Overmanning in public life...

There is a quote from Chandler in Friends, “All right, kids, I gotta get to work. If I don’t input those numbers... it doesn’t make much of a difference.” It reminds me of the civil service – you could probably sack two-thirds of them and it won’t make much of a difference.

The National Health Service employs about a million people – not all of them actually do anything beneficial. Many are pen pushers. In fact, at the Department of Health there is a department called the MRSA Cleaner Hospitals Team. I have no idea what they do but it seems to me that they would be a lot more useful if instead of sitting in an office shuffling paper they were given a mop and a bucket of bleach and sent to actually clean hospitals.

Miliband is not prime ministerial - although nor are any of the others

David Miliband writes an article for a little-read newspaper outlining his view for a Labour future and suddenly he is launching his bid for the leadership.

Former Blairite favourite Peter Mandelson says, "It would be a very strange government if there was nobody amongst the higher ranks who was not sufficiently qualified to be a future leader.

"I am not saying [David Miliband] is a candidate or that there is or should be a race but equally the government does have lots of talent and thank God for it."

That's the problem that could also be Gordon Brown's saving - there are not any big beasts on the Labour front benches who could take over. Jacqui Smith? Ed Balls? Miliband? They are hardly Cabinet material let alone prime ministerial.

Most of them are anonymous yes men (and women) - "government of all the talents"? Don't make me laugh...

Matt is a genius...

Absolutely brilliant (as always) cartoon from Matt Pritchett in The Daily Telegraph about the Weston-super-Mare fire that destroyed the pier.

Gordon can't have it both ways...

As the clouds gather over Gordon Brown, we are told that he is a financial genius and that the world is suffering from an economic downturn that is not his fault so he cannot be blamed.

Hang on, how come he took the credit when there was an economic upturn? He and his dwindling band of supporters can't have it both ways.

By the way, if he is such a financial genius why did he sell off our gold supplies at rock bottom prices?

Gordon is a weirdo

Amusing post yesterday from Guido showing further evidence that Gordon Brown is not as other men...

Hutton puts foot in mouth

Politicians really should think before they open their mouths.

The Times reports John Hutton, the Blairite business secretary who has taken a stand against the unions, responded by dismissing their influence, as asking, “Who are they? What is their mandate? Who elected them?”

One might be tempted to ask, who elected Gordon Brown?

Gordon, if you want to keep your job - get us out of Europe

Labour crash to another by-election defeat - in supposedly impregnable Glasgow. Another disaster for Gordon Brown. He has the Midas touch in reverse.

Brown said, "We've got to listen and hear people's concerns and that's exactly what we are doing.

"I'm getting on with the job. My task is getting on with the job. It's exactly what people want me to do."

Who are these "people" that Brown constantly refers to who supposedly want him to get "on with the job"? Most people want him to get out of his job.

To be fair to the useless weirdo, many of the problems he faces are not of his own making. However, he can do something about many of them - by simply withdrawing from the European Union.

Tax really doesn't have to be taxing...

News comes that Gordon Brown's tax credit system has cost £14billion in fraud, error and overpayment in just four years say the National Audit Office.

The tax credit system was created by Brown in 2003 to give otherwise unemployable people something to do. People on low incomes apply for tax credits to get back some of the money they have paid in tax. What company/government would take money from people, then employ other people to read forms filled in by the first people to get back some of the money they had originally paid? Utter madness.

Here's a radical idea. Change the tax system to introduce just three bands of tax that everyone can understand.
Band 1 for earnings up to £9,999.99 - 0p
Band 2 for £10,000 to £99,999.99 - 25p
Band 3 for £100,000+ - 40p
And that's it. Taxed at source so need for self-assessment - you know when the tax was collected by the Inland Revenue not the bodged HM Revenue & Customs.

Swindon sees some sense over speed cameras

A small cheer for Swindon Council who have announced that they might, might, get rid of their speed cameras and replace them with other devices.

I say a small cheer and not three rousing choruses of "Hip, hip..." because it hasn't happened yet and I am not sure that it will.

Typically, the (Labour) MP has even started a save out speed cameras campaign. Anne Snelgrove said the council was "playing politics with lives". As if the government doesn't do that 365 days a year.

Miss Snelgrove said the removal of the cameras could see road accidents and deaths rise. Could is the operative word.

A spokesman for the Department of Transport said the funding decision was a local matter for Swindon, but added: "Safety cameras are there to save lives not to make money. There are 1,475 fewer deaths and serious injuries at camera sites each year. The government is clear that the best safety camera is the one that takes no fines at all but succeeds in deterring drivers from speeding."

How on earth did he keep a straight face when he said that? How many times? They are not "safety" cameras - they are SPEED cameras. They are there to raise revenue for yet more of Gordon's mad schemes. And where did he come up with the figure of 1,475? Annually? Monthly? For each camera? All you need to know is that the figure is made up. Speed cameras are there to show people who is boss.

Another death in vain

In recent years roads have been further blighted by the painting of a bicycle and a zone near traffic lights - presumably for cyclists to wait "in safety" while waiting for the lights to change.

When have you ever seen a cyclist wait in the zoned area?

Last week, cyclist Jason Howard was fined £2,200 for killing 17-year-old Rhiannon Bennett, a horse management student he mowed down while cycling on the pavement.

As Howard, 36, a line painter from Buckingham, sped towards Rhiannon, he shouted, "Move, because I'm not stopping."

With no time to react, the 17-year-old was hit with the full force of the £4,750 custom-built bicycle, suffering fatal injuries as she hit her head on the pavement. Howard told the court that he could have avoided Rhiannon if he had slowed down.

The carbon fibre titanium bicycle was built to Howard's specifications. Despite its cost, the court heard it did not comply with the Highway Code because it had no reflectors on the pedals or on the back.

Howard, who has a previous conviction and is well-known in his home town as a thrill-seeker, was also ordered to pay £750 in costs.

Rhiannon's father, Mick, said, "It's laughable - when we first heard about this we thought it would be manslaughter, or perhaps even murder, but this is Britain. He is an arrogant, vile little man."

Rhiannon's mother, Diana, said: "Words cannot express how broken-hearted we are as a family.

"My daughter ended up dying for him having a bike ride."

A CPS spokesman said: "A file of evidence from the police was reviewed by a senior CPS prosecutor and, based on that evidence, it was decided the charge of dangerous cycling was the most appropriate."

Appropriate for whom? Another victory for British justice. And how does a line painter (roads? football pitches?) afford nearly five grand for a pushbike?

Up in the air madness...

There are many arguments for and against building a third runway at Heathrow. How it affects ethnic minorities or women should not really be taken into consideration. Yet, as Iain Dale reports, a decision on the future of Heathrow has had to be delayed because the government omitted to carry out a "race and gender impact assessment" of a new runway. There now has to be a new consultation to see how the proposals would affect ethnic minorities, women, the disabled and the elderly.

Madness, utter madness.

We can't afford IVF for all...

At PMQs today stand-in Harriet Harman was asked a question about IVF and said in essence that it should be available on the NHS everywhere and not just in certain areas - the so-called postcode lottery.

IVF should not be available on the NHS for anyone. When the health service began in 1948 it was formed to treat the sick, the elderly, children, victims of accidents and catastrophic illnesses - not to provide people with children that they can't have in the normal way.

Whilst I have sympathy for those people who want children but are unable to have them, it should not be the responsibility of the National Health Service to provide free fertility treatment anymore than it should pay for nosejobs, tattoo removals or sex change operations.

Successive governments have poured pots of money into the NHS and with what to show for it - and now people are dying from illnesses they have caught in hospitals.

More taxes on the way - thanks to a non-existent problem

Global warming is one of those subjects in which people - MPs especially - jump on the bandwagon to show their caring, "green" side.

The government announced in its Climate Change Bill that Britain is committed to make at least a 60 per cent cut in CO2 emissions by 2050. Now Gordon Brown faces yet another rebellion from 85 of his back benchers who want that figure to rise to 80 per cent.

The Labour rebels say the Climate Change Bill's 60 per cent goal will not do enough to control global warming and say the target is based on out-of-date science.

Britain is responsible for 1 per cent of the world's carbon emissions yet that minuscule figure has given Labour licence to introduce all sorts of exciting new taxes and to reduce the emptying of bins. Heaven knows what we will have to suffer if Brown gives in to his back benchers especially since the government has indicated it is not unsympathetic to the 80 per cent target and the prime minister has already said the evidence points that way.

The trouble is that the evidence is skewed and those in favour of man-made global warming are the ones who get the grants to perpetuate their nonsense. Those who look at the science find themselves short of money to challenge the orthodoxy.

Everyone should pay for healthcare...

This month is apparently “is Gypsy and Traveller month, an important time in the Equality and Human Rights calendar”.

The NHS wants to help more gypsies “access services” within the health service – an admirable aim, one might think.

Ian Holding of the Gypsy and Traveller Team at Bristol City Council has initiated a scheme to help them. He asks, “How can they access health services when they are moving about so much?”

Presumably, since they are moving about they are not paying tax or national insurance, so one might ask why they are entitled to health services they have not paid for?

Let the people speak, Mr Brunstrom

Richard Brunstrom has posted at length on his blog his view that crime no longer exists and so police can spend their time on minor incidents.

However, one thing Mr Brunstrom does not seem to believe in is free speech. At the bottom of his blog it states, "Anonymous comments are disabled" which is fair enough. However, he has also banned all comments which isn't.

Come on, Chief Constable, let the people have their say.

More madness from the Mad Mullah...

Just when you think that perhaps just perhaps, he has learned some common sense, up pops Richard Brunstrom, the idiot who runs North Wales Police Force.

Brunstrom writes on his blog about the recent furore about councils misusing CCTV to prosecute people who, for example, do not clean up after their dogs.

He says: “Research clearly and repeatedly shows that our citizenry in the UK is very comfortable with today’s surveillance society; CCTV makes people (including me) feel safer. The research also shows the importance of local issues – a clean and tidy environment has a much bigger impact on most people’s quality of life than does the burglary rate.

“Crime is now so low... that ‘traditional’ crime has become if not a rarity then certainly unusual.”

What planet is this man on? I hardly know where to begin.

Firstly, even senior policemen agree that CCTV does not work. Detective Chief Inspector Mick Neville, the officer in charge of the Metropolitan police force unit says "CCTV was originally seen as a preventative measure. Billions of pounds has been spent on kit, but no thought has gone into how the police are going to use the images and how they will be used in court. It’s been an utter fiasco: only 3 per cent of crimes were solved by CCTV. There's no fear of CCTV. Why don’t people fear it? [They think] the cameras are not working.”

Secondly, Brunstrom claims that “our citizenry in the UK is very comfortable with today’s surveillance society”. I would dispute that but if you spend a long time telling people that they have something to fear and that only CCTV (or 42 day detention or ID cards) will save them, it is hardly surprising that they will agree with you.

Thirdly, “‘traditional’ crime has become if not a rarity then certainly unusual”. This on the day that another teenager was stabbed to death in London.

Richard Littlejohn in his Daily Mail column today also has a story about the Mad Mullah.

Up Mad Mullah Creek without a paddle – you’re nicked

The Mad Mullah of the Traffic Taliban has extended his reign of terror from the roads to the waterways.

North Wales Police have arrested, fingerprinted, photographed and taken a DNA swab from a man accused of the heinous crime of canoeing without a permit.

Nigel Conway refused on principle to pay the £3 demanded by a rafting company to paddle along an 830-yard stretch of the River Dee in Llangollen.

The company leases the bank from a local landowner and believes it is entitled to charge others to use the river.

Mr Conway said: “I refused to pay because everyone should have the right to access water free of charge.”

The firm reported him to the police and a week later he had his collar felt. He was taken to the station and interviewed for two hours in connection with “obtaining services dishonestly” under Section 11 of the Fraud Act. He’s on police bail, awaiting charges.

This is despite the fact that there is no specific law relating to access to rivers in England and Wales.

“It was such a joke, even the officers at the station were laughing,” said Mr Conway.

Sorry, but it’s not funny. It’s monstrous. The rafting firm should have been told to take a running jump. At the very best, this was a mere civil dispute.

How dare the police arrest an innocent canoeist and treat him like a criminal? I hope he sues the leather motorcycling pants off the Mad Mullah and forces him to destroy his fingerprint and DNA samples.

Chief Constable Brunstrom runs North Wales like one of those deranged, sadistic sheriffs in some American Deep South hick town. I’m only surprised Mr Conway wasn’t breathalysed, too.

How long before the Mad Mullah gets round to putting up speed cameras on the banks of the River Dee?