Greengate, Jill Pays, Speaker Martin and the Police

The Speaker of the House of Commons, Michael Martin made a statement in the house of commons today which as Iain Dale notes tends to lead to more questions than it gives answers.

Lets look at the arguments.

No body is above the law!

Rubbish. How is the archery practice going, and how many hackney carriages carry a bale of hay? Further more the police and other emergency services get away with speeding when on an emergency.

Clearly there are circumstances where the law is not applied because it is ridiculous or overlooked in the public interest.

Firstly many parliamentarians, and indeed many journalists and commentators have cited parliamentary privilege, and its breach in this case. This is not some antiquated old rule that allows members of parliament to do what ever they want, it is a protection that parliament has so that it can do its job of protecting people and their liberties from an over mighty state. The following resolution is passed before each session of parliament:

Any action taken by either a Member of Parliament or a stranger which obstructs or impedes either Parliament in the performance of its functions, or its Members or staff in the performance of their duties, is a contempt of Parliament. Examples of contempt include giving false evidence to a parliamentary committee, threatening a Member of Parliament, forgery of documents and attempting to bribe members.

This law clearly protects parliament and its members, not in all circumstances but where they are carrying out their duty. The main duties of an MP are to represent their constituents and to hold the government to account. The later is what concerns us here, and that is what Damian Green was doing. Alas it is frequently the case that a department that is not fit for purpose, such as the Home Office does not try to fix it self but hide its failings instead. This is where leaks come in.

The crime it is alleged has been committed is that of misconduct in public office, or aiding abetting conspiring to cause misconduct in public office, defined in CPS guidance as:

a) A public officer acting as such.

b) Wilfully neglects to perform his duty and/or wilfully misconducts himself.

c) To such a degree as to amount to an abuse of the public's trust in the office holder.

d) Without reasonable excuse or justification.

Now where do we start? If you read this article on the subject here on wikicrimeline and this case here where the Attorney general sought the advice of the court, it is clear that no crime has been committed, further more that the police would have established such by merely asking what had been leaked and where it had turned up.

In order for the crime to be committed it has to in effect injure the public interest as well as falling well below the standards of the office holder. Rather obviously the leaks which are complained about are in the public interest and in fact have caused to government to fix things which it knew were broken but sought to hide.

Even if you could accuse Chris Galley of the offence (which you can't because you can't show he injured the public interest) then we have the question of parliamentary privilege. This protects an MP from interference in his job as an MP amongst other things, and in this case the job of holding the government to account. Clearly if the government is trying to hide its failings then the only way to get hold of information is via leaks. It is the legitimate business of parliament and there have been leaks for as long as there has been government.

It gets worse for the government because the cases involving leaks to the press have all either been lost by the Crown on appeal or thrown out before the jury trial started.

Some say "Ah but that does not put him above the law!" well, I say cobblers. It does not put him above the law as in he can ignore it, but laws apply differently to different classes of people. The order which states parliamentary privilege gets passed every year by parliament and so one would have thought it superseded the common law offence which we are talking about.

Then some even cite the case of Lord Cochrane who they say was arrested whilst sitting on the government benches supposedly to prove that parliamentary privilege does not make you immune from the law. The argument is sophistry at its very best. Lord Cochrane was arrested after having escaped from prison having been found guilty of fraud. It can't be said that the criminal act of which he was accused was part of the legitimate business of a parliamentarian so obviously the question of parliamentary privilege did not arise for it to be put aside.

Greengate, Harriet Harman plans a secret meeting!

Apparently Harriet Harman, Jacqui Smith and Speaker Michael Martin (along with Jill Pays sergeant at arms and others) are having a secret meeting tomorrow to discuss Speaker Martin's statement about the arrest of Damian Green.

Needles to say that is highly irregular as it includes no members of opposition parties.

All this we know from a leaked email sent to the Conservatives.

Iain Dale has this.

Sharon Shoesmith sacked!

Sharon Shoesmith, Haringey head of children's services has been sacked with immediate effect according to Ed Balls the children's minister, after what he has described as a devastating interim report into the death of baby P, who as you will know died of persistent horrific long term abuse.

Makes you kind of glad she did not resign. I do hope she does not get some kind of massive payoff.

I am also pleased, that unlike Gordon Brown, Ed Balls has not tried to use this case for party political advantage but seems to have done the right thing.

The BBC has this.

More later when the situation is clearer.

The Political implications of the arrest of Damian Green

I note that the political implications of the arrest of Damian Green are growing by the hour.

It started as outright horror on the opposition benches, with both David Cameron and Nick Clegg coming out strongly, followed by people like Tony Benn (Viscount Stansgate as was).

Well over the weekend whilst there has been briefing by the police against Damian Green (who is going to investigate that leak?) and cobblers talked by the Alleged Home Secretary Jacqui Smith we have had some interesting cover been broken by members of the cabinet.

We have had Harriet Harman, Jack Straw coming out against, whilst the speaker Michael Martin will make a statement on Wednesday. Now even Gordon Brown the Prime minister has come out and said there may need to be an inquiry.

The police are looking very bad as is Jacqui Smith.

The BBC has this.

Damien Green and the Police's contempt of Parliament

In order for Parliament to hold the executive to account it needs to operate without fear and also needs to be given information which the executive does not want it to hear. In other words leaks. They are part and parcel of parliament holding government to account.

There is an offence of Contempt of Parliament which is defined as (Also see here):

Any action taken by either a Member of Parliament or a stranger which obstructs or impedes either Parliament in the performance of its functions, or its Members or staff in the performance of their duties, is a contempt of Parliament. Examples of contempt include giving false evidence to a parliamentary committee, threatening a Member of Parliament, forgery of documents and attempting to bribe members.

Clearly as getting leaks and using them to hold government to account are part of parliaments daily business then interfering with that is contempt of parliament.

The police officers involved need to be arrested and brought before parliament.

The speaker, Michael Martin also needs to be relieved of his position as he has clearly failed to protect parliament.

Labour bloggers are apparently talking all sorts of twaddle on the subject. Consider this from Daniel Finkelstein on what was leaked to Gordon Brown when he was in opposition and ask yourself the question; would you want that stifled? Would that be in the interests of democracy?

Iain Dale also has this, Dizzy has this and Guido has this. The Guardian also has this.

Stasi arrest Damien Green over telling the truth!

After in sheer disbelief looking around for a bit and reading various reports it appears the East German Secret Police (Commissioner, New Labour Commissar Comrade Ian Blaire) have arrested Damien Green the Conservative Shadow immigration minister for the heinous crime of having proof the government are telling lie after lie after lie after lie shoved in his hand and quite possibly telling people about it in an attempt to hold the executive to account.

The speaker of the House of Commons, Michael Martin allowed the police to search his house of commons office.

This is all unheard of stuff in this country and is reminiscent of all sorts of totalitarian regimes, such as Hitler's, Stalin's or indeed East Germany's/ (Oh, and of course, the EU).

Be afraid, very afraid. Or just stand up and say NO!

The BBC has this, the Telegraph has this. Iain Dale has this and Guido has this.

Woolworths to be saved?

Last night we received news that Woolworths was being put into administration, broken by the burden of excessive debt.

I felt very sorry about that, not least because up to 30,000 jobs could be lost, but also because I regularly buy things there and always have. Last night I was fitting an external draught excluder in the dark. I used a battery powered rechargeable fluorescent lamp bought from Woolworths several years ago. Still works fine!

The good news is that Woolworths might well be rescued! Good.

The administrator will keep Woolworths open until after Christmas, but with a bit of luck it will be rescued by then.

The BBC has this.

What I could have done with an extra £100 a month!

It is I have to say fascinating talking to real people of all parties, including those running businesses, middle and low earners and hard bitten old Labour types.

None of them can see much point in what this government is proposing to do with VAT.

However, looking at the relative costs, both Bob Piper (not new Labour, not old Labour, just Labour), the Adam Smith institute, Iain Dale and indeed I agree on is that it would be oh so much better just to raise personal income tax allowances, for the same cost as the VAT giveaway to £10,000 per year giving every wage earner £66 per month, or for the cost of the whole package over £100 per month.

It would have lifted millions out of tax and really incentevised work.

I could really do with the money. I wont see any of the VAT decrease, but i would see cash in my pocket, to do with as I want.

Now wouldn't that be good?

VAT cut wont work and wont help the poor

Alistair Darling's pre budget report is out and it is nothing of the sort it is an emergency budget as the debt bubble comes home to roost.

The VAT cut wont work in that it will not sufficiently boost spending.

It crucially will do very little for middle and low income earners whose budgets are already stretched as they already have little spare to spend on items on which you pay VAT that has not also been clawed back in duty raises.

Consider the average family budget. What is it spent on at the moment and why is it squeezed? Well lets look at the top items.

1. Housing costs (rent or mortgage) no VAT.
2. Food. Mostly no VAT (Special cases luxury foods such as biscuits not essential ones like cakes, go figure.)
3. Gas and electricity. No VAT reduction as VAT is only charged at 5%.
4. Transport costs. Fuel VAT cuts will be made up for by increases in duty.
5. Beer, wine and cigarettes. All VAT reductions to be more than clawed back.

So there you have it. Any presents most of us can buy this Christmas will be priced at something like £9.99, or some variant there of. Can you imagine that dropping to £9.77? No, me neither. (That said all praise to those retailers who do use those sort of numbers o show they are doing there bit!)

What is more as massive shop discounts have not brought about nirvana what will a paltry discount do?

Now, what will help. Well when lower household gas and electric bills turn up they will relieve the pressure on hard pressed households and may even make them feel good. Rises in tax credits will help for those who claim them as well.

All in all it would have made much more sense to cut income tax though.

The BBC has this.

National Insurance and Fuel to rise!

Is Alistair Darling having a laugh?

National insurance to rise again and petrol and deisel duty to rise to take account of drop in VAT!

National insurance is in effect a tax on jobs!

What a git!

Pound set to fall as government promises to borrow out of recession!

The pound will fall during the course of the day as the markets work out that this government is going to try to borrow its way out of recession.

Ignore the comments about all governments around the world doing the same, its tosh. The Chinese have stacks of cash so are not borrowing and no serious country is looking at budget deficits as big as ours.

Expect the pound to hit a 52 week low today, and for the record it would have to go below $1.45.5 to £1.

The BBC has this on the current rate of the pound.

A Super Tax for the rich at 45%!

Apparently the Pre Budget report (or really a mini/maxi budget with brown pants) will say there will be a new super tax rate of 45% to be brought in after the next election.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

Is that the best they can do?

Obviously they will be playing this as "making the tax system fairer" except it won't. If you get get the super rich to pay 20% tax that would make the system fairer, but in fact they avoid it. (more on that later).

So it will make a challenge in the politics of the next election. Labour will go down the Old Labour lines. The reality though is this, this tax increase will bring in £2.5 billion a year compared to a budget deficit that will have risen to an eye watering £150 billion a year notwithstanding the fact that we appear to have guaranteed the banks to a level of 400% of GDP.

Expect there to be pressure on the pound tomorrow.

The BBC has this and the Times has this.

PS.

Had this been an honourable government someone would have resigned over these leaks. They won't, it is not an honourable government.

VAT cut to 15% but will it work?

The broadsheets today are filled with "speculation" that VAT will be cut to 15%, the lowest that being in the EU allows.

Of course were this true, any chancellor with honour would resign, but then new Labour chancellors have been leaking budget information since 1997 and have no honour so don't expect that.

However moving on the the substantive point. Will it work?

No.

Well, what it may do is drive up consumer spending, mostly on imports, but only for a while. It will be a bit like waking up in the morning with a massive hangover then having a large glass of whiskey to get drunk again. That may get you over the hangover for a bit, but you still have to get over the hangover.

The hangover here of course is massive debt. Consumer debt has tripled under New Labour, with our banks lending £700 billion more in loans than they had in deposits. That deficit is a massive problem.

On top of this government is borrowing hand over fist in some kind of weird attempt to have a bit of a sobering drink. It won't work.

The fact is that we have a millstone of debt that has funded an asset boom around our necks. This will need to be paid off and this will take an age. During that time we will face lower growth than we otherwise would have done.

The Times on Sunday have this, The Observer has this, the Telegraph has this, the BBC has this and the Spectator Coffee House blog has this.

John Sergeant forced of Strictly come dancing

I have to say I am gutted that John Sergeant has been forced off strictly come dancing, and it is clear to me that it is the shows loss not his.

John is popular with the public.

Some people say he is his own man, but it is clear from what he said that he is feeling the animosity of both the judges and other contestants, and that is his sole reason for leaving.

That is wrong. The rules are that the public get a say. Thats it. If the judges and other contestants don't like it they should go.

The BBC has this and this.

The BNP members list leak

This has been making big news. The BNP have expressed concern whilst Labour are expressing some delight as BNP activists get witch hunted out of jobs.

I do not approve of the BNP, but this is wrong and smacks of McCarthyism.

What is worse though is that Labour are very wrong if they think it is good for them. It will in fact grow support for the BNP which, as the BNP is a left wing party, is strongest in Labour areas.

The BBC has this.

Tax cuts should be for life, not just for Christmas!

It has to be said that is one hell of a soundbite, and indeed David Cameron has a point.

Here is the scenario:

You work, you get given a tax cut. It will last one year or maybe two. Taxes will rise after that. What would you do?

What is more what will the money markets do? They will know that there will be but a temporary boost to the economy and crucially they will know that nothing is yet being done to solve the debt bubble both private and public that there is in the UK economy.

In short the markets will tank. They are currently in headless chicken mode already.

The BBC has this on the debate.

So what is happening to the pound?

So what of George Osbourne's reckless undermining of the pound that Labour were so concerned about?

Well as Guido points out, the pound has rallied. When I wrote yesterday the pound was at $1.47, and had in the last few days hit a low of $1.45. Now it is currently trading at $1.50325 up some 3 cents since yesterday. (Current price is here)

Quite impressive and clear proof that Labour were talking rot in saying that George Osbourne's comments may damage the pound. In fact the way the reporting went over the weekend changed and started to highlight both the drop in the pound over three months and the level of the current budget deficit in such a way as to force to government to stop saying they will borrow and spend, replacing that with affordable borrowing. In many ways that tone change may have helped today's rally and would not have happened without George Osbourne's efforts.

What will sink or save the pound though is the pre budget report next Monday. Then we will see how the markets view the government.

Baby P and the dangers of a knee jerk reaction

Whilst it is clear to me, and no doubt all of you, that with the benefit of perfect hindsight, baby P should have been protected, what we have to remember is that we do not want a knee jerk reaction. Children brought up in care have very low life chances, (for a whole number of reasons) and we do not want to condemn children to that fate without good reason.

It does, however seem to me odd that alarm bells did not ring. If you read this from the Independent on Sunday, you will see what I mean. It is clear that there were plenty of warning signals.

I am a bit concerned about the involvement of Baby P's father and indeed the father of his three sisters.

Baby P spent a night with his father in late July according to the Independent report.

Did his father not notice? If not, why not? If so why did he not act?

Did the fact that you can no longer get legal aid in family matters on a routine basis mean that he could not afford to ask the courts to give him custody?

One thing I have learned in the British courts is that we have the best justice money can buy. Did that contribute to killing baby P?

George Osbourne, the pound and Labour's mendacity

In an interview in Saturday's Times, George Osbourne expressed concern that the pound could face a proper sterling crisis, a run on the pound.

In fact the article says:

There is also a more immediate risk. “We are in danger, if the Government is not careful, of having a proper sterling collapse, a run on the pound. The danger of that is that it pushes up long-term interest rates. The more you borrow as government the more you have to sell that debt and the less attractive your currency seems.”

Rather obviously there already has been a run on the pound, in the last four months it has collapsed from a value of $2 to the pound to $1.47, from €1.25 to €1.17 against the Euro (though in January £1 bought you €1.40) and against the Yen we have gone from £1 in July buying 205 Yen to 140 now.

To some extent this all helps our exports, except that no one is importing much right now so it doesn't. What it will do is raise inflation again suddenly forcing interest rates up.

What is worse is that Gordon Brown is looking to borrow even more hideous amounts of money for an electoral bribe. George Osbourne is right to say this will hammer the pound. We will be paying for the last Labour government for years to come. With a bot of luck there will not be another one.

The BBC has been angling on Labour criticism of George Osbourne's comments in such a way as to indicate that they would really like to have the BBC charter withdrawn altogether and be thrown to the free market.

Fraser Nelson has this on the Osbourne row, whilst Adam Boulton has this and John Redwood has this on Labour mendacity.

Baby P and Gordon Brown

I don't want to make this party political, because clearly it isn't. Instead I want to make this personal.

Gordon Brown is a tit.

I have just watched yesterday's Prime ministers questions, in which he failed to agree with Ed Balls, the children's secretary, that it was not good for a department head to investigate whether their own department had failed.

Gordon Brown was crash in suggesting that David Cameron was making a party political point.

Gordon Brown kept saying that the executive summary of the self report or Haringey council had said that there were failures in the system, and those would be looked at.


The problem here is that the head of the department that potentially messed up not only commissioned but was heavily involved in a report which said her department did nothing wrong, and that there is a problem with the "system".

Is there? How come despite 60 visits over 8 months, no one spotted the abuse? The missing fingernails, fingertip, gauge to the head, broken ribs and broken back?

What system can there be that is so fool proof that if individuals fail to spot these things the system can be blamed?

The report also highlights the difficulties of "lying parents".You jest surely? If a parent abuses a child they will first of all lie to themselves, convincing themselves that what they are doing is not abuse, after that they will obviously lie to anyone else. very seldom will an abuser confess to a social worker.

At least Ed Balls has some balls and has called for an urgent inquiry. That said on Channel 4, whilst Michael Gove was broadly supportive of Ed Balls, Ed did refuse to answer the question, "are children safe in Haringey tonight?" Rather obviously no one could confidently say they were.

The BBC has the full PMQ's here, comment here and news of Ed Ball's inquiry here.

The sad case of baby P

We do not even know his name, apparently for legal reasons, but we all share the horror at hearing how baby P died.

He had 8 broken ribs, a broken spine, was missing fingernails and a fingertip and had bruises all over his body.

I pray for him.

However we have to ask why this happened?

The government has ordered a review of child protection. This, whilst well meaning is ridiculous. The faults are clear, that the existing rules were not followed and people did not do their jobs.

No amount of procedure can compensate for not following procedure.

What is needed is not so much a general review but a close review of who did what and did it meat the procedure.

The other issue of course is Haringay council. They seem to have cropped up too often here. Is there a systematic problem.

The BBC have this.

For the fallen

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn

At the going down of the sun and in the morning

We will remember them.


For the Fallen, by Laurence Binyon

Remember Armistice day, and the millions who have given their lives to keep us free, from this country and throughout the Common Wealth.

Please also support the Royal British Legions appeal to mark Armistice day.

How to cut spending, and tax without affecting public services!

Here is a quick "How to" or "howto" cut public spending by 5% without hurting so much as a fly, or making one nurse, doctor, teacher, police person or indeed diversity officer redundant, and therefore pass this on in tax cuts.

It also has the great benefit of allowing the various departments of government, local government, quangos and all to plan more responsibly whilst getting better value for money for our cash!

Its a bit of a win win all round, but with one small catch which I will come on to later. Here is the plan;

End the hideously stupid rule that any budget needs to be spent by the end of the budget period or else not only will that money be lost but the next years budget will be lowered by the underspend.

This will stop government departments year end blow outs, incentivise them to look for value and allow them to roll over budget surpluses to spend on larger projects.

The one downside is that private companies that look to grab March spending splurges will be hit and that will have a knock on effect.

Tax cuts now!

There has been a debate in the Conservative party ranks for a long time, about tax cuts, or rather their timing.

I think we all agree that there should be tax cuts, and I think we all agree that the burden of taxation is too high. The problem was, and to some extent still is how do you pay for them?

If you intend on cutting public expenditure by £1 billion by say, losing people with ridiculous job descriptions, Labour will try and paint that as axing hundreds of nurses, doctors or teachers. That is a narrative that needs to be broken.

We, as a party have promised to promised to "share the proceeds of growth". That was fine. Times have however moved on. The car crash that is Gordon Brown has happened, the economy is hitting a brick wall at great speed and we need to look afreash at what we do and what we propose.

Firstly we need to cut taxes, and at the low end first, by reversing the increase in taxes on small companies and by reducing taxes on lower incomes by upping personal allowances or other similar moves.

The second thing the Conservative party needs to do is nail the idea that spending money equals results. It doesn't. This government is looking to raise spending on education, per child, to that spent in private schools. As a policy objective that is nuts. It also wanted to, and indeed has achieved, raising spending on health to the average across Europe. That is the policy objective, rather than looking for results.

This is where we need to attack Labour. If you can buy a car for £10,000 spending £20,000 on the same car does not make it a better car.

Yet another poll lead for the Conservative party

According to the Telegraph on Sunday an ICM poll reports a 13% lead for the Conservative party.

This is good news, and points to a Conservative overall majority of between 76 and 80.

You have to wonder if that will burst Labour's bubble and change the media narrative? It ought to as the media narrative was made up anyway.

Politicalbetting.com has this and Iain Dale has this.

Government controlled banks

Dizzy has gone off one one here, about the government control of banks and how bad an idea that really is. Quite right to.

Some banks did pass on the rate straight away like Lloyds TSB who's deposits are similar to its lending. Others have not, primarily because their deposits don't. They are trying to improve their books by reducing their mortgage books.

Cutting interests rates will also have a severe perverse effect and that is to reduce the amount of savings people put away, possibly making the banks deposits worse.

Having said all that the pound has not tanked badly as a result of the cut in bank interest rates though it is not as stable as I would like. Libor rates have dropped which is good. However what will happen as Dizzy points out, is that banks will just tighten their lending policy. They already have. They now will not lend to people who have nothing or little in the way of a deposit. That is still a constraint on lending and that position will not change until house prices start to rise which in turn will not happen for for some time.

Bank of England's pointless interest rate cut of 1.5%

The Bank of England has cut interest rates by 1.5% to 3.0% which is below the Eurozone interest rate which has also dropped today to 3.25%.

This cut is pointless. British banks for the most part don't have enough deposits to cover there lending by a gap of some £700 billion. They have to borrow from the Libor markets which ultimately means from people who do not care what the Bank of England base rate is.

The net effect of course is that banks who have to honour tracker deals will have less money available to lend on new deals.

In other words Gordon Brown has lost complete control of Tue economy, unless he can replace the £700 billion the banks have got from overseas.

The BBC has this and this.

Congratulations to Senator Barack Obama, President elect

It would be churlish to start with anything else.

He has ran a very good campaign, and at least he is not Hilary Clinton.

That said I am still concerned that he may be an American Tony Blair, though a Liberal Democrat friend of mine has pointed out that he does not have Tony Blair's punch me in the face insincere smile that both he and I have seen since day one but few others noticed.

I am also concerned that Barack Obama may be a bit of a protectionist which would be a disaster if that really is the case especially in these economic times. Protectionism deepened and lenghthened the great depression and what we do not need is a great depression.

Many people think that all of a sudden American foreign policy will change.. it won't. What it will do is come from a more palatable tongue. That is a good thing. For too long American politicians have used a domestic megaphone in foreign policy which causes problems. As Theodore Roosevelt once said "Walk softly with a big stick" or to put it another way, have the means to do what you want, but talk nicely, it might work.

Is America about to elect its own version of Tony Blair?

I must say I am amused that so many British Conservatives seem to like Barack Obama. To me he is exactly like Tony Blair. I could just see a victory rally for Obama featuring the song "It can only get better", except that as we have learnt here it didn't.


That said Carl Rove seems to be predicting a landslide for Obama according to Channel 4 news. This is not good news.

McCain or Obama; Who is going to win?

Well, personally I don't care, as I had this down as a McCain/Obama race from the beginning of the primaries and placed my bets accordingly (bar a chicken bet on Hilary Clinton just in case).

I did not get on as early on the Obama betting bandwagon as Mike Smithson of Politicalbetting.com who tipped him as a runner at 50/1, which gave Mike a fantastic trading position, so he also will probably win either way.

However I still think McCain is in it, for a number of reasons; firstly he has been dead and buried before, secondly there appears to be an almost Sheffield style victory party for Obama on Monday (USA time), thirdly the polls seem potentially to have a systematic errors and lastly the breaking news in Pennsylvania that Obama wants to bankrupt the coal industry. If that gets traction in the last hours could it swing it?

Well, we may know soon, I hope so, or it could go to endless litigation!

There is one certainty though and that is that this American election will see the highest turnout for many many years. I predicted that as well. It is good for democracy.

For more on American elections see here.

Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross: Who thought that was funny?

I see that Russell Brand has resigned from his show on BBC Radio 2 and Jonathan Ross has been suspended.

This all stems from phone calls to Andrew Sachs' answering machine giving details of a liaison between Andrew Sachs' granddaughter Georgina Baillie.

This does leave some strange questions, like just who thought that was funny? Has Russell Brand no manners? After all he should not have discussed his relationship with Georgina Baillie in such terms with anyone, let alone use it to taunt her grandfather and then broadcast it.

Who at the BBC thought this was fit to broadcast? Why have they not been sacked yet?

The content of the BBC is becoming increasingly worrying, especially that aimed at children and the younger audiences. The latest CBBC logo animation features farting. Why? Dick and Dom is puerile and vulgar as well. Perhaps the attitude that allowed Russell Brand's show to be broadcast is endemic in the BBC.

The BBC has this.

EU: Mandelson did nothing wrong!

Apparently the EU has insisted that Lord Peter Mandelson did nothing wrong as far as his relationship with Oleg Deripaska is concerned.

The question is; Does this say more about Peter Mandelson, or the EU which has failed to have its accounts signed off for years?

The BBC has this.

Bank Bailout looks OK so far.

Markets around the world look very positive over the frankly massive bank bailouts world wide.

However we have two issues.

The first is excessive debt in the west, particularly in the USA and UK, and excessive savings in places like China all leading to massive trade deficits funded by fiddling currency rates and the savers lending us the money to buy what they produce.

Expect tight times ahead.

The BBC has this.

Government admits defeat on 42 days?

The government admits defeat on 42 days, but wants to keep a bill in its back pocket to bring out at a moments notice to blackmail parliament into passing it at a moments notice.

You just could not make it up.

As a previous Lord Chancellor, Lord Cheerful Charlie Falconer has pointed out, its not needed because if the prosecuting authorities have a reasonable belief that the evidence will become available, they can charge someone much earlier then gather the evidence. The bill as it now stands includes provisions for post charge questioning as well.

So where is the problem?

This is obviously just political posturing, and trying to look hard.

The BBC has this.

No more boom and bust!

Prudence is our watchword.

I knew it was claptrap at the time, and I screamed it from the rooftops. I, and indeed anyone with a brain, could see we had a looming problem built on a debt mountain, joyless economic growth built on immigration and so on.

I won't say I told you so, because even I did not think it would get quite this bad.

Last year I had a building society account. This year it appears I own ten banks. Bizarrely they probably will not lend me my own money. Quite amusingly they won't borrow from me either.

Our banking institutions seem to me to be schizophrenic. They will throw money at people who they know can't repay their credit cards, or they will not lend at all. There seems to be no sensible middle ground. The reasons for this are obvious. Whereas a junior member of a bank had a final say over a certain size of lending, and a bank manager much larger, now a bank manager has to do what he is told by a computer operating on a model built by a mathematician who has never lent money to anyone. The system is simple in its wrongness. The more money you have available, the more victims you seek, the less, the harsher your lending criteria. At no point in this is there the opportunity for individual judgement. That is what is missing from the system.

The Big Bank Bailout: Will it work?

That is of course the £500 billion question.

I suppose the answer depends on what you mean by "work".

Will it bring on days of endless economic sunshine?

No. Emphatically no.

What it may do, and by goodness I hope it does, is stave off a depression. It will not stave off a recession, I am afraid for reasons I will state below.

You have to start by asking where we are. We are a debt ridden country with a debt ridden government. Money supply has been out of control. We may as well have been printing the stuff, but we haven't, we have been borrowing it from the Chinese and the OPEC countries to buy their exports. This is the fundamental root of the problem.

We have hideous amounts of private debt, something like £500 billion on credit cards and unsecured loans, let alone what we have in mortgages at horrific income multiples and/or self certified housing debt quite a lot of which was based on what now seems very optimistic valuations.

The bottom line is that we have to pay back at least £500 billion in foreign debt. We also need to encourage local savings. That will hit the economy hard for many years to come.

Still, at least we can bank on our banks, but with a bit of luck we can reduce the number of regulations they have to comply with whilst making them more effective. Less can definitely be more here.

The irritating thing about all of this is that both the Conservative party and the Liberal Democrats have been pointing out this car crash for years, though none expected it to be either this bad or this costly.

The BBC has this.

Sir Ian Blair resigns!

My position is clear. Sir Ian Blair should not have resigned. That is a tragic error.

Left leaning twits have accused the Conservative party of making things party political. This is tosh.

Sir Ian Blair should have been sacked, long ago for dragging his office into politics, and indeed so should have this government, for dragging the police into politics especially over various bits of anti terrorism legislation.

The fascinating thing was watching Chris Huhne's comments. he basically said that if Blair did not have the confidence of London's mayor, he should go. The reason for this approach is obvious. It distances the Liberal Democrats from a direct link to the ousting of a pratt, whilst supporting it, because Liberal Democrats have also been irritated by Ian Blair dragging his office into politics.

So when New Labour freaks (and anyone who is still new Labour is a freak) shout about us Conservatives dragging the police into politics, perhaps they might consider how they have dragged them in first.

For my first article on why he should go see here.

Labour meltdown continues, latest poll is dire!

The latest Ipsos Mori poll in today's Telegraph is dire news for Labour.

It reports the shares as follows; Conservatives 52% (+4), Labour 24% (NC) and the Liberal Democrats on 12% (-5).

On this basis the Conservatives would win 481 seats, and give them an overall majority of 312. This would be a landslide of staggering proportions.

Ouch.

Political betting also has this.

Labour meltdown

It is at times like this you do have to wonder, as a spectator, if it can get any worse.

We have ever increasing calls for a Labour leadership contest, and much gnashing of teeth. Curiously this has bumped the Liberal Democrat conference of the news agenda a bit which is bad manners, bu then they don't have much to say of significance anyway.

The big question has to be; Will there be a Labour party in 2015?

The answer is of course yes, as the Liberals suffered a massive prolonged wipe out and have to some extent made a bit of a comeback. The lesson here is not that Labour will be here for ever, just that it takes a long time to wipe out a party, for the Labour party has never delivered its promises to its base and now has alienated its base with its current message and awful leadership.

September the 11th anniversary.

Well, we are 7 years on from the 11th of September 2001.

I remember popping next door to the TV shop and watching the second plane hit on many TV screens.

It was so hard to take in.

Doubly so as I watched the towers collapse.

May they rest in peace.

Do the BBC hate the disabled?

I am growing increasingly incensed at how much it seems the BBC do not care for the disabled.

The coverage of the Paralymics is derisory.

I have just watched the sport report on BBC News 24.

The lead item was very brief, Lance Armstrong making a comeback.

Then football news.

Then the very briefest mention that we may have a passing interest in an event involving some cripples.

Well, cheers. F*cking cheers you useless mindless bunch of ignorant left wing useless w*nkers.

I, and several other able bodied friends are actually quite interested in the paralympics, our team our doing us proud thank you very much though they would be doing very well to beat their performance last time, when they came second in the medal table.

I mean, for pities sake, we have a one legged cyclist who's record beats the Los Angeles Olympic record of 1984, and is but 5 seconds behind Chris Hoy's record. I would love to be able to tell you his name, but alas it is not clear on the BBC's website, nor is that fact noted there that I could find.

The medals table is not there in an updated form either.

Mind you, the BBC has form for hating the disabled. You may recall the other day seeing a blind correspondent. He stuck in my mind because I had never seen one on TV before. He was not the best looking of people, and his obvious all white eyes were striking, but then so what? The BBC has plenty of not that good looking male reporters, (though now I come to think of it, not that many not so good looking women ones, are they sexist as well?) who cares if he is blind? His name was Gary O'Donoghue. His report seemed fair enough.

Well according to Private Eye, and indeed his wikipedia entry he was the man on the scene about to break the news of the political fallout over foot and mouth last year. He is after all an experienced political correspondent and was the on duty man at the time.

So there he was about to broadcast to the nation on the Friday night 10 o'clock news, a blind man, and as an observation, the first one to do so that I can recall, when, according to both Private Eye and Wikipedia, an hour before he was due on air the deputy editor, Daniel Pearl decided he did not want a cripple on TV.

The BBC has had to pay lots of money for that, as they were sued. Daniel Pearl looks set for promotion.

So there you have it. The BBC promotes those who discriminate against the disabled, and treats the paralympics as so second class it can't be arsed to give it air time, outside its good coverage on BBC2 for 1 hour in the evenings. (The Olympics had the same but on BBC1).

This is wrong. So very very wrong.

And whilst I am at it, I listen to the very good correspondent Peter White on BBC Radio 4, why don't we see him on TV?

Is the economy about to turn the corner?

Well, there is good news about, or at least better than the utterly dire news we have been getting.

The US government has effectively taken over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac who cover half the US mortgage market. Although leaving shareholders severely out of pocket, it seems the US government is going to make mortgage cash available helping the US housing market.

Markets around the world have reacted positively to this news. Had either or both of those institutions collapsed things would have been very grim indeed.

Also oil is down, as are raw materials prices leading to lower output figures.

Make no mistake, it will take quite a while for confidence to return to the market, but we may now be moving along the bottom and up again, in terms of confidence.

The BBC has this on the US and this on factory output prices.

Kevin Keegan not resigned or sacked shocker!

The whole world of journalism was thrown into turmoil last night after it emerged that Kevin Keegan had not been sacked and had not resigned.

Several journalists who had banked on a good lunch by making something out of nothing were completely dumbfounded.

One journalist who did not wish to be made said:

I don't know what's going on! We spend years talking to people, then take one unguarded comment completely out of context, misquote it, make a story and ruin someones life, sells lots of news papers and so on, but this time, it seems not to have worked. I am shocked!

Another older and wiser journalist intervened saying:

Yes, but if we keep this rubbish up long enough, and tell each side lies about each other, you never know what might happen. There are legs on this story yet.

So there we are then. A story journalists have made.... or what?

The BBC has this.

PS sorry for not posting for a while.

Northerners: Leave your homes and all move South!

Well, that is not actually quite the message of the Policy Exchange report released today but it sure does sound like it.

Iain Dale has his take here, with a helpful extract from the introduction. The full document is here, I no I have not as yet read it.

The premise seems to be that regeneration money has not actually kept the cities of the north with growth of the south. Obviously you would have to ask just how bad would it be had the money not been spent.

The point is well made, and the reports introduction does scream the answer, alas the report seems to miss the answer it is screaming on page one and prefers the answer that John Prescott obviously feels a bit insulting and David Cameron thinks is mad, which is that people should move to the same corner of the country. Is anyone going to ask us southerners if we want to take all this internal migration? What of the cities of the north now denuded of all their aspirational talent? Is this not just going to make some very bad situations worse?

As Iain points out above, Cardiff is doing well in its regeneration.

So what is the answer? Well the introduction of the report states:

Places that enjoyed the conditions for creating wealth in the coal-powered 19th-century often do not do so today. Port cities had an advantage in an era when exporting manufactured goods by sea was a vital source of prosperity; today the sea is a barrier to their potential for expansion and they are cut off from the main road transport routes.

Just re read that several times. Particularly "and they are cut off from the main road transport routes."

If you look at every deprived area of the country, and they exist in the south east as well as the north, you will note the lack of proper transport links. Hastings is an example of relative deprivation as is Weymouth.

The short answer is to build better road, rail and air transport to all these areas. Build the transport links and the business will come, its basic O level geography. What is more, the person representing the report on the news today seemed to know that transport is what built these cities, he just has not worked out that if those modes of transport have moved on, we can build new ones.

Something that is clear to me though, is that if the Conservative party wishes to build a prosperous Conservative country it needs to build road and rail like never before.

The BBC has this.

Russia withdraws from Georgia!

Russian troops have throughout the day been withdrawing from Georgia in accordance with statements made by President Dmitry Medvedev.

This would normally have been treated as good news, however there is a problem, and that is that either their navigational equipment is broken, or that their definition of "withdrawal" is a one with which we are not familiar with.

It beggars belief that Russian troops have been filmed by both Channel 4 and the BBC in and around Gori.

Iain Dale laments the tales of Georgian refugees in this article here. I have not been there, but I can tell you that I have been to the former Yugoslavia when it was at war, and this sort of things happen both ways. That is of course no excuse for anything, but I will say this: I suspect that if you went to Tshinvali* and sat and had a coffee with a few local Ossetians you would come away with the impression that these were good solid honest hospitable and above all friendly people. You would feel exactly the same way having spent the afternoon in the company of Georgians in Gori. You would however, as I was in the former Yugoslavia be dreadfully shocked at the bestial violence they seem to meet out amongst themselves.

I have heard much about the atrocities the Russians claim have been committed and those committed by them and the Ossetians. With regret I can believe and disbelieve both at the same time. What is of course needed is hard evidence and in war that is hard to come by. Is that dead child a Georgian killed by the evil Russians, and Ossetian killed by the evil Georgians, or just a casualty of war.

Two things are clear though, Mikheil Saakashvili is not the sort of person I would want to be able to declare war on my behalf, and Russia needs sorting out.

*Please note that a correct transliteration would probably spell that Tsinvali though other alternatives are Tschinvali. It is pronounced roughly as Shinvali but try to imagine a T being there, at the front, but just a bit.

The BBC has this.

What was Georgia thinking of?

You do have to ask, don't you.

It is true that at this time of year that the separatist parts of Georgia kick off. Conspiracy theorists might suspect that Russians are advising this is a good time of year to act as international leaders are on holiday. Such skirmishes happen every year it seems.

Yet this time Georgia responded.

I am not saying that Georgia does not have the right to defend itself or its citizens and so on and so forth, but the people threatening them are, at heart a super power of sorts.

So why now, and why like this?

Good question. I have no idea why now.

Why like this? It was nuts. There are Russian troops in Georgia and it must have been obvious that they would be reinforced if there was any sort of threat. Georgia is separated from Russia via a fairly defensible mountain range. The only rational thing to do would have been to only "go for it" if they could seal all mountain roads before reinforcements could be sent. That rather obvious part of the plan seems not to have made it on to the plan.

Georgia was provoked, and was aware of the large build up of Russian troops. It does beg the question what were they playing at?

War in Georgia: What do we do?

This is a question that Iain Dale poses on his blog, quoting some interesting articles including some from Cicero's songs. I like Cicero and find him pleasant company and very knowledgeable on Russia and its former imperial possessions of which Georgia is one. Cicero's songs has this and this. One of those articles says that Russian troops have turned up in Abkhazia, Georgia's other break away region which shows Russia's true intentions.

So what do we do? Well, I would not start from here.

Cicero makes the point that this is a bit like the Rhineland. For those who are not as well versed in history that refers to Nazi Germany sending in their army into the Rhineland breaching the Versailles treaty of 1919. You might ask what is wrong with the Germans stationing their troops in Germany. Well, it was the first test of international resolve and lead to ever greater ones until the invasion of Poland in September 1939 which led to war.

However the problem is this: Whilst we would have had trade with Germany which we could have stopped with sanctions (but did not) we can't do the same with Russia. Firstly we have too much money there but more crucially Europe is reliant on Russian oil and gas. The only other way of getting the stuff out of central Asia is.. yes you guessed it, via a pipeline in Georgia the Russians have just bombed. In short the Russians have us by both out wallets and our heating and lighting.

We do seriously look at the way we have taxed our oil companies out of our own oil fields. Europe also needs to do no important trade with Russia, because frankly we can't trust their government.

The BBC has this.

Government dithering smashes housing market

Government dithering over stamp duty is set to cause an even worse crash than we were headed for.

The problem is this: Some journalists got the idea that Alistair Darling was going to introduce a stamp duty holiday in a similar way to that introduced by the Conservative government in the last housing crash.

The problem is that now we have uncertainty. Buyers who have to pay the tax may wait until they know because there could be a few thousand pounds in it.

This could all be a story cooked up by the media but the problem with that thesis is that we know that this Labour government (including the Tony Blair years) likes to manage news. Whereas in years gone by if a budget measure was in the press before it was announced to parliament, the chancellor resigned New Labour's news management has gone to such levels that we know about most of the budget from well briefed journalists long before hand. In other words this government has form for this sort of thing.

However no actual announcement has been made so the housing market is in limbo. The Conservative party have rightly asked for an end to the uncertainty and rightly so. We can stymie the housing market until October's pre budget report.

This is of course the problem with Labour and indeed its news management. It has no idea why things are as they are so sees no reason not to change. It sees no boundaries in common conventions. Frankly they have not got a clue and never had one either.

The BBC has this and the Daily Mail has this.

A Woman's place is in the home: Official!

Hold on, don't shoot the messenger, I am only commenting on this survey conducted by Professor Jacqueline Scott of Cambridge university.

It seems that attitudes to working mums has begun to change back to thinking that perhaps it is better for women to be at home.

That is an interesting change and what is more it has begun to swing as more parents put their children with minders and go out to work.

From a personal point of view I can see why attitudes are changing and in some ways that is no bad thing. There seemed to be a building disdain for women who stayed at home to look after kids and it is also a job which is under appreciated.

However it would be a very bad thing if people started feeling constrained by others. After all people do need to make their own decisions. In quite a few cases it can make more sense for the man to stay at home for example. I am not sure it does make sense for both parents to work full time at the same time thus having their children in full time care though sometimes that is necessary.

Any way, I think I ought to shut up now before I did an even deeper hole for myself!

The BBC has this.

I have just bought £130 of Northern Rock Shares!

I know, I know, you must think I am mad, and I have to say I see your point, but I have just bought £130 of Northern Rock shares anyway.

The transaction was easy and fairly painless as far as I was concerned. I did not have to sign any papers, call any stock brokers or anything like that.

In fact coming to think about it, I wasn't even asked. Someone just dipped their hands in my pocket, just took the money and bought the shares.

Still the paper work is easy. No share certificates or anything like that.

On the upside its not like there will be any profits to pay tax on, on the downside I will not be able to write my losses of against the already murderous tax I pay.

The BBC has this.

Richard Dawkins and the non existence of God

I have to say I have heard a few snippets of what Richard Dawkins has had to say on the subject of religion, but never quite realised what a plonker he is.

Channel 4 have just screened a documentary billed as being about Charles Darwin whereas it was in fact about Richard Dawkins using the Origin of Species as an attack on religion. A bot of a shame really as Charles Darwin was a clever fellow, whom I would have liked to hear about. Richard Dawkins on the other hand I can live without.

His theory on the non existence of God seems to go along the lines of:

Christianity says the world was created in 6 days.

Evolution says it wasn't, ergo God does not exist.

Needless to say with thinking like that, it is no surprise to find h is a biologist rather than a mathematician or physicist.

The problem with Dawkins proposition is that he us taking the bible far too literally. For example what about the earth being created in 6 days? Well who's days? Ours? God's? Where is the evidence to say?

Further more, the bible and others like it have not only been passed down for generations often orally, but also crucially is not supposed to be a scientific treatise which is why it does not mention quantum theory, but a treatise on the way people should interact with each other and with God.

Gordon Brown declared Bankrupt!

You will not have read this in any of the national news papers but Gordon Brown has been declared bankrupt.

Personally I feel sorry for him. I don't know what is worse. Being declared bankrupt or having as a namesake the most unpopular Prime minister in history.

Curiously though it was in the High Court which is an odd place to make a window cleaner bankrupt. I wish him luck, he is going to need it.

Whatever you do, don't catch an unfashionable disease

Please don't.

There are fashionable diseases, like AIDS or breast cancer, then there are unfashionable ones like prostate cancer, malaria or Alzheimer's.

If you look at how many people who are going get a given disease and how much is spent on research and treatment there are clearly fashionable diseases and unfashionable ones.

Barry George guilty! but not of murder...

Well, the worst you say say about Barry George is that he is a bit odd, which combined wit the fact that he lived near Jill Dando about sums up the prosecution case against him.

I am very pleased he has been acquitted because last time I looked being a bit odd was not a criminal offence.

I wonder of the police will investigate the murder properly. Somehow I doubt it.

The BBC has this.

Record house Price drop reported by Nationwide.

The Nationwide building society has released their latest price survey indicating the largest drop in house prices in a single year since their records began in 1991, during the last housing collapse. Prices fell by 8.1% back to levels last seen in mid 2006.

Grim news indeed. So what happened to no more boom and bust?

The BBC has this.

Labour at War!

The Labour party is at war, according to this article in today's Daily Telegraph as bitter recriminations fly after David Miliband's Guardian article and yesterdays press conference (The BBC has this on the conference).

Well, if they are fighting like rats in a sack, all I can say is pass the popcorn, I am enjoying the spectacle!

Money grabbing Vultures circle over Methylene Blue wonder drug

According to a comment by greygeek77 (who alas does not allow viewing of his profile and so I can't find his blog to link to it) on a previous article on the subject:

A little Googleing will show that Methylene Blue, a coal tar dye, was first synthesized in 1875, and was used by the famous French scientist, Ehrlich, in 1861, to treat pain and neuropathy because he noticed it had an affinity for neural fibers. A typical dose is 100 mg per 100Kg of body weight as a pill, or 1 to 2 mg per 100Kg as an injection.

Bulk price for MB is $42/Kg but pharm grade is now going for $285 for 250mg!! The greed has begun.

A patent was filed in 2004 for a "new" way of making the compound because MB is too old to patent itself, and hence wouldn't be profitable enough. It appears that the prescription price will be about $5/day.

This is one "drug" that the US government should nationalize in order to HELP the elderly, most of whom are on limited incomes, and to prevent their exploitation by the pharmaceuticals for unearned profit.

So the bottom line is this:

Methylene Blue has been known for 127 years to be good for neurological problems, and is cheap.

Drug companies seem to have realised this and are rushing to shore up profits by applying for new patents on an old remedy.

The price has spiked, probably due to a sudden interest. I bet that as soon as things settle down generic drug producers will be producing this stuff like it is going out of fashion.

Gas bills taxed at 75%!

Just in case you were wondering why left wing Labour MP's were calling for a windfall tax on oil and gas companies, consider this:

We now import 40% of our gas, which is why it costs so much, but crucially when British gas draws it off the North sea it pays 75% over in tax to Gordon Brown. This explains two things:

1. Why gas bills are so high.

2. Why
no one can be bothered to bring new capacity on in the North sea. After all it is hardly worth looking if you can't make any money out of it.

In fact this government, egged on by very ignorant left wing MP's and unions, has taxed the North Sea oilfields to the point where no matter what is down there it is hardly worth a look.

So the next time you look at your gas, or indeed electricity bill, and lament the VAT on it, please remember the hidden 75% tax.

The figure of 75% jumped out at me as I was listening to an interview with the MD of British Gas who pointed that out.

Methylene blue: The new wonder drug?

After having published this article on Methylene blue and its affects on Alzheimer's I have been doing a bit of reading about this blue dye.

It seems that according to this article on a research paper it also repairs defective memory.

The great thing is that it is already administered as a medicine and crucially is cheap.

The interesting thing about the memory repair is that it works in a different way to the way it cures Alzheimer's in that it deals with some problems in mitochondria. You do have to wonder what its affect would be on errant proteins in cancer mitochondria as well. I suspect no one has tried this though as there will not be any money in it.

This does lead to some serious questions about how medical research and drug research is funded and what results it produces. There is no money in finding out that the cure for some ailment is something that is cheap as chips already. More on that later.

Police use terrorism acts to cover up their own criminality

Police in Portsmouth have tried to use the 2000 Terrorism act to cover up their own criminal breach of motoring laws.

A passer by noticed a police car illegally parked (Motoring offences are a criminal offence) so took a picture.

They then questioned the passer by, David Gates, under the terrorism act, citing security concerns.

We have to get seriously concerned when police cite "security concerns" when people are gathering evidence of specific criminal offences, even if they are only road traffic offences.

Let us be clear: If you can see it from a public place, you can photograph it, and if it is the police breaking the law you certainly can.

The local Portsmouth paper has this, whilst the BBC, appearing to have lost its bottle, had a brief news report at 6 but has dropped it since, showing such post Hutton courage, has nothing at all.

Doha trade talks collapse in rubbish!

I do not intend on slinging mud at any one in particular, but more at everyone in general.

The Doha trade talks have collapsed because, it seems people want to argue over how much of the cake they will get rather than looking at the obvious solution, making the cake bigger, much much bigger.

We have the primary issue of agricultural subsidy and agricultural trade.

The current position is that all blocks try to maximise there output at the cost of their tax payer whilst reducing the output of others as much as possible then imposing tariffs of all sorts to suit which ever lobby they want.

The net result is that you and I subsidise people to reduce world food output and keep food prices up, which does not seem like a good idea to me.

Just to move the position on though, consider this: You are a jobbing TV maker in Wales, a jobbing banker in London, a jobbing consultant in IT or some other possibly exportable service.

How many Africans who's economy has been destroyed by your taxes and can't afford to eat are going to pay for your services?

It is a no brainer really. There is no fair trade other than free trade, and like charity it starts at home. If you want a job, you have to allow others to have one too.

The BBC has this.

Blue dye known to cure Alzheimer's cures Alzheimer's Shocker!

There is a blue dye, methylthioninium chloride, otherwise known as the common biological staining agent and chemical indicator Methylene blue which seems to kill Alzheimer's stone dead. Well perhaps that is over egging it a bit, but it tackles the root observation of Alzheimer's which is a tangle of the tau proteins in neurons.

Apparently a researcher looking at tau proteins tried to dye them with methylene blue and found they disappeared 20 years ago.

It has taken this long, that is 100 years from finding the root pathology, and 20 years from finding a clearing agent for some research to be done.

Whilst I hail this storming success, which not only promises to halt Alzheimer's but in part reverse it, you have to ask why this research has taken so long and why it has taken a drug company to fund it? Alzheimer's is already a very expensive disease economically.

Curiously though, if the "drug" is expensive and unavailable on the NHS there may well be some jobbing chemists quite prepared to make the stuff up.

It will be cheap as chips after all.

The BBC has this, whilst the Telegraph has this.

Incidentally the Telegraph nor the BBC broadcast reports mention that it is a common chemical that has been available for years, whilst the Telegraph suggest that it may cost as much as £2.50 a day, half the price of the current non prescription curative, a pack of cigarettes. I do not know what other stiff is in "Rember" but suspect we will not find out easily. If it is just Methylene Blue, then it can be make up as a solution for little and I suspect available to even the poorest in society.

Labour Ministers plot to oust Brown as polls show dire news!

And all I have to say is:

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

The latest polls indicate a remarkable defeat for Labour at the next general election, for example the Sunday Telegraph has this poll of key marginals which shows Labour behind the Liberal democrats whilst Comres for Saturday's Independent shows Labour 22% behind nationally. (As I write this their website is down so you can read about the poll on politicalbetting.com)

The Sunday Telegraph also carries this news on the plots to oust Gordon Brown in September!

The problem with all the plotting stories is this:

It can't happen.

The rules of the Labour party say that they can only actually get rid of a sitting leader if 70 MP's decide they want to, and place a motion for conference sometime in April.

They haven't so they need to get Gordon to resign and that isn't going to happen because no one has got the Balls.

In short, Labour are going to be fighting like rats in a sack for a while to come, egged on by the media, with no real result.

What is more laughable is that some Labour insiders (Not all I hasten to add) seriously think that Gordon Brown is the problem. Well he is, but not as Prime minister, but more so as chancellor for the first 10 years.

The fact is that people have been sold a lie by Labour, and now they have found them out.

Labour are in for a drubbing no matter who they have as PM going into the next election.

SNP win Glasgow East!

Well there you have it, Labour have lost Glasgow East to the SNP, and the Liberal Democrats have been pushed into 4th place behind the Conservatives.

This is a fantastic result!

The question is what does this do for Gordon Brown?

The answer is of course, nothing, as no one in Labour has any balls, not even Yvette Cooper.

Glasgow East, and the winner is: Me!

I am sorry, but I could not resist at 50 to 1 odds on, I had to lay some SNP, so took 40 pence worth!

Then I backed Labour at 7 to 1 and after a while someone took up that bet and so win whoever wins the vote!

That is all about being fast and clever :)

SNP sure favourites to win Glasgow East say punters!

I have just had a look at the Betfair prices and the SNP are sure fire fifty to one odds on favourites.

Spectacular!

Glasgow East: Will Labour lose?

It has to be said that Glasgow East is Labour's 3rd safest seat in Scotland. Some polls have placed Labour 17% ahead of the SNP.

So what happens if Labour lose?

Well the by election has been carefully timed so that MP's are away on holiday until September so we will not know for a while.

Max Mosley wins, but fails to get punitive damages.

Max Mosley has won his High Court case against the News of the World, being awarded £60,000 in damages. Alas he has failed to get punitive or exemplary damages which is a shame.

The reason why I say it is a shame is that large media organisations can make money out of trashing peoples reputations even where they get sued for libel and lose.

Take Robert Murat. His name was resoundingly trashed with no shred of evidence whatsoever. The papers who did that settled out of court for £50,000 each plus costs, presumably similar in number. Does anyone seriously think they did not make much more than that trashing his reputation?

The BBC has this and there is a copy of the judgement here, whilst the BBC has this on Robert Murat.

Radovan Karadzic, You're Nicked!

The good news is that Radovan Karadzic has been arrested. He should meet the charges against him and is one of many war criminals involved in the breakup of Yugoslavia.

The BBC has this.

The bad news is that for several hours all BBC News 24 did was report on that, so whatever other news there was went unreported, including a review of the news papers.

This is appalling. Whilst this story is very big, it is not so important that there can be no other news.

Education: I despair! A Tale of Two Essays.

On the front page of today's Telegraph is a story about a tale of two essays, about someone called Pip Davenport, one which got 8 out of 12 and one which got 7. The former is littered with spelling and grammatical errors, the latter not. The former is less coherent than the latter. The Latter is, needless to say more comprehensible. You can read both here.

The head teacher of the children's school was shocked.

Alas I am not. The reason why exams results are going up is not because children are any better but that the exams are getting so much easier. Well, at least for those not capable of coherent writing.

Before any one whinges at my comments, saying I am discriminating against people from certain backgrounds, I would point out that both universities and employers certainly will. They will do so my binning the CV's of the illiterate, interviews and increasingly there own exams.

Labour are simply letting down everyone in state schools by failing to ensure proper marking and a proper education. This will also destroy our economy.

Max Mosley's Hanky Spanky, and Punitive damages.

The News of The World likes a bit of sex, doubly so if there is spanking and trebly so if they can call it a sick and deprived Nazi sex orgy. It sells papers after all and the bottom line profit is what it is all about.

They got a lead on a "dirty old man" who liked to pay for kinky sex. Lets face it, on the face of what is admitted it was fairly kinky.

The News of the World contends that this was a sock and depraved act. The Editor claimed he would not have gone to press with the story had it not involved Nazi role play. (Does anyone including him believe that?)

The problem for the News of the World is that all those involved bar their "whistle blower" have said it was not, and the video seems to be inconclusive at best. Then of course their witness E failed to testify due to emotional issues. I have no doubt this was not due to intimidation on Max Mosley's part, so you have to wonder what she was so concerned about?

It is an interesting case. Max is upset according to the BBC, because:

Mr Mosley has told the court previously that the publicity has been "totally devastating" for his wife of 48 years, and he could think of "nothing more undignified or humiliating" for his two sons to experience.

Well that is a fair reason to be upset but you can't help but feeling that he could have avoided upsetting his wife by being faithful.



So what of privacy which is at the heart of the issue? Does Max Mosley have the right to do what he likes in his private life? Well having affairs is not illegal, nor is using prostitutes nor in fact sadomasochism. We may feel that cheating on his wife is wrong, but enjoying kinky sex you would not want to tell your kids about, well, I mean would you want to tell your kids and all their friends?

It seems to me that the News of the World have be in trouble having linked the publication to a Nazi fantasy after all Sir Oswald Mosley was a famous fascist, and would not have published otherwise, thus accepting the fact that Max cheated on his wife as not worthy of publication.

However there is one final interesting bit to this case, that of exemplary and punitive damages which are being asked for. In this BBC article they are described as "unprecedented" which is, of course precisely untrue, but then again what can you expect of journalists?

Punitive damages are available to English courts and perhaps always have been. It is just that lawyers seldom have the balls to ask for them nor do they present evidence that would justify them.

There is a clear precedent in English law as well as the common law of the United States of America. In English law there is the case of Rookes v. Barnard [1964] AC 1129, 1167 in which Lord Devlin said that punitive damages were available where:

1. Oppressive, arbitrary or unconstitutional actions by the servants of government.
2. Where the defendant's conduct was 'calculated' to make a profit for himself.
3. Where a statute expressly authorises the same.
   

Clearly the News of the Worlds actions would fall into the second category. There are too many instances where a party can get away with making a profit from committing a wrong because they know they will either get away with it, or that the costs of being called to account will be less than the profit of committing the wrong or more usually a combination of the two.

For that reason and that reason alone, I hope that cheating git Max Mosley wins his case and wins it well.

For a further discussion on gains based damages I recommend James Edelman's book, Gain-Based Damages published by Hart Publishing.

David Davis wins 42 day debate!

On the eve of the by election in Haltemprice and Howden, David Davis has clearly won the debate which Labour through sheer cowardice refused to have.

In an ICM poll conducted for the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust now 61% of people are against holding people for longer than 28 days without charge. Of those who support 42 detention without charge, when told that is equivalent to a jail term for something like burglary 36% then change their minds.

The survey also is a blow to people who want an ever expanding DNA database with 75% thinking that innocent people should bot be on the database permanently.

In that sense David Davis has clearly won the debate. It is just a shame that the BBC refuse to cover it.

Iain Dale has this, whilst the press release is here and the full data here.

The World has gone mad!

The man who is now in custody, suspected of murdering Gabriel Ferez and Laurent Bonomo tried to give himself up at Lewisham police station. He was told to wait at the back of the queue.

Amazing.

Needless to say that the police who are investigating the savage murder were none too pleased.

The Sun has this, Iain Dale has this, and the BBC has this.

Waste Not want not, oh, and pass the caviar!

Gordon Brown came up with a priceless comment at the G8 yesterday, along the lines of waste not want not.

If we threw away less food then we would buy less and so prices would not be quite so high, so we would save twice!

Fair enough, however this message was delivered at a summit costing something like $280 million (yes you read that right) and involved an 8 course lunch followed by a 10 course dinner.

You can't blame Gordon Brown for that, but you do have to wonder which 42 carat plonker thought up the idea of having such a lavish summit to discuss poverty and high food prices!

The Sun has this on "waste not want not", and this in its Sun says, whilst the BBC has this on the G8.

The Lunatics* have taken over the Asylum!

*To be fair I am being very harsh on lunatics, they can't be this mad!

Apparently under the junk food advertising ban, things like Marmite, honey and raisins can't be advertised to children on the grounds of their nutritional value per hundred grammes.

Have you ever ever seen any one open a jar of Marmite and seen them consume the lot wit a spoon? I thought not. In a sandwich, on Rivita or crackers maybe, with cheese (though you can't advertise that either) even which you also can't advertise to children apparently.

Nevertheless, McDonald's can still sponsor programs and promote their brand as long as they do not mention any products.

This is the utterly ridiculous result of government regulation. Despite pleas from the food industry OffCom are standing firm as a complete and utter bunch of loonies.

The Telegraph has this.

Criminal Justice, a bizarre twist

So there we have it, Ben Coulter didn't do it, and had the police investigated properly perhaps they would have found that out.

Great series.

Ray Lewis resignation

Ray Lewis has resigned as deputy Mayor to Boris Johnson over allegations of impropriety that date back 10 to 12 years. Some of the allegations are listed here.

We do not know what truth lies behind these allegations but what we do know is that they are coming thick and fast.

The lesson clearly is that if you stick your head above the parapet and get into politics your enemies will try to get you.

I do not know why we are in this position. Clearly any appointee needs to be vetted. Was this done? Is this just a case of bad blood?

Still, a mans reputation lies in tatters because he tried to do something, and all this without a trial.

The BBC has this on the resignation, Iain Dale has this on the affair.

Criminal Justice, a very compelling drama!

Criminal Justice is a very compelling drama. In fact I think it is fantastic.

We do not yet know the result but what we have seen is the way the investigation works and the way prisons work.

We already know the main character Ben Coulter did not murder Melanie. What we also know is that he looks guilty as sin by forensic evidence and the fact he ran away.

We also know how partial "expert" witnesses can be.

This is one of the most important dramas to be aired on the BBC since things like Cathy come home and justifies their licence fee.

The only problem is that no one else I know is watching it, which in my view is criminal.

Police hand Peter Hain's file to CPS

The police have been investigating Peter Hain's declarations of donations in his deputy leadership bid. They have now handed the file over to the CPS, who will decide whether to charge or not.

The problem here is that as I read the law, non declaration is a strict offence and lets face it, Peter did not come clean until he was exposed. If he does not get prosecuted for this, whether it is an "innocent mistake" or not, people are going to smell a rat.

The BBC has this.

Gotcha! Bribes on the 42 day vote!

Gordon Brown has tried to insist that the government did not buy the 42 day vote. The problem is that no one believes him at all, not even a little bit.

David Cameron skewered him at prime ministers questions today after getting confirmation no bribes were offered. He read out extracts of a letter to Keith Vaz from Geoff Hoon saying he hoped that there would be an appropriate reward for his support which the Telegraph had been given.

The problem for Gordon Brown is this: No one believes a word he says anymore.

The Telegraph has this, Guido has this and the BBC has this.

Criminal Justice

First of all, after two episodes, I have to say fantastic.

Has it changed my mind about anything?

No!

Do I hope it has changed yours?

Yes!

The plot is interesting (if inaccurate in some ways) in that the lead character arrives at his predicament in a very unusual way. Despite the fact that the viewer knows it to be true, if you told that story down the pub, you would be laughed at. That does not mean that it could not be true, weirder things have happened to me (though not involving sex), and that he can't remember the murder so does not know if he did it.

Now, moving on:

We have the situation where the police seem to take the line of least resistance. Crucially the lead investigator has doubts but not the man power to investigate what appears to be an open and shut case.

We have lawyers who encourage the defendant to be silent, and who weigh up the odds on the basis of odds alone.

The truth seems to be a lost irrelevance.

Then the other thing is prison.

I am all in favour of locking up criminals. I am even in favour of remand subject to many caveats.

What I am clear on is that prison does not work. It is entirely dysfunctional and needs urgent fixing.

For a start it needs to return to the Victorian ideal of a prisoner to a cell. Secondly shower or toilet facilities can not and should not be shared. Anything else allows the rule of the bully and prevents rehabilitation.

More thoughts will appear as the series goes on.

The BBC has this.

NHS at 60, A Conservative policy implemented!

It is often said by Labour that they are the founders of the NHS and so on and so forth. Some even allege that the Conservative party was against it.

Nothing could possibly be further from the truth.

The Conservative Prime Minister Winston Churchill was not only in favour of it but passed an NHS bill in 1943. The Labour leadership opposed the formation of the NHS initially until they realised they would be lynched by both the PLP, their wider membership and the country when they relented.

It was a proposal by a Liberal (Sir William Beveridge) to a Conservative (Winston Churchill) opposed by Labour initially.

There is no doubt that we would have done it differently but don't let Labour con you that the NHS was either there idea or we would not have it without them.

If you do not believe me see the end of this article by Trevor Kavanagh in the Sun or this article in the Telegraph.

Alas you don't read a lot of the real founding fathers of the NHS in the Guardian, because despite Alan Rusbridger's all star cast of public school boys and girls they appear ignorant of history.

F*ck Off!

Sorry, just practicing for GCSE English.

If you do not believe me, read this in the Times and weep, or this on the BBC.

They say exams are not being dumbed down.

Alas I remain to be convinced.

Housing and oil gloom

Not only has oil reached yet another record high, at over $143 a barrel but the crisis in the housing market looks set to get deeper as mortgage lending sets a new record low.

So no more boom and bust then Gordon?

The BBC has this on the housing market and this on oil.

Whats up in Zimbabwe? Can't they rig a ballot properly?

Well, we are still waiting for the results of the presidential election run off in Zimbabwe, not that anyone thinks it is either free or fair.

The vote took place on Friday. Apparently they were counted yesterday.

So why the hold up? Given the amount of beatings, murders and intimidation is the result still embarrassing?

After the result, all eyes will be on Africa and we will see if they recognise the nasty evil Robert Mugabe as president.

The BBC has this.

Is Sweden stark staring mad?

The Times carries this story today about a Swedish child's attempts to organise a birthday party in which not all his classmates were invited.

According to this article in the Times this has sparked a national debate. The child's invitations were even confiscated.

They must be mad.

Bonkers smoking ban in Holland!

I have to say that I am against the smoking ban in this country. If they want clean air then they can legislate for clean air and if someone can provide that without banning smoking that is a matter for them.

However in a surreal move Holland, famous for its "coffee houses" where people smoke marijuana legally there is to be a smoking ban also. The thing is that it only applies to tobacco and not to marijuana. So you can smoke a joint if it has no tobacco in it but not if it has.

Is this just mad or what?

The BBC has this.

The great gun control experiment!

The Supreme Court of the United States of America has ruled that a ban on hand guns in Washington DC is unconstitutional.

Washington DC has both the some of the highest gun crime rates in the USA as well as the strictest laws on gun control. You could argue therefore that gun control laws do not work. Those who favour gun control argue that is rubbish and that gun crime is so rampant because you can nip across to Virginia and buy what you want.

There is some merit in both arguments, though gun control laws here came in and then gun crime rocketed. That does not mean they are related of course.

However it occurs to me that whilst the USA is going down this route we may get an answer on how useful gun control laws really are.

The BBC has this.

Are Labour just a bunch of muppets?

Well, the Crown blog thinks so here.

Wendy Alexander resignation

Firstly this obviously throws Labour in general and Labour in Scotland into some disarray.

Iain Dale apparently is not crowing about it here on the grounds that she only committed a technical breach of the rules whilst Guido points out that it goes much deeper than that in that she received two donations for £950 from a foreign source.

Well, Iain laments a system that is unclear in its rules that will catch out the honest but unwary. Well it does and that is wrong, though to be fair many who have been found guilty of "technical breaches" have been let off.

There is an air of mutual mud slinging going on where political enemies are getting at each other by leaking damning stories about sleaze. As the SNP note a lot of these enemies are in the same party as the accused.

This is all very damaging to politics and the only answer is a simple clean and transparent system of both making donations and declaring them.

The BBC has this.