November 28, 2009
Time to reignite the war on planners
Architecture without rules - Times Online
Urban planning has led to shoddiness, squalor and ugliness in our cities. Let’s throw away the rulebook and allow people to build where they want
The suburban semis built between the two world wars were one of Britain’s great social successes — liveable, adaptable and well-built. The onrush of pebbledash and privet was halted by a hysterical but influential pro-Plan campaign. Suburbia lacked the imprimatur of design intellectuals. Yet it was, and is, a land of hope and aspiration.
Today, because of Plan, about 40 per cent of the cost of any new house goes on buying land and getting planning permission. So present-day “executive homes” are often on cramped sites, compared with Non-Plan interwar semis. Meanwhile, to make up for the lack of other homes, about a quarter of a million people — more than the population of Milton Keynes — live in caravan parks....
In the worship of Plan, there’s an arrogant assumption that someone knows what people want, better than the people themselves. But in his Maxims for Revolutionists, Shaw wrote: “Do not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same.”
Once upon a time — before the clunking fist of Plan — if houses were needed, then houses were built, mostly by small-scale firms, often employing less than ten men. Thus were created those Non-Plan suburbs so derided by planners and cultural commentators, but in which more than one in five of the population live. Suburbia is the classic national compromise between town and country, and between privacy and price....
The time has come to cut the Gordian knot. Repeal, or drastically curtail, the planning laws. Let building-for-people recommence. Some precious zones should be preserved, many of them already national parks. Otherwise, houses should go where the demand is. Most would be spec-built. Only the most adventurous or the most hard-up people would venture into self-help. But they shouldn’t be vetoed.
There’s one glimmer of hope. Throughout the generations, the Conservative Party has risen to power on the back of promises about homes — from Lord Salisbury’s Villa Toryism in the late 19th century, through Anthony Eden’s “property-owning democracy” mid-century, to Margaret Thatcher’s “right to buy” offer in 1979. At present, David Cameron’s party offers only a hair shirt of cuts, cuts, cuts. Does the electorate really want nothing but that? Last weekend’s Ipsos MORI opinion poll, showing a narrowing gap between Tory and Labour to just 6 per cent, seemed to say, “No: we want more.”
A hair shirt and a home: that’s much more appealing. I’m no Tory. But as a libertarian I say : Let’s raise the banner of Non-Plan.
The minute control that the planners have over us all, boasting of social engineering, changing behaviour towards their ideals and forcing millions of us to live in squashed unloved homes is a huge scandal. And the All-right-Jacks in the CPRE and local action groups are as guilty as the spotty faced socialist in the planning department.
There is only one use for the planners, and that is to ensure that come the glorious day there are enough lampposts to go round.
Posted by The Englishman at 7:38 AM
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Climategate - The Blame Game
Who's to blame for Climategate? - Telegraph
... very real fears that hardline Republicans – together with powerful Right-wing media organisations – will use the scandal to scupper President Obama's proposed legislation to cap carbon emissions.
In Australia, the world's worst carbon dioxide polluter per capita,...Rupert Murdoch's Fox News has described the emails as a "game-changer" for Obama cap and trade bills. Fox's climate change commentator, John Lott, suggested that Prof Jones was guilty of an "unprecedented co-ordinated campaign to hide scientific information". Meanwhile Matt Drudge, arguably the most influential reporter on the internet ....Prof Jones is in little doubt that the timing of the leak – two weeks before the start of the Copenhagen conference – was a "concerted attempt to put a question mark over the science of climate change" at the most sensitive possible time....Little wonder, then, that climate change deniers are hailing the emails as final proof that global warming is nothing more than a hoax which is being covered up by governments who have themselves been duped.
What a nasty bunch of people.....In other news...
Prof Jones, whose department has for years refused to release its raw data on temperatures, wrote another email in which he said sceptics "have been after the CRU station data for years. If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the UK, I think I'll delete the file rather than send it to anyone". By chance, he now admits he has "accidentally" deleted some of the raw data.
Oh, whoops!
Posted by The Englishman at 7:12 AM
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Suggestion that Israeli Fans buy some No Surrender banners.
STUC calls on Celtic fans to fly flag for Palestine at Israeli match - Scotsman.com News
CELTIC fans are being asked to wave Palestinian flags by the Scottish Trades Union Congress (STUC) during a football match against Israeli team Hapoel Tel Aviv in protest at the invasion of Gaza last year.
And there was I thinking our Diddly-dee friends were all upset that foreign fans indulged in politics - this is the sight that the German Hamburg Fans put on for them...
I think the sentiment is one that the Israelis might understand.
Posted by The Englishman at 6:53 AM
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November 27, 2009
Friday Night is Music Night (Eric Coates Edition)
Performed at the Musikfestspiele Potsdam Sanssouci by the Deutsches Filmorchester Babelsberg
What was that other tune of his? I wonder why they didn't play it.....
Posted by The Englishman at 6:01 PM
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Dealing With Climate Change Invaders
Climate Change's Clear Winners: SPIEGEL ONLINE
They roam in close-knit, well-organized groups,...It's not surprising that they are doing so well. They eat anything from discarded pizzas and doner kebabs to maize and acorns, and they're highly adaptable....Their ability to learn also shows how clever they are. "They have a well-organized social structure,... They know the routes used by hunters, and when they hear the sound of car doors slamming, they immediately retreat to the edges of the hunting area and hide in reeds until the danger has passed," said Reinwald. "They know, 'if we go there, we're safe.'"
It's not that they can read the signs. But they have a keen instinct and they learn from observation.
The invasion of cities is also causing concern....In Berlin, buses avoid some stops because they hang around there begging....In Texas, which has similar problems, officials plan to use poisons and chemicals against them. But Reinwald says hunting is the only effective way to reduce their numbers: "Poisons and contraceptives will only do more damage to the environment, and they don't work."... Machine guns would probably reduce the man-hours involved, but they are banned from German forests....
How times change....
Posted by The Englishman at 12:27 PM
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Remove Speed Cameras and then what happens?
Pocket GPS World - Swindon Speed Cameras
It's now been almost four months since Swindon Council famously scrapped their fixed speed cameras. Swindon's five fixed cameras were decommissioned on July 31 due to funding issues.
Councillor Peter Greenhalgh, stated that on the roads where the speed cameras had been removed, "There has been no increase in accidents at those locations. Speed is an issue but there’s no evidence speeds have increased on those roads. We often get people saying speeds are too fast on a certain road then, when we do some analysis, we don’t get any evidence of that."
Coun Greenhalgh said: “There are a number of things we can do to reduce the risk but we cannot prevent people from getting killed on our roads.
“Road users have to take responsibility for their actions.”
Posted by The Englishman at 8:02 AM
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Full text: Climate science statement
Full text: Climate science statement
This is a joint statement from the Met Office, the Natural Environment Research Council and the Royal Society on the state of the science of climate change ahead of the Copenhagen climate conference
I believe for every drop of rain that falls
A flower grows
I believe that somewhere in the darkest night
A candle glows
I believe for everyone who goes astray, someone will come
To show the way
I believe, I believe
Posted by The Englishman at 7:29 AM
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Hanging Tree Decorations
Poole — the town with a Christmas tree that you can wipe your feet on - Times Online
When is a Christmas tree not a Christmas tree? When it is a giant cone covered in what appears to be green doormats.
Shoppers stared in bemusement at the mysterious object that landed in a shopping precinct in Poole, Dorset, this week. Some compared it to a giant traffic cone, a witch’s hat or a cheap special effect from an early episode of Doctor Who.
The 33ft structure turned out to be their Christmas tree, designed according to the principles of health and safety, circa 2009.
Thus it has no trunk so it won’t blow over, no branches to break off and land on someone’s head, no pine needles to poke a passer-by in the eye, no decorations for drunken teenagers to steal and no angel, presumably because it would need a dangerously long ladder to place it at the top.
Richard Randall-Jones, the town centre manager, said “We are a coastal town and so we have strict health-and-safety guidelines around making the Christmas tree safe due to the high winds we suffer. We have to have guy ropes and hoardings to stop it from falling over and hitting somebody. The public didn’t like all the ropes and hoardings so we came up with the cone tree.
Council, tree, rope, some assembly required? I have an idea for a tree with ropes that I know the public would like....
Posted by The Englishman at 7:27 AM
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November 26, 2009
Bukkake Bashing Billy Burgler
This week I have mainly been splashing DNA all over my fixtures and fittings like a Home Secretary's husband.
On the advice of the police I hasten to add.
I was talking to the PikeyFinder General of Wiltshire whose zeal and enthusiasm in disrupting our travelling friends little games is commendable and his advice was that security marking everything with a DNA kit is the best defence (or second best defence as some might say). It makes reselling the scrap and valuables much harder.
So I bought a kit and set to, what they don't say is where they get the sticky white DNA fluid from, they wouldn't be outsourcing its production would they?
Posted by The Englishman at 7:01 AM
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Danish Civil Liberties Wilt Under Climate Change
The Danish Government is rushing new laws through parliament to extend police powers and impose tougher penalties for civil disobedience. Brian Mikkelsen, the Justice Minister, has stated that anybody found to be “inhibiting police work” will be jailed for 40 days rather than fined. The new laws would also allow police the power to detain people for 12 hours even when no crime had been committed, and raise fines for failing to disperse from a demonstration to more than £350.
“I fear it’s a slippery slope,” the historian Jes Fabricius Møller told The Times. “We don’t have a strong awareness of citizens’ rights in this country.”
We didn't either...
Posted by The Englishman at 6:42 AM
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Andrew Watson Joins Sceptic Camp
BBC News - Harrabin's Notes: E-mail impact
Professor Andrew Watson, a long-term colleague of the researchers at the CRU, said the unit should have nothing to fear from an inquiry, as the CRU temperature data set at the heart of many of the e-mails is almost identical to the two other authoritative data sets, both in the US.
"The difference between science and other branches of life - like politics - is that we should be completely transparent about what we do," he said. "Everything should be open to question."
Quite, that's all many of us having been saying, what took you so long to say it?
Posted by The Englishman at 6:17 AM
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A Question for Baroness Ashton
Baroness Ashton was Treasurer for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), 1980-1982.
CND was notoriously secretive about its sources of funding and did not submit its accounts to independent audit; however, after public pressure they were audited for the first time in 1982-1983 (Godfrey Lord & Co). It was found that 38% of their annual income (£176,197) could not be traced back to the original donors.
The person responsible for this part of CND fund-raising, from anonymous donors, was Will Howard, a member of the Communist Party of Great Britain.
The Russian dissident and internationally respected figure Vladimir Bukovsky, has shown from his research that the nuclear disarmament campaigns across Europe were largely funded by the Soviet bloc. Mr Bukovsky has proven with hundreds of top secret documents from Soviet archives that the worldwide disarmament campaign in the 1980s was covertly orchestrated from Moscow. The money was channelled through communist parties or other pro-Soviet organisations and individuals.
If therefore seems very likely that the unidentified income came from the Soviet bloc.
If Baroness Ashton did not know where the unidentified income came from she was incompetent. If she did not ask where it came from she was negligent. If she did know that it came from the Soviet block then she knowingly accepted money from a hostile foreign power in order to undermine Britain's and NATO's defence policies.
Anyone who was compromised by the Soviet Union in the 1980s remains compromised by the Russian Federation.
In the light of these facts, my questions are:
1) Do you still believe that she is a fit and proper person to be in charge of the EU's (and Britain's) Foreign and Security Policy?
2) Do you intend to investigate these claims further? If not, why not?
3) The answer to the second question is 'Yes' would you like me to supply you with the contact details of Mr Bukovsky, and others, who can give you more detailed information about this matter?
Yours sincerely,
Gerard Batten MEP
UK Independence Party
More: Baroness Ashton denies taking funds for CND from Soviet Union - Times Online
h/t EU Ref of course
Posted by The Englishman at 6:04 AM
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November 25, 2009
Hot Air and Cow Farts
The Wiltshire Bustard: Cows Saved From the Altar of Climate Change
Priceless.
Posted by The Englishman at 10:20 PM
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Chilly Down Under
Iceberg off New Zealand a tourist mecca - World environment- msnbc.com
Nov. 21, 2006
WELLINGTON, New Zealand - An iceberg has been spotted from the New Zealand shore for the first time in living memory, drawing tourists via helicopter and scientists who are trying to determine where it and several other giant chunks drifting in the country's waters originated from.
Last year, icebergs were seen in New Zealand water for the first time in 56 years, but couldn't be seen from the shore. This year one was visible from Dunedin on South Island on Thursday.
BBC News - Ships on alert for icebergs heading towards New Zealand
25 November 2009
A warning has been issued to ships in the southern Pacific Ocean after more than 100 iceberg were spotted drifting towards New Zealand.
Scientists are now investigating the conditions which have allowed the icebergs to travel in such a large form for so long.
Heck, I wonder what could have caused the ice not melt...
Posted by The Englishman at 10:15 PM
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$1.5 Billion of our Green Taxes Missing Unaccounted For
Money promised by rich nations to tackle climate change unaccounted for
A total of 20 nations pledged up to 410 million dollars (£247m) a year in 2001, resulting in a pot that should be worth well over 1.6 billion dollars (£963m).
But only 260m dollars (£157m) has been paid into two United Nations funds earmarked for the purpose according to the latest figures, the BBC World Service investigation said.
Boni Biagini, who runs the funds, told the broadcaster: ''These numbers don't match the 410m per year. Otherwise, we'd be handling billions of dollars by now.''
Artur Runge-Metzger, the senior climate change negotiator for the European Union, said the EU had done what it promised to do.
''We can say we met the promise, climate finance has really been stepped up,'' he told the BBC.
But he admitted the EU was unable to provide data to show it did pay the money.
Not knowing the details but I think it is roughly $3 Billion (400 x 8) gone missing but the paper says it is only $1.5 billion, whatever, Artur just shrugs his shoulders....
Posted by The Englishman at 7:04 AM
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CRU Petitions
Probably won't do any good, but certainly won't do any harm to sign.
Posted by The Englishman at 6:58 AM
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Paid Expert Disses Unpaid Experts
Wikipedia: an anti-intellectual venture to its core - Times Online
Wikipedia is routinely cited in online articles as a substitute for explanations of concepts, events and people. It has thereby coarsened public culture. It is an anti-intellectual venture to its core.
Knowledge is democratic in the sense that no one has the right to claim the last word. Wikipedia is democratic in the different and corrosive sense that anyone can join in regardless of competence.
Dear old Olly Kamm banging on yet again as only a left wing intellectual expert can about how horrible it is that amateurs should be allowed to voice an opinion.
Of course he is right some parts of Wikipedia show that the loudest voices and most obsessive contributors become the arbiters of truth. That there are many Wikipedia articles that are scrupulous, balanced and fair treatments of their subjects. But these are liable to be overthrown at any time by an editor with an idée fixe and an empty life. Some might mention Climate Change as an example.
But better that than having only the regurgitated opinions of a Press Baron's Hireling.
Other Times articles about Wikipedia today include, this , this and this,....
Posted by The Englishman at 6:56 AM
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November 24, 2009
idl_cruts3_2005_vs_2008b.pdf and Hockey Sticks
AJStrata has been looking at idl_cruts3_2005_vs_2008b.pdf from the CRU archive which fell out of the æther at the weekend.
It contains 155 graphs showing the raw global temperature measurements and ‘trends’ for every country from 1900 though today. It contains two version of the CRU ‘processing’ – one from 2005 and one from 2008. What is just amazing from this ‘raw’ data is the realization that many areas of the Earth are not showing a huge upswing in temperature. The raw data paints a completely different picture than the final ‘results’ we see in Al Gore’s charts.
(As I'm from the UK I have put the UK charts in here)
... there are 4 graphs for the 4 seasons CRU uses to derive an annual global index (the NCDC level chart). MAM in the upper left panel stands for March-April-May, the next panel is June-July-August (JJA), etc. The purple data is the 2008 version of the data series, and the black line is the 2005. The dashed horizontal line is the mean for that country for that season: red is for the CRU 2008 version and black is for CRU 2005....
There is a lot to learn from this data, and how it correlates to other events or conditions. But what is clear to me now is there was probably no way to create a hockey stick from this CRU data alone. Which is why we have things like bristle cones and magic larches in Russia to create the mirage of global warming.
idl_cruts3_2005_vs_2008b.pdf is available here if you haven't already got your own copy. It is a very large file, 1923kb, and makes my server puff, so please be kind and spread the love around a little.
Posted by The Englishman at 7:47 PM
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Cool!
Fascinating online report, try turning the pages with your mouse, fascinating. Some really clever stuff has gone into producing it.
Not so sure about the content though. Is it really true that even Venus isn't saturated with CO2 and it would be warmed even more if the naughty Venusians drove their SUVs around?
Posted by The Englishman at 6:28 PM
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Aaronovitch in Green Hissy Fit (Sponsored by Shell)
Strip away the figleaf and reveal naysayers | David Aaronovitch - Times Online
I don’t think Lord Lawson accepts the science of climate change at all. But, in any case, according to him, “a warmer climate brings benefits as well as disadvantages”. Oh, really? And where exactly are those peer-reviewed scientific studies that say that if global warming does continue more or less unchecked, the gains and losses will be roughly balanced? No, what we should do, he argues, is “adapt”.
One day someone will spell out precisely how, say, Bangladesh should adapt to the climate change that has probably already been engendered, let alone to that which might be caused by simply carrying on as we are.
In the meantime low-lying Bengalis can take comfort from the thought that Lord Lawson is on their side in supporting rapid economic growth through current energy policies.
Oh dear, even a failed Oxford Modern Historian should be able to parse what Lord Lawson said better than that, instead of erecting a strawman. But I think the real reason for Aaronovitch's huffiness is because someone failed to recognise how important he is...
Yesterday in the late afternoon, after a day of leaving messages on someone’s Orange answerphone (an unnamed someone), I finally got a return call from the “new high-powered all-party think-tank”, the Global Warming Policy Foundation, promised to the world yesterday, via these pages, by Lord Lawson of Blaby. The foundation’s high-poweredness was clearly a forecast rather than a reality.
They don't call, they don't send flowers...
And of course The Times is publishing an alarmist supplement today on the Copenhagen Summit sponsored by a full page advert from Shell. Who's the Big Oil Shrill now?
Posted by The Englishman at 8:12 AM
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150 Years Old Today
On the Origin of Species: Chapter XIV, Recapitulation and Conclusion
"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved."
Posted by The Englishman at 7:22 AM
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Every cloud...
Economic collapse pays big dividend in carbon credit profits - Scotsman.com News
UKRAINE'S economic collapse has produced a potential multibillion-dollar bonanza, allowing the country to reap windfall carbon credit profits from the dead chimneys of its industrial decline.
The industrial collapse has been bad for jobs but good for the climate. Ukraine produces less than half the greenhouse gases it did 20 years ago, and under a system devised in the negotiations for the 1997 Kyoto Protocol curbing the gases blamed for global warming, it is allowed to sell credits for every ton of carbon dioxide saved.
See Gordon has a plan for our future prosperity...
Posted by The Englishman at 7:18 AM
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In case you hadn't heard.
BBC News - Global warming science alarming, say climate experts
Three UK groups studying climate change have issued an unprecedented statement about the dangers of failing to cut emissions of greenhouse gases.
The Royal Society, Met Office, and Natural Environment Research Council say the science underpinning climate change is more alarming than ever...
Persistent drought in Australia and rising sea levels in the Maldives were further indicators of possible future patterns, they said.
They argue that without action there would be much larger changes in the coming decades, with the UK seeing higher food prices, ill health, more flooding and rising sea levels....
But Prof Julia Slingo, chief scientist of the Met Office, Prof Alan Thorpe, chief executive of Nerc, and Lord Rees, president of the Royal Society, said cutting emissions could substantially limit the severity of climate change.
What, nothing from the East Anglia experts? They might have come up with something more convincing than those two discredited examples of evidence.
Posted by The Englishman at 7:15 AM
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November 23, 2009
The 13 Lines of Evidence for AGW
This comment is being posted around the blogosphere, including on Bishop Hill's site
Skeptics and conspiracy buffs need to understand that even without any CRU data nor the publications of it scientists, there are MULTIPLE lines of evidence for AGW:
1) UAH, RSS, and GISS show warming
2) Rapidly warming Arctic
3) Rapidly decreasing sea ice extent
4) Rapidly thinning sea ice
5) Rising ocean heat content
6) Cooling stratosphere
7) Net increase in downwelling LW
8 ) Net decreasing TOA LW emission
9) Increased species migrations/extinctions
10) Increased severe weather occurrences
11) Glacier mass loss and retreats increasing
12) Rising sea levels
13) Most importantly: rapidly rising human emissions of GHGs that have not been seen in millions of years.
None of these things read emails and have decided to play along in a massive international conspiracy.
Scott A. Mandia, Professor - Meteorology
http://www2.sunysuffolk.edu/mandias/global_warming
I admit I had to do a bit of research on the LW downwelling (radiation in the Long Wave spectrum that is bouncing about the atmosphere) reasons and I think I have found the relevant figures
http://www.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/t4/tlsglhmam_5.1
The global figures graphed out:
Maybe I got the wrong figures but that doesn't convince me that man is warming the atmosphere. And none of the other arguments work either.
Over the last few centuries it has been warming, the sea has been gently rising, the ice has retreated but that doesn't prove anything about man's involvement. The arctic temperature argument is dealt with at Watts Up as is the sea ice alarms.
Severe weather? Is that Hurricanes, don't make me laugh and Ocean heat - purleeaze!
And the thirteenth and most important argument that rising levels of man made GHG prove AGW can be filed under non sequitur.
Are these really the best arguments that we can be presented with?
Posted by The Englishman at 8:26 PM
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Against the Odds - A Few Good Men and the Fight Against Fascism
On Tyneside at the beginning of 1943 workers at the Neptune ship repair yard came out for six weeks over the refusal of five men at their firm to join the Amalgamated Engineering Union. They received massive support from workers in other firms and trades, and forced their employers to concede a 'closed shop' agreement, setting a precedent which would be followed up and down the country.
This was also the year of the famous Barrow engineering strike at the enormous Vickers Armstrong yard there. When the workers downed tools it sent shock waves throughout the country. Engineers, apprentices and other allied trades at the yard stopped work because Vickers refused to pay them a decent increase. The basic rate at Barrow had not risen for 29 years! Yet Vickers' profits had rocketed when the government began rearmament. Every morning, between 1,500 and 2,000 workers formed a mass picket outside the gates of the yard. Scabbing was kept to an absolute minimum. As the strike wore on, the National Arbitration Tribunal was called in to decide what a fair pay settlement should be. To a public outcry, it sided with the employer. But even this did not deter the Barrow strikers, and they voted unanimously to stay out.
While the Barrow strike was unofficial, it did have the backing of the local AEU district committee....
For the bosses and government though, the worst was yet to come. In 1944 the government was faced with a coal crisis. Coal was absolutely fundamental to the production demands of the war economy, and on top of this, plans were well under way for the opening of the Second Front in Europe, which also required vast amounts of home produced coal. Yet these extra demands were not received warmly by the miners when their demand for a minimum wage was met with a compromise deal falling far short of what they had expected. The 'Porter pay award' as it was known aroused massive anger in the pits. Within 24 hours of its announcement almost every single pit in South Wales and Lancashire was idle. These were soon joined by pits in Kent, Yorkshire, Durham and Scotland. Just when it needed coal most, the government had provoked the biggest single mining dispute since the 1926 General Strike with more than 180,000 miners stopping work.....
I didn't notice that bit in the video...
Posted by The Englishman at 7:58 PM
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The Harry Read Me File
As expected the paydirt is in the data files. I have been trying to make sense of the emerging story about the HARRY_READ_ME.txt file, and luckily The Devil has produced a first summary of the story so far.
The Devil's Kitchen: Data horribilia: the HARRY_READ_ME.txt file
Posted by The Englishman at 7:36 AM
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Of Kites and Coneheads
UK red kites soar despite European decline - Scotsman.com News
The UK as a whole is now home to 7 per cent of the world's red kites, up from 5 per cent only a year ago.
Populations in Wales and in reintroduction localities in southern and central England are now so large they cannot be counted annually and they are considered "birds of the wider countryside", fully re-established and well able to flourish without further direct conservation intervention.
The kites are approaching the Castle at about ten miles a year, and they are now only ten miles away, so I expect to see them here next year bothering my songbirds and pheasant chicks.
It is refreshing to see a story about conservation which doesn't bang on the climate change drum, though why the spread of Red Kites is seen as a conservation success and the spread of Long-winged Coneheads and the Roesel’s Bush Crickets as harbingers of climate change doom I'm not quite sure.
Posted by The Englishman at 7:08 AM
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Launch of The Global Warming Policy Foundation
Copenhagen will fail – and quite right too | Nigel Lawson - Times Online
.... I have no idea whether the majority scientific view (and it is far from a consensus) is correct. Certainly, it is curious that, whereas their models predicted an acceleration in global warming this century as the growth in emissions accelerated, so far this century there has been no further warming at all. But the current majority view may still be right.
Even if it is, however, that cannot determine the right policy choice. For a warmer climate brings benefits as well as disadvantages. Even if there is a net disadvantage, which is uncertain, it is far less than the economic cost (let alone the human cost) of decarbonisation. Moreover, the greatest single attribute of mankind is our capacity to adapt to changing circumstances. By adapting to any warming that may occur over the next century, we can pocket the benefits and greatly reduce the disadvantages, at a cost that is far less than the cost of global decarbonisation — even if that could be achieved.
Moreover, the scientific basis for global warming projections is now under scrutiny as never before. The principal source of these projections is produced by a small group of scientists at the Climatic Research Unit (CRU), affiliated to the University of East Anglia.
Last week an apparent hacker obtained access to their computers and published in the blogosphere part of their internal e-mail traffic. And the CRU has conceded that the at least some of the published e-mails are genuine.
Astonishingly, what appears, at least at first blush, to have emerged is that (a) the scientists have been manipulating the raw temperature figures to show a relentlessly rising global warming trend; (b) they have consistently refused outsiders access to the raw data; (c) the scientists have been trying to avoid freedom of information requests; and (d) they have been discussing ways to prevent papers by dissenting scientists being published in learned journals.
There may be a perfectly innocent explanation. But what is clear is that the integrity of the scientific evidence on which not merely the British Government, but other countries, too, through the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, claim to base far-reaching and hugely expensive policy decisions, has been called into question. And the reputation of British science has been seriously tarnished. A high-level independent inquiry must be set up without delay.
It is against all this background that I am announcing today the launch of a new high-powered all-party (and non-party) think-tank, the Global Warming Policy Foundation (www.thegwpf.org), which I hope may mark a turning-point in the political and public debate on the important issue of global warming policy. At the very least, open and reasoned debate on this issue cannot be anything but healthy. The absence of debate between political parties at the present time makes our contribution all the more necessary.
Posted by The Englishman at 6:49 AM
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Record Rain? From a reader.
Whilst the events in the NW are tragic for those involved we have the usual
deception claiming worst rainfall on record. http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2009/pr20091120.html.
This then allows the "Boy named Sue" Environment Minister to claim it's down to
our emissions and we can expect more extreme weather like this in the future.
Fairly safe statement really, we always will.
Depends of course on which record series you use. The England and Wales
rainfall series goes back to 1914 which is the one they are quoting. http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/seriesstatistics/ewrain.txt
There is the other one, the EWP which goes back to 1766, and they actually
show a graph here: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/science/monitoring/hadukp.html
Although filed under climate change there isn't actually much change. Data
at www.hadobs.org
Met officesay "In Cumbria, there has been 372.4 mm of rain at
Seathwaite in 56 hours"
There is a good weather history site at http://booty.org.uk/booty.weather/climate/wxevents.htm.
I think he is an ex Met office meteorologist from Bracknell days. He has 204mm
at Seathwaite in a day,on 12th November in 1897, about a 28%
higherrate.
Here are some more examples from N England and Scotland:
August 1829 Disastrous
floods of all rivers between Moray & Angus, after torrential rains 2nd to
4th August, with NE winds & waterspouts. Stone bridges and houses
washed away in 5 or 6 counties, coastline altered at river mouths.
(July had been very thundery in the South, but cold with night frosts in
Scotland).
1839 September: N.E. Scotland. Severe
flooding after heavy rainfall. Damage/destruction of bridges in
the area.
Quoted above 1897 (November)Exceptionally
heavy daily rainfalls included 204mm at Seathwaite (Cumbria /
Lake District) on the 12th November.
1907 (July):
During the afternoon of the 22nd July,
1907, Heavy thunderstorms occurred across a wide area of England, Wales, Ireland
and Scotland. These caused extensive flooding in urban areas and severely
damaged standing crops in the countryside.
1916 October 11th,208.3 mm of rain fell at
KinlocheweWestern Scotland). At the time, the highest 24hr
rainfall recorded in the British Isles, and now amongst the top 6 or 7 such
events - still (at 2005) the highest for October.
1938 October A wet month 150% of the long-term average
(though by no means a record.) Watendlath Farm (Cumbria) recorded 475mm
from the 2nd to the 12th of the month. This 12 day
totalisdouble the 444.2 mm from 1-20 Nov shown in the Met office
table.
1954 Highest Rainfall (UK) in any one year known: 6527 mm
at Sprinkling Tarn, Cumbria in (257 inches, 21.4 ft)
1963 (March): Exceptionally wet in parts of Scotland &
SW England, southern Wales etc. Combined with some rapid snowmelt (mild
air/heavy rain) early month, flooding a significant problem for these regions.
All stations recorded above average rainfall. More than three-times the average
rainfall in parts of Scotland and the south-west of England.
1974 (January): 17th: 238.4
mm of rain fell in a 24 hr period at Loch Sloy, Strathclyde (near Loch
Lomond) the highest such 24hr period total for January known, and the highest
known for Scotland for any month. Rainfall totals for the month
exceeded 1000mm at a few sites in western Scotland.
This is far in excess of anything current.
Phil Jones could have had these bridges done up years ago and still had
change.
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November 22, 2009
What about the EURO4M link?
The timing of the CRU leak, for I believe it was a leak rather than a hack, has people looking for a reason.
One of the last documents (\FOIA\documents\EURO4M_DoW_v2.doc) to be added to the archive is the Grant Agreement and Description of Work for European Reanalysis and Observations for Monitoring (EURO4M).
Four million Euros is what they want to "develop the capacity for, and deliver the best possible and most complete (gridded) climate change time series and monitoring services covering all of Europe."
"Recruitment of young, talented female researchers will be encouraged in EURO4M. ..The gender committee will liaise with national programmes in the production of suitable information material for schools....The Management Board has been chosen to ensure that women are adequately represented at the highest organisational levels of the project and consists of seven people. From the four appointed, one is woman (25%). Whilst not approaching equality, this percentage is higher than that of women in senior positions in climate science generally, and gives women a significant say in how the project is organised and run."
That sort of money, the takeover of national roles, the management selection methods is enough to make the passed over feel bitter....
Posted by The Englishman at 10:51 PM
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Stir-up, we beseech thee!
Stir-up Sunday
In 2009 Stir-up Sunday falls on 22 November, time to get busy in the kitchen....
Posted by The Englishman at 6:51 AM
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November 21, 2009
Bishop Hill's Must Buy Book
The Hockey Stick Illusion is a critical history of the affair, tracing the story from its very beginnings in the notorious Deming email, right up to the most recent developments - the release of the Yamal data and the wave of uproar that followed.
I've pre-ordered my copy - I suggest you do the same.
Posted by The Englishman at 9:10 AM
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European Tree Rings
BECKER S-CENTRAL EUROPE 546BC TO AD1979
from \FOIA\documents\briffa-treering-external\belfast\masters Modern European Ring Width Masters as supplied by Dave Brown, March 95
Posted by The Englishman at 8:51 AM
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A rejection of the irrational
Nigel Lawson: Thatcher's Chancellor takes on the planet alone - Telegraph
On Monday, Lord Lawson will once again place himself squarely in the minority. Two weeks before the international climate change summit in Copenhagen, he is establishing a think-tank that will act as a check on sweeping environmental reform.
He is not, like George Bush, a "climate change denier" (although he believes that the science is far from certain). His point is less about the fact of climate change, than our response to it – he believes we should not "slow down economic growth" by spending billions in trying to prevent what might be happening, but rather wait until it happens and respond more economically then.
Lord Lawson knows he will win few friends with his views. (His arguments may be rational and cogent, but there is a certain haziness about the amount of lives in the balance as he talks about "the possibility that the climate will get warmer and this will be uncomfortable for certain people".)
But then, he is not a fan of people-pleasing politics. "You must never believe that what are conventionally thought to be the bounds of the politically possible are fixed: you need to push them forward. That is what we did. It takes guts – and Margaret had guts – and, except towards the end, political skill."
More interesting stuff on dealing with deficits and wives from this single ex-Chancellor...
Posted by The Englishman at 8:40 AM
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Lib Dems Can Keep Ill Gotten Loot
You may remember that the Lib Dems were being investigated to see if they ought to forfeit the illegal donation that keeps them afloat. A situation that was compared to that of UKIP by Michael Crick admirably.
No surprise that the news is good for the yellow bellies...
THE Liberal Democrats have been told they can keep a donation of £2.4 million from a convicted fraudster.
The Electoral Commission ruled the party had taken the money in good faith
Posted by The Englishman at 7:47 AM
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November 20, 2009
English Tree Ring - Temperature Graphs
As The Englishman I was interested in what the hacked files said about England
...\FOIA\documents\briffa-treering-external\belfast\masters\england.dat is described as:
DMB 19 SITE MEAN MASTER 404AD TO 1981AD
Modern European Ring Width Masters as supplied by Dave Brown, March 95
Graphed out the figures look like this:
(If the right hand side of the graph is cut off click here
Do they relate to temperature?
I don't know but let's compare them to the Central England Temperature record from 1660 to 1981 (It's a pity that is the last date of the tree rings..)
Squinting at them, which is the poor man's multivariate analysis, they sort of do.
Now look back at the longer graph. Looks a bit "warmer" maybe back in the middle ages.
Of course I don't know anything more about the tree rings than the description above so I may be barking up the wrong tree. But I thought it interesting and it didn't cost the taxpayer anything to produce the graph, and only took me ten minutes...
Posted by The Englishman at 9:14 PM
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That Hack
...\FOIA\documents\greenpeace.txt
From: "paul horsman" - paul.horsman (at) uk.greenpeace.org
To: m.kelly (at) uea.ac.uk
Date: Tue, 10 Oct 2000 14:45:23 -0700
Hi Mick,
It was good to see you again yesterday - if briefly. One particular
thing you said - and we agreed - was about the IPCC reports and
the broader climate negotiations were working to the globalisation
agenda driven by organisations like the WTO. ....
All good knock about stuff, the scientists are behaving as expected and the sceptics are getting just a touch over excited about the emails.
I have a feeling the real revelations lie in the data files, which I'm sure some able number crunchers are pouring over as we enjoy the froth of the emails..
Posted by The Englishman at 8:32 PM
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Friday Night is Music Night (Another Typical Night at The King's Arms Edition)
Posted by The Englishman at 5:23 PM
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Hacked CRU Files? The Big Climate Science Story Today
Bishop Hill was the first to alert me that :
It is claimed that the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia has been hacked and there is a massive file of emails and code up on a server in Russia. If what has been posted is real then the balloon is about to go up.
Excerpts of the emails have been posted here. They include a CRU scientist welcoming the death of a prominent sceptic, discussion of how to fiddle results and so on.
Amazing. If true.
As someone says, if it looks to good to be true, it probably is.
The original download site seems to be down but I found a copy of the file here: MEGAUPLOAD
Quickly scanning through them they have a ring of truth, but has the original seam been salted with fools gold to catch out crowing sceptics?
Sample files are described as:
0926010576.txt * Mann: working towards a common goal
1189722851.txt * Jones: "try and change the Received date!"
0924532891.txt * Mann vs. CRU
0847838200.txt * Briffa & Yamal 1996: "too much growth in recent years makes it difficult to derive a valid age/growth curve"
0926026654.txt * Jones: MBH dodgy ground
1225026120.txt * CRU's truncated temperature curve
1059664704.txt * Mann: dirty laundry
1062189235.txt * Osborn: concerns with MBH uncertainty
0926947295.txt * IPCC scenarios not supposed to be realistic
0938018124.txt * Mann: "something else" causing discrepancies
0939154709.txt * Osborn: we usually stop the series in 1960
0933255789.txt * WWF report: beef up if possible
0998926751.txt * "Carefully constructed" model scenarios to get "distinguishable results"
0968705882.txt * CLA: "IPCC is not any more an assessment of published science but production of results"
1075403821.txt * Jones: Daly death "cheering news"
1029966978.txt * Briffa - last decades exceptional, or not?
1092167224.txt * Mann: "not necessarily wrong, but it makes a small difference" (factor 1.29)
1188557698.txt * Wigley: "Keenan has a valid point"
1118949061.txt * we'd like to do some experiments with different proxy combinations
1120593115.txt * I am reviewing a couple of papers on extremes, so that I can refer to them in the chapter for AR4
1059664704.txt reads:
From: "Michael E. Mann"
To: Tim Osborn
Subject: Re: reconstruction errors
Date: Thu, 31 Jul 2003 11:18:24 -0400
Tim,
Attached are the calibration residual series for experiments based on available networks back to:
AD 1000
AD 1400
AD 1600
I can't find the one for the network back to 1820! But basically, you'll see that the residuals are pretty red for the first 2 cases, and then not significantly red for the 3rd case--its even a bit better for the AD 1700 and 1820 cases, but I can't seem to dig them up. In any case, the incremental changes are modest after 1600--its pretty clear that key predictors drop out before AD 1600, hence the redness of the residuals, and the notably larger uncertainties farther back...
You only want to look at the first column (year) and second column (residual) of the files.
I can't even remember what the other columns are!
Let me know if that helps. Thanks,
mike
p.s. I know I probably don't need to mention this, but just to insure absolutely clarify on this, I'm providing these for your own personal use, since you're a trusted colleague. So please don't pass this along to others without checking w/ me first. This is the sort of "dirty laundry" one doesn't want to fall into the hands of those who might potentially try to distort things...
And so on - Lucia, Watts up and Climate Audit (and others) have more
Posted by The Englishman at 5:50 AM
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November 19, 2009
They are coming to take them away...
MPs' expenses: six MPs and peers face fraud charges
From the left: Lord Clarke of Hampstead, Baroness Uddin, Lord Hanningfield, Elliot Morley, David Chaytor, Jim Devine
The Daily Telegraph understands that detectives will imminently pass files on Labour MPs Elliot Morley, David Chaytor and Jim Devine, and peers Baroness Uddin, Lord Hanningfield and Lord Clarke of Hampstead to the Crown Prosecution Service.
I have never prayed to be on Jury service before, but please, just this once, I'll even supply my own rope....
Posted by The Englishman at 6:07 AM
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Chicken Little Climate Studies
Rising CO2 could cause catastrophic sea level rise finds Antarctic study - Telegraph
The British Antarctic Survey found that during past periods of high carbon dioxide, temperatures in Antarctica were up to 6C above current levels. This could cause a sea level rise of up six metres, threatening coastal cities like London, New York and San Francisco.
It is the latest research to warn of the consequences of increased greenhouse gases on the Earth's climate. Yesterday a study warned that carbon dioxide produced by man is now rising at record rates putting the world on a pathway for a 6C rise in temperature. A study out yesterday found that carbon dioxide levels rose by almost a third in the last seven years. Today another study added to the urgency by claiming that the oceans are losing their ability to absorb CO2.....
Seems to be a bit of a panic on to produce the scariest reports they can, wonder why that is?
".. carbon dioxide levels rose by almost a third in the last seven years." Huh?
Posted by The Englishman at 6:03 AM
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