Anti-democrats fighting like rats to retain power

The anti-democrats in parliament determined to block Brexit are fighting like trapped rats to try to cling onto power. It will do them no good. There is a hurricane coming - a storm of popular anger that will sweep them from their corrupt sinecures, flush them like recalcitrant turds, smash the barriers they have built against the peoples' will.

There is a Twitter meme doing the rounds; a capcha grid of the sort you must complete here to post a comment. The squares are filled with a view of the Commons chamber and the caption "Select all squares with a c**t". It pretty much sums up the mood of the nation.

Not only Corbyn's Labour are scared of the electorate. Up to a third or more of sitting MPs face being wiped out, swept away in the democratic storm at the hands of the Conservatives, Brexit or LibDems, and along with them any other MPs in Leave-voting constituencies that have betrayed their voters. This is the last we'll see of Yvette Cooper.

An election is inevitable and this time it will be People vs. Parliament. 

For the first time since 1945, the people of Britain are remembering the power of universal suffrage and the secret ballot, and the anti-democratic rats are cowed in fear of their only nemesis - Democracy.

A tsunami of popular anger will sweep away the anti-democrats in parliament

In praise of cities

I've long described myself in political shorthand as 'democrat and localist'. With Brexit for the past three years, I haven't found much of a chance to pursue the second of those core values - almost every day having been a battle to preserve the first. However, a serendipitous find in the Evening Standard has prompted this post. Under Osborne the paper has become a sort of lifestyle free adsheet with little bits of news squeezed in between the ads. Its editorials were given over to George's vindictive spleen against May for sacking him, but now she's gone (almost) our man with the look of a furtive Onanist is letting normal content slip past him. Such is a piece by Ben Rogers in the comment section - the first ES piece I think I've linked to since Osborne took over.

Rogers, head of a pro-London think tank, is pursuing an agenda for cities to gain greater local control. It is an area in which the RSA has long advocated multiple initiatives to take advantage of the strengths of cities. It is based on changes that in the developed world can be positive - the growth of world cities, city nation-states. London's population dwarfs that of Ireland, and is equal to the populations of Scotland and Wales combined. European cities, unlike the smog-laden sprawl of US cities, are compact and environmentally sustainable. For thirty years living in Zone 2 I never once owned a car - and consequently was able to spend much of those thirty years with a comfortable level of alcohol coursing through my veins. We build densely, and upwards; we have superlative public transport systems, we have 24/7 economies. For economic growth and vitality, for learning and development, for culture, for innovation, for leisure and pleasure, cities are ace.

I can almost hear your hackles erecting, readers, as you mentally enumerate the downsides of cities - that they avoid being part of our congruent national identity, that they display crime, extremes of wealth and poverty, poor environmental quality, are hotbeds of moral relativism, competing with the national culture and of course are breeding grounds for globalists and remainers. Yes, all these things are true. Yet cities are the engine of development, the powerhouses of renewal.

Boris showed how an effective Mayor could allow London to see its potential. Andy Burnham is no less committed to the North. Both were shackled by a constipated Treasury and power-hungry Whitehall; tax must be devolved as well as spend, city-specific laws and bye-laws should replace the centralisation and State power over law and public order, planning, health, transport, education and economic development - these should all be torn from Whitehall's grasp in an explosion of Localism.

Problems will tend to correct themselves. Cities attract militant and proud sexual deviants in hordes; they will overcome cabals of mediaeval bigots whose instinct is to persecute them. It's already happening. And without the veto of Whitehall, the instincts of city-dwellers of all races and classes is for a firm and determined approach to law enforcement; there are no greater fans of police and prisons than those at greatest risk of being burgled, robbed, stabbed or shot. The Lord Longfords of our age don't live in Peckham or Walthamstowe, and their ultra-liberal pleadings from their Cotswold vicarages can be drowned out.

We will leave the EU. This is the great gift - possibly the last great gift - that we can give our cities. Outside of the EU they will quickly learn to thrive and prosper, driving national growth and international trade and development. Powerful British city-states will dominate a sclerotic Eurozone on the verge of collapse, our buccaneer cities will be Drake to the clumsy Spaniards, Raleigh to the encumbered globalists, heavy and low in the water and ripe for the taking.

So let's hear it for cities, and for Localism!

Power Inquiry re-visited

One of the most seminal documents in the formation of my political outlook - which I guess one could describe as democratic libertarian conservative - was the Power Inquiry, from the earliest years of this century, cross-party and chaired by Helena Kennedy QC. The launch of the report in 2004 at the QE conference centre in Westminster was my first encounter in the flesh with a young politician with whom I was impressed - David Cameron. Alas, his commitment to all the good things he espoused back then soon disappeared, and he's since departed into history as one of Britain's most dilettante PMs. 

One has to remember we were in those days pre-Facebook and Twitter, and blogs were just emerging. People weren't used to exercising democratic opinion and even power online. Politicians regarded the Internet as just another 'push' medium, for their use and benefit in broadcasting their messages. They certainly weren't used to people answering back, responding as equals on platforms to which they had equal access, with no cost barriers to keep the young, the poor or the regional away. Cameron, like May, was one of the old school; it was his job to speak, and our duty to listen. He would transmit wisdom, we would receive it. The poor dears have had a dreadful shock in the intervening fourteen years and their world has been turned quite upside down. But how well has the Power Inquiry itself endured?

It's available online for anyone interested, and in the days leading up to the Meaningful Vote I'll try to look at the recommendations, starting with 'Rebalancing Power'. The report found:-

- The Executive has become more powerful at the expense of MPs in the House of Commons. In particular, the Prime Minister’s Office and whoever the PM decides to gather around him or her, has become the most powerful political institution in British politics.

- Central government departments have also become more powerful at the expense of local government over the last two to three decades.
 
- Appointed authorities – quangos – have gained extra powers, particularly at the expense of local councillors. 

- Supranational bodies and processes of international negotiation such as the European Union have gained extra powers and influence at the expense of nationally and locally elected representatives.

Well, the first two are as true as they were. The third is much worse than it was then; now called NDPBs rather than Quangos, there is a gradual melding between a growing number of these semi-detached Agencies and government funded fake charities, none of which are under direct democratic control and all of which are exercising even more anti-democratic power. As for the fourth, well, we are dealing with the EU. Just the UN and the rest of them to go. 

One final comment. Back in the days when I burnt the midnight oil taking a part-time Masters, we enjoyed a lecture given by a respected economist. He took a question from one of my colleagues that contained the word 'power'. 'Power' he responded 'is not an economic concept. We leave that sort of thing to the sociologists'. It was a neat put-down, and understandable given the efforts of economists to convince us that they are scientists, or at least more scientific than sociologists. But untrue. Understanding power is the point of understanding economic behaviour.

Postscript: Crapita and Smart Meters

Just a swift PS to the post below; it turns out that the whole infrastructure of smart gas and electric meters (new generation of which will use a common comms hub in each house that works with all power and gas suppliers plus 'enabled' appliances ..) is being rolled out by DCC Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Crapita plc, now reportedly approaching a Carillion crisis. Hey ho.

There are two WAN options - one for South and Central UK and one for the North, based on radio transmission. And the documentation is interesting, confirming exactly the configuration of metallic shielding / faraday cage that will block the meters (well done, Steve) for anyone interested. 

And from a skim through the technical docs, they're building in a lot of room for expanded functionality for those 'Comms hubs' - including an option for TCP/IP via packets carried on the hard power lines themselves, making wireless / radio HANs and WANs redundant.

Smart meters will hurt the just coping

The Mail carries a story today that reveals the electricity companies are recruiting charity muggers - chuggers - to doorstep householders and pressurise them into having smart meters fitted. 

I've written before about the risks posed by smart meters - chiefly the ability to remotely connect / disconnect the supply. A year ago, during yet another supply shortfall scare, the power companies let it slip that they needed smart meters to allow 'load management' - i.e. to impose rolling blackouts when demand exceeds supply, but to avoid disconnecting hospitals or households with dialysis machines. In a Ratner moment, they also let slip that wealthy customers who pay extra for their power could be exempt from 'load management' disconnections. Which is a useful reminder of the social effects of smart meters. 

For the wealthy and comfortably off, smart meters pose few problems except alerting hacker burglars of times when the house is empty. No sooner have they left for a weekend in their Welsh cottage than burglars are alerted that the kettle and toaster haven't been used and bosh! that's the Philip Stark spiraliser gone.   

For the poor, smart meters will add nothing to their misery. They're not allowed credit. They are already on smartkey supplies and pay pound-by-pound in advance for their power. At a rate significantly higher than the rest of us. If you've never stood behind some poor woman in the queue at the co-op as she empties copper coins on the counter to get another £3 on her key and not inwardly wept you have no soul. 

No. It's the borderline strugglers, the financial jugglers, the overdraft army who will really feel the impact of smart meters. They will already have switched from a fixed monthly direct debit (that always gives the power company a balance of around £1,000 of one's money) to payment on actual readings. By massaging-down their self-readings they can give themselves some wiggle room until the annual compulsory reading by the energy firm - and even then can delay the catch-up reading by a week or so. Then they can wait to 'pay on red' and even then can wait until the 'notice of intended disconnection' arrives. All of which currently allows them to juggle enough to keep a clean credit record and avoid disconnection. But not with smart meters. 

No wonder the power companies are so keen for smart meters. No more meter readers, and above all no more need for magistrate's warrants to break into a dwelling house to disconnect the supply. Just wait seven days after the red bill and -flic!- power disconnected. This will even give them the chance to charge, say, another £100 to -flic!- the power back on, so trebles all round.