Doing well. Doing good.

Until today, there were two of the biggest in the world in my constituency. Now there are three.

 I am in awe at the technology of the new £12 million recycling facility on Newport Docks. It eats dead vacuum cleaners, radios, telephones, televisions at one end and delivers steel, copper, four different kinds of plastic and precious metals out of  the other end. It is a consequence of the EU WEEE directive to recycle electronic waste. 100,000 tonnes can be processed by the Newport facility every year. The technology for separating plastic into four different types is unique and involves very high voltages. Recycled plastic is virtually valueless if it not separated into own group.

A short distance from the new plant is the vast crane of the End-of-life Vehicle recycling plant and End-of-life Fridge reprocessing plant. Both are the biggest and most efficient of their type in the world.

Wales’ First Minister, Rhodri Morgan opened the plant this morning. He congratulated Sims Recycling Solutions and suggested they were inspired by Gatland’s Rugby Recycling solutions on Sunday.

It is wonderful that Newport provides a welcoming habitat for these massive recycling operations. At this time, profits margins are tight. One problem is that competitors are price cutting. In the fridge business the cheapies do not extract as mush of the toxic gases as Sims does. I shall be pressing environment ministers to introduce some stronger compliance laws.

That would be good for Newport and for the environment. Meanwhile Sims is happy doing well, doing good.

Horse sense

The families of Roy Kinnear and Christopher Reeves might not agree but yesterday horse riding was declared to be a healthy, legal, safe activity. 

Inconveniently the facts tell a different story.  Horse riding  kills 100 people a year. It's uncomfortable to point out that is more than the total killed by magic mushrooms, ecstasy and cannabis.

 

Jacqui Smith put the boot in to Professor David Nutt for revealing an uncomfortable truth. Politicians should think twice before they try to silence scientific statements because they outrage public prejudice and bigotry. .Perhaps Jacqui had thought twice and decided that attack was the best form of defence.

After all no one mentioned second home expenses.

 

 Clear Red Water

I have just read  a splendid book. It is not published yet but it will be a must for all those interested in how Welsh Labour has stuck to the old time religion of Classic Labour.

Reading the book was a delight tempered with shame for me because my appreciation of the philosophy and pioneering work of WAG was so deficient.  How could I have missed so many of the achievements of the Welsh Assembly Government?

This is a splendid time to top up my knowledge banks.  We are on the brink of the Obama revolution. Political certainties are collapsing and the world economy is convulsed. Welsh Labour is receptive to fresh ideas that challenge the superficial canards of New Labour.

The Labour movement has been hurt by bewildering self-destructive polices from Westminster On the gravest error the Iraq War, the Labour Party in Wales had their objections silenced by bureaucratic procedure.

New Labour has drifted from our core values. Our subservience to American’s Neo-cons was our foulest hour.  Many opportunities have been neglected and much of the value of Labour’s electoral victories were dissipated in fruitless meandering into political dead-ends.  Happily, Labour in Wales has embarked on its voyage across the clear red water. 

Nick Davies and Darren Williams reveal the divergence between Classic Labour and New Labour. In Wales Labour has clung to the party’s traditional values avoiding much of New Labour’s perverse shift to the false gods of fashionable modernisation, (Hobson’s) choice, 'contestability' and the supremacy of the market.

With commendable objectivity the authors have chronicled the chosen paths of Welsh Labour.  The Welsh Assembly has sought an equality of outcome rather than an equality of opportunity.  Consumerism is rejected in favour of a collective voice. Mark Drakeford the guru of Welsh Labour argues that ‘Services that are reserved for poor people very quickly become poor services’ but universal services can be the ‘glue that binds together a complex modern society.’ Free school breakfasts are provided in Wales for all pupils not just for those stigmatised as needy.

Comments

[Paul Flynn]

Thanks Valleylad and Graham. I'll blog today on the second home rules. In the last parliament a Tory MP was alleged to have claimed for years for a house in London that allegedly did not exist. He was forced to end his career here and did not stand in the subsequent election. He got off lightly. It is a shame that the opportunity was not seized then to overhaul the whole system.

MPs from most part of the country need a second home. There is nothing wrong with that.

[Graham Marlowe]

Thank you, Paul, for being so forthright. You are about the only Labour M.P. who has had the courage to say this publically, and all credit where it is due.

Surely ministers in particular should be aware of the outrage they will cause if they are found out - it always looks worse, I think, when they come out and say "I have done nothing wrong" - certainly nothing LEGALLY wrong, but when you have people losing their only home and their jobs the moral question comes in. It all adds to the perception that all MPs and ministers are on the take (which of course they are not)

[valleylad]

It doesn't matter whether it is "within the rules", it is morally wrong. OK, in zanu-labour britain right and wrong have little if any relationship will legal or illegal.
Failing a convincing explanation as to why the taxpaper spending an extra 200k on security while the (redacted)milks 24k more for herself results in value for money benefit for the taxpayer. (redacted).

I think we need a spoilt ballot campaign for the next election. As very few people will have a candidate worth voting for, it would totally delegitimise the next govt and be very entertaining if more people wrote "none of the above" on their paper than actually voted properly. It could also be used to justify lynching most of the HoC!

[Paul Flynn]

Lots of people here are gobsmacked by the 'ruling' that there is nothing wrong in living in a relative's house in London and claiming expenses for the constituency home.

If that is within the rules, then the rules are barmy.

[Paul Flynn]

The book is not published yet Mark, but the title will be 'Clear Red Water.' As soon as I hear details I will post them here.

It's a great read for Classic Labour nerds like me.

[Graham Marlowe]

I think poor old Blunderwoman still thinks she's head girl, er sorry chief whip, and her schoolmarmish demeanour will make people shake in their boots. Given her playing the system regarding her "expenses" I think a decent period of silence wouldn't come amiss from her

[John]

I am sure I am not the only one who was outraged by Jacqui Smiths attack on Prof Nutt. This is a really dangerous precedent to stop scientists revealing the truth about relative harms just because it doesn't fit into the bigotry of our Politicians,
I find it amazing that every death of ecstasy ( 30 a year ) is emblazoned across the media yet that only 1 out of every 250 deaths from paracetamol are reported.
This is our hypocrisy and how far we are removed from the facts.
The population is kept in ignorance about the realitive dangers of drugs and for a Minister to perpetuate this is an outrageous abuse of power.

[Kay Tie]

"Hell, add a few bankers and you could sell tickets."

I'm glad I'm not the only one who finds banker-baiting by MPs a disgusting spectacle of hypocrisy.

Were the MPs lining up to dish out a kicking when banking was generating vast tax revenues and the bonuses were trickling down into Party coffers as donations? Were the MPs crying tears of rage at misspent tax payers money when the NHS IT system went wrong or when billions were lost to carousel fraud and Tax Credit fraud?

When the crowds gather with the burning brands and pitchforks, it never ceases to amaze how quickly politicians can run to the head of the queue and lead the villagers up to the castle..

[Kay Tie]

"The families of Roy Kinnear and Christopher Reeves might not agree but yesterday horse riding was declared to be a healthy, legal, safe activity."

Given the relatively few who engage in equasy (compared to the millions who regularly take ecstasy) we can conclude that ecstasy is far safer than horse riding. And any anti-freedom old Tory who denies this is simply propagating idle cant.

[Mark Gallagher]

whats the name of the book comrade?

[valleylad]

I can only assume you're trying to stir things up this morning.

Smith cowardly attacks the messenger - typical of people like her, and even more reason why we need to stand up for academic freedom. Evan Harris called this correctly.
Either Smith can produce evidence to counter Nutt or deserves to be publicly ridiculed in perpetuity.

Smith has also managed to demonstrate that not only is she a deep in the trough self serving hypocrite - she's even more stupid than I thought! She can either justify the extra 200K p.a. policing bill she has incured for the public on value grounds or doesn't deserve to be viewed as human.
We won't mention the 40K **we** pay her husband - to do what exactly?

Monbiot's vicious and accurate ridiculing of Blears is almost as funny. Now the Italians knew how to deal with people like these at the end of WW2 - perhaps that is what we need in Britain after 30 years of useless government - (hell, add a few bankers and you could sell tickets).

Drakeford however hits the nail square. I always supported the idea of the WAG to protect us from tories, it is just a pity we need it to protect us from this pathetic govt as well. Means testing always creates stigma and poverty traps whilst also costing significant money to administer. It is a cop out for weak unprincipled governments.