adrenochrome

Having been doing the family thing this week, I have had to bite my tongue and save up my comments till now. Here goes, let’s let rip;

Politics; New Labour announced another Tory policy of guaranteeing loans, though why they are doing this is not clear, especially as the recession is supposedly over and the green roots of recovery have been seen by a New Labour peer?! What a fool (and that was not the first word that sprang to my mind), who should have her peerage removed, she clearly isn’t up to the job of making decisions for the future of the country, for which she was elevated to the House of Lords.

Middle East; there has been a victim of the war who has not yet been mentioned. For the first two and a half weeks of the invasion, a female Israeli Major was on our telly teeling us the Israeli spin. After she named two Hamas militants who she claimed were in the UN school shelled by the Israelis, the army then said that they had NOT intended to shell the school, that NO Hamas militants were firing from within the school, and that they had been attacking near the school, and had accidentally misfired the shell that entered the UN compound. The major had also claimed that Hamas were targetting women and children in Israel, whilst thr PMs spokesman and the army have both stated that Hamas are not targetting anyone, but indiscriminately firing out of date missiles towards Israeli towns. The major has now disappeared, and is clearly facing the blame for Israel losing the war of words with the public and media.

Today, an almost identical shelling of a UN compound has taken place, and again Israel is telling two stories; 1/ We did shell the compound accidentally (though the UN had kept notifying them that their shelling was getting closer and closer to the compound) & 2/ We attacked it on purpose because Hamas were firing rockets from within the compound. Again the same two stories, and again Isreal has shelled a known UN compound, injuring UN staff and, because they used incendaries, destroying UN Aid Relief. Hopefully this repeated anti-UN activity and lies from the military will result in War Crimes being brought against Israeli Generals and Politicians (just as happened to Slobodan Milosevic and his Generals).

Israel sank an American ship during the Arab/Israeli War and yet America did nothing, even though according to the CIA radio observer, the pilots questioned the command to attack because the ship was a ‘friendly’ and, according to American Military survivors, the Israeli navy fired upon their liferafts. American Presidents love reassuring the people that they will always protect their people and troops, yet allowed Israel to get away with this prearranged attack. Israel has ignored International Law with regard to the building of its wall around the West Bank. Israel has now launched several attacks upon the United Nations. Terrorism is acting outside of International Law, and Israel is committing acts of terrorism in Gaza. No peace can possibly be achieved whilst the Palestinian people are shown that they must act within International Law, whilst Israel does not have to. They must be shown that the law applies to all.

BBC Radio7; a digital channel that was established for the spoken word, as opposed to being a music channel, has access to the whole archives of radio programmes from BBC4, the Light Programme and regional BBC radio stations. It focuses on comedy, crime & thrillers, sci-fi and classics. Strangely, like the rest of the BBC, when it comes to classics, they are incredibly ignorant and not at all well read. Guess what they are; yes, Dickens, Bronte & Austen! In fact, their knowledge of the subject is so poor that this week they are having to tell us two Dickens stories each day!!!

What is even more of a condemnation is that they need to repeat every programme that they have at least twice a year. They appear to have only about 5 months of programming. As most of the Crime & Thrillers section comprises only Sherlock Holmes and Miss Marple/Hercule Poirot, and that by turning to ITV3 on your tv set you can watch the same stories with Jeremy Brett etc and get the whole story in one sitting, this is quite pointless.

Comedy wise, each episode of classic comedy is played three times a day, and is so dated that at times it can be border racist and sexist. ‘The Goons’ often contains the type of stereotyping and Peter Sellars ‘faux Indian’ accent (among others) that if repeated by a modern broadcaster would result in firings, resignations and apologies that would make the Brand/Ross affair seem small fry. ‘Dad’s Army’ and ‘Hancocks Half Hour’ may contain humour but do not to further opinion of British foreign behaviour. After all, is it any surprise that Germans believe English people can not NOT mention the war, when wartime though post war comedy is seen as standard fayre by the BBC, and not a day goes by without one of the 5 terrestial tv channels showing a second world war movie? It also semmes that only 1 radio comedy was made by the BBC between 1959 and 1980, the amusing Kenneth Horne shows (’Around the Horne’ & ‘Beyond Our Ken’) which include risky and risque ‘gay’ performances despite homosexuality being illegal still at the time they were made - and they have Kenneth Williams in the show!

The more modern comedy offerings are more promising, though some still beg the question ‘who commissioned this b*llocks’. Too little Armando Iannucci and his stable of stars, too much Angus Deayton & Marcus Brigstocke.

What a shame that according to BBC7, the BBC has only produced circa 1,500 hours of worthwhile spoken material during its whole existence!

Modern Comedy Radio Shows; this is a different section, though BBC7 has plenty of this rubbish, and a real bugbear of mine. Don’t get me wrong, I love the modern comedy, I think that we have produced more quality comedy in the last 30 years than any other country in the world. It is just one aspect of the modern comedy radio shows that I hate - the musical interlude. Do not get me wrong, Bill Bailey is magnificent with his music based shows, Victorai Wood wrote some amazingly funny piano tunes to end her shows, and I even used to enjoy Richard Stilgoe at the end of Nationwide, summing up the days news amusingly to tune. I own numerous ‘Bonzo Dog DooDah Band’ LPs, and likewise ‘Half Man, Half Biscuit’, ‘Macc Lads’ and ‘John Shuttleworth’ ones.

The great stand up comedians of each era do not need to take 5 minutes out, having got the crowd laughing, to introduce some fool with a keyboard, who dismays the audience, only for the star to return and try to pick the crowd up again. Peter Kaye does not do this, Steve Coogan never did this, Dave Allen would have baulked at the idea, and Tony Hancock felt he could thirty minutes withhout such rubbish. Unfortunately, almost every Radio Comedy show of the past 30 years seems to have decided that the tried and tested, well proven approach is not for them, and force some musician onto the cast list. Shows such as ‘Punt & Dennis’s ‘It’s been a bad week” suddenly stop, and up steps a music graduate who is not good enough to play with an orchestra, who is such a non-entity personality wise, that no band would want to be on a tour bus with them, and who wouldn’t know satire if it spanked them. Usually, this role is taken by Mitch Benn, whoever he is, though I suspect his father/mother may work for the BBC.

Stop it - comedy is comedy, musical comedy is a great art which must be mastered, but these nobodys who destroy the work of the main artists must go. We are in 2009, not Vauderville.

That’s enough ranting for today. Instead, I shall sit back and think about my Spanish holiday next week. Sun, sand and sangria. Nice. 

Well done New Labour, another new policy, to pay employers for employing staff. Sounds good, especially as it is targeted at those who have been unemployed for over 6 months. Only one problem, it is the same policy announced two months ago by the Conservative Party. I thought it sounded familiar.

What is truly different this time is the speed at which the government stole an opposition party policy. It took six months for them to nationalize ‘Northern Rock’ after Vince Cable (Lib/Dems) proposed it. Since then three other policies have been stolen, and at increasing speed. This most recent one being snaffled in just two months. It really makes you grateful for the fact that we have opposition parties, or the government would have done nothing, remained clueless, and still in denial about the true state of the British economy.

If we are really lucky, Labour will announce a 2p reduction in the basic rate of income tax during the budget this Spring. Vince touted this, and it is probably the only real alternative that can genuinely inject cash flow into the economy.

And, whilst discussing New Labour, wasn’t it nice to see that lovely Tony Blair speaking about the Middle East. It is only the third week of conflict, with nearly a thousand dead, and thousands injured, and, at last, the Middle East Peace Envoy has found time out for touring America and collecting gongs from George W Bush, to actually look in on his day job! What a joke he is.

In this ever changing global landscape, I felt it was time to give updates on some of my previous blog entries;

1/ Israel - has now been condemned for violating international law, humanitarian law and failing to recognise the neutrality staus of the International Committee of the Red Cross. My best friend is of German Jewish extraction, and whilst being a generally calm and relaxed person, he is ashamed and angered by Israels actions. Many European Jews are likewise disgusted. Unfortunately, Israel tends to ignore international law, the UN, and even the Jewish people of the majority of the world. This cannot be allowed to continue; Jewish people have been attacked in Denmark, supposedly a list of influential European Jews has been drawn up for retribution (including Sir Alan Sugar), and this was before the atrocities of the last few days. These kinds of reprisals against the Jewish communities of the world can not be condoned, but only Israel can defuse this situation. Even the USA seems split, with Condoleeza Rice stating that the UN statement is a step in the direction towards the aims of America, but she still abstained rather than voted for the statement! Israeli soldiers must not attack Red Cross and UNWRA staff, can not block ambulances, should be ashamed that children are left for days without food and water whilst lying amongst the dead bodies of their mothers, and the whole idea of corralling citizens into a ’safe’ house then shelling them is just too close to concentration camp extermination for any human being to not be shocked. Israel is perfectly entitled to take action to protect its citizens, yet producing hatred of Jews across the world, and the next generation of Hamas and Hezbollah suicide bombers will not do this. The action of Israeli troops has got severely out of hand and is being counter productive. As usual, more carrot and less stick will win the war of hearts and minds in the long term.

2/ Andrew Strauss has been named the new England cricket captain, at least for the Test matches, and whilst I suggested Paul Colliongwood, Strauss is a level headed character, who has respect among the players and an even handed approach. This is a good selection, and I wish him well.

3/ The UK economy - well let’s face it, when Alistair Darling claimed in the pre-budget report that the recession would be over by July, and when Gordon Brown claimed the UK was better placed than other western countries to weather the storm, I mocked. Today it became clear that I was right.

We are all aware of the job losses in December and the downturn in manufacturing pre-Christmas (especially in the car industry) but today we have learnt that November saw a downturn in productivity 5 times larger than economists had expected. With even worse figures to come over the next few months, with unemployment likely to hit nearer to 4million than the 3million predicted, and with worse than anticipated US employment figures, it seems that Alistair Darling is going to have to rework his figures and downgrade his expectations. That these were ridiculously over optimistic was apparent to everyone, but by how far he has been proven to be innaccurate has even shocked me. The affect of all this on the individual is not being discussed by the media. Remember that after the PBR (Pre-budget report) the Tories said that this would lead to massive debt for the country, which the next generation would have to pay? Well the reappraisal will mean that the country will have to borrow even more, and for even longer, and the debt will be substantially higher, leading to higher VAT, PAYE and interest rates for even longer, possibly not just our children but our grandchildren. Additionally, both Darling and Brown stated that they were ‘urging’ the banks to lend more capital to individuals and small businesses to ride out the recession, keep people in jobs and aid the economy. They also agreed that if the banks didn’t act, they would take measures to force compliance from the banks. 2 months later, still no compliance, no lending, and no action from the government, who are obviously in the pockets of the same banks.

Yesterday we had the pointless action of a 1/2% cut in the Bank of England base rate. This will have no effect on the economy for numerous reasons. It only affects ‘tracker’ mortgages, most of which have a bottom level limit of 2%. The banks are not lending, and the lower the interest rate, the less profit for them from lending. This is a disincentive. It is made even worse by the fact that the government money lent to recapitalise the banks is charged at 12% to the banks, therefore, every pound that the banks lend at 1.5% will cost them 10.5p in losses. This is also a disincentive to lend.

The affects of the unemployment have not yet been felt, and as things stand it is unlikely that the country will start to come out of recession till November this year, at the earliest. Meanwhile, the most atrocious spectre of printing money to buy our way out of debt is now looming. This would be a travesty, leading to wage inflation, devaluation of an already devastated pound sterling, and inflationary pressures that could make the Weimar Republic blush.

Even so, the Guardian today had the headline that Barrack Obama agreed with Gordon Brown on policy. The truth is that the only way out of recession is to spend your way out, but not by giving money to the banks. This has already been tried and failed. Vince Cable, deputy leader of the LibDems, has again been right from the beginning. A small tax cut at the bottom level would put money back into the pockets of the public, who could then spend. This is the only practical way to spend our way out of recession.

No more money for the banks, no more cash being printed, just a two pence reduction in the bottom rate of income tax will redeem our ability to spend our way out of trouble. Strangely, this would have been the first thing a Labour government would have done, prior to their becoming Thatcherites under Tony ‘Middle East Peace Envoy’ Blair.

Sorry that todays blog is so bleak, at least the cold weather is coming to an end. Let’s hope the rain that falls on frozen ground does not lead to localized flooding.

I usually try to avoid religious comment, as it gets people rather hot under the collar, but two things reported in the news recently have caught my eye.

Firstly, I have long wondered how moderate members of the UKs Jewish faith could remain sikent regarding Isreals behaviour towards the Palestinians. I am very happy today, British Jewish groups have been involved in the protests outside the Israeli Embassy in London, alongside Islamic, Christian and other denominations. Congratulations to those people and groups who braved severely cold weather to show their disgust at the atrocities being carried out in the name of Judaism. I recall hearing a man from the ‘Wiesenthal Centre’ in America claiming that the message of the holocaust was that Jews should arm themselves, rather than that atrocities of this nature must never be allowed to happen again - although, Darfur shows that our politicians do not feel so inclined. I am glad that many Jewish people within Britain share my view, as opposed to the hard right opinion. Thank you and congratulations once again.

The second non-secular issue is regarding our Prime Minister. Having declared that he received ‘a moral compass’ from his Presbyterian Minister father, Gordon’s government has been declared ‘morally bankrupt’ by Christian Archbishops. Will Gordon be leaving his faith and converting to another like his predecessor? Does this mean his compass is demagnitized? As his economic policies are in tatters, his road taxing schene vetoed by the Manchester public, and, his christian morals shredded - will we get an election? Probably not.

Enough religion. Have a super New Year, and don’t over-do it.

Yesterday, I criticized the TIF (Transport Innovation Fund) bid effort this year. Today, I will offer a Plan B, which I believe would have satisfied both the government and local electorate.

Step 1 - a single tier congestion charge zone following the inner ring zone of the proposed bid. The original proposal of an inner and outer ring had several drawbacks; psychologically, it seems unfair to pay four charges just to visit the city centre and return home, and creates a perceived overcharging to visit your own city. Physically, it requires twice the roadside equipment and a more complicated computer software system (let’s face it, government computer contracts are infamous for being over budget, late on delivery, and, unworkable). Most importantly, governmentally, it seemed to lack direction, begging the question ‘where are we tackling congestion? Motorways or A & B roads?’ The whole plan seemed a second rate stealth tax.

There is considerable congestion at peak times throughout the citys roads, especially the A6 and the Ardwick and Worsley roundabouts, and also on the motorways, M60/61/62/602 junctions. However, these two problems must be tackled individually. When Alistair Darling cancelled the promised Metrolink extension, he chose to widen the M6 instead. If he had carried out the proposal, Rochdale and Oldham would have been connected, and alongside Bury, these towns create a large share of the traffic heading west along the M62 towards the M6/M61. These towns also contribute to the inflowing traffic that clogs up the northern A and B roads into the city. Instead, the government extended the M6 by one lane in each direction, then increased road tax, and will indubitably bring in tariffs for motorways soon.

Step 2 - re-regulate the bus services. It is no use proposing additional bus services when the existing ones do not run. When de-regulation came into force, we were told that this would promote competition, cheaper fares, and, better services. Of course, economists know that this is the short term case, then the large swallow the small. There are now basically three bus companies, two in the north and west, and just one for the south and east. I live in the east of the city and used to live in Longsight and Levenshulme, so can only address the issue of Stagecoach. Every year, the bus companies receive hundreds of thousands of pounds sterling of tax-payers money to provide their services and each year, Stagecoach receive fines for failing to deliver these services. As the fines come from profits (and rather healthy profits, too), it means that the bus user is paying them from their fares. It does nothing to deter Stagecoach from continuing to cut services and fail to deliver, as the fines are small in comparison to their profits, and as such, does nothing to help the commuter. The TIF bid claimed that there would be more buses and more routes, but this would only be on paper, as the reality would be that the bus companies would not deliver these services properly. More taxpayers money down the drain, and a perfect example of ‘throwing good money after bad’. Incidentally, Stagecoach have kept upping prices, claiming this is due to increased petrol costs. The global price of oil has fallen sharply over the last six months, yet Stagecoach have not cut prices, in fact, they are raising them again! 

Unfortunately, New Labour is too right wing to consider this option, as it is old Labour and reeks of nationalization. There is one other alternative; drop the fines, and where a bus company fails to supply the services that it is contracted to, remove the most profitable routes and award them (along with the government funding) to small local companies. For example,with Stagecoach, firstly remove the Oxford Road to Withington routes, then secondly the A6 to Stockport ones, before thirdly the Manchester to Ashton ones. This would hit profit margins, wake up shareholders, and ensure the timetabled buses would turn up.

Step 3 - de-Beeching. I am not a trainspotter, and this area is not my speciality. What I am aware of, though, is that our once proud railways were butchered by successive governments of both parties on a flawed report by an economist, Lord Beeching. I have also read many informed and well written letters in the Manchester Evening News, which explained how several disused old lines could be reclaimed for just a few million pounds. These proposals are not about long tracts, but short connecting tracks, that could link areas that we already need to enter the city and then head out to. It appears that about four such tracks could alleviate overcrowding on trains at commuter times, and also create alternatives that are currently far easier and reduce car traffic at the fringes of the city.

Step 4 - the current government swept in on a wave, promising a whiter than white alternative to sleeze. I have been a lifelong Labour supporter, but have found the majority of the current cabinet to be no less greasy, smarmy and backstabbing than the Tories. The whiff of corruption hangs over the whole party and many Labour politicians individually. Lord Mandelson has had to resign twice, but is back for a third time. Stephen Byers, David Blunkett (twice) have behaved despicably. The whole funding fiasco for the Deputy Prime Minister stank, and similar in the Scottish Labour Party. Lord Levy and Tony Blair being questioned by police, though, strangely not anti-terrorism police, and at a pre-arranged time (not dragged down the station and held for hours), and with no police access to Tonys office nor the House of Commons! Finally, John Prescott, the bumbling buffoon, adulteror, champagne socialist. Wasn’t his late appearance to urge citizens to vote ‘Yes’, a complete and utter failure. I felt that he was as welcome as whooping cough at a glass-blowers convention.

Politicians have to realize that most people no longer trust nor respect them. As such, it should have been stated in advance, the cost of the charge (and by how much it could be increased per annum) and the hours that it would be in operation. Having stated these, they MUST be enshrined in law, with a legal guarantee that neither could be altered without a further referendum. Remember, this is the government that claimed the police needed new powers to combat terrorism, then used those powers against Iceland! Give the politicians power and they will abuse it.

Step 5 - ensure that ALL the work involved in the programme goes to local business, not London. If it’s our money paying for it, keep the benefits for our economy. Far too many Southerners were involved in the bid, and do not understand the Northern psyche. We are warm and considerate people, but will not be patronized and treated like bumpkins.

I think I’ve addressed most things above, but if you feel I’ve missed something, or think my plan is unworkable, please comment.

This month, the ten boroughs of Greater Manchester held a referendum on proposed improvements to the transport infrastructure of the city, some paid for via grants, others from a central government loan. The cost to the public of this loan was the introduction of two congestion charging zones, pay-to-drive at peak times. The outcome seems to have surprised nobody, the Manchester Evening News has been full of quotes from councillors, government ministers and business leaders saying that despite their best efforts, the result was anticipated. For those outside Greater Manchester, the public rejected the Labour government and councils plans by a 4-1 majority, despite Geoff Hoon’s insistance that there would be no ‘Plan B’ and that the government loan would become available to other cities. As Greater Manchester is the last metropolitan province controlled by Labour, I wish him luck trying to convince other cities to sell their souls.

With the result known, the plan binned, and no plan B; it is time to look into what happened, and what went wrong.

From a budget of £34m set aside, over £18m has been spent on the TIF bid, including £3m on public consultancy. If the result was a foregone conclusion, and ‘no surprise’, then why continue with the process? Simple, New Labour has a dream of introducing congestion charging across the UK, and does not EVER listen to the electorate. They treat the public with a contempt that would have made Margaret Thatcher blush.

When Manchesters Metrolink was first opened, the people were told that this was just stage 1, with expansion planned to the airport, Salford Quays and more outskirt towns. Of course, I was  just a teenager living in Altrincham then. When Labour came to power, Gordon Brown promised to make savings in government and channel these new funds into projects across the country. Manchester was promised expansion of the Metrolink to Rochdale and Oldham, and to the airport, by Transport Secretary Stephen Byers. When Mr Byers resigned in shame, his replacement, Alistair Darling (yes, our current Treasurer) twice repeated Mr Byers promise, before cancelling the whole project. Thrice promised, never delivered. Finally, we are told that we can have what had been promised for over 20 years, but only if we accepted a comgestion charge zone 10 times larger than Londons. In return, we would receive nearly £2.75billion in funding, though £1.2bn would be in a 30 year loan. Compare this with the £5.8bn the government spent on St Pancras station in London, in order to reduce the journey time from London to Paris by a meagre 20 minutes!

It should also be mentioned that over 30 private consultancies were paid £6.5m to help research and draw up plans for the bid. Just think what that money could have done for schools in Greater Manchester.

As for the contempt shown by government, this seems to have been echoed throughout the process by these agencies; most notably, Creative Concerns apparent belief that Northerners are too ugly and unphotogenic, using photographs of Americans on their leaflets. Even at the last minute, these agencies continued to prove themselves unworthy of tax-payers money, when one even breached election rules, and another wasted £230,000 on a TV ad campaign that breached Ofcom rules.

Basically, New Labour has been caught lying too many times, and even the traditional Labour heartland no longer trusts them. This was reflected in the rule breaking by the agencies selected to sell the charge to the public.

It is easy to have 20:20 vision in hindsight, and to criticize without coming up with any valid alternatives, which is why I shall be proposing steps that could be taken to improve the bid, to address the concerns of business and the individual, and to improve transport throughout the district. Unfortunately, you shall have to wait till tomorrow for that.

Have  a great weekend, and congratulations to Lee ‘Evil’ McEvilly on his brace of goals against Shrewsbury, opening his account during his third spell at Spotland.

(Thanks to the Manchester Evening News and The Times for the figures quoted above.)

Hi folks

Today, I thought I’d take time out from my ranting criticisms, to tell you all about my birthplace, a very under-rated and historic town in the Northwest of England.

Rochdale, about 9 miles north/northeast of Manchester, is shrouded in history and culture, and this year its football (soccer) club celebrates its 101st anniversary. Staying with Rochdale AFC for a brief moment, they have never won anything, are possibly the most friendly team in the whole of English football, and was once voted the club with the best pies in the league.

Anyway, that’s enough about football, let’s move on to politics, and the great impact that Rochdale has had on the world, though never really receiving the credit it deserves. Rochdale is the birthplace of ‘Communism’, and to that end, once had a street in Moscow named in its honour. In 1844, before Marx and Engels had even learnt how to clean their teeth, never mind write their communist manifesto, Rochdale had established the ‘Co-op’, an organisation that still flourishes across the UK today. The ‘Workers Co-operative Society’ was created to help the families of the men, and later women and children, working in those ‘dark, satanic mills’ mentioned in William Blake’s ‘Jerusalem’ lyrics. The shop was basically owned by its customers, and any profits accrued during the financial year were re-paid to the customers in the form of a dividend, based upon how much they had spent in the shop. The movement spread across the mill towns of the Northwest of England, and almost one tenth of Manchester city centre is still taken up with the Co-ops Head Offices, which have branched out into insurance, banking, and funerals! The movement is still the only financial institution in the UK to have a moral policy over lending.

Rochdale has also been the birthplace of many great entertainers, film and pop stars, and one famous barmaid! The first, and perhaps best known, of this band of tremendous celebrities was one Grace Stansfield, who attained stage and silver screen fame under the abbreviated name, Gracie Fields. ‘Our Gracie’, as she is still affectionately known, has a newly refurbished theatre named in her honour in Rochdales town centre, not far from the colourfully decorated and famous Town Hall, and during WW2 was one of the great ‘forces sweethearts’, performing live close to the front lines for our troops. About 60 years later, another Rochdale Stansfield searched the world looking for her baby, the one and only Lisa Stansfield, whose fame and quality singing even led to her dueting with Barry White, before the great stars death.

Perhaps inspired by the ‘Gracie Fields Theatre’, several wonderful tv and film actors/actresses have followed in Gracies thespian footsteps, most recently, the English Rose, Anna Friel, who shot to fame as one half of the first lesbian kiss on British tv, during her role in Brookside, a soap opera based in Liverpool. Far too good an actress to remain in the realms of soap operas, Anna has gone on to star in many theatre and film roles has just completed 9 episodes of ‘The Jury’ for Fox T.V. in New York, has been a great success in the tv series ‘Pushing up daisies’ and has completed filming ‘Perfect Strangers’ with Rob Lowe.

Okay, Soap fans out there, what is the most famous pub in Britain? Yes, Coronation Streets own ‘Rovers Return’, and one of its most famous barmaids, Bet Lynch was played on screen by Rochdales own Julie Goodyear. Additionally, the sixth Dr Who, Colin Baker, lived in Rochdale for a long period of time prior to travelling time and space!

Whilst there have been several economists and unionists to be born in Rochdale, I shall not bore people with those figures, who can easily be traced via any of the numerous websites devoted to Rochdale. However, there are two important figures in the towns history whose names have spread farther afield than the others. The town features in the famous Domesday Book, compiled by William the Conqueror and his son during the twenty years after 1066, under the name ‘Recedeham Manor’ although the area was first settled about 5000 years ago. It was one of the Salford Hundreds until 1638, when it became part of the lands of one Lord Byron the famous and magnificent poet.

Possibly the biggest thing to ever come out of Rochdale, was the tremendously charismatic Liberal MP, Sir Cyril Smith, who represented the town throughout the 1980s and 1990s. A wonderfully large and jovial northerner, his name will remain associated with the town for decades to come.

On either side of this metropolis of class and culture, it is unrivalled, by Oldham (the ‘Home of the Tubigrip’) and Bury (claims to have invented the ‘Black Pudding’, though this is contested!). Clearly, Rochdale could well have been the inspiration for the old adage, a rose between two thorns.

So, the next time you’re planning a trip to the UK, ignore London (it’s full of French people nowadays), and Stratford-upon-Avon (the bard was really Christopher Marlowe), and make the short journey up the M6 motorway (they even have trains and coaches going into and from the town), and visit the Mecca of history and culture that is Rochdale.

All the best for the festive season (even if it is a big con based on the Persian Demi-God Mithra, venerated by the Romans as Mithras), and a joyous New Year to all and sundry.

‘Tis the season to be merry, and of good will. Walking through Manchester, you cannot escape the Christmas feeling, with lights along the streets, the market stalls outside the Town Hall and at Piccadilly Gardens, carol singers, and charity collectors.

In the UK, we have been rocked by the death of a young child whose whole life had been a catalogue of violent abuse, at the hands of the parents and a lodging friend. The child had been listed on the ‘at risk’ list, had been visited approximately 60 times by Haringey Social Services, and seen numerous times by doctors. After public outcry, especially as new regulations had come into place following the death several years ago in the same Haringey borough, heads finally rolled at the Council. All in all, a very sad state of affairs was exposed.

However, whilst the media searched for people to blame, childrens charities continued to run tv adverts asking for a monthly direct debit payment to protect the children of the UK. Gone have the appeals for a one-off donation, nowadays they want bank details and a set monthly contribution! A quick search on Yahoo! of the UK pages reveals a dozen charities all claiming to protect children in the UK, rather than children abroad. When ‘Baby P’, as the unfortunate child who died is referred to, was being tortured, abused and ultimately killed, where were these charities?

Yesterday, the news ran stories of problems within the charities of the UK, who, due to the recession, have seen donations down 13%, and by 20% from businesses. Shock horror, they may have to lay off staff.

When I was a child, charity was a genuine heart-felt matter; shops selling decent second-hand goods, staffed by unpaid, kindly old ladies, where  contribution was rewarded by a cup of tea and a biscuit. When my mother died, we asked for contributions to the British Heart Foundation rather than flowers. I took the money collected to a shop, my mothers details taken down, and I was made to feel very good that such a sad event would benefit others.

Certainly, historically, Barnardos did a lot of good for orphans, Childline (a free phone facility for children) was a great idea, and the NSPCC has been helping children for decades. However, there are now so many charities, each requiring administration, that charity has taken on a completely capitalist element. The industry, and that is what it has now become, employs thousands (mostly call centre and admin) and has a turnover of millions of pounds per annum.

I once worked in sales for 6 weeks, cold calling businesses trying to get them to pay for a child help magazine to be issued to pupils of local schools. The magazine was certainly well written, giving help and support on issues such as bullying, ’stranger danger’ and drugs. A certain charity was supposed to have endorsed the product, as had the Greater Manchester Police, and received a pay-off for the use of its name. The sales company made enough money to send its top 30 salespeople on a weeks foreign holiday each year, to pay a decent weekly wage, and very healthy commission on each sale. I was disgusted by the arrogance and greed of the salespeople and the company. What was worse, the government could have issued this magazine to each school child for about £5million per year.

Charity has taken the responsibility off the shoulders of the government, who used to see a child as an investment in the future of the country. It has also become an impersonal giant industry, with credit card databases and no heart.

In the Eastlands area of Manchester, over 90% of children are living in poverty, and the kids loiter looking lost, with no facilities; the next lost generation. Where are the charities? Nowhere to be seen.

Some charities do achieve things for our needy children, but most just swallow up money. The government should make it much harder to establish charity status, should legislate to consolidate charities within each field (cancer charities are even more common), and start taking responsiblity for the welfare of the people.

Strangely, since coming to power in 1997, the New Labour government has promised to halve child poverty in the UK by 2010, and eradicate it by 2020. As pointed out earlier, the figure for Eastlands is over 90%, and 2010 is only twelve and a half months away. This is the same area that won the SuperCasino bid, before the government pulled the plug on that investment. This would have had a MetroLink, promised by Stephen Byers and Alistair Darling, then abandoned (though resurrected to connect the football ground to Piccadilly Station since Manchester Citys purchase by an Emirate investor). What has happened to the local Labour MP, Tony Lloyd, for such abject failure in reducing child poverty and raising investment; he is now Chair of the Parliamentary Labour Party! The sort of blood money that even Judas Iscariot hung himself for accepting, but no such noble a gesture from the Right Honourable Member.

Well peeps,

 what can I say? I have only posted 3 blog entries, and already the effects are being felt across the world. Obviously, not a lot has happened to Victor Hugo recently, as the poor fellow is no longer with us. My other two entries already have additional updates, as clearly the whole fabric of the British establishment is reading with interest.

Firstly, the economy in Britain. Whilst Lord Mandelson has been discussing Jaguar/Land Rover and hogging the limelight from the Badger who is in charge of the Treasury, Alistair Darling has discreetly been mentioning to certain newspapers that the depression/recession may affect us more than other economies after all.

 Secondly, today the BBC received two more fines for dodgy competitions last year. Whilst only two shows were fined, three were admonished. One of these shows was for Londons local BBC radio station, but the other two were for Radio2. The London station and Radio2 were fined for running competitions during pre-recorded shows, where the winner was announced during the shows. Anyone who actually listened to the show could not win, yet were urged to enter. The other Radio2 show, which incurred no fine, was because the competition received no entries. To avoid the embarrassment of announcing that no-one had entered the competition, the show invented a winner!

Wow, only 3 days on the job and I’m striking gold.

If you want to keep up-to-date, you know where to come.

Perhaps this should have been titled; Is America solely to blame?

Gordon, there cannot be continuous ‘boom’ without ‘bust’. Anything that expands quickly will be overstretched, and will snap back to a more acceptable equilibrium.
That said, the Sub Prime market in the USA is generally blamed for the World recession by the British government, media and public. The real truth is that it was not so much the debt itself, but the way it had been constantly re-packaged and sold on amongst different banks that has led to problems. In the end, noone knew how much bad debt they were actually holding. This meant that banks figures were innaccurate, and they all felt they were better off than they really were. This was a clear failing of the Financial Services Authority (a QUANGO which took over responsibility for regulating and moderating the banks from the Bank of England, when the BofE was made responsible for interest rates). Putting the FSA in charge was Gordon Browns decision.
Additionally, suspicions should have been raised over the Enron/Anderson affair in the USA. Anderson were the biggest auditors in the US, and fiddled the accounts of Enron for it’s chiefs. If Anderson were willing to do this for one high profile customer, they would no doubt have been willing to do so for others. This would mean that the US major stocks could well be overpriced on Wall Street. Why were Anderson having to do this during economic growth, is a question that was not asked, and probably implied that the US economy was not as strong as thought. This is borne out by the massive collapse across the big companies of the US.
However, there is a lot more to the UKs financial system and failure than the USA, its banks and their ‘toxic’ debt. Domestically, 2 important signs were missed; spending on credit cards was larger than by cash for the first time in history 3 years ago, and domestic debt reached 4 times the GDP of the nation. This meant that the growth in industry was not being paid for by money, but by debt, that would need to be paid. The growth for the last 5 years was ‘on the never never’.

The government also hamstrung itself and the Bank of England, by making the BofE responsible for setting interest rates. This meant that the BofE had to focus on fighting inflation, whilst the housing boom spiralled out of control. As I stated at the being of this piece, nothing can expand rapidly forever. Now that housing represents its real value, most mortgage holders owe more money than their house is worth. After 20 years of paying, they may still not have got their moneys worth. Also, and because of the credit card condition mentioned above, controlling the flow of cash (ie the amount of genuine currency in circulation) no longer has the impact it used to. This was all predictable, yet Gordon missed them.
As house prices exceeded the value of the property, some UK banks were offering mortgages of 125% the market price. Even if house prices had stayed constant, this would be toxic debt. It was a stupid step, but the banks were falling over themselves to fight for our debt. This has nothing to do with the USA, and should have been stopped. Gordon did nothing.
Inflation has spiralled out of control, peaked and is now collapsing towards deflation. Keeping interest rates low for business, and causing the housing boom, has proven a pointless activity.

The rise in oil prices pushed inflation out of the BofEs control. Everyones fuel costs (private and business) rocketed. Now oil prices have fallen back massively (virtually a quarter their peak price), but Gordon has made Britain so unattractive to investors, that our currency has collapsed against the dollar and euro. As oil is priced in dollars, every country is now getting proportionately cheaper oil than we are. Gordon claimed we were better placed than other economies to weather the recession, and has refused to support the pound, or more likely - he doesn’t have the funds to support the pound, he gave it all to the banks. Unfortunately, only the Cabinet believe we are in better shape than others, or are just in denial. The World Bank, IMF and speculators worldwide, all of them disagree with Gordon.
As such, we are at a disadvantage to the USA and Eurozone, who are paying less for fuel, which will benefit their businesses.
Gordon Brown earnt the image of being frugal at the beginning of Tony Blairs government, by exercising cut backs and economising in government departments. He promised that the savings would be used to help regenerate the country. Manchester was promised an extension to its Metrolink service by Transport Minister Stephen Byers, who resigned in shame. He was replaced by Alistair Darling, who re-iterated the proposal twice, before running out of money and cancelling the whole plan. This week, Manchester voted no to a referendum offering us the same improvements Manchester had been promised, but this time by having a congestion charge area 10 times larger than Londons! All the money Gordon saved, he squandered, and it never went where it should have. Now, government wastage is just as bad as it was under the Tories. If things were so good, why did this money just drip away, shoring up other spending? Because, they were false economies in the first place.

Wake up Britain, stop blaming America and look far closer to home. Whilst a socialist myself, I must say that Vince Cable of the LibDems seems to be the only financial mind in the Houses of Parliament who understands our present predicament, and has sound proposals for the future. As a lifelong Labour voter, this scares me.