News round up

Been overseas on a business trip the last couple of weeks (in Asia of all places), so I thought I’d catch up on some news that came up while I was away.

Rayner Units

So the media continues its circus surrounding Angela Rayner. Since then some actual tax experts have given their option of the whole affair. And those opinions range from “plain daft” to “a non-issue”. And of course there’s the rank hypocrisy of it all, quote:

“Central to the Mail/Tory pursuit of this Rayner non-story is the belief:
“When you derive a benefit you’re not entitled to, however small, it’s because you’re dishonest, when we derive a benefit we’re not entitled to, however large, it’s a trifling oversight to be forgiven.” — Nick Pettigrew (@Nick_Pettigrew) April 7, 2024

Its let to use of the term “Rayner units” comparing how much tax Rayner was alleged not to have paid to the amount of money the Tories, or party donors, have squandered (or stolen), yet the media and the police haven’t made a big deal out of it. In fact they’ve gone out of their way to bury the story.

Why are the police (the police chief who is investigating Rayner having spoken at a previous Tory conference) suddenly pursuing a case where they have very little chance of securing a conviction (worse case scenario, the tax experts say a small fine) on an issue involving a few thousand pounds, yet ignoring the numerous cases of fraud on the Tory side, that amount to tens of billions defrauded.

The response from Rayner and labour should not be to offer to resign. This is appeasement, and it will just mean the press will hound every left wing MP relentlessly until they get their pound of flesh. Instead labour should be calling out what is clearly a politically motivated investigate by the police and the media. While also making it clear that once labour is in power a new body will be setup to investigate political corruption.

And its first task will be to begin investigations into the conduct of Tory MP’s over the last 14 years. There will also need to be serious questions asked as to why police took such a biased pro-Tory position (e.g. are senior officers on the take?). Which, might prompt them to try and jump the gun and arrest a couple of Tories before the election (which should cause the Tory press little plan to backfire).

Similarly, labour should be promising a ban on foreign ownership of UK news media and tightening up the regulations to stop political client journalism (I’d make clear that on day one all of the right wing client media lose their press passes, the government won’t do interviews or issue statements to said papers, but will instead focus its attention on less right wing media outlets instead).

But none of this is happening. And one has to conclude its either A) because Starmer wants to lose the election. Or B) he wants to see Rayner damaged, as his goal is to shift labour and the UK permanently to the centre right. Any sort of meaningful progressive policies are now off the agenda in the UK.

Manufacturing descent

Speaking of policing, we had a situation where there was a pro-Palestine demo in London. And a member of a pro-Jewish group (wearing a Jewish skull cap & escorted by body guards one of whom is known to have worked in the past for the Israeli government) tried to disrupt the protest and was stopped by the police. This was clearly an attempt to try and provoke an otherwise peaceful crowd and force the police to intervene. And in fact there were a bunch of friendly journalists standing by waiting to film it all (and immediately they’d label this crowd of thousands as a violent mob, because a handful got provoked).

I’d note this is not an uncommon tactic used by counter protesters. The far right are known to use these tactics all the time (they’ve shown up to BLM protests wearing full KKK regalia). It’s a common feature of sectarian marches in Northern Ireland too, where either loyalists or republican counter protests will run around waving Irish/British flags, hoping someone will throw a punch (upon which, they’re mates will all dive in and a start a full blown riot). And indeed, there’s reports from the US of right wing groups paying people tens of thousands to counter protest pro-Palestinian marches in the hope of kicking off a riot.

So its also not that unreasonable for the police to say, no you are clearly trying to provoke a riot. And I’d rather not get bricks thrown at me, or spend the next 2 weeks filling out paperwork. Granted the police officers in question (as there was more than one incident, the mainstream media simply focused on the more spicy encounter and didn’t report on the others) weren’t exactly very diplomatic about it (then again, the met police are hardly famous for such things), but its no worse than what other protesters have to put up with.

So why is in that there’s now calls for police chief’s to apologise or even resign? Are they also going to apologise for everything they’ve done to left wing protesters as well? Keep in mind the police have often brutally put down such protests. Why are we giving one group a free pass?

And while the media were quick to make a big deal about this, it being top of the headlines for several days (so much so, it was being reported where I was in Asia). The minute more details started to come out that revealed it was a setup, the story disappeared from the headlines. Suggesting that those journalists who reported it weren’t simply duped but entirely complicit.

Its right privilege. They want a police state, just one that cracks down on everything they don’t like. In short, the right in the UK have lurched towards full blown fascism.

More Nazi tourettes

In other news, a Malaysian university invited a conservative professor from the US to speak at an event. And he accused Malaysia (as in the whole country!) of being antisemitic and supporters of a new holocaust. Needless to say this went down like a lead balloon, forcing him to flee the country. He claimed he did so based on US government advice that Malaysia isn’t safe, forcing the US state department to intervene and refute this claim.

I’d note that this particular author has previously praised colonialism (so who in their right mind thought inviting him would be a good idea I do not know). So he has form here. The thing is that such nazi tourettes are entirely counter productive. Going around accusing everyone you disagree with of being antisemitic cheapens the term, which is exactly what the real nazi’s have been trying to do for the last 80 years (in fact given this same author has also said nice things about German colonialism too, that could be his ulterior motive).

Spanish tourist protests

There’s been more protests in Spain against tourists, this time in the Canary Islands. As with similar protests in Barcelona or the Balearic Islands this has to be put in the correct context.

For example, the issue in Barcelona is tour groups, often off of cruise ships, following a set route and they end up swamping parts of the city, the Rambles, the Boqueria, the Sagrada Familia, old town, etc. In fact the best way to avoid the crowds as a tourist is to avoid these areas at certain times of the day (so go in the early morning or late evening and it will be just you and the locals), or go to places the tour groups avoid (such as the Columbus monument, as there’s only one small lift, so its not compatible with groups of large American tourists).

Similarly the issues with these islands is they are often seeing large groups of tourists coming in on cheap package holiday’s. And let’s be honest, a lot of them aren’t exactly going out there for the culture and food. Instead they are aiming for two weeks of sea, sun, sex & a ton of booze/drugs. So I think you can see what the problem is.

My concern is that the solution local governments are coming up with, that of limiting numbers or charging tourist taxes aren’t really going to work. It will just squeeze out the independent travellers (including quite a large number of Spanish), as the tour groups will monopolise those selected places. In fact this is sort of what happened in Barcelona, they started taking measures against tourists, which just meant more enrolled with a tour group and opted for safety in numbers.

The solution is thus to crack down on the tour groups. Five euro a day might not mean much to them, but a few grand per month in fees to operate, plus a limit on the numbers per tour group would.
The problem with this solution is who benefits from these tour groups? Why the local bigwigs, whose hotels, restaurants and coach services make quite a bit of money. So it looks like what the locals are going to get is some window dressing that doesn’t actually solve the problem.

Electric vehicle bubble?

According to a number of news sources, there’s an electric vehicle bubble that’s just burst. Actually, I’d argue its more that the hype train behind electric cars has met with reality.

As I’ve long pointed out, electric vehicles are part of the solution to climate change and future transport, but they are simply one piece of the puzzle. They cannot provide a like for like replacement for existing cars. Not least because one has to question whether we even WANT to have such a thing (replacing bumper to bumper traffic with petrol powers cars, with bumper to bumper electric vehicles is hardly progress).

For example, while there’s been a drop in EV sales in the US, there’s still strong growth in Asia. And its not hard to see why. They have opted for electric vehicles that are smaller and more affordable, such as two seater cars and electric scooters. Or gone for vehicles with less expensive battery technology (sodium rather than Lithium), or just make do with a smaller battery. Which is fine, if you are only commuting in and out of town. I’d say, based on my recent visit, the majority of vehicles on city centre roads in China these days are electric or hybrid vehicles.

But what if you want to drive long distance? While yes there are nice wide roads between say Beijing and Shanghai, or Osaka and Tokyo, but nobody is going to be stupid enough to drive between these cities. Not when there’s a perfectly good high speed line representing a faster and vastly more convenient alternative. Never mind the problem of where do you plan on parking when you get to the other end.

Then there’s the matter of repair costs. While you’ll see plenty of workshops in Asian cities where people can get their electric scooters & cars mended at a reasonable cost, in the west we’ve gone for an anti-repair model, which will expect customers to fork out for essentially a new battery (often costing as much as the car costs) for the most minor of defects, without even attempting a repair. Inevitably word’s gotten out about this and put off buyers.

So the issue with electric vehicles has little to do with the technology, but what the car companies are trying to do with it. And saving the planet is pretty low on their agenda.

Growing racism in Ireland

There has been a worrying rise in racism in Ireland. There’s been racist attacks of foreigners, including a Croatian who was killed for not speaking English (remind me, when did English become the Irish national language? I must have missed that one), arson attacks of migrant accommodation centres, as well as various protests (often organised by certain people with a less than honest agenda…who seem to be a bit too close to certain foreign powers).

Ireland is full apparently (well if that’s the case how about the people whinging about it leave and make room for the rest of us, or maybe we should stop subsidising their children, that would solve the problem!). As usual, unwilling to admit that they are just xenophobic bigots, they’ve tried to come up with an excuse for their racism, notably the housing crisis.

Excuse me but Ireland’s had a housing crisis for the last two decades. Are these time travelling migrants? And one of the major flash points is accommodation for migrants, often in hotels (during the boom they built far more hotels than the country needs, so there’s dozens of so-called “zombie hotels” across Ireland that don’t make any sort of financial sense and are are often run at a loss). But surely putting them up in hotels will free up housing for locals? Surely this is something that should be encouraged?

As always its a convenient excuse, for bigots, but one that goes unchallenged as it hides a wider uncomfortable truth. To go into detail about Ireland’s housing crisis would fill an entire blog post (might do that in future), but the TLDR is Ireland’s had a massive boom in economic growth and population (more due to people having kids, or returning home from overseas, than foreigners arriving) but there’s not been a commensurate rise in housing stock. Successive governments have relied on laissez faire to magically provide a solution and, spoiler, its not worked (cos developers & landlords are trying to make money, not run a housing charity).

Then there’s also issues like NIMBYism. Everyone agrees we need more homes….just not in my backyard. Which is hardly helped by the fact those who own homes already, often don’t want to see more built (as it would bring down house prices). And outside of the big cities there’s a lack of good public transport, which means many affordable homes are of no use unless you have a car and are willing to drive for several hours into work.

To be clear, successive Irish governments have made some efforts to improve the situation, but just not nearly enough, for a wide variety of reasons. Most notably that by getting involved in housing (e.g. building thousands of affordable council homes, putting in new light rail lines, etc.) they’d be upsetting a lot of apple carts and vested interests. And it would cost money, which would mean taxes going up. And nobody wants to pay for that (there’s been protests about local rates, often from the same people now whinging about migrants).

But unfortunately a comforting lie will always be accepted instead of an uncomfortable truth. But just because the government hasn’t got an immediate answer, doesn’t mean you get to fill in the blanks with whatever fairy story most appeals to you. After all, brexit was sold as the snake oil that would “solve” migration, the housing crisis, farming, the NHS and give everyone a free unicorn. How did that work out? The migration rate has risen dramatically, the housing market is worse than ever, the farmers are all broke and the NHS is collapsing….and I’m still waiting on that unicorn.

AI Deception

Cold Fusion have a vlog post out about how much of the hype surrounding AI might be just a marketing stunt, but one with very damaging consequences. For example, they highlight Amazon’s “just walk out” stores, which supposedly used AI to monitor what customers picked off the shelves and charge to their card. Well in turns out, they have thousands of people in India monitoring these stores using CCTV and then manually inputting the purchases (leading some to claim that AI actually stands for “All Indians” or “Abused Indians”).

Its called AI washing, where by companies claim (Elizabeth Holmes style) that AI is central feature of their new product, when it has little to nothing to do with it. Or they are using a back office in a developing world country to act as a substitute for AI instead. While some are getting caught and charged, many are not. And some of these include fortune 500 companies.

Some worry this is creating a large and dangerous bubble in the tech industry. Indeed some are comparing it to the dot com bubble of the 2000’s. In the mean time however, its having real world effects as company CEO’s have been swept up by the AI hype train.

For example, a couple of months back Hasbro, who own the rights to D&D, fired a whole bunch of their game development staff, likely on the assumption they can just now use AI to generate art and game modules (good luck with that one!). Spotify has been accused by a whistle blower of quietly laying off thousands of employee’s with the goal of replacing them with AI.

So one has to ask, what’s going to happen when the AI bubble pops? Because so far, it just looks like an excuse to replace well paid jobs in west, with low wage exploitative work in the global south. And its not like that’s not happened before, nor backfired on us!

SNP maths

I think I’m starting to understand why Scotland’s not gotten independence, despite many decades of trying. And why their football and rugby teams are so unreliable. Its this common tendency for Scot’s to press the self destruct button.

Take what’s going on in Holyrood. Now when I heard that the SNP had withdrawn from their power sharing agreement with the Greens I assumed this was all part of some clever plan. And that the first minster had access to a calculator. Hence they’d understood the consequences of not having enough votes to win a no confidence motion. Well its looking increasingly likely the answer is no. They went ahead with this without doing some elementary maths first.

This could trigger an early election. The SNP are still in the lead and would likely be the largest party after an election, but its likely they’d lose seats and thus have to go into coalition with either labour or the lib dems (who are a lot less sympathetic to the independence argument than the greens). And that’s assuming such a vote takes place independent of the general election. If they take place at the same time, its likely the SNP will lose quite a lot of support in both elections (as people intending to vote labour to oust the Tories will vote labour in both elections).

Its possible FM Yousef is playing 3D chess, while the rest of us are playing drafts. But I suspect he’s just winging it and he’s managed to snooker himself and likely kicked independence into the long grass for sometime to come. In short, its a mess entirely of their own making.

Grumpy old men

Grumpy old men

Labour’s Jamaican switch

There’s was a strange story last week which I think explains a lot about UK politics. A Tory MP in London was campaigning for the opening of a fish and chip shop on his local high street. Oddly enough this same MP had voted voted against a fish and chip shop in the very same area back in 2019, when he was a Tory councillor.

You see as a councillor he had to deal with grievances of local tory voters. And ultimately tories are selfish, petty, vindictive and cruel. As far as they are concerned anyone with a slightly different skin colour is a migrant whose just paddled across the channel on a small boat (even thought its more likely they were born here) and thus obviously a terrorist, rapist and taking multiple jobs off locals in what little spare time they have. They see poor people as lazy, benefit scroungers and criminals (even thought most are working hard to make ends meet, while most Tory voters are retired or otherwise idle). And the most terrifying thing in the universe is a young person in a hoddie. Since many of the latter two would frequent a fish and chip shop, no surprise they’d oppose it. Always room for another Waitrose.

But as a Tory MP he’s expected to be a beer swilling every-man fighting against an out of touch elite. This despite the fact that most Tory MP’s are from very privileged backgrounds and the last fish products they consumed were likely smoked salmon or caviar, served to them on a silver plate. Plus there’s the obvious dog whistle that we want more of the sort of people who hang out in fish and chip shops and less of the ones who go to a falafel bar. And of course they get away with it, thanks to the Tory client media, who will ignore these obvious hypocrisies and petty racism.

Which tells us a lot about how the election will be fought. And not just this one, but every election for the next few decades, as British politics completes its transformation into US politics. Which means nothing is going to change. If you are struggling with the cost of living crisis or NHS waiting lists or you can’t find somewhere to leave, you are just going to have to deal with it, or consider moving to another country (which is going to be a bit of a problem post-brexit, as the UK burned that particular bridge). Labour’s core policies are now basically identical to those of the Tories. They’ll just pretend to be on the left in certain key areas.

Despite having a massive poll lead labour aren’t offering any real alternatively to the grinding rat race of an unregulated capitalist free for all, that brexit Britain has devolved into. The UK has transcended from being a plutocracy, to being a greedflationary kleptocracy. Yet labour offer nothing, not even platitudes. To pull up just one example, councils across the country are on their knees due to Tory cuts. Austerity has driven many people out of their homes and into poverty (which makes them the council’s problem, dramatically increasing their costs). Yet labour don’t seem to have any plan for how to fix things.

Its clear that labour are shifting to the right because those in charge of the party just don’t care. They WANT to shift the party and the UK to the right. They can’t even claim this is a tactic they need to adopt to win the election, as they are starting to lose support, precisely because of their right wing stance. Oddly enough the Tories have been talking about running on increasing public spending (as they know that’s what the public want), as well as highlighting the state of labour run councils (they’ll just leave out the bit about it being their fault) and portraying Starmer as a flip floper. They’re even now thinking of banning arms sales to Israel. Basically, attacking labour for everything Starmer claims he needs to do to win the election.

A few weeks ago, Owen Jones, a life long labour supporter quit the party and urged voters not to vote labour, as they’d gone power mad and were now only interested in gaining all the power for themselves, the country be damned. Keep in mind, Owen Jones was the same guy who was arguing back in 2018 that the Green party should just shut up shop and join labour, because Corbyn was going to lead us into the bright sunny uplands. Meanwhile another labour supporter George Monbiot is trying to organise primaries in UK constituencies to try and break the duopoly of UK politics.

Now I would moderate what Jones said. Obviously defeating the Tories has to be the priority. So if you are in a marginal seat and its a close race between a Tory and labour (keep in mind a lot of safe Tory seats will now be marginals), you’re going to have to hold your nose and vote labour. However, the majority of UK seats are not like this. There’s many marginal seats where the 2nd placed party is the lib dems (or SNP/Plaid Cymru). So you’d be doing everyone a favour by voting for those parties instead. And of course there’s safe labour seats, where you can pretty much vote for whoever you like as a form of protest vote, without fear of a Tory sneaking in. Indeed, there’s one or two labour seats where the greens are in with a shot.

The purpose of all of this is not just to ensure the Tories are beaten and beaten well, but also to keep labour in check. The more seats the third parties get, the more they get to ask questions in parliament. The Tories will just use their time to fight culture wars and pin the blame for their failings on labour. While the lib dems, SNP et al will ask awkward questions and hold labour to account (as they’ve been doing with the Tories on many issues Starmer’s ignored, such as brexit or Gaza).

In fact if the other parties can get enough seats, one might even get to lead the opposition (alternatively they could form a technical group, effectively acting as one party within Westminster, while being separate parties outside of it). This would again, increase their influence and set themselves up as the government in waiting. And more importantly it would kill off the Tories (as the dark money who support them will only continue to do so as long as they are useful to them, and they need to be at least leading the opposition to do that).

Another consideration is a split within the labour party. There are a lot of politicians within labour who are known to have strong left wing sympathies (e.g. Angela Rayner, who used to flat share with Rebecca Long Bailey). They might be going along with all of this, as they want to see the Tories annihilated before making any sort of move. In theory if labour have a narrow majority, or the opposition is led by someone other than the Tories, then a split would make them king makers. They could force the change they want onto labour. But again, that only happens if the Tories get decimated and the labour majority is cut down to size.

In fact in the event of a Tory wipe out, or them losing the support of their wealthy donors, one could see a scenario whereby in the post-Tory world UK politics undergoes a Jamaica like inversion, whereby labour having moved so far to the right that they become the new conservative party. And the opposition on the centre to centre left become the new left.

But either way, labour are not offering a credible alternative to the Tories. They risk just alienating another generation of voters (like Blair) who will then throw in their lot, not with moderates, but those on the extremes of politics (the far left and far right).