MPs, Cats, and Spiders

It’s good to be back in cyberspace after an absence of 8 weeks, due to my computer contracting some kind of virus which sadly turned out to be terminal. Fortunately, it wasn’t transmitted to the person sitting in front of the screen, so I’ve survived, and as you can see, I have set up another machine that will have to put up with my rantings for the foreseeable future.

Quite a lot has been happening over those weeks – the expenses row in Westminster surfaced again, MPs are to be banned from employing their close relatives to type out their missives and fetch their favourite biscuits, and the leader of the BNP was allowed to appear on Question Time. Shock and horror was expressed by the newspapers, trying to outdo each other in condemning John “Nick” Griffin, the BNP leader. Now, I’m certainly opposed to what that party stands for, but the scenes outside the BBC on the night in question were deplorable. We had the usual sort of mob, baying for blood, all with their own hidden, and sometimes weird, agendas. Some of those are members of the mainstream parties, whose leaders are allowed on most platforms, although their conduct leaves a lot to be desired at times. Britain, as far as I’m aware, is still supposed to be a democracy, so we should all have the right to express our opinions.

After the hype over the past couple of days over the 10 new nuclear stations that the Government says we need, there is widespread speculation as to how many of them will ever actually get off the ground. It seems that the Government is forcing potential nuclear investors, such as Centrica, EDF, EON, Scottish Power etc to take on full exposure to the risks of construction. Ongoing prices will be so volatile that they could easily cripple any of those large utility companies financially. Some of those companies are in debt anyway, and having to sell off assets such as their electricity networks to pay it off. Other governments across the world are also sanctioning new stations, and offering good subsidies, so it would seem likely that companies would prefer to do business with them, rather than with Britain.

On a lighter note, I’ve been fascinated for some time by some of the weird laws that exist in countries world wide, but it was only recently that I realized that our own country passes hundreds, nay, thousands of regulations and edicts each year, some of which are just about impossible to understand, even after having had a dictionary for breakfast. I might just mention a few of them here in the months ahead.

ASBOs (Anti-social Behavior Orders) were supposed to cure all ills in neighbourhoods, but some of them are completely absurd. Take the car thief from Manchester who received an ASBO forbidding him to walk or cycle anywhere in the city unless accompanied by his sister or mother. It did not ban him from stealing or driving cars. The poor guy – as he was banned from walking or cycling, it’s only logical that he should go out and nick the nearest available car. Then there was the woman from Kilbride who was given an ASBO denying her the right to answer the door in her underwear. It was okay, presumably, to strip everything off, and answer it in her birthday dress.

I mentioned at the beginning that my computer had been down for a while, so to pass some of the time, I enrolled in fiddle classes. It’s probably not a very bright idea at my age, but it has had a nice side effect. The classes are fine, but a lot of practice is needed at home as well. This has resulted in a lot of moaning and screeching sounds being heard in the vicinity of my humble abode, and cats of every make and model, that used to stare malevolently at me as I did my bit to save the birds, are to be seen no more. They have all fled; had enough, it seems. Likewise, my spider friends prefer to stay in their nooks and crannies, instead of taking their usual evening constitutional. The moral here seems to be simple – for those of you who are scared of the little creatures, get down to your local music shop, and invest in a fiddle.