Three Letters

I've written before about the TV programme, The Thick Of It, the BBC satire of  all things New Labour, and its central character Malcolm Tucker: a thinly-veiled caricature of former Blair press secretary Alastair Campbell. 

Tucker's creator, Armando Iannucci was awarded an OBE yesterday in the Queen's birthday honours list. Campbell, perhaps unwisely, decided to poke the metaphorical bear on twitter and got made something of a fool of.

As put downs go, concise, and straight to the point.

Tunnel Vision

One of the major promises newly elected Mayor, Naheed Nenshi, made to the Calgary electorate last October was his desire to construct the much debated - and much rejected - airport tunnel. In a nutshell, for those unfamiliar with the tale, the airport is reaching its capacity for aircraft movements and will build a new parallel runway, with construction beginning in April. The location means the closure of Barlow Trail NE, as shown on this map. The problem: spend $195m on a tunnel now, before the runway work began, or spend numerous multiples of that by delaying until the runway was open, then tunnel under an operating runway at Canada's fourth busiest airport. The road would connect to Metis Trail and the outer ring road., giving the NE a high speed, east-west connection, with the airport on the way. Seems a no-brainer, right?

You'd be wrong. 

I watched some of the debate on TV on Tuesday night. A rock and roll way to spend a Tuesday night, to be sure. It was interesting for a couple of reasons. Number 1: it was on TV. How many local councils in the UK have televised sessions the public-at-large can view? I bet it's nice round number, like zero. Secondly, I was surprised that a city of more than a million people has only 14 councillors and a mayor who has a casting vote in the event of  a tie. Sorry to have to flog a dead horse again, but guess how many councillors are on Bradford Council? Ninety. Nine Zero. Ninety people, plus chief executive, either salaried on expenses.  For a city one third of the size. Scandalous. But I'm digressing from the point.

The thing that I found most revealing was that although the vote only passed 8-7, the mayor deciding it, the majority in favour were, in the main, new councillors, who had canvassed the opinions of the citizens in their ward, who were in favour by a 2:1 margin. And often from wards very far removed from the airport and its surroundings. Generally, those against were the established, long-time members of the council. Who were worried about reckless spending. Like Councillor Farrell, she of the Peace Bridge, and the inane claim that people who use the C-Train lose weight. Let me be clear; I think more bridges over the Bow are a good idea, but not ones which are 400 yards from another one. In two directions. $25 million very well spent. She lives in a very glass house when it comes to profligate spending. She needs to stop throwing stones.

I can sort of understand the point of those that voted against, in that $195m would and could be spent on multiple other projects; for instance, solving the horrible traffic problems at Crowchild/24th and Crowchild/Kensington. Or some easement of the situation regarding the south-west portion of the ring road (an insuperable problem). But for once, solving a problem, before it became a problem, was evidently beyond the world view of the seven who voted against. The NE quadrant of the city will now have much better traffic infrastructure than it otherwise would. Did any of those councillors seek the opinions of those who elected them? I think you probably know the answer.

The epitaph: Mayor Nenshi flew to Toronto yesterday. His election has set the Torontonian based national media - with its preconceived notions as to what Calgary is, and what the people who live there are like - into frenzy; especially since the new Mayor of Toronto is such an, erm, interesting character. His airfare was paid by an architectural consultancy who had arranged a sequence of events. Councillor Lowe (who also voted against the tunnel) called this, to anyone who would listen, essentially a conflict of interest, despite a) the firm having no apparent business with the city, b) the mayor declared it in advance, and c) he saved the city $750 in air fares. In my mind, a non story. A bit of naivete at worst. But a defeated politician, behaving like a petty, vindictive arse? Surely not?

Vox Populi

Today is the election for the mayor of Calgary. There are fifteen candidates on the ballot today; I'm ineligible to vote given my non-citizenship, but it's been fascinating to watch the coverage all the same. 

The three main candidates were the long-time alderman Ric McIver, conservative, with the reputation of "Dr. No". Also were the former CTV news anchor Barb Higgins (think the Calgary version of Christa Ackroyd, but not quite as orange), and the left-leaning Naheed Nenshi, former professor at Mount Royal university in Southern Calgary. Nenshi leads by 14,000 votes with about 65% of the votes counted. So far, there are 185,000 votes counted, dwarfing the turnout of previous elections. There have been long queues and voting extended beyond the 8pm deadline, such has been the interest. Most people at work disappeared at 6pm to go and vote.

For the people of the city to pick a brown, muslim man as mayor -who was unheard of a few months ago- in this supposedly bluer-than-blue ultra-conservative province, will hopefully do something to dispel the image of Calgary as a town full of rednecks. It isn't.

ConDemNation

In the recent UK general election, Nick Clegg was heralded as a breath of fresh air.  'I agree with Nick' became a meme on the internet. Vince Cable was lauded as the man who predicted the credit crunch. Both signed a pledge resisting the increase of tuition fees. Here are Clegg's own words during the campaign:

"Not only will we oppose any raising of the cap, we will scrap tuition fees for good, including for part-time students … Students can make the difference in countless seats in this election. Use your vote to block those unfair tuition fees and get them scrapped once and for all."

Today, Lord Browne announced a radical shake-up of the higher education system, in which universities can effectively (at a minimum) double the tuition fees, in addition to swingeing cuts in the teaching budget. Notable for not sticking to their pledges? Messrs Clegg and Cable. It seems once you get your feet under the table at Number 10, promises you make to voters become much easier to back away from, as you pull the drawbridge up from behind you. They both benefited from a completely free university education, as did I, in one of the very last year-groups to benefit from the 'old' arrangements. 

As a consequence, I am largely financially independent of my parents and am not saddled with a huge debt to the Student Loans Company. Today's decision means some students will have to approach 30,000 pounds of debt to gain a degree. It's the first step on the road to the US system, where current tuition fees exceed $30,000 per year at places such as Harvard, MIT, Yale, Princeton, CalTech and so on.  That is what Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial College and so on aspire to be, and that is why they are constantly bleating about being 'left behind' and grasping for more money. Very soon, the top universities will be the domain of the very rich, and not necessarily the most talented. Which is a very bad situation for the UK as a whole to be in.

Back in January, I took one of the visiting speakers to lunch; he lives and works in one of America's finest cities (having visited I would agree), and has a worldwide reputation in his field. He was interested in the various academic systems myself and two others (a Mexican and a Canadian) had been through and the conversation extended to the US system. He has three children of university age. Bearing in mind his occupation, and his professorial salary (he can afford half-season tickets for one of the NBA's most storied teams), for him to call the tuition fees at such institutions as outrageous was very illuminating. All three children attend the state-run public universities. This will be the situation in the UK very quickly. Along similar lines, I was talking to a friend this afternoon whose younger sister may not now be able to afford to go to university at all. That's a terrible situation to be in.

So instead of the new politics, it's politics as usual. I would have voted LD at the election given enough time to arrange a postal vote. There's absolutely no way I would countenance such a decision in the future. Sad to see that those who paint themselves as 'outsiders', and not tainted by the Westminster machine, can be so quickly assimilated by it.

It's an Ill Wind...

...that does nobody any good. Or something like that. Now that the dust has settled on the election, and a government has been formed, the powers-that-be can get back to the business of running the country. I was reading somewhere that 150 MPs stood down this time, a product of a long running Labour government and the expenses scandal this time last year. One of the new MPs will be the new Conservative MP for Keighley, Kris Hopkins. Now he's a favourite piñata in these parts - for his part as leader of the council - in the buffoonery that goes on behind the doors of Bradford City Hall.

If having a Tory government means that he's not in charge any more, then it might be a small price to pay.

Newspapers

And speaking of elections and newspapers, it gives me an excuse to use this clip from "Yes, Prime Minister"

It Begins

By the time I get up for work in the morning, Gordon Brown will have gone to Buckingham Palace to reqeust a dissolution of Parliament, and the electioneering will begin. Already, opinion pieces are appearing. This will be an unusual election for me, having to follow the news across the internet and Canadian and American TV (and BBC World). At least it means that on election night, I can see the whole thing unfold from 3pm onwards, rather than having to stay up till stupid o'clock. I was reading some of the broadsheets online before dinner and nearly had a juice-laptop-interface moment when I read the following in the editorial of the Times:

"This is the 57th general election campaign that The Times has covered. Through this long history, we have never been a newspaper belonging to party or faction."

Did I wake up in some bizarro-world where the Times does not belong to Rupert Murdoch - not a British citizen - who does not interfere in British politics? In bizarro world, he doesn't stand to gain by the would be Conservative government emasculating the BBC so that BSkyB can make more money? Already, the vested interests begin to circle. Dig beneath that veneer of the new touchy-feely schtick and they're still the party by the rich, for the rich, judging by their apparent aversion to National Insurance contributions. Do you really want your money looked after by the shrill, unctuous George Osborne?

I think the best outcome is that election night sees a hung parliament, where the Lib Dems can team up with a Labour party shorn of a mandate by the nation. Labour hasn't achieved what it should, and deserves to lose this mandate. Above all else, they still deserve to for the terrible mess they made of Iraq, and taking a country to war on the basis of little short of outright lies. I wonder if they saw the leaked video today. By aligning themselves with a true left of centre party (which is what Labour were, once, after all ), maybe something radical and lasting -and for the better - in the way the country is run can be accomplished. The Lib Dems' Vincent Cable would certainly make a useful chancellor. He was, after all, one of the very few voices who foresaw the financial crisis of the 18 months. Odd, that as a former economist, he should spot it, don't you think?

People forget things too soon. Do they really want the Conservatives back?

Chicken Feed

Boris Johnson is in the news again. In case you haven't heard, he described his combined London mayoral salary and News of the World column income of £390,000 as "chicken feed" Boris is rich pickings for the media with all the supposed buffoonery, and his appearances on Have I Got News For You are never less than entertaining; personally, I can't believe an old Etonian and graduate of Balliol College Oxford is that stupid and it's all a carefully crafted act.

This weekend's error is still something of a Freudian slip in that however media friendly the new, touchy feely Conservative Party appears to be, they are at best as cynical with the media that New Labour were; and at worst still the party run by the select few, for the select few. What's worse is, given their leads in the opinion polls, that the British electorate seems to be falling for it. Cynical publicity stunts like 'Dave' Cameron's cycling to work on his bike to boost his green credentials while his chaffeur drives his suitcase behind him in the car might fool some of the people some of the time, but not all of them. Have people forgotten 18 years of Conservative rule that quickly?

MPs

I was surprised, but in a way also not surprised, to see that the latest MP's expenses scandal back home has made the news all the way out here. I have meant to write, repeatedly, a blog post in praise of the powers of the internet, and how it has manifested itself in the powers that be not being able to have their own way with the media any more. I read occasionally the blog 'Order Order', the so called Guido Fawkes Blog which is in effect, one man with a laptop with sources in high places. His politics seem quite conservative, but we all have our crosses to bear, after all.

The author of the blog has been writing for some months on 'pigs in the trough'. and the rather generous expense claims that members of Parliament have been submitting. of late Eventually, some of the national media outlets have picked up on it, culminating in the Daily Telegraph's expose of politicians of all sides really gettting it in the neck this week. Without wanting to go too Daily Mail on you, I find it bordering on obscene that the Education Secretary and his wife, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, (combined salary ca. £282,000) claim £600 a month in food expenses. Can they not afford it? Even by Waitrose standards (and take it from bitter personal experience, the one in Gloucester Road in London is eye-wateringly expensive), that's probably a bit pricey. I reckon my food bill is about 1/6 of that. Even including into that the effects of living in London Village, that's a real fiddle.

Add into that (from other suspects) claims for horse manure, cleaning out castle moats, bookcases costing £18,000, antique persian rugs, TVs worth £8800, two (at least) counts of claiming mortgage expenses for mortgages long paid off, several MPs suspended from their positions, multiple counts of 'second house flipping' and it seems that the public mood with their elected officials is at possibly the lowest ebb in living memory. The solution? As it is out here ,north of the 49th parallel. Publish every single expense claim on the internet, where the voting public can see and scrutinise. The internet is a force for good sometimes, and I think the british government should follow suit.

Wow. Just, wow

Not often am I lost for words. I'm going to let Representative Michele Bachmann (Republican, Minnesota) have her two minutes of fame on here. If you followed the US Elections last November, she was the person who suggested that journalists who didn't present the Republican point of view should be branded 'un-American'. Enjoy these pearls of wisdom, on Earth day, of all days.



I can't think which is worse: that she wrote this herself, or that someone else wrote it and she accepted it at face value. Be very afraid that such an empty headed loon can be a cog in the gears of the government of the most powerful nation on Earth. Be very very afraid.