They Just Don't Get It! Heavy Rain In The UK Shock!

They Just Don't Get It! Heavy Rain In The UK Shock!

Just how serially useless is the Environment Agency and the HarryPotteresque Minister for the Environment? Having just returned from an eventful round trip to the Canaries...The ship was really rocking "worst conditions in the Bay of Biscay for 100 years" and Captain Remo had the charts to prove it! However due respect to Royal Carribbean and the Independence of the Seas as it took 30 metre high waves in its stride and the side fin 6 metre stabilisers worked very well minimising the motion of the ocean but we still dropped Funchal Madiera to maintain the scheduled roundtrip to the Canary Islands... 

The point of all this being that the ship was bult to meet extreme weather conditions and the Captain had all the resources and training to meet such extreme conditions. But what on earth is happening at Cockermouth?

Aptly named as yet again the Environment Agency is once again exposed at the serially useless fraudulent talking shop with few active bodies on the ground to marshall resources or tough enough to demand from DEFRA and the Government of the day substantial practical and financial resources to protect our own populations. This wholly top heavy impractal and serially useless orgnisation needs a bottom to top investigation. It's no secret that the top EA management see theirt tenure as a passport to the top jobs in the water industry - a classic case of jobs for the boys (and girls) which you the taxpayer happily fund. (OK water companies sue me...)  

The reality is that unlike the USA where the National Guard can be mobilised in a moment we have to fall back on a mishmash of local, regional and voluntary sector resources. Cockermouth is now an insurance blackspot and few if any in the future will get full flood related insurance protection.

What financial and practical assistance is given by the insurance industry will have first been knocked back by the insurance company appointed so called independent loss adjusters. Few of those going through a living hell at the moment will think to appoint their own Loss Assessors to fight their corner and get a reasonable claim passed by the underwriters. Local Authorities will naturally hang back until the insurance payouts are completed or at least well advanced.

The Environment Agency has been working at full tilt, Press and PR people have been securing TV and Radio Interviews for bearded EA numpties in pristine new high viz jackets and just out of the box safety helmets. Weather bulletins promote the virtually useless Floodline Number which simply tells you the blinding obvious that your property is underwater or rather coated with raw sewage... forget about swine flu this is way more dangerous than any pandemic.    

It's no secret that I worked with the Environmanrt Agency and put in at the end of my contract a detailed multipage critique "whistle blowing" if you like and additionally sent a hard copy to EA Head Office before my files were locally wiped off the EA computer.

Money was in my time during the year 2000, being wasted on a massive scale, little on practical projects but on image building and paper-based studies that would never see the light of day, in addition to pet projects devised by staff to keep themselves busy, when their original functiion had long since gone.

 The man on the sluicegate,reed cutters, dredging and silt clearing all part of the old Nationasl Rivers Authority - all practical measures drastically cut back when the EA swallowed the NRA...

The solution: 

Cut all the silly non productive studies and pen pushers, massively pour practical resources and substantial money into flood defence, totally rethink cost saving plans whch curtailed NRA activities. 

Hire complete with crew and catering staff the largest cruise ships afloat to be used as an immediate accommodation and feeding resource and to lessen the trauma of stress which will this week start to kick in and cost the NHS an untold amount of money. Tell Gordon Brown where to stick his sticking plaster funding and put £30 million immediately ie in gthe next three days  (readily available from the CONTINGENCY FUND)  into the area together with military logistics, engineers, Hire marine designers and shipyards in Finland to turn out bailey type bridges which they will take a fraction of the time to build andf deliver.  Accommodation units - not caravans - to be sited locally.

But there again the EA knows all this and as senior political appointments only work in the short term, its more about posturing than practical life saving solutions. The rest of us should be weeping as Westminster just looks on slightly bemused...         

  


   

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So what is to be done about Afghanistan?

So what is to be done about Afghanistan? Fort Hood USA shooting -12 killed, dozens injured, graphically shows the threat is now from within our own borders not distant Afghanistan & Pakistan



The problem with the UK is since the Thatcher era we have been constantly punching above our weight and when Labour came into power some twelve years ago, it was with the promise of a new revitalised UK.

Northern Ireland (with an untold amount of money thrown at it) no longer was a nagging sore, deals were done and the Irish Taliban, senior IRA personnel, were given shoe-in positions of power, when at least one of them should have been facing a trial for 18 well documented murders and the UK authorities to this very day have all the evidence – firmly under lock and key.

The involvement of an Irish Priest at one point caused at least one of the major fugitives to be released having been captured after a long and bloody search by the military.

I know this as the senior military figure in Belfast at the time (now sadly passed on) recounted the story in detail to me. It was at the end of his distinguished military career when he, Major Napier was looking forward to retirement, but was unexpectedly posted to Belfast with the Kings Own Troop Royal Horse Artillery.


Ironically, I later heard the London Met. Police (at the time, on virtual permanent secondment to Northern Ireland) view on the same series of incidents in Northern Ireland and all the strands matched up.


So given the Northern Ireland experience and the fact that Tony Blair was in the driving seat, you can see why Gordon Brown is keen to make Afghanistan work, even though the current rate of murders (you really can’t call them battlefield casualties) is exceeding the Falklands daily tally.


Ministers keep to the line that if we pull out, the Taliban will join with other terrorist groups, overrun Pakistan and use nuclear weapons against us in the UK. So the classic Westminster model thinking is (as used back in colonial times) support the functioning Government of the day, put in place basic elements of a rag tag police force and implant basic civic systems, use a combination of bribes dressed up as aid and threats (withdrawal of bribes ie aid) to exert a nominal hold over the incumbent Government.


Trouble is everyone knows that the UK is financially stretched and the populous does not have the jingoistic (politically incorrect) will to support the action in Afghanistan.


Children have grown up during the 12 years of Labour inspired multicultural rule and with information computer technology, know far more about world affairs than many politicians from a previous more sane world.


Take a walk around any major UK conurbation, find the Central Library computer room or in-town internet cafés, the collective high tech teaching of discredited and deported Mullahs are to be found streaming hate and vilification 24 hours a day and 7 days a week.


Essentially it’s Gordon Brown looking at the Autumn of his political aspirations versus the Mullahs? No contest in some ethnic and religious groupings. The days of a stiff upper lip, swagger stick and a loud “Now look here…” no longer works. ‘Johnny Foreigner’ lives in the UK, has a growing family, a taxpayer and is now a second/third generation British Citizen.


Ministers say the threat comes from a variety of ‘dark’ fanatical well financed, trained, equipped forces combining together and then our own mainland is threatened.


For this reason if you follow the logic, we fight hand to hand skirmish actions with conventional weaponry and highly restrictive rules of engagement in Afghanistan? Rather than unleashing a concerted arms length missile based attack and blanket carpet bombing of poppy fields,Taliban strongholds and used of a whole range of weapons of mass destruction NATO forces have stashed away. The whole Dr Strangelove scenario if you like, and where are all those NATO troops and associated support?


Publicly when we were ‘winning’ it looked good, and gave MPs something to talk about. The UK looked good (in Gordons’ good eye anyway) at international symposia such as the G8 or G20 and soon wonderful Copenhagen. Such actions keep the arms industry in operation and many thousands employed in areas traditionally associated with high unemployment.


On the money side conventional warfare is also cheap, the Treasury likes that, having dipped into and virtually emptied the secret off balance sheet military ‘contingency fund’ or ‘war chest’ to pay off (or bail out) the bankers, prop up the massive underfunding of the Olympics, the private sector was supposed to have filled.


The truth is that few really understanding what goes on inside the many privately funded faith schools, parents and young impressionable people also have access to superior worldwide family and wider networking avenues only open and normal to people of Asian origin. All perfectly legal and supported to the hilt, by the Human Rights Act.


It also has to be said, the traditional British family unit crumbled a few generations back. As to the UK’s world financial standing, reading The Daily Telegraph as the Taliban certainly do, “UK is ‘skint’ says M&S’s Sir Stuart Rose”. If the Taliban didn’t know it earlier they certainly do now!


So no strong public backing for the war, no extra money to fight it and a Government on the way out probably by late March. MP’s collectively tarnished as corrupt with Duckhouses and moats to clean, all out of the public purse. Whilst mounting job losses are announced daily and not just in the hundreds but thousands. Nothing like a good recession to have a bottom upwards corporate clear out, it’s not looking good.

The USA Fort Worth killings allegedly by a lone shooter US Army Medic Major Nidal Hasan, who according to a neighbour wrote in arabic "Allah" on his apartment front door underlines the crass stupidity of the Gordon Brown position on Afghanistan, the terrorist threat is now clearly well organised and from within. Let me make it clear from within the UK, USA, France, Germany in fact every country.


A weak, corrupt Afghanistan Government and subsistence level poorly paid Afghan trainee police officers drawn from the general population, with minimal vetting. Extra income and wider families covertly maintained by the opium warlords and in a country where everyone is related. That is what our troops are facing, and Gordon Brown knows it.


So what should be done. Gordon needs to save face. He’s lost his saintly spin doctor, rudderless if you like, nervous about returning highly professional motivated battle hardened but disciplined British troops en-mass to the UK, but that is what has to be done, the real threat is from within and as we are now fully within Europe, the Lisbon treaty having been ratified, take full advantage of it.


Europe can now collectively take over the Police training role and supply on a rota basis, the NATO troops required, our insular role is effectively done and dusted. We should leave Afghanistan, within weeks and if there is any training to be done, it can be carried out at arms length in neutral territory in any one of a number of European countries.


We’ll continue to supply the hardware and remote drone assisted air support but our British troops on the ground in hostile conditions? This is the battle tactic of 64 years ago, the Battle of the Somme without the mud. Just as futile and pointless.


The heartbreaking thing is that all the Ministers know it, but have to keep it going until they can collectively pass the buck or baton to a new administration. “Not our problem old boy. Fancy a pink Gin?”

END


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For Publication CREDITLINE: Julian Bray MCIPR NUJ
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McCanns in new TV plea for missing daughter

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Gordon Brown dashes Tony Blairs chances as EU President!

That nail-biting master of the political podcast and self-serving media interviews Gordon (I'm looking for a job next May) Brown has thrown his lot in as Tony Blairs bagman for the EU Presidency. The EU has not filed proper accounts for many years now and hands out expenses, as we would dish out cornflakes...

Labour really did turn on 'Rivers of Blood', Blair,Straw and Blunkett said to be Implicated

Labour wanted mass immigration to make UK more multicultural, claims former adviser.

Labour threw open Britain's borders to mass immigration to help socially engineer a "truly multicultural" country, a former Government adviser has revealed.


The story originally published in the London Evening Standard was picked up by Tom Whitehead, Home Affairs Editor of the Daily Telegraph, he writes:


The huge increases in migrants over the last decade were partly due to a politically motivated attempt by ministers to radically change the country and "rub the Right's nose in diversity", according to Andrew Neather, a former adviser to Tony Blair, Jack Straw and David Blunkett.


He said Labour's relaxation of controls was a deliberate plan to "open up the UK to mass migration" but that ministers were nervous and reluctant to discuss such a move publicly for fear it would alienate its "core working class vote". I admire Islam, it's lefties I can't stand. As a result, the public argument for immigration concentrated instead on the economic benefits and need for more migrants.


Critics said the revelations showed a "conspiracy" within Government to impose mass immigration for "cynical" political reasons.


Mr Neather was a speech writer who worked in Downing Street for Tony Blair and in the Home Office for Jack Straw and David Blunkett, in the early 2000s.


Writing in the London Evening Standard, he revealed the "major shift" in immigration policy came after the publication of a policy paper from the Performance and Innovation Unit, a Downing Street think tank based in the Cabinet Office, in 2001.


He wrote a major speech for Barbara Roche, the then immigration minister, in 2000, which was largely based on drafts of the report. He said the final published version of the report promoted the labour market case for immigration but unpublished versions contained additional reasons, he said.


He wrote: "Earlier drafts I saw also included a driving political purpose: that mass immigration was the way that the Government was going to make the UK truly multicultural.


"I remember coming away from some discussions with the clear sense that thepolicy was intended – even if this wasn't its main purpose – to rub the Right's nose in diversity and render their arguments out of date."


The "deliberate policy", from late 2000 until "at least February last year", when the new points based system was introduced, was to open up the UK to mass migration, he said.


Some 2.3 million migrants have been added to the population since then, according to Whitehall estimates quietly slipped out last month. On Question Time on Thursday, Mr Straw was repeatedly quizzed about whether Labour's immigration policies had left the door open for the BNP.


In his Evening Standard column, Mr Neather said that as well as bringing in hundreds of thousands more migrants to plug labour market gaps, there was also a "driving political purpose" behind immigration policy. He defended the policy, saying mass immigration has "enriched" Britain, and made London a more attractive and cosmopolitan place. But he acknowledged that "nervous" ministers made no mention of the policy at the time for fear of alienating Labour voters.


"Part by accident, part by design, the Government had created its longed-for immigration boom.


"But ministers wouldn't talk about it. In part they probably realised the conservatism of their core voters: while ministers might have been passionately in favour of a more diverse society, it wasn't necessarily a debate they wanted to have in working men's clubs in Sheffield or Sunderland."


Sir Andrew Green, chairman of the Migrationwatch think tank, said: "Now at least the truth is out, and it's dynamite. "Many have long suspected that mass immigration under Labour was not just a cock up but also a conspiracy. They were right.


"This Government has admitted three million immigrants for cynical political reasons concealed by dodgy economic camouflage."


The chairmen of the cross-party Group for Balanced Migration, MPs Frank Field and Nicholas Soames, said: "We welcome this statement by an ex-adviser, which the whole country knows to be true. It is the first beam of truth that has officially been shone on the immigration issue in Britain."


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For Publication CREDITLINE: Julian Bray MCIPR NUJ
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Griffin gets the Cassetteboy treatment...Enjoy!

IF you missed the BBC Questiontime Show with BNP's Tubby Hitler affectionado Nick Griffen MEP, making a prize chump of himself, this is all you really need to know and in under 2 minutes! Hats off to Cassetteboy another mini masterpiece..

BBC TVC PROTEST AT BNP TAKING PART IN QUESTION TIME

Fun and games outside the BBC TVC in London as reviled British National Party Head Nick Griffin MEP was smuggled inside to appear on the 22nd October 2009 edition of the News Entertainment Question Time TV Programme. Around 600 people waving placards were in place to greet him and possibly still in place to see him smuggled out..

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OFT NOT TO INVESTIGATE PUBLIC HOUSE PROPERTY COMPANIES BEER TIE

The Office of Fair Trading is not going to investigate the beer tie purchase arrangement between pubcos and their managers. This means they must buy certain live or real ales,  at inflated non-market prices from designated distributors... rather than from frfee market sources or drerict from individual breweries.

OFT RESPONSE: Any strategy by a pub-owning company which compromises the competitive position of its tied pubs would not be sustainable, as this would result in a loss of sales," said Simon Williams, senior director of the OFT's goods group.
I leased a free of tie pub in Norfolk and after 18 months gave back the lease losing in the process. I found out too late that the previous landlord had in fact been trading around the clock and doubling bar prices after closing time during lock ins!

But the real problem with the OFT report is:

The OFT report totally misses the point that pubcos are these days in effect little more than property companies and have no interest in the promotion of live or real ale. That is fact.

They would prefer that real ale is confined to a bottle and that line fed beers are restricted to lagers and other easy to handle top pressure ( ie co2 driven) beers as the pubcos can put line monitors on each line, they are unable to do this with live or real ales through hand pump beer engines. in fact by the application of the tie, it effectively restricts distribution and competition.

Tie beers are usually distributed by third parties (ie Batemans use Small Beer many others use Waveney Beer Seller) so a dual price list will be applied on the same delivery run, the non tied pub will get a similar beer for say 30% less than the next drop off to a tied pub, all from the samer Gyle [brew]number.

If the Pubco can show that a pub is failing it can be easily disposed of, the licence withdrawn, despite any objections from locals, simply by showing the negative balance sheet! The property delicenced and used for other purposes such as a private residence. This returns an amazing proifit to the pubco shareholders, far more than a rental income! 

I cannot believe that the OFT has been so taken in by the pubcos!






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For Publication Subject to CREDITLINE: Julian Bray MCIPR NUJ
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"Barking Nutter Party has an efnik write two be herd" NIck Griffin

Each time the Robert Maxwell of the collective dangerous loony parties BNP (Barking Nutter Party) top of the slimeball manure heap and head honcho Nick Griffin (he retains Maxwells hair and colour stylist) correctly claims that the Spitfire “represents the collective will of the British people to respond to the threat of foreign invasion”. He forgets it also took a lot of aluminium pots and pans PLUS a variety of nationalities to knit the whole Spitfire and Hurricane series of iconic 1940's aircraft together.

However what he deliberately blanks out, as it does not fit into his Janet & John mini-Hitler Guide to Democracy is that the British Army, Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force has long recruited brave soldiers, sailors and airmen of every ethnic and cultural background.

Specifically to respond to the threat of any foe threatening the British community - irrespective of that community’s race, colour or creed.

This includes multi-cultural and ethnic British soldiers currently serving in Afghanistan, even if some of us doubt the correctness of our involvement, the military without question will carry out the wishes of the elected politicians (OK we did not elect Brown as our Prime Minister but hopefully that will be corrected by a wholesale change in leadership next May!)


But using iconic images to prop up the dangerous nutter party is not only a cheap shot but unwittingly for Griffin very cost effective and a truly brilliant move! All the hard work of thinking up policies and designing a corporate brand or logo is no longer required. I commend it to other aspiring but cash strapped political hopefuls!  

Just visit The Imperial war Museums' own wartime airport in Duxford and buy up the reproductions for a couple of quid in the museum shop, or stand in front of the classic displays with a throwaway camera. A couple of felt tip markers and an appropriate loony slogan and our top of the heap shite shoveller Nick is in business!

So much so, that the weak willed numpties at the BBC offers our Nick a seat on Question Time! It might however be a smart move as random questions from the floor might cause our Nick to depart from the six foot high idiot boards being held up by Millwall supporters for him to read extolling the Barking Nutter Party mantra. 

In spiderlike block capitals as written by a five year old (Oh it was! Apparently very few BNP members can string words together, so one of the children was bribed with a box of gob stoppers sent to Nick by the Tory party but he didn't take the hint!).

The sad part is the Nutters will pick up a few votes and may even elect an MP or two. They will contribute little to the overall democratic mix but at least they will be heard and for that the muti-ethnic sacrifice of our WW2 airmen - and the fatal casualties from the 200 wars since then -  will have been of lasting value and honour. Rather than the nation now speaking German and Nick having the life immediately squeezed out of him at birth as clearly he does not fit the true genetic make up of a real blonde Nazi. The hair dye gives it away.       
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For Publication subject to CREDITLINE: Julian Bray MCIPR NUJ
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Pink Taxi and a Fag for Jan Moir

Pink Taxi and a Fag for Jan Moir

I've never met Jan Moir or if I have it would have been at one time, during my long and distinguished drinking career, now sadly a distant twinkle. It would be in the back bar at El Vino's in Londons' Fleet Street (the late Nigel Dempster and Peter McKay (McHackey) would be at the front bar alcove on the right as you enter. Or perhaps later in the Kensington basement car park underneath the Daily Mail Building? Should explain, it was turned into a drinking/dining club Scribes West - hosted and part owned at one time by a Mr Terry Venables (of footy fame and a dab hand on the Karry-Oaki-Dokey machine - if you like 'My Way' sung like that).

I say this as I have this vivid picture of Jan knocking back a few gin martinis, a couple of Advocaat snowballs, a pink gin or two and a slug of Jack Daniels for good measure. Then just as she is about to start an evenings entertainment, a few moir (?) drinks perhaps, the office telephones.

A battle weary Sub-Editor (if they still have them) drones down the phone:"Stephen Gately has died", "Stephen WHO? You dare to ring me for this?! DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM??!!"

The sub-editor now standing to attention at his desk and not having the benefit of a good liquid lunch, just a few overpriced dried out cardboard sandwiches and a glass of Hock. "Err, I think you used to work here?" replies the deskbound hack warming to the challenge and knowing he has the power to ruin social and love lives, holidays and anything else that gets in the way of a good story.

At this point Jan reveals her softer side: "OK get me the cuttings from the Mo[ir]gue and I'll give you 750 sassy words. No one will read it as Baz and co will go celeb. overboard and I doubt if it will make the final edition."

Conspiracy theory or cock-up? The latter perhaps, in the biblical sense. Little was she to realise that the paper having already stupidly upset Tory MP hopeful (and possibly Alan A'Dales long lost bastard strolling minstral son - or was it Jim Dale?) the magnificent Iain Dale no less. ("He's a bugger Lord Rogermere, NO a BLOGGER, you fool!" the comment lost in the white noise of truth..).

Jan smoothes down the creases in her M&S blue polka dot dress - if its good enough for Mrs Cameron it's OK pour Moir! She happily tells anyone who will listen that "Mr Rose had given her one!" Falling over the threshold of the office, clearing a ton of detritus from the first available desk,clutching a box of grubby well thumbed cuttings, Jan begins, but first licking the traces of Advocaat from her parched but quivering lips....

Point par..In fact, it is rather depressingly familiar. But somehow we never expected it of him. Never him. Not Stephen Gately...In the cheerful environs of Boyzone, Gately was always charming, cute, polite and funny.,,, even though he could barely carry a tune in a Louis Vuitton trunk.... the Posh Spice of Boyzone...Gately came out as gay in 1999.... effectively smoked out of the closet


Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1220756/A-strange-lonely-troubling-death--.html#ixzz0U97Am7P8



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For Publication CREDITLINE: Julian Bray MCIPR NUJ
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MoD document confirms £97 MILLION worth of cuts in British Army resource

The British Army has been forced to cut the number of new soldiers it recruits to save money, official MoD document

According to MoD document ref:“ABN 57/09 In Year Savings Measures” Savage cuts in manpower are part of a £97 million package of spending reductions forced on the Army this year. This follows the UK Governments spending of over a TRILLION POUNDS STERLING to prop up the all but bust banking sector, the virtually unlimited printing of banknotes by thye Bank of England (other banks may be available!) and to pay for MP's expenses, Duck Houses, Moats, Food, Cleaners and so on.

Training for Territorial Army soldiers and the renovation of soldiers’ housing - already in a poor condition have also been cut to save the faces of several politicans. The reductions in training and recruiting are now raising concerns about the impact on the Army’s future capabilities. The squeeze on the Army’s already strapped budget has emerged in the same week that beleagured Prime Minister Gordon Brown, currently bumping along the bottom of the opinion polls, announced he will send another 500 British troops to Afghanistan. He did however put several conditions on the deployment, non of them medical or relating to his own health.

Ministers have publicly and repeatedly insisted that the Armed Forces are properly funded, but the Army document drawn up this week for the MoD shows that Army recruitment has been cut by 500 from January to relieve “pressure” on the manpower budget. The very same number earmarked for active service in Afghanistan.

The MoD paper, dated October 13 2010, obtained by the Miltary World website is entitled “ABN 57/09 In Year Savings Measures”. It outlines cuts drawn up by General Sir David Richards, the Chief of the General Staff and rubber stamped by the not very impressive Bob Ainsworth, the current defence secretary.

Sir David has already made cuts of £43 million to help the MoD balance its budget, but at a stormy meeting of the Defence Board last month, he was told to come up with another £54 million of reductions, an amount lesdsd than the Mod's annual spewnd on spin doctors.

The Daily Telegraph revealed last month that the MoD spent more than pounds 61 million on public relations last year.

To avoid direct cuts from the Afghan operation, Sir David has been forced to reduce the Army’s training and recruitment activities.

The paper states: “The planned recruit intake into the Army Recruiting and Training Division is to be reduced by 500 to help reduce the specific pressure on the Army manpower budget.”

In 2008, the Army took in 14,280 new people, while 14,070 personnel left. A 500-place recruitment cut would have meant the Army brought in fewer people than it lost. The recruitment cut will be felt across the Army. The only units to be spared from the cuts are the so-called “pinch point” trades where there are already deep shortages of specialists, and those infantry regiments with the worst recruiting records.

The recruitment cut will deprive the Army of £2 million in the current financial year, the MoD paper claims.

“The planned recruit intake into the Army Recruiting and Training Division is to be reduced by 500 to help reduce the specific pressure on the Army manpower budget," the document concludes.

After intense criticism from opposition parties, campaigners and commanders, ministers made repeated promises to improve the standard of accommodation for soldiers, but shamefully the document reveals that housing has also fallen victim to the cuts. Another £14 million of cuts will be made by delay some planned upgrade work on single soldiers’ living accommodation.

The Army had planned to upgrade 790 housing units this year. Now only 205 of those projects will be completed on time this year.

The MoD paper, widely distributed to commanding officers and senior officials this week, says the cuts are needed for the MoD to “remain within budget in this financial year.”

It says: “Financially, these are difficult times and the MOD, like all Government departments, is required to produce major cost savings.”

“Our priority is to support current operations and these measures are necessary to focus remaining resources on the main effort. These measures will not affect current operations.”

The document also confirms that training for Territorial Army soldiers will be cut by £20 million. That follows a £23 million cut earlier in the year. A budget reduction of £43 million in less than a year.

David Cameron, the Conservative leader, said the “unacceptable” cuts are affecting reservists due to go to Afghanistan next year.

Another £4 million will be cut from funding for school cadet forces. As Chancellor in 2006, Gordon Brown announced the expansion of cadet units, saying he wanted more children to participate in them.

University Officer Training Corps will also lose £3 million.

The cut in Army recruiting and training should raise questions about Government/MoD runaway spending on civilian officials. The MoD currently employs 85,730 civil servants. Britain now has more military bureaucrats for every active serviceman than any of its NATO allies..

Liam Fox, the Conservative shadow defence secretary, accused Labour of being: “disgraceful and penny pinching."

He said: “Too often, this Government has simply not been up to the task on defence. We need forces that are better supplied with equipment.. In Afghanistan and elsewhere, whether we’re dealing with equipment or other things, we’re willing the ends, but not the means.”





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SWNS South West News Agency News agency founder dies aged 73

SWNS South West News Agency News agency founder dies aged 73



A South West journalist synonymous with the Bristol region's news and sport has died aged 73. Roland Arblaster, affectionately known as Roly, worked for Bristol dailies the Evening Post and Western Daily Press in the 1960s as a news reporter despite nearly embarking on a cookery course to become a chef. While doing a paper round prior to commencement of the course he noticed an advert for a junior reporter so applied for that instead.

Upon leaving the Bristol papers, Roly was a founder member of the South West News Service, now a very well-established and busy news agency supplying copy and pictures to national and international magazines, newspapers and broadcasters.

During his 17 years with SWNS he built a long-standing relationship with HTV and worked for them as a freelance TV reporter. Roland also supplied my own news agency CNS-City News Service with background and research on all matters related to his home stamping ground Bristol. When Danny la Rue appeared in the 1980 box office record breaking Christmas Pantomime Aladdin at the Bristol Hippodrome, Roly 'invented' a series of stories surrounding the Aladdin theme, which had local children invading carpet shops in the City looking for a missing flying magical carpet which finally ended up on a parking space, being clamped and Aladdin played by Geraldine Gardner (Bombalurina in the original London production of Cats) mistakenly handed a REAL parking ticket which took some explaining as it wasn't subsequently cancelled and court documents issued stated "Registration Number Refused!"

In the late 70s he covered the region's sport and in 1982 sold his share of SWNS to work full-time for HTV, becoming news editor and then taking over the sports desk in 1992.

That same year he launched the hour-long highlights show 'West Match' which was HTV's first dedicated football show.

Among the big stories he covered included exposing patient cruelty at a local hospital in the 1970s after two nurses turned whistle blowers and the great floods of 1968.

Roly was an avid cricket fan, following Gloucestershire CCC, and was chairman of Timsbury Cricket Club.

His son Colin told the Evening Post: "He was kind and worshipped mum and put her on a pedestal. He supported us and was a really strong character, and we will all miss him."

Roly died at his home whilst watching football. He leaves behind his wife Janet, they married in 1965, three children and five grandchildren.

Ouch! Dave Letterman Divorce could cost $300,000,000!

Geraldo Rivera on FoxNews quoting sources says that naughty talk show king Dave Letterman is facing a divorce allegedly filed by his long suffering former girlfriend of many years and wife of a few years ...perhaps the two bricks treatment would have been cheaper!


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For Publication CREDITLINE: Julian Bray MCIPR NUJ
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Gordon Brown speaks:Eye,Eye that's your lot! Cassetteboy video...Enjoy

Gordon Brown speaks:"Eye, Eye that's your lot!" Cassetteboy video...Enjoy!
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