Thou shalt not

You'd think the Anglican church at least would have a grasp of some of the essential commandments, not the ones about God as many of us suspect God has very little to do with the machinations of the upper echelon Anglicans. I'm talking about the basic ones for life, don't lie, don't cheat. don't steal, those ones.

Telegraph.

Thousands of bogus weddings may have taken place in Anglican ceremonies throughout the country, an investigation by The Sunday Telegraph has uncovered. 

One vicar said he had been instructed by the Church to conduct marriages even after he warned officials that he believed they were bogus.

A senior Government source accused Church officials of failing to take sufficient steps to stop bogus marriages, which can grant foreigners the right to stay in Britain and claim benefits. 

The investigation found that the issuing of marriage licences, required for foreigners to marry in church, has almost trebled in five years. Church figures show that the number of common licences issued rose from 1,650 in 2004 to 4,632 last year.

The leap followed the introduction of rules in 2005 which required non-EU nationals to obtain a certificate of approval from the Home Office before they could marry in a civil ceremony at a register office. The Church of England was exemp­ted from the clampdown.

Furthermore, Anglican clergy are not legally required to report suspicious marriages, even though register offices have been compelled to do so for more than a decade.

The figures appear to indicate that the Government has underestimated the scale of the scam, and last night prompted calls for the Church to "wake up" to the problem.

A senior Government source said: "There is concern at high levels that some parts of the Church of England are not taking this as seriously as they should. The attitude seems to vary from diocese to diocese, and we clearly need more work in some dioceses."

Bishops have now admitted that a "loophole" has left the Church vulnerable to criminals arranging marriages of convenience.

Official Home Office estimates for the number of sham marriages that take place each year show a decline from 3,578 in 2004 to 561 in 2009.

Even when they suspected they were bogus weddings the vicars were told to put up and shut up. It's a very profitable sideline for the diocese after all, they get their cut.

However, Father Tim Codling, rector at Tilbury, Essex, claims that he was repeatedly ignored when he tried to warn Church authorities that he suspected the majority of weddings in his church to be fake.

He alleges that he was told he would face disciplinary action if he refused to conduct the ceremonies.

"I got the feeling that they thought I was being awkward and difficult," says Fr Codling.

"I was given the impression they were thoroughly disinterested in what I was saying.

Sounds about right, the immigration scam in this country caused by the previous government went down several avenues and the State church, like the BBC and various other organs of the "Righteous" were complicit in trying to change the demographics of the UK especially England to rub the rights face in the wonders of multiculturalism and diversity. It was to be a brave new world in which their new immigrant pets would do the work and be grateful enough to vote for them whilst the indigenous welfare pets would be grateful enough with their benefits to also vote for them. After all, what could go wrong? I mean apart from the working classes deciding they didn't like these non integrating foreigners, especially the ones with the violent religion and the odd habit of marrying their cousins, the favoured of the "Righteous" who could do no wrong in their eyes. Well at least until they voted for their own people, wanted their own laws enshrined instead of the state ones and set about causing trouble once their population levels reached critical mass.
Not that the "Righteous" have to live with it yet, though you can tell they are becoming increasingly uneasy with their pets and quite worried about those who have decided enough is enough. 10 years ago the scream of "racist" would have been enough to send the opposition scurrying away unable to debate such vitriol. Nowadays the tendency when being called racist is to say "so what" and carry on protesting anyway. Not even the states brownshirts can keep a lid on things these days, their numbers are fading away as the tide of public concern grows and people want solutions to the immigrant problem before its too late. The "Righteous" also faced a stunning blow when the German Chancellor stated that multiculturalism was an utter failure, very tricky when one of your own breaks ranks.Though it had become increasingly obvious that it was a failure and that the "Righteous" had allowed a fifth column of alien origin into their midst which didn't care for anyones sensibilities other than their own. Happy to use the "Righteous" yes, but definitely their own agenda which was convert to our religion, pay us protection money, or die.
I can't help wonder when the "Righteous" will seek to use the native rebels to tackle the foreign body in their midst, can't be long now, it's what they do when their status quo is upset, look for a scapegoat and ride the tiger and still end up running things. Though I suspect they're a little bit worried about a Ceaucescu moment if it gets really out of control, that's probably why our army is in Afghanistan rather than at home, last thing they need is people with guns around.

The next few years are going to be interesting and possibly quite violent.

Jail? I'd have given him a medal

Most people just want a quiet life, to be left alone to live as they please not harming anyone else. Then there are the thugs, yobs and other assorted ne'er-do-wells (I wont call them mindless, they are often ingenious in their petty maliciousness)

Express.

A TORMENTED householder on a yob-blighted estate was jailed yesterday for killing a man he caught urinating through his letterbox.

Michael Williams, 53, “just flipped” and stabbed father-of-one Anthony Kershaw, 25, after he caught him defiling his property.

Williams, who lived alone on the Smallbridge estate in Rochdale, had previously suffered a similar attack, and had paint thrown on his door.

Yesterday he wept as he was jailed for five years after admitting manslaughter at an earlier hearing. One night in April, ­Williams heard a bang on his front door as if someone was kicking at it to break in, Manchester Crown Court heard. He went to investigate and saw urine pouring through his letterbox,

In anger he went to his kitchen, grabbed a knife with a seven-inch blade and, as Kershaw urinated, swung the door open. In his own words he “just flipped” and stabbed his ­victim in the stomach.

Williams then rang his daughter and the police and confessed to what he had done while a baying mob tried to smash their way into his house screaming they would “burn him alive”.

Kershaw, who had been drinking and smoking cannabis in a flat in the same block before the incident, died later in hospital.

Prosecutor Peter Wright said Williams lived in an area where “extremely abusive” youths made trouble in ­the communal areas, leaving some res­idents despondent, ­intimidated, and at times frightened to go out.

Mr Justice Brian Keith told Williams: “Your reaction was not premeditated. Something snap­ped and you acted on the spur of the moment. Of course, I take into account that this was a frightening and ­intimidating estate to live on.”

Did Kershaw deserve to die? Probably not, however should Williams have even been prosecuted? No, the guy should have been praised as a lesson to all whose pleasure it is to make others lives a misery simply because they can. As for Kershaws mob, well they are the ones who should have been looking at 5 years today, not Williams, the very fact that Williams has been attacked in prison by Kershaw's "friends" tells me all I need to know about that waste of space.
Still the good news is of course that Kershaw can no longer pollute the gene pool, good riddance, the world is a better place without scum like that, just a shame Williams has to suffer the consequences of Kershaw's barbarity after all, what else can you call urinating through a letterbox? Whilst what happened to him was harsh, he brought it upon himself, Williams deserved better from out legal system, he was only defending his home from scum.

So why turn up in an ambulance?

I'm watching the 7/7 inquiry, not that I expect to learn anything new about the motivations behind those who did it, but more to confirm just what a mess the initial response was, from the TfL "Power cut/transformer fault" which sent the wrong people to the scene to the Ambulance service sending an ambulance to the scene only for it to act as a liaison centre for other ambulances rather than deal with casualties.

BBC.

Firefighters at the Aldgate terrorist bombing were "hostile" and "quite upset", the 7/7 inquests have heard.

Paramedic Anthony Kamner was in the first ambulance to arrive at the Tube station after the 7 July 2005 attack.
He told the hearings that firefighters "did not understand the role" of the initial ambulance which was to report the situation back to the control room.

The inquests are into the deaths of 52 people who were killed by suicide bombers on three Tube trains and a bus.

Mr Kamner said the firefighters were "demanding" that he take some of the injured patients to hospital.
He told the hearings that he tried to explain that this was not his role, and that the firefighters were "not helpful."
Shehzad Tanweer, one of the four bombers who carried out the London attacks, blew himself up at Aldgate station, killing seven people.
The inquests have heard that a group of firefighters refused to enter a tunnel at Aldgate because of health and safety concerns.
Police Inspector Robert Munn said there was a delay as they tried to confirm the electricity had been switched off.

Now I know it was a difficult and confusing time for all, but surely an ambulance should be used for its purpose? The guys a paramedic, he should have got to the scene, made a quick assessment, then got back-up, then started triage and evacuation of the injured. I'm no expert of course and I might have this wrong, but surely one of the controllers at HQ should have been despatched to the scene once alerted to a serious situation to do the liaison thus freeing up a trained paramedic to do his job? perhaps it did happen like that, though there's no indication in the report to say that it was, just fire fighters getting annoyed because an ambulance was just standing there. Did people die because they were waiting? Possibly. Were more lives saved because a proper liaison was going on? Possible too, though why he needed an ambulance once he'd got there remains a good question, particularly if he wasn't there to be a paramedic.

Madness

Now say I were to steal £50,000 from my employer and I were to be caught, even if I showed great remorse over my actions, I could be expected to be sacked and very likely prosecuted and given a prison sentence were I to be found guilty. You'd think that such a set of circumstances would apply throughout the system and of course you'd be wrong.

Express.

A BENEFITS cheat from Southampton who falsely claimed income support of almost £50,000 has escaped jail and will take 106 years to pay back the cash.

Mother of three Lee-Anne Jennings, 42, claimed the money for nearly five years but did not tell the Department for Work and Pensions her husband had moved back in.

She is now paying it back voluntarily at £9 a week, which will take 106 years.

A Southampton Crown Court official said on Thursday that Jennings admitted that she had failed to notify the DWP of a change of circumstances between 2004 and 2009.

She received an 18-week sentence suspended for 18 months coupled with 150 hours community service at a charity shop one day a week, because of poor health.

No order was made to pay the money back as Jennings did not have the means to pay.

Judge Derwin Hope said if he sent her to prison, her two younger children would have to go into care, the paper said.

Jennings began claiming for income support on the basis of being a single parent after her husband, Roy, left her in 2000.

But four years later they began living together again and she failed to tell the authorities, who eventually found out after a tip-off.

Not only does she have 106 years to pay it back, she's still getting benefits in order to pay for it! She still keeps her house, she still keeps her kids and no doubt gets certain benefits for having them too. This is taxpayers money too, taken from those of us who pay taxes and paid out to her to pay back the money she illegally claimed. She should have lost everything, at least until the money was paid back, including if necessary the costs of keeping her kids in care or adopted. Yes I know it sounds draconian, but other people out there manage fine, don't cheat the system and often enough want out of the system if only it paid for them to do so. Jennings has just shown the rest of the scroungers as well as the honest folk out there struggling along that it pays to cheat the system because even if you're caught it wont matter a damn, well £9 a weeks worth of damn.
The system needs to be completely overhauled, simplified and the penalties for fiddling it made plain and draconian, you aren't stealing from the state you're stealing from your neighbours, friends, anyone who pays tax in other words.

Sometimes the whole mess that's accrued over the years makes me very angry, today it managed to make me livid.

So, why move in there then?

There are some people out there who will move into a new home say next to an airport and decide that as it's noisy, the airport should shut down rather than move themselves. There's a similar problem in the village of Mayfield, East Sussex, where a couple who moved in 2 years ago are now complaining about the church clock bells ringing through the night, the bells of which have been ringing since 1887 and Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee.

Mail.

A row has erupted over a church clock which chimes every 15 minutes - after a couple used an iPhone app to discover it was disturbing their sleep.

Lucie Kinnell and partner Terry Godden used the Sleepcycle application which monitors their movements during the night.

The programme showed they were just falling into a deep slumber as the chimes went off.

The couple are spearheading a campaign in the sleepy village of Mayfield, East Sussex to get the 1,050-year-old St Dunstan's Church to switch the bongs off overnight.

Lucie and Terry have lived opposite the church in the leafy village for two years.

Church-goer Lucie, 24, who went to Sunday School at St Dunstan's, said today: 'I've written to the the vicar, father Nigel Prior, to tell him that the chimes are seriously affecting our sleep patterns.

'It's not just a simple bing bong every 15 minutes. When it hits midnight it does the whole bing-bong cycle and then bongs 12 times in a row and then repeats the bing-bong cycle.

It's driving us both mad. I found out what other villagers thought and a lot of them agree that it should be put on timer between 11pm and 6am.

'What is the point of it making a lot of noise at 2am?'

But instead of the vicar writing back, Miss Kinnell received a letter from the Parochial Church Council dismissing her request.

 "When I were a lad", I lived in Gateshead, right next to a railway marshalling yard, there were loud steam trains and diesels running about all the time at all hours. You got used to the noise, the only time we noticed it really was during a railway strike, when it wasn't there.
Now I'm all for getting a decent nights sleep, which means that were I to move somewhere I'd make damned sure that noise levels were acceptable at all hours of the day. For God's sake the woman went to the Sunday school there, didn't she know? The bells have been ringing for 123 years, they've lived there 2 years, if there were any justice in the UK they'd be told where to get off.

I'll not take bets on the bells going off at night sooner rather than later.

sadly there's no app for justice.

Wonder how the warmists will spin this one

One of the more amusing aspects of global warming, climate change, global climate disruption (and there isn't that much amusing about the amount of money this scam has raked in from the taxpayers) has been the ever more increasingly shrill explanations from the warmist camps in the face of colder and colder weather. We've had the "colder winters are all part of global warming" explanation which sounded lame even to warmists, coupled with the "weather is not climate" explanation which is now wearing a bit thin as enough weather does equal climate eventually.

Express.

BRITAIN faces a succession of harsh winters like those seen half a century ago when the country shivered in some of the coldest conditions on record.

One forecaster suggested we may even have a white Christmas this year.

The warnings come as temperatures plummeted in parts of the country to -6.6C (20.1F) on Sunday night, making it the coldest in October for 17 years.

Worldwide forecaster Weather ­Services International blamed a ­global La Nina weather pattern that sees ocean temperatures cool by up to 5C, ­subsequently cooling the rest of the planet.

Spokesman Dr Todd Crawford said: “As we head into winter, most of our important climate ­indicators are at or near record levels. Based on all of the available evidence, we expect a winter with below‑normal temperatures across the UK.

“Further, we expect the coldest weather to be early and late in the winter, with the potential for a very mild spell during the heart of winter.” He said conditions over the past three years suggested a return to weather patterns like those of the ­Fifties and Sixties.

The harsh winters of half a century ago have passed into legend. The nation came close to a standstill in the Great Freeze of 1963 when the sea off Kent froze and temperatures ­struggled to get above freezing for months on end. Last year we shivered in the ­coldest winter for 30 years.

Ian Michaelwaite, of Netweather, said: “This winter, we are convinced, is going to be colder than average for the third year in a row which is quite rare. Through November into ­December there is a good chance of a bitter cold spell which might lead to a white Christmas.

So, even the meteorologists are starting to have to skirt around the fact that it's obviously not getting any warmer, though there tendency to throw in terms like "rare" and "hurricane" as a smokescreen doesn't exactly fill me with confidence in their predictions either. They have been known to predict the weather for tomorrow completely wrong after all.
Still the house of cards that was global warming, climate change, global climate disruption continues to collapse. I suspect we're only a matter of a couple of years away from a new scam of global cooling starting up because of a lack of heavy industry in India, China and the rest of the third world so we must give them a lot more of our cash to heat up the world.
Meanwhile our pensioners will die as we struggle through a succession of cold winters because of the price of the environmental levy on fuel bills coupled with the fact that on the coldest of days, the bird choppers wind farms don't work.
I expect that will be about the time that the politicians will distance themselves from the green lobby and deny they ever believed in global warming, climate change, global climate disruption, but we know who they are, Huhne, Milliband E,  most of the Labour party and Lib Dems too, as well as far too many Tories.
They saw it as a tax scam, hopefully we'll make them pay for their greed and arrogance, but it will I suspect be a pyrrhic victory as these so called leaders will have lead the country into disaster and depression as we wont have the means necessary to keep our people alive in bitterly cold winters.

Not (in) the 9 o'clock news

Well you wouldn't have noticed it yesterday, it's certainly not in the MSM either the dead tree press or on it's online versions, not a mention on BBC or Sky either. The EDL were out on a protest yesterday, outside the Israeli Embassy, supporting the right of the Israeli state to exist. There was unfortunately no violence, save only an attempt by the great unwashed UAF to throw a bucket of water over the P.A system.

The (clearly) racist EDL earlier

The (clearly) homophobic EDL marching, note the pink Union Flag.

The only real trouble on the day happened when Rabbi Shifren attempted to speak at Hyde Park Speakers Corner, apparently the Muslims there did not like the idea of free speech to the police refused to allow his right of freedom of speech and turned him and the EDL contingent away, seems there were many complaints from the EDL’s opponents that a foreigner was somehow being allowed to speak for them.  These are probably the very same people who have the gall to call the EDL racist and xenophobic.

 A peaceful anti-EDL protester being given a hug by the police. Seems this is one un-pc PC who did not get the memo on how to treat the special ones

So, there you go, unless there is violence directed at the EDL, it doesn't get into the news and even when it does, the EDL invariably end up being judged by the MSM in a bad light. There is an agenda still being promoted by the "Righteous" and their minions that everything is ok in this country and that multiculturalism and open door immigration policies were welcomed by the people of the UK with open arms. That those who opposed this were violent racists and probably fascist homophobes to boot.

The EDL are no saints, but clearly the evidence is building that they are more sinned against than sinners. Those who oppose them are the ones directing the violence on the streets and the smears in the MSM. However hard they try though, the truth is emerging that multiculturalism and open door immigration policies particularly those that have brought in Sharia law and radical Islam are no longer being tolerated by the English at least. The EDL appear to be a genuine grass roots movement and they are not going away any time soon, this is something that the "Righteous" have brought upon themselves and something they don't understand and can never control.

They can get their lies out quicker, but sooner or later the truth will out.

Paranoia

At the moment I and a few others believe that Muslims are being set up as scapegoats for when/or if the economy goes "tits up" and the rioters take to the streets looking for someone to blame. Not that the certain Muslim groups help themselves at times.

Deccan Herald.

British Premier David Cameron has banned Conservative party Chair, Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, from attending a major Islamic meet where a number of pro-al-Qaeda speakers are also due to appear, igniting a bitter internal row over how the government tackles Islamist extremism.

Warsi, Britain's first woman Muslim Cabinet Minister, was told by the Prime Minister to cancel her today's appearance at the Global Peace and Unity Event billed as the largest multicultural gathering in Europe, according to The Observer.

The London-based conference is aimed at improving community relations, yet critics have pointed out that a number of speakers who are due to appear have justified suicide attacks and promoted al-Qaeda, homophobia and terrorism.

An influential voice among the international Muslim community, Warsi believes that confronting extremists at public events is a more effective way to tackle fundamentalism than a refusal to engage with them.

The report quoted a government source saying: "She had hoped to attend, but there is a conflict of opinion on how extremists should be dealt with and the Prime Minister, supported by Home Secretary Theresa May, were adamant no Tories should attend."

According to the report, Andrew Stunell, the Liberal Democrat Communities Minister, will deliver an aggressive speech against those who espouse fundamentalism.

"He will make clear that the coalition government will not tolerate extremism, hatred and intolerance in any form," a spokesman for the Department for Communities and Local Government, said.

The conference has been organised by Britain's most popular Muslim television station, the Islam Channel, which earlier this year was accused by a Muslim think-tank, the Quilliam foundation, of promoting extremist groups.

Ok fair enough I can sort of see Camerons reasoning about this, after all Labour managed to seriously tar themselves with their love ins with various Islamic extremist speakers Ken Livingstone seemingly being a magnet for it, even with his support for Lutfer Rahman in Tower Hamlets and the extremist Islamic Forum of Europe. Supporting minorities is fine, however some minorities appear to be more than equal, this was a major failing of Labour. However as Churchill put it, Jaw Jaw is better than War War, at least talking to them will prevent the alienation they feel even if a lot of it is self inflicted. Though I suspect ordinary Muslims will ignore the event about as much as the ordinary UK citizen. Even more hysterical was the reaction of MPACUK (the Muslim Public Affairs Committee UK) EXCLUSIVE: Is the Conservative Party becoming the Political Wing of the EDL?  Inside sources from the Conservative Party have leaked that the EDL and the Conservative Friends of Israel (CFI) have pressurised the Chairman of the Party, Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, into NOT attending this years Global Peace and Unity Event taking place this weekend at London's ExCel arena. MPACUK understand that this is not the first time Officials have been lobbied into abstaining from attending Britain's Biggest Islamic Event, organised by Islam Channel. Such heavy handed power exercised by the CFI in coordination with the EDL begs the question of where the Conservative Party's loyalty now lies, and how closely the Zionist lobby are linked with the EDL. Where does the Conservative Party's loyalty lie, with the EDL or the Muslim community? Now apart from wondering what the hell the MPACUK been smoking or popping, never in their wildest dream does the EDL  have that kind of influence, they're also starkly apolitical unlike the MPACUK and from what I can gather comprise quite a mix of political opinions though focussed solely on preventing Sharia law ever being implemented in the UK. Which puts them at odds with the multiculturalists that haunt most political parties despite the fact its becoming increasingly obvious multiculturalism is an abysmal failure. Yet this obvious falsehood keeps stoking the tensions in our society, some Muslims will believe it and so the pressure and the alienation remain. As for the EDL, they just shrugged and laughed it off, they don't like Cameron at all, see him as just another Blair, which goes to show who are the more saner of the two groups.

Having your cake and eating it

It never ceases to amaze me how some civil servants just don't get it where it comes to a recession and who actually provides the money to pay them. The civil service unions are even worse for this, many are actually paid by the state to be union reps in their places of employment and of course they fiddle the system to get what they want.

Telegraph.

An undercover investigation by Priti Patel, Conservative MP for Witham, found that officials at unions were telling members how to campaign against the Government's cuts programme on the taxpayers’ time.

The news emerged as Brendan Barber, the general secretary of the Trades Union Congress, announced plans for a national demonstration in Hyde Park in London against the cuts on 26 March next year. 

Ms Patel set up a bogus email account and contacted the officials, asking whether it was possible to attend demonstrations on “facility time" to carry out their union duties during office hours.

One official said she could be “economical with the truth about your use of the time you may be able to claim facilities time” while another suggested she could “pop it down as a union meeting and be creative about how you spend your union time”.

Last night, Ms Patel told The Daily Telegraph: “The hard working law abiding majority will be disgusted to see trade union officials suggesting ways that their members can fiddle the system and act dishonestly to get time off.

“Any civil servant using facility time to attend these political demonstrations should be disciplined and there need to be a full investigation into the way trades unions are abusing taxpayers.

"It is unacceptable for taxpayers to be left footing the bill for trade unions' political campaigning and union members abusing the system in this way should be regarded with the same disdain as crooks, fraudsters and benefit cheats."

Ms Patel, 38, a rising star who entered Parliament in May, used an alias “John Wright” to email a number of union officials this week, asking if it was possible to attend a Trades Union Congress-organised rally against the cuts using "facility time", because his holiday entitlement had run out.

Under official guidance, officials are only allowed paid time off as "facility time", typically 25 days a year, for a “tightly defined set of duties” including “negotiating with employers, representing members, performing the duties of an accredited Health & Safety rep and of an accredited Union Learning Rep”.

Laura Cockram, head of campaigns at the Public and Commercial Services Union, said: “It depends which dept [sic] you're in and how vigilant your management is regarding facility time.

“You could pop it down as a union meeting and be creative about how you spend your union time, however I wouldn't advise you to do that.”

Andrew Freemantle, another PCS organiser, replied: “If you are economical with the truth about your use of the time you may be able to claim facilities time. Look forward to seeing you.”

Shirley Mills, regional organiser at Unison, said: “I don't think you can use facility time to attend the rally and lobby as the employer may see it as activities rather than duties.

“Please inform your manager that you will be meeting with the Regional Organiser this should avoid any problems.”

Simon Weller, an official at Aslef, told her that facility time can only be used for “trade union duties’ in relation to your elected post. Demos and the like come under the label “trade union activities” which are not covered by your facility time”.

He added: “Although, if you've found something legitimate to do at the depot/meeting etc in the morning and then you could attend the demo in the afternoon.”

Bernie Pardon, an official at the NASUWT teaching union, replied: “I don't know who you are? Which union? What branch / association? I'm using facility time tomorrow if that helps.”

Last night Mr Weller from Aslef stood by his comments. He said a lot of his members worked in shift patterns and it would have been fine “if he [“John Wright”] was finished his shift, if he was free and in the area”.

A TUC spokesman said: “Union reps are entitled to paid time off for duties such as negotiating with employers and representing members in grievance and disciplinary matters.

“While there is no obligation for employers to pay reps time off for activities such as attending union meetings and events, many do provide paid time off as an acknowledgement of the valuable role played by union reps.”

A PCS spokesman said: “We're proud of all our reps who not only do their day jobs under increasingly difficult conditions, but also work hard to support their colleagues and improve their working lives - more often than not taking union work home with them to do in the evenings and at weekends.

First off, you want to be in a union fine, however it is a voluntary thing and you should not be paid by the state when doing union activities, any union activities.
Second, you aren't cheating your employer, you're cheating the people who are taxed in order to pay you, you're betraying the general public by attempting to be paid to go and protest.
Unions have been abusing taxpayer funds for years now with the Using the Trade Union Reform Act, Mandelson established the Trade Union Learning Fund in 2006 which along with the Union Modernisation fund more or less matches trade union contributions to the Labour party with a cash grant to the unions to help in reform, basically it's a scam.
Civil service unions are perhaps the worst in being militant these days, they've been coddled by the state with decent rises without increases in productivity or efficiency. It's time I think they came down to earth and learned what real life is all about as those of us in the private sector have figured. If they are planning on milking a corrupt system to protest about cuts, then plainly they need to be the first ones out. Lets see them try to pull that one in the private sector.

So what are our laws for then?

Labour were forever trumpeting the "fact" that crime was falling despite peoples personal experience, plus the interesting fact that a lot of people didn't report crimes anymore as they felt the police weren't interested.
Seems that of the crimes reported, 75% of those deemed serious weren't ever solved anyway.

Express.

SOFT justice under Labour’s Britain was exposed yesterday by the revelation that thousands of criminals were let off by police.

Official figures showed only one in four of the most serious crimes reported to police were solved.

Of the 4,338,604 notifiable offences recorded in England and Wales in 2009, 28 per cent, or 1,204,967 offences, were marked as detected, the Ministry of Justice figures showed. But only half of those detected by police resulted in criminal charges. 

More than a fifth, 269,552, offences were dealt with by police cautions and just under one in 10 led to penalty notices.

In all, 1.7 million defendants had their cases taken to court in 2009, with only 94,586 being sentenced in a crown court. Of these, 51,801 were jailed, with an average sentence of 24.3 months. But 19,749 were given a suspended ­sentence, 16,174 received a community sentence and 2,300 were fined.

Of the 1.3 million cases dealt with by magistrates, 943,194 people were fined, 179,593 were given community sentences and 48,389 were jailed.

The MoJ statistics showed the number of defendants found guilty of violence soared by 4.6 per cent to 43,300 in 2009, compared with 41,500 the previous year. The number of offenders found guilty of drugs offences also rocketed by 7.4 per cent from 52,900 to 56,800.

The figures showed the number of women found guilty rose by nine per cent to 314,700 in 2009, compared with the previous year, and was up 43 per cent compared with 1999.

The number of men found guilty remained unchanged from 2008 at 1.05 million, which was down 11 per cent from 1.18 million in 1999.

However, overall crime recorded by the police fell by eight per cent in the last year. Reported incidents of ­criminal damage were down 17 per cent, offences against vehicles were down 16 per cent and domestic burglary fell by eight per cent compared with last year, the latest Home Office figures for the year to June 2010 showed.

Violence against the person, which includes murder, attempted murder and causing death by dangerous ­driving, also fell, down seven per cent from 421,072 to 392,473.

Firearms offences were also down, dropping two per cent from 8,113 to 7,966. But the number of recorded sexual offences rose by eight per cent.

The statistics were released the day after the Government’s Spending Review outlined plans to cut the police budget by four per cent year-on-year to 2014-15, raising fears that the number of officers could fall by up to 20,000.

The total spending cut on police amounts to between 14 per cent and 20 per cent, depending on how much money is raised through council tax.

The first thing that springs to mind is what on earth are we paying them for? Don't get me wrong here, I know it's simplistic and that red tape and bureaucracy as well as imbecilic political correctness all divert resources away from catching criminals, not even the feared cctv really prevents crime either. Take into account the never ending war against motorists and you do have to wonder what the point of the police is anymore. They do appear to be unfit for purpose more often than not siding with minorities against the majority too if my observation of the police handling of EDL demo's is to be taken as an example.
So, what do we want? Well a crime free environment in which to live is a plus, also a clear definition of what is a crime and what is simply someone doing their own thing. Prison being the place we put people who harm others, not themselves, a society of few laws yet rigorously enforced. A place where you could drive at over 100 mph on the motorway, yet know if you have an accident and injure or kill someone, you'll go to jail for a long, long time, not just get a slap on the wrist and a 3 year ban.
Simple laws, where the definition of harm is seen to be how it affects others, go around robbing pensioners, expect 5 to 10 years, pull a knife and threaten someone, 2 years, hurt them 5 to 10 depending how bad, possibly more sentencing being open ended. Murder someone, life, meaning life, other sentencing being on a scale of personal harm to others. But no crime at all to carry a knife or gun, that's down to individual responsibility.
Fact is, Labour opened our eyes as to how ineffectual the law and the enforcers of it are. I can't bring myself to thank them for it though, they were after all responsible.

Nuts

Healthy eating, just the ticket for the health Nazi's to try and control your life and it gives jobsworth's great opportunities to tell people off and generally make peoples lives a misery. Problem is with jobsworth's (other than the fact that they are jobsworth's) is that they never know when to stop, never, ever.

Express.

A MOTHER feeding ducks with her two children told yesterday how she was ticked off by a council warden – for giving the birds “unhealthy” white bread.

Lisa Taplin, 34, was told to bring granary or wholemeal bread next time.

The fluorescent vest-clad official said giving ducks white bread was like Mrs Taplin feeding her two sons chips with every meal.

The dance teacher yesterday described the episode as crazy – but her local council defended the official.

It's a duck! not a gourmet specialist, not an endangered species and not normally poisoned by bread. essentially it's a walking, quacking, swimming dustbin. I've got pictures of one of my kids as a toddler being mobbed by ducks anxious to get their beaks into a sandwich. I really fail to see what type of bread they get fed should be an issue. Apparently I'm not the only one.

Naturalist Chris Packham, presenter off the BBC’s Autumn Watch, said: “I wouldn’t stop anyone from feeding birds. We send out the message that wildlife needs our help all the time so it seems a bit churlish to tell people what food to use.”

Still, I suppose we should be grateful that council jobsworth's don't go around fining people for feeding the ducks.

Oh...

Bastards!

To cross from Essex into Kent (and vice versa) on the M25 you have to pay a toll, it's currently £1:50 for cars, but free between 10pm and 6 am. There actually shouldn't even be a toll, because back in 2003 the crossing was paid for, but the toll was kept on by the DfT as a congestion charge and the additional monies were supposed to be used for road improvements in Kent and Essex.
Of course the government, both local and national see motorists as a cash cow, so I'm not surprised at this, but I am damned angry.

BBC.

Toll charges are set to be increased for the Dartford Crossing between Kent and Essex, it was announced in the government Spending Review.

Under the plans, the charges could rise from £1.50 to £2 next year for cars, before rising to £2.50 in 2012.

The Department of Transport (DfT) said the money would be used to explore ways of improving traffic flow.

RAC Foundation director Professor Stephen Glaister said motorists would be "very nervous".

Chancellor George Osborne has unveiled a package of spending cuts in the Commons aimed at tackling the country's deficit.

The Dartford Tunnel and Queen Elizabeth II bridge cross the River Thames between Dartford and Thurrock.

The crossing forms a link in the M25 motorway, carrying about 150,000 vehicles a day.

The DfT said the increased toll charges would be subject to consultation.

It said the decisions were "difficult but necessary" to maintain investment in transport infrastructure projects.

Mr Glaister said: "The 150,000 drivers using the Dartford Crossing each day will be very nervous about the planned hike in the toll, though moves to improve traffic flow might soften the blow slightly."

The toll was due to end in 2003, but was kept on by the DfT as a congestion charge.

The DfT said an independent report in 2001 showed that without charges, traffic would increase by 17.1%.

In November 2008, motorists protested when the charge was increased from £1 to £1.50 for cars.

There is no charge to use the Dartford Tunnel and QEII bridge between 2200 BST and 0600 BST.

 I am truly sick and tired of successive governments picking my pocket to pay for the economy, I'm a fairly easy target as I drive a car and need it to get into work. I've looked at alternative means, but they just don't work too well for 12 hour shifts and early starts. No, I don't use the crossing for work, but raising charges still rankles quite a bit as I do occasionally cross the river to go to Essex to visit relatives.
Why can't politicians just keep to their word? The charge was supposed to end when the new bridge got paid for and they kept it going, not as a congestion charge (though that's what they claimed) but as a source of government revenue and politicians are obsessed with having cash to pay for their follies as well as the necessary parts of government. Also I believe a lot of the congestion is caused by the toll booths themselves, remove them and I'd expect more traffic, but I'd also expect traffic flow to improve too, not that I'd expect the government to even admit this possibility, they're too concerned with getting their hands on motorists cash.
It's like road tax, the vast majority taken in by the government doesn't go on roads, same I suspect with the toll charges on the crossing, it's just another form of income to the state going into one big pot. Yes I know the economy is in a mess, yes I know the state has to find some way to pay for Labours mishandling. But I am just sick and tired of being hammered by the government because they see me as an easy target. All it will do is make motorists start using alternatives such as the Blackwall tunnel which is free but congested most of the day anyway.
Problem is of course, even if the economy gets back on track, will we see a price reduction?
Yeah, right, they'll just find something else to spend the excess on.

I thought that was the point?

Some parents are weird, I don't just mean the ones who let their kids run wild or the ones who you know have kids but never see them. However when it comes to education most want to get their kids into the better schools, the ones with a little bit of discipline left and who might just give their kids a chance to find a job at the end of their education. One of the things you'd think they'd grasp is the fact that the better schools stay "better" for a reason, Grammar schools for instance do well academically for a reason, that reason being they have a formula for selecting brighter kids via the eleven plus (no I'm not saying it's perfect, just that it's a criteria)

BBC.

Campaigners calling for changes to grammar schools selection in west Kent have lost their appeal.

Nearly 200 complaints were lodged against the selection policies of Tonbridge Grammar School, Judd School and the Skinners School.

The schools adjudicator Dr Bryan Slater ruled they could keep their admissions criteria - based on 11 plus results rather than where children live.

Most of the objectors claimed the policy denied places to local children.

Denied places to local children who couldn't pass the 11 plus, which frankly is the whole point of a grammar school as far as I'm concerned.

Following the ruling, Sevenoaks MP Michael Fallon called for an increase in grammar school places in west Kent.

He said: "It's Kent's grammar schools system, it has to be planned by Kent. They are responsible for making sure everyone has a place and there simply aren't enough places.

As in there are too many kids passing the 11 plus?
Apparently not, though I might be wrong here

"The big problem really is if only one school out of say 10 was operating this policy of super selection then the system could probably accommodate it but when there are three schools out of six doing it the whole thing gets distorted.

"I fear now there are going to be an ever increasing number of appeals and pupils having to wait right through to June, July until they get allocated to a school that they have not necessarily chosen."

Problem is too many grammar schools, so instead of calling for the system to improve the education of kids so that more can pass the 11 plus, he wants to lower the standards so more can get in easier. Sounds like a Labour politician all right...
Oh, hang on apparently he's a Tory...
Well, he's a politician, so he doesn't live in the real world anyway and can't quite grasp why good schools stay good schools because they set high standards. Back in the days before Labour butchered the education system by declaring that fairness meant all schools had to be comprehensives and accept everyone (save only for the lucky few who decided to opt out) There was a two tier system, the academically inclined went to grammars schools and became bosses, managers etc, the so called professional classes. The rest went to what were called secondary modern's and became the artisans and skilled craftsmen as well as unskilled labourers. As a system it wasn't ideal, some kids were late developers, some failed to progress after a certain age, but it worked generally. Bring in comprehensives and instead of the brighter ones helping their less fortunate to grow, everyone got dragged down to the lowest common denominator in that teachers had to spend so much more time with the thicko's the brighter ones were squeezed out.
Smarter parents soon realised this and given a choice would make sure their kids got into the remaining few "better" schools, even moving to a catchment area if necessary, sacrificing their finances to make sure their kids had a better chance in life, it's what good parents do, if they can afford it. Schools soon twigged that the higher the standards for entry, the better the pupils they got and the easier their jobs became. Market forces, to a certain extent.
The whole system is a mess and wont get better until equality is dumped into the waste bin of history and a proper two tier system set back up. Then at least you wont have the problems of locals finding a good school, there will always be one around as well as one for the not so bright but keen to work with their hands.
Until we go back to what worked, we'll never go forward.

They never learn

Tax and spend has gotten us into this current mess where the previous government ended up spending more than it brought in, raised taxes and then decided it was a brilliant idea to print more money as well.

Telegraph.

In his first major speech after Ed Miliband made the surprise decision to give Mr Johnson the Treasury brief, he said Labour would raise more from taxes than planned by the Coalition.

The Opposition is now advocating a percentage split between cuts and tax rises of 60-40, having previously committed to 70-30. George Osborne, the Chancellor, will go further when he announces this week that spending cuts will make up around 70 per cent of the savings needed to tackle the deficit.

Mr Johnson, who has no economic background and has never held a Treasury job for Labour, also attacked the 35 business leaders who have signed a letter to the Daily Telegraph backing Mr Osborne’s plans.

Outlining why he believed Mr Osborne was wrong, Mr Johnson said: “"Our policy remains to halve the deficit by 2013-14. But I have looked again at the way in which we deliver that reduction, at the balance of tax and spending.

"My view is that specific, targeted tax changes need to do more of the work."

He said he would work with the Government on "targeted tax rises that do not affect low and middle income families". 

Mr Johnson claimed that the banks should be paying an extra £3.5 billion a year in taxes to offset cuts in investment. He said that the Government's plans for a bank levy were “inadequate” compared with the pain being inflicted on children and families through public spending cuts.

The business leaders who signed the letter said that the private sector would be able to provide the jobs for those who lose out in the public sector because of the cut backs to Whitehall services. But Mr Johnson disputed that.

The shadow chancellor said the Tories' plans to eliminate the structural deficit in four years represented "a huge gamble with growth and jobs". And he warned that the private sector recovery could not be "taken for granted".

Johnson like most politicians seems to have forgotten a few key rules of life.
1) When in a hole, stop digging.
2) You can't keep spending what you haven't got.
3) Sooner or later the money you get in simply pays the debt and leaves nothing for anything else.
4) It's not your money to play with it's the taxpayers!

Politics, particularly the politics of the left seems to attract the hard of thinking after all, socialism is supposed to provide all the answers, despite the fact that everywhere its been tried, its failed miserably (and no the Scandinavian countries aren't beacons of socialism, they have high income tax but low business tax)
So, considering we're in a recession, possibly heading for a double dip recession, what is Labours answer? To carry on with the failed policies that put us there in the first place.

You really couldn't make it up, then again a definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result Perhaps they new politically correct definition of an insane person should be "socialistically inclined"

A license to print money.

There are speed cameras (which don't prevent accidents, ask Swindon council) which are know to be used as revenue raisers, there are also junction cameras, which catch you going through red lights, again there is a type of junction camera which takes your pic if you stand for more than 5 seconds blocking a junction. If however there were say some roadworks in to make sure the junction becomes blocked during peak periods then you'd expect a local authority to step in and either lengthen the period of waiting or switch the camera off.
Actually, what the hell am I saying, that sounded suspiciously like fair play and we all know that simply doesn't happen in public service, motorists are cash cows, after all if you can afford to drive a car, you can afford to be robbed blind by petty and ridiculous laws designed with one purpose in mind and it isn't safety.

Telegraph.

It has been called the "money box" – a traffic camera at a yellow box junction in Battersea, south London is raising a million pounds a year in fines levied on hapless motorists. 

Drivers claim they cannot avoid stopping inside the box because of severe congestion in the area caused by ongoing engineering works.

Campaigners say it is part of a growing trend of motoring fines being used by authorities as stealth taxes. 

Up to 2,000 drivers a month are being fined for becoming stuck in the junction on Battersea Bridge Road, a main route from the south into the centre of London. The road has been the scene of major hold ups since a main arterial route was closed in February, making it difficult for cars to avoid stopping in the junction.

When The Sunday Telegraph monitored the junction, it found that every single car that went through was unable to exit the box properly, because of the congestion ahead.

A camera erected above the traffic light films motorists as they pass through. Anyone who stops for longer than five seconds in the box is issued with a fine of £60, which can double if it is not paid immediately.

In response to a series of Freedom of Information requests, Transport for London said that £520,000 has been raised by the camera in the six months from January to July, with 10,087 motorists issued with tickets.

The figures show clearly that the number of penalties handed out doubled in February, at exactly the same time that the adjacent Albert Bridge was closed and traffic redirected over Battersea Bridge.

While only 640 people were caught in the box junction in January, that monthly total had more than trebled to 2,153 by March.

One motorist who was caught by the camera appealed her fine and last week an adjudicator at a parking appeals hearing upheld her complaint.

Elizabeth Lord won on the grounds that she could not have avoided stopping in the box as the exit was clear when she drove into it but became blocked by pedestrians by the time she was part way across.

 There are it seems thieves and then there are local authorities which put thieves to shame. Yes I can see the point of keeping traffic moving, however when you close a route and divert traffic through a choke point you'd expect problems? You'd also expect a sympathetic response too, well you would if you were an ordinary member of the public rather than the jobsworth types that gravitate to public service.

"Our traffic enforcement strategy is aimed at keeping the red route moving – it is not about raising revenue."

Yeah, right.

 

Mind your own

Being told what I can and can't do especially if it only concerns me and harms no-one else is almost bound to get my hackles up. This particularly involves what I can wear and naturally what anyone else can wear. This extends to the burka and if anyone wants to wear one, that's up to them, save only in health and safety, situations where your face should be seen as well as security concerns.
So the words of Jacques Myard, a senior ally of President Nicolas Sarkozy who believes Britain should go into wholesale bansturbationism were irritating to say the least, particularly as the French have some problems of their own with race relations.

Express.

BRITAIN is “losing the battle against Islamic extremism” by failing to follow France’s ban on the burkha, it was claimed yesterday.

Re-igniting the row over the controversial Muslim dress, Jacques Myard, a senior ally of President Nicolas Sarkozy, said relaxed British policies “opened the door to terrorism”.

Referring to Britain’s continued tolerance of the burkha, he added: “Allowing women to exclude themselves from society by wearing the full Islamic veil makes radicals extremely comfortable and Britain should realise this.”

Mr Myard made his outspoken comments to British journalists in Qatar, where he was defending his country’s ban on the veil at the prestigious Qatar Foundation Doha Debates, which are being broadcast by the BBC this weekend.

But his words will inflame tensions between the British and French governments as the inquests are held on victims of the 2005 London 7/7 bombings, which the French have blamed on lax policing.

Referring to the atrocity in which 52 innocent people died and 107 were injured, Mr Myard said: “Britain has suffered a number of high-profile failures in its fight against extremism in recent years. These could have been prevented if all signs of extremism were curbed, as they are in France.”

Asked if Britain should introduce a burkha ban, Mr Myard replied: “Of course. It is fundamental to ensuring that extremism is kept in check.

“There’s a good reason why London was nicknamed Londonistan – it was full of Islamic extremists. People should be learning from these mistakes.” 

The burka itself is not the problem, though it's an outward sign of a problem, nor is it religious dress, simply a sign that the woman or her family has issues. It tends to say more about Islamic paranoia than it conceals. The French also have big problems with Islamic extremism, though they tend to hide it a bit better, though car burning and rioting in the Muslim areas has been going on for a number of years now, Clichy-sous-Bois being a prime example.

Banning something rarely works, more often than not it reinforces the idea of discrimination rather than removes it. Forcing someone to wear a burka is wrong, preventing someone from wearing it because they want too is equally as wrong. Though wearing it in banks and classrooms as well as courtrooms has to be controlled, banks especially don't like masked people wandering into their premises.

All this though is a result of "Righteous" meddling where immigrant groups were told they didn't have to abide by our traditions or integrate into our society. They were told they could keep to themselves, this they did and produced an unhealthy society at odds with the mainstream. They don't tend to regard themselves as of this country, rather they think of themselves as Muslims and a heady intolerant mix that is. But that's no reason to tell them what to wear.

The joy of engineering

As I sit here tonight I ache all over as I've had the day from hell in so far as my normal occupation goes. I've spent the majority of a 12 hour shift sitting on top of a 100 foot crane trying to replace the rope pulley after the bearings had collapsed in it. It's normally a 3 man job, there were only 2 of us and the design leaves a lot to be desired with the pulley being held in a blind socket through a welded frame. Getting it out required that the pin be drilled and tapped so battery drills it is, flat battery drills at that, charger being 100 foot below in the workshop and not a quick charger either, still we managed though it was not as deep a hole as I'd normally like, by that time we were going for it.
So we extracted the pin, quite easily, only to discover there were two spacers front and back, not only front and back but 100 foot below us on the floor too.
A not so quick trip to the ground to get the replacement bearings, a new pin, new spacers (God knows where the others landed) and back up the crane to fit them, this was supposed to be the easy bit, but would the pin go back in the damned socket? No, it bloody wouldn't! At first we thought it was the spacers dropping a tad, but no, industrial strength sellotape held them in place, hitting the damned pin with a large copper mallet didn't help either, it was only by running a fingertip along the socket that we discovered a ridge had built up. Normally you'd use a small grinding wheel to remove these. No power. I just spent 2 hours with a needle file removing this ridge. The pin the went home thank God! And the next shift said they'd tidy up and put the ropes back on the drums.

I managed 1 cup of lukewarm coffee and 2 ham sandwiches in 12 hours. To top it all off I think I'm getting a case of piles from sitting/standing around on cold metal.

I love my job, just not today.

I'm sorry? Whose World Cup?

Ye Gods is there no end to the inanity amongst the political classes that Britain and England are one and the same? This is seriously insulting both to those who believe themselves to be English as well as to the Scot, Welsh and Northern Irish who though British themselves prefer the country of their birth to be the country of recognition when addressing them as a whole.

Hansard.

Q2. [16431] Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con): As vice-chairman of the parliamentary football club and a qualified football referee, I am well aware that there are just 50 days left before FIFA makes its momentous decision on the location of the 2018 World cup. Will the Prime Minister join me in supporting the English bid, which is in the interests not only of football, but of the entire country?

The Prime Minister: I thank my hon. Friend for his question. I am sure the whole country, and indeed everyone in the House, will want to get behind our bid for the 2018 World cup. I think we can launch and run an incredible World cup. We have the best fans, the best teams and the best stadiums, but above all this country has the biggest enthusiasm for football. We can make it a success for Britain and for the world.

I'm fairly sure that not everyone in the country wants to get behind the English bid, they aren't English after all, indeed a lot of the people living in England don't regard themselves as English having been told by the previous government that they are allowed to be British/any other nation and not have to mix or be a part of society.
It's also highly noticeable that Cameron seems to be suffering from Brown's disease i.e. the inexplicable inability to say the words England or English, seeming to prefer Britain or British, something that a lot of the political class suffer from. Whereas a lot of the English think the only British thing about them these days is the wording on their passports, pretty much the same as the other nations in the United Kingdom.
I'm just sick and tired of being treated as an interchangeable Britisher, I'm not, that ended back in 1997 with devolution, though the roots possibly go back to the European Championships of 1996 with the adopting of the Flag of St George again as the true symbol of England rather than the butchers apron.
The English nationalists though still have a lot of work to do to disentangle the English from the taint of Britishness, too many of us still believe that English and British are interchangeable, that has to be countered at every turn until we get our own parliament and can run our own lives free from the British in Westminster and hopefully the EU in Brussels.

On my wish list

One of the disadvantages of growing old is that sooner or (preferably) later you become a bit frail and can't get about so well. That shouldn't however preclude you enjoying yourself...

Mail. (Don't worry it isn't a rant)

It might look like your standard mobility scooter, designed to help the elderly and the infirm do their shopping.

But this particular version has had rather a substantial upgrade.

Plumber Colin Furze, 31, spent nearly three months converting the machine so that it now whizzes along at an incredible 69mph - making it the world's fastest mobility scooter.

It has a powerful 125cc motorbike engine hidden under the seat, five gears and twin exhausts.

Colin Furze tears along a country lane in his mobility scooter. He hopes to one day hit 70mph

The petrol-powered super scooter, which is British racing green, can almost reach the national speed limit and keep up with cars on the motorway.

It does 10 miles to the gallon and is nearly NINE times faster than an average mobility scooter which glides along at just 8mph.

Now at least I know what to do if I ever need such a device, particularly as it's my stated aim to grow old disgracefully. Just need to add a couple of scythes to the wheels and I'd be all set for frightening the shoppers in Asda.

Not real money

Whitehall waste is in the news (again) as Sir Philip Green owner of Topshop and Bhs who was tasked by Cameron to check on government department spending made his initial report. The report surprised no-one by stating that "staggering" amounts of money could be saved by renegotiating contracts and monitoring outgoings, even to the point of video-conferencing rather than booking hotels for face to face meetings.

Telegraph.

The billionaire owner of Topshop and Bhs found that the Government could save hundreds of millions of pounds if it renegotiated contracts with mobile phone and stationery suppliers.

Sir Philip said ministers could cut swathes of waste from public services after uncovering a “staggering” waste of money. 

He said that the Government’s buying practices were “appalling” and that central Government would be “bankrupt” if it was a standalone business.

The retail chief was asked by David Cameron, the Prime Minister, to carry out an external efficiency review of Whitehall departments in August.

In one example he found 138,000 civil servants were able to spend up to £1,000 a month on special procurement cards with little accountability.

He said: “People are allowed to spend up to £1,000 on stationery, travel or whatever from their normal suppliers.

“There is £1billion spent on that card. Is it spent efficiently? Respectfully, it can’t be because there will be a variation of prices that are getting paid.” 

Sir Philip found that taxpayers paid for 400,000 hotel nights in London last year, costing £38 million.

The prices of the rooms ranged from £77 to £117. “Have they not heard of video conferencing? It is just unacceptable,” he said.

Sir Philip highlighted details of un-coordinated spending, with departments paying wildly different amounts for the same services.

In one instance a department was paying £1.31 a leaflet, compared with a market price of 26p - an 80 per cent difference.

In another, departments were paying anything between £8 and £73 for a box of paper and between £86 and £396 for printer cartridges.

The report revealed that the price of a cup of coffee ranged from £1.45 to 90p, a 38 per cent difference, across Whitehall.

One of the biggest areas where savings could be made was fixed line telecoms, which costs the Government £2 billion a year.

Sir Philip estimated that this could be 30 per cent to 40 per cent cheaper and called for an urgent review of costs.

The annual cost of 105,000 mobile phones, mostly with one provider, was £21million Sir Phillip said it was “inefficient”.

The prices paid for its laptops varied from £353 to £2,000. Sir Philip said that one of his team found the same laptops online for £800.

There are no real surprises there, the civil service have always been fairly crap at awarding contracts and dealing with costs because at the end of the day their "company" can't go bust and they lose their jobs. That's the wonder of the taxpayer funding, until now and FOI requests they've been pretty much able to hide their excesses from the public gaze and just trough away at our expense. Now they are in the spotlight and it doesn't make for a pretty sight. The sheer waste as well as the dodgy practices are unacceptable even in times of economic growth, never mind austerity as Sir Philip said, "central Government would be “bankrupt” if it was a standalone business"
At the end you got the usual Labour spokesweasel claiming they'd been making efficiency cuts, but wanted more details and "fairness" which is the usual gobbledygook phrasing from the bunch that allowed such largesse to carry on under their regime. Fact is, they did it with our taxes and spent a fortune mostly unchecked by a decent audit/accounts dept, because they knew they could, there were never to be any comebacks as the taxpayer fountain would never run out and they probably still believe deep down, it never will.

Business as usual for Labour

The favourite sports of  the political classes were on display over the weekend including scapegoat hunting and muck spreading though nobody plays them more flamboyantly than Labour.

Express.

LABOUR erupted into a bitter war of words yesterday as rival factions clashed over the election of Ed Miliband as its new leader.

Lord Mandelson warned Mr Miliband not to reject the legacy of New Labour or face losing the next election.

He said: “It’s an insult to those people that worked for the Labour Party, who voted for the Labour Party, to say to them that they voted for something that was fraudulent, useless or didn’t deliver.”

 In this Mandelsnake is correct, Milliplonker E did help write the manifesto Labour fought upon, if he didn't believe it, he shouldn't have been involved.

At the same time, former Labour spin doctor Charlie Whelan blamed the party’s election defeat on Lord Mandelson and urged “annoying” David Miliband to “get a life” after his failed leadership battle.

Ed Miliband also came under attack from Peter Hyman, a former Downing Street adviser to Tony Blair, who accused him of “torpedoing” his brother’s career.

He said: “David was the man Cameron feared the unity candidate, the choice of most of the Labour Government’s Cabinet and a Prime Minister in waiting.”

I love the whiff of hypocrisy in the morning, Labour lost because England no longer believed they could be trusted to run the economy, simple as that.
Milliplonker E is only the leader because the unions wanted their man at the top to turn the Labour party back to the good old days of wildcat strike and wrecking the economy with exorbitant wage claims and petty grievances. Milliplonker D was tainted by the Blairite wing of the party and wouldn't let the unions come out to play, he at least knows what the price of that would be. Then again, it was always the unions who were going to pull the strings for the leadership, they own too much of the Labour party.
I don't think Cameron feared either of the Milliplonkers really, I suspect he fears the EUskeptics in the Tory ranks a hell of a lot more.

Sky lies

Sky News reports that during the EDL/UAF static demo's yesterday...

Powell said around 200 EDL protesters broke through a police cordon at the end of the demonstration and attacked the Sky News truck and a police car.

"Protesters started to charge against the cordon and it was clear the police were not going to be able to hold them back," Powell said.

Yet an eye witness account here...

I was in Leicester today with my wife, and was caught up with the demonstrations of the EDL and UAF.
Now I am no friend of the EDL or UAF, but as a shop steward within a national industry, I am fully aware of the beliefs of both political ism' of the political right and left.
I am a firm believer in the truth, but what I saw today was very different from what the media has told us. Yes I saw the EDL being very vocal, which was intense, but I saw no extreme actions from the EDL. What I did see was extreme behaviour from the UAF, which seemed focused on encouraging the Muslim population to riot.
The attack on the sky van was not by the EDL as reported, by Sky, but rather by the UAF.
We was stood by the sky van watching the demonstration, when my wife was attacked by the UAF because she had a St Georges flag on her T shirt.
Now being ex military I am actively involved in charities looking after ex and serving military personal. What I am hearing tonight from the military internet sites is very alarming, as 25 UAF thugs attacked 6 soldiers outside Leicester train station today. From what we understand the squaddies gave the UAF a bloody nose, and amazingly the police let the UAF go without any charges.

As ever the media seem to gloss over the activities of the Brownshirt UAF whilst constantly harping on and villifying the EDL. Now as you may be aware as an English nationalist, I'm no real friend of the EDL, the only English thing about them is the name, they are first and foremost a British organisation, holding up British working class values. Yet every time I investigate just what is going on at their demo's I come away with a completely different version to the "official" MSM version. More often than not it's the numbers involved, then it's the slanting of the story to paint the EDL in the worst possible light. Even down to plain outright lies, and the public is starting to notice which is making the denunciations and spin all the more aggressive as I believe that the establishment have realised they are losing control both over their thugs and the people of this country and their natural tolerance.
The John Cruddas CIF article is typical of the establishment and the left in this country, they see a threat yet can't understand why or how it's happening. Yet it was Labours desire to rub the "Right's" nose in multiculturalism that undermined its own support from the working class. The "Righteous" left of the Islington set (the so called champagne socialists) have no real idea of the damage they've done to working class communities by attempting to supplant them with a foreign and intolerant religious group. Nor are the "Common Purpose" trained senior officers aware of the alienation that is becoming ever more apparent where the police are seen as the enemy.
People are starting to see through the lies and the cracks in the system are becoming ever more apparent.

They seek her here...

One of the things the EUphiles hate is the fact that the UK gets a budget rebate from the EU, it currently stands at £3 billion, it used to be a lot more but successive prime ministers since Thatcher have allowed it to be whittled away usually under the influence of our treacherous foreign office mandarins who seem to want this country to be totally subsumed by the EU and turned into faceless regions rather than a homogeneous whole.
So it's not entirely too surprising that the EU foreign affairs supremo baroness Ashton managed to contrive not to be at the meetings where the budget rebate was discussed, being at a luxury hotel in Mauritius at an anti-piracy meeting.

Express.

SENIOR Eurocrat Baroness Ashton came under fresh attack last night after failing to attend crucial talks about the future of Britain’s £3billion EU rebate.

The EU foreign affairs supremo was at a summit on the luxurious island resort of Mauritius when other European Commission chiefs were discussing axing the annual repayment.

Her absence has enraged critics at Westminster, who argue the £231,000-a-year bureaucrat is not standing up for Britain in Brussels. It meant there was no British representative present to argue against ending the rebate and imposing more EU taxes on the UK.

Tory MP Bill Cash, chairman of the Commons European scrutiny committee, said her non-attendance would be raised in Parliament next week.

“She can’t be everywhere at once but unless there is a profound reason it is regrettable that she has not attended,” he said. Lady Ashton has been criticised since becoming the surprise choice of EU leaders last year for the foreign affairs post, created under the Lisbon Treaty.

The Labour peer, effectively number two to EU President Herman van Rompuy, is seen by some as the world’s most influential female politician. But critics say she is not up to the job.

EU leaders are pressing for the scrapping of Britain’s rebate, won by former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in 1984. Rather than attend a discussion on the issue on Thursday, Lady Ashton was at an anti-piracy meeting at the Grand Baie, Mauritius.

She also missed another meeting earlier this month. On both occasions, her Commission seat was filled by James Morrison, her British chief of staff, but he was not allowed to speak.

A spokesman for Lady Ashton said: “She has absolutely promised to be present when the budget review proposals are finalised on October 19.”

I honestly don't know why Cameron didn't sack the useless old bag the minute he became Prime Minister, well not unless of course he is sympathetic with the EU cause, something I and many other bloggers on the right and left suspect. At the minute though Cameron has the excuse that domestic troubles with the recession are taking up his time, but losing a £3 billion chunk of the budget will blow that out of the water. The EU is the fault line in the Tory Party between it and the Lib Dems, if UKIP hammer the Tories in the next EU elections or even solidify their votes into a solid second place it could force a referendum on the place of the UK in the EU, the in or out vote that no politician or civil service mandarin wants as it's highly likely that we'll vote to leave.
In one sense Baroness Ashton is helping this along, her idiocy strengthens the EUskeptic cause, but the damage she does to the UK outweighs this as her weakness allows the other members to railroad through legislation that needs far more scrutiny than this remarkably dim woman can give.

Can we just leave? Now!

An outbreak of common sense?

Well in theory anyway.

BBC.

The coroner who presided at the inquest into the death of Mark Saunders has told the Home Secretary, Theresa May, more "common sense" is needed in firearms operations.

Dr Paul Knapman has written to Mrs May saying there is currently "slavish adherence" to written documents and protocols.

He said officers may not be able to "see the wood for the trees".

He listed six manuals which firearms officers have to abide by.

Two of the Metropolitan Police manuals are over 90 pages long.

Dr Knapman also said it would be an advantage in long-running operations for a very senior officer to review what is happening - someone with the confidence that goes with not being too "risk averse" - so they can change the tactics and strategy if needed.

The coroner has also written to the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Paul Stephenson, with his suggestions for improvements.

Now whether or not the police should have shot Saunders is moot in my point of view, the man was clearly waving a dangerous weapon around had already opened fire at armed officers as well as at neighbouring homes. he might well have been in a delicate mental state as well as being under the influence of alcohol, but I wouldn't take a chance in that situation nor would I expect the police too either. You either put the gun down or you get shot and trust me they will not shoot to disable either.
Common sense dictates though that the rules be simple and clearly understandable with one guy in ultimate charge not a load of marksmen loaded down with 6 manuals some over 90 pages long. It needs really to be condensed down to a single sheet for the marksmen with the officer in charge having a fuller and more in depth knowledge of procedures. It really needs to be understood that if you fire at the police they will fire back. If you don't put down the weapon, they will shoot you, even if the weapon is a table leg in a plastic bag. Simple rules and procedures, that even the public can understand.
Yes mistakes might be made, but there will be fewer mistakes if everyone knows the rules and aren't trying to second guess how this incident matches with such and such protocol.