JUNE 2003
The latest statistics show that the national average of people in work that
can not afford even the cheapest starter home now stands at 49.9 per cent even
with the interest rate at an all-time low.
Speaking of statistics, the Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott, announced
the other day that there would be a referendum next Autumn on whether Yorkshire
should have a regional Parliament as 75 per cent of the responses the Government
had received was in favour. However, after being pressed on the number of responses
it turned out that only 833 people had bothered to indicate that this was a
good idea. That comes out at 0.0163 per cent of the region's population.
Talking to people locally the general opinion seems to be that a lot of folks
would actually go for independence if that had been on offer. Yorkshire, being
the same size as Scotland, could easily manage their own affairs without interference
from Whitehall. But what the People's Party seems to be after is the abolishing
of all local councils as the proposed regional Parliament's job would be to
distribute grants from the Government to a grateful populace.
Anyway, expect an all-out campaign villifying anyone who questions the motives
behind this idea.
Needing to take Kiyoko and her mother down to London to sort out a few things
at the Japanese Embassy, I dropped in at the Railway Station the other day to
buy tickets. The cheapest we could get came out at £210.- for the three
of us, and even these were restricted, so we couldn't travel during peak times,
meaning we would only have around 1 hour to spend in the capital unless we stayed
overnight. So we took the car down which only cost around £70.-
The next day the Transport Report was published which showed that The UK had
the most expensive rail travelling in all of Europe, which wasn't exactly news.
The only country almost as expensive was Norway, but a looking at the differences
between the two makes one wonder what's going on in the UK. Norway
is mountainous, more than 3 times as big as the UK and with a population of
only 4 million spread all over the place. There is also the problems of frost
in the ground and extreme snowfalls. The UK is compact, comparatively flat and
very densly populated. Apart from "leaves on the track" and
the occasional "wrong kind of snow" there shouldn't be many
problems. While a rush-hour commuter train in Norway might carry a hundred paying
passengers, in the UK there propably would be no limit on possible revenue for
the train companies if they would only run trains. But this is exactly what
they are incapable of doing. The idea seems to be that their income comes from
Government grants; the passengers are just in inconvienience that reduces the
profit. So the the Transport Ministry's solution to the overcrowding on the
network is to run fewer trains at a higher price.
The same report estimates that the road will be completely gridlocked within
7 years so the Government is now looking into taxing all use of roads. The idea
is that all cars will be fitted with a satelite tracking system, and you'll
get billed every month with higher costs for using main roads at peak times.
I fail to see how this will reduce traffic when there is no alternative to the
car, but it will sure put a lot more money into the Government's coffers than
the road tax and fuel tax do at the present. It will of course also tell our
masters where we have been at any time of the day which I suspect is the main
object of the exercise.
The on-going saga of Norfolk farmer Tony Martin is getting ever more surreal.
You may remember that he was refused parole because he was seen as a threath
to burglars, and the police recommended him to move abroad, as they would not
be able to protect him.
He will be released next month having served his sentence for man-slaughter.
Now the surviving burglar is suing him for damages as he is in jail, because
he can no longer run fast enough, and therefore is caught more often after committing
crimes. Of course the taxpayers are funding this chap's case, while Martin has
to pay for his own defence. So far, this is about par for the course, but there
is more. The word on the grapevine is that there has been put a bounty of £60,000.-
on Martin's head. Because the burglars is seen as a victim of a serious crime
he has the right to know at all time where Martin is. He's suing for £60,000.-
Draw your own conclusions
The Dear Leader has at the stroke of a pen abolished the 1,400 year old office
of Lord Chancellor. The Law Lords have not followed the script lately, and are
now also for the chop. In their place there will be a High Court modelled on
the American one. They will be appointed by an independent panel (which will
be appointed by the Dear Leader.)
A local chap just retired from the Army and applied for a job as a police
officer. However, he was turned down on the ground that he had a tattoo that
clashed with Home Office guidelines which states that no policeman may have
tattoos associated with "violence, sexism, racism or extreme political
views" The tattoo? The Union flag.
The Home Secretary, David Blunkett, has been looking into the possibility
of confiscating the houses of drug users. According to Government minutes the
idea was dropped "because it might alienate blacks" Oh dear me. I
see why the Union flag might be seen as a symbol of racism if people connect
it with the government.
The People's Party seems determined to go Orwell one better; he was speaking of double-think, they are going for tripple-think. Peter Haines speech on tax increases was reported in full in the media before he had even made it, and then re-written to unsay what he hadn't yet said.
As the Government is set to push through the growing of GM crop in the UK a
rather interesting case has been going through the courts in the Land of the
Free. As almost all farmers in The US of A are feeding their cows on GM fodder
a lone innocent advertised his milk as being GM free. Monsanto took him to court
because his advertissement would indicate that naturally grown crops are supirior
to GM ones, and of course they won the case. So there you have it. It is now
seen as illegal in the States to question GM crops in any way. Any bets on whether
this will be the case soon in this country?
Does Britain need the Euro? Evidently the Germans have embraced it much more
enthusiastically than previously thought. Research out in Germany shows that
nine out of every ten Euro notes have traces of cocain on them.
Another report shows that cheese can be as addictive as cocain and affects
the brain in roughly the same way.
Cut me a line of Double Cloucester, man.
It is official; Britain has a president. A transcript of the Tony Blair/Vladimir
Putin press conference issued by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office grandly
began: Tony Blair - President, Great Britain."
A glaring error or an alarming peep into the future?
One third of the British population now suffers from some sort of allergy,
and the NHS is unable to cope. Lots of reasons for the explosion of cases have
been given, but the main cause seems to be the lack of access to common dirt
in our children. I'm now waiting for some pharmaceutical company coming up with
a concoction (suitably patented, of course) of concentrated dirt to be rubbed
on babies in the craddle. The medical profession will surely regard it as a
godsend, as the old-fashioned solution of letting the little blighters loose
in a sand-box is of no good to anyone economically speaking.
A local consultant showed up in the 6 o'clock news recently complaining about
his workload, as there was a long waiting list of elementary school children
to be assessed for hyper-active behaviour. The treatment was prescribing Ritalin
with some schools having more than 20 per cent of the children on the drug.
Being asked by the interviewer if there was no alternative, he stated that there
was, but that non-drug therapy was not cost efficient. Hmm.
We are again suffering from an outbreak of a deadly animal disease with a
lot more deaths than was ever recorded by foot-and-mouth, but hardly anyone
is aware of this. More than half of the country's population of budgerigars
has been wiped out in the last few weeks by a mysterious new virus that has
baffled the vets.
On the subject of vets daughter Aki passed her final exams last week and is
now a qualified vet. Not that it will make a lot of difference, as she has been
operating on all kind of animals since she was in the 6th form, but at least
she can now do so legally.
We're getting a bumper crop of strawberries at Heimbu this year, just in time
for Wimbledon, despite the fact that we have never planted any; they're all
been grown from seeds brought by our resident birds population Which is only
fair, I guess as we also grow an enormous amount of cherries, but in the 12
years we have lived here we have only managed to salvage one single cherry before
the birds strip the trees. According to Kiyoko it was very sweet.
It is soon time for this year's Summer Thing here at Heimbu. As usual everyone
with an interest in Stav is welcome. The idea is for people to start arriving
on Friday the 1st of August; have the Thing on Saturday and then tie up any
loose ends before everyone disperses on Sunday.
I do have quite a few things that I want the Thing to discuss; then there is
the Second Hnefatafl Championship. Everyone attending is requested to bring
food and drink for 1 and a 1/2 person which will be laid out on a table plus
we'll be running a barbeque. Cheers.