Daily archives: November 19, 2015


A Change of Political Climate

I just watched a recording of Westminster yesterday where Tory Minister Amber Rudd announced the government was rapidly dropping the subsidy for solar energy down to zero. Yet the government has just agreed to pay to the nuclear industry a subsidy that will dwarf, in real terms, all the subsidies ever given to the coal and renewable industries combined, and what is more will be paid to the Chinese and the French. I am lost for words.

Nor am I in any way pleased to be proved instantly correct, that Western governments view terrorist incidents like that in Paris primarily as a means to enhance their power and social control. The French government has immediately seized on the pretext to ban all demonstrations at the forthcoming climate change summit in Paris. Yet they have not banned gatherings of large crowds generically, for example at football matches.

Cameron’s announcement of 15% budget and staff increases for the security services was made immediately after the Paris attacks, but was plainly not something thought up in a few hours. The plans for mass surveillance had already been announced, and would have to be staffed. This kind of sickening political opportunism is the true disrespect to the innocent dead.

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