The Haddock Committee On Iraq

There is an old adage that we get the Governments we deserve. The older I get I realise the less I know, (another old adage, I know), but I don't think we deserved a Government that contained somebody like Prescott.

His syntax apparently gets mangled when he gets a little over excited, so yesterday before Chilcot Ad Hoc Committee was reduced out of his mouth to 'Haddock Committee'

Prescott's appearance showed the man had little wit to understand the events that unfolded before him, his only concern was to keep the tribalism of the Labour together (unthinking and unquestioning ) and not to earn a place in Cabinet but on the Blair Sofa where the real decisions the last administration were made.

Blair of course was fully aware the the real real decisions were made at a ranch in Crawford, Texas. The nearest Prescott got to be on that particular sofa was when the Bush supporting Philip Anshutz bought him some cowboy boots that in the over excite that he promptly forgot all about the ministerial code and making a declaration to HMRC.

Prescott in acquiescing to the Iraq invasion, was just going along with the group think and blind loyalty to 'Labour'. What the Party says is good, everybody else is a class enemy (until you become a Lord, that is). I don't think that he for one minute questioned the dodgy dossier as 'Tittle Tattle' that came with the benefit of hindsight.

Did he not notice other Ministers resigning over this issue, most note worthy being Robin Cook, or that the Attorney General was lent on to say the war was illegal, or the Chiefs of the Defence staff who said we were ill prepared for war. Prescott I suspect just lay back and thought of Party interest and how far he had got up the greasy pole.

I would like to say that Prescott was the product of another era, but Balls performance on the 'Five Days That Changed Britain' showed that Labour arrogance and thuggish behaviour is still alive and well.

The repeated use of the word arrogance as applied to potential Lib Dem coalition partners, showed that the Labour Party did not accept the outcome of the Election, and immediately started cosying up to the Unions to disrupt and thwart the will of the people.

The most striking appearance on that programme was Mandelson, who obviously only loves winners not losers. He contrasted Cameron's outreach to Clegg favourably with that of Brown. Brown, Balls etc had no plan to enter coalition whatsoever. They just intended to carry on regardless in the Dictatorship of the Proletariat mode for another five years.

Prescott's appearance before Chilcot showed that there was a moral and intellectual void at the top of the Labour tree, that was filled by the 'born again muscular Christianity' of Blair/Bush.

We as a nation have paid the price, unfortunately we appear to have acquired a Prime Minister who equally shoots from the lip on Turkey,Pakistan and being the junior partner. We just do not deserve this from the political class.

Where Do Libertarians Belong ?

A view from across the pond-

So where should libertarians drop anchor and forge alliances within the famous four-sided Nolan Chart spectrum of political beliefs and groupings? In this exchange, Contributing Editor Brink Lindsey argues that it’s time, once and for all, to sever the libertarian-conservative alliance that dates back to the New Deal while remaining skeptical about the illiberal populism of Tea Party activism. In response, a conservative writer—National Review Online Editor-at-Large Jonah Goldberg—disputes Lindsey’s portrayal of the right and contends that the only major party giving free market economics the time of day is the GOP. Meanwhile, FreedomWorks President Matt Kibbe tells Lindsey and his think tank fellow travelers to climb down off that high horse and celebrate the most promising limited-government popular uprising in generations.

Right Is Wrong

Libertarians need to disengage from Republicans and conservatives once and for all.

By Brink Lindsey

By the waning years of the Bush administration, the old “fusionist” alliance between libertarians and social conservatives seemed to be on its last legs. After the inglorious collapse of Social Security reform, the political agenda of the right was more or less free of any contamination by libertarian ideas. The GOP sank into ruling-party decadence marked by borrow-and-spend fiscal incontinence and K Street Project cronyism. The broader conservative movement, meanwhile, expended its energy on gay-bashing, anti-immigrant hysteria, fantasies of World War IV, meddling in the Schiavo family tragedy, and redefining patriotism as enthusiasm for mass surveillance and torture.

Now, however, opposition to Barack Obama and the Democratic Congress has sparked a resurgence of libertarian rhetoric on the right, most prominently in the “Tea Party” protests that have erupted over the past year. “Libertarian sentiment has finally gone mainstream,” wrote Chris Stirewalt, political editor of the conservative Washington Examiner, in a column this April. “After two wars, a $12 trillion debt, a financial crisis and the most politically tone-deaf president in modern history, Americans may have finally given up on big government.”

Such talk gets many libertarians excited. Could a revival of small-government conservatism really be at hand? After the long apostasy of Bush père et fils, could the right really be returning to the old-time religion of Goldwater and Reagan? Could the withered fusionist alliance of libertarians and conservatives channel today’s popular disgust with statist excess into revitalized momentum for limited-government reform?

Read more

CON DEM's Greatest Mistake To Date

Was not to on day two, cull the BBC.







Sean Gabb of the Libertarian Alliance said as much in a speech a few years ago. Have no doubt that we are engaged in a cultural battle for the soul of Britain. Failure to defeat the ‘last bastion of Fabianism’ will lead to the return of a Labour led Government within three years, most probably propped up by the former Social and Liberal Democrats. ( In my opinion they should have dropped the Liberal not the Social wording, as they are an avowedly interventionist, Fabian Social Democratic Party)

If you thought the Brown/Blair years were bad for Civil Liberties, the much further left leaning Ed Milliband Labour Party, backed by UNITE will be far worse. The Stalinist Balls will be offered a significant role, possibly Chancellor, and we will see a State directed siege economy favouring the Nationalisation of the remaining two major High Street Banks not under State ownership, Barclays and HSBC, and the public sector and large corporations being the major employers. The Kulaks of the private sector will be forced to the wall, or reduced to servants of the public sector.

In Cultural Revolution, Culture War – Hampden 2003 now in reprint, Gabb shows how the conservatives lost Britain

An Anglican Bishop nearly arrested for stating Church doctrine. Villagers actually arrested for making fun of gypsies. Museums stripped of "imperialist" symbols. This is life in the England of today.
"Political correctness gone mad" some will say. Not so, says Sean Gabb. In this book, he explains how England in particular, and the English-speaking world in general, have been conquered from within.
We face a new ruling class made up of the student radicals of the 1960s and 70s. Now in power, they are creating in their own behaviour all the corruption and bigotry and hypocrisy that they falsely alleged against the liberal democratic rulers they have replaced.
This being so, the leading writers of the "New Left" Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, and Michel Foucault become highly relevant for conservatives and libertarians. They are relevant not because their analysis of liberal democracy was correct, but because it explains what their disciples are trying to do.



Before we can change the world, we need to understand it. This book helps towards that understanding, and suggests what needs to be done to give England back to its people.
This is a largely rewritten and much expanded version of a book first brought out in 2003. It went through five reprints, and is now rewritten by popular demand.
I was a mature student of twenty six when I was first exposed to the Italian Marxist Gramsci, and Althusser by over excited messianic left leaning university lecturers. It has formed the basis of our cultural life in this country in the intervening quarter century, much in the way that the French left bank Agrarian Socialists influenced Pol Pot in Cambodia in the seventies.

The idea being that the ‘people’ were truly happy and contented living as pre capitalist peasants. The result being that millions died. Notice how National Socialism and Communist Socialism and the recent agrarian Socialism always ends up as a mass body count.

Therefore Culture Wars do count, and the left has been hugely successful in winning these cultural wars.

Back to the BBC. In the aftermath of the Kelly affair the BBC got rid of its Chairman and CEO in a coup organised by Alistair Campbell, since then it has been the obedient mouthpiece of Fabianism.

Despite a state of near national bankruptcy and political corruption, the nightly fare of the BBC at both national and local level has been the ‘ devastating cuts’ and the special pleading of essential public services. Last night for regional viewers in the West it was the RSPB (I thought they were a Charity, not a quangos). Saying that if Government subsidies were not maintained, all the birds in this or that particular marshland habitat would perish and die.

The Insolvency Service has promised Vince Cable and 11% cut in costs but no redundancies !! So the default position is that it has been run in an incompetent manner for the last ten years if they can come up with 11% cuts over night. Most private business have already cut costs to the bone and have had to make redundancies.

Government spending is always justified by saying it is protecting us, it is not it is a vast job creation scheme. Dave there is no point going to India promoting Britain, when the bulk of our population now working for the State in some form or other. You cannot export paper pushing and call centres, the Indians do this far cheaper than we do.




I suspect that most of the captains of industry on this trip will be thinking ‘ Blimey, we need to export more of our back office staff functions out here'.

It baffles me why the British Taxpayer is still giving financial aid to India, a country with its own space program and nuclear weapons.

Dave, you are not a businessman, just stop it and come home and start fighting the Culture Wars. The Left has lost the election, but is fighting a rear guard action every night on our TV screens.

The State is currently only slowing down its rate of growth, not cutting back despite the nightly broadcasts by the Gramsci BBC, propounding cultural hegemony that the cuts are ‘devastating ‘ for essential services.

Con Dem may have lost the battle before it started. Why ? because Dave was a policy free zone from day one.

Friends of Libertarianism have literally months to start turning the tide, before the ‘endarkening’ of Fabianism becomes ‘Millibandism’ a welding of trade union money, and Hampstead Millionaire Socialism.

Deal with the BBC now because in a year it will be far too late to break up this expensive monolith.



Please join us, I would like to appeal to all members and supporters to donate what you can this month.

Our account number is 92635313 Sort Code 40-28-20

You may not be allowed to under UNITE Millibandism

More greenwash - this is no way to run a country

I have signed up to the TheyWorkForYou (an excellent initiative we should all support) feed for my new MP, Bob Walter (North Dorset), and was somewhat taken aback by an answer he received during the recent energy debate:

Robert Walter (North Dorset, Conservative)

I welcome the Secretary of State's statement on the low-carbon economy, particularly his commitment to offshore wind. In the beautiful Blackmore vale in my constituency we face yet another application to erect wind turbines. The only business case is the subsidy paid for those turbines; the wind blows barely 20% of the time. Will the Secretary of State confirm that it will still rest with the local planning authority to judge such applications on planning considerations?

OK, leaving aside the NIMBYism he is basically correct, or so I thought, about subsidies. But you can't expect a greenie such as Huhne to accept that comment lying down. Here's the response [my emphasis]:

Christopher Huhne (Secretary of State, Energy and Climate Change; Eastleigh, Liberal Democrat)

I can confirm to my hon. Friend that below 50 MW the decision is for the local planning authority. However, I urge him not to fall into the easy trap of assuming that the only reason for building onshore wind turbines is for subsidy. The recent study on costs that the Department has had from Mott MacDonald shows that there has been a dramatic reduction in the cost of onshore wind. The result is that it is competitive in a free market with other sources of energy.

What? Onshore wind stands up in a free market? Really? I had to find out if this was true even though I am in the middle of packing and can't really spare the time for the research.

So here is the paper: UK Electricity Generation Costs Update.

I've only had time to read the Executive Summary, but that was all that was needed to realise that it is all such a greenwash it should win a Humphrey Appleby prize for obfuscation and distortion.

The second paragraph ends with the rider:

All this means that any assessment of levelised costs is subject to large bands of uncertainty, which implies that the relative ranking of different technologies can also shift markedly.

This is consultant speak for "we stuck our fingers in the air and this is as far as we can go without sacrificing our own credibility to met your requirements".

The Executive Summary finishes:

There are a number of other important caveats that must be attached to these figures.

Not surprising really. The report looks like it was written to order, as are all consultants reports (I spent 12 years as a consultant so know the drill).

The cost estimates are generally for base-load energy on common assumptions of load factor (though wind is constrained by energy availability), and as such we are ignoring the issue of dispatch risk which depends on the plant’s expected merit position over its life.

If you can get them where you want them at the cost we have pulled out of the air you'll be lucky.

No consideration is provided here for differences between technologies for the requirements for reserve and balancing services, or in terms of transmission network reinforcement impacts.

We have not commented on (or quantified) the vulnerability of particular technologies to fuel supply and other interruptions, which varies considerably between technologies.

Don't expect any electricty on the coldest days of the year if you are mad enough to believe wind power is the solution.

Externalities relating to environmental and social impacts of construction, operation and fuel supply chains are excluded, except to the extent that they are internalised through the carbon price.

It only works if you set carbon tax high enough and ram them through local planning. We assume there will be no planning gain to pay for the disruption. My guess, following a cursory look at the figures, is that they have been told to use a carbon tax level higher than Stern calculated.

And finally, not forgetting that Huhne said that wind power is competitive in a free market:

The relative ranking of LGCs does not necessarily closely relate to the ability to finance technologies in the real world. Developers in practice factor in risk premiums, the appetite of lenders and the broader impacts on their own corporate financial positions. Once these factors are considered CCGTs and onshore wind projects are often easier to finance than most other technologies.

Which I read as you'll have to provide finance risk guarantees if you want some mug to build wind power in the future.

Wouldn't it be nice, just for one, to get some honesty in these reports and debates?

If anyone has the time to go through the detail and correct me if I'm wrong I'll be happy to retract my comments.

Greenpeace: Tin-pot Dictators.

If you don't want to buy oil produced by BP, then that is your freedom to do so.

If you want to protest outside BP petrol stations so as to convince others by argument or gesture, that is your freedom, too, as long as you do not endanger lives, hinder people, coerce or damage lives or property*.

If you take it upon yourselves to force other people, against their will, to not (be able to) buy BP fuel, then that is another matter entirely, for that is arrogance, Totalitarianism of thought and forced collectivism.

How very dare they, in fact. What possesses such people to think they have the "right", the authority, to dictate to others?

If I want to veto BP, the person who decides the when, where and how, is me, not YOU. Not the Government. Not the US Senate. Not Obama, Cameron, Her Majesty the Queen, but I. I decide when, where and how. Unilaterally. Independently. If I wish to abdicate to a collective, the when, where, how and with whom will also be unilaterally, independently and utterly of my own choosing, not the presumption and whim of dictators.

For let us be clear, Greenpeace are acting as Dictators. Totalitarian. Authoritarian. Coercive. Arrogant. Self-serving.

If you don't like BP products or the company, don't buy them. If you want others to not buy it, go and convince them with your arguments and reasoning. Bully-boy tactics, violence, aggression, coercion and downright vandalism might be "right on" ecothuggery, but all it does is demonstrate that those performing them either

a) realise they have weak arguments, no logic and are really only interested in maximising self-serving publicity.

b) Too lazy to do the leg work.

I am tempted to think the actual answer is both.

For shame, "Greenpeace", for shame.

All you have done is INCREASE the chances of my using a BP petrol station, if only to ensure you get no reward nor any encouragement from your disgraceful, spoilt child, aggressive behaviour.



* bearing in mind not to coerce, steal, damage, threaten and to remember that they are franchises, who are likely to suffer the most, running on wafer thin margins. But then again I think it is too much to expect of Greenpeace to ever consider even for a nanosecond their plight.

Dealing with nationalists

As libertarians we always argue that the best way to deal with the likes of the BNP (and other similar hard line organisations of left and right) is to give them a platform and let their own words condemn them. Whilst the BBC did rig the QT program that featured Nick Griffin it didn't need to, his performance was woeful and showed the BNP for what it is.

I have just been made aware of a similar case from the blogs of our (big) sister party in the US. The post is about the building of an Islamic Cultural Center near Ground Zero in New York and in defending the right to free speech the author gives the following example:

Another instance hit closer to home for me, literally, in my home town of Simi Valley, California. In 1991 Rodney King was videotaped being beaten by Los Angeles police. The subsequent trial of four police officers was moved to Simi Valley, where their 1992 acquittal sparked massive riots in Los Angeles which resulted in thousands of fires, a billion dollars in property damage, thousands of injuries, and 53 deaths.

After the riots, white supremacist Richard Barrett and his self-styled Nationalist Movement tried to cash in by announcing a march to the Simi Valley court house. Enraged Simi Valley residents demanded that the City Council block the march on the grounds that it might incite a violent response. My wife, Sandi Webb, was on the City Council at the time, and she published an article in the local paper identifying this demand as a “heckler’s veto” and a violation of free speech and assembly. She suggested instead that residents organize a counter-protest. The City Attorney (also a libertarian) warned the City Council that blocking Barrett would lead to a lawsuit and heavy monetary damages against the city.

After some dithering, the rest of the City Council followed Sandi’s lead and the City Attorney’s advice. Barrett and his pathetic handful of supporters twice paraded around the court house. Each time they were vastly outnumbered by hundreds of Simi Valley citizens expressing their loud opposition. Barrett normally made his living by shaking down those cities which prevented his demonstrations: He would sue them and (acting as his own lawyer) be awarded legal fees. But in the case of Simi Valley he left empty-handed and humiliated.

I commend the whole post which isn't that much longer than the section I quote.

There is a lot of admin stuff but it is worth adding their RSS feed to your reader as it does turn up some gems.

Reports From Those With Their Arse In The Grass

I take it as read that the Generals view is rather sanitised and sexed up for public consumption.

These field reports from junior officers with their arse in grass, show that the US military has not progressed beyond 'body count' as a war aim.

Good old Irish common sense

Here's a bit of welcome news from the Republic of Ireland. The government there has published the “Criminal Law Defence and the Dwelling) Bill 2010”, which – if passed – will recognise the right of a home owner, tenant or visitor to stand their ground if attacked in a home and specifically states that there is no obligation to retreat. The bill will allow people to use reasonable force to defend themselves and also specifically states that reasonable force can – depending on the circumstances – result in the death of an intruder.

Statists will scream that this is licensing vigilantism, which it obviously isn't – it's just common sense that you have the right to defend yourself and your home from attack. Here's a statement of support from Dan Hanley, vice-president of the AGSI (an organisation which represents police superintendents and inspectors, our equivalent would probably be ACPO): “The bill aims to shift the balance of rights back to the homeowner where it should always have been. It is intolerable a homeowner should be compelled to retreat in front of an intruder who has entered the home and who may have malign intentions towards the homeowner, the family or the home owner’s property."

Hanley added: "It is ridiculous to suggest the bill, which attempts to redress a serious legal imbalance, would provide a license to kill or a ‘have-a-go’ charter for homeowners, the vast majority of whom will continue to act with good sense and in a peaceful way."

This is exactly the sort of common sense we need more of in Britain.

Is there a lesson to be learned from the visceral reaction to the Big Society?

Does anyone sense undercurrents from the Left about the Big Society? You might detect the anguish at the threat of a loss of control - that "their turf" is being taken away and will be controlled and abused by "the other".

In a way they might now get a sense of what I as a Libertarian have felt about The State, but one must first remove from their emotions the clag of vested interests, entitlement, monopoly and collectivism and distil out the feeling that one has no control. For some, they are happy for group X to have control and they abdicate to it, gnashing teeth when group Y takes over. For me, X or Y is a false dichotomy and I want to decide to whom, when or if at all I abdicate control. Maybe it is too much to ask that The Left understand that if this occurs at the individual level, then the greatest number can be free.

What we are seeing in the Big Society appears to be a Changing of the Guard, not the removal of the guard. One in-crowd to be replaced by another. Dave Spart replaced by Hyacinth Bucket. The Nationalisation replaced by out-sourcing. I have yet to see any clear plan that suggests we will get free and open plurality, true voluntarism, but many hints that it will be monopolistic in nature and therefore still coercive. This is no surprise, for the State only truly understands monopoly, and that is unremarkable, for the State is the most rigorously enforced monopoly there is.

I hope some of the Left can learn from their visceral reaction to the Big Society and get a sense of how others feel about groups moving in to monopolise the social sphere. I do hope they will not fall into the trap of wanting "their turn next time", but to see that the least bad way forward is for the Sparts and the Buckets to be free to set up their own solutions in parallel without State enforcement, monopoly or concession and for each individual, not "the people" or some other kind of collective or tyranny of the majority, in turn to be free to decide atomically, individually, asynchronously across a plurality. I am not holding my breath.


p.s. Francis Maude wants children to be taught in his Youth Camps that they have an "obligation" beyond "just" being law abiding. Note the term "obligation". I say bring on the large pot, for Maude is in desperate need of having the opportunity of boiling his own head. Obligation exists in society, but it is one upon the State to maintain borders and Rule of Law, for it takes on that obligation because it demands taxes by force.

"The reputation of the police is poor, and morale won't be very good if public perception is that the police constantly get away with crimes

No Charges are to be brought in the Ian Tomlinson case

There has been little change since Con-Dem took over the steering wheel. It is the same car careering out of control.


The Director of Public Prosecutions announced that the police officer who struck him during the G20 protest wouldn't be facing any charges. Keir Starmer QC said there was too much conflicting evidence between the post-mortems - the first, by Dr 'Freddie' Patel - had concluded Mr Tomlinson died of a heart attack. That was before all the footage emerged showing the officer hitting him. And Dr Patel is up before the GMC right now, accused of professional incompetence relating to four other suspicious death cases. Mr Tomlinson's family are furious there's to be no prosecution.

Channel Four News


All this on the Fifth Anniversary of the Death of Jean Charles De Menezes. another innocent man to lose his life at the hands of the Police.

The Tories- A Warning From History or Labour Being Honest, Shocker

We have had a couple of months now since the Election and we have all been waiting to see how this is all going to pan out.

Well for me yesterdays 'Big Society' launch was the clincher that the 'Big State' is here to stay under the Cleggeron and any Libertarian worth their salt should not be taken in by Con-Dem mood music. This is not the State getting out of our face or pockets.

First let me congratulate the Labour Party on their honesty. I suspect that
they have been sitting back waiting as well. The Labour Party have shown their true colours and are proud of it. Fair play to them. The choice between four apparatchik white upper middle class men in grey suits from the 'rentier 'political classes and a token black woman to make them feel better, have one thing in common. They are backing the public sector and their financing Unions all the way to the exclusion of everything else.

They are Stalinist and Proud, and have finally 'come out' of Nu Labour by the
collective driving of a stake into the Prince Of Darkness on the publication of his kiss and smear memoirs. Balls is leading protests of school girls about the 'cuts', the Unions are all tuning up. All good honest 19th century class warfare.

So turning to the Con Dem 'Big Society' concept.

How can you build a 'Big Society' that is predicated on theft !!

My estimed colleagues in the Libertarian Party in Scotland ask this very question and deconstruct the 'Big Society' blurb.. I agree with their analysis that this is a window dressing exercise by the State that we can no longer afford, but is desperate to survive.

Thaddeus Wilson expands on the State building the Big Society on filching money that has been carelessly left lying around in private bank accounts

For Christs sake this is not like the Cleggerron coming across a vein of untapped Gold in the Black Hills of Dakota, it is private money, it belongs to somebody.

Look in Zurich, Basle and Geneva, there are billions of Dollars of cash and assets that were accidently left lying around by millions of Jews and other minorities who were gassed, and by Nazis who got their billions of loot out of Germany before May 1945, but failed to survive the collapse of the Third Reich. The ownership of these assets are disputed, but one thing is not disputed is that they do not belong to the Swiss Government to build a new Swiss Society.

The Fabian State has got form on this sort of criminal behaviour. Let me tell you a story about Trustee Savings Banks or you can read it here for yourselves.


The UK's Trustee Savings Banks had been collecting and looking after the working population's small savings for about 200 years. They were formed 'for the safe custody, and increase of small earnings belonging to the labouring and industrious classes'.

Trustees held the Bank 'upon Trust' for the depositors who in turn can appoint and remove trustees. Until recently Trustees were forbidden to 'receive any emolument, beyond actual expenses for the purpose of the institution'. The early savings banks were unincorporated associations for the sole benefit of the depositors.

So the Trustee Savings Bank (TSB) was run entirely for the benefit of its depositors. When profits were earned they were allocated to the bank which earned them and in part to a mutual assistance fund. Bank reserves (including assets) were accumulated from deposited savings. But accumulated reserves were not allocated or distributed to depositors.

Active in banking, credit cards, unit trusts and insurance, with more than 1,600 branches in the UK, the TSB had a profit of GBP 77 million in 1982.

In 1985, well known for friendly and effective service, the TSB had more branches than Barclays and was considered to be better managed than the big clearing banks. It had accumulated reserves of GBP 800 million, a lot of money in 1985.


£800m in an institution that was owned by the great unwashed British public,owned by millions of small deposit holders. Truly this was a 'Big Society' in every sense of the word. £800 m was too much for an institution that had no involvement from the State. The Thatcher Government looked on this this money much as the Cleggeron is looking upon the £400 m in the 'unclaimed' accounts mountain.

(Two years ago I was contacted by a pension company that I had forgotten about with a former employer, the sum in my unclaimed account was not insubstantial, and now forms part of my retirement fund. Had I not received the letter from them, this money would now be part of the Big Society Fund instead !)

The State Acted acted in concert with the Courts in one of the biggest robberies ever carried out in the United Kingdom. Only the Airdrie Savings Bank had the good sense not to be sucked into the TSB model, this avoiding making itself a target for Nationalisation/Privatisation by the State. It still thrives today and is a model of the type of banking we need to return to.

The 1981 TSB Act in turn stated that the TSB can accept deposits, accumulate the produce and return the deposits and produce to the depositors after deducting any necessary expenses of management, but without deriving any benefit from the deposits or produce.

The TSBs served the community. Trustees are meant to ensure the TSBs are run for the benefit of their depositors and of the community, their assets being looked after by Trustees on behalf of the depositors.

The UK government decided to 'privatise'(appropriate) the TSBs, to sell them off, stating in the 1984 White Paper: The TSBs do not belong to the Government. Nor do they belong to the trustees, to their employees or to their depositors.

So the government proceeded to sell the TSBs although it considers that they do not belong to the government, on the basis that the TSBs and their assets belong to nobody, that no one owns the bank. Is this starting to sound familiar in relation to the 'unclaimed bank accounts ' ?

The TSB's assets were to be transferred to a public limited company before flotation This is how Andrew Murray commented in the Financial Times:

As it considers that the TSB belongs to no one, the government apparently intends to appropriate the assets by Act of Parliament, fix the price, make the sale and return the payment with the goods. In other words, the existing assets would be a free gift to the purchasers of the shares.

The 1985 Act then took away the powers of the depositors. The bank is to be run first and foremost for its shareholders.


It did not seem to make sense to depositors and the matter was fought out in the courts in Scotland, then in England and Wales, and finally decided in the highest UK court, the House of Lords.

Their reasoning was interesting, their arguments appeared almost unreal, the conclusion was unexpected. The House of Lords agreed with the Government after all the subordinate Courts said the assets belonged to their Depositors. Quelle Surprise !

On this basis and chicanery, the £400m is as good as lost to the rightful owners of the unclaimed accounts. The Fabian State in the shape of Brown and the Cleggeron have all put forward proposals to use this money for the 'Public Good'.

This is nationalisation of private wealth or Finders, Keepers Theft and every Libertarian should be opposing this tooth and claw, not thinking this is the way to rolling back the State.

NOT IN MY NAME !

What of the £800m taken from the Depositors of the TSB, that took 200 years to build up. the TSB was absorbed into Lloyds. Lloyds were 'persuaded' by Brown to take over another former mutual/bank combine HBOS, a deal which has finally rendered TSB insolvent.

Two hundred years to build up, stolen by the State, twenty years to insolvency.

Concentration of political power and corporatism is called Fascism, that is why the 'Big Society/State' needs to be opposed.

Instead of the 'Big Society' with 'trained' community leaders lets go for the 'Small Libertarian State where voluntary institutions like the Airdrie Savings Bank can flourish.

Andrew Withers

Deputy Leader. Libertarian Party.

The Office of Tax Simplification

This body starts work today, and is yet another smokescreen for getting rid of allowances against Tax.

Admittedly out Tax codes are the most complicated in the world, but the only way to simplify Tax is to cut out the one thing that is causing these taxes- massive and intrusive Government.

This morning we are hearing on R4 that the Civil Servants are upto to their old tricks of double counting 'efficiency' savings in order to thwart any cuts to their empires whatsoever. Given that these cuts are not real in the first place just a projected slowing of the rate of growth of the State, a lot of this is just window dressing.

Liberating the NHS

Andrew Lansley, MP, has announced and published the White Paper “Equity and Excellence: Liberating the NHS”.

I have looked at this White Paper and attempted to convert the words into a diagram, so one can see who does what, who is in charge, who talks to whom and why.


1. In no way can one say the individual is in charge or has any real influence here. If you look closely, we sit in the lower left corner.
2. GPs are forced into being part of one and only one Consortia.
3. If a GP is good but the Consortia is operating in a way that is not agreeable, patients have a dilemma. This is unacceptable, especially as there is often not a surplus of GPs and so one may end up with a de facto Consortia monopoly.
4. Consortia are beholden to the Commissioning Board, not patients.
5. It is not clear how effective risk pooling will be in such Consortia, especially as the arrangement appears to presume that they will be very much a local grouping.
6. The Practice Budget setting appears to be dysfunctional and unnecessary. Either funding follows the patient or it does not. This appears to enable a degree of “mumble-swerve” into the process and this is therefore at risk of abuse.
7. `The “Local Authority” role is not clear. They appear to be able to function as a cipher or arbiter over the wishes of patients/individuals. Not a good thing if one has a Local Authority that does not respect your wishes.
8. The scope for local or National fiefdoms has not been dealt with.

The problem as anyone can see from the diagram is it is too rigid and dictatorial. There are no alternative ways of operating. It is a monoculture and the problem with monocultures is it is slower to realise or wish to realise what can be done better and when it decides, it often takes too long to implement it so that a further development can come along before the previous innovation has been implemented.

Some good points

1. Convert NHS Hospitals into independent trusts
2. phase out Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) and Strategic Health Authorities (SHAs).
3. Funding follows the patient…sort of.

This is quite a different system to that which we might see in the first few years of a Libertarian Party administration.

What follows is a potential alternative, but not formal policy position by any means. It is offered so as to reveal the complexity and bureaucracy of the White Paper proposition.


Providers commission services from other providers. GPs commissioning Hospitals, Insurance Services commissioning GPs etc.

The Dept of Health is shown with a supervisory role, but more along the line of upholding Rule of Law, as in misrepresentation, fraud, coercion, theft, abuse etc.

The above includes the concept of Voucher/State funding to show how Healthcare would evolve within the first Parliament. The nature of that funding, therefore needs to be mentioned.

Trying to pretend that Taxpayers must fund a voucher with no oversight or controls whatsoever is also unrealistic, which is why the “Baseline Care” concept needs to exist alongside any voucher scheme.

Vouchers:

Ideally it establishes price, quality and delivery competition between providers, for this ensures that the providers have their face towards the patients, not the State, so reducing what is called the Third Party Payer problem, whereby providers meet the needs of what appears to be the immediate funder, not the consumer. Trying to fund everything via a voucher funded by direct taxation also invalidates a significant portion of the power in a voucher for the patient, for it is reduced to an amount argued between provider and State.

This, then, implies that the voucher for most people does not cover "everything"*.

I put it to you that it would be better to top up the care costs of the few - poorest, ideally via Friendly Societies - instead of trying to provide all the care costs of everybody via a voucher.

I put it to you that if items are not covered, they are at the lower end, the elective, the cosmetic and small but many, as in the “deductibles” of healthcare plans one can find, e.g. a routine check up will not be covered, but cancer is. This ensures the catastrophic is dealt with without a blink, but one decides if that visit to the GP for flu is really necessary, or one bears the cost of IVF or cosmetic surgery. This is what would be defined in "Baseline Care".

The above mechanism combines the provision of core care with price, quality and efficiency competition. The real kind, not the faux “contestability” touted in the White Paper.

I am sure there are many other ways to deal with how to fund, or manage the funding of, the healthcare provision of the poor, but a single universal cover-all non means-tested voucher is probably one of the worst.

What is primary here, though, is that the Individual chooses their providers, be they GPs, Polyclinics, Hospitals etc. and as such the providers are constantly subjected to the scrutiny and immediate judgement of the population on delivery and cost.


* As we know, in truth, an attempt to cover "everything" is a conceit. In reality it does not happen.

Edited 18:04 19 Jul 2010.

The Latest Big Idea From Vince

Vince Cable thinks that the best way to deal will the financing of students is to introduce a 'graduate tax'. Another Social Democrat 'idea' (proto marxist) that determines that the 'rich, brightest and best' should pay and pay dearly for their education.

What is unsustainable is not the education system, but the paying of thousands of NEETS to sit around drinking lager, procreating and looking for inspiration from Jeremy Kyle. All of whom have never paid a penny into the benefits system.

If you are going to use the Tax system, set up tax free accounts that aspiring parents can start paying into the moment their children are born. Allow companies tax credits for setting up sponsorship funds, and tax credits for the wealthy to set up education trusts for the poorer members of the student fraternity.

This is sending out all the wrong signals to the young. Work hard and get educated, get taxed. Be idle get rewarded. Thats Socialism for you.

The Myth Makers- Controlling The Past For the Future

HERODOTUS


The Taxpayers Alliance have come across another EU bunfight- The European Liaison Committee of Historians

I hate this sort of patronage amongst 'scholars' because if the piper is paying the bill, he sure as hell will call the tune.

'It is completely independent and grant funded ' is an oxymoron

Its aims

The tasks to be carried out by the Liaison Committee are:

* to convey information about work on European history after the Second World War;
* to advise the European Union on scientific actions to be taken with its support; thus the Liaison Committee carried out a task concerning the public accessibility of the archives of the Community institutions;
* to assist researchers in making a better use of the available means of research (archives, oral sources,?);
* to promote the organization of scientific meetings in order to take stock of acquired knowledge and to stimulate new research : seven important research conferences were organized and their proceedings have been published.



OK how long will the grant hold out if they write European History that maintains that the EU is an expensive gravy train for 'has been' national politicians seeking a role in their declining years, is intensely bureaucratic and has failed its audit for fifteen years in a row.

Not long I think.

Fund Raising

Thanks to all of you who responded for the recent call for funds Members and supporters alike. Please keep it coming in.


Our account number is 92635313 Sort Code 40-28-20

Our immediate target is £2000. We are looking to open a permanent office to handle donations and all the other administration and membership applications.

Times are hard but every £5 , £10 and £20 is income in the right direction.

A Referendum on the Referendum on the FPTP voting system

If there is any sincerity at all in the move to have a referendum on our voting system, then we need to get away from the false dichotomy of First Past The Post vs Alternative Vote (FPTP vs AV).

The whole point of having the referendum is to let the public decide what system they feel they want to have, not to have this narrow choice between two compromises that might suit the incumbents.

The options are wider than just these two. The implications are broader, too.

We have STV, STV+, AV and potentially other variations.

Do you want Communism or Socialism? Neither? Not allowed. Sound familiar? What is the point of going through all the process of education, explanation and voting if we are only limited to the two systems?

Some people protest that to be against AV just because it is not perfect enough is to miss the point, that any move forward should be grasped. Yes and no.

We are not talking about some kind of fait acompli, some hard-wired option that cannot be broken no matter what. Yes, if we have FPTP, people wanting to change the voting system must get it changed by building a power base voted in via the existing system. That I understand, but now the genie of voting system reform is uncorked, the idea you should shackle it into just two flavours is rather odd.

Still, even then, we have a problem, for the voting referendum will, itself, be FPTP. When you have a straight two horse race between incumbent and replacement, it is going to be a simple FPTP event and that is logical.

When one introduces multiple alternatives, then the vote becomes more complex.

It raises the question of what mechanism do you use to determine the preferred and even least worst alternative?

We, in truth, need to decide what system we use to determine the outcome of the referendum itself.

We need a referendum on the voting system used to determine the referendum. Ad infinitum.

Maybe this is why they decided to only have a straight battle.

However, if the AV system wins, is it viable to accept the premise that what is being voted on is, in fact, "change"? "change" is a dangerous concept. We need to get away from blind "change". That got us New Labour and Obama.

So, to mitigate the danger of this blind "change", to lance the boil, why not have a secondary part of the vote using AV to determine what might be the final alternative? Why not do this on the same day?

As AV is to be the winner for "change", according to the assertion above, then could we not make the referendum into "Keep or Change, and if Change wins, Change to what?", with alternatives laid out with an AV mechanism to decide them.

People voting against change can then still vote on what poison they will have to swallow. People who want to vote for change away from FPTP will not have to accept the false dichotomy that gives them AV.

Maybe there are flaws in this plan, but the current trajectory risks another "change" and not necessarily what people actually want.

A Question Of Competence

Just how difficult is it for highly paid senior civil servants and MichaelGove to compile a list and communicate the contents of that list to the Headmaster, Local Authorities and Parliament.

From yesterdays performance far too difficult.

Labour were frothing at the mouth about the cruelty of the cuts in schools buildings, local Tory MP's are threatening economic NIMBYISM, cuts everywhere but not in my back yard.

If Gove and the backroom boys cannot compile even a list its time for them to be retired/sacked/made redundant.

Yet again centralisation falls on its own sword of mismanagement. Children need education in decent buildings. Scrap the Education Ministry and give thesepowers over to local education boards. Let the parents,local businesses,charities, churches, mosques, synagogues and local
benefactors raise the money to build and refurbish State schools.

I will bet you any money that they will be able to make lists competently

John Boateng: The Libertarian State- Revolution or Democracy ?

The guardian of the one true Libertarian flame has set the above question, Bella Gerens has given her usual erudite answer here
andObnoxio has done likewise here


As Deputy leader of the Libertarian Party I feel I should put my 2p in.

Democracy - Not going to happen in my lifetime, or even that of my two sons. TheLPUK goes through the motions of standing for elections not out of any hope of winning a damn thing, but to establish a legitimate discourse.

In the last week the Libertarian Party has been asked to put speakers up four times for that bastion of the State the BBC. Why ? I would like to believe that we have something very clear cut to offer, the State is about the very worst way of supplying any goods or services. The public
have the evidence in front of their very eyes, when Labour just promised the moon in the run up to the Election (Mandelson, I am looking at you !) and had not one brass farthing to pay for it.

By being a registered Political party we are playing 'the game',however Sinn Fein/IRA achieved far more in twenty years of bloody insurrection and bombed and shot their way to power sharing, as did the Israeli State, Makarios, and theMau Mau.

The Libertarian Alliance, and the likes of Dan Hannan and Douglas Carswell have tried to push the Conservative Party towards a Libertarian agenda to no avail. Dave made his famous 'The Conservative Party' is not a Libertarian Party at conference two years ago.

The Lbertarian in his core belief cannot initiate force in a Revolutionary manner because it is against our core beliefs. The question however has to be asked what does the Libertaian
do when a bankrupt state starts becoming more authoritarian, and starts to crack down on those advocating Classic Liberalism or Libertarianism. Which I would add most people in this country still believe they live under, not this Fabian State.

Resist by whatever means ? The Libertarian is entitled to self defence.

Revolution- We are all used to seeing revolutions being on the either the Marxist model or the ultra Conservative model. A lot of blood, a lot of bodies and a new El Presidente, before the whole thing collapses in either months or sixty years.

In 1989, there was a Revolution all over Eastern Europe, only in Romania did significant deaths occur. The Eastern States have now more freedom and the potential for prosperity than they ever had under Socialism.

Call me an idiot (and many will) we don't do violent revolutions in Britain (at least not since 1649). When Europe burned in 1848, we had the Chartist petition, who aims were absorbed over the next sixty years.

For that reason I believe a Revolution has already started, Statism has collapsed as surely as has Communism in the East. The old guard are mounting the barricades bleating about frontline services being cut by 25% or 40%. But in our hearts we know that there has to be a new settlement.

The debate on a bonfire of Laws has ignited debate and roused people. Even today there was a two page review in the 'Independent' on Hayek's 'Road to Serfdom which is now turning into a Amazon bestseller.

A year ago, I could not buy a copy in the Bristol University Bookshop ( I could buy sexy stuff on Che, Mao and Stalin- shelves of the stuff) and had to order it on line.

To quote the Independent, the book is being bought by the young and the politically savvy (the former does not apply to me)

Therefore the Revolution has started, the young will carry this forward. They have to because the alternative is to bail out the proceeding generation of welfare junkies by paying crippling taxation.

This Revolution does not need guns it needs words and courage, not storming the Winter Palace or the Bastille.

The Freedom Bill

Nick Clegg has launched the publicity for the Freedom Bill to go before Parliament in the Autumn.

Whilst your writer is very cynical about how much of the State is going to be rolled back by this and how much of this is a stunt he is not sure. I would rather that we had a written Constitution that protects the Individial from the State, and declare ALL Laws that are unconstitutional void.

Nevertheless I was pleased to put the Libertarian Party view point on the Nicky Campbell Show on Radio 5 Live this morning, and even more pleased to be asked to stay on the line for the full hour instead of the ten minutes booked.

If you want to listen to it I am sure it is on the BBC I Player, link to follow.

UPDATE

Tim Carpenter - Policy Director is doing 'Health on Talk Radio tonight at 10pm

Andrew is doing Radio London at 5.20pm on the Freedom Bill tonight

Prison Reform

I am glad the issue of imprisonment is being reviewed.

Kenneth Clarke, the Justice Secretary, is right in that we need to rethink the concept of imprisonment.

What comes out of his initiative is another matter. We will have to wait and see.

The decision to imprison people should be based on reason, scientific research and best practices, not on cost and not on the availability of spaces.

Letting people out early or not imprisoning them just because there is no money, all things being equal, is not acceptable. It is irresponsible and lazy. We do need to guard against this because there is always the risk that an initiative that indirectly means cutting prison places promotes that to become the end in itself, not out of the wellbeing of society or Law and Order, but of impatience or the need to exhibit results to coincide with the election cycle. I suspect five years is not a long time to produce measurable results in this field.

If the State begins to undermine what, in truth, is their prime directive, then it is undermining its reason for being, its sole legitimacy for raising taxes. That is not acceptable. We are now at risk of this happening.

What is certain is that imprisoning people for taking drugs or prostitution is absurd. Vast numbers of people could be removed from the criminal justice system by ending the criminalisation of these activities. If there is concern about drug takers, for example, then they should go directly to the rehabilitation stage. Locking a drug taker up in jail serves no rational purpose. Giving them a criminal record, likewise. If people really cared about prostitute welfare, they would focus on support facilities in the community, not lock them up, especially when many have dependent children.

The overriding aim of our criminal justice system (police, courts, prisons) is to enable citizens to go about their lawful business without let or hindrance. This should be implemented, primarily, by upholding the Rule of Law, which is about property rights, freedom of speech, of Association/Disassociation and, when within the system, presumption of innocence, habeas corpus and adversarial trial by a jury of one’s peers.

Imprisoning people is considered by many as a means to that end, not an end in itself. It is part of the deterrent effect. Prevention is better than cure. Cure is better than stabilising treatment. Prison is deterrent and punishment, a form of negative prevention, and a stabilising treatment via exclusion from society. Rehabilitation is cure and proactive future prevention. Good education is proactive future prevention and, as part of Rehabilitation, a cure.

The long term view then should be on ensuring we have a viable Educational system and a functioning rehabilitation service. The de facto monopoly of State education has not served us well and we have made our case to deal with this elsewhere.

Punishment and rehabilitation are two separate things and should require separate accommodation, different conditions and even institutions. There is no point trying to rehabilitate people who are living side by side with those newly convicted undergoing punishment. There is no point placing those beginning rehabilitation in with those who are well on the way to reform. What is essential to the whole purpose of the system is how those convicted will behave once released. This may, in some cases, mean fundamental habilitation. Common sense would then suggest that if the punishment makes habilitation or rehabilitation harder, then the form or even existence of punishment needs a review.

Rehabilitation in separate facilities need not be as secure as normal prisons and should free up resources for the rehabilitation process in general. If someone has poor impulse control, no sense of respect for themselves or others, until better mechanisms or therapies are found, we should not discard old approaches or suggestions out of hand based on some kind of prejudice. Consent by the individual is of course required – rehabilitation without consent could well be a form of inhumane treatment or torture. We also have to ensure that rehabilitation is not a Trojan Horse for political or social indoctrination.

When reforming the prison system, one also needs to look into the whole area of custody.

The threat of detention in a violent establishment while awaiting trial is a very powerful form of coercion at the disposal of the State and this coercion should be unacceptable to any civilised individual. Even after conviction, the potential, arbitrary actions of other inmates should not form part of any punishment, implied or otherwise.

Ensuring we are keeping like with like – first offenders, non-violent, violent, those on remand with no previous criminal convictions – should be seen as one way to stop the spread of criminality, improve the success of rehabilitation and protect the innocent. It might sound like I am treating criminality like a form of infection. I do not consider criminality as an infection, but it is common sense to isolate as far as practicable regardless of if it is even a meme or not. Many people commit crime because they are easily manipulated or influenced, so it makes sense to not make that situation worse.

The aim is the same – to enable those re-entering society to return being or become law-abiding, self-reliant, productive individuals as soon as possible. It might well be that a convict could go directly to forms of rehabilitation, though this needs to be used with caution and sensitivity in regards to any victims of the crime committed. The general deterrent effect should never be forgotten. Prisons should not be squalid, but housing people in conditions that are better than the living conditions some law abiding taxpayers or even the conditions of the convicts have come from could be seen as perverse, undoing disincentives to commit crime.

I do not condemn Kenneth Clarke’s announcement, but right now they are just words, at a time when budgets are being cut. We have justification and a duty to be sceptical.