So Lord Sugar attempted to avoid tax by claiming non-dom status. Unfortuantely for him being a member tof the House of Lords seems to preclude this avoidance of a £186million tax bill! Schadenfreude!
PROMS
They miss the irony! Harvey Proctor and Nils Gardner were amongst those decrying democracy at the final night of the Proms. They call for the BBC to conduct an inquiry as they did not like the number of EU flags being waved. No one was forced to wave one.
Despite ‘Rule, Britannia!’ being strongly associated with the Royal Navy, the song predates Britain’s domination of the seas, and historians suggest the music was actually created to oppose the Royals in power at the time of the premiere.
DOMESTICS
Very humid still. I just broke up the Aloe Vera and it is now in 9 pots – and I gave one to Kaush. The green wheeli is full but tomatoes are slow – but quite a few chillies of different sizes and clours and shapes. I just looked up pruning apple trees and think I need to prune mine tomorrow – lots of shoots going up – wheelie bin will be emptied tomorrow so I get cracking in a cooler environment than today!
Spicy chick peas is on the menu with a salad.; and then a bean stew of sorts.
COUNCILS
Councils across the country are warily looking over their shoulders to see if they are liable for equal pay claims. The Conservative MP’s who quickly tweeted that it was a labour run council problem have been shown up for the clowns they are Woking Conservative council being the latest to file a 114 notice. Even ASDA are facing a claim. Many schools and buildings are also facing claims for RAAC, fuel bill are higher than many will have budgeted for way back. Will we have any public services in the future? Swiming pools and libraries and youth clubs will be things of nostalga and a gentler age before Tory greed and austerity diminished the quality of life. And yet still the morons support the Nasty Party?
I am not happy with Starmer and his version of capitalism but would prefer Blairism (without the war rimes bit) over another 5 years of this ” Age of Incompetence”.
Sadly we are not alone with an incompetent government. Despite nature/climate (Earths bailiffs) knocking on the door with fire and floods, wind and fury, no one seems to be taking it seriously! Is there a trans-world policy of reactivism rather than being proactive? How bad does it have to get before countries have to make the drastic decisions that Covid forced upon us – lockdowns (for the plebs only of course).
HORIZON
So the UK is to rejoin the Horizon Project at a cost of £2.1bn. Presumably this was part of the funding which we said we would reclaim from Brussels with Brexit! How many more such deals will we need to do before we can return to the standards of 2016? Police co-operation and migrant return schemes come to mind? And Labour contiues to pander to red wall swing voters by refusing to counterance deals with Brussels.
As for the government – can it get any worse? First was the schools debacle which gets worse with every revalation of the way government withdrew funding. Then the prison break – with revalations of cuts in the prison service. Coffrey says that sewage discharges are nothing to do with DEFRA – it is all down to the Env.Agency -which is fully funded by DEFRA! What a pathetic excuse! Rather than the government spending £8million on photo’s of Charlie boy (what has he done for us in the last year?), if I am asked I will provide some tasteful desk notices for all government ministers stating the words of President Truman “The buck stops here”.
5 million single use vapes are disposed of every week – answer – ban them? Can it be difficult? I am surprised the govt. has not reacted more quickly – actually I am surprised that I just wrote that! What I was going to say was that it is younger people who vape, who do not vote or do not vote Conservative. Therefore a ban would not affect their polling potential … unless…… it was seen to cut profits??????
AND how many Conservative MP’s are tweeting about Woking council – considerably smaller than Birmingham, and with a £1.2billion debt forcing them to close a swimming pool, cut community welfare grants and basically everything that is not statutory.
The question for Sunak now is “How much longer can he and his pals milk the economy for all it is worth” before accepting the inevitable? Can he really believe that a turnaround of – well everything! happen in the next few months?
CLIMATE
World temperatures 0.66C warmer than the 1991-2020 average. Time for some action across the world – won’t happen as corporations like BP, Total, Shell, Exxon, Saudi Aramco, Sinopec, Chevron, Petro China, Conoco, Cnina National Petroleum rule the roost.
If this was a war situation (which I believe it to be!) all governments would sort the problem in weeks! Demand could be reduced drastically with speed limits (how I would love to see the Express and Mail headlines!), and insulation, alternative production by wind turbines and solar could be implemented quickly. Water power from old mills could help localise the supply. Yes this would cause major upheavals in the stock market – but it would survive.
Priority needs to be given to wildlife in any building scheme. Personally I thought the building of 200 new homes in my village was OK, although the traffic created by the lack of workplaces is regrettable. With little recreation and social facilities the countryside is not an optimum place for new housing.
INFLATION RATES
the longer that inflation rates remain high the worse it is. The quoted inflation rates are on a yearly basis. But if the rate was high a yer ago we should really be looking at inflation rates based on So inflation in 2021 was 2.59% Since then we have had a 9% rise in 2022 and thereofre the presnt rates (that the government boasts are falling) are actually 6% higher than the 9% rise of a year ago. I make that a 15% rise. Prices never fall and corporations are racking up record profits. So if wage rises are less than inflation the actual hit to household income is much worse.
WATER QUALITY
Water companies are breaking the law with impunity. The Minister for the Environment claims it is not her concern as it is down to the Environment Agency whose budget she has cut. Recent attempts to cut restrictions on river pollution are being questioned in the Lords.
COUNCIL PROBLEMS
Birming became the latest council to file a Section 114 Notice- they are the 7th and another 14 are likely to follow. Whilst the bill for equal pay has been a major factor and the IT fiasco another we need to look at the structure and purpose of local councils – what are they there for? Growing costs of social care, falling business rents and government austerity cuts are all major factors mentioned in the press. I would add executive pay, now many services and education are out sourced the pay of the nobs should be reduced, they cannot claim great efficiency! Some councils are bust due to property speculation – surely this is wrong, they are service providers, not speculators. They are forced to take extreme measures to benefit rate payers due to government cuts. Meanwhile important, if not essential services, like swimming pools and libraries are shutting. Car parking fees rise and visits to town centres fall, and thus business rates.
Their plush new city centre offices could be let out in part as many council jobs could be done from home.
“DOING A FUCKING GOOD JOB”
Education secretary’s self assessment! Quite how she came to that conclusion is weird. But then the government has said that it is not responsible for school buildings – that is down to local authorities and academy trusts! The governments own estimate was for the need of 400 schools a year being rebuilt. Sunak cut his to 100 and then 50 with priority instead shifted to free schools – an ideological decision based on ERG thinking.