The Cabinet ministers have now settled in. They've found their skivvies, they've found the booze cupboard and they've set about putting into practice their favourite nutty policies. We all know their policies weren't detailed in the run-up to the election and most of us suspect that if they were, the election results would have been very, very different with the Tories coming in way behind even the Communist party!
But they are in power now and they are happily destroying what we have because, well that is what they do.
The excuses are being trotted out to reduce the size of government. We all know that without government there will be even less regulation of big business, because with no one working for us to enforce the regulations then you get something like a banking crash or massive ecological disasters. Familiar?
Their other main plank for the moment is education. Mr Gove. The only use I can think for this man, the only use for the entirety of mankind is to bring back Spitting Image just so we can see the puppet the original puppet makers would make of him! In the meantime he is busily selling his disguised policy of privatising our State Education system.
Parents are supposed to set up committees to run schools. After all, parents will, by his definition be better than the professionals. Once the enthusiastic parents have embarked on the path to the ideology of Mr Gove. They will wear themselves out. Just before they collapse with exhaustion or the stress of biting off far more than they can professionally chew, they'll call in the experts. The experts will of course be private education companies. The company bosses will, like the MBA courses have told them to, aim high and begin buying up as many companies as they can. To do otherwise is to invite failure, apparently. We'll have globalised education providers soon enough. Home Economics will consist of teaching kids around the world what soup brand to purchase. Tin openers will be provided free by the sponsor (who also happen to be selling the top-rated brand of soup). And no one will suspect a thing. It will be just coincidence, won't it? Maths will be taught by a consultant from an investment bank or Enron II. Science classes will be devoted to finding ways of restricting the atmosphere to small portable packages while the business class will be busy creating marketing plans designed to sell permium fresh air to those who can afford it.
Be warned. We've an even bigger problem if that man is put in charge of nuclear power plants. Honestly. A serious problem. Just imagine what he could really be daft enough to do!
Luckily, here in Scotland education is devolved and Mr Gore doesn't have a job here! Not so far.
Saturday, 19 June 2010
Thursday, 17 June 2010
Civil Servants
I've just been reading a new bit of investigative journalism from The Bureau of Investigative Journalism about the giant companies treating senior civil servants to nights out, fancy meals, tickets to football matches (Bureau publishes comprehensive civil service hospitality database).
I'm disgusted. But I'm not surprised. Let's face it we don't live in the democracy we are told we do, after all. Until those civil servants spend an equivalent amount of time with every person on the registrar of voters, then I won't believe this isn't corruption. I know we'll be told the companies arent buying influence, just 'time'. Shall we guess? Exactly the amount of time (and luxury) it takes to successfully influence someone, get them to look after their 'new friends'.
I'm disgusted. But I'm not surprised. Let's face it we don't live in the democracy we are told we do, after all. Until those civil servants spend an equivalent amount of time with every person on the registrar of voters, then I won't believe this isn't corruption. I know we'll be told the companies arent buying influence, just 'time'. Shall we guess? Exactly the amount of time (and luxury) it takes to successfully influence someone, get them to look after their 'new friends'.
Monday, 7 June 2010
Red Tape?
I've just been reading this post from Tax Justice Network about how the Tories differ in their view of what red tape is with their coalition partners.
So Vince talks about the cost of form-filling while Boy George and his mates are talking about not only the form to complete for your holidays, but also the pay you get while you are on holiday!
Cracks in the marriage? Or will David win out over Nick and our way of life changes so much that we will become like America with little or no paid holiday entitlements?
So Vince talks about the cost of form-filling while Boy George and his mates are talking about not only the form to complete for your holidays, but also the pay you get while you are on holiday!
Cracks in the marriage? Or will David win out over Nick and our way of life changes so much that we will become like America with little or no paid holiday entitlements?
Successfully Subsidised
You know, our BBC news programmes love to tell us about the profits made by various companies.
I'd like to see how much government subsidy these companies receive all of it, including free school meals to the kids of their employees) and how much tax they paid at the same time!
Wouldn't that be revealing?
Perhaps we could have all those so-called business experts declare tax paid and subsidies received as they allow us to hear just how successful they really are by imparting their great knowledge. Would they be seen as successful and wise if we had this information?
Now why do we talk of subsidies to businesses but 'benefits' to people? Why is one OK but not the other?
UPDATE:
After I turned the machine off for the night, I was thinking that perhaps I should write about the true costs of the oil business. Bophal is back in my mind too with the paltry sentence handed out to the local managers employed by Union Carbide. I remember walking past their very ornate-looking front door on Michigan Avenue in Chicago. The student I was with at the time pointed out the building, declared it was beyond belief that the company was still trading and then spat on the pavement. From the look of that pavement, he wasn't the only American with that opinion and I've no doubt BP is held in contempt by many, many Americans across the world. Our environment is important, but we should never forget many, many more died and many, many more suffered in Bophal.
Monbiot has beaten me to it, and has written far more concisely than I'd have managed.
I'd like to see how much government subsidy these companies receive all of it, including free school meals to the kids of their employees) and how much tax they paid at the same time!
Wouldn't that be revealing?
Perhaps we could have all those so-called business experts declare tax paid and subsidies received as they allow us to hear just how successful they really are by imparting their great knowledge. Would they be seen as successful and wise if we had this information?
Now why do we talk of subsidies to businesses but 'benefits' to people? Why is one OK but not the other?
UPDATE:
After I turned the machine off for the night, I was thinking that perhaps I should write about the true costs of the oil business. Bophal is back in my mind too with the paltry sentence handed out to the local managers employed by Union Carbide. I remember walking past their very ornate-looking front door on Michigan Avenue in Chicago. The student I was with at the time pointed out the building, declared it was beyond belief that the company was still trading and then spat on the pavement. From the look of that pavement, he wasn't the only American with that opinion and I've no doubt BP is held in contempt by many, many Americans across the world. Our environment is important, but we should never forget many, many more died and many, many more suffered in Bophal.
Monbiot has beaten me to it, and has written far more concisely than I'd have managed.
Sunday, 6 June 2010
The Gulf of Mexico
So, now BP and their contractors have failed yet again to stop the thousands of barrels of oil pouring up from the sea bed. It is still pouring out, floating to the surface and heading for the coast line where it will poison the wildlife that live out their lives in the water and on the edges of land.
It seems the mission is now going to be a task of sweeping up the oil with little hope of stopping the massive leak.
It isn't as simple as just sweeping it all up. The Gulf of Mexico is warm and that means storms. That toxic sea water could very likely be dumped further inshore than you'd imagine.
And that Gulf Stream heads up into the Florida Straits. According to wiki the water moves at a rate of 30 million cubic metres per second. The waters of the Gulf of Mexico aren't static. They will move and they will take that pollution with them. The waters move right up the coast of America and Canda, they move over to the west coast of Africa and they move up passing the UK and keeping Norway warmer than you'd expect it to be.
I hope BP get it cleaned up. Otherwise, they'll be cleaning up a lot of oil from a lot of different places. Will they work for years in an attempt to repair every bit of damage the damage? Really?
One thing that may come from this is a growing realisation among the public that companies are legally obliged to make profits that require risks to be taken and cost burdens the public will carry not the company. Risk-management is a burden so such departments within companies are too often ignored and minimised; red-tape is viewed as something to be reduced and then reduced further.
Too often the real costs are externalised.
We need more red-tape. And we need a change in company law - all costs must be calculated and borne by the corporate body upfront rather than externalised to be paid for by others before profits and premiums are paid.
It seems the mission is now going to be a task of sweeping up the oil with little hope of stopping the massive leak.
It isn't as simple as just sweeping it all up. The Gulf of Mexico is warm and that means storms. That toxic sea water could very likely be dumped further inshore than you'd imagine.
And that Gulf Stream heads up into the Florida Straits. According to wiki the water moves at a rate of 30 million cubic metres per second. The waters of the Gulf of Mexico aren't static. They will move and they will take that pollution with them. The waters move right up the coast of America and Canda, they move over to the west coast of Africa and they move up passing the UK and keeping Norway warmer than you'd expect it to be.
I hope BP get it cleaned up. Otherwise, they'll be cleaning up a lot of oil from a lot of different places. Will they work for years in an attempt to repair every bit of damage the damage? Really?
One thing that may come from this is a growing realisation among the public that companies are legally obliged to make profits that require risks to be taken and cost burdens the public will carry not the company. Risk-management is a burden so such departments within companies are too often ignored and minimised; red-tape is viewed as something to be reduced and then reduced further.
Too often the real costs are externalised.
We need more red-tape. And we need a change in company law - all costs must be calculated and borne by the corporate body upfront rather than externalised to be paid for by others before profits and premiums are paid.
Friday, 4 June 2010
Apartheid, A Ghetto And Another Atrocity
So many words have been written this week about the act of war committed by the Israeli State. It isn’t the first. Sadly, I doubt it will be the last. As I write another ship is sailing toward Gaza. The ship stocked with food and medicine, manned by people from all walks of life including a Nobel Peace Prize medallist is named after Rachel Corrie. At the age of 23 Rachel was crushed to death by an Israeli bulldozer as she tried to protect a family who were living in conditions most of us could never imagine. Her parents attended a ceremony where the residents named a street in Ramallah in honour of their beautiful daughter while they were in Israel and the Occupied Territories as they pursue a wrongful death lawsuit against the State of Israel.
I’m being optimistic despite myself. Democracy Now! broadcast the American Vice President, Joe Biden on the 3rd June speaking in response to the boarding of the ship and the deaths that followed. His words are extraordinary. Joseph Biden: "You can argue whether Israel should have dropped people onto that ship or not, but the truth of the matter is, Israel has a right to know—they’re at war with Hamas—has a right to know whether or not arms are being smuggled in. And up to now, Charlie, what’s happened? They’ve said, 'Here you go. You're in the Mediterranean. This ship, if you divert slightly north, you can unload it, and we’ll get the stuff into Gaza.’ So what’s the big deal here? What’s the big deal of insisting it go straight to Gaza? Well, it’s legitimate for Israel to say, 'I don't know what’s on that ship. These guys are dropping eight—3,000 rockets on my people.”
On the same day the UN Human Rights Council voted for a probe into the attack. The US Ambassador Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe said: "Unfortunately, the resolution before us rushes to judgment on a set of facts that, as our debate over the last day makes clear, are only beginning to be discovered and understood. It creates an international mechanism before giving the responsible government an opportunity to investigate this incident itself and thereby risks further politicizing a sensitive and volatile situation."
I had naively hoped the Americans would do the right thing but they didn’t. The Americans opposed the vote but the vote passed by 32:3. I’m being optimistic that the Americans will change their stance. I said optimistic not realistic. Let’s face it, she didn’t see the need to call for an independent inquiry! Does she mean the Israeli government should investigate their own armed foces? Does she actually think an Israeli probe may reveal useful information? The British Government wasn't much better; they abstained.
The Israeli forces boarded a boat sailing through international waters and used armed force to do so. After assaulting, those onboard, assault that led to the deaths of some of those heroic activists, they then took command of the ships and took them to Israeli ports. Are we to assume the Israeli Authorities have left all the forensic evidence in tact?
All of us on this earth should applaud each of the heroes on board those ships and should always remember the brave actions of those who gave their lives in trying to help the residents of Gaza. I can think of no suitable words. Let me give you these words, taken from Democracy Now! programme broadcast on the 3rd June 2010.
JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, we also have on the line also someone else who was on that boat. Ann Wright is a retired Army colonel, a former US diplomat. She spent twenty-nine years in the military and later served as a high-ranking diplomat in the State Department. In 2001, she helped oversee the reopening of the US mission in Afghanistan. In 2003, she resigned her State Department post to protest the war in Iraq. She was on the Freedom Flotilla and just deported to Turkey.
ANN WRIGHT: Well, I was also on the Challenger 1 with Huwaida. And let me just give a great compliment to Huwaida and all of the Free Gaza Movement. It’s a tremendous, tremendous thing that they have done in creating this movement of boats that had six large vessels that went toward Gaza. And let me tell you how thrilling it was to see all of those boats steaming, those civilians trying to challenge the governments of the world that say there must be a siege to strangle the 1.5 million people in Gaza, and yet the citizens of the world are challenging that with everything they’ve got.
And in response to the words of Vice President Joe Biden…
ANN WRIGHT: Well, I think our vice president needs to take another look at this thing. The ships were open to inspection beforehand, and I’m quite sure Mossad had their little agents that were all over that place. These groups are humanitarian groups that are bringing in goods that are needed for the people of Gaza. They’ve had plenty of inspections on them.
If you talk about violence, it’s not 3,000 rockets Hamas is putting on Gaza; it’s a twenty-two-day attack that the Israelis did that killed 1,400 people, wounded 5,000, left 50,000 homeless. And here we are a year and four months later, and the Israelis will not let any sort of reconstruction materials in. And then, when reconstruction materials start coming that way, instead of waiting until—if they have a zone that they are trying to protect, let ships come into it and stop them.
But I would say that there are ways that you can stop them without killing people. There are ways you can stop even passenger ship like that ferry boat, and certainly like our little thirty-foot craft. You don’t have to use commandos with—I mean, you can use commandos with excessive force, which they do, but there are other ways to do it, if you want to kind of preserve a sense of civility, humanity, and meeting the international law, quite honestly.
Perhaps it is time Israel experienced a blockade to ensure the Israelis are unable to obtain materials that could be used to attack their neighbours.
I’m being optimistic despite myself. Democracy Now! broadcast the American Vice President, Joe Biden on the 3rd June speaking in response to the boarding of the ship and the deaths that followed. His words are extraordinary. Joseph Biden: "You can argue whether Israel should have dropped people onto that ship or not, but the truth of the matter is, Israel has a right to know—they’re at war with Hamas—has a right to know whether or not arms are being smuggled in. And up to now, Charlie, what’s happened? They’ve said, 'Here you go. You're in the Mediterranean. This ship, if you divert slightly north, you can unload it, and we’ll get the stuff into Gaza.’ So what’s the big deal here? What’s the big deal of insisting it go straight to Gaza? Well, it’s legitimate for Israel to say, 'I don't know what’s on that ship. These guys are dropping eight—3,000 rockets on my people.”
On the same day the UN Human Rights Council voted for a probe into the attack. The US Ambassador Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe said: "Unfortunately, the resolution before us rushes to judgment on a set of facts that, as our debate over the last day makes clear, are only beginning to be discovered and understood. It creates an international mechanism before giving the responsible government an opportunity to investigate this incident itself and thereby risks further politicizing a sensitive and volatile situation."
I had naively hoped the Americans would do the right thing but they didn’t. The Americans opposed the vote but the vote passed by 32:3. I’m being optimistic that the Americans will change their stance. I said optimistic not realistic. Let’s face it, she didn’t see the need to call for an independent inquiry! Does she mean the Israeli government should investigate their own armed foces? Does she actually think an Israeli probe may reveal useful information? The British Government wasn't much better; they abstained.
The Israeli forces boarded a boat sailing through international waters and used armed force to do so. After assaulting, those onboard, assault that led to the deaths of some of those heroic activists, they then took command of the ships and took them to Israeli ports. Are we to assume the Israeli Authorities have left all the forensic evidence in tact?
All of us on this earth should applaud each of the heroes on board those ships and should always remember the brave actions of those who gave their lives in trying to help the residents of Gaza. I can think of no suitable words. Let me give you these words, taken from Democracy Now! programme broadcast on the 3rd June 2010.
JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, we also have on the line also someone else who was on that boat. Ann Wright is a retired Army colonel, a former US diplomat. She spent twenty-nine years in the military and later served as a high-ranking diplomat in the State Department. In 2001, she helped oversee the reopening of the US mission in Afghanistan. In 2003, she resigned her State Department post to protest the war in Iraq. She was on the Freedom Flotilla and just deported to Turkey.
ANN WRIGHT: Well, I was also on the Challenger 1 with Huwaida. And let me just give a great compliment to Huwaida and all of the Free Gaza Movement. It’s a tremendous, tremendous thing that they have done in creating this movement of boats that had six large vessels that went toward Gaza. And let me tell you how thrilling it was to see all of those boats steaming, those civilians trying to challenge the governments of the world that say there must be a siege to strangle the 1.5 million people in Gaza, and yet the citizens of the world are challenging that with everything they’ve got.
And in response to the words of Vice President Joe Biden…
ANN WRIGHT: Well, I think our vice president needs to take another look at this thing. The ships were open to inspection beforehand, and I’m quite sure Mossad had their little agents that were all over that place. These groups are humanitarian groups that are bringing in goods that are needed for the people of Gaza. They’ve had plenty of inspections on them.
If you talk about violence, it’s not 3,000 rockets Hamas is putting on Gaza; it’s a twenty-two-day attack that the Israelis did that killed 1,400 people, wounded 5,000, left 50,000 homeless. And here we are a year and four months later, and the Israelis will not let any sort of reconstruction materials in. And then, when reconstruction materials start coming that way, instead of waiting until—if they have a zone that they are trying to protect, let ships come into it and stop them.
But I would say that there are ways that you can stop them without killing people. There are ways you can stop even passenger ship like that ferry boat, and certainly like our little thirty-foot craft. You don’t have to use commandos with—I mean, you can use commandos with excessive force, which they do, but there are other ways to do it, if you want to kind of preserve a sense of civility, humanity, and meeting the international law, quite honestly.
Perhaps it is time Israel experienced a blockade to ensure the Israelis are unable to obtain materials that could be used to attack their neighbours.
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