Donald Trump has been denigrated and called an idiot by those who want him removed from the face of the Earth, but he called this correctly along with much else.
It is often said we get the politicians we deserve. Recent events have proved that to be true, and the video below shows a classic example of a script reader clinging to the narrative, let them eat cake…
This seems to have been a week of stupid promises, as potential leaders officials, think tanks, ministers and businessmen offer silly solutions to the energy crisis as a way of being seen to be doing something, It should be said that as they are responsible for the majority of the mess we are in after decades of denying practical ways forward, preferring be in awe to the great green god, they should come up with solutions, but all I see is back of a fag packet knee-jerk reaction to problem of their own collective making.
Perhaps as they get energy allowances they are not that bothered about what happens to the plebs, but they should be careful, in times past this sort of situation resulted in heads on pikes across Westminster Bridge; not likely to happen in what has become a largely apathetic nation, but who knows?
Onward, such a hopeful name, a government think tank, has suggested a halving of stamp duty to those who would install a heat pump. You can tell this was made up over a couple of Mojitos on the terrace at Westminster as none of the obvious downsides are mentioned.
The rebate is an incentive to those being’ hesitant about adopting new technologies’; no, people are declining the fitting of heat pumps because without a suitably insulated property and underfloor heating the are an expensive mistake.
Naturally net zero and its addicts trump any sensible proposals. As a former environment secretary said ‘Liz Truss ought to know the devastating consequences of failing to reach net zero.’Do these bubble dwellers ever stop to think that if we actually reach net zero, we won't, that it will not make one jot of difference in the scheme of things other than reduce our standard of living?
James Kirkup writes a scathing article in the Spectator about Liz Truss' and Rishi Sunak's dismissal of solar farms. There is nothing wrong with solar power, apart from the fact that no sun no power and the much vaunted storage ‘that will save our nation’ is still a far distant fairy story; and how much will we ever be able to store for those long dark winter months when the sun doesn’t shine?
Kirkup goes into great detail about how cheap solar power is. It really isn’t: as I have said before, no renewables are cheap if you have to have a parallel source of energy on stand by for those dark windless days. Until renewables can stand alone, why don’t we invest in an energy source that works and gives us independence, or is that too simple?
Before the crisis, I received an email from a major energy supplier that claimed that all their energy was from renewables. They are not alone, several companies say the same. It is a blatant lie: no energy company can possibly have a choice in the source of their energy, they simply use a Renewable Energy Guarantee of Origin certificate REGO to enable them to say such twaddle.
It enables companies to claim they are 100% green when they actually only need to have 30% in the mix. Wherever they claim to get their energy from, in fact all companies get it from the national grid which cannot stream different sources of energy. These companies take people for fools and get away with it.
From the above link…
‘Both Ecotricity and Good Energy source enough renewable electricity to match their customers’ usage though this tends to mean that their costs are higher and as a result their tariffs are more expensive.‘
So Kirkup's claim that renewables are cheaper than fossil fuels falls at the first hurdle as the green consumer actually pays more and gets the same energy as everyone else
The energy companies have themselves come up with a plan to ‘help’ the public. Keith Anderson, boss of Scottish Power, wants to help by setting up a government-backed (i.e. taxpayer funded) deficit fund running to £100 billion. Other companies are backing him and you can see why as the self-serving plan is popular: it effectively underwrites their businesses takes away risk of bad debts and takes away any windfall tax extensions.
It involves freezing the cap at £2000 for two years then covering the gap between the cap and the wholesale price of gas with the deficit fund. The repayment would be spread over ten to fifteen years with a mix of energy bills and taxation.
I am sure there is a better way of ‘helping’ those struggling with bills than this and it doesn’t involve giving ‘insurance’ to energy companies; again, the public are being taken for stupid.
Meanwhile Rishi Sunak, hoping to become PM, has issued this statement about how the Covid period was mishandled:
“This is the problem… If you empower all these independent people, you’re screwed… We shouldn’t have empowered the scientists in the way we did.”
He concludes that had we not done so, and had we acknowledged trade-offs from the beginning
“... we could be in a very different place… it could have been shorter. Different. Quicker. There were often times the officials would do a “pre-meeting”, decide what they wanted to push through, then ram it through in the main meeting with the PM/ministers.”
This process wasn’t helped when, on occasion, ministers would go into the key Covid meeting and be handed a set of 100 papers by officials, with no chance of being able to digest them before a decision was taken....
“Mr Sunak recalled the moment when Prof Neil Ferguson and his team at Imperial College London presented their Report 9, which claimed Covid casualties could reach 500,000 if no action was taken but would be reduced to 20,000 with a lockdown.”
As wriggle-free statements go it is quite good, but what it actually says they blindly took the path laid out for them by ‘experts.’ Not only have experts prospered on their misleading of the nation, but those who govern us just sat on their arses and signed anything put in front of them without any scrutiny. Now he wants us to believe it was none of their fault.
Why was Ferguson even invited to give his opinion? His track record in modelling was there for all to see. You, Rishi, along with others were a minister at the time but you failed to raise any alarms or resign in protest; nor did anyone else for that matter, so it’s bit late now.
Boris has no exit plan so has gone on holiday and laid low until he sees a further opportunity to gloss over his multiple failures and visits Ukraine again, promising them almost anything and telling the people back home they will have to ‘suck it up’ re energy prices as the Ukraine is more important than your granny dying of hyperthermia this winter.
Strange words from a Prime Minister whose prime concern should be his nation, his borders, and most importantly the safeguarding of his people, but when you are seeking a life beyond Westminster and a legacy all that goes out of the window.
Of course, Boris doesn’t pay any energy bills and as long as he stays an MP he can claim on expenses, while a growing number of people at the bottom of the pile will not be able to turn on the heating.
His and previous governments have pandered to the green lobby and become evermore reliant on importing energy to cover the shortfalls when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun stays in, rather than build our own infrastructure and be secure, and now he wants us to suffer to save Ukraine.
They take us for idiots and get away with it.
