various blogs 7 (5/3/17)

5/3/17
I understand the logic of the Law against “stealing by finding” but I have strong sympathy for the woman prosecuted for pocketing a stray £20 note.
I have known a case where someone found a £20 note being blown along a beach.
Someone, who found one folded up on the floor of a packed New Year’s Eve pub.
Whom do you tell?
To whom would you pass it?
Legally, you take it to the police, you get a chitty and in 6 month’s time, if no-one has reported it lost, you are invited to claim it.
Would you be able to take it into a cop shop and explain what you were doing?
Would you be able to tell anyone that you had done this?
What if it was a 10p coin?
If you lost a £20 note would you report it to the Police, hoping to recover it?
There’s legality and morality and there’s a fear of ridicule.

3/3/17
Although I can’t endorse The Lords interference in the brexit process, their amendment has pointed up the lack of support for Theresa May’s intent to use the future of EU residents as a negotiation tactic.
This total lack of support must surely have lost her any hoped for leverage in her negotiations.
Her EU opponents will be confident that she can’t play this “chip”
Consequently she might as well go for the humane option of assuring all law-abiding EU citizens resident here that they will be allowed to stay, if a reciprocal arrangement is agreed
I would think that those, who do consider themselves as British, would formalise that status and apply for citizenship to avoid future problems.
1/3/17
I was told that in order to sell their cars in the EU, Nissan had to agree to incorporate poorer but more expensive French components such as the nylon reeled electronic window winder (5 million imported parts per day).
If Nissan remains in the UK and has surcharges imposed by the Single Market, then Nissan would presumably be able to manufacture their own, better quality, components here.
They would be producing a superior product, more cheaply.
It would be worth the Government’s while to try to keep Nissan here, if they cared about the Economy and UK jobs.
26/2/17
Reading the article on the Sunday Mirror Poll, it says nearly two-thirds of Labour voters are satisfied with Corbyn staying as leader.
We need to grow on that and find out why the remaining voters aren’t happy.
It also says that over 5 in 6 think Labour has the right policies.
Presumably the remainder have some concern over particular issues.
We obviously need to consider what these may be, bearing in mind that you can’t please all the people all the time.
Perhaps further polls are needed but ones which seek to find what aspects of Tory policy concern their voters.
I can’t believe that all of their voters are happy with their policies on the NHS, prisons, police, HS2, trains and schools.

25/2/17
Why are some Labour MP’s joining the Tory chorus of attacking Jeremy Corbyn?
It can’t just be the loss of Copeland, where the Labour vote has been dropping by thousands ever since the initial success of Blair’s Gov’t in ousting the “Sleaze” ridden Tory Gov’t.
Blair was encouraged to quit in favour of Brown, because of his unpopularity.
Brown lost the following election mainly because of his beggaring the Nation to bail out the banker’s but partly because of his “bigot” attack on a Labour supporter.
I think the latter carried more impact for the ordinary voter.
Miliband lost the next election and gave fuel to UKIP by further deriding Labour supporters and denying them the right to a referendum on the EU and by not challenging the Tory claim that Labour were not responsible with money.
Two elections lost but Corbyn has yet to lose an election.
Nevertheless, he has been subjected to so much abuse by MP’s of his own party, that Labour voters at the far Left and far Centrist have been given cause to withhold their vote.
Whether, or not, Corbyn is replaced, Labour looks set to lose the next election, unless the whole of the Parliamentary Labour Party starts singing from the same song sheet and a tune that all sections of the Labour vote can endorse.
Judging by recent comments, still being made by some MP’s, this will never happen.
No doubt there will be plenty of suggestions as to who can replace Jeremy Corbyn but they will all be tainted by either Blairite or Corbynista attacks and will lose votes from one of those sections of voters.
I fear we are about to lose our NHS and enter a period of far Right control, which will take us back to the 1930’s

24/2/17
Remind me why our Gas and Electricity were privatised.
To turn us into a shareholder nation? But if working people had enough spare cash to keep shares, Wonga and Visa would be out of business.
They were going to build new power stations etc., which is why some are still running decades after they were supposed to be closed down. It’s why the Government has agreed to pay an extortionate price for the French and Chinese to build a new nuclear power station.
Prices would come down through greater efficiency.
It’s all a nonsense, really. Instead of one overpaid CEO (like British Gas boss, Iain Conn), we have a dozen, each with a duplication of Accounts, Computer, Admin, PR, Sales and Advertising departments.
We have a whole industry badgering us to Switch suppliers, wasting a few more hours of our lives. Who pays for them?
I remember the bad old days, when the Nationalised Industries weren’t pre-occupied with maximising shareholder profits but with keeping the Nation supplied and minimising customer complaints, delivered through badgered MP’s and Ministers. I even remember complaining about having to wait in for the gasman to bother to show up. Still some things never change.

10/2/17
Why has the BBC started asking “when” we should be charged to see a GP?
The question should be what is the point of a GP, if you are going to charge to see them?
It’s the GP who does the initial diagnosis and then re-directs to a specialist, as needed.
It’s the GP, who judges, whether you should be allowed prescription medication.
It shouldn’t an overworked random intern in A&E.
In a civilised Society it shouldn’t be a return of Blackadder’s “wise woman”, or ancient folk remedies for the masses and a privatised NHS for our “betters”

10/2/17
What is the point of asking anyone on BBC’s Question Time, how they’d feel, if an elderly relative had had to wait 8 hours on a trolley in A&E?
This is root cause of the disaffection between voters and politicians.
We know that their elderly relatives would be snug and secure in a hospital bed, whilst most of ours were waiting for an ambulance.

The same applies with many of the public services, which the majority rely on, such as education, social care, pensions, public transport and so on.
Small wonder that panellists rarely answer questions directly, when they can not speak from a common experience

7/2/17
I find it hard to believe that Tiverton Town Council lost two full years of Council Documents.
The first thing that should be taught on computer security course is the grandfather, father storage system for files.
Even a basic Windows domestic PC platform will recommend a monthly backup of your files.
Computer memory is extremely cheap and fast nowadays; it should be a routine to save working files and archive others.
To lose two years worth can only be construed as mismanagement, or an administrative convenience.
5/2/17
I have to agree with Saira Khan’s support of MP’s taking their babies into The Commons.
After all who’d notice, if one began screaming its head off during PMQ’s.
5/2/17
When HS2 was first announced, the price tag was given as £40 Bn, quickly revised to £50 Bn.
Although some pundits suggested that it might be £80 Bn, when finally underway, it has been consistently priced at £50-60 Bn.
Then this morning, I’m sure the figure of £90 Bn slipped off Andrew Marr’s tongue.
These slipping figures seem so slight, one thinks of only another £10 Bn increase at a time.
Then one asks how much has NHS funding been cut by the Tories and feels despair.
One also has to ask if HS2 will be necessary, once the Northern Powerhouse is underway and businesses realise that there are great ports at either end of these linked cities, with greater room for airport expansion and new cheaper housing.
Who is pushing for HS2 and why?
5/2/17
Your piece in the Sunday Mirror questioning the Honour’s System and the lack of a knighthood for David Beckham, does form an indictment of decisions being made by those claiming to represent us.
A more honourable system would be if such honours were decided by populist vote.
Of course, this is unlikely to happen when the likes of Lord Prescott, who having been on the wrong side of two referenda, has expressed a distaste for them.
He says, in the same issue of the Sunday Mirror, that he prefers the sovereignty of Parliament, over populist sovereignty.
He was happy to become an MP by populist vote but like many other MP’s (past and present) of both parties, he now expresses contempt for the ability of the People to make rational choices.
How can we respect such people, who are repeatedly telling us that decisions on Honours and Government policy can not be entrusted to us and, moreover, should in many cases, be kept secret from us, until an irrevocable decision has been made and published?
2/2/17
Candidates in local bye-elections are supporting constituency view on #brexit, although, for some, it’s contrary to their own views.
On the other hand, we are repeatedly told by MP’s that they are entitled to vote in Parliament, according to their own consciences, regardless of voter, leader, or constituency wishes.
what are we actually being asked to vote for, if candidates can be so blatantly hypocritical in their campaigning?

27/1/17
Gina Miller’s court case was, allegedly, merely to establish the Sovereignty of Parliament.
It was successful, so what does it matter if MP’s are only being asked for permission to sign Article50
signing Article50 doesn’t commit us to any pre-conditions, it merely initiates the avowed intent of all parties to obey the plebiscite’s wish to leave the EU?
I’m sure every step of the negotiations will be reported and chewed over, every step of the way.
Every agreed point will be objected to in Parliament, with the time limit reached before our Sovereign Parliament has reached any concensus about what the 27 EU leaders have been prepared to concede.

27/1/17
Just before Blair issued his demand, for more homework, OFSTED had announced that Homework was of little benefit except in certain instances such as in Maths.
Blunkett then demanded minimum amounts for all pupils, regardless of relevance.
It then became a duty of teacher’s to set, mark and (especially) record such work.
Some pupils are incapable of such an effort and were ordered to be punished for their failure to comply, creating resentful and disruptive pupils.
Compulsory homework has been the cause of most of the social problems in schools.

Tags: bbcqt, Blairites, Corbyn, EU residents, Gina Miller, GP charging, Homework, HS2, Nissan, State utilities, the Lords, theft by finding