POLITICS CORNER

[Stanley]

Spain under attack. (LINK). The CEO of Bankia says that €1 billion of withdrawals isn't a bank run. Talk of asking the Central Bank for a bail-out. All dreadfully familiar.
I heard a comment yesterday that got my attention. A commentator said that in his opinion the nightmare scenario for the Euro-zone is that Greece defaults. Has no debt, the most flexible labour market in Europe and a national currency discounted so low that it encourages tourism and exports, becomes attractive to opportunist investors and after a decent interval emerges with a clean and thriving economy while the Euro members continue to struggle. This isn't as far fetched as it sounds, look at Argentina and others who defaulted.
One can't help getting the feeling that we are rapidly approaching a tipping point. Difficult to see how this can be avoided.

[Tardis]

Pendle is Conservative, Lib Dem administration.

split 6/4 on exec

new leader is Cllr Cooney, and maybe Cllr David is deputy (I was tired when the tweet came out)

I hear Cllr Whipp is on the Police board (again)

All details will of course be on the Pendle website as and when they update it.

[Tizer]

It's not just the Eurozone but the whole EU that has gone off the rails. As you know, Mrs Tiz and I are wanting to downsize by demolishing a chilly old bungalow and building a new energy efficient house. The plans have gone to the Council and, after a period of nowt happening at all, their ecologist has demanded we get a bat survey done on the old bungalow and its gardens. He'd like us to do a full survey for all protected species but we're managing to restrict it to bats so far. This has meant we've had to quickly learn a lot about bats and the relevant legislation...and the more you know the worse it gets. It's not about proving the presence or absence of bats but about the presence or absence of `bat habitat' - if bats could use it as a habitat you're snookered, you'll get landed with mitigation measures. What these measures are depends on the species - it could range from putting up bat boxes through to having an old design roof with a big open space for bats to fly about, or special boxed in areas of roof etc. If you've got the possibility of habitat for more than one species then you might have to do the lot. Now, all this derives from EU legislation which was brought into UK law but, from what I'm told, the UK is the only country that abides by the legislation. This will become a big problem soon. Pipistrelle bats can use a gap as small as 12mm which means that just about any roof, old or new, can be a habitat for them. So in the future all work to roofs could be seen as needing a bat survey. Attempts to improve heat insulation could become more difficult and costly. I'm always concerned to protect wildlife but there will have to be a realistic approach in the future otherwise we'll never improve the UK housing stock.

[Bruff]

I think it's worth pointing out that the EU legislation is the Directive on conservation of natural habitats and of wild flora and fauna. All bats are protected species under this Directive, along with all whales, otters, some dolphins and so on. I guess that slipper orchid somewhere in Yorkshire falls under it too. I would be interested in seeing the evidence for other EU states not abiding by the legislation. Member States have to report to the Commission on their implementation of Directives every 5 years and this report will include the steps they take to enforce the provisions of the Directive(s) through their national arrangements. The reports are also used to assess whether any Directive is still fit for purpose.

Richard Broughton

[Tardis]

Bats don't tend to roost in old buildings, unless they have found their way inside.

If you have a garden full of flowers, however, they may fly over harvesting the insects.

Always wise to know what the wildlife people want.

I'd also make sure you don't have old trees that might be disturbed, and thus subject to a tree preservation order from the council

[Tardis]

Whisper that Cllr Whipp is on Pendle Exec, so with prescence on Police Committee (most expenses), West Craven and Town Council, the only way he could gain anymore money is if he were on LCC too

There again, the person who told me could be wrong, but somehow I believe it is possible

[Tizer]

Richard, the person who told me is a former builder, now the representative for much of the south of England for a leading self-build company and who has a very wide network of contacts. Very knowledgeable about all building matters and not a man prone to making frivolous or exaggerated comments. When I quoted that the UK is the only country that abides by the legislation I think the meaning of this is not that governments of other countries fail to pass laws or set up enforcement but that down at the lower levels people get away with ignoring the legislation. Turning the old `blind eye'.

[Stanley]

Tiz. I sympathise with you and Mrs Tiz. I'm all for looking after the wildlife but it comes to a point when we should perhaps include human beings as an endangered species.
Cameron makes another apocalyptic speech about the Euro crisis. Does this mean the MPs will cancel their holidays to deal with it? Whet we really need is the equivalent of the War Coalition of 1940, get Party Politics out of the equation and all work together.
I see from the reports of the G8 summit in Washington that Cameron is warning them not to 'kick the can down the road'. Quite right of course but the signs are that this is what the majority will do. No expectation of any concrete agreement. The bottom line is that the most powerful economic forces in the world are helpless. Could it be that this is because nobody is mentioning the elephant in the room, the fact that there is a complete lack of recognition that the basic problem is that the western economies, all of them, have been living beyond their means and global retrenchment is the key. Not a good message to pass on to the electors.

[Tardis]

I'm told the new Pendle Leader was on radio Lancashire yesterday saying that a coalition was good for Pendle as they had some difficult decisions to make.

In the LT today it does say that no agreement has been signed so it just sounds like an opportunists charter for any politician who wishes to be two faced, and anyone who's been to the meetings will be able to identify the individuals

[Stanley]

Merkel under pressure at the G8 conference. (LINK)
Obama's version of the final communiqué is that any solution has to include measures to actively promote growth. Merkel sticks to austerity as the key. She has to differ because her objective is different than the other participants. They want growth to lift economies out of depression, she is desperate to protect the Euro and the German vision of a Federal Europe with budgets controlled from Frankfurt. While they argue, the markets will be having their own discussions and the expectation is that the flight of capital will continue. It's a mess.....
The focus now shifts to the meeting olf the North Atlantic Alliance in Chicago where top of the agenda is Afghanistan. Another mess...

[Stanley]

Vince Cable, quite rightly, reacts violently to the report that Cameron favours 'no-fault' dismissal to make labour market more 'flexible'. Will it apply to politicians? Another example of rabid right wing rolling back the improvements in conditions that the workers have fought for. Cameron wants us to go back to 19th C. laisser faire policies. These men are heartless and dangerous.
Flight of capital from banks in Greece and Spain accelerates, the politicians are powerless to stop it. The train wreck continues.....
Magrahi death does not end Lockerbie case. Remember that he had been given grounds to appeal against his conviction but his release ended that possibility of examination of further evidence. Jim Swire will have taken notice....

[Tardis]

Cable blows whichever way the wind direction takes him. I don't think he should be left alone without supervision run a bath.

Not sure I agree with the no fault dismissal, but I'd certainly like to see some detail. Much easier than taking someone aside and asking them to fall on their sword.

If a business does things properly through the aggravated bullying system of assessments and meetings imposed by unions and legislation then you can end up with a huge amount of anger and very little understanding of the situation. Certainly very little resolution.

The basis of team work is that everyone has to be a part, and if they don't want to be then they should be allowed to leave in a dignified manner so that the remainder can prosper. A 'bad' business will always fail.

[Tardis]

All the left wing angst over the weekend about Osbourne being in Germany for the Champions league final, seemingly orchestrated by Lordie Prescott

Soon died down when Drowning Street stated that he was there because of a meeting with German Finance Minister about the Eurozone, and he was a Chelsea fan.

Bizarre political rhetoric, soon politians will be all denied a home life in the style of Bunker Brown, although I would say it looked very opportunistic.

Then look at the G8 where they were all forced to watch the match on TV, and the Cameroons major clebration on Chelsea's victory.

Strange as it also comes on the back of Jack Straw's daily tete-a-tetes with Rebekah 'I'm not a witch' Brooks on the train in to work where they chose to sit together

[Stanley]

Report that Teresa May is 'looking at ASBOS'. Oh dear..... On previous form she will either go more repressive or simply cock-up the system.
Everything hanging in the balance in Europe, this week's meeting of the finance ministers is the last chance to get a coherent budgetary policy. Part of Merkel's problem is the recent anti-austerity election results in Germany where her party lost heavily. No doubt the markets will be watching events as they unfold....
The draft Energy Bill comes up for discussion. Because of the stated principle that the government won't subsidise nuclear power the only alternative is to pass the buck on to the consumers by guaranteeing contractors higher electricity prices. Problem with that of course is that all consumers will pay no matter where there electricity comes from. Will this apply to so-called 'Green Suppliers' as well?

[Stanley]

Reports this morning that the extreme right winger, party funder and venture capitalist Adrian Beecroft's proposals for 'no blame' dismissal which delighted the right wing of the Tories are about to be dropped by Cameron because it is such a divisive policy and might be a bridge too far for the LibDems. What strikes me from my reading of history is that what is happening is par for the course. If the Tories get into trouble or have absolute power their policies swing to the right and become more reactionary. The argument is that the more 'flexible' the labour market is the better it is for the economy. This is part of the Tory nostalgia for the 'good old days' of 19th century laisser faire policies which brought us to the brink of disaster in the 1930s. Apart from anything else, anyone working in a firm with less than ten employees has something else to worry about now. These men are heartless, greedy and dangerous. We will not find a way out of depression by repeating the mistakes of the past.

[Stanley]

Madame Lagarde gives a clear warning about the UK economy and growth. Osborne stands up and interprets what she said as endorsement for his policies. There are none so deaf as those who don't want to hear! What she actually said was that whilst austerity and debt reduction were essential and she said that she shuddered to think what would have happened to the UK if the 11% deficit hadn't been reduced. BUT! She also made it quite clear that the danger now was the flat economy and that it was time for the balance between debt reduction and investment in growth to be addressed. Osborne made no reference to this clear call for Plan 'B'.
Probably the most important sentence in the speech was when she alluded to the danger of the flat line becoming embedded in the economy. I think what she was referring to is that the longer the economy is stagnant the harder it is to move into into recovery. There are physical reasons for this, the longer assets are under-used the more they deteriorate and the harder it is to bring them back on line. This was not an IMF endorsement of UK economic policy but a warning against 'steady as she goes'. If Osborne and Cameron ignore this they aren't fit to hold office.
The inflation index is down but I don't think this is anything to cheer about. The question is 'why has it fallen'. Could it be a combination of lack of demand leading to price-cutting and diminishing profits? M&S announce a loss for the first time in three years. One of the High Street icons keeping turnover up at the cost of profits. I keep banging on about the deterioration in profits due to competition for market share. This could be evidence of this happening and of course has consequences for firm's survival and the security of employment.
The European finance ministers are meeting today and there is a clear rift between the anti-austerity camp led by France and the steady as she goes/we have paid enough camp led by Germany. Meanwhile Greece slides towards default. Another thing that Lagarde said was that it was a mistake to think that UK was insulated against a Euro melt down.
I have banged on about the mistakes the Coalition has made in going for austerity at the expense of growth ever since their policies became clear. The evidence is that this was a correct assessment. They should read the history! This is exactly the same scenario as the inter war years and is having the same results. What saved us then was deficit financed spending to finance WW2. We don't want this to happen again.
Funnily enough they repeated Robert Bartlett's programme about the factors which triggered the collapse of feudalism in medieval Britain on BBC4 recently. The catastrophe that led to a complete revision of the system then was the Black Death when between a third and a half of the labouring population died making them a more valuable sector in the economy, the start of the changes which led to a free entrepreneurial society. It seems as though catastrophe can be a valuable tool in recovery because it forces changes in policies. Is that what it is going to take today?

[Tardis]

Interesting that Vince the Cable is arguing against exactly what is not in the Beecroft report

Hopefully he'll go up against Brillo soon and get well and truely nailed to the floor.

[Whyperion]

Inflation is not down , just the annual rate of increase compared to previous month is a bit less supposedly due to cheaper furniture , and road fuel prices continue to fall a bit , mostly due to relative strength of the pound. Consumer spending is down compared to March , mostly due to petrol sales reducing, but also because April was so wet.

[Stanley]

I never said it was. I said the index was down.
I was mistaken about the meeting of the EU finance ministers. This was not decision making but just a talking shop to gauge attitudes before a full meeting later in June. It makes you wonder how much time they think they have.... The overall message is that Growth is Good and if Greece defaults it will be 'manageable'. How about the fact that if Greece did default €80 billion of German investment in the country goes down the pan? And that's just for starters.
If 'no blame dismissal' wasn't part of the measures advocated by Beecroft why did Cameron endorse it?
PMQs yesterday was a bad tempered affair and the last for a fortnight because the MPs are going to take a bit of time off. I would have thought that it would be better if they stayed at work and addressed the pressing problems we face. A fortnight could be a long time in politics.....
Hewlett Packard announce a massive round of job cuts. The High Street activity index is down 2% in April. European markets down yesterday by an average of 2% UK and US virtually flat. No cause for any op-timism in the indices. Interesting times.

[Tizer]

We're being softened up for a Greek default. Obama has criticised the euro governments for spending weeks debating and never getting anything done. It probably started that way but then they realised that it was a good scheme for letting out the bad news verrry slowly...because that's the only way to keep some control, to get us used to the idea that it's going to happen. No sudden changes. They might not be saying it to each other but it's in their communal subconscious - what they would call the `elephant in the room' (and I hate the phrase!).

[Tardis]

Much more long term gain from a German exit from the Euro, as that would actually put in the devaluation the currency needs for the remaining people

Then it becomes a French led Europe, and Germany can continue it's industrial dominance.

[Tizer]

But Germany would decline and lose its dominance because it has been benefiting from a captive single-currency market, once it loses that benefit it won't find life so easy.

[Tardis]

But Germany would decline and lose its dominance because it has been benefiting from a captive single-currency market, once it loses that benefit it won't find life so easy.

Exactly, currently it is buffered by the rest of the Euro zone. Now that it has made all that money, it won't do the socialist thing and bail out the economies that it has damaged along the way, which was tacit in the Eurozone agreement and would need to happen for further financial integration.

Without Germany the rest would also have to face the fact that the only bail out would come from some other country just as financially imprudent.

[Stanley]

The reason why the Euro emerged in the first place even though it was obvious that there were massive arguments against it was that it was always seen as the first step to a federal Europe with central budgeting controlled by the ECB. This would automatically mean German dominance. This is still the agenda and shouldn't be forgotten.
Leveson starts digging into the Jeremy Hunt affair starting with the Sky fixer and Hunt's former 'adviser'. Downing Street closes ranks but privately must be concerned, not necessarily because of wrong-doing, but because of the evidence we are getting of incestuous and incompetent sofa government inside the Cabinet Office. Regardless of any culpability, the fact that Adam Smith was so badly supervised that he exposed Hunt to criticism is an indictment in itself. It will be interesting to see what the senior civil servant supervising the matter has to say when he gives evidence.
Meanwhile, in Europe, some interesting questions and opinions are surfacing in the press asking why it is that the politicians are getting nowhere in their handling of the Euro crisis. There is a growing suspicion that the upside of the problem is acceleration of the federalisation project and that while this is not mentioned directly Germany sees it as a major factor which could be a useful consequence of any Greek failure. I'm cynical enough to believe there may be some mileage in this.
Clegg's attack on class sinks like a lead balloon. The last thing Cameron wants is any examination of the matter.

[Tardis]

I am told that Pendle's executive voted through some more cash (£100,000) for the town centres of Nelson, Colne and Barnoldswick, split 70:20:10 I think

Not sure about where or what it can be spent on, but answers may shortly be forthcoming from Cllr Paul White