Spiking the story by creating a story?

I think its a position that many of us would often love to be in. To be able to say "bugger off I quit" just before the boss says "you're fired". As others have said though, who is behind the leaking of the news that Jacqui Smith will quit as Home Secretary on Friday? Who gains?

Arguably, I reckon Jacqui Smith could actually gain from this. Specifcially she is already facing questions over her expenses. Some MPs have had to say they will quit Parliament, Smith, being one more rung up the ladder, has the luxury of quitting her position and appearing to take some sort of punishment for her behaviour.

Could it be that there is a hope that "Smith quits as Home Secretary" is a big enough story to stop people murmuring the possibility of "Smith to quit as MP"? Especially when you add in the expected "arse kicking" for Brown on Thursday and the furore that might surround it.

Has Smith just tried to spike a story that could lead to her total political downfall by creating a story that just takes her back down the ladder one rung? She's bound to lose the seat anyway, but better to do it with the pressure off you on expenses by falling on your sword in other areas maybe?

Speed cameras paying for more speed cameras

The following graph shows show the amount of speed camera fine revenue that was reclaimed by the partnerships implmenting speed cameras to implement further speed cameras.
Quite a spike after the first year huh?
Source

Hilary Benn: Ripped off?

Back in April, some may remember that the Cabinet had one of its away day meetings, this time in Glasgow. As has been reported in the mainstream media all of these out of London Cabinet meetings have come at a cost to the taxpayer.

One such example of the cost is Hilary Benn, the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. His travel costs for getting to Glasgow and back on April 16th were £744.67 and he took an official with him who costed a further £500.25.

Now, this may seem like small fry, but given there are 24 members of the Cabinet, and if we assume they all travelled with an official at similar cost, that amounts to just over £24,000 for travelling alone for a quick meeting in Glasgow. What suprises me more about Hilary Benn's costs is that it can easily be done for half the price.

I could book now and fly tomorrow from Gatwick to Glasgow with Easyjet, leaving at 7.30am and returning at 16.36, for £225. Hilary Benn could've got the Gatwick Express from Victoria for free. He could, being the Envfironment Secretary, carbon offset the flight for £1.80. If he then added a generous £50 for taxis in Glasgow its done for less than £300.

So why did he cost over £700 and his official £500?

Note: This is not an "expenses" claim. This is Government spending on Government business hence the tag reference to "Hansard" and not "expenses"

It's not time to nationalise Vauxhall

Have just read this post over on Liberal Conspiracy by Dave Osler saying it is now time to nationalise Vauxhall. What an absolutely genius idea that would be... not. Why should the British taxpayer fund the propping up of a crappy car maker?

I've never really got the instinctive call for nationalising big companies. Not because I'm a rabid market fundamentalist - which admittedly I am - but rather why they never ask the question "why is this company failing?" before suggesting we nationalise it.

It seems the cry goes up that "we must to save jobs!". The problem is we're talking about saving jobs in order to produce rubbish cars that no one wants to buy and when they do they're rather embarrassed about it.

It's not even as if Vauxhall make original cars, let alone decent ones. Who would buy a Vauxhall when you could pay comparatively less and get a Honda or a Toyota. Why buy a pretend car that sucks when you can buy a proper one built by the Germans or Japanese?

The reason that Vauxhall shouldn't be nationalised is pretty clear. They make crap cars.

Songs that stir memories....

Have just listened to the Wind of Change by the Scorpions for the first time in years and have had some crazy flashback memories as a result. The first time I heard this song was in August 1991.

I was in Hungary; the last Soviet soldiers had left the country less than two months before; and the Communists were in the process of an attempted coup d'état in Moscow, which put the song into serious context.

Funny how memories can stick to a song.

Brown's hidden pro-drugs message

Once upon a time we had the Shamen's classic hidden drugs message of "E's are Good, E's are Good, He's Ebeneezer Goode" - then along came Gordon.
Perhaps this explains the manic gurning and smiles in his YouTube videos. He's been off his box on pills!
Hat Tip: Croydonian

Email validation isn't difficult is it?

Last week, as reported elsewhere, a new site appeared called 38 Degrees appeared, which apparently has an intention to be a British version of Move On. The site hopes to be a progressive campaigning tool, and currently has a petition on having recall laws in the wake of the expenses row.

The problem is, whilst the petition may well be calling for something worthwhile, the number of signatures on it - however many it is up to now - are going to be pretty dubious as to their validity. This is because anyone appears to be able to sign anyone else up for the petition without any validation. I know this because last week I received the following email,

Thanks for signing the petition and helping us send a message to Parliament

Thank you for adding your voice to our call to party leaders to let voters choose whether to sack disgraced MPs. Together we can build the pressure to clean up politics.

You can tell your friends about the campaign here: Don’t worry – we won’t keep their e-mail addresses. We’ll just let them know about the campaign so they can decide whether or not to join us.

Thank you,
The 38 Degrees Team

Awfully nice that they don't intend to keep people's email addresses, but not so good that they have mine because think I signed their petition when I didn't.

You'd think they might have some sort of validation step in the petition. You know, like an email saying "you signed this petition, click the link below to confirm that it really was you". I mean, even Downing Street manages that, and Government IT is notoriously rubbish. They also want a postcode for some reason too.

If 38 Degrees is serious about mirroring the success of Move On then they need to start by not letting anyone sign anyone else up for their petitions without validation - otherwise their petitions can be too easily rigged.

And on that point, off you go and sign up all your friends to the petition just for fun!

Pro-life Takers?

When i saw the news this morning about an aboprtion doctor being gunned down in Kansas the only thing that sprung to my mind was the song below, called Pro-life Taker by a NYC based band called Bigwig.
There is something decidely nutty about killing someone in the name of being "pro-life" huh? But then the pro-choice lobby is equally nutty, and this song sums up both sides nihilism and moral fluidity. Silly seppos.

Is a LabourHome/Labourlist merger on the cards?

Has anyone seen the new look LabourHome yet? A fancy new layout, and new theme, but is there more too it than just a new look? Take a look at the source code of the page. For some reason LabourHome is referencing LabourList "Version 3".

Click Image for Larger Version
Apparently there has been some discussion in the depths of Labour HQ about merging these two sites, although I imagine that would require some sort of "buyback" as LabourHome was sold last year to Mike Danson at the New Statesman if I recall correctly.

More importantly, if it's true that there have been discussion at Victopria Street about merging the two sites, then it kind of brings into question the stated "independence" of both of them.

May - what a wonderful month

Yes I have a "no stat porn" rule on this blog because waving my willy around is not something that I really think is necessary. If I only had two readers I would be quite happy, but the month of May was incredibly so the rule is being broken.

The month of May, according to Google Analytics, saw 284,936 page impressions, from 245,241 visits, and 169,424 absolute unique visitors. I don't have delusions of grandeur though because next month it will be slightly more sane again as my willy shrinks to the size of an amphetamine addict's.

Thanks to everyone who bothered to read, especially my new readers in the United States.