Archive for the ‘UK’ Category
June 20, 2011
From the ever-reliable Guardian comes the story of high level diplomatic activity to get Ireland to be the wind-power producer for the UK.
I wonder if this means that all the UK taxpayers subsidies for wind power will also then flow to Ireland?
Ireland’s unspoiled, windswept west coast could become the focus of a new wave of wind farm construction in the wake of a high-level diplomatic meeting to be held tomorrow in London.
UK deputy prime minister Nick Clegg, Taoiseach Enda Kenny and other senior members of the British-Irish Council will gather to discuss a plan to expand electricity grid connections throughout the British Isles. In particular, they want to build new inter-connectors to link the electricity grids of Ireland and Britain in order to transmit power from new windfarms in Ireland to England.
The aim of the plan, created by the British government, is to open up remote regions that could provide Britain with more power generated by wind farms, as well as by tide and wave plants, and so reduce its reliance on fossil fuels.
Sleahead beach on the Dingle peninsula in Kerry, Ireland, which fierce winds make suitable for turbines. Photograph: Hemis/Alamy
“The west coast of Ireland has some of the fiercest winds in Europe,” said Charles Hendry, the UK energy minister, who will be attending the meeting. “They whip in off the Atlantic which makes it is an ideal location for wind farms. However, the Irish market for electricity is less than a tenth of that of Britain. That means that companies cannot afford to build wind farms in Ireland because there is no market for their power. We want to put that right.”
The construction of wind farms in Ireland that would supply power to neighbouring countries could help to put the UK back on track in its use of clean, renewable energy. Britain has recently been criticised for falling short of its targets for constructing wind power plants and for cutting its carbon emissions. Importing clean power could help to resolve the problem.
Tags:Ireland, UK, wind power
Posted in Energy, Ireland, Renewable Energy, UK, Wind power | Comments Off on UK to outsource wind farms to Ireland
June 13, 2011
The phenomenon of climate change will someday get back to science and leave the alarmist dogma behind. But we can expect that any moves in this direction will be resisted bitterly by the high priests of global warming and the carbon trading cabal.
The Guardian reports:
Climate change should be excluded from curriculum
Climate change should not be included in the national curriculum, the government adviser in charge of overhauling the school syllabus in England has said.
Tim Oates, whose wide-ranging review of the curriculum for five- to 16-year-olds will be published later this year, said it should be up to schoolsto decide whether – and how – to teach climate change, and other topics about the effect scientific processes have on our lives.
In an interview with the Guardian, Oates called for the national curriculum “to get back to the science in science”. “We have believed that we need to keep the national curriculum up to date with topical issues, but oxidation and gravity don’t date,” he said. “We are not taking it back 100 years; we are taking it back to the core stuff. The curriculum has become narrowly instrumentalist.”
But this is The Guardian and it must have been painful to report such a radical step!! Needless to say they provide ample space for global warming High Priest Bob Ward to voice his objections:
But Bob Ward, policy and communications director of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics, warned that Oates’ ideas might not be in pupils’ best interests and could make science less interesting for children.
“An emphasis on climate change in the curriculum connects the core scientific concepts to topical issues,” he said. “Certain politicians feel that they don’t like the concept of climate change. I hope this isn’t a sign of a political agenda being exercised.”
He said leaving climate change out of the national curriculum might encourage a teacher who was a climate change sceptic to abandon teaching the subject to their pupils. “This would not be in the best interests of pupils. It would be like a creationist teacher not teaching about evolution. Climate change is about science. If you remove the context of scientific concepts, you make it less interesting to children.”
But perhaps Bob Ward needs to be reminded that climate change has been happening for ever and will continue without caring very much about what our science purports to understand – or fails to understand. There is little science left in present day “climate science” – which has degenerated to be a dogma with the “consensus scientists” being little more than an advocacy group – and any return to science regarding the climate is welcome and long overdue.
Tags:Alarmism, Bob Ward, climate change, Global warming controversy, National Curriculum (England Wales and Northern Ireland), Science
Posted in Alarmism, Climate, Education, Politics, Science, UK | Comments Off on Climate change teaching to get back to science but High Priest Bob Ward wants the brainwashing to continue
April 25, 2011
A case of alarmism vs. alarmism.
That the clamour for protection of biodiversity is just so much alarmist nonsense becomes obvious from this report. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds apparently supports this action to eliminate a species from the wild even though it has not yet caused any damage!
Bio-diversity alarm always takes second place if any species poses even the slightest threat – real or perceived – to the human species.
From the BBC:
Monk parakeet
A species of parakeet that threatens wildlife and crops is to be removed from the wild, the government has said. The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) said the monk parakeet, originally from South America, was an invasive species.
It announced control measures to either rehouse the birds, remove their nests, or – as a last resort – shoot them. Defra estimates there are around 100 of the green-and-yellow birds in the UK, mainly in the south east of England.
Although the species had not yet caused any damage, Defra said they had the potential to threaten “national infrastructure”. It said extensive damage to crops had been reported in both North and South America, and the birds could cause power cuts when their nests were built on electricity pylons, particularly when they become wet from rain.
…..
A spokesman for the RSPB, the bird conservation group, said: “Our understanding is that they are going to be brought into captivity; we don’t see it’s necessary for them to be culled. “We’re happy action is taking place in that they’re being removed from the wild.
“It’s a small population at large, as the birds are colonial and are concentrated in one or two sites, so it will be possible to deal with as we think it could be a problem.”
Tags:Alarmism, bio-diversity, Monk Parakeet, monk parrakeet, RSPB, species elimination
Posted in Alarmism, Behaviour, UK, Wildlife | Comments Off on Parrakeet to be eliminated from the wild: So much for bio-diversity
March 28, 2011
A.A. Milne
Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind. “Pooh!” he whispered. “Yes, Piglet?” “Nothing,” said Piglet, taking Pooh’s paw. “I just wanted to be sure of you.”
BBC reports:
Little Wittenham Bridge with the lock keeper's house beyond: image Wikipedia
A nine-year-old girl from Oxfordshire has won the individual prize in the World Pooh Sticks Championships. Saffron Sollitt, from Wallingford, beat 500 other competitors from around the globe at Days Lock in Little Wittenham, near Abingdon, on the River Thames.
Team Kelly took the top spot in the group competition. Last year’s event was cancelled due to high water levels. The competition attracted entries from New Zealand, Germany and the Netherlands.
The championships started in 1983 when the lock keeper noticed walkers recreating Pooh’s pastime on the River Thames.
He thought it would be an excellent way of raising money for his favourite charity, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI). The event went from strength to strength until the lock keeper’s retirement when it was passed to the Rotary Clubs of Oxford Spires and Sinodun.
Money raised this year, expected to be excess of £1,500, will go to the RNLI, Little Wittenham Church and other charities supported by the Rotary club.
All about Poohsticks: image theenchanted100acrewoods
Poohsticks is a game first mentioned in The House at Pooh Corner, a Winnie-the-Pooh book by A. A. Milne. It is a simple game which may be played on any bridge over running water; each player drops a stick on the upstream side of a bridge and the one whose stick first appears on the downstream side is the winner. The annual World Poohsticks Championships have been held at Day’s Lock on the River Thames since 1984.
Tags:Little Wittenham, Pooh, Poohsticks, Saffron Sollitt, World Poohsticks championship
Posted in Behaviour, Literature, Trivia, UK | Comments Off on Saffron Sollitt wins 2011 Poohsticks
March 7, 2011
Does every civilisation go through a period of decadence and excess and crassness and vulgarity or is it just the normal behaviour of the famous and the wealthy?
I find it inexplicable that in spite of such behaviour Prince Andrew and bunga bunga Berlusconi still maintain their followings.
The Duke of York is facing new pressure to resign over his association with a convicted paedophile (Jeffrey Epstein), after ministers admitted that there would be “conversations” about his future role.
Andy at a Scotch tasting in Wasington photo: AP / Pablo Martinez Monsivais
The Daily Telegraph disclosed this morning that the Government had decided to downgrade his position as Britain’s trade ambassador. Vince Cable appeared to confirm that the Duke’s role and responsibilities were under review as he declined to give the royal his firm backing in a radio interview today. …
Chris Bryant, the Labour former Foreign Office minister, repeated his calls for the Duke to be relieved of his duties, telling the BBC: “I think we should be dispensing with his services. I think the charge list now against him is so long that he is a bit of an embarrassment.”
In the meantime Berlusconi is facing 4 trials simultaneously:
Berlusconi’s pimps Lele and Fido: Photo: REX FEATURES
The aging ‘pimps’ at the heart of the Berlusconi scandal. Emilio Fede, 79, and ‘Lele’ Mora, 55, are accused of playing a key role in organising Mr Berlusconi’s ‘bunga bunga’ parties.
While attention has focused on the parade of glamourous young women
who allegedly prostituted themselves with the prime minister, the men alleged to have masterminded what was in effect a vast pimping network are anything but youthful.
79-year-old Emilio Fede, a television anchorman, finds himself at the epicentre of the extraordinary prostitution scandal engulfing the Italian prime minister. Mr Fede (“Fido”) is accused along with Dario ‘Lele’ Mora, 55, a celebrity agent, of procuring escort girls to attend “bunga bunga” sex parties with the 74-year-old prime minister, who is due to face trial himself next month accused of paying for sex with an under-age prostitute. Prosecutors are expected within days to present a dossier of evidence to a judge in Milan in which they will request that Mr Mora and Mr Fede face court on related charges, along with Nicole Minetti, 25, an Anglo-Italian former television showgirl.
Tags:bunga bunga, Emilio Fede, ethics, Lele Mora, paedophile links, pimping network, Prince Andrew, Silvio Berlusconi
Posted in Behaviour, Corruption, Ethics, Italy, UK | Comments Off on The Prince and the paedophile and Berlusconi and his pimps
March 5, 2011
To celebrate the 75th anniversary of the first Spitfire flight, a replica of the plane will be flying over Kent.
The Spitfire Society's facsimile of the prototype Spitfire: image The Spitfire Society
The first Spitfire prototype took off on 5 March 1936 from Eastleigh airfield, which is now Southampton airport. This weekend, a replica spitfire is making frequent flypasts over the Battle of Britain Memorial site at Capel-le-Ferne. Visitors will also be able to see a facsimile of a Spitfire K5054.
The Spitfire Society is working with the Battle of Britain Memorial Trust to mark the anniversary of the Spitfire’s first flight on 5 and 6 March. A group of Spitfire Society members built the K5054 which will be on display over the weekend at the Battle of Britain Memorial site and visitors will be able to sit in its cockpit. There will also be technical experts and pilots at the memorial in Capel-le-Ferne on hand to talk to the public. There is also the opportunity to fly alongside the airborne Spitfire (Mark Five) BM597 in a helicopter.
Supermarine Spitfire: image mstation.org
Essential for British air defence in the Second World War the Spitfire’s wing design allowed for a higher top speed than many of its contemporaries and afforded the plane a manouverability that many pilots credited with saving their lives.
Designed by R.J Mitchell in 1931 the Spitfire initially saw action as an interceptor though it’s popularity with pilots soon led to it finding roles as a fighter-bomber, photo-reconnaisance and training plane.
About 25 Spitfires are still in flying condition.
Tags:Capel-le-Ferne, Spitfire, Spitfire 75th Anniversary, Supermarine Spitfire, World War II
Posted in 2nd World War, Aviation, UK | 2 Comments »
March 4, 2011
Sir Howard Davies: Image via Wikipedia
Not only did the UK government provide Gaddafi with absolution for all his sins for the sake of weapons deals and oil contracts, they also orchestrated the release of the Lockerbie bomber.
And the LSE was part of the process of providing legitimacy to a bunch of thugs and murderers – of course in return for a suitable remuneration. The LSE Director has now resigned.
BBC:
The director of the London School of Economics has resigned over its links to Libyan leader Col Muammar Gaddafi. Sir Howard Davies said he recognised the university’s reputation had “suffered” and he had to quit. He said the decision to accept £300,000 for research from a foundation run by Col Gaddafi’s son, Saif, “backfired”.
The LSE council has commissioned an independent inquiry into the university’s relationship with Libya and Saif Gaddafi. It will seek to clarify the extent of the LSE’s links with Libya and establish guidelines for future donations.
Lord Woolf, former Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales and former chairman of the Council of University College London, has been appointed to carry it out. Sir Howard said he regretted visiting Libya to advise its regime about financial reforms, calling it a “personal error of judgement”. …..
The LSE has already announced it is investigating claims that Saif Gaddafi plagiarised his PhD thesis, which was awarded in 2008. The Libyan leader’s son had studied at the LSE, gaining both an MSc and PhD.
The Guardian:
A leaked US diplomatic cable indicates that the British government was also party to the deal to bring 400 Libyans to Britain for leadership training. The cable, published by WikiLeaks, suggests that other UK universities were involved in similar schemes, though there is no independent confirmation of this.
The university’s reputation has taken a battering over links with the Libyan regime, which include a donation of £1.5m from a charitable foundation run by Saif, who studied at the LSE. On Tuesday, the LSE agreed to put £300,000, equivalent to the cash it has received from the foundation, into a scholarship for north African students. …..
Ashok Kumar, the education officer of the LSE students’ union said : “The recent revelations have shone a light on one part of the relationship between the upper echelons of the LSE and the Gaddafi family, which is deeper and more perverse than we would have ever imagined.
“This issue is damaging the reputation of the school – it should be a place of learning – not at the centre of unscrupulous dealings with Libyan regime.”
Tags:corruption, Libya, London School of Economics, LSE, Muammar al-Gaddafi, Plagiarism, Saif al-Islam Gaddafi plagiarism, Saif al-Islam Muammar Al-Gaddafi
Posted in Corruption, Education, Libya, Politics, UK | Comments Off on LSE head quits over suspect ties to Gaddafi & son
March 3, 2011
Image via Wikipedia
UK MP’s have been, for a long time, using expense claims to pad their incomes and many of these expenses are for generating income for family members as part of their staff. The Telegraph took the lead in exposing the culture of greed among these “servants of society”. Some rules have changed but it is not a culture that will be changed easily.
Now the Telegraph reports that even those MP’s already found to have been cheating on expenses and who had decided not to stand again have now claimed – and received – substantial sums for closing down their operations:
More than 200 MPs claimed the payments of up to £42,732, which they were entitled to use for staff salaries and office costs if they were leaving Parliament, receiving a total of £6.8 million. A large number of employees who would have received the payments were MPs’ relatives hired to run their offices, meaning that the cash would have gone straight into their household income.
- Labour’s Jim Devine, who was convicted last month of false accounting on his expenses, was paid £19,832.
- David Chaytor, who was sentenced to 18 months imprisonment for cheating on his Commons allowances, received £10,089.
- Jacqui Smith, quit as home secretary after putting her husband’s pornographic films on her expenses. He worked as her office manager and would have been entitled to some of the £37,868 she claimed.
- Mark Oaten, the disgraced ex-Liberal Democrat MP for Winchester, claimed £41,518 to wind up his office – four years after announcing he would not stand again after his affair with a male prostitute emerged.
- Several MPs who have now become peers also claimed the winding-up allowance, despite now being entitled to set up new offices just yards away from their former rooms in the House of Commons. Lord Howard, the former Conservative leader, and Lord Boswell, Tory MP for Daventry until May, received £26,590 and £42,708 respectively to wind up their offices having both announced that would not stand again in 2006.
- Lord Reid, the former Labour home secretary was paid £37,157 after announcing that he would not contest his Airdrie & Shotts seat at the election in 2007.
As well as a winding up allowance, departing MPs are also entitled to a “resettlement grant” of up to £64,766, a year’s salary, to allow help them make the “transition” to normal life. The former MPs received a total of £10.3million in “golden parachute” payments.
For parliamentarians, and not just in the UK, serving a party line has long ago replaced the notion of serving constituents’ interests and the allure of becoming a parliamentarian remains the many different ways of generating income that it affords.
Tags:David Chaytor, ethics, expenses fraud, Jacqui Smith, Jim Devine, Lord Boswell, Lord Howard, Lord Reid, Mark Oaten, MP corruption, UK MP expenses
Posted in Corruption, Ethics, Politics, UK | 1 Comment »
February 1, 2011
Tony Blair: Image via Wikipedia
Apparently Tony Blair and his government were more than mere US poodles. That Blair was an accomplished liar regarding his “sexed up” Iraq dossiers has become apparent. But that he had (has) little sense of ethics and could treat with the Devil for the sake of trade deals has always been suspected but is coming out clearly now.
British ministers secretly advised Libya on securing the successful early release of the Lockerbie bomber and demonstrate that Tony Blair’s Government was “playing false” over the issue.
If corruption is taken to be “having or showing a willingness to act dishonestly in return for money” it is not difficult to attach a label to Tony Blair and his government.
The Telegraph:
A Foreign Office minister sent Libyan officials detailed legal advice on how to use Abdelbaset al-Megrahi’s cancer diagnosis to ensure he was released from a Scottish prison on compassionate grounds, documents obtained by the Daily Telegraph show.
The Duke of York is also said to have played a behind-the-scenes role in encouraging the terrorist’s release.
The Scottish First Minister said the revelations confirm that while his administration acted according to its public pronouncements on the affair, Tony Blair’s Government was behaving duplicitously.
“The cables … show that the former UK Government were playing false on the issue, with a different public position from their private one,” said a statement released by Mr Salmond’s office.
Downing Street maintained at the time that is was not complicit in the release of al-Megrahi, and that the decision to free the convicted terrorist was taken by the Scottish Executive alone.
The Libyans closely followed the advice which led to the controversial release of Megrahi – who was convicted of the murder of 270 passengers on Pan Am Flight 103 – within months of the Foreign Office’s secret intervention.
According to American officials, Mr Blair was suspected of securing trade deals after agreeing to include Megrahi in the agreement.
After Megrahi was released in August 2009, another American document records Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s comments – which suggest that Prince Andrew, the UK’s trade envoy, may have played a role. The document records: “He [Gaddafi] went on to thank his ‘friend Brown’, the British Prime Minister, his government, Queen Elizabeth, and Prince Andrew, who ‘against all odds encouraged this brave decision’. [Gaddafi] noted that the UK efforts would positively affect ‘exchange’ between the two countries.
Tags:Blair's governmnt engineered Megrahi release, corruption, First Minister of Scotland, Lockerbie bomber release, Muammar al-Gaddafi, Prince Andrew, Tony Blair
Posted in Behaviour, Business, Corruption, Ethics, International Trade, UK | 2 Comments »
January 2, 2011
Kings College chapel, Cambridge: Image via Wikipedia
It used to be that being awarded a First Class Honours or an Upper Second (2:1) degree in the UK carried some weight since they were “awarded sparingly to students who showed exceptional depth of knowledge and originality”. But this no longer holds. The race for students and the use of league tables to “grade” universities has led to standards being deliberately diluted to improve the statistics. But the result is that in many universities where in 1970 less than 20% of students could expect a First or an Upper Second in 1970, today over 60% can expect such an award.
But I expect it will have a backlash. A key statistic emerging to define a “good” university will soon be the difficulty to be awarded a First and not the number of Firsts awarded. Just as in the US where one statistic defining the “goodness” of a University is now the difficulty to gain entrance. In Japan the difficulty to get into Tokyo University is what maintains its pre-eminence (though it is also alleged that once you get into Tokyo University you don’t need to do any more since your degree and your career are assured!).
The Telegraph carries the story of the “dumbing down” of UK degrees.
The results for last summer’s graduates, due to be published by the Higher Education Statistics Agency later this month, will increase pressure for reform of the degree grading system in Britain, which an official inquiry has already condemned as “not fit for purpose”.
The latest data shows that the criteria for awarding degrees has changed dramatically – despite complaints from many universities that grade inflation at A-level has made it hard for them to select candidates. Traditionally, first class honours have been awarded sparingly to students who show exceptional depth of knowledge and originality. But the new figures add further weight to a report by MPs last year which found that “inconsistency in standards is rife” and accused vice-chancellors of “defensive complacency”.
Prof Alan Smithers, director of Buckingham University’s centre for education and employment research, and a long-standing critic of falling standards, said: “There has been the most extraordinary grade inflation. As the system has expanded and a wider ability range has taken degree courses, the universities have altered their standards. Institutions are under pressure to improve their place in league tables and also need good results to compete for research grants. Giving university status to the polytechnics, some of which are very good, freed them to award their own degrees and they have exercised that freedom to award high degrees to relatively poorly-qualified entrants.”
Source article: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/universityeducation/8235115/Dumbing-down-of-university-grades-revealed.html
Tags:British undergraduate degree classification, downgrading of UK degrees, Grade inflation, University league tables
Posted in Education, UK | Comments Off on UK degrees downgraded
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