Moving sites

After a few weeks of planning I have now moved this blog to a new website. The key difference is the site is hosted and has a lot more functionality than using this version of WordPress. WordPress is the best but the new wordpress site is better.

Please therefore bookmark the new site and visit for a RSS link if you use those things.

www.kevindavis.org.uk

Another 10 inches of snow to hit by Thursday

Image by Juana/Joana Roja-Snowstorm again – sigh via Flickr

I noticed this sentence in the Daily Telegraph this evening.

With gritters and grit already in short supply,

I remember when I was a Councillor that we had a series of days of frost and the Council ran out of salt grit to do anything to combat accidents on the roads. This is of course unacceptable and I would hope that local Councils have got themselves in order this time. After all, snow may be unusual bit ice and freezing rain is not!

Snow Britain: Another 10 inches of snow to hit by Thursday – Telegraph

Snow, Snow, Snow

“British jobs for British workers”

Image via Wikipedia

Remember that phrase from our Brownian leader. Well, I guess his tune is changing yet again and Lord Mandy is advising him that it was an ill advised and ridiculous statement.

We are seeing demonstrations at Grangemeouth and the French going on strike and at the heart of the demonstrations is the concern that jobs at home are going to those from abroad.

The trouble is that this type of nationalism is the sort of thing that led to the second world war (as Europe came out of recession) and would lead to a longer and deeper recession now.

Who would have thought that Brown would have been doing the job for the BNP – disgraceful?
Grangemouth

France

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Proportional representation?

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Yesterday was a telling day for proportional representation. It involved bribery and the smallest party holding the largest party over a barrel. To cap it all the form of PR that has been used in Scotland has meant the smallest party has MSP’s for whom no one has ever voted!

That’s where PR gets you – it is not a better form of democracy;s it is a complete and utter mess. Yesterday at Holyrood proved that.

Mayhem at Scottish Parliament as SNP’s budget kicked into touch by Greens – Telegraph

Bail outs and Busts

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

I am a naturally optimistic person but today’s news of further High Street chains going bust (albeit a shoe chain who I do not believe I have ever bought shoes from) and now Lord Mandy’s pledge of a multi-million pound bail out of the motor industry, you cannot help thinking the world is coming to a crashing end.

Still, never mind, the people who got us into this mess are doing alright. Today sees hedge fund managers go before the Treasury Select Committee and argue that the run on the bank’s share price is nothing to do with them but is the banks fault for having some rubbish managers who allowed the banks to get into their parlous state. That’s a fair comment, but your argument is somewhat shot to pieces when it has been announced today that one Hedge Fund, Paulson & Co, made £100m profit from selling RBS short last week – hypocrisy or just plain stupidity?

UPDATE: I gather Ken Clarke has now revealed that Lord Mandy’s bail out of the car industry is nothing of the sort. It seems Mandy was spinning again and reheated some announcements that were made back last year.

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Letter to the Press: Misterton drains

Drains in Misterton

Dear Sir,

It is time the Lib Dems who run Somerset started doing their jobs.

I yesterday spent some time in Misterton and was horrified to find that despite the very wet weather we have had this Winter – and indeed we continue to have – key road drains are still blocked up with rubbish and silt. More horrifying is that some of this blockage has come from the original flooding the area experienced back in the Autumn.

When I asked local people about this problem I was told that the Parish Council had been pushing hard for something to be done and that the local County Councillor said he would do something about this immediately. This was some months ago and I gather the said
Councillor is on an extended holiday abroad. Because of his failings in getting his Council to do something about this, houses in the Misterton area face the threat of further flooding.
Being a Councillor is a responsible role and one which should be taken seriously. If, as has been reported to me, Councillors are ignoring the basic needs of local people then I hope they will consider whether it is in the best interests of local people for them to stand at the coming election in June 2009.

Ron Gill

Ron Gill was a great man. He was the long~standing President of the conservative Party where I stood at the last election. He died last week. His wisdom will be greatly missed.

Rest in peace and rise in glory.

Clegg thinks dumping the pound will put the economy right

Image via Wikipedia

Sometimes, in an attempt to get any press activity, the Lib Dems come up without the most absurd ideas. The latest is that Nick Clegg believes that because the economy is buggered under Labour that we are all going to start clamouring to dump the pound and take up the Euro.

In an interview with the Financial Times, he said public opinion could “turn on its head” and swing against the pound as the “sheer brutality” of the crisis prompted the public to yearn for the stability offered by the eurozone.

Well, there are two problems with this. The first is that there is not the slightest possibility that the British are turning against the Pound. If Mr. Clegg were in touch with the doorstep he might realise they are turning against Gordon Brown – Duh! The fact is the Lib Dems become blind to reason when their thinking is dominated by their obsession with throwing away the powers of the UK Government to Brussels.

Secondly, it seems that many of the Euro Zone countries are now looking back with affection to the time when they controlled their own economy. King amongst those is Germany ( who is, I believe, the only country that has the option of withdrawing from the Euro). A very good analysis of this position was done by Monday by William Rees-Mogg in the Daily Mail which you can see HERE

FT.com / UK – Euro could ‘anchor’ economy, says Clegg:

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Brown u-turn on expenses

What a vapid little man our Prime Minister has become. Having decided to put a whip on Labour MPs to vote for keeping their expenses secret he does a last minute about face because he thinks he will lose the vote.

When Blair caled him the ‘clunking fist’ I do not think many people thought he meant that type of clunking.