Archive for October 2011

EU referendum not a priority but line of succession is?

October 28, 2011 Bullshit One comment

David Cameron told us that now wasn’t the time for a referendum on the EU, saying it was more important to sort out the economy and that most people were more interested in jobs and the cost of living than having a referendum on the EU.

Queen with the PopeSo it’s not the right time to sort out the cause of our doom-spiralling economy, high unemployment and high cost of living but it is apparently the right time to sort out the laws governing succession to the throne to allow the monarch to marry Catholics, girls to accede to the throne ahead of boys and to remove the requirement for the monarch to authorise royal marriages.

I wonder how many people have written to their MPs asking them to make these changes?  I reckon most MPs will have had somewhere in the region of zero letters about this and quite rightly so – it doesn’t matter.

But the changes that are being made are.  The monarch is the head of the Anglican church, how can they marry a Catholic?  The changes require amendments to Act of Settlement and the Bill of Rights – I just don’t trust the British government to make changes to the English constitution.  They’re already talking about a British Bill of Rights and Responsibilities again, is this going to be used as an opportunity to do away with the English Bill of Rights and replace it with an inferior British alternative?

This is a pointless distraction, an unnecessary tinkering with the English constitution and a complete waste of time and money.

HMRC demanding a voluntary tax contribution!

October 19, 2011 WTF? 2 comments

Mrs Sane registered as self employed earlier this year for her Scentsy business.

Like most small businesses, she had start-up costs and is putting pretty much all of her profits back into the business so she won’t have any taxable income for at least a couple of years.  So it was a surprise to get a letter from HMRC today demanding £60 of National Insurance contributions.

I called them up for her and asked how she could be liable for National Insurance with no taxable income.  Or no salary at all, in fact.  The answer was that regardless of whether she has any taxable income, she is still liable for £2.50 per week National Insurance contributions to ensure she is eligible to receive benefits and to go towards a state pension.

She doesn’t claim benefits and there will be no such thing as a state pension by the time we’re old enough to retire so I asked if it was a voluntary contribution.  He told me that it wasn’t voluntary but she could opt out of paying it if she has a taxable income of less than £5k per year.  So … that would be voluntary then?

Forget about the recession, let’s change the law of succession

October 12, 2011 Bullshit, WTF? 3 comments

The world is in recession, the Bank of England have had to magic another £75bn out of thin air to try and stimulate the economy, unions are threatening to bring the country to its knees and what’s David Cameron’s number one priority?  Changing the laws of succession.

Apparently what we really need to concentrate on is not sorting out the economy, making sure that people have a roof over their heads, jobs and something to eat but changing the law to make sure women can inherit the throne ahead of younger men and that future monarchs can marry catholics.  How can the head of the Church of England marry a catholic?

Unbelievable.  Well done Dave.

Four ISPs agree to censor internet

October 11, 2011 Come the revolution, Technology 2 comments

Four ISPs have agreed to censor the internet on behalf of the British government.

Sky, BT, TalkTalk and Virgin have all signed up to the agreement to automatically block “adult content”, requiring customers to specifically ask for the block to be removed.  The agreement has come about following a report from the religious pressure group, the Mothers’ Union, which said that censorship is necessary to protect children.

We have a reliable way of preventing our children accessing adult content on the internet without state-organised censorship – the computer is in the living room and we watch what they’re doing.  Not a very high tech solution but it’s a damn sight more reliable than censorship.

This is just the thin end of the wedge.  Today it’s blocking whatever a panel of Mary Whitehouse wannabes determine to be “adult content” for the good of the children (won’t you think of the children, it’s for them), tomorrow it will be what a panel of career politicians decides are “extreme views” and then it will be anything that’s critical of the British government and before long the internet will be censored according to the whims of whichever illiberal clone happens to be in power at the time.

The erosion of civil liberties is one-way, we will never get them back if we allow them to be taken.  This isn’t about porn, it’s about the principal of uncensored and unrestricted access to information.  It’s not about saving children from the ignorance of their parents, it’s about the state establishing the principal of censorship of the internet.  Once you’ve agreed to the principal, the rest is just haggling about the price.

Choose your charity carefully

October 11, 2011 Anglophobia 6 comments

Remembrance Day is coming up and the poppy hawkers are out already.  Normally I would buy a poppy almost as soon as they went on sale but this year I won’t be buying one, not because I don’t think they collect for a good cause but because of an objection to the way they treat England.

The Royal British Legion’s Poppy Appeal merged with Poppyscotland this year in a deal which will see “substantial additional investment” in Poppyscotland paid out of money donated in England, Wales and Northern Ireland to the Poppy Appeal while “the Poppyscotland brand will continue unchanged and the Scottish Poppy and Scottish Poppy Appeal will remain in place, with funds raised from the campaign being used exclusively to support the Armed Forces and veterans’ community in Scotland“.

The British Legion are certainly not the only culprits where this sort of thing is concerned though.  Age Concern and Help the Aged also merged this year to become Age Scotland, Age Cymru, Age NI and Age UK.  Not Age England, Age UK.

I know there are lots of organisations that do this (eg. the British Medical Association, the FA, the RFU) so I had a look at some of the bigger, well known charities to see how they organise themselves and here’s what I found:

Amnesty  International organises itself as Amnesty International Scotland, Amnesty International Wales, Amnesty International NI and Amnesty International.  The British Heart Foundation is BHF Scotland the BHF.  Christian Aid is Christian Aid Scotland, Christian Aid Wales and Christian Aid.  There is a Citizens Advice Scotland and plain old Citizens Advice.  There is a MIND Cymru and just MIND that only operates in England.  There is a National Trust Scotland and the National Trust.  Oxfam has an Oxfam Scotland, Oxfam Wales and plain old Oxfam.  The YMCA is organised as YMCA Scotland, YMCA Wales, YMCA NI and the YMCA.

This poses a bit of a dilemma.  Charities (genuine charities, not taxpayer-funded lobbyists) perform a very important function, providing services that would otherwise be out of reach of vulnerable people and financially supporting those in need.  But there’s an important matter of principle at stake here – the deliberate and insulting ignorance of England.  I mean, in what alternative reality is it acceptable for the Poppy Appeal to merge with Poppyscotland, give them a share of the money they collect in England and allow Poppyscotland to keep all the money they collect in Scotland?

I won’t be buying a poppy this year – I’ll make a donation to Help for Heroes instead if I see one of their collectors out and about.  I won’t be donating to any of the charities named above either if I see their collectors (although I wouldn’t have donated to the religious ones anyway).  It might seem harsh but if charities want English money then they should stop insulting English people.

Oh dear

October 5, 2011 Funny 2 comments

Spotted at our local school the other day …

… anti-climb paint on a climbing wall.