Don't believe the hype. It's probably rubbish

As Guido has noted, this whole rubbish tax "U-turn" sounds familiar as it was reported in October that Brown personally intervened to stop the scheme. Thus as Guido and Sam Coates say, he can't U-turn because he's already done it making it just another reanouncement.

However, something which I blogged on the day of the last "U-turn" has been missed. You see, at lunchtime on that day the Government published a response to the Communities and Local Government Select Committee on the subject the so-called "rubbish tax".

In that response it effectively said it was going ahead with the scheme by giving powers to local authorities to introduce it anyway. So there wasn't really a U-turn in October, but a neat bit of spin whereby he said one thing to get psoitive headlines and then - via the back door - in an obscure response document, said the opposite. One might even go as far to say that someone "lied".

Given this, why should anyone believe a word Brown says on this subject? The evidence suggests the last time he "U-turned" he'd spun back again without anyone noticing on the very same day. So has he really U-turned this time or is it just more spin so the papers report his (third?) relaunch in a positive way?
Image shamefully leeched from Guido

The Listening Prime Minister?

Abuse of political power?
Image hotlinked from Guido

Cash for consultations?

Still half-asleep really, but not so tired that I can't be in shock after reading this via this, the long and short of it is this. An NHS consultation on closing hospitals took place in a loaded room, where the non-medical attendees (i.e. ordinary folk) always voted in favour of Government policy.

At the end of the day, the medical staff were asked to leave, and then all the oridnary folk were allegedly given an envelope with £75 in cash in it. Now some might say that's bribery but I don't. I reckon it's a pay rate for Labour Party members (well above minimum wage I note).

Now some might brush this aside, however, assuming it is true, the consultation was attended by the Secretary of State for Health, Alan Johnson, and the Prime Minister, Gordon Brown. That's the leader of the DoH and the leader of the country at an consultation where cash was surreptiously handed out to those that attended and voted the right way.

That is mine, and your money being used to pay stooges to spend a day creating the false impression that there is support for controversial policies, and the Prime Minister himself is at the events. It sounds like something out of the Soviet Union.

Opinion Leader Research reported for bias over nuclear consultation

Channel 4 News has just run a report about, if you excuse the pun, fall-out, from the Government's nuclear consultation. Deborah Mattinson's OLR (and also Brown's preferred pollster) has been reported to the Market Research Standards Board for hosting a bias consultation. OLR have refuted that this was the case.

Some may remember the post I did the other week that suggested the questions were loaded in a manner to achieve the Government's already desired outcome, or what it called, the "preliminary view", not forgetting of course the family links between Gordon Brown, Ed Balls, Yvette Cooper and the nuclear industry.

One can but hope that the complaint to the Standard Board comes to something, but it probably won't.

Gordon's control-freakery reaches LabourHome?

It's been well reported in the press that Gordon Brown has been trying to curtailing the ability of Labour Conference to raise contemporary resolutions that criticise the Labour leadership. As one would expect this has certainly upset some of the Labour blogosphere who fear for democracy at the heart of their party.

The curtailment on their right to speak is, one imagines, merely the icing on the cake after the woman they consider the "she-devil" was welcomed by Gordon into Downing Street at the end of last week. In fact, as Guido points out, the membership of LabourHome 'Back to the Roots" has reacted strongly to the visit of Thatcher by posting the following animated gif pointing out what Gordon said, and what he now does.


Sadly the original post with the image that Guido linked too appears to have been deleted, presumably by the site admin who is also hopeful prospective MP, RecessMonkey. I guess the Gordon Brown meme of restricting any internal dissent whilst telling everyone he's listening has now reached the Labour blogosphere? Well, at least maybe the bit that wants to get somewhere in the party appparatus?

Update: Animation pixelated and re-hosted to protect the innocent.

Do you like fluffy kittens, or are you a Nazi?

Last week I predicted that the nuclear consultation was a sham and the Government had already made clear the direction they were going based on their press release. Of course, Gordon Brown wants us all to think he is listening, so they have to have the charade of a consultation.

The charade as well must be maintained even though there the nuclear question is such a family affair and that Opinion Leader Research seem to be a making a mint from it too. That research by OLR will make for interesting reading though, take a look at this question they asked on Saturday,

In the context of tackling climate change and ensuring energy security, do you agree or disagree that it would be in the public interest to give energy companies the option of investing in new nuclear power stations?

Guess what, a majority of people agreed, and when you count the "neither agree or disagree" (which will be tacitly taken to mean "go for it now, build build build!") the figure goes well into an overall majority. You can't beat a good loaded question to elicit the desired response. It's a bit like asking someone allergic to cats: Do you like fluffy kittens, or are you a Nazi?

Note: I'm not anti-nuclear power per se I should add in case anyone is/was wondering. However, seeing pretty shoddy loaded questions makes me questions OLRs credability even more.

It's a nuclear family affair

According to this morning's Independent the energy giant EDF has gone on a public relations offensive to promote it's new reactors in conjunction with another supplier, Areva. They have launched a website with a generic design assessment called EPR Reactor, which is of course perfectly timed with the consultation upon which the Government appears to have already made up it's mind.

What's odd (given what you'd exepct the Indy line to be on things like nuclear) is that they don't mention that Gordon Brown's brother, Andrew, is the Head of Media Relations at EDF. Unbelievably good timing for a wesbite though, don't you think? The Government makes an announcement of a nuclear consultation on Friday and in the space of two days the big boys have designed and completed a new website to tell everyone all about the wonders of nuclear? They must have been whipping those Indian developers in Bangalore good this weekend.

It's worth noting as well that they also don't mention that Brown's protege, the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, Ed Balls, has a father-in-law, who just happens to be the former Chairman of the Nuclear Industry Association, and is now a non-executive director of the Government quango known as the Nuclear Decommissiong Authority.

If you're thinking right now "father-in-law?" and "Cooper?" the answer is yes. He is the father of the Minister of State for Housing (attending Cabinet) at the Department for Communities and Local Government, Yvette Cooper. Purely as an aside, you have to love the doublespeak style in the name of the NDA don't you? It makes it sound like its interests are somehow opposite to the interests of the nuclear industry.

Predicting the decision on nuclear power

What a brilliant press release from the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform. The title is "Public have their say on future of nuclear power in the UK" and says,

The public takes centre stage tomorrow (Saturday 8 September) in the Government's continuing consultation about the future of nuclear power in the UK.... [the events] will help inform the decision due to be made later this year on whether it is in the public interest to give energy companies the option of building new nuclear power stations.....

The Government has reached the preliminary view that new nuclear would be in the public interest because it believes it has the potential to make an important contribution to the UK's energy security and to help to reduce the amount of carbon we emit.

Anyone fancy a flutter that when the 'decision' is made they simply take the word "premliminary" out of the last paragraph and republish it?

Update: Forgot the link to the press release.

More evidence that Brown doesn't really want to listen

Yesterday, during he Downing Street briefing, the Prime Minister's spokesman was asked what the response was to the launch of I want a Referendum. He told the collected lobby £that the Government’s position was well known and nothing had changed."

Having already admitted Government consultations are a waste of time, this time he's showing us that he's not only is he unwilling to listen to the people, he's unwilling to trust them either.

Brown admits he's not listening to the public

As some people will remember, especially the potheads, back in July, Gordon Brown told MPs at PMQs that he would be launching a consultation on the reclassification of cannabis the following week. Now.. official Government consultation guidelines state that consultations should last 12 weeks. That means the consultation should not end until the middle of October.

Now shoot forward to today and Gordon Brown has said that he and the Government has already changed its mind on cannabis (and will reclassify) after "listening" to the public in a consultation that has not ended yet.

So he's either just admitted that the Government doesn't bother following its own official guidelines on consulation? Or, in fact, he just proved to everyone that he doesn't listen at all and consultations are indeed the sham everyone knows they are.