More Hideous Government Spending on Furniture

I have mentioned many times before, that my main dislike of the Labour party (and politics in general) is gross wasteful spending of tax payers money. Whether it’s half a billion on Helicopters that are desperately needed by our armed forces, but that are still incomplete and stuck in a warehouse thousands of miles away from where they are needed, or it’s an MP claiming her husbands pornography on her expenses.

But there is one thing that is consistent in Whitehall spending, it is the obscene amounts they insist on wasting on furniture. A few years news got out that when the Ministry of Defence moved buildings, they also got new office furniture, including office chairs costing £3000 EACH. At the time no one really batted an eye lid, we were a growing economy that showed no sign of meltdown. Roll on 2008.

Now that the world is in economic collapse and our governments are spending Billions (if not Trillions) bailing out our banks so society doesn’t fall apart, we started to pay a bit more attention to where our money was going. Last year the expenses scandal revealed to us all just how greedy, ignorant, unfair and downright stupid politicians could be, with claims for items such as Duck houses, Moat cleaners and toilet seats.

But if you think that because we are now in a recession that the wasteful spending has ended then think again. A new investigation from the new Coalition Government into Whitehall spending has found that Labour ministers authorised officials at the Department for Communities and Local Government to to buy 28 of the sofas at a cost of £4,120 EACH. That’s a total of £134,503.

If you think that is bad then wait until you hear how they (tried to) justify it. The luxury sofas were intended to create a “peaceful oasis” in the workplace in part of a an efficiency initiative called “SpaceFlex” to make the department “more practical” and save money. A source at the department said the red sofas made the office seem like a “Parisian boudoir” and pointed out that council tax bills had more than doubled under Labour. Anyone that thinks spending £4,120 on a sofa will help saving money needs to get there head examined and banned from working anywhere near the government!

Everyone involved with this decision has failed people they serve (us) massively whilst working in the public sector and should be out of a job. Spending on luxury items anywhere in the government should not exist until the deficit is paid off, we have perfect healthcare, a policing and criminal justice system that works, political reform, modern transport and decent education for everybody.

After all this, we now have to pay off a debt of over £900 Billion. A debt that we will all contribute to in one way or another in painful cuts over the coming years and months. Well government, they better start on your doorstep. If not we will be there banging down the door.

BP Makes a Mess

I don’t usually post funny videos on here but today I’m going to make an exception. You will all have seen the mass coverage of the BP oil disaster in the gulf of Mexico, and you still haven’t seen it be solved. BP are directly responsible for those who lost their lives when the rig exploded and for the Environmental impact the oil leak has already and continues to cause in the area.

Their efforts to solve the problem have been as ridiculous as the methods in this video to clean up spilt coffee.

China & India “Victims” of Climate Change

China has backed India’s stand on climate change, claiming that developing nations are not obligated to meet emission reductions . A spokesman said that China are ready to enhance “cooperation and coordination” between themselves and India, claiming both to be “Victims” of climate change.

“We understand the current situation in India. We should take adaptation and mitigation measures based on our national conditions and capacity. China and India are both developing countries and victims of climate change.  The two countries do not have the obligation to binding emission reduction targets on climate change.”

India has refused to accept binding emission cuts that it says could slow its economic growth and has instead harped on voluntary actions to stem emissions.

“Voluntary actions of developing nations will be subject to international monitoring, report and verification (MRV) as per agreed procedures to the extent that these actions receive international support” Claims Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh.

The State of Things – UK Government

Those of us in the UK today woke up to a new country. A country with a new government that only one day, or one week ago, no one could have predicted. A government lead by a man that only 34,000 people voted for.

Yesterday, in the wake of a breakdown of talks between Labour and the Liberal Democrats, Primeminister Gordon Brown stepped down from his role, opening the door for Conservative leader David Cameron to essentially take control of the country. After Brown yesterday announced that he was to step down as Labour leader, all expected to see a Labour – Lib Dem Coalition to take control of parliament. But before it became apparent that talks between the two parties had failed, Brown announced that he was conceding leadership and was off to see the queen. Less than 2 hours later and we have a new Primeminister in David Cameron. Less than another 2 hours later and we have a new cabinet. That’s British Politics.

So we now have a Commander in Chief that only 34,000 people voted for. That is the 34,000 people in his constituency of Witney. No one else voted for him. Only 36% of the country voted for his party. And this is supposed to be democracy. The country voted for no single party, so that means the people we did not vote into power get to make up their own mind about who runs the country. It’s the system that is broken, not the country.

I am however glad to see Nick Clegg taking an important role as the Deputy Primeminister. I am also glad to see him apparently getting on with Cameron, dispute my personal opinions of him. No body wants to see a dysfunctional government. I am glad to see what is hopefully the end of Peter Mandleson. William Hague as foreign secretary? Is that really the impression you want to give to the world? New Equality Minister Theresa May voted against the repeal of section 28.  And Osborne for chancellor? No thanks. If you are actually serious about combating the deficit, then why are you going to spend £100 billion on replacing the ageing Trident Nuclear missiles? I WILL NOT continue to live in a country that would rather spend that much money on something that can only be used to kill thousands of people, than on health-care or schooling or public services. We do not need nuclear weapons. Period.

The one good thing that could come from this is a compromise of the all the voiced of the British people might be achieved. But it’s early days, and it has never worked before and is unlikely to now. In the run up to the election, the Tories had almost opposite views to the Lib Dems. Are we supposed to believe that they can now run a country in harmony? We can only hope.

We don’t need electoral reform. We need social political reform. Will we get it? No. Because that’s not what politicians do and that is certainly not what Conservatism is about.

Conservative: “Disposed to preserve existing conditions, institutions, etc., or to restore traditional ones, and to limit change.”

A vote for change my arse. Enjoy the furniture in No.10 Cameron. Who knows how long you will sit there. Cold War Kids – Hospital Beds

Obama Calls For Nuclear Power

US president Barack Obama has announced federal funding to create create 2 new Nuclear Power Stations in America. The Decision is a landmark for Nuclear Power in the USA as it has been over 30 years since the last nuclear power stations were built.

The US has avoided Nuclear power since the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island, an accident that was caused by the partial core meltdown of one of the reactors at the site in Pennsylvania, which resulted in a release of radioactive gases into the atmosphere. The move ticks many of the boxes of Obama’s agenda, helping to reduce emissions and prevent climate change whilst ensuring a more secure energy future, as well as creating jobs.

According to BBC News just one nuclear plant will cut carbon pollution by 16 million tons each year when compared with a similar coal plant. It won’t persuade all the environmentalists, but it is an argument that does weigh heavily with some of them. Nuclear Power stations have much less emissions that conventional coal power stations, but can still lead to environmental damage when disposing of nuclear waste.

“To meet our growing energy needs and prevent the worst consequences of climate change, we’ll need to increase our supply of nuclear power. It’s that simple.” President Obama

There are currently 104 operating nuclear reactors across 31 states in the US, which provide about a fifth of the country’s electricity. Meanwhile, there are currently 56 new nuclear reactors being built around the world.

Economic Growth Vs Climate Change

One of the main arguments in politics about climate change is the potential cost of acting to prevent it. Changing the way we get our power, the way we travel and the way we build and manufacture things is far from cheap. Thanks to some of the richest people in the world trying to get richer at our expense, our economies are not exactly rolling in money right now.

For politicians, the appeal of spending billions on acting on climate change is not great at a time when most of their economies are still shrinking. This is perhaps the key subtext as to why the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference was a complete failure. Now the New Economics Foundation (Nef) has released a new report claiming that global economic growth “is not possible” if nations are to tackle climate change. The report also claims that only “unprecedented and probably impossible” carbon reductions would be needed to hold temperature rises below 2C.

“We urgently need to change our economy to live within its environmental budget. There is no global, environmental central bank to bail us out if we become ecologically bankrupt.”

As bleak as it sounds, it does not mean we are all doomed. It simply means that if we carry on as the way things are, we are doomed. This is a fact. Western economies are built on a lie, that you can consume the worlds recourse as much as you like for as long as you like. The blueprints of our economies are unsustainable: fact. Continuing to ignore this fact will be the end of us, but seems to be the number one priority for politicians and business leaders. Our economies simply cannot keep growing forever. We are trapped in a cycle of boom and bust and sooner or later the busts will become too big to fix.

The report concluded that for a economic growth rate of just 3%, the carbon emissions of the global economy would need to fall by 95% by 2050 from 2002 levels. This would require an average annual reduction of 6.5%. “Magic bullets – such as carbon capture and storage, nuclear or even geo-engineering – are potentially dangerous distractions from more human-scale solutions”

The only way to prevent dangerous climate change is to fix our broken economic system. We could have economic growth whilst preventing climate change, but with the current system we can have only neither. It may well be in most individuals personal interests to continue to ignore these facts but it is in humanities best interest that we go back to the drawing board and design a system that works for everybody and our planet.