you can stand: but because it's in 42 chunks (meaty chunks, it must be said), it is also quite straightforward to bite off something digestible on anything that piques your interest.

And there's plenty to choose from (did you know Turing was a pioneer in mathematical biology?)  I could imagine most C@W readers will be more concerned to learn about his WW2 exploits than, say, his 'gay martyrdom'.  Several of the contributors reckon Turing was personally instrumental in shortening, if not actually winning, the war.  Single-handedly?  No: notwithstanding a strong strand of idolisation of the man, the book does not fail to record in detail the efforts and mind-blowing achievements of half a dozen other outright geniuses at Bletchley Park and beyond, most of whom sadly are little-known today.  Riveting stuff.

(2) Compo

A most enjoyable set of car names.  But our Anons must realise - prizes are only awarded to folks willing to give themselves a name too!  So - nothing for the Ferrari Tosserati, nor for the Kia Thornberry.  Instead, it's

• Bronze (wins a test drive in the Thornberry):  Mr BQ, Renault Smug 
• Silver (a test drive in the Tosserati) - with special commendation for its accompanying spec - Kev, and his Mercedes Benz Diana
• Gold:  Steven L, LOTUS FARAGE  - a real guzzler of a motor, roaring along and belching smoke.  (a day trip to Aberdeen)

ND 

Naming a Car in Eco-Sensitive 2017

Just when you thought that everyone and everything had to big up their 'green' credentials, when Jeremy Clarkson was beyond the pale, when the snowflakes of Generation Wuss had to be appeased at every turn ...

Yup, Ford is calling its new 'executive' flagship  -  wait for it  -  the Nero !

Great choice!  "Unique dark accents ... highest expression of luxury".  Here's Wiki on what might inform the buying public's subliminal associations of the moniker. 

Nero's rule is usually associated with tyranny and extravagance; his more infamous executions include that of his mother.  Most Roman sources, such as Suetonius and Cassius Dio, offer overwhelmingly negative assessments of his personality and reign; Tacitus claims that the Roman people thought him compulsive and corrupt. Many Romans believed that the Great Fire of Rome was instigated by Nero to clear the way for his planned palatial complex, the Domus Aurea. He was said to have seized Christians as scapegoats for the fire and burned them alive, seemingly motivated not by public justice but by personal cruelty.

I think we can imagine the kind of bastard who'll want one of those - and what his driving habits are likely to be.  For their next trick, apparently Ford intend to call a new SUV the Trump ...

What other evocative car names can C@W come up with?  Answers on the usual postcard, please, with a small award for the best.

ND

Chloirnated Chicken. Have it YOUR way !

A month of Sundaes

Back in the mists of time, when the snowflake generation's parents were children themselves, a transformation occurred. Along with globalisation and council house ownership, cruise missiles and 'Big Bang' came the mini Americanisation of the UK.

Councils tried to ban McDonalds and the broadsheets derided the vacuousness and sexuality of MTV over the old Grey Whistle test.

But the public were queuing in long lines for a taste of 'the exotic'

Baskin Robbins 31 flavours had arrived in the UK. 

31 flavours was inconceivable. Everyone knew there were only four. 

Chocolate, strawberry, vanilla and a block containing all three for very special occasions.

 

The sound of the ice cream bells signified summer. Mr Whippy had a decent range and prices for ice lollies. But ice cream was vanilla. With different sauces. And a flake. And those ice creams were really expensive. More in real terms then, than they are now.

So people made it a mission to see what these extraordinary flavours could possibly be. Banana? Maybe Black Cherry..like in the SKI yogurts! Families loaded up the car and set off to find out. 

My Mother, always keen to embrace new foods, took us all. Her, three kids, and her mum. And we queued for an hour.

 

The whole queue outside the tiny Baskins were 'ohhing and ahhing'.

In the style of Peter Kay: 

"You kids..stop messing about or you'll get nothing. It won't be long now..Go and look at the board again..Do they have FAB? We've not queued up for ice lolly. What ice cream do you want. Rum and raisin ?..You can't have rum. You're only nine! Choose another..And not beer flavour, neither..

Jamoca? Jam and Ocha? What's that about?

What you having Mum? They've got Almond BonBon..You like Bon Bons, don't you.?  Almond..Not Strawberry, don't look like...Look up front. That's Beryl from the bakers. What's she getting? Mint Chocolate and Chips, did she say? She's always a bit funny, that one..In a waffle cone too..Ohh, get her, posh cow!

What you having Nan?..Praline 'N cream.. 'N cream it says. No idea ..what 'N is, no..Neapolitan? Ok..Pick another..there's plenty more..What's that? ..Bubblegum? With your dentures? I'm not having you chewing ice-cream all the way home...Try again, Nan..
Vanilla? We can get vanilla in shop! ..It's in the freezer with the crispy pancakes. Vanilla! What about Mango Tango? No.. Or Pistachio ? I don't know what it is....Its green. Looks like mushy pea flavour. No..  No ..Just vanilla..with a flake, you say..Ok Nan..With no chips..Ok pet.."

What has any of this to do with a USA trade deal and chlorinated chicken?

Simply that the most consumer focused, most 'can-do' and most litigious nation on the planet will sell us what we want to have and make damned sure they can't be sued for giving it to us.

The USA is not the EU demanding we follow diktat number 11/44k-sii'#2 - regulated size and depth agreement of ice cream tub for retail/wholesale, but non domestic, non hospitality purpose.

If we don't want chlorinated chicken, we won't have it. They will sell us, what we, the customer, wants to buy. As the interview between the BBC's impoverished Emily Maitlis and  Trump's spinner Anthony Scamucci revealed. He looked bemused when she brought the remoaner's fallback defence line of 'foreign chicken.'

The man from the nation of 'Have it your way! You choose!' seemed bemused she even raised the question. He admitted he didn't know the details regarding EU agriculture and US agriculture laws

From a country that had drive thru ATMs before we even had walk up ATMs, and the two hundred channel TV when we had only three,  it would be odd that if we wanted a specific item, in a specific way, that they wouldn't be able to give it to us. 

OR

Won't be able to give us something else that we really do want in order to allow them to sell us their chicken as it is.

That's what trade deals are. 

Gove is Causing Mayhem: A Pointer

Well alright, au fond it's May's weakness that is causing mayhem - but the form it seems to be taking just now is Gove's increasingly reckless leadership manoeuvres.

First, we are plausibly told, Murdoch required that May take Gove back on board.  A conspiracy theory, I realise, but hard to disbelieve.  With his Murdoch-mandate for a putsch in his back pocket, how is he to make progress, when it has been generally agreed between the circling barons and their factions that Now Is Not The Time?  Answer: to stake out noisily the old pre-2010 Cameroonian position.  Brand-detoxification + husky-hugging.

His pretext?  In the present state of cabinet anarchy he barely needs one.  But he was handed one on a plate when (as we are told**) May's new chief-of-staff Gavin Barwell instructed cabinet members to come up with policy initiatives that don't cost any money (not itself a bad idea, as Mr Quango has pointed out).  Sajid Javid - another wannabe who's keen to be in the news - rushed in with his house-lease intervention.

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2016/07/the-genius-that-is-gove.html

 

But Gove has outshone everyone with two crass, would-be populist performances in as many days.  Yesterday - in a move that must have been, ooh, at least a week or so in the hatching - he came up with the banning of new internal combustion engines by 2040 - the French wheeze.  Did he think that'll cost nothing for a year or two?  Only if the greens and red-greens stupidly let it lie quietly where it fell: but that's not what happened on Day 1, when the universal cries were: 'too little, too late', 'it's the air pollution Right Now, stupid', and 'watchergonnadoaboudit?'  As well as opportunistic secondary themes such as - 'don't just dump it on the local authorities'.

(And all this was before the 1 O'Clock News, which tells us the opposition is thinking quickly on its feet, even during the silly season.  And, of course, they have the BBC firmly in tow.  These are dangerous political times for Tories.)

But the day before that, Gove himself did some 'quick thinking on his feet' - and came out against chlorinated chicken!  Talk about swallowing the enemy's agenda.  The Remainders must have been overjoyed: their tactic for undermining a US-UK trade deal by guessing what'll be in it and demanding pre-emptive red lines has paid off on its first outing - and there's plenty more where that came from.  GM food will be next, mark my words.  And of course 'anything produced using gas that was fracked '.  (Oh, and the 'chicken' thing deflected attention from Corbyn's woes over repaying student grants).  Well Done, Michael.

We'll come back to electric cars another day: it's a technical issue as intractable as the electrification of trains and space-heating we considered at the weekend.  In the meantime, let me leave you with one other point to watch out for.   Gove and Barwell are best buddies.  You heard it here first.

ND 

_____________
** I have looked for this story, which was in the papers or on the news recently, but can't find the link.  Sorry.
Cartoon: Stephen Collins www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/cartoon/2012/mar/16/1 (detail)

Leasing Houses

OK, we all know what's going on here:

• every company on the planet from Microsoft downwards is trying to find ways of setting up reliable income streams (rather than just a one-off sales-price)  -  an 'annuity stream' of good quality is highly bankable, and raises the share price.  House-builders are no different

• anyone signing up for a rising / indexed / variable ground-rent & lease-related charges has a lousy lawyer, and/or is bonkers or stupid (or ought to be discounting the house price heavily)  

• but caveat emptor can't be the whole story in the real world: people are indeed badly advised / ignorant / bonkers / lazy / irrational etc and - sadly - need to be saved from themselves in some circumstances

• oh, and May has asked all departments for zero-cost initiatives to be seen to be doing something popular

So - does the C@W crew reckon dodgy leases on houses is one such case where the punter needs protection?  Or is the government meddling where it's not needed, thanks - just Sajid Javid responding to May's call?   

Answers on a postcard below ...

ND

The Long March

The Marxist Antonio Gramsci famously advocated advancing the revolution by undertaking a 'long march through the institutions'.  They've been at it for decades, of course, and over the weekend there was a little snapshot of their progress.

Sixty-six of the world’s leading minds were announced as Fellows of the British Academy ... the very best of humanities and social sciences research.  This year’s new Fellows are experts in subjects ranging from feminist theory to the economic development of Africa ... The British Academy’s newest cohort of Fellows also reflects the growing diversity of research in the UK. The proportion of women elected to the Fellowship has doubled in the last five years. This year, 38% of the new Fellows are women, exceeding the 24% share of female Professors in UK universities.

Sounds exciting.  What have these folks been researching?  Here are some extracts.  For the avoidance of doubt, I haven't made up any of this.   Well, you couldn't make it up - could you? 

Young women and mass media, feminist theory, gender and popular culture, British fashion industry, creative economy, fashion start-ups and micro-enterprises in the urban environment

Theory and politics of multiculturalism, secularism, Islamophobia, racial equality; sociology of ethnic minorities in higher education and employment; with special reference to Muslims in Western Europe

Inequality in education and labour market outcomes, educational efficiency, school and teacher effectiveness, social mobility 

Fundamental rights, interdisciplinary studies of law, gender studies, critical and feminist legal theory 

Colonialism and post-colonialism; civil wars and extreme violence in Africa; political violence and political justice; decolonization of the university and higher education; war on terror 

Comparative welfare state studies; social policies and gender inequality; theorisation and measurement of contemporary poverty; family policies within a comparative perspective; social care in contemporary states and societies; European Union social policy 

Legal recognition of family ties, the consequences of relationship breakdown, and experiences of the family justice system 

Inequality, wage structures, minimum wages; peer effects; the economics of migration 

Feminism in philosophy 

Contemporary social and cultural geography; agri-food studies; moral economies and consumer practice 

Language and migration; new dialects; multicultural youth language; language and social structure; sociolinguistics of West Africa 

Global development and social change; issues of inequality, gender, environmental sustainability, health and infectious disease in Africa and beyond; interfaces between social science, science and policy

ND

Everyone's Favourite Topic: Trains

Well, OK probably the weather - but trains run it a close second.

This past week something quite significant happened: the government scrapped plans to electrify the tracks in areas across Wales, the West Midlands and further up the West Coast.  Cue outrage from the greenies.

Why significant?  Because electricification is the only known strategy for getting anywhere near the UK's decarbonisation "legally binding targets" of 57% by 2030, 80% by 2050.  Electrification of transport and (even more dramatically), of space-heating, see below.  Most eyes - and subsidies - have been on decarbonisation of power generation thus far, because it's the easy target.  But transport (= oil) is about a third of our energy consumption and space-heating (= gas) another third.  So, the theory goes, when you've figured out how to de-carb power generation, you shift as much as possible of transport and heating onto the leccy.  Simples.

Accepting that 2050 is a long time in the future, you'd still expect government to be plodding methodically in that direction if it had these targets as a serious policy priority.  Around these parts we all know, don't we, that GDP trumps GHG - so we're less surprised.  But hard evidence of this important political principle is always interesting to come by.

Notwithstanding what a great topic trains is (cue our good friend Kev ...), space-heating is a really juicy one for fans of irrational policy-making.  Above is a graphic from the really quite diligent Energy Technologies Institute which crunches a lot of numbers on these matters.  The dark bands at the bottom is energy capacity used in the form of electricity in this country through a particular year (it's 2010, for reference).  A bit more in winter months than in summer.  And proving very difficult to decarbonise.

Now look at the red plot - that's energy capacity required for space-heating, largely gas-fuelled.  What kind of expansion in the grid will we require to switch from gas to electricity?  How will it cope with those winter peaks?  How much will need to be spent on replacing 20 million-odd old boilers?  Paid for by whom?   etc etc etc.

In the immortal words of ISIRTA: "I'm sorry, it can't be done!"  And I think the government knows it.

ND

Interest Only mortgages - a scam from the city?

Real non-story in the FT today.


Under their usual remoaning headline of course.


With PPI coming to an end there is an industry of ambulance chasers looking for some more victims.

Here the 'victims' are people with interest-only mortgages.




Given that property prices in the UK have followed a pattern, see graph above, why would anyone ever care about not repaying the principal?
You will always over time have a capital gain bigger than your mortgage, normally over 20 years by at least 100%.


You have to be historically unlucky, taking out a large mortgage right at a market top, to not manage to make a capital gain over 10 years, let alone 20 years.


This is just a non-issue. In fact I would consider it back to front - surely the scam is making people re-pay mortgages and forfeit their wealth for no reason when they are earning more in their property anyway? That must be the real scam, how much money the banks make on excessive interest rate charges on secured lending. All pushed even harder by the FCA since 2009!

BBC Salaries explained

BBC reveal the salaries of their top talent.

To inevitable controversy.

A spokesperson for the BBc contacted C@W to explain.

 "We compete for those first class Remainers in a very competitive market.
Whilst it is true that many of the leading Remainers would work for the Remain supporting, EU loving, BBC for less than they might at the evil Murdochian SKY, it would be unfair not to give these Remoaners the sorts of sums they, and we, feel they should have.

A commercial environment can be very competitive, so I'm told. I have no idea as I work for the public sector BBC. 

But assuming that commercial rates do have an impact, you can see that the BBC needs to pay the very best to attract the best Remoaners out there.

I mean, we would love to have Jon Snow. Love too! Openly Anti-Tory. The very personification of the Guardian. But we just cannot match the significant package that he gets at C4.
You see, Channel 4 is a major source of Remainer, Anti-Brexit media people competition for the BBC. We have to try and keep as near as possible to the vast salaries they pay themselves, just to hang on to our own Europhiles. Like Gary Lineker. John Humphrys. David Dimbleby. Laura Kuenssberg. We simply have to pay them huge sums to keep them. Have too!

And our, ahem..I mean ..your top talent are left wing too. Which is wonderful. 

But as you must be aware, the rise of Corbyn has caused a shift in political allegiance.
It used to be axiomatic that all potential BBC 'talent,' in the arts. Comedy. Literature. Academia. News. Sport, and social affairs, were lefties. And they would be ardently pro-EU.

But since Corbyn, senior left wing media people cannot be assumed to be signed up European Federalists!
This obviously puts a premium on the totally committed, 'ignore the referendum', Remainers, we already have.
Graham Norton, Claudia Winkleman, Chris Evans. Fiona Bruce, Andrew Marr, and political editor Laura Kuenssberg.Huw Edwards. NickyCampbell. Its people like these we must retain.

And anyway, the EU does make a significant contribution to these elite virtue signalers salaries. So in a way, it doesn't cost the public anything at all.

Unless you want to bring up that old chestnut that EU money is somehow just taxpayer's money redistributed. With an admin fee taken out."

If you wish to receive BBC content contact  http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/ and make an annual payment of £147.00.
If you do not wish to receive BBC content you must still make an annual payment of £147.00 anyway.

Interesting; Brexit Migration Map

Bending The Rules for Saudi Aramco

You gotta laugh at all the gnashing of teeth as the City gears up to change the rules for "sovereign-owned" flotations - manifestly, to win the Aramco business.

Many months ago I wrote: 

the government now needs to conduct itself as if we were at war. Yes, it's big and serious! Full attention and maximum effort required on all fronts. Melt down some of the family silver. Tighten the belt. Grown-ups to the front. Now is the hour.

and

... there'll be many a dark deed done on the road to a successful escape from the clutches of the Commission. It gladdens the heart to see that some proper pragmatists are settling down to their three-year-long task of doing Whatever It Takes. 

Frankly it wouldn't surprise me to see Gib and the Falklands 'sold' as this one pans out.

ND 

Uherd - will this work?

Enough of meaty topics this week!


Since I started blogging, I have always had time for Tim Montgomerie - perhaps this is related to him making time for me!


His new news venture is an interesting one, having left The Times. He intends to have a long-piece magazine-style website, not focusing on short-term themes. He certainly has lined up an, err, interesting mix of writers contributing.


The first topic, of the influence of rolling news and social media is an interesting one - if a little rhetorical - of course rolling news and social media are affecting the government - we can all see Jeremy Corbyn FFS!.


Perhaps some light will be drawn as to what exactly we are supposed to do about this, but I am less convinced when you get Alistair Campbell, the arch-creator of this mess, to opine from afar.


However, does the world need another alternative to the Spectator - indeed, can something like this work? I kind of hope so, because with news commentary declining in relevance and readership I do see around me that people are becoming less informed about the facts of the world than we previously the case.


Am I right to think that or just getting old?

UK economy is still going Japanese

We warned on here many, many years ago that the policy prescriptions coming out of the Great Recession would induce a Japan like coma on the UK economy.


High levels of quantitative easing and low inflation would lead to an investment strike and a huge debt over-hang simultaneously on the public and private sector balance sheet.


Low, it has come to pass.


Today's good news, of the unemployment rate dropping to 4.2% is sadly not the triumph that it should be for the UK economy. Due to low investment by corporates, the productivity of UK workers is low and still below 2007 figures in 2017 - 10 years of effectively no productivity growth at all!


As a result of this, it is unsurprising that wage growth is so low - companies are not making extra returns on their staff and so cannot reward them with more pay for the same productivity.


Adding to this, massive immigration supplies plenty of low wage workers, so that less business investment is made and there are more people with which to share the slowly growing GDP (hence GDP per capita has also grown only 2% since 2006, and only 4% from the 2009 trough!).


At the moment, this feels worse as the Brexit induced currency fall in Sterling has also pushed inflation to 2.4% - ahead of wage growth. No wonder Jeremy Corbyn is riding high, it is a time of economic malaise (not a crisis, but not nice either!).


Of course, this could be Japan or the UK in terms of the economic issues - the Bank of England has seemingly little room to move, keeping interest rates low and the QE piled up.


There is though a chance to change. We need desperately now to end QE which is no longer the prescription for our 2017 economy - it went to far in 2011 anyway. Ending QE will raise interest rates and harm the housing market - but will improve the saving rate for younger people and will encourage older people to spend - like they used to, in a normal economy.


Also essential is a continuation of the lowering of income tax to help generate demand. The continued Brexit issues may help in an odd way - the low currency effect will stimulate also demand, as will the now small growth the EU has managed to spark with its own ill-thought out QE program.


If we had not already reached £1.7 trillion of debt, there would be a fiscal loosening room too, but we don't have that luxury when we need to reduce QE as it is.

The Blarney

OK, so I am in Ireland just now, working (as ever) on an energy project, which requires me to grapple with the electricity market rules that will be coming into effect in a year or so when the two parts of the overall Irish grid system (North and Republic) harmonise into a single market regime.  Needless to say, this will be broadly along the lines pioneered in the rest of Great Britain nearly 20 years ago, with some very excellent new Irish twists, such as: wind farms must take their chances in to grid along with everyone else, and pay for their own imbalances.  Fair play to the lads! - we could benefit from that here.

Anyhow, as always, the rules are extremely complex, so the designated market operator 'SEMO' has kindly provided a handy guide: "Imbalance Settlement Plain English Version".

And here's an extract (I think it's in gaelic).

Still, that is the simplified version, as they say.  Wish me luck, boys, I'm going in ...

ND

Fabian Phil

 

Philip Hammond is still advocating the very slow, almost glacial exit of the UK from the EU.
A google search reveals that Spreadsheet Phil likes to bring up the transitional arrangement about once a fortnight. And he has been doing so since November 2016.

Mr Hammond must be buoyed by the EU-funded C.B.I, the Confederation of Brussels Industrialists, wailing that an end to the uninhibited movement of goods will cause a 1929 recession and end the world. The CBI much prefers a more nuanced and slower exit. No cliff edge. 
Instead the UK gradually removes itself from the current EU arrangements and languidly replaces  them with new arrangements, that are in effect identical. 
Except they will have a different title and be contained in a different coloured folder. And will undoubtedly be slightly or even significantly worse than the current agreements that the UK has with the European Union.

Chancellor and hostage survivor Philip Hammond is very much in favour of a leisurely transitional Brexit. A process that he would be happy if it took anything from three years, to five years, to five hundred years.
 Mr Hammond is the great hope for Remain. 

Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus, was a Roman general who fought Hannibal. At the time Roman armies were being destroyed by the invading Carthaginian forces. Each new legion created, met with defeat and panic ensued across the Roman republic.
Quintus developed the strategy of guerilla warfare. Harassing the invaders, without engaging them directly. Conserving his own forces whilst whittling down the enemy. 
Quintus understood he could not defeat the enemy head on. But he could slow them down. Giving time for his untrained army to develop. He realised that trading space for time, could be a winning tactic.

His fellow Romans were incensed with him. This wasn't how Romans fought! Hiding in bushes and running away after each javelin throw. They  added the name 'Cunctator' to his titles. 
Cunctator translates roughly from the Latin as  'To Linger' or to 'Delay.' 

Quintus The Delayer. Ultimately this originally unpromising senator, unlikely military hero,  defeated the Carthaginians and became dictator of Rome.A national hero.  He was revered and celebrated in history long after his death. Fabian Strategy has survived the 2000 years since his death and is still a term in use today. The word Fabian is derived directly from his achievements.

'Fabian Phil' must be aware that if we remain after the end of the negotiations, on a transitional deal, that we would still be subject to EU regulation. Still required to make payments to the EU of a similar, or larger amount than we do now. That we could not begin to make new trade deals on our own. That we would still be subject to the freedom of movement of EU citizens. And still be subject to the laws of the European Court, that have a higher status than our own.
That we not have, in any way on any area, Taken Back Control.

In effect, we would not have left at all. And would probably have a more costly and less favourable arrangement than we have now. With no fixed timetable to do anything to change the terms and conditions.

That is why, despite all the very sensible reasons,from very sensible people, for having a transitional arrangement, we should avoid it at all costs. 

It simply keeps the guerilla war in being. It keeps the insurgency fighting and gives heart to the partisan sniping until the will to carry on fades and the campaign is lost.

Fabian Phil is well aware of the power and effect of procrastination. 

He's a bit of a Cunctator himself.

We Are Looking Into The Abyss

The excellent BTL comments around here over the past few days indicate that C@W readers are looking over the rim of the abyss and shrewdly identifying all manner of appalling prospects.  Would that Crass Team May had been equally prescient before so blithely throwing everything away.  The status quo parties and their 'supporters' are hanging on the edge by their fingertips in the hope their grip holds for a full parliamentary term, and that 5 years in politics is time enough.

I am reluctant to share some of my own nightmares for fear of giving the other side ideas: one of our commenters has already pinpointed votes for 16-year olds ...  (You may like to know C@W is on the reading list of Team Corbyn.)   But it has to be said, the Grenfell catastrophe is more pregnant with possibility than almost anything I can remember.  We have already seen 'the community' (led by the usual suspects) demanding, inter alia:

• the Inquiry to dance to their tunes; 
• a "properly diverse expert panel with suitable experience of equality, diversity and socila welfare considerations" to sit on the Inquiry  
• the new leader of K&C to be chosen 'by the community';
• K&C be taken over by commissioners;  
• an amnesty for illegals (swiftly granted);  
• "undocumented survivors to be granted UK citizenship forthwith"
• everyone be rehoused in a property of their choice ...
• etc etc

It doesn't take much imagination to come up with a scenario in which tower blocks in every major city become the barricades of McDonnell's revolution.

On 'our side', people are wondering which building firms will profit most from the large-scale remedial works that will be required the length and breadth of the land ...  Oh, and Rupert Murdoch is on manoeuvres, puffing Gove for PM.

I still think there is absolutely everything to play for, both on the domestic front and with Brexit.  But, by Heaven, it will take serious players to bring it home.  I doubt many of us feel confidence in the players we have.

But: as a final note of optimism - there is another historical precedent to add to our list of regimes hanging on in there successfully against all odds.  It is our very own HM the Q.  At the death of the sainted Diana all looked lost there, in the face of apparent mass popular ressentiment and veneration of a cult figure (- any echos?)  And yet, heeding good advice and making a few deft changes, the royal family have made it through another two decades in surprisingly good shape.  Think on, Mrs May.

ND

The Great Migration resumes, will the EU sit and watch?

Just as the EU was getting all excited about besting the UK, reality is intervening once more to show its utter failure as an institution.


It is all great fun for the remainers and liberal media to have a jolly good laugh at the recent election victors and to praise the idiotic socialists. they are really enjoying their summer, never in my lifetime has a losing side been so happy with the world.


Reality in this case, is the arrival of economic migrants from Africa into Europe, now primarily via Italy - aided and abetted by 'friendly' NGO's who don't recognise borders etc in their utopian dreams.

So far this year, Italy has received double the amount of migrants that it did last year. Whilst Greece is still under pressure, really this all falls on Italy.


Of course, there is not much the EU can do. Eastern European countries are rightly refusing to take on the migrants in order to protect their culture. Merkel's 2015 statements on wanting to take them all in Germany are no longer so popular, plus she has an election to fight in a few months.


So Italy is left to confront the humanitarian disaster alone, Italy with its already high youth unemployment and sclerotic economy.


Much harder solutions are needed to stem the flow and close the door. There are over one billion people in Africa and the majority live in poverty, they can't all come to Europe en masse without also destroying the European states.


But of course, the EU is led by socialists and Marxists, obsessed with racism and intent on fixing the world's ills. In addition, they are bound by getting agreement and funds from the EU countries who are not co-operating. It is a very tough situation for the EU to handle - one which really exposes its weaknesses as a non-state actor.

Disturbing news for the reality-based community

Why do I keep meeting people who are spouting commie nonsense. Only today I have met some senior executives who should know better. They are bemoaning the state of the country post-Grenfell and saying how rubbish we are governed and how things must change....


How the rich (err, them?) have got richer and the poor poorer. How neo-liberal economics has taken us there, how terrible Brexit is for the Country.


Basically, the Corbyn mantra is working. The Tories too are wrongly adopting this nonsense instead of rallying around their own message.


Very worrying - is it just me or is this becoming common, that people have lost sight of the reality of the Hard Left and are instead running to its, umm, warm embrace?

Not Looking Great for OPEC & Co

The complexities of the internal politics of OPEC leave me reeling, but they won't get any less fraught with this as the backdrop.

Yes, the great effort to sustain $55 looks to have failed comprehensively, and US shale production storms ahead anyway. 

$45 it is, then, which looks like serious trouble ahead, from Nigeria to Saudi to Moscow.  Economic migrants?  We ain't seen nothing yet.  One that saddens me is the hard times that have befallen Oman, my favourite Gulf state, a country I keep up-to-date with in an occasional way.   It's a benign little regime, and used to be able to afford all manner of nice civilities: but all that largesse had to come from somewhere.

Yes, casualties aplenty and worse to come, no doubt.  As noted before, perhaps $100 oil was the 'tax' we paid to keep everyone happy.

ND