Got some time to kill but don't know where to go?
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"The issue as to whether pay rates should be increased is now being reviewed as part of [prison minister] David Hanson's proposals for a new compact balancing the opportunities we give to offenders to turn away from a life of crime with what the community is going to expect of them in return. "That means meeting certain standards of behaviour whilst in prison and on release, for instance getting off and staying off drugs."Shocker - another government review. Whenever this government haven't got a bloody clue what they are doing, or they want to hide the truth, or they just want to put off a contentious policy until a more fortuitous time (i.e. after local elections) they announce yet another sodding review. I wonder if this U-turn on prisoner pay has anything to do with the government trying to find money to compensate those who have lost out to the 10p tax rate. Or is it seen as a bad time to announce a pay rise for prisoners just before the local elections. Another vote winner that would be - we're going to rip millions off in tax and give prisoners a pay rise. No wonder it has suddenly gone to review. How much would you bet that we see this pay rise sneaked out on a bad news day after the local elections?
"Old Tibet was dark and cruel, the serfs lived worse than horses and cattle. "Watching on television a tiny number of unscrupulous people burning and smashing shops, schools and public property, brandishing knives and sticks to attack unfortunate passers-by I felt boundless surprise, deep heartache and indignant resentment. "The sins of the Dalai Lama and his followers seriously violate the basic teachings and precepts of Buddhism and seriously damage traditional Tibetan Buddhism's normal order and good reputation."A little China friendly perhaps?
"Sometimes even with the best brains available to government there are inadvertent consequences of changes. "We put our hands up to that, we should have known more about the impact of the abolition of the 10p rate."I say: What a complete and utter lie. There is no way on God's earth that those "best brains" did not know what the consequences of scrapping the 10p tax rate would be for over five million of our most needy. I believe they underestimated how the public and their own back bench MPs would react to this slap in the face. They have got so used to riding rough shod over the public, that they thought it would pass with hardly a whimper. How very wrong they were.
"I am in fact extremely pleased with where we are in the polls. "The polls yesterday we're at 20%, that's considerably higher than 13% just a few years ago. "It's far, far higher than we've ever been at this point in the political cycle two or three years after a general election."The truth of course, is that with Labour dying a slow death, the LibDems should be doing much, much better. The Lib Dems third leader in two years has, to my recollection only surfaced once since his Lisbon Treaty abstention fiasco - and that was to tell us how many notches he has on his headboard. He's not had a very auspicious year so far has he? If I were a Lib Dem supporter (not in a million years) I would be a little worried to have a leader who keeps a low profile, only to pop up to make a show of himself and the party. However, I would be more worried by his lack of ambition. Apparently his overriding ambition is to double or more than double the number of Lib Dem seats over the next two elections. Wow, five (ish) years of his leadership and he strives to have less seats than the Tories have now.
Got some time to kill but don't know where to go? 12 34 5
From Hansard written answers:Each year we are seeing approximately 5 million new vehicles registered (and growing) to use our roads. So this EU policy of fitting daytime running lamps to all new vehicles will see an increase in fuel consumption (5% of 5 million) the equivalent of adding a further 250,000 cars to our roads. This is of course the low end figure, and is for the UK only. I dread to think what the total number of additional vehicles would be for the entire EU.
Mr. Greg Knight: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what estimate her Department has made of the likely increase in annual fuel consumption resulting from the requirement to have daytime running lamps on motor vehicles.
Jim Fitzpatrick: Research undertaken for the Department for Transport indicated that the requirement for new types of motor vehicle to be equipped with dedicated daytime running lamps would result in an increase of about 5 per cent. in fuel consumption.
Mr. Greg Knight: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport pursuant to the answer of 4 February 2008, Official Report, on motor vehicles: safety, what provisions have been agreed with her EU counterparts on the exemption of vehicles registered for road use before the commencement of the relevant European directive from the mandatory use of daytime running lights or their equivalent.
Jim Fitzpatrick: Following EU decisions on daytime running lights (DRL) issues, a European Directive will require new vehicle types to be equipped with dedicated DRLs from early 2011 (cars, vans) and summer 2012 (other vehicles). Vehicles registered before these dates will not be required to be retro-fitted with DRLs or to use existing lights as an equivalent.
Got some time to kill but don't know where to go? 12 34 5
I understand the difficulty normally loyal backbench Labour MPs are now in: I am not standing to be your Labour MP to go to Westminster and then habitually vote against a Labour Government. So in no way do I underestimate the dilemma loyal Labour backbenchers face - and the distaste voting down our own government leaves them with - it's the same for me. But the government is wrong on this and if it refuses to back down or rectify its mistake - as they have said they will not, I can see no purpose, merit or honour in being a Labour MP if that role is to make life harder for the least affluent, the pensioners and the part-time workers of Putney.You can read Stuart's full post over on his Blog by clicking HERE.
If this is not the basis of a superstate I don't know what is. They intend to split up existing nations to remove any sense of individual nationalism. Countries will merge and disappear into the state of Europe and no doubt the great schemer Tony Blair will be crowned Emperor.
Eric Pickles, the Conservatives' communities spokesman, said:
"We already knew that Gordon Brown had hoisted the white flag of surrender to the European Constitution. "Now the Labour Government has been caught red-handed conspiring with European bureaucrats to create a European superstate via the back door. "Gordon Brown literally wants to wipe England off the map."I think it is becoming ever more clear why Brown and his cronies are not going to allow us our democratic right to the promised referendum.
Happy St George's Day all my fellow countrymen. It would of course be a better day if it was a public holiday, but you never know, maybe one day. Gordon Brown seems to have got something right at long, long last by flying the George Cross above Number 10. It's a shame we can't see this kind of celebration repeated around our great country.
England - God bless her.
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Another way of looking at what is going on is the tide gauge. Tide gauging is very complicated, because it gives different answers for wherever you are in the world. But we have to rely on geology when we interpret it. So, for example, those people in the IPCC [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change], choose Hong Kong, which has six tide gauges, and they choose the record of one, which gives 2.3 mm per year rise of sea level. Every geologist knows that that is a subsiding area. It's the compaction of sediment; it is the only record which you shouldn't use. And if that figure is correct, then Holland would not be subsiding, it would be uplifting.
And that is just ridiculous. Not even ignorance could be responsible for a thing like that. So tide gauges, you have to treat very, very carefully. Now, back to satellite altimetry, which shows the water, not just the coasts, but in the whole of the ocean. And you measure it by satellite. From 1992 to 2002, [the graph of the sea level] was a straight line, variability along a straight line, but absolutely no trend whatsoever. We could see those spikes: a very rapid rise, but then in half a year, they fall back again. But absolutely no trend, and to have a sea-level rise, you need a trend.
Then, in 2003, the same data set, which in their [IPCC's] publications, in their website, was a straight line—suddenly it changed, and showed a very strong line of uplift, 2.3 mm per year, the same as from the tide gauge. And that didn't look so nice. It looked as though they had recorded something; but they hadn't recorded anything. It was the original one which they had suddenly twisted up, because they entered a “correction factor,” which they took from the tide gauge. So it was not a measured thing, but a figure introduced from outside. I accused them of this at the Academy of Sciences in Moscow —I said you have introduced factors from outside; it's not a measurement. It looks like it is measured from the satellite, but you don't say what really happened. And they answered, that we had to do it, because otherwise we would not have gotten any trend!
That is terrible! As a matter of fact, it is a falsification of the data set. Why? Because they know the answer. And there you come to the point: They “know” the answer; the rest of us, we are searching for the answer. Because we are field geologists; they are computer scientists. So all this talk that sea level is rising, this stems from the computer modelling, not from observations. The observations don't find it!
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"In my particular patch it is felt very heavily, but I think people are still giving the government the benefit of the doubt and they will be voting on local issues, at least I pray they do."I think that says it all really. Blunkett is hoping that the country will forget its current disillusionment with our Labour Government when voting in the Local elections in May. I'm sure there are a good number of Labour councillors who are hoping for just that. To be honest it's not likely is it? We are fed up with Gordon Brown and his incompetent government and that will be reflected in a disastrous day for Labour Councils.
I wonder if anyone in the house of commons has started to call Gordon Brown "Mavis" yet? I can just imagine him standing at the dispatch box uttering those words that made Mavis Riley so popular during the eighties: "Oooh, I don't really know".Why did five ex-chiefs of staff attack you for inadequate MoD funding levels and the appointment of "two hats" Des Browne? "Oooh, I don't really know".
When your party's General Secretary Peter Watt resigned over dodgy donations, why did you say he was the only one who knew about them? "Oooh, I don't really know"
