SOT

My blog has moved www.billmelotti.me.uk

2007-03-15T22:10:00.000Z

As per the title I've moved to

www.billmelotti.me.uk

Ugly Rumours

2007-03-07T23:33:00.000Z

Listening to the chart on Sunday there was a cover of Frankie's hit 'War!' from the 1980's being covered by someone (maybe it was a cover by Frankie also, I can't remember if they wrote it or not)

Anyway it reminded me of another hit of theirs Two Tribes and I was wondering where are the great protest songs these days; do they not get in the charts anymore, or do they not get written.

As the cover finished, the band was apparently called 'Ugly Rumours', the same name as Tony Blair's group at University.

Shum coincidence shurely?

A 1970's TV renaissance on the horizon?

2007-02-22T14:28:00.000Z

Someone sent me this link today

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1a7G3cSOqs

It made me laugh, but also reminded me of watching this when originally broadcast with my parents. I enjoyed watching them laugh, but I didn't understand why. I certainly now recognise its great quality.

However I understand various broadcast companies are forcing YouTube to remove clips like this because of copyright infringement. A shame if they do, because more than likely many people will get to enjoy them properly second time around, and buying the DVDs because, not in spite of, YouTube.

Maybe we'll even get to see them on the screen again ?

Local Government

2007-02-21T11:59:00.000Z

Yawn, not exactly the most interesting subject, but here goes.

A couple of weeks ago, before I went on holiday, Sir Sandy Bruce-Lockhart and someone else (I think the name was Julian Myserson) described as a Guardian journalist and former London Labour Councillor (but I can't google that combination to get the right name) debated on Radio 4 changes needed in local government to get more involvement.

In short Sir Sandy was saying give us more power and the other guy was saying pay us properly. Also neither seemed to recognise the force of the others argument.

The truth is you need a several changes, a virtuous circle of a number of changes that will re-enforce each other to improve the standing and purpose of councils and increase relevance and interest in them. And both of these contributors were right.

Localism - Sir Sandy's point, give more power to the councils and let them have the freedom to govern their areas. In the council elections I'm running for this May, I'm told that have freedom to spend approx 4% of the budget. The rest of what we raise has to be spent the way Tony Blair's government wants it spent.

Professional Pay - Julian's point - Councillors need to be paid something approaching a proper allowance or salary. Oxfordshire County Council pays a basic allowance of 7k/year and expects a minimum of a day a week from its councillors. The really good people that you want running these organisations could easily earn £100k+ elsewhere. I'm not suggesting we pay that, but it seems a lot of Conservatives see it as a plus when their Councillors are working for peanuts. This greatly limits the people we can attract.

Two other points to make:-

- Unitary authority - Rather than the multi-tier council operations that exist in many shire counties, we should have a single authority responsible for all. No wonder hardly anyone turns to vote in local elections, most people haven't got a clue what council/service/issues they're voting for. In fact of the 30% who do, I bet a significant number do so because of a duty to vote rather than a clear understanding of what they're voting for. (Caveat here is that the current proposed reforms are exactly this, but are providing an excellent means for the Labour government to undermine well run Tory shire councils.)

Many rightly argue that multi-tier systems work fine in many places and in an operational sense they are correct. In a political or democratic sense that may not be so, but we mustn't break the good governance in pursuit of electoral utopia.

- Local fiscal accountability with revenue raising powers - The basic problem is most Councils raise only about 15% max of what they spend, the rest coming from Whitehall. This creates a gearing effect that means small reductions in central Government grant have a huge impact on the local council tax; it is genuinely not under their control.

The LibDems present their solution as a local income tax, but as often is the case with them it is a potentially good principle, spoiled by PC gibberish, bureaucracy and contradictions. The Direct Democracy group proposed raising sales tax (VAT) locally. Not all questions were answered by their research, but they made the good point that current central government grants almost equals the VAT take nationally. This implies a move to separation of local and central government without complex and drawn out transitory arrangements. Much better.

There's probably others as well, we must take time to make the changes and it will be painful at first, but all done together and we will achieve a great thing; restoral of a proper functioning local democracy.

Carphone Warehouse shows principle

2007-01-19T08:57:00.000Z

It appears that some people tied up with the Big Brother controversy can come out of this with reputations clean. CPW at least has shown it is not prepared to stay wallowing in the publicity and try to elicit some more business out of it.

I suspect there are other business considerations in that decision, but yesterday the behaviour of Endemol, Ch4 and advertisers linked with the show indicated they seemed to be happy to continue milking it to get the most out.

On Question Time last night the panel was asked if it was a window on society or irresponsible programming. Yet the MPs on the panel seemed a little retiscent to condemn it completely.

Earlier in the day Tessa Jowell said that the regulator would deal with it and it was not a good day if ministers call for programmes to be axed.

Well from a Government that wants to list us all on endless databases, and assaults our liberties everyday, yes that would be a worry. But if as David Cameron says we establish a consensus in a future Britain based around social responsibility, where the Government doesn't legislate on everything and anything and people to recognise the consequences of their actions, then we could rightly take such statements from Ministers and MPs for what they should be seen as; a lead to follow and an example of behaviour, not an implicit threat to outlaw something else.

Let's stop arguing whether BB is racist, based on class or a culture clash. It is glamourising and commercialising a behaviour pattern that many of us will recognise as objectionable and Channel4 or Endemol should take responsibility for their actions and get it off our screens.

Airport Tax

2007-01-14T13:54:00.000Z

The new tax Gordon has imposed on flights is getting a bit of airtime now that the deadline is approaching and it will have to be collected. Its quite small but it sums up Browns attitude to a lot of things; how can I turn it into a revenue opportunity ?

Applying this tax on all flights already booked (rather than flights booked after say Jan 1st 2007) is very unlikely to deter people from flying. Hotels and other expenses will already be committed. It might have a tiny, tiny affect on business or air frieght, but probably so small as to not be measurable. Yet this will now cause confusion and stress for travellers and the airlines trying to collect it.

Let's be honest, we need extra stress at an airport like a hole in the head.

Mythbusting fingerprint recognition

2007-01-08T20:15:00.000Z

Following on from my earlier ID cards post.....Mythbusters is a kind of kids semi-science program where the presenters use methods to try to disprove a myth, such as soldiers must break step whilst going over a bridge, otherwise it will collapse.

So they decided to break into a door lock that used finger print recognition, that supposedly had never been compromised.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhllPkr4kIg

Motorola V3i

2007-01-07T21:32:00.000Z

For a non-political post, I'm really miffed I spent money on one of these phones for my wife's birthday just before Xmas. Thinking of buying an iPod, I (slightly impulsively I'm afraid, so I guess its my fault) bought a Motorola V3i phone for her that had mp3 support, on the basis it might substitute for the iPod and renew her phone.

How wrong I was. This phone claims to be a music player as well as a phone, but the support is truly shocking. Music transfer speeds onto the phone are painfully slow, the player is awful and now we've stuffed it with a couple of hundred tunes, its locks up when you start the player. The phone needs to be switched on and off to recover.

My own music phone the Sony w800i at least has good music support and other good features in the hardware, however the software is truly dreadful on that one and lets it down.

My recommendation for anyone thinking of buying a music phone, research it well.

Saddam execution 'not dignified' - Do me a favour

2007-01-07T21:26:00.000Z

Bush and the American forces in Iraq say the execution was not dignified and they would not have conducted it this way.

This defies belief, I cannot believe killing someone in cold blood in front of witnesses can ever be dignified, so please let's not pretend it could be. Not many will miss Saddam and his crimes were truly horrendous. However hanging him still goes against at least two of the four principles for which I believe it should never be applied:-

1 It makes a martyr of him (look at the posthumous coverage he's getting, we've almost forgotten what he was like)
2 It reinforces the impression that killing someone is OK, provided you've got good reason

(The other two being the effect it has on your family and the fact that innocent people get hanged however much you try to prevent it)

Blair comment on Saddam execution video

2007-01-07T21:23:00.000Z

So its seems Blair is moving to comment on this, after having decided he would wait, he's now being bounced by Brown. Bush commented a few days ago, so surely Tony can go ahead now ?

As with the Americans, Blair should not be afraid to criticize the Iraqis when they do something we think is wrong. I thought this man was opposed to the death penalty?

His silence is deafening

ID Cards nonsense

2007-01-07T21:09:00.000Z

As a implaccable opponent of ID cards, I'm glad to see another admission that it won't quite be what was promised.

It appears now we won't be using Iris recognition as part of the biometrics. It'll just be fingerprints, which numerous people have now demonstrated can be fooled using culinary gelatin, cheap printers and other bits just from a print lifted off a glass. (I remember reading whenClinton visited before the end of his term, he had a pint with Blair in a Birmingham pub somewhere. Apparently after he went the Secret Service guys took all the glasses on the table he and Blair had been at, broke them and took the bits away. I guess they knew then what was possible in a few years)

So now we have something that nobody believes will achieve the hyped up promises, uses existing databases, not a 'clean database', uses only one biometric, not a multiple of 'infallible biometrics' (all Blunkett quotes fromthe debates during passage of the bill), and yet it seems some senior Labour MPs still think we should consider this compulsory, if Hazel Blears' poll on her website is any guide.

New Labour vs RyanAir

2007-01-07T20:05:00.000Z

Good to see that Ian Pearson MP got a dressing down for his attacks on Ryan Air. It was a typical piece of mindless posturing and missing of the point on air travel. The only positive thing you could say about it air travel is going to grow, so perhaps by vilifying the low cost airlines, they can justify taxing them more, thus putting the flights out of reach of more people in the future. Hardly a great way for all to work together to save the environment though.

It seems there is a bit of snobbery about low cost flights, as if it enables people to fly that are not able to act responsibly about the effects, thus we somehow have to force those people out. Forget the realities of full aircraft, modern aircraft, use of quiet airports, thus little circling around Heathrow waiting for slots.

How about supporting Biofuels for cars which make up the biggest UK CO2 contribution ? Or perhaps getting the railways right, as was promised by the foolish fat one when he was Transport Sec as well as Deputy PM.

Get involved

2007-01-04T15:31:00.000Z

Brian Jenner wrote this excellent platform piece on ConservativeHome the other day which really resonated well with me. It starts to open up a real issue now that I think is at the heart of democracy in this country. On the one hand we apparently have a populous that is disenchanted with politics, yet is clearly not apathetic about political issues as we see the growth of single issue campaigning. So what explains this ?

The mention of Jeremy Paxman’s book is interesting because the book provides quite a few anecdotes about life in politics and is well researched, but does leave you with a slightly miserable feeling about getting involved. In fact if it had not been the case I was already involved in my local Conservative Association already by the point of reading I would have been put off.

The one phrase that caught my attention at the time was where Paxman asks the question ‘What is that makes certain people want to tell the rest of us what to do ?’ and with that, as in real life Paxman did the world of politics a great disservice.

From what of I have seen of people involved in political activity (of any persuasion) they go in to it to genuinely try to make things better. In other words for the best of reasons. Indeed I believe there are not many bad people in politics, just plenty of bad ideas.

As a result of the bad ideas and mistrust we see the rise of single issue campaigning, but thanks to the Paxman effect we don’t see that reflected in traditional political activity. If nobody took an interest, then we would get the nutters and the bigots in, but thankfully it’s not got that bad yet.

Part of the problem is the potential exposure to public glare. When I stood for election as a County Councillor I fully expected my friends to either not be that interested or possibly even ridicule me for it. But I was truly amazed at how many people admired my actions, even to point of saying it was brave and thought it was a great thing to do.

So it appears doing politics is OK if you know and can trust the person and that brings me then to two points; firstly how can you translate that into a willingness to get more involved and secondly why is there is a taboo about ‘doing politics’. What is it that makes people resist switching from being a voter to an activist or candidate? Having been someone that made the switch relatively recently, I can say that once it is done, you really wonder what the big deal was.

The other thing which will happen if political activity starts to become normal again is people will become closer to their elected representatives and will start to realise they are human and fallible, just like the rest of us. Perhaps then the fascination with the human failures will fade.

So yes, the answer is to get involved, make a difference and do a bit. You can do a lot and it will probably only make a small difference, but the journey of a thousand miles starts with the first footstep. Don’t expect to change to happen at once. We can all shout from the sidelines, but it’s those who get in the action that make the difference. Those that make the biggest sacrifices and do the most work are those that effect the most change.

A-list resentment

2006-11-10T22:44:00.000Z

The various criticisms of the Conservatives Party's priority list, known as the A-list are well known and continue to be heard. Only a week or so ago, Anne Widdecombe took on Bernard Jenkin on 18 Doughty St on the subject.

However I was surprised at the resentment to the list amongst party activists I spoke to at the conference this year and most of the criticism seemed not to be based around the principle of the list (surprising) but just the practical issue of people on it. A significant proportion were regarded as being on it for all the wrong reasons.

It would be easy to attack the scheme as the failed result of imposition of 'top-down' targets placed on a system not capable of delivering the best result anyway, and unable to respond correctly to the new parameters of the target setter.

However on balance I still support it. It appears to me to be supporting two aims. Firstly ensuring we have the talent to form a good Government in the future and secondly to balance the type of representatives we have. For the former, it is essential we do this and other than selecting candidates centrally for the safe seats, this is probably the best way; cream off the most talented individuals, then give those associations the opportunity to select from that list.

For the latter aim of balancing the candidates, I regard this form of positive discrmination not so insidious if it is seen merely as a priming of the pump; a temporary neccessity to make badly needed change.

My belief is this system will take time to bed in, but that this and other selection reforms will not seem so controversial in 5 years time.

More Spy Cameras

2006-10-21T10:58:00.000+01:00

The news this morning reporting that the Government plans to let Councils outside London rollout 'Moving Traffic Offence' cameras tells me two things.

First that this Government is more than happy to keep rolling out technology to keep us all in line. It regularly assaults our liberties in other more direct areas, but there is this insidious creeping increase in the monitoring and spying on what we do. How far will this go and who will stop it ?

Second, that the Government has done nothing to tackle badly needed Police reform. Within the Police there is an increasing budget, but increasing bureaucracy. The Police have (rightly) outsourced a number of jobs to lesser paid/skilled civilian jobs and are offloading responsibility for traffic crime to technology, motorway patrols to the Highways Agency, rural policing to District and Parish/Town Councils (knowing the latter are not subject to capping), yet seem to have less and less capability to deal with crime in the way we would expect it, for instance such as by being visible on the street or in Police stations.

Within the force, Police officers complain of imcompetent management and political correctness/risk aversity gone mad. Staffing and pay structure encourage the status quo. Other than trying to force an unecessary amalgamation of certain forces, this Government has offered nothing to try to improve the situation. When will this change ?

Politics Show Sunday 24th September

2006-09-24T20:18:00.000+01:00

This was quite interesting for me this week. The second half of the show focusing on local politics came to our area to look at the Vale of White Horse, its Lib Dem Council implementing 'Greener and fairer taxes'.

That'll be my Council then that's been been charging to take people's grass cuttings away for the last few years, but chucking them straight into landfill. Only recently have they moved to a slightly better scheme with a wheelie bin for green waste. The problem ? The £40 charge; hardly encouraging people to go green is it?

Peter Henley interviewed LD Councillor Paul Bizzell, reference his idea for a land value tax. His mate the local LD MP Evan Harris, is another re-distributive evangelist. Whilst pandering to the politics of envy, it will also encourage development of increasingly denser housing, indeed that's the point as Cllr Bizzell was keen to point out.

He clearly hasn't learnt the lesson of Grove, the village in the Vale destined to be transformed by the large highly dense housing estate the LDs have given the go ahead for. Support for a smaller less dense alternate scheme was opposed by the Council and supported by the public. Controversy over the main housing scheme cost them Grove Councillors in 2003.

People don't live in this area to get packed into settlements and implicit LD support for garden grabbing is starting to become unpopular too.

Question Time

2006-09-24T18:09:00.000+01:00

On the Question Time just gone, whilst many people as usual were happy to lay into Politicians as a generic minority group bearing characteristics of liars cheats etc, one lady wasn't.

The lady in question was in the audience and was prepared to say the majority of politicians are working voluntarily and putting a lot of effort for very little thanks and deserve a little better than constant villification.

Good for her.

My own experience of involvement with politics, albeit it at a local level for the most part is a feeling of dedicated sincere involvement. There's not many bad people in politics, but there are plenty of bad ideas. And I suspect that applies across all parties, I wish people could recognise politicians for what they are; fallible human beings, and get more involved themselves.