My Opinions Online

Budget Airlines - They're Just Not Worth It

2009-07-14T21:04:00.003Z

In these challenging times, many cost-conscious travellers often think they can save a few pounds by travelling with one of the many budget carriers such as Ryan Air or EasyJet. If you want to enjoy your trip, then I implore you not to. A regular airline such as British Airways may be slightly more expensive when booking, but often by the time hidden costs are added, the savings are not that substantial. In addition the minimal costs savings, the whole "user experience" tends to be somewhat better with a regular airline.

A typical flight on a budget airline starts of all well enough, but with no allocated seating you could end up arguing with a chav from Essex because he doesn't want to be separated from any of the 17 illegitimate kids that he is taking with him to his annual pilgrimage to Majorca. Inflight services are non-existent unless you are ready to open your wallet, where you find the foot options are of the quality you would expect while shopping with a severe hangover. Roughly about halfway through the flight, you will be offered a chance to buy a lottery ticket. Has anyone actually ever actually won anything? What is the maximum prize? Naturally, this key information is witheld from you as they try to find yet more ways to part you from your wallet. I am suprised they haven't installed coin slots alongside the reading that you have feed while you read anything to distract you from the 3 hours of tedium.

When it gets to landing at your destination, you are lucky if the plane parks up in the same airport that it landed at. In an attempt to keep their costs down, these budget airlines will pay for the remote spots that are normally reserved for keeping hijacked planes away from the airport buildings. On a recent flight into Gatwick, the shuttle bus had to take us so far, I was convinced that then plane had parked up in a field in deepest West Sussex.

Finally, when you do actually to get to the airport and passport control, there are normally about 12 plane loads of budget travellers trying to get past the 2-man team of immigration controllers. Bedlam is assured while you hope that your baggage was loaded on to the plane that you were on, and the handlers did not decide to test the off-road capabilities of their baggage trucks on it.

So, use BA, Singapore or whomever (except Air France) for all your flying needs!

Big Brother...

2008-06-06T09:54:00.003Z

No not, Channel 4's attempt to turn the nation in to one populated by knuckle-draggers.

I noticed this article today, and I am of two minds. While copyright theft is a concern, especially for newly emerging "talents", I am against the wholesale admonishment of people that do download music and or movies. For example, if someone wanted to buy a movie and discovered that the DVD had been deleted and was no longer available, I believe that they should be able to download it. Of course, that is not to say that BPI, etc would necessarily agree with that theory, so if they want to prevent illegal downloading, they need to extend consumer choice by providing catalogues of older material and charging people to download them. Everyone would be a winner...

Of course, there is also the issue of DRM and what not but that's not likely to be fixed anytime soon.

One Mighty White Elephant

2008-03-28T09:56:00.002Z

Reading the paper this morning, I saw this article about an airborne laser "gun" designed to kill tanks from 10 miles (15kms) away. Pretty impressive considering that tank armour can be 300mm thick and beyond.

Whilst a great idea in theory, and obviously big-shiny technology always looks impressive (which is why billions are spent on high-tech planes rather than making them cheaper and in greater quantities), I do feel that this plane is going to be rather limited as it is totally reliant on air superiority.

Currently it is mounted on a converted 747, with plans to later fit in to the venerable Hercules. Certainly on my travels, I have not considered the 747 to be the most agile of craft and while 10 miles sounds like a considerable distance, it is not that deep for a battlefield as they can stretch to several miles by the time reserves are taken into consideration. As such, its use is going to be limited to insurgent situations and the flight crew will have to hope like hell that they don't possess any cheap anti-aircraft missiles, which the US government would have in no way supplied to them. And if you believe what's in store for the future, it's not going to be of much use.

Even assuming that the future is not so bleak, the limits of the laser means that at maximum range the laser is going to be degraded substantially by atmospheric conditions (smoke and dust from the battlefield, water vapour in the atmosphere), which will causing "blooming" and reduce the effectiveness of the beam. Still, with a skilled controller they should be able to beam "USA! USA! USA!" into the clouds.

Find dodgy content faster!

2008-03-20T09:56:00.004Z

I read this interesting piece in the Telegraph this morning. In a nutshell, the future Internet will allow you to enter a single search term and it will lead you to all related content. So far example, type in "Mel Gibson" and it will return his biography, options to buy his back catalogue and links to religious nutjob websites.

The article also discusses the possibility of linking bank accounts to online calendars and photo collections, so that you can see the impact that a holiday had on your bank account. Leaving aside the privacy issues, I am not exactly sure how that will be of benefit. After getting back from a pleasant holiday, the last thing I want is a reminder of the damage it did to my meagre funds. Still, it could persuade people not to holiday so much - ah, it's part of the Greenie agenda!

The return of centralised Government?

2008-02-27T11:13:00.004Z

Having announced that the ailing Northern Rock will now be nationalised due to the massive amounts of taxpayers money dropped into it, it is possible that the Politburo has got it sights on an even bigger target.

Although nothing has officially been announced, the stripping of the rail operators licence would easily allow the government to nationalise First Great Western, setting a precedent for all the other rail franchises that are failing to deliver. The rights and wrongs of privatised rail services vs. nationalised services can be debated, however the fact remains that a time when government bank balances are written exclusively in red (thanks to the previous Chancellor, now Prime Minister), increasing the public debt to fulfil an ideological desire is at best, foolish.

Hopefully, the Government will see sense and realise that nationalisation failed the country in the 60s & 70s and therefore does not need a repeat performance.

Next stop, franchising...

2008-02-07T21:31:00.000Z

I was happily surfing the 'net today and found saw this disturbing piece. The Premiere League today agreed in principle for each to team to have to play an additional match. Opposing teams will be selected by a random draw, and the game will then be played on neutral territory - not Wembley, not the Millenium Stadium but virtually any country on the planet, in any city. The Premiere League's motivation for this is that it will give fans in overseas countries the opportunity to see a live game. In my opinion, there are several problems with this idea, a few of them are:

Local leagues not appreciating the intrusion. Whichever country is hosting a game, it will mean revenues for that local league are likely to be negatively affected. The rationale for this is that fans will pay more to watch the Premiership game, and therefore not attend local fixtures. Additionaly, sponsors would rather put their money towards something that is going to get a world-wide screening.
Fixture congestion getting worse. Premiership teams can currently expect play games in (depending on their position) the Premiership, the FA cup, the Coca Cola cup, the Champions League or UEFA cup and pre-season friendlies/tournaments. Add to this, International commitments and the players themselves are going to be reaching a point of burn-out very much earlier in the seasons, and potentially their careers.
Local teams draw local fans. Something that is apparently hard to fathom for some, but (with a few notable exceptions), a team's fanbase comes from the immediate vicinity surrounding it. Is a Wigan - Derby match played in Bangkok going draw local interest? No disrespect to either team, but they do not have "marquee players" like Ronaldo, Rooney, etc.

I hope the Premiership see sense and avoid this stupid idea. However, their Chief Executive (Scudamore) seems to have little respect for the common fan, even though they were the ones that got him here in the first place.

Predictions for 2008

2008-01-02T14:58:00.000Z

As it is the start of the year, I thought I would put down a few predictions for the year ahead. I am no Mystic Meg, and most of it is pretty much guesswork so I don't know how accurate I will be.

Football

Premier League winners: everyone seems to think it will be Man Utd or Arsenal. I don't know though, I can see Derby having a good run of form. Failing that and a few intimidated referees later, Chelsea do have an outside chance out of the remaining 2 in the top 4. So, let's go with Arsenal.
FA cup winners: I would like to see an outside team win it, but I think Chelsea may have the edge as they tend to do well in tournaments.
Champions League: I will say this much, it won't be an English team.
England team: a year of optimism for future will be brought to a stuttering halt by a few players continuing to not find form. Rooney to become a super sub, Lampard to dropped completely after a dismal performance against Switzerland.

Politics

UK election: not while Gordon Brown is in power. If one is called, a slim majority for the Conservative party (maybe a hung Parliament?) with Labour losing out to both Tories and Liberals.
US election: isn't there one due soon? Don't know if it is this year or not, but if so, expect the Republicans to retain by 1% again, after multiple recounts, suing of the balloting machine developers and within 2 months everyone complaining that they didn't vote for them. The Democrats will blame Michael Moore for losing them votes.
Middle East: more of the same, I'm afraid.
Australia: they have just had an election, so they will be happy for a bit longer.

Economy:

Housing: prices down, then up, then down, then up. Then everyone will realise that Halifax's economic predictor is suffering from a previously unseen Y2K bug.
High-street spending: more on-line spending leads to less high street spending. By the end of the year, queues at on-line checkouts match high street stores.

Technology:

Facebook: mass desertions as everyone gets tired of being poked, bitten by Vampires and receiving dubious "do you find me hot?" requests. That, and people read the privacy statement.
iPhone: new one introduced, the world goes crazy. Steve Jobs has more followers than Ghandi, is canonised by the Pope, starts managing the US Football team, forms a US cricket team, cures cancer, etc...
Next big thing: not sure. Last year it was Facebook and the year before that You Tube, as a guess I will go with an application that syncs all your contacts, emails, instant messages, calendars, etc across work and home, mobile phone, etc. There are a few options already available in this field, but none of them have really taken off yet.
This blog: sporadically updated ;)

I will try and remember to check these out at the end of the year.

Happy New Year and a few resolutions

2007-12-31T09:09:00.000Z

Happy New Year to all. Hopefully, 2008 will be a successful and prosperous one for you all, and your resolutions are achievable. In that sense, here are some of mine:

Get to the gym more, and not just weights but cardio as well
Update this more

So not many, so hopefully I will be able to keep them going for more than a month.

I read today that TIME has awarded Vladimir Putin the Man of the Year award. At first I thought it was a practical joke given that Russia have started sending out their long range bombers to probe the Western air defences (something that has not happened since the height of the Cold War in the 1980s).

However a review of the TIME's Man of the Year awards shows that this is not entirely without precedent. Previous recipients have included notables such as:

Adolf Hitler
Joseph Stalin
Harry Truman (in the year that Hiroshima and Nagasaki was bombed)
Nikita Kruschev
Lyndon B Johnson (in the year prior to the Vietnam war escalation)
George W Bush (enough said)

As such, Putin joining such a list is therefore not entirely out of character for the editors of TIME. Here's hoping that Putin does not join his Russian predecessors...

It's not always good to be right.

2007-11-22T14:02:00.001Z

Last night the expected happened, and England failed to qualify for a major tournament for the first time in 14 years. This has been quickly followed up by the FA sacking McClaren and starting an urgent review of football in the country.

On the replacement coach a number of names have been mentioned as possible successors. Personally, I hope whomever is appointed is picked for his skills and not because he is a "safe" option, as McClaren was considered. Among the listed are:

Scolari: current Portugal coach and former coach of Brazil when they won the World Cup in 2002. He is proven on the international scene with a good pedigree while leading Brazil, I think he has been found a bit lacking for Portugal. This makes me question whether he can achieve much with England.
Mourhino: the controversial former Chelsea boss is currently sunning himself somewhere. Unproven on the international circuit but impeccable in domestic tournaments, he has stated that he is only interested in club football at present and would only consider coaching Portugal. Still, if there were enough 0's on the cheque, I am sure he could be persuaded.
Lippi: former Italian coach who won them the World Cup. Also whereabouts unknown, but may be worth a punt. However, Italy did not play particularly attractive football last year.
Klinsmann: the former German coach took them to the semis, even though it was his first managerial role. I cannot see the English press taking a German as the national coach though.
Hiddink: just signed a contract with Russia, who made it to Euro 2008 at England's expense. I cannot see him giving up that role; he doesn't want ex-KGB hitmen after him for a start!

Then there are some British names in the mix:

Sanchez: got a win over England when coaching Northern Ireland although currently with Fulham. A possible candidate.
Allerdyce: was annoyed he wasn't offered the role last time and to be frank, I would rather have had McClaren. I am not convinced that Allerdyce has enough to offer and has been found to be somewhat lacking in the more pressured environment of Newcastle.
O'Neill: the Aston Villa was turned down for the role originally, and although I think he has a lot of potential, it may be too early for him.
Shearer: there has been talk of the former Newcastle captain taking the coaching position. The worst that could happen is that this is done to try and emulate Klinsmann's success.

The selection process I imagine will be a drawn out affair, especially as a couple of the candidates are tied up until post Euro 2008. Personally, I favour Mourinho - as mentioned is untested in the international arena, but on the plus side he can eat the English press for breakfast and spit them out; and unfortunately that is prerequisite of the job nowadays. Failing that, given that we have such a long time to the next qualifying campaign, give O'Neill a run and allow him to build the team up.

For the review, I have written before about what I believe England needs to introduce in to their coaching. Hopefully, they will use this opportunity to reconstruct themselves as France did post Euro 1994. It is however a long shot if they can't get the clubs on board...

Sheep, lemmings, etc...

2007-11-09T13:16:00.000Z

Obsession is a dangerous thing... The cult of the iPod totally confuses me: it is a device that has a very high volume of competitors, often with superior products and despite the negative press (battery life, locking you in to iTunes), people continue to buy the thing.

Now, Apple have released the iPhone and again the lemmings are let out. This is a phone that's one innovation is the built in tilting mechanism, other than that it offers nothing and in some respects is a retrograde step (e.g. lack of 3G, vendor-locked service provider, etc). By the looks of it, there is again no way of changing the battery so within 18 months, users will have dead phones as good old memory effect will make them useless.

I am sure people will continue to buy them irrespective of how good the product is or the company's ethics. Wonder if Steve Jobs will ever get round registering Apple as a religion? He does a better brainwashing job than the Moonies.

Migrating my holiday blog

2007-09-13T20:53:00.000Z

I decided recently to migrate my other blog (JamesHeatherHols.blogspot.com) to Travellers Point. Progress has been pretty slow but I am getting there.

The reasons why I am doing this? Well, Traveller's Point offers the following:

Mapping of holiday journeys on a map of the planet, including distance travelled
Uploading of photos and linking them to cities on your mapped travels
Blogging and diary facilities

The biggest reason that I am using them however, is that it is possible to book accomodation through them. We used this site a lot on our travels last year, and have used them since, as they do the range from budget up to 5 star. I was comparing their prices with those on Expedia and they were roughly half the price for the same hotel.

As such, I would recommend them to all independent travellers out there.

What will he have to say for himself?

2007-09-10T13:33:00.000Z

The Telegraph is giving readers the opportunity to pose questions to David Cameron, leader of the Conservative party. Reading through the questions posted so far, there seems to be a pretty common theme: immigration, EU and crime.

After gaining some good momentum while Blur ran the country into the ground, Cameron has lost it all and is allowing Brown to take the upper hand. There seems to be a genuine fear in the Tory ranks of "lurching to the Right", which is complete nonsense. The simple fact is that the UK's resources in all areas are stretched way beyond capacity, and a firm line must be taken. Brown produces the rhetoric and is lauded for it, Cameron does it and is accused of being Right wing (as if it is a crime). It's something Nick Robinson of the BBC has also observed.

In my opinion, Cameron has to stop being Blur-lite and make some definitive policy statements on some of the harder issues to tackle. At least that way, people can either get on board or jump ship. The lack of anything of substance is going to be damaging as nobody will not what he or the Tories stand for. The incumbent government have many areas where they are prime for attacking: violent crime is rising, unions seem to be getting their edge back (a new winter of discontent?) and the Health service is failing with more administrators than there is capacity to treat patients. Sadly, Cameron and the Tories are failing to voice these - they must do if they want to be a credible opposition.

Flapping McClaren = problems for England

2007-08-07T07:33:00.000Z

Perusing the sports section of the Telegraph today, I noticed that Steve McClaren is considering bringing Sol Campbell back into the England fold, after firing him via an answer machine when he took over the reins. This has been brought about by a "defensive crisis" in the England squad with John Terry, Jonathan Woodgate and probably Gary Neville (woo hoo!) out injured.

Although the role of England manager is a thankless task, and I have tried not to criticise too much, McClaren has brought this all on himself. He would rather have players out of position on the field, rather than mustering the courage to drop those that were under-performing. This has lead to players being heckled on the pitch, him storming out of press conferences and quality players considering retirement from international football.

Since taking the England mantle, McClaren has travelled round the country to watch a number of Premiereship games (and will shortly be adding America to the mix), supposedly to pick the best squad available. However, the result of all this travelling is that he will have reverted to the same pre-World Cup squad of Sven. The World Cup 2006 squad was not the "golden generation" as heralded by the press; although it did possess a great deal of talent, it was not enough to see the result home. England need to build for the future, they need a squad that will last and and calling back Campbell and (allegedly) David James is not going to be the answer in the long term, despite how well they played last season.

The England line-up should be (subs are in brackets):

GK: Robinson (Carson, as Foster is injured)

RB: Richards (Shorey)

CD: Carragher (Neville)

CD: Ferdinand (Campbell)

LB: Cole, A (Bridge)

RW: Lennon (Wright-Phillips, Beckham)

CM: Hargreaves (Carrick)

CM: Gerrard (Lampard)

LW: Cole, J (Taylor, Downing)

ST: Owen (Crouch)

ST: Rooney (Smith)

Add to the squad a few players such as Johnson and Nugent up front, a few of the younger midfielders such as Jenas, Dyer and Bentley. It also may be worth calling up a couple of others from the U21 that impressed in Holland this year.

The FA Need This Man!

2007-07-11T12:49:00.000Z

Flicking through the BBC Sports website at lunchtime, I ran across this interesting article about football skills. It has been said that the current teaching methodology employed by the FA produces nothing but "leather-lunged athletes" with good pace (not that England uses that pace in their tactics) and able to withstand knocks from the opposition (a positive hinderence in the era of diving that FIFA encourages).

If England were to employ this guy to coach in all junior training and complement this with the existing training techniques (there is space in the curriculum, England trainees do the least number of hours per week of any European team), there is the real danger that we may win a meaningul trophy.

All we need to do is develop a coaching programme for trainee managers that a) improves their tactical abilities, b) makes them less bloody arrogant and c) removes their reliance on teeth whitening products.

Never a truer word spoken

2007-06-28T06:58:00.000Z

I was reading this impassioned piece over my morning coffee and pill breakfast and have got say that I fully agree with everything that Danielle Murphy has to say. Charlton Athletic have shot themselves in the foot with this: to disband a successful team to try and save money is short-sighted at best. The fact that the team is composed of part-timers means that the overall savings will amount to much I imagine.

Women's football in England is starting to gain momentum, as indeed it is internationally. Leveraging off this popularity could have enabled Charlton to sell more shirts, or whatever it is they have set as their corporate goal. Now, all that will come to naught for short-term gain; a poor decision, I believe.

I understand Ms Murphy's resentment at how the board managed situation. I hope her and her team-mates soon find success at another club.

Bye, bye Blur

2007-06-27T13:14:00.000Z

Well, our illustrious/lame-duck Prime Minister has left office, Downing Street and if rumours are to be believed, will be leaving Parliament to take up a "foreign envoy" position (so he can still travel First Class, no doubt). At the end of his tenure, it is probably a good idea to reflect on his many achievements while in office:

900,000 civilians killed in a non-UN sanctioned war in Iraq.
spiralling juvenile crime, fuelled by ASBO "badges of honour" (an oxymoronic term).
devaluing of the peerage system, so that anyone with a bit of loose change for the Labour coffers (OK, several thousands) can nab themselves a gong.
Interesting aside: my first realisation of things were amiss with the Honours system was when Alex Ferguson of Manchester United became Sir Alex Ferguson immediately before or after (I forget which) appearing on a Labour party Election broadcast.
Sleaze, scandal and cover-ups ranging from philandering Cabinet ministers (fair enough really), children of Cabinet ministers being sent to selective schools (a bit hypocritical) and the "sexing up" of the WMD document & its fallout.
A truly classless society, as epitomised by this nugget.

Will Brown do a better job? He certainly lacks the weaselly demeanour, which can only help his profile however a hard shift to the left may not be in his best interests. The recent defection of some MP from the Tories to Labour will make him feel confident; he would be wise not replace that with complacency.

Here's hoping for some improvement...

Five of the best looking blokes on the planet

2007-05-29T20:31:00.000Z

While browsing around FaceBook, I noticed that one of my friends had added a post about his celebrity look-alikes. Always eager to try out something new, I followed the link and uploaded a picture taken at the Roskilde Rock Festival that we were at last year. At the time that the picture was taken, I had not showered or shaved for more than a couple of days, so to say I looked a grot is a bit of an understatement.

After a couple of minutes, my results came through and I was slightly suprised by the results (to say the least). My results are below...

Robbie Coltrane and Peter Jackson I can sort of see, but Kofi Annan????!!!! Obviously the tan after 6 months on the road was better than I thought. I'm quite happy about Patrick Swayze and Michael Douglas though :)

We're off!

2007-05-22T19:52:00.000Z

After getting home tonight, I found an envelope from the FA. After ripping it open, I found it contained the expected tickets to England's game against Brazil. The picture on the right shows where we will be sitting; although it's right at the back, it's the very first of the rows and apparently all seats have great views. I think I will be taking the camera along.

It's unfortunate that it will not be the first official game of the new Wembley; that distinction was taken by the FA cup final last week. At least if it was the England/Brazil, it would not have been quite so boring a match. There is nothing less interesting to watch than two teams working to cancel each other out on the pitch.

I think most neutrals were hoping for a Man U win, I however was quite happy that Chelsea won it. There is something appropriate that the FA cup is held for the first time in the new Wembley by the English captain. But as one of the guys at work said, I am a bit of a sentimentalist.

Who can I abuse now?

2007-05-10T21:47:00.000Z

Well, after much procrastinating our wonderful Prime Minister has thrown in the towel and is going to leave office in June. Obviously this is not too soon for the country as it is being dragged further and further down by his vain-glorious policies designed to leave a "legacy". One of the most expensive has been the imposition of a major IT programme that is not only is way over budget, but is also failing to meet the key targets. Not too great a legacy...

But what about peace in Northern Ireland? I'm sorry but if a group of power-mad Islamic terrorists had not started trying to pick fights with the US, there would likely be no power-sharing, NORAID will still provide funding to the republican terrorists and sectarian killings would likely be happening. Blair thinking that he has a special touch and can apply that to bring peace to the Middle East is just delusional.

Maybe if he hadn't been so quick to follow GW down the road to war could he have been taken seriously...

We're still going anyway...

2007-05-04T16:00:00.000Z

After my last rant about the FA only allowing the sale of tickets to the England-Brazil game to paid-up members, today they started the sale to the general public. Preceeding this sale, there was a ballot to members of the England fan club, which we entered. Unlike our last attempt at a football ballot, we were actually successful.

Heather and I had a quick discussion about how much to spend and came to the agreement that we should go for the best available. By the time I had got to the front of the queue on the ticketing website, the £60 ones were all taken and the most expensive available were £50. Two tickets were duly bought and we got our allocated seats.

1 June, 8pm kick off - we will be there!

They cannot be serious...

2007-04-20T21:56:00.000Z

Today at midday the fans-only sale for the England's defeat against Brazil at the new (and late) Wembley went on sale. This sale was fully paid up members of the England fan club, of which I am one. At midday, the reminder went of and I immediately went to the ticketing portal and joined the queue. It said I had 1 hour to wait, giving me time to duck out to lunch.

I get back and I have a 5 minute wait. Excellent news. The time ticked by slowly (I didn't want to miss my window of opportunity so I was doing nothing else) and eventually the page loads. I punch in my member details (number and password) and specify that I want 2 tickets. The first field is populated with my name, the second requires the England fan number of the other person. Naturally, this is going to be Heather. After trying a couple of times to skip past this screen, I give and call Heather for her details, which are duly obtained.

This number is keyed in and I hit the "Submit" button. I immediately receive the message "This person is not a paying of the England Fan club". WTF?!! It's fair enough to get fans to be free members in order to get tickets, but to force everyone to be a paid up member in order to buy their tickets is just greedy. After shelling out for the tickets and membership, that would have cost around £100 per person.

I am sorry but in their current form England are not worth that amount. My pessimism about their qualification chances I have already mentioned, but even if we were to qualify, the football played will be boring and we will struggle to win anything, scratching out 1-0 wins.

Although Sven McClaren is receiving all the flak at the moment, it has to be said that some players do not play to their best when playing for England: Lampard, Rooney, Carrick, either of the Nevilles. Drop them from the first team and make them earn their spot again. Some of them (especially Rooney) seem content to rest on their laurels, so the shock my change their attitude and if it doesn't then they don't deserve to wear the 3 Lions.

Still, with McClaren's lack of balls, that's not going to happen any time soon.

Have they thought about the root cause?

2007-02-07T20:49:00.000Z

It appears that someone has a grudge against Government bodies responsible for the various aspects of car ownership in the UK. Targets have included the DVLA and the mob managing Ken Livingstone's pride: the Congestion Charge. The obvious culprit for this mentioned by the press is a disgruntled motorist (d'uh), however who is to say that it is one person? I propose that it may in fact it may be a newly-formed militant wing of the RAC.

Joking aside, the Government must look at themselves to a certain degree. While I don't condone violence, the fact is that the under the incumbent mob, the costs associated with motoring have risen manyfold, leaving more and more people out of pocket. The Government (local and national) have attempted to spin the fact that they are forcing a green agenda, but the facts do not back this up. The Congestion Charge gives Livingstone more money to spend on Cuban "fact finding missions" and duty on fuel and licence fees gives Brown more to pay for a greater number of administrators in the NHS.

As long as the government continues to penalise those that are easy targets, more and more people will become disgruntled. A change of Government is long overdue...

(not that things will probably change much)

Damn English Thugs

2007-02-05T21:22:00.000Z

Yet another major football hoolganism incident happened in continental Europe. In this case, an Italian policeman was murdered by a bunch thugs who had thrown a homemade inciderary device, which subsequently exploded in his face.

This sadly is not an isolated case, the English fans in Germany during the World Cup 2006 were among the best behaved of the fans. There were a couple of incidents that warranted few arrests, but by and large the English fans were well behaved. Not least part of the reason for this was that the German police had a really great policy of non-intervention unless necessary. When I was at the England-Sweden game in the fan enclosure, a cretinous English fan thought it would be clever to set fire to a German flag in front some riot police. The self-policing of the English fans soon ensured that the flag was soon put out (repeated chants of "You are a wanker" soon embarrassed him).

However despite the years of relatively good behaviour, there is still the perception of England fans being the troublemakers abroad. Repeatedly, the England team is threatened with expulsion from tournaments due to a small percentage of people getting drunk and causing problems. Some while ago (just after Euro 2004 to be precise) I posted on Usenet a counter-argument about English football hooligans which I have reproduced below

The largest incident of hooliganism in the tournament so far has between Germany and Holland fans.
Portuguese police have praised the English fans behaviour in recent weeks.
The "rioting" in the first week was well away from any games being played by England, and has been attributed to excessive alcohol consumption.
Any fan deported from Portugal will be subject to a ban ranging from 2 to 5 years (IIRC). This has already been used in this tournament
Some other hooliganism facts:
English fans have not instigated a major hooliganism incident for 5/6 years, both at club and national level
During the 1998 World Cup a French policeman nearly died after being badly beaten by German fans.
In 2000 two Leeds United supporters were stabbed to death by followers of the Turkish club Galatasaray
Italy's ultras (their organised hooligans) are said to view the English drunkenness with disdain because it impairs the ability to fight.
In 2000, Den Bosch (Holland) supporters rioting for three days after a match was called off after a fan was shot
In 1998, about 26,000 Manchester United fans travelled to Holland and there were just 28 arrests, mostly just for
drunkenness.

Of course, I don't have answer for all these problems, but consistency of treatment would be a good start.

Come on, England! x 2

2007-02-03T10:46:00.000Z

Today is the start of the Six Nations tournament, and it's the first time that a certain England player who has not had an international start since 2003 will be having a run-out. Having been ravaged by injuries for so long, some are concerned that throwing Wilkinson straight into the bear-pit exposes him to unnecessary risks both to him as an individual and the team due to his lack of match practice.

Wilkinson however is the consummate professional and as long as Scotland do not go out to deliberately injure him, I believe he will be more than capable of holding up his end of the bargain. If anything the risks come from him throwing himself into the game with the same level as gusto and reinjuring himself rather than being a liability on the pitch.

The England Rugby squad do have a number of World Cup veterans who have not seen much International game time since 2003. The one I most delighted to see is the return of Jason Robinson. He scored a fantastic try in the World Cup final, and has an amazing ability to jink his way around a defensive line. Bringing him out of International retirement is great for us in the short-term, but we need to look to the future.

And on Wednesday, the England football play a friendly at Old Trafford against Spain. Hmm, an underperforming team playing against an underperforming team. I am a paid-up member of the England Fan Club, and to be frank I am not entirely convinced that I am getting value for money. There are players in the England squad that I have the utmost respect for, but England are constantly coming up short. As I said earlier, I do not believe that we are likely to qualify for the Europe, although if we do, it will be a struggle. We have (and have had for a long time) a problem with at the management level. Sven was risk averse to the detriment of the England game, and when he did take risks it was illogical ones such as taking Walcott, rather than adopting aggressive formations. If he seriously believed that a 4-5-1 formation was going to get England through to the finals of the World Cup, then he was misguided at best.

Despite my pessimism, I would have gone and seen the game if it was either a) not at Old Trafford or b) not on a Wednesday night. As it is, I am going to have to take my England regalia to work and find a pub showing it before kick off. And Wednesday is meant to be a gym night...

The players that I have the most respect for are:

Paul Robinson: the stick he got after the Croatia game from the gutter press was a disgrace. The team are responsible for the result - not one man.
Jamie Carragher: should be the first-choice right-back for both club and country.
Steve Gerrard: this guy is the best midfielder in England bar none, but carries himself off the pitch with humility.
Owen Hargreaves: I am not a bandwaggon jumper - I voted for SG as the fan's player of 2006 - however, Owen Hargreaves gained my respect a long time ago for no other reason than the abuse that was levelled at him by "fans" and he continued to put on the England shirt and play the game.

TFL = Too Flaming Lazy

2007-01-08T21:55:00.000Z

Grrr... Why is something so intrisically simple so difficult?

I have switched to using my Oyster card for my general rail travel to stop having to carry around paper tickets, which consequently get jammed. Today I decided to renew and went online - oops forgot my password and locked out my account. No problem I thought, I will go to the Cannon Street Underground and get it renewed there. There were about half a dozen people queuing at the machine, so it wasn't too bad.

Unfortunately, they decided to turn off the only Oyster top-up machine at the station, just as I was about to get there. I wandered over to the office where I expected someone to be serving, no joy. Obviously, 5:30pm is tea-break time for both TFL staff and machines (hopefully, the actual trains don't cotton on to this, or we will be screwed).

I wandered back up to the Cannon Street BR station and looked in the ticket office. There was another queue, but they had Oyster leaflets and posters scattered around. Thinking I had a chance of renewing, I joined the end of the queue. No flaming chance, they "don't do them anymore".

There is no reason for any BR station sitting within Zones 1 to 5 to not have facilities to top up Oyster cards. Ken Livingstone should bloody stay in Cuba, rather than try to replicate their infrastructure over here.

On more positive news, over 3 million people turned off the latest Celebrity Big Brother. Hopefully, there is a glimmer of light ahead.

Winter's Night in Blackheath

2007-01-07T16:21:00.000Z

A few weeks ago, Heather and I were crossing the common and saw this picture which we thought was well worth taking. After getting home, I dug out my camera tripod and went and took the snap. Hopefully, the snow promised in the next week or so will come - I reckon a snow-covered picture of the church would make quite a good Christmas card for everyone.

One thing I have been killing time with is to try and research my family tree. Heather had bought me a book on family history research for Christmas (I had asked for it), and it's really useful that so many indices exist online with cheap or even free access. Unfortunately, they are mostly English (which isn't really a bad thing) or American. A bit of a problem for me, as I am such a mongrel with Jamaican, Irish and French ancestory. Also, there is a lot of inconsistency accross an index - one entry in a birth register will have the mother's maiden name listed whereas one won't. Coupled to this is that sometimes it is impossible to find an entry, it makes looking for a needle in a haystack easy.

I think this will not be an easy task...

Drugs are bad!

2007-01-05T16:38:00.000Z

Heather and I were visiting a friend who publishes a free paper aimed at the clubbing crowd and got in to an interesting chat about illegal drugs. I have never touched an illegal drug in my life, I have been offered but have refused everytime out of choice. That is not to say I have not been wasted a lot, I just do that with alcohol. :)

I am however realistic. People choose to do drugs, whether to party harder, to escape the futility of their existence or whatever. Just as prohibition in the US during the 30s failed to work, so is drug control not working. I am very much in favour of legalising soft drugs.

Current TV advertising warns about the increasingly stronger strains of cannabis hitting the streets and how it should be avoided. Here's an alternative suggestion: legalise it and regulate how strong it can be, just like alcohol. By doing that, dealers will no longer be the preferred means of obtaining, as it would still be an offence to supply cannabis without a licence. This also means that dealers will no longer be able to lace cannabis with heroin to get smokers addicted.

Ecstacy could be sold over the counter by pharmacies, with a limit of one per person per week or something. By making them legal, the government can regulate their contents and prevent rat poison and all manner of junk being put into them. The result is less risk to clubbers from taking a spiked pill.

When legalising these drugs, it also gives the government opportunity to tax them, money that is currently spent but not seen by the government. This money could be injected back into the Health system, and given the volume of drugs consumed it should amount to a sizable fortune. Better this than spending money on policing something that is becoming ever more difficult with the the constantly limited resources the police have.

While they're at it, they should legalise the oldest profession in the world. The five girls killed before Christmas could have been protected if they weren't having to ply their trade on the streets. A properly regulated setup would also help to stem the flow of human trafficking - proper proof would be required from the "job applicant" that they are doing it:

of their own free will
have a right to work in the UK
are willing to undergo six monthly checkups to check for STDs, etc.

May be I am too liberal to be conservative. Personally, I just like to think I am good at seeing money-making opportunities for governments. Beats Brown's "environment taxes" that will not achieve any improvements.

Happy New Year!

2006-12-31T17:36:00.000Z

Another week, another post. I should get more regular with this. I've been having a relatively hectic week at work with year-end and various things going wrong. Anyway, I thought I would proffer my opinions on the Saddam Hussein Execution.

There has been a lot of hand-wringing by the Bush and Blair about how he should not be executed. It's kind of ironic that Bush is adverse to this, given his track record. That being said, one thing that is bugging me is the constant need by Western countries to impose their morals and values on to another country, which has opposing views.

Taking the example of China, they are a totalitariean state that supresses individual human rights. However, they are also in a position where their economy is one of the fastest growing and they are slowly giving more rights to the individual. Contrast this with the changes that took place with the fall of the Communism, which resulted in bloody conflicts and massive corruption at the same time that Western values and a Capitalist economy was adopted. I really believe that it is better to allow countries to progress at their own speed, rather than to force upon them foreign values.

Anyway, time for me to go party :)

Merry Christmas!

2006-12-24T14:01:00.000Z

Well, it's been over a month since my last posting. In my defence, I have started my new job and in addition to being pretty busy, I also wanted to check out their policy regarding blogging (do they allow it, etc). Fortunately, as long as I don't publish any confidential information, I should be fine. All common sense really.

Hope you all have a merry Christmas out there. I am not going to apologise for using the C-word. It appears the only people that have a problem with it are the anorak wearing drips whose spine is gelatinous. Heck, even most Muslims don't mind it being celebrated because if I recall correctly, Islam acknowledges both Jesus and Mohammed as a prophet. (Apologies for any incorrect information or spellings).

Do they want them to fail?

2006-11-21T08:19:00.000Z

Just watching the news this morning, and I see that there is some controversy surrounding the preparations for the London Olympic games in 2012.

The BBC commentator raised the point that these were likely to be the most expensive games in the tournaments history, and will top over £8bn. What's the word I am looking for here? Oh, that's right: d'uh! Now, basic maths and economics may be beyond some reporters but costs will always rise as inflation is a fact of life.

The Sydney Olympics cost £2bn to stage, Athens cost over £4bn and Beijing is expected to cost over £6bn. Spotting a trend here? If London manages to keep costs below £9bn, I personally believe they will be doing well.

I have more concerns regarding the completion of the Olympic village, as the last major sporting venue redevelopment that involved the Government was Wembley Stadium. I really don't think the IOC would be willing to relocate to the Millenium Stadium quite so easily.

Turmoil on ITV

2006-11-20T07:44:00.000Z

No, it's not a new programme. ITV has been subject to some speculation that it was going to be acquired. First potential suiter was a merger with NTL, followed up not long after by the German company RTL. On Friday however, BSkyB bought nearly an 18% of the shares - just 2% under the maximum stake it is allowed to own, under current rules. NTL (and Richard Branson) have immediately called foul on BSkyB's behaviour, claiming it is anti-competitive. BSkyB responded with a comment that NTL thinks they have the "right" to acquire ITV.

Having lived in a country where all media outlets are locked up by two companies (and seen the damage that does to viewer choice), I believe BSkyB's behaviour needs to be assessed. Also keep in mind that BSkyB is owned by News International who in turn own Fox, the fine purveyor of junk TV.

There is far too much junk on tv at the moment: "reality" tv programmes, ADD-inducing sketch shows and lack-of-talent programmes. Putting more control into the News International group, I am sure will do nothing but increase this nonsense. Plus as a major shareholder, I am sure BSkyB will be happy to derail future bids by ITV for sporting events such as the F1, European Champions league, etc. This may sound far-fetched, but football in Australia is in a still-born state partially due to live games solely being available on Foxtel, the BSkyB equivalent down-under and 50% owned by News International.

I wonder who Johnathan Pryce in Tomorrow Never Dies was meant to be?

Oooh... This will be fun

2006-11-19T12:10:00.000Z

Heather and I were sorting out our holiday photos last night, and I had been exploring MyPixmania as a place to get them printed (as low as 3p each!). Heather however insisted on more of a coffee-table style picture book, something that MyPixmania no longer supports (that I can find).

After a bit of a hunt with Google, I found this interesting website. The great thing about it is that you download an application and design your photobook, before uploading (or sending it via CD) and they print it for you. The prices although they sound steep, seem to be pretty reasonable: £80 for a 144 page book, about A4 size.

Therefore instead of sorting out the house and preparing for our housewarming party, I am going to be playing with this. Much better than housework :)

Junk food advertising

2006-11-17T16:51:00.000Z

It was announced today that Ofcom (the regulator of the communication companies) has announced measure to prevent the screening of junk food advertisements during times when children would most likely be watching. Specifically, these are:

All pre-school children's programmes

All programmes on mainstream channels aimed at children

All cable and satellite children's channels

Programmes aimed at young people, such as music shows

General entertainment programmes which would appeal to a "higher than average" number of under-16s.

Like my comments about increasing the duty on alcopops, this will not make any difference. Kids will still want their Big Mucks when they are out with their parents on a Saturday afternoon, gaudiness of the "restaurants" are designed to attract the impressionable mind. Likewise, crisps and soft drinks are still going to be consumed at school break times, they are convenience foods and kids are too keen to be doing other things than eating.

In moderation, all these foods are fine and it is better that the message is spread by the junk food companies that moderation and exercise are necessary. An example junk food ad might be:

At the moment, there is no incentive for the companies to clean up their message. Ofcom had the opportunity to make a difference, but instead took the easy way out by the blanket banning. Government agencies, policy makers, etc have to realise that people will continue to do those things that are bad for them. Telling them not to do something is a sure enough way of making people want to do it. Be realistic and educate people, its the best option for improvement.

While Ofcom are at it, could they create an index for how moronic advertisements are? An advertisement with a high index rating (for example the Phones4U campaign) should be automatically banned, the video tapes destroyed by incineration and the person that thought of it sterilised to prevent them from infecting the gene pool any further.

Post Game Review

2006-11-16T19:35:00.000Z

Well, England played their game against Holland last night in the Amsterdam Arena. Allegedly, they played with a 4-3-3 formation, with Joe Cole, Rooney and Johnson up front. In my opinion, if they are going to be playing 3 up front, it would have been better to play a striker there rather than an out of place midfielder. I think combination of say Crouch, Rooney and Johnson would have been quite interesting to have seen.

Nevertheless, I think England played a reasonably good game and were probably deserved a win, rather than draw. The goal they conceded however smacked of poor defending that is untypical of the back four, the scoring player having been unmarked at the time. Not too sure who you can blame: Terry, Ferdinand or Ashley Cole. That being said Micah Richards had an impressive debut for an 18 year old, with no signs of stage fright and a good shot on target. How nice would it have been to score on your England debut as a right-back?

Steve McLaren's email to fans was pretty upbeat about the performance, however England are now in the position of having to win just about every remaining game in their qualifying group to get through to the tournamenet. I hope they can do it, but we still have to face Croatia again and two legs with Russia and Israel (both of whom I would not write off as easy to beat). I think that we may not make Euro 2008.

My other concern, is that England have found their position in Europe: mid-table fodder unable to throw of the shackles of Sweden or Holland and rise above them. I include Portugal in that group, who constantly are found wanting against strong opposition.

Can the man not think for himself?

2006-11-13T14:12:00.000Z

After the Republicans suffered probably their worst defeat in twelve years, old GW decided that may be things in Iraq were not actually going to plan and it was time to think about new options.

In a totally unsuprising move, our Ovine Prime Minister has come out a few days later and said the very same thing. This is just under a month after he stated that troops were there indefinetly. However, because George Bush has changed his mind, so must Blair.

In a show of some originality, Blair did entertain the idea of Iran and Syria. However as these are the very countries that form part of Bush's famed "Axis of Evil", I think the chances of this ever happening are slim to non-existent. And not solely for that reason.

Blair is missing one of the fundemental precepts that is causing the problems in Iraq: the Balkan war happened fundementally because the stabilising force (Tito) was no longer in power (actually he was dead) and Communism in the area was taking it's last breaths. The tribes were therefore free to start causing mayhem by extracting revenge on each other after years of oppression. Fast-forward a few years, and you have a similar situation to how it was in the Balkan states now in Iraq. The violence in Iraq is predominantly sectarian (Shi'a muslim vs. Sunni muslim), even though the numbers of security force personnel injured seems to be rising daily.

Finally, factor in that Syria is 75% Sunni muslim (like Saddam is) and Iran is about 85% Shi'a muslim, I don't think that Iraq will be peaceful anytime soon.

Will this squad do it?

2006-11-10T17:04:00.000Z

So Stevie Mac has announced his squad for the international friendly on Wednesday night, which can be found here. Unfortunately, I am not that impressed.

It's good to see Joe Cole back in a 3 Lions jersey so we have something on the left, and I assume Frank Lampard is going to hog his spot in the centre and push Gerrard out to the right wing. Gerrard hates playing there, and everyone can see his best form comes when he has freedom in the centre. Lamps has had a poor run of form recently, but seems to be returning to his normal ways for Chelsea - can he continue like that for England though? Personally, I would have Lamps on the subs bench, the lack of certainty over a starting position may help him find some form.

Up front, there is not a lot to shout about. Rooney has seen his form improve recently, although he missed a sitter on Saturday, Crouch is Crouch; he can have a brilliant night or an absolute pudding of one, once he figures out how to prevent the puddings, then he'll be consistently dangerous. I'm undecided about Johnson, his club form is great but he hasn't sparked in the England jersey. And as for Defoe, lets just hope he eats well before the match!!

The defence is as solid as ever, no complaints there at all. I am intrigued to see how new boy Micah Richards performs though. I guess every friendly squad needs a Theo though.

He's at it again...

2006-11-09T10:14:00.000Z

I see Graham Poll is getting himself in the papers, again. After a dismal World Cup performance, and his alleged behaviour on Saturday refereeing Chelsea vs. Spurs, the ego in black red-carded Everton player James McFadden last night in the Carling Cup match against Arsenal. The reason he was red-carded? Abusing an official.

Now, I have no problems with referees trying to put some discipline in to the game. It is something that needs to be addressed, but likewise swearing happens all the time and to start making random sending offs for it is going to lead to nothing but controversy.

Still, if the FA decide that Poll's ego has become too much for the game, they could demote him to the Championship League or expel him all together. Here's hoping it's the latter...

The tide's turning...

2006-11-08T10:58:00.000Z

But will things change?

Well, the results of the US mid-term are just about in, and it looks as if GW and his party have suffered a bit of a bloody nose. The loss of the House of Representatives for the first time in 12 years, along with the anticipated change in the Senate, means that the Republicans are on the back foot and at first analysis it looks as if things are going to improve, however a brief look at the facts here can dispel that notion.

Quite surprisingly for the Telegraph, they have a blog posting "revealing" media bias during the mid-term's campaigning, as if it was an untoward occurrence. Wake up and smell the roses! All media companies have an agenda, normally instigated by their Chairman or equivalent, to paint a picture that matches their own colour on the political spectrum. Although the BBC often gets a lot of abusive from the right for its bias, the real issue is the News International brand of newspapers as whomever the Sun has backed to win the UK general election has ultimately won. This shows the power that the media can have over parts of the population.

In the ideal world, all media would be like Switzerland - neutral and good at making chocolate.

Crikey, it's been a while

2006-11-08T10:47:00.000Z

Well, I had a week off posting not because I lost interest but because I was slightly busy.

The house is a complete bomb site at the moment as I try to assemble furniture (Lewisham council's recycling truck must be overloaded with cardboard waste from me) and we had my sister and her partner's wedding over the weekend. Plus there were interviews for that elusive job.

But I am back now, although with a strained back from lifting heavy furniture incorrectly. Remember people, bend the knees not the back!

My political leanings

2006-11-05T11:46:00.000Z

I will be honest, I have been worried about some of the political thoughts that I have been having recently. They were quite novel for me, what with environmentalism and what-not filling it. I therefore decided to checkout the Political Compass to see where I stood.

This site poses a series of statements to which you then have to say how strongly you agree or disagree. To prevent fence-sitters, there is no neutral box so you are forced to have an opinion either way. The results are then plotted on an x-y graph, where the x-axis is how left- or right-leaning your economic views are. The vertical axis represents how authoritarian you are, the higher up the scale, the more of a bossy boots you are.

Two examples cited on the website are Maggie Thatcher who was quite far to the economic right and quite authoritative (based on her assumed scores) and Adolf Hitler, who was naturally nearly through the roof when it comes to authority, but was way to the economic left. Anyone with an understanding of pre-WW2 Germany, will agree that is a true assessment.

So without further waffling, my results:

As I expected, I am slightly to the economic right - after all a free market means free people*. What was suprising though, was that I was totally neutral. I had expected me to be tending towards the authoritative side. A bit of a revelation.

* Except in China, where the free market has not meant the people are freed, however in reality the markets there are not truly free, so the mantra sticks.

Your voice is needed!

2006-11-01T15:28:00.000Z

The FA is conducting a survey to determine the future of grassroots football accross England. Anyone that completes not only has a say in how the sport is run in the country but also gets into a draw to win various prizes (I am hoping for friendly tickets myself).

The way I see it, the future of English football is to get kids at young age having the fantastic balls skills as seen on South American and certain European sides. England for years has produced players that are "hard", they push around the opposition and when they go down, they get right up again and keep running. The problem is, ball skills are sometimes left behind so that anyone that is slightly above normal skill is labelled a wonderkid.

Not that I want to see anything like this mind.

Green tax or just more tax?

2006-10-31T17:21:00.000Z

Well, it looks as if my cynicism regarding the government's environmental policy was not entirely misplaced. While I agree with some of the statement the article makes, I do have some issues: specifically, the fact that Britain only contributes 2% of the global Carbon Dioxide emissions, and anything that it is done must be done globally. While this in itself is true, if the majority of countries acted in isolation, then the overall result will be the same. There is the issue of increased economic cost, but this government has not shown itself averse to increasing taxes at all.

I did find the accompanying article interesting reading. It sort of flies in the face of Capitalism being seen as the root cause of the environmental issues. It does beg the question why Greenies are almost without exception Socialist, though.

Do the Swiss understand irony?

2006-10-30T10:37:00.000Z

It was mentioned today in the Sydney Morning Herald that Sepp Blatter, the distinguished head of the football world governing body FIFA has apologised to Australia for the way they exited this year's World Cup. For those that didn't see it or have erased it from their memories, in stoppage time some Italian dived in the box when closed in on by Lucas Neill, which lead to a penalty and a very underserving ride into the quarter finals by Italy (along with their win, which was also undeserved IMO). Subsequent replays showed no contact whatsoever was made.

Ok, Blatter has the nerve to apologise for something that FIFA has consistently refused to do anything to fix? Perhaps if he could move his corpulent frame away far enough from the sponsorship trough so that fans can get to see the games live, he may be able to summon up the energy to fix the diving that has ruined the last two tournaments. Something that I have already ranted about.

Fix the diving, fix the unequal allocations of tickets and fix the bias of referees, then I will take anything that comes out of FIFA executives with something less than a Lott-sized grain of salt.

Let's get cynical, cynical!

2006-10-29T17:12:00.000Z

(With apologies to Olivia Newton John).
An article in today's Mail on Sunday has a copy of a "secret memo"* sent by the Secretary of State for the Environment to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. This memo lists a number of measures that the government should consider introducing in order to make the general population more environmentally conscious. Let's take a look at some of these proposals and run them through the cynic's filter, shall we?

Increase vehicle excise duty for gass guzzlers: hmm, ok I guess but there are some people (farmers, etc) that need such vehicles and why should they be penalised just because DINK1 and DINK2 each want an 4x4 drive to work? As well as raising the duty, why not make it claimable as an expense for those engaged in agricultural work, as long as it was under a certain age. This would give farmers a reason to upgrade to cleaner models, and penalise the urban off-roader (which is the true intent of the tax).
Exemption from stamp duty for zero-carbon homes: fantastic idea, however I would also like to see greater rebates for those wishing to upgrade their homes, such as additional double-glazing, windmills or solar panels.
Increased tax on aviation: no! economic growth in the airline industry can lead to greater uptake of newer models which are more efficient and less polluting. Just give airlines (and manufacturers) a reason to upgrade.
Pricing to reflect enviromental cost: a nice idea in a utopian society, but if the government wants to encourage economic growth, raising prices will not achieve this unless salaries rise correspondingly - something that the government will not want.
Public sector activities to be more environmentally conscious: nice idea, but I would have expected most sectors to be reasonably environmentally aware. The only exception would be the armed forces, and really there's not a lot that can be done without massive expensive.

All in all, there are some good ideas, a few not so well thought out ideas and a couple of mistakes. Putting my cynical head on, it is likely that the tax increases will adopted a lot quicker than anything that either provides rebates or increases public spending. One thing Gordon Brown is not averse to is putting his hand in the electorate's pocket.

* The classification of it is actually Restricted which is the lowest classified level for Government documents, but lets not get hung up on semantics here.

Just a quick update

2006-10-27T16:59:00.000Z

We had our broadband connection relocated to our study today. Now it means I don't have to perch over a laptop while Heather tries to watch America's Next Top Model or some such tripe (for an intelligent woman, she does like more than her fair share of reality tv).

Also got my mate coming over from Basingstoke for a pub crawl around Blackheath. Should be a messy night as Heather is away :)

Of course, we wouldn't want them having fun would we?

2006-10-27T12:14:00.000Z

I was watching the news today and the Health Secretary of our wonderful government is proposing to increase the tax on alcoholic drinks, particularly alcopops, to discourage teenage binge drinking. Of course, the BMA are ecstatic about it as well, as it will reduce the number of casualties on Friday and Saturday nights due to drinking.

Here's a thought for them: It will not work! Irrespective of how much the drinks cost, teenagers will find a way to get the money. It may be working longer hours at their part-time job as they try to fund themselves through University, beating up old ladies or whatever. They want the drink, and they will get it. Sadly the nanny state cannot allow anyone to think and make decisions for themselves and Gordon Brown does not need a second invitation to raise taxes further, so it's I guess it is pretty much certain that the change will go ahead.

If the government were genuinely interested in the health and welfare of young drinkers, rather than taxing them, it would be better to spend more money on proper prevention. An increased police presence on foot at night would do a lot to calm people down, and if special constables are used, their costs are substantially less. Better education of drinkers can do a lot to reduce the alcohol consumption and this should be done at schools, colleges and universities as well as on TV.

Finally, 24 hour licensing laws need to be relaxed. In Sydney, a large number of pubs are open 24 hours and it avoids the desire for everyone to drink as many beers/wines/alcopops as possible before closing time. People will drink slower and therefore there is less likelihood of fights occuring due to excessive drunkeness.

But no, it's easier to just to tax everyone.

It's a disturbing trend that has to stop

2006-10-26T22:52:00.000Z

NOW!

What am I talking about? Well, let me run you by a brief story: I was wondering around WH Smiths today looking around for something to read, as nothing on my bookshelves was inspiring me. Now, I have read some really bad stuff in my time (the Da Vinci Code being an example) and I have some stuff that although bad is a guilty pleasure of mine (the Sven Hassel series of books for example). As such, I will consider buying something that may provide me with some entertainment, no matter how bad it appears.

Today, however what I saw beggars belief; and that is not hyperbole. I was wondering around the biographies section seeking inspiration as I have read a couple and as long as the person in question I either respect or looks interesting, I will always give it a crack. The tome I saw today was the biography of someone that I neither respected nor did it look interesting. No, it wasn't GW Bush, it wasn't Blair, Major or any politician. It was Wayne Rooney's girlfriend and I am not kidding. Look, Victoria Beckham (hate her or love her) did achieve a degree of fame by being the near mute one of the Spice Girls. To the best of my knowledge, Ms McLoughlin's road to fame was to snog Wayne Rooney as a teenager. What on earth is there to say?

It's a sorry state of affairs when the wives and girlfriends of footballers (I refuse to use the acronym as it is another sign of society dumbing down) start getting as much or more attention than the players. In the same vein, there is talk about Frank Lampard heading off to Spain to play for Barcelona as his girlfriend is from that region and misses home. Given the success of every English player since Steve McManaman left Spain, if Lamps has any plans on having a future in football he might be advised to deal with the nagging.

Curbing the Chelsea Tractors

2006-10-25T22:37:00.000Z

A recent article on today's news highlighted that the borough of Richmond in west London was introducing increasing the price of permits for 4x4 cars in the borough to £300 per year and free parking permits if you have an electric car.

On the surface, it looks like a good idea - cuts greenhouse emissions, penalises those bad drivers who say that they need it to protect their children, etc. However, the fact that the parking permit for a Nissan Micra driver has risen, just goes to show the real motive for this: raising revenue.

It's a pity that governments, whether they are local or national, use people's genuine environmental concerns in this cynical matter. The fact is that if local governments were genuinely interested in reducing emissions, they would tackle their fleet of diesel-spewing, often dilapidated buses and either improve them or replace them with genuine greener alternatives.

If national governments wanted to reduce emissions, then they could better invest their energies in developing an integrated transport policy that made greater use of the rail networks (which incidentally need to be cleaned up first) and removing the reliance on road haulage, where diesel-powered vehicles burn up and down the M1 when it should be transported en-masse.

If a government is going to espouse socialism and social conscious at least follow the Scandinavian model of socialism. It may cost a fortune, but the services delivered make up for it.
Still I don't think there is a full set of balls in the government at the moment.

Some people need more bran...

2006-10-24T21:37:00.000Z

Because they seem to be full of sh!t :)

I am talking about the uproar surrounding Jermain Defoe's "bite" on the arm of someone who had repeatedly tackled him from behind, the last one being a two-footed tackle.

Yesterday's Telegraph covered it in an article that did not really dwell on it greatly other than to mention the incumbent Minister of Sport whining like a spoiled child to the FA (via the media of course) to do something about it. Contrast this to an article in the Sun where not content with publishing the picture again, they have a diatribe from Javier Mascherano claiming it the most outrageous thing he has suffered in the UK.

My biggest issue with the incident is not the biting; tempers get riled in all sports nowadays and people forget these sportsmen and women are only human. My issue is that the moment Defoe made contact with Mascherano, Mascherano immediately started rolling around in agony on the floor - it's the diving mentality in him immediately taking effect. It appeared to me that the intention was to get him red-carded. This is the behaviour that has to stop, as diving has ruined two World Cups but it doesn't look as if it is going to end any time soon.

And if that is the worse thing Mascherano has suffered, he should head to a few home counties towns and deal with drunken ASBO candidates on a Saturday night like the police force have to.

A micro update

2006-10-23T17:04:00.000Z

This posting is just to get me listed on the directory Technocrati. Technorati Profile. I wonder what it does?

It's like Christmas early

2006-10-20T21:22:00.000Z

Well, not quite.

We had our consignment arrive today from Australia. It had been in storage while we travelled and started its own journey itself at the end of August.

The guys from Allied Pickfords were scheduled to arrive at 10am, so we set the alarm for 8:30 to give us time to shower and get dressed. Heather came out of the shower first at 9:10 and 5 minutes later the guys arrived (nearly taking down a tree in front of our house in the process).

After reading about the troubles our friends had when they moved, I was a bit nervous about what state ours would be in. In fact, everything went really smoothly with only a couple of minor breakages, which hopefully the insurance will cover.

Our place is currently full of half-empty cartons as we did not bring over any wardrobes as our last place had built-ins. We have ordered some cheap junk from Argos, which should arrive soon. Until then, it's a bit more living like a backpacker (albeit with nice furniture, HD tv, etc).

Oh and happy anniversary Sophie and Paddy!

Moving in...

2006-10-09T21:03:00.000Z

Ok, so we are now in our new place. Unfortunately, our stuff has yet to arrive so we are sleeping on an air mattress and using an inflatable sofa as our only seating. On the plus side, our new high definition television has arrived so at least we can watch tellie, and 40-odd channels of it!

We are renting a 3 bedroom place in Blackheath, which is a really nice suburb in London - very close to the Canary Wharf and the city but green and picturesque.

When we walked across the common for the first time, I knew that this is the place I wanted to be when I saw the church sitting in the middle of it. Hopefully, it will be cold this winter and it will get covered in snow. That would be a picture worth recording.

Our stuff arrives sometime soon (we hope) so our sparse place will soon be a lot more homely.

A new blog and a new posting...

2006-10-08T20:51:00.000Z

Ok so I have been running my other blog for a couple of years now and although it's reasonably up to date, it is more geared towards holidays, rather than the routine of day-to-day life. So with that in mind, I have decided to fire up a new blog and keep it regularly updated.

This blog will be a place for me to keep a record of what goes on in our life, what (non-holiday) related activity we are up to and a place for me to vent my opinions on politics, world affairs, sport, etc.

Let's get cracking!