New subsidies = No Nuclear

Total number of British Soldiers killed in Afghanistan = 290

Could I come to love the coalition?

It’s been a lonely thankless task trying to persuade parliament that New Nuclear is an expensive unaffordable mistake. I had had a debate exposing the vast insurance liability that has been dumped on taxpayers. The world’s only New Nuclear station is three years late and 2€billion over budget.  Few were persuaded – until today.

Liberal Democrat Chris Huhne, the new energy and climate change secretary of state, admitted to the Guardian this week that the government already faces a £4bn funding black hole over existing radioactive waste.

Greenpeace said, ' These documents blow EDF's claim that they won't need any subsidies for new nuclear clean out of the water. They know full well that the economics of nuclear don't stack up and that new reactors will only ever happen if the British taxpayer is forced yet again to carry the atomic can."

 

The coalition deal is that nuclear is only acceptable without public subsidy. That’s sound perfect to me

 

May Mandleson 1902 -2010

 

My oldest constituent has died at the age of 108.

 

Three years I filmed May Mandleson at a residential home. She was still remarkably clear-headed and entertaining. Up to a year or two previously she did the Times crossword every day. I also filmed her earlier providing me with high tea in her Newport Home. She talked of the Titanic and her early days watching the boats on the Clyde. She recalls when she was kept at home for three weeks because of an undesirable companion.

 

Her husband lived to 101 in spite of his unhealthy occupation of running a tobacconist shop in the centre of Newport. Her son told me that American researchers wanted to interview her to discover the secret of her longevity. ‘My parents’ he told me ‘ lived off cheese, butter and a wholly unhealthy diet.’ The Americans would not learn much from that.

What May had was a lively enquiring intelligent mind that she exercised every day. That may be the secret of her long happy life. 

Anti-depressants?

Are the Cumbria mass murders connected with the use of medicines for depression? Character changes that caused similar event elsewhere have been traced to the use of anti-depressants.

Comments

[christina sarginson]

Really sad to hear about May Mandelson, what a wonderful age to live too. The changes she would have seen in culture must have been amazing, to have lived through all those things life the sinking of the Titanic etc and to be able to recall all of this, this is a lesson for all of us to be able to live life and not be so stressed by rushing about we miss the most important things.

[DG]

It's probably more embarrassing to use it once you've over the age of 25; but it's so beautifully expressive I can't help myself.

[HuwOS]

It's embarassing to say that up until about a month ago I had no idea that ftw stood for, for the win.

[D.G.]

I'm not convinced that a boisterous one-upmanship across the HoC is the best way towards changing the consensus, especicially since your list is one of thoughtful, rather than knee-jerk, responses to existing problems.

Polite, reasoned debate ftw!

[HuwOS]

A related discussion here.

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/05/ff_pink_shirky/all/1

Links this back to things I have mentioned before whether DRM, copyright infringement or the manner in which social welfare recipients are dealt with at least tangentially with
"If you assume bad faith from the average participant, you’ll probably get it"

[HuwOS]

Trouble is Paul, New Labour will not be championing these things either, even if you personally are in favour of one or two of them.

As an aside, and an interesting one too.
Check this out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc

Prediction is that after watching the above presentation, normal people will get the message, companies should pay employees enough so that they are not worrying about money if they want to get best performance from their employees.
Employers, especially corporations will take the message, we don't need to pay people more because that doesn't motivate them.

[HuwOS]

I know they will Paul, that was the point.

[Paul Flynn]

Hell of list Huw. I agree with most of them. We must look at this list when the coalition settles in. I fear that they will disappoint you.

[HuwOS]

If the consensus was for these things, then yes I suppose they could happen.
But the consensus is not.
The consensus is that money is to be saved.
The consensus is that many people on IB, ESA, JSA are taking advantage and that they could work if only more pressure was put on them, pressure masquerading as assistance but not assistance of any kind, the kind of assistance that calls people with terminal cancer in for back to work interviews.
The consensus is that intellectual property must be defended to the fullest extent of the law and happily takes on the analogy of copyright infringement being the same as theft and has no interest in looking for any evidence at all for harm to anyone from copyright infringement.
The consensus is the nice cosy consensus of people who do not have to worry about any of these things, people who in fact would mostly feel threatened by any change, such as a sane version of PR.
The consensus is support for vested interests, people who use fear to justify holding people without charge for ridiculous lengths of time and being able to accuse people of atrocious crimes without ever giving them a chance to see or challenge the supposed evidence that we got told supports the accusations.

Even if the consensus were for everything I do want however, it would still be incredibly unhealthy for there to be no drastically opposing views in parliament.
Without opposition people, governments fall into terrible practices of building an ideological framework to support what they want and then letting it loose where the ideology itself pushes to the nth degree without flexibility.
And people end up forcing through laws supporting things that no one at all wants, but must be done because the ideology calls for it.

[DG]

That's an impressive list and I agree with a lot of it. But I don't understand how the less confrontational, consensus-style of politics makes it any less likely that these things will be achieved? And if they are achieved through consensus, it's probably less likely that they'll be pulled back by the next government.

I share your concern on AV, but hopefully it's a small stepping stone towards full PR. Lots of small changes is better than no change at all.

Also agree that the care system needs sorting out, urgently.

[HuwOS]

Oh and I have to say,

I want children in foster care to have some level of security and familiarity and not be moved every few months.

[HuwOS]

You must know some of them by now DG

I want full withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan, apologies issued and reparations promised (and paid).

I want to see those who took us into war there, taken before the appropriate courts and punished for their crimes.

I want to see a commitment from the present government that it will never again support a call to war without actual justification.
I want a commitment to abide by international law and that at the very least no aggressive military action will ever be taken again without definitive and unequivocal UNSC endorsement.

I also would like to see that when I started this I realised I would have pages and pages of stuff.

honestly trying to be brief.

A reformed Social Welfare system, not as the right wing would do, but to remove red tape and the constant implication that anyone claiming is a scrounger.
I want people to have a safety net they can actually rely on to be helpful not one that is constructed so as to be as unhelpful as possible.

I want an end to the family tax credits as the government subsidies to business that they are and businesses required to pay a living wage.

I want an end to prohibition on drugs and full legalisation.
I want the most harmful addictive drugs available for free to addicts, in clean, decent places with the opportunity available at all times to be provided with support to quit, but quitting not forced on people.

I want fewer people in prison, I want a repeal of most of the anti terrorist legislation particularly the lengthy period of detention without charge or trial, 48 hours or up to 5 days at the very most and with full judicial oversight and access to legal representation.

I want an absolute end to people being accused of activities but being prevented from hearing or rebutting claims made about them.

I want a commitment to not torture, to not support those who do torture and an acceptance that hooding, stress positions etc etc are in fact torture and unacceptable to a modern society.

I want PR brought in, at a bare minimum the type of PR they have in the Republic of Ireland, no lists, no AV or AV+.

I want a reconstituted Union, with full powers granted to the Scottish, Welsh and NI Assemblies and for them to decide which powers they are willing to grant to a new government of the UK.
Alongside that I want a parliament for England(Actually it's at least one, possibly two).
I want a new parliament for the UK, situated outside of London with proper modern facilities.

I want an end to university fees and a return to grants. I want an end to the ridiculous targets for what percentage of the population should have a degree.
I want more focus on primary and secondary level education.
But I do want a lifelong possibility of attending university and studying for a degree.
I would like to see apprenticeships back in the position they should be in as a proper career path for many.
I never again want to see any kind of PFI that loads the taxpayer with the risk while chancers take plenty of profit.
I do not want to see educational establishments run by people who "think" creationism is a valid scientific theory.
I want to see an end to universities having to cater to business, education is about education not about business not about anything else.
Done right, it will then have value to everyone including business, if pandering to business it will be useless to everyone including business.

I want to see the amount of money spent on the healthcare system raised to the level of the most successful health care systems in the world. I do not want to see private enterprise receiving a cut of this money for processing forms and taking payments.
I want dental and optical care brought fully back into the NHS.

I want scrapping of the DEA and before any new legislation is drawn up a complete review of the purposes and aims of copyright and how those purposes and aims might best be met.
I want a serious investigation to attempt to determine if the hysteria in certain industries about copyright infringement stands up to any scrutiny at all.
IE before passing legislation to protect copyright holders, determine if there is any harm being done to them in the first place.

I want an end to data retention, I want legislation to criminalise the actions of certain lawyers working on behalf of the movie and television industries, those blackmail letters you may have heard about, pay us or we will take you to court with no evidence and no crime.

I want the libel system completely redrawn to protect honest opinion (although you should be able to show that a reasonable person could form that opinion) and scientific disagreement.

I could go on, but I'm sure I've bored ppl to tears by now as well as giving people plenty to attack.

[DG]

In the spirit of non-confrontational not-politics, I'll refrain from deconstructing your argument and hijacking your analogy, and instead ask in a grown-up kind of way...

... what ideas would you like to see taken forward, and what would you like the government to do differently?

[HuwOS]

This new "grown up" politics, may appeal to you DG, but the reason its all "grown up" and non confrontational is that it isn't politics.
There is no passion because there are no ideas, nothing is being done that is particularly different from anything anyone else would do, minor arguments of specific timing aside.
The running of the country has passed from right wing middle managers with delusions of grandeur to right wing middle managers whose delusions are yet to be confirmed.

[DG]

I'm loving the new grown up politics :) It seems the media is less happy, but hey ho - Parliament's got an important job to do, they're not there to be entertaining. Except Lembit. Except he's not. So that's OK too.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/global/2010/jun/03/simon-hoggart-sketch-prime-ministers-questions

[Tony]

Maybe having a formal coalition will make it easier for consensus politics on a wider range of issues?

In that way MP's might feel able to vote in line with their views rather than adhere to a party line ?

That seems like quite a good idea to me - in that way to get legislation through in an environment where no one party commands a majority of the popular vote they have to get support across parties.

Or am I being too hopeful?

[senn]

Nuclear power has cancer inducing Radon associated with it, too many commentators are happy to push the onus onto Toxic Waste as a weakness, I beleive the uK govt has overplayed tobacco related cancer (not to say tobacco does not induce cancer) to cover up Radon