1707 And All That

..... Or a brief history of the Union.

.

Today's the day, three hundred years ago, that the Scottish parliament voted to abolish itself. The Act of Union which led, on 1 May 1707, to the formal establishment of the United Kingdom of Great Britain.

The background to this momentous event is, like most British History, complex, interesting and not all that it first appears upon detailed examination.

.

The background, in summary, form the time of the Union of the Crowns in 1603, England and Scotland had one monarch but two Parliaments. While this worked most of the time there were occasions when the two institutions parted company. One such example being when the English Parliament executed King Charles I (much to the distress of many in Scotland and some in England) and became a republic for 11 years. Scotland's governing body decided (in defiance to Oliver Cromwell) to appoint King Charles II as their monarch.

Fifty four years later following the Glorious Revolution of William and Mary the Parliaments in Scotland and England were freed from Royal management (and interference) and could take an independent line against the Crown. The Scottish Parliament did this big style in 1703 when it passed The Act of Security which in short meant that following the death of the then Queen of England and Scotland, Anne, Scotland would Crown, once again, its own separate Monarch.

Well, from the perspective of the leaders in London these situations were becoming, to use an English understatement, annoying and seen as hindering Economic growth. In order to concentrate the Scots on favouring ever closer union the English Parliament voted to close their markets to Scottish cattle, coal and linen and for good measure declared that all Scots would be treated as aliens. In addition Scots was excluded from England's colonial territories.

.
So there we have it (the first Union Flag left) on 16 January 1707, after three months of clause-by-clause debate the Scottish Parliament voted decisively for its own extinction. The Scottish people themselves were for the most part less than impressed - a mob held the City of Glasgow for a month and the Parliament in Edinburgh was attacked by rioters. As time passed and the economic transformation of the 18 th century would show the Scots probably, in fact, got a better deal than the English from the new Union.

.

As History moved on the legal entity of Great Britain established in 1707 actually ceased to be in 1801 when it was superseded by the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, brought about by the Act of Union of 1800 which had been enacted after the suppression of the Irish Rebellion in 1798. That then changed again, just as we were getting the hang of all this Union business, in 1922 with the grant of independence for the Republic of Ireland, after the partition of six of the nine counties of Ulster. These remained in the UK, formalised by the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 6 December 1921, although the current title of the UK – the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland – was not officially adopted until 1927.

.

Well now we come to modern times and the limited devolution settelement (a bribe by new Labour) introduced by the Scotland Act of 1998, which reintroduced a separate Scottish parliament and which have created no end of inconsistencies in England, not least the so-called "West Lothian Question" - have led to calls for a similar parliament in England.

.

What is rarely mentioned is that other great act of union which, coincidentally, has its fiftieth anniversary this year - Treaty of Rome, creating a European Economic Community, a proto-European state. This the UK joined in 1973, (most Britons did not notice) with our own act of union, the European Communities Act 1972, which effectively signed away our independence.

.

That, in the view of many, including this blog, renders nugatory any discussion about devolution and separate parliaments in England, Wales and Scotland – and Northern Ireland when and if they can get their act together.

.

As long as the bulk of our law is made in Brussels (and Strasbourg) it matters little whether we have additional talking shops in the provinces of a greater European Union. Genuine devolution would be the return of powers to local authorities, the central government acting more properly as a supervisor and guarantor of fair play than as ruler and administrator.

.

What is so remarkable though is the willingness, apparently, of some in Scotland to accept the yoke of Brussels while rejecting the rule of London. Scotland's economic and political well being will be much better (as was often repeated by the editor of this blog in Scotland in 2004) as a country within the United Kingdom not as a region of the European Union.

Early morning Englishness.

Englishness - well yes indeed. A 'phone call from a Producer at BBC Radio Cleveland this morning sent thought waves racing along the Editor's grey matter. ''Would he like to lead a discussion on Englishness on tomorrows morning breakfast programme, from 8.30 -9.30 am ?'' Well now, indeed he would.

.

Englishness is, of course, by its very definition is undefinable.
The radio programme gives an opportunity to comment on the Regionalisation (and sub-regionalisation) of our green and pleasant land as well as:

The dumming down of the English culture.
The loss of identity of English people.
The ability of Englishness to absorb incoming cultures.
The ridiculing of our glorious English History.
The increasing rarity of the truly English traditional Pub.
The decline of English Cricket.
The devastation of English rural heritage.
The disgraceful behavior of many English tourists when abroad.
The diversity of the most flexible language on the planet.
The fascination of the weather.
The English sense of fairplay.
The Cultivation of understatement.

The great English afternoon ritual of tea-time.

.
Oh - this will be fun. Readers of a stout disposition in the Teesside area can tune in on 95 FM - though most of our readers being further a field will need to link onto http://www.bbc.co.uk/tees/local_radio/ to listen to this broadcasting extravaganza.

The Sunday Quote

'' Public opinion is a compound of folly, weekness, predjudice, wrong feeling, right feeling, obstinacy and newspaper paragraphs.''

.

.
Sir Robert Peel, (1788 - 1850) Conservative Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from December 10, 1834 to April 8, 1835, and again from August 30, 1841 to June 29, 1846. He helped create the modern concept of the police force while Home Secretary, oversaw the formation of the Conservative Party out of the shattered Tory Party, and repealed the Corn Laws. A very British Politician indeed.

On Whos Side ?

The Old War Office, Whitehall London

The many comments in newspapers and on many British based blogsites on the failings to of the Ministry of Defence to properly equip British troops in Afghanistan and Iraq reminds the editor of the old story from the 1st World War.

A young Subaltern (Junior Army Officer) from a Scottish Highland regiment was summoned at the height of the conflict to a meeting to the War Office in Whitehall. Not having been to central London previously the young man soon became lost amongst the imposing buildings of Whitehall.

Spotting a senior officer the Subaltern approached the Colonel, saluted and asked: '' Excuse me Sir, which side is the War Office on.'' ''Well'' came the reply from the seasoned officer, '' Our-side I am told - but it is becoming difficult to be sure''

Some ninety years later the same comment could be made.

Christopher Booker takes up the point:

Sean Langan's chilling filmed reports from Afghanistan for Channel Four's Dispatches last week showed British troops hopelessly overstretched and ill-equipped to fight a guerrilla war with the fanatical Taliban. In particular they highlighted the inadequacy of the unarmoured Land Rovers in which our soldiers have to patrol, and in which not a few have died.

.

One telling detail was the sight of a wounded British soldier having to be rescued by Estonian troops in a properly protected Mamba personnel carrier. This was one of the nine bought by Estonia last summer, when the Ministry of Defence sold off the 14 Mambas – bought for £4.5 million for use in Bosnia — for a mere £44,000. Four others, sold to a security firm, Blackwater, are now being successfully used to give US officers and officials safe passage on the dangerous road between Baghdad airport and the city.

.

Last July the UK's defence procurement minister, Lord Drayson, was caught out more than once misleading the House of Lords over these Mambas, claiming "we judged the size and mobility of the vehicle not to be appropriate to the needs of our Armed Forces today". Yet months later, when one of our men is injured, he has to be moved to safety by one of these same Mambas flogged off by the MoD for peanuts, because the Land Rovers the MoD prefers are wholly inadequate to the task.

.

Isn't it time all the ministers responsible for this horrible scandal resigned, led by the Prime Minister.

.

The present day Ministry of Defence, Whitehall London

The War On Ignorance

Tony Blair Speaking aboard HMS Albion in Plymouth

At the early stages of his prime ministerial career, Mr Blair saw Britain's influence in the world in terms of membership of the European Union. To that effect – with enthusiastic support of his then defence minister Geoff Hoon – he was prepared to submerge the British military in the European defence identity.

.

Now, however, Tony Blair who today spoke on the subject aboared Britain's new Aircraftcarrier, HMS Albion in Plymouth - one of Britain's premier naval bases (for the time being) opened precisely the debate need. That being if Britain wants a leading presence on the world stage, it means continuing to send troops into dangerous places far away - with (and largely without) the involvement of the EU. In a interview with a local television programme, the Prime Minister declared, "There is a global terrorism that we face … I think it's right for Britain, alongside our allies, to be in Iraq and Afghanistan. But it is a big decision to decide to be in that game still."

.

The crucial issue for the Eurosceptic community (for the benefit of our overseas readers - those that want to leave or part leave the EU) is that the allies with whom we are working are not the European Union. They are Nato, the United States, countries like Pakistan – with whom we share the vital task of defeating the Taliban – and Anglospheric countries like Canada and Australia.

.

In short, the best way for the UK to maintain a semi-detached relationship with the core EU countries such as France and Germany – and ward off further encroaching political integration - is to remain immersed in fighting the "war on terror", from which the EU powers have largely opted out.

.

There is not only a political divide between the European and the US-led approach, but a growing schism in military philosophies – a divide between conventional "warfighting" and counterinsurgency operations.

.

The British Army sees the wizz-bang, shoot-em-up warfighting, with its tanks, artillery and other equipment as "proper" soldiering. It hates counter-insurgency and treats it as an aberration, hence its reluctance to gear up for it and to develop appropriate and effective tactics.

It wants to get it over and done with so that it can get back to its traditional role of of fighting "real" soldiers who have the decency to use green (or sand) painted equipment and wear uniforms.

.

Perversely, it is the "soft power" European Union which offers the military the best prospect of equipping and maintaining a modern "warfighting" army, in its grandiose plans for the European Rapid Reaction Force (ERRF). Because the ERRF is a theoretical construct, unhampered by having to be structured and equipped to deal with a real enemy in a known theatre, military planners can indulge in their flights of fancy.The debate is not actually about whether we should fight the war on terror but whether we should continue so doing or pull out in order to pursue the more acceptable - to some - programme of European defence integration. But, because the dreaded "E-word" is never mentioned, we have a wholly distorted and unreal debate, with the real issues being avoided and the parties indulging in proxy arguments.

.

With defence expenditure at current levels, the finance exists to equip our armed forces for conventional warfighting or for counter-insurgency, but not both. Clearly, the Europhiles would prefer the former - as that takes us in the direction of the EU. Also, the hierarchies of the armed forces desperately want to keep a warfighting capability and, forced to make a choice, would dispense with their counter-insurgeny roles. (As for the Tories, they do not seem even to be in the debate as they seem largely unaware of what is going on.)

.

Whatever the merit of retaining a significant conventional warfighting role, it has to be said that the urgent need for the here and now is to improve Britain's miltary counter-insurgency capability. By happy coincidence, promoting the development of that capability is the best way of scuppering the ERRF.

.

From the Eurosceptic stance, therefore, Mr Blair is suddenly the ally - as are those who support the continuatuion of the war in Iraq. The Lib-Dims, the Conservatives and the military – each for their different reasons – are the opposition. But, with the real issues ill-defined, the real opposition is ignorance.

There is a a real world out there. The EU is not part of it and, if we wish to be part of the real world, we cannot be part of the EU.

Conversion On The Road

A Labour and Lib-Dem MP recently joined forces during a debate in the House of Commons and called for all speed limits on British roads to be read as Kilometres/hour instead of miles/hour so that motorists will drive on motorways at 70 km/hr (43 mph) instead of 70mph.

This idea would cut the limits by a third without having to replace a single signpost claimed Nia Griffith Labour MP for Lanelli in Carmarthenshire who wants speed restriction signs to treated as kilometrs per hour instead of the familure miles per hour.

''Few people realise how much of an economy they can make as well as benefiting the inviroment by travelling more slowly, but at present they are unable to do do so without feeling they are holding up other road users." Says the Labour MP.

.

Backing the suggestion, Lynne Featherstone, the Lib Dem MP for Hornsey and Wood Green, North London, amazingly added: "This is a good idea, and it would be very cheap to implement; the ease with which ordinary people can do things and the cost of the proposals is important."

Perhaps what we ought to try first is to have MPs £75,000 pay paid as 75,000 Euros so they get only (once converted) £53,000 instead; clearly that would provide some (very small) benefit to tax payers, slow down some irresponsable use of public funds and probably be entirly appropriate since the EU is the true government of our country anyway.

The End of Week Quote

Prof. Tim Congdon

.

''Well-intentioned politicians are of two kinds, those who want to help people directly and those who want to free people so that indirectly they can help themselves. The distinction may sound like a quibble, but it is not.''

.

The quote is from Professor Tim Congdon, the eminent economist published in The Daily Telegraph this week. The well-argued article supporting UKIP and saying that he will not support David Cameron remains leader of the Conservative Party.

.

Whether Professor Congdon actually joins UKIP as George Jones and Brendan Carlin say in The Daily Telegraph or not remains to be seen, however if he continues to write well-argued articles of the kind on the op-ed pages, he will be something of a threat to the current 'modern compassionate' Conservative Party.

Lights Out

The letter below was published in The Journal Newspaper today:

.
Sir,

Two weeks ago I wrote in these columns that it was becoming increasingly important to purchase a back-up generator for when the national grid fails and we are without power for regular periods of time.

.

The likelihood of anything intelligent being done about the problem has just receded further. According to a Eurobarometer poll released recently only 20 percent of those polled throughout the EU are in favour of nuclear energy, 80 percent back solar energy and 71 percent are in favour of wind energy. But with that level of hostility towards nuclear, and those sort of percentages in favour of renewables, the chances of any politicians making the "tough decision" and implementing the only truly feasible alternative, modern nuclear plants are becoming extremely slight.

.

The poll itself has been published as a curtain-raiser to the publication of the EU's strategic energy review, which will not become a runaway best seller though the document does worryingly affirm that the EU has not made any key decisions on improving Europe's medium and long term electrical power problems.

So it would appear that the lights are going out (again) all over Europe.

Peter Troy

Editor of the blogsite Very British Subjects.
.

Noble Lords Join UKIP

The big news in eurosceptic circles today is that two of the "defrocked" Peers, Lord Pearson of Rannoch and Lord Willoughby de Broke, have joined UKIP. They have not precisely "defected" it was more a question of their party abandoning them.

Both Noble Peers are known for their outspoken views on many issues, particularly the European Union and its effects in this country. When the peers (together with two others, Baroness Cox and Lord Stevens of Ludgate) lost the whip in 2004, the stupidity of the Tory leadership in letting people like that go was a meaSure of the political low of the once great partyhad fallen.

Lord Pearson has worked long and hard for the Conservative Party, among other actions, raising a good deal of money and a party that is £35 million in the debt cannot afford to be sniffy about such matters. Before he was ennobled, Malcolm Pearson was well known in the ranks of those who fought Communism and he has continued to speak up in humanitarian matters, such as the fate of the Kalahari Bushmen.

During the EU parliamentary elections in 2004 Lord Pearson (Rannoch being in rural Scotland) was an invaluable asset to the editor of this blog who was the Lead Candidate in Scotland for UKIP. Lord Pearson's frequent 'phone calls during the hard fought campaign were welcome boosts to the moral of the small but professional electioneering team.

Lord Willoughby de Broke, one of the hardest working and most active peers in the House, though he has never held a paid ministerial job. He is not as well known in the media as Lord Pearson, but he is as important in politics. Furthermore, he is a scion of an old and active Tory family.

.

Dr Richard North wrote of Lord Willoughby de Broke when he addressed a UKIP fringe meeting:

David Willoughby de Broke is no ordinary peer. He is the 21st Baron, heir to an unbroken line, which stretches back to 1491, son of a war hero and a Tory through and through. If you cut him in half and split his bones, he would have "Tory" etched through them like a stick of rock. He is the embodiment of the Tory establishment, and, despite that, a thoroughly nice and truly caring man. He even looks like a Tory.

And it was this man, this High Tory, who carried the conviction. What he had hoped to hear from Mr Howard was that he would have wished to repatriate many more powers than just fishing, the Social Chapter and aid, and, if negotiations failed, then he would "consider all our options… including withdrawal", warning that his party was "dead meat" if it did not listen to public concern over greater European integration.

Both Peers are strong-minded and conscientious, campaigning for the issues they believe in, be thatleaving the EU, hunting, matters to do with agriculture or the situation in China, Tibet and Hong Kong. Of course, they do not get paid for the work they do, merely given rather limited expenses, unlike the various MPs who do little but are convinced that they are underpaid.

The Conservative Party can ill afford to lose people of such high calibre and UKIP has done well to snap them up, despite the ill-natured and frankly ignorant sniggering that has gone up from some of the Conservative blogs. No wonder Nigel Farage UKIP's leader is strutting this is all very good news for UKIP and indeed the Country.

Letter to the Iraqi Ambassador

British Politician Gordon Brown has added his comments relating to the execution of one of the nastiest tyrants in the modern world. The people of Iraq do not seem that upset about the going of the old mass-murderer. No pro-Saddam demonstration managed to have more than a few hundred, possibly a thousand at most, participants.

The popular horror being expressed, particularly among the West European elite, at the execution of Saddam Hussein and his taunting by some Shi’ite guards does not concider the reality of the horror that existed during Saddam's rule. Would it be too much to ask all these self-appointed guardians of international public morality to ask themselves what their reaction would be if they or their nearest and dearest had gone through what the people of Iraq have gone through under the far-from-benign rule of Saddam Hussein, his psychopathic sons and other Ba’athists who were given power by him?

.

Insenced by Romano Prodi, for example, traveling the World including such Nations as Russia, a country not known for the wonders of law and order, calling for a world-wide moratorium on capital punishment the Editor of the Blog has written to the Iriqi Ambassidor in London. The open email is as follows:

.

.

For the attention of H.E. Dr. Salah Al-Shaikhly, Ambassador to the Court of St James.


Your Excellency

Romano Prodi, has joined others in condemning the manner of the execution of the tyrant Saddam Hussein.

.
I read that the Italian President is going to various places, such as Russia, calling for a world-wide moratorium on capital punishment. Terrible, terrible, he is saying this is not fit behaviour for civilised countries and humane societies.

.

Perhaps your excellency should remind Senor Prodi that within living memory a certain Benito Mussolini, the former Italian dictator, together with his unfortunate mistress, Clara Petacci, hardly a war criminal and other members of his entourage were shot by the Italian partisans without the benefit of a trial, let alone a public one, or defence lawyers. Their still bloody bodies were then filmed hung upside down in a public square in Milan from meat hooks. Not the behaviour of a civilised country.

.

Perhaps the Italian President in the style of modern western politics should apologise for his nations own historic judicial misdeed before continuing his self righteous campaign against the execution of one of the modern world's worst despots.

The Best of British luck with the difficult task of restoring you nation to a sate of democracy and peace.

Peter Troy
Editor of blog site: Very British Subjects

.

The reply, if there is one, could be interesting.

.

Virgin Galactic - Day Return

World renowned British astrophysicist Prof. Dr. Stephen Hawking wants to go to a place he has only theorized about in his long career, space.

"This year I'm planning a zero-gravity flight and to go into space in 2009," he was quoted as saying recently in The Daily Telegraph newspaper.

Dr. Hawking, 65, has said he hopes to travel on British businessman Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic service, which is scheduled to launch in 2009.

.

The service (which one assumes will be cleaner than Virgin trains which rattle about badly on the Rail network) will charge space tourists about $200,000 US for a two-hour, suborbital trip some 100 miles above the Earth (presumably it will be a return ticket).

One of the best-known theoretical physicists of his generation, Dr Hawking gained fame with the bestselling book: A Brief History of Time.

The scientist, who uses a wheelchair and communicates with the help of a computer because he suffers from the neurological disorder amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, commonly called Lou Gehrig's disease, has done groundbreaking research on black holes and the origins of the universe, proposing that space and time have no beginning and no end {Gosh - adds the editor}

Dr Hawking has warned that the survival of the human race depends on its ability to find new homes elsewhere in the universe because there's an increasing risk that a disaster will destroy Earth. On that note we move on.

Revolting Action

From the Editor's post:

.
Well now, as a self employed businessman and high mileage motorist I am used to - all be it with grumbles - paying huge amounts of tax on vehicle fuel (73 per cent) and receiving nasty letters when photographed by those state sponsored roadside tax raising cameras.

.

So when I recently received a 'Notice of Intended Prosecution' (NiP) from the Police, following an alleged speeding offence in the northeast town of Hartlepool very early one cold morning last November when on my way to a business meeting I wrote (last week) to the local Chief Constable. I complained, bitterly, that my fundamental right of silence was being denied because I was suspected (wrongly) of being a speeding motorist.

.
As we are all aware the right to silence is granted to those suspected of far more serious crimes - including premeditated murder yet is ignored by the Camera Safety Partnership (Safety - round spherical objects - its all to do with tax raising) who clearly think that motorists are highly contemptible.

.
The core issue here as I have written before, is that excess speed, i.e., the act of exceeding an arbitrary limit; and inappropriate speed for the prevailing conditions (whether within or above the posted limit) have become synonymous in the official mind. The former is the archetypal victimless crime: a purely technical offence which has no road safety consequences; while the latter is potentially lethal and represents a crucial road user training and education issue which is currently left undressed.

.
The wilful misuse by the Police Service of the Notice of Intended Prosecution (NiP) means that most people are dissuaded from defending their cases by this document, which denies recipients the right of silence enshrined in the 1951 European Convention of Human Rights. So in the words of my political hero: ''Up with this I will not put''!

.
Rather than peruse easy targets, the authorities need to pay proper attention to the real causes of road traffic accidents — inadequate training, bad and dangerous driving and their inadequate policing, bad road layout and maintenance and all the other factors which are being largely ignored in the current simplistic and counter-productive campaign against speed per se.

.
Following a number of court cases Solicitors have recommended to the Association of Chief Police Officers that the wording of NiP's be changed, todate this has been ignored, well there is far too much money to collect.

.
Since I am of the view that it cannot be acceptable that drivers have fewer rights than those suspected of serious crimes such as murder, arson, rape, mugging or perjury I am going to join the growing army of disobedient motorists and protest.
.
So to return to the beginning I returned the NiP to the Chief Constable commenting:

.

Sir,

.
I refer to the ridiculous communication sent out in your name hereto attached. I decline to complete the form since to do so is in my view in breach of Human Rights Legislation (case currently before the European Court of Human Rights) and also jeopardises my position under Common law.

.
If you wish to proceed with a prosecution of the alleged breach of the Road Traffic Act as detailed in your communication, you are informed that I shall defend rigorously any prosecution.

.
No doubt you are in full agreement with the robotic prosecution of otherwise law-abiding motorists in the belief that to do so makes a contribution to road safety, despite overwhelming evidence that such relentless prosecutions irreparably damage police public relations and do nothing to improve road safety.

.
I also appended my congratulations to the Chief Plod in rebutting the Home Office's Regionalisation of the three northeast Police Services ( I remember when they were Forces -gosh that dates me).

.
So there we have it; my new years revolution going so far, to plan.

The Sunday Quote

'' To be or not to be: that is the qustion:

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The Slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,

Or to take arms agains a sea of troubles,

And by opposing end them? ''

.

Hamlet

.

William Shakespeare

(1564-1616)

It Can Only Get Better

Rading any of the very British national daily newspapers today makes depressing reading

.

The Daily Telegraph today runs a front page story about cuts in the Royal Navy, reducing it, as some would aver, to the status of a coastal defence force.

.

The Daily Mail, on its front page, launches a crusade against waste recyling, warning of a plague of rats as Councils cut back on collection frequencies in order to pay the extra costs of meeting recyling targets.

.

The Times gives its front page news of a proposed ban on rabbit-human embryos but also devotes two whole pages (as does the Mail) to the "crisis" over the "squalid homes" provided for our armed forces.

.

The Guardian choses to climate change as its lead issue, with "environment minister" Ian Pearson (who he?) complaining that airlines aren't taking it seriously enough.

.

The Independent offers, "for the first time", a ''real blueprint for peace in Iraq'', by Ali Allawi, the former Iraqi Defence Minister. Well, yes indeed.

.

The Sun, when you get past the "killer bus" front page story, is running an "exclusive" headed, "Infantry crisis as troops quit". Defence editor Tom Newton Dunn is claiming that the Army is facing a massive crisis "as troops in frontline fighting battalions quit in droves over poor pay and slum homes." All but one of "39 bayonet battalions" are undermanned, he claims, and overall they have only three-quarters of the men they need. Yet some of the worst-hit units are STILL being sent on dangerous operations to do the job expected of a full-strength battalion.

.

Oh well as Tony Blair said ten years ago '' it can only get better''. Well without doubt, Tony was more wright now than he was then.

End of Week Quote

"The UK government has enjoyed two big economic policy successes since 1997: making the Bank of England independent and not joining the euro."

Comment in the (pro EU) Financial Times today.

Piddling while Rovers Burn

By Dr Richard North

Ironically, it seems, the girlie agenda espoused by the Tory front bench has been exposed by Tobias Ellwood, the Tory MP for Bournemouth East.

.

While Gerald Howarth was pursuing his fatuous agenda on transport aircraft charters, Mr Ellwood – an ex Royal Green Jackets officer - was asking the secretary of state for defence how many Cougar and Vector Pinzgauer armoured vehicles were being sent to Iraq Afghanistan and when they were expected to arrive.

.

Alongside the 5 December answer about which Thomas Harding got so excited, defence minister Adam Ingram responded thus:

On current plans half of the Mastiff (the UK variants of the Cougar) vehicles will deploy to Iraq, the remaining half will be split between Afghanistan and a training pool of vehicles retained in the United Kingdom. The first batch of Mastiff vehicles is on schedule to arrive in Iraq by the end of the year.

.

A majority of the Vector vehicles will be deployed to Afghanistan with a small number retained in the United Kingdom for training. The first batch of Vector vehicles is on schedule to arrive in Afghanistan in January 2007.

.

This, as we indicated, was on 5 December and still there is no sign of the Mastiffs arriving in Iraq.

.

More to the point though, the minister is re-writing history. When the procurement of Mastiffs was first announced by Des Browne on 25 July, he stated that they were, "...expected to be delivered to Iraq and Afghanistan in batches over the next six month rotation, with an effective capability in place in Iraq by the end of the year."Yet, with no sign of a "effective capability" in place, their deployment is more than an academic issue. Troops may well die for lack of them in place.

.

Today, AFP issued another photograph of burning Land Rovers, reminding us of what is at stake.

.

One might say, in this context, that Liam Fox - in concentrating on leaky toilets rather than Army equipment - is piddling while Rovers burn.

2007

Happy New Year

From

A Very British Blog

The New Year Quote

''For Last year's words belong to last year's language and next year's words await an other voice''

.

T S Eliot American born Playwright, Poet, Editor and Critic (1888-1965)

The End is Nigh

The end is nigh for the Euro.

From the British award winning blog - the amazing eureferendum - we have a post ' No Land, No Hope, No Glory':

http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/search?q=No+land+no+hope

.

PS Sir Edward Elgar would have been pleased !

.

Who Owns Britain ?

Has anyone noticed but the Spanish are buying up the Best of British with amazing ease. The reason being that Spanish corporate raiders can do this because they enjoy a massive tax advantage which the European Commission has ruled as illegal – but they are allowd to carry on anyway for the time being.

.
The present £12 billion Spanish bid for Scottish Power will, if successful, bring to £55bn the sum recently spent by Spanish firms on buying up very British concerns. These include BAA — once the British Airports Authority — which owns Heathrow, Gatwick and other airports (£11bn); Abbey, our fifth largest bank (£8.6bn); the mobile telephone giant O2 (£17.7bn); the operating company of three London Tube lines, the Waste Recycling Group, Bristol Water and many more.

.
So untill the EU inforces its own competion rules –manana – it is accurate to say that we are ruled by Brussels (badly) and owned (increasingly) by Madrid.