ENTWISTLE GOES AS BBC IMPLODES.

I've awoken this morning to discover that the BBC's Director General, George Entwistle, has finally fallen on his sword.

 

Entwistle had only been in post for a few weeks but his period in charge had been dominated by scandals directly affecting his organisation. While he may not have had any personal responsibility for much of what has been revealed, his handling of the aftermaths was utterly incompetent; the revelations and ramifications of the Savile case have brought the Corporation into such disrepute that its future must be in doubt and Entwistle's response was pathetic. His appearance before the Commons CMS Select Committee was hopeless and his interview performance at the hands of John Humphries a couple of days ago was excrutiating; resignation had become the only option.

 

Listening to Jonathan Dimbleby, Max Hastings and Lord Patten on the 'Andrew Marr' show, it's clear that Entwistle's erstwhile chums are pulling out all the stops in an attempt to excuse his failings; this simply doesn't wash. Entwistle may be an honest and decent man but he was no use whatsoever as Director General. His expressed belief that he shouldn't get involved in anything unless someone specifically asked him to shows a shocking lack of leadership skill; it's also an indictment of those, such as the chairman of the BBC Trust Lord Patten, who appointed him.

 

For the BBC itself, it is now a rudderless and leaderless organisation which is suffering the greatest crisis since its founding in January 1927. The only serious advantages that it has over its commercial rivals are its funding from the licence fee and the absence of advertisements on its channels; much of its content is every bit as rubbishy as that of its competitors and one has to wonder why it should continue as it is. The notion that the BBC is somehow superior, with better staff and programmes, holds less water as the years go by and this may well be the moment when the scales are tipped against it.

 

We shall have to wait to see what develops.

OBAMA WINS, BBC GETS RASPBERRY.

With Barack Obama now safely re-elected for a second term as US President we can look forward to much of the same. Although the Democrat has won the Whitehouse race and the Democrats also have control of the Senate, the Republicans have maintained control of the House of Representatives; this means that for Obama to achieve anything of real note, he will have to convince his opponents in the House to vote for it. The chances must be that little of real note will be achieved in the next 4 years, the US economy will fail to ignite, and could even collapse, and we can look forward to an increasingly 'lame-duck' administration with every reasonably prominent politician beginning to position themselves for the next election in 2016.

 

While the political developments, or lack of them, in the US are all very interesting, my own attention has been caught by the extent of the BBC's coverage of events. For a corporation with huge financial issues to address, one has to question the way in which it seems to have sent everyone, and their dogs, on holiday.

 

Some programmes have done the right thing and relied on reports from accredited US correspondents such as Mark Mardell and Laura Trevelyan; others have thought it necessary to despatch their own presenters. As far as I can tell, Jeremy Paxman, David Dimbleby, Emily Maitlis, Huw Edwards, Jeremy Vine, Martha Kearney, James Naughtie, Bridget Kendall, Jane Hill, and some goon from the 'Breakfast' programme have all been spending time in the US at taxpayers' expense, with, no doubt, their associated personal armies of technical and other support. I also have no doubt that this list is nowhere near being exhaustive.

 

I don't deny that a US Presidential election is an important event but, in common with much that the USA does, it's an overblown event. That the BBC, with all of its difficulties, finds it necesssary to waste a significant amount of money on transporting so many of its 'big names' across the pond demonstrates just how far from reality its management are. With the technical abilities that we possess today, did they really need to base all of their election coverage in the USA ? Surely, transatlantic links by telephone, internet and satellite would have sufficed.

 

The USA now faces 4 more years of troubles while the BBC faces questions on many fronts. Obama will obviously survive his 4 years; whether or not the BBC will still be alive and kicking in 2016 is another matter entirely.

EU BUDGET MUST BE CUT.

Last week's EU budget debate and vote in the House of Commons has caused a few ripples but is unlikely to do achieve much more. When it comes down to the wire, Cameron, and the UK, have limited choices.

 

While the socialist mafia at the the centre of the EU want a massive increase to their budgt, Cameron has said tht he is determined to achieve a 'freeze' or, at worst, an inflationary increase only. That this is little more than political rhetoric and an almost impossible ambition has been glossed over. The Parliamentary vote which made it clear that there is no stomach in the House of Commons for anything less than a real-terms cut in the budget certainly stirred things up but power still resides with the EU and its assorted mechanisms.

 

Cameron can veto whatever the rest agree, but that will result in an inflationary increase allied with huge annoyance from the 17 nations which are net recipients of the EU's largesse. These countries want an increase and nothing less will do; a reduction simply isn't on the cards. There seems to be no doubt that the very best Cameron can achieve is the inflationary increase and this will create in great animosity towards the UK. Whtever the UK wants thereafter will be scrutinised minutely and very probably subject to vetos played by the annoyed members.

 

The EU is a disaster for the UK and we should get out. Trading is one thing, political and economic subservience is another. That the people at the centre of this obscene socialist entity continue to believe in bigger budgets and more spending at a time when individual states are suffering huge budget cuts and spending reductions shows just how out of touch they are. Their adherence to the Euro, at all cost, shows that it is politics and not economics or common sense that are driving them and we must distance ourselves from this.

 

The real test will come when Cameron brings whatever budget proposal he gets from Brussels back to the House of Commons. If they then reject the proposal it will be a crisis of sorts; the question is 'Will they actually do it ?"

MacSHANE SHOULD BE IN PRISON.

What is it that makes politicians almost universally corrupt ?

 

In 'tin-pot' third world dictatorships, national leaders habitually steal everything they can get their hands on and yet the developed world continues to pour in vast sums in so-called 'overseas aid'. Much of the money given by these countries simply disappears into the pockets of vicious tyrants such as Mugabe and, in the past, the likes of Bokassa. However, what we don't expect is for this same greed and corruption to occur in our own nation.

 

How wrong we are. The recent revelations of the activities of Labour MP, Denis MacShane, demonstrate that our own politicians are every bit as corrupt as those in other countries. MacShane has been suspended by his party and will almost certainly be suspended by the House of Commons within a few days for submitting entirely false and fraudulent expenses claims; a Parliamentary conmmittee has said that these were "plainly intended to deceive". He is, of course, not the first member of one or other of the Houses of Parliament to be caught out and he's unlikely to be the last, but his is a particularly corrupt case.

 

If MacShane were an ordinary member of the public, he would now be under arrest and would certainly be facing a lengthy prison sentence but, as a Member of Parliament, it seems that there are rules which prevent his prosecution. In this supposedly law-abiding country of ours, not only do our politicians routinely defraud the taxpayer, they have also provided themselves with a degree of immunity from the normal consequences of such behaviour. Is this really any different from the behaviour of dictators in the third world ?

 

MacShane is a crook and should be in prison. Unfortunately, the worst that is likely to happen to him is removal from his Parliamentary seat; this will simply free him to accept a variety of corporate posts which will bring him many more opportunities to enrich himself. Some punishment. Is it not time that we, the people, did something about the corrupt and self-serving political class which has failed so miserably to represent us and our interests for so many years ?

PPI SCANDAL RUMBLES ON.

Payment Protection Insurance, or 'PPI' as we all now know it, is one of the great scandals of our time. For years, our banks conned millions of people out of money they could ill-afford by selling them, sometimes surreptitiously, insurance which they didn't ask for, didn't need and didn't want.

 

Today, Lloyds bank has announced its latest results within which they've made a further provision of £1bn against the claims being made by people whom they conned in the past, bringing their total provision so far to £5.25bn. Lloyds seem to be the worst offender in this respect with other banks having made provisions, in total, of about the same amount, with the total cost of reimbursing victims now standing at something over £11bn. It's been said that the eventual total may be around £15bn.

 

That our banks can have been so criminal as to have robbed their customers of so much is surely a shocking thing. That they continue to find ways of relieving us of our money for useless or pointless services shows just how little they've learnt from the current scandal and also, rather sadly, how little many of their customers have learnt.

 

How long will it be before we can truly have any trust in our banks ? 

 

 

 

'RACIST' REFEREE WASTES POLICE TIME.

I find it astonishing that not only the Football Association but now the Metropolitan Police are engaged in investigating allegations of racism against a referee.

 

I'm not a football fanatic but I'm well aware that referees habitually face a barrage of shouted abuse from the players whom they are supposed to be controlling.The players cheat and foul their ways through match after match while the referees exercise almost no real control; every decision of any note that they make is disputed, often vehemently, by the penalised side. Referees are viciously criticised by players, managers and the media; in-depth post-match examination of slow motion replays is used to seek out every possible mistake. Now we have a referee not only being accused of using 'inappropriate language' but also being subject to a criminal investigation into what were his precise words. From a manager's perspective, this is, of course, all great news, with yet another means of intimidating referees into virtual impotence having been discovered.

 

I would have thought that the police had far better things to do than to waste time and precious resources on such a trivial and pointless investigation. Football is not a sport played by well brought up gentlemen who never use foul language; it's a high profile business in which grossly overpaid yobs kick lumps out of each other and habitually curse and swear at each other and at the referee. In such an environment, discovering whether 'a' abused 'b' is of little, if any, significance, regardless of what actual words are supposed to have been said. Any significance the issue does have should be for the FA to worry about, not the police.

 

If my house was burgled, I'd be lucky to get a visit from the police within several days. If I call, or am claimed to have called, a coloured person by some words that they consider to be 'racist' and they make a complaint, I'd be pretty sure to be arrested and dragged off to the local nick within a couple of hours. Why is this ? Who is the greater criminal - the burglar who invaded my house, wrecked it and made off with an assortment of my belongings, or the person who calls another a nasty word ?

 

In this country we have got our priorities horribly wrong; as a result, real crimes have been relegated in importance in favour of imagined 'social crimes'. What a farce.

WE NEED POLICE OFFICERS, NOT POLITICAL COMMISSIONERS.

With little more than 2 weeks to go until we're expected to vote for our sparkly new 'Police Commissioners' I've still seen almost nothing about them. Why we need them and exactly what they'll do remain mysteries. The only thing that appears clear is that the political parties, Labour and Conservative anyway, have hijacked the process and we are heading inexorably towards politicised police services across our once free nation.

 

In my area, I've been able to discover, purely by my own efforts, that we have 3 candidates; a Labour councillor from the nearby city, a conservative former senior RAF officer and an Asian man of indeterminate origin who's standing as an independent. None of these has any connection with my immediate area and, as far as I can tell, none has any experience of policing, crime and justice or anything else that would render them qualified to oversee a police service. If this is the pattern across the country, one fears for the future of our law enforcement.

 

I won't be voting for any of those on offer to me as I fail to see what benefits either they or their role will bring to me and the rest of the local population. One rather thinks that their impact, whoever wins, is more likely to be negative than positive, with yet another tier of expensive bureaucracy added to our already grossly overblown public administration.

 

I, and most other sane people, want to see more police on the beat, not Police Commissioners warming seats in plush offices and surrounded by hordes of fawning staff ; why does no one in authority understand this ?

SAVILE : HOW BAD CAN IT GET ?

As the Savile saga trundles on, the stories that are emerging are becoming worse and worse.

 

The BBC's 'exposé' that was eventually broadcast was bad enough with the revelations of Karin Ward followed by the realisation that she told the BBC of her experiences almost a year ago. Given these allegations, whether or not they were then considered to be wholly proven, that the corporation still continued with its laudatory programmes about Savile is incomprehensible. That the exposé went on to reveal that others in the employ of the BBC, such as Paul Gambaccini, not only knew of the rampant rumours but simply accepted Savile's behaviour as part of the local culture says more about them than about Savile; it seems clear that this kind of abuse was probably the norm in a world in which randy pop presenters were surrounded by large numbers of nubile teenage girls 

 

Since the BBC's programme was broadcast, others have made statements to the effect that not only was Savile's behaviour at least strongly suspected; Bill Oddie apparently knew and he joins Bob Langley and Martin Young who both appeared in the programme. None of them did anything about it. Today it's reported that a former governor of the BBC, Sir Roger Jones, heard of rumours more than 10 years ago and was so concerned that, in his role as Chairman of 'Children in Need', he ensured that Savile was kept very far away from any involvement in the charity. Despite what must have been very serious concerns, Jones apparently made no effort to bring them to the attention of the BBC's management because, it's said, 'he did not have evidence Savile abused children while a BBC employee'. What utter tosh is this ? The man was so worried that he wouldn't allow Savile anywhere near his charity but saw no reason to tell anyone else; am I the only person who finds this story ludicrous ?

 

With the number of possible victims of this appalling man now in the region of 300, many questions arise. Why is it that this army of victims has been so silent until now, or were they simply ignored ? It is very hard to believe that the BBC, Leeds General Hospital, Broadmoor and Stoke Mandeville Hospital all received complaints and all ignored them, or is it ? Given Savile's stratospheric public profile and fund raising activities, perhaps they all did shy away from the difficult publicity that might have resulted from taking action over any allegations.

 

The appearance of the new Director General of the BBC before a House of Commons select committee last week was another surreal moment. To say that George Entwistle's performance was pathetic is not to do him justice; it was far worse than that. The story reported on air of a 10 second conversation between him and Helen Boden before last Christmas simply fails the test of credibility; on being told that his entire Christmas schedule may need to be revised Entwistle failed to ask any questions or to follow up on the matter. Is this credible ?

 

The story now has so many facets that it's difficult to know what will be revealed next. Abuse associated with various BBC programmes - ToTP, Clunk Click, Jim'll Fix It, Savile's Travels and so on; the involvement of others with Gary Glitter high on the list and now arrested; public comments and statements made by Savile himself in his autobiography and on air; previous police investigations which failed to uncover his criminality; Fleet Street investigations that also led nowhere. Possibly worst of all, the BBC's 'pulling' of last year's Newsnight programme for reasons that appear entirely fatuous.

 

This is a story that will clearly run for some time. That the BBC, as well as the other implicated organisations, failed to notice that anything was wrong over so many years is a crime in itself. There can be little doubt that the culture at the BBC was such that Savile's behaviour, if not the norm' was at least not that unusual; others must have been involved and culpability has to go to the very top. Entwistle will no doubt claim that he was not in charge during the years of Savile's crimes but his failures over the last 12 months demonstrate that he has no business being Director General of the corporation. He has to go and he ought to be joined in the dole queue by several others; we can but hope that the other perpetrators of these egregious crimes are caught and find themselves serving very long terms in prison. We can but hope. 

BERLUSCONI : BUSINESS AS USUAL.

As the troubles of the European Union continue to create mayhem across the continent, there is news from Italy which is calculated to send shivers down the spines of anyone who believes in democracy and justice.

 

Just a day after being found guikty of tax fraud and sentenced to a year in prison, former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is apparently now threatening to withdraw his political party from the coalition which is currently in charge thus bringing down the government of his country. This is, of course, the same Silvio Berlusconi who is also in court on charges relating to a variety of sexual offences that occurred during his so-called 'Bunga Bunga' parties while he was in office.

 

Is it any wonder that both Italy and Europe are in such a mess when people such as this are in positions of great power and influence ? In the UK, the Conservative Chief Whip resigned because, in essence, he swore at a policeman; one or 2 of our representatives have gone to prison, and lost their jobs, for making false expenses claims; in the past, John Profumo resigned because of an affair with a prostitute and others have sufferred similar fates after committing sexual indiscretions; Charles Kennedy resigned as leader of the Liberal Democrats because he drank too much.

 

How can it be that in the UK we seem to be so sensitive while in Italy Mr Berlusconi not only hasn't resigned but is still in a position to bring down the government ? Not only is this unbelievable but it's also an indicator as to how far some countries need to progress in order to become truly democratic. Until they do, the UK would be well advised to give them, and the EU, a very wide berth indeed.

 

 

EUROPEAN UNION THIEVES WANT STILL MORE.

While our Government and those of most, if not all, of the other countries of the developed world cut back on spending in an effort to bring their economies back into financial balance, the European Union wants to increase its budget. Unsurprisingly, this demand is causing some controversy, at least in the UK.

 

True to its overwhelmingly socialist ethos, those who run the EU are only too happy to demand yet more money from their member nations. This is not simply a request for an amount equal to inflation but for another 5% on top of an already bloated budget; what the people of Greece and Spain, countries where budget cuts have been enormous, think of all of this is anyone's guess though I doubt their comments would be publishable.

 

Year after year, this entirely unnecessary bureaucratic nonsense absorbs billions of pounds and euros. Its offficials, in their thousands, live extravagant tax-free lifestyles at the expense of people who have little ability to control their excesses. Every year, without fail, they demand more money to fund their latest pet schemes and make it seem that without the increase the world will crumble around us; in truth, it is merely their own protected world that will be in danger of crumbling.

 

At a time of severe financial restraint elsewhere, why should the EU consider itself exempt from making its own contribution to savings ? How can their leaders possibly expect the people of Europe to give them even more to waste when they themselves are being squeezed  so aggressively ? If anything has ever demonstrated the way in which officials of the EU are utterly divorced from the realities affecting the rest of us, this is it.

 

David Cameron is reported to be meeting with the almost unknown President of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy, to discuss the UK's views on this subject and is, apparently, threatening to veto the proposed increase; such action will not prevent any increase but would limit it to around the rate of inflation at 2%. Allowing that Van Rompuy is something of a non-entity, having been put in his position largely due to his insignificance, why Cameron is bothering is a question worth asking. It seems clear that nothing of substance will be achieved and that the only person who really matters is the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, although the European Commission President, Barroso, will no doubt make plenty of mostly meaningless noise along the way.

 

To my simple mind the EU has one primary objective and that is to survive unchallenged; its leaders desire nothing more than to retain their privileged status come what may. The peoples of Europe should not only resist this, they should positively rebel. It is time for this bloated organisation to be cut down to size, to be made properly accountable to the people that they claim to represent and subjected to proper financial control. This is what Cameron should be telling "Rumpy-Pumpy" today, and the UK alternative to acceptance should be a referendum on total withdrawal from this insanity.

 

While their is little chance of Cameron having the bottle to really 'have a go', he will probably come back claiming some sort of victory, if not today then within the next few weeks. Whether it will be enough is a different matter. 

WHO WANTS POLICE COMMISSIONERS ?

I've heard today that I should receive a leaflet in the post telling me all about the elections for 'Police and Crime Commissioners' which are due to take place on 15th November. I can't wait !

 

Thus far, I have been told, purely through the media, that these unnecessary jobs are to be created and that we, the people, will have the joy of voting for them. I have no idea whose names have been put forward in my area nor, indeed, even what 'my area' is. I do know, again through the media, that those applying for the taxpayer funded jobs include a whole managerie of former Members of Parliament and other political hangers-on; in other words, the whole process has been hijacked by the political elite who see this as just another way to sponge off of the man in the street.

 

Exactly what these individuals will do that will benefit us is a mystery. Why we should be 'politicising' our police in this way is a mystery. Why we need yet another layer of political bureaucracy is a mystery. Why we should be inventing this expensive nonsense at a time of financial stringency is a mystery. The only thing that is not a mystery is the fact that few people are truly aware of what is going on and even fewer actually care.

 

*IF* I was ever to want a Crime Commissioner, I would not want anyone who had a prior career in politics. I would want someone who understood crime, the policing of it, and our society. The likes of John Prescott, who was putting himself forward somewhere or other, would not even make my 'long list' of possible candidates.

 

I look forward, with muted interest, to receiving my leaflet and discovering who my candidates are. I will consider the options most carefully and then, when it comes to the time to vote, I will make my mark with equal care :

 

NONE OF THE ABOVE, NOR ANYONE ELSE, THANKYOU !

CAMERON TO STOP US DRINKING WINE.

There was a time when the Conservative Party supported the free market and, in particular, people often defined as 'middle class'; no more, it would seem.

 

Today's newspaper carries the news that the Government, a coalition of interfering do-gooders, is to launch its Alcohol Strategy next week. This is theoretically aimed at preventing the abuses perpetrated by the hordes of young yobs who rampage around our streets on Fridays and Saturdays, having loaded themselves up with cheap alcohol before venturing out and subsequently drinking more until they can no longer stand, they vomit and cause a genuine nuisance to everyone else around them. Some of them end up in hospital having made themselves so ill that it takes the skills of doctors to save their lives.

 

Few would argue that addressing this generally disgusting and anti-social behaviour is necessary and a good thing, but there are ways and means. It seems that the 'coalition of the incompetent' is to use a sledge hammer which will affect everyone who drinks, rather than hitting the problem itself. The chances must be that their actions will do little to resolve the issue but will do much to annoy a large section of the population.

 

The plan is, so I've read today, to introduce a minimum price for alcohol of 40 pence per unit and also to ban supermarkets from offering discount deals, specifically for bulk purchases of wine. None of this would, of course, affect Dave, Nick and their pals but it may well affect a very large number of very ordinary people who like a glass of wine with their meals. If I drank wine regularly, which I used to do, I would buy my supplies in bulk, perhaps 6 or 12 bottles at a time. Up to now, many supermarkets have offered discounts for such purchases but under the coalition's plans this would no longer be allowed. I have never gone rampaging around the streets or caused a public nuisance but I, and people like me, are to be hammered by this insane Government's inability to act rationally and by the squawkings of the fanatics in the 'Health Lobby'.

 

I'm more than capable of making my own decisions about such matters - why should I be penalised because of the behaviour of ignorant yobs barely a third of my age ? If the imbeciles in power really want to deal with this issue, why don't they take direct action against the morons who set out at the weekend to get drunk and create mayhem ? Why aren't these people targeted by the police, arrested, charged and punished ? Why aren't those who end up in their local casualty department charged for their treatments, in the same way that injured motorists and their passengers can be ? Why aren't the bars and clubs which cater for these people, ignoring the laws governing the sale of alcohol to those who are already drunk and equally ignoring the sale and use of an assortment of illegal drugs, closed down ?

 

David Cameron may be a member of the Conservative Party but he is no Tory. He is a middle of the road liberal who believes that he has a duty to interfere in the lives of the rest of us, telling us what to do at every turn because he and his friends know best. However, he doesn't have the strength of character to actually tell the truth about such things and finds it much easier to attack a broad sweep of the population than to target issues directly. In doing so, he hopes to hide his actions and dilute the response; in fact he simply makes an even greater part of the population fed up with him.

 

Cameron is a disaster. The Coalition is a mess. The sooner we get rid of it the better, though it looks as though we will have to wait until 2015 unless the real Liberals decide to walk out sooner. Let's hope they do.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MITCHELL BOWS TO PRESSURE AT LAST.

It seems that I was wrong in my assessment that Andrew Mitchell, the Tory Chief Whip would survive the furore over his use of foul and derogatory language to a police officer at the gates of Downing Street.

 

Mitchell has now resigned following weeks of almost constant pressure which has done nothing but harm to his party and his leader. That the man should have resigned, or been sacked, almost immediately after the original incident seems to me to be clear; whatever he did or didn't say, the potential for the matter to be used as a cudgel with which to batter the government was obvious. Had Cameron been a tougher and more decisive leader, Mitchell's head would have rolled within hours.

 

Now that he's gone after such a protracted fight, Labour will claim a great victory for democrarcy and common folk while the Prime Minister's authority has been dented yet again. All-in-all, a real coup for the opposition.

EU LOOKS FOR EVER CLOSER UNION, AGAIN.

As the EU stumbles from crisis to crisis, the German Chancellor has reportedly called for the so-called 'Economics Commissioner' to be given explicit powers to veto the national budgets of member states should they go beyond limits set by the Union. This call has come a matter of hours before leaders of the 20 something member nations are due to converge for a summit meeting which is expected to focus on the proposed introduction of a banking union.

 

Given the EU's woeful management of its own budget and constant demands for more money to be granted to it, one wonders how anyone can consider such developments to be justified. However, from the perspective of Mrs Merkel, there may be some logic as Germany would clearly gain more power over the states that her country is currently financing, and this would probably go down quite well with elections due in Germany next year. For most of the rest, this looks like the beginning of the end. Should Merkel's plan succeed, a United States of Europe would not be far behind.

 

No doubt the UK and a few others may object to these initiatives but there must be a likelihood that those members which are in the deepest trouble plus the smaller nations which simply rely on German patronage may well accede. For countries like Greece and Spain, it will be a choice of accepting much greater external control over their affairs and the eventual forfeiting of their nationhood or bankruptcy and consignment to the economic scrapheap. While neither is very palatable, a choice will have to be made.

 

An aged aunt of mine who was married to an Austrian for many years has repeatedly told me that her husband had a little saying. Germany had lost 2 world wars but it would not lose the third; a German-dominated USE would be a decisive victory, indeed, in the economic war which has been fought ever since 1945.

CAMERON GETS IT WRONG ON ENERGY.

David Cameron, the man whom some believe is running the country but whom others consider to be an incompetent muddler, seems to have got himself into another mess.

 

Yesterday, Cmeron made an announcement about energy prices, stating that energy suppliers wouldbe forced to offer all of their residential customers the lowest available tariff. Today, as questions have been asked about this pledge, it's become clear that this was another example of our PM attempting to make up a policy 'on the hoof'; sadly for him, the policy hasn't yet been developed by the relevant ministry and even if it had been, it is rapidly becoming apparent that such a policy would have so many unintended consequences and difficulties that it would be unworkable.

 

We all know that the energy companies have little real competition, have such a maze of tariffs that it's virtually impossible to decide which is best at any particular time and that they operate as an effective cartel, something which is already illegal in this country. The companies' single aim is to screw their customers for as much as they can get away with and successive governments have done nothing to change this to any degree.

 

Gas and electricity, water and telecommunications, railways and so on are all guilty of similar approaches. Their customers have been consistently robbed for decades, while our political masters have fiddled. Cameron's announcement yesterday may have been well meant but it was also naive and stupid, not the type of rubbish we should expect from the leader of the country. Perhaps it's time he went and he might consider taking his arrogant chief whip with him.